CHAPTER XIV.
Early Congregational Churches.
A Congregational Church existed in London so early as 1568. It consisted of poor people, numbering about 200, "of more women than men," who openly separated from the Establishment, and sometimes in private houses, sometimes in fields, and occasionally even in ships, held meetings, and administered the sacraments.[434] Some of these early Independents were sent to Bridewell. In a declaration signed by Richard Fitz, the pastor, occurs the following brief statement of principles:—"First and foremost, the glorious Word and Evangel preached, not in bondage and subjection, but freely and purely; secondly, to have the sacraments ministered purely only, and altogether according to the institution and good word of the Lord Jesus, without any tradition or invention of man; and, last of all, to have, not the filthy canon law, but discipline only, and altogether agreeable to the same heavenly and almighty word of our good Lord Jesus Christ."[435] In these quaint words of Richard Fitz, and his obscure brethren, lie folded up the great truth that the Christian religion is simply a moral power, based on a Divine foundation, not asking, because not needing, support from political governments, or aid from physical force. These humble men really believed that Jesus Christ established His empire upon the consent and not the fears of man, "and trusted Himself defenceless among mankind."[435] Not caring for earthly sanctions, they threw themselves on the world with only Heaven for their protector. Through Christian faith they did what at the time they could not comprehend, being utterly unconscious of the importance of the act which they performed.
This Church in London existed before the well-known Robert Browne appeared as the advocate of advanced Nonconformist views. In 1571 he was cited on that account before the commissioners at Lambeth; and ten years later the Bishop of Norwich, in a letter to Lord Burleigh, referred to him as a person "to be feared, lest if he were at liberty he would seduce the vulgar sort of the people, who greatly depend on him."
1581.
Burleigh said in reply:—[437]
"I understand that one Browne, a preacher, is by your lordship and others of the Ecclesiastical Commission committed to the custody of the Sheriff of Norfolk, where he remains a prisoner, for some matters of offence uttered by him by way of preaching; wherein I perceive, by sight of some letters, written by certain godly preachers in your lordship's diocese, he hath been dealt with, and by them dissuaded from that course he hath taken. Forasmuch as he is my kinsman, if he be son to him whom I take him to be, and that his error seemeth to proceed of zeal, rather than of malice, I do therefore wish he were charitably conferred with and reformed; which course I pray your lordship may be taken with him, either by your lordship, or such as your lordship shall assign for that purpose. And in case there shall not follow thereof such success as may be to your liking, that then you would be content to permit him to repair hither to London, to be further dealt with, as I shall take order for, upon his coming; for which purpose I have written a letter to the sheriff, if your lordship shall like thereof."[438]
Congregationalism—Robert Browne.
Sir Robert Jermyn, in a letter to Burleigh (1581), alludes to Browne as a man who "had many things that were godly and reasonable, and, as he thought, to be wished and prayed for, but with the same there were other things strange and unheard." He further begged the Lord Treasurer to advise Browne to be more careful in his conduct, and to threaten him with sharp censure as an example to others, since he was but a mere youth in age and experience. The Bishop of Norwich, also, writing to the Lord Treasurer about this troublesome clergyman, observed "that Mr. Browne's late coming into his diocese, and teaching strange and dangerous doctrine in all disordered manner, had greatly troubled the whole country, and brought many to great disobedience of all law and magistrates—that yet, by the good aid and help of the Lord Chief Justice, and Master Justice Anderson, his associate, the chiefest of such factions were so bridled, and the rest of their followers so greatly dismayed, as he verily hoped of much good and quietness to have thereof ensued, had not the said Browne returned again contrary to his expectation, and greatly prejudiced those their good proceedings, and having private meetings in such close and secret manner that he knew not possibly how to suppress the same."[439] Browne, at length, through the influence of his illustrious relative, succumbed to the ecclesiastical authority which before he had daringly resisted, and became master of St. Olave's Grammar-school, in Southwark. His subsequent career covered him with disgrace. He had a wife with whom for many years he never lived, a church in which he never preached, and the circumstances of his death, like the scenes of his life, were stormy and turbulent.[440] Whatever sympathy with some of Browne's principles might be felt by the Independents of the next age, they repudiated any connection with Browne's name, and held his character and history in the utmost abhorrence.
1583.
