In the following year the slumbering embers of religious differences broke out into a general blaze all over the country. Then began those contentions about ecclesiastical questions, church discipline and liturgies, at all times fraught with the seeds of discontent and danger to the common weal, and which in this case ultimately led to such sad and momentous consequences as only religious feuds can. Charles I. was playing the despot with his subjects, not only in Scotland, but in England. He was governing without a Parliament, defying and trying to crush the desires and aspirations of a people born to govern themselves and to be free. His infatuated attempt to introduce the Liturgy of the Church of England into the Calvinistic and Presbyterian pulpits of Scotland was as insane as it was unavailing. But his English as well as Scottish subjects were at the same time almost in open rebellion for their liberties. He tried to put down the rising in Scotland by the sword, but his means and military skill were unequal to the task. He failed to impose the English Liturgy on his Scottish subjects, but his attempt to do so proved the deliverance of his English subjects from high-handed tyranny. It is only natural that in these circumstances Seaforth, though personally attached to the King, should be found on the side of the Covenant, and that he should have joined the Assembly, the clergy, and the nobles in the Protest, and in favour of the renewal of the Confession of Faith previously accepted and confirmed by James VI. in 1580, 1581, and 1590, at the same time that these several bodies entered into a covenant or bond of mutual defence among themselves against all opposition from whatever source.