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BR 743 .L8 1883 Lumby, J. Rawson 1831-1895. ' Compendium of English Churc^i' History : from 1688 to I
PRINTED BY C. J. CLAY, M.A. & SON. AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS.
COMPENDIUM
OF
ENGLISH CHURCH HISTORY,
FROM 1688 TO 1830.
WITH A PEEFACE
/
J. RAWSON LUMBY, D.D.
NORKISIAN PROFESSOR OF DIVINITY.
CAMBRIDGE:
DEIGHTON, BELL AND CO.
LONDON : GEORGE BELL AND SONS.
1883
tJSGSTG
PEEFACE.
Several years ago I promised the publishers of this Vohime to prepare for them a Manual of the History of the English Church between 1688 and 1830. Other duties arose and claimed all my time, and I found myself unable to perform my promise. But for two or three years I was in great hope that the work would be done, in my stead, by a member of the University who would, I am sure, have provided an excellent handbook on this subject. He however was called away to other labours, and finding himself unable to make such progress with the volume as he desired at last withdrew fi'om the work.
Soon after this disappointment, both to the publishers and myself, the following pages were offered me, and on perusing them I thought them not unsuitable to the purpose for which they were prepared. I therefore under- took to look them over as they passed through the press and to introduce them by a short preface when they were in print.
vi PREFACE.
Tlie book was written to be a handbook for those who are Candidates for the Ordinary Theological degree, for which this period of history is a fixed subject of exami- nation. The chapters are of set purpose made very short, but the reader is everywhere referred to authorities from whence he may extend his knowledge at any point where he desires to do so. In the chapters on the literature it has been thought sufficient to point out the most important writings. The student who desires to enlarge his acquaintance with the authors named will do so more satisfactorily by perusing their books, than by merely mastering a few sentences in which an attempt should be made to sketch or summarize their contents. Moreover by the perusal of one author he will have his attention directed in the best way to the works of others.
Some alterations and modifications of the text have been made at my suggestion and thus I have become in a degree responsible for the book, which I hope may supply a want that has been a good deal felt by students pre- paring for the Ordinary Degree.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
_ _^ PAGE
The Revolution of 1688 and its Causes .... 1
CHAPTER II. William III. Toleration and Comprehension ... 22
CHAPTER III. The Nonjurors 38
CHAPTER IV.
The Roman Catholics under William III. and Queen
Anne 55
CHAPTER V. Church History in Queen Anne's Reign .... 62
CHAPTER VI.
Theological Literature in the Reigns op William III.
and Anne '^
Vlll CONTENTS.
CHAPTER VII.
PAOB
Hbliqious Societies 103
CHAPTER VIII. Convocation from 1688 to 1717 113
CHAPTER IX. Church History under George I. and George XL . . 126
CHAPTER X. The Methodists and the Evangelical Revival . . . 146
CHAPTER XI. The Reign of George III . 165
CHAPTER XII.
Theological Literature after the commencement of the
eighteenth century 181
CHAPTER XIII.
Sketch op Church History in Scotland, Ireland and
America 192
TABLE OF DATES. INDEX.
,ioPaTy r
CHAPTER I.
THE EEVOLUTION OF 1683 AND ITS CAUSES.
In order to understand rightly the position of religious parties in England at the time of the Revolution of 1688, it will be necessary briefly to consider the events which preceded and brought about that Revolution. Since James II., being a papist himself, wished to bring papists into public employment and to allow them all the privileges enjoyed by members of the Established Church, one of his first steps was naturally to try to obtain the repeal of the Test Act\ This law had been passed in the reign of Charles II. (1672), when the memory of j^ast events and distrust of the King's religious opinions tended to make men equally jealous of Protestant Dissenters and of Roman Catholics, and its provisions excluded all persons, not conforming to the Established Church, from municipal, legal and military service, as well as from employment at
1 For the new parliament which had been summoned the Eang spared no pains to secure the election of such members as would favour his design. He granted new Charters and secured the nomination of persons devoted to the Crown. Forty-four obsequious members were sent up from the county of Cornwall alone, and the Iving looked upon the new parliament as almost entirely devoted to him. See Oldmisou's Hist, of England, ii. 698. Evelyn's Diary, Mar. 5, 1685.
L. 1
2 OUTCRY AGAINST THE TESTS.
Court \ James II. who, to do him justice, was no dis- sembler, bad not been long on the throne before his intentions became manifest. It was after Monmouth's rebellion (1685) daring the first year of his reign that he began openly to speak of abolishing the Tests. At the commencement of that insurrection the King had given commissions in the army to papists, an act " which was over- looked in the time of danger, in which all men's service was to be made use of'"^; besides which papists might legally serve for three months; but when that time had nearly expired, James began to complain that the Tests had been made purposely against him, and that to observe them was an affront to himself. He therefore continued the commissions of the Koinan Catholic officers, and declared openly that he must regard as his enemies any who did not vote for the Repeal of the Test Act in the coming session of Parliament. All those whose interest it was to be in favour at Court, adopted the same tone and declaimed against the Tests, as being insulting to the King, in obliging his subjects to swear that the form of religion which he professed was- idolatrous, and contrary to his rio-hts in depriving him of the services of some of his sub- jects. But this did not deceive the mass of the people, who had a deep-rooted hatred of popery and saw that the repeal of the Tests would pave the way for a total change of the established religion of the kingdom, and that if Roman Catholics were allowed to hold office at all, none but
1 Dalrymple's Memoirs, ii. p. 69, Perry, Hist, of Ch. of Engl. ii. 468.
2 Burnet, Hist, of Jiis own Times, i. 651, who is quoted mainly for those points on which he could not fail to be well informed and wherein his own special leanings would not influence his evidence. Without his work we should know very httle about the events and affairs which he professes to explain.
THE commons' address TO THE KING. 3
Roman Catholics were likely to be employed by the present King. The officers of the army foresaw that they would have to change their religion or lose their com- missions, and even the clergy, who had hitherto been so submissive to the King and had preached the doctrines of divine right and passive obedience most diligently, began to see their danger and hesitated to lend their support to so perilous a design as the repeal of the Tests \
Thus when Parliament met (Nov. 1685) and discussed the violations of the Test Act^, the Commons voted unanimously for an address to the King, praying him to maintain all laws and particularly that one which related to religious Tests, though at the same time they offered to pass a Bill for indemnifying those who had transgressed that laAV ^ In the House of Lords too the same tone soon began to prevail. Upon this, finding that the feeling of both Houses was fixed beyond the hojDe of change, the King prorogued and eventually dissolved the Parliament, while he shewed his opinion of its conduct by disgracing or dis- missing from their places all those who had voted for the Tests^
Up to this time the King had been on good terms with the clergy^, but now that, seeing whither his conduct
1 Burnet, i. 652.
- The king in his speech at the opening of Parliament informed the houses that he had increased the permanent land forces and employed officers who had not taken the Test. The Lords at first were courtier- like and did not express their disapproval. See Life of James II. ii. 54. Evelyn's Diary, Nov. 9, 1685.
^ Burnet, i. 666. ^ Burnet, i. 667.
5 It was Compton, Bp. of London, who had moved in the House of Lords for a day to take the King's speech into consideration, and declared that he spoke in the name of all his brethren, that the whole constitution, civil and ecclesiastical, was in danger. For his conduct in this matter
1—2
4 KING JAMES FAVOUllS DISSENTERS.
tended, they were no longer so obsequious as before, he ceased to treat them with any sort of favour and applied himself to win the Dissenters over to his side. He declared himself to be desirous of universal toleration and con- demned the severity with which Nonconformists had been treated by the Church. He encouraged Dissenters to hold conventicles again, which they had not done openly for four or five years S and intimated that he would not have them disturbed. Some of the Dissenters were deceived by this appearance of favour^; but the wiser men among them distrusted the sudden change and saw that the King's object was to embroil them with the Church, by which means he hoped to break up and so weaken the opposition to Popery. Therefore, though they held their conventicles and were thankful for the freedom accorded to them, they prudently abstained from doing anything which might provoke the Church party I
Now that Parliament no longer stood in his way, the King's government became most arbitrary. He had obtained from some of the Judges an opinion^ that he might dispense with laws at his pleasure, and acting on this decision, he appointed a Romanist judge and made
the Bishop was removed from his office as Dean of the Chapel Eoyal. Evelyn, Jan. 1, 168f.
1 Burnet, i. 172.
2 Sixty addresses were presented by Dissenters in praise of the King's clemency. Kennett's History, iii. 465. Life of Ken by a Layman, i. 362.
3 Baxter and Howe signified their disHke to the King's dispensing power as soon as it began to be exercised, and expressed their unwilling- ness to purchase religious freedom at the expense of the liberties of their country. Neal's Puritans, iv. 461.
4 The suggestion, that the King by his prerogative might exercise this dispensing power, first came from Sir Edward Herbert, Lord Chief Justice, but was eagerly accepted by some others. Evelyn's Dicmj (June 27, 1686). See Kennett, in. 451.
COURT OF ECCLESIASTICAL COMMISSION. 5
five papists members of the Privy Council. He set up an illegal court of Ecclesiastical Commission, by means of which he suspended the Bishop of London, for not obey- ing hlm^, he also attempted to infringe the rights and statutes of the Universities and at last brought matters to a crisis by the Declaration of Toleration^ In this pro- clamation the King set forth his dislike to religious persecution and his desire to allow all his subjects liberty of conscience ; he renewed his promise, made to his first parliament, to support the Church of England ; at the same time he suspended all penal laws in matters of religion; suppressed all oaths and tests required of persons in public employment ; and promised to maintain his subjects in possession of their property and especially of the Abbey lands ^.
By this declaration he also assumed the power of repealing laws by his own authority, for as the penal lavv^s were susj)ended without limit as to time, they were in effect virtually repealed. Such a proceeding alarmed most wise and thoughtful men who foresaw its con- sequences, and although addresses were sent up by the Dissenters, thanking the King for his declaration, yet they were not signed by any men of distinction among them.
The next year (1G88) the declaration was renewed, with the addition that the King would adhere firmly to it, and employ no one in his service who would not uphold it. But not content with republishing the declaration he
1 Bui-net, I. 675.
2 It was on April 4, 1G87, that the Declaration appeared in the Gazette. The King's intention to issue such a Declaration had been made known to the Privy Council on March 18th. He declared to them that it had 'always been his opinion, as most suitable to Christianity, that no man should be persecuted for conscience sake.' Kennett, iii. 463.
3 Burnet, i. 714.
6 king's declakation to be read in churches.
ordered that the Bishops* should distribute it among their clergy, and that the latter should read it in their churches during divine service on two consecutive Sundays, the 20th and 27th of May, 1G881
About this order the clergy were in great perplexity. Many were the meetings held in and about London and long the arguments on the point. Some were of opinion that they might read the illegal declaration as a mere act of obedience, saying publicly at the same time that they did not approve of it ; others, and they the majority, saw that if they obeyed once, they were bound to obey always, and might be made to read declarations subversive of the whole established religion, merely protesting against them as they did so. They must therefore resist such arbitrary assumption of power on the part of the King sooner or later and they thought it best to make a stand at once. For themselves they foresaw that their ruin was resolved on unless they turned traitors to their principles, so that they must prepare themselves to suffer for their Church and their liberties. They therefore resolved not to read the declaration ^
Sancroft, the Archbishop of Canterbury, acted at this time in a way that became him well as Primate of the Church on which this assault had been made'*. He sum- moned the Bishops of his Province to meet in London and discuss this most important matter. Six of the Bishops
^ See Evelyn's Diary, May 18th, 1688, on which day the six Bishops petitioned the King not to impose the reading of the Declaration in the congregations.
2 Burnet, i. 736. 3 Burnet, i. 738.
•* See D'Oyly's Life of Sancroft, i. 255, seqq., where a full account of this solemn meeting is given, and the resolutions at which the prelates arrived.
. TRIAL OF THE BISHOPS. 7
came, and twelve more sent word that they concurred in the resolution not to read the declaration. The Arch- bishop and the six Bishops, those of St Asaph, Bath and Wells, Ely, Peterborough, Chichester and Bristol, drew up a petition to the King, praying that they should not be forced to read the declaration until it had been settled by Parliament and Convocation what it was right for them to do. For this petition, which James declared to be a libel, they were committed to the Tower to await their triaP. Such an insult perpetrated against these reverend fathers of the Church roused the indignation of all classes of men, and left no doubt that now they must look to them- selves to protect their religion to which the King was shewing himself sua. open enemy. The result of the triaP in Westminster Hall and the unbounded rejoicings of the people on the acquittal of the Bishops ought to have warned James that he had carried his attempt to make Roman Catholicism the religion of England too far, but he was infatuated, and fortunately for our liberties held on his course. Such was the submissive temper of the nation at the beginning of James' reign, that it is highly probable that he would have been allowed to subvert its civil freedom without much resistance, but providentially he identified himself Avith popery, the very thought of which was hateful to the people, and in the course of three short years by attacking their religion he had changed the mass of his loyal subjects into determined and formidable opponents I
1 See Evelyn's Diary (June 8th, 1688).
2 The trial took place on June 29th, 1688. Evelyn records how it lasted the whole day, and the Jury were locked up all the night and gave their verdict next morning.
3 See Smyth's Lectures on Modern History, ii. 53: **It is a melancholy conclusion that if James had not violated the reUgious persuasions of his
8 WILLIAM PEINCE OF OKANGE.
For some time William Prince of Orange, the king's son-in-law, had been looked to by Englishmen as their only hope of deliverance from the tyranny of their own King. He was the great champion of Protestantism in Europe, and as husband to the Princess Mary, the pre- sumptive heiress to the crown, he had a right to more than an ordinary or passing interest in the affairs of England. When the trial of the Bishops and the birth of the Prince of Wales \ putting an end to all hopes of a Pro- testant succession, made the people of England seriously seek for a way out of their present difficulties, it was to him they turned ^ It cannot be said that he received any great encouragement to come over at first, for with the remembrance of Monmouth's rebellion and the horrors that followed it fresh in their minds, men hesitated to incur the guilt of treason rasbly, and only seven patriots signed the invitation to him ; four peers, two commoners, and Compton, Bishop of London, who had been suspended by the Ecclesiastical Court ^. But these men assert in their letter to the Prince that "the greatest part of the nobility
subjects, he would have met \vith no proper resistance whatever, and that the English nation, after all the sufferings and exertions of their ancestors, would at this period have submitted to such violations of theu' civil liberties, and would have a^llowed such precedents to be established, that in the event these liberties might very probably have been lost, like those of the other European monarcliies."
1 The prmce was born on Trinity Sunday, 1688, while the Bishops were in the Tower. D'Oyly's Life of Sancroft, i. 288 and note.
2 The invitation sent to William that he should come over and help the country was dated on the day of the acquittal of the Bishops (June 30th, 1G88).
3 The names of the seven signatories (though they were only sent in cipher) deserve to be remembered. With Bishop Compton were the lords, Devonshire, Danby, Shrewsbury and Lumley, and the commoners, Mr Sidney and Admiral Eussel.
INVITATION SENT TO WILLIAM. 9
and gentry are as much dissatisfied as themselves ; that nineteen out of twenty are desirous of a change, that very many of the soldiers do daily shew such an aversion to the Popish religion that there is the greatest probability they would desert ; and amongst the seamen there is not one in ten who would do James any service'."
With the seven signatures and this indirect promise of support from others, together with some few letters from influential persons, including several Tory Lords, William had to be content. It does not come within our province to enter upon the political difficulties of the coming of the Prince of Orange ; suffice it to say that those difficulties were most unexpectedly lessened by the quarrels of his two great enemies, the Pope and the King of France, and by the wilful blindness of James to the object of his son- in-law's preparations; advantages which were seized at the right moment and used as only a master-mind like William's could use them.
Finding that his attempt against the Bishops had failed, James next proceeded to cite the Chancellors of the various dioceses and the inferior clergy to appear before the Court of Ecclesiastical Commission and answer for their conduct in havino; nedected to read his declaration. This was a step too far even for Sprat, the hitherto subservient bishop of Rochester, who resigned his seat'' in that court, rather than sit in judgment upon so many pious and excellent men with whom it became him rather
1 See Smyth's Lectures, ii. 57.
2 Evelyn's Diary (July 23rcl, 1688). "Dr Sprat, Bishop of Rochester, wrote a very honest and handsome letter to the Commissioners Ecclesias- tical, excusing himself from sitting any longer among them, he by no means approving of their prosecuting the clergy who refused to read the Declaration for liberty of conscience, in prejudice of the Church of England."
10 LANDING OF THE PRINCE OF ORANGE.
to sufFer\ The Court was adjourned till December, 1688. It never met again ; for on the 5th of November in that year, the Prince of Orange landed at Torbay. On the 2nd of that month a declaration had begun to be cir- culated in England, in which the Prince stated that at the earnest solicitation of many Lords spiritual and temporal, of many gentlemen and other subjects of all ranks, he had interposed with no other view than to cause a free Parlia- ment to be assembled which might remedy all grievances and secure the national religion and liberty under a just and legal government for the future l This declaration opened James' eyes to the dangers which surrounded him*. He sent for the Bishops and expressed a wdsh that they would draw up a paper, declaring their abhorrence of the Prince's attempt^ But most of them approved of all that had been done and one of them (Gompton) had signed the invitation to the Prince, so they would give no direct answer to the King's request^ and left him with a recom- mendation that he should call a Parliament with all speedy
1 Burnet, i. 744.
2 It was dissolved by the advice of the Bishops given to the King on October 3.
3 Burnet, i, 775.
* The news that his son-in-law was about to invade the kingdom was first conveyed to James by a letter of the King of France. Dalrymple's Memoirs, i. v. 31.
« D'Oyly's Life of Sancroft, i. 353.
* Dr Stoughton, Ch. of the Revolution, p. 29.
7 The Bishops had two interviews with the King. First on Sept. 24th they came (but the Primate was not with them) to his presence by invitation, but were not bold enough to declare plainly what were their thoughts and feelings. But they afterwards asked for another audience (granted to them on Oct. 3rd) and then gave him their recommendation, drawn up under ten heads, of which the advice to call a parliament formed the ninth. See D'Oyly's Life of Sancroft, i. 339, 344.
CONDUCT OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE. 11
Meanwhile William had followed up his landing by a speedy march to Exeter where he stayed ten days in hopes of being joined by some people of note in the neighbour- hood. But the troublous times through which they had so lately passed deterred the West-country folk from plunging hastily into another civil war ; while the clergy, who had so long preached passive obedience, were ashamed to be found to have changed their opinions so soon, and held back now that it had come to the point of taking up arms against the King\ The Dissenters too were tardy in joining him, and on the whole for the first week after his arrival he was rather not opposed than supported ^ But soon the tide began to turn; people of influence in the West declared for the Prince, and soon "every man mistaking his neighbour's courage for his own, all rushed to the camp or to the stations which had been assigned them, with a violence proportioned to their late fears ^"
Now that it was too late, James saw the peril of his position and hastened with an army to Salisbury, but the number of his troops was soon so greatly diminished by desertions to the Prince of Orange that he found himself obliged to return to London ^ Wlien there, as a last resource, he issued two proclamations, one promising a free pardon to all his subjects who should now return to their allegiance, and one for the speedy calling of a Parliament ^ As might have been expected these concessions, extorted only by fear, had no practical effect, and James, deserted
1 Burnet, i. 790.
2 On William's complaints about the coldness of bis reception in England, see Echard's Hist, of the Revolution, p. 167.
3 Dalrymple, i. 225. Smyth's Lectures, ii. 62—63.
4 See Echard, Hist, of Rev. p. 192. e Stoughton, p. 47.
12 FLIGHT OF KING JAMES.
by all whom he had trusted, was forced to seek safety in flight.
The news of the King's flight threw everyone into consternation, no one knowing what should be done next until some Peers, who happened to be in London, called a meeting in the Guildhall, which was attended by the two Archbishops and several Bishops \ They there drew up an address to the Prince, in which they promised to assist him in obtaining a Parliament for the welfare of the country, the security of the Church and the freedom of Dissenters. This address was signed by all the Prelates present and by several Peers ^
The King had however been detained at Sheerness, when he was attempting to leave the country, and his return to London produced a brief outburst of loyalty in the people ^ He was welcomed back with a sufficient shew of en- thusiasm to make him for a moment take heart and begin to think all was not yet lost. But it was too late ; the Dutch soldiers soon reached London and James was requested by Wilham to leave that city for Ham near Richmond^ The King asked to be allowed to go to Rochester, and William, nothing loth, granted his request. Rochester afforded easy means of escape, and that James should leave the country was what the Prince sincerely wished. To Rochester therefore the King went, with a guard which was anything but strict, and soon in spite of the remonstrances of many who were still friendly to him, quitted England for St Germains'.
1 The meeting was composed of the two Archbishops, five Bishops and twenty-two temporal peers. Kennett, in. 501.
2 Stoughton, p. 53. 3 gee Dah:ymple's Mevioirs, i. vi. 224, seqq. ** Stoughton, p. 57.
5 He quitted the country on 23 Dec. 1688, "leaving," says Sir J.
CHURCH PARTIES. 13
Now that William, after a peaceable marcli from the West, had entered the capital, whence the reigning King had fled, the real troubles of his enterprise began. The difficult question of the settlement of the Crown remain- ed to be solved, and men who had been agreed in thinking that some change was necessary in order to keep the King's arbitrary disposition within bounds, were not at all united in opinion as to what the nature of that change should be. In the Church there were at this time three parties. (1) The High Church or Tory party, who held the doctrine of the divine right of Kings, and believing James to have an indefeasible title to the kingdom, would gladly have seen him recalled and reinstated on the throne, under certain conditions and restrictions \ Havinof taken an oath of allegiance to James, these men held it to be binding on them for ever, and would not swear allegiance to William, whom they began to regard as an usurper when it was proposed that he should be made King. This party shortly became known as the Nonjurors, and Archbishop Sancroft may be considered as the leader of it. (2) There was the Low Church or Whig party, who were William's great supporters, and had been the first to look to him for help from James's encroachments. They considered that the late King had virtually abdicated the throne by his flight, and being quite prepared to see William reigning in his stead, had no scruples about taking an oath of allegiance to him. (3j There was a small party of extreme High Church men, who had not
Dalrymple, "a terrible example to all British kings not to invade the liberties or religion of Britain."
1 "Up to this time tliere was no difference of opinion among the Bishops and Clergy," says Lathbury, llist. of Nonjurors, p. 27. But now they began to break up into parties.
14 THE PKESBYTERIANS.
sympathized in any way with the Revolution and who lonjied for James's unconditional return.
Among Dissenters there were only four parties of any importance; Presbyterians, Independents, Anabaj)tists and Quakers. (l)The Presbyterians were the descendants and followers of those people who were driven from England by the Marian persecutions and took refuge at Geneva, where they adopted the doctrines and discipline of Calvin. When the Protestant Queen Elizabeth succeeded to the throne, they returned to their country, but met with very little favour there. The distinctive tenet of their body was that all orders of ministers in the church ought to.be equal; they objected to many of the ceremonies of the Church of England, and in private life they adopted that strictness and severity of conduct and manners which gained them the name of Puritans. They were objects of great dislike to Queen Elizabeth, and some of their num- ber were imprisoned in her reign (1573) for drawing up what they called "an admonition" addressed to parliament, in which they denounced the doctrines and ceremonies of the Church of England and recommended a reformation on the model of the Church of Geneva. The intolerance of the government drove a great many of them to the other side of the Atlantic, there to seek homes where they might worship God unmolested, in the way their consciences most approved, and they were among the earliest settlers in the State of New England. Many of them went over to Ulster, some years later, when James I. colonized that province, and they have ever since been an important body in the north of Ireland.
(2) The Independents, though bitter enemies of the Presbyterians, differed from them in nothing but their views on church government. To the Independent, every
THE INDEPENDENTS. 15
distinct society of Christians united for religious fellowship and worship was a church, possessed of full power to regulate its own concerns and to choose its own ministers, independent of all foreign control. The sect was founded, during the reign of Elizabeth, by Robert Brown, a gentle- man of Rutlandshire, from whose name they were for some time known as Brownists. Meeting with great opposition in England, Mr Brown went over to Middle- burgh in Holland, where he formed a church on his own plan. The party went on gradually increasing in numbers, joining with their views of independence in religious government republican theories of civil government, till they reached the climax of their power during the Commonwealth, when Cromwell and most of the great statesmen of that period were Independents. While both they and the Presbyterians were powerful bodies, they kept up a bitter dissension on the subject of church government, but at the end of the reign of James II., w^hen they were both much depressed, they avoided that ground of dispute, and so were generally counted as one party, being together three-fourths of the whole number of Dissenters in England. But there was still this essential difference between them; the Presbyterians did not object to Episcopal Ordination, nor to the Liturgy, and, if some alterations^ had been made therein, many of them might have joined the Church, but the Independents, holdin<T: the choice of a conofreo^ation to be sufficient ordination and disapproving of set forms of w^orship, were irreconcileable to the Established Church and could never have been absorbed into it^
1 On the alterations desired and the difficulties which stood in the way of making them, see Lathbury's Hist, of Prayer-hooh, pp. 342 seqq.
2 Burnet, i. 702.
IG THE ANABAPTISTS.
(3)( JThe first notice of Anabaptists (afterwards known as Baptists)- as a distinct communion is about the time of Luthen../The sect had its origin in Germany, and, as its name implies, differed from the other reformed churches in the opinions held by its members on the subject of Baptism. The Anabaptists maintained that only those who personally professed their faith in Christ hvere proper recipients of that sacrament, and they also considered that baptism should be administered not by sprinkling, but by immersion. In most other points of their teaching the Anabaptists were exactly at one with the Independents, but they did not make Independency the most prominent feature of their doctrines. ', When first they appeared in England, in the reign of-£dward VI., they were very much persecuted, and Queen Elizabeth banished them from the country by proclamation. They took refuge in Holland, and were at first joined with the Brownists there, until their differences of opinion created dissensions, when they separated, and a controversy was for some time kept up with great bitterness between the most distinguished pastors on both sides. The sect sprang up again in England in the reign of James I., and separated itself entirely from the English Independents, of which it had at first formed part. At the time of the Bebellion, the Baptists had many representatives and great influence in the army, though in the legislature the Independents had a larger share than they. Bishop Burnet says of them in James II.'s reign, that ''they were generally men of virtue and of an universal charity: and as they were far from being in any treating terms with the Church of England, nothing but an universal toleration could make them capable of favour or employments \" 1 Burnet, i. 702.
THE QUAKERS. 17
(4) The Quakers formed the sraallest of the four sects, and differed entirely from the others, both in doctrine and manners. Of a later growth than those before mentioned, their society was founded by George Fox about the middle of the 17th century. At that time, just at the beginning of the Commonwealth, there were many men, dissatisfied with all existing forms of religion, who professed to be waiting for the truth which had not yet appeared, and among these Fox found his first followers. They were distinguished from the Church of England and from all other Dissenters by their opinions concerning the Holy Spirit and His influence. They held that there should be no baptism but that of the Holy Ghost, and none but spiritual communion. They strove in all things to live up to the letter of the Scriptures, and with that aim refused to take an oath, to serve as soldiers, and to pay tithes or church-rates. Their ministers were not distinguished from other members of their community by any difference in dress, and any one might officiate at their meetings in prayer or preach ing\
The Quakers availed themselves of the liberty granted them by James 11. 's declaration of Indulgence, without asking by what authority or with what motives it was issued, and thanked him for it in an address. William Penn, a distinguished member of the sect, was a great favourite at the court of that King, so much so that Bishop Burnet blames him for being so busy to do that Popish prince service. He was even suspected by some of his own society of leanings towards Rome, and his enemies reviled him as a Jesuit in disguise. But these suspicions
^ For an account of the Dissenters, their origin and tenets, see Lathbury, History of tlie Prayer-hook, chap, xii., and also Orme's Life of Owen.
L. 2
18 SETTLEMENT OF THE CROWN.
were unjust and unfounded, for he appears only to have made use of what influence he had over James to promote the cause of religious freedom \
When the difficult question of the settlement of the Crown began to be discussed, it soon became evident that only a very small proportion of the clergy were desirous of seeing William on the throned The majority wished that James should continue to enjoy the rank and title of King, while William administered the government as Regent. Bancroft^ and a great many of the Bishops were of this mind^ not perceiving that this unpractical arrangement would only lead to another revolution, for William would inevitably govern in a way so directty opposite to James' wishes that it would be a case of using the King's authority against himself, as the Long Parli'ament had used it against Charles I. Sherlock, the Master of the Temple, and a considerable number of divines^ wished to bring James back under certain conditions and stipulations for the peace and safety of the realm — ''an utterly Utopian idea."
Among the Dissenters less interest seems to have been taken in the Settlement. In order to further his designs,
1 Skeats' Hintonj of Free Churches, p. 81.
- Many of the clergy would have been more ready to accept William as permanent sovereign if James had left England at the time of his first attempt to flee, lint when he had returned and been welcomed, and received those who came to him most graciously, there could not be raised, with the same effect, the argument that he had voluntarily deserted the throne. For it was rather by the pressure of William's approach, than by his own choice, that he seemed at last to be driven to France. See Life of James II., ii. 264.
a Burnet, i. 809.
* See Evelyn's Diary (Jan. 15, 1689), where the several proposals and their siipporters are noticed.
5 These men Evelyn (u. s.) calls 'the Tory party.'
NONCONFORMIST VIEWS THEREON. 19
James II. had given them a certain degree of freedom, and some among them cared so little about public affairs, that so long as they had the liberty of preaching, it mattered not to them how or whence it came. Some others who had signed addresses to James were in a difficult position, for in the belief that he was anxious for religious freedom, they had unintentionally upheld his despotism. But now that they had seen whither his designs really tended, they withdrew from his party and awaited quietly whatever chanofe events mio^ht brins^.
Another class of Nonconformists had been glad of the liberty that had been given them, without approving of the way in which it was given. But when the Revolution seemed to promise them this liberty in a legal and consti- tutional way, they were thankful for it and congratulated William on his success. On the whole the Dissenters rejoiced at the downfall of James, and such support as they had to give was given as a rule to William, whose claim to the throne they upheld, although no doubt there were a few old Commonwealth men. Independents and Ana- baptists, who would have preferred a republic with the Prince of Orange as Protector to the most constitutionally limited monarchy \
When the Convention Parliament met early in the year 1C89, the state of feeling among the clergy shewed itself more distinctly. The primate, Sancroft, refused to attend, although summoned by the House of Lordsl He had, it is true, gone to great lengths^ in resisting
1 Stoughton, p. 72.
2 See D'Oyly's Life of Sancroft, i. 410.
3 He is reproached by one of his correspondents for his conduct in this matter, for 'having joined with the other trumpeters of rebellion to sound an alarm for the Prince of Orange, and after your endeavours were accomplished so to behave yourself as if you were ashamed of the glorious
9 9
20 FEELINGS OF THE CLERGY.
James' despotism, but he still held to the doctrine of divine right with all the obstinacy of his nature, and would not be a party to deposing his King. But although he was not in his place, many other Bishops, mostly under his influence, were in theirs. When the motion for a regency was made and lost by a majority of two, twelve Bishops voted for it, and only two, Compton of London and Trelawney of Bristol, for the subsequent motion that the throne was vacant by the flight of James \
Outside the House the same feeling was expressed. The clergy who had supported the Bishops in their arguments for a Regency, and found themselves now the advocates of a failing cause, were in an ill-humour with everything^. Although the throne had been declared vacant by the Convention, a great many of them prayed publicly for ''his most excellent Majesty" still. They trembled for their own particular interests, for William had promised his protection to Dissenters, and they knew if he became King he would keep his word. A Presbyterian himself, he cared nothing for the Established Church; what he had at heart was the procuring of equal religious liberty for all Protestants without giving any one section an advantage over the rest.
While different parties were proposing different arrange- ments, and getting more and more heated in their arguments and less and less likely to arrive at any calm and well-considered conclusion, William thought it time to make his opinion known*. It had been proposed that a Regent should be appointed, he said, and again, that the
action.' Letter of N. Van Grut to Sancroft. Tanner MSS. 27, 16. Cp. also Evelyn's Diary (Febry. 21, 168S).
1 See Clarendon, Correspondence, ii. 25G, note, and Stoughton, p. 75.
2 Skeats, p. 105. ^ Burnet, i. 820.
WILLIAM AND MARY PROCLAIMED. 21
Princess should succeed in her own right and he share her power by courtesy. To neither of these proposals could he agree. The rights of the Princess he would not oppose, her virtues he respected, but he would accept no dignity dependent on the life of another or the will of a woman. Should either of these schemes be adopted, he should return to Holland, satisfied Avith the consciousness of having endeavoured to serve England, though in vain\
The announcement of this decision produced the effect of bringing the debaters in the Houses of Parliament down from the airy theories in which they had been indulging to the practical resolution that the Prince and Princess of Orange should be declared King and Queen. This was carried in the House of Lords by a majority of fifteen only, among whom were five Bishops. Twelve others who were present protested. The Commons concurred in this reso- lution after having drawn up the Declaration of Right as a safeguard to liberty, and William and Mary were proclaimed King and Queen of England on the 13th of February, 1689.
1 Dalrymple, i. 269, quoted by Dr Stougliton, Church of the Revolu- tion, p. 77.
CHAPTER II.
WILLIAM III. TOLEKATION AND COMPREHENSION.
The prince now seated on the throne of England was a member of the House of Nassau. Born after the death of his father and losing his mother while still young, and in troublous times, the cares of government had devolved on him at an early age, and circumstances had forced him to be wise beyond his years. He had long been the champion of freedom and of the Protestant cause against the oppres- sions of Louis XIV. of France, who had become "more violently Roman Catholic than the Pope himself \" and he was without doubt the greatest Protestant Prince of his age. In principles he was a staunch Calvinist, and " was much possessed with the belief of absolute decrees, because, he said, he did not see how the belief of Providence could be maintained upon any other supposition^." He had been bred a Presbyterian, but regarded forms of church government as matters of secondary importance^, and when in England he conformed to the Established Church, which, according to Burnett he preferred to the Dutch. But Burnet is perhaps not altogether to be trusted on this point, for he evidently wishes to make William appear as much of a Churchman as possible ^ Although a Cal-
1 Dr Stoughton, Ch. of the Revolution, p. 7.
2 Burnett, ii. 305. 3 Stoughton, p. 5.
4 I. 691. 5 Stoughton, p. 5, n.
RELIGIOUS OPINIONS OF WILLIAM IIL 23
vinist at a time when Calvinism almost always went hand in hand with intolerance, William III. was singu- larly free from bigotry \ He considered the conscience to be God's province on which man should not encroach^, and, acting up to his principles, gave m^ny of his English sub- jects reason to thank him for the extension of their free- dom. Even Papists were not entirely excluded from the benefits of his hberality. One of his first cares on arriving in London had been to take measures to secure them from all violence, the carrying out of which measures he en- trusted to Burnet, who takes immense credit to himself for actinof with so much moderation towards those from whom none was to be expected in return'^. There was, however, not much fear at the time that the worthy man would ever be in a position in which he might have to be thankful for the forbearance of a Papist. Through the early part of his reign, from motives of policy, William proitected the Roman Catholics from those who would gladly have seized the opportunity of their downfall to make more stringent penal laws against them than those which already existed''. He saw that he could not pretend to demand toleration for Protestants abroad, if he did not protect in some measure the Papists in England, and he feared too that, if he used severity towards them, he should unite his enemies in a Catholic league against him, and by making the war on the continent a war of religion involve in it a deeper interest and larger numbers^ But in lat^r years, when dangers from abroad were not so pressing, and when anxiety and vexation
1 On King William's character and aims with respect to ecclesiastical matters, cf. Macaulay, iv. 77.
2 Burnet, ii. 12. 3 Burnet, i. 802.
* See his speech on the acceptance of the crown of Scotland, Macaulay, IV. 303, 304.
5 Burnet, ii. 12.
24 HIS ATTITUDE TOWARDS THE CHURCH.
at home had nearly worn him out, he tried no longer to stem the torrent of intolerance, and went so far as to give the disgraceful Act of 1700 his sanction.
Towards Protestants of all sects William was, without exception, tolerant, but though never an enemy to the Established Church, he cannot be called a zealous friend of it. He would gladly have seen its boundaries widened so as to admit Dissenters within its pale, by which it would have been reduced to a mere amalgamation of Protestant sects, with a leaning towards the Churches of Scotland and Holland \ He had been bred a Presbyterian and so had naturally no liking for Episcopacy ; the ceremonies of the Church of England he disapproved of^ her party dis- tinctions had no interest for him and were the source of per- petual trouble and vexation to him throughout his reign, and with her clergy generally he was at no time on the best of terms. To Church interests he was quite indifferent, and this alienated him from Churchmen ; he had promised to obtain redress for Dissenters, and he kept his word as far as it was in his power ^ He obtained for them the relief of the Toleration Act which, small as it was, was yet most welcome to them. This, together with the attempt to bring about a Comprehension and the abolishing of Episco- pacy in Scotland, led to his being regarded by the clergy of the Established Church as its enemy, which opinion in its turn was the cause of a great deal of that dissatisfaction which prevailed among the people and clouded the end of William's reign.
When the Convention which had declared William and Mary King and Queen, had been changed into a Parlia- ment and had held some debates on the subject of the
1 Overton and Abbey, Eng. Ch. in 18th CenUmj, i. 10.
2 Burnet, i. 691. 3 gkeats, p. 107.
TOLERATION AND COMPREHENSION. 25
Oaths (of which more hereafter), the Earl of jSTottingham, a High Churchman and Secretary of State, brought forward a Bill "for uniting their Majesties Protestant subjects," and a few days later another " for exempting their Majes- ties Protestant subjects, dissenting from the Church of England, from the penalties of certain laws\" These two important measures, the Bills of Comprehension and Tole- ration, met with very different fates. The object of the Bill of Comprehension was, by altering and modifying the ceremonies and the liturgy of the Church of England, and by making the necessity of observing them less strict, to pave the way for the admission of Dissenters into the Church, thus creating a strong Protestant league which should be able to defy all attacks from its adversaries. The Bill passed the House of Lords easily. The eight nonjuring Bishops had moved for such a measure before they left the House ''^j and Sancroft allowed his name to be used in support of it more by way of redeeming the promises^ made to Nonconformists in the time of danger, than because he really approved of the design*.
