"LI E) R.ARY 
 
 OF THE 
 U N IVLRSITY 
 or ILLI NOIS
 
 ^A 
 
 The Relation of 
 
 Church and Parliament 
 
 in regard to 
 
 Ecclesiastical Discipline 
 
 BY 
 
 WALTER HOWARD FRERE, 
 
 Of the Community of the Resurrection. 
 
 A. R. MOWBRAY & CO., 
 
 Oxford : io6, S. Aldate's Street ; 
 
 London : 64 and 65, Farringdon Street, E.G. 
 
 1903.
 
 Ef)t Kelation ot ©Iburcl^ ^ parliament 
 
 m regartr to 
 
 I. 
 
 The delicate adjustment of the relations between 
 Church and State is at all times a difficult task, and 
 one that is very liable to the mishandling that comes 
 from ignorance or prejudice or from confusion of 
 thought. There come periods in history when these 
 relations are barely, if at all, matters of discussion 
 or of public interest ; and again there come times of 
 disputation, strain, and tension, when they excite great 
 interest, and stir some of the strongest passions of 
 man. Those times of tension and discussion are not 
 by any means necessarily times also of change or 
 readjustment ; indeed, some of the chief changes and 
 developments in the relations of Church and State 
 have come about in the torpid periods when alterations 
 excited no interest and met with no opposition, or 
 when slackness and decadence have been allowed to 
 effect an unobserved transformation. But if tension 
 is not necessarily the herald of change, it calls upon 
 thoughtful people to clear their minds, to brush up 
 their facts, to scrutinize their terminology, and to 
 verify their postulates. 
 
 A wave of dissatisfaction with the relations between 
 Church and State has for some time now been passing 
 over Europe, and a state of tension in more or less 
 degree is the result. The prejudices called Clericalism
 
 4 The Relation of Church and Parliament 
 
 and Anti-clericalism have long been powerful factors in 
 the public life of France; of late they seem to have 
 crossed the Channel. It may very well be doubted 
 by sober persons, who have some acquaintance with 
 the facts of the case, whether the imposing proportions 
 to which they pretend are not somewhat factitious. 
 
 Among the working classes in large towns anti- 
 clerical feeling has been steadily on the decrease these 
 fifty years. In country districts it has undoubtedly in- 
 creased, and principally for the reason that the parson, 
 being commonly associated with the squire, has had 
 his share of the feeling of mistrust and suspicion with 
 which the decaying ranks of country labourers regard 
 their present magnates. Among the richer classes the 
 power of tradition in religion is departing or departed ; 
 many still practise religion, while others, who have no 
 conviction, no longer feel themselves bound by a 
 traditional comme il faut. In such circles anti-clerical- 
 ism has multiplied, for there has been a growing 
 divergence. There was an old compact between the 
 well-to-do laity and their brothers, cousins, and neigh- 
 bours of the clergy, that the laity would do a little for 
 God, provided they were not asked for too much. 
 Now both parties have, to a large extent, receded from 
 that compact. The laity are falling more and more, 
 as in France, into two camps, and becoming either 
 convincedly religious or frankly irreligious ; and the 
 latter will no longer for propriety's sake pay a minimum 
 homage to God. Meanwhile the clergy are ceasing 
 to be merely well-meaning persons with gentlemanly 
 instincts and philanthropic leanings, and are becoming 
 professional men, trained to their sacred calling as a 
 doctor or sailor is trained. The result of this, where 
 the training fails, is to produce clericalism, and in its 
 wake anti-clericalism ; and, even where it succeeds
 
 in regard to Ecclesiastical Discipline, 5 
 
 and makes men efficient priests, it is likely to produce 
 anti-clericalism, for there are many who regard all 
 clerical efficiency as a thing to be resented. From 
 all causes, therefore, it is no surprise to find these 
 prejudices on the increase in the richer classes. 
 
 With the middle classes the case is different ; 
 neither sentiment nor tradition nor conviction has 
 succeeded in retaining the bulk of them in the limits 
 of the English Church. It was Nonconformity that 
 moved them in the seventeenth century, and Wesley 
 that won them in the eighteenth ; and they still remain 
 Nonconformist at heart, either (in the original sense of 
 the word) as churchmen who still cling to the Church 
 while trying to make out her doctrine and discipline 
 to be other than they are ; or else frankly as separatists 
 who have inherited a venerable tradition of alienation. 
 
 The original causes of such separation were 
 widely different : some left the Church -sadly, as a 
 mother who had proved too unnatural to care for 
 them ; others defiantly, as a stepmother, who, as they 
 grew up, had ceased to have any longer the power to 
 persecute ; others, as the Scarlet Woman, only one 
 shade lighter than Rome herself, and therefore to be 
 shunned with much drawing aside of skirts and shaking 
 off of dust. 
 
 So again the original tenets of those who separated 
 were sharply at variance ; for example, the Independent 
 and the Presbyterian, when they had united to abolish 
 the Church, had no further point of concord left, 
 and began to demolish one another. Now all this is 
 changed : the distinctive doctrines of the Churches 
 have fallen into the background, and the Free Church 
 Councils are united, not merely by their common 
 animosity, but also by a positive refusal of all alliance 
 with the State, a down grade agreement on a vanishing
 
 6 The Relation of Church and Parliament 
 
 residuum of Christian belief, and a well-intentioned 
 but somewhat inconsistent eagerness to propagate at 
 the expense of the State an undogmatic form of 
 religion. All this is a tremendous change of front, 
 but it does not involve any increase of anti-clerical 
 feeling : at the base of all nonconformity there lie 
 several revulsions of feeling — an exaggerated hatred 
 of Rome, an unreasonable jealousy on behalf of the 
 Bible (or of parts of it), and a repudiation of the 
 historic teaching and discipline of the Catholic Church 
 in the supposed interests of the individual conscience. 
 No one can doubt therefore that the feeling of the 
 large nonconformist majority of the middle classes is 
 hot against the claims, and hotter still against the 
 pretensions, of the Church as a teacher and guide, and 
 of the clergy as her officers ; but the temperature has 
 fallen rather than risen, and the ritualist priestling in 
 his biretta or his chasuble does not now stir depths 
 of passion at all comparable to those which were 
 roused by his remoter ancestor, the reading minister 
 in his cassock and square cap, or even by his grand- 
 father that preached in a surplice. 
 
 The result of this analysis is to shew two things : 
 first, that though anti-clerical feeling is strong, its 
 increase among the richer classes is more than balanced 
 by the decrease elsewhere ; secondly, that some part> 
 at any rate, of its increase is due, not to unjustifiable 
 pretensions, but to increased efficiency on the part 
 of the Church at large, and of the clergy in 
 particular. 
 
 This is not to say that the wave of dissatisfaction 
 and the state of tension do not exist ; undoubtedly 
 they exist, but it is rather in the small world of 
 journalism and of politics than in the larger world 
 of religion. In this small area they have reached a
 
 in regard to Ecclesiastical Discipline. y 
 
 state which may be described as a crisis, or, more 
 accurately, as a panic ; and the reason of this is not 
 far to seek. Nothing is so liable to induce panic as 
 for a man to find himself called upon to handle strong 
 forces which he does not understand. Religious con- 
 troversy is for this reason, and very rightly, the pet 
 aversion of the politician and the journalist ; he steers 
 clear of it as long as he can, and handles it only when 
 panic seizes him and deprives him of his better judg- 
 ment. This is what has been going on of late, and is 
 still with us ; it is a common feature of history. 
 Should any one doubt this, let him look into the past, 
 and survey the controversies of the last century as 
 reflected, or caricatured, in the contemporary press, 
 and recall the legislation that resulted therefrom; he 
 will there find a convincing instance of the truth of the 
 general statement, and will rise from the enquiry with 
 a more trustworthy judgment of the present state of 
 affairs. 
 
 The existing House of Commons has lived the 
 greater part of its life on the verge of panic, and its 
 declining years seem hardly likely to be more staid in 
 this respect. True, it is growing increasingly conscious 
 of its inability to handle these questions; but un- 
 fortunately this consciousness may as easily lead to 
 the panic of interference, as to the wisdom which 
 declines improper tasks. Thus the real matter of 
 anxiety in the ecclesiastical outlook is, not either the 
 internal or the external relations of the Church itself, 
 but the behaviour of the House of Commons now 
 goaded by journalists and Orange wire-pullers to 
 intervene in circumstances where it has neither the 
 right nor the capacity for intervention. 
 
 If in this time of tension there can be some re- 
 consideration of the terms used and misused in the
 
 8 The Relation of Church and Parliament 
 
 discussion, some recalling of elementary principles of 
 the relation of Church and State, some brushing up 
 of historical evidence, and some exposure of popular 
 misconceptions, much good may be done, a sounder 
 public opinion may be formed, reasonable remedies 
 may be found for evils which are acknowledged on all 
 hands to need healing, and the House of Commons may 
 be induced to recognise the fact that it is not its 
 business to supervise the discipline of the Church. 
 
 II. 
 
