CHAPTER IX.
1687.
The audacious zeal of James in the support of Popery reached its climax in the summer of 1687. Monsignor Ferdinando D’Adda, described by a Jesuit as a mere boy, a fine showy fop, to make love to the ladies,[190] after having for some time privately acted as Papal Nuncio, had, in the spring of this year, been publicly consecrated at Whitehall, titular Archbishop of Amasia. He had immediately afterwards been received in his archiepiscopal vestments by the Sovereign of England, who, in the presence of the Court, prostrated himself before the Italian prelate to receive his benediction. The prelate being thus prepared by his new dignity, the King determined that he should be publicly received as an ambassador from His Holiness; and he caused arrangements to be accordingly made for his reception in that capacity at Windsor Castle, on the 3rd of July. At the Whitehall reception of the Archbishop, the Spanish Ambassador had warned James against being priest-ridden, when the latter asked, “Is it not the usage in Spain that Kings consult their Confessors?” “Yes, Sire,” replied the Minister, “and hence it is that our affairs go so badly.” In prospect of the Windsor ceremonial, the Duke of Somerset received orders to be in attendance to introduce the dignitary. He begged to be excused, lest compliance should be construed into a breach of law. “Do you not know,” said James, “that I am above the law?” “Your Majesty may be,” rejoined the Duke, “but I am not.” This nobleman being dismissed for his frankness, people remarked in gossip, that a Duke of Somerset “had put out the Pope, and now the Pope had put out the Duke.” “It would have been more remarkable,” said Sir John Bramston, “if the Duke had brought him in.”[191]
PROMOTION OF ROMANISTS.
These little incidents would have sufficed, under the circumstances, to make prudent men pause, but they produced no effect upon the imprudent King. When the day arrived, the Nuncio started from his lodgings in Windsor, clothed in purple, with a gold crucifix hanging at his breast, seated in a coach, accompanied by the Duke of Grafton and Sir Charles Cotterel. He was preceded by Knight Marshal’s men on horseback, and by twelve footmen—“their coats being all of a dark grey coloured cloth, with white and purple lace.” Altogether the train consisted of thirty-six carriages, with six horses each, two of the carriages being filled with priests—but some were sent empty, to increase the pomp of the procession; and amongst such equipages were those of the Bishops of Durham and Chester. The party alighted in the outer court, and went upstairs into St. George’s Hall, where the King and Queen, seated upon two chairs under a canopy, received the Papal emissary with great reverence. The effect upon the English people may be conjectured. Great multitudes had been attracted by a show, such as had not been witnessed until now, since the Accession of Elizabeth. Windsor overflowed, and for want of room in inns and houses, people of quality had to sit in their coaches almost all the day.[192] But they were shocked by the spectacle; and the indignation of the inhabitants of the little town upon the public celebration of mass in Wolsey’s Chapel rose to such a height, that they riotously assailed the building, and left it in a state of miserable dilapidation. The feeling thus expressed extended over the country; Protestant anger almost everywhere arose, and James himself, when too late, saw the extreme folly of his conduct. It might be supposed that the Pontiff and the Papal Court would be delighted to hear of the Nuncio’s pageant, yet this was not the case. At Rome the proceedings met with condemnation. They accorded with the daring policy of the Jesuits, who were masters at Court, but not with the more cautious measures of the Papacy, at that time in collision with the order which had proved such a prop to the Papal chair.
Innocent XI. refused to gratify James in a matter which he had much at heart. James wished to procure a mitre for a Jesuit, named Petre, but as the elevation of the dignitary to the Episcopate was contrary to the rules of the Order, James sought for him a red hat. But neither mitre nor hat could be obtained. The circumstance mortified the Monarch, and it certainly appeared as a very ungrateful return for all his devotion to the interests of Rome; but he resolved to give Petre a seat at the Privy Council table, for which, indeed, he had designed the mitre or the hat to serve as a preparation. He meant to pave the way to the civil distinction of his Roman Catholic favourites, by first obtaining for them ecclesiastical honours; and when the nation heard that a Jesuit had been made a Privy Councillor, the wrath excited by the public recognition of Archbishop D’Adda increased tenfold.
1687.
Parliament had shown nothing like independence in reference to either ecclesiastical or political affairs, and had resembled a French Bed of Justice, convened to register Royal decrees; yet James dissolved it on the 4th of July, the very day succeeding the Nuncio’s reception. The despotic King now took affairs entirely into his own hands, and speedily rushed headlong to destruction. Two events completed the catastrophe—his attack upon the liberties of Cambridge and Oxford, and his second Declaration of Indulgence. These events at the same instant accomplished his own fall, and saved the Protestantism of England.
