The temper of the new Parliament, in which Pym and Hampden at first
exercised a paramount influence, was very different from that of any of
its predecessors. Recent events had convinced its leading members that
half measures would be worse than useless. During its first session,
Strafford and Laud, the two main supporters of absolute government and
religious tyranny, were impeached and imprisoned; those whom the King
had employed as instruments of oppression were called to account for
their conduct; the Star Chamber, the Court of High Commission and the
Council of York, were abolished; ship-money was declared illegal, and
the judgement in Hampden's case was annulled; the victims of the recent
religious persecutions were set at liberty, and conducted through London
in triumph; old oppressive feudal powers still appertaining to the Crown
were swept away; the King was made to give the judges patents for life
or during good behaviour; the Forest and Stannary Courts were reformed;
Triennial Parliaments were established; and, finally, it was provided
that the Parliament then sitting should not be prorogued or dissolved
save by its own consent.
After the recess the difficulties and dangers of the situation
increased daily. Revolt, popularly regarded as fomented by the Court
Party, had broken out in Ireland; the King, evidently seeking power and
opportunity to retract the concessions he had made, was seeking aid in
all directions--Rome, France, Spain, and was intriguing in Scotland; the
air was full of rumours of a plot of the Court to bring down the army in
the North to overawe the Parliament; and the moderate men,--"that is to
say, men who never go to the bottom of any difficulty," as Gardiner
expresses it,--by whose aid the above changes had been effected, were
inclined to pause, if not to retrace their steps.
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