"10th May, the Boocke of Spartes vpon the Lord's Day, was burnt by the hangman in the place where the Crosse stoode, and at (the) Exchange." That great lover of sights, Master Pepys, notices one of these exhibitions: "1661, 28th May, with Mr. Shipley," says our gossip, "to the Exchange about business; and there, by Mr. Rawlinson's favour, got into a balcone over against the Exchange, and there saw the hangman burn, by vote of Parliament, two old acts: the one for constituting us a Commonwealth, and the other I have forgot; which still do make me think of the greatness of this late turne, and what people will do to-morrow against what they all, thro' profit or fear, did promise and practise this day." A note to this passage in the _Diary_ (vol. i. p. 236., 3rd edit.) supplies the defective memory of Pepys, by informing us that the last was an "Act for subscribing the Engagement;" and adds, on the same day there had been burnt by the hangman, at Westminster Hall, the "Act for erecting a High Court of Justice for trying and judging Charles Stuart." They seem to have been just then cleansing out the Augean stable of the Commonwealth: for it is added, "two more acts" were similarly burnt next day. In _A Letter to a Clergyman, relating to his Sermon on the 30th Jan._, by a Lover of Truth, 1746, the lay author (one Coade, I believe), inveighing against high churchmen, reminds the preacher that he-- "Was pleased to dress up the principles of the Presbyterians in a frightful shape; but let me tell you, Sir, in my turn, that the principles of your party have been burnt, not by a rude and lawless rabble, but by the common hangman, in broad day-light, before the Royal Exchange in London, and by authority of Parliament. Perhaps," he continues, "you never heard of this contemptuous treatment of the Oxford principles, and therefore I will give it you from the Parliamentary Records:--'Anno Domini 1710. The House of Lords, taking into consideration the judgment and decree of the University of Oxford, passed in their Convocation July 21, 1683,--it was resolved by the Lords Spiritual and Temporal in Parliament assembled, that the said judgment and decree contains in it several positions contrary to the Constitution of this kingdom, and destructive to the Protestant Succession as by law established. And it was thereupon ordered, by the Lords Spiritual and Temporal in Parliament assembled, that the said judgment and decree shall be burnt by the hands of the common hangman before the Royal {426} Exchange, between hours of twelve and one, on Monday the 17th March, in the presence of the Lord Mayor of the City of London,' &c." Doleman's _Conference about the next Succession to the Crown of England_, reprinted at N. with licence, in 1681, was, in 1683, condemned by the University of Oxford, and burnt by the common hangman.