INTRODUCTION.
The knell of the Puritan Commonwealth was rung when Oliver Cromwell died. The causes of its dissolution may easily be discovered. Some of them had been in operation for a long time, and had prepared for the change which now took place.[1]
Puritanism never won a majority of the English people. By some of the greatest in the nation it was espoused, and their name, example, and influence, gave it for a time a position which defied assault; but the multitude stood ranged on the opposite side. Forced to succumb, and stricken with silence, the disaffected nevertheless abated not a jot of their bitter antipathy to the party in power. Even amongst those who wore the livery of the day, who used the forms, who adopted the usages of their masters, many lacked the slightest sympathy with the system which, from self-interest or timidity, they had been induced to accept. The Puritans were not the hypocrites; the hypocrites really were people of another religion, or of no religion, who pretended to be Puritans. Besides these, there were numbers who whispered murmurs, or bit their lips in dumb impatience, as they watched for signs of change in the political firmament.
A mischievous policy had been pursued by the Puritans towards the old Church of England. Laud's execution yielded a harvest of revenge. The extirpation of Episcopacy, and the suppression of the Prayer Book, kindled an exasperation which kept alive a resentful intolerance down to the period of the Revolution. I am aware of the excuses made for Puritan despotism, and am ready to allow some palliation for wrong done under provoking circumstances, but I must continue to express indignation at the injustice committed; all the more, because of my religious sympathy with the men who thus tarnished their fame. It must, however, be confessed that had Presbyterians and Independents been ever so merciful in the hour of their might, there is no reason to suppose, from what is known of their opponents, that they would have shewn any mercy in return.
In enumerating the causes of the failure of Puritanism as a political institution notice should be taken of the prohibition of ancient customs. How far the prohibition extended has been pointed out in former volumes, and I must repeat, that whilst endeavours to suppress national vice were most praiseworthy, some of the Parliamentary prohibitions at the time were, to a considerable extent, unjust and unnatural. Those who chose to celebrate Christmas, Easter, Whitsuntide, and other seasons, had a perfect right so to do; and some, though not all, of the amusements remorselessly put down, were in themselves innocent; pleasant, and even venerable in their associations; and in their tendencies productive of kindly fellowship between class and class.
Puritan rule in England came as the child of revolution—a revolution mainly accomplished by civil war. The first battle, indeed, and that which led to all the others, was fought on the floor of the House of Commons. The patriots being returned as the representatives of the most active and influential citizens, many of whom were Puritans, possessed an immense amount of political power, and, as statesmen, they turned the scale in favour of revolution; but the revolution had to make good its ground by force, and the patriots, as soldiers, had to crush resistance in the field. This was a necessity. The attitude of the King, the chivalrous spirit of the nobles who rallied round him, under the circumstances in which Parliament had placed itself, rendered an appeal to arms inevitable. The wager of battle having been accepted, the quarrel having been fought out bravely, the relative position afterwards of the victors and the vanquished could not but embitter the feelings existing on both sides. The vanquished submitted without grace to their conquerors. They hated the new political constitution. When they seemed quiet they were only biding their time, only preparing for some fresh outbreak. Memories of privation, of imprisonment, of cruel usage, of houses burnt, of fathers, sons, and brothers slain, and especially the mortification of defeat, constantly irritated the Cavalier and goaded him to revenge. The blister was kept open year after year. The wound never healed. Alienation, or resentment, on the part of the Royalist provoked new oppression on the part of the Commonwealths-man. Fresh oppression from the hands of the one produced fresh resentment in the breast of the other.
A civil war may be needful for the deliverance of a country; but the recollections of it for a long while must be a misfortune, since those recollections exhibit the new state of things to the party on the opposite side as a result of force, not as a result of reason; and the remembrance of imposition ever involves a sense of wrong. Under this misfortune the triumphant Puritans laboured throughout the Protectorate.
After the Restoration the misfortune, in some respects, became heavier than before. The previous eighteen years had been to the Royalists years in which violence destroyed the Monarchy and the Church. They were the years of the Great Rebellion—so the political Revolution came to be named—and in that name, specious and plausible, although untruthful and unjust, lay much of the capital with which political leaders after the Restoration carried on their trade of oppression and wrong. The Puritans, they said, were rebels, for they had fought against the Crown: what they had done once they would do again. A valid defence was at hand, for the Puritans could show that there was nothing really inconsistent between their peaceful submission to the restored monarch, and the course which they had pursued under the Long Parliament; yet, although they could make out a case satisfactory to impartial men, over against their logic, however forcible, there stood some awkward facts of 1642 and the following years, upon which High Churchmen in the reign of Charles II. were never weary of ringing changes.
