ve time if his Highness would read them. "He received the
paper after, but I scarce believe that he ever read it; for I saw
that what he learned must be from himself--being more disposed to
speak many hours than to hear one, and little heeding what another
said when he had spoken himself." Cromwell had made up his mind
about Baxter long ago (Vol. III. p. 386), but had apparently now
given him another trial, on the faith of his reputed liberality on
the Toleration question. But Baxter did not gain upon him.]

As if to show how much in earnest they were on this whole subject,
the House had at that moment the notorious Anti-Trinitarian John
Biddle in their custody. Since 1644, when he was a schoolmaster in
Gloucester, this mild man had been in prison again and again for his
opinions, and the wonder was that the Presbyterians had not succeeded
in bringing him to the scaffold in 1648 under their tremendous
Ordinance of that year. His Socinian books were then known over
England and even on the Continent, and he would certainly have been
the first capital victim under the Ordinance if the Presbyterians had
continued in power. At large since 1651, he had been living rather
quietly in London, earning his subsistence as a Greek reader for the
press, but also preaching regularly on Sundays to a small Socinian
congregation. In accordance with the general policy of the Government
since Cromwell had become master, he had been left unmolested. The
orthodox had been on the watch, however, and another Socinian book of
Biddle's, called _A Two-fold Catechism_, published in 1654, had
given them the opportunity they wanted. For this book Biddle had been
arrested on the 12th of December, and he had been brought before the
House on his knees and committed to prison on the 13th. The views
which the House were then formulating on the Limits of Toleration in
the abstract may be said therefore to have been illustrated over Mr.
Biddle's body in the concrete. His case came up again on the 15th of
January, when the House, after hearing with horror some extracts from
his books, ordered them to be burnt by the hangman, and at the same
time instructed a Committee to prepare a Bill for punishing him. The
punishment, if the Presbyterians could succeed in falling back on
their Parliamentary Ordinance of May 1648, was to be death.[1]

[Footnote 1: Wood's Ath. III. 593-598; Commons Journals of dates.]

It was really of very great consequence to the Common