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THE PURITANS

AID THEIE PRIICIPLES.

THE

PURITANS

AND

THEIR PRINCIPLES

BY

EDWIN HALL.

SECOND EDITION.

NEW YORK:

BAKER AND SCEIBNER,
145 NASSAU STREET.
1846.

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1846, by
BAKER & SCRIBNER,
in the Clerk's office ofthe District Court of the United States for the Southern District 01
New York .

Abvtxtistmtnt.

The following Lectures were delivered to the First Congrega
tional Society in Norwalk, Conn., in the latter part of A. D. 1843,
and early in 1844. They are designed to set forth the causes which
brought the Pilgrims to these shores ; to exhibit their Princi
ples ; to show what these principles are worth, and what it cost
to maintain them ; to vindicate the character of the Puritans from
the aspersions which have been cast upon them, and to show the
Puritanic system of Church Polity, — as distinguished from
the Prelatic, — broadly and solidly based on the Word of God ;
inseparable from religious Purity and religious Freedom ; and of
immense permanent importance to the best interests of 'mankind.
In accomplishing this design, the author found it necessary
to enter, to some extent and with some minuteness, upon the
History of the Puritans and of their times ; to trace their pro
gress from the discovery of one important principle to another ;
to exhibit them in their sufferings ; and to trace the Pilgrims in
their wanderings, to their landing upon these then desolate
shores. The matter of Church Polity the author has attempted
to discuss in its fundamental principles as well as in its particular
details. The claims of Prelacy he has endeavored to subject to
the test of Reason, of History, and of the Word of God.
In the whole, the author has endeavored to bring together mat
ters of information of which no descendant of the Puritans
should ever be ignorant, and of which an adequate knowledge
can scarcely be attained at present, without an expenditure for
books, and a labor of research, beyond the means and leisure of
most people in the ordinary walks of life.
January, 1846.

CONTENTS.

i.
Preliminary Considerations : England before the Times of Wickliffe.
Importance of this discussion at the present day. Misconceptions
concerning the Puritans. Views of Hume. Principles not to be
measured by the occasion which calls them into debate. Princi
ples of the Puritans not to be appreciated without some know
ledge of their times. Plan of this work. England before the times
of Wickliffe, . .  15

II.
Wickliffe and his Times.
His early life, and writings. Negotiation with Rome. His Prin
ciples : Contrast these and modem Puseyism. Persecution of bis
followers for a succeeding century, ... 25

III.
Reign of King Henry VTCI.
The King and Martin Luther. He assumes the supremacy of the
Church. The King's Bible. Articles. " Institution of a Christian
man." " Erudition of a Christian man." Only two orders of the
ministry recognized as of Divine right, in the days of Henry, or
in the succeeding age. Evidence collected by Stillingfleet. The
bloody statute. Bible forbidden. Estimate of the Reformation
under Henry, ... • .38

Vlll CONTENTS. IV.
Reign of Edward VI.
Persecutions stopped. Doctrinal disputes revived. Book of Homi
lies. First service book: revised: never satisfactory to the Re
formers. Supposed necessity of forming such a liturgy as to keep
the Popish people in the Church. Discrepancy between the Arti
cles and Offices. Prayer-Book an equivocal standard : fairly
quoted by each of two irreconcileable schemes. The question
of a Liturgy. No right anywhere to impose one. Imposed not
by the Church, but by Parliament and Council. Uniformity en
forced. Reforming the Ordinal. Rise of the Puritans, 53

V.
Reign of Queen Mary.
Her Duplicity. Restoration of Popery. Re-ordination of Clergy
men ordained by King Edward's Book. Kingdom reconciled to
the Pope. Burning of the Reformers. A Puritan Church discov
ered : its officers burned. Exiles at Frankfort, . . .67

VI.
Queen Elizabeth.
Reformation conducted on principles of State policy. Papists to
be kept in the Church. High Commission. Things offensive to
Papists stricken out of the Liturgy. Plan of keeping Papists in
the Church successful. Foresight of the Puritans. Their pre
dictions verified. Original complaints of the Puritans. Progress
of their inquiries, ....... 77

vn.
The Conflict of Principle.
Ultimate scope of Puritanic principles. Means employed to extermi
nate them. Their rapid spread : nearly prevail in Convocation.
The Puritans ask only liberty of conscience. Not a struggle for
political power. Remonstrances of the Puritans. The separation
bdgins. Persecutions. The nation roused, . . 91

CONTENTS. IX
VIII.
The Puritans suffering.
New Canons. Supplication to Parliament. Cartwright and Whit
gift. Private press. New persecuting act. Brown and the
Brownists. Supplication of the Deprived Ministers. Whitgift's
inquisitorial articles. Martin Mar-Prelate. Act against separate
Worship. Sufferings of the Puritans. Their touching narra
tive. Roger Ripon. Barrowe. Greenwood. Penry, 106
IX.
" The Judicious Hooker."
The design and principles of his Ecclesiastical Polity. Its control
ling influence over the dynasty of the Stuarts. These principles
examined. His doctrine. His notion of the powers of orders, . 124

X.
King James I., and the going to Holland.
Change of James' Principles on his accession to tlie English throne.
Hampton Court Conference. Hundred and forty-one Canons.
Extra-judicial decision of the twelve Judges. Gathering of the
Pilgrim Church. Flight to Holland, . . .141

XI.
The Voyage to America
Question of a removal. Meeting for deliberation. Guiana. Ap
plication to the King. The arrangements. Farewell meeting.
Parting at Delft-Haven. The Departure. The Mayflower upon
the Ocean. The compact. Provincetown harbor. Landing at
Plymouth, ..... .153

XII.
The Pilgrims at Plymouth.
Apparent designs of Providence. Contrast between Popery in South
America and Protestantism in the North. The fruits of Puritanism
in New England. Sufferings of the Pilgrims. The first harvest.

CONTENTS.

The first Thanksgiving. New settlers. Famine. Day of Fasting.
Return of Plenty, . . . • • • -166

XHL
The Storm gathering in England.
Vacillating and Irritating Policy of James. Sycophantic bearing of
the Bishops. Passive Obedience and Non-Resistance. Attempts
of James to establish Episcopacy in Scotland. Assembly of
Perth. Change in the King's Theology. Original Calvinism of
the English Church. Lambeth Articles. Book of Sports. Perfidy
of James, . . . . . . 174

XIV.
Reign of Charles I.
Reaching for a union of Churchmen and Papists. Charles — his
High-Church and High-Prerogative notions. Strafford. Laud.
Huguenots of Rochelle. Book of the King's Chaplain. King and
Commons appeal to the people. Illegal exactions. The Church
Clergy side with tyranny. Overthrow of the Constitution. Cruel
ties of Laud, . , . . . . . .187

XV
Times of Archbishop Laud.
King and Prelates combine against the liberties of the People.
Popish ceremonies and utensils. Images, pictures of God, the
Father. Communion tables turned into altars. Natural tendency
of prelatic principles to corruption and persecution. Their fruit
on a broad scale, and for a thousand years. Original idea of " A
Church without a Bishop, a State without a king," . 203

XVI.
Removals to America, and Founding of the Puritan Churches.
Plymouth a few years after its settlement. Plantation at Cape Ann.
Naumkeag. Charlestown. Fleet and Colony of 1629. Tolerant
spirit of the Colonists. Salem Church. The Fleet and Colony of
1630. Rapid emigration. Planting of the New England Churches, 216

CONTENTS. XI

xvn.

Rise of the Crra Wars.
Charles a martyr to his own insincerity and crimes. Attempts to
impose a Liturgy upon Scotland. Uproar in St. Giles'. Solemn
League and Covenant. The Episcopal War. Charles forced to
call a Parliament. Laud impeached. Divine right of Episco
pacy discussed. Smectymnuus. Irish Massacre. Appeal to
Anns, ........ 229

xvm.
The Rule and Judge of Faith.
Bishop of Connecticut on the Rule of Faith. " The Scriptures as in
terpreted by the first two centuries." Dr. Jarvis extends it to five
centuries ; others to seven ; to nine ; to eighteen. Who to fix
the limit ? Who to declare the interpretation ? Absurdity of the
rule. No stable ground between Puritanism and Popery. The
Prayer-Book as the interpretation of an interpretation. Impos
sible to fix the standard of the first two centuries. Episcopalians,
on their principles, bound to fix the canons of the Fathers, and
to give them to the people. Doctrine of the Bishop of Connec
ticut contrasted with the doctrine of the Scriptures. The Bible
alone the religion of Protestants, . . 244

XIX.
On the alleged right to impose Liturgies and Ceremonies.
Illustrated by the Doctrines of Holy Alliance. Enormities in prac
tice. Necessarily a system of usurpation and persecution. Na
tural rights of Christian congregations. Plea of uniformity. The
question not of the expediency of a Liturgy, but of the right to
impose one. Canons of American Episcopacy. Limits of Church
power, ........

XX.
On Schism.

258

Examination of the grounds on which the Puritan Churches are
charged as schismatical. The Prelatical Doctrine of Schism test
ed by Scripture. Singular scheme for restoring a visible Unity.
Scriptural view of Schism, , . • • • .270

Xii CONTENTS. XXL
The Church.
No National, Provincial or Diocesan Church recognized in the
New Testament.
The Church invisible; partly on earth, partly in heaven. The
Church on earth, composed of all Christ's people, in all com
munions ; its members known only to God. The Church as com
posed of visible organizations. No National, Provincial, or Dio
cesan organization or authority, recognized in the New Testa
ment. Slater's argument concerning the Churches of Antioch
and Jerusalem, answered by Scripture, . . .281

xxn.
Materials, Structure and Discipline of a Christian Church.
Scriptural authority. The arrangements of Prelacy contrary to
Scripture, ........ 289

XXIII.
The Church, as to earthly rule, a Republic, and not a Monarchy.
Observation of distinguished Civilians. Inseparable connection be
tween doctrine and the genius of government. Prelacy incom
patible with Christ's injunctions. Claim of Bishops to be irre
sponsible sovereigns. Republican principles recognized by the
Apostles. Popular elections. Mistake with regard to the word
Ordain, ........ 299

XXIV.
Officers of the Church.
Extraordinary functions. Men called to a special work Evan
gelists. Deacons. Bishops. Presbyters, or Pastors. Singular
error of the Prayer-Book. Apostles; their office; requisite en
dowments, ....... 308

XXV.
Apostles no Successors.
Argument from the name. Epaphroditus, Andronicus, Junia. Ar
gument from the powers exercised. Bishop Onderdonk's argu
ment examined. Laying on of the hands of the Presbytery, 315

CONTENTS. X1U
XXVI.
Diocesan Bishops.
Timothy not Diocesan of Ephesus. The Angels of the Churches
were no Diocesan Bishops. No change of official designation
from Apostle to Bishop, ...... 326
xxvn.
Prelacy disproved by the Fathers, . . . .333
xxvra.
Inferential Presumptions.
High Priests. Priests and Levites. Three Orders. The Apostolic
Commission. Claims of Diocesans to be Vicegerents of Jesus
Christ,  350
XXIX.
Episcopal Exclusiveness — its Basis Superstition, . . . 359
XXX.
Apostolical Succession, corrupt as a doctrine, false in fact, . 371
XXXI.
Economy of Church Government.
Ordination. Headship of the Church. Episcopacy and Republi
canism. Episcopacy in the American Revolution. Reproaches
against the Puritans. The tables turned. Comparative tenden
cies of Puritanism and Prelacy. Conclusion, . 391
Appendix, ... 421

PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS.
Importance of this discussion at the present day. Misconceptions con
cerning the Puritans. Views of Hume. Principles not to be measured
by the occasion which calls them into debate. Principles of the Puri
tans not to be appreciated without some knowledge of their times.
Plan of this work. England before the times of Wickliffe.
The Puritans and their Principles : — the permanent im
portance of those Principles to Freedom, to true Religion, to
the present and the eternal interests of Mankind ! To those who
dwell amid the graves of a Puritan ancestry, these are subjects
which can never be devoid of interest. Nor can I feel — believing
as I do that to the principles and labors of these ancestors, under
God, we owe our dearest privileges — that the memory of such
fathers ought ever to go to decay among their children. I would
that no one of our sons or daughters might ever be able to visit our
ancient burying grounds, without feeling the blood ofthe Puritans
coursing through their veins with honest exultation ; and their
souls rising to God with heartfelt gratitude for the heritage be
stowed upon them, through the faith and toils of such an ancestry.
Such a discussion is the more important at the present day,
when so many seem scarcely to know ichat freedom is ; and so
many more seem not to know ivliat freedom cost ; and still more,
as if unconscious of the principles from which freedom sprung,
are ready to think lightly of the motives and wisdom of that
noble race of men, by whom, amid so many perils, the civil and
religious rights of mankind were so nobly asserted and
maintained. There is further occasion for such a discussion at the present
day, when the character of the Puritans is, in certain quarters, so
studiously misrepresented, and their principles so perseveringly
assailed ; — while a system of doctrine, in all essential respects
identical with that of Popery, is so fast rising and spreading in
certain quarters of the Protestant world ; and while the system of
Prelacy which, for a thousand years, and on so broad a scale,
has proved itself so uncongenial to the pure Gospel and to reli-

16 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
gious freedom, is now putting forth its claims with unwonted
boldness, and in the most exclusive and supercilious form ;— de
nouncing us and our Puritan Fathers as rebels and schismatics ;
our churches as no churches ; our ministers as sons of Korah
Dathan and Abiram ; and all people who do not submit to some
Prelatical Hierarchy, as out of the pale of Gospel grace, and
given over, like heathen, to the uncovenanted mercies of God.
The principles of our fathers are the principles of truth and
freedom : as important now as they were in the days of primi
tive Puritanism. They are to be maintained, — if either reli
gious truth or religious freedom is worthy to be maintained
among men. The conflicts of principle at the present day are
simply the old conflicts revived. He who would find the matters
now in debate, most fully set forth, and most amply as well as
most ably discussed, has only to review the productions of those
ancient times. The system now known as Oxfordism, or Pu-
seyism,— which many advocates of Prelacy affect to regard as one
of " The Novelties which disturb our peace,"* — is in reality
no new thing : it is nothing more nor less than that compound of
Arminianism and Popery into which the English Church was
fast declining in the days of " the judicious Hooker ;" which had
attained its maturity, and begun to develope its fruits under the
auspices of the persecuting Laud ; and which was again rife and
rampant in the days of Queen Anne and George I. It is indeed
the genuine Episcopacy of the English Church in its palmiest
days, as finally fixed and established under Queen Elizabeth;
and thereunto agree the Offices, though not the Articles of the
English Establishment. If there is any difference between the
system of those days and modern Puseyism, it is not in fun
damental principles, but mainly in the more eager reaching forth
of Puseyism towards Rome ; and in the more loving tones of
endearment, in which its advocates hail as a true Sister, and
even as a Mother, that " Mystery of Babylon the great,"
which the early British Reformers, as well as the Puritans and
the Bible, abhorred as the " Mother of harlots, and abomina
tions of the earth." » •
Some have conceived of the old Puritans as ignorant, turbu
lent, bigoted fanatics. Others have conceived of them as men
of lofty attachment to principle, but of narrow and intolerant
views : men of truth and daring ; men who feared God, and
who had tasted deeply of the powers of the world to come,—
but unsocial, all made up of sternness and gloom ; men whose
austere minds were never unbent in hilarity, and whose counte
nances were never lighted up by a smile. Those who thus
conceive of them have formed their conceptions not from the
• The Pamphlets of Bishop Hopkins.

introductory. 17
true likeness but from a caricature. Of this no one needs any
thing more to convince him, than to take up what writings are
left us of John Robinson, the Pastor of the Pilgrim Church ; of
Cotton, of Owen ; or to take the journals of Bradford, or Win-
throp ; or the works of John Howe, the favorite chaplain of Oliver
Cromwell: that. Hoive, from whose works Robert Hall declared
that he had learned more than from any other man. These are
not the productions of ignorant illiberal men. Such is not the
food that ignorance, or fanaticism, or bigotry feeds upon.
By novelists and historians the Puritans have been grossly
caricatured. How easily such caricatures, and even direct false
hoods, spread and gain credence, may be readily understood from
the errors which we have seen spreading, even in New England,
concerning the early history of our fathers. How many people
in these United States, and even here in our midst, confidently
believe that the famous code entitled " Hie Blue Laws of Con
necticut " once had a place among the statutes of this colony ?
Yet our fathers knew nothing about them. They are a sheer
fabrication, for which the world is indebted to " Peters' History
of Connecticut;" the work of an Episcopal clergyman of this
colony, who, in the beginning of the Revolution, sided with the
enemies of his country, and fled from the indignation of his
neighbors to England ; where he employed his time in writing a
history, so full of gross falsehoods, that the greatest charity can
imagine nothing better in its defence than to suppose it was not
intended to be believed. Yet there were men in New Haven,
who, as late as the year 1829, published an edition of that work,
" with such affirmation in the preface, as would lead all who are
without other sources of information, to believe that what it con
tains, is irrefragable truth."*
To this caricature of the Puritans, no one has contributed
more effectually than the historian Hume. He spares no pains
to stigmatize them as "zealots," whose " principles" appear "fri
volous," and whose " habits " were " ridiculous." Yet Hume is
compelled to declare, — what the course of history would have
developed, even had he not declared it, — that " the precious spark
of liberty had been kindled by the Puritans alone" and that it is
to them that " the English owe the whole freedom of their consti
tution." With regard to the particular events, — the secondary
causes, — which introduced the principles of freedom inlo the
British Constitution, — to which, in spite of the boasted Magna
Charta of King John, freedom was an entire stranger up to the
dynasty of the Stuarts, — with regard to these secondary causes,
Hume is a competent judge. But Hume was a cold-blooded
* See Kingsley's Historical Discourse, art the two hundredth anniversary of the
settlement of New Haven. O

18 the puritans and their principles.
infidel ; peculiarly bitter against Christianity in its evangelical
and spiritual form. To judge of the principles of evangelical
religion as distinguished from a religion of superstitious forms
and splendid rituals, Hume was not competent. He could never
appreciate the motives of the Puritans. He could not see how
the principle of Justification by faith alone, by bringing every
soul- for himself directly to God, with no reliance on Priestly inter
ventions, while it made every man feel his responsibilities,
made him also aware of his rights; and taught him to shake off
the despotism of a priesthood whose claims to divine authority
rested in sheer falsehood. He could not see how this dis
covery and vindication of the right to religious freedom, natu
rally led to the discovery of man's inalienable civil rights, and
gave him the spirit to maintain them. He could not appreciate
the principle that wrought in the Puritans ; and hence, in his
view, their activity was turbulence, their firmness wilfulness,
their zeal for the fundamental principles of the oracles of God
was fanaticism. Hume saw not what they saw, — freedom, pu
rity, truth, the vindication of the religious and civil rights of man,
as the end of their labors aud the reward of their perseverance.
From Hume's sketch of the Reformation, and his delineation
of the character of the Puritans, it is most evident, that except
the incidental bearing upon civil laws and popular freedom, he
saw no difference between the superstitions of Popery, and the
Reformed religion. With him religion was but an establishment :
the creation of popular ignorance and credulity : an engine of
the government, to be moulded by the civil power into such a
form as to render it most subservient to purposes of state. Hence
he praises the " slow steps by which the reformation was con
ducted in England;" he extols that human policy by which
" the fabric of the hierarchy was maintained entire ; and the an
cient" (viz. the Papal) "liturgy was preserved, so far as consis
tent with the new principles :" and by which " many ceremonies
become venerable from age, and preceding use, were retained."
With him, the only question is that of human expediency.
Whether the principles of the Gospel be preserved in their pu
rity ; whether impositions inconsistent with the Gospel be laid
aside ; whether the Church of God shall be severed from the domi
nation of mere worldly politicians; whether the Gospel and
its ordinances, given by the toils and blood of the Son of God,
shall be left as he gave them, pure and simple, with power to se
cure the great ends for which they were given, rather than so per
verted and disguised as to lull men into a false security ; — these
are matters for which Hume cares not, and concerning which he
makes no inquiry. Concerning the Reformation itself, he rejoices
that " the new religion, by mitigating the genius of the ancient

introductory. 19
superstition, and rendering it more compatible with the peace
and interests of society, had preserved that happy medium which
wise men have always sought, and which the people have so
seldom been able to maintain." Hence, in the Puritans, he sees
little else save the turbulent zeal of ignorant and misguided fa
natics; breaking the public peace; disturbing the established
order ; shaking the foundations of civil government ; and going
to the dungeon or into banishment, in their mad rage against,
what he styles, " inoffensive observances, surplices, corner caps,
and tippets." If from such a mingling of the elements there
comes out the fair product of human liberty, Hume acknowledges
the fact, but he accords not to the Puritans the praise. Deep and
overwhelming as was the mass of superstitions with which the
Papal Beast had loaded Christianity during the accumulating
corruptions of a thousand years of darkness, Hume rejoices that
so little was changed ; and he ascribes it to " the spirit of contra
diction to the Romanists, taking place in this one instance only
universally in England, that the altar was removed from the
wall, placed in the middle of the church, and was thenceforward
denominated the communion table." It did not occur to Hume,
or he considered it too trifling to notice, that the Popish altar was
a place where the Priest pretended to offer up a jtropiliatory sa
crifice ; and that when the eyes of men were opened to this hor
rid corruption, which in effect made void the one only and all
sufficient sacrifice of our Lord Jesus Christ, it was demanded, of
course, that the altar should be removed: since the Gospel now
knows no Priest nor altar nor sacrifice. The simplest lessons
as well as the fundamental principles of the Gospel demanded
that the Priest should be turned into a simple minister ; the n/tar
into a communion table ; the sacrifice of the mass, into simple bread
and wine; the symbols, not the substuiire, of the body and blood of
our Lord Jesus Christ. It was on this principle, that when the
communion table was afterwards turned again into an altar and
placed against the wall, — for the minister onee more to seem to
act the part of a priest, officiating, with sacerdotal interventions
before the altar, with his back to the people, — it was throughout
England deemed the symbol of a virtual abandonment of the
fundamental doctrine of the Reformation, and a virtual return to
popery. Yet so far is Hume from caring for or comprehending
the deep principle involved, that he regrets the change from the
Romish forms, and can ascribe the turning of the altar into a
communion table to no other cause than " the spirit of contradic
tion to the Romanists !" How poorly is such a man qualified to
judge of the principles of the Puritans ! How lamentable that
his opinions on these subjects should enstamp themselves on so

20 the puritans and their principles.
many minds ; and form, with scarcely a question of their accu
racy, the prevailing sentiments of a large portion of the world !
With regard to the true source of English liberty, however,
the testimony of Hume is largely corroborated and unquestion
able. Says Lord King, " By the independent divines, who were
his instructors, Locke was taught those principles of liberty,
which they were the first to disclose to the world. As for
toleration, or any true notion of religious liberty, or any general
freedom of conscience, xoe owe them not in the least degree to
what is called the Church of England. On the contrary, we owe
all these to the Independents in the time of the Commonwealth,
and to Locke, 1heir most illustrious and enlightened disciple."
Lord Brougham speaks also of the Independents, as "a body
of men to be held in lasting veneration, for the unshaken forti
tude with which, at all times, they have maintained their attach
ment to civil liberty ; men to whose ancestors England will
ever acknowledge a boundless debt of gratitude, as long as
freedom is prized among us ; for," he continues, " I fearlessly
confess it, — they, with whatever ridicule some may visit their
excesses, or with whatever blame others ; they, with the zeal of
martyrs, and with the purity of early Christians, the skill and
courage of the most renowned warriors, obtained for England
the free constitution which she enjoys."
The Puritans have been blamed as contending for frivolous
matters ; because the occasions in which these contests originated,
were such matters as the imposition of an ecclesiastical habit, a
surplice, a tippet, kneeling at communion, or the use of the ring
in marriage. But how seldom can the value of a principle be
measured by the occasion which calls it into debate ? Should
one now attempt to stigmatize the patriots of the American
Revolution as turbulent fanatics, because they took the field, suf
fered their sons to be slaughtered, their land to be wasted and
filled with smoking ruins, — and all for a paltry three-penny tax
on a pound of tea; how inadequate such a representation!
How deceptive ; how entirely removed from the truth ! Years
of oppression had preceded. Multiplied wrongs had been
inflicted. The tax on tea was a trifle ; the principle involved
was of untold importance to the welfare of millions yet unborn,
and to the liberties of the world. It was no quarrel of avarice
or ill-blood on the part of our fathers; but a war of principle;
whose result has put forward the dial of human freedom centu
ries in advance of the progress of ordinary times.
Such was the cause of the Puritans. They had suffered
grievous and indescribable wrongs. The world had groaned
under a spiritual bondage and groped in spiritual darkness,
through the want of a few first principles ; whose loss or un-

introductory. 21
checked violation results necessarily in darkness and bondage.
Bitter was the cup which had been long filling up ; the last drop
made it overflow. The last drop was the occasion on which the
debate arose ; not the whole matter in debate. It was not for a
cap or a surplice ; nor yet simply against a liturgy, or a hierar
chy, that the Puritans contended ; but against spiritual corrup
tion and despotism, and in behalf of religion herself, pure and
simple, as she came from heaven.
But if the matters in debate were indeed indifferent, or of small
moment, why did the hierarchy and the civil power empty more
than half the pulpits in England, and send men and women and
children to prison or into banishment, for matters of mere indif
ference? This is sheer persecuting tyranny. If the things in
debate were indeed indifferent, why did they impose them upon
the consciences of good men and true subjects with such fearful
rigors ? The Puritans did not deem them indifferent. They
never admitted that they were contending for matters of small
moment ; but for their rights, for conscience, for the truth ; for
their country ; for God.
But these preliminary matters need not farther occupy our
attention. We must return to the days of the Puritans, and
dwell among them ; hearing their statements, witnessing their
distresses, observing the course of events ; and weighing, as we
shall be able, the matters that pass under our review.
Justly to appreciate these things, it is indispensable that we
take a cursory view of the stale of things preceding the rise of
the Puritans. We will therefore, in this chapter, briefly glance at
a few things more important to be noticed previous to the dawn of
the Reformation. In the next, we will review the life and times
of Wickliffe, that honored father no less of Puritanism than of
the Reformation. The third will bring us to the beginning of the
Reformation under the reign of Henry VIII. The fourth will de-
velope its progress under Edward VI. This brief survey com
plete, we will proceed to sketch the rise of Puritanism, its conflicts
with Prelatical usurpations and oppressions, till we cross the Atlan
tic and land with the Pilgrims on the rock of Plymouth. Then,
leaving the Pilgrims in the midst of these labors, we will return
to England, and observe the events there transpiring under the
reign of James and the elder Charles : till this religious contro
versy, drawing into itself the great questions of civil liberty and
human rights, overturns the established church and the throne
together ; "despoils the bishops of their mitres, and brings the king
to the scaffold. A rapid glance at subsequent events will bring
us to the questions at issue bettrct n Puritanism and Prelacy at
the present day ; and to the vindication of that faith and order,
which, in common with our Pilgrim Fathers, we find broadly
and solidly based on the Word of God.

22 the puritans and their principles.
" England," says Bishop Burnet in his History of the Refor
mation," had been for three hundred years the tamest part of Chris
tendom to the Papal authority, and had been accordingly dealt
with." We can only give our attention to one or two of the
principal events which contributed to give the Pope such resist
less sway over the island of our forefathers.
William, duke of Normandy, surnamed the Conqueror, in
A. D., 1066, obtained the crown of England mainly through the
favor of the Pope ; and various unusual advantages were granted
to the See of Rome in return. Further prerogatives were granted
to the Popedom, under the re"ign of that weak and wicked king
John, who took possession of the throne A. D. 1190. John quar
relling with his bishops, the Pope took occasion to interfere, and
appointed on his own authority an archbishop of Canterbury.
John refused to admit the Pope's nomination, and the Pope put
the kingdom under an interdict. By the operation of that inter
dict, " The nation was deprived at once of all the exterior exer
cise of its religion. The altars were despoiled of their ornaments;
the crosses, the relics, the images and the statues of the saints
were laid on the ground : and as if the air itself had been pro
faned, and might pollute them by its contact, the priests carefully
covered them up even from their own approach and veneration.
The bells were removed from the steeples and laid on the ground."
" The churches were shut. The dead were refused Christian
burial, and thrown into ditches on the highways." According
to the belief of the times, the nation was cut off from God and
from heaven. No courage or patriotism could give any man
heart to meet the power of such a horrible and mysterious curse.
The king was excommunicated : and in those days the excom
municated person lost his civil rights, and was accounted not
only an outlaw, but loathsome and accursed. No one, as he
feared the like sentence upon himself, and perdition upon his
own soul, might afford him a shelter or do him a kindness. The
subjects of John were, by the Pope, absolved from their alle
giance ; and the kingdom was given to Philip, king of France ;
who was required, as a dutiful son of the church, to come with
an army and enter upon the possession.
John, in distress and terror, submitted to the Pope, and took
an oath to perform whatever stipulations the Pope should impose.
Then kneeling, with his hands held between the hands of the
legate, and under his dictation, he took the following oath : " I
John, by the grace of God, King of England and Lord of Ire
land, in order to expiate my sins, from my own free will, and
advice of my barons, give to the church of Rome, to Pope Inno
cent and his successors, the kingdom of England, and all other
prerogatives of my crown. I will hereafter hold them as the

introductory. 23
Pope's vassal. I will be faithful to God and to the church of
Rome ; to the Pope my master, and his successors legitimately
elected." Having done homage to the Pope's legate, and re
instated the archbisbop of Canterbury appointed by the Pope,
and paid tribute, the crown was restored to him, while the legate
trampled the tribute money under his feet."
The ecclesiastical preferments of England were thus given
into the hands of the Pope. Foreigners were put into the richest
bishoprics ; and enjoyed their revenues without residing in their
dioceses, or so much as setting foot on English ground. Va
cant preferments the Pope sold for the benefit of his own coffers ;
nay, without waiting for the death of the incumbent, he made
provisional sales of dioceses, parishes, and canonries, to any who
would pay his price ; who were thus endowed with the right of
succession whenever the void term should occur. He exacted
the revenues of all vacant benefices ; the twentieth of all ecclesi
astical revenues whatever : and where these revenues exceeded
a hundred marks, he demanded a third : of the benefices of non
residents he exacted one-half.
A century and more passed away while the kingdom was suf
fering under this foreign yoke with scarcely a hope of ever finding
relief. At length the sceptre of England was grasped by a firmer
and more sagacious hand. Edward III, A. D. 1352, ordained
that all forestalling of benefices should cease : that the elections,
presentments, and collations, should stand in right of the crown,
or of any of his majesty's subjects, notwithstanding any provisions
from Rome. An inquiry directed by Parliament, resulted in the
discovery that more than half the landed property in the kingdom
was in the hands of the clergy : that the mosi lucrative benefices
were in the possession of foreigners; some of them mere boys,
who had never set foot on English soil: that the collector of
Peter's pence, who " kept a house in London with clerks and
officers thereunto belonging, transported yearly to the Pope twenty
thousand marks, and most commonly more;" that other foreign
dignitaries, holding ecclesiastical benefices in the kingdom, though
residing at Rome, received an equal or greater sum for their sine
cures ; " that the tax paid to the Pope for ecclesiastical dignities
doth amount to five fold as much as the tax that doth appertain
to the king by the year, of this whole realm."
By the energy of Edward III, the evil began to be checked :
it was not cured. All trials of titles to the right of presentations
to benefices were still brought into the Romish courts beyond
sea ; appointments to benefices were still subject to the confir
mation of the Pope; the canons and constitutions enacted by
the clergy convoked without the king's authority, were binding
without any voice of the king ; so that the ecclesiastical power

24 the puritans and their principles.
was independent of the civil government, and had authority to
oppress the people, in various ways, without limit or redress.
To remedy these evils, the famous statute, whose provisions
are commonly referred to by the tide of Premunire, was passed in
the reign of Richard II. " That if any did purchase translations,
benefices, processes, sentences of excommunications, bulls, or
any other instruments from the court of Rome, against the king
or his crown ; or whoever brought them into England, or did
receive or execute them, they were declared to be out of the
king's protection, and should forfeit their goods and chattels,
besides enduring further processes and penalties, at the discretion
of the king and council."
By such enactments the kingdom was in a measure relieved
from the extraordinary impositions laid upon it under the hands
of William the Conqueror, and king John. In other respects,
the iron hand of the Papacy still lay heavy upon England. Ig
norance and superstition reigned. Though parts of the Scripture
had been translated into Anglo-Saxon, a few rare copies of
which might be in existence among the rubbish of the monaste
ries ; no Englishman had as yet possessed the Bible in his native
tongue. Few even of the clergy were able to expound the
prayers and forms of divine service, which were all in Latin ;
few were even able to read. Yet their power over the supersti
tious fears of the people was almost without limit. Under the
dominion of ignorance and superstition, oppressed and plundered
by a rapacious and debauched priesthood, subject to a govern
ment just emerging from the barbarous feudal system, with no
knowledge of their rights, the people enjoyed not the least degree
of freedom of conscience, and scarcely knew anything of the
security of just and equal laws.
It was in the midst of this darkness that Wickliffe arose,
the morning star of the Reformation.

II.

WICKLIFFE AND HIS TIMES.
His early Life and Writings. Negotiation with Rome. His Principles :
Contrast between these and modern Puseyism. Persecution of his fol
lowers for a succeeding century.
Wickliffe was a child, three years old, when Edward III.
ascended the throne, A. D. 1327. He lived, therefore, a century
and a half before Luther ; and died A. D. 1384, or 1.08 years be
fore the discovery of America by Columbus.
At an early age he entered the University at Oxford, where he
earned the name of a hard student and a profound scholar. One
of his bitterest enemies described him as " second to none in
philosophy, and in scholastic discipline altogether incomparable."
But most of all he was distinguished for his early and profound
acquaintance with the Holy Scriptures ; so that by the common
consent of his cotemporary scholars he was styled " the Evan
gelical Doctor ;" a rare distinction in those days ; and one which,
if conferred on a man of inferior genius and attainments, would
have been a token of equivocal praise, or even of contempt.
Who can doubt that it was the Bible that lighted up his genius,
and that gave a distinctness and vigor to the productions of his
pen, which rendered them the wonder of that age ?
Drinking tho waters of Christianity at their fountain, the Word
of God, Wickliffe saw even while a student, the gross supersti
tion and corruption of the prevailing religion. What he saw he
dared to speak, and to write : nor did he hesitate to adapt his
writings to the capacity of the common people; — setting forth
the way of holiness, and pointing out the worldliness, the cor
ruptions, and the errors of those, who by their office ought to be
guides and ensamplcs to the people, in the way of life.
Next, he set himself to resist the imposition of the " Black
Friar Mendicants ;" who had spread themselves over the king
dom, — absolving the sins of the vilest wretches for money, —
usurping the oifices of the regular clergy, — drawing away the
youth of the universities to their monasteries ; and who thus,
says an early historian,—" By their numerous arts and efforts of
lying and begging, and confessing ; by frightening the ignorant,

26 the puritans and their principles.
and flattering the rich, succeeded, — in twenty-four years from
their establishment in England,— in piling up their mansions to
a royal altitude."
These efforts secured for Wickliffe the admiration of the learn
ed, and the gratitude of his country. He was raised to the war-
dership of Baliol College ; and afterwards to that of Canterbury
Hall. But, continuing to proclaim the Gospel by every possible
exertion of his voice and his pen, he was soon hurled from this sta
tion by the mandate of the Archbishop. Yet he ceased not to
preach the Gospel, and to inveigh against the prevailing super
stitions and vices of the clergy.
His vigorous writings were the dawn of independence as well
as of light to England. To these it was owing, that the public
mind had become so far disabused with regard to the ghostly
power of the Pope, that the king and parliament ventured to in
quire how far the Pope might bind them, under penalty of perdi
tion, to yield to his enormous exactions. Wickliffe was now
summoned by name, to declare whether the king and nation
might not refuse to pay the odious tribute extorted from the su
perstitious and imbecile King John. If the people could not be
so far enlightened as not to fear the interdicts and excommunica
tions of the Pope, the king and parliament could not venture to
withhold the tribute, without certain ruin. Wickliffe obeyed the
summons. His arguments and eloquence prevailed. The tri
bute was withheld.
If.to the vigorous and politic Edward III. the praise is due of
beginning to wrest the kingdom from the grasp of papal power ;
the laws by which this was effected owed their existence and
efficiency not less to Wickliffe than to the king. Edward's
sword and sceptre would have been impotent in this matter,
without the pen of Wickliffe ; nor is it probable that, without
this, the project of such laws would ever have been conceived.
The Bible even then, chained and imprisoned as it was, was
England's best friend : nor is it possible that the Pope should
ever cease to consider it his deadliest foe.
Wickliffe was now raised to the chair of Theology in Oxford ;
where he shone equally the learned professor, and, — to borrow a
phrase of his own, — the diligent teacher " of simple men and
women " in the " way to heaven." From this station he was
called into the public service of his country, and sent by the
King on an embassy to procure from the Roman Court a re
dress of grievances. Bruges was the appointed place of meet
ing. A negotiation with the Commissioners of the Holy See
opened the eyes of Wickliffe to a clearer perception of the deep
iniquities and incurable corruptions of the whole scheme of
popery. He returned a Reformer in earnest. He denied the

wickliffe and his times. 27
Pope's supremacy. He denied his infallibility. He denied the
doctrine of transubstantiation. He denied that the Pope, or any
other prelate, ought to have prisons for the punishment of offend
ers against the discipline of the Church. The Pope himself he
denounced as " Antichrist, — the proud worldly priest of Rome,
— the most cursed of all clippers and purse-cutters."
Was this to be endured ? The monks drew up charges of
heresies, extracted from his writings, and sent them to Rome.
The Pope issued his bulls to the Archbishop of Canterbury, — to
the King, — to the University, — calling for Wickliffe's blood.
All was in commotion. I need not detail the means by which
Divine Providence defended the life of the Reformer : till hunt
ed, harassed, — and still continuing his labors for many years, —
he came at last, in spite of all his enemies, to a peaceful end.
After his return from Rome, Wickliffe descended from public
life into the retiracy of a country parson ; and in this work which,
above all others, his soul loved, he spent the remainder of his
days. CThe secret of Wickliffe's power lay in his appeals to the Bi
ble. Mighty as he was in his powers of logic and his stores of
learning, he still found that " The sword of the Spirit is the Word
of God." This was his theme ; this was his authority ; this was
his argument. He translated it into the English tongue : and
after all other claims have been discussed, it is now conceded, that
Wickliffe's version was the first English copy of the entire Word
of God.f Men saw now not only the corruptions of popery, but
of their own hearts. It was not long before Wickliffe had many
of like faith and spirit whom he sent forth " with their staff in
their hands, and the Word of Cod in their bosoms," that they
might make known everywhere the way of life, and preach every
where that men should repent. Such was their success, that the
"ancient chronicles inform us, that one half the kingdom in a
short time became Lollards, or Wiekliffites."*
It is not consistent with the work, in hand to pursue the per
sonal history of Wickliffe to any considerable extent. Our busi
ness is with his principles, and with the result of his labors, as
bearing upon the history and principles of the Puritans. It is
sufficient to say, that Wickliffe appears to have been a very de
vout and holy man ; — ardent, bold, — living in dark and danger
ous limes, — and but a man. It is not wonderful, therefore, if he
was not always so moderate and discreet as would be required
if he were to be judged according to the standard of more peace
ful and polished times. With less boldness and fire, he could
not have done the work of a reformer. Self-denying, humble,
prayerful, full of love for souls, and faithful to the cause of Christ,
* Puuchard.

28 THE PURITAN'S AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
he unquestionably was. Geoffrey Chaucer, the father of Eng
lish poetry, who had been the friend and fellow student of Wick
liffe, has drawn his picture, and paid a tribute to his memory id
the following description of a parish priest :
" A good man there was of religion,
He was a poor parson of a town, ,
But rich he was of holy thought and werk,
He was also a learned man, a clerk,
That Christe's Gospel trewely wolde preche ;
His parishens devoutly wolde tech,
Benign he was, and wonder diligent,
And in adversitie full patient.
* * * *
" Wide was his parish and houses far asunder,
But he ne left nought for no rain ne thunder,
In sickness and in mischeefe to visite,
The feriest in his parish, moche and lite,
Upon his fete, and in his hand a staff
But if were any person obstinat,
What so he were of high or low estat,
Him would he snibben sharply for the nones."
Wickliffe was, in the true sense, a Reformer. He traced cor
ruptions to their sources : he pursued abuses back to the princi
ple from which they sprung. He aimed not at lopping off now
and then a branch, but at tearing up the tree of evil by the roots.
He aimed at laying down such principles, and at basing his re
form upon such grounds, that when these principles were once
established and brought into successful operation, other things
would follow of course, and the work of reform be done. Of
his work it might be said as of that of John the Baptist ; " And
now the axe is laid at the foot of the tree." The plan of Wick
liffe resembled that of Luther, rather than that of Erasmus. Both
these men were learned ; both saw the abuses of popery ; both
aimed at reformation. But Erasmus looked not beyond the pre
sent abuses ; he saw not the principle from which they sprung.
Hence he began to wield his shafts of resistless satire against the
superstitions of the people, and the vices of the monks. Did he
accomplish anything ? Certainly he did : these vices and su
perstitions received a momentary check. But the sources re
mained ; and the stream of evil flowed on. Like an unskilful
physician, he mistook the symptoms for the disease ; and ap
plying his remedies to the symptoms, he allowed the disease to
fasten itself irrecoverably upon the constitution. Luther's plan
was different. He saw the vices and superstitions that prevail
ed, in all their enormity. But he saw also the source from which
these disorders sprung. He struck at the source. Justification by
faith alone ; no purchased indulgences ; no priestly interventions
and absolutions ; no reliance on works of merit or of penance : —
this was with him " The article of a standing or falling
Church ;" and this doctrine shakes the very pillars of popery.

wickliffe and his times. 29
Superstitions, vices, abuses, the despotism of ghostly power —
give way before it. The work is done ; there is a reformation.
Such was the plan of Wickliffe. The senseless superstitions,
the idolatrous forms which Popery had substituted for Christian
ity, Wickliffe saw ; but he spent not his strength to war upon
inferior things. Singling out the fundamentals of the Popish
scheme, he laid the axe at its colossal pillars. It was not sim
ply to purify a system, in its very foundation and principles cor
rupt and antichristian, but to clear away its very foundations ;
and to build up true religion in its room. There was no great
principle of the Reformation which Wickliffe did not see and
adopt. With the Bible in his hand, and taking that alone for
his guide, he advanced further into the field of Apostolic truth
and order, than Luther and his immediate coadjutors. Wickliffe
traced up his principles to their springs. He reached -hold on
the results, which after a lapse of centuries, and after an age of
suffering and research, the Providence of God unfolded once
more to the eyes of the Puritans.
And what were these principles ? The Bible alone, irre
spective of the decrees, or traditions, or interpretations of the
Church, whether by prelates, councils or fathers, Wickliffe main
tained to be the sole rule of faith and duty. " To the law
and to the testimony " as to the ultimate rule and arbiter, he direct
ed the mind of every man. No man might allow the priest or
the Church to interpose an authoritative interpretation : private
judgment was more than a right : it was an indispensable duty.
Christ alone, he acknowledged the sole head and law
giver of the Church ; affirming lhat " No true man will ever
dare to put two heads, lest the Church be monstrous.'' To im
pose mystical or significant ceremonies of human invention as
parts of religious worship was sinful : to restrict men to prescribed
rituals and forms of prayer, was " contrary to the liberty granted
by God."
The Church of Christ he defined to be '• The Congregation
of just men, for whom Christ shed his blood ;" a definition which,
instead of sweeping a parish or a nation into one indiscriminate
society falsely called " The Church," requires the Church to be
limited to those who, professedly and apparently, are disciples
of tha Lord Jesus Christ.
Of the site of Confirmation, not finding it in the Bible, and
seeing its baneful results in augmenting the power of the bish
ops, and in deluding the souls of the people, Wickliffe hesitated
not to declare his sentiments in ihe following terms : " The
short and trifling confirmation, performed by the Cesarean prelates,
together with its pompous mummery, was probably introduced
by the instigation of the Devil, for deluding people, and advanc
ing the importance and dignity of the Episcopal order."

&

30 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
As to the Orders of the Christian Ministry, said Wick
liffe, " there were but two species of orders, namely, that of
deacons and of priests." " The Church militant," said he, " ought
not to be burdened with three ; nor is there any ground for it."
" One thing," says he, " I boldly affirm : that in the primitive
Church, or in the time ofthe Apostle Paul, two orders of clergy
were thought sufficient ; — and I say also that in the time ol
Paul, a Presbyter and a Bishop were one and the same ; for in
those times the distinct orders of Pope, Cardinals, Patriarchs,
Archbishops, Bishops, Archdeacons, officials and deans, were
not invented." " By the ordinance of Christ," said Wickliffe,
" priests and bishops were all one ; but afterwards the Emperor
made bishops lords, and priests their servants." " From the
faith of Scripture, it seems sufficient that there should be presby
ters and deacons, holding the state which Christ assigned them;
since it appears that all other orders and degrees have their origin
in the pride of Caesar"
Such was the scheme of Church polity which this great and
good and most learned man drew from the Word of God. A
better summary of the principles for which the Puritans contend
ed can scarcely be given. Justification by faith alone, the fun
damental principle of the Reformation ; The Bible alone the rule
of faith and duty : Christ alone, the sole lawgiver of his Church ;
no human traditions to be received in proof for matters of faith ;
no human inventions to be imposed as essential parts of divine
ivorship ; — these were the original principles for which the Puri
tans contended. The wrath and power of the Hierarchy coming
down upon their heads for these, the Puritans were at length,
like Wickliffe, led to inquire into the foundations of the Hierar
chy itself, and to reject it as unscriptural ; a usurpation of Christ's
prerogatives and of his people's rights.
The contest on the first part of these principles has now be
come the great theological debate of the present day; the
Oxford Tractarians and their followers taking the ground of old
Rome, in favor of Tradition, denying the right of private judg
ment, and teaching the efficacy of priestly interventions in op
position to justification by faith alone ; and the evangelical party
in the Episcopal Church fighting over again the battles of Wick
liffe, of the early British reformers, and of the Puritans. The
Bishops of Maryland, New Jersey and Connecticut, have flung
their banners boldly to the wind. On the banner of the Bishop
of Maryland, as it floats in the breeze, you shall see inscribed in
words written by the Bishop's own finger :
"Ministerial intervention" — "that sins may be forgiven, is
the essence of priesthood."
" Truth has been obscured, in the discussions concerning a

wickliffe and his times. 31
Christian priesthood, by stopping short of that definition." " All
the forms of priesthood that the world has ever known have pro
pitiation for their end." " Why should the administrator of
water by which sins are washed aivay, be less a priest than
the sprinkler of blood, by which atonement was effected ?" ":
Again, as the waving breeze opens another fold of that banner,
you shall see inscribed there, " Rightly interpreted the Bible can
only be in and by the Church. Not a word of the text justifies
an individual in setting up his private interpretation of Scripture,
as the rule by which to judge his preacher's teaching." " The
people judges!" "But of what? Whether he" [the priest]
"is to teach? Whether he teaches the truth? of neither."
On the standard of Connecticut Episcopacy you shall see it
written by the hand of the Bishop in the solemn word of his
charge; " The Holy Scriptures, as they were interpreted by
the Church;" ". Our book of Common Prayer;" "a standard of
faith and worship." " Notions of the right of private judgment 1"
¦ — " erroneous."
As the waving breeze displays other folds of that banner, your
eye shall catch, at various glimpses, the words " Dissenters" —
" Dissenting Press" — "Incongruous Sects;" — " Numerous bodies
of intelligent, humble and devoted Christians, but without any
sufficient bond of union and stability ; the Bible alone, to the
exclusion of all church authority; the Bible alone, without note
or comment, their only slantlard of faith .'" " Surrounded by all
this desolation the Protestant Episcopal Church in this country
appears as an oasis in the desert."
" The church the great medium of communicating divine grace,"
" The Revelation of God offers salvation only through the
Church." " The true church of God is our only ark of safety."
" The true economy of the Christian religion regards men as by
nature the children of wrath ;" " it takes them from this state,"
* " and transfers them by baptism, into the family,
household, and kingdom of the Saviour." * * « Lei them
be assured, that those who are sacramentally baptized," *
* "become by tuat act" (not in name only, but in
deed and in- truth) "members of Christ," "children of God,"
" and heirs of the kingdom of heaven." ' + " They are re
stored to a state of favor with God!' " And this is not to be
regarded as a mere temporary act, but as the initiation into an
abiding state." * " The first sentiment impressed upon their
youthful hearts should be, that they are in very deed,
the children of God; * * that in the sacrament of Baptism
they received the spirit of adoption," by which they are enabled to
* " The Priesthood in the Church," by W. R. Whittingham, Bishop of Maryland,
1S43.

32 the puritans and their principles.
address God as their Father, to regard Christ as their Brother,
as well as Redeemer, and the Holy Ghost as their in-dwelling
companion and sanctifier." *
Turn we now to read the inscriptions written by the Bishop's
finger on the standard of New Jersey Episcopacy ; and here we
see traced, in broad and legible lines, the following sentence :
" The true Catholic Pastor, who thus receives the Word of God,
with the transmitted witness of the church ; who guides
himself by the Holy Scriptures, not as he understands them,
but as Catholic antiquity has revealed, and as Catholic
consent has kept their meaning ; will be chastened and schooled
by the submission of his judgment to the wise and good of every
age, into the child-like spirit which God will bless."
And what says the Bishop of Ohio as he contemplates these
doctrines, and gazes upon these unfurled standards ? He lifts
up his warning voice in solemn tones : " I am constrained to say
that every further step has produced a deeper conviction on my
mind," * * that "it is a systematic abandonment of the
vital and distinguishing features of the Protestant faith;
and a systematic adoption of the very root and heart
of Romanism."
" A Gambier Romance," cries the editor of " The Churchman."
" Slight shades of difference, which tincture the views of dif
ferent members of our household of faith," re-echoes the Bishop
of Connecticut.
There is one man more, whose name is as familiar in our Con
gregational and Presbyterian Churches as one of our household
words ; an aged and venerable man, whose life has been spent
in a simple and faithful testifying of the truth as it is in Jesus;
and who is now ready to descend into the grave,f followed by
the lamentation — " My father ! My father ! " by thousands of
the most devoted ministers of Christ in all communions ; an able
and a faithful man ; a scribe well instructed in the law of God;
that man we should like to hear if it may be, on these matters
which are daily growing to be of so much consequence in the
Episcopal Churches both of England and in the United States.
What says the venerable Dr. Milnor of the system of doctrines
emblazoned on these unfurled standards ? Let us hear him :
" When I can bring my mind to believe, that instead of my
Bible as the guide of my faith I am bound to dishonor this
best of heaven's gifts, by admitting tradition to a co-equal
rank ; * * * when my charity shall so fail that I can consign my
fellow Christians of other names, whatever be the strength of their
faith in Christ, and the holiness of their lives, to the uncovenant-
ed mercies of God, because of their not belonging to a Church gov-
* " Charge " by Rt. Rev. T. C. Brownell. 1843. t Since deceased.

wickliffe \nd his times. 33
erned by bishops, consecrated by succession from the Apostles ;
when I dare assert that that order is requisite, not only to the per
fection and completeness of a Christian Church, but to its very
existence ; when I am convinced that I must ascribe exclusively
to the Apostolical Commission, the derivation of the grace of
the Spirit and our mystical communion with Christ ; to believe
the truth that the sacraments of the Church are the only
channels whereby the gifts of the Holy Spirit are con
veyed to men * * * when I can be so presumptuous as to claim, as
a minister of Christ, the power of personally absolving indivi
duals from their sins. * * * When I can make these admissions
and subscribe these sentiments, I may join the ranks of the men
of Oxford."
It is most obvious that the debates in the Episcopal Church at
the present day, are but the revival of the same contest which
Wickliffe, the Reformers, and the old Puritans maintained
against the tenets which form the basis of the Romish apostasy.
Is the Evangelical system of faith, in opposition to the Romish,
consistent with the Prelatical claims ? Can this controversy be
long maintained without drawing into question the Prelacy itself,
and the very dogmas concerning ordination, the sacraments, and
apostolic succession, on which the Prelatical character and
claims are made to rest? If I have scanned the lessons of his
tory aright, the controversy, which is now rending the bowels of
the Episcopal Church, is soon to be hushed up ; the evangelical
party are to be silent ; and the whole body is quietly and im
perceptibly to yield to the Tractarian tendency towards Roman
ism; or else the controversy is to follow in the track of the same
old contest in the days of Wickliffe and the Puritans ; and Pre
lacy itself is to be called in question in the end. If I have read his
tory aright, the only alternative to the friends of Evangelical truth
in that communion is, either finally to acquiesce in the prevalence
and triumph of the principles which they now denounce as " the
root and heart of Romanism," or like the old Puritans, to aban
don the system of Prelacy itself and come out from the midst of
her. Of the reasons for these conclusions, you shall judge in
our survey of the course which this same controversy has
repeatedly taken in days of old ; and of the principles which
must ever continue to turn it to that course.*
* The author was gratified, some months after the delivery of this lecture, in read
ing, in the New Englander, the able article of Mr. Barnes, on " The position of the
Evangelical Party in the Episcopal Church," in which he discusses the question so
conclusively, " whether the objects at which they aim, can be secured in that com
munion ; or whether they do not necessarily meet with obstructions in the organi-
zation of this Episcopal Church, which will certainly prevent the accomplishment
of those objects."
Since that time we have seen the leaders of that party avow themselves deter
mined to bring the question to an issue ; and declaring themselves ready rather to
3

34 the puritans and their principles.
Let us turn from this digression. While Wickliffe turned his
artillery against the mendicant monks, his university, the regular
clergy, and the people applauded. While he stood forth the
champion of his country against the exactions of the Pope, his
king and the parliament sustained him. The Pope, indeed, thun
dered out his anathemas, and denounced his death. But Wick
liffe found those who were able, first to delay his trial, and after
wards to protect him. But when Wickliffe translated the Bible
into the English tongue ; when he poured the light of heaven
upon the thick darkness that reigned around him; when the
Romish clergy saw their superstitions likely- to be undermined
by a scheme of doctrine whose necessary result was to set the
consciences of men free from the domination of ghostly power ;
and when in addition to all this, the prelates saw that the very
basis of their prerogatives was likely to be overthrown and
destroyed ; then the life of Wickliffe was indeed in danger. The
wrath of his enemies was extreme ; the English prelates, the
Pope, the priesthood, and the civil arm, were leagued for his
destruction. But, with a series of remarkable providences, the
Lord watched over him, till on the last day of A.D. 1384, he died
in peace.
It is the rejoicing of High Churchmen, that England was
delivered from the arm of Wickliffe, even though it was only to
be thrown, for more than another hundred years, into the jaws of
the Pope. Says one of them, " Had Wickliffe succeeded in
shaking the established system to pieces, one can scarcely think,
without some awful misgivings, of the fabric, which, under his
hand, might have risen out of the ruins. * * If the reformation of
our Church had been conducted by Wickliffe, his work, in all pro
bability, would have nearly anticipated the labors of Calvin, and
the Protestantism of England might have pretty closely resembled
the Protestantism of Geneva ; Episcopal government might have
been discarded ; * * * the clergy might have been consigned to
a degrading dependence on their flocks." " Had Wickliffe
flourished in the 16th century, * * he might have been ready to
perish in the gainsayings of such men as Knox and Cartwright;
at all events, it must be confessed that there is a marvellous re
semblance between the Reformer with his poor itinerant priests,
and at least the better part of the Puritans who troubled our Israel
in the days of Elizabeth and her successors. The likeness is suf
ficiently striking, almost to mark him out as their prototype and
progenitor ; and therefore it is, that every faithful son of the
submit to martyrdom, than to the prevalence of the dogmas which they oppose.
But the General Convention has met, and Puseyism triumphs. After a feeble
struggle the contest is hushed. So much is settled ; that no effectual resistance to
Puseyism is to be expected in that communion.

wickliffe and his times. 35
Church must rejoice with trembling, that the work of her final
deliverance was consigned to him."*
We accept the resemblance ; j\ye receive Wickliffe with open
arms, and gladly enrol him among the ranks of our ever honored
fathers, the Puritans of old England.
At Wickliffe's death the art of printing was not invented ; nor
was it yet to be revealed to the world till after the lapse of half a
century. Wickliffe's translation existed only in copies written out
by hand ; and yet, in his lifetime, they multiplied and spread
rapidly. With great zeal, the Reformer had preached and pub
lished his doctrines ; having sent out, besides his translation of
the Bible, nearly two hundred volumes from his indefatigable
pen. These were now condemned as heretical, and as many as
could be found were committed to the flames. His translation
of the Word of God, so far as copies could be discovered, was
also consumed. But the seed was sown, and would continue to
spring up. Even before Wickliffe's death, a law was passed,
aimed at him and his followers, ordaining " That all who
preached without license, or against the Catholic faith, should be
arrested and kept in prison till they justified themselves according
to the law and reason of holy Church ;" and that law and reason
of holy Church was the good pleasure of the bishop.
Forty years after the death of Wickliffe, his bones were, by
order of the council of Constance, td|en from the grave, and pub
licly committed to the flames. Stlrthe seed of the Reformation
would continue to spring up. Taught by the writings of Wick
liffe, many embraced the true Gospel in England. Copies of his
writings found their way to the continent, and became the seeds
of a rising Reformation there ; which Rome vainly endeavored to
overwhelm in fire and blood.
The law of Richard IL, though rigorously enforced, proved
insufficient to suppress the rising Reformation. When Richard
was deposed, the usurper, Henry IV., was willing to do the en
raged ecclesiastics a further pleasure. In the second year of his
reign, A.D. 1401, it was enacted, " That if any person was sus
pected of heresy, the ordinary [the bishop, or the one having
jurisdiction in his stead] might detain them in prison, till they
were canonically purged, or did abjure their errors ; provided
that the proceedings against them were publicly and judicially
ended in three months. If they were convicted, the diocesan
or his commissary might imprison or fine them at discretion.
Those that refused to abjure their errors, or after abjuration re
lapsed, were to be delivered over to the secular power ; and the
mayors, sheriffs, or bailiffs, were to be present, if required, when
* Le Bas.

36 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
the bishop or his commissary passed sentence ; and after sen
tence they were to receive them, and in some high place, burn
them to death before the people." — (Neale.)
" By this law," says Neale, " the king's subjects were put from
under his protection, and left to the mercy of the bishops in
their spiritual courts; and might, upon suspicion of heresy, be
imprisoned and put to death, without presentment or trial by a
jury, as is the practice in all criminal cases." The Bishop's sus
picion stood instead of an indictment ; the bishop's suspicion
was instead of proof, unless the suspected person could purge
himself; the bishop's judgment was the sole test of what consti
tuted heresy ; he was accuser, jury, and judge ; and who could
stand against the suspicious displeasure of a brutish and in
censed bishop ?
Nor was this law sufficient ; for in the beginning of the reign
of Henry V. who ascended the throne A.D. 1413, it was further
enacted, " That whosoever they were, that should read the Scrip
tures in the mother tongue, they should forfeit land, cattle, life, and
goods from their heirs for ever, and be considered heretics to
God, enemies to the crown, and most arrant traitors to the land."
Such was the state of religious liberty in England, in the
glorious conquering times of Henry V. Nor were these laws
left to be a mere terror. By law it was made a part of the she
riff's oath, " that he would seek to repress all errors and heresies,
commonly called Lollards :U.U and it is," says Toulmin, " a striking
instance of the permanent looting which error and iniquity gain
when once established by law, that this clause was preserved in
the oath long after the Reformation, even to the 1st of Charles L,
when Sir Edward Coke, on being appointed sheriff of the county
of Buckingham, objected to it, and ever since, it has been left
out." ,
The wrongs inflicted, the sufferings endured under these laws
can never be told. There were no historians among the poor
victims of these oppressions to register their tears and to chroni
cle the months of their imprisonment. From the beginning of
these persecutions to the accession of Henry VIII., a century
rolled away. The witnesses were slain. The rising light was
quenched in blood. Darkness, almost unbroken, reigned once
more over the land. Rome and the Romish clergy of England
rejoiced once more in a reign unbroken and undisturbed.
But if there were no historians to chronicle the sufferings of
them who loved the Word of God, the public records tell what
public records may disclose, of their afflictions even unto death.
Hundreds of examples are on record in which men and women
were, on suspicion of heresy, seized, imprisoned, tortured, buried
in their dungeons, or given to the flames.

WICKLIFFE AND HIS TIMES. 37
We pass now over the reign of five kings, occupying the
space of more than a century ; a century of darkness, supersti
tion, commotions, and blood: but days of fatness and rejoicing
for the bishops and the Pope. We come to the times of Henry
VIII., and to the occurrences of his eventful reign : — we come to
the time when the morning star of the Reformation was rising
in Germany, in the beginning of the 16th century. The art of
printing had now been invented ; and letters were reviving. A
new world had just been discovered; and the old began to
awake from its long and leaden slumbers. Men began to think,
to inquire, and to enter upon fields of new and startling enterprise :
sad omens for the reign of popish superstition and intolerance.
It needed only that the Gospel should once more spring to light ;
and the contest must commence in which Rome could no longer
prove victorious. The causes of that long night of ignorance
and superstition were sure to be investigated. The sources of
spiritual despotism were to be explored. Lordly prelates, whose
dominion stood in usurpation and superstition, would be sure to
resist the progress of popular liberty ; till, in the course of that
struggle, their own claims should be canvassed, their authority
questioned and thrown aside.
Such was the progress of light and freedom. The Reformers
cast off the doctrinal errors of Popery. Another struggle between
prelatical oppressions and usurpations on the one hand and the
rights of conscience on the other, raised up the Puritans. The
progress of their principles gave to England whatever of freedom
it possesses that is worthy of the name ; and crossing the Atlan
tic, originated the institutions of our own happy Republic.

III.

REIGN OF KING HENRY VIII.
The King and Martin Luther. He assumes the Supremacy of the Church
The King's Bible. Articles. " Institution of a Christian man." " Eru
dition of a Christian man." Only two orders ofthe ministry recognized
as of Divine right, in the days of Henry, or in the succeeding age. Evi
dence collected by Stillingfleet. The Bloody Statute. Bible forbidden,
Estimate of the Reformation under Henry.
There was still subsisting in England, much of the leaven
of the Reformation infused by Wickliffe, when news came of
similar truths breaking forth and spreading under the labors of
the Reformers in Germany.
To the spread of the new heresy, or rather to the revival of the
old doctrine of Wickliffe, King Henry VIII. opposed the whole
weight of his absolute power. But why should not the king, —
who had been bred a scholar, and who had already been flattered
into the conceit of unequalled abilities and learning; — why
should not the king reap also some glory in the field of litera
ture and theology ? He descended into the arena to break a
lance with the great Reformer of Wittemberg ; whose onset no
learning of the doctors, nor even the thunders of the Vatican, had
been able to withstand.
The drama of the Reformation in England opened by a book
from King Henry VIII. in defence of the Seven Sacraments of
the Church, against the heresies of Martin Luther. What was to
be expected ? The book was lauded as the perfection of wisdom,
and the end of disputation. " Nor was it a performance," says
Hume, " which, if allowance be made for the age, does discredit
to his capacity." The king sent a copy to the Pope, "who
received so magnificent a present with great testimony of regard,"
and conferred on the king the title of " Defender of the faith ;"
a title which even down to the present century, the Protestant
sovereigns of England continued to wear.
But what cared Luther for kingly arguments ? The might
of monarchs lies in their power to command, — in their armies
and fleets. When a sovereign descends into the arena of intel
lectual strife, he comes single-handed, in the simple strength of

REIGN OF KING HENRY VIII. 39
an individual man. No long time was required to bring from
Luther an answer burning with the fire of hot controversy, and in
no manner regardful of the majesty of his opponent ; and when
did an advocate of Popery come off from a contest with Martin
Luther unscathed ?
The result of this royal controversy was, to add immense
notoriety to the Reformation ; and immensely to accelerate its
progress. The king, now so thoroughly committed to the cause
of Popery by having written a book, and so roughly handled and
chagrined in his contest with the Reformer, was for ever fixed in
his hatred of the Reformation. Accordingly we find, that the
change effected in ecclesiastical affairs under Henry was less a
Reformation than a revolution. Henry wrested the supremacy
from the Pope ; but the doctrines, the superstitions, the intolerance,
the cruelties of Popery were still retained in all their vigor ; —
save as some changeable hue of coloring appeared and vanished
with some new and uncertain caprice of the king. England
was cut loose from the Pope ; but the papal supremacy and
infallibility were transferred to the head of Henry and his suc
cessors. In the rites of the church, says Bishop Burnet, " The
alterations made were inconsiderable, and so slight, that there
was no need of reprinting either the missals, breviaries, or other
offices." Let us briefly review the leading particulars which enter into
the account; and mark the heads of the causes and events
which detached England from the See of Rome.
For twenty years after his accession, Henry had continued a
dutiful son of the Roman Church. He had even suffered the
laws to slumber, which had been enacted by his predecessors,
against procuring provisions and bulls, and exercising authority
from Rome. With his favor and connivance, Cardinal Wolsey
had received from Rome, and had long exercised, a sovereign
power over the whole clergy and church of England, contrary to
the statutes of the realm. The king had added to these powers
by giving him " full authority to dispose of all ecclesiastical
benefices in the gift of the crown, with a visitorial power over
monasteries and colleges, and all his clergy, exempt or not
exempt." With these powers a new court of justice had been
erected, called the Legatine Court, which had committed num
berless rapines and extortions ; all which doings the king had
connived at, out of favoritism to Wolsey and zeal for the
Church. But now the king had become wearied of his queen Catha
rine ; and perhaps he sincerely questioned the lawfulness of his
marriage ; as had already been done by many, and among others,
by some of the sovereigns of Europe. Both Wolsey and the

40 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
Pope had trifled with him, and delayed him for six years ; and,
out of purely selfish ends, had thwarted his desires. By other
means, which it is not to the purpose here to relate, Henry ac
complished his ends, was divorced from Catharine, and married
to Anne Boleyn, the mother of Queen Elizabeth.
And now for vengeance. Wolsey is entrapped ; having exer
cised the office of papal legate, contrary to the statute of Richard
II. Henry orders his attorney general to put in an information
against him in the king's bench ; and Wolsey forfeits goods and
chattels to the king ; is put from under the king's protection, and
becomes an outlaw. Under these reverses, the haughty cardi
nal sickens and dies. And now for the Pope: Henry will
snatch away his supremacy, make himself head of the English
Church, and stop the rivers of silver and gold that are flowing
from England to Rome.
How can this be done ? How will the clergy, so devoted to
the papal See, by interest and superstition, — how will they bear
to see the Pope rejected as head of the Church, and a profane
layman installed in his place ? In this way : the clergy, out of
reverence to the Pope,— encouraged by the king, and compelled
by Wolsey, — have yielded to Wolsey's legatine authority, — con
trary to the statute : — and have incurred the pains and forfeitures
of a premunire. They must submit to the king's terms, or their
vast domains, if not their liberty or life, must pay the forfeit.
The king assumes the supremacy over the Church. By pro
clamation, he forbids all persons to purchase anything at Rome,
under the severest penalties. As he expected, the clergy begin
to rouse themselves up for resistance. The king causes an in
dictment to be preferred against them at Westminster Hall, and
obtains judgment under the statute of premunire; whereby the
whole body of the clergy have forfeited all their goods and chat
tels, and are out of the king's protection. They must yield either
to the king or to ruin. They buy his pardon on condition of
paying into his treasury an immense sum of money, and of ac
knowledging the king as sole and supreme head ofthp Church of
England; yet with the saving clause, " so far as is agreeable to
the laws of Christ." But what was this saving clause when the
king was sole judge of what was agreeable to the laws of
Christ ? The clause itself was soon thrown aside, and the king's
supremacy confirmed by parliament and convocation.
And what was this supremacy ? First, it was to have and en
joy all the dignities, immunities and commodities which had
formerly gone to the Pope. Secondly, the king was invested
with the sole power of establishing, Ordering or reforming all
things connected with doctrine, worship, heresy, or error. What
ever power had been usurped by synods, councils and popes ;

REIGN OF KING HENRY VIII. 41
lordship over doctrine, ceremonies, worship ; lordship over the
interpretation of Scripture, and over the consciences and private
judgment of all men in the realm ; — all was given into the
hands of the king. Such was the tenor of the Act of Supremacy
passed by the Parliament.
The Bishops " took out new commissions from the crown, in
which all their episcopal authority was expressly affirmed to be
derived from the civil magistrate, and to be entirely dependent
on his good pleasure."
A new oath of allegiance was imposed, in which all the peo
ple were made to swear that the bishop of Rome had no more
power than any other bishop in his diocese ; and that they would
submit to all the king's laws, notwithstanding any censures from
the Pope.
The parochial clergy thus submitting to the king were taken
into favor. But England was full of monks, friars and monaste
ries, possessed of vast revenues and domains. These had been
in great measure independent both of the bishops and the civil
power. Their sympathies were wholly with Rome. The
monks and friars began to complain. In some places they ex
cited the people to insurrections, and endeavored to embroil the
affairs of the kingdom with foreign princes.
The king knew well how to take vengeance on these. As
head of the Church he appoints a general visitation of the mon
asteries, and commits the work to the Lord Cromwell as Visitor-
General. Several abbots and priors surrender their houses into
the king's hands. Others are examined ; and the grossest frauds,
impostures, and debaucheries, are brought to light. Their pre
tended relics are exposed and destroyed. These were innumera
ble ; among others, " The Virgin Mary's milk, showed in eight
places ; the coals that roasted St. Lawrence ; one wing of the
angel that brought over the head of the spear that pierced the
Saviour's side ; the rood of grace, so contrived by springs and
pulleys that the lips might move upon occasion." The images
of a great many pretended saints were taken down and burnt ;
and all the rich offerings made at their shrines, seized for the
crown. The lesser monasteries, to the number of two hundred,
were suppressed. The greater monasteries soon shared then-
fate. While Henry was busied in transferring to himself the supre
macy and emoluments of the Pope, the doctrines of the Reform
ation were taking root in England. The dungeon and the
faggot were the arguments on which the king and prelates
relied for putting down the rising heresy. Some were cited into
the bishops' courts for teaching their children the Lord's prayer
in English ; some for reading forbidden books ; some for not

42 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
coming to confession and mass; some for not observing the
Church fasts. Of these, many through the fear of death did pen
ance and were dismissed. But such as refused to abjure, or
after abjuration relapsed, were burnt at the stake. Many fled
into foreign lands. Among these was Tyndal, who, with others,
took refuge at Antwerp. These men employed the pen and
the press in exposing the corruptions of Rome. They wrote
against images, relics, and pilgrimages. They insisted on justi
fication by faith alone, in opposition to justification by priestly
absolutions, penances, fasts, flagellations, donations to churches,
and other works to merit the divine favor. Their books
came to England, and made converts everywhere. But the
mightiest engine of the Reformers was Tyndal's translation of the
New Testament, printed at Antwerp, A. D. 1527.
Against this translation the king and bishops were incensed
to the utmost. While others are spending their rage in deeds
of violence, Tonstal, bishop of London, must needs try his hand
at a stroke of policy. He gives secret orders to buy up all the
copies that can be found at Antwerp ; and collecting a vast
number, burns them publicly at Cheapside. A fine device,
truly, to stop the press by buying up its productions ! The first
edition was marred with many inaccuracies, which Tyndal
longed to correct ; but he was too poor to throw aside the first
edition and print another. What better service could the bishop
of London perform, than to buy up the whole and burn them ;
. and thus furnish the Reformer with funds to print more and
better ?
The burning of the Bibles shocked the minds of the common
people. They could not understand the righteousness of burn
ing the Word of God. The Reformation spread the more
rapidly ; the prisons became more crowded ; the fires burnt with
greater frequency.
The whole Bible was translated by Tyndal, assisted by Miles
Coverdale and by John Rogers, the first martyr of Queen Mary's
reign. This was printed at Hamburg in 1532; and greatly
helped to press forward the swelling tide of the Reformation.
At length, so great was the progress of popular sentiment, and
such the genial influence of Cranmer upon the bigoted king,
that the Convocation debated the question of translating the
Bible, and allowing it to be read in the vulgar tongue. The
majority of the clergy were opposed to it ; and their arguments,
says Hume, would probably have prevailed in the Convocation,
had it not been for the authority of Cranmer, Latimer, and some
other bishops, who were supposed to speak the king's sense of
the matter.
Tyndal, the Translator, had now been put to death as a heretic

REIGN OF KING HENRY VIII. 43
for his agency in that work. His Bible had been proscribed, and
men burned for reading it. But Cranmer, Archbishop of Canter
bury, now took the translation of Tyndal, and revising it, leaving
out the prologue and notes, and adding a preface of his own, set
it forth as a true translation of the Word of God.
In A.D. 1538, the work was printed at Paris. The king would
only allow copies of it to be deposited in some parish churches,
where they were fastened by chains. And he took care to inform
the people by proclamation, " That his indulgence was not the
effect of his duty, but of his goodness and his liberality to them,
who should therefore use it moderately, for the increase of virtue,
not of strife. And he ordered that no man should read the Bible
aloud, so as to disturb the priest while he sang mass; nor pre
sume to expound doubtful places without help from the learned."
— [Hume.]
But with the Bible, even though it were chained in the
churches, if it were allowed to be read by the people at all, how
could the doctrines of Popery maintain their ground? From
this moment, the light which had gleamed so faindy, began to
increase to the dawn of morning. Soon the system of Popery
and the doctrines of the Reformation began to conflict in the
pulpits. Could men be saved by the use of holy water, ghostly
absolution, extreme unction, and the Eucharist ; or must holy
principles, deep repentance, a living faith, renew and transform
the soul ? Is salvation of works and priestly offices ; or is it of
grace, and by faith alone ? Is Christianity a religion of forms
and incantations, or is it a religion of the heart ? So opposite
were the two schemes, and so earnest the conflict, that the king
forbade all preaching, till himself, as head of the Church, could
set forth the scheme of doctrine in which all should be required
to agree.
The king himself drew up the articles, to which both houses
of Convocation gave their assent as a matter of course. In this
system of doctrine, Popery and the Reformation were made to
mingle their discordant elements, and alternately shared the
several articles of faith. First, the Scripture, with three ancient
creeds, — the Apostles', the Nicene, and the Athanasian, were
made the standard of belief without the traditions or decrees of
tin- 1-ope.
Justification by Faith, not for any merit or work done by us,
but for the merits of the blood and passion of the Lord Jesus
Christ alone ; — in the next breath, auricular confession and
penance, are enjoined as essential to salvation.
Marriage, extreme unction, confirmation, and orders, were no
longer mentioned as sacraments ; on the other hand, the people
were required to believe " that in the sacrament of the altar, un-

44 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
der the form of bread, there was truly and substantially present
the same body of Christ that was born of the Virgin." " The
Catholics prevailed," says Hume, " in asserting the use of images ;
the Protestants in warning the people against idolatry." People
were still taught to pray to the saints. The prescribed ceremo
nies of worship were to be regarded as not only good and law
ful, but as possessing a mystic signification and power. Such
was the use of priestly vestments, holy water, " bearing candles
on Candlemas day ; giving ashes on Ash Wednesday ; bearing
palms on Palm Sunday ; creeping to the cross on Good Friday ;
hallowing the fount, and other exercises and benedictions."
The article on Purgatory, says Hume, " contains the most
curious jargon, ambiguity, and hesitation, arising from the mix
tures of the two tenets : the people were to believe it good and
charitable to pray for the souls of the departed ; but since the
place they were in, and the pain they suffered, were uncertain by
Scripture, people ought to remit them to God's mercy. There
fore all abuses of the doctrine ought to be put away, and the
people disengaged from believing that Popish masses, or pray
ers, said in certain places and before certain images, could
deliver souls out of purgatory."
In the meantime the Pope was endeavoring to spirit up the
people and clergy to rebellion ; but not succeeding in this, he
fulminated his sentence of excommunication against the whole
kingdom ; declared the king destitute of any title to the crown ;
forbade his subjects to obey him, and all princes to correspond
with him. The clergy were commanded to depart from the
kingdom, and the nobility to rise in arms against the king. For
all this the king took ample vengeance on the adherents of
the Pope, and pushed on the Reformation with great vigor.
He enjoined it upon the clergy to publish twice a quarter
that the Pope's power was usurped, and without authority
of Scripture ; to exhort the people to teach their children the
Lord's prayer, the Creed, and the Commandments, in English;
and ordered that every incumbent should explain these, one
article a day, till the people were instructed in them. Thus
the very things, for which so many of the followers of Wickliffe
and Luther had been burnt, were now enjoined by authority of
the king.
A book was now put forth by the command of the king, entitled
" The Institution of a Christian man," but more commonly
called The Bishops' Book, having been composed by Cranmer,
the bishops of London, Winchester, Chichester, Norwich, Elyj
Latimer, bishop of Worcester, and the bishops of Salisbury, Here
ford, St. Davids, and some other divines. This book contained
an explanation of the Lord's prayer, the Creed, the Sacraments,

REIGN OF KING HENRY VIII. 45
the commandments, the Ave Maria, the doctrines of justification
and purgatory, according to the theology of the times.
One thing is worthy of notice, as showing that the modern
notion of the Divine right of Bishops, as an order superior to
Presbyters, was not then even dreamed of by the heads of the
Church of England. This book, " The Institution of a Chris
tian man," declares that " In the New Testament there is no
mention made of any degrees or orders but only of Deacons (or
ministers) and of Priests (or Bishops) ;" thus renouncing all
claim of Divine authority for more than two orders of clergy.
This book was subscribed by the two archbishops, by nineteen
bishops, by the lower house of Convocation ; and was put forth
with the whole authority of the Church and the king, its acknow
ledged head.
The careful manner in which the opinions of this book were
drawn up, is worthy of notice. A committee of the highest dig
nitaries of the Church, and of the most learned divines in the
kingdom was previously called to sit and deliberate upon mat
ters of religion. The topics which they were to examine were
divided into heads and proposed in questions. These were
given out to the bishops and divines, and at a set time every one
brought in his opinion in writing on all the heads. Then all
conferred on points of difference until they were able to agree on
something to lay before the Convocation. One of these confer*
ences was held in 1537, or 1538 ; and one of the papers drawn
up was entitled " A Declaration of the functions and Divine in
stitution of Bishops and Priests." This paper, signed by Cran
mer and a large number of bishops and priests, contains the fol
lowing passage : " In the New Testament, there is no mention
made of any degrees or distinction in orders, but only of Deacons
(or ministers) and Priests (or bishops) ;" thus deliberately deny
ing the existence of more than two orders of permanent Church
officers in the New Testament ; and making bishops and pres
byters identical. Again in 1540, a commission sitting with
Cranmer at their head, declared, says Bishop Burnet, " That the
Scripture makes express mention of only two orders, Priests and
Deacons." Three years after this, another book was published, entitled
" The necessary Erudition of a Christian man;" corrected
by the king's hand, and approved by the parliament as the au
thoritative faith of the nation. This book likewise asserts that
Bishops ami Priests are of the same order, and limits the num
ber of scriptural Church officers to two orders, Bishops (or
Priests) and Deacons.
Here, perhaps, I ought to notice a singular statement made in
a recent work on Episcopacy, entitled " A view of the or-

46 THE puritans and their principles.
ganization and order of the Primitive Church ;"* a work widely
and earnestly circulated and extolled by the advocates of Epis
copacy in this quarter. This book also quotes these passages
concerning the two orders, from the " Institution " and from the
" Erudition of a Christian man ;" but maintains that Cranmer
and his coadjutor were not Reformers when they penned these
documents ; and that to quote them as evidence of what the Re
formers thought, " is gross misrepresentation." Indeed, the au
thor of this work earnestly argues that when Cranmer and his
coadjutors were Reformers, in the days of King Edward, they
were of another opinion, and maintained the Divine right of
Bishops as above Presbyters. The statements in the " Institution^
and the " Erudition" he says, " were the opinions of these men
as Romanists, and not as Reformers; and the man who quotes
them as such, is either too ignorant to write, or too dishonest
to be trusted."^
It so happens that the learned and celebrated Stillingfleet
more than a century ago, had occasion to refer to the opinions
of the Reformers upon these points ; and not only maintained,
but proved, by a reference to original manuscript documents,—
the best of all possible evidence, that the views of the Reformers
were precisely these, and that too at the brightest point of the
Reformation. Says Stillingfleet, " / doubt not to make it evident, that befm
these late unhappy times, the main grounds for settling Episcopal
government in the nation, was not accounted any pretence of
divine right, but the conveniency of that form of government
to the state of this Church at the time of its Reformation." And
here he says, " I meddle not with the times of Henry VIII., when
I will not deny but the first quickening of the Reformation might
be ; I date the birth of it from the first settlement of that most
excellent prince Edward VI." Then passing by the times of
Henry VIII., into the times of the undoubted Reformation, he
points out the steps by which the lower house of the Convocation
obtained liberty of proceeding in the work of Reformation : for
otherwise the law forbade them to agitate the question. He
gives the petitions at length. He relates how a select assembly
of bishops and divines were gathered at Windsor Castle, by
King Edward's special order, to digest matters preparatory to a
thorough Reformation. Here were Cranmer, Archbishop of Can
terbury, the Archbishop of York, the Bishops of Rochester, Lon
don, Carlisle, and others of the most distinguished of the reform-
* By A. B. Chapin.
t These passages had been so quoted by Dr. Dwight in his Theology, and by fr-
Hawes, in his " Tribute to the memory of the Pilgrims? I know not to whom else
these savory epithets may be considered as having a designed and special reference.

reign of henry viii. 47
ing divines. They followed the same course as the committee
in the time of Henry VIII. : each one giving his opinion in writ
ing, on several questions previously propounded to all; and
when all was agreed upon, the result was recorded in Cranmer 's
own hand. From that manuscript of Cranmer, Stillingfleet copies
the evidence in question. I can give only a small part, and refer
those who would see it in its whole extent, to Stillingfleet's
" Irenicum," where it is to be found.
Question 10. " Whether bishops or priests were first; and
if the priest, then the priest made the bishop ?" Answer. " The
bishops and priests were at one time, and were not two things, but
one office in the beginning of the Christian religion."
Question 11. " Whether a bishop hath authority to make a
priest, by Scripture, or no ; and whether any other, but only a
bishop, may make a priest ?" Answer. " A bishop may make a
priest, by the Scripture, and so may princes and governors also,
by that authority God committed to them; and the people also by
election." " For as we read that bishops have done it, so
Christian emperors have done it. And the people, before
Christian princes were, commonly did elect their bishops and
priests." Question 12. " Wliether in the New Testament be required
any consecration of a bishop or priest, or only appointing 4o
the office be sufficient ? Answer. " In the New Testament to be
a bishop or priest needeth no consecration, by the Scripture : for
election or appointing is sufficient."
Question 14. " Whether it be for ef ended by God's laio that if
it is so fortuned that all the bishops and priests were dead, and that
the Word of God should be unpreaehed, the sacrament of baptism
and others unminislcrcd, that the king of that region should make
bishops and priests to sui>pli/ the same, or no ?" Answer. " It is
not against God's law ; but contrary indeed they ought so to do ;
and there be histories that witness that some Christian princes and
other laymen uncousecrated have done the same."
To these declarations Cranmer subscribed his own hand, with
the affirmation, " This is my opinion at the, present. Thomas
Cant aurien sis.
Stillingfleet goes on to accumulate evidence upon evidence,
showing how long, and on what high authority, the same view
was held in the Church of England. He goes through the days
of Queen Elizabeth, and shows that in the articles of religion
agreed upon respecting the English form of Church govern
ment, that form was only described as being "agreeable"
[meaning not contradictory] " to God's Word." " Which had
been," says Stillingfleet, " a very low and diminishing expres
sion, had they looked upon it as absolutely prescribed and deter-

48 the puritans and their principles.
mined in scripture." He continues :— " The first who appeared
in vindication of the English hierarchy was Archbishop Whit
gift" [in the latter part of the reign of Queen Elizabeth], "whom
we cannot suppose either ignorant of the sense of the Church of
England, or afraid, or unwilling to defend it." Yet he frequently
(against Cartwright) asserts, " That the form of discipline is not
particularly and by name set down in Scripture :" — and again,—
" No kind of government is expressed in the word or can necessa
rily be concluded from them :" which he repeats, over and over
again ; " No form of Church government is by the Scripture pre
scribed to, or commanded in the Church of God." Stillingfleet
goes on to show the same from Dr. Cosins, Dr. Lowe, Bishop
Bridges ; and adds, " They who please to consult the 3d book
of the learned and judicious Master Hooker's Ecclesiastical
Polity, may see the mutability of the form of Church govern
ment largely asserted and fully proved."
Indeed the Hierarchy found it impossible to defend themselves
against the Puritans on any other ground. The Puritans showed,
not only that there is no authority for the Episcopacy, but that
the Word of God gives directions on the subject of Church
government, inconsistent with that scheme. The advocates of
the Hierarchy uniformly asserted the authority of the civil gov
ernment, or of the Church, to establish or change the form of
Church polity, according to circumstances. " Yea," says Stilling
fleet, " this is so plain and evident to have been the chief opinion
of the divines of the Church of England, that Parker" [the Puri
tan] " looks upon it as one of the main foundations of the Hier
archy, and sets himself might and main to oppose it."
" If we come still lower," says Stillingfleet, "to the time of king
James, his majesty himself declared it in print as his judgment,
that " It is granted to every Christian king, prince, and common
wealth, to prescribe within its own jurisdiction, that external form
of church government, which approaches as much as possible to
its own form of civil administration." But we cannot delay here
even to enumerate the additional items of the abundant proof
which Stillingfleet adduces. Those who will consult his " Ireni-
cum," will perceive that his proof is absolute demonstration of the
position, that the Reformers of the Church of England, and their
successors for a long course of years, rested the warrant for the
Episcopal office and jurisdiction, not upon any pretence of divine
right; but upon grounds by which, to adopt the language of
Stillingfleet), " The divine right of Episcopacy, as founded upon
apostolical practice, is quite subverted and destroyed."
I know not how it is, that in the face of all this array of facts,
the writer in question, in his " Primitive Church," has been led
into the error of saying, that in the Erudition of a Christian man

REIGN OF HENRY VIII. 49
(published in the reign of Henry VIII.), " is the last that we
hear of that opinion," — viz., that Bishops, as above Presby
ters, were not originally of divine right ; but that Bishops and
Priests were of the same order.
To proceed with the narrative : — The " Necessary Erudition
of a Christian man" became the standard doctrine ofthe Church
of England ; for by Statute it had been enacted, " That all de
crees and ordinances, which shall be made and ordained by the
Archbishops and doctors, and shall be published with the king's
advice and confirmation by his letters patent, in and upon matters
of Christian faith, and lawful rites and ceremonies ; shall be in
every point thereof obeyed and performed, to all intents and
purposes." Thus the Parliament had given to the king the pre
rogatives of infallibility, and bound themselves and the kingdom
to receive upon trust, without question or examination, what
ever dogmas *or ceremonies the king and prelates should be
pleased to establish.
It was indeed provided that nothing should be established
contrary to the laws and statutes of the realm ; but this was at
that period no defence, and was only introduced to serve the
king's purposes. " By introducing confusion and contradiction
into the laws," says Hume, " he became more master of every
man's property. Room was left for the civil courts to interfere
with the ecclesiastical, whenever it became a question what
ecclesiastical requisitions were contrary to the laws and statutes
of the realm. What the king meant as an instrument of tyranny,
became, in the lapse of time, one of the strongest defences against
ecclesiastical oppression."
But no Institution or Erudition, no laws, imprisonments or
burnings, sufficed to repress the rising Reformation. The more
effectually to accomplish this end Henry now caused the law to
be passed commonly known under the name of the Bloody
Statute ; informing his parliament " That it was his majesty's
earnest desire, to extirpate from his kingdom all diversity of
opinion in matters of religion." There were certain points
which answered the purpose of a Shibboleth, to sift those who
happened to be tinctured with Protestant views; and against
these the six articles of the Bloody Statute were aimed. The
1st declared, that after the consecration of the elements in the
Lord's Supper, there remains no longer bread, but the real natu
ral body of Christ.
The 2d maintained the necessity of communion in one kind
alone. The 3d insisted upon the celibacy of the clergy.
The 4th upon the perpetual obligations of vows of chastity.
4

50 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
The 5th, the benefit of private masses ; and the 6th the neces-
sity of auricular confession.
" If any did speak, preach, or write" against the 1st, they
should be judged heretics and burnt without any benefit of ab-
jurations. Their real and personal estate was forfeit to the
king. Those who should preach or dispute against the other
articles were to suffer death as felons, without benefit of clergy ;
and those, who either in word or writing declared against the
articles, were to be imprisoned during the king's pleasure, for
feit goods and chattels for the first offence, and for the second,
suffer death ; " An unheard of severity," says Hume, " and un
known to the Inquisition itself."
It was not long before five hundred persons were in prison,
under the operation of this statute ; but so great was the influ
ence of Cranmer and Cromwell that these were pardoned. Lati
mer spoke against the act, and was imprisoned«»till the king's
death. Shaxton, bishop of Salisbury, spoke against the article,
and resigned ; but being threatened with fire, he turned apostate ;
and in the days of Queen Mary, proved a cruel persecutor. ,
To complete the system of despotism under which England'
groaned, the same parliament gave to the king's proclamation
the force of the statute law : and, " What proves," says Hume,
" either a stupid or a wilful blindness in the parliament is, that
even after this statute, they pretended to maintain some limita
tion in the government. To fill up the measure of their treason
against justice and right, they passed an attainder against six
teen persons who had become obnoxious to the king's dislike ; —
some under pretence of their having denied the king's supre
macy ; and others without mention of any crime ; — persons who
had never been convicted ; — no, nor brought to trial ; — no, nor
ever arraigned or formally accused. They were condemned and
destroyed, — without accusation, trial, or defence,— -by a sove
reign act of parliament !
While the king waged this exterminating warfare against Pro
testants, he was equally violent against the partizans of the
Pope ; so that a stranger who was in England at the time, was
not far from the truth when he remarked, that " Those who were
against the Pope were burned, and those who were for him were
hanged." But how could popish doctrines be maintained by dungeons
and faggots, while the Bible was left to speak to the people ?
The Bible was at length discovered to be the great arch-.
heretic, after all ; and like other heretics, if it could not be
silenced, it must be burned. There were indeed only five hun
dred copies of the Bible in the common tongue, known to be in
the whole realm : for that was the extent of the impression.

reign of king henry viii. 51
These were chained in the churches, and few people could read,
yet those few could read to their neighbors, and their neighbors
could tell what they had heard. Henry perceived that the Bible
was no more compatible with his despotism over the understand
ing and the conscience of the people, than it was with the despot
ism of the Pope.
Accordingly the Bible was by statute forbidden to be read in
English in any church. No woman, or artificer, or apprentices,
journeymen, husbandmen, or laborers, "were to read the New
Testament in English. If any spiritual person should be con
victed of maintaining anything contrary to the king's instructions
already made, he should for the first offence recant; for the
second bear a faggot ; for the third be burned."
Thus stood the Reformation in England, when Henry was
summoned away by death on the 28th of January, A. D. 1547.
England was severed from the Popedom, with immense gain
lo its prosperity and political independence. It was indeed a
mighty movement to transfer the supremacy of the Church from
the Pope to the king; as no superstitious reverence belonged to
the latter, such as kept the people in abject subjection to the
infallibility and ghostly power of the former. But for the present,
nothing was gained for civil or religious freedom. The English
had lost in both these respects. But Henry could not live for ever.
The seeds of truth, which he vainly strove to suppress, had taken
root; and in the next age they began to yield their fruit. The
laws which he designed for the purpose of establishing his tyran
nical power, and of crushing the Reformation, afforded in the
next age the means of pushing forward the Reformation with
greater rapidity than the natural progress of truth. Of course,
things were ready for a re-action in the next succeeding age ;
and the same supremacy, with the same laws enacted to sustain
it, gave the bloody Mary power to carry England back once more
to the bosom of Rome. So impotent is power to resist the pro
gress of truth : so useless is violence to push forward reform
faster than the truth itself makes progress.
Had the Church been severed from the State ; with the Word
of God, aside from tradition, the sole standard of faith and duty:
had the hierarchy — that excrescence upon the simple institutions
of Christ, — not been in existence ; had the people been free to
follow the Word of God, calling" no man master," — how swiftly,
and how surely would the Reformation have spread over Eng
land ! What untold sorrows; what tears; what burnings and
blood might have been spared ! Had it not been for the obstruc
tion of hierarchical power, and Church authority and tradition,
how many times would the incipient Reformation, — which so
often broke out in Italy, in France, and in Spain, — have gone

52 THE PU-RITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
on to its completion ! But the Inquisition, and the sword, though
they could not resist the arguments of the witnesses, could yet
destroy the witnesses themselves. Let the people guard their
rights. Let them distrust the wisdom and kindness of those
who would bring in the traditions, and ceremonies, and formula
ries of a usurping hierarchy,— as a safer bulwark of their liber
ties than the simple Word of God. The word of God ; with no
bond upon the conscience ; no impediment upon the judgment,
to compel men to interpret it according to the decisions of a pre
tended Catholic tradition ; — this is the best friend of freedom
and of the rights of man ; this is the best, — the only divine bul
wark, — of the truth. Let it be for Prelates and Popes to decry
the exercise and even the right of private judgment, and to pro
claim a human production,— a prayer book — as a safer standard
than the Word of God. Our fathers have taught us to " count
nothing old that will not stand by the Word of God ; and nothing
new, that will." The Word of God, and no tradition : the Word
of God, our immediate instructor, with no authoritative interpreter
between to hush its voice or to enchain our understanding ; the
Word of God — unbound and free !< — this is our principle ; the
watchword of freedom : the watch-cry of everlasting truth.

IV.

REIGN OF EDWARD VI.
Persecutions- stopped. Doctrinal disputes revived. Book of Homilies.
First service book: revised: never satisfactory to the Reformers. Sup
posed necessity of forming such a liturgy as to keep the Popish people
in the Church. Discrepancy between the Articles and Offices. Prayer
Book an equivocal standard : fairly quoted by each of two irrecon-
cileable schemes. The question of a Liturgy. No right anywhere to
impose one. Imposed not by the Church, but by Parliament and Coun
cil. Uniformity enforced. Reforming the Ordinal. Rise of the Puritans.
Edward VI. came to the throne in the 10th year of his age,
A.D. 1547, seventy-three years before the landing of the Pilgrims
at Plymouth.The directorship of the faith and worship of the kingdom
having been vested in the crown, it now fell into the hands of the
Executive council, named by Henry VIII., and of the young
king ; who had been trained under instructors selected by Cran
mer, and early imbued with the true principles ofthe gospel.
By all Protestant authorities, Edward VI. is regarded, for his
enlightened views, his solid judgment beyond his years, and his
conscientious regard for righteousness and truth, the wonder
of his age. He was surrounded by a bright galaxy of Re
formers. There was the meek and guileless Cranmer, whom
the truth and the Spirit of God had led from the darkness of
Popery to a discovery of the way of life through faith in Christ
alone ; and yet he had been so gradually led, that he always re
tained the confidence of that tyrant monster Henry VIII., who
would in an instant have committed him to the flames, had he
dreamed that bis favorite was capable of ever exchanging the
dogmas of popery for the doctrines of the Reformation. There,
too, was the venerable and true-hearted Latimer, the zealous
Hooper, the eloquent Ridley, and John Rogers, and Miles
Coverdale ; of whom the last three had been among those who
fled into exile for conscience' sake, in the reign of Henry ; and
who were now welcomed back to their native land. There were
also many others whose names are to be had in high honor by

54 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
all who love the truth as it is in Jesus, and who know what the
true gospel and religious liberty are worth.
These were good men and true Reformers ; still they were
men, and were surrounded with difficulties. Many of the great
principles concerning the proper limit of civil or ecclesiastical
power, and concerning the rights of conscience, had never been
discussed. If, therefore, the Reformation was conducted, in some
measure, on principles inconsistent with itself, that was the fault
not so much of the Reformers as of the times. If in some re
spects they progressed too slowly to suit the more zealous ; if in
some respects they did not carry the Reformation so far as purity
in doctrine and worship demanded, they themselves saw and
deplored it ; and had the times allowed, they would certainly
have carried the Reformation further. They were by no means
of the opinion of some at the present day, that all was done
which a regard for purity in worship demanded ; much less were
they of the opinion of those who now lament that the Reforma
tion was carried too far.
No sooner was King Henry in his grave than it appeared that
a majority of those whom he had selected to compose the Execu
tive Council during the minority of the young king, were strongly
in favor of the Reformation; and that majority embraced the
most important members, with Hereford the Protector, and
Cranmer the Archbishop of Canterbury, at their head. The
ample power put into their hands they determined to wield in
favor of a Reformation, with as much energy as was consistent
with prudence.
The persecution under the bloody six Articles, was stopped,
The prison doors were thrown open. The exiles from the king
dom for conscience' sake were recalled. The reforming preachers
opened their mouths once more. The defenders of Popery
hurled back their defiance. Ridley preached against images;
the people in some places began to remove them from the
churches. Gardiner raised his voice in defence of the images,
and vainly tried by legal prosecutions to crush those who
ventured to destroy them. Ridley decried the use of such things
as Holy Water, and consecrated candles. Gardiner wrote an
elaborate " Apology for Holy Water," which he maintained
" might be made by the divine power, an instrument of much
good." From the dispute about superstitious instruments and
observances, the contest descended to the very foundations of
faith ; bringing into conflict the two great opposing schemes,
Popery and the Reformation ; justification by sacraments, masses,
absolutions, and ceremonials, — or justification by faith alone, to
the exclusion of all account of any priestly interventions whatever.
The council determined on a general visitation of all the

REIGN OF EDWARD VI. 55
dioceses in the kingdom. The most eloquent and influential of
the Reforming divines were appointed to accompany the visitors ;
to preach everywhere the great truths of religion, and to bring
the people off from the old superstitions. Thirty-six injunctions
were sent from the King, to be everywhere observed, requiring,
among other things, the observance of the laws against the Pope's
supremacy ; directing the clergy to preach once a quarter against
pilgrimages and praying to images; commanding that such
images as had been abused with pilgrimages and offerings,
should be taken down ; forbidding processions about church
yards and all ringing of bells before high mass, save one ; re
quiring all shrines, candlesticks, trindrills, rolls of wax, pictures,
paintings, and other monuments of feigned miracles to be re
moved ; requiring the churches each to be furnished with a Bible
within three months ; and within twelve months, with Erasmus's
paraphrase of the New Testament, and enjoining the Bible to be
read in all the churches.
A Book of Homilies, consisting of twelve discourses on the
topics most important at the time, and containing a vindication of
the doctrines of the Reformation, was ordered to be left with every
parish priest, who was enjoined to read these Homilies to the
people. When the Parliament met in 1547, they concurred in the line
of policy pursued by the Council. The laws against Lollardism
were repealed. The bloody statute of the six Articles was
repealed. The Act giving to the King's proclamation the force
of law, was repealed. This was indeed the dawning of liberty to
the people of England.
The Council struck once more at superstitious ceremonies and
customs ; candles were no longer to be carried on Candlemas
day ; nor ashes on Ash- Wednesday ; nor palms on Palm Sunday.
All images were ordered to be removed from the churches.
These innovations amounted almost to a total change of the
established religion. Indeed such it was designed to be. It was
not the ceremony or the image alone lhat was concerned, but
in these symbols the whole system of Popery was intended to
be assailed. But the outward reform was now carried by the
hand of power beyond the progress of light. The great body of
the priests and the people had not yet understood the truth ; and
were not ripe for these external changes. The debate of words
now began to reach the crisis of violence. The king thereupon
issued his proclamation requiring these contentions to cease, and
signifying his intention of soon having one uniform order
throughout the realm. Till that order could be set forth, all
manner of persons were forbidden to preach save by special
license, either in the pulpit or otherwise.