The law expressly provided, that none should be admitted to a Degree in either University who did not take the Oath of Supremacy and the Oath of Obedience. James had sent a mandate to Cambridge for Alban Francis, a Benedictine monk, to be created Master of Arts, although the monk was prevented by his religion from taking these oaths. Upon his refusing to be sworn, the University authorities refused to obey the mandate; consequently the High Commission summoned the two Chancellors and the Senate to appear before them at Westminster, upon the 21st of April. Dr. John Peachell, who then held the Vice-Chancellorship, with eight representatives of the Senate, including Isaac Newton, Fellow of Trinity, and Professor of Mathematics, answered the summons: and on meeting the Board, were treated by Jeffreys, who presided over the Commissioners, with an amount of insolence scarcely less than that which he had exhibited at the trial of Richard Baxter. He soundly rated Dr. Peachell; and when another more courageous person attempted to speak, he cried out, “That young gentleman expects to be Vice-Chancellor—when you are, Sir, you may speak, but till then it will become you to forbear.” Peachell had to suffer the loss of his office, and his emoluments, and the members of the Senate had to endure the vulgar insults of the minion who dismissed them, exclaiming, “I shall say to you what the Scripture says, and rather because most of you are Divines: ‘Go your way and sin no more, lest a worse thing come unto you.’”[193]
PROMOTION OF ROMANISTS.
1687.
The proceedings at Oxford are still more remarkable. A vacancy occurred in the highest office in Magdalen College. Notwithstanding the vested power of the Fellows to choose a President, Royal letters of nomination had been sometimes sent; and, as in deference to Royalty, such letters of nomination had been accepted and obeyed, precedents could be pleaded in this instance for the interference of the King. He recommended Anthony Farmer, a man who laboured under the threefold disqualification, of not being a moral character, of not being a Protestant Churchman, and of neither being, nor ever having been, a Fellow either of Magdalen or New College. The last circumstance, on statutory grounds alone, sufficed to exclude this nominee. The Fellows, of course, objected to him, and requested His Majesty to recommend another person. The election had been fixed for the 13th of April. The day arrived, without a further nomination from the Crown. At an adjourned meeting on the 15th, no notice having been taken of their request, the Fellows proceeded to make their election, and their choice fell on Dr. John Hough, a person of high reputation, whose firmness throughout the following troubles, have won for him a lasting renown. In June the Fellows were summoned to appear before the Commission, at Whitehall, to answer for what they had done. Jeffreys, the King’s evil star—whose conduct, both on the Bench and at the Council Board, must be pronounced one of the greatest curses, and whose appointment to the custody of the Great Seal must be held as one of the greatest crimes of this inglorious reign—badgered the deputation sent from Oxford to represent the College, as he had before badgered the deputation sent from Cambridge. “Who is this man?” he asked, as Dr. Fairfax raised a question touching the validity of the Commission. “Pray, what commission have you to be so impudent in Court? This man ought to be kept in a dark room. Why do you suffer him without a guardian? Why did not you bring him to me to beg him? Pray, let the officers seize him.” Hough’s election was declared void, and Fairfax was suspended from his Fellowship;[194] but the nomination of such a man as Farmer was too outrageous to be pursued any further, even by the impudent despotism which had already defied law and order to an intolerable extent.
PROMOTION OF ROMANISTS.
In August, James nominated to the Presidency of Magdalen, Parker, Bishop of Oxford, with whose character the reader is already acquainted. His unpopularity with Protestants had now been increased by the publication not only of his reasons for abrogating the test introduced to exclude Papists, but by his excusing the doctrines of Transubstantiation, and his vindicating the Romanists from the charge of idolatry. To nominate Parker offended the University for two reasons. No vacancy, in fact, existed, since Hough could claim office by virtue of his College election; besides, the Bishop had never been a Fellow of either of the Colleges specified in the Statutes. In September the King himself visited Oxford, determined to subdue the refractory body. The interview has been often described; the following account, substantially the same as that given in the State Trials[195] is preserved in MS. in the Record Office.
“The Lord Sunderland sent orders to the Fellows of Magdalen College to attend the King on Sunday last, at eleven o’clock, or at three in the afternoon.
“They waited accordingly. Dr. Pudsey, Speaker.
“K.—‘What’s your name? Are you Dr. Pudsey?’
“Dr. P.—‘Yes, may it please your Majesty.’
“K.—‘Did you receive my letter?’
“Dr. P.—‘Yes, Sir, we did.’
“K.—‘Then you have not dealt with me like gentlemen: you have done very uncivilly by me, and undutifully.’
1687.
“Then they all kneeled down, and Dr. Pudsey offered a petition, containing the reasons of their proceedings, which His Majesty refused to receive, and said, ‘You have been a stubborn and turbulent College. I have known you to be so this twenty-six years. You have affronted me in this. Is this your Church of England loyalty? One would wonder to find so many Church of England men in such a business. Go back, and show yourselves good members of the Church of England. Get ye gone; know I am your King, and I command you to be gone. Go and admit the Bishop of Oxon, Head-Principal—(what do you call it) of your College.’
“One standing by said ‘President.’
“K.—‘I mean President of the College. Let him know that refuses it. Look to’t. They shall find the weight of their Sovereign’s displeasure.’
“The Fellows went away, and being gone out were recalled.
“K.—‘I hear you have admitted a Fellow of your College since ye received my inhibition. Is this true? Have you not admitted Mr. Holden, Fellow?’
