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Title: Ecclesiastical History of England, The Church of the Restoration, Vol. 2 of 2
Author: Stoughton, John
Language: English
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ENGLAND, THE CHURCH OF THE RESTORATION, VOL. 2 OF 2 ***
ECCLESIASTICAL
HISTORY OF ENGLAND.
=The Church of the Restoration.=
BY
JOHN STOUGHTON, D.D.
IN TWO VOLUMES--VOL. II.
[Illustration]
London:
HODDER AND STOUGHTON,
27, PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C.
MDCCCLXX.
[Illustration]
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
Popish Plot 1
Titus Oates 2
Coleman 3
Act for Excluding Roman Catholics 10
CHAPTER II.
Fall of Danby 12
New Parliament 13
The Duke of York and the Bishops 14
Archbishop Sancroft 17
Dangerfield’s Plot 21
Exclusion Bill 23
CHAPTER III.
Stillingfleet 26
Howe and Tillotson 27
Scheme of Comprehension 29
Toleration Bill 30
Oxford Parliament 31
Exclusion Bill 32
King’s Declaration 35
CHAPTER IV.
Duke of Buckingham and Howe 40
Men in Power--
Halifax 41
Rochester 43
Conway and Jenkins 43
Trial of Colledge 45
Fall of Shaftesbury 49
Persecution of Nonconformists 50
Vincent 54
Annesley and Bates 57
CHAPTER V.
Duke of Monmouth 60
Royal Despotism 63
Rye House Plot 64
Lord Russell 65
Death of Owen 70
Persecution of Nonconformists--
Heywood 71
Rosewell 72
Delaune 73
Bampfield 75
CHAPTER VI.
French Protestants 76
Cabinet Meetings 82
William Jenkyn 84
Charles’ Court 85
Scenes at Whitehall 86
Death of Charles II. 87
CHAPTER VII.
James II. 89
Alterations in the Ministry 92
Trial of Baxter 95
Monmouth’s Rebellion 97
Alicia Lisle 98
Elizabeth Gaunt 99
Persecution of Nonconformists 100
CHAPTER VIII.
Changes in the Cabinet 104
Court Intrigues 105
James’ Policy 106
Declaration of Indulgence 118
Penn 125
Kiffin 127
CHAPTER IX.
The Papal Nuncio 129
Promotion of Romanists 131
Proceedings at the Universities 132
New Declaration 139
The Seven Bishops 140
Prosecution 149
Trial 153
Acquittal 155
CHAPTER X.
Development of Nonconformity 159
Presbyterians 159
Form of Church Government 160
Independents 164
Confession of Faith 166
Baptists 171
Confession of Faith 172
Quakers 177
Form of Church Government 178
CHAPTER XI.
Cathedrals 180
Churches 182
Worship 185
Ecclesiastical Revenues 190
Ecclesiastical Courts 198
Nonconformist Places of Worship 205
Relative number of Conformists and Nonconformists 207
Contrasts in Preaching 209
Superstition 213
CHAPTER XII.
Family Life amongst Nonconformists 217
Family Life amongst Episcopalians 228
Observance of the Sabbath 234
Festivals 237
Recreations 238
Charities 243
Missions 247
Universities 250
CHAPTER XIII.
Theology 259
Anglicans--
Thorndike 268
Bull 279
Heylyn 287
Taylor 289
Cosin 299
Morley 302
Bramhall 303
CHAPTER XIV.
Anglicans--
Sanderson 305
Hammond 306
Pearson 308
Barrow 311
Opinions respecting Popery 316
Opinions respecting Unepiscopal Churches 318
The Prayer Book 323
Hooker’s Works 324
Anglican Sermon Writers 328
Critics 331
CHAPTER XV.
Liberal Orthodox--
Chillingworth 334
Smith 336
Hales 338
Farindon 339
Fowler 344
Wilkins 348
Cudworth 349
Stillingfleet 352
Critics--
Lightfoot 353
Patrick 354
Science 355
CHAPTER XVI.
Latitudinarians 359
Milton 363
Biddle 365
Scargill 368
CHAPTER XVII.
Quakers--
Penn 369
Barclay 377
Other Mystics--
Saltmarsh 380
Sterry 382
Sir Henry Vane 385
CHAPTER XVIII.
Puritan Works on Evidences 386
Gale 387
Howe 389
Owen 390
Baxter 392
Puritan Theology 394
Thomas Goodwin 397
Owen 401
CHAPTER XIX.
John Goodwin 406
Horne 409
Conyers--Lawson 410
_Fur Prædestinatus_ 412
CHAPTER XX.
Baxter 414
Howe 421
Puritan Views on Sacraments and the Ministry 430
Controversy with Papists 435
Ecclesiastical Controversy 437
Practical Theology 442
Expositors 446
CHAPTER XXI.
Poetry 451
Hymnology 455
CHAPTER XXII.
Illustrations of Religious Character--
Isaak Walton 468
John Evelyn 471
Margaret Godolphin 475
Sir Matthew Hale 478
Dr. Henry More 482
Sir Thomas Browne 485
Countess of Warwick 488
CHAPTER XXIII.
Illustrations of Religious Character--(_Continued_)--
John Burnyeat 492
Joseph Alleine 494
Thomas Ewins 497
Owen Stockton 500
Dr. Thomas Jacomb 504
Sir Harbottle Grimston 505
Unity of Spiritual Life 506
APPENDIX.
I. Letter referring to Projected Insurrection. 509
II. Prayer Book attached to the Act of Uniformity. 513
III. Alterations in Prayer Book in compliance
with the Recommendation of the Puritans 521
IV. Act of Uniformity 522
V. Sealed Books 536
VI. Number of the Ejected 538
VII. Informer’s Note Book 542
VIII. Accuracy of Anecdote respecting Peter Ince 544
IX. Cecil, Lord Burleigh 545
X. MS. respecting the Death of Charles II. 546
XI. Story about Samuel Wesley 548
XII. Anglican Views on the Relations of Church
and State 549
XIII. MS. Journal of Parliamentary Proceedings,
by Lloyd, Bishop of Norwich 550
XIV. Extract from MS. Vol. in the Bodleian Library
respecting John Bunyan 555
INDEX 556
CHAPTER I.
We resume the thread of our History, and return to notice the progress
of the anti-Popish excitement.
[Sidenote: 1678.]
Perhaps, in the history of the civilized world, there never occurred
a period when the passions of men were more deeply moved, than in
the autumn of the year 1678, when England was startled from side to
side by the following extraordinary story. The Jesuits had formed a
project for the conversion of Great Britain to the Roman Catholic
faith; and £10,000 had been procured to assist in carrying out their
plans. With this project was blended a conspiracy to assassinate the
King, who was to be poisoned by the Queen’s physician; failing which,
he was to be shot with bullets; and, if that did not succeed, he was
to be stabbed with a large knife. With a feeble attempt at wit it was
said, if he would not become R.C., a Roman Catholic, he should be no
longer C.R., Charles Rex. Twenty thousand Catholics in London were to
rise within twenty-four hours, and cut the throats of the Protestant
inhabitants; eight thousand were to take up arms in Scotland; and, of
course, in Ireland the professors of the ancient religion, possessed
of enormous influence, meant to have it all their own way. The Crown
was to be offered to the Duke of York, upon certain conditions; and
if James refused, then, it was elegantly said, “to pot he must
go also.” Amongst other means certain Jesuits were instructed to
“carry themselves like Nonconformist ministers, and to preach to the
disaffected Scots, the necessity of taking up the sword for the defence
of liberty of conscience.” Seditious preachers and catechists were
to be sent out, and directed when and what to preach in private and
public conventicles, and field meetings. The Society in London intended
to knock on the head Dr. Stillingfleet and Matthew Pool, for writing
against them; and Croft, Bishop of Hereford, was doomed to death as
an apostate. A second conflagration in the City of London formed an
element in this scheme of wholesale destruction; and, in anticipation
of the success of the design, the Pope had prepared a list of the
priests to succeed the Bishops and other dignitaries, who were to be so
speedily swept away. The author of this intelligence was the notorious
Titus Oates, who professed to have picked it up at St. Omer’s, at
Valladolid, at Burgos, and at a tavern in the Strand, where, owing to
his pretended conversion and zeal in the Catholic service, the Jesuits
had entrusted him with their deepest secrets.
The first communication of the story staggered everybody. The King did
not know what to make of it. Danby, though inclined to use anything
he could for party purposes, hardly credited this amazing revelation.
Yet, incredible as it may appear, no means seem to have been used at
the outset to sift the matter to the bottom.[1] Therefore the tale came
to be looked at as credible, and, when Oates, on Michaelmas Eve, came
before the Council, and began his unprecedented story, he found ready
listeners. The items which he specified, with names and dates minutely
mentioned, certainly wore a plausible appearance; and, presently, two
circumstances occurred, which, at the time, obtained for his reports
all but universal credence.
[Sidenote: POPISH PLOT.]
The first of these circumstances was the sudden death of a magistrate,
Sir Edmondbury Godfrey, to whom Oates had made some of his statements
before divulging the whole to the Council. This magistrate was found
dead in a ditch near Primrose Hill, with a sword plunged in his body,
and marks of strangulation on his neck. A cry instantly rose, and ran
through London and the country, that Sir Edmondbury, who was famed for
his Protestant zeal, had been murdered by the Papists on account of his
receiving Oates’ deposition. The plot, it was argued, must be real, or
such a deed would not have been committed by the Roman Catholics. What
could the object of the murder be, but to take revenge on the exposers
of the conspiracy? The next circumstance which aided the prevalent
belief is found in the discovery of certain letters, in the handwriting
of one Coleman, addressed to Père la Chaise--the famous Jesuit, who
has given his name to the Cemetery at Paris--in which letters,
unmistakable allusions occur to designs for overthrowing Protestantism
in this country; and Coleman’s plans were at once identified with the
plot related by Titus Oates.[2]
[Sidenote: 1678.]
[Sidenote: POPISH PLOT.]
Believed by Parliament, not only by the Country party, but by the
Court party as well, believed also by the Ministers of State, and
by the dignitaries of the Church, the plot came to be regarded by
almost everybody as an unquestionable fact. The higher circles
would not tolerate any doubt of Oates’ veracity; even Burnet, with
all his Protestantism, inasmuch as he hesitated to accept Oates’
evidence, raised against himself “a great clamour:” and the Earl of
Shaftesbury, who threw himself with all his energy and eloquence into
the prosecution, declared “that all those who undermined the credit
of the witnesses were to be looked on as public enemies.”[3] In the
lower circles a conviction of the truthfulness of the accuser, and
of the guilt of the accused, prevailed to the last degree; and the
narrative related to the Council and the House of Commons, circulated
amongst eager and credulous groups, in thousands of chimney corners
during those autumn evenings. The King and the Duke of York seemed not
to believe what other people admitted. Yet the former felt obliged to
act as if he did. The reader who remembers the agitation attending
the Popish aggression more than twenty years ago, must not take even
that as a measure of the feeling awakened in 1678: perhaps nothing we
have ever seen could be a parallel to what our fathers experienced
at that time. Even the heavens were imagined to sympathize in the
abounding alarm: a fog, after Godfrey’s death, gave to the day on
which it occurred the name of _Black Sunday_; and a respectable
Nonconformist speaks of it growing so dark, all on a sudden, about
eleven in the forenoon, that ministers could not read their notes in
their pulpits without the help of candles,--no uncommon occurrence,
one would think, in the month of November. Not a house, he informs us,
could be found unfurnished with arms, nor did anybody go to bed without
apprehensions of something tragical which might happen before the next
morning.[4] People gave the martyred magistrate--for so they considered
Godfrey--a public funeral, after having for two days publicly exhibited
his wounded remains in his own house. An immense crowd followed him to
the grave, the corpse being preceded by seventy-two clergymen in their
robes; and, on its arrival at the church of St. Martin’s-in-the-Fields,
the Incumbent, Dr. Lloyd, afterwards Bishop of St. Asaph, delivered
a sermon in honour of the slain confessor. A Protestant festival had
long been kept on the 17th of November, Queen Elizabeth’s birthday;
and this year an effigy of the Pope with the Devil whispering in his
ear--and models of Godfrey’s dead body, and of Romish Bishops and
priests in mitres and copes--were carried through the streets, to
inflame to the highest pitch the prevalent indignation against the
Church of Rome. Daniel Defoe was then a mere boy, and looked with
wonder upon what passed before him; and, in after years, told how old
City blunderbusses were burnished anew; how hats and feathers, and
shoulder belts, and other military gear, came into fashion again; how
the City train-bands appeared rampant, and how soldiers disturbed
meeting-houses, even murdering people, under pretence that they would
not stand at their command.[5] Justice, or injustice, showed itself
swift in apprehending Roman Catholics. Two thousand suspected persons
are said to have been imprisoned, the houses of Roman Catholics were
searched for arms, and it is computed that as many as 30,000 recusants
were driven to a distance of ten miles from Whitehall. Within little
more than two months of the first whisper of the conspiracy, Stayley,
a banker, accused of sharing in it, died on the gallows at Tyburn, and
Coleman perished on the scaffold about a week afterwards.[6] Three more
victims followed the next month, all of them to the last declaring
their innocence. Oates at the same time went about dressed in gown and
cassock, wearing a large hat with a silk band and rose, and attended by
guards to secure him from Popish violence. Lodgings at Whitehall were
assigned for his use; he received a pension of £1,200 per annum, and
was welcomed at the houses of the rich and great.[7] A large number of
pamphlets containing accounts of the plot issued from the press, whilst
pulpits rung with impassioned declamation against Popery and rebellion.
[Sidenote: 1678.]
Amongst papers belonging to the Secretary of State at that period are
memoranda of strange rumours--one that the progress in rebuilding St.
Paul’s Cathedral was suspended, from fear lest it should become a
Popish Church. There is also a note, that the Prince of Orange should
be written to, or that some communication should be made to him,
through the Ambassador at his Court, or through Sir W. Temple, to
prevent the publication in Holland of a remonstrance, and of a hellish
libel, “destructive to the Royal authority, and the fundamental laws
of the nation.” The same Collection includes a letter to the Bishop of
London from some zealous Protestant, proposing an attack on the City of
Rome, “on that side where the Vatican Palace stands, and bringing away
the library.”[8]
[Sidenote: POPISH PLOT.]
Reviewing the whole of this history, I may remark, that Titus Oates
was an utterly worthless character, and that his statements are not
entitled to the smallest belief. He had been an Anabaptist under
Cromwell, had become an orthodox clergyman at the Restoration, had
professed himself a Catholic on the Continent, had been admitted
to Jesuit colleges, and had then abjured Popery on his return to
England. All this while he conducted himself in so abominable a
manner as repeatedly to incur expulsion from the positions in which
he was placed. His tale was as absurd and incredible as his conduct
was infamous; yet, notwithstanding this circumstance, it is by no
means surprising that at the time, the story with its most improbable
details should be believed--for Englishmen were filled with alarm at
the Romanism of the Royal family, at the manifest signs of revived
activity in this island by the Jesuits, at the obvious alliance between
spiritual and political despotism, and at the then suspected, and to
us, well-known intrigues which were being carried on to overthrow
the Protestantism of this country,--and they were therefore prepared
to be the dupes of Protestant credulity. An excitement of many years’
accumulation now existed, and rumours and lies of all sorts were as
sparks sprinkled over heaps of gunpowder. As we criticize the evidence
of the plot, it will not stand for a single second. Yet, however we may
at first smile or sneer at the matter, on second thoughts, we shall
see that people only did what, probably, we should have done under
the influence of strong Protestant convictions, sharpened by terrible
memories, and goaded by equally terrible apprehensions. It would be
monstrous enough for us now to behave as did our ancestors, but we must
judge of their character in that emergency by the standard of their own
age, and according to the conditions of their own circumstances.
[Sidenote: 1678.]
Godfrey’s death is one of those mysteries permitted by Providence to
baffle our investigation, and to remain inscrutable secrets to the
end of time, stimulating a belief in the revelations and judgments
of eternity. Whichever hypothesis be adopted--that of murder or that
of suicide--grave exceptions to it may be taken. The supposition of
his having destroyed himself may be shown to be ridiculous, and also
no sufficient motive for a Papist to murder him can be assigned: the
argument, that the drops of melted wax found on the clothes of the
dead man must have been dropped by Papists, _because_ they are so
notorious for using wax candles, is ridiculous enough; yet, as in the
case of the plot, so in the case of the death brought into connection
with it, we do not wonder at the prevalent idea. All the circumstances
and antecedents of the time, the whole spirit of the age, together with
the tendencies of human nature, the readiness of men under a pressing
excitement to rush to conclusions, to interpret suspicious incidents
as demonstrations of guilt, must be taken into account as we reflect
upon the common opinion found at that period. Believing Oates’ tale,
and knowing both the Protestant zeal of Godfrey, and the consequences
to the Catholics of the explosion of the plot, zealots of the day
consistently attributed the crime of murder to the same persons to whom
they attributed the crime of treason.[9]
[Sidenote: POPISH PLOT.]
After all, there was a plot, not indeed to murder the King, but to
restore Popery. Coleman’s letters render this a fact beyond all
question, when we find him declaring “We have here a mighty work upon
our hands, no less than the conversion of three kingdoms, and by that
perhaps the subduing of a pestilent heresy, which has domineered
over great part of this northern world a long time. There never
was such hopes of success since the death of Queen Mary, as now in
our days.”[10] The designs and intrigues brought to light in this
correspondence harmonize with the purpose and spirit of the treaty
between Charles and Louis; and, therefore, we cannot wonder at the
reluctance of Charles and his brother to enter upon an inquiry into
the business, since however false might be the charge of contemplated
regicide, they knew too much, not to be aware that awkward facts
respecting French, Papal, and Jesuit schemes could be brought into
broad daylight, by searching to the bottom of this business. And it is
not unlikely that Oates might have heard at St. Omer’s, and at other
places, things uttered by some disciples of Ignatius Loyola, indicating
dark designs upon English religion and upon English liberty, which he
exaggerated immensely, and dressed up in the most frightful colours for
purposes of his own.
[Sidenote: 1678.]
Leaving this plot with its mysteries, falsehoods, and alarms, and
turning once more to the proceedings of Parliament, we find that the
sixteenth session opened on the 21st of October, just at the crisis
when the storm raised by Oates had reached its height. The King’s
speech touched lightly on the subject. Lord Chancellor Finch noticed
it with guarded phraseology, but the House of Commons at once resolved
upon an address for removing Popish recusants from the Metropolis,
and having appointed a Committee to inquire into Godfrey’s murder,
they also agreed with the Lords to request His Majesty to proclaim a
national fast.
In 1673 an Act had been passed excluding Roman Catholics from all
places of profit and trust; now a Bill was introduced to exclude
them from Parliament and from the Councils of the Sovereign.[11] By
help of the existing panic, the Bill made its way with ease; and
what is remarkable, in this measure the obligation to receive the
sacrament is not mentioned--an omission doubtless intended for the
benefit of Dissenters, whose sympathy and assistance were just then
valued by persons who had been accustomed before to treat them with
violence--but a strong declaration to the effect that Romish worship
is idolatrous was imposed, together with the Oaths of Allegiance and
Supremacy. When this Bill reached the House of Lords, Gunning, Bishop
of Ely, objected to the description and treatment of Romish worship
as idolatrous; yet his arguments on this point being met by Barlow,
Bishop of Lincoln, Gunning--although he said he could not himself adopt
the new declaration--after it became law, followed the example of his
brethren.[12]
[Sidenote: PARLIAMENT.]
The Lords looked with little favour upon a Bill which, by disqualifying
Papists from sitting in Parliament, would deprive some of their own
order of hereditary rights; notwithstanding goaded by the Commons, and
encouraged by the King, they at last without opposition passed the
measure, providing in it an exception on behalf of the Duke of York.
This exception displeased the Commons, who, above all things, desired
to remove a Roman Catholic prince from the government of the country;
and, therefore, when the Bill returned to them with its amendments, it
had to meet the most strenuous opposition from the Country party. High
words were followed not only, as in the Long Parliament, by storms of
outcries and by menaces of violence, but by actual blows; and after
a singularly angry debate, the proviso passed only by a majority of
two, and the Royal assent was given to the whole Bill with very great
reluctance.[13]
CHAPTER II.
[Sidenote: PROTESTANT OPPOSITION.]
The fall of the Earl of Danby is to be attributed to an artful
contrivance by the French Court; which, from revenge against him for
his real enmity, accomplished his ruin, by pretending that he was a
friend. By means of Montague--who laid before the House of Commons
despatches, written to him by the Minister, most unwillingly, but at
the King’s command--Louis XIV. established against Danby, charges
of intrigues with France for obtaining money, quite sufficient to
extinguish for ever all the credit which he had ever had with his own
countrymen. His plea of unwillingness to enter into his master’s policy
with regard to France, although true, proved inadequate to save him
from impeachment by the Commons, who acted upon the constitutional
principle--that the King’s Ministers are responsible for what they
perform in the King’s name. Danby, though made a victim of revenge,
and in truth, suffering “not on account of his delinquency, but on
account of his merits,” had put himself in such a false position, that
Parliament could do no otherwise than demand his removal from office.
How far the extreme step of impeachment can be justified is another
question; and, at all events, the charge of his being Popishly affected
is truly absurd. The accusation of his concealing the Popish plot,
of suppressing the evidence, and of discountenancing the witnesses,
could not be made even plausible, for though he had been sceptical at
first respecting the story told by Oates, as any sensible man might
well be, he had afterwards fully committed himself to the proceedings
against the accused Papists; yet perhaps there is some truth in an
amusing passage written by one who cherished strong prejudices against
him:--“The Earl of Danby thought he could serve himself of this plot
of Oates, and accordingly endeavoured at it; but it is plain that he
had no command of the engine, and instead of his sharing the popularity
of nursing it, he found himself so intrigued that it was like a wolf
by the ears: he could neither hold it nor let it go, and for certain
it bit him at last, just as when a barbarous mastiff attacks a man, he
cries ‘poor cur,’ and is pulled down at last.”[14]
The resolution of the Commons on the 19th of December, 1678, to impeach
the Lord Treasurer, was followed by a prorogation on the 30th, and a
dissolution on the 24th of January, 1679; this Parliament having then
sat for the long space of eighteen years.
[Sidenote: 1679.]
The King immediately summoned a new Parliament, to meet at the end of
forty days; and again, as in 1661, a general election took place under
circumstances of immense excitement. Protestants believed the cause of
the Reformation to be in imminent danger from the Popish tendencies
of the King, from the avowed Romanism of the Duke of York, from the
intrigues of France, and from the want of principle in public men.
Therefore, multitudes rushed to the poll with the idea, that only
by voting for unmistakable and zealous Protestants, could they save
England from being dragged back to the condition in which she was
found before the Reformation. Thousands of horsemen rode into cities
and county towns to record their names in favour of the Established
Church. People had to sleep in market-places, to lie like sheep around
market crosses.[15] Candidates were chaired at midnight with the bray
of trumpets and a blaze of torches; but with all this Protestant
enthusiasm, elections could not be carried without bribery, treating,
and corruption. Horses were demanded in proportion to the number of
electors; there occurred an enormous consumption of beer, bread, and
cakes at Norwich; and as for the Knight of the Shire of Surrey, “they
ate and drank him out near to £2,000, by a most abominable custom.”[16]
Popular candidates pledged to oppose the Court against Popery succeeded
almost everywhere.
Scarcely had the shouts which hailed these returns died away, when a
remarkable interview took place between certain dignitaries of the
Church and the Popish heir to the throne.
As the Duke of York’s religious opinions had increasingly attracted the
attention and excited the alarm of the nation at large, the rulers of
the Church shared in the anxiety, and were very desirous, if possible,
to see him reclaimed from the Roman communion. The origin of a project,
with the view of accomplishing this purpose, is ascribed to the new
Archbishop of Canterbury.
[Sidenote: PROTESTANT OPPOSITION.]
Upon the death of Sheldon, William Sancroft, at the time Prolocutor
to the Lower House of Convocation, was elevated to the primacy, for
reasons differently stated by different persons. Probably, in this
case, the reason is to be found in his unambitious spirit and in his
amiable disposition, as suggested by Dryden:
“Zadoc the priest, whom, shunning power and place,
His lowly mind advanced to David’s grace.”
If it was supposed that he would become the pliant tool of the Monarch;
events at the Revolution contradicted the idea, and the circumstances
now to be described show that the Archbishop, after his exaltation,
determined to act as a zealous Protestant. He, with his aged brother,
Morley, of Winchester, and not without the consent of the King,
obtained an audience from His Royal Highness, and delivered to him
an address on the subject of reconversion. Sancroft spoke of the
Church of England as most afflicted, a lily amongst thorns, bearing
on her body the marks of the Lord Jesus--the scars of old, and the
impressions of new wounds. But the greatest amongst the multitude of
her sorrows was, the speaker said, that the Duke should forsake her
fellowship, after the education which he had received, and after the
solemn charge which his dying father gave his elder brother, touching
the duty of everlasting fidelity to the Established Church. The Duke
was described by the Primate as the bright morning and evening star,
which arose and set with the sun, but he had withdrawn his light; and
now the two Bishops, who had undertaken to plead with him in the cause
of Protestantism, assured His Royal Highness of their intercessions on
his behalf, and asked whether, with his noble and generous heart, he
would throw back these prayers? They inquired, if those to whom he had
surrendered himself, had not renounced reason and common sense, and
really taught him to put out his own eyes, that they might lead him
whither they would? His case did not seem hopeful to his Protestant
advisers, yet they declared that they had too good an opinion of his
understanding, to believe that he would sell himself at so cheap a
rate. Nothing of such moment as religion was to be huddled up in a
dark and implicit manner. It was his duty to “prove all things, and
hold fast that which is good.” The prelates offered their assistance,
referred to plain texts and obvious facts “in a hundred books,” and
then concluded their address with this syllogism: “That Church which
teacheth and practiseth the doctrines destructive of salvation is
to be relinquished. But the Church of Rome teacheth and practiseth
doctrines destructive of salvation. Therefore the Church of Rome is to
be relinquished.”[17]
[Sidenote: 1679.]
This speech, in which compliments and reproofs oddly struggle with each
other, and which ends with a logical formula, perfectly impotent under
the circumstances, bears upon it traces of Sancroft’s ornate but feeble
style of thought and expression. It produced no effect; and the Royal
auditor, after saying that it would be presumptuous, in an illiterate
man like himself, to enter into controversial disputes with persons of
learning, politely dismissed the Bishops, pleading that the pressure
of business prevented further discussion.[18] The strain of remark on
the one side, the mode of reply on the other, and the interchange of
courtesies between the two parties, present a striking contrast to the
conversations between John Knox and the Duke’s great-grandmother. The
Archbishop of Canterbury appears much more amiable than the Scotch
Presbyterian Reformer; and James is much more prudent than Mary Queen
of Scots: but how tame and lifeless appears all the smooth eloquence
of the Primate, compared with the burning words of the Elijah-like
Presbyterian; and how unimpressible is the saturnine Prince, compared
with the modern Jezebel, who wept and stormed at Holyrood.
[Sidenote: SANCROFT.]
No doubt can exist of Sancroft’s sincere opposition to Popery. Wilkins,
in his _Concilia_, gives, in addition to Royal proclamations on
that subject, a letter written by the Primate to the Bishop of London,
dated April 9, 1681, in which he requires that the three canons against
Popish recusants, agreed upon in the Synod of London in 1605, namely,
the 65th, the 66th, and the 114th, should be put in use, considering,
he says, in language then so current on that topic, “how acceptable
a service it will be to Almighty God, to assist His Majesty’s pious
purpose herein; and, on the other side, how severe a punishment, the
last canon of the three appoints, to those who shall neglect their duty
herein.”[19] It is remarkable, that after the death of Sheldon, we
find in Wilkins, no more documents enforcing the execution of the laws
against Nonconformists; an omission which indicates the very different
disposition of the new occupant of the see, from that which had been
manifested by his predecessor.
[Sidenote: 1678–80.]
In the affairs of his own Church, Sancroft endeavoured to effect some
useful reforms and improvements. Considerable laxity prevailed in the
admission of candidates to holy orders, testimonials to character
being often signed as a mere form, without sufficient knowledge of
the persons in whose favour they were given. To check this injurious
practice, Sancroft, in the month of August, 1678,[20] sent directions
to his suffragans, that thenceforth such recommendations should be
more carefully prepared, should contain fuller particulars, and
should be more cautiously used. The poverty of vicarages, and other
small ecclesiastical benefices, still continued: the augmentation of
them was an old remedy, the failure of schemes for the purpose an old
disappointment. Even the Act in relation to this matter in 1676, had
been carried into only partial execution; and, therefore, many of the
difficulties, so long complained of by the clergy, still remained.
Consequently, Sancroft, in the year 1680, sent an appeal to the Bishops
of his province, urging strongly the application of the Act; and
requiring every Bishop, Dean, and Archdeacon to send particulars of
all the augmentations made by them or their predecessors.[21] What he
recommended to others he practised himself, for he liberally improved
many of the livings in his gift. The chronic disease of the Church
forced itself on the Archbishop’s attention: many unsuitable persons
being appointed to benefices, and private advantage taking precedence
of public welfare, among the motives deciding the administration
of patronage. As a cure to some extent, Charles issued a warrant,
constituting the Archbishop, the Bishop of London, and four laymen
proper and competent judges of men deserving to be preferred, and
forbidding the Secretary of State to apply to the Royal fountain of
favour, for the bestowment of ecclesiastical preferments, without first
communicating with this council of reference.[22] What share Sancroft
had in the origin or the execution of the plan we do not know; but
the object was one which, from what we learn of his character, would
commend itself to his judgment. The practice of simony continued,
and an Archdeacon of Lincoln, convicted of that offence in the
ecclesiastical court, petitioned the King for pardon;--upon the
petition being referred to Sancroft, he replied that the crime of
which the man had been convicted, was “a pestilence that walketh in
darkness,” and that if he were saved from punishment, the markets of
Simon Magus would be more frequented than ever.[23]
[Sidenote: TEMPLE.]
After the impeachment and imprisonment of the Earl of Danby, in spite
of Royal endeavours to screen him, His Majesty being then left without
an adviser, sent for Sir William Temple, and appointed him Secretary
of State, in the room of Coventry. This ingenious politician proposed,
that there should be a Council, consisting of thirty members, fifteen
of them to be Officers of State, chosen by the King; the other
fifteen, popular leaders of the two Houses. The idea was, to blend
the Government and the Opposition together, or, rather, to prevent
the existence of any opposition at all.[24] The Council of statesmen
formed on this model included, on the one hand, Essex, Sunderland,
and Halifax--men attached to Court interests, in favour with the
King, and suspected by the people; and on the other hand, the Earl
of Shaftesbury, a leading spirit of the old Cabal, now an extreme
opponent of the Court policy, and Lord William Russell, an eminently
zealous Protestant, and popular Member of the House of Commons. The
last two names are interwoven from the beginning, with the popular plan
for setting aside the Duke of York--the first three Ministers being
entirely opposed to it, and advocating the legitimate succession, with
certain safeguards for the protection of Protestantism. This division
of opinion in the Council reflected and magnified itself in the
divisions of Parliament.
[Sidenote: 1679.]
Parliament met in March. The King and such Ministers as agreed with
him, proposed terms of compromise in reference to the succession.
The Chancellor, in April, stated that His Majesty was willing to
distinguish a Popish from a Protestant successor; and so to limit the
authority of the latter in reference to the Church, that all benefices
in the gift of the Crown should be conferred in such a manner as to
ensure the appointment of pious and learned Protestants.[25] Other
restrictions of a political kind were proposed, which, as Charles said,
would “pare the nails” of a Popish King.
The Exclusion Bill was carried by the Commons in the month of May, but
the effect was neutralized by a sudden prorogation of Parliament before
the month had expired.[26] Parliament being dissolved by proclamation
on the 12th of July, a new one was called for the following October.
[Sidenote: DANGERFIELD’S PLOT.]
The fourth Parliament of Charles II. met in October, 1679, and, after
repeated prorogation, assembled for the despatch of business in
October, 1680. Another informer just at that time rose to notoriety,
whose name deserves to be coupled with that of Oates. Dangerfield is
represented as a handsome young man, whom profligacy and debt brought
within the walls of Newgate, where he was visited by a Roman Catholic
woman named Cellier, one “who had a great share of wit, and was
abandoned to lewdness.”[27] The man professed to become a convert to
her religion, and, through the influence of his new friend with persons
at Court, obtained an introduction to the Duke of York, into whose ears
he poured tales of treason. This time a plot was attributed to the
Presbyterians, who, according to Dangerfield, were raising forces to
overthrow the Government. James gave the man twenty guineas; Charles
ordered an additional reward of forty. The adventurer, finding his
trade so gainful, determined to push his object further. He lodged an
information at the Custom House against Colonel Mansel, a Presbyterian,
whom he charged with being the quarter-master of the army of revolt;
but the revenue officers, on searching his house, found not what they
expected, but only a bundle of papers behind the bed. The papers
were plainly treasonable; not less plainly did they bear signs of
forgery. The accused traced home the infamous trick to the unprincipled
informer. Dangerfield, once more committed to Newgate, not for debt,
but for something worse, now changed his story, and declared that, at
the instigation of Cellier and Lady Powis, who had become mixed up in
the affair, he had engaged in a sham plot, as a cover for a real one.
Though no Presbyterian conspiracy existed, there was, he affirmed, a
Popish one, and a proof of the former being a fiction might be obtained
from a bundle of papers secreted in a meal tub. The meal was searched,
the papers were found; they demonstrated the artifice, and the trumpery
contrivance has gained a place in history under the title of the “Meal
Tub Plot.” Powis and Cellier were now, in their turn, imprisoned.
The grand jury ignored the bill against the former, and the latter
obtained an acquittal at the Old Bailey. Dangerfield received a pardon;
yet, though all three at the time escaped the penalties of the law,
Dangerfield subsequently received a cruel whipping for the crime of
perjury.[28] This miserable creature has been represented either as a
tool employed by the Catholics to retaliate upon the friends of Titus
Oates, or as a tool employed by the friends of Titus Oates to decoy
Catholics into an attempt at injuring the Presbyterians. The former is
the Protestant, the latter the Catholic hypothesis. Neither of them
seems satisfactory; the latter is almost incredible. At all events,
every reader must see that tissues of lies were woven in those days as
unaccountably and as plentifully as spiders’ webs in autumn nights.
[Sidenote: 1680.]
Whilst these plots were common talk, and indignation against Romanism
was fomented in a thousand ways, the Corporation of Bristol made the
following presentment:--
[Sidenote: EXCLUSION BILL.]
We lament that “at this time more heats and animosities should be
fomented among us, than hath been since His Majesty’s most happy
restoration, which gives us just cause to suspect, however such men
cover themselves under the umbrage of zeal and religion, that they are
influenced by Jesuitical principles. For the Jesuits have not a fairer
prospect of bringing us under the tyranny of Rome, than by continuing
and carrying on of differences among ourselves. _Divide et impera_
is their maxim. From this evil spirit and principle this city hath been
represented as ill inclined to His Majesty’s person and Government,
our worthy mayor, a person of unquestionable loyalty to the King, and
of exemplary zeal for the Church, [being] traduced as fanatically
disposed, and all those true sons of the Church of England who have any
moderation towards Dissenting Protestants, to be more dangerous to the
Church than the Papists themselves, when we cannot but think that a
hearty union among all Protestants is now more than ever necessary to
preserve us from our open and avowed enemy.”[29]
Union amongst Protestants at such a time seemed to be dictated by
reason and policy, but Churchmen who looked with neighbourly kindness
upon Nonconformists were apt to be suspected of laxity of principle and
a want of zeal; and the very paper from which I have given an extract
is endorsed as a “seditious presentment.”
[Sidenote: 1680.]
In the month of October, the Exclusion Bill reappeared and passed,
all the argument and eloquence of the members from day to day,
through long sittings, being devoted to this question. Interwoven
with the debate from beginning to end, like dark threads in shot
silk, are references to the recent Popish plot and its attendant
circumstances. Whilst treated as a legal and political question,[30]
its ecclesiastical bearings were most prominent and most vital, in the
estimation of zealous Protestants both within and outside the walls
of Parliament.[31] The central point in this controversy, whatever
might be its political relations, and however it might be mixed up
with party interests, was of a religious nature. Had the Church not
been united with the State, had all Christian congregations been left
to their own resources, and been exempt from Government control,
the case would have been very different, though even then religious
considerations would have certainly become mixed up with the question;
but, as it was, with such an interlacing between things political and
things ecclesiastical, with the King as supreme temporal Ruler of the
Church, and Defender of the Faith, to have a Roman Catholic placed in
that position justly appeared to Protestants not merely as inexpedient,
but as totally unreasonable and absurd. The ecclesiastical argument
formed the stronghold of the exclusion policy, and its opponents
could by no sophistry overturn it. Still they had much to say. They
praised the Duke as a man of ability, who had fulfilled important naval
duties, and deserved well of his country. The attempt to set such a
man aside, a man with so much decision of purpose, and with so many
friends, they contended, would incur the risk of plunging Great Britain
into another civil war. And beyond all personal and national reasons
against his exclusion, they took the high ground--so dear to the Stuart
race--of the Divine right of kings, and denounced the attempt to
deprive the heir apparent of his crown as nothing short of robbery and
wickedness.[32]
[Sidenote: EXCLUSION BILL.]
The Bill carried in the House of Commons met an adverse fate in the
House of Lords. Shaftesbury did his utmost for its support, and the
Country party amongst the peers gallantly rallied around him, but after
a telling speech from the Earl of Halifax, the measure was defeated by
63 against 30. The division took place at the then late hour of eleven
o’clock at night, the King being present, and the whole being described
as “one of the greatest days ever known in the House of Lords.”[33]
In the large majority against the second reading, appeared no less
than fourteen Bishops, who, for the course they adopted, were charged
with tearing “out the bowels of their Mother the Church.” They upheld
the doctrine of Divine right, in opposition to the Protestant zeal
of the day, which looked in a different direction, and they thought
that limitations, such as the King and the Court party were willing to
impose upon the legitimate successor to the crown, would suffice to
preserve the Reformed Church in its integrity and its supremacy.
CHAPTER III.
To prevent breaking the continuity of the narrative, an incident has
been passed over requiring some notice.
Upon the 2nd of May, 1680, Dr. Stillingfleet preached a sermon before
the Lord Mayor and Aldermen of the City of London, and the Judges
and Sergeants-at-law. The subject of discourse being “The Mischief
of Separation,” he treated his audience with an invective against
Dissenters as schismatics, who had rent the Church in twain; and he
represented them as reduced to this dilemma--“that though the really
conscientious Nonconformist is justified in not worshipping after the
prescribed forms of the Church of England, or rather would be criminal
if he did so, yet he is not less criminal in setting up a separate
assembly.”[34] Victims so impaled were in a wretched condition, and
no one can wonder that they made an effort to extricate themselves.
They did so with success, and if not always with perfect good temper,
nobody can severely blame them for that. Owen wrote with “great gravity
and seriousness.” Baxter was very “particular, warm, and close.” Alsop
briskly turned upon the preacher “his own words and phrases.”[35]
Stillingfleet’s _Irenicum_, published in 1659, had shown that
no form of Church government could be _jure divino_, a position
of which his opponents now took advantage, whilst they failed not to
ply the _argumentum ad hominem_. “A person of quality” sent to
John Howe the printed sermon, enclosing with it severe remarks. Howe,
with calm impartiality, such as nettles a partisan of either extreme
more than any stinging attacks can do, immediately expressed his
intention “of defending the cause of the Nonconformists against the
Dean, and then of adding something in defence of the Dean against his
correspondent.”[36] The reply which he produced is one of the most
beautiful specimens of controversy in existence. Stillingfleet was
subdued when he read it, and confessed that Howe discoursed “more like
a gentleman than a Divine, without any mixture of rancour, or any sharp
reflections, and sometimes with a great degree of kindness towards him,
for which, and his prayers for him, he heartily thanked him.”[37]
[Sidenote: TILLOTSON.]
The year proved unfortunate for the consistency of Divines of the
Liberal school, for Tillotson also committed himself. Preaching a
sermon at Court he maintained the monstrous position “that no man is
obliged to preach against the religion of his country, though a false
one, unless he has the power of working miracles.” “It is a pity your
Majesty slept,” observed a Courtier at the close of the service, “for
we have had the rarest piece of Hobbism that ever you heard in your
life.” “Odsfish!” rejoined Charles, “he shall print it then.” Howe once
more came forward with reproof and expostulation. He regretted that
the Dean should have pleaded “the Popish cause against the Fathers of
the Reformation;” and as the Nonconformist was riding with his friend
to see Lady Falconbridge at Sutton Court, he so touched the heart of
the Church dignitary, that the latter bursting into tears, confessed
that it “was the unhappiest thing which had for a long time happened to
him;” and pleaded in excuse of his great error, the haste with which he
had prepared his discourse, and the alarm produced in his mind by the
spread of Popery.[38]
[Sidenote: 1680.]
[Sidenote: COMPREHENSION.]
Perhaps these circumstances had some influence in producing another
useless attempt at comprehension at the close of the year 1680,
inasmuch as we shall find Howe in consultation with the two Divines
just mentioned touching the subject. Howe met Bishop Lloyd at
Tillotson’s house.[39] The Bishop asked what would satisfy the
Nonconformists, if an attempt should be made to adjust the differences
between them and the Church. Howe observed “as all had not the same
latitude, he could only answer for himself.” What concessions, he was
further asked, would, in his opinion, satisfy the scruples of the
greater number--for, added Lloyd, “I would have the terms so large
as to comprehend the most of them.” Howe declared that he thought “a
very considerable obstacle would be removed, if the law were so framed
as to enable ministers to attempt parochial reformation.” “For that
reason,” said the Bishop, “I am for abolishing the lay Chancellors as
being the great hindrance to such reformation.”[40] The next evening
Howe and Bates, with Tillotson, met at the Deanery of St. Paul’s, where
Stillingfleet had provided a handsome entertainment for his visitors.
Lloyd, though expected, did not join the party, being prevented by
a division in the House of Lords, upon the Exclusion Bill. Whatever
the bearing of these circumstances might be upon what followed, there
appeared in Parliament three days afterwards (November 18) a scheme of
comprehension.
The second reading of the Bill, embodying the scheme, occasioned a
debate, which went over well-worn topics, and presents no points of
interest.
The measure emanated from the Episcopalian party in the House of
Commons; but the Presbyterian members, to the amazement of every one,
did not promote it. They knew it could not be carried in the House of
Lords; and the clergy, as Kennet confesses, were “no further in earnest
than as they apprehended the knife of the Papists” to be near their
throats.[41]
The Bill dropped--what else could be expected, there being on one side
no earnestness in making the offer, and on the other no disposition to
accept it?[42]
[Sidenote: 1680–81.]
With the Bill founded on the principle of comprehension another was
brought forward, based on the principle of toleration. It proposed to
exempt Protestant Dissenters “from the penalties of certain laws.”[43]
The measure made way through the House of Commons, and it forced itself
through the House of Lords;[44] but because distasteful to the King on
account of its limiting toleration to Protestant Nonconformists, it was
put aside by some contemptible trick, when other Bills were presented
for the Royal assent.[45]
On the day of the prorogation, the Commons by a formal resolution
pronounced the prosecution of Protestant Dissenters to be a
grievance to the subject, a detriment to the Protestant interest, an
encouragement to Popery, and a danger to the kingdom’s peace.[46]
However strange it is to find such a resolution in the Journals, after
a Bill had been carried through the two Houses to the same effect a few
days before, the fact may be explained by the circumstance that the
Commons had become aware of the foul play practised on these cherished
measures. It seems incredible, but such was the factious spirit
existing, that the Court and High Church party--who were prepared to
vindicate, or to wink at all kinds of excesses in the despotism of the
Crown--positively objected to the resolution, as an unconstitutional
method of invalidating Acts of Parliament.[47]
[Sidenote: OXFORD PARLIAMENT.]
Charles II. dissolved his fourth Parliament on the 18th of January,
1681, and summoned a fifth to meet at Oxford on the 21st of March.[48]
This fifth Parliament opened amidst great excitement. The members for
London, who had sat before, received the thanks of the citizens for
searching into the Popish plot, and for supporting the Comprehension,
the Toleration, and the Exclusion Bills. They rode to the City
on the banks of the Isis, attended by a large body of horsemen,
with ribbons stuck in their hats, displaying the watchwords, “No
Popery--No Slavery.” Other members received similar addresses, and
proceeded to the scholastic halls,--for the occasion transferred into
senate-houses,--stirred by the conviction that a great political and
ecclesiastical crisis had arisen. Met by the King with gracious but
hollow sayings of the accustomed stamp, Parliament did not pass over
the recent breach of decency committed in reference to the Toleration
Bill, and reflections not more sharp than just were uttered by Liberal
members. It was said, that those who charged the Country party with
being Republicans were Revolutionists themselves, like thieves in a
crowd, crying “Gentlemen, have a care of your pockets;”[49] that if
Bills could be so thrown away the Commons vainly spent their time in
passing them, and that what had been done inflicted a heavy blow on
the English Constitution. The Commons requested a conference with the
Lords, and took up the subject with spirit, declaring, as recorded in
the _Lords’ Journals_, an intention to search out the accomplices
in the piece of impudent knavery, which had just been practised on
their own House.[50] Another Bill of Exclusion made its appearance, and
another debate on Popery arose; but a dissolution within one week put
an end to all Parliamentary inquiry, and extinguished all Parliamentary
discussion.
[Sidenote: 1681.]
Amidst much false alarm, and much popular folly, there existed a
reasonable antipathy to the superstition and intolerance of Rome; the
return of Papal ascendancy being, at that moment, no unreasonable
object of fear; for with it would have inevitably arrived a new reign
of civil and spiritual despotism. Protestantism on the one side, and
Popery on the other, stood face to face in irreconcilable conflict; and
during the storm which raged from one end of the Island to the other,
there came into play two famous party watchwords, which, though in our
time they have become nearly superseded, are not yet wholly swept out
of existence. It is curious to notice that “Whig” and “Tory”--names
then and since appropriated to political uses--had a religious origin:
Whig being the title coined to fit the Presbyterian Covenanters of
Scotland, suspected of anti-Monarchical principles; and “Tory” being
meant to designate the Roman Catholic Irishmen, who seized the property
of English settlers, and whose religion was considered most favourable
to despotism.
[Sidenote: EXCLUSION BILL.]
Whilst, in these days of enlightenment and of perfectly altered
circumstances, we can see how, without sacrificing universal religious
liberty, we can protect ourselves against the danger of Papal
ascendancy and despotism, should that danger again threaten us, it
is proper to take into account the whole case respecting the conduct
of our ancestors in the last two Stuart reigns, and to remember that
they dreaded such broad toleration, because they apprehended it would
lead to the supremacy of Romanism; and they could not see how it was
possible, in this case, to concede liberty without opening a gate
for the entrance of injustice. There was wisdom in the end they kept
in view, though there was error in the method they employed for its
attainment.
[Sidenote: 1681.]
It is ridiculous to look upon the Earl of Shaftesbury as the Æolus
who let loose the anti-Papal winds. He doubtless availed himself of
the public favour to accomplish ends of his own, and the elevation
of the Duke of Monmouth to the honour of legitimacy and heirship was
with him a favourite idea, equally absurd and mischievous; but the
desire, prevalent for a time, of cutting off the entail of the crown
from the King’s brother, was no creation of a single person, but the
offspring of public sentiment, and the outgrowth of years on years.
Indignation against Popery, and the support of an Exclusion Bill,
intimately connected as cause and effect, were two distinct things: but
although the former continued in unabated force, the latter dwindled
away, and the nation came to acquiesce, so far as the succession to
the throne was concerned, in the policy of the Court. The reasons
are easily assigned. Popular falsehoods respecting the Popish plots
exploded in disgrace, and honest folks saw they had been deceived
by knaves. From dislike to Rome, her doctrines, her polity, and her
worship, some diseased secretions, which had gathered over feeling,
came to be rubbed off. Romanists had been found less desperate plotters
than had been dreamed. Limitations upon the descent of the crown
appeared more efficacious than they had done before. The probability
of another Civil War, if James were excluded, alarmed many; personal
sympathy with a Sovereign required to perform so unnatural an act as
that of disinheriting a brother, prevailed with more; and perhaps,
considering the Royal ages, the uncertainty of the contemplated
emergency influenced most. In this last respect, a manifest difference
exists between the policy of an Exclusion Bill founded on a contingency
which might never occur, and the policy of a Revolution based upon
the despotic proceedings of an actual King. That these reasons proved
effective is plain; whether they were valid and wise is another
point. The sequel showed a Revolution to be inevitable. To have
anticipated the event of 1688 might have saved England some trouble
and much suffering; but England has always been slow to depart from
constitutional principles, and has always loved to stand as long as
possible “in the old ways.” The conflict which opened in 1643 had been
put off until it could be put off no longer: and the men of the second
half of the seventeenth century were, as it regarded an unwillingness
to come to extremities, just like their fathers of the first. What
really followed the departure from the scheme of Exclusion justified
some of the worst fears of its supporters. The Duke was restored to his
former position, and carried things with a high hand.[51]
[Sidenote: KING’S DECLARATION.]
After the dissolution of Parliament at Oxford, the King, by the advice
of Halifax, published a Declaration, explaining the reasons which
induced him to take that critical step. He charged the Commons with
arbitrary orders; with bringing forward accusations on mere suspicion;
with unconstitutional votes, especially in support of resolutions
condemning the persecution of Dissenters, according to law; with
obstinacy in the matter of the Exclusion Bill; with a design of
changing the government of the realm; and with a determination to set
and keep at variance the two Houses of Legislature.[52] In short, he
managed, as his father had done, only with more dexterity, to cover and
defend his own unconstitutional purposes, by throwing all blame on the
Houses of Parliament.
Immediately afterwards, Archbishop Sancroft received a Royal command
to require the public reading of the Declaration in all and every the
churches and chapels within the province of Canterbury, at the time of
Divine service, upon some Lord’s Day, with all convenient speed. If we
may here believe Burnet, Sancroft, at a meeting of Council, moved that
this order should be given; remembering the habits of the Historian
of his _Own Times_, I can scarcely trust his statement, without
confirmation from some other quarter. Yet, if Sancroft did not suggest,
he certainly did not resist the publication of this document--as he
did the publication of another at a later period; and, because he
received the order for its publication, and the publication followed
accordingly, he must bear the responsibility of having sanctioned a
procedure, which really made the Church an approving herald to the
nation, of the King’s despotic policy.[53]
[Sidenote: 1681.]
High Churchmen took the opportunity of presenting to the Throne the
most obsequious and abject addresses. Our princes, said they, derive
not their title from the people, but from God; to Him alone they are
accountable: and it belongs not to subjects either to create or to
censure, but only to honour and obey their Sovereign. They besought
His Majesty to accept the tender of their hearts and hands, their
lives and fortunes. These dearest sacrifices they abjectly laid down
at Royal feet.[54] It was about the same time that Morley, Bishop of
Winchester, declared:--“If ever it might be said of any--it may now
most emphatically be said of us: Happy are the people that are in such
a case.” We have “a Government pretending to no power at all above the
King, nor to no power under the King neither, but from him, and by him,
and for him--a Government enjoining active obedience to all lawful
commands of lawful authority; and passive obedience when we cannot obey
actively, forbidding and condemning all taking up of arms, offensive or
defensive, by subjects of any quality.”[55]
The King’s Declaration was compared by a writer of later date,
reflecting upon it, to the olive branch brought by the dove into the
ark,--an indication of peace, of the abatement of popular excitement,
and of the stability of laws and religion, like the dove which had
found _ubi pedem figeret_. Warming with his subject, he calls the
Declaration “that great vision of the _Lex terræ_” long wrapped in
mists, but now revealed; and likens the addresses called forth to the
seamen’s shout on approaching land, after a stormy voyage.[56] Some of
the Tory party went mad with joy at the triumph of despotism.
[Sidenote: LOYAL ADDRESSES.]
There were not wanting utterances of a very different order. A
well-known publication, entitled, _The Conformist’s Plea for the
Nonconformists, in four parts, by a Beneficed Minister, and a regular
Son of the Church of England_, bears the date of 1681, and at the
time made much stir. The author dwells upon the sufferings of his
Dissenting brethren--their hard case, their equitable proposals, their
ministerial qualifications, their peaceable behaviour, their orthodoxy
as tested by the doctrinal articles of the Church--and the injury
inflicted on that Church by their exclusion. “Some reverend sons of
the Church,” he remarked, with a good deal of common sense, “in love
to peace, and fear of enemies, have earnestly called and exhorted
the Dissenting ejected brethren, to come and unite, to come into the
present Constitution, as safest, as strongest, as best, &c. But if
they could not come in at the narrow door eighteen years ago, and the
door as narrow still as it was then, and there be the same cross-bars
laid across, as were then to keep them out, to what purpose is the
exhortation? Is there a great storm a coming? they think that Christ
is the same ship, and they are as safe as any other. They may clearly
plead, they could have conformed at first upon better worldly terms
than now; they might have saved what they have lost, and got their
share with others; to come now to conform, when all places are full,
and not enow for numerous expectants, and when there is nothing for
them without tedious waiting; and if their judgments and consciences
could not enter then, how can they now?”[57]
[Sidenote: 1681.]
Wit is not wanting, when he asks:--“But how did these Master-Builders
proceed in the Government of their New Reformed Church? It seemed to be
built no larger than to contain one family, the genuine sons of such
fathers; there was but one narrow door of admission to it, a strong
lock upon it, and the sole power of the keys was in trusty hands, and
the sword in the hand of a friend, there was no outward apartment in it
to entertain strangers, or belonging to it; but some got a false key to
the door, as many call it, a key of a larger sense; and when some got
in, more crowded in; and so the Latitudinarian in charity, came in with
the Latitudinarian in discipline, to the no little grief of some who do
not like their company. The fathers keep above stairs, and now and then
come down among us, and send their officers to visit us, and have their
watch renewed every year to tell tales of us; and they that are without
doors, cry, If there be any love in our Governors to Christ, and His
divided flock, that we would but widen the door, and reform but ill
customs; but we say, we cannot help ourselves or them, for the law will
have it so.”[58]
CHAPTER IV.
For the credit of humanity, it should be repeated that occasional
lulls occurred in the storm of persecution during this infamous reign.
Intolerant laws sank into desuetude, and merciful, or rather righteous
magistrates, neglected, or tempered their execution. Considerable
ingenuity sometimes appears in their methods of evasion. A Justice of
the Peace would ask certain informers whether they could swear that, in
a certain case, there was “a pretended, colourable, religious exercise,
in other manner than according to the liturgy and practice of the
Church of England,” and would caution them to consider that, if they
swore in the affirmative, they must know exactly what the liturgy and
the Church really were. He would also demand whether the informers were
present all the time during which the service lasted, for if they were
not, how could they be sure the Common Prayer was not used? An instance
is not wanting in which such an ingenious Justice dismissed both
parties, and sent the case to counsel for opinion, who decided that he
had done quite right.[59]
[Sidenote: 1677–80.]
During the year 1677, and for two or three years afterwards,
Nonconformists suffered less troubles than they had done before, owing
in part to the death of Archbishop Sheldon, in part to the prevalent
fear of Popery, and in part to the change of Ministry in 1679, and the
ascendancy of Shaftesbury in His Majesty’s Councils.[60]
About the year 1680 the Duke of Buckingham, like Shaftesbury,
exceedingly ambitious of popularity, and apt to bid high for the
prize by professing great liberality of opinion, made overtures to
the Nonconformists to become their advocate. It being signified
to John Howe, that this nobleman wished to see him, the Divine
took an opportunity of calling at the sumptuous residence of the
dissolute peer, and, after some conversation, His Grace hinted that
“the Nonconformists were too numerous and powerful to be any longer
neglected; that they deserved regard, and that, if they had a friend
near the throne, who possessed influence with the Court generally, to
give them advice in critical emergencies, and to convey their requests
to the Royal ear, they would find it much to their advantage.” There
could be no mistake as to the meaning of all this; yet, at the moment
of offering himself as the political adviser of the Nonconformists,
Buckingham was pursuing that course of flagrant vice which has brought
everlasting infamy upon his name. Howe replied, with great simplicity,
“that the Nonconformists, being an avowedly religious people, it
highly concerned them, should they fix on any one for the purpose
mentioned, to choose some one who would not be ashamed of _them_,
and of whom _they_ might have no reason to be ashamed; and
that, to find a person in whom there was a concurrence of those two
qualifications, was exceedingly difficult.”[61] This answer ended the
business.
[Sidenote: RENEWED PERSECUTIONS.]
But whatever might be the temporary relief then tacitly granted, or
the patronage and protection then virtually offered to Dissenters,
a manifest change occurred in their circumstances after the Oxford
dissolution of 1681. The causes of this change require attention.
Sir William Temple’s Utopian scheme had broken down. However plausible
on paper, it had proved a failure in practice. Shaftesbury and Russell
could not work with Temple and Halifax; and in the spring of 1681 the
three former had disappeared from the Board, so also had Salisbury,
Essex, and Sunderland,--the management of affairs being chiefly in the
hands of Halifax, of Lord Radnor, of Hyde, created Lord Rochester, and
of the Secretaries of State, Jenkins and Conway.
[Sidenote: 1681.]
Halifax is described as a man of great wit, which he often employed
upon the subject of religion. “He confessed he could not swallow down
everything that Divines imposed on the world; he was a Christian in
submission, he believed as much as he could, and he hoped that God
would not lay it to his charge if he could not digest iron as an
ostrich did, nor take into his belief things that must burst him.”
Accustomed to run on in conversation after this fashion, he excited a
suspicion of his being an atheist, a charge which he utterly denied;
betraying at the same time, in the midst of sickness, some kind and
degree of spiritual feeling, whilst at other tunes he would profess
a philosophical contempt of the world, and call the titles of rank
rattles to please children.[62] The colouring of his mind was better
than the drawing. He admired justice and liberty in theory,--he gave
them up for places and titles in practice.[63] With little or no
principle of any kind, he answered Dryden’s description--
“Jotham of piercing wit and frequent thought,
Endued by nature, and by learning taught
To move assemblies; but who only tried
The worse awhile, then chose the better side.”
The last line is scarcely true, but he well merited the name of
Trimmer,[64] his constancy being confined to his warfare with the
Church of Rome. Radnor, if we are to believe Burnet, was morose and
cynical, learned but intractable, just in the administration of
affairs, yet vicious under the appearance of virtue.[65] The gossip of
the Court called him “an old snarling, troublesome, peevish fellow;”
and even Clarendon speaks of him as of “a sour and surly nature, a
great _opiniâtre_, and one who must be overcome before he would
believe that he could be so.”[66] Of the Earl of Rochester, it is
remarked by Roger North, “His infirmities were passion, in which he
would swear like a cutter, and the indulging himself in wine. But his
party was that of the Church of England, of whom he had the honour,
for many years, to be accounted the head.”[67] But North, it must
be remembered, was a man of violent prejudices, and his judgment of
contemporaries must be estimated accordingly.
[Sidenote: MEN IN POWER.]
Lord Conway was a mere official, devoted rather to pleasure than
business; and Sir Leoline Jenkins was an assiduous Secretary and a good
lawyer. According to Burnet’s report, he was “set on every punctilio
of the Church of England to superstition, and was a great asserter of
the Divine right of monarchy, and was for carrying the prerogative
high.”[68] Nonconformists could not expect any mercy or much justice
from men like these.
A fiery zeal for Protestantism continued in the month of September,
1681, when an address was presented to the Lord Mayor of London from
20,000 apprentices, touching the “devilish plots carried on by the
Papists.”[69] But before that time, the excitement which had been
produced by Oates’ informations, and which had promoted the progress of
Exclusion measures, began to subside, and a reaction in many quarters
set in against the supporters of both.[70]
[Sidenote: 1681.]
Burnet speaks of “a great heat raised against the clergy” in 1679: of
Nonconformists behaving very indecently, and of the press, in which
they had a great hand, becoming licentious against the Court and the
clergy; but he does not specify what publications are meant. The only
remarkable one mentioned by Calamy as appearing that year, is “A short
and true account of the several advances the Church of England hath
made towards Rome--or a model of the grounds upon which the Papists
for these hundred years have built their hopes and expectations, that
England would e’er long return to Popery, by Dr. Du Moulin, sometime
History Professor of Oxford.”[71] Upon reading this book, it strikes
me, that the sting is stronger in the title-page, than in the contents;
it makes out a case as to Romanist tendencies against Laud and his
party, rather than against contemporary Churchmen. At all events,
alarm existed at the time--although a book like Du Moulin’s will not
account for it--lest a new revolution should break out resembling that
which occurred at the beginning of the Long Parliament. “The Bishops
and clergy, apprehending that a rebellion, and with it the pulling
the Church to pieces, was designed, set themselves, on the other
hand, to write against the late times, and to draw a parallel between
the present times and them; which was not decently enough managed
by those who undertook the argument, and who were believed to be
set on and paid by the Court.” Burnet’s statement is very loose, for
without mentioning any book on the subject, by any Bishop,--although
he might have cited what Morley, Bishop of Winchester, wrote soon
afterwards,--he alludes to the writings of a layman, Roger L’Estrange,
who richly deserves his severest condemnation. That man did more than
any one to turn the tide of indignation into a new channel. People
“seemed now to lay down all fears and apprehensions of Popery, and
nothing was so common in their mouths, as the year ’41, in which the
late Wars begun” (they did not begin till ’42,) “and which seemed now
to be near the being acted over again. Both city and country were full
of many indecencies that broke out on this occasion.”[72] Revolutionary
designs were charged upon the Whig party generally; and Nonconformists
unjustly came in for a large share of suspicion.
[Sidenote: STEPHEN COLLEDGE.]
[Sidenote: 1681.]
The first-fruit of this reaction appears in the discovery of a
pretended new plot against the life of the King, arranged to be
executed during his stay in the City of Oxford. The person made the
scape-goat of the offence was Stephen Colledge, who had acquired some
notice as a violent Protestant, and who had mixed himself up with
Oates and the other witnesses against the convicted Papists. Colledge
being indicted at the Old Bailey, had no true Bill found against him.
Political opinions then influenced Jurymen to an extent which shocks
us now that everything is done to banish prejudice from our Courts of
Justice; and therefore the Ministers of the Crown, who managed this
prosecution, after being baffled by the Whigs, who formed the panel in
London, determined to carry the case down to Oxford, where they could
empanel a number of Tories.[73] A true bill being found at last, Chief
Justice North tried the prisoner; and, on that occasion, behaved in
such an infamous manner, that it was thought probable, if he had lived
to see another Parliament, he might have been impeached.[74] Nothing
which any lawyer would now consider treasonable, could be proved
against Colledge; yet he was convicted, condemned, and executed. The
fate of this man excited a great degree of interest at the time, he
being considered a rebel by one party, and a martyr by another. Letters
written to the Secretary of State after Colledge’s death indicate the
eager desire of the former to establish his guilt;[75] and, if we may
credit other letters, Nonconformists showed much sympathy with the
sufferer. One writer thought it very credible, that the Presbyterians
at Lewes did, against the execution of Colledge, keep a very strict
fast; and it was supposed they of Chichester did the like, but the
circumstance wanted confirmation. Another correspondent the same month
reported that the general discourse in that Cathedral City turned upon
the man’s innocence, and described how much he had been wronged, and
how his blood would cry for vengeance against the rogues who took away
his life.[76] It is a strange circumstance, but it illustrates the
irrational feeling of the moment, that some people, who were hounding
this poor fellow on to the gallows, called him a Papist, and some
called him an Anabaptist. At Colledge’s execution the Sheriff evinced
much anxiety to know whether he belonged to the Presbyterians, to the
Independents, or to the Church of England. Colledge--after having
previously declared that he never had been a Papist--replied, that
before the Restoration, he was a Presbyterian; that since then he had
conformed to the Episcopal Church, until he saw so much persecution of
Dissenters; and that, afterwards, he had attended Presbyterian meetings
“and others very seldom.” Yet he had not forsaken the Establishment
altogether; for, only three weeks before his apprehension, he had
attended the ministry of Dr. Tillotson. He wished for union, and
lamented that some of the Church of England preached that the
Presbyterians were worse than the Papists, although he was certain they
were not men of vicious lives.
[Sidenote: STEPHEN COLLEDGE.]
[Sidenote: 1681.]
It is plain, from his own words, that at the time of his being charged
with treason, Colledge was identified with Nonconformity; and, in a
letter written by some one (not known) to the Bishop of London, July
11, 1681, it is stated, that just then Nonconformists were building
several meeting-houses; and that, after the acquittal of Colledge by
the Grand Jury in London, these people grew increasingly impudent.
Before his execution, there came to him in Oxford gaol--“a fanatic,
desiring to pray with him, but being not permitted, unless he would
use the Liturgy of the Church of England, he refused.”[77] We learn
that the poor man received “the Blessed Sacrament” from Dr. Hall, to
whom he made confession.[78] That confession, or a large portion of
it, is preserved; and, in substance, it corresponds with his speech
at the gallows. He acknowledged in his confession, that he might, on
some occasions, have “uttered words of indecency, not becoming his duty
concerning the King or his Council”; and, if so, he begged their pardon,
and in his speech he admitted that he had arms in his possession; but,
said he, “they were for our own defence in case the Papists should
make any attempt upon us by way of massacre.” Both in his confession
and speech, he stoutly denied, that he had entered into any plot; nor
did any sufficient evidence of such a thing come out on his trial.
From the confession, it further appeared, that on the Sunday before
his execution, the messenger who brought word respecting the day on
which he was to die, assured him he might even then save his life, if
he would only confess who was the cause of his coming to Oxford. He
persisted in maintaining, that his coming was entirely of his own
accord, and without any treasonable intention whatever.[79]
[Sidenote: REACTION.]
At Colledge’s trial, Dugdale and Turbeville, formerly co-witnesses of
Titus Oates, appeared against him, whilst Oates himself took Colledge’s
part, and vilified his old associates. The wretched combination against
the Roman Catholics now broke up: the conspirators were quarrelling,
the house divided against itself could not stand, the Nonconformist,
who in his Protestant zeal had mixed himself up with discreditable
people, now appeared as the victim, his own eagerness to sweep away
religionists whom he disliked, had stimulated his enemies to imitation;
and, as we conclude this singular history, it is impossible to forget
the words of Divine wisdom--“With what measure ye mete, it shall be
measured to you again.”
The same reaction which destroyed the Protestant Joiner, struck
down another person who declared himself the Protestant Earl.[80]
Shaftesbury, after the dissolution of the Royal Parliament, being
accused of entering into a conspiracy against the King, found himself
within the gloomy walls of London Tower. His spirits and wit did not
forsake him; and when accosted by one of the Popish lords, whom he
had been instrumental in sending there not long before, he replied,
“that he had been lately indisposed with an ague, and was come to
take some Jesuit’s powder.” Everything which ingenuity, prompted by
malice, could suggest was done to injure in public estimation the late
popular nobleman, and to prejudice his trial. The clergy inveighed
against him as “the Apostle of Schism;” and the Catholics called him
“the Man of Sin.” By the Tories he was styled “Mephistopheles,” and
“the Fiend;” and by Dryden he was satirized in his _Absalom and
Ahitophel_. The Bill at the Old Bailey having been ignored, the
popular favourite prosecuted his accusers; and would, if he could, have
raised an insurrection against the Government. Finding that enterprise
impossible, he escaped to Holland, and died there in February, 1683,
enjoying the hospitality of the Republic, which he had threatened
to overthrow. “_Carthago_,” was their generous and graceful
retort--“_non adhuc deleta, Comitem de Shaftesbury in gremio suo
recipere vult_.”[81]
[Sidenote: 1681.]
[Sidenote: RENEWED PERSECUTION.]
The reaction went on, and began to sweep like a storm over the
Dissenting Churches. The _State Papers_, after having for
some years failed to supply illustrations of the condition of
Nonconformity, again present a pile of informations and letters,
proving the renewed activity of spies, and opening a fresh loop-hole
through which we can discover the warfare going on against “the
fanatics.” It is but just to the Government, to say, that as far
as can be discovered from these records, this persecuting activity
originated with individuals of the Tory and High Church party, who were
continually writing to Sir Leoline Jenkins, informing him of political
disaffection and of religious discontent. Loyal addresses streamed
in from counties and towns, communications arrived respecting plots
and disaffection, and complaints were also made of the non-execution
of laws against Nonconformists.[82] All the way through, the object
was to represent Nonconformists as disloyal, as traitors to their
Prince, and as wishing to bring back the days of the Republic. So
numerous, it is said, were these disaffected fanatics, that they
swarmed everywhere,--none were safe from their influence. A question
arose, whether even some of the King’s messengers were not “Meeters
at Conventicles,” or, at least, persons who kept correspondence with
such as went there.[83] Yet, amidst this chaos of informations, not the
slightest hint appears of anything like _proof_ of the existence
of a Nonconformist plot; and, indeed, for the most part, the narratives
furnished are of the idlest description, some of them written by very
illiterate persons.
[Sidenote: 1681.]
Mixed up with complaints about the Nonconformists are discreditable
allusions to Churchmen, who, for their moderation and liberality,
were suspected of being no better than schismatics. Rumours reached
Northampton that Dr. Conant had been made Prebendary of Worcester, much
to the wonder “of those who knew what, lately as well as formerly, his
actions had been;” but these rumours were contradicted, “much to the
satisfaction of all who had any kindness to the King or Church.”[84]
Waspish informers, buzzing about the ears of men of office, would under
any circumstances have been annoying. Liberally-minded men--or rather
men respecting the rights of conscience--whilst keeping their eyes
open to detect dangers threatening the State, would have crushed, or
at least have brushed away the troublesome insects; but the persons
now in power were of a different character. Their known temper as
high Churchmen and as high Tories encouraged the tribe to renew that
infamous occupation, which happily had been gone now for some few
years; and when these reports reached the Secretary, he not only
graciously received them, but with his colleagues proceeded to take
active measures against the suspected parties.
[Sidenote: RENEWED PERSECUTION.]
The names of the accused, the nature of the accusation, and allusions
to the harvest of gain incident upon their conviction, are sufficient
to prove how idle, and how much worse than idle, were the charges of
disaffection. The _State Papers_ supply proofs of the interference
of Government to remove obstacles out of the way of magistrates and
officers, who found it difficult to clothe their acts with a semblance
of legality.[85] Public documents exhibit the further activity of the
Court in the same direction at the close of this year. His Majesty
in Council ordered the Lord Mayor and Aldermen of London, and also
the magistrates of Middlesex, to use their utmost endeavours for the
suppression of Conventicles. The last-mentioned body, in the following
January (1682), having previously ordered a return of the ministers
and hearers in Dissenting assemblies, now desired that the Bishop of
London would direct his officers to employ the utmost diligence for the
excommunication of persons who deserved such penalty, and to publish
the fact of their excommunication, so that no one of them might be
“admitted for a witness, or returned upon juries, or capable of suing
for any debt.”[86]
[Sidenote: 1681.]
A striking instance of the treatment of Nonconformists is supplied in
the history of Nathaniel Vincent, brother of Thomas Vincent, whose
ministerial labours have been already noticed. This ejected clergyman
came to London soon after the great fire, and preached amidst the ruins
to large multitudes. Occupying a Conventicle in Southwark, he was
dragged out of the pulpit by the hair of his head, and, at a subsequent
period, he suffered imprisonment in the Marshalsea, and the Gatehouse,
where he was denied the use of pen, ink, and paper.[87] In an
information, dated the 18th of December, the writer, after mentioning
other places, describes a visit he paid to Vincent’s place of worship,
when that minister hearing of the informer’s approach, slipped away,
and left his congregation singing David’s psalms. The more the Justices
talked, and the more they exhorted the people to disperse, the louder
the people continued to sing. Churchwardens, overseers, and constables,
all refused to give the names of the Conventiclers, pretending they
did not know who they were. A friend of Vincent’s, writing the next
day, speaks of him as a man of equal standing in the University with
most of the Conformists in Southwark, holding doctrines accordant
with the Articles, constantly praying for the King, and accustomed on
Christmas Day to make a collection for the poor of the parish of St.
Olaves.[88] And in a further information we discover a curious scrap
of intelligence respecting his place of worship:--“Almost every seat
that adjoins to the sides of the Conventicle has a door, like the sally
port of a fire ship, to make escape by, and in each door is a small
peep-hole, like to taverns’ and alehouses’ doors, to ken the people
before they let them in.” The author of the document proceeds to relate
how the Marshalls dispersed these congregations, how officers were
appointed to visit other meeting-houses, and how an old woman hoped
they would “rot in hell” for having disturbed her.[89]
[Sidenote: NATHANIEL VINCENT.]
[Sidenote: 1682.]
We learn from another source that a Justice once entered the meeting
during one of Vincent’s sermons, and commanded him in the King’s name
to come down, to which the minister replied he was there by command of
the King of kings, and had resolved to proceed with the service.[90]
The enforcement upon him of a fine of £20 proving impracticable, an
indictment followed, under the Act of the 35th of Elizabeth. Upon
the Sunday preceding the day of his trial, he preached to his flock
from the words, “Only let your conversation be as it becometh the
gospel of Christ: that whether I come and see you, or else be absent,
I may hear of your affairs, that ye stand fast in one spirit, with
one mind striving together for the faith of the gospel.” “There was a
numerous auditory, insomuch that the people were ready to tread one
upon another, and some hundreds went away that could not come near to
hear him.” “In these sermons,” as further stated in the records of
Vincent’s Church, “he earnestly pressed us to hold fast our profession,
and to be steadfast in the cause of Christ. The 4th of January, before
Mr. Vincent went to his trial, there was a solemn day of fasting
and prayer kept at his own meeting-place, to seek the Lord on his
behalf. On the 8th, there was a whole night spent in prayer. On the
9th he went to Dorking, and had his trial on the 10th, when he was
not suffered to speak in his own defence, but was found guilty of the
indictment, and was committed prisoner to the Marshalsea, in Southwark,
for three months, and then, if he would not conform according to that
statute, he was to adjure the realm or suffer death.” The Church,
deprived of their pastor, was much harassed by their enemies; and we
are informed, that on “the 10th day of this month, being Saturday,
one Justice Balsh, a silk throwster by trade, and a very bitter enemy
to the Lord’s people living in Spitalfields, having sent word to the
other Justices of the Peace, his brethren that lived in those parts,
that he would meet them very early the next morning, to disturb the
Whigs at their meeting-places (for so they called Dissenters at that
time), about eight of the clock at night, died suddenly in his chair,
and never spake a word.” “The 11th, we met in Aldersgate-street at a
cloth-worker’s, where Mr. Biggin, the minister, had but just begun
prayer, but we were disturbed by the train-bands.” “April 1st, we met
at Mr. Russell’s, in Ironmonger-lane, where Mr. Lambert administered
to us the ordinance of the Lord’s Supper, and _we sung a psalm with
a low voice_.”[91] This touching circumstance calls to mind two
parallels--one in the history of the Huguenots, when they crept into
their place of worship muffled up, and sang in suppressed tones one
of Marot’s psalms; and the other in the history of the persecuted
Christians of Madagascar, who when they secretly assembled for Divine
service, were wont to sing in whispers.
[Sidenote: PERSECUTION.]
In November, informers broke into the house of Dr. Annesley, and
distrained his goods for “several latent convictions;”[92] and, a
month afterwards the same people entered his meeting-house and broke
the seats in pieces; after which disturbance, worship was for a time
suspended.[93] Others were treated in a similar manner.[94] The
Bishop of London received orders from Court to require a return of
all parishioners who did not attend church and receive the sacrament,
several of whom were cited to appear in the spiritual court, but “the
Bishop, and divers of his most conspicuous clergy, in the matter of
persecution, carried themselves with great discretion and candour.”[95]
A warrant, however, came out for the apprehension of Dr. Bates; and a
little later, constables were posted at the doors of the “most known
meeting-places in the City, so that there were few sermons in them, at
least at the usual hours.”[96]
[Sidenote: 1682.]
In December fifty warrants for distresses in Hackney were signed;
one for the sum of £500, the others of different amounts, making
up altogether £1,400. Soon afterwards, 200 documents of the same
kind were served upon certain inhabitants of the town of Uxbridge
and its neighbourhood on account of their attending the proscribed
Conventicles.[97] At the same time, it is recorded that “on the Lord’s
Day the Dissenters were in some places in the City kept out, but in
most they met, though they varied hours; few were actually disturbed,
but the difficulties upon them were great.”[98]
Whilst the London informers utterly failed to supply a shadow of proof
that the Nonconformists were engaged in any treasonable designs, other
informers in distant parts of the country strove, with a like want of
evidence, to attach to their Dissenting neighbours the most infamous
suspicions. A clergyman at Kirk Newton had been assaulted by burglars,
who broke open his stable and stole two mares. Immediately a letter
was despatched to the Duke of Newcastle, signed by three persons--who
said, “We must conclude these men to be some fanatics or sent by them;”
the Vicar being “a zealous man for the Church of England and a loyal
person,” the circumstance calls for “some speedy course to suppress
such insolences.”[99]
[Sidenote: PERSECUTION.]
About Midsummer there came another batch of papers for the Secretary’s
examination, supplying the names of ministers in the Borough of
Southwark, their respective meeting-houses and the number of their
hearers.[100] The illness from which the King just then was suffering,
it is said, produced a great excitement amongst Dissenters, and a
few days after the arrival of the last of these despatches at the
Secretary’s office, the Lord Mayor of London issued a proclamation,
in which he alluded to tumults occasioned by putting the law into
execution against Conventicles.[101]
CHAPTER V.
[Sidenote: DUKE OF MONMOUTH.]
Readers of English history will remember the important political part
played in the last years of Charles’ reign, by his illegitimate son,
the Duke of Monmouth. When public feeling ran so high against the Duke
of York, and so many Protestants were zealous for the Exclusion Bill,
some amongst the latter favoured certain pretensions to the crown
which had been put forward on behalf of his nephew. The pretensions
were founded upon the alleged existence of a black box containing a
contract of marriage between the King and the Duke’s mother, Lucy
Walters, which black box made no small stir throughout the country in
the year 1680.[102] Two years afterwards, when the Popish plot had
ceased to alarm the public, and when the Duke of York’s prospects had
begun to brighten, Monmouth endeavoured to revive his popularity, and
to reinforce his claims by a progress in the North of England, during
which journey he assumed a degree of state proper only to an heir
apparent. Attended by a hundred horsemen,--fifty of whom rode before
and fifty behind--he occupied a space in the midst of the cavalcade,
mounted on a noble charger, and bowing with royal condescension to the
crowds, who rent the air with shouts, “A Monmouth, a Monmouth, and no
York!” Bells fired from the church steeples, and musketry roared from
gates and ramparts, as the gay procession entered town after town.
He might be found at fairs and races, rousing the men and wooing the
women, and in town halls dining with the burgesses; always affecting
royal etiquette, and actually going so far as to touch for the King’s
evil. His movements closely watched, were duly reported to the
Secretary of State by persons ill-affected towards the bold aspirant,
including Shakerley, Governor of Chester Castle, who industriously
wrote, day after day, minute descriptions of all Monmouth did in that
old city,--a city in which, it may be recollected, Nonconformists had
been found to be very numerous some years before.[103]
[Sidenote: 1682.]
According to reports, the whole company of horsemen who rode with
the Duke into Chester did not exceed 150, most of them being noted
Dissenters. They came shouting, with a company of rabble on foot, whom
they had induced to join them by providing drink. The bells rang,
except at the Cathedral and St. Peter’s; and there were some bonfires.
The Duke went first to the Mayor’s house, where he lodged; and, after
a short stay there, he repaired to an inn, where he and his companions
sat down at the ordinary, the chaplain being Dr. Fogg, one of the
prebendaries. The Duke proceeded to the Cathedral, where he heard a
sermon not very pleasant to him or to his associates. The same writer
complains of the rabble making a riot, breaking into the Church of St.
Peter’s, forcing open the steeple door, and ringing the bells, amongst
the rest the fire bell. “Another company,” he adds, “at a bonfire, made
by a great Presbyterian, broke the glass windows of an honest Churchman
opposite.” Two or three days later, after accustomed healths, such
as “Confusion to Popery, and to those that would not be enemies to
the Duke of York,” Monmouth’s party expressed great displeasure at a
sermon preached before His Grace, in the choir of the Cathedral; and,
in general, uttered loud exclamations against the clergy. Having, it is
said, spit their venom that way, without one syllable of opposition,
they fell to magnifying the last Parliament, and to commending their
votes.[104]
At such times as I am describing, people exist who are possessed by
an inordinate love of writing, and of publishing what they write, and
whose pens resemble the sting of wasps, and of other still more ignoble
insects. Pamphleteers of this kind wrote against Dissenters, some
whose malignity was greater than their wit, some whose wit kept pace
with their malignity. Sir Roger L’Estrange, perhaps, may be reckoned
as the most gifted, the most formidable, the most unscrupulous, and
the most fierce of this tribe of tormentors. He had narrowly escaped
being executed as a spy during the Civil Wars,--he had been shut up in
Newgate for several years; and now the memory of his sufferings made
him perfectly savage in his attacks upon those whom he identified with
his former enemies. He perpetually rang changes upon the miseries of
the year ’41, which he accused the popular party of having determined
to revive. In his _Foxes and Firebrands_, and in his _Citt and
Bumkin_, he vilified and lampooned all men of liberal opinions,
whether those opinions happened to be ecclesiastical or political.
Nonconformists were fools and rebels, and their toleration was
inconsistent with order and peace. By abuse of one kind, he sought
to force them into the Church, and then, when they had entered, he
by another kind of abuse endeavoured to drive them out. Outside they
were traitors, inside they were trimmers, so that it was impossible
such people as L’Estrange could ever be pleased, let the conduct of
Nonconformists be what it might. His career as a party writer, which
began after the Restoration, attained its highest point at the period
we have reached; and as a reward for his services to the cause of
despotism, he obtained from his Royal master the honour of knighthood,
an honour more than counterbalanced by the almost universal execration
of posterity.[105]
[Sidenote: ROYAL DESPOTISM.]
Charles, in playing the despot, went on from bad to worse. Municipal
corporations, whose freedom is always of primary importance to the
interests of this country, were then still more intimately connected
with our national liberties than at present--for not only was the
administration of justice in cities and boroughs lodged in their hands,
not only were juries in Middlesex returned by the City Sheriffs, but
the right of election for members of Parliament rested, in a number of
cases, not with the citizens and burgesses generally, but with those
who were mayors, aldermen, and common councilmen. In many large places,
especially London, the Corporation opposed the Court; and therefore
no representatives subservient to the Crown could be expected to
come from such a quarter. The King, relying upon legal advisers, who
preferred cunning to equity, determined to try whether he could not
deprive his subjects of their municipal rights by the process of _quo
warranto_.[106] The attempt, made in the Metropolis first, so far
succeeded, that the Court of King’s Bench gave judgment against the
Corporation; and,--although it allowed the Corporation to retain its
privileges, under certain restrictions,--from that time the capital of
the kingdom remained powerless in the hands of the sovereign.
[Sidenote: 1683.]
[Sidenote: LORD W. RUSSELL.]
Constitutional methods of expressing public opinion being suspended,
there were men whom desperation drove to think of the patriot’s last
resort. They talked of war. Shaftesbury, whose erratic ability and
eloquence sometimes helped the cause of liberty, had disappeared from
the stage of public affairs, and had, as we have seen, gone over to
Holland, where he died. But his restless brain, employed in concocting
schemes of insurrection, which at the time came to nothing, had left
behind, amongst many Englishmen with whom he had been associated,
seeds of discontent, ready to grow into acts of violence. The seeds
did grow, and the harvest proved “a heap in the day of grief, and of
desperate sorrow.” The Rye House Plot is well known. With any design
of assassinating the King, Sidney and Russell--who came within the
complications of a plan for forcibly resisting the despotism of
Government--had nothing to do. Nothing could be more idle than to talk,
as some did, of certain ministers--Owen, Mead, and Griffiths--being
engaged in revolutionary designs. The King, when Mead had been
summoned, ordered him to be discharged; but Sidney and Russell, it
cannot be contradicted, were present at conversations turning upon the
subject of an appeal to arms in the cause of freedom. These illustrious
men were, as all readers of English history know, tried,[107]
condemned, and executed; and as the story of Russell’s last moments
belongs to the religious annals of our country, it claims some space on
these pages.[108]
[Sidenote: 1683.]
[Sidenote: LORD W. RUSSELL.]
In prison he devoted most of his time to meditation, receiving his
death-warrant with calmness, and anticipating his departure with
hope. Six or seven times, upon the last morning of his life (July
21), he engaged in prayer; and, on parting from Lord Cavendish, urged
upon that nobleman the importance of personal piety: then, winding
up his watch, he remarked--that he had done with time, and was going
to eternity. As the mourning coach, which conveyed him to the place
of execution, turned the corner by Little Queen Street, he remarked,
“I have often turned to the other hand with great comfort (alluding
to the proximity of Southampton Square, where he resided), but now
I turn to this with greater.” As he saw some persons weeping, and
others manifesting disrespect, he appreciated the commiseration of the
former, and evinced no resentment at the conduct of the latter. He sang
“within himself,” scarcely articulating words, observing, he hoped
soon to sing better; and, as he looked upon the dense throng around
him, he expressed the hope of soon beholding nobler multitudes. As
he entered Lincoln’s Inn Fields, observing it rained, he said to his
friends in the coach, “this may do you hurt that are bare-headed;” and
as he caught sight of the familiar place he exclaimed, in allusion to
his early days, “this has been to me a place of sinning, and God now
makes it the place of my punishment.” Having expressed wonder at the
crowds assembled, he placed in the Sheriff’s hand a long paper, and
declared at the same time, that he had never intended to plot against
the King’s life or reign. After praying that God would preserve His
Majesty and the Protestant religion, he expressed an earnest wish that
all Protestants would love one another, and not by mutual animosities
open a way for the re-entrance of Popery. In the paper just mentioned,
he avowed his attachment to the Church of England, and expressed a
desire that Conformists would be less severe, and that Dissenters would
be less scrupulous. He said he had always been ready to venture his
life for his country and his religion; and he avowed his sincerity and
earnestness in supporting the Bill of Exclusion, as the best means of
defending the Crown and the Church: he forgave his enemies, although
he thought killing by forms and subtilties of law to be “the worst
sort of murder.” When he had knelt down, Tillotson, who with Burnet
stood by him on the scaffold, offered intercession on his behalf. The
sufferer then unfastened his dress, took off his outer garment, bared
his neck, and laid it on the block, without change of countenance. The
executioner, to ensure his aim, touched him with the axe, but he did
not shrink; and after two strokes Russell’s soul went where vindictive
passions could not follow him.[109]
It has been justly remarked that when his memory ceases to be an object
of veneration “it requires no spirit of prophecy to foretell that
English liberty will be fast approaching to its final consummation;”
and we may add, that no less a Christian than a patriot, he has left
behind a name as dear to English Christians as it is to English
patriots.
We have seen the spirit which prevailed two years before--we have
proofs of its continuance in connection with the last days of Lord
William Russell. That nobleman tenaciously held the principle, that in
some cases it was lawful to resist Government by force. But Churchmen,
who, at the Revolution, in practice approved, if they did not in theory
uphold the doctrine, condemned it at this early period not only as
impolitic, but as irreligious. Tillotson wrote to Russell just before
his execution a letter, in which he said that Christianity plainly
discountenanced the resistance of authority, that in the same law
which establishes our religion, it is declared to be unlawful, under
any pretence whatsoever, to take up arms; and that his Lordship’s
opinion was contrary to the doctrine of all Protestant Churches. He
also pronounced the same opinion to be an offence of a heinous nature,
calling “for a very particular and deep repentance.”[110]
[Sidenote: 1683.]
Tillotson, in this letter, committed himself to the doctrine of passive
obedience; and its publication, without any subsequent denial or
recantation, places him before the world as upholding one main-prop
of the Stuart despotism. Burnet also, by his conduct at the time,
lent his influence to the same side; for, with characteristic haste,
and with that inaccuracy, into which haste so often betrayed him, he
rushed from Russell’s cell at Newgate, saying, that he had converted
his noble friend, who declared his satisfaction in that point to which
Tillotson’s letter relates. Such conduct indicated sympathy at the
time with the opinions in the letter now mentioned; and, therefore, it
involves Burnet in the same responsibility with Tillotson. Russell,
however, soon undeceived both his advisers, insisting that the notion
which he had of the laws, and of the English Government, differed from
that of the two Divines. He died a martyr to the faith, which placed
the Crown of England on the head of the Prince of Orange, whose claims
Tillotson and Burnet afterwards vindicated, and whose conduct they ever
delighted to eulogize.
When Churchmen, of moderation and liberality, acted in this way, what
could be expected from Churchmen of a different order? The University
of Oxford having collected from the writings of Puritans, from
Independents, and from political philosophers, sentences which plainly,
or by implication, justified under certain circumstances resistance
to Government, decreed by a vote of Convocation, such propositions to
be false, seditious, and impious,--and most of them also heretical and
blasphemous, infamous to the Christian religion, and destructive of all
good government in Church and State. The books containing such opinions
were forbidden to be read, and ordered to be burnt.[111]
[Sidenote: CONTROVERSY.]
At this juncture it happened that Nonconformists were silent, as
respected political and ecclesiastical controversy, except that John
Howe published a beautiful sermon on the question, “What may most
hopefully be attempted to allay animosities among Protestants, that
our divisions may not be our ruin?” Owen had been overtaken by his
last illness, and Baxter had become tired of disputation. Many of his
brethren were suffering from persecution; and those who were not,
could have controverted the political doctrines of the Church only by
incurring the risk of losing their property, their liberty, or their
life. The Government did everything it could to prevent the expression
of liberal opinions. The quiet habits of most Dissenters, the
cultivation of calm endurance, especially by Quakers, and by others in
a less conspicuous manner, served to promote this remarkable silence--a
silence which, compared with the subsequent Revolution, resembles the
smoothness of the torrent on the edge of the abyss. Nor should it be
forgotten that men who comprehended the dangers of the hour felt,
notwithstanding, immense perplexity as to what they ought to say or do;
since Charles II. pertinaciously professed the greatest moderation,
and declared a love for Parliaments and for the liberties of his
country,--thus by cunning and artifice, showing as great a proficiency
in king-craft as ever his father had done.
[Sidenote: 1683.]
A little more than one month after Lord William Russell’s execution,
Dr. John Owen, whose illness we just now mentioned, entered his rest.
He closed his days in the little village of Ealing, where he possessed
an estate. In his seclusion he wrote _The Glory of Christ_.
Transported by his theme he poured forth reflections like “a sea of
glass mingled with fire,” and in conversation with his friends devoutly
expressed his hopes and desires. “I am going,” he said, “to Him, whom
my soul has loved; or rather who has loved me with an everlasting love,
which is the whole ground of all my consolation. I am leaving the ship
of the Church in a storm, but while the Great Pilot is in it the loss
of a poor under-rower will be inconsiderable. Live and pray, and hope
and wait patiently, and do not despond: the promise stands invincible
that He will never leave us nor forsake us.” The first sheet of his
last book had passed through the press, under the superintendence of
Mr. Payne, an eminent Dissenting minister at Saffron Walden; and as
he informed Owen of the circumstance the latter exclaimed “I am glad
to hear it; but, O! brother Payne, the long-wished-for day is come at
last, in which I shall see that glory in another manner than I have
ever done, or was capable of doing in this world.”[112] As the dying
man inherited a strong constitution, he had much to endure when the
last struggle came, and the attendants upon his dying bed were deeply
affected, both by the intensity of his pains and the brightness of his
peace. In silence, with uplifted eyes and hands, this eminent man left
the world; and--which is a remarkable coincidence--he did so on St.
Bartholomew’s Day.
[Sidenote: PERSECUTION.]
Throughout the last three or four years of the reign of Charles II.
the persecutions carried on against the Nonconformists increased in
violence; and the cause is to be found, not only in the religious
character of the victims, but in the political course which they felt
it their duty to pursue. Indeed the latter in some cases mainly excited
the party in power. Nonconformists generally had supported members of
the Opposition, at the last three elections. They were known to be
advocates of constitutional liberty against the despotic designs of men
in high places. “Which alone,” observed John Howe--and his testimony
is most trustworthy--“and not our mere dissent from the Church of
England in matters of religion, wherein Charles II. was sufficiently
known to be a Prince of great indifferency, drew upon us, soon after
the dissolution of the last of those Parliaments, that dreadful storm
of persecution that destroyed not a small number of lives in gaols, and
ruined multitudes of families.”[113]
The Presbyterians, who had often received promises of comprehension,
were persecuted in common with the rest of the Nonconformists. If ever
a man lived in the world inoffensively, as well as usefully, it was
Oliver Heywood; yet he did not escape imprisonment. His case exposes
the wicked intolerance of the rulers far beyond that of some others,
where partial ignorance of the circumstances might leave room for the
idea, that a measure of imprudence provoked opposition. No provocation,
we are sure, could have been given to the authorities of the country
by this eminently amiable and holy person.
[Sidenote: 1684.]
The case of Thomas Rosewell, a Presbyterian minister, in Rotherhithe,
differs from that of Heywood; but his treatment was not less unjust.
Charged with uttering treason in his discourses, the jury, after an
address from Judge Jeffreys, who presided at the trial, brought him in
guilty. When the prisoner moved for an arrest of judgment, the King,
being informed of the circumstances, felt so convinced of the infamous
character of the witnesses, and of the loyalty of Rosewell, that he
pardoned him at once.[114]
[Sidenote: PERSECUTION.]
From the evidence elicited during Rosewell’s trial we are enabled to
form a distinct picture of one of the Nonconformist places of worship
in those days, and of several interesting circumstances connected with
the services. The place in which he preached was situated in Salisbury
Street, Rotherhithe, near the preacher’s dwelling, and consisted of
a tenement or tenements, so altered as to adapt the building for
accommodating a large number of people. “The rooms were but of a low
height.” “There was a low parlour, and a little room up six steps;”
and where the preacher stood “was a large room and a garret.” He stood
“in the door-case of that room, that the sound might go up and down.”
The chamber was hung with sad-coloured paper, and a sad-coloured bed
was in the room. Upon the left hand of the speaker “was a chest of
sweet wood, and a little cabinet upon it; and a glass over that; and
upon the right hand, on the side of the chimney, was a closet.” Three
or four hundred people commonly attended--some “people of quality;”
and a “store of watermen and seamen” from Deptford, Rotherhithe, and
thereabouts. There were shutters in the windows, and the sun came in,
and Rosewell was afraid lest the people that went by should hear him.
Upon the occasion in question, at first there was not light enough let
into the apartment, and he desired that one part of the shutters should
be opened; then he requested that half might be shut again, for fear he
should be overheard. The congregation met at seven in the morning, and
did not break up until a little after two in the afternoon,--a pause
taking place in the middle, when the preacher went in to dinner, and
“left us there,” says the witness; “and abundance in the congregation
ate sweetmeats, or biscuits, or such things.” A man, who was a brazier,
acted as door-keeper, and was angry at a woman’s “coming with pattens,
for they made an impression on the ground, and gave notice to others
that there was company there.” She found out the place only “by dogging
of people as they went along;” and by inquiries made of certain persons
“set commonly at a place called Cherry Garden Stairs.”[115]
[Sidenote: 1684.]
[Sidenote: PERSECUTION.]
Thomas Delaune, a Baptist schoolmaster, and a person of considerable
learning, appears as an eminent sufferer in those dark days. He
published _A Plea for the Nonconformists_, in answer to a sermon
entitled _A Scrupulous Conscience_, published by Dr. Benjamin
Calamy, Rector of St. Lawrence Jewry. Delaune simply endeavoured to
prove that certain observances in the Episcopal establishment more
resembled what is found in the Popish Communion than what is found
in primitive antiquity. The publication being treated as a criminal
offence, the author was committed to Newgate in November, 1683, and
indicted for “a false, seditious, and scandalous libel concerning
the Lord the King and the Book of Common Prayer.” The Jury, imbued
with the spirit of the age, found him guilty, after which the Judge
sentenced him to pay a fine of one hundred marks, to be kept a
close prisoner until he paid the money, and to find security for
good behaviour during twelve months afterwards. Delaune remained in
confinement fifteen months, at the end of which time nature broke down
under hardship and suffering. The poor man died, and it is shocking
to add, his wife and two small children also expired during the same
period within the walls of Newgate.[116] In the same prison Francis
Bampfield, a Baptist minister, and an Oxford man, who had suffered
repeatedly for his Nonconformity, perished in the month of February,
1684.[117] Of all sects, perhaps, the Quakers suffered most. Their
meetings were disturbed by drums and fiddles; women were insulted,
their hoods and scarfs torn, and little boys were beaten or whipped
with a cat-o’-nine-tails. Seven hundred Friends were reported as being
imprisoned in the year 1683.
CHAPTER VI.
At the time when English gaols were filled with Nonconformists, and
English citizens were driven into exile, the English Sovereign offered
an asylum to Protestant refugees from France; thus, at the same moment,
persecuting his own conscientious subjects, and befriending those
like-minded, who suffered from the tyranny of Louis XIV.
[Sidenote: FRENCH PROTESTANTS.]
After the Edict of Nantes, in 1591, had formally guaranteed to the
Huguenots liberty of worship, vexatious interferences with their
religious rights goaded them to resistance, and revived those political
and military combinations which had proved so mischievous to the French
Reformation. But, before the middle of the seventeenth century, the
French Protestants became a purely religious community. The Count
d’Harcourt bore witness to their loyalty in the well-known words, “the
Crown tottered on the King’s head, but you have fixed it there:” and
Cardinal Mazarin testified to their good conduct, when he said, “I
have no cause to complain of the little flock,--if they browse on bad
herbage, at least they do not stray away.”[118] The latter illustrious
statesman, although a religious enemy, was a political protector of his
Protestant countrymen; and, soon after his death in 1661, they became
fully aware of the loss which they had sustained. His Royal master
determined to govern alone, at the very moment when he became more than
ever the slave of the Church; and, gathering up the reins entirely
within his own hands, he sought to atone for his immoralities by the
extirpation of heretical opinions. The conversion of the French King
was a change from courtly gallantries to religious persecution,--from
sensuality to intolerance,--from vice to crime. It is impossible to
say, in how many districts he interdicted the exercise of the Reformed
religion; how many places of worship he razed; how many schools he
suppressed; how many Protestant endowments he confiscated for Roman
Catholic purposes. Ordinances, declarations, decrees, and other acts of
Council swiftly followed one after another, striking the heretics with
blow upon blow.[119]
In 1681, Louis began his atrocious system of dragonnading, which
consisted in billeting ten or twelve military brigands in a Protestant
family, with authority to do anything short of murder, for the
conversion of its members to Popery. Curés shouted to these new
apostles, “Courage, gentlemen, it is the will of the King.”[120]
Horsemen fastened crosses to the ends of their musquetoons, and
compelled people to kiss them. They whipped their victims, they smote
them on the face, they dragged them about by the hair of their heads,
and drove them to church as they might drive so many cattle.
[Sidenote: 1681.]
In the middle of the seventeenth century, French exiles had established
themselves in different parts of England. A French Church had been
founded at Winchelsea in 1560, at Canterbury in 1561, at Norwich in
1564, with others at Southampton, Glastonbury, and Rye. A Church at
Sandtoft, Lincolnshire, dated from 1634; in the Savoy, from 1641; in
Dover, from 1646; in Marylebone, 1656; not to mention others.[121] The
Dragonnades, in 1681, sent at once a new and unprecedented wave of
emigration across the Channel.
[Sidenote: FRENCH PROTESTANTS.]
Charles II., who did not blush to receive a pension from Louis XIV.
for betraying the interests of his country, now came forward in
favour of the fugitives--from good nature, or through advice, or
in order to please the English Protestants, perhaps from all three
motives combined. By an edict, signed at Hampton Court, on the 28th
of July, 1681, he declared that he felt obliged by his honour and
his conscience, to succour the people who were fleeing into exile.
He therefore accorded them letters of naturalization, with all the
privileges necessary for the exercise of such trades as would not
injure the interests of his kingdom. He engaged that he would ask
the next Parliament to naturalize all who should seek refuge in
this island, and in the meantime he exempted them from all imposts
to which his other subjects were not liable. He authorized them
to send their children to the public schools and Universities. He
ordered all his officers, both civil and military, to receive them
wherever they landed, to give them passports gratuitously, and to
furnish such relief as might be necessary for them to travel to their
destination. He also instructed the Commissioners of the Treasury, and
of the Customs, to let the strangers pass free, with their furniture,
their merchandize, and their instruments of trade; and, further, he
encouraged charitable persons to assist those who were in want. He
also commissioned the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of
London to receive their requests and present them to him. To this
edict there succeeded, before long, an order in Council which granted
naturalization to eleven hundred and fifty-four fugitives;[122] and
boat after boat arrived freighted with these sufferers. Such sympathy
with the persecuted, however just, appears very inconsistent. About
a hundred years earlier, the Jesuits had turned the tables on the
intolerant Lutherans and Calvinists of the empire, by saying that
Catholic sovereigns had as much right to deny religious liberty as
Protestant ones;[123] and Louis could have taken sufficient ground for
retorting upon Charles after the same fashion. Reports were circulated
to the discredit of the refugees--and were met, on the other hand, by
friendly certificates from Incumbents and Churchwardens, testifying
of them as “sober, harmless, innocent people, such as served God
constantly and uniformly, according to the usage and custom of the
Church of England.”[124] In 1682, Charles issued briefs to the clergy
to make collections for the new comers; and, in this beneficent work,
Tillotson, Dean of Canterbury, took part. Beveridge, then a Prebendary
in Canterbury Cathedral, from some mistaken scruple--or from coolness
towards a foreign Church--objected to reading the brief, as contrary to
the rubric. This circumstance brought out Tillotson’s well-known reply,
“Doctor, Doctor, charity is above rubrics.”[125]
[Sidenote: 1682.]
The persecutions of these French Protestants, their arrival on our
shores, and the kindness with which they were received, are not
mentioned here simply because they are incidents of a religious
character locally connected with our own country, but for another
and more forcible reason. These persecutions had become a staple of
conversation in many an English home; and many an English heart had
palpitated with deep sympathy, as stories of violence and suffering
had fallen on the ear. Each fresh gust of intolerance, as it broke on
France, had stirred the feelings of English Puritans, scarcely less
than the feelings of French Protestants living on this side Dover
Straits. And the revival of oppression, after the death of Mazarin,
could not fail to inspire indignation in the breasts of multitudes
within our shores when the anti-Popery agitation burst out afresh.
The sight of the fugitives, their tales of horrid barbarity, of
patient endurance, and of romantic adventure, would reinvigorate
the Protestantism of our fathers, and largely contribute to that
fixed resolve, which defied the contrivances of Charles and James,
and ended in what has been ever since esteemed the _Glorious_
Revolution.[126]
[Sidenote: THE CABINET.]
It was natural for foreign Protestants to look to England for help in
more ways than one. The Archbishop of Canterbury received a letter
from Dr. Covel, chaplain at the Hague to the Princess of Orange, urging
the formation of a public League in defence of European Protestantism.
Sancroft did not possess the courage and heroism to promote such a
measure, had it been wise; but he did possess the sagacity and prudence
to see that the object desired was not wise; and, in addition to those
qualities, he displayed, in the answer to his correspondent, a large
measure of Protestant sympathy and devout feeling.[127]
The prospects of Protestantism became darker and darker. The Act for
excluding Papists from office was for a while cunningly evaded by
Charles, who placed the whole business of the Admiralty in the hands of
his brother, the Duke of York, he himself signing all official papers
in that department:--at last, this shadowy pretence he cast aside, and
boldly invited James to a seat at the Council-table--a step which even
one of his Tory supporters acknowledged “became the subject of much
talk, and was deemed to be a breach of one of the most solemn and most
explicit Acts of Parliament.”[128] Two other persons, at the same time
Members of the Council, ought to be noticed. One was Lord Chief Justice
Jeffreys, too infamous a character to require anything more than the
mention of his name; and Lord Keeper Guilford, who, whilst hating
Jeffreys with a bitter hatred, in some respects resembled him. The part
which these men took at this time in relation to Papists and Protestant
Nonconformists, and the manner of their conducting ecclesiastical
business, are illustrated by the following incident.
[Sidenote: 1684.]
It was the fashion to hold Cabinet meetings on Sunday nights. One
Sunday morning, the Duke of York asked Guilford to assist him in a
business which would that evening be brought before His Majesty.
Guilford thought that certain Courtiers just then looked at him with
remarkable gravity, as if something important was about to come on the
carpet; but he did not discover its nature until after the meeting
had commenced. Jeffreys had returned fresh from a Northern tour, and
had brought with him reports of large numbers of Papists convicted of
being recusants, and, after placing on the table rolls containing their
names, he rose from his chair, and proceeded to say:--
[Sidenote: CABINET MEETING.]
“I have a business to lay before your Majesty, which I took notice
of in the North, and which will deserve your Majesty’s royal
commiseration. It is the case of numberless numbers of your good
subjects, that are imprisoned for recusancy. I have the list of them
here, to justify what I say. They are so many that the great gaols
cannot hold them without their lying one upon another.” Then, to use
the language of Roger North, “he let fly his tropes and figures about
rotting and stinking in prisons;” and concluded his speech with a
motion that His Majesty be requested to discharge “these poor men,”
and restore them to “liberty and air.”[129] Such a motion from such
a man will be at once understood. It could have been made only to
please his Royal master, and that master’s brother. If selfishness
influenced Jeffreys in making the proposal, selfishness influenced
Guilford in opposing it; for, on the one hand, any such pardon as that
now proposed, must pass the Great Seal of which he was keeper; and by
affixing this to such an unpopular instrument, he might bring himself
into trouble with his friends. On the other hand, by refusal he might
incur a forfeiture of office, and have to give place to his most odious
enemy. After the Lord Keeper had sat silent awhile, expecting some
of the Lords in the Protestant interest, as Halifax and Rochester,
to speak,--he rose and addressed the King, entreating that the Chief
Justice might declare, whether all the persons named in these rolls
were actually in prison or not. His Lordship replied that he did not
imagine any one could suspect that to be his meaning, but that they
were under sentence of commitment, and were liable to be taken up by
any peevish Sheriff or Magistrate. North then proceeded to attack all
Sectaries. They were a turbulent people, he said, and always stirring
up sedition; and, if they did so when they were obnoxious to the
laws, what would they not do, if His Majesty gave them a discharge
at once? Was it not better that his enemies should live under some
disadvantages, and be obnoxious to His Majesty’s pleasure, who might,
if they were turbulent and troublesome, inflict the penalties of the
law upon them? As to the Roman Catholics, if there were any persons to
whom the King would extend the favour of a pardon, let it be particular
and express. After all, the disadvantage they were under, was but the
payment of some fees to officers, which was compensated for by their
enjoying exemption from serving in chargeable offices.[130]
[Sidenote: 1684.]
Guilford thought that in this way he outwitted his adversary, and
accounted his manœuvre the most memorable act which he had ever
performed. The report shows, that from personal inclination, or from a
wish to gratify the King, and the Duke of York, he evinced especial
hatred to Protestant Nonconformists in general, when he recommended
mercy to some Popish recusants in particular; and, whatever might be
his motive on the occasion, the speech which he delivered, and his
entire relation of this Cabinet secret, discloses to us very plainly
the characters of the men who then guided public affairs, and the
contemptible feelings which influenced their conduct.
One Nonconformist sufferer at that time demands a passing notice.
William Jenkyn, of St. John’s, Cambridge, ejected from the Vicarage
of Christ’s Church, London, where he had been exceedingly popular,
was, on September the 2nd, 1684, seized by a soldier,--he being at the
very time engaged in prayer with his friends. Refusing to take the
Oxford Oath, he was committed to prison; and to a petition for release
founded on a medical certificate that his health would be endangered
by confinement, no answer could be obtained but this,--“Jenkyn shall
be a prisoner as long as he lives.” As his end drew near, he said to
those around him, “Why weep ye for me? Christ lives; He is my friend,
a friend born for adversity, a friend that never dies.” “May it please
your Majesty,” remarked a nobleman, when he heard of his death, “Jenkyn
has got his liberty.” “Aye,” rejoined Charles, “who gave it him?”
“A greater than your Majesty, the King of Kings.” The Confessor was
followed to Bunhill Fields, by a procession of a hundred and fifty
coaches. Even gay Courtiers looked sad, and the reckless King seemed
concerned. “L’Estrange,” in his _Observator_, “alone set up a howl
of savage exultation, laughed at the weak compassion of the Trimmers,
proclaimed that the blasphemous old impostor had met with a most
righteous punishment, and vowed to wage war not only to the death, but
after death, with all the mock saints and martyrs.”[131]
[Sidenote: CHARLES’ COURT.]
Nor should it be forgotten, that whilst Nonconformists were suffering
all kinds of hardships, the King and his Court were indulging in
unbridled licentiousness, so that the contrast drawn by the poet of the
mysteries of Providence then appeared in our own country as vividly as
it ever did in any part of the world:--
“The good man’s share
In life was gall and bitterness of soul;
. . . . . . . While luxury
In palaces lay straining her low thought,
To form unreal wants, and heaven-born truths
And moderation fair, wore the red marks
Of superstition’s scourge.”
Imagination, as we read the history of the later Stuarts, ever and
anon places before us side by side the confessor’s dungeon and the
voluptuary’s chamber. The scenes which the Count de Grammont depicts,
the characters which he draws, and the intrigues which he unravels;
the entire want of moral principle, the absence of common shame, the
bare-aced profligacy, the devices to excite and gratify the lowest
passions, which he, who had lived at Court and shared in its pleasures,
so graphically and yet so complacently portrays, make us blush for our
race. The reaction from the simple manners and severe virtues of the
Commonwealth was tremendous. Courage, or rather an irritable sense of
honour, leading the gallant to wreak revenge upon any who offended him,
came to be the chief virtue of Cavalier Courtiers. Vices and crimes
were treated as petty foibles: beauty, liveliness, and wit alone were
counted meritorious; and “the manners of Chesterfield united with the
morals of Rochefoucault.” The Count’s book is indeed a reflection of
the age--elegant in style, but licentious in character--a veil of
embroidered gauze cast over a putrescent corpse.
[Sidenote: 1685.]
In the midst of this depravity death suddenly appeared. Art has
portrayed two scenes at Whitehall which point a moral never to be
forgotten. The one represents the Sunday night when Evelyn saw
inexpressible profaneness, gambling, and dissoluteness--the King
sitting and toying with his concubines, the French boy singing love
songs, and the Courtiers playing basset with a bank of 2,000 guineas
piled up on the table. The other exhibits what was witnessed a few
days afterwards in the anterooms of the chamber where the Royal
Sybarite awaited the summons of the Almighty; noblemen and ladies,
with heartless etiquette, performing their Court attendance; prelates
at a distance, hoping for an opportunity to administer to him the last
offices of that Church, which had called the dying man its Defender,
whilst, as he is in the act of renouncing communion with it, a delicate
hand is seen extended from behind a timorously opened door, to receive
a glass of water to assist in swallowing the wafer, laid upon the
Royal tongue by a disguised priest. These pictures[132] illustrate the
mutability of earthly grandeur, and the righteous retribution of God
upon a life spent in sin. Charles II. died on the 6th of February,
1685,--within three weeks of William Jenkyn.
[Sidenote: DEATH OF CHARLES.]
Very confused and contradictory accounts are given of the circumstances
connected with this event; but there is enough of what is perfectly
credible, to show that Charles died in a state of reconciliation with
the Church of Rome. The Duke of York, his brother, who watched him to
the last moment, states that two Protestant Bishops read by his bedside
the service of the Visitation of the Sick, and that one of them, Ken,
Bishop of Bath and Wells, after receiving from the sick man a faint
acknowledgment of sorrow for his sins, pronounced absolution, and
offered him the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, which was declined. But
the Duke makes no mention of the pathetic strain in which that prelate
addressed the King, or of the faithful exhortation addressed by the
Archbishop of Canterbury.
The Duke further relates that he arranged for the clandestine
introduction to the chamber, of a Benedictine Monk, who had aided
Charles’ escape after the battle of Worcester; that when the room had
been cleared of all, except the Earl of Bath and Lord Feversham, the
priest, brought up into a private closet by a back pair of stairs, was
taken to the bedside; and that, after confession, he administered the
last rites of the Popish Communion--that the expiring man uttered pious
ejaculations, lifting up his hands and crying, “Mercy, sweet Jesus,
mercy,” till the priest gave him extreme unction--that as the host was
presented, he raised himself up, and said “Let me meet my Heavenly Lord
in a better posture than lying on my bed.” But the Duke says not a word
of Charles’ blessing his natural children, and the rest of the persons
present; nor of any one begging the Royal benediction, calling the King
the father of them all.
[Sidenote: 1685.]
Yet these circumstances are related by others, as well as the utterance
of the words, “Do not let poor Nelly starve;” and Charles’ reply to
the Queen’s message asking forgiveness. “She ask my pardon, poor
woman?--I ask hers with all my heart.” James, in his _Memoirs_, is
evidently intent upon one thing, to show that Charles died a sincere
Papist, which we can well believe from what we know of his previous
history.[133]
CHAPTER VII.
[Sidenote: 1685.]
James II. met his Privy Councillors within an hour after his brother’s
death, on the 6th of February; and, upon taking his seat at the head
of the Council-table, he delivered an extempore speech, which was
afterwards written down from memory by Finch, the Solicitor-General.
According to his report, the King declared “I shall make it my
endeavour to preserve this Government both in Church and State, as
it is now by law established. I know the principles of the Church of
England are for monarchy, and the members of it have showed themselves
good and loyal subjects; therefore I shall always take care to defend
and support it.”[134] In explanation of this promise, coupled with so
dubious a compliment to the English Church, James afterwards, in his
own _Memoirs_, states that Finch worded “the speech as strong
as he could,” and, in the hurry, it was allowed to pass “without
reflection;” that he might have more clearly expressed himself had
he used the words “he _never would endeavour to alter_ the
established religion,” instead of the words “he would endeavour _to
preserve_ it;” and that he said he would support and defend the
_professors_ of it, not the _religion_ itself. He further
remarks, that no one could expect he would “make a conscience of
supporting what, in his conscience, he thought erroneous;”--that all he
meant, or could be expected, or was understood to say, was, simply that
he would not molest the members of the Protestant Church.[135] Read in
the light of such sophistry, the speech,--certainly at the time taken
to mean one thing, though the concealed intention of the King was to
do quite another,--shows that James must have possessed even a larger
share than his elder brother, of the inherent duplicity of the Stuart
race. Yet, unlike his brother, he evinced unmistakeable frankness in
the profession of religion; for on leaving the Council he immediately
proceeded with the Queen to the little Roman Catholic Chapel in St.
James’, leaving the door open during Divine service, that any one might
see him at worship there.[136] On Holy Thursday, accompanied by his
guards and gentlemen pensioners, he received the sacrament; and on
Easter Sunday he publicly appeared at mass--the Knights of the Garter,
in their collars, attending him, both as he went, and as he returned.
The Duke of Norfolk, who carried the Sword of State, however, stopped
at the chapel door, upon which His Majesty immediately observed to him,
“My Lord, your father would have gone further.” His Grace promptly
replied, “Your Majesty’s father would not have gone so far.” James not
only commanded an account to be published of Charles’ conforming in his
last moments to the Church of Rome, but he himself published two papers
professedly written by his brother, in favour of its doctrines. These
he showed to Sancroft, Archbishop of Canterbury, who said, “That he did
not think the late King had been so learned in controversy, but that
the arguments in the papers were easy to refute.” James desired him
to confute them if he could. Sancroft satisfied himself with politely
answering, “It ill became him to enter into a controversy with his
Sovereign.”[137]
[Sidenote: JAMES II.]
Plenty of gossip was circulated by lip and pen respecting the conduct
of His Majesty and his sympathizing friends at this important
juncture;--of which gossip a specimen is furnished in a letter, dated
February 24, 1685, which, after being taken out of the post-bag,
instead of reaching the person addressed, found its destination among
the Secretary of State’s papers--to be transferred in the nineteenth
century to the Record Office:--
“It can be no news to acquaint you of His Majesty declaring himself
a Papist and going daily to public mass. Neither can I choose but
commend the prudence and honesty of several great and worthy lords,
who have already assured His Majesty, that they have been a long time
past Papists in their hearts, and prayed His Majesty’s leave to declare
themselves Papists, that they might be in a capacity to serve His
Majesty at the holy altar. But His Majesty, it seems, very prudently
commanded them to contain themselves till after the sitting of
Parliament, and commended their holy zeal, and gave them many thanks,
with great assurances of his favour, &c. We are also very well assured,
from very good hands, that they are already under great apprehensions,
in that God Almighty appears so early against them; since one of the
first magnitude, Beauford [the Duke of Beaufort], has very lately, with
great consternation of soul, declared themselves all undone by His
Majesty’s too forward, and ungovernable zeal, in so soon and so openly
declaring himself: for, said he, had His Majesty been pleased but
to have dissembled himself till a Parliament had been called, we had
been sure to have got through, whereas now I tremble to think of the
dreadful blow an heretical Parliament may give us.”
[Sidenote: 1685.]
In accordance with his unequivocal profession of Romanism, James
complained to the Protestant Bishops of the declamations against Popery
in the pulpits of the Church; and at his coronation, on the 23rd of
April,[138] he declined to receive the sacrament, or to take any part
in the responses, although his Catholic Queen did so devoutly. The
King’s Romanism being demonstrated from the beginning of his reign,
there appears exquisite _naïveté_ or satirical shrewdness, in
the address presented by the Quakers to him on his accession: “We are
told that thou are not of the persuasion of the Church of England, no
more than we; therefore we hope thou wilt grant us the same liberty
which thou allowest thyself; which doing, we wish thee all manner of
happiness.”