56 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
This was the origin of the first Service book or Liturgy of King
Edward VI. A committee of divines, with Cranmer at their
head, were appointed to reform the Offices of the Church. They
began with the Eucharist. This, instead of a communion or
commemoration of the death of Christ, had become " A sort of
mystical ceremony, chiefly for the alleged purpose of delivering
souls out of purgatory ; and was claimed to be a real propitiatory
sacrifice and offering of the body and blood of Christ, which the
priest wrought for the forgiveness of sins." This was now
changed into a communion in both kinds. In other respects the
office of the mass was left very much " as it stood." Out of the
Romish Missals of Sarum, York, Hereford, and Bangor (for Po
pery had never required a uniform liturgy in England), they
compiled the Morning and Evening Service " almost in the same
form as it stands at present." — [Neale.] From the same mate
rials they compiled a Litany, " the same now used," except the
petition to be delivered from the tyranny of the bishop of Rome
and all his detestable enormities ; which petition, in the review
of the Liturgy under Queen Elizabeth, was struck out.
In the ministration of baptism, a cross was to be made on the
child's forehead and breast : the devil was to be exorcised ; the
child was to be dipped (not immersed, as some pretend) three
times in the font : on the right side, on the left, and on the
breast, if not weak.
In the office of burial, the soul of the departed was to be recom
mended to the mercy of God ; the minister was to pray that the
sins which he had committed in this world might be forgiven;
that he might be admitted into heaven and his body raised at the
last day.
By the law of Parliament, all divine offices were to be per
formed according to this book from the feast of Whitsunday,
1549. " Such of the clergy as refused, or officiated in any other
manner, should, upon the first conviction, suffer six months' im
prisonment, and forfeit a year's profit of their benefices. For the
second conviction, the offender was to forfeit all his church pre
ferments, and suffer a year's imprisonment. Such as wrote or
printed against the Liturgy were to be fined £10 for the first
offence ; ^£20 for the second ; and for the third, forfeit all their
goods and be imprisoned for life."
The people exhibited great unwillingness to give up their an
cient rituals : and to put it out of their power to observe them,
the clergy were ordered to deliver up the articles which com
posed the gear of popish service; such as " antiphonals, missals,
grails, processionals, legends, portuasses," and other things of
like sort ; of which we, in our simplicity, at the present day,
scarcely know the uses or the names. " All who had in their

REIGN OF EDWARD VI. 57
houses images that had belonged to any church, were required
to deface them ; and to dash out of their primers all prayers to
the saints."
If worship was to be performed by the use of a prescribed and
uniform liturgy, the Liturgy now established was probably re
formed as far as the times allowed. The Papists would not en
dure any more ; the Protestants would not be satisfied with less :
to suit the exigency of the times the Liturgy was cautiously
framed, while it was not all that those who framed it desired.
In 1552, it underwent a revision. Some things were added;
some that had been retained through the necessity of the times,
were stricken out. A rubric was added concerning the posture
of kneeling at the sacrament ; declaring that no adoration was
intended to the bread and wine ; nor did they think that the very
flesh and blood of Christ were there present. This was after
wards struck out by Queen Elizabeth to give latitude to the Pa
pists ; much to the grief of the Puritans : but in the reign of
Charles II. it was, at their instance, again inserted. Sundry old
rites which had been retained in the former book were discon
tinued, as, the use of oil in confirmation and extreme unction ;
prayer for the dead ; and the use of the cross in confirmation and
the eucharist. By this book of common-prayer, " All copes were
forbidden throughout England ; the prebendaries of St. Paul left
their hoods, and the bishops their crosses." [Strype, in- Neale.] " In
short, the whole liturgy was reduced to the form in which it now
appears, excepting some small variations that have since been
made." — [Neale.]
That the Prayer Book contains many and very great excellen
ces, all will readily acknowledge. Its compilers, however, never
thought of it as a standard, beyond which the Reformation was
never to advance. On the contrary, they lamented that the state
of the nation rendered it impracticable to cleanse it further from
the defilements of Popery. Cranmer was never satisfied with
the Liturgy ; and designed a thorough alteration, if not an entire
change ; King Edward was not satisfied with this, or with the
discipline of the Church, and laments in his diary, that he could
" not restore the primitive discipline according' to his heart's desire,
because of several of the bishops, some for age, some for igno
rance, some out of love to Popery, were unwilling to it."
The desire for further reformation appears in the sermons of La
timer, Hooper, Bradford, and others. John A'Lasco wrote, " that
King Edward desired that the rites and ceremonies used under
Popery should be purged out by degrees ; that it was his pleasure
that strangers should have churches to perform all things accord
ing to apostolical observations only, that by this means, the Eng
lish churches might be excited to embrace apostolic purity with

58 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
the unanimous consent of the states of the kingdom." It was left
written in the preface to one of the service books, that " They had
gone as far as they could in reforming the Church, considering the
times they lived in, and hoped that they that came after them,
would, as they might, do more."
Stillingfleet [Irenicum, p. 58] speaking of the causes which in
duced the reformed French churches, in order to please the Pa
pists, to insert into their prayer-books "that which men would
scarcely believe unless they saw it," says, " The same temper was
used by our reformers in composing our Liturgy, in reference
to the Papists ; to whom they had an especial eye, as being the
only party then appearing in the Church, whom they desired to
draw into their communion by coming as near to them as they well
and safely could."*
That this might be good state policy it is not necessary to
question. Whether such a veering between Popery and the
"Reformation, was likely to secure a liturgy and discipline so pure
as to satisfy all devout and conscientious men, is quite another
affair. Certain it is, that the Reformers were not satisfied with
that Book of Common Prayer, which it is now the custom to extol
with praises extravagant and almost idolatrous. The articles
were made such as the Reformers would have them, and are, as
a system, a noble monument of a pure and enlightened faith.
The offices of the Prayer-Book,— drawn from popish originals,
and left with the rituals and vestments retaining as much of the
shape and fashion and savor of Popery as would render them
not idolatrous ; — and so left by the Reformers only for the pre
sent, with the hope of further amendment when the times should
allow it ; — these offices contain many things which it is not hard
to interpret into a close alliance with Popery itself. They still
inculcate the doctrine of baptismal regeneration. In the Lord's
Supper they are not expurgated from the consecrations, the obla
tions, and other popish appendages, which left King James so
much reason to say that it was but " An ill mumbled mass."
To this origin of the Liturgy, and to this desire of " Keeping
the popish people in the Church," it is owing — as I conceive, —
that the Evangelical and the Tractarian parties in the Episcopal
Church at the present day, both appeal with so much justice and
with such entire confidence, to the same Prayer-Book as favoring
* Indeed in after times, when the Liturgy was finally settled under Elizabeth, this
design of so arranging the Liturgy and ceremonials as to " keep the popish people in the
church," was boldly avowed and defended as a matter of necessary policy. Thus
Mkddox, who wrote more than a hundred years ago against Neale's History of the
Puritans, and afterwards was rewarded with a bishopric, hesitates not to avow that
"As the nation in general was popish, it plainly appeared an act of great compassion
to many thousand souls, as well as necessary to the Queen's safety, and the success of
the Reformation, to contrive, if it were possible, such a form of worship without
idolatry, which might keep the popish people in the chuech."

REIGN OF EDWARD VI. 59
each of their discordant and irreconcilable schemes. It does so
favor them. The Reformation was purposely so mingled with
Popery in that book as to quiet the Protestants if possible, and at
all events to " keep the popish people in the Church ;" and
hence its double interpretation ; — its " iron mixed with the miry
clay." The Bishop of Connecticut, in his recent charge, is pleased to
draw a comparison between that Prayer-Book and the Bible
alone, as a standard of " faith and worship ;" making the Prayer-
Book, in spite of its mongrel origin, and its motley compromise
between the Reformation and Popery — a much better and safer
standard than the Word of God ! He commiserates the lot of
those who have " the Bible alone" for their " only standard of
faith" as being possessed of no " sufficient bond of union and
stability." He anticipates for them nothing bul division, error,
fanaticism, and " ignorance !" He contrasts the Episcopal
Church with these, as being surrounded by " desolation " — " an
Oasis in the desert;" — and declares that this happy result " has
been mainly effected " by having " this Book of Common Prayer
A STANDARD OF FAITH AND WORSHIP !"
But what bond of union and stability is this Prayer-Book ?
Never were schemes more diametrically opposed, each so jusdy
drawn and so logically defended from the same standard ; and
that owing to the worldly and wavering policy used in making
it up. Indeed, why should not" the same book blow hot and
cold now as well as in the days of Queen Elizabeth ? Why
should it not be able to " keep popish people in the Church,"
now as well as then? See what diversities are existing — yes
conflicting — under this bond of union and faith, boasted as so
much better than the Bible. Mr. Newman, the pillar of Oxford
"Tractarianism, says, that "In the English Church, we shall hard
ly find ten or twenty neighboring clergymen who agree together;
and that not in the non-essentials of religion ; but as to what are
its elementary and necessary doctrines, or whether there are any
necessary doctrines at all; any distinct and definite faith required
for salvation." Yet all make their appeal to the Prayer-Book.
Says the Bishop of Ohio, " What the articles and homilies so
distinctly tench, that system" [Tractarianism] " directly denies ;
most earnestly condemns,— and most indignantly casts away."
On the other hand, the Bishop of New Jersey responds, " He "
[Pusey] " is no nearer, on my word, to Rome, than the Liturgy and
offices ofthe Church of England and of her sister in America go
with him."
The Bishop of Ohio rejoins:—" Their mode of representing
the way of salvation is another gospel to us ; another to the
Church to ivhose doctrines we are pledged."

60 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
"My confidence in the doctrinal integrity ofthe Oxford writers
continues unshaken," responds the Bishop of New Jersey.
" The difference," replies Bishop Macllvaine, " between this
divinity and the true divinity for which our Reformers gave them
selves to death, is a difference of great vital doctrine ; not one
of doctrine merely, but of the system of doctrine from corner
stone to roof; a difference which makes so great a gulf between,
that according to the Oxford divines themselves, it makes the one
side or the other another gospel." " It is little else than popery
restrained, — essentially Romish divinity," — " of the house and
lineage of popery."*
It is plain that the Prayer-Book speaks Popery in Maryland,
and Protestantism in Ohio ; — according to the authoritative de
cision of the respective heads of the Church in those Dioceses :
while as Bishop Brownell describes these differences, as only
" slight shades of difference which tincture the views of different
members of our household of faith," — the same book should seem
to teach in Connecticut a mongrel theology compounded indif
ferently of the two.
It is only by such indifference that these discordant schemes
can ever be made to cease their conflict. If one system is laid
down in the Articles, it is no less plain that the Offices contain
the germ and essence of the other ; and most manfully is this
maintained and triumphantly established by those who hold the
system of the Tractarians. The true solution, I apprehend, has
been given in the origin of the Offices, and in the policy which
made them what they are. It does seem that in the providence
of God, these hot contentions are allowed to rise, as if in solemn
rebuke of the presumption which has dared to set up that Prayer-
Book — in fact as an idol — a safer bond of union and stability
than God's own holy and perfect Word.
That the Liturgy was framed from the old mass-books,
whatever reason it may have afforded for reprehension at ' the
time, is at the present day no manner of objection. If things
are good in themselves, they are not to be rejected simply because
they have been used by Rome. If there were attending evils at
the time, there was at least this advantage, that those who were
enamored of Popery would be less offended with the change,
when they knew that so much of that to which they had been
accustomed, was retained in the Liturgy which they were now
required to use.
Nor was the question of a Liturgy at all the same in that day
with what it is at present. It had been the custom. A very
* And yet that same Bishop in a few short months can join with the General
Convention in a thanksgiving, that all is so united and regular in the Episcopal
Church.

REIGN OF EDWARD VI. 61
large majority of the clergy were too ignorant to conduct public
worship without one. It was then, as it is at present, in the
English Church, that no practical and heartfelt acquaintance
with vital religion was a requisite qualification for one who was
to have the care of souls. In a national Church, — or in a Church
which relies on Baptismal regeneration, and gathers its mem
bers indiscriminately by " street rows" or parishes, — it is mani
fest that an attempt to'require such qualifications in the priesthood
must be both futile and absurd. It is a mercy to such a Church
to have a Liturgy. But in Churches founded on evangelical
principles, and making a distinction between the pious and the
profane in gathering their members; -in Churches where in
addition to the gifts of nature and education, the gifts of grace
are also required in the ministry, so far as these things may be
determined by careful scrutiny ; — in such Churches the question
of Liturgy assumes another form. Our most intelligent and
devoted Churches have not found themselves either shocked or
starved by the use of extemporary prayer. On the contrary,
they have felt that their devotions were more satisfactorily led ;
and their varied wants and thanksgivings more appropriately
uttered. Besides this, it is perhaps one of the very best available
tests and safeguards of their ministry, that their ministers are to
lead the devotions of God's people with prayer conceived in their
own hearts. How difficult for any man long to play the coun
terfeit here!* How soon the leanness of the minister's heart
appears to a devout and spiritual people ! What an appalling
barrier to eueh as do not love to pray, and who have not acquired
a facility of leading the devotions of public worship, by habits
of earnest and frequent prayer !
Aside from such considerations, and from the considerations of
our ever varying circumstances and wants, the question of wor
shipping Cod with or without a Liturgy, is a matter of taste or ex
pediency, concerning which individual Churches and ministers
should be left free to adopt their own course ; rather than a
question of principle or obligation about which Christians should
ever contend.
But if any pretend a right to impose a Liturgy upon individual
Churches or ministers, that right we deny. We know no
Catholic, national, provincial, or diocesan authority, which has
the rifdit to make such an imposition. We question both the
imposition and the pretended authority. The power assumed is
a usurpation both of the authority of God and of the rights of
man ; and the thing imposed under penalty of exclusion from
the ministry, of excommunication — (and in the case of the Puri
tans, by fines, imprisonments, or banishment) is a sheer human
invention. With our Puritan ancestors we deny the right

62 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
of any human authority to impose rites, ceremonies and Litur-
gies, as a necessary part of the public worship of God.
If an appeal be made to antiquity, as though we had aban
doned ancient or apostolic usage ; then we affirm, 1st, that the
present Liturgies and forms make no pretence to Apostolical
rise or institution ; 2d, we deny that a Liturgy at all, is any
thing more than a corruption of the simplicity of primitive and
apqstolic times ; and 3d, we affirm that the liberty is perfect
(even if the duty be not plain) of rejecting all imposed rites and
ceremonies for the worship of God, which are not ordered by
the only authoritative rule, his holy and perfect Word.
The authority which framed and imposed the English Liturgy
was the Council and Parliament : the State and not the
Church. It was not laid before the Convocation, nor any repre
sentative body of the clergy. Its origin was neither Divine nor
Ecclesiastical. Uniformity being now established by law, and rigidly enforced,
the civil and ecclesiastical authorities set themselves to the fur
ther guarding of that uniformity and to the suppression of alleged
heresies. The dreadful excess of the Anabaptists in Germany,had
caused their very name to be regarded with alarm and horror by the
governments of Europe. In the previous reign, some who were
charged with the name and doctrines of Anabaptism, were seized
and burned for that offence. I know of no evidence that they
were justly chargeable with the impious and horrid principles of
those who had heretofore been known by the name of Anabap
tists. They might have been simple-hearted and devout Chris
tians, good subjects ; holding only the peculiarities of the present
Baptists. And the history of these shows, that they have, as a
people, ever stood for religious freedom, and for the Word of
God alone as of any authority in matters of religion. Though
they have not generally shared in the honor, — they shared largely
in the perils of the Reformation. In the fundamental principles
of their creed, in their worship and discipline, and in then-
struggle for religious and civil freedom, they too were among
the Puritans.
People of this persuasion now began to appear in some num
bers in England, and agreed with many others in their reluc
tance to conform to the established ceremonies and Liturgy. A
commission was appointed to " Examine and search after all
Anabaptists, heretics, or contemners of common prayer," whom
they were authorized, if they could not reclaim them, to excom
municate, imprison, and finally to deliver them to the secular
arm. In what respect did this commission differ from the
Inquisition ? " People had generally thought," says Neale "that

REIGN OF EDWARD VI. 63
all the Statutes for burning had been repealed ; but they were
now told that heretics were to be burned by the common law."
How strange, that such good men as Cranmer and his co
adjutors could ever be so blinded as to engage in such cruelties !
How slowly may the minds even of good men come to the
light ! and how long it takes one simple principle, — not of mercy
and compassion, — but of right, to force its way through the
opposing prejudices of old customs and old opinions, into the
general conviction of the wise and good !
It has been alleged against Calvin, — and many have delight
ed to repeat it, — that " Calvin burnt Servetus." Calvin did
indeed take an active part in conducting the prosecution, and
Servetus was condemned, — not simply for heresy, nor for assaults
upon Christianity, — but for what was in that day judged to be
blasphemy, — in that, among other things, he had called One
God in three persons a Cerberus, — a three-headed monster. The
cantons of Berne, Zurich and Shaffhausen, to whom the case
was referred, replied that Servetus should be punished. The
gentle Melancthon partook so much of the error of the times,
as to approve the sentence of the magistrate. Farel approved
of it. Beza defended the sentence. When the court of Ge
neva pronounced the sentence of burning, Calvin earnestly
and importunately begged that the mode of punishment might
be changed to a milder death : but the court refused to yield.
It was a horrid deed. And now a similar one, yet more
horrid in its details, is to be recorded of that pattern of meekness
and gentleness, the pure-minded and upright Cranmer. There
was a woman named Joan Bochcr, who had been seized as an
Anabaptist, but whose only crime seemed to be the holding of
some strange but harmless notions concerning the manner of
our Lord's incarnation. To us her notions are a mere»confused
jargon; in that day they were judged heresy. "She had been
known," says Strype, " as a great reader of the Scriptures her
self; which book she dispersed in court." — "she used, for the
more secresy, to tie the books with strings under her apparel,
and so pass with them into court." — " By so doing, she had
jeoparded her life to bring others to a knowledge of God'**
Word." But neither her excellent character nor her devoted
piety could save her. She was condemned to the stake. The
king thought it wrong and horrible. He refused to sign her
death-warrant. Cranmer was deputed by the council to over
come his scruples. The youthful king, in reverence to the
authority of the archbishop, submitted ; but with tears solemnly
declared, that if he did wrong, since it was in submission to
Cranmer's authority, Cranmer should answer it to God. Even
Cranmer shuddered. He and Ridley took the woman to their

64 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
houses, and tried every argument to induce her to give up her
opinions ; but after nearly a year's delay she was committed to
the flames. One other person and only one suffered in this
manner during this reign. Would that even such a bloody
record might never have stood in connection with such venerable
and beloved names !
Bonner and Gardiner refusing to discharge the duties of their
bishoprics according to the new order of things, were deprived;
and afterwards, for political offences, imprisoned ; but it deserves
to be recorded that not one single Romanist suffered death from
the hands of the Reformers. Cranmer and his coadjutors appear
to have seen at length the horrid wickedness of burning people
for heresy ; for in revising the Canon law under act of Parlia
ment, — which revision was mostly by the hand of Cranmer-'-the
punishment of death was no longer to be inflicted. Even then
they had not discovered the important principle that no human
power has any right to inflict pains or penalties for such alleged
offences ; and that the utmost prerogative of the Church, is to
exclude ffie heretic from her pale. The revised law, — which,
however, never took effect, the king dying before, he could affix
his seal, — required that the heretic should be " Declared infamous,
incapable of public trust, or of being witness in any court or of
having power to make a will." Such was the light of those
days. By act of Parliament, the work of reforming the Ordinal,—
or forms for ordaining ministers, — was given into the bands of
six Prelates and six divines, to be named by the king, and
whatever they should arrange and the king should seal with the
great seal, was to have the authority of law. I notice the author
ity by which this was done, as another instance of the way in
which the Reformation was carried on, and in which the entire
service book was framed and established. It was not by the
Church, but by the King and Parliament.*
In the revised Ordinal, such offices as subdeacons, readers,
acolytes, &c, were dispensed with ; and the gloves, the sandals,
the mitre, the ring and the crosier were left out. The anointing,
the arraying in consecrated vestments, and the delivering of ves
sels for consecrating, the elements in the Eucharist, were also
omitted. * Chapin, in his "Primitive Church," has a chapter entitled "The English
Reformation Canonical." That may be so, for aught I care to dispute,— and
must be so, if it be " Canonical!' for the church to be the mere creature of the State,
and to suffer the civil power authoritatively to frame, fix, establish, and alter at its
Eleasure, her ceremonies of worship, her liturgy, her articles of faith ; and then to
ind the Church to their observance, and require her to bind all her children to the
same. If this be not Canonical, then it is simple folly to talk about the " Engluh
Reformation" as " Canonical."

REIGN OF EDWARD VI. 65
The Council in his majesty's name, A. D. 1550, required the
Bishops to see that all the altars in the churches were taken
down, and a communion table placed in their room. But why
this alteration ? The Reformers gave the answer : Because
Christ instituted the Sacrament not at an altar, but at a table :
Because the Holy Ghost calls it " The Lord's table," but never
an altar : because the altar, — in its name, form, and very idea,
— implies a sacrifice, and the people have been superstitiously
taught to regard the Sacrament as a sacrifice, a propitiatory
oblation of the body of Christ, for the sins of the quick and
dead. The altar thus administers to a gross and impious idola
try : many of the people actually worshipping a breaden god ;
supposing that the very person, soul, and divinity of Christ are
present on the altar. Why, therefore, should there be any longer
an altar without a propitiatory sacrifice, by a sacerdotal Priest ?
Let us return to the truth, to the Bible form and name ; let us
have no more an altar, but a tabic. What want we of an altar,
while we have no more a transubstantiation ?
We have now come to the period which marks the rise of
the Puritans. While so many things were struck off from
the ancient forms and implements of superstition, ihere were
several other appendages of Popery which those who held the
power of reforming determined still to preserve! The thing
which gave the first occasion to a debate that at length drew
after it the great questions of religious freedom and the limits of
civil or ecclesiastical power, was the Garments of the Priest
hood: apparently a small matter, but involving the mightiest
principles, and the dearest rights that concern the earthly exist
ence of man.
We arc willing, — said the more ardent among the Reforming
clergy, — to wear distinctive garments of some sort, if you
please ; — anything decent, — but do not compel us to wear such
regimentals of Popery, as will by the people be regarded a badge
of the popish faith. The refusal came first from the eloquent
and devoted Hooper, who had been appointed Bishop of Glou
cester, but who scrupled whether he might, in conscience, submit
to be consecrated in popish vestments. The martyr Hooper thus
shares with Wickliffe the immortal honor of being the father of
thi' English Puritans.
The reason for refusing the garments was the same as for
demolishing the altars. The garments had been consecrated by
popish mummeries, and were supposed to possess a mysterious
virtue, like holy water, — which mystic virtue imparted a sacred-
ncss and validity to the acts of the priest who wore them. In
deed, they were at that day very much like the bishop's hands,
and the " virtue" that is by full grown Puseyites at the present
5

66 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
day, supposed to flow from those hands by the mysterious effi
ciency of Apostolical succession ; so much so that without the
consecrated garments a priest could not be sure that the neces
sary virtue flowed from his acts to make them valid. Accord
ingly, when Bishop Latimer was clad in the garments in order to
be ceremoniously divested and degraded previously to his being
burned ; — as soon as the consecrated robes were torn off from
him, he cried out in derision, " Now I can make no more holy
water." John Rogers, the proto-martyr in Queen Mary's reign, per
emptorily refused to wear the garments, unless the popish priests
were enjoined to wear upon their sleeves, by way of distinction,
a chalice with a host. When Dr. Taylor was clad in the same
preparatory to being burned, he walked about saying, " How say
you, my lord, am I not a goodly fool ? If I were in Cheapside,
would not the boys laugh at these foolish toys and apish trum
pery ?" And when the surplice was pulled off, " Now," says he,
" I am rid of a fool's coat." When they were pulling the same
off from Archbishop Cranmer, he meekly replied, " All this
needed not : I myself had done with this gear long ago."—
[Neale.] Clad in these robes, the priest at the mass was considered
(to use the words of Challonar's Catholic Christian Instructed)
" as Christ's Vicegerent, and officiating in his person." The
same author informs us that the Amice, the Alb, the girdle,
the maniple, the stole, the chasuble, represent the cloth with
which Christ's face was muffled, the white garment in which
he was arrayed, the bands with which he was fastened, and the
purple garment which was put on him. The great cross on the
back represents the cross which he bore ; and the tonsure, the
crown of thorns. Such were the superstitions and corruptions
with which the priestly garments stood connected. Hooper
thought he could not use them without abetting the superstitions
of Popery. Bucer at Cambridge, and Peter Martyr at Oxford,
to whom he applied for advice, declared against the garments as
the inventions of antichrist. Most of the Reforming clergy
agreed with Hooper in opinion. Hooper was thrown into pri
son because he declined being made a bishop, on condition of
being obliged to wear the garments. Afterwards a compromise
was effected ; Hooper consented to wear the robes at his consecra
tion, and when he preached before the king in his Cathedral,
and was allowed a dispensation at other times.
King Edward was now rapidly descending to the grave. The
Reformers could do no more. Six years only had been allowed
them to begin the work of Reformation, when the Bloody Mary
ascended the throne and committed them to the flames.

REIGN OF QUEEN MARY.
Her duplicity. Restoration of Popery. Re-ordination of Clergymen or
dained by King Edward's Book. Kingdom reconciled to the Pope.
Burning of the Reformers. A Puritan Church discovered : its officers
burned. Exiles at Frankfort
It is now 290 years* since the popish Mary came to the crown
of England, and interrupted the fair work of the Reformers.
Never did the blasting breath ofthe Sirocco, or the pestilence, mark
its course with more ample tokens of its destructive power, than
that brief five years' reign of the Bloody Mary. Six years only
had elapsed since the death of Henry VIII. ; six years only were
allowed to the Reformers to effect and consolidate the Reforma
tion ; five years more brought the nation back into the chains of
Popery, and gave the long list of Reformers to the flames. We
can hardly bring our minds to admit the reality that these things
transpired in England within the last 300 years.
The character of Mary is no less accurately than briefly drawn
in the words of the historian Hume : " Mary possessed all the
qualities fitted to compose a bigot ; and her extreme ignorance
rendered her utterly incapable of doubt in her own belief, or in
dulgence to the opinions of others. She possessed few qualities
cither estimable or amiable ; and her person was as little en
gaging as her behavior and address. Obstinacy, bigotry, vio
lence, cruelty, revenge, tyranny, every circumstance of her char
acter took a tincture from her bad temper and narrow under
standing." To this we may add that she most conscientiously
thought, that in committing the Reformers to the flames, she
was doing the most acceptable service to God.
Her reign was answerable to these principles and this descrip
tion. The long and sickening details of the horrid cruelties
practised, we cannot now pursue to any extent. They should
however be read and pondered ; and works containing the his-
?1843.

68 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
tory in extended form are now accessible among the cheap pub
lications of the day.*
Mary had promised that she would make no alteration in
religion, and to this promise she was in no small measure in
debted for her bloodless succession to the throne in opposition to
the claims of Lady Jane Grey. Upon this promise the men of
Suffolk joined her standard, and at once decided the question,
A few days after her entrance into London, she declared in
Council, that though her conscience was settled in matters of
religion, she had resolved not to compel others but by the preach
ing of the Word. Within one week from that day, she prohibited
all preaching throughout the realm, without special license,
" It was easy to foresee," says Hume, " that none but Catholics
would be favored with this privilege." The men of Suffolk took
the alarm ; and presuming upon their services, sent a deputation
to represent their grievances ; but the queen rebuked their inso
lence ; and one of them venturing to speak of her promise, he
was " put in the pillory for three days together and deprived of
his ears." In three days more, the popish bishops, Bonner, Gardi
ner, Tonstal and others, were reinstated in their sees. Hooper,
Coverdale, Taylor, and Rogers, were taken into custody. Within
a fortnight more, Cranmer and Latimer were sent to the Tower,
The storm gathered thick and fast: many hundreds ofthe clergy
and principal men fled beyond sea : among whom were Samp
son, Sandys, Reynolds, Knox the reformer of Scotland, Fox the
martyrologist, and Grindal and Jewell, afterwards archbishops.
The popish priests began to celebrate mass in the churches
where they had control. The Protestant ministers and churches
began to be openly insulted and hindered in their worship. A
Judge Hales, who ventured to govern his conduct by the unre
pealed laws of the realm, rather than according to what he might
have conjectured to be the pleasure of the queen, was fined a
ruinous sum, and by rough treatment driven to distraction and
suicide. Two months had not quite elapsed when the queen was
crowned by Gardiner, attended by ten bishops, all in their mitres,
copes and crosiers, though contrary to law. Ten days after, the
parliament was opened by a Mass of the Holy Ghost in the
Latin tongue, celebrated by both houses, with all the ancient
ceremonies, though forbidden by law.
The service book of King Edward was abolished. All his
laws for the reforming of public worship were repealed. In
little more than four months from the queen's accession, the old
*" Fox's Book of Martyrs" is among these cheap publications, in which authen
tic accounts are found in full detail. " The Days of Queen Mary," prepared by the
London Tract Society, has recently been re-published in cheap form in this country

REIGN OF QUEEN MARY. 69
Romish service in Latin was by law resumed throughout the
realm. Severe laws were made against all who should treat the
Mass with irreverence ; and it was made felony for more than
twelve persons to assemble together with an intent to alter the
religion established by law. The Convocation met with Bonner
in the chair ; and all who had a right to sit, save six, subscribed
the doctrine of transubstantiation.
The queen now issued her orders, directing all the ceremonies,
holidays, and feasts of King Henry's time to be revoked. Those
clergymen who had been ordained by the late service book, were
to be re-ordained ; and all people compelled to come to church.
" The Mass," says Neale, " was set up in all places ; and the old
popish ceremonies revived. The carvers and makers of statues
had a quick trade for roods and other images that were to be set
up in the churches. The most eminent preachers were afready
under confinement, and about three thousand more were in this
visitation deprived."
Cardinal Pole was by this time come from Rome as Legate
of the Pope, with power to receive the kingdom once more into
the bosom of the Catholic Church. The parliament drew up
a supplication to Mary and her husband, Philip of Spain, to in
tercede with the legate of his holiness that England might be
graciously pardoned the damnable offence of departing from
Rome. This intercession the legate kindly admitted ; and
sitting covered, with the lords and commons kneeling before him,
he mercifully granted a full absolution ; only enjoining as a
penance that they should repeal all laws passed against Roman
ism. This being done, all proceeded to the chancel, and with
great joy sung praise to God for such singular mercy. One man
in parliament, and only one, refused to kneel before this deputy
of a foreign priest; and that man was Sir Ralph Bagnel ; a
name, for this alone, worthy of lasting honor.
The kingdom being now restored to the Papacy, the next
thing to be done was to take care of the Reformers. It has been
the uniform custom of Rome, wherever she has had the power, —
whenever a Reformation has broken out within her pale, to over
whelm the rising movement in blood. " Drunken with the
blood of the saints," has been her true description from age to
age. The Inquisitions of Spain; — those dungeons of secresy
and torture, the sighing and tears and blood of whose victims will
never be fully revealed till the Day of Judgment ; — the Cru
sades against the Christians of Piedmont ; — the dragooning
of the Huguenots and the massacre of the Protestants on
St. Bartholomew's day in France ; — these things have marked
her character in all countries and all ages. It is her boast
to be infallible— never to err and never to change. One of

70 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
her modern catechisms (I quote from the " Days of Queen
Mary," by the London Tract Society) uses the following
language : " It is not to be denied that heretics and schismatics,

'o

because they have revolted from the Church (for they no
more belong to it than deserters do to the army which they
have abandoned), it is not however to be denied that they
are in the power of the Church as persons who may be punished,
and doomed by anathema to damnation." Pope Pius VII.,
in A. D. 1805, writing his nuncio in Vienna, says : " We have
fallen on times so calamitous and humiliating to the spouse of
Jesus Christ, that it is not possible for her to practise, nor expe
dient for her to recall so holy maxims ; and she is forced to
interrupt the course of her just severities against the enemies
of the faith."
Rome now had the power once more in her own hands ; and
England was at her mercy. The old sanguinary laws against
dissenters from her faith and worship were restored in all their
severity. Henry VIII., though a bloody monster, who never
hesitated to burn such as he judged to be heretics, — had yet
made a merciful alteration in the laws. No person was any
longer to be seized and imprisoned, or doomed to death, at the
mere pleasure of an ecclesiastic. The civil power was required
to concur. The accused was to be condemned only by a course
of law, and upon the verdict of a jury. The ecclesiastical au
thorities were now once more empowered to seize any person,
and confine him, without trial, at their pleasure, in prisons wholly
under their own control. Such prisons the Bishops had, and
they used them without mercy. When the prisoner was brought
forth, it was not to stand before the tribunals of law, but before
mere arbitrary prelates, whose law was their caprice. He was
not allowed the privileges granted to the most atrocious criminal,
" There was no jury to decide ; no judge humanely examining
the evidence brought forward by the accuser ; no counsel to
advise, or to make such inquiries as the case suggested; no
friends whose presence might show the poor prisoner that there
were some to sympathize in his fate. There was no open ex
amination of witnesses ; nor was the prisoner allowed to call for
persons whose testimony might disprove the accusation against
him." I have taken these last sentences from " the Days of
Queen Mary," by the London Tract Society ; and a better general
description of these scenes cannot be given, than that given by the
same tract in the following words : " After enduring an arbitrary
imprisonment, generally in a loathsome dungeon, loaded with
fetters, debarred from the necessaries of life, — view the prisoner,
enfeebled with long confinement, brought before the cruel and
iniquitous Bonner, — or some one of like spirit, — whenever his

REIGN OF QUEEN MARY. /I
judge was pleased to summon him, and commonly without any
previous notice." — " View him received with taunts and revil-
ings, commanded to hear accusations brought forward by some
secret enemy ; not permitted to disprove any calumnies with
which he might be charged, but required to ' turn or burn! " —
" The judge might perhaps remand him for a short interval, or
even try to work upon him by false professions of kindness ;
but when these efforts proved fruitless, his end was certain. He
was condemned, and sent to the stake, probably within a few
hours, ' there to be burned alive, often with protracted sufferings,
subjected to insults and violence from ignorant, bigoted individu
als, who were taught to believe that such proceedings were
acceptable to a just and holy God.' " — " The martyr suffered not
in his own person only." — " When called upon to give the short
and important answer, which would seal his fate, he knew that
every member of his family would have to share the bitter cup
of persecution. Already the beloved of his soul were pining at
home, supported only by the scanty remnants of the earnings of
his former industry, or dependent on the charity of others, about
to be cast helpless upon the world, doomed to bear the disgrace
which would be attached to his name by a cruel and hard
hearted generation."
General statements, however, never strike the mind like the
detailed history of individuals. No one's imagination will fill
up the outline given in this meagre general description. To
obtain a just conception of these cruelties, one must read the
simple narratives of the martyrologists. He must see the inhu
man Bonner, tearing the hair, and lacerating the faces of the
victims, who have been dragged from a long and dreary confine
ment in the prison which has received the name of Bonner's coal-
house. He must see that bloodthirsty bishop holding the hand of
the humble Tompkins in the flame of a lamp, till the sinews shrink
and the blood spurts forth into the faces of those who stand by.
He must read the details of Rogers' imprisonment ; and see him led
to the stake forbidden even to say farewell to his wife and nume
rous family of children, who have come out, if possible, to take
their last view of him on his way to execution. He must see
Hooper, with green faggots piled around him, in a lowering
morning, while the high wind blows the scanty flame away
from his body; and the fire, for a long time, reaches only his
extremities, and when this nearly dies away, we must see him
with his hand wiping the sweat of agony from his face, and
mildly but earnestly entreating that more fire may be kindled ; —
and then continuing praying, till the operators see him "black
in the mouth," and his tongue so swollen that he cannot speak ;
yet his lips moving till they shrink from the gums ; and he

72 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
smiting his breast, till one of his arms falls off in the fire ; and
then continuing knocking with the other, while " the fat, and
water and blood, drop out at his finger ends;" we must
stand by him till the fire has been replenished the third time ;
and that hand at last cleaves fast to the hot iron upon his
breast ; — and he falls over his chain, and expires.
From witnessing such burnings as these, he who would be
come acquainted with the sorrows of the martyrs, must go to
the Lollards' tower, and elsewhere, to see the prisoners. He
must see them with their feet or hands in the stocks ; or fastened
in some torturing posture, pining away the weeks and months
in famine, cold, and darkness. As these prisoners are dragged
to the stake, he must see little children following a beloved
father, and begging with cries of distraction that they may be
burned with him. But I will not — I cannot dwell further upon
these horrid details.
Let us pass to the things in Queen Mary's reign, which more
appropriately relate to the rise and progress of the Puritans.
It is not to be supposed that the multitudes of pious and
enlightened people in the land, could, in these times of distress
and terror, rest satisfied with the idolatrous rites of Popery,
Kindred spirits would meet together, to pour their sorrows into
each other's bosoms, and to pour out their complaints unto God.
There were accordingly many secret congregations assembling
in private houses, in the fields, or on board ships, or wherever
they might find a place sufficiently concealed. Here we begin
to observe how uniformly Christian people, when they are cut
loose from human forms and restraints, and left to adopt for
themselves such organization and order as simple piety finds in
the light of nature and of God's Word, resort to the simple
worship and discipline of Puritanism. Such were the princi
ples laid down by Wickliffe. Such, of necessity, was the wor
ship of the Lollards. Such must have been the worship and
discipline of those congregations who are mentioned as meeting
secretly for worship during the reigns of the Henrys, the Seventh
and Eighth ; which congregations were, in all probability, but the
descendants and the successors of the early followers of Wickliffe,
Such was the case with the pious men and women who gath
ered secretly for the enjoyment of the worship and ordinances
of pure religion, in the day3 of the Bloody Mary. " There
were several congregations," says Neale, " up and down the
country, which met together in the night, and in secret places,
to cover themselves from the notice of their persecutors. Great
numbers in Suffolk and Essex constantly frequented the private
assemblies of the Gospellers, and came not at all to the pub
lic service ; but the most considerable congregation was in and

REIGN OF QUEEN MARY. 73
about London. It was formed soon after Queen Mary's ac
cession, and consisted of above two hundred members."
A seizure was made of Mr. Rough, who had been " elected"
minister of this Church, and of Cuthbert Sympson, their deacon,
who kept a book containing the names and accounts of the
congregation. This, then, was a Congregational Church, with
its minister and deacon, " elected" by the people. The Church
of England knows no such popular election ; it has no perma
nent unpreaching deacon, the officer of a particular Church. In
spite of their familiarity with the prelatical organizations, these
pious people who met to worship God at the hazard of their
lives, were no sooner left to themselves, to the Bible and to
nature, than the path was open and plain. They were led at
once to the simple worship, discipline and organization, so
manifestly used in apostolic times ; and afterwards so faithfully-
copied by our Pilgrim Fathers.
To test a principle, I would fain ask those who talk so much
about Apostolic succession, and the sin of schism, while they
maintain the Church of Rome a true Church, and her Priests and
Bishops to be ministers of the true Apostolic succession; — I
would fain ask these, Of what sin were these pious men and
women guilty, when they met in secret places to worship God,
in the reign of the Bloody Mary ? Lay your hand upon your
heart and tell me which was the true Church, and with which
was a true disciple of Christ to meet and worship ; with which
should he join in breaking the bread of the communion of the
body of our Lord ? — With those devout people who met in
secret, or with those who hunted them for their lives ? Tell me,
where does your soul go ? Where does the Word of God
bid you go ? With Christ's truth and people, or with a wicked
murderous succession, who have abandoned Christ's truth, and
are persecuting his people to death ? Suppose those times of
darkness had continued for some centuries, — as they did con
tinue over the Christian valleys of Piedmont,— might these
Christians never meet to worship God or to enjoy his ordinances ?
Are they still bound to that " Succession, of atheistical, heathen
ish, bloody monsters wearing mitres, whose constant work it is
to torture and destroy the disciples of our Lord Jesus Christ ?
Are they still helplessly dependent — from generation to genera
tion — upon those debauchees, infidels, and murderers, for the
bread of life ? Tell me, — When the Succession abandons
Christ and his truth, which shall we follow; Christ and his
truth ; or a lying and heathenish succession ? If there be schism
at such a time, who is the true schismatic, the simple Christian
who cleaves to Christ and his truth, or the mitred prelate who
departs from both ? Whatever be the doctrine of Prelatists on

74 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
this point, the doctrine of the Word of God is too plain to be
misapprehended ; " Though we, or an angel from heaven,
preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached
unto you, let him be accursed." If we must follow God's truth
rather than an Apostle or an angel from heaven ; how much
more must we abide by the truth, rather than by a persecuting
murderous teacher of falsehood, even though he should wear a
mitre, and claim to be official successor of the Apostles ?
These pious brethren continued to assemble wherever they could
hope to escape the bishop's spies ; till at length a false brother,
who perhaps had joined them for the purpose of treachery, be
trayed them. The minister, the deacon and many others were
seized. Sympson was put upon the rack three times in one day,
because he would neither discover the register ofthe Church, nor
the names of its members. He was sent to Bonner. " You see,"
said Bonner to the spectators, " what a personable man this is ; and
for his patience, if he was not a heretic, I should much commend
him ; for he has been three times racked in one day, and in my
house has endured some sorrow, and yet I never saw his pa
tience moved." Sympson, Rough, and others of the congregation
ended their lives in the flames.
The exiles at Frankfort also organized themselves into a
Congregational Church, electing their ministers and deacons.
Deliberately considering the order of worship to be used, they
laid aside the litany, the surplice, the responses, and many things
in the communion service. The order of their worship was first
a prayer, then a psalm, a prayer, a sermon, a prayer, at the close
of which was joined the Lord's prayer, a rehearsal of the articles
of belief, a psalm, and last the benediction. " Other exiles set
up another Church of like descriptions at Embden in East Fries-
land ; others did the same at Wesel in Westphalia." [Prince,
N. England Chronology.]
The exiles were not, however, in all places of the same mind.
The Church at Frankfort sending to certain divines at Strasburg
to come to their aid and ministry, these refused except on condi
tion that the Church should restore the Liturgy. The Church at
Frankfort refused, saying that the Liturgy had been altered in King
Edward's time as far as circumstances would permit, and that
" If God had not in these wicked days hindered it by his Provi
dence, they would have altered more ; — and in our case," said
they, " we doubt not but they would have done as we do."
The Strasburg divines urging a compliance, the Church gave
their decided answer in the negative. This answer was signed
in behalf of the Church, by John Knox, the famous Reformer of
Scodand, by Fox the martyrologist, and by several more.
In this juncture, willing to receive light, and wishing to fol
low the path of duty, the Church resolved to ask advice of Calvin,

REIGN of QUEEN MARY. 75
who was at that day in the highest repute in England and
throughout all countries where the Reformation had extended.
Calvin having carefully examined the Prayer-Book, gave it as his
opinion, that " There were many endurable weaknesses in it ;
which, because at first they could not be amended, were to be
suffered. But it behooved grave and godly ministers of Christ
to enterprise further, and set up something more filed from rust,
and purer. If religion had flourished till this day in England,
many of these things would have been reformed. But since the
Reformation is overthrown, and a Church is to be set up in
another place, where you are at liberty to establish what order
is most for edification, / cannot tell what they mean who are so
fond of the leavings of popish dregs."
The next year brought Dr. Cox to Frankfort, who broke through
the order established in the Church, created a great disturbance,
and caused Knox to be accused of high treason against the em
peror, on account of some expressions in a book which Knox
had some years before published in English, in which he had
said that the emperor was not less an enemy to Christ than Nero.
The magistrates, fearful of difficulty with the emperor, desired
Knox to leave the city. The party of Cox, now strengthened by
accessions from abroad, set up the Liturgy, and organized the
church anew. Most of the old congregation left the city. It is
remarkable that the new church, made up of men so strenuous
for the Liturgy, gave the very first exhibition of a conflict between
the clergy and the people, as to where lies the power of ultimate
appeal ; whether in the clergy or in the brethren of the church.
The rector summoned one of the members to appear at the ves
try before the officers of the church. The member appealed to
the body of the church, who ordered the cause to be brought before
them. The rector and officers chose rather to resign than to ad-
mil these rights of the church. The church maintained their
ground, and formally determined that" In all controversies among
themselves, and especially in cases of appeal, the last resort
should be in the church."
Such was the strange issue of the contentions at Frankfort.
Those who bad strenuously opposed the Liturgy, went and sub
mitted themselves to the Presbyterian discipline at Geneva.
Those who had been ready to turn everything upside down for
a Liturgy, remained and asserted the strongest principle of Con
gregationalism. So gradually dawned the light. So surely does
abuse of power teach the injured their rights. Discussion — and
even dissension — is made to lead to the discovery of truth. Old
principles, though established in ancient precedents and ratified
by law, are sifted. What can be shaken is laid aside. Truth
is eternal ; its opposers are mortal. Contests may await it ;
times of declension may leave it for a season depressed and ob-

76 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
scured ; but in spite of all it holds on its way ; commending itself
to right reason ; approving itself always simple and glorious ; the
friend of freedom, of knowledge, and religion ; till at last it is es
tablished, never to be overthrown. Though angry controversy in
trivial matters is always to be deprecated, I cannot be of the
opinion of those who dread the issue of a temperate though ear
nest discussion of questions lying at the foundation of the great
matters of truth -and order, and of human rights. I know not to
what stagnation and tyranny the world and the Church would
have been given over, but for such conflicts of principle. Cer
tain it is, that whatever evils may have resulted from such con
flicts, much darkness and much corruption would have encum
bered the Church without them; much that is fairest in truth would
never have been discovered, or being discovered, would have
been undervalued and of little use. " There must be heresies,"
says an Apostle, " that they which are approved may be made
manifest among you." There must be discussion — perhaps at
times dissension— that what is true and useful and important
may be made known. Only it should be remembered that truth
and duty — not party ends nor party spirit — should govern the dis
cussion ; for " The wrath of man worketh not the righteousness
of God." Save for the conflicts of Puritanism, freedom would
never have been known ; and a sort of religion scarcely in ad
vance of Romanism would have reigned unbroken in England,
if not throughout the Christian world.
But these heats of controversy between those who had for
conscience sake fled from their native land, could not last for
ever. These were transient fires ; the principle of love was deep
seated within them, an unquenchable flame. The short reign
of Mary had not passed away, before these grudges seemed
nearly forgotten. In this respect the " sun " did not " go down
upon their wrath." Letters of mutual esteem and love passed
between the exiles of Geneva and those of Frankfort. With the
accession of Elizabeth all promised to forget their former dis
pleasure, and to strive together for a further reform. " We trust,"
said those who had been so strenuous for the Prayer-Book, " that
true religion shall be restored, and that we shall not be burdened
with unprofitable ceremonies. And if any shall be obtruded
that shall be offensive at our meeting in England, — which we
trust will be shortly, — we will brotherly join with you to be
suitors for the reformation and abolishing of the same." " And
I find," says Prince, in his N. England Chronology, " that soon
returning to England they were as good as their word."
Having seen Puritanism in its first endurance of suffering, we
come now to view it in its activity, girding itself for its first en
counters with the spirit of formalism and despotism in the long
and rigid reign of Queen Elizabeth.

VI.

QUEEN ELIZABETH.
Reformation conducted on principles of State policy. Papists to be kept
in the Church. High Commission. Things offensive to Papists stricken
out of the Liturgy. Plan of keeping Papists in the Church successful.
Foresight of the Puritans. Their predictions verified. Original com
plaints of the Puritans. Progress of their inquiries.
The accession of Queen Elizabeth, 17th November, A.D. 1558,
was regarded by all parties as the signal for a return from Popery
to the Reformation. There were circumstances, however, which
rendered it difficult to make the change either sudden or com
plete, had the queen ever so heartily desired it. The offices of
the Church were filled with popish bishops and popish priests.
A large share of the people were still popish. The Pope had
pronounced the queen illegitimate, and incapable of inheriting
the throne. In the failure of Elizabeth, Mary Queen of Scots
was the undoubted heir, and both she and the popish sovereigns
wanted only a favorable opportunity to assert her title to the throne.
Elizabeth saw the difficulties of her situation, and was too
politic to risk any commotions by attempting too sudden or too
wide a departure from the rituals then in use. This caution
arose from a due survey of the dangers, and was deliberately
made the rule of the policy to be pursued. Maddo.r, who, a
hundred years ago, attempted to justify her conduct towards the
Puritans, transcribes a state paper " of considerable consequence,"
as he says, laying down " a plan of a Reformation," and contain
ing a survey of the " dangers that were likely to follow." The
following are the dangers specified in that survey :
" 1st. The Bishop of Rome will be incensed ; will excommu
nicate the queen's highness; interdict the realm, and give it a
prey to all princes that will enter upon it.
" 2d. The French king and his people will be encouraged to
persist more vigorously in the war against declared heretics.
" 3d. Scotland will have some boldness, and by that way the
French king will soonest attempt to invade us.
"4th. Ireland will be very difficult to be stayed in their obe
dience by reason of the clergy that are associated to Rome.

78 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
" 5th. Many people of our own will be very much discontented,
especially these sorts ; (1) Such as governed in the late Queen
Mary's reign, and were chosen thereto for no other cause, or
were then esteemed for being hot and earnest in the other re
ligion ; and now remain unplaced or uncalled to credit ; — these
will study all the ways they can to maintain the former doings.
(2) The Bishops and all the clergy will see their own ruin ; and
in confession and preaching, and all other ways they can, will
persuade people from it (3) Men which be of the papist sort,
who late were in manner all the judges of the law*, and justices
of the peace, — are like 4o join with the bishops and clergy. (4)
' Many such as would gladly have the alterations from the Church
of Rome, when they shall see, peradventure, that some old cere
monies shall still be left, or that their doctrine which they embrace
is not allowed and commanded only, and all other abolished and
disapproved, shall be discontented and call the altered religion
a cloaked papistry, a mingle-mangle.' "
These were the prudential reasons avowed, for not being
governed solely by the truth and purity of the Word of God in
the proposed Reformation, but by considerations of State policy.
What sort of standards for doctrine and rituals such a heart
less politician as Queen Elizabeth was likely to establish under
such circumstances, may be readily conjectured.
There was still another plea for conducting the Reformation
rather with a regard to keeping the Papists quiet, than with re
gard to truth and purity of worship ; which plea is thus stated by
Maddox, and which, though I have already quoted it, is of suffi
cient importance here to repeat : " Besides, as the nation in
general was popish, it plainly appeared an act of great compas
sion to many thousand souls, as well as necessary to the queen's
safety, and the success of the Reformation, to contrive, if it were
possible, such a form of worship, without idolatry, which might
KEEP THE POPISH PEOPLE IN THE CHURCH."
Thus the ground of defence and justification relied upon by
Bishop Maddox in his work against the Puritans, is the unblush
ing avowal that the offices of the Church of England were finally
settled, not on the ground which Protestants consider purest and
most scriptural, but upon the designed and avowed policy of
"keeping the Papists in the Church;" by retaining just as much
of the popish cast, and spirit, and forms, as was " not idolatry ?'
having due "regard to the essentials of religion ;" which were
still to be judged of by the politic queen !
Can there be any wonder that there should arise a band of
Puritans, bold enough to express their discontent at being com
pelled not only to conform in all particulars to rituals and Litur
gies established on these principles ; but compelled also to sub-

QUEEN ELIZABETH. 79
scribe to the same, their unqualified approval as fully consonant
to the Word of God ? Was all due to policy, and nothing to
conscience, to the truth, to freedom, and to God ?
If the dangers which surrounded Queen Elizabeth might be
pleaded to justify this policy in the beginning of her reign, these
dangers had passed away before her greatest severities against
the Puritans commenced ; and while these dangers lasted, the
Puritans chose rather to suffer in quiet, waiving their rights
and enduring everything that could be endured, rather than fail
in patriotism ; or than to expose the Reformation to the en
croachment of foreign powers. That the Puritans ever sided
with the Papist against the Protestant religion, or against the
Protestant government of their country, no well-informed man
will ever venture to assert, till in his party zeal he has bid a long
adieu to truth. When the Puritans stood at last for their rights,
it was no mere resistance to a crooked state policy induced by
dangers or by a stern necessity ; but a resistance to tyranny avowed
on principle, and to the settled policy of despotism, founded on no
plea of danger, but on open denial of the rights of conscience.
Besides this policy, which led to the predetermined adherence
to many of the forms and superstitions of Popery, Elizabeth was
by taste and principle much inclined to those superstitions and
forms. Hume has justly said, that " Elizabeth was attached to
the Protestants chiefly by her interests and the circumstances of
her birth ; and seems to have entertained some propensity to the
Catholic superstition, at least to the ancient ceremonies." " So
far was the princess herself from being willing to despoil religion
of the few ornaments and ceremonies which remained in it,"
that she " was rather inclined to bring the public worship still
nearer the Romish ritual; and she thought the Reformation
had already gone too far in shaking off those forms and ob
servances, which, without distracting men of more refined appre
hensions, tend, in a very innocent manner, to amuse and engage
the vulgar." " It was with great difficulty (says Neale, on the
authority of Burnet), and not without a sort of protestation from
the bishops, that she would consent to have orders given for
taking away from the churches, such remnants of idolatry as
the shrines, rolls of wax, paintings, arid other monuments of
feigned miracles. In her own chapel she kept still a crucifix
with images of the Virgin Mary and St. John ; and when
Sandys, Bishop of Worcester, spoke to her against it, she
threatened to deprive him of his bishopric. She would not
part with her altar and lighted candles." " The gendemen and
singing children appeared" [in her chapel] " in their surplices,
and priests in their copes." — " In short, the service performed in
the queen's chapel, and in sundry cathedrals, was so splendid

80 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
and showy, that foreigners could not distinguish it from the
Roman, except that it was performed in the English tongue."
" By this means, the popish laity were deceived into conformity,
and came regularly to church for more than ten years, till the
Pope, being out of all hopes of an accommodation, forbad them,
by excommunicating the queen, and laying the whole kingdom
under an interdict." " She grew so superstitious," says Prince,
" that when she was sixty years old, and her decaying nature
required the use of meat, she would not eat a bit of flesh for the
forty days of Lent, without a solemn license from her own arch
bishop Whitgift (who depended wholly on her for power to
grant it), — nor would she be easy with one general license, but
must have it renewed every year, for several years."
When we add to these considerations of state policy, and to
this tendency of the queen to superstition, the fact that to seven
Protestants in her council she chose thirteen Papists, — and that
the council and queen controlled entirely the establishment of
religion, we shall be able to anticipate the sort of Reformation
which was likely to follow.
Such were the power, the policy, the taste, the principles,
under which the rituals of the English Church were to receive
that final establishment, set forth in the Prayer-Book which it is
now the fashion to laud as the " sole surviving monument of the
Reformation."* A strict conformity to that standard was now
about to be enforced by the strong hand of power, and every
variation to be sought out and punished with inquisitoral
severity. The thoroughly Protestant part of the nation was not in a
mood to have anything forced upon them, which, in their estima
tion, savored of the mummeries or the abominations of Popery.
From the dungeons ; from the flames that consumed the martyrs
in the reign of terror now just over, they had imbibed an abso
lute horror of everything popish. In the gilded ornaments,
pompous ceremonies, and ghostly robes of the man of sin, they
had learned to discover the germs of false principles, — the latent
seeds of a superstition, which, when matured into their full
growth and power, and fully ripe, had turned religion itself into
an engine of tyranny and murder. They had learned to hate
even the garment spotted by the flesh. They could not in con
science give the sanction of their example to the use of ceremo
nies and utensils inseparably joined, in the common estimation,
to the superstitions and abominations of Popery. In retaining
the vestments, utensils, and ceremonials so thoroughly associ
ated with Popery, they foretold that the seeds of false doctrine,
of superstition, and of Popery itself, would be retained. These
¦* Bishop Brownell, Charge,

QUEEN ELIZABETH. 81
robes, utensils, and rituals were, therefore, in their view, not in
different. It was not that they were self-willed ; nor were they
with narrow views and bigoted minds fighting against a mere
surplice or ceremony ; — but they had been taught by bitter ex
perience, to resist first principles; — to take their stand where
alone a stand is possible, — at the beginnings of the evil, before
everything is overwhelmed and swept away by its prevailing
flood. The queen pursued the line of policy which herself with the
council had deliberately marked out. For some time the public
religion continued as she found it. The popish priests kept on
celebrating mass. None of the Protestant clergy ejected in the
last reign were restored. Orders were given against all innova
tions. When some began to use King Edward's service book,
the queen prohibited all preaching, and the reading of any prayers
save those appointed by law, till the meeting of parliament.
The parliament restored to the sovereign the supremacy of the
Church ; gave to her the nomination of all bishops ; and vested
in the crown, the power, without any concurrence of Parlia
ment or convocation, to repress all heresies, to establish or to
repeal all canons ; to ordain, alter, or abolish, whatever religious
rite or ceremony, she in her sovereign discretion and pleasure
should choose. In order to the due exercise of this power, they
gave her authority to institute that arbitrary and uncontrollable
Court of High Commission, whose atrocities we shall hereafter
have so much occasion to notice.
The queen now instructed her committee of divines to revise
King Edward's Liturgy. They were required to strike out all
offensive passages against the Pope, and to make the people
easy about the bodily presence of Christ in the sacrament. As
to the wishes of those who desired a purer worship, no provi
sion was made, or intended to be made, out of regard to these.
The petition, " From the tyranny of the Bishop of Rome, and
all his detestable enormities, good Lord deliver us," was struck
out from the Litany. The Rubric declaring that by kneeling at
the sacrament no adoration was intended to any corporeal pre
sence of Christ, was struck out. The old festivals, with their eves,
were continued as in the second year of King Edward VI., sub
ject to the queen's pleasure to take them away. Whereas in the
revised Liturgy of King Edward, all the garments except the
surplice were laid aside, the queen now ordered that the copes
and other gear should be restored.
The Book of Common Prayer thus prepared was by parlia
ment established by law ; and to its rituals and worship all were
required, under penalties adequate to compel anything but con
science, to conform. 6

82 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
I have already noticed how, all along, the government (not
the Church) established or changed the organization and wor
ship of the Church of England. It was not the Church, but
King Henry VIII. or Edward VI. and council, or Queen Eliza
beth and council and parliament, that ordered all these things.
In the ratifying of this service book in parliament, the Archbishop
of York objected that " An act of this consequence ought to have
had the consent of the clergy in Convocation, before it passed
into law. Even Arian Emperors," said he, " ordered that points
of faith should be examined by councils." But he was over
ruled. It is now common to speak of the establishment of that Prayer-
Book as the work of the Church : " The Church has ordered,"
" the Church has judged," " the Church has decided !" If these
things had been said of Romish mass books and Romish mum
meries, there might be some color of reason for pleading the
authority of the Church. But in establishing the English Prayer-
Book, the queen and parliament were the authority. The Church
— in the capacity either of people, clergy, or Convocation-
had no other hand in it, than submissively to receive whatever
their masters should impose.
" The forms and ceremonies now preserved in the English
Church," says Hume, " as they bore some resemblance to the
ancient service, tended further to reconcile the Catholics to the
established religion : and as the queen permitted no other mode
of worship, and at the same time struck out everything offensive
to them in the new Liturgy, even those who were addicted to
the Romish communion made no scruple of attending the estab
lished Church." The plan of keeping the Papists in the Church
was eminently successful. Maddox himself notices that even as
late as A. D. 1561, upon a visitation of Archbishop Parker, the
major part of the beneficed clergy were either mechanics, or mass
priests in disguise. And to justify the imposition of uniform
rites of worship and forms of prayer he adds, that " Most of the
inferior beneficed clergy kept their places," and that there were
only 100 parochial clergy displaced out of 9400 parochial bene
fices. The rest of the priesthood were such men as had con
formed to the religion of the bloody Mary ; and were, therefore,
either Papists or hypocrites. If any of the exiled clergy would
conform to the queen's establishment, they were furnished with
places ; if not, such as had at first been suffered to officiate were
suspended ; and, as the least part of their sufferings, reduced to
poverty. It was not for want of evangelical and learned men,
that illiterate mechanics were put into beneficed parishes,
but because these men could not in conscience comply with the
queen's demands. Jewell (afterwards Archbishop), the year

QUEEN ELIZABETH. 83
after the queen's accession, wrote lamenting the " worldly poli
cy " with which the Reformation was conducted : " As if the
Word of God ivas not to be received on his own authority." He
complained of the imposition of the popish vestments, " the relics
of the Amorites," and wishes they were " exterminated to the
deepest roots." Grindal (afterwards Archbishop) joined in
these complaints ; as also did Cox, Horn arid Pilkington, after
wards bishops. Many others did the same, whose judgment
and heart were for a purer worship, but who vacillated between
the duty of steadfastness for truth and purity, and the policy of
yielding for the present, with the hope of redress hereafter. Knox,
Sampson, Gilpin, and the old translator of the Bible, Miles
Coverdale, were offered bishoprics ; but they could not in con
science conform to the prescribed rituals. Whitehead was offered
the Archbishopric of Canterbury, but for the same reasons he
declined. These took their stand among the Puritans. Grindal,
Jewell, Cox, Horn, and Pilkington, yielded and received bishop
rics, yet " with fear and trembling," in hopes by their interest
with the queen to obtain some reform in the constitution of the
Church. This was the very thing against which the Reformers on the
continent had, from their own bitter experience, warned the
exiles upon their return to England. Bullinger and Peter Mar
tyr, had written earnestly to Jewell, Horn, Grindal, and the rest
of the exiles, to " take care in the first beginnings, to have all
things settled upon sure and sound foundations." Gualter, of
Zurich, in a prophetic strain, and yet only deriving his forecast
from the lessons of experience, urged the Reformers, " Not to
hearken to the councils of those men, who when they saw that
Popery could not be honestly defended, nor entirely restrained,
would use all artifices to have the outward face of religion to re
main mixed, uncertain, and doubtful ; so that while an evangelical
religion is pretended, those things should be obtruded on the
Church which will make the returning back to Popery, supersti
tion, and idolatry, easy." " We have had experience of this,"
said he, " for some years in Germany, and know what influence
such persons may have." " I apprehend that in the first begin
nings, while men may study to avoid the giving of small
offence, many things may be suffered under this color for a
little while, and yet it will scarce be possible, by all the endeavors
that can be used, to get them removed, at least without great strug
gles." It was thus that the far reaching view of the Puritans foresaw
the result of retaining in the Church of England things which
were in their origin popish, and in their nature almost insepara
bly united with the fundamental errors and superstitions of Po-

84 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
pery. Jewell and Grindal hoped for a further reform. The Pu
ritans entertained no such hope. They reasoned— they stood,
as though they foresaw,— and they actually did foretell, the in
sinuating spirit with which these objectionable things would not
only be retained, but how, like a gangrene, they would eat out
the very vitals of evangelical religion. I shall ask you to ob
serve, as we progress, the remarkable fulfilment of these predic
tions. The declension from the doctrines of the Reformers to
that compound of Arminianism and Popery which prevailed
under the persecuting Laud, was but a part of their fulfilment.
Elizabeth was not in her grave, before no dubious traces of that
same compound, now known under the name of Puseyism, began
largely to develope themselves in the Church of England. The
same corruption swept over the Church in the days of High
Churchism under Queen Anne. Again, before the rise of Wes
ley and Whitefield, says the " London Christian Observer," " The
majority of the clergy denounced the doctrine of Justification by
Faith, as hostile to the interests of morality." " In this shape,"
says the same authority, " the dispute came down to the present
century. Our clergy had nearly lost sight of the true Protestant
Scripture doctrine." " The clergy very generally disclaimed alto
gether the doctrine of Justification by Faith, and exhorted men to
justify themselves by good living. They, in fact, adopted the Pa
pists' second justification, losing sight of the first." The immor
tal Wilberforce declared the prevalent errors of the clergy and
Church in his day to be such, that " The very genius and essential
nature of Christianity was changed ;" and that the great essential
doctrines of Christianity, "had almost altogether vanished from
view. Even in the greatest number of our sermons, scarcely any
traces of them are to be found."
The labors of Wesley and Whitefield ; the publication of Wil
berforce' s " Practical View of the prevailing religious system of
professed Christians, contrasted with real Christianity;" the
writings of Hannah More — to say nothing of those of such men
as John Newton and Thomas Scott — constituted a new era.
Religion had been greatly revived in the Church of England.
But while the world is beginning to hope for better things, lo !
Oxfordism — otherwise called Puseyism — breaks forth once more
in the bosom ofthe Church ; and is carrying it once more, with
fearful strides, back to the popish corruptions from which it
seemed to have escaped. The rising leprosy crosses the Atlan
tic ; and the friends of true religion lift up their voices against it
in vain. The Bishop of New York in his charge (of 1841) ex
tols the scheme, and says, " My brethren, draw your studies this
way." The Bishops of Maryland and New Jersey come out its
open, strenuous, and unflinching advocates. The Bishop of Con-

QUEEN ELIZABETH. 85
necticut, in his solemn charge, adopts most of the fundamentals
of that scheme ; and from all his clergy, and from the whole
Church over which he presides, he is not met by one single note
of remonstrance or alarm ! Is it prejudice or want of charity
which leads people of other communions to stigmatize that
Puseyistic scheme as Popery ? Hear then the Bishop of Calcut
ta : " It is," says he, " to me a matter of surprise and shame, that
in the nineteenth century, we should really have the fundamental
position of the whole system of Popery virtually re-asserted in
the bosom of that very Church which was reformed so deter-
minately, three centuries since, from this self-same evil, by the
doctrine and labors and martyrdom of Cranmer and his noble
fellow sufferers." "What! are we to have all the fond tenets
which formerly sprang from the traditions of men re-introduced ?"
— " Are we to have a refined transubstantiation ; the sacraments,
not faith, the chief means of salvation?" " The whole hangs
together : it constitutes another Gospel. It overturns the
grand peculiarity and centre tenet of all the reformed Churches."
— " Rome, not the reformed Churches, are the object of venera
tion." — "Episcopacy is accounted, in the teeth of our Articles, to
be absolutely, and under all circumstances, essential to the exist
ence of a Church." * * * "I am full of alarm ; everything is
at stake. There seems something judicial in the spread of these
opinions. If they should come over here, and pervade the teach
ing of our chaplains, the views and proceedings of our mission
aries, our friendly relations with other bodies of Christians, our
position among the Hindoos and Mahometans, — Ichabod, — the
glory is departed ; may be inscribed over our Church of India.
All real adcauces in the conrrrsion of the heathen will stop."
While many of the best men in the Episcopal Church in this
country speak out boldly and decidedly, like the Bishop of Cal
cutta, the general policy is to hush this matter up; to persuade
the people not to read, not to talk on this subject; and in the
meantime the doctrine spreads. Willi the old Puritans, I ven
ture to predict that it will be iii'snun up; it will not be, it
cannot be, effectually resisled under the organization and disci
pline and liturgy of that Church. The gangrene will spread on ;
appearing less and less horrible to the members of that commu
nion, as it becomes more and more familiar ; — or I have misjudged
the inherent character of the High Church Episcopal claims;
and drawn from history my anticipations of the future in
vain.* But what were the particular complaints of the Puritans? It
* This was written in 1S43. The world has seen how amply the doings of the
General Convention ofthe Protestant Episcopal Church, in lblO, have fulfilled this
prediction.

86 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
is sufficient to mention a few of their leading objections, to
show the ground and nature of the whole. I have already
noticed their objections against being compelled to wear the
garments which were so inseparably associated with Romish doc
trines and superstitions with regard to the sacerdotal character and
offices of the Priesthood. These objections need not here be
repeated. They objected against being required to make the sign of the
cross in baptism ; not only as unscriptural, but as associated, in
the minds of the people, with the idea of some mystical virtue
arising from the performance of a ceremony, through the ghostly
character and power of the Priest.
They objected against the private baptism of infants by women
in cases of emergency, as countenancing the idea of mystical
virtue attached to the performance of the rile ; and as connected
with the notion that infants dying without baptism cannot be
saved. They objected against the requirement of Godfathers and
Godmothers ; as unscriptural ; as taking the responsibility out
of the hands of parents where God had placed it ; and as a
virtual denial of the covenant on which infant baptism is found
ed ; — resting the baptism not on the parents' faith and privilege,
and God's covenant promise, — but on the figment of a faith and
repentance promised by the child, through his irresponsible spon
sors. This was to renounce God's covenant and promise, and
to base the transaction on an unscriptural figment and ceremony,
wholly the invention of man ; and that too a corrupt and profane
invention. They objected against the ceremony of confirmation : (1) as
unscriptural, (2) as a false pretence of communicating grace, (3)
as certifying people of the favor of God, when the conditions
of confirmation do not forbid that the ceremony may be, — nay, in
an indiscriminate national Church, often must be, — a confirm
ing of the enemies of God in a miserable and ruinous delusion.
They objected against the injunction requiring all to kneel at
the Lord's Supper; (1) as being no imitation of Christ or his
Apostles, who received the first Supper at a table in the ordinary
table posture ; — (2) as not being used even by the Primitive
Church in the ages succeeding the Apostles, but as being ex
pressly condemned ; and (3) as not having been required till
the bread in the Sacrament was pretended to be transubstantiated
into the real natural body and blood of Christ ; when people
were enjoined to kneel — as an act of worship paid to the real
presence and person of Christ himself under the form of
bread. And though in King Edward's time a rubric had been
added, declaring that the kneeling was not now required as an

QUEEN ELIZABETH. 87
act of worship, as if to the body of Christ ; yet now by Queen
Elizabeth's command that explanation was stricken out, for the
very purpose that the Papists might still, — in the use of the
Liturgy of the Church of England, — continue the idolatry of
worshipping a breaden God. The Puritans objected to no
decent posture, merely as a posture ; but they were unwilling
to give this implied sanction to the doctrine of transubstantia
tion, or to open idolatry.
They objected against the injunction of the Liturgy, that
" When in time of divine service the name of Jesus shall be
mentioned, due and lowly reverence shall be done by all persons
present." This the Puritans regarded as a childish and super
stitious interpretation of the passage, " At the name of Jesus
every knee shall bow ;" as though a bodily bowing, at the literal
name, were even a resemblance of the thing intended in
Scripture ; and as though it were proper to make this distinction
between the mere literal name of Jesus, and the other names of
the Godhead.
They objected to the ring in marriage ; as one of the charmed
symbols of the Popish Sacrament of marriage. The custom
had been to bless the ring ; or to speak more truly, to charm it
with a popish incantation. The popish office for consecrating
the ring ran thus [I copy from " Challoner's Catholic Christian
instructed ;" a work published by authority] : The priest says,
" Let us pray." Then he says, " Bless -j- O Lord" (here he
makes the sign of the Cross), " this ring, which we bless -j- in
thy name ; that she that shall wear it, keeping inviolate fidelity
to her spouse, may ever remain in peace, and in thy will ; and
always remain in mutual charity through Christ our Lord. Amen."
" Then the priest sprinkles the ring with holy water, and the
bridegroom taking it, puts the ring on Ihe fourth finger of the left
hand, saying, In the name of the Father and of the Son, and of
the Holy Ghost; with this ring I thee wed," iVc.
They objected against filling up the calendar with a multitude .
of Saints' Days which people were required to observe religiously,
while the Lord's Day was required to be made a day of merri
ment and sports.
They objected to the office of Baptism* in which the priest is
required to say, " We yield thee humble thanks * * that it hath
pleased thee to regenerate this infant with thy Holy Spirit."
They objected to the service for visitation of the sick, in which
the priest is required, upon the patient's profession of penitence,
to pronounce this absolution ; " Our Lord Jesus Christ, who
hath left power to his Church to absolve all sinners who truly
repent and believe in him ; of his great mercy forgive thee thine
* Bogue and Bennett— History ofthe Dissenters.

88 the puritans and their principles.
offences; and by his authority committed to me, I absolve
thee from all thy sins, in the name ofthe Father, and ofthe
Son, and of the Holy Ghost, Amen." The Puritans considered
this not only the means of a cruel delusion, but a blasphemous
assumption of power which belongs to God only*
They objected against the Burial Service, that the clergyman
was required to say over every one, save unbaptized adults, and
those who die excommunicated, or who have laid violent hands
on themselves, these words : " For as much as it hath pleased
Almighty God, of his great mercy to take unto himself the soul
of our dear brother now departed, w*e therefore commit his body
to the ground * * in sure hope of the resurrection to eternal
life;" and again, " We give thee hearty thanks that it hath
pleased thee to deliver this our brother out of the miseries of this
sinful world, beseeching that it may please thee shortly to accom
plish the number of thine elect."
Against such things, among others, in the service book, the Pu
ritans objected as popish, and as tending to bring back a scheme
of faith not only corrupt, but subversive of the true gospel ; and
calculated to delude and destroy the souls of men. Those who
revised the Liturgy for the Episcopal Church in America ap
pear to have considered that there were good grounds for
objection in some of these instances ; for the absolution in the
visitation of the sick is omitted ; and the burial service, instead
of saying that God hath taken the soul of the deceased " to him
self '," says simply, that He hath taken it "out ofthe ivorld ;" and
instead of committing the body to the earth " in sure and certain
hope of the resurrection to eternal life," the American book reads,
" Looking for the general resurrection in the last day."
Such were the original complaints of the Puritans. But they
were put down by the strong hand of power. Deprivations,
fines, maiming, slitting of the nostrils, cropping of the ears,
lingering death by famine, and cold, and sickness, in damp, un
wholesome prisons ; these were the arguments used to enforce
a uniform observance of the Liturgy and rituals imposed by law.
It was impossible that the Puritans, under these persecutions,
should not at length enter into some inquiry concerning the
fundamental principles of right ; and concerning the authority
of the persecuting power.
They began to inquire what right the civil power had to
make laws for the faith and order of the Church ; and at once it
flashed upon their minds, that the assumption of such authority
is not only unscriptural, but a despotic usurpation, entirely
destructive both of purity in religion and of all religious liberty, —
the dearest and most important of all human rights. It fol-
* Bogue and Bennett — History of the Dissenters.

QUEEN ELIZABETH. 89
lowed, that whether the particular things complained of in the
Liturgy were right or wrong ; the imposition of a Liturgy or of
ceremonials or articles of faith, by parliament, was in itself a
heinous wrong — an act of despotism ; and that all the laws to
enforce that imposition were so many acts of outrage upon the
dearest rights of man. If the prince and parliament may impose
articles of faith, and forms and ceremonies of worship, then that
right was as good in Queen Mary, as in King Edward or in
Queen Elizabeth. Then, when the sovereigns are popish the
people are bound in duty to God to be good papists. Then
the people must be Lutherans in Saxony, good Greek Christians
at Constantinople ; and in old England, they must have no fixed
faith or worship, — no, nor any conscience or principle in the mat
ter, save meekly to change their religion with every change or
caprice of the sovereign.
But if the civil authority has not that power, does it reside
in the Hierarchy? The inquiry was first with regard to the
rightful power of the bishops ; and secondly, with regard to their
rightful existence. In the first case, it was discovered that if
Queen Elizabeth's bishops have authority to alter, to change, and
impose Liturgies and forms, then the same power resided in
Gardiner and the Bloody Bonner ; and the consequences were
the same as in the case of the same authority in the sovereign.
The inquiry on the second point resulted in the conviction that
the very office and order of prelatical bishops was unknown
both to the early Church and to the Word of God. Wickliffe
had indeed taught this before. And John Knox, even before he
became acquainted with Calvin, had refused the offer of a bish
opric from King Edward VI. on this ground."
For this, IJcza, who has of late been represented as favorable
to the English Hierarchy, bestows on Knox the highest
eulogiums. But if the Hierarchy of Prelates has not that power, may
such impositions be made by the Church ? The Church !
These impositions are not made by the Church, in any capacity;
but by the queen and parliament. True, they are as much the
Church as the bishops are ; but what right have prelatic bishops,
whose very existence is questionable, — what right have these to
make such impositions? The Church! What is the Church?
How does she make known her decisions? .May she impose
Popery in one age or country, and Protestantism in anolher ? and
are we still bound to change with her, however she may chance
to change ?
Here arose another great issue : — Wltat is the Church ? What
is its organization ? What is the reach and the limit of its
* Bogue and Bennett — History of the Dissenters.

90 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
power ? The inquiry convinced the Puritans that such a thing
as either a Catholic authoritative unity, or a national or diocesan
Church, with power to impose articles, creeds, liturgies or cere
monials upon individual congregations of Christians, was un
known to the New Testament and to the early ages of Chris
tianity, and a sheer usurpation ; equally destructive of purity of
faith or worship ; incompatible with religious liberty, and at war
with the dearest rights of man.
In addition to this, their inquiries resulted in the conclusion,
that a Church gathering whole parishes — the profane — the unbe
lieving — the careless and the impious — indifferently) within its
pale, was not only inconsistent with the ends, the character, and
discipline of a Church as described in the New Testament ; but
necessarily destructive of those ends ; and calculated to delude
and deceive men to their eternal ruin.
These were the results to which they were gradually led, as
longer discussion and suffering brought them more and more
fully into the light. For a long time they were in doubt with
regard to the alleged sinfulness of schism : they dared not, —
they wished not to separate. For a long time they continued to
forbear and to suffer ; till at length they were forced to the con
viction that they could not worship God according to his require
ments, and continue with a corrupt and persecuting Church. At
length they saw that for congregations of Christians to use the free
dom with which Christ has endowed them ; to follow Christ where
others depart from him; and to worship God according to his
Word, is not and cannot be schismatical : and that if there
be a separation or a schism, the sin is on those who depart from
the truth and simplicity of Christ, not on those who follow
it ; and on those who obstruct and persecute the liberty
wherewith Christ has made free ; not on those who en
joy it.
The causes which led to these investigations and results, and
the persecutions which awaited those who dared to stand for
purity and freedom to worship God, will be further set forth in
the following chapter.

VII.

THE CONFLICT OF PRINCIPLE.
Ultimate scope of Puritanic Principles. Means employed to exterminate
them. Their rapid spread : nearly prevail in Convocation. The Puri
tans ask only liberty of Conscience. Not a struggle for political power.
Remonstrances of the Puritang. The Separation begins. Persecutions.
The nation roused.
The contest, thus basing itself upon the fundamental principles
of purity and religious liberty, was likely to enlist not enthusiasts
alone, whose zeal flames out hotly for a season and then expires,
— but the sober, the deep thinking,— whatever men had penetra
tion enough to perceive the mighty interests involved, and prin
ciple sufficient to forego every personal advantage, and to set
themselves for the truth and for freedom, in defiance of the storm
that was now preparing to rage. Such men there were ; men
deeply learned in the school of Christ, and in all human wis
dom : men whose talents and influence the court would have
been glad to purchase by placing them upon the bench of bish
ops, had they known how to barter truth and freedom for so
tempting a prize. They had already learned how to endure ad
versity for Christ. They had witnessed the devastations of
Popery. They had traced its abominations to their source, — to
the very beginnings and principles of the impositions to which
they were now required to yield.
ll was a new thing for the people and their humble pastors to
talk about rights. But this new idea, — fraught with such con
sequences to the human race, and destined ultimately to revolu
tionize all the theories of government that the world had enter
tained, — now started up in the minds of the Puritans. Despot
ism and superstition were now to encounter a new enemy ;—
the consciousness of rights founded on a sense of responsibility
to God. The soul of freedom and the soul of religion were
now to combine in rousing up the Puritans to a firmness and
energy which no terrors could appal, and which no force of op
pression and no violence could subdue. Here was the spring

92 THE" puritans and their principles.
of their lofty courage and of their patient endurance. Nothing
was more certain than that the simplest forms of religious wor
ship, and that republicanism, both in church and state, must
eventually spring from these principles and this spirit.
The queen and her leading statesmen saw the ultimate scope
of this contest of principle, and determined to crush the rising
doctrine of popular rights. The " Judicious Hooker" saw that
the controversy drew deep into great questions of doctrine
and of right. " Let not any one imagine," said he, " that the
bare and naked difference of a few ceremonies could either have
kindled so much fire, or caused it to flame so long ; but that the
parties which herein have labored mightily for change, and (as
they say) for reformation, had somewhat more than this mark
whereat to aim." It was so indeed : the commencement of a
momentous contest which will hereafter for ever mark an era in
the history of the struggle between despotism and the rights of
man. The queen now appointed her Court of High Commission,
and directed a general visitation, to remove from the churches
such papal furniture as it had been determined to dispense with,
and to enforce the act of uniformity. That Court of High Com
mission figures largely in the future history of the Puritans. Its
enormities were so indescribably oppressive and cruel, that at
length its very name became as odious as that of the Inquisi
tion ; and the court was at last dissolved by act of parliament,
with a clause that no such jurisdiction should be received for the
future in any court whatever. As we shall have occasion so
often to refer to the doings of that court, it is proper here to give
a brief general account of its constitution and powers. Hume
thus describes it : — " The queen appointed forty-four Commis
sioners, twelve of whom were ecclesiastics ; three Commissioners
made a quorum. The jurisdiction of the court extended over
the whole kingdom, and over all orders of men ; and every cir
cumstance of its authority, and all its methods of proceedings,
were contrary to the plainest principles of law and natural
equity." " The Commissioners were empowered to visit and
reform all errors, heresies, schisms, — in a word, to regulate all
opinions, as well as to. punish all breaches of uniformity in the
exercise of public worship. They were directed to make in
quiry, not only by the legal methods of juries and witnesses, but
by all other means and ways which they could devise ; that is,
by the racks, by torture, by inquisition, by punishment." — " Where
they found reason to suspect any person, they might administer
to him an oath called Ex officio, by which he was bound to
answer all questions, and might thereby be compelled to accuse
himself, or his most intimate friend. The fines which they

the conflict of principle. 93
levied were discretionary, and often occasioned the total ruin of
the offender, contrary to the established laws of the kingdom.
The imprisonment to which they condemned any delinquents,
was limited by no rule but their own pleasure. They assumed
a power of imposing on the clergy what new articles of
subscription, and consequently of faith, they thought proper.
Though all of the spiritual courts were subject, since the Refor
mation, to inhibitions from the supreme courts of law, the
ecclesiastical commissioners were exempted from their control." —
" The punishments which they might inflict, were according to
their wisdom, conscience, and discretion. In a word, this court
was a real Inquisition ; attended with all the iniquities as well as
cruelties inseparable from that tribunal." Such was the engine
of persecution whose powrers were so long exerted in the work
of exterminating the Puritans.
The visitors of the High Commission now set about the work
of removing from the churches the utensils and implements of
popish idolatry. Though the parishes were filled with popish
priests, the people were generally eager for the Reformation.
" Having been provoked with the cruelties of the late times,
they attended the Commissioners in great numbers, and brought
into Cheapside, St. Paul's Churchyard, and Smithfield, the
roods and crucifixes that were taken down ; and in some places
the vestments of the priests, copes, surplices, altar cloths, books,
banners; and burnt them to ashes, as it were," says Neale, " to
make atonement for the blood of the martyrs which had been
shed there." " They broke the painted windows, rased out
ancient inscriptions, and spoiled the monuments of the dead
that had any ensigns of Popery on them." Though few of the
popish priests left their parishes, yet such were the terms of con
formity that it was not possible to find Protestants of a tolerable
capacity to supply the vacancies. There were, indeed, educated,
true and tried men enough, but because they could not comply
with the queen's injunctions they were shut out. Many places
were long left vacant; others were filled with ignorant me
chanics. The Bishop of Bangor wrote that he had only two
preachers in his diocese. And Bishop Parker found the major
part of his beneficed clergy " either mechanics or Mass- Priests,
in disguise ; many churches were shut up, and in some of those
that were open, not a sermon was to be heard in some counties
within the compass of twenty miles." So many country towns
and villages were vacant, that in some places there was no
preaching, nor so much as reading a homily for many months
together. In sundry parishes it was hard to find clerical persons
to bury the dead. In the meantime multitudes of able and
learned preachers who had proved their faith in times of persecu-

94 the puritans and their principles.
tion, were shut out of the churches because they could not
conform to the habits and ceremonies without violence to then-
conscience. Among these was Miles Coverdale, one of the first
translators of the Bible, a bishop under King Edward VI., and
an exile (barely escaping martyrdom) under Queen Mary.
When Queen Elizabeth wanted Parker to be consecrated arch-
bishop, she could use Coverdale to serve the turn ; but when
this was done he might not preach the Gospel even as a parish
minister. Grindal, who had been his fellow sufferer in distress
and exile, at length ventured to give him a small living ; but he
was persecuted thence and soon after died in penury at the age
of eighty-one. " The act of Uniformity brought down his reve
rend hairs with sorrow to the grave." Vast crowds of people
testified their affection by attending his funeral John Fox, the
martyrologist, whose writings gave a severer blow to Popery in
England, than any other human work, was for a long time leftin
distressing poverty, " till at last, by the intercession of a great
friend, he obtained a prebend in the church of Sarum, which,
with some disturbance, he held till death."
Though the Puritan preachers were shut out of the churches,
their principles had taken strong hold on, probably, the largest
share of the Protestant clergy in the land.
In the year A. D. 1 562, the convocation of the clergy met,
with the queen's license, to review the doctrine and discipline
of the Church. A petition was introduced by Bishop Sandys
and others, for doing away a long list of ceremonies and other
things deemed abuses or superstitions. Among other things, the
cross in baptism was to be dispensed with ; kneeling at the com
munion was not to be required ; copes and surplices were to be
taken away ; saints' days, festivals and holy-days bearing the
names of a creature, were to be abrogated ; or at least, after
service on such days men were to be allowed to go to their
work. A motion was made embodying most of the things
desired in these petitions ; and after an earnest debate, the vote
being taken, upon a division, a majority of those present ap
proved the motion for alteration ; the vote standing forty-three to
thirty-five. But on counting the votes of absentees, given by
proxy, the scale was turned by one voice ! So near were the
clergy of England to approving the chief demands of the Puri
tans, the first time they were allowed to express their sentiments
on the subject.
It has been common for the advocates of Prelacy to ascribe
the rise of Puritanism to the influence of Geneva. But to say
nothing of the Puritanism of Wickliffe, or the Puritan Churches
meeting in secret under the reign of the Bloody Mary, here is
a singular refutation of the charge, in this vote of the English

the conflict of principle. 95
convocation ; from which all avowed Puritans were shut out.
In that vote is found the name of only one who had been of the
English Church at Geneva. Seventeen had been of the exiles
of Strasburg, and of the Second Church at Frankfort, who had
all strenuously contended with their brethren for the use of King
Edward's Liturgy. Oh the other side were two deacons and
two archdeacons, who had complied with the popish religion
under Queen Mary, and who, after the accession of Queen Eliza
beth, adhered to Popery till they were compelled to abandon it
or lose their places.
Many of the parochial clergy had a strong aversion to the
" habits." " They wore them sometimes in obedience to the
laws, but more frequently administered without them ;" for which
some were cited into the spiritual courts and admonished ; the
Bishops not as yet proceeding to the extremity of deprivation.
" The laily were more averse to the habits than the clergy. As
their hatred of Popery increased, so did their aversion to the
garments." There was a strong party in the court against them ;
among whom were the Earl of Leicester, Walsingham and Bur
leigh. " The Protestant populace throughout the nation were
so inflamed, that nothing but an awful subjection to authority
could have kept them within bounds. Great numbers refused
to frequent the places of worship where service was ministered
in that dress. They would not salute such ministers in the
streets, nor keep them company." " Nay," as Neale goes on to
say, " if we may believe Dr. Whitgift, they spit in their faces,
reviled them as they went along, and showed such like behavior
because they took them for Papists in disguise, for time-servers,
and half-faced Protestants, that would be content with the return
of that religion whose badge they wore. There was indeed a
warm spirit in the people against everything which came from
that pretended Church, whose garments had been so lately dyed
with the blood of their friends and relations."
The admonitions of the bishops failing to check the growing
non-conformity, the queen was greatly displeased, and issued
peremptory orders to the archbishops to enforce the strictest uni
formity. And now the storm was coming. Many of the bishops
earnestly begged that they might not be compelled to be made
the instruments of oppression against those who could not in
conscience conform. Pilkington, Bishop of Durham, urged
" That compulsion ought not to be used in things of liberty :" —
" that all the reformed countries had cast away the popish appa
rel, and yet we contend to keep it as a holy relic ;" " That many
ministers would rather leave their livings than comply, while the
realm had a great scarcity of teachers, many places being desti-

96 THE puritans and their principles.
tute of any."* Whittingham, Dean of Durham, wrote, that he
" Dreaded the consequences of imposing that as necessary, which
at best was only indifferent ;" " that many Papists enjoyed their
livings and liberty, who have not sworn obedience nor do any
part of their duty to their miserable flock." " Alas," said he,
" that such compulsion should be used towards us, and such
lenity towards the Papists." Jewell, who was set to preach at
Paul's Cross, to reconcile the people to the garments, said, " He did
not come to defend them, but to show that they might be com
plied with." Pilkington urged again that the debate which
began about the vestments, " now goes farther, and reaches hold
on the very constitution of the Church ;"— and to the Puritans
he said, " 1 confess we suffer many things against our hearts,
groaning under them; but we cannot take them away. We are •
under authority, and can innovate nothing without the queen."f
Grindal, who had some time hesitated whether he could accept
a bishopric with the popish garments, — now called God to
witness that it does not lie at their [the bishops] door that the
habits were not taken quite away." Sandys Bishop of Worces
ter, and Parkhurst Bishop of Norwich, inveighed bitterly against
the habits, and declared they would not cease to cry out against
them, ',' till they were sent to hell from whence they came."*j: The
Bishop of Rochester wrote to the Secretary Cecil, that in his
opinion " the habits ought to be taken away ; and that men ought
to stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ had made them free."
Not one of the first set of bishops after the Reformation, ap
proved of the habits or argued for their continuance from Scrip
ture, antiquity, or decency ; but they submitted to them out of
necessity, and to keep the Church in the queen's favor.
On the other hand, the Puritan ministers said, " We leave our
brethren to stand or fall to their own master and desire the same
favorable forbearance from them. All that is pretended is, that
these habits are not unlawful, — not that they are good and expe
dient. They were not used in the Primitive Church ; they are
of papal use and origin. — Why are we now turned out of our
benefices, and some put in prison, only for habits ?"
The superintendent ministers of Scotland wrote to the English
bishops with true Scotch plainness : " If," said they, " the sur
plice, corner cap, and tippet, have been the badges of idolatry,
what have the preachers of Christian liberty, and the open re-
bukers of all superstition, to do with the dress of the Romish
beast? Our brethren, that of conscience refuse that unprofitable
apparel, do neither damn yours, nor molest you that use such
trifles. If ye shall do the like by them, we doubt not but you
will therein please God, and comfort the heart of many."§
* Neale. t Ibid. ' Ibid. ' Ibid.

the conflict of principle. 97
How often, and how falsely, it has been alleged that the Puri
tans were only struggling for political pre-eminency ; that it was
a mere contest of will, to determine which party should impose
their own peculiar forms and opinions upon the others ! What a
strange mode these men adopted to gain political power ! To
give themselves up to poverty, imprisonment, fines, banishment
or death, and to continue thus to suffer from generation to gene
ration! It was indeed true, that, seventy years afterwards,
when nothing was left the nation but victory or the entire loss
of freedom, the friends of liberty with one consent rallied
round the Puritans, its oldest and most unconquerable defenders.
Then the strife was not by the Puritans alone, but by all men
who stood for their liberties. But for two entire generations, the
Puritans, as such, only stood and suffered for conscience' sake
alone. Long after this time, even as late as the reign of King
James, a work of Dr. Ames, entitled " English Puritanism," thus
declared the principles and demands of the Puritans : " All that
we crave of his majesty and the state, is, that with his and their
permission, it may be lawful for us to worship God according to
his revealed will ; that we may not be forced to the observance of
any human rites and ceremonies ; so long as it shall please the king
and parliament to maintain the hierarchy or prelacy in this king
dom, we are content that they enjoy their state and dignity ; and
we will live as brethren among the ministers that acknowledge
spiritual homage to the spiritual lordships, paying them all
temporal duties of tithes, and joining with them in the service
and worship of God so far as we may without our own particu
lar communicating in those human traditions which we judge un
lawful. Only we pray that the prelates and their ecclesiastical
officers may not be our judges ; but that we may stand at the
bar of the civil magistrate ; and that if we shall be openly vilified
and slandered, it may be lawful for us, without fear of punish
ment, to justify ourselves to the world ; and then we shall think
our lives and all we have, too little to spend in the service of our
king and country."*
But the queen and archbishop pressed on. There must be
entire conformity, or ruin to those who opposed. It may well be
left to our American public to judge what right the queen had to
impose such things upon her Christian subjects ; and how the
bishops could be justified in allowing themselves to be made the
instruments of imposing with such fearful rigors, things which,
in the judgment of so many intelligent and godly people, were
absolutely sinful. But no man could be a bishop in those days
without yielding this submission to arbitrary power.
In obedience to the queen, the Commission now forbade all
n * Neale.

98 the puritans and their principles.
preachers throughout the realm, the exercise of their office with
out a promise under the hand of each, of an absolute conformity
in all things. Archbishop Parker cited the Puritan clergy of
London to Lambeth, and threatened them. The Puritan clergy
sent him " a humble supplicatory letter," protesting before God
that it was a bitter grief to them to be obliged to refuse obedience.
They pleaded the ancient and primitive toleration of a variety of
rites and forms; they pleaded the injunction of Paul respecting
things indifferent ; " Let not him that eateth despise him that
eateth not." " Let every one be fully persuaded in his own
mind." " All men," said they, " cannot look upon the same
things as indifferent ; if, therefore, these habits seem so to you,
you are not to be condemned by us ; on the other hand, if they do
not appear so to us, we ought not to be vexed by you. * * Where
fore we most humbly pray, that a thing which is the care and
pleasure of the Papists, and which you have no great value for
yourselves, and which we refuse not from any contempt of
authority, but from an aversion to the common enemy, may not
be our snare and crime."* But the archbishop brought them
before the court of High Commission, and told them peremp
torily that they should conform to the habits, i. e. wear the
square cap and no hats, in their long gowns ; wear hoods in the
choir, and communicate kneeling, in wafer bread, or suffer
punishment. Some declining to promise this, were sent to
prison. Others, who would not enter into bonds to wear the
square cap, were deprived of their office and benefices.
The clergy of London were now called before the High Com
mission. A man clothed cap-a-pie, in their priestly garments,
was placed before them. The bishop's chancellor said to them
from the bench, " My masters and ye ministers of London, the
council's pleasure is that ye strictly keep the unity of apparel
like this man who stands here canonically habited with a square
cap, a scholar's gown, priest-like, a tippet in the church, and a
linen surplice ; ye that will subscribe, write volo [I will] ; those
that will not subscribe, write Nolo [I will not]. Be brief; make
no words : Apparitor, call over the churches ; and ye ministers
and masters, answer presently under penalty of contempt."
Sixty-one subscribed ; thirty-seven refused and were presently
suspended. Archbishop Parker said, " He did not doubt, that
when the ministers had felt the smart of poverty and want, they
would yet comply, for the wood was yet green."
The secretary of state declared he could not keep pace with
the archbishop. Grindal relented. The Bishop of Durham
declared he would rather lay down his office than suffer such
* Neale.

the conflict of principlb.

99

proceedings in his diocese : but the archbishop wa3 above him,
and pressed on.
The Court of High Commission now required every clergy
man having the care of souls, to take an oath, that he would be
obedient : 1. To all the queen's injunctions by letters patent ;
2. To all letters from the lords of the privy council ; 3. To the
articles and mandates of his metropolitan; 4. To the articles
and mandates of his bishop, archdeacon, chancellor, &c, &c, —
in a word " to be subject to the control of all his superiors with
patience." " To gird these injunctions the closer," says Neale,
" there were appointed in every parish four or eight censors,
spies, or jurats," who " were under oath to take particular notice of
the conformity of the clergy and of the parishioners ; and to give
in their presentments when required ; so that it was impossible
for an honest Puritan to escape the High Commissioner."
These were but the beginnings of the milder measures of the
queen and the hierarchy to put down the spirit and principles
of the Puritans. And yet Maddox, so famous for his work
against the Puritans, extols the purity, the moderation, and the
dear regard for liberty, exercised by " Mother Church." He
makes it the very ground of his argument that the Puritans were
treated with unmerited mildness, consideration, and forbearance :
that the bishops only used their legitimate powers ; and used
them not only with a moderation greatly to be commended, but
which should have subdued and won the Puritans into a meek
and grateful submission !
The persecution went on against the non-conforming minis
ters, till a fourth part of the ministers were suspended ;* among
whom were the principal preachers, at a time when not one min
ister in six could compose a sermon. Many churches had to be
closed for want of ministers to officiate. The secretary wrote to
the archbishop to supply the churches, and release the prisoners ;
but " His grace," says Neale, " was inexorable, and had rather
the people should have no sermon or sacraments, than have them
without the surplice and cap." The archbishop replied, that
when the queen put him upon what he had done, " he told her
that these precise folks would offer their goods and their bodies to
prison rather than relent ; and her highness then willed him to
imprison them." He confessed that many parishes were unserved ;
but said that when he had sent his chaplains to serve in some of
the great parishes, they could not administer the sacraments, be
cause the officers of the parish had provided neither surplice nor
wafer bread ; — that he had had many churchwardens and others
before him ; but that he was fully tired ; for some ministers would
not obey their suspensions, but preached in defiance of them."f
* Bogue and Bennett — Hist. Dissenters. t Neale.

100 the puritans and their principles.
The secretary and archbishop wrote to Grindal, Bishop of
London, to fill up the vacant pulpits ; but he replied that it was
impossible, there being no preachers ; all he could do was to
supply the churches by turns ; which was far from stopping the
murmurs of the people. Such was the state of things in Lon
don, where the mild Grindal, having a true concern to promote
the preaching of the Word of God, would not act against the
ministers further than he was compelled by superior power. In
other parts of the kingdom, the queen's injunctions were rigidly
executed, and the state of things was worse.
The suspended ministers having vainly endeavored to procure
toleration from the queen and bishops, now (A. D. 1566) tried
the . novel and anti-monarchical mode of spreading their cause
before the people. With the throne was power ; but there was
another tribunal — that of reason, of public enlightened senti
ment — from whose decision, if they could not at present gain
redress, they might at least find comfort. They gave to the
press, " A Declaration of the doings of those ministers of God's
word and sacraments, who have refused to wear the upper apparel
and ministering garments of the Pope's Church." They showed
that neither prophets nor apostles used distinctive garments;
but that the linen garment was peculiar to the sacrificing priest,
whose office and work was entirely diverse from that of apostles
or Christian ministers ; that this distinction of garments did not
obtain generally in the Christian Church till after the rise of
Antichrist; that these garments had been abused to idolatry,
sorcery, and all kinds of conjuration ; that the popish priests can
perform none of their pretended consecrations of holy water,
transubstantiation, or conjurations of the devil out of pos
sessed persons or places, without a surplice, an alb, or hallowed
stole; that the use of these garments is an offence to weak
Christians, leading them into superstition and sin ; that at best
they are but the commandments of men, and that they came
within the rule of the apostle, " Why, as though living in the
world, are ye subject to ordinances, after the commandments and
doctrines of men ? Touch not, taste not, handle not :"— and that
even supposing the garments to be indifferent, yet they ought not
to be imposed, because it was cm infringement of that liberty
wherewith Christ had made them free.
The bishops answered this appeal. The Puritans rejoined.
Thus was the issue laid before the bar of truth and reason, with
the whole universal people for a jury. What was the conse
quence ? Puritanism spread as if both parties had been engaged
in scattering brands of fire.
The bishops left the field of argument, and resorted to author
ity. They procured a decree, 1, That no person should

the conflict of principle. 101
print or publish against the queen's injunctions, set forth, or to be
set forth, or against the meaning of them : 2, That no person shall
sell, bind, or stitch such book ; — and by various provisions of this
sort, they endeavored to silence the declaration of those princi
ples which neither their arguments had been able to resist, nor
their former persecutions to repress.
So long as the Puritan ministers were allowed to preach, they
had been acknowledged to be the most conscientious, laborious,
and efficient preachers in the kingdom. And many, after they
were deprived, braving all dangers, travelled up and down the
country, preaching wherever people could be gathered to hear.
" The Puritans," said Burleigh [one of Queen Elizabeth's minis
ters of state], " are over-squeamish and nice, yet their careful
catechising and diligent preaching diminish the papistical num
bers." And Bancroft, the American historian, has justly said
that " The party thus persecuted were most efficient opponents of
Popery ;" and that " but for the Puritans, the old religion would
have retained the affections of the multitude. If Elizabeth re
formed the court, the ministers whom she persecuted reformed
the commons. That the English nation became Protest
ant, is due to the Puritans." " How then," he asks, " could
the party be subdued ? The spirit of brave and conscientious men
cannot be broken. No part is left but to tolerate or destroy."
It was now eight years since Elizabeth ascended the throne.
The only prospect before the Puritans was that of a surrender
of their liberties ; an entire submission to despotic power ; a
giving up of the truth to a gradual relapse into the errors and
superstition and bondage of a scheme of religion little better
than Popery ; or to make a stand : to worship God according
to their conscience, whatever consequences might ensue. They
had attended the parochial churches as long as their consciences
and the fury of their persecutors would allow. Multitudes had
gathered round their old deprived ministers for instruction,
counsel and comfort ; often had these ministers spoken to them the
words of eternal life, and often had they joined in prayer to God.
At length the question arose : shall we worship God accord
ing to his Word? shall we enjoy the ordinances enjoined by
Christ? These are our ministers; they have been unjustly
deprived by the secular power. Shall they break to us the bread
of life ? or must we return and submit to what we cannot sub
mit without violating our conscience, betraying the truth, proving
traitors to freedom and to God, or must we be cut off for
ever from Christian ordinances ?
Long and prayerful were these deliberations. The conclu
sion was, that they ought to meet to worship God, and to keep
the ordinances enjoined by Christ. Their pastors were already

102 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
ordained, and had never been forsaken. They ventured to
use their freedom to worship God. The year of our Lord
1566 was the year of this memorable decision, from which
so important consequences have flowed. Few of the Puri
tans, however, separated themselves at first. The greater part,
though clear as to the right, were yet reluctant to separate,
nor did they have recourse to so unwelcome an expedient,
till, after many years of suffering, they were compelled to
despair of ever rinding liberty of conscience in the Church
established and controlled by the power of the state. The queen,
hearing that some ventured to worship God in private, gave strict
orders to the High Commission to keep the people to the
parish churches. On the 19th of June, 1567, a congregation of
separate worshippers was detected by the sheriff at Plumber's
Hall ; a large number were taken into custody, and sent to
prison, where they were kept in confinement more than a year ;
when twenty-four men and seven women were discharged with
an admonition to conduct better for the future. The strictest
watch was kept up by the spies of the High Commission. The
cruel persecutions of the Protestants in France, and the mas
sacres perpetrated by the Duke of Alva in the Netherlands, drove
multitudes from these countries for refuge to England. The
queen granted to these the liberty of their own modes of worship ;
but not the least toleration was granted to her own subjects.
The prisons were soon filled with the persecuted Puritans.
In the year 1568 a league was formed by the Catholic powers
of Europe, by which all Protestant princes were to be put down
and the Protestant religion exterminated. Many of the Papists
in England rose to arms. The Pope, for their encouragement,
denounced the queen as a usurper and heretic ; absolved all
her subjects from their oaths of allegiance, and anathematized all
who should defend her. But papal bulls had lost their power
in England. The Romish rebellion melted away upon the very
rumor of the approach of the queen's army ; and the assistance,
in men and money, which she with consummate statesmanship
furnished, at the right time, to the Protestants of France and Hol
land, defeated all the designs and preparations of the Romish
league. These disturbances called forth the enactment of new
laws, and the imposition of new oaths, aimed principally against
the adherents of the Pope. But though no part of the queen's
subjects were so thoroughly imbued with an utter abhorrence of
the popish claims and principles ; and though in the late dis
turbances none had been more loyal and faithful than the Puri
tans, the " edge of the laws that were made against Popish recu
sants was turned against the Protestant Non-conformists."*
* Neale.

the conflict of principle. 103
This unrighteous severity, instead of bringing these non-con
formists into the churches, like all other methods of severity, drove
them farther from it. " Many of the people were put in prison
because they would not provide godfathers and godmothers for
baptizing their children. While the Puritan ministers are de
prived, the Papists comply and triumph."* " In 1569, and
before, Papists were frequent in church, in court, in place ;
Popish priests still enjoyed the great ecclesiastical livings, with
out recantation or penance ; yea, in simoniacal heaps, cathedral
churches" were " stuffed with them ; the very spies and promot
ers of Queen Mary's reign were cherished."! The Puritans
were harassed with increasing vigor. " Many were cited into
spiritual courts, and after long attendance and great charges,
were suspended or deprived. The pursuivant, or messenger of
the court, was paid by the mile ; the fees were exorbitant, which
the prisoner, innocent or otherwise, must pay before he could
have his discharge." The method of proceeding was dilatory
and vexatious. " Though witnesses were seldom called to
support any charge, the defendant was himself put under oath
to answer the interrogations of the court ; and compelled to turn
his own accuser. If he refused the oath, they examined him
without it, and forced him to submit by every species of severity."
If the prisoner was, after all, dismissed, he was nevertheless
generally ruined with costs, and further bound to appear again
whenever the court should require him.
The sufferings and remonstrances of the Puritans had now
roused the nation. In several sessions of parliament from 1566
to 1587 efforts were made for some toleration and relief ; but the
queen frowned upon every such movement, and overawed the
parliament. " She pretended," says Hume, " that in quality of
supreme head of the Church, she was fully empowered by her
prerogatives alone, to decide all questions which might arise
with regard to doctrine, discipline, or worship ; and she never
would allow her parliament so much as to take these points into
consideration." " The parliament, in her opinion, were not to
canvass any matters of state ; still less were they to meddle with
the Church. Questions of that kind were far above their reach,
and were appropriated to the prince alone, or to those councils
and ministers with whom she was pleased to entrust them."
" What then was the office of parliament ? They might give
directions for the due tanning of leather, or milling of cloth ; for
the preservation of pheasants and partridges ; for the reparation
of bridges and highways ; for the punishment of vagabonds or
common beggars." " But the most acceptable part of parlia
mentary proceedings, was the granting of subsidies ; the attaint-
* Prince. t An ancient writer quoted by Prince.

