History of King Charles the First of England

by Jacob Abbott

He commenced his work, however, of strengthening and aggrandizing the Church, before he was appointed to this high office. He was Bishop of London for many years, which is a post, in some respects, second only to that of Archbishop of Canterbury. While in this station, he was appointed by the king to many high civil offices. He had great capacity for the transaction of business, and for the fulfillment of high trusts, whether of Church or state. He was a man of great integrity and moral worth. He was stern and severe in manners, but learned and accomplished. His whole soul was bent on what he undoubtedly considered the great duty of his life, supporting and confirming the authority of the king, and the power and influence of English Episcopacy. Notwithstanding his high qualifications, however, many persons were jealous of the influence which he possessed with the king, and murmured against the appointment of a churchman to such high offices of state.

There was another source of hostility to Laud. There was a large part of the people of England who were against the Church of England altogether. They did not like a system in which all power and influence came, as it were, from above downward. The king made the noblemen, the noblemen made the bishops, the bishops made the clergy, and the clergy ruled their flocks; the flocks themselves having nothing to say or do but to submit. It is very different with Episcopacy in this country. The people here choose the clergy, and the clergy choose the bishops, so that power in the Church, as in every thing else here, goes from below upward. The two systems, when at rest, look very similar in the two countries; but when in action, the current of life flows in contrary directions, making the two diametrically opposite to each other in spirit and power. In England, Episcopacy is an engine by which the people are ecclesiastically governed. Here, it is the machinery by which they govern. Whatever the forms are, the fact must be that the people govern here.

Opposition to the Established Church.

The Puritans.

Now in England there was a large and increasing party who hated and opposed the whole Episcopal system. Laud, to counteract this tendency, attempted to define, and enlarge, and extend that system as far as possible. He made the most of all the ceremonies of worship, and introduced others, which were, indeed, not exactly new, but rather ancient ones revived. He did this conscientiously, no doubt, thinking that these forms of devotion were adapted to impress the soul of the worshiper, and lead him to feel, in his heart, the reverence which his outward action expressed. Many of the people, however, bitterly opposed these things. They considered it a return to popery. The more that Laud, and those who acted with him, attempted to magnify the rites and the powers of the Church, the more these persons began to abhor every thing of the kind. They wanted Christianity itself, in its purity, uncontaminated, as they said, by these popish and idolatrous forms. They were called Puritans.

Disputes about the services of the Church.

There were a great many things which seem to us at the present day of very little consequence, which were then the subjects of endless disputes and of the most bitter animosity. For instance, one point was whether the place where the communion was to be administered should be called the communion table or the altar; and in what part of the church it should stand; and whether the person officiating should be called a priest or a clergyman; and whether he should wear one kind of dress or another. Great importance was attached to these things; but it was not on their own account, but on account of their bearing on the question whether the Lord's Supper was to be considered only a ceremony commemorative of Christ's death, or whether it was, whenever celebrated by a regularly authorized priest, a real renewal of the sacrifice of Christ, as the Catholics maintained. Calling the communion table an altar, and the officiating minister a priest, and clothing him in a sacerdotal garb, countenanced the idea of a renewal of the sacrifice of Christ. Laud and his coadjutors urged the adoption of all these and similar usages. The Puritans detested them, because they detested and abhorred the doctrine which they seemed to imply.

Controversy about amusements on Sunday.

Another great topic of controversy was the subject of amusements. It is a very singular circumstance, that in those branches of the Christian Church where rites and forms are most insisted upon, the greatest latitude is allowed in respect to the gayeties and amusements of social life. Catholic Paris is filled with theaters and dancing, and the Sabbath is a holiday. In London, on the other hand, the number of theaters is small, dancing is considered as an amusement of a more or less equivocal character, and the Sabbath is rigidly observed; and among all the simple Democratic churches of New England, to dance or to attend the theater is considered almost morally wrong. It was just so in the days of Laud. He wished to encourage amusements among the people, particularly on Sunday, after church. This was partly for the purpose of counteracting the efforts of those who were inclined to Puritan views. They attached great importance to their sermons and lectures, for in them they could address and influence the people. But by means of these addresses, as Laud thought, they put ideas of insubordination into the minds of the people, and encroached on the authority of the Church and of the king. To prevent this, the High-Church party wished to exalt the prayers in the Church service, and to give as little place and influence as possible to the sermon, and to draw off the attention of the people from the discussions and exhortations of the preachers by encouraging games, dances, and amusements of all kinds.

Laud's contention with the judges.