The Rebellion in 1745 made Englishmen bitter
against things Scottish, and in 1748 the Speech from
the Throne recommended certain regulations relative
to Scotland which were embodied in a Bill for disarming
the Highlanders and restraining the use of Highland
costume. The Bill also contained provision with
respect to the episcopal clergy that only letters of
orders granted by an English or Irish bishop should
be deemed valid in Scotland in spite of registration
according to a former Act. No doubt many of the
Scottish episcopal clergy, like the nonjuring bishops,
were secretly " promoters," as Lord Hardwicke said,
" of disloyalty and rebellion " ; but the prelates in
the House of Lords, including Herring, Sherlock, Seeker,
and Butler, treated the clause as an attack upon
Episcopacy. The clergy in question, said they, have
been duly ordained by persons holding the office of
bishops, who, even though deprived of their sees by
the State, would remain bishops and capable of con-



268 THOMAS SECKER [1758-

ferring valid orders. If willing to take the oaths of
fidelity they should be allowed to minister, and to refuse
them permission to do so was to ruin them unjustly.
Seeker led off the opposition to the clause enforcing
these arguments in a speech of half an hour. He was
answered by his friend, and shall we say patron. Lord
Hardwicke, in what is said to have been one of his
happiest efforts, and in Committee the clause was
rejected by 32 to 28. But on report Lord Hardwicke
exerted himself to the uttermost, expressing his appre-
hensions of the dangerous wound which would be given
to His Majesty, and to the Constitution, if that House
should show the least tenderness for any authority
temporal or spiritual set up in opposition to them.