104 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
ing and punishing of the obnoxious nobility."* " The redress
of grievances was sometimes promised to the people ; but sel
dom could have place while it was an established rule that the
prerogatives of the crown must not be abridged, or so much as
questioned and examined in parliament. Even those monopo
lies and exclusive companies, which had already reached an
enormous height, and were every day increasing to the destruc
tion of all industry ; — it v^as criminal in a member, to propose in
the most dutiful manner, a parliamentary application against any
of fhem."t
The Puritans, in their debates concerning the rights of con
science, had been led to investigate the principles on which
these monstrous regal prerogatives were founded : and they were
not only first and foremost in every effort for a parliamentary re
dress of abusive monopolies and other grievances, but they
alone were the indefatigable and undaunted opponents of royal
despotism. Was there a motion made in the House of Com
mons, touching these abuses and prerogatives which the queen
guarded with such a jealous vigilance ? That motion was by a
Puritan. Was a stirring speech made in parliament exposing
the royal and ecclesiastical abuses, and asserting the principles
of freedom and of popular rights ? That speech was by a Puri
tan. High Church principles, then as ever afterwards, were uni
formly leagued with the power and the assumptions of the sove
reign against religious tolerance and civil liberty. Hume saw,
and abundantly recorded, in his history of the doings of parlia
ment from A. D. 1571 to 1580, the connection between Puri
tanic principles and these movements in favor of popular rights.
He states how Strickland, in 1571, revived one of the seven bills
which " The Puritans " had introduced into the former parlia
ment for a further reformation of religion. The parliament even
entered upon a debate for a reformation of the Prayer-Book ; but
the queen, incensed at the presumption of Strickland, summoned
him before the council, and prohibited him from thenceforth
appearing in the House of Commons. Again, " A motion," says
Hume, " was made by Robert Bell, a Puritan, against an exclu
sive patent granted to some merchants in Bristol." Beil was
summoned before the council, and "returned," says Hume,
" with such an amazed countenance, that all the members, well
informed of the reason, were struck with terror ; and during
some time no one durst rise up to speak of any matter of impor
tance, for fear of giving offence to the queen and council ;" —
" And yet, that patent which the queen defended with so much
violence," was contrived for the profit of the courtiers, and was
attended with the utter ruin of seven or eight thousand of her
•Hume. tlbid.

the conflict of principle. 105
industrious subjects. Again, in 1576, Peter Wentworth, whom
Hume characterizes as " A Puritan," and who had signalized
himself in former parliaments by his free and undaunted spirit,
asserted once more in a manly speech the essential principles of
liberty ; principles which are now so clear that we wonder how
they could ever be doubted ; but which were novel and startling
in those days of despotic power. Wentworth was sequestered
from the house ; and taken into custody.
It is in connection with these illustrations of the natural
affinity between Puritanism and freedom, that Hume records
that sentence which has been so long and so justly celebrated,
viz : " So absolute was the authority of the croivn, that the pre
cious spark of liberty had been kindled, and was preserved by
the Puritans alone; and it was to this sect * * that the
English owe the whole freedom of their Constitution."
Thus early did the cause of purity in religious worship iden
tify itself with the great cause of civil and religious freedom.
Immense were the sacrifices with which these principles were
maintained. They are a rich legacy. The time will come
when — in this world — none need claim a nobler parentage than
to be a son of the Puritans, an inheritor of their principles and
their piety.

VIII.

THE PURITANS SUFFERING.
New Canons. Supplication to Parliament. Cartwright and Whitgift.
Private Press. New Persecuting Act. Brown and the Brownists,
Supplication of the Deprived Ministers. Whitgift's Inquisitorial Arti
cles. Martin Mar-Prelate. Act against separate Worship. Sufferings
of the Puritans. Their touching Narrative. Roger Ripon. Barrowe.
Greenwood. Penry.
Having stated the main grounds on which the Puritans rested
their complaints and their defence, and having shown the nature
of the efforts to reduce them, we may now pass more rapidly
over a long series of events, consisting mainly of a continued
recurrence of the same sort of doings. You have only to
picture to yourselves a long struggle of thirty-two years, from this
period to the death of Elizabeth, in which the power of the
queen, the council, and the bishops, with their chancellors and
spies, was exerted, with every engine of oppression ; Star
Chamber, High Commission, oaths ex officio, harassing and
expensive prosecutions, ruinous fines imposed without legal
limit, imprisonments, excommunications depriving the subject
of his civil rights;— imagine these engines plied with relent
less severity, against all who should omit a ceremony, or scru
ple a habit, or say a word against the Prayer-Book, or ques
tion the authority of the Bishops ; then picture to yourselves
Puritanism everywhere spreading and increasing, till the pri
sons are full ; families broken and scattered ; thousands of
women and children in distress, till a voluntary exile or banish
ment, or death fills up their miseries ; imagine all this, and you
have a true outline of a history which might now be filled up
with ample and heart-rending details, extending through the life
of a whole generation. Nor did these persecutions cease when
James I. ascended the throne ; but new modes of persecution
and still fiercer rigors were devised by that conceited, but heart
less and perfidious prince ; till our fathers chose a home on the
shores of a howling wilderness, rather than endure life under
such tyranny in their native land.

the puritans suffering. 107
We are now to draw a rapid outline of the history of the
thirty-two remaining years of Queen Elizabeth.
Though the Commons were forbidden to meddle with religion,
they still ventured to present an humble address to the queen, be
seeching her, as head of the Church, for some reformation and
relief. The deprived ministers at the same time petitioned the
Convocation of clergy to use their interest with the queen for
a redress of grievances. " If a godly minister," say they,
" omit but the least ceremony for conscience' sake, he is immedi
ately indicted, deprived, cast into prison, his goods wasted and
destroyed, he is kept from his wife and children, and at last
excommunicated." Instead of redress, the Convocation framed new Canons, to
increase the burden of the Puritans. All were now required
to subscribe to the whole Prayer-Book, and forms of ordina
tion ; all preachers who should not subscribe, were to be excom
municated. The Archbishop of Canterbury summoned before him the
principal clergy of both provinces, who were known to be averse
to this compulsory uniformity, and let them know that if they
were to continue their ministry, they must subscribe and con
form. Some of the Puritan ministers drew up an application to par
liament setting forth their grievances, and calling, in the spirit of
men indignant under grievous and protracled wrongs, for re
dress. Those who presented this petition were thrown into pri
son. Cartwright, who had become famous for his courage and
perseverance in defending the Puritan cause, and who had be
fore this been driven into exile, immediately drew up what he
called an " Admonition to parliament ;" and thus commenced
the long and famous controversy between Cartwright and the
no less celebrated Whitgift, afterwards archbishop. Cartwright,
on the side of the Puritans, maintained that " The Holy Scriptures
are not only a standard of doctrine, but of discipline and govern
ment ; and that the Church in all ages is to be regulated by them.
Whitgift, on the side of the established Church, maintained that
the Scriptures are not a rule of Church discipline or government ;
that the apostolical government was adapted to the Church in its
infancy and persecution ; but that the government of the Church
might be changed to adapt itself to the civil constitution and
government in different ages and countries: and on this ground
he defended the order, organization, and worship of the estab
lished Church of England." It is worthy of remark that " The
Judicious Hooker" takes the same ground. The Divine right
of the constitution and order of the Church of England, its ad
vocates had not, as yet, attained the hardihood to maintain.

108 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
They rested its claims, not on the institutions of the Word of
God, but on the power of the Church to arrange its own polity,
or rather on the power of every Christian civil government to
regulate the polity of the Church according to their will. " To
reckon bishops and priests as the same office " [i. e. as to their
order] Burnet declares, in his History of the Reformation, to have
been " the common style of the age."*
The queen, whether distrusting the prowess of Whitgift or
otherwise, took it upon herself to answer his opponent with re
gal arguments. She issued her proclamation, requiring all her
subjects who had any copies of Cartwright's Admonition, to
bring them to their bishops, and not sell them, under pain of im
prisonment. The issue of the debate was according to the cus
tom of the times : Whitgift was in due time made an Arch
bishop ; Cartwright was reduced to beggary and exile.
No man now might open his mouth against the " Church " or
the Hierarchy, or plead for the Puritans, without ruin: no
press in the whole kingdom might openly advocate their cause.
In this emergency some persons procured a press which they
worked in private, removing it from time to time to prevent dis
covery. The pamphlets printed at this press were scattered over
the land. Who could destroy them ? What law could de
scribe them all ? Who could tell from whence they came ? The
queen and bishops were in deep trouble ; their rage was baffled;
their power was vain. Archbishop Parker used every art to
discover this press. He sent out emissaries ; he employed
spies ; but all to no purpose. Whereupon he vented his grief
to the Lord Treasurer : " I understand," said he, " throughout
the realm how the matter is taken ; the Puritans are justified,
and we are adjudged to be extreme persecutors." The queen
rebuked the bishops for being so slow in putting down the Pu
ritans ; but what more could the bishops do ? In every shire
commissioners were appointed to put in execution the penal
laws against Puritans. The queen by proclamation declared
her royal pleasure that they should be punished with the utmost
severity. The lords of the council added their authority and
efforts. The Lord Treasurer made a long speech to the Com
missioners in the Star Chamber, in which, " by the queen's com
mand, he charged them with neglect ;" and said, " The queen
could not satisfy her conscience without crushing the Iuritans!']
The queen said repeatedly that " She hated them worse than the
Papists.% The work of persecution receiving this fresh impulse, went
vigorously on. " The officers of the spiritual courts planted their
spies in all the suspected parishes to make observation of those
* Vol. i., p. 587. t Neale. t Ibid.

REIGN OF QUEEN MARY. 109
who came not to church. * * The keepers [of the prisons]
were charged to take notice of such as came to visit the prisoners
or to bring them relief. * * Spies were set upon these, to bring
them into trouble. * * The conduct of the Commissioners
was high-handed and imperious ; their under officers were
ravenous and greedy of gain ; the fees of the court were exor
bitant, so that if an honest man fell into their hands, he was sure
to be half ruined."*
The clergy in some dioceses had been accustomed to meet for
mutual aid in studying and expounding the Scriptures. These
exercises had gone under the name of Prophesyings. The arch
bishop told the queen that those meetings were " little better than
seminaries of Puritanism" (and quite likely they were so, since
in them, godly men met to confer about the sense and doctrine
of the Scriptures). The archbishop, moreover, declared to the
queen that " The more averse the people were to popery, the
more they were in danger of non-conformity" (nor shall we be
inclined to doubt this also) ; " that these exercises [of Prophesy
ings, or conference meetings] tended to popularity, and made
the people so inquisitive that they would not submit to the orders
of their superiors as they ought." The queen thereupon ordered
these meetings to be suppressed.
But the people, as well as the ministers, seem to have been
seized with this same mania for meeting and studying the Word
of God. Many people in various quarters had been accustomed
to meet together on the holidays, and at other times when their
work was done, to read the Scriptures, and to confirm one another
in Christian faith and duty. The Commissioners ordered the
ministers of the parishes to suppress these meetings. The people
replied that they had conformed to the orders of the Church ; and
that they only met together after dinner, or after supper, on holi
days ; and that only for the mutual instruction of themselves and
their families ; for the reformation of their manners; and for a
further acquaintance with the Word of God. " For heretofore,"
said they, " we have spent and consumed our holidays vainly ;
in drinking at the ale-house, and playing at cards and dice, and
other vain pastimes ;" and " we thought it better to bestow the
time in soberly and godly reading the Scriptures, only for the
purposes aforesaid, and no other." But to do even this was re
garded (and no doubt justly regarded), as tending to Puritanism ;
and it is worthy of remark that the Episcopal Hierarchy has not
recovered from its ancient horror of conference meetings to this
dav- These meetings were suppressed.
Grindal, who succeeded Archbishop Parker, A. D. 1575,
would originally have been a Puritan, had he not felt himself
* Neale.

110 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
compelled to yield to the necessity of the times. His desire was
to cherish the godly ministers who had been deprived for non
conformity, rather than to persecute them. He ventured not
only to relax these persecutions, but to remonstrate with the queen.
But Queen Elizabeth was not to be gainsayed, even by the Primate
of all England. By an order from the Star Chamber, she forth
with confined him to the house, and sequestered him from his
archiepiscopal function for six months ; nor could he ever after
wards regain her favor. The work of persecution went on.
An act of parliament was now passed, providing that " All
persons who do not come to church, or chapel, where common
prayer is said according to the act of uniformity, shall forfeit £20
a month to the queen, and shall suffer imprisonment till it is
paid* Those who should be absent for twelve months, besides
their former fine, should be bound with two sufficient sureties in
a bond of d£200, for their future compliance. Every schoolmas
ter who should not come to Common Prayer was to forfeit £10
a month, be disabled from teaching school, and suffer a year's
imprisonment. The effect of this was to condemn non-conform
ists to perpetual imprisonment.
It is not surprising that these cruel enactments, and the fierce
and unrelenting manner in which these laws, canons and injunc
tions, were enforced, should provoke some roughness of resolu
tion and some asperity of language among the thousands who
were compelled to endure such things for so many years. But
these complaints were hushed with new and unheard of laws,
Any who should " devise, write, print, or set forth, any book,
rhyme, ballad, letter or writing, containing any false, seditious or
slanderous matter, to the defamation of the queen's majesty," &c.,
— should suffer death and loss of goods. " Sundry Puritans,"
says Neale, " were put to death by virtue" of this statute.
The period to which we are now arrived, witnessed the rise of
the Brownists. These denied the Church of England to be a
true Church, and her ministers to be rightly ordained. The dis
cipline of the Established Church they denounced as anti
christian ; and her ordinances and sacraments as invalid. Their
first congregation was gathered in 1583. In some respects these
people maintained some ofthe fundamental principles of Congre
gationalism ; — but they differed from Congregationalists in main
taining the extreme of Independency, in making the minis
terial office temporary, and the minister the mere creature of a
congregation, made and liable to be made at their pleasure,
They differed from all other Puritans in breaking off from the
communion of the English and the continental churches; re-
* Neale.

THE PURITANS SUFFERING. Ill
fusing not only to partake of the Lord's Supper with these, but
to mingle with them in worship and prayer.
Their leader was Robert Brown, who had signalized himself
for some years by travelling up and down the country, inveighing
with exceeding bitterness against the doctrines and discipline of
the Church ; and distinguished as much for being arraigned be
fore magistrates and committed to prisons ; till, as he used to
boast, he had been "committed to thirty-two prisons, in some of
which he could not see his hand at noon-day." The congrega
tion which he gathered was soon dispersed; and himself and ad
herents forced to flee the kingdom. At Middleburgh, in Zealand,
he collected his Church. In 1589, he returned to England ; became
a good Churchman ; was made Rector of a Church in the Estab
lishment ; grew dissolute and passionate ; led a miserable life ;
and at length, for some violent misdemeanor, was carried to prison,
where he died in 1630, — a poor decrepit miserable man, in the
81st year of his age.
It was long the fashion — as a means of reproach — to call those
who separated from the Established Church, Brownists. The
Puritans, and especially the Pilgrims, ever maintained this to be
unjust; since the principles of Brown were peculiar to him and
his immediate followers, while the principles which he held in
common with the Puritans were not discovered by Brown ; they
were as old as Wickliffe ; — indeed, as the Puritans contended,
they were as old as the Primitive Church ; as old as the New Tes
tament itself.
In 15H3, two ministers, Thacker and Copping, were hanged,
"for spreading certain books, seditiously penned by Brown,
against the Common Prayer, established by the laws of the realm."
This was their only crime.
In the same year Grindal died ; and the Archbishopric of
Canterbury passed into the hands of that merciless High Church
man, Wliilgifl. All non-conformists were forthwith made to feel
that the reins had been transferred to sterner hands. In the very
first week of his official power, he issued his injunctions forbid
ding all preaching, catechising, and praying in any private family,
where any besides the family were present ; requiring a rigorous
conformity, and a new subscription to articles which he therewith
prescribed. Two hundred and thirty-three ministers were forth
with suspended, and forty-nine absolutely, and at once, deprived.
The deprived ministers made a supplication to the lords of
the Council. " We commend," say they, " to your honors' com
passion our poor families ; but much more do we commend our
doubtful, fearful, and distressed consciences, together with the
cries of our poor people, who are hungering after the Word of
life, and are now as sheep having no shepherd." They declared

112 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
their readiness to subscribe to the doctrinal articles, and to the
other articles, so far as they were not repugnant to the Word of
God ; and that if they might be but tolerated, they would make
no disturbance in the Church, nor separate from it " We dare
not," said they, " say that there is nothing in the books repug
nant to the Word of God, till we are otherwise enlightened.
We humbly pray that we may not be pressed to an absolute sub
scription, but be suffered to go on in the quiet discharge of the
duties of our calling." " We protest before God and our Saviour
Jesus Christ, that if by any means, which is not wicked, we
might continue still our labors in the Gospel, we would gladly
and willingly do anything that might procure that blessing,
esteeming it more than all the riches in the world."
The people of their congregations sent up their earnest peti
tions : — " Since our ministers have been taken from us for nol
subscribing to certain articles neither confirmed by the law of
God nor of the land, there are none left us but such as we can
prove unfit for that office, being altogether ignorant, having been
popish priests, or shiftless men thrust in upon the ministry, who
knew not how else to live; men of no business, serving men, and
the basest of all sorts ; and which is most lamentable, as they
are men of no gifts, so they are of no common honesty, but
rioters, dicers, drunkards, and offensive livers."*
Archbishop Whitgift was inexorable. He blamed the coun
cil for receiving these petitions. He declared he could not do
his duty to the queen, if he might not proceed without interrup
tion ; and that if the council would help him, he would soon
bring them to comply. " Thus," says Neale, " this great pre
late, who had complied with the popish religion and kept his
place in the University through all the reign of Queen Mary,
was resolved to bear down all opposition, and to display his
sovereign power against those whose consciences were not as
flexible as his own."f
Whitgift now called for a new High Commission, " Because,"
said he, " a commission may search for books, and examine the
writers and publishers on oath, which a bishop cannot do — be
cause the commission can punish by fines, which are very com
modious to the government ; or by imprisonment, which will
strike the more terror into the Puritans."*): The commission was
granted. The archbishop drew up twenty-four articles for the use of the
High Commission, by which they might compel any man on his
oath to answer the most searching interrogatories concerning his
* Neale.
+ Maddox blames Neale for saying that Whitgift had conformed to Popery; but
Toulmin shows that it was even so ; as indeed otherwise he could not have kept
his place. } Neale.

THE PURITANS SUFFERING. 113
own doings and belief, as well as concerning all others whom be
should know to have refused conformity in any particular. If
any person refused this oath, he must suffer the punishment of
contempt, by fines and imprisonment at the mercy of the court
When the Lord Treasurer Burleigh read these articles, he
wrote to the archbishop, thus : " I have read over your four-and-
twenty articles, formed in a Romish style, of great length and
curiosity, to examine all manner of ministers in this time, with
out distinction of persons, to be executed ex officio mero ; and
I find them so curiously penned, so full of branches and circum
stances, that / think the inquisition of Spain used not so many
questions to comprehend and trap their priests." "I know your
canonists can defend these, with all their particles; but surely
under correction, this judicial and canonical sifting of poor min
isters, is not to edify or reform." " According to my simple
judgment, it is too much savoring of the Romish Inquisition, and
is a device rather to seek for offenders, than to reform any."
The archbishop and High Commission pressed on. It was
alleged, that no one ought to be held to accuse himself ; but the
admitted principle ofthe municipal law weighed nothing with
the archbishop. It was alleged that, by law, no man should be
fined beyond his estate or ability ; but the very policy and prin
ciple of the High Commission was, to impose ruinous fines.
" For worshipping God in private houses, or in the woods, with
out the help of the Prayer-Book, or the adornment of the square
cap, and cape, and surplice,"* — for such crimes, " many were re
duced to the last extremity of want and suffering, so that the
very jailors were touched with pity ; testifying that the prisoners
had not wherewithal to purchase food or clothing, for lack of
which numbers perished in prison." And yet Bishop Maddox
contends earnestly, that they were treated with great leniency
and favor by " Mother Church," and the merciful queen !
In the meantime, that secret press, of which we have spoken,
was plied with diligence, and made the complaints of the Puri
tans ring loud throughout the kingdom. The pamphlets issued
at this time were written with a coarseness and bitterness which
the leading and moderate men among the Puritans disapproved ;
but with such force of argument, with such clearness, and such
home-thrusts at the persecuting prelates, that nothing could re
sist them. The bishops were stung to the quick ; the queen was
enraged ; the kingdom was in a flame.
The authors of these tracts were supposed to be a club of
separatists ; but who they were is to this day unknown. The most
famous were those issued under the name of "Martin Mar-Prelate"
a scries of violent satires against the hierarchy and its supporters.
* Punchard.

114 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
One was entitled " Theses Martians, i. e. certain demonstra
tive conclusions set down and collected by Martin Mar-Pre
late the Great, serving as a manifest and sufficient confuta
tion of all that the eater-caps with their whole band of clergy-
priests have, or can bring, for the defence of their ambitious and
anti-christian prelacy. Published by Martin Junior, in 1589."
Another was entitled the " Protestation of Martin Mar-
Prelate, wherein, notwithstanding the surprising of the printer,
he maketh it known to the world, that he, feareth neither proud
priest, anti-christian Pope, tyrannous prelate, nor godless eater-
cap, &c, &c. Printed 1589."
Another was " Martin Mar-Prelate's Appellation to the
high court of Parliament, from the bad and injurious dealings of
the Archbishop of Canterbury."
Another was " A Dialogue, wherein is plainly laid down the
tyrannical dealings of the lord bishops against God's children."
Another was entitled " Ha' ye any more work for the
Cooper ;" written against Dr. Thos. Cooper, of Winchester, and
said to be printed " In Europe, not far from some of the bouncing
priests, 1590."
Another, " Epitome of the first work of Dr. John
Bridges, against the Puritans." " Oh, read over Dr. John
Bridges, for it is a worthy work; printed over sea, in Europe,
within two furlongs of a bouncing priest, at the cost and charges
of Martin Mar-Prelate, Gent."
Another, " The Cobler's Book, which denies the Church of
England to be a true Church, and charges her with maintaining
idolatry under the name of decency, in the habits of the priests,
baptisms by women, gangdays, saints' eves, bishoping of chil
dren," &c, &c.
Such titles are probably a fair indication of the work3 they
covered, which were admitted to be rough and coarse, even for
that age— far more inclined to such a style of argument than the
present. But the other side made no scruple of resorting to simi
lar weapons. On the side of the bishops appeared one work,
entitled, " Pappe with an hatchet," alias " A fig for my God
son ; or Crack me this Nut ; i. e. a sound-box on the ear for
the idiot Martin to hold his peace. Written by one who
dares call a dog a dog. Imprinted by John Anoke, and are sold
at the sign of the Crab-tree- Cudgel in Thwack-coat lane."
Another on the same side, was entitled, " Pasquil's apology ;
printed where I was ; and where I shall be ready, with the help
of God and my muse, to send you a May game of Martinism.
Anno 1593." Another, " An Almond for a Parrot, or cm alms

the puritans suffering. 115
for Martin Mar-Prelate, by Cuthbert Curry-Knave." Others
of similar titles were written in the same strain.
The press from which the anti-prelatical pamphlets issued,
was at length discovered. Some who had entertained it were
" Deeply fined in the Star Chamber ; others imprisoned, and
some put to death."*
Four years afterwards, the severities against the Puritans
having been continued with unabated rigor, another attempt
was made in Parliament to stay these oppressive cruelties. A
motion was made for inquiring into the abuses of Bishops'
Courts, and of the High Commission ; by which subscriptions
to articles were exacted at the pleasure of the prelates. The
queen sent for the Speaker and demanded the bill. She said
she " did greatly admire at the presumption of Parliament, for
she had already enjoined them, by the mouth of the Lord Keeper,
to meddle neither with matters of state nor religion." She charged
the Speaker, on his allegiance, if any such bills were offered,
absolutely to refuse them even a reading. The man who made
the motion in Parliament was taken into custody, stripped of his
public offices and employments, incapacitated from any practice
in his profession as a common lawyer, and kept a prisoner some
years.f In obedience to the queen, in 1593, a law was passed entitled
An Act to keep her Majesty's subjects in obedience. By this act,
any person above sixteen years, who obstinately refused for the
space of a month to repair to some church or chapel, or usual
place of Common Prayer ; or who, at any time, by writing,
printing, or express words, should dissuade others from coming
to church, or who should be present at any unlawful assembly
or conventicle, under color of any pretence or any exercise of
religion, every such person should be committed to prison with
out bail till he should yield, and till he should make a prescribed
declaration of full conformity. If any should not yield within
three months, they were to abjure the realm and go into perpetual
banishment. If they should not depart from the realm within
the time limited by the quarter sessions or justices of peace, or
if they should afterwards return without license from the queen,
they should suffer death without benefit of clergy.
Untold sufferings this act inflicted upon non-conformists in
this and the following reigns. Many families were forced to
flee into banishment. Some were put to death. The jails and
prisons were filled. The Puritans were now greatly increased.
Sir Waller Raleigh declared in Parliament, that there were not
less than twenty thousand of these, divided into several congre
gations in Norfolk and Essex, and in the parts about London
* Neale. t Hume.

116 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
alone. Among the ministers of these congregations, were Smith,
Jacob, and Ainsworth, all celebrated among the Puritans, and
the last noted as among the most learned men of the age.
The church meeting at Islington (the same place where the
Protestant Congregation was broken up in Queen Mary's reign),
was discovered by the bishop's officers. Fifty-six of its mem
bers were sent, two and two, to the jail and prisons in and about
London. At their examination they confessed that they had
for some years met in the fields, in summer time, at five o'clock
in the morning of the Lord's day, and in the winter at private
houses : that they continued all day in prayer and expounding
the Scriptures ; " that they dined together, and after dinner made
a collection for their diet, and sent the remainder of the money
to their brethren in prison." They administered baptism with
out godfathers or godmothers, and received the Lord's Supper in
the same manne'r in which it is now received in any New Eng
land Congregational Church.
The bishops dealing with these persons with intolerable seve
rity, they ventured to lay their case in a petition before the
lords of the council. In this petition they humbly but firmly
declared the grounds of their dissent, and their readiness to main
tain their faith and order from the Scriptures, offering not only
to conform, but to suffer any punishment, if they should fail to
justify themselves from the Word of God. " But the prelates
of this land," said they, " have for a long time dealt unlawfully
and outrageously with us, by the great power and high author
ity they have gotten into their hands, and usurped above all
the public courts, judges, laws, and charters of the land ; per
secuting, imprisoning, and detaining at their pleasure, our poor
bodies, without any trial, release, or bail ; some of us they have
kept in close prison four or five years with miserable usage, as
Henry Barrowe and John Greenwood, now in the Fleet ; others
they have cast into Newgate, and laden with as many irons as
they can bear ; others into dungeons and loathsome jails, —
where it is lamentable to relate how many of these innocents
have perished within these five years ; aged widows, aged men,
and young maidens ; where so many as the infection hath spared
be in woful distress, like to follow their fellows, if speedy redress
be not had." They related how they had been seized, with vio
lence and outrage, in the dead of night ; their houses broken
open, ransacked and plundered, and their families suffering every
abuse. " We therefore humbly pray," said they, " in the name
of God and our sovereign queen, that we may have the benefit
of the laws, and the public charter of the land : namely, that we
may be received to bail till we, by order of law, be convicted of
some crime deserving of bonds. We plight unto you our

THE PURITANS SUFFERING. 117
honors, our faith unto God, and our allegiance to her Majesty,
that we will not commit anything unworthy of the Gospel of
Christ, or to the disturbance of the common peace and good order
of the land ; and that we will be forthcoming at such reasonable
warning as your lordships shall command. Oh let us not perish
before trial and judgment, especially imploring and crying to
you for the same."*
The lords of council dared not interfere. Mr. Smith lay in
prison twelve months before he was called before the High Com
mission, and then he and the apprehended members of his
church were committed to different prisons, where " they were
shut up in close rooms, not being allowed the liberty of the
prison." " Here," says Neale, " they died like rotten sheep, some
of the disease of the prison ; some for want, and others of infectious
disorders." " These bloody men" [the High Commissioners],
says Barrowe in his supplication, " will neither allow us meat,
drink, fire, lodging ; nor suffer any whose heart the Lord would
stir up for our relief, to have any access to us : by which means
seventeen or eighteen have perished in the noisome jails within
these six years. Some of us had not one penny when we were
sent to prison, nor anything to procure a maintenance for our
selves and families but our handy-labors and our trades : by
which means .not only we, but our families and children, are
undone and starved." " That which we crave for us all, is the
liberty to die openly or live openly in the land of our nativity.
If we deserve death, let us not be closely murdered, yea, starved
to death, with hunger and cold, and stifled in loathsome dun
geons." Among those who perished in prison was Roger Rippon, who
dying in Newgate, his fellow prisoners put this inscription on
his coffin : " This is the corpse of Roger Rippon, a servant of
Christ, and her Majesty's faithful subject; who is the last of six
teen or seventeen, which that great enemy of God, the Arch
bishop of Canterbury, with his High Commissioners, have mur
dered in Newgate within these live years, manifestly for the tes
timony of Jesus Christ, &c. * * He died A. D. 1592." Many
copies of this inscription were dispersed among his friends, for
which some were apprehended and fined.
The prisoners now appealed in an humble petition to Lord
Burleigh, entreating for some examination before impartial judges.
u If anything be found in us worthy of death or of bonds," said
they, " let us be made an example to all posterity ; if not, we en
treat for some compassion to be shown in equity, according to
law." Fifty-nine persons, from eight prisons in and about Lon
don, signed this petition. But no relief could be had. "Thus,"
* Neale.

118 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
says Neale, " these pious and conscientious persons, after a long
and illegal imprisonment, were abandoned to the severity of an
unrighteous law; some of them being publicly executed as
felons, and others proscribed and sent into banishment."
Among those put to death, were Mr. Barrowe, a lawyer, and
Messrs. Greenwood and Penry, ministers of the gospel. On the
6th of May, 1593, Barrowe and Greenwood were carried to Ty-
burn, and there hanged for the crime of non-conformity, and for
having written against the bishops, the organization, and the
rites ofthe Church of England.
Twenty-eight years after the landing of the Pilgrims at Ply
mouth, Governor Bradford wrote a supposed " Dialogue between
some young men born in New England, and sundry ancient
men that came out of Holland and Old England." In this dia
logue, the " ancient men " cite the following testimony concern
ing Barrowe and Greenwood : " First," say they, " a famous and
godly preacher [Phillips] having heard Barrowe's holy speeches
and preparations for death, said, ' Barrowe, my soul be with
thine.' " " The same author," said the ancient men, " also re
ported that Queen Elizabeth asked the learned Dr. Reynolds
what he thought of those two men, Mr. Barrowe and Mr. Green
wood : and he answered her Majesty, that it could not avail any
thing to show his judgment concerning them, seeing they were
put to death : and being loth to speak further, her Majesty
charged him upon his allegiance to speak. Whereupon he an
swered that he was persuaded, that, had they lived, they would
have been two as worthy instruments for the Church of God, as
have been raised up in this age. Her Majesty sighed and said
no more. But after that, riding to a park by the place where
they were executed, and being willing to take further informa
tion concerning them, [she] demanded of the Right Hon. Earl
of Cumberland, that was present when they suffered, what end
they made. He answered, A very godly end, and prayed for your
Majesty and State. We may also add," say the ancient men,
" that some of us have heard by credible information, that the queen
demanded of the archbishop, what he thought of them in his con
science. He answered, he thought them the servants of God,
but dangerous to the State. 'Alas !' said she, ' shall we put the
servants of God to death ?' And this was the true cause why
no more of them were put to death in her days."*
But this conversation came too late to save Penry from death,
who was executed about six weeks after Barrowe and Green
wood. In 1590 a warrant had been issued for the apprehension
of Penry as one of the authors of Martin Mar-Prelate. Hume
unhesitatingly ascribes the authorship to him ; but Penry denied
* Young's Chronicles of the Pilgrims, p. 422

THE PURITANS SUFFERING. 119
it ; and Martin himself clears Penry fully from the cha/ge. Pen
ry fled into Scotland, where he remained three years. Ventur
ing at length to return home, he was seized. A manuscript
was found in his possession containing the heads of an address
to the queen, designed to show her majesty the state of religion
in the realm, and the many abuses in the Church of England ;
and to beg of her the favor of being allowed to go into Wales,
his native country, and preach the Gospel. For this manuscript
found in his possession, though he never published it or uttered
it, and though it could not be proved that he intended so to do,
he was condemned to die.
Penry protested against this injustice. " The case is most
lamentable," said he, " that the private observations of any stu
dent, being in a foreign land, and wishing well to his prince and
country, should bring his life with blood to a violent end : espe
cially seeing they are most private, and so imperfect that they
have no coherence at all in them." He declared that he had not
so much as looked into them for 14 or 15 months. " And," said
he, " I thank the Lord, I remember not that that day hath passed
over my head since under her government I came to the know
ledge of the truth, wherein I have not commended her estate
unto God." " I am," said he, " a poor young man, born and
bred in the mountains of Wales. I am the first, since the last
springing ofthe gospel in this latter age, that publicly labored to
have the blessed seed thereof sown in those barren mountains.
I have often rejoiced before my God, as He knoweth, that I had
the favor to be born and live under her majesty for promoting
this work. And now being to end my days before I am come
to the one-half of my years in the likely course of nature, I leave
the success of labors unto such of my countrymen as the Lord
is to raise after me." * * * * " An enemy unto any good
order and policy I was never. Whatsoever I wrote in religion,
the same did I simply for no other end than the bringing of
God's truth to light. I never did anything in this cause (Lord,
thou art witness) for contention, vain glory, or to draw disciples
after me. Whatsoever I wrote or held besides the warrant of
the written word, I have always warned all men to leave." * *
" Far be it, that either the thought of saving an earthly life, the
regard which in nature I ought to have to the desolate outward
state of a poor friendless widow and four fatherless infants * *
• * or to any other outward thing, should enforce me, by the
denial of God's truth, contrary to my conscience, to lose my
own soul. * * * [do from my heart forgive all that seek
my life, as I desire to be forgiven in the day of strict account-
praying for them as for my own soul, that although upon earth
we cannot accord, we may yet meet in heaven, unto our eternal

120 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
comfort and unity ; where controversies shall be at an end. *
* * Subscribed with the heart and the hand which never de
vised or wrote anything to the discredit or defamation of Queen
Elizabeth : I take it on my death, as I hope to have life after
this. " John Penry."
The archbishop was the first to sign his death-warrant. It
was sent to the sheriff, who the very same day erected a
gaflows, and sent his officers to bid the condemned man to be
ready, for he must die that afternoon. Thus, on the 29th of
May, 1593, died John Penry, in the 34th year of his age.
It will serve to show the spirit of these martyrs, as well as to
bring home to our own bosoms the sufferings of these men
whose firmness bequeathed us our liberties, to give here a
part of the letter which Penry wrote to his fellow sufferers just
before his death.
" To the distressed, faithful congregation of Christ in London;
and all the members thereof, whether in bonds or at liberty.
" My beloved brethren,
"Mr. F. Johnson, &c, &c, with the rest of you both men and
women, as if I particularly warned you all, which stand mem
bers of this poor afflicted congregation, whether at liberty or
in bonds ; Jesus Christ the Great King and Prince of the
kings of the earth, bless you and comfort you * * *- Beloved,
let us think our lot and portion more than blessed, that now we
are vouchsafed the favor not only to know and profess, but also
to suffer for the sincerity of the gospel ; and let us remember
that great is our reward in heaven, if we endure unto the end.
* * * I testify unto you for mine own part, as I shall answer
it before Jesus Christ and his elect angels, that I never saw any
truth more clear and undoubted, than this witness wherein we
stand. * * * And I thank my God I am not only ready to be
bound and banished, but even to die in this cause by his strength ;
yea, my brethren, I greatly long, in regard of myself, to be dis
solved, and to five in the blessed kingdom of heaven, with Jesus
Christ, and his angels * * * with the rest of the glorious kings
and prophets, and martyrs and witnesses of Jesus Christ, that
have been from the beginning of the world ; particularly with
my two brethren, Mr. Henry Barrowe and Mr. John Greenwood,
who have last of all yielded their blood for this precious testimo
ny ; confessing unto you, my brethren and sisters, that if I might
live upon the earth the days of Methuselah twice told, and that
in no less comfort than Peter, James and John were, in the mount,
and after this life might be sure of the kingdom of heaven, that
yet to gain all this, I durst not go from my former testimony.

THE PURITANS SUFFERING. 121
* * * Strive for me, and with me, that the Lord our God may
make me and all able to end our course with joy and patience.
Strive also that he may stay his blessed hand, if it be bis good
pleasure, and not make any further breach in his Church, by the
taking away any more of us as yet, to the discouragement of the
weak, and the lifting up of the horn of our adversaries. * * *
I would indeed, if it be his good pleasure, live yet with you to
help you bear that grievous and hard yoke, which ye are like to
sustain, either here or in a strange land. And, my good brethren,
seeing banishment with loss of goods is likely to betide you all,
prepare yourselves for this hard entreaty, and rejoice that any
are made worthy for Christ's cause to suffer and bear all these
things. And I beseech you in the bowels of Jesus Christ, that
none of you in this case look upon his particular estate, but
regard the general state of the Church of God ; that the same
may go and be kept together, whithersoever it shall please God
to send you. Oh the blessing will be great that shall ensue this
care ; whereas, if you go every man to provide for his own
house, and to look for his own family first, neglecting poor Zion,
the Lord will set his face against you, and scatter you from one
end of heaven to the other. * * * The Lord, my brethren and
sisters, hath not forgotten to be gracious unto Zion. You shall
yet find days of peace and rest, if you continue faithful. This
stamping and treading us under his feet, this subverting of our
cause and right in judgment, is done by Him, to the end that we
should search and try our ways. * * * Let not those of you
that either have stocks in your hands, or some likely trades to
live by, dispose of yourselves where it may be most commodious
for your outward estate, and in the mean time suffer the poor
ones that have no such means either to bear the whole work upon
their weak shoulders, or to end their days in sorrow and mourn
ing, for want of outward and inward comforts in the land of
strangers ; for the Lord will be the avenger of all such dealings
* * *. Let not the poor and friendless be forced to stay behind
here, and to break a good conscience for want of your support
and kindness to them, that they may go with you. And here I
humbly beseech you, not in any outward regard, as I shall
answer it before my God, that you would take my poor and
desolate widow, and mess of fatherless and friendless orphans
with you into exile, whithersoever you go ; and you shall find,
1 doubt not, that the blessed promises of my God made unto me
and mitir, will accompany them. _ * * * * Only I beseech you,
let thrin not continue after you in this land, where they must be
forced to go again into Egypt. * * * Be kind and loving and
tender-hearted, the one of you towards the other. Labor every
way to increase love, and to show the duties of love, one of you

122 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
toward another, by visiting and comforting and relieving one the
other. Be watching in prayer ; especially remember those of
our brethren who are especially endangered * * *. I fear me
our carelessness was over great unto our God for the lives of those
two so notable lights of his Church, who now rest wilh him ; and
that thus he took them away, for many respects, seeming good
to his wisdom ; so also, that we might learn to be more careful
in prayer in all such causes. Pray, then, * * * brethren, for
brother Mr. Francis Johnson and for me, * * that God may
spare us unto his Church, if it be his good pleasure ; or give us
exceeding faithfulness ; and be every way comfortable unto the
sister and wife of the dead : I mean unto my beloved Mrs. Bar
rowe, and Mrs. Greenwood, whom I heartily salute, and desire
to be much comforted in their God, who, by his blessings from
above, will countervail unto them the want of so notable a bro
ther and a husband. I would wish you earnestly to write, yea,
to send if you may, to comfort the brethren in the West and
North, that they faint not in these troubles ; and that you also
may have of their advice and they of yours, what to do in these
desolate times. * * * I would wish you and them to be
together if you may, whithersoever you shall be banished;
and to this purpose bethink you beforehand, where to be,
and be all of you assured, that he who is your God in
England, will be your God in any land under the whole
heaven ; for the earth and the fullness thereof are his ; and
blessed are they that for his cause are bereaved of any part of
the same. Finally, my brethren, the Eternal God bless you and
yours, that I may meet you all unto my comfort in the blessed
kingdom of heaven. Thus having from my heart, and with
tears, performed, it may be, my last duty towards you in this life,
I salute you all in the Lord, both men and women, even those
whom I have not mentioned, for all your names I know not.
And remember to stand fast in Jesus Christ, as you have received
him unto immortality ; and may he confirm and establish you
unto the end for the praise of his glory. Amen. Your loving
brother in the patience and sufferings of the Gospel. "John Penry.
" 24th 4th mo., April, 1593."
This was the last work of Penry ; to give a word of en
couragement and comfort to his brethren who were now about
to be' driven into that exile from which our pilgrim fathers came,
to give us, their children, our pleasant homes in this western
world. Others have labored, and we have entered into their
labors. How does it become the descendants of such ancestors
never to throw away the principles which they prized so dear,

THE PURITANS SUFFERING. 123
till at least we are satisfied that they are neither the principles of
national freedom nor of the Word of God. An age of suffer
ings is yet before us, before we come to the voyage of the
Pilgrim Fathers. But upon the details of sufferings we shall
dwell no more than is necessary to give the most rapid intelligi
ble account of the history. We now take our leave of the his
tory down to the death of Queen Elizabeth in 1603, and shall
employ the next chapter upon the great work of the "Judicious
Hooker," a work written expressly against the Puritans by the
master mind of the established Church in that age ; and which
was not only relied upon by the persecuting hierarchy of the
succeeding reigns as an ample and triumphant justification of
all their cruellies, but which has stood the great text book of
those who hate the principles of the Puritans down to the pre
sent day.

IX.

" THE JUDICIOUS HOOKER."
The design and principles of his Ecclesiastical Polity. Its controlling in
fluence over the dynasty of the Stuarts. These principles examined.
His doctrine. His notion of the power of orders.
The disputes which began about vestments and ceremonies in
volved deep principles concerning the rights of conscience. The
reign of Elizabeth had not expired before the debate left the form
of questions concerning particular grievances, and assumed a
shape corresponding with the reality — not a question about sur
plices, caps, and ceremonies, but a deep and solemn inquiry into
the ground, nature, and limits of ecclesiastical power ; and the
rights of conscience in congregations of Christians, and in indi
vidual men.
Accordingly, when Richard Hooker, in the latter part of
Elizabeth's reign, took up his pen against the Puritans in justifi
cation of the severities practised by the queen, the bishops, and
the High Commission, he spent not his strength upon the par
ticular impositions of kneeling at the sacrament, the surplice, the
sign of the cross in baptism, and things of that sort, but laid down
the broad principle that the Church has authority to impose such
things according to her discretion; and that the conscience of in
dividuals and of particular congregations in such matters is not to
be regarded; but that they maybe rightly and piously compelled
to yield, by whatever penalties good mother Church and the
sovereign prince may find it necessary to employ for the attain
ment of that end.
Richard Hooker was sufficiently "-judicious" to perceive that
on no principle short of this, could the rigors of the established
Church be justified, or the ChurcIi itself, as established in
England, be vindicated, and that if this principle could be sub
stantiated, the robes, ceremonies and liturgies were all right;
and the fines, the imprisonments, the banishments, and the
slaughters inflicted, were all proper, just, and wholesome pun
ishments for the coercion of the wickedly rebellious.
Accordingly, the account which Hooker himself gives of his great
work on Ecclesiastical Polity, is, that his design was " To write

" the judicious hooker." 125
a deliberate and sober Treatise on the Church's power, to make
canons for the use of ceremonies, and BY LAW TO IMPOSE
AN OBEDIENCE to them, as upon her children, and this he
proposed to do in eight books of the Laws of Ecclesiastical
Polity." *
This was cutting up the whole matter by the roots. Grant
this principle and there is no further dispute about surplices,
liturgies, and ceremonies ; the Church may stand upon her
authority. There are no rights of conscience in the case ; and
if any begin to prate about conscience, or hesitate to yield a due
conformity, they may be righteously silenced, imprisoned, banish
ed, hanged, or burnt. A most convenient doctrine, no doubt, for
the prelates and the despotic queen, in her capacity of head of
the Church !
This was the great design and principle of Hooker, which
he maintained with consummate ability, in a work on which he
employed his undivided energies for a series of years. Many
of his subordinate principles, illustrations, and arguments, are
admirable ; and could they be separated from this great design,
they would be most excellent. Much truth is mingled with his
scheme (when was any monstrous error ever put forth, entirely
dissociated from all truth, and in its own naked deformity ?), but
that has only served to make the lurking mischief the more de
ceptive and dangerous.
This great doctrine of Hooker, and the ability with which he
maintained it, have made him the great champion of the Church
of England, from that day to this. He became, in his day, the
beloved of Archbishop Whitgift; the honored of Queen Eliza
beth ; and when King James came from Scotland to take pos
session of the English throne, almost the first thing he did, was
to inquire of the Archbishop for " his friend Mr. Hooker, that
writ the works of Ecclesiastical Polity," and he expressed great
sorrow, when he learned that Hooker died the year before.
King James, when among the Presbyterians in Scotland, had
often and earnestly professed himself, from entire conviction, a
Presbyterian. His accession to the throne of England wrought
a marvellous change in his opinions. " No Bishop, no King,"
became now his favorite saying ; and he affirmed that " Presby
tery agreed with monarchy, as well as God with devil!' The
work of Hooker was precisely to his mind. It maintained his
lofty notions of Church prerogative ; or rather of his own pre
rogative as head of the Church. It was indeed as thorough
going a defence of despotism as could be desired. It is no
wonder that King James (as Hooker's biographer says) did
never mention him but with the epithet of "The learned," or "ju-
* Life, p. 58, vol. i., Ed. Lond., 1825.

126 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
dicious," or " Reverend," or " Venerable Mr. Hooker." " Nor
did his son, our late King Charles I, ever mention him, but with
the same reverence; enjoining his son our own gracious king
[Charles IL] to be studious in Mr. Hooker's book." The Bishop
of Exeter, in his epistle dedicatory of an edition of Hooker, ad
dressed to King Charles IL, says, that the king " needs nothing
more to commend the work to his majesty's acceptance, than the
commendation it had from his royal father; who, a few days'
before he was crowned with martyrdom, recommended to his
dearest children, the study of Mr. Hooker's Ecclesiastical Polity,
even next to the Bible."
It was here that these infatuated scions of an infatuated fami
ly drank in those lessons of despotism, and that contempt for
the rights of conscience, which, under James I., drove away our
Pilgrim Fathers ; brought his son Charles I. to the block ; led
on Charles II. in his iniquitous attempt to force Episcopacy upon
the Presbyterians of Scotland ; and which lost James II. and
his heirs the kingdom.
That these four successive kings of the house of Stuart might
have been so infatuated as to intrench so presumptuously upon
the liberties of their people, even if Hooker had never written, —
is possible. But it is more probable that the principles and rea
sonings of Hooker ripened the principles of despotism in these
kings; gave conscience and boldness to their endeavors; and
were thus the remoter but actual causes of the calamities that
overwhelmed the dynasty of the Stuarts. I see little cause to
doubt, that if the judicious Hooker had never lived, America
would not have been settled by the Pilgrims ; Charles I. would
not have been beheaded ; Scotland would have been saved the
burnings and butcheries of the Episcopal war; and James II.
would not have been driven from his throne.
It seems proper, therefore, in our survey of the history of those
times, to pay some particular attention to a work, otherwise so
famous, and which was productive of so great results both in the
religious and the political world.
The design of Hooker, then, was, as has been stated, " To write
a deliberate and sober treatise on the Church's power ; to make
Canons for the use of Ceremonies ; and by law to impose an obe
dience to them as upon her children."
The " Canons for the use of ceremonies," which Hooker main
tained the Church's power to make and impose b'y law, were the
imposition of a Liturgy, vestments, and the cross in baptism,
kneeling at the sacrament of the Lord's Supper, and all other
forms and rituals which the Church had, from time to time, de
vised and ordained.
He rejects entirely the idea that the Scripture is the sole or

"the judicious hooker." 127
a sufficient guide in matters of Church order and- polity ; and freely
admits that the things for which the Church of England was
persecuting the Puritans to death, are not required in the Scrip
tures, and have no pattern there.
" To devise any certain form for the outward administration of
public duties in the service of God or things belonging thereto,"
says Hooker,* " and to find out the most convenient for that use, is
a point of wisdom ecclesiastical. It is not for a man,which doth
know, or should know, what Order is, and what peaceable gov
ernment requireth, to ask, " Why should we hang our judgment on
the Church's sleeve ?" and " Why in matters of order, more than
in matters of doctrine, The Church hath AUTHORITY to es
tablish that for our order at one time, which at another time it may
abolish, and in both it may do well. * * * Laws touching matters
of Order are changeable by the power of the Church ; arti
cles concerning doctrine are not so." " The Church, being a
body which dieth not, hath always power, as occasion requireth,
no less to ordain that which never was, than to ratify what hath
been before."*
If this principle is correct, then the rituals of popery were all
right ; having been ordained by what churchmen acknowledge
the true Catholic Church, and having never been changed by the
same. On this principle, the Church of England, as well as all
reformed Churches, was purely schismatic and rebellious ; and
the Puseyit.es are only following out this principle of Hooker,
when they declare that they " Hate the Reformation more and
' more." But if by " The Church," Hooker means not any Catholic
organization, polity, or authority ; but a mere national or provin
cial organization ; or the body of Christians in any particular
land, that has power in its " Wisdom Ecclesiastical," to ordain or
alter for that particular land ; then the Episcopal Church in New
England is purely schismatic ; the Puritans, on Hooker's princi
ple, having as clear a divine right to ordain rites and ceremonies
for worship, and to fix the shape of the Ecclesiastical Polity
within their domains, according to their " wisdom ecclesiastical,"
as the Church of England has to do the same in England, or
the pope to do the same at Rome, or the Patriarch of Constanti
nople within the limils of the Greek religion.
Indeed [on p. 422] Hooker himself seems to draw this conclu
sion. He says, " That which the Church by her ecclesiastical
authority shall probably think and define to be true or good,
must, in congruity of reason, overrule all other inferior judg
ments whatsoever." * * " The bare consent of the whole Church
* Page 421. t Vol. i., p. 220.

128 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
should of itself stop their mouths, who, living under it, dare to
bark against it."
On this principle, the Reformation was a rebellious schism.
Luther was only barking at what should have stopped his mouth.
The Church had not only consented; it had thought and defined;
and done so "probably," i. e. with probable correctness ; probable,
in view of the Church itself : for why should infallibility be
mistaken? On this principle of Hooker, the Decrees of the
Council of Trent must be regarded as " true and good :" a suffi
cient law to bind the conscience of every one, who, by birth or
habitation, falls within the local domains of the Papal Church.
But Hooker thinks it a matter of common sense that the
Church should necessarily have this authority. " Might we not"
(he goes on to say) " think it more than wonderful, that nature
should in all communities appoint a predominant judgment to
sway and overrule in so many things ; or that God himself
should allow so much authority and power unto every poor fam
ily * * * and lhat the city of the living God, which is his Church,
be able neither to command, nor yet to forbid anything which the
meanest shall in that respect, and for her sole authority's sake,
be bound to obey?" * * * " Surely the Church of God in this
business, is neither of capacity, I trust, so weak, nor so unstrength-
ened, I know, with authority from above, but that her laws may
exact obedience, at the hand of her own children ; and enjoin
gainsayers silence, giving them roundly to understand, that, where
our duty is submission, weak opposition betokens pride."
And by this authority to command or forbid, Hooker would
seem to think it suitable for the Church to " command to abstain
from meats," in Lent ; or to forbid to eat the same on Fridays;
if the Church, in her Wisdom Ecclesiastical, should think fit so
to do. " Now," he says (p. 225), " as we live in civil society,
the state of the commonwealth wherein we live, both may and
doth require certain laws concerning food. * * * Yea,
the self-same matter is also a subject wherein some true Ecclesi
astical Laws have place, * * * our private discretion, which
otherwise might guide us a contrary way, must here submit
itself. * * * In which case, that of Zonaras concerning fasts
may be remembered : ' Fastings are good, but let good things be
done in good and decent manner. He that transgresseth in his
fastings the orders of the Holy Fathers, the positive laws of the
Church of Christ, must be plainly told, that good things do lose
the grace of their goodness when in good sort they are not per
formed.' And * here men's private fancies must give place to
the higher judgment of the Church, which is in authority a mother
over them."
And Hooker not only claims for the Church the divine right of

" THE JUDICIOUS HOOKER." 129
commanding and forbidding things not commanded or forbidden
in Scripture, but he claims a sort of inspiration of the Holy Ghost,
by which the Church is guided in making these canons. On this
ground he puts the canons and traditions of the Church on a very
near equality with the express injunctions of the Word df God :
claiming for these traditions and canons the same authority over
the consciences of men. " There is no impediment," he says
(p. 304), " but that the self-same Spirit, which revealeth the things
that God hath set down in his law, may also be thought to aid and
direct men in finding out by the light of reason what laws are ex
pedient to be made for the guiding of his Church, over and besides
them that are in Scripture, * * * and for that cause it is
not said amiss, touching Ecclesiastical Canons, That by instinct
of the Holy Ghost they have been made and consecrated by the
reverend acceptation of the world."
Here then is ecclesiastical tradition and usurpation claiming
for itself equal authority with the Word of God ! By what rule
Hooker could reject the canons " forbidding to marry," and com
manding to abstain from meat, or enjoining " auricular confes
sion," or anything else which the Church of Rome has estab
lished, does not appear. Surely, for some dark ages, these had
been consecrated by the "reverend acceptation of the world;" and
as to the " instinct of the Holy Ghost " for the making of canons,
why should not that reside at Rome as well as at Canterbury ? — at
Canterbury under the Popes, as well as at Canterbury under the
Prelates ? — at the Council of Trent as well as in the palace at
Lambeth ?
But it is time to inquire what is the Church to which Hooker
attributes this authority? Is it each particular congregation
of faithful men, acting for themselves alone ? By no means ; on
his system such congregations have no rights in the case, save
to submit to higher authority. His notion of the potential
Church, is not of a Church, but of the Church holy and catholic.
Yet even here Hooker is confused ; sometimes he attributes
these awful powers to the Holy Catholic Church having catholic
authority, and yet an ideal polity ; a catholic authority without a
catholic organization, speaking by no authorized agents, and with
no authorized tellers to declare her suffrages ; for he does not
allow her to speak with final authority either by councils or
by popes. Sometimes he vests this divine power in such an
unorganized, undefined, impalpable catholic authority, a mere
figment, a nonentity ; and sometimes his idea of mother Church
is that of the supreme ecclesiastical power in a given territory.
In neither case does he allow any share of authority to the com
mon people, but reposes all power in the hands of the clergy
alone. "Hereupon," he says (i.,p. 333), " we hold that God's
9

130

THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.

clergy are a state, * * * a state whereunto the rest of
God's people must be subject, as touching things that appertain
to their souls' health."
But what if this clergy in any land are ignorant or idolatrous ?
What if they are all sunk to the lowest abominations of popery ?
Must the rest of God's people continue subject in that case ?
Must we follow the blind, and antichristian, and idolatrous, be
cause they claim to be God's clergy ? Surely Hooker allows
popish clergy and prelates as righteous an authority as any other.
On this point he says expressly (p. 334), " It is with the clergy,
if their persons be respected, even as it is with other men ; their
quality many times far beneath that which the dignity of their
place requireth. Howbeit, according to order of polity, they
being the light ofthe world, others, though wiser and better, must
that way be subject to them"
But the clergy, being a state, require, on Hooker's scheme, a
" polity" over them. " Again, for as much as where the clergy
are any great multitudes, order doth necessarily require that, by
degrees, they be distinguished ; we hold that there have ever been,
and ever ought to be, in such case, at least, two sorts of ecclesi
astical persons, the one subordinate unto the other." Hooker
here shows himself really judicious in putting in a claim for no
more than " two sorts." But it is wonderful that Hooker did
not carry out his principle to its legitimate conclusions ; why he
did not make archbishops above diocesan bishops, patriarchs
above these, and then crown the apex with a pope. The princi
ple of Hooker is unfortunately different from that of the Lord
Jesus Christ, with regard to what " order doth require" among
his ministers. Two of the twelve disciples once desired to be
above their brethren by such " degrees ;" and when the ten heard
it, they were filled with indignation. Then our Lord took oc
casion to settle the question of " degrees" among his ministers.
" Ye know that the princes of the Gentiles exercise dominion
over them, and they that are great exercise authority among
them, but it shall not be so among you."
This prelatical domination being established as the polity of
Christ's Church, Hooker would leave nothing for the people and
the inferior class of clergy but to obey. " Are ye able" (he says to
the Puritans, p. 126), " to allege any just and sufficient cause,
wherefore, absolutely, ye should not condescend in this contro
versy, to have your judgments over-ruled by some such definitive
sentence ?" He insists that conscience ought to give way to
higher authority — the judgment of the prelates ; and that this
" Sentence of judgment is sufficient for any reasonable man's con
science to build the duty of obedience upon, whatsoever his own opi
nion were, as touching the matter before in question." (p. 127.) To

"THE JUDICIOUS HOOKER." 131
sustain this sentiment he quotes the law of the Jewish priesthood.
" That man which will do so presumptuously, not hearkening
unto the priest that standeth before the Lord to minister there,
nor unto the judge, let him die." The scope of the principle is
this : if the Pope, or a general council, or the bishop determine
that we ought to kneel to the host of the Mass, and We think that
so to do is a sinful idolatry, their sentence is enough for our
conscience ; and their authority is above all the decisions or
rights of conscienqe ; we must disobey conscience and follow
the judgment of the priests. What could the most abject devotee
of the papacy yield to the power of the priest beyond this ?"
But Hooker maintains that the Church, i. e. the clergy, i. e.
the prelates, or rather the queen, as head of the Church, has au
thority thus, to " Bind the conscience in their chains."
And what is that law by which such impositions may be en
forced ? The law of the Church ? under the simple penalty of
exclusion from her pale ? Alas, no ! Yet even if she exclude a
man from her pale, in the time of Hooker, he loses not only his
privileges as a member of the Church, but all his legal and civil
rights ; he becomes an outlaw — helpless and defenceless. The
laws which Hooker is undertaking to justify are the civil laws ;
demanding obedience to ecclesiastical canons, and enforcing
these oanons by sequestrations, fines, imprisonment, banishment,
or death. If people will not come to church, or if coining they
will not conform ; then any penalty is suitable that is necessary
to compel their obedience. Even the Court of High Commis
sion, that arbitrary and cruel inquisition, Hooker coolly attempts
to justify as a very suitable and proper instrument for maintain
ing the rights and prerogatives of the Church, against those
whose consciences should prove refractory to her canons. " Ye
have given us already to understand," he says, in his address to
the Puritans, " what your opinion is in part concerning her sacred
Majesty's Court of High Commission ; the nature whereof is the
same with that amongst the Jews, albeit the power is not so
groat." * * * * " As for the orders which are established
with reason and equity and the law of nature, God and man do
all favor that which is in being, till orderly judgment of decision
be given against, it is bul justice to exact of you, andpervcrseness
¦in yon it should be to deny thereunto your ivilling obedience "
(p. 128).
Such is the outline of the design and fundamental principles
of the famous " Ecclesiastical Polity" of the " Judicious Hook
er :" a scheme of despotism, and of outrage, both upon the rights
of man and the prerogatives of God. These are the principles
deliberately set forth as the justification of the Church in hereon-

132 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
troversy with the Puritans. This scheme of tyranny was no day
dream in the time of Hooker. From the time of the brutal
Henry VIII. through the reign of the Bloody Mary, and from
the accession of Elizabeth to the last of the Stuarts, these
notions so hostile to liberty, and so fraught with ecclesiastical
usurpation and abuse, were carried into rigorous practice. By
the bishops' mandates and by decisions of the bishops' courts ; by
means of the High Commission and the Star Chamber, a rigorous
and relentless enforcement of these principles was maintained,
through fines, imprisonments, maimings, and even by the inflic
tion of death.
To these principles the Puritans opposed the principle that
God alone is lord of the conscience : that every man has
an indefeasible right to freedom in the worship of God : that
what God has not enjoined to be observed as a ritual in his
worship, man has no right to impose, even in things indifferent ;
much less where an enlightened conscience cannot yield to such
impositions, without, in its own view, incurring the guilt of
idolatry, or of some other heinous sin against God.
But the scheme of Hooker is not yet completed. If the Church
is to claim such prerogatives over the judgment and conscience,
she must in all reason have corresponding benefits to bestow.
If " God's clergy" that " State" ecclesiastical whereunto " the
rest of God's people must be subject," are to possess these high
powers, that clergy should also be endowed with the power of
conferring some peculiar benefits, for which mankind are depend
ent on their hands. The claim for such ghostly authority has a
natural connection with a corresponding ghostly power for the
bestowal of spiritual gifts.
Accordingly, we find the two claims joined in the great work
of the judicious Hooker. He makes his scheme of doctrine cor
respondent to his polity. Having given to the clergy authority to
rule the conscience by their enactments over and beyond the
word of God, he attributes to them also, power to bestow grace
by sacraments, over and beyond the sanctifying power which the
gospel conveys, under the power of the Holy Spirit, when it is
received by faith alone.
I am fully aware that Hooker is, by many, considered as pure
ly and strongly evangelical ; and that the evangelical party in the
English Church earnestly claim him as maintaining the doctrine
of justification by faith. There are indeed many passages in
Hooker which, taken alone, would speak that doctrine. There
are many passages of exceeding excellence and pungency. So
there are in the famous Oxford Tracts, while, nevertheless, the
scheme is substantially that of Rome. The truth is, in Hooker
the " Iron mixed with miry clay." His work, in fact, consti-

" THE JUDICIOUS HOOKER." 133
tutes the transition state between the evangelical doctrines of the
Reformers, and that system compounded of Armenianism and
Popery, which attained its maturity under the auspices of Arch
bishop Laud ; and which is now again extending over the Eng
lish and American Episcopal folds, under the name of Pusey
ism: and hence, like the Prayer-Book, Hooker is most consistently
and cogently quoted by both sides in the Puseyistic controversy.
From this conflict of doctrine in Hooker, as well as from other
circumstances, many have supposed that the last books of the
Ecclesiastical polity were written by another hand, and falsely
ascribed to Hooker. But as to the matter of fact, the evidence, as
well as the common verdict, is on the other side. Indeed it
should not surprise us that Hooker should be deeply imbued
with what is now called the Puseyite doctrine, — it was begin
ning to prevail in his day, and without it, his scheme of polity
would have been incoherent and monstrous. Whatever may be
thought of subordinate points in his scheme of doctrine, we shall
see that its determining principles and features are those of the
scheme which denies the doctrine of justification by faith alone,
and teaches rather justification by the sacraments and interven
tions of a sacerdotal priesthood.
But let Hooker set forth the fundamentals ofhis scheme in his
own words.
"Instruction and prayer," he says (p. 561, Book V.), "are
duties which serve as elements, parts, or principles " [rudiments],
" to the rest that follow, in which number the sacraments of the
Church are chief. The Church is to us that very mother of our
new birth. * * * As many, therefore, as are apparently to
our judgment born to God, they have the seed of their regenera
tion by the ministry of the Church ; which useth to that end and
purpose, not only the word but the sacraments, both having gen
erative force and virtue." He continues (p. 595), " That saving
grace which Christ originally is, or hath for the general good of
his whole Church, by sacraments he severally deriveth into every
member thereof. Sacraments serve as the instruments of God,
to that end and purpose. * * * Where the signs and sacra
ments of his grace are not either through contempt unreceived,
or received with contempt, wc are not to doubt but they really
..ive what they promise and what they signify. For we take not
Baptism, nor the Eucharist, for bare resemblances, or memorials
of things absent, neither for naked signs and testimonies assuring
us of grace received before, but (as they arc indeed and in verity)
for mi.ans effectual, whereby God, when tee take the sacra
ments, DELIVERETH INTO OUR HANDS THAT GRACE AVAILABLE
UNTO ETERNAL LIFE."
" Fn," he adds (I., p. 602), " as we are not naturally men

134 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
without birth, so neither are we Christian men of the eye
of the Church of God but by new birth ; nor (according to the
manifest ordinary course of divine dispensation) new born, but
by that BAPTISM, which both declareth and maketh us Chris-
tians. In which respect, we justly hold it to be the door of our
actual entrance into God's house, the first apparent beginning of
life ; a seal perhaps to the grace of election before received, but
to our sanctification here, a step that hath not any before
it." In this connection, Hooker expressly opposes this doctrine
to the notion of justification by faith alone; declaring that notion
to " draw very near unto the error " of " the old Valentinian
Heretics," and maintaining on the contrary that " Baptism is
necessary to take away sin ;" and demanding " how we have the
fear of God in our hearts, if care of delivering men's souls from
sin do not move us to use all means for their baptism." The
implication is, that believe, repent, love God, give the whole soul
to Christ, it all avails nothing for your justification ; nor does
your inward sanctification have even the beginning of life, until
you have come under " the ministry of the Church," in baptism !
Paul taught a different doctrine. Abraham was justified by faith
years before he received circumcision as a sign and seal of that
justification. Surely the sacrament could not for the first time
bestow that which Abraham had before. The Publican, not the
Pharisee, went down to his house justified ; but was there any
ritual or sacrament in the case ? In Christ Jesus neither circum
cision availeth anything, nor uncircumcision ; but a new crea
ture. The new creature is then a thing entirely distinct from the
sacrament, and baptism can by no means be considered identi
cal with regeneration.
As to the efficacy of sacraments, Hooker does not suppose
that they confer grace from any physical operation of the ele
ments, nor yet from the mere action of the Priest (nor perhaps
does the "opus operatum" of the Papists mean to go so far as
this), but he says (p. 594), " Their chiefest force and virtue con-
sisteth not herein" [viz. as " warrants for the security of belief,"
or as marks of visible " distinction to separate God's own from
strangers "] — " but they are heavenly ceremonies which God has
sanctified and ordained * * * as marks whereby to know
when God doth impart the vital or saving grace of Christ unto
all that are capable thereof; and secondly as means conditional
which God requireth in them unto whom he imparteth the grace.
* * * Seeing therefore that grace is a consequent of sacra
ments, a thing which accompanieth them as their end, a benefit
which they have received from God himself * * * it may
hereby be understood that sacraments are necessary * " &c.
The difference between this doctrine and the opus operatum of

"THE JUDICIOUS HOOKER." 135
Papists appears to me rather nominal than real. What is the
practical difference between holding that the ceremony itself con
fers grace, and holding that God himself invariably confers grace
simultaneously with the performance of the ceremony ? The
grace in either case comes from God ; in the one case directly,
simultaneously with the sign, and in the other mediately, through
the sign. In both cases the grace is alike dependent upon the
will and work of the officiating priest. And so closely are the
two allied in the mind of Hooker, that he even dips into the
question of the priest's intention in the performance of the sacra
ment ; a question so important in the popish scheme as to involve
the whole efficacy and validity of the sacrament. " Further
more," says Hooker (p. 597-8), " * * we must note, that inas
much as sacraments are actions religious and mystical, which na
ture they have not unless they proceed from a serious meaning
(and what every man's private mind is, as we cannot know, so
neither are we bound to examine) ; therefore always, in these
cases, the known intent ofthe Church doth generally suffice; and
where the contrary is not manifest, we may presume, that he who
outwardly doeth the act, hath inwardly the purpose of the Church
of God."
Let us now turn to Hooker's account of the grace conferred by
the sacrament of the Lord's Supper. He supposes that a person
has in baptism received " that grace available unto eternal life ;"
but he seems also to suppose that, owing to the decays and wear
and tear of the gracious principle in the rough vicissitudes of life,
it needs to be recruited and aided by the virtues of another sacra
ment. Thus he says (vol. ii., p. 1) : "And it may be that the grace
of baptism would serve unto eternal life, were it not that the state
of our spiritual being is daily so much hindered and impaired after
baptism." " Whereas," he continues, " in our infancy we are in
corporated unto Christ, and by baptism we receive the grace of
His Spirit, without any sense or feeling of the gift which God
bestoweth ; in, the Eucharist ice so receive the gift of God * *
that his flesh is meal and his blood drink, not so surmised in im
agination, but truly ; even so truly that through faith we perceive
in the body and blood sacramcntally presented, the very taste
of eternal life : the grace of the sacrament is here AS THE
FOOD WHICH WE EAT AND DRINK."
How is this grace bestowed ? What is its nature ? Do we
receive anything else than the influences of the Holy Spirit in
the Lord's Supper? Is there any other Real presence of Christ,
than his presence by his Spirit ? Certainly there is, according to
Hooker. And here he teaches plainly what Pusey dares only
teach covertly and circuitously. Hooker maintains (vol. i., p.
591), that besides the " True actual influence of grace," " the DI-

136 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
VINE SUBSTANCE of Christ is in all the members of Christ,
is with the whole Church, and whole with every part of the
Church, AS TOUCHING HIS PERSON;" that « The parti
cipation of Christ imported, besides the presence of Christ's
person, a true actual influence of grace ;" — that thus we partici
pate Christ partly by imputation, * * * partly by habitual and
real infusion." He moreover denies that this participation
involves " any mixture of the substance of his flesh with ours."
The papists hold that the priest accomplishes the mysterious
act of transubstantiation, by using the mysterious words hoc est
corpus [this is my body] ; which the priest pronounces in a low
voice, as a sort of mystic incantation (from which practice come
the cant words of profane jugglers, " Hocus Pocus"). Hooker
believes in no transubstantiation of bread, but he holds to the
mystical virtue of the words. " Furthermore," he says, " seeing
that the grace which we here receive doth no way depend upon
the force of that which we do presently behold, it was of necessity
that words of express declaration should be addeduntothe visible
elements that the one might infallibly teach, what the other doth
most assuredly bring lo pass."
" How cometh it to pass," he inquires, " that so few words of
so high mystery being uttered, they receive with gladness the gift
of Christ, and make no show of doubt or scruple ? He answers :
" The bread and cup are his body and blood, because they are
causes instrumental, upon the receipt whereof, the participation of
his body and blood ensueth *****" They" [the bread and wine]
" are made such instruments as mystically, yet truly, invisibly, yet
really, work our communion with the person of Christ."
But how do they become such causes instrumental ? Hooker
thus explains it :" " This hallowed food, through concurrence of
divine power, is in verity and in truth unto faithful receivers in
strumentality a cause of that mystical participation." * * "The
real presence of Christ's most blessed body and blood, is not there
fore to be sought for in the sacrament." * * " Whereupon there
ensueth a kind of transubstantiation in us ; a true change both of
body and soul ; an alteration from death to life." " The very
letter of the word of Christ," says Hooker, " gives plain security
that these mysteries do, as nails, fasten us unto his very cross ;
that by them, we draw out, as touching efficacy and force and
virtue, even the blood of his gored side." * * " This bread hath
in it more than the substance which our eyes behold ; this cup,
hallowed with solemn benediction, availeth to the endless life and
welfare of both soul and body ; with touching it sanctifieth ; it
enlighteneth with belief; it truly comforteth us unto the image of
Christ." " What moveth us," he adds, to argue HOW LIFE
SHOULD COME BY BREAD: our duty being here to take

"the judicious hooker." 137
what is offered, and most assuredly to rest persuaded of this,
THAT CAN WE BUT EAT, WE ARE SAFE." [Vol. ii.,
p. 2.]
Such was the doctrine of the " Judicious Hooker :" and such
was the doctrine prevalent in the English Church in the latter
part of the reign of Queen Elizabeth. It is not the doctrine of
the Thirty-Nine Articles ; but that it is the doctrine of the offices
of the Church in the Prayer-Book, every one may see by a
careful recurrence to those offices ; and we have before seen how
this confusion between the Articles and the offices arose. Thus :
in the office for Baptism, the minister is directed to say, " Seeing
* * that this child is now regenerate," &c, then follows the
prayer : " We yield thee hearty thanks, Most Merciful Father,
that it hath pleased thee to regenerate this infant with thy Holy
Spirit, and to receive him for Thine own child by adoption," &c.
So in the Catechism before Confirmation ; the child is made to
answer, " My sponsors in Baptism, wherein I was made a chilel
of God, and an inheritor of the kingdom of heaven." Many
evangelical churchmen have tried to explain away these words :
but to all such attempts the recent charge of the Bishop of Con
necticut has given an everlasting quietus, at least in Connecticut.
" I know," says the bishop, " that there are some whose views
are, perhaps, tinctured with the theology I have referred to " [of
Edwards, Wesley, and Whitfield] " who would willingly explain
away the language of our baptismal office. But after all I have
heard and read, I believe there is but little real difference of sen
timent among churchmen on this subject." * * * " How
ever amicable it may be to make the doctrine more acceptable to
ilissenlers, the effort must be unavailing. The fundamental
principle of their theology stands directly opposite it."
(Charge, p. 22.)
It is well. This doctrine of Baptismal Regeneration is indeed
" directly opposed" to the " fundamental principles" of the
evangelical denominations who agree with the theology either of
Edwards, Wesley or Whitfield. Let no Jure-Divino Church
man hereafter tell us that the two systems are the same. The
bishop has spoken no less truly than authoritatively, that the two
systems are directly and fundamentally opposed: and that
all efforts to reconcile us to that doctrine " must be unavailing."
We hold it as " another Gospel."
The doctrine of Hooker on the Lord's Supper is the doctrine
evidently implied in the office for administering the same, in the
Prayer Book. The consecration ; the laying on of hands on " all
the bread, and on every vessel in which there is any wine to be
consecrated ;" the going over again with the ceremony of conse
crating imre when the first supply is not sufficient; the Oblation

138 THE puritans and their principles.
(the poor remains of the lifting of the Host, under the notion of
offering the body of Christ as a renewed sacrifice), the remaining
after the communion reverently to eat and drink what remnants
are left of the consecrated meats, that nothing be carried out of the
church ; all these things come from the same popish origin, and
are but in accordance with the same popish notions ofthe sacra
ment which Hooker maintains. I think it must be evident, that
Hooker's scheme, as it was the scheme of those who gave the
offices of the Church of England their final establishment, is the
true exposition of those offices : and that those who have labored
to " soften or explain away" the language of those offices, are en
tirely mistaken. Puseyism is but the legitimate revival of that
scheme which was laid down more fully and unequivocally
near three centuries ago, by that great Oracle of the English
Church, " the Judicious Hooker."
One thing is further necessary to be noticed to complete the
system of Hooker, and that is the account which he gives con
cerning the power of Orders; i. e. the ghostly power conferred
upon priests by the mystery of ordination. He says (vol. ii., p.
82), " The power of the ministry of God" [of God's ministers]
" translateth out of darkness into glory ; it raiseth men from the
earth, and bringeth God himself from heaven ; by blessing visible
elements it maketh them invisible grace ; it daily giveth the Holy
Ghost ; it hath to dispose of that flesh which was given for the
life of the world, and that blood which was poured out to redeem
souls ; when it pour eth malediction upon the heads of the wicked,
they perish ; when it revoketh the same, they revive. O wretched
blindness, if we admire not so great a power ! * * To whom
Christ hath imparted power both over that mystical body which
is the society of souls, and over that natural [body] which is
himself, for the knitting of both in one (a work which antiquity
doth call the making of Christ's body) ; the same power in such
is both termed a kind of mark or character, and acknowledged
to be indelible."*
• With this scheme of the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper, and of the powei
conferred by Ordination, set forth by Hooker and revived by the Oxford Tracta-
rians, Mr. Chapin (Editor of the Chronicle of the Church, at N. Haven) appears
fully to agree. In his recent work entitled " A Churchman's reasons for not joining in
sectarian worship," in which he sets forth the impropriety and sin of an Episcopa
lian's partaking of the Lord's Supper, or joining in acts of public worship with
other denominations, he declares that the elements " at the time of consecration"
become " a means wheeeb y grace is given to us ;" that " all the power that has been
transmitted from the apostles vests in the ministers of our" [the Episcopal] " Church-"
that Episcopal ministers and they alone " have this power of consecration * * *
" by the act of consecrating" [the bread and wine] " to make" them " the a uthori-
tative sign," * * and "not only a sign, but also a means whereby grace
is given ;" that for this reason, in regard to the Lord's Supper administered by
other denominations, " We" [Episcopalians] " know it is not the same table that
our Father gives us" * * " that their table is not the table our Father has erect-

" the judicious hooker." 139
Can we wonder at the terrific power of the Popish priesthood,
and at the abject submission in which they hold the souls of their
votaries, when such a doctrine concerning priestly prerogatives
is put forth in the very bosom of Protestant Christendom ; while
the great author of such a scheme of despotism and superstition
continues to be held in the highest reverence, and retains for two
centuries, and more, the epithet of " The Judicious," given him
by one of England's worst, weakest, and meanest kings ?
Hooker's biographer notices with becoming exultation, that
when Hooker's work was first printed, one of the Cardinals at
Rome declared to Pope Clement VIII., " That though he had
lately Baid he never met with an English book whose writer
deserved the name of author, yet there now appeared a wonder
to them, and it would be so to his Holiness, if it were in Latin ;
for a poor obscure English priest had writ four books of laws
of Church Polity, and in a style that expressed so grave and
such humble majesty, with clear demonstration of reason, that in
all their reading they had not met with any that exceeded him."
And the Pope, when he had heard the books of Hooker read,
declared that " this man deserves indeed the name of author —
nothing is too hard for this man's understanding." It is to us
no matter of wonder that Hooker's Ecclesiastical Polity should
meet with such favor at Rome.
It is well known how much Rome thinks of such "Holy mor
tifications" as fastings, flagellations, going barefoot, and wearing
sackcloth. In some austerities of this sort Hooker also seems to
have engaged to some purpose ; for his biographer records, as
one of the things for which Hooker is to be had in veneration,
that " his body was worn out, not with age, but with study and
holy mortifications,"
Nor did Hooker seem to be altogether freed from all ideas of
the efficacy of Auricular Confession and priestly Absolution.
His biographer records, that " About one day before his death,
Dr. Saravia, who knew the very secrets ofhis soul (for they were
supposed to be confessors to each other), came to him, and after
a conference of the benefit, necessity, and safety of the Church's
absolution, it was resolved that the Doctor should give him
both that and the Sacrament the day following. To which the
Doctor came, and after a short retirement and privacy, they
returned to the company." Thus died Hooker, enveloped still
in the fogs of the " necessity and safety" of auricular confession
and priestly absolution ! We wonder still less that Hooker should
be in such esteem at Rome.
ed for us" (these Italics are hi? own), "and consequently we may not join our
selves to it ;" and he adds, " If they are right, ,re have corrupted this Holy ordinance ¦
Out \] u'« at -t right, <A<y have lost tight of its true nature." '

140 the puritans and their principles.
These principles both of Church Polity and of doctrinal faith,
were the principles against which the Puritans of that day were
called to stand. They are the principles which are now once
more raising their front, and with honied accents striving to win
their way once more to the reverend acceptance of the world.
Happy will it be, if the friends of freedom and of Christ, warned
by the sad lessons of days that are past, take the alarm and
stand manfully for the truth and for freedom before it shall be
too late.

X.

KING JAMES L, AND THE GOING TO HOLLAND.
Change of James' Principles on his accession to the English throne.
Hampton Court Conference. Hundred and forty-one Canons. Extra
judicial decision of the twelve Judges. Gathering of the Pilgrim
Church. Flight to Holland.
King James, of Scotland, came to the throne of England, A. D.
1603. The prelates dreaded his accession, and spoke of it with
apprehension as the coming of the " Scotch Mist." The Puri
tans entertained hopes of relief; for King James was not only a
Presbyterian, but he had subscribed the solemn League and Co
venant. He had, often and solemnly, declared his full conviction
of the pre-eminent purity and excellence of the Church and wor
ship of Scotland. Once standing in the General Assembly at
Edinburgh, with his bonnet off and his hands lifted up to Heaven,
he praised God that he was born in the time of the true light of
the Gospel, and in such a place as to be king of such a Church,
the sincerest [purest] kirk in the world. " The Church of Geneva,"
said he, " keep Pasche and Yule" [Easter and Christmas], " what
have they for them ? They have no institution. As for our neigh
bor kirk of England, their service is an evil said Mass in English ;
they want nothing of the Mass but the liftings. I charge you,
my good ministers, doctors, ciders, gentlemen, and barons, to
stand to your purity, and to exhort the people to do the same."
While James was making these professions, he was at that
very time " carrying on a correspondence with the English no
bles and bishops, and promising to continue that very Liturgy
which he derided as an ill-said Mass.* The whole character of"
James was that of a false and lying prince : and he used to glory
in his double dealing as the art and mystery of "kingcraft."
After his arrival in England, he sank into drunkenness and low
debauchery ; and would yet from time to time with tears express
his hopes, that " God would not impute unto him his infirmity."
Queen Elizabeth and her courtiers saw through this shallow
* Bogue and Bennett, p. 32.

142 the puritans and their principles.
monarch, and discovered " that he was either inclined to turn
Papist, or to be of no religion."* Such was the man who was
now made head of the Church of England.
While James was on his way to take possession of the throne,
a petition was presented to him, called the Millenary petition
from being subscribed by nearly one thousand ministers ; — desir
ing the reformation of certain ceremonies and abuses of the
Church. The University of Oxford came out against the peti
tion. " Look," said they, " upon the reformed church abroad :
whenever the desires of the petitioners take place, how ill it suits
with the state of monarchy." They commended the present
church establishment to the sovereign, as the great support of the
crown, and calculated to support unlimited subjection. The
heads of the University of Cambridge wrote a letter of thanks to
the Oxonians ; and bade the " poor pitiful Puritans" (whom they
style homunciones miserrimi) " to answer their almost a thousand
books in defence of the hierarchy, before they pretend to dispute
before so learned and wise a king." The truth was, that the Pu
ritans desired nothing more than a fair field to discuss the preten
sions of the hierarchy ; but if they wrote, their books were stop
ped by the censorship of the press ; if they were suspected of
uttering anything against the hierarchy, they were imprisoned or
banished ; and for an unpublished manuscript found in his pos
session, Penry had been hanged.
The king, however, to furnish himself with some pretext for
his own apostasy from principles which he had so often avowed
and so solemnly subscribed, or to give some color of regard to
the millenary petition, and possibly to indulge himself with an
opportunity of displaying his own theological lore, appointed a
conference between himself and the two parties, at Hampton
Court. James himself nominated nine bishops and about as
many other dignitaries, and four Puritan divines to conduct the
conference for their respective parties.
The first day of the conference, was between the king and
bishops and deans alone ; the Puritans being excluded. The
king made a speech in commendation of the hierarchy of the
Church of England, and congratulated himself that he was now
come into the promised land ; that he sat among grave and rev
erend men, and was not a king as formerly without a State. He
assured them, that he had not called this assembly for any inno
vation ; and declared, " That howsoever he had lived among the
Puritans, yet since he was ten years old, he ever disliked their
opinions ; and as Christ said, though he lived among them, he
was not of them."
At the next day's conference, four Puritan ministers were
* Bp. Burnet, in Bogue and Bennett.

KING JAMES I. 143
admitted. When Dr. Reynolds petitioned that the ground for
confirmation might be examined, Bancroft fell upon his knees,
and begged the king to stop the Doctor's mouth, according to an
ancient canon, that schismatics are not to be heard against their
bishops. The king at last settled the question by repeating his
now favorite maxim, " No bishop, no king." With regard to the
garments, the Puritan ministers ventured to express a doubt
" whether the power of the Church could bind the conscience with
out impeaching Christian liberty." The king interrupted them at
once : " As to the power of the Church in things indifferent," said
his majesty, " I will not argue that point with you ; but answer
as kings in parliament, Le Roi s'avisera" — the king shall think
of that : — " but as to liberty in ceremonies, I will have none of
that ; I will have one doctrine, one discipline, one religion, in sub
stance and in ceremony ; never speak more to that point, how far
you are bound to obey."*
The Puritans desiring that the clergy might have liberty for
assemblies once in three weeks, and that in rural deaneries they
might have the liberty of prophesying [conference meetings],
" the king broke out into a flame, and told the ministers they
were aiming at a Scots' Presbytery : which," says he, " agrees
with monarchy as well as God with the devil." Turning to the
bishops, he put his hand to his heart, and said, " My lords, I
may thank you that these Puritans plead for my supremacy ; for
if once you arc out and they are in place, I know what would
become of my supremacy ; for — no bishop, no king." Then
turning to Dr. Reynolds, and rising from his chair, the king said,
" If this be all your party have to say, I will make them conform,
or I will harry them out of the land, or else hang them, that is
all." Throughout the conference, the Puritan ministers were
treated with brow-beating and insult. As the king grew hot
against the Puritans, the bishops cheered him on with flatteries
so gross as to have disgusted any other than one so weak and
vain as King James. They broke out into exclamations of
wonder at his wisdom ; called him the Solomon of the age.
Bancroft fell on his knees and said, " I protest my heart melteth
for joy, that Almighty God of his signal mercy has given us such
a king as from Christ's time has not been." The lord chancel
lor said, " He had never seen the king and priest so fully united
in one person." The king was equally well pleased with him
self, and wrote to a Scotsman, that he " had soundly peppered
off the Puritans."
The third clay of the conference, was between the king and the
bishops and the dignitaries alone. The king defended the court
of High Commission, the subscription to the Prayer-Book, and
* Neale.

144 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
the oath ex officio. One of the lords ventured to insist that the
proceedings of the High Commissioners Courts' were like the
Spanish Inquisition, and that by the oath ex officio men were
forced to accuse themselves. But the king vindicated the whole,
and declared that if any man would not be quiet and show his
obedience, " the Church were better without him, and he were
worthy to be hanged." Archbishop Whitgift cried out in
transport, " Undoubtedly your majesty speaks by the special
assistance of God's Spirit."
A few alterations of the Prayer-Book, agreed upon by the king
and bishops, was all the reform that this conference afforded.
One result of the Hampton Court Conference, however, was our
present English translation of the Bible, suggested by the Puri
tan ministers, who complained of the inaccuracy of the version
then in use.
When things were arranged by the king and bishops, the four
Puritan ministers were called in, and the Hampton Court Con
ference closed by the declaration of the king, that he " would
have no arguing ; let them conform, and that quickly too, or they
should hear from it."*
The king issued his proclamation, warning the Puritans that
there was to be no toleration of non-conformity : they must con
form or suffer the extremities of the law. In his opening speech
to his first Parliament, he acknowledged the Romish Church to
be his Mother- Church : he said he would indulge their clergy if
they would but renounce the Pope's supremacy, and his pre
tended power to dispense with the murder of kings. He wished
there might be a means of uniting the two religions ; and said
he would be content to meet them midway. But as to the Pu
ritans, said the king, " Their sect is insufferable in any well gov
erned commonwealth."*
The bishops were pleased with this speech. The thoroughly
Protestant part of the nation heard, with alarm, the king's offer
to meet the Papists half way. " What does he mean ? Is there
no difference between Popery and Protestantism but the Pope's
Supremacy ? Is this the only point on which we are separated
from Rome?"
In the Parliament, it appeared that the principles of the Puri
tans had taken deep root. There were those who dared to assert
the liberties of the people with such spirit and vigor that the king
declared " he would rather live like a hermit in a forest, than be
king over such a people as the pack of Puritans that overruled
the lower house."
The convention of the clergy, meeting at the same time with the
Parliament, busied themselves in framing a book of one hundred
* Neale. t Neale, and Prince.

KING JAMES I. 145
and forty-one canons, aimed chiefly at the Puritans. Whoever
should speak against the Apostolic character and authority of the
Church of England, or against its worship, or articles or ceremo
nies, or its government by archbishops, bishops, deans, or arch
deacons, — or against the form and manner of ordaining bishops,
priests or deacons, or separate from its communion, or allow the
claims of any other in England to be a Church ; — whoever should
do any of these things, was to be by that very deed excommu
nicated, with no power anywhere to restore him save the arch
bishop, and that only after repentance and public " revocation of
his wicked error." Nor was this excommunication a simple ex
clusion from the privileges of the Church : the excommunicated
person was incapable of suing for his just dues ; he might be
imprisoned till such time as he should make satisfaction to the
Church ; and at his death he must be denied Christian burial.*
Whitgift died a few weeks after the Hampton Court Confer
ence, and the fierce Bancroft was made Archbishop of Canter
bury in his room. It was he who in A. D. 1588, first publicly
maintained in England, the right of Diocesan Bishops above
Presbyters by divine appointment ; the common doctrine of the
Reformers, and of those who preceded them for centuries, having
been, that by divine institution, Bishops and Presbyters were
one and the same : and that a Diocesan is superior to a Presby-
* One or two of these 141 Canons will serve as a specimen of the whole :
Canon i. " Whosoever shall affirm the form of God's worship in the Church of
England established by law, and contained in the book of Common Prayer, and
administration of sacraments, is a corrupt, superstitious, and unlawful worship, or
contains anything repugnant to Scripture, let him be excommunicated, ipso facto,
and not restored but only by the Archbishop, after his repentance and public revo
cation of his wicked error."
Canon 0. " Whosoever shall affirm that the rites and ceremonies of the Church
of England as by law established, are wicked, anti-christian, or superstitious, or
such as being commanded by lawful authority, good men may not with a good con
science approve, use, or as occasion requires, subscribe, — let him be excommu
nicated," &c.
Canon 11. " Whosoever shall affirm that there are within this realm other meetings,
assemblies, or congregations of the king's born subjects, than such as are established
by law, which may rightly challenge to themselves the name of lawful churches, let
them be excommunicatea," &c.
Canon 1. " Whosoever shall affirm that the government * * of the Church
of England, by archbishops, bishops, deans, archdeacons, and the rest that bear office
in the same, is anti-christian or repugnant to the Word of God, let him be excom
municated." &c.
Canon 8 denounces the same upon those who speak against the forms of
ordination. Canon 14 denounces the same upon such as shall add to, or leave out any part of
the prayers.
Camm 18, in like manner enjoins bowing at the name of Jesus. Four others re
late to the wearing of habits ; one forbids requiring parents to be present at the bap
tism of their children, and forbids their answering as God-parents- The book con
cluded with denouncing the anathema of excommunication upon all who should
deny that the Assembly making the Canons was not the true Church of England by
representation. 10

146 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
ter, only bylaws of human appointment. Bancroft was a rough,
violent man, and a declared enemy of the religious and civil
rights of the people ; the creature and tool of the royal preroga
tives. To the tender mercies of this man, the Puritans were now
committed, with canons, laws, excommunications, oaths ex offi
cio, prisons, and every other engine of tyranny made ready to
his hand. He began his career as archbishop, by reviving the
strict observance of all the saints'-days and festivals of the
Church ; by reinstating the use of capes, caps, and hoods ; by
obliging the clergy to subscribe the articles over again, with an
additional avowal, "that they did it willingly and from the heart."
Three hundred Puritan ministers, who had not separated from
the established Church, were silenced, imprisoned, or exiled in
the year 1604.*
The king, to strengthen his hands against the Puritans, sum
moned the twelve judges into the Star Chamber, to obtain, by
an anticipated and extra-judicial decision of the judges, some
sanction for further severities which he contemplated. Having
secured their sentence in favor of the past proceedings of the
High Commission, and of the lawfulness of imposing the oath
ex officio, the king propounded to the judges, " whether it be an
offence punishable, and what punishment they deserved, who
framed petitions, and collected a multitude of hands thereto, to
prefer to the king in a public cause, as the Puritans had done :
with an intimation to the king, that if he denied their suit, many
thousands of his subjects would be discontented." The judges
replied, that it was an offence punishable at discretion, and very
near to treason and felony in the punishment ; for it tended to
raising sedition, rebellion, and discontent among the people."
In this decision, all the judges agreed.
Thus, the king might make such orders in religious affairs as he
pleased, and enforce the same by his High Commission. Should
any attempt even to petition for redress, they were fineable at
pleasure, and in danger of suffering an arraignment for felony or
treason. " A later convocation" says Bancroft,! " denied every
doctrine of popular rights, asserting the superiority of the king
to the Parliament and the laws, and admitting, in their zeal for
absolute monarchy, no exception to the doctrine of passive obe
dience. Thus the opponents of the Church became the sole
guardians of popular liberty : the fines of the contending parties
were distinctly drawn ; the established Church and the mon
arch on one side were arrayed against the Puritan clergy and
people." The whole body of the clergy of London were summoned to
* Bancroft's TJ. States. t Hist, vol i., p. 209.

THE PILGRIM CHURCH. 147
Lambeth to subscribe over again ; " but such numbers refused,
that the churches were in danger of being disfurnished." In
twenty-four counties, there were 746 of the clergy who refused
to conform ; and it was estimated that the whole number of non
conforming clergy in the kingdom, was from thirteen to fifteen
hundred. Again and again had the Puritan ministers been sifted
out of the Church by new tests ; but the more the plants of free
dom were weeded out, the more they seemed to grow. At the
time when the Pilgrims were driven to Holland, it was supposed
that not twenty ministers known to be in favor of their princi
ples were left in the Church of England ; but in a few years
they were as numerous as ever.
The bishops were amazed ; and shrunk from carrying out
fully the measures which they had begun. But great were the
sufferings endured by the Puritans, both ministers and people.
These oppressions at length became intolerable; and the
victims, seeing no hope of relief, and no prospect before them
but destruction, began to turn their eyes to a foreign shore.
Here we come to the commencement of the wanderings of
the Pilgrim Fathers. The Church of the Pilgrims, who first
landed on the rock of Plymouth, was organized in England in
the year 1602 ; and in 1607 and 1608 was driven to Holland by
the persecutions under King James I. Bradford, the second
governor of the colony of Plymouth, and one of the Pilgrims in
all their perils and wanderings, gives this account of the forma
tion of that Church : — « When by the travail and diligence of
some godly and zealous preachers, and God's blessing on their
labors, as in other places of the land, so in the North parts, many
became enlightened with the word of God, and had their igno
rance and sins discovered by the word of God's grace, and began
by his grace to reform their lives and make conscience of their
ways ; the work of God was no sooner manifest in them, but pre
sently they were both scoffed and scorned by the profane multitude ;
and the ministers ivcre urged with the yoke of subscription or else
must be silenced, and the poor people ivere so urged with appari
tors and pursuivants, and the Commission Courts, as truly their
affliction teas not small." For years they continued to bear these
persecutions. At length they began, says Bradford, " To see
further into these things by the light of God's Word. By this
thny saw, that the imposition of these "Base and beggarly cere
monies " was " unlawful ;" that the " Lordly and tyrannous
power of the prelates " was contrary to the gospel ; and that their
authority to "load men's consciences" — "ought not to be sub
mitted to."
They therefore, " shook off this yoke of anti-christian bondage,
and as the Lord's free people joined themselves by a covenant of

148 the puritans and their principles.
the Lord, in a Church estate, in the fellowship of the gospel, to
walk in all the ways made known, or to be made known unto
them, according to their best endeavors, whatever it should cost
them."* Thus was formed the first of the Puritan Churches of New
England ; the model of the rest. It was the fruit of a revival
of religion ; composed of men who had tasted the grace of
God ; who felt that the rites and forms of the established Church
were indeed " beggarly" — inadequate to express, and too narrow
to give scope to the warmest devotions of a new-born soul.
They saw that the power ofthe bishop was hostile to true reli
gion ; and discovered that it was unfounded in the Word of God.
They perceived that a national establishment, in which churches
are gathered indiscriminately by " street rows," must ever
embrace the world in its bosom, and of necessity must, in spite
of all articles, become corrupt in doctrine and in discipline, in
order to suit the views and taste of a world, which, in its present
state, is at enmity with God. In perilous times they came out
from a Church gathered, organized, and governed on worldly
principles ; and regarded their coming out from such a Church,
as coming out from the world. At the sacrifice of all their
worldly interests, and with the certain prospect of imprisonment
or exile, they formed themselves into a Church of Christ ; taking
his Word for their guide, and on the very principle of denying
entirely the doctrine of baptismal regeneration, and of grace
conferred by priestly prerogatives and interventions ; doctrines
which naturally constitute the basis of all national Church
establishments ; and which are very sure, sooner or later, to
insinuate themselves into all Christian institutions, where no
distinction is made between the parish and the Church.
The Church which had been gathered in 1602, became so
numerous, and its members were so widely scattered in Not
tinghamshire, Lincolnshire, and in some parts of Yorkshire, that
in 1606 it became two distinct churches. Of one of these Mr.
John Smith was pastor. Of him, Governor Bradford says, he
" was an eminent man in his time, a good preacher and of good
parts." He was one of them who had been sent to prison for
worshipping separately in 1592. Driven out by persecution,
he and many of his Church settled at Amsterdam, where he and
many of his people became Baptists. Mr. Smith being at a
loss for a proper administrator immersed himself, and then
administered the rite to others. Afterwards he embraced the
Arminian sentiments ; and in 1610 he died. Sopn after his
death, many of his people considering it wrong to flee fromper-
• Bradford's Journal, in Young's Chronicles ofthe Pilgrims.

the pilgrim church. 149
secution, returned to England, and, as is generally supposed,
became the first congregation of the English General (or Armi-
nian) Baptists.*
The other branch of the Church became the first of the Pil
grim Fathers of New England. The pastors of this Church, were
Richard Clifton and John Robinson. William Brewster, who
came with the Pilgrims to New England, was Teacher and
ruling Elder. Gov. Bradford, who was one of the Pilgrims both
in their flight to Holland and in their removal to America, says
of Mr. Clifton, that he was " A grave and fatherly old man when
he first came to Holland, having a great white head ; and pity it
was that such a reverend old man should be forced to go into
exile. But it was his lot, and he bore it patiently. Much good
had he done in the country where he lived, and converted many
to God by his faithful and painful ministry. Sound and ortho
dox he was, and so continued to his end."
Of John Robinson, his friends uniformly spoke in terms of
the profoundest veneration, and his enemies with the utmost
respect. "He was a man," says Gov. Bradford, "not easily
paralleled for all things, * * a man learned, of solid judg
ment, of a quick sharp wit, of a tender conscience, and very
sincere in all his ways." Baylie, the bitter enemy of the Puri
tans, says, that " Robinson was a man of excellent parts, and the
most polished and modest spirit that ever separated from the
Church of England."! The writings of Robinson that remain,
fully justify the highest character given of him by his friends.
Able, clear, discriminating, deeply learned, patient, laborious,
honest and candid, in an uncommon degree for this world,—
uniting distinguished humility and meekness with dauntless
courage, — Robinson was a fine model of the Puritan character ;
and happily was he mated in his compeer and fellow laborer
Brewster, who, on their Arrival at Leyden, was chos.en teaching
elder of the same Church. In his early years, Brewster had been
employed in an embassy to the Low Countries, and had long
been known as a man of character and capacity. He had long
been distinguished for his piety, and for his zeal and sacrifices
in endeavoring to do good. For thirty-six years he bore his
part in all the sorrows and sufferings of the Pilgrim Church;
the last twenty-four of which were spent at Plymouth, where,
at the age of four-score years, he died, the venerated patriarch of
the first generation of the Pilgrim Fathers of New England.
The Church of which Robinson and Brewster were ministers,
was composed of choice men. It required a deep insight into
God's Word, great sincerity of conscience, a religious integrity
too strong to be overcome by losses or perils, or to be seduced
• Murdock's Mosheim, iii., p. 210. t Young's Chronicles ofthe Pilgrims, p. 453.

