CHAPTER VI.
On the 1st of July, 1690, the memorable Battle of the Boyne was fought and won by William III. He received a slight wound; and that slight wound created an unexampled sensation throughout England and the cities and courts of Europe. A letter conveying the intelligence reached the Queen at Whitehall just as she was going to chapel; and, to use her own expression, it frightened her out of her wits. But out of her senses with trouble one day, she was out of her senses with joy the next, to find the injury turned out to be very slight.[190] Paris, at first frantic with exultation on hearing of the supposed death of the great enemy of France, sunk into rageful disappointment to find that he was still alive, and ready to fight further battles in support of Protestantism. Strange as it may appear—but the strange combinations of European parties and politics at that time will account for it—the tidings of the wound brought no joy to Rome, any more than to Austria.[191] Both were reassured by a true report of the fate of William. “No mortal man,” said Tillotson, “ever had his shoulder so kindly kissed by a cannon bullet;” a felicitous tune of expression, which even South, with all his prejudice against Tillotson, could not fail to admire.[192]
1690.
Whilst the battle was raging on the banks of the Boyne, a sea fight occurred off the Sussex coast; an English Bishop, in sympathy with his Royal master, was performing his sacred functions in the vicinity of the latter of these conflicts; and an extract from his Diary in reference to it is worth transcribing:—
“Thirtieth of June, being Monday, I began my visitation at Arundel; and went the next day to Lewes, where I visited on Wednesday; and on Thursday went towards Hastings, and heard by the way that the French were burning that town. But we resolved to go on, being invited to lie at Sir Nicholas Pelham’s, whose house was not many miles from it. He was gone thither with other country gentlemen; the French having attempted to burn some ships that were run on ground there. He sent us word the town was safe, but he could not come home that night. At six in the morning he came, and said there was no danger, but the town was in such confusion that it would be to no purpose to go thither. For the churches were full of soldiers, who lay there all night, and the streets full of country people, and all the women frighted away and fled, so that there were none left to dress any victuals. He invited us therefore to stay with him, and entertained us most kindly. But my Chancellor, Dr. Briggs, all on a sudden started up, and would go to Hastings, and about noon word was brought us some of the Clergy were there; which made me condemn myself for not going with him, though I followed the best advice I could get. And afterward it appeared to be the best; for though some of the clergy appeared, there was no place wherein to visit them; and besides it might have proved dangerous: for two men were killed with a cannon bullet in the very next house to that where my Chancellor sat; which made him run away in haste before he had done his business, and (as I remember) left some of his books behind him.”[193]
SHERLOCK.
The Battle of the Boyne led to an important clerical conversion. William Sherlock, Master of the Temple, had distinguished himself in the reign of James II., not only by his zeal in contending against Popery, but also by his decision in maintaining the principle of non-resistance. He strongly disapproved of the turn which affairs took at the Revolution, and advocated negotiations with the exiled Monarch, in reference to his being restored upon terms which would preserve constitutional liberty. The accession of the Prince and Princess of Orange inspired indignation, and the new oaths were by him unhesitatingly declined. He threw in his lot with the Nonjurors, who regarded his talents with respect and his character with admiration; and they esteemed the support of a man so popular as a tower of strength. After losing the Mastership of the Temple, he retired into private life, and, pensive amidst misfortunes, wrote and published his celebrated treatise on Death. Still he deprecated schism; disapproved of the establishment of any Episcopal sect; advised those who could conscientiously remain, not to forsake their parish churches; and even officiated himself at St. Dunstan’s, actually reading the prayers for William and Mary. When the Battle of the Boyne decided the fate of the exile, and secured peace for the occupants of the throne, Sherlock looked at things in another light, became reconciled to the revolutionary settlement, and took the oaths which he had before refused. As a consequence, he returned to the Mastership of the Temple, and also received the Deanery of St. Paul’s, vacated by Tillotson’s elevation to Canterbury. So prominent a man on the nonjuring side, could not pass through such a conversion without giving some reasons for it; accordingly he wrote a book, which he entitled, The Case of the Allegiance due to Sovereign Powers stated and resolved according to Scripture and Reason and the Principles of the Church of England.
