The doctrine of Papal superiority to temporal sovereigns was as odious to him as Puritan rebellion to the hierarchy of which he was the chief.

Moreover, in his hostility to both Papists and Presbyterians, there was much of professional rivalry.

Having been deprived by the accident of birth of his true position as theological professor, he lost no opportunity of turning his throne into a pulpit and his sceptre into a controversial pen.
Henry of France, who rarely concealed his contempt for Master Jacques, as he called him, said to the English ambassador, on receiving from him one of the King's books, and being asked what he thought of it--"It is not the business of us kings to write, but to fight.

Everybody should mind his own business, but it is the vice of most men to wish to appear learned in matters of which they are ignorant." The flatterers of James found their account in pandering to his sacerdotal and royal vanity.

"I have always believed," said the Lord Chancellor, after hearing the King argue with and browbeat a Presbyterian deputation, "that the high-priesthood and royalty ought to be united, but I never witnessed the actual junction till now, after hearing the learned discourse of your Majesty." Archbishop Whitgift, grovelling still lower, declared his conviction that James, in the observations he had deigned to make, had been directly inspired by the Holy Ghost.
Nothing could be more illogical and incoherent with each other than his theological and political opinions.