150

THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.

by the love of ease, of comfort, or a home. It required some
deep experience of the work of God in the soul to make one
willing to come out of the established Church, and to join his lot to
that of the persecuted Puritans. Ignorant minds could not appre
ciate the Puritan principles. Fanatical minds would be worn out
by the long continued sufferings that were to be endured ; and
by the caution and steadiness required to walk warily amid the
treacheries and snares that surrounded the Puritans. Light and
wavering spirits were sure to be brushed away by the rough hand
of adversity. Nothing but intelligence to discern the truth, love
to God, deep principles of religious integrity and faith, and cour
age and firmness too strong for earth or hell to overcome, could
make a man a Puritan in those days. God was about to plant
the Christian religion pure in a new world ; in a vast and impor
tant field, that had been kept vacant, in reserve for the last great
scene of the great drama of all time ; and in the furnace of
affliction he chose the instruments of that great work. Its fruits
the world has just begun to reap, in results of freedom, enterprise,
and pure religion, which have already made the embarkation of
the Pilgrims, and the sorrowful parting at Delft-Haven, one of
the great epochs in the history of time.
The Pilgrim Church was now on the eve of its removal. " They
could not," says Bradford, " continue in any peaceable manner ;
but were hunted and persecuted on every side." Some were
seized and imprisoned, others had their houses watched night
and day, and with difficulty escaped. Most were glad to flee,
leaving their houses and their means of livelihood. " Seeing
themselves thus molested, and that there was no hope of their
continuance," says Bradford, " they resolved to go into 1he Low
countries, where they heard was freedom of religion for all men."
Yet here difficulties awaited them ; it was a strange land, and
they were to sojourn among a people of a strange speech. The
people there lived mainly by trades and traffic ; but the Pilgrims
were accustomed only to till the ground. The adventure
seemed to them almost desperate ; yet liberty of conscience and
a pure religion seemed to them worth more than life.
But their persecutors were unwilling to let them escape. The
ports and harbors were closed against them. They were obliged
secretly to hire mariners at exorbitant rates, to take them in at
remote and unfrequented places ; and even here they were be
trayed and surprised, and put to indescribable losses and suffer
ings. Out of many such troubles Bradford relates two as speci
mens of the whole. A great company had hired a vessel to take
them from Boston in Lincolnshire, and made an agreement with
the master to be ready on a certain day, to take them and their
goods in at a convenient place, where all would be in readiness.

THE FLEEING TO HOLLAND. 151
" So," says Bradford, " after a long waiting, and large expenses,
though he kept not day with them, yet he came at length and
took them in the night. And when be had them and their goods
aboard, he betrayed them ; having beforehand complotted with
the searchers and other officers so to do ; who took them and
put them into open boats, and there rifled and ransacked them,
searching them to their very shirts for money ; yea, even the
women, further than became modesty ; and then carried them
back into the town, and made them a spectacle and a wonder
ment to the people who came flocking on all sides to behold
them."* Stripped of their money, books and goods, they were
brought before the magistrates and committed to prison ; when,
after being detained a month, the greater part were dismissed ;
but seven of the principal men were kept in prison to the next
assizes. Among those who were set free, was Bradford, then a
young man of 18 years ; who, after many perils by land and sea,
found his way to Holland. Brewster was among the number
of those detained in prison.
The next year (1608), a large number agreed with the master
of a Dutch ship to take them in between Grimsby and Hull,
" where was a large common a good way distant from any town."
The women and children and goods were sent to the place in a
small bark, while the men were to make the best of their way by
land. The bark arriving a day too soon, and the sea being rough,
the women prevailed with the seamen to put in at a small creek,
where at low water they were aground. " The next morning
the ship came ; the captain sent his boats to bring off the men
whom he saw walking on the shore. But after the first boat-full
was got aboard, and he was ready to go for more, the master es
pied a great company both horse and foot, with bills, and guns,
and other weapons, for the country was raised to take them."
" The; Dutchman seeing that," says Bradford, "swore his coun
try's oath, and having the wind fair, weighed anchor, hoisted sails,
and away." * " But the poor men which were got on board,
were in great distress for their wives and children, which they
saw thus to be taken; and even left destitute of their helps; and
themselves also nut having a c loth to shift them with more than
they had on their backs, and scarce a penny about them ; all
they had being on board the bark. It drew tears from their eyes,
and anything they had, they would have given to be on shore
again." Bradford might well attest this, for he was among those
on board the ship. A storm arose. For seven days they saw
neither sun, moon, nor stars. They were driven to the coast of
Norway. The mariners themselves gave up hopes of life, and
" oiii-o with shrieks and cries gave over all as if the ship had been
* Bradford, in Young's Chronicles of the Piltrrim';.

152 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
foundered in the sea. But when the men's help wholly failed,"
says Bradford, " the Lord's power and mercy appeared for their
recovery ; for the ship rose again, and gave the mariners courage
again to manage her; and if modesty should suffer me," says
Bradford, " I might declare with what fervent prayers they cried
unto the Lord in their great distress, especially some of them,
even without any distraction, when the water ran into their very
ears and mouths, and the mariners cried out, We sink, — they
cried, Yet, Lord, thou canst save; yet, Lord, thou canst save."
That ship bore the destinies of New England. It was not
the will of God that she should perish. The storm abated;
they arrived at their haven.
But that pitiful group of their companions left on the shore,
and on that bark : — the men seeing the troops surrounding them
made their escape ; all save some who offered themselves to re
main, to do what could be done for the women and children.
" But it was pitiful," says Bradford, " to see the heavy case of
these poor women in this distress ; what weeping and crying on
every side ; some for their husbands that were carried away in
the ship; * * others not knowing what should become of
their little ones : others melted in tears, seeing their poor ones
hanging about them, crying for fear and quaking with cold."
The women were apprehended, and hurried with their children
from place to place, from one magistrate to another. To im
prison women and innocent children for no crime than that of
going with their husbands and fathers, seemed hard. They had
no houses to which the magistrates might send them : their
houses and livings being sold. They were, however, made to
suffer for some time, till at length their persecutors, not knowing
what to do with them, suffered them to go at large.
These were the mothers of New England. This was the
beginning of their pilgrimage. It was with more comfort and
hope, twelve years after this, that they greeted the wintry coasts
and unbroken forests of the New England shore.
Under such perils and difficulties, did the Pilgrim Fathers
commence their wanderings. Another summer, and the hus
bands and wives and children, were gathered together in Hol
land, where they could worship God in peace.

XI.

THE VOYAGE TO AMERICA.
Question of Removal. Meeting for Deliberation. Guiana. Application
to the King. The Arrangements. Farewell Meeting. Parting at Delft-
Haven. The Departure. The Mayflower upon the Ocean. The Com
pact. Provincetown Harbor. Landing at Plymouth.
The Pilgrims, now arrived in the Low Countries, found them
selves strangers and homeless in a strange land. The language,
the customs, the dress, the employments of the people, — all
were strange. The scanty resources of the Pilgrims having
been much diminished by disadvantageous sales, by the plun-
derings of their persecutors, and by the expenses of their em
barkation and voyage, they found immediate need of their best
foresight and endeavor, to sustain themselves and their children.
" For," says Bradford, " though they saw fair and beautiful cities
flowing with abundance of all sorts of wealth and riches, yet it
was not long before they saw the grim and grizzled face of
poverty coming on them like an armed man, with whom they
must encounter, and from whom they could not flee."
But even then, religion and Heaven were uppermost in their
minds. These were the difficulties which they had looked in
the face from the beginning ; and when the trial came they were
neither disappointed nor dismayed.
Finding their brethren ofthe Churches, of Johnson, Ainsworth,
and Smith, who had come out before them, now fallen into
unhappy disputes at Amsterdam, where the Pilgrim Church
came first to sojourn ; they thought it best to remove be
fore they were any way engaged in these dissensions. They
removed lo Leyden, " a fair and beautiful city," says Bradford,
" and a sweet situation ; but wanting in that traffic by sea which
Amsterdam enjoyed, it was not so beneficial for their outward
means of living and estates." * * * " Being now here
pitched, they fell to such trades and employments as they best
could ; valuing peace and their spiritual comfort above any

154 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
riches whatsoever ; and at length they came to raise a compe
tent and comfortable living, with hard and continual labor."
Bradford, the future Governor of Plymouth Colony, bound
himself apprentice to a silk-dyer. Brewster became a teacher,
and afterwards a printer ; giving to the world such books as the
press was not allowed to strike off in England. " Being thus
settled," says Bradford, " they continued many years in a com
fortable condition, enjoying much sweet and delightful society."
* * * " And many came unto them from divers parts of
England, so as they grew a great congregation."* The number
of communicants in the Church appears to have been about 300.
" Never," said the magistrates of the city, after these people had
continued among them for ten years, " Never did we have any
suit or accusation against any of them." " Such was the humble
zeal and fervent love of this people towards God and his ways,"
says Bradford, " that they seemed to come surprisingly near the
primitive pattern of the first Churches." * * * " They lived
together in love and peace all their days, without any considera
ble differences, or any disturbances that grew thereby, but such
as was easily healed in love ; and so they continued, until by
mutual consent they removed into New England."
It was in the year 1617 that the Pilgrims began to discuss the
question of removing to America. The thought originated with
Robinson and Brewster ; who, after mature deliberation, imparted
their thoughts to other members of the congregation.! Bradford
and Win slow, who both participated in these deliberations, have
set down the reasons which weighed for this removal. The
country was hard ; many had spent their estates and had been
forced to return to England. Most of them were in adult life,
and some far advanced in years when they were driven from
home by persecution ; and now " old age began to come on some
of them." " Many of their children," says Bradford, " that were
of the best dispositions and gracious inclinations, having learned
to bear the yoke in their youth, and willing to bear part of their
parents' burden, were oftentimes so oppressed with their heavy
labors, that although their minds were free and willing, yet their
bodies bowed down under the weight of the same, and became
decrepit in their very youth." But the prevalent licentiousness
of the youth around them, the numerous temptations and evil
examples of the place, were sources of great apprehension to the
Pilgrims. " Some became soldiers ; others took upon them far
voyages by sea, and others some worse courses tending to disso
luteness and danger of their souls." The Sabbath was almost
universally profaned in Holland. This was a great grief to the
Pilgrims, and a snare to their children. They were loth that
* Bradford in Young's Chronicles ofthe Pilgrims. t Winslow.

THE VOYAGE TO AMERICA. 155
their posterity should live under any other government than that
of England. " Lastly," says Gov. Bradford, " (and that was not
least) a great hope and inward zeal they had of laying some
good foundations, or at least to make some way thereunto, for
the propagating and advancing the Gospel of the kingdom of
Christ in these remote parts of the world, " though they should be
as stepping-stones unto others for performing so great a work."
Well were these reasons for removal weighed. Well were the
dangers considered. The Pilgrims were now in mature life,
when the rashness of enterprise, if not enterprise itself, begins to
decline. They had had experience of hardships ; and if perse
cution may be supposed to kindle up a resolute enthusiasm,
they had now been settled in quietness for eight years. It was
sober judgment, religious principle, and prudent forecast, laying
plans for the building up of Christ's kingdom unfettered and free
in the wilderness of the New World. Advanced in years as the
Pilgrims were, they could not expect to enjoy the comforts of
life, or to behold anything beyond the first beginnings of a new
settlement, alone and unsupported on a distant wilderness shore.
They lived for Christ and for their posterity.
The project of a removal to America was made public for the
scanning of all. Some, full of hope, dwelt upon the brighter
aspects of the enterprise. Others, as caution or despondency
prompted, thought of the hazards and dangers of the scheme.
They dwelt upon the casualties of the seas ; for, at that time, a
voyage across the Atlantic was not like a voyage of the present
day. They alleged the weak bodies of the men and women,
worn out with age and labor; the miseries of a wilderness ; the
danger of famine and nakedness ; the changing of their diet and
water, as likely to infect their bodies with weakness or disease ;
the well known treachery and ferocity of the savages ; their " de
light to Hay men alive with the shells of fishes, cutting off the
limbs by piccc-mcal, and broiling them on the coals, and causing
men to eat the collops of their flesh in their sight while they
lived." " And surely," says Bradford, " it could not be thought
but the hearing of these things could not but move the bowels
of men to grate within them and tremble." In reply, the more
courageous answered, That all great and honorable actions were
always accompanied with difficulties. It was granted that tlie
dangers were great, but not desperate, and the difficulties many,
but not invincible. " All, through the help of God, by fortitude,
might either be borne or overcome." Besides, it was alleged,
their condition was not ordinary ; they were now only in exile,
and in poor condition ; as great miseries might befall them in
their present residence ; tlie twelve years' truce were now out, and
nothing was to be heard but the beating of drums and preparing

156 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
for war ; the events whereof are always uncertain. The Span
iards might prove as cruel as the savages of America.*
Having freely discussed in private, the subject of a removal,
the congregation at length set apart a time for fasting and prayer
for the Lord's direction. This done, they came together for sol
emn deliberation, and for a final decision of this great affair.
" Some, and none of the meanest," says Bradford (and he was
one of that important council), " had thoughts and were earnest
for Guiana." Sir Walter Raleigh, a few years before this, had
written a description of that country, 'which he calls " a mighty,
rich, and beautiful empire, directly east from Peru, towards the
sea, lying under the equinoctial line." Its capital was that great
golden city which the Spaniards call El Dorado, and the natives
Manoa, and for greatness, riches, and excellent seat, it far exceed-
eth any in the world." Such was the fabulous El Dorado : and
in that age of discoveries, things wonderful and strange had be
come so common, that nothing was too extravagant to surpass
belief. Raleigh had sailed up the Oronoco 400 miles in quest of
that far-famed city. " On both sides of this river," said he, " we
passed the most beautiful country that mine eyes ever beheld ;
plains of twenty miles in length ; the grass short and green ; and
in divers parts, groves of trees by themselves, as if they had been
by all the art and labor of the world so made of purpose ; and
still as we rowed, the deer came down feeding by the water's
side, as if they had been used to a keeper's call ; * * * The
river winding into divers branches, the plains adjoining without
bush or stubble ; * * * the birds towards the evening
singing on every tree a thousand tunes, the air fresh, with a gen
tle easterly wind ; and every stone that we stopped to take up,
promised either gold or silver by his complexion. I never saw
a more beautiful country nor more lively prospects."!
In such terms, Sir Walter Raleigh had described the country
of Guiana. Such arguments some of the principal men urged,
to turn the thoughts of the Pilgrims to these sunny and fertile
plains of the south, rather than to the wintry hills and forests of
North America. But the wary Pilgrims saw lurking evils under
these inviting prospects. They thought of the fierce diseases of
a sultry clime. The English nation had no claim to these re
gions. The colonies of Spain were in their neighborhood ; and
* The providence of God is to be remarked, in bringing the Pilgrims to Holland
just at the beginning of a truce of twelve years, agreed upon after a war of more
than thirty years between the United Provinces and Spain. Just when that truce
was closing, and everywhere was the beating of drums and preparations for war,
the Pilgrims, having now had time to establish their Church Polity, and to gather
their friends and resources from England, were led across the ocean, to the destiny
which God had appointed them to fulfil.
t In Young's Chronicles of the Pilgrims, p. 51.

THE VOYAGE TO AMERICA. 157
Spain was then a powerful and dreaded nation — pre-eminent in
bigotry and fierce intolerance.
The deliberation ended in favor of the Northern parts of what
was then called Virginia. Trusty men were sent over to Eng
land to see if their enterprise might find favor with the king ; and
if liberty of conscience might be allowed.
" To enlarge my dominions," said King James, " is a good
and honest motion. But whence may profits accrue to your
selves and to the crown ?" " From the fisheries at least," replied
the envoys. " So God have my soul," said the king, with his
eustomary profaneness, " 'tis an honest trade. It was the Apos
tles' own calling." But King James would give them no further
answer than to refer them to the Bishops of Canterbury and
London. The envoys chose rather to rest upon his majesty's
first indefinite and informal approbation. The Virginia Com
pany were desirous to have them go, and willing to grant them
an ample charter ; but no persuasions could wring a consent
from the king that they might be allowed liberty of religion,
and have it secured under the great seal. The king allowed
them to gather from his discourse, that he would not molest them
in the exercise of their religion, but he would grant nothing
further. The more sagacious concluded it best to act upon the
king's implied promise that he would not molest them ; for, said
they, if the king should hereafter take it into his head to trouble
us, it would be no security if we had his seal " as broad as the
barn-floor. He would make pretexts ; he would devise ways
enough to re-call or reverse it." " We must rest on God's
providence." " At the very time that this negotiation was pending, the king
issued his declaration requiring the Bishop of Lancashire to
constrain all the Puritans within his diocese to conform or leave
the country."*
After many delays and discouragements, which tried the
patience of the Pilgrims, and shook off many uncertain friends,
a patent was obtained of the Virginia Company ; which, though
it cost much, was afterwards of no use. Many of the Church at
Leyden were too poor to defray the expenses of the voyage ; and
the means of all united were inadequate to obtain ships and
procure the necessary outfit. They were compelled to form a
sort of partnership with a company of merchant adventurers for
a term of seven years ; each one having a share according to the
Block which he was able to contribute ; and the person of each
emigrant above 16 years to be rated at £10.
The patent, and the conditions of this agreement, being sent
over to the people for their consideration, the Church now
* Prince.

158 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
held a solemn meeting, and observed a day of fasting and prayer.
Under their trying circumstances,, Mr. Robinson preached from
the text, " And David's men said unto him, see, ice be afraid here
in Judah ; how much more if we come to Keilah against the host
ofthe Philistines? Then David asked counsel ofthe Lord."
Strengthened and encouraged by their pastor's words, they
decided to go. It was concluded that part of the church should
go first ; and that such of the youngest part should go as might
freely offer themselves. If the majority should go, the pastor
was to go with them ; if not, then the elder only. If the Lore
should frown upon the enterprise, "then those that went [were
to return, and the brethren that remained still here to assist ane
be helpful to them ; but if God should be pleased to favor them
that went, then they also should endeavor to help such as were
here, poor and ancient, and willing to come."* " Those who
go," says Bradford, "to be an absolute Church by themselves;
as well as those who should stay ; with this proviso, that as
any go over and return, they should be reputed as members with
out further dismission or testimonial ; and those who tarry, to
follow the rest as soon as they can."
Two trusty men were now sent — Mr. Cushman, to London,
and Mr. Carver, to Southampton — to make arrangements,
" Those who were to go first, prepare with all speed ; sell their
estates ; put their money into the common stock to furnish the
supplies for the company ; they cease from their ordinary busi
ness ; they employ themselves with diligence in making the
preparations for so great a work." When all is nearly ready on
their part, some on whom they relied in England disappoint
them. Some would do nothing unless they would go to Vir
ginia. Others were dissatisfied that they went not to Guiana.
Some of the merchants, who had proffered to adventure their
money, " withdrew and pretended many excuses." " In the
midst of these difficulties," says Bradford, " they of Leyden were
drawn to great straits." The season had advanced to June.
On the 4th, Mr. Robinson wrote to Mr. Carver, complaining of
the neglect of Mr. Weston, the merchant adventurer, in not get
ting shipping as he had engaged. In another week the Leyden
people were encouraged by the coming of their pilot. Mr.
Cushman writes that he is getting a ship, and hopes all will be
ready in fourteen days. The Pilgrims hasten their preparation.
A small ship of sixty tons (in size like one of our coasting packet
sloops) is provided in Holland. Another of 180 tons is hired in
London, and in these the Pilgrim Church with their children,
and all their supplies, and means of defence for founding a colony
in a wilderness remote from all human aid, are to cross the
ocean! * Winslow.

THE VOYAGE TO AMERICA. 159
" So being ready to depart," says Bradford, " they had a day
of solemn humiliation ; their pastor taking his text from Ezra, viii.
21. ' Then I proclaimed a fast there, at the river Ahava, that we
might afflict ourselves before God, to seek of him a right way for
us, and for our little ones, and for our substance.' The rest of
the time was spent in pouring out prayers to the Lord with great
fervency, mixed with abundance of tears."*
Their pastor gave them his farewell advice. " We are now
ere long," said he, " to part asunder, and the Lord knoweth
whether we shall ever live to see each other's faces again. * * *
I charge you before God and his blessed angels, to follow me no
further than I have followed Christ. If God shall reveal any
thing to you by any other instrument, be as ready to receive it
as ever you were to receive any truth by my ministry. I am
very confident that the Lord has more truth and light to break
forth out of his holy Word." " He took occasion," says Win-
slow, " to bewail the state and condition of the Reformed
Churches, who were come to a period in religion, and would go
no further than the instruments of their Reformation ; * * *
the Lutherans could not be drawn to go beyond what Luther
said * * * the Calvinists stick where he left them : a misery
much to be lamented ; for though these men were precious and
shining lights in their times, yet God hath not revealed his
whole will to them ; and were they now living they would be as
ready to embrace further light as that which they had received."
He put the Pilgrims in mind of their covenant, " to receive what
soever light or truth shall be made known from his written
Word ; but exhorted us to take heed what we received for truth,
and well to examine and compare it, and weigh it with other
Scriptures of truth before we received it. For, saith he, it is
not possible that the Christian world should come so lately out
of such thick antichristian darkness, and that full perfection of
knowledge should break forth at once." " Words," says Prince,
" almost astonishing in that age of low and universal bigotry
which then prevailed in the English nation ; wherein this truly
great and learned man, seems to be the only divine who was
capable of rising into a noble freedom of thinking and practising
in religious mailers, and even of urging such an equal liberty on
his own people."!
* In Young's Chronicles ofthe Pilgrims, p. 87.
t This has ever been the great principle of Puritanism : that God's Word is the
sole and sufficient standard of faith and duty. Nearly a century after the landing

of the Pilgrims, an assembly of Connecticut ministers, in setting forth their general
nssent to the Savoy Confession of Faith, as containing the system of doctrine which
they embraced, — deemed it important to preface that act and confession with these

words, worthy to be written in broad letters of living light. " We do not assume to
ourselves that anything is to be taken upon trust from us, but commend to our
people the following counsels: 1. That you be immoveably and unchangeably

160 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
The advice of the pastor being given, and their clothing and
effects being packed and in readiness, they turn their thoughts to
their departure. "And when the ship was ready to carry us
away," says Winslow (the future governor of the colony, but
now a young man of 26 years), "the brethren that stayed having
again solemnly sought the Lord with us and for us, and we fur
ther engaging ourselves mutually as before ; they that stayed at
Leyden feasted us that were to go, at our pastor's house, being
large ; where we refreshed ourselves, after tears, with singing of
psalms, making joyful melody in our hearts as well as with the
voice ; there being many of the congregation very expert in mu
sic ; and indeed it was the sweetest melody that mine ears ever
heard." " And now," says Bradford, " the time being come that they
must depart, they were accompanied with the most of their
brethren out of the city unto a town sundry miles off, called
Delft-Haven [24 miles south of Leyden], " where the ship
lay ready to receive them. So they left that goodly and pleasant
city which had been their resting-place nearly twelve years ; but
they knew they were Pilgrims, and looked not much on
these things, but lifted up their eyes to Heaven, their dearest
country, and quieted their spirits." * * " When they came to
the place they found the ship and all things ready ; and such of
their friends as could not come with them followed after them ;
and sundry came also from Amsterdam to see them shipped, and
to take their leave of them. That night was spent with little
sleep by the most, but with friendly entertainment and Christian
discourse." * * " The next day [July 22, 1620], the wind
being fair, they went on board, and their friends with them ; when
truly doleful was the sight of that sad and mournful parting ; to
see what sighs, and sobs, and prayers, did sound amongst them ;
what tears did gush from every eye ; and pithy speeches pierced
each other's heart ; that sundry of the Dutch strangers could not
refrain from tears. Yet comfortable and sweet it was to see such
lively and true expressions of dear and unfeigned love. But the
tide which stays for no man, calling them away that were loth to
depart, their reverend pastor falling down on his knees, and they
all with him, with watery cheeks commended them with most
fervent prayer to the Lord for his blessing; and then with mu
tual embraces and many tears, they took their leave of one
another."agreed in the only sufficient and invariable rule of religion, which is the Holt Scrip-
tube, the fixed canon, incapable of addition or diminution. You ought to account
nothing ancient that will not stand by this rule ; and nothing new that -will. 2. That
you be determined by this rule in the whole of religion. That your faith be right
and divine, the Word of God must be the foundation of it, and the authority of the
Word the reason of it."

THE VOYAGE TO AMERICA. 161
I avow it ; there is no other scene in the history of man, in
which mere human beings and uninspired men were the actors,
on which my eyes would gaze with so much interest — could any
past scene be recalled : — " That memorable parting at Delft- Ha
ven ! " What men and women, with their children, the hope of
their future country, were there ! For what principles were they
exiles from their native land ! What principles, what institu
tions are they about to carry into the New World ! It is one of
the great epochs in the course of time. What changes are to
come over the face of the whole world ! what revolutions in the
principles of human government, and in the prevalent views of
human rights ! How auspicious that day for the divine light and
freedom of God's Holy Word, and for the freedom and happi
ness of mankind ! Strike from the pages of history the achieve
ments of an Alexander or a Ccesar, or blot out the very exist
ence of empires that have swayed the world for centuries in their
turn — and comparatively little is lost. But blot out of existence
that band of Pilgrims at Delft-Haven, with the principles for
which they have suffered, and what they are going to plant in
the American wilderness, — and alas! what desolation, what
darkness broods over the destinies of man !
The youthful Winslow adds some touches which the more
ancient Bradford saw not fit to add to the picture. The prayer
being over, " A flood of tears was poured out, but we were not
able to speak one to another for the abundance of sorrow." * *
" The ship ready to sail, the wind being fair, we gave them a
volley of small shot, and three pieces of ordnance ; and so lift
ing up our hands to each other, and our hearts for each other to
the Lord our God, we departed."
A prosperous wind carries them to Southampton, where they
find "the bigger ship come from London, lying ready with all
the rest of their company."
And now all things being prepared, the company is called to
gether to hear a letter which Mr. Robinson had sent after them.
" Then they ordered and distributed their company for either
ship ; chose a governor and two or three assistants for each ship
to order the people by the way, and to see to the disposing of
their provisions, and such like affairs." Which being done, on
the 5th of August they set sail.
Unexpected delays had already protracted the time of their
departure until it was too late for the comfortable beginning of
a seiUement on a wilderness shore. Now further delays awaited
them. The master of the Speedwell (the smaller vessel) com
plained that his ship was so leaky that he durst not put further
to sea. Both ships were forced to return ; and on the eighth day
after leaving port they put into Dartmouth, when the Speedwell

162 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
was searched and repaired. They had not sailed again more
than a hundred leagues, before Reynolds, the master of the Speed
well, complained that his ship was so leaky that he feared that
he should founder in the sea if he held on. Both ships put back
and went into Plymouth. The Speedwell was searched again,
but no great matter appearing, the difficulty was judged to be
a general weakness of the ship. " The ship afterwards made
divers profitable and successful voyages," some alteration having
been made in her masts. The truth was, that the master and
crew were under contract to stay a year in America ; but fearing
the want of provisions and other perils of the adventure, " they
plotted this stratagem," says Bradford, " to free themselves ; as
was afterwards known, and by some of them confessed."
" These things falling out, it was resolved by the whole com
pany to dismiss the lesser ship and part of the company with her;
and that the other part of the company should proceed in the
bigger ship." And now, after another sad parting, on the 6th of
September, the Speedwell returns to London, and the Mayflower,
with her precious freight, turns her prow to the ocean. For a
time the winds are fair, and bear them rapidly forward. Then
contrary winds meet them : then fierce storms. The upper
works of the ship are shattered, and leak badly ; one of the main
beams of the midship is bent and cracked ; and the ship seems
in peril of being crushed by the waves. The seamen and pas
sengers hold a consultation whether to return or hold on. Provi
dence has ordered it that one of the passengers has brought with
him a large screw out of Holland. With that screw they bring
the beam into its place, where it is secured by the carpenter, and
the ship appearing strong under water, they hold on their voyage.
A succession of storms comes upon them. For days together
the ship is unable to bear a sail ; and is tossed and driven at the
mercy of the tempests. Two months pass away, and they are
yet upon the deep. The chill winds of coming winter give them
sad tokens of what they are to expect upon a bleak and houseless
shore. At length on the 9th of November, the cry of Land is
heard. It proves to be the extremity of Cape Cod ; while their
destination is in the vicinity of the Hudson. They alter their
course, and stand to the southward. But they are on an un
known coast. The wintry wind, veering, baffling, and stormy,
beats upon them. Twelve hours more, and they are entangled
in shoals and breakers. The wind begins to fail them. The
peril becomes imminent. They hold a consultation what to do,
and bear up again for the Cape.
And now, while the ship is standing northward along the
Cape, the Pilgrims draw up and sign a covenant, by which they
combine themselves into a " civil body politic," to enact, consti
tute and frame such equal laws, ordinances, acts, constitutions

THE VOYAGE TO AMERICA. 163
and officers, from time to time, as shall be thought most meet
and convenient for the general good of the colony ; unto which
they promised all due submission and obedience." It was the
first social compact in the world, entered into by freemen pre
serving the liberties of each, and guaranteeing to all equal privi
leges and rights. It was the germ of the first true republic on
earth. The great idea, so novel, so startling to the world, so
directly opposed to the divine right of kings and prelates, under
whose sway the world had so long groaned in bondage ; the
great idea of such a republic, as founded in the nature and
inalienable rights of man, the Pilgrims derived from the Gospel
scheme of a Christian Church. A congregational Church was
the original and model of American Republicanism; and for this
stupendous discovery, which is now so simple that we wonder
it could ever have been overlooked, we are wholly indebted to
the diligent search which the Puritans made into the great prin
ciples of the rights of conscience, and into the true scriptural
model of a Christian Church. That memorable transaction, in
the cabin of the Mayflower, arose from no sudden effort of
genius, and from no amazing reach of political sagacity ; it was
only the practical and natural carrying out of principles which
had long been canvassed, and which had become in the minds
of the Pilgrims settled and undoubted truths. It was the form
of government which it was well understood they should adopt,
before they sailed from Holland. For eighteen years they had
tried the experiment in their republican Church ; and so well
were they satisfied, that they could never resort to any other con
stitution of government. These things Mr. Robinson alludes to
as understood and settled, in the letter which he sent after them
lo Southampton. He speaks of their " design to become a body
politic using civil government;" and exhorts them to orderly
submission to such government from the consideration that it is
God's ordinance, and that they "are to have only them for their
governors, which they themselves should make choice of." Nor
did the Pilgrims at first contemplate forming a written compact ;
they seemed to take it for granted, that joining the community
under such circumstances, imposed, on every one so joining, a
sufficient bond ; and that God had naturally given to every com
munity so circumstanced, authority to institute government,
which, whenever duly established, should be one of the " Powers
ordained of God;" and not dependent on the consent of every
individual to bind him to its laws. The occasion for making
the compact, was that "they observe some who were not well
affected to unity and concord, but who gave some appearance
of faction." It was thought good, therefore, that there should be
an association and agreement.
The compact being signed, the Mayflower was now winding;

164 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
her way around the extremity of Cape Cod ; and on the 11th of
November, she cast her anchor in what is now Provincetown, or
Cape Cod harbor.
" Being now passed the vast ocean, and a sea of trouble,"
says one who then stood upon the deck of the Mayflower, "be
fore their preparation unto further proceedings, as to seek a place
of habitation, etc., they fell down upon their knees and blessed
the Lord, the God of Heaven, who had brought them over the
vast and furious ocean, and delivered them from all perils and
miseries thereof, again to set their feet on the firm and stable
earth." The same day, some fifteen or sixteen men, well armed,
were sent with others to fetch wood, for the Pilgrims had none
left, and to see to what sort of land they had come. They returned
at night, having discovered no person or habitation ; but with
" their boat loaded with juniper, which smelled very sweet and
strong, and which they burnt most of the time they lay there."
The next day was the Sabbath, and all remained quietly on
board. On Monday, the 13th of November, they unshipped their shal
lop to mend and repair her ; having been forced to cut her down
in stowing her betwixt decks ; and " she having become much
opened with the people's lying in her." Seventeen days were
passed away while the carpenter was completing this indispen
sable work. In the mean time the people by turns went on
shore to refresh themselves, " and the women to wash, as they
had great need." The ship had not been able to come nearer
than three-fourths of a mile to the shore ; and the shallows com
pelled the people " to wade a bow-shot or two in going to land,"
" which caused many to get colds and coughs, for many times it
was freezing cold weather."
In the meantime sixteen men, every one with his musket,
sword, and corslet, under the conduct of Capt. Miles Standish,
set out to explore the country. On the 27th of November, their
shallop and long-boat being repaired, another party of thirty men
in the shallop and long-boat proceed along the cape to a greater
distance. Stormy weather drives them on shore. They march
over hills and through valleys and deserts, making various dis
coveries and enduring great hardships ; but everywhere the soil
is barren, and the shore too shelving for a convenient harbor.
On the 6th of December, the third exploring party set off from
the ship, it " being very cold and bad weather," and several being
very near perishing with fatigue and cold, ere they could get
clear of a sandy point which lay within a furlong from the ship.
The water " froze on their coats, and made them," says their
journal, " like coats of iron." After various adventures, passing
through storms of snow, and over rough seas, and being nearly
lost on breakers, they are driven into a " fair sound," where they

THE VOYAGE TO AMERICA. 165
" get under the lee of a small rise of land ; but are divided
about going ashore, lest they should fall into the midst of sava
ges. Some, therefore, keep the boat; but others being so wet,
cold and feeble, that they cannot bear it, but venture ashore with
great difficulty, kindle a fire, and after midnight, the wind shift
ing to the north-west, and freezing hard, the rest are glad to get
to them, and here stay the night." It was a small island in
Plymouth bay, to which Providence had now directed their
course. In the morning they explore it and find no inhabitants.
The next day is the Sabbath ; and though their business is
so pressing, and their friends awaiting their return with anxie
ty, and though winter is already upon them, yet there they keep
the Sabbath. The next day they explore the harbor and march
into the land. They find vacant corn-fields, little running brooks,
a good harbor, and a place good for situation. They returned
to the ship. On the 15lh of December, the ship weighs anchor,
to proceed to the place of settlement ; but stormy weather makes
them glad to return once more to the shelter of the cape. On
the 16th, they come safe into the harbor. This again is Satur
day, and the next day being the Sabbath, they remain on board
and keep it holy unto the Lord. On Monday, a trusty party
land for further exploration. They march along the coast, but
see not an Indian nor a habitation. At night, they return weary
to the ship. On the 19th, they go ashore and determine to fix
upon one of two places. In the morning of Dec 20th, they go
ashore, and conclude " by most voices, to set in the main-land
on a high ground, where there is a great deal of land cleared and
hath been planted with corn, three or four years ago, and there is
a very sweet brook runs under the hill-side, and many delicate
springs of as good water as can be drunk, and where we may
harbor our shallop exceeding well." The next day it was
.stormy, and those on board could not go ashore ; those that re
mained on land all night, " could do nothing, but were wet, not
having daylight sufficient to make them a court of guard to
keep them dry." " All that night it blew and rained extremely.
It was so tempestuous that the shallop could not go on land so
soon as was meet, for they had no victuals on land. About 11
o'clock, the shallop went off with much ado, with provision, but
could not return. Friday, Dec. 22d, the storm continued so that
those on board could not get to land. On the 23d, so many as
could, went on shore and felled timber for building. On Thurs
day the 2Sth,1hcy went to work on a hill to form a platform for
the cannon on a site commanding all the plain and bay; and be
gan to measure out the ground, aud to arrange the families. It
was the "20 1 li of Jan., before they made up their shed for their
common goods: and on the "21ft of Jan., 1621, they kept their
first Sabbath on land.

r>

XII.

THE PILGRIMS AT PLYMOUTH.
Apparent designs of Providence. Contrast between Popery in South
America and Protestantism in the North. The fruits of Puritanism in
New England. Sufferings of the Pilgrims. The first harvest. The first
Thanksgiving. New settlers. Famine. Day of Fasting. Eetum of
Plenty.
Let us now go back to the 10th day of November, A. D. 1620,
when the Mayflower, hardly escaping from the shoals and breakers
in her attempted passage to the Hudson, turns her course, and bears
up once more for the northern extremity of the cape. An eloquent
orator has thus drawn the picture.* " Let us go up in imagina
tion to yonder hill, and look out upon the November scene.
That single dark speck just discernible through the perspective
glass on the waste of water, is the fated vessel. The storm moans
through her tattered canvass, as she creeps, almost sinking, to her
anchorage in Provincetown harbor; and there she lies with all
her treasures, not of silver and gold (for of these she had none),
but of courage, of patience, of zeal, of high spiritual daring. So
often as I dwell in imagination on this scene ; when I consider
the condition of the Mayflower, utterly incapable as she was of
living through another gale ; when I survey the terrible front pre
sented by our coast to the navigator, who, unacquainted with its
channels and roadsteads, should approach it in the stormy season,
I dare not call it a piece of good fortune that the general north
and south wall of the shore of New England should be broken
by this extraordinary projection of a cape, running out into the
ocean a hundred miles, as if on purpose to receive and encircle
the precious vessel. As I now see her freighted with the desti
nies of a continent, barely escaped from the perils of the deep,
approaching the shore precisely where the broad sweep of this
most remarkable headland presents almost the only point, where,
for hundreds of miles, she could with any ease have made a har
bor, and this, perhaps, the very best on the seaboard, I feel my
spirit raised above the sphere of mere natural agencies. I see the
* Hon. Edward Everett, at the Cape Cod Centennial Celebration, 1S39.

THE PILGRIMS AT PLYMOUTH. 167
mountains of New England rising from their rocky thrones.
They rush forward into the ocean, settling down as they advance ;
and there they range themselves, a mighty bulwark around the
heaven-directed vessel. Yes, the everlasting God himself stretches
out the arm of his mercy and his power, in substantial manifes
tation, and gathers the meek company of his worshippers as in
the hollow of his hand."
Their course was indeed heaven-directed. Had they gone to
the vicinity of the Hudson, they must have been involved in dif
ficulties with the settlers owing allegiance to another nation, or
perhaps have been reduced under their power.
These were the men, of all time, the best fitted by peculiar dis
cipline for just the work which the Providence of God led them
to accomplish. They had been taught the great principles of
evangelical truth and of religious freedom, by just such conflicts
as are necessary to separate the truth from old systems of abuse
and error. By long continued sufferings, they had learned to
prize these principles as dearer than their pleasant homes in
England, and dearer even than life. For the truth, for freedom,
for their posterity, for God, they had come with their wives and
little ones to a wilderness. Far from all human aid, with all
their resources in themselves and God, they had come to plant
themselves on the borders of that interminable forest, whose only
sounds were the deep moaning of the winds through the branches
that, cast their unbroken shadows over a continent; save as at
times the bowlings of wild beasts, and the yells of savage men
gave to this awful loneliness a variety of terror. After a long
night of a thousand years brooding over the whole world, the
Lord had effectually brought to light once more the fundamental
principles of his Holy Word. When lordly prelates joined with
the civil power to impose ceremonials and forms unfriendly to the
truth and inconsistent with purity of worship, then the Lord led
his people to make further discoveries of the principles of religious
freedom. lie suffered those in spiritual lordships to harden their
hearts, till by grievous persecutions they had driven the subjects
of their tyranny to a clear discernment of the corruptions and
usurpations, wrought into the very frame-work of the Church
organizations and civil institutions of the old world. As there
was no place on the Eastern continent where these great princi
ples might develope themselves, and show their beauty, and ma
ture their fruits, the Lord brought this people, so prepared, into
a new world. He guided them to an accessible haven. He
brought them into a void space, from which his Providence had
just swept off the original inhabitants by a desolating pestilence;
thus furnishing fields already prepared, and removing all ene
mies from their immediate borders. By bringing the adventur-

168 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
ers into a rough land of rocks and hills, requiring toil and fru
gality, and securing vigor and sagacity to its cultivators, the Lord
provided for the future sending off of hardy and well trained
colonists, to the wide plains and the fertile banks of the magnifi
cent rivers of the west ; of adventurers to trade in every mart of
commerce throughout the land ; and of mariners to spread their
sails on every sea, and to visit every portion of the globe. Thus
was provision made for spreading the principles of the Pilgrims
throughout the land, and for extending their influence over the
world. Can any one fail to recognize in all this the finger of
God 1 Here is indeed no pillar of cloud or of fire. Yet in all
these events,. connected with their great results, the Providence of
God declares itself as if in broad and legible lines ; calling upon
us to recognize His hand ; and encouraging the hope — if we for
sake not the God of our fathers — that He has yet greater designs
to accomplish, and yet more signal mercies to bestow upon man
kind, as the ultimate result of that series of providences, which
planted the Pilgrims in this American land.
O what emotions often fill my soul, when, on the very soil on
which the early fathers of New England trod, and looking abroad
over the hills and waters on which they once looked, and while
walking amid their graves, I think of the hand of God so clearly
revealed ; and on his great designs in bringing such a race of men
to people the shores of this great continent! What other people
on earth can point to such an ancestry as the people of New
England? Who else are under such obligations to truth, to
freedom, and to God ? I avow it — my soul pities those who for
light reasons, and for the most part without examination, have
thrown the principles of such fathers away ; and who, on the
principles to which they are now schooled to submit, must count
those fathers fanatics, misguided, ignorant, and turbulent men,
rushing into a sinful schism from unworthy motives, and for an
unworthy cause ! I envy not those who must now blot out
these fair lines of God's good providence ; who must regard the
reasons which led the Pilgrims to brave the ocean and the wil
derness, as unwarrantable ; their landing on the rock of Ply
mouth an ill-omened event ; and who can behold nothing in all
the fruits of their labors, save the results of an unhappy and
wicked revolt from the rich blessings and lawful rule of a right
eous ecclesiastical dominion ! Sure I am, that those Pilgrims
were well informed and godly men. Sure I am, that they
examined these principles with a patience and research to which
the present age is well nigh a stranger. Were Robinson and
his compeers alive ; were Cotton, and Shepard, and Elliot, and
multitudes of the first ministers of New England now alive, and
in our midst, — there are no ministers of religion in this country

THE PILGRIMS AT PLYMOUTH. 169
or in the world, who, for learning, eloquence, character, or
anything that adorns humanity — could pretend to be their
superiors. The results of their labors are manifest to all the
world. The prelatic system, the antagonist to theiis, has con
tinued to reign in the old world, as it had already reigned for a
thousand years. The Puritan principles came with a small band
of outcasts into a desolate wilderness. Only two centuries are
elapsed ; but take the history of those two hundred years, and
tell me : Which of these two systems has most signalized itself
by results of freedom and intelligence ? Which has done most
for the advancement of right principles ? Which has done most
to exalt and bless the people who have embraced it ? Nay, take
the map of the whole world ; open the history of all time, and
lay your finger on the spot of earth exhibiting the greatest com
parative amount of comfort, of enterprise, of piety, and of every
thing that conduces to the exaltation or happiness of man. Can
you hesitate ? Who is there that will not instantly point to the
rocks and hills of New England ; whose whole surface was, two
hundred years ago, one unbroken forest? Under every earthly
disadvantage, with incredible toil, in the midst of appalling dan
gers, obstructed by the jealousy of the mother country, and at
last compelled to encounter her in arms, in two centuries the
people, rich in nothing save the principles of the Pilgrims, have
turned this wilderness into a fruitful field ; and made it the
moral garden of the whole world. An intelligent Englishman,*
famed for his researches in science, a member of the established
Church, and one who by his extensive travels and personal
inspection is qualified to form an intelligent judgment, on his
return from a recent tour in this country, spoke earnestly of
New England, as the spot " where two millions of freemen are
enjoying a higher degree of intelligence, morality, and substantial
comfort and prosperity, than any other equal number of people
on the face of the earth." To what is this owing ? To fairer
beginnings? To exemption from dangers and burdens? To
more fertile fields, and fairer skies ? Alas, no ! Never was
prosperity achieved under greater hardships. The sunny plains
which Sir Walter Raleigh described as a second Paradise, were
given to the disciples of the Pope. The regions of eternal spring
and summer were given as a field for other principles to show their
power. As if to render the contrast more striking, there were
added mines of gold and silver enough to enrich a world. What
are those; fields now ? God stripped the Pilgrims of everything
save their principles and their life ; he sent them in the depth of
winter into a bleak and desolate land. He surrounded them
* Lyell.

170 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
with dangers. At every breath they were made to tremble for
their freedom to worship God ; and lo, what hath been wrought ?
To the principles of the Pilgrims, under God, New England
owes all she is.
The Pilgrims could not foresee these splendid results of their
labors. What thoughts came rushing upon their minds as they
crowded the deck, and gazed upon the shores of the New World!
Weary and worn, many of them enfeebled by sickness — a howl
ing wilderness is before them, and the rough ocean behind.
" For the season," says Bradford, " it was winter ; and they that
know the winters of that country, know them to be sharp and
violent, and subject to violent storms, dangerous to travel to
known places, much more to search out unknown coasts." * *
" All things stand for them to look upon with a weather-beaten
face ; and the whole country being full of thickets presented a
wild and savage hue." The captain of the ship urged them to
seek out a place for settlement with the shallop; for he durst not
stir with the ship from its first position in Cape Cod harbor, till
another safe harbor should be found. Again and again the ex
plorers went forth, and returned without success, after nearly per
ishing in their open shallop, from storms and cold. The captain
reminded them that " victuals consumed apace ; and that he must
and would keep sufficient for himself and company on their re
turn." It was rumored by the ship's company, that if the Pil
grims got not a place in time, they would turn them ashore and
leave them. But at length the good hand ofthe Lord directed them
to Plymouth, and after many trials and hardships they were at
last, with their effects, on the shore.
A dreary winter is before them. Three had died in Cape Cod
harbor. Mrs. Bradford, the wife of the future governor, had fallen
overboard and was drowned. Two more died before the landing
at Plymouth. Eight died in the month of January ; seventeen
more in the month of February ; thirteen in the month of March.
In three months half their company were dead : " the greatest
part," says Bradford, " in the depth of winter ; wanting houses
and other comforts, being infected with the scurvy and other dis
eases which their long voyage and unaccommodate condition
brought upon them." " Of a hundred, scarce fifty remain ; the
living scarce able to bury the dead." " In the time of the great
est distress, in the depth of winter, and in want of all resources,
there were not more than six or seven who were able to tend the
sick." But as the spring opened the mortality abated ; ihe sick
recovered ; and hope and courage once more returned to the suf
fering Pilgrims.
On the fifth of April, the Mayflower sailed for England ; and
it is remarkable that after the experience of so dreadful a winter,

THE PILGRIMS AT PLYMOUTH. 171
not one of the surviving Pilgrims took the opportunity to return
to his native land.*
In December of the first year, Edward Winslow wrote to a
friend in England, that they had built seven dwelling-houses,
and four for the public use of the plantation ; and had several
others in a state of forwardness! — they had planted twenty
acres of Indian corn, and sowed six acres of barley and peas.
And now, harvest being gathered, they kept the first New Eng
land Thanksgiving, — thus commencing a custom which the sons
and daughters of New England, unless they shall prove sadly
degenerate, will continue to observe till the end of time.
The cold weather had brought into the harbor an abundance
of water-fowl. Deer and wild turkeys were found near the
settlement. The governor sent four men with their guns to pro
cure the materials for a feast, that they " might after a special
manner rejoice, after they had gathered the fruit of their labors."
" They four, in one day, killed as much fowl, as with a little
help beside, served the company almost a week."
It was on the 9th of November, A. D. 1621, that the friendly
Indians of Cape Cod sent the colonists word that a ship had ar
rived there: and by the description it was concluded that this
vessel must be a Frenchman, and probably come on a hostile
errand. Not long after, the people of Plymouth looking out from
their hill, see the strange sight of a sail making for their harbor.
Supposing her an enemy, the Governor, says Winslow, " com
manded a great piece to be shot off, to call home such as
were at work. Whereupon, every man, yea, boy that could
handle a gun, were ready, with full resolution, that if she were
an enemy, we would stand in our just defence, not fearing
them." It proves to be the good ship " Fortune," — small indeed, — of
only fifty-five tons — but bringing over thirty-five new settlers ; a
part of whom were the persons left by the Speedwell. She had
sailed in the beginning of July, and it was now the 11th of No
vember when she came into the harbor of Plymouth.
On the 13th of December the Fortune sails, laden with two
hogsheads of beaver and other articles which the colonists had
collected ; together with " good clap-boards, and sassafras, as full
as she can hold ;" the fruit of the industry of the colonists in
their first season. The whole was estimated at £500 ; but as
the ship drew near to the English coast she was taken by the
French, and all was lost.
By this ship, Winslow wrote to his friends who might be
about to come over, to use great caution in packing their pro-
* Six moredied before the end of November. Most of the survivors were suffered
to live lo extreme old aire.

172 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
visions, and not to rely upon supplies from the colony, as the
new company already arrived would create a scarcity before the
next harvest. " Bring every man a musket or a fowling-piece,"
said he. " Let your piece be long in the barrel, and fear not the
weight of it, for most of our shooting is from stands." " Bring
paper and linseed oil for your windows, and cotton for your
lamps." Before the end of May, 1622, their store of provision was
spent ; and they had for some time lived on short allowance,
The last company had not landed so much as a barrel of bread
or meal ; and the ship had to be furnished from the stores of the
colony for her voyage home. A ship also arrived at the fishing-
grounds some hundred and twenty miles distant, and sent seve
ral colonists more. These also brought no more provisions than
were necessary for their boats' crew on their return.
The colonists were now destitute of bread. The Indians be
gan to cast forth insulting speeches, reminding them of their
weakness and threatening their destruction. The colonists
erect a fort on the hill, from which a few men may defend the
town, while the rest are employed in necessary affairs. And
though this took the greatest part of their strength from dressing
corn, " yet," said they, " life being continued, we hoped
God would raise some means instead for our further preserva
tion." It was now June ; harvest was yet at a distance. The
people were weakened, and some bloated and swelled for want
of suitable provisions. " Strong men," said Winslow, " stag
gered for want of food." A party was dispatched to the fishing-
grounds, who obtained some small supplies from the ships resort
ing thither. In July, two ships with colonists for Virginia came
in. Part of these emigrants were left, while the others were on
an exploring expedition ; and these committed such depredations
on the green corn of the colony, as prepared the way for a scarcity
in the coming year. In August two trading ships came, from
which they obtained some supplies. With great hazard and toil
some further supplies were obtained from the Indians at a dis
tance. These supplies saved the colony.
The spring opened fairly in the next year, and the colonists
made such efforts as they supposed would secure them from
want. But Providence seemed to frown. From the end of
May a severe drought continued till all their crops seemed
withered and burnt up. In addition to this, a ship sent to them
with supplies, of which they had had notice several months,
failed to arrive. Fragments of a wreck were discovered on the
coast, which they concluded to be the remains of their expected
vesseL Then every man began to look into his own conscience before

THE PILGRIMS AT PLYMOUTH. 173
God. A day was set apart for fasting and prayer. The morn
ing of that day was clear and sultry, like many which had
preceded it. The exercises of the fast continued eight or nine
hours ; and ere the people separated the sky was overcast.
From that evening there distilled a succession of gentle showers
for fourteen days. Their crops revived. They became cheer
ful with hope. News came of their supply-ship, which having
been twice driven back was now prosperously on her way.
" And therefore," says Winslow, " another solemn day was set
apart, wherein we returned glory and honor and praise, with
all thankfulness to God, who had dealt so graciously with us."
In the latter part of August their expected supply-ship, the Ann,
arrives ; bringing, together with supplies, about sixty new colonists.
Among these are some of the wives and children whom several
of the first adventurers had left behind them in Holland.
" When these passengers see our poor condition," says Brad
ford, " they are much dismayed, and full of sadness : only our
old friends rejoice to see us, and that it is no worse." " The
best dish we could present them with, is a lobster or piece of
fish, without bread, or anything else but a cup of fair spring
water." A few days after came in the ship, the " Little James," of forty-
four tons, new-built, and designed to remain in the country.
On the 10th of September, 1623, the pinnace is fitted and
ready to sail for trade. The Ann sails for London laden with
what clap-boards, and beaver and other furs, the colonists have
procured. " And now," says Bradford, " our harvest comes.
Instead of famine we have plenty. The face of things is changed
to the joy of our hearts ; nor has there been any general want of
food among us since to this day."
Thus, through the good providence of God, the colony is
established. Amid perils and distresses the foundations are laid.
We must now return to England, and trace the further progress
of the persecutions, which resulted in driving off the people who
laid the foundations of the other early colonies and churches of
New England.

XIII.

THE STORM GATHERING IN ENGLAND.
Vacillating and Irritating Policy of James. Sycophantic bearing of the
Bishops. Passive Obedience and Non-Resistance. Attempts of James
to establish Episcopacy in Scotland. Assembly of Perth. Change in
the King's Theology. Original Calvinism of the English Church. Lam
beth Articles. Book of Sports. Perfidy of James.
The wrongs of the Puritans at length aroused the sympathies of
the nation. Their principles and arguments had awakened the
people to some just perception of their rights ; and from this
time the spirit of freedom in the House of Commons had become
too daring to be overawed, and too strong to be crushed. It
is questionable whether even the resolute Henry VIII., or the
imperious Elizabeth, could have checked the rising spirit of
liberty. Elizabeth, however, always had sagacity to discern
when it was necessary to yield, and the good policy to yield in
such time, that instead of allowing her subjects to learn their
strength by driving her from her positions, she always made her
concessions appear to be the fruit of her goodness. In this man
ner her very concessions increased her popularity and augmented
her real power. Her people were not disposed to inquire con
cerning their rights, while they were rather inclined to seek how
they should show then gratitude, and exhibit further their confi
dence in so beneficent a sovereign. Thus Elizabeth continued
an absolute despot, and yet a most popular sovereign to her fife's
end. James never knew when to yield, or how to do it with grace.
He was self-conceited and obstinate enough, but he had neither
courage, vigor, magnanimity, nor any true sagacity. Without
necessity, he was for ever fond of declaring on all occasions his
own divine and indefeasible prerogatives as an absolute king.
The assertion of these prerogatives without occasion, induced
people to examine their nature and foundation ; and the perpetual
efforts of James to break down his people's liberties, without
doing anything effectual, not only taught his people their power,
but goaded them up to desperation. This craving desire to play

THE STORM GATHERING IN ENGLAND. 175
the despot, these high notions of the regal prerogatives, without
courage or energy to meet the resistance which these irritating
claims and these petty acts of tyranny awakened, drove James
into a perpetual course of dissimulation. " His reign," says
Burnet, " was a constant course of mean practices." And while
steering amid these breakers, — and dodging, turning, twisting
and lying, to effect his purposes, and to escape from difficulties
which an upright and magnanimous prince would never have
encountered, — his perceptions of moral obligation were so dis
torted, that he prided himself on these acts of dishonesty and false
hood, as though he had now become a proficient in the art and
mystery of " Kingcraft ;" as though no truth, nor honesty, nor
honor were requisite in one who sits upon a throne !
The bishops were ever ready to maintain his royal preroga
tives in their fullest extent. On all occasions they approached
him with flatteries ; and no flattery ever seemed fulsome to King
James. Passive obedience and Non-Resistance, was their con
stant doctrine ; and the king in return was ever ready to lend
himself to the furtherance of their views. The Puritans dared to
talk of rights, and therefore the king hated them. He thought
them weak, and therefore he ventured to oppress them.
James had penetration enough to discern the inevitable ten
dencies of the antagonist principles of High Churchism and Puri
tanism. The friends of freedom saw it too; and from this
moment, the principles which had been antagonists in religion,
began to form the elementary basis of two great political parlies.
The bishops, the king, the admirers of arbitrary authority, and
the despisers of popular rights, were ranged on one side ; on the
other side the friends of popular freedom, of every name, and
however differing in religious preferences, rallied round the
Puritans. Here were planted the germs of those commotions
which in a few years overturned the throne ; and as the Hier
archy, under the name of The Church, joined their destinies to
the destinies of arbitrary power, when the king fell, the hierarchy
fell with him. This is an outline of the affairs which are now
to come under review.
When James summoned his first Parliament in 1604, he took
it upon himself to direct his people what sort of representatives
they should elect ; and threatened, that if any other sort were
elected, and should take upon themselves the office, he would
fine or imprison them. " He threatened to fine and disfranchise
those corporations that did not choose to his mind."* When the
Commons assembled, he interfered with their examination of
elections. He required a conference between the House and his
judges, which, he said, he " commanded as an absolute kino-."f
* Hume. t Ibid.

176

THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.

" He added, that all their privileges were derived from his grant,
and he hoped they would not turn them against him." The
Commons yielded; but with murmurings of " Rights," "not
privileges ;" — Rights left them by their ancestors, and which they
were bound to transmit to their posterity : — not privileges depen
dent on the grant and tolerance of an absolute king.
In ancient times, the Parliament had granted the crown duties
of tonnage and poundage on various commodities, and for limit
ed times ; and as the grant expired from time to time, it had been
by act of Parliament renewed. Henry V., and the sovereigns
succeeding him, had had these revenues conferred upon them for
life. King James, however, thought them the natural dues of
his prerogative ; and by virtue of the same, took it upon him to
alter the rates, and to establish higher impositions. The Parlia
ment saw the mischief of the principle ; the same reasons, they
declared, might extend " even to the utter ruin of the ancient
liberty of the kingdom, and the subjects' right of property in
their land and goods." The king forbade them to touch his
prerogative : but they passed a bill abolishing these impositions,
which bill was, however, rejected by the House of Lords.
The Commons now took hold of ecclesiastical oppressions.
Bold speeches were made concerning the proceedings of the
bishops' courts ; the oppressive subscriptions required ; the oath
ex officio ; and the High Commission. The king summoned
both Houses to Whitehall, and told them that " the power of
kings was like the Divine power ; that as God can create and
destroy, so kings can give life and death ; judge all, and be
judged by none ;" * * " that as it was blasphemy to dispute
what God might do, so it was sedition in subjects to dispute
what a king might do." * * " He commanded them, there
fore, not to meddle with the main points in his government,
which would be to lessen his craft, who had been thirty years at
his trade in Scotland, and served an apprenticeship of seven
years in England."*
The Parliament, nothing terrified, went on asserting their
rights. On the 24th of May, 1610, twenty-three of the lower
house presented a remonstrance, declaring that " They do hold ii
their undoubted right to examine into the grievances of the sub
ject, and to inquire into their own rights and properties, as well
as his majesty's prerogative." Thus was an issue made between
the Parliament and king, which was not to be determined till the
nation was whelmed in blood.
In foreign affairs James was always timid and inefficient. An
opportunity to exhibit himself as a royal theologian, however,
was enough to rouse his utmost energies. " A professor of divin-
* Neale.

THE STORM GATHERING IN ENGLAND. 177
ity, named Vorstius, a disciple of Arminius, had been called to
the university of Leyden. James having read a work of Vorstius,
declared the writer lo be an arch-heretic, a pest, a monster of
blasphemies ; and ordered the book to be burnt publicly in St.
Paul's churchyard and at both universities. He wrote to the
States of Holland thus : As God hath honored us with the title
of Defender of the Faith, so (if you incline to retain Vorstius any
longer) we shall be obliged not only to separate and cut ourselves
off from such false and heretical Churches, but likewise to call
upon all the rest of the reformed Churches to enter upon the same
common consultation, how we may best extinguish and send
back to hell these cursed " [viz. Arminian] " heresies that have
newly broke forth."* " As to burning Vorstius for his blasphe
mies and atheism, he left them to their own Christian wisdom,
but told them that surely never heretic better deserved the
flames."! The States of Holland were not in the practice of
burning men for heresy ; though such was the weight and perse
verance of the King's diplomacy, that he gained the royal victory
of causing Vorstius to be deprived of his chair, and to be banish
ed from the Dutch dominions. In the course of that diplomacy
James denounced Arminius as an enemy of God ; and another
who had written against the Saints' perseverance, the king de
clared " worthy of the fire." We shall remember this when we
come to his league with Arminianism and Popery, for putting
down the Puritans. James published his manifesto of what he
had done in the affair of Vorstius, in several languages.
In the same year the king tried again his theological powers
in conjunction with some of his bishops, in a disputation with
two of his own subjects, who had embraced Arian sentiments :
the issue was that one of his opponents was by the king's writ
taken to Smithfield and burnt to ashes.
In the midst of all thi3 zeal for religious truth, while the Puri
tans were imprisoned, pursued, hunted, plundered, and hindered
in their efforts to leave the kingdom ; and while the king was
exercising his functions as Defender of the Faith in Holland, and
burning heretics in his own dominions, — the court was a scene
of indolence, luxury, amours, lasciviousness and debauchery.
The king lavished his fortunes upon worthless favorites, and was
obliged to have recourse to arbitrary and illegal methods of rais
ing money by hi3 prerogatives. He invented a new order of
knights baronets, and sold the honor for £1000 a patent. He
obliged such as were worth £40 a year to compound for not
taking the honors of knighthood. He sold patents of nobility at
£10,000 for a baron, £15,000 for a viscount, £20,000 for an earl.
The business of fining in the Star Chamber was driven forward
* Neale. t Hume.
12

178 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
with vigor. But all these expedients came short of his necessi
ties, and he was forced again to call a Parliament. The Parlia
ment met in April, 1614, and immediately entered upon a con
sideration and redress of grievances. The king in anger dissolved
them before they had passed one act, and threw the members
who had been most forward against his measures into prison.
" Full of his prerogative," says Neale, " he apprehended he could
convince his subjects of it; and for this purpose turned preacher
in the Star Chamber ; and took his text from Ps. 72, 1 : ' Give
the king thy judgments, O God.' After dividing and subdi
viding, and giving the literal and mystical sense of the text, he
applied it to the judges and courts of judicature; telling them
that ' The king sitting in the throne of God, all judgments centre
in him : and therefore, for inferior courts to determine difficult
questions without consulting him, is to encroach upon his prero
gative, and to limit his power ; which it is not lawful for the
tongue of a lawyer nor any subject to dispute. As it is atheism
and blasphemy to dispute what God can do (says he), so it is
presumption and high contempt to dispute what kings can do or
say : it is to take away that mystical reverence that belongs to
them who sit in the throne of God : ' then addressing the audi
tory, he advised them not to meddle with the king's prerogative.
' Plead not upon Puritanic principles, which make all things
popular,' said he, 'but keep within the ancient limits.' He then
turned his speech against the non-conformists, both Puritans and
Papists ; and concluded with exhorting the judges to counte
nance the clergy against them both ; adding, ' God and the king
will reward your zeal.'"
It was now A. D. 1617, just about the time that the Pilgrims
in Holland were beginning to agitate the question of removing
to America, when King James set himself about the work of
establishing Episcopacy in Scotland. Ever since the Reforma
tion, the Scotsmen had looked with more than suspicion upon
anything that resembled an order of Bishops. At the instance
of King James, they had been engaged to admit them as per
petual presidents or moderators in their ecclesiastical synods,
but with an explicit disavowal of all spiritual jurisdiction, and of
their holding any power over other ministers. James intended
this as the beginning of a gradual introduction of Episcopacy.
His next step was to introduce the ceremonies of the Church of
England, with the festivals of Christmas, Easter, Whitsuntide,
and Ascension. An assembly had been summoned at Aber
deen. The king, to forward his own purposes, prorogued it to
the following year. " Some of the clergy, disavowing his eccle
siastical supremacy, met at the time first 'appointed, notwith
standing his prohibition. He threw them into prison. Such of

THE STORM GATHERING IN ENGLAND. 179
them as submitted and acknowledged their error, were pardoned.
The rest were condemned as guilty of high treason. The king
gave them their lives, but banished them from the kingdom.'"*
The king now, on the sole strength of his prerogative, ven
tured to set up a Court of High Commission in Scotland, in
imitation of that of England. The bishops and a few of the
clergy who had been summoned, acknowledged the authority
of this court, and it proceeded immediately to business, as if its
authority had been grounded on the full consent of the whole
legislature.! James now made a royal progress into Scotland for accom
plishing his design. Pictures and statues of the Twelve Apostles
were carried up and set in the chapel of Edinburgh. The king
told the Scots' assembly and the parliament, " That it was a
power innate; a princely special prerogative which Christian
kings have, to order and dispose external things in the outward
polity of the Church ; or as " we [the king] with our bishops shall
think fit." " And, sirs," said he, " for your approval or disap
proval, deceive not yourselves ; I will not have my reason op
posed.""!: Some ministers protesting against these things, were
suspended, deprived, and banished.
The next year, A. D. 1618, an assembly (or rather convention),
consisting of some noblemen and burgesses, " chosen on purpose
to bear down the ministers " of the Gospel, met at Perth ; and
passed several articles establishing sundry of the ceremonials and
festivals of the Church of England. The king caused them to be
proclaimed in the market-place, and ordered them to be published
from the pulpits. The Scottish ministers refused. In 1621, an
attempt was made to ratify in Parliament, the articles of the As
sembly of Perth. The Scottish ministers were ready with their
protestation, and poured into Edinburgh in great numbers to sup
port it. The king's commissioners, by advice of the bishops, is
sued a proclamation commanding all ministers to depart out of
Edinburgh in twenty-four hours, except the settled ministers of
the city, and such as have a license from the bishop. The minis
ters obeyed, leaving behind them a solemn protestation against
the articles of Perth, and affirming the illegality of the assembly
by which they were passed. The Scots' blood was up, and King
James durst proceed no further. He left the work of completing
his design of imposing episcopacy upon the Scots, to his un
happy son ; who, in attempting to carry out the plan, set the
kingdom in a flame, which was not quenched till he had lost both
kingdom and life.
The Mnglish Parliament was now roused by the king's entrench
ment upon their liberties, as well as by several other things ap-
*Hume. t Ibid. J Neale.

ISO THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
parent in his general policy, such as his supineness in neglecting
to defend his son-in-law the Elector Palatine : and his evident
willingness to betray the Protestant cause and to entail a Popish
sovereign on England, in his concessions to promote the mar
riage of his son Charles with a princess of Spain. The Com
mons began to frame a remonstrance to be laid before the king.
The king wrote to the Speaker a sharp rebuke, forbidding the
Commons to meddle with anything that regarded his govern
ment ; and gave them intimations that a prison awaited such as
should venture to disobey his commands. " He plainly told them
that he thought himself fully entitled to punish every misdemeanor
in Parliament, as well during its sitting as after its dissolution ;
and that he intended thenceforward to chastise every man whose
insolent behavior should give occasion of offence."*
The Commons were inflamed, not terrified. They drew up
a new remonstrance, asserting their rights, and sent a committee
of twelve to carry it to the king. The king heard of their approach,
and ordered twelve chairs to be brought, " for there were so
many kings a coming." He told them that what they called
rights, they had rather, by royal toleration, than by inheritance ;
that they were derived and held from " the grace and permission"
of the king's ancestors and of himself.
The Commons voted, " That the liberties, franchises, privileges,
and jurisdictions of parliament, are the ancient and undoubted
birthright and inheritance of the subjects of England."^ The
king sent for the Journals of the House of Commons. With his
own hand he tore this protestation from the book, and dissolved
the Parliament. The leading members of the House, Sir
Edward Coke, and Sir Robert Phillips, were committed to the
tower ; Selden, Prynne, and Mallory, to other prisons. Others
were ordered abroad on the king's business, into an honorable
banishment ; the king claiming the prerogative of employing in
his affairs any man, at any time, and anywhere.
We begin here to see the spirit, and to meet with the names
of men, who, in the next reign, jeoparded their lives in defence
of the national liberties.
We come now to the remarkable change which came over the
king's theology : a change which so largely influenced his policy
and the affairs of the nation.
Calvin had been held in the highest repute by all the Reform
ers of England. By appointment of the Convocation, Calvin's
Institutes were made the text-book of theology in the Universi
ties of Cambridge and Oxford. Not only are the Articles oi
the English Church thoroughly Calvinistic, but the celebrated
Lambeth Articles drawn up A D. 1595, by Archbishop Whil-
• Hume. t Ibid-

THE STORM GATHERING IN ENGLAND. 181
gift, and carrying the dogmas concerning predestination to an
extreme beyond Calvin, were strictly enjoined upon students,
who were forbidden to allow their judgments to vary from the
doctrine of these Articles. The occasion of these Articles was
as follows : A Mr. Barret had ventured to assail Calvin's doctrine
concerning Predestination and Perseverance. He was summon
ed before the Chancellor, and heads of the University, and
obliged to retract in St. Mary's Church. Nor did this satisfy the
heads of the University ; but they demanded that the names of
Peter Martyr, Calvin, Beza and Zanchius, which this man had
reproached, should receive some further honorable amende.
Both parties appealed to the Archbishop, and the result was the
establishment of the celebrated Lambeth Articles, as the authori
tative exposition of the sense of the Church of England upon
these points. The following are the Articles : "
1. " God hath from eternity predestinated certain persons to
life, and hath reprobated certain persons unto death."
2. " The moving or efficient cause of predestination unto life
is not the foresight of faith or perseverance, or of good works, or
of anything that is in the persons predestinated ; but the alone
will of God's good pleasure."
3. " The predestinali are a pre-determined and certain number
which can neither be lessened nor increased."
4. " Such as are not predestinated to salvation shall inevitably
be condemned on account of their sins."
5. " The true, lively, and justifying faith, and the Spirit of God
justifying, is not extinguished, doth not utterly fail, doth not
vanish away in the elect, either finally or totally."
(i. " A true believer, that is, one who is endowed with justify
ing faith, is certified by the full assurance of faith that his sins
arc forgiven, and that he shall be everlastingly saved by Christ."
7. " Saving grace is not allowed, is not imparted, is not granted
to all men, by which they may be saved if they will."
R. " No man is able to come to Christ, unless it be given him ;
and unless the Father draw him ; and all men are not drawn by
the Father, that they may conic to his Son."
9. " It is not in the will or power of every man to be saved."
It is now well understood that the body of the Episcopal
clergy, both in England and the United States, hold the Armi-
nian sentiments on these points; while, nevertheless, this author
itative and ultra-Calvinisiic interpretation of the sense of the
Church in the 17lh of her Articles, has never, so far as I can
learn, been either reversed or annulled. Nor, if the Church
should reverse this authoritative interpretation, am I at all able'
to understand how she is authorized to interpret her Articles both
* Buck's Theological Dictionary.

182 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
ways. The sentiments of those who framed these Articles were
thoroughly Calvinistic. The present prevalent belief of the
Episcopal Church on these points is rather a sorry comment
upon the boasted efficacy of her " Standards."*
King James had loaded the name not only of Vorstius but
of Arminius himself with the bitterest epithets he could invent.
When, upon the fierce disputes against Arminianism in Holland,
the Synod of Dort was called in 1618, King James, full of zeal
against the Arminian doctrines, sent as his delegates to that
synod, Dr. Carleton, Bishop of Landaff, Dr. Hall, Dean of Wor
cester, afterwards the celebrated Bishop of Norwich, and Dr.
Davenant, afterwards Bishop of Salisbury. The English divines
concurred in the severe condemnation of Arminianism by the
Synod of Dort. Bishop Hall, some years afterwards, said, I,
shall live and die in the suffrage of that Synod of Dort ; and I
do confidently avow that those other opinions" [of Arminians]
" cannot stand with the doctrine of the Church of England."
Bishop Davenant replied in these words : " I know that no man
can embrace Arminianism, * * * but he must desert the
Articles agreed upon by the Church of England."
Whether such were the natural affinities of the two schemes,
of theology or not, such was the fact which James was notback-
ward to discover ; that those who scrupled the ceremonies and
habits of the Church, were uniformly attached to the Calvinistic
doctrine ; while the Arminians in sentiment were not only dis
posed to receive the ceremonies, but to favor the prerogatives
claimed both by the Church and the king. This was induce
ment enough for James to change his theology. He advanced
the most zealous Arminians to bishoprics ; among whom was the
famous Laud. Whoever stood by the laws and the constitution
in opposition to his arbitrary power, was in James' view a Puri
tan in state. Every Calvinist was, in his esteem, a doctrinal Pu
ritan. From this time " the fashionable doctrines at court were
such as the king had condemned at the Synod of Dort, and
which, in the opinion of the old English clergy, were subversive
of the Reformation."
Still another element now began to mingle in the prevailing
theology. The tenets, which are now known by the name of
Oxford Tractarianism or Puseyism, had now begun to prevail ;
as has already been shown in our view of the great work of the
" JudiciousHooker." Hooker lived nearer the old Reformers, and,
therefore, the Popery in his scheme was very unnaturally and
•discordantly mingled with Calvinism : a compound which was
* The sarcastic saying of the great Lord Chatham was not without foundation :
" We have," said he, " Calvinistic Articles, a Popish Liturgy, and an Arminian
Clergy."

THE STORM GATHERING IN ENGLAND. 183
sure not to endure very long : and in spite of some popish ele
ments, there are traits and passages in Hooker's theology upon
which Evangelical Christians of all denominations still look with
admiration. But now, under the change of King James' theolo
gical politics, the prevalent doctrine in the Church of England,
was fast becoming that compound of Arminianism and Popery,
now known as Puseyism.
The divines of this stamp, conscious that their Arminian sen
timents were inconsistent with the received sense of the 39
Articles, " and being afraid of the censures of Parliament, took
shelter under the Royal Prerogative ; and went into all the slav
ish measures of the court, in order to secure the royal favor."
The Papists, hoping nothing from Parliament, joined with the
court divines to support the dispensing power, and unlimited
prerogatives of the king. The king lavished his favors upon
Arminians and Papists, who upheld his prerogatives ; and
bestowed his frowns upon the Puritans, both nonconformist,
doctrinal, and political, who all united in the maintenance of
popular rights against the assumptions of the crown.
The lines of party were now distinctly drawn. " All," says
Neale, " who opposed the king's arbitrary measures, were called
at court Puritans ; and those who stood by the crown in oppo
sition to the Parliament, went by the names of Papists and
Arminians." By the king's command the judges were directed to discharge
all prisoners for Church recusancy, or for dispersing popish books,
or for saying Mass. Upon this, great numbers of priests flocked
into England ; " Mass was celebrated openly over the realm."*
This allowance was not on the principle of toleration, but as a
matter of policy, for strengthening the royal prerogatives ; and
for building up a party against the Puritanic principles. Thus
Popery and Prelacy were made to combine their energies ; and
the Puritans were persecuted with augmented vigor. " The
Puritans," says Neale, " retired to the plantations in America,
and Popery came in like an armed man."
A preacher (Mr. Knight), in a sermon before the University
of Oxford, ventured to assert the right of the people to resist the
sovereign when it should be the only way of securing their lives,
their property, or the rights of conscience. He was arraigned as
a criminal. Panrus' Commentary, which he quoted as authority,
was publicly burned at Oxford and at London. The University
of Oxford, in full convocation, passed a decree that it was not
lawful for a subject to appear offensively in arms against the
king on the score of religion, or on any other account. All
graduates of the University were required to subscribe that
» Neale.

184 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
decree ; and to take an oath that they would ever continue of
the same opinion. Thus it was attempted to bind all men of
learning in the nation, under the solemnities of an oath, always
to maintain the doctrine of passive obedience and non-resistance.
The king bethought himself of another device to check the
growth of Puritanism ; and that was by putting down the ob
servance of the Lord's day as a Holy Sabbath. " The old Puri
tans," says Neale, " were strict observers of the Christian
Sabbath, or Lord's day ; spending the whole of it in acts of
public and private devotion and charity." * * "It was the
distinguishing mark of a Puritan in these times, to see him going
to church twice a day, with his Bible under his arm ; and while
others were at plays or interludes, at revels, or walking in the
fields, or at the diversions of bowling, fencing, &c, * * on
the evening of the Sabbath, these with their families were em
ployed in reading the Scriptures, singing psalms, catechising
the children," &c. As early as the reign of Queen Elizabeth, a
Dr. Bound had published a book maintaining the obligation to
keep the Lord's day as a Sabbath. " This book had a wonder
ful spread, and wrought a mighty reformation among the people;
so that the Lord's day, which used to be profaned by interludes,
May games, morrice dances, and other sports and recreations,"
began to be religiously observed. The Puritans all embraced
this doctrine. " But the governing clergy exclaimed against it
as a restraint of Christian liberty; as putting an unequal lustre
upon Sunday, and tending to eclipse the authority of the
Church in appointing other festivals."* A Mr. Rogers, author
of a Commentary on the 39 Articles, writes in his Preface,
" That it was the comfort of his soul, and would be to his dying
day, that he had been the man and the means, that the Sabba
tarian errors were brought to the light and knowledge of the
state."f " Archbishop Whitgift called in all copies of Dr.
Bound's book, and forbade it to be re-printed. The Lord Chief
Justice Popham did the same ; both of them declaring that the
Sabbath doctrine agreed neither with our Church, nor with the
laws and orders of this kingdom.""]: Heylin complains that the
Puritans, by raising the Sabbath, took occasion to depress the
festivals ; and introduced by little and little a general neglect of
the weekly fasts, the holy time of Lent, and the ember days.'.
" Sad indeed !" exclaimed Neale.
To save people from the infection of Puritanism, but under
color of preserving people from running into Popery through the
austerity of the reformed religion, James, on the 24th of May,
161S, published his Book of Sports, in which he signified,
" That for his good people's recreation, his majesty's pleasure was
* Neale. t Ibid. 'Ibid. ' Ibid.

THE STORM GATHERING IN ENGLAND. 185
that they should not be disturbed, letted, or discouraged from
any such harmless recreations ; such as dancing, either of men
or women ; archery for men, leaping or vaulting, or any such
harmless recreations ; nor having of May poles, or other sports
therewith, so as the same may be had in due and convenient
time, without impediment or let of divine service." *
Only " no recusant [Papist] was to have the benefit of this
declaration ; nor such as were not present at the whole divine
service ; nor such as did not keep their own parish churches ;
i. e. the Puritans."* Though this was aimed at the Puritans, it
grieved all sober Protestants throughout the land. Archbishop
Abbot absolutely forbade it to be read in the church where he
was. The principles of Divine truth had taken too deep a hold
upon the conscience of the nation to be rooted out by the
mandate of an absolute king. The nation was now alarmed
lest the faithless king should prepare the way for bringing them
once more under the dominion of Popery. The Elector Pala
tine, who had married Elizabeth, the daughter of James — from
whom the present race of English sovereigns is descended — was
driven from his dominions, and had to take refuge in Holland.
The whole Protestant world murmured at James' supineness, both
as a father and a Protestant. The Commons were at the same
time indignant at this, and alarmed at the engagements into
which they suspected James to be at that time entering with the
king of Spain for the marriage of his son Charles with the Span
ish Infanta. James had indeed entered into a treaty, in which
he had promised either to annul all laws against Popery, or to
prevent their execution. He had provided for the admission of
popish priests and a popish bishop with the Infanta ; for the
erection of a popish chapel with all the paraphernalia of popish
worship. He had further entered into engagements, to which
Charles his son had sworn, which in the natural course of things
would in due time place a line of popish sovereigns upon the
throne. Notwithstanding these engagements, which were then
secret, James had assured the Parliament " on the word of a
Christian king," that the Spanish match was — " res integra" — an
affair entirely open and unfinished, in which he stood " not
bound nor either way engaged, but remained free to follow what
should be best advised." " It has been talked of my remissness,"
said he, "and a suspicion of a toleration" [of Popery] " but as
God shall judge me, I never thought or meant, nor ever in word
expressed anything that savored of it." To the remonstrance of
Parliament, .lames answered, " I wish it may be written in mar
ble, and remain to posterity as a mark upon me when I shall
swerve from my religion ; for he that dissembles before God is
* Neale.

186 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
not to be trusted with men ; I protest before God that my heart
hath bled when I have heard of the increase of Popery. * *
I will order the laws to be put in execution against popish re
cusants, as they were before these treaties; for the laws are still
in being, and were never dispensed with by me ; God is
my judge that they never were so intended by me." The
king did break off the Spanish match; but he forthwith en
tered into a treaty, with similar stipulations in favor of Popery,
for the marriage of Charles with Henrietta Maria, sister of Louis
XIII. of France. " Upon this occasion, the Archbishop of Am-
brun was sent into England, who told the king that the best way
to accomplish his wishes was to grant a full toleration to the
Catholics. The king replied, that he intended it ; and was will
ing to have an assembly of divines to compromise the difference
between Protestants and Papists : and promised to send a letter
to the pope to bring him into the project. In this letter, the king
styled the pope, " Christ's Vicar, and Head of the Church uni
versal ; and assured him that he would declare himself a Catho
lic as soon as he could provide against the inconveniences of
such a declaration."* The treaty was made. Ambrun was
permitted to administer confirmation to thousands of Catholics
at the door of the French Ambassador's house.
In the midst of these transactions, on the 27th of March, 1625,
James was summoned away by death. These things were
transpiring during the years in which the colony at Plymouth
was struggling for life. From the midst of these scenes the new
accessions to that colony fled from their native land to the wilder
ness of New England. The germs of the events in the next
reign were now planted. A conflict was at hand ; it could not
but come ; a conflict between the principles of Church Polity as
laid down by the " Judicious Hooker ;" united with a theology
half Popish and half Arminian on the one side ; and the doctrine
and principles of Puritanism on the other; a conflict of the
Reformation with essential Popery; of the principles of freedom
with the principles of despotism. * Neale.

XIV.

REIGN OF KING CHARLES I.
Reaching for a union of Churchmen and Papists. Charles — his High-
Church and High-Prerogative notions. Strafford. Laud. Huguenots
of Rochelle. Book of the King's Chaplain. King and Commons appeal
to the people. Illegal exactions. The Church Clergy side with tyran
ny. Overthrow of the Constitution. Cruelties of Laud.
The reformers and the Homilies of the Church of England had
declared concerning the Church of Rome, that for " nine hun
dred and odd years, * * the state thereof" was " so far wide
from the nature of the true Church, that nothing can be more."*
The religion of Rome, the Homilies declared to be the " ungodly
and counterfeit religion ;! and the Roman Church to be " The
idolatrous Church; * * a foul, filthy old withered harlot; the
foulest and filthiest that ever ivas seen."% The new theologians,
among whom Laud was most conspicuous, were now fond of
acknowledging the Church of Rome, not simply as a true
Church, a beloved sister, but as a mother ! The English reform
ers had treated the reformed Churches on the continent as true
Churches ; had held friendly correspondence with them, and had
received lhcir ministers as authorized and ordained ministers of
the Church of Christ. Laud and his compeers handed over all
out of the English or the Papal Church, to the uncovenanted
mercies of God. " Laud," says Neale, " thought there was no
salvation for Protestants out of the Church of England." His
aim, and the aim of those of like sentiments, was now to make
it appear, that there was, in the essentials of faith, no difference
between the Church of England and that of Rome ; and to seek
for a union of Churchmen and Papists. Could the true Pro
testants in the nation submit to this ? Could the friends of free
dom tamely endure the yoke of despotism that was sought to be
fastened on their necks ? The contest of principle had already
beimn. The weak and foolish attempts of James to play the
despot had roused the yeomanry of the nation to a spirit of
resistance, against which such attempts could be safe no longer.
• 'J. Homily for Whitsunday. f 3. Homily on Good Works. 1 Ibid.

188 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
At this juncture of affairs, Charles I. came to the throne on the
27th of March, 1625, a little more than four years after the land
ing of the Pilgrims at Plymouth.
In his own family Charles I. was a most amiable man. He
was possessed of ordinary good sense ; of more learning than
is usual in a prince ; he was a writer of no mean style or capacity
for the day. Formal and stately in his manners, he was not,
perhaps, more so than suited the notions of princely dignity at
the time. His temper seems to have been mild and beneficent.
Had he livqd a century earlier, before the people had begun to
understand 'their rights, or a century later, when they had taught
their kings to respect them, Charles I. would probably have been
as much beloved as any sovereign that ever sat on the English
throne. Few of those sovereigns have maintained so good a
private character, or have been blessed with so beneficent a dis
position. " But the high idea of his own authority which he im
bibed," says Hume, " made him incapable of giving way to the
spirit of liberty which began to prevail among his subjects."
These high notions of the regal prerogatives, Charles had learned
from his father. James had commended to him the great work
of " The Judicious Hooker," " as worthy of his study, even next
unto the Bible ;" and henceforth the support of High Church
principles and regal prerogatives, was with Charles not only a
matter of divine right, but of conscientious duty. When these
despotic principles were about to lead him to the scaffold, Charles
in his turn enjoined it upon his sons, Charles IL, and James II,
to " study the great work of the Judicious Hooker, even next
unto the Bible." They did so, and followed it out to its natural
results of despotism and popery, till Charles II. died a papist,
and James II., from a staunch Churchman of the Puseyistic
stamp, became a bigoted papist, and from the " Judicious
Hooker" his native tyranny received that conscience and boldness,
which ended in driving this last of the Stuarts from the throne*
* James himself declares that reading Heylin and "The Preface to Hooker's
Ecclesiastical Polity," " confirmed him in the opinion " "that those who changed
the English religion were not of God." On the principles of English prelacy, as
laid down by Hooker, he could not see why the Church of England should separate
from Rome. " Submission," says James IL, "is necessary to the peace of the Church;
and when every man will expound the Scriptures, this makes way to all sects who pretend to
build upon it " — (one might think that on this point the Bishop of Connecticut had
been to school to King James II.; for this is his precise objection in his recent
charge). " It is plain," continues James II., "that the Church of England does not
pretend to infallibility ; yet she acted as if she did ; for ever since the Reformation
she has persecuted those who differed from her, dissenters as well as papists, more
generally than was known. And he could not see why dissenters might not sepa
rate from the Church of England, as well as she had done from the Church of
Rome. — (Bishop Burnet, Hist of his own Life and Times.) Bishop Burnet says he
had this account of James ll.'s change of religion from James himself. " All due
care was taken," James says, " to form him to a strict adherence to the Church of
England ; among other things much was said of the authority of the Cuurch,

REIGN OF KING CHARLES 1.

189

The chief advisers and instruments in all the encroachments
of Charles I. upon the liberties of his people, were Thomas
Wentworth, Earl of Strafford, and Laud, who succeeded
to the supreme management of ecclesiastical affairs upon the se
questration of Archbishop Abbot, in 1627 ; and upon the death
of that prelate, became Archbishop of Canterbury in 1633.
Thomas Wentworth had signalized himself by his efforts
against the royal prerogatives. Charles understood his character,
and bought him up with office and a patent of nobility. From
this time, fidelity to his master was his controlling principle. He
regarded no rights, no constitutions, but bent all his energies to
the support and enlargement of the royal prerogatives.
The character of Laud appears to have been a combination
of superstition, bigotry, intolerance, and ambition. Hume draws
its outlines in the following words : " With unceasing industry,
he studied to exalt the priestly and prelatical character. His zeal
was unrelenting * * * * in imposing by rigorous meas
ures his own tenets and pious ceremonies on the obstinate Puri
tans who had profanely dared to oppose him. In prosecution
of his holy purposes, he overlooked every human consideration,
* * * all his enemies were imagined by him the declared
enemies of loyalty and true piety ; and every exercise of his an
ger, by that means, became in his eyes a merit and a virtue.
This was the man who had acquired so great an ascendant over
Charles ; and who led him by the facility of his temper, into a
conduct which proved fatal to himself, and to his kingdom."
There might still have remained some bulwark in the laws ;
but the Lord Chief Justice Finch was fond of declaring " that
a requisition of the Council or Star-Chamber should always be
good enough law for him." The judges held their offices at the
pleasure of the crown : and it was the practice of Laud to send
for their opinions beforehand; and both he and the Star-Cham
ber used often to remind the judges, that if they should not do
his majesty's business to his satisfaction, a removal from office
and of the traditions from the Apostles in support ok Episcopacy; so that
when he came to observe that there was more reason to submit to the Catholic Church than
to any otic particular Church, and that other traditions might be taken on her word,
as well as Episootacv was received among us, he thought the step was not great,
but that \l was very reasonable to go over to Borne; and Dr. Seward having taught him
to believe a real but inconceivable presence of Christ in the sacrament, he thought
f/ii» went more than halfway to transubstantiation." Here we have the process
natural ns life, and entirely logical. Can we wonder that the Puseyites are going
over to Rome '! Is there any logical ground short of that, on which High Church
men can rest f To suppose that the incipient principles of this scheme will stop
at any given limit short of essential Popery, is as contradictory to reason as it is to
all the lessons of past history. There is a natural and inevitable logic, by which
the masses will, in process of time, push out fir«t principles to their legitimate
conclusions. It is impossible that High Church Episcopacy, or Puseyism, should
finally rest anywhere short of essential Popery.

190 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
was the least they had to apprehend. Whatever soundness
there might be in the decisions of the courts on other subjects,
there was none in any matter of question between the royal pre
rogatives, the edicts of the Star-Chamber, and the rights and
liberties of the people.
The first parliament of Charles " was almost entirely govern
ed," says Hume, "by a set of men of the most uncommon ca
pacity, and the largest views." Among them, were Sir Edward
Coke, Digges, Elliot, Wentworth (afterwards created Earl of
Strafford), Selden and Pym; names afterwards so conspicuous
in the final struggle for freedom.
These men had stood against the encroachments of James.
They saw with alarm the dangerous assumptions of the crown :
and they determined to seize upon the first occasion, when the
king should need supplies, to reduce his enormous prerogatives.
The nation had grown into a horror of Popery ; yet the Roman
titular Bishop of Chalcedon appeared in his pontifical robes in
Lancashire, and appointed a bishop, vicar general, and archdea
cons all over England. The king made fair promises, directly
opposed to his marriage treaty with France ; issued his procla
mation against popish recusants ; and then immediately arrested,
by his special warrants, the course ofthe laws against Popery.
The government of France was now engaged in a series of
massacres for exterminating the Huguenots from the kingdom.
The Huguenots had gathered and stood for their lives in the town
of Rochelle. The Catholics were besieging the town, but being
destitute of shipping to block up the harbor, the French min
ister, Cardinal Richelieu, applied to Charles for the loan of some
ships. The pretext to the seamen was, that they were to be em
ployed against the Genoese, who, being allies of Spain, were re
garded with dislike by France and England both. The fleet ar
rived on the coast of France, when the sailors learned that they
were to fight against their Protestant brethren, the Huguenots of
Rochelle ! The sailors were enraged. They drew up a remon
strance to their commander, signing all their names in a circle
that none might be singled out as ringleaders, and declared that
they would sooner be thrown overboard, or be hanged at the top
of the masts, than fight against their Protestant brethren. This
remonstrance they laid under the admiral's prayer-book. It was
in vain that the admiral and the French officers endeavored to
move the seamen from their determination. The whole squadron
sailed for the Downs. Deception was now added to authority ;
and the usual terrors employed to overawe the mutineers. The
seamen were assured that France had made peace with the Hu
guenots ; and were persuaded to sail once more. King Charles
sent his warrant to the admiral : " We command you," said he,

REIGN OF KING CHARLES I. 191
" to consign your own ship immediately into the hands of the
French admiral, With all her equipage, artillery, &c, and require
the other seven to put themselves into the service of our dear
brother, the French king ; and in case of backwardness or refusal,
we command you to use all forcible means, even to their sinking."
Arrived once more at Dieppe, the sailors discovered the deception.
Sir Ferdinando Gorges, who commanded one of the vessels,
broke through and returned to England. All the officers and
sailors of the other ships deserted. " One gunner alone," says
Hume, " preferred duty to his king to the cause of religion ; and
he was afterward killed in charging a cannon before Rochelle."
The French manned the ships with sailors of their own religion ;
blocked up the harbor ; destroyed the little fleet of the Rocheilers ;
cut off their communication with their Protestant friends by sea ;
reduced them to a dreadful famine; took the last bulwark of the
Protestant interest in France ; and overwhelmed its inhabitants
in butchery and blood. Great was the indignation of the Protes
tant people of England ; and long and bitterly was this transac
tion remembered against their king.
One of the king's chaplains (Mr. Montague) published a book
in which, as well as in other writings of his, he maintained " that
the Church of Rome is, and ever was, a true Church ; and had
ever remained firm upon the same foundation of sacraments and
doctrines instituted by God ; that the doctrinal faith of Rome and
of England is the same ; that images are lawful for the instruc
tion of the ignorant, and for exciting devotion ; that saints are to
be invoked in prayer, as having patronage and custody and power
over certain persons and countries."
The Commons cited the author to their bar; a proceeding not
uncommon in those days, however strange it appears now, when
men are held answerable for their deeds, not to the legislature,
but to the courts ; and are liable to be deprived of their property
or freedom, not by the mere votes of a legislature, but only after
trial and sentence according to law.*
The Commons having cited Montague to their bar, Laud
defended his doctrines, and asserted the prerogatives of the
ecclesiastical courts. The king expressed his displeasure with
the Commons, and dissolved the Parliament.
As this was before Parliament had voted any supplies, Charles
endeavored to supply his want by compulsory loans. But this
did not relieve his necessities, while it greatly increased the rising
discontent of the people. Forced to call another Parliament, he
* This arbitrary manner of proceeding seems to have been not uncommon, at
least down to the time when tne Colonial Assembly of Massachusetts voted that
James Franklin (brother of Benjamin Franklin) " should no longer print the news
paper called the New England Courant."— Franklin's Life.

192 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
named the popular leaders of the last Parliament as sheriffs of
counties, in order to disqualify them for holding seats in the Par
liament. The people saw this policy ; and Parliament, when
they met, entered upon a redress of grievances with increased
resolution. They impeached the king's favorite minister, the
Duke of Buckingham. The king sent them his commands not
to meddle with his servant Buckingham ; but to finish in a few
days the bill for his supplies, and to increase the amount, or
they must not expect to sit any longer. If they should fail in
this, he threatened to try other counsels.
The Commons proceeded in their own course. By the king's
command, two leading members, Sir Dudley Digges and Sir
John Elliott, were thrown into prison. The Commons refused
to proceed to any other business till this breach of their privileges
should be redressed. The king yielded ; but the effect of all this
was greatly to exasperate the Parliament, and to expose to the na
tion, the tyranny, indiscretion and irresolute character ofthe king.
The Commons now entered upon the favor shown to Popery.
They complained that the laws were dishonored, the king's
promises violated, popish doctrines honored and defended, and
Papists exalted to stations of honor and authority around the
king. Charles made known his determination to cut all this
short by a dissolution of Parliament The peers interceded;
reminded him that the unfinished business, and the state of the
nation, demanded that Parliament should sit a little longer.
" Not a moment longer," cried the king, and dissolved the Par
liament The Commons foreseeing this, had taken care to finish and
disperse their remonstrance, in justification of their conduct to
the people. The king likewise published his declaration, giving
the reasons of his dissolving the Parliament before they had had
time to conclude any one act. Thus were the king and Parlia
ment at issue on the great questions of popular rights, in an
appeal to the great inquest of the nation, the sovereign people.
Little did Charles dream of the virtual admission contained in
that appeal. Little did he understand its tendencies, or antici
pate its results. The people were now called upon to investigate
for themselves the great question of rights ; and to judge
between the Parliament and the king ! Who should carry into
execution the award of the sovereign people ? It could not be
done as with us, peaceably at the ballot-box : unless one party
should voluntarily yield, it must await the decision of the sword.
The king now tried his threatened " New Counsels " for replen
ishing his exchequer. He established a commission for com
pounding with the Papists for a dispensation of the laws against
them. He demanded aid of the nobility. He demanded

REIGN OF KING CHARLES I. 193
d£100,000 of the city of London ; and the good city of London
gave him a flat refusal. He required the maritime towns and
adjacent counties to furnish, equip, and arm, each, an appointed
number of ships. This was the first appearance of ship money in
the reign of Charles. Little did he foresee the troubles that were
to rise from this exaction. He laid taxes on his people and re
quired the money under the name of loans. Whoever failed to
make the contribution at which he was assessed, was taken from
his house, carried to a distance and thrown into prison. Among
other articles of secret instruction, direction was given to the
commissioners appointed to levy these loans, says Hume, " That
if any shall refuse to lend, and shall make delays and excuses,
and shall persist in his obstinacy ; they should examine him
upon oath, whether he has been dealt with to deny or refuse to
lend, or to make an excuse for not lending ; who has dealt with
him, and what speeches or persuasions were used to that pur
pose ; and they also shall charge any such person, in his majesty's
name, upon his allegiance, not to disclose to any one what his
answer was. So violent an inquisitorial power, so impracticable
attempt at secresy," continues Hume, " were the objects of in
dignation, and even, in some degree, of ridicule."
To support this law, the Church clergy were employed to
preach up the doctrine of passi\*e obedience and Non-Resistance.
One Siblhorpe preached at the Lent assizes at Northampton,
" That if princes commanded anything which subjects might not
perform, because it is against the laws of God, or of nature, or
impossible; yet subjects are bound to undergo the punishment
without resistance or railing or reviling ; and so to yield a passive
obedience where they could not yield an active one." Dr. Man
icuring preached, that " the Royal will and pleasure of the king,
in imposing taxes without consent of parliament, doth oblige
the subject's conscience on pain of damnation ; and that those
who refuse obedience, transgress the laws of God, insult the
king's supreme authority, and are guilty of impiety, disloyalty
and rebellion ; that in cases of emergency all property belongs
to the king ; and of that emergency the king alone is the sole
and irresponsible judge* These were the doctrines of the court,
and of the high churchmen. Manwaring's sermon was printed
by special command of the king. Sibthorpe dedicated his ser
mon to the king, and carried it to the old Archbishop Abbot to
be licensed for the press. " Abbot's principles of liberty," says
Hume, " had acquired him the character of a Puritan. For it is
remarkable that this party made the privileges of the nation as
much a part of their religion, as the Church party did the pre
rogatives of the crown." Abbot refused to grant such doctrines
• Hume.
13

194 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
the seal of his license. The sermon was carried to Laud, then
Bishop of London, who not only licensed it, but recommended
it as " a sermon learnedly and discreetly preached, agreeable to
the ancient doctrine of the established Church, * * * and
to the established doctrine of the Church of England." For his
refusal, Archbishop Abbot was " suspended from the exercise
of his office, banished from London, and confined to one of his
country seats." His jurisdiction was, by commission, put into
the hands of five bishops, of which the chief was the aspiring
Laud. The people imprisoned for refusing the forced loan, had in
general submitted in hopeless silence. But now there were five
men, among whom was Hampden, who ventured to demand re
lease, not as a favor of the crown, but as due by the laws of their
country. This was a bold and novel proceeding. " Though
rebellious subjects had frequently," says Hume, " in the open
field resisted the king's authority ; no person had been found so
bold, while confined, and at mercy, to set himself in opposition
to regal power, and to claim the protection of the Constitution
against the will of the sovereign." These men demanded their
release. " No crime, no cause is assigned as the reason of our
commitment," said they. " We are imprisoned only by the spe
cial command, of the king and council; and by law, this is not
sufficient reason for refusing bail or releasement."
The judges remanded them to prison, and refused the offer
ed hail. The discussion of the question of law, and of the rights
of the subject, spread light, and excited inquiry among the peo
ple. Deep were the murmurings that spoke the popular discon
tent Is it so ? said the people. May the king demand our pro
perty at his pleasure ; the divines proclaim eternal wrath upon
our refusal ; and the judges condemn us to spend the present
life in perpetual imprisonment ? Then what is our freedom 1
How does our condition differ from that of slaves ?
The king pursued the " other measures " which he had threat
ened. He quartered his soldiers upon private families; and
whoever had paid the loan reluctantly and with delay, was sure
to have his house filled with these compulsory and lawless guests.
People of low condition, who refused, were pressed into the
army or navy. Men of a higher class were sent abroad on the
king's business, to the ruin of their own affairs. The soldiers
quartered upon the people, were left unpaid ; and, after being
tempted or driven to a course of plunder and outrage, were sub
jected to the rigors of martial law.
Laud and his creatures stood censors of the press. Books
against Arminianism were mutilated or forbidden : books in its
favor were licensed and commended. If any wrote in defence

REIGN OF KING CHARLES I. 195
of the liberties of the people, they were questioned in the Star-
Chamber, or fined by the High Commission. Apologies for
Popery, and books and tracts inculcating popish tenets or rituals,
were licensed ; if any ventured to write on the other side, — the
queen was a Catholic ; and she must not be insulted by any
thing disrespectful to her religion.
The king's wants compelled him at length to call another
parliament. They came — " men deputed from boroughs and
counties, inflamed by the violations of liberty." Many of the
members had themselves been cast into prison, and had other
wise suffered by the measures of the court. They were men
who had had occasion to examine, with some interest, the great
question of right ; men of independence and spirit : and, says
Hume, " possessed of such riches that their property was com
puted to surpass three times that of the House of Peers." It
was to these men that the king ventured, in his opening speech,
to address the language of threats ; — " If they should not supply
his wants, he should use other means which God and nature had
put into his hands." " Take not this for a threatening," added
the king, " for I scorn to threaten any but my equals."
The Commons were not alarmed. Cool, wary, and determin
ed, they went to the discharge of their duties in their own way.
" Nothing," says Hume, " can give us a higher idea of the capa
city of those men who now guided the Commons, and of the
great authority which they had acquired, than the forming and
executing so judicious and so difficult a plan of operations" as
that which they carried into execution. It was in that house that
Sir Francis Seymour stood up, and debated the question " whe
ther all they had was the king's by divine right." Sycophant
preachers might teach that doctrine and receive bishoprics as
their reward ; "but he is not a good subject, — he is a slave, who
will allow his goods to be taken from him against his will ; and
his liberty, against the laws of the kingdom."
It was there that Sir Robert Phillips stood up and declared,
that " Amongst the old Romans, once every year, even slaves
had liberty to speak their minds. The grievances of which I
complain," said he, "I draw under two heads; acts of power
against law, and judgments of law against our liberty. What
is this billeting of soldiers upon us in time of peace for a punish
ment? Yet, I can live, though another, who has no right, be
put in to live with me. But to have my liberty, which is the
soul of my life, ransacked from me ; to have my person shut up
in jail without relief by law ; if this be our state, why talk
about liberties ?" Even Sir Thomas Wentworth, the future apos
tate Earl of Strafford, could open his mouth for liberty. " We
must vindicate ;" — said he, " What? New things? No! our an-

196 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
cient, legal, vital liberties." It was not long before the royal
benefactions and favor leagued that same Wentworth with the
aspiring Laud, in a contest whose only issue was the over
throw of all liberty, or the overthrow of the crown.
The Commons framed a Petition; not a petition for Grace —
but a Petition of Right ; security against arbitrary and illegal
imprisonment ; against the royal denial of a Habeas Corpus ;
against the imposition of taxes, loans, or benevolences, without
act of Parliament; against the penalty of life, or limb, or exile,
inflicted on any man without the verdict of his peers.
The king tried evasions : he gave equivocal answers. But the
Commons were neither to be daunted nor foiled. They proceeded
against Manwaring. The Lords passed sentence. He was fined
and suspended. On his knees, at the bar of the House, he was
compelled to crave pardon of God, the king, the Parliament, and
the commonwealth. Yet no sooner was the session ended, than
Manwaring received the king's pardon ; was promoted to a rich
living ; made a dean ; and in due time a bishop. Sibthorpe also
received his measure of reward ; arid Montague, who still lay
under censure of Parliament, was made a bishop.
Thus, in the very face of the Parliament, did Charles avow his
determination to defend and reward the public maintenance of
principles incompatible with a limited government, or with the
Protestant faith. The people were already goaded to madness,
and thus he mocked and defied them.
The Commons proceeded to censure the conduct of Bucking
ham. The king in anger sent them a message, which he was
soon after glad to soften and retract ; — forbidding them to enter
upon any new business; and to let his servant and his govern
ment alone. Such messages raised the Commons to a sterner
tone. The king was glad to calm the rising storm by coming to
the House of Lords, and giving his full sanction and authority to
the Petition of Right. The House rang with acclamations of j oy.
The notes of joy resounded throughout the nation. But the king
did it with a hollow heart : and coming years showed him as false
as he was despotic. Restrained by no allowance of rights, and
by no sense of justice, he could be bound by no promises or en
gagements. Nothing remained for the people but resistance or
slavery ; and when the king was overthrown, his known princi
ples forbade his conquerors to hope for any security but in his
death. When the Parliament met, January 20, 1629, after their pro
rogation, they found that all the copies of the Petition of Right
which were dispensed, had annexed to them, by the king's orders,
his first evasive and unsatisfactory answer. In this dishonest
manner, Charles had endeavored to trifle with his own engage-

REIGN OF KING CHARLES I. 197
ments, and to deceive the people. Selden complained to the
House, that, contrary to that Petition, one man had already been
arbitrarily punished by the Star-Chamber, with the loss of his
ears. The king had illegally continued to exact the duties of ton
nage and poundage, which Parliament had not granted him.
Oliver Cromwell was in that Parliament, as yet a young man,
unknown to fame. As head of a committee, he reported to the
House, concerning the countenance given to divines, who preached
Arminianism, contrary to the Articles of the Church of England ;
and " others who preached flat Popery." He also called the at
tention of the House to the favors shown to Montague and Man
waring, who had been censured in the last session of Parlia
ment. " If this be the way to Church preferment," said Oliver,
" what may we not expect ?" Angry speeches were made against
the new ceremonies which Laud had begun to introduce into the
Church ; and against the images of saints, and angels, crucifixes,
and lighted candles, and things of that sort. Mr. Rouse stood
up and said, " I desire it may be considered what new paintings
have been laid upon the old face of the Whore of Babylon to
make her more lovely." Pym referred not only to the Articles,
but to the catechism of Edward VI. ; to the constant profession
of the reformers and martyrs; to the Lambeth articles, which
King James sent to the Synod of Dort, as the doctrines of the
Church of England ; all showing that this compound of Armi
nianism and Popery now introduced by Laud and the new
bishops, is a fundamental departure from the Church of England.
Parliament established the fixed doctrine of the Church of Eng
land dragging them out from the corruptions of Rome. They
stand on the authority of Parliament ; let Parliament now rescue
the same from Rome once more. Sir John Elliott said, " If there
is any difference concerning the interpretation ofthe 39 Articles,
it is said that the bishops and clergy have power to dispute it,
and order it which way they please : grant this to our present
bishops, and our religion is overthrown." The Commons passed
the following vote : " We, the Commons in Parliament assem
bled, do claim, protest and avouch for the truth, the sense of the
Articles which were established by Parliament in the 13th year of
our late Queen Elizabeth, which, by public act of the Church of
England, and by the general current and exposition of the writers
of our Church, have been delivered unto us. And we reject the
sense, of the Jesuits and Arminians, and all others that differ
from us."
Whether it was within the province of Parliament to interpret
the Articles of Religion, is a question which we need not stop to
discuss. Parliament had established the Articles ; and these Arti
cles had become a part of the fundamental law of the realm.

