Take Courage by Phyllis Bentley Page B

David, who shared a bed with Will, confided to me that he thought Will was wretched because he wanted to be married and Mr. Thorpe would not let him. As the marriage treaty between Will and Eliza had long been signed, this puzzled me still further, and I thought David must be wrong, for I noticed that Will was always most put out after we had been reading the diurnals.
    Indeed the news was not good, for Laud’s sermon having provoked the Parliament, it did not hurry to grant any subsidies, but began to attack the Duke; whereupon the King hastily scolded and dissolved it, before it was sixmonths long. Parliaments, he said, were altogether in his power—an observation fit to madden any Englishman. What was worse, having no subsidies lawfully granted him, he now began to levy them illegally, without consent, and began also to demand loans from the gentry, and to tax merchants’ goods entering the country from abroad; and many of the Arminian clergy began to preach sermons, exhorting their people to pay these loans and taxes. This all seemed to me very wicked, but still it did not strike me that it could happen nearer than London, for in Bradford we had no such sermons, Mr. Okell being a staunch Puritan and no lover of either the King or Laud. About this time Will began to spend more hours at the loom and fewer at his books, and his temper grew worse daily, but I was still quite in the dark as to why it should be so.
    Then one day, when we were all dining at Holroyd Hall, it was made clear to me. The occasion was Francis’s birthday; the Ferrands had many guests, and we were all at table. Mr. Ferrand was joking in a rather lewd way, as he loved to do, and he suddenly asked Will in a loud jovial tone when he was going to get a benefice and be able to marry. Poor Will coloured to his ears, and began stammeringly to explain that nowadays it was not easy for a young man of his views to find a Bishop or patron to appoint him. At once I saw the whole matter, for Mr. Thorpe, as his uncomfortable look now showed, would not wish Will and Eliza to marry till Will was in a fair way to gain his living.
    â€œIt is said that Bishop Laud gives the King lists of clergy marked O and P,” went on poor Will, more vehement as his anger gained on him: “O for Orthodox, who are to have promotion, and P for Puritan, who are not. Others with benefices in their gift take the cue, for fear they will be had up for heresy before the court of Starchamber.”
    â€œAnd very properly,” roared Mr. Ferrand in his loud cheerful voice. “You cannot have a Church without a government; you cannot have these Puritans doing just as they choose. A set of dirty arrogant rascals, saving your presence, Tom and Robert, preaching all over the placeand behaving saucily to their betters. We must have decency and order.”
    â€œYou are an Arminian, sir!” cried my father sternly on a sudden.
    Mr. Ferrand looked taken aback. “What do the Arminians hold?” he enquired doubtfully.
    My father, his sudden warmth gone, smiled and replied: “They hold all the best bishoprics and deaneries in England.”
    At this Mr. Thorpe laughed very heartily. “That’s good! That’s good, Robert!” he cried. “What do the Arminians hold? They hold all the best bishoprics—ha, ha, ha!”
    â€œIt’s not my own saying,” disclaimed my father hastily. “I read it in a diurnal. An Arminian, Giles,” he went on in his usual courteous tones: “is one who believes, like Bishop Laud, that episcopacy is a divine institution, begun by Christ with his disciples, continued down through the practice of the Roman Catholic Church, and handed on to the Reformed Church of the present day.”
    Mr. Ferrand looked vexed and doubtful. “In religion,” he said: “I am neither a fantastic Puritan nor a superstitious Papist, but a man who holds by Church and King.”
    â€œYou believe the King