160 LIFE, OF RICHARD BAXTER. sin which others did not : and I perceived he had been possessed with displeasure towards me upon that account, that I charged the church and liturgy with sin, 'and had not supposed that the worst was but inexpediency. I told him that I had spoken nothingbut what I thought, and had given my reasons for. After, other such discourse, we craved his favor to procure the king's declaration yet tobe passed into anact, and his advice what we had further to do. He consented that we should draw up an address to his majesty, rendering him an account of 'all ; but desired that we would first show it him, which we promised. , " Whenwe had showed our paper to the lord chancellor, (which the brethren had desired me to draw up, and had consented to without any alteration,) he was not pleased with some passages in it, which he thought too pungent or, pressing ; butwould not bid us put them out. So we went with it to the lord chamberlain, (the earl of Manchester,)' and Lread it to hin) also ; and hewas earnest with us to blot out some passages as too vehement, and such as would not well be borne. I was very,loth to leave them out,but Sir Gilbert Gerard, an ancient godly man,,being with him, and of the same mind, I yielded." ",But when we came to present it to his majesty, the earl of Manchester secretly told the rest, that if Dr. Reynolds,' Dr. Bates, and, Dr. Manton,. would . deliver it, it would be the more acceptable, intimating that I was grown unac-, ceptable at court. But they would not go without me, and he professed he desired'not my exclusion. ' When they told me of it, I took my leaveof him, and was going away ;,but he ànd'they came after the to the stairs, and importuned me to return, and I wept with them to take my farewell of this service." " So we desired Dr. Manton to deliver our petition, and with it the fair copies of all our papers to thebishops, which were required of us forthe king. And. when $,ishop Reynolds had spoken a few words, Dr. Manton de- livered them to the king, who received them and the petition, but did not bid :us read it at all. At last, in his speeches, something fell out which Dr. Manton told him that the petition gave a full account of, if his majesty pleased to give him leave tò, read it; whereupon he had leave to read it out." " And this was the end of these affairs. "* While this vexatious 'and fruitless negotiation was goingon,,Bax- ter had frequent interviews with the lord chancellor, on business of another nature, 'of which some account may be given in his own words. "In the time of Cromwell's government, Mr. JohnElliot, with some assistant in New England, having learned the natives' lan- * Narrative, Past II.pp. 364,365.
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