[Sidenote: JAMES II.]
The Ministry of the late King were not dismissed by his successor,
but alterations were made in the allotment of offices. Rochester was
appointed Lord Treasurer and Prime Minister. Halifax had to give up
the Privy Seal, and become President of the Council. Ormond was removed
from Dublin, where he had been Viceroy, to Whitehall, where he was to
act as Lord Steward; and Godolphin exchanged his post at the Treasury
for Chamberlainship to the Queen. Sunderland continued Secretary of
State; and Guilford retained the Great Seal; but Jeffreys--Lord Chief
Justice of the King’s Bench, and now made a Peer of Parliament,--with
a seat in the Cabinet, superseded, in political power, the Lord
Keeper. The men who chiefly influenced the councils of the Sovereign,
were Rochester, Sunderland, and Godolphin, and, in some respects, the
infamous Jeffreys.
The Tories welcomed the accession of James with immense enthusiasm;
they presented addresses of extravagant loyalty, and in the elections
for the new Parliament, exerted themselves with a zeal which provoked
the remark of one of their own party. Elections “were thought to be
very indirectly carried on in most places. God grant a better issue
of it than some expect.” “The truth is, there were many of the new
members whose elections and returns were universally censured.”[139]
When Parliament assembled, the King repeated, exactly, his reported
declaration respecting the Established Church; thus confirming the
false impression which his words were sure to produce, and this, too,
notwithstanding the acknowledgment which he records respecting it
in his _Memoirs_. “The Lords and Commons,” says the Bishop of
Norwich, “hummed joyfully, and loudly, at those parts of the speech
which concerned our religion, and the established Government.”[140]
The House of Commons, resolving itself into a Grand Committee of
Religion, determined to “stand by His Majesty” in the defence of the
Reformed faith, and to beg him to “publish a proclamation, putting the
laws in execution against all Dissenters whatsoever from the Church of
England.”[141]
[Sidenote: 1685.]
Perhaps the object of these resolutions was to embarrass the
Government, to disturb the alliance between the King and the High
Church party, and to decoy the Tories into an act, by which they
would commit themselves, and run the risk of breaking with the
Court. Certainly the resolutions tended to lay open to persecution,
directly and distinctly, not only Protestant Nonconformists,--whom
the Government and the Court, as well as the High Church party, were
anxious to repress,--but also Roman Catholics, whom the High Church
party wished to crush, the Court stood prepared to favour, and the
Government were ready to tolerate, for the sake of pleasing their
Royal Master. It has been suggested, that a reluctance in the majority
of the House to trouble Protestant Dissenters just then, produced a
reaction respecting the resolutions, but there is no foundation for
this idea; whereas, it is perfectly plain, that the King and the
Queen were exceedingly annoyed by the proceedings in the Commons’
House, and ordered the Court members to oppose them.[142] To crush
Protestant Nonconformists was a thing which, taken by itself, James
would have been very glad to do, but to persecute the members of
his own Church, was a thing from which he very naturally recoiled.
Obsequiousness to the Crown, in this case, triumphed over zeal against
Popery; and the House underwent the mortification of eating its own
words, and revoking the resolutions which had been passed in Committee,
by declaring it would rest satisfied with His Majesty’s repeated
declaration, to support the religion of the Church of England, as by
law established.[143]
[Sidenote: BAXTER’S TRIAL.]
The disposition of the Government towards Protestant Dissenters appears
in the trial of Richard Baxter. Three weeks after the King’s accession,
this distinguished minister was committed to the King’s Bench, for a
Paraphrase on the New Testament, which he published. On the 18th of
May, being then unwell, he moved for an allowance of further time, in
order to prepare his defence; but in reply to this very reasonable
application, Jeffreys, the Chief Justice, who by his behaviour on the
Bench whilst trying the venerable prisoner, has secured for himself
everlasting infamy, savagely growled out, “I will not give him a
minute’s time more, to save his life.” “Yonder stands Oates in the
pillory, and he says he suffers for the truth, and so says Baxter; but
if Baxter did but stand on the other side of the pillory with him, I
would say, two of the greatest rogues and rascals in the kingdom stood
there.”[144] Twelve days afterwards, Baxter appeared at the bar in
Guildhall, with his friends Sir Henry Ashurst, Dr. Bates, Dr. Sharp,
and Dr. Moore[145] attending by his side; when Jeffreys indulged in
that coarse, vulgar, and well-known rhetoric, a single specimen of
which is sufficient for our purpose. “What ailed the old blockhead, the
unthankful villain, that he would not conform? Was he wiser or better
than other men? He hath been ever since, the spring of the faction. I
am sure he hath poisoned the world with his linsey-woolsey doctrine.
Hang him! this one old fellow hath cast more reproach upon the
constitution and discipline of our Church, than will be wiped off this
hundred years; but I’ll handle him for it; for, by God, he deserves to
be whipped through the City.”
[Sidenote: 1685.]
An eye-witness states, that during this abuse, he himself could
but smile sometimes,--notwithstanding his own tears, and those of
others,--when he saw the Judge imitate “our modern pulpit drollery,”
and drive “on furiously, like Hannibal over the Alps, with fire and
vinegar, pouring all the contempt and scorn upon Baxter, as if he had
been a link-boy or knave.”[146] After the Judge had secured a verdict
from the Jury, the prisoner wrote a letter to the Bishop of London, to
intercede in his behalf. Whether the latter complied with this request,
we do not know; but there is reason to believe that Jeffreys wished to
see the Puritan whipped at the cart-tail, and that the prevention of
the punishment is to be attributed to the interference of his brother
Justices, who might well think it mad and brutal to treat after such
a fashion a man of the highest reputation, and one who had declined
a mitre. But the aged Divine did not escape being fined five hundred
marks, and condemned to imprisonment until he paid the sum. As he
declined to do it, he remained in the King’s Bench until the 24th of
November, 1686, when he obtained release by warrant, upon giving
sureties for his good behaviour.
[Sidenote: REBELLION.]
Scarcely had James ascended the throne, when one rebellion broke out in
Scotland, followed by the trial and execution of the Earl of Argyle;
and another broke out in the West of England, followed by the trial and
execution of the Duke of Monmouth. The latter aspiring to the Crown,
issued an absurd manifesto, took the title of King, and entered in
Royal state the Town of Bridgewater. This conduct could not be endured,
and, consequently, an Army marched against the Pretender, and defeated
him at Sedgemoor.
Mew, the warlike prelate of Winchester, who had fought both for Charles
I. and Charles II., employed his coach-horses in dragging the King’s
artillery to the field. Fell, Bishop of Oxford, assisted in organizing
a body of volunteers for the King’s service; whilst, at the same time,
Ken, whose loyalty is beyond suspicion, affected by the sight of
mutilated bodies left to rot by the roadside, remonstrated against the
cruelty of the officers; and, with an exemplary benevolence, visited
and relieved, at Wells and other places, those who had been taken
prisoners. The Church of England had made loud protestations of loyalty
to King James; but the Protestant Nonconformists, whose constitutional
loyalty in general cannot be impeached, were compromised, in the
estimation of some, by the part which a few of them took in Monmouth’s
rebellion. This unfavourable opinion received encouragement from
sympathy with Dissenters, expressed for selfish purposes, by the
unfortunate Duke himself, whose career could bring nothing but
discredit on his friends; probably, these circumstances sharpened the
severity of the persecution which marked the earlier part of James’
reign.
[Sidenote: 1685.]
Two Nonconformists suffered death from an innocent connection with some
incidents in the rebellion.
Mrs. (sometimes called Lady) Alicia Lisle stood at the bar in the City
of Winchester, before Judge Jeffreys, charged with having concealed,
after the battle of Sedgemoor, a Presbyterian minister named Hicks,
and another man named Nelson. With Nelson there is reason to believe
she had no acquaintance; but, respecting Hicks, she confessed that as
there were warrants out, to apprehend all Nonconformist clergymen, she
certainly wished to save him from apprehension. It was an office of
Christian kindness, which this good woman fulfilled for one in sorrow,
who professed with her a common faith; yet this perfectly innocent,
and, as she imagined, laudable deed, being construed into an act of
treason, the Jury, though they expressed their dissatisfaction with the
evidence, were bullied by the Judge into a verdict of guilty. Jeffreys
declared the evidence to be as plain as possible, and that upon it he
would have convicted his own mother. The aged matron, weighed down
under a load of more than seventy years, suffered from fits, and could
hear but imperfectly; yet, throughout her trial, she evinced a singular
calmness and serenity, and, save when overcome by drowsiness, exhibited
altogether a dignified deportment truly astonishing. Her behaviour on
the scaffold comported with her bearing in court; and, in the course
of a speech which she delivered to the Sheriff, she freely forgave
her enemies, and expressed a desire to possess her soul in patience.
Jeffreys had condemned her to be burnt, but the King commuted her
sentence, and this unfortunate lady perished at the block.
[Sidenote: ELIZABETH GAUNT.]
[Sidenote: 1685.]
The other sufferer was Elizabeth Gaunt, a person in humble
circumstances, and a member of a Baptist Church. The charge against her
resembled that brought against Mrs. Lisle--namely, the harbouring of
a person supposed to have been concerned in the Rye House conspiracy.
This man had professed himself to be a Nonconformist,--certainly he
proved himself a worthless villain, by becoming King’s evidence against
the woman who, to save his life, had jeopardized her own. It did
not appear that she knew that he had any share in the plot, or that
his name had been mentioned in any proclamation; want of evidence,
however, little affected the issue of a trial in those days, and this
poor person, without being permitted to call witnesses in her defence,
received a verdict of guilty, and the sentence of death. The miserable
favour which had been shown to the sufferer of higher rank reached not
so humble an individual; she had to die at the stake. Gathering round
her the materials of torture, that she might the sooner expire, she
remarked, that charity as well as faith was a part of her religion;
that her crime, at worst, was the feeding an enemy; so she hoped she
should find her reward in Him, for whose sake she did this service, how
unworthy soever the person might be who had made such an ill return for
it. She rejoiced that God had honoured her to be the first who suffered
by fire in this reign, and that her suffering would prove a martyrdom
for that religion which was all love.[147] “Thus,” to use the words of
Sir James Mackintosh, “was this poor and uninstructed woman supported
under a death of cruel torture, by the lofty consciousness of suffering
for righteousness, and by that steadfast faith in the final triumph of
justice, which can never visit the last moments of the oppressor.”[148]
There have been many martyrs for faith, but these women were martyrs
for charity, and their meek heroism in the hour of death seems worthy
of the cause for which they suffered. Such examples illustrate that
power of endurance, with which the Almighty has inspired the heart
of woman. Strong in the midst of apparent feebleness, she bears up
under trials sufficient to crush minds of the hardest texture; thus
resembling those delicate flowers which grow in Alpine regions--
“Leaning their cheeks against the thick-ribbed ice,
And looking up with brilliant eyes to Him
Who bids them bloom, unblanched, amid the waste
Of desolation.”
[Sidenote: PERSECUTION RENEWED.]
The persecution of Dissenters, commenced before the breaking out of
Monmouth’s rebellion, continued to rage, with additional vehemence,
after the rebellion had been extinguished. The trade of the informer
revived. The spiritual courts overflowed with causes. Ministers were
seized, their houses searched, their rooms and closets broken open,
and ransacked. The shopkeeper was taken from his business, the farmer
from his homestead, husbands were separated from their wives, and
parents from their children. The rich were mulcted in heavy fines,
or bribes were wrung from them by informers--a present of wine or a
few gold pieces being often sacrificed to these harpies, for the sake
of escaping imprisonment. The loss of liberty is always an object of
terror, but in those days it appeared with horrible aggravations--for
dungeons were covered with filth of the most loathsome description;
gaolers and turnkeys exercised despotic power, and extorted exorbitant
fees; prisoners of all kinds were crowded together to suffocation;
fever and pestilence were engendered and nourished; and numbers
perished before their trial. It may seem incredible, but it is
nevertheless a fact, that Ellwood the Quaker, and the friend of Milton,
when immured in Newgate for his religion, saw the quarters of those
who had been executed for treason placed close to the prisoners’
cells, and their heads tossed about like foot-balls.[149] The fear of
punishment under such circumstances induced Nonconformists, in their
worship, to return to those methods of secrecy and concealment which
have been already described. Some proved faithless to their profession,
and sought refuge from intolerant cruelty, in the bosom of the
Establishment: on the other hand, there were not wanting Episcopalians,
who seeing humanity outraged, professedly in support of the Church to
which they belonged, left it in disgust, and cast in their lot with the
sufferers for conscience’ sake.
[Sidenote: 1685.]
[Sidenote: PERSECUTION RENEWED.]
The storm continued for two years; and as it terminated the series
under the Stuarts, it seems to have been the worst--in this respect
resembling the persecution under the Emperor Diocletian. The Quakers
stated, in their petition to King James, that there had been of late
above one thousand five hundred Friends in prison, of whom one thousand
three hundred and eighty-three remained unreleased. Three hundred
and fifty had died in gaol, since the year 1660; nearly one hundred
of them since the year 1680. William Penn reckoned that altogether,
more than five thousand perished for the sake of religion;[150] and
Jeremy White is said to have collected a list of sixty thousand, who
had suffered in some way or other for conscientious opinions. Making
a large abatement from such rumours, there must have been an enormous
extent of imprisonment, exile, extortion, oppression, and misery
inflicted during those two reigns to account for such a rumour having
been listened to for a moment.[151] Sulpicius Severus, speaking of the
persecution under Diocletian, remarked, that Christians never achieved
a more glorious victory than when they could not be subdued by years of
slaughter. And, in the same spirit, Neal observes, that Nonconformists
did not decrease, amidst all the engines of intolerance which were
worked against them; their continuance and increase being attributed to
their firmness of character, their practical and awakening ministry,
their severe morality, their domestic religion, their able and learned
ministers, the disgust excited by the conduct of their adversaries,
and the reaction produced by carrying Tory principles to an unbearable
extreme. In statements of this kind an author’s eye is wont to rest
mainly on fines, imprisonments, and violent assaults. But there were
other persecutions which Nonconformists had to endure. Much is made,
by our High Church brethren, of the persecution which lingers amidst
legal toleration. They point to attacks in the newspapers, to slander
privately circulated, to innuendo and defamation, to irritation and
annoyance in subtle forms; but no social persecution complained of in
the present day, can be compared with what Nonconformists, in addition
to fines, imprisonments, and brutal treatment, had to endure, when such
a Christian gentleman and scholar as John Howe scarcely dared to walk
the streets. In the library of Canterbury Cathedral is a large volume
of MS. plays, recitations, and performances, in the reign of Charles
II., wherein Roman Catholics and Nonconformists of all kinds are
lampooned and abused with a vast deal more of coarseness than wit. Such
things impressively indicate what the state of social feelings must
have been at the time towards all who were not included within the pale
of the Establishment.
CHAPTER VIII.
[Sidenote: COURT INTRIGUES.]
Important changes occurred in the Cabinet towards the close of 1685.
Halifax, President of the Council--but no favourite with the King on
account of his opposition to Roman Catholicism, the repeal of the
Test Act, and the Royal foreign policy--was dismissed in the month
of October. In December he was succeeded by Sunderland, who, from
having conformed to Roman Catholic ceremonies at the commencement of
the reign, and from having encouraged his Master in anti-Protestant
proceedings, had succeeded in securing and retaining his good opinion.
There existed a violent Popish party at Court, consisting of the Earl
of Castelmaine, husband to one of Charles’ mistresses,[152] of Henry
Jermyn, created Lord Dover by James II., of the Earl of Tyrconnel,
and of another Irishman, named White. These persons promoted measures
as rash as they were violent, and in so doing acted in concert with
a few Jesuits who dwelt in England, at the head of whom was Father
Petre. The Order at that time had come into collision with the Pontiff,
Innocent XI. They were now in a state of alliance with the French
King, who resisted Ultramontane pretensions, rather than in a state
of obedience to the occupant of St. Peter’s Chair. Then, as it has
happened at other times, parties in a Church which boasts of unity,
were engaged in carrying on the most opposite intrigues: the Jesuits
counselling the English King to set the liberties and wishes of his
subjects at defiance, and to play the despot out-and-out; while the
Roman Court advised him to preserve caution, and to keep within the
lines of the British Constitution. Sunderland united with the Jesuits,
and the other extreme Roman Catholic politicians, in encouraging the
Monarch to follow those ways which ultimately led to his downfall. The
Minister, to strengthen his own position, embraced the King’s religion.
He had before conformed to Catholic rites, but now he professed himself
a decided convert, giving to James the credit of having effected
the change. After the elevation of Sunderland came the dismissal of
Rochester, who had long been a Trimmer, as well as an adviser of
moderation. To recover the good opinion of the King and Queen he
professed to be open to conviction, courted Popish advocates, and
listened to controversies between Divines of the opposite Church--but,
at last, this cunning intriguer thought it the safest plan not to go
over to Rome.[153]
[Sidenote: 1686.]
James, encouraged in his extreme folly, rushed headlong to utter
ruin. It was not because he had become a Roman Catholic, it was not
simply because he sought to promote the interests of the Church which
he had espoused; it was because, in seeking to accomplish that end,
he violated the Constitution of his country. His despotism, not his
religion, was the immediate cause of his losing a throne. He violated
the law--that most sacred palladium in the eyes of an Englishman.
Having commenced the practice of granting dispensations to certain
individuals before the reign of persecution came to an end, he
was sometimes found pursuing a course which placed him and some
chiefs of the Church in apparently contradictory positions, whilst,
notwithstanding, they were, for awhile, promoting the same end.
“You may see,” says a contemporary Diarist, “somewhat remarkable in
this last week’s account--the Hierarchy so severely prosecuting the
Dissenters, and the Crown’s granting dispensations to them under seal.
Cross winds sometimes raise waves that break the force of one another,
and the ship is thereby preserved--sometimes they presage a tempest
that destroys it, when those winds centre in a dangerous quarter.
The Hierarchists have not appeared in the prosecution of one Papist
this Assizes, nor Sessions, upon the strictest inquiries that can be
made; but they say the only way to prevent Popery is to prosecute the
penal laws against the Protestant Dissenters, and, which is somewhat
mysterious, the best way to prevent Popery is not to prosecute
Papists.”[154]
Calamy refers to the Royal exercise of a dispensing power, and to the
sending out of injunctions by the Bishops for the presentment of all
such as did not receive the Lord’s Supper at Easter.[155]
[Sidenote: JAMES’ POLICY.]
In the Journal just quoted, an entry occurs a little earlier, showing
the indignity with which the Monarch treated some of his suppliants,
and the fruitlessness, occasionally, of their humble applications. The
Anabaptists presented an address for “His Majesty’s gracious pardon,”
when “they were kept long on their knees, while His Majesty showed
the petition to several about him, at which they were very merry;” and
the Quakers, who had petitioned for liberty, received “only a verbal
order for impunity,” and were, nevertheless, still “disturbed and
punished.”[156]
Such were the floating stories of treatment experienced by the
persecuted sects; and, if I may be permitted further to use the MS.
from which our knowledge of these impressions is derived, I will
extract the following passage which vividly reflects the perplexity
some Dissenters felt at this time, in consequence of endeavours made to
obtain their consent to measures of toleration, including Papists as
well as themselves.
“The great inquiry now is, whether persons will not only use, but
thankfully accept of and vigorously endeavour after universal liberty,
by taking off the penal laws, and incapacitating laws against Papists;
if the Dissenters do not comply, they will incur the displeasure of the
Court, and the Court will destroy them. And, on the other hand, the
Church also, if these laws continue in being, or at least the Church
and the Court, will unite, and thereby utterly destroy them. And if
they do comply, they will first verify the imputation, the Church lays
upon them, as if they favoured Popery; and say, ‘they themselves are
the only pillars of the Protestant religion, you see the Dissenters
betray and give it up.’ Secondly, they may probably be dragooned by the
Court, when they have helped to take the laws off from the Papists, and
thereby weaken the Protestant interest. Thirdly, and lastly, in time to
come, the Church may call them to an account, and be severe upon them
for their compliance.”[157]
James’ policy of granting indulgence reached its culminating point in
the famous Declaration, published on the 4th of April, 1687.
[Sidenote: 1687.]
The document presented signs of righteous toleration, and viewed
superficially it exhibits a favourable contrast with the policy then
pursued in France. France and England seemed bent upon adopting
contrary lines of policy. When Elizabeth had supported ecclesiastical
despotism, Henry IV., by the Edict of Nantes, had proclaimed himself a
friend of religious liberty: now, as Louis XIV. drove from the French
shores his Protestant subjects, by striving to dragoon them out of
their religion, James II. talked to the English people graciously
touching freedom of conscience.
But what was the real design of it all? Fully to answer this question
we must carefully look at the line of policy which he previously
pursued towards Popery, towards the Church of England, and towards
Protestant Dissent. And here it should be premised, that the crushing
of Monmouth’s rebellion in England, and of Argyle’s rebellion in
Scotland, had swept away for a time all opposition to James’ title
and authority,--had consolidated his power, and had encouraged him to
attempt the experiment of ruling the nation as an absolute monarch: and
let it also be remembered, that his despotic designs were intimately
connected with his ecclesiastical polity.
His object with regard to Popery seems to have been, by a succession of
bold attempts, to give it not only toleration, but an establishment in
this country,--at least, an establishment upon terms of equality with
the Protestant Church.[158]
[Sidenote: JAMES’ POLICY.]
The Judges, in the case of Sir Edward Hales, having decided in favour
of the King’s dispensing power; and having also given it as their
opinion, that the laws of England were the King’s laws, that it was an
inseparable branch of his prerogative to dispense with penal statutes,
and that of the reasons for doing so in particular cases he was sole
Judge;--James immediately proceeded by Letters Patent, dated May the
3rd, 1686, to authorize Edward Sclater to retain his benefice, after he
had, on the previous Palm Sunday, confessed his conversion to Romanism
by attending Mass. He also allowed Obadiah Walker, a clergyman who had
long secretly leaned to Popery, and now openly avowed his conversion,
to retain his position and emoluments as Master of University College,
Cambridge. By a still bolder stroke, the King dashed down the barriers
which guarded admission to the Establishment, and conferred the Deanery
of Christ Church upon John Massey,--a Roman Catholic priest, possessing
neither learning nor ability,--who instantly decked an altar in the
usual way for the celebration of Mass.
The two sees of Chester and Oxford fell vacant in 1686. James appointed
to the one Thomas Cartwright, Dean of Ripon, a worthless sycophant,
who might be expected to do anything to please his master; and to the
other, Samuel Parker, already well known to the reader for his violent
Tory and High Church publications.[159] “I wished,” says the King to
the Papal Nuncio, Adda, “to appoint an avowed Catholic, but the time is
not come. Parker is well inclined to us, he is one of us in feeling,
and, by degrees, he will bring round his clergy.”[160]
[Sidenote: 1686.]
Whilst James secured for his purpose tools of this description he
did whatever he could to silence the voice of controversy against the
Church of his affections. He caused the Lord Treasurer to reprove
Sherlock, and to stop his pension for preaching against Popery;[161]
and he wrote to Compton, the Bishop of London, commanding him to
suspend the Rector of St. Giles, Dr. Sharp, who had engaged in a
pulpit contest with a Roman Catholic priest. This last interference
involved consequences more mischievous than itself. It had long been
in the mind of the Sovereign to revive the Court of High Commission,
as an efficient agent for the control of the clergy. To any one else,
the Act of Charles II., confirming the abolition of that Court by
the Long Parliament, would have been an insurmountable barrier, yet
despising such reasons as would have guided other men, James gradually
brought himself to the determination of re-establishing that odious
tribunal. The lawyers told him that what he proposed would be found to
be unconstitutional. His Ministers shrunk from committing themselves
to so perilous an act, but Sharp’s affair fixed his decision. Compton,
son of the Royalist Earl of Northampton, himself once an officer of the
Guards, had with something of a soldier’s gallantry and dash, opposed
the Government, from his seat in the House of Lords; and when receiving
the King’s command for the suspension of Sharp, he had declined to
take that step without a trial of the denounced clergyman, and had
also, by mere private influence, arranged for his submitting to a
period of silence. This conduct on the part of the prelate provoked the
King to end his hesitation, and to revive the very Court, which had
been a chief cause of his father’s ruin. The New Commission conferred
an indefinite spiritual jurisdiction, in this case the more dangerous
from its being indefinite.[162]
[Sidenote: JAMES’ POLICY.]
[Sidenote: 1686.]
It was to cover England and Wales; it was to be for the reform of
all abuses, contrary to the ecclesiastical laws of the realm. It
gave authority to summon before it such ecclesiastical persons of
every degree as should offend in any of the particulars mentioned,
and punish them accordingly, by depriving them of their preferment,
and by inflicting ecclesiastical censures and penalties. It brought
within its scope _suspected_ persons to be proceeded against, “as
the nature and quality of the offence, or suspicion in that behalf”
should require. It prescribed summary excommunication and deprivation
for all persons, who should be obstinate or disobedient; and it
brought within the control of the Commissioners, the Universities,
Cathedrals, Collegiate Churches, Colleges, and all ecclesiastical
Corporations whatever, with the power of obtaining and examining
all kinds of documents touching those foundations. This formidable
instrument was addressed to seven Commissioners, four laymen, and three
Bishops. Jeffreys, now Lord Chancellor, was President, and with him
were associated the Lord Treasurer, the Lord President, and the Chief
Justice of the King’s Bench. The three Bishops named were Sancroft, of
Canterbury; Crew, of Durham; and Sprat, of Rochester. The Primate at
once saw the illegality of the measure, yet had not firmness enough
to do more than excuse himself, on the ground of ill-health, from
attending the Board. This engine, contrived for the widest action,
was precipitately brought into play, to meet the particular emergency
of Compton’s case. The Commissioners summoned him before them upon
the charge, that he had not suspended the obnoxious Rector according
to Royal command. First, Compton objected to the tribunal itself as
illegal, an objection which the Commissioners instantly overruled.
Instead of persevering in that objection, and thus commencing at once
a constitutional struggle, which was both imminent and necessary,
the Bishop quietly gave way, and proceeded to plead that he had, in
fact, complied with His Majesty’s injunctions. To have suspended
Sharp formally, he contended would have been illegal; to prevent
Sharp from preaching, he represented as the only thing possible
under the circumstances. This line of defence reflects no honour
upon the defendant, it simply sheltered him from personal injury,
without raising any question of principle. It virtually surrendered
the liberties of the Church, and appears altogether unworthy of the
occasion. Nor did it avail for the protection of the accused. The
Commissioners pronounced him guilty, and for his “disobedience and
contempt” suspended him from his Episcopal office, permitting him,
however, to retain his revenues and his residence. The Bishop of
Peterborough, with the Bishops of Durham and Rochester, were directed
to execute the sentence.
As at St. James’, so at Whitehall, the King provided a Roman Catholic
Chapel.[163] He encouraged the fitting up of a similar place of
worship at the residence of an Englishman in London, who acted as Envoy
for the Elector Palatine. The Benedictines established themselves at
St. James’, the Franciscans in Lincoln’s Inn Fields, the Jesuits at the
Savoy, and the Carmelites in the City; and Roman Catholics are accused
of having seized some of the parish churches in Lancashire.[164]
[Sidenote: JAMES’ POLICY.]
The religious orders of Rome, arrayed in their distinguishing costumes,
now appeared in the streets of the Metropolis,--a sight which must have
shocked the old Puritans--but in such exhibitions the King greatly
rejoiced, prematurely exulting “that his capital had the appearance of
a Catholic city.”[165]
If the facts adduced be not sufficient to indicate the King’s
intentions, any remaining doubts must be dispelled by turning to his
private correspondence. The letters of the last two years of his reign
serve the same purpose as the letters of Charles I. in the year 1646.
They fully reveal his private designs, whatever, on certain occasions,
he might publicly declare. They repeatedly refer to the “establishment”
of the Catholic religion--which means, in the judgment of one of the
calmest of critics, that he “meditated no less than to transfer to his
own religion the privileges of an Established Church.”[166] What is
now so manifest from this correspondence, Halifax, Nottingham, and
Danby, perceived at the time, and though they differed from each other
on many points they agreed on this.
[Sidenote: 1686.]
Sunderland thoroughly engaged himself on behalf of the interests of
Popery, and communicated, without reserve, the Royal intentions to
Barillon, the French representative at the Court of St. James’. “This
minister,” wrote Barillon to Louis XIV., “said to me, I do not know
if they see things in France as they are here, but I defy those who
see them near, not to know, that the King, my master, has nothing so
much at heart as to establish the Catholic religion; that he cannot,
even according to good sense and right reason, have any other end;
that without it he will never be in safety, and always exposed to the
indiscreet zeal of those who will heat the people against the Catholic
religion as long as it is not fully established.”[167] Another fact at
the time is significant. The oath administered to Privy Councillors
included the words, “I shall to my utmost defend all jurisdictions,
pre-eminencies, and authorities, granted to His Majesty, and annexed
to his Crown by Act of Parliament, or otherwise, against all foreign
Princes, Persons, Prelates, States, or Potentates.” But this part
of the oath, it is stated, was by the Royal order expunged from the
Council-book.[168] In addition to all these circumstances, James
availed himself of the religious sympathies of the Irish people, to
establish a Roman Catholic hierarchy amongst them, assigning to the
Primate a revenue of £2,000 a year, and he authorized the clergy to
wear in public the habits belonging to their order.[169]
[Sidenote: JAMES’ POLICY.]
It must be confessed that the King met with much in the preaching of
the Protestant clergy to encourage his fondest hopes. A Chaplain to the
Bishop of Ely maintained the immaculate holiness of the Virgin, and the
necessity for seeking her intercession. Also, a Popish priest, in a
sermon at Court, proclaimed himself as an ambassador sent from heaven
to admonish the King to extirpate heresy, and to plant in the kingdom
the true grace of God.[170]
Encouragement of another kind presented itself. Conversions to Popery
became numerous. The Earl of Peterborough and the Earl of Salisbury
both embraced the faith patronized by royalty; the first described as
a worn-out Courtier, the second as a worn-out sensualist. Sir Ellis
Leighton, brother of the good Archbishop of that name, recanted the
Protestantism of his youth; and Sir Christopher Milton, a Judge,
brother of John Milton, the poet, if he did not do the same thing,
at any rate scrupled to communicate with the Church of England, in
consequence of Popish leanings. The lady of Sir Thomas Grosvenor, “the
Elizabeth Ebury, who brought the Westminster estates into his family,”
and the Lady Theophila, wife of Robert Nelson, both joined the Papal
communion; and Samuel Pepys, tells us in his _Diary_, that he
did not press his wife to attend the parish church, lest she should
“declare herself a Catholic.” Dryden, the poet, a man who perhaps cared
little about religion, Wycherley, the licentious dramatist, Haines, an
utterly worthless adventurer, and Tindal, who afterwards wrote against
Christianity, also seceded from the Church of the Reformation to the
Church of the Council of Trent.[171]
[Sidenote: 1687.]
The fact being proved that James intended to re-establish Popery, and
received encouragement to do so, little need be said respecting his
purpose in reference to the Protestant Episcopal Church. It follows
that he must have designed, through placing a rival and ambitious
power by its side, to overthrow its supremacy, if not to destroy its
existence. Such policy was alike ungrateful and treacherous. It was
_ungrateful_--for if the Presbyterians placed Charles II. upon
the throne, the Episcopalians secured the succession to James II.; and
amongst the most effective supporters of his arbitrary authority were
those Anglicans who had preached passive obedience and non-resistance.
And it was _treacherous_--for repeatedly he had declared, that he
would make it his endeavour to defend and support the Church of England.
[Sidenote: JAMES’ POLICY.]
Perhaps the actual discouragement which the prelates and clergy
received at the hands of him who had sworn to support them, and the
imminent perils which stared them in the face, roused the rather
inanimate Archbishop of Canterbury to attempt some little reform in
the Establishment. He, with the concurrence of the Bishops of his
province, issued Articles for some better regulations in the mode
of admitting candidates to the cure of souls, since many abuses
and uncanonical practices had lately crept in.[172] The Articles,
however, did not amount to anything remarkable, and what might be
their practical effect does not appear. If preventing the introduction
of Roman Catholic priests into the Church, or discouraging in it all
Romanizing tendencies, came within the designs of the Primate and his
brethren, no signs of it can be traced in the Articles themselves;
but there were other ways in which Anglican zeal against Popery at
that time made itself visible. Forbidden to preach against Popery,
the clergy employed their pens. Amongst four hundred and fifty-seven
controversial pamphlets which issued from the press--including those
written on both sides--may be mentioned Wake’s and Dodwell’s answers
to Bossuet; Clagett and Williams’ replies to Gother, author of _The
Papist Represented and Misrepresented_; Stillingfleet’s attack upon
Godden’s _Dialogues_; and Sherlock’s answer to Sabran, the Jesuit.
Atterbury, Smalridge, Tenison, and Tillotson, also took part in the
controversy. A noble set of writings, Calamy remarks, was now published
by Church Divines against the errors of Rome; and he endeavours to
explain the causes of that comparative silence which the Dissenters
maintained upon a subject in which they were so deeply interested. It
is pleaded by him, that they had written largely on the subject before,
their own people were not much in danger, if they did not write, they
preached upon Popery, they were satisfied to see the work well done by
others, and some who wished to publish had little chance of being read,
public attention being engrossed by distinguished Churchmen.[173] Some
of these excuses carry a measure of force; Nonconformists had not been
deficient in exposing the fallacies of Romanism, and the pulpit was now
employed when the press was inactive, but other parts of the defence
are more ingenious than valid; and it must be confessed, that clear and
distinct argumentative attacks upon the common foe of Protestantism
from the Dissenting point of view, coupled with the assertion of civil
liberty on behalf of all religionists, so far as the doctrine was then
understood, would have been more worthy of the Nonconformist cause at
that critical juncture.
[Sidenote: 1687.]
The policy of James respecting the Protestant Establishment, thus
nobly resisted by some of its members, together with his policy
towards Romanism, will help the reader to understand his designs upon
Protestant Nonconformity. He could not but be aware of its deadly
opposition to his own religion; its evangelical creed, its popular
discipline, and its simple worship, must have inspired his deepest
dislike; and, whatever professions of charity and forbearance he
might offer at times, the same feelings which created his enmity to a
Protestant Establishment, must necessarily have created in him also
enmity to Protestant Dissent.
His threefold policy thus throws light upon the Declaration of
Indulgence published in 1687. That Declaration could not proceed from
sound views of religious freedom, or from a generous desire to relieve
Protestant sufferers, it must have been designed immediately to help,
and ultimately to establish, Roman Catholicism in England. According
to the terms of the Declaration, the King wished that all his subjects
had been members of the Catholic Church, but such not being the case,
he respected the rights of conscience, promising to protect those of
his subjects who belonged to the Church of England; he also resolved
to suspend the laws for the punishment of Nonconformity, and therefore
granted liberty of worship to all who did not encourage political
disaffection. The Oaths of Supremacy and Allegiance, and the Tests
and Declarations, mentioned in the 25th and 30th of his brother’s
reign, were to be no longer enforced; and ample pardon was extended to
all Nonconformist recusants, for all acts contrary to the penal laws
respecting religion.
[Sidenote: DECLARATION OF INDULGENCE.]
That James simply wished to promote his own religion, and did not
care for what is meant by religious freedom, is clear from the
French ambassador’s account of the liberty which the King conceded to
the people of Scotland; for the diplomatist, writing to his master,
states that the measure, debated for several days, created much
difficulty, and that he would by no means allow to Scotch Protestants
the extensive right of worship which he granted to Scotch Roman
Catholics.[174] The same writer, a little earlier, told the French
Sovereign that His Britannic Majesty heard with pleasure a recital of
the wonderful progress with which God had blessed the efforts of the
former for the conversion of the Huguenots, there being no example of
a similar thing happening at any time, or in any country, with so much
promptitude.[175] It is absurd to represent a man who thus approved
of conversion by violence as a friend to religious liberty. It should
also be remembered that there was no little duplicity involved in the
conduct of the English Monarch at this time, for just after the above
communication had been privately made to the Court at Versailles, he
issued letters patent to the Bishops, authorizing a collection on
behalf of the exiles.
How was the Declaration received?
[Sidenote: 1687.]
The Catholics expressed their satisfaction with it; and whilst they
gladly availed themselves of the professed benefit, they felt pleasure
in seeing liberty extended to all sects without exception, by a prince
of their own communion.[176] Politicians, who understood and cared for
the liberties of their country, however glad they might be to see
different forms of religion tolerated, could not help being alarmed
by so daring an exercise of the Royal prerogative, which if conceded,
would imperil the Constitution, break down the safeguards of law, and
place the destinies of the nation for evil, as well as for good, in
the hands of a despotic sovereign. Members of the Church of England,
in this hour of its need, said kind things of the Nonconformists,
whom they had persecuted before, and spoke of legal securities for
freedom of worship; yet they viewed with the utmost alarm this exercise
of absolute power, and saw in it only a confirmation of their worst
fears, that, under a pretence of general liberty, the Monarch sought to
destroy the ascendancy of Protestantism. The selfishness, which blended
with their fears, and the compunctions which mingled with their alarm,
did not diminish the reasonableness of their apprehension.
[Sidenote: DECLARATION OF INDULGENCE.]
Some Bishops, however, distinguished themselves by a line of conduct
different from that pursued by their brethren. Durham, Rochester,
Peterborough, Oxford, and Chester, being invited to meet the Lord
Chancellor and the Earl of Sunderland, the latter told them how
acceptable to His Majesty would be an address of thanks. Three of them
at once signed such an address. Rochester hesitated, but complied;
Peterborough decidedly refused. Chester reported that the four who
signed altered their first paper, which gave thanks for the Declaration
as a whole, into a second, which acknowledged only the King’s promise
to protect the Church; and it is further reported that when the Bishop
of Durham presented the document to the King, His Majesty said, “I
expected this sooner from you of the Church of England, and also now,
that it would have come much fuller than what it is. Can you find
nothing to give thanks for, but that one clause which relates to
yourselves? Have you no sense of that kindness others have received
thereby? Methinks you might have given thanks, at least, for that ease
and relief your Protestant brethren have received by it.”[177]
Those who prepared such cautious addresses found it difficult to obtain
signatures, even when requested to sign, by diocesans favourable to the
proceeding. The subject seems to have been most carefully canvassed
by the superior as well as by the inferior clergy; for I find in the
library of the Cambridge University a long paper, containing the
reasons of the Bishops for and against subscription to an Oxford
address. Amongst the reasons for subscription, as offered by the
Chancellor, are these--that it might continue the King’s favour,
whereas the omission might irritate the Treasury to call upon the £500
bonds of first-fruits at full worth; and that it would testify unity
with and submission to the Bishops who required the address, and who,
perhaps, expected it upon the canonical obedience of the clergy, there
being nothing in the document _præter licitum et honestum_. On
the other side, amongst other things, it is alleged that it would be
superfluous to thank His Majesty for continuing legal rights; and it
is remarked, respecting the Declaration, and the aspect of it upon
the Established Episcopal Church, “As to the free exercise of our
religion, it necessarily holds us among the various sects, under the
Toleration, who for that favour in suspending the laws have led the way
to such addresses, depending for protection upon no legal statutes, but
entirely upon the sovereign pleasure and indulgence which at pleasure
is revocable.”[178]
[Sidenote: 1687.]
The manner in which Nonconformists received the measure requires to be
more fully explained.
One class, not so fanatical as to refuse the liberty offered, objected
notwithstanding, and that strongly, to the dispensing power; and,
after much deliberation, they declined to present to the King any
acknowledgment. This class included Richard Baxter and John Howe:
Baxter refusing to join in offering thanks; Howe, wavering at first,
but at last becoming so decided respecting the matter, as to move and
carry a resolution against going to Court upon the occasion.
[Sidenote: DECLARATION OF INDULGENCE.]
Another class remains, including Vincent Alsop and Stephen Lobb; the
former being drawn into “some high flights” of loyal flattery in return
for a Royal pardon granted to his son; the latter showing himself
contemptibly obsequious in his approaches to the King, and receiving
in consequence the appellation of the “Jacobite Independent.” Of the
favourable addresses then presented, one from the Anabaptists in and
about the City of London came first:[179] One from the Presbyterians
in the same neighbourhood came next. This, whilst giving thanks for
the Indulgence, expressed a hope that the two Houses of Parliament
would concur in the measure.[180] The Quakers said the Declaration did
the less surprise them, because it was what some of them had known to
be the principle of the King long before he came to the throne.[181]
In some of these compositions very eulogistic terms appear. The loyal
subjects of the Congregational persuasion in Ipswich, and other towns
of Suffolk, displayed a curiously rhetorical style. “The shields of
the earth,” said they, “belong unto God, He hath made you a covering
cherub to us, under whose refreshing shadow we promise ourselves
rest.”[182] The Dissenters of Malden in Essex spoke of the great
service God designed to accomplish by His Majesty, “the blossoming
whereof is now made visible in your celebrated wisdom, in hapning
(_sic_) upon the most melodious harp to charm all evil spirits,
that many other princes had no skill to use.”[183] Some Dissenters, in
and about the City of London, exceeded their brethren in extravagance.
“Your Majesty,” they declared, “hath distinguished and set the bounds
of your own dominion from that of heaven itself. You have given to God
and man their due, and yet preserved your own right.”[184] Who were the
persons engaged in drawing up these adulatory compositions, by what
kind of people, and by how many they were signed, we have no method of
ascertaining; but it is more than probable, that Court agents employed
the most insinuating arts to secure their production. Addresses to
the King were for a twelvemonth all the fashion. They were presented
by all sorts of people, who vied with each other in most absurd
expressions of loyalty. The Company of Cooks were pre-eminent in their
laudations, and praised the Indulgence as resembling the Almighty’s
manna, which suited every man’s palate; and they declared “that
men’s different gustos might as well be forced, as their different
apprehensions about religion.”[185] In some cases the compliments of
the subject were matched by the complaisance of the Sovereign; and in
answer to a Presbyterian address he professed he had no other design
than toleration, and “hoped to see the day when the people should have
a _Magna Charta_ for liberty of conscience, as well as for the
protection of their property.”
[Sidenote: 1687.]
The Yarmouth Congregational Church Book bears witness to the effect
produced by the Declaration just afterwards:--“It was ordered by the
Church, that the Meeting-house should be made clean, and shutters be
made for the upper windows, which was accordingly done by many of
our maid-servants.” This curious minute affords an example of busy
scenes of religious zeal, such, probably, as occurred in many towns
and villages. The humble conventicle was repaired, the interior was
cleansed and fitted up for a public assembly, and many a heart beat
with joy at signs which promised they should once more “sit under their
vine and fig-tree, none daring to make them afraid.”
About the same time Evelyn remarks:--“There was a wonderful concourse
of people at the Dissenters’ meeting-house in this parish, and the
parish church (Deptford) left exceeding thin. What this will end in,
God Almighty only knows; but it looks like confusion, which I pray God
avert.”[186]
[Sidenote: DECLARATION OF INDULGENCE.]
The Dissenters generally, whilst they accepted James’ Indulgence, saw
through his designs. Not only did they oppose the King’s claim to
dispense with laws, but many of them also, through fear of Popery,
resisted the repeal of the Test Act; choosing rather to suffer
exclusion from civil offices than open a door for the admission of
Papists. Some indeed, who advocated occasional conformity (that is
communicating at times with Episcopalians in the celebration of the
Lord’s Supper), suffered no personal inconvenience from the Test Act,
and therefore advocated its continuance. Among them was Sir John
Shorter, the Presbyterian Lord Mayor of London, in the year 1687; he
preferred occasional attendance at Church during his mayoralty, to
an acceptance of the suspected benefits offered by the Indulgence.
Considering such cases, one cannot help seeing, that if such persons
confined conformity to their year of office, they laid themselves open
to the charge of sacrificing their principles for personal ends.
[Sidenote: 1687.]
The King, at this period, regarded the famous Quaker, William Penn, as
his particular friend and supporter. The Admiral, his father, had been
a favourite with James when Duke of York; that favour he transferred
after the Admiral’s death, to the pious son. The Royal regard--added to
the Quaker’s wealth and rank, his personal character, social qualities,
and active habits--made him one of the most important and influential
men of his day, and the early gathering of suitors at the door of
his mansion at Kensington, resembled the resort of clients to some
popular Roman patrician. Penn has been charged with involving himself
in dishonourable transactions with the maids of honour for the purchase
of a Royal pardon for girls at Taunton, who presented a banner to
Monmouth; and also with attempting to bribe the Fellows of Magdalen
College, Oxford, to submit to the King in certain illegal proceedings
which we shall hereafter describe. But it appears in a very high
degree probable, that the Penn, who acted as a pardon-broker for the
Taunton young ladies was not Penn the Quaker: and the charge against
the latter, in reference to the business at Magdalen College, is not
established, even after the cleverest special pleading employed for the
purpose.[187] But Penn certainly did all he could to support James in
his policy of Indulgence, and to persuade Nonconformists to accept its
benefits. As an Englishman this excellent person could not have had
a clear understanding of the constitutional question involved in the
measure; as a Nonconformist he showed a want of wisdom in countenancing
the dispensing power; and he is to be reckoned as one of that class
whose humanity, whose benevolence, and whose desire to secure present
liberty under critical circumstances, are wont to interfere with their
perception of fundamental principles and of ultimate results. Nor can
any one, even with the greatest admiration of his eminent virtues,
and of his conscientious adherence to his religion in the midst of
persecution, regard him as free from infirmities. It may be fairly
suspected that, with his courteous manners, he blended, in spite of his
Quaker usages, a measure of obsequiousness to Royalty, that gratified
by Royal attention, this Courtier Friend felt disposed to go further
than other conscientious men could do in promoting Royal designs, and
that a little spice of personal vanity was sprinkled over the better
qualities of this very estimable person.
[Sidenote: WILLIAM KIFFIN.]
[Sidenote: 1687.]
Upon a different character from Penn, James wasted his acts in vain.
William Kiffin has been mentioned already as the victim of a scandalous
forgery. This and other attempts upon his safety he overcame. Indeed,
he was charged with designs upon the life of Charles II., a charge
too absurd to be prosecuted, yet it exposed him to some degree of
temporary inconvenience. Although not himself accused of complicity in
the Rye House Plot, or in the Monmouth Rebellion, his family suffered
from both--a son-in-law being tried for his connection with the first,
and two grandsons, handsome youths, pious, and of great promise,
being executed for their share in the second. Kiffin still continued
a preacher of the Gospel in the Baptist denomination, as well as a
prosperous merchant in the City of London, and it is curious to notice
how this twofold character is indicated in his portrait: a Puritan
skull-cap covers his head, whilst long curly locks flow from under it,
and a richly embroidered lace collar covers his breast, with a loose
cloak gracefully wrapped round his shoulders. His wealth and position
in the City, together with his influence amongst Nonconformists,
rendered him a person worthy of being conciliated. Upon his coming
to Court, in obedience to the Royal command, the King told him that
his name had been put down as an alderman in the new Charter. “Sire,”
he replied, “I am a very old man, and have withdrawn myself from all
kind of business for some years past, and am incapable of doing any
service in such an affair, to your Majesty or the City--besides,
Sire,” he continued, the tears running down his cheeks, “the death of
my grandsons gave a wound to my heart, which is still bleeding, and
never will close, but in the grave.” “Mr. Kiffin,” returned James, “I
shall find a balsam for that sore.” The marble-hearted[188] monarch
had no conception of such deep sorrow as filled Kiffin’s breast; and
Kiffin showed himself proof against all attempts upon his political
and ecclesiastical integrity. He felt obliged nominally to accept the
aldermanship; but, after holding it for a few months, without meddling
much in civic affairs, he obtained a discharge from his troublesome
office.[189]
CHAPTER IX.
[Sidenote: 1687.]
The audacious zeal of James in the support of Popery reached its
climax in the summer of 1687. Monsignor Ferdinando D’Adda, described
by a Jesuit as a mere boy, a fine showy fop, to make love to the
ladies,[190] after having for some time privately acted as Papal
Nuncio, had, in the spring of this year, been publicly consecrated at
Whitehall, titular Archbishop of Amasia. He had immediately afterwards
been received in his archiepiscopal vestments by the Sovereign of
England, who, in the presence of the Court, prostrated himself before
the Italian prelate to receive his benediction. The prelate being thus
prepared by his new dignity, the King determined that he should be
publicly received as an ambassador from His Holiness; and he caused
arrangements to be accordingly made for his reception in that capacity
at Windsor Castle, on the 3rd of July. At the Whitehall reception
of the Archbishop, the Spanish Ambassador had warned James against
being priest-ridden, when the latter asked, “Is it not the usage in
Spain that Kings consult their Confessors?” “Yes, Sire,” replied the
Minister, “and hence it is that our affairs go so badly.” In prospect
of the Windsor ceremonial, the Duke of Somerset received orders to
be in attendance to introduce the dignitary. He begged to be excused,
lest compliance should be construed into a breach of law. “Do you not
know,” said James, “that I am above the law?” “Your Majesty may be,”
rejoined the Duke, “but I am not.” This nobleman being dismissed for
his frankness, people remarked in gossip, that a Duke of Somerset “had
put out the Pope, and now the Pope had put out the Duke.” “It would
have been more remarkable,” said Sir John Bramston, “if the Duke had
brought him in.”[191]
[Sidenote: PROMOTION OF ROMANISTS.]
These little incidents would have sufficed, under the circumstances, to
make prudent men pause, but they produced no effect upon the imprudent
King. When the day arrived, the Nuncio started from his lodgings in
Windsor, clothed in purple, with a gold crucifix hanging at his breast,
seated in a coach, accompanied by the Duke of Grafton and Sir Charles
Cotterel. He was preceded by Knight Marshal’s men on horseback, and
by twelve footmen--“their coats being all of a dark grey coloured
cloth, with white and purple lace.” Altogether the train consisted of
thirty-six carriages, with six horses each, two of the carriages being
filled with priests--but some were sent empty, to increase the pomp of
the procession; and amongst such equipages were those of the Bishops
of Durham and Chester. The party alighted in the outer court, and went
upstairs into St. George’s Hall, where the King and Queen, seated upon
two chairs under a canopy, received the Papal emissary with great
reverence. The effect upon the English people may be conjectured. Great
multitudes had been attracted by a show, such as had not been witnessed
until now, since the Accession of Elizabeth. Windsor overflowed, and
for want of room in inns and houses, people of quality had to sit in
their coaches almost all the day.[192] But they were shocked by the
spectacle; and the indignation of the inhabitants of the little town
upon the public celebration of mass in Wolsey’s Chapel rose to such a
height, that they riotously assailed the building, and left it in a
state of miserable dilapidation. The feeling thus expressed extended
over the country; Protestant anger almost everywhere arose, and James
himself, when too late, saw the extreme folly of his conduct. It might
be supposed that the Pontiff and the Papal Court would be delighted
to hear of the Nuncio’s pageant, yet this was not the case. At Rome
the proceedings met with condemnation. They accorded with the daring
policy of the Jesuits, who were masters at Court, but not with the more
cautious measures of the Papacy, at that time in collision with the
order which had proved such a prop to the Papal chair.
Innocent XI. refused to gratify James in a matter which he had much at
heart. James wished to procure a mitre for a Jesuit, named Petre, but
as the elevation of the dignitary to the Episcopate was contrary to the
rules of the Order, James sought for him a red hat. But neither mitre
nor hat could be obtained. The circumstance mortified the Monarch, and
it certainly appeared as a very ungrateful return for all his devotion
to the interests of Rome; but he resolved to give Petre a seat at the
Privy Council table, for which, indeed, he had designed the mitre or
the hat to serve as a preparation. He meant to pave the way to the
civil distinction of his Roman Catholic favourites, by first obtaining
for them ecclesiastical honours; and when the nation heard that a
Jesuit had been made a Privy Councillor, the wrath excited by the
public recognition of Archbishop D’Adda increased tenfold.
[Sidenote: 1687.]
Parliament had shown nothing like independence in reference to either
ecclesiastical or political affairs, and had resembled a French Bed of
Justice, convened to register Royal decrees; yet James dissolved it
on the 4th of July, the very day succeeding the Nuncio’s reception.
The despotic King now took affairs entirely into his own hands, and
speedily rushed headlong to destruction. Two events completed the
catastrophe--his attack upon the liberties of Cambridge and Oxford, and
his second Declaration of Indulgence. These events at the same instant
accomplished his own fall, and saved the Protestantism of England.
The law expressly provided, that none should be admitted to a Degree
in either University who did not take the Oath of Supremacy and the
Oath of Obedience. James had sent a mandate to Cambridge for Alban
Francis, a Benedictine monk, to be created Master of Arts, although the
monk was prevented by his religion from taking these oaths. Upon his
refusing to be sworn, the University authorities refused to obey the
mandate; consequently the High Commission summoned the two Chancellors
and the Senate to appear before them at Westminster, upon the 21st
of April. Dr. John Peachell, who then held the Vice-Chancellorship,
with eight representatives of the Senate, including Isaac Newton,
Fellow of Trinity, and Professor of Mathematics, answered the summons:
and on meeting the Board, were treated by Jeffreys, who presided
over the Commissioners, with an amount of insolence scarcely less
than that which he had exhibited at the trial of Richard Baxter. He
soundly rated Dr. Peachell; and when another more courageous person
attempted to speak, he cried out, “That young gentleman expects to be
Vice-Chancellor--when you are, Sir, you may speak, but till then it
will become you to forbear.” Peachell had to suffer the loss of his
office, and his emoluments, and the members of the Senate had to endure
the vulgar insults of the minion who dismissed them, exclaiming, “I
shall say to you what the Scripture says, and rather because most of
you are Divines: ‘Go your way and sin no more, lest a worse thing come
unto you.’”[193]
[Sidenote: PROMOTION OF ROMANISTS.]
[Sidenote: 1687.]
The proceedings at Oxford are still more remarkable. A vacancy occurred
in the highest office in Magdalen College. Notwithstanding the
vested power of the Fellows to choose a President, Royal letters of
nomination had been sometimes sent; and, as in deference to Royalty,
such letters of nomination had been accepted and obeyed, precedents
could be pleaded in this instance for the interference of the King.
He recommended Anthony Farmer, a man who laboured under the threefold
disqualification, of not being a moral character, of not being a
Protestant Churchman, and of neither being, nor ever having been, a
Fellow either of Magdalen or New College. The last circumstance, on
statutory grounds alone, sufficed to exclude this nominee. The Fellows,
of course, objected to him, and requested His Majesty to recommend
another person. The election had been fixed for the 13th of April.
The day arrived, without a further nomination from the Crown. At an
adjourned meeting on the 15th, no notice having been taken of their
request, the Fellows proceeded to make their election, and their choice
fell on Dr. John Hough, a person of high reputation, whose firmness
throughout the following troubles, have won for him a lasting renown.
In June the Fellows were summoned to appear before the Commission, at
Whitehall, to answer for what they had done. Jeffreys, the King’s evil
star--whose conduct, both on the Bench and at the Council Board, must
be pronounced one of the greatest curses, and whose appointment to the
custody of the Great Seal must be held as one of the greatest crimes
of this inglorious reign--badgered the deputation sent from Oxford
to represent the College, as he had before badgered the deputation
sent from Cambridge. “Who is this man?” he asked, as Dr. Fairfax
raised a question touching the validity of the Commission. “Pray, what
commission have you to be so impudent in Court? This man ought to be
kept in a dark room. Why do you suffer him without a guardian? Why did
not you bring him to me to beg him? Pray, let the officers seize him.”
Hough’s election was declared void, and Fairfax was suspended from his
Fellowship;[194] but the nomination of such a man as Farmer was too
outrageous to be pursued any further, even by the impudent despotism
which had already defied law and order to an intolerable extent.
[Sidenote: PROMOTION OF ROMANISTS.]
In August, James nominated to the Presidency of Magdalen, Parker,
Bishop of Oxford, with whose character the reader is already
acquainted. His unpopularity with Protestants had now been increased
by the publication not only of his reasons for abrogating the test
introduced to exclude Papists, but by his excusing the doctrines
of Transubstantiation, and his vindicating the Romanists from the
charge of idolatry. To nominate Parker offended the University for
two reasons. No vacancy, in fact, existed, since Hough could claim
office by virtue of his College election; besides, the Bishop had never
been a Fellow of either of the Colleges specified in the Statutes.
In September the King himself visited Oxford, determined to subdue
the refractory body. The interview has been often described; the
following account, substantially the same as that given in the _State
Trials_[195] is preserved in MS. in the Record Office.
“The Lord Sunderland sent orders to the Fellows of Magdalen College to
attend the King on Sunday last, at eleven o’clock, or at three in the
afternoon.
“They waited accordingly. Dr. Pudsey, Speaker.
“_K._--‘What’s your name? Are you Dr. Pudsey?’
“_Dr. P._--‘Yes, may it please your Majesty.’
“_K._--‘Did you receive my letter?’
“_Dr. P._--‘Yes, Sir, we did.’
“_K._--‘Then you have not dealt with me like gentlemen: you have
done very uncivilly by me, and undutifully.’
[Sidenote: 1687.]
“Then they all kneeled down, and Dr. Pudsey offered a petition,
containing the reasons of their proceedings, which His Majesty refused
to receive, and said, ‘You have been a stubborn and turbulent College.
I have known you to be so this twenty-six years. You have affronted me
in this. Is this your Church of England loyalty? One would wonder to
find so many Church of England men in such a business. Go back, and
show yourselves good members of the Church of England. Get ye gone;
know I am your King, and I command you to be gone. Go and admit the
Bishop of Oxon, Head-Principal--(what do you call it) of your College.’
“One standing by said ‘President.’
“_K._--‘I mean President of the College. Let him know that
refuses it. Look to’t. They shall find the weight of their Sovereign’s
displeasure.’
“The Fellows went away, and being gone out were recalled.
“_K._--‘I hear you have admitted a Fellow of your College since ye
received my inhibition. Is this true? Have you not admitted Mr. Holden,
Fellow?’
“_Dr. P._--‘I think he was admitted Fellow, but we conceive--.’
The Dr. hesitating, another said, ‘May it please Your Majesty, there
was no new election or admission since Your Majesty’s inhibition, but
only the consummation of a former election. We always elect to one
year’s probation, then the person elected is received or rejected for
ever.’
“_K._--‘The consummation of a former election! It was downright
disobedience, and is a fresh aggravation. Get you gone home, and
immediately repair to your Chapel, and elect the Bishop of Oxon, or
else you must expect to feel the heavy hand of an angry King.’
“The Fellows offered their petition again, on their knees.
“_K._--‘Get ye gone, I will receive nothing from you till you have
obeyed me, and elected the Bishop of Oxford.’
“Upon which they went directly to their Chapel, and Dr. Pudsey
proposing whether they would obey the King and elect the Bishop, they
answered every one in his order; they were always willing to obey His
Majesty in all things that lay in their power, as any of the rest of
His Majesty’s subjects, but the electing of the Bishop of Oxford being
directly contrary to their Statutes, and to the positive oath they had
taken, they could not apprehend it in their power to obey him in this
matter. Only Mr. Dobson, who had publicly prayed for Dr. Hough, the
undoubted President, answered doubtingly, he was ready to obey in every
thing he could. And Mr. Charrochi, a Papist, that he was for obeying in
that.”[196]
[Sidenote: PROMOTION OF ROMANISTS.]
[Sidenote: 1687.]
James found this a much more troublesome business than he had expected;
and in October he thought it necessary to send to Oxford a Special
Commission to endeavour to reduce Magdalen College to obedience. Forty
years before this, when the Parliamentary army had taken possession of
the University, Puritan Commissioners had visited the City to eject
from office the loyal Episcopalians; and now, Commissioners of a far
different character, and escorted by troops of cavalry, appeared in
the same place, to eject men of the same stamp as had been ejected
in 1647. Traditions of the past must have risen before Hough and his
companions; and as they compared their own treatment by the King, with
the treatment of Dr. Oliver by the Parliament, they must have felt
the aggravated cruelty and injustice which they had to endure in the
present instance; for, before it was a warfare of one Church against
another Church--now opposition came not only from a Monarch sworn by
law to support the Establishment, but from a prelate who was bound by
his most religious vows to do the same; Cartwright, Bishop of Chester,
being one of the Commissioners on the occasion. Conscientious Churchmen
suffered persecution from the powers they had long honoured even to
excess: they could, in this instance, as in so many others at the
same period, complain both of treachery and ingratitude, if there be
any obligations arising from oaths on the one side, or any obligations
arising from loyalty on the other. What the King’s Commissioners
did, and how the President and Fellows of Magdalen behaved, are well
represented by the chisel of Roubiliac upon the famous sarcophagus
to the memory of Hough, in Worcester Cathedral, and are succinctly
described in the well-known words which form the inscription upon that
work of art. “Having adjourned till the afternoon, the President came
again into the Court, and having desired to speak a few words, they all
took off their hats, and gave him leave; whereupon he said, ‘My Lords,
you were pleased this morning to deprive me of my place of President
of this College; I do hereby protest against all your proceedings, and
against all that you have done, or hereafter shall do, in prejudice of
me and my right, as illegal, unjust, and null; and, therefore, I appeal
to my Sovereign Lord the King, in his Courts of Justice.’”[197]
The sequel of the affair, briefly told, was this. Hough was deposed,
and deprived; and Parker was installed by proxy, only two members
of the College, however, taking part in the ceremony. The humblest
officers resented the insult put upon the noble foundation--porter,
butler, and blacksmith, all refused to execute the commands they
received to disturb the President elected by the Fellows, and to
acknowledge the President nominated by the Crown. The ejection of
the Fellows who supported Hough speedily followed. All were deprived
of their income. But men of the same, or of other Colleges would not
accept the vacant fellowships; the excitement raised at Oxford spread
over the country, and subscriptions poured in from various quarters,
for the support of the deposed Collegians. Parker died in the midst of
the struggle; and then, to make bad worse, James designated a Roman
Catholic Bishop, Bonaventura Giffard, as head of this Protestant
institution. Twelve Romanists became Fellows--whilst Protestants,
applying for fellowship, met with rejection. These proceedings
agitated the whole country. Churchmen considered it as an attack upon
the Establishment, Nonconformists as an attack upon Protestantism,
politicians as an attack on chartered liberty, and people, who did
not care for religion or politics, as an attack on the rights of
property.[198]
[Sidenote: NEW DECLARATION.]
The King renewed the Declaration of Indulgence in April, 1688; and on
the 4th of May issued an order that it should be read in all churches,
and that the Bishops should see the order obeyed. He intended to test
the obedience of the clergy; and he placed them in the dilemma of
exposing themselves to his displeasure, or of degrading themselves
by compliance with his arbitrary command. Crew of Durham, Barlow
of Lincoln, Cartwright of Chester, Wood of Lichfield and Coventry,
Walters of St. David’s, and Sprat of Rochester, presented addresses
of thanks to the Sovereign for his promise to maintain the Church as
by law established. The Chester clergy issued an address, maintaining
that they were bound by “statute law, the rubric of their liberty,”
to publish what the King or the Bishop required; and Herbert Croft,
who still presided over the see of Hereford, read the Declaration,
justifying his conduct, and recommending it as an example by the
Scripture words, “Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the
Lord’s sake, whether it be to the king as supreme, or unto governors as
unto them that are sent by him.”[199]
[Sidenote: 1688.]
A meeting of the clergy was held in London, including Tillotson,
Stillingfleet, Patrick, Sherlock, and other well-known men. They
canvassed arguments for and against compliance, the latter being
reinforced by an assurance conveyed to the meeting, in a note from some
Nonconformists, who said that “instead of being alienated from the
Church they would be drawn closer to her, by her making a stand for
religion and liberty.”[200] Fowler, another distinguished clergyman,
declared that whatever the majority might decide he was determined
not to read the Declaration.[201] His speech encouraged the waverers,
and an unanimous resolution of refusal resulted from the discussion.
A paper to that effect rapidly received signatures from eighty-five
London Incumbents. This meeting was held on the 23rd of May.
A more important meeting still had been held on the 18th of the same
month, at Lambeth Palace. Then also Tillotson, Stillingfleet, Patrick,
and Sherlock were present, together with Grove, Rector of St. Mary’s
Undershaft, and Tenison, Vicar of St. Martin’s. But the most important
personages taking part on that occasion were Compton, Bishop of London,
then under suspension; Sancroft, Archbishop of Canterbury, also under
the King’s displeasure; and the six Bishops, who, with Sancroft, make
the _seven_ so illustrious in English History. The six included
Turner, Bishop of Ely; Lake, Bishop of Chichester;[202] White, Bishop
of Peterborough; Trelawny, Bishop of Bristol; Ken, Bishop of Bath and
Wells; and Lloyd, Bishop of St. Asaph. The last two alone require
particular notice.
[Sidenote: BISHOP KEN.]
[Sidenote: 1688.]
Thomas Ken, Bishop of Bath and Wells, the openness of whose countenance
corresponded with the simplicity of his character,[203] is the best
known of all the seven. A Wykehamist, and an Oxonian, he took orders in
the Church just after the Restoration, and became Fellow of Winchester
College, and Chaplain to the Bishop. In his former capacity he refused
to admit to his lodgings Nell Gwynn, the mistress of Charles II.,
when she accompanied her lover on a visit to the romantic old city;
and it is to the honour of the erring King, that, instead of showing
resentment for this high-principled act, he rewarded with a mitre the
virtues of the pure-hearted clergyman.[204] People suspected that, in
consequence of a journey he made to the City of Rome, Ken had become
tinged with Popery; but though ascetic in his habits, a High Churchman
in principle, and decidedly “Catholic” in feeling, his protest from the
pulpit against the errors of Rome, and his resistance of the policy
of James, is sufficient to clear him from any suspicion of that kind:
James did not personally dislike him, and listened to what he had to
say on behalf of sufferers in the Monmouth Rebellion. His popularity
appears to have been very great. Evelyn speaks of the crowd to hear
him at St. Martin’s, as “not to be expressed, nor the wonderful
eloquence of this admirable preacher;” and again at Whitehall, the
same Diarist speaks of the Holy Communion after the Morning Service
being interrupted by “the rude breaking in of multitudes, zealous
to hear the second sermon to be preached by the Bishop of Bath and
Wells.”[205] On that occasion Ken applied the story of the persecution
of the Church of Judah, by the Babylonians, to the peculiar position
of the Church of England; and he so powerfully urged the congregation
to cling to the reformed faith, that they could scarcely refrain
from an audible response. Sent for by James, and reproved for his
boldness, Ken quietly replied “that if His Majesty had not neglected
his own duty of being present, his enemies had missed the opportunity
of accusing him.” But the Bishop’s wide fame rests mainly on his
Morning, Evening, and Midnight Hymns, respecting which, it has been
truly said, had he endowed three hospitals, he might have been less a
benefactor to posterity.[206] Nor should we overlook the interest which
he took in the young, his manual of prayer for Wykeham’s scholars, his
establishment of parish schools, and his zeal for catechizing.[207]
[Sidenote: BISHOP LLOYD.]
William Lloyd, Bishop of St. Asaph, took a leading part in the
proceedings of the seven. He had been ordained by Bishop Brownrigg, in
the time of the Commonwealth, and had been made Dean of Ripon at the
Restoration. In 1676 he had obtained the vicarage of St. Martin’s,
Westminster; and amidst the excitement of the Popish plots had
distinguished himself by his Protestant zeal. He had preached Godfrey’s
funeral sermon, and had been indefatigable in his endeavours to elicit
evidence in support of the accusations by Titus Oates.[208] Decidedly
a party man, although sincere and honest, he showed himself apt
practically to adopt the principle, that the end sanctifies the means,
and to betray feelings of a kind which, though sometimes attributed
exclusively to Papists, are rather the bad qualities of human
nature.[209] He combined, with his Protestant activities, a fondness
for prophetical studies, dwelling much upon the predicted downfall of
Babylon, and bringing to bear upon his Biblical and other researches
a considerable amount of learning, not always under the control of a
sober judgment. Promoted in the year 1680 to the see of St. Asaph,
he endeavoured to reduce the Dissenters to conformity by means of
argument and friendly influence; and where he failed to convince he won
respect.[210]
Such were the Bishops engaged in the Lambeth Conference, and it ended
in the drawing up of a petition to the King, in which the petitioners
professed that their objection to publish the Declaration did not arise
from disloyalty to the King, nor from any want of due tenderness to
Dissenters, in relation to whom they were willing to come to such a
temper as should be thought fit, when the subject should be considered,
and settled in Parliament and Convocation; but such a dispensing power
as he now exercised had been by Parliament pronounced illegal.[211]
[Sidenote: 1688.]
[Sidenote: THE SEVEN BISHOPS.]
Of the disposition of the petitioners to obey the commands of the King,
so far as their conscience allowed, there can be no doubt; for some at
least of the Bishops had maintained, or countenanced, the doctrine of
passive obedience and non-resistance. Nor did they consider themselves
as now acting inconsistently with that doctrine,--inasmuch as they
distinguished between active and passive obedience, and refused only
an active compliance with authority, which they had never held to be
binding in cases where conscience interposed to the contrary. They
would not do what the King commanded, but they would, as Confessors,
patiently accept the consequences, should all constitutional and
legal defence of themselves prove in vain. They would countenance no
forcible resistance, they would not sanction taking up arms against His
Majesty, and they would oppose the accession to the throne of any other
claimants, however supported by the nation, so long as the anointed
prince continued to live; and hence the attitude which they assumed as
nonjurors. Respecting their conduct on this occasion, I must, without
a grain of sympathy in their opinions, say, that they did not act so
inconsistently as is supposed. But if justice requires this to be
said, it requires also something more. As it regards Sancroft his
conduct must be pronounced inconsistent. For although he now refused
to read the Royal Declaration it appears that in the Prayer Book of
Cosin,--amongst MS. suggestions, where it is said that nothing is to
be read in church, but by direction of the Ordinary,--Sancroft had
added the significant words “_or the King’s order_:”[212] and,
moreover, he had recommended, or approved, at a recent period, the
publishing of Royal declarations by the clergy in service-time.[213]
As it regards the seven Bishops generally, in their relation to
Dissenters, they now declared that they did not resist the Royal
demand from any want of tenderness to them,--a plea which would have
been valid had they all shown a tolerant and charitable spirit, but
they had not done so. It is notorious that persecution had continued
nearly up to the time of the first Declaration; and this, too, with the
connivance or encouragement of some of the Bishops. The Bishop of St.
Asaph, indeed, had distinguished himself by his moderation, Ken had
not manifested a persecuting temper, but Sancroft, though appearing
to advantage in comparison with Sheldon, cannot be defended from a
charge of intolerance, for a letter exists, in which, after alluding to
Conventicles at Bury and Ipswich, he expresses His Majesty’s pleasure,
that effectual care should be taken for the suppression of unlawful
assemblies.[214]
[Sidenote: 1688.]
The altered and improved tone of Sancroft on the subject of
Nonconformity just after the trial of the seven will be noticed in its
proper place;[215] but certainly the language which the seven now
employed looked too much as if introduced to serve a purpose. Their
expressed objection to the Royal proceedings as unconstitutional, and
as fraught with perilous consequences to the liberties of the country,
and their implied maintenance of the authority of Parliament as the
conservator of national freedom deserve, however, an Englishman’s
gratitude; although here again, it is provoking to remember, that
the current teaching of the High Church school, to which some of the
prelates belonged, had been such as to exalt the power of Kings far
above the power of Parliaments. The ostensible ground of defence, that
the Declaration and the order were unconstitutional, gave the Bishops
the appearance of being confessors in the cause of civil liberty,
but this is a view of their character entirely contradicted by their
previous career. The real ground of their conduct, no doubt, is to be
discovered in their alarm at the King’s patronage of Roman Catholicism,
in their persuasion that the Indulgence, which they were commanded to
publish, had been contrived for that end, and in their conviction, that
by active compliance with the Royal mandate at this crisis, they would
be betraying the Church of England, and degrading their own character.
[Sidenote: THE SEVEN BISHOPS.]
The seven Bishops just described or mentioned, signed the petition. On
the evening of the day on which they performed that momentous act, six
of them crossed the water, to seek an interview with the King,--the
Archbishop not accompanying them, because he had been forbidden access
to Court. The prelates were admitted after ten o’clock to the Royal
bedchamber, and then into the King’s closet,[216] where the Bishop of
St. Asaph, dropping on his knees, presented the petition. The King
exclaimed, “This is my Lord of Canterbury’s own hand.” “Yes, Sir,” said
the Bishops, “it is his own hand.” “What,” cried His Majesty, in a
furious tone, “the Church of England against my dispensing power? The
Church of England! They that always preached it.” The prelates told him
they never preached any such thing, but only obedience and suffering
when they could not obey.[217] “This,” added James, as he folded up the
paper, “is a great surprise to me; here are strange words--I did not
expect this from you. This is a standard of rebellion.” The Bishops
rejoined--“That they had adventured their lives for His Majesty, and
would lose the last drop of their blood rather than lift up a finger
against him.” The King repeated, “I tell you this is a standard of
rebellion; I never saw such an address.” The Bishop of Bristol burst
into an exclamation, “Rebellion, Sir! I beseech your Majesty, do not
say so hard a thing of us. For God’s sake do not believe we are, or
can be guilty of a rebellion. It is impossible that I, or any of my
family should be so. Your Majesty cannot but remember that you sent me
down into Cornwall to quell Monmouth’s rebellion, and I am as ready to
do what I can to quell another, if there were occasion.” The Bishop
of Chichester backed his Episcopal brother by saying, “Sir, we have
quelled one rebellion, and will not raise another;” and the rest, after
professing their loyalty, continued their objections. James, insisting
upon the rebellious tendency of the document demanded that he should
be obeyed, and have the Declaration published; but, he said, if he
altered his mind he would let them know.[218] The conversation ended,
and they retired. Now the Archbishop had written the petition himself,
that he might prevent its being published, but in some way a copy
of it got abroad, and being fast multiplied, the paper the very same
evening in which it reached the hands of His Majesty reached also the
hands of hundreds, and perhaps thousands of the people. Afterwards it
received the signatures of the Bishops of London, Norwich, Gloucester,
Salisbury, Winchester, and Exeter, who were not present at the earlier
meetings.
[Sidenote: 1688.]
The Declaration was read at Whitehall “by one of the choir, who used
to read the chapters.”[219] It was read in Westminster Abbey; but
there arose so great a noise, that nobody could hear it, and at the
end of the publication none remained present, except the prebends, the
choristers, and the Westminster scholars. The number of instances in
which it was published in London is reckoned by Burnet and Kennet at
seven, and by Clarendon at four.[220] In dioceses, where the Bishops
ordered the clergy to comply, the command met with only limited
obedience; within the diocese of Norwich, not more than three or four
parishes, out of about twelve hundred, heard a single word of the
document; and a story is told of an incumbent, who informed his people,
that he had been enjoined to read, but they were not compelled to
hear, and, therefore, he suggested that they should retire, whilst he
repeated the proclamation within empty walls.
[Sidenote: THE SEVEN BISHOPS.]
The following singular letter by Barlow, the Bishop of Lincoln,
indicates at once the difficulty felt by his clergy, and his own
lukewarmness in the matter. Addressing a correspondent, he says:--
“Sir,--I received yours, and all that I have time to say (the
messenger which brought it making so little stay here) is only this.
By His Majesty’s command, I was required to send that Declaration to
all churches in my diocese, in obedience whereto I sent them. Now the
same authority which requires me to send them, requires you to read
them. But whether you should, or should not read them, is a question
of that difficulty, in the circumstances we now are, that you can’t
expect that I should so hastily answer it, especially in writing. The
two last Sundays, the clergy in London were to read it, but, as I am
informed, they generally refused. For myself I shall neither persuade
nor dissuade you, but leave it to your prudence and conscience,
whether you will, or will not read it; only this I shall advise, that,
after serious consideration, you find that you cannot read it, but
_reluctante vel dubitante conscientiâ_, in that case, to read it
will be your sin, and you to blame for doing it. I shall only add, that
God Almighty would be so graciously pleased to bless and direct you so,
that you may do nothing in this case, which may be justly displeasing
to God, or the King, is the prayer of your loving friend, and brother,
THOS. LINCOLN.”[221]
[Sidenote: 1688.]
After a short delay, the King resolved to prosecute the Bishops
for a misdemeanour. Having received a summons to appear before the
Privy Council, they spent the interval in conference, being greatly
cheered by expressions of sympathy from many friends of the highest
distinction. After an audience with the King on the 8th of June, the
Lord Chancellor announced the Royal pleasure to proceed against the
accused according to law; and so soon as the warrants for commitment
had been issued, the intelligence spread through London like
wildfire,--people flocking in multitudes to see these venerable persons
led out of court under the custody of a guard. Popular love of liberty,
and zeal for religion, blazed up at once, and the spectators, including
soldiers, fell down on their knees, to implore Episcopal benedictions.
With these benedictions the Bishops united exhortations, that the
people would fear God, and honour the King, and keep the peace; and no
sooner had the prisoners entered within the precincts of the Tower,
than they repaired to the chapel, to return thanks for that which the
Almighty had counted them worthy to endure.[222] The next day numbers
flocked to offer them service, and to express their thanks for such
heroic behaviour, and amongst other visitors came ten Nonconformist
ministers--a circumstance which so offended the King, that he summoned
four of them to his presence, when they respectfully answered, that
they could not help adhering to the Right Reverend prisoners, as men
who were constant to the Protestant faith. Even the soldiers who kept
guard expressed sympathy, in their own rude way, toasting the Bishops
with brimming cups; and when rebuked for this by their captain, they
said, they were doing it at that instant, and would continue to do so,
until the Bishops were set free.[223]
[Sidenote: THE SEVEN BISHOPS.]
The Nonconformists had reason to expect that they would be required to
read the Declaration in their meeting-houses; but one of their number,
Mr. Morice, used all the means in his power to prevent the issue of
such an order, and in this he succeeded. The Nonconformists, however,
were pressed to get up congratulatory addresses: which they declined to
do, for reasons which they stated in the following awkward terms:--
“None,” said they, “will offer it of condition, or quality, and so we
shall be greatly diminished and lessened, by offering it, by persons of
a little figure or that are not known to be ours.
“Our enemies and friends will greatly dislike it and heinously censure
us for it.
“We shall become suspected, and so lose our interest in our great
friends, both as to their private and public capacity.
“The inconsideration of those that occasion the debate of an address
is the only reason that can be suggested for it, as a deference to the
King.
“The report, or common talk of it, will be to our great advantage if we
do it not, and will greatly strengthen our influence both upon enemies
and friends, and in truth our influence is now full as great upon our
enemies, as it used to be upon our friends.
[Sidenote: 1688.]
“Lastly, we are absolutely [and indeed so they seem to be] for
liberty by a law, but we are utterly against letting Papists into the
Government, and of this the King has often had and should have a clear
understanding and be fully possessed with it, that he may not have any
colour afterwards to say we deceived.”[224]
Some few towns and corporations presented addresses of thanks to the
King for the Declaration, and amongst them one from the “Old Dissenting
officers and soldiers of the County of Lincoln;”[225] but the most
numerous, as well as the most respectable of the Nonconformists,
objected to such a course, and Baxter publicly in his pulpit
extolled the Bishops. “The whole Church,” says the Papal Nuncio in
his correspondence, “espouses the cause of the Bishops. There is no
reasonable expectation of a division among the Anglicans, and our hopes
from the Nonconformists are vanished.”[226]
[Sidenote: THE SEVEN BISHOPS.]
On the 15th of June, Sancroft and his brethren were brought from the
Tower to the Court of King’s Bench; as their barge floated along the
Thames, they were greeted with applauses and with prayers, and on their
reaching Westminster, noblemen and gentlemen accompanied them into
Court. Of the immense concourse of people who received them on the bank
of the river and followed them to the bar, the greater part fell upon
their knees, wishing them happiness and asking their blessing; and as
the Archbishop laid his hands on the heads of those that were nearest,
telling them to be firm in their faith, the people cried out that all
should kneel, and tears were seen to flow from the eyes of many.[227]
Westminster Hall has raised its huge form many a time, like an old rock
out of the bosom of the sea, as crowds of excited people have gathered
under its shadow: on this occasion the ocean of heads was more immense
than ever, whilst surges of indignant and sympathetic feeling rose and
rolled and broke every moment. All London seemed to be on the spot,
and the spirit of the nation seemed to be there concentrated. Upon
the prelates being desired to plead, the Archbishop was permitted to
read a short paper, claiming sufficient time for preparing an answer;
but the plea was rejected as a device for delay. The accused pleaded
“Not guilty,” in the usual form, and the trial was fixed for that
day fortnight. When the prisoners were admitted to bail on their own
recognizance, the people took the circumstance as a triumph, and set no
bounds to their boisterous joy. Huzzas rent the air, the Abbey bells
rung, and people thronged the way the Bishops went, lighting bonfires,
maltreating Roman Catholics, and execrating the other prelates who
yielded to the Royal will.
On the 29th of June the trial took place in Westminster Hall. One of
the most worthless men that ever sat on the bench, Lord Chief Justice
Wright, the _protégé_ of the infamous Jeffreys, presided, and
with him were associated three puisne Judges--Holloway, Powell, and
Allybone, a Roman Catholic. Strangely enough, Sawyer and Finch,
two lawyers who had been State prosecutors under Charles II., and
had conducted the proceedings against Lord William Russell, now
appeared on the side of the prosecuted; whilst Williams, a Whig,
now Solicitor-General, with Powys, the Attorney-General, conducted
the prosecution. This confusion of parties led to attacks and
recriminations which afforded such amusement to bystanders and so
provoked their raillery, that the Court with difficulty suppressed
demonstrations of censure or applause. Numerous noblemen sat by the
Judges, scrutinizing their acts, and the Chief Justice looked, we are
told, as “if all the peers present had halters in their pockets.”
[Sidenote: 1688.]
The information having been read, the first thing was to prove the
handwriting of the Bishops, a point not to be established without
considerable difficulty. The Counsel for the defence raised the
question,--Had the paper been signed in the County of Middlesex,
where the venue had been laid? This could not be proved, inasmuch as
Sancroft, during the whole business, had remained in his Palace at
Lambeth. The case, so far, legally broke down, when the Crown lawyers
changed their ground, contending, that the libel, if not written,
had been published in Middlesex, by the delivery of it into the
King’s hands,--a circumstance proved by the testimony of Sunderland,
Lord President of the Council. It now remained for the advocates of
the Bishops to defend the document. This they proceeded to do, by
representing that, whereas their right reverend clients stood accused
of having published a “false, malicious, and seditious libel” against
the King, nothing could be further from deserving such epithets than
the paper which they had presented, it being couched in the most
respectful terms, and presented in the most private manner. It merely
asked relief from compliance with a demand which distressed their
consciences. Every subject had the right of petition, and Bishops ought
not to be deprived of this common privilege, they being principally
charged with the care and execution of laws concerning the Church’s
welfare; but the main stress of the defence rested on the illegality of
dispensing with penal laws.[228]
[Sidenote: THE SEVEN BISHOPS.]
The managers of the prosecution urged, that the King was entitled to
the prerogative which he claimed; that what took place in the years
1662 and 1672 did not amount to any authoritative decision on the
subject, but merely expressed the opinion of Parliament, to which
His Majesty, under the circumstances, gave way, without a permanent
surrender of his regal power. The libel of the Bishops was malicious
and full of sedition, casting the greatest reflection on the
Government. The tendency of their conduct was to inflame the public
mind, and, though they had the right of petition, it could be no excuse
for publishing a reproachful and scandalous attack upon the King’s
Majesty. The Chief Justice, in summing up, pronounced the petition
to be libellous; Justice Allybone took the same view; but the other
two, Holloway and Powell, dissented from such a judgment,--an act of
independence which cost them their seats on the Bench as soon as the
term was over.[229] Evening had come, when the exhausted Jury retired
to consider their verdict. They remained closeted all night without
fire or candle, but basins of water and towels were furnished for their
use. At about three o’clock in the morning, so it is reported, they
were overheard in vehement debate with one another; and, at six, they
sent word they had come to a conclusion, upon which, the prisoners
being brought into Court, the foreman pronounced the verdict--“_Not
Guilty_.” The effect was electric, the joy of the multitude
burst out in a triumphant shout; “one would have thought,” said the
Earl of Clarendon, who was present, “the Hall had cracked.” Now, as
before, the people on their knees made a lane from the King’s Bench
to beg a blessing as the Bishops passed; the crowd shook hands with
the Jurymen, crying, “God bless you, and prosper your families, you
have saved us all to-day;” noblemen flung money out of their coach
windows for the mob to drink the health of the King, the Bishops,
and the Jury; churches were crowded with people to pour forth their
gratitude to God, for the delivery of His servants; and the prelates
themselves, immediately after their acquittal, went to Whitehall
Chapel, and thence proceeded to their respective homes, followed by
the acclamations of delighted multitudes. An illumination succeeded in
the evening, seven candles,--the middle one longer than the others,
representing the Primate,--gleamed in thousands of windows; bells
rang, bonfires blazed, rockets and squibs burst in all directions,
the populace burnt an effigy of the Pope dressed in pontificals, as
he appears in his chair at St. Peter’s, and Protestant demonstrations
of various kinds continued all that night, until the church bells on
Sunday morning called the people to worship and to rest. The joy of
London repeated itself in the provinces, and vainly did the authorities
forbid the outburst of gladness which rolled from shore to shore.
[Sidenote: 1688.]
James was at Hounslow, reviewing the troops, when, on hearing a great
noise, he asked what was the matter: “Nothing but the soldiers shouting
for the acquittal of the Bishops.” “Call you that nothing,” he might
well ask, and then insanely added, “but so much the worse for them.” It
certainly proved so much the worse for him.
The popularity of the seven Bishops in 1688, appears in striking
contrast with the unpopularity of the thirteen Bishops in 1642. There
had been a number of circumstances, operating from the period of
the Restoration, which contributed to the favourable impression now
produced. The reaction against the rigours of Puritan rule, and the
reverence, as well as the resentments kindled by clerical sufferings,
the effect of the abolition of the Star Chamber and of the High
Commission Court, the cessation of that troublesome zeal for ritualism,
which had so harassed the country in the days of Laud, and the firm
hold which the Episcopal Church had taken on the majority of the
nation--these circumstances, and others, probably prepared for that
gush of enthusiasm which greeted the Bishops on the day of their trial.
[Sidenote: THE SEVEN BISHOPS.]
Also, a change had come over the clergy. In 1677, they supported
absolutism; then their opposition was chiefly directed against
Protestant Nonconformity, and their resistance of the encroachments
of Popery seemed lukewarm: but, before 1688, they opened their
eyes to the intolerance of Romanism, and to the dark omens of its
establishment in England. Alarmed at the impending evil, they warmly
engaged in controversy, and many of them, seeing that the united
strength of all Protestants had become needful to meet the emergency,
proceeded to alter their conduct towards their long-despised Dissenting
brethren. Convinced at last of the mischiefs connected with arbitrary
rule, whatever subtle theories some might have respecting passive
obedience and non-resistance, they now opposed, under the pressure of
circumstances, the despotic policy of the Crown. Some saw the folly of
their former course in exalting the Royal prerogative, with the idea of
thereby defending the Church; now they discovered the unconstitutional
power which they had conceded to the Sovereign to be an instrument
capable of inflicting mischief on themselves. The ghost which they had
raised, they now sought to lay; the monster which they had created or
nourished, they now strove to crush. Ten years had produced a change in
the clergy; and the change in the clergy had made them popular with the
nation.
[Sidenote: 1689.]
One great cause of the popularity of the Bishops may be found in the
men themselves, in their unmistakeable honesty of purpose, in their
zeal for Constitutional Government, in their professions of liberality
towards other Protestant denominations, and certainly not a little,
in their social virtues and their Christian piety. Their advocacy
of the Reformed faith carried all its disciples along with them,
their readiness to suffer for the Established religion inspired with
affection the bosom of Churchmen, and their overtures of reconciliation
touched the hearts of Nonconformists. The release of the Bishops
proved a proud day for the Church of England, and the man must be of a
cynical temper and of narrow sympathies, who cannot enter warmly into
the triumphs of that occasion. Notwithstanding, historical justice
requires, and the utmost generosity does not forbid us to remember the
treatment which Nonconformists for twenty-seven years had endured at
the hands of the English priesthood, through their steady refusal the
whole of that time, to grant or to encourage either comprehension or
liberty. Nor can we forget the prevalence of thorough irreligion, of
frivolous scepticism, of downright immorality, and of disgusting vice,
which blackened the last two Stuart reigns, and which the Church did
so little to overcome or to diminish. Her laxity and time-serving, her
want of missionary earnestness and love, her neglect of faithful and
pointed preaching, and of pastoral diligence, her indifference to the
education and well-being of the lower classes, at the time of which we
treat, are in conspicuous contrast to her activity in these respects
at the present day. There are few of her most devoted sons who would
think of vindicating her from the reproaches now expressed, however
they may value her formularies, rejoice in her Constitution, and join
in celebrating the ovation of her seven Bishops.
CHAPTER X.
Up to this point, we have been engaged in watching the course of
affairs within the bounds of the Establishment, and in pointing out its
relations to Nonconformity; it remains for us to examine the growth of
Nonconformity itself, in the principal varieties of its manifestation.
Presbyterianism underwent a change. The ejected ministers, who had
adopted that system, continued to cleave to the idea of an Established
Church, and it was long before they gave up all hopes of some
comprehensive scheme, which, whilst retaining a modified Episcopacy,
should provide for the removal of their own well-known scruples. They
manifested an indisposition to enter upon any proceedings which could
be termed denominational; yet, preaching the Gospel appeared to them an
employment which they ought on no account to relinquish, for they felt
that they had received a Divine commission, and that it would be at
their peril to draw back from its fulfilment. The personal satisfaction
also which they experienced in the discharge of their vocation, and
the eagerness of people to listen to their voices, deepened the
consciousness of a necessity laid upon them. But, at first, they only
preached in their own houses, in the hall of a friend’s mansion, in
some sequestered forest nook, or in the retirement of a mountain dell.
Like the seventy disciples, like the brethren scattered abroad upon the
persecution of Stephen, like the witnesses of the Middle Ages, like
Wycliffe’s friars, like the early Methodists, they simply attempted
to kindle and keep alight the flame of spiritual piety. Two years
after the Act of Uniformity had been passed, although some ministers
then “were vehement for an entire separation” from the Establishment,
others, including Baxter, Bates, and Heywood, advocated attendance
at the parish church--in this respect acting in the same manner as
John Wesley did, at least for some time after the institution of
Methodism. Yet coming events cast their shadows before them. At the
end of 1666, Oliver Heywood baptized a child at Halifax, a significant
incident; and, in 1672, the same patriarch of the “old Dissent” “kept
a solemn day at Bramhope,” when old Mr. Holdsworth “administered
the Supper.”[230] By degrees, and almost unconsciously, the worthy
Heywood--and he may be taken as the specimen of a class--made advances
towards a determined position outside the enclosure fenced in by law.
Celebrating the Lord’s Supper, besides administering Baptism, could
not be consistently repeated many times, without involving other acts,
inevitably preparing for the institution of distinctive and separate
Churches. Admission to the Lord’s table rendered some religious
oversight of the communicants necessary, and practically, what
amounted to a distinct Christian society, would begin to exist before
such an existence became clearly recognized even by those engaged in
its creation. When, in the year 1672, the Declaration of Indulgence
afforded liberty of action, cautious and hesitating men, who had
felt their way, availed themselves of the Royal concession to pursue,
practically, the legitimate consequences of their prior proceedings.
A minister gathered together such godly neighbours as sympathized in
his views; and such persons, owning him as their rightful pastor,
entered into covenant--as it was called--“to believe and practise
what truths and duties,” he should make manifest to them, “to be the
mind of God.”[231] According to the Presbyterian theory, the minister
in the order of nature, and generally in the order of time, takes
precedence of the Church; he does not spring from the Church, but the
Church has its root and beginning in him; nor does the origin of his
ministerial power rest in the people, his vocation is bestowed upon
him directly from above; and this idea of the origin and relation of
the Christian ministry we may see worked out in the history of English
Presbyterianism.
[Sidenote: DEVELOPMENT OF NONCONFORMITY.]
To build upon the platforms of the Westminster Assembly and the Long
Parliament, had become impossible. It was a hopeless thing to think
of forming classes, of meeting in synods, and of exercising parish
discipline, such as had been the ideal of twenty or thirty years
before--of instituting schools of virtue and religion in towns and
villages, where the pastor should have the rod of the magistrate to
enforce the belief of truth, and the practice of goodness. Perhaps,
choice without necessity, through what had been taught by experience
after the Restoration, would have led some Presbyterian pastors
to abandon certain portions of their earlier cherished schemes of
parochial order and discipline.
No deacons, having authority together with the minister, existed in
Presbyterian Churches, and the control of affairs rested chiefly, if
not entirely, with one presiding person, except where there might
be a plurality of pastors. The question of individual admission to
fellowship was decided by the wisdom and the care of the presbyter
or bishop, not by the deliberation or vote of the Church; and the
decision and administration of discipline would naturally fall into
the same hands as those which had opened the door of entrance to the
enjoyment of ecclesiastical privileges. One of the last things which
the Presbyterians accomplished, in reference to their separate and
permanent existence as a religious body, appears, indeed, one of the
first things essential to that existence. The ordination of others to
succeed in the ministry must be reckoned a primary measure, requisite
for the existence of Nonconformist Churches; yet it seems not to have
been until the year 1672, that any Presbyterian orders were conferred
after the Restoration. The first solemn act of this description, with
which I am acquainted, was performed in Manchester, at a house in
Deans’-gate, by five presbyters; and it is worthy of notice that those
so ordained were not novitiates, but persons who had been engaged for
several years in preaching the Gospel.[232] Subsequently, several
instances of ordination occur, but the ceremony continued, up to the
time of the Revolution, to be observed in private. As in the days of
the Commonwealth, so still, a careful examination of the candidates
preceded the service: Latin themes, and theological debates in the
same language were required, and after a confession of faith had been
made by the young minister, there followed the imposition of hands,
and a solemn ordination-prayer, the right hand of fellowship being
afterwards given to him in token of his admission to the ministerial
brotherhood.[233]
[Sidenote: DEVELOPMENT OF NONCONFORMITY.]
The form of Church government, approved at Westminster, 1645,
had declared that “it is agreeable to the Word of God, and very
expedient, that such as are to be ordained ministers, be designed
to some particular Church, or other ministerial charge;”[234] but
from this rule the Presbyterians deviated after the Restoration,
perhaps not so much from any change in judgment, as from a change in
circumstances--scattered flocks and unsettled times rendering a general
provision for perpetuating the ministry alone convenient or practicable.
In these ways innovations arose upon the old Presbyterian system, but
a more important change occurred in the gradual leavening of the whole
body with a more tolerant spirit. Presbyterians had persecuted “the
sects,” or had connived at their persecution, but now, often having
to share with them in the endurance of sorrow, they came to regard
them with brotherly kindness and charity. The principle of religious
liberty had once filled them with alarm, their own freedom for a long
while could not satisfy their wishes, but they now came to see, that
their return to the Establishment being precluded by insurmountable
barriers, they must make common cause with those who were in a like
position with themselves, and the liberty which they had learned to
value, they must also learn to concede. The discipline of circumstances
has played no small part in the education of mankind. Great principles
have, indeed, on rare occasions, flashed on minds of the highest
order with a kind of inspiration; but, in the cases of most men, the
knowledge of truths lying below the surface, has but slowly arisen, and
gradually dawned. Now and then some momentous doctrine has been struck
out as by fire--resembling the _fusile_ process, when a bronze
statue is cast, and at once it comes from the mould complete--but
commonly the acquisition of important principles may be compared to the
hewing of marble, and the carving of oak, by a patient, laborious, and
oft-repeated application of the chisel.
The history of Congregationalism after the Restoration is a history of
development. Between Presbyterianism and an Establishment there are
strong affinities; but there are insuperable difficulties connected
with the maintenance of Congregational order in a parish, and the only
real kind of Congregational Church, formed by any incumbent under the
Commonwealth, had to be practically severed from the legal position
which he held as a parochial clergyman. When, therefore, upon the fall
of Cromwell’s Broad Church, the bark of Congregationalism was cut
completely adrift from its State moorings, it was, so far as intervals
of peace would allow, left to make its way, under God’s blessing, by
the efforts of the rowers whom it carried on board.
[Sidenote: DEVELOPMENT OF NONCONFORMITY.]
Independents and Baptists are included under the general denomination
of Congregationalists. Independents retired into obscurity for a
while after the Restoration. The doors of buildings where they had
been wont to assemble were nailed up; the pastors were driven out;
flocks were scattered; the administration of ordinances could not take
place; and meetings could not be held, as the still existing records
of communities, which had been prosperous under the Commonwealth,
bear ample witness. There is reason to believe that the Independents
had diminished in number. The Court influence in their favour, which
they enjoyed so long as the Protector, Oliver, lived, would die when
he died; and those who had joined their company, so long as the sun
shone on their side of the street, and who had walked with them in
silver slippers, would forsake their old companions, and go another way
when the path was overshadowed, and the silver slippers were changed
for spiked sandals. The political antecedents of the Independents as
a party, their allegiance to Oliver Cromwell, the sympathy of many
of them in Republican ideas, and their supposed complicity in the
execution of Charles I., combined to make them exceedingly unpopular
with the Royalists, whilst their democratic notions of Church
government appeared most offensive to Episcopalians; consequently, to
maintain a position under so much odium, and to withstand the steady
fire of persecution, required a degree of faith, and a measure of
decision, not very common in this world, where the love of ease and the
sacrifice of principle too frequently set the fashion.
The principles of Congregationalism, however, proved their vitality,
and although assemblies of Church-members were unfrequent, or were
altogether discontinued for a while, the identity of Churches was
preserved, and whenever an opportunity presented itself, the scattered
ones gladly re-united in the pleasant fellowship after which they
yearned.
Congregational principles had received a definite expression in the
Savoy Declaration. The Independents had petitioned Oliver Cromwell
for permission to hold a synod, which he had reluctantly conceded.
After his death, they assembled on the 29th of September, and having
conferred together, reached certain theological and ecclesiastical
conclusions, which they published to the world.[235] To their
confession, which is substantially the same as the Westminster
Confession of Faith, they added a clear outline of ecclesiastical
order; and, whereas the _covenants_ or mutual agreements into
which Congregationalists had entered at the formation of their
Churches, in the time of the Civil Wars, generally contained some
references to further light breaking in upon them from God’s Word, we
discover, in the Savoy Declaration, no language whatever of that kind,
and it seems to be assumed in the document that Congregationalism, as
to the knowledge of its principles, had by that period attained to
something like completeness.
The following were fundamental propositions.
[Sidenote: DEVELOPMENT OF NONCONFORMITY.]
A particular Church consists of officers and members: the Lord Christ
having given to His called ones--united in Church order--liberty and
power to choose persons fitted by the Holy Ghost to be over them in
the Lord. The officers appointed by Christ to be chosen, and set apart
by the Church, are pastors, teachers, elders, and deacons. The way
appointed by Christ for the calling of any person unto the office of
pastor, teacher, or elder, in a Church, is that he be chosen thereunto
by the common suffrage of the Church itself, and solemnly set apart
by fasting and prayer, with the imposition of hands of the eldership
of that Church, if there be any before constituted therein; and of
a deacon, that he be chosen by the like suffrage, and set apart by
prayer, and the like imposition of hands; and those who are so chosen,
though not set apart after that manner, are rightly constituted
ministers of Jesus. The work of preaching is not so peculiarly confined
to pastors and teachers, but that others also, gifted and fitted by
the Holy Ghost, and approved by the people, may publicly, ordinarily,
and constantly perform it. Ordination alone, without election or
consent of the Church, doth not constitute any person a Church officer.
A Church furnished with officers, according to the mind of Christ, hath
full power to administer all His ordinances; and where there is want of
any one or more officers, those that are in the Church may administer
all the ordinances proper to those officers whom they do not possess;
but where there are no teaching-officers at all, none may administer
the seals, nor can the Church authorize any so to do. Whereas the Lord
Jesus Christ hath appointed and instituted, as a means of edification,
that those who walk not according to the rules and laws appointed by
Him be censured in His name and authority: every Church hath power in
itself to exercise and execute all those censures appointed by Him.
The censures appointed by Christ are admonition and excommunication;
and whereas some offences may be known only to some, those to whom
they are so known must first admonish the offender in private; in
public offences, and in case of non-amendment upon private admonition,
the offence being related to the Church, the offender is to be duly
admonished, in the name of Christ, by the whole Church through the
elders, and if this censure prevail not for his repentance, then he is
to be cast out by excommunication, with the consent of the members.
These particulars respecting a Declaration of Faith but little known,
indicate the opinions entertained by the Independents, not only at the
time of the Restoration, but, with some modification, afterwards; and
here it may be added that if, in the theory of Presbyterianism, the
minister, as to the order of existence, precedes the Church, in the
theory of Congregationalism, the Church, in that same order, precedes
the minister; and in this significant fact may be found a key to some
important differences between the two systems.
Besides those rules, which had reference to the internal order of
the Churches, there were these three, relative to their dimensions,
their co-operation, and the catholicity of their fellowship. For the
avoiding of differences, for the greater solemnity in the celebration
of ordinances, and for the larger usefulness of the gifts and graces
of the Holy Ghost, saints, living within such distances as that they
can conveniently assemble for Divine worship, ought rather to join in
one Church for their mutual strengthening and edification than to set
up many distinct societies. In cases of difficulties or differences,
it is according to the mind of Christ, that many Churches holding
communion together do by their managers meet in a synod or council, to
consider and give advice; howbeit, these synods are not intrusted with
any Church power, properly so called, or with any jurisdiction over the
Churches. Such reforming Churches as consist of persons sound in the
faith, and of conversation becoming the Gospel, ought not to refuse
the communion of each other, so far as may consist with their own
principles respectively, though they walk not in all things according
to the same rules of Church order.[236]
[Sidenote: DEVELOPMENT OF NONCONFORMITY.]
It will be seen upon comparing the account of Independency with the
account just given of Presbyterianism, that the Independents differed
from their brethren (1) in their mode of admitting members,--for
the Presbyterians left that responsibility entirely in the hands of
the minister, and the Independents placed it entirely in the hands
of the Church; (2) in their method of exercising discipline,--for,
in the one case, such exercise followed the minister’s authority,
and, in the other case, it followed the popular voice;[237] (3) in
the relation of pastor and people,--for Presbyterians considered
the first to be placed over the second by the presbyters engaged in
ordination, but the Independents looked upon the second as validly
appointing the first to office, the essence of the call, according to
their judgments, consisting in the election of the Church; and (4)
in the manner of ordination,--fasting, and prayer, and imposition of
hands were recognized by Presbyterians as parts of the one rite, but
though fasting and prayer were generally observed in the ordination
of Independent ministers, the imposition of hands was omitted in some
cases.
The conclusions at the Savoy were not ecclesiastical canons, but simply
united opinions. They had no binding force. They aspired to no higher
character than that of counsel and advice. How far they were studied,
or how frequently they guided the proceedings of Congregationalists,
I cannot say, but they may be considered as embodying the ideas of
Congregationalism, which were most common amongst the early advocates
of the system. The principle laid down with regard to the extent
of a Church is in conformity with the practice adopted under the
Commonwealth, when the multiplication of distinct societies was avoided
as much as possible, and, except when the number of worshippers
demanded a different course, it was the rule not to have more than
one Congregational community in one place; and it would seem that the
multiplication of small assemblies, which afterwards became frequent,
resulted from the pressure of circumstances--persecution, or inability
to obtain extensive accommodation rendering division absolutely
necessary. Conferences in the form, but without the authority, of
synods were held by Congregationalists under the Protectorate, and
the cessation of them afterwards, except upon a small scale, may be
easily accounted for, without supposing the occurrence of any change
of opinion upon the subject. Willingness to receive Presbyterians into
communion, and a disposition to unite with Presbyterian fellowships,
distinctly appear in the history of those times. It is recorded,
respecting Heywood’s Church, in the year 1672, that Independents were
willing to acknowledge Presbyterians, and Presbyterians were willing
to acknowledge Independents; “and a special season was appointed for
communicating together in the Lord’s Supper. Both parties went away
abundantly satisfied.”[238]
Both Presbyterians and Independents adopted the practice of adult and
of pædo-baptism by sprinkling. According to the Westminster Confession,
“not only those that do actually profess faith in and obedience unto
Christ, but also the infants of one or both believing parents are to
be baptized.” John Owen remarks, as to the subjects of the rite--“The
question is not whether all infants are to be baptized or not. For,
according to the will of God, some are not to be baptized, even such
whose parents are strangers from the covenant.”[239] Baxter adopted the
same view.[240] So did Goodwin, but he considered that the child of a
godly person, though not in fellowship with any Church, was entitled to
the ordinance.[241]
[Sidenote: DEVELOPMENT OF NONCONFORMITY.]
Of the importance of a baptismal dedication of infants, Presbyterians
and Independents held decided views. Some of the former spoke of the
nature and advantages of the sacrament in terms which would be greatly
modified by their successors,[242] even as the latter confined its
administration within narrower limits than many of the former.
The Baptists resembled the Independents in Church polity, except as
it regards baptism. They were specially singled out for attack by the
High Church party, and their extraordinary sufferings have never been
forgotten by their successors. They could not but be winnowed by the
winds of persecution. Forty-six Baptist Churches are said to have been
in existence in London in the year 1646. The number of them represented
at an assembly held in 1689 is but eleven.[243] Supposing the first of
these statements to be exaggerated, and the second to be inadequate,
allowing that in the former estimate some small groups of worshippers
were counted as Churches, although not organized as such, and that
there might be more Baptist Churches in London than were represented in
the assembly held after the Restoration; further, taking into account
the fact that the erection of larger places of worship, after liberty
had been conceded, would absorb the fragmentary assemblies common when
oppression was rife; still, the comparison even of these loose returns
would indicate that the fact of the case is in accordance with the
probability, and that Baptists, like Independents, declined somewhat
in numerical power.
Baptist Churches sprung out of Independent ones, as before, so after
the days of Cromwell. For instance, in the year 1633, a number of
Baptists in London, who had been members of an Independent Church,
swarmed, and settled down into a distinct Baptist community,[244] and
in 1667 a Baptist member of the Independent Church in Norwich withdrew
from that society, and entered upon the task “of building another house
for God.”[245]
In the records of early Independency we meet with allusions to
messengers appointed to take part in conferences between those Churches
and others of the same denomination. A like practice existed among the
Baptists, who seem to have gone beyond their brethren in the number and
importance of such conferences.
The Baptists were divided into Particular and General. The Particular
Baptists were those who held the doctrine of particular redemption.
Upon comparing the doctrinal part of the confession of the Particular
Baptists, published in the years 1677 and 1689, with the doctrinal
part of the confession of the Westminster Divines, it will be found
to resemble it--differing in this respect from an earlier confession
of faith, published by seven Baptist Churches in 1644 and 1646. That
earlier confession presents a statement of doctrinal belief much
shorter, couched in different terms, and arranged in a different
order.[246] The Predestinarianism expressed by the Baptists in 1677
and 1689, is not less decided than the Predestinarianism of the
Confession of 1644 and 1646, but in neither of these confessions can I
find the doctrine of reprobation. The omission in the last confession,
of the Westminster Article on that subject, is very significant.
[Sidenote: DEVELOPMENT OF NONCONFORMITY.]
The Article on the _nature_ of baptism in the Baptist Confession
of 1677 differs but slightly from the Articles on the same subject
in the Westminster Confession, and in the Savoy Declaration; but,
of course, there is a great difference from these, in the Article
touching the _subjects_ of baptism, and the _mode_ of its
administration. The Baptist Confession says, “Those who do actually
profess repentance towards God, faith in and obedience to our Lord
Jesus Christ are the only proper subjects of this ordinance. The
outward element to be used in this ordinance is water, wherein the
party is to be baptized in the name of the Father, and of the Son,
and of the Holy Ghost. Immersion or dipping of the person in water is
necessary to the due administration of the ordinance.”
The General Baptists, whose early history can be reviewed more
conveniently when we have passed the Revolution, were those who,
resembling their brethren in other respects, held Anti-Calvinistic
sentiments, and preached the doctrine of general redemption. Some of
the Churches of this denomination kept Saturday as a day of rest and
worship, and were on that account called Seventh Day Baptists. They
seem to have been very strict in their ecclesiastical discipline, and
to have drawn around them very closely the bonds of fellowship. Not
only were formal letters of dismissal from one Church to another given
when members removed to a new residence--as was a common practice
amongst all Congregationalists--but an instance is at hand of “an
epistle of commendation,” written in a very primitive style, being
given to a person on the point of travelling to some distant part of
the country.
The document is signed by Francis Bampfield, a well-known ejected
minister,[247]--who died in Newgate,--and also by his deacons. They
thus jointly express their fraternal affection: “To any Church of our
Lord Jesus Christ, to whom our brother may come, who are one with us
in the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, and in the order of the Gospel
of God keeping the holy Sabbath. Our brother, having occasion to visit
your parts, and being unacquainted with the faces of the saints in your
parts, was desirous of a testimony from us, which we are desirous to
give unto you, that he may be watched over, and made a partaker of the
privileges of Christ’s house. For he is a brother, and faithful, who
also hath been as a living member amongst us, in varieties of cases in
which he hath been tried. Therefore receive him as you would receive
any of us, and as we would receive you in the Lord, who commend him and
you to the grace of God, and subscribe ourselves in behalf of the rest,
&c.”[248]
Baptists were not only divided into Particular and General, as it
respects doctrine; they were distinguished as Strict and Open with
respect to communion. In the Confession of 1677 the distinction as to
discipline is thus represented--“The known principles and the state of
the consciences of us that have agreed in this confession is such, that
we cannot hold Church communion with any other than baptized believers,
and Churches constituted of such; yet some other of us have a greater
liberty, and freedom in our spirits that way.”
Kiffin and Thomas Paul were advocates of strict communion; Jessy,
Tombes, and Bunyan were advocates of open communion.[249]
[Sidenote: DEVELOPMENT OF NONCONFORMITY.]
The records of the Baptist Church assembling in Broadmead, Bristol,
furnish a complete history of its Christian fellowship. The mode
of admission is fully described. Candidates gave an account of the
work of God upon their souls before the whole congregation. Three
are on one occasion mentioned as giving satisfaction, but two of the
brethren desired further time to discourse with one Mary Skinker
about her principles, whether she was sound in the doctrine of the
Gospel, concerning the person and human nature of Christ our Lord; and
time also to discourse with one Elizabeth Jordan somewhat further,
for their satisfaction concerning the truth of the work of grace
upon her soul. Persons, “hoped to be in the truth,” were baptized in
the river Frome--this was done once, amidst frost and snow, and a
sharp, piercing wind, so that a wet handkerchief was frozen round the
neck of one of the women; although one person was sick, and another
had tooth-ache, and a third had sprained his leg, and a fourth was
consumptive, the Lord, it is said, “to declare His power, did, as it
were, work a miracle, to give a precedent to others,” lest, from the
coldness of the season, they should fear to do His will. He preserved
them all, and not so much as one was ill; each was the better for
being baptized, and all were alive ten years afterwards to speak of the
Lord’s goodness, and have it recorded in the Church Book. Discipline
was rigidly maintained. Letters were written to members suspected of
improper conduct, and the answers they returned of confession, or
denial, or excuse, are carefully preserved. Instances of answers to
prayer are recorded--one of a bachelor, who fell distracted, so that he
was forced to be bound to his bed, but after days of prayer the Lord
cast out, “as it were, three spirits, visible to be seen”--a spirit of
uncleanness for rage and blasphemy, a spirit of horror and fear, and a
spirit of shame and dumbness. Allusion is made to the occurrence of a
fiery apparition on the north-west side of the City, like a boy’s kite,
with a fiery oval head, and a long white tail. These records abound in
stories of persecution and disturbance; but whatever may be thought
of the superstitious tinge, so apparent in the character of these
simple-hearted and pious people, every reader must be touched by the
following entries:--
“On the 2nd of July [1682], Lord’s Day, our pastor preached in another
place in the Wood. Our friends took much pains in the rain, because
many informers were ordered out to search, and we were in peace, though
there were near twenty men and boys in search.” “On the 16th brother
Fownes first, and brother Whinnell after, preached under a tree, it
being very rainy.” “On the 13th [of August] our pastor preached in the
Wood, and afterwards broke bread at Mr. Young’s in peace. But Hellier
and the rest were busy that day, and shut up the gates, and kept watch
at the Weir, and behind St. Philip’s in the morning, to prevent any
going out, and in the evening to catch them coming in, and took up
several in the evening as vagrants on the Lord’s Day, and sent some to
Newgate, and some to Bridewell, watching till seven in the evening for
that purpose.” “On the 20th met above Scruze Hole, in our old place,
and heard brother Fownes preach twice in peace. Brother Terrill had
caused workmen to make banks on the side of the hill to sit down on,
several of them like a gallery. And there we met also on the 27th in
peace. And both days we sang a psalm in the open wood.”[250] No doubt
if other Congregational Church books, Baptist and Pædo-baptist, had
been as minute and copious in detail, and had been as safely handed
down to us as the Broadmead Records have happily been, we should have
found in them somewhat similar information, touching different kinds of
Independent communities.
[Sidenote: DEVELOPMENT OF NONCONFORMITY.]
The history of the Quakers, throughout the period under review, is a
history of spiritual life, of intense suffering, of calm endurance, of
inflexible adherence to principle, of heroic zeal, of indefatigable
activity, and of large success, both as to the increase of numbers,
and the moral improvement of mankind. It is also a history of organic
ecclesiastical development. So spiritual an impulse worked out a
graduated system of co-operation and discipline. Quakers differed
from the Presbyterians, from the Independents, and from the Baptists
in doctrinal opinions, and they also rejected the celebration of
sacraments, which all the others reverentially observed; but in
ecclesiastical government the Quakers were much less unlike the
Presbyterians than the other two denominations. Quakers’ Societies
were not distinct Churches, independent of each other, but they formed
one large spiritual aggregate, the various parts being united, not
only in sympathy and general action, but in certain definite social
arrangements. In respect to corporate unity, Quakers attained to a
perfection at which the Presbyterians of the Commonwealth aimed in
vain, and which the Presbyterians of the Restoration never attempted.
After the first few years of struggle and suffering, Quakerism
consolidated itself into the following shape, as described by Sewell,
the historian of the sect:--
“As to Church government, both for looking to the orderly conversation
of the members, and for taking care of the poor, and of indigent widows
and orphans, and also for making inquiry into marriages solemnized
among them, they have particular meetings, either weekly, or every
two weeks, or monthly, according to the greatness of the Churches.
They have also quarterly meetings in every county, where matters are
brought that cannot well be adjusted in the particular meetings. To
these meetings come not only the ministers and elders, but also other
members, that are known to be of sober conversation; and what is
agreed upon there is entered into a book belonging to the meeting.
Besides these meetings, a general annual assembly is kept at London
in the Whitsun Week so-called, not for any superstitious observation
the Quakers have for that more than any other time, but because that
season of the year best suits the general accommodation. To this yearly
meeting, which sometimes lasteth four, five, or more days, are admitted
such as are sent from all Churches of that Society in the world, to
give an account of the state of the particular Churches, which from
some places is done only by writing, and from that meeting is sent a
general epistle to all the Churches, which commonly is printed, and
sometimes particular epistles are also sent to the respective Churches.
By which it may be known every year in what condition the Churches
are, and in the said epistle generally is recommended a godly life and
conversation, and due care about the education of children. If it
happen that the poor anywhere are in want, then that is supplied by
others who have in store, or sometimes by an extraordinary collection.”
[Sidenote: DEVELOPMENT OF NONCONFORMITY.]
He supplies the following particulars respecting another subject:--
“In their method of marriage they also depart from the common way,
for in the Old Testament they find not that the joining of a couple
in marriage ever was the office of a priest, nor in the Gospel any
preacher among Christians appointed thereto. Therefore it is their
custom, that when any intend to enter into marriage, they first having
the consent of parents or guardians, acquaint the respective men’s
and women’s meetings of their intention, and after due inquiry, all
things appearing clear, they in a public meeting solemnly take each
other in marriage, with a promise of love and fidelity, and not to
leave one another before death separates them. Of this a certificate
is drawn, mentioning the names and distinctions of the persons thus
joined, which, being first signed by themselves, those then that are
present sign as witnesses. In the burying of their dead they mind
decency, and endeavour to avoid all pomp, and the wearing of mourning
is not approved among them, for they think that the mourning which is
lawful may be showed sufficiently to the world by a modest and grave
deportment.”[251]
CHAPTER XI.
After tracing the political history of the Church, and the development
of Nonconformity in different directions, I proceed to gather up a
number of facts illustrative of the worship and social religious life
of England after the Restoration.
I. The injuries done to cathedrals during the Civil Wars were repaired,
and such partitions as had been erected to adapt them for Nonconformist
use were removed.
Seth Ward, first as Dean, afterwards as Bishop of Exeter, improved the
cathedral of that diocese. The same may be said respecting Salisbury,
to which he was translated. That cathedral had been kept in repair
during the Commonwealth, at whose expense no one knew, for the workmen
engaged upon it were wont to reply to inquirers, “They who employ us
well pay us--trouble not yourselves to inquire who they are. Whoever
they are they do not desire to have their names known.” But Ward
increased the beauty of the building, for he paved the cloisters and
choir, the latter with black and white marble.[252]
[Sidenote: CHURCHES.]
Hacket persevered in his labours at Lichfield until the sacred edifice
reached its completion. He raised money “by bare-faced begging,” and no
gentleman lodged or baited in the City whom he did not visit, that he
might solicit contributions towards the object so dear to his heart.