1690.
SHERLOCK.
Sancroft, soon after the Revolution, published what was called Bishop Overall’s Convocation Book, written in the reign of James I., containing certain conclusions respecting Ecclesiastical and Civil Government, one of which, notwithstanding the current tone of the book in favour of non-resistance, is to the effect, that a Government originating in rebellion, when thoroughly settled, should be reverenced and obeyed as “being always God’s authority, and therefore receiving no impeachment by the wickedness of those that have it.” The Convocations of Canterbury and York had endorsed the contents of Overall’s volume; and, by a canon, distinctly condemned the doctrine that a Government begun by rebellion, after being thoroughly settled, is not of God.[194] Sherlock made a good deal out of this, and said he should have continued to stick at the oaths, had he not been relieved by Overall’s book, and had not the venerable authority of a Convocation given him a freedom of thinking, which the apprehensions of novelty and singularity had cramped before.[195] He did not consider, as is sometimes represented, that the Bishop and Convocation settled the matter, and that he was to submit as a child to the authoritative decree; but that a door had been thereby opened to the sons of the Church to look at the matter;[196] and that he, having been thus induced to examine it afresh, had for various reasons, which he assigns—some of which, it must be acknowledged, run counter to his previous publications on the subject[197]—arrived at the conclusion that he could conscientiously take the required vow. A terrible storm assailed him after this. Argument, satire, and abuse, sometimes in vulgar prose, sometimes in doggerel rhyme, descended in torrents upon his devoted head. Nonjurors reviled him on the one side; Revolutionists on the other; and people who did not care for either side joined in the old English cry against turncoats and time-servers. Most people maintained he had changed for the sake of loaves and fishes; and, as Mrs. Sherlock had made herself very notorious, and was said to have had immense influence over her husband, she caught a terrible pelting from a literary mob, who assailed her as Xanthippe, Delilah, and Eve, all in one. Sherlock had to pay the penalty, which men, whose new opinions jump in the same direction as their pecuniary interests, must ever pay; but human motives, whether good or evil, lie so far beneath the surface, that the reading of them by even honest historians may widely differ from the reading of them by the only Omniscient One. Contemporaries were too much involved in party strife to take an unbiassed view of Sherlock’s conduct; and writers since have scarcely been able to free themselves from prejudices handed down by the pamphlets of that day. The grave feature of the case affecting the reputation of the Master and Dean, is to be found, not in the new application of a principle which he had long held; but in the repudiation of his old principles, just at the moment when the Battle of the Boyne had destroyed all prospect of James’ restoration—the chance upon which, as Sherlock’s enemies believed, he had ventured hopes of high preferment, during the time of casting in his lot with the poor Nonjurors.[198]
1690.
The Battle of the Boyne having established the Revolution, and with it the throne of William, the people who had hailed him as their Deliverer became more than ever impatient towards all who remained disaffected towards his Government.
Lloyd, the nonjuring Bishop of Norwich, a friend, adviser, and correspondent of Sancroft, not being one of the illustrious Seven, had never shared in that halo of confessorship which for awhile had played around their sacred heads; but he had long been, and was still more than ever, regarded as an obstinate, violent, and intriguing Churchman, bent upon overthrowing the new Sovereign, and bringing back to Whitehall the exiled King. His politics, not his religion, made him unpopular; and his letters to his archiepiscopal friend, written in the summer of 1690, betray the fact, that whatever might be the dislike of the London populace to nonjuring Bishops in general, a feeling of hatred prevailed against him in particular, and threatened his security in one of the most unaristocratic districts of the Metropolis.
