[671] Strype's Whitgift, 434-472.
[672] It is admitted on all hands that the Greek fathers did not inculcate the predestinarian system. Elizabeth having begun to read some of the fathers, Bishop Cox writes of it with some disapprobation, adverting especially to the Pelagianism of Chrysostom and the other Greeks. Strype's Annals, i. 324.
[673] Winwood, iii. 293. The intemperate and even impertinent behaviour of James in pressing the states of Holland to inflict some censure or punishment on Vorstius, is well known. But though Vorstius was an Arminian, it was not precisely on account of those opinions that he incurred the king's peculiar displeasure, but for certain propositions as to the nature of the Deity, which James called atheistical, but which were in fact Arian. The letters on this subject in Winwood are curious. Even at this time, the king is said to have spoken moderately of predestination as a dubious point (p. 452), though he had treated Arminius as a mischievous innovator for raising a question about it; and this is confirmed by his letter to the States in 1613. Brandt, iii. 129; and see p. 138; See Collier, p. 711, for the king's sentiments in 1616; also Brandt, iii. 313.
[674] Sir Dudley Carleton's Letters and Negotiations, passim; Brandt's History of Reformation in Low Countries, vol. iii. The English divines sent to this synod were decidedly inclined to Calvinism, but they spoke of themselves as deputed by the king, not by the church of England which they did not represent.
[675] There is some obscurity about the rapid transition of the court from Calvinism to the opposite side. It has been supposed that the part taken by James at the synod of Dort was chiefly political, with a view to support the house of Orange against the party headed by Barnevelt. But he was so much more of a theologian than a statesman, that I much doubt whether this will account satisfactorily for his zeal in behalf of the Gomarists. He wrote on the subject with much polemical bitterness, but without reference, so far as I have observed, to any political faction; though Sir Dudley Carleton's letters show that he contemplated the matter as a minister ought to do. Heylin intimates that the king grew "more moderate afterwards, and into a better liking of those opinions which he had laboured to condemn at the synod of Dort." Life of Laud, 120. The court language, indeed, shifted so very soon after this, that Antonio de Dominis, the famous half-converted Archbishop of Spalato, is said to have invented the name of doctrinal puritans for those who distinguished themselves by holding the Calvinistic tenets. Yet the synod of Dort was in 1618; while De Dominis left England not later than 1622. Buckingham seems to have gone very warmly into Laud's scheme of excluding the Calvinists. The latter gave him a list of divines on Charles's accession, distinguishing their names by O. and P. for orthodox and puritan; including several tenets in the latter denomination, besides those of the quinquarticular controversy; such as the indispensable observance of the Lord's day, the indiscrimination of bishops and presbyters, etc. Life of Laud, 119. The influence of Laud became so great that to preach in favour of Calvinism, though commonly reputed to be the doctrine of the church, incurred punishment in any rank. Davenant, Bishop of Salisbury, one of the divines sent to Dort, and reckoned among the principal theologians of that age, was reprimanded on his knees before the privy-council for this offence. Collier, p. 750. But in James's reign the University of Oxford was decidedly Calvinistic. A preacher, about 1623, having used some suspicious expressions, was compelled to recant them, and to maintain the following theses in the divinity school: Decretum prædestinationis non est conditionale—Gratia sufficiens ad salutem non conceditur omnibus. Wood, ii. 348. And I suppose it continued so in the next reign, so far as the university's opinions could be manifested. But Laud took care that no one should be promoted, as far as he could help it, who held these tenets.
[676] Winwood, vol. i. pp. 1, 52, 388; Lettres d'Ossat, i. 221; Birch's Negotiations of Edmondes, p. 36. These references do not relate to the letter said to have been forged in the king's name, and addressed to Clement VIII. by Lord Balmerino. But Laing, Hist. of Scotland, iii. 59, and Birch's Negotiations, etc. 177, render it almost certain that this letter was genuine, which indeed has been generally believed by men of sense. James was a man of so little consistency or sincerity that it is difficult to solve the problem of this clandestine intercourse. But it might very likely proceed from his dread of being excommunicated, and, in consequence, assassinated. In a proclamation, commanding all jesuits and priests to quit the realm, dated in 1603, he declares himself personally "so much beholden to the new bishop of Rome for his kind office and private temporal carriage towards us in many things, as we shall ever be ready to requite the same towards him as Bishop of Rome in state and condition of a secular prince." Rymer, xvi. 573. This is explained by a passage in the memoirs of Sully (l. 15). Clement VIII., though before Elizabeth's death he had abetted the project of placing Arabella on the throne, thought it expedient, after this design had failed, to pay some court to James, and had refused to accept the dedication of a work written against him, besides, probably, some other courtesies. There is a letter from the king addressed to the pope, and probably written in 1603, among the Cottonian MSS. Nero B. vi. 9, which shows his disposition to coax and coquet with the Babylonian, against whom he so much inveighs in his printed works. It seems that Clement had so far presumed as to suggest that the Prince of Wales should be educated a catholic; which the king refuses, but not in so strong a manner as he should have done. I cannot recollect whether this letter has been printed, though I can scarcely suppose the contrary. Persons himself began to praise the works of James, and show much hope of what he would do. Cotton, Jul. B. vi. 77.