Browne's influence told considerably in the Eastern Counties, where a strong leaven of ultra-Protestantism has existed ever since the Lollard days. Even Kett's rebellion, often treated as a Roman Catholic outbreak, looks more like a peasants' war in aid of the Reformation than anything else. Bury St. Edmunds, where Brownism flourished, witnessed the death of Copping and Thacker, two Congregational martyrs, hanged in 1583. In Essex, a movement which looked like Congregationalism won some measure of sympathy from the upper classes, and even the wife of Sir Nicholas Bacon, Lord Keeper of the Great Seal, attended meetings held in Rochford Hall by Mr. Wright, who had been ordained in the Netherlands. Writing to Lord Burleigh, that lady observed, "I hear, them in their public exercises, as a chief duty commanded by God to be done, and also I confess, as one that hath found mercy, that I have profited more in the inward feeling knowledge of God his holy will, though but in a small measure, by such sincere and sound opening of the Scriptures by an ordinary preaching within these seven or eight year, than I did by hearing odd sermons at Paul's well nigh twenty year together."[441]
It is a curious circumstance to find Lord Bacon's mother connected with a minister who maintained, as Wright did, that every pastor was a bishop, and that he should be chosen by his own congregation, opinions which constitute the essence of modern Congregationalism. From these opinions the ecclesiastical authorities sought to convert him by imprisonment; and with that forcible argument another was associated, which is so original that we cannot resist the temptation of quoting it. Mr. Barwick, a conforming clergyman, commended to Wright the Church of England as a church most admirable on account of its being free from the two opposite extremes of Popery and Puritanism. "God delights in mediocrity," says this logician, and the logic is worth being noted for its curiosity: "Man was put in the midst of Paradise; a rib was taken out of the midst of man; the Israelites went through the midst of the Red Sea, and of Jordan; Samson put firebrands in the midst, between the foxes' tails; David's men had their garments cut off by the midst; Christ was hanged in the midst between two thieves."
Congregationalism—Henry Browne.
Perhaps Henry Barrowe,—a lawyer of Gray's Inn, and in his young days a courtier,—of all men in the reign of Elizabeth, propounded the clearest views of Congregationalism. He strongly objected to forms of prayer, especially the Common Prayer Book; to the sacraments, as administered in the Church of England; to the ecclesiastical laws and canons; to the idea that the establishment was a true church; to the extent of the Queen's ecclesiastical supremacy, and to the abolition of the judicial law of Moses. He denied that it was lawful for any private person to intermeddle with the prince's office, and to reform the State without his good liking and licence; but he virtually admitted the right of private Christians to share in the regulation of ecclesiastical matters: for he expressly contended that the government of Christ's Church belongeth not to the profane or unbelieving, neither could it, he said, without manifest sacrilege, be set over parishes as they then stood in confusion, no difference being made between the faithful and unbelieving, all being indifferently received into the body of the Church; but over every particular congregation of Christ he concluded that there ought to be an eldership, and that every such congregation ought to aim at its establishment.[442]
1593.
In 1592 a Church was formed in Nicholas Lane. Spies were on the look out, and a wary doorkeeper admitted the little congregation as they stealthily dropped in one by one. Mr. Francis Johnson and Mr. Greenwood were of the number. The first of these rose and prayed for half an hour, and, opening his Genevan Bible, discoursed to the assembly on the constitution of primitive brotherhood. The brethren formed themselves into such a communion, and gave to each other the right hand of fellowship. Mr. Johnson was chosen pastor, after which he baptized seven persons. "But they had neither godfathers nor godmothers; and he took water and washed the faces of them that were baptized." He afterwards broke the bread, consisting of five white loaves, which, with a cup of wine, were distributed amongst the members by Mr. Bowman and Mr. Lee, who had been elected deacons: after which a collection was made for the poor.[443]
Not only in Nicholas Lane, but in Aldgate and Smithfield, were gatherings of this description, and especially in Islington, where meetings of persecuted Protestants had been held in Mary's reign. As the dew sparkled on the grass, as the birds twittered on the hedges, and as the sun bathed the landscape in golden light—the memories of the congregation in the Islington woods would go back to Roger Holland and his brother confessors, who on that very greensward, and under the shadow of those old trees, had studied their Bibles, and then been burned for doing so.
Barrowe and Browne.
