ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the practical policies of Ussher and Bramhall prior to, during, and after what was perhaps the most important event of their careers, the 1634 Irish Convocation of the established Church. Ussher's episcopal career was characterised by absenteeism and lack of interest. From the outset the fledgling bishop already had the appearance of the bookish academic, ill-equipped for the finely balanced world of politics in which diplomacy was considered a higher virtue than the pursuit of eternal verities. One of Bramhall's first duties in Ireland was a regal visitation in his capacity as one of the King's Commissioners. On these occasions he gave Laud full and graphic accounts of the material, moral and spiritual decay he was forced to witness. The passage of the Irish articles and canons through the 1634 Convocation was the single biggest and most lasting of all the activities of the Laudian regime in Ireland.
