placed by a Latitudinarian Prelate in the hands of a Sovereign adored as the incarnation of civil and religious liberty. [Sidenote: 1693–8.] Although it is true of ancient times and Oriental states, that “where the word of a King is, there is power,” the King’s word amongst Englishmen at the time we speak of, especially upon religious subjects, carried with it no weight whatever; and although the controversy raging when the injunctions were devised soon burnt out, the heresies assailed lingered on, and in 1698 the Commons appealed to His Majesty for a proclamation for suppressing pernicious books containing doctrines opposed to the Holy Trinity, and other fundamental articles of the Christian faith.[270] The King, not choosing to do this, gave his faithful Commons a short answer, promising attention to the subject, and wishing that provision could be made for the purpose desired; but, however, a proclamation was immediately issued for preventing and punishing immorality and profaneness. Not long before this circumstance, a youth of only eighteen years of age was executed in the city of Edinburgh for blasphemy--a victim to the zeal of the Presbyterian Clergy;[271] and, about the same time, the orthodox Dissenters of England, in an address of theirs, most inconsistently urged His Majesty to deprive Unitarians of the liberty of the press.[272] [Sidenote: THE TRINITY.] [Sidenote: 1693–8.] An Act of Parliament was passed in 1698 declaring that any one educated in the Christian religion, who should, by writing, printing, or teaching, deny the doctrine of the Trinity, the truth of Christianity, or the authority of the Scriptures, must, for the first offence, be disqualified for holding any office; and, for the second, be incapacitated for bringing an action, possessing lands, becoming a guardian, acting as an executor, or receiving a legacy; moreover, such a person might be subjected to imprisonment for three years. Parliament thus united its authority with that of the Sovereign in the support of orthodox opinions, without perceiving the futility of such methods of defending the Gospel. And it is not a little surprising that such a man as Calamy, both in his _Diary_ and in his _Historical Addition to Baxter’s Life and Times_, passes by the objectionable enactment; indeed, so entirely unaffected by its injustice does he appear to have been, that, in the latter work, he tells us, in the year 1698, Parliament “did not meddle with matters of religion, though they had a committee for religion as usually.”[273] Nothing could more decidedly prove how much even the advocates of religious liberty had yet to learn touching that very object which they were supposed to understand, and were sincerely anxious to promote. It is a pleasure to be able to add, that neither at the time, nor afterwards, so far as can be ascertained, did this Act take any effect; and, apparently, it remained a dead letter until its repeal in the year 1813.[274]