Barrowe and Greenwood were indicted at the Old Bailey, in 1593, for publishing seditious books, but from the examination preserved in the Egerton papers,[444] it appears that the specific accusations against them related simply to religious opinions.
By a refinement of cruelty these poor men were conveyed to Tyburn in the death-cart—to receive a delusive respite under the gallows-tree—to be brought back again to Newgate—and when they had thought that the bitterness of death was past, to be a second time dragged to the place of execution, to return no more. This extraordinary proceeding, which at first looks like a piece of intentional barbarity, receives its explanation from a contemporary letter in the State Paper Office.
1609.
"The Parliament is to end this week. * * * There was a bill preferred against the Barrowists and Brownists, making it felony to maintain any opinions against the ecclesiastical government, [which by the bishops' means did pass the Upper House, but found so captious by the Nether House, as it was thought it would never have passed in any sort, for that it was thought all the Puritans would have been drawn within the compass thereof. Yet by the earnest labouring of those that sought to satisfy the bishops' humours,] it is passed to this effect: That whosoever shall be an obstinate recusant, refusing to come to any church, and do deny the Queen to have any power or authority in ecclesiastical causes, and do, by writing or otherwise, publish the same, and be a keeper of conventicles also, being convicted, he shall abjure the realm within three months, and lose all his goods and lands; if he return without leave it shall be felony. Thus have they minced it, as is thought, so as it will not reach to any man that shall deserve favour in a concurrence of so many faults and actions. The week before, upon the late conventicle you wrote of last, Barrowe and Goodman,[445] with some others, were indicted, arraigned, and condemned upon the statute of writing and publishing seditious books, and should have been executed, but as they were ready to be trussed up were reprieved, but the day after, the Court House had shewn their dislike of this bill, were early in the morning hanged. It is said 'their reprieval proceeded of [[446] * * * *
John Penry, another Congregational martyr—who uttered the following memorable words:—"If my blood were an ocean sea, and every drop thereof were a life unto me, I would give them all, by the help of the Lord, for the maintenance of my confession"—perished on the gallows for the advocacy of his opinions, as if he had been the worst of criminals, at a place in Southwark called St. Thomas-a-Watering. Roger Rippon, of the same religious profession as Penry, died in prison; and his friends, moved by intense sympathy with the sufferer, and by indignation against his unmerited fate, paraded before the house of Justice Young (the magistrate who had committed him) the coffin containing the sufferer's remains, on the lid of which appeared the following inscription:—"This is the corpse of Roger Rippon, a servant of Christ, and her Majesty's faithful subject; who is the last of sixteen or seventeen, which that great enemy of God, the Archbishop of Canterbury, with his High Commissioners, have murdered in Newgate within these four years, manifestly for the testimony of Jesus Christ. His soul is now with the Lord, and his blood crieth for speedy vengeance against that great enemy of the saints, and against Mr. Richard Young, who in this and many the like points hath abused his power, for the upholding of the Romish Antichrist, prelacy, and priesthood."[447]
Congregationalism—Jacob.
1632, May.
Henry Jacob is a commanding figure in Congregational annals.[448] Originally a clergyman in the county of Kent, he had written in defence of the Church of England, but afterwards, perhaps influenced by an answer to his book from the pen of Francis Johnson, a zealous separatist, he warmly espoused the cause of Nonconformity.[449] To him has been attributed a tract, published in 1609, entitled: "An Humble Supplication for Toleration and Liberty to enjoy and observe the Ordinances of Jesus Christ in the Administration of His Churches in lieu of Human Constitutions." In this publication it is maintained, that "our Lord Jesus hath given to each particular church or ordinary congregation this right and privilege, namely, to elect, ordain, and deprive her own ministers; and to exercise all the other parts of lawful ecclesiastical jurisdiction under Him." Toleration is sought in order that "each particular church may put in execution this her particular privilege;" but, the writer adds: "We do humbly beseech your Majesty not to think, that by our suit, we make an overture and way for toleration unto Papists, our suit being of a different nature from theirs. The inducements thereof, such as cannot conclude aught in favour of them, whose doctrine is heresy, and a profession directly contrary to the lawful state and government of free countries and kingdoms, as your Majesty hath truly and judiciously observed."[450]
In other tracts which bear Henry Jacob's name,[451] he explained his views of Independency, and in accordance with them he founded a church in the year 1616. The ceremony connected with the institution is described as consisting of fasting and prayer, and the joining together of the hands of the members as they solemnly covenanted to walk together in all God's ways and ordinances, according as He had already revealed them, or should further make them known. Jacob was succeeded in the pastorship of the Congregational Church by John Lathrop,[452] who suffered from the tyranny of the High Commission Court. With reference to the proceedings carried on against him and certain members of his flock, some fresh information may be gathered from one of the Rawlinson MSS. As it illustrates both the extent to which private meetings of the Separatists were carried, and the interruption which they experienced, we will here introduce a few passages from that curious document.
