writer in 18 11 of a note to Howell's State Trials, says that in 1688 he " was a very considerable man in his profession," and Atwood's own statement, after he came to the colony, that he was not unknown in Westminster Hall and at the Bar of the House of Lords." However that may have been, he had, at the time of his appoint ment, become somewhat known as the author, during the twenty years preceding, of publications upon a variety of subjects, legal, historical, political, and theological.2 In 1680 he published a tract entitled Juri Anglorum Facics Nova (A New Face to the English Law), which was of sufficient im portance to induce Dr. Brady, the histo rian, to reply to it, — a man whose writings had been, largely devoted to establishing that all the liberties of the English people were concessions from the crown, and who then represented the University of Oxford in Parliament. The next year, 1681, a tract of a legal historical character by Atwood appeared, entitled Jus Anglorum ab An tique (The English Law from of Old); and the following year he published another, to show that William the Conqueror made no absolute conquest of England, in the sense of modern writers.3 Another publication, in 1689, was in con nection with an event upon which the public mind had been greatly excited. Among the acts of James II. against the liberties of the people of England, none were more ar bitrary than his removing four of the judges of the King's Bench, that he might obtain 1 Howell's State Trials, Vol. II., p. 1260; 5 Col. Doc. p. 103. ' A Poetical Essay toward an Epitome of the Gospels, 1678; Letter of Remark upon Dr. Kirk's Jovian, 1683; A Commentary on the Life of Edward VI,; Grotius's Argu ment on the Truth of Christianity, put in English verse, with an appendix concerning the Prophecies, 1686; A Par aphrase of Waller's poem on Divine Love, 1688. s Argumentum Antinormanicum. or an Argument proving from Ancient Histories and Records that William, Duke of Normandy, made no absolute conquest of England by the sword, in the sense of our modern writers, London, 1682.
from that tribunal the decision shortly after ward given by it in Sir Edward Hale's case, that he was an absolute sovereign, that the laws of England were the king's laws, that he had the power to dispense with any of them whenever he saw a necessity for it, he alone being a judge of that necessity. ChiefJustice Herbert, by whom this decision was pronounced, though an honest and con scientious man, had the most exalted, or as Burnet put it, " high notions," respecting the king's prerogative, which, being known to James, he appointed him unsolicited Chief-Justice of the King's Bench. This decision, under which James could dispense with the test act that required any one before taking a public office, in addition to other obligations, to abjure all belief in the doctrine of transubstantiation, and which he informed Parliament he intended to do, "struck," in the language of Hume, "uni versal alarm throughout the nation, infused terror into the church, which had hitherto been the chief supporter of the monarchy, and disgusted the army." ■ When James in 1687 issued his " Decla ration for liberty of conscience," which " an nulled all oaths by which subjects were disabled from holding office," and followed it up by removing Protestants in numerous instances and appointing Roman Catholics in their places, it necessarily followed that the decision which authorized this use of his prerogative was throughout the kingdom the subject of constant discussion. It was assailed in sermons, books, and pamphlets, in which the Chief-Justice was held up to general condemnation. To express it in his own words, " he had the hard fortune to fall under the greatest infamy and reproach that it is possible for any man to lie under, of perjury and breach of trust, in giving judg ment in Sir Edward Hale's case contrary to law and contrary to my knowledge and opinion, which alone made it criminal." 2 1 Hume, chap. 70. 3 11 Howell's State Trials, p. 1251.
