throne of Augustin, should be called | fathers or Levitical genealogies. There Your Grace, and should walk in pro- might be some doubt whether King cessions before the Premier Duke: but, in spite of the legislature, Sancroft would, while Sancroft lived, be the only true Archbishop of Canterbury; and the person who should presume to usurp the archiepiscopal functions would be a schismatic. This doctrine was proved by reasons drawn from the budding of Aaron's rod, and from a certain plate which Saint James the Less, according to a legend of the fourth century, used to wear on his forehead. A Greek manuscript, relating to the deprivation of bishops, was discovered, about this time, in the Bodleian Library, and became the subject of a furious controversy. One party held that God had wonderfully brought this precious volume to light, for the guidance of His Church at a most critical moment. The other party wondered that any importance could be attached to the nonsense of a nameless scribbler of the thirteenth century. Much was written about the deprivations of Chrysostom and Photius, of Nicolaus Mysticus and Cosmas AttiBut the case of Abiathar, whom Solomon put out of the sacerdotal office for treason, was discussed with peculiar eagerness. No small quantity of learning and ingenuity was expended in the attempt to prove that Abiathar, though he wore the ephod and answered by Urim, was not really High Priest, that he ministered only when his superior Zadoc was incapacitated by sickness or by some ceremonial pollution, and that therefore the act of Solomon was not a precedent which would warrant King William in deposing a real Bishop.* cus. But such reasoning as this, though backed by copious citations from the Misna and Maimonides, was not generally satisfactory even to zealous churchmen. For it admitted of one answer, short, but perfectly intelligible to a plain man who knew nothing about Greek *See, among many other tracts, Dodwell's Cautionary Discourses, his Vindication of the Deprived Bishops, his Defence of the Vindication, and his Parænesis; and Bisby's Unity of Priesthood, printed in 1692. See also Hody's tracts on the other side, the Baroccian MS., and Solomon and Abiathar, a Dialogue between Eucheres and Dyscheres. Solomon had ejected a high priest; but there could be no doubt at all that Queen Elizabeth had ejected the Bishops of more than half the sees in England. It was notorious that fourteen prelates had, without any proceeding in any spiritual court, been deprived by Act of Parliament for refusing to acknowledge her supremacy. Had that deprivation been null? Had Bonner continued to be, to the end of his life, the only true Bishop of London? Had his successor been an usurper? Had Parker and Jewel been schismatics? Had the Convocation of 1562, that Convocation which had finally settled the doctrine of the Church of England, been itself out of the pale of the Church of Christ? Nothing could be more ludicrous than the distress of those controversialists who had to invent a plea for Elizabeth which should not be also a plea for William. Some zealots, indeed, gave up the vain attempt to distinguish between two cases which every man of common sense perceived to be undistinguishable, and frankly owned that the deprivations of 1559 could not be justified. But no person, it was said, ought to be troubled in mind on that account; for, though the Church of England might once have been schismatical, she had become Catholic when the last of the Bishops deprived by Elizabeth ceased to live.* The Tories, however, were not generally disposed to admit that the religious society to which they were fondly attached had originated in an unlawful breach of unity. They therefore took ground lower and more tenable. They argued the question as a question of humanity and of expediency. They spoke much of the debt of gratitude which the nation owed to the priesthood; of the courage and fidelity with which the order, from the primate down to the youngest deacon, had recently defended the civil and ecclesiastical constitution of the *Burnet, ii. 135. Of all attempts to distinguish between the deprivations of 1559 and the deprivations of 1689, the most absurd was made by Dodwell. See his Doctrine of the Church of England concerning the Independency of the Clergy on the lay Power, 1697. The Whigs were vehement on the other side. They scrutinised, with ingenuity sharpened by hatred, the claims of the clergy to the public gratitude, and sometimes went so far as altogether to deny that the order had in the preceding year deserved well of the nation. It was true that bishops and priests had stood up against the tyranny of the late King: but it was equally realm; of the memorable Sunday when, | with their scrupulosity, if he considers in all the hundred churches of the them, notwithstanding