This equally profane and ridiculous document originated, as his Majesty declared, from the prohibition of Sunday recreations by some “puritans and precise people;” from which “unlawful carriages” there flowed, according to the royal doctrine, two main evils, the hindering the conversion of many from popery, and the preventing the meaner sort of people from using such exercises as would render their bodies fit for war, when his Majesty might “have occasion to use them.” He therefore announced his pleasure, that all the “puritans and precisians” should be constrained to conform, or to leave the country; and that, after divine service, the people should not be discouraged in any lawful recreation, such as dancing, archery, leaping; nor from May-games, Whitson-ales, morris-dances, and the setting up May-poles, and other sports therewith used. [101]
The clergy were required to publish this “Declaration” in all parish churches. Many who refused to do so were brought into the high commission court, suspended and imprisoned. [102a]
Dr. Samuel Harsnet, who was translated in 1619 from the see of Chichester to that of Norwich, was a zealous assertor of the ceremonies of the church, [102b] and a bitter enemy to all “irregularities.” Mr. Peck, having catechised his family and sung a psalm in his own house when several of his neighbours were present, the bishop required them all to do penance and recant. Those who refused were immediately excommunicated, and condemned in heavy costs. The citizens of Norwich afterwards complained to parliament of this cruel oppression. [102c]
By the same prelate, an individual named Whiting, was prosecuted and brought before the high commission, expecting to be deprived of considerable estates; but the death of the king put an end to the prosecution. [102d]
When Charles the first succeeded to the throne many of the descendants of the early puritans still adhered to the established church, seeking only the reduction of the inordinate power of the bishops, and the removal of “popish ceremonies.” But the injuries they received were constantly stimulating their inquiries, and strengthening their objections to episcopacy. Dr. Laud, who was successively promoted from the bishopric of Bath and Wells, to the see of London, [103a] and the archbishopric of Canterbury, [103b] wielded the terrors of the star chamber and high commission courts with redoubled cruelty. New and more offensive rites were introduced into the church. The communion table was converted into an altar, and all persons were commanded to bow to it on entering the church. [103c] All week-day lectures, and afternoon sermons on Sundays, were abolished; and the king, “out of pious care for the service of God, and for suppressing humours that oppose truth,” republished, by the advice of his ecclesiastical favourite, the Book of Sports, with a command that it should be read in all parish churches. [104a] This the puritan clergy refused, for which they felt the iron rod of their oppressors.
Another grievance under which the puritans laboured at this period, arose from the power assumed by the bishops, (in manifest dereliction both of the canons of the church and the laws of the land,) of framing and enforcing Articles of Visitation in their own names. The Articles of Dr. Matthew Wren, bishop of Norwich, were among the most remarkable. They consisted of nearly nine hundred questions, some very insignificant, others highly tinctured with superstition, and several impossible to be answered. [104b] They appear to have been chiefly designed to detect such ministers as were not “perfect” conformists—inquiring minutely into the observance of the ceremonies, the reading of the Book of Sports, the practice of conversing upon religion at table, and in families, &c. [104c] By his severities this prelate drove upwards of three thousand persons to seek their bread in a foreign land. [104d]
Among many who refused to read the Book of Sports, and otherwise disobeyed some of the bishop’s Articles, was Mr. William Bridge, who had been a fellow of Emanuel College, Cambridge, and was parish chaplain of St. George’s, Tombland, Norwich. [105a] He was silenced, and afterwards excommunicated. The writ de excommunicato capiendo, having been issued against him, he withdrew into Holland. [105b] An Independent church of English refugees, at Rotterdam, chose him as their pastor, and, during his residence among them, he appears to have become firmly attached to the Congregational mode of church government. [105c]
The forbearance of the English nation at last broke beneath the despotism of a king, who, not content with governing by a parliament, desired to rule without one, and the cruelty of a hierarchy which had become a hideous contrast to the church of the “holy, harmless, and undefiled” Redeemer. On the assembling of the long parliament in 1640, a storm of righteous retribution fell upon the authors of the ecclesiastical oppressions. The people assailed the parliament with complaints; the parliament presented their grievances to the king; and the deluded monarch replied by a proclamation, requiring an exact conformity to the established religion! But tyranny had already reached its height, and the torrent had set in an opposite direction.
The Independents, who had assembled in private, and shifted from house to house for many years, took courage and showed themselves in public. The same promising appearances induced Mr. Bridge to return to England in 1642. Many families of refugees accompanied him, some of whom settled in Yarmouth, and others went to reside at Norwich. All of them appear to have been warmly attached to Mr. Bridge, and very desirous of continuing under his pastoral care. This however was highly inconvenient, and it was at length agreed that the seat of his church should be at Yarmouth, and that the residents at Norwich, with some other serious persons there, should form themselves into a separate communion. This was done June 10th, 1644, several of the Yarmouth brethren signifying their consent with expressions of the most tender and endeared affection, as having been, many of them, “companions together in the patience of our Lord Jesus, in their own, and in a strange land, and having long enjoyed sweet communion together in divine ordinances.” [107]
Mr. Bridge may be regarded as the founder of the Independent churches in the East Anglian counties. A constant intercourse had been maintained between those counties and the opposite coast of Holland, from whence they were not too remote to catch the spirit of religious freedom which had actuated the conduct, and which constituted the reward of the exiled Christians. A district so situated—the scene of Robinson’s usefulness and sufferings, and which had given birth to Goodwin and Ames, and was receiving back into its bosom the champions of liberty and truth—presented an encouraging field for disseminating the principles of Independency. Hence they were rapidly and extensively embraced in this part of the kingdom. Dr. Calamy intimates that, some years after Mr. Bridge’s return, “most professors of religion” in these counties “inclined to the Congregational way.” [108a]