In the House of Commons, where a similar Bill had been prepared already^, it met with more opposition, but all proceedings connected with its progress are so sur- rounded with mists of intri2:ue and double-dealinp^, that it is almost impossible to find out who were the real supporters and who the sincere opposers of it. For as Bp Burnet says'', " some of those who moved for the Bill and after-
1 Stoughton, p. 102. 2 Burnet, 11. 6.
3 See D"Oyly's Life of Sancroft, i. 326 seqq. * D'Oyly's Life of Sancroft, i. 412 seqq.
5 Stoughton, p. 105.
6 II. 11. But Burnet was of opinion, as proved to be correct, that a Convocation would prove the entire ruin of the 'Comprehension Scheme.' Hence his judgement on the conduct of Parhament in this matter.
26 ACT OF TOLERATION PASSED.
wards brought it into the House acted a very disingenuous part, for while they studied to recommend themselves by this shew of moderation, they set on their friends to oppose it ; and such as were very sincerely and cordially for it, were represented as the enemies of the Church, who in- tended to subvert it." Instead of proceeding with the Bill, however, the Commons concurred with the Lords in an address to the King, praying for a Convocation which might decide in matters ecclesiastical, a step which put it out of their power to take any further measures with regard to Comprehension, and so the Bill was dropped.
The Toleration Act fared better. It passed easily in the House of Lords, and very little debate was held upon it in the House of Commons. Some Tory members would have had it tried as an experiment for seven years before it should become permanent law\ but this motion was not adopted and the Bill passed without any such limitation^ Judging from a passage in the Entering Book^, written at this time (May 25, 1C89), the passing of this Bill seems to have occasioned little surprise. " Some said that the Bishops passed it with that latitude, concluding it would have been stopped in the Common's House, and the Commons would not stop it, because then the imputation of persecution would have been laid upon them." A reason for its passing may be found in the state of feeling on the subject which prevailed among most classes at this time^ The minds of men had been prepared to accept wider views of religious toleration by many works written
1 Hallam, Const. Hist. in. 172, n.
2 It received the lloyal Assent, May 24, 1689. Birch's Life of Tillotson, p. 171.
3 Quoted by Stoughton, p. 115, n.
* See Gibson's Codex, Vol. i. p. 518.
PBOVISIONS OF THE ACT. 27
on the point, particularly by Independents and Baptists \ proving the absurdity and uselessness of any attempts to coerce the conscience. Though these writings may not have had a very widespread influence in themselves, they appealed to the understanding and convinced the reason of thoughtful and rehgious men whose opinions could not fail to affect those around them. Then also, in the time of adversity, a year before, a fellow-feeling had sprung up between Churchmen and their " Dissenting brethren," and in the impulse of the moment promises of relief had been given which could not now be disreoarded without dishonour".
o
William too threw all the influence he possessed into the same scale, to further a project so much in keeping with his own views.
It will be well briefly to state the provisions of this remarkable Statute which marks a turning-point in the history of the English Church.
It began by repealing the penal laws of Elizabeth and James I. against Dissenters, provided that they took the oaths as by Parliament prescribed. The laws against Papists, passed in the reign of Charles 11. (1673), were expressly excepted from this repeal. The Act provided that persons convicted of recusancy should be discharged on taking^ the oaths of allemance to Kinof William and Queen Mary, and that no one so taking them should be liable to any forfeiture or to prosecution in any Ecclesi- astical Court, except such persons as had met together for religious worship with locked doors, by which offence they
1 Stoughton, p. 115.
2 On this point, see D'Oyly's Life of Sancroft, i. 325. In consequence of [this good feeling] now displayed by the Protestant Dissenters, Sancroft was induced to set on foot a scheme of comprehension. See also Echard, p. 1107. Birch's Life of Tillotson, p. 177. Wake's Speech on the Trial of Sacheverel.
28 CHAKACTER OF THE ACT.
excluded themselves from the benefits of the Statute. For the relief of Anabaptists (Baptists), it was made sufficient for them to take the oaths and subscribe the Articles of ReHgion, with the exception of the S-ith, 35th, 3Gth, part of the 20th, and part of the 27th Article. Justices of the peace were empowered to tender the oaths to any person attend- ing a religious meeting, and to commit to prison without bail any one who refused to take them. Quakers, whose scruples forbade them to take an oath, were allowed to make a Solemn Declaration of Allegiance and Profession of Faith instead. Papists and persons who denied the Trinity were expressly excluded from all the advantages of this Act. For the protection of religious meetings it was made criminal to disturb them in any way, while at the same time, to prevent abuse of this privilege, no such meet- ing was to be held with locked doors. Lastly, no place Avas to be used for public worship without a certificate from the Bishop, the Archdeacon, or a Justice of the Peace, which certificates these persons were obliged to grant on applica- tion being made to them \
Such was the substance of the Act of Toleration, which not only granted liberty of conscience, but protected those who exercised it from the malice of their enemies. It was far from perfect 'tis true; it retained all the old intolerant spirit against Roman Catholics, and the many restricting regulations with regard to the oaths were by no means in accordance with an advanced conception of religious liberty. But still it was an important step in the direction of im- provement and, after the irritating persecutions and intoler- ance of the two preceding reigns, it was an immense and most welcome relief to the Dissenters, and the high estimate which they have of its provisions may be seen from the 1 The Act is printed in extenso in Appendix I.
DISAFFECTION OF THE CLERGY. 29
following Nonconformist testimony. "By shielding Dis- sent, the law, though not of course endowing it, might be said in a certain sense to estabhsh it. It placed Dissent on a legal footing, and protected it side by side with the en- dowed Church By the change which the Act effected
in the legal position of Nonconformity, it produced a relative change in the legal position of the Establishment. From the moment that William gave his assent to the Act, that Church ceased to be National in the sense in which it had been so before. The theory of its constitution underwent a revolution. It could no longer assume the attitude it had done, could no longer claim all Englishmen, as by sovereign right, worshippers within its pale ; it gave legalized scope for differences of action — for their growth and advancement, and for the increase of their supporters in point of numbers, character and influence\"
William's tolerance towards Dissenters and the fact that he had abolished Episcopacy in Scotland led to an opinion, not altogether unfounded, among the clergy that if not absolutely unfriendly, he was at least indifferent to the interests of the Established Church. Of those who liad taken the oaths and owned him as their King, by far the greater number were in a disaffected and irritable state of mind. The prevalence of such ill-humour augured little success to a scheme which was set on foot in the autumn of 1689. Tillotson, Dean of St Paul's, an ardent supporter of the Government, would not give up all hopes of a Compre- hension. Parliament having put all action in the matter out of their own power^, he thouglit it best thata Commis-
1 Dr Stoughton, p. 120.
2 Of this Tillotson was glad, for in his conferences with King "William he reminded the monarch how ready Eoman Catholics were to deride the Church of England as a parHamentary Church, and recommended the
30 CONFERENCE ON THE PRAYEli-BOOK.
sion should be appointed to inquire into such things as might conveniently be altered in the Book of Common Prayer and the Canons oi' the Church of England, before Convocation entered upon the subject. The King was persuaded by him and, influenced by the concurrence of Burnet, now Bishop of Salisbury, issued an Instrument for bringing together 10 Bishops and 20 Divines to confer upon this matter\ They met and with all the objections, made by Puritans before the Restoration and by Nonconformists since then, before them, together with much advice offered at various times by learned divines, they deliberated "freely and calmly I" This freedom and calmness they owed chiefly to the fact that several mem- bers of the Commission, who either disapproved of all alterations, or of this way of making them, never came to the meetinGfS at all, or withdrew from them after the first few days.
The Commission began^ by considering the question of the reading of Apocryphal lessons in church; then the Prayer-book version of the Psalms underwent discussion, though nothing definite was resolved on with regard to it*. It was agreed that though the ordinary posture of receiving the Sacrament, kneeling, should not be changed, yet such persons as objected might give notice beforehand to the
summoning of Convocation, but that its assembly should be preceded by a Commission which might prepare propositions for their consideration.
1 Stoughton, p. 125. The most eminent men in the Commission ■were Compton Bp of London, Burnet Bp of Salisbury, Patrick almost immediately made Bp of Chichester, Stillingfleet soon made Bp of Worcester, Tillotson, Dean of St Paul's, Dr Sharp and Dr Beveridge with Dr John Williams, prebendary of St Paul's, who has left a diary of the proceedings of the Commissioners.
2 Burnet, ii. 31.
3 It was opened on October 3, 1G89, in the Jerusalem Chamber. * These two points occupied the first session.
FAILURE OF THE COMPREHENSION SCHEME. 81
minister and receive it in their pews. The necessity of hav- ing godfathers, the use of the Athanasian Creed, the form of Ordination and the observance of Saints' Days, were all discussed. A great many verbal alterations were made in the Liturgy \ the Collects were all to be rewritten, and some additions made to the Catechism and Confirmation Serviced Though the changes proposed touched no matters of faith, they were so extensive that it was said at the time that they would have brought two-thirds of the Dissenters into the Church^ But, fortunately for the Church of England, all this work of these Commissioners was labour in vain'', for when Convocation met, as it did on the Cth of November, the Lower House was set against all changes, and the Upper House was not strong enough to control them in the least. So after a short and stormy sitting, Convocation was prorogued and discontinued by successive prorogations for ten years.
The failure of the Comprehension scheme was a great disappointment to the Whig and Low Church party. They had thought that since the Toleration Act was passed it would be absolutely necessary to enlarge the boundaries of the Church, for Dissenters being no longer under penalties, desertion would become more easy and more frequent. They did not perceive that in gaining the Dissenters they would infallibly sacrifice a large number of Churchmen and strengthen the schism of the Nonjurors by giving them a reason for calling themselves not only supporters of the
1 A temperate judgement at the present day would pronounce against almost every one of them as needless and destructive of the grand diction of the Prayer-book.
2 Stoughton, pp. 125—136.
3 Calamy's Abridgement, 448, quoted by Stoughton, 136. And for a full account of all that was proposed and accepted see WilUams' Diary.
4 Their sessions, 18 in number, lasted for more than six weeks.
32 FEELING IN THE NATION ON THE SUBJECT.
rightful King but also members of the only true original Church of England. As it was, the Nonjurors had a large share in bringing about the rejection of the proposed changes, for they raised such a clamour^ against the Low Church party, saying that the Church was to be pulled down and Presbytery set up, that they made men alarmed for the safety of that which they so much cherished, and inflamed their minds against Comprehension ^
Dissenters, moreover, were not all in favour of the scheme. Some, it is true, earnestly desired its success ; these were mostly Presbyterians. The Independents and Baptists could not hope that the doors of the Church would be opened wide enough for their admission and '' looked with envy at that participation in the honours of Church and State which the Presbyterians w^ere to obtain and from which they themselves were to be excluded I" Even some of the Presbyterians did not support the measure because they were afraid of dividing the Dissenting interest if they did. Now that the Dissenters had so long been separated from the Church it became every year more hopeless to try and bring them back into it. They were so strong in them- selves now that they did not feel the need of Comprehen- sion and looked but coldly on the advances of the Church party. " There had been an interval during wdiich circum- stances had been singularly favourable for a wisely con- ceived measure of comprehension. It had passed by, so soon as Wilham and Mary had been actually crowaied*." From that moment Churchmen began to fear for the safety of the Establishment and Dissenters to hope for such tolerance as would make them independent of the Church.
1 See Cardwell's Synodalia, Vol, ii, p, 092. 2 Burnet, 11, 32.
3 Dalrymple, i, 318, quoted by Stoughtou, p. Ill, u.
4 Overton and Abbey, i. 11.
KING William's bishops. 33
The nonjuring Bishops had been allowed to hold their sees for more than a year since they refused to take the Oaths, though they were living in all respects like private persons, performing none of the offices of Bishops. In February, 1G90 — 91, they were deprived and the King pro- ceeded to fill the vacancies by a wise choice of good, able and learned men. Tillotson, Dean of St Paul's, the sfreat supporter of Comprehension, a "man of large principles, zealous against Atheism and Popery V' though some- what too much inclined to sacrifice the ancient order of the Church for the sake of gaining the Dissenters, was made Archbishop of Canterbury. Dr Sharp, a great preacher and an excellent man, was appointed to the see of York. Thirteen other Bishops were appointed, "men of moderate principles and calm tempers," chosen for their merits and not for any Court favour. These Bishops, who, on the whole did very high honour to King William's selection, "were regarded by a number of the clergy with suspicion and aversion, as his pledged supporters, both in political and ecclesiastical matters, no less ready to upset the esta- blished order of the Church than they had been to change the ancient succession of the throned" Tillotson, especi- ally, was an object of dislike to the High Church party ; whatever he did was sure to be wrong in their eyes, and the Queen, in whose hands William had left all Cliurch matters (despairing of ever managing them to the nation's satisfaction himself), was obliged to exert her utmost influence to protect the Archbishop, to whom she was much attached, from the attacks of his enemies on all sides. For the unfortunate man, in hopes of softening the animosity of the High Church party, had given preferment to some members of it, thereby exciting the jealousy of the
^ Burnet, ii. 75. ^ Overton and Abbey, i. 15.
L. 3
34 DEATH OF QUEEN MARY.
Whigs and gaining nothing for himself, since the preferment was accepted by those to whom it was offered as the due reward of their merits, while they vised the increase of authority obtained by it wholly against the man who had promoted them \
In the year 1G93, Bancroft the deprived Archbishop died, having lived for some years in a state of separation from the Church. By the Nonjurors he was always regarded as the rightful Archbishop and Tillotson as an usurj)er, though he himself had retired into private life entirely, and took no part in the controversies which were carried on about him. His successor did not long survive him; a year later the see of Canterbury was again vacant. Tillot- son was succeeded by Tenison, Bishop of Lincoln, a Low Churchman, active and discreet and far more popular than his predecessor^. This was the last appointment made by Queen Mary. A short time afterwards she was seized with small-pox and died in a few days. Her death was a great misfortune both to the Church and nation. She had used her patronage in the Church most wisely, seeking out for promotion men whose merits were enhanced by modesty, so that it became known that to solicit preferment was a sure way not to obtain it. Her sweetness and cheerful disposition had done much to counteract the unpleasing impression made on the people by the melancholy temper and silent manners of the King, who now, overcome with grief for the loss of the wife he had loved so devotedly, grew more and more stern and morose, and in consequence less and less popular among his English subjects.
Not long after the Queen's death the peace of the Church was disturbed by a controversy which arose on the subject of the Trinity. Thomas Firmin, a citizen of 1 Burnet, ii. 118. - Burnet, ii. 136.
TRINITARIAN CONTROVERSY. 35
London, wealthy and of good repute, but a Socinian, had caused to be printed and dispersed many books against the doctrine of the Trinity \ As these books brought the matter under very frequent discussion and did much harm by giving an excuse to irreverent people to talk lightly of that which they could not understand, the subject was taken up by some of the clergy. And first by Dr Sherlock the former Nonjuror and Master of the Templet He wrote a book in which he tried to explain the Trinity, and was answered and accused of Tritheism by Dr South, a learned but ill-natured man. Sherlock replied to him, and many others now joining in it, the controversy grew hot. A sermon was preached on the subject at Oxford and cen- sured ; Sherlock answered the censure in a strain of con- tempt, publications on the matter were multiplied and the dignity and sacredness of the doctrine in dispute seemed often to be forgotten in the heat of argument. The Bishops at last petitioned the King to interfere, and he put a stop to the controversy by an Injunction requir- ing them to repress Heresy and Error with all possible zeaP, which silenced the disputes, as the death of Mr Firmin about the same time put an end to the distri- bution of Socinian books*. This exercise of the King's authority gave great offence to some of those who were so much more jealous of any stretch of prerogative in William HI. than in James II., and complaints were raised that Convocation was not allowed to sit, for that body, which ought, it was said, always to accompany a Parliament, had alone the right of deciding in any religious question on which opinion was divided.
The two parties, High Church and Low Church, into
1 Burnet, ii. 211. 2 stoughton, p. 214.
3 Stoughton, p. 222. 4 Burnet, 11. 214.
3—2
86 ACT AGAINST PAPIS'l-S.
wliich now the clergy were split up, were quite as much political as religious. The High Church party, which was numerically by far the stronger, was at heart disloyal to King William, though its members had taken the oaths, and had any turn of fortune brought King James back again, would without scruple have renewed its allegiance to him. Discontented with the existing Government and finding fault with every step it took, these clergymen did not exercise a soothing influence on the minds of their flocks, and towards the end of the reign of William III. it is no wonder that we find the nation in an irritable and dissatisfied mood, being already distressed with taxation and impoverished by a long war. When the peace of Ryswick (1697) brought relief from some evils, a cause of jealousy was found in the fact that large numbers of Popish priests who had come over to England after that treaty was made and had done nothing to draw down the special displeasure of Government, were allowed to live unmolested. Some Jacobites spread the absurd report that the King himself was a Papist in disguise, and some unwise Protestants either believed it or professed to do so. At any rate the bare idea was sufiicient to raise once more the cry of "No Popery," and a severe Bill, preventing Roman Catholics from inheriting property and banishing all Romish priests from the kingdom, was passed by Parliament with- out opposition (1700). Without Bishop Burnet's statement that William had grown weary of our affairs, and partly by the fret from the opposition he had of late met with, partly from his ill-health, had fallen as it w^ere into a lethargy of mind\ we can scarcely understand hoAV he could ever liave given his consent to a measure so flagrantly unjust. Burnet himself voted for the Act and is at great pains to 1 Burnet, ii. 247.
CONVOCATION. DEATH OF THE KING. 37
explain his reasons, poor as they are, for doing so\ For- tunately for the credit of the nation this disgraceful statute defeated its own end, for it was so severe as never to be put in force, and so vaguely worded as to be easily evaded if it had been.
The demand for a Convocation was still kept up, and when a new Ministry was formed in 1700, they refused to serve unless it was allowed to sit'"^. In the autumn of the next year (1701) it met, but only to hokl a few stormy meetings in which the Lower House tried its strength against the Upper and refused to submit to its authority. No real business was done. The Archbishop went through the form of proroguing the Lower House on several oc- casions, only to be defied by their subsequently proroguing themselves, and the disputes between the two Houses as a body and individual members of each had already passed the bounds of moderation, when the tumultuous course of the assembly was checked by the death of the Prolocutor^, and cut short altogether by that of one much greater than he. Towards the end of February, 1702, William TIL died, and \vith him closed the line of the five Princes of Orange, ''the noblest succession of heroes that we find in any HistoryV
1 Burnet, ii. 229.
2 Burnet, ii. 280, Stoughtou, p. 269.
3 Dr Woodward, Dean of Salisbury, Lathbury's Hist, of Cunvocatio7i, p. 306.
4 Burnet, ii. 306.
CHAPTER III.
THE NONJURORS.
Before the coronation of William and Mary took place, by a clause in the Declaration of Right, a new form of the Oath of Allegiance was prescribed \ As soon as the Con- vention became a Parliament^, a Bill was brought in for abolishing^ all old forms of the oath and determininsj the circumstances under which the new one should be enforced ^ It was decided that all persons holding office in the Church of England and in the Universities should be obliged to take the oath, by which they " sincerely promised and swore to bear true allegiance to their Majesties King William and Queen Mary^" The House of Lords, of a milder temper than the House of Commons, wished to enact that every beneficed clergyman should continue to
1 The form of oath was, "I, A. B. do sincerely promise and swear that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to their Majesties, King William and Queen Mary : So help me God."
This was required to be taken by all lay persons holding ofdces, as well as by all in possession of any benefice or other ecclesiastical prefer- ment. See Knight's Hist, of England, vol, iv. p. 70.
2 The Parliament was opened on the 18th of Feb. 1G89, and the Lords immediately passed a Bill in which it was declared that the convention which assembled on the 22nd of January are the two Houses of Parha- ment.
3 Stoughton, p. 88.
•* Lathbury, Hist, of Nonjurors, p. 44.
THE OATH OF ALLEGIANCE. 39
hold his living without taking the oath, unless the King required him to do so, when if he refused he should be deprived \ But this gentle treatment found no favour with the Lower House, and a clause was inserted in the Bill, requiring every one holding preferment to take the oath before the 1st of August, 1689, under pain of suspen- sion, or before the 1st of February folloAving, under pain of deprivation ^
The greater number of the clergy took the oath^, though there were various opinions among them as to the principles on which they acted in doing so. Some held that the oath itself could lawfully be taken, though they objected to its being imposed ; some took it with an explicit declaration of the sense in which they took it ; some, while question- ing its lawfulness, gave themselves the benefit of the doubt^; others took it with mental reservations. Some who did not understand the arguments for and against it were willing to be guided by their friends, while others troubled themselves little about the matter, but, since the reiornino^ King had been recognized by Parliament, thought them- selves justified in recognizing him too^. But the party whose action we are at present about to notice, is that which refused to take the oath. These men, the Non- jurors as they were called, consisted of those High Church- men, who held the doctrine of the Divine Bifyht of Kins^s. Though some of them had not hesitated to oppose James IL in his attempt to overthrow the Established Church (for among them were several of the Bishops who had been
1 Burnet, ii. 8. 21 Wm. and Mary, c. 8.
3 Tlie number of those who refused to take the oath was about four hundred. See Knight's Hist, of Eng., vol. v. p. 70.
4 Stoughton, p. 97.
5 KettlewelVs Life, 91, 92, quoted by Lathbury, p. 54.
40 EEASONS FOR NOT TAKING THE OATIL
committed to the Tower'), yet tbey regarded him, even in exile, as their rightful King, and to swear allegiance to William was to them perjury. They had seen the danger in which they' had been placed by James' conduct, and very few of them, at all events at this time, thought of bringing him back. They would have recognized William as Regent gladly, though they could not acknowledge him as King^ To us, who read the history of this period in the light of subsequent events, it seems strange that any sen- sible men should have imagined it possible to divide the title and authority of King between two Princes so directly opposite in character and aims as James and William, but to those who lived at the time of the Revolution, the matter was not so clear, and the proposal for a Regency found favour with a large part of the nation and with most of the Nonjurors. That the latter would have been good and peaceable subjects to William as Regent is almost certain, but since he had been recognized as King, they would have had difficulties in acknowledginor him, and praying for him during Divine service, even if the oath had not been imposed. So tbat there is little reason to suppose that in any case a division in the Church would have been prevented, while if the government had not imposed the oath, it would have seemed weak and timid at a time when an appearance, at least, of strength and confidence was necessary to its safety. Yet however much we may de-
1 The primate (Sancroft), Turner, Bp, of Ely, Lake of Chichester, Ken of Bath and Wells, and White of Peterborough were five out of the seven bishops whose lawful opposition to the arbitrary proceedings of King James had sent them to the Tower. The other bishops who refused to take the oath of allegiance were Lloyd, Bp. of Norwich, Thomas of Worcester, Frampton of Gloucester and Cartwright of Chester.
2 Thomas, the deprived Bishop of Worcester, said on his death-bed : **I think I could burn at a stake before I took this new oath."
THE DEPRIVED BISHOPS. 41
pi ore the mistaken views of the Nonjurors, and condemn their conduct in continuing the schism in later years, we must honour them at this time for holding to their prin- ciples so conscientiously, when those principles could bring them nothing but poverty and suffering.
When the Act for settlino- the matter of the oaths was passed Sancroft, the Primate, and eight other Bishops, those of Bath and Wells, Ely, Gloucester, Norwich, Peter- borough, Worcester, Chichester and Chester, refusing to take the oath, left the House of Lords. Their last act before they departed was to make a motion for the Com- prehension of Dissenters. Their motives for doing this it is difficult to discover. Burnet, who is however unfairly severe on the Nonjurors, said it was from fear and a desire to conciliate the government by a shew of moderation\ But it is more probable that they remembered the old promises given to Dissenters, in the excitement before the Ee volution, and thought it only honest to fulfil them, though they had little sympathy with Comprehension themselves.
When the 1st of February, 1690, the day fixed for the deprivations, arrived, about four hundred clergy quietly left their benefices ^ The Archbishop did not submit so readily. He had been living, ever since the Revolution, in
1 II. 6.
2 Among the deprived clergy were some men of considerable dis- tinction. Dr Hickes, then Dean of Worcester, was one of the most learned, and will be longer remembered for his Thesaurus Antiqnae Litera- turae Septentrionalis, than by what he did subsequently as a Nonjuring bishop. Mr Kettlewell, Jeremy Collier, and Charles Leslie, were all eminent men among the party, as also was the laj-man Eobert Nelson, the author of the Companion to the Fasts and Festivals of the Church of England. The last named after some time found himself able to return to the EstabHshed Church. There is a list of those deprived appended to the Life of Kettleicell.
42 THE PRIMATE LEAVES LAMBETH.
his palace at Lambeth, and not recognizing the power which deprived him, he made no sign of leaving that place. No notice was taken of his remaining for some time, in the hope that he would depart quietly at last, but as he did not do so, a process of ejectment was brought against him, and he left the palace on the 23rd of June to avoid being expelled by force \ He retired (after living for a short time in the Temple) on August 3, to his native place of Fressingfield in Suffolk, where he spent the rest of his life^
Not all those who joined the Nonjurors at first, re- mained true to their principles. Some were convinced of their mistake or consulted their interest and complied after a time. Conspicuous among these was Sherlock, once Master of the Temple, who had thrown in his lot with the Nonjurors and been deprived in consequence. When the battle of the Boyne made Wilham's possession of the throne secure, and crushed the last hope of James' return, Sherlock saw matters in quite a different light, consented
1 There is no doubt that both William and Mary desired to deal ten- derly with the deprived prelate. It is said that on the day of the Proclamation the Queen sent two of her chaplains to ask the blessing of the Archbishop and to attend his chapel at Lambeth.
2 See D'Oyly's Life of Sancroft, vol. i. p. 470, and Stoughton, pp. 171, 187. Tillotson was nominated to the Archbishopric, to succeed Sancroft, on 23rd April, 1G91. Dr Fowler was appointed to Gloucester in the place of Dr Frampton, Dr John Moore was appointed to Norwich in- stead of Bp. Lloyd, the latter residing mainly in London, and ultimately being delegated by Sancroft to execute the archiepiscopal functions. Turner's place at Ely was filled in 1G91 by Dr Patrick, who had previ- ously for two years held the see of Chichester which Bp.Lake had vacated by death in 1G89. Bp. Ken was succeeded in the see of Bath and Wells by Dr Kidder, Dean of Peterborough, Bp. White at Peterborough by Dr Cumberland, Bp. Thomas at Worcester by Dr Stilliugfleet, and Bp. Cartwright at Chester by Dr Strafford, Dean of St Asaph.
SHERLOCK'S 'CASE OF ALLEGIANCE'. 43
to swear allegiance to the King and was made Dean of St Paul's. It was necessary that a reason should be given for the sudden change of so eminent a member of the Nonjuring party ; Sherlock therefore published a book known as his Case of Allegiance^, in which he explained the grounds of his compliance. Sancroft, soon after the Revolution, had published a book which had been written in the reign of James I. by Bishop Overall, called the Convocation Book^, in which, though its tendency is to advocate the doctrine of non-resistance, it is set forth that a government originating in rebellion, when thoroughly settled, should be reverenced and obeyed as " being always God's authority, and therefore receiving no impeachment by the wickedness of those that have it I" The Convoca- tions of York and Canterbury had sanctioned this doctrine (in IGOG), and Sherlock gave this as the reason of his con-
1 The full Title of the book is The case of Allegiance to Sovereign Princes Stated.
2 Lathbury, Hist, of No}}jurors, p. 116.
3 The portion of B]}. 0\'erairs Convocation Book referred to is chap. XXVIII. The canon there given runs thus :
"If any man therefore shall affirm either that the subjects when they shake off the yoke of obedience to their sovereigns and set up a form of government among themselves after their own humours do not therein very wickedly : or that it is lawful for any bordering kings, through ambition and malice to invade their neighbours : or that the providence and goodness of God in using of rebellions and oppressions to execute his justice against any king or country doth mitigate or qualify the offences of any such rebels or oppressing kings : or that when any such new forms of government begun by rebellion are after thoroughly settled the authority in them is not of God : or that any who live within the territories of such new governments are not bound to be subject to God's authority which is there executed, but may rebel agaiust the same: or that the Jews either in Egypt or Babylon might lawfully for any cause have taken arms against any of those kings, or have offered any violence to their persons, he doth greatly err."
44? SEPARATION OF NONJURORS FROM THE CHURCH.
version. Naturally Le was assailed on all sides^ in prose and rhyme as a hypocrite and a tiraeserver, and his wife, who was said to have immense influence over him, did not by any means escape the general storm of abuse. Whether Sherlock was sincere or not it is difficult to say, but he chose a very suspicious time to announce his change of opinions, just when all hopes of gaining anything by main- taining^ them were cut off.
At first the Nonjurors were not all willing to separate entirely from the Established Church ; some were in the habit of attending their parish Churches and satisfying their consciences by not joining in the prayers for the reig^ning' Sovereigns. But the more strict among them would not allow even this, regarding those who had taken the oath as no priests of the true Church. Sancroft^ was accustomed, after his retirement to Fressingfield, to speak of the Nonjurors as the true Church of England and of the National Establishment as an apostate and rebellious Church. A year after his deprivation he delegated his Archiepiscopal functions by a formal instrument^ to Lloyd, the deprived Bishop of Norwich, who was still living in the suburbs of London, in spite of the danger of molesta- tion from the rabble, whenever the popular fury against Nonjurors was roused.
As long as the Nonjurors merely refused to swear alle-
1 See Scott's Life of Swift, p. 68, and Life of Kettlewell, p. 304. Sherlock had just at this time published his Vindication of the Doctrine of the Trinity and the Licarnation of the Son of God. This work was reputed to be doctrinally unsound, and the writer was attacked by Dr South and accused of Tritheism. His adversaries therefore remarked "that it was no wonder Sherlock was so ready at an oath, since he had two gods to swear by more than other men."
2 D'Oyly's Life of Sancroft, ii. 39.
3 This document was printed in Notes and Queries, Jan. 12, 1856.
THE SUFFRAGAN BISHOPS. 45
glance to the existing powers because they could not reconcile such an action with their consciences, and braved hardships for the sake of their principles, we cannot help admiring their courage and firmness. But they were not justified in taking the steps they did to make the schism, caused by them in the Church, continuous. Had they been content to leave matters as they were, probably the party of Nonjurors would soon have ceased to exist, for time would have removed many of the difficulties which stood in the way of compliance. Instead of doing so, however, they took a course which tended to make reunion with the Church impossible, and was besides that irregular in itself. King James was applied to, to grant permission for con- secrating two new Bishops. They could only be Suffragans, for the Nonjurors saw the impossibility of creating Bishops of equal rank with those who had been deprived. Accord- ingly a noted Nonjuror, Hickes by name, was sent over to St Germains with such a list of the nonjuring clergy as could be made, which was not very perfect, as some Non- jurors declined to have their names made known. Out of these the exiled King appointed two, one of whom was Hickes himself and the other a clergyman named Wagstaffe\ Hickes came back to England and the two were consecrated "* by the deprived Bishops of Ely, Peterborough and Norwich, in a private house in London, with the titles of Suffragans of Thetford and Ipswich^ Sancroft died before the con- secrations took place, but it is not to be supposed that he disapproved of the step, since it was brought about mainly
1 Thomas Wagstaffe liad been chancellor of the diocese of Lichfield, and Eector of St Margaret and St Gabriel, Feuchurch St., Loudon.
2 Lathbury, Hist, of Nonjurors^ p. 97.
* Their consecration took place on 24 Feb. the Feast of St Matthias, 1693.
46 SCHISM IN THE CHURCH.
through the influence of his delegate, Lloyd. The deprived Archbishop had lived in a state of separation from the Church since his retirement to Fressingfield, none but Nonjurors were allo\\''ed to officiate in his presence and he never attended his parish Church. But his opinion of those whose conscience allowed them to comply was most charitable and worthy of so good a man. He said of them sometimes that "notwithstanding he and they might go different ways with respect to the public affairs, he trusted yet that heaven-gates would be wide enough to receive both him and them\" " From the period of the new con- secrations the schism must be regarded as having been completed I" There were now two distinct communions in the Churcli of England, and a provision made for keep- ing them distinct. It is much to be regretted that Bancroft was not content to do as Ken, the deprived Bishop of Bath and Wells, one of the best of the Nonjurors, did, and while refusing to comply himself, refrain from per- petuating the schism in any way. The party was weakened too by this illegal step, for not all the Nonjurors were agreed on the subject of the new consecrations, and from this time their house began to be divided against itself I
As might be expected the Nonjurors were staunch Jacobites, and from 1693 to 1701 many of them were engaged in plots and conspiracies with the Court of St Germains. Assurances were sent to James of help not only from Nonjurors; it was asserted that four parts out of five of the ministers who had taken the oath were ready to join him, or to stir up people in his favour ^ Much of this was exaggerated, but there is no doubt that a strong
1 KettlewelVs Life, 159. - Lathburj^ Hist, of Nonjurors, p. 103.
3 Lathbiiry, p. 106.
^ Macplierson's Original Papers, i. 459.
JACOBITE PLOTS. 47
feeling in favour of a restoration existed among both clergy and laity at this time. Such correspondence went on without any very serious design until the death of Mary, when plots for the assassination of William began to be set on foot. It is certain that no such plot originated with James himself, but he knew what was going on and con- nived at it. One plot for killing William as he was driving over a piece of bad road at Turnham Green, near Brentford, was betrayed and several of the conspirators suffered death for it. Among them were two knights, Sir John Friend, a Jacobite and Nonjuror, and Sir William Perkyns also a Jacobite, but a juror. Their execution^ created great ex- citement from the fact that Jeremy Collier, the celebrated nonjuring divine, and two other clergymen, accompanied them to the scaffold and there laid their hands on them and pronounced absolution over them. People were much astonished at this unusual occurrence. The two Arch- bishops and ten Bishops published a Declaration^ in which they censured the conduct of the three clergymen, and the public authorities interfered^. They arrested the two less
1 Both the conspirators confessed at the time of their execution that they were adherents of King James, and that they believed in the justice of the cause in which they had been engaged ; but made no profession of sorrow for the offence for which they were condemned nor any confession of private sins, and it was a cause of great reproach to the Nonjurors that Collier (with Mr Snatt and Mr Cooke), should under such circumstances have pronounced over them so solemn an Absolution as that which is contained in the Prayer-Book service for the Visitation of the Sick.
- The Archbishops' declaration asks "If those ministers knew not the state of these men's souls, how could they without manifest transgression of the Church's order, as well as profane abuse of the power which Christ has left with his ministers, absolve them from all their sins."
3 A bill, was found against them of high misdemeanour, for it was argued that they must have approved of the conduct of the con- spirators.
48 THE AEJURATIOX OATH.
important actors in the matter, but Collier contrived to evade them, and in some place of concealment wrote a defence of what he had done\ His two companions were tried and set at liberty ; he himself remained in hiding for some time and succeeded at last in escaping arrest entirely.
The death of James II. in 1701 would probably have been the occasion of the compliance of many Nonjurors ^ had not the Government unwisely deemed it necessary to impose a new oath on all holders of preferment civil and ecclesiastical, by which William was recognized as rightful King, and any title in James's son, now called the Pretender, deniedl By imposing this oath the Government was ask- ing more than it had any right to expect from all its subjects ; to swear allegiance to the King de facto was one thing ; to deny the existence of any title to the Crown in another Prince was quite a different matter'*. It was justly judged that the Abjuration Bill quitted the region of fact with which the former oath had dealt and entered the domain of theory, on which it is absurd of any Govern- ment to attempt to impose regulations. Almost immedi- ately after the passing of this Bill, William III. died and
1 In this he stated that Sir William Perkyns had given him the state of Ills conscience privately, some time before his execution.
- Lathbury, p. 185.
3 Tlie two Bills whicli were passed at this time, one for the attainder of the Prince of Wales and the other for abjuring him, were due in part to the conduct of the King of France. Louis, by the treaty of Rj'^swick, had acknowledged William as King of England, and so could not concede to the son of James the same title. But in spite of this he was persuaded when James was dead to recognise the Prince of Wales as James III. For which reason William pressed on his Parliament to adopt measures which might extinguish the hopes of all pretenders to the crown. See Tindal's Continuation of Eapiii, vol. iii. p. 24G.
* Stoughton, p. 256.
ACCESSION OF QUEEN ANNE. 49
was quietly succeeded by his sister-in-law Anne, according to the provisions of the Act of Settlement. The hopes of the Jacobites were raised by her accession, for it was known that she rather favoured the idea of her brother's being her successor and had lived on good terms with her father for some time before his death. Not long after her accession, Lloyd, the deprived Bishop of Norwich, died, and now, of the eight Nonjuring Bishops, Ken was the only one left. Queen Anne would have been willing to restore him to his diocese of Bath and Wells, but he declined the offer \ declaring himself averse to returning again to the business of the world^. The Nonjurors were now left with none but the two Suffragan Bishops and it was hoped that at their death an end might be put to the schism. Several ardent Nonjurors, among whom the chief were Nelson, Dodwell and Brokesby, did indeed return to the Esta- blished Church, being anxious that the rupture might be closed, and holding that in case, as now happened, the in- validly deprived Fathers should, either by death or resigna- tion, leave all their sees vacant, none would then be obliged to keep up any longer their separation from those Bishops, who were, according to them, involved in the guilt of schism, until the deprived Bishops were all dead or had resigned^.
1 The offer was made on the death of Dr Kidder. Ken had resided since his deprival at Longleat, a mansion belonging to Lord Weymouth. This nobleman, who was warmly attached to the Bishop, and at the same time one of the Privy Council, is supposed to have prompted the Queen to make the offer. The matter had been mooted before Kidder's death, on a vacancy of the See of Carlisle, to which it was proposed to move that Bishop, and make way for Ken's restoration. But on neither occasion could he be prevailed on to return to his former charge.