19S THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
Was Parliament to look tamely on while the king was subverting
one part of the constitution, and the. bishops another; and carry
ing the nation back into the chains both of a secular and an eccle
siastical despotism ?
Much has been said of late, of the " Fences" with which the
Episcopal Church is guarded. But with those same fences, and
by means of the very principles which they involve, the Chris
tian world had sunk into the arms of a pestilent and anti-Chris
tian superstition ; and had groaned under the iron hand of a
spiritual despotism during a dark night of a thousand years.
These fences, of decrees, canons, liturgies, ceremonials, and pre
latical prerogatives, had proved the sturdiest foes that the Refor
mation had to encounter. The people everywhere would have
embraced the truth with alacrity, had they been free ; but these
" fences " seemed equally efficient to keep in darkness, and to
keep out light. The Church of England was going post-haste
to Rome. The sturdy resistance of the Puritans, under God,
alone prevented it. That same compound of Arminianism and
Popery, which is now spreading and prevailing under the name
of Puseyism (only at that time it was more manfully develop
ed), had taken an absolute possession of the high places of the
Church of England. Hume has well said, that " Throughout
the nation" the advocates of this system " lay under the reproach
of innovation and heresy."
The advocates of the original and manifest sense of the Arti
cles, were silenced by authority. From that day, the mass of the
Episcopal clergy have gone away from the system of the 39 Arti
cles, over to Arminianism. In the hands of a hierarchy, who
had departed from the simplicity of Christ, these "fences" of
liturgies, offices, and articles, became as straws ; while to their
hapless flocks, the same fences became barriers to pen them up
helpless, and without power of flight, to the embrace of raven
ing wolves.
The Parliament proceeded in their work of vindicating the
liberties of Englishmen. They summoned to their bar some
officers who had seized the goods of sundry merchants and who
had taken one of these merchants from the House of Commons,
of which he was a member, and locked him up in prison, for
refusing to pay duties imposed without the authority of law.
The king sent word to the Commons, that what his servants had
done, was by his special command ; and he himself took the re
sponsibility. In a contest with the king about his right to lay
taxes without law, the House was dissolved : but not before they
had passed their remonstrance by acclamation ; and declared
every person " who should introduce Popery or Arminianism, or
advise the king to levy the subsidies of tonnage and poundage

REIGN OF KING CHARLES I. 199
without consent of Parliament ; or who should voluntarily pay
the same, — a betrayer of the liberties of England, and
AN ENEMY OF THE SAME."
The king committed the leaders of the Commons to prison.
Others were brought to trial, in the king's bench, for seditious
speeches in Parliament. Refusing to answer in a lower court,
for their conduct in a superior, they were heavily fined, and sen
tenced to imprisonment during the king's pleasure. Sir John
Elliott was confined till he died a martyr to the liberties of his
country. Even then the people murmured vengeance upon
Laud, the prime minister and adviser of these outrages.
The Parliament having proved so troublesome, Charles deter
mined that he would never call a parliament more, and published
his determination, adding a threat against any person who should
presume to urge or advise him to the contrary. As to tonnage
and poundage, and other duties levied without consent of Par
liament, he declared that he neither could nor would dispense
with them.
He tried the plan of purchasing off the popular leaders with
wealth, office, and letters of nobility. With Thomas Wentworth
he succeeded, who became a baron, a viscount, and then Earl
of Strafford. All his talents, body and soul, he sold to the
work of rendering his master an arbitrary and absolute king.
For twelve long years the English Constitution was at an end.
Laud and Strafford led on the king to every lawless act of oppres
sion. The king's will was law. His proclamations took the
place of enactments of Parliament. Every man's property,
liberty, and life, lay at the mercy of the king and his rapacious
ministers. They levied duties of tonnage and poundage ; and
whatever other illegal imposts they thought proper. They laid
taxes on " soap, candles, wine, cards, pins, leather, coals," and so
on to the end. They sold monopolies " for gauging red-herring
barrels, and butter casks * * for marking iron and seating
lace," even down to the monopoly of " gathering rags !" They
levied ship money ; and of the times, and the amount, the king
was made sole judge. They demanded " coat and conduct
money" for the army ; they billeted soldiers upon private fami
lies. They exacted loans and benevolences ; they compounded
for nuisances and pretended encroachments ; they put many to
death by martial law, who should have been tried by the laws of
the land." Indeed, what did they not do ? Fines, imprisonments,
cropping of ears, slitting of noses, and whatever outrages may be
committed by unbridled and irresponsible power, rendered Eng
land for a long time as intolerable a despotism as Turkey. " Such
was the calamity of the times, that no man might call anything
his own, longer than the king pleased ; or might speak or write

200 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
against these proceedings without the utmost hazard of his liberty
or estate." For twelve long years the nation endured these
things ; and long might be the time filled up with narrating the
details of these heart-rending cruelties. When I read the history
of these things, I cannot wonder that Charles, with the two
ministers ofhis iniquities, Strafford and Laud, were made to atone
to the injured people of England for their violated laws and Con
stitution. Upon what principle of justice or decency is it, that
the Church of England celebrates that tyrant as a "martyr;"
and that Laud, the heartless pander of his crimes, is "sainted"
as England's " Holiest man 1"
Take a specimen or two of the tender mercies of Laud. Dr.
Alexander Leighton, a Scots divine, and father of the excellent
archbishop of that name, had ventured to write against the
hierarchy, a work which he entitled " Zion's plea against Prela
cy." He was brought into the Star-Chamber, sentenced to be
pilloried, whipped, his ears cut off, his nose slit, to be branded in
the face with a hot iron, fined £10,000, and then to lie in the
Fleet prison for life. When this sentence was pronounced, Laud
pulled off his cap and gave God thanks for it ; and when it was
executed, he recorded it thus in his private diary : " 1st. He was
severely whipped before he was put in the pillory. 2d. Being
set in the pillory he had one of his ears cut off. 3d. One side of
his nose slit. 4th. Branded on the cheek with a red-hot iron,
with the letters S. S. [sower of sedition]. * * * On that day
seven-night, his sores upon his back, ears, nose, and face, being
not yet cured, he was whipped again at the pillory in Cheapside,
and had the remainder of his sentence executed upon him, by
cutting off the other ear, slitting the other side of his nose, and
branding the other cheek." He was then carried back to prison,
where he continued in close confinement ten years, and until
he was released by the Long Parliament.
Prynne, a barrister, had written a book, in which, among other
things, he had spoken severely of " Keeping Christmas, and
dressing houses with ivy." " It must be confessed," says
Hume, " that he had in plainer terms blamed the Hierarchy, the
ceremonies, the innovations in religious worship, introduced by
Laud; and this probably * * * was the reason why his
sentence was so severe." He was sentenced to have his book
burnt by the hangman ; to be made for ever incapable of his
profession ; to stand in the pillory ; to lose both his ears ; to pay
a fine of d£5000, and to suffer perpetual imprisonment* In pri
son, Prynne still managed to write against the Hierarchy ; and
* Neale.

REIGN OF KING CHARLES I. 201
after a lapse of four years was again brought from prison to an
swer for the renewed offence. " I thought," said Lord Finch,
" that Prynne had lost his ears already ;" but added he, looking
•it the prisoner, " there is something left yet." An officer of the
court removing the hair displayed the mutilated organs. " I
pray to God," replied Prynne, "that you may have ears to hear
me." " Christians," said Prynne, as he presented the stumps of
his ears to be grubbed out by the hangman's knife ; " stand fast ;
be faithful to God and your country, or you bring on yourselves
and your children perpetual slavery."*
The mutilation being effected, Prynne and his fellows in suf
fering, were sent to distant prisons, and afterwards removed to
the islands of Scilly, Guernsey, and Jersey, where they were
kept without the use of pen, ink, or paper, or the access of
friends ; till at last they were released by the Long Parliament.
Nor did the tender mercies of Laud stop here. He pursued
those who had showed these men civilities as they were carried
to prison. Some who visited them in prison, though it had not
been forbidden, were fined £250, £300, and £500. The servant
of Prynne was prosecuted in the High Commission because he
would not accuse his master.
But the cruelties of Laud cannot be told. He made new
rules ; imposed new ceremonies ; adorned the churches with
pictures, images, and altar-pieces ; drew the rituals of worship to
a closer assimilation to those of Rome. " Laud and other pre
lates," says Hume, " had adopted many of those religious senti
ments, which prevailed during the fourth and fifth centuries,
when the Christian Church, as is well known, was already sunk
into those superstitions which were afterwards continued and
augmented by the policy of Rome. Nor was the resemblance
to the Romish ritual any objection, but rather a merit with Laud
and his brethren ; who bore a much greater kindness to the
1 mother Church,' as they called her, than to sectaries and Pres
byterians ; and frequentiy recommended her as a true Christian
Church ; an appellation which they refused, or at least scrupled,
to give to others. So openly were these tenets espoused," con
tinues Hume, " that not only the discontented Puritans believed
the Church of England to be relapsing fast into superstition ; the
court of Rome itself entertained hopes of regaining its authority
in Ihe island; and in order to forward Laud's supposed good
intentions, an offer was twice made him in private of a Cardinal's
hat; which he declined accepting. His answer was, as he him
self says, " That there was something dwelling within him,
which would not suffer his compliance till Rome were other
than it was." * Bancroft, Vol. i., p. 410.

202 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
In the meantime, the spiritual courts were full of business.
" Every week," says Neale, " one or another of the Puritan min
isters was suspended or deprived ; and their families driven to
distress: nor was there any prospect of relief; the clouds gath
ering thicker every day, and threatening a violent storm."
These " Puritan ministers " were the early ministers of Mas
sachusetts Bay ; and the ministers of the people who came
through the forests to settle the towns on the Connecticut, and
on the shore of Long Island Sound. The colony at Plymouth
had lived, and others began to think of freedom to worship God
in New England. " The sun shines as brightly in America,"
said they, " let us go." We shall leave our native land ; we
shall encounter perils and distress : but we and our children shall
have Freedom to worship God.

XV.

TIMES OF ARCHBISHOP LAUD*
King and Prelates combine against the liberties of the People. Popish
ceremonies and utensils. Images, pictures of God the Father. Com
munion tables turned into altars. Natural tendency of prelatic princi
ples to corruption and persecution. Their fruit on a broad scale, and
for a thousand years. Original idea of " A Church without a Bishop,
a State without a king."
At the coronation of Charles, a novelty had been introduced by
the officiating prelates, which struck the minds of his Protestant
subjects with alarm. The king sitting with his crown and royal
robes, the officiating bishop in the name of his brethren, recited
to him the words of this charge : " Stand and hold fast from
henceforth the place to which you have been heir by the succes
sion of your forefathers, being now delivered to you by the
authority of fllmighty God, and by the hands of us, and all the
bishops the servants of God. And as you see the clergy to come
nearer to the altar than others, so remember that in all places
convenient, you give them greater honor ; that the mediator of
God and man may exalt you on the kingly throne to be a medi
ator betwixt the clergy and laity ; that you may reign for ever
with Jesus Christ the king of kings and lord of lords."
King Charles never forgot this lesson. His constant aim was
to uphold and aggrandize the clergy. His queen, Henrietta, a
woman of exquisite beauty and blandishments, and possessed
of an unbounded influence over the mind of her husband, was
a papist. It pleased her to see papists raised to authority and
favor. It pleased her to see the Church of England adopting
the rituals and doctrines of Rome ; it pleased the king, it
pleased Bishop Laud. Why should any favor be shown to the
* I employ in this caption the most honorable designation of the man — the one
by which he is now ordinarily known ; intending, however, to embrace the whole
time ofhis ascendency. He became archbishop in 1633. He was made Bishop of
Si David's in 1621 ; afterwards he was translated to the See of London. His actual
supremacy in church affairs began in October, 1627, upon the sequestration of
Archbishop Abbot

204 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
Puritans, who set themselves so stoutly against popish doctrines
and ceremonies, as well as against the absolute prerogatives ofthe
king ? Why should the king trouble himself with parliaments,
that dared to question and resist the prerogatives which he held
not from the British Constitution, but indefeasibly, and unlimited,
from God ? " In return for Charles' indulgence towards the
Church," says Hume, " Laud and his followers took care to
magnify on every occasion the regal authority, and to treat with
the utmost disdain all puritanical pretensions to a free and inde
pendent constitution." But while these prelates were so liberal
in raising the crown at the expense of public liberty, they made
no scruple of encroaching themselves on royal rights the most
incontestible, in order to exalt the hierarchy, and to procure to
their own order, dominion, and independence. All the doctrines
which the Romish Church had borrowed from some of the
Fathers, and which freed the spiritual from subordination to
the civil power, were now adopted by the Church of England,
and interwoven with her political and religious tenets. A divine
and apostolical character was insisted on preferably to a legal
and parliamentary one. The sacerdotal character was magnified
as sacred and indefeasible. All right to spiritual authority, or
even to private judgment, was refused to " profane laymen."
In one word, it was a conspiracy between the prelates and the
king, against the civil and religious liberties of the people. No
thing but the civil war that followed, prevented the nation from
being carried back into the chains of popery, and into an un
limited and hopeless despotism.
A few specimens will serve to show the character of the su
perstitions introduced by Laud. " St. Katharine's church having
been repaired, was suspended from all divine service till it should
be consecrated again. On Sunday, 16th January, 1630, Bishop
Laud came, with a procession, to consecrate it At his ap
proach to the west door of the church, which was shut and
guarded by halberdiers, some who were appointed for the pur
pose, cried with a loud voice, ' Open, open, ye everlasting doors,
that the king of glory may come in.' " As soon as Laud en
tered the doors, he fell down upon his knees, and with eyes lifted
up, and his arms spread abroad, he said, " This place is holy;
the ground is holy ; in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy
Ghost, I pronounce it holy." Then walking toward the chancel
he took up some of the dust and threw it into the air several
times. When he approached near the rail of the communion table,
he bowed toward it five or six times ; and returning, went round
the church with his attendants, saying the 100th, and then the
19th Psalm, as prescribed in the Roman Pontificalr. He then
read several collects, in one of which he prayed " That all who

TIMES OF ARCHBISHOP LAUD. 205
should thereafter be buried within the circuit of that holy and
sacred place, may rest in their sepulchre in peace, till Christ's
coming at judgment, and may then rise to eternal life and hap
piness." Then sitting under a cloth of state in the aisle of the
chancel near the communion-table, he took a written book in his
hand, and pronounced curses upon those who should thereafter
profane that holy place." At the conclusion of each curse he
bowed to the east, and said, " Let all the people say amen."
When these curses, about twenty in number, were ended, he
pronounced in like manner, blessings upon all who had any hand
in framing and building that sacred and beautiful edifice, and on
those who had given, or should hereafter give any chalices,
plate, ornaments, or other utensils ; and at the end of every bless
ing, he bowed to the east, and said, " Let all the people say
amen." Then followed the- sermon and the sacrament The
consecration of the elements he performed in the following
manner ; " As he approached the altar, he made five or six low
bows ; and coming to the side of it where the bread and wine
were covered, he bowed seven times ; then * * he came near
the bread, and gently lifting up the corner of the napkin beheld
it; and immediately letting fall the napkin retreated hastily a
step or two, and made three low obeisances. His lordship then
advanced, and having uncovered the bread, bowed three times
as before ; then laid his hand on the cup, and letting it go, he
stepped back and bowed three times toward it ; then came near
again, and lifting up the cover of the cup, looked into it, and
seeing the wine he let go the cover again, retired back, and
bowed as before, after which the elements were consecrated."*
He consecrated St. Giles' Church in the same manner. It had
been repaired, and in part rebuilt; and divine service had been
performed, and the sacraments administered in it for some years.
But upon Laud's accession, he interdicted the Church from divine
service till it had been re-consecrated. Several other churches
and chapels were in like manner shut up, till they had been con
secrated after the same fashion.
Laud now set himself to introduce into the churches the orna
ments and trappings of Popery. To support the enormous ex
pense of repairing and beautifying St. Paul's, he raised money
by " compositions with recusants, commutations of penance, ex
orbitant fines in the Star-Chamber and High Commission; in
somuch that it became a proverb that St Paul's was repaired
with the sins of the people ;" nor was the work much more than
begun, when, after the expenditure of more than half a million of
our money, the civil wars arrested its progress.
The zeal of the people in the Reformation had destroyed many
* Neale.

206 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
of the Popish ornaments in the churches. Yet many remained ;
and Laud would have the others restored. In the Cathedral of
Canterbury, there yet remained the images of the Twelve Apos
tles, and of Christ, together with the images of sundry Popish
saints. On the windows were placed images of the Virgin Mary,
inscribed, " Hail, Mary, Spouse of God." Besides these, there
were pictures of God the Father, and of the Holy Ghost. In the
Cathedral of Durham were carved images ; and among them an
image of God the Father. The dignitaries of the Cathedral had
procured copes of Mass priests with crucifixes and images of the
Trinity upon them. They had consecrated knives to cut the
sacred bread ; and lighted candles upon the altars on Sundays
and saints' days. On Candlemas day they had no less than 200
of these, of which 60 were upon and about the altar."
The repairing of these paintings and images, was considered
by many as the signal of an open return to essential Popery.
Many among the most moderate, thought that these decorations
tended to image worship, and that they were directly contrary to
the homily on the peril of idolatry. Some ministers preached
against them ; others ventured to remove them ; and in return fell
under the vengeance of Laud and the High Commission. Ruin
ous fines, a prison, or recantation, awaited all who ventured to
open their lips against these things. Some were arraigned and
punished for the very texts on which they preached ; and no doubt
it was very easy to find passages in the Bible containing no very
obscure inuendos against such doings. One preached on Num
bers, xiv. 4 : "Let us make a captain, and let us return into Egypt."
Another, on 1 Kings, xiii. 2 : "And he cried against the altar in
the word of the Lord, and said, 0 Altar, Altar." Such persons
reaped the reward of their temerity in Newgate. Says Hume :
" Not only such of the clergy as neglected to observe every cere
mony, were suspended or deprived by the High Commission ;
oaths were by many of the bishops imposed upon the church
wardens ; and they were sworn to inform against any who acted
contrary to the ecclesiastical canons." Some were whipped ;
some confined in a dark dungeon a whole winter, chained to a
post in the middle of the room, with irons on then hands and
feet ; having no food but bread and water, with a pad of straw to
lie on ; and they were not released, but on condition of taking an
oath and giving a bond not to preach any more, and to depart
from the kingdom within a month, never to return.
Henry Sherfield was tried, May 20,1632, in the Star-Chamber,
for taking down some painted glass out of one of the windows of
St Edmund's Church, in Salisbury ; in which were seven pic
tures of God the Father, in form of an old man in a blue and red
coat, with a pouch by his side : one represented him as creating

TIMES OF ARCHBISHOP LAUD. 207
the sun and moon with a pair of compasses ; others as working
on the business of the six days' creation, " and at last he sits in
an elbow chair at rest." Many simple people, upon going in or
out of the Church, did reverence to this window, because, as they
said, the Lord their God was there. This gave such offence to
Sherfield, who was a justice of the peace, that he moved the
parish, at a vestry, for leave to take it down, and to set up a
window of glass in its place; which leave was granted.
Soon after, Mr. Sherfield broke with his staff the pictures of God
the Father, in order to new glaze the window. He was called
before the High Commission. Sherfield pleaded that that church
was a lay fee, exempt, from the jurisdiction of the bishop ; that
the parish had lawful power to take down the glass : and that, as
for the images, it was impious, by the divine law, to make an
image or resemblance of God the Father. Laud stood against
him, and justified the images. Sherfield was fined £500, and
committed to close imprisonment.
A Mr. Workman had ventured to say in a sermon, that these
pictures and images were no ornaments to churches, but tended
to idolatry, according to the Homily. For this he was suspend
ed, excommunicated, condemned to pay the costs of suit in the
High Commission, and imprisoned. He had long been noted
as a man of distinguished piety, wisdom and moderation. In
consideration of his merits, and of the necessities of his family,
the city of Gloucester gave him an annuity of £20. For this
act of charity, the Mayor, Town Clerk, and Alderman, were cited
before the High Commission, fined, and the annuity cancelled.
Mr. Workman set up a little school : Laud inhibited him from
this at his peril. Workman then tried the practice of physic;
but this Laud absolutely forbade ; so that being deprived of all
methods of subsistence, the persecuted man sank into despon
dency and died.
In the time of the Reformation, when the bread was no longer
thought the real body of Christ, nor the communion a sacrifice,
the altar was deemed both a falsehood and an absurdity. It
was accordingly turned into a communion table ; and removed
from the wall, so that the minister might no longer seem to be a
sacrificing' priest, a mediator between God and man, ministering
as such with his back to the people. Laud now took order for
turning the communion-tables into altars, and removing them
back to the wall, as they had stood in the times of Popery. " It
is not easy," says Hume, " to imagine the discontents excited by
this innovation, and the suspicions which it gave rise lo." " Many
ministers and churchwardens," says Neale, " were excommu
nicated, fined, and obliged to do penance, for neglecting the
bishop's injunctions. Great numbers refused to come up to the

208 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
rails and receive the sacrament ; for which some were fined, and
others excommunicated, to the number of hundreds."
The court clergy were become very exact in observing the
popish ceremony of bowing to the altar at various parts of ser
vice, and upon coming in and going out of church. " Laud
strictly enjoined it ; and always had a lane made upon his com
ing in and going out, that he might see the altar and do reverence
towards it." " In the new body of statutes for the Cathedral of
Canterbury, the dean and prebendaries were obliged by oath lo
bow to the altar at coming in and going out of church."
Laud, also, undertook to enforce by penalties, the ceremony
of bowing whenever the name of Jesus occurs in the service ;
and many ministers were fined, censured, or deprived for omit
ting this ceremony or for speaking against it.
The people made too much of the Sabbath to suit the genius
of Laud. The Lord Chief Justice having observed the mischief
arising from church-ales, clerk-ales, and other revelries on the
Lord's day, followed the example of the judges in the 10th of
Elizabeth, and made an order at the assizes to suppress them.
Laud interfered, and the Chief Justice was forced to recant.
The justices signed an humble petition to the king, declaring that
these revels not only introduced great profanation of the Lord's
day, but riotous tippling ; and other things contrary to order and
good government. At the instance of Laud, the king published
his Book of Sports, declaring it his pleasure, that his subjects,
having first done their duty to God, should engage in all manner
of lawful games, recreations, and sports ; and commanded that
this declaration should be published through all the parish
churches from the pulpit. The court had their balls, masquer
ades, and other plays on the Sabbath ; and the youth throughout
the country engaged in all kinds of games and revelling on that
holy day. A minister ofthe Gospel ventured to write, " A de
fence of the most ancient and sacred ordinance of God, the
Sabbath day;" for which he fell into the hands of the High
Commission. The Bishop of Ely, Dr. Pocklington, and Heylin,
the archbishop's chaplain, were employed to write down the Sab
bath, and to write up the sports.
The sober and religious part of the community were struck
with horror. Many of the clergy refused to publish the book of
sports. Others read it, but immediately after " read the Fourth
Commandment; adding, This is the Law of God; the other \-
the injunction of man." Laud knew that pressing the Book of
Sports would distress the Puritans, and accordingly it was pressed
with relentless severity. Many clergymen were silenced and
deprived ; others were excommunicated ; others were forced to
leave the kingdom for not publishing the Book of Sports.

TIMES OF ARCHBISHOP LAUD. 209
A Dr. Bastwick ventured to call in question the divine right of
the order of bishops ; he was cited before the High Commission,
fined a thousand pounds, and thrown into prison till he should
recant. Laud stretched out his hand across the sea, but his endeavors to
compel the English congregations at Hamburgh, and elsewhere,
to conform to the canons and rubrics, only showed the impo-
tency of his malice and bigotry to accomplish anything there.
The chaplains of the English regiments and factories abroad
were, however, brought under the yoke ; the merchants abroad
were compelled to yield ; the king's ambassador in France was
forbidden to frequent the Protestant worship ; and he took care
to publish, that the Church of England looked not upon the Hu
guenots as a part of their communion. The descendants of the
foreigners who had fled to England from persecution, and who
had been allowed to worship God in their own way, were now
forced to abandon the way of their fathers, and to conform to
the ceremonials of the English Church. Thousands of them
left the kingdom,— many of them, such as had been engaged in
manufacture, greatly to the benefit of the poor and to the advan
tage of the nation. The French government pleaded the exam
ple of England to justify their severities against the Huguenots.
" If," said Richelieu, " a king of England, who is a Protestant,
will not permit two Disciplines in his kingdom, why should a
king of France, who is a Papist, admit two religions ?"
Laud took another occasion to exhibit his hatred of Protest
antism. The Queen of Bohemia, sister of King Charles, had
earnestly proposed the king to allow a public collection, over
England, for the poor persecuted ministers of the Palatinate.
The king's brief, giving this allowance, spoke of these as "min
isters:" and of their constancy in the '¦'¦true religion" Laud
was enraged that their religion should be called the true; and
that the brief spoke of Rome in its persecutions, as Anti-chris
tian. He was enraged that these men should be recognized as
ministers ; not having had Episcopal ordination. His objection
to calling the Church of Rome Anti-christian is one which those
who at the present day are earnest to seek out a less filthy chan
nel for the " Succession," would do well to mark. He objected
to calling Rome Anti-christian, "because it would then follow
lhat she was in no capacity to convey sacerdotal power
in ordinations; and consequently the benefits of the priesthood,
and the force of holy ministrations, would be lost in the Eng
lish Church ; forasmuch as she has no orders but what she
derives from the Church of Rome."*
The collection was defeated. Some Puritan divines encourag-
* Neale.
14

210 the puritans and their principles.
ing their friends to enlarge their charity, were brought before the
High Commission, and a stop put to the collection.
Conformity to the new ceremonies pressed with greater vigor,
spies were everywhere employed. Informers were upon the
watch, whenever a minister suspected of Puritanism entered the
pulpit. " No man was safe in public company, nor even in
conversing with his friends."
It is a weariness to proceed any further in these details of the
superstitions introduced ; the treacheries and cruelties practised
by the prelates of the Church of England in those days.
The Puritan ministers, harassed, persecuted, hunted from one
diocese to another, turned their thoughts to the wilds of America.
From the midst of such persecutions came out those who
planted the early Churches of Massachusetts ; and some of them
removing southward, began the early plantations on the Connec
ticut, as at Windsor, Hartford, Weathersfield, and those upon
the seashore, as at New Haven, Branford, Guilford, Milford,
Fairfield, Stamford, and Norwalk. From the midst of these
corruptions and persecutions, came the early fathers of this con
gregation, whose graves are still visible in our ancient burying-
grounds ; and whose names are still perpetuated among their
descendants of the sixth and seventh generations. Till this time
they had remained in the Church of England: they had not
separated from it like the Pilgrims of Plymouth ; but they had
groaned under its corruptions and tyranny ; till compelled at last
to flee, and looking narrowly into the Word of God that they
might lay the foundations right, they returned to the apostolic
simplicity of organization and worship ; rejecting the hierarchy
and the trammels and forms imposed by mere human authority,
as the source of that corruption, despotism, and persecution,
under which the disciples of Christ had so long groaned in
bondage. The fathers of these New England Churches were
enlightened, conscientious, bold, and determined men ; who
valued religious liberty above all earthly price. Their ministers
were all regularly ordained ministers in the Church of England ;
among the most learned, the most laborious, the most beloved,
and godly in the land. Puritanism had endured persecution
for ages. Again and again had the authorities supposed it
rooted from the land. Now, once more, the best ministers and
people of the Church of England had found its corruptions and
cruelties too grievous to be borne ; and fondly as they had been
attached to that Church, no sooner were they free, and left with
the Bible and the light of experience, to guide their judgment,
than they cast off the prelacy, its impositions, and its forms to
gether. In twelve years, during the ascendency of Laud, there

times of archbishop laud. 211
came over to New England more than 4000 such people.
Their posterity bearing their names, are scattered through the
wide extent of the United States. It was nearly ten years after
the landing of the Pilgrims at Plymouth, before another colony
was established in New England ; but ere another ten years had
passed, seventy-seven ministers, who had been clergymen of
the Church of England, were established as pastors and teachers
of the Puritan churches in the rising villages of New England.*
The tide of emigration continued to pour on. " The Puritans,"
says Hume, " shipped themselves off to America, and laid there
the foundations of a government which possessed all the liberty,
both civil and religious, of which they found themselves bereaved
in their native country.f But their enemies, unwilling that
they should anywhere enjoy ease and contentment, and dreading,
perhaps, the consequences of so disaffected a colony, prevailed
on the king to issue a proclamation, debarring these devotees ac
cess even into these inhospitable deserts."
After multitudes of the Puritans had been drained off, those
who had remained members ofthe Established Church, unable to
bear its tyranny any longer, rose upon the king and the bishops,
and swept away the throne and the hierarchy together. Our
fathers were away. They were here in the wilderness at the time
of the civil wars in England. Hooker, Davenport, and Cotton,
were sent for by the Long Parliament, to constitute a part of the
celebrated Assembly of Divines; but they wisely declined.
In that Assembly of Divines, the most learned and the ablest
men in England — though bred in all the prejudices of the Es-
* Cotton Mather gives tho catalogue of these seventy-seven ministers, as well
as the catalogue of the churches where they were settled. Many of them had been
second to none in Old England. Perhaps the history of the whole world may be
searched in vain to find seventy-seven other names of cotemporary ministers, of
contiguous churches, equal to these in learning, in piety, in cool, sound judgment,
in firmness, enterprise, and in everything that can adorn the character of a man and
minister of Christ. There was Thomas Hooker, of Hartford, of whom Ames, the
gToat theologinn of his age, used to say, " He never knew his equal." There was
John Cotton, of Boston. There was Davenport of New-Haven, who was atyled by
one of the ablest of his cotemporarics, " A princely preacher." There were Wilson,
and Norton, and Elliot, the Apostle of the Indians, and Shcpard, of Cambridge ; in
deed nearly the whole list is made up of distinguished names. England was sifted
and the choicest of her ministers transplanted to the New World.
In addition to these seventy-seven names, Cotton Mather gives the names of four
teen more, who were students in divinity, but who finished their education in the
colonies. Among these were Mr. Bishop of Stamford, and Thomas Hanford, the
first p.islor of the Church in Norwalk ; who began to preach to the fathers of this
congregation in 1648, and continued their minister till his death, in 1692 ; a period
of 41 years.
t " It has been computed," says Neale, " that the four settlemente of New Eng
land, vi/.. Plymouth, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New Haven, all of which
were accomplished before the civil wars, drained England of £400,000 or £500,000
sterling (a very great sum in those days) ; and if the persecutions of the Puritans
had continued twelve years longer, it is thought that a fourth part of the riches of
the kingdom would have passed out of it through (his channel."

212 the puritans and their principles.
tablished Church — when they met to establish a Church Polity
in consonance with the Word of God, renounced the scheme of
Prelacy altogether. That scheme came in again at the Restora
tion, as the Bourbons returned to France, not by the wishes of
the people, but by the hand of power. No sooner was it re-in
stated than it began its persecutions of the Puritans within the
bosom of the Church. The Puritans and Puritan divines again
began to pour into America, and as fast as they arrived, from
sober conviction they renounced the hierarchy and adopted the
simple organization and order of the New England Churches.
" These ministers," says Cotton Mather, " which were without
any exception, as faithful, painful, and useful as most in the na
tion, being exiled, there were not known to be left so many Non-
Conformist ministers as there were counties in England." Yet
the spirit and principles of Puritanism immediately began to
spring up and grow, so that in a few years the same domineering
spirit of the hierarchy drove out two thousand of the ablest and
most devoted ministers of the Church of England, upon a Pro
testant St. Bartholomew's Day. And in spite of all artifices, re
wards and punishments; with every effort of patronage, wealth
and power — test-acts and disabilities — in spite of intolerable and
crushing burdens and discouragements, Puritanism has since
continued to gain upon the Established Church of England, till
now one-half of the regular attendants upon public worship in
England, are numbered among the Dissenters. A large share of
the remaining half, the old Laudean system, with all its enor
mities of corrupt doctrines, superstitious forms, and intolerance,
under the new name of Puseyism, is carrying back with rapid
strides to the very gates of Rome. In all these times, multitudes of
Christ's true disciples have no doubt lived and died in the bosom
of the English Established Church. Doubtless, Christ has true
and beloved disciples among all denominations who bear his
name. Doubtless, many are found, of whom the world is not
worthy, even amid the anti-christian abominations of Popery. It
is true, also, that in the Articles of the English Church, the true
scheme of the Gospel is traced in clear and living lines. With
many glaring defects, there are also many noble excellences in
her Liturgy. But the character and tendencies of the prelatical
system have been legibly written in the results of its past domi
nion over the Christian world. For that scheme of polity, the
Popish and Puseyistic doctrines have ever shown, in the long run
and on a grand scale, an invincible affinity. Those tendencies
are at the present day broadly developed in the practical working
of the system in its fairest fields, England and the United States.
We see here a gangrene, and there a foul leprosy ; creeping on,
and spreading over large portions of the body, the marks of ap-

times or archbishop laud. 213
proaching spiritual death. We trace the history backward, and
find the same seeds of mischief ever springing up, and bearing
. still the same fruits of intolerance and spiritual death. We
trace these unvaried results of the system, on a large scale,
and for a long course of time, up to the causes which produced
them. They lie in the assumption of ghostly prerogatives and
power ; priestly intervention for the forgiveness of sins; bap
tismal regeneration; the validity of ordinances ministered by
virtue of a power to confer grace in sacraments; a virtue
flowing down through a chain of an Apostolic succession; the
right of the Church, viz. of a Hierarchy, to make canons and pre
scribe ceremonies and forms for the worship of God : the denial
of the right of private judgment ; and of the sufficiency of
the Bible alone, without human traditions or Church interpreta
tions, to make men wise unto salvation. These are the fond tenets
of Puseyism ; the rudiments and essentials of Popery itself;
without which all other abominations of Popery would fly like
straws upon a whirlwind. To these false principles, these tenets
of superstition and despotism, we trace the tyranny and spiritual
death, from which so many godly ministers and people of the
Church of England, found no relief, but in coming out and being
separate. After witnessing the results of that scheme in Eng
land, we look abroad to Austria, to Spain, to Italy ; we cross to
Asia, where without a Pope, the same principles have reigned
long enough, and with sufficient power, to show their results ;
and we find everywhere the same dismal reign of darkness and
spiritual death. We go up lo remoter ages, and a Hierarchy
with its forms and fences, its decrees and its canons — wherever
it meets us — presents to us still the same hideous features of
intolerance and spiritual death. We tread through the hollow
aisles and vaults of the Inquisition — the places of the dead ; we
go where the ashes of martyrs are mouldering ; where the fires
once raged that have long since been quenched; we go to the
lowers and dungeons where the Lollards dragged out their lives
in darkness and in chains; we go where the dragoonings were
indicted on the Huguenots of France ; we penetrate the valleys
of Piedmont, where the nights were once lightened by the flames
of their dwellings, and the snows around were crimson with
their blood ; everywhere — everywhere, we trace the legitimate
fruits of that principle which denies the right of private judgment
to the people ; gives the interpretation of the Scriptures to the
fathers, to councils, or to prelates, under the name of " The
Church;" and claims for that Church, "holy and apostolic,"
" the right to make canons for the use of ceremonies in the wor
ship of God, and to enforce the same by law as upon her chil
dren." Surely the grand experiment has been tried for centuries

214 the puritans and their principles.
enough ; and on a scale sufficiently grand. What is become
ofthe hundreds of happy Churches that once lined the shores of
Northern Africa ? Gone ! Where are the lights that once shone
in Asia Minor, in Syria, in Mesopotamia, at Rome? Gone
out in a night of a thousand years. And where, in all these
times, do we find the true light of the Gospel ? Among those
poor Churches unblessed with a prelacy ofthe boasted "succes
sion ;" among the Albigenses, who, in the words of Mosheim,*
"denied that the ministers of religion (bishops, presbyters, and
deacons), were of divine appointment [i. e., that they hold their
authority according to the dogma of a jure divino succession],
and maintained that the Church could exist without an order
of teachers." We look among the Waldenses, who had
bishops, not such as boast of a lineal apostolical succession,
but bishops of the people's making, and who held, not only
that the Pope of Rome is not superior to bishops, but that " there
is no difference as to rank or dignity among priests ;"f we look
to those poor Churches, which the Great Harlot, sitting on the
seven hills of Rome, and drunken with the blood of the saints ;
the great scarlet persecutor with which Protestant Prelacy is now
claiming a sisterhood, and a unity of catholicity, to the exclusion
of all " Dissenters," we look to the Churches which this Scarlet
Harlot was then persecuting to death. History has written the
character of prelacy in broad lines of darkness, despotism, and
blood; and that over many lands, and for a thousand years!
With what arguments, with what honied accents shall the world
be persuaded to try the grand experiment again ? An apostolical
succession ! The authoritative interpretations 'of the Church !
We remember who it was that sent his disciples away from the
tradition of the elders to " search the Scriptures ;" thus for ever
establishing the right and the duty of private judgment.
We remember who it was that said "Prove all things;" yes,
even the interpretations of the first two centuries are to be proved
by the Word of God. Surely those interpretations cannot them
selves be the rule of thai standard by which they are to be tried !
It was a true Apostle, not a pretended successor, who said,
" Though we or an angel from heaven preach any other Gospel
unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him
be accursed." " God's clergy, a state whereunto God's people
must be subject! We remember who it was that said, " Call no
man master." The same it was who said, " Ye know that the
princes of the Gentiles exercise dominion over them ; and they
that are great exercise authority upon them ; but it shall not be
so among you." Long, long, has the world seen the consequences
of breaking away from this injunction of the Saviour. And
so broadly and plainly are the principles of this injunction writ-
* Vol. ii., p. 204. t Jones' Church History, n. 318.

Times of archbishop laud.

215

ten in the Bible, that with great uniformity the people of God
come to the same conclusions, the moment when, released from
ecclesiastical influence and power, they set themselves with dili
gence to search out the principles of Church polity laid down in
the Word of God. Wickliffe and his followers came to the
same results with the Puritan founders of New England. Those
who worshipped God in secret under the bloody Mary, came to
the same results. Those who from time to time left England
for the wilds of America, though strongly prejudiced in favor of
the English Church establishment, upon searching the Scrip
tures, came to the same results with their brethren who had gone
before. The distinguished orator at a recent celebration of the
landing of the Pilgrims, was not quite correct when he attributed
the rise of the republican principles of the English Puritans to the
time when they found at Geneva " A Church without a Bishop, a
Slate without a king."* Republicanism in the Church was no
new thing among the Puritans of England. It was as old as
Wickliffe. Too much has been attributed to the influence of the
exiles at Geneva. That was a drop in the bucket. Before these
principles were known at Geneva, thousands had embraced them
and died for them in England. They owe their origin not to
Geneva; not lo the Puritans ; not to Wickliffe ; but to the Word
of God ; to the principles of Church polity laid down in the
New Testament ; and to its delineations of the organization and
discipline of the Primitive Apostolical Church. The present age
may have too little consideration to prize these principles.
Light and uncertain spirits may turn apostates. But if the
world should once more sink in darkness and spiritual bondage,
these principles will once more rise in majesty to vindicate the
rights of man and the truth of God. Their might is inherent
and indestructible. In the greater spread of light and freedom
and pure religion, these principles will ever continue to rise
and prevail. What our fathers proved by Scripture and justi
fied by reason, has now been made a matter of experiment for
two hundred years ; and the spot where that experiment has
been tried, though the trial began in the wilderness, and was con
tinued in the midst of difficulties, hardships, and wars ; that
spot has long stood forth unrivalled by any other spot for any
two hundred years in the history of the whole world. In its
results to this nation alone, the grand experiment has richly
repaid all the toils and sufferings it cost. Future genera
tions will yet appreciate, better than the fondest admirer of the
Puritans has ever yet appreciated, the worth of their principles
to the cause of freedom and humanity ; to the cause of right
eousness and of God. * Hon. Mr. Choate.

XVI.

REMOVALS TO AMERICA, AND FOUNDING OF
THE PURITAN CHURCHES.
Plymouth a few years after its settlement. Plantation at Cape Ann.
Naumkeag. Charlestown. Fleet and Colony of 1629. Tolerant spirit
of the Colonists. Salem Church. The Fleet and Colony of 1630
Rapid emigration. Planting ofthe New England Churches.
The settlement at Plymouth affording a rendezvous and shelter
to adventurers in the fisheries and the trade in furs, such adven
turers began immediately to swarm all along the northern coasts
of New England. In the year 1624 about fifty ships left Eng
land for such adventures upon these coasts. At this period there
were at Plymouth about one hundred and eighty souls. The
town was impaled about, half a mile in compass. On the hill
they had a fort " well built with wood, lime, and stone,"*
Health had returned to the colony ; not one of the first planters
having died within the last three years. This year they had
freighted with the products of their trade and industry, a ship of
180 tons.f
The adventurers for trade and commerce had now turned
their thoughts to the establishment of some settlements for the
furtherance of their projects ; when Mr. White, a Puritan minis
ter of Dorchester in England, conceived the idea of making
these settlements conducive to the great ends of planting religion
in America. A plantation was commenced at Cape Ann ; and,
soon after, its management was committed to Mr. Roger Conant,
a " pious, sober, prudent man," from among the colonists at
Plymouth. In 1626 the adventurers threw up their business in
discouragement. Mr. White, unwilling that so good a design
should fail, writes to Mr. Conant, that if he and three others will
remain, he will procure them a patent, send them men, provi
sions, and whatever they need to pursue the trade with the
natives. Mr. Conant had, before this, foreseen that the persecuted Puri-
* Prince. t Ibid.

REMOVALS TO AMERICA. 217
tans in England must soon want a place of refuge. Before the
settlement of Cape Ann was given up, he had fixed his eye upon
Naumkeag, now Salem, as a convenient spot for such a settle
ment ; and had communicated his views to his friends in Eng
land. Upon the reception of Mr. White's letters, he told his
disheartened companions, that he " Did believe God would make
this land a receptacle for his people ; and if they should leave
him, yet he would not stir, for he was confident he should not
long want company."
Conant and his companions removed to " Naumkeag, a plea
sant and fruitful neck of land, embraced on each side with an
arm of the sea,"* and awaited the coming of those who, they fore
saw, must soon flee from the storm of persecution in England.
A year had nearly passed after their removal, when some friends
in Lincolnshire, conversing together about their troubles, turned
their thoughts to New England. Might there not be a refuge
there ? Might they not plant the Gospel there ? Might they
not enjoy there freedom of conscience, and leave the ordinances
of religion pure, to their posterity ? " We imparted our
reasons," says Dudley, " by letters and messengers to some
in London and the West country." A purchase was made from
the Council for New England, for a patent for a belt of
land from three miles south of the Charles River, to three miles
north of the Merrimac, extending from Massachusetts bay to the
Pacific Ocean. White sought out and secured such associates
as could be relied upon for the great enterprise ; men of religious
fervor, of high character, of enterprise, courage, and unyielding
perseverance. Their design was to found a religious settlement ;
and their determination was lo colonize " the best."
On the 20th of June, 1628, Eudicott set sail from Weymouth,
in England, with a small company, to make way for the settle
ment of the new colonists. In September, they were welcomed
by Conant and his companions to the new settlement amid the
forests of Salem. Yet what will not the restless spirit of enter
prise and adventure do ? It was a curious prognostic of the fu
ture character of American pioneers, that of the little band which
came over with Endicott, some seven, with leave of the governor,
undertook a journey through the woods ; and, after a ramble of
Uvelve miles, lighted on the present site of Charlestown. Here
they found a lonely English house, thatched and palisadoed ; and
hero, with the consent of the Indian Sachem, they began a set
tlement Another company was sent over to Salem, in the fall
of the same year, to make further preparation for the expected
colony. In February, 162S, Mr. Cradock, at London, wrote to
Mr. Endicott, of the progress of things at home. " Our company,"
* Piince.

218

THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.

said he, " are much enlarged : there is one store ship bought, of
100 tons ; two more hired of 200 tons ; one of 19, the other of 20
ordnance ; in which ships are likely to be embarked between two
and three hundred persons, and about 100 head of cattle." " It
is resolved to send two ministers, at least, with the ships now to
be sent : those we shall send shall be by approbation of Mr. White,
of Dorchester, and Mr. Davenport I account our ships will be
ready to sail hence, by the 20th of next month."*
One of the ministers to whom the company made application,
was Mr. Higginson, of Leicester; a man eminent for his abilities,
his piety, and for the great success which had attended his min
istry. Says Cotton Mather, " Such was the divine presence with,
and the blessing on the ministry of this good man " [in Leices
ter], " that the influence thereof on the whole town became a
matter of observation ; many were turned from darkness to light,
and from Satan to God : * * and there was a notable revival
of religion among them." The matter of Church order and dis
cipline was then agitating the Church of England : and for some
years, Higginson, while continuing a Conformist, had entertained
scruples of conscience. Pursuing the study of the Scriptures,
and of antiquity, he at length came out a conscientious Non-Con
formist He still retained his attachment to the Church of Eng
land, and refused to separate, though he could no longer conform
to its rituals. Of course, he could no longer officiate in his parish
church. By the favor of the good Bishop Williams and of the
people of Leicester, he was still permitted to preach the Gospel, till
both the people and the bishop fell under the vengeance of Laud.
Even then the aulhorities of the town chose Mr. Higginson to be
their town preacher, to which place there was annexed a large
maintenance paid out of the town treasury. Mr. Higginson
thanked them, but could not comply with the necessary condi
tions of conformity. " Offers were made him," says Mather, " ofthe
greatest and richest livings of the country thereabouts." These
he declined for conscience' sake. He still endeavored to do good
in private. " Many resorted to him for his counsel and advice in
regard to the state of their souls, and he did much for the educa
tion of scholars going to or coming from the University ; some
of whom were afterwards among the most eminent ministers of
the Gospel in England. But the fury of Laud could not suffer
him to rest. Complaints were laid against him, " so that he lived
in continual expectation to be dragged away by the pursuivants
to the High Commission Court; where," says Mather, "a sen
tence of perpetual imprisonment was the best thing that could
be looked for."
With Higginson, was associated Mr. Samuel Skelton, another
* In Prince.

REMOVALS TO AMERICA. 219
nonconformist clergyman of Lincolnshire. With these, came
also Mr. Ralph Smith, who became the first pastor of the Church
at Plymouth ; that Church having lived in expectation of Mr.
Robinson for some years, till with deep sorrow, they heard of
his death
It was in the beginning of May, 1629, that these ships, the
" George Bonaventure," the " Lion's whelp" and the " Talbot,"
sailed for Massachusetts. Three more, the " Mayflower," the
" Four- Sisters," and the "Pilgrim," followed them in the begin
ning of June. When the first of these fleets came opposite to
Land's-end, Mr. Higginson called up his children and the other
passengers to take their last view of England. " We will not
say," exclaimed Mr. Higginson, " as the Separatists are wont to
say at their leaving England, — Farewell, Babylon, — Farewell,
Rome ;— but we will say, FareweU, dear England : Farewell, the
Church of God in England, and all the Christian friends there.
We do not go to New England as Separatists from the Church
of England, though we cannot but separate from corruptions in
it; but we go to practise the positive part of Church Reforma
tion, and to propagate the gospel in America." He concluded
" with a fervent prayer for the King, the Church, and state in
England, and for the blessing of God with themselves in their
present undertaking for New England."
After a pleasant summer voyage, on the 24th of June, 1629,
Ihey entered the harbor of Salem, and descried the eight or ten
hovels, that composed the town, surrounded by a few corn-fields,
and the dense forest beyond. The whole body of planters was
now three hundred ; of whom one-third removed, and joined
the infant settlement at Charlestown.
The Pilgrims at Plymouth came as an organized Church ;
having long enjoyed the ordinances, and exercised the discipline
of a Church, separate from the Church of England. The colo
nists at Salem had continued with the English established
Church ; — Puritans, and suffering for nonconformity ; but never
having established a separate Church organization. Bringing
with them regularly ordained and acknowledged ministers of the
Church of England, they had contemplated the enjoyment of
Church organization and ordinances: nor did they design to set
up again those things in their Church estate, which they deemed
unscriptural, for which they had suffered persecution, and to
avoid which they had fled from their native land. The princi
ples of Church polity had been long and earnesdy discussed in
England. Mr. Higginson had devoted special attention to this
subject for years. He had conferred with such men as Thomas
Hooker and Davenport ; and, with the great mass of the Puri
tans, he had come to the conclusion, that in several important

220

THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.

respects, the organization of the English Church corresponded
neither with the scriptural platform, nor with the earliest antiquity
of the Christian Church. The people who carne with hini,
came with an understanding of each other's views ; they expected
to set up a Church polity differing materially from that of the
English Church ; yet/'before their voyage, they had agreed only
on this, that in their future organization, " The Reformation of
the Church was to be endeavored according to the written Word
of God."
Being now arrived at their destined haven, these general out
lines of Church polity were to be filled up ; their principles were
to be reduced to practice ; a Church was to be organized accor
ding to the pattern set forth in the Word of God.
Here might appear to be room for great discrepancies of opi
nion, and great difficulties might seem to lie in the way of then
coming to an agreement, as to what are the principles o"f Church
polity delineated in the Word of God. These discrepancies
and difficulties were not found in practice. The Word of God
was found so plain on this subject, that their views readily har
monized on every practical point, as soon as they were at liberty
to throw everything else away, and to follow the Word of God
as then only authority. They had been bitterly prejudiced
against the settlers at Plymouth : yet it is remarkable how closely
they agreed with the people of Plymouth in all the conclusions
which they drew concerning Church polity, as soon as they set
themselves down to reduce to practice the scheme to be drawn
solely from the Word of God. No less remarkable was the
unanimous conclusion to which scores of the most learned min
isters in England arrived — who had either independently, or with
mutual consultation, set themselves to collect the scheme of
Church order and organization recognized in the New Testament,
Ten years brought over, as we have seen, no less than seventy-
seven ministers, who had all been clergymen of the Church of
England, and who had all continued their connection with that
Church ; having never set up a separate Church organization ; —
all of whom gave up every earthly emolument and comfort ; —
left their country as well as their livings, and took up their abode
in a wilderness for the sake of Gospel truth and order ; and all of
whom, as the result of their independent study of the Word of
God, came out upon the platform of Church government which
has characterized the New England Churches ever since that
time. The prejudices of the Salem colonists against the Church of
Plymouth, arose from the mistaken impression that the people of
Plymouth were Separatists and Brownists ; separating not merely
from the world, but from all other Churches ; and that they held

REMOVALS TO AMERICA. 221
close communion against all, save such as agreed exactly with
themselves ; adopting the peculiar disorganizing Independency
of Brown. It was against such a principle of separation and
close communion, that Higginson spake, when standing on the
deck and taking his last view of his native land, he exclaimed,
" We will not say, as the Separatists were wont to say, ' Farewell,
Babylon ; farewell, Rome;' but, farewell, dear England ; farewell,
dear Church of God in England. We do not go as Separatists
from the Church of England, though we cannot but separate from
the corruptions in it."
Mr. Higginson, as well as the other Puritans who had remained
in England, had been greatly misinformed concerning the princi
ples and spirit of the Pilgrim Church, both at Leyden and Ply
mouth. It was true that Robinson had in his early years been
inclined lo the principles of the Brownists and Separatists ; but
maturer age and experience had corrected his errors ; and his
views had become enlarged and liberal beyond the age. Wins
low, in his Brief Narration, written some years after the removal
to Plymouth, is very earnest to refute the slanderous accusations
which had been circulated by their enemies in England. He
bears this testimony concerning Mr. Robinson : " I living three
years under his ministry before we began the work of plantation
in New England, it was always against separation from any
other of the Churches of Christ; professing and holding commu
nion both with the French and Dutch Churches ; yea, tendering
it to the Scotch also." Against the constitution and government
of the Church of England ; against its national communion,
mingled up of worthy and unworthy — of Christians and of open
blasphemers — Robinson and his Church never ceased to bear
witness. But he ever maintained the liveliest esteem for Christ's
people in the Church of England, and never shut them away
from the rights of conscience and of communion which he claimed
for himself. The Pilgrim Church not only admitted members of
the Dutch and French Churches to occasional communion, but
received them into their Church. A minister of the Church of
Scotland having fled from persecution to Leyden, and asking the
privilege of being present at the communion, as a spectator, Mr.
Robinson replied, " Reverend sir, you may not only stay to be
hold us, but partake with us ; for we acknowdedge the Churches
of Scotland to be the Churches of Christ :" an invitation which the
Scotsman, fearing ecclesiastical censure at home, durst not ac
cept When Robinson himself could not go to America, he
advised his people to take with them some godly minister from
England : " For," said he, " there will be no difference between
the unconformable ministers and you, when they come to the
practice of the ordinances out of the kingdom." " And so," says

222 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
Winslow, " he advised us by all means to endeavor to close with
the godly party of the kingdom of England, and rather to study
union than disunion ; viz. how near we might possibly close
without sin." Winslow adds : " If any joining us formerly,
either when we lived at Leyden, in Holland, or since we came
to New England, have, with the manifestation of their faith and
profession of holiness, held forth separation from the Church of
England, I have divers times, both in the one place and the other,
heard either Mr. Robinson or Mr. Brewster stop them forthwith;
showing that we required no such thing at their hands, but only
to hold forth faith in Christ Jesus, holiness in the fear of God,
and submission to every ordinance and appointment of God,
leaving the Church of England to themselves and to the Lord."
Robinson and the Pilgrim Church were neither separatists noi
schismatics. They were ready to commune on equal terms
with all of Christ's people of every name. They held it no
schism for Christian congregations to refuse to submit to or
dinances imposed by the commandments of men. If any,
claiming authority to impose rites and ceremonies which Christ
has not ordained, thrust his people away from their Lord's table,
forbid them to worship, deprive them of their goods, and send
them to prison or into banishment, because they cannot in con
science practise such inventions in the worship of God — they
who impose such things, and who distract the Church of God—
they are schismatics ; not those who simply claim the natural
right to worship God according to conscience and His word.
A pleasing incident, in which it is easy to trace the overruling
hand of Divine Providence, had prepared the way for a better
acquaintance between the colonists of Salem and those of Ply
mouth, and for that friendly intercourse which has always marked
the Puritan Churches of New England. A severe sickness, such
as is incident to settlers in new countries, had fallen upon the
pioneers at Salem ; and Endicott, hearing that there was at Ply
mouth a physician [Mr. Fuller], famous for his skill in the
diseases of the country, sent to the governor of Plymouth, entreat
ing that Mr. Fuller might come to their assistance. The physi
cian hastened to Salem ; and his efforts were crowned with great
success. He was a pious man, deacon of the church at Ply
mouth, intelligent, well able to give an account of the polity of
the Plymouth Church, and to show its warrant from the Word
of God. The prejudices of Endicott and of his associates were
removed. They discovered that the principles of the Plymouth
Church were none other than those, at which the Puritans of old
England had already arrived after a careful searching of the
Word of God.
These things were transpiring while Mr. Higginson and his

CHURCHES ORGANIZED.

223

company were yet on the waters ; and while they were yet on
their way, Endicott wrote to Governor Bradford, at Plymouth,
expressing his gratitude for the timely aid. " I rejoice," said he,
"that I am by him [Mr. Fuller] satisfied touching your judg
ments of the outward form of God's worship. It is, so far as I
can gather, no other than is warranted by the evidence of truth ;
and the same which I have professed and maintained ever since
the Lord in mercy revealed himself to me; being far from the
common report that hath been spread of you touching that par
ticular; but God's children must not look for less here below."*
Mr. Higginson and his company having arrived, frequent con
versations were held concerning the method to be pursued in
organizing the Church ; till the method was agreed upon by
common consent. By vote of the congregation, Mr. Shelton
was chosen pastor, and Mr. Higginson teacher. A day was ap
pointed for organizing the Church and installing their ministers.
Letters were sent to the Church at Plymouth, requesting them
to attend by their delegates for friendly counsel and aid. This
practice of sending for the counsel and aid of neighboring
Churches on such occasions became, from that time, one of
the settled customs of the New England Churches ; and in own
ing and observing their obligation to observe such a fraternal
intercourse and communion, in which each Church shall, on
occasions of common interest, seek the aid and counsel of
sister Churches, as well as hear their remonstrances, and be
ready to give an account of their doings — these Congregational
Churches differ from Independents.]
In the mean time, thirty persons are, by common consent,
chosen out of the whole number of communicants, to be the first
to enter into covenant and to begin the foundation of the new
Church. A confession and covenant are drawn up ; thirty copies
are written out; each of the thirty persons is called upon to
ponder these engagements and to prepare himself for such a
solemn transaction. On the appointed day the thirty come forth,
and own the confession and covenant in the presence of the
congregation and of Almighty God. Then the ministers are
instilled. Mr. Higginson, and a chosen number of brethren in
the Church — elders in age, and for this special work chosen as
the elders [Presbyters] of the Church, — lay their hands on Mr.
Shelton with solemn prayer. Then Mr. Shelton and the persons
chosen lay iheir hands on Mr. Higginson.J Both of these hav-
* Prince. t Ibid,
% The Colonists at Salem had from the first treated Messrs. Higginson and Shel
ton with the courtesies due to acknowledged ministers of the Lord Jesus Christ.
So with the seventy-seven who had been ministers ofthe Church of England, and
who were within a few years from this time installed as pastors and teachers ofthe
Puritan Churches in New England ; they were treated with the consideration due

224 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
ing long been acknowledged ministers of the Church of Eng
land, I suppose that even Prelatists could have nothing to
object against their ordination. The Church and congregation
recognized no right, in any other human authority, to set over
them pastors and teachers save by their own choice. The act
of installation, or induction, was no doubt sufficiently formal and
regular to make it valid in the sight of God and man. Can any
tell why this Church, so gathered in the wilderness, and so fur
nished with pastors, was not a regular and proper Church ? Can
any show it to be otherwise, on any principle of God's Word,
or of common sense ; or on any grounds that do not involve the
grossest absurdities ?
It may be interesting here to give some extracts from the
Covenant on which the Church at Salem was formed. It is a
fair specimen of the covenants on which the Puritan Churches
were generally organized, and which still remain in use among
the Puritan New England Churches.* " We covenant with our
Lord and with one another, and we do bind ourselves in the
presence of God, to walk together in all his ways, according as
he is pleased to reveal himself unto us in his blessed Word of
truth : and do especially, in the name and fear of God, profess
and protest to walk as followeth, through the power and grace
of our Lord Jesus Christ." * * " We avouch the Lord to be
to ministers ; hut they were allowed no official prerogatives in the Churches with
out election and an induction, which was then styled Ordination, but afterwards
more properly Installation; and the ceremony is now performed without the
laying on of hands. The Churches,to secure their franchises from priestly as well
as from prelatic usurpation, allowed no ministers save their own pastors and
teachers to officiate for them without an invitation. The elders or deacons would
say in such cases, — " If ye have any word of exhortation, say on." The formality
is laid aside, but the principle is still preserved. No strange minister officiates in
our churches on his own prerogatives as a minister, but only on invitation of the
Church or its constituted authorities. Many of the early settlers of New England,
held with Mr. Cotton, the extreme opinion that a " minister hath no power to give
the seals" [Baptism, &c.l "but in his own congregation."
* Each Church has also a summary of the essential doctrines of the Gospel.
which each person received into the Church, solemnly and publicly owns as his
Confession of Faith. All that is essential to entitle any Church to the privileges of
this community of Puritan -Churches, so far as doctrine is concerned, is, that its
Confession of Faith substantially corresponds either with the Savoy Confession,
the Confession ofthe Assembly of Divines, the Assembly's Shorter Catechism, or
with the doctrinal part ofthe Articles ofthe Church of England. There is a sur
prising agreement between the several Confessions formed by the Protestants of all
countries about the same age. The Augsburg of 1530 ; the Second Helvetic, framed
in 1536 ; the French, drawn up and adopted by a Synod held in Paris in 1559; the
Belgic, of 1563; the Bohemian or Waldensiden, of 1573; the Baptist, by the
seven Baptist Churches of London in 1646; the Westminster of 1643; the Savoy
(at the Savoy in London), in 1658, anil the English Articles of 1562; — these aie
substantially the same in the fundamental doctrines of the Gospel. The Reformers
of all countries going to the Bible alone, and each for himself; all substantially
agreed as to the great scheme of truth laid down in the Word of God. What an
argument for the truth of these doctrines; and what a reproach to the present Ar
minianism of the English Church, so contrary to the manifest sense of her Articles,
as evinced by the concurrent testimony of all Protestant divines of that day !

CHURCHES ORGANIZED. 225
our God, and ourselves to be his people, in the truth and sim
plicity of our spirits." * * " We give ourselves to the Lord
Jesus Christ, and the Word of his grace, for the teaching, ruling,
and sanctifying us in matters of worship and conversation ; re
solving to cleave unto him alone for life and glory, and to reject
all contrary ways, canons, and constitutions of men in his wor
ship. We promise to walk with our brethren with all watchful
ness and tenderness ; avoiding jealousies and suspicions, back-
bilings, censurings, provokings, secret risings of the spirit against
them ; but in all offences to follow the rule of our Lord Jesus,
and to bear and forbear, give and forgive, as he hath taught us."
In the remaining Articles, they engaged for orderly walk with
the Church ; to study the advancement of the Gospel in all truth
and peace ; to be orderly citizens ; to approve themselves dili
gent in their callings ; and unto the best of their ability to teach
their children and households, the knowledge and fear of God.
" All this," said they, " we promise not by any strength of our
own, but by the Lord Jesus Christ ; whose blood we desire may
sprinkle this our covenant made in his name."*
The remarks of the historian Bancroft upon this transaction,
are worthy to be repeated: — " The emigrants were not so much
a body politic, as a Church in the wilderness ; with no benefac
tor around them but nature, no present sovereign but God. An
entire separation was made between State and Church ; religious
worship was established on the basis of the independence of
each separate religious community ; all officers of the church
were elected by its members ; and these rigid Calvinists, of
whose rude intolerance the world has been filled with malignant
calumnies, subscribed a covenant cherishing, it is true, the sever
est virtues, but without one tinge of fanaticism. It was an act
of piety, not of study ; it favored virtue, not superstition ; inqui
ry, not submission. The people -"vere enthusiasts, but not bigots."
* * " The doctrine and discipline established at Salem re
mained the rule of Puritan New England."
The Church at Salem refused to receive to its communion
some persons of scandalous life, and exercised discipline upon
some who had committed offences. Upon this a few gathered
together ; set up separate worship with the use of the book of
Common Prayer, and complained that the Church used neither
that nor the ceremonies prescribed by the Church of England.
Their conduct was deemed inconsistent with the safety of the
infant colony : the governor rebuked them as guilty of mutiny
aud faction, and ordered them back by the return of the ships
to England. This was meting the adherents of the Church of
England with the Church of England's own measure. What-
* Mather.
15

226 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
ever extenuation may be pleaded from the exigencies and new
ness of the colony, from the law of necessity, lest this effort in
Dehalf of the Church of England, and these claims of the obli
gations of the colonists to observe its forms, should end in the
subversion of the colonial liberty to worship God according to
their conscience (for such was the scope of these new claims,
if not the design ofthe claimants) ; whatever may be said in pal
liation, from their not having had time fully to free their minds
from the prejudices which they had been taught in their native
land ; it must be confessed that in this proceeding, as in some
others of a later date, the Puritan colonists acted inconsistently
with their principles. But with them it was not so much a ques
tion of toleration as of the maintenance or defeat of the very de
sign of their emigration ; they were well assured that if the mal
contents could succeed in their designs, they themselves would
not much longer be allowed their freedom in the worship of God.
The returning ships carried home such accounts from the pen
of Higginson, and of others of the emigrants, as awakened deep
interest among the persecuted Puritans of England. They had
suffered almost beyond endurance ; but they had seen no mode
of escape, without running into hardships and perils that seemed
almost certain destruction. Now the way appeared open ; and
the more so when it was determined that the charter and man
agement of the new domains were to be transferred to America.
Cotton Mather justly describes the enthusiasm raised in England
when he says, — " Briefly the God of Heaven served, as it were,
a summons upon the spirits of his people in the English nation;
stirring up the spirits of thousands who never saw the face of
each other, with a most unanimous inclination to leave all the
pleasant accommodations of their native country, and go over a
terrible ocean, with a more terrible desert, for the pure enjoyment
of all his ordinances."
Before the end of 1629, a congregational Church was gathered
at Plymouth in England, of which Mr. John Wareham, a
famous preacher of Exeter, and Mr. John Maverick, were chosen
ministers. Great preparations are made for removing to New
England. Men, women and children are gathered, a chosen
company ; Winthrop is made governor of the new colony. In
February, 1630, the good ship Lion sails from Bristol. The
Mary and John leaves Plymouth on the 20th of March. On the
29th of March, Winthrop with Johnson and other leading men,
in the Arabella of 350 tons, 28 guns, and 52 seamen, the Talbot,
the Ambrose and the Jewel, leave the port of Cowes ; the May
flower, the Whale, the William and Frances, the Tryal, the
Charles, the Success, and the Hopewell, lying at Hampton, not
yet ready. Winthrop and his fleet had been informed, at the

CHURCHES ORGANIZED. 227
Isle of Wight, that " ten Spanish ships, with brass guns, the
least of which was thirty," were waiting to intercept them. On
the 10th of April, they discover several ships bearing towards
them, and " provide to fight them ;" but these prove to be the
remainder of their fleet from Hampton. On Saturday, the 12th
of June, at two in the morning, the Arabella, admiral of the fleet,
" finding her port near, shoots off two pieces of ordnance ;"
and descrying the Lion, which had arrived before her, " sends
the skiff aboard," stands in towards the harbor, and comes to
anchor. " Mr. Pierce, master of the Lion," says Governor Win
throp, " comes presently to us, but returns to fetch Mr. Endicott,
who with Mr. Skelton and Captain Levit, come aboard us about
two o'clock. And with them, this afternoon, the governor, with
those assistants on board the Admiral, and some other gentlemen
and gentlewomen," go ashore to their friends at Salem. "Many
of the other people also, landing on the eastern side of the har
bor, regale themselves with strawberries, wherewith the woods
are everywhere in these times replenished."
Next morning, Masconomo, the Sagamore of that side of the
country towards Cape Ann, comes on board the Admiral to bid
him welcome. In the afternoon arrives the Jewell. Monday,
June 14, the Admiral weighs, is warped into the inner harbor,
and in the afternoon most of the passengers go ashore ; but find
the colony in an unexpected and sad condition ; more than eighty
having died in the preceding winter, many ofthe remainder being
feeble or sick, and the stock of corn hardly sufficient to feed
them a fortnight The governor and principal men leave to
find out a place for settlement. At Nantasket they find the ship
Mary and John. The Ambrose reaches Salem before their re
turn. The Mayflower and Whale reach Charlestown on the 1st
of July ; the Talbot, on the 2d ; the William and Frances on the
3d ; the Tryal and Charles, on the 5th ; the Success on the 6th ;
the Hopewell comes at last ; and on Thursday, July 8, they keep
a public thanksgiving " throughout all their plantations, to praise
Almighty God for all his goodness and wonderful works towards
them." Among these emigrants were Winthrop, Ludlow, Rossiter,
Johnson, with his wife, the Lady Arabella, whose story is so
touchingly remembered in all the annals of New England ;
Wilson, Philips, Warham, Pynchon, Bradstreet, Dudley, and
many others whose honored names are yet perpetuated among
the families of New England. " Some of these," says Prince,
" set forth from tho west of England, but the greatest numbers
came from about London, though Southampton was the place
of rendezvous where they took ship. These were they who first
came to set up Christian Churches in this heathen wilderness."

229

THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.

It is not my design to trace the history of the new settlements,
nor to give any further account of the gathering of the early
Churches, nor of the distinguished men who labored in the work
of the ministry during the early times of the New England His
tory. Norton, Cotton, Shepard, Stone, Elliot, Hooker, Daven
port ; these are a constellation of names which would have dis
tinguished any age or country in any period of the Christian
Church. Nor were these alone. The seventy-seven ministers,
who left England and the English Church for conscience' sake,
were all choice men. Those who came over the ocean left not
their superiors behind ; nor has the splendor of their character,
their talents, and their piety ever been eclipsed, either in
Old England, or among the descendants of those to whom
they ministered in the Western Wilds. They laid the founda
tions of learning and religion well. New England, America,
the world, has already reaped, and is still to reap in larger mea
sures, the fruits of their sagacity, their piety, and their self-deny
ing toil. Sufferings awaited them ; diseases, dangers, and death,
stood thick around the devoted colonists ; yet, in the words of
Bancroft, " As the brightest lightnings are kindled in the
darkest clouds, the general distress did but augment the piety
and confirm the fortitude of the coionists. Their enthusiasm
was softened by the mildest sympathy with suffering human
ity ; while a sincere faith kept guard against despondency and
weakness. Not a hurried line, not a trace of repining appears
in their records ; the congregations always assembled at the
stated times, whether in open fields or under the shade of an
ancient tree ; in the midst of want they abounded in hope ; in
the solitudes of the wilderness they believed themselves in com
pany with the Greatest and most Benevolent of Beings."
The emigrations continued. The plantations and churches
spread abroad. Within twelve years, about one hundred and
ninety-eight ships were employed in bringing over the founders
of New England, and by the good providence of God, only one
of those ships miscarried by the way.

XVII.

RISE OF THE CIVIL WARS.
Charles a martyr to his own insincerity and crimes. Attempts to impose
a Liturgy upon Scotland. Uproar iu St. Giles'. Solemn League and
Covenant. The Episcopal War. Charles forced to call a Parliament.
Laud impeached. Divine right of Episcopacy discussed. Smectym-
nuus. Irish Massacre. Appeal to Arms.
The English Church celebrates the " Martyrdom of King
Charles I!' But in no sense did King Charles sacrifice his life
for the cause of religion. His political crimes against the laws
and the Constitution ; his falsehoods and treacheries ; his utter
want of faith in his solemn engagements to his indignant people ;
these were the causes of his ruin. His people found no redress,
save in arms : and when their monarch was overthrown, his
known insincerity and treachery forbade them to hope for any
safety but in his death. King Charles was a martyr to his own
insincerity and crimes. He fell, in endeavoring to erect an
absolute despotism over a free-spirited and indignant people.
He had cast his life upon the die ; and either his people
must be reduced to slavery, or he must perish : there was no
other possible alternative. But perhaps by the celebration of
his " martyrdom," it is designed to intimate that he lost his life
in the cause of " The Church," or (which they claim as the same
thing) of Episcopacy ; which High Churchmen seem to consider
as nearly synonymous with religion. How then was Charles a
martyr for " the Church ?" Under the covert of his authority, cor
ruptions were introduced into its doctrines ; a wide and funda
mental departure was made from the original sense of its articles ;
'.ts rites and ceremonies were nearly assimilated to those of Rome.
The power of the prelates was greatly augmented at the expense
both of the royal prerogatives and of the popular rights. Charles
was one of those kings, who in this manner delight to " Give their
glory to the Beast." In the reign of Henry VIII., the bishops
were content to hold even their spiritual superiority over presby
ters, from the civil power. But in passing sentence on Bastwick,
the bishops, with the allowance of Charles, denied that they held the

230

THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.

jurisdiction of their courts from the king. At the instance of Laud,
Charles permitted the bishops to hold their ecclesiastical courts in
their own names, without the king's letters patent under the great
seal. The design of this was fully to realize the idea that bishops
hold their authority not from the crown, but,/M/-e divino, from God
himself. Half the business of Chancery was drawn into the
hands of the bishops' officers. The king allowed the bishops to
frame new articles of visitation, and to administer new oaths of
inquiry. " In this manner," says Hetherington,* " the prelates
became possessed of extensive jurisdiction, both civil and eccle
siastical, not only independent of the Crown and Parliament, but
based upon the assumption of a divine right, which rendered
them entirely irresponsible, and beyond the control of human
law. Had not the spirit of liberty, civil and religious, been at
that time vigilant and strong, these prelatic usurpations must
have soon reduced England to a state of the most abject
slavery." For this abject devotion to the interests of an aspiring and
domineering hierarchy, the prelates of the Church of England
have had the address to persuade the people of that Church to
forget the crimes of King Charles, and to celebrate him as a saint
and martyr !
They have a further show of reason for so doing, from the fact
that it was the foolish attempt of Charles to impose an Episco
pacy and a Liturgy upon Scotland that roused up the civil wars,
which overturned Episcopacy " root and branch," and in which
the king lost both throne and life.
Freedom still breathed amid the hills of Scotland. A hierarchy
had been established there, but its prelates were prelates only in
name ; circumscribed and watched by a jealous and undaunted
people, while the ministers of the Scottish Church regarded
episcopal jurisdiction as a mere mischievous usurpation.
Laud now persuaded the king that it would be a good and
pious work to establish a liturgy and Episcopacy in full form over
the people of Scotland. A liturgy was prepared, modelled
mainly after the English, but altered and fashioned in such a
way as to suit the genius of Laud, and of a cast more popish
than that of England. In the office for the Lord's Supper (which
was made closely to resemble a mass), the priest, taking the
bread and wine into his hands, and reciting the words of the
original institution of the Lord's Supper, is made to say, " Which
WE NOW OFFER UNTO THEE THAT THEY MAY BECOME THE
BODY AND BLOOD OF THY MOST DEARLY BELOVED Son J * *
these words being printed in large capitals to mark their signifi
cance."-)- The compilers of this liturgy were ordered to retain
* London Christian Observer, April, 1843. 1 Hist. Assembly of Divines.

RISE OF THE CIVIL WARS. 231
such Catholic saints in the calendar as were retained in the
English ; and in no case to omit St. George and St. Patrick.
Sundry lessons out of the Apocrypha were inserted* " There
was a benediction or thanksgiving for departed saints, and ru-
bricks were added instructing the people when to sit, when to
stand, and when to kneel."
Such was the Liturgy sent up to be imposed upon the people
of Scotland. Due notice was given ; and on the Sabbath, July
23, 1637, in the great church of St. Giles, was assembled a
mighty concourse of people, with both the archbishops, several
bishops, lords and magistrates, to witness the setting up of the
new liturgy. The dean, arrayed in his surplice, began the service.
No sooner had he opened the book than there began a mighty
uproar among the lowest of the people ; clapping of hands, cries
of " A pape — a pape," " Antichrist — antichrist." The Bishop
of Edinburgh stepped forward to the pulpit, hoping to appease
the people. A resolute Scots woman hurled a stool at his head,
shouting, " What, ye villain ; will ye say mass in my lug ?" " A
pape — a pape," cried the multitude. The magistrates succeeded,
partly by force, in expelling the people, and the dean went on
with the service, while a rapping at the doors, and throwing
of stones, and cries of " A pape — a pape," were kept up by the
populace without.
The lords of the council, who knew what stuff Scotsmen were
made of, feared to attempt the reading of the Liturgy again.
When the news reached Laud, he was furious, and hastened a
message blaming them for suspending the Liturgy, and requiring
its continuance. Again the indignant people poured into Edin
burgh. The prelates' lives were in danger; nor would the peo
ple disperse till the council had promised to join with the other
iords in petitioning the king against the service book. The king
issued his proclamation, forbidding any more such petitions on
pain of high treason. The barons, ministers, and burghers, as
sembled and signed a declaration of rights.
The hot blood of the Scots was now cooled. There were no
more tumults ; but cool and wary, every countenance bore the
marks of a determination never to be overcome. The nation
renewedly entered into the solemn league and covenant, subscrib
ing with their hands their confession of faith, declaring their
abhorrence of all kinds of papistry ; of all rites and traditions
brought into the kirk contrary to the Word of God. These
things they engaged to oppose to their utmost power ; " and to
defend the ancient doctrine and discipline of the kirk all the
* The English book of Common Prayer, as also the American Prayer-Book, still
directs sundry portions ofthe Apocrypha to be read as portions of tlie Word of God!
See " Tablks op Lessons foe Holy Days."

232 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
days of their lives, under the pains contained iu the law, and
danger both of body and soul in the day of God's fearful judg
ment." Every threatening and artifice the king tried, to move the Scots
from their determination, but it was all in vain. The Scots had
taken their stand. The king was forced to allow the calling of
a general assembly, but when that assembly was found intracta
ble, he dissolved it, and forbade the members to continue their
session under the pains of high treason.
The assembly continued its sessions. The episcopacy, the
high commission, the cannons, the liturgy, were thrown down
and abolished. Like the acts of the Continental Congress in the
American Revolution, the acts of that assembly were sustained
by the delermination of the people, and were therefore law.
" Thus," says Hume, " the whole fabric which James and
Charles, in a course of years, had been rearing with so much
care and policy, fell to the ground."
You will fix in your minds the chronology of these events, by
observing that they were cotemporaneous with the first settle
ments in Connecticut. These things occurred between the time
when the few adventurers came through the wilderness from
Watertown, in Massachusetts, and began the settlement of
Weathersfield in 1635, and the beginning of the plantation of
New Haven in 1638.
And now King Charles approaches the crisis that decides his
final destiny. He proclaims his determination to take the field
in person against the Scots Covenanters. The principal nobility
are summoned to attend his Majesty. Every power of the pre
rogative is exerted to raise men and money. The bishops exhort
the clergy to liberal efforts for his Majesty's support in what they
do not scruple to call " The Episcopal War." The archbishop
writes for a contribution from the civil courts ; requiring his com
missary to send him the names of such as should refuse. The
queen and her friends undertake for the Roman Catholics ; who
well approve their zeal and liberality in so holy a cause. The
English nation is roused to a crusade for forcing bishops and a
Liturgy upon the poor Scots ; whose resources in money are
nothing ; and who have not three thousand stand of arms in the
nation. Every pulpit in Scotland rang with the " rights of conscience,"
and " freedom to worship God." Every Scotsman was a soldier,
determined for freedom or a grave.
With a formidable fleet and a powerful army, King Charles
came and looked on the Scots ; and suddenly entered into a
negotiation to withdraw his fleet and army, while the Scots should
dismiss their forces. Charles was insincere : but the Scots were

RISE OF THE CIVIL WARS. 233
wary. They ordered every officer to be ready at a moment's
warning, and every soldier to make his account for another in
vasion. With great difficulty Charles drew together another army.
But his means were exhausted: his credit was gone. Thus
ended his experiment of an arbitrary government for twelve
years. He was forced to call a Parliament. The Parliament
deemed it more their duty to redress the wrongs of their own
nation, than to furnish the king with the means of renewing the
Episcopal War.
The indomitable Pym called the attention of Parliament to the
wrongs in Church and State. Inquiry was made concerning
persons illegally detained in prison. The Parliament began to
look into the affair of ship-money. The king, in anger, hastily
dissolved the Parliament. He summoned the offending mem
bers before the council, and cast them into prison. He borrowed
money. He forced loans. Every dishonorable and illegal method
was resorted to, to furnish means ; and being at length prepared,
he marched his army once more against the Scots.
The Scots were ready, and advanced to meet him. Every
man carried his week's provision of oatmeal ; and they took a
drove of cattle to furnish them with meat. They had no cannon,
but a fertile invention supplied this deficiency. " They prepared,"
says Burnet,* "an invention of guns of white iron, tinned, and
done about with leather, and corded so that they could serve for
two or three discharges." These were light, and were carried on
horses. Thus furnished, they advanced, they said, "To meet
their gracious Sovereign ;" and with all coolness and civility, en
treated the opposing troops not to stop them in their way. When
these did not comply with their request, they attacked them with
an irresistible onset. Those tinned guns saved the nation;
proved the ruin of Charles ; and perhaps saved the English lib
erties. The English, thinking the Scots destitute of artillery,
were surprised and struck with a panic at the first discharge.
Their whole army fled. The Scots pressed on to the collieries ;
and by cutting off the supply of fuel, had London at their mercy.
They advanced to Durham ; and maintaining the exactest disci
pline, plundering nothing, taking nothing without pay, they sent
messengers with redoubled expressions of loyalty to their gracious
sovereign ; and made apologies full of sorrow and contrition for
the necessity that had forced them to achieve the victory.
Thus ended the second crusade of King Charles I., for forcing
Episcopacy and a Liturgy upon the Presbyterians of Scotland.
His resources were now so exhausted, that he must either call a
Parliament or cease to reign. The nation, injured, indignant,
* Burnet's Hist of His Own Times.

234 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
and long groaning under every outrage upon the Constitution and
laws, was now to be heard. The necessities which forced Charles
to call a Parliament, forced him also to give his consent that they
should not be dissolved, save by their own act. Thus began the
Long Parliament on the 3d November, 1640 : the very year when
the pioneers of the first fathers of this town* began to clear away
the unbroken forests that covered these shores.
Never was there a greater array of talent and patriotism in an
English Parliament. Even Lord Clarendon admits that " There
were many great and worthy patriots in the house, and as emi
nent as any age had ever produced." The difficult times ; the
long continued debates ; the deep reflection upon the principles
of law, and of popular rights, had awakened a mighty array of
talent : and the people, aware of the crisis, had returned to Par
liament their ablest and best tried men. In every crisis of the
kind, the times produce a race of men adequate to the emergency.
It was in those times, as when the long continued aggressions of
Britain upon these colonies, and the long debates, and long con
tinued times of peril, had brought into being that race of men
who accomplished the American Revolution : a race not less dis
tinguished for their intellectual greatness than for their pure de
votion to their country, and for their heroism. Even Hume pays
the highest compliment to the distinguished character of the Long
Parliament. " This was the time," he says, " when genius and
capacity of all kinds, freed from the restraint of authority, and
nourished by unbounded hopes and projects, began to exert
themselves and to be distinguished by the public. There was
celebrated the sagacity of Pym, more fitted for use than orna
ment ; matured, not chilled, by his advancing age and long expe
rience." There was Hampden, " supported," says Hume, " by
courage, conducted by prudence, embellished by modesty."
There was Selden, whose name will ever be considered as one of
the ornaments of English history. There was Cromwell; and
whatever else may be said of him, this at least will scarcely be
disputed, that never was the sceptre of England wielded by a
more vigorous or sagacious hand. His Protectorship, compared
with any preceding age, or with several ages succeeding, was an
era of toleration, justice, and law. Weakened as she was by
the civil wars, England rose to respect and greatness abroad ;
and foreign tyrants and persecutors trembled at Cromwell's name.
At one word from Cromwell, the persecutions against the Wal
denses ceased. The Duke of Savoy and Cardinal Mazarin
gnashed their teeth with rage; but with the whole power of France
at command, they durst not raise a finger more against the Wal
denses while Cromwell lived. " All Italy," says Bishop Burnet,
* Norwalk.

RISE OF THE CIVIL WARS. 235
''trembled at the name of Cromwell, and seemed under a panic
a3 long as he lived. His fleet scoured the Mediterranean ; and
the Turks " [who had been the terror of Europe] " durst not of
fend him." Power, scenes of strife, and living so long amid
plots and tumults, corrupted his religious character ; so that in
his latter days he was not what he once was ; but future ages
will yet wipe off the stigmas of ignorance, fanaticism, brutality,
and hypocrisy, that have been so diligently cast upon the name
of Cromwell. The men of secondary rank in that Parliament,
as Hetherington has well remarked, " were possessed of talents
and energy enough to have earned a high renown in any period
less prodigal of human power."
It cannot be pretended that all their measures were entirely
moderate or wise. The times were unfavorable. The English
people were not, like the American people at their Revolution,
prepared for a Republic. The past history of the world did not
hold out sufficient light to guide the great experiment. Causes
beyond their control ; casualties to human power inevitable, hin
dered the results of their labors. Divine Providence overruled.
But what man may be expected to do, they did. It is not certain
that any amount of human wisdom or energy, in their circum
stances, could have done more. Even Hume confesses, that,
" What rendered the power of the Commons more formidable,
was the extreme prudence with which it was conducted."
These were now become the vindicators of the laws and con
stitution against the fickle and irresolute King Charles, the
bigoted and vindictive Laud, and the aspiring Wentworth, Earl
of Strafford ; himself a host, though on the side of tyranny. It
was not to be expected that such a Parliament would be swift to
furnish the king with means for carrying on the Episcopal war in
Scotland, while those same means might be further employed
against their own liberties. They impeached the Earl of Strafford
for various overt acts aimed at subverting the fundamental laws
of England. While the bill of attainder was yet before the
House of Lords, a conspiracy was detected by which the king
was to bring the army, raised against the Scots, up to London,
to overawe the Commons, seize the town, release the Earl of
Strafford, place him at the head of the Irish Papists, call over
succors from France, and lay the liberties and religion of the
people at the feet of the king*
An impeachment of high treason was brought against Laud.
The Lord Keeper Finch, who, on the bench of justice, had proved
himself the willing tool of the king and council, and had poison
ed the very laws in their administration, took the alarm and fled.
The Commons took hold of those who had been the instruments
* Neale.

236

THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.

of illegal exactions. The judges who had condemned Hampden
in the trial of ship-money were accused before the peers. The
sentence which had been executed against Prynne, Bastwick, and
Leighton, underwent an examination. The long captivity of
these injured men was broken. They, were brought from their
distant prisons in the isles of Scilly and Jersey. The people met
them at their landing, with shouts of joy, and swelled the tide of
their attendants on their triumphant journey to London. Their
mutilated members could not be restored, but redress was given
them against those who had pronounced and inflicted the illegal
punishment. The Parliament by a unanimous vote abolished
the courts of the Star-Chamber and the High Commission.
They abridged and regulated the authority of the council. To
all these things Charles, either through weakness or necessity,
yielded his royal assent, though the sequel shows that he did it
with a hollow heart, and with the full determination to regain
his despotic power as soon as it could be done, by flattery, by
treachery, or by force.
As this Parliament abolished the system of Prelacy in Eng-
lund, it is now necessary to give some attention to the causes
which more immediately led to that event. It was no pre
determination on the part of the members of that Parliament.
" As to their religion," says Lord Clarendon, " they were all
members of the Established Church, and almost to a man for
Episcopal government"1" Says another, " who lived through
those times," " Both lords and commons were most, if not all,
peaceable, orthodox, Church of England men ; all conforming to
the rites and ceremonies of Episcopacy, but greatly averse to
popery, tyranny, and to the corrupt part of that Church that in
clined to Rome."f
The change of sentiment in this Parliament, and the change
in that able body of ministers and laymen, who composed the
Assembly of Divines, is another instance of the repeated rise of
Puritan principles, as opposed to the Prelatic, among men, by
education, by habit, and by prejudice, strongly biased in favor of
Episcopacy. The circumstances which led to so great a change of senti
ment, were these. After the king had so suddenly dissolved the
last Parliament, finding the prelates and clergy so much in favor,
not only of his " Episcopal war," but of his claims to despotic
power, he gave, under the great seal, his commission to the Con
vocation to reassemble and continue their sitting. If the Par
liament would not bind the nation to slavery by law, the prelates
seemed determined to do it by their canons. The Convocation
proceeded to ordain seventeen canons ; and first, concerning the
* Neale. t Moulin in Neale.

RISE OF THE CIVIL WARS.

237

regal power : " That the most high and sacred order of kings is
of divine right, being the ordinance of God himself; * * that for
subjects to bear arms against their king, either offensive or defen
sive, upon any pretence whatsoever, * * even though they do not
invade, but resist, is worthy of damnation." This decree, every
parson, vicar, curate, or preacher, was to read one Sunday in
every quarter of the year, upon pain of suspension ; and if he
should maintain any position contrary to it, he should forthwith
be suspended and excommunicated. They added the king's
inauguration day to the number of Holy Days, to be observed
by coming to church, under the usual penalties. They de
nounced excommunication upon all who should print, import, or
disperse, any books written against the discipline of the Church
of England. They imposed upon all ecclesiastical persons an
oath, that they would never give their consent to alter the gov
ernment of the Church by archbishops, bishops, deans, archdea
cons, &c. Whoever should refuse this oath should be suspended
and deprived. It was to be imposed, likewise, upon all students
in the universities ; all graduates, lawyers, divines, physicians, and
schoolmasters. Great were the complaints that the clergy should presume to
define the prerogatives of the king, and to impose upon the peo
ple the dogma of the divine right of kings, of passive obedience,
and non-resistance. Great complaints were made of this illegal
imposition of oaths never to consent to the altering of a scheme
of Church government, parts of which nobody ever pretended
to be of divine authority, and which were in their nature change
able. Great complaints were made of compelling men to swear to
the " &c." without defining what it meant, or might be supposed
to mean. It was called " The Et Cetera oath." Numbers of
the clergy scrupled to take it ; and the murmurings of the people
were deep and strong.
The authority of that illegal convocation, and their doings,
fell under the animadversion of Parliament The bishops had
set forth and attempted to impose principles touching the gov
ernment of the Church, so mingled up with tenets destructive of
all liberty, that they provoked from that keen-sighted Parliament,
an examination which could not well stop without drawing into
the inquiry, the claims of Episcopacy itself. Such an inquiry
had not heretofore been allowed. Whoever ventured to write
against Episcopacy, was sure to be ruined ; his books were sup
pressed and destroyed. A new era had now come : the people
and the Parliament would have light.
Another circumstance had contributed to awaken attention to
this subject When the king was endeavoring to force Episco-

238 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
pacy upon Scotland, the Scots Assembly had issued their
declaration affirming Episcopacy to be unlawful. To stop the
mischief of that declaration, Bishop Hall, at the request of Laud,
composed a treatise on the " Divine Right of Episcopacy." Di
vine right of Episcopacy ! Is this so ? murmured many who
sympathized with the persecuted Scots. The press was now
open ; and a flood of publications poured forth under titles like
these :
"Prelatical Episcopacy, not from the Apostles!"
" Lord bishops, not the Lord's Bishops!"
" A comparison between the Liturgy and the Mass-Book !"
'• Service Book no better than a mess of pottage !"
" Nature of Episcopacy !"
Archbishop Laud was in close keeping now. The Star-
Chamber and the High Commission were abolished. It was no
longer possible to slit men's noses, and to crop their ears, or to
condemn them to perpetual imprisonment for examining the
nature and claims of Episcopacy. It was the first time that
there had been liberty of discussion, and a safe field. The king
and the bishops had made the issue under the claim of a divine
right. Bishop Hall once more entered the field with " An Humble Re
monstrance to the High Court of Parliament," and again in "A
Defence of that Remonstrance." He was answered by the com
bined forces of several writers under the strange title of " Smec-
tymnuus ;" which word was nothing more than the initials of
Stephen Marshal, Edmund Calamy, Thomas Young, Matthew
Newcomen, and William Spurstow.
The debate filled the nation. Letters were written on both
sides, for the views of foreign divines. Blondel came out in a
learned work on the side of the Puritans. Amyraldus for Epis
copacy. Says Hetherington, " Even the mighty Milton employ
ed his pen in this keen literary warfare ; and it is no rash matter
to assert, that in learning, talent, genius, and strength of argu
ment, the Puritan writers immeasurably surpassed their antago
nists, and produced an impression on the public mind so deep
and strong, that it decided the controversy, so far as prelatic
Church government was concerned, even at its beginning.''*
Petitions poured into Parliament One, of fifteen thousand
citizens of London, called the " Root and Branch Petition ;" de
siring that the whole fabric of the hierarchy might be destroyed,
" Root and Branch :" another, signed by seven hundred beneficed
clergymen, and an incredible number of hands from the several
counties of England, praying, not for an extirpation of Episco
pacy, but for its reformation. On the other side, petitions were
• Hist, of Assembly of Divines, p. 72.

RISE OF THE CIVIL WARS. 239
presented to the king and the House of Lords, by multitudes of
the people, including six thousand of the nobility, gentry, and
dignified clergy. These petitions imported that, without bishops,
there can be no presbyters, no consecration of the elements, no
Church." The " Root and Branch " petition set forth that, " Whereas the
government of archbishops and lord-bishops, deans and arch
deacons * * * with their courts and administrations in them,
have proved prejudicial and very dangerous to the Church and
commonwealth : they themselves having formerly held that they
have their jurisdiction or power of human authority; till of late
they have claimed their calling immediately from Christ ; * * *
And whereas the said government is found, by woful experience,
to be a main cause and occasion of many foul evils, pressures,
aud grievances of a very high nature, to all his Majesty's sub
jects, in their consciences, liberties, and estates, We therefore
humbly pray and beseech this honorable assembly, the premises
being considered, that the said government, with all its dependen
cies, roots and branches, may be abolished."
For several days set apart for the purpose, these matters were
debated in the Parliament. Sir Harry Vane, Selden, and Lord
Falkland, whom Clarendon declares the most extraordinary per
son of his age, participated in that debate. The most eminent
advocates of Episcopacy agreed with Lord Falkland when he
said, " I do not believe the order of bishops to be of divine right,
nor do I think them unlawful." From that moment, the Divine
Right of the order of bishops was numbered, by the Parliament
and by the bulk of the nation, among the idle dreams and ex
ploded dogmas of superstition. But neither the Parliament nor
the nation was ready to abolish, Root and Branch, a system which,
however arrogant and mischievous, was yet interwoven into the
Constitution as one of its integral parts. They dreamed not yet
of abolishing the monarchy: they hoped to settle the affairs of
the nation in good understanding with the king; but henceforth
they placed the Divine Right of bishops and the Divine Right of
kings on the same grounds, as in their claims too idle, and in-
their tendency too clearly at war with all freedom, ever more to
be entertained.
I need not detail the efforts of Parliament at amending the
Hierarchical establishment. That it needed retrenchmenf and
limits, and that great abuses needed to be redressed, all acreed.
The opposition of the king and bishops only served to discover
more and more the enormity of these abuses, and the deep mis
chief of the prelatical scheme. When at length the Assembly
of Divines was called, which consisted of men all bred in the

240 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
Established Church, and up to these times all friends of Episco
pacy, so thorough was the conviction of the groundless nature of
the Episcopal claims, and of its incompatibility with the best in
terests of freedom and religion, that there were none to plead for
the prelatical scheme.*
One or two incidents more must be added to thecauseswhich
concurred to originate the civil wars ; and first, the massacre of
the Protestants of Ireland. " The British Protestants transplanted
into Ireland," says Hume, " having every moment before their
eyes all the horrors of Popery, had naturally been carried to the
opposite extreme ; and had universally adopted the highest prin
ciples and practices of the Puritans. Monarchy as well as the
hierarchy was become odious to them ; and every method of lim
iting the authority of the Crown, and detaching themselves from
the King of England, was greedily adopted and pursued. For
the same reasons, the Irish Catholics had become the bitter foes
of the English Parliament, and the warm adherents of King
Charles. The queen, a zealous Papist, had been informed by
the heads of the Irish Papists, with what ease they could seize
the control of Ireland, and aid the king against the Puritans.
Letters were written in the queen's name, authorizing them to
take arms and seize the government." This was all doubtless
with the king's concurrence, though there is a dispute whether
they had his commission. In the first plotting of this scheme,
there was probably no intention of the massacre which followed ;
that was a subsequent addition of the Irish leaders and priests.
From April to October, the English court knew of the intended
insurrection ; but no information reached the Protestants of Ire
land till the very night before which it was to take place ; and
when the news reached the Commons by an express, every man'
* An abler body of divines was probably never assembled among uninspired men.
Among its lay members, were Selden, Pym, and Sir Matthew Hale. Among the
clergy were Caryl, Calamy, Goodwin, Lightfoot, Prideaux, Reynolds, Usher, Ruth
erford, Gillespie, besides a multitude of others, whose names would have been suf
ficient to distinguish the history of any other age. The journal of Lightfoot shows
with what thoroughness, freedom, and deliberation every subject was discussed;
and with what care and critical minuteness they resorted to the Word of God as the
arbiter and end of strife. As to the principles of entire toleration, the Assembly of
Divines had not wholly thrown off the shackles of ancient error. They, too, aimed
at a compulsive uniformity. But defective as their establishment was, the nation
still preferred it to Episcopacy. On this point the testimony of Hume is unequivocal :
" Had the jealousy of royal power prevailed so far with the Convention Parliament,
as to make them restore the king with strict limitations, there is no question bid
the establishment of the Presbyterian discipline had been one of the conditions most rigidly
insisted on. Not only that form of ecclesiastical government is more favorable to liberty
than royal power ; it was likewise, on its own account, agreeable to the House of Commons,
and suited their religious principles. But as the impatience of the people, the danger
of delay, the general disgust with faction, and the authority of Monk, had prevailed
over the jealous project of limitations, the full settlement of the hierarchy, together
with the monarchy, was a necessary and infallible consequence."

