XIV.] THE PURITANS. 373 in the exercise of them, condescended to borrow from the canonical jurisprudence some of its most offensive details, its ex officio oath and the censures by which it would enforce its sentences. It was a strange composite system, perhaps the only one possible consistently with the retention of historic continuity, but obviously and most certainly tolerable only for a time. What was the attitude of theologians, of common lawyers, and of canonists towards this critically-balanced structure? T o the true theologians, whether Catholic or Puritan, the whole was repulsive : we see this in the half-hearted, almost despairing adhesion of Archbishop Parker, and in the strong and justifiable protests of the Puritans; and I mention them with respect here, because this opposition to unconstitutional tyranny is the only point in which I have any sympathy with them; their tenets I hold to be untenable, and their methods of promoting them by calumny, detraction, and coarse ribaldry I think entirely detestable ; but I do think they were right in denouncing the Court of High Commission and all its works. Even conservative churchmen like Hooker, in their defence of the ecclesiastical system, are hampered by the consciousness that much of what existed was indefensible. Thè bishops saw their position as bishops ignored, and the Puritans saw the power which they thought should be exercised by their own ministers exercised through a royal commission : the bishops however had the power and endured the ignominy, the Puritans suffered and waited for their turn to persecute. The lawyers were not all of one mind ; Coke the great lawyer was himself of two minds ; he liked the crown better than the episcopate, but he loved the common law better than the crown ; and his inconsistency produces some curious results on his teaching. This leads us to two or three facts. From 1587 to 1591 the famous Cawdrey's case drew its