[265] Neal, ii. 19, etc., is fair enough in censuring the committees, especially those in the country. "The greatest part [of the clergy] were cast out for malignity [attachment to the royal cause]; superstition and false doctrine were hardly ever objected; yet the proceedings of the sequestrators were not always justifiable; for, whereas a court of judicature should rather be counsel for the prisoner than the prosecutor, the commissioners considered the king's clergy as their most dangerous enemies, and were ready to lay hold of all opportunities to discharge them their pulpits."--P. 24. But if we can rely at all on White's _Century of Malignant Ministers_ (and I do not perceive that Walker has been able to controvert it), there were a good many cases of irregular life in the clergy, so far at least as haunting alehouses; which, however, was much more common, and consequently less indecent, in that age than at present. See also Baxter's _Life_, p. 74; whose authority, though open to some exceptions on the score of prejudice, is at least better than Walker's. The king's party were not less oppressive towards ministers whom they reckoned puritan; which unluckily comprehended most of those who were of strict lives, especially if they preached calvinistically, unless they redeemed that suspicion by strong demonstrations of loyalty. Neal, p. 21; Baxter's _Life_, p. 42. And, if they put themselves forward on this side, they were sure to suffer most severely for it on the parliament's success; an ordinance of April 1, 1643, having sequestered the private estates of all the clergy who had aided the king. Thus the condition of the English clergy was every way most deplorable; and in fact they were utterly ruined. [266] Neal, p. 93. He says it was not tendered, by favour, to some of the clergy who had not been active against the parliament, and were reputed Calvinists. P. 59. Sanderson is said to be one instance. This historian, an honest and well-natured man at bottom, justly censures its imposition. [267] "All the judges answered that they could deliver no opinion in this case, in point of treason by the law; because they could not deliver any opinion in point of treason, but what was particularly expressed to be treason in the statute of 25 E. III., and so referred it wholly to the judgment of this house." Lords' Journals, 17th December 1644. [268] Lords' Journals, 4th January. It is not said to be done _nem. con._