“I was yesterday,” he wrote on the 5th of August, “forced to a sudden flight, being alarmed by the rabble, who began to appear at their Reformation work in Old Street. I had a message from a good friend last Saturday, which assured me that the rabble would be up in a short time. And on Friday, my housekeeper (being among some of her relations in Cripplegate) brought me word, that the fanatics talked bitterly against the Bishops, and would shortly call them to an account.
“About 9 of the clock yesterday, Mr. Edwards, of Eye, and another gentleman, called upon me, and told me they saw about 150 of the mob very busy in pulling down of houses in Old Street. Within a few minutes the hawker which sells pamphlets brought the same tidings, and, in regard the dangerous crew were so near, I sent forthwith one of my men to see how the affair went abroad, and another to fetch me a hackney coach, into which I got with my wife and child, and straightway took sanctuary in the Temple. From thence I sent for further information, and found that the crew in Old Street was dispersed; partly by Justice Parry coming among them and taking their names and threatening them with informations; and chiefly by a company of the train-bands, who in that nick of time passed that way to muster in the fields.
1690.
“About four in the afternoon I returned to my house and found all quiet in the way. If the rabble had continued I would not have failed to send notice to your Grace; and, on the other hand, I resolved not to send a confused uncertain alarm. God be praised, this scarecrow is over, and I hope God will still deliver us from the bloody fangs of cruel saints and scoundrels.”[199]
Six months later the popular fury against men of Lloyd’s order was being fanned afresh, and again he told his sorrows to his old friend:
“Your Grace will see by the enclosed papers how the mob are encouraged to bring some under their discipline: their wrath is cruel, and their malice as keen as razors, but God defend the innocent from their rage.
“There is also published a most devilish Atheistical satire against the Clergy in general, but more especially against poor Nonjurors. I think no age hath seen the like of it,—it’s called a Satire against the Priests.”[200]
Nonjurors lived on both sides the Irish Channel. Soon after the battle which decided the fate of James, though it did not crush the hopes and schemes of his supporters, William had his attention called to the refusal of the Bishop of Ossory to pray for him in public worship. “His Majesty’s command,” said the Secretary of State to the delinquent, “is, that your Lordship be suspended till further order. I know not the terms, being here in a camp, that are used in things of this nature; but I acquaint your Lordship of His Majesty’s present resentment, and can say no more till I hear from your Lordship herein.”[201] Nonjurors on this side of the Channel, however, gave much more trouble than they did on the other.
SCHEMES FOR RESTORATION.
A scheme for the restoration of James came to light at the end of 1690. The leader of the conspiracy was Richard Graham, Viscount Preston, Secretary of State in the preceding reign, whose patent of nobility had been drawn up at St. Germains, and who retained his seals of office in spite of the Revolution. Secret conferences were held amongst the English Jacobites, and as the result, Lord Preston, with a Mr. Ashton and another companion, were despatched with treasonable papers to the ex-King; but ere they had passed Tilbury Fort, in a smack which was to convey them to the shores of France, they were seized and brought back to London. Preston and Ashton were tried, convicted, and condemned at the Old Bailey. Ashton was executed; Preston was pardoned. As they lay under sentence of death, the sympathies of the Nonjurors eagerly gathered round them, and the following letter from two well-known members of the party, to Sancroft—who still lingered in his Archiepiscopal Palace on the banks of the Thames—shows how earnestly they sought to enlist his offices:—
1691.
“We who waited on your Grace on Sunday last, in the evening, being sensible that we were defective in the delivery of our message, occasioned, in great measure, out of profound respect to your Grace, have, upon a fuller recollection of the importance of that affair, presumed to lay our thoughts more plainly before your Grace, humbly conceiving, with all due submission to your Grace’s judgment, that if your Grace shall think it proper to give your personal assistance to the gentlemen under sentence of death, it would not only be a very great comfort and satisfaction to the dying gentlemen, but likewise a considerable support and encouragement to all surviving honest men.
