hem out of their livings; to
do this, not by the power of their legal visitors or governors, but by
acts of the legislature, and to do it without forfeiture and without
fault; whether all this be not in the highest degree an indefensible and
arbitrary proceeding, is a question of which there would seem to be but
one side fit for a lawyer or a scholar to espouse.

Of all the attempts of James the Second to overturn the law, and the
rights of his subjects, none was esteemed more arbitrary or tyrannical
than his attack on Magdalen College, Oxford; and yet that attempt was
nothing but to put out one president and put in another. The president
of that college, according to the charter and statutes, is to be chosen
by the fellows, who are the corporators. There being a vacancy, the king
chose to take the appointment out of the hands of the fellows, the legal
electors of a president, into his own hands. He therefore sent down his
mandate, commanding the fellows to admit for president a person of his
nomination; and, inasmuch as this was directly against the charter and
constitution of the college, he was pleased to add a _non obstante_
clause of sufficiently comprehensive import. The fellows were commanded
to admit the person mentioned in the mandate, "any statute, custom, or
constitution to the contrary notwithstanding, wherewith we are
graciously pleased to dispense, in this behalf." The fellows refused
obedience to this mandate, and Dr. Hough, a man of independence and
character, was chosen president by the fellows, according to the charter
and statutes. The king then assumed the power, in virtue of his
prerogative, to send down certain commissioners to turn him out; which
was done accordingly; and Parker, a creature suited to the times, put in
his place. Because the president, who was rightfully and legally
elected, _would not deliver the keys, the doors were broken open_. "The
nation as well as the university," says Bishop Burnet,[48] "looked on
all these proceedings with just indignation. It was thought an open
piece of robbery and burglary when men, authorized by no legal
commission, came and forcibly turned men out of their possession and
freehold." Mr. Hume, although a man of different temper, and of other
sentiments, in some respects, than Dr. Burnet, speaks of this arbitrary
attempt of prerogative in terms not less decisive. "The president, and
all the fellows," says he, "except two, who complied, were expelled the