North, who says this, also remarks, that the Bishop adorned the choir
so “completely and politely,” that he had never seen a “more laudable
and well-composed structure.” He also mentions the Cathedral of York as
“stately,” only “disgraced by a wooden roof.” Durham too is described
by the same pen as most ancient, with the “marks of old ruin;” and of
that, and of York Minster, the judge says that “the gentry affect to
walk there to see and be seen.”[253] Dr. John Barwick, who, for his
loyalty, was first rewarded by the bestowment upon him of the Deanery
of Durham, exerted himself vigorously during the short time that he
held that office, in the reparation of the cathedral and the prebendal
houses.[254] And when removed to the Deanery of St. Paul’s he evinced
equal zeal in promoting the restoration of that edifice. The rebuilding
of it after the fire was a great undertaking, and called forth the
strenuous efforts of Sancroft, who succeeded Barwick in the Deanery.
To him, as much as to any one, posterity owes the adoption of Sir
Christopher Wren’s design, after abortive attempts had been made to
build anew upon the old foundations. Sancroft’s correspondence with the
architect indicates his interest in the preparation of the plans; the
passing of the Coal Act, by which funds were secured, was promoted by
his exertions, and amongst the voluntary subscribers the Dean’s name
is conspicuous.[255] The first stone was laid in 1675, and ten years
afterwards the edifice had so far advanced that the walls of the choir
and side-aisles were completed, and the porticoes and pillars of the
dome were finished.
The style of architecture adopted in new ecclesiastical structures was
debased Grecian; of which a specimen may be found at Northampton, in
All Saints’ Church, with its Ionic columns supporting a balustrade, in
the centre of which--symbolical of the worship of royalty--stands the
statue of Charles II., who gave towards the building a large quantity
of timber. The pencil of Sir Godfrey Kneller was employed upon pictures
of Moses and Aaron for the decoration of the altar-piece; there, and
in several cathedrals and large churches, remained until of late,
hideous examples of the wooden screens and galleries of the period. In
connection with this allusion to ecclesiastical carpentry, it is not
impertinent to notice that there is a paper in the Record Office, dated
February 18th, 1677, thanking Williamson for a new pulpit just erected
at Bridekirk, “gilded with gold and silver for its better adornment,
and all covered over with a brownish ointment.” The churchwardens ask
for a new pulpit-cloth and cushion. Sculptured sepulchres of the same
age, now, after a complete revolution in public taste, excite as much
ridicule as they then excited admiration; yet long before it was said,
“Princes’ images on their tombs do not lie, as they were wont, seeming
to pray to Heaven; but with their hands under their cheeks, as if they
died of the tooth-ache. They are not carved with their eyes fixed upon
the stars; but, as their minds were wholly bent upon the world, the
self-same way they seem to turn their faces.”[256]
[Sidenote: CHURCHES.]
The ornaments of the church, like its architecture and its sculpture,
expressed the taste of the day. An altar “especially adorned, the white
marble enclosure curiously and richly carved,”--flowers and garlands,
the work of Grinling Gibbons,--purple velvet fringed with gold, with
the letters I H S richly embroidered,--sacramental plate valued at
£200--these are notable objects which, in the new church of St. James,
Westminster, erected at that time, called forth admiring words from
the eminent Anglican John Evelyn.[257] They indicate a feeling totally
at variance with mediæval Catholicism; and nowhere does it appear
that in those days vases of flowers, or painted banners, or other
accompaniments of mediæval Ritualism, were in any case employed. On the
contrary, a keen jealousy of Romanism extensively prevailed, and it may
be discovered very plainly in the following passage, extracted from a
contemporary diary:--“The Church of Allhallows, Barking, in London, was
presented for innovations, as bowing to the East, and for the picture
of the Angel Gabriel over the altar. It came to a trial, Monday, March
1st, and the picture was brought into the Court; and the minister that
caused it to be set up submitted to the Court, and the picture must be
set up no more, and so the business ends.”[258]
In Articles of Visitation we meet with minute inquiries respecting
parish churches; but many of the old fabrics must have been in a
miserable condition, if we may judge from complaints made in the
diocese of Winchester; it being said that “some in late times were
totally ruined and demolished, and those of them still standing were
much decayed and out of repair.” The Bishop, in pursuance of an Act
of Parliament, united some of the parishes, “for the encouragement of
able ministers to undertake the care of them.”[259] The cost expended
on the church at Euston, in Suffolk, is mentioned as “most laudable,”
in contrast with other Houses of God in that county, which resembled
thatched cottages rather than “temples in which to serve the Most
High.”[260] Even cathedrals were badly furnished, and in sorry repair.
“Are the uncomely forms,” asks the Bishop of Durham, in 1668, “and
coarse mats, lately used at the administration of the Holy Communion,
for such persons as usually resort thither, without the rails, taken
away; and others more comely put in their place, and decently covered,
as heretofore hath been accustomed? And are the partitions on each hand
of these forms, under the two arches of the church next the said rails,
well framed in joiners’ work, and there set up for the better keeping
out of the wind and cold, which otherwise do many times molest and
annoy the communicant?”[261]
[Sidenote: WORSHIP.]
It was required that in every parish church there should be a stone
font; a comely pulpit, with a decent cloth or cushion; a carpet of
silk, or some decent stuff, on the communion-table during service; and
a fair cloth for the celebration of the Lord’s Supper; also a cup and
flagon of silver, chests for alms and for registers; and it was also
ordered that in churches there should be placed the Book of Canons, a
Book of Offices for the 30th of January, the 29th of May, and the 5th
of November, a copy of _Jewel’s Apology_ well and fairly bound,
and a record--in which strange preachers should write their names in
the presence of churchwardens. Notwithstanding the careful and repeated
inquiries made respecting such matters in Articles of Visitation, it is
highly probable that they were often neglected.[262]
II. From the buildings and their furniture we turn to the worship,
including its vestments and mode of celebration. Whatever may be the
exact meaning of the rubric prefixed to the Order of Morning Prayer,
chasubles and other priestly attire used in the second year of King
Edward, were not worn after the Restoration, nor did any of the
Anglican prelates attempt to enforce their use. Copes, according to
the Twenty-fourth Canon, were prescribed to be worn by the principal
ministers at the Holy Communion in cathedrals; but in other churches
ministers were to read the Divine service, and administer the
sacraments, in a decent and comely surplice with sleeves, and wearing
University hoods according to their degrees. With such an arrangement
the visitation articles of the prelates are in accordance. Croft,
Bishop of Hereford, that very low Churchman, took care to express his
decided approbation “of a pure white robe on the minister’s shoulders,”
emblematical of the purity of heart which became the service.[263]
Wind instruments were, for a time used in some cathedral choirs, but
they soon gave place to organs; and the boys failed not to bring “a
fair book of the anthem and service, and sometimes the score,” to
distinguished strangers.[264]
Baptism was performed according to the Prayer Book, and a public
administration of it in the case of those who had passed the age of
childhood sometimes attracted considerable notice. The following
anecdote on this subject occurs in a letter:--“Mr. John Harrington
(whose father was some time since one of the serjeants-at-arms to His
Majesty) had his boy baptized in the church; he being about fifteen
years old, and not baptized before, and the son of a Nonconformist. To
see which the church was fuller than it useth to be at other times; he
having God-fathers and God-mothers according to the ceremony of the
Church.”[265]
The Lord’s Supper was administered from the table placed by the wall,
at the east end of the church, in accordance with Laudian precedents,
in spite of the rubrical direction that it “shall stand in the body
of the church, or in the chancel; where morning and evening prayers
are appointed to be said.” In some churches, the Communion Service, on
non-communion days, was read from the desk, it being alleged, “that it
was indecent to go to the altar and back, with the surplice still on,
to the homily or sermon”--a reason which implies that the surplice was
worn in the pulpit, even by those who read the Communion Service in the
desk. Clergymen left the desk, after the second lesson, to baptize in
the font at the west end of the church.[266]
[Sidenote: WORSHIP.]
On special occasions, cathedrals witnessed extraordinary
processions--as when Judges, with the Sheriffs and their officers,
attended at Assize sermons; or when a Mayor and Aldermen, clothed in
municipal robes, with their gold chains, marched or rode thither,
through streets of quaint architecture, to celebrate festivals civic
or sacred. A Royal visit eclipsed all mere annual pageants; and it is
related that when Charles II., in the year 1671, visited the City of
Norwich, as the guest of Lord Henry Howard, afterwards Duke of Norfolk,
His Majesty went to the grand old Norman temple in the Close--the pride
of the City--and was “sung into the church with an anthem; and when he
had ended his devotion at the east end of the church, where he kneeled
on the hard stone, he went to the Bishop’s palace [then occupied by
Reynolds], and was there nobly entertained.”[267]
St. George’s Chapel, Windsor, became the scene of peculiar solemnities.
The Feast of St. George was there celebrated in 1662; and the knights
elect were constrained to receive their investiture below, in the
choir, yet directly under their proper stalls, because of “the great
concourse of people which at that time had flocked to Windsor (greedy
to behold the glory of that solemnity, which for many years had been
intermitted), and rudely forced not only into and filled the lower row
of stalls, but taken up almost the whole choir.” Two years afterwards,
at the Feast of St. George, there was an anthem, composed for the
solemnity, accompanied by the organ and other instrumental music; this
was the first time that instrumental music was introduced into the
Royal chapel.[268]
Pompous funerals had taken place during the Commonwealth, particularly
in Westminster Abbey. Funerals more pompous still occurred in the same
national edifice, with a splendour surpassing what might be exhibited
elsewhere. Monk, Duke of Albemarle, in 1670, was conveyed “by the
King’s orders, with all respect imaginable,” in a long procession;
and within the sacred walls the remains were met by the Dean and
Prebendaries, who wore copes; and, in connection with the service,
offerings were made at the altar.[269]
On Easter Day, at the Royal Chapel, when the Bishop of Rochester
preached before the King, and the sacrament followed, “there was
perfume burnt before the office began.”[270]
The Restoration brought with it much irreverence in religion. The
worship at Lichfield was performed “with more harmony and less
huddle” than in any church in England, except in St. Paul’s at a
later period;[271] a laudable exception proving a disgraceful rule.
Complaints were officially made, by a circular letter in the name of
Archbishop Sheldon, respecting the slovenly performance of sacred
duties by Deans, Canons, and other dignitaries. Reading the service and
administering the sacraments had been neglected by such persons, as if
they had been offices beneath their importance, to be performed only
by Vicars or petty Canons.[272] Croft, Bishop of Hereford, complains
that “such dirty nasty surplices as most of them wear, and especially
the singers in cathedrals (where they should be most decent), is rather
an imitation of their dirty lives,” and had given his “stomach such a
surfeit of them” as that he had almost an aversion to them all; and
he adds, “I am confident, had not this decent habit been so indecently
abused, it had never been so generally loathed.”[273] And Trelawny,
of Bristol, laments, in reference to the united parishes of Elberton
and Littleton, “I never saw so ill churches, or such ill parishioners.
In one the sacrament has not been administered since the Restoration,
in the other very seldom; and all the plate is but a small silver
bowl, and that is kept at a Quaker’s house, with my late orders to the
contrary.”[274] In Articles of Visitation by the Bishop of Lincoln, it
is asked whether churchwardens took care that people should not stand
idle, or talk together in the church-porch, or walk in the church-yard
during the time of sacred offices, or lean or lay their hats on the
communion-table; and whether no minstrels, morrice-dancers, dogs,
hawks, or hounds were brought into the church to the disturbance of the
congregation.[275]
[Sidenote: WORSHIP.]
Neglect on the part of ecclesiastical officers was accompanied by
irreverence on the part of people in general; in all of which may be
traced--beyond the result of certain Puritan extravagances during the
Civil War--the effect of educational habits which date as far back as
the Reformation, and even earlier still, when worn-out superstitions
produced contempt. In some cases during the reign of Charles II.
impious frivolity and brutal ignorance are apparent. A curious
example of this is furnished in the letter of a Canon Residentiary at
York, written February 12th, 1673, and preserved amongst the State
Papers:--“On Sundays and holidays (when the young people of the town
are afloat), 400 or 500 would walk, talk, and do much worse things,
to the great disturbance of Divine service (not to mention other
aggravations), that nothing could be heard, though with all, I have
used such temper and moderation in it, that nothing hath at any time
been done against any of them, further than to urge them either to go
in to prayers, or to go out of the church, unless sometimes I have
catched at a rude boy’s hat, and kept it till the end of the prayers,
and given it him (with a chiding) again. Howbeit, this, it seems,
so exasperated the youth of the town, that yesterday (being Shrove
Tuesday) they, in time of Divine service, broke open the church doors
(which I had caused to be shut), and when (after service ended) I was
going to my house, they so affronted and abused me, that Captain Henry
Wood, and sundry other officers of the garrison, who were walking in
the church, were forced not only to come, but to send for two files
of musketeers, to my rescue.” The writer then relates that, after the
soldiers had left, the mob attacked his house, broke his windows, and
did damage to the extent of £40; and would possibly have set fire to
his house, had they not been restrained by the military. The Lord Mayor
of the City refused to interfere, as the church-yard was not within his
liberty.
[Sidenote: REVENUES.]
III. Episcopal revenues were unequally distributed.[276] The Bishop
of Durham received, in 1670 and afterwards, an annual income of
£3,280; previously to which his resources were so limited, that it was
computed not more than £1,500 remained after he had paid subsidies
and first-fruits. Durham House, in the Strand, had been seized by
Queen Elizabeth; although reclaimed by the Bishop upon her death, it
never again became the episcopal residence; but Aukland Palace, which
used to be to Durham what Croydon used to be to Lambeth, remained in
the Bishops’ possession, and furnished an opportunity for the richest
hospitalities. Ely Place, where Shakespeare’s “good strawberries”
grew in the garden, with its vineyard, meadow, and orchard, had
been appropriated to Sir Christopher Hatton by Queen Elizabeth; yet
Bishop Laney had possession of the palace, and died there in 1675.
The Bishops of Carlisle had long lost Worcester House, in the Strand;
and the prelates of Winchester had leased out “their very fair
house well repaired” (in Southwark), which had “a large wharf and
landing-place,” to occupy a mansion in the suburb of Chelsea.[277] The
provincial palaces of the Bishops surpassed those which they had in
the Metropolis, and were well-known centres of social attraction and
entertainment. Whilst lamentations were poured forth by some over the
robbery and spoliation of sees, so that it was said a mean gentleman of
£200 in land yearly would not exchange his worldly state and condition
with divers Bishops,[278]--Burnet speaks of the extravagance of the
class generally, and represents them as a bad pattern “to all the
lower dignitaries, who generally took more care of themselves than
of the Church.” It is a fact, however, which it would be unjust not
to mention, that many of the Bishops were large contributors to the
repairs of sacred buildings, and to other ecclesiastical objects.
Cosin, for instance, expended the income of the first seven years of
his episcopacy in the improvement of property belonging to the see of
Durham, and in establishing various charitable foundations.
The see of Bristol was extremely poor, and Hereford yielded only
£800 a year.[279] Yet Brian Duppa, after his translation to the see
of Winchester, which he held but a year and a half, is reported to
have received in fines as much as £50,000. Out of this large amount,
however, he remitted £30,000 to his tenants, and expended £16,000 in
acts of charity.[280] Morley disposed of almost all his income in
benefactions. Sheldon’s gifts were computed at upwards of £66,000.[281]
[Sidenote: REVENUES.]
Palaces, deaneries, and prebendal houses, like cathedrals and churches,
had suffered in the wars. Their reparation, and the business connected
with raising funds for the purpose, largely occupied the attention of
the restored possessors. Hacket, so successful in the re-edification
of his cathedral, failed to complete the re-edification of his palace,
and left the work to his successor, who shamefully neglected it; but
it should be remembered that the restoration of the palaces at Exeter
and Salisbury are amongst the good deeds ascribed to Seth Ward.[282]
Sancroft procured an Act of Parliament which enabled him to lease
out shops and tenements in St. Paul’s Churchyard, upon condition of
expending £2,500, before September 30th, 1673, in building a commodious
deanery; and the Privy Council, after noticing, in their minutes, that
the houses of the Dean and Prebendaries of Winchester, in the late
rebellion, were totally demolished, and the greatest part of two
other houses likewise pulled down, and three only left standing on the
old foundations, very ruinous and out of repair, gave orders, with a
view to facilitate the rebuilding, that there should be a repeal of
the clauses in the statutes of the Church “which concern succession
in vacant prebends, and the reparation of deans’ and prebends’
houses.”[283] Large demands were made upon Chapter revenues, not only
for repairs, but for Royal presents and charities; and some cathedral
stalls furnished little emolument to their occupants: so that, speaking
of a prebend, Croft of Hereford says, “This thing, though small
(worth not above £80 per annum) is the best and only considerable
thing in my gift, my bishopric being as wretched in this--to my great
discomfort--as in the revenue.”[284] Deans and Canons could not vie
with Bishops in hospitality, but the comforts of life were amply
provided and enjoyed in snug and cozy abodes, within the limits of the
cathedral close: and North mentions the good ale and small beer brewed
from South Country malt, and supplied from the Prebend’s cellars to his
relative the Judge, when visiting the City of Carlisle.[285]
In the year 1663 it was computed that there were 12,000 church livings,
of which 3,000 were impropriate, and 4,165 were sinecures without
resident clergymen. Considering the small means possessed by some
distinguished clergymen, we are not surprised at the eager applications
with which they beset Secretary Williamson, whenever vacancies occurred
in ecclesiastical posts of a promising kind. Sometimes bribes were
offered to promote success, as appears from a letter written to
Williamson by a clergyman named Gregory, who sought a stall in a
cathedral. He said he had a friend near the Earl of Clarendon; but, the
Earl’s interest failing, he desired the Secretary to procure a grant
of the next prebend in either of the places he referred to; and he
promised gladly, upon the passing of the seal, to gratify his friend
with one hundred pieces. A living in any county, if considerable, would
be no less welcome, though the simoniacal oath deterred the writer
from anything more than an indefinite engagement. He could answer for
it, that his Lordship of Gloucester would give him such a character as
showed him deserving of the preferment desired.[286]
[Sidenote: REVENUES.]
To pass from this shot so skilfully but so illegally fired into the
ecclesiastical preserves of the State--whether it brought anything
into the hands of this ministerial poacher is not worth inquiry--we
light upon other examples, in abundance, of clergymen patiently waiting
and eagerly asking for the bestowment of patronage. The Rector of
Meonstoke, Hampshire, informed the influential man at head-quarters
that he had just fulfilled his course of preaching in the Cathedral
Church of Chichester as a minor prophet, which rendered him capable of
advancement to a residentiary’s place, if he could obtain an election.
There was a place vacant, and he now solicited the Secretary’s interest
with the Dean, who was Clerk of the Closet,--as he would not deny
such an important personage anything,--and the petitioner was sure
that a certain Canon he mentions would agree with the Dean; and both
together could overrule the Chapter, which at that time consisted of
them and two others. The latter, indeed, were stiffly resolved for a
Mr. Sefton, and the Dean had thoughts of the thing for himself; but
the writer presumed the Dean would get loose to it when he understood
it was below him. Should he, however, continue in such inclination, the
petitioner asked that he might be the Dean’s successor. The place would
be a preferment to the suppliant Rector, who considered he would not
be unacceptable to the Church and City, and it would redeem him from
the desolate condition he was in by the death of his dear Betty.[287]
Again, Bishop Reynolds appointed Dr. Mylles to be his Chancellor in
the diocese of Norwich, by patent under his Episcopal seal dated 13th
of September, 1661. The Chancellor requested the Dean and Chapter to
confirm the patent, which they refused to do, without assigning any
reason for their refusal. He accordingly applied to the King, and
prayed that he would be graciously pleased to enforce the needful
confirmation of the patent by the proper ecclesiastical authorities. In
urging upon His Majesty this petition, Dr. Mylles notices an objection
made to him, on the ground of his having been on the side of the
Parliament in the late troubles. To remove the objection, he asserts
that he had never disobliged any of the King’s friends; that when he
discovered Cromwell’s designs, he quitted the army; that he was ejected
from the University at Oxford for declining to take the Engagement;
that he had served under the Duke of Albemarle, and had helped to
bring in the King. This petition was backed by Rushworth, who pleaded,
amongst other things, in his client’s favour, that at private meetings,
where he thought he might speak without danger, he had not hesitated to
contribute counsel and advice towards His Majesty’s restoration, which
had produced upon Lord Fairfax, and other considerable persons, a good
effect.[288]
To cite another case:--“Most honoured Sir,”--wrote Dr. Fell,
Vice-Chancellor of Oxford, to Williamson, immediately after the
death of Dr. William Fuller, who had been translated from Limerick
to Lincoln,--“it is a privilege our people here take to themselves
to bestow all bishoprics before the King disposes of them; and they,
having, upon the first news of the vacancy of Lincoln, made the Provost
to be the successor, went on, in the same method of liberality, to
bestow his places; and upon Sunday night one of the most popular
Bachelors in Divinity that we have in town came to me upon that errand,
signifying his concern on behalf of the Master of Pembroke; and on
Monday several others, of other houses, made the same application.
I told them all, that first it was very indecent to begin a canvass
before a place was actually void, and probably a considerable time
would pass before there would be a vacancy; besides, they should
consider that Dr. Tully might justly pretend to the place, and, if
he did, would not fail of being assisted by his friends.” To move on
behalf of Dr. Hall, he goes on to say, might be a great unkindness
to him, since he did not appear as a candidate, nor probably would
like to have his name brought in question; besides, it would create a
competition and disturbance in the University; and therefore he had
desired his friends not to proceed in the matter.[289] Dr. Tully,
referred to in this letter--an eminent Divine and Controversialist,
of whom notice will be taken in our review of the theology of the
period--was not an unconcerned spectator of the changes occurring at
the time, and the excitement which they produced; and I find amongst
the State Papers the following exquisite specimen of the characteristic
flattery of the age preserved in a letter which he wrote, on Holy
Thursday, to his friend at Court:--“Right Honourable,--Having no way
else to express the sense of my greatest obligations to you, I beg
you will commiserate so far as to accept this renewal of my heartiest
acknowledgments. I hasten to make it, not for fear I should forget your
favours (I know that to be next impossibility), but to shun the pain
of delay, from the weight and pressure of them. It is some ease to a
grateful mind, under such a load of obligations, to air itself in the
field where they grow. Most honoured Sir, amongst all the rest of your
noble kindnesses to me, I must single that out of the crowd, which
made you unkind (I had almost said, unnatural) to yourself, to let me
know how much you are my friend. I can but thank you, and tell stories
at home and abroad of your goodness to me, and heartily pray for the
increase of all honour to you, with a long enjoyment, and the reward at
last of a blessed immortality.”[290]
[Sidenote: REVENUES.]
These well-timed compliments were not in vain; for, though Tully did
not obtain any preferment in consequence of the death of the Bishop
of Lincoln, he was immediately afterwards promoted to the Deanery of
Ripon, upon the death of Dr. John Neile.
Dr. Barlow, a well-known Oxford man, and an eager aspirant for a
bishopric, obtained the see of Lincoln, and wrote on the 29th of May,
as mentioned already, to his friend, the Secretary, stating that fees,
first-fruits, and other charges cost him £1,500 or £2,000 before he
could receive a penny from the bishopric. “I was never in debt,” he
says, “yet borrow I must, and, to enable me to repay honestly, I mean
to stay here (as others I see do in the like case) till a little after
Lady-day next. My College and Margaret Lecture I can (without any
dispensation) keep, and perform the duties of both till then.”[291]
Amidst the turnings of the preferment-wheel at that time, Dr. Hall,
referred to in Vice-Chancellor Fell’s letter, was elected to the
Margaret professorship, vacated at length by Barlow’s resignation.
In July of the same year, 1675, another letter reached Whitehall,
upon a similar subject. “It is thought here,” wrote Dr. John Wallis,
the celebrated Mathematician at Oxford, “that the Bishop of Worcester
is either dead, or at least not likely to subsist long, which will
give occasion of alterations. If that or any other occasion give you
opportunity of doing a kindness to your servant, or my son, I believe
His Majesty would be very ready to grant, if we knew what to ask. I
have signified to Dr. Conant by his son your good thoughts of him.” We
must now terminate these illustrations.
IV. By an easy transition we pass from ecclesiastical revenues to
ecclesiastical courts. Both the Archidiaconal and the Consistorial
resumed their activity after the Restoration, and before them were
brought numerous charges of delinquency, respecting clergymen
and laymen. It would be beyond my purpose to enter into the
_penetralia_ of these intricate proceedings; it will be sufficient
to notice the nature of some of the accusations on which individuals
were arraigned, as illustrative of the social life of the period. Yet
before doing so I must notice two circumstances, which require more
attention than they have received from historians. The first is this:--
[Sidenote: ECCLESIASTICAL COURTS.]
By the Act of the 13th Charles II. cap. 12, which restored the
jurisdiction of the ordinary Ecclesiastical Courts, but abolished
that of the extraordinary High Commission Court, it was expressly
provided that there should no longer be any administration of the
_ex-officio_ oath, by which persons were compelled to accuse, or
to purge themselves of any criminal matter. But as it has been recently
remarked, whilst the letter of this enactment seems to have been so
far observed, that an accused clergyman or other person, liable to
deprivation, could not be obliged to answer on oath as to the truth
of the charge,--the spirit of the enactment, in certain other cases,
was violated to a great extent. For, in the administration of articles
to a defendant in a cause of correction, the practice was to charge
the commission of the offence on the ground of public “fame,” without
specific evidence, and to require the defendant to answer on oath, who,
if he failed to do so, was treated as having admitted the truth of the
allegation. Thus, instead of the burden of proving guilt being thrown
on the accuser, the burden of establishing innocence seems to have
rested on the accused, and he became liable to be called upon to make
“canonical purgation;” _i.e._, “to declare on oath that he was not
guilty of the offence, and to produce a certain number of witnesses,
as ‘compurgators,’ to swear that they believed his declaration to be
true.”[292] This circumstance shows, in what a limited degree the
Act of Charles II., restoring the ecclesiastical courts, diminished
even oppressive tendencies; how, whilst it altered them in form,
it left scope for the exercise of their former spirit, and how they
remained instruments of injustice and cruelty, to be used by those who
were malignantly or resentfully disposed. At the same time we should
carefully weigh the number and the nature of the appeals made from the
judgment of the lower to the decision of the higher authority. To this
I will presently direct attention.
The second circumstance is that the High Court of Delegates was
restored upon the return of Charles II. This court, which had from
ancient times received secular appeals, acquired, in the reign of
Henry VIII., the power of deciding ecclesiastical appeals from all
ordinary ecclesiastical tribunals in England and Wales.[293] It
appears that the only court not within its appellate jurisdiction
was the Court of High Commission. Cases of doctrine, and cases of
discipline, unsatisfactorily litigated in the lower courts, came up
before this tribunal of delegates for final review and decision.
The constitution of the court was remarkable. Although exercising a
supreme ecclesiastical jurisdiction, the lay element preponderated.
Of the fifty-one Commissions between 1660 and 1688, two were composed
of Bishops and Civilians; eighteen included Bishops, Judges, and
Civilians; one contained Peers, Bishops, Judges, and Civilians; eleven
of the Commissions were directed to Civilians only, and nineteen
to Judges and Civilians.[294] It may be added that soon after the
Restoration the use of Latin was resumed in their proceedings. The
fact, with regard to the strong infusion of laical power into the
constitution of this important court, not only throws an instructive
light upon the relations of Church and State, but it proves that for
none of the acts of this court, at that time under consideration,
whether righteous or unrighteous, are the clergy to be held entirely
responsible; with some of them they had nothing whatever to do.
[Sidenote: ECCLESIASTICAL COURTS.]
It is to the Parliamentary Returns of the appeals made to the
delegates, that we are indebted for the knowledge of the following
ecclesiastical causes:--
A clergyman, named Slader, Rector of Birmingham, had been brought
before the Court of Arches on an appeal from the Consistory of
Lichfield, and finally his case came before the Court of Delegates,
by which court he was decreed to be sequestered _ab officio suo
clericali_. He stood charged with having forged letters of
orders, with disaffection to the King, with preaching amongst the
Quakers, railing in the pulpit at the parishioners, and indulging in
swearing, gaming, perjury, and incest. Some of these charges were
very scandalous, but to them were added others of a most curious and
extraordinary description,--for this man was accused of practising
jugglery, of pretending, on one occasion, to cut off his son’s head,
and to set it on again, and of “taking money for the sight thereof.”
One Dr. Meades was deprived, on an appeal from the Arches, and from
the Consistory of Winchester, for non-residence, neglect of duty,
allowing the vicarage to fall into decay, and for not having read the
Thirty-Nine Articles within the time prescribed by law, after his
institution and induction. William Woodward, Rector of Trotterscliffe,
Kent, was charged with “having uttered various profane and blasphemous
speeches, _e.g._, that the Lord’s Prayer was not commanded to be
used; that the Church of England might as well be called the Church
of Rome; that he had attained such perfection that he could not sin;
and that one William Francklin, a ropemaker, who had lived with him,
was the Christ and Saviour.” Sentence of deprivation was ultimately
pronounced in this case.[295] Theophilus Hart, in the diocese of
Peterborough, was corrected, punished, and condemned in costs, for not
conforming in the exercise of his clerical office: he did not baptize
infants with the sign of the cross, he did not catechise the young, and
he omitted many parts of the services prescribed by the Book of Common
Prayer. Woodward and Hart seem to be the only clergymen during this
period who appealed to the delegates in proceedings carried on against
false doctrine. One Clewer, Vicar of Croydon, figures in local history
as a very disgraceful person; he was tried and burnt in the hand at the
Old Bailey for stealing a silver cup. His case came before the Court
of Appeal, and the deprivation previously pronounced by the Court of
Arches received confirmation.[296]
The laity, as well as the clergy, being subject to the ecclesiastical
tribunals, causes relating to the former, after being tried elsewhere,
were finally adjudicated by the delegates. One man was proceeded
against for having three children unbaptized, and for not receiving
the Lord’s Supper; a second, for absence from public worship; a third,
for not keeping in repair the chancel of the parish church; and a
fourth, for contempt of the law, and ecclesiastical jurisdiction, in
teaching boys without having obtained any faculty or license.[297]
Ancient forms of Church discipline sometimes followed conviction. A
party, charged in the Consistory Court of Norwich with defamation, was
sentenced to do penance in the parish church of Darsham, by repeating,
after the minister, words of confession and contrition.[298]
[Sidenote: ECCLESIASTICAL COURTS.]
As to the number of appeals there may be reckoned up forty-five during
a little more than a century, between the year 1533--the date of the
commencement of the ecclesiastical power of the court--and the year
1641, the period of its temporary suppression. There were forty-six
between the date of its re-establishment, in 1660, and the year of the
Revolution, 1688. This would look as if more dissatisfaction was felt
with the judgment of the lower ecclesiastical authority during this
twenty-eight years after the Restoration, than during the hundred and
eight years before the outbreak of the Parliament struggle with Charles
I. Hence it might be inferred that the grievances of ecclesiastical
rule increased in the reign of Charles II.; but this would not be a
fair deduction, because the High Commission Court, which had been by
far the most oppressive tribunal for spiritual causes, and which had
been exempted from the supervision of the Court of Delegates, remained
no longer in existence; and thereby a large amount of injustice was
prevented. Forty-five appeals in twenty-eight years from all the
ecclesiastical courts of England and Wales do not form a large number,
and would seem to show that trials in ecclesiastical cases must have
been much less numerous than when the High Commission existed in
full play. Very few cases of appeal touching Dissenters appear in
the records of the Court of Delegates. Dissenters, of course, were
subject to trouble and annoyance from Archidiaconal and Consistorial
authorities, but the main sorrows of Nonconformity, under the last two
Stuarts’ reign, arose from the operation of Statute Law, as found in
the Uniformity, Conventicle, and Five Mile Acts.
Amongst instances of discipline exercised by Bishops upon the clergy,
there occurred one so striking and curious that it deserves particular
mention. Dr. Lloyd, who held the see of Peterborough from 1679 to
1685, and was thence transferred to Norwich, seems to have been
extraordinarily strict in the discharge of his episcopal functions,
and to have visited offending ministers with public punishment. In
accordance with his habitual zeal for purity in the faith and morals
of the Church, he required the following recantation to be read in his
cathedral by the person whose name is mentioned, and whose case is thus
described:--“I, Thomas Ashenden, being deeply sensible of the foul
dishonour I have done to our most holy religion, and the great scandal
I have given by a late profane abuse of the Lord’s Prayer, the Creed,
and the Ten Commandments, which I wrote and caused to be published,
do here, in the presence of God, and of His ministers, and of this
congregation, most heartily bewail, with unfeigned sorrow, both that
notorious offence, and also all my other sins, which betrayed me into
it, most humbly begging forgiveness of God, and of his Church, whose
heaviest censures I have justly deserved. And as I earnestly desire
that none of my brethren (much less our holy function or the Church)
may be the worse thought of by any, by reason of my miscarriages, so I
do faithfully promise, by God’s grace, to endeavour to behave myself
hereafter so religiously in my place and calling, that I may be no more
a discredit to them. In which resolution that I may persist, I beg and
implore the assistance of all your prayers, and desire withal, that
this my retractation and sincere profession of repentance, may be made
as public as my crimes have been, that none may be tempted hereafter to
do evil by my example.”[299]
[Sidenote: NONCONFORMIST PLACES OF WORSHIP.]
V. There existed, in different parts of the country, buildings
entirely set apart for Nonconformist worship. Some of them were barns
and warehouses adapted to the purpose, and in Norwich the refectory
and dormitory of the old Blackfriars’ Convent, which, after the
Restoration, had been turned into granaries for the City corn, were
fitted up by permission of the Court of Mayoralty, for the use of
the Presbyterian and Independent Congregationalists: also the old
Leather Hall, in Coventry, a gloomy but spacious room, fitted up with
galleries, was used for Nonconformist religious service.[300] A large
meeting-house was erected in Zoar Street, Southwark, not far from
the spot occupied by the summer theatre of Shakespeare, and within
that building John Bunyan attracted immense congregations. “If there
were but one day’s notice given,” his friend, Charles Doe, remarks,
“there would be more people come together to hear him preach than
the meeting-house could hold. I have seen, to hear him preach, by my
computation, about 1,200 at a morning lecture, by seven o’clock, on
a working-day, in the dark winter time. I also computed about 3,000
that came to hear him one Lord’s Day, at London, at a town’s-end
meeting-house [in Zoar Street], so that half were fain to go back again
for want of room, and then himself was fain at a back-door to be pulled
almost over people to get upstairs to his pulpit.”[301] Mill Hill
Chapel, at Leeds, was built during the period of Indulgence, being the
first edifice erected by Dissenters “_more ecclesiastico_ with
arches.”[302] A meeting-house at Yarmouth is described as measuring
fifty-eight feet one way, and sixty feet another, with a gallery
quite round close to the pulpit, with six seats in it, one behind the
other, and all accommodation possible for the reception of people
below.[303] The “fanatic party” at Margate is referred to as building a
“conventicle house” when it was illegal to do so, and as making great
haste to get it up in spite of His Majesty’s proclamation.[304]
In some cases, so favourably inclined were the parish authorities,
that they allowed Nonconformists to meet in the Church. At Southwold,
every fourth Sunday, the incumbent and the Dissenting ministers both
conducted Divine service under the same roof. The first who came took
precedence, and after he had pronounced the Benediction, his neighbour
began another service in his own way.
The liberty of using a parish church was also enjoyed by the
Nonconformists of Waltham-le-Willows, a small village in Suffolk,
and in connection with this arrangement there occurred a ludicrous
circumstance. On one occasion when Mr. Salkeld, the Congregational
minister, occupied the pulpit, Sir Edmund Bacon, of Redgrave, and
Sir William Spring, of Packenham, being greatly scandalized at what
they deemed a profanation of the edifice, came, with other country
gentlemen, and planted themselves at the church-doors. Sir Edmund
wished to compel the minister immediately to desist, but Sir William
thought it more seemly to wait until the minister had finished his
discourse. A noisy altercation consequently arose in the church-yard
between the two gentlemen, when, upon the former becoming outrageously
violent, his friend observed, “We read, Sir Edmund, that the devil
entered into a herd of swine, and, upon my word, I think he is not got
out of the Bacon yet.”[305]
[Sidenote: RELIGIOUS STATISTICS.]
VI. Perhaps this is as convenient a place as any to inquire into the
relative number of Conformists and Nonconformists, towards the end of
the period, embraced in this History.
The population of England towards the close of the seventeenth
century, has been computed by Lord Macaulay at rather more than five
millions.[306] He bases his estimate upon calculations made by King,
Lancaster Herald, in 1696; upon returns consulted by William III.,
and upon conclusions drawn in the preface to the population returns
of 1831. I find the estimate of about five millions confirmed by the
author of _The Happy Future State of England_, published in 1688,
who states an approximate number as the result of returns reported
in a survey made by the Bishops in 1676.[307] Of these five millions
and a half, or so, the Conformists formed an immense majority. In
the returns which came under William’s eye, and in the report of the
Bishops’ survey,--which seems to have been all but identical with
them,--the Conformists, above sixteen years of age, in the province of
Canterbury are put down at 2,123,362. York yields 353,892, making a
total of 2,477,254. Against these are reckoned the following number of
Nonconformists above sixteen years of age:--93,151 in the province of
Canterbury, and 15,525 in the province of York--forming a gross amount
of 108,676. The Conformists to the Nonconformists here are as 22⅘ to 1.
The author I have just mentioned represents the Nonconformists as on
the decline; and no doubt they were, during the reigns of Charles II.
and James II., much fewer than they had been under the Commonwealth;
but there is reason to believe, from their subsequent history, they
were on the increase before the period of the Revolution. The same
writer speaks of them, in the gross, as consisting of artizans and
retail traders in corporations,[308] and probably the bulk of them
would be found amongst the humbler classes; but it is to be remembered
that some county families, including noble ones, to say nothing of
old army officers, and rich citizen merchants, continued still within
the ranks of Dissent. It is interesting and instructive to ponder the
following particulars appended to the returns brought under the notice
of William III., and certainly not prepared in any friendly spirit.
Many persons left the Church upon the late Indulgence, who before did
frequent it. The inquires made (I presume those of 1676 are referred
to) caused many to frequent church. Walloons chiefly made up the number
of Dissenters in Canterbury, Sandwich, and Dover. Presbyterians were
divided; some of them not being wholly Dissenters, but occasionally
going to church. A considerable number of Nonconformists belonged to
no particular sect. Of those who attended church many did not receive
the sacrament. There were in Kent about thirty heretics, called
Muggletonians; the rest were Presbyterians, Anabaptists, Independents,
and Quakers, in about equal numbers. The heads and preachers of the
several factions had taken a large share in the Great Rebellion.[309]
[Sidenote: PREACHING.]
I may add that the Papists altogether are reckoned in the same document
at 13,856. It was thought that they had increased in consequence of the
Indulgence, and that the Jesuits had been very active up to the time of
the plot, when they amounted to 1,800. After the excitement created by
Oates’ business they are said to have considerably diminished.[310]
VII. The contrasts between Churchmen and Nonconformists already
described, suggest another of a corresponding kind. Divine service in
the Establishment, especially as conducted in cathedrals, in Royal
chapels, and in large churches, would present an imposing appearance,
such as never could belong to worship conducted in a conventicle. And
a social prestige pertained to the Episcopalian priest, now forfeited
by the Nonconformist preacher. Baxter, Owen, and Howe could not but
feel the change which had come over their external circumstances since
the day when, from high places--Westminster Abbey and St. Paul’s, for
example--they had addressed _ex cathedra_ the _élite_ of
Puritan intelligence and rank.
The form of sermons, whether composed by Anglicans or Puritans,
continued after the Restoration to be that which we may call textual,
rather than topical, and Sanderson, who survived that crisis, broke
up what he had to say upon a text into a perplexing arrangement of
divisions and subdivisions; so far he resembled Andrewes, the great
preacher of the reign of James I. This practice did not form the
peculiarity of a class. It had been borrowed from the schoolmen, and
came to be adopted alike by those who were most Protestant and those
who were most Catholic. As it was with the teachers, so it was with
the taught; the people, no doubt, liked this method, and acquired a
habit of threading the mazes of a lengthened homily through all its
numerical departments, with an expertness resembling that of modern
schoolboys who perform such wonderful evolutions in mental arithmetic.
Tastes began to change before the Revolution. Even Dr. Donne, in the
beginning of the century, broke somewhat through technical trammels,
and indulged in sonorous periods, flowing out into ample paragraphs;
and Baxter himself, slave as he often was to scholastic fashions, would
often burst into a strain of impassioned rhetoric which carried him
page over page without a single break. South may be mentioned as a
distinguished instance of departure from the old style, and Bates may
be named also as an example, so far, of the same class. Sermons were
very long. Some compositions, indeed, bearing that name, but extending
to the dimensions of a considerable treatise, were never delivered at
all. They were intended to be read, not heard. This was the case with
some compositions from the pens of Baxter and Barrow: but anecdotes
related respecting the latter Divine, show the enormous length to which
he sometimes carried his oral addresses. Once, before he preached in
Westminster Abbey, the Dean requested him to be short. He showed the
sermon to that dignitary, who, finding it consisted of two parts,
requested him to deliver only one of them. Barrow did so, yet that
occupied an hour and a half in the delivery. Upon another occasion,
he “enlarged” so much, that the vergers who were anxious to show to
impatient visitors “the tombs and effigies of the Kings and Queens in
wax,” “caused the organ to be struck up against him, and would not
give over playing till they had blowd him down.” His Spital sermon
lasted three hours and a half; what the Lord Mayor and Aldermen thought
of it we do not know; but we are informed that the preacher, when
asked if _he_ felt tired, replied, that “he began to be weary of
standing so long.”[311] Barrow’s case, no doubt, is an extreme one; but
although he exceeded what might be common, it is plain enough from the
specimens of pulpit eloquence belonging to that age, that they usually
were such as would exhaust the patience of modern congregations.
[Sidenote: PREACHING.]
An amusing story is related of Barrow’s preaching, soon after the
Restoration, at St. Lawrence Jewry. His “aspect pale, meagre, and
unpromising, slovenly and carelessly dressed, his collar unbuttoned,
and his hair uncombed,” so alarmed the congregation that a spectator
declares, “there was such a noise of pattens of serving maids and
ordinary women, and of unlocking of pews, and cracking of seats, caused
by the younger sort hastily climbing over them, that I thought all the
congregation were mad.” An apprentice accosted him when all was over,
saying, “Sir, be not dismayed, for I assure you ’twas a good sermon.”
When asked what he thought of the congregation running away, Barrow
answered--“I thought they did not like me or my sermon, and I have no
reason to be angry with them for that.” “But what was your opinion
of the apprentice?” “I take him,” replied he, “to be a very civil
person, and if I could meet with him I’d present him with a bottle of
wine.” Some of the parishioners afterwards called on Dr. Wilkins, the
Incumbent, to expostulate with him for allowing one “who looked like
a starved Cavalier to preach in his pulpit.” Baxter, happening to
be in the Vicar’s house when the parishioners arrived, Wilkins said:
“The person you thus despise, I assure you, is a pious man, an eminent
scholar, and an excellent preacher, for the truth of the latter, I
appeal to Mr. Baxter, here present, who heard the sermon you so vilify,
I am sure you believe Mr. Baxter is a competent judge.” Baxter praised
the sermon, and the parishioners ended by requesting that Barrow might
preach again. But he was not disposed to appear any “more on that
stage.”[312]
As to the mode of delivering sermons, some Nonconformists, as well as
Churchmen, read from a MS., and Dr. Charnock is described as having
used an eye-glass to assist his sight.[313] Of Baxter, it is said in
the funeral sermon by his friend and assistant Sylvester--“He was a
person wonderful at extemporate preaching, for _having once left his
notes behind him_, he was surprised into extemporate thoughts upon
(as I remember) Heb. iv. 15, ‘For we have not an High Priest, &c.’
Whereon he preached to very great satisfaction unto all that heard him;
and when he came down from the pulpit, he asked me if I was not tired?
I said, With what? He said, With his extemporate discourse. I told him,
that had he not declared it, I believe none could have discovered it.
His reply to me was, that he thought it very needful for a minister
to have a body of divinity in his head.” Clarkson, in his funeral
sermon for Dr. Owen, remarks that he seldom used notes. Of Dr. Bates,
Howe observes, that faithful to the example and traditions of their
Puritan fathers, “his sermons, wherein nothing could be more remote
from ramble, he constantly delivered from his memory, and hath sometime
told me, with an amicable freedom, that he partly did it, to teach some
that were younger to preach without notes.”[314] Bull, however,--in
this respect anticipating Addison,--advised young Divines not at
first to preach their own sermons, but to provide themselves with the
compositions of approved authors, or to read to their congregations
either one of the authorized Homilies or a chapter selected from _The
Whole Duty of Man_.[315] The old Puritan practice of taking down
sermons continued to be very common; and, if we may notice so trivial
a matter as pulpit costume, it is amusing to add an odd story told of
a Royal chaplain, who preached before the King at Newmarket, “in a
long periwig and holland sleeves, according to the then fashion for
gentlemen,” at which His Majesty was so scandalized that he commanded
the Chancellor of the University to put in execution the statutes
respecting decency in apparel.[316]
[Sidenote: SUPERSTITION.]
VIII. Superstition still prevailed. Though the zeal for witchfinding
diminished, rumours of witchcraft continued in circulation. People
in Worcestershire said, that if certain witches had not been taken
up, the King would never have returned to England. From Lancashire, a
stronghold of the infernal sisterhood, one of the correspondents of the
Secretary of State wrote an account of a woman who confessed, that she,
and her father and her mother, “each rode on a black cat to Warrington,
nine miles off, and that the cats sucked her mother till they sucked
blood.” He states, however, that he had “little faith in this, though
given on oath.”[317]
Wise and good men, especially Divines and lawyers, clung as firmly
as ever to the old belief of the power of necromancy. Baxter pursued
his inquiries into the subject; and Sir Matthew Hale, at the Bury
Assizes, in March, 1664, observed, touching a witch case, that he
made no doubt there were such creatures, and appealed to Scripture in
proof of the fact.[318] On that occasion, Sir Thomas Browne, gave it
as his opinion, that the parties named in the indictment as sufferers,
were really bewitched. It is proper to remember, with respect to such
superstitions, that, at that time, things were worse in France than in
England. Witchcraft, divination, raising apparitions, and consulting
the stars, were so common there in 1679, that a Commission was
appointed, called the “Chambre Ardente,” to inquire into such cases.
The Royal touch for curing the King’s Evil was again sought and
bestowed. A minute religious ceremonial, almost incredible to us,
accompanied the act. His Majesty sat in a chair of state. One of the
Clerks of the Closet stood on his right hand, holding as many gold
angels, everyone tied to a riband of white silk, as there were patients
to be touched. A chaplain read in the 16th chapter of the Gospel of
Mark from the 14th verse to the end. The _chirurgeon_ presented
the diseased; and making three reverences, they knelt down together
before the King, the chaplain repeating the words: “They shall lay
their hands on the sick, and they shall be healed.” His Majesty then
touched the cheeks of the persons brought to be cured; after which, the
chaplain read the first chapter of John as far as the 15th verse; and,
as the words were pronounced, “That was the true light, which lighteth
every man that cometh into the world,” the King suspended round the
neck of each person one of the gold angels, handed to him by the clerk.
Other passages of Scripture followed, a prayer was offered, and the
ceremony ended with the King’s washing his hands.[319] Numerous were
the applications made for the Royal touch, to which, no doubt, the
obtaining of a gold angel operated as a motive, no less than the hope
of receiving a sovereign cure.
[Sidenote: SUPERSTITION.]
I add a further illustration of the superstition of the age, not
amongst the ignorant, but the educated. Rectors of parishes requested
the Secretary of State to procure His Majesty’s touch for parishioners
who were troubled with the malady. When Charles II. went to Newmarket,
Sir Thomas Browne wrote to Sergeant Knight, and sent certificates for
divers afflicted persons who were going from Norwich to be touched by
the King. No fewer than 92,107 persons were asserted by the eminent
physician, just named, to have passed through this ceremony between the
years 1660 and 1683. One woman is said to have been cured of blindness
by these wonderful means; and greater marvel still, a man is reported
to have been cured of Nonconformity by witnessing the effect of the
Royal fingers upon his child!--he expressed his thanks in this method:
“Farewell to all Dissenters, and to all Nonconformists; if God can put
so much virtue into the King’s hand as to heal my child, I’ll serve
that God and that King so long as I live with all thankfulness.” An
example of other absurd beliefs is found in a statement made to the
Secretary of State, about a salmon which came up to the River Avon,
on a Christmas Day. It was represented as being so religious, that it
allowed itself to be touched by a staff, whereas at other times it is
said, “Salmon are so shy that they endure not the least shadow.” “If
any one made a prey of these quiet _Christian fish_ they came to
an unfortunate end.”[320]
Samuel Hartlib, in his correspondence with Dr. Worthington, of
Cambridge, raised a question respecting angelic apparitions: “For
long-bearded, good angels,” he says, “or lady-angels of true light,
they do indeed cross all the old records of antiquity, whether Gentile
or Jewish, neither Mercury, nor Gabriel, appeared otherwise than in
prime of youthful vigour.”[321] The Cambridge scholar inclined to the
idea, that angels might appear in long beards, and told his friend a
story of a stranger, who knocked at a sick man’s door, and directed him
to make use of two red sage leaves, and one blood-wort leaf, steeped
in beer for three days,--and to live for a month in fresh country air.
“Several circumstances,” he gravely added, “made it probable that he
who came was a good angel, and if so, that he appeared as a grave old
man, very tall and straight, of a very fresh colour, his hair as white
as wool, and his beard broad and very white.” This old man, believed to
be an angelic visitant, wore new shoes, tied with black ribbons.[322]
CHAPTER XII.
IX. Family life amongst the Nonconformists, in the reign of the later
Stuarts, framed itself after the Puritan model; and in the memoirs
of Oliver Heywood and Philip Henry, windows are open through which
we discover their domestic habits. Saint Bartholomew’s Day became a
solemn fast in commemoration of the ejectment,--sometimes held in
fellowship with a neighbouring minister or ministers,--when “the
Lord helped His servants, with strong cries, many tears, and mighty
workings to acknowledge sin, accept of punishment, and implore
mercy.”[323] Sometimes, when none but the family were present, each
person prayed in turn, the minister, the wife, the two sons, and the
maid, beginning with the youngest. Heywood, in his _Diary_,
alludes to a particular friend--“a solid, gracious, useful, peaceable,
tender-hearted Christian,” with whom he had “many a sweet day of
prayer; and,” he says, “a few days before he died, we were at a
private fast together in Ovenden-wood; and, oh! oh! how melting and
affectionate was his heart for his children, a son and daughter, both
here this day!” At another time, the same minister speaks of a private
fast with two of his brethren, “about a special business, and our
judgment was desired in an intricate matrimonial case, which seems
something dark.”[324]
It is said of Thomas Aquinas that he had “the gift of tears;” and his
weeping at church is mentioned amongst the signs of his saintship. The
same gift seems to have been possessed by this Nonconformist family.
When Heywood’s two sons devoted themselves to the work of the Christian
ministry, and a solemn domestic service of worship celebrated the
event, as one of the ministers read the 48th chapter in Genesis, and
came to the words, “The angel which redeemed me from all evil, bless
the lads,” tears stopped him; all wept. He says in prayer “God helped
all;” and he adds: “God wrought strangely in my heart; oh! what a flood
of tears, what pleadings with God! I can scarce remember the like.”
At night again, they prayed, “sobbing and weeping,” like David and
Jonathan, “until David exceeded.”[325]
Loyalty to the Stuarts beat in the bosoms of these Nonconformists,
notwithstanding the treatment which they received; for we learn that,
in the month of May, Mr. Heywood, his children, and his servant,
spent several days with Mr. Angier at Denton, one of which days was
the anniversary of Charles’ return, when there was a service in which
Heywood took part.[326]
[Sidenote: FAMILY LIFE.]
They had their family meetings. Nathaniel Heywood, with his wife and
his sons, visited Oliver; and the brother and uncle felt it a comfort
to have “these three couples of Heywoods to meet together”--“a rising
generation, all very hopeful.”[327] We fancy how they talked that April
time--in the oak parlour, as the window was thrown open, during a burst
of sunshine, after a shower which had drenched the fruit-blossoms and
the rose-buds. We may guess the topics from incidents in connection
with the Stanley family: Nathaniel might relate the story of his
being taken by a party of soldiers, while preaching in the chapel at
Bickerstaff, when Lady Stanley, who attended the service, came out of
her gallery, and placed herself near the pulpit door, hoping to overawe
their spirits and obstruct their designs; and how, when he attended the
sessions at Wigan, Lady Stanley came with her husband, and others, to
speak on behalf of the persecuted clergyman.[328] And Oliver might be
led to recur, by the force of association, to the visit of himself and
Mr. Angier to Sir Thomas Stanley of Alderley, when, being requested
to pray in that large family, the first morning he was tempted to
study and speak “handsome words from respect to the company;” but,
reflecting to whom he prayed, and that it was no trifling matter, he
set himself to the exercise in serious earnestness, and God helped him
to speak devoutly, with respect to the state of their souls.[329] The
hospitalities of Broad Oak were the praise of all the country round.
The dwelling stood by the roadside, and any one travelling that way
met with a cordial welcome at the bright fire-side, where the silenced
Presbyter, Philip Henry, exemplified the virtues of a Bishop, “like
Abraham sitting at his tent-door in quest of opportunities to do good.
If he met with any poor near his house and gave them alms in money,
yet he would bid them go to his door besides, for relief there. He was
very tender and compassionate towards poor strangers and travellers,
though his charity and candour were often imposed upon by cheats and
pretenders.”[330] “This man,” says a competent witness, “(ever since
I knew him, and whilst I was his neighbour) was careful to rise early
on Sunday mornings, to spend a considerable portion of his time in his
private devotions and preparations, then to come down and call his
family together, and, after some short, preparatory prayer, to sing
a Psalm (commonly the 100th), and then read some part of the sacred
Scripture, and expound it very largely and particularly, and at last
kneel down with all his family and pray devoutly; with particular
references to the day and duties of it, and the minister that was to
officiate. After which a short refection for breakfast, he made haste
to church, and took care that all his family that could be spared,
should go in due time likewise: sometime he was before the preacher,
and often before the rest of the congregation; (as once particularly,
when I gave them a sermon in that place, he and I walked together
a considerable time before the people came;) he behaved himself
reverently and very gravely in the church during the service; stood
up commonly at prayers, and always, in my time, wrote a sermon after
the minister. When the morning service was ended, he commonly invited
the minister to dine with him, who seldom refused; and many others,
who either lived at a distance, as Mrs. Hanmer, Sir Job Charleton’s
daughter, married to a Justice of Peace in that country, or else
such as were poor and needy. His discourse homewards was sweet and
spiritual; at table it was seasoned as well as his meat; edifying,
and yet pleasant, and taking; never wild or offensive. After meat and
thanks returned, they commonly (I think constantly) before departure
from table, sung the 23rd Psalm. Sometime after, when the servants
had dined, he propounded to such guests as he thought in prudence he
should not be too free with, to retire into the parlour for a while,
till he had attended upon his family, repeated over the sermon and
prayed with them; after which he returned to his guests again, and
having entertained them with some short discourse, he retired awhile
himself, and by and by, called upon his family to go to church. After
evening service and sermon ended, he retired again till six o’clock
(then called for prayers, catechised, took an account of children and
servants of what they remembered at church, which accounts were given
sometimes very largely and particularly), sung a Psalm, kneeled down to
prayers (which consisted more of praise and benediction than at other
times), and at last, his children kneeling down before him (to beg his
blessing), he blessed them all, and concluded the service of the day
with the 123rd Psalm; save that after supper, he retired for about
half-an-hour more into his study before bed-time. Sometimes after the
public service ended at church, he gave some spiritual instructions,
and preached in his house to as many as would come to hear him; and
in his last years, when the Incumbents grew careless in providing
supplies for two or three neighbouring churches and chapels, and the
people cried out for lack of vision, he set up a constant ministration
and preaching at home, never taking anything by way of reward for his
pains, unless with a purpose to give it away to those who were in
greater necessities.”[331]
[Sidenote: FAMILY LIFE.]
That a sad colour tinged the joys of the Nonconformists must be
confessed. How their Anglo-Saxon gravity might become more grave,
and the light which sparkled over the home-life of their neighbours,
might, in their own case, be darkened,--we see plainly enough when
we recollect the perils which brooded over them even in seasons of
calm, and the cruel interruptions which they suffered in the cloudy
and dark day. Heywood speaks of officers sweeping away his chests,
his tables, his chairs, his bed,--in short all his goods, except a
cupboard and a few seats; and the same person was, for holding a
religious meeting, imprisoned in York Castle.[332] How could such men,
with all their tenderness, help being stern in their faith, and solemn
in their pleasures? If genial they could not be light-hearted. They
did not weep, as their enemies often said of them that they did, with
a hypocritical whine; nor did they laugh, as some of their enemies
really did, with affected glee,--their tears and smiles were genuine
as the rain and the sunshine from heaven. Life was not to them, as
to some others, a gay comedy,--it had in it a tragic cast; yet they
never regarded it as a drama acted on the stage, but always as a real,
earnest battle, fought in the open field, under the eye of God.
[Sidenote: FAMILY LIFE.]
Let us pass from the homes of Oliver Heywood and the two Henrys to
the mansion of a Nonconformist nobleman already noticed--Philip Lord
Wharton, the good Lord Wharton, as he is called, to distinguish him
from a descendant of a far different character. In the pleasant
village of Woburn, in Buckinghamshire, situated on the river Wick, a
tributary to the Thames,--which in its course through a delightful
district, turns the wheel of many a paper mill,--there stands, under
the shadow of richly-wooded hills, and adorned by a stately row
of poplars, a goodly house; connected with which are stables and
fish-ponds, pertaining to a far nobler residence which once occupied
the site. The estate, before it came into the possession of the
Whartons, exhibited much magnificence, of the feudal stamp, containing
a palace for the Bishops of Lincoln, and a chapel with a small cell
adjoining, called Little Ease,--where Thomas Chase, of Amersham, was,
in 1506, privately strangled for heresy, and where Thomas Harding,
of Chesham, was confined in 1532, previously to his being burnt at
the stake. This ancient and stately house became a great place of
resort for Nonconformist Divines. Manton and Bates, Howe and Owen,
were often entertained under the hospitable roof, and the shadows of
these departed ones still pleasantly haunt the spot, as the Puritan
residents of the neighbourhood conduct strangers through the gardens,
and relate to them the legends of the old dwelling. There--during one
of the severe attacks of his fatal malady--Owen wrote his last and
justly admired letters to his Church; and there, under the operation
of the Five Mile Act--the house being above that distance from High
Wycombe--the Nonconformists of the neighbouring town used to assemble
for worship. The chapel formed a convenient place for the purpose; and
within its walls the voices of eminent Divines, Owen and Howe, for
example, might be often heard. Thither came Puritans from Wycombe and
Farnham, and Langley and other places; and one can see them in the
dress of the period, with their steeple-crowned hats, and their short
cloaks, coming down the hill-side, or crossing the green--not in large
groups, but singly, stealthily picking their way to avoid observation,
a peasant from a neighbouring farm wading on foot, a burgess from the
good town of Wycombe, riding his little cob. When the service was
over on Sunday forenoon, and the Wycombe people and other folks from
Marlow and Beaconsfield, and stragglers from a greater distance, were
putting on their hats and cloaks, and preparing to unfasten their nags
and to turn homewards, the noble host would invite the people, in
Buckinghamshire phraseology, “to stop and take a sop in the pan,” that
they might avail themselves of the privilege of attending worship again
in the afternoon.[333]
[Sidenote: FAMILY LIFE.]
The curious and quaint structure of Hoghton Tower, in the County of
Lancaster, is also connected with the Nonconformist memories of the
seventeenth century; for there Howe preached a part of his sublime
discourse concerning “The Redeemer’s dominion over the invisible
world.” And from the exquisitely tender dedication prefixed to it, we
gather that it was occasioned by the death of the eldest son of Sir
Charles and Lady Hoghton, to whom the tower belonged. The dedication
indicates that the bereaved parents had sprung from “religious and
honourable families, favoured of God, valued and beloved in the
countries where He had planted them;” and that their early homes had
been “both seats of religion and of the worship of God, the resorts
of His servants; houses of mercy to the indigent, of justice to the
vicious, of patronage to the sober and virtuous; of good example to
all about them.” Addressing her ladyship, the preacher says: “Madam,
who could have a more pleasant retrospect upon former days, than you?
recounting your Antrim delights; the delight you took in your excellent
relations, your garden delights, your closet delights, your Lord’s Day
delights! But how much a greater thing is it to serve God in your
present station, as the mother of a numerous and hopeful offspring;
as the mistress of a large family; where you bear your part, with your
like-minded consort, in supporting the interest of God and religion,
and have opportunity of scattering blessings round about you.”[334]
The graceful allusions, which the author makes to the family circle
at Hoghton, brings before us a domestic picture, which may serve as
a pendant to that of Broad Oak, the accessories of a Nonconformist
minister’s household being alone exchanged for those of a baronet.
From the title and dedication of another sermon by the same Divine,
“Self-dedication discoursed in the anniversary thanksgiving of a
person of honour for a great deliverance,”--namely, the preservation
from death by a fall from a horse of “John, Earl of Kildare, Baron of
Ophalia, first of his order in the kingdom of Ireland,”--we gather that
it was a Puritan practice to celebrate distinguished family mercies
by annual religious solemnities. Two sermons by the same writer on the
words, “Yield yourselves unto God,” are inscribed “To the much-honoured
Bartholomew Soame, Esq., of Thurlow, and Susanna his pious consort;”
with the notice, that one day in the previous summer the author
preached the sermons under their roof.[335] The circumstance shows,
that sometimes elaborate addresses, fitted for public audiences, were
carefully prepared for a small number of persons, such as could be
accommodated within the entrance-hall, or in one of the apartments of a
country gentleman’s house.
In some Nonconformist families, as was quite natural, romantic
incidents occurred. Major-General Lambert, who figured prominently in
connection with Cromwell, and who was kept a prisoner in the days of
Charles II., had a son very unlike himself as it regards religion.
This gentleman became acquainted with the widow of Charles Nowel of
Merely--a lady who was of the family of Lister, of Arnoldsbiggen. The
union with her first husband had been a runaway match, contracted in a
covered walk within her father’s grounds; after which the bridegroom
fell into the water, and was drowned, in returning home with the
license of marriage in his pocket, so that he and she never met again.
Young Lambert married this ill-fated maiden-widow; and then it turned
out that the tastes of the couple were utterly unlike--he much addicted
to pleasure, she against it; he going to church at Kirkby, Malham-dale,
she walking every Sunday to the Dissenting meeting-house at Winterburn.
His father, the Major-General, wrote a letter, rebuking him for his
extravagance; and his wife invited Mr. Frankland, the Nonconformist
pastor, to come and preach in Craven, with a view to his benefit;
this the gay sportsman at first opposed. But a change came over him;
he himself invited Oliver Heywood to be his guest, and showed him his
pictures--“he being an exact limner:” one would hope he also became a
penitent Christian. Lambert was seized with palsy in January, 1676,
about which time his mother died in Plymouth Castle.[336]
During the first three centuries of the history of Christianity, and
the more than ten persecutions which annalists have numbered, the
professors of the Divine faith had to suffer, far beyond what the laws
in their utmost severity could inflict. Imperial rescripts carried out
to the letter, or magisterial commands going further, were terrible
beyond description; and popular fury shouting, “The Christians to the
lions,” became more cruel still. But another source of suffering, to
minds of sensibility exceeding the rest in the bitterness of anguish
which it produced, was when the husband persecuted the wife, and the
father the child. Tertullian tells us that there were many such cases.
The annals of the Church of the Restoration afford parallels in this
last, as in other respects, to the records of older times.
[Sidenote: FAMILY LIFE.]
Agnes Beaumont, the daughter of a Bedfordshire yeoman, lost her mother
when very young. Her father sometimes went to hear the preaching of
John Bunyan, but he afterwards conceived a strong antipathy to that
famous minister. The girl manifested religious feeling, and joined
Bunyan’s Church, when a lawyer, who had wished to marry her for the
sake of her father’s property, became her inveterate foe. But the
daughter remained faithful to her convictions; and this circumstance
so provoked her father’s irritable temper, that he opposed her going
to hear the favourite preacher any more. On a particular occasion,
however, she extorted his consent to attend once. It was the depth of
winter. Weary of wading through the mud, and overtaken by Bunyan riding
on his way to the place of worship, she was reluctantly permitted by
him to sit, pillion-fashion, behind him on horseback, when the two
were met by a clergyman, who immediately invented a scandalous report
respecting the minister and the maid. Agnes, after attending the
meeting, found the door of her house barred against her admission.
“Who is there?” asked Beaumont, as she knocked. “’Tis I, father, come
home wet and dirty: pray let me in.” “Where you have been all day, you
may go at night,” was the answer from the other side of the bolted
entrance. She went and sought shelter in a barn. The morning brought no
relenting to the heart of her unnatural parent; and he declared that
she should not enter the house, unless she promised never to go to a
meeting again so long as he lived. “Father,” she answered, “my soul is
of too much worth to do this. Can you stand in my stead, and answer
for me at the great day? If so, I will obey you in this demand, as I
do in all other things.” Much painful excitement followed. At last,
fearful of being disobedient, the young woman promised never to go to
a conventicle as long as he lived, without his consent. This softened
him a little, and they were reconciled; but as she reflected upon her
promise, it struck her that she had been unfaithful to her conscience,
and she passed through great spiritual distress. Soon afterwards
Beaumont fell ill, and retired to rest. His daughter, hearing him
moaning in his chamber, rushed to his assistance, and found him struck
with death. Fatal disease had been brought on, most likely by violence
of temper; and the poor girl, through the villany of her pretended
lover, now had to face the accusation of having murdered her parent.
Though, on the coroner’s inquest, her innocence was established, her
implacable enemy perseveringly maintained, that she had privately
confessed the crime, the object of which was to marry Bunyan, who had
a wife living at that very time; the villain also, without one atom of
evidence, charged her with committing arson.[337] More of revenge than
persecution entered into the conduct of this man; yet, for a while,
Agnes Beaumont, for her religious constancy, endured the most violent
parental anger, probably not uncommon in those days, and akin to that
which fell upon many a pure-minded maiden in Carthage or in Rome.
[Sidenote: FAMILY LIFE.]
The domestic and private life of the Established clergy and
their friends, as they appear in the biographies and gossiping
literature of the day, assume a rather different aspect from that
of the Nonconformists. Such a dignitary as Reynolds, who had been a
Presbyterian, would no doubt preserve, in his palace at Norwich, many
of the Puritan habits of the Commonwealth--would gather around him,
as far as possible, a godly household, in sympathy with him in his
spiritual tastes--would continue to converse much after the fashion of
by-gone days--and with the adoption of the Episcopalian formularies in
the cathedral and chapel, would connect, in more retired devotion, the
use of extemporaneous prayer, and of Scripture exposition. And such
a parish pastor as Gurnall would, in a similar way, continue Puritan
usages in his quiet parsonage at Lavenham. We must look elsewhere for
characteristic habits and customs of the Episcopalian stamp. Of an
Anglican prelate, enjoying his palace, and engaged in his diocese, a
good specimen is afforded by the memoirs of Seth Ward, the Bishop of
Salisbury.[338]
He was renowned for hospitality. The clergy, even the meanest curates,
were welcome at his table; and people of quality, travelling between
London and Exeter, stopped at the Wiltshire city, and dined at the
palace. He was a hearty entertainer, we are told, assuring his guests
that he accounted himself but a steward, and pressing upon them the
enjoyment of the fare which he plentifully provided. He would not ask,
“Will you drink a glass of wine?” says his biographer, with amusing
minuteness; but he would call for a bottle, and drink himself, and then
offer it to his friends. The poor were relieved at his gates. He had
a band of weekly pensioners; and when he went out for a walk in the
streets or on the plains, he gave money to all who solicited alms; and
when children saw him in his coach or on horseback, they would rush
from their play, to shout, in expectation of a largess, “The Bishop is
coming.” Being a capital horseman, he would ride twenty miles before
dinner, and not mind following the hounds, if he “by chance chopt upon”
them. After dinner and “a dish or two of coffee or tea,” as soon as the
bell “tilled,”--to use the Salisbury phrase,--he called for his robes,
and went to church, taking with him his visitors.[339]
Of another kind of dignitary an example is afforded in the memoirs of
the Honourable and Reverend Dr. John North. He was Clerk of the Closet
to Charles II.; possessing “a very convenient lodging in Whitehall,
upon the parade of the Court, near the presence-chamber,” where his
table was provided from the Royal kitchen, and he enjoyed the company
of His Majesty’s chaplains. People who had nothing else to do, would
say to one another--so North’s brother reports--“Come, shall we go
and spend half-an-hour with Mr. Clerk of the Closet?” but when they
went with the expectation of getting “a glass of wine or ale,” the
wary Divine, by the advice of an old Courtier, would not offer so
much as “small beer in hot weather,” lest he should be overdone with
visitors. In consequence of this prudent determination, he lived “like
a hermit in his cell, in the midst of the Court, and proved the title
of a foolish French writer, _La Solitude de la Cour_.” “Divers
persons,” however, particularly ladies, “far from Papists,” were wont
to repair to this spiritual officer for a different purpose, thinking
“auricular confession, though no duty, a pious practice,” and seeking
“to ease their minds” by means of that Anglo-Catholic custom. He did
“the office of a pastor or _parochus_ of the Court,” somewhat
after the fashion of the mediæval Clerks of the Closet, who were,
in fact, Court confessors. “And I have heard him say,” proceeds his
brother, “that, for the number of persons that resided in the Court,
a place reputed a centre of all vice and irreligion, he thought there
were as many truly pious and strictly religious as could be found in
any other resort whatsoever; and he never saw so much fervent devotion,
and such frequent acts of piety and charity, as his station gave
him occasion to observe there. It often falls out that extremes are
conterminous, and, as contraries, illustrate each other: so here virtue
and vice.”[340] We are glad to hear such testimony, and, when we think
of Evelyn and Margaret Godolphin, we cannot altogether doubt it; but,
as this Court Divine lived in a cell, he could not know much of what
went on around him in the Court.
[Sidenote: FAMILY LIFE.]
Noble families observed the duties of domestic worship; and, from
the same source as that from which the last illustration is drawn,
it appears how the household of the princely Duke of Beaufort, at
Badminton, attended to this practice. There was breakfast in the
Duchess’ gallery, which opened into the gardens, where perhaps a deer
was to be killed; and half-an-hour after eleven in the forenoon the
bell rang to prayers; and at six in the evening the best company went
into an aisle in the church, where the Duke and Duchess could see if
all the family were present. Her Grace had divers gentlewomen with her,
commonly engaged upon “embroidery and fringe-making; for all the beds
of state were made and finished in the house.”[341]
Instead of extemporary effusions, Episcopalians used the daily prayers
of the Church, or selections from them. On special occasions the
minister of the parish performed the office; and an amusing instance
occurs of the neglect of this custom on the part of a gentleman who
had the honour of entertaining the Judges on the Western Circuit. “He
himself got behind the table in his hall, and read a chapter, and then
a long-winded prayer, after the Presbyterian way. The Judges took it
very ill, but did not think fit to affront him in his own house. Next
day”--who the narrator is may be guessed--“when we came early in the
morning to Exeter, all the news was that the Judges had been at a
conventicle, and the Grand Jury intended to present them and all their
retinue for it; and much merriment was made upon that subject.”[342]
Devout Anglicans attended strictly to the private duties of religion.
They kept fasts and festivals in their own houses, as well as at
church; and in their morning and evening devotions they used portions
of the Common Prayer, or forms supplied by Taylor and Andrewes. They
read the sermons of those Divines, and of Sanderson and others; perhaps
also the annotations of Hammond or some kindred expositor. At a later
period, _The Whole Duty of Man_ became a very popular book with
the class of persons now described.
I conclude these illustrations of Anglo-Catholic life with the account
of the death of an Anglo-Catholic young lady:--
“Upon Thursday, the 1st of February, my most dearly beloved daughter
Grimston fell sick of small-pox.
“She had, from the beginning of her sickness to the last period of her
breath, an understanding very entire, and so perfect a patience that
her demeanour towards them who were about her was not only holy, but
cheerful too.
[Sidenote: FAMILY LIFE.]
“She received the sentence of death with the greatest tranquillity
of soul that is imaginable, and sent for Mr. Frampton (the household
chaplain to the Master of the Rolls, in whose house she died). To him
she made an excellent confession of her faith and life, and opened all
the burdens of her spirit, wherein were found no heavier matters than
a few angry words spoken seven years since, and some small errors of
that nature. But [there followed] a most solemn repentance for all
transgressions, whether remembered or forgotten. This being done,
she did, with great devotion, receive the blessed sacrament, and the
absolution of the Church. Before she composed herself to die, she
first took a most kind and comfortable leave of her dear husband--who,
from the beginning of her sickness till the hour of her death, never
left her chamber--praying God to bless him, and that he might never
find the want of her. Then she recommended her little girl to my wife,
entreating her to take her into her family, if it might not be too
great a trouble, and desiring her not to weep, for she was happy. She
remembered almost every relation she had in the world by name, and
offered up a particular prayer for them. I had never seen her after
the second day of her sickness; but she prayed most devoutly for me,
and desired all that were present to tell me from her, that, if prayer
were made in heaven, she would never cease to pray for me there so long
as I lived here: an expression so amazing from a child, and withal so
piercing, that, in the midst of all my spiritual joys, I feel a sorrow
great enough to break my heart if I would give way to it. For within a
few minutes after these words uttered, she surrendered up her blessed
soul into the hands of God Almighty, who, by the assistance of His
most blessed Spirit, had prepared and fitted her for Himself. And now
she hath left her dear husband, and his family, and mine, as full of
mourning and lamentation for the want of her as can possibly consist
with Christian patience and submission. On Monday next she is carried
from hence to her grave, in St. Michael’s Church, near Gorhambury.”[343]
X. As during the Commonwealth, so after the Restoration, different
opinions were entertained respecting the observance of Sunday.
Puritans were not all of one mind upon that matter. Extreme men argued
thus:--“If honest labour be forbidden, much more honest recreations;
for recreation is but the means to prepare and fit men for labour;
therefore, if labour, which is the end of recreation, be forbidden,
much more recreation, which is but the means to labour.”[344] But
Baxter, who was himself strict in the observance of the day, and who
then walked for his health _privately_, lest he “should tempt
others to sin,” observed, with great moderation, “The body must be kept
in that condition (as far we can) that is fittest for the service of
the soul: a heavy body is but a dull and heavy servant to the mind,
yea, a great impediment to the soul in duty, and a great temptation to
many sins.” “When the sights of prospects, and beautiful buildings,
and fields, and countries, or the use of walks, or gardens, do tend to
raise the soul to holy contemplation, to admire the Creator, and to
think of the glory of the life to come (as Bernard used his pleasant
walks), this delight is lawful, if not a duty where it may be had.” Of
music and moderate feasting he says, when they “promote the spiritual
service of the day, they are good and profitable.”[345]
[Sidenote: OBSERVANCE OF THE SABBATH.]
Owen, perhaps, was more strict in his views of Sabbath observance
than Baxter; yet he spoke of its being no small mistake that men have
laboured more to multiply directions about external duties than to
direct a due sanctification of the day according to the spirit and
genius of Gospel obedience; and he did not deny that some, measuring
others by themselves, tied people up unto such long tiresome duties,
and rigid abstinences from refreshments, as clogged their minds, and
turned the whole service of the day into a wearisome bodily exercise
which profiteth little.[346]
Between Puritans and Anglicans a great difference continued upon the
Sunday question. Jeremy Taylor, speaking of persons who objected to
have meat dressed upon the Lord’s Day, or to use an innocent, permitted
recreation, says--“When such an opinion makes a sect, and this sect
gets firm, confident, and zealous defenders, in a little time it will
dwell upon the conscience as if it were a native there, whereas it
is but a pitiful inmate, and ought to be turned out of doors.”[347]
Thorndike denied the obligation of the Fourth Commandment upon any but
the Jewish people; he based the authority for the Lord’s Day on the
Apostolic custom of the Church, and he disapproved of the Sabbatarian
strictness of the Puritans.[348] Sanderson pleaded for recreations,
“walking and discoursing” for “men of liberal education;” but for
the “ruder sort of people,” “shooting, leaping, pitching the bar,
and stool-ball,” rather than “dicing and carding.” “These pastimes,”
he said, were to be used “in godly and commendable sort,” with great
moderation, at seasonable times, not during Divine service, nor at
hours appointed by the master of the house for private devotion, but
so as to make men fitter for God’s service during the rest of the
day, and all this was to be done, not doubtingly, _for whatsoever
is not of faith is sin_; nor uncharitably, for in this, “as in all
indifferent things, a wise and charitable man will, in godly wisdom,
deny himself many times the use of that liberty, which, in a godly
charity, he dare not deny to his brother.”[349] Although the _Book
of Sports_ had lost its authority, its spirit revived after the
Restoration, and amusements in accordance with its provisions were
encouraged, in some cases, without any checks or any religious teaching
of the kind adopted by Sanderson. Cosin, indeed, in a sermon upon
Sunday observance, quotes a remark by Augustine, which condemns all
vain and idle pastimes--“Some people keep holy day for the devil, and
not for God, and should be better employed, labouring and ploughing
in their fields, than so to spend the day in idleness and vanity,
and women should better bestow their time in spinning of wool, than
upon the Lord’s Day to lose their time leaping and dancing, and other
such wantonness.”[350] Borough magistrates enforced the observance
of the Sabbath; not only were corporations, attired in their gowns,
required to attend church, morning and afternoon, but all masters were
ordered to cause their apprentices to be at Divine service at the
same time.[351] In the houses of such as disliked Puritanism, scenes
of levity, if not dissipation, often desecrated the holy hours. After
attendance at church, time was spent in a manner at variance with the
previous devotions.
[Sidenote: RECREATIONS.]
Pious Anglicans after the Restoration loved the first day of the
week with all the fervour of George Herbert;--and what some of them
said with reference to recreations, shocking as it appeared to
Puritans, proceeded not from a desire of self-indulgence, but from
a consideration of weakness in other people,--still, the Sabbath
remained the Puritans’ peculiar treasure. They put on it the highest
price. To them it seemed the jewel and crown, the bloom and flower
of the week, the torch which lighted up its dark days, the sunshine
which from eternity streamed down on the waters of time. Unwisdom,
sinking into superstition, betrayed itself in the strictness of their
conduct, provoking ridicule, and producing reaction; but it should
not be overlooked that it was from their great love to the festival,
that they were so careful to frame rules for its preservation. Some
treated Puritan habits as pitiable, and regarded the men as insanely
melancholy, but the latter esteemed themselves objects for envy rather
than commiseration, since in their own hearts they made the Sabbath “a
delight, the holy of the Lord, and honourable.”
XI. The idea of “a Christian year,” a sanctification of the seasons
of nature by Gospel memories, is undeniably beautiful. This theory of
time, adopted by the Church of England, reappeared at the Revolution,
and days which mark the progress of the old earth’s journeys round
the sun were stamped anew with sacred names, and entwined with the
history of the Redeemer and His Apostles. Christmas celebrated the
Incarnation, and Epiphany the infant appearance of Jesus to the Magi at
Bethlehem, with subsequent manifestations of His glory; Lent was the
spring period, set apart for fasting and prayer, preparatory to the
commemoration of Divine mercy in the atonement of Christ. Palm Sunday
is not recognized in the English Prayer Book. On the Sunday before
Easter no reference occurs to our Lord’s entrance into Jerusalem in
the proper Lessons, the Epistle, or the Gospel. But Easter itself,
after the sorrows of Good Friday, is a high and holy festival, when
the Church breaks out into songs of joy because of the Resurrection
of her Lord. At the close of the forty days following, come Rogation
Week, with Holy Thursday, and then Whitsuntide--a season associated
with Christ’s Ascension, and culminating in the celebration of
Pentecost. Trinity Sunday crowns the whole, and invites the faithful to
contemplate the comprehensive, the fundamental, the mysterious doctrine
of a distinction in the Godhead. The character and history of St. John
the Baptist, and of the Apostles, St. Matthias, St. Peter, St. James,
St. Bartholomew, St. Matthew, St. Simon and St. Jude, St. Andrew,
St. Thomas, are in succession bound up with certain days, the series
terminating in the festival of All Saints.[352]
[Sidenote: RECREATIONS.]
With these seasons, observed from ancient times, various recreations
had become connected in the middle ages. Many of them survived the fall
of Popery, and with exceptions and changes, came once more, at the
Restoration, into general fashion and indulgence. To say the least,
they brought around sacred things the strangest and most incongruous
associations. Some, indeed, were very much worse than strange and
incongruous. Christmas Eve shone with the blaze of the Yule log, and
its bountiful accompaniments of good cheer. The Christmas carol echoed
through the family hall with gay music from the minstrels’ gallery.
The Christmas hobby-horse cut strange capers, and Christmas-boxes
were given freely to young and old. The Lord of misrule, the foot
plough, and the sword dance, Yule doughs, mince-pies, Christmas-pies
and plum-puddings added to the tide of fellowship and pleasure at
that mid-winter season. All the glories of Twelfth night, which threw
old men and old women, as well as little children, into ecstasies
of merriment, were engrafted on the feast of Epiphany. Easter
holidays, Easter liftings, Easter eggs, and all sorts of Easter fun,
gathered in strange, grotesque, often revolting, contrast round the
professed acknowledgment of the greatest of the redemptive miracles
of Christianity. Rogation Week, with Ascension Day in its centre, had
long been the chosen time for sacred processions and litanies, and now
again in England, on the Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday of that week,
parochial perambulations revived; charity children carried flowers;
the clergy with singing men and boys, all in sacred vestments, and
with churchwardens and parishioners, beat the bounds of the parish,
and under Gospel oaks, and other Gospel trees, the Incumbent read the
Gospel, according to an old custom, in which had originated these
familiar appellations. The idea of such perambulations, sanctioned by
the Church, was--that processional worship should be offered to the
Almighty, that thanks should be given to Him for the promise of a good
crop, or that prayer should be offered for His mercy on the prospect of
a bad harvest. But the gathering together of all sorts of idle people,
and the habit of drinking which obtained amongst them, led to most
deplorable excesses.
Superstitious and absurd practices cropped up profusely on St.
Mark’s Eve. With St. John’s Day was coupled the use, in decoration,
of the birch, the lily, and St. John’s wort, and at night bonfires
illuminated the villages of “Merrie England.” St. Peter’s Day had
similar illuminations; St. James’ Day was a time for eating oysters,
and Allhallow Even was devoted to nut-cracking, apple-catching, and the
ancient game of quintain. The feasts of the consecration of churches
degenerated into rush bearings, hoppings, and all kinds of rustic
amusements, in which, as Bishop Hall observed in his _Triumph of
Pleasure_ “you may well say no Greek can be merrier than they.”
The theory was to unite the remembrance of Christian facts and
Christian names with particular seasons in the lives of men, to
interlink religion with social intercourse, to recognize recreation
as a human necessity, to hallow it with Christian influences, and to
allow joy, on account of the events recorded in the Gospel, to express
itself in innocent festivities. But nobody can fail to see that if
this was the theory, the practice did not correspond with it, for the
history of the amusements common in England at these festivals after
the Restoration, as before, abounds in proofs of revelry and riot, most
unseemly in the estimation of sober Christians. A distinction ought
to be made between the use of festivities at Christmas, Easter, and
other seasons, and their abuse; between what is harmful and what is
innocent; and also it must be allowed that, whilst Churchmen, in the
days of which we speak, mingled recreation with religion, some of them
also mingled the spirit of religion with recreation, and condemned
all vicious indulgence; but the fact still remains, that amongst the
lower classes, and the upper as well, in cities and towns, and in rural
districts, a large amount of social demoralization existed under the
cover of Christian symbols, and in union with professedly Christian
observances. This fact should not be overlooked in an Ecclesiastical
History of England.
[Sidenote: RECREATIONS.]
Different ideas respecting amusements are marked badges of religious
denominations, and one of the dangers of all Puritanism is a tendency
to separate between recreation and religion, and to regard them as if
antagonistic, from mistaken views of the condition and necessities
of human nature; views which ignore one side of the mind of man, and
narrow the range of social sympathies. Some good men of the Puritan
class did, in consequence, look sourly on several very innocent
sorts of pleasure; but the morbid, ungenial restriction of feeling,
ascribed to the Puritans in general, has been greatly exaggerated, and
to some extent, so far as it really existed, an excuse may be found
for it in the persecuting treatment which they, as a body, received
from those who were foremost in promoting the revival of old English
customs. The distinctive amusements of the Church festivals the Puritan
disliked, condemned, and opposed. Indeed, many disliked, condemned,
and opposed the festivals themselves, from a strong conviction that
they were superstitious in their origin, their character, and their
tendency. They devoutly believed in the events which those festivals
commemorated, and thought that they should be remembered, not at
particular seasons, but all the year round. Their idea of the festivals
was not such as to redeem the recreations which had clustered round
them; and the recreations themselves were, to their religious and moral
tastes, exceedingly offensive.
After all which has been said to the contrary, however, numbers of the
Puritans--under the later Stuarts, under the earlier ones, and under
the Commonwealth--were genial and even “facetious”--to use a word
applied to some of their best men--full of pleasantness, and by no
means averse to certain English amusements. Many demonstrations of joy
they made in common with their neighbours. Feasting and sending gifts
to one another, the ringing of bells, making bonfires, and sounding
trumpets, with thundering of ordnance on great national occasions, had
been recommended in so many words from the chief pulpit of Manchester,
by the chief Presbyterian minister of that City. If Puritans objected
to drinking healths, some had no objections to see the street-conduits
running with claret. Anti-prelatists, like prelatists before, and
Nonconformists, like Conformists after the Restoration, indulged in the
sports of fishing and shooting; they followed the hounds, and they went
a hawking.
Cock-fighting is an old English amusement, especially at Shrove-tide,
and, strange as it may seem, an eminent Puritan minister, Henry
Newcome, allowed his boys, when that season came round, to “shoot
at the cock.” He amusingly expresses in his diary a fear lest the
youngsters should come to mischief in so dangerous a game, and
therefore prayed to God that He would preserve them, as he thankfully
acknowledges God was pleased to do; and he mentions that on one
occasion he had particular reason to be alarmed, since what was meant
for the cock threatened danger to the boy, for “Daniel’s hat on his
head was shot through with an arrow.” Yet the careful and devout
father never indicates an apprehension of there being anything wrong
in the game itself.[353] Nonconformists condemned card-playing, and
other games of chance, but if the late Nonconformists resembled their
Presbyterian predecessors, they amused themselves with balls and
billiards. The game of shuffle-board was a Royal amusement, and a
board for playing the game is mentioned in an inventory of the goods
belonging to Charles I., which were seized at Ludlow Castle. Boards
of this description had lines drawn across them at one end, and the
players stood at the other, the object being to push or _shove_
flat pieces of metal across the lines, without causing them to fall off
the board. Newcome liked to play this game, as appears from his diary,
only he was afraid of taking “too great a latitude in such mirth,” and
thought it his duty to let some “savoury thing” fall at the time, and
if he cracked a jest, he considered himself as thereby incurring a debt
for an equal amount of serious discourse. The Presbyterian minister,
who tells these stories of himself, was a young man at the time to
which he thus refers, and he lived beyond the Revolution, but it is
very probable that in after years he continued cautiously to practise
his early favourite amusement. There is, however, no reason to believe
that his taste in this respect, and his habit of indulging in it, is to
be taken as a specimen of Nonconformists’ recreation in general.
[Sidenote: CHARITIES.]
XII. The charities revived or established after the Restoration,
springing from the benevolent spirit of Christianity, call for some
notice. Visiting the venerable hospital of St. Mary, in the City
of Chichester, with its spacious hall, spanned by an arched roof,
and its rows of tiny rooms built on either side, as if in a covered
street, with its chapel and altar table, and other provisions
for Episcopalian worship on Sundays and week-days, and with its
old-fashioned men and women finding rest in their declining days,
after the toils and troubles of life; or visiting the like venerable
hospital of Bishopgate, in the City of Norwich, with somewhat similar
arrangements, we see the kind of place in which benevolent people loved
to shelter the aged and the infirm in the days of Charles II. After the
banishment--during the Commonwealth--of the ancient religious services,
and of the old spirit of these quaint retreats--not, however, to the
violation of the charitable purposes of the foundation--those services
took possession of them again at the Restoration. The same may be said
of numerous almshouses in different parts of the country.
New ones of a similar description were established. Bishop Ward’s
College of Matrons, for the maintenance of ten widows of orthodox
clergymen, may be mentioned as an instance. He disliked it to be called
an hospital, it being intended for those who were well descended,
and had lived in good reputation. He purchased land in the Close at
Salisbury, on which to erect the buildings, and the Cathedral being
so near, they were required to attend worship there, both morning
and evening. The same prelate endowed an hospital at Buntingford,
in Hertfordshire, the place of his birth, for ten aged men, each to
receive ten pounds a year.
Some persons, in founding almshouses, required that all the inmates
should “be conformed to the Church of England, according to the
Thirty-Nine Articles,” and placed under the ban of exclusion all such
as should not profess, or follow the Protestant religion, or should
absent themselves from the parish or castle church without cause.[354]
Others devised bequests in a more catholic spirit, providing “that poor
boys may be instructed in the principles of the Protestant religion,
and in the fear of the Lord, and also to read and to write, and to cast
up accounts, that so they may be blessed in their souls as well as in
their bodies, and may be a blessing to their masters, and may for ever
have cause to bless God for the fatherly care” of the Mayor on their
behalf.[355]
[Sidenote: CHARITIES.]
The name of a singular kind of person, who signalized himself by his
beneficence, may also be introduced.
An epitaph on a tomb-stone in the Chapel of Jesus’ College, Cambridge,
records his deeds:--“Tobias Rustat, Yeoman of the Robes to King Charles
II., whom he served with all duty and faithfulness in his adversity
as well as prosperity, both at home and abroad. The greatest part of
the estate he gathered by God’s blessing, the King’s favour, and his
industry, he disposed in his lifetime in works of charity, and found
the more he bestowed upon churches, hospitals, universities, and
colleges, and upon poor widows and orphans of orthodox ministers, the
more he had at the year’s end. Neither was he unmindful of his kindred
and relations in making them provision out of what remained. He died a
bachelor the 15th day of March, in the year of our Lord 1693, aged 87.”
Dr. Sutcliffe, in the reign of James I., founded and built a college
at Chelsea “principally for the maintenance of the true Catholic,
Apostolic, and Christian faith, and next, for the practice, setting
forth, and increase of true and sound learning against the pedantry,
sophistries and novelties of the Jesuits, and others, the Pope’s
factors and followers; and, thirdly, against the treachery of the
Pelagians, and Arminians, and others, that draw towards Popery and
Babylonian slavery, endeavouring to make a rent in God’s Church,
and a peace between heresy and God’s true faith--between Christ and
Antichrist.”[356] Although patronized by the King, this indefinite
scheme for maintaining truth in a controversial age came to nothing,
and Charles II. appropriated the ground occupied by the college to
the famous Royal Hospital for superannuated soldiers. Everybody is
familiar with the imposing edifice near the banks of the Thames, and
with the stories about Nell Gwynn’s influence, in the establishment
of the foundation, but it is not generally known, that a number of
persons, besides the King, took part in the work, and that it is really
a monument of national as well as of Royal munificence.
Tillotson, in one of his sermons, commemorates the benevolence of a
London merchant:--
“He (Mr. Gouge) set the poor of St. Sepulchre’s parish (where he was
a minister) to work at his own charge. He bought flax and hemp for
them to spin; when spun he paid them for their work, and caused it
to be wrought into cloth, which he sold as he could, himself bearing
the whole loss. This was a very wise and well-chosen way of charity,
and in the good effect of it, a much greater charity; than if he had
given to those very persons (freely and for nothing) so much as he made
them earn by their work, because, by this means, he rescued them from
two most dangerous temptations--idleness and poverty. This course, so
happily devised and begun by Mr. Gouge, gave, it may be, the first hint
to that useful and worthy citizen, Mr. Thos. Firman, of a much larger
design, which has been managed by him some years in this city, with
that vigour and good success, that many hundreds of poor children,
and others, who lived idle before, unprofitable both to themselves
and the public, now maintain themselves, and are also some advantage
to the community. By the assistance and charity of many excellent and
well-disposed persons, Mr. Firman is enabled to bear the unavoidable
loss and charge of so vast an undertaking, and by his own forward
inclination to charity, and unwearied diligence and activity, is fitted
to sustain and go through the incredible pains of it.”[357]
[Sidenote: CHARITIES.]
Such instances of Christian benevolence are quite as worthy of being
recorded in ecclesiastical history as the strifes of controversy, and
the changes of government, and it may therefore be added in reference
to “the useful and worthy citizen, Mr. Firman,” just mentioned, that,
although he was a person of singular and heterodox opinions, he
distinguished himself above many who condemned his errors; and left
behind him a name for active and unwearied charity, which entitles
him to a place in the same honourable list with Howard, Fry, and
Peabody. The details of his beneficence are minutely recorded in his
interesting life: besides establishing a linen manufactory entirely
for the employment and benefit of poor spinners, he visited prisons,
and redeemed poor debtors; he was a zealous supporter of Christ’s and
St. Thomas’ Hospitals; he largely gave away Bibles, good books, and
catechisms; he diligently helped the French Refugees; he evinced a deep
interest in the sufferings and relief of the persecuted Irish, and he
was an eminent contributor to the wants of the poor.[358]
Nor were missionary efforts altogether neglected. Sir Leoline
Jenkins--who, in 1680, succeeded Sir William Coventry as Secretary of
State--was touched by the large amount of spiritual destitution amongst
the Navy and in the Colonies, and with a view to the supplying of it,
he instituted two fellowships in Jesus’ College, Oxford, the holders of
which should go out to sea as Chaplains of the Fleet, or proceed to
“His Majesty’s foreign plantations, there to take upon them a cure of
souls.”
In July, 1649, an ordinance had been passed by the Long Parliament for
the propagation of the Gospel in New England. A collection for the
object having been made in every parish, a large sum was realized in
consequence. With this money certain lands were purchased of Colonel
Beddingfield, a Roman Catholic Royalist, the annual proceeds of which
were to be devoted to the mission. But after the Restoration, the
Colonel seized back the property for his own use, and it was only after
legal proceedings,--in which Clarendon, as Lord Chancellor, behaved
most equitably,--that it was recovered by the trustees. Charles II.
granted the Society a new Charter of Incorporation, of which Robert
Boyle became president; and Mr. Ashurst, an influential and pious
citizen, and alderman of London, who had been treasurer before,
reaccepted that important post. Richard Baxter took an active part in
the proceedings at home, and John Eliot, a missionary to the Indians,
carried on its operations abroad. Letters are preserved which passed
between the illustrious Divine and the illustrious Evangelist, and
from one written by the former we learn that, although, from reasons
connected with the peculiar character of the times, numbers were
unwilling to leave England just then to embark in this new expedition
of religious zeal, many would have been glad to have gone amongst
“Persians, Tartarians, and Indians,” to preach the Gospel, had they
but understood the language. Hints respecting universal language--a
dream which occupied the thoughts of Wilkins, the Bishop of Chester,
and inspired George Dalgarno’s _Ars Signorum_--occur in Eliot’s
letters, showing that he leaned towards the Hebrew tongue as the
all-comprehensive vehicle of instruction--the tongue which, he said,
will be spoken in heaven, and which, by its “trigramical foundation,”
is “capable of a regular expatiation into millions of words, no
language like it.” Baxter was strongly excited by the deplorable
destitution of the Gospel, but it inspired more of despair than of
hope; it paralyzed rather than stimulated effort. “He that surveyeth
the present state of the earth, and considereth, that scarcely a sixth
part is Christian, and how small a part of them are reformed, and how
small a part of them have much of the power of godliness, will be ready
to think that Christ hath called almost all His chosen, and is ready
to forsake the earth, rather than that He intendeth us such blessed
days below as we desire. We shall have what we would, but not in this
world.”[359] There are also several letters from Eliot to Boyle,
written with touching simplicity--reports, in fact, of the missionary
work in New England--in which the apostle to the Indians addresses
the President of the Society as a right honourable, deeply learned,
abundantly charitable, and constant, nursing father.[360]
[Sidenote: CHARITIES.]
Boyle devoted to the New England mission, £300 a year during his life,
and, by his will, bequeathed a legacy of £100; and although several
persons of distinction were nominally connected with the scheme, he was
its moving-spring, its power and life. The meetings for the transaction
of its affairs, which he commonly attended, were held at Alderman
Ashurst’s residence in London--the first board of foreign missions in
Protestant England, and the first mission-house of that kind in its
enterprising metropolis. Missionary operations on a much larger scale
were commenced after the Revolution.
XIII. I have recorded several incidents which occurred in the
Universities. Nothing like a history of those great institutions comes
within the purpose of this work, nor is there any need to describe
their state after the Restoration, as in former volumes I described it
before that event:--because, during the Commonwealth, the Universities
were extraordinarily circumstanced, but at the Restoration they
returned to their normal condition, in which they have continued ever
since. A few notices, however, indicative of the studies and habits of
the members, may be appropriately included within this chapter.
Sancroft conveys an unfavourable impression of the state of things
at Cambridge in the year 1663:--“It would grieve you to hear of our
public examinations; the Hebrew and Greek learning being out of fashion
everywhere, and especially in the other Colleges, where we are forced
to seek our candidates for fellowships; and the rational learning they
pretend to, being neither the old philosophy, nor steadily any one of
the new. In fine, though I must do the present society right, and say,
that divers of them are very good scholars, and orthodox (I believe)
and dutiful both to King and Church; yet methinks I find not that old
genius and spirit of learning generally in the College that made it
once so deservedly famous; nor shall I hope to retrieve it any way
sooner, than by your directions who lived here in the most flourishing
times of it.”[361]
Not only would the transition from Puritan to Anglican occasion
inconvenience, but a transition also occurred from the study of the
old to the study of the new philosophy,--from Aristotle to Plato,
and from the pursuit of metaphysics to the investigation of physical
science. Lucas founded a professorship of Mathematics in the year 1663,
to which office Barrow was the first appointed, and in his inaugural
address, he eulogizes that department of knowledge which he was about
to teach.[362]
[Sidenote: UNIVERSITIES.]
Another great change at Cambridge, consequent upon the Restoration, is
seen in the decline of Calvinistic theology, the return of Anglican
opinions, and especially the progress of the Latitudinarian schools of
Divinity, described in a subsequent portion of this work. Turning to
less important matters, it may be observed that Royal mandates became
too common, and provoked refusals from the College authorities. Dr.
Cudworth, Master of Christ’s, politely apologized for declining an
order for the election of a son of Sir Richard Fanshaw, as a Fellow,
pleading that “since the Restoration, their little College had received
and obeyed ten Royal letters; and even received a manciple imposed
by letter, though it was a thing never known before.” “When mandates
are so plentifully granted they cannot possibly be all obeyed.”[363]
North set himself decidedly against these mandates, as most mischievous
abuses, and contrived by pre-elections to obviate their occurrence.
“Out of the several years, four or five one under another, he caused
to be pre-elected into fellowships scholars of the best capacities
in the several years; which made it improbable another election
should come about in so many years then next ensuing, for until all
these elections were benefited there could be no vacancy, and that
broke the course of mandates whilst he lived.” North was a High Tory,
an advocate of absolute monarchy, a severe disciplinarian, and an
austere man in his personal habits. Although his opinions accorded
with those prevalent in the University, his conduct as the Head of
a College made him unpopular; and it happened, one evening,--when
sitting in his dining-room by the fire, the chimney being opposite to
the windows, looking out into the great quadrangle,--that a stone was
sent from the court through the window. He was “inwardly vexed, and
soon after, the discourse fell upon the subject of people’s kicking
against their superiors in government, who preserves them as children
are preserved by parents; and then he had a scroll of instances, out of
Greek history, to the same purpose, concluding that no conscientious
magistrate can be popular, but in lieu of that, he must arm himself
with equanimity.” He differed at times from the senior fellows, and
at a meeting for business, when eight of them had determined to have
their own way, and carry a point on which they had previously agreed,
one of them attempted to effect his object by saying, “Master, since
you will not agree, we must rise, and break up the meeting.” “Nay,” he
replied, “that you shall not do, for I myself will rise and be gone
first.”[364] This brought them round. The relation of such an incident
gives an idea of the High Church Don at Cambridge much better than any
general description, and throws amusing light on the social life of the
University.
The election of a new Chancellor was then, as it generally is, an
exciting event for the University men, and every kind of influence
was brought to bear upon the success of the respective competitors.
In 1671, the Duke of Buckingham entered into a contest with the Earl
of Arlington, for the enjoyment of the honour, and obtained the
prize; Williamson, the Secretary of State, having without effect
canvassed on the opposite side. Leading men apologized to him for not
supporting his candidate, of which an instance appears in the following
communication:--
[Sidenote: UNIVERSITIES.]
“For Joseph Williamson, Esq., Whitehall.--Sir,--My worthy
friend,--This morning, about seven, I received the favour of
your letter sent me by Dr. Turner, of St. John’s, and Dr.
Cudworth our Master received another from you to the same
effect. But we were so far engaged before, having been visited
(as we call it here, for the Duke of Buckingham) on Sunday or
Monday last, and the inclinations of the University lay so
against an Oxford man (you know our academical humour) that
no good could be done so late for my Lord Arlington, but the
Duke was chosen this day with a _nemine contradicente_. You
know, dear Sir, my personal obligations to you are such, and
peculiarly in my expectancy for the professorship, that you
might command not only my own suffrage, but all the friends I
could make if it had been in time.
“Believe me to be your much obliged and humble Servant,
JOHN CARR.
“CHRIST’S COLL., CAMBRIDGE,
_May 11, 1671_.”
There are other letters amongst the _State Papers_ on the same
subject, including one from Dr. Cudworth, to Williamson, excusing
himself for supporting the Duke instead of the Earl.
Charles II. visited Cambridge on the 4th of October in the same year,
and the whole body of students wearing academical habits, according to
their several degrees, lined the streets as His Majesty visited the
various buildings. He was received by the new Chancellor and the other
authorities, who presented him with a “fair Bible,” accompanied by a
short speech from the public orator. The King visited the University’s
libraries and the Colleges of Trinity and St. John, and after dining at
Trinity he saw a comedy acted there, with which he expressed himself
well pleased.[365] In 1674, the Duke of Monmouth succeeded the Duke of
Buckingham in the Chancellorship, and in that year we find the former
sending a curious communication to the Eastern University.
By His Majesty’s desire he noticed the liberty which several persons in
holy orders had taken to wear their own hair and perukes of an unusual
and unbecoming length, and rebuked them for it, strictly enjoining
that all such, who professed the study of Divinity, should wear their
hair in a manner more suitable to the gravity and sobriety of their
profession. He also blamed them in His Majesty’s name for reading
sermons, and commanded that preaching from MS., which took a beginning
with the disorders of the late times, should be wholly laid aside,
and that preachers should deliver their sermons, both in Latin and
English, by memory or without book, as being a way of preaching which
His Majesty judged most agreeable to the use of all foreign Churches,
to the former custom of the University, and the nature and intention of
the holy exercise itself.[366] These injunctions were anticipated at
Oxford, where James, Duke of Ormond, continued Chancellor from 1669 to
1688.
[Sidenote: UNIVERSITIES.]
“It is not long since,” writes Dr. Ralph Bathurst, President of
Trinity, “we had notice of the Duke of Monmouth’s letter, written
by His Majesty’s command, to the University of Cambridge, against
_long hair_ and the _reading of sermons_. It was here thought
advisable to obviate the like reproof to ourselves, by an early
compliance with His Majesty’s desires, though we think ourselves much
more blameless than they, especially in the last particular. To this
end, I have this day published a programme, the copy whereof I have
made bold to send you.”[367]
With this amusing insight into academic life, may be coupled another
of earlier date. Williamson, Secretary of State, presented to Queen’s
College, a silver trumpet and two pairs of banners. Thanks were
returned by Dr. Thomas Barlow, in the name of the Society, and the gift
was described as “most welcome, not only for its cost and curiosity,
but for its congruity to them who by statute are to be called to dinner
with a trumpet, though fitter for him to give than for a poor College
to receive, to call them to a mess of pottage and twopenny commons. It
will be used on all solemn days, but at other times their old brass
trumpet will serve the turn.” In another letter, it is remarked,
“The Provost, and all the company, highly extol them, and are very
grateful for them. The trumpet was long sounded in the quadrangle,
wine was drunk through the hall, and venison pasties were at every
table, there being a whole buck from Lady Foster, of Aldermaston,”
besides Williamson’s from Woodstock.[368] Old Christmas and Candlemas
customs were revived, and the senior undergraduates amused themselves
at night before the charcoal fires by bringing in the freshmen, and
making them “sit down on a form in the middle of the hall, joining to
the declaimer’s desk,”--where they were required to “speak some pretty
apothegm, or make a jest or bull;” and if the thing were not done
cleverly, the unhappy wight was punished by the seniors, who would
“_tuck_ him--that is set the nail of their thumb to his chin, just
under the lip, and by the help of their other fingers under the chin,
they would give him a mark which sometimes would produce blood.”[369]
A picturesque usage occurred on Holy Thursday, when the Fellows of New
College walked to Bartholomew’s Hospital, which was decked with fruit
for the occasion, and then, after reading the Scriptures, and the
singing of hymns, they offered silver to be divided amongst poor men;
then they proceeded to Stockwell, where, after reading the epistle and
gospel for the day, the Fellows in “the open place, like the ancient
Druids, echoed and warbled out from the shady arbours, melodious
melody, consisting of several parts, then most in fashion.”[370]
[Sidenote: UNIVERSITIES.]
The conduct of persons who from time to time acted the part of
_Terræ filius_, had been complained of under the Commonwealth;
it continued to be complained of after the Restoration. The excesses
into which these lawless students were wont to run, with other
corresponding extravagances, appear to have reached their greatest
height in 1669, at the opening of the Sheldon theatre. South once, as
University orator, delivered a long oration, in which he satirically
inveighed against Cromwell, the Fanatics, the Royal Society, and the
new philosophy:--and then pronounced encomiums upon the Archbishop,
the building, the Vice-Chancellor, the Architect, and the Decorator,
concluding with execrations, cast upon Fanatics, Conventicles, and
Comprehension, “damning them _ad inferos, ad Gehennam_.” At the
same Commemoration, the _Terræ filius_ gave so general offence,
that Dr. Wallis says: “I believe the University hath thereby lost more
reputation than they have gained by all the rest.” “The excellent
Lady,” he adds, “which your letter mentions, was, in the broadest
language represented as guilty of those crimes, of which, if there were
occasion, you would not stick to be her compurgator.”[371]
Complaints of the same kind were made years afterwards. The Bishop of
Oxford, writing December 14, 1684, complains:--“The _Terræ filii_
in this place have of late taken to themselves such licenses as were
altogether intolerable, their scurrilous discourses passing not only
the bounds of decency but of common humanity, so that it was necessary
for the University to oppose sharp remedies to so prevailing an
evil.”[372]
Within eighteen months of the date of the Oxford decree for burning
the books of Milton and others, there occurred another Act conceived
in the same spirit. Lord Sunderland wrote to the Bishop of Oxford, Dr.
John Fell, complaining of John Locke,--“He being,” remarks the Bishop
in reply, “as your Lordship is truly informed, a person who was much
trusted by the late Earl of Shaftesbury, and who is suspected to be
ill-affected to the Government, I have for divers years had an eye upon
him, but so close has his guard been on himself, that after several
strict inquiries, I may confidently affirm that there is not any man in
the College, however familiar with him, who has heard him speak a word
either against, or so much as concerning the Government.” Yet, although
Locke was so extremely cautious, the Bishop professed the greatest
zeal in seeking his expulsion, and, after describing what he himself
meant to do, adds: “If this method seem not effectual or speedy enough,
and His Majesty, our founder and visitor, shall please to command his
immediate remove, upon the receipt thereof, directed to the Dean and
Chapter, it shall accordingly be executed.” A warrant, immediately
despatched by Sunderland, signified the King’s pleasure, that John
Locke should be removed from his student’s place, to which the Bishop
obsequiously replied: “I hold myself bound in duty to signify to your
Lordship that His Majesty’s command for the expulsion of Mr. Locke from
this College is fully executed.”[373] This disgraceful deed originated,
it is true, with the Sovereign, but the part taken by the Bishop, and
the Dean and Chapter of Christchurch, with the silent acquiescence of
the University, demonstrates what must have been the political and
ecclesiastical atmosphere of the place at that time.
We here terminate these somewhat rambling notices of the
ecclesiastical, the religious, and the academic life of the period;
and proceed to notice, in the next chapter, a very important subject
connected with the state of the English Churches, which has not
received from historians the attention it requires.
CHAPTER XIII.
Theological science is a growth; and to its growth, as developed in our
own day, the labours of a long line of students have contributed. The
_genesis_ of doctrinal opinion is a subject worthy of much more
careful research than it has yet received. To find out how particular
dogmas have been broached and modified, how they have originated and
been unfolded, goes far to fix their truth or their falsehood; and
any man who would thoroughly understand the theology of this country,
must study carefully the chief authors of theological literature
in the seventeenth century. Andrewes, Donne, Jackson, Thorndike,
Taylor, Pearson, and Bull--More, Smith, Cudworth, and Barrow--Goodwin,
Owen, Baxter, Howe, and Charnock--were all eminent Divines of that
period--all, in different degrees, erudite scholars--all hard
thinkers; and although they belonged to schools of thought differing
in important respects, inasmuch as they read each other’s books, and
answered each other’s arguments, they could not but influence each
other’s minds. To ponder and to compare them is an exercise helpful
to a theological thinker in his search after truth. Unless we believe
in the infallibility of our own Church, whatever that Church may
be--unless we also believe our own Church to have collected every
part of theological truth, to have examined it under every possible
aspect, and to have secured the best possible point of view--all of us
who engage in sacred studies are bound not to confine ourselves to the
perusal of authors who belong to the way of thinking which prevails in
our own denomination. Rome has her _Index Expurgatorius_, and in
this she is perfectly consistent. Protestantism, whilst it condemns
the Romanist prohibition of inquiry, is excessively inconsistent, if
it encourages similar exclusiveness on the part of its own disciples,
or allows a wider circle of reading only for controversial purposes.
The narrowness of theological schools, and the bigotry of religious
sects, is very much owing to a limited acquaintance with books, and
to a prejudiced feeling against what is read when accustomed limits
are overstepped. And in reference to the authors of the seventeenth
century, it cannot be fairly denied--after all which may justly be
said touching the dryness and prolixity of their dissertations--that a
depth, thoroughness, and power may be found in some of these men which
we miss, with a few exceptions, in Divines of our own day.
As the writings of which I speak, together with other influences, have
served to produce phases of religious thought amongst ourselves, so
amongst them, the writings of earlier theologians, together with other
influences, served to produce the characteristic peculiarities of their
religious thought. We are apt to underrate the _number_ of ways in
which thinking is affected; and we often forget that a simple result
may proceed from most complex and composite causes. Many people imagine
that the climate of a country is determined entirely by position in
point of latitude--that every mile nearer the pole it must be colder,
and every mile nearer the equator it must be warmer; whereas numerous
and diversified agencies interfere with climate, and produce wonderful
curves in the isothermal lines. So, many people imagine that one
cause--the study of the Bible--solely determines theological opinion;
whereas, forces of all descriptions--even climate and scenery, race
and language, laws and memories, especially early education, domestic
life, books, friendships, and idiosyncrasies--have a share in the
result. Divines two centuries ago might not, any more than ourselves,
be conscious of the diversified and subtle operations to which they
were subjected; but that circumstance does not interfere with the fact
itself.
[Sidenote: THEOLOGY.]
There had been four broad lines of theological opinion long before
the middle of the seventeenth century, as there have been four broad
lines running on ever since. In the second century and onward we
meet with _patristic orthodoxy_, the great facts and principles
of Christianity taught by the Apostles being illustrated and
defended, especially in the Nicene age, by thoughtful men, who, in
the use of their natural faculties, by the blessing of Almighty God,
explained and established much which is true; not, however, without
an admixture of something which was false. In the third century
we meet with _Alexandrian philosophy_, which, by a natural
tendency, aimed at bringing the intellectual culture of the age
into connection with the Gospel; and therefore dwelt much upon the
reasonableness of Christianity, and the points of affinity between
it and certain forms of human opinion. In the fourth century we find
_dogmatic Evangelicalism_ gathered up by Augustine, and woven
into a distinctive system of Christian thought. At the same time the
element of _Mysticism_ appears at work, preparing for a vigorous
expression of itself during the middle ages. Throughout those ages
these four currents are traceable, generic resemblances, being marked,
of course, by specific varieties. At the Reformation two of these,
the Nicene and the Augustinian, are manifest enough in the English
Protestant Church, both struggling against Rome; each also struggling
with the other. The traces of Alexandrianism and of Mysticism, after
disappearing for awhile, become distinctly visible in the seventeenth
century.
It is impossible not to connect the Anglican development of that period
with the faith, the polity, and the worship of the Nicene age, and the
Puritan doctrines of the same period, with the theology and spiritual
life of Augustine. Nor can there be any doubt that the so-called
Latitudinarianism (I use the word in its historical sense) of the
Cambridge school comes in lineal succession to that of Alexandria. And
if Mysticism, as existing amongst Quakers, be not capable of showing
distinct historical links of connection with previous thinking, it
is plain that its elements had existed long before: a fact, indeed,
insisted upon by its more erudite exponents.[374] Anglicans, Puritans,
Latitudinarians, and Mystics were all of ancient lineage, although
some were unacquainted with, and might even be prejudiced against,
their ancestry. Besides, as already indicated, there were other and
more immediate influences at work. The ecclesiastical revolutions and
conflicts under Elizabeth and the Stuarts, the traditions of domestic
life, parental and school education, the atmosphere pervading social
circles, and especially the constitution of individual minds--these
served to shape systems which stood in direct and determined conflict
with one another. Nor let it be forgotten that, though divers factors
of religious thought may be enumerated, others exist which lie too deep
for discovery and analysis, even by the most subtle inquirers. If it
be true generally that we have no complete science of history, it is
eminently true of the history of theological opinion. There is mystery
in all growth, for there is mystery in all life; and it is idle to
suppose that, at least in this world, we shall ever arrive at a perfect
philosophy of the progress or activity of mind, in reference to that
which is at once, of all subjects, the most practical and the most
mysterious.
[Sidenote: THEOLOGY.]
It will assist the reader in understanding what follows, to observe
that, whilst all the theologians to be described appealed to Scripture,
each class had its own standard and principles of interpretation; and
that, whilst all professed to take the Bible as a whole, each selected
from it some favourite parts. The Anglicans, professedly as well as
actually, adopted the teaching of the first four or five centuries as
a guide to the meaning of Holy Writ. They looked upon that period as
the purest and ripest age of Christian wisdom, and concluded that the
Church of after-days has been, and is, bound to adhere to the faith
and order then established. The Puritans had no such idea of patristic
teaching, but contended for the full right of private judgment. Some
of the Fathers they valued and loved, particularly Augustine; yet
without attaching any special authority even to him. They professed
to come to the sacred oracles with unbiassed minds, and it is one of
their characteristic notions that the Holy Spirit, bestowed upon devout
seekers, remains alone the unerring Expositor of His own Word. The
Latitudinarians had their favourite authors, particularly of the Greek
philosophical school; and although they did not adopt the opinions of
the Puritans as to the teaching of the Spirit, any more than did the
Anglicans, yet, in common with both of them, they were prepared to seek
Divine assistance in the study of the sacred volume. What, however,
they mainly relied upon was their own reason. The Quakers, in their
turn, extolled the inward light, the illumination of Christ’s Spirit,
as explaining and supplementing the written Word. The Fathers, the Holy
Spirit, human reason, and the inward light, were the interpreters to
which different classes of Scripture students looked for help in their
momentous investigations. In connection with this difference another
presents itself. The Anglicans insisted upon those parts of Scripture
which relate to the Holy Trinity, the Incarnation, and the Atonement,
and to the ordinances of baptism and the Lord’s Supper. They used the
priesthood and rites of Judaism for the support of their own views
regarding sacerdotal ministrations. Diocesan episcopacy and Apostolical
succession they endeavoured to deduce from the New Testament; but they
were obliged to rest principally upon patristic records for what they
believed and taught upon these subjects.
[Sidenote: THEOLOGY.]
Passages relating to justification by faith, to the election of grace,
and to the adoption of believers, do not stand out in their writings,
as do the other class of passages to which I have referred. In this
respect the Anglicans differed from the Puritans. By the latter,
texts bearing upon the topics now mentioned, in connection with other
texts touching the Divinity of our Lord, and the Holy Trinity, and
the satisfaction made by Christ upon the cross, were most abundantly
cited, illustrated, and enforced. The Puritans regarded such texts
as distinctive of the Gospel--as rendering it a suitable message of
redemption and love to sinful men. I scruple not to say that I warmly
sympathize with them in this last respect. The Gospel is glad tidings
of great joy to all people: this is the pith of the blessed message,
“Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.” “His name shall
be called Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sins.”
But whilst I admire and honour the Puritans for their attachment to
evangelic truth, I cannot conceal my conviction that they too, in their
turn, are chargeable with one-sidedness. They had their favourite
verses, and, in some instances, dwelt upon them to the neglect of
others, and without fully considering the general current of Scripture
instructions--which current is really still more important and decisive
than particular sentences, which are apt to be looked at apart from
their connection. Some of the Puritan Divines did not sufficiently
consider those passages which recognize in the Atonement an element
of moral power over the human soul; or those passages which present
justification and sanctification, in their inseparable relation, as
two sides of one and the same redemption; or those passages which
teach the power of the human will, the free agency of man, and his
personal responsibility; or those passages which unfold the sweet and
beautiful fatherhood of Almighty God. The reaction produced by the
errors of Popery in identifying sanctification with justification, in
overlooking the free grace of the Gospel, and in fostering notions of
human merit, drove the Puritans into extreme antagonistic positions,
where the forensic idea of righteousness too often overshadowed the
moral idea, and an inevitable and resistless fatalism took the place of
Divine parental government at once merciful and righteous. Some of the
Puritans, indeed, lie less open to such exceptions than did others, as
will appear in the subsequent analysis of their works.