“My Lord, the concern is very extraordinary, otherwise we had not presumed to give your Grace this trouble, and therefore, we humbly beg your Grace would please to excuse this freedom.[202]
“Jeremy Collier,
“Shadrach Cooke.”
Turner, Bishop of Ely, was charged with complicity in Preston’s treasonable business, and two suspicious letters were produced, said to be in the Prelate’s handwriting; but I cannot find evidence of their authorship, or any proof in their contents justifying a charge of treason. As Turner immediately hid himself, and then absconded, it looks, notwithstanding, as if he felt a pang of conscious guilt; but concealment in his case seems to have been a difficult matter, for he had such a remarkable nose, that Sancroft, with a play of humour,—which occasionally illumined his misfortunes,—spoke of his friend as resembling Paul’s ship of Alexandria, which carried a well-known sign upon its prow, or beak. Hence, though London was a great wood, it would be hard for one with such a face, however disguised by a patriarchal beard, or by a huge peruke, to escape detection.[203] It is not a little remarkable that, though the deposed Primate prayed for his friend’s safety, he expressed no conviction of his friend’s innocence. The Nonjurors, as we have seen, had been treated with consideration and kindness. Though forfeiting their Sees in February, 1690, after which successors were nominated, the Prelates of the party were allowed to retain their palaces; and even as late as April, 1691, attempts were made by friends of the Government to compromise matters with them, in spite of the increased odium cast on their order by Turner’s conduct: it was proposed that, at least, they should disavow all share in the alleged conspiracy, but Sancroft would do nothing of the kind, easy and reasonable as such a concession seemed.
NONJURORS EJECTED.
There remained no alternative but to eject the disaffected, and to induct loyal successors. As the crisis approached, questions were raised and discussed by Nonjurors, touching the treatment of those so inducted. Lloyd, Sancroft’s busy correspondent, now wrote to say how perplexed he felt; for, extreme as might be his views, they were surpassed by the views of others. He reported that they asked, what they should do in case they appeared at any of the new Episcopal elections,—should they oppose them? From such a proposal he shrunk, for to carry it out might incur a premunire. Further, he inquired whether for him to recommend their absenting themselves would not be cowardly? Nonplussed by these problems, he despondingly added, “What, then, is to be done? Here I stick.” His friend Wagstaffe informed him, some had resolved to resist all Erastian intrusion, and expected the displaced Bishops would assert their rights. Lloyd grew testy at such an excess of zeal, and wished to know what the self-appointed critics would advise the Prelates to do? Had not those very critics submitted to deprivation? Of what use would it be for their superiors to do otherwise?[204]
1691.
Presently the question came again on the carpet.
“May it please your Grace,” wrote the indefatigable Lloyd, “I had last Saturday a fit opportunity to discourse with Sir Edward Entwich about the vexatio questio, and found him—upon consideration of the whole matter—to be of the same opinion with Mr. N—— th. The first question that I proposed was, whether it was advisable for us to keep possession till we were ejected by legal processes; his answer was, we might, if we judged it meet, dispute the possession; but then, saith he, you must at last expect to be outed, and to pay the costs and charges of the suit, and to be called to Westminster Hall, and perhaps elsewhere, to answer hard questions, and that with all rigour. I then asked whether he would advise us so to do, and appear for us, and draw pleas as occasions offered? To this his answer was, that he knew not to what purpose we should put ourselves to fruitless trouble; for, saith he, if a happy turn should come, all the proceedings against you will be out of doors. This is the sum of our discourse.”
He adds a paragraph respecting a Nonjuror whose Jacobitism had plunged him into serious danger:
“I saw Dr. B[ea]ch last week, who hopes shortly to be at liberty, or at least to be abroad upon bail.