2 Bowles's Life of Ken, ii. 249—253, 256.
3 KettlewelVs Life, 127, 128. Lathbury, No7ijurors, chap. vu. L. 4
50 NEW CONSECRATIONS.
The good Bishop Ken died early in the year 1711, and the next year by the death of the Suffragan Wagstaffe, Hickes was left as the sole representative of the Nonjuring Bishops. In order to continue the succession he called in the help of t\Yo Scotch Prelates and consecrated three new Bishops, one of whom was Jeremy Collier. In this step Hickes was seriously to blame \ Very few people had any doubt of the reigning Sovereign's right to the throne and no one questioned the lawfulness of the existing Bishops' posses- sion of their sees, so that when the last of the Nonjuring Bishops died there was no longer any reason for per- petuating the schism. Now that so little stood in the way of their compliance, the Nonjurors cannot be praised for taking measures to make the breach in the Church's unity irreparable. From this period our sympathy for them as a party must be considerably diminished.
During the whole of the reign of Queen Anne, the Nonjurors enjoyed great freedom from interference on the part of the Government, the Queen herself being no enemy to their High-Church views and Jacobite leanings. There is little doubt that, had she lived a few months longer and had the Pretender promised to renounce the Roman Catholic religion, an attempt would have been made, not without chances of success, to procure the succession for himl But her somewhat unexpected death and the quiet accession of George I., put an end to all hopes of the peaceable restoration of the Staarts. It was but natural that the Nonjurors, whose Jacobite sympathies were no- torious, should fall under great suspicion at the time of the Rebellion of 1715. They were subjected to much harsh treatment in consequence of it, for the oaths were tendered
^ Lathbiiry, p. 228. Terry's Hist, of Church of England, m. 72. 2 Lord Mahon's Hist, of England from the peace of Utrecht, i. 10.
THE "USAGES." 51
anew to all suspected persons, and those who refused to take them were thrown into prison. Though many of those implicated in the Rebellion were Nonjurors, yet, as a body, they can scarcely be said to have had any active share in it, rather approving of it than aiding it\
The party was now constantly being weakened by in- ternal dissensions on one point or another. During the reign of George I. a great division occurred on the subject of the Communion Office. The Liturgy we now use and which was used also at that time, differs in several points from the first Liturgy of Edward VI. This First Liturgy, some of the Nonjurors, with Collier at their head, wished to restore, and a meeting was held to discuss the matter in London in the year 1717. The meeting decided by a large majority that there should be no alterations, but in spite of this, those who wished for the chang^e met ao^ain and re- solved that the Primitive Usages, as the First Liturgy was called, should be restored^. A new office was then com- posed : communion with those who adhered to the Book of Common Prayer was prohibited : and the new service was actually used at Easter in the year 1718^ This course of action caused the most serious division that had as yet broken up the Nonjuring party. Pamphlet after pamphlet was written for and against the Usages as these alterations were called, Collier being the foremost in defending them, opposed chiefly by Spinkes who had been consecrated at the same time as himself.
A very important scheme had been set on foot by the English and Scotch Nonjurors in 1716 before the dispute about the Usages took place ^ This was a project for uniting the Nonjurors to the Greek Church in the East.
1 Overton and Abbey, i. 73. 2 Lathbury, p. 259.
3 Lathbury, p. 291, * Lathbury, p. 309.
4—2
52 PROPOSED UNION WITH THE GREEK CHURCH.
The idea originated with Campbell one of the Scotch Bishops. He had become acquainted with one of the Archbishops of the Eastern Church who was in London at that time. He laid the plan for this proposed union before his friends at a meeting, and at first they were all agreed about it, but later on when the division about the Usages arose, Spinkes, who had previously translated their proposals into Greek, declined to have any more to do in the matter, and the negotiations were then carried on by Collier and Campbell with some other Nonjuring Bishops. The scheme however, fell to the ground; the Nonjurors could not agree with the Greeks on the subjects of the authority of ancient councils, the worship of the Virgin, prayers to Saints, transubstantiation and the worship of images. From this it may be seen that they had not that leaning towards the Church of Rome with which they have often been charged. These points on which they differed irreconcileably from the Eastern Church are all distinctive features of the Roman Catholic religion, and union with the Greeks was therefore as impossible to the Nonjurors as a body, as imion with the Church of Rome would have been\ It is not to be regretted that this plan failed ; it could not have done much good and might have done a great deal of harm.
The two parties among the Nonjurors, differing as widely from each other as both differed from the National Church, took steps to continue the succession of Bishops in each. Several men were consecrated by each division and the schism continued till the year 1731, some time after the death of Collier and Spinkes, when if the disputes had not entirely ceased they had greatly subsided, and most of the Nonjurors had adopted the Usages ^
» Overton and Abbey, i. 157—161. « Lathbury, p. 3G0.
REBELLION OF 1745. 53
For tlie first years of George II/s reign the condition of the Nonjurors remained much the same as it had been during the reign of his father. In 1745 the second Re- bellion again drew down severity upon the Jacobites and by consequence on the Nonjurors. But before the Rebellion broke out another breach had been made in the ranks of the Nonjurors, who were already becoming a diminished party. Campbell, the Scotch nonjuring Bishop, had on his own authority, consecrated a learned Nonjuror, Roger Lawrence by name, which act was contrary to the Canons and therefore invalid. The other Nonjuring Bishops did not recognize Lawrence as properly consecrated, and Campbell and he became the heads of the party of Non- jurors known as the Separatists \
All who were implicated in the Rebellion of 1745 w^ere considered to belong to the Nonjurors, but in fact, the only Nonjurors who really had a share in it were Separa- tists ; the regular body, though they could not take the oaths would not disturb the government by any attempt to restore the exiled line I Several of the Separatists took an active part in the Rebellion and some of them suffered death as traitors in consequence.
Under the well-established government of George III. the sect of Nonjurors soon became a very small one. In 1779, Gordon, the last of the regular line of Bishops died and from that time the Nonjurors ceased to be a Church ; though the Separatists continued still for some time as a distinct party. The death of Charles Edward, the young Pretender, in 1788, by extinguishing the line of the exiled
1 Lathbury, p. 371—387.
2 The nonjuring Bishops were always particularly strict in their Consecrations, which were performed by at least three Bishops, the acts of Consecration being always signed, sealed and properly attested. See D'Oyly's Life of Sancroft, ii. 34, note.
54 THE LAST OF THE NONJURORS.
family, put an end to the cause of their existence, and even Cartwright, the last Separatist Bishop but one, had become a very good subject of George III., before his death in 1799 \ Boothe, the last of the irregular Bishops, died in Ireland in 1805, but long before his death the sect was virtually extinct, although there is said to have been a nonjuring clergyman living as late as the year 1815 ^
1 HaUam, iii. 341. 2 Lathbury, 412.
CHAPTER IV.
THE ROMAN CATHOLICS UNDER KING WILLIAM IIL AND QUEEN ANNE.
Under the government of James II-, the Roman Catho- lics, released from the oppression and persecution^ which they had undergone during the reign of his predecessor, gradually gained confidence, and encouraged by the favour of the King, ventured to profess and exercise their religion openly. As time went on, and the King's design to subvert the Established Church began to ripen into action, the chief offices of state were given to Papists, the council-board was filled with them, and even church preferment was bestowed on them or on those known to be friendly towards them ; they literally carried all before them and no one could hope to obtain employment, much less promotion, who was not already a Roman Catholic or likely to call himself one before long^. James proclaimed to the world that his brother had died a
^ For an account, perhaps somewhat highly coloured, of the hardships under which Roman Catholics suffered about 1679, see Macaulay i. p. 247 seqq. He says "the general opinion was that a good Papist considered all lies which were serviceable to his Church as not only excusable but meri- torious." From such an opinion it came to pass that much innocent blood was shed under the forms of justice.
2 See D'Oyly's Life of Sancroft, i. 219.
56 OPINIONS OF JAMES II.
Roman Catholic* and shewed to Archbishop Sancroft some papers of a theological character which he professed were the composition of Charles. Though the answer of the Archbishop that he had not known the late king to be so much of a theologian might have checked the production of those papers, yet James proceeded to print them I They were answered by Stillingfleet who questioned their genuineness. This called forth a reply by Dryden^, then a recent convert to Eomanism, and the bitter discussion which followed led to the production of Dryden's famous poem, The Hind and the Panther, published in April 1687.
King James also ventured on the clearly illegal measure of sending an envoy to the court of Rome and in ever}^ way shewed that favour at his hands was only to be expected by members of the Romish Church.
No long and faithful service, no talents or capacity for office could atone to James for the fault of heresy in his servants. Whatever his failings may have been, insincerity was not one of them and he was genuinely anxious for the conversion of those whom he valued to the religion which he believed to be the only true one. He used every means in his power to convince them of their error, and if he failed, they fell. So fell, among others his own brother-in-law, the Earl of Rochester, who was en- deared to him by kinship and many services'' ; one of his few virtues, constancy to his Church, being in James' eyes, his one unpardonable sin.
The rise of the Papists to power had been sudden, but more sudden still was their fall, simultaneous, of course, with that of the monarch who had raised them
1 Evelyn's Diary, Oct. 2, 1685. 2 Macaulay, ii. 298.
3 See Scott's Life of Dry den, i. 323. * Macaulay, ii. 405 scqq.
JACOBITE INTRIGUES. 57
to such a height. When the Prince of Orange marched towards London and James's cause seemed hopeless, such of the Papists as did not seek safety in flight beyond sea returned to those holes and hiding-places in London, which had become so familiar to them within the last few years. For a brief space, on the return of James to the capital after his first attempt at flight, they shewed themselves again in public, trusting that the storm was overpast, but this transient gleam of hope soon faded\ and they withdrew once more to live in obscurity in England or to join their exiled king at St Germains. William had no wish to act the i3art of a persecutor to them and he gave orders on his way to London that none of them should be molested, orders which Burnet takes great credit to himself for carrying out to the letter.
The court of the exiled king at St Germains naturally beca.me the point to which the eyes of all English Papists were turned and when the conclusion of the campaign in Ireland had put an end to all hopes of the restoration of the Stuarts by force of arms, a great many of them went over to France and settled there. Between these people and the Jacobites in England a series of intrigues, some petty and aimless, some more serious in design and conse-
^ Much violence was causecl at this time by the issue of a forged pub- lication styled ' The Third Declaration of the Prince of Orange.'' In this document it was stated that Papists who persisted in holding employ- ments contrary to law should be treated as robbers and banditti. The result of its publication was an outbreak against all Papists. Evelyn evidently believed this and similar papers to be set forth by the Prince of Orange (See Diary, 2 Dec. 1688), and seven days afterwards he chronicles the result, "Lord Sunderland meditates flight. The rabble demohshed all Popish chapels and several Papist lords and gentlemen's houses, especially that of the Spanish ambassador, which they pillaged, and burnt his hbrary."
58 NONJURORS AT ST GERMAIXS.
quences, were carried on. Even men in liigli offices of State under William III. were not ashamed to keep up a treasonable correspondence with James, and Russell, Godolphin, Marlborough and Shrewsbury were all more or less involved in the guilt of such double-dealing.
They were not Roman Catholics alone, who followed the fortunes of their King and took up their abode at St Germains ; some Protestants also left their country for his sake, but all their devotion could not atone in James' opinion for their heresy, and they were treated with neglect, except in so far as every effort was made to convert them. If any Protestants deserved kind treatment from James, they were the Nonjurors, who from loyalty to him had given up almost all they had in the world, but even they were but coldly received, if indeed, they were not treated with insult and contumely, as often happened. ''The nonjuring clergy were at least as much sneered at and as much railed at in James's palace as in his nephew's.^" He made it clear that he wished to have no Protestant divine whatever at his court.
In England the Papists had now become a small and unimportant body ; they did not give the Government as much trouble as did the Nonjurors, and except that they were expressly excluded from the benefits of the Act of Toleration, very little notice was taken of them at all. William himself, whose views of Toleration were far in .advance of those of his subjects, would gladly have ex- tended to Catholics all the privileges which he had obtained for Dissenters^ But that could not be ; and before long the rash behaviour of the Papists themselves and the old panic terror of Popery in the nation threatened * Macaulay, vn. 4. 2 Hallam, iii. 177.
ACT OF 1700 AGAINST PAPISTS. 59
to deprive them of the little liberty they already had and to drive them out of the kingdom altogether. After the peace of Ryswick in 1697 great numbers of Popish priests who had fled from England at the time of the Revolution, returned and showed themselves in public with so much ostentation and insolence as to arouse the animosity and fear of the Protestants. It was said, and probably with truth, that by one of the secret articles of the Peace, William had bound himself to relax the penal laws against Catholics\ It was also said, certainly with no truth at all, that the king himself was at heart a Papist, and this absurd notion found supporters. At any rate, the House of Commons became alarmed and a Bill was brought in, for checking the growth of Popery, which at the present day can hardly be read without astonish- ment. This disgraceful Act begins by banishing all Roman Catholic priests under pain of perpetual imprison- ment and it offers a reward of £100 for information which shall lead to the conviction of any one of them per- forming the Offices of his Church. It requires every person brought up in the Romish religion or suspected of it, to take the oaths of allegiance and supremacy and to sign the Declaration of Charles II. against tran- substantiation and the worship of saints, within six months after attaining the age of eighteen; in default of which any such person is to be incapable of purchasing, in- heriting, or holding any estate, and that which he may already possess is to become the property of the next of kin, being a Protestant. He was also prohibited from sending his children abroad to be educated in his own faiths The Bill passed the two Houses easily, although
1 Hallam, iii. 178.
2' See May's Constitutional History, ii. 321,
60 LATER CONDITION OF THE CATHOLICS.
it is said that the Tory party in the Lower House inserted some very severe clauses, hoping that the Lords might be induced to reject it. But the Upper House, "under the influence of an Anti-Popish fever" passed the Bill without amendment and it received the Royal assent \ The design of the Bill was to force the Catholic landowners to sell their property and thus to destroy that class altogether. But its very severity helped to defeat its object. The spirit of liberty was strong in the nation and the judges hesi- tated to enforce a law as tyrannical as the edicts of the French government against Protestants. Fortunately the Act was found to be drawn up in terms so indefinite as to be easily evaded and there is scarcely a single instance on record of any loss of property under it^ From the time of the passing of this Act, which relieved the minds of the timid from the fear that the King and the nation were drifting into Popery together, till the end of William's reign not lonsf after, no restrictive measures were taken against Roman Catholics. As a class they were shunned and neglected a good deal, both at this time and for nearly a century after. " Hatred of Rome long continued to be as it had become in James II. 's reign, a ruling passion of ploughmen and artisans^". As members of a communion so generally detested, the Catholics, and particularly those whose property kept them in the country, were compelled to lead very lonely and se- cluded lives, more especially as their well-known leanings towards the exiled royal family caused them to be avoided by their neighbours as persons whose acquaintance, never very desirable, might now and then bring them into serious difficulties.
1 Dr Stougliton, p. 245. 2 Hallam, 11. 333.
3 Overton and Abbey, i. 350.
ATTEMPTS TO OPPRESS THEM. 61
An effort^ was made in 1705, to render the Act of 1700 against Papists effective, but the motion was lost in the House of Commons by a large majority, shewing that men were ashamed of what they had done I Yet not long after, in 1711, a proclamation was published for enforcing the penal laws against Roman Catholics^, and after the Rebellion of 1715, Parliament endeavoured to strengthen the Protestant interest by enforcing the laws against Papists. In 1722, the estates of Roman Catholics and Nonjurors were charged with a special taxation from which other property was exempt. The spirit of the Act of 1700 was again revived by the Rebellion of 1745, at which time a proclamation was made of a reward of £100 for the discovery of Jesuits and popish priests, and magis- trates were exhorted to bring them to justice ^ Roman Catholics did not obtain indulgence for a long time after. Yet when the Act of King William's reign was at length repealed in 1779, it is gratifying to find that, amid all the excitements of Jacobite plots and fears of Popish conspiracy, its penalties had never once been inflicted.
1 This effort was occasioned by several complaints brought from many parts of the kingdom and especially from Cheshire, of the practices and insolence of the Eoman Catholics. The Bill passed the Lords, but the Commons had no mind to pass it, yet, to avoid the ill effects of a refusal to do so, they added a clause to it, containing severe penalties on Papists who should once take the oaths and come into the Communion of the Church of England, if they should be guilty of any Occasional Conformity with Popery afterwards. They expected that the Lords would reject the Bill on this clause, but when they learnt that it would be agreed to, they would not run any hazard of its becoming law, and so it was suffered to lie on the table till the prorogation of Parliament. See Tindal's Con- tinuation, vol. XXI. p. 152.
2 Hallam, in. 178.
3 Boyce's Reign of Queen Anne, pp. 429 &c. *• May's Constitutional History, n. 323.
CHAPTER V.
CHURCH HISTORY IN THE REIGN OF QUEEN ANNE.
With the accession of Queen Anne the relative position of parties changed considerably. The last monarch had been a Whig (if indeed he could be said to belong to any English party at all) and a Presbyterian ; the new Queen was a Tory and decidedly friendly to the High-church party. The Whigs, the supporters of the Revolution and the advocates of toleration, found themselves suddenly in a minority ; while all the favour of the Court was extended to their rivals. The Jacobites, and among them must be classed the great majority of the clergy, regarded the state of the nation with less discontent than formerly ; for they now saw a daughter of the Stuarts on the throne in her own right, and had some reason to believe that she wished for the restoration of the exiled family and would try to obtain the succession for her brother at St Germains. That was the utmost that they could hope. Circumstances were not just at this time favourable to any attempt to place the Pretender on the throne of his fathers. He was too young, too closely connected with France and too bigoted a Romanist to be made king of England at once \ The satisfaction too with which the High-Church party, on whose support the Jacobites had reckoned, regarded
^ Overton and Abbey, i. Gl.
PEOSPECTS OF DISSENTERS. 63
their new Queen \ was unfavourable to tlie cause of the Pretender and made it more hopeless to attempt a rising in his favour. Schemes for his restoration were still being made, it is true, and English statesmen still continued to take part in them, but they remained schemes, and never developed into action during the reign of Queen Anne.
Of all parties, the Dissenters had least to hope and most to fear from the new Government. Popular feeling, almost always more or less opposed to them, now allowed itself an outlet in some few riots ; it was suggested that all the meeting-houses should be pulled down, but the mob only carried that design into effect at Newcastle on Tyne I The Dissenters presented an address to the Queen on her accession, which she received in silence, neither thanking them, nor promising them her protection^, but as Bishop Burnet says that it was her frequent custom to listen to these addresses without saying a word in answer ^ per- haps little can be inferred from the fact of her doing so on this particular occasion. But in her first speech to Parlia- ment, the Queen gave more certain evidence of her feelings, for she said that though she should always protect Dis- senters as long as they continued to conduct themselves peaceably towards the government, yet her favour would be accorded to members of the Established Church ^ Under these circumstances it was very natural that an effort should soon be made to exclude Dissenters as far as
1 In the address to the Queen presented by the two Houses of Con- vocation they say that " they promised themselves that whatever might be wanting to restore the Church to its due rights and privileges, her Majesty would have the glory of doing it, and of securing it to posterity." See Lathbury, Hist, of Convocation, p. 378.
2 Skeats, Hist, of the Free Churches, p. 197.
3 Skeats, 198. " Burnet, n. 310. 5 Boyer's Annals, Vol. i, quoted by Skeats, 199.
64 OCCASIONAL CONFORMITY.
possible from public offices. On the fourth of November, 1702, the members^ for the two Universities brought in a Bill for the prevention of Occasional Conformity I
The law which made it necessary for every holder of office, civil or militarv, to receive the Sacrament according: to the rites of the Church of England, had led to great abuses, for many persons, and not Dissenters alone, often merely conformed in this matter because otherwise they would not have been qualified for the place they sought or would have forfeited the one they already held. For the prevalence of this practice the Dissenters were not to blame, but the framers of the Test Act who had degraded the most solemn of all the Church's ordinances into a mere guage of civil qualification. Occasional Con- formity was practised and enjoined by many excellent Dissenters from the highest motives ; as members of one division of the Catholic Church, they deemed it their privilege and their duty to hold communion with other divisions from whom they differed in external matters only. In neglecting this duty they held that they would be guilty of schism. Among Presbyterians especially this custom prevailed ; one of their own number has left it on record that he was '' a non-conformist minister, but a conforming parishioner," and that no one (knowing his constant principles) was offended at it ^ Occasional Con- formity of this kind was a very different thing from the Occasional Conformity that sought a place and salary ;
1 These were Mr St John (afterwards Lord BoHngbroke). Mr Annisley and Mr Bromley.
2 Skeats, 213. The Test Act provided that none should be in oflSce in any corporation who had not within the year previous to his nomination communicated in the Church of England.
3 J, Humphrey, in Thoresbifs Correspondence, i. 324, quoted by Overton and Abbey, i. 427.
PROVISIONS OF THE BILL. 65
;iiid tliougli it must be admitted that most Occasional Conformists had selfish and secular motives for their con- duct, yet it was not the case with all, and that it was so with any was the fault of the Act which made the sacramental test necessary. Had nothing but zeal for suppressing the " vile hypocrisy " of Occasional Conformity animated the Tories, they might have attempted to repeal the Test Act, but their zeal was rather political than religious ; the numbers and increasing influence of the Dissenters had begun to alarm those who thought the Church's only safety lay in undivided sway, and the pro- posed Bill passed rapidly and with a large majority through the House of Commons. Its provisions, when brought in for the first time, were such as would have counteracted in a great measure the working of the Toleration Act. It was enacted that all persons who had once conformed and now held any public office of any kind, if they attended any Dissenting meeting where more than five persons besides the family w^ere present, should forfeit their employment, pay a fine of £100, and £5 for every day that they continued in ofiice after having attended such a meeting ; and that no one, having thus forfeited his employment, should obtain any other until he had con- formed for a whole year to the Established Church. Upon a relapse the penalty and time of incapacity were to be doubled. No limit of time, when an information mioht be made, was mentioned in the Bill, neither was it stated how the offence was to be proved. The Test Act had only dealt with the Magistrates in Corporation ; this Bill was to affect all the inferior ofiicers as well \
In the House of Lords the Bill met with a cooler reception. The Whigs had a larger party in that House ;
1 Burnet, ii. 336. L. 5
6G THE BILL THROWN OUT.
King William's bishops were there and they were well sup- ported. The Lords altered more than one clause in the Bill, making it more moderate, and in several free conferences with the Commons, slight differences were yielded on either side, but still the Bill was not approved by the Upper House. When it was to be voted upon, the Court strained all its power to the utmost to get it passed, and even the Prince Consort, an occasional conformist himself, was sent down by the Queen to give his reluctant vote for the Bill, although it is recorded that he said to Lord Wharton, a vigorous opponent of it, as he went into the House, ''My heart is with yoiC^ The Bill was lost, to the great disgust of the Commons and the clergy, and as so many Bishops had opposed it, the opportunity was taken to accuse them of being cold and careless in the Church's cause.
During the same session a Bill was brought in by the Commons, by which those persons who had not yet taken the oath of Abjuration were allowed one year more in which to consider the matter, and those who took the oath, even after some delay, were made capable of returning to their benefices or employments, provided that they were not already legally filled up. To this Bill two important clauses were added; one making it high treason to attempt to defeat the Protestant succession and another imposing the oath of Abjuration in Ireland, where there were so many Catholics, that this seemed a very necessary precaution. This Bill was a great blow to the Jacobites, who had expected much advantage from it when it was first brought in, but found themselves cruelly mistaken when the two additional clauses passed^.
The Tories were far too intent upon their object of ^ Stanhope's Queen Anne, 80. 2 Burnet, 11. 340.
BROUGHT IN AGAIN. 67
crushing Dissent to be baffled by one failure, and in next year's session (1703) the Bill for preventing Occasional Conformity was again brought in. This time however they had modified some of its former harsh clauses. Twelve persons besides the family was the number fixed to form a conventicle, instead of five, as the first Bill had enacted, and the fine which was to accompany the loss of office was reduced from a hundred to fifty pounds. But now a feeling against the Bill had arisen even among the Commons, who before had passed it rather by acclamation than by vote, and the question was debated earnestly on both sides. The supporters of the Bill however declared that the Church was in danger and that this Act was necessary to its security, and under the influence of this opinion the Bill was passed again by a large majority. Once more it was sent up to the Lords and once more its progress was checked by them. Some Peers who had voted for it in the previous session, thought it better to absent themselves now, and Prince George did not appear to record his vote. The Bill was thrown out again, and naturally the clergy, who had set their hearts on its passing this time, were disgusted \ Even the Queen fell under their displeasure, as not having exerted herself sufficiently in the cause, and they could not forgive their favourite, Godolphin, for having said that he thought the Bill unseasonable^ and so did little to ensure its success.
Meanwhile the Dissenters naturally took a lively interest in a subject which so closely concerned them. The Baptists and Quakers, it is true, held aloof from all interference in the matter as they never had been and never could be occasional conformists. The Presbyterians,
1 Burnet, ii. 364. Perry, History of the Church of England, m. 154.
2 Stanhope's Queen Anne, 110.
5—2
G8 QUEEN ANNE's BOUNTY.
whose interests were more at stake, took a side in the controversy, and although they admitted that Occasional Conformity weakened their community and led many members of it to become constant conformists, yet they opposed the BilP. When the discussion of the Bill ceased in Parliament, it was taken up outside the House ; pamphlet on pamphlet appeared on both sides of the question, and the controversy was thus carried on actively through the medium of the press.
While such excitement was still raging and men of all classes were doing their utmost with tongue and pen for and against the Bill, an Act was passed to allow the Queen to alienate a part of her revenue for a purpose which has been and still is most useful. In the time of the Crusades the Pope had levied a tax of the first-fruits^ and tenths on all benefices, for the support of these wars. Long after the Crusades had ceased to be, the money was still paid, and at the Reformation the receiver of it alone w^as changed; it came to the King instead of the Pope I In Queen Anne's reign, this fund amounted to nearly £17,000 a year, and this sum the Queen desired"* to devote to the augmentation of poor livings. To this generosity she was instigated by Bishop Burnet, (to his own great satisfaction) who had before tried to induce William III. to do the like, but with no result, though the King approved uf the proposal^. It might have been thought that this act
^ Skeats, 221. ~ i.e., one year's clear revenue of every preferment.
3 Stanhope, 118.
■^ Her Majesty's message to the House of Commons on this subject was brought on 7th Feb. 1703, being Queen Anne's birthday. The pro- ceeds of this rehnquishment form that charity known as ' Queen Anne's Bounty.'
5 Own Times, ii. 370. It was the influence of Lord Sunderland which deterred King William from this act of liberality to the Church.
TORY STRATAGEMS. C9
of favour on the Queen's part would have pacified the dis- contented clergy, but their dissatisfaction was too deeply rooted, and though they sent up many complimentary addresses of thanks to the Queen, they were none the less disposed to find fault with her government. To the Act which sanctioned the alienation of this branch of the Ke venue was added one to repeal the Statute of Mortmain, so that any one so disposed might leave money to a Church or benefice. This Act was much debated by the Lords, some of whom feared that it might give occasion to practices on dying men to persuade or frighten them into endowing a living. But the Bishops were all so strongly in favour of the Bill, that it passed, and became law\
In the first session of 1705, the Tories determined to make one more effort to get the Occasional Conformity Bill passed, and since by ordinary means they could not gain their end, they tried stratagem. The Duke of Marl- borough had concluded a treaty with Prussia on the credit of the Land-tax Bill, which was to be passed this session : the Tories thought the Peers would never venture to reject a measure to which the faith of the nation had been pledged, so the Occasional Conformity Bill was tacked to the Land-tax Bill, and it was proposed to carry them both throuo^h too'ether". This artifice was however too much even for some of their own party, and the tack was rejected by a large majority. Nothing daunted, the Tories carried the Bill through independently, and sent it up to the Lords. The Queen came down to the House to hear the debate on it, and for her benefit, the arguments on both sides were stated with much clearness and great warmth^.
1 Stanhope, 119.
2 It is a rule of Parliament that any money Bill sent up from the Commons to the Lords must he accepted by them without alteration, or entirely rejected. ^ Stanhope, 1G8. Burnet, ii. 405.
70 DISCONTENT OF THE CLERGY.
It was understood however that for the present the Queen did not wish the Bill to pass. Her Whig favourite, the Duchess of Marlborough, was beginning to make her influence felt, and the power of the Tories, which had so long been paramount, was declining\ The Bill did not pass, and it was seven years before another attempt was made to carry it through.
The discontent which now prevailed among the clergy continued to increase. The High Churchmen were dis- appointed with the new Queen^ They had hoped much from her sincere, though perhaps not very enlightened, attachment to the Church, and they had found themselves mistaken. The Low Churchism which had been so preva- lent during William III.'s reign was not by any means extinguished, and the Queen was not strong enough to effect much change. The Bishops, mostly those of William's creation, gave no satisfaction to their clergy. Dissent was increasing, moderation seemed to be leading to indifference; in short, in the opinion of the High Church party, the Church was in danger I This opinion became so prevalent, that the Queen protested against it in her speech to Parliament (Oct. 1705), and as this protest had no effect, it was deemed advisable that a day should be appointed on which the cause of the alarm might be inquired into, and solemnly debated in the House of Lords. The question whether the Church was
1 Boyer's Life of Queen Anne, p. 162.
2 Overton and Abbey, ii. 372.
3 The excitement on this subject was greatly fostered by the issue of an anonymous pamphlet entitled 'The Memorial of the Church of England,'' which wrought the same sort of mischief as afterwards was effected by Sacheverell's Sermons. Indeed one of the speakers in Sacheverell's trial says the Doctor's sermon arose 'from the ashes of that Phoenix.' See Sacheverell's Trial, p. 83.
THE "CHURCH IN DANGER" CRY. ' 71
or was not in danger was put and discussed, and it was confidently expected that important facts would be brought forward to prove the point, but though one speaker reflected on the rejection of the Occasional Conformity Bill, and another on the increase of Dissenting schools, while a third complained of the principles destructive of religion which were so widely spread, no real danger could be shewn : on the contrary, it was set forth that never before had the Church been so prosperous, with a Queen who lightened the burdens of her poorer Clergy, and Bishops who served their dioceses as they had never been served before. The debate ended in a vote for an address to the Queen, declaring the Church to be, by God's blessing, in a most safe and flourishiog condition, and those who spread reports of its daoger to be the enemies of the Queen and the Government. The Commons concurred in the resolu- tion; the Queen issued orders to the Judges to punish all persons who "falsely, seditiously, and maliciously^" suggested that the Church was iji danger, and there the matter rested for the present I
Towards the end of the session of 1706, great complaints were made in both Houses of the increase of Popery in Lancashire, and an attempt was made to bring the dis- graceful Act of 1700 against Papists into force. The Papists themselves, however, alarmed at the prospect of so great a blow to their freedom interceded with many of the most distinguished men among the Commons, and as it was made known that the Queen thought such a measure unnecessary and ill-advised, since, at that moment,
1 Overton and Abbey, ii. 377.
2 Stanhope, 208. Burnet, ii. 435. Some of the Peers however entered their protest against the vote, saying, "It is not a proper way to prevent dangers by voting that there are none."
72 CHUECH PREFEEMENT.
the nation was in alliance with several Roman Catholic; jmnces, the Bill was allowed to drop, and the Lords con- tented themselves with an address to the Queen, praying that she would order the Justices of the Peace and the clergy to make a return of all the Papists in England before the next session of Parliament \
In the next year (1707), three Bishoprics fell vacant ; Winchester, Exeter and Chester. The first was given to the famous Trelawney, a man whose influence and popula- rity did not at this time extend beyond the boundaries of his own native county of Cornwall, though there it was unlimited. This appointment therefore gave no satis- faction. But the two next were still greater occasions of disgust to the ruling party. The Whigs were now in power, but the Queen had secretly pledged herself for these two dioceses to two violent Tories, Dr Blackball and Sir William Dawes, the latter of whom was also a Jacobite I The Whigs were most indignant, and even the filling of the sees of Ely and Norwich, which fell vacant soon after, by persons of unexceptionable character in their eyes did not serve to pacify them. The Queen had been unfortunate in her management of parties, and was now distrusted both by the Tories whom she had deserted and by the Whigs to whom at the most she had never given more than half her heart, and that under the compulsion of the Duchess of Marlborough. Harley, who was now in her confidence, took pains to impress upon the Tory leaders that she was weary of the Whig tyranny and longed to shake it off, but they were very little inclined to believe this, thinking it a mere pretence to ensnare them.
Two years later (1709), a Bill was brought in which had long been desired by many and more than once been 1 Burnet, ii. 440. 2 Burnet, 11. 487.
DR SACHEVERELL. 73
brought in without success ; it was for naturalizing all foreign Protestants who should take the Oaths and receive the Sacrament in any Protestant place of worship. Some High- Churchmen wished to restrict the Protestant place of worship to the Church of England, but it was deemed advisable to extend the privilege as far as possible and allow naturalization even to foreign Dissenters. Bishop Burnet spoke, as he says, *' copiously " (it is quite con- ceivable) in favour of the Bill, for which he was accused of indifference to the Church's interests, not the first time that he had incurred that reproach. The Bill was passed with very little opposition on the whole \
The alarm of the Church's danger was not yet for- gotten, and the cry was again raised in 1709 ; this time by a certain Dr SacheverelP, a violent High-Churchman "with a very small measure of religion, virtue, learning or common-sense" who distinguished himself as a preacher by the torrent of language he poured forth, for the most part abusive of the government and not always very coherent. He preached two sermons, one on the 15th of August before the Judges at Derby^ and one in St Paul's on the 5th of November, on "the Perils of False Brethren," in which he inculcated so plainly the doctrines of passive obedience and non-resistance as to call public attention to himself. The Court of Aldermen would not thank him for his sermon nor ask him to print it, but the Lord Mayor for the time being* was so unwise as to do so, and Sacheverell printed it and dedicated it to him. Forty thousand copies
1 Burnet, ii. 524.
2 Sacheverell was a fellow of Magdalen College, Oxford, and Chaplain of St Saviour's, Southwark.
3 A kinsman of Sacheverell was High Sheriff of the County of Derby in 1709.
** Sir Samuel Garrard, Bart.
7* HIS TRIAL.
of the sermon were quickly sold and eagerly read by the discontented and the Jacobites. In the sermon the Lord Treasurer, Godolphin, was so plainly described that it would have been only one step more to name him,^ ; in revenge for this insult, a Parliamentary impeachment of the preacher was in an evil moment resolved upon. But the proceedings were slow and so much time was allowed to elapse between the impeachment and the trial that Sacheve roll's supporters had abundant opportunity to in- flame the minds of the people against the Whigs ; no difficult task in a time of peculiar dearth and scarcity, and with a discontented and violently High-Church mob. On the 27th of February 17^ the trial began; every day Sacheverell came in a coach from his lodgings in the Temple to Westminster H^^ll, escorted by immense crowds with every demonstration of favour. The Queen came to the Hall several times to hear the trial and met with an almost equally tumultuous reception, as it was generally believed that she took the part of the accused. The mob thronged her sedan-chair, shouting " God bless your Majesty and the Church ; we hope your Majesty is for Dr Sacheverell."
At first, certainly, the Queen had not a very high opinion of the accused, for when she spoke to Bishop Burnet on the subject, soon after the impeachment had begun, she said of him and his discourse : " It is a bad sermon, and he well deserves to be punished for it." But when all the clergy, almost to a man, and her own chaplains among the number, ranged themselves on 1 The words thought to have been directed at Godolphin are, "What dependence can there be upon a man of no principles ?...In what moving and lively colours does the holy Psalmist paint out the crafty insidious- ness of such wily Volpones...,Like Joab they pretend to speak peaceably, and smite as mortally under the fifth rib."
THE SENTENCE. 7o
Sacheverell's side, she may very ^Drobably have changed her secret inclinations.
The trial lasted ten days, on one of which (the eighth) Sacheverell read a speech, " with much bold heat " in his own defence. This speech was so unlike his usual style that he could never have written it himself and it was generally, and not without reason, attributed to Atterbury. To this defence the managers for the Commons replied, and then the Lords openly debated the question for some time. Y/hen the debates closed the votes which pronounced the doctor Guilty or Not guilty were taken, and he was found Guilty by a majority of seventeen \ But when it came to fixing the penalty, the majority dwindled down and the motion that he should be prohibited from preaching for three years was carried only by six. The subsequent motion that he should be incapable during that time of taking any preferment in the Church was lost by one. It was resolved that his two sermons should be publicly burnt by the common hangman, but no further penalties were proposed. Such a sentence was almost equivalent to an acquittal and as such the friends of Sacheverell regarded it. The enthusiasm for him and his cause increased and when next summer (1710) he set out to take possession of a living in Wales, his journey resembled a triumphant progress. When, three years later, his sentence of sus- pension expired, its end was made the occasion of a general rejoicing in all parts of the country. Soon after, the Queen gave him one of the most valuable London livings, St Andrew's, Holborn, as a reward, and in the possession of a good income and high social position, he sank into comparative insignificance. But his sermon and impeach-
1 Stanhope, p. 415. Sixty-nine votes were for Guilty, fifty-two for Not guilty.
76 OCCASIONAL CONFORMITY BILL.
ment had proved the ruin of the Whig miDistry ; the Duchess of Marlborough had lost the Queen's favour and next year saw the administration in the hands of the Tories once more \
The Tories, being now again in power, took the oppor- tunity of bringing in their Bill against Occasional Con- formity for the fourth time. This time it was introduced first in the House of Lords, and it was also considerably modified. It now enacted that all persons holding office, who should attend any Dissenting meeting, where there were more than ten persons besides the family present, should, upon conviction, forfeit their place of trust or profit. The offence was to be proved by two witnesses within ten days of its occurrence ; the prosecution was to. take place within three months after. Convicted persons were to be incapable of any public employment until they could prove that they had for a Avhole year attended no conventicle ^
No opposition was made to this Bill, it passed in the House of Lords in three days, and the Commons offered no check to its progress, merely adding to the penalty of forfeiture, a fine of £40, to be paid as a reward to the prosecutor.
