68 LIFE OF ARCHBISHOP SHARP. 



affair of Dr. Sharp, in which his diocesan was 

 involved, gave rise to the Ecclesiastical Com- 

 mission, the effects of which proved afterwards 

 so prejudicial to the King and his affairs. And 

 Bishop Burnet places the advising and erecting 

 of that court after the Bishop of London's re- 

 fusal to suspend the Doctor upon the difficulties 

 that arose about a method of proceeding legally 

 against him. It has indeed been assured from 

 other hands, that the commission was actually 

 granted in April, before the Doctor preached the 

 sermon that gave offence, though it was not 

 opened till the August following. But that this 

 is a mistake appears from hence ; that when the 

 Bishop of London pleaded before the Commis- 

 sioners, that he conceived their commission did 

 not extend to the crime laid to his charge, be- 

 cause what he was accused of was before the 

 date of the said commission ; the Lord Chan- 

 cellor did not deny the date of the commission 

 to be subsequent to the offence, but alledged 

 that it had restrospect to offences past. 



However the Bishop and the Doctor were the 

 first over whom that unprecedented authority, 

 and illegal power, was exercised. 



Their troubles on this occasion (particularly 

 the Bishop's,) are taken notice of in most of the 

 histories of these times. But because several 

 things relating to Dr. Sharp's conduct in the 



