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NEILE ADVOCATES PERSECUTIOX. 383
adopted by so many who occupied the highest positions
in the Church. It would be difficult indeed to
estimate the number of individuals thus repelled and
estranged, who, by gentler handling and the exercise
of a wiser policy, might probably have been retained
as members of the Church of England.
Neile even vindicated persecution, and that of the
most cruel kind. We have it under his own hand.
In a letter to Laud (August 23, 1639),! he speaks of
the proceedings taken in the case of Legate, who
— '•'
was burnt for heretical opinions in James' reign
whose punishment, I am persuaded, did a
great deal of good in this church :" —and he goes
on to say, " I fear the present times do require like
exemplary punishment, which I refer to your grave
consideration."
When we find such sentiments uttered by a man
holding one of the very highest positions in the
Church of England, we can scarcely feel much surprise
at the reaction which followed, or wonder
greatly at a feeling being aroused which, within a
few short years, resulted in the expulsion of the
bishops from the House of Lords, and the banishment
of the clergy from their benefices.
Other causes combined, beyond question, to bring
about the civil war which so soon ensued, and
which ended in the subversion, for a time, of the
Monarchy and the Church of this country ; but the
attitude so persistently maintained by the authorities
of the latter, in their relations with the Puritans, can
' S. P. Dom. Charles I., ccccxxvii. 78.