CHARLES I.

275

Though these writings were of consequence,and tended much to reconcile the nation toCharles, it was evident that they would not bedecisive, and that keener weapons must determinethe controversy. To the ordinance of the par-liament concerning the militia , the king opposedhis commissions of array. The counties obeyedthe one or the other, according as they stoodaffected. And in many counties , where thepeople were divided , mobbissi combats andskirmishes ensued l! \ The parliament, on thisoccasion, went so far as to vote, “ That when<c the lords and commons in parliament, which istc the supreme court of judicature , shall declare« what the law of the land is, to have this notcc only questioned , but contradicted, is a high“ breach of their privileges " This was a plainassuming of the whole legislative authority, andexerting it in the most material article , the go-vernment of the militia. Upon the fame principlesthey pretended , by a verbal criticism on thetense of a Latin verb , to ravish from the kinghis negative voice in the legislature ,IJ .

The magazine of Hull contained the arms of

1,1 May, book ii. p. 99. -Rulhworth, vol. v. p. ; 14.

,I! The king, by his coronation oath, promises thathe would maintain the laws and customs which the people* had chosen, quas vulgus elegerit: The parliament pretended,that elegerit meant shall chuse; and consequently, that theking had no right to refuse any bills which should bepresented him. See Rushworth, vol. v. p. 580.

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HAP.

LV.

TS»r.