Persecution of Congregationalists.
On the 2nd of May, 1632, certain conventiclers, as they are called, were taken at the house of Barnett, a brewer's clerk, residing at Blackfriars.[453] At first John Lathrop, who is described as their minister, did not appear, "but kept himself out of the way awhile; therefore the man of the house wherein they were taken, was first called." He was asked when he last attended the parish church? He replied that he was present in the parish church at the time when, according to the allegation, the meeting was held at his house, but that his wife did not then attend worship with him. The accused persons were all required to take the ex officio oath, but they excused themselves from doing so at least for the present, and requested time for further consideration of that subject. Archbishop Abbot addressed them as follows:—
1632, May.
"You shew yourselves most unthankful to God, to the King, and to the Church of England, that when (God be praised) through his Majesty's care and ours you have preaching in every church, and men have liberty to join in prayer and participate of the sacraments, and have catechisings, and all to enlighten you, and which may serve you in the way of salvation, you in an unthankful manner cast off all this yoke, and in private unlawfully assemble yourselves together, making rents and divisions in the Church. If anything be amiss, let it be known; if anything be not agreeable to the Word of God, we shall be as ready to redress it as you; but whereas it is nothing but your own imaginations, and you are unlearned men that seek to make up a religion of your own heads, I doubt no persuasion will serve the turn, we must take this course; you are called here, let them stand upon their bonds, and let us see what they will answer; it may be they will answer what may please us." Laud, then Bishop of London, proceeded to observe, in a very characteristic manner—"It is time to take notice of these; nay this is not the fourth part of them about this City. You see these came of set purpose; they met not by chance; they are desperately heretical; they are all of different places, out of Essex, St. Austin's, St. Martin's le Grand, Buttolph's, Aldgate, Thisleworth, (Isleworth) St. Saviour's; let these be imprisoned. Let me make a motion. There be four of the ablest men of them; let these four answer and be proceeded against, and the while if the rest come in, they shall be received, but if they will not, I know no reason why four or five men should not answer for all."
When Lathrop was present before the Commissioners, the Bishop, after having asked some very insulting questions, demanded, "Where are your orders?" to which Lathrop replied—"I am a minister of the Gospel of Christ, and the Lord hath qualified me." "Will you lay your hand on the book, and take your oath?" enquired the Court; to which question the minister returned a distinct negative. The following curious conversation between the Commissioners and certain accused parties is worth being transcribed. Eaton, together with "two women and a maid," appeared, and were asked by the Court why they were assembled in a conventicle, when others were at church?
Persecution of Congregationalists.
Eaton. "We were not assembled in contempt of the magistrate."
London. "No! it was in contempt of the Church of England."
Eaton. "It was in conscience to God (may it please this Honourable Court); and we were kept from church, for we were confined in the house together by those that beset the house, else divers would have gone to church, and many came in after the sermons were done."
London. "These were first discovered at Lambeth, and then at other places, and now taken here; they have in their meetings books printed against the Church of England."
Archbishop of Canterbury. "Where were you in the mornings before you came hither to this house?"
[Eaton.] "We were in our own families."
Canterbury. "What did you?"
Eaton. "We read the Scriptures, and catechised our families; and may it please this honourable Court to hear us speak the truth, we will shew you what was done, and (free us of the contempt of authority) we did nothing but what you will allow us to do."
London. "Who can free you? These are dangerous men; they are a scattered company sown in all the City, and about St. Michael of the Querne, St. Austin's, Old Jury, Redriffe, and other remoter places. Hold them the book."
Eaton. "I dare not swear, nor take this oath, though I will not refuse it; I will consider of it."
Sir Henry Marten.[454] "Hear, hear! You shall swear but to answer what you know, and as far as you are bound by law. You shall have time to consider of it, and have it read over and over till you can say it without book if you will; when you have first taken your oath that you will make a true answer."
