h other with mortal
aversion, though neither of them would have had any scruple about
persecuting the other, they had much in common. They were perhaps the
two most remarkable specimens that the world could show of perverse
absurdity. Each of them considered his darling form of ecclesiastical
polity, not as a means but as an end, as the one thing needful, as the
quintessence of the Christian religion. Each of them childishly fancied
that he had found a theory of civil government in his Bible. Neither
shrank from the frightful consequences to which his theory led. To all
objections both had one answer,--Thus saith the Lord. Both agreed in
boasting that the arguments which to atheistical politicians seemed
unanswerable presented no difficulty to the Saint. It might be perfectly
true that, by relaxing the rigour of his principles, he might save his
country from slavery, anarchy, universal ruin. But his business was not
to save his country, but to save his soul. He obeyed the commands of
God, and left the event to God. One of the two fanatical sects held
that, to the end of time, the nation would be bound to obey the heir of
the Stuarts; the other held that, to the end of time, the nation would
be bound by the Solemn League and Covenant; and thus both agreed in
regarding the new Sovereigns as usurpers.

The Presbyterian nonjurors have scarcely been heard of out of Scotland;
and perhaps it may not now be generally known, even in Scotland, how
long they continued to form a distinct class. They held that their
country was under a precontract to the Most High, and could never,
while the world lasted, enter into any engagement inconsistent with that
precontract. An Erastian, a latitudinarian, a man who knelt to receive
the bread and wine from the hands of bishops, and who bore, though
not very patiently, to hear anthems chaunted by choristers in white
vestments, could not be King of a covenanted kingdom. William had
moreover forfeited all claim to the crown by committing that sin for
which, in the old time, a dynasty preternaturally appointed had been
preternaturally deposed. He had connived at the escape of his father in
law, that idolater, that murderer, that man of Belial, who ought to
have been hewn in pieces before the Lord, like Agag. Nay, the crime of
William had exceeded that of Saul. Saul had spared only one Amalekite,
and had smitten the rest. What Amalekite had William smitten? The pure
Church had been twenty-eight ye