 Among the terms in use in the discussion of the 
 relations of Church and State that most need scrutiny 
 at a period of tension such as the present is the term 
 " compact ; " it is a term that is constantly used to 
 express these complicated relations, and, even when 
 it is not explicitly employed, there is often latent in 
 people's minds the idea that it expresses. A statement 
 purporting to be authoritative, has lately asserted 
 that— 
 
 "At the Reformation . . . the State agreed that 
 the reformed Church should retain certain emolu- 
 ments, and should have the privileges of the 
 National Church so long as it adhered to the 
 reformed faith and ceremonial as set forth in the 
 Book of Common Prayer and the Thirty-nine 
 Articles. The State on its side makes no claim 
 whatever to alter the doctrines or the discipline 
 of the Church, but promises to protect the Church 
 in the possession of her endowments and privileges 
 so long as she keeps to her part of the agreement. 
 On the other hand the Church agreed to alter 
 neither her doctrine nor her ritual, so long as she 
 remained the National Church without consulta-
 
 ill regard to Ecclesiastical Discipline. g 
 
 tion with the State. . . . Parliament has no right 
 
 whatever to interfere with Church doctrine or 
 
 ritual, but it has the right on behalf of the British 
 
 people, to insist that the terms of compact made 
 
 in the sixteenth century be religiously observed, 
 
 and to enable the Church under the changed 
 
 conditions of the twentieth century to enforce 
 
 them upon her members." 
 
 This statement is liable to mislead seriously any 
 
 one who comes to it without a considerable fund of 
 
 historical knowledge. Not merely are details of it 
 
 objectionable ; see for example the suggestion that the 
 
 affairs of the Church of England are according to the 
 
 precedent of the sixteenth century the concern of '' the 
 
 British people " — a phrase which is meaningless if it is 
 
 not meant expressly to include Scotland and Ireland ; 
 
 or see again, the way in which the writer covertly gives 
 
 away the whole of the point, that he wishes^ to make, by 
 
 speaking of " the changed conditions of the twentieth 
 
 century " : but the whole is unhistorical in its entire 
 
 fabric and tone, and especially in that it can hardly 
 
 fail to convey to the mind of an innocent reader, who 
 
 does not know any better, the idea, that there was at 
 
 the Reformation a new compact formally made, which 
 
 exists somewhere in the Archives of Church or State, 
 
 and has only to be produced in order to shew up the 
 
 dishonest practices of some persons unknown who have 
 
 of late receded from its time-honoured provisions. This 
 
 idea is of course false, and ludicrously false to anyone 
 
 who has any acquaintance with the ecclesiastical history 
 
 of the sixteenth century ; unfortunately most people 
 
 have not sufficient knowledge of the facts to prevent 
 
 them from being misled, and therefore it is necessary 
 
 to scrutinize closely this suggestion of a compact made 
 
 between Church and State at the Reformation.
 
 lo The Relation of Church and Parliament 
 
 That there is a compact between Church and State 
 no one can wish to deny ; there always has been one of 
 some sort ever since the coming of S. Augustine, and the 
 official acceptance of the Christian religion by Anglo- 
 Saxon kings ; this is a characteristic feature of English 
 history, and the intimate bond between the two has 
 been one of the most powerful factors in the develop- 
 ment of England's greatness ; but, beginning thus at 
 the dawn of the history, and being anterior to the 
 coalescing of the separate kingdoms of the Heptarchy 
 into the one English State, it is natural to find that 
 the compact is all along based upon tradition. That 
 tradition has been constantly subject to modification 
 in one form or another, and through different agencies — 
 the definite actions of Kings, Popes, Prelates, Synods, 
 or Parliaments, as well as the more indefinite influences 
 of time and change : but it subsists throughout the 
 whole history as a mutual understanding based upon 
 tradition. 
 
 Large modifications were no doubt made in the 
 thirty years, from 1530 to 1560, and affecting great 
 issues, but they touched after all but a relatively small 
 part of the whole field of the mutual understanding 
 between Church and State : they were, and they 
 professed to be, a restoration of what had previously 
 been, rather than an innovation ; the Norman kings 
 had altered the traditions of the Saxons, and each 
 succeeding century witnessed further modifications in 
 one or other direction in the relations of Church and 
 State. A good instance of this continual modification 
 of a traditional arrangement is afforded by the history 
 of the appointment to bishoprics First, the Church 
 fought with the Crown for the recognition of the 
 spiritual part of the appointment, and finally came to 
 terms which were a considerable alteration of existing
 
 in regard to Ecclesiastical Discipline. ii 
 
 theory and practice. Then the right of canonical 
 election was won, and very soon lost again, for the 
 most part, because the Pope overrode the liberties 
 of the electors. Then came the curbing of the papal 
 power by the Statutes of Provisors ; but the King, 
 while nominally restoring their power to the electors 
 by restraining papal interference, practically got the 
 matter into his own hands by sending a '' letter 
 missive " directing the choice of the Chapter. And 
 so the conflicts went on. They are a good instance 
 of the way in which the traditional understanding of 
 Church and State was being continually modified in 
 the pre-Reformation days. 
 
 The Reformation changes, though theologically of 
 quite a different calibre, are constitutionally only the 
 successors of the foregoing. There was no new com- 
 pact, but only a series of modifications of the traditional 
 arrangement. This will be seen more clearly by con- 
 sidering two of the most central parts of that traditional 
 arrangement. The first is the recognition by the State 
 of the right of the Church, in some form or another, 
 to meet and legislate for itself. This right, which had 
 in earlier days been exercised in Councils, had more 
 and more devolved upon the Convocations of the 
 Clergy, which had originally come into existence for 
 the purpose of clerical taxation ; they had in this way 
 been drawn into a closer analogy with Parliament, and 
 thus, as a machinery for ecclesiastical legislation, had 
 already become more amenable to direction from the 
 Crown. Henry laid upon them far larger restrictions 
 than had bound them before, by the Act for the 
 Submission of the Clergy (25 Hen. viii. c. xix.), but 
 it was a modification of what already existed, not a 
 new compact ; the old legislative power was to continue, 
 but under greater restrictions.
 
 12 The Relation of Church and Parliament 
 
 The second instance to be taken is that of the 
 judicial system of the Church. It was part of the 
 immemorial constitution of the country that the 
 Church should not merely legislate, but also exercise 
 judicial functions for itself. Here, again, there was 
 change, but only by way of some modification of the 
 time-honoured state of things. The Act already 
 mentioned forbade appeals to Rome, and with other 
 similar legislation recovered the position of the Crown 
 as the ultimate source of justice in causes ecclesiastical 
 as well as civil ; but, apart from this question of the 
 Court of ultimate appeal, the whole system went on 
 as before ; there was no new compact ; indeed the 
 changes in the ecclesiastical administration of justice 
 made in the sixteenth century by Henry were quite 
 inconsiderable compared to those made in the early 
 part of the nineteenth century — not to mention the 
 more debateable changes of the middle years of the 
 same period — which swept away with general approval 
 the greater part of ecclesiastical suits, or transferred 
 them to the civil courts. 
 
 Only one notable attempt was made at making a 
 new compact to supersede the old arrangements, and it 
 failed. This was the project of the " Reformatio 
 Legum," a well meant endeavour to codify the Canon 
 Law, so as to be able to start clear upon the new lines 
 which were necessitated by the repudiation of the papal 
 supremacy. There was certainly no sphere where it 
 was so needful to have, if possible, a fresh start ; for 
 the papacy was so entirely interwoven into the whole 
 fabric of the mediaeval Canon Law that it seemed a 
 hopeless task to try to eliminate it, and have any thing 
 still left remaining. But the project came to nothing ; 
 and the reason is obvious and illuminating. The 
 tradition was too strong ; the breach with the past was
 
 in regard to Ecclesiastical Discipline. 15 
 
 too great. If Bishops and their legal officials were still 
 to go on administering the discipline of the Church, 
 they must go on in the old way ; and as for the 
 difficulties and the anomalies that were bound to crop 
 up, it must be a case of solvitur ambulando with them. 
 And, even if the Puritans take it as a grievance, and 
 decry the whole administration as inherently popish, 
 it cannot be helped ; but the civil judges must, if 
 appealed to, support their ecclesiastical confreres 
 and recognise the permanence of the old Canon 
 Law. 
 
 There is, however, one sphere in which it seems at 
 first sight as though a new compact may have been 
 made. Hitherto, the State had had no reason to take 
 any interest in all that side of Church discipline which 
 is concerned with Services ; but at the Reformation 
 it discovered that it was worth its while to do so, not 
 only in order to second the new enforcement of stricter 
 uniformity, which the Church was seeking to carry out, 
 but also in order to secure, for political reasons, the 
 repression of dangerous dissidence. No doubt in a 
 sense this may be called a new departure ; but it would 
 be more accurate to describe it as an extension of a 
 principle already well recognised. The State had long 
 been accustomed to lend its aid to enforce the discipline 
 of the Church ; this was indeed part of the traditional 
 understanding; nothing was more suitable, according 
 to the theory, than that the Church should appeal for 
 the help of the State in any sphere where it found a 
 difficulty in enforcing its discipline, and that the State 
 should respond to the appeal. The State had thus 
 brought its own proper terrors to bear, not only on 
 contemners of the ecclesiastical courts in general, but 
 also, upon special emergency, on heretics too. When 
 once it was decided that it was important for the
 
 14 The Relation of Church and Parliament 
 
 Church that the diversities of rite and ceremony should 
 yield to a new and fuller uniformity, nothing was more 
 consonant with the old traditions than that the State 
 should be asked to second its efforts in this department 
 of discipline as in others ; and if the State had its own 
 reasons, too, for wishing to secure liturgical uniformity, 
 that circumstance does not make what was done a new 
 departure, except in the sense already limited, and 
 certainly does not justify any one in thinking of Acts 
 of Uniformity as forming a new compact. The more 
 exact interpretation of the bearing of these Acts on the 
 relations of Church and State must be left to a later stage. 
 Finally, it may be pointed out how entirely unlike 
 the English position is to that of countries where there 
 has been a definite compact formulated to be the terms 
 of association of Church and State, or the treaty 
 between the Pope and the secular government. There 
 is no need to go far to seek out instances of these. In 
 Scotland the old hierarchy was destroyed by Act of 
 Parliament (1560), and with it went the rest of the 
 organization and tenets of the pre- Reformation Church. 
 A new ministry and a new organization was then set 
 up. It was in its earlier form neither episcopal nor 
 presbyterian, though at a later date it became first one 
 and then the other. It was based on three documents : 
 the Confession of Faith, the Book of Discipline, and 
 the Book of Common Order ; but the recognition of 
 this new system on the part of the State came 
 about only gradually. At first Parliament refused to 
 sanction the Book of Discipline; then the Privy Council 
 similarly refused, but allotted to the new ministry a 
 fraction of the endowments that had once belonged to 
 the Old Church, but had since been in lay hands. 
 Finally, in 1567, the Parliament confirmed the Con- 
 fession of Faith, made more permanent provision for the
 
 in regard to Ecclesiastical Discipline, 15 
 
 stipends of the ministers, and declared the new 
 organization to be the only true and holy Kirk of Jesus 
 Christ within this realm. 
 