1632, May.
Eaton. "I dare not; I know not what I shall swear to."
King's Advocate.[455] "It is to give a true answer to articles put into the Court against you, or that shall be put in touching this conventicle of yours, and divers your heretical tenets, and what words and exercises you used, and things of this nature."
Eaton. "I dare not."
Archbishop of Canterbury. "What say you, woman?"
Sara Jones. "I dare not worship God in vain."
Bishop of London. "Will you not swear and take an oath when you are called to it by the magistrate?"
S. Jones. "Yes! I will answer upon my oath to end a controversy before a lawful magistrate."
Earl of Dorset. "What dost thou think, woman, of these grave Fathers of the Church, that these here be not lawful magistrates?"
[S. Jones.] "I would do anything that is according to God's word."
[Richard Neile] Archbishop of York. "Would you? then you must take your oath now you are required by your governors; you must swear in truth, in judgment, in righteousness."
Persecution of Congregationalists.
S. Jones. "Yes, and they that walk in righteousness shall have peace; but I dare not forswear myself."
Canterbury. "Come, what say you?"
Pennina Howes (a maid). "I dare not swear this oath till I am better informed of it, for which I desire time."
Sir Henry Marten. "Must you not be ready to give an account of your faith?"
P. Howes. "Yes! I will give an answer of my faith if I be demanded, but not willingly forswear myself."
King's Advocate. "What, will you take your oath, good woman?"
Sara Barbone. "I dare not swear; I do not understand it; I will tell the truth without swearing."
Archbishop of Canterbury. "Take them away."
So they were all committed to the New Prison. And it was appointed that at the next Court, being a fortnight after this, because of Ascension Day, they should be brought again to the Consistory at St. Paul's, because of trouble and danger in bringing so many prisoners as these were over the water to Lambeth.
These people were immediately committed to the New Prison; and on the 8th of the same month (May) they were brought up again before the same tribunal, when again they declined to take the obnoxious oath. On the 7th of June, it was reported to the Court that some of the conventiclers had escaped; and on the 17th more persons were arraigned, who had been seized at a meeting held in a wood near Newington, in Surrey. These also refused to be sworn, after which the Bishop of London and the Archbishop of Canterbury repeated their expostulations. The High Commission, on the 21st, had brought before it Ralf Grafton, an upholsterer, dwelling in Cornhill, and reported to be a rich man, charged with being a principal ringleader of "those conventiclers that met at Blackfriars." Upon his declaring, "I dare not take the oath, and I am no ringleader of any to evil," the Archbishop said: "You met without law; you had no authority; pœna ad paucos, metus ad omnes; wherefore, the Court, for his contempt in refusing to take the oath, set a fine of two hundred pounds upon him, and committed him to prison." Grafton replied: "I have bail here ready, if you please to take it; I do tender it to you." Upon this the Bishops exclaimed: "No; away with him to prison; if he come not in by the day of mitigation, let the fine stand!"[456]
1630.
In connection with these notices of persecution endured by frequenters of conventicles, we may present the following picture of their method of worship, as depicted by one of their enemies in that style of minute and graphic detail which so characteristically marks the narrative of events given by common people in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries:—"To shew the manner of their assembling, or dissembling, in that house where they intend to meet, there is one appointed to keep the door, for the intent to give notice if there should be any insurrection, warning may be given to them. They do not flock together, but come two or three in a company. Any man may be admitted thither, and all being gathered together, the man appointed to teach stands in the midst of the room, and his audience gather about him. He prayeth about the space of half an hour; and part of his prayer is, that those which came thither to scoff and laugh, God would be pleased to turn their hearts, by which means they think to escape undiscovered. His sermon is about the space of an hour, and then doth another stand up, to make the text more plain; and at the latter end he entreats them all to go home severally, lest the next meeting they should be interrupted by those which are of the opinion of the wicked. They seem very steadfast in their opinions, and say, rather than they will turn, they will burn."[457]
Independents and Brownists.
