Laud employed the power of the Star Chamber a great deal in the accomplishment of his purpose of enforcing entire submission to the ecclesiastical authority of the Church. He even had persons sometimes punished very severely for words of disrespect, or for writings in which they censured what they considered the tyranny under which they suffered. This severe punishment for the mere expression of opinion only served to fix the opinion more firmly, and disseminate it more widely. Sometimes men would glory in their sufferings for this cause, and bid the authorities defiance. [Sidenote: Case of Lilburne.] [Sidenote: His indomitable spirit.] One man, for instance, named Lilburne, was brought before the Star Chamber, charged with publishing seditious pamphlets. Now, in all ordinary courts of justice, no man is called upon to say any thing against himself. Unless his crime can be proved by the testimony of others, it can not be proved at all. But in the Star Chamber, whoever was brought to trial had to take an oath at first that he would answer all questions asked, even if they tended to criminate himself. When they proposed this oath to Lilburne, he refused to take it. They decided that this was contempt of court, and sentenced him to be whipped, put in the pillory, and imprisoned. While they were whipping him, he spent the time in making a speech to the spectators against the tyranny of bishops, referring to Laud, whom he considered as the author of these proceedings. He continued to do the same while in the pillory. As he passed along, too, he distributed copies of the pamphlets which he was prosecuted for writing. The Star Chamber, hearing that he was haranguing the mob, ordered him to be gagged. This did not subdue him. He began to stamp with his foot and gesticulate; thus continuing to express his indomitable spirit of hostility to the tyranny which he opposed. This single case would be of no great consequence alone, but it was not alone. The attempt to put Lilburne down was a symbol of the experiment of coercion which Charles in the state, and Laud in the Church, were trying upon the whole nation; it was a symbol both in respect to the means employed, and to the success attained by them. [Sidenote: The young lawyers' toast.] [Sidenote: Ingenious plea.]