ing as what were thought to attend the first, nor could the materials for it have been of a character so substantial. Richard Baxter might have made the voyage, and have brought some companions of a like earnest spirit. But a large number of men like Winthrop and Cotton, or like those who guided the Long Parliament and the Westminster Assembly, were not at that day to be found in England. Statesmanship there, as well in the patriot circle as in that of the court, was, in the time of King James and his son-in-law, of a type widely different from what it had been in the first half of the same century. And though the circle of Bates, Calamy, and Howe was composed of worthy Christian men, their virtue was not distinctly of the sort which welcomes danger, conflict, and sacrifice. 1 Improbabil ther resist As bodies politic, the Colonies of New England were now disabled. The most powerful and restiff of them, after triumphing in a sharp contest with the Ministry of King Charles the Second, had afterwards been stricken to his feet. The charter of Massachusetts, the only unquestionable title of her citizens to any rights, proprietary, social, or political, had been vacated by regular process in the English courts. The condition of the four towns. which were collectively called New Hampshire ity of furwas undefined; they were awaiting a new organization. Plymouth, never endowed with a charter, was at the royal mercy, as indeed she always had been except so far as she had been protected by the influence or the imputed power of Massachusetts. The charters which Connecticut and Rhode Island had owed to Lord Clarendon's jealousy of the confederacy and hatred of Massachusetts were understood to have been surrendered -the latter with little reluctance to the usurpations of Randolph and Andros. They had been resumed, but it ance. ing which William the Third sat upon his elective throne." (Hallam, Constitutional History, Chap. XV.) was uncertain whether that anomalous proceeding would be allowed in England. B On the other hand, the reasons which had quickened the desire for independence did not now exist in the same strength as in earlier times. Except in the twenty years that intervened between the assembling of the Long Parliament and the restoration of King Charles the Second, New England, through her whole history, had been agitated by fears for her religious freedom. She had been disquieted from the first to the last of that history by apprehension of encroachments from the English hierarchy, and during no small part of it by alarm lest the government that claimed her allegiance should itself fall into vassalage to the Roman see. On the British throne she at length saw a prince not only unquestionably Protestant, but understood to be strictly orthodox after the standard of her own doctrines and forms, -an unflinching Dutch Calvinist according to the pattern of the Synod of Dort. King William the Third was indeed no enthuand position siast for the creed in which he agreed with the colonists. No ardor possessed him but for the humiliation of France. During the seventeen years since he had been summoned, at the age of twenty-two, to direct the defence of his country against a devastating invasion of the French king, a succession of intrigues and wars against that monarch had been his perpetual occupation. Louis the Fourteenth, in his declining life, was after his incongruous manner a furious devotee to the Romish religion which he had always professed; and the safety of the reformed faith in England, Holland, and the North of Europe depended on successful resistance to his power. But the Protestantism of William of Orange was not so fastidious as to withhold him from alliances with the King of Spain, with the Emperor of Germany and other Catholic princes of the empire, and even with the Pope; nor was it so hearty as to make him willing to Character of King William. 1672. protect suffering Protestants at the cost of his political convenience, as was mournfully manifested by his desertion of the French confessors in the treaty of Ryswick. It might be true that, though the doctrine of predestination was dear to him as it made an uncalculating courage easy, his religious belief, on the whole, had no strong hold of his mind; for he was no brooder upon theories, but a busy man of affairs. But if in that case his Calvinistic subjects might not hope encouragement from him as a sympathizer, they might expect from him toleration as an indifferentist. Toleration had on the whole been the policy of his race, though his rough predecessor, Maurice, had broken the continuity of the tradition. William's position as Protestant head of coalitions composed of Catholics on the one hand, and on the other of Protestants of different names, imposed upon him as a necessity the disavowal of intolerant sentiments. And he had given reason to