The severities against catholics seem at first to have been practically mitigated. Winwood, ii. 78. Archbishop Hutton wrote to Cecil, complaining of the toleration granted to papists, while the puritans were severely treated. Id. p. 40; Lodge, iii. 251. "The former," he says, "partly by this round dealing with the puritans, and partly by some extraordinary favour, have grown mightily in number, courage, and influence."—"If the gospel shall quail, and popery prevail, it will be imputed principally unto your great counsellors, who either procure or yield to grant toleration to some." James told some gentlemen who petitioned for toleration, that the utmost they could expect was connivance. Carte, iii. 711. This seems to have been what he intended through his reign, till importuned by Spain and France to promise more.
[677] 1 Jac. I. c. 4. The penalties of recusancy were particularly hard upon women, who, as I have observed in another place, adhered longer to the old religion than the other sex; and still more so upon those who had to pay for their scruples. It was proposed in parliament, but with the usual fate of humane suggestions, that husbands going to church, should not be liable for their wives' recusancy. Carte, 754. But they had the alternative afterwards, by 7 Jac. I. c. 6, of letting their wives lie in prison or paying £10 a month.
[678] Lingard, ix. 41, 55.
[679] From comparing some passages in Sir Charles Cornwallis's despatches, (Winwood, vol. ii. pp. 143, 144, 153, with others in Birch's account of Sir Thomas Edmondes's negotiations, p. 233, et seq.) it appears that the English catholics were looking forward at this time to some crisis in their favour, and that even the court of Spain was influenced by their hopes. A letter from Sir Thomas Parry to Edmondes, dated at Paris, 10 Oct. 1605, is remarkable: "Our priests are very busy about petitions to be exhibited to the king's majesty at this parliament, and some further designs upon refusal. These matters are secretly managed by intelligence with their colleagues in those parts where you reside, and with the two nuncios. I think it were necessary for his majesty's service that you found means to have privy spies amongst them, to discover their negotiations. Something is at present in hand amongst these desperate hypocrites, which I trust God shall divert by the vigilant care of his majesty's faithful servants and friends abroad, and prudence of his council at home." Birch, p. 233. There seems indeed some ground for suspicion that the nuncio at Brussels was privy to the conspiracy; though this ought not to be asserted as an historical fact. Whether the offence of Garnet went beyond misprision of treason has been much controverted. The catholic writers maintain that he had no knowledge of the conspiracy, except by having heard it in confession. But this rests altogether on his word; and the prevarication of which he has been proved to be guilty (not to mention the damning circumstance that he was taken at Hendlip in concealment along with the other conspirators), makes it difficult for a candid man to acquit him of a thorough participation in their guilt. Compare Townsend's Accusations of History against the Church of Rome (1825), p. 247, containing extracts from some important documents in the State Paper-Office, not as yet published, with State Trials, vol. ii.; and see Lingard, ix. 160, etc. Yet it should be kept in mind that it was easy for a few artful persons to keep on the alert by indistinct communications a credulous multitude whose daily food was rumour; and the general hopes of the English Romanists at the moment are not evidence of their privity to the gunpowder-treason, which was probably contrived late, and imparted to very few. But to deny that there was such a plot, or, which is the same thing, to throw the whole on the contrivance and management of Cecil, as has sometimes been done, argues great effrontery in those who lead, and great stupidity in those who follow. The letter to Lord Monteagle, the discovery of the powder, the simultaneous rising in arms in Warwickshire, are as indisputable as any facts in history. What then had Cecil to do with the plot, except that he hit upon the clue to the dark allusions in the letter to Monteagle, of which he was courtier enough to let the king take the credit? James's admirers have always reckoned this, as he did himself, a vast proof of sagacity; yet there seems no great acuteness in the discovery, even if it had been his own. He might have recollected the circumstances of his father's catastrophe, which would naturally put him on the scent of gunpowder. In point of fact, however, the happy conjecture appears to be Cecil's. Winwood, ii. 170. But had he no previous hint? See Lodge, iii. 301.