The controversy about the Popish habits was one of the first that arose amongst the English reformers. Cranmer and Ridley were zealous for the use of them, whilst other very pious and learned Divines were for laying them aside, as the badges of idolatry and antichrist. Amongst these was Dr. Hooper, nominated to the bishoprick of Gloucester; but because he refused to be consecrated in the old vestments, he was by order of council first silenced, and then confined to his own house; and afterwards, by Cranmer’s means, committed to the Fleet prison, where he continued several months.
[[320]]In the beginning of Queen Elizabeth’s reign, A. C. 1559, an act passed for the uniformity of common prayer, and service in the church, and administration of the sacraments; by which the queen and bishops were empowered to ordain such ceremonies in worship, as they should think for the honour of God, and the edification of his church. This act was rigourously pressed, and great severities used to such as could not comply with it. Parker, Archbishop of Canterbury, made the clergy subscribe to use the prescribed rites and habits; and cited before him many of the most famous Divines who scrupled them, and would allow none to be presented to livings, or preferred in the church, without an intire conformity. He summoned the whole body of the London pastors and curates to appear before him at Lambeth, and immediately suspended 37, who refused to subscribe to the unity of apparel; and signified to them, that within three months they should be totally deprived, if they would not conform. So that many churches were shut up; and though the people were ready to mutiny for want of ministers, yet the archbishop was deaf to all their complaints, and in his great goodness and piety was resolved they should have no sacraments or sermons without the surplice and the cap. And in order to prevent all opposition to church tyranny, the Star Chamber published a decree for sealing up the press, and prohibiting any person to print or publish any book against the queen’s injunctions, or against the meaning of them. This decree was signed by the bishops of Canterbury and London.
This rigid and fanatical zeal for habits and coremonies, caused the Puritans to separate from the established church, and to hold private assemblies for worship. But the queen and her prelates soon made them feel their vengeance. Their meetings were disturbed, and those who attended them apprehended, and sent in large numbers, men and women, to Bridewell, for conviction. Others were cited into the spiritual courts, and not discharged till after long attendance and great charges. Subscriptions to articles of faith were violently pressed upon the clergy, and about one hundred of them were deprived, anno 1572, for refusing to submit to them. Some were closely imprisoned, and died in jail, through poverty and want.
And that serious piety and christian knowledge might gain ground, as well as uniformity, the bishops, by order of the queen, put down the prophesyings of the clergy, anno 1574, who were forbid to assemble as they had done for some years, to discourse with one another upon religious subjects and sermons; and as some serious persons of the laity were used to meet on holidays, or after they had done work, to read the scriptures, and to improve themselves in christian knowledge, the parsons of the parishes were sent for, and ordered to suppress them.
Eleven Dutchmen, who were anabaptists, were condemned in the consistory of St. Paul to the fire, for heresy; nine of whom were banished, and two of them burnt alive in Smithfield. In the year 1583, Copping and Thacker, two Puritan ministers, were hanged for non-conformity. It would be endless to go through all the severities that were used in this reign upon the account of religion. As the queen was of a very high and arbitrary temper, she pressed uniformity with great violence, and found bishops enough, Parker, Aylmer, Whitgift, and others, to justify and promote her measures; who either entered their sees with persecuting principles, or embraced them soon after their entrance, as best befitting the ends of their promotion. Silencings, deprivations, imprisonments, gibbets, and stakes, upon the account of religion, were some of the powerful reasonings of those times. The bishops rioted in power, and many of them abused it to the most cruel oppressions. The cries of innocent prisoners, widowed wives, and starving children, made no impression on their hearts. Piety and learning with them were void of merit. Refusal of subscriptions, and non-conformity, were crimes never to be forgiven. A particular account of these things may be seen in Mr. Neal’s history of the Puritans, who hath done some justice to that subject.
