------------------------------------------------------------------------
Transcriber’s Note:
This version of the text cannot represent certain typographical effects.
Italics are delimited with the ‘_’ character as _italic_. Characters
printed in ‘smallcap’ form are simply given in CAPITAL characters. The
occasional superscripted character is preceded by ‘^’.
Footnotes have been moved to follow the paragraphs in which they are
referenced.
The Table of Contents was printed in double columns, but are presented
here in a single column.
Minor errors, attributable to the printer, have been corrected. Please
see the transcriber’s note at the end of this text for details regarding
the handling of any textual issues encountered during its preparation.
THE LIFE AND TIMES
OF THE
REV. SAMUEL WESLEY, M.A.
[Illustration: _Sam^ḷ Wesley._]
THE LIFE AND TIMES
OF THE
REV. SAMUEL WESLEY, M.A.,
RECTOR OF EPWORTH,
AND FATHER OF THE
REVS. JOHN AND CHARLES WESLEY,
THE FOUNDERS OF THE METHODISTS.
BY
L. TYERMAN.
LONDON:
SIMPKIN, MARSHALL & CO., STATIONERS’ HALL COURT.
SOLD ALSO AT 66 PATERNOSTER ROW.
1866.
TO
THE REVEREND WILLIAM SHAW,
PRESIDENT OF THE METHODIST CONFERENCE,
=This Volume=
IS MOST RESPECTFULLY AND AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED,
AS A SMALL TRIBUTE
TO HIS
LONG AND USEFUL LABOURS AT HOME AND ABROAD,
AND AS AN
EXPRESSION OF THE BENEFIT DERIVED FROM
HIS PRIVATE FRIENDSHIP
BY
THE AUTHOR.
PREFACE.
I have the conviction that due honour has never yet been paid to Samuel
Wesley. The praises of his noble wife have been sung loudly and long;
and no one acquainted with her character and history, can doubt that Mrs
Wesley deserves all the laurels that have been awarded her. While the
general public, however, have justly regarded her as a lady of the most
eminent abilities, and most exalted piety, they have been in danger of
thinking that her husband, though learned, was often foolish; and though
pious, was painfully eccentric, stern, and quarrelsome. This is utterly
unfounded, and cruelly unjust. I submit, with all due deference to
others, that while the Methodists owe an incalculable debt of gratitude
to “the mother of the Wesleys,” they owe an equal debt to the
honest-hearted father. I trust that the present work contains sufficient
evidence of this.
It is also hoped that the following pages will help the reader to a
better understanding of the position occupied by Samuel Wesley’s sons,
John and Charles; and of the difficulties and discouragements
encountered by the illustrious first Methodists.
The “Memoirs of the Wesley Family,” by Dr Clarke, though loosely
written, have been of great service in the compilation of the present
volume; but a large number of other works have also been consulted. I
have carefully examined everything that Mr Wesley published, except
perhaps his first political pamphlet; and as that was published
anonymously, I cannot be _certain_ that I have seen it. I am not aware
that there is any _printed_ matter, casting light on Mr Wesley’s
history, that I have not laid under contribution. To have cited all the
authorities from which the work has been compiled, would have crowded
the margin with an inconvenient number of titles of tracts, pamphlets,
and books. A few are given, and the remainder can be easily adduced if
needed.
For the chapters on national affairs, I am largely indebted to Macaulay,
and to Knight’s “Pictorial History of England;” also to the _Tatler_,
_Spectator_, and _Guardian_; and to other publications of a kindred
character. In some instances, quotations have not been marked by
inverted commas; because they have not been made continuously, but
pickings from ten or a dozen pages of another work have been put into
half a page of this. I hope that this general acknowledgment will save
me from the charge of plagiary.
A few original letters are now for the first time published. For three
of these, I am indebted to the kind courtesy of the Rev. Elijah Hoole,
D.D.
The portrait is taken from the large engraving published in the year of
Mr Wesley’s decease, in his “Dissertations on the Book of Job.”
The work has been a labour of love; and if the reader derives as much
profit and pleasure in perusing it as the author has had in writing it,
I shall be amply satisfied.
L. TYERMAN.
STANHOPE HOUSE, CLAPHAM PARK,
_January 18, 1866_.
CONTENTS.
--------------
CHAPTER I.
TWO HUNDRED YEARS AGO—1640–1665.
PAGE
Convocation in 1640, 1
Divine Right of Kings, 1
Civil Wars Commenced, 2
Ejected Clergymen, 3
Ecclesiastical Outrages, 4
Sports Suppressed, 4
New Sects, 4
Assembly of Divines, 5
Church of England during the Commonwealth, 6
Cromwell’s “Triers,” 7
Morals of the Nation, 8
Restoration of Charles II., 10
Persecutions, 12
Archbishop Usher’s Scheme, 12
“The Healing Declaration,” 13
Meeting to Revise the Liturgy, 14
Solemn League and Covenant, 15
Act of Uniformity, 16
Alterations in Book of Common Prayer, 17
St Bartholomew’s Day, 19
Three Classes of Conforming Ministers, 20
Nonconforming Ministers, 21
Conventicle Act, 25
Five-Mile Act, 25
CHAPTER II.
PARENTAGE—1600–1670.
Bartholomew Wesley, 28
His Attempt to Arrest King Charles, 29
His Ejectment and Death, 32
John Wesley’s Birth, 32
John Wesley at Oxford, 33
John Wesley’s Appointment to Preach, 34
John Wesley’s Dialogue with Bishop of Bristol, 36
John Wesley’s Arrest and Trial, 43
John Wesley’s Ejectment and Persecutions, 46
John Wesley’s Friend, Joseph Alleine, 47
John Wesley’s Character and Portrait, 50
“The Patriarch of Dorchester,” 51
Thomas Fuller, 52
CHAPTER III.
SCHOOL DAYS—1662–1683.
Dorchester School, 55
National Events during S. Wesley’s Youth, 55
Titus Oates, 57
National Immorality, 62
Great Men, 64
S. Wesley intended for Dissenting Ministry, 65
S. Wesley sent to London, 65
Edward Veal, 65
Charles Morton, 66
Morton’s Pupils, 68
Rev. Thomas Doolittle, 69
Wesley writes Lampoons, 70
John Biddle, 71
Charges against Dissenting Ministers, 73
Wesley’s School-fellows, 74
Daniel De Foe, 75
CHAPTER IV.
UNIVERSITY DAYS—1683–1688.
Why S. Wesley left the Dissenters, 77
Wesley goes to Oxford, 79
Exeter College, 80
Wesley a “Servitor,” 81
Wesley publishes his “Maggots,” 82
Pope’s “Dunciad,” 84
John Dunton, 84
Wesley’s Life at the University, 86
King James’s Visit to Oxford, 89
Birth of Prince of Wales, 91
“Strenæ Natalitiæ,” 91
Wesley’s Poem, 92
His Feelings towards King James, 92
His Defence of the Revolution of 1688, 93
CHAPTER V.
NATIONAL AFFAIRS—1685–1688.
Charles II., 94
Argyle and Monmouth’s Invasion, 95
Judge Jeffreys, 96
King James’s pro-Papistical Acts, 98
King James’s Declaration of Indulgence, 98
National Patience Exhausted, 99
Deplorable Treatment of Dissenters, 100
Disobedient Clergy, 101
Story respecting S. Wesley Refuted, 102
S. Wesley’s Opinion of King James’s Indulgence, 103
Trial of Seven Bishops, 105
Flight of the King and Queen, 106
Accession of William and Mary, 107
Description of London, 107
State of the Country, 108
Religion and Morals, 111
CHAPTER VI.
ORDINATION AND MARRIAGE—1688, 1689.
Hardships at College, 113
Ordained a Deacon at Bromley, 113
Bishop Sprat, 114
Ordained a Priest in Holborn, 114
Bishop Compton, 114
Distinguished Clergymen, 115
Distinguished Dissenters, 117
Other Distinguished Men, 117
Wesley’s First Curacy, 118
Dr Annesley, 119
Samuel Annesley, jun., 121
The Father of Mrs Annesley, 122
Susannah Wesley, 125
CHAPTER VII.
THE “ATHENIAN GAZETTE”—1690–1695.
South Ormsby, 128
The Rural Clergyman, 129
Dunton projects the _Athenian Gazette_, 131
_Lacedemonian Mercury_, 133
Elkanah Settle, 133
Wesley and the Swearer, 134
Richard Sault and the Second Spira, 135
John Norris, 136
Nahum Tate, 137
Jonathan Swift, 137
Sir William Temple, 138
Mrs Rowe, 138
Charles Gildon, 138
History of Athenian Society, 138
Gildon’s Character of Wesley, 139
Questions Answered in _Athenian Gazette_, 141
Wesley’s Opinions of Quakers, 143
Wesley’s Theological Opinions, 143
Wesley’s Opinion of Churchmen and Dissenters, 148
CHAPTER VIII.
MORE LITERARY WORK—1692, 1693.
“The Young Student’s Library,” 150
Its fantastic Frontispiece, 150
Contents of Young Student’s Library, 151
Wesley’s Article on Hebrew Points, 152
Wesley’s Essay on all sorts of Learning, 155
Wesley’s “Complete Library,” 158
Wesley’s “Life of Christ,” 160
Opinions for and against it, 160
The Engravings in it, 163
William Fairthorn, 163
Extracts from the “Life of Christ,” 164
CHAPTER IX.
WILLIAM AND MARY’S REIGN—1689–1702.
