[The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part D. by David Hume]@TWC D-Link bookThe History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part D. CHAPTER XL 5/95
107, 108, 109.
She was an enemy to sermons; and usually said, that she thought two or three preachers were sufficient for a whole county.
It was probably for these reasons that one Doring told her to her face from the pulpit, that she was like an untamed heifer, that would not be ruled by God's people, but obstructed his discipline See Life of Hooker, prefixed to his works. She took care to have a law for uniformity strictly enacted: she was empowered by the parliament to add any new ceremonies which she thought proper: and though she was sparing in the exercise of this prerogative, she continued rigid in exacting an observance of the established laws, and in punishing all nonconformity.
The zealots, therefore, who harbored a secret antipathy to the Episcopal order, and to the whole liturgy, were obliged, in a great measure, to conceal these sentiments, which would have been regarded as highly audacious and criminal; and they confined their avowed objections to the surplice, the confirmation of children, the sign of the cross in baptism, the ring in marriage, kneeling at the sacrament, and bowing at the name of Jesus.
So fruitless is it for sovereigns to watch with a rigid care over orthodoxy, and to employ the sword in religious controversy, that the work, perpetually renewed, is perpetually to begin; and a garb, a gesture, nay, a metaphysical or grammatical distinction, when rendered important by the disputes of theologians and the zeal of the magistrate, is sufficient to destroy the unity of the church, and even the peace of society.
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