The Latitudinarians also had their favourite portions of hallowed
Writ, raising the moral teaching of the New Testament, and what they
considered the large and liberal views of humanity given in the Bible,
above the doctrinal sentences which so much occupied the attention of
Anglicans on the one hand, and above those which equally occupied the
attention of Puritans on the other. To Latitudinarians, Christianity
seemed more an ethical than a doctrinal system; and in their writings
evangelic truth shines with a very subdued and chilly kind of
illumination.
The Quakers, too, had their favourite verses, and were continually
insisting upon those which, as they thought, supported the idea of an
inward light.
What has now been imperfectly advanced in relation to predominant lines
of thinking in the seventeenth century is to be accepted only in a
general sense. One writer differed so much from another, that, whilst
resemblances exist, mere general statements respecting them are likely
to mislead, unless they are checked and modified by a careful review of
individual opinions.
Such a review is now to be attempted, with a full conviction of its
very great difficulties.
[Sidenote: THEOLOGY.]
Taking the period between the opening of the Long Parliament and the
Revolution (1640–1688), I might divide it into two epochs--the one
extending as far as the end of the Commonwealth, the other beginning
at that crisis. Modes of thought of the kind just pointed out can
be traced along the whole course, abreast of each other. The two
antagonistic systems are Anglicanism and Puritanism; and from 1640
to 1660, Puritanism is seen in the ascendant, as a reaction against
Anglicanism; and from 1660 to 1688, Anglicanism is in the ascendant,
as a reaction against Puritanism. No doubt some slight differences
obtained between the Anglicanism of the first twenty years and the
Anglicanism of the last twenty-eight, and the same may be said of the
Puritanism of the first and second of those generations; but there
is no necessity for breaking the history into two parts, since the
general identity of each system is preserved throughout the whole
period, and all the leading representatives lived and studied, and
most of them acted and wrote, both before and after the Restoration;
besides, to separate their later from their earlier works would destroy
the unity of this narrative, and create confusion in the reader’s
mind. The Latitudinarians appeared at Cambridge before the death of
Oliver Cromwell, and at that period began to produce some effect upon
theological speculation and religious life; but it was not until
afterwards that their characteristic tendencies became fully apparent.
Quaker Mysticism took its rise in the midst of the Commonwealth era,
and continued its course, with increasing power, up to the hour of
the Revolution. Therefore to cut in two the theological history of
this half century would be inconvenient; and although the plan which
I adopt is open to objection, I shall select examples of the teaching
throughout that period, without adopting any chronological subdivision.
I shall begin with the Anglicans, then notice the Latitudinarians,
then touch upon the Quaker Mystics, and end with the Puritans. My
endeavour will be to state them as fairly as I can; not to indulge in
vague generalization, but to give their own words and turns of thought
whenever it is possible; and, by references as well as citations,
to supply the means of rectifying any mistakes into which I may
unfortunately happen to fall. In stating arguments on different sides,
I shall endeavour to guard against colouring reports of opinion with my
own predilections or prejudices. At the same time, I shall not refrain
from occasionally indicating, in a few words, my own belief; for no man
who has deep convictions touching these subjects, however he may strive
to write with impartiality about various parties, will dare to write
with indifference upon what he conceives to be vital truths. Moreover,
it appears to me very important to notice certain circumstances in
the lives of these authors; for it is quite clear to my mind, that we
cannot accurately understand the history of theology, or duly estimate
theological opinions, apart from the biography of the theologians
themselves.
Herbert Thorndike first claims attention. He possessed a mind which
was singularly acute and comprehensive. He had trained himself to the
practice of subtle reasoning, yet he generally gives, in his writings,
indications of no small measure of what Englishmen call common sense;
and, on every page, he exhibits those rich and varied treasures of
theological learning which a quiet life of study alone can enable any
one to accumulate. It cannot be denied that the formal method employed
in his arguments is often quite unimpeachable; yet, whilst logical in
reasoning, he is illogical in arrangement; and his discursive habits
of thought often tempt him into zigzag courses, and lead him to double
his path, and retrace his steps, and come back to some point which the
reader concludes the author had finished. And to this serious defect
he adds another: his crabbed and crooked style presents the most
infelicitous collocation of words, perhaps, to be found in English
literature, many of his sentences needing to be translated into some
plainer form before they can be understood. What a contrast, in point
of style, does the student find, when, leaving the majestic diction of
Hooker, or the flowing rhythm of Jackson, he turns to the perusal of
Thorndike’s paragraphs! Yet, in spite of drawbacks, Thorndike deserves
to be carefully studied. No other theologian of his age, or, indeed, of
any other, has wrought out the Anglican theory with such elaboration
and completeness. The disciples of that system find in his books an
arsenal of defence; and its opponents should examine carefully his
positions, if they would overthrow the citadel in which Divines of his
order are wont to entrench themselves. But he ought not to be studied
simply for controversial purposes: any large-minded student, with
sympathy for God’s truth wherever found, may derive great advantage
from many parts of this good man’s writings.
[Sidenote: ANGLICANS.--THORNDIKE.]
In common with some other Divines of that day, he passed through a
change of opinion, and that at an early period of life. He went to
Cambridge with no strong theological bias of any kind, and entered
Trinity College at a time when that College was accused neither of
Puritan nor of Romanizing tendencies. But he thought less unfavourably
of Calvinism at the commencement of his studies than he did during his
subsequent career. At first he did not, without some qualification,
condemn the doctrine of final perseverance; also he then opposed other
parts of the system upon grounds which he afterwards abandoned, as not
sufficiently distinct and fundamental. He was also far less severe when
controverting the arguments of Nonconformists in the former than in the
latter period of his life.[375] Patristic studies, to a large extent,
most likely produced the change which he experienced; and his ejectment
from his Fellowship at Trinity by the Presbyterians would naturally
serve to increase his growing distaste for their distinguishing tenets.
The book in which he unfolds his scheme of divinity was written before
the Restoration, and bears the title of _An Epilogue to the Tragedy
of the Church of England_ (1659): a title which provoked the
criticisms of his friends, especially afterwards, when the book proved
to be a prologue to that Church’s revival. The work contains _The
Principles of Christian Truth_; _The Covenant of Grace_; and
_The Laws of the Church_.
In laying down the principles of Christian truth, Thorndike, as an
Anglican, somewhat startles his reader by his first position, that
reason is to decide controversies of faith[376]--a form of words which,
taken alone, certainly conveys an idea very different from what the
writer intends. Any rationalistic interpretation is prevented by what
follows. He proceeds, indeed, to explain that neither the private
teaching of the Spirit of God to the individual soul on the one
hand, nor the authority of the Church in relation to men in general
on the other, can be the ground of believing. But, on that account,
he does not enthrone human reason. He adds, that there is obscurity
in Scripture, all truth being in it _not explicitly_ but only
_implicitly_; and he argues that whilst the Bible is sufficient in
one sense, it is not so in another, and that it therefore needs such
interpretation as is supplied by the traditions of the Church.[377]
The use of reason (or reasoning) in matters of faith is resolved by
him into this--that by it “all undertake to persuade all,” and its
only scope is in the examination of evidence. Yet what are commonly
called the evidences of Christianity are very much overlooked in
Thorndike’s writings. There are numerous incidental allusions to the
opinions of Herbert and Hobbes. Sometimes these writers are grappled
with; but reliance on reasoning is abandoned when, by this Divine,
outlawry is maintained to be “the penalty of the Leviathan, and all
that have or may follow him either into apostasy or atheism.”[378]
Thorndike, indeed, touches on both the external and internal proofs of
revealed religion, but he nowhere, that I can find, thoroughly and at
length discusses the matter. I may here observe, in passing, that he
speaks with approval of the way in which the Jewish Doctors resolve
inspiration into different degrees.[379] But the interpretation of
Christianity is, in his view, the office of the Church. The Church,
he maintains, is a permanent teacher, its permanence depending upon
Apostolical succession, and its tuition finding expression in the
decisions of Councils and in the writings of Fathers; the authority of
the latter being explained as not arising out of personal qualities of
learning and holiness, but out of ecclesiastical position. Tradition
limits the interpretation of Holy Writ; but this principle “pretends
not any general rule for the interpretation of Scripture, even in those
things which concern the rule of faith, but infers a prescription
against anything that can be alleged out of Scripture, that, if it
may appear contrary to that which the whole Church hath received
and held from the beginning, it cannot be the true meaning of that
Scripture which is alleged to prove it.” At the same time Thorndike
says, that the power of the Church limits the tradition of Apostles
only in matters of ceremony and order, such as are indifferent in
themselves; changes in circumstances, and in the usages of society,
rendering changes of that nature necessary and unavoidable: a
conclusion equivalent to the well-known one that the Church hath
power, within certain bounds, to decree rites and ceremonies. Heresy,
Thorndike defines as consisting in the denial of something necessary
to salvation; and schism to consist in a departure from the unity
of the Church, whether from heresy, or from any other cause. Upon
these principles--which he defends at great length, not without
many discursions, and sometimes in a manner which it is difficult to
follow--Thorndike declares the Church of England to have laid her deep
foundations; and her main position is by him asserted to be, that,
repudiating all pretensions to infallibility, she owns tradition to be
her guide, and requires that “no interpretation of the Scriptures be
alleged contrary to the consent of the Fathers.”[380]
[Sidenote: ANGLICANS.--THORNDIKE.]
The covenant of grace is examined by this Divine at great length; and,
if I may be allowed the attempt, I would give an outline of his method
somewhat as follows:--
I. The _condition_ of that covenant is the contract of baptism,
and that contract is identical with justifying faith. Such faith is not
simply credence, or trust, or persuasion--it is not merely the belief
of a Divine testimony, or a reliance upon a Divine person--nor is it a
conviction that one is already justified and predestinated to life; but
is an acceptation of Christianity, “embracing and professing it” as a
whole. Faith, as enjoined by St. Paul and St. James, and as exemplified
in the lives of the Hebrew patriarchs, is essentially practical; and
when the former Apostle puts faith in opposition to works, he means
the works of Jewish law, and not the works of Gospel precept. Faith
is rooted “in the affection of the will, not in the perfection of the
understanding.” Yet good works are entirely the production of Divine
grace.[381] Though the Fathers are free to acknowledge, with St.
Paul, the doctrine of justification by faith alone, they are, on the
other side, so copious in attributing the promises of the Gospel to
Christian obedience, that it may be truly said, there is not one of
them from whom sufficient authority may not be drawn in favour of it: a
concurrence which amounts to a tradition of the whole Church upon this
important point.
[Sidenote: ANGLICANS.--THORNDIKE.]
II. The _necessity_ of the covenant of grace arises out of
original sin, which is confessed by David and St. Paul, which consists
in concupiscence, and which cleaves to every man by his first birth,
the birth of a carnal nature.[382]
III. The _Mediator_ of the covenant is the Divine Christ, the
Angel of the Lord, whose apparitions of old “were prefaces to the
Incarnation”--the Word, who was in the beginning, by whom all things
were created, and who was made flesh. He is “the great God,” with St.
Paul; the “true God,” with St. John; the “only Lord God,” with St.
Jude. Scripture abounds in proofs of His Godhead. To the full meaning
of these titles, as expressed by other texts in equivalent terms, the
early Church’s belief in Christ’s Divinity, and the writings of the
ante-Nicene Fathers, Ignatius, Justin, Irenæus, Clement, and Origen,
bear concurrent witness. The fact of a Trinity in the Godhead is
fully and clearly stated in Scripture. The admission of the mystery
is reconcilable with reason; but no one can explain the secrets of
the Divine nature, and it is only rational that, on such a subject,
we should submit to the teaching of revelation. “All dispute about
essence, and persons, and natures, and all the terms whereby either the
Scriptures express themselves in this point, or the Church excludes
the importunities of heresies from the true sense of the Christian
faith, improves no man’s understanding an inch in this mystery. The
service it does, is to teach men the language of the Church, by
distinguishing that sense of several sayings which is, and that which
is not, consistent with the faith. And if any man hereupon proceed, by
discourse upon the nature of the subject, to infer what is and what is
not such, his understanding is unsufferable.”[383]
IV. The _method_ of the covenant is gracious. All its provisions
depend entirely upon the grace of Christ. But salvation is not through
any Divine predestination of the will of man. God determines not
what the moral acts of His creatures shall be in themselves, but
only the practical results of them. The soul is free from necessity,
though not from bondage; and the doctrine of the predetermination
of the human will is not the root but the rooting up of freedom and
of Christianity. Nothing formally determines the will of man, but
his own act. Predestination to the enjoyment of grace is absolute,
but predestination to the enjoyment of glory is conditional, and has
respect to character. The end _to_ which God predestinates is
not the end _for_ which He predestinates. Grace is the reward of
the right use of grace. Upon this entire subject, the tradition of
the Church runs counter to Predestinarianism, to Arminianism, and to
Pelagianism.[384]
[Sidenote: ANGLICANS.--THORNDIKE.]
Thorndike says, in reference to Calvinism: “It seems that God’s
predestination must of force appoint salvation to them that are to be
saved, in the first place; from thence proceeding to design the way and
order by which the person designed to it may be induced of his own free
choice to accept the means of it. This slight mistake,” he observes,
“seems to have been the occasion of many horrible imaginations, which
even Christian Divines have had, of God’s design from everlasting to
create the most part of men on purpose to glorify Himself by condemning
them to everlasting torments, though in consideration of the sins which
they shall have done.” “The mistake is,” he remarks, “that the end of
the creature by God’s appointment, is taken for God’s end, which though
it be His end because He appointeth it for His creature, yet it is not
any end that He seeks for Himself.” God, being of Himself sufficient
for Himself, can have no end upon human beings. He is personally
disinterested. Nothing accrues to Him, nothing is lost by Him; all
the gain or loss is by the creature; and, having given a moral law to
intelligent beings, He will abide by that law, and bestow happiness
upon them accordingly.
Salvation is through the satisfaction of Christ, who, by His
propitiatory sacrifice perfected in death, paid the ransom of human
souls. He expiates our sin by bearing the punishment of it, and we are
reconciled to God by the Gospel in consideration of Christ’s obedience.
This is taught by the sacrifices according to the law, by the prophet
Isaiah, and in the New Testament. Socinus is altogether in error,
and the doctrine that Divine grace rests on a satisfaction made for
guilt is the doctrine of the Catholic Church. Yet neither according to
Scripture nor according to patristic teaching, are our sins imputable
to Christ, or His sufferings imputable to us: the latter are but the
meritorious causes of the Christian covenant, and the promises of the
Gospel depend upon His active as well as His passive obedience. Yet
though all this be true--though salvation is now actually conveyed only
through the work of Christ--yet God might have reconciled man to
Himself in some other way.[385]
Salvation is not secured by a decree of perseverance, but the saying of
the schoolman is true--_Deus neminem deserit, nisi desertus_, God
leaves no man that leaves not Him first; and, though the assurance of
salvation is not included in the act of justifying faith, it follows as
the consequence of it.[386]
Finally, with respect to the covenant of grace, salvation is
not through obedience to the original law of God--for that is
impossible--but through the fulfilment of evangelical precepts. The
fulfilment, if not perfect, may be acceptable, for there are venial as
well as mortal offences; and if, among men, friendship long exercised
suffers not a man who stands upon his credit to break with his friend
upon ordinary offences, we see the reason why God so often helps His
ancient people in respect of that covenant, which they, for their
parts, had made void and forfeited; and therefore how much more He
obligeth Himself to pass by these failures and weaknesses which
Christians endeavour to overcome, although they cannot fully do it.[387]
Thorndike describes not so much salvation itself as the means of
salvation. He nowhere endorses the dogma of Trent which confounds
justification with sanctification; neither does he clearly distinguish
between these two blessings. In his writings much may be found upon
justifying faith, little upon justification as a distinct theological
idea; and what little may be discovered is by no means explicit.[388]
[Sidenote: ANGLICANS.--THORNDIKE.]
Such is a very condensed account of Thorndike’s scheme of salvation by
grace. Yet enough is seen to show the theological student how closely
this Anglican Divine in some points touches upon the creed of the
Romish Church, how now and then he even crosses the line; and the fact
is made still more clear by his distinctions between matters of precept
and matters of counsel,--by his notions of Christian perfection,--by
his stating that the backslider’s recovery of God’s grace is a work of
labour and time,--by his doctrine of the efficacy of penance,--and by
the position, that there is a sense in which the works of Christians
may be regarded as satisfying justice with regard to sin, and as
meriting heaven.[389]
What Thorndike advances respecting the laws of the Church must be
reported with still more brevity. The Church is founded upon the duty
of communicating in Divine offices, particularly in the sacrament of
the Eucharist, wherein, with the elements, Christ Himself is present,
not simply through the living faith of the recipient, but because of
the true profession of Christianity in the Church; nevertheless, the
invisible faithfulness of the heart, in making good or in resolving
to make good the said profession, makes the receiving of it effectual
to the spiritual eating and drinking of Christ’s body and blood.
Which Eucharist also, according to the New Testament and the Fathers,
Thorndike maintains, may be accounted a sacrifice, first as to the
oblation of the bread and wine; secondly, as to the offering of prayer;
thirdly, as to the consecration of the elements, whereby they become
a propitiatory and impetratory offering; and fourthly, as to the
presenting to God of the bodies and souls of the receivers. He argues
for the baptism of infants, on the grounds, that there is no other
cure for original sin; that the children of Christians are holy, and
may be made disciples; and that the effect of circumcision under the
law inferreth the effect of baptism under the Gospel. This third book
also treats of penance, extreme unction, marriage, government, and,
in particular, of the Papal supremacy, and of the Presbyterian and
Independent schemes; of the days, places, forms, and subject matter of
Divine service; of the state of souls after death; of prayer to saints,
and image worship; of monachism, and the celibacy of the clergy; and,
lastly, of the relation of the ecclesiastical and civil powers. In some
cases this Divine draws a pretty broad distinction between what he
holds as Catholic views and the views which are held by the Church of
Rome; but in other cases the difference is so refined that it becomes
almost imperceptible. No doubt Thorndike may, on technical grounds,
be vindicated from the charge of Romanism proper; and it may be said
that, in his defence of prayers for the dead, he follows Ussher; and
that, in his doctrine respecting the Eucharist, he symbolizes with
Cosin and with Bramhall, with Hammond and Taylor and Ken.[390] Between
him and many clergymen of the Established Church in the present day
a strong resemblance exists; but certainly, in the judgment of other
theologians, whose opinions will be stated hereafter, and in the
judgment of such as may be deemed their successors, the tendency of
Thorndike’s teaching is decidedly towards Rome; and, whatever may
be the distinction drawn between the Catholicism taught by him, and
the Catholicism of the Council of Trent, that distinction, in some
particulars, although comprehended by metaphysical Divines, is scarcely
to be discerned by plain English understandings.
[Sidenote: ANGLICANS.--BULL.]
George Bull may be placed next to Herbert Thorndike. Bull was admitted
into Exeter College, Oxford, two years before the imposition of the
Engagement. That Act, in 1649, ejected him; in consequence of which he
became a student in the house of a Presbyterian Rector. The Puritan
influence in the rectory, however, became neutralized by the Rector’s
son, through whose friendship the young student came to study Hooker,
Hammond, Taylor, Grotius, and Episcopius. The father foresaw the
result, and, looking at it from his own point of view, would often say,
“My son will corrupt Mr. Bull.”[391]
Bull has not, like Thorndike, bequeathed any treatise on systematic
Divinity in general, nor has he propounded views of the extreme kind,
which the former has done in his _Laws of the Church_; but between
Bull’s two great works and certain aspects of Thorndike’s teaching
there is a considerable resemblance.
The first great work produced by him is his _Harmonia Apostolica_,
published in 1670, in which he propounds his views upon justification.
His general method is to examine the Scriptures in the light of
patristic teaching; and, adopting the same principles of interpretation
as Thorndike, he arrives at similar conclusions. He is quite as
learned as the contemporary of his earlier days, and he is far more
lucid and methodical in his mode of treatment; for he can be easily
followed, and he can be clearly understood. Also, he is much more
cautious in his statements, and he carefully strives to save himself
from misapprehension. He attributes salvation entirely to Christ’s
meritorious obedience, of which obedience Christ’s death was the
consummation and completion. Bull maintains that this obedience
satisfied Divine justice, that this alone is the efficacious cause
of eternal life; and he constantly insists that no man can, without
Divine grace, and the assistance of the Holy Spirit, as flowing from
the precious side of the Crucified One, perform the conditions of the
covenant.
He further distinctly states, as the result of a careful examination
of Scripture, “that the word justification, in this subject, has
the meaning of a judicial term, and signifies the act of God as
a Judge, according to the merciful law of Christ, acquitting the
accused, pronouncing him righteous, and admitting him to the reward
of righteousness, that is, eternal life.”[392] But, though adopting
the _forensic_ view of justification, and thus moving in the
same line as Martin Luther, Bull differs from the German Reformer in
this very important respect--that, instead of taking law to mean law
apart from the Gospel, he explains it to mean law as incorporated in
the Gospel; for he says, “It must be ever observed, as an undeniable
truth, that Christ, in His sermon, not only explained the moral law,
but also laid it down as His own, and required its observance, assisted
by the grace of the Gospel, from all Christians, as a condition of His
covenant indispensably necessary.” It is this view of the law which
lies at the foundation of Bull’s theory of justification. Consistently
with it, he reduces his argument to this syllogistic form--“Whoever
is acquitted by the law of Christ must necessarily fulfil that law;
but by faith alone, without works, no one fulfils the law of Christ;
therefore by faith alone, without works, no one is acquitted by the law
of Christ.”[393]
[Sidenote: ANGLICANS.--BULL.]
Having arrived at such a conclusion from the study of the Epistle
of St. James, then comes the _pinch_: how is such a conclusion
to be reconciled with the teaching of St. Paul? The learned author,
after hastily disposing of other methods of reconciliation, prepares
for defending his own, by laying down the principle that St. Paul’s
teaching is to be explained by St. James’ and not St. James’ by
St. Paul’s; our critic believing, with Augustine, that St. James
wrote after St. Paul--an assumption contradicted by modern Biblical
criticism. Bull, then, asserts, that faith, to which justification
“is attributed by St. Paul, is not to be understood as one single
virtue, but denotes the whole condition of the Gospel covenant--that
is, comprehends in one word all the works of Christian piety.”
“Assuredly,” he adds, “it is clearer than light itself, that the
faith to which St. Paul attributes justification is only that which
worketh by love, which is the same as a new creature, which, in short,
contains in itself the observance of the commandments of God.” In
order to get over the great objection arising from the plain words
of St. Paul, that “a man is justified by faith, _without the deeds
of the law_,” this controversialist attempts to show, that the
works which St. Paul excludes from justification are not all kinds of
works, but works of a certain description only,--namely, works of the
Mosaic law, and works of the natural law, works done in obedience to
the Jewish ritual, and works done by the force of nature. Bull then
proceeds to dwell at considerable length upon the Apostle’s argument
from the universality of sin, and the weakness of the law; and, as the
result, he presents two deductions--first, that the Apostle entirely
excludes from justification only those works which are performed by the
aid of the Mosaic, and of the natural law, without the grace of the
Gospel; secondly, that the Apostle’s argument, so far from taking away
from justification the necessity of good works, proves that the true
righteousness of works is absolutely necessary to justification, and
that the Gospel is the only efficacious method by which any man can be
brought to practise such righteousness.[394]
The coincidence of Bull’s teaching with Thorndike’s, as to the grounds
of faith, appears in the following passage:--
“God knows the secrets of my heart; so far am I from the itch of
originality in theological doctrines, ... that whatever are sanctioned
by the consent of Catholic Fathers and ancient Bishops, though my own
small ability attain not to them, yet I will embrace them with all
reverence. In truth I had already learned, by no few experiments, in
writing my _Harmony_, while yet a young man, what now in my mature
age I am most thoroughly persuaded of, that no one can contradict
Catholic consent, however he may seem to be countenanced for a while by
some passages of Scripture wrongly understood, and by the illusions of
unreal arguments, without being found in the end to have contradicted
both Scripture and sound reason. I daily deplore and sigh over the
unbridled license of prophesying which obtained for some years in this
our England, ... under the tyranny of what some considered a wretched
necessity. In a word, my hearty desire is this, Let the ancient customs
and doctrines remain in force.”[395]
[Sidenote: ANGLICANS.--BULL.]
The publication of the _Harmonia Apostolica_ occasioned much
controversy. Answers appeared, written by Charles Gataker, son of
Thomas Gataker, one of the Westminster Divines; by Joseph Truman,--who,
though refusing to conform as a clergyman to the Established Church,
remained in it as a lay communicant; by Dr. Thomas Tully, Principal
of St. Edmund’s Hall, Oxford, a man of high reputation for learning
and ability; and by John Tombes, the Anti-pædobaptist,--who, like
Truman, declined ministerial conformity, but at least occasionally
practised communion. Truman differed from Bull less than did the other
combatants. Not to be wearisome, I would merely state, that his part
in the dispute mainly turned upon the question, What is grace? Bull,
in Truman’s estimation, regarding it as a bestowment of spiritual
power, to be improved or misimproved, according to the will of the
recipient; Truman, who in this respect anticipated the opinions of
modern Calvinists, representing grace as a Divine influence securing
the obedience of the will to the Gospel of Christ. He highly commended
that sober sentiment of the great Bishop Sanderson, who, confessing
his own disability to reconcile the consistency of grace and free-will
in conversion, and being sensible that they must both be maintained,
tells us, he ever held it “the more pious and safe way, to place
the grace of God in the throne, where we think it should stand, and
so to leave the will of man to shift for the maintenance of its own
freedom, as well as it can, than to establish the power and liberty
of free-will at its height, and then to be at a loss how to maintain
the power and efficacy of God’s grace.”[396] Gataker, Tully, and Tombes
were, what might be termed, High Calvinists. The first maintained, in
opposition to the Author of the _Harmonia_, as it appears from his
reply,--that remission of sins is entirely extraneous to justification,
that there are conditions in the Gospel covenant which are not
conditions of Gospel justification, that repentance is a condition of
the Gospel joined by Christ with faith, but it is not a condition of
justification, and that we are justified by the imputed righteousness
of Christ.[397] Tully treated Bull as an innovator; and after alluding
to Socinians and Papists, insinuated that he belonged to those, “who
perfidiously serving the interests of one or other of these parties,
shamelessly take to themselves the title of sons of the Church of
England.”[398] Tully contended for justification by faith alone; and,
injudiciously adding to the Scriptural argument the authority of the
Fathers, which he maintained to be in his favour, laid himself open to
the attacks of his opponent, who criticised his citations, and turned
against him testimonies from Irenæus, Origen, Cyprian, Hilary, Basil,
and Ambrose. The judgment of the Church of England, and of the Reformed
Churches on the Continent, also came under debate in this department
of the controversy; Bull and his antagonists each claiming patristic
witnesses on his own side. Also the doctrine of the saint’s final
perseverance, and the limitation of the efficacy of the atonement to
the elect, were points asserted by Tully and denied by Bull. Tombes’
book seems to have been of a more discursive kind than the rest; and
to have aimed at answering not only the _Harmonia_, but also
_Aphorisms_, written by Richard Baxter, whose name we find much
mixed up in this controversy;--and by an alliteration very agreeable
to the taste of that day, associated with the names of Bull and
Bellarmine. Bull’s name is provocative of puns; and we find the author,
in his preface to the _Examen Censuræ_, commenting on Tombes in
the following manner, which shows the kind of attack to which Tombes
had descended:--“He,” says our author, “need not fear the horns and
stamping of the Bull (such is his wit, which foreigners will scarcely
understand, Englishmen will smile at) since the Bull has long since
learnt to despise all such barking animals.”[399] In an age when the
amenities of literature were unknown, when Milton and Salmasius were
abusing one another with a virulence which astonishes a modern reader,
we cannot wonder at finding very bad passions manifested in the field
of theological controversy. Bull, doubtless, was a learned and pious
man, but his polemical writings show that he was deeply imbued with
the violent polemical spirit of the times; yet, violent as may be the
spirit of controversy in the modern Church, where can we find anything
so fierce, so truly savage, as Tertullian’s attack on Marcion, at the
opening of the first Book?
[Sidenote: ANGLICANS.--BULL.]
The _Defensio Fidei Nicenæ_ (1685) was written not to establish,
by proofs from Scripture, the doctrine of Christ’s Divinity, but to
show that the opinions of the ante-Nicene Fathers upon the subject,
were in harmony with those expressed in the Creed of the first
Œcumenical Council. This purpose Bull formed, in consequence of an
attack upon those Fathers, by the learned Jesuit Petavius, and the use
made of that attack, for ends opposed to his, by Arians and Socinians.
The most perfect success on the part of the Anglican advocate would
not, in the estimation of Divines of the Puritan school, be conclusive
evidence of our Lord’s Deity, nor would his failure shake their faith;
but the importance which he attached to the question, appears from the
immense labour which he devoted to it. To him, as an Anglo-Catholic,
the inquiry into what the early Church believed and taught appeared
one of vital interest; and into his chosen task he threw the treasures
of a vast erudition, and, if not powers of the highest order,
certainly a decisive will and an extraordinarily active and patient
inquisitiveness. Parts of his argument, it must be confessed, seem
unsatisfactory. For he deals with his patristic authorities, as we
do with the Holy Scriptures. Whilst we reasonably assume that the
latter are always consistent, and therefore endeavour to harmonize
_apparent_ discrepancies, he assumes the same with regard to the
writings of the Fathers. Hence he attempts to reconcile contradictory
passages in the same author, and also contradictory passages in
different authors. Moreover, upon a presumption of the perfect unity
of patristic opinions, and of a thoroughly logical apprehension of
subjects on the part of the Fathers, he sometimes educes proofs not
from what they plainly say in so many words, but from what their
language may be made to imply, when analyzed and manipulated with the
utmost sagacity and skill. Loyal men standing at the bar have been
unjustly arraigned for constructive treason. In controversy men of the
soundest opinion have been unrighteously charged with constructive
heresy. On the other hand, Bull’s method of criticism serves sometimes
to vindicate opinions open to suspicion, and so to throw around
doubtful points the halo of a constructive orthodoxy.[400]
[Sidenote: ANGLICANS.--HEYLYN.]
There is a good deal of special pleading in Bull’s _Defence of the
Nicene Creed_. Nevertheless he has, in my opinion, clearly and
fully established his main point, that a belief in the Divinity of our
blessed Lord was common in the ante-Nicene Church. Bull’s views, as
they are expressed in these works, are coincident as far as they go
with those of Thorndike on the same subjects, but Bull leaves unvisited
many fields which Thorndike traversed from end to end. Before leaving
this eminent theologian it may be interesting to notice that he was
one of those who in this country, in the seventeenth century, revived
the ancient and scriptural distinction between soul and spirit; yet
he so united the Spirit of God with the spirit of man that his theory
amounts to a sort of _tetrachomy_. I may add--Hammond, in his
_Paraphrase_ (1 Thess. v. 23), and Jackson _On the Creed_,
also insisted upon a distinction between soul and spirit.[401]
Another investigator, or rather champion, more comprehensive in his
way than Bull, even going beyond Thorndike in variety of discussion,
is Peter Heylyn, inferior to them both in all respects. Educated at
Oxford, partly under a Puritan tutor, he, within three years after
his ordination as a deacon, expressed such extreme ecclesiastical
opinions, that he was denounced by Prideaux, the Regius Professor of
Divinity, as _Bellarminian_ and _Pontifician_: these very
opinions, however, recommended him to the favour of Laud, at the time
Bishop of Bath and Wells.
Heylyn, in his _Theologia Veterum_, gives what he calls “the sum
of Christian theology, positive, philological, and polemical, contained
in the Apostles’ Creed, or reducible to it.” Drawing his outline from
the Creed, which he pronounces to be written by the Apostles, and to
be all but canonical, he falls, though at a distance, into the wake
of Dean Jackson: the eloquence of that great Divine it was impossible
for Heylyn to reach; his candour and practical habit of mind, he had
no disposition to cherish. In his preface, Heylyn declares himself
an English Catholic,--keeping to the doctrines, rules, and forms of
government established in the Church of England; and beyond those
bounds, regulating “his liberty by the traditions of the Church, and
the universal consent of the ancient Fathers.” The authority of the
Church, in this writer’s opinion, includes the exposition of Scripture,
the determination of controversies and the ordering of ceremonies; and
he never misses an opportunity of upholding the rank and reputation of
the Fathers. Heretics greatly excite his wrath, yet he admits, that
neither all nor any who are merely schismatics, exclude themselves
from the Catholic pale; but, speaking of Presbyterians and Popery,
he remarks, the last is the lovelier error: better the Church be all
head, than no head at all.[402] The antiquity and importance of fasts
and festivals he strenuously maintains; the forgiveness of sin he
connects with baptism; and he advocates both confession to a priest,
and sacerdotal absolution. He is orthodox respecting the doctrines of
the Trinity and the Atonement. The article upon Christ’s descent into
hell, he discusses at length; and informs us, in his preface, that his
inquiries into this mysterious subject led him to an exposition of the
whole Creed. Pearson says cautiously that Christ’s soul “underwent the
condition of the souls of such as die, and being.[403] He died in the
similitude of a sinner, His soul went to the place where the souls of
men are kept who die for their sins, and so did wholly undergo the
law of death.” But Heylyn maintains that hell in the Creed means “the
place of torments;” and that the soul of Christ as really descended
there as His body entered the grave. The indication of these points
will suffice to show the stamp of Heylyn’s theology, and the place to
be assigned him among Anglican Divines. His talents were considerable,
his learning does him credit; but he is so full of prejudice and party
spirit that, whilst he has incurred odium from opponents, he can never
win admiration even from friends.
[Sidenote: ANGLICANS.--TAYLOR.]
Jeremy Taylor is better known and more renowned for the rhythm of
his rhetorical diction, the exuberance and felicity of his poetical
illustrations, and the inexhaustible stores of his varied knowledge,
than for Biblical scholarship, or for the depth, wisdom, and soundness
of his theological reasonings. Yet he was a learned, painstaking, and
diligent Divine, as well as a surprisingly eloquent and persuasive
preacher: and though he has left behind him no body of divinity, there
are some points distinctive of the Anglican school which he has
treated with especial fulness; and, whilst faithful to its theology
as a whole, there are portions of it which he has handled after a
manner of his own. The influence of his patristic studies may be traced
throughout his works; and the patronage of Archbishop Laud, and his
friendship with Christopher Davenport--a learned and able Franciscan
friar--were not likely to be altogether without effect upon so
sensitive a nature as that of young Jeremy Taylor.
[Sidenote: ANGLICANS.--TAYLOR.]
He has much to say upon baptismal regeneration. In baptism, according
to his teaching, we are admitted to the kingdom of Christ, we are
presented unto Him, we are consigned with His sacrament, and we enter
into His militia. It is also an adoption into the covenant, and a new
birth. In it, all our sins are pardoned. “The catechumen descends,”
he says,--following the words of Bede,--“into the font a sinner, he
arises purified; he goes down the son of death, he comes up the son of
the resurrection; he enters in, the son of folly and prevarication, he
returns the son of reconciliation; he stoops down the child of wrath,
and ascends the heir of mercy; he was the child of the devil, and
now he is the servant and the son of God.” Baptism not only pardons
past sins, but puts us into a state of pardon for time to come. It
is a sanctification by the spirit of grace. It is the suppletory of
original righteousness. Its effects are illumination, new life, and
a holy resurrection. In short, by baptism we are saved. After having
thus, in the most unqualified way, exhausted, one might suppose, all
which imagination could conceive of the efficacy of the rite, Taylor
says, there is less need to descend to temporal blessings, or rare
contingencies, or miraculous events, or probable notices of things
less certain; and then he speaks of miraculous cures effected by the
baptismal water, and of the appointment of an angel guardian to each
baptized person--which, indeed, he does not insist upon, although it
seems to him “hugely probable.” Resuming a poetical theology, he adds,
in patristic phraseology, that baptism is a new birth, “a chariot
carrying us to God, the great circumcision, a circumcision made without
hands, the key of the kingdom, the _paranymph_ of the kingdom,
the earnest of our inheritance, the answer of a good conscience, the
robe of light, the sacrament of a new life, and of eternal salvation,
Ἄριστον μὲν ὕδωρ.”[404] Perhaps no one ever hung so many wreaths of
flowers around the font as Taylor did; and if we were to take the
highly coloured words which he uses by themselves, we should say, that
his teaching on the subject was calculated to lull his disciples, if
they had been only baptized, into a state of most deceptive and fearful
self-security. But then, we know that other parts of his writings are
of the most pungent and heart-searching description, destructive of
all self-delusion, and, in some respects, ministering to a spirit of
bondage, rather than to a spirit of presumptuous hope. The truth is,
that much of the air of the old economy is breathed over Taylor’s
views of the new dispensation. At times it blows with a chilling
gust. We lack, in the garden of his rhetoric, the genial warmth of an
evangelical summer; and in his language respecting sacraments, he shows
a fondness for what St. Paul calls, “beggarly elements.” It should be
noticed, in connection with his doctrine of baptism, that, though, in
his _Liberty of Prophesying_, he deals gently with Anabaptists,
no one could hold more strongly than did he the doctrine of infant
baptism.
The doctrine of the Lord’s Supper is expressed in less figurative
terms, but with the same excess of description, and, as his admiring
biographer admits, with some incautiousness in the use of terms. He
says:--“The doctrine of the Church of England, and generally of the
Protestants, in this article, is,--that after the minister of the holy
mysteries hath rightly prayed, and blessed or consecrated the bread
and the wine, the symbols become changed into the body and blood of
Christ, after a sacramental, that is, in a spiritual real manner:
so that all that worthily communicate, do by faith receive Christ
really, effectually, to all the purposes of His passion: the wicked
receive not Christ, but the bare symbols only; but yet to their hurt,
because the offer of Christ is rejected, and they pollute the blood
of the covenant, by using it as an unholy thing. The result of which
doctrine is this: It is bread, and it is Christ’s body. It is bread
in substance, Christ in the sacrament; and Christ is as really given
to all that are truly disposed, as the symbols are; each as they can;
Christ as Christ can be given; the bread and wine as they can; and to
the same real purposes, to which they are designed; and Christ does as
really nourish and sanctify the soul, as the elements do the body. It
is here, as in the other sacraments: for as the natural water becomes
the laver of regeneration; so here, bread and wine become the body
and blood of Christ; but, there and here too, the first substance is
changed by grace, but remains the same in nature.”[405]
[Sidenote: ANGLICANS.--TAYLOR.]
Taylor is one of the last men to whom we are to look for cautious
and qualified statements. He had a mind of that order which “moveth
altogether if it move at all.” He could say nothing by halves;--and,
no doubt, his glowing periods require qualification. But, when
all possible allowance has been made, the passage just quoted
conveys something which is very much like the Lutheran doctrine of
consubstantiation. Yet, strange to say, the same author, who holds that
there is a real change in the Lord’s Supper, interprets our Lord’s
words, “This is my body”--to mean no more than this: “it figuratively
represents my body:” and he denies that the passage in the sixth
chapter of John, often urged in support of the doctrine of the real
presence, has anything to do with the Lord’s Supper.[406]
In his notion of original sin, he deviates from Anglican as well
as Puritan standards. The superiority of Adam before the fall, in
Taylor’s opinion, consisted in certain superadded qualifications which
he forfeited by the first sin--and he thought that men now come into
the world, not with any evil taint or tendency, not with anything
of corruption or degeneracy, but simply without those superadded
qualifications. He says of human sinfulness, that “a great part is a
natural impotency, and the other is brought in by our own folly.” He
imputes it, in great part, to the “many _concurrent_ causes of
evil which have influence upon communities of men; such as are evil
examples, the similitude of Adam’s transgression, vices of princes,
wars, impurity, ignorance, error, false principles, flattery, interest,
fear, partiality, authority, evil laws, heresy, schism, spite and
ambition, natural inclination, and other principiant causes, which
proceeding from the natural weakness of human constitution, are the
fountain and proper causes of many consequent evils.”[407] His
doctrine has in it altogether a strong taint of Pelagianism; and what
he says of “concurrent causes,” is pronounced by Bishop Heber--a mild
critic and a moderate Divine--to be “neither good logic nor good
divinity.”
No one can be more definite and precise than Jeremy Taylor in his
doctrine of the sacraments, but he shows elsewhere a remarkable leaning
to what is general and vague. What he means exactly by original
sin--how he distinguished it from actual sin, and what effect he
believed the sin of Adam to have upon his posterity, it is difficult
to say; and the same and even greater indefiniteness is manifest in
his views of the doctrine of justification. Indeed, here he avowedly
eschews all precision of language. He differs from Thorndike and Bull,
not only in not defining justification as they do, but in not defining
it at all, and he speaks almost pettishly on the subject.
[Sidenote: ANGLICANS.--TAYLOR.]
“That no man should fool himself by disputing about the philosophy of
justification, and what causality faith hath in it, and whether it be
the act of faith that justifies, or the habit? Whether faith as a good
work, or faith as an instrument? Whether faith as it is obedience, or
faith as it is an access to Christ? Whether as a hand or as a heart?
Whether by its own innate virtue, or by the efficacy of the object?
Whether as a sign, or as a thing signified? Whether by introduction,
or by perfection? Whether in the first beginnings, or in its last and
best productions? Whether by inherent worthiness, or adventitious
imputations? _Uberiùs ista quæso_ (that I may use the words of
Cicero): _hæc enim spinosiora, prius, ut confitear me cogunt, quam ut
assentiar_: these things are knotty, and too intricate to do any
good; they may amuse us, but never instruct us; and they have already
made men careless and confident, disputative and troublesome, proud and
uncharitable, but neither wiser nor better. Let us, therefore, leave
these weak ways of troubling ourselves or others, and directly look to
the theology of it, the direct duty, the end of faith, and the work of
faith, the conditions and the instruments of our salvation, the just
foundation of our hopes, how our faith can destroy our sin, and how it
can unite us unto God, how by it we can be made partakers of Christ’s
death, and imitators of His life. For since it is evident, by the
premises, that this article is not to be determined or relied upon by
arguing from words of many significations, we must walk by a clearer
light; by such plain sayings and dogmatical propositions of Scripture,
which evidently teach us our duty, and place our hopes upon that
which cannot deceive us, that is, which require obedience, which call
upon us to glorify God, and to do good to men, and to keep all God’s
commandments with diligence and sincerity.”[408]
This kind of teaching cuts away the ground entirely from under
scientific theology, treating it as a work of supererogation, or
as an utter impossibility, and at the same time reducing religion
to the observance of certain commands. Yet this passionate protest
against dogma has hardly escaped the writer’s pen, when he proceeds
to construct that against which he protests, and lays down logically,
“two propositions, a negative and an affirmative.” The negative is: By
faith only a man is not justified; the affirmative, By works also a man
is justified. He says “that obedience is the same thing with faith,
and that all Christian graces are parts of its bulk and constitution,
is also the doctrine of the Holy Ghost, and the grammar of Scripture,
making faith and obedience to be terms coincident, and expressive of
each other.”[409]
Having expressed this theological idea in a double form, he immediately
abandons the theological element; and proceeds to declaim, with his
accustomed vigour and variety, upon the common truth, which all
Divines, Calvinist and Arminian, maintain--that no man enjoys the
blessing of justification, apart from a life of Christian obedience.
After a careful perusal of the whole discourse, the reader feels that
the theological question of justification by faith, or by works, or by
both, has really not been touched by the author, although much that
is of practical value has been said on the necessity of holiness.
The essential defect of the treatment is an omission to explain what
justification means; hence the loose and ambiguous employment of the
term throughout, and its application most frequently to the idea of
salvation as a whole. In one place, after having repeatedly used
the two words, as bearing different significations, Taylor says:
“So that now we see that justification and sanctification cannot be
distinguished, but as words of art, signifying the various steps of
progression in the same course: they may be distinguished in notion and
speculation, but never when they are to pass on to material events, for
no man is justified but he that is also sanctified.”[410] It is very
noticeable, by a critical reader who will take the trouble to analyze
Taylor’s sentences, how much he is in the habit of playing fast and
loose with the meaning of words.
[Sidenote: ANGLICANS.--TAYLOR.]
The same habit of thought--avoiding and even protesting against
definite statements of certain doctrines--appears in the _Liberty of
Prophesying_ and in the _Nature of Faith_. The duty of faith,
he remarks, is complete in believing the Articles of the Apostles’
Creed,--“All other things are implicitly in the belief of the Articles
of God’s veracity, and are not necessary in respect of the constitution
of faith to be drawn out, but may there lie in the bowels of the great
Articles, without danger to any thing or any person, unless some other
accident or circumstance makes them necessary.”[411] “This is the great
and entire complexion of a Christian’s faith, and since salvation is
promised to the belief of this creed [I believe that Jesus Christ
is the Son of God] either a snare is laid for us with a purpose to
deceive us--or else nothing is of prime and original necessity to be
believed but this Jesus Christ our Redeemer.”[412] Bearing in mind the
distinction between religion and theology;--and it is to the former
that Taylor seems to refer in his treatise on Faith,--the doctrine,
in substance, may be accepted as sound. But turning to the _Liberty
of Prophesying_ where also the standard raised is the Apostles’
Creed, the question, as his biographer remarks, “becomes much more
difficult, if, as Taylor seems to have meant, and as is implied in
the very title of his discourse, we extend this same principle to
the admission of persons into the public ministry.”[413] In other
words, to treat Theology, which ought to be thoroughly understood by
Christian teachers, as if it were entirely comprehended within the
first simple primitive creed,--as if that creed, regarded as seminally
containing all Christian doctrine, and as actually drawn out by the
study of Scripture, and devout reflection into theological particulars,
were a sufficient standard of orthodoxy for those who are teachers
of others,--betrays a manner of thinking in which scarcely a second
Anglican teacher could be found to agree. There and elsewhere the
Bishop would seem to have found his way within Latitudinarian lines.
Taylor is a strenuous advocate for an Episcopal Church--yet even here
he breaks bounds, and has exposed himself to the correction, if not
the censure, of Episcopalian critics. Departing from Hooker’s method
in his _Ecclesiastical Polity_, he endorses the Puritan idea,
that a precise form of government is laid down in Scripture; and
then he proceeds to say, that “the government of the Church is in
_immediate_ order to the good and benison of souls.” The first of
these peculiar opinions, his biographer pronounces unwise, the second
untrue, and both as going too far,--the one as proving too much, the
other as an exaggerated conception of what is not to be ranked amongst
things of the first importance,--for the sincere word and the means of
grace are alone _immediately_ necessary to salvation.[414] Mere
government, according to Hooker, rests amongst the non-essentials of
Christianity; and any change therein is to change the way of safety,
no otherwise than as “a path is changed by altering only the uppermost
face thereof, which, be it laid with gravel, or set with grass, or
paved with stone, remaineth still the same path.”[415] A further
example of running to an extreme of strictness in reference to Church
polity, after so much latitude, and even looseness in relation to
Christian doctrine, is found in Taylor’s assumption of facts touching
Episcopal orders. It is an assumption, says Heber, “in which he is
neither borne out by antiquity, nor the tenor of the Gospel history,
when he finds in the Apostles, during the abode of their Lord on earth,
the first Bishops, and in the seventy-two disciples, whom Christ also
selected from His followers, the first presbyters of His Church.”[416]
[Sidenote: ANGLICANS.--COSIN.]
Amongst Anglican theologians Cosin requires particular attention.
The history of his opinions is somewhat peculiar. In early life, his
sermons, and especially his devotional writings, betray a strong
leaning towards Roman Catholicism. In later life it is otherwise.
His second series of _Notes on the Prayer Book_, indicates a
controversial tone opposing the Anglican to the Roman view, which
does not appear in the first series. After his son became a Papist,
the father assumed a more decided attitude towards the Papal Church;
but it does not so much appear that Cosin’s own views of doctrine
altered, as that, during the earlier part of his life, he dwelt on
points of agreement, and during the latter, on points of difference,
between himself and Rome.[417] Every one, however, must see that such
a change was a very great one, and involved much more than at first
sight is visible. Cosin’s two principal contributions to theological
literature are his _Scholastic History of the Canon of the Holy
Scriptures_ and his _History of Transubstantiation_. The
former, which is a work of very great learning and ability is directed
entirely against the decisions of the Council of Trent, as to the
canonicity of Apocryphal Books; and the author patiently goes over
the whole field of Church literature, from the Apostolic age to the
Reformation, showing that the books in question were never accepted by
the Church, as inspired authorities. The stores of learning displayed
in this history are of great value to the general student; and in any
revival of this old controversy with Romanist theologians, Cosin’s work
will be of eminent service on the Protestant side. The _History of
the Canon_ appeared in 1657, during Cosin’s exile. The _History
of Transubstantiation_ was, about the same time, written in Latin,
although not published until 1675. A year afterwards, an English
translation came out, executed by Luke de Beaulieu. The origin of the
book is a key to its character. When Charles II., in his wanderings,
reached Cologne, and there “visited a neighbouring potent prince of
the Empire of the Roman persuasion,” he met with certain Jesuits, who
accused the English Church of heretical opinions touching the sacrament
of the Lord’s Supper. That Church, said they, “holds no real, but
only a kind of imaginary presence of the body and blood of Christ;”
whereas Rome holds the sacred mystery of all ages,--to wit, that the
whole substance of the bread and wine is changed into the substance of
Christ’s body and blood. Cosin, being asked to vindicate the Church
“from the calumny,” and plainly to declare what is her doctrine of
the real presence, complied with the request; and the result is, that
throughout his book, he labours to establish the doctrine of a _real
presence_ of the body and blood of the Redeemer in the bread and
wine;--but at the same time, denies and demolishes the doctrine of a
_transubstantiation_ of the elements. As to the latter point, what
he says resolves itself into an argument for the continued presence,
not merely of the material _accidents_, but of the material
_substance_. The bent of the author’s mind, and the necessary
conditions of the author’s argument, looked at from the Anglican point
of view, may be seen in his copious citations from the Fathers and
schoolmen; and the purpose of those citations is to show that the
_real_ presence, as he expresses it, is the ancient doctrine of
Christendom; and that the dogma of Transubstantiation is an invention
of the twelfth century. Theologians of the Puritan stamp, if disposed
to avail themselves of the distinctive reasoning of this distinguished
scholar against Rome, would not follow the patristic and scholastic
teaching on its positive side, to which he showed so much deference;
but would rather represent very much of it--by its incautious
phraseology, and its mystic sentiment--as preparing for the definite
error which Cosin so earnestly denounced. Some of them would say,
that the extreme doctrine of the spiritual presence of the body and
blood of Christ in the bread and wine is as mischievous, in respect to
superstition, as the doctrine of Transubstantiation itself. They would
also say that Anglicans attach an undue importance to the continued
existence and _presence_ of the material substance of bread and
wine, an importance which is scarcely perceptible to others who differ
from them; for if the bodily presence of Christ in the sacrament be
admitted, arguments in support of the continued substantial presence
of bread and wine as well, only issue in some consubstantial theory,
between which and the transubstantial one, there is little to choose,
in the estimation of most English Protestants. And further, they would
allege that whilst the Roman dogma is in itself incredible and absurd,
it is in its terms intelligible; but that the High Anglican dogma is
unintelligible in terms and incredible in itself, so far as its import
can be divined. To the Puritan mind, the distinction maintained by
Cosin and others between a real presence and a transubstantiation is
of little importance, and quite incomprehensible; but to the Anglican
mind, it is perfectly clear, and of the highest moment.[418] That I
distinctly perceive. Without entering into the controversy, I may be
allowed to add, that the belief of the spiritual presence of Christ’s
body in the elements is one thing, and the deep and devout belief of
a real and a special presence of Christ Himself with His people in
the Lord’s Supper, is another. There is nothing whatever to prevent
a modern disciple of the Puritans from consistently maintaining
the latter. For my own part, I would maintain it with the utmost
earnestness.
[Sidenote: ANGLICANS.--MORLEY.]
Next to Cosin let us take Morley. Morley lived to a great age, and
had a high reputation for theological learning before the Civil Wars,
as well as after the re-establishment of Episcopacy, being well
versed in the logic of the schools, and proving himself a formidable
controversialist. That he was a Calvinist is distinctly stated by
Wood and Burnet; but I cannot find that he published anything upon
the subject. Besides his controversy with Baxter, which turns upon
political and ecclesiastical questions, we possess certain treatises
written by him before and since the Restoration, in which he undertakes
fully to make known his judgment concerning the Church of Rome, and
most of those doctrines which fall into controversy betwixt her and
the Church of England. The reader is disappointed to find, that
these Treatises consist only of _A short Conference with a Jesuit
at Brussels_; An Argument against Transubstantiation; A Sermon
preached at Whitehall; Correspondence with Father Cressey; A Letter
to the Duchess of York; and two Latin Epistles, relating to Prayers
for the Dead, and the Invocation of Saints. Three points alone in the
Romanist controversy are discussed. The treatment of these, however,
indicate deep learning and great skill. Morley plies with much success
the argument against Transubstantiation, “drawn from the evidence and
certainty of sense,”--maintaining his convincing argument with the
dexterity of a practised logician, so as to parry most successfully all
the objections of Roman Catholic antagonists. He decidedly opposes the
Popish doctrine of purgatory,--but he vindicates prayers for the dead,
in the way in which they were offered in the early Church, and as by
modern Anglicans they are still encouraged to be offered; that is, for
the rest of the soul, the resurrection of the body, and the plenitude
of redemption at the last day.[419] Whatever may be the propriety of
praying for the dead in such a qualified sense as this, Morley contends
that there is no ground on which to rest the doctrine of the Invocation
of Saints. That doctrine he overthrows by an appeal to Scripture; and
then he proceeds, after the Anglican method, to examine the writings of
the Fathers, and to show that they do not justify the Popish dogma and
its associated practices.
The writings of so eminent a man as Archbishop Bramhall ought not to
be wholly passed over, even in this limited and superficial sketch. He
did not write any comprehensive treatise on theology in general, or on
any doctrine in particular; but whilst the other Divines named, with
one exception, guarded what they believed to be the citadel of truth,
this learned prelate of Ireland defended what he regarded as some
of the outworks of Anglican Christianity. He strove, in his _Just
Vindication of the Church of England_ (1654), to repel the charge
of schism, alleged by the Romanists; and, in his _Consecration and
Succession of Protestant Bishops_, to rebut the Nag’s Head fable
(1658). So far his battle was with Rome. He dealt blows of another
kind in his treatises “Against the English Sectarie” (1643–1672), and
included within his polemical tasks a “Defence of true liberty from
antecedent and extrinsical necessity” (1655); “Castigations of Mr.
Hobbes’ Animadversions” (1658); and “The Catching of Leviathan or the
Great Whale” (1653). In the quaint pleasantry of the age, he spoke of
using three harping irons, one for its heart, a second for its chine,
and a third for its head,--meaning by these images, the religious,
political, and rational aspects of the work. He further described this
monster as neither fish nor flesh, but the combination of a man, with
a whale--“not unlike Dagon, the idol of the Philistines.”[420] The
Malmsbury philosopher was reckoned the most dangerous enemy of the
day to the true interests of the Christian religion, and Bramhall, in
writing against him, acted the part of one anxious to expose a covert
and to crush a seminal infidelity.
CHAPTER XIV.
Those Divines whom I have already imperfectly described, may be
characterized as High Anglicans. There remains for consideration, a
second class, whom I venture to denominate semi-Anglicans.
Sanderson’s fame as a theologian rests mainly upon his treatment of
casuistical questions, and upon his noble volume of sermons. The latter
compositions (1659–1674), which exhibit great vigour, compass, and
patience of thought, expressed in massive but tedious eloquence,--are
chiefly practical; but also, they here and there reveal doctrinal
opinions, and, together with the reports of his friends, and extracts
from his MSS., indicate some of the leading points in the preacher’s
system of divinity. He affords an instance of that change of opinion
which we find to have been so common at the time. In early life, having
adopted the sublapsarian scheme, he afterwards renounced it, “as well
as the supralapsarian, which he could never fancy.”[421] To use his
own words, “We must acknowledge the work of both (grace and free-will)
in the conversion of a sinner. And so, likewise, in all other events
the consistency of the infallibility of God’s foreknowledge at least
(though not with any absolute but conditional predestination), with
the liberty of man’s will and the contingency of inferior causes and
effects.”[422] He made strong objections to some leading points in
Twiss’ _Vindiciæ Gratiæ_, a book written against Arminius. But one
of the characteristic principles held by the Divines of the school, to
which Sanderson in earlier life belonged, he seems to have retained
to the last, for he expresses, in one of his sermons, published by
himself not long before his death, the following account of Christian
faith:--“The word faith is used to signify, that theological virtue or
gracious habit, whereby we embrace with our minds and affections the
Lord Jesus Christ as the only-begotten Son of God and alone Saviour of
the world, casting ourselves wholly upon the mercy of God through His
merits for remission and everlasting salvation. It is that which is
commonly called a lively or justifying faith; whereunto are ascribed
in Holy Writ those many gracious effects, of purifying the heart,
adoption, justification, life, joy, peace, salvation, &c. Not as to
their proper and primary cause, but as to the instrument, whereby we
apprehend and apply Christ, whose merits and Spirit are the true causes
of all those blessed effects.”[423]
The life of Sanderson requires us to consider him as sympathizing in
some respects with Anglican Divines, but their distinguishing dogmas
are not at all conspicuous in his sermons.
[Sidenote: HAMMOND.]
Hammond, the friend of Sanderson,[424]--associated with him scarcely
less in doctrinal opinions and ecclesiastical sympathies, than in the
closest intimacy and warmest affection,--has been described as one--
“Whose mild persuasive voice
Taught us in trials to rejoice
Most like a faithful dove,
That by some ruined homestead builds,
And pours to the forsaken fields
His wonted lay of love.”
And the calm, tender strain of his theology harmonizes with the spirit
which the poet has thus so touchingly characterized. Like Sanderson,
Hammond is more practical than scientific. Like Sanderson, he shines
with richer lustre as a Christian casuist, than as a systematic
Divine. In his _Practical Catechism_, however, he appears to advantage
both as an evangelical moralist and a doctrinal teacher: it contains
expositions of the Creed, of the Ten Commandments, and of the Sermon
on the Mount. Exhibitions of principle are skilfully interwoven with
the enforcement of precepts; moderation is blended with orthodoxy;
and in his conclusions touching the critical points of theology which
we have selected as tests for elucidating distinctive opinion, he
closely approaches his beloved companion Sanderson. With Hammond
faith is the _condition_ of justification; he scruples to call it the
_instrument_, lest he should ascribe to it any undue efficiency;[425]
but in faith he includes the germ of all Christian obedience, all
Christian virtue; he describes it as a cordial, sincere, giving up
oneself to God, particularly to Christ, firmly to rely on all His
promises, and faithfully to obey all His commands. Hammond broadly
distinguishes justification from sanctification,--defining the first
as God’s covering or pardoning our iniquities, His being so reconciled
unto us sinners, that He determines not to punish us eternally;--and
the second, as the infusion of holiness into our hearts, the turning
of the soul to Himself. Into the relation between the two blessings,
and the order of their bestowment--which of them is conferred first--he
enters, with a subtlety of analysis unusual in the Anglican school;
and whilst, with exemplary candour, he suggests what he allows to be
an orthodox rendering of the Puritan doctrine of justification before
sanctification, he himself prefers to place the latter first in the
order of time; yet, in doing this, he so qualifies his statement as not
to alarm even the Puritan, who ventures upon this abstruse, perplexing,
and not very profitable path of speculative inquiry. Hammond believed
that justification flows from the mediatorial priesthood of the Lord
Jesus; but he distinctly denied that the Redeemer’s active obedience is
imputed to men.[426]
[Sidenote: PEARSON.]
Pearson’s _Exposition of the Creed_ (1659) is a well-known
theological treatise. He implicitly pursues an Anglican course, citing
the Fathers in support of his positions; but he nowhere distinctly
defines what authority he attaches to them, or, indeed, formally lays
down as a principle that they are his guides at all. Pearson must
have been moderate in his ecclesiastical views, or he could not have
pursued the course he did during the Commonwealth; and his position as
Lecturer at St. Clement’s, Eastcheap, and the association into which
he would necessarily be brought with his Puritan brethren, might have
the effect of widening his sympathies, and of preventing, in his case,
those controversial asperities which embitter the writings of extreme
Anglicans. In his article on the Church, he refers to its unity, its
perpetuity, its holiness, and its Catholicity, meaning apparently by
the Church the aggregate of Christian professors, whether they be
good or bad.[427] Under the last head, he touches upon the authority
of the Church in the following brief remark:--“They call the Church
of Christ the Catholic Church, because it teacheth all things which
are necessary for a Christian to know, whether they be things in
heaven or things in earth, whether they concern the condition of man
in this life, or in the life to come. As the Holy Ghost did lead the
Apostles into all truth, so did the Apostles leave all truth unto
the Church, which teaching all the same, may be well called Catholic
from the universality of necessary and saving truths retained in it.”
Even this scarcely amounts to an assertion of Church authority in
the Anglican sense; it might be explained consistently with Puritan
principles, it never would have satisfied Thorndike or Heylyn, or even
Bull. To baptism, however, Pearson attributes great efficacy, coupling
it, as Heylyn and others do, with the article on _Forgiveness of
Sins_, according to the teaching of the Nicene and other Creeds.
Unlike Thorndike, he does not propound any theory of justification in
connection with baptism; nor does he, any more than Heylyn, dwell on
the subject of justification in any way: he confines himself to the
idea of remitting sins, which perhaps, in his opinion, is equivalent
to justification. He uses strong expressions in speaking of the
Atonement,--referring to “the punishment which Christ, who was our
surety, endured,” as “a full satisfaction to the will and justice of
God.” “It was a price given to redeem”--something “laid down by way
of compensation.” “Although God be said to remit our sins by which
we were captivated, yet He is never said to remit the price, without
which we had never been redeemed, neither can He be said to have
remitted it, because He did require it and receive it.” A Calvinist
could scarcely have marked the point more strongly. Pearson also says
“that Christ did render God propitious unto us by His blood--that is,
His sufferings unto death--who before was offended with us for our
sins; and this propitiation amounted to reconciliation, that is, a
kindness after wrath. We must conceive that God was angry with mankind
before He determined to give our Saviour; we cannot imagine that God,
who is essentially just, should not abominate iniquity.” Pearson’s
definition of faith is very different from Thorndike’s. It is a habit
of the intellectual part of man, and therefore of itself invisible;
and to believe is a spiritual act, and consequently “immanent and
internal, and known to no man but him that believeth.” We find in
Pearson’s exposition none of those peculiarly High Church views in
which Thorndike and Heylyn so much delighted; and, what is very
remarkable, as far as I can find, he only in a cursory way mentions the
Lord’s Supper. Certainly he does not dwell upon it in any part of his
treatise.[428]
Pearson’s common sense, mastery of learning, clearness of thought,
perspicuity of style, and directness of reasoning, have secured and
will retain for him a high place amongst English theological teachers.
His orderly arrangement of topics, and his compact and forcible method
of expression, render him popular with all students of his school
of theology; and there are few points on which they can consult him
without finding what they want in a shape convenient for use. Those
who differ from him may read him with advantage; and they will discover
that, for the most part, his faults are only defects which may be
supplied by repairing to other sources of information.
[Sidenote: BARROW.]
Isaac Barrow devoted long years to the study of mathematics, for
which he has acquired high renown; and he travelled in Turkey, and
resided twelve months in Constantinople, where he read the whole of
Chrysostom’s works near the spot upon which many of his sermons were
delivered--a course of reading which must have been of immense service
to him as an expounder of Christian morality. His favourite scientific
studies left upon his mind a stamp of precision and order, apparent
in his writings; and his familiarity with Greek patristic eloquence
may be traced in the stately flow of his copious diction. His theology
lies close to the boundary line between Anglicanism and the Divinity
of the Cambridge school. After holding a mathematical professorship at
Cambridge, he devoted the remainder of his life to theology, in which
he achieved a reputation equal to that which he had won in the pursuit
of science.
In his sermons on the Creed, instead of confining himself, as Pearson
and Heylyn have done, to the exposition of Christian truth, he
carefully employs himself in constructing defences of the faith. He
begins his task with an exposure of the unreasonableness of infidelity,
and with an assertion of the perfectly rational nature of belief
in the Gospel. He afterwards dwells, at length, upon proofs of the
existence of God; upon the Divinity and excellence of the Christian
religion, as compared with the impiety and imposture of Paganism and
Mahometanism, and the imperfection of Judaism; and upon the evidence
that Jesus is the true Messias. Thus Barrow appears as a Christian
advocate. He habitually bases his arguments upon Scripture texts, but
he also habitually weaves into these arguments threads of reason, so
as to commend what he advances to the understanding of his readers,
ever avoiding what is mystical, or merely imaginative. Yet he does not
neglect the dogmas of revelation, but brings many of them out with a
clearness and precision which has been overlooked by some critics.
His disquisition upon the nature of faith is as exhaustive as that of
any Puritan, and will be found a wearisome piece of reading by some
modern students. He dwells much upon the difficulties of faith, and
upon the moral virtue involved in overcoming them; and when we compare
his opinions with those of Thorndike and Bull, we discover in him a
general similarity to them, in connection with shades of difference.
In common with Thorndike, he resolutely opposes the idea that faith
consists in any belief of our being pardoned, or in any assurance of
salvation, or in any persuasion that a true Christian cannot fall
from grace. His representations of the virtuousness of evangelical
belief are obviously in harmony with that writer’s statements; and
he also, in accordance with them, associates faith and the baptismal
covenant, saying, “Faith is nothing else but a hearty embracing
Christianity, which first exerteth itself by open declaration and
avowal in baptism.”[429] Barrow, however, of all men, requires to be
judged, not by isolated expressions, but by a comparison of one part
of his teaching with another. Turning, then, to the following passage,
which is complete in itself, and which I quote as an example of his
diffuse and affluent style, we meet with an account of Christian faith,
such as would scarcely have satisfied the demands of Thorndike’s
baptismal theology:--“By this faith (as to the first and primary sense
thereof) is understood the being truly and firmly persuaded in our
minds that Jesus was what He professed Himself to be, and what the
Apostles testified Him to be, the Messias, by God designed, foretold,
and promised to be sent into the world, to redeem, govern, instruct,
and save mankind, our Redeemer and Saviour, our Lord and Master, our
King and Judge, the great High Priest, and Prophet of God--the being
assured of these and all other propositions connexed with these;
or, in short, the being thoroughly persuaded of the truth of that
Gospel which was revealed and taught by Jesus and His Apostles. That
this notion is true, those descriptions of this faith, and phrases
expressing it, do sufficiently show; the nature and reason of the
thing doth confirm the same, for that such a faith is, in its kind
and order, apt and sufficient to promote God’s design of saving us,
to render us capable of God’s favour, to purge our hearts, and work
that change of mind which is necessary in order to the obtaining God’s
favour, and enjoying happiness; to produce that obedience which God
requires of us, and without which we cannot be saved: these things
are the natural results of such a persuasion concerning those truths;
as natural as the desire and pursuit of any good doth arise from the
clear apprehension thereof, or as the shunning of any mischief doth
follow from the like apprehension; as a persuasion that wealth is to
be got thereby makes the merchant to undergo the dangers and pains of
a long voyage (verifying that, _Impiger extremos currit mercator ad
Indos, Per mare pauperiem fugiens, per saxa, per ignes_); as the
persuasion that health may thereby be recovered, engages a man not only
to take down the most unsavoury potions, but to endure cuttings and
burnings (_ut valeas, ferrum patieris et ignes_); as a persuasion
that refreshment is to be found in a place, doth effectually carry
the hungry person thither; so a strong persuasion that the Christian
religion is true, and the way of obtaining happiness, and of escaping
misery, doth naturally produce a subjection of heart and an obedience
thereto; and accordingly we see the highest of those effects, which the
Gospel offers or requires, are assigned to this faith, as results from
it, or adjuncts thereof.”[430]
[Sidenote: BARROW.]
The strong moral power attributed to faith places Barrow’s description
of it in nearly strict coincidence with the teaching of Bishop
Bull upon the same subject. Yet from Thorndike, and from other
Anglo-Catholic Divines, with exceptions already pointed out, Barrow
differs in his definite and sharp distinction between holiness and
justification. No Puritan could more precisely mark off the latter
from the former. Admitting, he says, that whoever is justified is also
endued with some measure of intrinsic righteousness--“avowing willingly
that such a righteousness doth ever accompany the justification St.
Paul speaketh of--yet that sort of righteousness doth not seem implied
by the word justification, according to St. Paul’s intent, in those
places where he discourseth about justification by faith, for that such
a sense of the word doth not well consist with the drift and efficacy
of his reasoning, nor with divers passages in his discourse.”[431] But
to the distinction he so clearly makes he attributes less importance
than many theologians are wont to do.
[Sidenote: BARROW.]
Although Barrow does not copiously discuss the doctrine of the
Atonement--although he dwells chiefly on the moral effects of
Christ’s death--yet he uses very strong expressions as to the effect
of our Lord’s sacrifice upon the Divine government, speaking of it
as “appeasing that wrath of God which He naturally beareth toward
iniquity, and reconciling God to men, who by sin were alienated
from Him, by procuring a favourable disposition and intentions of
grace toward us.” “Christ died, removing thereby that just hatred
and displeasure.” “The non-imputation of our sins is expressed as
a singular effect, an instance, an argument of His being in mind
reconciled and favourably disposed towards us.”[432]
In five sermons, entirely devoted to the subject, this Divine asserts
and explains the doctrine of universal redemption, saying that
salvation is made attainable, and is really tendered unto all, upon
feasible and equal conditions; and that a competency of grace is
imparted to every man, qualifying him to do what God requires.[433]
His account of the Divinity and personality of the Holy Spirit is the
same as is generally given by orthodox teachers. As to the work of the
third Person in the Trinity, Barrow’s line of thought coincides more
with Anglican than with Puritan writers. Besides much of a general
character upon the Spirit’s assistance, in the thirty-fourth sermon
on the Creed, Barrow remarks--“It hath been the doctrine constantly
with general consent delivered in and by the Catholic Church, that
to all persons by the holy mystery of baptism duly initiated into
Christianity, and admitted into the communion of Christ’s body, the
grace of the Holy Spirit is communicated, enabling them to perform the
conditions of piety and virtue which they undertake.”[434]
Barrow appears to have been a Low Churchman, and, in the fragment he
has left us upon “the holy Catholic Church,” omits those assertions
respecting ecclesiastical authority which were the joy of Thorndike and
Heylyn. He explains the different senses in which the word “Church”
is used in the New Testament; and, in its larger sense, applies to
it the epithets “holy” and “Catholic,” winding up all he has to say
with practical remarks which commend themselves to candid Christians
of all denominations.[435] It may be added that, in his discourse
concerning _The unity of the Church_, he opposes the idea of any
such ecclesiastical authority as is contended for either by Papists or
Anglo-Catholics.
The _Treatise of the Pope’s Supremacy_, from the same pen--too
long to be described--places the author amongst the chief defenders
of Protestantism, and deserves the eulogium of Tillotson,--what “many
others have handled before, he hath exhausted.” The student can
find arguments against the assumptions of Rome nowhere so fully and
powerfully stated as on Barrow’s pages. Those arguments are, perhaps,
like Saul’s armour, too cumbrous for the Davids of the present day;
but there are in Barrow’s armoury stones from the brook for simple
shepherds, as well as spears and shields for veteran warriors.
The feeling of Barrow towards the Romish Church is plain from what
has now been said, and it is desirable, before we leave the opinions
of the Anglicans, to inquire what their feeling generally was upon
this subject; and also how they expressed themselves in reference to
Protestant communities.
[Sidenote: OPINIONS RESPECTING POPERY.]
Thorndike calls the Romish a true but corrupt Church, in which
salvation may be obtained, although it be clogged with difficulty. It
is not Antichrist. It is not formally idolatrous; yet, after referring
to its abuses, he says, “to live under them, and to yield conformity to
them, is a burden unsufferable for a Christian to undergo: to approve
them by being reconciled to the Church that maintains them is a scandal
incurable and irreparable.”[436]
Bishop Bull observes, referring to certain doctrines held by Romanists,
“I look upon it as a wonderful both just and wise providence of God,
that He hath suffered the Church of Rome to fall into such gross errors
(which otherwise it is scarce imaginable how men in their wits that
had not renounced not only the Scriptures, but their reason, yea and
their senses too, could be overtaken with), and to determine them for
articles of faith.”[437]
Heylyn concedes to Rome the character of a true Church; yet after
referring to the argument for image worship, he remarks:--“Though
perhaps some men of learning may be able to relieve themselves by
these distinctions; yet I can see no possibility how the common
people, who kneel and make their prayers directly to the image itself,
without being able to discern where the difference lieth between their
_proprie_ and _improprie_, or _per se_ and _per accidens_, can be
excused from palpable and downright _idolatry_.”[438]
The same writer, describing the Reformation, and contending for the
continuity of the English Church, reflects, by implication, severely
upon its previously Romanized state:--“Whereas, the case, if rightly
stated, is but like that of a sick and wounded man, that had long lain
weltering in his own blood, or languishing under a tedious burden
of diseases, and afterwards by God’s great mercy, and the skilful
diligence of honest chirurgeons and physicians, is at the last restored
to his former health.”[439]
Taylor is much more decided in his condemnation of Rome:--“Now let any
man judge whether it be not our duty, and a necessary work of charity,
and the proper office of our ministry, to persuade our charges from
the ‘immodesty of an evil heart,’ from having a ‘devilish spirit,’
from doing that ‘which is vehemently forbidden by the Apostle,’ from
‘infidelity and pride;’ and, lastly, from that ‘eternal woe which is
denounced’ against them that add other words and doctrines than what
is contained in the Scriptures, and say, ‘_Dominus dixit_, the
Lord hath said it,’ and He hath not said it. If we had put these severe
censures upon the Popish doctrine of tradition, we should have been
thought uncharitable; but, because the holy fathers do so, we ought to
be charitable, and snatch our charges from the ambient flame.”[440]
Bramhall, whose Protestantism went further than that of Thorndike
or Heylyn, says:--“That Church which hath changed the apostolical
creed, the apostolical succession, the apostolical regiment, and
the apostolical communion, is no apostolical, orthodox, or Catholic
Church. But the Church of Rome hath changed the apostolical creed, the
apostolical succession, the apostolical regiment, and the apostolical
communion. Therefore the Church of Rome is no apostolical, orthodox, or
Catholic Church.”[441]
[Sidenote: RESPECTING UNEPISCOPAL CHURCHES.]
In reference to Protestant communities abroad, the same writer
expresses his opinion thus:--
“I cannot assent that either all or any considerable part of the
Episcopal Divines in England do unchurch either all or most part of
the Protestant Churches. No man is hurt but by himself. They unchurch
none at all, but leave them to stand or fall to their own master. They
do not unchurch the Swedish, Danish, Bohemian Churches, and many other
Churches in Polonia, Hungaria, and those parts of the world who have
an ordinary, uninterrupted succession of pastors--some by the names of
Bishops, others under the name of Seniors, unto this day. (I meddle
not with the Socinians.) They unchurch not the Lutheran Churches in
Germany, who both assert Episcopacy in their confessions, and have
actual superintendents in their practice, and would have Bishops, name
and thing, if it were in their power.... Episcopal Divines do not deny
those Churches to be true Churches, wherein salvation may be had. We
advise them, as it is our duty, to be circumspect for themselves, and
not to put it to more question, whether they have ordination or not, or
desert the general practice of the Universal Church for nothing, when
they may clear it if they please. Their case is not the same with those
who labour under invincible necessity.... This mistake proceedeth from
not distinguishing between the true nature and essence of a Church,
which we do readily grant them, and the integrity or perfection of a
Church, which we cannot grant them, without swerving from the judgment
of the Catholic Church.”[442]
“Wheresoever, in the world,” observes Cosin, “Churches bearing the
name of Christ profess the true, ancient, and Catholic religion and
faith, and invocate and worship, with one mouth and heart, God the
Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost, if from actual communion
with them I am now debarred, either by the distance of regions, or
the dissensions of men, or any other obstacle; nevertheless, always
in my heart, and soul, and affection, I hold communion and unite with
them--that which I wish especially to be understood of the Protestant
and well-reformed Churches. For the foundations being safe, any
difference of opinion or of ceremonies--on points circumstantial, and
not essential, nor repugnant to the universal practice of the ancient
Church, in other Churches (over which we are not to rule)--we in a
friendly, placid, and peaceable spirit, may bear, and therefore ought
to bear.”[443]
Morley is cautious:--“Our Church is not so liberal of her anathemas
as [Rome] is. We are sure our Church is truly apostolical, and that
for government and discipline, as well as doctrine. Whether the
Christian congregations in other Protestant countries be so or no,
_Ætatem habent, respondeant pro semetipsis et Domino suo stent
vel cadent_. In the mean time our Church hath declared, that no
man shall be accounted or taken to be a lawful Bishop, Priest or
Deacon in the Church of England, or suffered to exercise any of those
sacred functions, except he be called, tried, examined, and admitted
thereunto, according unto the form hereafter following; or unless he
had formerly Episcopal consecration, or ordination.”[444]
[Sidenote: RESPECTING UNEPISCOPAL CHURCHES.]
Of Nonconformists, Thorndike speaks in distinct and decided terms.
Presbyterians, Independents, and Baptists, are guilty of schism.
This he asserts over and over again; and of his opinion respecting
schism, he leaves us in no doubt. Schism may, indeed, be unjust on
both sides,--a favourite idea with Thorndike;--and it may be such as
that salvation may be had on both sides; but this lenient view of the
subject, he expresses only in relation to the differences between the
Eastern and the Western Churches, between the Church of England and
the Church of Rome. Schism, as committed by Nonconformists, he ever
represents in the darkest colours. Presbyterian baptism, he affirms, to
be no baptism. Their service is an imposture; in opposing Episcopacy,
and setting up their synods, they erect altar against altar. It is mere
equivocation to call their congregations Churches, and their ordinances
sacraments. It was unwarrantable, he maintains, under the Commonwealth,
to communicate with Presbyterians and Independents; although the moral
impossibility of communing with them could not justify communing with
Papists. The theory of the Independents he holds to be more suitable
to Christianity than that of the Presbyterians, but he says it is
impracticable, without Scriptural authority, and not less free from
schism.[445] He counts the doctrine of justification, as he supposed
it to be held by some Nonconformists, no other than a dreadful heresy,
worse even than the Romanist doctrine of justification. Yet we find, in
one place, this cold gleam of charity:--“I confess, as afore I allowed
the Church of Rome some excuse from the unreasonableness of their
adversaries; so here, considering the horrible scandals given by that
communion in standing so rigorously upon laws so visibly ruinous to the
service of God, and the advancement of Christianity, and the difficulty
of finding that mean in which the truth stands between the extremes
(as our Lord Christ between the thieves, saith Tertullian), I do not
proceed to give the salvation of poor souls for lost, that are carried
away with the pretence of reformation in the change that is made, even
to hate, and persecute, by word or by deed, those who cannot allow it.”
The book in which this passage occurs was published in 1659.
Anabaptists, Thorndike pronounces to be schismatics, if not
heretics:--“As for the ground of that opinion, which moves them
to break up the seal of God, marked upon those that are baptized
unto the hope of salvation upon the obligation of Christianity, by
baptizing them anew, to the hope of salvation, without the obligation
of Christianity; whether they are to be counted heretics therefore or
not, let who will dispute. This, I may justly infer, they take as sure
a course to murder the souls of those whom they baptize again, as of
those whom they let go out of the world unbaptized.”[446]
As Thorndike is more full and explicit in the statement of his
views respecting the schism which he believed to be involved in
Nonconformity, so also he goes beyond some other Anglicans in
denouncing its principles, and censuring its professors. Perhaps
certain writers of his class might think less unjustly, and more
charitably, of Dissenters; yet none of them, consistently with their
own Church notions, could regard Independent societies as Churches,
whatever favourable opinion they might entertain of individual members.
Anything like intercommunion with communities not Episcopalian,
seems, in the estimation of such a man as Thorndike, utterly out of
the question; and therefore by him, and by those who think with him,
the Episcopal Church of England is placed in an entirely isolated
position, in reference to the rest of Protestant Christendom, except
where Bishops are retained; such instances being few and doubtful.
[Sidenote: THE PRAYER BOOK.]
Cosin, in his _Confession_, declares very strongly against
sectaries and fanatics, amongst whom he ranks “not only the
Separatists, the Anabaptists, and their followers, alas, too, too
many, but also the New Independents and Presbyterians of our country,
a kind of men hurried away with the spirit of malice, disobedience,
and sedition, who by a disloyal attempt (the like whereof was never
heard since the world began) have, of late, committed so many great
and execrable crimes, to the contempt and despite of religion, and the
Christian faith: which, how great they were, without horror cannot be
spoken or mentioned.”[447]
Connected with love for the Anglican Church, with dislike of the
Papacy, and with alienation from unepiscopal communities, there existed
a strong attachment to the formularies of faith, and of worship,
contained in the Book of Common Prayer. That Book was used in secret
during the Commonwealth; and before being reviewed in 1662--indeed
previously to the Restoration--it received comment and eulogy from the
pen of Hamon L’Estrange,--who published, in 1659, an elaborate and
learned work on _The Alliance of Divine Offices_, in which he
compared other Liturgies with that of the Church of England since the
Reformation. His book is based upon the study of Whitgift and Hooker,
who had answered Cartwright’s objections to the Anglican services, and
who had convinced the author that they did not lie open to the charge
of unlawfulness, but were of a nature to command obedience. L’Estrange
also studied the previous records, as he calls them, of the first six
centuries; the result being a conviction, that the noblest parts of
the Liturgy were used by the Primitive Church, before a Popish Mass
had ever been said; and that an admirable harmony obtained, even in
external rites, between the Church of England and the ancient Fathers.
This volume did not reach a second edition before the year 1690; but
until it was supplemented or superseded by later works, it continued
to be the chief authority on the subject, and has been, in our own
time, thought worthy of republication in the library of Anglo-Catholic
Theology.
A new publication appeared, partly in 1651, and partly in 1662, bearing
upon the Anglican controversy with Puritanism, of too important a
character to be passed over in silence. The first five books of
Hooker’s _Ecclesiastical Polity_, had long been the admiration
of Episcopalian Churchmen,--the rest of the treatise, supposed to
be lost, remaining to them an object of desire. At the periods now
mentioned, there came to light the last three books of this great work
as possessed by posterity.
[Sidenote: HOOKER’S WORKS.]
The sixth book, included in the part which issued from the press in
1651, is, according to the title, a disquisition upon ecclesiastical
power and the question of lay eldership; but the reader does not
proceed many pages before he finds the disquisition going off in a
tangent, from the subject of Church jurisdiction, to pursue inquiries
relative to the Popish dogmas of confession and penance. Such a method
of composition is so unlike that of “the judicious Hooker,” that there
can be no doubt his last accomplished Editor is right in concluding,
that we have here some compositions from the author’s pen not intended
for insertion in the _Ecclesiastical Polity_. Notes remain
showing that he had drawn up a plan for this department of his task,
which would have methodically and pertinently disposed of it, but no
MS. has been discovered filling up the carefully-digested outline. It
has been suspected that the Puritan relatives of the Church champion
in Elizabeth’s reign were guilty of foul play in this matter, and
that after destroying most of the genuine copy, they vamped up the
mutilated remainder with dissertations selected from other papers. Such
a thing may be possible, but certainly it is not proved. I can find
no satisfactory positive evidence in support of the suspicion,[448]
and it is quite unaccountable how, if the Puritan manglers of his MSS.
had made away with what related to lay eldership, they should leave in
existence a long Essay, containing a lengthened defence of Episcopal
order. This defence, which appeared in 1662, under the Editorship
of Gauden, who does not say where he obtained it, presents abundant
internal proof of its genuineness, showing nevertheless the absence
of that careful revision and correction, which the Author would have
bestowed, had he lived to complete his own publication. It forms the
seventh book.
In the fourth and fifth chapters there is a discussion of the main
point, “whence it hath grown that the Church is governed by Bishops.”
In the fifth, Hooker says:--
“It was the general received persuasion of the ancient Christian
world, that _Ecclesia est in Episcopo_, ‘the outward being of a
Church consisteth in the having of a Bishop.’ That where colleges of
presbyters were, there was at the first, equality amongst them, St.
Jerome thinketh it a matter clear: but when the rest were thus equal,
so that no one of them could command any other as inferior unto him,
they all were controllable by the Apostles, who had that Episcopal
authority abiding at the first in themselves, which they afterwards
derived unto others. The cause wherefore they under themselves
appointed such Bishops as were not every where at the first, is said to
have been those strifes and contentions, for remedy whereof, whether
the Apostles alone did conclude of such a regiment, or else they
together with the whole Church judging it a fit and a needful policy,
did agree to receive it for a custom; no doubt but being established
by them on whom the Holy Ghost was poured in so abundant measure for
the ordering of Christ’s Church, it had either Divine appointment
beforehand, or Divine approbation afterwards, and is in that respect to
be acknowledged the ordinance of God, no less than that ancient Jewish
regiment, whereof though Jethro were the deviser, yet after that God
had allowed it, all men were subject unto it, as to the polity of God,
and not of Jethro.”
In the course of the entire argument respecting Episcopacy, Hooker
changes his standing again and again; sometimes taking higher,
and sometimes lower ground; now insisting upon the Divine origin
of Diocesan Bishops, and then, supposing their origin not to be
immediately Divine, attempting to show the inherent authority of the
Church to determine its own frame of government, and to establish the
sufficiency of such evidence as may be drawn from patristic sources.
[Sidenote: HOOKER’S WORKS.]
The eighth book treats of the Royal supremacy in ecclesiastical
matters, and is intended as a reply to certain Puritan objections
brought against the form of that supremacy as established by the laws
of the land. It is a curious circumstance that one chapter contains a
vindication of the title, “Supreme Head of the Church;”[449] although
this did not remain the parliamentary title of the sovereign, according
to the statute of supremacy in the first year of Elizabeth’s reign: and
such being the fact, it may be inferred, that Hooker used the title as
an equivalent to the statutable appellation of “Supreme Governor in all
spiritual and ecclesiastical causes.”
Hooker’s vindication of the Royal supremacy contains a course of
elaborate reasoning in support of the prerogative with regard to Church
assemblies, and Church legislation, the appointing of Bishops, and
the jurisdiction of Ecclesiastical Courts. Finally, he discusses the
Royal exemption from ecclesiastical censure, as well as from all other
kinds of judicial power. This topic is handled with much caution, and
some reticence, and the chapter in which it is considered remains
in an unfinished state. I have not lighted upon any controversial
publications arising out of the appearance of these recovered writings,
but I notice that Kennet says, Bishop Gauden “doth, with great
confidence, use diverse arguments to satisfy the world that the three
books joined to the five genuine books of the said Mr. Hooker are
genuine, and penned by him, notwithstanding those poisonous assertions
against the regal power, which are to be found therein.”[450] To what
in particular the closing words refer is not plain; they can scarcely
point to a fragment on the limits of obedience, which Gauden attached
to the eighth book, but which Keble transfers to an Appendix, since the
author there enforces subjection to civil governors as a conscientious
duty. It is not a little remarkable, that Thorndike makes no use either
of the earlier or later editions of the _Ecclesiastical Polity_.
The Anglican Divines included distinguished sermon writers. They
followed in the wake of Andrewes and Donne, whom they resembled in
their theology, from whom they differed in their style. Like the
Puritans after the Reformation, they were generally cut off from public
preaching during the Interregnum; but they wrote sermons, and some
abroad had liberty to preach,--as for example Cosin, who, at Paris,
during his exile, delivered several discourses, which are included in
his works. The chief of them were prepared for the festivals of the
Church, and treat of the Nativity, the Resurrection, and the Ascension:
subjects which are handled sometimes in a cold orthodox manner,
sometimes with forcible and original reasoning, and now and then with
strokes of vigorous eloquence. It is remarkable that we have no sermons
by Cosin, written after the Restoration; and indeed there is a general
paucity of homiletic literature by members of the Episcopal bench for
twenty years before the Revolution.
[Sidenote: ANGLICAN SERMON WRITERS.]
The Irish bench supplied one brilliant sermon-writer--whose
compositions in that department are above all praise. Jeremy Taylor’s
theology has been already considered, space here only permits the
remark that his theology appears in his sermons, that he is the
true Anglican throughout, and that all his opinions are there
arrayed in robes of bewitching grace and splendour. His practical
works,--for example _The Life of Christ_ and _Holy Living
and Dying_,--may be classed with his discourses; and abound in
rich specimens of that golden eloquence--stamped with an Anglican
mint-mark--which he was wont copiously to issue from the pulpit.
Sanderson’s sermons are exhaustive treatises, in which the homiletic
character sometimes fades, but orthodox doctrine is always implied;
the casuistry of Christian experience is handled sometimes in almost
a Puritan spirit, and Christian ethics are ever treated in a clear,
manly, incisive style. Barrow’s sermons are also treatises, many of
them most decidedly doctrinal, orthodox and argumentative. But, of all
these Divines, it may be said--not excepting Jeremy Taylor, who exerts
a charm of another kind--that they lack the evangelical unction, the
softness and fragrance of which is felt to be suffused over the Puritan
homilies.
Controversy tinges more or less most of the sermons of that period;
but, for invective, Dr. South has won an unenviable notoriety. No one
can admire more than I do, the good sense and masculine style of this
author. There are sermons of his which are perfect models of pulpit
address; but on reading others, who but must feel that perhaps there
never was another man who _could_ so well enforce the truths
of Christianity, who also _did_ so flagrantly violate their
spirit. He never misses, or rather, he never fails to make, when he
had any pretence for it, an opportunity of attacking his Puritan
contemporaries; although he must have lived on terms of civility with
them when at Oxford. As in a sermon by Chrysostom, preached at Antioch,
one scarcely ever gets to the end, without finding him rebuking
swearers, so South in his sermons preached at Westminster Abbey, and in
other places, rarely concludes without assailing English schismatics,
who were not less bad in his eyes, than were the most profane Syrians
in the eyes of the orator of the Eastern Church. Men destitute of
South’s power manifested a similar temper, vilifying the Nonconformists
“as far more dangerous enemies than the Papists;”[451] and thus,
in the treatment of opponents, they imitated and even exceeded the
worst polemical vices of such men as Vicars and Edwards, under the
Commonwealth.
[Sidenote: ANGLICAN CRITICS.]
Before the Restoration there appeared a book on practical piety, which
attained to an extraordinary degree of popularity. Every one has heard
of the _Whole Duty of Man_; and most people given to religious
reading have met with a treatise bearing that title; probably on
examination it has proved to be what is entitled, the _New Whole
Duty of Man_, a work proceeding on different principles from the
original treatise--only the name of which it bears, only the form
of which it imitates.[452] The original treatise, from the pen of
an anonymous author,[453] bears a commendatory letter, written by
Dr. Hammond, a circumstance which alone would suggest our ranking
it amongst the productions of the Anglican school of theology. Its
contents justify our doing so. It proceeds upon the theory, so largely
illustrated by Thorndike, that by baptism men are brought into a
gracious covenant with God; and that men become, not by merit, but by
mercy, entitled to the blessings promised in the Gospel. A Christian
life is the fulfilment of vows and obligations incurred in baptism.
The book recognizes the doctrines of the Trinity, the Divinity of
our Lord, the Atonement, and other related truths under Anglican
forms of expression; but the stress of the work, indeed every page,
except a few at the beginning, consists in an inculcation of human
duty, considered under a threefold aspect--so common once in the
pulpits of the Establishment--our duty towards God, our duty towards
ourselves, and our duty towards one another. All the precepts of
devotion, of virtue, and of beneficence are ranged under these heads.
The great motives to godliness and goodness are not overlooked; but
the proportion in which they are exhibited is very small compared with
the space allotted to a prescriptive treatment of the subject. Of the
fulness and variety of the practical advice given no one can complain;
but the scanty reference to the distinctive doctrines of the Gospel,
will be acknowledged by most Divines as a serious defect. The defect
is explained, but not justified by the circumstance, that the book is
a reaction against a theological tendency, needing to be checked--“the
fanatics were shamefully regardless of good works, and preached up
faith as all-sufficient.”
The _Whole Duty of Man_ has been more condemned and more praised
than it deserves. It presents a large amount of moral advice, but it
lacks the main motive power which produces Christian virtue; and as
to style, it is hard and unattractive from beginning to end, utterly
lacking tenderness, and exhibiting practical religion only in a _dry
light_.
Some of the Anglican Divines zealously devoted themselves to Biblical
criticism. In the matter of exegesis, the Puritans achieved much; but
they looked with suspicion upon all attempts to amend the sacred text.
In this department, certain of their theological opponents laid their
own age and posterity under immense obligation. Bryan Walton, perhaps,
is not to be numbered with Anglicans; and amongst his most efficient
helpers, was Lightfoot, more of a Latitudinarian than an Anglican,--but
Castell and Pocock, Herbert Thorndike, and Alexander Huish, if not
Thomas Hyde and Samuel Clark,[454] all of them eminent scholars, were
more or less Anglican, certainly they were all Episcopalian, in their
views; and it is to them, assisted by Oliver Cromwell, who permitted
the paper for the purpose to be imported duty free, that we owe the
English Polyglott,--which competent judges have pronounced superior to
its more splendid predecessors, published on the Continent. Castell was
enthusiastically devoted to critical studies, to which he sacrificed
his property, his time, and his energies, with small reward, in the way
of Church preferment. His _Lexicon Heptaglotton_ is a monument of
astonishing learning, and worthy of being associated with his friend’s
Polyglott Bible.
After the Restoration, an idea was entertained of printing the famous
Alexandrian MS., which had been sent as a present to Charles I. from
the Greek Patriarch Cyrillus; and the editorship was to have been
entrusted to Dr. Smith, an Oxford scholar, to whom Charles II. promised
a Canonry at Windsor or Westminster for his labour; but the design was
abandoned. Dr. John Fell, Bishop of Oxford, published, in 1675, an
edition of the Greek New Testament, with various readings, taken from
Walton and others; his object being to show the substantial correctness
of the received text, and how little its integrity is affected by the
numerous lections accumulated by an industrious collation of MSS.
[Sidenote: ANGLICAN CRITICS.]
To these critics must be added the well-known commentator Dr. Hammond,
who, instead of following the Fathers and the Reformers in their
schemes of mystical interpretation, struck out a path for himself, and
sought to illustrate the grammatical sense of the sacred writings.
He studied the Hellenistic dialect, compared Greek MSS., examined
ancient manners and customs, and employed the opinions of the Gnostics
to elucidate references in the Epistles to early heresies. This is
very remarkable in an Anglican Divine, and it indicates what some
who sympathized with him in other respects might have regarded as
a rationalistic tendency--certainly they would have so regarded it
in any one not belonging to themselves. Hammond’s _Paraphrase and
Annotations_, published in 1659, may be taken as constituting
an epoch in the history of exegesis; the more so on account of his
influence, for his name stood so high with the Episcopalian clergy,
“that he naturally turned the tide of interpretation his own way.”[455]
CHAPTER XV.
Four eminent Divines, who have made a deep mark on English literature,
now claim attention, coming, as they do, from their complexion of
thought, and from their characteristic opinions, between the Anglicans
just reviewed, and the Latitudinarians who remain to be noticed.
William Chillingworth was one of those clever, hard-headed men in whom
the reasoning faculty predominates over imagination and sentiment, and
who are thoroughly at home in the exercises of logic, subjecting the
opinions of opponents to a subtle analysis, and entrenching themselves
behind carefully-constructed outworks of argumentative defence. The
skill which, as an engineer, he displayed at the siege of Gloucester,
in framing engines to storm the place, was of a piece with the skill
which he exhibited in attacking what he believed to be forms of error
and superstition.[456] He is best known by his great work, _The
Religion of Protestants a Safe Way to Salvation_; and it is evident
that he had derived advantages, as an assailant of the Roman Church,
from the acquaintance with it which he had formed during the period of
his connection with that community.
[Sidenote: LIBERAL ORTHODOX.--CHILLINGWORTH.]
His famous dictum, “The Bible, and the Bible alone, is the religion of
Protestants”--the lever with which he sought to upheave and overthrow
the tenets of Popery--placed him in a theological position distinct
from that which was occupied by Anglicans; for, though they were
ready enough to appeal to Scripture against Rome, they also appealed
to Christian antiquity against Puritanism. Chillingworth’s method of
reasoning betrayed an absence of sympathy with High Church Divines in
their reverence for the early Fathers, and showed how he fixed his
religious opinions solely upon the basis of the written revelation,
as interpreted by reason. And at the same time, by largely insisting
upon the principle that the Apostles’ Creed contains all necessary
points of mere belief,[457] and by the disposition which he manifested
to recognize as little doctrinal meaning upon disputed points as
possible in the articles of that early Christian confession, he not
only separated himself from Anglicans, but he separated himself from
Puritans. He was reticent upon evangelical subjects, respecting which
the latter delighted to speak; and from his desire to comprehend people
of considerable dogmatic divergency within the pale of the Church, he
incurred reproaches from those last named, and was stigmatized by them,
not only as an Arminian, but as a Socinian. No definite idea of his
opinions upon some important parts of Divine truth can be gathered from
his writings. It is plain that he loved a large liberty in all kinds
of thinking, and set a higher value upon a religious temper, a devout
spirit, a Catholic disposition, and a moral life, than upon orthodoxy
of sentiment, or forms of worship, or methods of ecclesiastical
government and discipline.
Chillingworth, a native of the City, and an ornament of the University
of Oxford, died in 1644. Eight years afterwards, the English Church
lost another Divine, an ornament of the University of Cambridge, who,
though very different in many respects from Chillingworth, may be
classed with him in the same division of liberal Divines.
[Sidenote: LIBERAL ORTHODOX.--SMITH.]
John Smith possessed a mind in which the mystical element mingled
itself with an intense energy of reflection, a habit of calm thought,
and an imagination which employed itself, not in painting individual
objects, but in dyeing, with rich tints of colour, abstract and
immutable ideas. His mental training had been in the Greek Academy.
He had long sat as a loving disciple at the feet of Plato, and had
conversed with the earlier and later Platonists. The reader of
Smith’s works will, in every page, discover traces of his peculiar
culture, as well as of his peculiar endowments. His _Select
Discourses_, published in 1660, take a wide range, embracing the
true method of attaining Divine knowledge; the errors that grow up
beside it--superstition on the one hand, atheism on the other; the
immortality of the soul, which is the subject, and the existence and
nature of God, who is the Author and object of religion; and prophecy,
which Smith treats as the way whereby revealed truth is dispensed
and conveyed, rather than as a proof whereby it is established. The
discourses upon the difference between an evangelical and legal
righteousness, upon the excellency and nobleness of true religion, and
upon a Christian’s conflict with and conquest over Satan, exhibit the
author’s characteristic views of doctrinal, ethical, and experimental
Divinity. The first only requires particular notice here. “The law was
the ministry of death, and in itself an external and lifeless thing;
neither could it procure or beget that Divine life and spiritual form
of godliness, in the souls of men, which God expects from all the
heirs of glory, nor that glory which is only consequent upon a true
Divine life.” Whereas, on the other side, the Gospel is set forth “as
a mighty efflux and emanation of life and spirit, freely issuing forth
from an omnipotent source of grace and love, as that true, God-like,
vital influence whereby the Divinity derives itself into the souls
of men, enlivening and transforming them into its own likeness, and
strongly imprinting upon them a copy of its own beauty and goodness;
like the spermatical virtue of the heavens, which spreads itself
freely upon this lower world, and, subtily insinuating itself into
this benumbed, feeble, earthly matter, begets life and motion in
it. Briefly, it is that whereby God comes to dwell in us, and we in
Him.”[458]
Particular passages may mislead as to the general character of an
author’s teaching; but there is a ring in these words, indicating at
once the kind of metal of which Smith’s theology is made. It is of the
same substance throughout. “The righteousness of faith,” he says, “and
the righteousness of God, is a Christ-like nature in a man’s soul, or
Christ appearing in the minds of men by the mighty power of His Divine
Spirit, and thereby deriving a true participation of Himself to them.”
And in accordance with this, and showing at the same time the author’s
shrinking from definite and precise forms of dogmatic statement, such
as may be found in Anglicans on the one side, and in Puritans on
the other, he observes that the Gospel “was not brought in, only to
refine some notions of truth that might formerly seem discoloured and
disfigured by a multitude of legal rites and ceremonies; it was not to
cast our opinions concerning the way of life and happiness only into a
new mould and shape in a pedagogical kind of way; it is not so much a
system and body of saving Divinity, but the spirit and vital influx of
it, spreading itself over all the powers of men’s souls, and quickening
them into a Divine life; it is not so properly a doctrine that is
wrapt up in ink and paper as it is _vitalis scientia_, a living
impression made upon the soul and spirit.”[459] Another name challenges
attention.
The ever-memorable John Hales, pronounced by Pearson to have had “as
great a sharpness, quickness, and subtlety of wit as ever this or
perhaps any nation bred,” had been a Calvinist; but he said, that at
the Synod of Dort, which he attended, he bid John Calvin good-night.
He had certainly what might be termed very broad views of Christian
faith; for he remarked, “The Church is like Amphiaraus, she hath no
device, no word in her shield; mark and essence with her are all one,
and she hath no other note but to be.”[460] This was a statement which
removed him to an equal distance from both Anglicans and Puritans; and
one sentence from a sermon by Hales is sufficient to show how widely
his teaching as to the way of salvation differed from all preachers
of the latter class. “The water of baptism, and the tears of true
repentance, creatures of themselves weak and contemptible, yet through
the wonderful operation of the grace of God annext unto them, are able,
were our sins as red as twice-dyed scarlet, to make them as white as
snow.”[461] Hales was as orthodox as a man could be on the subject of
the Trinity;[462] and, in his masterly sermon on Christian omnipotency,
plainly asserts the power and sufficiency of Divine grace.[463]
[Sidenote: LIBERAL ORTHODOX.--FARINDON.]
Hales died in 1656, and was followed to the grave two years afterwards
by his attached friend Anthony Farindon, both of them being members
of the University of Oxford. Farindon was far more evangelical than
Hales and Chillingworth. He had not the mystical turn of mind which
is so marked in John Smith, nor was he so manifestly a Platonist.
Altogether his habits of thought are much more on a level with common
understandings.
The distance which severed Farindon from the Anglicans comes out in
the following passage:--“And now, if we look into the Church, we shall
find that most men stand in need of a ‘yea, rather.’ ... _Felix
sacramentum!_ ‘Blessed sacrament of baptism!’ ... It is true; but
there is ... ‘Yea, rather; blessed are they that have put on Christ.’
‘Blessed sacrament of the Lord’s Supper.’ It is true; but, ‘Yea,
rather; blessed are they that dwell in Christ.’ ‘Blessed profession
of Christianity!’ ‘Yea, rather; blessed are they that are Christ’s.’
‘Blessed cross!’ The Fathers call it so. ‘Yea, rather; blessed are
they that have crucified their flesh, with the affections and lusts.’
‘Blessed Church!’ ‘Yea, rather; blessed are they who are members of
Christ.’ ‘Blessed Reformation!’ ‘Yea, rather; blessed are they that
reform themselves.’”[464]
Nor is the distinction between Farindon and the Puritans much less
visible, when he remarks, with regard to the act of justification,
“What mattereth it whether I believe or not believe, know or not
know, that our justification doth consist in one or more acts, so
that I certainly know and believe that it is the greatest blessing
that God can let fall upon His creature, and believe that by it I am
made acceptable in His sight, and, though I have broken the law,
yet shall be dealt with as if I had been just and righteous indeed?
whether it be done by pardoning all my sins, or imputing universal
obedience to me, or the active and passive obedience of Christ?”
“And as in justification, so in the point of faith by which we are
justified, what profit is there so busily to inquire whether the nature
of faith consisteth in an obsequious assent, or in the appropriation
of the grace and mercy of God, or in a mere fiducial apprehension and
application of the merits of Christ?”[465] It would be difficult to
point out, in the writings of this theologian, a precise definition
either of justification or of faith, and equally difficult to point
out any statement adverse to those views of salvation by grace in
which all evangelic Christians agree. He finds fault with Augustine
for confounding justification with sanctification, and separates
himself from the Anglican, though not so widely as from the Romanist,
when he stigmatizes as “an unsavoury tenet” the doctrine, “that
justification is not a pronouncing, but a making one righteous; that
inherent holiness is the formal cause of justification; and that we
may redeem our sins, and purchase forgiveness, by fasting, almsdeeds,
and other good works.” Deficient in definiteness upon these points,
Farindon is clear in reference to the Trinity, the Incarnation, and
the Atonement. He expounds them in an orthodox way, yet he does not
dwell upon them so frequently, and at such length, as his Anglican
and Puritan contemporaries. He is no Calvinist; without entering into
lengthened controversy on the five points, he shows his great dislike
to Calvin’s views.[466] He holds decidedly that Christ died for all
men; and with caustic reasoning, shows that, when it is said, “God
so loved the world,” it cannot mean, He so loved the elect.[467] His
Arminianism is perhaps nearly, if not quite, as evangelical as that of
our Wesleyan brethren, but he lacks the fervour with which they set
forth the verities of Christianity in relation to the deepest wants of
man. Puritans could scarcely apply the moral lessons of the Gospel to
the hearts of men on grounds more evangelic than those presented by
Farindon; but we miss in his sermons a penetrating fire like that of
John Owen, and a melting pathos like that of Richard Baxter.
[Sidenote: CAMBRIDGE SCHOOL.]
The way is now open for viewing that division of thinkers who
distinguished themselves, after the Restoration, by the breadth of
their opinions. They followed in the steps of those whom we have now
described, but in some particulars they went far beyond them. In a
former volume I touched upon the Cambridge school of theologians; it
remains for me to trace the subsequent development and progress of
their peculiarities. They early received the name of Latitudinarians,
and in 1662 their name had passed into everybody’s mouth, although its
explicit meaning, it was said, remained as great a mystery as the order
of the Rosicrucians. Some spoke of them as holding dangerous opinions,
others defended them; but all which people in general knew seemed to be
that the new school of thinkers mostly belonged to the University of
Cambridge, and that they mostly followed the new philosophy.
A contemporary--one of their number--describes them in the first place
as attached to the liturgy of the Church of England; and as admiring
its solemnity, gravity, and primitive simplicity, together with its
freedom both from affected phrases, and from any mixture of vain
and doubtful opinions. They also, he says, believed “that it is the
greatest check to devotion which can be, to hear men mix their private
opinions with their public prayers,”--and they expressed themselves
strongly against extempore devotions. As for rites and ceremonies,
they approved what is called “the virtuous mediocrity of the Reformed
Episcopal Church,” between the “meretricious gaudiness” of Rome, and
“the squalid sluttery” of the fanatics. They contended that “so long as
we live in this region of mortality, we must make use of such external
helps” as the Church has thought fitted for the ends of worship.
According to the same authority, they were averse to Presbyterianism
and to Independency; and were decided supporters of Episcopal order. As
for the doctrines of the Church, the Latitudinarians cordially adhered
to the Thirty-nine Articles, to the three Creeds, and to any doctrine
held by the Church, “unless absolute reprobation be one, which they do
not think themselves bound to believe.” Great reverence is attributed
to them, for the genuine monuments of the ancient Fathers, those
especially of the first and purest age; and the writer then meets the
charge of their hearkening too much to reason. For reason, he says,
“is that faculty, whereby a man must judge of everything; nor can a
man believe anything except he have some reason for it, whether that
reason be a deduction from the light of nature, and those principles
which are the candle of the Lord, set up in the soul of every man that
hath not wilfully extinguished it, or a branch of Divine revelation
in the oracles of Holy Scripture; or the general interpretation of
genuine antiquity, or the proposal of our own Church consentaneous
thereto; or lastly, the result of some or all of these: for he that
will rightly make use of his reason, must take all that is reasonable
into consideration. And it is admirable to consider how the same
conclusions do naturally flow from all these several principles; and
what in the faithful use of the faculties that God hath given, men have
believed for true, doth excellently agree with that revelation that
God hath exhibited in the Scripture, and the doctrine of the ancient
Church with them both. Thus the freedom of our wills, the universal
intent of Christ’s death, and sufficiency of God’s grace, the condition
of justification, and many other points of the like nature, which have
been almost exploded in these latter degenerate ages of the world, do
again begin to obtain, though with different persons upon different
accounts: some embrace them for their evidence in Scripture, others
for the concurrent testimony of the primitive Church for above four
hundred years; others for the reasonableness of the things themselves,
and their agreement both with the Divine attributes, and the easy
suggestions of their own minds. Nor is there any point in Divinity,
where that which is most ancient doth not prove the most rational, and
the most rational the ancientest; for there is an eternal consanguinity
between all verity; and nothing is true in Divinity, which is false
in Philosophy, or on the contrary; and therefore what God hath joined
together, let no man put asunder.”[468]
[Sidenote: CAMBRIDGE SCHOOL.]
The account is that of a partizan, who evidently wishes to make
Latitudinarianism stand well in the estimation of all sorts of
Churchmen; and therefore he strives to paint its teachers in colours
of orthodoxy, and he charily remarks that they will be “generally
suspected to be for liberty of conscience.”
Baxter, in 1665, speaks of the same school, as Platonists, or
Cartesians, and of many of them as Arminians, with this addition, that
they had more charitable thoughts than others of the salvation of
heathens and infidels; and that some of them agreed in the opinions
of Origen, about the pre-existence of souls.[469] Burnet says that
they “read Episcopius much,”[470] respecting whose works Thorndike
affirmed, that in them “the faith of the Holy Trinity is made an
indifferent thing,” and the doctrine of original sin is “turned out of
doors,”[471]--a sweeping accusation which has been called in question,
yet it would be difficult to establish the orthodoxy of Episcopius
on the Trinity, in the sense attached to that term by writers like
Thorndike. No doubt there were heterodox tendencies in the writings
of Episcopius and his school; but in this respect some of the later
Remonstrants went beyond their master.
[Sidenote: FOWLER.]
The writer who most fully expounded the tenets of the Latitudinarians
as a whole was Edward Fowler, who hesitated to conform in 1662, but who
became afterwards Rector of Allhallows, Bread Street, and finally was
elevated to the see of Gloucester. In his work _On the Principles and
Practices of Certain Moderate Divines of the Church of England_,
published in 1679, he professes truly to represent and defend them, and
every page bears witness to the fact of their having been adopted by
this author. He strongly maintains the eternal and immutable grounds
of morality, against the pernicious principle which had been urged by
some Calvinists, that the entire basis of virtue is to be found in the
will of God, and vindicates the prominence given by the new teachers to
the reasonableness of Christianity. Though the supernatural origin of
the Gospel, and the Divine authority of its doctrines, are implied, and
even distinctly acknowledged in the volume, yet the impression given by
it altogether is such as to place the duty of accepting Christianity
mainly upon the ground of its being a rational system. The production
of faith is described as a process of reasoning, with regard to which
the inward testimony of the Spirit is resolved “ordinarily” into a
blessing on the use of means, _i.e._, the consideration of the
motives He hath given us to believe.[472]
Another passage may be quoted, indicating the view of the writer upon a
question which proves a touchstone of theological sentiment.
The Latitudinarians “are very careful so to handle the doctrine
of justifying faith, as not only to make obedience to follow it,
but likewise to include a hearty willingness to submit to all
Christ’s precepts in the nature of it; and to show the falsity and
defectiveness of some descriptions of faith, that have had too general
an entertainment, and still have. This they look upon themselves
as greatly obliged to do, as being well aware, of what dangerous
consequence some received notions of that grace are, and that not a few
that have imbibed them, have so well understood their true and natural
inferences, as to be thereby encouraged to let the reins loose to all
ungodliness.”[473]
Fowler affirms that those who are sincerely righteous, and from an
inward living principle allow themselves in no known sin, nor in
the neglect of any known duty, which is to be truly, evangelically
righteous, shall be dealt with and rewarded, in and through Christ,
as if they were perfectly and in a strict legal sense so. Entering
essentially into Fowler’s notion of faith is the idea of its being the
germ of Christian virtue: and, as it regards the connection between
faith and justification, he believes that the receiving of Christ
as Lord is a prerequisite to the obtaining of Christ as Redeemer.
He defines justifying faith in these words:--“A grace of the Holy
Spirit, whereby a man being convinced of his sin and miserable estate
in regard of it, and an all-sufficiency in Christ to save from both,
receives Him as He is tendered in the Gospel, or according to his three
offices of Prophet, Priest, and King;” and,--which is important to
the understanding of Fowler’s views,--he adds, “That act of receiving
Christ as Lord, is to go before that of receiving Him as a Priest;
for we may not rely upon Him for salvation, till we are willing to
yield obedience to Him.”[474] In all this, and in much more, may
be recognized a striving after some way of thoroughly meeting the
two sides of that redemption from evil, which in the Gospel is ever
represented as one. Whilst some theologians made holiness the result
of faith in a Divine salvation, which salvation was treated by them
as identical with justification, and others considered holiness as
an essential part of it,--Fowler leaned in the direction of making
holiness the means of salvation; and the tendency to adopt a _via
media_ further appears in his attempt to steer a middle course
between Calvinism and Arminianism:--He remarks, “That there is such
a thing as distinguishing grace, whereby some persons are absolutely
elected, by virtue whereof they shall be (having potent and infallible
means prepared for them) irresistibly saved. But that others, that are
not in the number of those singular and special favourites, are not
at all in a desperate condition, but have sufficient means appointed
for them to qualify them for greater or less degrees of happiness, and
have sufficient grace offered to them some way or other, and some time
or other; and are in a capacity of salvation either greater or less,
through the merits of Jesus Christ; and that none of them are damned,
but those that wilfully refuse to co-operate with that grace of God,
and will not act in some moral suitableness to that power they have
received.”[475]
[Sidenote: FOWLER.]
Universal redemption,--by which is signified the universal
applicability of our Lord’s atoning sacrifice,--is strenuously
maintained by this Divine;[476] and he speaks hopefully of the future
state, through Christ, of virtuous heathens.
Passing to Church questions, the same writer expresses a preference
for Episcopacy, but does not unchurch unepiscopal societies; he
holds Erastian views of the power of the civil magistrate; and
strangely denies, that liberty of conscience forms a part of Christian
liberty. He would concede to every man liberty of opinion, but not
the liberty of persuading others to adopt his opinion; so that this
scheme, ecclesiastically considered, runs at last into the doctrine
of intolerance. Throughout Fowler’s works an anti-Puritan feeling
is predominant; and his allusions to Nonconformists are by no means
friendly.[477]
Wilkins, the moderate and liberal Bishop of Chester, belonged to
the same class with Fowler. Known chiefly by his scientific works,
he, nevertheless, deserves notice as one of the early defenders of
natural religion against the attacks and the innuendoes of sceptics
and infidels. The authors who have been just mentioned passed over
the evidences of religion and plunged at once into the discussion of
doctrines; but Wilkins saw that there is much outside Christianity
which needed defence, for the subsequent preservation of the palladium
of the faith. He is to be reckoned amongst the first to expound those
more general and fundamental truths which, in the next century,
occupied so much attention, and were esteemed bulwarks of revelation.
He wrote upon the principles and duties of natural religion; but
only twelve chapters of the book on the subject were completed by
himself; the rest being prepared from the Bishop’s MSS., by his
friend Tillotson. Cumberland’s _De legibus Naturæ Disquisitio
Philosophica_ (1672) is scarcely a theological treatise, it being a
pioneer in the dangerous region of utilitarian ethics; but Cumberland
may properly be reckoned as belonging to the Latitudinarians, for his
speculations are more or less intimately related to what is generally
regarded as the religion of nature in its alliance with the religion of
revelation.
[Sidenote: CUDWORTH.]
A chief--if not the very first place--amongst the opponents of atheism
and immorality, must be adjudged to Ralph Cudworth, whose learning
and ability have reflected so much lustre on the Cambridge school.
His _Intellectual System_ is left unfinished, and reminds us of
costly preparations for palatial buildings which have never risen
above a few layers of marble blocks. With such a comparison, however,
a contrast is suggested; for whilst the substructions referred to, may
be monuments of the folly, condemned in the Gospel, of him who begins
to build and is not able to finish,--Cudworth’s treatise shows it was
from no want of power that he left his work incomplete. Of the five
chapters of the first and only book of the _Intellectual System_,
the fourth and fifth are by very far the longest, and these are devoted
to Theology. It comes not within my province to make an attempt at
deciding upon the place of honour due to Cudworth in the temple of
fame, to report his speculations, or to repeat his critical estimates
of different philosophers; my duty is simply to call attention to the
two chapters, in which he ventures to trace a resemblance between the
Trinity of Plato and the Trinity of Scripture, and argues also against
Atheism. Respecting the latter, Cudworth had stated in his second
chapter, the various reasonings of the ancient fatalists, whose system
he characterized as “a gigantical and titanical attempt to dethrone
the Deity,”--“Atheism openly swaggering under the glorious appearance
of wisdom and philosophy.” In the fourth chapter, where he speaks of
the Trinity, he explains Platonic ideas, attempting to show, that
notwithstanding the difference between them and the ideas in Scripture,
the three hypostases of the Platonists were Homoousian, Coessential,
and Consubstantial. He touches upon the opinions of the Fathers, and
expounds the views of Athanasius, who supposes that the three Divine
hypostases “make up one entire Divinity, after the same manner as the
fountain and the stream make up one entire river; or the root, and
the stock, and the branches, one entire tree.” Cudworth contends that
the Christian Trinity, though a mystery, is more agreeable to reason
than the Platonic; and that there is no absurdity at all in supposing
“the pure soul and body of the Messiah to be made a living temple or
Shechinah-image or statue of the Deity.”[478] The bent of the author’s
mind, and the tendency of the school to which he belonged, is seen
throughout this part of his design, which is not to place the doctrine
of the Trinity on a scriptural basis, but to establish and illustrate
its perfect reasonableness, and to point out coincidences between it
and some of the best guesses, or most satisfactory conclusions, of
thinkers who never enjoyed the advantages of revelation. In harmony
with this, is the fact of his noting, in the midst of his speculations,
the following errors:--“The first, of those who make Christianity
nothing but an Antinomian Plot against real righteousness, and, as
it were, a secret confederacy with the Devil. The second, of those
who turn that into matter of mere notion and opinion, dispute and
controversy, which was designed by God only as a contrivance, machine,
or engine to bring men effectually to a holy and godly life.”[479]
[Sidenote: CUDWORTH.]
