502 LIVES OF THE PURITANS. means of Bishop Laud, to stay the proceedings against the commissioners. As this cause made a great ferment at court, it will be proper further to observe, that the king sent his advocate, Dr. Rives, to the chief justice, requiring that there should beno further proceeding in the business till he had spoken to him. The chief justice answered, " We receive the message;" but, upon consultation together, " the judges conceive the message not to stand with their oaths, com- manding an indefinite stay of a cause between party and party, and might stop the course of justice so long as the king pleased." On this occasion JudgeWhitlocke insisted upon these points :-1. " That it was against law to exempt any man from answering the action of another that woidd sue him.-2. That if the court should exempt any, where should they begin, andwhere should they end?-3. That it was altogether agreeableto the king's monarchical power, and was lawful for any subject to complain before him of any other subject, and to be answered in that complaint." The high commissioners, not content with the answer of the judges, urged the king to take the cause into his own hands, who sent for the judges and COMMANDED THEM NOT TO PUT THE DEFENDANTS TO ANSWER. This did the tyrannical king, at the importunity of Laud and the arch- bishop,. who carried on the business with great violence. In the conclusion, "the king expressly commanded, that they should not put the commissioners to answer ;" but the ,learned judges stoutly answered, " that they could not, without breach of their oaths, observe that command ;" so they parted in displeasure. Afterwards, by the king's special command, the business was brought before the council-table, in the presence of the judges. After a long debate and hearing of Bishop Laud, the Bishop of Winchester, two of the privy council, the judges, and the king's attorney, it was agreed that the com- missioners should answer.+ This was a bold stand against the oppressions of a despotic monarch, prompted by the tyrannical court prelates to exercise an illegal power, to the unspeakable injury of his subjects. e Archbishop Abbot, it is said, was suspected and accused of being a puritan, because he would not, like his predecessor Bancroft, persecute them, nor blindly follow the maxims of the court with respect to govern- ment. But the zealous courtiers had, surely, no reason to complain on the present occasion.-Rapin's Hist. of Eng. vol. ii. p. 179. Whitlocke's Mem. p. 15.
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