WIIIIAM AND MARY.

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There was consequently a division in the Whig party. One chap.section of that party was for relieving the dissenters from the —jjTest Act, and giving up the Comprehension Bill. Anothersection was for pushing forward the Comprehension Bill, andpostponing to a more convenient time the consideration of theTest Act. The effect of this division among the friends ofreligious liberty was that the High Churchmen, though aminority in the House of Commons, and not a majority in theHouse of Lords, were able to oppose with success both thereforms which they dreaded. The Comprehension Bill was notpassed; and the Test Act was not repealed.

Just at the moment when the question of the Test and thequestion of the Comprehension became complicated together ina manner which might well perplex an enlightened and honestpolitician, both questions became complicated with a thirdquestion of grave importance.

The ancient oaths of allegiance and supremacy contained J h °some expressions which had always been disliked by the Whigs, tiingand other expressions which Tories, honestly attached to the °i a /o-new settlement, thought inapplicable to princes who had notf, 1 , 3 ,"the hereditary right. The Convention had therefore, while the pre ”throne was still vacant, framed those oaths of allegiance andsupremacy by which we still testify our loyalty to our Sovereign.

By the Act which turned the Convention into a Parliament, themembers of both Houses were required to take the new oaths.

As to other persons in public trust, it was hard to say how thelaw stood. One form of words was enjoined by statutes,regularly passed, and not yet regularly abrogated. A differentform was enjoined by the Declaration of Right, an instrumentwhich was indeed revolutionary and irregular, but which mightHistory and Antiquities of Dissenting Churches and Meeting Houses inLondon, Westminster, and Southwark, will be found several instances ofnonconformist preachers who, about this time, made handsome fortunes,generally, it should seem, by marriage.

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