in that gentleman's own words:

6

"This remarkable, and we might indeed say this unparalleled instance. of the continued perseverance of bigotted and unchristian zeal, actu- . ating a large deliberative assembly of legislators in pursuing to the very gates of death, one whose offence was confined to mere difference in religious opinion, is rendered still more remarkable by the following petition of their victim to the supreme executive magistrate who had vainly endeavoured to save him from the fate which was impending over him.

which they demonstrated in taking And whereas six priests,' says measures for his destruction. In the petition of the lords and com- the course of these proceedings there mons, now in Newgate, are con- had been no less than three conferdemned to die, and by your ma- ences of both houses, in one of which jesty, have been reprieved; they a message was delivered from the humbly pray your majesty to be king, stating that Goodman had been pleased that the said reprieve may 'condemned for being in orders of be taken off, and the said priests a priest merely, and was acquitted executed according to law.' On of the charge of perverting the king's this the king, after many messages people in their belief.' Indeed the to the house in their favour, eventu- parliament never laid any other of ally granted a warrant for their ex- fence to his charge, yet did they reecution, provided the parliament fuse the king's offer to banish him were not content with their banish- for life, with instant capital punishment. The remonstrance also of ment if he returned into the kingboth houses of 29th January, 1640, dom, still rigorously insisting on his closes with a demand, that Good-being presently hanged.' man the priest be left to the justice of the law,' to this the king answered, "concerning John Good. man the priest, I will let you know the reason why I reprieved him, aud it is, that (as I am informed) neither queen Elizabeth nor my father did ever avow that any priest, in their times, was executed merely for religion, which to me seems to be this particular case; yet seeing I am prest by both houses to give way to his execution, because I will avoid the inconveniency of giving so great a discontent to my people, as I conceive this mercy may produce; there. fore I remit this particular cause to both the houses, but I desire them to take into consideration the inconveniences, as I conceive, may upon this occasion fall upon my subjects and other protestants abroad, especially since it may appear to other states to be a severity. Which having thus represented, I think myself discharged from all ill consequences that may ensue from the execution of this person.' That this unfortunate man only escaped the execution of his sentence by being forgotten amidst the more important objects which were daily claiming the attention of his persecutors, is evident from the extraordinary zeal

"To the king's most excellent majesty, the humble petition of John Goodman, condemned, humbly sheweth.

"That whereas your petitioner hath been informed of a great discontent in many of your majesties subjects, at the gracious mercy your majesty was freely pleased to shew unto your petitioner, by suspending the sentence of death pronounced against your petitioner, for being a romish priest.

"These are humbly to beseech your majesty, rather to remit your petitioner to their mercy, that are discontented, than to let him live, the subject of so great discontent, in your people against your majesty;

for it hath pleased God to give me |
the grace, to desire with the pro-
phet, that if this storm be raised for
my sake, I may be cast into the sea,
that others may avoid the tempest.
"This is, most sacred sovereign,
the petition of him that should es-
teem his blood well shed, to cement
the breach between your majesty
and your subjects upon this occasion.
"Ha. Festor.

"JOHN GOODMAN.' "This man had most probably taken neither the oath of allegiance nor of supremacy, yet I question whether many persons who had been duly sworn to both these obligations, would have acted in a manner so fully evincing their loyalty to their king and their desire to preserve (even by the sacrifice of their lives) the peace of a country, whose laws antecedent to the commission of the slightest moral offence had not cast them off (as in this case they had) as utterly unworthy their protection. Yet a catholic, we are told, cannot possibly be a good subject! What I would simply ask the maintainers of this doctrine would they have termed the persecuted but submissive Goodman?"

With these testimonies of the unparalleled bigotry which marked the ferocious transactions of the leading demagogues of those days, ought we not to blush that men are to be found in this enlightened age, who profess to be the friends of civil and religious liberty, boasting of these sanguinary deeds of their ancestors, and styling them glorious struggles for liberty of conscience? Surely, if they were animated with a sense of true patriotism, their cheeks would tinge with shame at the recital of these facts, and they would feel more inclined to throw the veil of oblivion over such unhallowed dealings, than hold them up, as they now do, as worthy the praise and admiration of the people! To enumerate even a

ORTHOD. JOUR. VOL. V.

moiety of the intolerant and unchristian practices of the parliamenta rians towards the professors of popery in England alone would fill a a large volume; what has been said shews the merciful temper of those times towards them, and I shall now remove the scene to another part of the kingdom.

RELIGIOUS LIBERTY IN SCOTLAND.

The councils of Laud, archbishop of Canterbury, by whom Charles was principally directed in ecclesiastical affairs, aided by his own sincere attachment to its discipline, induced that monarch to attempt the introduction of the Liturgy and Canons of the Church of England into Scotland, which circumstance occasioned the memorable league and covenant that afterwards led to the overthrow of both monarchy and episcopacy in Great Britain. As this ill-fated measure has been considered one of the heaviest crimes committed by the unfortunate Charles, and ranked by the patriarchs and tribes of the reformation a most diabolical act of tyranny and despotism, I shall here shew that this prince acted in virtue of his supreme prerogative of Head of the true reformed church of England, granted unto him in the person of his predecessors, by and with the consent of the councils of the nation, and consequently that it could not be an act of tyranny, though it might be an imprudent one, unless it was accompanied with despotic proceedings, which does not appear to have been the case. When the two houses of parliament in 1534 conferred upon Henry the title of the only supreme head on earth of the church of England, they consequently granted to him and his successors a power visit and repress, reform, restrain, or amend all errors, heresies, abuses, and enormities, which fell under any spiritual authority or jurisdiction;