Though certain Independents of the seventeenth century disavowed all connection with the Brownists, that name was often applied to them; and in some instances it is difficult to decide whether by the title we are to understand persons whose origin might be traced to the teaching of Cecil's relative, or persons who had been made converts by more recent apostles of Independency.[458] Allusions are discovered in the Corporation Records of Yarmouth for the years 1629 and 1630 to Brownists then living in that town. The Earl of Dorset, writing in the latter of these years to the bailiffs, aldermen, and commonalty, after a reference to the party spirit prevalent in the borough, observes: "I should want in my good care of you if I should not let you know that his Majesty is not only informed, but incensed against you for conniving at and tolerating a company of Brownists amongst you. I pray you remember there was no seam in our Saviour's garment. Root out that pestiferous sect forth from your town; they are as dangerous to the soul as the plague is to the body. But I know not whether in this you be traduced, as well as (I am sure) you have been in other things. They are arrows shot forth from the same quiver, and drawn by the same hands; and perhaps the mark aimed at through that false perspective is but to place in his Majesty an ill opinion of you. If you be innocent, let me know, and I shall endeavour to clear you. Howsoever, I pray, give testimony of your obedience and good zeal to religion in chasing those companions from your society. God cannot prosper you while they live amongst you, and you willingly protect and harbour them; and I am sure it will alienate his Majesty's respect from you and enforce him to take some course against you, when you shall so neglect your duties in that kind."[459]
1630.
Independents and Brownists.
The Corporation gave heed to the Earl's exhortation, and in reply, dated the 13th of September, 1630, manifested abundant zeal in rooting out schism.
"Concerning those separatists by your lordship mentioned, we must acknowledge that there be amongst us still some persons of that sect, to the number of thirty, and not above; the most of them women; not any one of them ever yet bearing the meanest office amongst us, and, one only excepted, not any one of ability to be a subsidy man. What courses we have taken from time to time for the suppressing of them, the Lord's Grace of York, whilst he was our diocesan, could bear us record, to whom (as we have since done to our present diocesan, as also to the Lord Bishop of London) we tendered an impartial list of all their names, without favour or affection, craving his lordship's aid for their reformation. The ecclesiastical courts have from time to time received presentments of them. The judges of assize have been solicited by us. What authority soever the law has put into our hands, we have not spared to execute to the uttermost, by indicting them constantly at our public sessions, by fining them according to statute, by imprisoning the ringleaders amongst them, and by forcing some of them to avoid, not only the place, but the kingdom. If, beyond this, we could be directed by and to any course whereby we might free ourselves of them, we should not only willingly, but thankfully embrace it. In the meantime, vouchsafe the acceptance of this our humble protestation, that, as for ourselves, being the representatives of the town, we are, all and every one of us, free from faction and schism, either in religion or discipline, and every ways conformable to the doctrine and government of this Church, whereof we profess ourselves to be members."[460]
1630.
Independents and Brownists.
In connection with this reference to the Brownists and the poor Separatists of Yarmouth, (for amongst them, it is said, there was not "one subsidy man,") it may be observed that two classes of Independents are distinctly visible at that period. As some Independents, mostly the obscure, went further than others in their doctrine of toleration; so some Independents, principally of the same class, went further than others in the doctrine of voluntaryism. Any broad and philosophical exposition of that now much discussed principle we have not been able to discover in the writings of that day; others, better acquainted with the immense pamphlet literature of the times, may prove more successful. But, at an earlier period, in a Confession of Faith published in 1616, there occurs the following simple and explicit statement on the subject:—"We believe that tithes for the pastor's maintenance under the Gospel are not the just and due means thereof. Howbeit, yet we do not think these tithes absolutely unlawful, if they remain voluntary; but when they are made necessary we think them not to be so lawful. The same do we judge also of whatsoever other set maintenance for ministers of the Gospel is established by temporal laws. We grant, that for the minister's security, such established maintenance is best; but for preserving due freedom in the congregation, sincerity in religion, and sanctity in the whole flock, the congregation's voluntary and conscionable contribution for their pastor's sustenance and maintenance is, doubtless, the safest and most approved—nay, it seemeth the only way; wherewith the Apostles caused their times to be content, neither did they care for other order therein; which certainly they would and should have done if other order had been better. Only they are careful (and that very religiously) to command all churches of conscience and duty to God to give (not sparingly, but liberally, and not as alms, but as duty), for upholding, advancing, and countenancing of the holy worship and service of God, which is either much strengthened or weakened, much honoured or abased among men, according as is the pastor's maintenance."