The reason that this Bill, which had before been the subject of such violent contests, passed now so easily, must be sought among the party complications of the time. The Tories and the ministry were in a great majority in the House of Commons, but in the House of Lords, the parties were so evenly balanced, that if but a few could be won over to one side or the other, the scale would be turned. Seeing this the Whigs, anxious to
1 Stanhope, chap. xii. Burnet, ii. 539, &c. Overton and Abhey, ii. 379.
2 Burnet, ii. 585.
PASSED WITH THE HELP OF THE WHIGS. 77
return to power, opened negociations with the Earl of Nottingham, a veteran Tory, who had been disappointed in his hopes of taking office under the ministry, and formed a coaUtion with him and a small party of Tories, on reciprocal terms, not altogether creditable to themselves. Nottingham engaged to aid the Whigs in resisting the proposal for a peace which was to be made this session, while they, with some sacrifice of principle, promised to support his favourite measure, the Occasional Conformity Bill. By this means the Bill was carried through the House of Lords, by the assistance of the Whigs, with whom it had hitherto always met with opposition; it was naturally received and passed eagerly by the Tory House of Commons, and so became law\
The Dissenters justly complained of the desertion of their former allies, the Whigs, in this matter, and the latter gave as their reason for not opposing the Bill that they wished to allay the fears of those who still believed the Church to be in danger, and thereby lay them under an obligation to help them in their turn, when the time should come^. With this lame excuse the Nonconformists were obliged to be content. The Act, however, did not materially weaken their party; those who wished to keep their offices ceased to attend public worship anywhere, while those who valued their religion more than their place resigned^
One more step for the restriction of religious liberty was taken during this reign. For the purpose of those who still had hopes of setting aside the Protestant succession, it w^as necessary that Dissent should be greatly weakened
1 Stanliope, 497, 498, 502.
- Burnet, ii. 586. See also Calamy's Nonconformists Memorial,!. 725.
'^ Skeats, 268.
78 THE SCHISM BILL.
if not entirely crushed out; since the Dissenters would certainly form a strong party against the Pretender, if any attempt should be made in his favour. The Occasional Conformity Bill had not had the desired effect, so in May, 1714, a measure, known as the Schism Bill, was brought in and passed. By this measure, no person was allowed to teach publicly or privately without first signing a declaration of conformity, and obtaining a license from the Bishop of his diocese, which license Avas not to be granted unless he could produce a certificate that he had received the Sacrament according to the rites of the Church of England for a year previous. Anyone teaching without such a license was liable to be imprisoned without bail. This intolerant Bill was passed only by a small majority. The Queen signed it, and it was to come into force on the 1st of August, 1714. But on that very day, a day looked forward to with dread by the Dissenters, the Queen died, and by her death the Act was nullified\ No attempt was ever made to enforce it, and to the credit of the succeeding reign, it dropped out of notice entirely, and was repealed in 1719, together with the Occasional Con- formity BilP.
^ Skeats, 273. 2 Hallam, in. 249.
CHAPTER VI.
THEOLOGICAL LITERATURE IN THE REIGNS OF WILLIAM IIL AND ANNE.
This period was one rather remarkable for theological controversy than for any earnest religious life, and the character of course is impressed on all the writings of the time. Bunyan died in 1688, and it is a sign of the times that the Pilgrims Progress was little regarded by the gene- ration to which it was first presented, and it was left for comparatively modern times to recognize the beauty and power of this great religious allegory. The a.ttempt made by Charles II. and James II. to restore the Roman Catholic religion had revived for a time the hopes of those who cluno; still to the old faith. But in Eng^land the Roman Catholics were not a numerous body. The nation as a whole had accepted the doctrines of the Reformation, and so there is no literature by writers of the Romanist party which seems worthy of special notice. We can see from the language of Dryden in his preface to the Hind and Panther that there was no general acceptance given to the claims of the Church of Rome. That poem was written by him as a defence of the older religion which he had adopted, but that the national heart was not with him he knew full well. He writes, *'The nation is in too high a ferment for me to expect either fair war, or even so much as fair quarter, from a reader of the opposite party. All men are engaged either on this side or that; and
80 CONTROVERSIAL WRITINGS.
though conscience is the common word which is given by both, yet if a writer fall among enemies, and cannot give the marks of their conscience, he is knocked down before the reasons of his own are heard."
The special ferment to which Dryden here refers was much allayed at the accession of William, and the stringent measures believed then to be politically necessary against Roman Catholics soon suppressed all literature, whether poetry or prose, which supported the party of Dryden's Milk-iuhite hind.
But internal controversy rent the Church of England for a long time, and the position of the Non-jurors, though basing itself on the solemn question of the sanctity of an oath, became so mixed up with purely political issues, as well-nigh to remove the writings which sprung out of it from the class of theological literature. On other questions the paucity of works of a devotional character, and the abundance of polemical literature is remarkable. But these latter though dealing specially with deep questions of Christian doctrine, and the mysteries of the Christian faith, treat those subjects in such wise as to shew that the decay of faith was very real. The doctrines of the Trinity and of the divinity of Christ are approached both l)y assailants and defenders almost in the manner of mathematical enquiries, and the consequence is that all life perished from both sides. The phenomena of the literary history of the time are enough by themselves to ac- count for the apathy toward religious teaching which the best men so much deplored, and for the scoffing tone towards religion, which we know from many sources to have been so current \ This lethargy and scorn was not dispelled till
1 Bishop Butler's remarks on this subject in the preface to the Analogy have been often quoted and were echoed by many in his day.
JEREMY COLLIER. 81
the movement inaugurated by John Wesley, and there can scarcely be said to have been an awakening of real Church feeling before the early part of the present century.
If in noticing the books produced during this period we adopt as nearly as we can a chronological arrangement we come first upon the writings of the Nonjurors. Of these Jeremy Collier, Hickes, Leslie and Brett are the authors who have left their mark most clearly on the time, and the first and last of them entered warmly into the special subject which caused their separation from the rest of the Church of England.
Collier's first treatise (1088) w^as entitled The Desertion discussed. It was written with the view of counter- acting the influence of a pamphlet which Burnet had put forth, in which the Bishop strove to shew that James II. by his desertion of his people, particularly after the course of injustice and violence by which his reign had been distinguished, ought no longer to be considered or treated w^ith as king. For t|iis book Collier suffered some months' imprisonment in Newgate. After his release how- ever he wrote on the same subject Vindicke Juris Regii (1689), which is a reply to a paper entitled an Fnquirf/ into the Measures of Submission to the Supreme Authority, also A king de facto, and A Caution against Incon- sistency, or the connexion between praying and swearing in relation to the Civil Powers. In 1G91 he issued " JDr Sherlock's Case of Allegiance considered, with some remarks upon his vindication." This was a reply to the work of the Dean of St Paul's, who, having at first refused to take the oaths of allegiance to the new king, had in the end consented to do so, and had to bear much derision in consequence. Another work of Collier's on the same sub- ject was A brief Essay concerning the Independency of Church
L. G
82 GEORGE HICKES.
Power. For these works lie was subjected to a second, but only short imprisonment.
But apart from and superior to his controversial writings we owe to Collier the best History of the Church of England which yet exists. One element of its value consists in the numerous documents which it contains, and though its appearance produced much discussion and roused up such opponents as Bishops Burnet and Kennett, its great worth remains undeniable. Another work, much needed, and productive of great good was his >S^/io?'^ Vieiu of the Immorality and Profaneness of the English Stage, which may be fitly noticed here, as if not theological, it was an effort in the cause of religion and purity. It is satisfactory to have to note that the verdict not onl}^ of the wise and pious, but also of the nation at large, was with Collier, while none of those who wrote against him could resist the learning, justice and wit of his attack.
George Hickes, though for a time a more prominent figure than Collier, in the Nonjuring society, did not con- tribute to the controversy any important writing. His Apologetical Vindication of the Church of England was a work dealing with the questions at issue between the Church of England and the Church of Kome, but w^as deemed of sufficient merit to be included in 1738 by Bishop Gibson in his Presei^vative against Popery, a collection of the best pieces written against popery in the reiofn of James II. Amon^: his other controversial writings his tract entitled Jovian, deserves specially to be named. It was an answer to the Julian the Apostate of Samuel Johnson ^ who had written against the doctrines
1 This gentleman was a clergyman of Corringham in Essex, but was non-resident, and living in London took an active part in the politico- religious conflicts of the time, being a stout Protestant and an opponent of the High-Church doctrine of passive obedience.
LESLIE AND BRETT. 83
of non-resistance and passive obedience of which Hickes was a constant champion. But Hickes will probably be known to the world longest by his very learned volumes on the Ancient Literature of the Northern Nations, in which he gives Grammars of the various Teutonic and Scandinavian tongues, with discussions and original docu- ments in great abundance \ Some papers of Hickes, pub- lished after his death, called forth Hoadly's Preservative against the Principles and Practices of Nonjurors (1716), which may be regarded as the commencement of the Bangorian controversy, to be mentioned hereafter.
Charles Leslie, an Irish clergyman and chancellor of the Cathedral of Connor, contributed as his share of the Nonjurors' literature a volume entitled The case of the Regale and the Pontificate. In this work he claims for the Church the right of self-government, and points out how Kings and Popes have from time to time encroached upon her liberties. The object of the book, which appeared in 1692, was to point out the iniquity of the late depri- vation of the Nonjurors. Leslie was warmly devoted to James 11. and on that account lost all his preferments at the Revolution. He spent the rest of his life in polemical writing against Deists, Socinians, Romanists, Quakers and Infidels. His Short and Easy Method luith the Deists, his best known work, will be mentioned below.
Thomas Brett, was a later accession to the ranks of the Nonjurors. At first he had not scrupled to take the oaths to William and Mary, but by the arguments of his friends he became convinced that he ought to sever himself from the communion of the Established Church, and did so in 1715. At first it was rumoured that he was about to join the Church of Rome, and against this report he wrote a Vindi-
^ The work is generally connected with Wanley's catalogue of Ancient Mss, and etill holds its ground as a book of high authority.
6—2
84 WHIG THEOLOGIANS.
cation, and subsequently published two or three essays in defence of the position of the Nonjurors. Of these the best known is The independency of the Church upon the State as to its pure spiritual powers. But like others of his party, Brett was a deeply learned man, and has contributed many volumes to Church History, and kindred subjects. Of these one was written to shew that the government of the Church of England is most agreeable to that of the Primitive Church; another on the subject of the Validity of Lay Baptism, a point at that time in much dispute; another, on the Principal Liturgies used by the Christian Church in the celebration of the Holy Eucharist : while the list of his letters and pamphlets is exceedingly large.
Among the supporters of the principles of the Revo- lution the two men who stand prominently forward as writers in the early days of King William's reign are Tillotson, who was made Archbishop of Canterbury on the deprivation of Bancroft, and Burnet, whom the King appointed Bishop of Salisbur}^ Both these men had been fitted by their early education and associations, to feel large sympathy with all measures of Toleration. Tillotson in his early life was a favourer of Presbyterianism, and it is said that his first sermon was preached at the Morning Exercises at Cripplegate, which was a service of the Non- conformists. But in 1662, he submitted to the terms of the Act of Uniformity \ and being ordained, became in a short time a preacher at Lincoln's Inn. His most active literary labours fell in with the agitation against Popery, a,nd his discourses Against Transuhstantiation, and Against Purgatory, are well known portions of a long continued controversy, which was commenced by his Rule of Faith,
1 It is said that Tillotson's attachment to the Church of England was dne to a study of ChilHngworth's work " The Religion of Protestants a safe way of Salvation.^^
BURNET. 85
written in reply to a book issued by a recent convert to the Komish Churcb. At tbe period of tbe Revolution bis character commended bim to King William, and bis great popularity as a preacber marked bim for promotion. His acceptance of tbe arcbbisbopric exposed bim to mucb censure at tbe bands of tbe Nonjurors, but it ought to be observed in reply to such criticisms that Tillotson at tbe time of tbe Revolution kept almost entirely in tbe back- ground, and though favouring tbe principles which were then in the ascendant, be still felt pain and much reluc- tance at accepting a dignity from which Bancroft bad been ejected.
Burnet, on bis mother's side was sprung from a Presby- terian family, and as Scotland was tbe seat of bis education and where be spent tbe early part of his life, bis leanings towards the principles favoured by King William can be well understood. Before settling in England be bad shewn his powers and bis learning by publishing a Vindication of the Authority, Constitution and Laws of the Church and State of Scotland, being a defence of the Royal preroga- tives of tbe Crown, and tbe establishment of Episcopacy in that country. Soon after coming to London Burnet became one of tbe chaplains of Charles II. and was appointed preacher at the Rolls. His first noteworthy book of a theological character was The History of the Reformation in England, on the publication of the first volume whereof, in 1679, tbe author received the thanks of both Houses of Parliameut. Tbe second volume was published two years afterwards, and the final volume in 1715. He wrote a short but elegant life of John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester, who from being one of the most dis- sipated members of tbe Court of Charles 11. was converted by tbe ministrations of Burnet. Dr Johnson describes tbe work as "one which the critic ought to read for its elegance,
80 BURNET S WORKS.
the philosopher for its arguments, and the saint for its piety." Burnet also wrote lives of Sir Matthew Hale, and Bishop Bedell, Bishop of Kilmore in Ireland. Soon after the accession of James II. he retired to the Continent and lived in great privacy at Paris, but after a time he was invited to the Hague by the Prince and Princess of Orange, and from that time took an active part in every way in promoting the designs of William. After he had been made Bishop of Salisbury, he published a Pastoral letter to his clergy respecting the oaths of allegiance and supre- macy, and in it he grounded the claims of William and Mary to the throne on the right of conquest. This gave such offence to both Houses of Parliament that the letter was ordered to be publicly burnt by the common hangman.
When settled in his diocese (1692), he wrote the Pas- toral Care, a work in which he points out and enforces the duties of the clergy, as he did also in Four Discourses which he delivered in the discharge of his episcopal duties in 1693 to the clergy in his diocese. A larger work was his Exposition of the Thirty-nine Articles, which was censured, at the time of its publication, by the Low^er House of Convocation, but has nevertheless held its ground as, in many points, a trustworthy and valuable text-book on the subject with which it deals. Burnet left behind him a somewhat garrulous and vain Ilistorif of His own Times, which was published by his son, and which is valuable as a history (and the only one) of many matters of which few could be better cognizant than he, and of which, in spite of his manifest vanity, there is no reason to believe he has given other than a correct represen- tation.
The next place among the theological writers of the time may be assigned to Dr William Sherlock, who became
DR SHERLOCK. 87
Dean of Sfc Paul's in 1691. He took part both in the discussions on the oaths, and also in more strictly theologi- cal controversy. He had for some time objected to the oaths of allegiance and supremacy, and so ranked himself on the side of the Nonjurors, but on the offer of the deanery he changed his position, took the oaths, and defended the step in a pamphlet called The case of allegiance to sovereign Princes stated. His conduct in this matter subjected him to much scorn both from Nonjurors and others, for at first he had been as ready as the stoutest with reasons why the oaths should not be taken. He published about the same time a work entitled Vindi- cation of the doctrine of the Trinity, and the Incarnation of the Son of God. This book involved him in controversy with Dr South, who accused him of Tritheism, and South appears to have had the better of the argument, for the doctrine as propounded by Sherlock was judged to be unsound. Perhaps also part of the success of the witty doctor was due to the sneer of which he is reputed the author \" No wonder Sherlock is so ready at an oath, since he has two Gods to swear by more than other men." Dr Sherlock's works comprise many discourses which were highly esteemed in their day. Among these may be mentioned one on The Knowledge of Christ; others on Judgment, Providence, Religious Assemblies, and that most popular Practical Discourse concerning Death, about which Addison writes ^, " He who has not perused this excellent piece, has not perhaps read one of the strongest persuasions to a religious life that ever was written in any language." Dean Sherlock was the father of Dr Thomas Sherlock, afterwards in succession Bishop of Bangor, Salisbury and London, whose writings will be noticed in the Bangorian controversy.
1 See Scott's Life of Swift, p. 68. ^ Spectator, 289.
88 DR BULL.
Passing from the clergy who distinguished themselves in political and religious controversy to those who may more strictly be styled learned, we meet in the early portion of this period, first with the name of Dr George Ball, afterwards Bishop of St David's. He gave to the world in 1CG9 his Apostolical Harmony, a work under- taken in the hope of reconciling the current disputes on the doctrine of Justification, by shewing that there was no difference in the te'achingj of St Paul and St James on that subject, except what was due to the different times and varied needs of the churches to which the two Apostbs wrote. But the work which has formed the foundation of Bull's fame is his Defence of the Nicene Creed. This book extended his reputation as a scholar and divine beyond his own country, for it was accessible to the learned men of the continent because Bull wrote in Latin. Another and later work in continuation of the same subject was entitled, Judicium Ecclesice CathoUcce trium primorum sceculorum de necessitate credendi quod Dominus noster Jesus Christus sit iierus Deus. For this work he was thanked through Bossuet, the celebrated Bishop of Meaux, by the clergy of France assembled in convocation at St Germain's. The book was exceedingly well-timed for England also, since the disputes between Sherlock and South, and others who followed in their train, were calcu- lated to compromise the character of our Church for orthodoxy. The last work which Dr Bull put forth was entitled Primitive and Apostolic Tradition. This also deals with the question of the Divinity of our Lord and was written in opposition to a Prussian named Zwicker and his followers in England. Zwicker had maintained among other things that Justin Martyr was the first to introduce into the Christian Church the doctrine of our Lord's pre-existence before the foundation of the world,
ROBERT NELSON. 89
and that Justin's teaching was derived from the school of Plato. Another treatise by Bull entitled A Vindication of the Church of England, was not published till after the author's death, though he had written it several years before for the instruction of two ladies of quality whose minds had been unsettled by Jesuit influence. Bishop Bull found a fitting biographer in his friend Robert Nelson, himself worthy to be classed among the writers of the period for his still well-known book on The Festivals and Fasts of the Church of England. Nelson on the accession of William III. declared himself a Nonjuror, and so continued till 1709, when, persuaded by the arguments of his friend Bishop Ken, he returned to the Communion of the Church of England. In spite however of his Nonjuring sympathies he was the attached friend of Tillotson, whom he attended in his last illness, and who died in his arms. Beside the work already mentioned. Nelson wrote The Practice of True Devotion, and a Life of John Kettlewell, a distin- guished Nonjuring clergyman, who in conjunction with Nelson arranged the model of a Fund for the needy and suffering Nonjuring clergy.
Another of the learned clergy of this time was Dr William Beveridge, afterwards Bishop of St Asaph. He was well versed in Oriental lano-uao^es, and at first devoted his powers mainly to such subjects, publishiug a Syriac Grammar, and making collections for a Syriac Lexicon. But in 1G72 he put forth a work of another character. This was a collection of the (so-called) Apostolic Canons and the Canons of the early Councils of the Church. These volumes attracted notice both abroad and at home, and as Beveridge assigned an earlier date to the Apostolic Canons than is generally admitted, he became involved in some controversy on the subject, throughout which he still adhered to his original view though the arguments
90 PRIDEAUX.
by which he supported his position are not always deemed conclusive. Besides these erudite works Beveridge put forth an Explanation of the Church Catechism for use in his diocese, and wrote an Exposition of Thirty out of the Thirty-nine Articles, though this was not published till after his death. The book however by which he has been known to most people is his Private Thoughts. This work has passed through numerous editions in English, and has been translated into French and German. It is a production of the early part of the author's life, and pro- bably was never meant to be printed. But it reveals so much goodness of heart, and earnest piety, that it has been a welcome volume to many devout minds.
As a writer who contributed to the knowledge of the history of Scripture should be mentioned Dr Humphrey Prideaux, sometime Dean of Norwich. He also was a learned Hebraist, and a lecturer on that language in Oxford. He encracred in some severe contests with the Roman Catholics, and published in consequence his Validity of the Orders of the Church of England made out, the title of which sufficiently indicates the objections against which he wrote. He put forth a Life of Mahomet \ and also Directions to Churchwardens, which has continued to be (with correc- tions as time made them needful), a standard work until our own times. But his greatest work, and that for which his Jewish learning well fitted him was The connexion of the History of the Old andKew Testaments. This was not completed till 1717.
Of a like learned character are the works of Dr Edw^ard Stillingfleet, who in 1688 was made Bishop of Worcester.
1 Appended to this work is a "Letter to the Deists." The Life of Mahomet was undertaken to shew the impostures that are in Mahommed- anism, to contrast Christianity with the teaching of the Prophet of Mecca, and to manifest the truth and purity of the faith of Christians.
STILLINGFLEET. 91
He had previous to that date written his Origines Sacrce. This is a rational account of the Christian faith, as to the truth and divine authority of the Scriptures and the matters therein contained. It was esteemed a most able defence of revealed religion, and was afterwards republished, with some additional matter, by Dr Bentley, the celebrated Master of Trinity College, Cambridge, Stillingfleet also wrote his Irenicum, or a Weapon-salve for the ChurcJis Wounds. In this work he treats on the divine right of particular forms of Church-government, discussing and examining such forms according to the principles of (1) the Law of nature, (2) the positive laws of God, (3) the prac- tice of the Apostles and the primitive Church, (4) the judgment of Reformed Divines. Thus he endeavoured to lay a foundation of peace in the Church, and to abate the prevailing differences. When James II. had revived the court of Ecclesiastical Commission, Stillingtleet refused to be a member of it, and wrote after the Hevolution a " Dis- course concerning the Illegality of the Ecclesiastical Com- mission." Into the discussions on the doctrine of the Trinity, so prevalent at this period, he entered by writiog A vindication of the Trinity, to combat the Unitarianisra, lead- ing on to Deism, which was taught by such writers as Toland. He deals with the same errors in his Discourse on the Reason of CJirist's suffering for us. He was emplo3^ed by the Bishop of London to write a vindication of Arch- bishop Laud's conference with Fisher the Jesuit. Stilling- fleet's work is entitled A Rational account of the grounds of the Protestant Religion. On the death of Tillotson, Queen Mary specially desired that Stillingfleet should succeed to the Archbishopric, but the Whig party, feeling that he held views of a far more definitely High-Church character than their own, made his delicate health an excuse for passing him by. He died in 1699.
92 JOSEPH BINGHAM.
Another learned and laborious student who contributed by his writings to increase the knowledge of Church History was Joseph Bingham. After a distinguished University career, he was obliged to retire from Oxford on account of the share which he took in the Trinitarian controversy. The discussion was on the meaning of j^^ersow, and Bingham's studies eminently fitted him for the exami- nation of Ecclesiastical Writers of antiquity on the words which are so translated. But his learning was cried down through the influence of his opponents, and he was forced to resign his fellowship. The remainder of his life was spent in a small living near Winchester, where by the use of the Cathedral library he produced a work that supplied a OTeat void in Ecclesiastical literature. This was the Orig'mes Ecclesiastical or Antiquities of the Christian Church, of which the first volume appeared in 1708, and he completed his labours in 1722. The Avork is one of great orisfinal research and of much intrinsic excellence. So highly was it admired abroad that even Roman Catholic waiters admitted it to be a most important addition to theological libraries, and Englishmen may be thankful that such a work was undertaken by a son of the Church of England. The prejudices of a Roman Catholic would have explaiued away or coloured much of the history, while Protestant dissenters had at that time little grasp of or care for historical writings, or for anything else in literature, save what was devotional or expository.
Bingham took a share in the debates of the time on the subject of Lay-Baptism\ The High-Church party held that all such Baptism was invalid, and, apparently
1 The discussion had its rise in the writings of the learned Henry Dodwell, one of the Nonjurors. He taught that the soul is naturally mortal, but immortalized by union with the Divine Baptismal Spirit which alone could be bestowed by episcopally ordained clergy.
ARCHBISHOP WAKE. 93
through apprehension of irregularities which might arise from allowing such baptism to be valid, Waterland supported this High-Church view, though knowing it to be contrary to primitive teaching, and the long-continued practice of the Church of England. Bingham's ScJiolastical History/ of Lay Baptism, proves clearly that the Primitive Church admitted Lay-Baptism to be valid in cases of pressing necessity.
The list of eminent ecclesiastical writers in the Church of England during these two reigns may be fitly closed by a notice of the works of Dr (afterwards Archbishop) Wake. His first appearance as a writer was in answer to Bossuet's Exposition of the Roman Catholic Faith. His work (known generally by the name of Wake's Catechism), is entitled an Exposition of the Doctrine of the ChiLvch of England. This called forth much literature for and against the Church and her doctrines, among which Wake published a first and second " Defence " of his original book, and contributed several Tracts to the controversy with the Romanists. Also in order that the truth might be widely known concerning the teaching of the Apostolic Fathers, whose writings had been largely used in opposition to the doctrine and government of the Church, Wake published an English version of their genuine Epistles, which gained popularity enough to pass through several editions during his lifetime. But the most active part taken by him was in the Convocation controversies. Though these reached their climax in the next reign, yet Wake's works on the subject may be briefly noted here. In 1697 there had been published A letter to a Convocation Man, discussing the right, j)owers and privileges of that body. To this Wake issued a reply of a liberal character entitled The Authority of Christian Princes over their Ecclesiastical Synods. This was attacked
94 CONVOCATION CONTROVERSY.
on several sides, but perhaps the most noteworthy opponent of Wake was Atterbury, who as the controversy was waxing warm published his Rights, Powers and Privileges of an English Convocation stated and defended. The dis- cussion thus fostered attracted the ablest writers among Churchmen. Bishop Burnet and Kennett, afterwards Bishop of Peterborough, as well as Hody and Gibson, took part with Wake, the most important supporter of Atterbury being Dr George Hooper. Atterbury, however, was most decisively answered by AVake himself, for his book, entitled The state of the Church and Clergy of England, in their Councils, Synods, Convocations, Conventions and other ]_mhlic Assemblies, historically deduced from the conversion of the Saxons to the present time, not only silenced Atterbury, who attempted no reply, but is even to this day regarded as an authoritative work on that whole con- troversy. After his elevation to the episcopal bench. Wake's literary labours were necessarily curtailed, although he took some part in the Arian controversy against Whis- ton and Clarke. He also entered into a correspondence with Dupin,the well-known French Ecclesiastical historian, with the view of bringing about some union between the Church of England and the Jansenist party of the Romish Church in France. The Archbishop was blamed at the time for his action in the matter, for he was thought to have proposed that the English Church shouki make con- cessions of principle for the sake of this union, but the publication of all the documents at a later period entirely exculpated him.
The close of the seventeenth and beginning of the eighteenth centuries were marked by the appearance of numerous writings of a sceptical character, which must be here noticed, because of the answers which they called forth. Pushing the arguments of Locke in his Reasonable-
SCEPTICAL WRITINGS. 95
ness of Christianity far beyond what was contemplated by that author, men bej^an to claim that all should be re- jected from religious belief which was not capable of appre- hension by human reason. The first writer of this class whom we need mention was John Toland (1G69 — 1722) whose Christicmitij not Mysterioits is a treatise shewing that there is nothing in the Gospel contrary to reason or above it, and that no Christian doctrine can be properly called a mystery. Of course Christianity as expounded by such a writer was a Christianit}^ without miracles, and faith with him was persuasion built on substantial reasons, and though he himself did not follow his line of thought so far, those who would do so must embrace a religion without God. Among noteworthy answers to the Deistical argu- ments of Toland and similar writers was Stillingfleet's Vindication of the Trinity, in which not Toland only, but the rationalizing principle in the work of Locke is attacked. Another Refutation of Toland' s Christianity not Mysterious was written by Peter Browne, afterwards Bishop of Cork.
The steps of Toland were not followed by those who succeeded him in the Deistical controversies. The works of Dr Samuel Clarke (1675 — 1729) may be noted as those which led the way for a considerable list of kindred writings. Clarke was a learned mathematician, and treat- ed Christianity as if it were capable of the same sort of precise demonstration as the problems of Euclid. He attained considerable fame by two series of Boyle Lectures (delivered in 1701^ and 1705), the first on The Being and Attributes of God, the second on The Evidences of Natural and Revealed Religion. It was in a later work Tlie Scripture Doctrine of the Trinity that Clarke's decidedly Arian tendencies were made more plain. Its heterodox and dangerous character was noticed by Convocation, and the
06 THE ARIANS.
author was prevailed upon to declare his sorrow for the offence which his book had given. But his after conduct in reference to the Doxologies of some hymns used in his Church shews that he still was unsound on the question of the divinity of Christ. The most important writer against Clarke was Dr Waterland, whose works will be mentioned in a later chapter. Another author who em- braced Arian tenets was William Whiston (1G67 — 1752). He like Clarke (whose friend and biographer he was) was a learned mathematician, and published a treatise shewing that the creation of the world in six days, the universal deluge and the general conflagration as laid down in the Holy Scriptures are perfectly agreeable to reason and philosophy. But at a later period the study of the so- called 'Apostolical Constitutions' had such influence on his mind, that he in the end ix^aintained that these were the most sacred of the canonical books of the New Testament. He subsequejitly published his Primitive Christianity revived, a work embracing the EiDistles of Ignatius, the Apostolical Constitutions, an essay on these Constitutions, and an account of the Primitive Faith concerning the Trinity and the Incarnation. An attempt was made, according to the fashion of those times, to prosecute Whiston for his errors, but the proceedings were abandoned in 1715.
Closely connected in writings and opinions with Clarke and Whiston was William Wollaston (1659 — 1724). His best known work was The Religion of Nature delineated. In this work he makes no mention of revealed religion, he affects in his writing on the truth of religion all the forms of mathematical demonstration, and bases all re- ligion on the obligations of truth, reason and virtue. Thus he derives the commandments of the first table from general principles without any reference to the Mosaic
MATTHEW TINDAL. 97
code. He admits the doctrine of a particular providence, and allows the efficacy of prayer, a,nd grounds his argument for the immortality of the soul on the necessity for another state in which the miseries of mankind in this world may receive some proper amends. For he argued that God makes no creature in whose existence the unavoidable pains outweigh the pleasures. The work of Wollaston did not call forth much adverse criticism, and was even commended by Warburton, probably because it seemed to take up one side of the question of the Analogy between Natural and Revealed Religion. But the disregard shewn in it of Revelation and of the work of Christ marks it as one among the numerous Deistical writings of the time. Of a different character was Christianity as old as the Creation. This was the work of Matthew Tindal (1657 — 1733) a fellow of All Souls' Oxford, and its purport is somewhat declared by its second title, which says that the Gospel is a republication of the religion of Nature. The writer's argument is that God is infinitely wise, good, just and immutable ; that human nature is also unchangeable ; therefore the law of God for man will be perfect and un- varying. Would such a God have chosen a small nation like the Jews to enjoy the sole knowledge of his favour ? Arguing thus he rejects the Jewish revelation, and asserts that the theory of sacrifice shews a low conception of God. He deals largely in ridicule of everything which he con- ceives to be an addition to the law of nature, and styles such matters priestcraft. His final conclusion is "There are some things whose internal excellence sufficiently proves their divine origin, there are others which though of no intrinsic value are useful as means to an end, and they must necessarily be left to human discretion and vary according to circumstances. And finally there are some L. 7
98 LELAND. LAW. COLLINS.
things so essentially indifferent as to be useful neither as means nor end, the observance of which as part of religion is highly superstitious." So that Tindal's Christianity meant nothing more than a belief in the ordinary laws of morality. The Old and New Testaments were alike objects of his attack because they contained more than the plain and simple code of rules which every man (as he said) could discover for himself. He took no account of the many who had no wish to discover them.
The most notable replies to Tindal are Conybeare's Defence of Revealed Reh'gio)i, Leland's Vieiv of the Deistical Writers, and William Law's Iiephj to Tindal, the last of which is far the most vigorous, and is worthy of perusal at the present day, though the point of some of the reasoning may seem antiquated. He strikes a heavy blow at that "fitness of things" which Tindal had set up as the rule of God's actions, and shews that it was the placing of a metaphysical idol in the place of a living God. He also points out that Tindal's argument must end in Atheism, for if man may reject the divine origin of a revelation which does not square with his reason, he may in the same wise reject the divine origin of the Creation and so banish God from His world altogether.
i\nother line of attack on the Holy Scriptures was adopted by Anthony Collins (167G — 1729), vvho in his Scheme of Literal Prophecr/ considered maintains that the fulfilment of the prophecies which are cited in the New Testament can only have been allegorical. This was an- swered by Dr Chandler in a Vindication of the Defence of CJiristianity from the prophecies of the Old Testament. The same sort of assault was made, on the miraculous portion of the New Testament history, by Thomas Wool- feton (1669 — 1733), who adopted an allegorical explanation
LEARNED NONCONFORMISTS. 99
of all that is miraculous in the Gospels. Tliis was a greater step towards infidelity than the free-thinking of Collins. He taught that Christ's resurrection had never been foretold, Woolston that it had never really taken place, and that all that was said of a resurrection of his body was merely figurative speech. These men Avere the forerunners of that teaching which culminated in the denial by Hume of every narrative which deals with miracles, and of which more will be said hereafter. Wool- ston's principal book was Six Discourses on the Miracles, but the levity with which he had treated so solemn a subject gave his writings such a character that they were hardly worthy of a reply. Smalbroke, Bp of St David's, however wTOte against him his Vindication of Miracles, and Zachary Pearce his Miracles of Jesus Vindicated, in which latter work the overwhelming evidence in favour of the resur- rection is displayed, and the argument is insisted on that if that crowning miracle of Christ's life be proved the rest become not only possible but highly probable.
During this period the theological literature of the Nonconformists was not very extensive. The events in which they were most interested were rather political than religious. Perhaps the most learned of the Non- conformists was John Howe, whose attainments were highly respected by men like Whichcote, Kidder and Tillotson. His works were mainly of a practical and devotional character, though he wrote A View of Antiquity giving an account of the Christian Fathers, and also Annotations on the Three Epistles of St John, but the work by which he is perhaps best known is The Living Temple or A Designed Improvement of that notion that a good Man is the Temple of God. Having written A Cahn and Sober Enquiry concerning the Trinity, he afterwards en-
100 CALAMY. MEAD.
tered somewhat into the controversy on that subject on which he published a few short treatises. He died in 1705.
Another name of note was Edmund Calamy, grandson of that Edmund who was one of the joint authors of Smectymmms, and a friend of Milton. He was educated in the University of Utrecht, and on his return settled in Oxford, where he gave himself to the study of works on English Church-government. His Defence of Moderate Nonconformity is his best-known work, and was com- mended by Locke. He arranged also Baxter s Lfe and Times for the press, and in consequence entered into con- troversy with Hoadly on the subject of conformity to the Church of England. This was the occasion of Hoadly's writing his Defence of Episcopal Ordination. Besides the above works, Calamy published many sermons and one especially in which he maintains the genuineness of the text 1 John v. 7 on the three heavenly witnesses, now generally accepted as an interpolation.
Another Nonconformist name that may be mentioned in connexion with the events of the time, is Matthew Mead. He was amongst those accused in the Rye-House Plot, but was discharged. His works are Sermons on EzehieVs Wheels, and The Young Mans Remembrancer, but like Benjamin Keach, Robert Trail, and Daniel Burgess, his labours were better known as a preacher than a writer. One name among Nonconformists deserves to be specially noticed as a laborious Biblical Student. Matthew Henry, for a long time pastor of a congregation at Chester and afterwards at Hackney, has left besides his occasional Sermons and Discourses, A Commentary on the Bible, of which he completed all the Old Testament and the Gospels and the Acts, but died in 1714, before he could finish the remainder.
QUAKER WRITINGS. 101
Connected with the Quakers there is very little litera- ture which need be mentioned. The writings of Geors^e Fox (1624 — 1690) the founder of the sect are such as would be expected from an illiterate zealot. He published in 1694 a Journal of his Life, Travels and Sufferings ; some Epistles in 1698, and some doctrinal treatises in 1706 in which he assailed the vices of the times, the clergy and the estab- lished modes of worship, asserting that the inward light of Christ in the heart of men was the only means of salvation and the right qualification for a Gospel Minister. In spite of this, Penn (but he, as himself a Quaker, may be no impartial witness) speaks of Fox as a man meek, humble and moderate.
A writer among the Quakers of a very different character and training was Robert Barclay (1648 — 1690), a Scotch gentleman of no mean position and education and who is the standard divine of the Quakers. He published in Latin the best defence of Quakerism which has ever appeared. The title was Theologice veix Christianm Apologia. This book has been translated not only into English, but into most of the languages of the Continent and has passed through many editions. Beside this, his chief work, Barclay wrote a Ti'eatise on Uni- versal Love, Truth cleared of Calumnies, A Catechism and Confession of Faith, in which the answers are wholly Biblical, and some other works of a controversial character.
The full English Title of Barclay's larger work is " An Apology for the true Christian Divinity, as the same is held forth and preached by the people called in scorn Quakers, being a full explanation and Vindication of their principles and Doctrines ", while his Catechism is quaintly styled 'A Catechism and Confession of faith approved and agreed unto by the general assembly of the patriarchs,
102 WILLIAM PENN.
prophets and apostles, Christ himself chief speaker in and among them.'
William Penn (who died in 1718) published a Sum- mary of the Histonj, DocU'ine and Discijdine of Friends, while another member of the society, William Sewell, wrote a History of the Rise, Increase and Progress of the Christian j^eople called Quakers, a work which Charles Lamb describes as ' far more edifying and affecting than anything of Wesley and his colleagues.'
CHAPTER YII.
RELIGIOUS SOCIETIES.