“Dr. P.—‘I think he was admitted Fellow, but we conceive—.’ The Dr. hesitating, another said, ‘May it please Your Majesty, there was no new election or admission since Your Majesty’s inhibition, but only the consummation of a former election. We always elect to one year’s probation, then the person elected is received or rejected for ever.’
“K.—‘The consummation of a former election! It was downright disobedience, and is a fresh aggravation. Get you gone home, and immediately repair to your Chapel, and elect the Bishop of Oxon, or else you must expect to feel the heavy hand of an angry King.’
“The Fellows offered their petition again, on their knees.
“K.—‘Get ye gone, I will receive nothing from you till you have obeyed me, and elected the Bishop of Oxford.’
“Upon which they went directly to their Chapel, and Dr. Pudsey proposing whether they would obey the King and elect the Bishop, they answered every one in his order; they were always willing to obey His Majesty in all things that lay in their power, as any of the rest of His Majesty’s subjects, but the electing of the Bishop of Oxford being directly contrary to their Statutes, and to the positive oath they had taken, they could not apprehend it in their power to obey him in this matter. Only Mr. Dobson, who had publicly prayed for Dr. Hough, the undoubted President, answered doubtingly, he was ready to obey in every thing he could. And Mr. Charrochi, a Papist, that he was for obeying in that.”[196]
PROMOTION OF ROMANISTS.
1687.
James found this a much more troublesome business than he had expected; and in October he thought it necessary to send to Oxford a Special Commission to endeavour to reduce Magdalen College to obedience. Forty years before this, when the Parliamentary army had taken possession of the University, Puritan Commissioners had visited the City to eject from office the loyal Episcopalians; and now, Commissioners of a far different character, and escorted by troops of cavalry, appeared in the same place, to eject men of the same stamp as had been ejected in 1647. Traditions of the past must have risen before Hough and his companions; and as they compared their own treatment by the King, with the treatment of Dr. Oliver by the Parliament, they must have felt the aggravated cruelty and injustice which they had to endure in the present instance; for, before it was a warfare of one Church against another Church—now opposition came not only from a Monarch sworn by law to support the Establishment, but from a prelate who was bound by his most religious vows to do the same; Cartwright, Bishop of Chester, being one of the Commissioners on the occasion. Conscientious Churchmen suffered persecution from the powers they had long honoured even to excess: they could, in this instance, as in so many others at the same period, complain both of treachery and ingratitude, if there be any obligations arising from oaths on the one side, or any obligations arising from loyalty on the other. What the King’s Commissioners did, and how the President and Fellows of Magdalen behaved, are well represented by the chisel of Roubiliac upon the famous sarcophagus to the memory of Hough, in Worcester Cathedral, and are succinctly described in the well-known words which form the inscription upon that work of art. “Having adjourned till the afternoon, the President came again into the Court, and having desired to speak a few words, they all took off their hats, and gave him leave; whereupon he said, ‘My Lords, you were pleased this morning to deprive me of my place of President of this College; I do hereby protest against all your proceedings, and against all that you have done, or hereafter shall do, in prejudice of me and my right, as illegal, unjust, and null; and, therefore, I appeal to my Sovereign Lord the King, in his Courts of Justice.’”[197]
The sequel of the affair, briefly told, was this. Hough was deposed, and deprived; and Parker was installed by proxy, only two members of the College, however, taking part in the ceremony. The humblest officers resented the insult put upon the noble foundation—porter, butler, and blacksmith, all refused to execute the commands they received to disturb the President elected by the Fellows, and to acknowledge the President nominated by the Crown. The ejection of the Fellows who supported Hough speedily followed. All were deprived of their income. But men of the same, or of other Colleges would not accept the vacant fellowships; the excitement raised at Oxford spread over the country, and subscriptions poured in from various quarters, for the support of the deposed Collegians. Parker died in the midst of the struggle; and then, to make bad worse, James designated a Roman Catholic Bishop, Bonaventura Giffard, as head of this Protestant institution. Twelve Romanists became Fellows—whilst Protestants, applying for fellowship, met with rejection. These proceedings agitated the whole country. Churchmen considered it as an attack upon the Establishment, Nonconformists as an attack upon Protestantism, politicians as an attack on chartered liberty, and people, who did not care for religion or politics, as an attack on the rights of property.[198]
NEW DECLARATION.
The King renewed the Declaration of Indulgence in April, 1688; and on the 4th of May issued an order that it should be read in all churches, and that the Bishops should see the order obeyed. He intended to test the obedience of the clergy; and he placed them in the dilemma of exposing themselves to his displeasure, or of degrading themselves by compliance with his arbitrary command. Crew of Durham, Barlow of Lincoln, Cartwright of Chester, Wood of Lichfield and Coventry, Walters of St. David’s, and Sprat of Rochester, presented addresses of thanks to the Sovereign for his promise to maintain the Church as by law established. The Chester clergy issued an address, maintaining that they were bound by “statute law, the rubric of their liberty,” to publish what the King or the Bishop required; and Herbert Croft, who still presided over the see of Hereford, read the Declaration, justifying his conduct, and recommending it as an example by the Scripture words, “Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord’s sake, whether it be to the king as supreme, or unto governors as unto them that are sent by him.”[199]
1688.
