of those for whom they acted, "though then under the power of a strict
and strong garrison put over them by Parliament, the King in prison, and
their hopes desperate, passed a public act and declaration against the
covenant, with such invincible arguments of the illegality, wickedness,
and perjury contained in it, that no man of the contrary opinion, nor
even the assembly of divines, which then sat at Westminster, ever
ventured to make any answer to it." And the publication of their
reasons, "must remain to the worlds end, as a monument of the learning,
courage, and loyalty of that excellent place, against the highest malice
and tyranny that ever was exercised in or over any nation."

Resistance of such a pure and steady character, conducted with meek
fortitude, and supported by unimpeachable wisdom, was too dangerous an
offence to be forgiven. Ejection of the members from the scanty
subsistence which they derived from their collegiate endowments, was the
first punishment. To this, banishment from Oxford was immediately added,
and, in many cases, imprisonment. The obnoxious oaths were tendered to
all the members of the university, and those who refused to compromise
their consciences for bread, were commanded to quit the happy asylum of
their age, or to renounce all their youthful studies and hopes in
twenty-four hours, by beat of drum, on pain of being treated as spies.
Few were found so selfish as to submit to the alternative of perjury;
and thus the venerable sages and generous youth of England went forth
like the confessors of antient times, "of whom the world was not worthy;
afflicted, destitute, tormented, they wandered in deserts, in mountains,
in caves, and dens of the earth." At one time they were forbidden to
earn a subsistence as private tutors in families; at others, restricted
from performing any ministerial functions, even so much as administering
the sacrament to dying persons, who yet, by the arbitrary regulations of
many of the new parochial ministers, might not receive it from them,
unless they also first took the covenant.

Dignified clergymen were at this time travelling on foot, nearly
destitute of common necessaries, and relying on the charity of casual
passengers for support[1]. Cathedrals had long been converted into
barracks for horse-soldiers, and bishop's palaces into prisons for the
ejected clergy, whose families, now deprived of the last pittance, and
actually in want of bread[2], became ea