South’s Sermons, which now amount to six Volumes, make Reading Jests and Banter upon Dissenters, the religious Exercise of good Churchmen upon Sundays, who now can serve God (as many think they do by hearing or reading Sermons) and be as merry as at the Play-house. And Hudibras, which is a daily High-Church Entertainment, and a Pocket and Travelling High-Church Companion, must necessarily have a very considerable Effect, and cannot fail forming in Men that Humour and Vein of Ridicule upon Dissenters which runs thro’ that Work. In a word, High-Church has constantly been an Enemy to, and a Ridiculer of the Seriousness of Puritans and Dissenters, whom they have ever charg’d with Hypocrisy for their Seriousness.
“After [89] the Civil War had broke out in 1641, and the King and Court had settled at Oxford, one Birkenhead, who had liv’d in Laud’s Family, and been made Fellow of All Souls College by Laud’s Means, was appointed to write a Weekly Paper under the Title of Mercurius Aulicus; the first whereof was publish’d in 1642. In the Absence of the Author, Birkenhead, from Oxford, it was continued by Heylin. Birkenhead pleas’d the Generality of Readers with his Waggeries and Buffooneries; and the Royal Party were so taken with it, that the Author was recommended to be Reader of Moral Philosophy by his Majesty;” who, together with the religious Electors, it is justly to be presum’d, thought Waggery and Buffoonery, not only Political, but Religious and Moral, when employ’d against Puritans and Dissenters.
IX. King Charles the Second’s Restoration brought along with it glorious High-Church Times; which were distinguish’d as much by laughing at Dissenters, as by persecuting them; which pass for a Pattern how Dissenters are to be treated; and which will never be given up, by High-Church-men, as faulty, for ridiculing Dissenters.
The King himself, who had very good natural Parts, and a Disposition to banter and ridicule every Body, and especially the Presbyterians, whose Discipline he had felt for his Lewdness and Irreligion in Scotland, had in his Exile an Education, and liv’d, among some of the greatest Droles and Wits that any Age ever produc’d; who could not but form him in that way, who was so well fitted by Temper for it. The Duke of Buckingham was his constant Companion. And he had a [90] great Liveliness of Wit, and a peculiar Faculty of turning all things into ridicule. He was Author of the Rehearsal; which, as a most noble Author says, is [91] a justly admir’d Piece of comick Wit, and has furnish’d our best Wits in all their Controversies, even in Religion and Politicks, as well as in the Affairs of Wit and Learning, with the most effectual and entertaining Method of exposing Folly, Pedantry, false Reason, and ill Writing. The Duke of Buckingham [92] brought Hobbes to him to be his Tutor, who was a Philosophical Drole, and had a great deal of Wit of the drolling kind. Sheldon, who was afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury, and attended the King constantly in his Exile as his Chaplain, was an eminent Drole, as appears from Bishop Burnet, who says[93], that he had a great Pleasantness of Conversation, perhaps too great.
And Hide, afterwards Earl of Clarendon, who attended the King in his Exile, seems also to have been a great Drole, by Bishop Burnet’s representing him, as one, that had too much Levity in his Wit, and that did not observe the Decorum of his Post[94]. In a Speech to the Lords and Commons, Hide attack’d the Gravity of the Puritans, saying[95], “Very merry Men have been very godly Men; and if a good Conscience be a continued Feast, there is no reason but Men may be very merry at it.” And upon Mr. Baxter and other Presbyterian Ministers waiting on him in relation to the Savoy Conference, he said to Mr. Baxter on the first Salute[96], that if “he were but as fat as Dr. Manton, we should all do well.”
No wonder therefore, that Ridicule, and Raillery, and Satire, should prevail at Court after the Restoration; and that King Charles the Second, who was a Wit himself, and early taught to laugh at his Father’s Stiffness[97], should be so great a Master of them, and bring them into play among his Subjects; and that he who had the most sovereign Contempt for all Mankind, and in particular for the People and Church of England, should use his Talent against them; and that his People in return should give him like for like.
It is well known how he banter’d the Presbyterian Ministers, who out of Interest came over to him at Breda; where they were placed in a Room next to his Majesty, and order’d to attend till his Majesty had done his Devotions; who, it seems, pray’d so artfully, and poured out so many of their Phrases, which he had learned when he was in Scotland, where he was forced to be present at religious Exercises of six or seven Hours a-day; and had practis’d among the Huguenot Ministers in France[98], who reported him to have a sanctify’d Heart, and to speak the very Language of Canaan. This Ridicule he cover’d with Seriousness; having at that time Occasion for those Ministers, who were then his great Instruments in reconciling the Nation to his Restoration. When he had no farther Occasion for them, he was open in his Ridicule, and would say, that [99] Presbyterianism was not a Religion for a Gentleman.