A meeting of the clergy was held in London, including Tillotson, Stillingfleet, Patrick, Sherlock, and other well-known men. They canvassed arguments for and against compliance, the latter being reinforced by an assurance conveyed to the meeting, in a note from some Nonconformists, who said that “instead of being alienated from the Church they would be drawn closer to her, by her making a stand for religion and liberty.”[200] Fowler, another distinguished clergyman, declared that whatever the majority might decide he was determined not to read the Declaration.[201] His speech encouraged the waverers, and an unanimous resolution of refusal resulted from the discussion. A paper to that effect rapidly received signatures from eighty-five London Incumbents. This meeting was held on the 23rd of May.
A more important meeting still had been held on the 18th of the same month, at Lambeth Palace. Then also Tillotson, Stillingfleet, Patrick, and Sherlock were present, together with Grove, Rector of St. Mary’s Undershaft, and Tenison, Vicar of St. Martin’s. But the most important personages taking part on that occasion were Compton, Bishop of London, then under suspension; Sancroft, Archbishop of Canterbury, also under the King’s displeasure; and the six Bishops, who, with Sancroft, make the seven so illustrious in English History. The six included Turner, Bishop of Ely; Lake, Bishop of Chichester;[202] White, Bishop of Peterborough; Trelawny, Bishop of Bristol; Ken, Bishop of Bath and Wells; and Lloyd, Bishop of St. Asaph. The last two alone require particular notice.
BISHOP KEN.
1688.
Thomas Ken, Bishop of Bath and Wells, the openness of whose countenance corresponded with the simplicity of his character,[203] is the best known of all the seven. A Wykehamist, and an Oxonian, he took orders in the Church just after the Restoration, and became Fellow of Winchester College, and Chaplain to the Bishop. In his former capacity he refused to admit to his lodgings Nell Gwynn, the mistress of Charles II., when she accompanied her lover on a visit to the romantic old city; and it is to the honour of the erring King, that, instead of showing resentment for this high-principled act, he rewarded with a mitre the virtues of the pure-hearted clergyman.[204] People suspected that, in consequence of a journey he made to the City of Rome, Ken had become tinged with Popery; but though ascetic in his habits, a High Churchman in principle, and decidedly “Catholic” in feeling, his protest from the pulpit against the errors of Rome, and his resistance of the policy of James, is sufficient to clear him from any suspicion of that kind: James did not personally dislike him, and listened to what he had to say on behalf of sufferers in the Monmouth Rebellion. His popularity appears to have been very great. Evelyn speaks of the crowd to hear him at St. Martin’s, as “not to be expressed, nor the wonderful eloquence of this admirable preacher;” and again at Whitehall, the same Diarist speaks of the Holy Communion after the Morning Service being interrupted by “the rude breaking in of multitudes, zealous to hear the second sermon to be preached by the Bishop of Bath and Wells.”[205] On that occasion Ken applied the story of the persecution of the Church of Judah, by the Babylonians, to the peculiar position of the Church of England; and he so powerfully urged the congregation to cling to the reformed faith, that they could scarcely refrain from an audible response. Sent for by James, and reproved for his boldness, Ken quietly replied “that if His Majesty had not neglected his own duty of being present, his enemies had missed the opportunity of accusing him.” But the Bishop’s wide fame rests mainly on his Morning, Evening, and Midnight Hymns, respecting which, it has been truly said, had he endowed three hospitals, he might have been less a benefactor to posterity.[206] Nor should we overlook the interest which he took in the young, his manual of prayer for Wykeham’s scholars, his establishment of parish schools, and his zeal for catechizing.[207]
BISHOP LLOYD.
William Lloyd, Bishop of St. Asaph, took a leading part in the proceedings of the seven. He had been ordained by Bishop Brownrigg, in the time of the Commonwealth, and had been made Dean of Ripon at the Restoration. In 1676 he had obtained the vicarage of St. Martin’s, Westminster; and amidst the excitement of the Popish plots had distinguished himself by his Protestant zeal. He had preached Godfrey’s funeral sermon, and had been indefatigable in his endeavours to elicit evidence in support of the accusations by Titus Oates.[208] Decidedly a party man, although sincere and honest, he showed himself apt practically to adopt the principle, that the end sanctifies the means, and to betray feelings of a kind which, though sometimes attributed exclusively to Papists, are rather the bad qualities of human nature.[209] He combined, with his Protestant activities, a fondness for prophetical studies, dwelling much upon the predicted downfall of Babylon, and bringing to bear upon his Biblical and other researches a considerable amount of learning, not always under the control of a sober judgment. Promoted in the year 1680 to the see of St. Asaph, he endeavoured to reduce the Dissenters to conformity by means of argument and friendly influence; and where he failed to convince he won respect.[210]
Such were the Bishops engaged in the Lambeth Conference, and it ended in the drawing up of a petition to the King, in which the petitioners professed that their objection to publish the Declaration did not arise from disloyalty to the King, nor from any want of due tenderness to Dissenters, in relation to whom they were willing to come to such a temper as should be thought fit, when the subject should be considered, and settled in Parliament and Convocation; but such a dispensing power as he now exercised had been by Parliament pronounced illegal.[211]
1688.