their prejudices, capital, scarcely one slave could be as innocent and useful members of found to read the Declaration of Indul- society, who else can be entitled to gence; of the Black Friday when, amidst complain? the blessings and the loud weeping of a mighty population, the barge of the seven prelates passed through the watergate of the Tower. The firmness with which the clergy had lately, in defiance of menace and of seduction, done what they conscientiously believed to be right, had saved the liberty and religion of England. Was no indulgence to be granted to them if they now refused to do what they conscientiously appre-true that, but for the obstinacy with hended to be wrong? And where, it was said, is the danger of treating them with tenderness? Nobody is so absurd as to propose that they shall be permitted to plot against the Government, or to stir up the multitude to insurrection. They are amenable to the law, like other men. If they are guilty of treason, let them be hanged. If they are guilty of sedition, let them be fined and imprisoned. If they omit, in their public ministrations, to pray for King William, for Queen Mary, and for the Parliament assembled under those most religious sovereigns, let the penal clauses of the Act of Uniformity be put in force. If this be not enough, let His Majesty be empowered to tender the oaths to any clergyman; and, if the oaths so tendered are refused, let deprivation follow. In this way any nonjuring bishop or rector who may be suspected, though he cannot be legally convicted, of intriguing, of writing, of talking, against the present settlement, may be at once removed from his office. But why insist on ejecting a pious and laborious minister of religion, who never lifts a finger or utters a word against the government, and who, as often as he performs morning or evening service, prays from his heart for a blessing on the rulers set over him by Providence, but who will not take an oath which seems to him to imply a right in the people to depose a sovereign? Surely we do all that is necessary if we leave men of this sort at the mercy of the very prince to whom they refuse to swear fidelity. If he is willing to bear which they had opposed the Exclusion who is unwilling to be the slave of France and of Rome has a deep interest. In such a case it would be unworthy of the Estates of the Realm to shrink from the responsibility of providing for the common safety, to try to obtain for themselves the praise of tenderness and liberality, and to leave to the Sovereign the odious task of proscription. A law requiring all public functionaries, civil, military, ecclesiastical, without distinction of persons, to take the oaths is at least equal. It excludes all suspicion of partiality, of personal malignity, of secret spying and talebearing. But, if an arbitrary discretion is left to the Government, if one nonjuring priest is suffered to keep a lucrative benefice while another is turned with his wife and children into the street, every ejection will be considered as an act of cruelty, and will be imputed as a crime to the sovereign and his ministers.* priesthood will to a great extent be more unjust to His Majesty. The formed the character of the nobility matter, they said, is one of public conand gentry of the next generation. Of cern, one in which every Englishman the higher clergy some have in their gift numerous and valuable benefices; others have the privilege of appointing judges who decide grave questions affecting the liberty, the property, the reputation of Their Majesty's subjects. And is an order thus favoured by the state to give no guarantee to the state? On what principle can it be contended that it is unnecessary to ask from an Archbishop of Canterbury or from a Bishop of Durham that promise of fidelity to the government which all allow that it is necessary to demand from every layman who serves the Crown in the humblest office? Every exciseman, every collector of the customs, who refuses to swear, is to be deprived of his bread. For these humble martyrs of passive obedience and hereditary right nobody has a word to say. Yet an ecclesiastical magnate who refuses to swear is to be suffered to retain emoluments, patronage, power, equal Thus the Parliament had to decide, at to those of a great minister of state. the same moment, what quantity of relief It is said that it is superfluous to impose should be granted to the consciences of the oaths on a clergyman, because he nonconformists and what quantity of may be punished if he breaks the laws. pressure should be applied to the conWhy is not the same argument urged sciences of the clergy of the Established in favour of the layman? And why, if Church. The King conceived a hope the clergyman really means to observe that it might be in his power to effect the laws, does