The fifth chapter is devoted to “a particular confutation of all the
atheistic grounds,” which confutation covers 270 folio pages. The two
principal objections which he combats are, that, either men have no
idea of God at all, or else, none but such as is compounded and made up
of impossible and contradictory notions; whence these Atheists would
infer Him to be an inconceivable nothing, and that, as nothing could
come from nothing, it may be concluded, that whatever substantially
or really is, was from all eternity of itself unmade, or uncreated by
any Deity. The answering of these objections--in a course of argument
which combines great learning with metaphysical acuteness--leads
Cudworth to introduce proofs of the Divine existence drawn from final
causes, as in the subjoined passage, which is quoted as one of the
most familiar and popular forms of reasoning to be found in this
recondite treatise:--“It is no more possible, that the fortuitous
motion of dead and senseless matter, should ever from itself be taught
and necessitated to produce such an orderly and regular system as the
frame of this whole world is, together with the bodies of animals, and
constantly to continue the same; than that a man perfectly illiterate
and neither able to write nor read, taking up a pen into his hand, and
making all manner of scrawls, with ink upon paper, should at length be
taught and necessitated by the thing itself, to write a whole quire of
paper together, with such characters, as being decyphered by a certain
key, would all prove coherent philosophic sense.” Or to take another
instance:--“This is no more possible than that ten or a dozen persons,
altogether unskilled in music, having several instruments given them,
and striking the strings or keys thereof, any how as it happened,
should, after some time of discord and jarring, at length be taught and
necessitated, to fall into most exquisite harmony, and continue the
same uninterruptedly for several hours together.”[480]
Cudworth directed his studies chiefly to the foundations of religion
and morality. Neither from his published works, nor, it would appear,
from his unpublished MSS., in the British Museum, can any definite
system of Biblical doctrine be gathered. The general colouring of his
theological views, however, may be inferred from the very title of one
of his printed treatises: “_Deus Justificatus_; or the Divine
Goodness vindicated and cleared against the assertors of absolute and
inconditionate Reprobation.”
[Sidenote: CAMBRIDGE.--CRITICS.]
Edward Stillingfleet, who has claimed our attention both as a healer
and a stirrer up of strife, although not a doctrinal controversialist,
demands some notice as a writer on Christian evidences. His broad
and moderate churchmanship at the period of the Restoration, and
his sympathy also at that time with the Latitudinarian Divines of
Cambridge,--where he was educated and obtained a Fellowship at St.
John’s in 1653,--entitle him to a place amongst them in the early
part of his life.[481] It was in the year 1662, that he published his
“_Origines Sacræ_; or Rational Account of the Christian Faith,
as to the Truth and Divine Authority of the Scripture.” His learning,
acuteness, logical ability, and lawyer-like habit of thought eminently
fitted him for controversy, and these talents are signally displayed
in the book now mentioned. The first part is occupied with an exposure
of the obscurity, defect, and uncertainty of heathen histories, and of
heathen chronology. In the treatment of this subject, he so completely
undermines the credibility of all ancient history, except what is in
Scripture, that he unwittingly precludes the proper use of the former
in certain instances as a corroboration of the latter. He does not with
thorough care distinguish between insufficiency and a complete want of
authority. In the second book, he dwells on the knowledge, fidelity,
and integrity of Moses; and upon the proofs of a Divine inspiration of
the prophets from the fulfilment of their prophecies; but in this part
of his work, he does not so much anticipate the details of the modern
argument, as unfold the principles upon which he conceived the argument
should rest. The evidence from miracles is also exhibited. The third
book, to which the title of _Origines_ particularly points, treats
of the being of God, and the origin of the universe,--of evil--of the
nations of the earth--and of the Heathen Mythology. In connection with
the origin of nations, he vindicates the Scripture history of the
Deluge, and falls into harmony with modern geologists, by confessing
that he sees no necessity from Scripture, to assert, that the flood
spread itself over the whole surface of the earth.[482]
Before proceeding further with the current of theological opinion, let
me pause for a moment to mention the names of men who, in the service
of Biblical learning, may perhaps be justly classed with the Divines
now under review. Lightfoot, the Erastian, published, between 1644 and
1664, a Harmony of the Gospels, a Commentary upon the Acts, and Notes
upon St. Paul’s Epistles to the Romans and Corinthians, besides _Horæ
Hebraicæ, et Talmudicæ_, and other Exercitations of a similar kind.
All his books exhibit Rabbinical lore applied to the elucidation of the
Holy Scriptures; and he is not only the first of our English Divines to
break up new ground decidedly and extensively in this field, but he
actually tills the soil to such a degree, that none of his successors
in the same path of industry are equal to this master-workman. Besides
his own volumes, he has contributed to the interests of Biblical
scholarship, by largely assisting Walton in his Polyglott, and Poole in
his Synopsis.
Simon Patrick--numbered by Burnet among the Latitudinarians--wrote
Commentaries upon the Old Testament, as far as the Book of
Esther,--these were published between the years 1694 and 1705,--but at
an earlier date, between 1678 and 1681, he wrote Paraphrases of Job
and the Psalms, of Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the Song of Solomon. He
united reverence with learning, and brevity with accuracy; and avoiding
the method of citing a number of opinions, which only perplex the
reader, he gives his own in a style which is clear, and with arguments
which are forcible.[483]
There is another person entitled to honourable mention, which perhaps
may be as fittingly introduced here as anywhere: for, though he cannot
be identified with the Latitudinarian school, neither can he in any
proper sense be pronounced either Anglican or Puritan. Dr. James Ussher
occupies a niche of his own in the temple of theological literature.
His broad sympathies seem to fix his place at least near to those
scholars who have just been described. As to time, his publications
take their place between the beginning of the works of Lightfoot and
the beginning of the works of Patrick. Ussher differed from them both.
He was far superior to the last in learning; but I should infer, from
what is said of him, that in some respects--certainly in the Rabbinical
department of study--he was inferior to Lightfoot as a Biblical critic.
In the learning which relates to sacred chronology he had no rival.
[Sidenote: CAMBRIDGE.--SCIENCE.]
At the close of this chapter, in which so much has been said respecting
the free thought of the Cambridge school, and just as we are on the
point of noticing its wider developments, I would seize the opportunity
of saying a few words in relation to views of science entertained by
more advanced theological inquirers. Aristotle remained a favourite
philosophical teacher with the supporters of old-fashioned orthodoxy.
The “new learning,” as the investigation of physical phenomena after
the Baconian method, came to be termed, inspired an immense degree of
suspicion in the minds of a large number of clergymen, who fancied
they could detect in it tendencies to Popery, or Socinianism,--they
scarcely knew which; and the infant Royal Society, then beginning “to
knock at the door where truth was to be found, although it was left for
Newton to force it open,”[484] expressed a good deal of indignation
on account of its supposed arrogance. It received such treatment as
falls to the lot of a pert and conceited child, and old people shook
their heads as they prognosticated the end of such folly after a little
experience. Gunning, Bishop of Ely, Barlow, Bishop of Lincoln, and
South, when orator at the University of Oxford, denounced these new
studies as most mischievous; and Henry Stubbe, an intense admirer of
Aristotle, raved against the scientific associates with a violence
which was perfectly absurd.[485] That jealousy of science, which is
not yet extinguished, then burnt with greater fury than it does now;
and the Divines who united the inductive study of nature with the more
immediate duties of their profession, had to sustain the brunt of a
fierce battle. Seth Ward, Bishop of Salisbury, and Wilkins, Bishop
of Chester, whilst theologically at variance, were scientifically in
unison, and occupied the front rank in the clerical army on the side of
intellectual advancement. But the person most zealous and laborious in
the defence of the new philosophy was Joseph Glanvill, Rector of Bath,
and Chaplain in Ordinary to Charles II., a writer of great ability, who
had at his command a racy vigorous English style. It is amusing to find
him employing the doctrine of a pre-existence of souls as the key to
unlock the grand mysteries of Providence, and defending the possibility
and real existence of witches and apparitions; still more amusing to be
told by him that Adam needed neither spectacles nor telescope, for his
naked eyes saw as much of the celestial world as we can discover with
all the advantages of art.[486] Nevertheless the tone of his philosophy
on the whole was decidedly sceptical; more so than Descartes, more so
than Malebranche.
[Sidenote: CAMBRIDGE.--SCIENCE.]
Glanvill, who was a Fellow of the Royal Society, and acted as its
Secretary, described and vindicated its character and proceedings, as a
noble institution, vouchsafed to the modern world for the communication
and increase of knowledge, according to the pregnant suggestion of
Lord Bacon, that many heads and hands should unite in making and
recording scientific observations, thus gathering up the facts which
lie scattered in “the vast champaign of nature,” and bringing them
into a common store.[487] But a notice of the way in which Glanvill
defended the religious temper and tendencies of the experimental
philosophy is more to our purpose; and I may, therefore, state that
he executed his task in an ingenious and lively performance which is
well worth the attention of certain people in the present day. He shows
that God is to be praised in all His works--that His works are to be
studied by those that would praise Him for them--that the study of
nature in relation to God is very serviceable to religion--and that
the ministers and professors of religion ought not to discourage, but
promote the knowledge of the ways and works of its Author. He not only
points out the connection between science and natural religion, but
proves how true philosophy may be a friend of revelation, since it is
a maxim of reason, that whatsoever God saith is to be believed, though
we cannot apprehend the manner of it or tell how the thing should
be.[488] No heterodoxy lurked under the advocacy of this scientific
Divine, for he applied his principle to the Trinity and Incarnation,
as being defensible on the same grounds as the existence of matter
and motion. He moves nearer to the controversies of our own time, and
indeed takes up a position in the midst of existing strifes, when he
challenges the imputation, that philosophy teaches doctrines contrary
to the Word of God. He meets it by saying, philosophy teaches many
things which are not revealed in Scripture, for the design of Scripture
is to teach religion, not science; no tenet ought to be exploded
because some statements in the Divine oracles seem not to comport with
it, natural objects being popularly described in the Old Testament;
and the free experimental philosophy which the author pursued, and
undertook to recommend, ventured, he said, on no peremptory and
dogmatical assertions opposed to Divine authority, but confined itself
to probabilities, where religion and the Scriptures are not at all
concerned.[489] In many of his remarks, Glanvill anticipates the line
of defence adopted by modern religious philosophers; and whilst he
evinces a freedom of inquiry into natural phenomena which proves that
he had burst the trammels of ancient prejudices, he also indicates a
profound reverence for the Bible, and never allows his scepticism to
utter a syllable inconsistent with belief in Divine revelation. I may
add, that he published a discourse upon the agreement between reason
and religion, against infidelity, scepticism, and fanaticisms of all
sorts. It is apparent, from what he says, that he had no sympathy with
Puritanism, but he had a great respect for Richard Baxter.
CHAPTER XVI.
The term Latitudinarian, both as a term of praise and a term of
reproach, intended by friends to signify that a man was liberal,
intended by enemies to denote that he was heterodox, came to be applied
to thinkers holding very different opinions. Amongst the Divines, often
placed under the generic denomination, very considerable diversities of
sentiment existed. Indeed, the name is so loosely used as to be given
to some persons whose orthodoxy is above all just suspicion--to others
not only verging upon but deeply involved in considerable error. When
we examine the essence of Latitudinarianism, and find that it consisted
in the elevation of morals above dogmas, in the assertion of charity
against bigotry, in abstinence from a curious prying into mysteries,
yet in the culture of a spirit of free investigation, we see that
there might be lying concealed under much which is truly excellent,
elements of a different description. Scepticism might nestle under
all this virtue, and all this tolerance--under this love of what is
reasonable, and this habit of liberal inquiry. Faith, in that which is
most precious, might live in amicable alliance with the distinctive
Latitudinarian temper, or scepticism might secretly nestle beneath its
wings.
From the beginning of the movement, some who took part in it,
betrayed a want of sympathy in those strong Gospel convictions, which
are of supreme importance, and in connection with it there were
entertained, at an early period of its history, curious speculations
respecting the pre-existence of souls, the salvation of the heathen,
and the state of the body at the resurrection. Though some of these
speculations were only fanciful, and others were capable of an orthodox
construction, they certainly indicated a mental tendency very apt to
resent the restraints of the Church’s faith, and to run into devious,
if not dangerous paths. It was more than possible for this habit of
rational and free inquiry to slip from under the control of its better
principles, and to assume forms of even a disastrous kind.
[Sidenote: LATITUDINARIANISM.]
We cannot help recognizing in the movement, one wave amongst many then
foaming and breaking over the wide ocean of human thought. Resistance
to the strict Calvinistic theory appeared and increased in the French
Protestant Church. In the academy of Saumur speculations were rife,
undermining the doctrines of imputation and original sin, and pointing
to the idea of universal grace.[490] A similar tendency existed in
Switzerland, not so manifest but yet operative; for the _Formula
Consensus_ adopted in 1675 to exclude Divines, who were not sound
in the faith of Geneva, met with violent opposition, and had to be
softened down, and explained away. Against orthodox Lutheranism, as
expounded in its symbolical books, there had appeared in Germany,
in the first half of the century, a scheme in support of union and
toleration resting on the basis of the Apostles’ Creed, such a
proposal being pronounced by opponents to be _Syncretism_ or a
“_Lying medley_;” and in the second half of the same century may
be traced the rise of Pietism under Spener, who, although an orthodox
believer, exalted spiritual life above theological belief.[491]
Even the Roman Catholic Church throbbed with inquisitive impulses
perilous to the blind rule which it upheld. The theology of Jansenism,
whilst, under one aspect, it appears as an assertion of orthodox
Augustinianism,--under another aspect reveals itself as a protest
against authority; and the sentiment of Quietism, with its spiritual
ardour, tended to the depreciation of what is dogmatical. The Port
Royalists and Madame Guyon were, in fact, falling into a current which
they did not comprehend. Biblical criticism was looking the same
way. It carried in its bosom elements both of faith and scepticism.
Inquiries into the state of the sacred text alarmed many of the
learned and the good; and Hermeneutical Canons were being followed,
which, while soundly Protestant, imperilled ideas venerable for their
antiquity.[492] Historical criticism exposed ancient falsehoods. The
spuriousness of the Isidorian Decretals, for ages the stronghold of
Papal despotism, was demonstrated by the Protestant Controversialist
Blondel, and was acknowledged even by the Catholic Canonist Contius.
The abandonment of the scholastic method of reasoning, the triumph of
modern philosophy in the Universities of Europe, the formation of a
fresh secular literature, and the critical study of history in general,
with the explosion of old fables and superstitions, were all signs of
the times, conveying the impression that a new epoch was at hand in
the history of human intelligence.
Philosophy abroad placed itself at the head of these tendencies. Even
Descartes, the Christian, in seeking a basis for positive belief,
started with a doubt; Spinoza, the Jew, his disciple in some respects,
found his goal in pantheism.[493] The Malmesbury philosopher, Hobbes,
and, still earlier, Lord Herbert of Cherbury, in their free-thinking
speculations, long before any great movement took place at Cambridge,
not only laid religion open to the inroads of infidelity, but aided and
abetted attacks upon its citadel: Herbert, by denying the necessity of
a Scripture revelation, Hobbes by representing Christianity as resting
on a foundation, which no reasonable man can tolerate for a moment.
Thus widely, for good and for evil, free thought was at work in Europe.
Some saw in it a rising storm, which would tear every vessel from its
moorings; others believed it to be the breaking up of a winter’s frost,
and the melting down of icebergs, which had long chilled the whole
intellectual atmosphere. For my own part, I am convinced that there was
both evil and good in all this activity, of which the effect may be
traced in the history of intellectual inquiry ever since. It is felt
in the controversies of the present day; and he is the wise man who
strives to distinguish between the precious and the vile, to separate
the one from the other, and in the noble service of truth to abstain
from any alliance with error.
[Sidenote: MILTON’S OPINIONS.]
In this notice of the progress of free inquiry one great thinker should
be mentioned, whose fame as a poet has so eclipsed the reputation
of his genius in other respects, that he is rarely remembered in
the character of a theologian, although he really was one. In that
capacity he combined, perhaps, beyond any man of his age, peculiarities
drawn from two schools, with neither of which could he be identified.
In the very title of John Milton’s _Treatise on Christian Doctrine,
compiled from the Holy Scriptures alone_, there is a Puritan-like
renunciation of the Anglican doctrine of patristic authority: his
inquiry touches only what the Bible teaches, and he professes, as many
others have done, without allowing for educational and constitutional
influences, to draw all his conclusions immediately and impartially
from Holy Writ. He might free himself from Church trammels of all
kinds; nevertheless even he could not deliver his mind from all
predilections and prejudgments; and when in his old age he sat down to
read the Bible, Milton, no more than other men, could bring to it a
_tabula rasa_ ready to receive nothing but unbiassed impressions
from the Divine oracles.
The Latitudinarianism of Milton--how far influenced by the spirit
of free thought existing at Cambridge I cannot say--appears in his
doctrine of the Son of God; yet it modestly presents itself, and it
by no means reaches a Socinian conclusion. In contradiction to the
title of his Treatise he approaches this mysterious subject, through
the medium of certain metaphysical postulates, and teaches that the
Son, produced by generation, is neither co-eternal, nor co-essential,
and that His existence “was no less owing to the decree and will of
the Father, than His priesthood or kingly power, or His resuscitation
from the dead.” Milton overlooks, or virtually denies, the distinction
in the Nicene Creed, “begotten and not made;” when he says, “nothing
can be more evident than that God, of His own will, _created or
generated_, or produced the Son before all things;” and again,
whilst professing to discard reason in such matters, and to follow
the doctrine of Holy Scripture exclusively, he proceeds to insist
metaphysically upon the unity of God, and to confine that unity to
the nature of the Father. According to this idea, he interprets a
number of texts, respecting the union of Christ with the Father, as
meaning no more than that the Father and the Son are one in purpose.
Milton examines, _seriatim_, the texts adduced in proof of the
absolute Divinity of the Redeemer, and sets them aside one by one, with
a calmness only now and then ruffled by a slight breeze of anger--in
striking contrast with the Neptune-like storms of controversy which he
raises in most of his polemical works. The negative side of his theory
of the nature of the Son is sufficiently clear; not so the positive
side. He is not a Trinitarian. He is not a Socinian. Is he an Arian?
If so, he belongs to the class nearest to orthodoxy, for all which he
denies is the co-eternity, and the co-existence of the Son, whilst he
expressly attributes to Him, Omnipresence, Omniscience, Omnipotence,
and universal Authority, as well as Divine works, and Divine honours.
His Editor, Dr. Sumner, remarks, that Milton ascribes to the Son
as high a share of Divinity as was compatible with the denial of
his self-existence, and eternal generation, his co-equality, and
co-essentiality with the Father.[494]
Milton devotes a chapter to the doctrine of predestination, which he
defines as being not particular but universal:--none are predestinated
or elected irrespectively of character (_e.g._, Peter is not
elected as Peter, or John as John, but inasmuch as they are believers,
and continue in their belief); and thus, he says, the general decree of
election becomes personally applicable to each particular believer,
and is ratified to all who remain steadfast in the faith.
[Sidenote: MILTON’S OPINIONS.]
Milton’s sympathy with Puritanism appears in his views of redemption,
regeneration, repentance, justification, and adoption. In his chapter
on saving faith he describes it as a full persuasion produced in us
through the gift of God, whereby we believe, on the sole authority
of the promise itself, that all things are ours, whatsoever he has
promised us in Christ, and especially the grace of eternal life.[495]
The spirit of free inquiry, at a later period, ran into decided
Arianism and Socinianism: at the time of which I am now speaking,
tendencies in that direction were at work in different quarters.
When, under the Commonwealth, Philip Nye said that “to his knowledge
the denying of the Divinity of Christ was a growing opinion;”--when
Edwards said, it had found an entrance into some of the Independent
Churches;--when Owen said, “The evil is at the door, there is not a
city, a town, scarce a village in England wherein some of this poison
is not poured forth;”--these writers might be under the influence of
uncharitableness, or of false alarm--both are common in seasons of
excitement--but when Parliament resolved, in the year 1652, to seize
and burn all copies of the Racovian Catechism, that fact forces us to
conclude that the Catechism must have been in circulation, and that the
tenets which it expressed were being propagated.
John Biddle, who under the Commonwealth Government suffered much
in consequence of his opinions, may be considered the father of
Socinianism. Being a man of blameless life, the persecutions that he
underwent awaken our sympathy; and it is highly probable, that the
treatment which he received, although intended to reclaim him from
his errors, only served to drive him further from orthodoxy. He took
high ground as to free inquiry; but professed to exercise it simply
in getting at the meaning of Scripture; and he exhorted people “to
lay aside for a while, controversial writings, together with those
prejudicate opinions that have been instilled into the memory and
understanding, and closely to apply themselves to the search of the New
Testament.” At first he declared, “I believe, that our Saviour Jesus
Christ is truly God, by being truly, really, and properly united to
the only Person of the Infinite and Almighty Essence;”--this position,
instead of being employed by his opponents as an admission, sufficient
to keep him, if consistent, within the bounds of evangelical faith,
excited their suspicions, and led to fresh controversy, and fresh
persecution. Although he continued to use orthodox language, he made it
more and more a vehicle for conveying unorthodox ideas. His opinions
and modes of expression are equally peculiar.
For example, one of the positions which he lays down is this:--“I
believe that there is One principal Minister of God and Christ,
principally sent from heaven to sanctify the Church, who, by reason
of His eminency, and intimacy with God, is singled out of the number
of the other heavenly ministers, or angels, and comprised in the Holy
Trinity, being the third Person thereof, and that this Minister of God
and Christ is the Holy Spirit.” Further, he observes, “the Trinity
which the Apostle Paul believed, consisteth of One God, One Lord, and
One Spirit, but not of three Persons in One God.” And he proceeds
even to adduce the usual arguments for the personality of the Holy
Spirit:--a doctrine which he admits throughout a singular Tract,
published by him at an earlier period.
[Sidenote: BIDDLE.]
In another article of faith, he avers, “I believe that Jesus Christ,
to the intent He might be a brother, and have a fellow-feeling of our
infirmities, and so become the more ready to help us (the consideration
whereof is the greatest encouragement to piety that can be imagined),
hath no other than a human nature; and, therefore, in the very nature,
is not only a Person (since none but a human person can be our
brother), but also our Lord, yea, our God.”
His use of the word Trinity, which it seems he never dropped, he
explains by saying, that the Trinity which the Apostle Peter (Acts ii.
36) believed, consisteth of God the Father, of the Man Jesus Christ our
Lord, and of the Holy Spirit, the gift of God through our Lord Jesus
Christ.[496]
In Biddle’s Catechism, which John Owen couples with the Racovian,
and elaborately answers in his _Vindiciæ Evangelicæ_,[497] the
author so far from explaining away the language of Holy Writ, pushes
its literal interpretation, respecting one subject at least, in a
very bold, rude fashion, to such an extreme, that he attributes to
the Almighty, a bodily and visible shape, with human affections and
passions. Consequently, he objected to the terms _infinite and
incomprehensible_, as forms of speech not used in Scripture, and not
applicable to the Supreme Being. Tertullian, it may here be noticed,
ascribed corporeality to God, but he seems to have meant by it nothing
more than substance and personality.[498]
A very different man from Biddle,--one whom from his absurd manner
of talking, we should suspect had in him a touch of insanity,--was
Daniel Scargill, Fellow of Corpus Christi, Cambridge. In 1669, he
formally and publicly, before the University, recanted the following
opinions which he had formerly maintained: that all right of dominion
is founded only in power--that moral righteousness is based on the law
of the Magistrate--that the authority of Scripture rests on the same
foundation--that whatsoever the Civil Government commanded is to be
obeyed, although it may be contrary to Divine laws, and “that there is
a desirable glory in being, and in being reputed an Atheist--which I
implied when I expressly affirmed that I gloried to be an Hobbist and
an Atheist.” These retractions indicate the previous entertainment of
most extraordinary errors.
In the next chapter I shall examine the mysticism of the Quakers before
I proceed to the theology of the Puritans.
CHAPTER XVII.
George Fox was the father of Quakerism, but to William Penn belongs the
distinction of being the first logical expounder of its principles.
William Penn was the son of Admiral Penn. When only twelve years old
he began “to listen to the voice of God in his soul:” and when a
student at Oxford he suffered fines and expulsion for his incipient
Nonconformity. His father, incensed by these religious peculiarities,
turned him into the streets, but this did not in the least degree
destroy his convictions; and subsequently, European travel, and
education, which it might have been expected would dissipate his
impressions, left them as deep as ever, combined with an accession of
intelligence, and an acquisition of graceful manners which rendered him
the admiration of polite society. He had learned to handle the rapier,
with all the skill of a French gentleman, yet he remained imbued with
“a deep sense of the vanity of the world, and the irreligiousness
of its religions.” “Further,” to use his own language, “God, in His
everlasting kindness, guided my feet in the flower of my youth, when
about two-and-twenty years of age. Religion is my crime, and my
innocence,--it makes me a prisoner to malice, but my own freeman.”
When the fashionable world laughed at the rumour of the accomplished
William Penn becoming a Quaker, such ridicule did not move his purpose,
he only showed more steadfastness of conviction, and avowed his
adoption of Quaker habits by going to Court with his hat on. When the
Bishop of London menaced him with imprisonment, “My prison shall be my
grave,” the youth replied. When Charles sent Stillingfleet to talk with
him, the youthful Dissenter, through that Divine, returned an answer
to every threat--“The Tower is to me the worst argument in the world.”
This was in 1668, the year in which he published his _Truth Exalted,
or a Testimony to Rulers, Priests, and Bishops_; and the same year,
and in consequence of this same book, he was actually confined as a
prisoner within the gloomy walls of the old Norman fortress, where he
remained seven months; and where he wrote his _No Cross, No Crown,
or Several Sober Reasons against Hat Worship, Titular Respect, You
to a single person, with the Apparel and Recreations of the Times,
in Defence of the poor despised Quakers, against the practice and
objections of their adversaries_. The title is modified in later
editions.
[Sidenote: QUAKERS.--WILLIAM PENN.]
The old Admiral paid his son’s fines, and on his deathbed, in altered
tones, observed to him, “Son William, if you and your friends keep to
your plain way of preaching and living, you will make an end of the
priests.” Now possessed of his father’s fortune, he surprised people
by his religious eccentricities. “You are an ingenious gentleman,”
said a magistrate before whom he was brought, “you have a plentiful
estate, why should you render yourself unhappy by associating with
such a simple people?” “I prefer,” said he, “the honestly simple to
the ingeniously wicked;” this was in 1670, when committed to Newgate,
under the Conventicle Act, for preaching to “a riotous and seditious
assembly,”--that is to say, for preaching to a company of Friends, who
met for worship in the open-air; and from Newgate, he addressed to
Parliament and the people of England, a plea for liberty of conscience,
saying, if the efforts of the Quakers cannot obtain “the olive branch
of toleration, we bless the providence of God, resolving by patience
to outweary persecution, and by our constant sufferings, to obtain
a victory, more glorious than our adversaries can achieve by their
cruelties.”[499]
These incidents in his early life were obviously connected with his
religious opinions. Far less imbued with the element of mysticism
than was the founder of the sect, this eminent disciple appears no
less earnest in the advocacy of his opinions; and he works them out
with a facility of reasoning, a compass of knowledge, and a force
and glow of diction, in which the reader cannot but recognize, in
connection with his natural ability, the fruits of his Oxford culture.
A comparison between the writings of Fox and Penn, as it regards mental
peculiarities, is interesting and instructive, showing the original
and creative genius of the one, and the effect of academical training
upon the other: in the enjoyment of a spiritual education, not of this
world, they were much alike.
The fundamental principle of Quaker theology is found in the doctrine
of the inward light; and to the exposition and establishment of that
doctrine, William Penn devotes himself in his work, entitled _The
Christian a Quaker_ (1674). He explains the light as being not
something metaphorical, nor yet the mere spirit or reason of man, but
Christ, “that glorious Sun of Righteousness and heavenly luminary
of the intellectual or invisible world, represented of all outward
resemblances, most exactly by the great sun of this sensible and
visible world; that as this natural light ariseth upon all, and
gives light to all about the affairs of this life, so that Divine
light ariseth upon all and gives light to all that will receive the
manifestations of it about the concerns of the other life.” That light
manifests sin, and reveals duty. It saved from Adam’s day, through
the holy patriarchs’ and prophets’ time down to Christ; amongst the
Jews as proved from Scripture, amongst the Gentiles, as proved from
their own literature. Under this division, Penn quotes largely from
the _Stromata_ of Clement of Alexandria, adopting his quotations
as genuine and trustworthy. The primitive Fathers expressed themselves
in accordance with this doctrine; and amongst the heathen there were
men of virtuous lives, who taught the indispensableness of virtue to
life eternal. The author contends that the latter foresaw the coming
of Christ, and curiously adds, that their refusing to swear proves the
sufficiency of the inward light.[500] In the support of these opinions,
Penn appeals to the authority of Scripture, and employs a large amount
of general reasoning.
[Sidenote: QUAKERS.--WILLIAM PENN.]
Although the inward light be _the_ rule,[501] Holy Scripture is _a_
rule, and one authoritative and binding on those who possess it. Hence,
whilst ever appealing to reason in his theological arguments, Penn
habitually refers to Scripture as an inspired revelation from God, of
great importance in determining religious controversy. The distinction
which he makes, and the place which he assigns to the Bible had better
be given in his own words:--“_A_ rule, and _the_ rule are two things.
By _the_ rule of faith and practice I understand the living, spiritual,
immediate, Omnipresent, discovering, ordering Spirit of God; and by _a_
rule I apprehend some instrument, by and through which, this great
and universal rule may convey its directions. Such a subordinate,
secondary, and declaratory rule, we never said several parts of
Scripture were not, yet we confess the reason of our obedience is not
merely because they are there written (for that were legal) but because
they are the eternal precepts of the Spirit in men’s consciences,
there repeated and declared.”[502] This is the key which unlocks
Penn’s theological system; and it is remarkable, how the controversy
between the old Quakers and their contemporaries, turned mainly upon
a question, agitated in the present day by thinkers very unlike the
Quakers in many respects.
The two rules thus defined were regarded by this writer as requiring
the rejection of the Anglican doctrine of the Trinity, and of the
Puritan doctrines respecting Christ’s Atonement, as a satisfaction
offered to God, and respecting the imputation of Christ’s
righteousness.[503]
In consequence of what he said touching the Trinity, Penn was charged
with not believing in the Divinity of Christ, and indeed was sent to
prison on that account; but he clearly avows in his apology, entitled,
_Innocency with her Open Face_, that Christ is God; for, he
observes, if none can save or be properly styled a Saviour, but God,
and yet Christ is said to save, and is properly called a Saviour, it
must needs follow that Christ the Saviour is God. The strongest passage
I have noticed in the writings of Penn in relation to the atonement is
the following:--“That as there was a necessity that ‘One should die for
the people,’ so, whoever, then or since, believed in Him, had and have
a seal or confirmation of the remission of their sins in His blood;
and that blood--alluding to the custom of the Jewish sacrifices--shall
be an utter blotting out of former iniquities, carrying them as into a
land of forgetfulness.”
The prominence which this Quaker Divine justly gave to the truth, that
Christ saves _from_ sin, is not associated with such ideas of
justification as accord with Puritan standards. According to his own
view, holiness is an integral part of that justification, which he
seems to identify with man’s entire salvation.[504]
Penn, no doubt, misunderstood both Anglicans and Puritans, and in some
cases his disputes turned very much upon the meaning of words, yet
no one who attentively studies his works, can help seeing that there
were real and momentous differences between the Quakers and their
fellow Christians. Quakers, absorbed by their inward experiences, did
not attach the importance which is due to the historical and dogmatic
instructions of the sacred volume. Not that Quakers denied what is
historical, but they often, like early mystical expositors--Origen, for
example--overlaid it with fanciful meanings. Not that they neglected
all dogmatic teaching, but they failed to bring out clearly some of the
truths revealed in the New Testament, especially in the writings of the
Apostle Paul. The bright side of Quakerism lies in the marked elevation
of the moral above the intellectual, of the spiritual above the formal,
of the Divine above the human, of the work of God above the work of
man: and it is as a corollary from the master principle of the whole
system, the principle of the inner light, rather than as a deduction
from reason or from expediency, or even from Scripture, that there is
contained in Quaker literature such a distinct enunciation of men’s
right, universally, to the freedom of religious speech and of religious
worship.[505]
[Sidenote: QUAKERS.--WILLIAM PENN.]
Liberty, in William Penn’s estimation, was identical with Christianity.
Persecution he held to be thoroughly anti-Christian. Judging people
by their conduct, not by their creed, esteeming meekness and charity
as fruits of the Spirit, inseparable from true religion, he looked
upon all persecutors, whether Churchmen or Separatists, whether sound
or heterodox, as alienated from their Maker, and as enemies to their
race.[506]
William Penn had an opportunity such as no other person amongst the
authors we are now describing ever possessed, of testing his theory of
religion and morals.
After travelling with George Fox over the Continent upon religious
service, and after finding all hopes of liberty crushed at home, Penn
in 1681 resolved to cross the Atlantic, and in America to realize the
bright dreams which had entertained his imagination from a boy--dreams
of “a free Colony for all mankind.” He landed on the banks of the
Delaware, to try “the holy experiment.” Tradition tells of his
receiving the enfeoffment of the territory, by delivery of earth and
water to him, as he stood surrounded by Swedes, Dutch, and English, in
the Court House of the Colonial town of Newcastle; and of his ascending
the river, fringed with pine trees, to the spot where was to rise the
City of Philadelphia, and of his treaty with the Indians under the
autumn-tinted elm tree of Shakamaxon. “We meet,” he said to his new
neighbours, the red-complexioned children of the forest, “on the broad
pathway of good faith and good will, no advantage shall be taken on
either side, but all shall be openness and love. I will not call you
children, for parents sometimes chide their children too severely; nor
brothers only, for brothers differ. The friendship between you and me,
I will not compare to a chain, for that the rains might rust, or the
falling tree might break. We are the same, as if one man’s body were
to be divided into two parts, we are all one flesh and blood.” Never
had there been in the wild regions of the earth such colonizing as
that before. “We will live,” said the red men, “in love with William
Penn and his children, as long as the moon and the sun shall endure.”
God was the sole witness of that covenant. Its only memorials were the
strings of wampun which these covenanters hung up in their huts, and
the shells they counted over upon a piece of bark; yet whilst other
treaties amongst civilized Europeans have been torn into shreds as soon
as they have been sealed, this has remained inviolate. “We have done
better,” could the Colonists say, “than if, with the proud Spaniards,
we had gained the mines of Potosi. We may make the ambitious heroes
whom the world admires, blush for their shameful victories. To the
poor dark souls round about us we teach their rights as men.” Penn
visited the natives in their cabins, partook of their roasted acorns,
laughed and played with the frolicksome, and spoke to them of God. “The
poor savage people believed in God, and the soul, without the aid of
metaphysics.”
The infant city, the Philadelphia, which in 1683 “consisted of three or
four little cottages,” grew and spread, hollow trees were succeeded by
houses. The chestnut, the walnut, and the ash were cut down for the use
of the emigrants, roads were made, boys and girls played in the streets
of this new Jerusalem, and the kindly-hearted Quaker, with his genial
good-humoured face, with his broad-brimmed hat, his long neckcloth, and
his drab attire, might be seen patting their heads with fatherly love.
William Penn, as a theologian, wrote books. William Penn, as a
Christian philanthropist and statesman, did a work which surpassed his
books. “How happy must be a community instituted on their principles,”
said Peter the Great, speaking of the Quakers. “Beautiful,” cried
Frederic the Great; “it is perfect, if it can endure.” It has endured.
[Sidenote: QUAKERS.--BARCLAY.]
Robert Barclay, a Scotch Friend, the son of Colonel David Barclay, of
an ancient family, and of Catherine Gordon, of the ducal house of that
name, published his famous _Apology_ in 1676, two years after
Penn had published _The Christian a Quaker_. With nothing like
the flowing style of his English contemporary, he had a more robust
understanding, a keener conception of what he meant to say, a still
more logical method of treatment, and, without any show of learning,
perhaps he had a deeper amount of scholarship, obtained during his
education and residence in France. Barclay affords the student a great
advantage wanting in Penn; whereas, in the case of Penn, we have to
search through several treatises, extending to five volumes, in order
to ascertain the beliefs which he inculcated, in Barclay they are
brought together in their proper relation and proportions, and are
compactly yet fully expressed. A remarkable coincidence of opinion
appears between the two writers, although the intimacy between them
does not seem to have commenced until after Barclay had written his
_Apology_.
He strikes the same key-note as does his friend. The inward light is
the true foundation of knowledge, and the Scriptures are not to be
esteemed the principal ground of truth and knowledge, the primary rule
of faith and manners. He maintains that there is universal redemption
by Christ, and that the saving spiritual light enlighteneth every man.
Christ is in all men a supernatural light or seed, beyond reason, above
conscience, _Vehiculum Dei_: yet there is a great difference
between Christ in the wicked, and Christ in the saints. He is quenched
and crucified in the one; He is cherished and obeyed in the other.[507]
[Sidenote: QUAKERS.--BARCLAY.]
Barclay speaks of an outward redemption wrought for man by Christ in
His crucified body, whereby we are made capable of salvation, and of
an inward redemption wrought within us by the Spirit of Christ. “The
first,” he says, “is the redemption performed and accomplished by
Christ for us, in His crucified body, without us; the other is the
redemption wrought by Christ in us, which no less properly is called
and accounted a redemption than the former. The first, then, is that
whereby a man as he stands in the fall, is put into a capacity of
salvation, and hath conveyed unto him a measure of that power, virtue,
spirit, life, and grace, that was in Christ Jesus, which, as the
free gift of God, is able to counterbalance, overcome, and root out
the evil seed, wherewith we are naturally, as in the fall, leavened.
The second is that whereby we witness and know this pure and perfect
redemption in ourselves, purifying, cleansing, and redeeming us from
the power of corruption, and bringing us into unity, favour, and
friendship with God. By the first of these two, we that were lost
in Adam are so far reconciled to God by the death of His Son, while
enemies, that we are put into a capacity of salvation, having the glad
tidings of the Gospel of peace offered unto us; and God is reconciled
unto us in Christ. By the second, we witness this capacity brought
into act; whereby receiving, and not resisting, the purchase of His
death, to wit, the light, Spirit, and grace of Christ revealed in
us, we witness and possess, a real, true, and inward redemption from
the power and prevalency of sin; and so come to be truly and really
redeemed, justified, and made righteous, and to a sensible union and
friendship with God. Thus He died for us, that He might redeem us from
all iniquity; and thus we know Him, and the power of His resurrection,
and the fellowship of His sufferings, being made conformable to His
death. This last follows the first in order, and is a consequence of
it, proceeding from it, as an _effect_ from its _cause_; for,
as none could have enjoyed the last, without the first had been (such
being the will of God); so also can none now partake of the first, but
as he witnesseth the last. Wherefore, as to us, they are both causes of
our justification; the first the _procuring efficient_, the other
the _formal cause_.”[508]
Although in Barclay’s proposition concerning justification, he seems
verbally to distinguish between that privilege and holiness of
character, yet he really confounds them together. Nor does he scruple
to style good works meritorious “in a qualified sense.” He takes care,
however, distinctly to ascribe human salvation to the merit of the
Lord Jesus Christ. In another proposition, he expresses his faith
in perfection, defining it as a freedom from actual sinning, yet
admitting a growth of goodness which, however, involves a possibility
of sin.[509] The Calvinistic doctrine of perseverance he distinctly
denies; and in the remainder of the treatise he unfolds the well-known
Quaker views concerning the ministry, Divine worship, the sacraments,
the power of the magistrate, and social intercourse.
There is remarkable breadth in the Quaker scheme of theology, it has
singular affinities to other systems; and hence, in addition to its
inherent amiable and loving spirit--which from the beginning rose above
its fierce antagonism to existing Churches--the hold it has frequently
gained upon the sympathies of Christians of different communions.
Its relationship to all mystical forms of Christianity is obvious at
a glance. Not less real is the resemblance between it and certain
aspects of Latitudinarianism on the one side, and of Anglicanism on
the other. The Quaker, like the Latitudinarian, dwells chiefly on the
moral and spiritual side of the Gospel, eschews dogmatical teaching,
sees a heavenly Teacher in every human soul, and looks for religious
instruction beyond what written texts convey. He also, like the
Anglican, treats Scripture as insufficient, taken alone; it is to both
a rule, a supreme rule, but not the only one. The Quaker finds in his
own breast the supplemental voice which the Anglican seeks in the
ancient Church.
There were at that period other Mystics besides the Quakers. Indeed,
our English theological literature of the seventeenth century is much
richer in sentiment, speculation, and imagery of this kind, than many
well-informed persons suppose.
[Sidenote: OTHER MYSTICS.--SALTMARSH.]
John Saltmarsh’s “_Sparkles of Glory_, or some beams of the
Morning Star, wherein are many discoveries as to truth and peace, to
the establishment and pure enlargement of a Christian in spirit and
truth,” is a book of considerable power, written in a compact and
lucid style, such as one rarely finds in works of this description.
The author--without condemning water baptism, or the divers organized
ministries of the Churches, or the institutes of Episcopacy,
Presbyterianism, and Independency, as the Quakers were wont to do, but
rather counting them as mere forms, full of weakness and defect, yet
to be tolerated, as having subordinate and preparatory uses--dwells
chiefly upon the passage from lower ministrations to higher, and
expatiates with much delight upon the mystery of true Christian liberty
from God, upon the glorious discoveries of the Spirit to the soul, and
upon the revelation of Christ in us. The history of Christ’s life and
death, with the new relationships in which those stupendous events
place mankind to the Divine Being, and the grand doctrines embodied
in the ancient Church creeds, are little, if at all, noticed in this
mystical treatise. Religion is resolved entirely into the experience
of a spiritual life. Personal responsibility, moral obligation, and
individual duties, are not the subjects which attract the writer’s
attention, his one chief idea throughout being, that the Christian
soul is the passive, quiet, trustful recipient of grace and love.
The highest prayer is a spiritual revelation. “All that we pray--and
not the Spirit of God in us, not that spirit of prayer spoken of
in Scripture--is but the spirit of man praying, which is but the
cry of the creature, or a natural complaining for what we want, as
the Ninevites, and the children and beasts of that city, all cried
unto the Lord.” “That which is the pure, spiritual, comprehensive
principle of a Christian is this:--That all outward administrations,
whether as to religion, or to natural, civil, and moral things, are
only the visible appearances of God, as to the world, or in this
creation; or the clothing of God, being such forms and dispensations
as God puts on amongst men to appear to them in: this is the garment
the Son of God was clothed with down to the feet, or to His lowest
appearance. And God doth not fix Himself upon any one form or outward
dispensation, but at His own will and pleasure comes forth in such
and such an administration, and goes out of it, and leaves it, and
takes up another. And this is clear in all God’s proceedings with the
world, both in the Jewish Church and State, and Christians now. And
when God is gone out, and hath left such or such an administration,
of what kind soever it is, be it religious, moral, or civil, such an
administration is a desolate house, a temple whose veil is rent, a
sun whose light is darkened; and to worship it then, is to worship an
idol, an image, a form, without God, or any manifestation of God in
it, save to him who (as Paul saith) knows an idol to be nothing. The
pure, spiritual, comprehensive Christian, is one who grows up with God
from administration to administration, and so walks with God in all his
removes and spiritual increasings and flowings; and such are weak and
in the flesh who tarry behind, worshipping that form or administration
out of which God is departed.”[510]
[Sidenote: OTHER MYSTICS.--STERRY.]
Peter Sterry, one of Cromwell’s chaplains, is described as “a
high-flown mystical Divine.” After being first much abused and then
long neglected, he has of late been named with honour in high literary
quarters. _The Rise, Race, and Royalty of the Kingdom of God in the
Soul of Man_, is a publication in which the characteristics of the
author’s mind and teaching may be fully seen. It consists of a series
of sermons upon the words, “Except ye be converted, and become as
little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven;” the
rise to the kingdom being conversion, the race to the kingdom being
a life like that of little children, and the royalty itself being
composed of the two states of present grace and future glory. The
practice of minutely dividing and subdividing a discourse, until it
becomes a thing of shreds and patches, is pushed in this instance to
an intolerable extreme; and the breaking up of sentences into distinct
paragraphs, with the carrying on of different sets of numbers from page
to page, render the perusal of the book a tremendous task. Upon reading
it, I find that the mysticism which it exhibits is of another order
than that found in the pages of Saltmarsh. The substance of Saltmarsh’s
thought is saturated with the spirit of mysticism, the whole nature and
scope of his theology is mystical from head to foot; but the mysticism
of Sterry strikes one as pertaining more to his imaginative forms of
conception and modes of expression than to anything else. His doctrines
of conversion and of religious life, of Christian experience, duty, and
hope, are of the usual evangelical type, but his ideas are ever dressed
in mystical phraseology. He quotes texts of Scripture in abundance, and
then commonly runs out into some strain of allegorical interpretation.
I will quote one passage, which, whilst a specimen of his style, is
more than ordinarily impregnated with mysticism in the substance of the
thought:--
“God comes into our nature, as the root of each single person. Here
He becomes our Jesus, making Himself a new seed; out of this seed He
brings forth a new image of Divinity, by which He breaks through the
image of the devil and nature, brings forth man out of them, brings
them into subjection to this growing beauty. As the fuel is dissolved
into smoke, and the smoke again breaks up into flame, so the image of
the devil riseth up out of the image of nature, shaking that to dust,
as it riseth: the image of God, again, sprouts forth in the midst of
the devil’s image, first spoiling, then triumphing over, and in both.
“God through nature, as the root, grows up into single persons, as the
branches. Then as the shades of night fly away before the ascending
day, so,--as this Divine seed our Jesus sends forth itself in an image
of beauty through our souls,--the image of darkness and death sinks
down into its own place, and principle.”[511]
To Sterry’s book on _The Kingdom of God_ an introduction is
prefixed, written by Jeremy White, who had been chaplain to Oliver
Cromwell, and who lived in private after the Restoration, preaching but
occasionally. White sympathized in the mysticism of Sterry, and, in
the following beautiful passage, uttered truths well worth the serious
consideration of all spiritually-minded people, especially of those who
are disposed to undervalue, perhaps to ridicule, thoughts imbued with
mystic elements:--
“Who among us is yet able to comprehend all the distinct ages and
growths of good minds; to understand the various improvements,
measures, and attainments, the several capacities, languages, and
operations which are peculiar to those ages and growths? It is
impossible for us to set the bounds to spiritual things, to stint that
spirit in ourselves or others which is a fountain of Divine light and
life in all regenerated souls, continually sending forth new streams,
and running along with a fresh succession of waters without any stop or
limit. We are too proud to understand the condescensions, too low to
take the height, too shallow to fathom the depth, too narrow to measure
the breadth, too short to reach the length of the Divine truth and
goodness, and the various communications of themselves to us. We cannot
assign the highest or the lowest state of saints whilst they are here
below. We cannot say, All above this is fancy, whimsey, dream, and
delusion; all below that is common, carnal, formal, and superstitious.
As we ought not, then, to despise and contemn that which is below,
so let us not censure and condemn that which is above us. Blessed be
God, all good souls, in the midst of their greatest distances from one
another here below, do all meet in the Divine comprehension above. We
are all enfolded in the Divine arms, we are all encircled in the Divine
love. That has breadth, and length, and depth, and height enough to
reach and hold us all. And if we cannot yet receive and embrace each
other in our several ages, growths, measures, and attainments, it is
because we have little, low, dark, narrow, and contracted hearts, feel
but little of the love of Christ, and are no more filled with that
Spirit which is the spring, the centre, the circle, the band to all
good spirits in heaven and on earth.”
Jeremy White was a follower of Origen in his views of the ultimate
safety and happiness of the whole universe, and he wrote a
book,--published after his death,--the title of which sums up his
theory: he calls it “_The Restoration of all Things_, or a
vindication of the goodness and grace of God, to be manifested at last,
in the recovery of the whole creation out of their fall.”
[Sidenote: OTHER MYSTICS.--SIR HENRY VANE.]
Sir Henry Vane is numbered amongst English Mystics, but he was more of
the mystical philosopher than the mystical theologian, and the same
may be said, to some extent, of Henry More; but the profession of the
latter, as a clergyman, naturally directed his attention to Divinity
properly so called, and how his mystical views influenced his religious
life and character, will be shown in a subsequent portion of this
volume.
CHAPTER XVIII.
The proofs of Christianity were noticed by Anglican Divines. Embedded
in the rich quarry of Jeremy Taylor’s _Ductor Dubitantium_, may
be found an able and eloquent summary of the external and internal
evidences; and Hammond, in his _Reasonableness of Christian
Religion_, points out the ground upon which men embrace it “in the
gross, all of it together,” after which he descends in detail to the
survey and vindication of those particular branches of Christianity
which appeared to men at that time to be least supported. And it may be
mentioned, as an illustration of the changing fashions of scepticism,
that the points here considered by Hammond were--objections to God’s
disposition of providence, founded on the prosperity of injustice and
the calamities of innocence; and the exceptions taken to Christ’s
commands because He enjoins the duty of taking up the cross--points
which certainly would not engross the attention of Christian advocates
in the present day.
[Sidenote: PURITAN WORKS ON EVIDENCES.]
The evidences of our holy religion were more largely discussed by
writers of the Latitudinarian school, as already described; and they
also received pre-eminent attention from Puritan authors. Authors of
that class were amongst the first keenly to discern the signs of the
times in the direction of scepticism, amongst the first to combat
the rising evil. Devoted to the study of the Sacred Volume, they also
devoted themselves to the examination of the basis of its Divine
claims. One reason why the Cambridge and Puritan Divines paid more
attention to this branch of study might be, that they thought so much
more of Christianity than of the Church, so much more of the former as
a system of truth, than of the latter as a scheme of government; and
further, which is only another particular effect of the same general
cause, they were under the influence of an individualizing power, which
is one of the secrets of Protestantism, and which makes each person
feel so strongly his own responsibility for the creed which he adopts.
In this respect especially, the Puritan differed from the Anglican, who
might be said to receive his Christianity from the Church, rather than
his Church from Christianity.
Two distinguished Puritan writers exhibit the proofs of natural
religion,--and two others the proofs of revealed religion.
Cudworth’s great work was published in 1678; but nine years before
that time, Theophilus Gale presented to the world treatises containing
arguments against atheism. _The Court of the Gentiles_--as the
expansion of the title shows--is “a discourse touching the original of
human literature, both philology and philosophy, from the Scriptures
and Jewish Church, in order to a demonstration of the perfection of
God’s Word and Church light, the imperfection of nature’s light, and
mischief of vain philosophy, the right use of human learning, and
especially, sound philosophy.” The title-page describes and exhibits
the whole work as a defence of religion. The author’s idea is that the
philosophy of the ancients, so far as it is true, constitutes an outer
court, leading to the Holy of Holies in the Word of God. All which is
valuable in classic writings, according to Gale, had been derived from
the chosen people. Pagan ignorance and folly arose from the obstinacy
of the human mind in forsaking Divine oracles. The inventiveness of
the human intellect added to the mischief, and the degradation of
the heathen, proves the need of the Gospel. In this frame-work of
evidence, built up in four parts, Gale inserts one book--the second
of the fourth part upon Atheism, and the existence of the Deity, in
which,--professedly following Plato, but often adding much to the
force of his master’s reasoning,--he demonstrates the being of a God
from universal consent--from a subordination of second causes to the
first, from a _prime Motor_; from the order of the universe; from
the connate idea of God in the soul; and from moral arguments founded
upon conscience and a natural sense of religion. In his reasoning he
anticipates Cudworth, and will bear honourable comparison with his
great successor.
[Sidenote: PURITAN WORKS ON EVIDENCES.]
The first part of Howe’s _Living Temple_ appeared in 1676. In it
he proves the “existence of God and His conversableness with men.” His
first argument is the same as Gale’s,[512] the consent of mankind;
but Howe does not appear to be indebted to his predecessor for this
mode of treating his subject. Common consent, Howe extends from God’s
existence to God’s conversableness,--in other words, to religious
worship; he quotes from Plutarch in proof of its universality, it
being characteristic of the age to cite an ancient classic in proof of
a statement of fact, which we should test by our own experience and
observation. Howe anticipates the _Demonstration_ contrived by
Samuel Clarke, and engages in a strain of reasoning beyond that of
either Gale or Cudworth.[513] He argues that since something exists
now, something must always have existed, unless we admit, that at one
period or another, something sprung out of nothing. When he proceeds to
prove the intelligence of this Eternal and uncaused Being, he enters
upon the _à posteriori_ path, which Gale and Cudworth, and indeed
the ancients, traversed to some extent, but in which the moderns have
gone so far beyond them. It is worthy of remark, that the ingenious
reference of Paley to a watch, as illustrating the indication of
design in nature is found in Howe; and to him also belongs the credit
of including among the proofs of Divine purpose, the constitution of
the human mind, as well as the organization of matter,--a department
in natural theology the neglect of which by many was lamented by Lord
Brougham. I may add, that when Howe demands of the atheist, whether,
if he will reject all the preceding evidence for the existence of God,
there are any conceivable methods by which the fact of the Divine
existence could be certified,--he opens another spring of thought on
this subject, as original as it is profound. After establishing the
truth of the Divine existence, Howe resumes his argument for the Divine
conversableness; and after ingeniously overthrowing the Epicurean
theory, he deduces from what he has said, that God is such a Being as
can converse with men, and he asserts His omniscience, His omnipotence,
His immensity, and His unlimited goodness.
There is another work by John Howe of singular eloquence--_The Vanity
of Man as Mortal_--in which the author suggests arguments for the
soul’s immortality, of a kind which only occur to minds of a superior
order. The works just noticed relate to natural religion.
John Owen and Richard Baxter wrote upon the evidences of revealed
religion.
In 1659, the former published _The Divine Original of the
Scriptures_. He bases his argument chiefly on the _light_
and _efficacy_ of Divine truth,--a branch of reasoning too much
neglected in after times, but vigorously renewed in our own day. Light,
from its very nature, he says, not only makes other things visible,
but itself manifest. So Scripture has a self-evidencing power, a power
beyond that of miracles. And as there are _innate_ arguments in
the Bible of its Divine original and authority, so also it exerts an
influence which confirms those arguments. Owen’s forms of expression
suffice to show that, whilst as to the points and bearing of his
arguments, he anticipates modern turns of thought, the details of his
logic bear an unmistakeably Puritan impress. But he passes out of
the range of evidence into the domains of dogmatic theology, when he
proceeds to dwell upon the conviction of the Bible being the Word of
God as the result of a twofold efficacy of the Spirit--that efficacy
consisting in a Divine communication of spiritual light, enabling the
mind to discern the majesty and authority of Revelation, and also in
the Divine inspiration of a sense or taste for the truths revealed.[514]
[Sidenote: PURITAN WORKS ON EVIDENCES.]
Owen, in his book upon _The Holy Spirit_, published at a later
period, speaks of the nature of inspiration as not leaving the sacred
writers to “the use of their natural faculties, their minds or
memories, to understand, and remember the things spoken by Him, and so
declare them to others. But He himself acted [upon] their faculties,
making use of them to express His words, not their own conceptions.”
This Divine reduces the modes of revelation mentioned in Scripture to
three heads--voices, dreams, and visions, with the accidental adjuncts
of symbolical actions and local imitations.[515]
Owen wrote his defence of revelation in the year 1659, before the end
of the Commonwealth;--at a still earlier period in 1655, when Oliver
Cromwell was on the throne, before any of the authors now mentioned
had published a word upon the subject, Richard Baxter produced his
_Unreasonableness of Infidelity_. It is thrown into the form of
the Spirit’s witness to the truth of Christianity, so far reminding
us of John Owen’s later work. Baxter, however, assigns a much higher
place to the evidential force of miracles than did his contemporary;
and, instead of dwelling upon the Spirit’s influence, in and through
the Holy Scriptures, he resolves the Spirit’s witness into the
miraculous operations of the first age. Baxter proceeds to show that
the evangelists did not deceive the world, but that they published
undoubted truths,--and that we have received their writings without
any considerable corruption. Having gone thus far in a path much
trodden since, he strangely turns aside to insist upon the doctrine of
everlasting punishment, and to explain the nature of the sin against
the Holy Ghost. He then refers to tradition, to the creed, to church
ordinances, to the succession of religion, to the preservation of
MSS., to the writings of Divines, to the laws of the Roman Empire,
and the like, as evidences of the history of the New Testament. He
writes, in rather a vague and confused way, upon a subject afterwards
elaborated by Lardner and Paley, but to him belongs the distinction of
having first entered this new field. He grapples with the objection
to miracles, but not as Campbell afterwards did. The ground he takes
somewhat resembles that of Bishop Douglas, when the Bishop compares
with the miracles of Scripture, those recorded by Augustine and other
Fathers.
Baxter’s treatise did not satisfy its author; and, in 1667, he added
_Reasons for the Christian Religion_. In this book, he treats of
religion, both natural and supernatural, describing man as “a living
wight having an active power, an understanding to guide it, and a will
to command it,”--and pointing out the relations in which he stands
to the Creator, as his Owner, his Governor, and his Benefactor. The
difficulties of religious duty, a future life of retribution, the
intrinsical evils and righteous penalties of sin, the present miserable
state of the world, and the mercy of God, all come within the scope
of Baxter’s observations, and are presented in the light of nature
and of reason. In the second part the Author points out the need of
Revelation, refers to the several religions existing in the world,
illustrates the nature and “congruities” of Christianity, and proves
the Divine mission of our Lord, by prophecy, by His character, by
His miracles, and by His renovation of men. Confirmatory proofs, and
collateral arguments follow, touching the historical grounds on which
we believe in miracles, and unfolding certain curious considerations
which tend to show that the world is not eternal.
The extrinsical and intrinsical difficulties of the Christian
faith, altogether amounting to the number of forty, are resolved
_seriatim_, and the refutation is extended over nearly one hundred
pages, concluding with a long and devout address to the Deity--somewhat
after the manner of Augustine’s confessions--in which the Puritan
Presbyter pours out his soul in strains not less devout and eloquent
than those of the patristic Bishop.
[Sidenote: PURITAN WORKS ON EVIDENCES.]
In 1672 Baxter returned to the subject, and published _More Reasons
for the Christian Religion and No Reason against it_, in which he
answers the _De Veritate_[516] of Lord Herbert, the first of our
English deistical writers. The author dedicates his work to Sir Henry
Herbert, a relative of the philosopher, and makes a graceful allusion
to Sir Henry’s brother,--the “excellently holy, as well as learned and
ingenious,” Mr. George Herbert. Baxter also wrote two treatises on the
Immortality of man’s soul, the nature of it, and of other spirits. And
also a most singular production, entitled, “The certainty of the world
of spirits fully evinced by unquestionable histories of apparitions,
and witchcraft’s operations, voices, &c.--proving the immortality
of souls, the malice and misery of devils, and the damned, and the
blessedness of the justified--written for the conviction of Sadducees
and Infidels.” This treatise was not printed until the year 1691--a
short time before Baxter’s death,--but its illustrations and arguments
are akin to those which, forty years earlier, he had introduced into
his incomparable _Saint’s Everlasting Rest_.
Baxter leads the van of the great army of our Christian _Apologists_
as they have been infelicitously termed. The armour which the veteran
wore was made after the fashion of the times--the weapons which he
wielded, and which he had forged, are some of them not such as would
be serviceable now, and all of them, as used by him, are unsuited to
our methods of defence; his wisdom also, it must be admitted, was
occasionally defective in his modes of attack, yet no small honour
is due to the man who was the first to enter the lists in English
literature against the infidelity of his day.
[Sidenote: PURITAN THEOLOGY.]
Turning to the doctrinal views of the Puritan school, I shall first
notice certain points of resemblance between them and the opinions of
Anglican Divines. The former, as well as the latter, insisted upon the
doctrines of the Trinity, the Deity of our Lord, and the Divinity and
personality of the Holy Spirit--nor could any disciple of the Nicene
faith more firmly hold the eternal generation of the Son of God than
did some of them.[517] Also, they firmly held the doctrine of original
sin. At the same time, in common with the Low Church or Latitudinarian
writers, they eschewed appeals to the Fathers as invested with any
special authority, adopting more or less a spirit of free inquiry
which gradually led some of them to relax a little their doctrinal
strictness; and they went beyond their last-mentioned contemporaries
in anti-sacerdotal and anti-sacramental views. They present marked
characteristics of their own. They all appeal to the Scriptures, not
only as the supreme, but as the exclusively accessible tribunal to
which theological controversy could be brought; yet, it should be
noticed in passing, that many of them studied patristic literature with
great diligence, especially certain portions in harmony with their
own opinions and tastes. There is also this peculiarity attaching to
them as a class, that they do not, as Thorndike, work out a covenant
of grace founded upon baptism,[518]--although they occasionally allude
to that sacrament in a way which is surprising to some of their
descendants; nor did they, as Jackson, as Heylyn, as Pearson, or as
Barrow, follow the creeds of the Church in their theological inquiries.
Baxter especially valued the Apostles’ Creed, but Puritan Divines did
not adopt that, or any other of the ancient symbols, as a formula for
the order of their own thoughts. Not that they broke away altogether
from the habit of beginning with God the Great Cause, and descending
to man His creature, subject, and fallen child; not that they adopted
an _à posteriori_ method, beginning with man as a degenerate and
guilty being, and rising up to God whom man has offended, and who alone
can be the Author of his salvation,--a method which is adopted by some
theological thinkers of our own time. In commencing their systematic
ideas of theology with God, and coming down to man, the Puritans
followed the traditional order of studious thoughtfulness upon such
high themes. Goodwin resolved all Divine knowledge into the knowledge
of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost; but still it was
not to the Creed as a textual authority, it was not to its clauses, one
by one, that he or any of his brethren referred, as direction posts
along the sacred way. Their wont was to select some one principle as
a centre, and then to cluster round it kindred theological ideas, the
various parts being woven into one harmonious whole. In this respect,
they differed both from Anglicans and from Latitudinarians, who were
not accustomed to the use of such a graduated scale of doctrine,
who did not attach to what are termed _Evangelical_ truths, so
much relative importance. Certainly, the themes which the Puritans
most devoutly cherished, were not those to which either Anglicans
or Latitudinarians chiefly turned. Puritan theology, because it is
more experimental than Anglican theology,--because it deals more with
the spiritual consciousness of Divine relations, with the position
and acts of the human soul towards the Divine Lord and Redeemer,--is
thought by some to be less dogmatic than Anglican theology; by which
is meant, that it deals less with those Divine fundamental facts,
which are distinctly recognized in the Creeds, and which, whether men
believe them or not, are absolute and unchangeable realities. But this
apprehension is a mistake. Puritanism, indeed, does insist much upon
what is experimental and practical in theology; it looks at Divine
persons, at their attributes and dispensations in reference to man’s
wants, and character, and conduct; it treats revelation rather as a
light to walk by, than as a light to look at,--which is wise--but it
does not throw into a distance, it does not place on the remote horizon
of its view the doctrines respecting Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,
taught in the Scriptures, and upheld by the early Church.
[Sidenote: PURITAN THEOLOGY.]
The Puritans broke with the Anglicans--not upon the doctrines of the
Creeds, but upon other points. They broke with them as Reformers
had broken with Romanists on the question--What are the true means
of grace? Clerical orders and sacraments, said the Church of Rome.
Apostolical succession and sacraments, said the Anglican Church of
England; but the Anglican Church of England controverted the doctrine
of the Church of Rome as to the number, the nature, the form and the
efficacy of the sacraments. The Puritans went much further than the
Anglicans in this direction, and denied the Anglican views of the
ministry and the sacraments. The Anglican watchwords were,--_orders_,
_sacraments_, _faith_, _grace_. The Puritan watchwords were--_the
Bible_, _grace_, _truth_, _faith_. Both parties believed that men are
saved by grace through faith; but the one connected the salvation
chiefly with sacraments, the other with truth.
In considering the theology of the Puritans, we ought carefully to
notice differences amongst them, and I shall therefore subdivide them
into three classes--the _Calvinistic_, the _Arminian_, and
the _Intermediate_. I begin with the Calvinists, and shall select
Thomas Goodwin and John Owen.
The influence exerted by Perkins and other Puritan teachers and
friends in the University of Cambridge upon the mind of Goodwin when
a student, his remarkable conversion, the effect of his residence in
Holland, and of his association there, with Dutch Divines, and with
“English Dissenting brethren,” are visible in his opinions. Three main
stand-points come out sharply in the phases of Goodwin’s theology.
The first is _Faith_. In his treatise on that subject he discusses
(1) the object of faith, including the mercies in God’s nature, the
Person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the riches of free grace
as declared and proposed in the Gospel covenant; (2) the acts of faith
in the understanding, the affections and the will, respecting which
he distinguishes between justifying faith in general, and the faith
of assurance; and (3) the properties of faith, its excellence and
use--good works, he says, so far from being slighted by the exaltation
of belief, are really promoted in a pre-eminent degree by the influence
of that principle. It is apparent at once, that in this way a complete
scheme of theology is arranged with faith for a pivot on which the
entire circle of thought is made to move. Accordingly, we find
introduced into this elaborate treatise, nearly, if not quite, all the
doctrines comprised within the writer’s evangelical creed. There are
abundant descriptions of faith, of what it is, and of what it does,
but we do not discover any compact definition of it in any part of the
volume. Goodwin alludes to it as sealed in the understanding, in the
heart, and in the will,--a description which might seem comprehensive
enough to take in all which Thorndike or Bull has advanced on the
subject; but Goodwin’s way of working out the idea is very different
from theirs, and whilst they are chiefly intent upon preserving the
interests of Christian morality, he, although not neglectful of them,
is principally engaged in exalting the glories of sovereign grace.
According to his theology, faith is commanded by God, it influences
all the graces--but it is the meanest and lowest of them all, and it
is merely and altogether a passive principle. It should be carefully
noticed, as amongst the marked features of Goodwin’s teaching:--not,
however, peculiar to him, but common to Puritan Divines--that although
he enumerates many objects of faith, by far the most prominent one is
Christ Himself, as the great propitiation for sin.[519]
[Sidenote: GOODWIN.]
Another stand-point of Goodwin’s is _Election_. He argues for the
necessity of this--saying, that without it “Christ had died in vain,
and not saved a man,” and had been in heaven alone to lament that He
had come short in this work. Goodwin dwells upon the order of God’s
decrees touching election and reprobation, and upon the end to which
the elect are ordained, even a supernatural union with God, and the
communication of Himself to their souls. The infinity of God’s electing
grace is a special theme of this writer’s meditations, in which,
amongst other points most repulsive to moderate Calvinists, he insists
upon a vast disproportion between the elect and the rest--rejoicing
not, as one would suppose, in the thought, that the saved immensely
outnumber the lost, but in the thought, that the paucity of men who
enjoy any privilege magnifies it the more. He speaks of the infinite
number of those laid aside in a fallen condition, in comparison with
the very few elected out of them, as enhancing the grace of election.
He contends for the perfect freedom of election, and the absence in it
of all reference to merit or worthiness; for its intimate connection
with effectual calling, which he unfolds at length; and for the
doctrine of final perseverance, which follows from the doctrine he has
previously laid down. It is remarkable that he employs a whole book
in showing that election in its ordinary course runs from believing
parents to their posterity; that the covenant of grace is entailed
upon the children of believers, and that God most usually makes them
His choice. He is careful practically to apply his views to Christian
parents on the one hand, and to their children on the other.[520]
The doctrine of reprobation is connected by Goodwin with the
doctrine of election; it is described as being its dark shadow. If
Goodwin was not a supralapsarian, he was, next to that, the highest
predestinarian a man could be.[521] It is marvellous how, with all
his thoughtfulness, he could have overlooked the question of moral
government and human responsibility, in connection with some of his
speculations; and it is distressing to find that one so zealous for
what he deemed the glory of Divine grace, could lay his scheme of
theology open to the charge of its robbing God of the attributes of
justice and righteousness.
Goodwin does not, in his treatise on election, or in his other
writings, give prominence to the dogma of particular redemption; but he
distinctly affirms in one place that the elect alone are redeemed;[522]
and his whole system of theology proceeds on the principle, that the
death of Christ was a ransom for the salvation of the elect. He presses
to the utmost extreme the ideas of suretyship, and of debt-paying;
and refers to the sinner’s liability as met by the sufferings of
the Saviour, and to the sinner’s bonds as for ever cancelled by the
Redeemer’s resurrection. To such an extent does the author carry his
notion of the identification of the Lord with His people as their
surety, that he positively declares Christ by imputation was made the
greatest sinner that ever was--for the sins of all God’s chosen met in
Him![523]
The last stand-point of Goodwin, which I have space to notice, is
_Regeneration_. In his treatise, entitled _The Work of the Holy
Ghost in our Salvation_, Regeneration is the theme throughout the
volume. Its necessity, its nature, and its cause are illustrated in
every variety of form and phrase; and it is noteworthy that no allusion
is made to the ordinance of baptism in connection with it, nor is any
opportunity lost of placing this spiritual change in relation to the
Divine decrees and electing love.[524]
[Sidenote: JOHN OWEN.]
Were it not that my proper business is to present, as succinctly
as possible, the doctrinal views of the Puritans, I should most
earnestly combat some of Goodwin’s theological positions, and point
out the tremendous consequences which they involve--admitting, at
the same time, the redeeming elements, which may be found in his
ofttimes wearisome method of instruction. I will only say, that when
he wandered into what appear to me not only perilous but pernicious
regions of thought, he did but stumble in the midst of fields into
which Augustine had gone before, and where Jonathan Edwards followed
afterwards. Happily, such men are inconsistent, and whilst sacrificing
the righteousness of God in one way, they contend for it most zealously
in another.
Owen’s works may be appropriately coupled with Goodwin’s. Their
literary defects and their religious excellencies are not dissimilar.
In each the reader is wearied with refinements and perplexed by
multiplied divisions; in neither can be found any graces of style,
any delectable flow of words, any rhythm of diction, any wealth of
expression; in both are presented signs of profound reflection, of
patient inquiry, of logical acumen, and also, beyond all these, proofs
of intense evangelical piety.
Owen goes over very much of the ground which is occupied by Goodwin,
and he is scarcely less rigid in his predestinarianism. It is
instructive to compare with the point of view selected by Goodwin
that which is chosen by Owen. Owen’s treatise on the _Doctrine of
Justification_ (1677) should be examined by the side of Goodwin’s
work on the _Objects and Acts of Justifying Faith_. Owen
describes justifying faith “as the heart’s approbation of the way of
justification and salvation of sinners by Jesus Christ;” he omits,
and vindicates the omission of any definition of this spiritual
act: but he is singularly full in his account of the Divine side of
justification, dwelling at great length upon its forensic nature,
and its basis in the imputed righteousness of the Redeemer. The last
point is wrought out with pre-eminent distinctness. It occurs at the
beginning--it is resumed in the middle--it is enforced at the end of
the book. The idea of Christ’s imputed righteousness is considered by
many evangelical Divines as at the best a theoretical key to explain
the fact of justification, rather than as an essential element of the
doctrine. Some hold the fact without accepting the explanation, not
finding it to be a key at all. But the state of opinion was widely
different in Owen’s day, the whole atmosphere of controversy was
different; he and others identified imputation with justification, and
fought for it as for the hearth of truth, as for the altar of God. They
deemed the interests of Protestantism, the security of the doctrines
of grace, and the welfare of Christ’s Church at stake in this one
doctrinal dispute.
[Sidenote: JOHN OWEN.]
Owen agrees substantially with Goodwin, but he is more cautious; and
he more frequently qualifies his statements. He says men may really be
saved by that grace which doctrinally they question, and they may be
justified by the imputation of that righteousness, which, in opinion,
they deny to be imputed. He shrinks from affirming what Goodwin affirms
as to the identification of Christ with the sinner.[525] It may again
be observed, that throughout, Owen looks more intently at the Divine
act of the sinner’s justification than at the human act by which
the justification is secured. His views on the whole are coincident
with Goodwin’s as to the Divine decrees; but he exhibits them less
prominently in reference to the doctrine of election than in reference
to the doctrine of particular redemption. The Atonement is a central
point in his thoughts; and it is in a treatise respecting the death and
satisfaction of Christ, that his clearest statements on the tenet of
election can be found.[526]
It was usual with most of the Puritan Divines, in harmony with the
order of thought pursued in the Westminster formularies, to start with
the doctrine of the Divine decrees; to regard, as the foundation of
all theology, the idea of God having resolved to save a certain number
of human beings; and to view all the processes of redeeming love, as
simply designed to accomplish that resolution. They did not deny the
responsibility of all men in a certain sense, and they were ready to
maintain the righteousness of God, as they understood it, against any
who dared to impugn that righteousness. But generally they did not look
at the moral government of God as dealing with mankind in general, on
common grounds of justice, love, and mercy; they did not regard the
Gospel as a gracious law for a fallen race; they did not consider it
as alike the duty and the privilege of every sinful child of Adam, to
accept the offer of eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. There
is a deeper _theological_ difference between ancient and modern
Calvinists than some suppose--a difference appearing even more in the
order, the relations, and the turns of thought touching salvation, than
in any scientific mode of expressing it. But there remains a strong
_religious_ resemblance between the two classes. What most of the
old doctrinal Puritans put first as the premises leading to certain
conclusions, many of what may be called the new doctrinal Puritans
put last, as a conclusion drawn from certain premises. In a careful
study of the whole Bible, as a revelation of God’s government of the
whole world, they find passages which relate to mysterious operations
of grace upon human minds; and after a careful analysis of all human
and secondary causes, at work in the world’s history, or at work in
private experience, they discover rightly, in my opinion, a residuum
which points to what is not human, but Divine and absolute; and in this
they recognize the mysterious sovereign grace of God. Further, in those
passages of Scripture which speak of an election, a predestination,
and a purpose before the world began, they see a statement of the
fact, that what God does in time He from eternity meant to do; that
the knowledge and mercy, that the wisdom and the will of the Infinite
and Eternal One, must have been ever the same as they are now. And
also, the present disciples of this Puritan faith, like the former,
delight to dwell upon the cause and character of salvation, more even
than upon its consequences in their own experience and hopes; and they
are not weary, and I hope never will be, of adoring the Divine love,
righteousness, and power in which their redemption originated, and on
which it must for ever rest.
[Sidenote: JOHN OWEN.]
Owen enters fully into the nature of the death of Christ, and insists
upon its having been a price or ransom, a sacrifice and a satisfaction.
He contends that it was a punishment for sin properly so called; and
that the covenant between the Father and the Son was the ground and
foundation of the penal sufferings from which redemption flows. Nor
does he confine himself to the citation and enforcement of Scripture
texts in support of these opinions. He supplies a dissertation on
Divine justice--in which, from the consent of mankind, as appears
in the testimony of the heathen, and the power of conscience, from
the prevalence of sacrifices, and from the works of providence,--he
concludes that Divine justice is a vindicating justice, and that the
non-punishment of sin would be contrary to the glory of that justice.
He examines and answers the objections of Socinus, and the main drift
of the whole treatise is to establish the indispensable necessity of
the satisfaction of Christ for the salvation of sinners.
In his _Salus Electorum Sanguis Jesu_, a work published so early
as 1648, Owen connects the Atonement with the Divine decrees. He points
out what he conceives to be the false and supposed ends of the death
of Christ, and unfolds his reasons for a belief in the doctrine of
particular redemption.[527] He admits that the sacrifice of Christ was
of infinite worth and dignity, sufficient in itself for the redeeming
of all and every man, if it had pleased the Lord to employ it to that
purpose; but the main drift of the Essay is to prove that it did not
please the Lord so to employ it.[528] Whatever may be thought of the
logical consequences of Owen’s positions in reference to election and
particular redemption, it would be extreme injustice--and the same
remark may be applied to Goodwin and others--to charge him or them with
any connivance at Antinomianism, an error which they regarded with the
utmost abhorrence, and opposed with not a whit less of zeal than burns
intensely in their writings, when they are subjecting Arminianism to a
process of destructive criticism.
CHAPTER XIX.
We have noticed a change in the Church of England, from prevalent
Calvinism, during the reign of Elizabeth, for prevalent Arminianism,
during the latter part of the reign of James I. A corresponding change
occurred in the history of several eminent Divines of the seventeenth
century: Bishop Andrewes, Dean Jackson, Bishop Davenant, Archbishop
Ussher, John Hales, of Eton, and Dr. Sanderson, are conspicuous
examples. Another instance, more remarkable in some respects, is
found in the life of John Goodwin--now less known to fame than the
celebrated Churchmen just mentioned, and yet a man who, in his own
day, attracted not less attention than did they; and whose works for
vigour, ingenuity, argument, and eloquence deserve to rank high amongst
theological productions, in an age when theology bore its richest
fruit. The names now grouped together belong to men who, from first
to last, retained more or less of Anglican predilections, and after
the commencement of the Stuart period, Anglicanism and anti-Calvinism
appear in close alliance; but John Goodwin, unlike the other converts,
began his career under the influence of that description of religious
feeling which forms so important an element in Puritanism, and he
retained that feeling to the end of life. Although he became an
Arminian, and renounced opinions identified with doctrinal Puritanism,
his Arminianism did not destroy the unction and ardour which were
characteristic of his earlier creed. His Arminianism presents some
striking differences from that of both the Anglican and Latitudinarian
schools; it is animated by an evangelical spirit, and it is wrought
out, in connection with evangelical principles, akin to those which
appear prominently in the Arminianism of our Wesleyan brethren. Like
them, this eminent predecessor of theirs maintained strenuously the
doctrine of human depravity, of justification by faith, of the work of
the Holy Spirit, of the new birth, and of sanctification.
[Sidenote: JOHN GOODWIN.]
Before John Goodwin abandoned Calvinism he repudiated the doctrine
of the imputed righteousness of Christ as held by the Calvinists of
his own day. Yet he concedes almost all for which modern Calvinists
would contend, when he remarks that a believer may “be said to be
clothed with the righteousness of Christ, and yet the righteousness of
Christ itself may not be his clothing, but only that which procured
his clothing to him. So Calvin calls the clothing of righteousness,
wherewith a believer is clad in his justification, _Justitiam morte,
et resurrectione Christi, acquisitam_--a righteousness procured by
the death and resurrection of Christ.”[529]
Goodwin, in his _Redemption Redeemed_, earnestly insists upon
the broad view of the effect of the Atonement,--“that there is a
possibility, yea a fair and gracious possibility, for all men without
exception, considered as men, without and before their voluntary
obduration by actual sinning to obtain actual salvation by His death;
so that, in case any man perisheth, his destruction is altogether
from himself, there being as much, and as much intended, in the death
of Christ to and towards the procuring of his salvation, as there is
for procuring the salvation of any of those who come to be actually
saved.”[530]
The great moot point between the old-fashioned Calvinists and their
opponents is treated by this intensely-evangelical Arminian in such a
way in his concessions, that he approaches rather closely to modern
Calvinism, without conceding the whole for which the advocates of the
latter system would stipulate.[531]
[Sidenote: JOHN GOODWIN.]
John Goodwin’s object was, whilst magnifying the grace of God, to
preserve what is demanded by the personality, the free agency, and
the responsibility of man. He so clearly explains his opinion and so
carefully fences it round, he so distinctly asserts the Divine origin
of salvation in every individual, and so vigilantly repels every idea
of indigenous rectitude in human nature, suffering from the fall, that
no one can charge his creed with any Pelagian or even semi-Pelagian
taint. So far as that point is concerned, Goodwin’s opinion might
have received the approval of Augustine, and it ought to have passed
muster with the second Councils of Milevis and Orange. Whether the
keen Catholic theologians of the fourth and fifth centuries, in their
jealousy for orthodox opinion, would have endorsed the following
sentence is another question: “That the act of believing whensoever it
is performed, is at so low a rate of efficiency from a man’s self, that
suppose the act could be divided into a thousand parts, nine hundred,
ninety, and nine of them are to be ascribed unto the free grace of God,
and only one unto man. Yea, this one is no otherwise to be ascribed to
man, than as supported, strengthened, and assisted by the free grace of
God.”
Goodwin was a person who thought for himself, and looked at a subject
on more sides than one, and was as zealous to maintain the freeness
of Divine grace as any Divine could be; consequently, we find him
expressing himself, so as to appear, in the eyes of opponents,
logically inconsistent, although he had a way of his own by which to
defend himself against the imputation. Although he distinctly denies
the Calvinistic doctrine of predestination, yet he maintains, when
stating his own opinion on the subject, that predestination does not
depend on the foresight of faith, or righteousness. “For though it
be supposed,” he says, “that God decreeth to elect, and accordingly
actually electeth all that believe and none other; yet this, at no hand
proveth, either that His purpose, or the execution hereof, proceed in
their origination, from the faith of such persons foreseen, no nor from
the foresight of their faith: though this be more tolerable than the
other. There is nothing in the nature of faith, nor in God’s foresight
of faith, in what persons soever, that hath in it any generative virtue
of any such purpose in God.”
There were other Puritans who adopted Arminian views. John Horne, Vicar
of Allhallows, Lynn--a learned man of most exemplary and primitive
piety who was ejected in 1662--previously published a book entitled,
“The open door for Man’s approach to God; or, a vindication of the
Record of God concerning the extent of the death of Christ.”[532]
Tobias Conyers, Minister of St. Ethelbert’s, London, also one of the
ejected clergy, accused of being “schismatical and heretical,”--but
who seems to have been a man of high character, and of a catholic
spirit,--published, in 1657, a translation of a work by Arminius, under
the title of “The Just Man’s Defence, or the Royal Conquest.”[533]
Of George Lawson, Rector of More, in Shropshire, who animadverted
upon Baxter’s _Aphorisms of Justification_, Baxter himself
remarks,--after eulogizing him as almost the ablest man whom he knew
in England,--“He was himself near the Arminians, differing from them
only in the point of perseverance as to the confirmed, and some little
matters more.” He published (1659) an excellent sum of divinity, called
_Theopolitica_.[534]
[Sidenote: JOHN GOODWIN.]
The position of these Divines, especially of John Goodwin, amongst the
religious thinkers of that age, is remarkable and significant, and
deserves much more attention than it has ever received. The common
notion is that the Puritan movement, in its theological character, was
essentially Calvinistic, that Calvinism constituted its life and soul;
and, moreover, that evangelical opinions in general,--understanding
by them those views of the Gospel which rest on a keen appreciation
of its precious and saving character,--necessarily involve ideas
of Divine predestination, akin to those which were entertained by
the great Genevan Reformer. Both the disciples and the opponents of
that illustrious man have, in many cases, adopted or countenanced
this conception. But the writers we have just described show us that
it is a mistake. Here were men Puritan in spirit, Puritan in their
characteristic religiousness, Puritan in their habits and modes of
life, who, so far from being imbued with the distinctive sentiments of
John Calvin on the subject of the Divine purposes and decrees, utterly
repudiated them, and spent an immense amount of time and thought
upon their confutation. They believed in justification by faith, in
conversion to God, in the gracious work of the Holy Spirit upon the
human soul, and in the riches of Divine mercy manifested throughout the
salvation of men, as firmly and deeply as did any of those who most
fervently proclaimed the doctrines of election, effectual calling, and
perseverance. Neither their philosophy, nor their logic, nor their
religion, led them to identify the one class of ideas with the other.
And, if the discussion were proper in a work like this, it would
not be difficult to show, that the motive power in Puritanism--that
which made it such a well-spring of life and energy to multitudes of
Englishmen--consisted not in high notions of predestination, where such
notions were entertained, but in those articles of evangelical belief
which can unite devout Calvinists and devout Arminians in the bonds
of a common experience, and in the inheritance of the same hope. And,
if anything further were needful to prove that the Puritan spirit can
exist and thrive apart from Calvinistic theology, it is sufficient to
point to the Wesleyans of the present day, than whom none are more
decided in their opposition to predestinarianism, none are more zealous
in preaching salvation by grace, and none are more inspired with the
life and glow of a warm-hearted piety.
Anti-Calvinistic zeal, however, often took an anti-Puritanical form,
and by assaults which were made upon predestinarian principles, the
interests of evangelical religion were very seriously compromised.
[Sidenote: “FUR PRÆDESTINATUS.”]
A Latin tract, entitled _Fur Prædestinatus_, made some noise at
the time of its publication, and has received the commendation of
literary and theological critics. The _Fur Prædestinatus_ was
printed in London in 1651. D’Oyley, simply on the ground of general
rumour, ascribes the tract to Sancroft, and prints it in his life.
Hallam accepts the rumour, adding, “It is much the best proof of
ability that the worthy Archbishop ever gave.” Birch says, in his
_Memoirs of Tillotson_, that Sancroft joined with Mr. George
Davenport, and another of his friends, in composing this satire upon
Calvinism. But Jackson, in his _Life of John Goodwin_, affirms
that the tract was in existence many years before Sancroft was capable
of such a production. He adds, it was circulated in Holland, at the
early part of the seventeenth century, and was thought to have been
written by Henry Slatius. It is a dialogue between a condemned thief
and a Calvinistic minister, in which it is attempted to be shown,
that not only the doctrine of predestination but also the doctrine of
justification by faith is marked by an immoral tendency, and several
quotations from Luther and Zwingle, as well as from Calvin, Beza,
and others, are pressed into the service. It exhibits, no doubt,
some cleverness, and from the narrow view of the Atonement which
is introduced, as held by some distinguished evangelical Divines,
consequences are drawn which it would be difficult logically to repel.
Yet most persons will acknowledge, that conducting controversy,
dialogue fashion, is more easy for an author than it is satisfactory
to a reader; and that, in this controversy especially, allusions to
all sorts of authors can with ease be unfairly brought together, so as
to impart a specious appearance to allegations which on a thorough
scrutiny are found to be perfectly untrue. Certainly, Luther and Calvin
never dreamt of entertaining such views as are put into the lips of the
criminal and of his spiritual adviser--and they would have crushed,
with a force of logic too much for a stronger man than the writer now
under review, whoever he might be, the sophisms which are employed in
the _Fur Prædestinatus_, to the discredit of that which Reformers
held to be the scriptural doctrines of Divine grace.
Two eminent Puritans remain for consideration, and they may be regarded
as maintaining an intermediate position between High Calvinists and
Evangelical Arminians.
CHAPTER XX.
[Sidenote: BAXTER.]
Few persons could have been subjected in early life to a greater
variety of influence than Richard Baxter. His father having been a
gambler, became, before the birth of his illustrious son, a pious man,
and trained up his offspring in godly discipline. Whilst over his home
a religious atmosphere diffused itself, the people in the village spent
the greater part of most Sundays in dancing round the Maypole. After
four successive curates of worthless character, there followed a grave
and eminent man who expected to be made a Bishop. Having been placed
under each of them at school, Richard afterwards had for his tutor a
Royalist chaplain, who did all in his power to make the youth hate
Puritanism. Baxter’s religious impressions were deepened by reading the
works of a Jesuit, which an evangelical Protestant had revised, and by
the perusal of evangelical books from the pens of Sibbs and Perkins.
The youth’s first associations in life were with the Episcopal Church,
and he was then a Conformist in practice and principle. He studied
Richard Hooker, and did not come in contact with Nonconformists, until
just before he attained his majority. He spent, as a young man, a month
at Whitehall, with the chance of becoming a courtier. Accident brought
him within an inch of the grave, and he suffered so much from illness,
that at twenty he had the symptoms of fourscore. No classic, no
mathematician, he plunged into the study of logic and metaphysics, and
soon formed an intimate acquaintance with Aquinas and Scotus, Durandus
and Ockham. He had omnivorous habits of reading, and it is curious
to notice the variety of authors whom he cites or enumerates. He was
a self-taught man, and when Anthony Wood inquired of him by letter,
whether he had been educated at Oxford, Baxter replied, “As to myself,
my faults are no disgrace to any University, for I was of none: I have
little but what I had out of books, and inconsiderable helps of country
tutors. Weakness and pain helped me to study how to die: that set me
on studying how to live; and that set me on studying the doctrine
from which I must fetch my motives and comforts; and beginning with
necessaries, I proceeded to the lesser integrals by degrees, and now am
going to see that which I have lived and studied for.”[535]
By bearing in mind these remarkable facts, we shall be assisted in
accounting for some peculiarities of opinions in this remarkable man.
There was a manifold character in his theology corresponding with the
manifold influences which moulded his religion, and we may trace the
effects of his education in both the excellencies and defects of his
numerous writings. In a literary point of view, they are strikingly
different from those of Thomas Goodwin and John Owen. He is, in
his doctrinal discussions, often as tedious as they, and sometimes
more provoking with his endless distinctions, but, in the practical
application of his theological principles, he exerts a charm which
neither of those contemporaries could ever rival. His masculine
style, just the outgrowth of his thought, just the natural skin, pure
and transparent, which covers it, has been the admiration of popular
readers and practised critics. It has been praised by Addison and
Johnson; it has been felt and appreciated by thousands of unlettered
people. We detect in Baxter, no rhetorical tricks, no striving to shine
for the sake of shining, no waving of the scarlet flag, no “taking out
his vocabulary for an airing:” and yet for fullness of expression,
for a rich flow of words, for occasional felicity of diction, for
poetry in prose, he surpasses all his compeers, except Jeremy Taylor:
and in directness, force, and genuine fervour, as to a glowing heat
of the affections, which is more intense than the eloquence of the
imagination, as to words which come rolling out like balls of white
fire, the great Church orator must give place to the Nonconformist
Divine. If immense popularity, if the possession of a spell which
can hold fast minds of all orders, be a test of genius, then Baxter
must be allowed to have possessed it in a high degree. In activity of
thought and in keenness of perception, in the grasp of his knowledge
and in the retentiveness of his memory, in dialectic skill and in
logical fencing, Baxter is acknowledged to have had no superior, if
any equal, in his own day, and he would have been worthy of a lot
amongst the mediæval schoolmen, to whose list of doctors his might
have added another characteristic name. But such qualities have their
disadvantages. In this instance, they led their possessor to travel
over such an immense field of inquiry, to meddle with so many topics,
to dispute with so many men, to make so many distinctions without any
difference, at least such as less acute minds can discern, that it is
difficult to gather together and harmonize his opinions, and to say on
certain points what he believed, and what he did not. It is easy for
a man of one-sided views to be consistent; but who that loves truth
for the truth’s sake, and wishes to see as much of it as is possible
in this world of imperfect knowledge, will value consistency of that
kind? Baxter was not one-sided, but strove to look at every subject
on its many sides, if it has many; and to reconcile aspects of truth
which to hasty and prejudiced thinkers seem contradictory. Hence he
has given occasion to the charge of inconsistency. His opinions have
been a battle-ground for critics ever since he left the world; and
in this respect he has attained a position honourable in one point
of view, dubious in another--like that of Origen. A great thinker, a
great debater, an eloquent expounder of his own convictions, he has
been pronounced a heretic by some members of his own Church, and his
orthodoxy has been endorsed by members of Churches not his own. It
is a curious illustration of the difficulty of deciding what were
Baxter’s sentiments on some intricate subjects, that his most copious
and intelligent biographer should first say, that he was neither
a Calvinist, nor an Arminian--should next assert his claims to be
considered a faithful follower of the Synod of Dort,--and should
finally pronounce this verdict: “Baxter was probably such an Arminian
as Richard Watson, and as much a Calvinist as the late Dr. Edward
Williams.”
[Sidenote: BAXTER.]
After such a verdict, I cannot hope successfully to thread the mazes
of Baxter’s theology. Yet there are a few conclusions which appear
to me undeniable. He took a Calvinistic view of the Divine decrees.
Several passages, probably, might be found in his writings apparently
inconsistent with the Genevan doctrine, but what convinces me that
he held it substantially, is not so much his confession, that he
accepted the decisions of the Synod of Dort (upon which his biographer
just mentioned insists), for Baxter sometimes interpreted statements
after a manner of his own,--as the fact that in his treatise _On
Conversion_, when dealing with such as say, “Those that God will
save shall be saved, whatsoever they be, and those that He will damn,
shall be damned,”--instead of cutting the matter short, as an Arminian
would do, by denying the Calvinistic dogma altogether, our Divine goes
on to guard against the abuses of that dogma; and to argue that people
should act in relation to the decrees of Grace, as they do respecting
the decrees of Providence. He finishes by saying just what Calvinists
say,--“God hath not ordinarily decreed the end without the means, and
if you will neglect the means of salvation it is a certain mark that
God hath not decreed you to salvation.”[536]
Baxter’s opinions of the efficacy of Christ’s death resemble those of
John Goodwin, rather than those of Thomas Goodwin. For he remarks,
“God hath made a universal deed of gift of Christ and life to all
the world, on condition that they will but accept the offer. In this
testament or promise, or act of oblivion, the sins of all the world
are conditionally pardoned, and they are conditionally justified, and
reconciled to God.”[537]
[Sidenote: BAXTER.]
Baxter seems to have believed that whilst those who are ultimately
saved, are saved by the sovereign and gracious purpose of the
Almighty--in other words, by Divine election--there is a provision
made by the mediation of Christ, sufficient for the wants of all men,
and of which all men, if they pleased, could avail themselves; and in
this respect his views do not materially differ from those expressed
by Dr. Edward Williams, in his treatise on _The Divine Equity and
Sovereignty_; or from those taught by Andrew Fuller in several of
his publications. A somewhat similar _via media_ was pursued by
Amyraut, the French Divine. Yet it is, I believe, not an uncommon
impression that Baxter went beyond this, and supposed that whilst some
are elected to eternal life by a special Divine decree, others are
saved through a general provision of Divine grace. I do not pretend to
have read all Baxter’s works: but in those with which I am acquainted,
I find no trace of such an opinion, neither does it appear in Orme’s
careful summary of Baxter’s theological writings. It is a curious
fact, however, that an idea of the kind attributed to the Puritan was
expressed, at the Council of Trent, by a Papist, Ambrosius Catarinus,
of Siena,[538] and that a similar idea is exhibited in the writings of
Fowler, the Latitudinarian.[539]
Baxter did not adopt the doctrine of imputation held by Thomas Goodwin
and John Owen. He remarks:--
“Most of our ordinary Divines say, that Christ did as properly obey
in our room or stead, as He did suffer in our stead, and that in
God’s esteem, and in point of law, we were in Christ’s obeying and
suffering, and so, in Him we did both perfectly fulfil the commands
of the law by obedience, and the threatenings of it by bearing the
penalty; and thus (say they) is Christ’s righteousness imputed to
us (viz.)--His passive righteousness for the pardon of our sins and
delivering us from the penalty, His active righteousness for the making
of us righteous, and giving us a title to the Kingdom--and some say
the habitual righteousness of His human nature, instead of our own
habitual righteousness--yea, some add the righteousness of the Divine
nature also. This opinion (in my judgment) containeth a great many of
mistakes.”[540]
Faith, Baxter explains as “both a general trust in God’s revelations
and grace, and a special trust in Jesus Christ,” adding, “I have oft
proved this justifying faith to be no less than our unfeigned taking
Christ for our Saviour, and becoming true Christians according to
the tenour of the baptismal covenant.” The characteristic nature of
Christian faith he further represents as consisting of trust in a
personal Saviour, inclusive of an assenting trust by the understanding;
a consenting trust by the will; and a practical trust by the executive
powers.[541] The linking of the exercises of faith upon three faculties
in human nature may be observed both in Goodwin and in Owen; but Baxter
seems to have proceeded further than they in carrying out the practical
relations of faith, and in this respect to have occupied ground not
unlike that of Thorndike.[542]
[Sidenote: HOWE.]
Howe’s Puritanism might almost be said to have reached him by descent;
but his extraordinary thoughtfulness, and his singular originality,
require us to believe, that far from blindly accepting the inheritance,
he carefully investigated the whole subject, and became a Puritan from
conviction. His father, appointed to the incumbency of Loughborough
by Archbishop Laud, afterwards displeased his patron, by refusing to
comply with his requirements, and was consequently ejected. The father
took the son to Ireland, whence he was driven back by the rebellion;
after which, John Howe, before he proceeded to Oxford, went to
Cambridge, and there, from the “Platonic tincture” of his mind, became
associated with Cudworth, More, and John Smith, from whom his Platonic
tastes received the highest culture. The great Pagan theologue,
however, exerted a more powerful influence upon his sympathizing
disciple, than did any of these under-masters; for Howe carefully read
Plato for himself. He had “conversed closely with the heathen moralists
and philosophers; had perused many of the writings of the schoolmen,
and several systems and common places of the Reformers. Above all,
he had compiled for himself a system of theology, from the Sacred
Scriptures alone: a system which, as he was afterwards heard to say, he
had seldom seen occasion to alter.”[543]
His defects of style have robbed him of that meed of honour to which
as a theologian he is entitled. He exhibits an utter neglect of the
art of composition, like a man of great wealth, thoroughly careless
about his attire, and falls into a habit of writing most inharmonious
periods, perhaps for want of a musical ear. His frequent poverty of
expression, and his numerous and intricate subdivisions, are failings
in their effect vastly heightened by the unaccountably strange method
of punctuation which he adopted himself, or left his printer to adopt
for him.[544] Yet his works present, in numerous instances, the most
felicitous phrases and the choicest epithets, and only less frequently
does he, under the inspiration of his genius, pour forth sonorous
sentences, with an organ-like swell, in keeping with the magnificent
ideas which they were employed to convey. After all Howe’s drawbacks, I
have often risen from the perusal of his works with feelings similar to
those of a traveller, who, at the end of his journey, charmed with the
remembrance of the scenes he has visited, forgets the ruggedness of the
road, and the inconvenience of his conveyance, however unpleasant they
might have been at the moment they were experienced. The originality
and compass of Howe’s mind, and the calmness and moderation of his
temper, must ever inspire sympathy, and awaken admiration in reflective
readers: his Platonic and Alexandrian culture commends him to the
philosophical student, and the practical tendency of his religious
thinking endears him to all Christians. His works contain no treatises
on Faith, on Justification, on Election, or Particular Redemption.
Though essentially evangelical, Howe’s writings are pervaded by a tone
of thought which varies from that which is predominant in Puritan
literature: and I may add that, as in Baxter, so in Howe, yet not from
exactly the same cause, or in the same measure, heresy hunters, if
their scent be keen, may discover passages open to exception.
[Sidenote: HOWE.]
In the _Blessedness of the Righteous_, when describing those
who bear that character, instead of dwelling upon justification by
the imputed righteousness of Christ, after the manner of Goodwin or
Owen, Howe exhibits chiefly the moral view of religion, that “it
can be understood to be nothing but the impress of the Gospel upon
a man’s heart and life; a conformity in spirit and practice to the
revelation of the will of God in Jesus Christ; a collection of graces
exerting themselves in suitable actions and deportments towards God
and man.” Calamy justly says that Howe “did not consider religion
so much a system of doctrines, as a Divine discipline to reform the
heart and life.” He carries out the idea of Christianity being a law,
“with evangelical mitigations and indulgences.” He speaks of the law
of faith, and insists upon that part of the Gospel revelation which
contains and discovers our duty--what we are to be and do, in order
to our blessedness.[545] Some of his expressions would scarcely have
been used by the two Divines we have just mentioned; yet, without
going into a theological discussion on the question, I may observe,
that Howe certainly believed most firmly in all which is essential to
the doctrine of justification by faith, and disposed of the opposite
doctrine in a summary way by saying, “To suppose the law of works, in
its own proper form and tenor, to be still obliging, is to suppose all
under hopeless condemnation, inasmuch as all have sinned.” The spirit
of his teaching throughout must be remembered, in order that we may
qualify, somewhat, certain expressions which seem to look favourably
towards such schemes as were advocated by Thorndike and Bull. The
drift of Howe’s theology was different from theirs, notwithstanding an
occasional resemblance of phraseology; and whilst I admit that some
of his passages on this subject require to be carefully guarded, and
others are open to exception, I must say that he did immense service
to the cause of Gospel truth, first, by insisting upon the present
dispensation of the Divine will as a form of moral and righteous
government for men in general, not simply an expedient for gathering
together the elect; and, next, by insisting upon the responsibility of
man, as well as upon the freeness of the grace of God. In my opinion,
Howe brought out--and Baxter did the same--phases of truth in relation
to man as a responsible being, as a subject morally accountable to the
universal Governor of the world, too much neglected by many of their
Puritan brethren.
[Sidenote: HOWE.]
The comprehensiveness of Howe’s mind, the harmony of his own spiritual
life, and the essentially practical character of his instructions,
appear in his _Carnality of Religious Contention_, especially in
the following passage relative to the two great blessings of the Gospel
which he distinguishes whilst he unites them:--In fine, therefore, the
Apostle “makes it his business to evidence to them that both their
justification and their sanctification must be conjoined, and arise
together out of one and the same root,--Christ Himself,--and by faith
in Him, without the works of the law, as that which must vitally unite
them with Him; and that thereby they should become actually interested
in all His fulness--that fulness of righteousness which was to be found
only in Him, and nowhere but in Him; and withal, in that fulness of
spirit and life and holy influence, which also was only in Him; so as
that the soul, being united by this faith with Christ, must presently
die to sin and live to God. And at the same time, when He delivered a
man from the law as dead to it, He became to him a continual living
spring of all the duty which God did by His holy rule require and call
for, and render the whole life of such a man a life of devotedness to
God.”[546]
The Popish theory of justification, which confounds it with personal
righteousness, and the approaches made in that direction by Anglican
Divines, drove the Puritans to an opposite extreme; and the distinction
they sometimes make between justification and sanctification amounts
almost to a separation; but Howe--following St. Paul, who seems never
to have thought of the one without having in his mind at the same time
the thought of the other--whilst distinguishing between them, justly
presents the two as _conjoint_ blessings, “arising together out of
one and the same root,” or as being, in reality, two harmonious aspects
of one simple salvation.
Howe nowhere maintains the doctrine of particular redemption, but
he exhibits the expiatory sacrifice of Christ with great clearness,
and introduces an argument to the effect “that to account for the
sufferings of the perfectly holy and innocent Messiah is made
abundantly more difficult by denying the Atonement.”[547]
In his _Redeemer’s Tears wept over Lost Souls_, he does not
enter at all into the Predestinarian controversy--a circumstance which
distinguishes him from High Calvinistic theologians, who would not
have failed largely to discuss the question of the Divine decrees,
together with the Divine foreknowledge. But Howe rigorously confines
himself to a solution of that broad difficulty which presses equally
upon Arminians and Calvinists, supposing that both believe, as they
generally do, that God is omniscient, and that man is responsible.
The author’s simple purpose is to vindicate the Divine sincerity and
wisdom, in employing methods of moral persuasion with His intelligent
and accountable creatures, when He discerns beforehand that they will
prove of no avail, in offering invitations of mercy which He knows will
never be accepted, and in urging admonitions and rebukes to which He
foresees many will turn an unlistening ear and an obdurate heart. The
reticence of Howe, in this and in other parts of his writings, upon
subjects which present a fascinating attraction to speculative minds,
however incapable they may be of grappling with the objects towards
which they are so irresistibly drawn, is worthy of special notice, and
indicates a resemblance between him, in this respect, and Robert Hall,
who regarded Howe with intense admiration.
One of the characteristic imperfections of that age in relation
to theology is found in the endeavour to define and explain many
things which are utterly beyond the reach of human comprehension.
Anglican and Puritan, in almost equal degrees, boldly ventured into
regions of speculation, and mistook for solid ground what really is
but cloud-land. Metaphysical conclusions of their own were by their
imagination transformed into Divine verities; and they often overlooked
the grand distinction between what revelation plainly teaches, and what
can be only inferred from its teaching. John Howe is singularly free
from all presumptuous intermeddling with subjects which lie beyond the
ken of mortals; and, although versed in the highest philosophy, beyond
many of his contemporaries--and, indeed, because he was thoroughly
imbued with the purest spirit of philosophy--he knew when to stop in
his path of inquiry, and how to distinguish between the wisdom of God
and the reasonings of man.
[Sidenote: BAXTER AND HOWE.]
Both Baxter and Howe were pre-eminently earnest in their endeavours
to promote the moral righteousness of Christians, and to exhibit its
production in human character and human life as the grand aim of the
Gospel of Jesus. Other Puritans, more Calvinistic in their modes of
thinking, inculcated holiness with emphasis and effect, and might
imply, throughout their instructions, that pardon and justification
were means to an end, that end being the conformity of the saints to
the will of God and the image of Christ; but no teacher of that class
impresses my mind with the positive conviction of such being the true
order of the great redemptive process, to the same extent, and with
the same depth, as do the two theologians now under review. They most
effectually relieve at least their part in Puritan Divinity from the
charge, and from the suspicion, of subordinating that which is moral in
religion to that which is speculative, that which is personal to that
which is relative, that which is practical to that which is emotional.
They give the true perspective in theology, and place subjects of
belief in their position one towards another, more accurately perhaps
than any of their contemporaries. They exhibit the sinner’s forgiveness
and acceptance with God, and his adoption into the Divine family of
the Church, and his heirship of celestial felicities, not as the
ultimatum of Christian object and desire, but as spiritual conditions
and circumstances essential to the growth and maturity of that moral
and God-like life which is begotten in the human soul at the hour of
the new birth by the Holy Spirit. No one, who reflects upon a scheme
of theology constructed after this type, can regard it as defective in
moral power, or as betraying the interests of perfect righteousness.
To place righteousness in the position of an end, rather than in the
relation of means to an end, must be to exalt and glorify it. Those
who impugn the whole system of evangelical belief as derogatory to
the moral character of religion, and who _therefore_ insist upon
moral duties as the means of attaining eternal life, do really dethrone
Christian righteousness from its Divine supremacy, and turn it into a
prudential expedient for promoting one’s own advantage, by making it a
series of stepping-stones or a flight of stairs by which men may climb
from the borders of perdition to the threshold of heaven. It is they
who dishonour--of course unintentionally--the nature and claims of
Gospel righteousness, not teachers like Baxter and Howe, who, refusing
to look at that righteousness merely or mainly as means to an end, as
price paid for a treasure, or as service done for reward, represent
it as the goal of all endeavour, the prize of the Christian race, the
richest gift of Divine love, and the brightest diamond in the crown of
salvation.
[Sidenote: BAXTER AND HOWE.]
A word may be added indicative of the literary and intellectual niche
which the names of these distinguished men deserve to occupy. Dr.
Arnold said of the Church Divines of the seventeenth century, “I
cannot find in any of them a really great man.”[548] Without adopting
the opinion so expressed, I am constrained to say that we can find
little of what may be called genius in some of the most renowned. No
one could ascribe that high gift to Thorndike, with all his stores of
learning and powers of reflection. No one would think of ascribing it
to Bull or Pearson. Nor, if we include Puritans, can it be attributed
in any high degree to Goodwin or Owen. Perhaps not one of the whole
class of theological writers at the time, able as they were, could
be justly esteemed the equal of that magnificent moral philosopher
and theologian in the days of Queen Elizabeth, Richard Hooker, or the
compeer even of Thomas Jackson, whose power, learning, and eloquence so
brightly adorned the Church in the reign of James I. Jeremy Taylor, no
doubt, had received Heaven’s gift of genius in the form of imagination,
and a power of musical expression in prose such as no one else could
rival, not even John Milton; but, in my opinion, the two theologians of
that age who possessed most of original power were Richard Baxter and
John Howe.
Moreover, there was in both of these men a breadth of human
sympathy--always closely allied to the highest order of
intellect--which redeemed them from the narrowness of some of their
contemporaries. Baxter and Howe evinced none of the restricted
Churchmanship which blinded the Anglicans to all goodness not seen in
their own communion; and none of the exclusive Calvinism which made
some Puritans virtually shut up God’s love to a few like themselves,
and hand over to reprobation the remainder of the race. Baxter,
although not an accomplished scholar, was a man of wide and varied
reading, and had a decided taste for history, politics, and especially
metaphysics, as well as for theology; and Howe, who seems to have known
much more of Greek than his friend, was at home amongst the ancient
masters of philosophy, and perhaps with none of his brethren, except
Theophilus Gale, was Plato such an intimate acquaintance, and such a
thorough favourite. It has been justly remarked that the man who is
only a theological scholar is a very poor one.[549] The remark may
detract from the reputation of some of the Puritans, but not from the
reputation of the two Divines we have last described.
Before I close this imperfect survey of the theology of the Puritans,
it is desirable to bring together, in some distinct form, the
characteristics of their teaching in reference to certain points which
have not been noticed in the foregoing detailed account of their
opinions.
Here we notice first what they say upon the nature of sacraments.
Goodwin and Owen refer to the subject of baptism incidentally, the
former speaking of it as the sign of salvation, and as the sealing of
our calling, our justification, our renewal, and our union with Christ;
the latter alluding to it chiefly for the purpose of denying that it
has the regenerating or purifying power ascribed to it by Catholics.
But he says a cleansing in profession and signification accompanies
baptism, when it is rightly administered.[550]
[Sidenote: PURITAN VIEWS OF SACRAMENTS.]
Baxter enters at large upon the subject, and discusses, in reference
to it, such questions as are particularly interesting to Catholics;
and one question at least--“Is baptism by laymen or women lawful in
cases of necessity?”--he answers after a manner resembling that of
the highest Anglican. He denies that there can be such necessity,
yet he does not absolutely pronounce lay baptism a nullity; although
he adds, If the baptizer “were in no possession or pretence of the
office, I would be baptized again if it were my case; because I should
fear that what is done in Christ’s name by one that notoriously had
no authority from Him to do it, is not owned by Christ as His deed,
and so is a nullity.”[551] Again, he remarks, “All that the minister
warrantably baptizeth are sacramentally regenerate, and are, _in foro
ecclesiæ_, members of Christ, and children of God, and heirs of
heaven.” “Therefore it is not unfit that the minister call the baptized
regenerate and pardoned members of Christ, and children of God, and
heirs of heaven, supposing that _in foro ecclesiæ_ they were the
due subjects of baptism.” What so subtle a dialectician exactly meant
by some things he said upon this subject, I do not undertake to say;
but certainly Baxter showed, like Thorndike, a strong disposition to
connect the functions of faith with a baptismal covenant. Baxter’s
theory was one which, upon a comparison of his theology in general
with that of Thorndike, must have materially differed from it; and
the qualifications introduced by the former in immediate connection
with the sentences quoted--which qualifications I have deferred citing
until now, in order that their force may be more clearly seen--must
be considered, if we would avoid misapprehending the drift of his
sentiments. “It is only those that are sincerely delivered up in
covenant to God in Christ, that are spiritually and really regenerate,
and are such as shall be owned for members of Christ and children of
God _in foro cœli_.”[552] Those readers who are familiar with the
controversy on baptismal regeneration will see at once that Baxter’s
statements, with his qualifications, may be so explained as to point
to a condition of Divine privilege, possibilities, and opportunities,
rather than to anything else. He further made a distinction between
some baptized children and others; a distinction which seems to
shift the conveyance of spiritual benefit from the rite itself to
the relation sustained by the child to a godly parent. “Not,” he
says, “that all the baptized, but that all the baptized seed of true
Christians are pardoned, justified, adopted, and have _a title
to_ the Spirit and salvation.”[553] And in his _Now or Never_
(published in 1663), there occurs a very strong passage against
baptismal regeneration as held by some Episcopalians.[554]
Howe touches upon the subject of baptism in his _Living Temple_,
and speaks of it as a taking on of Christ’s badge and cognizance,
as the fit and enjoined sign and token of becoming Christians, and
as a federal rite by which remission of sin is openly confirmed and
sealed.[555]
Dr. Jacomb, in his treatise on _Holy Dedication_, uses, as already
noticed, very strong expressions relative to the nature and effects of
the ordinance; and I may observe that generally the writings of the
Puritans on the whole subject are pervaded by a mystic and sacramental
tone such as would not evoke the sympathies of their religious
descendants.
[Sidenote: PURITAN VIEWS OF SACRAMENTS.]
The Lord’s Supper, Dr. Goodwin exhibits, in opposition to the Catholic
view, not as a commemorative sacrifice to God, but as a remembrance of
His sacrifice to men; and he says that by it the intention on God’s
part is to represent the whole work of Christ; and the intention on
our part is to show it forth, and to signify our personal interest
in the benefits of His death.[556] Neither in Owen nor in Howe, so
far as I can find, is there anything indicative of their opinions
on the nature of the Lord’s Supper; but Baxter writes copiously
upon this theme. According to him, the _consecration_ of the
sacrament respects God the Father, and makes it the representative
body and blood of Christ, whilst, in such consecration, the Church
offers the elements to be accepted of God for this sacred use; the
_commemoration_ of the sacrament respects God the Son, and He is
in it, “in effigy,” still crucified before the Church’s eyes, and by it
the faithful show the Father that sacrifice in which they trust; and
the _communication_ of the sacrament respects God the Holy Ghost,
as being that Spirit given in the flesh and blood for the quickening of
the soul.[557] The same author, in his _Dying Thoughts_, remarks,
with reference to the Real Presence, “When we dispute against them
that hold transubstantiation and the ubiquity of Christ’s body, we do
assuredly conclude that sense is judge, whether there be real bread and
wine present or not; but it is no judge, whether Christ’s spiritual
body be present or not, no more than whether an angel be present. And
we conclude that Christ’s body is not infinite or immense, as is His
Godhead; but, what are its dimensions, limits or extent, and where it
is absent, far be it from us to determine, when we cannot tell how far
the sun extendeth, its secondary substance, or emanant beams; nor well
what locality is as to Christ’s soul, or any spirit, if to a spiritual
body.”[558] It is strange indeed to hear a Puritan speaking thus; his
language has almost a patristic and Anglican sound. Some mysterious
presence of the body of Christ in the material elements on the altar
was believed by the orthodox Fathers; and Origen regarded that body
as being ethereal and ubiquitous, and capable of assuming different
forms: even the judicious Hooker supposed that the human substance of
Christ is universally present “after a sort, by being nowhere severed
from that which everywhere is present.” It is easier to employ definite
expressions on this subject, and others of a similar kind, than to form
definite notions corresponding with the expressions; and it appears
to me very hard to say exactly what either Origen or Hooker meant by
the language which they employed on this subject. Certainly Baxter
expresses no decided opinion as to the presence of Christ’s body in
the sacrament; but he admits such a presence to be not impossible, and
thus opens the door for such unsatisfactory speculations as those in
which Origen and Hooker indulged. Baxter, from his scholastic habits of
thought, and from his familiarity with Catholic as well as Protestant
theologians, was led, on the subject of baptism and the Lord’s
Supper--especially the latter--to adopt a much more mystical form of
belief than his Puritan brethren were wont to entertain.[559]
[Sidenote: PURITAN CONTROVERSY WITH POPERY.]
In connection with the subject of sacraments, it is pertinent to
inquire what were the opinions of these Divines in reference to the
ministry and ordination. Baxter, as might be expected, discusses the
question in his usual scholastic manner. His views on baptism, as just
stated, indicate that he attached much importance to clerical order;
and he alludes to the power conveyed from Christ to the individual
minister, of which power he says neither the electors nor the ordainers
are the donors; they are only the instruments of designing an apt
recipient, and of delivering the possession of office. This position
involves a denial of the High Church doctrine of orders, and this
doctrine Baxter still farther denies, when he concludes that imposition
of hands is not essential to ordination, but is simply a decent, apt,
and significant sign. Ordination, however, he holds to be needful;
for, without this key, the office of the ministry and the doors of the
Church would be thrown open to heretics and self-conceited persons.
The power of ordination he believes to be vested in the senior pastors
of the Church, and the people’s call, or consent, he does not regard
as necessary to the minister’s reception of office in general, but
only to his pastoral relation. He admits that laymen may preach,
as did Origen and Constantine, but he cautiously restricts their
preaching to their families, or within “proper bounds.” What he had
witnessed in the army had given the good man a great horror of the
license claimed by lay orators on religious subjects; and, no doubt,
recollections of some of his military antagonists came before his
mind when he laid down the law, that lay teachers must not presume to
go beyond their abilities, especially in matters dark and difficult.
He also forbids them to thrust themselves into public meetings, and
proudly and schismatically to set themselves up against their lawful
pastors.[560] Baxter’s Presbyterianism appears throughout his treatment
of these subjects--subjects respecting which Goodwin, Owen, and Howe
are silent. But it is not to be inferred from this circumstance that
they were indifferent to order in the ministry and the Church. What
the Independents determined respecting these matters, in the Savoy
Declaration, we have seen in a previous chapter.