THE SEVEN BISHOPS.
Of the disposition of the petitioners to obey the commands of the King, so far as their conscience allowed, there can be no doubt; for some at least of the Bishops had maintained, or countenanced, the doctrine of passive obedience and non-resistance. Nor did they consider themselves as now acting inconsistently with that doctrine,—inasmuch as they distinguished between active and passive obedience, and refused only an active compliance with authority, which they had never held to be binding in cases where conscience interposed to the contrary. They would not do what the King commanded, but they would, as Confessors, patiently accept the consequences, should all constitutional and legal defence of themselves prove in vain. They would countenance no forcible resistance, they would not sanction taking up arms against His Majesty, and they would oppose the accession to the throne of any other claimants, however supported by the nation, so long as the anointed prince continued to live; and hence the attitude which they assumed as nonjurors. Respecting their conduct on this occasion, I must, without a grain of sympathy in their opinions, say, that they did not act so inconsistently as is supposed. But if justice requires this to be said, it requires also something more. As it regards Sancroft his conduct must be pronounced inconsistent. For although he now refused to read the Royal Declaration it appears that in the Prayer Book of Cosin,—amongst MS. suggestions, where it is said that nothing is to be read in church, but by direction of the Ordinary,—Sancroft had added the significant words “or the King’s order:”[212] and, moreover, he had recommended, or approved, at a recent period, the publishing of Royal declarations by the clergy in service-time.[213] As it regards the seven Bishops generally, in their relation to Dissenters, they now declared that they did not resist the Royal demand from any want of tenderness to them,—a plea which would have been valid had they all shown a tolerant and charitable spirit, but they had not done so. It is notorious that persecution had continued nearly up to the time of the first Declaration; and this, too, with the connivance or encouragement of some of the Bishops. The Bishop of St. Asaph, indeed, had distinguished himself by his moderation, Ken had not manifested a persecuting temper, but Sancroft, though appearing to advantage in comparison with Sheldon, cannot be defended from a charge of intolerance, for a letter exists, in which, after alluding to Conventicles at Bury and Ipswich, he expresses His Majesty’s pleasure, that effectual care should be taken for the suppression of unlawful assemblies.[214]
1688.
The altered and improved tone of Sancroft on the subject of Nonconformity just after the trial of the seven will be noticed in its proper place;[215] but certainly the language which the seven now employed looked too much as if introduced to serve a purpose. Their expressed objection to the Royal proceedings as unconstitutional, and as fraught with perilous consequences to the liberties of the country, and their implied maintenance of the authority of Parliament as the conservator of national freedom deserve, however, an Englishman’s gratitude; although here again, it is provoking to remember, that the current teaching of the High Church school, to which some of the prelates belonged, had been such as to exalt the power of Kings far above the power of Parliaments. The ostensible ground of defence, that the Declaration and the order were unconstitutional, gave the Bishops the appearance of being confessors in the cause of civil liberty, but this is a view of their character entirely contradicted by their previous career. The real ground of their conduct, no doubt, is to be discovered in their alarm at the King’s patronage of Roman Catholicism, in their persuasion that the Indulgence, which they were commanded to publish, had been contrived for that end, and in their conviction, that by active compliance with the Royal mandate at this crisis, they would be betraying the Church of England, and degrading their own character.
THE SEVEN BISHOPS.
The seven Bishops just described or mentioned, signed the petition. On the evening of the day on which they performed that momentous act, six of them crossed the water, to seek an interview with the King,—the Archbishop not accompanying them, because he had been forbidden access to Court. The prelates were admitted after ten o’clock to the Royal bedchamber, and then into the King’s closet,[216] where the Bishop of St. Asaph, dropping on his knees, presented the petition. The King exclaimed, “This is my Lord of Canterbury’s own hand.” “Yes, Sir,” said the Bishops, “it is his own hand.” “What,” cried His Majesty, in a furious tone, “the Church of England against my dispensing power? The Church of England! They that always preached it.” The prelates told him they never preached any such thing, but only obedience and suffering when they could not obey.[217] “This,” added James, as he folded up the paper, “is a great surprise to me; here are strange words—I did not expect this from you. This is a standard of rebellion.” The Bishops rejoined—“That they had adventured their lives for His Majesty, and would lose the last drop of their blood rather than lift up a finger against him.” The King repeated, “I tell you this is a standard of rebellion; I never saw such an address.” The Bishop of Bristol burst into an exclamation, “Rebellion, Sir! I beseech your Majesty, do not say so hard a thing of us. For God’s sake do not believe we are, or can be guilty of a rebellion. It is impossible that I, or any of my family should be so. Your Majesty cannot but remember that you sent me down into Cornwall to quell Monmouth’s rebellion, and I am as ready to do what I can to quell another, if there were occasion.” The Bishop of Chichester backed his Episcopal brother by saying, “Sir, we have quelled one rebellion, and will not raise another;” and the rest, after professing their loyalty, continued their objections. James, insisting upon the rebellious tendency of the document demanded that he should be obeyed, and have the Declaration published; but, he said, if he altered his mind he would let them know.[218] The conversation ended, and they retired. Now the Archbishop had written the petition himself, that he might prevent its being published, but in some way a copy of it got abroad, and being fast multiplied, the paper the very same evening in which it reached the hands of His Majesty reached also the hands of hundreds, and perhaps thousands of the people. Afterwards it received the signatures of the Bishops of London, Norwich, Gloucester, Salisbury, Winchester, and Exeter, who were not present at the earlier meetings.