X. Would you, who are a Man of Sense and Learning, and of some Moderation, be for punishing the Author of The Difficulties and Discouragements which attend the Study of the Scriptures in the way of private Judgment, &c. who is suppos’d to be a Prelate of the Church, for that Book, which is wholly an Irony about the most sacred Persons and Things? Must not the fine Irony it self, and the Execution of it, with so much Learning, Sense, and Wit, raise in you the highest Esteem and Admiration of the Author, instead of a Disposition to punish him? Would you appear to the intelligent Part of the World such an Enemy to Knowledge, and such a Friend to the Kingdom of Darkness, as such Punishment would imply? In fine, can you see and direct us to a better way, to make us inquire after and understand Matters of Religion, to make us get and keep a good temper of Mind, and to plant and cultivate in us the Virtues necessary to good Order and Peace in Society, and to eradicate the Vices that every where give Society so much Disturbance, than what is prescrib’d or imply’d in that Book? And can you think of a better Form of Conveyance, or Vehicle for Matters of such universal Concern to all intelligent People (if you consider the State of the World, and the infinite Variety of Understandings, Interests, and Designs of Men, who are all to be address’d to at the same Time) than his Method of Irony? And has not Success justify’d his Method? For the Book has had a free Vent in several Impressions; has been very generally read and applauded; has convinced Numbers, and has been no Occasion of trouble either to Bookseller or Author. It has also had the Advantage to have a most ingenious Letter of John Hales of Eton join’d to some Editions of it; who by this Letter, as well as by several others of his Pieces, shews himself to have been another Socrates, one of the greatest Masters of true Wit and just Irony, as well as Learning, which the World ever produc’d; and shews he could have writ such a Book as the Difficulties, &c. But if you are capable of coming into any Measures for punishing the Author of the Difficulties, &c. for his Irony, I conceive, that you may possibly hesitate a little in relation to the same Author, about his New Defence of the Bishop of Bangor’s Sermon of the Kingdom of Christ, consider’d as it is the Performance of a Man of Letters; which, tho far below The Difficulties, &c. is an ingenious Irony on that Sermon. You may probably, like many others of the Clergy, approve of Satire so well employ’d, as against that Bishop, who has succeeded Bishop Burnet in being the Subject of Clergy-Ridicule, as well as in his Bishoprick. The Bishop himself was very justly patient, under all Attacks by the Reverend Trapp, Earbery, Snape, Law, and Luke Milbourne, in his Tom of Bedlam’s Answer to his Brother Ben Hoadley, St. Peter’s Poor Parson near the Exchange of Principles; some of which were of a very abusive kind, and such as can hardly be parallel’d; and did not call upon the Magistrate to come to his Aid against that Author, or against any others of the Clergy who had attack’d him with as great Mockery, Ridicule, and Irony, as ever Bishop had been by the profess’d Adversaries of the Order; or as ever the Bishops had been by the Puritans and Libellers in the Reigns of Queen Elizabeth, King James and King Charles the First; or as Lesley, Hickes, Hill, Atterbury, Binks, and other High-Church Clergy, did the late Bishop Burnet. Instead of that he took the true and proper Method, by publishing an Answer to the said Irony, compos’d in the same ironical Strain, intitled, The Dean of Worcester still the same: Or his new Defence of the Bishop of Bangor’s Sermon, consider’d, as it is the Performance of a great Critick, a Man of Sense, and a Man of Probity. Which Answer does, in my Opinion, as much Honour to the Bishop, by its Excellency in the ironical Way, as it does by allowing the Method it self, and going into that Method, in imitation of his Reverend Brethren of the Clergy, who appear to be under no Restraints from the Immorality or Indecency of treating the Bishop in the way of Ridicule and with the utmost Contempt; but, on the contrary, to be spurr’d on by the Excellency and Propriety thereof to use it against him, even in the [100] Pulpit, as Part of the religious Exercise on the Lord’s-day.
XI. There is an universal Love and Practice of Drollery and Ridicule in all, even the most serious Men, in the most serious Places, and on the most serious Occasions. Go into the Privy-Councils of Princes, into Senates, into Courts of Judicature, and into the Assemblies of the Kirk or Church; and you will find that Wit, good Humour, Ridicule, and Drollery, mix themselves in all the Questions before those Bodies; and that the most solemn and sour Person there present, will ever be found endeavouring, at least, to crack his Jest, in order to raise a Character for Wit; which has so great an Applause attending it, and renders Men so universally acceptable for their Conversation, and places them above the greatest Proficients in the Sciences, that almost every one is intoxicated with the Passion of aiming at it.
In the Reports made to us of the Debates in the Houses of Lords, Commons, and Convocation, the serious Parts of the Speeches there made die for the most part with the Sound; but the Wit, the Irony, the Drollery, the Ridicule, the Satire, and Repartees, are thought worthy to be remember’d and repeated in Conversation, and make a Part of the History of the Proceedings of those Bodies, no less than their grave Transactions, as some such must necessarily be.