CHAPTER III.
To prevent breaking the continuity of the narrative, an incident has been passed over requiring some notice.
Upon the 2nd of May, 1680, Dr. Stillingfleet preached a sermon before the Lord Mayor and Aldermen of the City of London, and the Judges and Sergeants-at-law. The subject of discourse being “The Mischief of Separation,” he treated his audience with an invective against Dissenters as schismatics, who had rent the Church in twain; and he represented them as reduced to this dilemma—“that though the really conscientious Nonconformist is justified in not worshipping after the prescribed forms of the Church of England, or rather would be criminal if he did so, yet he is not less criminal in setting up a separate assembly.”[34] Victims so impaled were in a wretched condition, and no one can wonder that they made an effort to extricate themselves. They did so with success, and if not always with perfect good temper, nobody can severely blame them for that. Owen wrote with “great gravity and seriousness.” Baxter was very “particular, warm, and close.” Alsop briskly turned upon the preacher “his own words and phrases.”[35] Stillingfleet’s Irenicum, published in 1659, had shown that no form of Church government could be jure divino, a position of which his opponents now took advantage, whilst they failed not to ply the argumentum ad hominem. “A person of quality” sent to John Howe the printed sermon, enclosing with it severe remarks. Howe, with calm impartiality, such as nettles a partisan of either extreme more than any stinging attacks can do, immediately expressed his intention “of defending the cause of the Nonconformists against the Dean, and then of adding something in defence of the Dean against his correspondent.”[36] The reply which he produced is one of the most beautiful specimens of controversy in existence. Stillingfleet was subdued when he read it, and confessed that Howe discoursed “more like a gentleman than a Divine, without any mixture of rancour, or any sharp reflections, and sometimes with a great degree of kindness towards him, for which, and his prayers for him, he heartily thanked him.”[37]
TILLOTSON.
The year proved unfortunate for the consistency of Divines of the Liberal school, for Tillotson also committed himself. Preaching a sermon at Court he maintained the monstrous position “that no man is obliged to preach against the religion of his country, though a false one, unless he has the power of working miracles.” “It is a pity your Majesty slept,” observed a Courtier at the close of the service, “for we have had the rarest piece of Hobbism that ever you heard in your life.” “Odsfish!” rejoined Charles, “he shall print it then.” Howe once more came forward with reproof and expostulation. He regretted that the Dean should have pleaded “the Popish cause against the Fathers of the Reformation;” and as the Nonconformist was riding with his friend to see Lady Falconbridge at Sutton Court, he so touched the heart of the Church dignitary, that the latter bursting into tears, confessed that it “was the unhappiest thing which had for a long time happened to him;” and pleaded in excuse of his great error, the haste with which he had prepared his discourse, and the alarm produced in his mind by the spread of Popery.[38]
1680.
COMPREHENSION.
Perhaps these circumstances had some influence in producing another useless attempt at comprehension at the close of the year 1680, inasmuch as we shall find Howe in consultation with the two Divines just mentioned touching the subject. Howe met Bishop Lloyd at Tillotson’s house.[39] The Bishop asked what would satisfy the Nonconformists, if an attempt should be made to adjust the differences between them and the Church. Howe observed “as all had not the same latitude, he could only answer for himself.” What concessions, he was further asked, would, in his opinion, satisfy the scruples of the greater number—for, added Lloyd, “I would have the terms so large as to comprehend the most of them.” Howe declared that he thought “a very considerable obstacle would be removed, if the law were so framed as to enable ministers to attempt parochial reformation.” “For that reason,” said the Bishop, “I am for abolishing the lay Chancellors as being the great hindrance to such reformation.”[40] The next evening Howe and Bates, with Tillotson, met at the Deanery of St. Paul’s, where Stillingfleet had provided a handsome entertainment for his visitors. Lloyd, though expected, did not join the party, being prevented by a division in the House of Lords, upon the Exclusion Bill. Whatever the bearing of these circumstances might be upon what followed, there appeared in Parliament three days afterwards (November 18) a scheme of comprehension.