Touching to Cure the King’s Evil, 167
Non-jurors, 169
William Sherlock, 169
George Hickes, 170
Jeremy Collier, 170
Henry Dodwell, 170
John Kettlewell, 171
Charles Leslie, 171
The Seven Non-juring Bishops, 171
The Act of Toleration, 172
The Comprehension Bill, 173
Commission to Revise the Liturgy, &c., 173
Convocation in 1689, 175
High Church and Low Church, 177
Samuel Wesley not a High Churchman, 177
His Opinion on the Union of Churchmen and 178
Dissenters,
King William the Head of the Low-Church Party, 180
Episcopacy Abolished in Scotland, 180
Position occupied by Socinians and Papists, 181
Character and Death of George Fox, 182
Wesley’s Comparison of Quakers with Papists, 183
Archbishop Tillotson, 184
Death and Character of Queen Mary, 185
Great Men flourishing in the Reign of William, 187
Character and Death of William, 188
CHAPTER X.
LAST DAYS AT SOUTH-ORMSBY—1694–1696.
Wesley’s Elegies on the Queen and Archbishop, 191
Epworth Living obtained through the Queen, 193
Tillotson refuses to Recommend Wesley to an Irish 194
Bishopric,
Marquis of Normanby, 195
Wesley, his Chaplain, in doubt how to Act, 197
Wesley’s Fidelity obliges him to leave Ormsby, 198
Children born at Ormsby, 199
Emilia Wesley, 199
Susannah Wesley, 200
Mary Wesley, 200
CHAPTER XI.
EPWORTH AND CHRISTIAN SOCIETIES—1696–1699.
Isle of Axholme, 203
Epworth Parsonage, 203
Mehetabel Wesley, 204
Character and Death of Mrs Dunton, 207
Timothy Rogers, 208
Wesley writes Mrs Dunton’s Epitaph, 209
Dunton quarrels with Wesley, 210
Wesley’s Sermon on Reformation of Manners, 213
Society for the Reformation of Manners, 213
Dr Anthony Horneck and Mr Smithies, 213
William Beveridge, 214
Young Men Converted, 214
Form Themselves into Societies, 215
Religious Societies give birth to Reformation 218
Societies,
Daniel Defoe on the Wickedness of the Age, 219
Wesley on do., 220
History of Society for Reformation of Manners, 221
History of Religious and of Methodist Societies, 224
Samuel Wesley’s hearty Approval of Religious 227
Societies,
CHAPTER XII.
DEBT AND DILIGENCE—1700–1704.
Wesley unfortunately turns Farmer, 229
Letter to Archbishop Sharpe, 229
Explanations, 231
Archbishop Sharpe’s Application for a “Brief,” 234
Wesley declines it, 235
Wesley helps his Mother, 235
A _few_ Children born, 236
Archbishop Sharpe, 236
“The Pious Communicant,” 237
Wesley’s Opinions on Transubstantiation and 237
Baptism,
John Wesley’s Re-publication of his Father’s 239
Discourse,
Wesley’s Epistle on Poetry, 239
Its Preface, 239
Impurity of the Press, 241
Macaulay on do., 242
Account of Epistle on Poetry, 243
Wesley’s History of Old and New Testament, 244
John Sturt, 245
Quotations from History of Old and New Testament, 246
CHAPTER XIII.
CONVOCATION—1701, ETC.
Description of Convocation, 249
Wesley elected a Member of Convocation, 250
Exaggerated Anecdote, 251
Convocation of 1701, 253
Convocation of 1702, 258
Queen Anne, 258
Duke of Marlborough, 258
Queen Anne a Bigot, 259
Occasional Conformity Bill, 260
Queen Anne’s Bounty, 260
Lord Halifax’s Motion in Parliament, 261
The Act to prevent the Growth of Schism, 261
John Wesley’s Character of Queen Anne, 262
Increase of Club-houses, &c., 262
The Fashionable Classes, 263
Bully-beaus, &c., 263
National Superstition and Ignorance, 265
CHAPTER XIV.
DISASTERS AND DISSENTERS—1702–1705.
Wesley in Debt, 267
His House on Fire, 267
His Friends help Him, 268
His Letter on Dissenting Academies, 270
Secret History of the Calves-head Club, 271
Clarendon’s History of the Rebellion, 274
Samuel Palmer, 277
Robert Clavel, 278
Palmer’s Defence, 279
Wesley’s Defence, 280
Sacheverell’s Sermon on Political Union, 282
Dissenter’s Demands as expounded by Defoe, 284
Defoe’s Shortest Way with Dissenters, 286
Defoe’s Arrest and Punishment, 288
Defoe attacks Wesley, 289
Other attacks on Wesley, 290
CHAPTER XV.
THE IMPRISONED FATHER—1705–1709.
Wesley’s Missionary Scheme, 295
Parliamentary Election in 1705, 297
The Mob at Epworth, 297
Wesley deprived of his Military Chaplainship, 299
Duke of Marlborough, 299
Wesley’s Poem on Marlborough, 299
Wesley in Lincoln Castle, 300
Letters to Archbishop Sharpe, 300
Wesley’s Release, 304
Archbishop Sharpe’s Kindness, 304
Horrible Death of one of Wesley’s Enemies, 304
A Prayer, 305
Letters to S. Wesley, jun., 307
Wesley’s Passion for Music and Poetry, 311
More Letters to S. Wesley, jun., 312
Wesley’s Reply to Palmer’s Vindication, 316
More Letters to S. Wesley, jun., 319
Wesley the Teacher of his Children, 322
Anne Wesley, 322
Martha Wesley, 322
Kezziah Wesley, 325
Wesley’s Confidence that all his Children would be 325
Saved,
CHAPTER XVI.
FIRE AND FURY—1709–1712.
The Burning of Epworth Parsonage, 326
A Rescued Hymn, 327
Wesley’s Account of the Fire, 328
Unjust Accusation, 329
Outrages in the Isle of Axholme, 331
Family Destitution, 333
The New Parsonage, 333
Dr Adam Clarke at Epworth, 333
Henry Sacheverell, 334
Sacheverell’s Sermons at Derby and at St Paul’s, 334
Sacheverell’s Trial, 338
Sacheverell’s Defence written by Wesley, 339
Great National Excitement, 342
The New Parliament and Convocation in 1710, 343
Wesley at Convocation, and Events at Epworth, 345
CHAPTER XVII.
PRETERNATURAL NOISES—1716, 1717.
Belief in Ghosts, 348
Witchcraft, 349
Wesley’s Remarks on Apparitions, 349
Samuel Badcock, 350
Wesley Papers and Dr Priestley, 350
Account of Noises at Epworth Parsonage, 350
Divers Opinions respecting them, 357
The Noises really Preternatural, 359
Why Permitted, 360
Effect produced on Emilia Wesley, 361
John Wesley’s firm Belief in Witchcraft, &c., 362
CHAPTER XVIII.
THE LAST TWENTY YEARS—1714–1735.
The Pretender, 365
The South Sea Bubble, 366
Bishop Atterbury, 367
Social, Moral, and Religious Condition of the 368
Country,
Eminent Divines in the Church of England, 369
Eminent Dissenting Ministers, 370
Other Eminent Men, 370
Wesley’s Dissertations on the Book of Job, 371
His elaborate Preparations, 371
His Helpers, 372
Maurice Johnson, 372
Roger Gale, 372
John Romley, 373
John Whitelamb, 373
The Titles of Wesley’s Dissertations, 377
Wesley’s Portrait, 378
Lord Oxford, 379
Subscribers to Wesley’s Dissertations, 379
Dedication to Queen Caroline, 380
Opinions respecting the Dissertations, 380
Samuel Badcock, 380
Bishop Warburton, 380
Alexander Pope, &c., 381
Wesley’s Letter to a Curate, 381
Wesley on Christian Ministers, 382
Wesley on Reading Prayers, 383
Wesley on Books to be Studied, 384
Wesley on Sermons, 386
Wesley on Catechising, 387
Wesley on the Administration of Sacraments, 387
Wesley on Church Discipline, 387
Wesley obtains the Rectory of Wroot, 388
CHAPTER XIX.
LETTERS—1725–1735.
Advices to his son John about Entering Orders, 391
Wesley and his Wife differ in Opinion, 392
Wesley on Thomas à Kempis, 393
Wesley’s son John Ordained a Deacon, 396
Wesley’s Designs to Publish a Polyglot Bible, 397
Wesley Pinched for Want of Money, 399
John Wesley at Epworth and Wroot, 399
Wesley’s Love for his Children, 399
Wesley’s Journey from Wroot to Epworth, &c., 402
Mrs Wesley thought to be Dangerously Ill, 403
Wesley on Oriental Languages, 404
Two fair Escapes from Death, 405
Wesley’s Advices to his son Charles, 406
Wesley’s Letters on the First Methodist Meetings 407
at Oxford,
Wesley’s Dedication of his Dissertations to the 409
Queen,
Wesley’s Dissertations nearly Completed, 410
Wesley a strict Disciplinarian, 411
Letters on Doing Penance, 412
A Difficulty about his Churchwardens, 414
Wesley nearly Killed by being
thrown out of his Waggon, 416
Wesley writes to his son Samuel on Family Affairs, 417
S. Wesley, jun., declines Epworth Living, 419
Wesley learns to Write with his Left Hand, 419
Wesley’s Benevolence, 420
Letter to the Lord Chancellor respecting J. 420
Whitelamb,
Wesley Visits his Sons at Oxford, 422
John Wesley Refuses to be his Father’s Successor, 422
His Father’s Reply to his Objections, 422
Two Papists at Epworth, 424
Wesley’s Kindness to a Fatherless Boy, 424
General Oglethorpe, 425
Wesley’s Letter to Oglethorpe on his Return from 425
Georgia,
Proposed Special Sacraments for his Friends, 427
Would have gone to Georgia if ten years younger, 428
Inquiries respecting Georgia, 429
John Whitelamb’s wish to go to Georgia, 430
The Missionary Spirit a Trait of the Wesley 431
Family,
A Family Letter written by Proxy, 432
Matthew Wesley and his Visit to Epworth, 435
He unjustly Accuses his Brother, 436
S. Wesley’ s Reply to his Brother’s Accusation, 437
CHAPTER XX.
