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against Strafford. Out of ninety peers who had constantly attended his trial, forty-five only were present when the bill of attainder was brought into the house; and among these, nineteen had the courage to vote against it; a certain proof that if entire freedom had been allowed, the bill had been rejected by a great majority.

The queen, terrified by the fury of the populace which flocked round Whitehall, accompanying their demand of justice with open menaces, pressed Charles to content his people. Of all the ministers, Juxon alone, no less distinguished by his courage than by his other virtues, ventured to advise him not to give by any means his assent to the bill, if in his conscience he did not approve of it.

Strafford hearing of Charles's irresolution and anxiety, wrote to him a letter, in which he entreated his majesty for the sake of public peace to put an end to his unfortunate, however innocent, life, and to quiet the tumultous people by granting them the request for which they were so importunate. "In "this," added he, "my consent will more acquit 66 you to God than all the world can do besides. "To a willing man there is no injury."

After the most violent struggles and doubts, Charles, the just, the virtuous Charles, so completely, so unaccountably, rejected the imperious dictates of justice, honour, and virtue, as to become the accomplice of the murderers of his most faithfully devoted minister and friend. He granted a commission to four noblemen to give the royal assent, in his name, to the bill, and in the agony of grief and shame for Strafford's doom, he empowered the same commissioners to sanction another bill by which the parliament was rendered perpetual. Unfortunate monarch! who was not aware that he thus sanctioned before hand the warrant of his own death. The expedient, or rather the revolutionary

trick, which was employed to compel him to sanction this last bill, was to persuade him that no lenders could be found for the last loan that had been voted, unless they were certain that the present parliament were to continue till their repayment.

Secretary Carleton was sent by the king to inform Strafford of the final resolution which necessity had extorted from him. The earl starting up, exclaimed in the words of scripture; "Pul not your trust "in princes, nor in the sons of men; for in them "there is no salvation." He was soon able, however, to collect his courage, and prepared himself for the execution of the fatal sentence. Only three days interval was allowed him. The king made a new effort in his behalf, and sent by the hands of the young prince a letter addressed to the peers, in which he entreated them to confer with the commons about a mitigation of Strafford's sentence, and begged at least for some delay, but he was refused in both requests.

Strafford, in passing from his apartment to Towerhill, where the scaffold was erected, stopped under Laud's windows, with whom he had long lived in intimate friendship, and entreated the assistance of his prayers in the awful moment which was approaching. The aged primate, dissolved in tears, and having pronounced with a broken voice a tender blessing on his departing friend, sunk into the arms of his attendants. Strafford, still superior to his fate, moved on with an elated countenance, and with an air even of greater dignity than what usually attended him. His discourse on the scaffold was full of decency and courage. "He feared," he said, "that the omen was bad for the intended reformation "of the state, that it commenced with the shedding "of innocent blood." Having bid a last adieu to his brothers and friends who attended him, and having sent a blessing to his nearer relations who

were absent ; "Now," said he, "I have nigh "done! one stroke will make my wife a widow,

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my dear children fatherless, deprive my poor ser"vants of their indulgent master, and separate me "from my affectionate brother and all my friends! "But let God be to you and them all in all!" Go. ing to disrobe and prepare himself for the block; "I thank God," said he, " that I am nowise afraid "of death, nor am daunted with any terrors; but "do as cheerfully lay down my head at this tine, as ever I did when going to repose.

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Thus perished (12th May), in the forty-ninth year of his age, the illustrious earl of Strafford, one of the most eminent characters to be found in the annals of any country. The people, grossly deceived and criminally excited against him by their factious leaders, loudly demanded his death as a satisfaction to justice; and the atrocious sentence by which his murder was judicially perpetrated, has for ever stamped with detestation and ignominy the names of those who acted the part either of his accusers or of his judges. Conscious that such would be the deserved reward of their iniquity, the commons endeavoured by many other operations to entitle themselves to the gratitude of their couutry, and to praise from all lovers of liberty. Nothing was more exceptionable than the court of high-commission, whose institution rendered it entirely arbitrary in ecclesiastical matters. The star-chamber also was a court which exerted high discretionary powers, without having a precise rule or limit either with regard to its decisions, or the causes which came under its jurisdiction. A bill unanimously passed the houses to abolish these two courts, and by which the jurisdiction of the council was regulated and its authority abridged.

By removing the star-chamber the king's power of binding the people by his proclamations was in

directly abolished. This strong feature of arbitrary power being thus annihilated, left the system of go. vernment more consistent and uniform. The starchamber alone being empowered to punish infractions of the king's proclamation, no man thenceforth was bound to obey them, as the other courts of judicature could only take cognizance of common and statute law. The parliament considered that the king was too eminent a magistrate to be invested with, discretionary power, which, though useful in some circumstances, he or his ministers might so easily turn to the destruction of liberty.

At the request of parliament Charles, instead of patents during pleasure, gave all the judges patents during their good behaviour, which secured their independency, and barred the influence of arbitrary power in the ordinary courts of justice; a most important improvement, which had taken place in France nearly two hundred years before, under the reign of Louis XI. the most despotic of the French monarchs.

The marshal's court, which took cognizance of wards, and was not thought sufficiently limited by law, was for that reason abolished, as well as the stannery courts, which held jurisdiction over the miners, and were liable to the same objection. The council of the North, and the council of Wales, underwent a like fate, from the same principles. The authority of the clerk of the market, who had a general inspection over the weights and measures throughout the kingdom, was very judiciously transferred to the mayors, sheriffs, and ordinary magistrates. Not only were former abuses reme. died and grievances redressed; great provision for the future was made by laws to prevent the return of similar complaints. Artifice and even violence were often employed to obtain these important improvements in the constitution; but the impropriety

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of the means has been forgiven, and even forgotten, in a long and uninterrupted enjoyment of their happy consequences.

The king had promised his Scottish subjects that he would this summer pay them a visit, and settle their government; and all the importunities of the English parliament to persuade him to lay aside this journey, could not prevail with him even to delay it. As he must necessarily in his journey have passed through the English and Scottish armies, the commons, alarmed by the possibility of any sparks of loyalty being rekindled by his presence, hurried now as much as they formerly deÎayed the disbanding of all these troops. The arrears therefore due to the Scots were fully paid them; and those of the English, in part. The Scots returned home, and the English were dispersed into their several counties and dismissed. After this the parliament, on the 9th of September, adjourned to the 20th of October, and, for the first time, a committee of both houses was appointed to sit during the recess, with very ample powers. Pym was elected chairman of the committee of the lower house; and as the parliament while it sat, and even the commons alone, had made farther attempts for assuming sovereign executive power, and publishing their ordinances, as they called them, instead of laws, the committee on their part discovered also great readiness to imitate the example.

Another committee of both houses was appointed to attend the king into Scotland, under pretence of seeing that the articles of pacification were executed, but really to be spies upon him, and extend still farther the ideas of parliamentary authority, as well as eclipse the royal majesty.

Amidst the number and variety of important events which filled that period the king concluded the marriage of the princess Mary, his daughter,

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