A MARKED feature of the Endisli Churcli at the close of
o
the seventeenth century, is the estahlishment of societies, under royal sanction, for the spread of Christianity and the education and improvement of the poor. Associations for religious purposes were common in the Roman Catholic Church, but unknown in the Church of England before the time of which we speak \ The rigid austerity of the Puritan rule necessarily produced a reaction in the manners of the people, and the accession of such a monarch as Charles 11. rendered the reaction violent in the extreme. The times in England were worse, with that sort of badness that shews no redeeming feature, than they had ever been. Religion was scoffed at, virtue was made a laughing-stock, and wit and wickedness became inseparable ^ But to this profligacy as well as to the austerity which had preceded it, succeeded a reaction. The danger in which the Church stood in the reign of James IL, not only roused the nation to defend the Establishment but awakened it to more serious views of religion altogether. Already
1 Stougliton's Church of the Revolution, p. 355.
2 Macaulay, Essay on Hallam's Const. Hist.
104 HORNECK AND BEVERIDGE.
in 1678 a few young men had banded themselves together to do all they could to stem the torrent of vice. They met weekly for religious conferences, prayer and scripture reading, and laid down rules of conduct for themselves, mostly scriptural, to which they added a resolution to re- main faithful to the Church of England. They avoided all discussion on disputed points of doctrine and used no prayers but those of the Church of England or such as were sanctioned by the clergy \ Under the guidance of Dr Horneck '^ and Dr Beveridge ^ these societies grew and flourished in London, and proved of great service to the Church when religious feeling was revived by peril. Similar societies were founded elsewhere, and by the middle of William III.'s reign they had become numerous and important in London, while many of them existed in other parts of the kingdom, working under the direction of the Bishops. At the time when the Church of England was threatened so much, first by Popery and then by a too Latitudinarian policy, these associations were most useful. One of their chief aims was to promote frequent services in the churches and constant attendance at them, and to encourage the clergy to celebrate the Holy Com- munion much oftener than they had been used to do. They did not work without opposition ^ for they alarmed some timid people, too much given to suspect a secret evil design in any form of association, but King William approved of them, and Queen Mary encouraged them, and gradually they gained the respect they deserved as an
1 Stoughton, p. 356.
- Dr Anthony Horneck \A'as preacher at the Savoy and afterwards made Canon of Westminster.
3 Dr William Beveridge, subsequently made Bishop of St Asaph.
^ Perry, Shulent's Church Iliistory, p. 5G2. Hist, of Church of England, III. 130—133.
SOCIETIES FOR REFORMATION OF MANNERS. 105
earnest effort in the right direction. When the spiritual lethargy of the early part of the eighteenth century seized the nation religious societies fell out of notice, but they were not quite extinct, and it was on the principles of these associations fostered by Dr Horneck that the "Holy," " Sacramentarian " or "Methodist" Club was founded at Oxford in 1729, a society which was destined to have a great influence on the religious character of England.
These early associations were among Churchmen alone. The Puritans had had their religious societies and the Dis- senters still had theirs, but they had a narrower range and more limited influence. But in time there sprang up other associations in Avhich Churchmen and Nonconformists stood on an equal footing and had an equal interest. These were the "Societies for the Reformation of Manners." The troubles of James II.'s reign and the Revolution of 1688, though they had roused the nation into an enthusiasm of reliofious zeal for the time, had not effected a radical reform in the manners and morals of the people, which had suffered from so many years of corruption \ The fervour subsided and much vice remained ; the ejection of the Nonjurors weakened the Church by depriving it of some of its best clergy, and the worldly motives which influenced some of those who took the oath did not pass unnoticed by the enemies of religion. Impiety and immo- rality increased, so that in 1698, after the Peace of Ryswick, William III. said in his opening speech to Parliament, that he esteemed it one of the greatest advantages of the peace that it would leave him leisure to reform the internal administration and *' effectually to discourage profaneness and immorality''^ ". The profaneness here alluded to was the
1 Debary, Hist, of Church of England, p. 278.
2 Charles Knight, Hist, of England, Vol. v., p. 204.
106 CAUSES OF FAILURE.
spread of Socinian doctrines, and the open denial of the doctrine of the Trinity, to suppress which an Act was passed in this session, disqualifying for office those who were guilty of propagating this heresy and punishing them if they persisted in the offence \ Heresy could not however be extirpated by Act of Parliament, though it might be made penal, and the doctrine of the Trinity was subjected to the discussions of those who did not believe it till far into the next century. In the same way immorality might be punished but could not be prevented by statute. It was for the better enforcing of the laws against vice that the societies for the reformation of manners were founded. This was an object to which no confession could be indifferent and men of all shades of opinion joined in promoting it. The wealthy gave their money, the less wealthy their time and individual efforts for the cause, and bands of constables were soon enrolled, employed by the societies to bring to justice all offenders against the laws of decency and sobriety whom they could find^ But notwithstanding the excellence of their object these societies did not effect all the good that was expected of them; there were great faults in their management. In the first place they were not impartial in their severity. It was much easier to take up a drunken vagabond in the street and hale him before a magistrate than to discover and check the evil that went on in the houses of the well-to-do classes, so that while the lowest of the people were being reformed with such severity that it soon became difficult to find a swearer in the streets, the richer people, who were able to shelter their vices at home, escaped scatheless I Then too they
^ Perry, Hist, of Church of England, iii. 109.
2 Stoughton, p. 360.
2 Cliarles Knight, Hist, of England, v. 205.
SOCIETY FOR PROMOTING CHRISTIAN KNOWLEDGE. 107
encouraged persons to act as informers against their less godly neighbours, and the ill-will and suspicion to which this gave rise on all hands were evils almost as great, in their way, as the open vice which they laboured to repress.
Altogether the societies ended in a great measure in failure ; vice was certainly compelled to shew a more decent outside, but beneath it was often as bad as ever. A better plan for imj^roving the moral state of the peo]3le was found in the publishing and distributing among the poor of books and tracts, Avith the aim of raising the minds of the lowest classes above the evil to which they were accustomed. To be^in at the beo^inninor and teach them what was fjood was a far truer road toward reformation than any amount of punishment for evil done wljen they knew no better. The society wliich undertook this work was founded in 1699, uuder the name of the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge. Among its earliest mem- bers was the pious nonjuror, Robert Nelson, who from the first took the deepest interest in all these associations ^ At the meetings of the society sat the Whig Bishops Burnet and Fowler, side by side with the nonjuring priests Wheeler and Mapletoft, all these good and earnest men laying aside their party differences and working with one mind for the welfare of humanity. The Society did not confine its efforts to the distribution of books; the education of the lower orders generally was its great object. It made the first attempt at national education by striving to get a school established in every parish in London and many in the country ^ To the clergy, especially to the poorer clergy, it gave great help by providing parochial
1 Abbey and Overton, English Church in tlie 18th Century, i. 109.
2 Debary, p. 289. By 1704 there were 5-4 schools in and about London. Chamberlayne, Magnce Brit. Notitia, p. 672.
108 DR THOMAS BRAY.
libraries, containing books wbicb their means would often not allow them to purchase for themselves. It also under-' took in some degree the instruction of paupers in work- houses and the visiting of prisons. It was a Home Missionary Society too, and took especially great pains to convert the Quakers, chiefly through the agency of a man named George Keith, who had himself been a Quaker, but had joined the Church of England, and now laboured with all the zeal of a proselyte to induce others to follow his example. The Roman Catholics received also a large share of the attention of the Society, but no attempts were made by it to convert any Protestant Nonconformists.
One of the first members of the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge was Dr Thomas Bray, whose name deserves to be held in honourable memory for the good that he did both at home and abroad. He was born at Marton in Shropshire in the year 1656 and Avas educated at Oxford. He entered the Church and soon turned his attention to improving the condition of the people and aiding the clergy. He was the originator of the system of parochial libraries, which afterwards obtained the sanction of Par- liament. He published a volume of catechetical lectures which attracted much notice, and the Bishop of London, Dr Compton, approving what he had done in the matter of the parochial libraries, appointed him his commissary for Maryland in America, where the churches needed much help on account of the peculiar circumstances in which they were placed. The colony of Maryland had first been founded as a Roman Catholic settlement, but other forms of religion were tolerated within it. The states round it were Protestant, and Maryland itself gradually came to belong almost entirely to the Church of England \ But at 1 Debary, Hist, of Church of England, p. 288.
SOCIETY FOR THE PllOPAGATION OF THE GOSPEL. 109
the same time many Roman Catholics remained there. The population was increasing rapidly, and the clergy, far from any means of help, found themselves unable to cope with the work. Dr Bray went over to Maryland in 1699 and at once set himself to remedy the condition of affairs. To make the clergy more fit for their duties, he established there, as he had done in England, parish libraries, and for two years he worked hard in the colony to revive the flagging energy of the Church. He recog- nized the value of association for the purpose of supporting the distant branches of the English Church, and it was mainly through his efforts that in May 1701 a charter was obtained from the King incorporating the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts. The objects of this Society, as at first established, were much more limited than they are at present. It was founded, first, to provide learned and orthodox Ministers of God's word among the King's subjects in the plantations, colonies and factories beyond sea, and secondly to make such provision as might be necessary for the propagation of the Gospel in those parts. Thus it was a purely colonial missionary society without any intention of carrying Christianity to the heathen in all parts of the world as it now does. Maryland, where Dr Bray had already done so much good work, was one of the first colonies put under the care of the Society. Soon it began to send out missionaries and to build churches in the New World; the first were founded in South Carolina and in the islands of Central America. The Society's chief efforts were directed to the colonies in North America, where the population was increasing so rapidly and the work of the Church so extensive that in 1712 it was voted by the Society that it would be well to establish Bishops there. But the
110 HELPERS IN GOOD WORKS.
enthusiasm which started the work had already begun to pass away and for years the proposal for an episcopate in the New World was regarded as almost schismatic.
After Dr Bray's return from Maryland and the establishment of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, he was presented to the living of St Botolph Aldgate (1706), and from that time till his death in 1730, he devoted himself with all his large-hearted charity and practical common-sense to his great objects. He was not a rich man, but all he possessed he gave willingly to further the cause which he had at heart. In his work he was helped by many of the most eminent men of the time ; Tenison, Archbishop of Canterbury; Burnet, the Low- Church Bishop of Salisbury ; Bull and Beveridge, the High-Church Bishops of St David's and St Asaph ; Thomas Wilson, Bishop of Sodor and Man ; John Evelyn the author of the Diary^', Dr Bray's friend, though his opposite in political views, Robert Nelson, and others too numerous to mention. The founding and working of missionary societies was not however the only means of doing good adopted by these men. The building of new churches in London, the improvement of prisons, the assistance of Eastern Christians in Armenia, and the teaching of charity children in England, all received a share of the attention of each one of them, but notably of Dr Bray and Robert Nelson^ the latter of whom, little as he approved of the Hanoverian succession, could yet ''find pleasure in marshalling four thousand children" from the charity-schools he had helped to found in London, "to witness the entry of George I., and to greet him with the Psalm which bids the King rejoice in the strength of the
1 Evelyn's Biary, May 3, 1703. ^ Perry, m. 92.
ABATEMENT OF ACTIVITY. Ill
Lord and be exceeding glad in his salvation^" But the chief place among them all must be given to Dr Bray, not only for the zeal and faith with which he laboured, but also for the sound good-sense which characterised all his designs^, and which has enabled them to hold their place as good and useful institutions during nearly two centuries.
With all this vigour in good works and the increased zeal for religion which marked the first few years of the last century, it was a time of great promise. The accession of a Stuart Queen in her own right pacified the Jacobite clergy for a season, while the death of James II. had brought several eminent ISonjurors back to the Church. In spite of some outbreaks of party violence, High Churchmen and Low Churchmen did not refuse to co- operate heartily in schemes for the good of mankind, and it seemed as though the Church, which had been tossed to and fro by different factions during the whole of the previous century, had at last become securely established and was about to give herself up to quiet activity and earnest work. Never had she possessed greater influence, and never had her clergy been more popular. But the bright prospect soon clouded over. That very power and popularity became a snare. When it was found that the cry of "the Church in danger" w^ould raise a mob and overthrow a ministry, the weapon was too tempting not to be used. The Church began to be mixed up in politics and her spiritual activity was at once lessened. Then too, before fifteen years of the century were gone, both parties had lost many of their best men. Very few of the devout, high-souled Nonjurors, very few of the hard-working Bishops remained. A generation of smaller men had suc-
^ Abbey and Overton, i. 110. 2 Perry, Church History, iii. 92.
112 TIMES OF rNDIFFERENCE.
ceeded them. The religious tone of the age was alow one, and political churchmanship was unfavourable to missionary efforts. The dalness and inactivity which crept over the English Church during the reigns of the first two Georges seems the neater from the contrast with the life and. vigour that had gone before. Yet the work of Dr Bray and Robert Nelson and their good fellow-labourers lived after them, though the fervour and enthusiasm which had inspired them w^as fled ; the great Societies were up- held, by God's Providence, through all that time of indif- ference and infidelity. They did not obtain the support which they had at first, but neither did they collapse, and when at length the "trumpet-call of Wesley and White- field" roused the Church from her "unseemly slumber," England awoke to a sense of her responsibility for her de- pendencies and the interest in the Societies revived. To propagate the Gospel among the heathen and to provide instruction for the poor once more became important branches of the Church's work, and that they were able to be carried on so widely and so successfully was in a great degree owing to the organizations so well and firmly founded a hundred years before.
CHAPTER VIII.
CONVOCATION FROM 1688 TO I7l7.
With the Convention Parliament of 1688 Convo- cation was not summoned, but the second Parliament in the same year petitioned William and Mary to allow it to sit for the consideration of ecclesiastical affairs. Before it was summoned, a commission was given under the great seal to a committee of bishops and divines to draw up a scheme for such alterations as might be deemed necessary in the Liturgy and Canons for the furtherance of a design which had at that time many supporters, namely the Comprehension of Dissenters^ We have already seen how that scheme failed, how de- termined the majority of the Lower House was not to admit any changes, and how even the advocates of the changes came themselves to see afterwards that their wishes had been over-ruled for good^ Had the chano-es been made, there is little doubt that they would have brought a few Dissenters into the Church, but this would have been at the cost of alienating a great many Church- men, and would have given rise to a more serious schism
1 Lathbury, Hist, of Convocation, 265.
2 Burnet, ii. 34.
L. 8
114 SUSPENSION OF CONVOCATION.
than even that of the Nonjurors; since those who still held to the old form of the Church's services and canons would infallibly have formed themselves into a separate body, and thus the Comprehension scheme which was intended to unite in one all Protestant communions, would have been the cause of divisions far more serious than those which already existed. When Convocation met (Dec. 1689) it was found that the feeling against the proposed changes was so strong, particularly in the Lower House, that the King was advised to dissolve the assembly without per- mitting them to enter on the business proposed by the commission\ It was therefore dissolved, with the Parlia- ment, early in 1690.
On Bancroft's deprivation in the same year Tillotson was made Archbishop of Canterbury, and from that time until 1700, although Convocation met as usual, it was as a mere form and no business was allowed to be transacted. Tillotson and his successor Tenison, as Low Churchmen, mistrusted the High-Church tendencies of the Lower House, and Burnet is a fairly good exponent of the feeling - of the Whigs with regard to Convocation, when he says that it was "kept from doing mischief hy prorogations for a course of ten years^." This suspension gave rise to an active controversy, as to whether Convocation had or had not a riorht to meet and transact business with every session of Parliatnent, independently of the royal license. One of the most powerful supporters of this claim was Dr Atterbury, whose book on the " Rights, Powers and Privileges of an English Convocation " published in 1700 was said by a contemporary^ to have produced such effect that Convocation was permitted to act that same
1 Lathbury, 275. 2 Burnet, 11. 33.
3 Leslie, Case of the Eegale, p. x.
DISPUTES BETWEEN THE TWO HOUSES. 115
year\ When it did meet, however, the two houses could not agree among themselves, for the Lower House disputed the right of the Archbishop to prorogue them, maintain- ing that they held the same position with regard to the Upper House as the House of Commons held to the House of Lords, and were quite independent in their actions; while the Upper House asserted that the whole body of Convocation was but one, and both houses must be prorogued at once by the Archbishop as president of the whole. Convocation met on the 10th of February, 1700, and when on the 25 th the Archbishop's schedule for its prorogation was sent to the Lower House, they continued their sessions for some time in order to assert their rio-ht, and prorogued themselves by consent, to meet again in Henry VII.'s chapel, although the Archbishop (Tenison) had named the Jerusalem Chamber as their place of meeting^ When the Bishops met again the clergy did not attend as usual, and the prolocutor was summoned and questioned as to their proceedings since the prorogation. He answered that they were preparing a report on this matter to be laid before the Upper House.
In this report it was stated on the authority of Convo- cation books which had been searched for information, that the Lower House adjourned whenever they were prorogued by the prolocutor, and not of necessity at the same time as the Upper House ; that they had generally met in the place where they last sat, and not in any place appointed by the Archbishop, and that it had not been the custom for them to attend the Upper House before proceeding to business, but only to come when summoned by a special nger.
1 Perry's Hist, of the Cli. of England, Vol. in. 115—118.
2 Lathbury, 284. Perry, iii. 121.
8—2
116 CENSURE OF BURNET' S BOOK.
The Bishops answered this paper, examining and ex- plaining the case so clearly that they thought they had put an end to the disputes. But they were deceived, for in the next session (March, 1700) the Lower House voted that they had a right to adjourn themselves^ and sent a message to the Upper House to that effect. They also said that the Bishop's answer to their report was unsatisfactory, and asked for a free conference. The Archbishop requested that they would give a written answer to the questions which had been put to the prolocutor and which they had evaded in their report, but the prolocutor replied that their answer, if written, would occupy twenty sheets. The Archbishop remarked that he did not confine them to length and breadth, but expected their answer in writing. Still the Lower House persisted in refusing and sent up instead of an answer a long paper containing their reasons for not giving a written reply. This attitude of opposition was kept up during several sessions and to make it still more marked the Lower House attacked an Exposition of the XXXIX Articles, written by Bishop Burnet, and presented their censure on it to the Upper House, under the pretence that it had something to do with the irregularity. This was more than the Bishops could bear. The Upper House maintained that the Lower had no right to censure any book j udicially, nor to examine a book written by one of the Bishops without first acquainting them with the fact.
The Lower House was not prepared to carry the matter against the Bishop of Salisbury any further, but neither would they submit to the Upper House in any way, and the disputes were only ended by the prorogation and ultimate dissolution of Convocation with the Parliament. 1 Lathbury, 287.
FURTHER DISPUTES. 117
At the next meeting in January 170|- the same dis- putes were carried on with increased bitterness on either side\ The Lower House shewed its determination to dispute the claims of the Upper by choosing for prolocutor Dr Woodward, Dean of Salisbury, who owed his promotion to Bishop Burnet, but was nevertheless so ungrateful as to court popularity by opposing him^, in preference to Dr Beveridge, a man far superior to Woodward in learning and piety, and inclined to bring about a peace between the two Houses had it been possible.
The smallest act of the Upper House was disputed by the Lower, and it was even moved, when they met in Henry VII.'s chapel after general prayers in the Jerusalem Chamber, that they should have prayers again by them- selves to shew their independence. The motion was lost, but other debates arose on like trivial points. The Archbishop's messenger was kept waiting outside the door while the House discussed whether he should be admitted, and when at last he was allowed to come in and appeared with the schedule of prorogation, the prolo- cutor did not read it, but notified the time and place and put it to the House for their pleasured A few days after, another message of adjournment was received, and then, after some dispute, Atterbur}^, who busied himself in stirring up strife with all his might, proposed (and at length gained the point) that an entry should be made in the minutes assuming the right of independent assembling. This unwise act tended greatly to widen the breach between the two houses. A quarrel which arose between Bishop Burnet and the prolocutor, Dean Woodward, about matters connected with their diocese, served to inflame
1 Lathbury, 302. 2 Perry, in. 127.
3 Lathbury, 303. Perry, iii. 128.
118 CONVOCATION UNDER QUEEN ANNE.
still more the spirit of hostility, until the peacemaking eloquence of Beveridge in the Lower, and the calm firmness of Archbishop Tenison in the Upper House be- came alike unable to restrain the tempers of the rest. But unforeseen events soon checked their course. The prolocutor was taken suddenly ill and died in a few days, and while disputes were still raging about the election of his successor, the death of the King dissolved both Parlia- ment and Convocation.
With Queen Anne's first Parliament Convocation again assembled, and again although they concurred in an address to Her Majesty (quarrelling, however, about the form of that), they continued the dispute about the right of prorogation. During the progress of these dis- cussions it came to the knowledge of the Lower House that on account of their undutiful conduct towards the Bishops, they had been accused of favouring Presbyterianism. On learning this they thought it necessary to draw up a declaration of their adherence to episcopacy, and of their belief that it was a divine and apostolical institution. But they were not satisfied with this; they sent the declaration to the Upper House, desiring the concurrence of the Bishops with it that it might be the standing rule of the Church. They had another, and not a very honest, inten- tion in doing this; they wished, if possible, to entrap the Bishops into making in this way a new canon, for doing v/hich they had no commission or license, but would be overstepping the bounds of their submission to the Queen \ The Bishops, however, saw the danger, and merely referred the Lower House to the Preface of the Ordination Service, where they could see the doctrine of the Church in this matter set forth, and added that without a royal license, 1 Burnet, ii. 3i7.
REPRESENTATIONS FROM THE LOWER HOUSE. 119
they could not make any rule concerning either doctrine or discipline \ They commended the zeal of the Lower House for episcopacy, and hoped that they would act in accordance with their professions, a hope which was not destined to be realized. The Lower House expressed their surprise that the Bishops would not concur with them in their declaration, but they were jjowerless to do more, and the matter rested there.
In the session of 1703, the Lower House sent up a representation to the Bishops, complaining of the increase of evil throughout the country and of the laxity of religious discipline. This paper was intended as a rebuke to the Bishops, implying, as it did, that they had the power to remedy these abuses if they would. In proroguing Convocation (April 1703) the Archbishop in his speech alluded to this representation. He owned that many abuses existed, but he denied that they were so great or so little heeded as had been stated; in many resj)ects Church discipline and order were far better maintained than they had ever been before, and the Bishops were more zealous in the performance of their duties. Mean- while, for the suppression of such evils as really existed, he invoked the assistance of all the cl-ergy.
The moderation of tlie Archbishop was well calculated to soothe the irritable temper of the clergy had such a thing been possible, and in the next year (1701^) the Lower House did indeed make a representation to the Bishops, expressing their regret that so little good should have been done in so many meetings of Convocation, and intimating that the cause was to be found in the disputes between the two Houses^ This was very true, but as neither party w^ould stir one step from the position they 1 Lathbury, p. 316. 2 Lathbury, p. 325.
120 THE queen's letter.
now held, there seemed very little prospect of recon- ciliation. 8oon after this the quarrel began again. The Lower House complained that Bishop Burnet had delivered a charge to his clergy in which he reflected on them as enemies to the Bishops, the Church and the country. To this Archbishop Tenison replied that they had no right to call the Bishops to account for their conduct, and also took occasion to censure them for holding inter- mediate sessions and to admonish them not to persist in so doing. The Lower House greatly resented this admonition and the quarrel was again assuming a serious aspect, when a prorogation prevented the matter from going any further \
These unhappy differences between the Bishops and clergy still continued and were even increased during the session of 1705, for the Lower House would not concur with the Upper in an address to the Queen censuring those who spread abroad the report that the Church was in danger. So tliat all communication between the two houses was broken off. The Lower House continued its intermediate sessions, in spite of the Archbishop's prorogation and a protest from nearly one half of the members. In this state of affairs, the Queen thought it best to send a letter to the Arch- bishop in which she expressed her concern at their differences and commanded him to prorogue Convocation at its next meeting. This letter took the Lower House completely by surprise, and though they continued their sittings for a time after it was communicated to them, they did not venture to pass any vote^
In the next session, the Lower House noticed with dis- approval a sermon by Hoadly, afterwards Bishop of Bangor,
1 Perry, in. 172.
2 Perry, in. 191. Lathbnry, 329. Burnet, n. 441.
TEMPORARY PROROGATION. 121
they also censured a book by HickeringilP, and commended Wall's History of Infant Baptism. Thoiigli the Bishops might have agreed with them in their opinion of the books, which was very just, they did not concur in the censure, be- cause they held that they had no right to act thus judicially without the royal license. During the next session (1707) the important question of the Union with Scotland was under discussion ia Parliament. This measure excited the fears of some of the clergy for the safety of the Church, and a report w^as spread that the Lower House intended to address the Commons against it, to prevent which the Queen directed the Archbishop to prorogue Convocation for three weeks, during which time the Act of Union passed both Houses of Parliament^. On as- sembling again the Lower House sent up a representation complaining to the Bishops that such a prorogation was unprecedented, and accompanying it with a list of former prorogations to prove the correctness of their assertion. The representation was laid before the Queen ; the records were searched ; and it w^as found that there had been seven or eight similar prorogations before. The Queen wrote to the Archbishop, saying that the representation of the Lower House was an invasion of her supremacy and directing the prorogation of Convocation by writ for some days. Though it assembled again after this interval the members of the Lower House had become so refractory that no business could possibly be transacted, and it was kept inactive by successive prorogations till its ultimate dissolution with the Parliament ^
1 This was Edmund Hickeringill, vicar of Boxted, and rector of All Saints, Colchester. He was noted for his wild and scurrilous attacks on the Church.
2 Burnet, ii, 470. s Lathbury, 331—333. Perry, m. 190—197.
122 CENSURE OF WHISTON's BOOK.
Ill 1708 also nothing was done, and not till 1710, when Atterbury was chosen prolocutor in opposition to Kennet who represented the moderate party, did Con- vocation again sit to transact business. The Queen sent a letter to the Archbishop stating the subjects which were to be considered by the two Houses. These were the drawing up of a representation of the state of the Church ; regu- lating the proceedings in excommunications ; preparing certain forms for the visitation of prisoners, &c. ; establish- ing rural deans ; giving more exact accounts of glebes and tithes ; and regulating marriage licenses.
The first subject was left by the Lower House to Atterbury alone, who drew up a report reflecting most severely on the government ever since the Revolution, which report passed easily through the Lower House but was rejected by the Bishops, who ordered another to be pre- pared in more general terms. Several conferences were held about the other subjects to be discussed, but though many papers were drawn up by both houses, no definite conclusion was arrived at and the business dropped \
It was this Convocation which censured Whiston's book The Historical Preface to Primitive Christianity revived. The Lower House first called atte^tion to the book ; but the Bishops were undecided as to their power to act in a case of heresy and referred the question to Her Majesty's Judges. Eight out of the twelve agreed that Convocation had a jurisdiction in such cases ; the remaining four thought that it was a matter for the ecclesiastical courts, and not for Convocation. The book was therefore censured but the censure was never confirmed by the Queen : at first because Convocation was prorogued, and afterwards because
1 Terry, 244. Lathbury, 338, 344.
CASE OF DR CLAEKE. 123
the Queen by design or carelessness had mislaid the paper which contained the condemnation \
In 1714 Dr Samuel Clarke the Semiarian, Whiston's friend and one of the Queen's chaplains, drew down upon himself the notice of Convocation by his habit of omitting such parts of the Liturgy as did not agree with his views, and also by a book he had written called The Scripture Doctrine of the Trinity. The Queen dismissed him from his chaplaincy and the two Houses of Convo- cation were considering his case, when he presented to the Bishops a paper explanatory of his views. In this paper the doctrines which he maintained were not the same as those set forth in his book, although in a later paper to the Bishop of London he declared that they were. The Upper House expressed themselves satisfied with his explanation, but the Lower House resolved that he had made no re- tractation and that his paper was not satisfactory. Though nothing was confirmed, some other matters were begun by this Convocation, such as the preparing of some Forms of Prayer to be used when converts were admitted into the Church and when persons were to be excommunicated. Bat all these matters were cut short by the death of the Queen, who had recommended them to the consideration of Convocation^.
The first Convocation of George I.'s reign met in 1715. The Kinof's license to the two Houses contained heads of business which they were to consider. They were much the same as those of the last Session with the addition of some suggestions for slight alterations in the Canons in order to make some of them more effectual. Convocation was also recommended to consider the settling of the
1 Perry, in. 249. Lathbury, 343. Burnet, ii. 573.
2 Lathbury, 354. Perry, iii. 2G5.
124 ' THE BISHOP OF BANGOR.
qualifications of candidates for orders, and to make rules for the better instruction of youth for confirmation. The two Houses divided the subjects between them and were for once making some progress, when Hoadly's case, out of which rose the Bangorian controversy, came under their notice.
Dr Hoadly, the Bishop of Bangor, had preached a sermon on 'the Nature of the Kingdom of Christ/ in which he expressed some very Latitudinarian views. It gave great displeasure to the clergy, and the Lower House appointed a committee, of which Dr Sherlock (Dean of Chichester, and son of the famous Dean of St Paul's, before mentioned) was a member, to draw up a report on it. The committee coupled with the sermon a book that Hoadly had written against the claims of the Nonjuring clergy to the sacredness of their character as priests, and prepared a representation which they in- tended to present to the Upper House, stating that the Bishop of Bangor had given great offence by certain doctrines advanced in these works, which doctrines were subversive of all Church government, and contrary to the regal supremacy. The representation was never pre- sented, for the government, foreseeing the political turn which such discussions must inevitably take, thought it best to prorogue Convocation at once, and until very recent times it has received no further license for the transaction of business \ It did not require a royal license for some small acts, such as presenting addresses to the Crown or making declarations, and in the year 1728 the Upper House put forth a decree, stating their opinion on the subject of the Archbishop's claims which had so long been disputed by the Lower House, and in which he 1 Lathbury, 383. ,
CONVOCATION SILENCED. 125
asserted his right to prorogue them at his pleasure and declared the present method of continuing the Lower House irregular. Had the clergy been disposed to submit at this time, it was thought probable that a license for transaction of business might again have been granted, but the opportunity was lost. Thirteen years later (1741), when Dr Potter, who had written a learned Discourse of Church Government, was Archbishop of Canterbury, another opportunity was allowed to pass. The Low^er House had at first on their assembling, seemed inclined to submit to the Archbishop, but they returned soon to their former refractory state and notliing more w^as done that might lead to a restoration of the powers of Convo- cation. Its chief duties, though much neglected, had been to alter and adjust the Church's system so as to meet the varying requirements of the times and to repress by censure heretical teaching among its ministers; and since after its silencing there remained to the Church no definite power to effect these objects, its suspension must be regarded as a great loss. But for the last twenty or thirty years of its existence as an active body it had shewn itself on the whole of so little use in practical matters and so little w^orthy of respect by reason of the unseemly disputes in wdiich its attention was almost entirely absorbed, that it was perhaps for the ultimate well-being of the Church that it was suspended until the feeling which occasioned those disputes had died out, and until the want of such a governing body being felt, its value could be better appreciated.
CHAPTER IX.
CHUECH HISTORY UNDER GEORGE I. AND GEORGE II.
The somewhat sudden death of Queen Anne was a severe blow to the hopes of the Jacobites. Had she lived a few years longer the succession to the Crown might have been changed. Her fondness for her half-brother, the Pretender, was well-known and the Jacobite party had thought that, when the time should be ripe for such a proceeding, she might be induced to set aside the Act of Settlement and make Prince James Edward her heir. But the time was not ripe, and the Queen was dead, and it was only that most uncompromising Jacobite of all the party, Dr Atter- bur}^, who even proposed to proclaim James IH. ^ Lord Bolingbroke, to whom he suggested it, hesitated to carry matters to such extremes, even though the Bishop offered to give the proclamation the sanction of the Church by heading the procession in his lawn sleeves. " Then is the best cause in Europe lost for want of spirit," exclaimed At- terbury angril}^ The Bishop's enthusiasm led him to see things out of proportion. What he named " the best cause in Europe" was but a weak one after all. For all that the Jacobites did not intend to let it parish for want of spirit.
1 Abbey and Overton, i. 86.
CHAEACTEE OP GEORGE I. 127
They must wait for the present but they trusted not to have to wait lono;. With the arrival of the new Sovereif]^n their hopes revived. The selection of a king for England had been at best but a choice of evils ; a choice between a Papist and a foreigner, between a renewed struggle against Popery and a constant entanglement in continental politics. Of these evils the lesser was certainly chosen, but we must not blame too severely those who could not see at the time that it was so. George I. had been pro- claimed quietly and even with signs of rejoicing \ but his own character and manners as they became better known were greatly in his disfavour. He had not the art of pleasing the multitude ; he disliked ceremony and popular demonstrations and could speak no word of English. Some good qualities as a ruler he must have had for he left Hanover amid the sincere regrets of his subjects there, but his merits were not calculated to win general affec- tion. His morality could not be highly spoken of and though he came to England as a supporter of religion, he had been brought up in a family where religion was but little cared for, and he was not superior to his education. His Protestantism, which had gained for him the crown of England was not of a kind that would draw English Churchmen to him. His sincere devotion to any form of religion was questioned by the Jacobites I The Electoral House of Hanover seemed to hold such things in slight regard. His sister, afterwards Queen of Prussia, had been brought up in no particular communion, that when she came to be married she might the more readily embrace the faith of her husband ^ The Lutheran views which the
1 Lord Mahon, Hist, of Eng. i. 68.
2 Atterbury, English Advice to the Freeholders of England, Somers' Tracts, Vol. xiii. ^ Stanhope, Queen Anne, p. 19.
128 THE JACOBITES.
King professed were more likely to raise the hopes of Dissenters than of Churchmen^ and if most of the clergy had been Jacobites in Queen's Anne's reign, they became more decidedly so than ever after the accession of George I. The strength of the Jacobites lay in three classes of men: the landed proprietors, the squires and country gentry, who were much attached to the old dynasty; the clergy, to whom, since the death of Charles I. and the exile of the royal family, the name of Stuart had become almost sacred; and the lowest orders who would easily be influenced by either squires or clergymen and who nourished a great hatred of foreigners.
On the other hand, they had immense difficulties to contend wdth. They were not more loyal to the Stuarts than to the Church of England, and the Prince whom they wished to restore to the throne of his fathers was a Papist so bigoted that they could scarcely hope that he would tolerate, much less uphold, a religion which he felt himself bound in conscience to exterminate if possible. His Roman Catholicism was a terrible hindrance in the way of their success and when, added to this disqualification, the Prince shewed a lack of enterprise and no capacity for command, while betraying a large share of the lamentable obstinacy which belonged to his family, his unfortunate adherents might be pardoned if they thought the leader of their party the most unmanageable member of it. Then too in England there was a mighty power arrayed against them. Not to speak of the Government and all whose interest it was to be in its favour, all the middle classes, the trades-people and money-making part of the popu- lation, whose prosperity depends on tranquillity, together
1 Skeats' Free Churches, p. 278. Perry, Hist, of Ch. of Eng. iii. 269.
INSURRECTION OF 1715. l^iO
with all Protestant Nonconformists were, if not stanek Hanoverians, at least zealous an ti- Jacobites.
Weighing their advantages and disadvantages, however, the Jacobites decided that the time was favourable for a combined insurrection and invasion in 1715. A history of that rising would be out of place here. Suffice it to say, that the Jacobites overrated their strength in England and mismanaged the invasion of Scotland. The Rebellion was suppressed and Jacobitism discouraged for the time. But not for long. Active agents kept the Pretender informed of every turn of the tide which might promise something for him. The silencing of Convocation in 1717 and the concessions to Dissenters iu 1719 diso-usted almost the whole body of the clergy and with them a great number of Churchmen. This disaffection seemed favourable to the Stuart cause, and in 1721 there took place what has been called the " second birth of Jacobi- tism." In the previous year an heir had been born to the Pretender, which event stimulated his adherents to fresh efforts on his behalf, while in England the failure of the South Sea Bubble had spread depression and discontent through the nation and made the Government more unpo- pular than ever. In 1721 therefore, the Pretender issued a manifesto, the absurdity of which shews how little his agents really knew of the state of the nation on which they were constantly reporting to him. In this declaration, he assumes that the King and jDCople are equally and heartily tired of their connexion with one another and he proposes to dissolve the union, promising to procure for George the title of King of Hanover, if George on his part will quietly yield England to him. The mass of the people were not so blinded as not to see that the restoration of the Stuarts meant another struggle with Popery, and little L. 9
180 CONSPIRACY OF 1721.
as they liked George I.'s government they yet knew it to be the support of Protestantism and remained faithful to it accordingly.
The Pretender's manifesto was only intended as the prelude to a more serious design. A conspiracy was on foot to seize the Tower, the Bank of England and other public buildings, to effect landings of foreign troops on the coast and to proclaim James III. In this conspiracy was supposed to be implicated Dr Atterbury, the Bishop of Rochester, one of the Junta of Five who managed the Pretender's affairs in England \ His great talents and his unflinching devotion to Jacobitism made him a very dangerous enemy to the Government. From the very first he had been a High Churchman and a Tory of the most decided type. His book on the Rights, Powers and Privileges of an English Convocation had brought it about in 1700 that Convocation was allowed to act after an interval of ten years ; he became the champion of the Lower House and was made its Prolocutor, in which capacity he carried on the struggle against the Bishops with great eagerness; in Sacheverell's trial, the defendant's speech was said to bear traces of Atterbury 's hand, and now when most Jacobites kept their opinions a little in the back-ground, the Bishop of Rochester made no secret of his and let no opportunity of attacking the Government escape him.
On the suspicion of having had a share in the con- spiracy of 1722, Dr Atterbury was arrested and sent to the Tower. A Bill of Pains and Penalties was brought against him in the House of Commons, but he refused to submit to the jurisdiction of any but his peers, and was
1 The other four were the Earls of Arran and Orrery, and Lords North and Gower.
BANISHMENT OF DR ATTERBURY. 131
accordingly summoned to the bar of the House of Lords, where he made a most able, touching and eloquent speech in his own defence \ The evidence against him was strong, but not altogether conclusive, and though if the law had been carried out in all its rigour the Bishop might have incurred the penalty of high treason ^ the government was not prepared to go to such extremes. He was found guilty and sentenced to deprivation and perpetual banishment, and spent the remainder of his life in France, to the last a devoted friend of a family which never treated him with the trust and consideration that so fearless and self-sacri- ficing an adherent deserved I
The arrest, attainder and banishment of Dr Atterbury created great discontent, especially among the parochial clergy ; whose champion he had been in years gone by, as Prolocutor of the Lower House of Convocation, and who were Jacobites almost to a man. During the Bishop's imprisonment he was publicly prayed for in many of the London Churches, not indeed openly as a sufferer for con- science sake, but under the pretext of his being in ill- health ^ The party was not strong enough to remonstrate or resist. His banishment was the most severe blow that could have fallen on it. There was no one who could take his place, no one with his surpassing talents and uncon- querable spirit to be its leader when he was gone. The cause languished greatly after the Bishop left England, and it was nearly a quarter of a century before another Jacobite rising alarmed the Government.
