of Dartmouth's MSS., p. 170). When the news of the project of William of Orange became known, he had several interviews with James, and drew up a declaration that he had never invited or encouraged the invasion (original draft in Tanner MS. 28, f. 224, 3 Nov. 1688), but persistently refused, after a long wrangle, to join in any declaration of abhorrence or repudiation of the declaration that had been put out in the name of William (Tanner MS. 28, f. 159). On 17 Nov. he went to the king, with the archbishop-elect of York and the bishops of Ely and Rochester, to urge the summoning of a ‘free parliament’ (draft petition in Tanner MS. 28, f. 250; printed in ‘A Compleat Collection of Papers relating to the great Revolutions in England and Scotland,’ &c., London, 1689; Gutch, Collectanea Curiosa, vol. i.).
After the king's flight Sancroft signed, with other peers, the order to Lord Dartmouth to abstain from any acts of hostility to the Prince of Orange's fleet (Hist. MSS. Comm., Report on Dartmouth MSS., p. 229). He signed also the declaration of 11 Dec. 1688, by which a meeting of peers at the Guildhall called upon William to assist in procuring peace and a ‘free parliament.’ This was the last public action undertaken by Sancroft. When he saw that William was resolved to procure the crown for himself, he withdrew from all association with proceedings by which he might appear to break his oath of allegiance. On 16 Dec. he saw James for the last time at Whitehall, and from that moment he took no step which might even indirectly forward the revolution, withdrawing altogether from public business. On 18 Dec. 1688 the university of Cambridge elected him their chancellor, but he declined to accept the honour. When the Prince of Orange entered London, Sancroft alone among the prelates did not wait upon him. His friends vainly urged him to attend the House of Lords. James wrote to him from France expressing his confidence in him. He engaged in constant discussion at Lambeth on public affairs, and wrote long statements and arguments concerning the political questions at issue (Tanner MS. 459). His papers show him to have been in favour of declaring James incapable of government, and appointing William custos regni. He declared that it was impossible lawfully to appoint a new king; ‘and if it be done at all, it must be by force of conquest.’ On 15 Jan. 1689 a large meeting of bishops, lay peers, and others was held at Lambeth. On the 22nd the Convention met and voted the throne vacant. Sancroft was not present. On the day when the new sovereigns were proclaimed, Henry Wharton, his chaplain, misunderstanding his instructions, prayed for William and Mary in the chapel. Sancroft, ‘with great heat, told him that he must thenceforward desist from offering prayers for the new king and queen, or else from performing the duties of his chapel, for as long as King James was alive no other persons could be sovereigns of the country’ (D'Oyly, i. 435, from Wharton's ‘Diary’).
On 15 March 1689 he issued a commission which virtually empowered his suffragans to perform the coronation. On 23 March he wrote to Lord Halifax, speaker of the House of Lords, to excuse his attendance which had been ordered on the 22nd (Lords' Journals, xiv. 158), saying that since his refusal to sit on the high commission, and James's command to him not to attend at all, he had never been out of doors save when he was forced, and for the last five months he had not been so much as into his garden, and that he could not cross the river without great detriment to his health (State Papers, William and Mary, 1689–90, p. 38; Hist. MSS. Comm., Report on MSS. of House of Lords, 1689–90, p. 39; original manuscript in Tanner MS. 28, f. 381). He still continued to exercise the ecclesiastical functions of his office (cf. Cal. State Papers, William and Mary, 1689–90, p. 58), but he prepared for what must follow. ‘Well,’ he said to a friend, ‘I can live on 50l. a year.’
On 1 Aug. 1689 he was suspended, on 1 Feb. 1690 deprived, with five bishops and about four hundred clergy. Shortly after this he joined with the other nonjuring bishops in putting out a flysheet (‘A Vindication of the Archbishop and several other Bishops from the imputations and calumnies cast upon them by them Author of the “Modest Enquiry,”’ London, 1690, one leaf), denying all sedition or intrigue with France, and appealing to their past resistance to ‘popery and arbitrary power.’ Burnet states that some efforts were made by the court to make a settlement with him, and it appears that he received the revenues of his see till Michaelmas 1690.
Tillotson was publicly nominated his successor on 23 April 1691. Sancroft did not leave Lambeth. He packed up his books, told his chaplains that they had better leave him—which they declined to do, though they ‘differed from him concerning public matters in the state’—dismissed most of his servants, and gave up the public hospitality which it was the practice of the archbishops, down to the time of Howley, to offer to all comers. On 20 May he received a peremptory order from the queen to leave Lambeth
