But James’s illegal and arbitrary conduct proceeded still further. He commanded the Fellows of Magdalen College to elect, as their Master, one Antony Farmer, another concealed Papist. The Fellows petitioned his Majesty, but finding him not to be moved, they exercised their own undoubted right, and elected Dr Howe. A new mandate was issued to the college to elect Parker, Bishop of Oxford. This man had been a zealous Puritan preacher under the Commonwealth, a bigoted High Churchman at the Restoration, and was now a papistical prelate, through his popish servility to James II. He died a few months after, as destitute of virtue as of judgment—a drunkard and a miser—unlamented and even despised by all good men. The Fellows of Magdalen College refused to accept of James’s nominee, and, with commendable spirit, stuck to the Master of their own choosing. James was inexpressibly annoyed; and, in the course of the summer of 1687, arrived at Oxford. The unmanageable Fellows of Magdalen were summoned into the royal presence, and were chid for their disobedience. Samuel Wesley was present, and was an intensely interested spectator of the disreputable scene. “You have not dealt with me like gentlemen!” cried the weakly, arrogant, and furious king; “you have been unmannerly as well as undutiful. Is this your Church of England loyalty? I could not have believed that so many clergymen of the Church of England would have been concerned in such a business. Go home!—get you gone! I am king! I will be obeyed! Go to your chapel this instant, and admit the Bishop of Oxford. Let those who refuse look to it; they shall feel the whole weight of my hand; they shall know what it is to incur the displeasure of their sovereign!” Here was a call for passive obedience from the very lips of the Lord’s anointed, but still the Fellows were uncowed; and answering the royal tyrant respectfully but firmly, they insisted on their right. They were then privately warned that they would be proceeded against by _quo warranto_, and inevitably lose everything. But still the gownsmen were firm. The king was astonished and enraged, and issued a commission to examine the state of the college, with full power to alter the statutes and frame new ones. The chief of this Commission was Cartwright, Bishop of Chester, who, like Parker, had been a Puritan in the days of Cromwell, then a flaming Churchman under Charles, and was now a drunken tool in the hands of James. The Commissioners arrived at Oxford on the 20th of October 1687; but Master Howe maintained his rights, and the rights of the body which had elected him. On the second day, the Commissioners deprived him of his Mastership, struck his name from the books, and bound him in a penalty of £1000 to appear in the King’s Bench. Parker was put into possession by force, and a majority of the Fellows were at length prevailed upon to submit to royal dictation.