The counsellors by whom Charles was surrounded on his return were men of different characters, and they ought at once to be noticed, since they had more or less to do with the ecclesiastical affairs, which it is our business to study. Hyde immediately became Chief Minister. His round face and double chin, as we see them in his portrait, appear signs of good nature; but, perhaps, a skilful physiognomist would discover in his eyes and lips indications of qualities less pleasant. He was a different man from his master. Like Charles I., he was sincerely attached to the Episcopal Church of England. That unhappy Monarch, in one of his published letters, dated Oxford, March 30, 1646, assures Queen Henrietta that "Ned Hide" was fully of his mind on the subject of Episcopacy; he was almost, if not altogether (at that time), the only person in the confidence of the King who concurred with him on the point of religion.[100] The same year, when matters were even worse, Hyde expressed himself against "buying a peace at a dearer price than was offered at Uxbridge," and encouraged the notion that it was the duty of the Royalists to submit to a kind of martyrdom. "It may be," he remarked, "God hath resolved we shall perish, and then it becomes us to perish with those decent and honest circumstances that our good fame may procure a better peace to those who succeed us, than we were able to procure for them, and ourselves shall be happier than any other condition could render us."[101] Looking at the circumstances under which the letter was written, there can be no doubt of the sincerity of this confession--a sincerity confirmed in all the years of his exile under the Commonwealth, and in his active solicitude for the interests of the Church in the prospect of the Restoration. His subsequent conduct in reference to ecclesiastical affairs will appear as we proceed. [Sidenote: THE KING'S RETURN.]