oath. The lords justices and council wrote the same day to General Monroe, charging him not to suffer the Covenant to be taken by any of the officers or soldiers under his command; and four days after, on the 18th of December, they published a proclamation, condemning it as a seditious combination against his majesty, contrary to the municipal laws of the kingdom, destructive to the government of the Church established, inconsistent with the liberty of the subject, and tending to create great unquietness and distraction in the kingdom; and so they forbade all persons either to tender or take it. This was followed soon after by a long declaration from the same authority; wherein, for the information of the people, they entered into a particular examination of all parts of the Covenant, fully demonstrated the unlawfulness thereof, and renewed their charge upon all persons to refuse it".

the troops in its

favour.

But these orders and arguments were too weak Inclination of to oppose the passion, with which the Covenant was received in the North, where most of the old officers of the Scottish troops were inclined to it; and the inhabitants were so eager for its adoption, that they had dispatched a messenger to Scotland, expressly to desire that it might be sent over to them. The colonels, indeed, of all the regiments under the Marquis of Ormonde's command were averse to it; and at a meeting at Belfast, on the 2nd of January, 1645, at which were present the Lord Montgomery, Sir Robert Stewart, Sir James Montgomery, Sir W. Cole, the Colonels Chichester, Hill, and Mervyn, and Robert Thornton, mayor of Derry, Sir W. Stewart, though absent, approving their resolutions; they all agreed privately amongst themselves, in 12 CARTE'S Ormonde, i. 487.

Resolution of officers against it.

commanding

Jan. 2, 1645.

Covenant pressed by emissaries from Scotland.

Taken in the church of Carrickfergus;

And generally in the counties of Down and Antrim.

resolving to preserve their allegiance to his majesty, to obey the orders of the Marquis of Ormonde, and not to accept the Covenant.

But the influence of the Scottish forces was predominant with the inhabitants of the North, who were most of them Scotch by original, and Covenanters by principle. And on the arrival of four ministers of the kirk in the beginning of April, sent for the purpose of tendering and pressing the Covenant, the country, previously quiet, was thrown into a state of general disturbance.

On the 4th of that month, the Covenant was taken with great solemnity in the church of Carrickfergus, by Monroe and his officers, and in two days afterwards by all his soldiers, with the single exception of Major Dalzeel of his own regiment, the only person who refused. The ministers afterwards dispersed themselves over the country, to tender it to the rest of the army; and passing through the several parishes of the counties of Down and Antrim, recommended it everywhere; the country people, as well as the soldiery, taking it with as much zeal as if it were the only means of preserving both their souls and bodies. The inhabitants were indeed so violent for it, that they refused maintenance to the soldiers, who would not take it and there was so strong an inclination for it with the officers of the old Scotch regiments, that they took it privately without the knowledge of their colonels, who had declared against it; and, when they came to know and inquire into the matter, found the number of them thus engaged so very great, that they wanted power to suppress or stop their progress.

Notwithstanding the decision and activity of the

government, and the general fidelity and courage of the commanding officers of the British forces in Ulster, the Covenant still continued to make its way, being urged forwards with the utmost violence by the Scotch ministers. These men preached up the Covenant in all places, and pressed it upon acceptance as no less necessary to salvation than the sacrament of the Lord's Supper, and would allow no man to receive the one who refused the other. They carried all before them wherever they came, every one complying with it, except at Cole- Refused at raine, a town which had been almost ruined by a Scotch garrison, and of which the chief inhabitants refused to take the test.

Coleraine.

proceedings at

Derry, in the mean time, presented a different Tumultucus scene, being too much disposed to receive the Cove- Derry. nant. That town was full of factious and seditious persons, who had on former occasions torn the Book of Common Prayer, and thrown libels about the streets, threatening every person who should dare to use it. So that the mayor, who had written to the itinerant ministers, with a request that they would refrain from visiting the town, was compelled, when he went to church, to take a strong guard of English soldiers of his own company, and plant them about the reader's desk, to secure himself from being insulted, and the book from being torn, as they threatened, before his face. Two of the Scotch ministers, however, were introduced into the town with a great company, and leave was demanded of the mayor, that they might preach in the church. This being refused, they preached two seditious sermons in the market-place; and their patron, Sir Frederick Hamilton, made an oration to the people, exhorting them to take the Covenant.

Correspondenco between the sec

and Popish asso

ciation.

582

REIGN OF KING CHARLES I.

[CH. VII.

Such were some of the steps whereby the sectarian Covenant tarian Covenant kept pace with the Popish oath of association; the great difference between them being only in the different substitutes, which they proposed to establish upon the ruins of the Church, which both of them were calculated to destroy.

The Usurping
Government.

It was not till the 30th of January, 1649, that the temporary triumph of rebellion and fanaticism was accomplished in England by the martyrdom of King Charles the First: but in Ireland the king's authority had been annulled two years before, and the power had passed into the hands of the Usurping Government, where it continued till 1660, during the first eleven years of the nominal and legal, but not the actual, reign of King Charles the Second. During that interval many events occurred intimately connected with the history of the Church of Ireland: but forasmuch as they occurred under the exercise, not of the kingly, but of the parliamentary authority, I am induced to take them apart from the reigns of both these sovereigns, and to dispose of them in the following chapter as occurrences during the Usurpation.

Royal Power suspended. Dublin surrendered to Parliamentary Commissioners. Order for discontinuing the Liturgy. Declaration of Dublin Clergy. Episcopal Signatures. Memorable examples of continued use of the Liturgy. Personal dangers of Ministers of the Church. Revenues of racant Bishopricks sequestered. Legalized plunder of Episcopal Property. Opportunities of exercising pricate malice against the Clergy.

concerning the

Dublin.

REBELLION had been for some years successfully King's orders raging through the country; and the city of Dublin surrender of had been long besieged, and appeared incapable of a protracted defence. Whereupon the king had sent his orders to the Lord Lieutenant, "that, if he could not keep the city, he should rather surrender it to the parliament than to the Irish."

The Lord Lieutenant was well acquainted with the sentiments of the Protestants of that kingdom; although some of them were very fearful of the Covenant, and many of them were jealous and suspicious of each other, yet they agreed in mistrust and abhorrence of the common enemy. He acceded, therefore, to the advice of the privy council, that he would treat with the parliamentary commissioners for the surrender of Dublin, and not expose its inhabitants to the mercy of their cruel and hereditary enemies: advice to which he the more listened,

Its surrender to

the parliamen

tary commis

sioners, 1647.