The second reading of the Bill, embodying the scheme, occasioned a debate, which went over well-worn topics, and presents no points of interest.
The measure emanated from the Episcopalian party in the House of Commons; but the Presbyterian members, to the amazement of every one, did not promote it. They knew it could not be carried in the House of Lords; and the clergy, as Kennet confesses, were “no further in earnest than as they apprehended the knife of the Papists” to be near their throats.[41]
The Bill dropped—what else could be expected, there being on one side no earnestness in making the offer, and on the other no disposition to accept it?[42]
1680–81.
With the Bill founded on the principle of comprehension another was brought forward, based on the principle of toleration. It proposed to exempt Protestant Dissenters “from the penalties of certain laws.”[43] The measure made way through the House of Commons, and it forced itself through the House of Lords;[44] but because distasteful to the King on account of its limiting toleration to Protestant Nonconformists, it was put aside by some contemptible trick, when other Bills were presented for the Royal assent.[45]
On the day of the prorogation, the Commons by a formal resolution pronounced the prosecution of Protestant Dissenters to be a grievance to the subject, a detriment to the Protestant interest, an encouragement to Popery, and a danger to the kingdom’s peace.[46] However strange it is to find such a resolution in the Journals, after a Bill had been carried through the two Houses to the same effect a few days before, the fact may be explained by the circumstance that the Commons had become aware of the foul play practised on these cherished measures. It seems incredible, but such was the factious spirit existing, that the Court and High Church party—who were prepared to vindicate, or to wink at all kinds of excesses in the despotism of the Crown—positively objected to the resolution, as an unconstitutional method of invalidating Acts of Parliament.[47]
OXFORD PARLIAMENT.
Charles II. dissolved his fourth Parliament on the 18th of January, 1681, and summoned a fifth to meet at Oxford on the 21st of March.[48] This fifth Parliament opened amidst great excitement. The members for London, who had sat before, received the thanks of the citizens for searching into the Popish plot, and for supporting the Comprehension, the Toleration, and the Exclusion Bills. They rode to the City on the banks of the Isis, attended by a large body of horsemen, with ribbons stuck in their hats, displaying the watchwords, “No Popery—No Slavery.” Other members received similar addresses, and proceeded to the scholastic halls,—for the occasion transferred into senate-houses,—stirred by the conviction that a great political and ecclesiastical crisis had arisen. Met by the King with gracious but hollow sayings of the accustomed stamp, Parliament did not pass over the recent breach of decency committed in reference to the Toleration Bill, and reflections not more sharp than just were uttered by Liberal members. It was said, that those who charged the Country party with being Republicans were Revolutionists themselves, like thieves in a crowd, crying “Gentlemen, have a care of your pockets;”[49] that if Bills could be so thrown away the Commons vainly spent their time in passing them, and that what had been done inflicted a heavy blow on the English Constitution. The Commons requested a conference with the Lords, and took up the subject with spirit, declaring, as recorded in the Lords’ Journals, an intention to search out the accomplices in the piece of impudent knavery, which had just been practised on their own House.[50] Another Bill of Exclusion made its appearance, and another debate on Popery arose; but a dissolution within one week put an end to all Parliamentary inquiry, and extinguished all Parliamentary discussion.
1681.
Amidst much false alarm, and much popular folly, there existed a reasonable antipathy to the superstition and intolerance of Rome; the return of Papal ascendancy being, at that moment, no unreasonable object of fear; for with it would have inevitably arrived a new reign of civil and spiritual despotism. Protestantism on the one side, and Popery on the other, stood face to face in irreconcilable conflict; and during the storm which raged from one end of the Island to the other, there came into play two famous party watchwords, which, though in our time they have become nearly superseded, are not yet wholly swept out of existence. It is curious to notice that “Whig” and “Tory”—names then and since appropriated to political uses—had a religious origin: Whig being the title coined to fit the Presbyterian Covenanters of Scotland, suspected of anti-Monarchical principles; and “Tory” being meant to designate the Roman Catholic Irishmen, who seized the property of English settlers, and whose religion was considered most favourable to despotism.