DEATH AND CHARACTER—1735.
Declining Health, 443
Last two Sermons, 443
John Wesley’s Account of his Father’s Death, 444
Charles Wesley’s ditto, 444
Notice of Death in _Gentleman’s Magazine_, 447
His Tomb, 447
His Elegy, by his son Samuel, 448
His Poetry, 448
Eupolis’s Hymn, 449
Wesley’s Wit and Pleasantry, 451
The Miser’s Feast, 451
The Epworth Parish Clerk, 452
Two Letters written by Wesley’s Granddaughter, 453
Snuff and Tobacco, 455
Dr Whitehead’s Critique on Wesley, 456
J. Hampson’s ditto, 457
Adam Clarke’s ditto, 457
Success of Wesley’s Labours, 458
APPENDICES.
Titles of Poems in Wesley’s “Maggots,” 461
List of Pamphlets published at the Revolution of 462
1688,
List of Books Condensed in “The Young Student’s 464
Library,”
------------------------------------------------------------------------
THE LIFE AND TIMES
OF
SAMUEL WESLEY.
--------------
CHAPTER I.
TWO HUNDRED YEARS AGO—1640–1665.
Samuel Wesley was born a little more than two hundred years ago; and a
brief review of the state of the nation and of the Church at that period
will be useful in illustrating some parts of his history.
From March 1629 to April 1640, the houses of legislature had not
assembled; never in English history had there been an interval of eleven
years between one parliament and another. Charles I. had systematically
attempted to make himself a despot, and to reduce the parliament to a
nullity.
To make bad things worse, Archbishop Laud, in the year 1640, convened
Convocation, which ordered that every clergyman should instruct his
parishioners once a quarter, in the divine right of kings, and the
damnable sin of resistance to authority. By the divine right of kings
was meant, that the Supreme Being regarded hereditary monarchy, as
opposed to other forms of government, with peculiar favour; that the
rule of succession, in order of primogeniture, was a divine institution
anterior to the Christian, and even to the Mosaic dispensation; that no
human power, not even that of the whole legislature, could deprive the
legitimate prince of his rights; and that the laws by which, in England
and in other countries, the prerogative was limited, were to be regarded
merely as concessions, which the sovereign had freely made, and which he
might at his pleasure resume.
By the same ecclesiastical parliament, all clergymen and all graduates
in the universities were required to take an oath, that everything
necessary for salvation was contained in the doctrine and discipline of
the Church of England, as distinguished from Presbyterianism and
Papistry; and they were also required to swear that they would not
consent to any alteration of the government of the Church, by
archbishops, bishops, priests, and deacons. Those refusing to take such
oaths were threatened with heavy penalties.
This assumption of ecclesiastical power, on the part of Convocation, was
most offensively absurd. The nation for years had been divided both in
politics and religion; and it was not to be expected that such decrees
could be issued without provoking resistance and creating trouble.
Hence, in the same year, and in the year following, we find a crowd of
events which exerted a most powerful influence on the subsequent history
of the nation. The House of Commons, which, after an interval of eleven
years, was again brought together, appointed a grand committee of the
whole house to inquire into the scandalous immoralities of the clergy.
Above two thousand cases were presented, and the work of cleansing the
Augean stable became so heavy, that the grand committee had to divide
itself into four or five sub-committees, called White’s, Corbett’s,
Harlow’s, and Dearing’s committees, after the chairman of each. An act
also was passed by the House of Commons, that the clergy should not be
magistrates, neither should officiate as judges in civil courts. Lord
Strafford—eloquent and bold, but imperious and cruel, Charles’s most
trusted counsellor, and one whose object it had been to make his royal
master as absolute a monarch as any in Europe—was arrested, tried, and
beheaded. The Star Chamber and the High Commission courts, the former a
political, the latter a religious inquisition, were abolished. Thirteen
bishops were impeached by the Lower House of Parliament, Archbishop Laud
being one of them. The London apprentices began their riots. Two hundred
thousand Protestant men, women, and children, were massacred in Ireland,
and thousands more had to flee to England, naked and famished, to obtain
subsistence. The papistical butchers, not satisfied with this, proceeded
to threaten that, when they had wreaked their vengeance on the handful
left in Ireland, they would come to England, and inflict upon the
Protestants there the same barbarities.
It was impossible for such events to happen without public feeling being
excited to the highest pitch. The parliament was aroused; the country
rose to arms; and the civil wars commenced. The Commons passed a
resolution that they would never consent to any toleration of the popish
religion, either in Ireland or any other part of his majesty’s
dominions; and another bill was passed excluding bishops from the House
of Lords. From this date, the Church of England, if not entirely
demolished, may be regarded as a ruin.
In 1642, a committee was appointed by the House of Commons to inquire
“what malignant clergymen had benefices in and about London, which
benefices, being sequestered, might be supplied by others, who should
receive their profits;” and in the year following, the “Scandalous
Committee” of 1640, and the “Plundering Committee” of 1642, (as the
royalists called them,) were empowered to act in concert; and, by their
united efforts, the Church was well-nigh cleared both of the clergymen
who were immoral, and of those whose opinions did not harmonise with the
opinions generally entertained by parliament. Many left their cures, and
took sanctuary in the king’s armies; others were put under confinement
in Lambeth, Winchester, and Ely; and about twenty were imprisoned
beneath deck in ships on the river Thames, no friend being allowed to
come near them. Several pious and worthy bishops and other clergymen,
who desired to live peaceably without joining either side, had their
estates and livings sequestered, and their houses and goods plundered,
and were themselves reduced to live upon the fifths, a small pension
from parliament. Among these may be mentioned, Archbishop Usher, Bishops
Morton and Hall, and the no less renowned Jeremy Taylor, who, driven
from his living at Uppingham, retired into Wales, and, while supporting
himself and his family by teaching a school, there composed some of the
greatest of his immortal works.
For the space of about two years, the country might be said to be
without any established form of worship. The clergy were left to read
the liturgy, or not to read it, as they pleased, and to use equal
discretion as to wearing the canonical habits, or the Geneva cloak. The
ecclesiastical polity of the realm was in total confusion. Episcopacy
was the form of government prescribed by the old law of the land, which
was not repealed; but the form of government prescribed by parliamentary
ordinance was presbyterian; and yet, neither the old law, nor the
parliamentary ordinance, was practically in force. The Church actually
established may be described as an irregular body, made up of a few
presbyteries, and of many independent congregations, all held down and
held together by the authority of government. Cathedral worship was
almost everywhere abolished, and many of the sacred edifices themselves
defaced and injured. By the parliamentary ordinance of 1643, clergymen,
both bad and good, were ejected from their benefices by thousands;
altars and stone tables in churches were destroyed; candlesticks,
tapers, and basins standing upon communion tables were unsparingly
removed; and all crosses, crucifixes, images, and superstitious pictures
and paintings demolished. Churches and sepulchres, fine works of art and
curious remains of antiquity, met with the same ruthless treatment. In
Chichester Cathedral, the rabble, meeting with the portrait of King
Edward VI., picked out its eyes, because Edward had established the Book
of Common Prayer. In Canterbury Cathedral, where they found the
arras-hangings, representing the history of Christ, they swore they
would stab the picture of our Saviour, and rip up its bowels, which they
did accordingly; while at the south gate, they discharged forty muskets
at a carved figure of Christ, and rejoiced exceedingly when they hit it
on the head or face. At Lichfield, they stabled their horses in the body
of the church, polluted the orchestra, baptized a calf at the baptismal
font, and hunted a cat with hounds every day throughout the windings of
the sacred edifice.
While such proceedings were taking place in cathedrals and churches,
parliament was passing sharp laws against betting, and enacting that
adultery should be punished with death. Public amusements, from masques
in the mansions of the great, down to wrestling and grinning matches on
village greens, were vigorously attacked. All the May-poles in England
were ordered to be hewn down. Play-houses were to be dismantled, the
spectators fined, and the actors whipped at the cart’s tail. Magistrates
dispersed festive meetings, and put fiddlers in the stocks. The zeal of
the soldiers was still more formidable, for in every village where they
happened to appear, there was an end of dancing, bell-ringing, and
hockey.
