It is sometimes forgotten, but it is worth remark, that other meetings, besides Conventicles, were at this period proscribed. Coffee-houses were then such institutions as clubs are now; and Dryden might be seen at "Wills," in Covent Garden, surrounded by the wits, seated in "his armed chair, which in the winter had a settled and prescriptive place by the fire." Some houses of a lower character are described as exchanges "where haberdashers of political small-wares meet, and mutually abuse each other and the public with bottomless stories." Conversation ranged over all kinds of topics—scandalous, literary, political, and ecclesiastical; and questions touching Papists and Nonconformists were earnestly discussed within those quaint old parlours, over cups of coffee and chocolate, sherbet, and tea. These discussions were reported to the men in power as being often of a treasonable nature, even as Nonconformist sermons—only with much less reason—were so represented. Consequently a proclamation appeared in the month of December, 1675, recalling licenses for the sale of coffee, and ordering all coffee-houses to be shut up; "because in such houses, and by the meeting of disaffected persons in them, divers false, malicious, and scandalous reports were devised and spread abroad, to the defamation of His Majesty's Government and the disturbance of the quiet and peace of the realm." But public opinion was stronger in reference to coffee-houses than it was in reference to Conventicles—and whilst the latter remained beneath a legal ban, the former were speedily re-opened, "under a severe admonition to the keepers, that they should stop the reading of all scandalous books and papers, and hinder every scandalous report against the Government."[627]
1668–1676.
SAMUEL PARKER.
Comprehension and toleration continued to be discussed from the press. We have noticed publications in the year 1667 bearing upon such subjects. Between that date and the period to which we are now brought, a controversy had been going on respecting the fundamental principles of religious liberty; notorious on the one side for the baseness of the attack, memorable on the other for the chivalry of the defence. Samuel Parker had been brought up amongst the Puritans, had distinguished himself at Oxford during the Commonwealth as one of the gruellers (an ascetic little company of students, whose refection, when they met together, was oatmeal and water), and was esteemed "one of the preciousest young men in the University."[628] This man proved recreant to his principles after Charles' return, and, swinging round with immense momentum, became as violent in his Episcopalian as he could ever have been in his Presbyterian zeal. Having come up to London, and made himself known as "a great droller on the Puritans," he, in the year 1667, obtained a chaplaincy at Lambeth, and thus found himself on the high road to preferment. In 1669 he published a book, the title of which—like so many in those days—fully describes its contents, and expresses its spirit. He calls it "A discourse of ecclesiastical polity, wherein the authority of the civil magistrate over the consciences of subjects in matters of external religion is asserted, the mischief and inconveniences of toleration are represented, and all pretences pleaded on behalf of liberty of conscience are fully answered." The spirit of this book may be seen from the preface, in which the author justifies the violence of his attacks upon Nonconformists. "Let any man that is acquainted with the wisdom and sobriety of true religion," he exclaims indignantly, "tell me how 'tis possible not to be provoked to scorn and indignation against such proud, ignorant, and supercilious hypocrites. To lash these morose and churlish zealots with smart and twinging satires is so far from being a criminal passion, that 'tis a seal of meekness and charity." Thus he strikes the key-note of what he continues from page to page, disgusting every sensible reader; yet it is curious to find him maintaining unequivocally that the affairs of religion, as they must be subject to the supreme civil power, so they ought to be to none other, and "that the ecclesiastical jurisdiction of princes [is] not derived from any grant of our Saviour, but from the natural and antecedent rights of all sovereign power." His principles are thoroughly Erastian, although the writer objects to Hobbes' philosophy; and whilst his positions are often monstrous, his reasonings are contemptible. Dr. Owen wrote in reply to this assault, his Truth and Innocence vindicated; in which, after repelling the accusations brought forward by Parker, he exposes and confutes that author's principles.[629] Parker, in his rejoinder, poured upon Owen the coarsest abuse, calling him "the great bellwether of disturbance and sedition, and the viper swelled with venom, which must spit or burst." He also cast upon his old associates more and more of bitter invective, calling them "the most villanous unsufferable sort of sanctified fools, knaves, and unquiet rebels, that ever were in the world;"[630] and having in his first book attacked Dissenters in general, in the second he assailed Independents in particular, quoting against Owen divers extracts taken from his sermons. That Divine made no reply; but another formidable combatant appeared on his side against the scurrilous accuser. As the High Church party could boast of Samuel Parker who knew how to lampoon the Puritans, so the Liberals of that day gloried in Andrew Marvell, who could quite as cleverly satirize High Churchmen. In his Rehearsal Transposed, he carried the day, and tormented beyond endurance the champions of despotism. Everybody who could read, from the King to the artizan, perused with glee the pages of the book, so that the discomfiture of the Archbishop's Chaplain excited derision through a much wider circle than was ever reached by his foolish writings. Parker, however, was not a man easily to be silenced, nor was the cause he undertook easily to be crushed; and therefore he and his friends returned to the onslaught, and soon the printers were busy with a number of pamphlets, presenting a catalogue of most ridiculous titles. Marvell rejoined; and it is confessed by Parker that, at the end of the literary encounter, the odds and victory were against him, and lay on Marvell's side: the style of warfare adopted by the latter can scarcely be approved, but it was in the fashion of the times, and had been provoked by an unprincipled assailant, who, it may be hoped—as it is intimated by one sometimes resembling Parker in virulence—was all the better for the castigation he received.[631]
1668–76.
