the general surprise, two noblemen
who had been eminently zealous for the Revolution spoke against the
proposed test. Lord Wharton, a Puritan who had fought for the Long
Parliament, said, with amusing simplicity, that he was a very old man,
that he had lived through troubled times, that he had taken a great many
oaths in his day, and that he was afraid that he had not kept them all.
He prayed that the sin might not be laid to his charge; and he declared
that he could not consent to lay any more snares for his own soul and
for the souls of his neighbours. The Earl of Macclesfield, the captain
of the English volunteers who had accompanied William from Helvoetsluys
to Torbay, declared that he was much in the same case with Lord Wharton.
Marlborough supported the bill. He wondered, he said, that it should
be opposed by Macclesfield, who had borne so preeminent a part in the
Revolution. Macclesfield, irritated by the charge of inconsistency,
retorted with terrible severity: "The noble Earl," he said, "exaggerates
the share which I had in the deliverance of our country. I was ready,
indeed, and always shall be ready, to venture my life in defence of her
laws and liberties. But there are lengths to which, even for the sake of
her laws and liberties, I could never go. I only rebelled against a bad
King; there were those who did much more."

Marlborough, though not easily discomposed, could not but feel the edge
of this sarcasm; William looked displeased; and the aspect of the whole
House was troubled and gloomy. It was resolved by fifty-one votes to
forty that the bill should be committed; and it was committed, but
never reported. After many hard struggles between the Whigs headed
by Shrewsbury and the Tories headed by Caermarthen, it was so much
mutilated that it retained little more than its name, and did not seem
to those who had introduced it to be worth any further contest, [615]

The discomfiture of the Whigs was completed by a communication from the
King. Caermarthen appeared in the House of Lords bearing in his hand
a parchment signed by William. It was an Act of Grace for political
offences.

Between an Act of Grace originating with the Sovereign and an Act of
Indemnity originating with the Estates of the Realm there are some
remarkable distinctions. An Act of Indemnity passes through all the
stages through which other laws pass, and may, during its progress, be
amended by either House. An Act of Grace is received w