 For a Concordat it is natural to turn to France. 
 After the Church had been destroyed at the Revolution, 
 it was necessary that some steps should be taken for its 
 restoration when happier days dawned. This was not 
 done, as was the case at our English Restoration, by 
 treating the recent events as null, and by merely going 
 back to the Status quo ante^ but a new documentary 
 bargain was made (1801) between the Pope and the 
 Government, called by the name which previous docu- 
 ments of the same sort had borne both in France and 
 elsewhere, namely, a '' Concordat." 
 
 Recent events have shewn how, even with a formal 
 documentary bargain of this degree of definiteness, it is 
 possible to have room for much dispute ; and though it 
 is characteristic of France to have all arrangements 
 elaborately codified, she does not thereby escape an 
 ecclesiastical crisis, compared to which the disturbance 
 at home, however artfully fomented, is trifling indeed. 
 
 Our English character and our English history are 
 alike different. We cling to the old, even when 
 anomalous, sooner than devise an ideal new platform. 
 It is therefore a misconception of both our national 
 history and character to think of the Reformation as 
 having involved a fresh compact between the Church 
 and the State, It is true that their mutual relations 
 were profoundly modified then ; but they were under- 
 going continual modification before that time, and they 
 have never ceased to undergo a continuous process of 
 modification ever since. 
 
 It can therefore only cloud the issues to appeal to 
 the sixteenth century as representing either a definite 
 or a permanent compact between Church and State.
 
 1 6 The Relation of Church and Parliament 
 
 III. 
 
 Another term in constant employment in this dis- 
 cussion, which also needs close scrutiny, is the term 
 State. It is far too readily assumed at the present 
 time that that term in this connexion is only a 
 synonym for Parliament ; and there are few mistakes 
 more fatal to the comprehension of the whole question. 
 
 According to the theory current in England in the 
 middle of the sixteenth century, the State consists of 
 the Crown, as the head of the body politic, with the 
 spiritualty and the temporalty as the body ; which 
 body is divided into three estates — the Lords Spiritual, 
 the Lords Temporal, and the Commons. Its executive 
 is thus to be looked on as two-fold, comprising the 
 Royal and the Parliamentary authority. Therefore, in 
 any discussion of the relations of Church and State, 
 the first thing necessary to enquire is this, whether by 
 the term State is meant Crown, or Parliament, or both; 
 and these distinctions are of primary importance. 
 Throughout the whole of the changes in the relations 
 of Church and State in the sixteenth century, the 
 distinction between the relation of the Church to the 
 Crown, and its relation to the Parliament was jealously 
 preserved ; and it is necessary to go somewhat fully 
 into this history, in order to recover principles, which 
 have been left too long out of sight, and to obviate a 
 repetition in the future of blunders which have resulted 
 in consequence. 
 
 The great Reformation changes of Henry VIII. 
 involve these two principles : (i) that the ecclesiastical 
 Supremacy recovered from the Pope is a Royal 
 Supremacy, and not a Parliamentary Supremacy; 
 (2) that all matters directly affecting the Spiritualty 
 are rightly only to be initiated (by agreement with the 
 Crown) in the assemblies of the Clergy.
 
 in regard to Ecclesiastical Discipline. 17 
 
 The first of these needs only to be stated to be 
 recognised, though it must have some further exposition 
 before its full force is realized ; the second is far more 
 a matter of controversy, and the history that it involves 
 is far more intricate, therefore its handhng requires 
 some fullness and much care. It will be best, therefore, 
 to review briefly some of the chief of the changes in the 
 relation of Church and State made in the sixteenth 
 century, with special reference to the circumstances 
 that bear on one or other of these points. 
 
 At the first sessions of the great Reformation 
 Parliament of 1529, a strong anti-clerical spirit was 
 manifested, and two Acts touching the clergy, and of 
 an objectionable character to them, were passed. This 
 behaviour evoked a strong remonstrance from Con- 
 vocation at the breach of constitutional precedent, but 
 one that was apparently unsuccessful. Meanwhile 
 the Convocation went on with plans of its own for 
 reform of abuses. * 
 
 It is significant that the series of occurrences to be 
 observed for our purpose should start with an infringe- 
 ment and a protest ; the principle was recognised even 
 when it was not observed : and it was the interest of 
 the Crown as well as of the new men of the royal 
 circle to do anything that would humble the clergy, 
 and to reduce them to emulate the Commons in 
 subserviency. 
 
 The sessions of 1531 did not touch the relation of 
 Church and Parliament, but they extorted from the 
 clergy the acknowledgment of the Royal Supremacy in 
 terms which, though they were too gross to survive 
 long, were considerably less objectionable than those 
 at first propounded to the Convocation by the King. 
 The humiliation was great, and indeed the extortion of 
 the acknowledgment was more intended to humiliate 
 
 B
 
 1 8 The Relation of Church and Parliament 
 
 than to claim any novel status ; but, be it observed, 
 that the Supremacy recognised was that of the Crown, 
 not that of the Parliament. Even in its lowest days 
 the clergy never demeaned itself so far as to accept a 
 Parliamentary Supremacy, though Parliament at the 
 time was very largely composed of spiritual persons, 
 more than half of the Upper House being prelates, and 
 contained no one who was not a churchman and a 
 communicant. 
 
 The year following saw the famous Submission of 
 the Clergy, by which they bound themselves not to 
 make new canons without the Royal assent ; and it is 
 important to notice that this serious curtailment of the 
 former liberties of the Church was made by vote of 
 Convocation itself, and not of Parliament. Further, it 
 was the Convocation that took the initiative in the 
 chief piece of ecclesiastical legislation of this date, the 
 abolition of annates ; in the lesser measures that dealt 
 with the procedure of ecclesiastical courts, &c., there is 
 no sign that it took action. 
 
 In 1533 began the series of enactments to abolish 
 the jurisdiction of the Pope in England, and to secure 
 that appeals were to be decided by the metropolitans, 
 or, in matter that touched the King, by the Upper 
 House of Convocation of the province. These bodies 
 themselves meanwhile were entirely taken up with the 
 affair of the King^s divorce, and seem to have had no 
 hand in the matter. Next year, however, they ac- 
 companied the anti-papal legislation of Parliament 
 with declarations that the Pope ought to have no 
 power in England ; and Parliament incorporated with 
 that legislation a confirmation of the restrictions on the 
 legislative power of the Church, which the clergy had 
 already accepted in their Submission. 
 
 It is unnecessary to give further details of this
 
 in regard to Ecclesiastical Discipline. 19 
 
 reign. The rights of the clergy in their convocations 
 to a share in legislation that affected them is recognised 
 as a principle of the constitution, even though in these 
 troublous times it is honoured from time to time rather 
 in the breach than in the observance. • 
 
 In the reign of Edward VI. constitutional pro- 
 cedure was utterly neglected, not only in this, but in 
 many other respects. The chantries were destroyed, 
 as the monasteries had been before them, without the 
 clergy being asked to share the onus or the sin of the 
 measure ; and the right of election to bishoprics went 
 without a word. The earlier liturgical reforms of the 
 reign, like those of Henry's day, were made without 
 any reference to Parliament ; they were the result of 
 an agreement made, not very formally, by the Church 
 and the Crown. But when the Divines had prepared 
 the new English Service-book, it was -advisable to 
 secure uniformity by such penalties as only an Act 
 of Parliament could enact ; and the two Acts of 
 Uniformity were the result. Here the Church took 
 all the initiative, and the Parliament seconded its 
 efforts. It is clear that the second book was not 
 submitted to Convocation, and doubtful whether the 
 first was ; but in any case the Church, in some form or 
 another, took the lead in defining its own discipline, 
 and only called in the aid of Parliament to reinforce 
 what it had already decided, though clearly the first 
 Act, to a certain extent, carried with it a restriction on 
 the Church's part of her own liturgical freedom, since 
 it necessitated a further Act of some sort whenever any 
 important change was to be made. 
 
 But the Convocation did not let the constitution 
 lapse into chaos without a bold attempt to mend 
 matters, as far as its own privileges were concerned.
 
