* Monson, p. 163.
** Monson, p. 169.
*** Monson, p. 165. Camden, p 569.
**** Strype, vol. iii.
She summoned, therefore, a parliament, in order to obtain supply: but she either thought her authority so established that she needed to make them no concessions in return, or she rated her power and prerogative above money: for there never was any parliament whom she treated in a more haughty manner, whom she made more sensible of their own weakness, or whose privileges she more openly violated. When the speaker, Sir Edward Coke, made the three usual requests, of freedom from arrests, of access to her person, and of liberty of speech, she replied to him by the mouth of Puckering, lord keeper, that liberty of speech was granted to the commons, but they must know what liberty they were entitled to; not a liberty for every one to speak what he listeth, or what cometh in his brain to utter; their privilege extended no further than a liberty of “aye” or “no:” that she enjoined the speaker, if he perceived any idle heads so negligent of their own safety as to attempt reforming the church, or innovating in the commonwealth, that he should refuse the bills exhibited for that purpose, till they were examined by such as were fitter to consider of these things, and could better judge of them: that she would not impeach the freedom of their persons; but they must beware lest, under color of this privilege, they imagined that any neglect of their duty could be covered or protected: and that she would not refuse them access to her person, provided it were upon urgent and weighty causes, and at times convenient, and when she might have leisure from other important affairs of the realm.[*]
Notwithstanding the menacing and contemptuous air of this speech, the intrepid and indefatigable Peter Wentworth, not discouraged by his former ill success, ventured to transgress the imperial orders of Elizabeth. He presented to the lord keeper a petition, in which he desired the upper house to join with the lower in a supplication to her majesty for entailing the succession of the crown; and he declared that he had a bill ready prepared for that purpose. This method of proceeding was sufficiently respectful and cautious; but the subject was always extremely disagreeable to the queen, and what she had expressly prohibited any one from meddling with: she sent Wentworth immediately to the Tower; committed Sir Thomas Bromley, who had seconded him, to the Fleet prison, together with Stevens and Welsh, two members, to whom Sir Thomas had communicated his intention.[**]
* D’Ewes, p. 460, 469. Townsend, p.37.
** D’Ewes, p. 470. Townsend, p. 54.
About a fortnight after, a motion was made in the house to petition the queen for the release of these members; but it was answered by all the privy counsellors there present, that her majesty had committed them for causes best known to herself, and that to press her on that head would only tend to the prejudice of the gentlemen whom they meant to serve: she would release them whenever she thought proper, and would be better pleased to do it of her own proper motion, than from their suggestion.[*] The house willingly acquiesced in this reasoning.
So arbitrary an act, at the commencement of the session, might well repress all further attempts for freedom: but the religious zeal of the puritans was not so easily restrained; and it inspired a courage which no human motive was able to surmount. Morrice, chancellor of the duchy, and attorney, of the court of wards, made a motion for redressing the abuses in the bishops’ courts, but above all, in the high commission; where subscriptions, he said, were exacted to articles at the pleasure of the prelates; where oaths were imposed, obliging persons to answer to all questions without distinction, even though they should tend to their own condemnation; and where every one who refused entire satisfaction to the commissioners was imprisoned, without relief or remedy.[**]
* D’Ewes, p. 497.
** D’Ewes, p. 474. Townsend, p. 60.
This motion was seconded by some members; but the ministers and privy counsellors opposed it, and foretold the consequences which ensued. The queen sent for the speaker, and after requiring him to deliver to her Morrice’s bill, she told him, that it was in her power to call parliaments, in her power to dissolve them, in her power to give assent or dissent to any determination which they should form: that her purpose in summoning this parliament was twofold, to have laws enacted for the further enforcement of uniformity in religion, and to provide for the defence of the nation against the exorbitant power of Spain: that these two points ought, therefore, to be the object of their deliberations: she had enjoined them already, by the mouth of the lord keeper, to meddle neither with matters of state nor of religion; and she wondered how any one could be so assuming, as to attempt a subject so expressly contrary to her prohibition: that she was highly offended with this presumption; and took the present opportunity to reiterate the commands given by the keeper, and to require that no bill, regarding either state affairs or reformation in causes ecclesiastical, be exhibited in the house: and that in particular she charged the speaker upon his allegiance, if any such bills were offered, absolutely to refuse them a reading, and not so much as permit them to be debated by the members.[*] This command from the queen was submitted to without further question. Morrice was seized in the house itself by a serjeant-at-arms, discharged from his office of chancellor of the duchy, incapacitated from any practice in his profession as a common lawyer, and kept some years prisoner in Tilbury Castle.[**]
The queen having thus expressly pointed out both what the house should and should not do, the commons were as obsequious to the one as to the other of her injunctions. They passed a law against recusants; such a law as was suited to the severe character of Elizabeth, and to the persecuting spirit of the age. It was entitled, “An act to retain her majesty’s subjects in their due obedience;” and was meant, as the preamble declares, to obviate such inconveniencies and perils as might grow from the wicked practices of seditious sectaries and disloyal persons: for these two species of criminals were always, at that time, confounded together, as equally dangerous to the peace of society. It was enacted, that any person, above sixteen years of age, who obstinately refused during the space of a month to attend public worship, should be committed to prison; that if, after being condemned for this offence, he persist three months in his refusal, he must abjure the realm; and that, if he either refuse this condition, or return after banishment, he should suffer capitally as a felon, without benefit of clergy.[***] This law bore equally hard upon the Puritans and upon the Catholics; and had it not been imposed by the queen’s authority, was certainly, in that respect, much contrary to the private sentiments and inclinations of the majority in the house of commons. Very little opposition, however, appears there to have been openly made to it.[****]
* D’Ewes, p. 474, 478. Townsend, p. 68.
** Heylin’s History of the Presbyterians, p. 320.
*** 35 Eliz. c. 1.
**** After enacting this statute, the clergy, in order to
remove the odium from themselves, often took care that
recusants should be tried by the civil judges at the
assizes, rather than by the ecclesiastical commissioners.
Strype’s Ann. vol. iv p. 264.