The resentment felt by the greater part of the nation against the Jacobite conspiracy was turned to account by the Government in raising money by a tax on the estates of
1 Abbey and Overton, i. 101. 2 Lo^d Malion, i. 301.
^ Lord Mahon, i. 339. * Perry, IJist. of Ch. of Eng. m. 319.
9—2
132 THE NONJURORS TAXED. ii
all Roman Catholics. In the existing state of public opinion, the Bill imposing this tax passed easily, and by a subsequent motion its operation was extended to all Non- jurors \ In order to discover which were the nonjuring landowners, it was of course necessary to call upon every landowner whatsoever to take the oath of allegiance to the Government. If by this measure it was intended to dis- cover the disaffected, the plan was a complete failure. The Jacobites, for the most part, took the oath, thinking that they were only doing their duty to their party by deceiving a hostile power, a moral precept which was greatly in favour at that time.
Deprived of their great leader and liable to penalties if they dared to avow their opinions at home, and banished through the policy of Lord Stanhope, from France, which had ever been the head-quarters of the party abroad and which was the most convenient position for correspondence with England, the Jacobites attracted very little notice for many years. The peaceable, though never glorious, ad- ministration of Walpole served to keep all parties in England comparatively quiet and fairly contented, and when, in 1745, another effort was made to regain the crown for the Stuarts, an effort far better organized and carried out than the previous one, it was regarded in England with indifference or with mere idle curiosity. In the rebellion of 1715, the clergy had been prominent partisans of the Stuarts, in that of 1745, they took no particular interest; the Jacobite cause was virtually extinct in England.
George I. and his Government owed much to the steady
support of the Protestant Nonconformists, and they in their
turn, naturally looked for some reward for their services ^
In 1718, Lord Stanhope was prime minister, and as a friend
1 Lord Mahon, i. 294—296. « Skeata' Free Churches, p: 283.
CONDITION OF DISSENTERS. 133
of toleration, was anxious to obtain a repeal of some of the most unjust laws against Dissenters. The Occasional Con- formity Bill, the Schism Bill, and the severest clauses of the Test and Corporation Acts, he would gladly have seen withdrawn from the statute-book. A Bill, "for strength- ening the Protestant interest" was accordingly brought into the House of Lords with the view of repealing all these. The Bill was very warmly debated ; Dr Hoadly, the Latitudinarian Bishop of Bangor, supported it and Dr Atterbury opposed it. The Bill passed, but not in its original form. The Occasional Conformity and Schism Bills were repealed, but the Test and Corporation Acts still held too high a place in the esteem of Churchmen, as pillars of the Establishment, to admit of being altered or modified. The Dissenters were very deeply disappointed. Nothing touched them so nearly as the Test and Corpora- tion Acts. The Occasional Conformity Bill had made very little difference to them ; the Schism Act had never been enforced ; but the Test and Corporation Acts were felt to be their greatest burden. The other laws had rather been the monuments of oppression than the reality, while these were a constant grievance, which weighed upon them sensibly, and the Dissenters felt that it was on that very account that their repeal had been resisted. Some of them, seeing that the Bill was not likely to pass as a whole, strongly advised their party to insist and press their claims, but they were ultimately persuaded that to do so would ruin the whole Bill and be prejudicial to the Government, and so withdrew, relying on promises of future help which proved long in fulfilment\
Once more, in 1736, the Dissenters made an attempt to obtain the repeal of the obnoxious Acts. The time 1 Lord Mahon, i. 237. Skeats, pp. 289, 290. ;
134 walpole's treachery. '
seemed favourable for such an effort. No trouble, internal or external, harassed the Government, and the nation was at leisure to think calmly if it would. The Nonconformists urged their claims to favour, their services to the Crown, and Sir Robert Walpole, the minister then in power, could not deny them. He was himself, indeed, much in favour of granting religious liberty, but he knew the value of tranquillity too well and loved his own power too dearly, to allow so dangerous and exciting a subject to be brought under public discussion. As a young man he had taken part in Sacheverell's trial, and the tumult raised then had warned him, never, if by any means he could avoid it, to stir up ecclesiastical disputes. He did not wish to break with the Dissenters, he did not dare to offend the Church. When the Bill for the repeal was introduced he made a vague and wavering speech, and ending by voting against it\
The indignation of the Dissenters at this treachery (for Walpole was bound to them by promises) was great; it would have been far greater, had not something been already done to alleviate their condition. In the first year of the reign of George II. (1727) was passed an Act of Indemnity, relieving Protestant Nonconformists from the penalties consequent on their not duly qualifying themselves for office, and with six exceptions during that same reign, the Act continued to be renewed annually until the repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts in 1828. This Indemnity Bill "threw open the gates of all offices to Protestant Dissenters as fully as if the law had been re- pealed; and if they still wished its repeal, it was because they thought it an insult, not because they felt it an injury^".
1 Skeats, p. 341. Lord Macaulay, Essays, p. 279.
2 Lord Mahon, Vol. i. 239.
QUAKERS' tithes' BILL. 135
Jn the same year (1736) a Bill was brought in for relieving Quakers from some of the hardships to which their refusal to pay tithes exposed them. It passed the House of Commons, but was rejected by the Lords, to the great disgust of Walpole, who had many Quaker con- stituents in Norfolk and who had set his heart on its passing. He never forgave Dr Gibson, the Bishop of London, the share he had had in its rejection. This pre- late had hitherto been Walpole's chief guide in ecclesias- tical matters, and was looked upon as the certain successor to the Primacy, but in consequence of his conduct in the affair of the Quakers' Tithes' Bill, he forfeited the minister s esteem and his prospects of preferment \
One or two more instances of ecclesiastical legislation during this period must be mentioned before we turn to consider the condition of the Church in itself. The first is the attempt made in 1753 to grant permission to persons professing the Jewish religion to be naturalized and ad- mitted to certain privileges from which they were still ex- cluded by law. The Bill was introduced in the House of Lords and passed, not with the open support it is true, but with the silent consent of the Bishops. In the House of Commons it met with violent opposition, but was ultimately carried. The promoters of the Bill had not reckoned on the reception it would meet with outside the walls of Parliament. A tremendous outcry was raised on all sides. The Bill was unscriptural, unchristian, unpatriotic. It ran directly counter to the Old Testament prophecies which declared that the Jews should remain landless till they acknowledged the Messiah ; it undermined Christianity by receiving into fellowship those whom God had cast out ; it would damage the country by allowing the trade to pass 1 Perry, m. 359.
13C -THE MAREIAGE ACT. :
into the hands of aliens. Such were a few of the objections urged against it\ The Bishops, because they had not opposed it, were assailed with every kind of abuse. So fierce was the storm that the ministry felt unable to weather it, and in the next session of Parliament the Bill was repealed. The prejudice against the Jews was as deep-rooted as that against the Roman Catholics, and as it dated from much earlier time^ so it was not removed till much later. The present century was already more than half over before just toleration was granted to that much persecuted race^ The second parliamentary measure which must be mentioned is the Marriage Act of 1753. This was a much needed and very beneficial measure, though it was unpopu- lar and gate rise to much complaint when first it came into force. It enacted that a marriage, unless taking place by licence, should be preceded by the publication of banns in a parish church, and that the marriage should be solemnized in that church. It also made other regulations for the prevention of hasty or clandestine marriages, which were all too common at that period. By this Act the scandal of " Fleet marriages " was abolished. It had long been allowed to clergymen, confined in the Fleet prison for debt, to marry couples within its precincts, and this abuse had grown serious. The most disreputable clergy- men performed the mockery of the marriage rite in a tavern, asking no questions and charging but a small fee. The number of rash marriages performed in this way was increasing and the remedy for this and the many other
^ Another kind of argument was also urged which it is interesting now to note. It was asserted that the Jews would deluge the country with usurers, brokers and beggars, and more especially that the lower classes of them, by working for small wages, would interfere with the industiious orders who earn their bread by labour.
2 Abbey and Overton, ii, 396—401. May's Const. Hist. ii. 119.
POLITICAL CHURCHMANSHIP. 137
evils of ill-regulated marriages came not a moment too soon \
The promise of practical activity which the Church had given at the beginning of the century was not fulfilled as time went on ^ Violent political partisanship accords ill with the duties of a clergyman, and the great share that the clergy took in politics during the last years of Queen Anne's reign and under the first Hanoverian king consider- ably lessened their usefulness as priests. The politico-reli- gious cry of " the Church in danger," which was used as a weapon by each party in the State, and the Jacobite risings and conspiracies afterwards brought the Church into too close contact with politics for its good, and as the century advanced this evil grew worse. Not to pay court to the Church but to make it a useful servant was the policy of the Government under the first two Georges. When George I. came to England it was to the Hanoverian dynasty a threatening power. The majority of the paro- chial clergy were Jacobites, and their influence was not to be despised. In order to weaken this power, the Govern- ment issued Directions to the clergy, in 1714, to avoid
.3
preferment to none but steady adherents of the Whigs, and ultimately silenced the voice of Convocation, in 1717. The tone of religious feeling was already low in the country, but now it rapidly sunk lower. The Whig Bishops who were appointed by George I.'s Government were mostly very Latitudinarian Churchmen ; a strong support to the government but feeble rulers of their dioceses. As pre- ferment was only given for political opinions and ability.
^ Abbey and Overton, ii. 504. Ch. Knight, Hist, of Eng. vi. 194.
2 Abbey and Overton, i. 174.
3 Debary, Hist, of Church of England, pp. 457—460.
138 NON-RESIDENCE AND PLURALITIES.
and courage in expressing them, the duty of service to the powers that be grew to an importance out of all proportion with the duties of waiting on the ministry. It soon came to be thought unnecessary for a Bishop to reside in or near his diocese. Bishop Hoadly held the See of Bangor for six years without ever going near it. A bishopric was com- monly regarded as a reward for past services, not as a stimulus to further activity : they were said to be of two classes, bishoprics of learning and bishoprics of ease ; the former for men of literary tastes, the latter for men of rank and fashion \ Under such a system irregularities might exist and multiply and pass unheeded. Deprived of all synodal action, the Church as a body was powerless to express censure or to suggest improvements, and in this state of things discipline naturally grew lax. It was not an age of religious earnestness, and lacking both inward impulse and outward constraint, the clergy grew less zealous at their posts. Pluralities and non-residence were not the only abuses tolerated in the Church, but they were among the greatest and brought others equally serious in their train. Where the rector did not reside in his livins^ he usually put into it a curate on a wretched stipend of from £30 to £50 a year, which the poor man had often to eke out by the labours of his hands^ Work so much undervalued was done but grudgingly. Services in the churches be- came less frequent; evening services were in many places discontinued altogether, and celebrations of the Holy Com- munion were rare and ill-attended. Sunday-schools did not yet exist and the old custom of catechising was falling gradually into disuse, so that by the neglect of public worship and the want of religious instruction provision
^ Life of Bishop Newton, p. 154. 2 Abbey and Overton, ii. 16.
CONTROVERSIES. 139
was made that the future generations should grow up more isjnorant of relio^ion and more indifferent to it than the past. The early part of the eighteenth century was a dull, prosaic time, lacking nearly all real devotion and frightened at the mere name of enthusiasm. The Church succumbed to the spirit of the age and in point of practical work remained apathetic in the midst of indifference.
In one particular, however, and that an important one, the Church shewed herself not unmindful of her trust. Spiritually this period was one of the most depressing through which she had passed ; controversially it was the most active. From the Reformation up to this time the Church had been struggling for existence, first against Popery, then against Puritanism, then against Popery once more. That struggle was now over. The law of the land provided that the sovereign should be a member of the Church, and neither Roman Catholics nor Dissenters threatened its safety. Now it was that other antagonists arose who called some upon the Church, some upon all Christianity to explain and defend their principles. The greatest doctrines of our faith were questioned and under- went a scrutiny so keen and frequentl}^ so liostile that nothing but truth itself could have stood the test. The Church proved itself well able to defend its tenets and though controversy is not its noblest work, it served to test its strength. Among the hosts of disputes carried on at this period three controversies are specially deserving of mention, the Trinitarian, the Bangorian and the Deistical.
In point of time the Trinitarian controversy comes first. Heterodox opinions on the subject of the Trinity were already rife at the close of the l7th century and those who denied the doctrine were, together with Roman
140 THE TRINITARIAN CONTROVERSY.
Catholics, expressly excluded from the benefits of th6 Toleration Act. Disputes "not about the doctrine of the Trinity, but about the mode of explaining it^", occupied the minds of many of the greatest theologians of the day; Bishop Bull, Dr Sherlock, Dr South, Charles Leslie, Bishop Burnet and Archbishop Tillotson all took a share in them. With the new century, a new phase of the controversy presented itself Hitherto the question had been discussed only among men, all believers in the Trinity, though they professed to explain the doctrine in different ways. But ^he early part of the 18th century is marked by the revival of Arianism, the upholders of which denied the existence of the Trinity, co-equal and co-eternal. They believed the Sa- viour to be divine, but subordinate to the Father, the one supreme God, and the Holy Spirit to be also divine but subordinate both to the Father and to the Son. The first member of the Church of England who distinctly avowed these opinions was William Whiston, Professor of Mathe- matics at Cambridge, a really good and honest man, but superstitious and eccentric. Among his earliest followers was his friend Dr Samuel Clarke and they both incurred the censure of Convocation for their heretical opinions. Whiston had formed a sort of society of his adherents, to which at first belonged Hoadly and Bundle (both of whom afterwards became Bishops), but the censure of Convocation induced some of them to reconsider their position and Hoadly and Bundle withdrew. Whiston remained firm to his principles, but he was not the man to found a sect, and the real reviver of Arianism in England was Dr Clarke, who had already earned some reputation as a theologian, when in 1712 he published his Scripture Doctrine of the Tri?iity, in which he drew from texts out of the New ^ Abbey and Overton, i. 488.
ARIAN SUBSCRIPTION. 141
Testament the same conclusions as those at which Whiston had arrived \ Two years after its publication the Lower House of Convocation made a representation to the Upper House, noticing Dr Clarke's heretical opinions. In order to avert the coming censure, Dr Clarke published a de- claration of his views which almost amounted to a recanta- tion. The Lower House declared this explanation to be insufficient but it satisfied the more Latitudinarian require- ments of the Bishops, and Dr Clarke escaped censured Some years after (1719) a formidable antagonist came for- ward to do battle with him; this was the celebrated Dr Water- land, "one of the few really great divines of the 18th cen- tury^". Dr Clarke had many other opponents but none who so effectually refuted his arguments as Dr Waterland, whose Vindication of the Divinity of Christ and History of the Athanasian Creed, though they could neither con- vince nor silence Dr Clarke, weakened his position seriously. The insincerity of the Arians in the matter of subscription to the XXXIX Articles was a point on which they were assailed by Dr Waterland, who maintained that if they could reconcile it to their consciences to subscribe, inter- preting the Articles in any way which they thought con- sistent with Scripture, they might remain in communion with the Church, but not accept Church trusts. "Arian subscription" was the subject of much controversy for more than half a century, and the complaints of many Arian and Low Church clergy of the hardship of being forced to subscribe led to an agitation (in 1772) for the abolition of subscription altogether. A petition was drawn up and signed by a good many clergymen, but it did not receive
1 Abbey and Overton, i. 494.
2 Abbey and Overton, i. 509. Perry, iii. 261—264. 2 Abbey and Overton, i. 507.
142 THE BANGORIAN CONTROVERSY.
the support that had been expected for it. The Evangeli- cal movement was gaining influence, the Methodists had ah'eady gained it and both parties were strongly opposed to the design. It failed and as a more loyal spirit towards the Church revived, the clergy ceased to murmur at a pledge to uphold its doctrines. At the same time the subscription of others besides th^ clergy was certainly irksome and an unwarrantable encroachment on liberty of opinion, and little by little it was abolished, as it deserved to be.
The Bangorian controversy is chiefly important from its connexion with the silencing of Convocation. Bishop Hoadly's Latitudinarian Sermon on the Nature of Christ's Kingdom in which he rejected all ecclesiastical government and tests of orthodoxy provoked the resentment of the Lower House of Convocation. They coupled the Sermon Avith a book against the Nonjurors (the Preservative) and represented to the Upper House the pernicious character of the opinions therein expressed. In order to avert the political discussions which must have followed and in which the Lower House certainly would have shewn itself no ardent friend to the existing Government, Convocation was pro- rogued at once (1717). It was after this that the Bango- rian controversy broke out. The clergy had not been allowed to express all their feelings in Convocation, but the matter touched them too nearly to be allowed to drop entirely. The question at issue concerned the whole con- nexion of the Church with the State and involved the interests of the entire body of clergy. Accordingly there was scarcely a clergyman of any note at the time who did not take one side or the other in the controversy. Dr Hoadly whose views would have led to a republic in civil government and a chaos of independent sects in ecclesias-
THE DEISTICAL CONTROVERSY. 143
tical order, was the leader of the one party, and his chief opponents were Dr Snape, Provost of Eton, Dr Sherlock, son of the former Dean of St Paul's, and Francis Hare, Dean of Worcester. The subject of the controversy was an important one, but, unlike most of the controversies of the time, it failed to produce any really important work. The writers who took part in it disgraced their arguments by quibbling, bitterness and personalities, and of all the im- inense number of pamphlets which appeared on either side scarcely one is remembered now\
The third great controversy of the 18th century, the Deistical controversy, was in many respects the most im- portant of all. It involved the whole question of the manner and extent of God's revelation of Himself to man, and though it brought many able divines to prove the truth and stability of Christianity, it did incalculable harm to the generations among which it was waged. It is diffi- cult to say precisely what were the opinions of the Deists for they were not a united party and scarcely two men who called themselves by the name thought alike. Their aim was to prove that God has revealed Himself clearly to man in Nature and all other revelation is uncertain and not to be trusted. Most of the Deists asserted that they were Christians, but as their doctrines led them to the rejection of all Holy Scripture, they were not very consistent in their professions. It is only right to say however that many of them were most sincere in their search for truth, and if they went the wrong way to find it, they were still in earnest and rather to be pitied than condemned. The principal writers among the Deists were Toland, whose book, Christianitij not Mysterious, had been censured by Convocation in 1701^; Anthony Collins, the author of a 1 Perry, iii. 283—308. Abbey and Overton, i. 31. 2 Perry, iii. 123.
144 WRITERS IN THE CONTROVERSY.
Discourse of Freethinking, Lord Shaftesbury, whose "Cha- racteristics' were most dangerous, because most popular, and Tindal, perhaps the greatest of the Deists, whose book, Christianity as old as the Creation, called forth Cony- beare's able Defence of Revealed Religion. The strongest champions of revelation against the Deists were among the Bishops. Diligence in the work of their dioceses did not distinguish them, but they proved able defenders of their faith. To this controversy we owe Butler's Analogy, and at a later period Warburton's Divine Legation of Moses. Dr Sherlock, Dr Gibson, Dr Zachary Pearce, all Bishops, took part in the struggle and defended their cause well. Deistical opinions and the infidelity to which they led con- tinued however to spread for a time. Deism formed an excuse for many, who cared nothing for the truth involved in the struggle, to throw off the unwelcome restraint of religion altogether. It was in this way that the sect (if sect it can be called) did so much harm. It gave rise to that "polite infidelity" which sapped the life of spiritual religion, and in consequence it lowered the tone of morality in the countr}^ In itself Deism was never very strong. Its professors w^ere not united ; its teaching was vague and uncertain ; it was prepared to destroy much that existed already but was not certain how to supply its place: Towards the middle of the century the party collapsed utterly and Deism almost died out of England\
The controversies of the eighteenth century must not be undervalued in their effect upon Christianity. They sifted to the bottom some of the greatest truths of our faith and proved the strength of them. They gave definite ex- pression to doctrines which had long been vague and unsettled, and they brought forward writers whose works 1 Abbey and Overton, pp. 117, scqq.
DECAY OF RELIGION. 145
will be useful through ages to come. But they also did grave harm at the time. The feeling that every principle of religion was under discussion gave an argumentative, de- fensive tone to all religious teaching and preaching. Human reason, which had never had its due before, was now exalted out of all proportion, and all that reason could not grasp was allowed to be neglected. The "reasonableness" of Christianity was adduced as the great ground for be- lieving it. Then too the many disputes on rehgious sub- jects unsettled the minds of the multitude, and while every form of faith was being questioned, many threw off all faith of any kind. The attention of the clergy was drawn away from their parish-work to the more exciting paths of con- troversial writing, religious teaching was neglected and all classes of men suffered thereby \ The general decay of religion was noticed at the time and not in the Church alone. Nonconformists bear witness to the fact that ''re- ligion, whether in the Church or out of it never made less progress than after the cessation of the Bangorian and Salters' Hall disputes'^." The battle of Christianity against Arianism and infidelity was well fought by the "intellec- tual giants" of the early part of the century, but its truths "required not only to be defended, but to be applied to the heart and life\" The first these great theo- logians were well able to do ; the second was beyond their power and remained for the enthusiasm and devotion of the Evangelical revival to accomplish.
1 Abbey and Overton, i. 5.
3 Skeats' Free Churches, p. 313.
' Abbey and Overton, n. 58.
10
CHAPTER X.
THE METHODISTS AND THE EVANGELICAL REVIVAL.
While the Church of England was still sunk deep in the lethargy which overcame her after the silencing of Convocation, the influences were already at w^ork which were to arouse her. At Oxford \ a few students, some of whom were destined to play so important a part in the Church's history, had, as early as 1729, banded them- selves together into the little society which has given the name, bestowed on it first in derision, to that large sect, whose members mustbe called Dissenters, although, leaning more towards the Church than do other Nonconformists, they form, as one of their own number has said, "a middle body between the Establishment and the Dissenters I" The leader of the Methodists, as these few young men were called, in allusion to the strictness and regularity of their lives, was John Wesley, the son of Samuel Wesley, rector of Epworth, in Lincolnshire. In that quiet, duty-loving home, under the guidance of his good mother^ John
1 For interesting notices of other Oxford Methodists besides Wesley and Whitefield see Tyerman's Oxford Methodists.
- Watson's Observations on Southey's Life of Wesley, pp. 138 and 159, ed. 1821.
3 "The true founder of Wesleyanism was Mrs Wesley," Julia Wedge- wood.
THE METHODIST CLUB. 147
Wesley first received impressions which influenced the whole of his life and through him the lives of thousands of his countrymen. But what chiefly roused him to earnestness in religion was a book entitled A Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life, written by William Law, a clergyman in Northamptonshire, a High Churchman and a Nonjuror, to whom Wesley himself confessed that Methodism owed its origin \ Wesley's home teaching had implanted in him a fervent love for the Church of England ; he went up to Oxford an avowed High Church- man, and "plunged into religious studies with an un- wearied diligence, with a piercing intellect, with an ardent, but sometimes ascetic, pietyl" He resolved to enter the Church, and having been ordained by Dr Potter, the bishop of Oxford, returned to Epworth as his father's curate. A little later he went back to Oxford as a Fellow of Lincoln College, and found there that his brother Charles, who had gone thither in the meantime, inspired with as much zeal as himself, had formed out of the few kindred spirits he had met a little society, nicknamed by outsiders the "Holy," "Sacramentarian" or "Methodist" Club, which, modelled on the plan of the religious societies founded forty years before by Dr Horneck and Dr Beveridge, was itself the germ of the greatest religious movement of the 18th century. As in the earlier societies attachment to the Church was a distinctive feature, so in this one constant attendance on its services and devotion to its ordinances were enjoined. John Wesley joined this
1 Abbey and Overton, ii. 61, 62. Other books which were acknowledged by the Wesleys to have had great influence on the members of the society were Jeremy Taylor's Holy Living and Holy Dying and Thomas a Kempis' Imitation of Christ.
2 Lord Mahon, Hist, of England^ ii. 2.
10—2
148 WESLEY IN AMERICA.
band, and being in years the oldest member and by nature intended for a ruler, he soon became the head of it. At this time the little society numbered among its members Herv^ey, the author of the Meditations, and George Whitefield, whose share in the revival of religion in England was almost as great as that of Wesley himself
In 1735, having failed to obtain the living of Epworth after his father's death, John Wesley, in company with his brother Charles, went over to Georgia \ then a newly- settled colony, as a missionary to the heathen. There he found imtnense difficulties to contend with. The dissolute and lawless lives of the colonists had given the Indians no favourable impression of Christianity, and the colonial authorities offered Wesley no encouragement in his efforts. He had gone out with much zeal but unfortunately he did not temper his zeal with prudence^ and his conduct con- ciliated neither natives nor settlers, so that after nearly three years of disheartening work, he returned to England, whither his brother had preceded him^ In London, he found that his friend and former pupil Whitefield, who had been ordained during his absence, had attracted great attention by the wonderful eloquence of his preaching. " Gifted with a fine presence, attractive features, and a magnificent voice, which could make itself heard at an almost incredible distance, and w^hich he seems to have known perfectly well how to modulate V' and above all inspired with ardent zeal and the deepest sincerity. White- field possessed every attribute of a great preacher. Preach-
1 Their mission was under the direction of the Society for the Propa- gation of the Gospel.
2 Wesley is said to have been too severe in his ideas of religious discipline. He was a very High Churchman.
3 Lord Mahon, ii. 2. Skeats' Hist, of Free Churches, p. 335. ■* Abbey and Overton, ii. 95.
whitefield's preaching. 149
ing was his vocation and he loved it. Without the refine- ment, the learning or the clear judgement of Wesley, his sermons when read seem poor enough ; it needed the action, the voice and the earnestness of the preacher to make them produce, as they did, a greater immediate effect than the more strictly beautiful and thoughtful discourses of Wesley. Wesley appealed to the conscience of men, Whitefield to their emotions. Never before had the men of the eighteenth century heard preaching of this kind ; there had been nothing to claim their par- ticular attention in the dry moral discourses to which they were accustomed, but Whitefield terrified or charmed them into hearinsj. The hig'hest and the lowest, the most learned and the most simple, the sceptics of Lady Huntingdon's drawing-room and the rough colliers of Bristol all felt the fascination. Hume, Franklin and Lord Chesterfield acknowledged the power of his eloquence as fully as did the uneducated thousands who flocked to hear him in Moorfields or at Kingswood. But Whitefield lacked the good taste and good judgement of Wesley, and his sermons were not always characterised by discretion. Consequently when Wesley arrived in London, being classed .in the public mind with Whitefield, he found nearly all pulpits closed against him and other Methodists. Whitefield had already taken to field-preaching, which he found more congenial to his temperament than the tamer and more orderly rule of the Church^ and Wesley found himself obliged to do the same though he had at first been very much averse to it ; for he dreaded anything that seemed like separation from the Church. It is remarkable that though Wesley's sermons were far from anything of the exciting nature of Whitefield's addresses 1 Skeats' Free Churches, p. 367.
150 THE MORAVIANS.
they were more frequently accompanied by those con- vulsions and outbursts of hysterical emotion which were so strangle a feature of the Methodist revival. Wesley, whose mind was always strongly tinged with superstition, believed in these outbreaks of overwrought religious emotion, either as the work of God or as the manifested opposition of the Evil One ^ His brother Charles was less credulous and exerted himself to check them whenever they occurred in his presence. Some cases of these convulsions were proved to be counterfeited for the purpose of attracting notice; some, "no doubt, were real and unfeigned; the effect of austere fasting or of ignorant fanaticism; of an empty stomach or an empty brain I"
On John Wesley's return from America he had met in London a member of the newly-founded sect of the Moravians, Peter Bohler by name. This man persuaded John and Charles Wesley to embrace the tenets of his society, of which the chief were that man is saved by living faith in Christ alone, which faith is given by the grace of God in a moment : that no one can have this faith without knowing that he has it, and that, having it, he is born of God and cannot sin I These doctrines, most attractive to some minds, were liable to terrible per- version, and soon suffered it, for the society in London, leaving the tenets of its German founder, Count Zinzen- dorf, far behind, asserted that all ordinances and means of grace were useless and superfluous, and that good works were to be avoided, since true religion consisted in sitting
1 For some, not too favourable, accounts of these exhibitions of emotion : See Bp Lavington's Enthusiasm of Eomanists and Dissenters compared.
2 Lord Mahon, Hist, of England, ii. 3. ^ Perry, in. 345.
QUARREL BETWEEN WESLEY AND WHITEFIELD. 151
still and waiting for the manifestation of the grace of God. From such idle dreaming the active souls of the Wesleys revolted, and they hroke off their connexion with the Moravians as soon as these unsacramental doc- trines were avowed \
Wesley's separation from the Moravians was soon followed by the more serious separation from his fellow- worker, Whitefield. The latter, influenced by some of the older Puritan writers, had adopted the Calvinistic doctrine of predestination, and Wesley, who saw the harm this doctrine might do, preached a sermon against it, which in an evil moment, and guided, not by his own sound sense, but by the superstitious plan of drawing lots, he decided to print. Whitefield answered him in a letter, feeble and faulty, like most of his writings. This letter his friends surreptitiously printed. Wesley, whose temper was rarely calm when he was attacked, treated it with contempt, and the two great leaders parted I In the course of time they became reconciled, though neither of them would stir an inch from the position he held. Whitefield henceforth was an avowed Calvinist and Wesley an Arminian, but the former devoted most of his energy to America, where the revival of religion was as marked as in England, and so the two avoided clashing with one another. Abundant occupation too left them no time for disputes, for the Methodist movement was now assuming vast proportions and needed organization and government. Wesley had no doubt hoped that many clergymen would join their society, but so few did so, that he was obliged, though reluctantly, to institute
^ Lord Mahon, ii. 4. Perry, in. 3o0. 2 Abbey and Overton, ii. 151.
152 FIRST METHODIST CONFERENCE.
itinerant lay-preachers^ to help him in his rapidly in- creasing work. The first step towards forming the Methodists into a distinct sect was taken when these lay-preachers were appointed, and though Wesley was to the last unswervingly loyal to the Church of England, the impulse towards separation was then given and the Church and the Methodists drifted apart.
Having instituted these lay-preachers Wesley took them completely under his own guidance, and ruled them absolutely both in religious and secular matters. In his letters to them he gives them the minutest instructions with regard to their health and conduct. By one and all he was implicitly obeyed, and the congregatious exhibited equal docility ^ He was born to be a ruler of men, and the worid has known few who possessed the talent of governing in an equal degree, but he must be an absolute monarch; none might interfere with his authority or question his decrees. When in 1744, he summoned the first Methodist Conference, consisting of four clergymen besides the two Wesleys and four lay-preachers, he ex- pressly stated that he called them not to govern but to advise him^. Had his s^ift for organization been less wonderful, such an assumption of supremacy would have been presumptuous. But the system on which he ordered the Methodist society was so well-adapted to the needs of the newly-awakened religious sense, especially among the lower classes, and so well-devised to keep up the excitement and novelty necessary to the success of the movement, that those whom it affected felt no inclination
1 The first lay preacher among them is said to have been Thomas Maxfield, a schoolmaster, who commenced his preaching in the 'Foundry ' at Moorfields.
2 Abbey and Overton, ii. 77, 78. 3 ma,^ u, 78.
ORGANIZATION OF THE METHODISTS. 153
to rebel against it. He divided the congregations into Societies and Circles; these were again divided into Classes, which were to meet weekly under the presidency of Leaders to give an account of their spiritual experience, and discuss their difficulties and temptations. The lay- preachers or Helpers, as they were called, met the Classes and the Leaders every week, and thus provision was made for keeping alive the emotions which had first been stirred by the enthusiastic preaching of the Methodists. The country was divided into Circuits through which the preachers were continually moving, and this constant change served too to keep alive the religious excitement\ The teaching of the Methodists was beginning to get a great hold on the people, especially on those to whom the vapid moral philosophy, which had widely taken the place of the "good tidings," had been but so much empty sound. The society was doing a great deal of good, and still remained strictly within the pale of the Church; indeed the Conference of 1744 decreed that the Bishops and the Canons of the Church were to be obeyed as far as possible I It might have been thought that the help of a large body of men devoted to teaching the Gospel to the very poorest and most neglected of the people, and anxious to be faithful to the Church, would have been welcomed gladly in a country where there was still so much left to be done, and whose appointed teachers had not altogether become unconscious of the fact. But it was not so. From a variety of causes the Methodists were most unpopular among the clergy and upper classes^.
1 Perry, iii. 461.
2 Cf. also Wesley's Journal Sept. 28, 1756, where it is stated that the Conference of that year was closed with a solemn declaration, in which all concurred, never to separate from the Church.
5 Abbey and Overton, ii. 129 — 144.
154 UNPOPULARITY OF THE METHODISTS.
A disturbing influence is most disliked by those who need it most, and the Wesleyans were indeed a disturbing influence to that calm indifference to religion which had so long reigned supreme. Their zeal formed a striking and disagreeable contrast to the easy inactivity into which many of the clergy had sunk, and accordingly they found themselves opposed by those who, had they been wise, should have welcomed them, and the churches were mostly closed against them. They had to bear much hatred for righteousness' sake, and not a little for their own faults; for faults they certainly had. Few of the Methodists were men of much learning, and yet they presumed to lay down the law on disputed points of doctrine with a hardi- hood which disgusted those who were better qualified to judge, and this presumption of theirs earned them much dislike. The outbursts of extravagant emotion exhibited sometimes by their weaker-minded followers brought dis- credit on them too. At the same time great ignorance existed as to their real teaching, and they were accused of leanings towards Popery, or towards Puritanism, or to- wards an ingeniously invented combination of the two^; Wesley, on account of his High-Church views and fond- ness for primitive usages, fell under the first imputation; Whitefield, an undoubted Calvinist, under the second. Many other charges were brought against the Methodists, some utterly groundless, some with a shadow of truth in them, all implicitly believed by outsiders and all calcu- lated to make them objects of popular dislike. This dislike took a more active form than that of words alone ; the preachers were often attacked by ignorant and excited mobs, — led on it is said at times by clergymen, — and
^ Wesley was accused of being a Presbyterian-Papist.
THE CALVINISTIC CONTROVERSY. 155
subjected to rude and violent treatment \ On Wesley, as the leader, the popular fury fell most heavily, and on one occasioD, while preaching at Wednesbury, his life was actually in danger and nothing but his own gentle fear- lessness, which turned some of his enemies into friends on the spot, could have saved himl The better class of clergy, though as a rule they disapproved of Methodism, scorned to attack the Methodists in such bad company, and withdrew into the background, leaving the battle to be fought on their side by the very worst and most negligent of their order. The opposition of the Church to Methodism thus assumed a coarse, vulgar and ungodly aspect, and brought discredit on the Establishment of which the Methodists wished to be the reformers not the enemies ^
More injurious to their cause than any amount of opposition from without was the controversy, if it can be dignified with the name, which began in 1771 among the Methodists themselves on the subject of predesti- nation. It was the same disputed question that had caused the separation between Wesley and Whitefield years before, and though they had forgiven one another all the harsh things that had been said, and had agreed to differ without hindrance to their friendship, they had never really worked together since. Each represented one of two great sections of the Methodist party; Wesley the Arminian, Whitefield the Calvinistic. Whitefield died in 1770, and it was the party of which he had been the leader that opposed Wesley in this controversy. The great support of the Calvinistic Methodists was Selina,
^ Examples of such treatment can be found in many portions of Wesley's journal.
2 Lord Mahon, ii. 14. 3 perry, iii. 353.
156 LADY Huntingdon's connexion.
widow of the Earl of Huntingdon, who had devoted her- self and all she possessed to the service of religion. She had founded two colleges, one at Trevecca in Wales and the other at Cheshimt, for training ministers, and had built more than fifty ^ chapels in different parts of England, which she provided with ministers over whom she ruled at least as absolutely as Wesley ruled over his preachers. The congregations of the chapels became known as Lady Huntiugdon's Connexion and comprised most of the Cal- vinistic Methodists. Whitefield when in England acted as one of the Countess' chaplains, and often preached at her house in London or in her chapel at Bath to the brilliant audiences whom she drew together in the devout hope of reviving religion among the nobility and people of fashion. This brave effort was not very successful ; crowds came to hear Lady Huntingdon's preachers, but rather because it was the fashion than because they were impressed by what they heard.
Some of the parochial clergy whom the example of the Methodists had roused occasionally preached in her chapels, until 1781, when the necessity of giving a legal status to the chapels compelled Lady Huntingdon re- luctantly to own herself and her preachers seceders. The regular clergy then broke off all closer connexion with Lady Huntingdon's chapels, though they did not cease to be on friendly terms with her and her ministers. At the Methodist Conference held in 1770 the Calvinistic controversy was kindled anew. In the Minutes of that Conference, drawn up by Wesley himself, the necessity of works to salvation was asserted, a statement which scandalized the Calvinistic party, led now that Whitefield
1 It is stated that at her death in 1791 the number of her chapels was 04.
FLETCHER AND TOPLADY. 157
was dead by Lady Huntingdon and her relative Mr Shirley. Nearly all the so-called serious clergy were Calvinists, and they took Lady Huntingdon's side in disavowing the Minutes. Hence it will be seen that the Minutes of the Methodist Conferences were at first looked to for guidance by some of the clergy. Wesle}^ had not leisure to engage in the controversy himself, but he delegated the task to one who, after himself, was the best able of all the Methodists to fulfil it. This was John Fletcher \ the saint-like vicar of Madeley, who alone of all the writers in this miserable controversy had not to reproach himself for violent and abusive language. He too was the author of the Checks to Antinomianism, the only work of the countless number produced by these disputes which deserves to be remembered. Other de- fenders John Wesley had, most of them pupils of his own, but none of them so able as Fletcher. On the other side the foremost writer was Augustus Toplady, the vicar of Broad Hembury, and the writer of the hymn, " E-ock of Ages," which fortunately for his reputation will live when the very names of his controversial writings^ are forgotten. For while Fletcher was the mildest of all the disputants and never passed the bounds of Christian charity, his chief opponent was conspicuous for the unmitigated abuse which he heaped on those who differed from him. It was however, only with his pen in his hand that he was so fierce ; in reality he was an earnest, useful parish priest, a man of some learning and endowed with a poetic mind".