 20 The Relation of Church and Parliament 
 
 In 1547 it protested, first against the delay in the 
 reform of canon law, which had been the project to 
 which it had assented in the Submission of the Clergy ; 
 and secondly, against the handling of ecclesiastical 
 matters in Parliament without consultation with itself. 
 The protests were sadly ineffective, but at any rate 
 they served to keep alive the memory of the true 
 principles of action, until days when they would receive 
 better recognition. Meanwhile the clergy were in 
 advance of the secular legislators in passing Com- 
 munion under both kinds, and in sanctioning the 
 marriage of their Order. — ^ 
 
 In the first Parliament of Elizabeth, both the two 
 points under consideration were raised afresh after the 
 reaction of Mary's reign. The Act of Supremacy once 
 again annexed to the Crown the former and legitimate 
 visitatorial power and jurisdiction, declaring the Queen 
 to be Supreme Governor of the Realm, as well in all 
 spiritual or ecclesiastical things or causes as temporal. 
 Again, it is a Royal Supremacy, and Parliament claims 
 nothing of the sort for itself over the Church. Provision 
 is made on new lines for the exercise of this authority ; 
 formerly Henry had used his reasserted power, as from 
 time to time it pleased him, even to the extent of 
 making Thomas Cromwell his Vicar- General, and using 
 him, not only in a visitatorial capacity, but even to 
 preside in Convocation. Now a proviso was inserted 
 for the exercise of these functions by a person or 
 persons to be appointed to act for the Crown by 
 letters patent, and from that clause there arose the 
 Ecclesiastical Commission, which came, not only to 
 exercise the royal jurisdiction in ecclesiastical affairs, 
 but also to a dangerous extent to supersede the more 
 normal and regular jurisdiction of the Episcopate. It 
 was an attempt on the part of the Crown to back up
 
 in regard to Ecclesiastical Discipline. 21 
 
 or even stimulate the authority of the Bishops — a 
 legitimate outcome of the Royal Supremacy, though it 
 was misused, and thus became detested ultimately, and 
 regarded as the synonym for all that was iniquitous. 
 
 The same Act, in touching on the question of 
 Heresy, rehearsed the old constitutional principle for 
 whose better recognition the Convocation had petitioned 
 in 1547, with so little success. Among heresies, it says, 
 such things may be reckoned as have been determined 
 so to be " by the High Court of Parliament of this 
 realm with the assent of the Clergy in their Con- 
 vocation." The rehearsal of this is all the more 
 valuable at this moment because, ^from the peculiar 
 circumstances of the situation, it was not being acted 
 upon in the ecclesiastical legislation that was going on. 
 The sitting Convocation was entirely Marian in its 
 views ; this was not unnatural, considering that it was 
 more an official than an elective body, and that the 
 leaders of the clergy of the contrary persuasion, if not 
 dead, were either in exile or in hiding. It was clearly 
 useless to submit the Government's plans to such a 
 body as this : and indeed the Government had quite 
 enough to do to find means of carrying some of its 
 desires through the Houses of Parliament, and in face 
 of the unswerving opposition of the prelates there. 
 
 Thenceforward the relations of Church and Parlia- 
 ment are, for a long spell, of great interest. The second 
 Parliament was opened by a speech from the Lord 
 Keeper, Sir N. Bacon (Jan. 12, 1563), which spoke of 
 disorders in the Church that needed amendment — want 
 of diligence in preachers, want of attention and credit 
 in hearers, ministers few, and some of them insufficient, 
 laxness of discipline, that has bred loose living on the 
 one hand, and neglect of the ornaments prescribed for 
 worship on the other. The Bishops must see to all this ;
 
 22 The Relation of Church and Parliament 
 
 if the Act of Uniformity is not stringent enough to force 
 men to church, it must be made more so ; if it is, let them 
 see it executed. It would be well to have two disciplinary 
 officers appointed for each diocese ; but the chief care 
 of all this pertains to the Lords of the Spiritualty, and 
 they must take steps about reforms. Parliament will 
 then join laws to their measures, not only for the more 
 perfecting of the same, but for the maintenance as well 
 of the heads as the ministers thereof. 
 
 It was a good exposition of the old principles, and 
 the Bishops acted upon it. A Bill was originated by 
 Convocation, and passed, in an enlarged form, by 
 Parliament for securing greater efficiency in the 
 sentence of excommunication. Two other propositions 
 from the Convocation House were less fortunate, and 
 were rejected. 
 
 In the next Parliament the first signs began to 
 shew themselves of a wish on the part of some of the 
 Commons to take the initiative in Church reform. On 
 December 5th, 1566, a Bill was introduced into the 
 Commons to establish the Articles of Religion, which 
 had been newly revised by Convocation, and published 
 with semi-official royal approval in 1563. It passed, 
 and was sent up to the Lords on the 14th. After a 
 single reading it was stopped there by order of the 
 Queen, who was very angry at its introduction into the 
 ParHament, blamed the Bishops for it, and was little 
 mollified when they disclaimed having had a hand in 
 the matter, but begged her to allow it to go forward. 
 
 The first attempt of an Elizabethan Parliament to 
 take the initiative in ecclesiastical affairs was thus a 
 complete failure ; the reasons for that failure, and the 
 motives of the Queen's action, will come out more 
 clearly when the question comes up again in a fuller 
 form in the next Parliament.
 
 in regard to Ecclesiastical Discipline. 23 
 
 This measure had been the hardiest of a Htter of six: 
 the other bills had been killed at the birth ; but on 
 April 7th, 1 57 1, the whole six were revived and 
 presented afresh to the Commons with a new addition, 
 and had the honour of committees and a first reading 
 apiece. The House proceeded, however, very cautiously, 
 feeling its ground, and gradually pushing on one after 
 another of its bantlings, not without conference with 
 the Lords. 
 
 Meanwhile a parallel development was taking place. 
 Mr. Strickland made a long discourse calling attention 
 to the superstitious blots in the Prayer Book, and to 
 the abuses of ecclesiastical government, and complain- 
 ing that authority and great livings were in the hands 
 of known Papists — meaning no doubt, by that term, 
 Churchmen more loyal than himself, as is the way of 
 his sort. He concluded by asking the House to 
 appoint committees to confer with the Lords of the 
 Spiritualty for consideration and reformation of these 
 matters. This was on April 6th, and a week later, on 
 Easter Even, it was evident that this move was also 
 progressing. Committees had been appointed in each 
 House, and had arranged to spend Palm Sunday after- 
 noon in conference ; Secretary Smith had said cautious 
 words in favour of consulting the Bishops on other eccle- 
 siastical business also ; Recorder Fleetwood had replied 
 with a legal argument that such a course was unneces- 
 sary ; the Queen herself had sounded a warning note in 
 a Message that she had sent, telling the Commons to 
 spend little time in motions, and to avoid long speeches. 
 It was under such circumstances of encouragement alike 
 and discouragement that Strickland introduced his Bill 
 for the Reformation of the Prayer Book. It was well 
 received by the House ; but the Treasurer, Knollys, 
 thought it ought to be referred to the Queen, for fear
 
 24 The Relation of Chiirch and Parliament 
 
 that it might be an interference with her Prerogative ; 
 and Hatton, the Comptroller, urged definitely that the 
 time and the place were not fit, and that such heady 
 and hasty proceedings, contrary to and before the law, 
 did rather hinder than help. In the end the House 
 decided to petition the Queen for leave to proceed with 
 the Bill. When it met again, after the recess, Mr. 
 Strickland was not there, having been sent for by the 
 Council in the meanwhile, and detained by its command 
 from attending the House for infringing the Prerogative 
 of the Queen in introducing his Bill. The Commons 
 were at first disposed loudly to resent this development, 
 as an invasion of their privileges, but Treasurer and 
 Comptroller again recalled them to a truer estimate of 
 their place. The Speaker, at the instance of the 
 members of the Council, stopped the debate, and 
 later on in the day Strickland was restored to his 
 duties. 
 
 A fortnight later another rap on the knuckles was 
 inflicted by the Crown, this time on both Houses. 
 Their committees had gone on consulting about the 
 group of ecclesiastical Bills, and the Bill for the 
 Articles had reached the same stage at which its career 
 had been checked in the previous Parliament, when 
 the committees brought back the news that the Queen 
 had sent a Message to express her approval of the 
 Articles, and her intention to publish them and have 
 them executed by the Bishops, by direction of her 
 Highness' regal authority of Supremacy of the Church 
 of England, and not to have the same dealt in by 
 Parliament. In the end two only of the group of 
 seven Bills passed into law ; one was a small measure 
 dealing with the leases of benefices, the other was the 
 important Act, " For the ministers of the Church to be 
 of sound religion," which was principally concerned
 
 in regard to Ecclesiastical Discipline. 25 
 
 with exacting from certain classes of clergy that 
 subscription to the Articles which had been already 
 demanded in general by the simple ecclesiastical 
 authority. Since the action of the Church had pre- 
 ceded the action of the State, there was no objection 
 to be raised to this. 
 
 In the Parliament of the next year (1572) the 
 activity of the Puritans was taken up, not with trying 
 to subject the Church to a parliamentary discipline, 
 for the Commons had learnt their lesson for the 
 moment, and were not disposed again to court reproof 
 and failure, but with tr3dng to goad them on to the 
 task which they were wise enough, for this occasion, to 
 decline. The '' Admonitions " represent, among other 
 things, the protest of a section of the people against 
 the constitutional view of the relations of Church, 
 Crown, and Parliament, which the Crown, even more 
 than the Church, had shewn itself determined to 
 uphold. The Queen had had, moreover, an oppor- 
 tunity of restating her determination, and she had not 
 missed it. The Parliament was only a fortnight old, 
 and had thrice read one of two Bills concerning rites 
 and ceremonies, when the Speaker was called upon to 
 deliver a further Message from the Queen *' that her 
 Highness' pleasure is, that from henceforth no Bills 
 concerning religion shall be preferred or received into 
 this House, unless the same should be first considered 
 and liked by the clergy." The offending Bills were 
 delivered over to her Majesty, and she expressed 
 openly her disapproval, especially of the first of them. 
 After this it was not surprising that the House was on 
 its best behaviour for the rest of the session ; and not 
 surprising also, perhaps, that the disappointment of the 
 baffled reformers was so bitterly expressed in the 
 ^' Admonitions."
 
