By their advice, alterations were made in the thirty-nine articles, or in the metaphysical doctrines of the church; and what was of greater importance, the liturgy was entirely abolished, and in its stead a new directory for worship was established; by which, suitably to the spirit of the Puritans, the utmost liberty both in praying and preaching was indulged to the public teachers.

By the solemn league and covenant, episcopacy was abjured, as destructive of all true piety; and a national engagement, attended with every circumstance that could render a promise sacred and obligatory, was entered into with the Scots, never to suffer its readmission.

All these measures showed little spirit of accommodation in the parliament; and the king's commissioners were not surprised to find the establishment of presbytery and the directory positively demanded, together with the subscription of the covenant, both by the king and kingdom.[**] * Whitlocke, p.121.Dugdale, p.

758.
** Such love of contradiction prevailed in the parliament, that they had converted Christmas, which with the churchmen was a great festival, into a solemn fast and humiliation; "in order," as they said, "that it might call to remembrance our sins and the sins of our forefathers, who, pretending to celebrate the memory of Christ, have turned this feast into an extreme forgetfulness of him, by giving liberty to carnal and sensual delights." Rush.

vol.vi.p.