he scruple to take the a compromise agreeable to all parties. oaths? The law commands him to He flattered himself that the Tories designate William and Mary as King might be induced to make some conand Queen, to do this in the most cession to the dissenters, on condition sacred place, to do this in the adminis- that the Whigs would be lenient to the tration of the most solemn of all the Jacobites. He determined to try what rites of religion. The law commands his personal intervention would effect. him to pray that the illustrious pair It chanced that, a few hours after the may be defended by a special provi-Lords had read the Comprehension Bill dence, that they may be victorious over a second time and the Bill touching every enemy, and that their Parliament the Oaths a first time, he had occasion may by divine guidance be led to take to go down to Parliament for the pursuch a course as may promote their safety, honour, and welfare. Can we believe that his conscience will suffer him to do all this, and yet will not suffer him to promise that he will be a faithful subject to them? To the proposition that the nonjuring clergy should be left to the mercy of the King, the Whigs, with some justice, replied that no scheme could be devised pose of giving his assent to a law. From the throne he addressed both Houses, and expressed an earnest wish that they would consent to modify the existing laws in such a manner that all Protestants might be admitted to public employment. It was well understood | religion, and must not be surrendered that he was willing, if the legislature for the purpose of saving any man would comply with his request, to let however eminent from any hardship clergymen who were already beneficed however serious. It would be a sad continue to hold their benefices with- day doubtless for the Church when the out swearing allegiance to him. His episcopal bench, the chapter houses of conduct on this occasion deserves cathedrals, the halls of colleges, would undoubtedly the praise of disinterest-miss some men renowned for piety edness. It is honourable to him that and learning. But it would be a still he attempted to purchase liberty of sadder day for the Church when an Inconscience for his subjects by giving dependent should bear the white staff up a safeguard of his own crown. or a Baptist sit on the woolsack. Each But it must be acknowledged that he party tried to serve those for whom showed less wisdom than virtue. The it was interested: but neither party only Englishman in his Privy Council would consent to grant favourable terms whom he had consulted, if Burnet was to its enemies. The result was that the correctly informed, was Richard Hamp- nonconformists remained excluded from den; and Richard Hampden, though office in the State, and the nonjurors a highly respectable man, was so far were ejected from office in the Church. from being able to answer for the Whig In the House of Commons, no memparty that he could not answer even ber thought it expedient to propose for his own son John, whose temper, the repeal of the Test Act. But leave naturally vindictive, had been exaspe- was given to bring in a bill repealing rated into ferocity by the stings of the Corporation Act, which had been remorse and shame. The King soon passed by the Cavalier Parliament found that there was in the hatred of soon after the Restoration, and which the two great factions an energy which contained a clause requiring all muniwas wanting to their love. The Whigs, cipal magistrates to receive the sacrathough they were almost unanimous ment according to the forms of the in thinking that the Sacramental Test Church of England. When this bill was ought to be abolished, were by no means about to be committed, it was moved by unanimous in thinking that moment the Tories that the committee should be well chosen for the abolition; and even instructed to make no alteration in the those Whigs who were most desirous law touching the sacrament. Those to see the nonconformists relieved Whigs who were zealous for the Comwithout delay from civil disabilities prehension must have been placed by were fully determined not to forego the this motion in an embarrassing posi opportunity of humbling and punish-tion. To vote for the instruction would ing the class to whose instrumentality have been inconsistent with their princhiefly was to be ascribed that tremen- ciples. To vote against it would have dous reflux of public feeling which been to break with Nottingham. A had followed the dissolution of the middle course was found. Oxford Parliament. To put the Janes, the Souths, the Sherlocks into such a situation that they must either starve, or recant, publicly, and with the Gospel at their lips, all the ostentatious professions of many years, was a revenge too delicious to be relinquished. The Tory, on the other hand, sincerely respected and pitied those clergymen who felt scruples about the oaths. But the Test was, in his view, essential to the safety of the established *Lords' Journals, March 16. 