 26 The Relation of Church and Parliament 
 
 From this Parliament one member went home very- 
 sore. Peter Wentworth had been one of the com- 
 mittees of the House who had been urgent in the 
 matter of the Articles of Religion in the previous 
 Parliament of 1571 ; he had then come into conflict 
 with Archbishop Parker, who pointed out to the 
 committees that it was not the province of the House 
 to pick and choose, but to accept them en bloc, and 
 " refer themselves wholly to the Bishops therein." 
 Wentworth indignantly replied, that to do this was to 
 make the Bishops into popes, and he would have none 
 of it ; but his protest was in vain. The new Parlia- 
 ment, in its earlier session, had brought him no 
 comfort, but, on the contrary, he had seen the Crown 
 again assert itself. In the interval of four years that 
 had elapsed since the previous session, he had occupied 
 himself in writing out a speech of protest against 
 the Queen's treatment of the Parliament in matters 
 both civil and ecclesiastical. On the first morning of 
 the new session (Feb. 8, 1576) he delivered himself 
 of this philippic : he was not allowed to finish it, and 
 in the afternoon he found himself a prisoner, under 
 examination by a committee of the House concerning 
 his " violent and wicked words." He had complained 
 in the first place in general of the subservience of the 
 House to the rumours as to the wishes of the Queen, 
 and in the second place of the Messages from the 
 Crown *' either of commanding or inhibiting, very 
 injurious to the freedom of speech and consultation." 
 As to the Message that Parliament " should not deal 
 in any matters of religion, but first to receive from the 
 Bishops," he said that it was a doleful Message, 
 prohibiting them from dealing in God's causes, or 
 seeking to advance His glory, and such as was bound 
 to forfeit the blessing of God upon the work of the
 
 in regard to Ecclesiastical Discipline. 27 
 
 session ; he quoted the precedent of 1559, when the 
 Parliament had taken the initiative, and laid at the 
 door of the Bishops the blame of this inhibition. 
 Besides the ecclesiastical question he had much also 
 to complain of in the Queen's dealings with Parliament 
 in the matter of the Queen of Scots. On the day- 
 following the committees reported adversely to the 
 House, and he was sent as close prisoner to the Tower, 
 where he remained over a month before he was, by the 
 favour of the Queen, restored to his liberty and his 
 place in the House. (March 12, 1576.) 
 
 Later on, when the House proposed to deal with 
 the thorny subject of Discipline in the Church, it 
 proceeded cautiously. A petition was drawn up to the 
 Queen, and the Council was moved to take the matter 
 up. Then a Bill was prepared and read once. A week 
 ensued, and the Council presented the petition to the 
 Queen, and received answer as follows: — ^" Her Majesty 
 before the Parliament had a care to provide in that 
 case of her own disposition ; and at the beginning 
 of this session her Highness had conference therein 
 with some of the Bishops, and gave them in charge 
 to see due reformation thereof; wherein, as Her 
 Majesty thinketh, they will have good consideration 
 according to her pleasure and express commandment 
 in that behalf; and further, if the said Bishops should 
 neglect or omit their duties therein, then Her Majesty, 
 by her supreme power and authority over the Church 
 of England, will speedily see such good redress therein 
 as may satisfy the expectations of her loving subjects 
 to their good contentation." 
 
 The same Parliament sat again early in 1581, and 
 reverted to its petitions. In this instance, however, it 
 did more wisely in addressing itself to the Bishops, and 
 found some of them very willing to take up the
 
 28 The Relation of Church and Parliament 
 
 grievances, and join in the petition to the Queen. 
 The Lower House of Convocation was also moving 
 on the same subject. A considerable programme of 
 reform was drawn up, and it seemed as if there were 
 all the conditions ready for a successful redressing of 
 crying evils ; but the Queen was again obdurate, 
 apparently for no other reason, except that the move- 
 ment had been initiated in the Parliament ; and, when 
 pressed by the Bishops, all that she would allow was a 
 smaller programme of reform, to be carried out solely 
 by the episcopal authority, without Parliament having 
 any share in it. The prevention of the larger scheme 
 was no doubt a misfortune to the Church, but it was 
 insisted on by the Queen in defence of the true 
 principles of the relation of Church and Parliament, 
 which, as was proved, by many other instances than 
 this, were more clearly perceived and more tenaciously 
 held by the Queen than by the Episcopate. 
 
 When the next Parliament assembled in November, 
 1584, the strenuous regime of Whitgift had taken the 
 place of the inefficiency of Grindal. He had already 
 done much in the way of reforming abuses, though 
 not always in the way that was agreeable to the 
 Puritan party, and, when the Parliament began again 
 with its petitions for reform, it found that in many 
 respects it had been forestalled by the action of the 
 Archbishop, and that in others it had in him a 
 powerful and convinced antagonist, who would not 
 yield at all to Puritan innovations that tampered with 
 the constitution of the Church. The days had passed 
 when the Crown had stood alone in her defence, and 
 a new stage of the history had opened in which the 
 attempts at interference on the part of Parliament 
 with the Church's liberties would soon be brought to 
 an end. Whitgift was quite equal to making short
 
 in regard to Ecclesiastical Discipline, 29 
 
 work of the petitions without having to invoke the 
 aid of the Queen. Thereupon the Convocations went 
 on their own way, and passed a very valuable set of 
 canons, which became a real instrument of reform. 
 When their representatives were received in audience 
 by the Queen on February 27th, she was especially 
 gracious to them, thanked them profusely for their 
 subsidy, contrasting their generosity favourably with 
 the reluctance of the Parliament. She would not 
 suffer the reproachful speeches of the nether House 
 against the Church, nor allow them to " meddle with 
 matters above their capacity not pertaining to them." 
 She did not deny that there were things that needed 
 amendment, indeed she called attention to some of 
 them in very clear terms, but she promised to call 
 to account any that molested the Church in dealing 
 with her own business, even though they are supported 
 by some of the Council. 
 
 Parliament greatly resenting its rebuff, applied itself 
 to ecclesiastical legislation on its own account ; several 
 ecclesiastical measures passed the Lower House, and 
 two attained to the Upper ; then the Archbishop 
 appealed to the Crown, complaining of this action, 
 both as being a defiance of the Queen's Messages, 
 and as being in detail injurious to the Church. 
 When the session was brought to an end, five days 
 later, none of the Bills in question had passed, and 
 the Queen smoothed over the soreness of the House 
 by a diplomatic speech. Speaking of the fault-finders 
 with the Order of the Clergy, she said that they 
 might become a slander to herself and the Church, 
 for, since God had made her its over-ruler, her negli- 
 gence could not be excused, if any schisms or errors 
 heretical were suffered. ** Thus much I must say," she 
 continued, '* that some faults and negligences may
 
 30 The Relation of Church and Parliament 
 
 grow and be, as in all other great charges it happeneth. 
 And what vocation without ? All which if you, my 
 Lords of the Clergy, do not amend, I mean to depose 
 you. Look ye, therefore, well to your charges. This 
 may be amended without heedless or open exclama- 
 tions." Thus the laity were gratified by the blaming 
 of the Bishops, while the Bishops had their way as to 
 the main issue. 
 
 But Parliament had not yet entirely learnt its 
 lesson. At the end of February, 1587, when the 
 excitement over the Queen of Scots had been closed 
 by her execution, there re-appeared in the Commons 
 a ** Bill and Book," which had already figured there 
 twice in abortive attempts on the part of Puritan 
 members to establish the Presbyterian Discipline in 
 the Church, and to substitute the Genevan Service- 
 book for the Book of Common Prayer. The introducer 
 on this occasion was a Mr. Cope, and he asked that his 
 documents should be read to the House. The Speaker 
 thereupon reminded the House of the previous com- 
 mands that had come from the Queen not to meddle 
 with this matter, and desired that Mr. Cope's request 
 should be refused on that account. A discussion 
 ensued between those who were in favour of the 
 reading and those that opposed it, and this occupied 
 the whole of the rest of the sitting, so that when the 
 House rose, nothing had been decided. At its close 
 the Queen sent for the documents, together with 
 similar ones that had been exhibited on previous 
 occasions, and the next day had an interview with 
 the Speaker, which prevented the meeting of the 
 House. On the third day (March ist) Mr. Went- 
 worth's wrath was again at boiling point, and he came 
 to the House armed with a speech and eight pointed 
 questions as to the rights of free speech, the privileges
 
 in regard to Ecclesiastical Discipline, 31 
 
 of the Parliament, and the powers of the Speaker ; 
 his demand, that they should be read as an introduction 
 to his speech, was met by a reminder on the part of the 
 the Speaker, that it was better to wait until the Queen's 
 pleasure was known with regard to the Bill and Book ; 
 and when he persisted in his demand, the Speaker took 
 his papers to peruse first; having done so he ''pocketted 
 them up and shewed them to Sir T. Heneage, who so 
 handled the matter that Mr. Wentworth went to the 
 Tower, and the questions not at all moved." The 
 Queen again sent for the Speaker, and so closed the 
 sitting, and on the following day Mr. Cope and three 
 of his supporters went to share Wentworth's fate. 
 When a petition was mooted in Parliament for the 
 restoration of the imprisoned members, the Vice- 
 Chamberlain spoke at length, justifying the Queen's 
 action, and explaining the obnoxious character of the 
 proposals made. Shortly afterwards a -motion was 
 made for an appeal to her Majesty to redress disorders 
 in the ministry, and further steps were taken to secure 
 the release of the prisoners ; while a more bold step 
 still was taken in petitioning the Queen on behalf of 
 the Presbyterian " Platform," and the whole scheme 
 of the Puritan revolution. Her reply to this was as 
 uncompromising as ever ; she is satisfied with the 
 present reformation, and considers the objections raised 
 against it to be frivolous ; the substitute proposed is 
 prejudicial from many points of view ; even if there are 
 abuses, continual legislation about them is undesirable, 
 and '* it appertaineth to the clergy more properly to 
 see the same redressed." Moreover, the petition is an 
 infringement of the prerogative of the Crown, and the 
 supremacy in Church causes now annexed to the 
 imperial Crown of this realm. 
 