RISE OF THE CIVIL WARS. 241
was struck dumb with astonishment and horror. The Court evi
dently meant to betray the Protestants into the hands of the Pa
pists. The castle of Dublin contained arms for 10,000 men, with
numerous cannon, and immense military stores ; and yet, that it
might fall an easy prey, it was left with a guard of no more than
fifty men. An Irishman, the night before the rising, betrayed the
plot to a friend, and this saved the castle, which proved a shelter
to some Protestants during the storm that followed. The Irish,
everywhere mingling with the unsuspecting English, at the signal
given, fell upon their victims. Not to trust myself with a descrip
tion, I simply copy from the words of Hume : " A universal mas
sacre commenced of the English, now defenceless. No age, nor
sex, nor condition was spared. The wife, weeping for her butch
ered husband, and embracing her helpless children, was pierced
with them and perished by the same stroke. * * * In vain
did flight save from the first assault. In vain was recourse had
to relations, to companions, to friends ; all connexions were dis
solved ; and death was dealt by the hand from which protection
was implored and expected." * * * " But death was the
slightest punishment inflicted: all the tortures which wanton cru
elty could devise ; all the lingering pains of body, the anguish
of mind, the agonies of despair, could not satiate revenge excited
without injury, and cruelty from no cause. * * The weaker
sex themselves- here emulated their more robust companions in
the practice of every cruelty. Even children * * * essayed
their feeble blows on the dead carcasses or defenceless children of
the English." * * " From Ulster, the flames of rebellion dif
fused themselves in an instant over the other three provinces of
Ireland. In all places death and slaughter were not uncommon,
though the Irish in these ether provinces pretended to act with
moderation and humanity. But cruel and barbarous was their
humanity. Not content with expelling the English from their
homes ; with despoiling all their goodly manors ; with wasting
the cultivated fields ; they stripped them of their very clothes, and
turned them out, naked and defenceless, to all the severities of the
season. The heavens themselves, as if conspiring against that
unhappy people, were armed with cold and tempest unusual to
the climate, and executed what the merciless sword had left Un
finished. The roads were covered with crowds of naked Eno-.
hsh, hastening towards Dublin and other cities which remained
in the hands of their countrymen."
In this massacre, there perished from one hundred and fifty to
two hundred thousand. The surviving English were blocked
up m Ihcir defences till the " Parliament was at leisure to pour
out thoir vengeance upon the heads of the murderers by the
hands of the victorious and terrible Oliver Cromwell."
16

342

THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.

While the Parliament and nation were under the strong feel
ings excited by these transactions, the king entered an accusation
of High Treason against Lord Kimbolton, and five Commons,
Hollis, Hazelrig, Hampden, Pym, and Strode. A serjeant at
arms came to the house, and in the king's name demanded the
five members — but in vain. The next day, the king in person,
accompanied by some two hundred men with swords, came to
seize them, but they had received notice, and were fled. In
passing through the streets of London, the next day, Charles
was everywhere greeted with the cry of " Privilege," " Privilege"
" Privilege of Parliament !" A sturdy yeoman drew near to the
royal coach and shouted aloud, " To your Tents, O Israel!"
The die was cast. There was no further appeal but to arms.
The king collected his forces ; and at Nottingham, on the 25th
of August, 1642, " he erected his royal standard ; the open sig
nal of civil war, throughout the kingdom." Before another sun
arose, a dreadful storm had blown that standard down ; nor did
the raging tempest permit it to be erected again for two days.
It is not my design to pursue the incidents of that war, in
which the royal power, and the Hierarchy, fell before the strength
of the people ; and in which Charles, with the two ministers of
his tyrannies, Strafford and Laud, perished on the scaffold. These
were stirring times ; full of incidents, and full of instruction.
But my design is accomplished in having pursued that history
so far as to trace the events which mark the history and princi
ples of the Puritans. We might go on to trace the renewal of the
old persecutions against the Puritans on the restoration of King
Charles II. We might tell of the bloody massacres which he
inflicted upon the Scots. We might tell of the " Corporation
Act," requiring all Magistrates to swear to the doctrine of pas
sive obedience and non-resistance ; of the " Act of Uniformity"
by which all ministers, heads of Colleges, and schoolmasters,
and every person instructing youth in a private family, were re
quired to declare their unfeigned assent to everything contained
in the Prayer-Book, and to all the rites and ceremonies of the
established Church ; as well as their full assent to the doctrine of
passive obedience and non-resistance. We might tell of St Bar
tholomew's day, in 1662, when two thousand of the ablest and
best esteemed clergymen were at once turned out of their liv
ings, for non-conformity.
We might tell ofthe Five-mile Act in 1665, by which all dis
senting ministers were forbidden, except upon the road, to come
within five miles of any place where they had preached since
the act of oblivion. "By ejecting the non-conforming clergy
from their churches," says Hume, " and prohibiting all separate
congregations, they had been rendered incapable of any liveli-

RISE OF THE CIVIL WARS. 243
hood by their spiritual profession. And now, under color of
removing them from places where their influence might be dan
gerous, an expedient was fallen upon to deprive them of all
means of subsistence." Multitudes of them pined out their
years in prison. We might go on to tell of these things in a
long course of injuries which have not wholly ceased down to
the present day. Even now, under all the mitigations obtained,
the wrongs and indignities inflicted upon the non-conformists of
England, are such as Americans would find it impossible to en
dure. But a detail of these things would be only a repetition of
the same conflict of principle, and of the same development of
the temper, principles, and tendencies of prelacy, which we have
already traced for a course of more than two hundred years ; and
yet which we have only partly and inadequately portrayed.
This part of my work, is, therefore, now done. We return to
the principles and polity of the Puritan Churches ; and to an ex
amination ofthe Prelatical claims, as set forth by those who would
fain persuade us that we are bound to abandon the principles of
our fathers, and to return to the yoke which our fathers detested
as more intolerable than banishment or death.

XVIII.

THE RULE AND JUDGE OF FAITH.
Bishop of Connecticut on the Rule of Faith. " The Scriptures as inter
preted by the first two centuries." Dr. Jarvis extends it to five centu
ries ; others to seven ; to nine ; to eighteen. Who to fix the limit !
Who to declare the interpretation ? Absurdity of the rule. No stable
ground between Puritanism and Popery. The Prayer-Book as the
interpretation of an interpretation. Impossible to fix the standard
of the first two centuries. Episcopalians, on their principles, bound
to fix the canons of the Fathers, and to give them to the people.
Doctrine of the Bishop of Connecticut contrasted with the doctrine of
the Scriptures. The Bible alone the religion of Protestants.
There are two or three preliminary questions, involving funda
mental principles, which lie back of all questions of Church or
ganization, of discipline, and modes of worship. If, in debating
the great question at issue between Puritanism and Prelacy, we
make our appeal to the Word of God, even Protestant Prelacy,
at the present day, affirms that " The Bible alone, to the exclusion
of all Church authority; * * is no sufficient ground of union
and stability."* The Bishop of Connecticut in his recent charge
says, that " Tlie Holy Scriptures as they were interpreted
by THE CHURCH during the two first centuries, * *
constitute THE ONLY SURE BASIS to rest upon." Nor
does he allow us to go and search those two first centuries for
ourselves ; oh no ; we must take the Church's interpretation of
that interpretation, so that our rule is removed two steps back
from the Word of God! " The result," he says, " is fully em
bodied in our book of Common Prayer ; a standard of faith;
which, he says, " now stands secure, as the only enduring monu
ment of the Protestant Reformation." The Bible alone as a rule
of faith, and the right of a private man to go to the Bible with
out subjecting his judgment to the interpretations or traditions of
the Church, he stigmatizes as among " The Errors ofthe Times."
" The continental Reformers," he says, " went to the extreme of
rejecting all tradition and Church authority." Hejaments
the " schisms," " heresies," " infidelity," " fanaticism," and " dis-
* Bishop Brownell, Charge.

THE RULE AND JUDGE OF FAITH. 245
tractions," which have sprung from this rejection. " I need not
tell you," he says, " that there are numerous bodies of intelli
gent and devoted Christians ; but without any sufficient bond of
union and stability ; the Bible alone, to the exclusion of all-
Church authority, the Bible alone, without note or comment, their
only standard of faith ; and the utmost liberty of private inter
pretation allowed."
Now in opposition to these views, the Puritan principle
(which, indeed, till recently we had supposed the common prin
ciple of Protestantism) is, that the Bible alone is the sole and
sufficient standard of faith. With regard to the interpretation of
that rule we have ever held, that we may search for all the light
that can be found in Christian writers, or in profane, modern or
ancient, but that we need not — nay, we must not bind our belief
to any interpretation, whether of the Church or of councils, doc
tors, or Fathers ; otherwise our faith stands not in the Word of
God, but in the opinions of men.*
Let us examine a little, the Prelatic principles as laid down by
* In laying down his doctrine, the bishop makes several false issues. We do not
(as he intimates that we do) refuse to investigate '' any fact" pertaining to "re
mote antiquity," by the light of " cotemporary history." But that is not the ques
tion; the point at issue is, What at last is the authoritative standard? Is it the
Word of God 1 or must we make a Bible of the Fathers, or rather of the Prayer-
Book? Is the standard of faith the Bible alone ; or the Bible as interpreted by the
two first centuries ; or rather the Bible as interpreted by the interpretation of the
interpretation of those two centuries ; the "results" of which interpretation of an
interpretation, it is claimed are now " fully" embodied in the " Prayer-Book ?"
With regard to private judgment the bishop makes one or two false issues more.

judgment, we had maintained the right to exercise that judgment in so reprehensible
a mode and spirit I We claim a right to go to the Bible for ourselves, without tradi
tion, or decrees, or interpretations of bishop, council, or Pope ; but we claim no
right to indulge a spirit of " vanity, perversity, or self-conceit." If the bishop
thought these inuendos argument, he mistook the question. If he threw them out
as correct representations of matters of fact, he did us injustice.
Another position of Bishop Brownell, in this connection, deserves further notice
than we can give it here. We hold, that for the conscientious exercise of our
private judgment in matters of faith, we are responsible only to conscience and to
God. The bishop holds that we are responsible, not only to God, but in a minor degree
'fo our fellow-men." He says that "we may not rightly exercise [viz. our private
judgment in matters of faith], in a way injurious to the order and peace of society ; nor
without a due veneration for the judgment ofthe Church and its ministry." — ( Charge,p. 7.)
So thought Bishop Bonner ; and he did hold the private conscience and judgment
responsible to man. He carried out the idea to its legitimate consequences The
Pope has ever thought that such heretics as the Albigenses, Waldenses, and Hugue
nots, exercised their judgment "in a way injurious to the peace and order of
society," and "without due veneration for the judgment of the Church;" and
doubtless he thinks the same of us, and of the Bishop of Connecticut too. But will
the Bishop of Connecticut allow the Pope to hold us " responsible ?" If so, to
wiiom are we "responsible?" Who may call us to an account for exercising our
private judgment in matters of faith, " without due veneration for the judgment of
the Church and its ministry ?"

246

THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.

Bishop Brownell ; that " The Holy Scriptures, as they were in
terpreted by the Church during the two first centuries, * * con
stitute the only sure basis to rest upon."
I. On whcit principle, or by what authority does he fix the limit
at the first two centuries ? If, because those centuries were pure
and others were not, then does he set his private judgment above
his standard ; judging those centuries whether they iverepure.
And by what rule does he judge them? By the Bible? But
he cannot interpret the Bible till he has" first fixed its meaning on
the authorities of those two centuries, i. e., till he has first proved
his standard by the thing which it is to measure ! He, therefore,
has no ultimate standard, unless he will either set up his private
judgment as infallible, or consent to repose in the supreme infal
libility of the. Church, or of the Pope.
Thus he lays the foundation of his scheme in an ineffable
absurdity, and imposes upon himself the necessity of rearing its
superstructure in mazes and self-contradictions without end.
But in fixing the limit at two centuries, the bishop has an ac
count to settle with his more learned presbyter. Dr. Jarvis ex
tends the limit three hundred years further* The bishop in his
charge considers the Prayer-Book as a fixed and certain standard ;
not to be varied and invariable. Dr. Jarvis boldly avows f that
neither is the Episcopal Church established in its " ancient cus
toms and privileges," nor in " the doctrines of the Scriptures
according to the consentient interpretation of Catholic antiquity ;"
nor in " government, discipline, and ritual :" that " The inten
tion of the reformers was hindered from being fully carried out by
opposition, first of the Papists, and afterwards of the Puritans ;"
and that " It remains for us [the Episcopal Church] with tran
quillity and patience to pursue the great and true principles of
the English Preformation;" which, he says, "are reducible to
three heads : 1st. To recover the original customs and privileges
of the British Church. 2d. To restore the doctrines, &c. 3d.
To bring back the government, discipline, and ritual, to the
general analogy of practice at the time of the fourth general
council, or middle of the fifth century." The first two cen-
turies will not do. The standard of faith, ritual, and discipline,
is not fixed in the Prayer-Book, as the bishop fondly thought ;
but as his learned presbyter assures us, Prayer-Book, ritual, and
doctrine are all yet out of then longitude by three hundred years,
and that a work of " restoring, recovering, and bringing back,"
yet " remains" to be " pursued" with " tranquillity and patience."
The Episcopal Church is, therefore, yet afloat, and whither it
will yet drift, can any mortal tell, unless we may conjecture by
*" Address to Members ofthe Protestant Episcopal Church; or, No Union with
Rome, dated ' Festival of St. Bartholomew, 1843.' " t Ibid.

the rule and judge of faith. 247
the drift of the current, which is now so strongly and manifestly
setting toward Rome ?
" Quern das flnem, rex magne, laborum ?" How determine
where to rest ? How shall they decide where to fix the land
mark ? It is not in the Bible alone. It is not in the Prayer-
Book. It is not in the first two centuries. Some say, with Dr.
Jarvis, it is in the middle of the Fifth. Some say it is at the end
of the Sixth General Council, or at the end of seven centuries.
Others place it at the point of division between the Eastern and
Western Churches ; which point, again, some assign to the
seventh century, others to the ninth. Others still, like Bishop
Doane, Mr. Newman, and Dr. Pusey, declare that it embraces the
whole eighteen centuries. — " The Holy Scriptures, as Catholic
antiquity has revealed, and as Catholic consent has kept their
meaning."* But suppose the limits finally established, whether it be at
two, seven, or nine, or eighteen centuries; then,
II. Who is to declare, or interpret the interpretations of those
two, five, seven, or nine, or eighteen centuries ? Private judg
ment, surely, will find it more difficult to interpret those interpre
tations than the Word of God. Or if the Church is the authori
tative interpreter, then who is to declare the interpretation of the
Church ? Is it the Pope ? Councils ? Each individual bishop ?
The bishops of each province or country — so that what is the true
interpretation of Catholic antiquity in France, Spain, Austria,
and Italy, shall be a false interpretation of the same in these
United States ? Or if the power of interpreting resides in no
particular Pope, or council, or bishop, and in no house of bish
ops, but in Catholic consent,- — who has that consent? Bishop
Brownell, in his Charge, says that the creed of his Church ex
presses its belief in " One Catholic and Apostolic Church," and
declares that the expression imports that there is " but one Church."
He talks about an "Identity" with this Church. He distinctly
recognizes the Roman Church as a part of that one Catholic
Church. If, therefore, the Protestant Episcopal and the Pcoman
Churches are equally constituent parts of that one Catholic
Church, which party may be presumed to have the " Catholic
consent " that constitutes the authoritative interpretation of the
interpretation of the two centuries 1 Does that consent and that
right lie with the twenty-one bishops, or with the twenty-one
hundred ? Does it lie with the little party in England and the
United States, setting up their interpretation for three hundred
years : or does it lie with the great party in Italy, Austria, Ire
land, France, Spain, and Portugal, who not only symbolize with
the great Eastern Churches in the points on which these differ
* Cited in New Englander, Jan., 1844, p. 70

24S THE PURITANS and their principles.
from the Protestant Episcopalians in England and the United
States, but who hold the doctrines which confessedly prevailed
over Europe for a thousand years before the Reformation ? On
Bishop Brownell's own principles, I do not see why he is not
bound to renounce all Protestantism as a wicked schism and
heresy, and to hasten back, as fast as he can, to Rome.
There is still another question : How many of these twenty-
one* American bishops are entitled to a seat in the conclave, which
might be supposed to sit in determining the American interpreta
tion of the first two centuries, even if such an interpretation might
be supposed to determine the Catholic consent ; and it is a diffi
culty wfTich those who depend upon the valid sacraments of a
ministry of the true Apostolical succession, would do well to ex
amine, lest they should find themselves, after all, baptized, con
firmed, and fed by hands without any valid authority or efficiency.
It is this : It is the undoubted doctrine of all prelatists, that there
can be but one bishop having authority in the same territorial diocese
at the same time.f Now, Popish bishops are regarded by our Pro
testant Episcopalians as true bishops ; and when a presbyter or
dained by them enters the Episcopal Church, according to canon,
and in actual practice, he is not re-ordained. But on the 6th of
October, 1789, Pope Pius VII. erected the United States into a
bishopric, and appointed " John Carroll, an ancient Jesuit " (as the
record says), its bishop. At this time there was a Protestant
Bishop in Connecticut, another in New York, and another in
Pennsylvania; but the rest of the ground had no bishop. On the
principles of Episcopacy, it was all missionary, or heathen
ground. In a National Convention for determining the " Catholic
assent," save in these three States, the Protestant Bishops must be
regarded as mere usurpers. Is this doubted ? Hear, then, au
thority, which those concerned are not allowed to doubt. Cyprian
declares it " contrary to law, for two bishops to preside together in
the same city." This also was determined on by the Council of Nice,
and became a settled proverb, " One God, one Christ, one Bishop,"
two bishops being, as Theodoret testifies, infamous. So that
whoever is made a bishop in any given territory after the first, is not
a second bishop, but no bishop at all. Let those who have passed
under the hands of the Protestant bishops in the vast majority of
these United States, take care. What right has Bishop Whitting
ham in Maryland,where there was even a popish archbishop before
him ?$ What right has Bishop Kemper in Missouri ? or McCos
kry in Michigan ? or Smith in Kentucky ? or Polk in Louisiana '
t See Chapin's Primitive Church, dedicated to Bp. Brownell.
t It is not for those to gainsay this appointing of a bishop to foreign unoccupied
territory, who have so recently made a bishop for Texas.

?

THE RULE AND JUDGE OF FAITH. 249
or Chase in Illinois ? Over these fields the Roman bishops had
already extended their jurisdiction. The Popish title is, therefore,
on the prelatical principle, indefeasible in these dioceses ; and all
the doings of the Protestant prelates, absolutely void and null ;
and their voices can weigh nothing in the supposed convention
for determining the Catholic consent.
Now I do maintain, in all soberness, that if we are to depend
upon Church authority to interpret the interpretations of the first
two centuries, we can, with no manner of consistency or reason,
stop with Protestant Episcopacy. We cannot linger on the road
with Bishops Whittingham and Doane, and the Tractarians.
We shall not palter with Romish principles, and still call our
selves Protestant, like the Bishop of Connecticut. We must go
directly to Rome, whither these principles inevitably tend.
Waiving all these difficulties, however, and supposing the
Prayer-Book of two countries, and of three hundred years — and
not the Mass-Books of many countries, for a thousand years — to
be the authoritative interpretation of the interpretation of the first
two centuries, — then,
III. Even that standard, the Prayer-Book, has proved no ground
of quietness and repose, but is even now the ground of turmoil and
of war. While all parties praise it, the system of doctrines which
the Evangelical and the Puseyistic parties draw from that stand
ard, are fundamentally and irreconcileably opposed. Several of
the bishops have denounced the latter scheme as " another Gos
pel ;" while several others as openly avow and as strenuously de
fend it* Nothing is more notorious than that the body of the clergy
and people of the Episcopal Church no longer hold, but utterly
reject some of the doctrines unequivocally set forth in the Thirty-
Nine Articles. Thus the Seventeenth Article clearly teaches
the final perseverance of all the elect : and so it was authorita
tively interpreted in the Fifth of the celebrated Lambeth Articles :
" The true, lively, and justifying faith, and the Spirit of God,
doth not utterly fail, doth not vanish away in the elect, either finally
or totally." Such was the doctrine of the Church : yet the Bishop
of Connecticut says, in his Charge (p. 22), " The idea of a per
severance in grace is popularly connected with a change of heart ;
and it is hence inferred, that if a person is regenerated in baptism,
his salvation is secured : but the Church holds no such doctrine."
* * * " But the grace vouchsafed in baptism may be misim-
provetl and lost." King James not only sent the Lambeth Arti
cle* to the Synod of Dort, as the authoritative interpretation of
ilie Church of England, but he declared one who held to the
* See "The Churchman," and " Protestant Churchman." See also Bishop
Mcllvnine's elaborate and admirable exposure of the Popery of Puseyism; see also
the testimony of Dr. Milnor, and of the Bishop of Calcutta.

250 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
notion of falling from grace, to be " worthy of the fire." Dr. Wain
wright, in his recent letters, earnestly denounces the dogmas of
election and reprobation ; and declares the Episcopal doctrine to
be, " The system of free grace and of salvation within the reach of
all :" " The gates are continually open to every man," * * " to
which no man is admitted, and from which no man is excluded, by
any unconditional decree ofthe Almighty." Would any man ima
gine that Dr. Wainwright belonged to that Church, which puts
forth as fundamental in its scheme of faith, these words of the
Tenth Article : " The condition of man after the fall of Adam, is
such, that he cannot turn and prepare himself by his own natural
strength and good works, to faith and calling upon God ; where
fore we have no power to do good works pleasant and acceptable
to God." Would any one dream that Dr. Wainwright belonged
to that Church, which so absolutely sets forth the doctrine of ab
solute predestination in its seventeenth Article ; and which declares
that doctrine to be full of sweet and pleasant, and unspeakable
comfort to godly persons ?" Dr. Wainwright's private judgment
will not do here ; nor must Bishop Brownell trust his own. The
Church authoritatively interpreted these Articles, by the Articles
of Lambeth ; in which she declares, that " God hath from Eter
nity predestinated certain persons to life ; and reprobated certain
persons to death." This predestination and reprobation, the Ar
ticles make absolute, unconditional, and utterly irreversible.
Now all this war of Puseyism and Evangelism — this discor
dant interpretation of the same standard in different ages, comes
most naturally from the setting up of human standards as a safer
authority than the Word of God. If the Bible needs interpret
ing, much more does the Prayer-Book need interpreting. If the
first, though the perfect Word of God, affords grounds for differ
ence in the interpretation, how much more must differences arise
in interpreting an extended work of poor ignorant and erring
man ? Thus, while that Church boasts of her stability as pos
sessed of a standard so much safer than the Word of God, she
becomes like him of old, of whom it was said, " Unstable as
water, he shall not excel." Nor is it possible to fix this floating
and Protean standard on the principle of authoritative interpreta
tion. Suppose the next General Convention of the Protestant
Episcopal Church possessed of entire authority, to give a decision
between the conflicting interpretations of Evangelism and Pu
seyism ; suppose their results should be, no commingled and
equivocal compromise between the two parties, as it is to jbe
expected,* but a plain, straightforward document, intending
finally to settle the meaning of the Standards : if that decision
shall sustain the Puseyistic views, will the Bishops of Vermon
* The General Convention has met, and this expectation has been fulfilled.

THE RULE AND JUDGE OF FAITH. 251
and Ohio conclude to receive that as the true Gospel which they
have so earnestly and solemnly declared another Gospel ? Or
should their views prevail, will Bishops Doane and Whittingham
surrender to that, the faith for which they have so strenuously
contended as the doctrine of ancient Catholic consent? But
suppose the General Convention to agree in a definitive inter
pretation : Who is to interpret the General Convention ? Here
is a circuitous way of coming at the standard of faith : God has
given his pure and perfect Word, by which all things are to be
measured, and which is to be measured by none. " If any man
shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues
that are written in this Book." Is that book, then, the ultimate
standard? Is the Bible alone, without note or comment, a
" sufficient bond of union and stability ?" O no ! We are told
that we must " add unto" it the interpretation of the "first two
centuries!" Unfortunately, at the Reformation, there is a differ
ence of opinion as to the interpretation of the first two centuries ;
and the bishops of a little province set up their interpretations
against the bishops of the Catholic World, and against the
" Catholic consent " for a thousand years ! To what do they ap
peal ? To the Bible alone ? Do they then allow the right of
private judgment ? Alas ! the Continental Reformers, says
Bishop Brownell, " went to that extreme of rejecting all tradi
tion and Church authority" (and so did the British Reformers
too): but now he will have it that the Bible alone is no sufficient
standard, nor must private judgment set itself up against the
judgments of the Church. Is the little handful of Protestant
bishops, for this purpose, the Church? But suppose they are ; —
they fundamentally disagree. Who is to interpret them ? Oh,
the General Convention ! Who now is to interpret the General
Convention ? Where, on this principle, is the ground, on which
— to adopt the language of Bishop Brownell — " wearied with
perpetual agitation and changes," we may " find rest and repose ?"
Instead of repose, another element of discord is thrown into the
hurly-burly, by interposing still another interpretation of an in
terpretation, which was originally but an interpretation of an in
terpretation, of the interpretation which the first two centuries
gave of the Word of Cod! The difficulties are multiplied in
the duplicate ratio of the number of removes from the original
standard ; and by what shall we adjust them now ? By the
Bible? What, by the Bible alone; and by private judgment,
without reference to tradition, or the authority of the Church ?
0 no — this is the Puritan ground, which the bishop so earnestly
rejects. Ho must take his choice, then, of the only two alterna
tives that remain : these difficulties are to be settled either by the
infallibility of the Pope ; or they are to abide the decision of

262 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
some future interpretation, which yet depends upon one more
remotely future, and that remote future upon another future;
and so on, till the Day of Doom. If we take neither of these
last alternatives, then we are driven conclusively to private judg
ment : and then, if we take not the Bible alone as the sole and
sufficient standard, we must chase the shadow of the shadow
of an ignis fatuus, and follow it whithersoever it may chance to
fly, through swamps and quagmires, with no possibility of being
able to plant our feet at last upon solid ground. There is no
POSSIBLE GROUND TO REST UPON HERE, BETWEEN PURITANISM
and Popery. Dr. Jarvis, indeed, sets forth* as a " glorious ob
ject of an American Christian's contemplation, " A great Ame
rican Catholic Church, equally removed from the extremes
of Popery and Protestantism." He has a very pleasing argu
ment to show that " if ever the broken parts of Christ's body
come together" it must be " not upon the extremes, but in the
middle." He will find it a hard matter, however, when he has
leaped from the brink of Niagara, to stop half-way down. The
experiment, as well as the philosophy of the thing, in the other
case shows, that he who once abandons his footing on the
Rock of God, must expect to go to the bottom. Bishop
Brownell, in his charge, speaks of " repose and stability " in the
Episcopal " Standards of Faith " and " primitive forms of wor
ship." Repose ? Here is no possibility of repose ! Here is no
bottom ; no shore : but " A dark
Illimitable ocean without hound :"
" Chaos umpire sits,
And by decision more embroils the fray
By which he reigns ; next him, high arbiter
Chaboe governs all."
Those who have fled to Church traditions and interpretations,
and to Church authority, hoping to find repose in these, rather
than on the basis of God's Word alone, have already begun to
discover that it is time to remove once more to the bosom of an
older mother. There is no rest to such lovers of repose, save in
the infallibility of Rome.f
* Address to members of Prot. Epis. Church.
t Mr. Newman began on this point with affirming antiquity to be a much more
stable and inflexible guide than the Word of God. " A private Christian," said he,
" may put what meaning he pleases upon parts of Sckiptuee, and none can hinder him."
* # * " But we cannot so deal with antiquity. Antiquity does not allow scope
for the off-hand or capricious decisions of private judgment" [Mr. Newman has (two
years since the above was written) taken refuge in the infallibility of Rome. If the
Bishop of Connecticut does not go there too, it will be because he follows neither
his principle nor the logic by which he sustains it.J But it was not long ere a
brother Tractarian discovered that it was as hard to interpret antiquity, as to inter
pret the Bible " Is not private judgment," said he, " as apt to mislead in the interpre
tation of antiquity, as in that of Scripture ?" He comes to the conclusion that, aftei

THE RULE AND JUDGE OF FAITH. 253
IV. It is impossible to fix the standards of the first two
centuries. The Bible is complete : given by inspiration of God, and by
his signal providence preserved. Its canon is fixed and unalter
able. The Prayer-Book, it is true, yet orders parts of the Apo
crypha to be read on certain saints' days : but Protestants appear
now to be agreed that the Apocrypha is no part of the Word of
God. The canon of the Bible is therefore fixed ; but no research
has been able wholly to separate the spurious writings attributed
to the Fathers, from the true. Whole epistles and treatises have
been forged: alterations and interpolations have been made, for
the purpose of favoring the corruptions of Rome. There was
opportunity to do this ; these writings, never having been re
ceived as the Word of God, were never extensively translated
and spread abroad. For ages, many of them were laid aside,
time out of mind ; and, from time to time, dug out of the dust,
and brought to light. It is not two centuries since one of the
oldest of them all, that of Clemens Romanus, was dug from the
dust, after having been lost and unknown for a thousand years.
That oblivion was its protection from the mutilations, the changes,
and interpolations, which were inextricably mingled up with such
works as monks and priests were able to lay their hands upon.
As different works attributed to the Fathers were brought to light,
all, the judgment of the Church (not the Bible, nor antiquity) is to be the rule
of faith. "We have in no way maintained" says he, " that an ordinary religious inquirer
would have any chance of discovering for himself the truth, by his personal study of the
Fathers" Here we have it: Popery at full length; the result wrapped up in the
principle of Bishop Brownell ; though he seems not to be aware of it ; and would
doubtless, at this stage of his progress, be frightened by a full view of this awful
progeny of his own principles. But the Oxford Tractarian — more far-seeing, or
more consistent — manfully embraces the conclusion. " We have no hesitation,"
says he, "in speaking of resorting to Church history in the manner we do, as the
result of our degraded position. In the time of Augustine, or St. Thomas Aquinas,
it would be a matter of conscientious inquiry whether they should follow the
Church's instructions, as in our days, with infants, whether they shall believe what
their parents teach them." Here we hive it in full. The Bible is no safe standard :
private judgment is not to be trusted with the Fathers; we must follow the
Ciiukou's instructions: away with ilie Bible; away with the Fathers ; away
wilh private judgment: give us sprigs of lf'ing infallibity; and as these will
make a Babel of their diverse interpretations, let us have that infallibility concen
trated and made of one speech in a Pote.
" It is a hopeful sign," says Goode, " that we have at last got to the second stage
of tlie controversy, when our opponents are quilling the Fathers, and making the best
of their way, in various directions, after tub Church." * * * "And the next
question will no doubt be: How are we to get introduced to the Church ? Whether
by the Pope himself; or whether iho good offices of any individual priest will do 1
And if by the Pope, whether by the Pope in the chair, or whether the Pope out
of the chair, will do 1 or whother it must be a Pope and General Council ? &c, &c."
" Tin- contest is between Reformation T-ulh and Reformation Principles on the one hand,
and Romish Principles and Romish Truth on the other."
On tho system of Bishop Brownell, the Church is made a co-ordinate authority
with God ; lier interpretations are a rule, not simply co-ordinate with the Word of
Jehovah, but ;i rule paramount to that Word ; since her interpretations fix and govern
its meaning. The system is Cliurch-anity rather than Christianity ; and its advocates
very appropriately and consistently prefer the style of Church-men to that of Christian.

&

254 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
the corruptions were gradually detected. False dates, allusions
to events of later years, words and phrases unknown to the Fath
ers, and indicative of a later age, detected many entire forgeries,
which, after having been relied upon for centuries, were at length
given up by the entire Christian world. In most that remain,
we have not the originals ; but only fragments, quoted in writers
of a later date. To this day, the genuine writings, and the gen
uine readings of those supposed in the main to be genuine, are
unsettled : learned men of all communions still holding them in
debate. Besides this, the early Fathers, in their writings, which are
allowed to be genuine, betray gross unsoundness, erring and mis
taking in many of the clearest and most indubitable principles of
the Word of God. Crudities, errors of judgment and of igno
rance, fables, a mingling of Christianity with the various fond
tenets of the philosophy prevalent in their respective countries
and ages, have greatly marred their expositions of divine truth.
They conflicted with each other. Origen, the most learned of the
ancient Fathers, adopted principles of interpretation which all de
nominations in the world reprobate at the present day. He
actually mutilated his own body, because the Saviour had said,
" Some have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of Hea
ven's sake." It seems as though Christ had intended, not only to
ivam us against reliance upon the Fathers, by charging us to " call
no man master ;" but that God by his Providence intended to
beat us off from this reliance, by confounding the builders of such
a Babel, even in the days of those who had seen the Apostles.
Even so early it became a question, on what time they should
keep Easter. Both sides pleaded with confidence that their tra
dition was apostolical. Polycarp pleaded that he had been
acquainted with the Apostle John. Anicetus of Rome pleaded
that he had his tradition from the Apostle Peter. Here were the
Fathers only one remove from the Apostles, on a plain matter
of fact. And yet, says Stillingfleet, " So great were the heats, so
irreconcilable the controversy, that they proceeded to hurl the
thunder of excommunication in each other's faces ; and at length
Victor, in the spirit of a Pope, excommunicated all the Churches
of Asia, for differing as to this tradition. The small coals of this
contention kindled a whole ^Etna of contention in all the Chris
tian world."
Now what was good in the so called Fathers we readily ap
prove. Let them pass for witnesses of facts which came under
their own observation ; let them, if they please, testify as to their
opinions ; but if we must measure the doctrine of " an Apostle
or of an angel from Heaven" by the Word of God, how much
more must we measure the opinion of the Fathers ? We can
not receive as the standard that which we are presently to prove

THE RULE AND JUDGE OF FAITH. 255
by another measure. This difficulty would remain, even if we
could separate what is genuine in the Fathers from that which
is spurious. V. If the standard of faith is to be the Bible as interpreted by
the first two centuries, then the Episcopal authorities are as much
to be blamed for not fixing upon the authentic writings of these
two centuries, establishing their canon, and giving them to the
people, as the popish Prelates are for withholding from the people
the Bible. Nay, more so ; for on this scheme the " Bible alone"
as the "only standard faith," is " no sufficient bond of union or
stability ;" nay, it leads to " error, heresies, disunion, and confu
sion^ without end ! " Miserable people that have not the ultimate
standard in their hands ; without which the Bible is so insuffi
cient and so erring a guide ! Unfaithful prelates that give not
even a translation; no, nor a poor abstract, or epitome; no,
nothing but a poor weak decoction or infusion of the fathers, such
as happens to be sprinkled, we know not where, upon the pages
of the Prayer-Book! The people should either demand that the
Bible shall be accompanied by the Falhers of the first two centu
ries, authentic, unmutilated, uninterpolated, so that they may
search the standard of faith for themselves, or they should re
nounce the name of Protestants, and be content with the tradi
tions ofthe Falhers, as set forth and interpreted second-hand by
the traditions of the priests. But what Episcopal layman or
clergyman pretends that he can accurately fix the canon of the
Fathers of the first two centuries ? Has Bishop Brownell him
self ever read all those interpretations of the first two centuries,
or can he, for his life, draw the line between the spurious and the
true ? No well informed man on earth will have the impudence
to pretend that this can be done. Let us then hear no more
about Popish abominations. The extravagance of Romish in
fallibility is sober reason compared with this specimen of Pro
testant Episcopal folly touching the standard of faith. *
* From this dreary waste of error and absurdity, it is refreshing to turn back to
the words of good old Bishop Hooper, who sealed his faith in the flames, in the days
<>l the Popish Mary. " In the Blessed Virgin's time, the Pharisees and Bishops wae
accounted the tkuf. Church ; yet by reason their doctrine was corrupt, the true Church
rested not unth them, but in Simeon, Zachary, the shepherds, and others. So, Paul
leaches us that whosoever he be that preaches another doctrine than the Word of
God, he is not to be accredited though he were an angel from Heaven. * # The
tulrersaries of truth defend many a false error under the name of Holy Church * *
and when the Church is named, we ought diligently to consider when the
Articles they would defend were accepted of Ihe Church, by whom, and who was
the author of them, and not leave the matter till it is brought unto the first original
and most perfect Church of the Jlpostlcs. If you find by their writings that the
Church used the thing which the preacher would prove, accept it, or else not. Be
not amazed though they speak of ever so many years ; or name ever so many doc-
lois. Christ and his Apostles are grandfathers in age to the doctors
and masters in i.earnino. Fear neither the ordinary power or succession of
bishops, nor that of the greater part. For if either the authority of Bishops or of
Ihi' greater part should have power to interpret the Scriptures; the sentence ofthe

256 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
VI. What say the Scriptures themselves concerning the ques
tion in hand ? " The law of the Lord is perfect, converting
the soul; the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the
simple." Thus speaks the Word of God. Oh no ! says the
man with a surplice and mitre from Rome : not "perfect" nor
'- sure," but mischievous without the infallible interpretations of
the Church ; the Church can do better by taking the testimony
of the Lord away. And thereupon the Protestant Bishop of
Connecticut raises his voice. '• The Bible alone !" " The Bible
without note or comment ! " To the exclusion of all tradition
and Church authority !'' It is no sufficient "bond of union or
stability !" And thereupon he rings the changes, " Heresies,"
" Infidelity," " Fanaticism."
But hear again the Word of God : " O how love I thy law !
It is my meditation all the day. Thou, through thy command
ments, hast made me wiser than mine enemies : for they are
ever with me. I have more understanding than all my teachers;
for thy testimonies are my meditation. 1 have more understanding
than the ancients (alas, what a heresy this would be in the eyes
of the Tractarians, if it were not in the Bible ! But so it
reads.) I have more understanding than the ancif.nts, be
cause I keep thy precepts," "Thy Word is a lamp to my feet,
and a light to my path."
We had supposed that " The Bible alone" was "the Religion
of Protestants." We had humbly supposed it a sufficient and
perfect guide, " given by inspiration of God," — that " the man of
God may be thoroughly furnished" with that which is "able
to make him wise unto salvation." We had supposed that
whoever were our teacher, we were still to " search the Scrip
tures," " to see whether these things are so." We turn to the
History of the World ; and though some have " wrested the
Scriptures to their own destruction," yet the History of the World
has not shown for any two hundred years, so real and unwaver-
Pharisees should have been preferred before the sentence of Zacharias, Simeon,
Elizabeth, or the Blessed Virgin. * * Remember that the gift of interpretation
of Scripture, is the light of the Holy Ghost given unto the humblest penitent per
sons, that seek it only to honor God ; and not unto that person who claims it by
title or place, because he is a bishop, or followed by succession, Peter or Paul.
Examine their laws by the Scripture, and then perceive that they are the enemies of
Christ's Church, and the very Church of Korah. Remember therefore to ex
amine all kisds of doctrtne BY the Word of God. As touching the ministers
of the Church, I believe that the Chubch is bound to no sort of people or ant
ordinary sugcssion of Bishops, Cardinals, or such like, BUT UNTO
THE WORD OF GOD ONLY" , . ,, _ ,
The language of Hooper was the common language ol the Ketormers. hays
Jewel " There is no way so easy to beguile the simple as the name and countenance of the
Fathers" "I see plainly," says Chillingworth, "and with mine own eyes, that
there are popes against popes, councils against councils, same fathers against othert ;
a consent of fathers of one age against the consent of the fathers of another age ; the
Church of one age against the Church of another age; traditive interpretations of
Scripture are pretended, but there are few or none to be found. * * In a word,
there is no sufficiency but of the Scripture only, for any considering man to build upon.

the rule and judge of faith. 257
ing a uniformity in the belief of the simple and fundamental
doctrines of grace, as has been found among the several denomi
nations who receive the Bible alone as the sole and sufficient
standard of faith and duty. Wilh all their conflicts on minor
points, there has been in fundamentals, more than anywhere
else, One Faith, and one Lord. Freedom of thought, and free
discussion, have caused at times sharp controversy ; error de
serves it; truth is worth it : but in all, the truth has gained.
Some have apostatised : but the Bible is before them, and no
superior authority binds their consciences to retain the error.
Let the vast corruptions of a thousand years ; let the corruptions
now rising and spreading within the communion paled in and
fenced by Church interpretations and Church authority, decide,
whether, within such fences, these apostates would have done any
better. " There must be heresies," says the Word of God,
" that they which are approved may be made manifest among
you." The great mass have remained firm : the more firm from
the discussions to which these heresies have given rise. " The
sword of the Spirit " is not the interpretations of the Church, but
" The Word of God." If you would repress heresy, leave that
sword unsheathed. A pious prayerful soul may be trusted with
that ; a wilful heretic will not be put down with a human decree
or canon. Bind not up the thoughtful inquirer to believe on the
authority of human interpretations and canons, lest his faith rest
on the wisdom of man, rather than on the Word of God. Rear
up fences of forms, interpretations, and decrees ; and you may
perpetuate your own folly ; you may thrust your wisdom be
tween the soul and the authority of God ; you may arrogate to
yourself the authority of conservator over the understanding of
future generations, as well as of God's Holy Truth ; — but you
may at the same time perpetuate heresy and darkness, and lay
the foundations of a spiritual bondage under which your chil
dren's children may groan in hopeless misery. But let a conti
nent sink in error; let ten thousand times ten thousand blinded
priests conspire to hold them in bondage ; yet throw these fences
down, and send forth one living man with " the Sword of the
Spirit, which is the Word of God ;" — and darkness and super
stition will flee before him. That sword of the Spirit which is
the most powerful to conquer, is most powerful to defend. Give
us this, and let error take the field ; let Satan come in subtlety
or in wrath ; and we have wherewithal to quench his fiery darts.
But remove the faith of the people one step from the Word of
God, and try to fence it round by human decrees and forms,
and the incipient apostasy has begun its march ; the mystery of
iniquity is at work ; nothing but the special providence of God
can prevent Anti-christ from being, in time, fully developed and
revealed. 17

XIX.

ON THE ALLEGED RIGHT TO IMPOSE LITURGIES
AND CEREMONIES.
Illustrated by the Doctrines of Holy Alliance. Enormities in practice,
Necessarily a system of usurpation and persecution. Natural rights of
Christian congregations. Plea of uniformity. The question not of the
expediency of a Liturgy, but of the right to impose one. Canons of
American Episcopacy. Limits of Church power.
Another fundamental principle which demands discussion, sepa
rate from all consideration of Church organization, or modes of
discipline and worship, is the alleged right lo frame Liturgies
and devise ceremonies for the worship of God ; to forbid Christians
to celebrate public worship in any other mode ; and to enforce these
Liturgies and ceremonies by penalties, either civil or ecclesi
astical. The importance of this topic will be better appreciated by a
reference to some instances of parallel usurpations in civil af
fairs. Such a reference will show what fundamental principles
are worth ; and how many seeds of despotism, mischief, and wo,
may be wrapped up in a seemingly innocent line.
Those who are old enough to remember the campaign of Bona
parte in Russia, will call to mind the famous Holy Alliance
formed by several of the crowned heads of Europe. Its object was,
professedly, the peace and stability of the European nations. " The
world," says Daniel Webster, " seems to have received this treaty
upon its first promulgation, with general charity. It was com
monly understood, as little or nothing more than an expression
of thanks for the successful termination of the momentous con
test in which these sovereigns had been engaged."* " In the
name of the Most Holy Trinity," said their manifesto, " their Ma
jesties solemnly declare, that the present act has no other object
than to publish in the face of the whole world, their fixed resolu
tion, both in the administration of their respective states, and in
their political relations with every other government, to take for
* Speech on the Greek Revolution.

alleged right to impose liturgies. 259
their sole guide the precepts of that Holy Religion — namely, the
precepts of justice, Christian charity, and peace — which, far from
being applicable only to private concerns, must have an imme
diate influence on the councils of princes, and guide all their
steps, as being the only means of consolidating human institu
tions, and remedying their imperfections."
All this appeared vastly well. It is probable that they were
sincere ; and that Alexander, at least, the great soul of the Alli
ance, was actuated by the most beneficent motives.
This Alliance, then, was made to keep the peace of Europe ;
and to enforce that peace and the observance of the principles of
justice and Christianity among nations (in the language of Web
ster), " by a million and a half of bayonets."
But now there arose a momentous question : What do these
princes deem to be " the principles of Christianity and justice,"
with regard to human governments ? Oh ! the Divine Right of
Kings : and the absolute destitution of all political rights on the
part of the people ! It was not long before they revealed the
principles on which their conduct was to be governed. The first
principle they put forth was in these words: " All popular or con
stitutional rights are holden no otherwise than as grants from the
crown!' "Society," says Webster, "upon this principle, has no
rights of its own: it takes good government when it can get it,
as a boon and a concession ; but can demand nothing. It is to
live in that favor which emanates from regal authority ; and if it
have the misfortune to lose that favor, there is nothing to protect
it against any degree of injustice and oppression. It can right
fully make no endeavor for a change by itself. * * * All its
duty is described in the single word submission."
The Holy Alliance was not slow to draw the same conclusion.
In the Laybach Circular, of May, 1821, they declared, " That
useful and necessary changes in legislation ought to emeinate
fromthc freewill and intelligent conviction of those whom God
has rendered responsible for power ; and that all that deviate from
this line, necessarily tenet to disorder, commotions, and evils, far
more insupportable than those which they pretended to remedy."
On this principle, the English Barons who, six hundred years
ago, after suffering from the intolerable tyranny of King John,
sword in hand, wrested the Great Charter from that infamous
king at Runnimede, — were entirely to blame ! If the Holy Alli
ance had existed then, it would have put the Barons down. The
king had a divine right to rule the English ; responsible only to
God : and they must submissively wait till the tyrant should
grow kind.
Our notions of freedom are such as to make the very nam?
of charier and liberties, in the English sense, a reproach. Our

260

the puritans and their principles.

franchises we hold by no kingly charter : nor do we hold these
as liberties, but as rights which we will vindicate, — not askas
a favor from any power below that of God. " I need not stop,"
says Webster, " to observe how totally hostile are these doctrines
of Laybach, to the fundamental principles of our government.
They are in direct contradiction ; the principles of good and
evil are hardly more opposite. If these principles of the sove
reigns be true, we are but in a state of rebellion, or of anarchy,
and are only tolerated among civilized states, because it has not
yet been convenient to conform us to the true standard."
The Holy Alliance pursued the principle to its legitimate issue.
They declared that " The Powers" [the Alliance] "have an un
doubted right to take a hostile attitude in regard to those states
in which the overthrow of the government may operate as an ex
ample." " There cannot," says Webster, " be conceived a more flagrant
violation of public law, or national independence, than is con
tained in this short declaration." * * "No matter what be
the character of the government resisted ; no matter with what
weight the foot of the oppressor bears on the neck of the oppress
ed ; if he struggle, or if he complain, he sets a dangerous exam
ple of resistance ; and from that moment he becomes an object
of hostility to the most powerful potentates of the earth. I want
words to express my abhorrence of this abominable principle. I
trust every enlightened man throughout the world will oppose it ;
and that especially those who, like ourselves, are fortunately out
of the reach of the bayonets that enforce it, will proclaim their
detestation of it both loud and decisive."
But why this outcry at a mere abstract principle? On that
principle depends the movement of a million and a half of bay
onets ; and the question of despotism or freedom throughout the
globe. That principle soon awoke to vigorous life. The people
of Spain, worn out with inquisitorial cruelties and grinding op
pression, rose in their might, and established a Constitution. The
bayonets of France, as the instruments of the Alliance, advanced
across the Pyrenees and put that Constitution down. Greece
rose against the bloody rule of the Turks. When the revolu
tion broke out, the sovereigns were in Congress at Laybach, and
declared " their abhorrence of those criminal combinations which
had been formed in the. eastern part of Europe." " The practical
commentary," says Webster, " corresponded with the plain lan
guage of the text. Look at Spain. Look at Greece. If men
may not resist the Spanish Inquisition, and the Turkish Cimetar,
what is there to which humanity must not submit? Stronger
cases can never arise."
The butchery of the Turks was too horrid : nature cried out

alleged right to impose liturgies. 261
against the doctrine of the Holy Alliance. The genius of Eng
land prevailed. The Turkish authority was broken : but mark ;
— The Greeks must not be free ! The republics of Greece re
stored in the midst of despotic Europe ! 0 no : they must have
a king. A weak, wrong-headed boy, a scion of some legitimate
succession, must be set to reign over the high-spirited republican
Greeks !
The Holy Alliance turned their thoughts to the insurrectionary
provinces of South America, and their bayonets would have
re-established there the authority of Spain : but Great Britain
would not be a partner in the crime ; the fleets of Britain were
to be encountered on the sea ; and beyond, lay that Young Re
public, whose chief magistrate had in his message intimated the
determination of the people, that on this continent such things
must not be done.
The principle of the Holy Alliance reached even to the evil
example of our Revolution, and of our Republican Institutions :
nor is there room to question, that not their good will, nor their
forbearance, but the good hand of God, and the difficulty of the
undertaking, kept the Holy Alliance from sending their bayonets
to set up a monarchy in this American land. They did not believe
that any government established and wielded by the people could
be valid. They did not believe that there could lawfully be " a
state without a King."
So much for a principle. The illustration has been long ; but
not too long for its importance.
How does the illustration apply to the case in hand ? The
Church, alias the Hierarchy, set up a claim, not only to be the
judge of faith with authority -paramount to all rights of private
judgment; but they claim also a right to frame liturgies, and
ceremonies, fur the worship of God, and to impose the same upon
all Christians. I say — upon all Christians. Whoever, being
within the pale of that Church, presumes to worship God in
public in any other way, is ecclesiastically punished, or cast out.
Whatever bodies of Christians presume to worship God, with
out submitting to this Hierarchy, and to its liturgies and ceremo
nies, they are regarded as wicked schismatics; and with their
ministers are held up to abhorrence as followers of Korah. In
this principle, and in this line of conduct, Episcopalians both
Popish and Protestant, with some honorable exceptions fully
agree. This principle has been tried on a vast scale, and for a period
of more than a thousand years. And what has been the result ?
A despotism a thousand times more iron-handed and bloody
than that ofthe Holy Alliance. What mummeries; what false
doctrines ; what idolatrous riles ; what prayers to the saints and

262

the puritans and their principles.

the Virgin ; what adoration of images and relics did not the
Church impose ! What oceans of blood were shed, to which all
that has ever been shed by the Holy Alliance has been as a single
drop ! What thousands of martyrs have perished at the stake !
How the snows of the mountains have gleamed with the confla
grations of the burning homes of the disciples of Jesus ! How
the rocks amid the midnight darkness have echoed back their
screams of agony ! What tales of suffering have the prisons to
declare ! What secrets of horror have the vaults of the Inquisi
tion to reveal! .How long and how dreary the darkness that
brooded over the face of the entire Christian world !
Were these the doings of Rome ? They were the legitimate
results of the principle that the Church has authority to ordain
Liturgies and ceremonies for the worship of God, and to require
the people to submit to the same. Is this the principle exclusively
of Rome ? Our fathers fled from the cruelties of the same princi
ple inflicted upon them by Protestant hands. Some of them were
compelled by Protestant hands to drink the cup of martyrdom.
Some were spoiled of their goods. Some were pilloried, mutilated,
scourged. Multitudes perished in prison, of starvation and cold.
Read the sufferings of the Scotch Covenanters under the persecu
tions and dragoonings of the licentious and bloody Charles II.
They were hanged on the gallows, tied to the stake at low water
and drowned by the rising tide ; shot down in the fields, or on the
green grass before their own fire-sides ; hunted in the morasses
and glens ; and their bodies left unburied to be devoured by the
birds of prey* These things were done by Protestant High-
Churchmen, and since the last of them, one hundred and sixty
years have not yet passed away ! From that day to this, the
same ruthless principle has borne upon all who have scrupled to
receive Liturgies and rituals ; in disabilities, vexatious oppres
sions, and in every form of severity that the period of the world
would endure. Why, we are told even in this American land,
that not only has the Church authority to impose these things,
but that without these imposed Liturgies and rituals, the
fold of Jesus is an "unfenced field." Prelates tell us that it
will not do for the people and their ministers to be trusted with
freedom in the worship of God ! Oh, no ! liberty in this matter
is a dangerous possession to the people; the Prelates can
manage to keep it better ! These canons, saints' days, angels'
days, Liturgies and rituals, are very useful ! A liberty to wor
ship God without them is very pernicious, and therefore the
* " It is supposed that Popery has put to death fifteen millions of persons for
truth's sake. * * In the years 1684 and 1685, eighty persons were shot in the
fields in cold blood in Scotland."— ( Traditions ofthe Covenanters, p. 170.) This was
an inconsiderable item in the account ofthe murders perpetrated by the Protestant
High- Churchmen in Scotland.

ALLEGED RIGHT TO IMPOSE. LITURGIES. 263
Church as a good mother has taken that liberty away ! And
thereupon Bishops give charges, and presbyters preach sermons,
to show what schisms, heresies, errors, fanaticisms, spring up for
the want of these very valuable and holy fences to restrain the
very dangerous liberty of people lo worship God ; saying less or
more than the Liturgy prescribes ! Just so Rome talks about the
pernicious results of allowing the people liberty to read the Bible
for themselves.
Do you not see the principle ol the Holy Alliance still ? De
spotic Austria comforts her good people by telling them of the
horrors of liberty. She points to the slrife of political parties in
these United States, to show how dangerous it is for people to
be allowed to choose their own rulers, and how ineffably superior
is the Divine Right of Kings to ihe freedom of the people ! nay,
she shows them by conclusive arguments that absolute despotism
is the only possible freedom ! She points to these unhappy States
as a demonstration of -the mischiefs of popular discussion, of a
free-press, and of popular rights ; and then points to the repose,
stability, and uniformity of a despotic government. Blessed
Austria ! No popular rights to create disturbances ! No popu
lar discussions of political subjects ! No popular elections ! A
good censorship of the press, and a close espionage over every
man's lips, to "fence " out error ! Blessed Austria ! whose
people are trained to regard with silent horror this miserable, wild,
unhappy democracy — this State without a king, across the
waters !
Now, I pray you, whither tends all the talk, that this commu
nity has of late heard, about the benefit of ecclesiastical " fences,"
and all this outcry about heresies and schisms for the want of
liturgies and of a better standard of faith than the Bible ; whither
tend all these harangues, but to show, after the example of Aus
tria and the Holy Alliance, the mischiefs of liberty, and the bene
fit of despotism in Church as well as in State ? Granting that
all these cries of heresies were true (as they are not, but false),
as to the main drift of these allegations (since heresies prevail
far more within the fences of liturgies and rituals than without
them; and discussion in the Episcopal fold, is, or ought to be
as earnest as anywhere else) : granting that all these allegations
were true— still despotism is not the remedy. If it were, even
Protestant Prelatists might return with some advantage to Rome.
Prince Metternich may persuade the Austrians that they live un
der a more blessed government than that of the United States ;
and so the prelates may persuade their people, that prelates and
priests can do much better for them by taking their religious
liberties away ; but we trust that such doctrines can never be so
sweetened and smoothed as to make them extensively palatable

264

THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.

to the sons of the Pilgrims, or to the descendants of the Patriots
of Seventy-Six.
Will it be said that the Episcopal Church, in these United States,
neither professes nor claims the power to enforce her canons,
liturgies and forms by civil penalties?
She nevertheless does enforce them by all the penalties within
her power. She claims a right to rule all the disciples of Christ
within this territory ; and declares, and treats, all who do not
submit, as guilty schismatics. She claims it as the duty of all
Christians to forsake every other Church, and to cleave only to
her, as the only true Church ; out of which there are no cove
nanted mercies of God. She then cuts off every minister, every
man, and every congregation, that does not submit to these man-
made and man-imposed liturgies, rituals, and decrees. What is
this but usurpation and persecution ?
If it is our duty to belong to a particular Church, then that duty
involves a right to enter it and remain there, in the enjoyment of
all the franchises wherewith Christ has made his people free.
He who curtails those franchises is a usurper. He who puts up
a single bar which Christ has not put up, or which Christ has
not authorized him to put up, is a usurper. If Christ has not
enjoined ceremonies, rituals, or liturgies, then any congregation
of Christ's people has an indefeasible right to worship him without;
and he who shuts another out of the Church or the ministry be
cause that other cannot in conscience, or according to his sense
of propriety, observe the ceremonies and liturgies which man has
made to prescribe and limit the worship of God, is both an
USURPER AND SCHISMATIC He HAS USURPED THE RIGHTS OF MAN AND
the prerogatives of God. The so styled Church, which claims
authority over a nation or a province (even admitting, as we do
not, that its entire authority is not usurped), has no more right to
impose upon the several congregations a Liturgy, than it has to
impose a set form of sermons, and to forbid any other sermon or
exhortation. Nay, for a book of sermons a better pretence might
be made, viz. the necessity of guarding the doctrines of the
Church. The so styled " Church," of a nation or province
(which we deny to be any Church at all, in its national or pro
vincial organization or authority), has no more right to require,
of the several congregations, the ceremony of kneeling at the sa
crament, than it has to require them to celebrate Mass ; it has no
more right to require the observance of Lent, or Saints' days,
than it has to require them to fast on Fridays ; no more right to
silence a minister or to exclude a member for refusing to obey
such canons, than it has to cut off their heads. He who cuts me
off from the franchises with which Christ has endowed me, he
who forbids me to worship God in public without the use of a

ALLEGED RIGHT TO IMPOSE LITURGIES. 265
prescribed Liturgy, hinders and obstructs me from discharging
the duties which Christ has commanded me. It matters not
whether it is some " Diotrephes " who " loveth to have the pre
eminence," that has done it, " casting them out of the Church ;"
or whether some Hierarchy, or clique, who have seen fit to im
pose, what neither Christ nor his Apostles enjoined for the worship
of God : and who take it upon them to cast Christ's people out
of his Church, because they will not obey these man-made de
crees ; they are usurpers, schismatics, and persecutors.
But it is said that liturgies and prescribed rituals are necessary
for securing uniformity. Did Christ require all congregations
to observe an exact uniformity, in every word and ritual, when
assembled for the worship of God ? The colors of the rainbow
are not all alike. The beautiful flowers, and trees, and land
scapes, are not all alike. The rivers and valleys are not all alike.
The minds and tastes of men are not all alike ; their circumstances
and wants are not all alike ; the times in which they live are not
all alike ; that prayers and praises may be stinted and limited to
suit the character, circumstances, and wants of all alike. Besides,
the Liturgy of England is not uniform with that of Rome, or with
any other Liturgy. If it were so, uniformity is not unity.
It is not the right, or the expediency of using a Liturgy, which
here comes into question ; but the right to enforce a Liturgy, on
congregations of Christians who do not choose it. Nor would
the question be tho same, if the Liturgy were enforced only upon
those who choose to unite with the communion to which a Lit
urgy is prescribed; while others should be allowed to worship
elsewhere as they please. The Episcopal Church makes not this
allowance; it claims to be " the Church," with right to rule
over all : it treats all others as schismatics out of the pale of
the covenanted mercies of God. And holding forth these exclu
sive claims, it writes this its forty-fifth canon, for the due ob
servance of all Christians who shall attempt to worship God :
" Entry minister shall, before all sermons and lectures, and on all
other occasions of public worship, use the Book of Common Prayer,
as the same is or may be established by the authority of the General
Convention of this Church. And in performing said service, no
other prayers shall be used than those prescribed by said book."
On this canon, Dr. Hawkes remarks, that some of the clergy
" have felt themselves at liberty, after the sermon, to make an ex
temporary prayer. Very few, however," he adds, " it is be
lieved, have "done so." He gives it as his opinion, that such a
practice is not in accordance with the canon : " as its purpose
was, on all occasions of public worship, to render obligatory
the use of a rescript form of prayer :" which rescript he con
siders as obligatory " After the sermon as before:

"»

* Constitution and Canons of the Episcopal Church, p 377

266 THE puritans and their principles.
Now, to my mind, such a canon is a horrible usurpation and
tyranny, to which no Christian should ever submit. What ! for
such a man as the venerated Dr. Milnor, or Leigh Richmond, in
the habit of praying without book, and entirely capable of pour
ing out his soul in warm, living language ; for such a man, under
circumstances of peculiar interest, or of great and startling emer
gency ; or after a sermon, when sinners are awakened, and in
tears, to be told, No, you must not offer an extemporary
prayer; the canon forbids it! You shall be liable never to be
allowed to preach the Gospel more, if you transgress the canon !
For such a man, and for the congregation, too, while the spirit
within him is groaning for utterance, to be limited to a rescript,
formal, general Collect, of no adaptedness to the occasion ! What
is it but the grossest tyranny ! an insult to God ! an outrage upon
the dearest rights of man ! How nearly it savors of the proceeding
of Darius the king, when, at the instigation of the presidents,
governors, and princes, he made a " Decree that whosoever should
ask a petition of any God or man, save of the king, for thirty
days, should be cast into the den of lions." What right has the
Church to prescribe prayers more than sermons ? Why might
she not, with the same propriety, prescribe a sermon-book; and
decree by canon, that if any warm-hearted minister should pre
sume to venture an exhortation, not prescribed in the book, he
should be cast out of the Church, or silenced, according to the
canon ?
How often is the Prayer-Book lean and barren, when com
pared with the occasion ? I remember one gloomy Sabbath
morning during the last war with Great Britain, when every man
capable of bearing arms was summoned from my native village
to meet the invading foe ; — how desolate the Sanctuary seemed
when none but the aged, the women, and the children were
there; what tears were shed; what stifled sobs were heard,
when the minister poured forth his prayer adapted to the dangers
of their loved ones, and to the sorrows and fears of those who
remained. I remember hearing the people in a town on the
shores of Lake Champlain, near the northern line of Vermont,
tell,— how on the 14th of September, 1814— when nearly all
their men were gone across the lake to meet the overwhelming
force of the enemy, who were only waiting the coming up of
the fleet, to begin the combat ; on the morning of that Sabbath,
the British fleet was descried sweeping by ; and as the bell was
tolling for public worship, the roar of the battle began ; they
saw the smoke ; they heard the distant thunder ; their husbands
and fathers and brothers were there. The man of God entered
with a firm step into the place of worship, and without taking
his seat, or a moment's pause— lifted up his hands and said, Let

ALLEGED RIGHT TO IMPOSE LITURGIES. 267
os Pray. Nor while that combat raged, did he cease to pray .
nor the anxious congregation to mingle their tears and sobbings
with their prayers. O, for the Church to come in with its canons
at such a time : and say to the man of God, Here, take the book ;
the Church forbids you to call upon God, save only in this re
script form ! Wlio is the Church, that comes thus to interfere
with individual ministers and congregations ; and to stand be
tween their souls and the Throne, when they assemble to wor
ship God ?— But this inquiry belongs to another place, in which
we trust it will appear that Christ has left no such authority — no
such " Church " on earth, as the authority by which these canons
and liturgies are framed and imposed.
But supposing, as we do at present for the argument's sake, that
what claims to be " The Church " is such in reality, and may
rightfully exercise ecclesiastical powers : even on this supposition,
Christ has given no power of prescribing liturgies and ceremo
nies for the worship of God, to any human authority. The
commission to the Apostles was (and surely none may go be
yond this) — " Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I
have commanded you." No Church authority, therefore, may go
beyond, and charge upon the conscience, or lay an incumbrance
upon the worship of God, beyond what Christ has commanded.
John Cotton has well remarked on this passage, " if the Apostles
leach people to observe more than Christ has commanded, they
go beyond their commission ; and a larger commission than that
given to the Aposlles, nor Elders, nor Synods, nor Churches can
challenge." But it is said that the Church has authority to order in things
indifferent. Who is to judge whether the thing imposed be
indifferent? Does the Church then judge a liturgy to be indiffer
ent? Sponsors in baptism; and other things which she pre
scribes for the worship of God, and for the Sacraments ; — does
she judge these all indifferent ? Under this notion of indiffer
ence were brought in all the mummeries of Rome ; and Rome,
as well as the English Church, judged that she had a right to
overrule all scruples of conscience, as to what things were, or
were not indifferent.
But imposing things indifferent is more than Apostles durst
do ; for when certain from Judca told the disciples of Antioch
that they must be circumcised, and advice was asked of the
Church at Jerusalem with the Aposlles and elders; these having
the Holy Ghost, concluded to lay upon them no greater burden
than some " necessary things." Who now may go beyond,
and impose things unnecessary, i. e. things indifferent ? " What
charier," says Stillingfleet, "has Christ given the Church, to bind
men up to mure than himself hath done ? ox to exclude those from

268

THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.

her society, who may be admitted to heaven. Will Christ ever
thank men, at the great day, for keeping such out from commu
nion with his Church, to whom he will vouchsafe (not only)
crowns of glory ; but it may be aureola;, golden too, if there be
any such there ?" " The grand commission with which the
Apostles were sent out, was only to teach what Christ had com
manded them. Not the least intimation of any power given
them to impose anything beyond what he himself had spoken
to them, or they were directed by the immediate guidance of the
Spirit of God." " There were diversities of practice and vari
eties of observances among Christians ; but the Holy Ghost
never thought those things ought to be made matters of laws."
* * " The Apostles valued not indifferences at all," * * '
" and what reason is there why men should be so strictly tied up
to such things, which they may do, or let alone, and yet be very
good Christians still ?" * * * " Without all controversy, the
main inlet of all the distractions, confusions, and divisions ofthe
Christian world, hath been by adding other conditions of Church
communion than Christ hath done." * * * " Would there
even be less peace and unity in a Church, if a diversity were
allowed as to practices supposed indifferent ? Yea, there would
be so much more as there was a mutual forbearance and conde
scension as to such things. The unity of a Church is a unity
of love, and of doctrine, not a bare uniformity of practice, or of
opinion." The remarks of Owen on this question are also in point.
" Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have com
manded you — Tluvxa 6o-a. The commission goes no further.
Let the Liturgy be tried by this rule ; and I cannot but admire,
with what peace and satisfaction to their own souls, men caw
pretend to act as by commission from Christ, as the chief adminis
trators of his government and worship on earth, and make it
their whole business almost, to teach men to do and observe
what he never commanded; and rigorously to inquire after
and into their own commands, whilst those of the Lord Jesus
are openly neglected."
But it is alleged that the Scripture says " Let all things be
done decently and in order." This only forbids things disorderly
and indecent in the worship of God. Within the wide range of
what is orderly and decent, it leaves people entirely free. It can
give no authority to impose a Liturgy, till it is first decided that
to worship God without a Liturgy is disorderly and indecent,
and subversive of the ends of worship. The remarks of John
Cotton on this point are to the point and conclusive. " Suppose
the Church of Corinth (or any other Church or Synod) should
enjoin upon their ministers to preach in a gown. A gown is a

ALLEGED RIGHT TO IMPOSE LITURGIES. 269
decent garment to preach in, yet such an injunction is not ground
ed upon that text of the Apostle ; for then a minister neglecting
to preach in a gown would neglect the commandments of the
Aposlle, which indeed he doth not. For if he preach in a cloak
he preacheth decently enough, and that is all which the Apostle's
canon reacheth."
The duty of worshipping God involves the right to worship
him according to our own conscience and His holy Word. It
frees us from all Liturgies and ceremonies imposed by man. In
imposing such things by all the penalties within her power, and
in debarring all who will not use these Liturgies and ceremo
nies, from the common privileges of Christianity, the Episcopal
Church, as well as the Roman, while she claims to be exclusively
"the Church," is, according to her ability, a great persecutor
and a schismatic. She has usurped Christ's prerogatives, and
his people's rights ; she hinders and forbids Christ's people
from a free and conscientious discharge of the duties required of
them. If they will not submit to her usurpations, she will, as
much as in her lies, debar them from all Church privileges and
ordinances, and deny them all participation in the public worship
of God.
Ought there to be a doubt that this part of her settled policy
and law, is a criminal usurpation, which no Christian should
either submit to or abet — a course of policy and law, which that
Church is bound forthwith to reform, and for whose past
enormities she ought to humble herself in deep repentance 1 To
deny men their civil rights is something ; to plunder men of their
property by highway robbery is something ; but to usurp the rights
of conscience in the matter of worshipping God, and in such a
matter to " frame iniquity by law," is an outrage which ought
no longer to be perpetrated by anything that claims to be The
Church of Christ.

XX

ON SCHISM.
Examination of the grounds on which the Puritan Churches are charged
as schismatical. The Prelatical Doctrine of Schism tested by Scrip
ture. Singular scheme for restoring a visible Unity. Scriptural view of
Schism.
A great outcry is made about the sin of Schism. Our Puri
tan Fathers, and all who worship God, save in the forms and
under the authority of Prelacy, are denounced as Schismatics.
The grounds on which these charges are made, are various—
our accusers not appearing to have well digested the principles on
which they would determine in what the sin consists ; and, for
that reason, laying down now one basis, and now another; con
sistent with themselves in nothing, save that in all shifting and
changes, they keep still upon ground which would hand over
the whole Christian world to despotism and darkness.
What is that guilty schism which is charged upon us ? If you
inquire of the books and missiles in which that charge is so cur
rently made, you will find its essence to consist in one of these
three particulars :
1. The breaking away of any body of Christians from the
customs, or rule, of the Catholic, or Universal Church :
2. Worshiping God in public, or socially, without conformity to
the Liturgy, or rituals of the National Church : or,
3. Departing from the authority of the Diocesan Bishop of the
particular territory : or in not maintaining communion with, and
subjection to, some Prelate of the Apostolical succession.
With regard to the first of these grounds, we answer (1.) That
if Schism consists in breaking away from the authority of the so
called Universal or Catholic Church — viz. the authority of a
Catholic organization, having an earthly head, or bearing earthly
rule over all Christians ; then neither we nor our Episcopal breth
ren recognize any such organization or authority. The New
Testament knows nothing of it Nobody claims it, save Anti
christ

ON SCHISM. 271
(2.) If Schism consists in want of conformity to the customs-
liturgies, ceremonies, observances — of the Universal Church ;
then we answer that there are no such universal customs
from which we have broken away. The liturgy of those who
particularly make the charge upon us, differs from every other
liturgy on earth, and from that of any other Church that ever ex
isted. Its ceremonials do the same. Its doctrines differ funda
mentally from those of the Roman, and Greek, and Armenian
Churches. Between its written prayers and our extempore
prayers, and worship, there is, in the main, a happy agreement, in
spirit and substance ; while the difference between both and
many of those of Rome, is heaven-wide. But we are not
bound at all to inquire what are the customs, ceremonies, liturgies,
or doctrines of the Universal Church : but only what is required
in the Word of God. It is no schism for any congregation of
Christians, to cast off entirely all forms, and doctrines, and ordi
nances, which rest merely in the " commandments of men."
In so doing, they break none of Christ's laws, and infringe not
upon any of his people's rights. It is no schism, no breach of
fellowship, or of charity. They who take offence at this ; who
deny these franchises ; who would impose human rituals and
ordinances; and then denounce and punish those as schismatics
who do not obey— tbey are the schismatics.
What is true of all congregations of Christ's people every
where, is more apparently and undeniably so in ours. Our Fa
thers came — acknowledged members of Christ's Church, and their
ministers acknowledged as lawfully ordained ministers — into a
wilderness, three thousand miles away from any part of Christ's
Church, that could even pretend to any jurisdiction over them.
They took Christ's word: and whatever He ordained, that they
acknowledged. Whatever ceremonies and ordinances were
9imply of man's invention, those they threw entirely aside. Was
it schism to do so? And now there come men into the midst of
these Churches, and call us dissenters and schismatics ! They
say it is a heinous sin for any Christian to worship with us !* that
our Churches are no Churches ! that our ministers are followers
of Korah, Dathan and Abiram ! and that none who hold with
us, have any part in the covenanted mercies of God !
But if our Fathers were bound to follow the customs of the
Catholic Church ; then, what customs, or the customs of what part
of it, should they have followed ? Those of England ? Then the
emigrants to Mexico and South America must follow those of
Sec Chapin's Reasons for not joining in sectarian worship. Yet in that work,
the author makes this remarkable concession: " If we" [Episcopalians] " have no more
Scripture warrant than other denominations, we" [Episcopalians] ''are guilty of
scniMit. They were here first ; they are more in numbers ; aw" if they are equally right,
i' w tin /or us (o separate from tliem." P. 16.

272

THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.

Spain: the emigrants to Canada must follow those of France:
the mingled emigrants to these United Stales of later years, must
follow the customs of their respective countries : and here is a
beautiful specimen of Unity in Catholic customs ! On this ground,
why has England sent her Protestant Bishops and Liturgy into
Popish L-eland ? Why did she send them to Popish Canada?
The first alleged ground of schism is an absurdity.
2. Does Schism consist in worshipping God publicly or so
cially, without conforming to the Liturgy or rituals of the Na
tional Church ?
The National Church ? Then what constitutes schism in these
United States ? The National Church ! The authority of that
Church was as valid under the Bloody Mary as in the days of
Elizabeth ; and Cranmer, Latimer, Ridley and the other English
martyrs were schismatics, for not conforming themselves to the
canons, rituals and liturgy of the National Church. If such a
Church may exist and have authority, then the Church of Spain
or of France is endowed with righteous authority, equally with
that of England. A National Church ? A National organiza
tion with power to decree rites, liturgies and canons for a nation !
Where is its model or warrant in the New Testament ? What
are its prerogatives and powers ? What are its officers ; and
where in the New Testament is the record of their appointment?
Where is the charter of their authority ? A National Church !
There is no such thing, having any authority that a Christian
may acknowledge. It is all a usurpation. It is no schism to
regard such canons, traditions, ceremonies, and imposed liturgies
as a nullity. No Schism ? — Nay, they who submit to its decrees
are abettors of a conspiracy against the rights of Christ's people ;
and of treason against the only Lawgiver and Head ofthe Church.
They who attempt to enforce the requirements of such a pre
tended Church upon Christ's people, make war upon the liber
ties and order of Christ's kingdom. These are they who rend
the seamless mantle of Christ; and who, in the pride and arro
gance of assumed power, seem determined to rule or ruin the
Church of the living God.*
* Chapin, in his " Primitive Church," has a chapter entitled " The English
Reformation Canonical." It would have been more to the point to show.
(with regard to the authority that effected it) that it was scriptural. Canonical!
Queen Mary too made a " Canonical" reformation when she carried the reformation
back to Rome. " The English Reformation Canonical 1" The very implication of
such a title condemns the reformation in Germany as a wicked schism. This is
indeed the drift of his argument. So Dr. Jarvis, in his late Tract, " No Union
with Rome " gravely argues that it was lawful for the " British Church" to recover
her original customs and privileges." He says he is "prepared and if proper encour-
aeement is given, he will hereafter proceed to show that * * * the Church of Britain
was one of those countries, which in the language of the Canonists was autoctpha-
lous, i e held in itself an inherent jurisdiction independent of any foreign power.
"And if such was the fact it would be absurd to maintain that the United Stales, a

ON SCHISM. 273
3. The third ground on which, we are charged as schismatics
is, that schism consists in departing from the authority of the
Diocesan Bishop of the particular territory : or in not
maintaining communion with, and subjection to, some pre
late of the Apostolical succession.
We hold that the very existence of a Diocesan Bishop was
unknown to the original Church ; and that his power and office
is an entire usurpation, and that the so-called " Apostolical suc
cession" is false and Popish in principle, and false in fact.
These things we shall endeavor to show in the proper place. If
these views are correct, then Diocesan Bishops and their adherents
are the schismatics ; not those who reject their usurped authority.
But for the present, let us examine the prelatical doctrine of
schism upon its own grounds. The principle which now comes
into question is, that a departure from the Diocesan Bishop is to
be guilty of the sin of schism. Reforms must begin with the
Bishop ; those who do not stand by the Bishop wherever he
stands, and follow him whithersoever he goes ; — or certainly,
they who separate from him, are wicked schismatics. Here is the
doctrine of the Holy Alliance over again : all needful reforms
must come from the sovereign — i. e. in this case, from the lord
over God's heritage. The people have no rights or duties, save
that of submission to the Bishop. On this principle the Wick-
liffites, the Hussites, the Albigenses, and Waldenses were
wicked schismatics : Luther was but a wicked schismatic — de
parting from his Bishop, and even calling in question his very
rnuntry not known when the Patriarchate ofthe West was conceded to the Bishop
i>f Rome, and colonized by Britain after she had recovered her independence, can,
of riijht, become a dependent on the Roman see."
What an exhibition of folly and superstition ! Does the right of the British
f'hurch to reform itself, depend upon what records Dr. Jarvis or some other man may
dig up from dust and worms, to prove that Britain was originally autocephalous ?
\Vill_Dr. Jarvis join in that issue with Rome ? And if the proof fails, will he concede a
riijht to Rome once more to sway the sceptre over England ? Is this the last hope of
wanting off from these United States the calamity of being conceded " of right" a
dependency ofthe Roman see ? Why, to enter at all upon this argument, is to oon-
ckdii, that all countries which began their Christian career under the auspices of
Rome, must for ever remain under her dominion. Dr. Jarvis is "prepared," and if
'' suitable encouragement is given ," he " will proceed to show" — what 1 Why, this
forsooth ;— he will show by learned researches in history about the Patriarchate ofthe
Wast, and its date; — hy documentary proofs — so voluminous, that encouragement is
needed to pay the printer I — that these United States are not " of right" a dependency
ofthe Roman see I"
But let not the good Protestants of the United States be alarmed. The ques
tion it only between the Protestant Prelates and the Papist, as to which has
the cxcluiivo right to lord it over this domain. When they are through with their
documentary proofs, and with their "endless genealogies" of " the succession-" —
whether England waB ever Autocephalous or not, we apprehend that either party, if vic
torious, will have to enter upon another argument with the peoi>le. We do not by
My moons concede, that if Protestant prelates do not rule us, the Popish must We
care not at all how that dispute, about the autocephalousncss of England, is decided
wwten Dr. Jarvis and the Pope.
18

274

THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES,

authority. The disciples of Christ who perished in the dun
geons ofthe Inquisition, were schismatics ; those who met in secret
to worship God under the reign of Bloody Mary, were wicked
schismatics ; and the same was true of all the martyrs who perished
at the stake. This principle delivers the world over to a despotism
as dark and hopeless as any under which human nature ever groan
ed. A reformation under such a principle is a hopeless impossibil
ity. Never, in the history of the world, did a reformation begin
with prelatical bishops : Never. The reformation had struggled in
England among the common people, from the days of Wickliffe.*
From the midst of persecutions and dungeons, the light fled
from England to the continent ; and there John Huss and Je
rome of Prague had suffered burning. The remains of thai
persecuted and crushed reformation were yet lingering in Eng
land, when the light once more broke in from Saxony. Even
then, it was not the canonical movement of the Bishops that com
menced and carried on the Reformation ; but God overruled the
lust and wickedness of one of the vilest monsters that ever filled
* It was on the ground that the English people kept with the Bishops, that Mr. Cha-
pin styles the English Reformation canonical. On the same ground, Bishop Brow
nell declares in his charge, how happy it would have been, " When the Dignitaries
of the Continental Churches refused to unite in the Holy work of the Reformation * *
* * if a continuance of the ministerial succession had been sought from the English
Church ;" at all events, they should have had the grace to keep by some Bishop.
Would that have been canonical ? Bishop Brownell, here', would allow private judg
ment to determine upon the orthodoxy of the Bishops ; when he will not trust pri
vate judgment with the Word of God ! He here admits the right of the people, in
one diocese, to renounce their own Bishop, and attach themselves to another ; and
that on the ground of their own private judgment. Is that canonical; oris it
schism ? The principles of Bishop Brownell, and of Mr. Chapin, would not fail,
on their own principles, to fill the " Catholic Church " with confusion and divi
sions without end. Besides, that principle is heresy on their own ground ; being
condemned by the fathers, and that too, by one of the first two centuries : as we shall
presently see.
There is a further inquiry with regard to this " Canonical Reformation." Is it
canonical for the civil power to depose one set of Bishops, and to set up others ?
Our Canonists may take which horn of the dilemma they will. The deprivation
of the Popish Bishops under Queen Elizabeth was either lawful or unlawful.
At that time, Bishop Kitchen alone consented to the Reformation ; and all others
were deposed. If their deprivation was lawful ; tben any apostolical acts which
these Popish Bishops might afterwards perform in England, were null and void.
The priests whom they should ordain, would be no priests ; and their acts a nullity.
Also, if the deprivation of these Bishops was lawful, then was the deprivation of
the Protestant Bishops, in the time of Queen Mary, also lawful— being performed in
the same way, and by the same authority. If so, then the consecration of Arch
bishop Parker by these deprived Bishops ( Coverdale, the only " conducting " link,
was never restored) was unlawful; and all the present ordinations of England and
of the United States are unlawful, and null, and void ! This is one horn of the di
lemma. But if the deprivation of the Popish Bishops by Queen Elizabeth was
unlawful; then the Reformation was not canonical, but a wicked schism! The
ordination of Archbishop Parker, hy deprived Bishops, was unlawful, and all the
ordinations of the usurping Bishops, and of all that follow them down through
time are unlawful and null, and void. On their own ground, our High Church
Episcopalians are cut off from "the covenanted mercy of God ;" their first duty,
and their only hope is, to make the best of their way back to Rome.

ON SCHISM. 275
a throne, to break through all canons ; and to chain the prelates
to his revolutionary car. It was the throne and the Parliament
that finally unthrottled the hands of the prelates from the neck
of truth and freedom gasping for life ; — that deposed some, and
set up others ; and in a way contrcvry to all canons, carried on the
Reformation by the weight of the civil arm. Had any of the
crowned heads on the continent been laid under similar induce
ments, there might have been reforming Bishops on the continent ;
provided those sovereigns had wielded the sceptre with as vigor
ous a hand as the English Henry. Otherwise, like kings and em
perors before them, tbey might have been glad to wait before the
gates of the sovereign Pontiff, barefoot, and in a shirt of hair,
through a winter's night, glad to be admitted to kiss his toe in the
morning. A Reformation canonical, in the sense of waiting for
the Bishops, and of not moving without them. Never. Human
nature is too fond of power ; and the possession of such unearth
ly power is too corrupting for a reformation ever to begin with
Prelates. And yet it is schism to depart from Diocesan Bishops !
Thus Bishop Hobart, in his " Companion for the Altar," says,
" Let it be thy supreme care, O my soul, to receive the blessed
sacrament of the body and blood of the Saviour, only from- the
hands of those who derive their authority by regular transmission
from Christ." * * * " Where the Gospel is proclaimed, com
munion with the Church by the participation of its ordinances
at the hands of the duly authorized priesthood is the indispen
sable CONDITION OF SALVATION."*
Now were it not that the Fathers of the second and third cen
turies speak of parish Bishops and not of Diocesans, this dogma
might be substantiated from the Fathers ; though, as we shall see,
it is contrary to the Bible. Thus : Irenaeus says, " Wheresoever
the Bishop shall appear, there also let the people be." That is,
if thi3 can apply to Diocesans — let the people be with Bonner
when he is bishop : when Latimer is in the chair, let them go
with Lalimer; at another time, let them go with Laud. Let
them believe one Gospel with Bishop .Mellvaine, and another
Gospel with Bishop Doane and the Pope. The same Father says.
*' See that ye follow your Bishop, even as God the Father." Ig
natius says, " We ought to look upon the Bishop as we would look
* The Bishop afterwards attempted to extricate himself from this position, by
»«yingthatby_" indispensable condition" he did not mean that God might not dis
pense wilh it in cases of "ignorance, invincible prejudice, imperfect reasoning, &c,
—but that man might not dispense with it." What is this but preaching to every
man, KpUenpnry or Brdition ? you may not dispense with Episcopacy, and have any
warrant on Gospel grounds— or offers,— that you shall be saved. Rev. Mr. Bristed,
n thorough Kpiscopalian, but a Low Churchman, makes this just remark. "The
utirlnne of High Churchmen is, that all Non-Episcopalians are in the broad road
<o perdition ; their watchword is, Episcopacy or damnation * * * as if such
a dogma were not the very essence of Popery."

276

THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.

upon the Lord himself;" and again, — " subject to your Bishop
as to the command of God;" and again, — "Hearken unto the
Bishop, that God may hearken unto you. My soul be security for
them that submit to their Bishop." The Oxford Tractarians
add their testimony on this point, thus : Tract No. 5. " The
Bishop is the shepherd of our souls while Christ is away ;" and
Tract No. 10. " Be as sure that the Bishop is Christ's appointed
representative, as if we actually saw upon Ms head a cloven
tongue like as of fire ;" and again ; " The Bishop rules the whole
Church here below, as Christ rules it above :" and again ; " Christ
the true mediator above ; the Bishop his earthly likeness."
Such is the doctrine of Prelacy ; but hear the doctrine of the
Bible. It was a true Apostle, and no pretended successor, who
said, " Be ye followers of me, even as I am of Christ." No
further than this must we follow even an Apostle ; no, nor even
an angel. " Though we or an angel from Heaven preach
any other Gospel unto you than that which we have preached
unto you, let him be accursed. As we said before, so say I now
again ; If any man preach any other Gospel unto you than that
ye have received, let him be accursed ;" no matter what his suc-
cessional pedigree; no matter what his office; if you leave
Christ's Gospel to follow such a Bishop, you leave Christ, and
are a traitor to his truth and kingdom. Even though the
authority of a Bishop were ever so lawful, it is as it was in the
case of the traitor Benedict Arnold, in the days of the American
Revolution ; bis office was valid, his officers and soldiers owed
him a military obedience, but the moment they discovered his
treason against the supreme power which gave him his commis
sion, that moment they were bound to leave him. To follow him
then would make them partakers of his treason.
The prelatical doctrine of schism turns away from the great
principles and design of Christianity, or rather it lays Christianity
itself on the altar a sacrifice to Prelacy. It makes an outward
organization the main end of religion ; it sacrifices God's truth,
and human freedom, and conscience, to the great end of exalting
the hierarchy. It makes Christ's kingdom emphatically of this
world. It puts Christ's laws and people beneath the feet of the
Prelates. In one word, it is Anti-Christian ; a part of the " mys
tery of iniquity ;" one of the main foundations of him " who sit
teth in the temple of God, showing himself, that he is God."
It affords an instructive lesson concerning the miserable nature
of this prelatical notion of schism, to observe the plan gravely
marked out by the present Bishop of Vermont, for the restoration
of Unity in the Church. " 0, my brethren," says he (p. 303),
" how often have I thought of this question, until my heart has
yearned over the miseries of sectarian division ; and I have felt

ON SCHISM. 277
as if my life would be a cheap sacrifice for the Unity of Zion."
* * " How often have I dwelt upon the mode in which alone
it seemed to my mind, that such a result could be accomplished,
until I almost imagined that the time had come."
And what is that " mode" that " only" mode, " in which alone"
this unity can be effected ? Hear Bishop Hopkins' plan : "At
length the favored hour is come, and lo ! a general cry is heard, for
a UNIVERSAL COUNCIL." He would have it held on our
free soil; in Philadelphia, the city of brotherly love. " Rome
hears, and responds to the appeal." * * " Her hierarchy all
consent to the proposed pacification, and appoint their delegates ;
men unsurpassed in varied learning, and renowned for dialectic
skill." "Greece gladly unites." "Protestant Germany" — yes!
Protestant Germany ; Transcendentalists, Neologists — men de
nying the Lord that bought them : denying the inspiration of the
Scriptures, and the very personality of the Holy Ghost — even
these the Bishop greets, as they enter the precincts of the Univer
sal Council! And England ? " England, the friend of toleration;
and now, more than ever, feeling the absolute necessity of religious
unity: England, chafed and irritated by the demons of sectarian
zeal; once revolutionized by the fury of fanaticism, and now bleed
ing under the lash of civil discord, * * * England hails the
summons, and joyfully yields her treasures to the work which pro
mises to make the Holy Catholic Church one again."
England the friend of toleration ! Shades of Bishop Bonner
and Archbishop Laud! England, "chafed by the demons of
sectarian zeal ?" Marvellously conciliatory to the children of
them who suffered imprisonment, banishment or death, for free
dom to worship God ! But let that pass.
The Grand Council is assembled. Papists, Neologists, Prela-
tists : all are there. But for the Dissenters — the Puritans, the
Methodists, the Baptists — the good Bishop gives them no sum
mons. It might not be agreeable to the company invited, to
summon any that are not of the " Catholic Church." The Coun
cil is assembled. And now for the basis on w/ti-ch to agree : what
is tiik Rule and Judge of faith ?
In another publication, Bishop Hopkins has stood for the Bible
alone: but now, in the Universal Council, he will give up that
principle for the sake of Union with Romanists. On what Rule
of Faith he would agree with the German Neologists, who deny
both inspiration and the Holy Ghost, it does not appear. But
hear the Bishop in his own words (p. 306)," And now the prin
ciple is to be settled, which shell guide the deliberations of this
august body. And, thank Cod, there can be no serious difficulty
in the search; for the principles avowed by the Church of Rome
may be made to quadrate sufficiently with the principles of the Re-

278

THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.

formation, when the minds of Christians are governed by the
pure desire of truth and of unity. The Bible and Apostolical
Tradition, are the standards to which the Church of Rome has
always professed to appeal ; and she consents lo try her apostoli
cal traditions by the testimony of the Fathers." * * *
" The Word of God, therefore, and the writings of the Fathers,
being in fact the only authorities to which the great divisions ofthe
Christian world ever have appealed, TO THESE THE AP
PEAL MUST NOW BE MADE." Alas, alas! Bishop Hop
kins will now trust a Council of Papists, Greeks, High Church
men and Neologists, to settle authoritatively the faith of the world,
on the basis of Scripture and tradition, interpreted by the Fathers!
And that with the express understanding, that " The principles
of the Church of Rome may be made to quadrate sufficiently
with the principles of the Reformation!" " And now," he says,
" behold the work is done : the trumpet of the Christian Jubilee is
blown throughout the earth."
Yes ; a Holy Alliance to dethrone the Lord Jesus Christ, and
to give his seat and sceptre into the hands of a human hierarchy !
A Holy Alliance to throw down the Bible from the altar of God,
and to exalt a mingled creed, the fruit of an incestuous compro
mise between truth and falsehood ! This is to give peace to
Zion ! This is to bind Christians in uniformity ! Just as
if when men cannot be made to agree by the clear truth and
authority of God, they can be made to agree by the wisdom
and mandates of such a mongrel assembly, — ycleped a " Uni
versal Council."
We can point Bishop Hopkins to a shorter, surer, safer way
to Christian unity. Bind each congregation and each Christian
to God's Word and lo Christ's commandments alone. The ordi
nances and commandments of men, throw them all aside.
Leave each congregation, and each Christian, to go to his Bible
for himself. Whatever congregations hold the essentials of
Christianity, and conscientiously observe Christ's ordinances ;
hold them as true Churches ; call them not sectarians or schis
matics ; no, nor dissenters. Lift everywhere the standard of
mutual respect and love, emblazoned with these sentences of
Divine truth : " Let every man be fully persuaded in his
own mind." " Who art thou that judgest another man's
servant." " Why dost thou judge thy brother? or why
dost thou set at naught thy brother?" "Not as Lords
over God's heritage but as ensamples to the flock." This
done, blow the trumpet of Jubilee as loud and as long as
you please. If not uniformity, there is essential unity ; all that
Christ has made provision for, or required. Uniformity, he has
forbidden any man, or any Church to require. " Let not Am

ON SCHISM. 279
thai eateth, despise him that eateth not : and let not him which
eateth not, judge him that eateth; for God hath received him."
" Let us not, therefore, judge one another any more; but judge
this, that no man put a stumbling-block, or an occasion to fall, in
his brother's way."*
It is time to turn from these notions of schism, so absurd in
themselves, and so utterly inconsistent with the least shadow of
Christian liberty, to the idea of schism set forth in the
Word of God.
We shall find there, no allusion to such thing as schism,
consisting in breaking away from the domination of Popes,
Councils, Prelates, or of the " Catholic " Church. The Word
of God charges no schism upon those who follow simply the
ordinances of th3 Lord Jesus Christ, and reject the mere ordi
nances and commandments of men. It does not forbid us to
separate from false teachers, whatever be their official character ;
but, on the contrary, requires us to reject such a teacher, though
he were an Apostle or an Angel from Heaven. The Schism
of which the New Testament speaks, is internal dissension, within
the bosom ofthe same Church. Thus, Rom. xvi. 17, "Now I beseech
you, brethren, mark those which cause divisions " (dixoojucnac,)
" contrary to the doctrine which ye have heard, and avoid
them." Is it schism, then, to "avoid" a bishop who teaches
another Gospel contrary to the doctrine that we have heard ?
Again, 1 Cor. i. 11, " Now I beseech you, brethren, by the name of
our Lord Jesus Christ, that there be no divisions " (o/io-.uara,
schisms) " among you; but that ye be perfectly joined together in
*The English Reformers, while they greatly erred in requiring uniformity at
homo, nevertheless, acted on these principles with regard to Christians abroad.
Mr. Chapin, in his Primitive Church, with his usual assurance, says, " The Episco
pal Church has never renounced the divine institution of Episcopacy, nor has she
ever acknowledged the orders of any one who had not been Episcopaily ordained.''
I have before shown that the English Reformers did not believe in the divine in -
itilution of Episcopacy ; and it is notorious that they uniformly treated the non-
Episcopal foreign Churches and ministers as true Churches and true ministers.
fislmp Burnet, whose authority on this point is unquestionable, says, " Whatever
some, hotter spirits have thought of this since that time, yet tee are very sure that
not only those who penned the Articles, but the body of this Church for about half
nn ;\ge after, did * # acknowledge the foreign Churches so constituted, to be
trim Churches as to all the essentials of a Church." Ciiillinoworth denies that
Luther and the other Reformers were schismatics for leaving Rome ; and maintains
tli.it lliey were "a part of the Church, and still continued so; and therefore could
no more separate from the whole than from themselves." Even Hooker (Book
J, ' C\H) says, " The Church is a name which aTt has given to the professors of the true
ru""'' * * We find that accordingly the Apostles do everywhere distinguish the
Church from Infidels and Jews ; accounting them which call i;ros the name of
ouit Loud Jesus Christ, to he his Church ;" and any other essential thing
nut into the definition of the Church, Hooker maintains to be wrong. He express
ly snys (Book 7, '11) that "There may be sometimes very just and sufficient
reasons to allow ordination without a Bishop. * *¦ And therefore we are not simply,
without exception, to urge a lineal descent * * by continued succession of Bishops
in every effectual ordination."

280 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
the same mind, and in the same judgment ; for it hath been de
clared unto me of you, my brethren, by them which are of the
house of Chloe, that there are contentions among you." Is there
no schism in the Episcopal Church, because they all bow to the
authority of bishops, all use the Liturgy, and all the priests wear
gowns and surplices ; while, nevertheless, contentions about
Puseyism are rending the very bowels of the Church, and forbid
them to be " in the same mind," and in the " same judgment ?" In
like manner, in 1 Cor .xii. 25, it is said, " That there should be no
schism in the body, but that the members should have the
same care one for another."
The prelatical notion of schism is unfounded in Scripture : an
engine invented to bind the consciences of men in the chains of
despotism ; to detach Christ's people from their allegiance to His
truth and throne, and to bind them to the usurped power of a
human hierarchy. An Apostle of old found occasion to speak of
some who would burden Christianity by the addition of human
rites. " Who," says he, " came in privily to spy out our liberty
which we have in Christ Jesus ; that they might bring us into
bondage : to whom we gave place by subjection, no, not for an
hour." How sad a case the Apostle would have been in, had
these imposers of human rituals turned round and branded him
as a Schismatic, because he declined to wear the yoke which
they had so kindly made for him!

XXI.

THE CHURCH.
NO NATIONAL, PROVINCIAL, OR diocesan church recognized in
THE NEW TESTAMENT.
The Church invisible ; partly on earth, partly in heaven. The Church
on earth, composed of all Christ's people, in all communions ; its
members known only to God. The Church as composed of visible
organizations. No National, Provincial, or Diocesan organization or
authority, recognized in the New Testament. Slater's argument con
cerning the Churches of Antioch and Jerusalem, answered by Scrip
ture.
The New Testament uses the word " Church " in several
senses :
1. As COMPRISING ALL THE PEOPLE OF GoD, IN ALL LANDS, OF ALL
AGES, THOSE ON EARTH, AND THOSE IN HEAVEN. Thus : Eph. i.
22, 23, " And gave him to be head over all things to the
Cuurch, which is his body ; the fullness of him that filleth all
in all." This is that Universal or Catholic Church, of which it
is said, Eph. v. 25, 27, " As Christ loved the Church, and gave
himself for it, that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the wash
ing of water by the word ; that he might present it to himself a
glorious Church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing ;
but that it should be holy and without blemish." This is that
Church, of which it is said, Col. i. 18, 20, " And he is the head
of the body, the church ;" * * * " and having made peace
through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all things
unto himself ; by him I say whether they be things in earth
or things in heaven."
But this Catholic Church, of all times and nations, part of
which is on earth and part -in heaven, is no earthly organization.
It is the Church invisible, whose members are found in all com
munions, and who are known only to God. Not every one in
nny earthly communion belongs to this invisible Church ; no rites,
no sacraments, no creeds, can distinguish them ; they are not all
Israel who are of Israel ; but " the Lord knoweth them that are
his."

282 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
This universal and invisible Church, being no earthly organi
zation, has no earthly officers.
2. There is another sense in which the word Church desig
nates Christ's apparent and professed people on earth.
Thus, when Paul persecuted the saints whether at Jerusalem or
at Damascus, he said, " concerning zeal, persecuting the Church;"
i. e. the visible, professed disciples of Jesus. It was in this sense
that the Saviour used the word, when he said, " on this rock will
I build my Church." This is that " Church " in which it is said
that God hath set " first apostles, secondarily prophets, thirdly
teachers ; after that miracles ; then gifts of healings, helps, gov
ernments, diversities of tongues." This is the Church which
has received the covenants and the promises ; and to which
Jesus, when he ascended up on high, gave various officers " for
the perfecting of the saints ; for the work of the ministry ; for the
edifying of the body of Christ."
In this sense the Church is visible; embracing all Christ's ap
parent and professed disciples. It is universal. It is one. But
it is not one as collected into one organized society. It has not,
since the Apostles, any universal officers, holding authority over
the universal body ; and this none have pretended, save in an
unmeaning and self-contradictory sense ; except the adherents
of the Pope.
The unity of this Church is not a unity of organization ; nor
unity in the degrees and numbers of officers ; nor unity in forms
of worship. It consists in having "one faith, one Lord, one
baptism ; one God and Father of all, who is above all, and
through all, and in all." Its members are one in their agreement
in the same fundamental truths of Christianity ; one in the same
profession and visible ordinances ; partakers of one spirit; and
one in the same hope of heaven. The unity which it is essential
for them to keep, is " the unity of the spirit, in the bond of
peace ;" provision being expressly made for difference of opinion,
and difference of practice in unessential things : those who ob
serve days and eat meat, and those who do not, being expressly
forbidden to judge one another ; and that injunction ending in
the sharp reprimand, " Who art thou, that judgest another man's
servant?" This universal Church is independent of modes of organiza
tion, and modes of worship ; it being in these respects varia
ble, and having actually varied from age to age. Its first visible
form began with Abraham — when it had a sacrament, but no
priesthood. It had neither presbyters nor bishops ; but it was
still the Church of the living God, the root into which other
Churches are graffed ; and how much soever these Churches
may glory in their hierarchies, or how much soever they may

the church. 283
insist that there cannot be a Church without a Bishop, it may
still be said to them, " Thou bearest not the root, but the root
thee;" that root was long a " Church without a Bishop ;" even
all the time from Abraham to Moses.
When the Abrahamic Church had continued in this state
four centuries and more, a ritual law and a sacrificing priesthood
were added ; both of which were typical and temporary ; being
added to remain only " till the promised seed should come."
When Christ, the substance of these types, came, the types —
both priests, rituals and sacrifices — were abolished. There is
now no temple, altar, priest, or sacrifice. The dispensation of
the Spirit began ; the blessing of Abraham came upon the Gen
tiles, In all these changes of external form, the Church is one ;
its design, its covenant, its foundation being the same. The
unity ofthe Church, then, can by no means consist in uniformity
of organization, or of forms of worship.
3. As visible organizations, no Churches are recognized
in the New Testament, except such as are congregational ;*
there being no such thing as a National, Provincial, or Diocesan
organized Christian Church even alluded to in the New Testa
ment. Important conclusions follow this principle, if it be true. Let
those whom it concerns look well to it. If there be no National,
Provincial, or Diocesan Church organization in the New Testa
ment, then there can be no offices or officers corresponding to
such organizations ; no Pope, no Patriarch, no Diocesan Bishop.
These offices are of purely human device ; there is no place or
duty for them ; no provision made for such officers in the Church
of God.
It follows, moreover, that all canons, rituals, and Liturgies pre
scribed for the Churches of any nation, province, or so called
diocese, are entirely without authority.
Let those who are concerned, therefore, look well to the prin
ciple. We read of " The Church at Jerusalem ;" " the Church at Anti
och ;" " the Church at Corinth ;" at Ephesus, Smyrna, Thyatira,
Philadelphia, Surdis, Pergamos, and Laodicea. We read of the
t'hurch at Cene.hrea, distinct from the Church at Corinth, though
Criu'hrca was the port of that city ; of the " Church in thy house ;"
the " Church which is in Nymphas' house." Nowhere do we read
of the Church of a Nation, a Province, or of a Diocese comprising
several congregations. No such organization is mentioned, re-
lerred to, or implied in any part of the New Testament. On the
* Tho word is not used here in the technical sense; i e. as distinguishing Con-
|T<'g»lii<iial from Presbyterian. The Presbyterian scheme, as well as the Congre-
Kiilmnal, recognizes no National, Provincial, Or Diocesan officers, corresponding
to a National, Provincial or Diocesan organization.

