That the Declaration was unconstitutional is universally agreed, for a monarch competent to issue such a document is nothing less than an absolute ruler.  This was, in point of fact, the most audacious of all attacks of the Stuarts on public freedom.  The Anglican party was in amazement and terror, for it would now be exposed to the free attacks of its enemies on every side.  And though Dissenters appeared to be allowed relief, what guarantee was there for the sincerity of the Court?  It was notorious that James had been completely subjugated by the Jesuits, for only a few days before the publication of the Indulgence, that Order had been honoured with a new mark of his confidence, by appointing as his confessor an Englishman named Warner, a Jesuit renegade from the Anglican Church.

Petition of the Seven Bishops and their Trial

A meeting of bishops and other eminent divines was held at Lambeth Palace.  The general feeling was that the king’s Declaration ought not to be read in the churches.  After long deliberation, preceded by solemn prayer, a petition embodying the general sense, was written by the Archbishop with his own hand.  The king was assured that the Church still was, as she had ever been, faithful to the throne.  But the Declaration was illegal, for Parliament had pronounced that the sovereign was not constitutionally competent to dispense with statutes in matters ecclesiastical.  The Archbishop and six of his suffragans signed the petition.  The six bishops crossed the river to Whitehall, but the Archbishop, who had long been forbidden the Court, did not accompany them.  James directed that the bishops should be admitted to the royal presence, and they found him in very good humour, for he had heard from his tool Cartwright that they were disposed to obey the mandate, but wished to secure some little modifications in form.

After reading the petition the king’s countenance grew dark and he exclaimed, “This is the standard of rebellion.”  In vain did the prelates emphasise their protests of loyalty.  The king persisted in characterising their action as being rebellious.  The bishops respectfully retired, and that evening the petition appeared in print, was laid out in the coffeehouses and was cried about the streets.  Everywhere people rose from their beds, and came out to stop the hawkers, and the sale was so enormous that it was said the printer cleared a thousand pounds in a few hours by this penny broadside.

The London clergy disobeyed the royal order, for the Declaration was read in only four churches in the city, where there were about a hundred.  For a short time the king stood aghast at the violence of the tempest he had raised, but Jeffreys maintained that the government would be disgraced if such transgressors as the seven bishops were suffered to escape with a mere reprimand.  They were notified that they must appear before the king in Council.  On June 8 they were examined by the Privy Council, the result