long contest with James over their ecclesiastical and also their
constitutional rights. At his accession, the king had seemed inclined
to tolerate the Catholics. Yet only a short time elapsed before many
Romanists were found upon the proscribed lists. The Guy Fawkes plot
followed. Its scope, its narrow margin of failure, coupled with the
king's previous leniency towards Catholics and his bitter persecution
of nonconformists, created a frenzy of fear among
Protestants. Immediately the Puritans saw in every objectionable
ceremonial of the English church some hidden purpose, some Jesuitical
contrivance for overthrowing Protestantism. And as the ritualistic
clergy made their pulpits resound with the doctrines of the divine
right of kings, the divine right of bishops, and of passive obedience,
and as they thundered at the preachers who opposed or denied these
principles, the high-church party came to be associated more and more
with the unconstitutional policy of the king. And this was so,
notwithstanding the praiseworthy efforts of Archbishop Abbott to
modify the practical working of these royal notions. This archbishop
of Canterbury was a man of great learning and of gentle spirit. His
name stands second among the translators of King James's version,
while as head of the Ecclesiastical Commission his power was great,
his influence far reaching. So earnestly did he strive to moderate the
king's severity toward nonconformists, to bring about a compromise
between the two great church parties, and so simple was the ritual in
his palace at Lambeth, that many people believed the kindly prelate
was more than half a Puritan at heart. He even refused to license the
publication of a sermon that most unduly exalted the king's
prerogative, and he forbade the reading of James's proclamation
permitting games and sports on Sunday. This proclamation was the
famous "Book of Sports," and many Puritan clergymen paid dearly for
refusing to read it to their congregations. Its issue exasperated and