71 ing those grievances and oppressions from the prelatical! innovators, which had forc'd them thus to defend their religion and liberties. This they did so effectually, that the hearts of the English were much mooved towards them, and the king perceiving it, by their mediations, consented to a dissembled peace for that time, and return'd home. But the Scotts unsatisfied in the performance of their articles, made preparation for a second returne into England; whereupon the king, in his anger and necessity, was forc'd to have recourse to the long neglected remedie of parliaments, and assembled one at Westminster the 13' ' of Aprill640, which he suffer'd to sitt but 21 dayes, and broke it up againc, apprehending that if he had suffer'd them to sitt a day longer, they would have voted against the war with Scotland, which he was violently bent to prosecute. The bishops at that time devised as an anti-covenant, in their convocation house, that execrable oath knowne by ti1e name of the etccetera, wherein all ministers were required to sweare to uphold the government of the church of England by archbishops, deanes, archdeacons, <S·c. After this. the Scots enter England, the king makes a second expedition into the north against them, and sends part of his armie to keepe the passes upon the river Tine; but the souldiers being raw and heartlesse to this warre, and the commanders themselves unexperienc'd, they were vanquisht, and the Scotts forc' cl their way, after they had bene refus'd to passe quietly by, with their petitions in their hands, and thus possess'd themselves of Newcastle and Durham. At that time the Scotts had put forth a declaration, wherein they had affirm'd their intentions not to lay downe arms till the refonn'd religion were setled in both nations upon sure grounds, and the causers of these present troubles brought to publick iustice, and that in a parliament. This was so plausible to the English, that the king, finding both the hearts and hands of his people faile him in this occasion, was induc'd to grant the peti- · N
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