“It was well for him that the informer blundered in his depositions against him, and indeed, so did the justices who took the information; for there is not in the deposition any express mention of the time or place, when and where the Doctor said, that the same power which put our Saviour on the pinnacle of the Temple, put William and Mary upon the throne; but I am told that there are other informations against him. His successor has broke into his Church in his absence, and got possession in his absence, and this is a very great trouble to the Dr.
NONJURORS EJECTED.
“I hear that Mr. Dean of Worcester begins to appear again, and hopes that the storm will blow over him. I heartily wish it may, sed timeo Danaos; for commonly they are not so generous.”[205]
The Dean of Worcester here referred to was Dr. Hickes. A little more than a fortnight before Lloyd’s letter was written, the Dean drew up a protest against his own ejectment, addressed to the Sub-Dean and Prebendaries, idly declaring the appointment of a successor to be illegal, and as idly calling upon them to defend the rights of the dispossessed. This protesting ended in smoke. Hickes and Wagstaffe, as well as Lloyd, had to succumb; so had Frampton of Gloucester, and White of Peterborough. Sancroft yielded only to a legal process; and at last, on Midsummer eve, between seven and eight o’clock, accompanied by the steward of his household and three other friends, he entered a boat at Lambeth ferry, which conveyed the little party to the Temple stairs, where the deprived Primate sought shelter for a few days in Palsgrave Court. One imagines, as amidst the lengthening shadows on the waters that same night he left for ever the towers of the familiar palace, he would cast “one longing, lingering look behind.” But history preserves a more touching picture of the departure of Ken from the city of Wells.
1691.
After he had from his pastoral chair in the Cathedral asserted his Canonical right to remain Bishop of the Diocese, he passed through the gardens and crossed the drawbridge over the moat, whilst old and young crowded round him to ask his blessing and say farewell. “Mild, complacent, yet dignified,” remarks the Layman who writes his life, “on retiring with a peaceful conscience from opulence and station to dependence and poverty, as the morning sun shone on the turreted chapel, we naturally imagine he may have shed only one tear, when looking back on those interesting scenes. Perhaps his eye might have rested on the pale faces of some of the poor old men and women who had partaken their Sunday dinner so often, and heard his discourse in the old hall.”[206]
Dr. Beveridge, who will be more particularly noticed hereafter, was offered the See of Bath and Wells; but he was threatened by the Nonjurors, in case he should accept the offer, with the fate of schismatical usurpers, like Gregory and George of Cappadocia, who invaded the See of Alexandria, upon the deposition of the orthodox Athanasius.
NONJURORS EJECTED.
A rumour went abroad that the Archdeacon of Colchester had accepted a mitre, in consequence of which friends pestered him with letters for his suspected act, and turned against him his reputation for learning and loyalty. Dr. Lowth prematurely addressed him under an Episcopal title, and expostulated with him in the following terms:—
“May it please your Lordship,
“You must be sensible in what great reputation all well-minded, learned, and judicious men, have had your laborious performances upon the Laws and Canons of the Church. But notwithstanding, since you have accepted a nomination to the Bishopric of Bath and Wells, of which See Dr. Ken is the Canonical proprietor; and having not been removed by his brethren, the Bishops, something more is required of you, whereby its comportment with those Church Laws may appear, so frequently forbidding two Bishops to be in one city. It is well known what separations the same practice hath bred in God’s Church, as also that her decision hath still been against you. If, then, the same return, the guilt and schism of it must be laid at your door, unless you can produce such ground for the present practice, whereof not only yourself but the Ancient Church hath heretofore been ignorant. These are the sentiments of many, who have formerly been your just admirers, and desire that you will give them no occasion of taking new measures concerning you, and particularly of him, who, notwithstanding he may no longer—upon the account of your present promotion—write himself your brother, yet will always remain
“Yours, in the faith and discipline
of the Ancient Church.”[207]
Whether or not such rebukes and warnings prevented Beveridge from accepting the vacant See, at all events he declined it, and remained a Presbyter till after the death of William.