In this year occurred the famous incident in the House of Commons――on occasion of the king asking a grant of money to provide against a Swedish invasion. Downright Jacobite Shippen felt as others felt, that the demand was for English money to be applied to the defending of Hanover. Shippen opposed the reception of the message, on the ground of want of detailed information. He added that such a proceeding was unparliamentary, and that it was to be regretted that the king was as ignorant of parliamentary rules as he was of the English language. A committee, however, was formed, which, by a majority of 15, proposed a grant of a quarter of a million; but the question, when submitted to the House, was carried by four votes only――153 to 149. This almost compensated the Jacobites for what they had suffered this year by Bishop Hoadly’s ‘Preservative against the Principles and Practices of the Nonjurors.’ The High Church priesthood took some little comfort from it, too. The bishop’s sermon on ‘My kingdom is not of this world,’ had seemed to deny them all temporal power. It led to the famous Bangorian Controversy which ultimately deprived Convocation, for ever, of being actively mischievous. The Nonjuring preachers were violent in their pulpits. And the Nonjurors were out-done in Parliament by that outspoken member, Shippen. In December, the king opened Parliament with a speech, which the ‘Downright’ representative treated as that of his ministers. He discussed it and the measures recommended in it, with the utmost freedom. ‘We are,’ he said, ‘at liberty to debate every proposition in it, especially those which seem rather calculated for the meridian of Germany than of Great Britain. ’Tis the only infelicity of his Majesty’s reign, that he is unacquainted with our language and constitution; and ’tis therefore the more incumbent on his British ministers to inform him that our government does not stand on the same foundation with his German dominions, which (by reason of their situation and the nature of their constitution) are obliged to keep up standing armies in time of peace.’――Lechmere, Solicitor-General, moved that the words be taken down, and the speaker of them be sent to the Tower. Shippen would not retract anything he had uttered against maintaining an army of sixteen thousand men in time of peace. A majority of 175 to 81 sent him to the Tower. Shippen’s speech was delivered on December 4th. Two days later, an attack against the disaffected party was made from the stage. The assailant was Colley Cibber; his weapon was the comedy, which he adapted from Molière’s ‘Tartuffe,’ and called ‘The Nonjuror.’ The town was in a ferment, and it would be difficult to say which faction was the more excited. [Sidenote: _CIBBER’S ‘NONJUROR.’_]