The Long Parliament had rested upon the Army; so had the constitution of the Protectorate. His Highness's rule had been fortified by his major-generals and his troops. For its good and for its evil it depended upon soldiers. A military despotism had become necessary from the confusion of the times; it alone could bring quiet to the country after political earthquakes. The regal sway had fallen into the hands of a great general, a great statesman, and a great patriot, who, because he combined these three characters, was able to work out benevolent designs for his country. So long as he held the baton, so long as he drew the sword, he could maintain his standing, but not a moment longer. He had immense difficulties to overcome. Episcopalians were almost all against him; very many Presbyterians stood aloof or offered opposition; Spiritual Republicans, Fifth Monarchy men were his torment; even Congregationalists, with whom he felt spiritual sympathy, wished for a more democratic government than he would allow; the Quakers neither loved nor feared him. Besides, he had political colleagues who, as statesmen, appeared in opposition. Also, old generals were looking after an occasion for making resistance. Vane and Haselrig, Harrison and Ludlow, disapproved of the policy of their former friend. They disliked the new Constitution; they were for placing the keys in the hands of Parliament, not in the hands of a single person. They regarded the Protector as the Greeks had regarded a tyrant. Monarchy they detested, Democracy they would enthrone; yet they saw amongst them a sovereign, mightier than any Stuart, only called by another name. And it became a germ of weakness in the new Constitution, that it had to be defended by arguments similar to those which availed for the support of the ancient monarchy. It could be said—and truly said—that English traditions, usages, genius, spirit, and social necessities, demanded a supreme head—the rule "of a single person." But the rule of a single person was the very thing so hateful to the Republicans, although connected with the modifying checks of a Parliament. Many saw that the reasons employed in favour of Oliver Cromwell's Protectorate might be employed more consistently in favour of the restoration of Charles Stuart. This circumstance was felt by numbers who did not confess it.
Moreover, respecting domestic and foreign policy Cromwell had to meet strong opposition. Finances, and law reform, were matters of contention. The Dutch war, the French alliance, and the relations with Spain, also presented points in which he and other distinguished Commonwealths-men differed. As the political reign of Puritanism depended upon Cromwell these circumstances could not fail to undermine its strength. His statesmanship showed consummate ability; his knowledge of mankind and of individuals amounted to a species of divination; his control over those about him was irresistible; his sagacity, vigilance, promptitude, decision, and patience were unrivalled; his name was a tower of strength at home and abroad; his foreign policy was successful, and therefore, as long as he lived, the system which he had inaugurated and administered was sure to last. It did—but at his death came collapse. There remained no master-mind to rule the State, and to control the Army. The State soon showed a disposition to go one way, the Army another. Confusions ensued; and the latter fell under the command of a soldier who betrayed his trust, and employed his influence to pull down the entire fabric of Puritan power.
So far, then, as Puritanism had become a political institute it sunk under the shock of Oliver Cromwell's death. But though as an institute it crumbled away, the political spirit which it had evoked and cherished did not die. It would be a repetition of what has been said a hundred times, to insist here upon the influence of the Puritan leaders of the Long Parliament, and the influence of the Puritan chiefs of the Commonwealth Army in preparing for the political liberties of England, guaranteed at the Revolution. A peaceful change then came as the consequence and complement of the Civil Wars. It is the destiny of nations to pass through the waters of conflict and suffering ere they can reach the shores of freedom. Our Puritan fathers then breasted the torrent, and made good their landing on the right side, where we, thanks to their bravery and endurance, have, under God, found a home. The superstructure they immediately raised was not permanent; but its strong foundation-stones were too deeply laid to be removed in a brief period of reaction; and on them we now are building new forms of political justice, order, and peace. It may take longer time and nobler labour than we imagine to complete the edifice, but our hope and trust is that Divine providence will one day bring it to perfection.
Puritanism must be considered under its ecclesiastical as well as its political aspect. It became political through its ecclesiastical action, and its ecclesiastical character has been damaged by its political relations. It was worked up into an elaborate Presbyterian system, framed not only for the purpose of instructing the nation in the truths of the Bible, but for the purpose also of constituting every Englishman a member of the Church, and of subjecting him to the authority and discipline of its officers. This ecclesiastical organization its advocates brought, so far as they could, into union with the civil government to be defended and enforced by the magistrate. And where Puritanism assumed a Congregational shape, and claimed the name of freedom, although, as to Church institutes, it sought, and to some degree attained liberty of operation, yet, in all cases where its ministers were parochial incumbents, they, by their identification with the national establishment, exposed themselves to the political danger which, at certain crises, threaten institutions of that description. When ecclesiastical arrangements are complicated with State affairs they must be subject to a common fortune. What endangers the one endangers the other, and the history of Puritanism offers no exception to the general rule.
