Like his friend Laud, then Archbishop of Canterbury, he desired general uniformity. In order to attain it, he summoned a meeting of Convocation, and directed it to supersede the ” Confession of Faith,” passed in 1615, and to substitute the English Articles of 1562 (see Chap. IV). When the bishops and clergy hesitated to comply with this order, he called certain of them before him, and so violently rated and threatened them that in terror they submitted, as did the whole body of Convocation subsequently, so that the desired Articles were passed (1634).

To maintain what he conceived to be proper discipline amongst the clergy, he erected on the king’s order alone, and therefore illegally, a Court of High Commission to deal with ecclesiastical offences. The Connacht Plantation Scheme.—In spite of all Wentworth’« efforts, the Irish revenue was far from yielding the sums which he desired, and he began to consider other methods for obtaining from the country money for the royal Treasury.

In the August of this year (1629), Falkland finally left Ireland. He had asserted, and endeavoured by fabricated evidence to prove the existence of a plot against the Government, whose leaders were, as he declared, Sir Phelim Mac Hugh O’Byrne, a large Wicklow land-owner, and his six sons. Falkland had already attempted to overreach the O’Byrnes in a certain transaction concerning land, but had not succeeded, and this accusation was his revenge, as well as a method, should it prove successful, of reaping profit for himself. The O’Byrnes, brought before a jury consisting largely of men who coveted their estates, were of course convicted, their lands were confiscated, and they themselves imprisoned.

Certain members of the Irish Privy Council, actuated, not by love of justice or by pity for the Deputy’s victims, but rather by dislike of the Deputy himself, brought the transaction under the notice of the King, and induced him, in spite of Falkland’s remonstrances, to institute a Commission of inquiry. The revelations which followed so completely shattered Falkland’s reputation that it became necessary to recall him. The O’Byrnes had gained little, except their liberty. No compensation was given them, and their lands were nor restored. Later, they were permitted to buy back a part of their estates for the sum of £15,000.