[358] The puritans objected to the title of lord bishops. Sampson wrote a peevish letter to Grindal on this, and received a very good answer. Strype's _Parker_, Append. 178. Parker, in a letter to Cecil, defends it on the best ground; that the bishops hold their lands by barony, and therefore the giving them the title of lords was no irregularity, and nothing more than a consequence of the tenure. Collier, 544. This will not cover our modern _colonial_ bishops, on whom the same title has, without any good reason, been conferred. [359] Strype's _Annals_, i. 159. [360] 1 Eliz. c. 19; 13 Eliz. c. 10; Blackstone's _Commentaries_, vol. ii. c. 28. The exception in favour of the Crown was repealed in the first year of James. [361] It was couched in the following terms:-- "PROUD PRELATE,--You know what you were before I made you what you are: if you do not immediately comply with my request, by G---- I will unfrock you. ELIZABETH." Poor Cox wrote a very good letter before this, printed in Strype's _Annals_, vol. ii. Append. 84. The names of Hatton Garden and Ely Place (Mantua væ miseræ nimium vicina Cremonæ) still bear witness to the encroaching lord keeper, and the elbowed bishop. [362] Strype, iv. 246. See also p. 15 of the same volume. By an act in the first year of James, c. 3, conveyances of bishops' lands to the crown are made void; a concession much to the king's honour. [363] Harrington's "State of the Church," in _Nugæ Antiquæ_, vol. ii. _passim_; Wilkins's _Concilia_, iv. 256; Strype's _Annals_, iii. 620 _et alibi_; _Life of Parker_, 454; _of Whitgift_, 220; _of Aylmer, passim_. Observe the preamble of 13 Eliz. c. 10. It must be admitted, on the other hand, that the gentry, when popishly or puritanically affected, were apt to behave exceedingly ill towards the bishops. At Lambeth and Fulham they were pretty safe; but at a distance they found it hard to struggle with the rudeness and iniquity of the territorial aristocracy; as Sandys twice experienced.