1689. † Burnet, ii. 7, 8. The adjournment of the debate was moved and carried by a hundred and sixteen votes to a hundred and fourteen; and the subject was not revived.* In the House of Lords a motion was made for the abolition of the sacramental test, * Burnet says (ii. 8.) that the proposition to abolish the sacramental test was rejected by a great majority in both Houses. But his memory deceived him; for the only division on the subject in the House of Commons was that mentioned in the text. It is remarkable that Gwyn and Rowe, who were tellers for the majority, were two of the strongest Whigs in the House. but was rejected by a large majority. | layman was surely as competent as a Many of those who thought the motion clergyman to judge. That the Angliright in principle thought it illtimed. A can liturgy and canons were of purely protest was entered; but it was signed human institution the Parliament only by a few peers of no great acknowledged by referring them to a authority. It is a remarkable fact Commission for revision and correcthat two great chiefs of the Whig tion. How could it then be maintained party, who were in general very at- that in such a Commission the laity, tentive to their parliamentary duty, so vast a majority of the population, Devonshire and Shrewsbury, absented the laity, whose edification was the themselves on this occasion. * main end of all ecclesiastical regulaThe debate on the Test in the Upper tions, and whose innocent tastes ought House was speedily followed by a to be carefully consulted in the framdebate on the last clause of the Com-ing of the public services of religion, prehension Bill. By that clause it ought not to have a single representawas provided that thirty Bishops and tive? Precedent was directly opposed priests should be commissioned to to this odious distinction. Repeatedly, revise the liturgy and canons, and to since the light of reformation had suggest amendments. On this subject dawned on England, Commissioners the Whig peers were almost all of one had been empowered by law to revise mind. They mustered strong, and the canons; and on every one of those spoke warmly. Why, they asked, were occasions some of the Commissioners none but members of the sacerdotal had been laymen. In the present case order to be entrusted with this duty? the proposed arrangement was pecuWere the laity no part of the Church liarly objectionable. For the object of of England? When the Commission issuing the commission was the conshould have made its report, laymen ciliating of dissenters; and it was would have to decide on the recom-therefore most desirable that the Commendations contained in that report. missioners should be men in whose Not a line of the Book of Common fairness and moderation dissenters Prayer could be altered but by the authority of King, Lords, and Commons. The King was a layman. Five sixths of the Lords were laymen. All the members of the House of Commons were laymen. Was it not absurd to say that laymen were incompetent to examine into a matter which it was acknowledged that laymen must in the last resort determine? And could any thing be more opposite to the whole spirit of Protestantism than the notion that a certain preternatural power of judging in spiritual cases was vouchsafed to a particular caste, and to that caste alone; that such men as Selden, as Hale, as Boyle, were less competent to give an opinion on a collect or a creed than the youngest and silliest chaplain who, in a remote manor house, passed his life in drinking ale and playing at shovel-board? What God had instituted no earthly power, lay or clerical, could alter and of things instituted by human beings a * Lords' Journals, March 21. 1689. could confide. Would thirty such men be easily found in the higher ranks of the clerical profession? The duty of the legislature was to arbitrate between two contending parties, the Nonconformist divines and the Anglican divines, and it would be the grossest injustice to commit to one of those parties the office of umpire. On these grounds the Whigs proposed an amendment to the effect that laymen should be joined with clergymen in the Commission. The contest was sharp. Burnet, who had just taken his seat among the peers, and who seems to have been bent on winning at almost any price the good will of his brethren, argued with all his constitutional warmth for the clause as it stood. The numbers on the division proved to be exactly equal. The consequence was that, according to the rules of the House, the amendment was lost. * At length the Comprehension Bill * Lords' Journals, April 5. 1689; Burnet, ii. 10. |