Two ecclesiastical principles are seen at work in connection with the religious organizations which existed in the middle of the seventeenth century: Erastianism and Voluntaryism. Erastianism came across the path of both Presbyterians and Congregationalists. It wrought powerfully through the ordinances and laws of the Long Parliament, in the way of checking what it justly deemed the despotic tendencies of uncontrolled authority in the exercise of discipline. The working of Erastianism is visible in the legal prevention of the full establishment of parochial assemblies and provincial synods; and in the interference of the magistrate with those Independent pastors holding benefices, who would fain have excluded from the Lord's table persons whom they deemed morally unfitted for approaching it. In curbing suspected despotism, Erastianism, as is its wont, paralyzed the hand of a salutary restraint upon the irregularities of Christian professors. It opened a door for promiscuous communion. It thwarted the designs, and enfeebled the energy of ecclesiastical Puritanism; and thus laxity of fellowship followed as a penalty for seeking State support, on the part of communities which prized the purity of Christ's Church.
Voluntaryism cannot properly be identified with Puritanism. The leading Puritans neither advocated nor countenanced that principle; such as were Episcopalians did not. The Presbyterians, and some of the Independents, as we have this moment noticed, did not. A few of the Baptists did not. Oliver Cromwell, who protected them all, did not. Whilst some Puritans thus stood apart from Voluntaries, and even opposed them, there were some Voluntaries who stood apart from Puritanism, and even opposed that. The Quakers, from the commencement of their history, protested against the union of Church and State, and were ever faithful to their convictions in this as well as in other respects; they also kept aloof from Puritanism altogether, and even condemned it severely, under several of its aspects. Many of the Independents, and more of the Baptists, previously to the Civil Wars, also disapproved strongly of that kind of union which displeased the Quakers, and contended firmly for the support of Churches by voluntary contributions; yet they entered into cordial alliance with Puritanism in other things, promoting certain of its political proceedings, and sympathizing generally with its spiritual movements and tendencies. Voluntaryism had strong affinities for the spiritual side of Puritanism, deriving from it the most vigorous impulses, contributing towards it the most devoted service; and if it did not win its way at first amongst the rich, the noble, and the learned, it laid hold upon the hearts of the humbler classes; and, by widely leavening them with its power, prepared for subsequently working upwards to that influence which is exercised by it in the present day. The history of this principle is the same throughout: as it was with the primitive Christians,—as it was with so many of the most pious and active men of the Middle Ages,—as it has been with the Methodists,—so it was with those of whom I speak. They began their work—"in a great trial of affliction the abundance of their joy and their deep poverty abounded unto the riches of their liberality."
Voluntaryism, so far as it affected Puritanism, did not contribute to its weakness, but to its strength; yet amongst those who professed Voluntaryism, as amongst those who adopted different views, there appeared an element which proved injurious to them all. It was dis-union—it was strife.
If the Crusading knights had been of one mind, it is a question, whether, in the end, they would have retained mastery over the Mussulmen; but certainly they stood no chance whilst feuds were rife in the Camp of the Cross. The same may be said of the Puritans. It would have been hard enough, with the utmost concentration of force, to bear down opposition; but amidst their own discords it became simply impossible. Presbyterians were of different shades of opinion, and they were not without mutual jealousies. But their hatred of what they stigmatized as Sectarianism appears scarcely less than their hatred of Prelacy, or even of Romanism; in some minds abhorrence existed equally in reference to all three. The sects were not behindhand in their mutual antipathies, and were by no means gentle in their collisions. Independents, Baptists, and Quakers, to mention no others—I speak of them all generally—did anything but keep "the unity of the spirit in the bonds of peace." The apostolic warning betokened evil to Puritan Christendom in England—"If ye bite and devour one another, take heed that ye be not consumed one of another." Yet those whose eyes are open to discern the defects in principle and temper of the ecclesiastical organizations of the Long Parliament and the Commonwealth, can also see that Puritanism has bequeathed to English Christendom a precious legacy of religious freedom. That spirit has not only wrought out modern Free Churches—which, whatever may be men's opinions on ecclesiastical questions, must be admitted by everyone to be efficient powers in spreading Christianity at home and abroad, and in exerting beneficial influences of many kinds upon society at large—but that spirit has also leavened, to a large extent, other communities not based upon what is called the voluntary principle. Toleration, for which the Independents struggled under Cromwell, won a victory in 1688—an imperfect victory it is true, but still precious; and the toleration then established opened the way for the progress now advancing along the paths of mutual religious justice.
