Church, and not in the sense of
the Jesuits and Arminians, which was repudiated.

The question of tonnage and poundage came before the House while it
was labouring under the irritation kindled by this discussion. What
the government desired, the establishment of this tax on a legal
footing, was also the wish of Parliament; but Parliament wished the
matter to be settled in a way different from that intended by the
King. Parliament desired to make the right of granting taxes a genuine
reality, and henceforward to fix the duties in detail. The first
reading of the bill brought forward by the government was rejected, on
the formal ground that tonnage and poundage were subsidies, for
granting which a resolution must be taken before a bill on the subject
could be brought in.[495] Parliament espoused the cause of the London
merchants, who had certainly suffered in support of its claims, and
demanded that the proceedings of the Treasury should be reversed. For
they maintained that the collection of tonnage and poundage was as
much a breach of the fundamental principles of the realm, as the
raising of any other tax that had not been granted would be. Or could
any one, they asked, grant what he did not possess? If tonnage and
poundage already belonged to the King, he did not need to have it
granted him. The arrangement proposed by the government was rejected
altogether: and everything else which was inconsistent with the
literal meaning of the petition was also declared illegal.

The King was incensed at the political, as well as at the religious
attitude of the Lower House. A treatise in his own handwriting is
extant, in which he expresses himself on the latter subject. 'You take
to yourselfs,' he says, 'the interpretation of articles of religion,
the deciding of which in doctrinal points only appartaines to the
clergy and convocation.'[496] He added that His Majesty--for he loved
to speak of himself in the third person--had a short time before
announced his intention of maintaining the integrity of the religion
of the English Church, and its unity, and that after much reflection,
in agreement with the Privy Council and with the bishops: that as the
Commons had the same object in view, he was surprised that they were
not content with this announcement, and that they did not at all
events state wherein the King's declaration did not content them: for
that the King was the supreme governor of the English Church after
God.

At