After this first step in resistance, a second and more definite one was immediately taken. Some zealous ministers in Fife met the repeated summons to introduce the book by a demand that they might be allowed to prove it first, especially as it had not been laid before the General Assembly, which was the representative body of the Church. The Bishop of Ross replied to them that they were mistaken; that the representation of the Church was in the hands of the bishops. But this question was the great question of the day. The ministers, who insisted upon their old established claims, presented a petition to the Privy Council which, amid all this commotion, thought it expedient to hold a session on August 23, in the middle of the vacation. In this petition they based their request for a suspension of the order issued to them simply on the ground that the Liturgy had not been confirmed either by the General Assembly, which since the Reformation had always, they said, had the management of Church affairs, or by Parliament[91]. ‘This Church,’ they exclaimed, ‘is a free and independent Church, just as the kingdom is a free and independent kingdom.’ They thought that as the patriots should decide what was best for the kingdom, in the same way the pastors should decide what was best for the Church. They held that the Romish Church, to which this book brought them nearer, was just as idolatrous, superstitious, and anti-Christian now as at the moment when they had separated from it. The expressions which the speakers used were echoed back from all parts of the country. The Privy Council remarked with astonishment, that even those who had hitherto obeyed the will and the laws of the King, made common cause with his opponents. The Council thought that it was justified in suspending all further steps for introducing the Liturgy until the King had again taken the matter into consideration, and had expressed his will decisively.