284 THE puritans and their principles.
contrary, when a province, or district of country is mentioned,
we read of the Churches of that province or district ; we read of
"the Churches of Galatia," "the Churches of Judea," "the
Churches of Asia," " the Churches of Macedonia." Had there
been a Provincial or Diocesan organization, it must have been
mentioned. The only Church organization recognized in the New Testa
ment is that of local societies or congregations of believers, joined
together under Christ's rules, having their own officers, and
meeting for social worship, for the observance of Christian
sacraments, and for the exercise of discipline over their own
members.* The design of a Church organization renders a larger Church
organization needless. If Christ's rules are a safe and sufficient
guide, then any congregation of his people, anywhere, have all
that they need for the ends of worship, instruction, and the
observance of Christ's ordinances ; for their mutual watchfulness,
encouragement, consolation, and edification. Nothing forbids
contiguous Churches to associate for mutual advice and advan
tage ; but to no higher authority are they necessarily bound ;
since for a Diocesan, Provincial, National, or Catholic organiza
tion with inherent power to rule over his Churches, the Lord Jesus
Christ has made no provision. Nay, he has forbidden submis
sion to such power. " The princes of the Gentiles exercise
dominion over them, and they that are great exercise authority
upon them ; but it shall not be so among you."
The plea for the exercise of such authority over the Churches ;
for the imposition of canons, ceremonies, and liturgies, is, the
preservation of unity ; the prevention of schism; or the attain
ment of uniformity. But turn over every page of history, from
the time when Victor of Rome excommunicated one half
of the Christian world — trace the exercise of such "dominion"
where it leads you ; and you must follow it through fields
of slaughter; through the dungeons of the Inquisitions ; through
the jails and prisons of England ; — the only result has been
to create oppression, persecution, corruptions, schisms, dis
tractions without end. When shall it be that all Christ's people
shall vindicate their Christian liberties ?
Having gone so far, we might rest here ; there is no authority
for a National, Provincial, or Diocesan Church in the Word of
God. We are not bound to inquire any further. Were it God's
design that we should bear allegiance to such authority, it would
have been mentioned or implied, or alluded to, in his Holy Word,
Since it is not mentioned there, those who demand of us submis-
* The reference to the Apostles, and elders, and brethren, at Jerusalem, made by
the Church at Aniioch, concerning the matier of circumcision, was no exception to
this ; it was simply a question of advice, made by one Church to another.

THE church. 285
sion to such authority, come without warrant. Prove to us
that such organizations and authorities existed in the very next
age (which cannot be proved) — that is no warrant ; it imposes
no obligation. The Lord meant to have an end of law-making
for his Church, when he made an end of it in his Word.
But though we are not bound to inquire any further, it may
be well just to look at the nature of the claims for a further
authority. After searching very extensively in the standard writings of
Prelacy, I have found no attempt at proof of a Diocesan organiza
tion from the New Testament, save some very shrewd conjec
tures as to what might have been the case in certain instances.
It is conjectured that some Churches, as those of Antioch and
Jerusalem, might have been so numerous as to require several
distinct congregations organized as Churches, which were again
combined in one Church, thus making a diocese. On the ground
of this conjecture, it is confidently asserted that it must have been so ;
and thereupon Prelacy sweeps over the whole ground, and de
clares that churches everywhere are bound to submit to Diocesan
authority. But suppose we admit this conjecture to be correct,
that the Church at Jerusalem and that at Antioch at length be
came Diocesan. It applies only to one or two large cities ; —
while all the rest of Christendom is left destitute of dioceses ;
there being no recognition of any other such organization,
and no necessity or ground for supposing from the New Testa
ment that there were any such. The proper inference is that both
modes have an example in Apostolical times; and that neither is
of any exclusive authority.
If, however, we find that the conjecture is incorrect, and that
so far as the New Testamentgoes, these great Churches continued
still to meet together, then the last pretence of an organized Dio
cesan Church in the days of the Apostles, vanishes away.
The Prelatical argument is, that the Church of Antioch and
Jerusalem must have been too numerous to meet together; and
that, therefore, each must have been composed of several churches
united in a Diocese. No direct evidence is adduced ; the argu
ment is wholly conjectural or inferential.
And first with regard to Jerusalem. It is urged that three
thousand were converted on the day of Pentecost ; that subse
quently there were added to the Church daily. Again, that the
number of the men who believed, was about five thousand ; and
how could so numerous a Church continue to meet together ? If
we shall show, that to the last New Testament record in the
case, they did " come together," we need not trouble ourselves
about the difficulties. That proof I reserve, till we have consid
ered the case of Antioch. At present I remark, in passing, that

286 THE puritans and their principles.
those converted on the day of Pentecost, appear to have been
principally strangers — dwellers in Mesopotamia, Parthia, Medes,
Elamites, and others, who were then casually at Jerusalem, and
who probably soon after returned to their homes. What accom
modations there were for a large multitude to come together, may
be inferred from the fact, that out of the hearers on the day of
Pentecost, three thousand were converted ; while it is not cer
tain that the converts were one half or one third of the hearers.
These conjectures may fairly be set over against all conjectures
on the other side ; but we need not rely upon any conjectures,
since we have the direct and unequivocal testimony of the Word
of God.
Let us turn to Antioch ; and that we may have the full
benefit of the Prelatical argument, let me here copy the words of
its favorite and ablest champion — Slater, in his " Original
Draught ofthe Puritan Church," pp. 70, 71. Says Slater, " Anti
och was early blessed with the glad tidings of the Gospel ; the
blood of the first martyr became the seed of a Christian Church
there, as the Fathers took a pleasure to speak ; for many Chris
tians dispersed on that occasion, resorted thither; and the first
account we have of their labors is, that the hand of the Lord
was with them, and a great number believed and turned unto the
Lord." " Tidings of this came to the Church of Jerusalem,
where the whole college of Apostles was in readiness to consult
for them." " They send Barnabas, a good man, and full of the
Holy Ghost and of faith, to improve this happy opportunity, and
the success answered their expectation ; for by his powerful
exhortations much people, says the holy text, was added to the
Lord. But to forward this work of the Lord still more, Barna
bas travels to Tarsus, and joins Saul, the great Apostle of the
Gentiles now, and returning with him to Antioch, they continue
a whole year together, in that populous city, teaching much people.
What a harvest of Christian converts those Apostolical laborers
made in that compass of time, assisted by all that fled thither
from Jerusalem besides, by the men of Cyprus and Cyrene, fel
low laborers with them, to convert the Greeks as well as Jews to
the faith ; and by the several inspired prophets, so peculiarly
noted to be among them, I refer to the sober judgment of all
who know the fruits of so many single sermons preached by an
Apostle, at the first promulgation ofthe Gospel. Two things are
sure, 1st. That the reputation and honor of the converts there
were such, that they laid aside the derided name of Nazarenes or
Galileans now, and openly assumed the name of their Lord and
Master, and were first called Christians there. Secondly, That
there were two distinct sets or parties of them— Judaizing Chris
tians, zealous of the law, and Gentile converts, as earnestly

the church. 287
insisting on their freedom and exemption from it : each party so
considerable, as to call for an Apostolical council to decide the
controversy between them."
" Such was the very infant state of this Church of Antioch;
the oversight whereof, antiquity tells us, the great Apostle St
Peter, in a peculiar manner took upon himself, and for six or
seven years at least, made it his first, and special apostolic see."
This is all lhat Prelacy can allege to show from the New
Testament, that there might have been or must have been, a
Diocesan Church at Antioch ; the force of the argument consists
in whatever ground there may be to conjecture, that the Church
at Antioch was too large to come together.
Let us compare these conjectures with the Word of God,
Slaler says, " Tidings came to the Church of Jerusalem, where
the whole college of Apostles was in readiness to consult for
them. They" (the college of Apostles) " send Barnabas." Turn
to Act3 xi. 22, " Then tidings of these things came unto the ears
of the Church which was in Jerusalem ; and they sent forth
Barnabas." There is no breath about a " College of Apostles."
Slater again : " They continue a whole year in lhat populous
city, leaching much people." The sacred record says, Acts xi.
26, that " A whole year they assembled themselves with the
Church and taught much people."
Slater continues to argue from various probabilities, '• What
a harvest of converts those Apostolic laborers made ;" he accu
mulates circumstances and considerations, to show how nume
rous these converts must have been. To what end does he do
this ? Why, simply to show that the Church at Antioch must,
from its numbers, have become a Diocese embracing several
congregations : being loo large to meet together.
This, then, is the question : Can this Church at Antioch come
together; or can it not? If it can ; and if the same continues
true of the Church in Jerusalem, the last pretence of a Scriptural
Diocesan Church, for ever vanishes away.
What says the Scripture ? In Acts xiv. 24, 27, Barnabas and
Saul, having been sent from the Church at Antioch through sev
eral regions on a special work, passing through Lyetra, Derbe,
Ieonium, Antioch in Pisidia, and throughout Pisidia, to Para
philia and Attalia, come at length to Antioch, " from whence they
had been recommended to the grace of God for t'he work which
they fulfilled." " And when they were come and had gathered
nir. Church together." This was after the time of the great
in-galhering of converts at Antioch. No necessity for a Diocese
on account of the impossibility of the Church's coming together
yet ; for they not only " gathered the Church together," but when
ihcy had done so, they " rehearsed all that God had done with

288

THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.

them." But this is not all ; the record goes on to relate that
" Utey continued a long time roith the disciples." And in that
long time, what further came to pass ? Why, a dissension arises
about the doctrine of certain Judaizing teachers from Judea.
" The brethren " at Antioch determine that Paul and Barna
bas, and certain other of them should go up to Jerusalem unto
the Apostles and elders about this question. Trace these min
isters ami delegates. " And when they were come to Jerusa
lem, they were received of the Church, and of the Apostles
and elders." * * " Then all the multitude kept silence and gave
audience to Barnabas and Saul." * * * " Then it pleased
the Apostles and elders with the whole Church to send chosen
men of their own company." They wrote in the name of " The
Apostles, and elders, and brethren." So when these chosen
men were dismissed, " They came to Antioch ; and when they
had gathered the multitude together, they delivered the
epistle." At the latest record, the Church of Antioch and the
Church at Jerusalem come together, and act in a body, as Con
gregational Churches.
It is unnecessary to say more. The New Testament record
is so circumstantial and varied, that had there been a Diocesan
organization, in the times within the scope of its history, some
hint or allusion to its existence, must have been left on the sacred
page. As to the Fathers ; there could not have been a Diocesan Church
in their times, till they had altered the constitution of Church
government traced in the Word of God. All that the Lord in
tended to render obligatory, he doubtless caused to be put on the
record, either in direct terms, or by some implication or allusion ;
otherwise we are thrown upon tradition, or Church authority. The
Bible, in that case, is not our guide or rule; and we know not where
we may be tossed or driven. No testimony of the Fathers, there
fore, no possible arguments can render that binding, in the very
principles and fundamentals of Church organization and govern
ment, of which no trace is written on the pages of the Sacred
•«7„»,1

XXII.

MATERIALS, STRUCTURE, AND DISCIPLINE OF
A CHRISTIAN CHURCH.
Scriptural Authority. The arrangements of Prelacy contrary to Scripture.
1. Of what materials is a Christian Church to be composed?
In the present state of the world, may the Church, wherever
she goes, gather the whole population, by " street rows," parishes,
or by entire nations, indiscriminately into her bosom 1
Paul writes to " The Church of God at Corinth," thus (1
Cor. v.): " I write unto you, not to company with fornicators ; yet
ml altogether with the fornicators of this world, or with the cov
etous, or extortioners, or with idolators,for then ye must needs go
out of the world; but now I have written unto you, not to keep
company, iv any man that is called a brother, be a fornicator,
or covetous, or an idolalor, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extor
tioner ; with such a one no not to eat ; for what have I to do
lo judge, them also that are without? Do not ye judge them lhat
are within."
Hero are established certain principles :
1. That each Church is to "judge " of the qualifications and
character of its members.
2. That merely being " called a brother," i. e. being regarded
as a nominal Christian (holding the belief of Christianity rather
than of Judaism, Paganism, Mohammedanism, or Infidelity),
does not entitle one to be regarded as a member of a Church,
while Ips conduct falsifies and shames such a profession. The
Church must cast him out, even if he is within ; much more,
being without, they may not admit one of such a character to
their communion ; i. e. they are bound to judge concerning the
character and qualifications of their members ; and to cast out,
much more to keep out the grossly immoral ; whatever their pro
fessions. With such a one, says the Aposile, " No not to
eat ;" — not by the slightest act of recognition, to own him as
a brother in the Church. As one of the world, you may hold
necessary dealings and intercourse with him, as with a heathen
1"J

290 the puritans and their principles.
man and a publican ; but his pretensions as a Christian brothei,
you are not to countenance.
Such instructions Paul had already given to the Corinthian
Church ; and now he sharply rebukes them that they had not
cast out a notorious fornicator. " Know ye not that a little lea
ven leaveneth the whole lump ? Purge out therefore the old lea
ven ;" that is, put such a wicked person away. But a Church
gathered by " street rows," in any part of Christendom, will have
more than " a little leaven" in it; the majority of such Churches
will consist of a large proportion of leaven, as the world now goes.
In such a Church discipline is impossible ; as the very idea of dis
cipline, in such a case, is an absurdity. Such a Church is cor
ruptly constituted, and being made up mainly of those who spirit
ually reject Christ, it will reject Christ's laivs.
Nor does it alter the case, that these people are gathered (as
is pretended) under a true successional priesthood ; and under
the notion that baptism and the Lord's Supper, administered by
that priesthood, confer regeneration and impart a sanctifying vir
tue. Nothing is more notoriously untrue. The people of the
National Church of England have all been baptized ; but nothing
is more notorious and undeniable, than that multitudes of them
are fornicators, profane swearers, and otherwise as utterly destitute
of all religion as the inhabitants of Sodom or Gomorrah. The
same is true of every National Church, and of all particular
Churches indiscriminately gathered. And when, or where, has
an instance occurred of such a discipline as the Gospel enjoins ;
viz. the casting out, or excommunication, of grossly vicious or
immoral persons, in all the Episcopal Churches in England or the
United States ?
A little attention to facts, will show a state of things, which
calls for deep reflection on the part of all true Christians, who
stand connected with churches gathered on this indiscriminate
principle. The Oxford Tract, No. 59,* says "Every church
warden in every parish in England, is called upon once a year,
to attend the visitation of his Archdeacon. At this time, oaths
are tendered to him * * * and among other tilings he
swears, that he will present to the Archdeacon the names of all
such inhabitants of his parish as are leading notoriously immoral
lives. This oath is regularlv taken once a year, by every church
warden in every parish in England ; yet I believe, that such a
thing as any single presentation for notoriously immoral conduct
has scarcely been heard of in a century." Again, Tract No. 41+
says, " I think the Church has in a measure forgotten its own
principles, as declared in the sixteenth century ; nay, under
* Quoted in Coleman's Primitive Church. t Quoted in Coleman, p. 122-

the christian church. 291
stranger circumstances * * than have attended any of the
errors and corruptions of the Papists. Grievous as are their de
clensions from primitive usage, I never heard in any case, of
their practice directly contradicting their services ; whereas we
go on lamenting once a year the absence of discipline in our
church, yet do not dream of taking any one step towards its res
toration." Thus speak the Tractarians, with regard to the English Church,
With regard to the Episcopal Church in this country, hear Dr.
Hawkes, in his " Contributions to the Ecclesiastical History, &c."
[pp. 359, 360] : It is true, the power of excommunication does
belong to the Church ; it does, too, deprive of all the privileges of
church membership ; and it is the most awful power ever confided
by heaven to man ; rightfully exercised, its consequences [though
the world may scorn them) ore of the most terrific character, if the
Scriptures be true."
Since, then, excommunication is a power given to the Church :
and since the exercise of that power, in worthy cases, is enjoined
by the Word of God, does the Episcopal Church in this coun
try ever exercise that power ? Or if not, is it because there are no
subjects, within her pale, whose character demands it ? Hear
Dr. Hawkes in continuation :
"It is true the power of excommunication does belong to the
Church." * * * * " But who ever heard of the ex
communication of a layman by our branch of the apostolic
Church? The law is a dead letter. Neither the General Con
vention nor any state Convention have ever provided any rules or
process for excommunication. There is not a clergyman in
thi'. Church, who, if he were ever so desirous to excom
municate an offender, would know how to take the very
first step in the process. It certainly is not to be done ac
cording to his mere whim ; and if it were so done, it is as cer
tainly invalid. Shall then the presbyter alone do it ; or shall i*
In; done by his hishop; or by a conclave of bishops; or of
nisiiops and presbyters; or by estate convention, including
the, laity; or bt/ the general convention, including the
laity again? NO MAN CAN ANSWKR, for there is
no hulk on the subject; andirc arc glad that it is so: for our
excommunication, bringing in its train no penalty which would
be felt, depriving a man of no civil rights, would be laughed at
ns mere brut urn fit/ men. The spiritual consequences would not
l»c thought of." * * * * "To our apprehension, the rubric
i". "ii this subject, quite law enough, unless we had power to
make the disci/dine of the Church to be more felt as a punish-
•mit." Alas ! that a minister of Christ should acknowledge it to be

292 THE puritans and their principles.
Christ's ordinance, that vicious and incorrigible offenders should
be excommunicated by the Church; and then, declaring that "No
man can answer" how, or by whom, that is to be done ; and that
no minister in the Church can tell " how to take the very first step
in the process ;" should express his pleasure " that it is so;" —
" We are glad it is so !" Glad that Christ's laws are neutralized
and nullified in the Church! And Dr. Hawkes really thinks
and declares, that excommunication would all be idle and laugh
able, and is therefore useless, unless the Church had power to
" deprive a man of some civil rights ;" or " to make the discipline
of the Church more felt as a punishment !" Has Christ then been
unwise in enjoining the discipline of excommunication, unless
he would give his Church some, of the power of the kingdoms
of this world? Were not the subject so solemn, how supreme
ly ridiculous it would be, after all the loud vauntings of the
" Apostolic Church," to hear this confession ; that no man in the
Church knows how to take the very first step in a process which
Christ has so clearly marked out and enjoined. How to do it;
who can do it : Presbyter, Bishop, General Convention, State
Convention, a conclave of Bishops, a conclave of Bishops
and Presbyters, or conclave including the laity, either the State
laity, or the general laity : — really Dr. Hawkes, with all his elabo
rate research into " Constitutions and Canons," cannot tell ! He
is sure no clergyman or layman in their whole Church can tell;
and he is glad of it !
If he will just throw away his " Constitutions and Canons,"
and go to the Bible, he will find the malter pointed out very
minutely by our Lord's own finger, in the eighteenth of Matthew ;
— Go to the offender alone ; if he refuse to hear thee, take an
other with thee ; if you cannot gain him so, then " Tell it to the
Church :" That is the injunction : " TeU it to the Church :"
not to the Archdeacon ; not to the Rector; not to the Bishop ;
not to the General or State convention ; no, nor to any conclaves
of dignitaries, — but to the Church :" and if he refuse to hear
the Church, "let him be unto thee as a heathen man and a
publican ;" as a bad man, having no standing or privileges as
a member of the Church. Call for no civil penalties ; if the
offender does not feel this " as a punishment," then reform your
Church, so that it will be something to turn a man out of it into
the world.
If there should arise any doubt whether the Rector is not "the
Church," or whether the Bishop is not the Church, turn to 1 Cor.
v., and you will find that it is such a Church as can be "gathered
together;" and certainly a Bishop or a Rector would appear very
singular in "gathering" himself, all alone, " together," for the pur
pose of hearing and deciding in matters of discipline. If any

the christian church. 293
doubt still remains, whether it be not some State or general con
clave that constitutes the Church, turn to 1 Cor. i. 2, and you will
find that Paul speaks of a local Church, " The Church of God
which is at Corinth ;" and it is made up of them that are " called
to be saints;" who, at least by their profession, and in the judg
ment of charity, are in some measure " sanctified in Christ
Jesus." It is most manifest, and undeniable, that the Episcopal Church
has made void an acknowledged ordinance of Christ, by its tra
ditions and canons. And this error springs from another still
more radical ; from sweeping the world indiscriminately, with a
drag-net, into the bosom of the Church. No discipline, such as
Christ enjoins, ever has been maintained, or ever can be main
tained in a Church so constituted. In one word ; the world,
under any form or principle of organization, can never form a
GOOD INSTRUMENTALITY FOR MAINTAINING THE TRUTH OF CHRIST,
AND THE DISCIPLINE of CHRIST'S CHURCH.
Of what materials, then, is a Church of Christ to be com
posed? I answer, of those who credibly profess to be the real
disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ. If any confessedly have no
repentance toward God, and no faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, it
is a gross absurdity to think of gathering them into the Church
of Christ. If any make such a profession, and yet profess it
not credibly; — evidently mistaking the nature of faith and re
pentance, or in works and character, falsifying their profession,
they are not to be received ; for such, in case of definable crimes
and immoralities, are, upon proof, to be cast out ; even after they
have found admission. How much more are they not to be admit
ted? The New Testament, when it speaks of a Christian Church,
always presumes that it is made up of visible saints by the call
ing of God. Thus 1 Cor. i. 2 ; " Unto the Church of God whichis
at Corinth ;" " to them that are sanctified in Christ Jesus," —
" called to be saints." So Ephesians i. 1 : " To the saints which
are at Ephesus, and to the faithful in- Christ Jesus." And, through
out, their true conversion and faith are assumed. Paul speaks
of theni as "having trusted in Christ," — "obtained inheritance"
— " sealed with that Holy Spirit of promise"—" And you hath he
quickened." To the Church ofthe Philippians he writes," To
all the saints in Christ Jesus." " To the saints and faithful breth
ren in Christ which are at Colosse."
It is not pretended that a visible Church must be made up ex
clusively of true Christians. Some deceive themselves ; some
are very possibly hypocrites; some show that they are "false
brethren." All that we affirm is, that the materials of the Church

294 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
must be such as credibly profess a true allegiance to the
Lord Jesus Christ*
Having taken this view of the proper Church materials, we
come 3. To THE MANNER OF PUTTING THESE MATERIALS TOGETHER
IN ORDER TO CONSTITUTE A CHURCH.
A number of baptized believers dwelling in the same vicin
ity, do not, necessarily constitute a Church. They must asso
ciate together for the enjoyment of Christian ordinances, and
for other ends of Church fellowship. Doing this, they are a
Church, even before they have appointed a single officer, and
without regard to the peculiar organization which they may
adopt. An imperfect or inexpedient manner of organization and
of polity, does not destroy their Church existence ; unless it is
such an organization as necessarily defeats the very ends for
which a Church was instituted. The words of the Cambridge
Platform (c. v. 1) are to the purpose: " A Church being a com
pany of people combined together by covenant for the worship
of God, it appeareth thereby, that there may be the essence and
being of a Church without any officers ; seeing there is both the
form and matter of a Church ; which is implied when it is said,
The Apostles ordained elders in every Church," i. e. there were
churches before there were Church officers ; as there must be
society before there are rules.
But how do Christians become thus associated ? The formal
manner is indifferent ; provided there is the substance. If these
come together with a mutual, though informal, understanding ;
and act together as a Church, they thereby bind themselves to
the duties of Church members in that Church. This appears to
have been the usual mode of gathering Churches under the
labors of the Apostles ; nothing further appears on the record.
A disorderly or vicious brother might be admonished or cast out
according to Christ's laws, as well as though the covenant had
been ever so formal.
People afterwards joined the Church on profession of their
* Let those who would see the matters of Church materials, power, structure,
and things of that sort, ably and conclusively handled, turn to the first six chapters
ofthe Cambridge Platform. Every word of those chapters was well pondered. Its
statements and definitions are given in the most studied and guarded terms : show
ing the whole to be the work of men who had spent more time, and expended more
toil, in studying these subjects than have been given to them by most divines in
modern days. The subject had been earnestly discussed for more than an age ; the
various difficulties, and the bearing of various principles, were most clearly seen by
the men who drew up that Platform. The various treatises andtrnctsof 6 wem on
the same subjects, will richly repay any one who feels it worth his time to give
these matters an examination. The recent works of Punchard and Coleman are
also a rich contribution to this branch of theology. The cause of truth and godli
ness bears a more intimate relation to Church order and government, than those
who have thought little on the subject are apt to suppose.

DISCIPLINE OF THE CHURCH. 295
faith, being baptized, and being received to, and enjoying the
privileges of Church members ; they thereby assumed the duties
of members of the Church. On these principles our Puritan
Fathers acted, but they made the confession and covenant formal.
There are advantages in this formal mode of confession and
covenant, while no possible mode of confessing Christ, and
availing one's self of the privileges of Church membership, in
volves less than the substance of what is here done in form.*
4. In cases of discipline, to whom is the offence to be
told ; and when necessary, who is to try and pronounce
sentence upon the offender?
We have already referred to the answer in Matt, xviii., " Tell
it to the Church;" "And if he Refuse to hear the
Church," &c. The Church, then, is the tribunal which is to hear
and issue complaints, to remonstrate, rebuke, and when necessa
ry, to excommunicate. We have already seen from 1 Cor. v.
that this is such a Church as may be "gathered together." In
Matt, xviii. Christ adds, " Whatsoever ye shall bind on earth
shall be bound in Heaven ;" whatsoever ye, the Church, shall
bind; not that the excommunication of a member seals his dam
nation, but Christ in Heaven will require of its members a due
regard to such decisions of the Church ; and so far forth
clothes the Church wilh authority. Paul asserts the same prin
ciple in 1 Cor. v. " In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, ivhen
ye are gathered together, and my spirit,wilh the power of the Lord
Jesus Christ, to deliver such a one to Satan;" that is, by Christ's
requisition and authority, they are to gather together for such a
purpose; and when gathered together, they are clothed " with the
power of the Lord Jesus Chris'," — with whatever power he
has committed to human hands, for the authoritative exercise of
discipline in the Church.
If this is Christ's law on this subject, then it follows : 1. That
* When a candidate seeks admission into a Congregational Church, in some cases
he comes into the Church meeting, and either orally, or in a brief writing, gives
the reason ofthe hope that is in him. In others, this is done in conversation with
a committee of thcChurch, or with ihe pastor; and after being duly propounded,
if no objections are made, he is received by owning the confession and covenant
of tho Church.
The nature of the qualifications for membership is thus stated hy Cotton in
his " Way of the New England Churches," written two hundred years ago. " In this
we do not exact eminent measure, either of knowledge or holiness ; but do stretch out
our hands to receive the u-cak in faith ; such in whose spirits we can discern the least
measure of breathing nnd panting after Christ, in their sensible feeling of a lost
estate- for we had rather that ninety nine hypocrites should perish through pre
sumption, than one humble soul belonging to Christ should sink under discourage
ment ami despair." Can any one imagine, that the Apostles and early Churches
used less discrimination than this '.
The principle of communion is thus nobly stated by Owkn , '• And we do there-
foie alfinn, that we will never deny that communion unto any person, high or low, rich
or poor, old or young, male or female, whose doty it is to desibe it."

296 the puritans and their principles.
no governor, pastor, or Prelate, has power to turn men out of
Christ's Church, or to impose the continuance of an unworthy
member upon the Church ; but the brotherhood hold the power
in their own hands. 2. That every member of the Church has
a right to be judged by his peers. That is, The Church is not
a monarchy, but a republic ; and from this idea, elaborated
by our Puritan forefathers, and vindicated by their sufferings and
firmness, is derived the very idea and germ of our American
Republic In this point of view, the organization of the Puritan Churches
differs heaven-wide from all Prelatical Churches. On the Epis
copal scheme, whatever discipline may be exercised, it is to be
exercised arbitrarily by the Rector and Bishop. The people have
not the slightest power. They can neither exclude an unworthy
associate, nor defend an injured one. In this most important re
spect, the Bishop is King, and the Rector is a subordinate satrap;
the people have no right nor duties in the case, except to acquiesce
in the mandate of their masters. On the Prelatical scheme, the
offence is never told "to the Church;" the Church is never "gath
ered together " for such a purpose ; but Christ's law is set aside
and forbidden.
Attempts have been made to evade the force of these two pas
sages in Matt, xviii., and 1 Cor. v.
It is said with regard to the direction in Matt, xviii., that the
Church was not then constituted ; and consequently that a Chris
tian congregation cannot be the Church intended ; but that the
direction means, Tell it to the synagogue. The absurdity of this
evasion appears from several considerations. (1.) The disci
ples could understand the meaning of the word Church here as
well as they could in the passage two chapters previous, Matt.
xvi., when Christ says, " On this rock will I build my Church f"
he could not refer to building up a Jewish synagogue. (2.)
Nothing shows that the word Church here, is used out of its
usual sense. It was one of the most common words among the
disciples, from this time to the end of the New Testament. (3.)
It is impossible to suppose that Christ would refer his disciples
to the Jewish synagogue as a proper tribunal when the Jews
had already agreed, that if any man should confess Christ, he
should be put out of the synagogue. Surely Christ did not
require his disciples to treat such a person, so cast out of a Jewish
synagogue, as " a heathen man and a publican."
With regard to 1 Cor. v., an invasion is attempted which is thus
set forth by Mr. Chapin in his " Primitive Church." " The sen
tence," he says, " was by the Apostle, the execution of it was com
mitted to the Church, either as a part of their official duty, or in
consequence of the Apostle's absence." (p. 139.)

discipline of the church. 297
But Paul's direction is no sentence, he is only laying down the
law, under which, the Church is the tribunal to hear, determine,
and execute.
1. He had heard of the case only by report. Is he passing sen
tence of condemnation on hearsay, without trial, and without spe
cifying \heperson on whom the sentence is pronounced ?
On the principle laid down by Mr. Chapin, a diocesan Bishop
has only to hear a report concerning some member of a Church
at a distance, and forthwith he may pronounce his sentence, which
the Church must execute. They may guess who it is that is con
demned ; and if the person arrested pleads not guilty, no matter,
the Church is no tribunal : they cannot institute an inquiry whe
ther he has done this thing, for sentence is passed, and they are
only executioners ! The only possible inquiry which they are
competent to make is, whether this is the person whom the
Bishop intends ; if so, away with him ; he is condemned, sen
tenced, executed without trial! Is this the law of Prelacy?
Why even a Jew could demand, "Doth our law judge any
man before it hear him ?" Paul himself said with indignation,
" They have beaten us openly uncondemned, being Romans :
and now do they thrust us out privily ?" Was Paul a man to
pronounce sentence without a hearing? Even if he had done
so, the Church must have instituted an inquiry, (1.) who was the
man intended : and (2.) whether he had " done this thing:" since
Paul condemns no other : so that in any case the Church is the
tribunal to hear and determine ; and Paul's direction can be re
garded in no other light than as an instruction concerning the
law and their duty in the case.
2. The context shows this to be the nature of Paul's injunc
tion. " Purge out the old leaven." " I wrote lo you in an epis
tle, not to company with fornicators." * * " But now I have
written to you, not to keep company, if any man that is called
a brother, be a fornicator," &c, &c., " with such an one., no, not
to eat." Here is no sentence upon a particular individual, but
a general law applicable to the case of " any man" that is called
brother, who is found to be "such a one :" and to make the
matter entirely indubitable, the Apostle adds — " Do not ye judge
them lhat arc within ?"*
•Our author himself is not satisfied with his interpretation, though he hangs
tremendous consequences upon it. After taking his stand, that Paul is here pro-
nmiiu-ing a judicial sentence, which the Church is merely called upon to execute, he
siys (p. lS'.l), "There is another interpretation of this passage, which may, after all,
lie llie true ono." * * * » " In this view, the decree of the Apostle would
have tin. force of a Canon, and the office of the Church would be the execution ofthe
law * » • l'|H. act of the t'liuuh, therefore, in either point of view, wis that
of irrruiioii." This is erroneous! If Paul is not giving a judicial sentence, but only
declaring the law, or " Canon, " then the Church does not execute a. sentence; but
institutes a process of law. The Church is therefore a Tribunal; to hear, decide,

298 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
On turning to 2 Cor. ii. 6, we find that the Church had
exercised discipline upon the offender to good purpose. He had
repented; and now Paul exhorts the Church to restore him.
" Sufficient to such a man is this punishment which was inflicted
of many ; so that contrary wise, ye ought rather to forgive him."
Such is Christ's law on the subject of discipiine. Such are
the powers and responsibilities which Christ has reposed in the
Church. Who has a right to take them away ? By what au
thority does a Church of Christ ever surrender these powers and
responsibilities into the hands of Prelates ? Can they do it with
out altering the very constitution which Christ has given to
his Church, and trampling the fundamental laws of his kingdom
under their feet ?*
and pronounce sentence, according to law; i. e., The power of discipline is, by the
Word of God, reposed in the Church. He appears to value his book as the work
of a lawyer: but what will lawyers say to the legal acumen, that can see no dis
tinction between a " Canon" or general rule or principle of law, and a sentence
awarding the penalty of that canon to a particular transgressor ? And what will
the lawyers say to a judgment on hearsay; a sentence without a trial; a sentence to
be executed without designating the person ?
* Dr. Hawkes, in his " Constitution and Canons," says that the " Rubrics " be
fore the communion service, requiring the minister to repel evil livers from the com
munion, and to give notice to the Bishop, is all the provision for any discipline
upon ordinary members of the Church. He says, p. 362, " We know of no other law
of the Church, which practically reaches the case of an offending layman but this ; and
there are very few Dioceses in whiph any provision is made by canon for investi
gating or trying the case of a layman. He must, therefore, so offend as to come
within the terms ofthe rubric, or we know not how he is to be disciplined."
What usurpation and perversion is here ! The priest's judgment, caprice, or
will, without any trial or defence, takes away one of the dearest rights of Christ's
people. The Bishop only can institute an inquiry, on complaint in writing by the
repelled party ; and then there are very few Dioceses in which any provision exists
for investigating or trying the case of a layman 1 The layman, therefore, has no
remedy but in the good pleasure or mercy ofhis rector or Bishop. He can demand
nothing of right. A punishment which Christ did not enjoin, is to be inflicted by
an authority different from that to which Christ entrusted the power of discipline ;
punishment is inflicted arbitrarily, without trial, and in most Dioceses without any
method of redress ! Can there be a more flagrant or fundamental departure, in
matters of discipline, from the laws of Christ's house 7 And that Church talks
about Apostolicity, and Primitive order!

XXIII.

THE CHURCH, AS TO EARTHLY RULE, A REPUB
LIC, AND NOT A MONARCHY.
Observation of distinguished Civilians. Inseparable connection between
doctrine and the genius of government. Prelacy incompatible with
Christ's injunctions. Claim of Bishops to be irresponsible sovereigns.
Republican principles recognized by the Apostles. Popular elections.
Mistake with regard to the word Ordain.
It is remarkable how men of comprehensive views, and free
from sectarian bias, have agreed with regard to The Republican
ism of Christianity. " Christianity," says Montesquieu, " is a
stranger to despotic power." " The religion," says De Tocque-
ville, " which declares that all are equal in the sight of God, will
not refuse to acknowledge that all citizens are equal in the eye of
the law. Religion is the companion of liberty in all its battles
and all its conflicts ; the cradle of its infancy and the divine
source of its claims." " The friends of liberty in France are
accustomed to speak in enthusiastic commendation of the Repub
licanism of the Scriptures." The Abbe de la Mennais, acknow
ledged as one of the most powerful minds in Europe, little as
he regards Christianity as a revelation from Cod, familiarly
speaks of its Author as " The Great Pwpublican." Our own De
Witt Clinton said, " Christianity, in its essence, its doctrines, and
ib forms, is republican."1*
In the view of Christianity all men are " of one blood." Chris
tianity extends its laws over the rich and over the poor, the peas
ant and the prince, the bondman and the free alike. In its doc
trines, its demands, and its eternal retributions, it is a leveller
like the grave. There is one way of salvation for the Apostle
and the publican. The most exalted in the Church is only " as
he that doth servo ;"' he has no prerogative to come with any
" Priestly intervention" between the mere>t beggar and the
Throne ; the merest beggar may come and must come before
the mercy seat for himself. So surely do these doctrines tend
t" republicanism, and to break up all spiritual despotisms, that no
* Theso citations are from Dr. Spring's " Obligations ofthe World to the Bible."

300 THE puritans and their principles.
Hierarchy, Protestant or Romish, dares hold fearlessly to the
Bible alone as the rule of faith, and to the doctrine of justifica
tion by faith alone, to the renunciation of all priestly interventions
for the forgiveness of sins. The sure tendency of Prelacy is
through Puseyism to Popery : so essentially and inseparably are
the fundamental doctrines of the Gospel connected, in the long
run and on a broad scale, with the genius of the government
adopted in the Church. Give people the Bible alone for their
rule, and justification by faith alonc^and they will neutralize or
cast offL-the Hierarchy. Impose upon them the dogmas of
priestly interventions through a successional priesthood, and they
cannot remain {me. If any one imagines this to be mere theory,
we fearlessly challenge him to point us to any facts that contra
dict it in the whole history of Christianity. Low Church and
Evangelical doctrine go together. High Church stands
ASSOCIATED WITH Pl'SEVISM OR POPERY THE WORLD OVER; thus
it has been, is now, and ever must be, till causes shall be dis
joined from their effects, and the world turn once more to chaos.
The tendency of the true Gospel principles is to bring the
most absolute despotism iirTdeTThirlimits of law j~to imbue lim
ited monarchies^ more and more with llic spirit crfpopular institu
tions ; to prepare^ the people to govern themselves ; and finally to
establish everywhere the spirit and the reality, if not the very
forms of a republic.
The great founder of Christianity seemed to have in view this
elevation and ultimate freedom of the whole race, when he en
joined it upon his disciples to " call no man master ;" thus
binding the conscience to God's throne, and setting it free from
all human domination. The great design seems to be, like that
of Eden, to exalt and discipline the individual soul, and to pre
pare it for citizenship in God's free, but holy and everlasting
kingdom. In the same manner he left his worship simple and
free; forbidding all his disciples to judge their brethren in
" meats " or " days ;" and by parity of reason, forbidding them to
judge each other, in rites and forms ; and forbidding all alike to
be subject, in such matters, to the ordinances and commandments
of men. In the same manner, pointing to "Lordship," and no
bility, among the nations, he said to his Church, " It shall not be
so among you." He carefully laid down such rules of discipline,
as leave the authority in the hands of the Church; thus making
it a republic. And surely, if any one maintains lhat a brother
hood of Christians, under the few simple rules, and for the sim
ple ends of Church government, are imcompetent to govern them
selves, he ought for ever to abandon the idea, that the indiscri
minate people, of an extended state, with all the complication of
interests and laws which come under the purview of civil gov-

THE CHURCH A REPUBLIC. 301
ernment, will ever be competent to manage the concerns of a re
publican government. If Christ's people, few and simple as
are the ends of Church government, are not competent to govern
themselves in Church estate, then the very idea of republican
government ought to be abandoned in all the earth.
But the very elements of popular rights in the discipline and
government ofthe Church, 'Prelacy has taken quite away*
She has subverted the very genius and spirit of the polity of
the Christian Church ; making it a monarchy instead of a re
public. There are indeed some popular elements interwoven
* Is it the genius of Prelacy to invert all the fundamentals of Church polity laid
down in the Word of God ? Christ gathers only professed and apparent believers
into his Church. Prelacy gathers her Churches in indiscriminate masses, by par
ishes and nations ; thus confounding the Church and the world. Christ enjoins
the duty of private judgment ; Prelacy denies even the rigid. Christ enjoins us to
call no man master, but to search the Scriptures ; Prelacy denies that the Bible
alone is a safe or sufficient guide ; it binds us to the traditions and interpretations
of men. Christ forbids his disciples to be brought under the yoke of bondage, by
subjecting themselves to the ordinances and commandments of men ; Prelacy frames
her canons, prescribes her ceremonies, garments, and postures ; issues her ordi
nances, and if any man will not be subject to these, he shall have no part nor lot in
the Church. Christ says, " Tell it to the Church." No, says Prelacy, " Tell it to
the Bishop." Christ bids us depart from an apostle or an angel from Heaven
when they preach another Gospel ; Prelacy forbids us to depart from the Bishop,
though he be a limb of Antichrist; nay, she draws her life-blood from such a suc-
cession, and counts it her virtue and her glory. Christ is jealous over his people,
and fears " lest by any means, as the Serpent beguiled Eve," so their minds should
be " corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ." Christ's Gospel is jealous over
them who are tempted to rely on forms, and holy days ; "lam afraid of you; you
observe days, and months, and times, and years ;" Prelacy disfigures the whole cal
endar with Saints' days, Angels' days, Lent, Ember days, and other arrangements of
"voluntary will worship;" she prepares her forms, and canons, and rituals, and
robes, and thinks the simplicity that is in Christ, too simple and bald ; and betters it
much, she supposes, by ceremonials and observances of her own devising.
Suppose a company of the primitive disciples could come back, and by some
means stumble upon the Liturgy of the Episcopal Church; turning over iu
pages they read such titles as these : " The Cucwnnnon" '• Fifth Sunday after
Epiphany," " Fourth Sunday in Advent" " Scptuagcsinii Sunday," " Fifth Sumlay in
Lent," " Monday before Easier," " timid Friday," "Easter E-en," " Tuesday in Baster
week," Wliit sunday," " Trinity Sunday,"1 " St. Stephen's day" " The Innocents' day,"
" Annunciation of the Blessed I'irgni Mary" "St. Peter's tlay," "St. Michael and
all Angels,"'" St. Simon and St. Jute}' "All Saints' day." and so on. and so on.
What a strange spectacle would all this be to these old disciples ! Well might
they inquire, "What does this mean ! Where, in the name of wonder, did you get
all these ' Lent, Saints' days, Angels' days '" Why, this is what Paul meant
whon he said to some of our neighbors of old, " I am afraid of you; you observe
days, and seasons, and months, and years" Who could wonder, if these ancient dis
ciples, roading here about " St. Michael's day, and all angels," should call for the old
epistle which they used to hear read at Colosse ; and laying their finger on i the 10th
verse should read thus : " Let no man, therefore, judge you in meat or drink, or in
respect of a' vlyday," " Let no man beguile you of your reward in a voluntary hu
mility and worshipping of angels!" " Wherefore, if ye be dead with Christ trom the
rudiments of the world, why, as living in the world, are ye subject to ordi
nance, • * after the commandments of men, (touch not, taste not,
handle not), Which things have indeed a show of wisdom, in wiU-worship, and hu
mility, and neglecting ofthe body, not in any honor, to the sitisfying ol the flesh."
How 'straugo too, it would appear to these ancient Christians to turn to the table
Hi the front ofthe Prayer-Book, and see the '¦ Church" gravely giving out " Les
ions" from the Apocrypha, to be read as portions ofthe Word of God.

302 the puritans and their principles.
into the organization both of the state and general conventions
in this country ; but they are unlike the same system anywhere
else in the world, and inconsistent with its fundamental princi
ples. They arose from the necessity of making the system, in
some degree, conformable to the popular sentiments and institu
tions of the American people ; and they were unwillingly adopted
by the staunch Prelatists of the day. '
The Prelatical principles are truly set forth by Mr. Chapin in his
recent work on the Primitive Church. Whoever will consult
that work (which, in Connecticut at least, is regarded as a
standard work on Episcopacy), will find (p. 175) that he gives
to Bishops " exclusively," " the power to judge in the Church."
(p. 175, and p. 32.) He makes them not only Christ's ministers
but Christ's "representatives" (p. 33), maintaining that Christ
has " made over, or committed to them, as by devise or bequest, the
kingdom which the Father had appointed or committed to him,"
" that they might sit on thrones," * * * " judging {in a judicial
sense) * * the Church." (pp. 173, 174.) All this he builds upon
' what he calls the Apostolic commission (in the sense of commis
sion to the rank and office of Apostle), viz. " As the Father hath
sent me, even so send I you." A plain Christian would find
here no commission to an official rank, but a commission to ex
ecute an important work, to act as Christ's servants, to carry his
Gospel, and proclaim his grace. But in the transforming hands of
Prelacy, this rises into a Prelatical commission, creating an order
of viceroys and vicegerents ! Our author argues at length that the
" even so" refers (not to the sending) but to the official rank and
headship of Christ; that the Bishops are vested with the rank and
prerogatives which Christ held as head and sovereign of
the Church! This he draws out into formal particulars of
"¦powers granted in this commission." 1. Of preaching. 2. Of
baptizing. 3. The power " of admitting to, or rejecting from the
Church." 4. Of ordaining. 5. Of kingly authority like that of
Christ. 6. (In his own words), " Christ had power to forgive
sins, and he gave authority to his Apostles to absolve and remit
the sins of repenting sinners." 7. Sovereign power of judging
the Church, in a judicial sense. The sum of the whole view is,
THAT WHATEVER POWER, PREROGATIVE, OR SOVEREIGNTY, ClIRIST
HAD OVER THE ChURCH, HE TRANSFERRED IT, DEVISED IT, MADB
IT OVER BY BEQUEST, CONFERRED IT BY COMMISSION, Upon the
Apostles ; and that sovereignty the Bishops now hold. The
" even so send I you," he holds, conveys all. " The commis
sion as it here reads," says he (p. 171), " is one of the most im
portant things of which we can conceive, yet the rule of construc
tion furnished by the Scriptures, tends rather to enlarge than to
limit the powers granted in it." Surely if ever the Pope claimed

THE CHURCH A REPUBLIC. 303
more than this, or made himself more the " Vicar and Vicege
rent of Jesus Christ," than is here claimed for a Prolestant Dio
cesan Bishop, I know not where to find that more extravagant
claim. Surely our Diocesans are not chargeable with making
claims too modest or moderate !
Thus, the Church is made no more a republic, but a sovereign
ty, tied to an exclusive and indefeasible succession. The world
has recently seen how these claims are carried out in practice.
Bishop Onderdonk of New York claims as Bishop, sovereign
and divine right to control and overrule the action of a delibera
tive assembly, whose whole constitution and organization and
functions arc a matter of conventual arrangement. By virtue
of this divine right he shouts, "Sit down, sir; not a word, sir ;"
and the assembly reverently obey their master ! Sixty clergy
men go in procession to congratulate him and to thank him for
his manful vindication of his divine prerogatives; and then
kneel down and receive his Apostolical benediction in return !
In his address to his convention, every inch a Bishop, he denies
that the clergy, and pre-eminently that the Bishop, owes "any
responsibility to the Church as a body." In the Church, he
maintains lhat "Responsibility * * unlike thatof human organiza
tions, is toward concentration, not diffusion." " Power and pre
rogative in the Church came from Christ to the first order in the
ministry; thenci- to the lower orders, and to the brethren and
laity of the Church. As the last gave no power nor prerogative,
it is difficult to conceive how they can demand resjionsibi/i/y to
them as a right." * * " The primary powers of the Church, then,
are not diffused, but concentrated ; they are not in the members,
but the head.1' This is not merely the statement of Prelatical
principles, by the head of the first Diocese in these United States ;
bul it is a correct statement of the principle, held and avowed by
the universal Prelacy of the world. That is, The Church is no
republic, but a monarchy ; a monarchy not of the people, nor by
the people, but of Divine right, indefeasible, and with no re
sponsibility to the people ; but only a mutual responsibility of
the several sovereigns of the "one body," to the sovereigns in
conclave. " A popular election to the ministry," says the Bishop of Con
necticut, "derives not the least support from the Scriptures. *
There is no other Scriptural foundation for the sacred ministry,
than that which is contained in the divine commission of the
Apostles. From them the authority is derived through the suc
cession of Aposto/ie Bishops down to the present time."
From these dreary principles of spiritual despotism let us turn
"nee more to the republican features of the churches organized
by the Apostles. These churches had officers, which were to be

304 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
regarded and observed, in their proper sphere, as much as the
officers of any other republic. But the manner of their ruling
was not to be as " Lords over God's heritage ;" " Whosoever
will be chief among you," said the Saviour, " let him be your
servant." The Apostles themselves gave several striking illustrations of
their regard for popular rights. The first public act of the Church,
after our Lord's ascension, was the choice of an Apostle in the
place of Judas. Peter stands up in the midst of the disciples —
the number of names together was about one hundred and twenty
— and proposes the matter. The election is made by the body
of the Church.
Here is the strongest possible case. If the people are ever to
be passed by, in the appointment of their ministers, surely it
should be so here. Yet this is done by a popular election, and
that, in the very presence, and at the instance of the Apostles
themselves : and the Holy Ghost records it for our instruction in
such matters, if any instruction is given on the subject. How
much more is this rule to be regarded in the appointment of an
ordinary minister ?
Attempts have been made to set aside the plain record of facts
in the first chapter of the Acts. Slater, among others, deems it
necessary for the cause of Prelacy (as indeed it is) to overturn
the commonly received and natural interpretation of this simple
narrative. He contends that Peter is addressing the Apostles,
and not the brethren ; and that the Apostles — not the brethren —
made the choice. I am willing to refer the reader to the record
for himself without one word of comment. For the satisfac
tion of those who believe in the Fathers, it is sufficient to ad
duce authority which good prelatists may not gainsay : Chry
sostom says, " Peter did everything here with the common con
sent. * * He left the judgment to the multitude."*
Cyprian confirms the exposition of Chrysostom. f
The appointment of Deacons was suggested by the Apostles,
as it was fit that inspiration should direct what officers were to
* " The judicious Hooker," vol ii., p. 122, sneers at " the pretended right of the
people to elect their ministers before the Bishop may lawfully ordain ;" and declares
that by his arguments against a popular election " is drowned whatsoever the peo
ple, under any pretence or color, may seem to challenge, about admission and
choice of the pastors that shall feed their souls."
Slater It, 111) thinks that "reason, common sense, and experience, go against
popular elections ;" and that " the will of a few select ones [prelates] is safer than
the votes of a mixed multitude;" declares that there are " no footsteps of it [popii
lar elections] in the Holy code of Christ's laws;" and that "not this man but
Barabbas is a tremendous instance of a popular election in the most eminent con
gregation of the only church of God then amongst men." He forgets to tell us
what hand the " Chief Priests" had in exciting this tumult, and in rejecting Christ
Would it have been any better had it been left to the Chief Priest alone f
t Coleman.

THE WORD ORDAIN. 305
be established in the Church ; but the election was by the peo
ple. The record is in Acts vi.
The same appears to have been the mode of electing Elders,
or Pastors. Paul and Barnabas (Acts xiv), passing through an
extensive district of country, "¦ordained them Elders in every
church." Immediately upon this word ordained, there arises
before the mind of Prelacy a vision of some sacred rite, the com
munication of some ghostly virtue or power. But in the original,
the word is the one in common use to denote an election by the
suffrages of the people. The Greeks gave a popular vote by
raising the hand: and hence their word vote, ox elect, is a com
pound one of xstQ, the hand, and reirio, to lift. Thus Demosthe
nes says, " The people exet-Qozovei, voted in my proposals ;" i. e.
gave their vote by lifting the hand. Every tyro in classic Greek
will remember the fable of the birds assembling to elect a king ;
where the same word is used in the case of one who thought
himself worthy to be elected. Birds have no hands to lift, but
the word was so common that it came to signify an election in
any mode. So Thucydides says, " They were at an election,"
xeiqoTona. Cicero refers to this manner of voting among the
Greeks : " Their manner of voting is known, they lift up the
hand." The same word is used (xstQOJOV7lOeVTEs) in 2 Cor. viii.
19, where Paul speaks of one who was " chosen of the Church"
to travel with " this grace" (another instance of popular manage
ment of Church concerns). Here the same word is used as that
where it is said that Paul and Barnabas ordained: but su#ely in
the present instance Prelatists will not contend that the Clturches
conveyed a mystical grace, or performed a ghostly ceremony of
ordination; they simply chose these men. How then can the
same word mean any more when it is said that Paul and Barna
bas ordained?
The same word xflQO'"vfu> is used in the same sense by the
Fathers. Ignatius says to the Philadelphians, " It will become
you, as the Church of God, xftQn">''lac" — to choose some deacon to
go there ;" again, " That your Church appoint, x^Q0™*'!™' — some
worthy delegates."*
This throws light upon the nature of the ordination performed
by Paul and Barnabas. They caused elders to be appointed, or,
as in the margin of the English translators, " When with lifting
up of hands they had chosen them." TyndaFs translation reads,
" And when they had ordained them seniors by election in every
congregation." The ancient French version reads, " And after
having by common suffrages ordained elders." Beza reads, "And
when they had by suffrages created elders."
Nothing in the record refers to any ceremony of consecration ;
* Coleman, p. OS
20

306 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
nothing refers to the modern sense of ministerial ordination ;
though Prelacy is compelled to hang a mountain weight upon
the notion that the word ordained here, can mean nothing but a
mystical ceremony of ordination.
The same remark applies with equal force to the passage in
Titus i. 5, " Thou shouldest ordain elders in every city." The
word translated ordain has no imaginable reference to any cere
mony or act of consecration ; in the original it is xoroor^CT^c — the
most general word possible for establish (that thou shouldest
establish elders in every city),without any possible reference to any
particular mode of doing it ; least of all any ceremonial consecra
tion. Doubtless there was a mode, or perhaps several modes ;
but the Holy Ghost has not seen fit to allude to any in this con
nection. The presumption is, that whatever else was done, the
chief thing consisted, as in the case of Paul and Barnabas, in
calling the people to a popular vote.
It is amusing to see the immense weight that Episcopacy
tries to hang upon such a peg as the word ordain, in our version
of the Scriptures. It has not there the modern technical sense,
but is the common rendering of several different words, none of
them referring to an act of consecration like a modern ordination.
No sooner does Prelacy fix its eyes upon that word, than images
of ghostly virtue, ghostly power, consecration, awful mysteries,
conveyed by an awful succession, rise to her view. But on
examining the word in Titus i. 5, we find the same as that
usediLuke xii. 14) where the Saviour says, " Who made me
a judge or a divider over you?" Surely here is no reference to
a mystical consecration. The same is used Rom. v. 19, " By
one man's disobedience many were made sinners." Surely it
was no Apostolic consecration, no mystic ceremony of ordination,
to make men sinners ! Yet Episcopacy must hold so, or she
must drop from this peg on which she has hung so long, and
with such a feeling of security.
It is admitted that the power of electing their own officers was
gradually, and at length entirely stolen away from the people by
a grasping hierarchy, till the last semblance of the popular rights
was lost. Yet it was a long time ere they were wholly lost
Clement of Rome, A. D. 96, speaks of the appointment of minis
ters with the approbation ofthe whole Church, as among the regu
lations of the Apostles.* Cyprian, A. D. 258, says, "The peo
ple * * ought to separate themselves from ¦& wicked bishop, nor
mix themselves with the worship of a sacrilegious priest. For
they principally have the power of electing worthy ministers and
of rejecting the unworthy; which thing itself we see descends
from divine authority." As late as A. D. 437, Ambrose of Milan
* Coleman.

THE CHURCH A REPUBLIC. 307
was elected by the people, of their own accord, by acclamation :
Martin of Tours, A. D. 375 : Chrysostom at Constantinople, A.
D. 39S. But there is no need to multiply proofs. Even Slater
admits (p. 77) and uses the fact in argument, that "all the breth
ren met together in the Church to choose a Bishop, in the 4th,
5lh, and 6th centuries."
The accurate historian Mosheim thus states the conclusion to
which his own mind came after a most thorough investigation.
" In these primitive times, * * * the highest authority was in the
people, or the whole body of "Christians ; for even the Apostles
themselves inculcated by their example, that nothing of moment
was to be done or determined but vnth the knowledge and consent
ofthe brotherhood." * * * * " The people did everything that is
proper for those in whom the supreme power of the community
is vested."* Neander, the most distinguished ecclesiastical historian of the
present day, says, " Each individual Church which had a Bishop
or Presbyter of its own, assumed to itself the form and rights of
a little distinct republic or commonwealth ; and with regard to
its internal concerns, was wholly regulated by a code of laws,
lhat, if they did not originate with, had at least received the
sanction of the people constituting such Church.|"
I need not pursue this part of the subject further. " Power is
always stealing from the many to the few." Favors granted to
the ministers of metropolitan and other important towns, were
soon demanded as inherent prerogatives. Step by step, corrup
tion and despotism crept stealthily on. Moderators and minis
ters of large towns grew into Prelates — into archbishops, patri
archs; till the apex was at length crowned by a Pope.
We see what principles are worth. The lessons drawn from
the history of our fathers are corroborated by the history of more
ancient times: both show the importance ofthe principles for
which our fathers stood.
Once more we are invited to enter the path of Prelacy, and of
the incipient corruptions of the Man of Sin. The beggarly ele
ments of ancient despotism and superstition are again stalking
forth, and striving, with "high swelling words," with lordly
claims, and contemptuous abuse of all who refuse to receive their
yoke, to make their way once more to the empire of the world.
It is not to be disguised that the battle of the Reformation is once
more to be fought with those who once gloried in the style of
Protestant, but who are now beginning to be weary of the
name. * In Tunchard. t In Coleman.

XXIV.

OFFICERS OF THE CHURCH.
Extraordinary functions. Men called to a special work. Evangelist*
Deacons. Bishops. Presbyters, or Pastors. Singular error of the
Prayer-Book. Apostles ; their office ; requisite endowments.
We read, Eph. iv. 11, that " Christ gave some, apostles ; and
some, prophets ; and some, evangelists ; and some, pastors and
teachers; for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the
ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ."
In 1 Cor. xii. 28, that " God hath set some in the Church ;
first, apostles ; secondarily, prophets; thirdly teachers ; after that
miracles ; then gifts of healings, helps, governments, diversities
of tongues."
Here are men discharging some eight sorts of functions ; none
pretend these are eight orders of permanent officers in the Church.
Some of these powers were adapted to the special and miracu
lous establishment of the Gospel. " Diversities of tongues,"
" gifts of healings," " miracles ;" there were none to discharge
these functions after the Apostolic age. These may therefore be
dismissed from our present inquiry.
Evangelists, as such, are men specially called to a special
work ; but nowhere recognized as officers attached to any
church. They were men sent to preach where Churches were
not formed ; or sent to complete the organization and arrange
ment of Churches where anything was wanting. Thus Philip,
originally a deacon, afterwards styled Philip the Evangelist, is
found in the capacity of Evangelist attached to no Church, but
preaching and baptizing in unevangelized places (Acts xxi. 8).
Thus Timothy, 2 Tim. iv. 5, is exhorted to " do the work of an
evangelist." His work is on all hands agreed to be the same
with lhat of Titus, who was left in Crete, that he might " set in
order the things that were wanting, and ordain elders in every
city :" the churches being not as yet fully organized.
As Timothy was called to do the work of an Evangelist, it is
plain that he was not regarded as an Apostie ; since Paul makes
the two offices distinct : " some Apostles, some prophets, some

OFFICERS OF THE CHURCH. 309
Evangelists." If Timothy had been regarded as an Aposde, it
would have been said to him, " Do the work of an Apostle."
The officers recognized by the Epistles as permanently attach
ed to the several Churches, are Bishops and Deacons, the Bishops
being also styled Elders [Presbyters], and Pastors. Thus, Paul
writes " To all the saints in Christ Jesus which are at Philippi,
with the Bishops and Deacons." Had there been a third, fourth,
or fifth order of officers attached to the Church, he would not
have passed them by. So in 1 Tim. iii. he sets down the quali
fications requisite for the officers of the several Churches ; and
specifies only two sorts, Bishops and Deacons. He makes no
allusion to the existence of any other.
In 1 Tim. v. 17, Paul says, " Let the elders that rule well be
counted worthy of double honor, especially they who labor in
word and doctrine." From this many infer that there were
elders who rule, but who do not labor in word and doctrine ;
i. e. Ruling Elders. In this conclusion the early Churches of
New England agreed with the Presbyterians ; but they attribut
ed to the ruling elders different functions ; such as are not incon
sistent with retaining the power of discipline in the body of the
Church. In their polity, the ruling elder was a sort of select-man
to look after the affairs of Church rule and discipline, and to
present them in due form for the adjudication of the Church.
In addition to these officers, Episcopacy maintains that their
Diocesan Bishops are official successors of the Apostles ; and
in reality Apostles ; only having, for modesty's sake, assumed
the name Bishop; which was, in the days of the original Apos
tles, exclusively appropriated to the second order — the elders,
presbyters, or pastors. These claims of Diocesan Bishops we
entirely deny ; maintaining the office of Diocesan Bishops to be
an entire corruption and usurpation, and one fraught with im
mense mischief to the Church of God. The reasons we shall
give in the proper place. In the meantime, let us look more
particularly at the unquestionably permanent officers of every
Church.
1. Deacons.
These were appointed, Acts vi., for the special purpose of at
tending to the ordinary secular affairs of the Church ; and for
the very reason that the Apostles might give themselves " con
tinually to prayer, and to the ministry of the word." The conclu
sion is inevitable, that the deacon's work is not to preach. The
office is permanent. There are deacons attached permanently
to each particular Church ; and those Churches have other offi
cers to ad as pastors and teachers.
In all these respects, Prelacy, according to her usual custom,
Sets herself to alter and subvert the arrangements set down in

310 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
the Word of God ; she attaches the deacon permanently to no
Church ; she makes him a preacher, and sends him wandering
abroad. It is no justification of this course to allege, that Philip preach
ed and baptized ; that was not the work for which he was ap
pointed a deacon ; when he preached and baptized, the sacred
record expressly styles him an Evangelist.
2. Bishops or Pastors.
That these were " Elders who labor in word and doctrine,"
all agree. Among the requisite qualifications set down for the
office are these (1 Tim. iii.) : He must be " blameless," " vigi
lant," " sober," " of good behavior," " given to hospitality," " apt to
teach," " one that ruleth well his own house, having his children
in subjection with all gravity. For if a man know not how to
rule his own house, how shall he take care of the Church of
God ?" Moreover he must be one " Holding fast the faithful
word, that he may be able by sound doctrine both to exhort, and
to convince gainsayers " (Tit. i. 9).
The requisite qualifications point out the duties of the Bishop,
Pastor, or Elder ; for these terms are indiscriminately applied to
the same office and person. As an office bearer, he is styled
Elder ; as charged with rule, he is called Bishop (overseer, su
perintendent) ; as charged both with oversight and instruction,
he is styled Pastor. These terms are in the New Testament
indiscriminately applied to the same person and office. Thus,
1 Peter i. 1-4, to the Churches " throughout" the several prov
inces of Asia Minor : " The elders which are among you, I ex
hort, who am also an elder, and a witness of the sufferings of
Christ. Feed the flock of God which is among you, taking the
oversight thereof." The elders (presbyters) he exhorts to feed
the flock (original noi/iaivsiv—to do the work of a shepherd or
pastor) ; taking the oversight (emoKonowTes — doing the work of
bishop). The Elder, then, is the same as Pastor, or Bishop,
throughout all the Churches of Asia Minor. Dr. Scott makes
the following just remark on the passage : " This must be allow
ed decisive testimony that no express distinction between pres
byters and bishop was, at the time the Apostle wrote, established
in the Church."
Again (Acts xx.), Paul being at Miletus, sends for the Elders
(Presbyters) of the Church at Ephesus, and says to them ; " take
heed therefore * * unto all the flock over which the Holy
Ghost has made you overseers " (emoxonovc. — Bishops); to feed
the flock of God (noipuuvur — to do the work of shepherd, or Pas
tor). The two Apostles, Peter and Paul, entirely agree in mak
ing the Bishop, the Presbyter, the Pastor, one and the same
office, in one and the same person.

officers of the church. 311
Again Paul (Titus i. 5) says — " and ordain elders (Presbyters)
in every city." Describing their qualifications, he says, " For a
Bishop must be blameless ;" — the Bishop and the Presbyter are
one and the same.
Now that word Bishop, so regularly interchanged with the
word Presbyter, is in no instance interchanged with the word
Apostle in the New Testament It was never, in a solitary in
stance, used by the Apostles or their contemporaries, to dignify a
Diocesan Bishop, or an officer, distinct from, and above, a Pres
byter. The Bible Bishop, is uniformly the pastor, or one
of the pastors, of a congregation ; never is the name Bishop
given to a Diocesan, or an Apostle, either by the Apostles, or in
the Apostolic age. It is absolutely certain, that for a hundred
years after Christ, the name Bishop, whether used by Apostles
or Fathers, signified the Pastor of a Church ; never a persou
holding a degree above that office.
And yet, I apprehend, that till quite recently, the mass of the
common people, who have entertained Episcopal views, have
rested upon the name Bishop, in the New Testament. Till re
cently the mass of Episcopalians have not dreamed lhat their
Diocesans were not Bible Bishops, but veritable Apostles. The
views of their learned men were confused and contradictory.
The learned Dr. Hammond maintained that all who bore the title
of Bishops or Presbyters in the New Testament, were Prelates ;
and that none of the second order were ordained during the
Apostolic history. Dodwell on the other hand maintained, that
Bible Bishops were simple Presbyters ; and that no Prelates were
ordained till in the second century. Owen observed, two centu
ries ago, that " the most learned advocates of Prelacy begin to
grant, that in the whole New Testament, Bishops and Presby
ters and Elders are every way the same persons in the same of
fice," (vol. xx., p. 394). At the present day, all well-informed
Episcopalians fully admit this to be true. Thus Bishop Onder-
ilmilc, in his work on Episcopacy, says (p. 12), " It is proper to
advert to the fact, that the name Bishop, which now designates
the highest grade of the ministry, is not appropriated to that of
fice in the Scripture. That name is there given to the middle
order, or Presbyters ; and all that we read in the New Testament
concerning Bishops (including, of course the words "Overseers,"
and " oversight " which have the same derivation), is to be regard
ed as pertaining to the middle grade. * * It was after the
Apostolic age that the name Bishop was taken from the second
order, and appropriated to the first, * * and when we
find in the New Testament the name Bishop, wo must regard it
:is meaning the Bishop of a parish, or a lJre~hyter. The Bishop
of a diocese, or the highest grade of the ministry, we must seek

312 THE puritans and their principles.
there, not under that name, and independently of any name at
all." * * " The word Bishop," — " in Scripture, means a Pbes-
byter, properly so called."
With this view, Chapman, Chapin, Bowden, and all modern
Episcopal writers fully agree.
This, however, is a point in which the framers of the Prayer-
Book were unfortunately " overseen." In searching the Scrip
ture for something to read at the ordination of a Diocesan Bish
op, they could find nothing to the purpose at all, save one or two
passages which use the word Bishop ; and in which, it is now
unfortunately discovered, that the word signifies no diocesan at
all, but the simple Bishop or Pastor of a single Church ; a mere
presbyter. But there it stands, as the Epistle to be read at the
ordination of a Diocesan : " This is a true saying, if a man de-
sireth the office of a BISHOP, he desireth a good work.'
" A BISHOP then must be blameless." Or as a substitute foi
this, the passage in Acts xx. is set down, " From Miletus Paul
sent to Ephesus, and called the Elders of the Church ;" " And said,
take heed * * to the flock which the Holy Ghost has made
you overseers" (original emuxonovg — Bishops). And our good
Diocesans at the ordination of a brother diocesan — in full canon
icals and with all gravity, continue to read these passages, as
though the word Bishop here meant (as they know it does not)
a diocesan bishop, and not a simple presbyter ! Why do they
do this ? Why do the people suffer it ? Are they willing to
pass this word Bishop, knowing it to be, for their purposes, base
coin ? or are they to be slaves, in perpetuity, to an old form,
which they know is — in relation to the purpose for which they
use it — a falsehood ? or is it because, forsooth, some Scripture
must be had, and they may as well use this for want of a bet
ter? Surely, surely, if a Diocesan be such an essential corner
stone and pillar to the very existence of a Church, some Scrip
ture ought to be found which can, by some decent pretext, be
used with some pertinency at his ordination. Surely, surely, if
Apostles had successors, it is wonderful that the record should
be made so abundantly of inferior officers, but no record of
the ordination of a successor Apostle .' If there is such a record,
pray let us have it in the Prayer-Book. If there is none, then tell
the people plainly at such an ordination, that a deed is doing, for
which you find no warrant or example to read them from the
Word of God. 3. Apostles.
These needed qualifications possessed by none since their
day. They were appointed, in their peculiar office, to a work
which was finished when they died. Their number was limited.

officers of the church. 313
Their office was special, peculiar and personal. They could
have no successors.
1. They were personal witnesses of the resurrection of Christ:
it was essential that, as such, they should have seen the Lord.
Christ, speaking of his death and resurrection, said to the
Eleven, and " Ye are witnesses of these things." When one
was to be chosen in place of Judas, to fill up the number twelve,
Peter said (Acts i.), " Wherefore of those men who have compa-
nied with us all the time that the Lord Jesus Christ went in and
out among us, beginning from the baptism of John, unto the day
when he was taken from us, must one be ordained to be a wit
ness with us ofhis resurrection?" Here was one special quali
fication and work of the Twelve. Many were personally cog
nizant of the facts pertaining to our Lord's resurrection ; but out
of that number must one be ordained, to be vnth the eleven, a
witness (a special official witness) of these things.
The case of Paul corroborates this view, " The God of our
Fathers hath chosen thee that thou shouldest know his will, and
see dial Just one, and shouldst hear the voice of his mouth. For
thou shalt be his witness unto all men, of what thou hast
seen and heard." Accordingly, Paul himself aays, " Am I
not an Apostle ? Have I not seen Jesus Christ ?" Will
any modern Diocesan venture to abide a similar test of Apostle-
ship? 2. Apostles, as such, were endowed with miraculous powers.
This Christ promised them ; this they received. If it be said
that others besides Apostles wrought miracles, the answer is
plain: others may: but he who claims to be an Apostle, must.
For Paul says (2 Cor. xii. 12) ; " Truly the signs of an Apostle
were wrought among you in  signs and wonders and mighty
deals." Those who pretend to hold the Apostolic office at pre
sent, should in all fairness be required to show the signs ; other
wise it may be said concerning them : " And hast tried them
that say they are Apostles, and are not ; but hast found them liars."
3. The Apostolic office was peculiar, inasmuch as, like the
Prophets, they were inspired teachers of Divine Truth. The
Holy Spirit was promised, to guide them into all truth, and to
bring all things to their remembrance. On this ground, their
writings are received as records of the Holy Ghost. If others
may be inspired, Apostles must be ; or they are false Apostles.
Surely our modern Diocesans cannot claim this prerogative; and
if they should, some of their writings constitute " another Gospel,"
the most trustworthy of their own number being judges.
1. The Apostles were a limited number ; the " Twelve Apos
tles." The case of Paul specially and miraculously called and
qualified, " like one born out of due time," is the only exception.

314 the puritans and their principles.
The appointment of Matthias was not to continue the succession,
but to supply a substitute to one ofthe Twelve. Even if they might
have successors, those successors should not exceed the number
twelve. But, besides filling a vacancy in the original number, there
is no record of appointing a single successor. When James
was slain (who is claimed as Prelate of the most important See
on earth), then we should naturally look for the appointment of
a successor, if successor there was to be. But there is none.
Even down to the close of Revelation, we find allusions made to
Tlie Tivelve. The Holy Jerusalem (Rev. xxi.) has " Twelve
foundations ; and in them the names of the Twelve Apostles
of the Lamb."
5. Wlien the twelve were dead, the name, Apostle, was applied
to no man on earth. No man claimed to be an Apostle. No
man pretended to hold their office for a long time. The name
and the office vanished away. Nor has there been a time since,
when Prelates would dare to assume the official title, though
they claim the office. The common sense of Christendom is
against it. Apostle Brownell, of Connecticut ! Apostle Doane,
of New Jersey ! How it sounds ! Who ever heard, in Scrip
tural times, of Apostles of particular Dioceses ? Wliittingham,
Apostle of Maryland! Onderdonk, Apostle of Pennsylvania!
Onderdonk, Apostle of New York ! The very style is so revolting
and absurd, that to adopt it would be death to the prelatical
claims. But if they in reality hold the office, they shoufd, in all
conscience assume the name.

xxv.

APOSTLES NO SUCCESSORS.
Argument from the name. Epaphroditus, Andronicus, Junia. Argu
ment from the powers exercised. Bishop Onderdonk's argument
examined. Laying on of the hands of the Presbytery.
Diocesan Bishops claim to be Apostles ; successors of the Twelve
in their peculiar office. Bible Bishops they confess they are not ;
if they are not veritable Apostles they are nothing. We have
seen the Apostolic office to be, in its very nature, special and tem
porary; that though a vacancy was filled to complete the
number twelve, yet no record was made of the appointment of
any successor ; which appointment, in the Episcopal scheme,
ought to have been one of the most important things, and to have
appeared most fully and minutely on the sacred pages. We
have, therefore, a right to demand of any who claim this office,
to show that they have seen the Lord, that they arc inspired, and
that they can work miracles. These arc "signs of an Apostle,"
which no one who claims the office should omit to furnish.
We will, however, attend further to the Episcopal arguments.
It is alleged ;
1. That others besides the tivelve, anil besides Paul, were called
Aposlles ; and that therefore both the office and the name were com
mon ; and if so, then the office was communicable and permanent.
Thus Bishop Onderdonk, in his work, " Episcopacy tested by
Scripture," contends that Sylvanus and Timothy were called
Apostles, and that, " Besides Andronicus and Junia, others could
be milled to the list." Epaphroditus and Barnabas, it is contended,
are so added.
This is nothing to the purpose, unless it can be shown that
they arc called Apostles in the peculiar and official sense. Even
Bishop Onderdonk elsewhere argues largely that nothing is to
be determined by the name ; that the officers, of which he is a
successor, are to be sought for in the New Testament, " inde
pendently of any name at all." Here the exigencies of Prelacy
demand that something should be made of a mere name.
l'nforliinatcly for Prelacy, however, the word Apostle in its
primary and common meaning, signified one sent, a messenger ;

316 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
and is so used and so translated frequently in the New Testa
ment. Thus, certain brethren of the Church who accompa
nied Titus when he was sent by Paul to Corinth, are called
a-nou-xoXoi exxlrjaibiv (literally Apostles of the Churches) which our
translators have very properly rendered " messengers of the
Churches" 2 Cor. viii. 23. Were these messengers official
Apostles ? Yet there is precisely the same ground for contend
ing that they were so, as for contending that Epaphroditus
was an official Apostle. In Phil. ii. 25, Paul says, " I sup
posed it necessary to send you Epaphroditus, my brother
and companion in labor, and fellow soldier, but your mes
senger" (original, anoorolov, the word for Apostle). Bishop
Onderdonk would correct our English translation, by making it
read, "your Apostle." Mr. Chapin, too, argues at length that
Epaphroditus must have been the official Apostle over the Church
at Philippi ! No doubt it is very important to the cause of Epis
copacy to make him so ; but the effort is unavailing, he was a
simple messenger sent out by that Church, not an Apostle reigning
over them. Our translation needs no mending here. An official
Apostleof a single Church ! Theveryidea is preposterous. Which
one of the twelve Apostles ever held the office of Diocesan ? Dr.
Barrow, one of the ablest divines of any age, has not only largely
and conclusively argued that the Apostles had no successors in
their office, and could have none, but particularly with regard to
this point, has remarked, that to make Epaphroditus Apostle of
the Church at Philippi, and Timothy Apostle of the Church at
Ephesus, is like " setting the king to be Lord Mayor of London,
or the Archbishop of Canterbury to be Vicar of Pancras."
Besides, Paul, writing an official Epistle to the people of
another man's Diocese ! that man being an Apostle like himself!
And Paul, telling that people, that he had sent their Apostle !
Does he ever do so by Apostle Peter, or Apostle John, or James ?
Bishop Onderdonk argues that we must look for the office inde
pendently of any name, and infer the office from what one does.
On this ground, what is the office of Paul, while he is sending
other Apostles, writing them letters of instruction, and giving
them his authoritative charges ; as he does with Epaphroditus,
Titus and Timothy ? Why, on this ground, if Timothy, Titus
and Epaphroditus are bishops, Paul at least must be an Arch
bishop, or an jdrcA-apostle, and so, that office is clearly demon
strated on the Episcopal ground, " independently of any name
at all."
But it is argued that Andronicus and Junia are said to be
Apostles. They are not even said to be so. The passage referred
to in proof, is Rom. xvi : 7, " Salute Andronicus and Junia, my
kinsmen, and my fellow prisoners, who are of note among the

APOSTLES NO SUCCESSORS. 317
Apostles" (emtnyioi, ev toict anocnolots), i. e. not noted Apostles, as
the Episcopal argument makes them ; but celebrated among
them ; themselves being no Apostles at all. Dr. Scott takes the
common sense view of the passage : " Well known and esteemed
by the Aposlles."
What is still more to the purpose is, that this " Apostle Junia,"
who is here made to hold half the weight of Episcopacy on her
shoulders, was beyond all proper question a woman. Our trans
lators accordingly gave the feminine name ; whereas, had they
supposed Junia a man, they would have made it read not Junia
but Junius. " Qum videtur fuisse uxor Andronici" says Rosen-
miiller (" Which [woman] appears to have been the wife of An
dronicus"), " well known to the Apostles."
It so happens that we have proof of this, which Episcopalians
must not gainsay. Chrysostom, Theophylact, and several other
Fathers take Andronicus for a man, and Junia for a woman, his
wife. And both Greeks and Latins actually kept their festival
on the 17th of May, as husband and wife."*
One thing further in passing ; Bishop Onderdonk feels so
much the need of some help to hold up this prop of Episcopacy,
that he endeavors to lug in Calvin to his aid. After claiming
these to be veritable official Apostles, he adds, " Calvin allows
Andronicus and Junia to be Apostles ;" and quotes chapter and
verse, B. iv. C. iii. § 5. If you turn to Calvin in that place, you
will see that instead of allowing Andronicus and Junia to be
Apostles in the official sense, he affirms the contrary ; expressly
denying that Apostles were instituted to be of perpetual continu
ance in the Church, but that they were only for that age " when
Churches were to be raised up where none had existed before, or
were at least to be conducted from Moses to Christ." Then fol
lows the passage from which Bishop Onderdonk quotes a part,
and so grossly mistakes its meaning. Calvin's words are these :
" So those twelve individuals, whom the Lord chose to promul
gate the first proclamation of his Gospel to the world, preceded all
others in order and dignity. For although according to the
meaning and etymology of the word all ministers of the Church
may be called Apostles, because they are all sent by the Lord,
and are his messengers ; yet as it was of great importance to
have a certain knowledge of the mission of persons, who were
lo announce a thing new and unheard of before, it was necessary
that those Twelve together with Paul who was afterwards added lo
Mteir number, should be distinguished beyond all others by a
peculiar title. Paul indeed himself gives this name to Andro
nicus and Junia, who he says axe of note among the Apostles ;
but when he means to speak with strict propriety, he never applies
* Dr. Miller on Christian Ministry, p. 110.

318 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
this name except to those of first order that we have mentioned.
And this is the common usage of the Scripture." Calvin, in
stead of saying as Bishop Onderdonk represents, says directly
the contrary. In his commentary on the passage, Calvin says,
" It would be absurd to ascribe this great excellence in the pro
per sense [Apostleship] to these two believers" [Andronicus and
Junia]. Barnabas, also, is alleged to have been an official Apostle like
one of the Twelve ; because it is said in Acts xiv. 14, " which
when the Apostles, Barnabas and Paul heard of, &c." There is
nothing to show that the word Apostles here is used out of its
common meaning — " persons sent," or Missionaries. Barnabas
is mentioned with such frequency, that had he been numbered
as an Apostle, in the official sense, it could hardly have failed
that he should somewhere be recognized as such. But there is
no remote intimation that he was so considered, unless it be in
the use of the word (Apostle) in this case. The common (not
the official) sense of that word is equivalent in some cases to
Messenger ; in others to Missionary. Now, strictly speaking, by
Missionary, we mean an ordained minister, sent to preach the
Gospel among the heathen. Our Missionary boards accordingly
mention such and such persons as missionaries, and such and
such persons as physicians or teachers. But in the narratives
of their labors, nothing is more common than to speak of
them all together as Missionaries. If a preacher or physician,
and a teacher, should sail from Hawaii to Oahu, or take a tour
of either island, it would be said of them, The Missionaries came
to such and such a place ; the missionaries did so and so. Would
it do to hang the mountain weight of a Hierarchy upon the as
sumption that all of them were ordained preachers, because they
are together spoken of as the missionaries ? Yet such is the pre
cise nature of the Episcopal argument.
The same remarks apply to the case attempted to be made out
in 1 Thes. i. 1, compared with ii. 6. " Paul, Sylvanus, and Timo-
theus " — ****<( Nor 0f men sought we glory, neither
of you, nor yet of others, when we might have been burdensome
as the Apostles of Christ." Prelacy assumes that Sylvanus, as
well as Timotheus, was a veritable Apostle ; forgetting that the
force of the argument lies wholly in the word, which is com
monly used in another sense, and that in the absence of all proof
that it is used in the official sense here, the argument is not worth
a straw. Yet, straw as it is, Prelacy is glad to lay it in her foun
dation. We are now through -with the argument from the name ; and
have seen, I think, to borrow the words of Bishop Onderdonk—
that " The name is not worth a line of controversy."

APOSTLES NO SUCCESSORS. 3 19
It is argued,
2. That certain persons are shown to be Apostles,
independently of any name, from the powers they exer
CISED. What is the proof? Timothy and Titus ordained. Timothy
and Titus (it is said) ruled the clergy. The sum of the argu
ment is contained in these words of Onderdonk's Episcopacy
tested by Scripture (p. 26) ; " Is it not evident, abundantly evi
dent, that Timothy had supreme power over the clergy at Ephe
sus, and the full right to ordain? * * * Then, as to Tims,
examine his powers in the island of Crete. * * * To him
are specified the due qualifications of a Presbyter, Bishop, or
Elder. His clear credential from the Apostle Paul is, " For this
cause, I left thee in Crete, that thou shouldst set in order the
things that are wanting, and [that thou shouldst] ordain elders in
every city, as I had appointed thee." * * Again, " a man
that is a heretic, after the first and second admonition, [do thou]
reject." "Ordination, admonition, and rejection [or degradation
and excommunication] are all committed to Titus personally.
The elders, as already seen, had no power to reject those who
should speak perverse things, or heresy. Titus had that power.
All this agrees perfectly with the case of Timothy. And no
thing like it can be shown anywhere in Scripture of any who
are there called Elders, or Presbyters. Is it not clear, that the
recorded powers of Titus make him an officer of a grade supe
rior to that which we must assign, resting only on the Sacred
Record, to such elders? This is Episcopacy."
I have copied so much from the work of Bishop Onderdonk,
because it is the sum of the argument as stated by himself. I
say the sum. It embodies the points and principles of the
whole. Neither admitting nor denying for trie present, the details on
which Bishop Onderdonk comes to these conclusions, let us ex
amine these points and principles. If the details do not make
out these, they make out nothing ; if they make them out, they
cannot go beyond them. Admit therefore, for the present, for
the sake of argument, that the details justify these principles;
the argument is answered, if the points and principles themselves
are shown to be inconclusive, and the inference to be drawn
from a total non-sequitur.
Admitting, then, the whole that is here alleged, it does not
prove Timothy or Titus to be an Apostle.
I might urge here, the facts already considered : that these are
not officially styled Apostles ; it is not pretended that they have
seen Jesus Christ ; they arc not inspired ; they do not show the
miraculous signs of an Apostle ; they are not like the Twelve, in

320 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
any of the peculiar characteristics that designate an Apostle.
But let these things pass.
I say then, that ruling and ordaining are not peculiar to the
Apostle ship.
1. Ruling is not : for admonition and excommunication, as we
have already seen, instead of being committed to Diocesans, as
Prelatists falsely claim, are by Christ himself expressly given to
the Church. Whatever is said of the " rule " of officers, it gives
them no lordship over God's heritage : it only shows them to be
possessed of ministerial power; while the authority is in the
Church. But it is said that Titus and Timothy rule the clergy; and
are therefore of a higher degree ; and if of a higher degree they
must be Apostles.
I answer (1.) Nothing forbids, that what Paul says about "re
ceiving an accusation against an elder" — may be a simple in
struction concerning the matter of receiving accusations against
elders, without intending to designate the tribunal which is to try
or depose them. The same remark applies to the words, " Them
that sin, rebuke before all :" — though it is a mere conjecture that
this is spoken exclusively of sinning elders.
(2.) It is assumed that receiving and trying charges against an
elder, necessarily implies a superiority of rank ; and that an elder
cannot be tried and deposed without a rank above him to do it.
False and ridiculous assumption : for among Congregationalists,
Baptists, Presbyterians, Reformed-Dutch and others, the trial of
a minister is as easy, as regular, as efficient as it is among Pre
latists or Papists ; and yet there is no superior rank to do it.
And who receive charges and try them among Prelates them
selves ? Does it require one of a superior rank to try and depose
a Diocesan Bishop ? Then must your Bishops be entirely irre
sponsible, or else you must have an Archbishop, who can be
nothing less to you than an irresponsible Pope, having no rank
above him, that can receive charges against him and bring him
to trial. So either show us your Pope, or admit that Parity is as
good as Prelacy for receiving and trying charges against Elders ;
and that on this ground, neither Timothy nor Titus could be
either Apostle or Prelate at all.
The principle that an officer cannot be tried and punished
without a superior rank above him, draws as deep in civil gov
ernment as in ecclesiastical ; in the latter case, it ends in an irre
sponsible Pope, in the former it ends in a jure divino monarchy,
as the everlasting destiny of all civil government. The whole
argument for Prelacy here, hangs upon a false assumption.
To this assumption is tacked a Therefore : Therefore Tim
othy and Titus were of a rank superior to Presbyters. To this

APOSTLES NO SUCCESSORS. 321
* therefore " is fastened a conclusion that does not follow. If of a
superior rank — therefore an Apostle ! A string of therefores
is hung upon a false assumption, and from the last point, the
Bishop leaps to a conclusion that does not hang upon the chain
at all. The argument would not lose one whit of its logical ac
curacy — had the last link in the chain read thus : Therefore,
Timothy was Pope of Rome, and Titus Autocrat of all the Rus-
sias. And yet, if this logic be not correct — (it is one of the
main pillars of the building) — the mighty fabric of Episcopacy
must tumble to the ground.
The instructions given to Timothy and Titus concerning the
matter of Ruling, therefore, do not prove them Apostles ; and
2. The instructions given them concerning ordination do not
prove them Apostles.
(1.) Where it is said to Titus (i. 5), " and ordain elders in every
city" the word in the original (xuiaair/arn) has no possible refer
ence to any ceremony or mode of ordination, but is the most
general of all possible terms for " establish." In the case of Bar
nabas and Paul, we have already seen (Acts xiv 23), the ordina
tion spoken of was a simple election (xeiQ°T0>"]<""'Tls) i.e., proba
bly, as in the choice of Matthias, they called the people to choose
elders. A ceremony of induction there probably was, but the
Holy Ghost appears to think that of too little consequence to put
on the record, as it is not noted here at all. I have already re
marked that the word " ordain" in this direction to Titus, is the
same as that used in the passage " by one man's disobedience
many were made sinners" (Rom. v. 19). There is no more
reference to a mystic ceremony of ordination in the case of Titus,
than there is of a mystic ordination to make men sinners.
(2.) The words used to denote the ordination spoken of in the
New Testament, as if on purpose to pour contempt upon the
Prelatic notion of conferring grace or office by the mystic virtue
of ordination, are of the most changeable, various, and vague
character possible. Thus, where it is said in the case of Mat
thias, "must one be ordained," the word is i'"^«', "must one
be, or become a witness." Where it is said that Christ is
" ordainetl" to be judge of quick and dead (Acts x. 42), the word
is (bonr//f >o^ fiXe(l Vpon7 selected, appointed. In Rom. xiii. 1, it is
said that " The powers that be, are ordained of God," rf *"i."f ''<">
ordered, appointed.
(3.) The civil power is as much ordained of God as the clergy ;
bul does it require a superior rank to ordain [instal in office] a
civil magistrate ? That is the dream of Legitimists, who hold to
the divine right and order of kings ; just as it is of Prelatists who
hold to the succession of the order of bishops. The Legitimists
would not be able to see how the people could ever confer an

322 the puritans and their principles.
office which they have not ; all power must flow down from the
jure divino monarch, else it could not be a power " ordained of
God." But whatever Legitimists may think, we doubt not
that the Governor of Connecticut, or the President of the
United States, is as much a " Power ordained of God," as any
other earthly potentate that ever existed. And the Governor or
President must be ordained before his acts are legal. But does
it require a superior officer to induct the Governor or the Presi
dent ? Why, a simple justice of the peace may ordain the one
or the other ; and that without any claim to an office superior to
that of either.
(4.) The performance of any ceremony of ordination, is no mark
or peculiarity of Apostleship. In all the instructions of our
Lord to the Apostles, and in all the commissions he gave them
he said not one word to them about ordaining. He spoke of
preaching, teaching, and baptizing, but not of ordaining. Had
this been their great and peculiar work, it could not have been
so passed by. With Episcopalians, ordination is something
mystic and awful. Virtue flows from the ordainef's hands. Or
dination is everything. If the ceremony be not performed by the
hands of one who has received the virtue, or virus, by a good
conducting medium, or succession, everything is lost, — nothing
is valid ; all who come after that interrupted link, and all who
depend upon them, are out of the Church and destitute of all
claim to covenant mercies. Nothing can exceed the care, mi
nuteness, and circumstantial pomp with which they make their
records of the ordination of Bishops. But go to the New Testa
ment, and you find nothing ofthe kind. The ordination of a
successor of the Apostles ! The New Testament is silent about
it. Christ said not one word about this (on the Episcopal
scheme) greatest, most stupendous transaction — the ordaining
of an Apostle.
(5.) But it may be said that though the word " ordain," in the
New Testament, has no reference to any particular ceremony
like a modern ordination, yet there are passages, which show
that the induction to office was by the laying on of hands.
Grant it. By whose hands ? Does the New Testament say
that it must be by the hands of an Apostle ; so that whoever may be
supposed to perform the ceremony of ordination, hemust be sup
posed to be an Apostle? Nothing like it. The only passage
that bears this reference, and that attributes the act of ordaining
to an office, attributes it not to the Apostleship, but to the
Eldership. Thus, 1 Tim. iv. 14, " Neglect not the gift that
is in thee, which was given then by prophecy, with the fay
ing on of the hands of the Presbytery." The hands ol
a " PRESBYTERY" (or collection of elders), therefore, may

apostles no successors. 323
ordain;" and that ordination is Scriptural. Admitting, therefore,
that so Titus and Timothy ordained ; they ordained by the lay
ing on of hands of the Presbytery, not by virtue of Apostleship.
The ordaining, therefore, cannot prove them Apostles.
The shifts and windings to which Prelatists are driven on this
point, furnish some amusing specimens ofthe art of shifting off
the force of arguments, that cannot be met in direct encounter.
You have heard of the ancient Retiarius, or gladiator of the net ;
whose weapon was an instrument to entangle his adversary,
not to meet him in fair and sturdy combat. Bishop Onderdonk,
on this all essential point of the argument, very strikingly resem
bles the ancient gladiator of the net. With regard to this ordi
nation of Timothy by the hands of the Presbytery, he first inti
mates, that it is no ordination at all ; but the casual designation
of a person already in orders to a special work. This ground
he first "submits to the candid judgment of his readers;" and
yet shows in the issue that he himself neither rests upon it nor
believes it. Next, to " meet his non-Episcopal brethren on their
own ground," he is willing, for argument sake, to admit it to be
an ordination ; but denies that there was a laying on of the hands
of any Presbytery ; the word Presbytery meaning Presbyterate,
the office to which he was ordained, not a body of Elders. Here
he quotes Calvin again, to sustain a position which both himself
and Calvin finally renounce. Next he argues that if it be an or
dination, and by Presbyters, then the sort of Elders (or Presby
ters) is not designated. (We should have thought, in such a
case, that it was no matter what sort, provided they were Elders,
or Presbyters.) He insists that it might have been a Presbytery
of Aposlles; or at least that an Apostle might have been present,
from whose hands the virtue of the ordination might have pro
ceeded. At last he comes upon the ground where Episcopafians
commonly rest ; that it was an ordination ; that the Presbytery
was composed of real Presbyters ; and that it is so recognized
by Paul ; " who," he says, " makes the following distinction in
regard to his own agency and that of others in this supposed or
dination ; by the putting on of my hands, with the laying
on of the hands of the Presbytery." Such a distinction, he says
(p. 22), "may be justly regarded as intimating that the virtue of
the ordaining act flowed from Paul, while the Presbytery, or the
rest of the body, if he was included in it, expressed only con
sent." If wc follow the steps of Bishop Onderdonk, through the sev
eral positions which he assumes, we must come to the following
conclusions with regard to this ordination of Timothy. It was
an ordination, and it was not an ordination ; there was a laying
on of the hands of the Presbytery, and there was not a laying on

324 the puritans and their principles.
of the hands of the Presbytery ; Presbytery means Presbylerate
and no body of men, and again it means a body of men and no Pres-
byterate ; the body was made up of Apostles, and it was not
made up of Apostles, but of Presbyters ; the ordination was by
the hands of the Presbytery, because perhaps an Apostle or
Apostles might have been among them ; and again it was not
by the hands of the Presbytery, the virtue flowed from Paul,
while the Presbytery only gave consent. Truly, Bishop Onder
donk must get out of his own net as he can. No man ofhis
unquestionable capacity, in such a studied and deliberate trea
tise, would have taken so many inconsistent positions, had he
seen any firm and inpregnable ground.
The " by " and " with," two little particles which constitute
the final ground for Prelacy to rest on here, are in two separate
Epistles, 1 Tim. iv. 14, pera snidrjaebig tojv XetQ<»v — (with the laying
on of hands) ; and 2 Tim. i. 6, " That thou stir up the gift
of God which is in thee by (Sm) the putting on of my hands."
Chapin puts the two passages together, and makes them read
thus: "By the putting on of my hands, with the hands of the
Presbytery. Nothing can be plainer than this," he says, " The
ordination was by the Apostle, with the concurrence of the
Presbytery." On this I remark :
(1.) It admits the act to be an ordination, and the body to be
composed of simple Presbyters ; since they only concur.
(2.) It assumes that the two passages refer to the same act ;
whereas the gift of God by the putting on of Paul's hands might
have been no appointment to office, but gifts of miraculous power ;
which Paul, again and again, was the instrument of conferring
on others by the laying on of his hands.
(3.) Even admitting the two records to refer to the same act ;
Paul, in the first, deems it a sufficient account to speak of the
laying on of the hands of Presbytery. Presbyters, therefore, ar-)
all that is needed. But :
(4.) The criticism about meta and dia (/""« and 8*) is both
erroneous and contemptible ; too weak a peg to hang a rush
upon, and yet here it must bear the mountain weight of Episco
pacy, or Episcopacy must tumble to the ground. Dr. J. M.
Mason so thoroughly exploded this criticism, that it was forty
years ere Episcopacy ventured to revive it again. " Be it so,"
says Mason, " be it so, that meta and dia are contrasted ; the
first simply denoting concurrence, and the last the efficient cause.
Be it so. I open my New Testament and read that " Many-
signs and wonders were done by (dia) the Apostles. Proceed
ing in the narrative, I read that Paul and Barnabas rehearsed all
things which God had done (meta) with them, i. e., in the case
of miracles wrought by Peter and James, Peter and James

APOSTLES NO SUCCESSORS. 325
were the efficient cause, or the conductors of the Divine power :
but in the case of miracles wrought by Barnabas and Paul, they
only acted in concurrence ; meta and dia being words used in con
trast, to show that the first had power and authority to work mi
racles, the last only power to act in concurrence !"
I do not see but that the Prelatical argument, from the powers
exercised, dies, though in the last ditch. It has veered and shift
ed, and finally betaken itself for shelter in the last resort to sim
ple meta and dia, which turn out to be no shelter at all ; but after
every evasion and shift, the brethren of the Church ruled, and
Presbyters ordained : nor is the receiving of a complaint against
an elder, nor the act of ordaining, any mark of Apostleship
at all.

XXVI.

DIOCESAN BISHOPS.
Timothy not Diocesan of Ephesus. The Angels of the Churches were
no Diocesan Bishops. No change of official designation from Apostle
to Bishop.
It is contended, that Timothy was Diocesan Bishop, that is,
Jlpostle, of Ephesus. But the New Testament shows that Tim
othy was notoriously an itinerant, going from field to field, and
not a stationary officer of any special district. To this, our Epis
copal brethren reply that Timothy was a Missionary Bishop, at
least so long as his journeyings continued. A Missionary
Bishop ! A Missionary Apostle ! Does the New Testament
recognize such a thing as a stationary Apostle — the Apostle of a
single Church or Diocese ?
Paul says to Timothy, " I besought thee to abide still at Ephe
sus." The inference is inevitable : he was not by his peculiar
office permanently stationed there. Daille has well remarked ;
" To beseech a man to abide in a place where his charge assigns
him to be, and which he cannot forsake without offending God,
and neglecting his duty, is, to say the truth, not a very civil en
treaty ; as it plainly supposes that he has not his duty much at
heart." There is, however, very plain proof from Scripture, that Tim
othy was not Bishop of Ephesus at all. If he ever was so, it
must have been when the first Epistle of Paul was written to
him : for the sole argument that he was so, is built upon the as
sumption that this Epistle was written to him in capacity of
Bishop [Apostle] of Ephesus.
But some time after that Epistle was written, Paul (a little
before his being sent prisoner to Rome) returns through Macedo
nia to Asia, " bound in the Spirit unto Jerusalem" (Acts xx.). In
the 4th verse, it is specially recorded that Timothy was with him.
Coming to Miletus (v. 17), Paul sends to Ephesus for the elders
of the Church, and when they are come, he gives them the
solemn charge recorded in Acts xx. 18-35. In Timothy's pre
sence, Paul sends for these elders : Paul charges them. He says
not a word about Timothy, or any other Diocesan. This is alto-

timothy no diocesan. 327
gether unaccountable on the notion that Timothy is their Bishop
[Apostle]. Why does not Timothy send? Why does not
Timothy charge these elders ? He is their Apostle ! the equal of
Paul. Why does not he greet his own Presbyters, from whom
he has been so long absent ? Why does Paul interfere in his
brother Apostle's special Diocese ?
It is so plain that Timothy is not, at this time, their Diocesan
Bishop, that even Bishop Onderdonk concedes it ; " Ephesus,"
says he (p. 25), " was without a Bishop when Paul addressed
the elders ; Timothy not having been placed over that Church,
till some time afterwards." But if Timothy was not at this time
their Diocesan, he never was. If you turn to 1 Tim. i. 3., you
will see that Paul left Timothy at Ephesus, when he himself
went into Macedonia ; and in chap. iii. 14, we learn that Paul
expected to return. " These things I write, hoping to come unto
thee shortly: But if I tarry long, &c." And chap. iv. 13, " Till
I come, give attendance to reading, &c." The evidence is con
clusive that the Epistle was wrilten when Paul expected to re
turn to Ephesus. But how was it, when, being at Miletus (Acts
xx.), he sends for the Ephesian Elders and gives them their
charge? It is his final charge. " And now behold I know that
ye all, among whom I have gone preaching the kingdom of God,
shall see my face no more " (Acts xx. 17). " And they all wept
sore, and fell on Paul's neck and kissed him, sorrowing most of
all for the words which he spake that they should see his face no
more." And they did see. him no more. He went to Jerusa
lem ; was apprehended ; sent as a prisoner to Rome, and died a
martyr. This renders it certain, that his interview with the Ephesian
Elders recorded in Acts xx. was after the Epistle to Timothy was
written. But it is both proved and conceded, that at the time of
that interview with the Ephesian Elders, Timothy was not Bishop
of Ephesus. The conclusion is inevitable : Timothy never was
Bishop of Ephesus: and nothing in the Epistle to Timothy can
bear the slightest possible allusion to the work of a Diocesan
Bishop. This main prop and pillar of Episcopacy must needs
tumble to the ground.*
The search after Diocesan Bishops in Apostolic times, now
* " Theodoret and Athanasius among the Fathers affirm this early date of the First
Epistle to Timothy. Baronius, Ludovic, Capellus. Blondel, Hammond, Grotius,
Lightfoot, Benson, Doddridge, and Michaclis affirm it. Townsend says, " I can ad
mit no theoretical argument to overthrow what seems to me the unforced deduction
from Scripture, that the Epistle was written after St. Paul went from Ephesus, and
left Timothy there when he went into Macedonia."
'' Episcopalians have been challenged to produce a single passage from the writ
ings of the Fathers for the first three centuries, in which Timothy or Titus are
recognized ns Bishops in the prelatical sense; and the challenge remains unan
swered to this day." " Chrysostom acknowledges them to be Evangelists." (Pu-
•eyite Episcopacy, by J. Brown, D.D.)

