Strange to the ear of the masses was the doctrine of the Stuart, that the king was one of the Lord’s anointed and could do no wrong. They had seen kings do wrong when cursed with a wrong-doer as king, and supported any aspirant to the crown of England, no matter how slender may have been the thread of his claim thereto. Richard II. had played the autocratic ruler. Englishmen had resisted by espousing the cause of the first claimant who appeared upon the field. The assumption by the Stuarts of a divine right was the first stab that they gave to their own existence as the ruling House of an Anglo-Saxon people. Charles I. reaped where James I. had sown. The English people had forgiven before the bad faith of their sovereign, as they have since. They have endured the waste of their money because the Anglo-Saxon, whence we Americans derive the source of blood and laws, has not his tender spot upon the pocketbook, but in his heart, his home, his pride, believing himself, each man, equal to any other man. In 1628, Parliament wrested from Charles I. the famous Petition of Rights, the second great charter of English liberty. It forbade the kings to levy taxes without the consent of Parliament, to imprison a subject without trial, or to billet soldiers in private houses. As usual, Charles disregarded his promises, and then for eleven years ruled like an autocrat. During that period no Parliament was convoked, a thing unparalleled in English history. Buckingham having been assassinated by a Puritan fanatic, the Earl of Stafford and Archbishop Laud became its royal advisers. The Earl contrived a plan for making the king absolute. All who differed from Laud were tried in the High Commissioner’s Court, while the Star Chamber Court fined, whipped, and imprisoned those who spoke ill of the king’s policy or refused to pay the money he illegally demanded. The bitter persecution of the Puritans drove them to America. In Scotland, Charles carried matters with a high hand. Laud attempted to abolish Presbyterianism and introduce a liturgy. The Scotch rose _en masse_, and signed (some of them with their own blood) a covenant binding themselves to resist every innovation directed against their religious rights. Finally, an army of Scots crossed the border into England, and Charles was forced to assemble the famous “Long Parliament” (1640), which lasted twenty years. The old battle was renewed. Stafford, and afterward Laud, were brought to the block; the Star Chamber and High Commissioners’ Courts were abolished, and Parliament voted that it could not be adjourned without its own consent. Charles attempted to arrest five of the leaders of Parliament in the House of Commons itself. They hid in the City of London, whence a week later they were brought back to the House of Commons in triumph. Charles hastened Northward, and unfurled the royal banner. For a time his supporters swept everything before them.