BISHOP CROFT.
This remarkable controversy lasted from 1669 to 1673; and was in its first stage when the new Conventicle Act appeared; and reached its height whilst the debates on the Indulgence, the Relief Bill, and the Test Act agitated Parliament and the country. High Churchmen read with sympathy the pages of the assailant of Nonconformists, and they, on the other hand, suffering from local persecution, or rejoicing in Royal indulgence, pondered Owen's arguments, or laughed at Marvell's wit.
In the year 1675, Croft, Bishop of Hereford, despatched anonymously The Naked Truth, in which he maintained the sufficiency of the Apostles' Creed as a standard of faith, and protested against the refinements of Alexandrian and scholastic philosophy. At the same time he declined submission to the authority of the Fathers, or of Councils, although paying respect to them as teachers and guides; and deprecated the importance attached to ceremonies, pleading for such liberty as St. Paul, "that great grandfather of the Church, allowed his children." He would dispense with using the surplice, bowing to the altar, and kneeling at the Lord's Supper, and also with the cross in baptism, and the ring in marriage. He advocated a revision of the Prayer Book, contended that all ministers are of one order, and believed that confirmation might be administered by priests as well as by prelates. The tract concludes with a charitable admonition to all Nonconformists, in which the author, after pleading his own desire for certain changes, yet confessing he saw no hope of being successful, most inconsistently proceeds to exhort his Dissenting readers, on grounds of Christian humility, and the mischiefs of separation, immediately to submit to the authority of the Church.[632]
1668–76.
BISHOP CROFT.
It has often been the fate of moderate men to suffer from condemnation by zealots in their own Church. Even Popes of Rome, when taking the side of charity and candour, have been dishonoured by advocates of the Papacy; and Anastasius II., for his mild behaviour towards the Eastern Church, has been represented by Cardinal Baronius as the victim of a Divine judgment. Dante, too, has assigned him to one of the circles of the damned. In a similar spirit contemporaries assailed the author of Naked Truth. "Not only the Churches, but the coffee-houses rung against it; they itinerated, like excise spies, from one house to another, and some of the morning and evening chaplains burnt their lips with perpetual discoursing it out of reputation, and loading the author, whoever he were, with all contempt, malice, and obloquy. Nor could this suffice them, but a lasting pillar of infamy must be erected to eternize his crime and his punishment. There must be an answer to him in print, and that not according to the ordinary rules of civility, or in the sober way of arguing controversy, but with the utmost extremity of jeer, disdain, and indignation."[633] Gunning, Bishop of Ely, attacked it in a sermon which he preached before the King; and to him has been ascribed a pamphlet entitled The Author of Naked Truth Stript Naked. It also met with animadversions from Dr. Turner, Head of St. John's, Cambridge. Still there were those of another spirit who appreciated the calm reasoning and the amiable temper of the Bishop; and Pearse, who is described by Wood as "a certain lukewarm Conformist," because he could not join in reviling his Nonconformist brethren, spoke of the book at a later date, in his Third Plea for the Nonconformists, as a Divine manifestation of a primitive Christian spirit of love. And he proceeds, "certainly, as that pious endeavour hath increased his (the author's) comforts, so he hath not lost all his labour; for since that, we have had more overtures of peace than we heard of in many years before of discord and troubles, from the learned in the Church of England." Marvell, in his answer to the animadversions, styled the writer of Naked Truth "judicious, learned, conscientious, a sincere Protestant, and a true son, if not a father of the Church of England." Baxter also alludes to it as an excellent book, "written for the Nonconformists," in favour of "abatements, and forbearance, and concord."[634]