 When an attempt was made in the following
 
 32 The Relation of Church and Parliament 
 
 Parliament, by Mr. Damport, to criticise the action 
 of the Bishops and their administration of ecclesiastical 
 government (Feb. 25, 1589), he was at once reminded 
 that the session had been begun with an inhibition 
 from the Queen, warning the Parliament not to deal 
 with ecclesiastical causes, and the matter was at once 
 dropped. 
 
 A similar warning was given to the new Speaker, 
 Sir E. Coke, at the beginning of the Parliament of 
 1593. *' Mr. Speaker, her Majesty's pleasure is that if 
 you perceive any idle heads . . . which will meddle 
 with reforming the Church and transforming the 
 Commonwealth, and do exhibit any Bills to such 
 purpose, that you receive them not until they be 
 viewed and considered by those, who it is fitter should 
 consider of such things and can better judge of them." 
 The warning was not superfluous : a week had not 
 passed before Mr. Morrice complained in the Commons 
 of the stringency of the episcopal discipline, and 
 produced two Bills intended to restrain it. In the 
 debate which followed, some discussed the questions 
 on their merits, others confined themselves to pointing 
 out the danger of taking them up in defiance of the 
 Queen's Messages. In the end the Speaker took the 
 Bills unread to peruse, and in the same afternoon he 
 was sent for to Court, and charged with a new Message 
 which he delivered on the day following, to the effect 
 that Parliament had been summoned for other purposes, 
 and had been specially warned at the opening not to 
 intrude into ecclesiastical causes, and therefore that no 
 such Bills were to be exhibited or read. 
 
 It is merely the same story once again : the only 
 fresh interest in this case is, that the mouthpiece on 
 this occasion was the great constitutional lawyer, 
 Sir E. Coke.
 
 in regard to Ecclesiastical Discipline. 33 
 
 When Mr. Finch offered a Bill to the next Parlia- 
 ment (Dec. 3, 1597), to reform disorders touching 
 Ministers of the Church, no attention was paid to his 
 offer. So with this rapid dimimcendo ended the attempt 
 of a Puritan section of Parliament to secure for itself 
 a power of control over the Church, at least so far as 
 the Elizabethan Settlement of Religion is concerned. 
 
 It is no part of the present task to pursue the 
 history in detail from Parliament to Parliament through 
 the seventeenth century. It has been enough to shew 
 what are the principles that underlie the relation of 
 Church and Parliament, as defined in the era of the 
 Reformation ; and to remind the present generation 
 that in the constitutional system of England the 
 Parliament has no initiative in ecclesiastical affairs, 
 and that it legislates in such matters only when the 
 initiative has been taken by the clergy. 
 
 It is, however, worth while to call attention to two 
 broad facts of the seventeenth century which reinforce 
 this point, otherwise it might be supposed that the 
 relation between Church, Crown, and Parliament, which 
 has been revealed by the Elizabethan history, was one 
 of the features of the constitution, which were trans- 
 formed by the changes of the succeeding century. 
 At the Rebellion, when the Parliament usurped a 
 new position, and destroyed for the time the orderly 
 constitution of the realm, its treatment of the Church 
 was all of a piece with the rest, and the successors 
 of the Puritan faction of Elizabeth's day did not rest 
 until they had not merely got control of the Church, 
 but had first transformed it, and then abolished it as 
 a part of the English constitution. The movements 
 that had been abortive in the previous century now 
 produced their results; and it is possible for all to 
 
 c
 
 34 The Relation of Church and Parliament 
 
 see what the results involved in such a revolution 
 were, and the wisdom of the Elizabethan policy which 
 staved off such results. 
 
 These results, however, were not lasting, and the 
 Restoration marks the return to the old principles, in 
 this respect as in so many others. The new Act of 
 Uniformity exemplified the recovery of the old prin- 
 ciples of the alliance of Church and State : indeed the 
 most scrupulous care was taken to secure the liberties 
 of the Church in this very crucial moment. The 
 initiative was taken by Convocation ; when it had 
 produced its book the King sent it to Parliament ; 
 Parliament received it as the form already agreed 
 upon by the Church and Crown. The Commons 
 asserted their right of discussing the changes made 
 by Convocation in the book, for it had come within 
 their competence through having been already author- 
 ized by the Elizabethan Act of Uniformity; but they 
 decided not to exercise it, and accepted the changes 
 en bloc ; even the correction of clerical errors was not 
 made without reference to the Convocation, so scrupu- 
 lous was the care taken not to infringe the ancient 
 terms of alliance. 
 
 IV. 
 
 The question now rises as to the meaning of Acts of 
 Uniformity ; for clearly these have a special bearing 
 upon the relation of Church and Parliament. On the 
 one side clericalism may be inclined to argue that they 
 are a mere civil enactment which does not bind the 
 Church, while anti-clericalism or erastianism might 
 attempt to reply that they are the directions given by 
 the State to the Church as to the method that it is to 
 employ in its public worship; between these two
 
 in regard to Ecclesiastical Discipline, 35 
 
 extreme statements there is a large field for other 
 intermediate views. 
 
 In examining the question it is important first to 
 notice that uniformity in worship is a thing with which, 
 ordinarily speaking, a State does not concern itself; 
 if it does so, it is because some exceptional circum- 
 stances force it to take an exceptional course. 
 Throughout the greater part of the history of the 
 Church of England, the State has had no interest in 
 the matter; even in 1542, when the civil control of the 
 Established Church was more oppressive than it had 
 ever been since Saxon times, or has ever been since, 
 the Church made great moves in the direction of 
 liturgical uniformity without the Parliament interesting 
 itself in the matter at all. But when the reign of 
 Edward came, and greater liturgical changes were 
 prepared by the Church, the State saw that it was to 
 its own interest that the new Services should be univer- 
 sally accepted ; and, therefore. Parliament enforced the 
 substitution of the English Book for the Latin Books 
 by severe civil penalties. It was a State necessity that 
 no other Services should be allowed, and the State felt 
 it to be now as essential for it to secure this beforehand 
 by adding the sanction of a penal Act to the liturgical 
 innovations prepared by the clergy, as it was to secure 
 quiet afterwards by repressing the Cornish rebels, who 
 rose in favour of the restoration of the superseded Latin 
 rites. The frontier between the provinces of Church 
 and State was, in these instances, not respected in as 
 careful a fashion as was right, for Edward's days were 
 days of increasing anarchy. But in spite of irregu- 
 larities, it is clear, even with regard to the Edwardine 
 Acts, that their purport was to accept at the hands of 
 the Church and Crown a certain set of Services, and to 
 secure that these should be adopted, not only in
 
 36 The Relation of Church and Parliament 
 
 deference to the ecclesiastical authority which pro- 
 mulgated the Book, but also from fear of the civil 
 penalties which Parliament thought well to enact 
 against offenders. 
 
 The case of the Elizabethan Act is in some ways 
 clearer still, though in other respects it is more ir- 
 regular. Liturgical uniformity was more than ever 
 a political necessity, and, therefore, Parliament was 
 bound to hasten at once to secure it. The existing 
 Convocation was entirely hostile, but the State could 
 not afford to take that into account, or even to wait 
 till the Convocation was altered in temper by the 
 revulsion of feeling against the Marian religion which 
 was spreading through the country. Parliament was 
 forced by stress of circumstances to act unconstitution- 
 ally, and to decide for itself on a standard of liturgical 
 uniformity. The varied temper of the House made 
 this a very difficult task. Some thought the recent 
 Prayer Book too much of an innovation, and some too 
 little, and this difference of opinion in the House was 
 but a reflection of the divergence of feeling outside. 
 Eventually it seemed best, all things considered, to 
 fix upon the last Prayer Book, modified by as few 
 changes as possible, to be the standard^ and to enact 
 the measure which gave it authority with as little delay 
 as might be, in order to forestall conflicts and even 
 rebellions which were bound to ensue, unless some such 
 strong enforcement of uniformity were effected. 
 
 This Act, therefore, represents a purely civil enact- 
 ment ; it was a violation of the tradition of the alliance 
 of Church and State — as indeed its authors were the 
 first to acknowledge — but it was to be justified by the 
 exceptional circumstances of the time. 
 