EXCLUSION BILL.
Whilst, in these days of enlightenment and of perfectly altered circumstances, we can see how, without sacrificing universal religious liberty, we can protect ourselves against the danger of Papal ascendancy and despotism, should that danger again threaten us, it is proper to take into account the whole case respecting the conduct of our ancestors in the last two Stuart reigns, and to remember that they dreaded such broad toleration, because they apprehended it would lead to the supremacy of Romanism; and they could not see how it was possible, in this case, to concede liberty without opening a gate for the entrance of injustice. There was wisdom in the end they kept in view, though there was error in the method they employed for its attainment.
1681.
It is ridiculous to look upon the Earl of Shaftesbury as the Æolus who let loose the anti-Papal winds. He doubtless availed himself of the public favour to accomplish ends of his own, and the elevation of the Duke of Monmouth to the honour of legitimacy and heirship was with him a favourite idea, equally absurd and mischievous; but the desire, prevalent for a time, of cutting off the entail of the crown from the King’s brother, was no creation of a single person, but the offspring of public sentiment, and the outgrowth of years on years. Indignation against Popery, and the support of an Exclusion Bill, intimately connected as cause and effect, were two distinct things: but although the former continued in unabated force, the latter dwindled away, and the nation came to acquiesce, so far as the succession to the throne was concerned, in the policy of the Court. The reasons are easily assigned. Popular falsehoods respecting the Popish plots exploded in disgrace, and honest folks saw they had been deceived by knaves. From dislike to Rome, her doctrines, her polity, and her worship, some diseased secretions, which had gathered over feeling, came to be rubbed off. Romanists had been found less desperate plotters than had been dreamed. Limitations upon the descent of the crown appeared more efficacious than they had done before. The probability of another Civil War, if James were excluded, alarmed many; personal sympathy with a Sovereign required to perform so unnatural an act as that of disinheriting a brother, prevailed with more; and perhaps, considering the Royal ages, the uncertainty of the contemplated emergency influenced most. In this last respect, a manifest difference exists between the policy of an Exclusion Bill founded on a contingency which might never occur, and the policy of a Revolution based upon the despotic proceedings of an actual King. That these reasons proved effective is plain; whether they were valid and wise is another point. The sequel showed a Revolution to be inevitable. To have anticipated the event of 1688 might have saved England some trouble and much suffering; but England has always been slow to depart from constitutional principles, and has always loved to stand as long as possible “in the old ways.” The conflict which opened in 1643 had been put off until it could be put off no longer: and the men of the second half of the seventeenth century were, as it regarded an unwillingness to come to extremities, just like their fathers of the first. What really followed the departure from the scheme of Exclusion justified some of the worst fears of its supporters. The Duke was restored to his former position, and carried things with a high hand.[51]
KING’S DECLARATION.
After the dissolution of Parliament at Oxford, the King, by the advice of Halifax, published a Declaration, explaining the reasons which induced him to take that critical step. He charged the Commons with arbitrary orders; with bringing forward accusations on mere suspicion; with unconstitutional votes, especially in support of resolutions condemning the persecution of Dissenters, according to law; with obstinacy in the matter of the Exclusion Bill; with a design of changing the government of the realm; and with a determination to set and keep at variance the two Houses of Legislature.[52] In short, he managed, as his father had done, only with more dexterity, to cover and defend his own unconstitutional purposes, by throwing all blame on the Houses of Parliament.
