The difference in some respects, the similarity in others, between the principles upon which the Anglican politicians proceeded in their conduct towards Puritans, and the principles upon which the Puritan politicians had proceeded in reference to Anglicans, has been little, if at all, noticed. As to the difference, the Conventicle Act regarded Conventicles simply as seditious, it punished men for religious convictions, under pretence of preventing rebellion; on the other hand the Long Parliament and Oliver Cromwell had forbidden the use of the Prayer Book, in order to break up assemblies for worship held by persons who, not without reason, were suspected of political disaffection. There was a further difference--Clarendon and his party sought to establish uniformity by the use of the Anglican Liturgy; the Presbyterians had aimed at their uniformity through a prohibition of that Liturgy, not by any enforcement, under penalties, of the Westminster Directory. The Anglican law was prescriptive; the Puritan prohibitive. But there is involved in all this a general resemblance between the two. Neither appears thoroughly straightforward; each is exceedingly intolerant; and both aim at doing one thing, under pretence of doing something else. Yet let it not be forgotten, that while there is little to choose between them in point of principle, the extent to which persecution was carried, under Charles and his brother James, immensely exceeded anything reached under the Long Parliament, or under Oliver Cromwell. [Sidenote: CONVENTICLE ACT.] The new law was ordained to take effect after the 1st of July; but formidable difficulties in the way of its execution presented themselves as the time approached, arising from political disaffection, from the numbers of Nonconformists, and from the sympathy which their more tolerant neighbours felt with them in the sufferings which they endured.