Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 19.djvu/710

Rh 686 PRESBYTERIANISM [ENGLAND. a purely Presbyterian system, the Orders of Wandsworth. Similar associations were erected in London and in the midland and eastern counties. When, however, an attempt was made to join the foreign churches in London, the privy council forbade it. Jersey and Guernsey, whither large numbers of Huguenots had fled after the massacre of St. Bartholomew s, alone were Presbyterian by per mission. Cartwright and Snape were pastors there, and from 1576 to 1625 a completely appointed Presbyterian church existed, confirmed by synods (held at Guernsey and Jersey on 28th June 1576 and 17th October 1577) and authorized by the governor. Meantime Cartwright and Travers had drawn up a scheme, never realized, by which ministers were bound to refuse ordination by a bishop unless they had previously been &quot; called &quot; by a congre gation and approved by a church classis. Ceremonies in dispute might be omitted ; should this cause danger of deprivation the classis was to decide. The doctrinal Articles might be subscribed, but not the Prayer Book. Churchwardens might easily be converted into elders and deacons ; and classical, comitial, and provincial assemblies were to be held. The suppression of independent life in the church at length drove numbers out, known in the future as Brownists or INDEPENDENTS (q.v.}. Those who remained still strove for reform. They were met by a new court of high com mission and the &quot; ex officio &quot; oath, an increase of severity strongly opposed by Burghley and the privy council. These views are expressed in Travers s Disoiplina Ecclesix ex verbo Dei descripta, printed at Geneva in 1574, trans lated with additions by Cartwright in 1584, then sup pressed and not again published until 1644, when it was officially recognized as the Directory of Government. 1 Its Presby- leading principles were those of French Protestantism. tenamsm it wa s signed by some 500 ministers, Cartwright among them. The action of the Commons in 1584, stimulated by the opposition of the Lords, shows that the principles of Presbyterianism were very strong in the country. Bills were introduced to limit the stringency of subscription, and to confine the penalties of suspension and deprivation to cases of heresy or scandalous life, to reduce the posi tion of a bishop wellnigh to that of merely primus inter pares, for placing the power of veto in the congregation, for abolishing the canon law and all spiritual courts, and for establishing a presbytery in every parish. All these proposals were, however, cut short by the unflinch ing exercise of the queen s prerogative ; and, with some slackening during the great year of peril, the Puritans suffered extreme persecution. In 1588 they held a pro vincial synod at Warwick, and also again at Michaelmas. It is noticeable, as showing the growth side by side with Presbyterianism of the spirit directly its opposite, that on 12th January 1588 Bancroft for the first time maintained the jus divinum of Episcopacy. There seems no doubt that during the later years of Elizabeth Presbyterianism declined. The position of the conforming Puritan was in every way a weak one. He had sworn to the queen s ecclesiastical supremacy, and this supremacy was what he most hated ; he Avas compelled to have recourse to the figment that, although she had this supremacy, she could not exercise it ecclesiastically, but could merely give her sanction to whatever was enacted by the church. On the other hand, in appearing to attack the church he appeared to attack the nationality of the country when the national spirit was most intense. The nation was rapidly becoming conscious of a vivid and energetic national life, and whatever impaired the national unity was regarded with impatience and resentment at a 1 M Crie, Annals of Presbytery, says that the Orders of Wands- worth were the Directory. England. time when the political condition of Europe was fraught with such danger to England herself. The Scottish Presbyterian had triumphed over a hated and alien church, and the bishops whom he overthrew were evil-living and oppressive men ; the English Presbyterian knew that his church was the symbol of freedom and that her bishops had been holy men martyred for the sake of that freedom. Finally, in England there had existed among the common people, as there had not in Scotland, an absence of inter ference and an independence of private life which would naturally form the strongest obstacle to the introduction of the longed-for Presbyterian discipline. The difference between English and Scottish Presbyterianism was clear to James when in the millenary petition the reforming clergy disclaimed all idea of affecting parity in the church or of attacking the royal supremacy, and merely requested the redress of certain abuses in rites and ceremonies. Even with regard to the &quot; ex officio &quot; oath they asked only that it might be more sparingly used. The Puritans had evidently lost faith in themselves and had been unable to spread their views. &quot; Elizabeth had drained the life out of Puritanism by destroying the Armada and by her subse quent policy in taking the leadership of the Protestant interest in Europe.&quot; It needed the abuses of the reign of James I. to restore it. The king was still further en couraged by the servile support of the universities, which had quite lost their Puritan tone. At the Hampton Court Conference in January 1604, Dr Reynolds as spokesman of the Puritans desired permission for clerical assemblies every three weeks, &quot; prophesyings &quot; in rural deaneries, and that appeals might lie from the archdeacon s invitation to the diocesan synod, composed of the bishop and his presbyters. The coarse and menacing rejection of these demands made clear the weakness of the reforming party within the church as opposed to the cordial alliance between the High Church and the crown. The breach was wider than at any time under Elizabeth. The struggle was becoming political. Divine right of Episcopacy, Arminianism, and prerogative in the crown were becoming ranged against Presbyterianism in church government, Calvinism in creed, and moderate republicanism in politics. In 1604 James put out the Book of Canons, by which Persec every clergyman was forced to subscribe, &quot; willingly and ex tion. animo,&quot; (1) the spiritual and ecclesiastical supremacy of the ^ J crown, (2) the Book of Common Prayer, (3) the Thirty- the nine Articles of 1562, as being all and every one of them Stuarl agreeable to the word of God. The Book was passed under the great seal, but was never ratified by parliament. As the result, a large number of ministers, variously reckoned at from 45 to 300, were deprived of their benefices. Henceforward the persecution was steady and grievous, and an exodus took place to Holland, where the exiles erected Presbyterian churches which in their turn reacted con tinually upon opinion in England. By far the larger part of the Puritans, however, clung to the church. As late as 1607 they eagerly expressed their desire &quot;above all earthly things &quot; to continue their ministry &quot; as that without which our whole life would be wearisome and bitter to us.&quot; And in 1605, in answer to the attacks from both the extreme parties, William Bradshaw published his English Puritanism. The system herein developed, so far from being Presbyterian, is Congregationalism under state con trol. While each congregation is to be entirely inde pendent of all other ecclesiastical courts, the election of its officers and other important matters are ostentatiously given to the civil magistrate. Not the slightest intrusion by ecclesiastical officers upon civil authority may be allowed ; and all church preferment is absolutely in the hands of the crown, which is supreme over the constitution and pro ceedings of synods, and whose commands may not be