Whatever conflicts, therefore, the honest Cavalier might have had to maintain against Whigs and Roundheads he had at least been hitherto undisturbed by conflict in his own mind.

He had seen the path of duty plain before him.

Through good and evil he was to be true to Church and King.

But, if those two august and venerable powers, which had hitherto seemed to be so closely connected that those who were true to one could not be false to the other, should be divided by a deadly enmity, what course was the orthodox Royalist to take?
What situation could be more trying than that in which he would be placed, distracted between two duties equally sacred, between two affections equally ardent?
How was he to give to Caesar all that was Caesar's, and yet to withhold from God no part of what was God's?
None who felt thus could have watched, without deep concern and gloomy forebodings, the dispute between the King and the Parliament on the subject of the test.

If James could even now be induced to reconsider his course, to let the Houses reassemble, and to comply with their wishes, all might yet be well.
Such were the sentiments of the King's two kinsmen, the Earls of Clarendon and Rochester.