1 Weslej' looked upon Fletcher as his successor in the work of the Society, but Fletcher died in 1785.
2 The style of these writings may be judged of by the title of one, which is called More ivork for Mr John Wesley,
' Abbey and Overton, ii. 163.
158 GRADUAL SEPARATION FROM THE CHURCH.
The passages of arms between the inferior combatants on both sides are scarcely worth mentioning ; the writings on either side consisted mostly of "mere Billingsgate abuse," and are better forgotten. The controversies of the 18th century are not distinguished by less heat, less railing and fewer personalities than others before and since, but they at least threw some light on points which greatly needed it, and left some "literary masterpieces" to compensate for the harm they had otherwise done. But this Cal- vinistic controversy produced no really valuable work, it cleared up no difficulties whatever but left the question exactly as it had found it, and it was carried on with a violence and lack of Christian charity which make all the previous controversies seem mild and gentle in com- parison with it \ The disputes gradually died out, leaving nothing behind that one would not joyfully have exchanged for the peace and unity which they had destroyed.
Meanwhile Wesley's own labours were unremitting, and the influence of his work was making itself felt, though at the same time the breach between the Church and the Methodists was gradually becoming wider. This was distinctly against the will of Wesley, who in the Conference of 1744 and constantly since then had urged his congregations to remain true to the Church, and enjoined his preachers never to hinder attendance at the Church Services. He himself was to the last, at heart if not in action, a sincere Churchman ^ and re- peatedly asserted his love for the Church of England and his desire to help and uphold it. " If ever the
1 Abbey and Overton, ii. 147.
2 In a letter written near the close of his life he says " Our own Church with all her blemishes is nearer the Scriptural plan than any other in Europe."
IRREGULAR ORDINATIONS. 159
Methodists leave the Church/' he said, " I must leave them\" He ruled his people so absolutely that it might have been thought that his commands to them to do nothing that might seem schismatical would have been obeyed implicitly. But it was not so ; strong as he was, the movement he had set on foot had become too powerful for him. All Methodists were not such good Churchmen as Wesley and the opposition they met with from the Church embittered them against it. Almost all the Bishops refused ordination to Methodist preachers, and the congregations were increasing and in want of ministers. In 1760, three lay-preachers at Norwich took a decided step in schism by administering the Holy Communion in the chapel there. For this Wesley seriously censured them, but he could not prevent the like taking place again and elsewhere. It is * strange that while Wesley professed and felt a deep affection for the Church, the most schismatical act should have been his own. In 1784, when all the clergy of the English Church had left the revolted colonies in America, and Wesley's congregations there were in need of pastors, he took upon himself to ordain " elders " and " superintendents," virtually priests and bishops ^, to supply their wants. Such an action must be confessed to be schismatical. Not that Wesley thought it so or believed for one moment that he was disloyal to the Church. His fondness for the usages of Primitive Christianity had led him to the conclusion that bishops and priests were originally of the same order, and that therefore he as a priest had as good a right to ordain as to administer
1 Abbey and Overton, ii. 82.
2 Asbury, one of the two appointed by Wesley, assumed the title of 'bishop' and this was the commencement of the Methodist Episcopal Church of America.
160 METHODISTS LEAVE THE CHURCH.
the Sacraments \ To his intensely practical mind the supplying of a pressing need fully justified his conduct ; where there was a regularly ordained priest to administer the Sacraments he would not allow his preachers to do so (although, as we have seen, they sometimes disobeyed him), but when without irregularly ordained ministers the people would have been deprived of the means of grace, he thought it no schismatical act to ordain them. The chief blame in the matter must rest with those who had so long refused America the Episcopate ; had there been a Church system, such as was greatly needed in the colonies, there would have been no occasion for any irregular ordination whatever^.
From this time Methodism must be regarded as outside the pale of the Church, though John and Charles Wesley were still as loyal to it as they had always been. The tendency to separate from the Church was strong among the Methodists, many of whom had originally been Dissenters, and the brothers Wesley knew and deplored it^. But it was beyond their power to root out, and though the separation was not so marked as long as they lived, it nevertheless existed, and became complete aS soon as they, the connecting links, were gone.
George Whitefield had died in America in 1770, Charles Wesley died in 1788, and three years later his elder brother followed him to his rest. Thus Methodism was bereft of its three greatest men ; the preacher, the poet and the ruler. But they had left it strong enough to stand without them and to continue to gather strength, though the two latter at least would have regretted the
1 Perry, in. 467 n.
2 For the reasons which probably influenced Wesley, see Abbey and Overton, ii. 83—85. ^ Abbey and Overton, ii. 110.
THE EVANGELICAL SCHOOL. 161
distance to which it has since become parted from the mother Church. These three men had done a great work ; they had found a nation in which vital religion was almost extinct, and in the face of opposition, difficulties and dangers, they had aroused it to a sense of its needs ; they had found heresy and infidelity rampant and had met and overcome them by the simple truth of the Gospel. They were hated and despised by their own generation; they were accused of heresy and treason, of spreading Popish or Puritan error, and of encouraging Jacobite tendencies. They were struggling for the right, however, and their cause did not prosper the less in the end because of the calumny they had to endure ; they were heroes, and "heroism would not be heroism, did not half the world mistake it for superstition or infidelity or treason or mad- ness or folly \"
After the death of the Wesleys the work of the Methodists was entirely outside the Church. But their example, while they had been in it, had stimulated many of the clergy to greater diligence in their office and more earnestness in their teaching. These men, the serious clergy, as they were called, were the founders of the Evangelical School in the Church of England. They were not Methodists and disliked to be classed with Methodists, though their tenets and their rules of life were scarcely to be distinguished from those of the Calvinistic Methodists, with whom, especially with Lady Huntingdon, they kept up a close connexion. They, like the Methodists, believed in instantaneous conversion, and a consequent, entire change of life. They were strict in their manners, even to Puritanic severity, and like the Methodists they kept religious journals, in which the spiritual state of the 1 Guesses at Truth, ii. 187. L. 11
162 WORK OF THE EVANGELICAL CLERGY.
writer was dissected, in all sincerity, no doubt, but with what seems to another age a most painful minuteness. In contrast to the indolence and luxury of many of the clergy, they were indefatigable in preaching and cared nothing for remuneration. Their teaching was Calvinistic, but they were careful not to make the doctrine of predesti- nation unduly prominent, and in all things gave to good works their rightful place as the fruits of faith. Their attachment to the Church of England was very sincere, and it was mainly owing to their influence that the agitation for the abolition of subscription among the clergy in 1772 failed.
Long years of inactivity on the part of the Church had loosened her hold on the hearts of the people. The Evangelicals left questions of doctrine and philosophy, and, preaching the Gospel simply and from the heart, won them back to their allegiance. The decay of religion in the nation had produced, as it inevitably must, a corre- sponding decay of morality. In France where the same retrogression took place, nothing occurred to check it, and it came to a terrible end in the overthrow of religion and morality together at the Eevolution. England was mer- cifully spared such a fate ; and that she was spared was in great measure due to the Evangelical clergy. "They evangelized the Church and saved the nation \" Taking the Gospel as their guide and preaching Christ simply and earnestly, they opposed the spread of Arianism; reverenc- ing every ordinance of the Church and loving her Liturgy, they offered a determined resistance to all attempts to deprive her of her individuality. They revived the societies for the Reformation of Manners as a check to the terrible growth of vice ; they established Sunday- 1 Perry, iii. 476.
EVANGELICAL LAYMEN. 163
schools, they founded missions to the heathen, they obtained the abolition of slavery. Now for the first time, too, laymen were brought to see what impor- tant duties they had as Christians, and what immense influence for good, scarcely less than that of the clergy, they could and therefore ought to exercise. Some of the most ardent Evangelicals were laymen \ William Wilberforce, whose countless talents were all devoted to his Master's service, his two friends, John and Henry Thornton, the bankers of Clapham, and William Cowper, the poet, are all men whose names will ever be nobly associated with those of the clergymen, John Newton, Thomas Scott, Henry Yenn, the two Milners, and many others, as "mighty spiritual heroes" whom the Evangelical school may claim as its own. Faults these men and their fellows certainly had, but such faults as those who carefully read the history of their times and of their work will not find it hard to forgive. Their Churchmanship leaned too much towards Calvinism, but it had the merit, rare at the time, of being sincere; they were perhaps somewhat narrow-minded, but a false liberality had nearly proved the ruin of the Church ; their austerity made them regard even innocent pleasures with suspicion, but the rigidity of their conduct is pardonable when we consider the loose and careless tone of the age which it was their mission to reform. They rescued the Church from ruin, and infused into it that vigour and energy for lack of which it was perishing. It was, however, beyond their power to do all that the Church needed ; their work was necessarily one- sided. Loyal Churchmen as they were, " they did not bring into prominence what are now called, and what would have been called in the seventeenth century, the 'Catholic' 1 Perry, in. 477—483
11—2
16 ii VIEWS OF THE EVANGELICAL SCHOOL.
features of the English Church. They simply regarded her as one of many 'Protestant' communions \" It was left for a later generation to bring to due notice the Catholicity of our Church ; to have insisted on that feature would have been worse than useless among the people to whom Wesley and Whitefield preached. Each age can only be taught such things as it will learn, and incomplete as we may consider the work of the Evangelicals, we must always remember that without it, the more Catholic move- ment of a later day would have been practically impossible.
1 Abbey and Overton, ii. 226.
CHAPTER XI.
THE EEIGN OF GEORGE III.
It has been seen how the Church of England had been roused from a state of deplorable apathy to a sense of her duties and responsibilities by the great movement which has received the name of the Evangelical revival, and how the cold infidelity of the earlier part of the century was disappearing before the earnestness of the Methodists ; it now remains to consider the attitude of the Church to- wards the two great bodies of dissenters from her doctrines, whom it had been her object during two centuries to oppress and destroy, but who were gradually asserting their right to liberty alike of thought and worship.
The last Act that had been passed against Protestant Nonconformists was the Schism Bill in the reign of Queen Anne. During the whole of that reign the Dis- senters had experienced little else but hardship, and the terrible Schism Act was the climax of oppression. From the disgrace of putting it in force the nation was saved by the sudden death of the Queen. Under George I., to whom the attachment of the Dissenters was of import- ance, more favour was shewn them, and in the repeal of the Occasional Conformity and Schism Bills, there was
166 CONDITION OF PROTESTANT DISSENTERS.
accorded to them a small measure of relief. Their hopes were thus raised so high that they even ventured in 1718 to agitate, though unsuccessfully, for a repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts.
With the reign of George II. came prospects of greater toleration; in the first year of his reign "was passed the first of those Acts of Indemnity, afterwards annually renewed, which were meant to protect those who had failed to qualify themselves for office from the rigour of the penal laws, of whose uselessness they were sufficient proof. The Nonconformists once more (1736) attempted to obtain the repeal of the Test Act, but their efforts were abruptly checked by Sir Kobert Walpole, who dared not run the risk of proposing or favouring changes in laws, which at that time men deemed so important to the national well-being.
In 1745, the Dissenters again came into prominent notice. When in that year the young Pretender landed in Scotland, and encouraged by his reception there marched into England, the Nonconformists at once rallied round King George and took up arms for the House of Hanover, thereby exposing themselves to all the penalties which awaited those who dared to handle sword or musket with- out being members of the Established Church. "A pardon was generously granted to them for their noble exploits^ ;" and in recognition of their services they were exempted from the penalties they had incurred by a special Act of Indemnity.
When George III. ascended the throne the position of
the Establishment towards Protestant Dissenters was one
of calm indifference. The Church had nothing to fear
from the Nonconformists ; the Nonconformists seemed to
1 Speech of Mr Fox, March 2, 1790, Pari Hist.
CONDITION OF ROMAN CATHOLICS. 167
have little to hope from the Church. Nevertheless a feeling of sympathy with their claims was silently growing in the nation. The injustice of hampering with disabilities and oppressing by penal statutes a large body of loyal sub- jects, was beginning to be recognised, and when the next attempt to obtain relief for them was made, it will be seen that by the House which represents the feeling of the people it was favourably received.
During the first half of the century the Roman Catho- lics played but a very small part in the history of the English Church. The uncontested accession of the House of Hanover was the death-blow to their hopes, and the sus- picions which naturally fell on them after the rebellion of 1715 made it prudent for them to call as little attention as possible to their existence. The severest penal laws still hung over them, ready to be put in force whenever greed or malice should prompt anyone to turn informer and enrich himself with the wages of unrighteousness. A small excuse was sufficient just at that time to make them the object of oppression and extortion, as was the case after the Jacobite revival in 1721, when an enormous tax was levied on the estates of all Roman Catholics because some of them were suspected of having plotted against the Government. Later on in the century they were not molested thus, but they were still regarded by the mass of the people with suspicion, and though some with truer insight might realise the weakness of the party, there still existed in the country such a terror and hatred of Popery that the mere name was sufficient to create a panic, if not to raise a mob\
Such was the position of religious parties at the accession of George HI. "The old party distinctions were
1 Abbey and Overton, ii. 392.
168 POSITION OF BOTH IN 1760.
almost effaced ; nor was their place yet supplied by dis- tinctions of a still more important kind. A new genera- tion of country squires and rectors had arisen who knew not the Stuarts. The Dissenters were tolerated, the Catholics not cruelly persecuted. The Church was drowsy and indulgent. The civil and religious conflict which began at the Reformation seemed to have terminated in universal repose \" This repose was not to last long, how- ever ; it was soon broken by the struggles of both bodies of Nonconformists to obtain something more than mere toleration or exemption from actual harsh usage. The history of the Church during the reigns of the last two Georges is mainly the history of these struggles for liberty ; first, of the Protestant Dissenters alone, then of the Roman Catholics as well ; struggles, successful in the case of the former in some minor points, then for a long time remitted, but crowned with ultimate triumph in the repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts, — attended with every difficulty in the case of the latter, hindered first by the prejudices of a mob, then by the scruples of a king, until at last their persistence wrung Catholic Emancipation from a reluctant Government, too late to save the kingdom which needed peace most sorely from civil war and years of misery".
In 1772, the first step toward the attainment of full toleration for Protestant Dissenters was taken. There were at that time some reasons for hoping that public opinion was favourably inclined towards lightening the restrictions with which Nonconformists were burdened, and indeed, when Sir Henry Houghton brought in a Bill for relieving Dissenting ministers from the necessity of sub- scribing the XXXIX. Articles into the House of Commons,
^ Macaulay's Essays. Earl of Chatham, p. 312. 2 Erskine May, Const. Hist, of Eng. ii. 404.
PKOPOSED CATHOLIC BELIEF. 169
it met with very little opposition. The House of Lords, however, adhered more firmly to old traditions and re- jected the Bill, though it had the warm support of Lord Chatham and Lord Mansfield. The same fate met it the next year, but in 1779, after some relief had already been granted to the Roman Catholics, Sir Henry was more fortunate, and succeeded in getting his Bill passed. For the subscription there was henceforth substituted a declaration, to be made by every Nonconformist preacher and teacher, that he was a Christian and a Protestant, and took the Scriptures for the rule of his faith and practice'.
A little before the passing of this Act an attempt had been made to procure a slight measure of relief for the Roman Catholics. There was no thought as yet of removing the Catholic disabilities, but many men recognised the injustice of allowing laws which the Government no longer needed to enforce, to exist as weapons for the malice or covetousness of individuals; when therefore Sir George Savile proposed to repeal the Act which doomed a priest to perpetual imprisonment for celebrating Mass, deprived a Roman Catholic heir, educated abroad, of his lawful inheritance, and forbade him to purchase an estate, the measure passed both Houses with ease (1778). But unhappily the opinion of the public outside the Houses of Parliament did not coincide with that of the legislators within. The cry of " No Popery " had always found a ready hearing in Great Britain, how- ever carelessly it might be raised. In Scotland, which of all countries had least to fear from Popery, this cry, excited by Sir George Savile's Bill, roused a fanatical mob to such deeds of violence in Edinburgh and Glasgow, that the Roman Catholics there, whose property had been 1 May, II. 331. Perry, in. 439.
170 THE GORDON RIOTS.
destroyed and whose lives were in danger, were terrified into relinquishing future advantages for the sake of present safety, and consented to accept compensation from the Government for their losses and to concur in the postpone- ment of the Act for a time, as far as Scotland was con- cerned.
The success of the rioters in Scotland encouraged their brethren in bigotry in England to imitate their example, and to check the proposed measures of relief in an equally effectual manner. Under the leadership of the turbulent and half-witted president of the Protestant Association, Lord George Gordon, the mob of London murdered, pillaged and burned for three days in the much-abused name of religion, and shouting "No Popery" without either reason or knowledge, left the deeds of their Scotch exemplars far behind in the riots of 1780. Such dis- turbances, while they could have no lasting effect on the action of Government, produced the immediate result of discouraging any further attempt at obtainiog Catholic relief for some years \
When Mr Pitt, who owed part of his success to the steady support of the Dissenters, came into power, it was thought that the time had arrived when they might reasonably ask, as a return for their services, the repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts. Accordingly, in 1787, the cause was entrusted to Mr Beaufoy, a member of the House of Commons, who, if not an eloquent speaker, was at least an earnest, sensible and straightforward one. Early in that year he moved for the repeal in a speech in which he clearly set forth the hardships under which Noncon- formists suffered in being excluded from so many honour- able positions, while if they served their country in spite 1 May, II. 337—339. Perry, in. 441.
THE FRENCH REVOLUTION. 171
of hindrances, they were not only left unrewarded for their loyalty, but forced to take shelter from the rigour of the law under Acts of Indemnity. He condemned too most justly the narrow-mindedness which had degraded the highest ordinance of the Christian Church into a mere qualification for secular employment. In spite of all he could say, the motion for the repeal was lost by a considerable majority ; Lord North opposed it, and even Mr Pitt, who had at first favoured the claims of the Dis- senters, was persuaded to speak against it, since the Bishops were of opinion that such a measure would bring danger to the Church.
In 1789, Mr Beaufoy made another attempt, in which he was vigorously seconded by Mr Fox, and though the motion was lost again, the majority against it was much smaller than before. Thus encouraged, the Dissenters sought in Mr Fox an abler and more influential champion, and made one more effort to gain their end in 1790. But the opportunity, such as it had been, was past; influences were at work adverse to all attempts at changing the existing state of things. "The French Revolution at its outset met with much sympathy from generous spirits in England. But as it ran on in its wild course, alarm filled men's minds, and made them rally more enthusiastically than ever round, the Altar and the Throned" The Dissenters were known to have sym- pathized with the American Revolution ; they were sup- posed not to disapprove of that in France. Their claims were no longer regarded as a reasonable demand for toleration but as the first step in a course which might subvert both Church and State. In vain the supporters of the motion urged that it had been brought forward in ^ Abbey and Overton, ii. 402.
172 BIRMINGHAM RIOTS.
precisely the same form three years before, when the most revolutionary-minded Dissenter could not possibly have been influenced by events in France; change of any kind was dreaded at such a moment, and the motion was lost by an overwhelming majority. Forty years elapsed before the repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts was proposed again\
The feeling of distrust towards the Nonconformists broke out into open violence in this same year (1791) at Birmingham, where Dr Priestley, a distinguished Uni- tarian minister and an ardent sympathizer with the French Revolution, had a large following. The celebration of the taking of the Bastille by some of Dr Priestley's friends was made the occasion of outrages as disgraceful, though not as extensive, as those of the Gordon rioters eleven years before. Dr Priestley's chapel was destroyed, and his house, containing his most valuable library and collection of manuscripts, burnt to the ground. "Church and King" was the watchword of the rioters, who threat- ened with immediate demolition every house that did not display their motto. The riots were soon quelled, but with the feelings of the people in this hostile state it was hopeless to look for any relief for Dissenters yet. But the principle of universal religious toleration had already taken ipot, and men could not acknowledge it and rest content with the penal code as it then existed. In that very year 1791, a Bill was brought into Parliament, for the relief of a certain sect of Roman Catholics, calling themselves " Pro- testing Catholic Dissenters," who were alleged to protest against the Pope's assumption of temporal authority in England and against his power to absolve subjects from their allegiance, as well as against the principle, commonly
I May, II. 339—344. Perry, iii. 442—450. Skeats, 485—499.
RELIEF TO ROMAN CATHOLICS. 173
ascribed to Roman Catholics, that they were not bound to keep faith with heretics. The Bill was very imperfect in itself; the tenets with which it dealt were indignantly repudiated by all enlightened Roman Catholics, and the oath, which was to procure them exemption from penalties, was of such a character that none but a very lax Papist could bring himself to take it. Neither did the Bill satisfy the friends of religious liberty in Parliament. Mr Fox urged that such relief as was to be granted should be granted to all Romanists alike, and Mr Pitt saw no danger in allowing religious liberty to Papists. In the House of Lords the Bill in its original form was objected to, but the Archbishop of Canterbury (Dr Moore), and the Bishop of St David's (Dr Horsley), succeeded in altering it by amendments until it was likely to be a real relief to all Roman Catholics. An entirely different oath was substituted for the one first proposed, one that no Papist need scrapie to take; and on taking it, he was free to enjoy his property, was safe from the hitherto dangerous "nearest Protestant heir," and though the army and navy were still closed against him the law was opened to him as a profession. From the date of the passing of this Bill there was an end of legal persecution for opinion in England ; freedom of thought was gained now both for Roman Catholic and Protestant Nonconformists. Civil disabilities still existed indeed, but they were tottering to their MV.
The condition of Ireland helped to bring matters to a crisis. The troubled state of that country made it evident that no mere repeal of penal statutes was a sufficient remedy for the evils from which it suffered. As long as three-fourths of the whole population, being 1 Perry, iii. 450—454.
174 THE STATE OF IRELAND.
Catholics, were unrepresented in Parliament, no hope could be entertained of quelling the constant discontents of the Irish. Accordingly, in 1793, the Irish Parliament passed a bill which allowed Roman Catholics^ to vote at elections and to hold rank in the army. But in 1795 the English Government shewed very clearly that it did not mean to grant any very liberal relief to the Catholics. For they recalled Lord Fitzwilliam, who had been made lord lieutenant in that year, only six weeks after his appoint- ment, because his views on the subject of Catholic eman- cipation were in advance of his instructions. Religious, political and social evils, all of which existed in Ireland in some of their worst forms, led to the outbreak in 1797 of a rebellion, organized with inexperience, suppressed with barbarity, and disgraced by unnecessary bloodshed, cowardice and cruelty on both sides. It was not a religious war; the Catholics took no prominent share in it. It was begun and carried on by an association, calling themselves the United Irishmen, " who clubbed all kinds of discontents together, to produce all kinds of disorders." These disorders only confirmed the prevailing impression in England that Ireland would never be peaceably governed until it was united with Great Britain. In 1801 this union was consummated. Nothing was said in the terms of the Union about the Catholic claims, but Mr Pitt, the chief promoter of the Union, saw clearly that it could never be permanent, while so large a proportion of the king's Irish subjects were virtually proscribed by the state. He was of opinion that the small number of Roman Catholics who, if the disabilities were removed, might hold office in the state or be returned as members of Parliament could not possibly endanger the security of the Established Church, and feeling that concessions
THE king's SCRUPLES. 175
made at this time both to Catholics and Dissenters would be fraught with benefits to the whole kingdom, he consulted the king as to the advisability of intro- ducing a measure of relief into Parliament. He met with the most determined opposition from the sovereign, whose scruples, as conscientious as they were disastrous, made him regard the removal of any measures of re- pression as a violation of his coronation oath. Mr Pitt resigned ; he felt that he had tacitly pledged himself at the Union to obtain relief for the Catholics, and he chose rather to quit office than to remain the head of a Government which would not gratify the hopes it had raised.
The new Ministry, with Mr Addington as premier, was avowedly anti-Catholic, and when, in 1804, Mr Pitt returned to power, the king had so worked upon his feelings by reproaching him with being the cause of his serious illness three years before, that he had given a promise never to advocate the Catholic claims again, nor to support any one who might advocate them. For a long time the cause of emancipation languished. At length in 1807 another attempt at relief was made, in the shape of a bill for allowing Roman Catholics in England to serve in the army, as already by the Act of 1793 they were allowed to do in Ireland, though even there the highest ranks of the service were still closed ao-ainst them. It was further proposed to extend the privileges of this bill to Dissenters and its operation to the navy.
Again the king's resolute opposition checked the progress of the measure. He had only reluctantly con- sented to allow the simple extension of the Irish bill to Great Britain, and the proposal to include Dissenters in its provisions decided the fate of the bill and of the Ministry
176 THE REGENCY.
that had brought it in. Under the new administration of the Duke of Portland and Mr Perceval the " No Popery " cry was again raised, with so much vigour and effect that it provoked from Mr Henry Erskine an expression of regret that poor Lord George Gordon did not live in those times, when he would have stood a chance of being in the cabinet instead of being in Newgate \ In spite of the apparent hopelessness of their cause, the Catholics did not cease to remind the legislature of their existence and their claims by constant petitions, which though barren of direct results served to keep the subject continually before the mind of the public.
In 1811 the aspect of affairs was slightly changed by the illness of the king, and the consequent appointment of the Prince of Wales to the Regency. The Prince had at one time been an ardent supporter of the Catholic cause, and though of late years he had allowed his enthusiasm to cool, yet much was hoped from him, far more than was ever realized. His opinions had changed, and he was now as little inclined to grant relief as ever his father had been. The cause was consequently not much advanced during the remainder of George III.'s reign. Motions on the subject were constantly made in both Houses of Parliament, and Mr Grattan's voice was raised again and again on behalf of his countrymen. The perseverance of the Catholics and the manifest justice of their cause began to rouse sympathy even among English Protestants, who joined in petitioning Parliament for relief. One important man was won over to the Catholic side ; this was Mr Canning, whose opposition to measures of relief had been based, not on their unlawfulness but on what he deemed their inexpediency. In 1812 he brought forward amotion 1 Komilly's Mem. ii. 193.
RELIGIOUS SOCIETIES. 177
for the consideration of the laws affecting Roman Catholics, and for the first time in the history of such motions it was carried, and by a large majority. In the following year Mr Grattan brought in a Bill, which while it carefully guarded the Church of England from any chance of danger would have given the Roman Catholics full relief The Bill was read twice, but amended until it retained no trace of its original form and was abandoned in despair even by its promoters. In this year, however, a Bill was passed to allow Irish Roman Catholics to hold such offices in England as they were already permitted to hold in Ireland, and a few years later (1817) Roman Catholics and Dissenters were ad- mitted both to the army and navy. Beyond this no im- portant advantage was gained by the Catholic party during the remainder of George III.'s reign, and in 1820 it suffered a serious loss in the death of Mr Grattan, who had so long been its champion in the House of Commons, and who did not live to see the object gained for which he had so perseveringly striven.
There are a few matters connected with Church history during the latter part of the reign of George III. which deserve to be recorded with their dates. First may be mentioned the establishment of the "British and Foreign Bible Society" in 1804. This Society was, and continues to be, so constituted that in it churchmen cooperate with dissenters in the good work of the circulation of the Sacred Volume without note or comment, and it is one of those organizations to which we may look hopefully for the en- couragement of further joint action by Christians of varying opinions in works which they all admit to be of primary importance.
The "Church Missionary Society" was established about the same time, mainly if not wholly by the efforts of the L. 12
178 THE NATIONAL SOCIETY.
Evangelical body in the Church. The names of Venn, Thornton and Newton are conspicuous among its promoters and first supporters. It now ranks side by side with the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, as one of the Church's most effective agencies for the conversion of the heathen, the former having directed its labours more especially to the spiritual needs of those countries to which England was sending forth colonists, while the Church Missionary Society trains men for mission stations in heathen lands where their work lies entirely among the unconverted natives.
In 1811 it was found that the educational labours of the "Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge" had grown to such an extent that the committee were warranted in establishing a new Society to which a large portion of this educational work and superintendence should be given over. This is the "National Society for promoting the Education of the poor in the principles of the Established Church." The new Society received incorporation by a Eoyal Charter in 1817, and has employed the funds en- trusted to it in building and enlarging Schools, providing proper school books at a cheap rate, supporting Training Colleges for the supply of Masters and Mistresses fitted to teach, and helping, where need is, the Church of England Sunday Schools throughout the land. There are at present 14,000 Schools in connection with this Society, and it has disbursed more than £1,100,000 since its establishment, and has called forth subscriptions equal to twelve times that amount from other sources to be bestowed on the education of the poor.
Of the Sunday School movement in England Mr Raikes of Gloucester is generally held to be the originator, though similar efforts were made in other parts of England about
CATHOLIC EMANCIPATION. 179
the same time. Mr Raikes commenced his work in 1781 and lived till 1811. He was much assisted by a clergyman of Gloucester, the Kev. T. Stock. At the present time a Sunday School exists in almost every parish in England and Wales, and the movement has been by no means limited to the Church. For Church of England Sunday Schools much help is provided both in the matter of books and systematic teaching by the "Church of England Sunday School Institute," which has agencies in every diocese and is working in conjunction with the National Society and the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge in making Sunday School teaching as efficient as possible. It may be mentioned that as far back as 1833 the number of children attending Sunday Schools exceeded a million and a half\
The political measures which concern the Church of England in the period between 1820 and 1830 are not many. The first is the repeal in 1828 of the Test and Corporation Acts, which had required every person admitted to civil or military office, or into any office in a corporation, to receive the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper according to the use of the Church of England. The repeal was a concession, and not an improper one, to Dissenters who might prove themselves as loyal subjects and as good citizens as Churchmen. Lord Eldon, who opposed the measure to the last, prophesied when it was passed that "the concessions to Dissenters must soon be followed by like concessions to Eoman Catholics." And so it came to pass. For in 1829 a movement for Catholic Emancipation was taken up by the Duke of Wellington, and in the speech at the opening of Parliament it was recommended that the laws which imposed civil disabilities on Roman Catholics should be repealed. After continued and violent 1 Knight's Hist, of Engl, viii. 230.
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180 KOMAN CATHOLICS IN PARLIAMENT.
debates a Bill became Law on April 13th, whereby a Roman Catholic can be admitted to Parliament on taking, instead of the old oath of Supremacy, one in wdiich he pledges himself to support the existing institutions of the State and not to injure those of the Church. A Roman Catholic can enjoy all civil and municipal privileges, and may be admitted to the great offices of state, only that he may not be Regent, or Lord Chancellor, or Viceroy of Ireland, nor may he dispense Church patronage. The first fruits of the new Act was the admission to Parliament of Daniel O'Connell as Member for Clare, and though his election had taken place before the passing of the Act he claimed to be admitted under the newly prescribed form of oath. This was refused and a new writ was issued. But he was again elected, and then entered the House under the new regulation.
In the next year, on the 26th of June, 1830, George IV. died at Windsor, and was succeeded by his brother William IV.
CHAPTER XII.
THEOLOGICAL LITERATURE AFTER THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURA.
The stagnation in Church life, which ensued on the accession of the House of Hanover, had its effect on the writings both of Churchmen and Dissenters, and for some time we meet with but few names of authors whose works have gained a permanent place in theological literature. The Bangorian controversy, which caused great excitement at the opening of the century, called many pens to the conflict, but out of all the list of pamphlets for and against the positions of Bishop Hoadly, there is little that deserves to be remembered except the Three Letters to the Bishop of Bangor, by William Law, which have been often praised, not only for their close argumen- tation, in which the writer had in some points the better of the Bishop, but also for the way in which they rise above the general tone which pervaded this whole controversy. Of Hoadly's own writings probably the sermon on John xviii. 36, which was the origin of the whole warfare, is that alone which is now known, and the
182 THEOLOGIANS OF THE 18TH CENTURY.
oblivion which has come on the entire literature is well deserved. William Law, whose name has already been noticed among the list of eminent nonjurors, was also the author of a more important work, entitled, A serious call to a devout and holy Life, to the reading of which Dr Johnson ascribes his own first deep religious im- pressions, and which was so highly esteemed by John Wesley, that some have traced to it the origin of the Methodist movement. Law died in 1761.
Another writer who took some part in the Bangorian controversy was Dr Thomas Sherlock, afterwards bishop successively of Bangor, Salisbury and London. Beside his contribution to the controversy in a tract, entitled A Vindication of the Corporation and Test Acts, he published six discourses which he had preached at the Temple, of which he was master, on The use and intent of Prophecy, which were intended as a refutation of Collins. Dr Sherlock died in the same year as Law.
A writer of a more powerful character than either of the foregoing was Dr Daniel Waterland, Master of Magdalene College, Cambridge. The first of his more important works was a Vindication of Christ's Divinity, written to oppose the Arian views so common at the time, and of which Dr Samuel Clarke was the most famous exponent. To this work Dr Waterland made several subsequent additions, and also printed eight sermons preached at Lady Moyer's lecture on the same topic. In 1723 he put forth his History of the Athanasian Creed, in which he examined very carefully all the evidence then accessible on the authorship and date of that symbol. His next considerable work was Scripture Vindicated, being an answer to Tindal's deistical publication Christianity as old as the Creation. In 1737 appeared A review of the doctrine
butler's analogy. 183
of the Eucharist as laid down in Scripture and Antiquity. This was the last work which Wateiiand put forth daring his lifetime. His death took place in 1740, and his complete works which still hold a high place among theological writings have since been published in eleven volumes.
Another learned writer of the same period was Bishop Butler, whose treatise on the Analogy of Religion, Natural and Revealed, to the Constitution and Course of Nature, is, and is likely to remain, one of the most valuable portions of evidential literature which our language possesses. The author, born in 1692, first attracted notice by some anonymous letters which he addressed to Dr Samuel Clarke concerning his work on Tlie Demonstration of the Being and Attributes of God. Butler obtained preferment in the Church, and was first made Bishop of Bristol and afterwards of Durham. Beside the Analogy Butler has left some sermons of the same sound and logical character as his larger work, but gave strict orders that at his death which occurred in 1752 all his papers should be destroyed. The style of Bishop Butler's writing is not equal to his power as a thinker, and probably this defect has caused his great work to be less known than it deserves to be. Less learned and less logical was the author of The Divine Legation of Moses. This was Wm. Warburton, subsequently made Bishop of Gloucester. The treatise undertakes to prove the authenticity of the Old Testament revelation from the absence in it of any doctrine of a future state of rewards and punishments. Great attention was at the time drawn to the work by its novel character; and the author had to publish a vindication of his book; now it is well-nigh forgotten. A more durable memorial
184 BIBLICAL RESEARCH.
of Warburton remains in the lecture^ which he founded at Lincoln's Inn, and which is estabhshed for proving the truth of Chi'istianity from the fulfilment of the Old and New Testament prophecies which have a relation to the Christian Church. Bp Warburton died in 1779.
The next important writers are distinguished rather for scholarship than for any part which they took in the controversial writing of their time. First may be mentioned Dr Robert Lowth, who became Bishop of St David's, then of Oxford, and afterwards of London. In 1753 he published some lectures on the Sacred poetry of the Hebrews, \ti which he dfe'als with the difficult subject of Hebrew metre. He engaged in some contro- versy with Bishop Warburton on the subject of the book of Job, but his most important work was a new translation of the book of Isaiah, with an introduction and notes, which appeared in 1778, and nine years afterwards the author died.
Equally devoted to Old Testament studies was Dr Benjamin Kennicott, to whose critical labours we owe a very valuable edition of the text of the Hebrew Bible. His first noteworthy ptiblication was in 1753, The state of the Hehrev) t^xt of the Old Testament considered. He designed by this dissertation to overthrow the foolish opinion, theii widely prevalent, that the Hebrew text of the Scripture had been preserved absolutely pure and in- corrupt. Absurd as this opinion now appears, Kennicott's essay encountered most violent opposition, one of his assailants being Dr Rutherforth, Regius Professor of
1 This was a favourite form of endowment about tliat time. Similar lectures were founded in the University of Oxford by the Rev. John Bampton, danon of Salisbury, and in Cambridge by the Rev. John Hulse. The lectures are respectively known as the Bampton and Hulsean.
VARIOUS AUTHORS. 185
Divinity in Cambridge, and another the polemical Bishop Warburton. Kennicott after this spent several years in searching out and examining Hebrew MSS., and in 1759 he put forth a catalogue of these, which caused an urgent demand to be made for the collation of the most important of them. This work he undertook and published a critical Hebrew Text, the first volume in 1776 and the second in 1780. He was enabled to do this by liberal sub- scriptions, a sum of £9000 being contributed for his labours. The introduction to this work sets forth the importance of the task which the author had undertaken. He died in Oxford in 1783.
Dr Richard Watson, Bishop of Llandaff, is the next author who seems to deserve mention. As a writer on behalf of Christianity he devoted himself to stem the tide of infidelity, of which Butler had complained in his introduction to the Analogy. Watson's first publication of this nature was an Apology for Christianity, in a series of letters addressed to Gibbon the historian. He next edited in six volumes a series of Tracts selected from the works of various earlier writers, which were designed to be helpful for the younger students in Theology in the University of Cambridge, where the editor was Begins Professor. He put forth in 1790 Some Considerations on the Expediency of revising the Liturgy and Articles of the Church of England, and six years later his more famous work the Apology for the Bible, being a series of letters addressed to Thomas Paine. He died in 1816.
Another author who may be set beside Bishop Watson is Dr Joseph Milner, who wrote an Anstuer to the attack on Christianity, which is contained in Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. Milner was one of those Evangelical Clergy who sympathized with the labours
186 EVANGELICAL WRITERS.
of Wesley, and from this cause he was for some time much opposed by the upj^er classes in the neighbourhood of Hull, where he was Head-Master of the Grammar School and held some clerical preferment. But he was able to live down all the opposition, and subsequently was chosen by the Corporation of the Town to be vicar of the principal church there. His most important literary work was a History of the Christian Church which he was able to carry down to the thirteenth century. It was a notable work for its time, but has long been superseded by the writins^s of authors who have had access to more, and more trustworthy, authorities than were at Milner's disposal. Milner died in 1797.