1688.
The Declaration was read at Whitehall “by one of the choir, who used to read the chapters.”[219] It was read in Westminster Abbey; but there arose so great a noise, that nobody could hear it, and at the end of the publication none remained present, except the prebends, the choristers, and the Westminster scholars. The number of instances in which it was published in London is reckoned by Burnet and Kennet at seven, and by Clarendon at four.[220] In dioceses, where the Bishops ordered the clergy to comply, the command met with only limited obedience; within the diocese of Norwich, not more than three or four parishes, out of about twelve hundred, heard a single word of the document; and a story is told of an incumbent, who informed his people, that he had been enjoined to read, but they were not compelled to hear, and, therefore, he suggested that they should retire, whilst he repeated the proclamation within empty walls.
THE SEVEN BISHOPS.
The following singular letter by Barlow, the Bishop of Lincoln, indicates at once the difficulty felt by his clergy, and his own lukewarmness in the matter. Addressing a correspondent, he says:—
“Sir,—I received yours, and all that I have time to say (the messenger which brought it making so little stay here) is only this. By His Majesty’s command, I was required to send that Declaration to all churches in my diocese, in obedience whereto I sent them. Now the same authority which requires me to send them, requires you to read them. But whether you should, or should not read them, is a question of that difficulty, in the circumstances we now are, that you can’t expect that I should so hastily answer it, especially in writing. The two last Sundays, the clergy in London were to read it, but, as I am informed, they generally refused. For myself I shall neither persuade nor dissuade you, but leave it to your prudence and conscience, whether you will, or will not read it; only this I shall advise, that, after serious consideration, you find that you cannot read it, but reluctante vel dubitante conscientiâ, in that case, to read it will be your sin, and you to blame for doing it. I shall only add, that God Almighty would be so graciously pleased to bless and direct you so, that you may do nothing in this case, which may be justly displeasing to God, or the King, is the prayer of your loving friend, and brother,
Thos. Lincoln.”[221]
1688.
After a short delay, the King resolved to prosecute the Bishops for a misdemeanour. Having received a summons to appear before the Privy Council, they spent the interval in conference, being greatly cheered by expressions of sympathy from many friends of the highest distinction. After an audience with the King on the 8th of June, the Lord Chancellor announced the Royal pleasure to proceed against the accused according to law; and so soon as the warrants for commitment had been issued, the intelligence spread through London like wildfire,—people flocking in multitudes to see these venerable persons led out of court under the custody of a guard. Popular love of liberty, and zeal for religion, blazed up at once, and the spectators, including soldiers, fell down on their knees, to implore Episcopal benedictions. With these benedictions the Bishops united exhortations, that the people would fear God, and honour the King, and keep the peace; and no sooner had the prisoners entered within the precincts of the Tower, than they repaired to the chapel, to return thanks for that which the Almighty had counted them worthy to endure.[222] The next day numbers flocked to offer them service, and to express their thanks for such heroic behaviour, and amongst other visitors came ten Nonconformist ministers—a circumstance which so offended the King, that he summoned four of them to his presence, when they respectfully answered, that they could not help adhering to the Right Reverend prisoners, as men who were constant to the Protestant faith. Even the soldiers who kept guard expressed sympathy, in their own rude way, toasting the Bishops with brimming cups; and when rebuked for this by their captain, they said, they were doing it at that instant, and would continue to do so, until the Bishops were set free.[223]
THE SEVEN BISHOPS.
The Nonconformists had reason to expect that they would be required to read the Declaration in their meeting-houses; but one of their number, Mr. Morice, used all the means in his power to prevent the issue of such an order, and in this he succeeded. The Nonconformists, however, were pressed to get up congratulatory addresses: which they declined to do, for reasons which they stated in the following awkward terms:—
“None,” said they, “will offer it of condition, or quality, and so we shall be greatly diminished and lessened, by offering it, by persons of a little figure or that are not known to be ours.
“Our enemies and friends will greatly dislike it and heinously censure us for it.
“We shall become suspected, and so lose our interest in our great friends, both as to their private and public capacity.
“The inconsideration of those that occasion the debate of an address is the only reason that can be suggested for it, as a deference to the King.
“The report, or common talk of it, will be to our great advantage if we do it not, and will greatly strengthen our influence both upon enemies and friends, and in truth our influence is now full as great upon our enemies, as it used to be upon our friends.
1688.