Meanwhile several sects sprung into existence, whose eccentricities
surpassed anything that had ever been seen in England. A mad tailor,
named Ludowick Muggleton, wandered from pothouse to pothouse, tippling
ale, and denouncing eternal torments against those who refused to
believe, on his testimony, that the Supreme Being was only six feet
high, and that the sun was just four miles from the earth. Another sect
of fanatics, which now sprung up, were the Fifth Monarchy Men, so called
because they taught that the four great monarchies of the world were
about to be succeeded by the monarchy of Christ, who would reign among
mankind for a thousand years. The powers of earth were to be utterly
destroyed, and Christ to be king alone. Acting upon their fanatical
principles, in 1660 they scoured the streets of London, committing
murder, without distinction of age or sex, till they came to Aldersgate
Street, where they halted, and proclaimed king Jesus, crying out, “No
king but Christ.” These enthusiasts fought like lions; but, of course,
were overpowered. A number of them were killed in the skirmish that took
place in scattering them; and sixteen, who were taken prisoners, were
drawn on sledges from Newgate through Cheapside to a place opposite
their meeting-house in Swan Ally, Coleman Street, where they were hanged
and quartered, their quarters being afterwards set upon the four gates
of the city. George Fox, also, raised a tempest of derision by
proclaiming that it was a violation of Christian sincerity to designate
a single person by a plural pronoun; and that it was an idolatrous
homage to Janus and Woden to talk about January and Wednesday. He hated
Episcopacy, steeple houses, and the liturgy; and propounded the most
extravagant whimsies concerning postures, dress, and diversions. One of
his coadjutors was John Hinks, first a shepherd’s boy, and then a
shoemaker, prodigiously ignorant, and yet an enthusiast, who pretended
to be inspired. James Naylor was another of Fox’s mad associates, a man
who, when he entered Bristol, stripped himself stark naked, had his
horse led in triumph by two women, while his nasal-twanged followers
strewed branches in his way, and shouted “Hosannah.” Solomon Eccles, one
of the Quakers’ chief teachers, went naked into the church at
Aldermanbury, in the time of divine service, bedaubed all over with
filth, as an emblem of the nakedness and filth of the minister who was
preaching. And two women, at Kendal, of the names of Adlington and
Collinson, are said to have walked through the streets of that town in
the same state of nudity, and who, when friendly hands tried to cover
them, rebuked such kindness, by declaring that “it hindered the work of
the Lord.”
Such, substantially, was the state of affairs, when, in 1643, the
Assembly of Divines met, by an ordinance of parliament, in the city of
Westminster, for “settling the government and liturgy of the Church of
England, and for vindicating and clearing the said Church from false
aspersions and interpretations.” The Assembly consisted of thirty
members of parliament, including six noblemen; and of one hundred and
twenty-one ministers, including Dr Lightfoot, Edmund Calamy, and Joseph
Caryl. Baxter says, the divines were men of eminent learning and
godliness, ministerial abilities and fidelity. Each member of the
Assembly had four shillings a—day allowed by parliament towards his
expenses. They sat five years, six months, and twenty-two days, during
which time they had 1163 sessions. A few of the members were attached to
Episcopacy; but, finding themselves in a hopeless minority, they soon
retired. The great majority were in favour of Presbyterianism; but
these, to the last, were vigorously opposed by a minority, consisting of
two sections, who, although they generally acted in concert against the
common enemy, were also distinguishable from each other. These were,
first, the Independents; and, secondly, the Erastians, so called because
of their adoption of the principles of Erastus, a German divine of the
preceding century, who maintained that the Church, or the clergy, as
such, possessed no inherent legislative power of any kind, and that the
National Church was, in all respects, the mere subject and creature of
the civil magistrate.
Such were the men to whom was committed the work of building up a new
ecclesiastical polity. By their advice alterations were made in the
Thirty-nine Articles, the intention being to render their sense more
express and determinate in favour of Calvinism. In 1645, their
“Directory of Public Worship” supplanted the liturgy, and was
established by an ordinance of parliament. They also agreed in
introducing and enforcing the Solemn League and Covenant, by which
Episcopacy was abjured. In 1646, the name, style, and dignity of
archbishops and bishops were formally abolished; and, in 1649, the
“Confession of Faith,” which laid down a Presbyterian system of
ecclesiastical polity, received the sanction of an Act of Parliament.
Many difficulties, however, stood in the way of the actual extension of
this new system over the whole kingdom; and, in fact, it never obtained
more than a very limited and imperfect establishment. Accordingly, the
National Church of England, during the Commonwealth, was by no means
exclusively composed of Presbyterians, (though they were the most
numerous,) for some of the benefices were still retained by their old
Episcopal incumbents; a considerable number were held by Independents,
and a few were filled even by the minor sects, that now swarmed in the
sunshine of the Protector’s all but universal toleration.
King Charles was beheaded in 1649, and Oliver Cromwell was appointed
Lord Protector in 1653. A quarter of a century before he was raised to
this high position, Cromwell had openly deserted the Church of England,
and attached himself to the Puritans, who were just then rising into
wealth and power. Under the Commonwealth, the Dissenters increased in
numbers, and exercised a predominating influence in national affairs.
Besides being incumbents of parish churches, their ministers officiated
as chaplains of political bodies; and preached to mayors and aldermen,
as they sat arrayed in golden chains and scarlet robes at Guildhall
festivals. The rights of presentation to church livings were still
retained to patrons; but, to prevent abuses, Cromwell, in 1653,
appointed a Board of Commissioners to examine all candidates for holy
orders, and without whose sanction none could be admitted to a church
benefice. These “Triers,” as they were called, were thirty-eight in
number. Part of them were Presbyterians, part were Independents, and a
few were Baptists. Among them were Dr Thomas Goodwin, Dr John Owen,
Joseph Caryl, the author of the gigantic Commentary on the Book of Job,
and Thomas Manton, whose writings, so full of sanctified genius, will be
prized by the Church of Christ to the end of time. Baxter tells us that
the Triers, with all their faults, did a great amount of good. They
saved many a congregation from ignorant, ungodly, drunken teachers. All
that either preached against a godly life, or preached as though they
knew not what it was; and all those that used the ministry as a common
trade, and merely as a means of getting bread, were usually rejected;
while all who were able, serious preachers, and whose lives were holy,
were admitted, of whatsoever opinions they were, so long as their
opinions were “tolerable.” The authority of Cromwell’s Triers was almost
unlimited, and, certainly, was not unneeded. Previous to their
appointment, any one who wished might set up to be a preacher, and so
give himself a chance of obtaining a living in the Church. Now, every
candidate for the pulpit and emoluments of a parish church had to bring
to the Board of Triers, sitting at Whitehall, a testimonial, subscribed
by the hands of three persons of known goodness and integrity, one of
whom, at least, had to be a preacher of the gospel in some constant
settled place. On the candidate passing his examination, he was inducted
to the church living, to which he had been presented, by a document,
given in the name of the Triers, signed by the State Registrar, and
sealed with the seal of the Commonwealth. He then took possession,
cultivated the glebe lands, prayed, if he choose, without book or
surplice, and administered the eucharist to communicants seated at long
tables. In some instances there was also formed a sort of independent
church outside the parish church, to whom the preacher administered the
sacraments, not in the parochial edifice, but in private houses. It is
impossible to ascertain the exact number of these beneficed Dissenters,
under the Commonwealth, but it may be safely inferred, that they were
numerous, when it is borne in mind that, after the elevation of Cromwell
to the Protectorate, they were favoured by the ruling powers; and, after
the Restoration, were regarded by their opponents with great anxiety.
Of the two, the Presbyterians were more numerous than the Independents,
and, in many instances, the feeling between the parties was anything but
brotherly. Cromwell had tried to be impartial, and to allow all classes,
Episcopalians, Presbyterians, Independents, and Baptists, to have a fair
share of church emoluments, and thereby he hoped to secure something
like church amity, but the effort was futile and the hope not realised.
Among the ministers who, during the Commonwealth, occupied the pulpits
of England, there were not a few who will always rank among England’s
most powerful preachers, and most profound divines. Besides these there
were likewise men in the country belonging to other classes, whose names
will ever be invested with a halo of honour. Dr Busby was master of
Westminster School, and celebrated alike for his classical abilities and
unflinching discipline. Vandyke was putting on canvas his unequalled
portraits; and Inigo Jones reviving classical architecture. There were
also Andrew Marvell, renowned as the first of patriots and of wits;
George Withers, some of whose earlier poetry, especially, abounds in the
finest bursts of sunshine; John Milton, Cudworth, Sir Thomas Browne, and
others of a like character.
The morals of the nation, up to the time of Charles’s execution, were
about as bad as badness could make them. The chief amusements of the
court were masques, and emblematic pageants, some of which cost more
than £20,000 each. Extravagance in dress and personal adornment had
become an absolute phrenzy. James I., when transported from the
scantily-furnished halls of Holyrood to the plentiful palaces of the
south, burst from a clumsy, ungainly figure into a gilded coxcomb,
almost daily figuring in a new suit, and his courtiers copying his
example. When Buckingham was sent ambassador to the court of France, his
suit of white velvet was set all over with diamonds, valued at £80,000;
and, besides this, he had another suit of purple satin, embroidered with
pearls worth £20,000. In fact, the beaux of this period were animated
trinkets. Prodigality in feasting soon became as conspicuous as
extravagance in dress; and gambling kept pace with both. The manners of
the court, and of both sexes in the higher classes, were gross in the
extreme. English taverns were dens of filth, tobacco smoke, roaring
songs, and roysterers; and yet, even in such places, women of rank
allowed themselves to be entertained, and tolerated those freedoms from
their admirers which are described with such startling plainness in our
old plays and poems. The streets of London, and even of the inferior
towns, were filled with prowling sharpers; and the highways of England
were equally infested with robbers, concealing their faces with visors,
and carrying in their pockets false tails for their otherwise well-known
horses. Divination was a thriving business; and fortune-telling was
frequently a cover to the worse trades of pandering and poisoning. The
stars were more eagerly studied than the diurnals; and both cavaliers
and roundheads thronged to astrologers to learn the events of the
succeeding week. Exorcising devils was common, and the belief in witches
became the master superstition of the age; so that between three and
four thousand persons are said to have been executed for witchcraft
between the year 1640 and the Restoration.
