n murder. The rage of punishment
did not stop even here, but questions were put to persons, and in many
instances to persons under torture, who had not been proved to have been
in any of the insurrections, whether they considered the archbishop's
assassination as murder, the rising at Bothwell Bridge rebellion, and
Charles a lawful king. The refusal to answer these questions, or the
answering of them in an unsatisfactory manner, was deemed a proof of
guilt, and immediate execution ensued.

These last proceedings had taken place while James himself had the
government in his hands, and under his immediate directions. Not long
after, and when the exclusionists in England were supposed to be entirely
defeated, was passed (James being the king's commissioner), the famous
bill of succession, declaring that no difference of religion, nor any
statute or law grounded upon such, or any other pretence, could defeat
the hereditary right of the heir to the crown, and that to propose any
limitation upon the future administration of such heir was high treason.
But the Protestant religion was to be secured; for those who were most
obsequious to the court, and the most willing and forward instruments of
its tyranny, were, nevertheless, zealous Protestants. A test was
therefore framed for this purpose, which was imposed upon all persons
exercising any civil or military functions whatever, the royal family
alone excepted; but to the declaration of adherence to the Protestant
religion was added a recognition of the king's supremacy in
ecclesiastical matters, and a complete renunciation in civil concerns of
every right belonging to a free subject. An adherence to the Protestant
religion, according to the confession of it referred to in the test,
seemed to some inconsistent with the acknowledgment of the king's
supremacy and that clause of the oath which related to civil matters,
inasmuch as it declared against endeavouring at any alteration in the
Church or State, seemed incompatible with the duties of a counsellor or a
member of parliament. Upon these grounds the Earl of Argyle, in taking
the oath, thought fit to declare as follows:--

"I have considered the test, and I am very desirous to give obedience as
far as I can. I am confident the parliament never intended to impose
contradictory oaths; therefore I think no man can explain it but for
himself. Accordingly I take it, as far as it is consistent with itself
and the Protestant