rs,
and Scottish commissioners and deputies from the assembly. Thus a new apple
of discord was thrown among the combatants. The lords Say and Wharton, Sir
Henry Vane, and Mr. St. John, contended warmly in favour of toleration;
they were as warmly opposed by the "divine eloquence of the chancellor" of
Scotland, the commissioners from the kirk, and several eminent members
of the English parliament. The passions and artifices of the contending
parties interposed additional delays, and the year 1644 closed before this
interesting controversy could be brought to a conclusion.[1] Eighteen
months had elapsed since the assembly was first convened, and yet it had
accomplished nothing of importance except the composition of a directory
for the public worship, which regulated the order of the service, the
administration of the sacraments, the ceremony of marriage, the visitation
of the sick, and the burial of the dead.

[Footnote 1: Baillie, ii. 57, 61, 62, 66-68. Journals, Sept. 13, Jan. 24;
of Lords, 70.]

On all these subjects the Scots endeavoured to introduce the practice of
their own kirk; but the pride of the English demanded alterations; and both
parties consented to a sort of compromise, which carefully avoided every
approach to the form of a liturgy, and, while it suggested heads for the
sermon and prayer, left much of the matter, and the whole of the manner,
to the talents or the inspiration of the minister. In England the Book of
Common Prayer was abolished, and the Directory substituted in its place by
an ordinance of the two houses; in Scotland the latter was commanded to be
observed in all churches by the joint authority of the assembly and the
parliament.[1]

To the downfall of the liturgy succeeded a new spectacle,--the decapitation
of an archbishop. The name of Laud, during the first fifteen months after
his impeachment, had scarcely been mentioned; and his friends began
to cherish a hope that, amidst the din of arms, the old man might be
forgotten, or suffered to descend peaceably into the grave. But his death
was unintentionally occasioned by the indiscretion of the very man whose
wish and whose duty it was to preserve the life of the prelate. The Lords
had ordered Laud to collate the vacant benefices in his gift on persons
nominated by themselves, the king forbade him to obey. The death[a] of the
rector of Chartham, in Kent, brought his constancy to the test. The Lords
named one person to the living, Charles