Of course, during the Commonwealth, when Puritan principles were in the
ascendancy, a great change came over the general manners and morals of
the land. Republican simplicity prevailed in the banquets at Whitehall;
Scotch collops, marrow puddings, and hog’s-liver sausages forming
standing dishes of Lady Cromwell’s cookery. Religion was the language of
the court, and also its garb; prayer and fasting were fashionable
exercises; and a godly profession was the road to preferment. Not a play
was acted in all England for many years, and from the prince to the
peasant and common soldier, the features of Puritanism were almost
universally exhibited. Many doubtless were fanatics and others designing
knaves, whose whole religion consisted in the use of a religious
vocabulary and hypocritical grimace; but making all due allowance for a
large amount of unscriptural enthusiasm and pious fraud, there were
unquestionably among those sickly dreamers and canting fanatics,
thousands and tens of thousands of enlightened, sincere, and earnest
Christians.
Cromwell died in 1658. Immediately after his death, the Protectorate
broke down under his son Richard, and confusion became worse confounded.
The army was unsettled, the parliament divided, the republic was
discouraged, trade decayed, and the exchequer empty. The majority of the
nation were weary of change, and had no faith in ideal republics; and,
by the spring of 1660, public feeling was strongly in favour of the
restoration of Charles II. In the month of March, the Rump Parliament
was finally dissolved. All the bells in London were set a ringing; and,
as Pepys tells us, bonfires blazed on every side, there being not fewer
than fourteen burning, at the same time, between St Dunstan’s and Temple
Bar.
The Presbyterians now stood foremost, and, in Parliament, were the
leaders. The League and Covenant was hung on the walls of the House of
Commons, and was ordered to be read in every church once a year; but in
March 1660, as an indication of other changes coming, Dr John Owen,
Cromwell’s chaplain, was removed from the deanery of Christ’s Church,
Oxford, and Dr, afterwards Bishop, Reynolds was appointed in his place.
On the 30th of April, a public fast was held, Reynolds and Hardy
preaching before the House of Lords; and Gauden, Calamy, and Baxter
before the House of Commons. On the 1st of May, Sir John Granville
arrived from Breda with despatches from Charles II.; one being addressed
to the House of Lords, and another to the House of Commons. The latter
contained the famous “Declaration of Breda,” offering indemnity for the
past, and liberty of conscience for the future. The declaration was, “We
do declare a liberty to tender consciences, and that no man shall be
disquieted, or called in question for difference of opinions, which do
not disturb the peace of the kingdom.” Within a fortnight after this,
Charles was proclaimed king, amid “festivals, bells, and bonfires,”
Richard Baxter preaching a sermon on the occasion, before the Lord Mayor
and Corporation of London.
The restoration of Charles being settled, several members of the Lords
and Commons, on the 11th of May, started off to Holland to meet him. The
city of London sent commissioners, and with them went certain
Presbyterian ministers, as Reynolds, Manton, and Calamy. These reverend
brethren told the king that they had urged the people to restore him to
the throne of his father, and declared themselves as no enemies to
moderate Episcopacy; but begged that his Majesty would dispense with the
surplice being worn, and that, instead of adopting the use of the Common
Prayer entirely and formally, he would direct that only some parts of it
should be read, with some superadded prayers by his chaplains. At the
end of the month Charles landed at Dover. The castle guns bid him
welcome. Thousands upon thousands, standing upon the beach and cliffs,
waved their hats, and gave right hearty cheers. When he arrived in
London, the corporation waited in a tent at St George’s-in-the-Fields to
receive him. All the houses in Southwark, Cheapside, Fleet Street, and
the Strand were hung with banners and adorned with tapestry. The Livery
companies turned out in their velvet coats, silver doublets, and rich
green scarfs; while kettle-drums and trumpets made all London ring
again. Addresses flowed in from all quarters welcoming the king back to
Old England, and, among others, one from the county of Devon, bearing
among others the signature of the celebrated Joseph Caryl.
All seemed to be unanimous and jubilant; and yet all this was but the
beginning of the tug of war. Charles was a constitutional king, and was
to rule through parliaments. The Presbyterians, who were still in power,
expected royal favour for recent services, and to be comprehended in
some wide church establishment. Independents, Baptists, and Quakers
asked for toleration. Roman Catholics, who had been friends to the
beheaded father and the exiled son, thought themselves entitled to
consideration. While the Episcopalians claimed the new monarch as their
own, sought exclusive re-establishment, wished to cast out all
Presbyterian intruders, and were inwardly resolved to tolerate no
sectaries whatever. Charles’s position was difficult and perplexing.
Alterations were soon made. The dioceses in England had bishops
appointed to them, though it was not until the next parliament, in 1661,
that the bishops took their places among the peers. The Liturgy was
immediately introduced into those parish churches, where the ministers
avowed themselves Episcopalians; and, already, the reign of persecution
had commenced. Even before the king had landed at Dover, the Episcopal
party in Wales were busy sending sixty-eight Quakers to gaol; while the
prison at Montgomery was so full of Independents and Baptists that the
governor had to pack them into garrets. John Milton was committed to the
custody of the sergeant-at-arms, and was declared to be disqualified for
the public service; while his “Defence of the English People” and his
“Eikonoclastes” were ordered to be publicly burned. Oliver Heywood was
insolently harassed for a twelvemonth with citations to appear before
the Consistory Court at York. Philip Henry was prosecuted for not
reading the Common Prayer, and John Howe was accused of treason for some
utterance in the pulpit. During the summer of 1660, a bill was passed by
parliament, which aimed at the expulsion of all who had been inducted
into church livings during the Commonwealth, and the immediate
restoration of all the clergy who had been expelled. This bill included
a proviso to the effect that the Presbyterian and Independent ministers
should not be bound to give back livings which were legally vacant when
they obtained them; but there was another that almost rendered null the
previous one, viz., that every incumbent should be excluded that had not
been ordained by an ecclesiastic, or had renounced his ordination, or
had petitioned for bringing the late king to trial, or had justified his
trial and execution, in preaching or in writing, or had committed
himself in the vexed question of infant baptism.
The bill failed to give satisfaction to any party. The Episcopalians
complained that it was a thing of mean subterfuges and compromises;
while the Dissenters alleged that the Episcopalians were monopolists of
honours and preferments, and were waiting to renew the persecutions of
Archbishop Laud.
Archbishop Usher, who died in 1656, had left behind him a scheme of
union, and a proposed plan of church government by suffragan bishops,
and synods, and presbyteries conjointly. By this plan he had fondly
hoped to reconcile the two great religious parties, the Episcopalians
and the Presbyterians; and the latter, being now hopeless of obtaining
an entire supremacy, professed their willingness to make Usher’s scheme
the basis of negotiation. The principal ministers, who were parties to
this proposal, were Dr Reynolds, Dr Manton, Dr Bates, Edward Calamy, and
Richard Baxter. They were promised a meeting with some Episcopal divines
in the presence of the king; but when the time appointed came, instead
of a meeting, the Presbyterians received a paper rejecting their
proposal, but telling them that they were all to meet the king on
October 22d, at the house of Lord Clarendon, in the Strand, and that his
Majesty would then adjust all their religious differences. At the
appointed meeting there were present, besides the king, the Dukes of
Albemarle and Ormond, the Earls of Manchester and Anglesea, the six
bishops of London, Worcester, Salisbury, Durham, Exeter, and Lichfield,
and six Presbyterian ministers, viz., Reynolds, Spurstow, Wallis,
Manton, Calamy, and Baxter. The Presbyterians entrusted their cause to
the eloquence and learning of Calamy and Baxter; while the chief
speakers on the Episcopalian side were Dr Gunning and Bishop Morley.
Three days after this important meeting, Charles published what is
commonly called “The Healing Declaration.” This royal manifesto, after
commending the Episcopalians, and acknowledging the moderation of the
Presbyterians, promised—1, To encourage religion; 2, To appoint
suffragan bishops where dioceses were thought to be too large; 3, Not to
allow church censures to be pronounced by bishops without the advice and
assistance of the presbyters; 4, To give deaneries to the most learned
and pious presbyters of the diocese; 5, Not to allow persons to come to
the Lord’s Supper without confirmation and a credible profession of
their faith; and 6, To appoint an equal number of learned divines
belonging to the Episcopalians and Presbyterians to revise the Liturgy.
As soon as this Declaration was made public, bishoprics were offered to
Reynolds, Baxter, and Calamy. Reynolds accepted the see of Norwich;
Baxter and Calamy declined. A fortnight after, royal letters were issued
commanding the University of Cambridge to confer the diploma of D.D. on
the three eminent Presbyterian ministers, William Bates, Thomas Jacombe,
and Robert Wilde, the king being fully satisfied “of their integrity and
loyalty;” and, at the same time, a bill was brought into the House of
Commons to make the king’s “Healing Declaration” law, but the bill was
lost.
As time advanced, the prospects of the Dissenters became more gloomy. On
January 2, 1661, an Order in Council was made against Baptists, Quakers,
and other sectaries meeting in large numbers and at unusual times. The
order also forbade any of their assemblies being held out of their own
parishes.
