That which has been said relates to the circumstances, the education, the preaching, and the habits of clergymen. What estimate is to be formed of their religious and moral character? It is a common vice to pass sweeping censures on a whole party. Most people fall into it when speaking of opponents, and protest against it when speaking of friends. Wishing to avoid that fault I would first say, undoubtedly many clergymen might be found at that time who were most exemplary in their lives, and two distinguished instances of the High Anglican type may be cited in proof. Ken was successively Incumbent of Little Easton, Brightstone, and East Woodhay. The purity of his life, the devoutness of his temper, the eloquence of his preaching, and his assiduous discharge of ministerial duties, are amongst the cherished memories of the English Church. With him his neighbour, Isaac Milles, the simple-hearted Rector of Highclere, is worthy of being associated. For nine-and-thirty years, on an income of £100 per annum, this worthy minister of Christ laboured for the welfare of his rural flock. Filled with the charity which thinketh no evil, "he would often rise up and leave the company rather than hear even a bad man reproached behind his back." So hospitable was he, "that he used to be much displeased, if any poor person was sent from his house without tasting a cup of his ale;" and "he turned a perfect beggar in order to get from others something to supply their wants." He walked "every day in the week to read the service in the parish church," and was "a constant visitant by the bedside of the sick and dying."[741]
CLERGY.
But there is another side to the picture—pamphleteers accused the clergy not only of ignorance, and of fanaticism, but also of immorality. This charge is but faintly touched in the particular controversy just reported; but a writer, at an earlier period, who fiercely assails the ministers of the Establishment, declares how the Church resents the scandalous profaneness of many of her sons; and reproaches the reverend in function, who were shameful in life, those who were disorderly in holy orders, and who, bound to walk circumspectly, reel notwithstanding, having their conversation in the ale-house as well as in heaven. He proceeds in the name of the Church to complain of unconscionable simony, and of encroaching pluralities; saying, "Lately you were thought incapable of one living, now three, four, or five cannot suffice you;" and the whole is wound up by charges of non-residence, whereupon the writer inveighs, in most violent terms, against the employment of curates.[742]
CLERGY.
Such testimony must be taken only for what it is worth. But it seems incredible that, without a substratum of facts, any one would make these bold assertions. Other writers of the period speak of the clergy in terms which give a mean opinion of their religious character. Philip Henry states of many who conformed, that, since they did so, from unblamable, orderly, pious men, they became exceedingly dissolute and profane.[743] Burnet alludes to the luxury and sloth of dignitaries "who generally took more care of themselves than of the Church."[744] Pepys records, that there "was much discourse about the bad state of the Church," and how the clergy were "come to be men of no worth in the world."[745] The King himself laid at their door the blame of the spread of Nonconformity; for "they thought of nothing but to get good benefices, and to keep a good table."[746] It was deemed necessary in Articles of Visitation to inquire whether the clergy resorted to taverns, or gave themselves to drinking, or riot, or played at unlawful games.[747] The rush of parish ministers out of London during the plague testifies to a want of devotedness and self-sacrifice; and the awful dissoluteness of public manners, looked at in connection with all circumstances, indicates not merely the failure of a faithful ministry in some cases, but the consequence of a careless and inefficient one in many more. Poverty and dependence, or even want of learning, will not account for all the clerical humiliation in the time of Charles II. A half-starved curé with love for his parishioners, and a ragged friar of true sanctity, had a far different social standing on the Continent, from many Protestant curates and chaplains at that time in England.
END OF THIRD VOLUME.
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