re out the Archbishop's
assertion. Everywhere the Puritans were becoming more outrageously
disloyal. There were everywhere signs of disaffection and revolt against
the authorities of the Establishment, even on the part of the most
sincere and earnest men, many of whom were looking forward to the day
when the last rags of popery should be cast away, and formal
Presbyterianism inaugurated in the Church of England. Episcopal
Ordination was more and more being regarded as a merely civil
requirement, but conveying no ministerial commission; recognition by the
congregation with the laying on of the hands of the presbyterate was the
only ordination they allowed as apostolic.

Anthony said a word to the Archbishop about this.

"You must not be too strict," said the old man. "Both views can be
supported by the Scriptures; and although the Church of England at
present recognises only Episcopal Ordination within her own borders, she
does not dare to deny, as the Papists fondly do, that other rites may not
be as efficacious as her own. That, surely, Master Norris, is in
accordance with the mind of Christ that hath the spirit of liberty."

Much as Anthony loved the old man and his gentle charity, this doctrinal
position as stated by the chief pastor of the Church of England scarcely
served to establish his troubled allegiance.

During these autumn months, too, both between and after the disputations
in the Tower, the image of Campion had been much in his thoughts.
Everywhere, except among the irreconcilables, the Jesuit was being well
spoken of: his eloquence, his humour, and his apparent sincerity were
being greatly commented on in London and elsewhere. Anthony, as has been
seen, was being deeply affected on both sides of his nature; the shrewd
wit of the other was in conflict with his own intellectual convictions,
and this magnetic personality was laying siege to his heart. And now the
last scene of the tragedy, more affecting than all, was close at hand.

Anthony was present first at the trial in Westminster Hall, which took
place during November, and was more than ever moved by what he saw and
heard there. The priest, as even his opponents confessed, had by now "won
a marvellously good report, to be such a man as his like was not to be
found, either for life, learning, or any other quality which might
beautify a man." And now here he stood at the bar, paler than ever, so
numbed with racking that he could not lift his hand to