“Lastly, we are absolutely [and indeed so they seem to be] for liberty by a law, but we are utterly against letting Papists into the Government, and of this the King has often had and should have a clear understanding and be fully possessed with it, that he may not have any colour afterwards to say we deceived.”[224]
Some few towns and corporations presented addresses of thanks to the King for the Declaration, and amongst them one from the “Old Dissenting officers and soldiers of the County of Lincoln;”[225] but the most numerous, as well as the most respectable of the Nonconformists, objected to such a course, and Baxter publicly in his pulpit extolled the Bishops. “The whole Church,” says the Papal Nuncio in his correspondence, “espouses the cause of the Bishops. There is no reasonable expectation of a division among the Anglicans, and our hopes from the Nonconformists are vanished.”[226]
THE SEVEN BISHOPS.
On the 15th of June, Sancroft and his brethren were brought from the Tower to the Court of King’s Bench; as their barge floated along the Thames, they were greeted with applauses and with prayers, and on their reaching Westminster, noblemen and gentlemen accompanied them into Court. Of the immense concourse of people who received them on the bank of the river and followed them to the bar, the greater part fell upon their knees, wishing them happiness and asking their blessing; and as the Archbishop laid his hands on the heads of those that were nearest, telling them to be firm in their faith, the people cried out that all should kneel, and tears were seen to flow from the eyes of many.[227] Westminster Hall has raised its huge form many a time, like an old rock out of the bosom of the sea, as crowds of excited people have gathered under its shadow: on this occasion the ocean of heads was more immense than ever, whilst surges of indignant and sympathetic feeling rose and rolled and broke every moment. All London seemed to be on the spot, and the spirit of the nation seemed to be there concentrated. Upon the prelates being desired to plead, the Archbishop was permitted to read a short paper, claiming sufficient time for preparing an answer; but the plea was rejected as a device for delay. The accused pleaded “Not guilty,” in the usual form, and the trial was fixed for that day fortnight. When the prisoners were admitted to bail on their own recognizance, the people took the circumstance as a triumph, and set no bounds to their boisterous joy. Huzzas rent the air, the Abbey bells rung, and people thronged the way the Bishops went, lighting bonfires, maltreating Roman Catholics, and execrating the other prelates who yielded to the Royal will.
On the 29th of June the trial took place in Westminster Hall. One of the most worthless men that ever sat on the bench, Lord Chief Justice Wright, the protégé of the infamous Jeffreys, presided, and with him were associated three puisne Judges—Holloway, Powell, and Allybone, a Roman Catholic. Strangely enough, Sawyer and Finch, two lawyers who had been State prosecutors under Charles II., and had conducted the proceedings against Lord William Russell, now appeared on the side of the prosecuted; whilst Williams, a Whig, now Solicitor-General, with Powys, the Attorney-General, conducted the prosecution. This confusion of parties led to attacks and recriminations which afforded such amusement to bystanders and so provoked their raillery, that the Court with difficulty suppressed demonstrations of censure or applause. Numerous noblemen sat by the Judges, scrutinizing their acts, and the Chief Justice looked, we are told, as “if all the peers present had halters in their pockets.”
1688.
The information having been read, the first thing was to prove the handwriting of the Bishops, a point not to be established without considerable difficulty. The Counsel for the defence raised the question,—Had the paper been signed in the County of Middlesex, where the venue had been laid? This could not be proved, inasmuch as Sancroft, during the whole business, had remained in his Palace at Lambeth. The case, so far, legally broke down, when the Crown lawyers changed their ground, contending, that the libel, if not written, had been published in Middlesex, by the delivery of it into the King’s hands,—a circumstance proved by the testimony of Sunderland, Lord President of the Council. It now remained for the advocates of the Bishops to defend the document. This they proceeded to do, by representing that, whereas their right reverend clients stood accused of having published a “false, malicious, and seditious libel” against the King, nothing could be further from deserving such epithets than the paper which they had presented, it being couched in the most respectful terms, and presented in the most private manner. It merely asked relief from compliance with a demand which distressed their consciences. Every subject had the right of petition, and Bishops ought not to be deprived of this common privilege, they being principally charged with the care and execution of laws concerning the Church’s welfare; but the main stress of the defence rested on the illegality of dispensing with penal laws.[228]
THE SEVEN BISHOPS.