Shortly after this, at the request of Baxter, Lord Clarendon made an
arrangement for carrying into effect that part of the king’s “Healing
Declaration” which promised a revision of the Liturgy. Twelve bishops
and nine coadjutors were appointed to represent the Episcopal party, and
twelve leading divines and nine coadjutors to represent the Presbyterian
party. The twelve bishops belonged to the dioceses of York, London,
Durham, Rochester, Chichester, Sarum, Worcester, Lincoln, Peterborough,
Chester, Carlisle, and Exeter. Among their coadjutors were some of the
most eminent men of the day, as Dr Heylin, and Dr Pearson, immortalised
by his profoundly able work on the Apostles’ Creed. The twelve
Presbyterian divines included Reynolds, Manton, Calamy, and Baxter; and
their coadjutors included the “silver-tongued” William Bates and Dr
Lightfoot. The place of meeting was the old Savoy Palace, and the first
day of their coming together was April 15, 1661. Baxter proposed an
entirely new Liturgy; and, in the short space of a fortnight, prepared
one. His brethren meanwhile were employed in preparing exceptions to the
old one, which Baxter wished to set aside. Baxter seemed to be equal to
any amount of work assigned to him. When he brought his completed draft
of the new Liturgy to his co-commissioners, instead of finding their
exceptions to the old Liturgy finished, he found them only just begun;
and, as both the draft and the exceptions had to be submitted to the
Savoy Conference at the same time, there was no alternative but to wait
another fortnight; during which Baxter himself prepared as many
exceptions to the old prayer-book as filled eight closely-printed folio
pages.
On the Conference reassembling, the Presbyterians read their paper,
pleading that, as the first Reformers composed the Liturgy so as to draw
the Papists into their communion, the Liturgy ought now to be so revised
as to unite all substantial Protestants. Hence it was suggested that
certain repetitions should be omitted; that the Litany should be turned
into one continued prayer; that neither Lent nor Saints’ Days should
continue to be observed; that free prayer should be allowed; that the
Apocrypha should not be read in the daily lessons; that the word
“minister” should be used instead of the word “priest;” and “Lord’s-day”
instead of “Sunday;” that the Liturgy was defective in praise and
thanksgiving; that the Confession and Catechism were imperfect; and that
the surplice, the cross, and kneeling at the Lord’s Supper, were
unwarrantable. All these, however, were regarded as minor objections;
and the main ones that were raised were against the baptismal service,
the marriage service, the service for the visitation of the sick, and
the burial service.
When the objections had been submitted to the Conference, the bishops
and their coadjutors rejected them _in toto_. Baxter was appointed to
answer the reply of the bishops, and went out of town, to Dr Spurstow’s
house in Hackney, for that purpose. In eight days his rejoinder was
finished. Unprofitable disputes followed; the Conference broke up; and
nothing but vexation and sorrow came out of it.
The Presbyterians were now treated as the vanquished party; and Baxter
especially became the butt for malignant marksmen. Almost every time he
preached he was accused of treason; and even his prayers were listened
to with suspicion. Still, as the parliament now sitting had been elected
before the Restoration, the Presbyterians in that assembly were too
numerous and troublesome to permit of summary suppression. Hence, in
March 1661, a new election was ordered, and great excitement followed.
Alderman Thompson, “a godly man of good parts, and a congregationalist,”
was one of the candidates for London; but the Royalists objected to him,
because he was “so fond of smoking that his breath would poison a whole
committee.” Dr Caryl and other eminent ministers held a fast. Zachary
Crofton preached against bishops “every Sunday night, with an infinite
auditory, itching, and applause;” and Mr Graffen had a crowd of two
thousand in the streets, who could not get into his meeting-house to
hear him “bang the bishops.”
The new parliament met on the 8th of May 1661; and the change from
Presbyterian to Episcopalian predominancy was manifested in one of the
earliest orders,—viz., that the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, on the
Sunday seven night, should be administered, at St Margaret’s Church,
according to the form prescribed in the Liturgy of the Church of
England; and that no one should be admitted a member of that House who
neglected to partake of the Communion, either there publicly, or
afterwards in the presence of two or more witnesses. In addition to
this, it was resolved that “the Solemn League and Covenant,” the
well-known symbol of Presbyterian ascendancy—which, for a year past, had
been taken down from the walls of the House of Commons—should be burnt
by the common hangman; and this was done, the hangman first tearing the
document into pieces, and then burning the fragments in succession,—he
all the while lifting up his hands and eyes in pious indignation, until
not a shred was left.[1]
-----
Footnote 1:
The Solemn League and Covenant was a contract agreed to by the Scots,
in the year 1638, for maintaining their religion free from innovation.
In 1643 it was brought into England; and on February 2, of that year,
it was enacted, by a joint ordinance of both Houses of Parliament,
“that the League and Covenant should be solemnly taken and subscribed,
in all places throughout the kingdom of England and dominion of Wales,
by all persons above the age of eighteen.” Accordingly, it was signed
by most of the members of the two houses of legislature, by all the
principal officers of the rebel army, by all the _Divines_ of the
_Assembly_ then sitting at Westminster, and by a large number of the
people in general. Two of the principal vows were—1. That the party
taking and subscribing the Covenant would endeavour to “bring the
Churches of God in all the three kingdoms to the nearest conjunction
and uniformity in religion, confession of faith, and form of church
government, as the _Directory_ prescribes for worship and
catechising.” And, 2. That he would “endeavour, without respect of
persons, to extirpate Popery and Prelacy—that is to say, church
government by archbishops and bishops.”
-----
Before the year was ended, the bishops took their place in the House of
Lords; and a bill was passed requiring all members of corporations to
swear that the “Solemn League and Covenant was unlawful; and declaring
that no one was eligible for office who had not, within one year before,
taken the sacrament according to the rites of the Church of England.”
Added to this, another and a far more important bill was introduced:—“A
Bill for the Uniformity of Public Prayers and Administration of the
Sacraments.” The bill was first submitted to Parliament in December
1661, and became law on the 19th of May 1662. During this interval of
five months the greatest excitement prevailed throughout the nation.
Loud and fierce were the diatribes uttered from the Episcopal pulpit
against Roundheads, Anabaptists, and Quakers. Swarms of pamphlets and
broadsides were issued, to support Church and State by argument, but
more frequently by ridicule and satire. Many of these, as “Noctroft’s
Maid Whipt,” and the “Antidote of Melancholy made up in Pills,” were
coarse and filthy in a high degree. Of course, sharp and bitter things
were said and written on the Nonconformists’ side, but in none of their
publications is there anything like the abominable and indecent
scurrility which the royalist press published against them.
Before giving a synopsis of the Act of Uniformity, it may be well to
say, that the Book of Common Prayer, which it mentions, was the book as
revised by Convocation in November 1661. About six hundred alterations
had been made in the body of the volume. Forms respecting the weather,
prayers to be used at sea, and emendations in the commination, and in
the churching of women services were introduced. The calendar was
revised, and the Apocrypha appointed to be read in the daily lessons.
The absolution was to be pronounced by the “priest,” instead of by the
“minister.” In the Litany, the words “rebellion and schism” were added
to the petition against sedition; and the words, “bishops, priests, and
deacons,” were substituted for “bishops, pastors, and ministers of the
Church.” A few new collects were added, and, in one of them, a new
epithet was added to the title of Charles I., he being styled “our most
religious king.” None of these things were calculated to make the
prayer-book more palatable to the Presbyterian and Dissenting parties,
and hence the terrible rupture occasioned by the passing of the Act of
Uniformity.
By that act it was provided, that “every parson, vicar, or other
minister whatsoever, now enjoying any ecclesiastical benefice or
promotion, within this realm of England,” who neglected or refused to
declare publicly, before his congregation, his “unfeigned assent and
consent to the use of all things contained and prescribed” in the Book
of Common Prayer, on some Lord’s-day before the feast of St Bartholomew,
in 1662, should be deprived of all his spiritual promotions; and that,
henceforth, it should be lawful for all patrons and donors of such
church livings to present others to the same, as though the person or
persons so offending or neglecting were dead. The act further provided,
that all deans, canons, and prebendaries; also all heads, fellows, and
tutors of colleges; and likewise all schoolmasters, keeping any public
or private schools, should, before the same feast of St Bartholomew,
subscribe a declaration to the effect that they would conform to the
liturgy of the Church of England, as now by law established; and that
they renounced all obligation from the oath commonly called “The Solemn
League and Covenant,” and regarded it as an unlawful oath, contrary to
the laws and liberties of the kingdom. It likewise enacted that all the
church functionaries above-mentioned who refused to subscribe to this
declaration were to be deprived of their promotions; and all
schoolmasters who refused were to suffer three months’ imprisonment. It
also provided that if any minister, not being a foreigner, who was not
episcopally ordained, should presume to administer the sacrament of the
Lord’s Supper after St Bartholomew’s day, he should, for every such
offence, forfeit the sum of £100; and if he presumed to lecture or
preach in any church, chapel, or other place of worship whatever, within
the realm of England, he should suffer three months’ imprisonment in the
common gaol. And another, though minor provision was, that the
parishioners of every parish church, at their own cost, should provide
for such church, before the feast of St Bartholomew, a true printed copy
of the revised Book of Common Prayer; and that they should be fined £3
for every month, after St Bartholomew’s, that they neglected to obey
such a mandate.
