Shipping in the Thames, circa 1660: from Pricke's South Prospect of London.
8. The Cavalier Parliament, and the Corporation Act. 1661.—On May 8, 1661, a new Parliament, sometimes known as the Cavalier Parliament, met. In times of excitement, nations are apt to show favour to the party which has a clear and decided opinion; and, on this occasion, nine-tenths of the new members were Cavaliers. The new Parliament voted that neither House could pretend to the command of the militia, nor could lawfully make war upon the king. Before the end of 1661 it passed the Corporation Act, which was aimed at the Presbyterians as well as at the Independents. All who held office in municipal corporations were to renounce the Covenant, and to take an oath of non-resistance, declaring it to be unlawful to bear arms against the king; and no one in future was to hold municipal office who had not received the Sacrament according to the rites of the Church of England. This Act did more than exclude from corporations those who objected to submit to its injunctions. In many towns the corporations elected the members of the House of Commons, and hence, by excluding non-conformists from corporations in towns, Parliament indirectly excluded them from many seats in the House of Commons.
9. The Savoy Conference, and the Act of Uniformity. 1661-1662.—After the dissolution of the Convention Parliament, the old number of bishops was filled up, and, in April 1661, a conference between some bishops and some Presbyterian clergy was held at the Savoy Palace, and has therefore been known as the Savoy Conference. The two parties differed too much to come to terms, and the whole question of the settlement of the Church was left to the Cavalier Parliament. In 1662 Parliament decided it by passing the Act of Uniformity. Every clergyman and every schoolmaster refusing to express, by August 24, his unfeigned consent to everything contained in the Book of Common Prayer, was to be precluded from holding a benefice. On August 24 (St. Bartholomew's day), about 2,000 clergy resigned their cures for conscience' sake, as their opponents had, in the time of Puritan domination, been driven from their cures, rather than take the Covenant.
10. The Dissenters. 1662.—The expulsion of the dissenting clergy, as they were now called, made a great change in the history of English Christianity. The early Puritans wished, not to separate from the national Church, but to mould the national Church after their own fashion. The Independents set the example of separating from the national Church, in order to form communities outside it. The Presbyterian clergy who kept up the tradition of the early Puritans were now driven out of the national Church, and were placed in very much the same position as the Independents. Hence, these two bodies, together with the Baptists and the Society of Friends—popularly known as Quakers—and other sects which had recently arisen, began to be known by the common name of Dissenters. The aim of those who had directed the meeting of the Savoy Conference had been to bring about comprehension, that is to say, the continuance within the Church of those who, after its close, became Dissenters. Their failure had resulted from the impossibility of finding any formularies which could satisfy both parties; and in consequence of this failure the Dissenters now abandoned all thought of comprehension, and contented themselves with asking for toleration, that is to say, for permission to worship apart from the Church, in their own assemblies.
11. The Parliamentary Presbyterians. 1662.—The Presbyterian clergy were followed by most of their supporters among the tradesmen and merchants of the towns. They were not followed by the Presbyterians among the gentry. The party in Parliament, which had hitherto styled itself Presbyterian, had originally become so mainly through dislike of the power of the bishops. They now consented to accept the Prayer Book, when they found that the regulation of the Church was to depend on Acts of Parliament and not either on the bishops or the king. The few members of the House of Commons who had hitherto been known as Presbyterians formed the nucleus of a party of toleration, asking for a modification of the law against Dissenters, though refusing to become Dissenters themselves.