Puritanism presents another—a spiritual aspect—under which it has exercised an influence more vigorous and salutary than it has done in any other way.
It laid hold on thousands, not only by simple methods of religious worship which commended themselves to the plain understanding, and the unsophisticated taste of Anglo-Saxon people,—but by its emphatic exhibition of the truths of Christianity as a redemptive system, full of the love of God to sinful men, commending itself to humble and sorrow-stricken hearts. In the Gospel of Christ, which Puritanism prominently exhibited as adapted to the wants of mankind, lay the secret of its greatest success, and the key to its noblest results. As a spiritual power it had been strong under Elizabeth and the Stuarts; but its conflicts in war, its entrance into the Court, its elevation to the throne, defaced somewhat its spiritual beauty, and impaired in a measure its spiritual force. The most favourable aspects of Puritanism are not found in the history of the Civil Wars, and of the Commonwealth. As with Christianity in general—as with Protestantism at large, so with the system now under consideration. Not in the palace of Constantine do we discover the best specimens of Gospel piety; not in the Courts of English and German sovereigns do we see the workings of the Reformed Faith to most advantage; and not at Whitehall must we watch for the fairest visions of Puritan life. Our religion, in its best forms, is no doubt essentially a genial social power, healing, constructive, conservative—such we believe it will prove itself to be in the Church of the future—but in the Church of the past, it has shown itself purest and strongest when contending against opposition, when passing through scenes of suffering, when grappling with the evils of society, and when informing and animating individual souls. Persecution has been to piety what the furnace is to the potter's clay; it has burnt in, it has brought out, its richest colours. The Huguenots appear to much greater advantage in the defeats which they endured than in the victories which they won; the peasantry in their cottages are more to be admired than the nobles in their chateaux. The history of successful battles fought, or of courageous resistance made by the French Protestants; and the story of Henry of Navarre and his Courtiers even before his reconciliation with Rome; read not so well as does the record of men of the same class who were burnt at the stake, or who were sent to the galleys, or who were exiled from their country. So also the chief moral charm of Puritanism is found, not in the successes of statesmen and soldiers; not in Pym's debates and majorities; not in Cromwell's charges and laurels; but in the deaths of Barrow and Greenwood, and in the tortures of Leighton and Burton; and, if we may anticipate, in the ejection, the wanderings and the imprisonment of Howe, and Heywood, and Baxter. On the same principle the quiet, earnest, and exemplary lives of the middle-class Puritans did more than anything else, at the commencement of the Civil Wars to give ascendancy to their cause; and after the Restoration to recover its character, and promote its progress. Puritanism, when once more separated from the State, returned to the old and better paths of confessorship and humiliation; and thrown back upon itself and upon God, it became, as of yore, a spiritual agency of the most potent kind. The theological books it produced, the devoted characters it formed, and the pious memories it handed to posterity, have created an influence embracing within its reach both England and America. The effect of its works, examples, and traditions have never perished in Dissenting Churches and families; but beyond these circles, it has manifestly told upon the Christian world. It contributed to the great revival of religion which arose within the pale of the Establishment during the last century; and from an earlier period than that, down to the present day, its perpetuated spiritual power has been deeply felt, and gratefully acknowledged on the other side of the Atlantic.
Such was the system of Puritanism—politically, ecclesiastically, spiritually; such were some of the causes which produced changes in it at the era of the Restoration. What it was, and what it did at that period and afterwards, remains to be related. We are to consider what, in its Presbyterian, Congregational, and other forms, it became; what it endured of direct persecution and of indirect social wrong; and what it achieved in works of faith, and love, and zeal. We are to trace its social influence in the retirements of English life; its new political influence on the side of liberty; the germs of after-thought which it planted; the stones of reform and improvement which it laid. Also, and this will occupy a still wider space, we are to mark how the Episcopal Church of England rose out of her ruins, and the Establishment became once more Anglican. All this, in the minute grades of the process, together with the form of the re-edification; the policy of its new builders; their relations and conduct towards their Nonconformist brethren; the intermingling of ecclesiastical and political events; the Church developments; the theological controversies; and the spiritual life of the period, amongst Conformists and Nonconformists—much of it, on each side, beautiful, some of it, on both sides, marred—it is my arduous task faithfully to unfold.