N

"to

and by being corrupted, may mar all
the tree and that there be some
fault finders with the order of the
clergie, which so may make a slan-
der to myself and the church, whose
overlooker God hath made me, whose
negligence cannot be excused, if any
schisms or errors heretical were suf-
fered. Thus much I must say, that
some faults and negligences may
grow and be, as in all other great
changes it hapneth, and what voca-
tion without?
All which, if you,
my lords of the clergie, do not amend,
I minde to depose you, looke you
therefore well to your charges......I
see many over-bold with God Al-
mighty, making too many subtil scan-
nings of his holy will, as lawyers do
with human testaments: the pre-

--and in 1543, it was further enacted, that nothing should be taught contrary to the king's instructions, under pain of death. This parlia ment too, after confirming the act of the six articles, granted liberty to the king to change this act or any proviso in it. So that, says Mr. Echard, it brought the reformers wholly to depend on the king's mercy for their lives; since he could now chain up or let loose the act of the six articles upon them at his pleasure." Thus, under pretence of emancipating the nation from the chains of a supposed spiritual slavery, since by the first article of Magna Charta, the church was declared to be free, the legislators established an unheard-of system of arbitrary and despotic power, by grant-sumption is so great as I may not ing to the reigning monarch a control over the conscience of every individual in the realm. Such was the authority granted to the first head of the English church; nor were the pretensions of the she pope Elizabeth, or the obsequiousness of her parliaments, less conspicuous in retrenching the liberty of the subject than those of her brutal father.-By the records of her reign we are informed that she established a commission, consisting of forty-four members, any three of whom were authorised to exercise the power of the whole, which extended over the entire kingdom, and over all orders of men, without being subject to any control. Thus the lives and property of her subjects were placed at the disposal of her supremacy ship, and how far she carried her notions of the authority conferred by it, will best be seen by the following extract of a speech she delivered to both houses of parliament on the 29th of March, 1585" My lords, and ye of the lower house.....One matter toucheth me so neere, as I may not overskip religion, the ground on which all other matters ought to take roote,

suffer it, (yet minde I do not hereby
animate romanists, which what ene-
mies they be to mine estate is suffici-
ently known) nor tolerate new fan-
glednesse. I mean to guide them
both by God's true rule," &c.-
The reader will here see that this
lady, whose reign has been denomi-
nated by the patriots of Westminster,
no longer since than the 13th of
last February, a bright period of our
history, and her conduct recommend-
ed by them, in an address to the re-
gent, as worthy his imitation, as-
sumed an exclusive right of govern-
ing the consciences of her subjects in
spirituals, without any demur on the
part of her parliament; and can we
then be surprised that either James,
or his son Charles, her successors,
should assert the same prerogative,
especially as the English parliaments
of the latter sovereign were con-
stantly complaining to him, as one
of the great grievances of the nation,
of the innovations daily made in the
true religion, and the consequent
dangers of the church? If the con-
duct of the strugglers for liberty-of-
conscience was meritorious and
praise-worthy in petitioning the king

was directed in his councils by men who were better practised in the the pleasures of a court than in the art of governing. Hehad tosustain the factious turbulence of discontented demagogues; and because he thought to silence their clamours by coercing a few of the ringleaders, and had recourse to extraordinary measures to raise supplies for the necessities of the state, which his par

to strangle, banish, mulct, and im prison, the professors of popery, for the preservation of true religion and a young parliament church; how can the same individuals, who extol these proceedings of their patriotic ancestors, condemn Charles, for merely desiring to introduce the doctrines and discipline of this church among the Scots, uninfluenced by pains and penalties.-Episcopacy, it is to be observed, was not then abo-liament refused to grant him, his lished in Scotland; and it does not memory is cursed as the tyrant and appear that the introduction of the oppressor of his country, and his liturgy and canons of the church of whole family partake of a share England was accompanied by any in the odium. So inconsistent, of the bloody laws passed against po- so blind, so infatuated is a nation pery. Had Charles indeed imitated which has swerved from the princithe conduct of his maiden prede- ples of truth and integrity. If cessor; had he established a similar Charles was a tyrant, it arose from commission in Scotland to that form- the new prerogative granted by the ed by Elizabeth in England; had he reformation, and not from any dessent the halter and the faggot into potic propensities of his mind. It the former kingdom along with his was the system then, and not the proclamations; had he roasted a few sovereign; it was the bigotry and of the refractory ringleaders, the blindness of the people, and not the same as Elizabeth did the puritans capriciousness of the monarch, which of her days, episcopacy might still drenched the nation with the best have flourished in North Britain, and blood of her people, and overturned Charles have died a natural death: a constitution under which our cabut it was otherwise ordained. The tholic forefathers enjoyed the bles unpitying Elizabeth, who spared sings of true liberty during the space not the blood of her subjects, was of several centuries. assisted in her councils by the most crafty politicians and abandoned villains, who kept the people in continual alarm with sham popish plots, in order to cover their avaricious and mercenary designs in plundering the property of the church, and persecuting the papists yet her reign is hailed as a glorious era by modern patriots, and her principal advisers, Cecil and Walsingham, two as great miscreants as ever disgraced the human form, are termed by the modern apostle of reform, Major Cartwright, the "great, honest and independent counsellors," of this queen. The compassionate Charles, who was more desirous of sparing than spilling the blood of his people,

Echard says, that one of the main causes which occasioned the failure of the introduction of the English liturgy into Scotland and fomented the rebellion, was the improper exercise of a veto on the part of the crown in the appointment of the Scottish prelates.-As some of the present cabinet ministers are using their utmost influence at Rome to obtain a similar power over the unspotted hierarchy of Catholic Ireland, in which they are seconded by a few misguided sycophants of the catholic body, I shall here insert that historian's account of the evil consequences arising from court intrigue in spiritual concerns, in the hope it may work conviction on the