Next to the Puritan treatment of the sacraments and the ministry comes
the Puritan share in the anti-Popish controversy. Although none of
the Divines now under consideration took so prominent a part in it
as did Cosin, Bramhall, and Barrow,--although none of them, on this
subject, published books which have become so famous as some written
by their brethren,--yet of their intense opposition to Romanism there
is not the shadow of a doubt. They might not have the same reasons for
wielding anti-Papal weapons which their Anglican contemporaries had,
who, by the charges of Romanizing tendencies brought against them,
were compelled to stand up in self-defence.[561] Still, expressions
of horror at the very thought of Rome are numerous enough in the
works of the Puritans, and some of them couched their thoughts on the
subject in the strongest phraseology. Nor were there wanting treatises
expressly upon the errors of Romanism from Puritan hands. Owen, at the
suggestion of Lord Clarendon, it is said, wrote his _Animadversions
on Fiat Lux_; a work which so pleased His Lordship that he declared
the writer had more merit than any English Protestant of that period,
and offered him preferment if he would conform. Baxter went beyond
Owen in the laborious defence of the Reformed against the Tridentine
Church; for he published altogether nearly twenty books and pamphlets
in this department of polemical literature, leaving “no one point in
the extensive field untouched,” and supplying “a complete library on
Popery.”[562]
[Sidenote: PURITAN ECCLESIASTICAL CONTROVERSY.]
In addition to what has been said on the subject in other portions of
this History, a passing notice must be taken of the ecclesiastical
controversies carried on by the Puritans against the High Church party.
During the Civil Wars, and under the Protectorate, unsparing attacks
were made upon Prelacy, modified schemes of Episcopacy were proposed,
Presbyterianism was upheld in books and pamphlets almost innumerable,
and between that system of Church government and Congregationalism the
warfare continued fierce and incessant. The Presbyterian contended
against the Prelatist for the original identity of Bishops and
elders, and for the scriptural authority of their own scheme of rule
and discipline. He contended against the Congregationalist for the
right and the duty of reducing England to a state of ecclesiastical
uniformity, based upon the decisions of the Westminster Assembly, and
defended by the employment of magisterial power. The Congregationalist
contended against the Presbyterian for the liberty of gathering
Independent Churches, and of maintaining Independent discipline--and
for the toleration, within certain limits, of all Christian sects. Of
course, after the Restoration, although the main differences continued
as before, and ecclesiastical disputes, essentially the same, were
carried on--differences in the treatment of these questions necessarily
arose, and changes in polemics on all sides became inevitable. When
the garrison within the castle walls are mastered and turned out by
the besiegers--when those who were besiegers become the garrison, and
those who formed the garrison become besiegers, the tactics of each
party will undergo alteration. Whilst Presbyterians or Independents, or
both, were in the ascendant, Episcopalians had to assume an offensive
attitude. They were, in fact, for the time being, Dissenters from
the Established religion of the country, and had, as such, to make
good their position as best they might. But when Prelacy had been
reestablished, its friends no longer needed the kind of battering-rams
which they had used very uncomfortably for about twenty years, they
would simply buckle on their defensive armour, and fence with their
weapons as in days of old. The other party had now to attack those
who were in power, and to draw their lines of circumvallation around
the fortress of intolerance, whilst they steadily defended themselves
against the charge of schism, and earnestly contended for liberty and
the rights of conscience. Baxter, in his _Plea for Peace_, argued
against Conformity on the ground of its unjust impositions,--such as
the expression of “assent and consent” to all things contained in the
Prayer Book, canonical subscription, re-ordination in the case of
Presbyterians, and the oath against seeking any change in Church or
State.
The right of imposing things indifferent was a point which met with
much consideration in books as well as in the Savoy discussions.
Respecting this subject, the reader cannot do better than ponder an
extract from Sanderson, in favour of imposing such things, and another
from Baxter, against all impositions of the kind.
“The liberty of a Christian,” says the Anglican, “to all indifferent
things, is in the mind and conscience, and is then infringed, when
the conscience is bound and straightened, by imposing upon it an
opinion of doctrinal necessity. But it is no wrong to the liberty of
a Christian man’s conscience, to bind him to outward observance for
order’s sake, and to impose upon him a necessity of obedience. Which
one distinction of doctrinal and obediential necessity well weighed,
and rightly applied, is of itself sufficient to clear all doubts on
this point. For, to make all restraint of the outward man in matters
indifferent, an impeachment of Christian liberty, what were it else,
but even to bring flat Anabaptism and anarchy into the Church; and to
overthrow all bond of subjection and obedience to lawful authority?
I beseech you consider, wherein can the immediate power and authority
of fathers, masters, and other rulers over their inferiors consist; or
the due obedience of inferiors be shown towards them, if not in these
indifferent and arbitrary things. For, things absolutely necessary, as
commanded by God, we are bound to do, whether human authority require
them or no; and things absolutely unlawful, as prohibited by God, we
are bound not to do, whether human authority forbid them or no. There
are none other things left then, wherein to express properly the
obedience due to superior authority than these indifferent things.”[563]
[Sidenote: PURITAN ECCLESIASTICAL CONTROVERSY.]
Turn from the Anglican to the Puritan:--“I confess,” he says, “it is
lawful for me to wear a helmet on my head in preaching; but it were
not well if you would institute the wearing of a helmet, to signify
our spiritual militia, and then resolve that all shall be silenced
and imprisoned during life that will not wear it. It is lawful for
me to use spectacles, or to go on crutches; but will you therefore
ordain that all men shall read with spectacles, to signify our
want of spiritual sight, and that no man shall go to church but on
crutches, to signify our disability to come to God of ourselves. So,
in circumstantials, it is lawful for me to wear a feather in my hat,
and a hay-rope for a girdle, and a hair-cloth for a cloak: but if you
should ordain that if any man serve God in any other habit, he shall
be banished, or perpetually imprisoned, or hanged; in my opinion, you
did not well: especially, if you add that he that disobeyeth you must
also incur everlasting damnation. It is in itself lawful to kneel when
we hear the Scriptures read, or when we sing psalms; but yet it is not
lawful to drive all from hearing and singing, and lay them in prison
that do it not kneeling. And why men should have no communion in the
Lord’s Supper that receive it not kneeling, or in any one commanded
posture, and why men should be forbidden to preach the Gospel that wear
not a linen surplice, I cannot imagine any such reason as will hold
weight at the bar of God.”[564]
Owen was particularly active and vigorous in defending Nonconformity,
in pleading its rights, and in expounding his own views of Church
polity. In the year 1667, he published several tracts, the design
of which was to promote peaceable obedience to the civil enactments
of government; to show the injustice and impolicy of subjecting
conscientious and useful men to suffering, on account of their
religious sentiments; to expose the unconstitutional nature of the
proceedings against them by informers and secret emissaries; to unfold
his ideas of the nature and benefits of toleration in former ages, and
in other lands; to vindicate it from various charges; and to point out
the folly of attempting to settle the peace of the country on the basis
of religious conformity.[565]
At a later period, in 1681, Owen published his _Enquiry into
the Original, Nature, Institution, Power, Order, and Communion of
Evangelical Churches_, in which he maintains that “unless men by
their voluntary choice, and consent, out of a sense of their duty
unto the authority of Christ, in His institutions, do enter into a
Church-state, they cannot, by any other ways or means, be so framed
into it, as to find acceptance with God therein.”
[Sidenote: PURITAN ECCLESIASTICAL CONTROVERSY.]
A Church he defines to be--“An especial society or congregation of
professed believers, joined together according unto his mind, with
their officers, guides, or rulers whom he hath appointed; which do or
may meet together for the celebration of all the ordinances of Divine
worship, the professing and authoritatively proposing the doctrine of
the Gospel, with the exercise of the discipline prescribed by himself,
unto their own mutual edification, with the glory of Christ, in the
preservation and propagation of His kingdom in the world.”[566]
But with all this zeal in defence of particular forms of government,
the great Puritan Divines expressed the utmost charity towards all
Reformed Churches at home and abroad. The schismatical sentiments of
Anglicans, who cut off Presbyterians and Independents from communion,
and expressed hopes of their salvation in only cautious, faltering
terms, find no echo in the writings of their antagonists. It was the
main business of Baxter’s life to unite together Christians of all
kinds; for this he wrote numerous books, to this he devoted his best
years; and if Owen came behind him in this respect, he has, as in a
nut-shell, summed up most truly the cause of all disunion:--
“Men fall to judging and censuring each other as to their interest
in Christ, or their eternal condition. By what rule? The Everlasting
Gospel? The Covenant of Grace? No, but of the disciples: ‘Master, they
follow not with us.’ They that believe not our opinion, we are apt to
think believe not in Jesus Christ; and because we delight not in them,
that Christ does not delight in them. This digs up the roots of love;
weakens prayer; increases evil surmises; which are of the works of
the flesh, genders strife and contempt, things that the soul of Christ
abhors.”[567]
Able as the Puritans might be in controversy, they appear to much
greater advantage in their experimental and practical instructions.
And here it ought to be noticed, that whilst the conforming Puritans
did not number amongst them any great scientific Divines, they
included well-known names of another class. Bishop Hall, by no
means an ecclesiastical Puritan, sympathized a good deal with the
doctrinal Puritans in their distinctive views, and still more in their
evangelical spirit; and this British Seneca, as he is called, always
wrote upon moral and practical subjects with the unction characteristic
of the best kind of Puritanism. Thomas Fuller, chiefly known as an
Historian, employed his matchless wit in the enforcement of religious
duties, after a manner which bore much of a Puritan stamp, whilst it
fascinated and edified all parties. Dr. Reynolds, the Puritan Bishop
of Norwich, wrote books which were once of considerable celebrity,
and which contain a great deal of evangelical sentiment and practical
piety. The _Christian Armour_, by Gurnal, the Puritan Incumbent
of Framlingham, is perhaps as popular as ever--exhibiting as it does,
amidst much perverted ingenuity of arrangement and a vitiated style
of expression, a surprising amount of spiritual truth and of genuine
wisdom. The Nonconformists, however, outpeer their brethren in this
department of literature. John Bunyan has a niche of his own in the
temple of literary fame, where the image of his genius has been crowned
with chaplets woven by the noblest hands. Other Puritan authors of
that age have contributed to the wealth of our spiritual literature.
In proof of which I need only mention Owen’s ideal of Christian
character, in his _Mortification of Sin_, and his _Spiritual
Mindedness_; Baxter’s encouragement for believers, in his _Saint’s
Everlasting Rest_; his warnings to the ungodly, in his _Now
or Never_; and Howe’s solace for mourners, in _The Redeemer’s
Dominion over the Invisible World_.
[Sidenote: PRACTICAL PURITAN THEOLOGY.]
Alleine’s _Alarm to the Unconverted_--of which it was stated
in 1775 that 20,000 copies had been sold, and 50,000 more under the
title of _The Sure Guide to Heaven_--is one of those books which
are eminently adapted to awaken deep spiritual convictions. Bates’
_Spiritual Perfection Unfolded and Enforced_--to mention no other
book by this estimable author--is written in his characteristic silvery
style: and, if there be sometimes an “abrupt dismissal of a train of
thought,” “these breaks in the veins of valuable ore do not appear
to be ever very material, and are rarely perceptible except to the
eye of a closely-reflecting and examining reader.” But the religious
excellencies of the volume surpass those which are literary, and if
Alleine’s _Alarm_ be calculated to arrest the godless, Bates’
_Spiritual Perfection_ is equally fitted to guide and edify the
godly. The titles of Brooks’ Treatises indicate the quaint kind of
talent which he possessed:--“A Box of Precious Ointment”--“An Ark for
God’s Noahs”--“A Golden Key to open hidden Treasures”--“Apples of Gold
in Pictures of Silver.” “Many of his sentences are proverbs newly
coined, shrewd, humorous, and Saxon; and they are provided with an
alliterative jingle, which, like a sheep-bell, keeps a good saying from
being lost in the wilderness.” It is impossible to read his writings
without respecting his character as well as admiring his ingenuity;
and whilst he exhibits more originality than Bates, like him he is
a teacher fitted to instruct Christian people and to comfort their
hearts under the troubles of life.
Flavel is entitled to occupy a niche, not far from that which is filled
by John Bunyan; not that he possessed the inventiveness of the Great
Dreamer, yet, like him, he delighted to use similitudes, and did it
successfully. His _Husbandry Spiritualized_--suggested by his
walks through pleasant farms in Dorset and Devon; and his _Navigation
Spiritualized_, arising from observations on sea-faring life, whilst
he resided in the picturesque town of Dartmouth, are full of sweet and
healthy allegories.
Less known than Flavel, but somewhat akin to him in natural and
spiritual taste, was Isaac Ambrose, whose work, entitled _Looking to
Jesus_, is full of pleasant illustrations, drawn from the scenes of
nature amidst which he delighted to ramble, especially “the sweet woods
of Widdicre,” on the banks of the Darwen, where in a little hut, to
which he annually repaired, this Puritan hermit, for the time, spent
hour after hour in meditation and prayer.
John Spencer, in his _Things New and Old_; Robert Cawdray, in his
_Treasury of Similes_; and Benjamin Keach, in his _Key to open
Scripture Metaphors_;--also belong to the same class of authors as
Flavel.[568]
[Sidenote: PRACTICAL PURITAN THEOLOGY.]
Many of the practical treatises published in the seventeenth century
consisted of courses of sermons, and partook largely of the diffuse
style proper to the pulpit; also many of the sermons of that day are in
fact practical treatises. We see this fashion of treating Divinity in
the works of Taylor and Barrow, and still more strikingly in the works
of Owen, Baxter, and Howe. Casuistry, now neglected by Protestants,
was then much studied by theologians of all schools. Taylor’s _Ductor
Dubitantium_, and Baxter’s _Christian Directory_, are worthy of
a chief place on the shelf of a library appropriated to works of this
description. The characters of the men, and the peculiarities of the
different schools of theological thought to which they belonged, may be
traced in these volumes, and there is truth in the remark of one well
read in all kinds of theological literature,--“Both may be consulted
occasionally with profit and advantage; but if resorted to as oracles,
they will frequently be found as unsatisfactory as the responses of the
Delphic tripod.”[569]
As, in common with devoted Conformists, Dissenting preachers “watched
for souls,” the means they pursued for the accomplishment of their
end bore a stamp indicating their distinctive theological principles.
One peculiarity in the mode of preaching adopted by the Anglican,
and an opposite peculiarity in the mode of preaching adopted by the
Puritan, grew--as differences always must--out of different systems
of Divinity maintained by the two parties. The first, regarding the
ordinance of baptism as lying at the root of Christianity, and looking
upon all who had undergone the holy rite, as regenerated Christians,
addressed their congregations at large--those congregations being
composed almost entirely of the baptized--as members of the mystical
body of Christ, as people already in fellowship with the Redeemer, and
as needing only to be awakened to a sense of their privileges, and of
their responsibility, and to be stimulated to the discharge of their
duties. The Puritan, on the contrary, regarding spiritual consciousness
as at the bottom of all spiritual life, and looking upon those who
were destitute of such consciousness, as dead in trespasses and sins,
laboured at making people feel the need of that new birth which our
Lord inculcated upon Nicodemus. The tone of the Anglican harp is heard
sweetly in Jeremy Taylor’s _Rule and Exercises of Holy Living and
Dying_. The Puritan trumpet waxes loud in Baxter’s _Call to the
Unconverted_.
The office of expositor was necessarily, to some extent, combined
with that of preacher. Puritan homilies were chiefly expository, and
Puritan expositions were chiefly homiletic. Biblical criticism, in the
precise sense of the word, was not studied then so thoroughly as it is
in the present day; but looking at the critical literature produced
by Puritans, in comparison with that which was produced by other
scholars, those who come in the line of succession after the former
have no reason to be ashamed of their predecessors. Thomas Gataker
the younger, Incumbent of Rotherhithe, who died in 1654, was one of
the first scholars of his age, and applied his extensive and profound
learning to Biblical investigations. He was somewhat erratic in certain
of his conclusions, but in the defence of them he displayed both
erudition and ingenuity. In his work on the style of the New Testament,
he overthrew the positions of Sebastian Pfochenius, who maintained the
classical purity of the Scripture Greek; and in establishing the fact
of Hebraistic peculiarities in apostolic writings, he anticipated the
opinions of modern scholars, and also entered upon original inquiries
respecting the origin of languages.[570] Pool’s _Synopsis_,
published between 1669 and 1674, with the _Annotations_, which
appeared in 1683, present, in an accurate and well-digested form,
the principal results of all the learning which had then been
applied to the investigation of the Old and New Testament. And Owen’s
_Exposition of the Epistles to the Hebrews_ is a rare monument
of erudition:--considering the age in which it was written, it is
equal if not superior to anything on the same subject which has been
composed since. Still, its value as a series of devout and practical
meditations far surpasses its exegetical worth, and that which is a
pre-eminent quality in Owen is a pre-eminent quality in his brethren.
Thomas Goodwin, if not equal in Biblical scholarship to John Owen, does
not come very far behind him. His exposition of a part of the Epistle
to the Ephesians is a noble production; but the chief excellence of
Goodwin, like that of the other “Atlas of Independency,” lies in his
clearness, sagacity, comprehensiveness, and point, as a practical and
experimental expositor. Burroughs on Hosea; Caryl on Job; Greenhill
on Ezekiel; Manton on James, Jude, the 119th Psalm, the Lord’s
Prayer, and the 53rd chapter of Isaiah,--and the list could be easily
enlarged,--are commentaries, in which the critical element appears
faint, when compared with the theological and hortatory characteristics.
[Sidenote: PURITAN EXPOSITORS.]
As Divines, as expositors, and preachers, the Puritans showed a
wonderful acquaintance with the Bible and with the human heart, for
they apply the one to the other with singular skill, force, and pathos.
No doubt they were deficient in taste, and sometimes worried their
metaphors to death, and handled their flowers till they dropped to
pieces, and are open to all kinds of criticism from modern masters of
science. No doubt, also, we in our day have many advantages over them
in reading the Bible; for, owing to helps now familiar, we acquire a
keener insight into ancient Eastern life than any of these worthies
could ever attain. They had no works in those days like that of
Conybeare and Howson; yet they had a pre-eminent gift in bringing
to bear, for spiritual and practical purposes, the daily life of
patriarchs and Apostles upon the daily life of the people to whom
they preached, and for whom they wrote. Travellers often gaze with
interest upon those frescoes in the churches of Florence and other
Italian cities, in which the stories of Scripture are rendered into
landscapes and figures, derived from streets and gardens, and costumes
and faces, with which the artist happened to be familiar in the place
where he dwelt. And who that has seen them has not been struck with
the stained glass windows in Germany, grotesquely portraying Scripture
scenes and incidents under forms borrowed from German dwellings and
German people? So at times, when reading the homely applications of
Bible stories in Puritan writers, are we not reminded of these works of
art; do we not feel that amidst a great deal which provokes criticism,
and which may make one smile, there is in the Puritan writer, as in
the mediæval painter, an instinct of truth, and an insight into the
connection between the Bible and common life, most profound, most keen,
most admirable? As the wickedness of old is still reproduced, and as
the enemies of Christ are the same in spirit whether dressed like
Jewish priests or as Saxon burgomasters,--so the devotion and piety
of ancient and sacred times may transmigrate into the souls, and be
embodied in the habits of modern citizens. But of all the excellencies
of Puritan divinity, this is the chief,--that it exhibits clearly, and
with warmth and love, with light and fire, the distinctive doctrines of
Christianity--the Fatherhood of God, the Divinity, the mediation, the
priesthood, and the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ, the agency of
the Holy Spirit, the freeness of salvation, the way of acceptance with
God through faith, and the new birth and sanctification of the human
soul, through the efficacious operations of Divine grace.
[Sidenote: COMPARISON.]
Thus I have attempted to give an outline of the opinions which
divided the English Christendom of the latter half of the seventeenth
century. In citing passages from various authors I am fully aware how
fallacious quotations are when taken by themselves; at the best they
are insufficient for the formation of a judgment. The old illustration
of a brick taken out of a house as a specimen of the structure scarcely
applies to the subject; yet no judicious student of literature will
rely upon passages extracted from an author, detached from their
connection and separated from the leading idea and spirit of his work.
Those which are employed in these pages have been chosen on account of
their being not mere blocks lying upon the surface, but the croppings
up of characteristic strata, penetrating deeply, and spreading far
beneath the surface of the ground upon which they appear.
How do we acquire a correct knowledge of the opinions of the Fathers?
Not by looking at quotations alone, but by analyzing their writings,
by tracing out their trains of thought, by measuring the space which
they devote to particular topics, by arranging together their favourite
texts, by examining their references to tradition and the Church, as
well as to Scripture, and by endeavouring to detect their sympathies
and predilections; it is in the same way that I have endeavoured,
not so well as I could wish, to read the Divines of the seventeenth
century, and the result is such as the reader finds imperfectly stated
in the pages of this volume.
What was indicated at the beginning of our survey may, in other words,
be expressed at the close. In the Anglican teaching we find what is
doctrinal, what is ethical, and what is emotional; we see the orthodox
dogmas of Christianity, the indisputable morals of Christianity, and
the spiritual experience of Christianity; but these are introduced in
different proportions, the third less than the second, perhaps the
second less than the first. Yet not in any of these do we detect the
characteristic stamp of Anglican sentiment so much as in the belief of
one catholic Church preserving this truth, inculcating this morality,
and cultivating this experience, and in the idea of an organized unity,
with its ministers, sacraments, and ordinances, receiving, enjoying,
and dispensing God’s gifts of grace. In the Latitudinarian teaching,
there is not much which can be called experimental, there is more of
what is theological, but the principal feature is undoubtedly moral.
Quakerism has its exposition of dogmas and its enforcement of duties;
it has its creed and its forms as have other systems of Christianity;
but it is in its mystical element that we discover the key to unlock
the secrets of its power. Puritanism has its Church organizations,
Presbyterian, and Independent,--it has its moral teaching, for it is
decidedly practical, yet in neither of these do we reach its most
prominent distinction. That consists both in its doctrinal zeal, and
in its experimental tone, and in the last more than the first; for the
dogmatical difference between John Goodwin[571] and Thomas Goodwin,
between the Arminian and the Calvinist, seems lost when we ponder
the fellowship of these souls in the same peculiar kind of emotional
ardour, which glows with a coloured light, easily distinguishable from
such fires as burn in Anglican, in Latitudinarian, or in Mystic lamps
before the altar of the one God, in the one temple of His redeemed
Church.
CHAPTER XXI.
Doctrinal, expository, and homiletic literatures exhibit the divergent
theological opinions of Christian men; but psalms, hymns and spiritual
songs reveal the sensibilities of the devout, as they converge towards
the common centre of all religious trust and hope and love. More of
unity is possible in the worship of praise than in any other kind of
worship. What on one side is deemed superstition, what on another is
regarded as sectarianism, may sometimes taint the expression of pious
thought and feeling in verse; but an immense number of compositions
in English hymnology are altogether free from defects of either of
these kinds, and are fitted to convey, with propriety, the sentiments
of people who differ widely from each other whenever they enter the
region of polemics. Broad Church and Low Church, the Anglican, the
Evangelical, and the Nonconformist, on some occasions find it easy to
combine in the service of song, and to adopt with common joy and love,
the same strains of sweetness and purity which form a consentaneous
_Cardiphonia_, a blended utterance of many hearts.[572]
Before approaching the subject of hymnology proper, a few words may
be introduced in relation to a kind of poetry which closely resembles
it. It would be foreign to my purpose to say anything critical of the
grand religious epics of John Milton, known by every one: they belong
to the realms of imagination, and scarcely come, except in some of
the songs which they include, within those precincts of Christian
affection where the humble hymn-writer makes his home. Nor can I
take up Joseph Beaumont’s _Pysche or Love’s Mystery, displaying
the intercourse betwixt Christ and the Soul_, which was published
in 1648, and is known by very few; since its length, extending to
40,000 lines, baffles all attempts at description, and its blending
of Pagan fables with Bible facts, often takes it out of the circle of
religious poetry altogether. Benlowes’ poem, entitled _Theophila, or
Love’s Sacrifice_, published in 1652, is of a different character:
his verses come more within the range of modern sympathies, whilst
their quaintness of style leave no doubt as to the age in which they
were written. Such compositions can scarcely be called devotional;
but verses flowed from certain pens, at the time I speak of, which,
although not meant for public or private worship, did very charmingly
embody the aspirations of Christian men. Some of them, it is true, had
a tinge of peculiarity, derived from ecclesiastical or theological
preferences, but the general stamp of these compositions was such as
to commend them to many outside the circle to which they particularly
belonged. For instance: Richard Crashaw, a clergyman, who had been
Master of the Temple, and who died in 1652, wrote _An Ode prefixed to
a Prayer Book_, in which, imbued with an Anglican admiration of that
volume, he beautifully says:--
[Sidenote: POETRY.]
“It is an armory of light,
Let constant use but keep it bright,
You’ll find it yields
To holy hands and humble hearts,
More swords and shields
Than sin hath snares, or hell hath darts.
Only be sure,
The hands are pure,
That hold these weapons, and the eyes,
Those of Christians, meek, and true,
Wakeful, wise;
Here is a friend shall fight for you;
Hold but this book before your heart,
Let prayer alone to play its part.
O, but the heart
That studies this high art,
Must be a sure housekeeper,
And yet no sleeper.
Of all this store
Of blessings, and ten thousand more,
(If, when He come
He find the heart from home),
Doubtless He will unload
Himself some other where,
And pour abroad
His precious things
On the fair soul whom first He meets,
And light around him with His wings.”
When the Anglican wrote these words, such of them as express admiration
of the Common Prayer would not command the sympathy of certain
Puritans; other Puritans, however, with a measure of qualification,
could share in that sympathy; and all, one would think, might enter
cordially into such feelings, as are expressed, generally, by the
largest portion of the Ode, in reference to the pleasures and duties of
devotion.
Whatever there might be restrictive of sympathy under one form in
the verses from which I have just made a selection, nothing of the
kind, under any form, can be found to exist in Henry More’s _Sonnet
on Religion_; for that exhibits the widest breadth of Christian
fellowship, and embraces within the range of its regards the devout
members of all communities. The Anglican and the Evangelical, the
Broad Churchman and the Mystic, might consistently adopt the following
sentiment:--
“The true religion sprung from God above,
Is like her fountain--full of charity;
Embracing all things with a tender love,
Full of good will, and meek expectancy;
Full of true justice and sure verity,
In heart and voice; free, large, even infinite;
Not wedged in straight particularity,
But grasping all in her vast active sprite--
Bright Lamp of God, that men would joy in
Thy pure light.”
More died in 1687. The same year Edmund Waller passed away, singing
the following lines, which complete and crown his _Divine Poems_;
lines which indicate faith in the life and immortality brought to light
by the Gospel, and which convey aspirations breathed by Christians of
every Church and creed:--
“The seas are quiet when the winds are o’er;
So calm are we when passions are no more:
For then we know how vain it was to boast
Of fleeting things, so certain to be lost.
Clouds of affection from our younger eyes
Conceal that emptiness which age descries:
The soul’s dark cottage, battered and decayed,
Lets in new lights through chinks that time has made.
Stronger by weakness, wiser, men become,
As they draw nearer to their eternal home,
Leaving the old, both worlds at once they view,
That stand upon the threshold of the new.”
[Sidenote: POETRY.]
Francis Quarles had a place assigned him in the _Dunciad_, by
Alexander Pope, but is by Campbell admitted into “the laurelled
fraternity,” and has lately recovered somewhat of his original renown.
He wrote a paraphrase of the Book of Ecclesiastes, which was published
in 1645, just after his death, but the _Emblems_, for which he is
still so celebrated, appeared as early as 1635; and, although earlier
than our period, may be noticed here in passing, because they seem
to have been largely read for fifty years, or so, after their first
publication. They strikingly reflect the poetical taste, most popular,
under the Commonwealth, and amongst a large number of religious
people for some time afterwards. Quarles furnishes an example of the
combination of pictorial devices with the printed text. He tells his
readers at the outset, “Before the knowledge of letters, God was known
by hieroglyphics,” and then asks, “Indeed, what are the heavens, the
earth, nay every creature, but hieroglyphics and emblems of His glory?”
Leaving this border land of religious poetry--which, although in the
seventeenth century large in itself, appears small in comparison with
religious prose, and, for the most part, inferior in its literary
pretensions--we enter the province of hymnology proper, where we
find much to interest us. Yet here we must remember, that within the
era prescribed in these chapters, we do not reach what may be called
the land of Beulah in the regions of English sacred song. Before we
can approach that region, we must pass over another half century.
The position of hymnology in the history of our literature since the
Reformation is a little remarkable. Hymnology was late before it
appeared in any thing like vigorous efflorescence, and in this respect
it exhibits a contrast to what we notice with regard to poetical
literature in earlier times and other respects. Poetry came before
philosophy in Greece. Homer composed his Iliad and Odyssey long ere
Plato wrote his Dialogues. Something of the same order meets us in
the succession of authorship when we turn to the Biblical and sacred
literature of our own country in the middle ages. Versification rose
into life much earlier than prose. Between the metrical paraphrase
of Scripture by Cædmon, the Whitby monk, and the theology of the
Anglo-Norman schoolmen, five centuries elapsed; the prose translations
and treatises of Wycliffe came two centuries later still. Romantic and
dramatic poetry took the lead at the close of the sixteenth century.
Spencer and Shakespere are a little in advance of Raleigh and Bacon.
But when we look at our religious literature since the Reformation,
we notice an inversion of such order. The Church under Elizabeth and
the earlier Stuarts produced prose theology in abundance, some of it
of a high order; but it yielded comparatively few verses strictly
religious. The Augustan age of divinity is comparatively poor in the
hymnal department, poorer in quality than it is in quantity. When,
however, doctrinal divinity had declined in the eighteenth century, and
the most intellectual theologians were those who defended the outworks
of Christian evidence, and no such men as Thorndike, Bull and Pearson
appeared among Churchmen; and no Divines equal to Owen, Baxter, and
Howe could be found in the ranks of Nonconformity,--hymn-writers arose
in greater numbers, and with sweeter notes, than at any earlier season.
We must not anticipate them, but confine ourselves to the scanty
collections of psalms and hymns contributed between the commencement of
the Civil Wars and the epoch of the Revolution.
[Sidenote: POETRY.]
First we shall glance at books simply intended for use in public
worship. New versions of the Psalms were early prepared by Rous and
Barton--the first was published in 1641, the second in 1644. The
Psalter, with titles and collects, attributed to Jeremy Taylor,
appeared in the same year, and afterwards ran through several editions.
“The Psalms of David from the New Translation of the Bible, turned into
metre by Henry King,” Bishop of Chichester between 1641 and 1669--James
I.’s “king of preachers,” and who to his fame as a preacher added some
reputation as a poet--issued from the press under the Commonwealth,
in 1651 or 1654. In the following year, the Rev. John White published
“David’s Psalms in metre, agreeable to the Hebrew;” and it may be
mentioned, as an indication of the alliance of instrumental music with
psalmody under the Protectorate, that on the 22nd of November, 1655,
according to a printed quarto sheet still in existence, there were
select Psalms of a new translation, arranged to be “sung in verse, and
chorus, of five parts, with symphonies of violins, organ, and other
instruments.” The Psalms were paraphrased and turned into English
verse by Thomas Garthwaite in 1664, by Dr. Samuel Woodford in 1667,
and by Miles Smyth in 1668. In 1671 there came out “Psalms and Hymns,
in solemn music, in four parts, on the common tunes to Psalms in metre
used in parish churches, by John Playford;” and in 1679, “A Century
of Select Psalms in verse, for the use of the Charter House, by Dr.
John Patrick.” J. Chamberlayne Gent, Richard Goodridge, and Simon Ford
added, before the Revolution, volumes of paraphrases; and in the year
of that great event, we find another volume, bearing the title of
“The whole Book of Psalms, as they are now sung in the churches, with
the singing notes of time and tune to every syllable, never before
done in England, by T. M.” These are the principal, if not all the
Psalm-books, produced from the opening of the Commonwealth to the
legal establishment of toleration. Public worship was, from the time
of passing the Act of Uniformity, until its modification under William
III., forbidden by constitutional law to be celebrated anywhere but in
the churches and chapels of the Establishment; and therefore it was for
them expressly, and for them alone, that the various translations and
editions of the Psalter were designed. Specimens of these productions
need not be given, as they are more or less close and unpoetical
renderings in rhyme of the Book of Psalms.
Besides these publications, translations of particular Psalms appeared
in detached forms. John Milton translated several. Some, indeed, are
only classical renderings of the thoughts contained in those sacred
compositions; but under date April, 1648, we find, under his hand,
“Nine of the Psalms, done into metre, wherein all, but what is in
a different character, are the very words of the text, translated
from the original.” This method of versification put such chains on
the wings of poetry that it was impossible for it to do otherwise
than stretch them with awkwardness; yet, notwithstanding such an
incumbrance, there may be noticed a few movements in the bard’s verses
which are free and graceful. The paraphrase of the 136th Psalm, which
he wrote in his fifteenth year, contains strokes of magnificent
diction, and expresses adoration and praise in some of its very highest
strains. Milton, as a boy, there struck a key-note which must lead off
a chorus of Divine music wherever it is heard:--
“Let us, with a gladsome mind,
Praise the Lord, for He is kind;
For His mercies aye endure,
Ever faithful, ever sure.
Who by His wisdom did create
The painted heavens, so full of state;
Who did the solid earth ordain
To rise above the watery plain;
Who, by His all-commanding might,
Did fill the new-made world with light,
And caused the golden-tressed sun
All the day long his course to run.”
[Sidenote: POETRY.]
Paraphrases of the Psalms were attempted by distinguished poets who
rarely touched on sacred themes. John Oldham, for example, who died in
1683, composed a number of elaborate lines upon the 137th Psalm, but
they contain as little of devotion as they do of harmony and rhythm. I
am not aware that Dryden clothed any of the Psalms in English numbers,
but he translated the _Te Deum_, and wrote a hymn for St. John’s
Eve. These pieces are little known, and scarcely strike the chords of
devotion; but there is a rich, full, Divine spirit in his rendering of
the _Veni Creator Spiritus_, such as floods the soul with heavenly
desires:--
“Creator Spirit, by whose aid
The world’s foundations first were laid,
Come visit every pious mind;
Come pour Thy joys on human kind;
From sin and sorrow set us free,
And make Thy temples worthy Thee.”
George Wither, the Puritan poet, who died in 1667, wrote hymns and
songs of the Church; and amongst translations of the Lord’s Prayer,
perhaps there never was one so compact, and so closely adhering to the
original, as his:--
“Our Father, which in heaven art,
We sanctify Thy name;
Thy kingdom come; Thy will be done,
In heaven and earth the same:
Give us this day our daily bread;
And us forgive Thou so,
As we, on them that us offend,
Forgiveness do bestow.
Into temptation lead us not,
But us from evil free:
For Thine the kingdom, power, and praise,
Is, and shall ever be.”
I proceed now to notice a few original productions. Jeremy Taylor wrote
hymns, which he describes as “celebrating the mysteries and chief
festivals of the year, according to the manner of the ancient Church;
fitted to the fancy and devotion of the younger and pious persons: apt
for memory, and to be joined to their other prayers.” In much of his
poetry we miss the exquisite rhythm of his prose; nor can there be said
to be in it much of that Divine power, or that human pathos, which
kindles devotion in Christian bosoms. The first hymn for Christmas Day
is perhaps the best of all:--
“Mysterious truth! that the self-same should be
A Lamb, a Shepherd, and a Lion too!
Yet such was He
Whom first the shepherds knew,
When they themselves became
Sheep to the Shepherd-Lamb.
Shepherd of men and angels,--Lamb of God,
Lion of Judah,--by these titles keep
The wolf from Thy endangered sheep.
Bring all the world into Thy fold;
Let Jews and Gentiles hither come
In numbers great, that can’t be told;
And call Thy lambs, that wander, home.”
These lines are thrown into a form which partakes of the nature of
an ode more than that of a hymn: certainly they are altogether unfit
for Divine worship, and the same remark may be made of all the verses
printed in Taylor’s works.
[Sidenote: POETRY.]
Robert Herrick, who comes within our range of time--for he died about
1674--wrote a beautiful litany to the Holy Spirit, which bears a
lyrical character suitable for psalmody, and contains the following
earnest cries:--
“In the hour of my distress,
When temptations me oppress,
And when I my sins confess,
Sweet Spirit, comfort me!
When I lie within my bed,
Sick in heart and sick in head,
And with doubts discomforted,
Sweet Spirit, comfort me!
When the house doth sigh and weep,
And the world is drown’d in sleep,
Yet mine eyes the watch do keep,
Sweet Spirit, comfort me!
When, God knows, I’m tost about,
Either with despair, or doubt,
Yet before the glass be out,
Sweet Spirit, comfort me!
When the judgment is reveal’d,
And that open’d which was seal’d,
When to Thee I have appeal’d,
Sweet Spirit, comfort me!”
Although Richard Baxter has been always so renowned as a prose writer,
his poetry was for a long time neglected; but of late one of his
lyrical compositions has obtained a very extensive popularity. There
is in it a quaint beauty, which evokes our admiration of the author’s
piety, beyond the praise which we bestow upon the freshness and
originality of his mind. It is a specimen of that devout confidence
in God which so thoroughly inspired the best religiousness of the
seventeenth century; it furnishes an incentive to pure and hallowed
affections, in every bosom, and it possesses some of the best
qualities of a Christian hymn:--
“Lord, it belongs not to my care,
Whether I die or live:
To live and serve Thee is my share,
And this Thy grace must give.
If life be long, I will be glad
That I may long obey:
If short, yet why should I be sad,
That shall have the same pay?
If death shall bruise this springing seed,
Before it comes to fruit,
The will with Thee goes for the deed,
Thy life was in the root.
Long life is a long grief and toil,
And multiplieth faults:
In long wars he may have the foil,
That ’scapes in short assaults.
Christ leads me through no darker rooms
Than He went through before;
He that unto God’s kingdom comes,
Must enter by this door.
Come, Lord! when grace has made me meet
Thy blessed face to see;
For if Thy work on earth be sweet,
What must Thy glory be?
Then shall I end my sad complaints,
And weary, sinful days;
And join with the triumphant saints,
That sing Jehovah’s praise.
My knowledge of that life is small,
The eye of faith is dim;
But ’tis enough that Christ knows all,
And I shall be with Him.”
[Sidenote: POETRY.]
John Mason, who died in 1694--father of him who wrote the _Treatise
on Self-Knowledge_--was a very superior hymnologist. Between the
verses just quoted from Richard Baxter, and the following, taken from
a hymn by Mason, entitled _Surely I come quickly_, there is a
remarkable resemblance:--
“And dost Thou _come_, my dearest Lord?
And dost Thou _surely_ come?
And dost Thou _surely quickly_ come?
Methinks I am at home!
My Jesus is gone up to heaven
To get a place for me;
For ’tis His will that where He is,
There should His servants be.
Canaan I view from Pisgah’s top,
Of Canaan’s grapes I taste;
My Lord, who sends unto me here,
Will send for me at last.
I have a God that changeth not,
Why should I be perplext?
My God, that owns me in this world,
Will own me in the next.
Go fearless, then, my soul, with God
Into another room:
Thou, who hast walked with Him here,
Go, see thy God at home.”
Flourishing between the age of Quarles and Watts, Mason attained a
style which is described by Montgomery as “a middle tint between the
raw colouring of the former and the daylight tint of the latter. His
talent is equally poised between both, having more vigour and more
versatility than that of either his forerunner or his successor.”[573]
His merit as a hymn-writer--extraordinary for the age in which he
lived--seems to have been appreciated by Pope, Watts, and the Wesleys,
who studied and copied him; but he was much neglected for a long time,
to be reinstated in popular favour of late years.
Mason’s _Song of Praise for the Evening_ is now well known, but,
in its modern form, we miss the middle stanza of the original:--
“Now from the altar of my heart
Let incense-flames arise:
Assist me, Lord, to offer up
Mine evening sacrifice.
Awake, my love; awake, my joy;
Awake, my heart and tongue;
Sleep not when mercies loudly call,
Break forth into a song.
Man’s life’s a book of history;
The leaves thereof are days;
The letters mercies closely joined;
The title is Thy praise.
This day God was my Sun and Shield,
My Keeper and my Guide;
His care was on my frailty shewn,
His mercies multiply’d.
Minutes and mercies multiply’d
Have made up all this day:
Minutes came quick; but mercies were
More fleet and free than they.
New time, new favour, and new joys,
Do a new song require:
Till I shall praise Thee as I would,
Accept my heart’s desire.”
[Sidenote: POETRY.]
Amongst the anonymous poetry of that period there is a hymn of the
sacred ballad type, so singularly touching to my mind, so expressive
of that admiration of Christ which lies at the heart of all Christian
piety, and so much less known than it ought to be, that I venture to
introduce several of its stanzas:--
“There was a King of old,
That did in Jewry dwell;
Whether a God, or Man, or both,
I’m sure I love Him well.
Love Him! why, who doth not?
Did ever any wight
Not goodness, beauty, sweetness, love--
Not comfort, love, and light?
None ever did, or can;
But here’s the cause alone
Why He of all few lovers finds,
Because He is not known.
There are so many fair,
He’s lost among the throng;
Yet they that seek Him nowhere else
May find Him in a song.
This God, Man, King, and Priest
Almighty was, yet meek:
He was most just, yet merciful;
The guilty did Him seek.
He never any failed
That sought Him in their need:
He never quenched the smoking flax,
Nor brake the bruised reed.
He was the truest Friend
That ever any tried,
For whom He loved He never left,
For them He lived and died.
And if you’d know the folk
That brought Him to His end,
Read but His title--you shall find
Him styled the sinner’s Friend.
His life all wonder was,
But here’s a wonder more,
That He, who was all life and love,
Should be beloved no more.
I’ll love Him while I live;
To those that be His foes,
Though I them hate, I’ll wish no worse
Than His dear love to lose.”
Benjamin Keach, the author of _Tropologia; a Key to open Scripture
Metaphors and Types_, was a zealous hymnologist. This Baptist
minister vindicated the practice of singing against the objections
of some of his brethren, in a curious book printed in 1661 under the
title of _Breach repaired in good Worship, or singing Psalms proved
to be an Ordinance of Christ_. Having written _The Glorious
Lover, a Divine Poem_, in 1679, he published, in 1691, a volume
entitled _Spiritual Melody_, containing “Psalms and Hymns from
the Old and New Testament,” and also _The Bread revived in God’s
Worship, or singing of Psalms, Hymns, and Spiritual Songs proved to be
an Holy Ordinance_. These were followed, in 1696, by _The Feast
of Fat Things full of Marrow_. In referring to hymns of this date,
however, we pass over our boundary line, yet, if I may trespass so far,
I would select a copy of verses composed by Keach as a specimen of
the extraordinary doggerel which he considered fit for congregational
worship. It is not to be taken as a specimen of the worship which was
actually celebrated in Nonconformist chapels before the Revolution;
for Keach’s book, as it appears from what I have just said, was
not published until afterwards, and the state of psalmody amongst
Dissenters must be reserved for future consideration. It, however,
indicates a certain taste, or a want of taste altogether, which in some
quarters might be found during the period covered by our present survey.
“If saints, O Lord, do season all
Amongst whom they do live,
Salt all with grace, both great and small,
They may sweet relish give.
And, blessed be Thy glorious name!
In England salt is found,
Some savoury souls who do proclaim
Thy grace, which doth abound.
But O the want of salt, O Lord!
How few are salted well!
How few are like to salt indeed!
Salt Thou Thy Israel!
Now sing, ye saints who are this salt,
And let all seasoned be
With your most holy gracious lives;
Great need of it we see.
The earth will else corrupt and stink;
O salt it well, therefore,
And live to Him that salted you,
And sing for evermore.”
[Sidenote: POETRY.]
Certainly this is not one of the hymns fitted to convey the devotion
of the united Church; but I suppose we must take it for granted, that
there existed people, at the time when it was written, who could sing
it with gravity. It is impossible to mark absolutely the point of
separation between what demands some respect, if it do not inspire
reverence, from that which excites ridicule, and even contempt. So much
depends upon education, association, and habit, in religious matters,
that we may here truly apply the adage of one man’s meat being another
man’s poison. People who laugh at Keach’s metaphors and hymns perhaps
indulge in forms of worship which appear excessively ludicrous to
religionists of his order. The devoutness of some people may feed on
aliment which would produce only revulsion in others; and let us hope
that the good folks who were taught to conduct services of song after
this very peculiar fashion could nevertheless make melody in their
hearts unto the Lord. At all events, Keach’s _Saints the Salt of the
Earth_ is a specimen of one kind of hymnology which the seventeenth
century produced.
CHAPTER XXII.
We have completed the circle of theological schools. Many illustrations
of religious character and experience growing out of the principles
now explained, or rather, in some cases, producing sympathy with them,
have been already exhibited. To give completeness to the task I have
undertaken, it is desirable that there should be added some other
biographical illustrations, and that they should be brought together in
immediate connection with the forms of opinion to which they belong.
I may again begin with the Anglicans, and as the examples of the class
hitherto have been clerical, I shall now select examples from the laity.
[Sidenote: ISAAK WALTON.]
Isaak Walton deserves to be taken first. Disliking “the active
Romanists,” averse, perhaps still more, to the “restless
Nonconformists,” he would rank himself as “one of the passive and
peaceable Protestants;” but the Anglican tincture of his Protestantism
is visible in the whole of his writings. Without giving to the
world any theological treatise, or entering into any ecclesiastical
controversy, he has diffused his religious sentiments with singular
sweetness and purity over his works, so as to leave no doubt respecting
their distinctive colour. How far the influence of his parentage and
education might contribute to the formation of his character we do not
know; but no doubt the natural bent of his mind, his taste for quiet
contemplation, his reverence for antiquity, his disposition to submit
to authority, his faculty of imagination, and his taste for music, had
prepared him for those paths of faith and worship in which, through a
long life, he loved to walk. In addition to this, we should remember
his early, as well as his later friendships, with certain distinguished
members of the Anglican communion.
In his Elegy on Dr. Donne, he exclaims--
“Oh do not call
Grief back by thinking on his funeral,
Forget he loved me--
Forget his _powerful preaching_, and forget
I am his _convert_:”--
words which indicate the writer’s spiritual obligation to that eminent
orator. Walton’s marriage with his first wife brought him into “happy
affinity” with the descendants of Archbishop Cranmer; and to this
circumstance is attributed the origin of Walton’s _Life of Hooker_. The
marriage with his second wife--half-sister to Bishop Ken--placed him,
in his latter days, upon intimate terms with that holy prelate. Morley,
Sanderson, and King were amongst his endeared associates.
Walton’s _Lives_ give us glimpses of himself: for he is one of
those artists who introduce their own portrait in a corner of their
pictures. Of all his heroes, Bishop Sanderson was the man respecting
whom he knew most; and, at the close of his memoir, Walton touchingly
reveals his own spiritual aspiration:--“’Tis now too late to wish that
my _life_ may be like his, for I am in the eighty-fifth year of my
age; but I humbly beseech Almighty God, that my _death_ may; and
do as earnestly beg of every reader to say, Amen.--‘Blessed is the man
in whose spirit there is no guile.’” (Psalm xxxii. 2.)
His _Complete Angler, or the Contemplative Man’s Recreation_,
is a mirror of his life. His moral and religious sympathies are seen
gleaming over his pages from beginning to end; and as the revelation
of an inner life, the first part by himself should be compared with
the second part by Cotton; we see at once that he was not born to be a
reformer, that he was not one of those who can grapple with falsehood
and corruption, and that if all had resembled him, England’s destiny
would have been humiliating indeed,--we feel that in his case absence
from any active part in the controversies of his time, can be regarded
neither as a virtue nor as a vice, neither as censurable nor as
admirable, but simply as the operation of a natural tendency.
Being what he was, he loved the quiet nooks and corners of human
experience and interest, and in every place manifested purity,
gentleness, meekness, and charity; as he wandered along the banks
of the Lea, or sat in the fishing house beside the Dove, Scripture
thoughts, like flowers, bright and sweet, entwined about the
trellis-work of his cherished recreations; sacred thoughts, of the
quaintest kind, gathered round his rod, and his fish-hooks, and that
“most honest, ingenuous, quiet, and harmless art of angling.” “Evil
communications, which corrupt good manners,” filled him with sadness.
“Such discourse,” he observes, in one of his walks, “as we heard last
night, it infects others, the very boys will learn to talk and swear
as they heard mine host, and another of the company that shall be
nameless; I am sorry the other is a gentleman, for less religion will
not save their souls than a beggar’s; I think more will be required at
the last great day.” He counted every misery he missed a new mercy,
was thankful for health, competence, and a quiet conscience, and dwelt,
with sympathetic joy, on the character of the meek man who has no
“turbulent, repining, or vexatious thoughts,” who possesses what he has
“with such a quietness as makes his very dreams pleasing both to God
and himself.” “When,” he says in another place, “I would beget content,
and increase confidence in the power, and wisdom, and providence of
Almighty God, I will walk the meadows of some gliding stream, and there
contemplate the lilies that take no care, and those very many other
various little living creatures, that are not only created, but fed,
man knows not how, by the goodness of the God of nature, and therefore
trust in Him. This is my purpose, and so ‘let everything that hath
breath praise the Lord;’ and let the blessing of St. Peter’s Master be
with mine.”
Walton, at his death--amidst the great frost of 1683--could not but
enter that world of perfect harmony to which his thoughts and desires
had so often ascended as he listened to the nightingale. “He that at
midnight, when the very labourer sleeps securely, should hear, as I
have very often, the clear airs, the sweet descants, the natural rising
and falling, the doubling and redoubling of her voice, might well be
lifted above earth, and say; Lord, what music hast thou provided for
the saints in Heaven, when thou affordest bad men such music on earth?”
We now turn to another and somewhat different type of the same school.
[Sidenote: JOHN EVELYN.]
John Evelyn lost his mother when he had reached his fifteenth year;
and her beautiful memory, as of one “whose constitution inclined to a
religious melancholy, or pious sadness,” seemed to have remained with
him all his days, giving that plaintiveness to his piety, which, as a
richly-coloured thread, appears interwoven with the brightest joys
of his calm yet active life. He records her death with reverential
affection, and how she summoned her children around her, and expressed
herself in a manner so heavenly, with instructions so pious and
Christian, as made them strangely sensible of the extraordinary loss
then becoming imminent:--after which, she gave to each a ring, with
her blessing. Evelyn lost his father at twenty-one; and again he
minutely relates the tale of his sorrow, how, at night, they followed
the mourning hearse to the church at Wotton, where, after a sermon and
funeral oration by the minister, the ashes of the husband were mingled
with those of the wife. “Thus,” he adds, “we were bereft of both our
parents, in a period when we[574] most of all stood in need of their
counsel and assistance, especially myself, of a raw, vain, uncertain,
and very unwary inclination; but so it pleased God to make trial of my
conduct in a conjuncture of the greatest and most prodigious hazard
that ever the youth of England saw; and, if I did not, amidst all this,
impeach my liberty nor my virtue with the rest who made shipwreck of
both, it was more the infinite goodness and mercy of God, than the
least providence or discretion of mine own, who now thought of nothing
but the pursuit of vanity, and the confused imaginations of young
men.”[575]
[Sidenote: JOHN EVELYN.]
The mercy of Providence, the truths of Christianity, and the grace of
the Holy Spirit, kept him amidst his extensive travels, amidst his
intercourse with men of different countries and classes, and especially
amidst the temptations of fashionable society at a period when such
as frequented courts were commonly addicted to vice. Notwithstanding
the great moral peril to which Evelyn stood exposed, he preserved a
pure mind and a virtuous reputation. He loved the Episcopal Church
of England with a jealous affection,--finding in her liturgy what
was congenial with his spiritual taste; deriving nourishment for
his spiritual sensibilities from the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper
administered according to her ritual; and, in short, living in the
culture of those habits which are distinctive of Anglican piety.
He did not, indeed, refuse to attend his parish church during the
Commonwealth, and to hear a Presbyterian or Independent minister;
but this proceeded from prudence rather than from sympathy. Evelyn’s
Catholic feeling shrank from Puritanism; his charity leaned towards
Roman Catholics. It is with regard to such that he says:--“For the
rest we must commit to Providence the success of times and mitigation
of proselytical fervours, having for my own particular a very great
charity for all who sincerely adore the blessed Jesus, our common and
dear Saviour, as being full of hope that God (however the present zeal
of some, and the scandals taken by others at the instant [present]
affliction of the Church of England may transport them), will at
last compassionate our infirmities, clarify our judgments, and make
abatement for our ignorances, superstructures, passions, and errors of
corrupt times and interests, of which the Romish persuasion can no way
acquit herself, whatever the present prosperity and secular polity may
pretend. But God will make all things manifest in His own time, only
let us possess ourselves in patience and charity. This will cover a
multitude of imperfections.”[576]
Like other persons of his cast of sentiment, like the nuns at Gidding
eulogized by Isaak Walton and condemned by the Puritans, like the
Anglican sisterhoods of the present day, Evelyn had a liking for a
semi-monastic life; and in the year 1659, when affairs were unsettled
in England, he proposed to Robert Boyle, an elaborate plan for an
establishment of this description. There was to be a house erected
in the midst of a tall wood, and “opposite to the house, towards the
wood, should be erected a pretty chapel; and at equal distances, even
within the flanking walls of the square, six apartments or cells
for the members of the society, and not contiguous to the pavilion;
each whereof should contain a small bedchamber, an outward room,
a closet, and a private garden, somewhat after the manner of the
Carthusians.”[577] There was to be maintained at the public charge
a “chaplain well qualified.” There were to be prayers in the chapel
morning and evening; and a weekly fast and communion once every
fortnight or month at least, with divers arrangements for study and
recreations. The scheme came to nothing, but it shows the bent of its
author’s inclinations. Whatever may be thought of them, one impression
only can be justly derived from reading on the white marble, covering
his tomb, in Wotton Church, the record of his death:--“He fell asleep
the 27th day of February, 170⅚, being the 86th year of his age, in
full hope of a glorious resurrection, through faith in Jesus Christ.
Living in an age of extraordinary events and revolutions, he learnt (as
himself asserted) this truth--which, pursuant to his intention, is here
declared--‘_That all is vanity which is not honest, and that there is
no solid wisdom but in real piety_.’”[578]
[Sidenote: JOHN EVELYN.]
The cast of Evelyn’s religion is further illustrated in that of his
friend Margaret Blagge,[579] afterwards the wife of Sidney Godolphin.
When he heard some distinguished persons speaking of her, he fancied
she was “some airy thing that had more wit than discretion.” But,
making a visit to Whitehall with his wife, he fell in with the youthful
maid of honour, and “admired her temperance, and took especial notice,
that, however wide or indifferent the subject of their discourse
was amongst the rest, she would always direct it to some religious
conclusion, and so temper and season her replies, as showed a gracious
heart, and that she had a mind wholly taken up with heavenly thoughts.”
Their acquaintance was ratified by a quaint solemnity; after a formal
solicitation, that he would look upon her thenceforth as his child,
she took a sheet of paper, upon which Evelyn had been carelessly
sketching the shape of an altar, and wrote these words: “Be this
a symbol of inviolable friendship: Margaret Blagge, 16th October,
1672;” and underneath, “For my brother E----.” Something of romance
is visible in the singular attachment which this girl formed for her
amiable and pious friend; and it issued in his guiding her affairs,
in his increasing her wisdom, and in his ripening her piety. Never at
home amidst the gaieties of Whitehall, Margaret, after seven years’
experience, felt that she could no longer endure living at Court, and
therefore earnestly sought, and at length, with difficulty, obtained
Royal permission to retire. On a Sunday night, after most of the
company were departed, Evelyn waited on her down to her chamber, which
she had no sooner entered, than falling on her knees, she blessed God,
as for a signal deliverance: “She was come,” she said, “out of Egypt,
and was now in the way to the land of promise.” Tears trickled down
her cheeks, “like the dew of flowers, making a lovely grief,” as she
parted from one of the ladies who had a spirit kindred to her own. She
found a home with Lady Berkeley, and what she especially sought, time
for meditation and prayer; indeed the love of seclusion so increased,
that she manifested a strong tinge of asceticism. Evelyn, in this
respect more sober-minded, availed himself of his influence, and
with success, to persuade her to renounce a celibate life, to which
she seemed strongly disposed; and she came to see that union with a
virtuous and religious person, would tend rather to promote than to
retard her spiritual progress. Accordingly, she was married privately
in the Temple Church, on the 16th of May, being Ascension Day, “both
the blessed pair receiving the Holy Sacrament, and consecrating the
solemnity with a double mystery;”[580] but, in a letter written shortly
after, she showed what continued to be the main bent of her mind. “I
have this day,” she says, addressing Evelyn, “thought your thoughts,
wished I dare say your wishes, which were, that I might every day sit
looser and looser to the things of this world; discerning as every day
I do, the folly and vanity of it; how short all its pleasures, how
trifling all its recreations, how false most of its friendships, how
transitory everything in it; and on the contrary, how sweet the service
of God, how delightful the meditating on His Word, how pleasant the
conversation of the faithful, and, above all, how charming prayer, how
glorious our hopes, how gracious our God is to all His children, how
gentle His corrections, and how frequently, by the first invitations of
His Spirit, He calls us from our low designs to those great and noble
ones of serving Him, and attaining eternal happiness.”[581]
[Sidenote: MARGARET GODOLPHIN.]
Margaret Godolphin became an exemplary matron. She instructed her
servants, she cultivated domestic religion, she breathed towards
everybody a kind considerate spirit, and with all this condescension as
a mistress, she blended the utmost devotion and tenderness as a wife.
She also assisted the poor, and in the spirit of Elizabeth Fry, visited
the hospital and the prison: and Evelyn could produce a list of above
thirty, restrained for debts in several prisons, which she paid and
compounded for at once; and another list of no fewer than twenty-three
poor creatures whom she clad at one time. She employed “most part of
Lent in working for poor people, cutting out and making waistcoats and
other necessary coverings, which she constantly distributed amongst
them, like another Dorcas, spending much of her time, and no little
of her money, in relieving, visiting, and inquiring of them out. And
whilst she was thus busy with her needle, she would commonly have one
or other read by her, through which means and a happy memory, she
had almost the whole Scriptures by heart, and was so versed in Dr.
Hammond’s _Annotations_ and other practical books, controversies,
and cases, as might have stocked some who pass for no small Divines:
not to mention sundry Divine penitential and other hymns, breathing of
a spirit of holiness, and such as showed the tenderness of her heart,
and wonderful love to God.”[582]
Within a few days after the birth of her only child, she expired,
September 9, 1678, in the twenty-fifth year of her age, and she lies
buried in the church of Breague, in Cornwall: her tomb reminding us of
the pillar over Rachel’s grave.
As in the Court of Arcadius, we meet with the pious Olympias in
contrast with the Empress Eudoxia, and her ladies,--so, in the Court
of Charles II., we discover a Margaret Godolphin in contrast with a
Castelmaine and a Gwynn.
[Sidenote: SIR MATTHEW HALE.]
There are, in every age, Christians whom it would be difficult
to connect with one particular school of theological sentiment,
because they have sympathies with all good men, and do not adopt
the peculiarities of any class. Such a person was Sir Matthew Hale.
No ecclesiastical history of the period--unless written upon some
miserable sectarian principle--could be considered complete which did
not include a reference to so eminently excellent a man. His parents
dying when he was very young, he became dependent for his education
upon a relative who was a Puritan minister, and this circumstance
may account for some points in his character which present a rather
Puritanical appearance. After being addicted to the gaieties of youth,
he was, whilst at Oxford, _converted_, in heart and life, as the
result, partly at least, of an affecting circumstance which occurred
at a convivial meeting when he was present. A boon-companion fell
down in a state of death-like insensibility, when Hale, overwhelmed
with remorse and pity, retired into another room, and, prostrating
himself before God, asked forgiveness for his own sins, and interceded
earnestly for the restoration of his friend. A sudden spiritual
crisis like that, when the soul is suddenly fused, and poured into a
new mould, is sure to be remembered afterwards, and to influence all
subsequent religious feeling. As it has been justly said, a man no
more forgets the moral deliverance it involves, than he forgets an
escape from shipwreck,[583] and therefore Hale’s conversion gave a
marked evangelical impress to his subsequent experience. He glorified
the riches of Divine grace, and delighted “in studying the Mystery
of Christ.” He found in God an overflowing fulness which fills up
the intensest gaspings and outgoings of the soul, a fulness which
continues to eternity, ever increasing gratitude, adoration, and
love. Throughout a course of remarkable diligence in business, this
illustrious Judge manifested no less fervour of spirit. Prayer “gave a
tincture of devotion” to his secular employments--it was “a Christian
chemistry converting those acts which are materially natural and civil,
into acts truly and formally religious, whereby all life is rendered
interpretatively a service to Almighty God.” It was a sun which “gave
light in the midst of darkness, a fortress that kept safe in the
greatest danger, that never could be taken unless self-betrayed,”--a
“Goshen to, and within itself, when the rest of the world, without and
round about a man, is like an Egypt for plagues and darkness.” “To
lose this,” Hale went on to say, “is, like Samson, to lose the lock
wherein next to God our strength lieth.” Such expressions as these
have a Puritanical sound in the ears of many, and there are other
things noticeable in his memoirs in harmony with such expressions:--for
it is stated, as very probable, that he took the Solemn League and
Covenant, it is certain that he did not approve of the rigours of the
Act of Uniformity, and he severely condemned the conduct of many of the
clergy. He had also the deepest reverence for the Sabbath, he cherished
an intense aversion to Romanism, he cultivated, with great respect,
a friendship with Richard Baxter--to whom he acknowledged himself
under great theological obligations--and, if we may mention so minute
a circumstance, which however is significant--“in common prayer, he
behaved himself as others, saving that to avoid the differencing of the
Gospels from the Epistles, and the bowing at the name of Jesus, from
the names Christ, Saviour, God, &c., he would use some equality in his
gestures and stand up at the reading of all God’s Word alike.” These
facts separate him from the Anglo-Catholic division of the Church of
England, yet they are not sufficient to identify him with the fully
developed, and sharply defined Puritan party. For he did not use such
religious language in conversation, as satisfied them--they considered
him too reticent on spiritual subjects;--and, as Baxter says, those
that took no men for religious, who frequented not private meetings,
regarded him simply, as “an excellently righteous man.” Baxter himself
seems to have wished, that Hale had been a little more communicative
on spiritual matters, instead of confining himself in conversation to
what is philosophical in religion. The Divine remarks, respecting the
Judge:--“At last I understood that his averseness to hypocrisy made him
purposely conceal the most of such of his practical thoughts and works
as the world now findeth by his Contemplations and other writings.”
In some respects, Sir Matthew sympathized with the Latitudinarian
school--for, like them, he believed, “that true religion consisteth
in great plain necessary things, the life of faith and hope, the love
of God and man, an humble self-denying mind, with mortification of
worldly affection--and that the calamity of the Church, and withering
of religion hath come from proud and busy men’s additions, that cannot
give peace to themselves and others by living in love and quietness on
this Christian simplicity of faith and practice, but vex and turmoil
the Church with these needless and hurtful superfluities.”[584] Nor
did he believe in any divinely authorized form of ecclesiastical
government; although he greatly preferred, on grounds of expediency,
the Episcopalian polity to any other. Yet these points of affinity
do not justify us in numbering him with the Latitudinarians any more
than with the Puritans, because there was in him more of evangelical
sentiment, more of attachment to dogmatic truth, and more of spiritual
fervour, than belonged to the former description of thinkers. He
counted amongst his religious friends, the High Churchman, Seth Ward,
Bishop of Salisbury, as well as the Broad Churchman, Wilkins, Bishop
of Chester, and the Low Churchman, Richard Baxter, who refused to be a
Bishop at all. It suggests rebuke to all bigoted partizans, to remember
that a layman of the latter half of the seventeenth century most
renowned for his wisdom, justice, charity and piety, was one of whom it
is equally true that he can be claimed by no particular party, and yet
can be claimed by all single-minded Christians.
[Sidenote: HENRY MORE.]
It is little more than a nominal departure from the purpose of
selecting lay examples in this chapter, to introduce Dr. Henry More, as
another distinctive type of the spiritual life of the period--inasmuch
as he was a clergyman in little more than name, and constantly eschewed
public office. For after being appointed to a stall at Gloucester, he
quickly resigned it to another person, and a deanery, a provostship,
and two bishoprics he successively refused. Retirement and study were
his delight. He has been commonly numbered amongst the members of the
Cambridge school, but he--and there were others of that school more
or less like him--ought to be regarded as a most decided Mystic. As
an Eton boy, when wandering in the quaint old quadrangle, or in the
beautiful playing fields, with his head on one side, and kicking the
stones with his feet, he had, he says, a deep consciousness of the
Divine presence; and believed that no deed, or word, or thought could
be hidden from the Invisible yet All-seeing One. He early conceived
an antipathy to Calvinism, in which he had been educated, and plunged
himself, to use his own words, “head over ears” into the study of
philosophy. He forsook Aristotle for Plato, and found a most congenial
teacher in John Tauler, whose deep spiritual thoughts he drank in with
avidity.
He was a philosopher, a friend of Cudworth, and a correspondent
with Descartes. Imagination largely influenced his opinions, and in
his enthusiastic reveries,--under the influence of which, he seemed
unconscious of the outer world, and fancied himself to be living in
a trance,--he conceived that he possessed an ethereal body, which
“exhaled the perfume of violets.” Yet, Mystic as he was, he could
criticise other Mystics, and find just the same fault with them, which
others of a different turn of mind would find with him.
More says of Jacob Behmen:--He, “I conceive is to be reckoned in the
number of those whose imaginative faculty has the pre-eminence above
the rational: and though he was an holy and good man, his natural
complexion, notwithstanding, was not destroyed, but retained its
property still; and therefore his imagination, being very busy about
Divine things, he could not, without a miracle, fail of becoming an
enthusiast.”
It is further curious to couple with this, More’s opinion of the
Quakers:--“To tell you my opinion of that sect which are called
Quakers, though I must allow that there may be some amongst them
good and sincere-hearted men, and it may be nearer to the purity of
Christianity for the life and power of it than many others; yet, I am
well assured, that the generality of them are prodigiously melancholy,
and some few perhaps possessed with the devil.”[585]
As his philosophy is poetical so his poetry is philosophical; and his
_Psychozoia, or Life of the Soul_, puzzles, if it does not weary
its readers: yet it leaves the impression that he “believed the magic
wonders which he sung;” and it has been well compared to a grotto,
“whose gloomy labyrinths we might be curious to explore, for the
strange and mystic associations they excite.”[586]
His philosophy and his poetry touched his religion, and he was wont
to speak in language very different from that of the Anglican on the
one hand, and from that of the Puritan on the other. “The oracle of
God,” he remarked, “is not to be heard but in His Holy Temple, that is
to say in a good and holy man thoroughly sanctified.” “This or such
like rhapsodies,” he observes, relative to his _Dialogues_, “do I
often sing to myself in the silent night, or betimes in the morning,
at break of day, subjoining always, that of our Saviour, as a suitable
_Epiphonema_ to all, ‘Abraham saw my day afar, and rejoiced at
it.’ At this window, I take breath, while I am choked and stifled with
the crowd, and stench of the daily wickedness of this present evil
world; and am almost wearied out with the tediousness and irksomeness
of this my earthly pilgrimage.”[587] More felt deeply the sins and
sorrows which he could not remove, yet a strain of holy peace ran
through such melancholy; and it was doubtless from experience that
he exclaimed--“Even the most miserable objects in this present life
cannot divest him (the good man) of his happiness, but rather modify
it, the sweetness of his spirit being melted into a kindly compassion
in the behalf of others, whom, if he be able to help, it is a greater
accession to his joy; and if he cannot, the being conscious to himself
of so sincere a compassion, and so harmonious and suitable to the
present state of things, carries along with it some degree of pleasure,
like mournful notes of music, exquisitely well fitted to the sadness
of the ditty.”[588] Yet More’s life was not all sentiment; he was
charitable to the needy, and “his chamber door was an hospital.”
His death was like his life, holy, peaceful, happy; and even in
his last hours, he could not help expressing his Christian hope in
philosophical language--uttering the beautiful words of Cicero, which
come so near the Gospel, “_O præclarum illum diem_,” &c., and
declaring that he was going to join that blessed company, with whom, in
a quarter of an hour, he would be as familiar as if he had known them
for years.[589]
[Sidenote: SIR THOMAS BROWNE.]
Our notice of the phases of religious life in the Church of England
would be defective, did we omit all reference to a distinguished,
but eccentric individual, who has left his mark upon our religious
literature. Eccentricity is sometimes the main distinction of a man’s
religious life, and even in such cases there may be no room to doubt
the genuineness of personal piety; but in the instance to which we now
refer, there were distinguishing qualities of another and a worthier
nature. Sir Thomas Browne was charged with being a Quaker, on what
ground it is difficult to say; and a Roman Catholic, although the
Pope honoured his _Religio Medici_ with a place in the _Index
Expurgatorius_; and an atheist, whilst all his writings bear witness
to his reverence for the Divine Being.
Dr. Johnson has vindicated the character of this remarkable person
by referring to passages in which he says, that he was of the belief
taught by our Saviour, disseminated by the Apostles, authorized by
the fathers, and confirmed by the martyrs; that though paradoxical in
philosophy, he loved in Divinity to keep the beaten road, and pleased
himself with the idea; that he had no taint of heresy, schism, or
error.[590] But a more satisfactory vindication is supplied in his
memorable resolutions, never to let a day pass “without calling upon
God in a solemn formed prayer seven times within the compass thereof,”
after the example of David and Daniel; always to magnify God, in the
night, on his “dark bed when he could not sleep,” and to pray in all
places where privacy invited--in any house, highway, or street; to
know no street or passage in the City of Norwich, where he lived,
which might not witness that he remembered God and his Saviour in it;
never to miss the sacrament upon the accustomed days; to intercede
for his patients, for the minister after preaching, and for all
people in tempestuous weather, lightning and thunder, that God would
have mercy upon their souls, bodies, and goods; and “upon sight of
beautiful persons, to bless God in His creatures, to pray for the
beauty of their souls, and to enrich them with inward graces to be
answerable unto the outward; upon sight of deformed persons, to send
them inward graces, and enrich their souls, and give them the beauty
of the resurrection.”[591] A dash of eccentricity is obvious in these
his pious regulations for the government of life, such as might be
expected in the author of the _Hydriotaphia_ and the _Garden
of Cyrus_; but there is no reason whatever to question their
perfect sincerity, or to suspect his affection towards the Church of
England--with respect to which he said that he was a sworn subject to
her faith, subscribing unto her Articles, and endeavouring to observe
her constitutions.[592]
[Sidenote: SIR THOMAS BROWNE.]
We notice with deep regret an absence in his writings of all reference
to certain important evangelical doctrines, and only a slight allusion
to others. Besides this grave omission, we find a positive statement
of opinions generally pronounced to be heterodox, namely, that the
soul sleeps with the body until the last day, that the damned will at
last be released from torture, and that prayers may be offered for the
dead; and these opinions he implies he had entertained himself, but
he insists in his own characteristic style, that he never maintained
them with pertinacity; that without the addition of new fuel, “they
went out insensibly of themselves;” and that they were not heresies
in him, but bare errors, and single lapses of the understanding,
without a joint depravity of the will. “Those,” he remarks, “have not
only depraved understandings, but diseased affections, which cannot
enjoy a singularity without a heresy, or be the author of an opinion,
without they be of a sect also.”[593] Browne entertained comprehensive
and liberal views of the extent of salvation, saying, that though
“the bridge is narrow, the passage strait unto life--yet those who do
confine the Church of God either to particular nations, Churches, or
families, have made it far narrower than our Saviour ever meant it.”
“There must be therefore more than one St. Peter. Particular Churches
and sects usurp the gates of heaven, and turn the key against each
other, and thus we go to heaven against each other’s wills, conceits,
and opinions, and, with as much uncharity as ignorance, do err, I
fear, in points not only of our own, but one another’s salvation.”
He professes a consciousness of there being, not only in philosophy,
but in Divinity, “sturdy doubts and boisterous objections, wherewith
the unhappiness of our knowledge too nearly acquainted us;” and
declares that, after having in his earlier years, “read all the books
against religion, he was in the latter part of his life, averse from
controversies.”[594]
We dismiss the character of Sir Thomas Browne by quoting the following
passage, with which he concludes his _Religio Medici_, and
which taken alone is sufficient to show the devoutness of the man’s
spirit:--“Bless me in this life with but the peace of my conscience,
command of my affections, the love of Thyself, and my dearest friends,
and I shall be happy enough to pity Cæsar! These are, O Lord, the
humble desires of my most reasonable ambition, and all I dare call
happiness on earth, wherein I set no rule or limit to Thy hand or
providence. Dispose of me according to the wisdom of Thy pleasure. Thy
will be done, though in my own undoing.”[595]
[Sidenote: COUNTESS OF WARWICK.]
The Countess Dowager of Warwick--seventh daughter of Richard, first
Earl of Cork--died in 1678, and remained in the Church of England to
the close of her life. Her education, her conversion, her abstinence,
her inward beauty, her love to souls, her family government, together
with her justice and prudence, have been duly celebrated by Samuel
Clarke, in his _Lives of Sundry Eminent Persons_; and her Diary,
extensively circulated of late years, has made this lady very widely
known. “She was neither of Paul, or of Apollos, or of Cephas, but only
of Christ. Her name was Christian, and her surname Catholic. She had
a large and unconfined soul, not hemmed in or pounded up within the
circle of any man’s name.” She bountifully relieved both Conformist
and Nonconformist ministers; but she “very inoffensively regularly and
devoutly observed the orders of the Church of England, in its liturgy
and public service, which she failed not to attend twice a day, with
exemplary reverence. Yet was she far from placing religion in ritual
observances.”[596]
“She needed neither borrowed shades, nor reflexious lights, to
set her off, being personally great in all natural endowments and
accomplishments of soul and body, wisdom, beauty, favour, and virtue.
Great by her tongue, for never woman used one better, speaking so
gracefully, promptly, discreetly, pertinently, holily, that I have
often admired the edifying words that proceeded from her mouth. Great
by her pen, as you may (_ex pede Herculem_) discover by that
little taste of it, the world hath been happy in, the hasty fruit of
one or two interrupted hours after supper, which she professed to me,
with a little regret, when she was surprised with its sliding into
the world without her knowledge, or allowance, and wholly beside her
expectation. Great, by being the greatest mistress and promotress,
not to say the foundress and inventress of a new science--the art of
obliging; in which she attained that sovereign perfection, that she
reigned over all their hearts with whom she did converse. Great in
her nobleness of living and hospitality. Great in the unparalleled
sincerity of constant, faithful, condescending friendship, and for
that law of kindness which dwelt in her lips and heart. Great in
her dexterity of management. Great in her quick apprehension of the
difficulties of her affairs, and where the stress and pinch lay, to
untie the knot, and loose and ease them. Great in the conquest of
herself. Great in a thousand things beside, which the world admires as
such: but she despised them all, and counted them but loss and dung in
comparison of the fear of God, and the excellency of the knowledge of
Christ Jesus.”[597]
Before concluding this review of different forms assumed by personal
religion in the national Church, at least one word is due to a
remarkable instance of conversion, in the case of the Earl of
Rochester, whose deep repentance and Christian faith, after a career
of reckless vice, have been made familiar to the world through the
memoir of him written by Bishop Burnet. Nor should Ley, Earl of
Marlborough, less known to posterity, be entirely overlooked; for,
after having contemned religion, he was “brought to a different sense
of things, upon real conviction, even in full health, some time before
he was killed in the sea-fight at Southold Bay, 1665.”[598] Neither
can I omit all notice of that quiet, unobtrusive piety which in those
days adorned some in the higher walks of life; for example, “the
Lord Crew,” of whom, in a contemporary diary, it is said,--“Friday,
December 12th, 1679. The Lord Crew died, who had been very eminent in
his age for holiness and charity; and at, and in his death, for useful
and suitable instructions to those about him, and for well-grounded
peace, and solid comfort for himself.”[599] Much of the religion in
the Church of England, however, bore a very different impress. Many
were of the same type as William Cavendish, the loyal Marquis of
Newcastle, of whom Clarendon says: “He loved monarchy, as it was the
foundation and support of his own greatness; and the Church, as it
was well constituted for the splendour and security of the Crown; and
religion, as it cherished and maintained that order and obedience that
was necessary to both; without any other passion for the particular
opinions which were grown up in it, and distinguished it into parties,
than as he detested whatsoever was like to disturb the public
peace.”[600]
[Sidenote: THEOLOGICAL DIVERGENCES.]
These notices of persons, all of them members of the Church of
England, present great differences of character. As amongst the
Divines described in a former chapter, we observed, in connection with
their maintenance of the established Episcopal order and government,
their use of the same formularies, and their subscription to the same
standards of faith, a wide divergence of theological belief, and the
indications of a considerable diversity of religious sentiment; so
amongst the laity, as might be expected from the circumstance of no
subscription being exacted in their case, we discover a still greater
divergence of belief, and a still greater variety of sentiment. Not to
speak here of that deep inner life, existent in the Church of Christ
under various outward forms, to which I shall refer hereafter, I may
observe now that the only manifest resemblance amongst those who have
just been indicated, consisted in the uniformity of their worship,
and in their submission to the same kind of Church government. The
High Church, the Low Church, and the Broad Church of the nineteenth
century find their historical parallels in the seventeenth, although
by no means in the same measure of development; and if legal questions
touching Church matters were not raised at that time as they are at
present, the same radical differences between one section and another
existed then as now.
CHAPTER XXIII.
[Sidenote: JOHN BURNYEAT.]
A characteristic specimen of Quakers’ piety is furnished in the
following narrative, extracted from a volume of their biographies:--
“John Burnyeat was born in the parish of Lows-water, in the county of
Cumberland, about the year 1631. And when it pleased God to send His
faithful servant George Fox, with other of the messengers of the Gospel
of peace and salvation, to proclaim the day of the Lord in the county
of Cumberland and north parts of England, this dear servant of Christ
was one that received their testimony, which was in the year 1653,
when he was about twenty-two years of age; and through his waiting in
the light of Jesus Christ, unto which he was turned, he was brought
into deep judgment and great tribulation of soul, such as he had not
known in all his profession of religion, and by this light of Christ
was manifested all the reproved things, and so he came to see the body
of death and power of sin which had reigned in him, and felt the guilt
thereof upon his conscience, so that he did possess the sins of his
youth. ‘Then,’ said he, ‘I saw that I had need of a Saviour to save
from sin, as well as the blood of a sacrificed Christ to blot out sin,
and faith in His name for the remission of sins; and so being given up
to bear the indignation of the Lord, because of sin, and wait till
the indignation should be over, and the Lord in mercy would blot out
the guilt that remained (which was the cause of wrath), and sprinkle
my heart from an evil conscience, and wash our bodies with pure water,
that we might draw near to Him with a true heart in the full assurance
of faith, as the Christians of old did (Heb. x. 22).’ Thus did this
servant of the Lord, with many more in the beginning, receive the truth
(as more at large may be seen in the journal of his life) in much fear
and trembling, meeting often together, and seeking the Lord night and
day, until the promises of the Lord came to be fulfilled, spoken of by
the prophet Isaiah, chap. xlii. 7, and xlix. 9, and lxi. 3; and some
taste of the oil of joy came to be witnessed, and a heavenly gladness
extended into the hearts of many, who in the joy of their souls broke
forth in praises unto the Lord, so that the tongue of the dumb (which
Christ, the healer of our infirmities, did unloose) began to speak
and utter the wonderful things of God. And great was the dread and
glory of that power, that one meeting after another was graciously and
richly manifested amongst them, to the breaking and melting many hearts
before the Lord. Thus being taught of the Lord, according to Isaiah
liv. 13, John vi. 45, they became able ministers of the Gospel, and
instructors of the ignorant in the way of truth, as this our friend
was one, who after four years’ waiting, mostly in silence, before he
did appear in a public testimony, which was in the year 1657, being at
first concerned to go to divers public places of worship, reproving
both priests and people for their deadness and formality of worship,
for which he endured sore beating with their staves and Bibles, &c.,
and imprisonment also in Carlisle Gaol, where he suffer’d twenty-three
weeks’ imprisonment for speaking to one priest Denton, at Briggham.
After he was at liberty, he went into Scotland, in the year 1658,
where he spent three months, travelling both north and west. His work
was to call people to repentance from their lifeless hypocritical
profession and dead formalities, and to turn to the true light of
Jesus Christ in their hearts, that therein they might come to know the
power of God, and the remission of sins, &c. And in the year 1659 he
travelled to Ireland, and preached the truth and true faith of Jesus in
many parts of that nation.”[601]
Of the piety of Puritan Nonconformists several examples have already
appeared; but it is proper to add a few more.
[Sidenote: JOSEPH ALLEINE.]
Joseph Alleine was born in 1634. As a child, whilst living in Devizes,
the sieges and battles of the Civil Wars made him familiar with the
question then being fought out, both by the sword and the pen; and as
he heard gun answering gun, and saw the flashes “through the chinks of
his father’s barred and shuttered windows,” and as he read fly-leaves
which were then distributed far and wide, ideas were entering his
mind which shaped the Puritanism of his whole after-life. He went to
Oxford when that University had fallen into the hands of the Army, and
just before the time when Oliver Cromwell became Chancellor. There he
distinguished himself by his diligence, often rising at four o’clock
in the morning, and prolonging his studies beyond midnight; and he
added to the exhaustion of toil, the mortification of fasting; for he
often gave away his “commons” at least once a day. In the year 1655
he became minister at Taunton, as assistant to George Newton, the
minister of St. Mary’s; and there he married: a long love-letter, which
he wrote to the lady of his affections, still remains, as a specimen
of the grave courtship of Puritan suitors. Having been ordained
according to Presbyterian order, his activity as a pastor rivalled
his assiduity as a student. What he did as a catechist long remained
amongst the traditions of the town. “In this work, his course was to
draw a catalogue of the names of the families in each street, and so
to send a day or two before he intended to visit them. Those that sent
slight excuses, or did obstinately refuse his message, he would speak
some affectionate words to them, or, if he saw cause, denounce the
threatenings of God against them that despise His ministers, and so
departed; and after would send letters to them so full of love as did
overcome their hearts, and they did many of them afterwards receive him
into their houses. Herein was his compassion shown to all sorts, both
poor and rich.” All this may be regarded as not only characteristic of
Alleine, but of the class to which he belonged; for there was nothing
about which the Presbyterians were more anxious than the culture of
domestic religion. Alleine’s preaching also stood in high repute, the
judgment in his discourses being likened to “a pot of manna,”--the
fancy to “Aaron’s rod that budded,”--and the fervour to “a live coal
from off the altar.” His public career of labour, usefulness, and
honour, in the town of Taunton, reached its close at the general
ejectment of 1662, to the common grief of himself and his parishioners.
Alleine’s habits of indefatigable toil could not be repressed by the
Act of Uniformity, and he still preached, ordinarily in some weeks six
or seven times, in others ten or fourteen. Such a zealous evangelist
could not escape the hand of the law; and in the year 1663 he was
sent a prisoner to Ilchester Gaol. He remained in confinement a year
all but three days. The vigilance of his gaoler could not have been
strict, for he had “very great meetings, week-days and Sabbath-days,
and many days of humiliation and thanksgiving. The Lord’s days many
hundreds came.” Alleine held conferences, wrote to his old flock,
taught children, circulated catechisms, and, during the chaplain’s
illness, discharged his duties, exerting himself to such a degree that
he would keep on his clothes all night, and allow himself to sleep only
one or two hours. After his liberation, his indomitable perseverance
in preaching, and in other religious efforts, brought him again into
trouble: indeed, it is said, “he was far more earnest than before,”
although that appears impossible. A second imprisonment followed in the
year 1666. In the June of 1667, he was again liberated; but excessive
labour, severe self-mortification, and the vexations and sorrows of
imprisonment, had broken down his constitution. “It was impossible,”
observed Dr. Annesley, “that anguish like his could continue long, and
at last his sufferings for Christ hurried him to heaven in a fiery
chariot.” When conveyed in a horse-litter to Bath--then called the
“King’s Bathe,” a mere maze of five hundred houses--“the doctors were
amazed to behold such a wasted object, professing they never saw the
like, much wondering how he was come alive; and, on his appearance
at the Bathe, some of the ladies were affrighted, as though death
had come amongst them.” The Puritan was much grieved by “the oaths,
drinking, and ungodly carriage of the persons of quality there;” and he
failed not to reprove them for their misconduct. “His way was first to
converse of things that might be taking with them; for, being furnished
by his studies for any company, he did use his learning for such ends,
and by such means hath caught many souls.” He caused himself to be
carried in a chair to visit schools and almshouses; he persuaded
teachers to adopt the Assembly’s Catechism as a class-book; and on a
Sunday he gathered sixty or seventy children together at his lodgings,
and he also paid daily visits to the poor.
The Puritan impress rests on all Alleine’s labours, on all his
self-denial, on all his social intercourse, and on much of his
suffering. The same may be said of his last moments. We are told
that the night before he died, about nine o’clock, he brake out with
an audible voice, speaking for _sixteen hours_ together, and
did cease but a little space now and then all the afternoon. About
three o’clock in the afternoon he had some conflict with Satan, for
he uttered these words:--“Away, thou foul fiend, thou enemy of all
mankind, thou subtle sophister: art thou come now to molest me--now I
am just going--now I am so weak, and death upon me? Trouble me not,
for I am none of thine! I am the Lord’s; Christ is mine, and I am
His; His by covenant. I have sworn myself to be the Lord’s, and His
I will be. Therefore begone!” These last words he repeated often.
Thus his covenanting with God was the method he used to expel the
devil and all his temptations. In November, 1668, he died, and was
buried in the chancel of St. Mary’s, Taunton, under a brass plate with
this inscription: _Hic jacet Dominus Josephus Alleine holocaustum
Tauntonensis et Deo et vobis_.[602]
[Sidenote: THOMAS EWINS.]
Thomas Ewins, a Baptist minister at Bristol, was mentioned in a former
volume, as a man of great natural power: the character of his life also
deserves commemoration. The records of the Broadmead Church, which
have already supplied us with many illustrations, afford us touching
memorials of this good man’s piety. When his flock were about to
meet for prayer on his behalf, during his final illness, he addressed
to them the following letter, which indicates at once the close and
confidential religious relations in which he stood to them, and the
deep spirituality of the pastor’s character:--“Dear brother,” he says,
addressing one of the ruling elders, “understanding that some friends
intend to become suitors at the throne of grace this day on my behalf,
I think good to send these few lines for information, to acquaint you
that being weak, I cannot conveniently be with you, but hope I shall
meet you with some few sighs and groans to Him that heareth prayer;
first, that the God of all grace and health will command health and
cure to the soul and body, chiefly to that soul of all soul maladies,
unbelief, and all the fruits thereof; and also to the body, for the
cure of those maladies which unfit for work and service, especially
melancholy, and the fruits thereof; and that God will, of His infinite
riches of grace and mercy, bestow a double portion of His blessed
Spirit both upon me and upon the whole congregation, and that we may
obtain more of the blessed spirit of adoption, and all the fruits
thereof. Amen. Which is all at present from your weak brother, Thomas
Ewins. The Lord give you much of His presence, and grant that His ear
may be open to your prayers.”
[Sidenote: THOMAS EWINS.]
He had been declining very fast, and had kept his chamber nearly five
months when he sent this letter. The end was at hand; and his departure
and character are thus recorded in these simple and beautiful annals:--
“Our pastor, brother Ewins, having lain a great while weak, he departed
this life in the second month, 1670, having faithfully served his Lord
and Master, Jesus Christ, near towards twenty years in this city,
in the work of the ministry; preaching clearly the gospel of free
grace, by faith in Jesus Christ, wherein he laboured abundantly, in
the public (places), and in his particular charge--the congregation;
and also would go and preach to the poor people in their almshouses
at Michael’s Hill, and Lawford’s Gate almshouse, once a fortnight, in
the morning; and in those times of liberty, would, for some convenient
seasons, set up a lecture, and preach at Bedminster and other places.
And at other times, during the winter long evenings, would keep an
expository lecture or meeting at T’Ewins’ Church, and sometimes at
Leonard’s Church, besides his constant public preaching, as he was one
of the city lecturers, every third day, Tuesday, at Nicolas Church,
and every fifth day (Thursday) at the Church meeting of Conference,
and twice every Lord’s Day constantly; besides many times a word to
the Church, after that those who were not members were departed, upon
the Lord’s Day, in the evening, at the Church’s select meeting. Thus,
as one unwearied to serve the Lord Jesus, he took all opportunities,
doing good; insomuch that many ministers did admire him for his great,
diligent labours, and that he had always variety of matter; which,
though he had not the original tongues, yet God did endue him with
great grace, and a quick understanding in the things of God, and (in)
the Gospel of our Lord Jesus, to the winning and converting many souls
to Christ, and building and binding up the broken-hearted. He was a
man full of self-denial, and subduing his natural temper; so that he
walked very lovely and holy in his conversation, showing patience
where it required, and meekness toward all men; visiting all his
members carefully, and searching into the state of their souls; and
by some ministers that were his familiars (it was) observed and said,
they never saw him over merry nor over sad, but given to prayer and
almsdeeds. He was interred in James’s Yard, the 29th day of the second
month, April, _anno Domini_, 1670, accompanied with many hundreds
to the grave, the like funeral not seen long before in Bristol. He left
so good a savour behind for faithfulness to God and humility towards
man, that his very chief persecutor, Sir John Knight, said, He did
believe he was gone to heaven.”[603]
[Sidenote: OWEN STOCKTON.]
Owen Stockton was born at Chichester in 1630, his father being a
Prebendary of the Cathedral in that city. The father died when the
son was only seven years old; the mother then removed to Ely, and, as
the boy was looking into a copy of _Foxe’s Acts and Monuments_,
chained to the wall of one of the parish churches, he was so affected
by what he read, that he begged his friends to obtain at least a part
of the work for his private use. Having secured his object, he spent
the vacant hours which other children devoted to play, in eagerly
perusing the martyrology; and he thus imbibed the strong Protestant
and Puritan spirit, which influenced his whole after-life. On being
sent to Cambridge he enjoyed the instruction of Dr. Henry More as his
tutor, and being only sixteen years old, and of small stature, the
tiny gownsman attracted general attention as he walked the streets.
When he accompanied some of his fellow-students into the presence of
Charles I., to express their loyalty, the King gave him a “gracious
benediction,” saying, “Here is a little scholar indeed, God bless
him.” Stockton devoted himself to study; and coming up to London for
awhile, he attended the Gresham Lectures and the library of Sion
College, and availed himself of the City bookstalls. After receiving
his degree of Master of Arts, he “exercised his gifts” in villages
around the University, and also became a catechist in his own college.
His ordination to the full work of the University occurred in London
in the year 1655; and on the Sunday following, he preached at the
Charterhouse. “In the afternoon”--so runs the quaint memoir of this
worthy--“one put up a bill to him, wherein the person that put it up
acknowledged, that he had long lain under the guilt of a known sin, and
was convinced of it by the morning sermon, and desired prayers to God
for help against it.” Upon receiving an invitation to become the Town
Lecturer at Colchester, Stockton accepted that office, adding to it the
voluntary task of preaching every Sunday morning in St. James’ Church;
and, until he was ejected in 1662, his labours were abundant, winning
for him honourable renown amongst the Essex Puritans.
He removed to Chattisham in Suffolk, where he not only continued
to preach privately, but in the absence of the Incumbent, once a
fortnight, he had, in spite of his Nonconformity, freedom to occupy
the pulpit of the parish church. He enjoyed a like privilege in
neighbouring villages. His doing so being illegal, as soon as the
vigilance of his enemies succeeded the connivance of his friends,
Stockton felt himself exposed to peril. “It being a time of danger,”
he wrote in his diary, April 16th, 1665,--“as to the keeping of my
meeting-service, many soldiers being in the town, I being dubious
whether I should admit the people to come or no,--when I considered
that Christ took it as an act of love to feed His sheep--that he
exposed Himself to death to save me, I being under a sense of the
comfort that the Lord had given me in the morning,--in my meditation on
1 Timothy i. 15, I was willing to adventure myself upon the providence
of God.” In this case, it would appear, that the alarm was unnecessary.
It certainly proved so in another instance, and the incident may be
mentioned, as illustrative of the double trials of the period,--the
fightings without producing fears within:--“As I was exercising in my
family, in the afternoon, several of my friends being with me, I had
word sent me that Sir J(ohn) S(haw), the Recorder; the Mayor, Thomas
Wade; and Justices, would come down to my house. Whereupon I, being
near the end of my exercise, concluded with a short prayer. After I
(had) done, and dismissed the people, one of the constables came to me
and told me he was sent to dissolve my meeting, and had some kind of
trembling upon him when he spoke to me, and said he blessed God that
had given him an heart to come sometimes himself, and his wife, to my
meetings, so that instead of doing me any hurt, he gave glory to God
for giving him an heart to be present.”[604]
Stockton was reported at Lambeth in the year 1669, for holding a
“conventicle in Colchester with George Done.” He also preached at
Manningtree, Marks Tay, and Ipswich. In the year 1672, Stockton
took out a license to be “a Presbyterian and Independent teacher in
Grayfriars House, in St. Nicholas Parish,” in the county town of
Suffolk. These were halcyon days for men like him: and again his
ministry became his whole business. Besides conducting Sunday services,
including two sermons, several expositions, and catechetical exercises,
he “preached a lecture at Ipswich, on the week day, once a fortnight;
and, scarce a week passed, but he preached at some other lecture,
or funeral, besides keeping of private fasts, which he frequently
practised both at home and abroad.”[605]
[Sidenote: OWEN STOCKTON.]
Not only Stockton’s ministerial work, but his spiritual life also, is
fully described in his Diary. His conversion, which took place when
he was young, he tells us was not preceded by any “notable workings
of the spirit of bondage,” or followed “by those ravishing joys which
some have felt.” He feared his humiliation was not deep enough; but
he received full satisfaction from a passage in a sermon, which he
heard preached by that worthy and excellent servant of Jesus Christ,
Mr. Richard Vines, then Master of Pembroke Hall. Phraseology of this
kind indicates the kind of theology and of spiritual life which gave
a stamp to the character of Owen Stockton: and the whole of the Diary
bears the same religious complexion. He entered into a solemn covenant
with God, and he set down at large the evidences of his faith and
of his pardon,--of his being one of God’s servants, and having an
interest in Jesus Christ,--of the Divine love to his soul, and of
his possession of eternal life. No Anglican or Latitudinarian could
have dealt with questions of personal religion after the manner which
Stockton adopted. His accounts of providences, and of dreams, are
tinged with superstition. The analysis which he gives of his motives
for doing certain things; and his statement of cases of casuistry--as
for example, whether it was lawful to write a letter, even of spiritual
advice, on the Lord’s Day, and his long list of reasons for and
against courses of conduct which he specifies--indicate a morbid
conscientiousness, and a habit of keen and irritating introspection
far beyond that self-examination which the Scriptures recommend. Yet,
accompanying these infirmities, there appear a strong conviction of the
realities of the invisible world, a tenacious grasp of the doctrines
of grace, and a deep tone of devotion, a thorough consecration to the
service of God, and a burning zeal for the glory of Christ, and for
the welfare of souls. The manner in which his death is described
harmonizes with the rest of his biography, and accurately describes
what he professed:--“Discharging his dying office by grave exhortations
and encouragement to serious religion and suffering for it, which
he especially applied to his only child; owning and professing his
Nonconformity to the last, as judging himself obliged thereto in
conscience towards God; blessing God for His invaluable gift of Jesus
Christ to the children of men; blessing God, who had called him to the
honourable employment of the ministry of the Gospel, and had enabled
him to be faithful therein, and encouraged him with His presence and
blessing under all the difficulties thereof; blessing God, who had
lifted him up above the fear of death; rejoicing in the peace and
testimony of a good conscience, and hope of the glory of God, after ten
or eleven days’ conflict with his disease (which, after some hope of
recovery, very suddenly and unexpectedly seized his head), he quietly
slept in the Lord, September 10th, 1680, in the one and fiftieth year
of his age.”[606]
[Sidenote: DR. JACOMB.]
Another of the ejected ministers--one who survived the two excellent
persons just described, and who is much better known than either of
them--ought to be noticed before concluding this selection from the
roll of Puritan names. Dr. Thomas Jacomb has been mentioned already, as
a man who took a prominent part in the ecclesiastical affairs of his
age. His biographers speak of his zeal for the glory of his Master,
of his love to the souls of men, and of his constancy and diligence
in ministerial work. He suffered much from cancer in the mouth; but
when pain became tolerable, preaching acted as an anodyne; and, at
all times, reflection upon the Divine goodness afforded him relief. He
manifested much compassion, charity, and beneficence, and was moderate
in his Nonconformity--“rather desiring to have been comprehended in the
National Church, than to have separated from it.” His last illness is
described as very distressing, and he said to an intimate friend--“I
am using the means, but I think my appointed time is come. If my life
might be serviceable to convert or build up one soul I should be
content to live; but if God hath no more work for me to do, here I am,
let Him do with me as He pleaseth.” On another occasion, he observed:
“It will not be long before we meet in Heaven, never to part more: and
there we shall be perfectly happy; there neither your doubts and fears,
nor my pains shall follow us; nor our sins, which is best of all.” He
longed to be above, and said with some regret--“Death flies from me; I
make no haste to my Father’s house.”[607] Dr. Jacomb expired under the
roof of the Countess of Exeter, March 27, 1687.
Burnet affords a pleasant sketch of an eminent Puritan layman, Sir
Harbottle Grimston, Speaker of the House of Commons in the Convention
Parliament, and afterwards Master of the Rolls; and in connection with
this sketch occurs an equally pleasant notice of his exemplary wife.
“He gave yearly great sums in charity, discharging many prisoners by
paying their debts. He was a very pious and devout man, and spent
every day at least an hour in the morning, and as much at night, in
prayer and meditation. And even in winter, when he was obliged to be
very early on the bench, he took care to rise so soon, that he had
always the command of that time, which, he gave to those exercises.
He was much sharpened against Popery; but had always a tenderness to
the Dissenters, though he himself continued still in the communion
of the Church. His second wife, whom I knew, was niece to the great
Sir Francis Bacon: and was the last heir of that family. She had all
the high notions for the Church and the Crown, in which she had been
bred; but was the humblest, the devoutest, and best tempered person I
ever knew of that sort. It was really a pleasure to hear her talk of
religion; she did it with so much elevation and force. She was always
very plain in her clothes; and went oft to jails, to consider the wants
of the prisoners, and relieve, or discharge them; and by the meanness
of her dress she passed but for a servant trusted with the charities
of others. When she was travelling in the country, as she drew near
a village, she often ordered her coach to stay behind till she had
walked about it, giving orders for the instruction of the children, and
leaving liberally for that end. With two such persons I spent several
of my years very happily.”[608]
[Sidenote: UNITY OF SPIRITUAL LIFE.]
Without repeating what I have said in a former volume, respecting
the varieties of spiritual life, I would observe, that it is of very
great importance to distinguish between religion and theology: between
spiritual life in man, and the philosophy of its causes, its nature,
and its modes of operation. The philosophy of that life is of a far
higher description than any other branch of science in relation to
either material things or the human mind. Christian personal religion,
when complete and satisfactory, must rest upon the study of Divine
Revelation--this is the supreme authority for the religious beliefs of
all to whom it comes--without which those beliefs are as the shifting
sands and as the changeful clouds. It is of immense moment to search
out the truth amidst various theories, and theological theories are
to some minds an intellectual necessity, which it is idle to deny and
foolish to ignore. Nor should the fact be overlooked that creeds--the
creeds of the early Church--may serve as guards and preservers of the
Church’s faith; as lines which have been drawn, after sounding the
channels of Christian thought, to guard us against shoals towards which
we are apt to be driven, as buoys which may help to preserve us from
shipwreck, and as landmarks which may continue to secure for us the
precious inheritance of truth bequeathed by Christ.[609] But at the
same time these theories and these creeds should be distinguished from
religion itself; and beyond all doubt, the religion of the soul, in a
multitude of cases, is much less influenced by definite theological
opinions on certain points than many persons are disposed to admit.
Theology is oftener determined by religion, than religion is determined
by theology. Hence the trite maxim that some men are better than their
creeds and some are worse.
Christianity teaches, that faith in Christ is essential to religion in
the case of all those to whom the Gospel comes, by which faith is meant
trust in Him as the Divine Redeemer of souls. It further teaches that
love to God is essential to religion, which love is to be expressed
in worship and obedience. Finally, it teaches that morality is
essential to religion, which morality includes all the pure, exalted,
comprehensive, and noble virtues inculcated in the Scriptures. This
threefold kind of religion may be found in cases where, what many
may deem, erroneous views on various points are entertained; and it
may be absent in cases where no such erroneous views exist. Religion
does not centre in intellectual opinions, but in the affections of the
heart, and the volitions of the will. Consequently, we have been able
to trace, with more or less distinctness, the presence and power of
real piety in all the great schools of theological thought, which have
come under our review. We recognize amongst men of different creeds,
of different forms of worship, of different ecclesiastical polities,
members of the one Holy Catholic Church, because we discover in them
that faith, devotion, and morality, which are the constituent elements
of true religion. It is remarkable how, in these respects, Christians
of various communions, such as I have attempted to portray, resemble
each other. They have not been able to repeat the same theological
confession: but under a sense of sin, in the great exigencies of their
existence, in the hour of death, and looking forward to the day of
judgment, they have rested upon the only _Name_ given under heaven
whereby we can be saved. They could not unite in the same symbolic
rites, but there are hymns of praise and supplication in which they
have all been enabled to express the devoutness of their spiritual
life. They could not co-operate in ecclesiastical action, but each in
his own sphere could and did engage in deeds of Christian justice,
zeal, and charity.
I am not writing the history of any sect, but of Christ’s Church
in England during the latter half of the seventeenth century, and
therefore I have endeavoured to make these pages reflect, as far as
possible, the many coloured types of moral and spiritual beauty, with
which the Spirit of truth and love adorned and blessed our land at that
eventful period.
APPENDIX.
No. I.--See Vol. I., p. 60.
I find in the Record Office a very curious letter, dated
Llanothyng,[610] the 8th of April, and addressed to Linwell Chapman.
There is placed in the same bundle in which I discovered it a fairly
transcribed copy. As the contents are remarkable, I shall give a full
description of them, and supply a few extracts.
The letter purports to come from more persons than one, and it
commences by expressing their joy on account of suffering for Christ’s
sake, their spirits being borne up by the fury of the adversary, by the
patience dispensed to the godly, and the great spirit of prayer poured
out, together with active faith in the most precious promises. They
had sent messengers to their brethren, all over the nation, including
three to South Wales, exhorting them to stand by the good old cause,
once the most precious in the eyes of the saints. They mention “Dr.
Owen, that precious servant of Christ,” as having had a sinecure in
their neighbourhood, and as having sent them word “that he doubted
not of good issue.” “We hope very speedily,” they proceed, “to give
you a good account when that discontented part of the army we expect
is come up, to countenance us until we can get together. We have laid
out £10,000 in arms, and distributed most of them; we have raised such
a jealousy here between the Cavaliers and Presbyterians as opens us
a wider door than otherwise could be expected; and, indeed, were we
considerable, the Presbyterians would close with us, upon any terms,
rather than undergo an intolerable yoke under an implacable enemy.”
The writers refer to an attempt upon “Charles Stewart,” which, they
heard, “did not succeed in the way intended, but there was another
way more successful.” They afterwards state,--“Mr. Kiffin, and Mr.
Cockam, Mr. Hudson, Mr. M. the Committee-man, and Mr. Feake, write to
us of securing the General and the Parliament about the 6th of May,
to which they say all the congregations in London agree, except Mr.
Caryles and Mr. Griffiths. Mr. Nie [Nye] doth great service in it, we
hear. Mr. Brooks is very willing. Mr. Barker is, they say, indifferent.
Indeed Sir Harry Vane is a man that seems to be born for such a time as
this. He will come up, we hear, to head us; for we shall rise first,
being furthest off.” After further explanation of their policy, they
continue: “This we know, that we shall be (the Lord assisting us), a
month hence, so considerable, coming towards London, that most of your
Londoners must draw out, and then you have your opportunity. We hope
you have received the arms, ammunitions, &c. V. A. L. was appointed to
bring from C. to B., and then to D., where your carts were to meet him.
What use you may make of the training day at London we leave to your
discretion. Would we were rid of all the carnal and self-interested men
on our side, and we doubt not but to do well. Mr. Thomas, the bearer
hereof, will tell you how far we prevailed upon the Irish Brigade, and
pray do you tell him how far you prevailed upon your London forces. The
report of their being to be disbanded makes much for us here; what it
doth there we know not. Col. Okey is very successful, and it’s believed
his agitation may produce what may make both their ears tingle. Whether
Mr. Powell, Mr. Mostyn, and Mr. Lloyd, be come up to you, we hear not.
When they come, we doubt not they will put life in the cause. Mr.
Jessey, with the brethren of Swan Alley, Mr. Rogers, Mr. Spilsbury,
&c., are very zealous. And it’s good to be zealous in a good matter.
Mr. Row, of Westminster, hath been very instrumental in a late design.
The Lord strengthen the hands of such faithful souls. I pray, let us
hear what the brethren of Gloucestershire intend to do. Mr. Helme, of
Winchcombe, is diligent, spending himself and being spent among the
neighbouring congregations if they be not already at London.” (The
congregations referred to were either Independents or Baptists.) The
writers further state that they heard a piece was “coming out on the
character of the wretched villain Monk,” and an account of his plots.
They advised that the first work should be to secure the militia and
gentry, seize several of the Welsh castles, and be at Gloucester by
the 12th of May, and tempt the General out. “Let the Quakers,” the
letter goes on to say, “have the knottiest piece, for they are resolute
in performing, though but rash in advising. It were to be wished the
House had some bones to pick, that they might determine nothing until
the 12th of May.” The writers then ask, whether the Long Parliament
members, under whose authority they and their friends were acting,
would sit at Shrewsbury as a place of rendezvous; that would be the
safest place. They refer to Scotland, adding, “If it may be, it were
well all places were at once disordered by a common alarm, while one
place is chiefly aimed at. We expect Sir Arthur here suddenly, and
then, when a convenient number of the old Parliament and army are met,
we declare. The declaration is already agreed on.” ... “We are apt to
believe that every honest man of all interests will acquiesce in it.
Verily some Presbyterians, upon their late experience, are ready to
hear and submit to the reason of it, when proposed to them. The press
is free enough for it, there being no restraint upon that as yet.” The
letter concludes with an exhortation to prosecute the design on the
Tower, the House, and the head-quarters.
Besides this letter, there is another dated a few days earlier,
addressed to Master Evan Thomas Taylor, relating to the same subject,
but not containing any important information.
When I first lighted upon the letter of the 8th of April, 1660, with
the actual outbreak under Lambert, in the same month, fresh in my
mind, I was startled at the sight of these extraordinary statements,
and began to think that they supplied new and important information
respecting Republican movements going on at that confused period. A
little reflection, however, sufficed to raise very considerable doubts
as to whether much reliance could be placed upon several parts of the
letter of the 8th, in which mere rumours are related, and accounts
are given of what was going on at a distance. Further consideration
made me suspicious as to the origin of the papers altogether. For
the fabrication of letters said to be intercepted, and containing
treasonable matter, was no uncommon device in those days, of which a
signal instance is furnished in our notice of William Kiffin (Vol.
I., p. 211). Besides, there are certain things about these professed
communications from Wales, which the more I thought of them the more
suspicious they appeared,--such as the statement respecting Dr.
Owen, the expenditure of so large a sum as £10,000 by poor Welshmen
in procuring arms, the reference made to Quakers as engaged in
military movements, and the engagement of all the Congregational
Churches in London, with two exceptions, in a plot to secure Monk and
the Parliament. The more I considered these circumstances the more
incredible they looked. Impressed with very strong doubts, I applied to
my kind friend, the late Mr. John Bruce, whose judgment on the point I
felt would be most valuable.
He gave the following opinion:--“I have looked at the letters dated 4th
and 8th of the 2nd month of 1660, and the copy of the latter, which is
endorsed in the handwriting of the Secretary, Sir Joseph Williamson.
That they are all of the period assigned to them is, I think, pretty
certain, but whether they are genuine or fabricated is a question not
easily answered.
“It seems to me probable that the two letters were written by the same
hand, the writing of the letter of the 4th being a feigned hand. That
of the 4th was intended to contain that of the 8th, which is rather
strange, and the oddity is increased by the circumstance, that in
that of the 4th there is an allusion to that of the 8th as if it were
already written:--‘Pray tell Mr. Chapman, which I forgot to write.’
“The letter of the 8th, purporting to be dated at ‘Llanothyng,’ a
place I do not know; that of the 4th at ‘Llanvaire,’ I suppose in
Monmouthshire. The former mentions ‘Dr. Owen, that precious servant
of Christ,’ as having had a ‘sinecure here.’ If this be John Owen, it
seems very like a blunder.
“Probably many other strangenesses might be discovered upon a close
study of the letters, but that which in my mind makes most against the
genuineness of the letter of the 8th, is the enormous improbability
that any one would have sent a letter in such manner as this has been
forwarded, which disclosed a plot to kill the King and other members of
the Royal Family, and implicated in movements connected with it, not
one or two persons only, but all the most conspicuous persons of the
Republican party. The letter is in this respect so overdone as on that
account alone to be a subject of very great suspicion. But, supposing
it possible that a man could be found who was fool enough to write such
a letter, I cannot believe that it would have been transmitted in the
careless, half-open way in which these have been sent to Master Thomas
in Quart-Pot Alley, Philpot Lane--if that be the address.
“My present impression is that these letters are not genuine, but if
anything turns upon a point, or you are about to publish an opinion, I
should like to reconsider the question.”
A little while afterwards, Mr. Bruce wrote the following:--“I
have looked again at the letters said to have been intercepted,
and am more and more convinced they are not genuine. Contents,
handwriting--everything--is against them. They are not papers upon
which any one ought to found an historical conclusion.
“Mr. Hardy came in just as I was putting up the bundle which contains
these letters. I took them out and asked him what he thought of them.
He shook his head, and pronounced them to be most suspicious-looking
papers.”
After such an opinion, confirmatory of my own strong doubts, I could
not think of using these documents in the text, but, as curiosities, I
have transferred them to this Appendix.
No. II.--Vol. I., p. 244.
The following important Memorandum from W. J. Thoms, Esq., House of
Lords, on the MS. Prayer Book attached to the Act of Uniformity, 1662,
occurs in the Appendix to the Minutes of Evidence taken before the
Royal Commission on Ritual:--
“In the course of a conversation with the Dean of Westminster on
Tuesday week (30th July), after calling my attention to a pamphlet of
Mr. Hull on the subject of the supposed loss of the Book of Common
Prayer attached to the Act of Uniformity, the Dean expressed a wish to
see the tower (formerly a portion of the Abbey) in which the original
Acts of Parliament were till lately kept, the rooms in the Victoria
Tower where the Acts are now deposited, and the Act of Uniformity
itself. I promised to make the necessary arrangements for his doing so,
on the following Thursday (1st August).
“My attention having been called by the Dean to the Prayer Book before
alluded to, when settling with the person who arranges the Acts in the
Victoria Tower to be in the way at the time the Dean had appointed to
come, I spoke to him about the book; and he then told me, that when the
Acts were removed, he had found, among other books, MS. Journals, &c.,
a Manuscript Prayer Book, which he had handed over to the Chief Clerk,
Mr. Smith. I at once felt satisfied that that was the book respecting
which there seems to have been so much mistaken anxiety; but the
accidental absence of Mr. Smith prevented my then examining the book;
and until I had seen it, and positively ascertained the fact, I thought
it better, in case I should prove mistaken, not to mention to the Dean
that the book was in Mr. Smith’s custody.
“Mr. Smith, who came to me in the Library a few minutes after the Dean
had left, at once said the Prayer Book was in his custody, showed it to
me, and I communicated the fact on the same evening to the Dean.
“WILLIAM J. THOMS.
“LIBRARY, HOUSE OF LORDS,
“_8th August, 1867_.”
“An inspection of this MS. Prayer Book has proved to the Commissioners
that the ‘Order for Morning and Evening Prayer daily to be said and
used throughout the year,’ is identical in all respects with that which
is ordinarily prefixed to the Book of Common Prayer.”
It would be beyond my purpose to attempt a description of these
books--indeed no full and correct idea of their appearance and contents
could be supplied except by a _fac-simile_ reprint of them, which
I hope will be some day published--but in the meanwhile I will present
the reader with a transcript of the list of alterations inserted at the
beginning of the MS. volume. This copy was carefully compared with the
original by Mr. Thoms and myself.
With the MS. volume now in the Library of the House of Lords, there
is also a copy of the Prayer Book, printed by Robert Barker, in 1636,
containing alterations of the text made with a pen in a very neat hand,
believed to be that of Sancroft. I have been permitted to inspect these
volumes on three occasions; and there are two instances of alterations
made in the printed copy, and in the MS. book, so curious, and indeed
important, that I will transfer them to these pages.
The first relates to a passage at the end of the service for the public
baptism of infants. In the printed book it stands thus:--
#children ~persons~ w^{ch} are dying#
“It is certain by God’s Word, that ~children being~ baptized, ~have~
#before they committ actuall sinne are#
~all things necessary for their salvation, and be~ undoubtedly saved.”
The MS. book presents the same sentence thus:--
“It is certain by God’s Word, that children which are baptized, dyeing
before they commit actuall sin, are undoubtedly saved.”
The second instance relates to the last rubric prefixed to the
Communion service. In the printed book it stands thus:--
“The table at the communion
time having a fair white linnen
cloth upon it shall stand in the
#body of the church or in the#
~body of the church or in the~
#chancell where morning ~prayer~ and#
“Most convenient place in the ~chancell where morning and~
upper end of y^e chancel (or
of y^e body of y^e church #evening prayer are appointed to be#
where thereis no chancel.” ~evening prayer be appointed to be~
#said.#
~said.~
[611]#at#
And the priest standing ~at~ the
#~part~ side#
north ~side~ of the table, shall say
north side of the table, shall say
#the#
the Lord’s Prayer with ~the~ collect
following” [MS., y^e people
kneeling.]
In the MS. book it appears thus:--
“The table at the Communion time having a fair white linen cloth
#of the church, or#
upon it, shall stand in the body[612] ~or convenient place~ in the
#where Morning and Evening Prayer are appointed to be said.#
~upper end of the~ chancel ~or of the body of the church where there is
no chancel.~
#side#
And the priest standing at[613] the north ~part~ of the table, shall say
the Lord’s Prayer with the Collect followeing, the people kneeling.”
LIST OF ALTERATIONS PREFIXED.
OLD. NEW.
_Litany._
Bishops, Pastors, & Ministers. Bishops, Priests, & Deacons.
_Collect._
The 3d Sunday in Advent A larger & more proper inserted.
_For Christmas-day._
this day. as at this time [as also in y^e
preface at y^e Communion].
_For Easter Tuesday_ is put _For Low Easter_.
_For Whitsunday._
upon this day. as at this time.
y^e Epistle. For y^e Epistle [as often as it is
not taken out of an Epistle].
_Communion._
Overnight or else in y^e at least some time y^e day before.
morning before y^e beginning
of morning prayer, or
immediately after.--_Rubrick._
in y^e body of y^e Church or in y^e most convenient place in
in y^e Chancel. y^e upper end of y^e Chancel, or
of y^e body of y^e Church where
there is no Chancel.
north side. north part.
Bishops Pastor & Curates Bishops and Curates.
The 1st & 2d Exhortations are altered and fitted for timely
notice & preparation to y^e
Communion.
In y^e 3rd Exhortations this is left out.
Clause [If any of you be a
blasphemer of God, an
hinderer, &c.]
These words [before this omitted.
Congregation]
Before y^e Confession for by one of y^e Ministers.
these words [either by one
of them or else by y^e
Minister.]
In y^e 2d prayer after in y^e mysticall body of thy Son.
Receiving for [in
thy mysticall body]
In y^e last Rubrick but one omitted as needlesse now.
these words [And y^e Parish
shall be discharged of such
sums of money or other
dutyes w^{ch} hitherto they
have payed for y^e same by
order of their houses.
_Baptisme._
didst sanctify y^e flood in y^e River Jordan didst sanctify
Jordan & all other waters. water.
dost thou forsake? _Ans._ I doest thou in y^e name of this
forsake. this Child renounce? _Ans._ I
renounce.
_Private Baptisme._
This Demand [whether thinke omitted.
you y^e Childe to be
lawfully & perfectly
baptized]
_Confirmation._
In y^e Rubrick for these set before y^e Catechisme until
words [untill such time as such time as he be confirmed,
he can say y^e Catechisme or be ready and desirous to be
& be confirmed] these confirmed.
_Catechisme._
y^e King and his Ministers. y^e King and all that are put in
authority under him.
Water, wherein y^e person Water, wherein y^e person is
baptized is dipped, or baptized, in y^e name, &c.
sprinkled in it, In y^e
name, &c.
Yea they doe performe them Because they promise them both
both by their sureties, who by their sureties, which promise.
promise and vow them both
in their names.
_Matrimony._
Thes words [In Paradise] omitted.
depart. do part.
Children’s Children unto y^e Children, Christianly & virtuously
3d & 4th generation. brought up.
loving & amiable to her amiable, faithfull & obedient to
husband as Rachel--wise as her husband.
Rebecca--faithfull &
obedient as Sara.
The new married persons, the It is convenient y^t y^e new
same day of their marriage, married persons should receive
must receive y^e Communion. y^e Communion at y^e time of y^r
marriage or at y^e first
opportunity after y^e marriage.
_Visitation of y^e Sick._
In y^e Psalme y^e 5 last verses omitted
_Buriall._
Y^e Lesson read before they goe to y^e grave.
eyes. eares.
of resurrection. of y^e resurrection.
this our brother. omitted.
them that be elected. y^e faithfull.
_Churching._
For Psalme 121 116 or 127.
w^{ch} hast delivered. wee give thee hearty thanks for
that thou hast vouchsafed to
deliver.
in her vocation. omitted.
