On the 10th of September the same year, another person at Bath declared that the Nonconformists grew in numbers and insolence, saying they should have liberty of conscience, and that the Government, which could not stand much longer, could do no otherwise than allow them their freedom. They had reached such a degree of insolence as to break open church doors, and to get into the buildings to vent their sedition and rebellion. The minister at Marshfield often returned from church for want of a congregation, even of two or three, whereas, at the same time, 500 met in a barn within the town. They transformed such buildings into the likeness of churches, with seats for the convenience of speaking and hearing. The writer, who was a clergyman, declared that he had taken all ways imaginable to keep his people within the bounds of sobriety and obedience, and had preached constantly twice a day to suit their humour in all things lawful, descending to the plainest and most practical speaking, and had never used a note, or so much as wrote a word. Moreover, he had treated the party with all civility and kindness, and been very pacificatory in public and in private, yet all seemed in vain, and he saw that a minister must be a martyr.[531]
EXTENT OF NONCONFORMITY.
A contemporary author affirms that the Nonconformists everywhere spread through city and country; they made no small part of all ranks and sorts of men; by relations and commerce they were so woven into the nation's interest, that it was not easy to sever them without unravelling the whole skein. They were not excluded from the nobility, among the gentry they were not a few, yet none were of more importance than mere tradesmen, and such as lived by their own industry. To suppress them would beget a general insecurity, and might help to drive trade out of the country, and send it to find a home with an emulous and encroaching nation. If no greater latitude could be allowed than existed at that time, a race of Nonconformists would, in all probability, run parallel with Conformists to the end of the world.[532]
CHAPTER XIX.
It was a pamphleteering age; and religion as well as politics fell under discussion in numerous small publications. Some one published in the beginning of August, 1667, under the name of "A Lover of Sincerity and Peace," A Proposition for the Safety and Happiness of the King and Kingdom, both in Church and State, a work in which the writer advocated comprehension and toleration. In the middle of the month of October there followed a reply, from the pen of a Mr. Tomkyns, one of Archbishop Sheldon's chaplains. The same month another pamphlet appeared anonymously, under the title of A Discourse of the Religion of England, maintaining that Reformed Christianity, settled in its due latitude, secures the stability and advancement of the kingdom, of which the author is known to have been John Corbet, an ejected minister, who lived privately in London, after the passing of the Bartholomew Act.[533] Corbet was answered by Dr. Perinchief, Prebendary of Westminster, whereupon Corbet replied, and Perinchief put in a rejoinder. From August to November the printers and the public seem to have been busy in producing and reading these controversial tracts.
COMPREHENSION.
Whether or not this circumstance arose from a knowledge of what was going on in upper circles, it is certain that, now Clarendon had gone, Sir Robert Atkins—who afterwards became one of the Justices of the Common Pleas, and ultimately Lord Chief Baron of the Exchequer,—prepared a Bill of Comprehension. This healing measure, Colonel Birch, member for Penryn, undertook to introduce in the House of Commons;[534] and a careful account of it, written by Bishop Barlow, is preserved at Oxford in the Bodleian Library,[535] from which document we derive our information. The Bill provided that ordained ministers—whether Episcopal or Presbyterian—who should within the next three months subscribe to all the Articles of Religion "which only concern the confession of the true Christian faith and the doctrine of the sacraments" should be capable of preaching in any church or chapel in England, of administering the sacraments according to the Book of Common Prayer, of taking upon them the cure of souls, and of enjoying any spiritual promotion. After prescribing that the Common Prayer, according to law, should be read before sermon, there follows a proviso, that no one should be denied the Lord's Supper, although he did not kneel in the act of receiving it; and that no minister should be compelled to wear the surplice, or use the cross in baptism. The authors of the project, in addition to clauses touching Presbyterian ordination and ceremonies, wished to have the word "consent" left out of the form of subscription,—to confine subscription to the doctrine of the Christian faith,—not to bind ministers to read the Common Prayer themselves, if they procured others to do it,—and to lay aside the Oath of Adjuration.