Such was the substance of that most momentous Act of Parliament. What
were the results? Terrible were the struggles in many a good man’s
breast during the fourteen weeks elapsing between the 19th of May and
the 24th of August 1662. As the corn ripened, and the country rector sat
with his wife in the snug parlour, and looked out of the latticed
windows on the children chasing the butterflies in the garden, or
gathering daisies on the glebe, he had to decide in his heart and
conscience whether he should leave all this, or whether he should keep
it. He must either _conform_, or he and his family must _go_. Such was
the ugly alternative. The vicarage was comfortable and commodious; the
means of usefulness had bright attractions; and hardest wrench of all it
was, to snap the union between the shepherd and his flock. To resolve to
_go_, required now and then a woman’s quiet fortitude to reinforce a
man’s more loud resolve.
Meanwhile, mutterings of discontent and growlings of sedition began to
be heard on every hand. Rumours circulated that some of the king’s
regiments were disaffected; that trained bands were refractory or
negligent; that gunsmiths were dressing arms; and that Lancashire
ministers talked little less than treason. The Court was uncertain
whether to execute or to suspend the Act. Presbyterian lords pleaded for
indulgence; but Sheldon was opposed to it. It was the long vacation, and
few of the council remained in town to decide the point. The nobility
were at their country seats enjoying the summer months. The bishops were
performing their visitations. Charles was at Hampton Court, joking with
his lords, toying with his mistresses, watching games in the tennis
court, and feeding ducks in the royal ponds. Time travelled on, and the
23d of August came. All Quakers imprisoned in the gaols of London and
Middlesex were released, because on that day Charles’s consort, Queen
Catherine, first came “to our royal palace at Westminster.” The Thames
was covered with boats almost without number. Music floated on the
water, and thundering peals roared from huge cannon on the shore.
Charles and his queen sailed in an open vessel covered with a canopy of
cloth of gold, which was supported by Corinthian pillars wreathed with
flowers, festoons, and garlands. This was Saturday.
The previous Sunday had been a day such as England never knew, either
before or since.[2] Hundreds of faithful ministers on that day preached
farewell sermons to heart-broken, weeping flocks. Churches were crowded;
aisles and stairs were crammed to suffocation; and people clung to the
open windows like swarms of bees. It would have been pardonable if the
ministers had mingled with the loving exhortations addressed to the
distressed crowds before them sentiments of indignation at the
legislative act which was the means of their removal. But, instead of
that, the discourses were as calm as the pastors had ever preached, and
some of them scarcely alluded to the peculiar circumstances of the time.
-----
Footnote 2:
And yet, perhaps this is hardly true. A most pitiful picture might be
drawn of the clergymen who, twenty years previously, had been expelled
from the same churches by the _ipse dixit_ of Oliver Cromwell, whom
Bishop Hackett represents as regarding neither parliaments nor
patents—neither canons nor scriptures—“in comparison of some new light
shining in the lantern of his own head.” Men of learning and religion
were in many instances succeeded by “mere rhapsodists and ramblers,”
“cried up as rare soul-saving preachers.” Not a few venerable and
worthy ministers, expelled by the rough hand of violence, “lingered
out their lives, laden and almost oppressed, worried, and worn out
with fears, anxieties, necessities, rude affronts, and remediless
afflictions.” A great deal may be said on both sides of the question.
-----
A week after, on the day after Queen Catherine’s jubilant reception, the
Act of Uniformity was enforced in all its rigour, and upwards of two
thousand ministers, with their families, were ejected from their
livings.[3]
-----
Footnote 3:
Baxter estimates the number of the ejected and deprived as from 1800
to 2000. Calamy gives it at 2400. A catalogue in Dr Williams’s library
gives 2257. A manuscript, by Oliver Heywood, gives 2500.
-----
“What a scene,” says John Wesley, “is opened here. The poor
Nonconformists were used without either justice or mercy; and many of
the Protestant bishops of King Charles had neither more religion nor
humanity than the Popish bishops of Queen Mary.”[4] “By this Act of
Uniformity, thousands of men, guilty of no crime,—nothing contrary
either to justice, mercy, or truth,—were stripped of all they had—of
their houses, lands, revenues—and driven to seek where they could, or
beg their bread. For what? Because they did not dare to worship God
according to other men’s consciences!”[5]
-----
Footnote 4:
Wesley’s Works, vol. ii. p. 297.
Footnote 5:
_Ibid._, vol. xi. p. 37.
-----
A large majority of the ministers in the Church conformed; and these may
be divided into three classes—first, those who had been Presbyterians or
Independents, or other sectaries, and who on former occasions had more
or less opposed Episcopacy and the Book of Common Prayer; secondly,
those who had already conformed to previous changes—passively submitting
to their superiors for the time being, be they who they might; and,
thirdly, a class of consistent Episcopalians, including—1. such as had
been allowed to hold their livings, and to use the Prayer-book even
during the Commonwealth; 2. such as had been ejected from their
benefices, but had been reinstated since the Restoration; and, 3. such
as had been recently ordained, and inducted into livings during the last
twelve months. Many of these Conformists—as Tillotson, Gurnall,
Stillingfleet, Cudworth, and others—were men of high character; but many
others were low, mean, grovelling spirits, who valued the priest’s
office only because it gave them a piece of bread. In a publication of
that period, “the parsonage house” is described “as holding scarcely
anything but a budget of old stitched sermons, hung up behind the door,
with a few broken girths, two or three yards of whipcord, and perhaps a
saw and a hammer to prevent dilapidations.” Macaulay, speaking of the
rural clergy, says: “Those who could, sported a few Greek and Latin
words for the benefit of the squire, and pitched their discourses so as
to accommodate themselves to the fine clothes and ribbons in the highest
seats of the church, instead of seeking to instruct those of the
congregation who had to mind the plough and to mend the hedge.” And
again, in reference to the clergy in cities and corporations, he writes:
“There were men whose parts and education were no more than sufficient
for their reading the lessons, after twice conning over. An unlearned
rout of contemptible men,” says he, “rushed into holy orders just to
read the prayers, and who understood very little more of their meaning
than a hollow pipe would, made of tin or wainscot.” Some idea may be
formed of the character of many of the clergy who conformed in 1662,
from the fact that three years after, during the great plague in London,
instead of firmly remaining at the post of duty when most needed,
numbers of the London clergy, like craven spirits, rushed off into the
country, leaving their pulpits to be occupied, and their afflicted and
dying parishioners to be cared for, by the very ministers who had been
ejected by the Act of Uniformity.
The Nonconformist ministers may be divided into several classes:—1. Some
were moderate Episcopalians, and would have conformed to the Prayer-book
and to the Church government that were in use previous to the
Commonwealth, but could not give their unfeigned assent to all things in
the Prayer-book as revised by the Convocation of 1661. 2. Some were of
no sect or party, but liked what was good in all, without being able to
adopt the Prayer-book as prescribed. 3. Some were Presbyterians, of whom
Baxter says: “They were the soberest and most judicious, unanimous,
peaceable, faithful, able, and constant ministers that he had ever heard
or read of in the Christian world.” 4. Some were Independents, of whom
the same writer says: “They were serious, godly men, some of them
moderate, little differing from the Presbyterians, and as well ordered
as any; but others were more raw and self-conceited, and addicted to
separations and divisions, their zeal being greater than their
knowledge.” Perhaps Baxter was hardly an unprejudiced witness respecting
either the Presbyterians or the Independents.
Amongst the ministers expelled by the Act of Uniformity, there were not
a few of the most remarkable men that the Church in this country has
ever had. Most of them were excellent scholars, judicious divines,
faithful and laborious pastors; men full of zeal for God and religion,
undaunted in the service of their Master, diligent students, and
powerful preachers. Especially were they men of great devotion, pleading
for almost hours together at the throne of grace, and there inspired
with faith, and love, and zeal, which raised them to the highest rank of
heroes, and made them willing, not only to lose their livings, but to
suffer even martyrdom itself, rather than to prove traitorous to Christ
and to the liberties of His Church. More than two thousand of such men
were ejected from the Church benefices of this country in 1662, and a
passing glance at some of them may help the reader to remember others.
In this portrait-gallery, let us point to Edmund Calamy, who studied at
the rate of sixteen hours a-day, was one of the most popular preachers
in the capital, and whose week-day lectures were attended by such
numbers of the nobility, that there were seldom fewer than sixty
carriages at his church’s gates. William Bates, of graceful mien and
comely person, generally reputed one of the best orators of the age,—his
voice charming, his language neat, his style pleasing, his learning
vast, his piety conspicuous, and his “Harmony of the Divine Attributes”
alone sufficient to immortalise his memory. Samuel Annesley, who
declared he remembered not the time when he was not converted; the
descendant of a good family, whose estate was considerable; a man of a
large soul, of flaming zeal, and of extensive usefulness; faithful in
the ministry for fifty-five long years, during the last thirty of which
he enjoyed an uninterrupted assurance of God’s forgiving love; a man of
moderate learning, though an LL.D., but a most devoted Christian, and
the father of Susannah Wesley. Joseph Caryl, a man of great piety,
learning, and modesty, and author of a marvellous Commentary on the Book
of Job, originally published in eleven volumes quarto. Thomas Brookes, a
very affecting and useful preacher, rich in homely phrases and familiar
figures, and whose “Apples of Gold” are still prized as much as ever.
