[103] Neal, 569; Rushworth Abr. ii. 166; Collier, 758; Heylin's Life of Laud, 241, 290. The last writer extenuates the persecution by Wren; but it is evident by his own account that no suspension or censure was taken off till the party conformed and read the declaration.
[104] Neal, p. 546. I do not know how he makes his computation.
[105] A proclamation, dated May 1, 1638, reciting that the king was informed that many persons went yearly to New England in order to be out of the reach of ecclesiastical authority, commands that no one shall pass without a licence, and a testimonial of conformity from the minister of his parish. Rymer, xx. 223. Laud, in a letter to Strafford (ii. 169), complains of men running to New England, when there was a want of them in Ireland. And why did they so, but that any trackless wilderness seemed better than his own or his friend's tyranny? In this letter he laments that he is left alone in the envious and thorny part of the work, and has no encouragement.
[106] In thirteen years, ending with 1640, but £4080 was levied on recusants by process from the exchequer, according to Commons' Journals, 1 Dec. 1640. But it cannot be denied that they paid considerable sums by way of composition, though less probably than in former times. Lingard, ix. 424, etc., note G. Weston is said by Clarendon to have offended the catholics by enforcing penalties to raise the revenue. One priest only was executed for religion, before the meeting of the long parliament. Butler, iv. 97. And though, for the sake of appearance, proclamations for arresting priests and recusants sometimes came forth, they were always discharged in a short time. The number pardoned in the first sixteen years of the king is said to have amounted, in twenty-nine counties only, to 11,970. Neal, 604. Clarendon, i. 261, confirms the systematic indulgence shown to catholics, which Dr. Lingard seems, reluctantly and by silence, to admit.
[107] Strafford Letters, i. 505, 524; ii. 2, 57.
[108] Heylin, 286. The very day of Abbot's death, an offer of a cardinal's hat was made to Laud, as he tell us in his Diary, "by one that avowed ability to perform it." This was repeated some days afterwards (Aug. 4th and 17th, 1633). It seems very questionable whether this came from authority. The new primate made a strange answer to the first application, which might well encourage a second; certainly not what might have been expected from a steady protestant. If we did not read this in his own Diary, we should not believe it. The offer at least proves that he was supposed capable of acceding to it.
[109] Clarendon State Papers, ii. 44. It is always important to distinguish dates. By the year 1639, the court of Rome had seen the fallacy of those hopes she had previously been led to entertain, that the king and church of England would return to her fold. This might exasperate her against him, as it certainly did against Laud; besides which, I should suspect the influence of Spain in the conclave.
[110] Proofs of this abound in the first volume of the collection just quoted, as well as in other books. The catholics were not indeed unanimous in the view they took of the king's prerogative, which became of importance in the controversy as to the oath of allegiance; one party maintaining that the king had a right to put his own explanation on that oath, which was more to be regarded than the sense of parliament; while another denied that they could conscientiously admit the king's interpretation against what they knew to have been the intention of the legislature who imposed it. A Mr. Courtney, who had written on the latter side, was imprisoned in the Tower, on pretext of recusancy, but really for having promulgated so obnoxious an opinion. P. 258, et alibi; Memoirs of Panzani, p. 140. The jesuits were much against the oath, and, from whatever cause, threw all the obstacles they could in the way of a good understanding between the king and the pope. One reason was their apprehension that an article of the treaty would be the appointment of a catholic bishop in England; a matter about which the members of that church have been quarrelling ever since the reign of Elizabeth, but too trifling for our notice in this place. More than half Panzani's Memoirs relate to it.
[111] Id. p. 207. This is a statement by Father Leander; in another place (p. 140), they are reckoned at 360. There were about 180 other regulars, and five or six hundred secular priests.
[112] Kennet, 73; Harris's Life of Charles, 220; Collier, 772; Brodie, ii. 224 note; Neal, p. 572, etc. Laud, in his defence at his trial, denies or extenuates some of the charges. There is, however, full proof of all that I have said in my text. The famous consecration of St. Catharine's Creed church in 1631 is mentioned by Rushworth, Welwood, and others. Laud said in his defence, that he borrowed the ceremonies from Andrews, who had found them in some old liturgy.