The managers of the prosecution urged, that the King was entitled to the prerogative which he claimed; that what took place in the years 1662 and 1672 did not amount to any authoritative decision on the subject, but merely expressed the opinion of Parliament, to which His Majesty, under the circumstances, gave way, without a permanent surrender of his regal power. The libel of the Bishops was malicious and full of sedition, casting the greatest reflection on the Government. The tendency of their conduct was to inflame the public mind, and, though they had the right of petition, it could be no excuse for publishing a reproachful and scandalous attack upon the King’s Majesty. The Chief Justice, in summing up, pronounced the petition to be libellous; Justice Allybone took the same view; but the other two, Holloway and Powell, dissented from such a judgment,—an act of independence which cost them their seats on the Bench as soon as the term was over.[229] Evening had come, when the exhausted Jury retired to consider their verdict. They remained closeted all night without fire or candle, but basins of water and towels were furnished for their use. At about three o’clock in the morning, so it is reported, they were overheard in vehement debate with one another; and, at six, they sent word they had come to a conclusion, upon which, the prisoners being brought into Court, the foreman pronounced the verdict—“Not Guilty.” The effect was electric, the joy of the multitude burst out in a triumphant shout; “one would have thought,” said the Earl of Clarendon, who was present, “the Hall had cracked.” Now, as before, the people on their knees made a lane from the King’s Bench to beg a blessing as the Bishops passed; the crowd shook hands with the Jurymen, crying, “God bless you, and prosper your families, you have saved us all to-day;” noblemen flung money out of their coach windows for the mob to drink the health of the King, the Bishops, and the Jury; churches were crowded with people to pour forth their gratitude to God, for the delivery of His servants; and the prelates themselves, immediately after their acquittal, went to Whitehall Chapel, and thence proceeded to their respective homes, followed by the acclamations of delighted multitudes. An illumination succeeded in the evening, seven candles,—the middle one longer than the others, representing the Primate,—gleamed in thousands of windows; bells rang, bonfires blazed, rockets and squibs burst in all directions, the populace burnt an effigy of the Pope dressed in pontificals, as he appears in his chair at St. Peter’s, and Protestant demonstrations of various kinds continued all that night, until the church bells on Sunday morning called the people to worship and to rest. The joy of London repeated itself in the provinces, and vainly did the authorities forbid the outburst of gladness which rolled from shore to shore.
1688.
James was at Hounslow, reviewing the troops, when, on hearing a great noise, he asked what was the matter: “Nothing but the soldiers shouting for the acquittal of the Bishops.” “Call you that nothing,” he might well ask, and then insanely added, “but so much the worse for them.” It certainly proved so much the worse for him.
The popularity of the seven Bishops in 1688, appears in striking contrast with the unpopularity of the thirteen Bishops in 1642. There had been a number of circumstances, operating from the period of the Restoration, which contributed to the favourable impression now produced. The reaction against the rigours of Puritan rule, and the reverence, as well as the resentments kindled by clerical sufferings, the effect of the abolition of the Star Chamber and of the High Commission Court, the cessation of that troublesome zeal for ritualism, which had so harassed the country in the days of Laud, and the firm hold which the Episcopal Church had taken on the majority of the nation—these circumstances, and others, probably prepared for that gush of enthusiasm which greeted the Bishops on the day of their trial.
THE SEVEN BISHOPS.
Also, a change had come over the clergy. In 1677, they supported absolutism; then their opposition was chiefly directed against Protestant Nonconformity, and their resistance of the encroachments of Popery seemed lukewarm: but, before 1688, they opened their eyes to the intolerance of Romanism, and to the dark omens of its establishment in England. Alarmed at the impending evil, they warmly engaged in controversy, and many of them, seeing that the united strength of all Protestants had become needful to meet the emergency, proceeded to alter their conduct towards their long-despised Dissenting brethren. Convinced at last of the mischiefs connected with arbitrary rule, whatever subtle theories some might have respecting passive obedience and non-resistance, they now opposed, under the pressure of circumstances, the despotic policy of the Crown. Some saw the folly of their former course in exalting the Royal prerogative, with the idea of thereby defending the Church; now they discovered the unconstitutional power which they had conceded to the Sovereign to be an instrument capable of inflicting mischief on themselves. The ghost which they had raised, they now sought to lay; the monster which they had created or nourished, they now strove to crush. Ten years had produced a change in the clergy; and the change in the clergy had made them popular with the nation.
1689.
One great cause of the popularity of the Bishops may be found in the men themselves, in their unmistakeable honesty of purpose, in their zeal for Constitutional Government, in their professions of liberality towards other Protestant denominations, and certainly not a little, in their social virtues and their Christian piety. Their advocacy of the Reformed faith carried all its disciples along with them, their readiness to suffer for the Established religion inspired with affection the bosom of Churchmen, and their overtures of reconciliation touched the hearts of Nonconformists. The release of the Bishops proved a proud day for the Church of England, and the man must be of a cynical temper and of narrow sympathies, who cannot enter warmly into the triumphs of that occasion. Notwithstanding, historical justice requires, and the utmost generosity does not forbid us to remember the treatment which Nonconformists for twenty-seven years had endured at the hands of the English priesthood, through their steady refusal the whole of that time, to grant or to encourage either comprehension or liberty. Nor can we forget the prevalence of thorough irreligion, of frivolous scepticism, of downright immorality, and of disgusting vice, which blackened the last two Stuart reigns, and which the Church did so little to overcome or to diminish. Her laxity and time-serving, her want of missionary earnestness and love, her neglect of faithful and pointed preaching, and of pastoral diligence, her indifference to the education and well-being of the lower classes, at the time of which we treat, are in conspicuous contrast to her activity in these respects at the present day. There are few of her most devoted sons who would think of vindicating her from the reproaches now expressed, however they may value her formularies, rejoice in her Constitution, and join in celebrating the ovation of her seven Bishops.