There was a house in the Strand known as Worcester House. It had belonged to the Bishops of Carlisle; it had been bestowed on the Bedford family; it had been transferred to the author of the Century of Inventions, whose family title of Marquis of Worcester, gave it its name; and it had been fitted up by the Long Parliament for the reception of the Scotch Commissioners. By a turn in the wheel of fortune, which, at the Restoration, brought about so many changes, this residence had come once more into the possession of the Marquis, and he had lent it to Lord Chancellor Clarendon, as a residence, without requiring "one penny rent." The mansion, over which had fallen such varying shadows—and which had been designed to accommodate the deputation in 1643 from the Presbyterians of Scotland—now appeared as the scene of important negotiations between the Court and the Presbyterians of England.
Clarendon proposed a meeting of the two parties upon the 22nd of October. It was a time of great excitement in London, for the execution of the regicides—which will be noticed hereafter—had only just taken place; and, through the fortitude with which some of them had suffered, a reaction of feeling had arisen, and people had become disgusted with such bloody spectacles. His Majesty was present in the Chancellor's mansion, with the Dukes of Albemarle and Ormond, the Earls of Manchester and Anglesea, Lord Holles, and the Bishops of London, Worcester, Salisbury, Durham, Exeter,[138] and Lichfield and Coventry. Presently were ushered into the apartment—fitted up in the style of the seventeenth century, with costly furniture and superb decorations, for Clarendon lived like a prince—the following Presbyterian Divines—Reynolds, Spurstow, Wallis, Manton, Ash, and Baxter. Their Puritan habits contrasted obviously with the costume of the Courtiers and the Bishops, and would be eyed, we imagine, rather oddly by the pages as they announced their entrance. No disputing was to be allowed; the Lord Chancellor was simply to read over his revised Declaration, and as he advanced, the two parties were simply to declare their approbation or their disapproval. The particulars of the interview are too long for insertion; but we may observe, that after many comments upon Clarendon's paper, and after much conversation respecting the subjects of Episcopal power, and of reordination, the Chancellor drew out of his pocket another paper, observing, that the King had been asked by Independents and Anabaptists to grant toleration. He therefore proposed to insert in the document which had been read, a clause to the effect, that persons not members of the endowed Church should be permitted to meet for religious worship, provided they did not disturb the public peace. A pause followed. "The Presbyterians all perceived," says Baxter, "that it would secure the liberty of the Papists." Dr. Wallis whispered to him to be silent, and to leave the Bishops to give an answer. But the eager disputant could not hold his tongue. "I only said this," he reports, "that this reverend brother, Dr. Gunning, even now speaking against sects, had named the Papists and the Socinians. For our parts, we desired not favour to ourselves alone, and rigorous severity we desired against none! As we humbly thanked His Majesty for his indulgence to ourselves, so we distinguish the tolerable parties from the intolerable. For the former, we humbly crave just lenity and favour; but, for the latter, such as the two sorts named before by that reverend brother, for our parts we cannot make their toleration our request. To which His Majesty said, that there were laws enough against the Papists; and I replied, that we understood the question to be, whether those laws should be executed on them, or not. And so His Majesty brake up the meeting of that day."[139]
1660.
No doubt Charles looked as grave and as gracious as possible whilst he talked at Worcester House with Baxter and his brethren; and, although His Majesty alarmed his auditors by a reference to laws against Papists, he took care not to betray the utter hollowness of his professed zeal for Protestantism. So far as he had any sincere desire to grant an indulgence, it was not on behalf of Protestants, but on behalf of other persons whom Protestants most disliked. Puritans were to him troublesome people, whom he had to keep quiet as long as he could; and, in the meantime, he seems to have wished to use them as tools for producing the liberty which the Papists craved.
WORCESTER HOUSE DECLARATION.
1660.
Baxter went home dejected; two or three days afterwards, however, as he was walking in the City, amidst the din of carts and coaches, and the confusion of London cries, he heard a boy bawling at the top of his voice, that he had on sale copies of the King's new Declaration. He bought one of the sheets, and stepped into a shop to peruse the contents. The King, he found, commended in the highest terms the Church of England; and also acknowledged the moderation of the Presbyterians; he then proceeded to enumerate a series of concessions, which he had not the least doubt that the present Bishops would think "just and reasonable," and "very cheerfully conform themselves thereunto:"—That none should be presented to Bishoprics but men of learning, virtue, and piety; that suffragans should be appointed in the larger Dioceses; that the censures of the Church should not be inflicted without the advice and assistance of Presbyters, who should aid Bishops, Chancellors, and Archdeacons, in their respective offices; and that Confirmation should be rightly and solemnly performed:—that no Bishop should exercise any arbitrary power; that the Liturgy should be revised; but, that until the revision was effected, the unexceptionable portion of it should be used; that no existing ceremonies in the Church should be at once formally abolished; but, to gratify the private consciences of those who were grieved with the use of some of them, they should be dispensed with for the present; the final decision being left to a national Synod, to be duly called after a little time, when mutual conversation between persons of different persuasions should have mollified those distempers, abated those sharpnesses, and extinguished those jealousies which made men unfit for such consultation. The sign of the cross in baptism, bowing at the name of Jesus, the use of the surplice, and the oath of canonical obedience, were things not to be enforced, but to be left to individual opinion and choice. The King concluded, by renewing his Declaration from Breda, for the liberty of tender consciences, and by expressing hopes for the unity of the Church, the prosperity of religion, and the peace and happiness of the nation.[140] This Declaration went a long way towards meeting the views of moderate Presbyterians, and seemed at first to supply a basis on which a scheme of comprehension might have been reared. It is expressed in a tone utterly different from that adopted by the Bishops. It might well lead some Presbyterians to believe that the hour of union had come. Baxter found that suggestions made by himself and his friends, at the Worcester House Conference, had been adopted in the Declaration; and, on the whole, he felt pleased with the document. On the day that it appeared, he received from the Lord Chancellor an offer of a Bishopric. He replied, that if this offer had come before his seeing the Declaration, he should have declined it at once; now, however, he said, "I take myself, for the Churches' sake, exceedingly beholden to his Lordship for those moderations; and my desire to promote the happiness of the Church, which that moderation tendeth to, doth make me resolve to take that course which tendeth most thereto; but whether to take a Bishopric be the way I was in doubt, and desired some farther time of consideration; but if His Lordship would procure us the settlement of the matter of that Declaration, by passing it into a law, I promised him to take that way in which I might most serve the public peace." Soon afterwards Baxter made up his mind to decline the proffered honour, partly on personal, partly on ecclesiastical grounds.[141] He tells us, indeed, that he disapproved of the "Old Diocesan frame," and feared that, as a Bishop, he might have work to do contrary to his conscience; but he also particularly expresses the feeling that the Episcopal office would draw him aside from those works of theological authorship, for which he believed he had a special fitness, and a divine mission.
WORCESTER HOUSE DECLARATION.
Reynolds, at the same time, was offered the Bishopric of Norwich, and accepted it. For this he was then reproached, and has often since been severely blamed. Yet Baxter persuaded him to take this step, advising him to declare, that he did so upon the terms of the Royal Declaration, and that he would resign if these terms were withdrawn. Reynolds read to his friend a paper which he had prepared for His Majesty's hands, stating that he believed a Bishop was only a chief Presbyter, and ought not to ordain or govern but with the assistance of his co-Presbyters,—such being the doctrine according to which he was prepared to take his seat on the Bench. Whether he actually did present such a paper, Baxter could not tell.[142]
1660.