NOTE y^t All y^e Epistles & Gospels & most of y^e Sentences of
Scripture are put in y^e last Translation of y^e Bible.
* * * * *
These are all y^e materiall alterations--y^e rest are onely verball, or
y^e changeing of some Rubricks for y^e better performing of y^e service
or y^e new moulding some of y^e Collects.
ADDITIONS.
OLD. NEW.
deliver us from evil, for thine is y^e Kingdome, y^e power
& ye glory for ever and ever
[here and in some other places].
Praise ye the Lord. _Ans._ The Lord’s name be praised.
_Litany._
privy conspiracy & rebellion.
heresy & schisme
To y^e Prayer in time of another prayer added.
Dearth
_In y^t of Plague._
Almighty God, w^{ch} in thy didst send a plague upon thine
wrath owne people in y^e wildernesse,
for their obstinate rebellion
against Moses and Aaron, and also
didst then accept of an atonement and
Two Prayers for y^e Ember-weekes.
A Thanksgiving for restoring
publique peace.
A Prayer for y^e Parliament.
_Collects._
A Collect for y^e 6 Sunday
after the Epiphany
Epistle 1 S. John, 3. 1.
Gospel S. Matt. 24. 23.
A Collect for Easter Eve.
An Antheme on Easter day,
I Cor. 5. 7.
_Communion._
In y^e 3d Rubrick added Provided y^t every Minister so
repelling any as is specified, in
this or in y^e next preceding
Paragraph of this Rubrick shall
be obliged to give an account of
y^e same to y^e Ordinary within
14 days after at y^e furthest, &
y^e Ordinary shall proceede
against y^e offending person
according to y^e Canon.
the Lord thy God who brought thee out of y^e land of
Egypt, out of y^e house of
bondage.
In y^e prayer for whole state
of Christs Church--
to accept our almes and oblations.
adversity. And wee also blesse thy holy name
for all thy servants departed
this life in thy faith & fear,
beseeching thee to give us grace
so to follow their good examples
that w^{th} them wee may be
partakers of thy heavenly
Kingdome.
draw neere in full assurance of faith.
At y^e prayer of consecration Marginall notes, directing y^e
Action of y^e Priest.
_Baptisme._
A fourth demand added here & Wilt thou then obediently keepe
in private Baptisme Gods holy Will & Commandments,
& walke in y^e same all
y^e dayes of thy life? _Ans._ I
will.
In y^e prayer after y^e Sanctify this Water to y^e mysticall
demands after these words washing away of sin.
[y^e supplications of thy
Congregation] added
A marginall note added Here shall y^e Priest make a crosse
upon y^e childes forehead.
At y^e end of y^e Rubrick is It is certaine by Gods word that
added this Declaration persons w^{ch} are baptized, dying
before they committ actuall sin,
are undoubtedly saved.
An Office for baptizing such added.
as are of riper yeeres.
_Confirmation._
Then shall y^e Bishop say, Doe you
here in y^e presence of G^d & of
this Congregation &c. And
every one shall audibly answer,
I doe.
After y^e words of Y^e L^d be w^{th} you. _Ans._ And
Confirmation added w^{th} thy spirit.
Y^e Lords Prayer.
After y^e Collect Another prayer added.
_Visitation of y^e Sick._
for ever. _Ans._ Spare us good Lord.
Y^e 2d prayer enlarged.
A Commendatory Prayer.
A Prayer for a Sick Child.
A Prayer when there appears small
hope of recovery.
A Commendatory at y^e point of
death.
A Prayer for persons troubled in
minde.
_Buriall._
After they are come into y^e Church,
shall be read one or both these
Psalms, 30, 90.
Everlasting Glory through Jesus Christ our Lord.
At the End Y^e Grace of our L^d Jesus Christ
&c.
_Commination._
In y^e last prayer after in y^e merits & mediation of thy
[look upon us] blessed Son Jesus Christ our
L^d. Amen.
Then shall y^e Minister alone say,
Y^e Lord blesse us, & keepe us,
y^e L^d lift up y^e light of his
countenance upon us & give us
peace, now and for ever more.
Amen.
No. III.--Vol. I., p. 180.
Points in which the Prayer Book, according to _Cardwell’s Conferences_,
was modified in 1662, in compliance with the recommendation of the
Puritans.
This list of alterations has been given me by my kind friend, Dr.
Swainson.
Page 314. _Lord’s Prayer._ The Doxology was added at the beginning of
Morning and Evening Prayer, in the Post-Communion service, and in the
Churching of women.
Page 315. _Plain tune._ Altered.
„ 316. Collect for Christmas Day. _This day_ altered.
„ 316. „ „ Whit Sunday. „ „ altered.
„ 317. Very many of the Collects were altered.
„ 317. “Time assigned not sufficient.” Rubric altered.
„ 317. The next Rubric was altered too, though insufficiently.
Page 318. [The preface asked for was inserted in the written book which
we saw in the Library of the House of Lords, and then erased.[614]]
Page 319, line 10. Exhortation altered; the words are read now on the
Sunday before the administration, and not “at the Communion.”
Page 319, line 30. The confession is now appointed to be made “by one
of the Ministers,” not by one of the people.
Page 320, line 11, &c. The words “this day” altered, “as at this time.”
Page 320, line 17, &c. This is interesting. My note from the MS. book
is this. The words there ran, “that our sinful bodies and souls may be
made clean by his body, and washed through his most precious blood.”
This would have pleased the Puritan party. It was however altered
_back_.
Page 321, line 1. Thus it was in accordance with the wishes of the
same party that the marginal directions were added in the prayer of
Consecration.
Page 322, line 15. The Rubric was added with alterations, not however
affecting the point at issue.
Page 324, line 5. Expressions altered. (Query, sufficiently?)
„ 324, „ 18. “Doest thou forsake?” The words were altered, but not as
the Puritans desired.
Page 325, line 10. Unless by _a lawful_ minister. (Altered
accordingly.)
„ 325, „ 13. [No part is reiterated.]
„ 327, „ 1. Altered. Note the praise of that part of the catechism
which concerns the doctrine of the Sacraments.
Page 327, line 20. [Rubrick was altered, whether satisfactorily, I
question.]
Page 327, line 32. The words “are come to a competent age,” were added,
and another rubric limiting the children to be presented, to those whom
_the Curate shall think fit_.
Page 328, line 23. Altered slightly.
„ 329, „ 30. Altered.
„ 330, „ 31. _Depart._ Altered to “Do part.”
„ 331, „ 13. Omitted.
„ 331, „ 18. Altered.
„ 331, „ 30. Altered.
„ 333, „ 14. Altered. “Resurrection” into “the resurrection.”
„ 333, „ 22. Altered.
„ 334, „ 1–9. Altered.
„ 334, „ 11. The Psalm 121 altered.
_So much for details._
I will make a few more notes in the _same direction_:--
The prayer, “O God, whose nature and property,” altered as recommended
in 1641. (_Cardwell_, page 277, line 10.)
Thanksgiving added. (_Cardwell_, page 309, line 30.)
New Translation used in Gospels and Epistles. (_Cardwell_, page 307,
line 4, &c.)
“Portion of Scripture appointed for the Epistles.” (_Cardwell_, page
308, line 13.)
The first Rubric in the Burial Service, “Here it is to be noted, &c.,”
would clearly gratify the Puritans.
The position of the woman at churching was altered. (_Cardwell_, page
334.)
No. IV.--Vol. I. chap. x.
The following is a copy of the Act of Uniformity taken from the Rolls
by a clerk connected with the House of Lords. All the passages printed
within brackets, with a broader margin or underlined, are amendments
upon the Bill in its original form, and notified accordingly in the
original.
[Sidenote: 14 C. 2, Chap 4.]
_An Act for the Uniformity of Publique Prayers and
Administration of Sacraments other Rites Ceremonies and for
establishing the form of making ordaining and consecrating
Bishops Priests and Deacons in the Church of England._
[Sidenote: I. Recital of Act of Uniformity under Elizabeth.]
Whereas in the first yeare of the late Queene Elizabeth there was one
uniforme Order of Comon Service and Prayer and of the Administration
of Sacraments rites and Ceremonies in the Church of England (agreeable
to the word of God and usage of the primitive Church) compiled by the
Reverend Bishopps and Clergy set forth in one Booke entituled the Booke
of Comon prayer and Administration of Sacraments and other Rites and
Ceremonies in the Church of England and enjoyned to be used by Act
of Parliament holden in the said first yeare of the said late Queene
entituled An Act for the Uniformity of Comon prayer and Service in
the Church and Administration of the Sacraments very comfortable to
all good people desirous to live in Christian conversation and most
profitable to the Estate of this Realme upon the which the Mercy Favour
and Blessing of Almighty God is in no wise so readily and plentifully
poured as by Comon prayers due useing of the Sacraments and often
preaching of the Gospell with Devotion of the Hearers And yet this
notwithstanding a great number of people in divers parts of this Realm
following their own sensualitie and liveing without knowledge and due
feare of God do willfully and schismatically abstaine and refuse to
come to theire Parish Churches and other publique places where Comon
Prayer Administration of the Sacraments and preaching of the word of
God is used upon the Sundayes and other dayes ordained and appointed
to be kept and observed as Holy dayes. And whereas by the great and
scandalous neglect of Ministers in using the said order or Liturgy so
set forth and enjoined as aforesaid great mischeefs inconveniences
during the times of the late unhappy troubles have arisen and grown
and many people have been led into Factions and Schismes to the
great decay and scandall of the Reformed Religion of the Church of
England and to the hazard of many souls [Sidenote: Amendment.] [For
prevention whereof in time to come for setling the Peace of the Church
and for allaying the present distempers which the indisposition of
the time hath contracted. [Sidenote: The King’s declaration 25th
October 1660.] The King’s Majestie according to His Declaration of
the five and twentieth of October One thousand six hundred and sixty
granted His [Sidenote: Commission for Conference.] Comission under
the Great Seale of England to severall Bishopps and other Divines to
review the Booke of Comon prayer and to prepare such alterations and
additions as they thought fitt to offer. [Sidenote: Convocation.] And
afterwards the Convocations of both the provinces of Canterbury and
Yorke being by His Majesty called and assembled and now sitting His
Majestie hath beene pleased to authorize and require the presidents of
the said Convocations and other the Bishopps and Clergy of the same
to review the said Booke of Comon prayer and the booke of the forme
and manner of the making and consecrating of [Sidenote: V. Penalty
of refusing.] Bishops Preists and Deacons. And that after mature
consideration they should make such additions and alterations in the
said Bookes respectively as to them should seem meet and convenient
and should exhibit and present the same to His Majesty in writing for
his further allowance or confirmation since which time upon full and
mature deliberation they the said President Bishops and Clergy of both
provinces have accordingly reviewed the said Bookes and have made some
alterations which they thinke fitt to be inserted to the same and some
additionall prayers to the said booke of Comon prayer to be used upon
proper and emergent occasions. And have exhibited and presented the
same unto His Majestie in writing in one Booke entituled the Booke of
Comon Prayer and Administration of the Sacraments and other rites and
Ceremonies of the Church according to the use of the Church of England
togeather with the psalter or Psalmes of David pointed as they are
to be sung or said in Churches and (the) forme and manner of making
ordaining and consecrating of Bishopps Preists and Deacons All which
His Majesty haveing duly considered hath fully approved and allowed the
same and recomended to this present Parliament that the said bookes of
Comon prayer and of the forme of ordination and consecration of Bishops
priests and Deacons with the alterations and additions which have beene
soe made and psented to His Majesty by the said Convocations be the
Booke which shall be appointed to be used by all that officiate in all
Cathedrall and Collegiate Churches and Chappells and in all Chappells
of Colledges and Halls in both the Universities and the Colledges of
Eaton and Winchester and in all Parish Churches and Chappells within
the Kingdome of England Dominion of Wales and Toune of Berwick upon
Tweed and by all that make or consecrate Bishops Preists or Deacons in
any of the said places under such sanctions and penalties as the Houses
of parliament shall thinke fitt] [Sidenote: II. Religion advanced by
Uniform worship.] Now in regard that nothing conduceth more to the
setling of the Peace of this Nation (which is desired of all good
men) nor to the honour of our Religion and the propagation thereof
than an universall agreement in the publique worshipp of Almighty God
and to the intent that every person within this Realme may certainely
knowe the rule in which he is to comforme in publique worship and
administration of Sacraments [_and other rites and ceremonies of the
Church of England and the manner how and by whom Bishops Preists and
Deacons are and ought to be made ordained and consecrated_]. Be it
enacted by the Kings most Excellent Majestie by the advice and with
the consent of the Lords [_Spirituall and Temporall and of the_]
Comons in this present parliament assembled and by the authority of
the same That all and singular Ministers in any Cathedrall Collegiate
or Parish Church or Chappell or other place of publique worship within
this Realme of England Dominion of Wales and Toun of Berwick upon
Tweed shall be bound to say and use the morning prayer Evening prayer
Celebracon and administracon of both the Sacraments and all other the
publique and Comon prayer in such order and forme as is menconed in the
[_said_] booke annexed and joyned in this present Act and intituled
The Booke of Comon prayer and administration of the Sacraments and
other rites and Ceremonies of the Church [_according to the use of the
Church_] of England [_togeather with the psalter or Psalmes of David
pointed as they are to be sung or said in Churches and (the) forme
or manner of making ordaining and consecrating of Bishops Preists &
Deacons_] And that the Morning and Evening prayers therein contained
shall upon every Lords day and upon all other [_dayes and_] occasions
and att the times therein appointed be openly and solemnly read by all
and every minister or Curate in every Church Chappell or other place of
publique worshipp within this Realme of England and places aforesaid
[Sidenote: III. All ministers to declare assent to Book of Common
Prayer.] And to the end that uniformity in the publique worshipp of
God (which is so much desired) may be speedily effected bee it farther
Enacted by the authority aforesaid That every parson vicar or other
Minister whatsoever who now hath and enjoyeth any Ecclesiasticall
Benefice or promotion within this Realme of England or places aforesaid
shall in the Church Chappell or place of publique worshipp belonging
to his said benefice or promotion upon some Lords day before the Feast
of Saint Bartholomew which shall be in the yeare of our Lord God One
thousand six hundred sixty and two openly publiquely and solemnly read
the morning and Evening prayer appointed to be read by and according
to the said Booke of Comon prayer att the times thereby appointed and
after such reading thereof shall openly and publiquely before the
congregation there assembled declare his unfeigned assent & consent
to the use of all things in the said booke contained and prescribed
[Sidenote: Amendment.] [in these words and no other. I, A. B doe
declare my unfaigned assent [Sidenote: IV. Form of Declaration.] and
consent to all and everything contained and prescribed in and by the
booke intituled The booke of Comon Prayer and Administration of the
Sacraments and other rites and ceremonies of the Church according to
the use of the Church of England togeather with the psalter or psalmes
of David poynted as they are to be sung or said in Churches and the
form or manner of making ordaining and consecrating of [Sidenote:
V. Penalty of refusing.] Bishops Preists and Deacons] And that all
and every such person who shall (without some lawfull impediment to
be allowed and approved of by the Ordinary of the place) neglect or
refuse to doe the same within the time aforesaid (or in case of such
impediment) within one moneth after such impediment removed shall
(ipso facto) be deprived of all his spirituall promotions And that
from thenceforth it shall be lawfull to and for all patrons and donors
of all and singuler the said Spiritual promotions or of any of them
according to theire respective rights and titles to present or collate
to the same as though the person or persons so offending or neglecting
were dead. [Sidenote: VI. Declaration to be made in all cases of
promotion.] And bee it further Enacted by the authority aforesaid that
every person whoe shall hereafter be presented or collated or put
into any Ecclesiastical Benefice or promotion within this Realme of
England and places aforesaid shall in the Church Chappell or place of
publiq worshipp belonging to his said benefice or promotion within two
moneths next after that he shall be in the actuall possession of the
said Ecclesiastical benefice or promotion upon some Lords day openly
publiquely and solemnly read the morning and Evening prayers appointed
to be read by and according to the said booke of Comon prayer att the
times thereby appointed and after such reading thereof shall openly
and publiquely before the Congregation there assembled declare his
unfeigned assent and consent to the use of all things therein contained
and prescribed [_according to the forme before appointed_] And that
all and every such person who shall (without some lawful impediment
to be allowed and approved by the ordinary of the place) neglect or
refuse to doe the same within the time aforesaid (or in case of such
impediment within one moneth after such impediment removed) shall
[ipso facto] be deprived of all his said Ecclesiasticall Benefices and
promotions And that from thenceforth it shall and may be lawfull to and
for all patrons and Donors of all and singuler the said Ecclesiastical
Benefices and promotions or any of them (according to theire respective
rights and titles) to present or collate to the same as though the
person or persons so offending or neglecting were dead [Sidenote: VII.
Amendment Incumbents to read the Common Prayer once a month.] [And
be it further Enacted by the authority aforesaid that in all places
where the proper Incumbent of any parsonage or vicaridge or Benefice
with Cure doth reside on his living and keepe a Curate the Incumbent
himselfe in person (not haveing some lawful impediment to be allowed
by the Ordinary of the place) shall once (at the least) in every
moneth openly and publiquely read the Comon prayers and service in
and by the said Booke prescribed and (if there be occasion) administer
each of the sacraments and other rites of the Church in the parish
Church or Chappell of or belonging to the same parsonage vicarage or
benefice in such order manner and forme as in and by the said booke is
appointed upon pain to forfeit the sum of five pounds to the use of the
poore of the Parish for every offence upon conviction by confession
or proofe of two credible witnesses upon Oath before two Justices of
the peace of the County City or Toun Corporate where the offence shall
be comitted (which Oath the said Justices are hereby impowered to
administer) and in default of payment within ten dayes to be levied
by distresse and sale of the goods and chattells of the offender by
the warrant of the said Justices by the Church Wardens or Overseers
of the poore of the said Parish rendring the surplusage to the party
[Sidenote: VIII. Deans and Canons, &c., shall subscribe declaration
following.]And be it further Enacted by the authority aforesaid that
every Deane Canon and prebendary of every Cathedrall or Collegiate
Church and all Masters and other Heads Fellowes Chaplaines and Tutors
of or in any Colledge Hall House of Learning or Hospitall and every
publique professor and Reader in either of the Universities and in
every Colledge elsewhere and every parson viccar curate lecturer and
every other person in Holy Orders and every Schoolmaster keeping any
publique or private Schools and every person instructing or teaching
any youth in any House or private family as a Tutor or Schoolmaster
who upon the first day of May which shall be in the yeare of our Lord
God One thousand six hundred sixty two or at any time thereafter
shall be Incumbent or have possession of any Deanry Canonry Prebend
Mastershipp Headshipp Fellowshipp Professors place or Readers place
Parsonage vicarage or any other Ecclesiasticall Dignity or promotion
or of any Curates place Lecture or School or shall instruct or teach
any youth as Tutor or Schoolmaster shall before the Feast day of St.
Bartholomew which shall be in the yeare of our Lord One thousand six
hundred sixty two or at or before his or theire respective admission to
the Incumbent or have possession aforesaid subscribe the Declaration
or acknowledgement following scilicet.--I, A, B, do declare that it
is not lawfull upon any pretence whatsoever to take Armes against the
King and that I do abhorr that traiterous position of taking [Sidenote:
IX. The declaration of non-resistance and repudiating the Covenant.]
Armes by his Authority against his person or against those that are
commissionated by him And that I will conforme to the Liturgy of the
Church of England as it is now by Law established And I do declare
that I do hold there lies no obligacon upon me or on any other person
from the Oath comonly called the Solemne League and Covenant [_to
endeavour any change or alteration of Government either in Church or
State_] [Sidenote: X. Penalty for not subscribing.] And that the same
was in itselfe an unlawfull Oath and imposed upon the subjects of this
Realme against the knowne lawes and liberties of this Kingdome.--Which
said Declaration and acknowledgment shall be subscribed by every of the
said Masters and other Heads fellowes Chaplaines and Tutors of or in
any Colledge Hall or House of Learning and by every publique professor
and Reader in either of the Universities before the Vice-Chancellor
of the respective Universities for the time being, or his Deputy And
the said Declaration or acknowledgment shall he subscribed before the
respective Archbishopp Bishopp or Ordinary of the Diocesse by every
other person hereby enjoyned to subscribe the same upon pain that all
and every of the persons aforesaid failing in such subscription shall
loose and forfeit such respective Deanery Canonry Prebend Mastershipp
headshipp fellowshipp Professors place Readers place parsonage
viccarage Ecclesiasticall Dignity or promotion Curates place Lecture
and School and shall be utterly disabled and (ipso facto) deprived
of the same And that every such respective Deanry Canonry Prebend
Mastership headship fellowship Professors place Readers place parsonage
viccarage Ecclesiasticall Dignity or promotion Curates place lecture
and schools shall be void as if such person so failing were naturally
dead.--[Sidenote: XI. Schoolmasters in private houses included.] And if
any Schoolmaster or other person instructing or teaching youth in any
private House or family as a Tutor or Schoolmaster shall instruct or
teach any youth as a Tutor or Schoolmaster before licence obtained from
his respective Archbishop Bishop or Ordinary of the Diocesse according
to the Lawes and Statutes of this Realme (for which he shall pay twelve
pence onely) and before such subscription and acknowledgement made
as aforesaid then every such Schoolmaster and other instructing and
teaching as aforesaid shall for the first offence suffer three moneth
imprisonment without baile or mainprize and for every second and other
such offence shall suffer three months imprisonment without baile or
mainprize and alsoe forfeit to his Majesty the sume of five pounds
And after such subscription made every such Parson Viccar Curate and
Lecturer shall procure a Certificate under the hand and seal of the
respective Archbishop Bishop or Ordinary of the Diocese (whoe are
hereby enjoyned and required upon demaund to make and deliver the
same) and shall publickly and openly read the same togeather with the
declaration or acknowledgement aforesaid upon some Lords day within
three moneths then next following in his Parish Church where he is to
officiate in the presence of the Congregation there assembled in the
time of Divine Service upon pain that every person failing therein
shall loose such Parsonage Viccarage or Benefice Curates place or
Lecturers place respectively and shall be utterly disabled (ipso
facto) deprived of the same And that the said Parsonage Viccarage or
Benefice Curates place or Lecturers place shall be void as if he was
naturally dead Provided alwaies that from and [Sidenote: XII. Omissions
in declaration after 25 March, 1682.] after the twenty fifth day of
March which shall be in the yeare of our Lord God one thousand six
hundred eighty two there shall be omitted in the said Declaration or
Acknowledg^{t.} so to be subscribed and read these words following
scilicet.--And I do declare that I do hold there lies no obligacon
on me or any other person from the Oath comonly called the Solemne
League and Covenant to endeavour any change or alteration of Government
either in Church or State and that the same was in itselfe an unlawfull
Oath and imposed upon the Subjects of this Realme against the knowne
lawes and liberties of this Kingdome So as none of the persons
aforesaid shall from thence forth be at all obliged to subscribe or
read that part of the said declaration or acknowledgement [Sidenote:
XIII. Persons not episcopally ordained incapable of ecclesiastical
preferment.] Provided alwaies and be it Enacted that from and after
the feast of St. Bartholomew which shall be in the yeare of our Lord
One thousand six hundred sixty and two no person who now is Incumbent
and in possession of any Parsonage Vicarage or Benefice and who is
not already in Holy Orders by Episcopall Ordination or shall not
before the said feast day of St. Bartholomew be ordained Preist or
Deacon according to the forme of Episcopall Ordination shall have
hold or enjoye the said Parsonage Vicarage Benefice with Cure or
other Ecclesiasticall Promotion within this Kingdome of England or
the Dominion of Wales [_or town of Berwick upon Tweed_] but shall be
utterly disabled and (ipso facto) deprived of the same And all his
Ecclesiastical promotions shall be void as if he was naturally dead.
And be it further Enacted by the authority aforesaid that no person
whatsoever shall thenceforth [Sidenote: XIV. And of administering
sacraments.] (_be capable to bee admitted to any parsonage vicarage
benefice or other Ecclesiastical Promotion or Dignity whatsoever
nor shall_) presume to consecrate and administer the Holy Sacrament
of the Lords Supper before such time as he shall be ordained Preist
according to the forme and manner in and by the said booke prescribed
unlesse he have formerly beene made Preist by Episcopall Ordination
upon pain to forfeit for every offence the sum of one hundred pounds
one moyety thereof to the Kings Majesty the other moyety thereof to
be equally divided betweene the poore of the parish where the offence
shall be comitted and such person or persons as shall sue for the same
by Action of debt bill plaint or information in any of His Majesties
Courts of Record wherein no essoine protection or wager of law shall
be allowed and to be disabled from taking or being admitted into the
order of Preist by the space of one whole yeare then next following
[Sidenote: XV. Exception on behalf of foreigners.] Provided that the
penalties in this Act shall not extend to the forreiners or aliens of
the forrein Reformed Churches allowed or to be allowed by the Kings
Majestie his heires and successors in England [Sidenote: XVI. Cases of
voidance or deprivation.] Provided alwaies that no title to conferre
or present by lapse shall accrewe by any avoydance or deprivation
(ipso facto) by vertue of this Statute but after six moneths after
notice of such voidance or deprivation given by the Ordinary to the
patron or such sentence of deprivation openly and publiquely read in
the Parish Church of the Benefice Parsonage or Vicarage becomeing void
or whereof the Incumbent shall be deprived by vertue of this Act.
[Sidenote: XVII. No other form of prayer to be publicly used.] And be
it further Enacted by the authority aforesaid that no form or order of
Comon prayers administracon of Sacraments rites or Ceremonies shall
be openly used in any Church Chappell or other publique place of or
in any Colledge or Hall in either of the Universities the Colledges
of Westminster Winchester or Eaton or any of them other than what is
pscribed and appointed to be used in and by the said booke And that
the present Governour or Head of every Colledge or Hall in the said
Universities and of the said Colledges of Westminster Winchester and
Eaton within one moneth after the feast of S^{t.} Bartholomew which
shall be in the yeare of our Lord One thousand six hundred sixty and
two And every Governour or Head of any of the said Colledges or Halls
hereafter to be elected or appointed within one moneth next after
his Election or Collation and admission into the same Government or
Headship shall openly and publiquely in the Church Chappell or other
publique place of the same College or Hall and in the psence of the
fellowes and Sckolars of the same or the greater part of them then
resident subscribe [Sidenote: Subscription to Articles.] unto the nine
and thirty Articles of Religion mentioned in the Statute made in the
thirteenth yeare of the Reigne of the late Queene Elizabeth And unto
the said booke and declare his unfeigned assent and consent unto and
approbation of the said Articles and of the same booke and to the use
of all the prayers rites and ceremonies formes and orders in the said
Booke prescribed and contained according to the form aforesaid And
that all such Governours or Heads of the said Colledges and Halls or
any of them as are or shall be in Holy Orders shall once (at least) in
every quarter of the yeare (not having a lawfull impediment) openly and
publiquely read the Morning prayer and service in and by the said booke
appointed to be read in the Church Chappell or other publique place of
the same Colledge or Hall upon pain to loose and be suspended of and
from all (the) benefitts and profitts belonging to the same Government
or headshipp by the space of six moneths by the Visitor or visitors of
the same Colledge or hall And if any Governour or head of any Colledge
or Hall suspended for not subscribing unto the said Articles and booke
or for not reading of the Morning prayer and service as aforesaid shall
not att or before the end of six moneths next after such suspension
subscribe unto the said Articles and booke and declare his consent
thereunto as aforesaid or read the Morning prayer and service as
aforesaid then such Government or headshipp shall be (ipso facto) void.
[Sidenote: XVIII. Who may use the service in Latin.] Provided alwaies
that it shall and may be lawful to use the Morning and Evening prayer
and all other prayers and service prescribed in and by the said booke
in the Chappells or other publique places of the respective Colledges
and Halls in both the Universities in the Colledges of Westminster
Winchester and Eaton and in the Convocations of the Clergies of either
province in Latine any thing in this Act contained to the contrary
notwithstanding.]
[Sidenote: XIX. Amendment Lecturers.]
And be it further Enacted by the authority aforesaid [that no person
shall be or be received as a Lecturer or permitted suffered or allowed
to preach as a Lecturer or to preach or read any Sermon or Lecture
in any Church Chappell or other place of publique worshipp within
this Realme of England or the Dominion of Wales and Towne of Berwick
upon Tweed unless he be first approved and thereunto licensed by the
Archbishopp of the province or Bishopp of the Diocesse or (in case the
See be void) by the Guardian of the Spiritualities under his Seale and
shall in the psence of the same Archbishop or Bishop or Guardian read
the nine and thirty Articles of Religion mentioned in the Statute of
the thirteenth yeare of the late Queene Elizabeth with declaration of
his unfeigned assent to the same And] that every person and persons
whoe nowe is or hereafter shall bee (_licensed_) assigned (or)
appointed or received as a Lecturer to preach upon any day of the weeke
in any Church Chappell or place of publique worship within this Realme
of England or places aforesaid the first time he preacheth (before his
Sermon) shall openly publiquely and solemnly read the Comon prayers
and service in and by the said booke appointed to be read for that
time of the day and then and there publiquely and openly declare his
assent unto and approbation of the said booke and to the use of all
the prayers rites and ceremonies formes and orders therein contained
and prescribed according to the forme before appointed in this Act
[Sidenote: Amendment.] And alsoe shall upon the first lecture day [of
every moneth afterwards so long as he continues lecturer or preacher
there at the place appointed for his said lecture or sermon before his
said Lecture or Sermon openly publiquely and solemnly read the Common
prayers and service in and by the said booke appointed to be read for
that time of the day at which the said lecture or sermon is to be
preached and after such reading thereof shall openly and publiquely
before the Congregation there assembled declare his unfeigned assent
and consent unto and approbation of the said booke and to the use of
all the prayers rites and ceremonies forms and orders therein contained
and prescribed according to the forme aforesaid] and that all and every
such person and persons who shall neglect or refuse to do the same
shall from thenceforth be disabled to preach the said or any other
lecture or sermon in the said or any other Church Chappell or place
of publique worshipp untill such time as he (_and they_) shall openly
publiquely and solemnly read the (_Common_) prayers (_and service
appointed_) by the said booke and conform in all points to the things
therein appointed and prescribed (_according to the purport true intent
and meaning of this Act_) [Sidenote: XX. Amendment. In Cathedral or
Collegiate Churches.][Provided alwaies that if the said Sermon or
Lecture be to be preached or read in any Cathedrall or Collegiate
Church or Chappell it shall be sufficient for the said Lecturer openly
at the time aforesaid to declare his assent and consent to all things
contained in the said booke according to the form aforesaid] [Sidenote:
XXI. Penalty for preaching by persons disabled.] And be it further
Enacted by the authority aforesaid That if any person who is by this
Act disabled to preach any Lecture or Sermon shall during the time
that he shall continue and remaine so disabled preach any Sermon or
Lecture that then for every such offence the person and persons so
offending shall suffer three monthes imprisonment in the Comon Goal
without baile or mainprize and that any two Justices of the Peace
of any County of this Kingdome and places aforesaid and the Maior
or other Cheife Magistrate of any City or Town Corporate within the
same upon Certificate from the Ordinary of the place made to him or
them of the offence committed (_shall and are hereby required_) to
committ the person or persons so offending to the Gaol of the same
County City or Town Corporate accordingly [Provided alwaies and be it
further [Sidenote: XXII. Amendment. Common Prayer to be read before
every lecture.] Enacted by the authority aforesaid that at all and
every time and times when any Sermon or Lecture is to be preached the
Comon Prayers and Service in and by the said Booke appointed to be
read for that time of the day shall be openly publiquely and solemnely
read by some Preist or Deacon in the Church Chappell or place of
publique Worship where the said Sermon or Lecture is to be preached
before such Sermon or Lecture be preached and that the Lecturer then
to preach shall be present at the reading thereof [Sidenote: XXIII.
Proviso touching Universities.] Provided neverthelesse that this Act
shall not extend to the University-Churches in the Universities of
this Realme or either of them when or at such times as any Sermon or
Lecture is preached or read in the same Churches or any of them for
or as the publique University-Sermon or Lecture but that the same
Sermons and Lectures may be preached or read in such sort and manner
as the same have been heretofore preached or read this Act or anything
herein conteyned to the contrary thereof in any wise notwithstanding.]
[Sidenote: XXIV. Former laws for uniformity confirmed.] And bee it
further Enacted by the authority aforesaid That the severall good Lawes
and Statutes of this Realme which have been formerly made and are
now in force for the uniformity of Prayer and administration of the
Sacraments within this Realme of England and places aforesaid shall
stand in full force and strength to all intents and purposes whatsoever
for the establishing and confirming of the [_said booke entitled the_]
booke of Comon Prayer and administration of the Sacraments [_and
other rites and ceremonies of the Church according to y^e use of
y^e Church of England together with the Psalter or Psalmes of David
pointed as they are to be sung or said in Churches and the forme or
manner of making ordeyning and consecrating of Bishops Preists and
Deacons_] herein before menconed to bee joyned and annexed to this
Act And shall be applyed practised and put in use for the punishing
of all offences contrary to the said Lawes with relation to the Booke
aforesaid and no other Provided alwayes [Sidenote: XXV. Prayers for the
King, &c.]And bee it further Enacted by the authority aforesaid That
in all those Prayers Letanyes and Collects which doe any way relate
to the King Queene or Royal Progeny the names be altered and changed
from time to time and fitted to the present occasion according to the
direccon of lawfull authority. [Sidenote: XXVI. Copies of Prayer Book
to be provided in all parishes &c.] Provided also and be it Enacted
by the authority aforesaid that a true printed Copy of the said
Booke entituled the Booke of Comon Prayer and Administration of the
Sacraments and other rites and ceremonyes of the Church according to
the use of the Church of England togeather with the Psalter or Psalmes
of David pointed as they are to be sung or said in Churches and the
forme [_and manner_] of making ordeyning and consecrating of Bishops
Preists and Deacons shall at the costs and charges of the parishioners
of every parish church and chappelry cathedrall church colledge and
hall be attained and gotten before the Feast day of Saint Bartholomew
in the yeare of our Lord one thousand Sixe hundred sixty and two upon
paine of forfeiture of three pounds by the moneth for so long time
as they shall thenafter be unprovided thereof by every Parish or
Chappelry Cathedrall Church Colledge and Hall making default therein.
[Sidenote: XXVII. Translation of Common Prayer into Welsh.] Provided
alwayes and bee it Enacted by the authority aforesaid That the Bishops
of Hereford St. David’s Asaph Bangor and Landaph and their successors
shall take such order among themselves for the soules health of the
flocks comitted to their charge within Wales That the Booke hereunto
annexed be truly and exactly translated [_into the British or Welsh
Tongue and that the same so translated_] and being by them or any
three of them at the least viewed perused and allowed bee imprinted
to such number at least so that one of the said Books so translated
and imprinted may be had for every Cathedrall Collegiate and Parish
Church and Chappell of Ease in the said respective Diocesses and
places in Wales where the Welsh is comonly spoken or used before the
first day of May one thousand six hundred sixty five And that from and
after the imprinting and publishing of the said Booke so translated
the whole Divine Service shall be used and said by the Ministers and
Curates throughout all Wales within the said Diocesses where the Welsh
Tongue is comonly used in the Brittish or Welsh Tongue in such manner
and forme as is prescribed according to the Booke hereunto annexed
to be used in the English Tongue differing nothing in any order or
forme from the said English Booke For which Booke so translated and
imprinted the Churchwardens of every of the said Parishes shall pay
out of the parish money in their hands for the use of the respective
Churches and be allowed the same on their account And that the said
Bishops and their successors or any three of them at the least shall
sett and appoynt the price for which the said Booke shall be sold And
one other Booke of Comon Prayer in the English tongue shall be bought
and had in every Church throughout Wales in which the Booke of Comon
Prayer in which is to bee had by force of this Act before the first
day of May one thousand six hundred sixty and fower and the same Booke
to remaine in such convenient places within the said Churches that
such as understand them may resort at all convenient tymes to read
and peruse the same. And alsoe such as doe not understand the sayd
language may by conferring both tongues together the sooner attaine
to the knowledge of the English Tongue Any thing in this Act to the
contrary notwithstanding And untill printed Copies of the said booke
soe to bee translated may bee had and provided The forme of Comon
Prayer established by Parlyament before the making of this Act shall
be used as formerly in such parts of Wales where the English Tongue is
not comonly understood [Sidenote: XXVIII. “Sealed books” to be obtained
and kept.] And to the end that the true and perfect copies of this Act
and the said booke hereunto annexed may be safely kept and perpetually
preserved and for the avoyding of all disputes for the tyme to come Bee
it therefore Enacted by the authority aforesaid that the respective
Deanes and Chapters of every Cathedrall or Collegiate Church within
England and Wales shall at their proper costs and charges before the
Twentie fifth day of December one thousand six hundred sixty and two
obtaine under the Greate Seale of England a true and perfect printed
Copie of this Act and of the said booke annexed hereunto to bee by
the said Deanes and Chapters and their successors kept and preserved
in safety for ever and to bee allso produced and shewed forth in any
Court of Record as often as they shall bee thereunto lawfully required
and also there shall bee delivered true and perfect Copies of this Act
and of the same booke into the respective Courts at Westminster and
into the Tower of London to be kept and preserved for ever among the
Records of the said Courts and the Records of the Tower to be alsoe
produced and shewed forth in any Court as neede shall require which
sayd books soe to be exemplyfied under the Great Seale of England shall
be examined by such persons as the King’s Majestie shall appoint under
the Great Seale of England for that purpose and shall bee compared
with the originall booke hereunto annexed and shall have power to
correct and amend in writing any error comitted by the Printer in
the printing of the same booke or of any thing therein conteyned and
shall certifie in writing under their hands and seales or the hands
and seales of any three of them at the end of the same booke that
they have examined and compared the same booke and finde it to bee
a true and perfect copie which said bookes and every one of them so
exemplyfied under the Greate Seale of England as aforesaid shall be
deemed taken adjudged and expounded to bee good and available in the
law to all intents and purposes whatsoever and shall be accounted as
good Records as this booke it selfe hereunto annexed any law or custome
to the contrary in any wise notwithstanding [Sidenote: XXIX. Proviso
for King’s Professor of Law at Oxford.]Provided also that this Act or
any thing therein conteyned shall not be prejudiciall or hurtfull unto
the King’s Professor of the Law within the University of Oxford for or
concerning the Prebend of Shipton within the Cathedrall Church of Sarum
united and annexed unto the place of the same King’s Professor for the
time being by the late King James of blessed memory Provided alwaies
that whereas the sixe and thirtieth Article of the [Sidenote: XXX.
Proviso concerning Art. 36.] nine and thirty Articles agreed upon by
the Archbishops and Bishops of both Provinces and the whole Cleargy in
the Convocation holden at London in the yeare of our Lord One thousand
five hundred sixty two for the avoyding of diversities of opinions
and for establishing of consent touching true Religion is in these
words following (vizt.) “That the Book of Consecration of Archbishops
and Bishops and ordeyning of Preistes and Deacons lately set forth
in the time of King Edward the Sixth and confirmed at the same time
by Authority of Parliament doth conteyne althings necessary to such
Consecration and ordeyning Neither hath it any thing that of it selfe
is superstitious and ungodly: And therefore whosoever are consecrated
or Ordered according to the Rites of that Booke since the second yeare
of the aforenamed King Edward unto this time or hereafter shall be
consecrated or ordered according to the same rites. Wee decree all such
to be rightly orderly and lawfully consecrated and ordered.” [Sidenote:
XXXI. Subscription to extend to form of Consecrating Bishops, &c.] It
be Enacted And Be it therefore Enacted by the authority aforesaid That
all subscriptions hereafter to be had or made unto the said Articles by
any Deacon Preist or Ecclesiasticall person or other person whatsoever
who by this Act or any other Law now in force is required to subscribe
unto the said Articles shall be construed and taken to extend and
shalbe applyed (for and touching the s^d sixe and thirtieth Article)
unto the Booke conteyning the forme and manner of making ordeyning
and consecrating of Bishops Preists and Deacons in this Act mentioned
in such sort and manner as the same did heretofore extend unto the
Booke set forth in the time of King Edward the Sixth mentioned in the
said six and thirtieth Article anything in the s^d Article or in any
Statute Act or Canon heretofore had or made to the contrary thereof
in any wise notwithstanding [Sidenote: XXXII. Form to be used till
Bartholomew’s Day, 1662.] Provided also that the Booke of Comon Prayer
and Administration of the Sacraments and other rites and ceremonyes of
this Church of England together with the forme and manner of ordeyning
and consecrating Bishops Preists and Deacons heretofore in use and
respectively established by Act of Parliament in the first and eighth
years of Queen Elizabeth shalbe still used and observed in the Church
of England untill the Feast of Saint Bartholomew which shall be in the
yeare of our Lord God one thousand six hundred sixty and two.
No. V.--Vol. I., p. 261.
Letters patent on parchment are attached to the sealed books. A copy of
the letter is given in Stephens’ edition of the Prayer Book, published
by the Ecclesiastical History Society.
After reciting the Act of Uniformity, it is said, “And whereas the
printed copy of the Act of Parliament, and Book aforesaid hereunto
annexed, hath been duly examined by the persons, whose names are
thereunto subscribed, in pursuance of our Commission to them and others
in that behalf directed. Now know ye, that, we according to the form
and effect of the said Act of Parliament, and in accomplishment of
the intent thereof, in this behalf, have inspected the said examined
copy of the Act of Parliament and Book aforesaid, and have caused the
same to be hereunto annexed, and to be exemplified under the Great
Seal of England. In witness, &c.,----; signed Barker.” No copy of the
Commission is supplied, nor the names of the Commissioners.
In the sealed books alterations are made by the pen of the
Commissioners to bring them into accordance with the copy of the book
attached to the Act. Most of these are quite unimportant. For example:--
1. _In the titles of the services_, “_The_” is prefixed to the word
collect.
2. _In the headings of the pages_, “_Trinity Sunday XXIII_” is altered
into “_The XXIII Sunday after Trinity_.”
“_Whitsun Munday_” into “_Munday in Whitsun Week_.”
It is important to notice, that the title “_The Creed of St.
Athanasius_” was printed originally, in the sealed books, on the top
of the page over the creed; it was then struck out by the Commissioners.
3. _In the text of prayers_:
In the sentences at beginning of morning prayer, it was printed, “Hide
thy face from my sins, and blot out _all_ my iniquities:” “_all_” was
struck out. “Forgiveness” was altered into “Forgivene_sses_.”
In the clause of the Lord’s Prayer “Thine is the kingdom _and_ the
power and the glory,” the first “_and_” is cancelled.
In the Absolution, “Wherefore _let us beseech Him_,” is changed into
“Wherefore _beseech we Him_.”
In the sealed book at Chichester, Dr. Swainson pointed out to me in
Psalm xc. verse 8, as used in the Burial Service, _light_ corrected
into _sight_; and in verse 12 _so_ into _O_. Some of our modern Prayer
Books retain the _O_, but have given up the _sight_.
4. _In the Rubric_, at the end of the Communion Service, the words,
“_for the whole state of Christ’s Church militant here on earth_,” are
inserted, by the Commissioners, in some sealed books, after an erasure
of the original printed words.
Many of the alterations cannot be corrections of the printer’s errata.
They evidently indicate changes of words made in the original copy
after the printing of the books which were used as sealed copies.
In the Appendix to the first Report of the Royal Commission on Ritual
will be found remarks upon the sealed copy at Ely.
It is strange that the printers of Prayer Books do not bring them into
correspondence with the sealed books, which alone contain the legally
correct formularies of the Church.
No. VI.--Vol. I., p. 282.
The number of the ejected is a vexed question. We possess at present
unsatisfactory data; and I fear that we shall never obtain such a
knowledge of facts as will enable us to reach a precise conclusion.
The Ecclesiastical Registers of the country might seem to afford great
hope of being sufficient to decide the controversy; but, to say nothing
of the labour of searching them, unfortunately when the work has been
begun, in some cases, from the imperfection of the records, it has
yielded little or no fruit.
Some years ago I attempted searching the records of the See of London,
in St. Paul’s Cathedral; but from the state of the records at that time
the attempt proved unsuccessful.
The friendly kindness of the Dean of Chichester, and Canon Swainson,
afforded me every facility for examining the Archives in the
Cathedral. The latter assisted me in examining the Registers; to our
disappointment they were found defective for 1662. But as this Work
was passing through the press, Canon Swainson communicated to me some
valuable information, which will be subjoined to this note. At present
our conclusions must rest upon the lists of names which have been
published by Calamy and Palmer; and upon such general statements as are
furnished by writers who were living at the time when the ejectment
took place.
Calamy, in his second volume, undertakes to give an “Account of the
ministers who were ejected or _silenced_ after the Restoration
of King Charles II.” In his second, and two following volumes, he
includes ministers, lecturers, masters and fellows of colleges,
and schoolmasters. Palmer, in his _Nonconformist Memorial_,
describes those whom he registers as “Ejected or _silenced_
after the Restoration, particularly by the Act of Uniformity.” These
important distinctions are often overlooked; and it is imagined that
all the names collected together, are the names of clergymen who were
removed from their livings on Bartholomew’s Day. Such an imagination
is contradicted by facts. In agreement with the indication given on
the title pages of our two principal authorities, we discover in
these biographical sketches a number of incumbents who were displaced
before the Uniformity Act was passed, most of them in consequence of
Episcopalian clergymen having returned to claim their sequestered
livings. Cases of this kind appear in the present History. Those
ministers who thus lost their benefices clearly ought to be arranged in
a class by themselves. Having set them aside, there remain others who,
according to all accounts, did not forfeit their emoluments through
the operation of the new Act. They consisted of such clergymen as,
through Episcopal connivance, or from some other cause, continued to
hold their benefices; they were comparatively few in number, and the
benefices of most were of inconsiderable value. We are then to add
another class, described as simple candidates for the ministry, who
therefore possessed no livings from which they could be driven. Also we
must separate the cases of persons who, though mentioned amongst the
ejected, did not quit the Church until after St. Bartholomew’s Day;
some of whom were not ministers in the Establishment at that time. The
exceptional cases of the last three kinds, such as were connived at,
such as were only candidates, and such as did not quit the Church until
afterwards, so far as I can see, are altogether below fifty. I may have
overlooked some.
What would be the total number of the persons who, although included
in the general list of sufferers, did not surrender their incumbencies
on St. Bartholomew’s Day, I am at a loss to determine. The information
given in many cases is so incomplete, that it does not show when and
how the persons mentioned were removed. In more than five hundred
instances bare names occur, and in many more so little is added as to
be next to nothing. Most of the persons named were probably in some way
or other losers for conscience’ sake; but I am not aware of any means
by which all those among them who left the Establishment before the
24th of August of 1662, can be separated from those who were ejected on
that day.
If we refer to general statements, we find Baxter saying, in his
_Petition for Peace_ presented to the Bishops with the proposed
reformation of the Liturgy, at the Savoy Conference, “_Some_
hundreds of able, holy, faithful ministers, are of late cast
out.”[615] He also speaks in the _Rejoinder_ of “_several_
hundreds.”[616] These statements were made in 1661, more than a year
before the Uniformity Act came into operation. Taking the indefinite
_several_ hundreds at the lowest reasonable computation, and
remembering, that during the intermediate year more Nonconformists
would be “cast out,” we can scarcely reckon the ejected, before St.
Bartholomew’s Day, 1662, at less than six hundred. Hook’s letter
written in the month of March, 1663, alludes to the number of the
ejected on St. Bartholomew’s Day as 1,600, and says “as many had been
removed before.” This, no doubt, is an exaggeration; but it would seem
to suggest, at least, that the number previously removed bore a large
proportion to the number ultimately ejected. To the six hundred, or
so, ejected before the Uniformity Act came into effect, let there be
added two or three hundred more,--which would be a very large allowance
for such exceptional cases as I have indicated, and for the great
uncertainty respecting the five hundred bare names in the lists of
“the ejected and _silenced_,”--and we thus reach a total of some
eight or nine hundred, who may be admitted to have suffered more or
less in consequence of the Restoration, but who must not be considered
as undergoing ejectment on Bartholomew’s Day. The last and the longest
list of sufferers, before and upon the 24th of August, 1662, put all
together, is that furnished by Palmer, amounting to 2,231,--a list
evidently prepared with much care. He mentions a MS. “Index eorum
Theologorum Aliorumque No. 2,257, qui propter Legem Uniformitatis, Aug.
24, A. D. 1662, ab Ecclesia Anglicana secesserunt.” Calamy’s
entire list reckons 2,190. Making the largest allowable deduction for
those deprived before Bartholomew’s Day--that of nine hundred as just
suggested--then the number of those who were deprived on that day would
amount to about 1,200. I do not see how more than that number could
have been then displaced. I am induced to believe there were scarcely
so many.
But whilst the distinctions and abatements which I have just made are
demanded with a view to some accurate conclusion, it is to be borne
in mind that the whole body of Nonconformist ministers, including
the ejected, the candidates for the ministry, and all who had been
accustomed in any way to preach the Gospel, were _silenced_ by
the Act. They could no longer any of them preach in a place of public
worship. Therefore if we include the silenced, I should think that
Baxter is rather under than above the mark in saying, “When Bartholomew
Day came, about one thousand eight hundred, or two thousand ministers
were silenced and cast out.”--_Life and Times_, ii. 385. After
all, no bare statistics, no enumeration of figures, can ever represent
the amount of trial, sorrow, and loss inflicted upon conscientious men
at that lamentable era in our ecclesiastical history.
Palmer, following Calamy, gives a large number of names of clergymen
who “afterwards conformed.” It may be inferred that amongst these were
not a few who passed through considerable conflict of mind before they
did so.
What was the exact number of the clergy just after the Act of
Uniformity I cannot ascertain. Chamberlayne says, in his _Present
State of England_, ed. 1692, that there were 9,700 rectors and
vicars, besides dignitaries and curates--p. 189. In another place, he
says:--“The whole number of the clergy of England are in all, first,
two archbishops, twenty-four bishops, twenty-six deans of cathedral and
collegiate churches, 576 prebendaries, 9,653 rectors and vicars, and
about so many more, with curates, and others in Holy Orders.”--Part
ii., 19. But this estimate must be greatly in excess of the actual
number.
The communication from Dr. Swainson is as follows:--
“Let me inform you that I have found a book in our muniment-room which
to a certain extent supplies the place of the Episcopal Registers of
Henry King, who was restored to his see with the Restoration. The
Registers, you know, are reported as lost. This book is the book
of subscriptions to the three articles of the 36th Canon, and the
declaration against the Solemn League and Covenant. With the assistance
of a friend I have analysed the former, and the enclosed paper contains
the result. But I must notice that it gives no intimation as to the
number of clergymen who returned to the livings from which they were
banished during the Commonwealth, nor of the Presbyterians and others
who were then ejected from their homes; it only gives the livings into
which _new_ incumbents were installed; and I think you will agree
with me that the number is very small. At the same time my attention
has been drawn to the large number of ordinations of deacons in the
first two years after the book commences. My impression is that a
Presbyterian or Independent minister in legal possession of a living
might retain it by the Act of Uniformity, if he accepted deacon’s
orders. Thus we should have in the first three years twenty-three more
vacancies than in the last three of the period before us; and in the
first three years one hundred and eight men ordained deacons, in the
last three fourteen or fifteen. I infer that, of these one hundred and
eight a large proportion conformed and retained their preferment. My
friend notices a large ordination in 1673. Eighteen priests and sixteen
deacons on Trinity Sunday; eight priests and eleven deacons in Advent.”
The enclosed paper states, “The book of subscriptions commences on 2nd
November, 1662, and the last subscription is dated on 22nd September,
1678, thus it includes a period of sixteen years. I have no reason
to suppose that it is imperfect. On analysing it, the subscriptions
describe, that the subscriber is about to be admitted (1) to some
rectory, vicarage, or cure of souls; (2) to a prebend or dignity in the
cathedral; (3) to ‘Presbyteratus ordinen;’ (4) to deacon’s orders.
There are a few who are about to be licensed to preach, and about four
in the sixteen years who come to qualify themselves to keep school. The
number of vacancies in rectories, vicarages, and places with cure of
souls thus indicated in the several years are:--
November 1, 1662 to October 31, 1663 19
„ „ 1664 26
„ „ 1665 14
„ „ 1666 16
„ „ 1667 18
„ „ 1668 20
„ „ 1669 12
„ „ 1670 10
„ „ 1671 20
„ „ 1672 13
„ „ 1673 16
„ „ 1674 16
„ „ 1675 9
„ „ 1676 8
„ „ 1677 15
„ „ 1678 13
making a total of 245 in 16 years, or an average of 15¼ per annum.
“The number of vacancies in the first three years is thus fifty-nine;
in the last three, thirty-six. Taking the last figures as representing
the number from ordinary causes, we have an overplus of twenty-three
due to extraordinary causes, _i.e._, nonconformity, in the first
three years. The number of men ordained deacons in the first three
years was one hundred and seven; in the last three years, fifteen.
Therefore the overplus of ninety-two ordained in the first three years
was due to extraordinary causes; the question is what these causes were?
“N.B.--Eighty-three men were ordained priests during the same first
three years. The number of benefices in the diocese of Chichester is
_now_ (1869) 330.”
No. VII.--Vol. I., p. 314.
Of the informer’s _Note Book_, preserved in the Record Office, I have
an entire copy in my possession, made by the late Mr. Clarence Hopper,
and from it I give the following extracts:--
“_Brokes_ (Pastor)--Meets at Mr. Shaw’s, sailmaker, in Tower Wharf,
sometimes at one Palmer’s Wise, [_sic_] and Holmes’s, who dwell all in
the fields on the left hand, near Moorgate, where the quarters hang;
where there is suspected some persons of note lie dormant, viz., Col.
Danvers, Col. Gledman, Mr. Wollaston. The field is named ‘Phines-berry’
(Finsbury).”
“_Caitnesse._--A Scotchman intimately acquainted with Lawrye the
merchant (his old maid knows much of him). He dwells a little beyond
Ratcliffe Church, hard by Gun Alley, next door to a shoemaker’s.
Brother-in-law to Mr. Roe (formerly minister), a schoolmaster in
Christchurch, within the Cloisters can tell of Caitnesse. Several of
the Lord General’s old soldiers know Caitnesse; he knows Lieut.-Col.
Desborough and Ellison.”
“_Duckenfield._--They are 3 brothers all officers in the Army. Col.
Jo Duckenfield, a stout fellow, now in Ireland, 1663, married an
Exchange-woman, commanded the Foot at Winnington-bridge, 1659. Major
Wm. Duckenfield in Ireland, 1663, married Franklin’s daughter, over
against Salisbury House, an Exchange-man. Col. Rob. Duckenfield
married Fleetwood’s sister, and hath an estate at Duckenfield Hall, in
Cheshire, all 3 dangerous fellows.”
“_Forbes._--Formerly in Gloucester, a Scottishman. Caitnes. Rawdon. His
wife’s mother lives near Henley-upon-Thames, in Bucks. When in town,
lodges behind Abchurch, going into Sherburne Lane from Cannon Street,
upon the right hand, beyond the church; his landlord keeps a shop in
Pope’s Head Alley. Enquire of Henley Coach, where it stands, for Mr.
Forbes. His sister is an apothecary’s wife, over against Warwick House,
in Holborn; and at Mr. Johnston’s, in Gr. Inne Lane, &c.”
“_Thomas Goodwine_ (pastor).--Dwells in the fields, on the left hand
near Moorgate, where the quarters stand, and meets often with Dr.
Owen.”--(_Vide O._)
“_Mrs. Homes_, at the Red Lion, a grocer’s shop, in St. Laurence Lane,
is the great patroness of the worst of people now in London, and Ewell
in particular. (Mrs. Holond Com. his wife), and Mr. Sheldon, prisoner
in the Tower, who married Holond’s daughter; Mrs. Homes, now or lately,
paid and discharged the rent for the house, which Thomas Goodwin lies
in, at Bone Hill, beyond the Artillery Ground, near Cherry Tree Alley.
She has a great estate; and spends it among those that lie in wait
to disturb the peace of the kingdom. She is a frequent visitor of
the prisons, and encourages and confirms those that are in greatest
opposition to the Government. Her chief servant is called Browne,
who ’tis thought, was one of the Rump Parliament. Her cash-keeper
confessed, that, in six weeks after her husband died, she gave away
£800. ’Tis no wonder, for she gains, with her money, several from the
Church daily and under pretence of charity, corrupts many poor and
wanting people.”
“_Jessey_, meets often at one Thomas Goodwine’s, and Dr. Owen’s in the
fields, near to Moorgate, where the quarters hang; (pastor). The said
Jessey meets also at the Lady Hartups, at Newington, Harfordshire, dead
1663.”
“_Harwood_, Jo., a merchant at Mile-end Green, a factious dangerous
Independent; and the common factor for all the merchants trading
especially to New England; who uses constantly to cover and disguise,
the ships, goods, and persons, of those of that opinion in their
voyages and passages, so as the officers of the Customs, &c., at
Gravesend, and other places, are, by his interest and money, corrupted
to slip the oaths, which otherwise ought to be tendered to all persons
going out, &c.”
“_Knowles_, an Anabaptist minister, a good scholar, and a leading man,
now in Amsterdam, maintained by the churches; and one Thibalds (his
elder), in Tower Street, corresponds with him, (to him Mr. Riggs was
recommended by Thibalds.) Knowles dwells in Wapping.”
“_Meade_, Pastor of the Independent Church, meets twice a week with
Greenhill at Ratcliffe, and Stepney.”
“_Dr. Owen_ (_Pastor_), dwells in the fields, on the left hand near
Moorgate, where the quarters hang, and meets often with Goodwine.”
“_Robinson_ (Andrew), a Scotts Quaker, dangerous young fellow; carries
letters between London and Edinburgh; comes frequently to Mr. Lawrye’s.”
“_Sprig_, a minister, and great creature of the late usurper’s. Mr.
Johnson knows him intimately. Sprig is a great acquaintance of Sir Hen.
Vane’s and Ludlow’s.”
No. VIII.--Vol. I., p. 319.
In connection with the narrative on this page, and others elsewhere of
the same kind, I would request the reader to bear in mind what I have
remarked on p. 102. of this volume.
After the printing of the anecdote respecting Mr. Ince, a very
interesting little book, entitled _The Church at Birdbush_, has
come under my notice, from which I extract the following passages
in reference to the story I have related:--“This striking narrative
has sometimes been repudiated as a fiction. The evidence for its
credibility seems, however, to be stronger than the supposition of its
falsehood. The fact that the individual on whose authority it rests,
had spent much time and labour in collecting authentic accounts of
the period to which it refers, and that before the year 1705, he had
lived at Shaftesbury, where, from its proximity to the scene of its
occurrence, this event would be the theme of general conversation,
is a fair argument in proof of its validity. Assuming then, in the
absence of proof to the contrary, that the principal points in this
striking incident are true, there are connected circumstances which
require that some additional remarks should be made. The _date_ of the
occurrence of this remarkable event has been a matter of conflicting
statement. While the _Nonconformist’s Memorial_ fixes it at ‘not long
after the year 1662,’ a writer in the _Evangelical Magazine_ for 1798,
states it to have taken place ‘soon after the Toleration Act passed
in 1689.’ Perhaps the precise year cannot be fixed, and yet, from an
incidental remark in the life of the Rev. T. Rosewell, given in the
_Nonconformist’s Memorial_, we may arrive at a satisfactory conclusion.
His biographer says, ‘After leaving Lady Hungerford’s family, he was
invited, in 1672, into that of Mr. Grove, at Ferne, where Mr. Ince
lived, where he spent some months much to his comfort.’ By this it is
evident that the event referred to happened before the year 1672. A
second disputed point is, the apparent improbability of Mr. Ince being
unknown at Ferne, after having been Rector of the adjoining parish
for fourteen years or more. It should be remembered, that some few
years, at least, elapsed between his ejectment at Donhead, and his
being employed on the before-named estate. Time would of course leave
its impressions on the form which would otherwise have been easily
recognized. Besides, it is attested that he had hired himself to the
‘employment of tending sheep;’ and the shepherd’s dress, connected
with the effects of prison usage, and of the other circumstances of
trial to which he had been exposed, may all have combined to conceal
his true profession as a minister of Christ, until the time fixed in
the Infinite Mind arrived for its discovery. His ‘appearance’ was that
which surprised Mr. Grove, when he contrasted it with his ‘language
and manner.’ The last sentence of the statement obviously requires
correction. The _Meeting-house_ referred to, was _not_ erected on the
estate at Ferne, nor by Mr. Grove.”
No. IX.--Vol. I., p. 374.
I have adopted the common account of Cecil’s signing Edward VI.’s
Instrument of Succession as a witness. It is endorsed by Mr.
Froude.--(_Hist._, v. 509). But I ought to add, that Tytler, in his
_England under the Reigns of Edward VI. and Mary_, discredits the
story which rests on a statement made by Roger Alford, twenty years
afterwards, who on Cecil’s authority, and at his request, was trying
to make out a case in favour of his master. Cecil’s signature occurs
in the midst of many names appended to the document, not at all in
the way of witness; and Tytler thinks, that Cecil had determined to
retain his place, whatever sacrifice it might cost him. It did cost him
dear--“for he was driven by it to falsehood, to evasion, and to little
subterfuges, from which every upright mind would have recoiled.”--(Vol.
ii. 175.) In a defence of himself, written in his own hand, for the eye
of Queen Mary, and which Tytler has printed (vol. ii. 192), he says
nothing of having signed the instrument as a witness.
It appears further, from an examination by Tytler, of some of Cecil’s
papers in the Record Office, that in the reign of Queen Mary he
conformed to the established religion by attending mass.--(Vol. ii.
443.) Yet it is remarkable that although regarded kindly at court,
he never held office under the Popish Sovereign; and is distinctly
described as “a heretic” by the Count de Feria, writing in 1558.--(p.
499). Whatever his compliances at the time, there must have been enough
in his conduct to indicate that he was an unwilling Conformist, and
that he was in heart a Protestant. Still, in respect to religious
profession in the earlier part of life, he is seen to disadvantage when
compared with Clarendon.
No. X.--Vol. II., p. 88.
Lord Macaulay mentions in his _History of England_, a broadside which
he had seen, and which is printed in Somers’ _Tracts_. The author,
as he says, was a Roman Catholic, having access to good sources of
information, and although no name but one is given at length, the
initials are intelligible except in a single instance. The Duke of York
is said to have been reminded of his duty to his brother by P. M. A. C.
F., which mysterious letters puzzled his Lordship as they had done Sir
Walter Scott, who edited Somers’ _Collection_. Plausible conjectures
as to their meaning occurred at the same time to Macaulay and others,
and though the conviction continued in his mind, that the true solution
had not been suggested, he was inclined to read the initials thus:
“Père Mansuete, a Cordelier Friar.” A Cordelier of that name was James’
Confessor.
After all, the shrewd conjecture was correct. The following paper,
mentioned in my Preface, settles the question. It is substantially the
same as the paper printed in _Somers_ (Scott’s Edition, viii. 428),
but the verbal differences are considerable, and the P. M. A. C. F. is
identified as Père Mansuete, a Cordelier Friar, Confessor to the Duke.
I print the MS. at length, as it will be interesting for the historical
student to compare it with the broad sheet reprinted by Somers:--
“On Munday 2^d of February Candlemas day the King rose early, said he
had not slept well. About 7 a clock comeing from his private devotions
out of his Closett, fell downe so that he was dead for foure hours
in an Apoplecticke fitt: with losse of 16 ounces of blood and other
applications came to his sences againe: Great hopes of his recovery
till Thursday one a clocke. But at 5 the Doctors being come before the
Councill declared he was in great danger. On Friday a quarter before
12 he departed. God have mercy upon his soule. _P. M. a C. ffryar C_
to the Duke upon the Doctors first telling him of the State of the K.
told him that now was the time to take care of his soule and that it
was his duty to tell him so. The D. with this admonition went unto the
King and told it, The K. answered O Brother how long have I wished but
now help me: He said he would have Father Hudd:[617] who preserved him
in the tree, and now hoped he would preserve his soule; H was sent
for to bring all necessaries for a dying man: not having the B: S. by
him, H mett one of the Q^s P,[618] told him the occasion, desiring
his assistance to procure it and bring it to the back staires. The
King having notice that Mr. Hudd: waited desired to be in private with
his Brother. All the Bpps and Nobles goeing out, the D latching the
dore, the L^{de} P. B. and F.[619] were goeing out also, the D told
them they might stay, the Kg seeing Father cryed out: Almighty God
what good planet governes me that all my life is wonders and miracles
when I O Lord consider my infancy, my exile, my escape at Wor’ster my
preservation in the tree by this good Father and now to have him againe
to be the Preserver of my Soule, O’ Lord my wonderfull Restauration,
the great danger of the late Conspiracy and last of all to be raised
from death and to have my soule preserved by the assistance of this
good Father whom I see that thou O Lord hast created for my good: the D
and E^{s,}[620] withdrew into the Closett, they were private for some
time, after which the D and E^{s} entred againe, the Father remaining
comforting and praying with him, He said, if I am worthy of it, Pray
lett me have it, the Father said he exspected it and offered to
proceed with the extreeme unction, The King said, with all my heart:
the D and the L^{ds} assisting at the time M^{r.} Hudd: being called
to the doore received the B: S: he desired the Kg to compose himselfe
to receive. the King would rise, he was perswaded to the Contrary,
Let me meet my heavenly father in a better posture then lying thus,
being overruled they pray, amongst other the Father repeated an Act
of Contrition, the King desired him to repeate it againe, saying it
word by word after him, Received with the greatest expressions of
devotion imaginable: This being ended they proceeded in the Prayer de
Recommendacöne animæ, that being done, the King desired a repetition of
the Act of Contrition once more, Lord Good God when my Lips faile let
my heart speake these words eternally.
“The Bishops and Lords entred againe and perswaded the King to remember
his last end and to endeavour to make a good end. He said he had
thought on it and made his peace with God. Asking him whether he would
receive, he said he would not, he persisting in extolling the Queene
and Duke said he was not sorry to leave the world leaving so good a
brother to rule behind him.”
No. XI.--Vol. II., p. 148.
Macaulay, speaking of the disobedience of the London clergy to the
Royal order, says:--“Samuel Wesley, the father of John and Charles
Wesley, a curate in London, took for his text that day the noble
answer of the three Jews to the Chaldean tyrant, ‘Be it known unto
thee, O King, that we will not serve thy gods, nor worship the
golden image which thou hast set up.’” The historian quotes as his
authority Southey’s _Life of Wesley_. The story has been repeated
again and again. Unfortunately, in reference to Wesley, it cannot be
true. He was ordained in deacon’s orders the 17th of August, 1688,
about three months after the issuing of the order: and the only
foundation for the story seems to be a poem by the younger Wesley,
written “upon a clergyman lately deceased,” the Rev. John Berry, the
poet’s father-in-law, and published four years before Samuel Wesley’s
death.--See _The Mother of the Wesleys_, by the Rev. John Kirk, p. 58.
No. XII.--Vol. II., chap. xiv.
ANGLICAN VIEWS ON THE RELATIONS OF CHURCH AND STATE.
In the review of Anglican opinions in the 14th chapter I have scarcely
entered upon what is understood by the Church and State question. I am
not able to supply, from the works of Bull, Pearson, Cosin, Heylyn,
Barrow, and others, any satisfactory catena of passages bearing on this
point, or to report any definite theory, or any sustained arguments of
theirs in relation to it. Their theological writings treat of other
themes. Thorndike, indeed, has a good deal to say of the State, as
well as of the Church, and speaks, on the one hand, of the State being
in subjection to the Church, of the State being bound to protect the
Church, and of the State being justified in inflicting penalties for
religion when the latter interferes with civil peace. On the other
hand, he speaks of kings being justified in reforming the Church, even
against the ecclesiastical order. (Reference to these passages will
be found in the index to the Oxford Edition of Thorndike.) Yet I can
find in Thorndike no precise theory of Church and State relations.
Jeremy Taylor treats of ecclesiastical laws and power; he insists on
the concurrence in them of the civil authorities, and that kings are
bound to keep the Church’s laws; yet he denies that Christian princes
can be lawfully excommunicated. (_Works_, xiii. 583–616.) Bramhall
alludes to the Royal nomination and investiture of bishops in England
as approved by ancient canons and constitutions (part iv. dis. 6);
and Sanderson goes so far as to declare, that the king hath power, if
he shall see cause, to suspend any bishop from the execution of his
office, and to deprive him utterly of his dignity. (_Episcopacy not
prejudicial_, s. iii. 33.) Morley’s extravagant views of the Royal
prerogative have been noticed. On the whole it appears that after the
Restoration, High Churchmanship manifested itself more in theological
doctrine, than in either ritualism or in ecclesiastical supremacy.
Looking at the whole history of the period between the Restoration and
the Revolution, we see in the ascendant that which is commonly meant by
the word Erastianism. Indications of this are afforded by the manner
in which the Act of Uniformity was carried; by the utter inactivity
of Convocation after the year 1664,--for it did scarcely more than
formally assemble from time to time,--and by the notions of the Royal
supremacy so generally maintained, and so plainly expressed, not only
by Bishop Morley but by the two Universities.
No. XIII.--Vol. II., p. 93.
“On the 19th of May, 1685, the King (about 11 a clock in the morning)
came to the House of Peers in his royal robes, and with his crown off
his head, being attended with the great officers of state, and having
placed himself on his throne, the Usher of the Black Rod, Sir Thomas
Duppa, was sent to bring up the Commons to the bar of the Lords’ House.
The Commons being come, the Lord Keeper standing behind the Chair of
State (from whence he usually speaks to the two Houses) acquainted the
Commons that his Majesty had commanded him to tell them that it was his
royal pleasure, that they should go down to the Lower House, and choose
their speaker, and present him at 4 of the clock in the afternoon, to
his Majesty at the bar of the Lords’ House, for his approbation.
The Lord Keeper acquainted the Lords and Commons at the same time, that
they should, in the mean time, apply themselves to take the oaths of
allegiance and supremacy and the test, as the law requires, and when
that was done in both Houses, his Majesty would then acquaint them with
the reasons why he called them to Parliament.
Thereupon the Commons withdrew, and went down to their own House, and
(as I have been informed) forthwith chose Sir John Trevor to be their
speaker.
In the mean time, the Lords went about the taking of the oath of
allegiance, and supremacy, and the test; and in the first place, the
Lord Keeper took the oaths and test singly; and then the Lords in their
order, beginning with the Barons, and ending at the Archbishop of
Canterbury.
When that business was over, the Lords called to go to prayers, and
the Bishop of Bath and Wells read prayers, he being Junior Bishop.
When prayers were ended, the Lords that were lately created by new
patents, were introduced, according to the usual solemnity, that is to
say, the Lord Keeper went below the bar, and being attended with the
Usher of the Black Rod, and Sir W. Dugdale, King at Arms, and the Lord
Marshall, and the Lord Great Chamberlain, and two other Barons (for
Barons introduce Barons, and Earls do introduce Earls, &c.), the patent
was carried by my Lord Keeper, and laid at his Majesty’s footstool, at
the throne, he kneeling; and then he took his patent up, and carried it
to his side upon the Woolsack, and then delivered it to the Clerk of
the Parliament, who read it, and after the reading of it, he was, by
the Lords and Officers aforesaid, brought to his seat upon the Barons’
bench, from thence he went to his place upon the woolsack, which is his
seat as Speaker to the Lords’ House.
The rest of the Lords were introduced in the same manner, only they
went out of the House to bring in their patents; and so did the Earl
Marshall, and the Lord Great Chamberlain, and Sir William Dugdale, and
the Usher of the Black Rod go out of the House to fetch them in; but
the Lord Keeper did not go out of the House, because he being Speaker,
ought not to be absent from the House, while its sitting, and that is
the reason why he did not go out.
The Lords that were introduced were these:--First, Lord Keeper; second,
Lord Treasurer; third, Lord President; fourth, Duke of Beaufort; three
Earls, _i.e._, Earl Maclesfield, Earl Berkley, Earl Nottingham; three
Viscounts, Viscount Hatton, Viscount Weymouth, Viscount Townsend. The
Barons that were introduced were Dartmouth, Stawell, Churchill, Wemen;
there were more, but I do not now remember their names, but I will
hereafter insert them.
Then all those Lords that were introduced took the oath of allegiance
and supremacy, and the test; and so went into their seats. And this was
about 3 of the clock in the afternoon.
Then the Lord Privy Seal moved the House in the behalf of the three
Popish Lords, that were upon bail to appear at the bar of the Lords’
House the first day of the Parliament, and he produced a petition
from them, which was read; and in it they set forth, that they were
impeached of high treason, and imprisoned for five years, and upwards,
upon the single testimony of Titus Oates, who was found guilty of
perjury by several indictments, and they prayed to be set at liberty,
with reparation of their honours.
Then the Earl of Chesterfield moved the House in behalf of the Earl of
Danby, and told their Lordships that he had a petition from the Earl of
Danby, and prayed it might be read; and it was ordered to be read by
the Clerk. The purport of his petition was to shew to the Lords, that
he had been impeached and imprisoned for above four years, merely upon
suggestion, without oath, and prayed their Lordships’ favour for his
enlargement.
This petition of the Earl of Danby was more modest than the other
Lords’ petition, which made the Lord Keeper observe, and say to the
House, that the prayer of the Earl of Danby’s petition was different
from the prayer of the Popish Lords’ petition; for they desired to be
enlarged forthwith with reparation. And the Earl of Danby prayed either
to have his trial, or to renew his bail, or to have such directions as
their Lordships should think meet in his case.
The Lord Keeper’s intimation was not taken well by my Lord Danby’s
friends; and therefore the Earl of Chesterfield, Lord High Chamberlain,
and others stood, and moved successively, that the Earl of Danby’s
case was the same with the Popish Lords, _i.e._, imprisonment and
impeachment without oath, and therefore the remedy was the same.
Upon these motions, the House came to this resolution and order,
_i.e._, they ordered that the Lords should be called in, and stand
at the bar, to whom the Lord Keeper said that the House had read their
petition, and had given order to record or enter the appearance, and
that they should withdraw, and attend the House the first time they sat
after this day, to know the further pleasure of the House as to their
petitions.
The Lord Butler moved in behalf of the Earl of Tyrone, and he appeared
at the bar, and had the same answer as the other Lords, viz., to attend
at the next sitting day.
When this was done the House adjourned during pleasure, and the King
withdrew into the Prince’s lodgings for a quarter of an hour, and
the Lords went to the adjacent rooms to refresh themselves; and in a
quarter of an hour the King returned into the House, and the Lords into
their places, and then the House was resumed.
Thereupon the King withdrew, and presently came in his robes, and his
crown upon his head, attended with the officers of state and heralds
as aforesaid, and sat on his throne, and then the Usher of the Black
Rod went down to call the Commons, who forthwith, with Sir John Trevor,
their Speaker, attended at the bar of the House, and said (having made
their bows or _congé_ of reverence) that the Commons assembled in
Parliament had made choice of him for their Speaker, and that he was
sensible of his great disabilities to undergo that weighty task, and
thereupon prayed his Majesty, that he would graciously be pleased to
command the House of Commons to go down and choose another Speaker.
The King having heard his disabling harangue, whispered the Lord
Keeper; and then the Lord Keeper (from behind the Chair of State) said,
“Sir John Trevor, the King hath commanded me to tell you, that he is
well apprised of your parts and zeal to serve him, and the Commons,
and therefore he approves of their choice, and admits you to be the
Speaker.”
Then the Speaker, in a short speech (read out of his paper, which was
the first time that I observed a Speaker read any speech) expressed
his thankfulness for his Majesty’s good opinion of him, and his parts,
and promised to do his duty zealously and loyally, and then prayed
(after the usual manner) that the Commons might have (1) their freedom
of speech and (2) freedom from arrest, and (3) access to his Majesty to
deliver their addresses, &c.
Again the King called to the Lord Keeper, and spake privately to him;
and then the Lord Keeper told the Speaker, that the King had granted
their petitions; and so the Commons and the Speaker were dismissed. And
when the company was withdrawn, and the House clear of the people that
thronged there, the doors were shut, and then the Lord Lovelace called
to the Clerk to be sworn, and tendered himself to take the test.
But the Lord Keeper said that by the order of the House he should have
offered himself to do that business in the morning after prayers, and
therefore he could not be sworn that day.
Then the House called to adjourn, and they did adjourn, that is, the
Lord Keeper as Speaker adjourned the House until Friday, at nine of the
clock in the morning.
_Friday 22 May, 1685._
The Lords met in their House, and in their robes that day. In the
Lords’ House there was a canopy of state for the Queen Consort set up
in the Lords’ House, near the Archbishop’s seat. The Queen came into
the House about ten of the clock, and was in the House, while the House
went to prayers.
In the same seat with her, that is with the Queen, sat the Prince of
Denmark, and the Princess Anne, his consort.
About eleven of the clock, the King came to the House in his robes and
attended as aforesaid, and sat upon his throne. And immediately the
Commons, with their Speaker, came to the bar of the Lords’ House, at
which time the King made a gracious speech, which is in print, and it
is his first speech to the Parliament. The Lords and Commons hummed
joyfully and loudly at those parts of it which concerned our religion,
and the established government.
When the King’s speech was ended, the Commons went down to their own
House, where, as I have been told, they forthwith voted the King’s
revenue to be settled upon him for life.
The Lords, after reading an order _pro formâ_, chose committees for
receiving and trying of petitions, committees for privileges and for
the journal book.
The next thing was a motion made by the Lord Newport, and seconded by
others, against several Lords that were minors or under 21 years, who
would sit in the Lords’ House against the order of the House.
In fine, the minor Lords were ordered to withdraw, and told that they
were not to sit there until they attained 21 years of age.
Then the Lords took unto consideration the petition of the imprisoned
Lords, and after a warm debate, they came to the question about
vacating an order of the House made anno 1678 about the continuance
of impeachments after the dissolution of Parliament. The question was
carried for the vacating of that order, and by that means the three
Lords were _ipso facto_ set at liberty.
Its observable that there was not above nine Lords in the negative, and
there was above 80 in the affirmative at the question.
The same day there was a bill brought in and read against clandestine
marriages, and then the House adjourned; only they voted thanks to the
King for his gracious speech, and attended the King at the banquetting
house, with the House of Commons, to give their thanks at 4 o’clock
that day.
_Saturday 23 of May._
The House met about ten of the clock, and after prayers, as is usual,
some orders, _pro formâ_, were read, and then some Lords were sworn.
Then several petitions for appeals from decrees in chancery were read
and admitted.
Then the bill against clandestine marriages was read 2nd time and
committed.
The House fell upon consideration of Argyle’s declaration, which was
by his Majesty’s order communicated to the House. It was a treasonable
declaration, inviting his friends and vassals to take arms and oppose
the King, whom he traitorously called a tyrant and usurper in that
wicked paper.
The House returned thanks to his Majesty for imparting that matter unto
the Lords, and they declared Argyle to be a traitor, and that they
would be ready with their lives and fortunes to stand by his Majesty
in the defence of his person, crown and dignity against that traitor
and all his enemies. And they sent a message to the Commons for their
concurrence in that vote, who sent answer that they did readily concur.
Then an address was made to the King by the Lords of the White Staves,
to know when both Houses might wait upon his Majesty, to give him
thanks for communicating unto them, the designs of Argyle, and to
present their declaration upon the subject matter of his traiterous
declaration.
The King’s answer was, that he would be waited upon at 5 of the clock
in the afternoon in the banquetting house.
Then the house adjourned till Monday.
Both houses attended the King at the banquetting house at 5 of the
clock on Saturday.
[This journal is all in the Bishop of Norwich’s (Dr. Lloyd) own
hand.]”--_MS. in the University Library, Cambridge._
No. XIV.--Vol. II., p. 139.
James, towards the close of the year 1687, contemplated the calling of
a Parliament. There is a collection of papers in the Bodleian Library,
Oxford, to which my attention has been directed by the learned and
courteous librarian, the Rev. Mr. Coxe, containing interrogations,
addressed to Justices of the Peace and others, as to whether persons
were likely to be returned who would pledge themselves to vote for
taking off the tests and penal laws respecting religion. The following
extract from a letter by John Eston, dated Bedford, November 22, 1687,
is very curious:--“My Lord,--Since your honour spake with me at Bedford
I have conferred with the heads of the Dissenters, and particularly
with Mr. Margetts and Mr. Bunyon, whom your Lordship named to me. The
first of these was Judge Advocate in the Army under the Lord General
Monk, when the late King was restored; the other is the pastor to the
dissenting congregation in this town. I find them all to be unanimous
for electing only such members of Parliament as will certainly vote
for repealing all the tests and penal laws touching religion, and they
hope to steer all their friends and followers accordingly; so that if
the Lord Lieutenant will cordially assist with his influence over the
Church party, there cannot be in human reason any doubt of our electing
two such members.” Again, December 6, 1687, the same writer says:--“The
Dissenters are firm for us, but the Churchmen are implacable against
us.”--_MSS., Vol. I., Penal Laws of Test._
INDEX.
Abney, i. 431
Acts, Indemnity and Oblivion, i. 126
Uniformity, 187, 229, 245–255
Effects of the Act, 261, 270
Conventicle, 322–327, 388
Five Mile, 345–354
Test, 425–428
For better observance of Lord’s Day, 465
For Improvement of Small Livings, 467
Adams, Alderman, i. 148
Adda, D’, Papal Nuncio, ii. 109, 129, 132
Albemarle, Duke of, _see_ Monk
Alleine, Joseph, i. 264
His Writings, ii. 443
His spiritual life, 494–497
Allybone, one of the Judges at the Bishops’ Trial, ii. 153, 155
Alsop, Vincent, ii. 122
Ambrose, Isaac, ii. 444
Andrewes, Bishop, i. 219; ii. 259, 328, 406
Angier, John, i. 291, 484; ii. 218
Anglesea, Earl of, i. 114
Annesley, Dr., i. 363, 394; ii. 57, 496
Ann Hyde, Duchess of York, i. 452
Argyle, Earl of, his Trial and Execution, ii. 97
Arlington, Lord, _see_ Sir Henry Bennet
Arminianism, ii. 397, 406–413
Army, Discontent of, i. 22, 42
Petitions, 23, 25
Violence against Richard, 24
Difficulty in managing it, 67
Meets the King at Blackheath, 76
Disbanding of Old Army, 86
Its Religious Character, 88
Ash, i. 100, 101, 102
Ashby, i. 64
Ashenden, Thomas, ii. 204
Ashley, _see_ Sir A. A. Cooper
Ashurst, Sir Henry, ii. 95, 248
Atkins, Robert, i. 278
Atkins, Sir Robert, i. 379
Aubony, Lord, i. 51
Aubrey, i. 474
Axtell, i. 126
Aylesbury, Countess of, ii. 57
Bacon, Lord, i. 254; ii. 506
Bacon, Sir Edmund, ii. 206
Bagshawe, Edward, i. 293
Balsh, Justice, ii. 56
Bampfield, Francis, ii. 75, 174
Baptists, i. 9, 10, 138, 144, 395
Overtures made by them to Charles, 31
Forbidden to meet in large numbers, 143
Not represented at Savoy Conference, 195
Amongst the ejected, 281
Persecution of them, 296
Laws against them, 321
Their Sufferings, ii. 73, 171
Treatment of them by James II., 106
Their Churches, 171
Particular and General, 172
Their Confession of Faith, 172
Strict and Open, 174
Broadmead Records, 175, 497–500
Accused of Schism, 320
Barclay, David, ii. 377
Barclay, Robert, his Friendship with Penn, ii. 377
Similarity in their Writings, 377
His Theological Teaching, 378–380
Barillon, ii. 114
Barkstead, Colonel John, i. 256
Barlow, Bishop of Lincoln, i. 379; ii. 192, 197
His Account of Scheme of Comprehension, i. 381–385
Barrow, Dr. Isaac, ii. 251, 395, 436
His Long Sermons, 211
His Travels and Studies, 311
His Theology, 311–315
His Defence of Protestantism, 316
His Sermons, 329
Bartholomew’s Day, i. 278–282
Barton, ii. 457
Barwick, Dr., i. 125, 174
Barwick, Dr. John, i. 156, 225
His Correspondence with Clarendon, 36
Goes to Breda, 71
His Exertions in Restoration of Cathedrals, ii. 181
Basire, Isaac, i. 481
Bates, Dr., i. 120, 168, 187, 191, 283, 302, 381, 439; ii. 29, 223
Commissioner at the Savoy, i. 156, 165, 170
His Farewell Sermons, 271
Takes Oath of Non-resistance, 349
Warrant for his Apprehension, ii. 57
At Baxter’s Trial, 95
His Sermons, 212
His _Spiritual Perfection_, 443
Bathurst, Dr. Ralph, ii. 255
Baxter, Richard, i. 52, 58, 168, 259, 340, 362, 391, 449, 485, 503;
ii. 26, 122, 214
Preaches in St. Paul’s, i. 63
His appointment as Chaplain at Court, 100
His Address to Charles, 101
Present at Sion College, 102
Vindicates his Policy, 106
His Petition to the King, 107
At Worcester House, 115
Buys the King’s Declaration, 117
Receives the Offer of a Bishopric, 118
Declines it, 119
Complains of Letters being Intercepted, 145
Leader of Presbyterians in Conference, 156, 164–166
His Objections to the Prayer Book, 170
His Reformed Liturgy, 180–182
Composes Rejoinder to Bishops’ Answers, 183
At Savoy Conference, 185–188
His Account of his Brother Commissioners, 189
Described by his Opponents, 190
His Account of Conference presented to the King, 191
Leaves the Establishment, 262
Disapproves of Declaration of Indulgence, 298
His Independence after being Ejected, 318
Refuses to take Oath of Non-resistance, 351
Charged with keeping an Unlawful Conventicle, 393
His Imprisonment, 394
Refuses a Pension, 410
Overtures made to him respecting Comprehension, 438
Tires of Disputation, ii. 69
His Trial, 95
Imprisonment, 96
Release, 97
His Views on Baptism, 170
His Preaching, 210–212
His Views on Observance of the Sabbath, 234
His Interest in Missionary Work, 248
His Writings on the Evidences of Revealed Religion, 391–394
Incidents in his Early Life, 414
His Theology, 415–420
Resemblance between his Teaching and Howe’s, 427
His Views on Baptism, 430
On the Lord’s Supper, 432
On the Ministry, 434
His share in Anti-Popish Controversy, 436
Works on Union, 441
_Christian Directory_, and other Works, 445, 446
His _Hymns_, 461
Beamish, John, i. 409
Beaufort, Duke of, ii. 91, 231
Beaufort, Duchess of, ii. 231
Beaulieu, Luke de, ii. 300
Beaumont, Agnes, ii. 227
Beaumont, Joseph, ii. 452
Beddingfield, Colonel, ii. 248
Behmen, Jacob, ii. 483
Behn, Aphara, i. 356
Bellarmine, ii. 285
Bendish, Mrs., i. 431
Benlowes, ii. 452
Bennet, Sir Henry, Lord Arlington, i. 123; ii. 253
Secretary of State, i. 293, 308, 336, 391
Member of the Cabal, 401, 425
Relinquishes his Secretaryship, 434
Berry, Major-General, i. 430
Bertie, Peregrine, i. 348
Beveridge, ii. 79
Biddle, John, the Father of Socinianism, ii. 365
His Catechism, 367
Biggin, ii. 56
Billingsley, Nicholas, i. 291
Birch, Colonel, i. 153, 379, 380, 386, 418
Bishops, i. 83, 148, 248, 284, 463; ii. 204
Censured by Hyde, i. 36
Their Loyal Address, 71
Nine of the Old Régime, 97
Appointment of New Bishops, 98
Answer to Proposals made by Presbyterians, 105
At Worcester House, 114
New Bishops Consecrated, 131
At Savoy Conference, 156, 165, 184–188
Convocation, 173
Answers to Presbyterians’ Exceptions, 179
Bill for Restoring them to Upper House, 197
Take their Seats in Parliament, 209
Their Revision of Prayer Book, 213, 219–222, 248
Dioceses in Confusion, 226
Issue Articles of Visitation, 289
Effects of their Opposition to King’s Declaration, 300
Deaths amongst them, 306
Accounts of some of them, 470–504
Manner of receiving James’ Declaration, ii. 120–122
Lambeth Conference, 140
The _Seven_, 140
Their Petition, 144
King’s Displeasure, 147
Sent to the Tower, 150
Trial, 153
Acquittal, 155
Revenues, 190
Survey, 207
Blackmore, i. 283
Blagge, Margaret, _see_ Godolphin
Blagge, ii. 475
Blake, i. 273
Blandford, Dr. Walter, i. 494
Bloworth, Sir Thomas, i. 148
Boscawen, Hugh, i. 153, 155
Bowen, i. 432, 433, 442
Bowles, Edward, i. 44, 277
Boyle, Robert, ii. 248, 249
Braham, Richard, i. 157
Bramhall, i. 37; ii. 278, 318, 436
Appointed Archbishop of Armagh, i. 133
His Death, 307
His Writings, ii. 303, 304
Bramston, Sir John, ii. 130
Brewster, i. 432
Brideoake, Dr. Ralph, i. 501
Bridge, i. 29
Bridgeman, Chief Justice, i. 284, 348
Lord Keeper, 380, 403
Bridgeman, Dr., i. 207
Bridgwater, Earl of, i. 231
Bristol, Earl of, i. 86, 198, 298, 426
Broderick, i. 22
Broghill, Lord, i. 16, 23, 100
Brooks, ii. 443
Brown, Sir Richard, i. 148
Browne, Sir Thomas, i. 287; ii. 214, 215
His Religious Life, 485
His Eccentricity, 486
His Writings, 488
Brownrigg, Bishop of Exeter, i. 37; ii. 142
Buckingham, Duke of, i. 73, 75, 77, 86, 230, 245, 427, 434, 457
Favours Toleration, 352
A member of the Cabal, 401
Raises Recruits, 457
His Speech for a New Parliament, 461
Committed to the Tower, 462
Liberated, 462
His Overtures to Nonconformists, ii. 40
Chancellor of Cambridge, 253, 254
Bull, Bishop of St. David’s, i. 492; ii. 213, 317, 424, 429
His _Harmonia Apostolica_, 279–282
Answers to his Book, 283
His Violent Polemical Spirit, 285
His _Defensio Fidei Nicenæ_, 285
His Teaching compared with Barrow’s, 314
Bunyan, John, i. 138, 316, 409, 414; ii. 175, 205, 227
Burleigh, Cecil, Lord, Comparison between him and Lord Clarendon,
i. 373
Burnet, i. 256, 258, 392, 410; ii. 4, 67, 191
Burnyeat, John, ii. 492–494
Burret, Dr., i. 222
Busby, Dr., i. 264
Cabal Ministry, i. 400–403, 416, 434
Calamy, Dr. Benjamin, ii. 74
Calamy, Dr. Edmund, i. 58, 63, 68, 100, 169, 283, 302
His Funeral Sermon for Ash, 277
Offered a Bishopric, 120
Commissioner at the Savoy, 156, 164, 170, 183
Calamy, Dr. (Historian), ii. 117
Calvinism, ii. 274, 397–405, 406, 408, 410
Campbell, ii. 392
Care, Henry, ii. 123
Carlile, Lawson, i. 416
Carr, Colonel, i. 364
Carr, John, ii. 253
Cartwright, Thomas, Bishop of Chester, ii. 109, 137, 139, 323
Carver, Richard, i. 412
Caryl, i. 194, 363, 394
Case, i. 68, 69
Commissioner at the Savoy, 156
Castell, ii. 332
Castelmaine, Earl of, ii. 104
Cathedrals, Injuries Repaired, ii. 180
Furniture, 184
Processions, 186
Worship, 188
Catherine of Braganza, Queen of Charles II., i. 268, 275, 276, 294,
450
Cavendish, William, Marquis of Newcastle, ii. 490
Cawdray, ii. 444
Cellier, ii. 21
Chaise, Père la, ii. 3
Chamberlayne, ii. 457
Chandler, John, i. 290
Charles I., i. 84
Churches named in his honour, 177
Alexandrian MS. sent to him by Cyrillus, ii. 332
Charles II., i. 6, 43, 51, 86, 124, 141, 191, 213, 321, 336, 369,
392, 424, 435, 441, 457; ii. 2, 10, 18, 45, 141, 187, 245, 300
Suggestions made to him by his friends, i. 53, 54
His Letters to Monk and the Commons, 60, 61
Proclaimed King, 63
Invited back without conditions, 65–67
Presbyterian Deputation visit him at the Hague, 68
His Attachment to the Liturgy, 69
His Character and Opinions, 73, 74
Lands at Dover, 75
Addresses presented to him, 77–80
His Counsellors, 83
His Speech to the two Houses, 95
Appoints Commission to compose Differences in Ecclesiastical
Affairs, 96
Baxter’s Address to him, 101
Presbyterian Proposals, 104
Baxter’s Petition, 107
At Worcester House, 114–116
His new Declaration, 117
Opens New Parliament, 154
Coronation, 161, 166, 167
Cabinet Meetings, 201
Speeches at Opening of Parliaments, 209, 416; ii. 31
Sanctions Revised Copy of Prayer Book, i. 229
Aims at a Dispensing Power, 232
Gives Assent to Uniformity Bill, 245
Head of Roman Catholic Party who concur in the Act, 252
Unpopularity of his Government, 267, 268
His Marriage, 275
Presbyterians’ Petition, 283
At Hampton Court, 284
Holds a Council, 284
His Declaration of Indulgence, 296, 303, 403–408
Toleration towards Colonists, 311
His Disapproval of Dutch War, 344
Interest in Sufferers by Fire, 359
Empty Exchequer, 367
Anxious for Union amongst Protestants, 386
Grants an Audience to Presbyterians, 390
His Interviews with Carver and Moore, 412
Releases Quakers from Prison, 414
His Popularity Declines, 417
Gives Assent to Test Act, 427
Withdraws Declaration of Indulgence, 428
His Desire for Absolutism, 437
Suspected of being a Romanist, 450
Signs a Treaty with Louis XIV., 451
Proposes Terms of Compromise in reference to Succession, ii. 20
His Illness, 59
His despotism, 63
His Proficiency in Kingcraft, 69
Offers an Asylum to French Refugees, 76
Invites his Brother to seat at Council-table, 81
His Licentiousness, 85
Scenes at Whitehall, 86
His Death, 87
Touches for King’s Evil, 214
His Visit to Cambridge, 253
Charlton, Sergeant, i. 241, 243
Charnock, Dr., ii. 212
Charrochi, ii. 137
Chase, Thomas, ii. 223
Chaworth, Dr., i. 222
Chelsea College and Hospital, ii. 245
Chillingworth, William, his Theological Opinions, ii. 334–336
Churches, Architecture, ii. 182
Furniture, 183
Vestments and Manner of Worship, 185
Churchill, Lord, ii. 128
Clagett, ii. 117
Clare, Sir Ralph, i. 52
Clarendon, _see_ Hyde
Clark, Samuel, the Episcopalian, ii. 332
Clarke, Samuel, the Puritan, i. 121, 349; ii. 332
Commissioner at Savoy Conference, i. 156, 165, 170
Clarkson, David, i. 409
Clergy, i. 89, 90, 261; ii. 194
Their Petitions, i. 99, 321
Taxation, 329
Their conduct during the Plague, 336
Their Miserable Condition, 505
Ignorance, 507
Costume, 509
Character, 510
Articles of Visitation, 509–512
Writings against Errors of Church of Rome, ii. 117
Change in them, 157
Ecclesiastical Tribunals, 201
Discipline exercised on them by Bishops, 204
Private Life, 228
Cleveland, Duchess of, i. 500
Clewer, ii. 202
Cleypole, Lord, i. 18
Clifford, Sir Thomas, i. 401, 427, 429, 434
Coffee Houses, i. 443
Colbert, i. 397, 420, 429
Coleman, ii. 3, 6, 9
Colledge, Stephen, his Trial and Execution, ii. 45–49
Collinges, Dr., ii. 56
Collins, Dr., i. 156
Colonies, Ecclesiastical Policy towards them, i. 310, 311
Spiritual Destitution, ii. 247
Missionary Work, 248
Compton, ii. 110, 140
Commons, House of, i. 23, 24, 468
Members excluded by Pride restored, 48
Solemn League and Covenant reappears, 50
Letter from the King, 60
Conference with the Lords, 62
Debate on Church’s Settlement, 88
Bill founded on King’s Declaration, 121–124
Uniformity Bill, 187, 201, 204, 229–244
Their Intolerance, 250
Zeal for the Established Church, 303
Bills against Papists and Nonconformists, 304
Bill for better Observance of the Sabbath, 305
Their Opposition to Measures for Comprehension, 386
Bill for Reviving Conventicle Act, 388
Country Party Predominant, 418
Exclusion Bill, 469; ii. 20
Complain of Trick on Toleration Bill, 30, 32
Grand Committee of Religion, 93
James II. annoyed with their Proceedings, 94
Conant, Dr., i. 156, 288; ii. 52, 198
Convocation, i. 158
Writs drawn up, 159
Election of Members, 168
First Meeting since 1640, 173–178
Resume their Deliberation, 213–222
Subscribe Book of Common Prayer, 223
Accomplish no Alterations in the Canons, 226
Power diminishes, 331
Conway, Lord, i. 141; ii. 41, 43
Conyers, Tobias, ii. 410
Cooper, Sir Anthony Ashley, Earl of Shaftesbury, i. 34, 56, 86,
416, 437; ii. 4, 33, 41
A Member of the Cabal, i. 401
Lord Chancellor, 403, 426
Dismissed from Office, 434
Desires a Dissolution of Parliament, 460
Supports the Duke of Buckingham, 462
Committed to the Tower, 462
Obtains his Liberty, 462
Accused of entering into a Conspiracy against the King, ii. 50
His Imprisonment, 50
Dies in Holland, 50
Effects of his Schemes, 64
Cooper, Dr., i. 156
Corbet, John, i. 378
Cosin, Dr. John, i. 37, 97, 114, 159, 222, 231, 248, 290, 406; ii.