Immediately afterwards, Archbishop Sancroft received a Royal command to require the public reading of the Declaration in all and every the churches and chapels within the province of Canterbury, at the time of Divine service, upon some Lord’s Day, with all convenient speed. If we may here believe Burnet, Sancroft, at a meeting of Council, moved that this order should be given; remembering the habits of the Historian of his Own Times, I can scarcely trust his statement, without confirmation from some other quarter. Yet, if Sancroft did not suggest, he certainly did not resist the publication of this document—as he did the publication of another at a later period; and, because he received the order for its publication, and the publication followed accordingly, he must bear the responsibility of having sanctioned a procedure, which really made the Church an approving herald to the nation, of the King’s despotic policy.[53]
1681.
High Churchmen took the opportunity of presenting to the Throne the most obsequious and abject addresses. Our princes, said they, derive not their title from the people, but from God; to Him alone they are accountable: and it belongs not to subjects either to create or to censure, but only to honour and obey their Sovereign. They besought His Majesty to accept the tender of their hearts and hands, their lives and fortunes. These dearest sacrifices they abjectly laid down at Royal feet.[54] It was about the same time that Morley, Bishop of Winchester, declared:—“If ever it might be said of any—it may now most emphatically be said of us: Happy are the people that are in such a case.” We have “a Government pretending to no power at all above the King, nor to no power under the King neither, but from him, and by him, and for him—a Government enjoining active obedience to all lawful commands of lawful authority; and passive obedience when we cannot obey actively, forbidding and condemning all taking up of arms, offensive or defensive, by subjects of any quality.”[55]
The King’s Declaration was compared by a writer of later date, reflecting upon it, to the olive branch brought by the dove into the ark,—an indication of peace, of the abatement of popular excitement, and of the stability of laws and religion, like the dove which had found ubi pedem figeret. Warming with his subject, he calls the Declaration “that great vision of the Lex terræ” long wrapped in mists, but now revealed; and likens the addresses called forth to the seamen’s shout on approaching land, after a stormy voyage.[56] Some of the Tory party went mad with joy at the triumph of despotism.
LOYAL ADDRESSES.
There were not wanting utterances of a very different order. A well-known publication, entitled, The Conformist’s Plea for the Nonconformists, in four parts, by a Beneficed Minister, and a regular Son of the Church of England, bears the date of 1681, and at the time made much stir. The author dwells upon the sufferings of his Dissenting brethren—their hard case, their equitable proposals, their ministerial qualifications, their peaceable behaviour, their orthodoxy as tested by the doctrinal articles of the Church—and the injury inflicted on that Church by their exclusion. “Some reverend sons of the Church,” he remarked, with a good deal of common sense, “in love to peace, and fear of enemies, have earnestly called and exhorted the Dissenting ejected brethren, to come and unite, to come into the present Constitution, as safest, as strongest, as best, &c. But if they could not come in at the narrow door eighteen years ago, and the door as narrow still as it was then, and there be the same cross-bars laid across, as were then to keep them out, to what purpose is the exhortation? Is there a great storm a coming? they think that Christ is the same ship, and they are as safe as any other. They may clearly plead, they could have conformed at first upon better worldly terms than now; they might have saved what they have lost, and got their share with others; to come now to conform, when all places are full, and not enow for numerous expectants, and when there is nothing for them without tedious waiting; and if their judgments and consciences could not enter then, how can they now?”[57]
1681.
Wit is not wanting, when he asks:—“But how did these Master-Builders proceed in the Government of their New Reformed Church? It seemed to be built no larger than to contain one family, the genuine sons of such fathers; there was but one narrow door of admission to it, a strong lock upon it, and the sole power of the keys was in trusty hands, and the sword in the hand of a friend, there was no outward apartment in it to entertain strangers, or belonging to it; but some got a false key to the door, as many call it, a key of a larger sense; and when some got in, more crowded in; and so the Latitudinarian in charity, came in with the Latitudinarian in discipline, to the no little grief of some who do not like their company. The fathers keep above stairs, and now and then come down among us, and send their officers to visit us, and have their watch renewed every year to tell tales of us; and they that are without doors, cry, If there be any love in our Governors to Christ, and His divided flock, that we would but widen the door, and reform but ill customs; but we say, we cannot help ourselves or them, for the law will have it so.”[58]