I shall only add, that the court of high commission established in this reign, by the instigation of Whitgift, Archbishop of Canterbury, by which the commissioners were impowered to inquire into all misdemeanors, by all such ways and means as they could devise, and thought necessary; to examine persons upon oath, and to punish those who refused the oath by fine or imprisonment, according to their discretion, was an high stretch of the prerogative, and had a very near resemblance to the courts of inquisition; and the cruelties that were practised in it, and the exorbitant fines that were levied by it in the two following reigns, made it the universal abhorrence of the nation, so that it was dissolved by parliament, with a clause that no such court should be erected for the future.
[[321]]King James I. was bred up in the kirk of Scotland, which professed the faith and discipline of those called Puritans in England; and though he blessed God, “For honouring him to be king over such a kirk, the sincerest kirk in the world,” yet, upon his accession to the English throne, he soon shewed his aversion to the constitution of that kirk; and to their brethren, the puritans in England. These were solicitous for a farther reformation in the church, which the bishops opposed, instilling this maxim into the king, [[322]]“No Bishop, no King;” which, as stale and false a maxim as it is, hath been lately trumped up, and publicly recommended, in a sermon on the 30th of January. In the conference at Hampton Court, his Majesty not only sided with the bishops, but assured the puritan ministers, who were sent for to it, that “he had not called the assembly together for any innovations, for that he acknowledged the government ecclesiastical, as it then was, to have been approved by God himself;” giving them to understand, that “if they did not conform, he would either hurry them out of the kingdom, or else do worse.”[[323]] And these reasonings of the king were so strong, that Whitgift, Archbishop of Canterbury, with an impious and sordid flattery said, “He was verily persuaded that the king spoke by the spirit of God.”
It was no wonder that the bishops, thus supported by an inspired king, should get an easy victory over the puritans; which possibly they would not have done, had his majesty been absent, and the aids of his inspiration withdrawn; since the archbishop did not pretend that himself or his brethren had any share of it. But having thus gotten the victory, they strove by many methods of violence to maintain it; and used such severities towards the non-conformists, that they were forced to seek refuge in foreign countries. The truth is, this conference at Hampton Court was never intended to satisfy the puritans, but as a blind to introduce episcopacy into Scotland, and to subvert the constitution and establishment of that church.
His majesty, in one of his speeches to his Parliament, tells them, that “he was never violent and unreasonable in his profession of religion.” I believe all mankind will now acquit him of any violent and unreasonable attachment to the protestant religion and liberties. He added in the same speech, it may be questioned whether by inspiration of the spirit, “I acknowledge the Roman church to be our mother church, although defiled with some infirmities and corruptions.” And he did behave as a very dutiful son of that mother church, by the many favours he shewed to the papists during his reign, by his proclamations for uniformity in religion, and encouraging and supporting his bishops in their persecutions of such as differed from, or could not submit to them.
Bancroft, promoted to the Archbishoprick of Canterbury, was, as the historian[[324]] calls him, “A sturdy piece,” a cruel and inflexible persecutor, treating the non-conformists with the greatest rigour and severity; and who, as Heylin tells us, [[325]]“was resolved to break them, if they would not bow.” He put the canons and constitutions agreed on A. C. 1603, furiously into execution, and such as stood out against them, he either deprived or silenced. And indeed, as the aforementioned author says, [[326]]“Who could stand against a man of such a spirit, armed with authority, having the law on his side, and the king to his friend? During his being archbishop he deprived, silenced, suspended, and admonished, above three hundred ministers. The violencies he and his brethren used in the high-commission courts, rendered it a public grievance.”[grievance.”] [[327]]“Every man must conform to the episcopal way, and quit his hold in opinion or safety. That court was the touchstone, to try whether men were metal for their stamp; and if they were not soft enough to take such impressions as were put upon them, they were made malleable there, or else they could not pass current. This was the beginning of that mischief, which, when it came to a full ripeness, made such a bloody tincture in both kingdoms, as never will be got out of the bishop’s lawn sleeves.”