236, 278, 320, 436
Consecrated Bishop of Durham, i. 131
Commissioner at the Savoy, 156, 163, 184, 188
Described by Baxter, 189
His Notes on the Prayer Book, 219, 221
Account of him, 478–481
Improves the See of Durham, ii. 191
His Theological Opinions, 299–301
Declares against Sectaries, 323
Preaches abroad, 328
Cotterel, Sir Charles, ii. 130
Court of Wards, i. 97
Of Delegates, ii. 200
High Commission, 200
Arches, 201
Covel, Dr., ii. 81
Coventry, Thomas, i. 64
Coventry, Sir W., i. 418, 419, 420, 423; ii. 247
Crabb, John, i. 294
Crabb, Nathaniel, i. 211
Crabb, Peter, i. 294
Cradock, i. 439
Crashaw, Richard, ii. 452
Cressey, Hugh Paulin, i. 453
Crew, Bishop of Durham, ii. 111, 139
Crew, Lord, ii. 490
Crisp, Sir Nicholas, i. 148
Croft, Herbert, Bishop of Hereford, i. 306, 503; ii. 2, 139, 188,
192, 193
Publishes _Naked Truth_, i. 447–449
Account of him, i. 487; ii. 2
Crofton, Zachary, i. 150, 394
Cromwell, Henry, i. 17
Cromwell, Oliver, i. 49, 85, 347
Confusion after his Death, 5, 6
His Acts set aside, 21
His Corpse disinterred and hanged at Tyburn, 130
Cromwell, Richard, i. 20, 26, 140
Is acknowledged Protector, 15
His Tolerance, 16
Calls a Parliament, 17
His Opening Speech, 18
Is personally Popular, 22
Summons a Council, 23
Is forced to dissolve Parliament, 24
Retires into Private Life, 27
Rumour of attempt to restore him, 354
Cudworth, Dr. Ralph, ii. 251, 253
His Intellectual System, 349–352, 387
Culpepper, Nicholas, i. 85
Cyrillus, ii. 332
Dalgarno, George, ii. 248
Danby, Earl of (_see_ Osborne)
Dangerfield’s Plot, ii. 21, 22
Davenant, Bishop, ii. 406
Davenport, ii. 412
Declaration of Indulgence, i. 296–301, 403–408
Debate on Declaration, 418
Withdrawn, 428
James II.’s Declaration, ii. 118–125
Defoe, Daniel, ii. 5
Delaune, Thomas, ii. 73
Denham, Thomas, i. 313
Derby, Countess of, i. 501
Derby, Earl of, i. 353, 501
Desborough, Colonel John, i. 22, 23, 430
Dillingham, i. 225
Dobson, ii. 137
Dod, i. 484
Dodwell, ii. 117
Doe, Charles, ii. 205
Dolben, John, Bishop of Rochester, i. 478, 498, 499
Donne, Dr., ii. 210, 328, 469
Doolittle, Thomas, i. 363, 408
Douglas, Bishop, ii. 392
Drake, Commissioner at the Savoy, i. 156
Dryden, ii. 115, 459
Dugdale, ii. 49
Duppa, Bishop of Salisbury, i. 37, 98
Translated to Winchester, 131
His Death, 306
Expends large Sums in Charity, ii. 192
Dutch, i. 344, 366, 402
Defeated by the English Fleet, 355
Alarm the Nation again, 366
Earle (or Erle), John, Dean of Westminster, i. 156, 160
Bishop of Salisbury, 491
Ebury, Elizabeth, ii. 115
Edwards, Jonathan, ii. 401
Eliot, John, Missionary to the Indians, ii. 248, 249
Ellwood, ii. 101
Episcopalians, i. 5, 34, 39, 52, 53, 77, 93, 94, 161, 292
Their violence in Elections for New Parliament, 57
Their Joy at prospect of King’s return, 71
Recovery of their sway in Parliament, 88
Their Refusal to make Concessions to the Presbyterians, 105
Differences between the two Parties, 107–112
Their Scheme of Comprehension, 381–383
Secure the Succession to James II., ii. 116
His Treachery towards them, 116
Their Cathedrals and Churches, 180–185
Revenues, 190–198
Ecclesiastical Courts, 198–205
Their numbers as compared with Nonconformists, 207
Contrasts in Preaching, 209
Their Observance of the Sabbath, 235
Recreations, 237
Charities, 243
Examples of the Teaching of High Anglicans, 268–303
Semi-Anglicans, 305–311
Sermon Writers, 328
Critics, 331
Liberal Orthodox, 335
Latitudinarians, 341
Points of Resemblance between them and the Puritan Divines, 394
Points of Difference, 396
Biographical Sketches of Anglicans, 468–491
Essex, Earl of, ii. 19
Evans, George, ii. 49
Evelyn, John, i. 38, 43, 91, 277; ii. 86, 124, 142, 183, 231
Biographical Sketch of him, 471–474
His Friendship with Margaret Godolphin, 475–477
Ewins, Thomas, ii. 497, 500
Fairfax, Lord, i. 313
Fairfax, Dr., ii. 134
Fairfull, Archbishop of Glasgow, i. 227
Falconbridge, Lord, i. 23, 27
Falconbridge, Lady, ii. 28
Falkland, i. 67
Fanshaw, Sir Richard, ii. 251
Farindon, Anthony, his Theological Teaching, ii. 339–341
Farmer, Anthony, ii. 133
Faucet, John, i. 433
Feake, i. 140
Featley, Dr. Daniel, i. 91
Fell, John, Bishop of Oxford, ii. 196, 257, 332
Ferne, Dr. Henry, Dean of Ely, i. 175
Promoted to the Bishopric of Chester, 225
Feversham, Lord, ii. 87
Fiennes, i. 16
Fifth Monarchy Men, i. 5, 41, 140, 144, 325
Finch, Sir Heneage, i. 435, 437; ii. 234
Finch, Sir John, i. 141
Fire of London, i. 357–362
Firman, Thomas, ii. 246
Flavel, John, his _Husbandry Spiritualized_, i. 318; ii. 444
Fleetwood, i. 17, 22, 26, 48, 430
His Power, 25, 34
Fogg, Dr., i. 288; ii. 61
Ford, i. 65
Ford, Sir Richard, i. 148
Ford, Simon, ii. 457
Foster, Lady, ii. 256
Foulke, Alderman, i. 148
Fownes, ii. 176
Fox, George, i. 258, 415
Petitions Charles for Release of Quakers, 275
The Father of Quakerism, ii. 369
Frampton, ii. 233
Francis, Alban, ii. 132
Francklin, ii. 201
Frankland, ii. 226
Franklin, i. 363
French Protestants, ii. 76–81
Frewen, Accepted, Bishop of Lichfield and Coventry, i. 98
Promoted to the Archbishopric of York, 131
Member of Savoy Conference, 156, 165
His Death, 495
Authorship of _Whole Duty of Man_ ascribed to him, ii. 330
Fuller, Andrew, ii. 419
Fuller, Dr. Thomas, i. 479; ii. 442
Fuller, Dr. William, ii. 196
Fulwood, i. 103
Gale, Theophilus, his Writings on Evidences of Natural Religion,
ii. 387
Garroway, i. 418, 421
Garthwaite, Thomas, ii. 457
Gasches, i. 52
Gataker, ii. 283, 284, 446
Gauden, John, i. 58, 114, 140, 150, 160, 230, 474
Consecrated Bishop of Exeter, 131, 132
Commissioner at the Savoy, 156, 163
Described by Baxter, 189
His Death, 306
Gaunt, Elizabeth, her Trial and Execution, ii. 98–100
Germain, St., i. 458
Gibbons, Grinling, ii. 189
Giffard, Bonaventura, ii. 139
Gifford, i. 439
Glanvill, Joseph, ii. 356
Glemham, Henry, Bishop of St. Asaph, i. 499
Gloucester, Duke of, i. 75, 77
Glynne, John, i. 152, 153
Godden, i. 117
Godfrey, Sir Edmondbury, ii. 3, 5, 8
Godolphin, Sidney, ii. 475
Godolphin, Margaret, ii. 231
Her Piety, 475–478
Goodridge, Richard, ii. 457
Goodwin, John, ii. 418
An Arminian, ii. 407
His Theological Opinions, 407, 409, 410, 450
Goodwin, Dr. Thomas, i. 294, 363; ii. 418, 419, 450
His Views on Baptism, ii. 170
Stand-points in his Theology: _Faith_, 397
_Election_, 398
_Regeneration_, 400
His Works compared with Owen’s, 401
His Views on Baptism, 430
On the Lord’s Supper, 432
His Commentaries, 447
Gordon, Catherine, ii. 377
Gother, John i. 453; ii. 117
Gough, Major-General, i. 259, 260
Gouge, ii. 246
Gower, Dr., i. 489
Gower, Sir Thomas, i. 313
Graffen, i. 150
Grafton, Duke of, ii. 130
Greathead, Thomas, i. 312
Greene, i. 283
Gregory, ii. 194
Greenhill, ii. 447
Grenville, Sir John, i. 60
Griffin, i. 211
Griffith, Bishop of St. Asaph, i. 290, 499
Griffiths, i. 363; ii. 65
Grimston, Mrs., her death, ii. 232
Grimston, Sir Harbottle, i. 61; ii. 232
Speaker of Convention Parliament, i. 58
Member of New Parliament, 153
Sketch of his Life, 506
Grindal, Bishop, i. 217, 254
Grosvenor, Sir Thomas, ii. 115
Grotius, ii. 279
Grove, i. 319; ii. 140
Guilford, _see_ North
Gunning, Peter, Bishop of Ely, i. 115, 220, 449, 502; ii. 11, 355
At Savoy Conference, i. 156, 163, 187
Described by Baxter, 189
His Intolerance, 397
His Death and Character, 489
Gurnal, i. 288; ii. 442
Gwynn, Nell, ii. 87, 141, 246
Hacker, i. 126, 202
Hacket, John, Bishop of Lichfield, i. 156, 248, 502
Account of him, 481–483
Labours in Restoration of his Cathedral, 481; ii. 180
Hagger, i. 476
Haines, ii. 115
Hale, Sir Matthew, i. 62, 68, 124, 202, 380; ii. 214
Draws up Comprehension Bill, i. 384
Sketch of his Life, ii. 478–481
Hales, Sir Edward, ii. 108
Hales, John, his Theological Teaching, ii. 338, 406
Halifax, Viscount, ii. 19, 93, 104
His Character, 41
A “Trimmer,” 42
Hall, George, Bishop of Chester, i. 263, 306
Hall, Dr., ii. 196, 198
Hamilton, Bishop of Galloway, i. 227
Hammond, Dr., i. 52; ii. 278, 330, 386
His Intimacy with Sanderson, 306
His Doctrinal Opinions, 307
His _Practical Catechism_, 307
His _Paraphrase_ and _Annotations_, 287, 333
Hampden, i. 67
Hanmer, Mrs., ii. 220
Harcourt, Count D’, ii. 76
Harcourt, Sir Philip, i. 464
Harding, Thomas, ii. 223
Hardy, i. 58
Preaches before the King at the Hague, 70
Hardy, Matthew, i. 199
Harrington, John, ii. 186
Harrison, Major-General, i. 5
His Trial and Execution, 128
Hart, Theophilus, ii. 202
Hartlib, Samuel, ii. 216
Hartopp, Sir John, i. 430
Haselrig, Sir Arthur, i. 5, 17, 20, 25, 34, 58, 126
Hatton, Sir Christopher, ii. 191
Havers, Henry, ii. 102
Hawes, Richard, i. 292
Haywood, Dr., i. 170
Heber, Bishop, ii. 294, 299
Hellier, ii. 176
Henchman, Dr. Humphrey, i. 222, 290, 491
His appointment to the Bishopric of Salisbury, 131
Commissioner at the Savoy, 156
Described by Baxter, 189
His Translation to the Bishopric of London, 492
His Death, 493
Henrietta, Maria, i. 84, 268
Henrietta, Duchess of Orleans, i. 451
Henry, Philip, i. 65, 138, 206, 207, 409, 512
His Difficulty with regard to Act of Uniformity, 263, 264
His Refusal to take Oath of Non-Resistance, 352
His Hospitality, ii. 219
His Home Life, 200
Henshaw, Joseph, Bishop of Peterborough, i. 493
Herbert, Sir Henry, ii. 393
Herbert, Lord, ii. 393
Herbert, George, ii. 237, 393
Hermann, Archbishop of Cologne, i. 216
Herrick, Robert, ii. 461
Heylyn, Dr. Peter, i. 112, 131, 158, 161; ii. 309, 316, 317, 395
Commissioner at the Savoy, i. 156
His Theology, ii. 288, 289
Heyricke, i. 283
Heywood, Nathaniel, i. 431; ii. 218
Heywood, Oliver, i. 207, 351, 409; ii. 160, 226
His Imprisonment, 71
Family Meeting, 218
Hickeringhill, i. 505
Hicks, ii. 98
Hobbes, The Malmesbury Philosopher, ii. 270, 304, 362
Hoghton, Sir Charles, ii. 224
Hoghton, Lady, ii. 224
Holcroft, Francis, i. 316
Holden, ii. 136
Holdsworth, ii. 160
Holles (or Hollis), i. 58, 86, 114
Holloway, one of the Judges at Baxter’s trial, ii. 153, 155
Hook, William, i. 286, 301, 302
Hooker, Richard, ii. 268, 277, 429
His _Ecclesiastical Polity_, 298, 324, 328, 434
Hookes, Ellis, i. 415
Horne, John, ii. 409
Horton, Dr., i. 156, 288
Hough, Dr. John, ii. 133–138
Howard, Lord, i. 23, 187
Howe, John, i. 26, 138, 194; ii. 29, 71, 103, 122, 223, 224, 426
His Difficulties with respect to the Act of Uniformity, i. 264
In Lord Massarene’s Family, 317
Defends cause of Nonconformists, ii. 27
Expostulates with Tillotson, 27
His Interview with the Duke of Buckingham, 40
His Sermon on Controversy, 69
His Writings on Evidences of Natural Religion, 388–390
His Puritanism, 421
His System of Theology, 421
Resemblance between his Teaching and Baxter’s, 427
His Original Power, 429
His Views on Baptism, 432
Hubberthorn, Richard, i. 275
Huish, Alexander, ii. 332
Hyde, Edward, Earl of Clarendon, i. 31, 71, 86, 95, 101, 105, 154,
159, 198, 231, 299, 311, 328; ii. 248
His Correspondence with Dr. Barwick, i. 36–38
Prime Minister, 83
His Attachment to Episcopal Church, 84
Proposes a Meeting between the Court and Presbyterians, 114
His Desire for the Restoration of the Establishment, 125
His Interview with Presbyterians, 190
Answerable for the Severity of the Act of Uniformity, 250
Opposes King’s Declaration, 300
Disapproves of Dutch War, 344
Resigns the Great Seal, 368
His Impeachment, 369
His Letter to his Daughter, 370
His Character, 371
Comparison between him and Lord Burleigh, 373, 374
His object, the Establishment of the Episcopal Church and
Crushing of Dissent, 374
Hyde, Laurence, Earl of Rochester, ii. 41, 43
Appointed Lord Treasurer, 92
Dismissed from Office, 105
Hyde, Dr. Alexander, i. 491
Hymnology, ii. 451
Ince, i. 319
Independents, during the Protectorate, i. 9
Their Meetings, 29
Lose their Political Influence, 48, 193
Their Address to the King, 79
Protest against Vernier’s Insurrection, 144
Their Ejection, 281
Their Hopes revive at King’s Declaration, 297
Return Thanks for Indulgence, 408
Their Numbers diminished, ii. 164
Their Declaration of Faith, 166–168
compared with Presbyterians, 168–170
With Baptists, 171
Accused of Schism, 320
Ingoldsby, i. 59, 60
Innocent XI., ii. 104–131
Ireland, i. 37
Consecration of Irish Bishops, 133
James II. establishes a Roman Catholic Hierarchy in Ireland,
ii. 114
Ireton, Henry, i. 130
Ironside, Gilbert, Bishop of Bristol, i. 494
Isle of Man, i. 134
Jackson, Commissioner at the Savoy, i. 156
Jacomb, Dr. Thomas, i. 120, 317
Commissioner at the Savoy Conference, 156, 165, 170, 187
His Farewell Sermon, 272
Preaches in London after the Fire, 363
His Views on Baptism, 432
His Death, 505
James, Duke of York, afterwards James II., i. 75, 304, 328, 425;
ii. 11, 21, 101
Supports Provisions for Uniformity, i. 252
Approves of Dutch War, 344
His Energy at the time of the Fire, 359
Pleads on behalf of Clarendon, 368
Becomes a Roman Catholic, 452
His Interview with Bishops, ii. 15
Exclusion Bill, 20, 23, 25
Bill dropped, 33
Becomes a Member of the Council, 81
Present at Death of Charles, 87
Meets his Privy Councillors, 89
His Duplicity, 90
Declares himself a Roman Catholic, 90
His Coronation, 92
His Annoyance with proceedings of House of Commons, 94
Violates the Constitution of his Country, 105
His Treatment of the Persecuted Sects, 106
His Declaration of Indulgence, 107, 119–125
His Policy, 108–118
His Attempt to establish Popery, 113–118
Receives D’Adda as the Pope’s Ambassador, 129
His anxiety for Promotion of Romanists, 131
Dissolves Parliament, 132
His Attack on the Universities, 132
Visits Oxford, 135
His Second Declaration, 139
His Displeasure with the _Seven_ Bishops, 147
Prosecutes them for a Misdemeanour, 149
Jeffreys, Judge, ii. 72, 98, 111, 132, 134
A Member of the Council, 81
Proposes Release of Popish Recusants, 82
His Political Power, 93
His Behaviour at Baxter’s Trial, 95
Jenkins, Sir Leoline, ii. 41, 43, 51, 59, 247
Jenkyn, William, ii. 84
Jermyn, Henry, ii. 104
Jessy, i. 211; ii. 175
Jews, Bill for their Suppression, i. 19
Jones, Colonel Philip, i. 16
Jordan, Elizabeth, ii. 175
Juxon, Dr., Bishop of London, i. 97, 174
His Translation to Canterbury, 131
Crowns and anoints Charles II., 160, 167
His Death, 307
Keach, Benjamin, ii. 444
His Hymns, 465, 467
Keeling, Sergeant, i. 202, 203, 349
Ken, Thomas, Bishop of Bath and Wells, ii. 87, 97, 278, 469
One of the _Seven_ Bishops, 141, 145
Kiffin, William, i. 211, 212; ii. 127, 175
Kildare, John, Earl of, ii. 225
Killegrew, Sir William, i. 54
King, Lancaster Herald, ii. 207
King, Henry, Bishop of Chichester, i. 98; ii. 457
Commissioner at the Savoy, i. 156, 160
Lake, Bishop of Chichester, one of the _Seven_ Bishops, ii. 140, 147
Lamb, Philip, i. 274
Lambert, i. 33, 44, 87, 126
Dissolves Remains of Long Parliament, 39, 40
His Outbreak, 58
Taken Prisoner, 59
His Son, ii. 225
Laney, Dr. Benjamin, i. 503
Appointed Bishop of Peterborough, 132
Commissioner at the Savoy, 156
Translated to Lincoln, then to Ely, 488; ii. 191
Latitudinarians, their Theology, ii. 262
At Cambridge, 267, 341–344
Expounders of their Tenets, 344–354
Term Latitudinarian applied to holders of very different
Opinions, 359–369
Lauderdale, a Member of the Cabal, i. 401, 427, 434
Lawson, George, ii. 410
Lee, Sir Thomas, i. 418
Leighton, Bishop of Dunblaine, i. 227
Leighton, Sir Ellis, ii. 115
Lenthall, i. 42, 126
Lesley, Henry, i. 133
L’Estrange, Hamon, i. 181; ii. 323
L’Estrange, Sir Roger, i. 269; ii. 45, 62, 84
Letters intercepted, i. 145, 151
Lewis, i. 58
Ley, Earl of Marlborough, ii. 490
Lightfoot, Dr., i. 156, 288
His Biblical learning, ii. 353
Lisle, Lady Alicia, her Trial and Execution, ii. 98
Littleton, Sir Charles, i. 145
Lloyd, William, Bishop of St. Asaph, i. 500; ii. 5, 28
One of the _Seven_ Bishops, 141, 142, 146
Lloyd, William, Bishop of Llandaff, i. 132
Translated to Peterborough, and then to Norwich, 502; ii. 28, 204
Lobb, Stephen, ii. 122
Locke, John, i. 292, 422
Expelled from Oxford, ii. 257
Lords, House of, Charles’ Letter from Breda, i. 61
Conferences between the two Houses, 62
Bill for restoring Prelates, 198, 199
Uniformity Bill, 204
Bill for repealing Statutes concerning Jesuits and
Nonconformists, 205
Pretended Plots reported, 210
Appoint Committee for Revision of Prayer Book, 219
Uniformity Bill, 229, 230, 232, 235, 241
Less intolerant than the Commons, 250
Bills against Papists and Nonconformists not sanctioned by them,
304
Disapprove of Exclusion Bill, ii. 11
Louis XIV., i. 355, 397, 420, 429; ii. 12, 76, 114
His Treaty with Charles II., i. 451
Love, Alderman, i. 148, 419, 421
Lucy, Bishop of St. David, i. 132
Ludlow, Edmund, i. 5, 20
Supports Republicanism, 58
Flies to Vevay, 258
Luzancy, i. 458
Lye, Thomas, i. 278
Manchester, Earl of, i. 58, 85, 100, 114, 283, 380
Mansel, Colonel, ii. 21
Manton, Dr., i. 16, 18, 68, 115, 120, 283, 302, 394, 408, 439;
ii. 223
Commissioner at the Savoy, i. 156, 190
Preaches in London after the Fire, 362
His account of Interview between the King and Presbyterians, 390
His Imprisonment, 397
His Commentaries, ii. 447
Markham, Major, i. 367
Marten, Henry, tried as a Regicide, i. 129
Dies in Prison, 130, 232
Martindale, Adam, i. 119
Marvell, Andrew, i. 222
His Satires, 446, 449, 464
Mary of Modena, Queen of James II., i. 452; ii. 90, 92
Mason, John, ii. 462–464
Massarene, Lord, i. 317
Massey, John, ii. 109
Maynard, Sir John, i. 145, 152, 153, 203
Mazarin, i. 58; ii. 76
Mead, William, i. 398
Meades, Dr., ii. 201
Meal Tub Plot, ii. 21, 22
Meres, Sir Thomas, i. 418, 420; ii. 94
Mew, Bishop of Winchester, ii. 97
Middleton, Sir Thomas, i. 33, 34
Milles, Isaac, i. 510
Milton, John, ii. 285, 452
His Lament for the Commonwealth, i. 47
His Theological Opinions; ii. 362–365
His Translation of Psalms, 458
Milton, Sir Christopher, brother of the Poet, ii. 115
Mompesson, i. 341
Monk, i. 68, 77, 114, 141, 230, 245, 475
His Military Power, 44
Believed to be a Republican, 45
Issues Writs for re-filling Parliament, 46
Addresses Parliament, 48
Declares his devotion to Charles, 56
His Character, 56
Hastens the Restoration, 62
Meets the King at Dover, 75
Invested with the Order of the Garter, 76
Created Duke of Albemarle, 86
His Burial in Westminster Abbey, ii. 187
Monk, Nicholas, Bishop of Hereford, i. 306, 487
Monmouth, Duke of, ii. 33, 49
His pretensions to the Crown, 60, 62
His Execution, 97
Chancellor of Cambridge in 1674, 254
Moore, Thomas, i. 413–415
More, Henry, his Mysticism, ii. 385, 454
His Religious Life and Character, 482–485
Morley, Dr., i. 52, 169, 231, 245, 248, 435, 437, 502; ii. 15, 320
Appointed Bishop of Worcester, i. 131
Commissioner at the Savoy, 156, 163
Preaches at Coronation, 160, 167
Described by Baxter, 189
Bishop of Winchester from 1662 to 1684, 435, 477
His Inconsistencies, 439
His Old Age, 478
His _Vindication_; ii. 36
Expends Money in Charity, 192
His Theological Learning, 302
Morrice, Secretary, i. 122, 124
Morton, Bishop of Durham, i. 388, 487
Moulin, Lewis du, ii. 44, 102
Muggletonians, ii. 208
Mylles, Dr., ii. 195
Mystics, ii. 262, 369–385, 482
Neile, Dr. John, ii. 197
Nelson, Robert, ii. 115
Nelson, Lady Theophila, ii. 115
Neville, i. 19
Newcastle, Duke of, ii. 58
Newcome, Henry, i. 65, 353; ii. 242
Newcomen, Commissioner at the Savoy, i. 156, 165, 170
Newton, George, i. 274; ii. 494
Newton, Isaac, ii. 132
Nicholas, Sir Edward, i. 85, 123, 124, 293
Nicholas, John, i. 157
Nicholson, William, Bishop of Gloucester, i. 492
Nonconformists, i. 57, 144, 149, 207, 292, 384
Their Sufferings, 135–138
Accused of being Disaffected, 210
Act of Uniformity, 255
Effects of the Act, 261
Their Farewell Sermons, 271–275, 278, 279
Their Ejectment, 278, 282, 286
Bills against them, 304
Their Assemblies treated as Revolutionary, 308
Nonconformists in the Colonies, 311
Informers against them, 313
Their Places of Worship, 314–316
Ejected Ministers, 316–320, 336, 362
Their Sufferings from Conventicle Act, 322–327, 388
From Five Mile Act, 345–354
New Conventicle Act, 395–398
A change in feeling towards them, 400
Declaration of Indulgence affected them, 404
Receive Pecuniary Assistance from the Crown, 411
Measures for their Relief, 421–424
How affected by Test Act and Cancelling of Declaration, 429
Their changeful Fortunes, 442
Their dislike of Romanism, 454
Conformist’s Plea for them, ii. 37
Duke of Buckingham’s Overtures to them, 40
Renewed Persecution of them, 41, 50–59, 71–75, 100–103
Disposition of Government towards them, 95
Their manner of receiving James’ Declaration, 122–128
Their Places of Worship, 205
Relative number of Conformists and Nonconformists, 207
Contrasts in Preaching, 209
Family Life, 217–226
Family Persecution, 227
Accused of Schism, 320
Their Observance of the Sabbath, 234
Recreations, 241
Nonconformity, its growth, i. 375–377; ii. 159–179
Norfolk, Duke of, ii. 90
North, Dr. John, ii. 230, 251
North, Roger, ii. 181, 193
North, Sir Francis, Baron Guilford, ii. 46, 81–84
Northumberland, Earl of, i. 229, 294
Nowell, Charles, ii. 226
Nye, Philip, i. 45, 91, 194, 297
Oates, Thomas, i. 312
Oates, Titus, his Extravagant Stories, ii. 6, 7, 49, 95, 143
Okey, Colonel, i. 60, 256
Oldham, John, ii. 459
Ormond, Duke of, i. 84, 86, 114, 284; ii. 93, 255
Ormond, Lady, i. 141
Orrery, Earl of, i. 438
Osborne, Thomas, Earl of Danby, i. 348
Minister of Charles II., i. 434; ii. 2
His Policy, 435, 436, 463
His Fall, ii. 2
His Impeachment, 13, 19
Osmund, Bishop of Salisbury, i. 214
Outram, i. 439
Overall, Bishop, i. 219
Overton, Major-General, i. 21
Owen, Dr. John, i. 18, 29, 45, 194, 411, 430, 433; ii. 26, 65, 212,
222, 365, 367, 419
His Opinion on the Power of Magistrates and Maintenance of
Ministers, i. 30, 31
His removal from Deanery of Christ Church, 50
Means of Support after his Ejection, 316
His Refusal to take Oath of Non-Resistance, 351
His loyal Address, 408;
His Answer to Parker’s Attack on Nonconformists, 446
His Illness, ii. 69, 223
His Death, 70
His Views on Baptism, 170, 430
On the Observance of the Sabbath, 235
His Writings on the Evidences of Revealed Religion, 390
His Works compared with Thomas Goodwin’s, 401
His Treatise on the _Doctrine of Justification_, 401
His Views on Election and Particular Redemption, 403–405
His Defence of Nonconformity, 440
His Commentaries, 447
Oxford, _see_ Universities
Packington, Sir John, i. 145, 212
Packington, Lady, ii. 330
Palmer, i. 309
Parker, Samuel, his Attack on Nonconformists, i. 444–447
Appointed to the Bishopric of Oxford, ii. 109
Nominated President of Magdalen, 134–138
Parliament, i. 38, 303, 361
Opening of Richard Cromwell’s Parliament, i. 18
Debates, 19–24
Its Dissolution, 24
Members of Long summoned to resume their places, 24
Its Dissolution by Lambert, 39
Again restored, 42
Convention Parliament, 57
Letter to the King, 63
Ecclesiastical proceedings, 88–95
Acts of Indemnity and Oblivion, 126
Elections for a New Parliament, 147–152
Assembles, 154
Order League and Covenant to be burnt, 196
Bill against Quakers, 197
For restoring Prelates, 197
For governing Corporations, 199
For Restoration of Ecclesiastical Courts, 200
Parliament Reassembles, 209
Reports respecting Plots, 212
Conventicle Acts, 322–327, 396
At Oxford during the Plague, 343
Five Mile Act, 345–354
Debate on Declaration, 418
Relief Bill, 421-424
Test Act, 425
Cancel Declaration, 429
New Test, 436
Comprehension, 438–440
Debate on a Dissolution, 461
Four Lords sent to the Tower, 462
Bills against Popery, 463
Act for Better Observance of Lord’s Day, 465
For Repeal of the law _De Hæretico Comburendo_, 467
Exclusion Bill, ii. 10
Parliament Dissolved, 13
Third Parliament Meets and Dissolves, 20
Fourth Parliament, 20
Dangerfield’s Plot, 21
Exclusion Bill, 23–25
Bill for Comprehension, 29
Bill for Toleration laid aside by a trick, 30
Fifth Parliament, 31
Exclusion Bill, 32
Assembling of James II.’s Parliament, 93
Its Dissolution, 132
Parliamentary Returns, 201
Pascal, Blaise, i. 277, 455
Patrick, Dr. John, ii. 457
Patrick, Simon, i. 338; ii. 140, 354
Paul, Thomas, ii. 175
Paul, William, Bishop of Oxford, i. 490
Paul’s, St., i. 357; ii. 181
Payne, ii. 70
Peachell, Dr. John, ii. 132
Pearce, Dr. Thomas, i. 174
Pearson, John, Bishop of Chester, i. 175, 485, 503; ii. 289
Commissioner at Savoy Conference, i. 156, 163
Described by Baxter, 189
His Theological Teaching, ii. 308, 311
Peirce, Sir Edmond, i. 204
Pell, i. 221
Pembroke, Earl of, i. 230
Penn, William, i. 129, 398; ii. 101, 125
Charges against him, 126
Incidents in his Early Life, 369
His Exposition of the Doctrine of Inward Light, 371-374
Travels with Fox, 375
His Colony in America, 375
His Intimacy with Barclay, 377
Pennington, Isaac, i. 129
Pepys, Samuel, i. 47, 68, 258, 271, 340, 380–386; ii. 115
Perinchief, Dr., i. 378
Peterborough, Earl of, i. 115
Peters, Hugh, i. 45
His Execution, 128
Petre, Father, ii. 104, 131
Pett, Sir Peter, i. 292, 484
Petties, Sir John, i. 432
Piers, or Pearce, Bishop of Bath and Wells, i. 97
Pierrepoint, i. 58
Plague, The, i. 333, 343
Plots, Rumours of, i. 292–295, 312
Popish, ii. 1-10
Meal Tub, 21
Rye House, 64
Pocock, ii. 332
Pokanoket, Indian Chief, i. 260
Pool (or Poole), Matthew, his _Synopsis_, i. 410; ii. 354, 446
Pory, Dr., i. 177
Powell, one of the Judges at the Bishops’ Trial, ii. 153, 155
Powis, Lady, ii. 21
Powys, ii. 153
Prayer Book, Reintroduced, i. 91
Commission for Revising it, 155
Exceptions taken to the Liturgy, 170–173
Bishops’ Answers to Exceptions, 179
Baxter’s Additions, 180–182
Discussions on Liturgy, 184, 187
Search for Edward’s Prayer Book, 201
Its Revision, 213
History of the Book, 214–219
Alterations made, 220–222
Adopted and Subscribed, 223
Revised Copy sanctioned by the King, 229
Attached to Act of Uniformity, 244
Revised Edition published, 260
Episcopalians’ Attachment to it, ii. 323
Presbyterianism, i. 68, 88
Its Revival, 20
Re-established as the National Religion, 49
Innovations in the Old System, ii. 159–163
Differences between Independency and Presbyterianism, 168
Resemblances, 170
Presbyterians, during the Protectorate, i. 5, 8, 10
In Richard Cromwell’s Parliament, 17
Their Loyalty to the Stuarts, 33
Their Rising put down by Republicans, 33
Contend for Solemn League, 41
Power again in their hands, 48
Principal Instruments in Charles’ Restoration, 51
Their Influence over Monk, 51
Union between them and Episcopalians thought to be possible, 53
Their wish to control the King, 55
Their Efforts in Elections for a New Parliament, 57
Deputation visit Charles at the Hague, 68
Their Intolerance, 69
Are kept in Suspense, 83
Their Clergy Displaced, 89
Chaplains appointed at Court, 100
Meetings at Sion College, 102–107
Their anxiety for Union, 102
Their Proposals, 103
Defend their Proposals, 106
Receives a Draft of Royal Declaration, 107
Difference between the two parties, 107–112
Divines at Worcester House, 115
Present an Address to the King, 120
Change in their Affairs, 125
Numerous in Convention Parliament, 147
Not well represented in New Parliament, 152
Commissioners at Savoy Conference, 155
Their Exceptions to Liturgy, 172–173
Their Rejoinder to Bishops’ Answers, 183
Their Debate with Bishops, 184–187
Interview with Clarendon, 190
Their Attachment to the Covenant, 237
Their Conduct with regard to the Act of Uniformity, 263
Their Petition for Redress, 283
Some Conform, 288
Some remain in the Establishment without Conforming, 290
Disapprove of Declaration, 298
Scheme of Comprehension as Modified by them, 383
Their Interview with the King, 390
Differ in their Opinion of the Declaration, 406
Their Desire for _Accommodation_, 439
Persecuted, ii. 71
Become more Tolerant, 163
Thorndike accuses them of Schism, 320
Pride, Thomas, i. 130
Prideaux, Bishop of Worcester, ii. 288
Prynne, William, i. 24, 43, 89, 121, 153, 455
Psalms, New Versions, ii. 457–459
Pudsey, Dr., ii. 135
Puritanism, Failure of Puritanism as a Political Institution, i. 1-6
Its Ecclesiastical Aspect, 7–11
Its Spiritual Aspect, 11-13
Puritans, ii. 262–265
Their Works on Evidences, 386–394
Points of Resemblance between them and the Anglican Divines, 394
Points of Difference, 396
Divided into Three Classes:
Calvinistic, 397;
Arminian, 406–413;
Intermediate, 414
Their Opinions on the Nature of Sacraments, 430
On the Ministry and Ordination, 434
Their Controversies, 435
Practical Theology, 442–446
Expositors, 446
Examples of their Piety, 494–505
Quakers, opposed to Union of Church and State, i. 9
Bill for their Suppression, 19
Their Sufferings, 137, 138; ii. 75, 101
Forbidden to meet in large numbers, i. 143
Bill against them, 197
Released from Gaol, 275
Persecuted, 296
Suffer under Conventicle Act, 398
Released from Prison, 413
James II.’s Treatment of them, 107
Differ from other Nonconformists in Doctrinal Opinions, 177
Their Form of Church Government, 177, 178
Their Method of Marriage, 179
Their Doctrines, 264, 266
Penn an Expounder of their Principles, 369
His Exposition of the Doctrine of the Inward Light, 371, 374
Barclay, 377
His Theological Teaching, 378–380
John Burnyeat, 492, 494
Quarles, Francis, his Emblems, ii. 455
Querouaille, Duchess of Portsmouth, i. 451
Racovian Catechism, ii. 365, 367
Radnor, Lord, ii. 41
Rainbow, Dr. Edward, i. 493
Rawlinson, i. 156
Reeve, Dr., i. 208
Republicans, i. 5, 21, 22, 33, 34, 40
Reresby, Sir John, i. 458
Reynolds, Dr., i. 18, 50, 68, 191, 220, 230, 245, 290; ii. 229
Appointed Chaplain at Court, i. 100
At Worcester House, 115
Accepts a Bishopric, 119
Member of Conference, 155, 164, 170, 183
His Peculiar Position, 179
Described by Baxter, 189
His Character, 485
His Writings, ii. 442
Richardson, Dr., i. 312
Richmond, Duke of, i. 245
Roberts, Bishop of Bangor, i. 97
Robinson, Sir John, i. 148
Rochester, Earl of, _see_ Laurence Hyde
Rochester, Earl of, _see_ Wilmot
Rogers, i. 140
Roman Catholics, i. 19, 78, 363, 404, 460; ii. 113, 117
Their Concurrence in Act of Uniformity, i. 251
Their Prospects brighten, 298
Bills against them, 304, 361
How affected by Test Act, 425, 429
Their Hopes in the Royal Family, 450
Their Zeal in making Converts, 453
Proclamations concerning them, 456
Popish Books Seized, 459
Bills against Popery, 303, 463–465
Titus Oates’ Popish Plot, ii. 1-9
Suspected Persons Apprehended, 6
Exclusion Bill, 10
At Court, 104
Their Numbers increase, 115
Their Satisfaction with James II.’s Declaration, 119
Their Promotion, 131
Their Numbers, 209
Rosewell, Thomas, ii. 72, 123
Roughed, Josias, i. 409
Rous, Lady, i. 318
Rous, ii. 457
Royalists, i. 43, 66, 151
Rupert, Prince, i. 142
Rushworth, ii. 195
Russel, Lord William, i. 418; ii. 20, 41, 153
Joins in an Attempt to resist the Despotism of Government, 64
His Trial and Execution, 65–67
Rustat, Tobias, ii. 245
Rutherford, Lord, i. 293
Rye House Plot, ii. 64
Rymer, Ralph, i. 313
Ryves, Dr. Bruno, i. 91
Sabran, ii. 117
Salisbury, Earl of, i. 462; ii. 115
Salkeld, ii. 206
Saltmarsh, John, his _Sparkles of Glory_, ii. 380–383
Samwayes, Dr., i. 213
Sancroft, i. 93, 132, 221, 225; ii. 90, 192, 330
Assists Pell to Revise the Calendar, i. 221
Created Archbishop of Canterbury, ii. 14
His Interview with the Duke of York, 15
His Opposition to Popery, 17
Sanctions the Publication of King’s Declaration, 35
His Inconsistency with regard to Declaration, 145
One of the Seven Bishops who signed the Petition, 140, 146, 150
His Trial, 153
His Acquittal, 155
His Interest in Rebuilding of St. Paul’s, 181
Sanderson, Bishop of Lincoln, i. 156, 187, 231, 248; ii. 283, 406,
438
His Death, i. 306
His Manner of Preaching, ii. 209
His Approval of Sabbath Pastimes, 235
His Doctrinal Opinions, 305
His Intimacy with Hammond, 306
And with Isaak Walton, 469
Saville, Sir George, i. 366
Savoy Conference, i. 155, 163–167, 170–173, 179–188
Savoy Palace, i. 162
Sawyer, ii. 153
Scargill, Daniel, ii. 368
Scattergood, i. 225
Sclater, Edward, ii. 109
Scotch, their Anxiety for an Exclusive Presbyterian Establishment,
i. 68
Their Religious Rising, 363
Cruelty to them, 364
Their Rebellion, ii. 97
Scott, i. 20, 58
Severne, Thomas, i. 284
Shaftesbury, Earl of, _see_ Sir A. A. Cooper
Shakerley, Sir Geoffry, i. 367; ii. 61
Sharp, Dr., Agent in London of Scotch Presbyterians, i. 63, 68–69,
94
Sharp, Dr., ii. 110, 112
Shaw, Sir John, ii. 502
Shaw, Samuel, i. 342
Sheldon, Dr. Gilbert, i. 99, 122, 170, 221, 231, 248, 285, 296,
330, 331, 334, 348, 397, 415, 502; ii. 145, 188
His Appointment to the Bishopric of London, i. 131
Master of the Savoy, 157
Officiates at Coronation of Charles II., 160
Commissioner at the Savoy, 156, 163
President of Convocation, 174
His Appointment to Archbishopric of Canterbury, 308
His Exertions during the Plague, 337
His Inquiries respecting Conventicles, 392
His Circular on Education, 402
His Death and Character, 470–473
His Expenditure of Large Sums in Charity, ii. 192
Sherlock, Dr., ii. 110, 117, 140
Shorter, Sir John, ii. 125
Sibthorpe, Dr., i. 131
Sidney, Algernon, i. 344
His Trial and Execution, ii. 64, 65
Sidney, Henry, ii. 92
Skinker, Mary, ii. 175
Skinner, Bishop of Oxford, i. 37, 97
Translated to Worcester, 491
Slader, ii. 201
Slatius, Henry, ii. 412
Smalridge, ii. 117
Smith, Dr., ii. 332
Smith, John, ii. 421
His Theological Teaching, 336–338
Smith, Thomas, i. 93
Smyth, Miles, ii. 457
Soame, Bartholomew, ii. 225
Solemn League and Covenant, i. 50, 89, 235–237
Publicly Burnt, 196
Somerset, Duke of, ii. 130
South, ii. 257, 329
Southampton, Earl of, i. 85, 86, 124, 300, 347
Sparrow, Dr., Commissioner at the Savoy i. 156
Spencer, John, ii. 444
Spragg, Sir Edward, i. 416
Sprat, Bishop of Rochester, ii. 111, 139
Spring, Sir William, ii. 206
Sprint, i. 478
Spurstow, Dr., i. 100, 115, 156
Stayley, ii. 6
Stanley, Thomas, i. 342
Stanley, Lady, ii. 219
Stanley, Sir Thomas, ii. 219
Steel, i. 261
Sterne, Richard, Bishop of Carlisle, i. 132
At Savoy Conference, 156, 493
Described by Baxter, 189
Translated to Archbishopric of York, 493, 497
His Imprisonment, 495
Sterry, Peter, ii. 382
Stillingfleet, Edward, i. 117, 385, 410, 439; ii. 2, 114, 140, 370
His Disapproval of Act of Uniformity, i. 292
His Sermon on “The Mischief of Separation,” ii. 26
Entertains Howe, Bates, and Tillotson, 29
His Theological Opinions, 352
Stockton, Owen, i. 340; ii. 500–504
Strode, John, ii. 51
Stubbe, Henry, ii. 355
Suffolk, Earl of, i. 167
Sunderland, ii. 19, 93, 104, 135
Sutcliffe, Dr., ii. 245
Sylvester, his Funeral Sermon for Baxter, ii. 212
Taswell, William, i. 358
Tattersall, Nicholas, i. 412
Taylor, Jeremy, ii. 235, 278, 318, 386, 416, 429, 457
Nominated to Diocese of Down and Connor, i. 133
Preaches Funeral Sermon for Bramhall, 307
His Theology; ii. 289–297
Advocates an Episcopal Church, 298
A brilliant Sermon Writer, 328
His Writings, 445, 446
His Hymns, 460
Temple, Sir William, appointed Secretary of State, ii. 19, 41
Tenison, Archbishop of Canterbury, i. 243; ii. 117
When Vicar of St. Marten’s, ii. 140
Founds the Tenison Library, i. 508
Terrill, ii. 177
Thompson, Alderman, i. 148
Thorndike, Herbert, i. 112; ii. 235, 316, 332, 395, 424, 431
His _Epilogue_, i. 34–36; ii. 269
At Savoy Conference, i. 156
Member of Convocation, 170, 222, 227, 248
His _True Principle of Comprehension_, 385
His Theological Learning, ii. 268
His Principles of Christian Truth, 270
His Scheme of Salvation by Grace, 272–277
Laws of the Church, 277–279
His teaching compared with Bull’s, 287
With Taylor’s, 294
With Pearson’s, 309
Barrow’s, 314
His opinion of Nonconformists, 320
Thurloe, Secretary, i. 55
Tillotson, i. 184, 439; ii. 29, 47, 79, 117, 140, 246, 316, 348
His Letter to Baxter, i. 440
His Inconsistency, ii. 27
Reproved by Howe, 28
Attends Russell on the Scaffold, 67
Tilsey, i. 291
Tindal, ii. 115
Tombes, John, i. 317; ii. 283, 285
Tomkyns, i. 378
Tompson, Sir John, i. 430
Tompson, Lady, i. 430
Tongue, ii. 9
Tory, Origin of Term, ii. 32
Trelawny, Bishop of Bristol, ii. 141, 147, 189
Truman, Joseph, ii. 283
Tuckney, Dr., i. 155, 489
Tully, Dr. Thomas, ii. 196, 283, 284
Turbeville, ii. 49
Turner, Bishop of Ely, ii. 140
Turner, Sir Edward, i. 155
Turner, Sir James, i. 363
Tyrconnel, Earl of, ii. 104
Uniformity (_see_ Act)
Universities, their Petitions to Parliament, i. 92
Changes at Oxford and Cambridge, 93
Puritan Power at Cambridge, 93
James II.’s Attack on their Liberties, ii. 132
Proceedings at Cambridge, 132
Proceedings at Oxford, 133–139
Studies and Habits of Members, 250–258
Ussher, Dr. James, i. 100; ii. 278, 406
His Biblical Learning, 354
Vane, Sir Henry, i. 5, 20, 21, 26, 49, 126, 140, 202
Member of Richard’s Parliament, 17
Member of New Council of State, 25
His Trial, 257
His Mysticism, 256; ii. 385
His Execution, i. 258
Vane, Lady, i. 366
Venner, his Insurrection, i. 140–144
Vernon, Alderman, i. 64
Vic, Sir Henry de, i. 124
Vincent, Nathaniel, ii. 54–56
Vincent, Thomas, i. 338, 339; ii. 54
Vincent, William, i. 148
Vines, Richard, ii. 503
Visitation, Articles of, ii. 183–185, 189
Wade, Thomas, ii. 502
Wake, ii. 117
Wakerley, i. 313
Wales, i. 19, 137
Walker, Obadiah, ii. 109
Waller, Edmund, ii. 454
Wallis, Dr. John, i. 115, 156, 170, 288; ii. 198
Walters, Lucy, ii. 60
Walters, ii. 139
Walton, Bryan, Bishop of Chester, i. 131, 156
His Death, 306
His Polyglott, ii. 332, 354
Walton, Isaak, ii. 468–471
Ward, Seth, Bishop of Exeter, afterwards Bishop of Salisbury,
i. 264, 348, 385, 395, 478, 483, 502; ii. 192, 356
His Intolerance, i. 397, 435–437
Account of him, 474–476
Improves Exeter Cathedral, ii. 180
His Hospitality, 229
Warmestry, Dr., i. 157
Warner, Bishop of Rochester, i. 98, 490
Commissioner at the Savoy, 156, 160
Warwick, Countess of, ii. 488, 489
Watson, Richard, ii. 417
Whalley, Edward, Major-General, i. 23, 259, 260
Wharton, Philip, Lord, i. 126, 230, 231, 313, 347; ii. 71
Supports the Duke of Buckingham, i. 461
Committed to the Tower, 462
Released, 462
His House a resort of Nonconformist Divines, ii. 223
Whig, Origin of Term, ii. 32
Whinnel, ii. 176
White, Jeremy, ii. 101, 384
White, Bishop of Peterborough, ii. 141
White, John, ii. 457
Whitehead, George, i. 414
Whitelocke, i. 25, 45
Whitford, John, i. 91
_Whole Duty of Man_, ii. 330
Wilde, i. 120
Wilkins, Dr. John, Bishop of Chester, i. 16, 264, 380, 385, 396,
503; ii. 248, 356
Account of him, i. 483–485
His Theological teaching, ii. 348
Wilkinson, Lady Vere, i. 430
Williams, Dr. Edward, ii. 417, 419
Williams, Solicitor-General, ii. 153
Williamson, Joseph, Esq. (afterwards knighted), i. 365, 367, 410,
432, 442, 456; ii. 182, 193, 253, 255
Wilmot, John, Earl of Rochester; ii. 490
Windsor, Lord, i. 145
Wiquefort, De, Dutch Minister, i. 231, 232, 267
Witchcot, i. 439
Wither, George, ii. 459
Wood, Captain Henry, ii. 190
Wood, Thomas, Bishop of Lichfield and Coventry, i. 500; ii. 139
Woodbridge, i. 156
Woodford, Dr. Samuel, ii. 457
Woodhead, Abraham, i. 453; ii. 330
Woodward, William, ii. 201
Worcester House, i. 114
Worth, Dr., i. 103
Wren, Bishop of Ely, i. 37, 97, 488, 502
Wren, Sir Christopher, ii. 181
Wright, Chief Justice, ii. 153–155
Wyche, Sir Cyril, i. 243
Wycherley, ii. 115
Wylde, Recorder, i. 148
Yarrington, Captain, i. 212
York, Duke of (_see_ James II.)
Young, ii. 176
Vol. I.
Page 34, line 28, _Henry_, should be _Herbert_.
„ 160, „ 7, _Convocation_ „ _Coronation_.
„ 181, „ 6, _Hammond_ „ _Hamon_.
„ 277, „ 11, _Edward_ „ _Edmund_.
UNWIN BROTHERS, PRINTERS, BUCKLERSBURY, LONDON.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] _Burnet_, _Rapin_, _Hume_, and _Lingard_, give numerous
particulars, but the account I have presented is drawn from _A True
Narrative of the Horrid Plot and Conspiracy of the Popish Party against
the Life of His Majesty, the Government, and the Protestant Religion_,
by Titus Oates himself, published 1679.
In the Dedication there is a sentiment expressed worthy of a better
man. “It is a false suggestion,” says Oates, “which such tempters use,
that a King that rules by will is more great and glorious than a King
that rules by law:--the quality of the retinue best proves the state
of the lord; the one being but a king of slaves, while the other, like
God, is a king of kings and hearts.”
I have before me a narrative of “the horrid Popish plot,” by Capt.
W. Bedloe, 1679; another by Miles Prance, 1679; and a collection of
letters relating to it published by order of the House of Commons,
1681. Oates’ narrative, which, though dated the 27th of September,
1678, was not published until the following April, contains a digested
statement, in eighty-one items, of all the particulars which he had
alleged.
[2] The letters are published in the collection just named. Some are in
_Rapin_, iii. 171.
[3] _History of his Own Time_, i. 434.
[4] _Life of Calamy_, i. 83.
[5] Defoe quoted in _Knight’s Hist. of England_, iv. 335.
[6] Stayley was executed November 26th, Coleman December 3rd.
[7] In the _Moneys for Secret Services_, published by the Camden
Society, are numerous entries of sums paid to Oates and others.
Curious references to Oates’ character as an impostor, may be found in
_Reresby’s Memoirs_, 239, and _North’s Lives_, i. 325.
[8] _State Papers, Dom. Charles II._, 1678, November 1, December
(without further date), and December 28. It would divert attention from
the main current of this history to go fully into Oates’ plot. The
historical student will find a bundle of papers bearing on the subject
under date 1678, and further papers on the same subject under 1679,
January to June.
[9] Lord Keeper North “was of opinion that the fiction of the
Popish Plot did not arise from the accident of Tongue’s and Oates’
informations, but from a preconcerted design.” The reasons are given in
a MS. of North’s, printed in _Dalrymple’s Memoirs_, ii. app. 320. That
the plot was _invented_ by Shaftesbury there seems no sufficient ground
for believing. See _Campbell’s Lives of Lord Chancellors_, iv. 197.
[10] _Rapin_, iii. 172. Evelyn says, “For my part I look on Oates as a
vain insolent man, puffed up with the favour of the Commons, for having
discovered something really true, more especially as detecting the
dangerous intrigue of Coleman, proved out of his own letters, and of
a general design which the Jesuited party of the Papists ever had and
still have, to ruin the Church of England.”--_Diary_, ii. 140.
[11] _Commons’ Journals_, October 28. “The Oath of Supremacy was
already taken by the Commons, though not by the Lords; and it is a
great mistake to imagine that Catholics were legally capable of sitting
in the Lower House before the Act of 1679” (1678).--_Hallam’s Const.
Hist._, ii. 121.
[12] _Burnet_, _Hist. of his Own Times_, i. 436.
[13] _Journals_, Nov. 21 and 30; _Lingard_, xii. 151, 152. Reresby
says, (_Memoirs_, 230), “In April, 1680, I went to London to solicit
some business at Court, but the application of all men being to the
Duke, who quite engrossed the King to himself, His Highness had but
little leisure to give ear to, or assist his friends.”
[14] _North’s Lives_, i. 340.
[15] _Sir Thomas Browne’s Works_, i. 241. This relates to a second
election for Norwich in the month of May, the first having been set
aside. It illustrates both the excitement and the custom of the times.
The general election took place in February.
[16] _Evelyn’s Diary_, ii. 136.
[17] Quoted in _D’Oyley’s Life of Sancroft_, i. 165–176.
[18] _Life of James II._, i. 539.
[19] _Wilkins_, iv. 606.
[20] _Ibid._, iv. 600.
[21] _Wilkins_, iv. 605; _Sancroft’s Life by D’Oyley_, i. 186.
[22] _Wilkins_, iv. 607.
[23] _Tanner MSS._, 32, 208; _Life of Sancroft_, i. 204. D’Oyley
conjecturally assigns this document to the reign of Charles, but he is
not sure it may not belong to the reign of James.
[24] Sir W. Temple, in his _Memoirs_, part iii., gives an account of
the plan and working of this Council. His object was to enable the
Crown to manage the Commons, by making the Crown, as far as possible,
independent of the Commons. After noticing the wealth of the Council
in revenues of land or offices as amounting to £300,000 per annum,
whilst that of the House of Commons seldom exceeded £400,000, he
adds, “And authority is observed much to follow land, and, at the
worst, such a Council might, out of their own stock, and upon a pinch,
furnish the King so far as to relieve some great necessity of the
Crown.”--_Temple’s Works_, vol. i. 414. He says (436) he told the Duke
of York, “he might always reckon upon me as a legal man, and one that
would always follow the Crown as became me.” These passages seem to be
overlooked by some historians, in estimating the nature and objects of
Temple’s scheme.
[25] April 30, 1679.--_Parl. Hist._ iv. 1128.
[26] The Habeas Corpus Act was passed during the spring of 1679.
[27] _Burnet’s Hist. of his Own Time_, i. 475.
[28] “The information of Dangerfield, delivered at the bar of the
Commons, the 26th of October, 1680.” _Lords’ Journals_, Nov. 15, 1680.
_State Trials._ _Burnet_, i. 475 and 637. _Lingard_, xii. 227, _et
seq._ Dangerfield died from a blow, struck whilst he was being whipped.
[29] Dated August 25. Received September 1.--_State Papers._
[30] _Parl. Hist._ iv. 1162, _et seq._ Again let me refer the reader to
Fox, _Hist. of James_ ii., p. 311, for some admirable remarks on this
whole question, politically considered.
[31] _Sommers’ Tracts_ i. 97.
[32] _Parl. Hist._ iv. 1197, _et seq._; _Rapin_, iii. 198, _et seq._
[33] _Reresby’s Memoirs_, 234. He says that the speech of Halifax, “so
all confessed, influenced the House, and persuaded them to throw out
the Bill.” The debate took place on the 15th of November.
[34] _Rogers’ Life of Howe_, 181.
[35] _Calamy’s Life of Baxter_, 354.
[36] _Rogers’ Life of Howe_, 183.
[37] _Ibid._, 187.
[38] “Tillotson’s conduct on this occasion places his amiable character
in the fairest light. One can hardly regret that he committed
a fault for which he so nobly atoned, and which has furnished
us with so impressive an example of ingenuousness, candour, and
humility.”--_Rogers’ Life of Howe_, 190.
[39] There were two Bishop Lloyds at the time; one of Norwich, the
other of St. Asaph, consecrated October 3, 1680. It was most likely the
latter. We shall meet with him as one of the seven Bishops committed to
the Tower in 1688.
[40] _Life of Howe_, 191, 192.
[41] _Kennet_ quoted in _Neal_, iv. 496.
[42] Dec. 30, 1680. “The Commons have before them a Bill of
comprehension and a Bill for indulgence. The latter is proposed very
full and clear, requiring nothing but subscription to Thirty-six
Articles, and taking a test against Popery. This hath been read twice,
and is before the Committee. The former moreover requires the use of
Common Prayer, and, I think, as proposed even relapses almost all other
things that almost anybody scruples. This has been read twice and
passed the Committee. Opinions about these Bills are various. All that
I have heard of, who desire comprehension, desire indulgence also for
others, though multitudes desire indulgence that most fervently oppose
comprehension. This begets great misunderstandings.”--_Entring Book,
Morice MSS._, Dr. Williams’ Library.
On the 24th of December a clergyman was charged before the House of
Commons with saying that the Presbyterians were such as the very devil
blushed at, and were as bad as Jesuits, and otherwise denying the
Popish plot, throwing the same on Protestants. It was resolved that he
should be impeached.--_Journals._
[43] Both read the first time Dec. 16.--_Journals._ The Bill for
toleration was read a second time Dec. 24.
[44] The Lords desired the concurrence of the Commons in the amendments
which they had made to this relief Bill Jan. 3. See _Journals_ of both
Houses.
[45] _Burnet_ (i. 495) says the Clerk of the Crown withdrew it from the
table by the King’s particular order.
[46] _Journals_, Jan. 10, 1681. Eachard, Rapin, Burnet, and Calamy
quote or mention two resolutions on this subject, as passed at the same
time by the Commons--the first, that the Act of Elizabeth and James
against Popish recusants ought not to be extended against Protestant
Dissenters--the second, that which has just been noticed. It is the
only one respecting toleration, recorded in the Journals for that day.
[47] I have, in the history of this whole affair, followed the
Journals; and they show the inaccuracy, more or less of _Burnet_,
_Eachard_, and _Neal_. Even what Sir William Jones says in his
_Vindication_ (_Parl. Hist._ iv. _Appendix_) is scarcely consistent
with the records of the Houses.
[48] “The Court was at Christ Church, and the Commons sat in the
schools, but were very much straitened for room, there being a very
great concourse of members.” “Many of the discontented members, of both
Houses, came armed, and more than usually attended; and it was affirmed
there was a design to have seized the King, and to have restrained him
till he had granted their petitions.”--_Reresby’s Memoirs_, 243, 245.
[49] March 24, _Parl. Hist._ iv. 1308.
[50] _Lords’ Journals_, March 26.
[51] _Reresby’s Memoirs_, 290.
[52] _Lingard_, xii. 281.
[53] _Burnet_, i. 500; _D’Oyley’s Life of Sancroft_, i. 252. The King’s
letter to Sancroft is dated April 11, 1681.
[54] Address from the University of Cambridge. _Wilkins_, iv. 607;
_State Papers, Charles II. Dom._ 1681, May 16. I have pretty closely
adhered to the words used in the addresses.
[55] _Bishop of Winchester’s Vindication_, 394, 410. This work was
published in 1683, but the author says that it was written a year
before. Probably the above passage may belong to 1681.
[56] Preface to _The Happy Future State of England_, published 1688.
[57] _The Conformist’s Plea for Nonconformists_, 7.
[58] _The Conformist’s Plea for the Nonconformists_, 34. _The Life of
Julian the Apostate_ also made a great noise at that time.
[59] _State Papers, Dom. Charles II._, 1677.
[60] There is a remarkable absence of information in Sir Joseph
Williamson’s papers of this date, preserved in the Record Office.
Several letters, written at this time by the informer Bowen, of
Yarmouth, upon local matters, contain no allusion to the Nonconformists
there. The Histories of Nonconformists silently bear witness to this
fact. Neal, Crosby, and Sewel, under these years, say little or
nothing of persecution. It must not, however, be inferred that it was
then unknown, for it is stated in the Church Book of Guildhall-street
Chapel, Canterbury, that Mr. Durant, the pastor, and some of his
congregation, in 1679, “fled for refuge to Holland, and some forsook
the Church and fell off--_Timpson’s Church Hist. of Kent_, 307.
[61] _Rogers’ Life of Howe_, 180.
[62] _Burnet’s Hist. of his Own Times_, i. 267, 268, 476.
[63] _Earl Russell’s Life of Lord William Russell_, 159.
[64] Macaulay describes the manner in which Halifax endeavoured to
vindicate his trimming. _Hist._, i. 254. The following quotation from
Halifax is characteristic:--
“Why,” he asks, “after we have played the fool with throwing _Whig_
and _Tory_ at one another, as boys do snowballs, should we grow angry
at a new name, which by its signification might do as much to put
us into our wits, as the other has done to put us out of them. This
innocent word _Trimmer_ signifies no more than this, that if men are
together in a boat, and one part of the company would weigh it down on
one side, another would make it lean as much the contrary; it happens
that there is a third opinion of those who conceive it would do as
well if the boat went even, without endangering the passengers. Now
’tis hard to imagine by what figure in language, or by what rule in
sense, this comes to be a fault, and it is much more a wonder it should
be thought a heresy.” By a common fallacy, Halifax applies what is
true of one thing to another thing very different. Too many miserably
act respecting religion on the same principle as Halifax adopted in
relation to politics.
[65] _Burnet_, i. 266.
[66] _Memoirs of Count de Grammont_, vol. ii. 112; _Clarendon_, 503.
[67] _Lives_, ii. 57.
[68] _Burnet_, i. 482.
[69] Printed document. _State Papers, Dom._, 1681, Sept. 2.
[70] _State Papers, Dom. Charles II._, 1681, Aug. 25, Sept. 2. There
are several very curious papers relative to Oates, which I have copied,
but have not space to insert.
The Prevaricator at Cambridge at the commencement of 1680, referred to
the plot. The reference seems to have been very brief and unimportant,
but it gave concern in high quarters. A letter was written to the
Vice-Chancellor, by direction of the Bishop of London, complaining
of the Prevaricator turning the plot into ridicule, that it would
be brought before Parliament “to the reproach of the government of
the Universities, if not to strike at the Universities themselves,
unless it be timely prevented by a severe animadversion.”--_Cambridge
Portfolio_, 242.
[71] _Life of Baxter_, 349. The book is dated 1680, and the author,
Lewis du Moulin, recanted his reflections on the Divines of the Church
of England, the same year.
[72] _Burnet_, i. 461.
[73] There is a letter from the Lieutenant of the Tower in the Record
Office, _Dom. Charles II._, August 5, 1681, in which the writer
describes how the prisoner was to be conveyed to Oxford “in a coach
with ten or twelve of the warders on horseback, with carabines.”
[74] _Burnet_, i. 505. Colledge was tried on the 17th and 18th of
August. The trial is reported at full length in a folio pamphlet of 102
pages published by authority, 1681. Colledge defended himself, examined
witnesses and made speeches. It is plain that under the circumstances,
with such judges, the poor fellow stood no chance.
[75] September 1, 1681, Oxon. Letter from Thomas Hyde states that just
before the execution of Colledge, he had denied having written certain
letters, but that when he heard these letters had been intercepted, he
acknowledged them.
There are several letters respecting Colledge; amongst other papers
is the following:--September 30, 1681. “Deposition of Benjamin Wyche
of the parish of Saint Andrew’s, Holborn, London, Apothecary. This
deponent saith that being in Richards’ coffee-house near Temple
Bar, soon after His Majesty had dissolved the Parliament sitting at
Westminster, amongst other company in the room, Mr. Colledge was one
whom (upon discourse of the Parliament being then dissolved) he this
deponent, heard uttering these words, ‘_Well I see what it will come
to, we must e’en draw our swords, and fight it out again_,’ or words to
that effect.--_Ben Wyche._”
“_Jurat coram me.--L. Jenkins._”
[76] The first letter is dated Sept. 21. In the second letter, in the
same bundle, the day of the month is not given. The letter is numbered
164. Another paper in the Record Office, dated August 20, 1681, reports
that the Countess of Rochester said “Colledge was a Papist to her
knowledge, and had been so for a long time.” There are other statements
to the same effect. Thomas Hyde (September 1, 1681) writing from
Oxford, says that Colledge would not acknowledge what religion he was
of, but that “he was of the Anabaptists.”
[77] It is added “this fanatic’s name was formerly Bishop, but being
a hater of bishops changed his name into Marten; and because he
is by that name known for a notorious villain he hath changed it
again.”--_Dom. Charles II._
[78] _Ibid._, August 27, 24.
[79] The confession, of which a portion is missing, bears date August
24, 1681. _State Papers, Dom. Charles II._ The dying speech is in MS.
in the same collection dated August 31. It was published as a distinct
tract, 1681; also it is printed in _The Dying Speeches and Behaviour
of several State Prisoners_. Ed. 1720. The reason for his being called
the Protestant Joiner he thus describes:--“The Duke of Monmouth called
me to him, and told me he had heard a good report of me, and that I
was an honest man, and one that may be trusted: and they did not know
but their enemies, the Papists, might have some design to serve them
as they did in King James’s time by gunpowder, or any other way; and
the Duke with several Lords and Commons did desire me to use my utmost
skill in searching all places suspected by them, which I did perform:
and from thence I had as I think, the popular name of _The Protestant
Joiner_, because they had entrusted me, before any man in England to do
that office.”--_Dying Speeches_, 387.
[80] There is amongst the _State Papers_, one dated November 26, 1681,
_Dom. Charles II._, by George Evans, who complains that there was a
bonfire on Cornhill, and that gentlemen were stopped in their coaches
and required to drink Lord Shaftesbury’s health. This was on the
occasion of the Grand Jury ignoring the bill against him. There are a
number of documents relating to Shaftesbury under the year 1681.
[81] _Campbell’s Lives of the Chancellors_, iv. 229. Lord Campbell has
not done justice to Shaftesbury. It should be remarked to Shaftesbury’s
honour, Earl Russell says, “that though in the secret of every party,
he never betrayed any one: and that the purity of his administration
of justice is allowed even by his enemies.”--_Life of Lord William
Russell_, 61.
[82] From a mass of illustrations I select the following in reference
to the last point:--
_Dom. Charles II._, 1681, Sept. 9. “I was interrupted,” says the
Archdeacon of Durham, “in the execution of my office, as I was
officiating in my own church, by a very bold and insolent fanatic,
who though indicted at our last assizes, escaped punishment--to the
great contempt, I hear, of God’s house and service--I am sure to the
great trouble of the clergy, who fear it may go very hard with them,
in the execution of their offices, when so great a violence offered
to the Archdeacon should go unpunished. Since a Churchman can expect
to meet with no more favour from a lay judicatory, I am forced to fly
to the ecclesiastical courts, where this person stands presented, for
disturbing the minister in time of Divine service, and I think no
ecclesiastical judge can be of the same mind with the jury, that what
was done between the Nicene Creed and the sermon, was not done in time
of Divine service, upon which point he was found not guilty, to the
admiration [wonder] of those that understood the rubric.”
John Strode, of Rye, writes, September 13, “that the new Mayor chosen
by the fanatics refused to grant warrants according to the Act of
Parliament, pretending some frivolous thing.”
[83] November 7, 1681.
[84] _Dom. Charles II._, 1681, November 15. I find, dated November
25, “The names of such Nonconformists who being presented in the
Attorney-General’s name, are actually served with subpœnas returnable
on Monday last:--
“John Collins, D.D.
“John Owen, D.D.
“Samuel Annesley, D.D.
“Thomas Jacomb, D.D.
“Thomas Watson.
“Matthew Meade.
“Robert Fergusson.
“Edmund Calamy.
“Thomas Doolittle.
“Samuel Slater.
“Nicholas Blackley.
“Sir,
“There are two informations filed against every one of the above-named
Nonconformist ministers, _i.e._, one on the Statute for not repairing
to Church, upon which they forfeit £20 per mensem. This information is
laid for twenty months. The other is on the Oxford Act, prohibiting
Nonconformist ministers, &c., to reside within five miles of any
corporation, upon the penalty of £40. So that the penalties against the
persons above-named, if recovered, and not remitted, will amount to the
sum of £4,840.
“Yours,
“WM. SHERMAR”
[85] The Minutes of Council show that the Mayors of Plymouth and
Reading were directed to put the Oxford Act in execution against the
preachers in Conventicles.--December 2. The constables of the East
Riding of Yorkshire refused to disturb meetings.--_State Papers_,
bundle 260, No. 474. The magistrates at Hickes’ Hall complain that the
laws respecting Conventicles had been long silent.--December 10.
[86] _Echard_, _Neal_, iv. 507.
[87] _Calamy’s Continuation_, 137.
[88] _State Papers_, Dec. 19.
[89] _State Papers_, 1682, February 15.
[90] _Calamy’s Continuation_, 139.
[91] I copied these extracts many years ago from the old Church books,
now unfortunately lost. In the State Paper Office, under date of the
2nd February, 1682, there is a long report of the political sentiments
of people in different parts of Norfolk, in which report,--besides
mention of the Anabaptists and the Quakers worshipping under one
roof, and of a clergyman in the Commission of the Peace, an itinerant
Justice, “who rides all the circuit, and makes disturbances wherever
he comes by his pragmaticalness and unskilfulness in the laws”--a
reference is made to Dr. Collinges, a very respectable Presbyterian
minister at Norwich, and it is suggested, “were he removed, it is
probable many of that sect would fall off.”
[92] _Morice MSS., Entring Book_, i., 1682, November 21.
[93] December 30.
[94] December 14.
[95] November 30, December 7.
[96] December 14, February 6, 1682–3. “On Monday, in the Common Pleas,
some citizens were cited, because they did not receive the sacrament at
Easter by their minister, the Churchwardens saying they believed that
they did not receive it then. But because the process saith not what
Easter it was, and because there was no sacrament at their church the
last Easter; and further, because the Churchwardens do but believe they
did not receive it, therefore a prohibition was granted unless cause be
shown to the contrary.”
The Countess of Aylesbury was informed against for being at a
Conventicle.--March 15, 1684.
[97] December 14, 1682; March, 1683.
[98] Much trouble and suffering arose from fear; and many
congregations, after apprehending disturbance, were allowed to worship
in peace. This I learn from the _Entring Book_, 1683, January, in the
_Morice MSS._ (in Dr. Williams’ Library,) from which the passage in the
text is taken.
[99] _State Papers, Dom. Charles II._, February 21, 1682.
[100] The Presbyterians are reckoned altogether at 5,420; the Baptists,
&c., at 4,250.
[101] _State Papers, Dom. Charles II._, 1682, June 2, 16, 20. On the
9th of December, the following queries were submitted to Secretary
Jenkins:--
“Whether, at a time when the Dissenters in shoals transport themselves
beyond sea, to the apparent throwing up of many farms throughout
England, and a dearth of servants, it may not be thought reasonable to
prohibit such a transportation occasioned by a sullen humour?
“2. Whether, at this time, when the Dissenters calumniate the
Government with a connivance at debaucheries, while themselves are
vigorously prosecuted about matters of religion, it may not be thought
reasonable to revive His Majesty’s proclamation against profane cursing
and swearing and other debaucheries?
“3. Whether the prosecution against Dissenters ought not to be
prosecuted to excommunication, for not coming to church and receiving
the Sacrament, in Corporations especially,--thereby to incapacitate
them from being elected, or electors of, members of Parliament?”
[102] There are many documents connected with this subject amongst the
_State Papers_, 1680, January to June.
[103] _State Papers, Dom._, 1682, September 11, 13, 16. There is also
a letter describing the Duke’s visit to Chichester, and the insults
offered to the Bishop’s chaplain. February 24, 1683.
[104] It is said (Sept. 18) the Duke had not the encouragement which
Dissenters expected.
[105] L’Estrange was a censor of the press. In the Record Office, _Dom.
Charles II._, may be found Williamson’s authority to “Roger L’Estrange,
surveyor of the press, to act as one of his deputies in the licensing
of books,” dated Whitehall, February 5, 1674–5.
In 1684 L’Estrange commenced a periodical entitled _The Observator_,
which he carried on until 1687. He there upholds the Royal dispensing
power, and ridicules Protestant excitements, the right to liberty
of conscience, the Long Parliament, and Nonconformists of all
kinds, pronouncing Dissent a political schism. He published the
paper irregularly, sometimes twice, sometimes thrice a week. It is
written after the manner of a dialogue between _The Observator_ and
its opponents. I have met with three or four large volumes of the
publication, in the library of Trinity College, Cambridge. They justify
the strong language I have used.
[106] _State Trials_, 1683. The judgment was that the franchise and
liberty of the City of London should be taken and seized into the
King’s hands.
[107] The Act for annulling Russell’s attainder, in the first year of
William and Mary, justly declared that “he was, by undue and illegal
return of jurors, having been refused his lawful challenge to the said
jurors, for want of freehold, and by partial and unjust constructions
of law, wrongfully convicted, attainted, and executed for high treason.”
[108] The charges against Russell and Sidney, of being engaged in
negotiations with the French Court, and of the latter receiving pay
from that quarter, belong to the political history of England. I must
refer the reader to _Hallam_, _Mackintosh_, and especially to _Earl
Russell’s Life of Lord William Russell_. Supposing that Sidney accepted
money from France, I am not at all disposed to regard his conduct so
leniently as do the first two of the above-named writers; but, after
pondering what Earl Russell says, I feel some doubt respecting the
truth of Barillon’s reports, and the accuracy of his accounts. As
to Lord William Russell’s conduct, his biographer says it “was not
criminal, but it would be difficult to acquit him of the charge of
imprudence.”--p. 107.
[109] “Much discourse hath been about the apparition of Lord William
Russell’s ghost in Southampton square, July 27 (1683), about twelve
o’clock at night.”--_Entring Book, Morice MSS._, Dr. Williams’ Library.
The above notice of Russell’s execution is almost entirely drawn up
from Earl Russell’s life of this illustrious person, 337, _et seq._
[110] _Tillotson’s Life_, 109.
[111] _Collier_, ii. 903. Filmer’s writings were most in vogue with the
partisans of despotism. See _Hallam’s Const. Hist._, ii. 156, on the
subject.
[112] _Orme’s Life of Owen._
[113] _Howe’s Case of Protestant Dissenters; Life_, 247. In a letter
which Howe wrote in the year 1685 from the Continent, when he was
travelling with Philip Lord Wharton, to escape the persecution of
the times, he uses the following words, which indicate, more than
any laboured description, the reign of terror he had left behind
him in England:--“The anger and jealousies of such as I never had a
disposition to offend, have of later times _occasioned persons of my
circumstances_ very seldom to walk the streets.”--_Life by Rogers_, 225.
[114] The trial is published in a volume edited by Samuel Rosewell,
1718. The trial took place in the months of October and November, 1684.
In the _Memoir_ there is an account of his apprehension and first
appearance before Jeffreys at his house in Aldermanbury. Rosewell, lest
he should commit himself before witnesses, answered Jeffreys in Latin.
The Judge flew into a passion, and told him, he supposed he could not
utter another sentence in the same language to save his neck. Rosewell
did not give him the lie, but thought it better to give his next answer
in Greek. “The Judge seemed to be thunderstruck upon this.”--p. 47.
[115] _Trial of Rosewell_, p. 52, _et seq._ Speaking of the latter part
of the reign of Charles II. Mrs. Mary Churchman says, “Persecution now
came on apace, the Dissenters could have no meetings but in woods and
corners. I, myself, have seen our companies often alarmed with drums
and soldiers; every one was fined five pounds a month for being in
their company.”--_Abstract of the Gracious Dealings of God, &c._, by
Samuel James, 74.
[116] I have gathered this account entirely from Delaune’s pamphlets on
the subject, which were collected and published in a volume in the year
1704. The controversy had been mixed up with a reference to Calamy’s
invitation to private Christians, to consult their pastors in their
religious difficulties; and to Nonconformists also to hear both sides;
which--by a wide stretch of interpretation--Delaune construed into a
public challenge to an answer in print. It had been further complicated
with reproaches, because Calamy did not intercede for the sufferer, or
visit him in prison. Defoe says, “It was very hard such a man, such a
Christian, and such a scholar, and on such an occasion should starve
in a dungeon; and the whole body of Dissenters in England, whose cause
he died for defending, should not raise him £66 13s. 4d. to save his
life.” A modern Baptist historian justly says, “We would not mitigate
this crime an atom; but it is right to suggest that Mr. Delaune may
have interdicted the payment of the fine.”--_Evans’ English Baptists_,
ii. 337. Delaune, I suspect, was one of those men who, in the judgment
of an opposite class, are said to court martyrdom.
[117] _Neal_, iv. 521.
[118] _De Felice_, _Hist. of the Protestants of France_, 261.
[119] “The King of France uses the Huguenots with inexpressible
severity, takes away very many of their children by force, and puts
them into Popish convents, and has published an edict for taking away
one half of their churches that remain throughout all the provinces,
and has actually begun to execute it in Normandy.”--_Morice’s Diary_,
December 2, 1679. For a minute record of proceedings against the French
Protestants, see _Histoire Chronologique de L’Eglise Protestante de
France, par C. Drion_, ii.
[120] _Elie Benoit Hist. de L’Edit de Nantes_, iv. 479.
[121] _Hist. des Réfugiés Protestants, par Weiss_, i. 265–267.
[122] _Hist. des Réfugiés Protestants, par Weiss_, i. 268.
[123] _Coxe’s House of Austria_, ii. 352.
[124] _State Papers_, 1682, quoted in _Smiles’ Huguenots_. I have found
several other documents on the same subject in the Record Office.
The Mayor and Aldermen of Bristol, on the 2nd of January 1682, oddly
enough, proposed that fines levied on Dissenters should be applied to
the relief of French Protestants.--_State Papers, Dom. Charles II._
[125] _Life of Tillotson, by Birch_, 131.
[126] I find an illustration of the number of refugees who arrived in
London, in a curious book I have elsewhere cited, _The Happy Future
State of England_, published in 1688. It is there noticed (p. 122),
that they had lately come, and filled 800 of the empty new-built houses
of London.
[127] The letter is dated January 2, 1684.--_Life of Sancroft_, i. 197.
[128] _Reresby’s Memoirs_, 290.
[129] _North’s Lives_, ii. 70.
[130] Abridged from _North’s Lives_, ii. 72.
[131] _Palmer’s Nonconformist Memorial_, i. 100; _Observator_, January
29 and 31, 1685; _Macaulay_, i. 407.
[132] By Ward.
[133] _James’ Memoirs_, by Clarke, i. 747–9. See _Macaulay_, ii. 13,
for authorities respecting the death of Charles. In the appendix to
this volume will be found a copy of the recently discovered MS., which
solves a riddle referred to by Macaulay.
[134] _Gazette_, 2006.
[135] _James’ Memoirs_, by Clarke, ii. 4.
[136] _Ibid._, ii. 6.
[137] _Dalrymple’s Memoirs_, i. 109. I do not find that this
circumstance is referred to by D’Oyley in his _Life of Sancroft_.
[138] As to the coronation, it is observed in a _Diary_ amongst the
_Morice MSS._ in Dr. Williams’ library, under date April 25, “Far above
one-half of the nobility made excuses, for one reason or another, and
were absent.” “The noblemen were rather more than the ladies.”
Amongst the _Baker MSS._, Cambridge University Library, marked 40–2,
are notes concerning the Coronation Office by Archbishops Laud and
Sancroft, with the Coronation Office at large, used by Archbishop
Sancroft.
“During the coronation of James, the crown not being properly fitted
to his head, tottered. Henry Sidney, Keeper of the Robes, afterwards
so famous for the mischiefs he brought upon James, kept it once from
falling off, and said, with pleasantry to him, ‘This is not the first
time our family has supported the Crown.’ This trifle was much remarked
and talked of at the time; a sure mark that the minds of the people
were under unusual agitations.”--_Dalrymple’s Memoirs_, i. 112.
[139] _Evelyn._ 1685, May 10, 22.
[140] From a MS. in the University Library, Cambridge. See _Appendix_
to this volume.
[141] It was proposed in Committee that the word _Reformed_ religion
should be inserted in the address, for the word _Protestant_ was
excepted against. Sir Thomas Meres said, “The word Protestant had been
used in a good sense by well-meaning persons, but time and use change
the nature of words. As knave formerly was an honourable title, but now
signified a very ill man.”--_Entring Book_, June 4.--_Morice MSS._
[142] Compare _Eachard_, _Kennet_, _Reresby_, _Barillon_, and _Fox_.
[143] See _Commons’ Journals_, May 27; _Parl. Hist._, iv. 1358.
“Lest the last words of this resolution should not make sufficient
impression on James, the Speaker, when he presented the Revenue Bill,
remarked, that the Commons had passed that Bill, without joining any
Bill to it for the security of their religion, though _that was dearer
to them than their lives_.”--_Dalrymple’s Memoirs_, i. 133.
[144] _Orme’s Life of Baxter_, 359.
[145] The appearance of Sharp and Moore is mentioned in the _Morice
MSS._
[146] _Baxter MSS._, Dr. Williams’ Library. Quoted by Orme, _Life of
Baxter_, 363–366.
[147] _Burnet’s Hist. of his Own Time_, i. 649. For a report of the
proceedings against Alicia Lisle and Elizabeth Gaunt, see _State
Trials_, iv. 105, _et esq._
[148] _Hist. of the Revolution_, 31.
[149] _Mackintosh’s Hist. of Revolution_, 159, where authorities are
given.
[150] _Ibid._, 160; _Neal_, iv. 552, 554.
[151] The story told about _White’s MS._ in _Neal_, iv. 555, does not
appear to me at all probable.
When persecution was at its height, extraordinary cases of escape
occurred. Many a wonderful story is told of deliverances vouchsafed to
suffering Dissenters, of which the following anecdote is a conspicuous
example. Henry Havers, of Catherine Hall, Cambridge, had been ejected
from the Rectory of Stambourne in Essex. Receiving friendly warning
of an attempt to apprehend him, and finding the pursuers on his
track, he sought refuge in a malt-house, and crept into the kiln.
Immediately afterwards, he observed a spider fixing the first line of
a large and beautiful web, across the narrow entrance. The web being
placed directly between him and the light, he was so much struck with
the skill of the insect weaver, that, for a while, he forgot his
own imminent danger; but, by the time the network had crossed and
re-crossed the mouth of the kiln in every direction, the pursuers
came to search for their victim. He listened as they approached, and
distinctly overheard one of them say, “It’s no use to look in _there_,
the old villain can never be there. _Look at that spider’s web, he
could never have got in there without breaking it._” Giving up further
search, they went to seek him elsewhere, and he escaped out of their
hands.
A similar narrative I find related in reference to Du Moulin, the
French Protestant. It is impossible, after the lapse of two centuries,
to ascertain the exact truth of such accounts. That incidents of the
kind occurred I have no doubt; but whether they are attributed to the
right persons, and are quite accurate in minute details, may admit of
question.
[152] Castlemaine wrote an apology for the Catholics.--_Butler’s
English Cath._, iii. 47.
[153] I must refer to the pages of Macaulay and others, for the
politics of the period. Of the theological debates in the presence
of the King and the Earl of Rochester, there is a curious account in
_Patrick’s Autobiography_, 107.
[154] _Entring Book_, 1686, July 17, _Morice MSS._
[155] _Abridgment_, 374.
[156] _Entring Book_, 1686, June 26, _Morice MSS._
[157] _Ibid._, 1687, Jan. 1.
[158] Compare, as to James’ designs, _Fox’s Hist. of James II._,
332; _Hallam’s Const. Hist._ ii. 212; and _Mackintosh’s Hist. of
Revolution_, chap. v.
[159] Articles were exhibited against them “too scandalous to be
repeated.” _Burnet’s Own Time_, i. 696; _D’Oyley’s Life of Sancroft_,
i. 237. Sancroft consecrated these two worthless men at Lambeth Palace,
the 17th October, 1686, from fear of a _premunire_.
[160] _Clarendon’s Correspondence_, i. 258.
[161] “At Tonbridge Wells, this last summer, some company of condition,
dining with Dr. Sherlock, amongst others the Doctor himself, talking
of the great changes that had been in men and things these late years,
even in his time, who was not old. Saith Mrs. Sherlock, his wife (who
is a very brisk, sharp gentlewoman), ‘a greater instance thereof cannot
be given, than yourself Doctor, for I have known you set up for a
Sectary, a Presbyterian, a Papist, a Church of England man, but you
never nickt your time right, nor turned seasonably, but when those
respective interests were falling, and what you will turn to next,
no man living knows. If ever I become a Papist, call me a knave,’
whereupon the company smiled.”--_Entring Book_, 1686, August 9, _Morice
MSS._
[162] Printed in _State Trials_, iv. 243.
[163] See _Evelyn’s Diary_, December 29, 1686.
[164] The last of these facts comes to light in the _State Papers,
Dom._ 1687, August 21.
[165] _Mackintosh’s Hist. of Revolution_, 207.
[166] _Ibid._, 209. Mackintosh cites proofs from letters written by the
King, the Queen, the Nuncio, and the French Minister.
In the _Entring Book_, _Morice MSS._, it is remarked, under date 1686,
November 7--“The King told the Archbishop of York he depended upon his
vote to take off the Test, and other penal laws from the Papists, for
he remembered his lordship was against the making of the Test. The
Archbishop answered, he hoped His Majesty would excuse him in that,
and leave him to give his vote according to his judgment. It was true
he _was_ against the imposing of the Test, but the case was altered;
for then the Papists’ interest was so little, that he thought it not
(as others did) then necessary, but now the Papists’ interest did so
preponderate, that he thought it necessary to keep it on.”
[167] _Dalrymple’s Memoirs_, ii. 175.
[168] _Ibid._, i. 166.
[169] _Ibid._, 157.
[170] _Entring Book_, January 9, _Morice MSS._
[171] _Macaulay_, ii. 337, 453; _Secretan’s Life of Nelson_, 24.
[172] _Concilia_, iv. 612.
[173] _Abridgment_, 373.
[174] April 19/29, 1686. Quoted in _Macaulay_, ii. 375.
[175] October 4, 1685. _Dalrymple_, ii. 177.
[176] _Lingard_, xiii. 105. In the _Entring Book, Morice MSS._, under
date 1687, January 8, there are allusions to the anti-Jesuitical
Papists, as uneasy at present proceedings--fearing lest by an
ill-understanding between the King and the Prince of Orange, there
should come a revolution, and Roman Catholics should be destroyed. It
was still treason to be reconciled to the Church of Rome; and Papists
might be convicted now by law, though twenty years after the fact. It
was asked, if the King pardoned their past conversion, would not the
continuance of their fellowship with the Romish Church be a continuance
of treason?
[177] All this information I gather from the _Morice MSS., Entring
Book_, 1687, April 30; May 14, 28.
[178] _Transcripts of Digby MSS._, D.d., iii. 64, 57.
[179] _London Gazette_, April 14.
[180] _Ibid._, April 28.
[181] _Ibid._, April 30.
[182] _London Gazette_, June 11.
Lord Macaulay is very severe upon Lobb. He certainly disgraced himself;
but Wilson, in his _Dissenting Churches_ (iii. 436), puts the whole
case so as to modify the reader’s judgment. What may be said in
palliation of Alsop’s conduct may be seen in _Calamy_ (_Account_, ii.
488); but really Alsop’s address to James (see _Somers’ Tracts_, i.
236) is inexcusable. Alsop accepted an Alderman’s gown, and was called
Alderman Alsop. His Lordship mentions also Henry Care and Thomas
Rosewell amongst the tools of the Court. As to Henry Care, I cannot
find that he was a Nonconformist minister; and as to Thomas Rosewell,
there is not one word in the _State Trials_, or in his _Life_ by his
son, or in _Calamy’s Account_ (the references made in his Lordship’s
notes), to justify his statement in the text about Rosewell’s services
being “secured.” No doubt much was done to court the Dissenters at this
time, but the picture in _Macaulay’s Hist._ (ii. 474), is too highly
coloured.
[183] _London Gazette_, July 9.
[184] _Ibid._, August 18.
[185] _Dalrymple_, i. 169.
[186] _Diary_, April 10, 1687.
[187] It appears to me that no impartial person, who reads Macaulay’s
defence of his own charges against Penn, in the last edition of the
_History of England_, can fail to see how unsatisfactory are the
arguments which he employs. The subject has been discussed afresh in
the Spring number of the _Quarterly Review_ for 1868.
[188] When the sister of these youths presented a petition on their
behalf, while waiting in the ante-chamber for admission to the Royal
presence, Lord Churchill, standing near the chimney-piece, said,
“Madam, I dare not flatter you with any such hopes, for that marble
is as capable of feeling compassion as the King’s heart.”--_Kiffin’s
Life_, quoted in _Wilson_.
[189] _Wilson’s Dissenting Churches_, i. 403–31.
[190] _Clarendon’s Correspondence_, ii. 506.
[191] _Autobiography of Sir John Bramston._--_Camden Society_, p. 280.
[192] _Autobiography of Sir John Bramston_, and _A Full and True
Relation_ of the Entry, reprinted in _Somers’ Tracts_, 2nd Edition.
[193] _State Trials_, iv. 250.
[194] _State Trials_, 258, _et seq._ “Dr. Fairfax is a very modest,
quiet-tempered man, of very few words, loves to be concerned in no
public business, and offered great violence to his own temper, to
appear now; but he has other apprehensions of the danger the Church
and State are in, than formerly he had, and so is far more tender
to the Dissenters for these last ten or twelve years than he was
before.”--_Entring Book_, June 11. _Morice MSS._
[195] Vol. iv. 265, _et seq._
[196] _State Papers, Dom. James II._ 1867, Sept. 9.
[197] _Life of James II._, ii. 120.
[198] “Penn went the progress with His Majesty, and earnestly pressed
the King to let the business of Oxford fall; for, he said, it would
prejudice his designs and purposes more than his Declaration had
advanced them.”--_Entring Book_, Sept. 3, _Morice MSS._
[199] _Neal_, iv. 588.
[200] _Mackintosh_, 246.
[201] See notice of Fowler’s writings in a subsequent chapter.
[202] Salmon, in his _Lives_, p. 212, states that Lake was useful in
the Church in maintaining order and decency, and tells a story of what
he did on a Shrove Tuesday, when Archdeacon of Cleveland. He went from
his seat in the choir, and pulled off the hats of a noisy mob, who
afterwards insulted him, and attacked his house.
[203] _Granger_, iv. 290.
[204] _Life of Ken_, by a Layman, 142. An entry appears in the list of
contributors to the rebuilding of St. Paul’s. “January 26, 1684/5. Dr.
Thomas Ken, Lord Bishop of Bath and Wells, in lieu of his consecration
dinner and gloves, £100.” _Ibid._, 148.
[205] _Diary_, 1687, March 20; 1688, April 1. This sermon for its
circumstances, ingenuity, eloquence, and power was one of the most
remarkable ever preached.
[206] _Hawkins’ Life of Ken_, 17, 99.
[207] _Life of Ken_, by a Layman, 62, 207.
[208] _Burnet’s Hist. of his Own Time_, i. 424, 429, 434, 446.
[209] See Burnet’s account of Lloyd’s conduct in reference to
Turbervill’s evidence against Lord Stafford. _Hist. of his Own Time_,
i. 488. Neither Lloyd nor Burnet appear to advantage in this business.
[210] _Philip Henry’s Life_, by Matthew Henry. Edited by Williams, p.
152. For particulars and remarks respecting Lloyd see _Wood, Burnet,
Salmon, Mackintosh’s Hist. of Revolution, Wharton’s Life_ in _Appendix
to D’Oyley’s Sancroft_, and _Rees’ Nonconformity in Wales_. There
were two other Bishops of the same name. The following extract in the
_Entring Book_, 1686, September 25, _Morice MSS._, refers to Dr. Lloyd,
Bishop of Norwich: “He, at his first going down thither, gave great
encouragement to religion, and set up evening exercises in his family
upon the Lord’s Days, in the evening, and explained _The Whole Duty of
Man_, and prayed and carried himself very respectfully to all. But of
late, he has set a day for all Dissenters to come to the Sacrament,
and if they do not come, then he will proceed against them with all
severity. Many of his own way always had and still have bad thoughts of
him.” The other Lloyd was Bishop of St. David’s, 1686–7.
[211] _D’Oyley’s Life of Sancroft_, i. 263.
[212] _Calamy’s Life_, i. 198.
[213] _Perry’s Hist. of the Church of England_, ii. 510.
[214] _State Papers_, 1682/3, Feb. 23.
[215] The significant Articles which he sent out to the clergy in July,
1688, will be considered in the next volume in connection with the
ecclesiastical history of the Revolution.
[216] _State Trials_, iv. 362. _Gutch Collect. Curiosa_, i. 335.
[217] _Patrick’s Autobiography_, 134.
[218] _D’Oyley’s Life of Sancroft_, i. 265–268.
[219] _Evelyn_, ii. 285, May 20, 1688.
[220] _Mackintosh_, 252. He observes, “perhaps the smaller number
refers to parochial clergy and the larger to those of every
denomination.” We are not aware that other denominations did read it.
[221] Buckden, May 29, 1688, _Baker MSS._, Cambridge University Library.
[222] In _James’s Memoirs_, ii. 158, the foolish step of committing
the Bishops is attributed to Jeffrey’s influence, and it is added,
“When the veil was taken off,” the King “owned it to have been a fatal
counsel.”
[223] _Reresby’s Memoirs_, 347.
“Sir Edward Hales, Lieutenant of the Tower, invited the Bishops to
dine on Lord’s Day; but being to receive the sacrament that day, they
desired to be excused. He sent them half a buck, and knowing that they
would be at church on Lord’s Day, being now sufferers, he, on Saturday
night, told Dr. Hawkins he had an express command to deliver to him
from the King, to read the Declaration in the Tower Church the next
Lord’s Day following. Hawkins, after expressing the most abject kind of
loyalty, refused.”--_Entring Book_, 1688, June 9, _Morice MSS._
[224] _Entring Book_, 1688, June 9, _Morice MSS._
[225] _Gazette_, May 3.
[226] _Mackintosh’s Hist. of the Revolution_, 253; also, _Ibid._,
_D’Adda_, 1/11 June.
[227] _D’Adda_, 15/22 June; _Mackintosh_, 262.
[228] _State Trials_, iv; _D’Oyley_, i. 297. The first part of the
defence was entrusted to Sawyer. That part which related to the
dispensing power was in the hands of Finch.
[229] _Reresby_, 348. A letter of Barillon (12 Juillet) leaves no room
for doubt as to the reason of their discharge.
[230] _Hunter’s Life of Oliver Heywood_, 163, 187, 219.
[231] _Life of Oliver Heywood_, 235.
[232] _Hunter’s Life of Heywood_, 244.
[233] _Hunter’s Life of Heywood_, 285–6.
[234] _Neal_, iii. 600.
[235] For preparations made in Oliver’s lifetime with a view to this
meeting, see _Church of the Commonwealth_, 514. For a notice of the
place of meeting, see the third volume of this history (_Church of the
Restoration_, i.).
[236] The Savoy Declaration is printed in _Hanbury’s Memorials_. Most
of the passages I have given are abridged.
[237] Mather remarks, “There is no Congregational man, but he reports
to the Church something of what the person desiring communion with them
has related to him, which the Presbyterian does not, only declares his
own satisfaction, and giveth the brethren a liberty to object against
the conversation of the _admittendi_.”--_Magnalia_, ii. 61. Such
reports may be found in the _Choice Experience of Mrs. Rebecca Combe,
and Mrs. Gertrude Clarkson_, printed in _An Abstract of the Gracious
Dealings of God, &c._, by Samuel James.
[238] _Life of Heywood_, 238.
[239] _Works_, xxi. 547.
[240] _Works_, v. 46.
[241] _Works_, xi. 452.
[242] Some very high views and strong expressions may be found in
_Jacomb’s Dedication_, 136.
[243] _Baillie’s Letters and Journals._ _Gould’s Introduction to the
Report of St. Mary’s Norwich Chapel Case_ cxiv. _et seq._
[244] I refer to what Crosby says of Mr. Spilsbury’s Church (i. 148;
iii. 41). A number seceded from Mr. Jessy’s Church in 1638, 1641, and
1643, and became Baptists before he did.--_Crosby_, i. 310.
[245] _Gould_, xxviii.
[246] See generally upon this subject _Underhill’s Confessions of
Faith_, and _Gould’s Introduction to St. Mary’s Case_. The latter
writer, who has carefully studied the subject, says, “The history of
the Baptists in England has yet to be written.”
[247] See p. 75 of this vol.
[248] _State Papers_, 1676, April 8. Appended to this document is an
unsigned letter, addressed to the same person, whose name was Warner,
expostulating with him for absenting himself from communion, because he
was dissatisfied with the writer.
[249] The history of the controversy is itself a subject of
controversy. I cannot notice it. The question is ably argued on both
sides in the _Report of St. Mary’s Norwich Chapel Case_. The character
and limits of this work prevent me from entering more fully into
Baptist affairs. The most learned representatives of that denomination
seem to be dissatisfied with all the books which relate their own
history.
[250] _Broadmead Records_, 189–221, 458, 459.
[251] _Hist. of Friends_, ii. 448 and 442.
[252] _Pope’s Life of Ward._
[253] _North’s Lives_, i. 296, 279.
[254] _Barwick’s Life_, 302. I find the following in the Cambridge
University Library:--“Negotium Consecrationis Sacelli palatio
Episcopali Norw. pertinentis.”
“May 16, 1672. The chapel was built and adorned at Bp. Reynolds’
expense, having been demolished in the Civil War. Consecration of the
reading-desk, pulpit, and altar. Sermon by Jno. Conant, D.D., the
Bishop’s son-in-law, the Bishop being disabled by illness.”--_Baker
MSS._, 40, 5. Cat. v. 478.
[255] _D’Oyley’s Life_, i. 145. Reynolds, Bishop of Norwich, zealously
assisted.--_Blomefield_, i. 585.
[256] _Webster’s Poetical and Dramatic Works_, i. 274. _Duchess of
Malfey_, a tragedy published in 1623.
[257] _John Evelyn’s Diary._ 1684, Dec. 7.
[258] _Entring Book_, March 3, 1681, _Morice MSS._
[259] _State Papers, Dom. Charles II._ Entry of Ecclesiastical
business. 1670, July 27.
[260] _Evelyn._ 1677, Sept. 10.
[261] _Cosin’s Works_, iv. 381.
[262] _Articles of Visitation_, in Appendix to Report of the Commission
on Ritual. Most of these requirements were in compliance with the
Canons of 1603.
[263] _Naked Truth._ _Somers’ Tracts_, iii. 346.
[264] _Lives of North_, i. 279.
[265] _State Papers._ Osborne to Williamson, March 27, 1675.
[266] _Lathbury’s Convocation_, 309.
[267] _Blomefield’s Norwich_, i. 413.
[268] _Ashmole’s Order of the Garter_, 357, 542.
[269] _Sandford’s Funeral of Monk._
[270] _Evelyn._ 1684, March 30.
In Sancroft’s form of “Dedication and Consecration of a Church or
Chapel, 1685,” this direction is found:--“So likewise, when a censer is
presented and received, they say, ‘While the King sitteth at his table,
my spikenard sendeth forth the smell thereof,’” &c. In the _MS. Life of
Ashmole_, Ashmole Museum, Oxford, he says--1675, Jan. 6--“I wore the
chain of gold sent me from the King of Denmark before the King in his
proceeding to the chapel to offer gold, frankincense, and myrrh.”
[271] _North’s Lives_, i. 296.
[272] _Wilkins’ Concilia_, iv. 590. June 4, 1670.
[273] _Naked Truth._ _Somers’ Tracts_, iii. 347.
[274] From an autograph letter addressed to Sancroft, shown in 1862 at
an exhibition of autographs in the Institution of the Incorporated Law
Society. See Catalogue.
[275] _Articles_ of Fuller, Bishop of Lincoln, 1671. Appendix to Second
Report of Commission on Ritual, 641.
[276] They are computed by the writer of _The Future Happy State of
England_ (109) as having amounted, in 1660, to between £300,000 and
£500,000 a year. The annual revenue of the whole nation he puts down at
eight millions.
[277] _Stowe._
[278] _Chamberlayne’s Angliæ Notitia._
[279] _Wood_, iv. 311. There is in the Record Office (1678, May) a
petition from Croft, Bishop of Hereford, in which he says the bishopric
is not worth, in rents, £700 a year. In sixteen years he had not raised
£2,000 in fines. There is also a letter from Bishop Barlow (Oxford, May
29, 1675), in which he writes, “Fees, first-fruits, &c., will cost me
£2,000 or £1,500 before I shall receive a penny from the bishopric.”
[280] _Granger’s Lives_, iii. 235.
[281] Notice of Morley in _Life of Ken_, 138, and _Le Neve_, 192.
According to another computation, Sheldon gave away £72,000.
[282] _Life, by Pope_, 57–63.
[283] _Life of Sancroft_, i. 147. _State Papers--Entring Book._
Ecclesiastical business, 1670–4. 1670, 13th June.
[284] _State Papers, Dom. Charles II._ 1678, May.
[285] _North’s Lives_, i. 289.
[286] _State Papers, Dom. Charles II._ 1667, Sept. 30.
[287] Dec. 18, 1669.
[288] March 12, 1672.
[289] _State Papers_, April 27, 1675.
[290] _Dom. Charles II._ April, 1675.
[291] _State Papers, Dom. Charles II._ Wood says (_Ath. Ox._ iv. 334),
“On the 22nd of April, 1675, being the very day that Dr. Fuller, Bishop
of Lincoln, died, after several discussions that passed between His
Majesty, and certain persons of honour then present, concerning the
person to be preferred, Dr. Barlow was introduced into the presence of
His Majesty, and had the grant of that see, and forthwith kissed His
Majesty’s hand for the same.” Coventry and Williamson were his friends.
[292] Parliamentary Return on _Ecclesiastical Appeals_, ordered by
the House of Commons April 3, 1868, p. xxviii.--_Oughton’s Ordo
Judiciorum_, vol. i. 219, _et seq._
[293] Act of 25th Henry VIII., c. 19, 1533.--_Parl. Return_, p. iii.
[294] _Parl. Return_, p. xxx.
[295] There were two Commissions on this case: the first contained four
Bishops and ten laymen--the second, five Bishops and ten laymen.
[296] There are papers relating to him in the Record Office.--_Dom.
Charles II._, 1673, October.
[297] The cases are given in the _Parliamentary Return_; they are
numbered:--53, William Duncke; 74, Edward Hirst (there are three other
cases for not resorting to parish church, 53, 70, and 76;) 78, Catherine
Gounter; 82, Jonathan Rutter. Duncke and Rutter were excommunicated.
[298] _Return_, p. viii.
[299] _Salmon’s Lives of the Bishops_, 310.
[300] I am not sure of the date in the 17th century when the Hall was
so used. A fine copy of _Baxter’s Christian Directory_ is preserved in
Dr. Williams’ Library, and is said to have been chained to some part of
the porch of the great meeting-house in the City of Coventry.
[301] _Offor’s Life of Bunyan, Works_, iii. lxix.
[302] _Thoresby._
[303] _State Papers, Dom. Charles II._, 1674, Nov. 4.
[304] _State Papers, Dom. Charles II._, 1674, Feb. 12.
[305] I find these anecdotes in a _MS. History of the Suffolk
Churches_, by the Rev. T. Harmer, author of _Observations on Scripture_.
[306] _History of England_, i. 294.
[307] The author, however, considers that the Bishops’ survey came
far below the mark,--he mentions a conjectural estimate of eight
millions.--_Happy Future, &c._, 116.
[308] _Happy Future, &c._, 281.
[309] _Dalrymple’s Memoirs_, Appendix, ii. 12.
[310] _Happy Future, &c._, 150.
[311] _Pope’s Life of Ward_, 148.
[312] _Pope’s Life of Ward_, 148.
[313] James II. said at Oxford, “he heard many of them used notes in
their sermons, but none of his Church ever did.”--_Wood_, quoted in
_Southey’s Common-Place Book_, iii. 496. The early Puritans greatly
disliked read sermons. See _Hooker (Keble)_, ii. 107.
[314] _Howe’s Works_, vi. 295.
[315] _Life_, 419. This was Bull’s advice after he became a Bishop in
1705.
[316] _Wood, Ath. Ox._--Ed. Bliss. iv. 619.--See at the end of chapter
xii. the Chancellor’s injunctions.
[317] _Worcester MS._ 1660, May 14. _State Papers_, 1666, Jan. 30.
[318] _Williams’ Life of Hale_, 106.
[319] _Kennet’s Register_, 154.
[320] These instances are gathered from the _State Papers_ and the
works of Sir Thomas Browne.
[321] _Diary and Correspondence of Dr. John Worthington_, i. 360,
August 20, 1661. Samuel Hartlib was the son of a Polish refugee who
lived in Prussia. He came to England in 1630, and devoted his time
and fortune to the promotion of literature and science. Milton speaks
highly of him in his _Treatise on Education_. Hartlib was reduced to
poverty soon after the Restoration.
[322] _Worthington’s Reply_, ii., Sept. 12, 1661.
[323] _Hunter’s Life of Heywood_, 162.
[324] _Hunter’s Life of Heywood_, 219, 252, 204.
[325] _Ibid._, 254.
[326] _Ibid._, 192.
[327] _Ibid._, 277.
[328] _Hunter’s Life of Heywood_, 276.
[329] Dean Stanley informs me, that his father, the Bishop of Norwich,
delighted to relate this anecdote of the connection between his
ancestors and Oliver Heywood.
[330] _Life of Philip Henry_, 120.
[331] _Turner’s Hist. of Remarkable Providences_, ch. lxv. p. 80.
[332] _Life of Heywood_, 215, 331.
[333] For the knowledge of this tradition, I am indebted to Mr. Parker,
of Wycombe.
[334] _Howe’s Works_, ii. 362, 369.
[335] _Ibid._, iv. 3, 47.
[336] _Life of Heywood_, 290.
[337] From an account entitled _The Singular Experience and Great
Sufferings of Mrs. Agnes Beaumont_, printed in _An Abstract of the
Gracious Dealings of God, &c._ Edited by Samuel James. 4th Edit., 1774,
p. 83.
[338] _Life by Dr. Pope._
[339] _Pope’s Life of Ward._
[340] _North’s Lives_, iii. 323, 324.
[341] _Ibid._, i. 275.
[342] _North’s Lives_, i. 242.
[343] Heneage Finch to his sister.--_State Papers_, Feb. 10, 1671/2.
[344] _Sabbatum Redivivum_, ii. 37.
[345] _Works_, iii. 102. Baxter’s doctrine was that the Jewish Sabbath
was abrogated, and that the Lord’s Day was instituted by Divine
authority.--_Works_, xiii. 369, _et seq._ According to Orme, there is
only another writer of the same period with Baxter who takes just the
same view of the subject, and almost the same ground. He alludes to
_Warren’s Jews’ Sabbath Antiquated_, 1659.
[346] _Exposition of the Hebrews_, ii. 453.
[347] _Taylor’s Works_, xii. 437.
[348] _Thorndike’s Works_, vi. 73; iv. 483–507.
[349] Cases of Conscience, _Sanderson’s Works_, v. 15.
[350] _Cosin’s Works_, i. 188.
[351] _Annals of Windsor_, ii. 404.
[352] Hooker paints the sacred year in magnificent colours.--Book V.,
c. lxx., s. 8.
[353] _Newcome’s Diary._
[354] Reeve’s Charity at Windsor is an example.--_Annals of Windsor_,
ii. 370.
[355] _Blomefield_, i. 412.
[356] _Faulkener’s History of Chelsea_, 153.
[357] Tillotson’s funeral sermon for Mr. Gouge, 62–64.
[358] _Life of Thomas Firman, late Citizen of London_, 1698.
Wesley prefaces the life of Firman in the _Arminian Magazine_ with
these words: “I was exceedingly struck at reading the following
life, having long settled it in my mind that the entertaining wrong
notions concerning the Trinity was inconsistent with real piety.
But I cannot argue against matter of fact. I dare not deny that Mr.
Firman was a pious man, although his notions of the Trinity were quite
erroneous.”--_Southey’s Life of Wesley_, ii. 68.
[359] _Life and Times_, pt. ii. 296–7.
[360] _Birch’s Life of Boyle_, Appendix. The New England Company is
still in existence. I hope to be able to give some account of its
proceedings in a future volume.
[361] The College referred to was Emmanuel.--_D’Oyley’s Life of
Sancroft_ i. 128.
[362] “The gradual exclusion of mental by physical science from
the circle of ‘philosophy’ as defined in the Cambridge Schools,
belongs to the first half of the 18th, not of the 17th century,”
says the author of _Thorndike’s Life_, but he justly adds that in
the 17th century ancient philosophy and languages were yielding “to
the continually-increasing influence of mathematics and natural
philosophy.”--_Works_, vi. 166.
[363] _State Papers, Dom._, 1667, Cal. 301.
[364] _North’s Lives_, iii. 362–367.
[365] _Cooper’s Annals_, iii. 549.
[366] Dated Oct. 8, 1674.--_Wilkins’ Concilia_, iv. 594. Letters
referring to Monmouth’s election as Chancellor, may be found amongst
the _State Papers_, (1674,) and a characteristic one from the Duke,
accepting this office in Lambeth Library, _Tenison MSS._ 674, fol. 5.
[367] Printed Copy of the programme in Latin:--“Quod se unusquisque,
post sex hebdomodas abhinc numerandas, coram Academicis Concionem, sive
Anglice, sive Latine habiturus, Illam, more majorum, a principio ad
finem, memoriter recitare tenebitur; ita ut, vel non omnino, vel saltem
perraro, nec nisi carptim, et stringente oculo, librum consulere opus
habeat.”--_State Papers, Dom._, 1674, Nov. 24.
[368] _Dom. Charles II._ 1666, Aug. 16, 17. There is a curious letter,
dated 1677, July 23, written by Joseph Addison’s father, Launcelot
Addison, begging preferment.
[369] _Autobiography of A. Wood_, quoted _Oxoniana_, ii. 23.
[370] _Ibid._, 89.
[371] Letter from Dr. Wallis, July, 1669, _Neal_, iv. 423.
[372] _State Papers._
[373] The letters are dated 1684, Nov. 6, 8, 12, 16, _Oxoniana_, ii.
205–210.
[374] See the Writings of William Penn.
[375] _Life, Works_, vi. 176, _et seq._
[376] _Works_, ii. 15.
[377] _Ibid._, ii. 88–100.
[378] _Ibid._, v. 488.
[379] _Works_, i. 118; iii. 246.
[380] Vol. ii. 424, 409, 471, 564.
[381] Vol. iii. 68, 80, 128. It is well to recollect, all through this
account of the Anglo-Catholic view of faith, what is the doctrine of
Roman Catholics upon the subject--“Jam vero Catholici agnoscunt quidem
vocabulum fidei, in divinis literis non semper uno, et eodem modo sumi
... tamen fidem historicam, et miraculorum, et promissionum, unam et
eandem esse docent, atque illam unam non esse proprie notitiam, aut
fiduciam, sed assensum certum, atque firmissimum, ob auctoritatem primæ
veritatis; et hanc unam esse fidem justificantem.”--_Bellarmin, De
Justificatione_, c. iv.
[382] Vol. iii. 173, 355.
[383] Vol. iii. 313.
[384] _Ibid._, 393, 496.
[385] Vol. iii. 541-547; chap. xxviii.–xxx.
[386] _Ibid._, 649.
[387] _Ibid._, 660.
[388] Any one who wishes to verify this may do so by consulting the
useful index to the Oxford Edition of _Thorndike’s Works_. It is
interesting and instructive, in connection with the study of Thorndike,
to read the deeply thoughtful sermon on Justification by Hooker
(_Works_, iii.). The divergence between them is manifest. Thorndike
could not consistently hold Hooker’s clear view of justification, as
distinguished from holiness. It may not be amiss here to observe that
the doctrine of justification by faith, though tenaciously held by the
Puritans, was not held by them alone. It was maintained by Reformers
who opposed Puritanism, and by some Roman Catholics before the Council
of Trent. There were anti-Lutherans who so far agreed with Luther.
Whether they were consistent is another question.
[389] Vol. iii. 695.
[390] _Life of Thorndike_, 224, 253.
[391] _Nelson’s Life of Bull_, 24.
[392] _Harmonia Apostolica_, 10.
[393] _Harmonia Apostolica_, 21, 22.
[394] _Harmonia Apostolica_, 58, 71, 76, 87–166.
[395] This quotation is taken from the _Tracts for the Times_, iv. 63.
The words in _Bull’s Apology_, sect. i., are not closely followed.
[396] _Nelson’s Life of Bull_, 191.
[397] _Bull’s Exam. Cens., &c._, Oxford Edit., 38–91.
[398] _Ibid._, 228.
[399] Preface to _Exam. Cens._
[400] See for example his defence of Origen, _Def. Fid._, i. 190, 196,
200. Notice, also, what Hallam says of Bull, _Introduction to Lit._,
iv. 152. Hooker (in the _Eccl. Polity_, book v. s. 42) speaks of the
Deity of our Lord Jesus Christ--the co-equality and co-eternity of the
Son with the Father--as contained but not opened in the former Creed
(the Apostles’). I would call attention to a pregnant remark of that
great Divine:--“Howbeit, because this Divine mystery is more true than
plain, divers having framed the same to their own conceits and fancies,
are found in their expositions thereof more plain than true.”--_Ibid._,
s. 52. May I add, that he seems to forget his own remarks in s. 56.
[401] _Bull’s State of Man_, ii. 96; _Jackson_, iii. 117; _Ellicott’s
Destiny of the Creature_, 172.
[402] _Theologia Veterum_, 407.
[403] The word _being_ is used by Pearson and Heylyn in the same way as
we use the word _since_. The quotation is from p. 251, in the 12th fol.
edit. of _Pearson’s Exposition_. For Heylyn’s opinions, see _Theol.
Vet._, 255. The contrast between the tone of Pearson and Heylyn is very
striking.
[404] _Works_, ii. 241-255.--_Life of Christ_, first published in 1649,
afterwards “with additionals,” 1653.
[405] _Taylor’s Works_, ix. 424.--_Real Presence_, 1654.
[406] See Sect. iii. iv. v. vi. of the _Real Presence_, ix. 436, _et
seq._
[407] _Taylor’s Works_, i., p. ccxxviii.
[408] _Taylor’s Works_, vi. 271. _Sermons._
[409] _Taylor’s Works_, ii. 323.--_Life of Christ._
[410] _Ibid._, vi. 279.--_Sermons._
[411] _Taylor’s Works_, vii. 444.--_Liberty of Prophesying_, 1647.
[412] _Ibid._, 445.
[413] _Works_, i. ccxi.
[414] _Life_, clxxxiii.
[415] _Hooker’s Works_, book iii., sect. 3.
[416] _Life_, clxxxv.
[417] _Cosin’s Works_, vol. v., pref. xix.
[418] _Bingham_, in his _Antiquities_ (v. 358, _et seq._), expends
much learning upon proofs that the Fathers believed in the continued
substantial presence of bread and wine. In _Hooker_, there is a
clear description of the Anglican view as distinguished from other
views.--_Eccl. Polity_, v.c. lv., &c.
[419] “Nam multi ex antiquissimis patribus, ut Justinus Martyr,
Tertullianus, Clemens Romanus, Lanctantius, Victorinus Martyr, et alii,
non putabant animas justorum hinc recta ad cœlos ire: sed in sinu
Abrahæ, vel in aliquo alio refrigerii loco usque ad ultimi judicii
diem detineri; adeoque interea Beatificæ visionis, seu perfectæ
felicitatis, ex Dei promissione et Christi merito illis debitæ,
expertes esse. Quare cum sic judicarent non abs re erat Deum illorum
nomine orare, ut maturaret illum diem, quem coronandis Sanctis suis in
plenitudine Redemptionis destinâsset.”--_Epistolaris Dissertatio_, &c.,
18.--Compare _Tracts for the Times_, No. 72.
[420] _Works_, Oxford Edit., iv. 507.--Preface to the “Catching of
Leviathan,”--this preface is very clever and amusing.
[421] _Walton’s Lives: Pierce’s Letter._ For an account of
Sublapsarianism, &c., see _Burnet_ on the _Articles_, xvii.
[422] _Walton’s Lives_: Pierce’s letter, 52.
[423] _Sermons_, 60.
[424] Some account has been given of Hammond in the _Church of the
Commonwealth_. A letter, from which a quotation is inserted on p. 333,
has been incorrectly supposed to refer to him. Hammond was unmarried.
[425] _Practical Catechism_ (published in 1662), p. 78. Oxford Edit.,
1847.
[426] _Practical Catechism_, 34, 79, 25. His minor Theological Works
are controversial.
[427] _Exposition_, 337, 345.
[428] _Exposition_, 348, 364, 365, 366.
[429] _Works_, ii. 85, 117, 131.
[430] _Works_, ii. 113.
[431] _Ibid._, 128.
[432] _Works_, ii. 337.
[433] _Ibid._, 13, 15.
[434] _Ibid._, 16.
[435] _Works_, ii. 533.
[436] _Thorndike’s Works_, ii. 4; iv. 910.
[437] _Bull’s Works_, ii. 187.
[438] _Theologia Veterum_, 450.
[439] _Theologia Veterum_, 417.
[440] _Preface to Dissuasive from Popery._--_Works_, x., cxviii.
[441] _Works_, i. 72.
[442] _Bramhall’s Vindication of Grotius_, quoted in _Tracts for the
Times_, No. 74.
[443] _Cosin’s Latin Confession._--_Works_, iv. 525.
[444] _Treatises._ _Answer to Father Cressy_, 31.
[445] _Thorndike’s Works_, v. 20; i. 622, 530.
[446] _Works_, iv. 923, 173.
[447] _Cosin’s Works_, iv. 527.
[448] Hallam speaks of the testimony brought forward as consisting of
“vague and self-contradictory stories, which gossiping compilers of
literary anecdote can easily accumulate.”--_Const. Hist._, i. 216.
[449] Compare this with what I have said in vol. iii., p. 81.
[450] _Register_, 386.
[451] _Thoresby’s Diary_, i. 61.
[452] I have before me the 20th edition of the _New Whole Duty of Man_,
authorized by the King’s most excellent Majesty, in which there is
a decided attack made upon the old _Whole Duty of Man_. Some of the
author’s criticisms are scarcely fair.
[453] The first edition was published 1659. In Aubrey’s _Letters_, ii.
125–134 there is an interesting discussion respecting the authorship
of the book. It has been ascribed to Lady Packington, to Archbishop
Frewen, to Archbishop Sancroft, and to Woodhead, who, after the
Restoration, became a Roman Catholic.
[454] He is to be distinguished from Samuel Clarke, the Puritan.
Walton’s Polyglott is noticed in _Ecclesiastical Hist._, vol. ii.
[455] _Hallam_, _Introduction_, &c., iv. 149. See note to this chapter
in the Appendix. It is too long for insertion here.
[456] See vol. i. of this history for particulars in Chillingworth’s
life.
[457] Chap. iv.
[458] _John Smith’s Select Works_, 333.
[459] _John Smith’s Select Works_, 344, 349.
[460] _Golden Remains_, 157.
[461] _Ibid._, 95.
[462] _Ibid._, 257.
[463] _Ibid._, 114.
[464] _Farindon’s Sermons_, iii. 171.
[465] _Farindon’s Sermons_, iii. 285, 286.
[466] _Ibid._, 562.
[467] _Farindon’s Sermons_, i. 71.
[468] _Phenix_, ii. 505.
[469] _Life and Times_, ii. 386.
[470] _Hist. of his Own Times_, i. 188.
[471] _Works_, v. 316.
[472] _The Principles and Practices of Certain Moderate Divines of the
Church of England_, by Edward Fowler, 89.
[473] _Ibid._, 114.
[474] _The Principles and Practices of Certain Moderate Divines of the
Church of England_, 126, 161.
[475] _The Principles and Practices of Certain Moderate Divines of the
Church of England_, 213, 228.--Compare with this extract what is said
hereafter respecting the opinions of Richard Baxter.
[476] _A Discourse of Christian Liberty_, Sect. II. chap. viii.
[477] Sect. III., chap. xv.; see also chap. xiii. _Fowler’s Discourse
on the Principles of certain Moderate Divines, &c._, was published
1679. In 1671, he published _The Design of Christianity_, in which
he dwelt upon the restoration of righteousness in man as the chief
purpose of the Gospel. He was answered in the following year by
John Bunyan. The reply is entitled, “A defence of the doctrine of
justification by faith in Christ Jesus; showing true Gospel holiness
flows from thence; or Mr. Fowler’s pretended _Design of Christianity_,
proved to be nothing more, than to trample under foot the blood of
the Son of God; and the idolizing of man’s own righteousness: as also
how while he pretends to be a minister of the Church of England, he
overthroweth the wholesome doctrine contained in the 10th, 11th, and
13th of the Thirty-nine Articles of the same, and that he falleth in
with the Quaker and Romanist against them.” The bad temper of the book
is indicated in this long title. Bunyan points out Fowler’s defects,
and defends important doctrines which Fowler impugns; but he deals in
a good deal of fierce and coarse invective. In this respect, Fowler
equalled him, when he published a rejoinder.
[478] _Intellectual System_, 61, 597, 619.
[479] _Ibid._, 191.
[480] _Intellectual System_, 676.--We may gather from the passage,
how Cudworth would have treated the Darwinian hypotheses of natural
selection and struggle for life.
[481] _Burnet_, i. 189, includes him when describing the
Latitudinarians.
[482] _Origines Sacræ_, 539.
[483] _Kitto’s Cycl., Art. Patrick._--It is many years ago since I
consulted Patrick, but my impressions are of the kind stated above.
Of Lightfoot’s learning I am not a competent judge, but I follow the
current of opinion as I find it in the best critics.
[484] _Whewell’s Inductive Sciences_, ii. 112.
[485] See _Letters by Stubbe_, in _Birch’s Life of Boyle_, 189–200.
[486] See his _Lex Orientalis_, _Sadducismus Triumphans_, and _Vanity
of Dogmatizing_, Ed. 1661.
[487] _Plus Ultra_, 88.--Glanvill answered Stubbe’s attack. No love was
lost between them; most bitterly did they abuse one another.
[488] In the _Plus Ultra_, p. 141, is a passage which might have been
written by a modern controversialist.
[489] _Philosophia Pia_, particularly pp. 81 and 119. This treatise
and others, published under new titles, may be found in his volume of
_Essays_, published in 1676. He was addicted to the habit of reprinting
old treatises under new titles. There is, in Dr. Williams’ Library, a
good collection of Glanvill’s works, including the first and second
editions of _The Vanity of Dogmatizing_, now very scarce.
[490] _Joshua de la Place_ (_Placæus_) died 1655; _Claude Pagon_, 1685.
They were leaders in this direction.
[491] Spener commenced his ministry in 1662, and died in 1705.
[492] See Andrew Rivet, _Isagoge_, &c., 1627, xx. “Nullum esse hominum
cœtum, nullum hominem quantacunque dignitate polleat, qui sensus
Scripturæ aut controversiarum fidei, sit judex supremus et judici
infallibalis.”
[493] Descartes died 1650; Spinoza, 1677.
[494] _Christian Doctrine_, translated by Sumner, 85–89, 135.
[495] Chap. xiv.-xxiii. One of the most extraordinary charges which
party spirit ever created was that of Milton being a Papist.
[496] _Biddle’s Confession of Faith touching the Holy Trinity._
[497] _Works_, viii. 83, _et seq._ In the Lambeth Library, Tenison
MSS., 673, is a curious volume containing “Original papers, which a
cabal of Socinians in London offered to present to the Ambassadors of
the King of Fez and Morocco, when he was taking leave of England in
1682.” The agent of the Socinians is said to have been Monsieur de
Verze.
[498] _De Carne Christo._--_Adv. Prax._, c. vii.
[499] Quoted in _Bancroft’s Hist. of the United States_, ii. 373.
[500] _Works_, i. 150, 151, 157, 167, 209, 215, 231.
[501] _A Discourse of the General Rule of Faith and
Practice._--_Works_, i. 294.
[502] _Works_, i. 310.
[503] See his _Sandy Foundation_.--_Works_, i.
[504] _Works_, i. 62, 262, 267.
[505] See Penn’s _Great Case of Liberty of Conscience_, published
1670.--_Works_, iii.
[506] See _Truth Exalted_.--_Works_, i.
[507] _Third Proposition concerning the Scriptures._ See pp. 142–146,
204.
[508] _Apology_, 204 (abridged).
[509] _Ibid._, 207, 226, 241.
[510] _Sparkles of Glory_, 145, 200.
[511] _Sterry’s Sermons_, 17.
[512] Gale insists upon the sense of religion in barbarous
nations.--Part iv., 238.
[513] _Howe’s Works_, iii. 37. He refers to Cudworth. See remarks on
the argument in _Rogers’ Life of Howe_, 368.
[514] _Works_, iv. 416, _et seq._
[515] _Works_, ii. 144, _et. seq._--I have, in speaking of Thorndike,
mentioned the distinction which he makes between degrees of
inspirations. But that was a turn of thought which seems to have been
rarely taken in those days. I have searched Pearson, and Taylor, and
Goodwin, and even Baxter, besides others, in vain for any indication
of their having contemplated any such controversy on the subject as
exists in our day. The complete inspiration of the Bible was believed.
The Lutheran theologians of the seventeenth century maintained the
inspiration of every word, and also that the Hebrew vowel points are
original.--_Hagenbach Hist. of Doctrine_, ii. 231.
[516] _Herbert’s De Veritate_ was published in 1624.
[517] For the doctrine of the Eternal Generation, see _Goodwin’s
Works_, v. 547; _Owen’s Works_, viii. 112, 291. For the doctrine of
the Trinity: _Goodwin_, iv. 231; _Owen_, ii. 64, 175; _Orme’s Life of
Baxter_, 470.
[518] See Howe’s mode of speaking about the covenant in contrast with
Thorndike’s.--_Works_, iii. 448.
[519] _Works_, viii. 4, 257, 459, 546; ii. 234; viii. 288.
[520] _Works_, ix. _Discourse of Election._
[521] See _Ibid._, 154, 160, 344. He mentions a good woman, who said
to her wicked son, “Well, I shall one day rejoice that thou shalt be
damned, and take part with the glory of God therein.” The conviction of
so high a grace in her soul he declares was the means of breaking the
man’s heart, and converting him.
Such things had been said by the schoolmen. Thomas Aquinas, in his
_Summa_ (pt. iii. sup. quest. 94, art. i.), alludes to the bliss of the
saved being increased by the sight of the lost.
[522] _Works_, iii. 15.
[523] _Ibid._, iii. 15; iv. 64, 9.
[524] Vol. VI. bk. ii.
[525] _Owen’s Works_, xi. 203, 209.
[526] _Owen’s Works_, ix. 198.
[527] _Works_, v. 325 _et seq._ They are sixteen in number, and
are stated in such a way that it is impossible to condense them
satisfactorily.
[528] _Ibid._, 267, 308, 318.
[529] _Imputatio Fidei_ (1642), pp. 7, 17. Nothing can exceed the
clearness and precision with which the whole case is stated at the
beginning of the Treatise.
[530] _Redemption Redeemed_, (1651), 433.--This point he pursues at
great length in chapters v., viii., xvi., xx. He argues, that if Christ
died _sufficiently_ for all, He died _intentionally_ for all.--p. 95.
Although I agree with Goodwin, so far as to believe that Christ died
for all men, I may observe that sometimes his reasonings against the
Calvinistic doctrine of election, as for instance in chap. xviii. sec.
4 and 7, are as unsatisfactory as they are intricate. He frequently
attributes to his opponents implications in argument, and consequences
of doctrine, which they would indignantly repudiate. It is a common
vice in controversy.
[531] _Ibid._ Preface.
[532] _Calamy’s Account_, 484. _Cont._ 632.
[533] _Ibid._, 35.
[534] _Baxter’s Life and Times_, i. 107.
[535] _Ath. Ox._ iv. 784. Even Wood seems to have been a little touched
by this beautiful statement, for after calling Baxter the late pride
of the Presbyterians, he remarks, “he very civilly returned me this
answer.”
[536] _Works_, vii. 312, 315.--_Treatise on Conversion_, 1657. The
first chapter of the _Saint’s Everlasting Rest_, published in 1649, is
Calvinistic.
[537] _Ibid._, viii. 119. He says, however, in his _End of Doctrinal
Controversies_, published in 1691 (p. 160): “Christ died for all, but
not for all alike, or equally; that is, He intended good to all, but
not an equal good, with an equal intention.” See also extracts from his
_Catholic Theology_ (1675), _Orme’s Life of Baxter_, p. 477. In the
Appendix to _Baxter’s Aphorisms_ (1649), there are Animadversions on
Owen’s views of Redemption.
[538] _Polano’s History of the Council of Trent_, 212.
[539] See p. 347 of this volume.
[540] _Aphorisms of Justification_, 44.
[541] _Works_, xviii. 503.
[542] It is interesting here to observe, that as the Anglicans differed
from the Romanists, so did the later Puritans from the Reformers, as
to the nature of faith. “Quid est fides? Est non tantum notitia qua
firmiter assentior omnibus, quæ Deus nobis in verbo suo patefecit,
sed etiam certa fiducia, a Spiritu Sancto, per Evangelium in corde
meo accensa, qua in Deo acquiesco, certò statuens, non solum aliis,
_sed mihi quoque remissionem peccatorum, eternam justitiam et vitam,
donatam esse_, idque gratis ex Dei misericordia propter unius Christi
meritum.”--_Cat. Rel. Christ. quæ in Eccl. et Scholis Palitinatus_, p.
8. Bull, in his _Harmonia Ap._, Diss. I., cap. iv. s. 6, attributes
this doctrine of personal assurance as the essence of faith, to the
Reformers generally. Owen admits, “Many great Divines at the first
Reformation, did (as the Lutherans generally yet do) thus make the
mercy of God in Christ, and thereby the forgiveness of our own sins,
to be the proper object of justifying faith, as such.”--_Justification
by Faith._--_Works_, xi. 104. Owen’s idea of justifying faith did
not include assurance. As we have noticed already, Goodwin’s, at
any rate, was much more comprehensive. The Romanists regarded faith
as _Credence_; the Reformers as _Assurance_; the Anglicans and the
Latitudinarians as _Obedience_; the Puritans as _Reliance_.
[543] _Rogers’ Life of Howe_, 21.
[544] The new edition of _Howe’s Works_, published by the Tract
Society, has done much, not only to make them accessible to the public,
but to make the reading of them more easy and pleasant. Professor
Rogers, by an improved punctuation and arrangement of paragraph, has
provided the latter advantage. The work of an Editor is too often
in the present day mere pretence, but in this case there has been
an amount of painstaking, which renders these volumes, in point of
accuracy, worthy of a place by the side of _Keble’s Hooker_.
[545] _Works_, i. 30, _et seq._ _The Blessedness of the Righteous_ was
published in 1668.
[546] _Howe’s Works_, iv. 322.
[547] _Rogers’ Life of Howe_, 389.
[548] _Life of Arnold_, ii. 67.
[549] The remark, I believe, was made by the late Bishop of Lichfield.
[550] _Goodwin’s Works_, iv. 41; ix. 82, 362. _Owen’s Works_, ii. 247,
513.
[551] _Works_, v. 364.
[552] _Ibid._, v. 46; _Christian Directory_, 1673.
[553] _Works_, v. 346.
[554] _Ibid._, vii. 517.
[555] _Howe’s Works_, iii. 460.
[556] _Goodwin’s Works_, vii. 311.
[557] _Baxter’s Works_, iv. (_Christian Directory_), 315.
[558] _Works_, xviii. 301.
[559] _Baxter’s Works_, v. 346. Compare _Origen_, _cont. Celsum_;
_Hooker_, _Eccl. Polity_, ii. 310; and _Thorndike’s Works_, iv. 39.
[560] _Baxter’s Works_, v. 287, _et seq._, 400.
[561] Compare this with what has been said at p. 117.
[562] _Orme’s Life of Baxter_, 659.
[563] _Sermons_, 12.
[564] _Orme’s Life of Baxter_, 589. These passages I have before
referred to.
[565] _Orme’s Life of Owen_, 234.
[566] _Works_, xx. 74, 113.
[567] _Works_, xvi. 256.
[568] I confine myself here to books published before the Revolution,
and of course must omit numbers worthy of mention.
[569] _Orme’s Baxter_, 552.
[570] Brook gives an account of the book in his _Lives of the
Puritans_, iii. 213.
[571] It is a significant fact that John Goodwin’s work on _The Spirit_
is included in Nicholl’s series of _Puritan Divines_.
[572] I cannot but refer, and that with sincere pleasure, to a Sunday
evening spent at Pontresina, in the Engadine, the summer before last,
when, together with a Nonconformist friend, I united in such a service,
with representatives of different sections of the Establishment.
[573] _The Christian Poet._
[574] Himself and his brothers.
[575] _Diary_, i. 15.
[576] Memoir prefixed to _Diary_, p. xviii.
[577] Memoir prefixed to _Silva_, i. 15.
[578] My rule has been to select characters who died before the
Revolution, but it is necessary to notice Evelyn’s life in connection
with Margaret Godolphin; and although he survived the Revolution so
many years, he may fairly be taken as a type of religious life before
that period. A MS. by him was published in the year 1850, in two
volumes, entitled, _A Rational Account of the True Religion_. The first
volume treats of natural theology. In the second, besides a description
of Judaism, primitive Christianity, and the decadence and corruption
of religion, Evelyn “professes to explain the true doctrines of Holy
Scripture and of the Church of England.” The chief interest attaching
to the work will be found to consist in its value “as an impartial
interpretation of her Articles and her Liturgy; conveyed too in a
manner which shows he was not propounding new views, but merely stating
them as understood by her members in his time.”--p. xi. In other
words, Evelyn explains the doctrines of the Church of England from an
Anglo-Catholic point of view. The book indicates the intelligence and
devoutness of the author.
[579] One of the Blagge family was Gentleman of the Privy Chamber to
Henry VIII., and a great favourite with the King, who, for some reason,
called him his pig. “He was a Sacramentarian; and when Wriothesley and
Gardiner, in 1546, commenced their persecution on the Statute of the
Six Articles, Blagge was clapped up in Newgate, and, after a hurried
trial, condemned to be burnt. But the moment the King heard of it, he
rated the Chancellor for coming so near him, even to his privy chamber,
and commanded him instantly to draw out a pardon. On his release,
Blagge flew to thank his master, who, seeing him, cried out, ‘Ah, my
_pig_, are you here safe again?’ ‘Yes, Sire,’ said he, ‘and if your
Majesty had not been better than your Bishops, your _pig_ had been
_roasted_ ere this time.’”--_Tytler’s England under Edward VI. and
Mary_, i. 146.
[580] _The Life of Mrs. Godolphin_, by Evelyn, edited by the Bishop of
Oxford. p. 104. The year of the marriage is not given.
[581] _Ibid._, 106.
[582] _The Life of Mrs. Godolphin_, 176.
[583] Paley.
[584] These quotations from Hale’s writings are found in his _Life_ by
Sir J. B. Williams. See also _Life_ by Burnet.
[585] These passages are taken from a work entitled _Mastix_.
[586] _Campbell’s Essay on Poetry_, 245.
[587] _More’s Dialogues._
[588] _Ward’s Life of More_ gives a full account of this excellent man.
See also _Willmot’s Lives of the Poets_.
[589] See the thought expanded in More’s _Letters on Several Subjects_.
[590] _Sir T. Browne’s Works_, i. liv.
[591] _Ibid._, iv. 420.
[592] _Ibid._, ii. 6.
[593] _Sir T. Browne’s Works_, ii. 12.
[594] _Ibid._, ii. 27, 81, 82; i. xlvii.
[595] _Sir T. Browne’s Works_, ii. 117.
[596] _Lives_, ii. 172.
[597] _Aubrey’s Letters_, ii. 255.
[598] _Birch’s Tillotson_, 75.
[599] _Morice MSS., Ent. Book_.
[600] _Clarendon, Hist._, 493.
[601] _Tomkins’ Piety Promoted_, quoted in _Pattison’s Rise and
Progress of Religious Life in England_, 248.
[602] See _Stanford’s Life of Alleine_.
[603] _Broadmead Records_, 97.
[604] _Stockton MSS., Diary_, Dr. Williams’ Library.
[605] _Life_, 43.
[606] _Life_, 24, 26, 59, 147. Stockton bequeathed £500 and his
valuable library to Gonville and Caius College.
[607] _Calamy._
[608] _Burnet’s Hist. of his Own Time_, i. 381.
[609] Such illustrations occur in Dr. Swainson’s valuable Hulsean
Lectures on _The Creeds of the Church_, 58.
[610] There is, in Glamorganshire, an extra-parochial district called
Llan-vethin.
[611] _At_ was first struck out, and _on_ written over it, then _on_
was altered into _at_.
[612] Appears as if _midst_ had been altered into _body_.
[613] _On_ altered into _at_.
[614] I examined the books once with Dr. Swainson, and once with the
Dean of Westminster.
[615] _Documents_, 177.
[616] I find this stated by Dr. Vaughan, and I have no doubt of its
correctness; but in looking over the _Rejoinder_, I cannot lay my
finger on the passage.
[617] Father Huddlestone.
[618] The Queen’s Priests.
[619] Petre, Bath, and Feversham.
[620] In the Somers’ copy it is “‘the Duke and Lords’ withdrew into the
closet for the space of an hour and a half.”
Transcriber’s Note:
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wh^{ch}.
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6. The INDEX has been added to the Table of Contents.
7. Struck out text is shown as ~xxx~.
8. Smaller font is shown as #xxx#.
9. Where necessary the sidenotes have been placed inside the text of
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