Not content with direct remonstrance to Parliament on the subject of the increase of sects and heresies, nor with the power of exhorting it on the subject through the pulpit, the Presbyterians of the Assembly, I find, resorted to other agencies. They had great influence in the City, and it occurred to them, or to some of them, to stir up the Stationers' Company to activity in the matter. The Stationers, indeed, had a commercial interest, as well as a religious interest, in the suppression of the obnoxious books and pamphlets, most of which were published without the legal formalities of licence and registration. It is without surprise therefore that we find this entry in the Commons Journals for Saturday, Aug. 24, 1644: "_Ordered_ that the Petition from the Company of Stationers be read on Monday morning next," followed by this other as the minute of the first business (after prayers) at the next sitting, (Monday, Aug. 26): "The humble Petition of the Company of Stationers, consisting of Booksellers, Printers, and Bookbinders, was this day read, and ordered to be referred to the consideration of the Committee for Printing, to hear all parties and to state the business, and to prepare an Ordinance upon the whole matter and to bring it in with all convenient speed; and they are, to this purpose, to peruse the Bill formerly brought in concerning this matter. They are diligently to inquire out the authors, printers, and publishers of the Pamphlets against the Immortality of the Soul and _Concerning Divorce_." It had been determined, it seems, that Palmer's denunciation of Milton in his sermon a fortnight before should not be a _brutum fulmen_. To the incident, as it affected Milton himself, we shall have to refer again. Meanwhile it belongs to that stage of the action of the Westminster Assembly on English politics which we are now trying to illustrate.