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HISTORY OF ENGLAND.

chap. Danvers was a man of the same class, hot-headed, but faint-1685. hearted, constantly urged to the brink of danger by enthu-siasm, and constantly stopped on that brink by cowardice.He had considerable influence among a portion of the Baptists,had written largely in defence of their peculiar opinions, andhad drawn down on himself the severe censure of the mostrespectable Puritans by attempting to palliate the crimes ofMatthias and John of Leyden. It is probable that, had hepossessed a little courage, he would have trode in the foot-steps of the wretches whom he defended. He was, at thistime, concealing himself from the officers of justice; forwarrants were out against him on account of a grossly ca-lumnious paper of which the government had discovered himto be the author.*

Charac-^ It is easy to imagine what kind of intelligence and counselleading men, such as have been described, were likely to send to therefugees. ou (.j awg ; n jy ie Netherlands. Of the general character ofthose outlaws an estimate may be formed from a few samples.Ayioffe. One of the most conspicuous among them was JohnAyloffe, a lawyer connected by affinity with the Hydes, andthrough the Hydes, with James. Ayloffe had early madehimself remarkable by offering a whimsical insult to thegovernment. At a time when the ascendency of the court ofVersailles had excited general uneasiness, he had contrivedto put a wooden shoe, the established type, among theEnglish,of French tyranny, into the chair of the House of Commons.He had subsequently been concerned in the Whig plot; butthere is no reason to believe that he was a party to the designof assassinating the royal brothers. He was a man of partsand courage; but his moral character did not stand high.The Puritan divines whispered that he was a careless Gallio or* London Gazette. Jan. 4. IfiSl; Ferguson MS. in F.acbard’s History,iii. 164. ; Grey’s Narrative; Sprat’s True Account; Danvers's Treatise onBaptism; Danvers's Innocency and Truth vindicated; Crosby’s Historyof the English Baptists.