believe that he would favor such legislation for the Church of England as should offer easy terms of comprehension to dissenters. The disaffection with which the new settlement of the kingdom was regarded by many of the clergy inclined him to favor the sectaries, who were warmly its friends.1 Still, if King William was head of the Church of England, that body was constituted of warring members; nor would the degree of respect with which the rights of nonconformity were to be treated in his colonies be determined by his friendship or his discretion. In the danger which had lately distressed the Church, the dissenters, to whom the Church had all along been so cruel, had to the new helped in its extrication. Had the Church learned moderation and lenity, and was it capable of grat- istration. Prospects as ecclesiastical admin 1 "Their [the clergy's] disaffec- fected to his person and title.” tion made the King more inclinable (Kennett, History of England, III. to favor the dissenters, whom he 518.) generally looked upon as better af 1689. itude? and, if it should be indisposed to relent, how far would it prove able to overrule or to persuade a tolerant sovereign? The "Claim of Right," which constituted the settlement for Scotland, contained an express April 11. declaration against episcopacy in that kingdom;1 if one form of dissent from the established religion of England might be established in Scotland, might the precedent be followed and another form be permitted in Massachusetts ? The leaning of the King's mind in respect to the religious administration was thought to be indicated when presently after his accession he gave the bishopric of Salisbury, the only see then vacant, to Gilbert Burnet, a frank and active enemy to all intolerance, and even reputed to be a doubtful churchman. And the appointment of a successor to Archbishop Sancroft, when that impracticable prelate refused to take the oath of allegiance, afforded a further acceptable assurance of the bias of the royal mind. It was impossible that the enlightened and generous Tillotson should ever lend himself to a vexatious treatment of dissent. Accordingly the course of religious administration in this reign was such as, if it did not give complete satisfaction to the dissenters of New England, yet afforded them sufficient practical security. An early proceeding of the convention which, after recognizing the Prince and Prin 1689. Toleration cess of Orange as King and Queen of England, Feb. 13. resolved on the same day to declare itself a parliament, was to pass an Act commonly known as the Toleration Act, "for exempting their Majesties' Protestant subjects from the penalties of certain May 24. laws." It left the Corporation Act and the Test Act still in force. But all Trinitarian Protestants who should take the oaths of allegiance and supremacy, and make the prescribed declaration against popery, were now permitted to absent themselves from church and to attend 1 Fifth Article, ibid., 588. conventicles, provided that their places of meeting should be open during religious services, and that their preachers should subscribe the doctrinal articles of the Church of England. It has been supposed that the terms of the Toleration Act were negotiated by John Locke. His writings show that he must have considered them inadequate to the ends of justice." measures of sion. A repeal of the Test Act, and a measure of Defeat of Comprehension, as it was called, including such Comprehenalterations of the Liturgy and Articles as might satisfy the consciences of orthodox non-conformists and bring them into the Church, were both proposed. Patrick, Tillotson, Burnet, and Tenison were among the eminent churchmen who favored the concession.3 But difficulties which proved to be insurmountable intervened. Even Whigs could not be persuaded to a unanimous agreement upon measures of so radical a character. Lord Nottingham, whose vast influence in the ecclesiastical circle might have brought about a generous indulgence, was well disposed to a comprehension, but the Test Act he was more inclined to strengthen than to rescind. The embarrassing subject was gotten rid of by a shift which only saved both parties from the mortification of confessing a defeat. The Houses petitioned the King to summon a Convocation of the clergy to give their advice. The Convocation met, and its temper was shown when Dr. 1 Hansard, Parliamentary History, V. 263; compare Hallam, Constitutional History, 584–586. 2 Herbert Skeats, History of the Free Churches of England, 133, 196. - It was in the year of the landing of the Prince of Orange in England that Locke wrote, in Latin, his first Letter on Toleration. (Lord King, Life of Locke, I. 327.) 3 66 They proposed a new selection of lessons; . they left it to the minister's option to substitute the Apostles' for the Athanasian creed; April. Nov. 20. |