Kettlewell entered with sympathy into the poverty and sufferings of his brethren. They had many of them lost all, and this benevolent man, anxious to assuage their distress, drew up a plan for collecting and distributing a fund for their relief, directing inquiries as to the income and expenditure of the deprived, with a view to prevent impositions upon charity. He proposed that the Clergy in London, who had no business there, but remained only because it was the best place for obtaining gifts, should be sent where they would be better maintained at less expense, and where they might make themselves of some service. Then, touching upon a notorious evil, he remarked, that others would then have no excuse for frequenting coffee-houses and hunting after benefactions, but would have time to promote their own improvement, and he advised those who sought relief, simply to note their sufferings, without making reflections.[462] He did not confine himself to sectarian charity, but sought also to promote the welfare of persons not of his own communion, of which a monument remained after his death, in a comprehensive trust, of which he was the founder.[463]
NONJURORS.
Kettlewell remained a Nonjuror to the last, and on his death-bed expressed his distinctive principles; but he did something better, and beautifully uttered the language of Christian hope.
He expired April the 12th, 1695, in London, and was buried in the parish church of All Hallows, near the Tower, in the same grave which had contained the remains of Archbishop Laud from his death till the Restoration. Ken was permitted by the Incumbent to read Evening Prayers on the occasion, and to attend in his episcopal robes to perform the burial service.
Kettlewell’s scheme of charitable relief received the sanction of the Nonjuring Bishops, who wrote a letter in its favour. The proceeding was laudable; yet such was the political antipathy to the Nonjurors by those in power, that Ken had to appear before the Privy Council to account for putting his name to the appeal; and of the interrogations he received and the answers he gave, there remains a report under his own hand.
1694–1702.
Dodwell threw his whole soul into the Nonjuring cause, and continued on its behalf, after the schism had occurred, the advocacy he had undertaken at the beginning. His pen was busy with denunciations and encouragements; in private letters to those whom he suspected of timidity, he deplored the general apostacy from Church principles; described the apostates as pretending to the name of the Church of England, whilst acting on the principles of its adversaries; spoke of latitudinarian notions as tincturing those of the laity who were so warm for what they call liberty of conscience; and expressed his deep sorrow for what he considered vacillation and cowardice.
No multitude of apostates, he declared, could ever be pleaded as an authoritative example against a small number continuing firm. The doctrine and practice of these faithful Abdiels, he added, had been maintained by the Church in all the cases which had occurred from the beginning of the Reformation to that very day. In the case of Queen Mary and the Lady Jane Grey, in the case of Cromwell and King Charles II., nay, in the present case, and in opposition to republican adversaries. He believed there were few of these great lapsers but would, a few years before, have resented it, like Hazael, as a great calamity and scandal had they been charged with doing the things which they had since actually done.
NONJURORS.
He denounced all compliance, eschewed all compromise, and reprobated all “carnal politics;” warned against balancing expediency with conscience, and against seeking to promote Protestantism by a sacrifice of Church principles.[464] He set aside reasons for taking the oaths, by saying there is no cause so bad but something may be said in its support, and by referring to Carneades’ Oration on Injustice, Burgess and Barnet’s Defence of Sacrilege, and the Hungarian’s Vindication of Polygamy. As an illustration of the lengths to which party spirit will carry people, I may cite the following passage from Dodwell’s vehement lucubration: “It is not a particular sect or opinion that we contend for, but the very being of a Church and of religion. Whether there shall be any faith that shall oblige to our own hindrance? Whether religion, which ought to add to its sacredness, shall be made a pretence for violating it? Whether our Holy Mother, the Church of England, which hath been famous for her loyalty, shall now be as infamous for her apostacy? Whether there be any understanding men who, in this incredulous age, can find in their hearts to venture the greatest worldly interest for their religion; that is, indeed, whether there be any that are in earnest with religion?”[465]