Laud, in his defence, when speaking of his ecclesiastical career, did not profess that he had sought, as the highest objects of his life, the gathering of souls into Christ's fold, and the promotion of truth and charity; but he plainly said that his main endeavour had been to secure an outward conformity. Nor did he, as most men would have done under the same circumstances, qualify his avowal of ritualistic zeal by expressing large and noble Christian sentiments. On the contrary, he simply declared: "Ever since I came in place I laboured nothing more than that the external worship of God (too much slighted in most parts of this kingdom) might be preserved, and that with as much decency and uniformity as might be; being still of opinion that unity cannot long continue in the Church, where uniformity is shut out at the Church door; and I evidently saw that the public neglect of God's service in the outward face of it, and the nasty lying of many places dedicated to that service, had almost cast a damp upon the true and inward worship of God, which, while we live in the body, needs external helps, and all little enough to keep it in any vigour."[496] Yet we must confess that for Laud to adopt this strain was honest; and certainly, amongst his many faults, hypocrisy is not to be reckoned. Indeed, he made it his boast, and he had ground for so doing, that he did not shift from one opinion to another for worldly ends; and that he had never attempted to slide through the difficulties of the times by trimming his religious opinions. [Sidenote: 1644.] In dealing with the evidence against him, the Archbishop maintained that personal resentment influenced the witnesses in the statements which they made; and in that opinion probably he was to a considerable extent correct. Certain of their allegations had, no doubt, a spiteful appearance; but then it is impossible to forget how this merciless man had provoked such conduct towards himself by his own inexcusable demeanour towards others; and that by a law of Providence, righteous in itself, though executed by instruments not free from blame, such delinquents as Laud, after having sown the wind, are sure, sooner or later, to reap the whirlwind. Prynne, of course, tried to make everything tell against his enemy; yet even he could not help allowing that the prisoner at the bar "made as full, as gallant, and pithy a defence, and spake as much for himself as was possible for the wit of man to invent." This special pleader proceeds however to say, the very moment after making this admission, that Laud spoke "with so much art, sophistry, vivacity, oratory, audacity, and confidence, without the least blush, or acknowledgment of guilt in anything, as argued him rather obstinate than innocent, impudent than penitent, and a far better orator and sophister than Protestant or Christian."[497] Prynne attributed the Primate's boldness to the King's pardon which he carried in his pocket. [Sidenote: _Laud's Trial._]