 The Church had no initiative in the matter, but she 
 accepted the parliamentary Act, and accepted it all the
 
 in regard to Ecclesiastical Discipline. 37 
 
 more readily because the Act did not hamper her own 
 action. The Book, which she actually used, never did 
 correspond exactly with the Book authorized by the 
 Act, and as time went on, the Church allowed the 
 divergence to become greater. The royal order for 
 wafer bread modified one rubric, and the episcopal 
 directions concerning ornaments modified another. 
 Further changes of a like sort followed, so that it soon 
 came to pass that the Uniformity Act was in fact 
 enforcing, not the system of worship laid down by 
 its provisions, but that system as altered by subsequent 
 non- Parliamentary changes. The non- conforming 
 Puritans saw this clearly, and complained of it bitterly. 
 '' This Book on whose account we suffer," they said in 
 effect, " is not the Book ordered by the Act. Why 
 should we be punished for not wearing the surplice, 
 while others who equally do not wear other ornaments 
 prescribed by the Act are left unmolested?" Such 
 arguments fell on deaf ears, and for this very good 
 reason, that the authorities, both civil and ecclesiastical, 
 knew very well that the purpose of the legislation was 
 not to prescribe a Parliamentary system of worship, 
 or even to hold the Church to any particular bargain 
 in respect of its Services, but simply to lend civil 
 support to the power of the ecclesiastical rulers for 
 the enforcement of that system which the Crown 
 and Church agreed to be desirable. 
 
 Thus the Elizabethan Act of Uniformity, although 
 it began with great irregularities, ended by bringing 
 out into relief the real principle that underlies such 
 Acts. They are not bonds to bind the Church, or 
 fetter its governors so that they cannot freely exercise 
 their authority ; nor even are they necessarily a 
 stringent compact entered into by Church and State 
 for the settlement of all ritual questions: they represent
 
 38 The Relation of Church and Parliament 
 
 the civil and penal sanction which Parliament, for its 
 own reasons under particular circumstances, has thought 
 wise to give to the Church's system, while leaving her 
 considerable latitude to modify or add to that system 
 in detail without hindrance. 
 
 The Uniformity Act of 1662 has already been 
 treated, and it has been pointed out with what 
 scrupulous delicacy the frontier of Church and State 
 was respected. The principle of the legislation was, 
 as before, that it added civil and penal sanction to 
 the Church's system of worship without curtailing 
 her liturgical liberties : it bound not Church authority, 
 but only impugners of Church authority. 
 
 When the various measures became law which 
 introduced Toleration and Emancipation, they, in 
 a very large degree, amounted to a repeal of the 
 Acts of Uniformity and other Acts like them which 
 had insisted upon conformity: thenceforward Recusants 
 and Sectaries — two of the classes penalized by these 
 Acts — were allowed to go their own way. In so far, 
 however, as these measures were directed against 
 non-conforming clergy of the Church, their provisions 
 were not abrogated ; and in so far as they survive now 
 upon the Statute Book, they still perpetuate civil 
 penalties against those who, in open prayer, refuse to 
 use the Prayer Book or substitute for it some other 
 and unauthorized form. 
 
 V. 
 
 In the nineteenth century it was considered neces- 
 sary to pass an Act of Uniformity Amendment Act, 
 in order to authorize Shortened forms of Morning 
 and Evening Prayer, and Additional Services (1872). 
 This step shews how the nature of the compact
 
 in regard to Ecclesiastical Discipline. 39 
 
 between Church and State embodied in an Act of 
 Uniformity had at the time been forgotten. Both 
 Shortened forms of Prayer and Additional Services had 
 been in use from the day when the last Act of 
 Uniformity had been passed ; and no one then sup- 
 posed that such use was any infringement of the Act, 
 or was anything else indeed but the legitimate exercise 
 by Church authority of a liturgical right which it still 
 retained, the Act of Uniformity notwithstanding. But 
 the old cordiality had died down in the winter of the 
 early years of the century, and the latter years of the 
 previous century. The traditions had been lost, and 
 a new and rigid legalism had taken their place, which 
 took every opportunity of surrendering the Church's 
 liberties, and transforming her ancient alliance into a 
 novel bondage. 
 
 The beginnings of this disastrous change had mani- 
 fested themselves long before 1872 ; indeed the 
 tendency was characteristic of the century, and is 
 traceable only too plainly in a series of misguided 
 ecclesiastical enactments. The series began with the 
 Ac4: of 1832, which, by a mere piece of bungling, de- 
 stroyed the Final Court of ecclesiastical appeal, and at- 
 tempted, without the consent of the Church, to make the 
 Court of the Privy Council into an ecclesiastical court. 
 The authors of this change little foresaw the confusion 
 that would result from their inadvertence ; but it is not 
 too much to say that this ill-advised action on the part 
 of Parliament has not only flagrantly broken the best 
 traditions of the alliance of Church and State, but has 
 also thrown the whole judicial system of the Church 
 into confusion, and is responsible in the highest degree 
 for the present paralysis of coercive discipline. The 
 knowledge that every appeal will go to this Court 
 invalidates in the eyes of a large and ever increasing
 
 40 The Relation of Church and Parliament 
 
 body of churchmen the action of every ecclesiastical 
 court. The fact that other courts are held to be bound 
 by its decisions has robbed the true courts, diocesan 
 and provincial, of any power to set matters straight ; 
 while the actual decisions given by the Privy Council 
 have not been of a kind either to restore or to create 
 confidence by any intrinsic merits of their own, but, on 
 the contrary, they are discredited in the eyes of the 
 public, and are in practice disregarded by almost the 
 whole of the clergy, from- the Bishops downward ; and 
 even by those who would not, on principle, dispute the 
 competence of the Court. 
 
 Next, in 1840, Parliament was so far forgetful of its 
 place and of the ancient terms of alliance with the 
 Church as to pass a Discipline Act for the Church on 
 its own initiative, thus infringing what -we have seen 
 to be the time-honoured provisions of the Constitution. 
 That this was possible is only a further sign of that 
 aggressive tendency which has already been alluded to 
 as characteristic of the time. Though this was no 
 proper Church measure, a number of Bishops used the 
 powers, which even this Act was careful to retain in 
 their hands, and from 1845 to 1874 a number of 
 prosecutions were the result. The proceedings began 
 in the proper Episcopal Courts, but the appeals went to 
 the Privy Council. In some cases the clergy refused 
 to appear or to recognise that Court. Moreover, the 
 judgements were so contradictory, and appeared to 
 many to be so prejudiced, that more harm was done 
 than good. The chaos introduced by the unfortunate 
 action of Parliament was only made worse by the 
 efforts of civilians unversed in Ecclesiastical Law and 
 liturgical and historical science. 
 
 In order to cover this failure. Parliament, at the 
 instance of Archbishop Tait, passed in 1874 a new
 
 in regard to Ecclesiastical Discipline. 41 
 
 Act, intended to deal more summarily with offenders. 
 This, the Public Worship Regulation Act, increased the 
 facilities for prosecution, diminished the part of the 
 Bishop in any proceedings, but reserved to him a veto, 
 appointed a new judge to a very anomalous position 
 for the moment, but with the prospect of his becoming 
 the judge of both Provincial Courts. A fresh outbreak of 
 prosecutions ensued ; Lord Penzance, the first judge 
 appointed under the Act, refused to qualify as an 
 ecclesiastical judge according to the Canons, and for 
 this, as well as other reasons, a large proportion of 
 churchmen refused to recognise him or his court. The 
 prosecutions went on, and became more and more of 
 a scandal and a farce, till after twelve years of ill 
 success they ceased. The prosecuting party was too 
 ill supported to be able to go on prosecuting, the public 
 was scandalized, partly by the impotence of the novel 
 system, and partly by its success in some* instances in 
 imprisoning loyal and devoted clergy. The whole of 
 this Parliamentary action had outraged the consciences 
 of many, and raised the scorn of more ; the men that 
 were supposed to be lawbreakers had been proved, in 
 some respects, to be more law-abiding than their 
 persecutors ; and, as prejudice died down, and the 
 questions at issue began to have a more learned and 
 impartial hearing, the tide turned, and the persecuting 
 party began to realize that, if it went on, the laugh 
 would very soon be on the other side. 
 
 The nett result of these Acts of Parliament has been 
 to reduce the system of Ecclesiastical Courts to chaos, 
 and to paralyze Church discipline. No other result 
 could well have been expected, seeing that the whole 
 was done in defiance of the true principles of the 
 relation of Church and State. 
 
 Since the cessation of the ritual suits against Priests
 
 42 The Relation of Church and Parliament 
 
 two or three things have happened that bring out, 
 more clearly still than the failure of the legislation, the 
 truth of this contention that it was grounded on false 
 principles. The first point is, that in these years there 
 has been a growing conviction that the judgements of the 
 Privy Council were, in fact, erroneous, and a growing 
 disregard of them. Its view of the Ornaments Rubric 
 is set aside, not only by the thousands of clergy who wear 
 the Eucharistic vestments, but also by the still larger 
 number — amounting probably to ninety per cent, or 
 ninety-fivis per cent, of the whole body — who wear 
 stoles, either black or coloured ; and not only by the 
 clergy, but by the bulk of the laity who support them 
 in this disregard of the finding of the Court. 
 
