Note 692 — Chapter XI · (continued 2)

Commons' Journals, 28 and 29 March 1673; Lords' Journals, 24 and 29 March. The Lords were so slow about this bill that the lower house, knowing an adjournment to be in contemplation, sent a message to quicken them, according to a practice not unusual in this reign. Perhaps, on an attentive consideration of the report on the conference (March 29) it may appear that the Lords' amendments had a tendency to let in popish, rather than to favour protestant, dissenters. Parker says that this act of indulgence was defeated by his great hero, Archbishop Sheldon, who proposed that the nonconformists should acknowledge the war against Charles I. to be unlawful. Hist. sui temporis, p. 203 of the translation.