Another clergyman who took a large share in the Evangelical movements of the time, was Charles Simeon, fellow of King's College in Cambridge. He was for many years vicar of Trinity Church in that town, and exercised by his preaching a powerful influence over the religious life of his generation. As might be expected his chief labour was bestowed on the production of the pulpit addresses which he found so eagerly received, and thus his works, which fill twenty-one volumes, have taken the form of homiletic notes designed to form a sort of preacher's commentary on the whole Bible. Simeon died in 1836, but the scene of his labours still retains the character which it derived from his earnest ministrations.
In 1833 there died one who, though a layman, occupied a foremost place among his countrymen in every movement of a religious or philanthropic character. This was Wm. Wilberforce. Early in 1787 he had taken an active part in the promotion of a society for the reformation of manners. His great efforts as a statesman were bent to the abolition of the Slave Trade, though he did not live long enough
DR PALEY. 187
to see the Act ^passed by which that object was achieved. In 1797 he put forth a work which produced a deep effect both in England and Scotland. This was his Practical View of the prevailing religious system of professed Chris- tians in the higher and middle classes of this country con- trasted with real Christianity. This book was at once widely read, and the author was thanked on all sides for the earnest tone and powerful appeals which it contained. And its popularity and usefulness has been such that it has been translated into nearly ever}^ language of the European continent and has been as welcome in America as in England. Mr Wilberforce also exerted himself to obtain the establishment of a branch of the English Church in our Indian possessions and his exertions led the way to the appointment of bishops for India.
The list of theological writers, who may be identified with the Church of England, will fitly close with the name of Dr WilHam Paley. Born in 1743, he died in 1805. He first became known as an author by some Observations on the character and example of Christ which he prefixed to a new edition of Bp Law's Reflections. His first important work was published in 1785. This was Elements of Moral and Political Philosophy, which on its appearance was much attacked. In 1790 was given forth his Horce Pau- lincB, a comparison of St Paul's Epistles with one another and with the Acts of the Apostles, and by exhibiting their undesigned coincidences and the support which each gives to the contents of the other, established the genuineness and authenticity of those portions of the New Testament. Four years later Paley published his Evidences of Chris- tianity in which he deals with those objections to miracles of which Hume had made so much in his Essays. His last work was the Natural Theology, in which he gathered
188 ASSAILANTS OF CHRISTIANITY.
together evidence of the Existence and Attributes of the Deity from the various appearances of Nature. A new- edition of this work has been published with notes and illustrations by Lord Brougham and Sir Charles Bell.
It has been mentioned that Paley's Evidences were directed against the sceptical writings of David Hume. This author, known also for a History of England, had first in 1737 published his opinions in a Treatise on Human Nature, but the work, which was attacked by Warburton, met with small acceptance. Afterwards the book was re-cast and appeared with the title An Enquiry concerning Human Understanding. This too was not a success. Next he put forth the Natural History of Religion, and he wrrote also, though it was not published till after his death, Dialogues concerning Natural Religion. In all these works he either explained away, or denied the truth of what is supernatural in Revelation, and in some of his essays he propounded his opinions in forms that were gross and offensive. He died in 1776.
A still more gross opponent of religion was found in Thomas Paine whose name has already been mentioned in the notice of Bishop Watson. Paine was a political, as well as an infidel writer. The only work of his which need be here mentioned is the Age of Reason which he wrote in a French prison, and which is still much lauded by the apostles of infidelity. Paine died in 1809, and was buried in America. Cobbett some few years after- wards brought his remains to England, in order to excite political enthusiasm for a republican form of government, but the attempt met with the ridicule and contempt which it deserved.
Christianity was also assailed by Gibbon in some chapters (xv. and xvi.) of his Decline and Fall of the
DR PRIESTLEY, 189
Roman Empire. This laborious work was composed by him between 1776 aud 1788, and it is in his account of the growth and progress of Christianity that the author's enmity to religion shews itself. The disingenuousness, which can be traced amid statements that profess to be made with the utmost impartiality, has often been exposed, and the rudeness of the author's sarcasm betrays at once on what side his feelings were engaged. Gibbon died in 1794.
Another form of opposition to Christian truth made itself apparent in the writings of Joseph Priestley. He was a dissenter and of considerable eminence as a student of Natural Science. His religious opinions were Arian, and he wrote a Defence of Socinianism. He became also a believer in the doctrine of philosophic necessity and wrote an essay in defence thereof. Assailing the early records of our religion, as is the wont of the Arian school, he wrote first in 1782 a History of the Corruptions of Christianity/, and in 1786 another History of the Early Opinions concerning Jesus Christ. For his liberal opinions in politics and his sympathy with the republicans in France, as has been already noticed, the mob in Birmingham most unwarrantably destroyed all his philosophical appa- ratus, books and MSS. The offenders were tried, and punished; but even on removal to London Priestley's peculiar tenets on religion and politics made his society little sought for, and in consequence he emigrated to America where he died in 1804.
Among the nonconformist writers there are some names which ought not to be omitted in a notice of theological authors. First may be named the Unitarian, Nathaniel Lardner, whose best known work is Credibility of the Gospel History, a treatise in five volumes which
190 NONCONFORMIST AUTHORS.
still have their value as books of reference. It was first published in 1743, and afterwards the author wrote a supplement to it. He also, in reply to the cavils of Woolston, wrote a Vindication of Three of our Saviours Miracles. Lardner's Unitarian opinions are set forth in his Letter on the Logos. He died in 1768.
Philip Doddridge, who for many years presided over a famous dissenting school in the town of Northampton, was the author of a work which was widely popular both among Dissenters and Churchmen. This was The Rise and Progress of Religion in the Soul. He also wrote a Family Expositor of the New Testament, which held its place for a long time as the most useful book that could be readily found for giving a clearer understanding of difficult texts in Holy Writ. Weak health compelled Doddridge to leave England and he died at Lisbon in 1751. He was the author of several hymns which still retain their popularity. Among them are the Advent hymn, " Hark the glad sound, the Saviour comes," and the hymn for Holy Communion which begins, " My God, and is thy table spread."
Of John Wesley as a writer much need not be said. His sermons form a portion of the standard of doctrine required from ministers in the Wesleyan body. His whole works havebeen published in thirty-two volumes, but he was rather an organizer than a writer. He died in 1791, three years later than his brother Charles, who was the author of most of the Wesleyan hymns, and whose influence from that source, though not so prominently noticeable as that of his brother, was largely helpful to the foundation of the Society.
At a little later period Robert Hall, a Baptist minister, who preached for many years in Cambridge, and afterwards
WRITINGS OF ROBEET HALL. 191
at Leicester, was famous both for learning and eloquence. His chief writings are Christianity consistent luith the love of freedom; Modern infidelity considered with respect to its influence on Society ; and On terms of Communion, a work which relates to some differences between the various sections of the Baptists, and the liberality of which was very remarkable. He also wrote Difference between Christian baj^tism and the baptism of John. He died after many years of severe physical suffering at Bristol in 1831.
CHAPTER XIII.
SKETCH OF CHURCH HISTORY IN SCOTLAND, IRELAND
After the fall of the Stuart dynasty and tlie accession of William III., the Presbyterian form of Church government was re-established in Scotland in 1690 under the Revolu- tion settlement on the same basis as at its first establish- ment in 1592. It does not appear that William at first was very careful about this matter. He had however for his chief adviser in Scotch affairs William Carstairs, after- wards Principal of the University of Edinburgh, and from this source the King learnt, and rightly, that the Presby- terians constituted the great body of the nation. It was also added that they were almost entirely in favour of the Revolution, while the Episcopalians had imbibed the doctrines of regal supremacy, passive obedience and non- resistance to such an extent that they could not be counted on as faithful subjects of any but the ejected royal family. From these considerations the episcopacy which Charles I. had introduced was set aside and presbyterianism was made the established form of Church government in the northern part of the Kingdom.
1 In this Chapter it has been necessary for clearness' sake in some points to carry down the narrative of events beyond 1830.
THE "RABBLING OF THE CURATES." 193
The Act of 1669 which made the King supreme over all causes civil and ecclesiastical was repealed, about sixty of the surviving ejected ministers were reinstated, and the Church was established on the basis of the Westminster Confession. Some laws which had been passed in favour of episcopacy were repealed, but the presbyterians com- plain that the terms which Carstairs accepted or suggested were far too much of a compromise. He seems to have been a man whose experience of the world had made him afraid to trust the whole government of the Church and the disposal of the benefices thereof into the hands of the Scotch people, irritated, as many of them were, with the thought of recent injuries. Hence it came to pass that in the matter of Church patronage wdiile the voice of the people was allowed to be heard on the question of the settlement of ministers, the right of nomination was given to the heritors and elders. The violent action known as the ' Rabbling of the Curates ' whereby at the time of the Revolution the people in more than two hundred parishes took the law into their own hands and summarily ejected the episcopalian clergy most probably gave Carstairs his feeling of dread at committing the sole selection of their clergy to men in such a state of mind. He took care that the violence of the 'Rabblers' should be legalized, but dealt in such tender wise towards the Curates (as the episcopalian clergy were styled) that many of them con- tinued in their parishes after the Revolution as presby- terian ministers. But it was the position in which the patronage question was left, and the parties which arose in consequence, that brought about those divisions in the presbyterian body which are to this day without much prospect of reunion. There were those who would fain have seen the choice of the ministers put solely in the L. 13
194 FIRST SECESSION.
hands of those to whom they were to minister, and these became known by the name of "Evangehcals." But there was a far greater number of those who were named " Moderates " who acquiesced in the middle measure which had been adopted in regard to patronage, and these elements of discord in a short time began to operate.
By the Act of Union between England and Scotland, passed in 1707, the doctrines, worship and government of the presbyterian Church of Scotland were embodied in the Articles of Union, and each sovereign of Great Britain and Ireland on accession to the throne swears to "inviolably maintain and preserve the aforesaid settlement of the true Protestant religion, with the government, worship, discipline, rights and privileges of this Church as above established."
But in 1712 the Parliament set aside the Act of Security by which the Westminster confession of faith and the presbyterian form of Church government were rati- fied, and restored lay patronage. It was not long before the effects of this act began to be felt. In 1725 there took place the first attempt by the patron to intrude a minister into a parish against the will of the people, and after that, cases Were of frequent occurrence, and in a few years the formality of a "call" by the people came to be by the moderate party well nigh disregarded. A remonstrance on this matter addressed to th6 General Assembly of 1732 was disregarded, and in 1733 took place the first Secession, the chief leader of which was Ebenezer Erskine. He and those who sympathised with him formed what was termed an "Associated Presbytery!' It had been the custom for the members of every presbytery to induct each presentee into his parish, but when lay patronage became the rule, the General Assembly provided agents of its own (known under the name of a Riding Committee) who when the
FURTHER DIVISIONS. . 195
presbytery was reluctant to induct, took the business out of their hands, and inducted in the name of the General Assembly.
When Dr Robertson (well known as the historian of Scotland, America, and of the reign of Charles V.) became Principal of the Assembly, he . decided that each presby- tery must do its own work, and the consequence was that a Mr Gillespie, refusing to assent to the settlement of a minister appointed to Inverkeithing, was deposed from his office, and thus became the founder of what was known as the Relief Church in 1752.
For a long period those who were willing to acquiesce in the patronage system were the most powerful body in the General Assembly, and this period was much de- plored by the Evangelical section of the Church, for it was marked by what is thought to have been a degeneracy of doctrine, and an increasing want of strictness in Christian life. Rhetoric was most cultivated in the sermons of the time and morality took the place of Christianity.
But during this time the body which had first seceded in 1733 had grown extensively and was itself subject to a disruption in 1749 by a dispute concerning the right reading of an oath to be administered to burgesses. The two parties in the Secession Church became known from this cause as the Burghers and Anti- burghers. The two synods which grew up from this dispute continued to act as separate Church bodies till 1820 when they again were united, and adopted the title of the " United Secession." In 1847 this body joined itself to the Relief Church and the whole forms now a strong party under the name of the " United Pi^esbyterian Church."
Within the Establishment the struggle between the
13—2
196 SCOTCH CONGREGATIONALISM.
Moderates and Evangelicals continued, and was manifested in the matter of the holding of pluralities. To the minds of the Evangelical party the duties of the ministry had a claim upon the whole powers of him who had entered upon it, and they v^ere able successfully to resist the holding of a pastoral charge and a professorship in the University at the same time. In the meanwhile some of the Seceders had drifted farther than ever from the Church and had begun to look upon all establishment as unscriptural. Such men could never be recovered, and they laid the foundation of a voluntary system in the country from which has sprung Scotch Congregationalism.
Within the Church the question of patronage grew more and more vexed, and in 1834 the General Assembly with the hope of providing a remedy, passed the " Veto " Act. It was therein directed that no ordination should go forward if a majority of the male heads of families being communicants formally placed their veto on the induction of a minister presented by the patron. But it w^as not long before a conflict was raised, on this decree of the Assembly, by the famous Auchterarder case. Mr Robert Young had been presented to Auchterarder but his induction had been vetoed. He sought his remedy in the Civil Courts, and by them it was decided that the Assembly had exceeded its powers in the passing of the Veto Act, and that the Parliament was the temporal head of the Established Church.
Thus the popular acceptance might be utterly dis- regarded in the settlement of a minister, and this made a disruption inevitable. For though there were some who were ready to acquiesce in the ruling of the Civil Courts, to many such a course was abhorrent. Matters went on till 1843, and then was made the great separation, by
THE EPISCOPAL CHURCH. 197
whicli those who refused to accept the decision of the Civil Courts left the Assembly declaring that what had ever been understood by the Church was now overthrown. This seceding body now forms the ''Free Church of Scotland!' Thus it comes to pass that there are in Scotland three Presbyterian bodies, all of which profess to adhere to the old standards, but are on a different footing with regard to the civil power, the Established Church, the Free Church, and the United Presbyterian Church, which last comprises nearly all the earliest secessions. Beside these bodies and the Congregational Churches, which have arisen from their seceders, there are in Scotland some Koman Catholics descendants of those old families who have never changed to the Reformed faith, and still more who have come over into the country from Ireland. The Episcopal Church is also a growing body, and is presided over by seven bishops \ and the closer inter-communication with England gives it more influence than it possessed in earlier days, w^hile it numbers among its members a large proportion of the gentry of the land. It is making quiet progress and is free from the stormy debates and struggles which have in recent times much agitated all the Presbyterian bodies.
In Ireland after the accession of William III. the vacancies which had been allowed to remain in the Epis- copal bench during the reign of James II. were filled up and the Protestants of Ireland were almost unanimous in their hearty acceptance of the new dynasty. But the Roman Catholics continued to be a hostile body and as their hostility was of a political character many severe
1 The sees are (1) Moray, Eoss and Caithness ; (2) St Andrews, Dun- keld and Dunblane ; (3) Edinburgh ; (4) Aberdeen and Orkney ; (5 Glasgow and Galloway ; (6) Brechin ; (7) Argyll and the Isles.
198 THE CHURCH IN IHELAND.
laws were passed against them. Romish bishops and monks were to leave the country, the monasteries were suppressed, no inter-marriage between Papists and Pro- testants was allowed, nor could a Koman Catholic hold property, carry arms, or practise as a solicitor. The effect of such laws was, as might be expected, to increase the bitterness of feeling between men of different creeds, and to engender the strongest party spirit, so that it seemed to be hopeless to win the people as a whole to allegiance, or to gain them over to the Reformed religion. An effort w^as made by those who at the time presided over the Established Church in Ireland to reach the people through a translation of the Bible and Prayer-book into the Irish language and by appointing preachers who would teach and minister in Irish, but the project was not received with much favour, and the opposite course, of trying to win the Irish to adopt English habits and speech, was preferred by many.
During Queen Anne's reign the Irish Convocation was revived and held several sessions but when the silencing of
o
the English Convocation took place in 1717, the Irish convocation was also suspended. When George I. came to the throne his supporters displayed through a long term of years a very suspicious policy towards Ireland. There may have been many grounds for suspicion, for the Jacobites had cherished hopes that at the death of Anne, the Stuart family might be restored. But the influence of such a policy on the Church was very disastrous. English- men rather than Irishmen were appointed most frequently to the episcopate in Ireland and to any posts of profit and emolument in the Irish Church and thus there arose within the Episcopalian body itself two parties, the English and the Irish, whom this inequitable distribution of
CATHOLIC EMANCIPATION. 199
patronage had made mutually jealous of aud antagonistic to one another. From this cause was the house not only beset by foes without, but wofally divided against itself within.
Yet before the close of the eighteenth century it was found possible to repeal many of the penal laws against Romanists, though the rebellion of 1798 shews that poli- tical feeling was in no degree calmed in this excitable portion of the Empire. It was this rebellion which brought about the proposals for a formal union between the two kingdoms, so that one parliament might legislate for Ireland, Scotland, and England. This Union was effected in 1801, and then the continuance and preservation of the one National Church as the Established Church of Enofland and Ireland was declared to be "an essential and fundamental part of the Union of the Realms."
In 1829 when the Roman Catholic Emancipation Act was passed there was an end put to the disabilities under which Romanists had so long been suffering. It is worth while to notice some of the language then employed by Roman Catholic prelates in reference to the Protestant Established Church. *' There is no wish/ said the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Dublin in his evidence before the House of Commons, "on the part of the Roman Catholic Clergy to disturb the present establishment, or to partake of any part of the wealth it enj.oys, and they have not the least objection to give the most full and .entire assurance on this subject that might be required of them." Read in the light of subsequent agitation, which lias resulted in the disestablishment of the Irish Church, these words shew how far men are justified in trusting to assurances made under such circumstances.
In the year 1823 a Tithe Commutation Act for Ireland
200 IRISH CHURCH TEMPORALITIES ACT.
was passed which seemed for a time likely to render the payments required for the support of the Established Church somewhat less unpopular. As in England the arrangement was made greatly in the interest of the payers of tithe, but the clergy, being now spared the un- popularity arising from the collection thereof, were not indisposed to balance the gain against the loss. But agitation does not cease in Ireland, and in 1838 the tithe commutation, which had for fifteen years been paid by the occupier, was converted into a rent-charge payable by the owner, and for this change the receivers of tithe were mulcted of about one-fourth of the sum at which the tithe had been first commuted.
While these movements were in progress there was passed in 1834 the "Irish Church Temporalities Act." By this measure the rates, payable for the repair of Churches, the payments of the needful officers and the provision of such things as are requisite for divine Service, were abolished ; a board of Ecclesiastical Com- missioners was established, who were to have the care of Church fabrics, and the provision of the expenses of public worship, and to secure funds for this purpose ten out of the twenty-two Irish bishoprics were suppressed, and a tax imposed on the remaining bishoprics and on all clerical incomes above £300 a year. Then in 1854 a sum of more than £12,000 a year, known as "Ministers' Money" and payable by the householders of certain principal towns was also given up. By these measures even before the disestablishment, which took place in 1869, the revenues of the Irish Church had been curtailed by about one-third.
In America, after the departure of Dr Bray, whose labours in behalf of the Colonists have already been men-
AMERICAN BISHOPS. 201
tioned, commissaries were appointed for others of the American colonies, e.g. South Carolina and New York, and the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel sent out labourers into this field, and even some of the Puritans of New England joined the Episcopal body. Many efforts to obtain an Episcopate for America were made by the colon- ists, but for a long time without any success and in the face of great opposition, and all church life was weak- ened by the political struggle for Independence, while, during the war, the confiscation of Church Property brought the clergy into deep suffering, and then after the Declaration of Independence, and its recognition by Great Britain, the grants of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel were withdrawn, so that the clergy were thrown upon the voluntary offerings of the people for their whole support. But the almost expiring church awoke to new life after the cessation of hostilities, and some young men who had been trained for her ministry were sent over to England, and through the influence of Dr Lowth, then Bishop of London, obtained ordination from Enghsh Bishops, without the need of taking the oath of allegiance to the King, and in 1784 a Bishop of Connecticut was consecrated. This was Dr Samuel Seabury who had been a missionary, sent out by the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel. He came over to England to seek for consecration from our Episcopate, but just at that time the Archbishop of Canterbury had died, and certain other difficulties arising, Dr Seabury was even- tually consecrated by the Scotch Bishops at Aberdeen on the 14th of November.
In September 1785 there assembled in Philadelphia the first General Convention of the American Episcopal Church, but bishop Seabury was not present. The main subjects of discussion were the compilation of a Liturgy
202 REVISION OF THE PRAYER-BOOK.
and a debate on the means which should be adopted for obtaining an Episcopate for America. The movement in connexion with the latter object resulted after some time in the sending to England of Dr White, who had been chosen to be bishop of Pennsylvania, and Dr Provost, who had been named for bishop of New York. These clergy- men were consecrated by the Archbishop of Canterbury, and returning home reached New York on Easter Sunday, 1787. Subsequently Dr Madison in 1790 was sent to England for consecration, after being chosen bishop-elect of Virginia, and he afterwards joined with the other bishops in consecrating Dr Claggett bishop for Maryland, and in this way the Church became strengthened and able to make good progress in the various states.
The Revision of the Liturgy was undertaken by the first General Convention in Philadelphia in September, 1785, under the presidency of Dr White. ''The Proposed Book," as the work produced by this body is often called, bears signs of hasty preparation. Beside many changes rendered necessary by the separation of America from the crown of England, the 39 Articles of the English Church were in it reduced to 20, and these exhibiting a sad muti- lation of the original. The Nicene Creed and the Atha- nasian Creed were neither of them acknowledged, and the clause "He descended into hell" was omitted from the Apostles' Creed. The book so modified was not acceptable to the Church at home or in England, and it was a subject of debate in several conventions. At length in 1801 the 89 Articles of the English Church were adopted by the Americans with the one exception of the recognition of the Athanasian Creed, and the few political altera- tions which changed circumstances made unavoidable. The words of Bishop White on the work as it now
GROWTH OF THE CHURCH IN AMERICA. 203
remains are "The object kept in view in all the con- sultations held, and the determinations formed, was the perpetuating of the episcopal Church, on the ground of the general principles which she had inherited from the Church of England ; and of not departing from them except so far as either local circumstances required, or some very impor- tant cause rendered proper. To those acquainted with the system of the Church of England it must be evident that the object here stated was accomplished on the ratification of the Articles."
Beside the exclusion of the Athanasian Creed the only very noteworthy change made by the Americans is the insertion in the Communion office of the prayer of Obla- tion and Invocation taken from the Scotch pvayer-book, which is the same in this particular as the first prayer- book of Edward VI. The adoption of this prayer is ascribed to the influence of Bishop Seabury.
Since the date of these discussions the Episcopal Church has advanced, at first only slowly but in later years more rapidly, in the United States, and a greater increase in the number of her ministers and in her members has been brought about since the establishment in New York, through the exertions of Bishop Hobart, of the General Theological Seminary of the Church. In 1814 the clergy were little more than two hundred and forty, which number in 1861 had increased to 2400, and it is almost made cer- tain by statistics that the present growth of the Episcopal Church in America is more rapid in proportion than is the in •grease of the population.
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L. 14
INDEX.
Abjuration oath, 48, 66
Activity of the Church at the be- ginning of Q. Anne's reign, 111
Act of 1700 against Papists, 59
Act of Settlement, 49
Addington, Mr, anti-Catholic ad- ministration of, 175
Agitation for abolition of subscrip- tion, 141
America, question of Bishops for, 109, 160; Methodists in, 159; growth of Episcopal Church in, 203
American alterations in the Prayer- book, 203
Anabaptists, see Baptists
Anne, Queen, 49, 62, 78, 198
Arianism, revival of, 140
Aiian Subscription, 141
"Associated Presbytery," 194
Atterbury, Dr, 75; opponent of Dr Wake, 94; author of a book on Convocation, 114; Prolocutor of Lower House, 122 ; arrested, 130 ; tried and banished, 131
Auchterarder case, the, 196
Bangorian controversy, 142, 181
Baptists, 15
Barclay, Kobert, the Quaker, works of, 101
Beaufoy, Mr, moves the repeal of Test and Corporation Acts, 170, 171
Beveridge, Dr William, Bp of St Asaph, 89, 104
Bill for naturalizing foreign Protes- tants, 72
Bingham, Joseph, works of, 92
Birmingham riots, 172
Bishops, names of those who re- fused to take the oath, 40 n. Bishops, nonjuring, deprived, 33 Bishops, King William's, 33 Bishops, Queen Anne's, 72 Bishops, trial of the seven, 7 Bohler, Peter, the Moravian, 150 Boothe, the last Separatist Bishop,
54 Bounty, Queen Anne's, 68 Bray, Dr Thomas, member of S. P. C. K. and founder of S. P. G., 108, 200; his friends and coadjutors, 110 Brett, Thomas, 83 Brokesby, 49
Brown, Robert, founder of the Inde- pendents, 15 Browne, Peter, opponent of Toland,
95 Bull, Dr George, his works, 88 Burnet, Gilbert, Bp of Salisbury, 30, 68 ; his works, 85 ; his book on the XXXIX. Articles censm-ed, 116
Calamy, Edmund, works of, 100 Calvinistic controversy, 155 — 158 Campbell, a Scotch Bishop, 52, 53 Canning, Mr, won over to the
Catholic side, 176 Carstairs, William, 192 Cartwright, one of the Separatist
Bishops, 54 Case of Allegiance, Dr Sherlock's, 43 Catholic Emancipation, 179, 199 Catholic reHef, 173, 175, 177 Chandler, Dr, a writer against the
Deists, 98 Cheshunt, Lady Huntingdon's Col- lege at, 156
212
INDEX.
"Church in Danger" cry, 70
Church in Scotland, the, 192; in Ireland, 197 ; in America, 200
Claggett, Dr, BishoiD of Maryland, 202
Clarke, Dr Samuel, works of, 95; censured by Convocation, 123 ; reviver of Arianism, 140, 182
Clergy unfriendly to William III., 29
Collier, Jeremy, 47, 50, 81
Collins, Anthony, a deistical writer, 98, 143, 182
Commissaries in America, 201
Commission to consider plans for Comprehension, 30
Comprehension, BiU of, 25; the scheme revived, 30
Compton, Bp of London, 5, 8
Congregationalism in Scotland, 196
Connexion, Lady Huntingdon's, forced to secede, 156
Controversies of 18th century, 139 ; their effects, 144
Controversies frequent in the Church of England, 80
Controversy on the Eights of Convo- cation, 114
Convocation Book, Bp Overall's, 43
Convocation, rejects the proposal for Comprehension, 31 ; sum- moned after some interval (1701), 37 ; short account of, 112 — 125
Conybeare's Defence of Eevealed Religion, 98, 144
Correspondence of English states- men with James II., 58
Court of Ecclesiastical Commission, 5, 10 and note
Cowper, Wilham, 163
Declarationof William of Orange, 10 Deism, evil effects of, 144 Deistical controversy, 143 ; writers
in, 143, 144 Deprivation of the Nonjurors, 41 Differences between the Nonjurors
and the Greek Church, 52 Directions to the clergy, 137 Dispensing power, 4 Disputes between the two Houses of
Convocation, 115 et seqq.
Dissenters, Protestant, favoured by James II., 4 ; slow to join William of Orange, 11 ; their views on the settlement, 19 ; their feelings about Comprehension, 32; gloomy prospects at Q. Anne's accession, 63; interest in Occasional Con- formity Bill, 67 ; deserted by the Whigs, 77; prospects at the ac- cession of George I., 128; slight relief granted to them, 133 ; their condition during l8th century, 165 — 167 ; they attempt to obtain the repeal of the Test and Corpo- ration Acts, 170; feeling of dis- trust towards them, 171
Distribution of Patronage in Ireland, 198
Doddridge, PhiHp, 190
Dodwell, 49
Dryden, 56, 79
Enquiry into the state of the Church,
71 Envoy sent to Eome by James H., 56 Episcopal Church in Scotland, 197 Erskine, Ebenezer, 194 Evangelical School, the, its tenets
and rules of life, 161 Evangelicals, a party in the Church
of Scotland, 194
Firmin, Thomas, the Socinian, 34
Fitzwilliam, Lord, 174
Fletcher, John, vicar of Madeley,
157 Fox, Charles James, 171, 173 Fox, George, the founder of the
Society of Friends, 17, 101 Free Church of Scotland, origin of,
197
George I., 127
George H., Dissenters under, 134,
166 George IH., 175, 176 George of Denmark, prince, 67 General Convention of American
Episcopal Church, 201 Gibbon, Edward, 189 Gillespie, Mr, founder of the Relief
Church, 195
INDEX.
213
Godolphin, 67, 74
Gordon, the last of the regular non- juring Bishops, 53
Grattan, Mr, the advocate of Catho- lic claims, 176 ; his hill for Catholic relief, 177
Greek Church, proposal for uniting the nonjurors with the, 51
Hall, Kohert, 190
Hare, Francis, dean of Worcester, 143
Henry, Matthew, a Nonconformist theologian, 100
Hervey, the author of the Medi- tations, 148
Hickeringill, Edmund, 121 and note
Hickes, the first Nonjuring Suffra- gan Bishop, 50, 82
Hoadly, Dr, 121, 124, 142
Horneck, Dr, 104
Houghton, Sir Henry, his Bill to relieve Dissenters, 168
Howe, John, a Nonconformist theo- logian, 99
Hume, David, 188
Huntingdon, Selina, Countess of, 156
Indemnity, Acts of, 134, 166 Independents, 14 Injunctions, King "William's, 35 Insurrection of 1715, 129 ; of 1745,
166 Ireland, troubles in, 174; union
with England, 174, 199 Irish Catholics allowed to hold
office in England, 177 Irish Church Temporalities Act,
200 Irish Convocation, 198 Irish Parliament passes a Bill for
Catholic rehef, 174
Jacobite plots, 46
Jacobites, their satisfaction at Q. Anne's accession, 62; hopes at the time of her death, 126 ; their supporters and their opponents, 128
Jacobitism, second birth of, 129
James II. seeks to repeal the Test Act, 1 ; pays court to Dissenters, 4 ; publishes Declaration of Tole- ration, 5 ; proclamations, 11 ; leaves England, 12 ; his death, 48 Jews, Bill for naturalizing, 135 Junta of Five, the, 130 and note
Keith, George, the Quaker, 108 Ken, Bp of Bath and Wells, 46, 49 Kennicott, Dr Benjamin, 184
Land-tax Bill, Occasional Con- formity Bill tacked to, 69
Lardner, Nathaniel, 189
Latitudinarianism among the Clergy, 137
Law, William, his works, 98, 147, 181
Laws against Eoman Catholics in Ireland, 198
Lay-Baptism, controversy about, 92
Laymen roused by the Evangelicals, 162
Lay-preachers, instituted by Wes- ley, 152; schismatical conduct of some, 159
Leland's View of the Deistical writers, 98
Leslie, Charles, his writings, 83
Letter from Q. Anne commanding the prorogation of Convocation, 120
Liturgy, Kevisionof the, in America, 202
Lloyd, Bp of Norwich, 46, 49
Lowth, Dr Robert, 184, 201
Madison, Dr, Bp of Vh-ginia, 202 Manifesto of the Pretender in 1721,
129 Marriage Act of 1753, 136 Mary, wife of WiUiam HI., 8, 21,
33, 34 Maryland, Dr Bray sent to, 108 Mead, Matthew, works of, 100 Methodist Club, 147 Methodist Conference, first, 152,
153 Methodists, origin of the name,
146; gradually separate from the
Church, 158, 160
2U
INDEX.
Milner, Isaac and Joseph, 163
Milner, Joseph, 185
"Minister's Money," 200
Minutes of the Methodist Confer- ence of 1770, 156
Moderates, a party in the Scotch Church, 194
Monmouth's rebellion, 2
Moravians, the Wesley s join the, 150
Mortmain, repeal of the statute of, 69
National Society founded, 178
Nelson, Eobert, the Nonjuror, 49, 107
Newcastle, riots against Dissenters at, 63
Newton, John, 163, 178
Nonjurors deprived, 41 ; they conse- crate new Bishops, 45 ; their Jaco- bite sympathies, 46; a few rejoin the Church, 49; suspected of sharing in the rebellion of 1715, 50; proposal of union with the Greek Church, 51; find little favour with James II., 58; un- justly taxed, 61
Nonjurors, writings of, 81 et seqq.
Nonresidence among the clergy, 138
"No Popery" riots in Scotland, 169; in England, 170; the cry raised again, 176
Nottingham, Earl of, 25, 76
Oath of Allegiance, 38
Obj ects of the first religious societies ,
104 Occasional Conformity, 64 Occasional Conformity, Bill against
brought and rejected repeatedly,
64—70 ; passed, 76 ; repealed, 133 O'Connell, Daniel, 180 Opportunities for reviving the power
of Convocation, 125 Organization of the Methodists, 153
Paine, Thomas, 188
Paley, Dr VViUiam, writings of, 187
Parties in the Church at the time
of the Eevolution, 13 Parties in the Scotch Secession
Church, 195
Patronage, question of, in Scotland,
193 Penn, WUliam, 17, 102 Pitt, "William, his attitude towards
Dissenters, 171; towards Koman
Catholics, 174 Political Churchmanship, 111, 137 Popery, increase of, in Lancashire,
71 Presbyterian Church government
reestablished in Scotland, 192 Presbyterians, 14 Prideaux, Dr Humphrey, writings
of, 90 Priestley, Dr Joseph, 172, 189 "Proposed Book," the, 202 Protesting Catholic Dissenters, 172 Provost, Dr, Bp of New York, 202
Quakers, 17; allowed to make a declaration instead of taking an oath, 28
Quakers' Tithes' Bill, 135
"Babbling of the Curates," 193
Kaikes, Thomas, founder of Sunday Schools, 178
Eeasons against taking the oath to Wilham III., 40
KebeUion, Irish, 174, 199
Kegency, question of a, 18
Regency of George, Prince of Wales, 176
"Relief Church," 195
Religious societies, 103 et seqq.
Revolution, French, its effects on opinion in England, 171
Right, Declaration of, 21
Riots in Scotland, 169 ; in London, 170; at Birmingham, 172
Rochester, Earl of, 56
Roman Catholics, commissions in the army given to, 2 ; protected by order of William in., 23; excluded from the benefits of the Toleration Act, 28; severe Act against, 36, 59; make St Ger- mains their head-quarters, 57 ; taxed with the Nonjurors, 61; their condition during early part of 18th century, 167 ; failure of attempt to grant them relief.
INDEX.
215
169; relief obtained, 173; final emancipation, 179, 199 Eutherforth, Dr, 184
Sacheverell, Dr, his sermons, 73 ; his trial, 74, 75
Bancroft, Axchbp of Canterbury, summons the Bishops to a meeting, 6; is in favour of a Regency, 18 ; refuses to attend the Convention Parliament, 19; supports the Bill for Compre- hension, 25, 40 ; deprived, 42 ; his death, 84
Savile, Sir George, his Bill for CathoHc relief, 169
Schism Bill, 78; repealed, 133, 165
Scott, Thomas, 163
Seabury, Dr Samuel, first American Bishop, 201
Secession, first, in the Scotch Church, 194
Security, Act of, 194
Separatists, a party among the Nonjurors, 53
Serious clergy, the, 157, 161
Settlement of the Crown, 13
Sewell, WiUiam, works of, 102
Shaftesbury, Lord, deistical writings of, 144
Sharp, Dr, Archbp of York, 33
Sherlock, Dr, Master of the Temple, 18, 35, 43, 87
Sherlock, Dr Thomas, Bp of Bangor, 87, 143, 182
Shirley, Mr, 157
Simeon, Charles, 186
Smalbroke, Bp of St David's, 99
Snape, Dr, Provost of Eton, 143
Societies for the Eeformation of Manners, 105
Society, British and Foreign Bible, 177
Society, Church Missionary, 177
Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 107, 178
Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, 109
Socinian doctrines, attempt to sup- press, 106
South, Dr, Sherlock's opponent, 35, 87
Spinkes, the Nonjuror, opposes the
Usages, 51 Sprat, Bp of Rochester, 9 St Germains, abode of James II., 12 Stillingfleet, Edward, works of, 90,
95 Stock, Thomas, 179 Suffragan Bishops, nonjuring, 45 Sunday School Institute, Church of
England, 179 Supremacy, Act of, repealed in
Scotland, 193 Suspension of the penal laws, 5
Tax on the estates of Roman Catholics and Nonjurors, 132, 167
Tenison, Archbp of Canterbury, 34
Test Act, 1; violations of, discussed by Parliament, 3
Test and Corporation Acts, at- tempts to obtain repeal of, 133, 134, 166, 170, 171; repealed, 179
Third declaration of William of Orange, a forgery, 57
Thornton, John and Henry, 163, 178
Tillotson, Archbp of Canterbury, 29, 33, 84
Tindal, Matthew, deistical writings of, 97, 144
Tithe Commutation Act for Ire- land, 199
Toland, John, writings of, 95, 143
Toleration Act, 25, 27
Toleration, declaration of, 5, 17
Toplady, Augustus, 157
Trevecca, Lady Huntingdon's col- lege at, 156
Trinitarian controversy, 34, 139
Union with Ireland, 174, 199 Union with Scotland, 121, 194 "United Irishmen," 174 Unpopularity of the Methodists,
154 Usages, the, 51, 52
Venn, Henry, 163, 178 "Veto" Act, the, 196
216
INDEX.
Wagstaffe, one of the Suffragan Bishops, 45
Wake, Archbp, works of, 93
"Wales, Prince of, 8
Wall's History of Infant Baptism, 121
Warbiirton's Divine Legation of Moses, 144, 183
Waterland, Dr, writer against the Arians, 96, 141, 182
Watson, Dr Richard, Bp of Llandaff , 185
Wellington, Duke of, 179
Wesley, Charles, 147, 148, 160, 190
Wesley, John, 146—160; his writ- ings, 190
Wesley, Samuel, 146
Whiston, William, the Arian, 96,
122, 140 White, Dr, Bishop of Pennsylvania,
202 Whitefield, George, 148, 149, 151,
154, 160 Wilberforce, William, 163, 186 William, Prince of Orange, 8, 10,
20, 21 William m., 22, 29, 33, 57 Wollaston, William, works of, 96 Woodward, Dr, dean of Salisbury,
117 Woolston, Thomas, a deistical
writer, 98 Writers in the Deistical contro- versy, 144
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