And, after all, what do the charges of tyranny and misgovernment amount to, even in Massachusetts? The real _gravamen_ of all the charges is, that the charter had been taken away, and the people of Massachusetts did not enjoy those laws of England which they had always claimed as their birthright. The personal charges against Andros were so frivolous that the colonial agents did not dare to put their hands to them when the case was brought to trial in England, and, by their failure to appear, confessed that they were false and malicious. It is not likely that Andros was always conciliatory. That a population of dissenting Whigs should put difficulties in the way of public service of the Church of England, as by law established, must have been to Andros unendurable, and it is absurd to represent his use of a meeting-house in Boston for the religious services of the national church as an instance of malignant despotism.[140] It is far from improbable that Andros was compelled against his will to be as civil as he was to the American non-conformists, because his master was trafficking with them in England. While Increase Mather was intriguing with the king and receiving friendly messages from Father Petre, and while men like Alsop and Rosewell and Penn were basking in the favors of the court at Whitehall, a governor of New England, even if he had wished, could not venture upon any acts of oppression in America.[141] In fact, Andros’s actions in insisting on the services of the English Church in Boston may be considered among the most creditable in his history, and exhibit the character of the man. He risked offending the king, and did offend the puritans, in order to show respect to that historic church of his nation, which king and puritan alike desired to overthrow.