If Caroline could not speak so harshly of the prelates, generally or individually, as her husband, she could reprove them, when occasion offered, with singular asperity. We may see an instance of this in the case of the episcopal opposition to the Mortmain and to the Quakers’ Relief Bills; but especially to the latter. This particular bill had for its object to render more easy the recovery of tithes from Quakers; the latter did not ask for exemption, but for less oppression in the method of levying. The court wished that the bill should pass into law. Sherlock, now Bishop of Salisbury, wrote a pamphlet against it; and the prelates generally, led by Gibson, Bishop of London, stirred up all the dioceses in the kingdom to oppose it, with a cry of _The Church in danger_. Sir Robert Walpole represented to the Queen that all the bishops were blameable; but that the chief blame rested upon Sherlock, whose opposition was described as being as little to be justified in point of understanding and policy as in integrity and gratitude. Sir Robert declared that he was at once the dupe and the willing follower of the Bishop of London, and that both were guilty of endeavouring to disturb the quiet of the kingdom. The first time Dr. Sherlock appeared at court after this the Queen chid him extremely, and asked him if he was not ashamed to be overreached in this manner by the Bishop of London. She accused him of being a second time the dupe of the latter prelate, who was charged with having misled him in a matter concerning the advancement of Dr. Rundle to an episcopal see. ‘How,’ she asked him, ‘could he be blind and weak enough to be running his nose into another’s dirt again!’ As for the King, he spoke of the prelates on this occasion ‘with his usual softness.’ They were, according to the hereditary defender of the faith, ‘a parcel of black, canting, hypocritical rascals.’ They were ‘silly,’ ‘impertinent’ fellows, presuming to dictate to the Crown; as if it were not the duty of a bishop to exercise this boldness when emergency warranted and occasion suited. Both bills were passed in the Commons. The Mortmain Bill (to prevent the further alienation of lands by will in mortmain) passed the Lords; but the Quakers’ Relief Bill was lost there by a majority of two.