[461] And in other tracts, largely quoted by Mr. Hanbury, in his "Memorials," there are passages expressing ideas on the subject of ministerial support in advance of those which were entertained by more distinguished Independents. The latter countenanced and advocated the acceptance of tithes; but in a Puritan tract, written before, though not published until 1644, notice is taken of a very sharp attack on the tithe system by the sect commonly called Brownists or Separatists. It is objected, say the Presbyterian authors, "that we are not maintained according to the direction Christ hath given in His Testament; but our maintenance is Jewish and anti-Christian." "Our ministers receive maintenance from all sorts of men in their parish without difference." This they call "an execrable sacrilege, and covetous-making merchandize of the holy things of God; a letting out of ourselves to hire, to the profane for filthy lucre." Tithes, in particular, are denounced by these Nonconformists, but the principle of their objection goes to a much deeper point than to touch or remove these particular imposts; it also cuts at the root of all kinds of ministerial support, except that which is exclusively voluntary.[462] In another publication, written by Burton against his late fellow-sufferer William Prynne, there is a decided assault both on tithes and on parishes; the former being pronounced unapostolic, and the latter a human and political institution. But, whilst maintaining that Christ will provide for His faithful and painful ministers, this champion of voluntary churches puts in a caveat in favour of the state appointing some kind of "maintenance for the preaching of the word, as is done in New England to those who are not members of Churches."[463] At a later period, Independents objected to tithes, yet they accepted support from the Government in another form.
1642.
Upon the opening of the Long Parliament, Congregationalism took deep root, and afterwards spread its branches over East Anglia. As the Dutch church in the city of Norwich, the Dutch aspect of Yarmouth Quay, and the settlement of a colony of Flemings in the village of Worstead, shew that there was an early intercommunication between the inhabitants of the Low Countries and the county of Norfolk; so also the connection between the English Independents in Holland and the Nonconformists of the eastern counties indicate that there was intercourse between the people of the opposite shores at a later period, in relation to Puritanism and Independency. Links of union appear in the persons of the Congregational pastors, Robinson and Bridge, who each resided one part of his life in Norfolk and another in Holland.
The oldest Congregational Church in the county of Norfolk was formed in Yarmouth, and consisted of persons who had just returned from Holland, where they had been in exile for conscience' sake.
"Inchurching," as it is quaintly termed, created much solicitude, and the Yarmouth people wrote to Rotterdam for sanction and advice before taking any decided step. In 1642, a formal document of dismissal was sent; after which it became an enquiry, whether the Church should choose Yarmouth or Norwich as the place of assembly. Unable to settle this question, they deferred it for a time, and simply resolved upon "inchurching, judging ten or twelve to be a competent number." Soon afterwards, an answer came "that Yarmouth was safer for the present," and a Church covenant having been adopted and ratified at Norwich, the people unitedly chose Mr. Bridge as their pastor. The Independents of Norwich held religious worship by themselves in some private house, and joined with the townspeople of Yarmouth only in the celebration of the Lord's supper. But at length, becoming tired of their journeys in passing to and fro, the former constituted themselves a distinct community.[464]
Presbyterians and Independents.
The Presbyterians at Yarmouth betrayed some jealousy of their Independent neighbours; for Sir Edward Owner, an alderman and justice of the peace, who represented the town in the Long Parliament, waited, in company with the Presbyterian Incumbent of the parish of St. Nicholas, upon Mr. Bridge, to express displeasure at his having gathered a Church in what was called the "Congregational way." After this occurrence, the Church resolved "that for a time they would forbear to receive any into their fellowship, until they gave notice to the town that they could forbear no longer."
Mr. Bridge, when elected to the pastorate of this new community, held the office of town preacher in Yarmouth, and was also a member of the Assembly of Divines. He had preached before the House of Commons in February, 1643; and it was in the May of the same year, whilst at home, during a temporary suspension of his Westminster duties, that his brethren called him to be their Bishop. Notwithstanding his position at Westminster and his Congregational office at Yarmouth, the Corporation retained him in his municipal chaplaincy and allowed him fifty pounds a year during his absence. The continuance of this connection no doubt led to the interference of the bailiffs with his pastoral relations, and explains the effect produced by the interview; but the Church, notwithstanding this circumstance, speedily asserted its independence, and by doing so did not at all affect the public position of their pastor, or diminish the influence which he exercised over his fellow-townsmen.