 Secondly, the history of the "Lincoln Judgement," 
 delivered by Archbishop Benson in 1890, is a further 
 proof that the turn of the tide had come, and that the 
 tide of aggressive legalism had begun to ebb. The 
 Privy Council pronounced in favour of the competence 
 of the Archbishop to hear the case in his own Court, 
 though there was little precedent to be quoted for such 
 a course, and it depended on those very Church 
 principles which recently had met with but scanty 
 recognition. Thereupon the Primate decided to hear 
 the case, welcoming especially the opportunity of a suit 
 that need not be vitiated in the eyes of Churchmen by 
 its being of a piece with the ecclesiastical chaos created 
 by Parliament. The pleas were heard independently 
 of the decisions of the Privy Council, and the Judge- 
 ment was pronounced independently of it: and the 
 widespread satisfaction that this method of handling 
 the matter caused was in itself proof of a widespread 
 dissatisfaction with the state of things which the legis- 
 lation of 1832, 1840, and 1874 had created. If further 
 proof were needed, it is forthcoming in the fact that,
 
 in regard to Ecclesiastical Discipline. 43 
 
 when an appeal was made by the prosecutors to the 
 Privy Council, it excited comparatively little interest : 
 the general public was inclined to regard the Arch- 
 bishop's Judgement as having much more authority 
 and finality about it than any Privy Council Judgement 
 on such matters was likely to have : while those who 
 were interested in the appeal belonged to the smaller 
 circle of specialists who were only curious to see how 
 far the Privy Council would go in deferring to the 
 Judgement which it was nominally called upon to 
 revise I 
 
 A third sign of the turn of the tide lies in the history 
 of the passing of the Clergy Discipline Act of 1892. 
 The Archbishop had made strenuous and successful 
 efforts to get a Bill through Parliament to enable the 
 Bishops to deal more summarily with criminous clergy: 
 when, almost beyond belief, there was a real hope of 
 its passing, the question arose as to the action of the 
 Church in the matter. Convocation has repeatedly 
 agreed to the principle, but this was not enough, 
 if the measure was to proceed on the right lines, 
 and the principles of the relation of Church and 
 State were to be once again respected. In face, 
 therefore, of much opposition from officials, though 
 with the help and support of statesmen of the better 
 sort, the Archbishop insisted on procuring Letters 
 of Business for the Convocations, and on passing 
 there a canon to the same effect as the Bill in 
 Parliament. The action of the Church thus once 
 again preceded the action of the Parliament in the 
 matter, according to the old principles of the Con- 
 stitution. A new and brighter era had begun, and 
 Parliament had begun again to realize in the dis- 
 ciplinary sphere the truth which it had recently 
 recognised in the liturgical sphere in the legislation
 
 44 ^^^ Relation of Church and Parliament 
 
 of 187 1 and 1872, viz., that the initiative in such 
 matters belongs to the Church rather than to itself. 
 
 VI. 
 
 Does Parliament seriously contemplate going back 
 upon this at the beginning of the twentieth century ? 
 It would seem incredible, were it not that there is 
 always a jealousy of Convocation in the parliamentary 
 breast, that there is a strong Erastian body, a strong 
 anti-clerical body, and a strong nonconformist section 
 ready to unite against the rights and liberties of the 
 Church ; and were it not that there is actual evidence 
 of this recrudescence in the fact that two private 
 '' Discipline Bills " have passed a second reading. 
 
 We have already in the first chapter considered the 
 circumstances of the hour which account for this 
 recrudescence, and also tried to estimate the amount 
 of good reason that there is for the demand for better 
 discipline in the Church, as well as to distinguish that 
 sober and reasonable demand from the heated and 
 panic-stricken state into which some minds have been 
 thrown by a trend of ecclesiastical affairs which they 
 are unable to understand ; not because it is at all 
 unintelligible, but only because they have not the 
 requisites for forming a sober judgement upon it. 
 
 Let it be granted by all means that all is not 
 satisfactory in the present ecclesiastical position. Let 
 it be granted that there is a need of better facilities for 
 Discipline. The point at issue is not as to the 
 existence of such a state of things, but as to — (i) the 
 true estimate of the magnitude and character of the 
 evil : and (2) the proper way of redressing it. 
 
 As to the first of these. There can be little doubt 
 that the want of discipline at the upper end of the
 
 in regard to Ecclesiastical Discipline. 45 
 
 scale of churchmanship has been greatly exaggerated, 
 while the want at the lower end has been greatly 
 understated. It is commonly said in defence of this 
 prevalent onesidedness that, because the upper end 
 is the progressive end, there is more need of a curb for 
 the head than of a stick for the tail. It is possible that 
 this may be true as a statement of policy ; but it is 
 not so much policy that is in question as justice and 
 truth ; and these demand that defaulters at the lower 
 end should have their fair share of blame. 
 
 Is it, however, so certain that, as a matter of policy, it 
 is right to seek to discipline the ritualist rather than the 
 latitudinarian or the puritan ? Is it true, after all, that 
 denial of the faith does less harm than ceremonial 
 indiscretions or extravagances ? Is the priest who 
 deprives his people of many of their Services, mutilates 
 many of those that he provides, and withholds from his 
 flock the opportunities for confession and communion 
 which their Prayer Book gives them a right to expect, 
 less criminal than the priest who obtrudes confession 
 on unwilling ears, or even supplies Additional Services 
 which run beyond the likings of his people, or even the 
 sanction of his Bishop ? 
 
 The ecclesiastical situation cannot be understood 
 without a recognition of the fact that the upper end 
 of the scale is smarting from a sense of unjust 
 treatment in this respect ; and that, where men have 
 gone into extravagancies, it has often been due to their 
 feeling that in any case the}^ despaired of having justice 
 done to their point of view, after two or three genera- 
 tions of continual misrepresentation and injustice. 
 Further, this is the reason why many less advanced 
 men will not dissociate themselves from the more 
 extreme men, though they regret their extravagancies ; 
 they feel that, until justice is done to the tenets which
 
 46 The Relation of Church and Parliament 
 
 they share with them, they must stand shoulder to 
 shoulder with them, even at the cost of sharing the 
 blame of a few things which they themselves dis- 
 approve. It is of no use to appeal to "old tractarians" 
 to desert the ritualists, or to "the historic high Church 
 party " to throw over the " Catholics." Until the 
 rights have been secured, which are alike dear to both 
 sections, there will continue to be alliance between 
 them ; in other words, if extreme views are to be re- 
 pressed, moderate views must be more justly judged, 
 and more generously welcomed. 
 
 Among the points on which these two sections 
 are agreed, and in urging which they will not be 
 divided, are these points now under consideration — the 
 stickling for the right relation of Church to Parliament, 
 the refusal of the Privy Council as an Ecclesiastical 
 Court, the repudiation of a bastard church discipline, 
 and the like. The hopeful way, therefore, of dealing 
 with the present situation is not by repeating the 
 blunders of the middle of the last century, and making 
 another attempt at exercising a Parliamentary Church 
 discipline. The whole of the history that we have 
 reviewed shews this to be an expedient which is 
 indefensible in theory and ineffective in practice. 
 Rather it is by recognising that the contentions of high 
 churchmen were just : that the recovery of true 
 principles in the Discipline Act of 1892 was a valuable 
 recoveiy, and forms a precedent that ought to be 
 carefully followed in any future Acts of a similar 
 character : that the essential first step in the recovery 
 of the system of ecclesiastical discipline is the readjust- 
 ment of the judicial system by the establishment with 
 consent of the Church of a proper final Court of 
 Ecclesiastical Appeal : that if Parliament is dis- 
 satisfied with the Convocations as being unsuitable or
 
 in regard to Ecclesiastical Discipline, 47 
 
 inadequate representatives of the Church, it should, at 
 least, recognise that they are better representatives 
 of her than the modern Parliament is, now that it 
 combines Scotch and Irish members as well as English, 
 and those no longer necessarily churchmen or even 
 christian : that, if they are inadequate, it is not the 
 fault of the Church, which has been now for a long 
 time trying to effect a reform, and has so far been 
 hindered by the Government : that if episcopal 
 control is insufficient, this is due to a large degree to 
 the unwieldly size of dioceses, and this can hardly be 
 made a fair matter of reproach by a Parliament which 
 has let so large a part of its lifetime slip away without 
 making any serious attempt to pass the Southwark 
 Diocese Bill. Behaviour of this sort gives a strong 
 Pecksniffian flavour to the protests that are from time 
 to time emitted in the Commons with regard to the 
 " crisis in the Church," and it would be far better if 
 such protests ceased, and something were done to ex- 
 tricate the Church from the quandary into which the 
 ineptitude of past Parliaments has landed it. 
 
 When the legislative system of the Church has 
 been set in order by a recognition of the true principles 
 of ecclesiastical legislation and by a reform of the 
 Convocations, and the judicial system has been 
 rescued from chaos by the establishment of a proper 
 Court of Final Appeal, the Church will have two 
 things essential to the efficiency of any body, both of 
 which it now lacks, viz., the power to formulate its own 
 opinion, and the power to enforce its decisions on its own 
 members. There is no other self-respecting institution 
 in the kingdom that would be allowed to be so crippled, 
 bound, insulted, and scoffed at, as is the case with the 
 Catholic Church of this country. This state of things 
 cannot continue much longer ; and if freedom is to be
 
 48 The Relation of Church and Parliament, etc, 
 
 purchased only at the cost of Disestablishment, the 
 present situation is rapidly multiplying the number 
 of churchmen who are prepared, not only to tolerate it, 
 but to demand it, as a measure, which may be indeed 
 a very bad bargain for the State, but has become 
 imperative for the welfare of the Church. 
 
 4* 
 
 A. R. MOWBRAY AND CO., CHURCH PRINTERS, OXFORD.