Matthew Pool, who spent ten years upon his “Synopsis Criticorum,” in
five volumes folio, and who, during its compilation, used to rise
between three and four o’clock every morning. Thomas Manton, a man of
great learning, judgment, and integrity, and respected by all who knew
him; endowed with extraordinary knowledge of the Holy Scriptures; his
sermons clear and convincing; his delivery natural, eloquent, quick, and
powerful; his piety answerable to his doctrines; and, to say nothing of
his other publications, which were very numerous, his discourses,
including those on the 119th Psalm, published in five volumes folio.
Thomas Gouge, who, besides preaching and visiting, catechised his church
every morning the year round; seldom merry, and yet never sad; a man who
set up and established three or four hundred schools in Wales, which, to
a great extent, were supported by himself. Thomas Watson, eminent in the
gift of prayer, a hard student, a popular preacher, and author of “A
Body of Divinity,” in the shape of sermons on the “Assembly’s
Catechism.” John Goodwin, learned, clear-headed, and fluent; a thorough
Arminian, and the author of “Redemption Redeemed.” John Owen, whose
proficiency in learning was such, that he was admitted to the University
when he was a child only twelve years old; and who pursued his studies
with such diligence that, for several years, he allowed himself but four
hours’ sleep a-night; tall in stature, affable in temper, charitable in
spirit, and a friend of peace; a man of enormous learning, and whose
labours as a minister were almost incredible; eminent for piety, an
excellent preacher, and whose writings are almost enough to fill a
library. Stephen Charnock, who spent most of his time in his study,
except on Sundays, when, by his sermons in the pulpit, he showed how
well he had employed the week; a man of strong judgment and lively
imagination; well skilled in the Hebrew and Greek of the Old and New
Testaments; a recluse, whose library was burnt in the great fire of
London, and who was writing his discourses on the “Attributes of God,”
when a peaceful death removed him to heaven. Thomas Harrison, of whom
Lord Thomund used to say, “He had rather hear Dr Harrison say grace over
an egg, than hear the bishops pray and preach.” John Flavel, an
unwearied student, with an immense amount of both divine and human
learning; a plain but popular preacher, and the well-known author of
“Husbandry Spiritualised.” Isaac Ambrose, who, once a year, for the
space of a month, retired to a hut, in a wood near Preston, and,
avoiding all human converse, devoted himself to religious contemplation.
Richard Alleine, pious, prudent, diligent, and whose well-known
practical writings have been blessed to thousands. Joseph Alleine, of
solid intellect and great piety; a man whose imprisonment for preaching
hastened his death at the early age of thirty-five, and whose “Alarm to
the Unconverted” has been read by myriads. Oliver Heywood, who, besides
his stated work on Sundays, one year preached more than a hundred times,
kept fifty fast days and nine days of thanksgiving, and, in the service
of his Master, travelled fourteen hundred miles. Philip Henry, who
preached a funeral sermon for every person whom he buried, but whose
excessive modesty was such that he would publish nothing that he wrote.
John Howe, who, when a young minister in Devonshire, used to perform
divine service on fast-days (at that time frequent) as follows:—At nine
in the morning he prayed for a quarter of an hour; then read the
Scriptures and expounded three quarters of an hour; then prayed an hour;
then preached another; then prayed half an hour, after which the people
sung for fifteen minutes; he then prayed an hour more, preached another,
and then, with a prayer of half an hour, concluded a service which
lasted from nine in the morning until a quarter past three in the
afternoon;—John Howe, in person tall and graceful; with a piercing but
pleasant eye; singularly great in ministerial qualifications; his power
in prayer marvellous, and his writings too well known to need
description. And last, but not least, Richard Baxter, a man to whom Lord
Chancellor Clarendon offered a bishopric, and whom Judge Jeffries,
another government official, addressed thus:—“Richard, Richard! thou art
an old knave. Thou hast written books enow to fill a cart, every one of
them as full of sedition, indeed treason, as an egg is full of
meat;”—Baxter, “a man,” says his contemporary, William Bates, “with a
noble negligence of style; for his great mind could not stoop to the
affected eloquence of words;”—a man animated with the Holy Spirit, and
breathing celestial fire to inspire life into sinners dead in trespasses
and sins; a man whose expulsion from the Church gave him time to write
and publish most of his invaluable books, some of which have been the
means of converting more men from sin to holiness than any other books
in modern times;—a man, says Dr Barrow, “whose practical writings were
never mended, and his controversial ones seldom confuted;”—a man holding
constant communion with God, and living in charity with men; whose life
was a living sermon, and his conversation becoming a citizen of heaven.
Such were some of the two thousand martyr spirits who were ruthlessly
ejected from their churches and their homes in 1662, and, for years
afterwards, had to live in obscurity and silence; yea more, not only
were they doomed to silence, but to suffering. In 1664 the “Conventicle
Act” was passed, which provided that “every person above sixteen years
of age present at any meeting of more than five persons besides the
household, under a pretence of any exercise of religion, in other manner
than is the practice of the Church of England, shall, for the first
offence, be sent to gaol three months, till he pay a £5 fine; for the
second offence, six months, till he pay a £10 fine; and for the third
offence, be transported to some of the American plantations.” The
execution of this execrable act, to a great extent, was committed to the
king’s soldiers, who broke open every house where they fancied a few
Nonconformists might be gathered together for sacred service. Close,
unhealthy prisons were soon crammed with conscientious victims, men and
women, old and young; whilst others were ruined in their estates by
bribing the corrupt and rapacious myrmidons of a licentious and
persecuting court. If a few of these persecuted people happened to be
driven to madness and insurrection, as now and then occurred, they were
strung up on the gallows, a dozen at a time, the _good-natured_ king
rarely exercising the prerogative of mercy on their behalf.
In 1665 the plague broke out in London, and swept away one hundred
thousand of the inhabitants. The poltroon ministers in the city churches
fled, and the ejected ministers re-entered the forsaken pulpits, and
tried to benefit the terror-stricken people, whom the new-fledged
parsons had cowardly left to the pestilence and the devil. The
parliament, frightened from London, met in Oxford; but there, instead of
showing kindness to the men who were so bravely doing duty in the city
of the plague, they actually added injury to injury, by passing the
execrable “Five Mile Act,” which provided that it should be a penal
offence for any Nonconformist minister to teach in a school, or to come
within five miles (except as a traveller in passing) of any city,
borough, or corporate town, or of any place in which he had preached or
taught since the passing of the Act of Uniformity, unless he had
previously taken the oath of non-resistance—to wit, that it is not
lawful, under any pretence whatever, to take arms against the king, or
against those that are commissioned by him, or to endeavour to make any
alteration of the government, either in Church or State.
What was the result of all this? An amount of suffering was endured far
greater than had been inflicted, in the same space of time, since the
days of the Reformation. Jeremy White collected a list of the names of
Nonconformist sufferers, amounting to sixty thousand, and he states that
of these sufferers five thousand died in prison. Informers skulked about
cottages, garrets, back rooms, stables, and outhouses, wherever they
suspected a handful of quiet Christians might be assembled to hear the
word of life from the lips of an old pastor; and despite curtains,
shutters, trap-doors, and other simple devices to ensure safety, seized
on their hapless victims, and dragged them before merciless magistrates,
who, with savage joy, doomed them to deep, dark prisons. Some, in search
of godly quietude, wandered far away, others secreted themselves in
fields and woods, but the more daring remained in their former
dwellings, and met to worship God, in consequence of which they were led
off to prison. Students, deprived of all means of subsistence, had to
lay aside their books, take up the spindle, earn a few pence at
knitting, and live on the coarsest fare. Closets, beds, tubs, hay-ricks,
and other places of concealment were haunted by ruffian soldiers,
pointing a musket at the door, or thrusting a sword into the straw.
Troopers made no scruple of rushing into a good man’s house, while he
was at prayer, and of threatening, while holding a pistol at his head,
to blow out his brains, unless he ceased from his whining cant.
These were days of terror and of suffering such as Englishmen now seldom
think about. Thousands of disgraceful and heart-rending facts might be
stated. Suffice it to remark that, notwithstanding the severity of law,
the harshness of magistrates, the brutality of constables, the
deceitfulness of spies, and the rudeness of the rabble, Nonconformists
continued as numerous as ever. Their firmness of character, their plain,
practical, and awakening ministry, the purity of their morals, their
strict observance of the Sabbath, their care for family religion, their
succession of able and learned preachers, the disgust at the
persecutions they were made to suffer, and the reaction produced by
pushing High Church principles to an unbearable extent, in the short
space of a quarter of a century, brought about the English Revolution of
1688, and obtained for them that which is the birthright of all, liberty
to worship God according to the dictates of their own consciences.
Samuel Wesley began life amid all this royal perfidy, legalised
suffering, and national excitement, and, as we shall shortly see, he was
the son of one of the two thousand persecuted and martyr-like ministers,
ejected from their churches and their homes by the tyrannic Act of
Uniformity, passed and enforced in the year 1662.
[This chapter has been compiled principally from Baxter’s _Life and
Times_; Calamy’s _Nonconformist Memorials_; Calamy’s _Life and Times_;
Macaulay’s _History_; Knight’s _Pictorial History of England_;
Stoughton’s _Church and State Two Hundred Years Ago_; Alleine’s
_Memorial_, by Stanford; Gauden’s _Ecclesiæ Anglicanæ Suspiria_, 1659;
Walker’s _Sufferings of the Clergy_, 1714; _History of Modern
Enthusiasm_, 1757; Rees’ _Encyclopædia_; _Encyclopædia Britannica_; and
from tracts and pamphlets too numerous to mention.]