328 THE PURITANS and their principles.
comes to a narrow corner of the field. Bishop Onderdonk, the
modern Goliath of Episcopacy, first bids us look for veritable
Apostles, other than the Twelve, bearing the Apostolic name;
Apostle Andronicus, Apostle Junia, Apostle Epaphroditus ; we
have looked, and find no Apostles there. He next bids us look
for Apostles without ihe name, and independendy of any name
at all ; we have looked, and they are not there. Where now
shall we look for men bearing the Apostolic office after the death
of the Twelve ?
Shall we look for them under the name of Bishops ? No : it
is conceded that they are not yet to be found under that name.
Every Church, in city and in country, has its Bishop, who is
everywhere known by that name ; but he is admitted to be a
simple pastor, and no successor of the Apostles in their peculiar
office. Shall we look for them under the name of Apostles ? There
is no man, bearing that name, anywhere on the face of the earth.
Where then, in the name of wonder, are they ? It is passing
strange that this office, on which the very existence of the Church
depends, should be known by no distinctive name ! Why, every
poor pastor, every deacon and deaconess, bears a well known
official title. Is there none for that first order in the Church ?
Do they move about, in every province and city, bearing the
burden and rule of all the Churches, and while Deacons and
Bishops are every day referred to by name, is there no trace ex
tant, upon the whole earth, of any reference to this high order of
functionaries ?
O certainly, replies Bishop Onderdonk ; you will find them
under the name of Angels of the Churches. Hear him (p.
262) : " The dignitaries in question were addressed when it was
somewhat too late to call them Apostles, and too soon to call
them Bishops, particularly as the latter word had a different
meaning in the Scriptures already written. Another designation
therefore is given them ; they are called angels ; and the kind of
office is left to be inferred from the powers and distinctions given
them." " The name Bishop was in transitu from the second or
der to the first."
To this I reply (1.) That there is no proof that the name
Bishop was undergoing a change. The allegation that it was
so, is entirely gratuitous and untrue. About A.D. 100 Clemens
Romanus uses the word Bishop as it is used in the New Testa
ment ; to signify the simple Pastor of a congregation. This is
admitted by Slater (p. 18), who maintains that a different use of
the word Bishop was first made by Ignatius in the second cen
tury. We do not admit that it was made even then ; but the
proof is complete, that the name Bishop was not now in a pro-

NO CHANGE OF OFFICIAL DESIGNATION. 329
cess of change, from pastors to those who were formerly called
Apostles. For the first century of the Christian era, there is no
evidence that the name, Bishop, meant anything else than it did
in the days of the Apostles ; and four hundred years passed away
before any one ventured to assert that those were called Bishops
who were once called Apostles.
(2) The supposition is absurd. In the process of a gradual
change of name, there will be, for a time, an intermingling ofthe
old name with the new ; but never in such a gradual change
was it heard, that for a while it is too early to use the new
name and too late to use the old ; and that, therefore, a third
name, distinct from either, is introduced to soften down the pro
cess ofthe change.
But the case is still worse in the case supposed by Bishop
Onderdonk. He will have it that the Christian world is studded
all over with real Apostles, bearing that name. There is Apostle
Timothy, Apostle Epaphroditus, Apostle Andronicus, Apostle
Junia, and' Apostle who not, besides. While this is so, every
congregation in every city, village and hamlet, has its pastor,
who, the world over, is styled a Bishop. Presently, and ere the
volume of revelation closes, the Apostles are all gone ; all, save
the last of the Twelve in Patmos. No man anywhere bears the
name Apostle. It is " too late " to call any man an Apostle ;
but unfortunately for the argument of Bishop Onderdonk, the
world is full of Bishops, who are all simple Pastors ; and it is
too early to call an Apostle by the name of Bishop.
Now how is this double change effected ? How is it that the
Apostles everywhere give up their own name, and everywhere
filch away the names of the Bishops, and yet no trace or frag
ment of this double change can be found, in the history of the
whole world for four hundred years ? If the process of change
is so universally going on, it must somewhere appear. But it
does not. Writings are abundant : a trace of almost everything
else appears in them : but no trace or fragment of such a change
can anywhere be found. The very life of Episcopacy hangs
upon the certainty of such a change; but it brings no proof;
it is obliged to rest upon a baseless, unreasonable, impossible
assumption. (3.) It is alleged that during this process of change, Apostles are
designated neither as Apostles nor as Bishops, but under the
style of " Angels of the Churches." If this were so, then "Angels
ofthe Churches" would be very common affairs : we should find
mention made of them at every turn. But the word Angel is in
no other instance used in this sense in any writing sacred or
profane. Episcopacy is driven here to find an Apostle in the
angel ofthe Church. If an Apostle is not here he is confessedly

330 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
nowhere. He is nowhere called Apostle ; he is nowhere
called Bishop. It is too late for the one, and too early for the
other. Episcopacy, therefore, as a last resort, fastens upon the
angels of the Church. She guesses that they are Diocesan Bish
ops, — for if not . there, where can they be? She guesses, that
each one of these seven Churches must be a Diocese of several
congregations ; and that the angel presided over the clergy of the
several congregations ! It is all guess-work, without a particle
of proof; but with the acknowledged fact that "angel of the
Church" nowhere else means a bishop, in all the writings of
man ! Other people guess that these angels were Presbyters ;
others again guess that they figuratively represent the whole
body of the church ; since the Spirit says to one of these angels,
" Behold, the devil shall cast some of you into prison." Light
foot guesses that the angel of the Church was something answer
ing to the Chazan of the Jewish Synagogue, who took care of
the reading of the iaw, and who sometimes preached ; but who
was far enough from being the type of a Diocesan Bishop. If I
might be allowed to add my guess, I should guess that the
angel of the Church is no officer at all ; but that the use of the
word is figurative ; — one of the images in that highly figura
tive book. We have an angel in the sun ; an angel stand
ing on the sea and on the earth ; angels coming down with
chains. I should guess, that the addresses to angels of the
Churches are only figurative modes of addressing the Churches
themselves. Indeed, after these messages to the angels, it is
added, " He that hath ears to hear, let him hear what the Spirit
saith unto the churches." And in making this guess, I do it
in very good company, for Stillingfleet says (lrenicum, p. 315),
" Why may not the word Angel be taken only by way of repre
sentation of the body itself ? either of the whole Church, or, which
is far more probable, of the consessus or order of Presbyters in
that Church ? We see what miserably unconcluding arguments
those are, which are brought for any form of government from
metaphorical or ambiguous expressions, or names promiscuously
used, which may be interpreted in different senses ? What cer
tainty, then, can any rational man find, what the form of govern
ment was in the primitive times, when only those arguments
are used which may be interpreted in different senses. And
without such certainty, with what confidence can men speak
of a divine right to any one particular form ?"
Here Episcopacy again hangs her whole weight upon what
Stillingfleet well calls, "a miserably unconcluding argument"
She has conceded that if her Diocesan Bishops are not, at this
time, found under the name of angels of the Churches, they are
not to be found under any name upon the face of the earth. It

NO CHANGE OF OFFICIAL DESIGNATION. 331
is too late to call them Apostles ; it is too early to call them
Bishops. It is not pretended that they are at this period called
anything if not angels. It is certain that they are not so
called anywhere save in this passage of the book of Revelation ;
and it is a baseless, unreasonable conjecture to suppose that they
are so called here.
After this book of Revelation, it is certain that these high
functionaries, the successors in the office of the Apostles, are not
called angels of the Churches. Nor are they called Apostles.
For a hundred years, the pastors of Churches everywhere
monopolize the name of Bishops. Where, in the name of
wonder, are these Diocesan successors of the Apostles ? There
ia no Irace of them after the " angels," till more than a century
afterwards they come out Bishops! A double change of title
occurs, in two orders of Church officers ; a change involving
some confusion and mingling of terms ; it occurs in thousands
of instances, in many languages, all over the world, and no trace,
no fragment indicative of that change remains ! A body of men
nowhere alluded to by any distinct name, move noiselessly about,
bearing on their shoulders the supreme authority of the Churches ;
till at last they have everywhere filched away the names of the
second order in the ministry, and no trace or fragment of this
double change remains.
But it is said that there is testimony to the fact of such a
change, though the process of the change cannot be traced.
" It was after the Apostolical age," says Bishop Onderdonk,
" that the name Bishop was taken from the second order and ap
propriated to the first, as we learn from Theodorct."
Well, who is Theodoret ? A man who lived in the fifth cen
tury ! No hint or trace of such an opinion ever has been cited
before him. On what authority does Theodoret say this ? Does
he allude to any record, any memorial, or even any tradition ?
None at all. It stands on his conjecture, bare and unsupported ;
an unreasonable and absurd conjecture, about a thing concern
ing which all proof is wanting, and that, too, when proof could
not be wanting, were the thing itself true. Episcopacy thus
hangs her monstrous claims upon a conjecture unsupported,
unreasonable and absurd ; and this conjecture of Theodoret
concerning a matter of which he knows nothing, Episcopacy
calls his testimony! Testimony! about a thing which he
neither saw nor read of; and which if it had ever taken place,
must have taken place two or three centuries before he was
born ! If it did not take place four centuries before he was
born, Episcopacy is a demonstrable perversion of the institutions
of Christ and his Apostles.
Prelacy must needs take the laboring oar here. Let her tell

332 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
when or how this double change occurred. Let her explain how
it could possibly occur, and no trace or fragment remain to indi
cate the process. Let her tell by what name these successors in
the Apostolic office were known ; or where they lurked, when
for one hundred years they were neither Aposdes, nor Angels,
nor Bishops ; and how it was possible that this nameless body of
Prelates could so entirely escape the observation or notice of
all writers for so long a time. Let Prelacy explain these matters
to us ; or let her frankly admit that the pretended change never
occurred, but that ambitious parish Bishops, in favorable situa
tions, gradually assumed more and more, till they became Pre
lates ; metropolitans grew up by degrees into Archbishops and
Patriarchs ; till at last, this gradual stealing of power from the
many to the few, brought forth the Pope ; while Pope, Patriarch,
Archbishop, and Diocesan, are alike unknown and unauthorized
in the Word of God.

XXVII.

PRELACY DISPROVED BY THE FATHERS.
We have now searched clear down through the Scriptures,
and find not a trace or fragment of Episcopacy. The supposi
tion, to which the advocates of the scheme are obliged to resort
in order lo maintain that it had any existence in the first age
after the Apostles, we have seen to be absurd and impossible.
Beyond this point, we are bound to receive nothing. We are
not bound to inquire any further : we are already beyond the
Apostles and Apostolic times. In all propriety, the argument
should end here.
But we will not end here : we are willing to follow the preten
sions of Prelacy to her haunts and strongholds, in the deep tan
gled wild-wood of the Fathers, and to see what sort of resting-
place she possesses even there.
And first, as to the nature of the authority to be allowed to
the Fathers. We are willing to admit them as witnesses to mat
ters of fact existing in their own day, and coming under their
own observation, so far as any testimony can be ascertained to be
really theirs, and not a forgery or an interpolation. Secondly,
when they conjecture merely, as Theodoret does, without refer
ring to any record or even to any tradition, we are willing to
weigh even their conjectures ; especially when they give reasons
for the same. But thirdly, as authoritative interpreters of Scrip
ture, we know them not. It is said indeed, that we must receive
their opinions and interpretations, or reject the Bible ; but we
beg leave to dissent from this ; — a man may be a good witness
of the authenticity of a document, when he would make a most
miserable interpreter of its meaning. And it may be affirmed,
without any danger of contradiction, that nowhere, among Shak
ers, Swedenborgians, or Mormons, can there be found interpre
tations more crude, or monstrous, than are everywhere rife in the
writings of the boasted Fathers.
And now, let the Fathers advance and give their testimony :
The first who comes upon the stand is Clemens Romanus.

334 THE PURITANS AND THEIK PRINCIPLES.
He is supposed to be the Clement mentioned by Paul. He
wrote an Epistle to the Corinthians about A. D. 96. It is the
earliest and most authentic of all the writings of the Fathers.
His object in writing, was to conciliate the minds of the Corin
thians to their Pastors, some of whom they had rejected from the
ministry. Throughout his epistle, he calls these ministers Pres
byters, and speaks of the people having expelled them °™o ir,,-
Emcjy.oTiTj; from the Episcopate (the office of Bishop). He uses
the words Pastors and Bishops repeatedly and throughout, as
synonymous. This, Slater admits ; and the learned Dr. Camp
bell says, " No critic ever questioned " it.
But let Clemens speak for himself. " The Church of God
which sojourneth at Rome to the Church of God which is al
Corinth." (Why, this seems not a lordly Diocesan writing to a
Diocese, but very much like the minister of a congregation
writing in the name of the people to a sister Church.) But read
on. " The Apostles have preached to us from the Lord Jesua
Christ ; Jesus Christ from God. Christ, therefore, was sent by
God, the Apostles by Christ ; so both were orderly sent accord
ing to the will of God. For, having received command, and
being thoroughly assured by the resurrection of our Lord Jesus
Christ, and convinced by the Word of God, with the fulness of
the Holy Spirit, they went abroad publishing that the kingdom
of God was at hand. And thus preaching through countries
and cities, they appointed the first fruits of their conversions, to
be Bishops and Deacons over such as should afterward believe,
having first proved them by the Spirit ; for thus saith the Scrip
ture in a certain place, I will appoint their overseers [Bishops] in
righteousness, and their Deacons in faith."
Here we have everywhere, in cities and country places, Bish
ops and Deacons, in each place or congregation ¦ and with Cle
mens as with Paul, a Bishdp is the simple Pastor of a Church.
Clemens goes on to show how Moses, to prevent all dispute
about the priesthood, referred the matter to God ; when Aaron's
rod alone blossomed. " So likewise, our Apostles knew that
there should contentions arise upon the name of the Bishopric,
and therefore, having a perfect knowledge of this, they appointed
persons as we have before said, and gave directions, how, when
they should die, other and approved men should succeed in their
ministry; who were either appointed by them, or afterwards
chosen by other eminent men, with the consent of the whole
Church. For it would be no small sin in us should we cast off
these from their Episcopate [Bishopric], who nobly and without
blame fulfil the duties of it. Blessed are those Presbyters, who
having finished their course before these times, obtained a per
fect and fruitful dissolution. For they have no fear lest any one

PRELACY DISPROVED BY THE FATHERS. 335
should turn them out of the place which is now appointed for
them." * * * * " It is a shame, my beloved, yea, a great
shame, and unworthy your Christian profession, to hear, that the
most firm and ancient Church ofthe Corinthians, should by one
or two persons be led into a sedition against its Presbyters. *
* * * Do ye, therefore, who first laid the foundations of this
sedition, submit yourselves to your Presbyters," * * * *
"only let the flock of Christ be in peace with the Presbyters
that are set over it."
In this discourse, speaking expressly about the ministry, its
appointment and succession, Clemens recognizes only two orders,
Bishops and Deacons ; and he use3 the words Bishop and Pres
byter as synonymous, meaning the same identical office, as be
longing to the same identical men (just as we have seen the
words to be uniformly used in the New Testament).
It is therefore certain, that both at Rome and at Corinth, the
name Bishop has yet undergone no change from its original
signification. The Bishop is still the simple pastor of a Church ;
Presbyter being used as the title of honor [Elder], and Bishop
[overseer] being the name of office.
If there had been a Diocesan over these " Presbyters," whom
the Corinthians were rejecting from "the Episcopate," how
strange that Clemens did not mention him ; how impertinent in
that case, for Clemens to write at all ! How passing strange that
Clemens should say so much about these Presbyters coming
in succession from the Apostles, and forget to say one word
about their Diocesan, if they had one !
Will it be said that their Diocesan is dead ; and that Clemens
is writing as their provisional Diocesan ? But he writes not as
Diocesan, or in his own name at all; it is the Church of Rome
writing to the Church of Corinth !
Ask Clemens, while he is on the stand, whether he ever
knew the title Bishop to signify an office superior to that of
Presbyter, i. e., one holding the official rank of Apostle. He is
silent as the grave ; he knows nothing about it. Ask him, if he
knows of any such things as Angels of Churches, so called, who
in his day were in reality Apostles. He knows nothing about it.
Ask him if such an order of men exists, with or without a name,
whom it is too late to call Apostles, and too early to call Bish
ops ; he knows nothing about it, save that " everywhere," in
cities and in country places, at " Rome and in Corinth," a Bishop
is, like the New Testament Bishop, the Pastor, or Presbyter
(Elder) of a Church, i. e., of a congregation of Christians.
But Prelatists, nevertheless, claim Clemens as proving for them
three orders instead of two. Let us notice this claim. It will
servo as a fair specimen of the way in which Prelatical writers

336

THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.

delude each other, and mislead their people by mistaken inter
pretations of the Fathers. Perceval, in his famous book on
Apostolic succession (p. 54), cites this epistle of Clemens thus:
" It will behoove us, looking into the depths of divine knowledge,
to do all things in order, whatsoever our Lord has commanded
us to do. He has ordained by his supreme will and authority,
both when and by what persons, they [the sacred services and
oblations] are performed. For the chief priest has the proper
services, and to the Priests their proper place is appointed, and
to the Levites appertain their proper ministries ; and the layman
is confined within the bounds of what is appointed to lay
men." Perceval cites this with the express design of making those
who read him, believe that Clemens applies the term Chief
Priest, Priests, and Levites, to three orders in the Christian
ministry ; and here he leaves it. He passes entirely by the plain
testimony of Clemens concerning the identity of Presbyters and
Bishops ; but he adduces this passage as proof positive of three
orders, and especially of the Diocesan Bishop. Sure enough,
people who read Perceval, and who are not aware of his bare
faced trickery in this quotation, will naturally conclude that
Clemens acknowledges three orders in the Christian ministry.
But Clemens is not speaking here of the Christian ministry
as existing in three orders : he is drawing an argument for or
derly proceeding among Christians, from the consideration of
the regard to order observed in the Jewish sacrifices and priest
hood: and immediately after the sentence quoted by Perceval, he
makes the application : " Let every one of you, therefore, bless
God in his proper station, with a good conscience, and with all
gravity, not exceeding the rule of his sacrifice, which is appoint
ed to him. The daily sacrifices are not offered everywhere, nor
the peace-offerings, nor the sacrifices appointed for sins, but only
at Jerusalem."
Why did not the Hon. and Rev. Mr. Perceval, Chaplain to
the Queen, tell his readers, like an honest man, that he had
suppressed the true testimony of Clemens, and made a gross
perversion of his words, in the quotation which he gave ? — that
he was, in this instance, dealing wholly in false pretences ; and
that if they understood the words, Chief Priest, Priest and Leyite,
in this passage, to refer to three orders in the Christian minis
try, they must also conclude that Christian ministers offered
daily sacrifices, peace-offerings, and sin-offerings, and that only at
Jerusalem? And if Perceval was not honest enough to tell the
truth in this matter, why does the American Protestant Episcopal
Tract Society still persist in scattering that Tract, on the wings
of the wind, without one word of correction, and that, so long

PRELACY DISPROVED BY THE FATHERS. 337
after this piece of arrant fraud has been so clearly and unanswer
ably pointed out by Powell in his work on Apostolical succes
sion ?*
The words of Stillingfleet on the testimony of Clemens Ro-
manus, are worthy to be repeated ; " They that can find any one
single Bishop " [Diocesan] at Corinth, at the time when Clemens
wrote his epistle to them * * " must have better eyes and judg
ment than the deservedly admired Grotius, and he was a great
friend of Episcopacy, who brings this in his epistle toBignonius, as
an argument of the undoubted antiquity of that epistle, that Cle
ment nowhere mentions the singular authority of Bishops, which
by Church customs, after the death of Mark, at Alexandria, be
gan to be introduced : but Clement clearly shows, as did the
Apostle Paul, that then by the Common Council of the Presby
ters (who both by Paul and Clement are called Bishops) the
Churches were governed."
Milner, though an Episcopalian, also admits the force of this
absolute proof of Clemens. " At first indeed," says he, " and for
some time, Church governors were only of two ranks, Presbyters
and Deacons. The Church of Corinth continued long in this
state, as far as one may learn from Clement's epistle." " And
Faber says, here we may observe, no more than two orders are
specified ; the word Bishops being plainly used as equipollent
to the word Presbyters : and all possibility of misapprehension
is avoided by the circumstance of Clement's affirmation that the
appointment of these two orders was foretold in prophecy. *
* * Had the Church, in Clement's lime, universally acknow
ledged and believed that three distinct orders of clergy had been
appointed, that Father could never have asserted such a form of
polity to be foretold in prophecy, which announced the appoint
ment of no more than two sorts of officers."
I trust it is now clear, that in Clement's day, Episcopacy had
no existence. There was no name for such an officer as a Dio
cesan Bishop : no allusion, no fragment bears the least trace of
his existence.
Let us next call Justin Martyr, who suffered A. D. 165
*Mr. Chapin, in his work on the Primitive Church, stumbles into this ditch dug
by Perceval : I cannot for a moment suppose that he knowingly concurs in so gross
a piece of deception. He quotes (pp. 232 and 24 1) the same passage as proof from
Clemens of three orders in the ministry. He passes by and suppresses the real tes
timony of Clemens on the matter in question ; and adduces, as testimony, a pas
sage not relating to the Christian ministry at all, but only to the Jewish Priesthood.
Ihere is one piece of acumen, however, which appears to belong exclusively to
Mr. Chapin. Clemens had said that the Apostles " preaching in cities and coun
tries," appointed " everywhere Bishops and Deacons ," using the terms in the genuine
New Testament sense. This is too naked. It will indicate that Bishops are still,
everywhere, Phstors of Churches, with no change in the meaning of the word Bishop.
Mr Chapin avoids this by a new translation ; making Clement read, " They ap
pointed overseers and ministers" (instead of Bishops and Deacons).

338 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
He speaks of two orders in the ministry, and of two only ;
though expressly treating of the Church, its institutions, its offi
cers, and worship. He speaks repeatedly of the (jroojEoroic) Presi
dent of the brethren, and of the Deacons ; describing the Presi
dent as leading the congregation in prayer (which by the way
he describes as extemporary and not liturgical) — as setting apart
the bread and wine, while the deacons distribute the same. It
is evident that his President is simply the Pastor of a congrega
tion : and so far as appears from the writings of Justin, he is
entirely ignorant of such a thing as a Diocesan Bishop.
Call the next witness in order: Polycarp, of a date some
half century later than Clemens Romanus. Polycarp has been
familiar with the immediate disciples of our Lord. His epistle
was in such respect, among Primitive Christians, that it used to
be read publicly in their churches till the fourth century. "This
valuable relic," says Coleman (p. 165), " harmonizes in a remark
able degree with that of Clement, in recognizing but two orders
of the clergy." " Polycarp and the Presbyters with him to the
Church of God dwelling at Philippi" — If you turn to the Epistle
of Paul to the Philippians, you will see that he addresses the
Bishops and Deacons. Polycarp in like manner mentions but two
orders, Presbyters and Deacons. Coleman has justly remarked
(p. 166), that " If there were three orders of clergy at Philippi, the
omission of one by the Apostle, and another by this Apostolical
Father, is unaccountable." Polycarp exhorts the Church to be
subject to the Presbyters and Deacons. He intimates nothing
concerning any higher officer. The conclusion is inevitable, that
the words Bishop and Presbyter are still used interchangeably, as
they were in the days of Paul.
Here we have Clement and Polycarp, cotemporaries and sur
vivors of the Apostles, one at Rome, the other at Smyrna, in dif
ferent languages, in portions of the Church widely separated,
agreeing in making Bishops and Presbyters the same : and
speaking in such terms as to preclude the supposition that they
know anything of any higher officer.
But Prelatists still endeavor to press Polycarp as a witness
for their cause. Can you imagine how it is done ? In a very
ingenious way indeed. It you turn to Chapin on the Primitive
Church (pp. 229, 230), you will see how the thing is done.
He conjectures that the Bishop of Philippi is dead ; — as well
he may be, since (non est inventus) he is not to be found. Upon
this hook, he hangs another conjecture ; that the Church in Phi
lippi in Europe, being a Church without a Bishop, — may have
invited Polycarp of Smyrna in Asia, to exercise a temporary
and provisional Episcopacy over them. No history shows it :
Polycarp does not intimate any such thing : no— but the exigen-

PRELACY disproved by THE FATHERS. 339
cies of Episcopacy require it ; and so by virtue of two good
broad guesses, — as broad as the iEgean sea, — Polycarp is very
conveniently installed provisional and temporary Bishop of
Philippi : and that, before the days of steam-ships or magnetic
telegraphs !
If we do not allow this guess-work to be substantial proof of
the claims of Episcopacy, then we have come down into the
second century, and nearly through it, and not only has the word
Bishop undergone no change of meaning such as is pretended ;
not only is there no name as yet for such a thing as a Diocesan
Bishop; but no trace or hint of his existence. On the Episcopal
Bcheme the world is studded full of them ; the very life and
breath of all Church-existence depends upon them ; and yet, some
how, they are so very noiseless and shy, that nobody seems to
know anything about them ; and no footstep or trace is left
either of their name or of their existence ! No ; nothing but a
few arrant perversions, and some two or three chains of random
guesses, is pretended, as yet, to show that Diocesans exist any
where upon the face of the earth ! The Apostles, so called, are
dead. The angels of the Churches are no more. The Bishops
sit everywhere, each as the Pastor or Presbyter of his own con
gregation ; but the Diocesan, where is he ?
0 yes, it is said ; but hear our next witness and he will tell
you all about it. Hear Ignatius :
Ignatius! He comes too late by a whole hundred years.
Ignatius ? I hear bad stories about the writings attributed to
Ignatius. I hear from Prelatists and Puritans, Papists and Pu-
seyites, that the greater part of the writings attributed to Ignatius
bear indubitable marks of forgery ; and that the remainder is so
full of interpolations, that no one is willing to vouch for a single
sentence, that it was penned by Ignatius.
But will you not hear our truly important witness ? Will you
not hear Ignatius? Certainly ; we wish to hear him. But first
tell us yourselves how much this witness is worth. If you turn
to the last page of the appendix of Chapin's Primitive Church,
you will find it ad milted that there are two versions, or distinct
copies, of what purports to be the same seven epistles of Ignatius ;
the one set long, the other set short. One set teaches Arianism,
the other its opposite. Chapin thinks that we may well guess
the one which teaches Arianism, to be a forgery ; and that
the shorter, therefore, must be the true copy. But with regard
to the epistles in the shorter set, he admits the general conclusion
ofthe learned world ; that they are altered and interpolated, with
no notice given, to inform us what paragraphs, phrases and epi
thets, are genuine, or what are spurious.
Now, how are we to pick out what really belongs to Ignatius ?

340

THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.

How do you know that it is Ignatius, that you would bring
upon the stand, or that it is not some lying monk, or some scores
of lying advocates of Popery, who, in the course of seven centu
ries, have here mingled and confounded their forgeries together ?
Mr. Chapin give3 us a very sage rule for getting out of this difficulty.
He tells us to compare the interpolated and altered copies with
the forged ones ; and where the dubious witnesses accord with
the lying ones, he would have us guess that the first probably
speak the truth ; and this guess he would have us admit as a
proof for Episcopacy !
Very well ; let us now hear the witness, with the full under
standing that we are to guess as we can, where he speaks the
truth, and where the contrary. And if he proves Episcopacy, we
will not be so unreasonable as to refuse to admit, that Episcopacy,
after having come down to the second century and been found
wanting, has now some tolerable ground of g-wess-work to rest
upon in the testimony of a witness, concerning whom, nobody
can tell when he lies, or when he speaks the truth.
" Obedience to Bishops as the successors of the Apostles,"
says Chapin (p. 213), " is one of the leading topics of Ignatius."
" In all" [his seven epistles] " a prominent topic is obedience to
the Bishop."
" Wherefore, it becomes you," says Ignatius, " to run together
according to the will of your Bishop."
" It is your duty, also, not to despise the youth of your Bishop,
but to yield all reverence to him according to the power of God the
Father ; as also, I perceive your holy Presbyters do. * * *
It is, therefore, fitting that we should not only be called Chris
tians, but be so ; as some call a Bishop by that name, yet do all
things without him." * * * "It is, therefore, necessary that
ye do nothing without your Bishop, even as ye are wont." *
* * " He that is within the altar is pure. But he is not that
doeth anything without the Bishop, Presbyters and Deacons.
" For as many as are of Christ, are with their Bishop. * *
* I cried whilst I was among you, I spake with a loud voice.
Give ear to the Bishop, and to the Presbyters, and to the Dea
cons. * * * See that ye follow your Bishop as Jesus Christ,
the Father, and the Presbyters as the Apostles, and reverence
the Deacons as the command of God." * * "He that honors
the Bishop shall be honored of God." * * " Hearken unto the
Bishop, that God may hearken unto you.
" My soul be security for those who submit to their Bishop,
Presbyters and Deacons." * * * " Especially if at unity
with the Bishop, and the Presbyters and Deacons. Give ear to
the Bishop, and to the Presbyters, and to the Deacons." * *

PRELACY DISPROVED BY THE FATHERS. 341
"He that doeth anything without the Bishop and Presbyters and
Deacon3 is not pure in his conscience."
Such is the amount of the testimony of Ignatius. The writings
attributed to him, speak unequivocally and repeatedly of Bish
ops, Presbyters, and Deacons.
Upon this I remark, — •
1. How easy it would have been for those who confessedly
interpolated so much in the shortest of these epistles, to have
added the word Presbyters and Presbytery in these few passages ?
The best critics argue, from the great stress laid upon the digni
ty of Bishops, and the extravagant exhortations to obey them as
God the Father, that these passages were, in all likelihood, dis
honestly inserted in after times, to magnify the office of Bishop.
Others, and many among the deeply learned, do not hesitate to
declare the whole epistles to be forgeries ; alleging the tone, spirit,
and style, to be indicative of a later age ; that there are anachro
nisms, corruptions, and absurdities enough to stamp the brand
of forgery upon the whole; that it is absurd to suppose that
Ignatius while a prisoner, and in custody of his persecutors on
his way to martyrdom at Rome, should be allowed leisure and
means to write these numerous epistles. " And truly," says
Stillingfleet, '^the story of Ignatius (as much as it is defended
with his epistles) doth not seem to be any the most probable.
For wherefore should Ignatius of all others be brought to Rome
to suffer, when the proconsuls, and the Presides Provinciarum
did everywhere iu that time of persecution execute their power
in punishing Christians at their own tribunal, without sending
them to Rome to be martyred there ? And how came Ignatius
to make so many, and such strange excursions, as he did, by the
etory, if the soldiers that were his guard were so cruel to him,
as he complains they were ? Now all these uncertain and fabu
lous narrations as to persons there, arising from want of suffi
cient records made at those times, make it more evident how in
competent a judge antiquity is, as to the certainty of things done
in Apostolic times."
John Milton long ago made this common sense remark con-
cernmg the authority of these writings in this controversy. " To
what end then should they cite him as authentic for Episcopacy,
when they cannot know what is authentic in him, but by the
judgment which they brought with them, and not by any judg
ment which they might safely learn from him." — (Coleman, p.
2. When we add to this, the inconsistency of this alleged
testimony of Ignatius with the testimony of Clemens Romanus,
and Polycarp, it is rendered the more probable, that if these
epistles are genuine, their testimony is interpolated, i. e., on the

342 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
supposition that the import of the passages is what it is claimed
to be. I say on this supposition ; for
3. Admitting them to be genuine it does not follow that the
Bishop here spoken of, holds the office of Apostle. He may
have been of the same order as a Presbyter, and only chosen as
a special superintendent, as was afterwards done. The testi
mony admitted to the full extent of all that is claimed for it, does
not stretch the proof back over the impassable chasm, which we
have heretofore seen to exist between the Aposdes and the ex
istence of Diocesan Bishops.
4. Nothing goes to show that the term Bishop, as denoting
an order of office, has as yet changed its meaning ; but positive
evidence that about this time the word generally meant what it
did in the days of the Apostles. The testimony, admitting it to
be genuine, is capable of being explained olherwise than by
supposing that the name Bishop had changed its meaning. No
thing points beyond the arrangement of the Presbyterian Church,
with its Bishop (Pastor), Elders, and Deacons. There is no
ground for the conjecture, that the Bishop here spoken of must
have been a Diocesan, the ruler of several Churches. The
Churches written to are single congregations ; at Ephesus, at
Magnesia, at Tralles, at Philadelphia. No reason exists for sup
posing these Diocesan Churches. It is conjectured that they are
Dioceses. It is conjectured that these Bishops are of a different
order from the Bishops made by the Apostles, and which, up to
this time, have been found as Pastors of single congregations,
everywhere all over the Christian world. It is conjectured that
these epistles are not forgeries ; and though, interpolated, beyond
the power of man to determine what parts are genuine, it is con
jectured that these passages are not interpolations ; and that they
are not themselves interpolated by the addition of one single word ;
and so Episcopacy reposes her weight upon the strength of this
chain of conjectures. It is the best evidence she has ; altogether the
strongest and best. In a matter where proof would be abundant
and overwhelming, broad and legible as the sun at noon-day,
if the monstrous claims of Episcopacy had any foundation in
truth, she is here compelled to rest upon this scanty and con
jectural ground! The very necessity which drives her to hold
here is fatal to her cause.
5. What finally renders all these Prelatical conjectures of no
value, is that if admitted they prove too much, and overthrow
the point which Episcopacy wishes to prove by Ignatius. The
point to be proved is, that Diocesan Bishops are the successors
in the office of the Apostles. If Ignatius proves not that point,
he proves nothing at all. But if we admit his testimony, it ex
pressly proves that Bishops do not succeed the Apostles, but are

PRELACY DISPROVED BY THE FATHERS. 343
the vicegerents of God the Father, while Presbyters are the suc
cessors of the Apostles. Unfortunately Ignatius himself, or
whoever forged or interpolated his epistles, lived too early for
the more recent Episcopal theory that Bishops are successors
of the Apostles. Recall Ignatius and ask him. Speak, Ignatius ;
are your Bishops in reality Apostles ; successors in .the office of
those who originally bore the name ? He speaks ; " Yield all
reverence to your Bishop according to God the Father." Well,
that is rather dubious ; can you not speak a little plainer, Igna
tius, and tell us how it is ? " See that ye follow your Bishop
as Jesus Christ the Father, and the Presbyters as the Apos
tles." 0 now we understand you, Ignatius ; you afford no counte
nance to the more recent basis of the Episcopal claims. But
speak again, Ignatius ; tell us over and over again : do you
agree with modern Prelatists, in making your Bishops successors
of the Apostles, or do you not ? He speaks, " Let all reverence
the Deacons as Jesus Christ; and the Bishop as the Father; and
the Presbyters as the Sanhedrim of God, the college of the Apos
tles." And again : " Without your Bishop you should do no
thing; also be ye subject to your Presbyters as to the Apostles
of Jesus Christ."
It is a clear case, that whoever wrote these epistles, he was ig
norant of the claims of Bishops to be successors of the Apostles ;
since he pertinaciously persists in putting Presbyters in the place
of Apostles, and in making the Bishops vicegerents of God.
The Ignatian epistles, however spurious or interpolated, were
written before that figment was laid down as the basis of the
Episcopal claims.
We have now brought the matter down to the middle of the
second century, and found neither Diocesan Bishop nor official
successor of the Apostles. But let us pass on.
Iremcus, who died about A. D. 202, speaking of Marcion and
other heretics, says ; " When we refer them to the Apostolic tra
dition which is preserved in the Churches through the succession
of their Presbyters, these men oppose the tradition, pretending
that being more wise than not only the Presbyters, but the Apos
lles themselves, ihey have found uncorrupted truth." Soon af-
ler, he styles these Presbyters, Bishops. " We can enumerate,"
he continues, " those who were constituted by the Apostles,
Bishops and their successors even down to our time." Again he
calls Polycarp "Bishop ofthe Church of Smyrna," and afterwards
calls him that " Holy and Apostolical Presbyter." You will re
cognize still the Scriptural identity of Bishop and Presbyter.
Again he says, "the Apostles founding and instructing the
Church (of Rome) delivered to Linus the Episcopate. Anacle-

344 the puritans and their principles.
tus succeeded him : after him Clement obtained the Episcopate
from the Apostles :" — he proceeds to enumerate in order, " Eva-
ristus, Alexander, Sixtus, Hygnus, Pius, Anicetus, and Eluthe-
rus in the twelfth place."
Here, say the Prelatists, you find the succession of Bishops:
and accordingly the names of this succession are paraded in all
the tables of Episcopal genealogies. But softly : This same Ire
naeus writing against Victor, Bishop of the Roman Church, says,
" Those Presbyters before Soter, who governed the Church which
thou Victor now governest : I mean Anicetus, Pius, Hygnus,
Telesiphorus, and Sixtus; did they not observe it? And those
Presbyters who preceded you, did they not observe it ? And when
the blessed Polycarp, in the days of Anicetus, came to Rome, did
he not persuade Anicetus to observe it ? as he (Anicetus) declar
ed that the custom of the Presbyters, who were his predecessors,
should be retained ?"
Irenaeus uses the words Presbyter and Bishop as synony
mous. The very Bishops set down in the list of the Episcopal
succession, he styles Presbyters.
By this time, one appointed by the Presbyters of large
Churches to be their moderator, began to rise gradually above
his brethren ; but not yet so far as to be recognized as of a differ
ent order. Accordingly we find Clemens of Alexandria, in the
beginning of the third century, speaking of Bishops, Presbyters,
and Deacons. "Numerous other precepts," says he, "directed
to select characters, some to Presbyters, some to Bishops, some
to Deacons, and others to widows, &c." Here the name Bishop
begins to be used distinctly from the name Presbyter ; but it does
not yet begin to signify a different order ; for Clemens repeatedly
shows, that as yet there are properly but two orders in the minis
try. Having observed that, in most things, there are two sorts
of ministry, the one of a nobler nature than th'e other which is
subservient ; and having illustrated this distinction by several
other examples, he says : " Just so in the Church, the Presby
ters are entrusted with the dignified ministry ; the Deacons, with
the subordinate." He speaks of a nooxadedQia — or first seat in
the Presbytery.* From all which, as Coleman has well observed,
" the obvious inference is, that the Bishop of this author is only the
nQtaicroig of early writers — the Presiding Elder of the Presbyte
ry." " Henceforth, the title of ngmaTcag is seldom used in the
Fathers, but instead of that, the word Bishop constantly occurs."
Yet even after this time, the word Presbyter is used by Cle
mens of Alexandria, interchangeably with Bishop. Thus, he
relates how John, struck with the appearance of a young man,
committed him to the Bishop that presided over all; and the
* Coleman, p. 173.

prelacy disproved by THE FATHERS. 345
Presbyter (the Bishop) taking this young man, nourished, edu
cated, and lost him. John, on his return, addressed that Presby
ter with the style " O Bishop .'" If John called him Bishop, he
must needs have been a Bible Bishop, and identical with a
Presbyter. Here, then, we find the rise of Prelacy, in the beginning of the
third century. A Presbyter, first appointed as a standing mode
rator by the Presbyters of large Churches, grew up gradually
into power, till finally he usurped not only the power, but the
name. We trace the identity of Presbyters and Bishops up to
the middle of the second century : and it is not pretended that
there is anywhere a higher officer, of any other name.
But now, lest it should be thought that these conclusions de
pend too much upon the deductions of argument, and not suffi
ciently upon testimony, let us call a witness who shall substan
tiate these facts by his clear and undeniable testimony. Let
Jerome come forward and tell what he knows of this matter.
Jerome died A. D. 426. Erasmus styles him " by far the most
learned and most eloquent of all the Christians, and the prince
of Christian Divines" (Coleman, p. 182). In his Commentary
on Titus, Jerome says, " A Presbyter, therefore, is the same as a
Bishop. And before there were, by the devil's instigation, parties
in religion, and it was said among the people, I am of Paul, I
am of Apollos, and I of Cephas, the Churches were, governed by
the Common Council of the Presbyters. But afterwards * *
it was determined in the whole world, that one chosen from
among the Presbyters should be put over the rest."
He proves the identity of Presbyters and Bishops by the
Epistle of Paul lo the Philippians — " Paul and Timotheus to all
the saints in Christ Jesus which are at Philippi with the Bishops
anil Deacons." " Philippic" says Jerome, " is a single city of
Macedonia ; and certainly in one city, there could not be several
Bishojis as they are now styled : but as they at that time called
the very same persons Bishops whom they called Presbyters, the
Apostle has spoken without distinction, of Bishops and Presby
ters." He proves the same from the address of Paul to the El
ders of the Church of Ephesus : " Take particular notice," says
ho, "that calling the Presbyters of the single city of Ephesus,
lie afterwards names the same persons Bishops." " Our inten
tion," says he, " is to show that among the ancients, Presbyters
and Bishops were the very same. But by little and little, that
the plants of dissension might be plucked up, the whole concern
was devolved upon an individual. As the Presbyters, therefore,
know that they are subjected by the custom of the Church to
him who is set over them, so let the Bishops know that they are

346 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
greater than Presbyters, more by custom, than by any real ap
pointment of Christ."
Prelatists claim from Jerome's accommodating the language
of Scripture, " when one said I am of Paul, I am of Apollos,"
&c, that he means to affirm that Diocesans were first created
upon the dissensions in the Church of Corinth. But Stilling
fleet has well replied that this is impossible, since the proofs
which Jerome adduces of the identity of Bishops and Presbyters
are all of a later date than that epistle to the Corinthians. It is
absurd to suppose that he meant to fix the rise of Prelacy at the
time of the dissensions in Corinth, and yet bring all his proofs
of the parity of Bishops and Presbyters from records of later
times. Besides, Jerome says that the distinction grew up " by little
and little." He denies that a Bishop is superior to a Presbyter
by divine appointment, or by any other right than a custom of the
Church which grew up by little and little. Stillingfleet has well
remarked, that if Episcopacy had first been instituted at Corinth
on the occasion of the dissensions mentioned by Paul, then, of
all places, we should expect to find a Diocesan at Corinth. But
when Clemens Romanus writes to the Corinthians, he finds fault
with their turning their Presbyters out of the Episcopate. He
knows absolutely nothing of any Diocesan over these Presbyters.
The testimony of Jerome stands absolute and unequivocal,
that Bishops and Presbyters were originally the same ; that in
ancient times the Churches were governed by the common coun
cil of the Presbyters; but that afterwards Episcopacy grew up
" by little and little" from Presbyters elected to preside over the
rest ; and that the superiority of Bishops over Presbyters is not
by any real appointment of Christ, but by the custom of the
Church. And he appeals to Bishops and Presbyters that they
both know it to be so.
But it is alleged that Jerome contradicts himself and main
tains the superiority of Bishops over Presbyters. That you may
have this objection in full force, I will here copy the passages as
they are referred to in Chapin's Primitive Church (p. 200), with
his capitals and italics, to set forth the important points with due
prominence. " The Epistle to Evangelum, if it be genuine, which some doubt,
was written on hearing that some one had given Beacons preference to
Presbyters, as though they were of a superior order." Upon this he
says, " I hear that one was so impudent as to rank Deacons before
Presbyters, that is Bishops. Now the Apostle plainly declares thet-ume
to be Presbyters, who are also Bishops." And after mentioning some of the
duties of Deacons and Presbyters, he proceeds to quote Phil. i. 1 ; Acts
xx. 17 ; Titus ii. 5-7 ; 1 Tim. iii. 8, in proof of the position he had
before laid down, when he adds :

PRELACY DISPROVED BY THE FATHERS. 347
"Who are significantly called in the Greek Episcopountes, from whence
the name of Episcopi (Bishops) is derived." He then quotes from one
Caius, a Presbyter, who says : — " In the See of Alexandria, from St.
Mark the Evangelist to Heracleus and Dionysius, Bishops, thePresbyters
always elected one from among themselves, and raising him to a higher
rank, they called him Bishop ; much as an army chooses an Emperor,
or as Deacons elect one from among themselves, and call him Archdea
con. Indeed, what can a Bishop do, that a Presbyter may not do, ex
cept ORDINATION ?" Then after saying that the same practice existed
in all places, he adds, " Wherever the Bishop be, whether at Rome or
Engubium, or Constantinople, or Rhegium, or Alexandria, or Tanais, he
is of the same degree, and of the same priesthood, for all are successors
or the Apostles." And after some remarks concerning the Roman
custom, he adds ; " Let them know wherefore Deacons were establish
ed ;, let them read the Acts of the Apostles, and remember their condi
tion. Presbyter is a title of age ; Bishop of office. Wherefore [in the
Epistles] to Timothy and Titus, is mention made of the ordination of
Bishops and Deacons, but not of Presbyters, because in the Bishop
the Presbyter is contained. We are advanced from the less to the
greater ; if, therefore, the Deacon is ordained from among the Presby
ters, then is the Presbyter least ; but if the Presbyter is ordained from
among Deacons, then is the Presbyter of a higher order of the priest
hood. And we know from Apostolical Tradition, taken from the Old
Testament, that what Aaron and his sons and the Levites hare been in the
Temple, the same the Bishops, and the Presbyters, and the Deacons may
claim as their own in the Church."
By the help of italics and capitals, Mr. Chapin, and other advo
cates of Prelacy, here make out something plausible to the eye
of a careless reader, while the impression, so made, is false to the
sense. If the cursory reader casts his eye over the passage so
garnished, what will he find ? — " What can a Bishop do that a
Presbyter may not, except ordination ?" — " Wherever the
Bishop be — he is of the same degree — for all are successors
of the Apostles." — " Because in the Bishop the Presbyter is
contained." — " What Aaron and his sons and the Levites have
been in the Temple, the same the Bishops, and the Presbyters, and
the Deacons, may claim as their own in the Church."
This array is set forth constantly, by the advocates of Prelacy,
to show that Bishops are divinely superior to Presbyters ; that
Bishops may of divine right ordain, while Presbyters may not ;
and that Bishops, Priests, and Deacons, correspond to Aaron, his
sons, and the Levites.
Let us sift this testimony. Jerome begins with saying, "I
hear that one was so impudent as to rank Deacons before Pres
byters." How does he prove that they are not so ? By asserting the
identity of Presbyters with Bishops : " Now the Apostle plainly
declares the same to be Presbyters, who are also Bishops," and he

348 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
refers to the passages commonly cited, to show the absolute iden
tity of the two. That is, Deacons cannot be superior to Presby
ters, because Presbyters are not only equal to Bishops, but iden
tical with them.
This is the proof. Will Jerome stultify himself in pressing
the proof further, by proceeding to show that Presbyters are not
equal to Bishops? He certainly does not. He quotes one
Caius, to substantiate, not to deny what he has affirmed ; viz., that
Presbyters are, by divine right, identical with Bishops. What
is the proof from Caius? Why this: that in Alexandria, the
Presbyters elected one of themselves to hold a higher authority.
That could not make him of a higher order. By divine right,
and appointment, he was still a Presbyter, though by the elec
tion of his brethren, he was made their presiding officer, or mode
rator ; — " Just," — says Caius — " as Deacons elect one from
among themselves and make him an Arch-deacon ;" — yet he is
but a Deacon in order ; he holds no divine order above that of
simple Deacon : but is in this respect a simple Deacon still.
What further proof from Caius ? Why, that even at this day,
Presbyters are so identical with Bishops, that there is nothing
that a Bishop may do, which a Presbyter may not, except ordi
nation. Here is no divine right alleged, but for the sake of or
der, and by the election and appointment of his brethren, as
Jerome has already affirmed — he has at this day, that pre-emi
nence assigned to him.
What further proof? Why this: that what this Bishop, so
elected by his brethren at Alexandria, is, that all Bishops are,
whether at Rome, Engubium, or anywhere else; — one is as
much a successor of the Apostles as another ; Presbyters are, by
divine right, everywhere equal with Bishops.
What further proof? Why this ; that Paul, writing to Timo
thy and Titus, speaks of ordaining Bishops, but nothing of
Presbyters, for the simple reason, that in the Bishop the Presby
ter is contained; — and the. Bishops mentioned by Paul to Timo
thy and Titus are on all hands admitted to be simple Presbyters.
Our author wishes to show in this place, that the higher order of
Bishop embraces the inferior order of Presbyter, while Jerome's
argument, and the proof which he cites from Paul's Epistle to
Timothy and Titus, show that the Bishop and Presbyter referred
to, are absolutely identical.
But what concerning Aaron and his sons, and the Levites, as
answering to Bishop, Priest, Deacon ? Does Jerome, after build
ing his argument entirely upon the identity of Bishops and Pres
byters, now, at the very close of it, turn round and deny that same
identity ? By no means. The answer of Stillingfleet is con
clusive on this point; "For the comparison runs not between

PRELACY DISPROVED BY THE FATHERS. 349
Aaron and his sons under the law, and Bishops and Presbyters
under the Gospel; but between Aaron and his sons as one part
of the comparison under the law, and the Levites under the
other" (i. e., not between High-Priest and Priests, but embra
cing both logether as Priests and making Levites inferior). " So
under the Gospel, Bishops and Presbyters make one part of the
comparison, answering to Aaron and his sons in that wherein
they all agree, viz. the order of the Priesthood ; and the other
part under the Gospel answering to the Levites under the
law." — (Irenicum, p. 293.)
In an evil hour for Episcopacy, she fastened upon this pas
sage to make Jerome contradict himself, by a seeming acknow
ledgment of a divine right of Bishops above Presbyters. His
whole argument begins and ends with the affirmation, and the
proof that Bishops and Presbyters are, by divine appointment,
one and the same. Instead of a contradiction, it is as strong a
corroboration of Jerome's previous testimony as can well be
given ; that by divine appointment Bishops and Presbyters are
the same ; that in primitive times they were identical ; that
Bishops grew up into a superior order by little and little, from a
human appointment as moderators ; and that this both Bishops
and Presbyters of his day know to be true.
We have now done with the Fathers. Their testimony
sweeps the claims of Prelacy away as with the besom of destruc
tion. Adducing their real testimony, which Perceval and other
Prelatists are so careful to suppress, and clearing away the per
versions of those parts of the testimony of the Fathers, which the
advocates of Prelacy adduce ; the evidence stands forth clear,
consistent, and uniform, affording no manner of support to the
Episcopal claims ; but making it certain, that the entire fabric of
Prelacy grew up by gradual ursurpations, and is as baseless of
all divine authority, or of primitive institution, as the domination
of the Pope or the false prophet*
* The learned Stillingjlcet comes to this conclusion with regard to the testimony of
the Fathers. "For as to the matter itself," says he (p. 301, Irenicum)" I believe upon.
the strictest inquiry Medina's judgment will prove true ; that Hicrom, Austin, Jm-
brost, Sedulius, Primasius, Chrysostom, Theodoret, Thtophylact, were all of Aerius's
judgment, as to the identity both of tlie names, and order ot- Bishops and Pres
byters." Churchmen are fond of saying that Stillingfleet afterwards changed his mind.
After proving by matters of fact the novelty and idle claims of Prelacy, he did, in-
clocd, afterwards, become a Bishop and a bitter enemy to all dissenters from the
Church of England. Bishop Burnet says of him, that, " To avoid the imputation
that book btought on him, he went into the humors of a high sort of people, beyond
what became him, perhaps beyond his own sense of things. '' The arguments of his
Irenicum against the divine right of Episcopacy, were, however, such matters of
fact, that he was unable ever, to renounce them, or set them aside. "The book,"
•ays Bishop White, " was, it seems, easier retracted than refuted, for though offensive
to many of both parties, it was managed with so much learning and skill, that none
of either side ever undertook to answer it."

XXVIII

INFERENTIAL PRESUMPTIONS.
High Priests. Priests and Levites. Three Orders. The Apostolic Com
mission. Claims of Diocesans to be Vicegerents of Jesus Christ.
It is alleged that the three orders, Bishop, Priest and Dea
con, come in the place of the three orders, High Priest, Priest
and Levite.
This is mere fancy ; the Bible gives no intimation of any such
thing. Bishops coming in the place of the Jewish High Priests!
When was such a claim made by the Apostles ? Where is
there the faintest intimation of such a thing in the Word of
God? If this fancy were true, and if the argument drawn from it had
any weight, then it would go, not for the claims of the Bishop,
but for the supremacy of the Pope ; since, from the nature of the
case, there could be but one High Priest in the world.
But the fancied resemblance fails. There is no correspon
dence between the functions of the Jewish Priesthood, and those
of the Christian ministry. Every priest must have somewhat to
offer ; the Christian ministry cannot be a priesthood, since the
offerings and sacrifices of the Jewish law were but types of the
priesthood and sacrifice of Christ. The substance being come,
the shadows pass away ; there is no more any Priest, or altar,
or sacrifice, since Christ, by one offering of himself, hath for
ever perfected them that are sanctified by him.
The High Priest entering within the vail to make atonement
for sin, was a type of Christ entering into the holiest place of the
true tabernacle, obtaining eternal redemption for us. For any
man, therefore, to claim to come in the place of the Jewish High
Priest is a deep injury to the sole priesthood of Christ.
The claims of Episcopacy, on this ground, are worse than sim
ple error; they are injurious to Christ, and subversive of the entire
truth of the Gospel. They should never be tolerated for a mo
ment, but met with the most pointed and indignant rebuke.
But we hear the advocates of Prelacy harping still upon the
mystic number Three. It is said that there were three orders

INFERENTIAL PRESUMPTIONS. 351
under the Mosaic dispensation, three orders in the time of Christ ;
and therefore, three orders in the Christian ministry to the end
of time.
This, too, is fanciful. It is true there were three orders of of
fices under the Jewish dispensation ; but that dispensation was
of temporary use and arrangement. The Abrahamic Church
was long with no order at all. Why not take the analogy from
this, rather than from a priesthood not pertaining to the covenant,
and which was designed to vanish away ?
But how were there three orders in Christ's time ? It is al
leged that Christ was one, the Apostles another, and the seventy
a third. But the seventy were no Church officers at all. Their work
was special and soon completed.
It is alleged that the Deacons succeeded these. But the work
of the seventy was to go throughout the villages and preach pre
paratory to Christ's personal visits ; the Deacons were permanent
officers in each Church, to see to its secular affairs. The Bible
gives no intimation that they, in any way, take the place of the
seventy ; and there is no resemblance between the functions of
the two classes of men. It is therefore not true, that Deacons
came in the place of the seventy : and not true that the seventy
were any order of Church officers at all.
If our Lord is one order in the ministry, then who succeeds
him in that order ? Our Lord is one ; sole head over the ivhole
Church. He has no peer nor equal. If the Church constitutes
one, he can have but one successor. This argument, also, makes
not for the Bishops, but for the Pope. If our Lord was the first
order, then the Apostles were the second ; and Bishops claiming
to succeed the Apostles, must still look to an order above them ;
and that an order consisting of one.
But it is alleged, that when Christ departed, the Apostles were
raised one degree from second to first : that the seventy were
raised to the station which Apostles previously held, and Deacons
created in place of the seventy. This is all fancy, and contra
dictory to fact. The Apostles were not ordained again to a
higher order : the seventy, instead of being advanced to higher
dignity, are absolutely mentioned no more ; and in no sense did
Beacons come in the place of the seventy. This is all an awk
ward and cumbrous piece of machinery, invented for the special
service of Prelacy. And yet, when Doctors of Divinity put on
their robes, and talk gravely about High Priest, Priests and Le
vites; Christ, the Twelve, the seventy; Bishops, Priests, and
Deacons: Three orders: — how many people do not stop to ex
amine, but receive it, as if it were not — what it is in reality —

352 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
among the grossest absurdities that have ever been attempted to
be palmed off under the name of truth or argument!
But it is alleged that the Apostolical Commission transferred
the sovereignty of the Church from Christ to the Apostles ; which
sovereignty devolves (through the Apostles) — upon the modern
Bishops, and that thus the Bishops come into the place of Christ.
The first passage adduced in proof of this monstrous claim is,
that in Luke xxii. 29-30. " And I appoint unto you a kingdom,
as my Father hath appointed me ; that ye may eat and drink at
my table in my kingdom, and sit on thrones, judging the Twelve
tribes of Israel. This, says Chapin (Primitive Church, p. 165),
" Is tantamount to saying, I make over, or appoint to you" as
by bequest, the kingdom I have received from my Father;
and the reason given is, in order that they might be able to eat
and drink at that table which he had spread ; that is, might have
power and authority to consecrate and set apart the elements of
bread and vjine, so that they should become sacramentally his
body and blood, as he himself had declared them to be." Cha
pin reiterates this doctrine (p. 173), insisting that Christ " made
over or committed, as by devise or bequest, the kingdom which
the Father had appointed, or committed to him ; in order that
they might — sit on thrones (the emblems of power), judging
(in a judicial sense) the twelve tribes (or persons composing the
commonwealth) of Israel, which, in the New Testament, signi
fies the Church." This is indeed a monstrous claim, now
made by Diocesan Bishops, which, formerly, nobody had the au
dacity to make, save the Pope, kings over the kingdom, given to
Christ by the Father ! Kings [sovereigns] of the Church ! (Lords
over God's heritage !) and vicegerents of Jesus Christ ! Christ
is no longer king : He has abdicated — made an assignment —
vacated the throne, and "made over" to the Bishops "the
kingdom which he has received from the Father." Can the hor
rid impieties of Popery go to a greater length of extravagance
and madness, than the claim which is here made for Diocesan
Bishops? It is assumed that " kingdom " here means the Church ;
and that sitting at his table, means power and authority to conse
crate the elements in the Lord's supper, to make them sacramen
tally his body and blood."*
?Hence Chapin argues that as power to consecrate must be derived from the
Bishop, itis not lawful to celebrate the sacrament of the Lord's supper without the
Bishop's consent (p. 165). He quotes, as a document of instruction and evidence,
an old Liturgy which represents the consecration as afiUing the bread with the Holy
Ghost." In his Tract, showing the sinfulness of Episcopalians taking the sacra
ment, from other hands, or of uniting with other denominations in their public wor
ship, he claims that the consecration makes the bread " not only a sign, but also a
means whereby grace is given-"— imparting the most precious body and blood ^of
our Lord Jesus Christ to worthy partakers, and " making them one with Christ, —
" filling them with heavenly benediction, so that their sinful bodies are made clean

inferential presumptions. 353
What mountains of consequences may be made to depend
upon a little false interpretation of Scripture ! If you turn to
the passage in question, you will perceive that there is no trans
ferring of Christ's kingly power, and no allusion to the sacra
ment of the Lord's supper contained in it at all. Let us read
the whole passage : Luke, xxii. 24—30.
" And there was also a strife among them which of them should be
accounted the greatest. And he said unto them, The kings of the Gen
tiles exercise lordship over them ; and they that exercise authority upon
them are called benefactors, But ye shall not be so ; but he that is
greatest among you, let him be as the younger ; and he that is chief, as
ne that doth serve ; for whether is greater, he that sitteth at meat, or
he that serveth 1 is not he that sitteth at meat 1 but I am among you as
he that serveth 1 ye are they which have continued with me in my
temptations. And I appoint unto you a kingdom, as my father hath
appointed unto me ; that ye may eat and drink at my table in my king
dom, and sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel."
Now, what transfer of kingly power is here ? The disciples,
thinking about a splendid earthly kingdom, such as they sup
posed the Messiah would set up, disputed who should be the
greatest. The Saviour first rebukes their ambition. Their
highest greatness is to be as servants. " Ye are they which have
continued with me in my temptations ;" as if he had said ; you
want to be great in my kingdom ; — well, you have witnessed my
temptations ; you have seen me a man of sorrows and acquainted
with grief; you have seen me destitute, afflicted, persecuted,
having not where to lay my head. Such a kingdom I appoint
you. " I appoint unto you a kingdom as my Father hath ap
pointed me," i. e., glory indeed hereafter, but in the present life
tribulations. Observe he does not say the kingdom which my
Father hath appointed me ; he makes no transfer of his kingly
power; he says I appoint unto you " a kingdom, as my Father
hath appointed me ;" a kingdom of sorrows and humiliation.
You are disputing who shall be the greatest, in what, you sup
pose, shall be my earthly kingdom. Well, you have been with
me in my temptations, my trials, my sorrows ; and just such a
kingdom I appoint unto you; that ye may eat and drink at my
table in my kingdom, and sit on thrones judging the twelve
tribes of Israel.*
by his body," and "their souls washed through his most precious bloodr" that
none but Episcopal ministers have this power to consecrate ; hence he concludes
that the bread given at other tables, is not the food that " our Father hath provided
tor us." What extravagance of Tuseyism goes beyond this > And this is Connec
ticut Episcopacy!
* RoBeinniiller says on the passage. " The sense is. As my father hath appointed
me ii kingdom to be acquired by iWuranrc of adversities; so l appoint unto you a
llory like unto royal majesty, to be acquired in a similar way." That is to sav, the
kingdom promised to the Apostles is not the majesty which was promised to Christ
but,— from the connection, — the reward of labor undergone.
23

354 the puritans and their principles.
Oh, what a rebuke to their ambition ! And out of this rebuke,
this sorrowful declaration of the persecution and tribulation to be
endured by his disciples in this world, Episcopacy derives a trans
fer of Christ's kingly power and sovereignty, to the order of
Bishops ; and exclusive Letters Patent for consecrating the
elements of the Lord's Supper, to make them sacramentalty the
body and blood of Christ, and the efficient means of confer
ring divine grace !
Another passage relied on as conferring Prelatical authority is
that in Matt, xxviii. 19, 20, " Go ye therefore and teach all
nations ; baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the
Son, and of the Holy "Ghost ; teaching them to observe all things
whatsoever I have commanded you. And lo I am with you
always, even to Ihe end of the world."
From this it is argued : 1. That this direction is addressed,
and the promise given exclusively to the Apostles in that capaci
ty ; and that 2. As Christ is to be with the Apostles, as such, to
the end of the world, so the Apostolic office is alway3 to subsist;
and that the line of personal successors in this office is always to
run infallible and indefectible.
Does the commission contain any such powers or promise?
1. It is assumed that this commission gives the sole right of
ordaining and ruling : but not one word of ordaining or of ruling
is contained in the passage. It is a commission of preaching,
teaching, and baptizing, which any ordinary minister may do.
How then can it be a commission conferring exclusive Prelatical
powers, when not one word is said of anything which Prelacy
claims as peculiar to itself?
2. It is claimed as a commission and a promise exclusively to
Prelates. If it were so, then Prelates alone must go and preach
the Gospel to the heathen. Instead of staying at home to ordain
and confirm, and Lord it over God's heritage, as our modern
Diocesans do, every soul of them should go to the heathen ; and
nobody else should go, since, as it is claimed, the commission is
exclusive. 3. The promise is not of a personal succession, that their line
shall be indefectible in ordaining and ruling, but to them who
go, and preach. Those who do not go and preach — i. e., who
do not go to propagate the Gospel abroad — cannot exclusively
claim this promise. To which one of our Diocesans, then, does
the promise appertain ? How preposterous to argue from this
promise, that Christ has been with all the infidel, obscene, and
murderous Alexanders and Borgias, who have ever worn a
mitre, so that the possession of a Prelate who derives his
authority through their hands is a mark of the true Church !
But has not Christ been with his missionaries and minis-

inferential presumptions. 355
ters (even though they were not Prelates), wherever and
whenever they have been found preaching in obedience to his
command ? Has not Christ been with the Baptist missionaries
in Burmah ? with the Congregational missionaries in the Sand
wich Islands? with the Moravians in Greenland? — with Elliot,
the Mayhews, and with Brainerd among the Indians ? Are the
fruits of the Divine influences of the Spirit all limited to Episco
pacy ? It is true, as the famous Puseyite Dr. Hook said of this
country, that " here you may see the Church " (meaning the
Episcopal Church) " like an Oasis in the desert, blessed by the
dews of heaven, and shedding her heavenly blessing around
her in a land, where, if it were not for her, nothing but the ex
tremes of infidelity or fanaticism would prevail ?" And Bishop
Brownell has seen fit to reiterate this sentiment, charging his
clergy — with reference to other denominations, that " surrounded
by all this desolation, the Protestant Episcopal Church in this
country, appears as an oasis in the desert." Bul is it so ? Is
there nothing but the extremes of infidelity and fanaticism in
this country, out of the pale of the Episcopal Church ? Do the
dews from heaven descend exclusively upon the Episcopal
Church ? Are their preachers and missionaries the only ones
with whom Christ goes ? Alas ! what madness of arrogance is
this ! What insulting superciliousness, towards all others who
bear the Christian name !
Another passage is relied on for these exclusive claims of Pre
lacy. It is that contained in John xx. 21 , 25, " As my Father
has sent me even so send I you," &c. This " even so," Cha
pin argues largely, in his " Primitive Church," to be descriptive
of the powers granted in the Apostolic commission ; the Bish
ops, in this respect, taking the place of Christ, in the authority
which he received from the Father ; and that this sentence con
fers upon the Bishops, Christ's regal and priestly power; his
kingdom ; and his authority to absolve the sins of repenting sin
ners! It appears very strange to me, how any man can possibly
imagine that this passage is a transfer of Christ's kingdom and
priestly authority ! To me it seems a simple sending forth of
laborers to a self-denying work ; to call men to repentance, and
to invite them to salvation. So Christ was sent — to toil and to
die ; so he sends his Apostles ; " even so," not to die as he died,
an atoning sacrifice for sin ; but to spend and be spent for the
salvation of dying sinners. And out of this simple sending
forth as servants and laborers, Prelacy claims a transfer to lordly
Bishops, of the kingdom, and priestly prerogatives of the Lord
Jesus Christ! Was there ever a more monstrous or inexcusable
perversion of the words of Holy Writ? Was there ever a more

356 THE puritans and their principles.
unscriptural or horrid idea than this fundamental basis of Pre
lacy; the demission and transfer of Christ's priesthood and
kingdom, to earthly representatives and vicegerents ; a demission
and transfer of prerogatives which he has reserved for himself
for ever, and the glory of which he will not give to another !
And yet how unblushingly these claims are put forth ; aud put
forth with scarce a rebuke ; with increasing complacency on the
part of Prelates, and with increasing belief on the part of their
people ; may be seen by some extracts from a production of Mr.
McCoskry, the present Protestant Episcopal Bishop of Michi
gan.* In his sermon, " Episcopal Bishops, successors of the
Apostles," he says, " He (Christ) is the head and permanent
ruler thereof; and although now removed from sight, and seated
on his mediatorial throne, yet he governs and regulates this
Church, or kingdom (as it is frequently called), by his constituted
agents, to whom he has committed the very same authority
which he received from the Father." " Everything that
could be possessed by a mere human being, was given by the
Saviour." " He was, as the Apostle declares, the head of the
body" — " consequently this headship was transferred, and all
the power necessary to preserve and regulate the body." * *
" It must follow then, that as Christ is the permanent Ruler and
Head of this body now in Heaven, so are those to whom he
transferred this power permanent rulers and heads on earth." *
* " The Apostles were raised to the very same office which
Christ himself held, I mean that which belongs to him in his hu
man nature, as head and governor of the Church. They were
to supply his place in this respect, * * * and in short, to do
everything which Christ would have done had he continued on the
earth." " They received the full power which Christ possessed,
so long as the Saviour exercised the office of High Priest,
and before he transferred it to the Apostles, &c." *
" It cannot be supposed for one moment, that the Saviour would
transfer so great an office as he himself had received from the
Father, without giving instructions, * * * whether it could
be transferred to others." And this "very same office which
Christ himself held," Bishop McCoskry claims, has been
transferred and transmitted down to the Bishops of the
present day ! And if this has not been done, he declares, that
" all who profess to be commissioned as ambassadors of Christ,
are gross impostors !"
Surely, the Bishop of Michigan must sufficiently magnify his
office. He claims to have received the kingdom of the Church in
Michigan! holding ihe very same office that Christ would hold,
were he on earth ; with authority to do all that Christ in his hu-
• In Boardman, p. 274.

inferential presumptions. 357
man nature might do, as head of the Church in that peninsula,
were he there in person ! Surely, if we may borrow an epithet
of the old Puritans, we have an abundance of " Popelings " in
our American Dioceses, each speaking " high swelling words,"
but scarcely in all one decent Pope. How can it be that Christ
can have so many supreme Vicegerents, holding each supreme
authority over the one Catholic Church ? How can it be that
there are so many Heads over one single body ?
I see that many of the details of Popery are wanting in this
system ; but the very heart, and frame work, and life-blood of
Popery are all here.* Let these principles prevail ; let them have
* The following extract will show the progress which Protestant Episcopacy
is making towards Popery in the Diocese of New York. It is from a funeral ser
mon, on the death of Rev. Palmer Dyer, late of Whitehall, preached in Trinity
Church, Granville, N. Y., by Rev. John Alden Spooner, A. M., Rector of the Church
of Messiah, Glenn's Falls, and of Zion's Church, Sandy Hill, N. Y. The extract is
copied from the " Protestant Churchman."
" He was Baptized. The record and proof of that his conversion is in the
Church book at Granville, N. Y. At the sacred fount there his sins were washed
away, and he was regenerated."
" He was Confirmed. There is left us no doubt as to his ' receiving the Holy
Ghost.' That gift was imparted to him in the Church, by ' the laying on of the
hands' of Bishop Brownell; and the record of it exists. Our ground of humble
and sciiptural joy is thus enlarged. Union with the mind of God was thus rendered
more sure by the possession of the Holy Spirit to enlighten and guide. The heart
before cleansed in Baptism, now made the tenement of the Holy Ghost in the lesser
Sacrament of Confirmation, had double certainty of improvement."
" Hence, when after mature reading he was led to the belief that among Chris
tians no Baptism had ever been considered unquestionably safe except it were given
by a Bishop or by one ordained by a Bishop, he at once ceased to rely on any other,
and not only taught so, but set a consistent example by first getting himself rightly
baptized in the Church. Hence, too, he was a second time confirmed, because he
felt that confirmation came rightly only after Baptism, and not till his Baptism in
the Church did he consider himself as baptized at all. And hence, in the awaken
ing to sound truth and early practice which the spirit of God has mercifully grant
ed to part of Christendom in the last twelve years, he thoroughly sympathized ;
thankful if instead of one accurate and energetic minded Fronde to one kingdom, God
had kimlty given many to each ,¦ if, instead of one blameless Pttscy to be ignorantly and
unrighteously condemned, God had kindly given more than impugners could frame de
crees to silence."
" As a final ground of consolation and the crowning and necessary mark of saint-
ship, we notice in the deceased, that he continued and worthily, in the communion of
the Church. He lencw that out of tlie fold there could be no expected safety : that out of the
ark there could be nothing but the common distraction."
"Nay, if good hope exists for any one, it must be drawn from such deeds and ex
hibited conduct as could not be well brought together in the last hours of a few
painlul days, or in the distracted exercises of a last few weeks. Yea, whosoever
will have himself and leave for his friends the Bible ground of hope, will have it and
leave it to the portraiture following."
" Bible ground of hope requires of a person that he be Confirmed. Without the
gift of tlu' Holy Spirit, that which is required to precede all others, is imparted by
tin1 'laying on ol hands.' And in all cases, that in the laying on of the hand9 of
the chief Minister, the Bishop, as an act distinct from Baptism and succeeding to it"
" We would have placed before this the existence of habitual private Confession
and Absolution. Our judgment dictated to do that in drawing out the case of our
departed brother; but our section of Christendom has lost that portion ofthe Chris
tian's heritage. Yet, as we doubt not that tlu intervention of the Priesthood is indis-
ptntabU to a scriptural tranquillity of the conscience so do we believe that no positn e

358

the puritans and their principles.

room, and air, and time, to expand to their natural growth, and
there is nothing in Popery more destructive to truth, to freedom,
and to true religion, more arrogant, more impious toward God,
or more injurious to man.
and undoubting ground of hope can ordinarily exist, either in an individual for him
self or in.others for him, except that up to the last there have been, as in the case
of Hooker (page 7), habitual confession and free and full absolution and benedic
tion." " It is the absolution and benediction ofthe Church for which God looks in the individual
to determine that he is in favor. It is to the Ministry that God says : ' Whatsoever ye
shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven ; and whatsoever ye shall loose on
earth shall be loosed in heaven.' St. Matt, xviii. 18. Separated, then, from the
Church we see no ordinary Bible hope of heaven. Otherwhere than in the Church,
and with that Ministry which God appointed, the individual is not ' loosed from
sin.' "
" Habitual religiousness demands frequency in the stated forms and acts of piety.
Among those forms, the restored elevation of the cross, and habitual and devout cross
ing of the person, should be distinguished. In our poverty, we cannot, it is true, wit
ness the consecrated Church at the end of every second league; but if we would,
we might at such intervals behold the Cross, towards which the traveller might turn, and
near which the wayfarer might kneel. And devout crossings of the person, while in every
emergency and in every act vie might not by word place ourselves in Christ, by this sacred
symbol we should. Crossing ourselves in the beginning of n duty and at its end, as when
we rise from our prayer ; crossing ourselves at the appearance of danger, or in each hourly
act, we thereby invoke the power of Christ and place ourselves with him : and so, from every
section could one go to his death from almost within the shadow of the cross, and
in any emergency close his eyes in the embrace of the Lord. To such an one no
death could be a surprise."
" Again, among those acts of piety that should he frequent, and that, next to the
holy Communion, are of chiefest efficacy in making the soul ripe for even an un
warned death, are, habitual private confession, and the Pastor's absolution and the
Pastor's blessing. Inflicted Penance is the loving correction that maketh great;
the Pastor's absolution and the Pastor's frequent blessing are the purest and richest
gifts through Christ on this side of heaven to fit to live, to fit to die, and to insure
the best destiny of eternity. Frequency in the stated forms and acts of piety is
necessary to habitual religiousness."

XXIX.

EPISCOPAL EXCLUSIVENESS— ITS BASIS SUPER
STITION.
The Bishop's charge in Primitive times was a single Church,
not a Diocese of Churches. Like our Congregational, Presby
terian, and Baptist Churches, every congregation had its Bishop,
and every Bishop his congregation. For a long time these
Bishoprics were about as numerous in Christian countries, as
Congregational Churches in New England. The parish and
the Bishopric were coextensive and identical. Instead of one
Bishop in a territory, like that of Connecticut, there were scores,
if not hundreds. There were no Diocesans over these congrega
tions and their Bishops ; each Bishop was what the Apostles
made him and left him, the Pastor of a single Church. If any
one will see the proof of this, let him read Lord King, on the
Primitive Church ; a work which Slater has vainly attempted to
set aside. Let him read Mosheim, or the lectures of Dr. Camp
bell, or the recent works of our own Punchard and Coleman.
The length to which these lectures have already been protracted,
admonishes me that I ought not to enter upon the details of this
part of the subject: nor is it, indeed, necessary. Let me simply
quote the conclusions of Archbishop Whately on this subject ;
conclusions of whose correctness the amplest proof is at hand.
" Each Bishop," says Whately, " originally presided over one
entire Church. It seems plainly to have been the general, if not
the universal practice of the Apostles, to appoint over each sepa
rate Church, a single individual." * * " A Church and a
Diocese seem to have been for a considerable time co-extensive
and identical." " And each Church or Diocese perfectly inde
pendent as regards any power of control." " The plan pursued
hy the Apostles seems to have been, as above remarked, to es
tablish a great number of small (in comparison with modern
Churches), distinct, and independent communities, each gov
erned by its own single Bishop, consulting no doubt with his
Presbyters, and accustomed to act in concurrence with them, and
occasionally conferring with the brethren in other Churches."

360 THE puritans and their principles.
Wliately (like Stillingfleet) renounces all pretensions lo a di
vine authority for Episcopacy. He denies that modem Episco
pacy conforms to the Primitive model; and justifies it only on
the ground that the Church has power to alter and arrange its
own polity, without being limited and restricted to one particular
form. " And they " [the English Reformers], he says, " rest the
claims of ministers, not on some supposed sacramental virtue
transmitted from hand to hand, in unbroken succession from the
Apostles, in a chain of which, if any one link be even doubtful,
a distressing uncertainty is thrown over all Christian ordinances,
sacraments, and Church privileges ; but on the fact of those being
the regularly appointed officers of a regular Christian communi
ty ;" and that regular Christian community, he regards as " a
congregation of faithful men," — " having inherent rights belong
ing to a community ;" to declare what is the regular way of ap
pointing their officers (pp. 123-125). " The Church of England,"
he maintains, " it is notorious," " does not possess exact confor
mity " to the most ancient models. And he adds — " To vindi
cate them on the ground of the exact conformity, which it is noto
rious they do not possess, to the most ancient models, and even
to go beyond this, and condemn all other Christians, whose insti
tutions and ordainers are not utterly like our own — on the ground
of their departure from the Apostolical precedents, does seem —
to use no harsher expression — not a little inconsistent and un
reasonable." " And yet, one may not unfrequently hear num
bers of Episcopalians pronouncing severe condemnation on those
of other communities, and even excluding them from the Chris
tian body : not on the ground of their not being under the best
form of government, but of their wanting the very essentials
even of a Christian Church ; * * and this while Episcopa
lians have universally so far varied from the Apostolical institu
tions, as to have in one Church several Bishops, each of whom,
consequently, differs in the office he holds, in a most important
point, from one of the Primitive Bishops, as much as one of the
governors of our colonies differs from a sovereign prince."
Had not this work been already so long protracted, it would
afford an interesting and important topic of inquiry, to trace
in history the simultaneous growths of prelatical assumption
and superstition, as side by side, faithful and inseparable co
adjutors, they strode on to an undivided dominion over 1he un
derstanding, the conscience, and the liberties of mankind. No
sooner was the figment of the Christian ministry a priesthood
invented, than the path to despotism over the conscience, and to
the subversion of the fundamental doctrines of the Gospel, lay
open without obstruction. Ambitious Prelates were sure to ex
alt their ghostly power, and to grasp an entire monopoly of con-

episcopal exclusiveness. 361
ferring that power in ordination. Forms, canons, sacerdotal
rites, absolutions, penances, false doctrine after false doctrine,
and one superstitious ceremonial after another, followed in the
train, till the Gospel and all religious liberty well nigh expired
together. What is now called Puseyism, is the natural,
AND SURE TO BE THE ULTIMATE SYSTEM OF PRELACY. It is
but a mingling of the same old elements in the same old way.
Superstition goes hand in hand with every advance of the exclu
sive and monstrous claims of Prelacy. He who forms his anti
cipations of the future from the history of the past, will readily
perceive, that these two conspirators against truth and freedom
are only travelling the road which they travelled before, when
corruption in doctrine and usurpation of power went hand in
hand to take their seat upon the seven hills of Rome.
With these remarks we proceed to notice —
The Exclusiveness of the Episcopal Claims.
The Rev. Mr. Wetmore, one of the earliest champions of
Episcopacy in Connecticut, did not hesitate to say of the Congre
gational Churches in this State that " they must necessarily be
esteemed abettors and approvers of schism, disorders, and usurpa
tion; contempt of the chief authority Christ has left in his
Church ;" and that " whatever they may call themselves, and
whatever show they may make of piety and devotion in their
own ways," they " ought to be esteemed in respect to the mys
tical body of Christ, only as excrescences or tumors in the body
natural, or perhaps as fungosities in an ulcerated tumor, the eat
ing away of which, by whatever means, tends not to the hurt but
the soundness of the body."
If such language had been uttered only by a few, or only for
some hundreds of times ; if it were not truly descriptive of the
principles, and the line of conduct pursued by all High Church
Episcopalians, with regard to other denominations of Christians,
we might pass it by as the raving of bigots ; some of whom are
to be found in all bodies of Christians, and whose extravagances
are not to be regarded as an index to the principles and spirit of
the body. But I am sorry to be obliged to say, that this is only
a sample of the spirit and bearing assumed by Episcopal Eccle
siastics in general (with some few rare and honorable exceptions),
towards all other Christians, save only the followers ofthe Pope.
" Incongruous sects" of " Dissenters" is ihe style adopted by
Bishop Brownell with regard to all other Christian denomina
tions. The Episcopal Church he styles "The true Catholic
Church." The Episcopal Bishops, in general, no longer style
Ihcir communion " The Protestant Episcopal Church," but " The
Church;" intending by that term to deny the right of all other

362 the puritans and their principles.
bodies of Christians to be considered as Churches. The Right
Rev. Thomas C. Brownell writes himself Bishop, not of the
Episcopal Church in Connecticut, but " Bishop of Connecti
cut," intending thereby to claim, and actually claiming, exclusive
sovereignty by divine right over all Christians in the whole field.
So another styles himself not — bishop of a diocese of Episcopa
lians in New York, but Bishop of New York ; a sovereign by
divine right of the whole territory. Another claims to be Bishop
of Maryland ; and another has been addressed in a Dedication,
by the celebrated Pusey as " George, Lord Bishop of New
Jersey ;" and " Lord George" claims to be the rightful and ex
clusive Apostle of that domain ; as another claims to hold the
" very same office," in Michigan, " which the Lord Jesus
Christ" would hold over Christians in that field, were he person
ally to come down and undertake to be their ruler. The
" Church Almanac," published by authority, talks not of The
Protestant Episcopal Church in America, but of " The Church
of the United States," intending thereby to deny that there
is, or can be, any other Church or Churches in the whole do
main. Not long since, an Episcopal minister (Rev. Mr. Watson)
spoke in a printed sermon, of the people in the sixty towns in
Connecticut where Episcopacy is not planted, as " destitute ones,"
" destitute of the sacraments, destitute of a Scriptural ministry,
destitute of the Church ;" and declared that " every inch of the
ground" belongs to Episcopacy. Bishop Brownell looks abroad
over the tens of thousands of Christians and Churches of all
Protestant denominations in this land, and complacently styles
them a " Desolation," in the midst of which, " The Protestant
Episcopal Church appears as an oasis in a desert." The Bishop
and his Presbyters concur in admitting the authenticity of the
Papal Church and Priesthood, while they deny the same to all
Protestants, save of their own Church. A "Presbyter of Con
necticut," in an extensively circulated tract, declares he " cannot
regard the confused mass of Protestantism as anything else but a
human contrivance, the weakness and folly of man ; the result
of departing from the divine and primitive institution of Christ."
" With as much propriety," he declares, " might we suppose
there is more than one Holy Spirit, as to suppose that there is
more than one Church." " The Romish Church," he says, " must
be regarded as a portion of the Catholic Church, since she pos
sesses the Apostolic ministry ; her sacraments, though vitiated,
are not invalid." But " as to Protestant Dissenters, how can they
claim to be a portion ofthe true body of Christ, when they lack the
very foundations of a Church?" " At the same time," he says,
" we are free to acknowledge that they exhibit fruits of piety in
their lives. We could take example from them," * * * we

EPISCOPAL EXCLUSIVENESS. 363
doubt not they may be saved ; * * so we believe the heathen
may be saved." In the same manner Palmer, whose work is
in the highest vogue among Episcopalians, says of other denomi
nations, " They and iheir generations are as the heathen, * *
we are not warranted in affirming absolutely that they may be
saved." Bishop Hobart, in his " Companion to the Altar," says,
" Let it be thy supreme care, O my soul, to receive the blessed
sacrament of the body and blood of the Saviour, only from the
hands of those who derive their authority by regular transmis
sion from Christ." " Where the Gospel is proclaimed, com
munion with the Church by participation of its ordinances at
the hands of an authorized priesthood is the indispensable condi-
tionof salvation." " Great is the guilt, and eminent the danger of
those who, possessing the means of arriving at the knowledge of
the truth, negligently or wilfully continue in a state of separa
tion from the authorized ministry of the Church, and participate
in ordinances administered by an irregular and invalid authority."
Says Bishop Onderdonk of New York, " None but the Bishops
can unite us to the Father in the way of Christ's appointment ;
and these Bishops must be such as receive their mission from the
first commissioned Apostles." Other Episcopal writers of stand
ard authority in that Church use such language as this : " The
only ministrations to which the Lord has promised his presence,
are those of the Bishops who are successors of the first commis
sioned Apostles." " The real ground of our authority is our
Apostolic descent." " An uninterrupted series of valid ordina
tions has carried down the Apostolical succession to the present
day," " Christ," say the Oxford Tracts, " never appointed two ways
to Heaven ; nor did he build a Church to save some, and make
another institution to save other men. There is no other name
given under Heaven among men whereby we may be saved, but
the name of Jesus ; and that is no otherwise given under Hea
ven than in the Church." " It is not merely because Episcopacy
is a better, or more scriptural form than Presbyterianism, * *
but because the Presbyterian ministers have assumed a power
which was never entrusted to them. They have presumed to
exercise the power of ordination, and to perpetuate a succession
of ministers, without having received a commission to do so."
" A person not commissioned from the Bishop may use the
words of baptism, and sprinkle or bathe ;" " * " he may
break bread and pour out wine, and pretend to give the Lord's
Supper, but it can afford no comfort to any to receive it at his
hands, because there is no warrant from Christ, to lead commu
nicants to suppose, that while he does so here upon earth, they
will be partakers of the Saviour's heavenly body and blood."

364 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
" As for the person himself, who takes upon himself without
warrant to minister in holy things, he is all the while treading in
the footsteps of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram, whose awful pun
ishment you read of in the book of Numbers."
A work entitled " A Doctrinal Catechism of the Church of
England," has the following questions and answers:
" Who appoints dissenting teachers 1
" Arts. They either wickedly appoint each other, or are not appoint
ed at all ; and so in either case their assuming the office is very wicked.
" But are not dissenting teachers thought to be very good men 1
" Ans. They are often thought to be such, and so were Korah,
Dathan, and Abiram, till God showed them to be very wicked.
" But may we not hear them preach 1
" Ans. No ; for God says, depart from the tents of these wicked
men." Says the author of a sermon recently published at New York :
" She [the Church] must administer to you according to the
record of her own testimony." * * " Within these prescribed
boundaries, her power is absolute over you, so long as you re
main in her communion, which you cannot renounce, excepting
at the peril of your salvation."
The Rev. Palmer Dyer, of Whitehall, N. Y, says, " No reli
gious society or communion, of whatever denomination or char
acter, is a Church, unless it be Episcopal." " We cannot be
brought into the Holy Covenant, except in an Episcopal Church;
or by the agency of an Episcopal ministry." " Those who pro
fess to be ministers of the Gospel without having received Epis
copal ordination, possess no more ministerial authority than any
private Christian." " Their supposed commission is a nullity ;"
— " it involves the guilt of schism and rebellion." " Those who
separate from the Episcopal Church, reviling and opposing it,
and connecting themselves with Anti-Episcopal sects, are in fact
fighting against God." " We can have no fellowship with non-
Episcopal sects, nor ever pretend to receive Christian sacraments
from them ; they have no real sacraments to give."
I have not excerpted here and there the mere slips of a few un
guarded writers, but have taken passages which express guard
edly and designedly the very claims which, in all sobriety, our
Episcopal neighbors designedly and unwaveringly assert. These
are but common specimens of the common phraseology and
spirit in which those claims are advanced at the present day.
This is the actual attitude and bearing of the Episcopal Church
in this country, towards all other denominations and their minis
try. The Prelates and their clergy who admit anything incon
sistent with these claims are few and far between.

EPISCOPAL EXCLUSIVENESS. 365
We now pass to the fundamental principle on which
THESE CLAIMS ARE MADE, TO SHOW THE SUPERSTITION WHICH
THAT PRINCIPLE INVOLVES.
That principle, I affirm, to be the fundamental principle of
Popery; a principle inconsistent with the essential truth of the
Gospel, and tending to its entire corruption and subversion.
The principle, the fundamental idea, on which these excessive
claims of Episcopacy are built, is that of regarding the Christian
ministry as a Priesthood, to work by virtue of a ghostly power
conferred in ordination, a priestly intervention between God and
man for the forgiveness of sins ; in opposition to the doctrine of
salvation by faith alone.
This ghostly power is affirmed to have been committed to the
Apostles, and by them to have been transmitted exclusively to
their successors in office, the Diocesan Bishops. This is the
ground on which it is claimed, that there can be no Church with
out a Bishop.
Take the following illustration of the nature and spirit and
foundation of this claim. In one of the cities of Connecticut is
a venerable Congregational minister whose labors God has
owned and blessed for more than a quarter of a century. By his
side is a stripling in a surplice, renowned chiefly for a Eulo
gy on Archbishop Laud, and more recently for a work main
taining that the difference between Episcopacy and the popular
system of religion in New England, is not one of non-essentials
of Christianity, but one affecting " the very nature and being of
the faith ;" in which work he intimates the scriptural authority
for bowing whenever the name of Jesus occurs in the Liturgy,
for requiring stated vigils and fasts by authority of the Church ;
for using the sign ofthe cross ; for saints' days, the tonsure, and
for the oil of Chrism.
That venerable Congregational minister is now regarded as a
Dissenter, a schismatic, a rebel, a son of Korah ; while that sur-
pliced stripling is a true minister of our Lord Jesus Christ.
I inquire for the specific difference between the two. What
does the one possess which the other has not? I am told, that
when the former preaches, the Gospel from his lips conveys no
assurance of salvation to them who repent and believe ; that his
preaching is unauthorized and invalid ; and that the same is
true ofhis baptisms, and his administrations of the Lord's Sup
per; that his people are all out of the pale of covenanted mercy,
and if saved at all, thev are not to be saved on Gospel grounds
or promises, but by mere uncovenanted mercy, like the heathen ;
and that for these reasons every tyro of a Deacon in the Episco
pal Church is authorized, and bv canon enjoined, to treat that
venerable minister as an interloper and an impostor ; and utterly

366 the puritans and their principles.
forbidden to treat or regard him as a true minister of our Lord
Jesus Christ.
I ask why is this ? What has that stripling, which this vene
rable minister has not ; the possession of which causes this amaz
ing difference in the validity of their acts ? I am told that it is
this : A certain Bishop has had on his head the hands of a man
who has had on his head the hands of another, and he of another
man, and so on — clear back to the Apostles ; that through this
chain of conductors a virtue has flowed ; which that Bishop has
communicated to that stripling by laying his hands on his
head. Absurd and ridiculous as this statement appears, it is not only
the grave doctrine of Episcopacy, but the very foundation of all
its monstrous claims.
Having already traced the foundation of this doctrine in the
Judicious Hooker, the next author whom I shall quote is Law,
who became famous in the celebrated Bangorian controversy
in the reign of George I. Many suppose that Puseyism is a
" Novelty" in the Episcopal Church, and so Bishop Hopkins
affects to treat it* You have seen it to be the dominant doc
trine of Episcopacy in the days of Elizabeth. You have seen
it ripening and symbolizing still more closely with Popery, under
Archbishop Laud. It became rampant once more in the High
Church days of Queen Anne ; and the specimen which I shall
now give you is taken from the days of the First King George.
The trait here furnished is not indeed an incident in the history
of High Church Episcopacy; it runs throughout— constituting
the very life-blood of its existence.
The Work of Law was written on this wise : Hoadley, Bishop
of Bangor, in preaching before King George I. asserted the su
preme authority of Christ, as king in his own kingdom ; denying
that he had delegated his power to any deputies or vicegerents.
He afterwards published his " Preservatives," in which he under
took to oppose what he considered the fundamental principles of
temporal and spiritual despotism. In one word, you will per
ceive that the tenets which he opposed, were the same as those
of the modern Puseyism.
Law became the Church champion against Hoadley ; and his
work is of the highest authority among all Episcopalians of the
present day.
Hoadley had said, in opposition to the notion of ghostly
power claimed by the priesthood, that " to expect the grace of
God from any hands but his own, is to affront Him :" * * *
" Human benedictions, and human excommunications, have no
thing to do with the favor of God."
* " Novelties which disturb our peace."

episcopal exclusiveness. 367
Upon this, Law replies, " It is evident from the maxim (for
your Lordship asserts it as such), that whatever institutions are
observed in any human society, upon this supposition, that there
by geace is conferred by human hands, or by the ministry of the
clergy — ought to be condemned ; and are condemned by your
Lordship." Upon this he makes a home thrust at Bishop Hoad
ley, from the offices of the Church under which the Bishop was
ordained; the office of ordination containing the words " Re
ceive the Holy Ghost" and pretending to confer the Holy Ghost
in the ceremonial of ordination. " The Bishop," says Law,
"laying his hands on the person's head, saith, receive the Holy
Ghost for the office work of a priest" " From this," says Law,
" it is plain (1.) that the reception of the Holy Ghost is necessary to
constitute a Christian priest : (2.) that the Holy Ghost is conferred
through human hands. If, therefore, your Lordship is right in
your doctrine, the Church of England is evidently most corrupt.
For if it be dishonorable and affronting to God to expect his
grace from human hands, it must of necessity be dishonorable
and affronting to God, for a Bishop to pretend to confer it by his
hands." " Suppose," says he, " your Lordship was to have been conse
crated to the office of Bishop by these words : " Take thou power
to sustain all things in being, given thee by my hands : I suppose
your Lordship would think it entirely unlawful to submit to the
terras of such an ordination. But, my Lord, receive the Holy
Ghost, is as impious a form according to your Lordship's doc
trine, and equally injurious to the Eternal power and Godhead
as the other."
Law proceeds : " Suppose your Lordship had been preaching
to the Laity against the authority of the Virgin Mary, and yet
should acquiesce in the condition of being made a Bishop in her
name, and by recognizing her power: could such a submission
be consistent with sincerity? Here you forbid the laity to ex
pect God's grace from any hands but his ; yet not only accept
office upon a supposition of the contrary doctrine, but oblige
yourself, according to the sense of the Church wherein you are
ordained as Bishop, to act frequently in opposition to your own
principles."* * It is but a few days since a Protestant paper in New York, describing an ordi
nation by the Popish Bishop, spoke of the solemn effect of the " thrilling words'"
" Secriet the Ility Ghost." To my mind it was horrible and blasphemous, that a
•nan, pretending to act by virtue of ghostly power running down through a succes
sion ot monsters of impiety and pollution, all red with the blood of saints and mar
tyrs lor a thousand years — should pretend to have power officially to confer the
Holy Ghost! To me it seemed a horrible attempt at aping the Lord Jesus Christ in
Ills omnipotent power. Nor was the impression more favorable when I read an
account of tin* same words being used at the ordination ofthe present Bishop of the
I rotcstant Diocese of Massachusetts. The nature ofthe claim— viz. the power offi-

368 the puritans and their principles.
Law proceeds to show the claim made by the Church to con
vey God's grace by human hands in the office of confirmation.
" The design of this institution," says he, " is that it should be the
means of conferring grace by the prayer, and imposition of the
Bishop's hands on those who have already been baptized."
" When the Bishop is said to confer grace in confirmation, this
is properly an authoritative benediction." " In this sense the
people are said to be authoritatively blessed by the regular clergy,
because by their hands the people receive the grace of God's
ordinances." So, when the Bishop or the priest pronounces the customary
benediction, Law says, " We do not consider this barely as an
act of charity and humanity, of one Christian praying for an
other, but as the work of a person who is commissioned by God
to bless in his name, and to be effectually ministerial in the con
veyance of his grace."
Concerning the Lord's Supper, Law asks, as though the pow
er of the sacrament were indubitable, " Can God consecrate
inanimate things to spiritual purposes, and make them the means
of eternal happiness ?"
Ofthe pretended absolution used by the priests ofthe Episcopal
Church, Hoadley had said, " The same you will find a sufficient
reply to their presumptuous claim to an authoritative absolution.
An infallible absolution cannot belong to fallible men." To this
Law replies, "Is it not as easy to conceive that our Lord should
confer his grace of pardon by the hands of his ministers, as by
means of the sacraments ? And may not such an absolution be
justly called authoritative?"
Hoadley had said, " But to claim a right to stand in God's
stead, in such a sense that they can absolutely and certainly bless
with their voice alone ; this is the highest absurdity and blasphe
my, as it supposes God to place a set of men above himself;
and to put out of his own hands, the disposal of his blessing and
curse." To this Law replies : " Now if it has pleased God to
confer the Holy Ghost in ordination and confirmation, and only
by them, &c, and to annex the grace of pardon to the imposition
of their hands on returning sinners ; is it any blasphemy to claim
and to exert their power?" Again and again he speaks of " an
nexing grace to sacraments," and making them " necessary to
salvation." " Now, my Lord," says he, "these are the sacerdotal
prayers which your lordship encourages the laity to despise.
Your lordship sets up, in this controversy, against the arrogant
pretences and false claims of the clergy."
cially and authoritatively to confer the Holy Ghost— whether uttered by Popish or
Protestant lips taken in connection with the claims of Diocesan Bishops, sounds
in my ears horrible and discordant— nearly resembling blasphemy.

episcopal exclusiveness. 369
From these powers and functions of the priesthood, he argues
the "absolute necessity of a strict succession of authorized
ordainers, from the Apostolic times, to constitute a Christian
priest." Now compare with this system of Law, the following creed
of the " New York Churchman," the organ of the Bishop of that
Diocese, and the expositor of the views of the majority of its laity
and clergy. " A ministry of the Apostolic succession, empow
ered to act as Christ's ambassadors and representatives on earth ;
the divinely appointed limitation of the blessings of salvation and
the gifts of the Holy Spirit to communion with this ministry in
the sacraments and word and ordinances of the Church ; regene
ration in baptism ; salvation suspended on faith and good works ;
the supreme authority of Scripture as explained and interpreted
by the Church ; these are the principles which are plainly writ
ten in our Prayer-Book, and these we are resolved, by God's
grace, to maintain both in life and death."
Coincident with these views, are the doctrines of a sermon
preached A.D. 1843, before the convention of the Diocese of
North Carolina, entitled " Sacerdotal Absolution," which teaches
lhat "it is the explicit sense of our Church that the power of re
mission and retention [of sins] is as permanent as the ministry,
and is an essential prerogative of the sacerdotal office ;" that " to
remit sins," is to be understood in its literal acceptation; and that
" such was the understanding of our Church when the Liturgy
was prepared ;" " that a power was given [to Apostles and their
successors] over doctrines and persons ;" " with the specific
power of retaining and remitting sins ;" that to him who is
loosed by the priesthood " heaven is opened, to him who is
bound, heaven is shut ;" that with regard to " Absolution," " God
having appointed an order of men in the world fer accomplish
ing his gracious purposes of mercy toward mankind, makes them
his agents in conferring the blessings which he has in store for
them ;" that in absolving sins, the minister, " as representative of
Christ, does what Christ himself would do under the same cir
cumstances ;" that his " sovereign will ratify the acts of his min
isters as much as if they were done by himself;" that "the
final purpose of Christ's kingdom on earth being the remission
of the sins of men, and his ministers being the authorized agents
for fulfilling its offices, who therefore act in his name and in his
stead, their acts done with their authority will be ratified and
sealed by him as effectually as though, done without their imme
diate agency." " And hence it may be properly urged, of what
special and positive value is a ministry, if its service be only of
incidental benefit, such as might ensue from the sober action of
any man whatever, and not of an appointed and certain dficaei ,
24

370 the puritans and their principles.
one to which mankind, encouraged and fortified by the promise
of God, can confidently resort as the divinely authorized agent
for dispensing grace to the soul. * * A true authority im
plies either an inherent or accompanying power, which' is com
petent to all the purposes for which it is held ; * * that is, in
the present instance, the ministry have either an inherent or ac
companying power to forgive sins, by pronouncing the formula
of absolution .'"
Such is the doctrine of all Churchmen who regard their
Church as having a divine and exclusive right. It is the doc
trine, not so much of Pusey, as of the Church itself. The
Church compels all her ministers, high or low, to act in accordance
with it, in denying all other ministers to be ordained. It acts
out the same system in ordaining over again all ministers who
come to their fold from the Protestant ranks, and in receiving
without re-ordination all priests who come to them from the
Church of Rome. There are indeed evangelical ministers in the
Episcopal Church, who reject these views, but Mr. Barnes has
well shown their " position."* The Church is against them. Its
offices compel them to belie their sentiments, at every baptism,
confirmation, and ordination. The system here set forlh, is es
sentially the system of Popery ; it is inconsistent with Protestant
ism, and with the Reformation. And yet this is the very basis
of all the exclusive Episcopal claims ; a pestilent superstition ;
the sum and essence of the great anti-christian apostasy of Rome.
No one can even begin to talk about valid ordination, v.alid or
dinances, and Apostolical succession, till his head is first filled
with the fundamental principles of Popery.
Words cannot express my astonishment, that such claims, and
such doctrines, should find any countenance or toleration in any
thing pretending to call itself a Protestant Church. What wild-
ness of fanaticism, what depths of delusion, what ravings of mad
ness, go anything beyond this quiescent and complacent fanati
cism, which coolly pretends to Apostolical succession, with power
to confer grace to impart the Holy Ghost, and authoritatively to
absolve sins ! Yet, this is the system of High Church Episco
pacy, and has ever been so, from the days of Queen Elizabeth
to the present day.
* See Barnes on the position of the evangelical party in the Episcopal Church,
in the New Englander.

XXX.

APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION, CORRUPT AS A
DOCTRINE, FALSE IN FACT.
The basis of the Episcopal doctrine of Apostolical succession is
the idea, that the Christian ministry is a Priesthood, whose office
is less to preach the Gospel, than to propitiate God by the ex
ercise of priestly functions; and to be the indispensable and
efficient instruments of conveying to men the grace of God
by the ministration of sacraments.
This mystic " virtue," it is pretended, is received in ordination ;
being conveyed down from the Apostles, exclusively through the
order of Bishops, to the priesthood of the present day. A mere
Presbyter is a non-conductor. Should he pretend to ordain, the
" virtue" is not imparted ; the chain is broken.
Valid ordination, and valid sacraments, consist in this ; that
when other men consecrate the elements in the Lord's Supper,
these elements fail to become sacramentally the Lord's body and
blood, and can furnish no spiritual benefit and comfort. Other
men may preach the Gospel, but there is no covenanted mercy
to those who believe the Gospel so preached ; and who repent
of their sins, and serve God in the communion of these men un-
ordained by virtue of the Apostolical succession. But the ordain
ed priesthood, when they preach, actually pledge God to fulfil the
promises of the Gospel to those who embrace them ; their
preaching is valid; when they consecrate the elements in the
Lord's Supper, they make them effectual means, as well as
authoritative signs, of grace. When they pronounoe the bene
diction, the people are authoritatively blessed ; and when they
pronounce the absolution, it becomes valid on earth and in
heaven ; the sinner is truly, authoritatively, and effectually ab
solved from his sins.*
* To the proofs of these Episcopal dogmas, given in the last lecture, the follow
ing may be added from that choice Churchman, Bishop Whittingham of Maryland :
" The ministry ofthe Christian Priesthood in the word and sacraments, is equiva
lent in its nature and efficacy to that of the Jewish priesthood, in offering of anuria*
and other sacrifices. Christ's own availing blood is avouched and pledged by the
outward act of his representative, the Priest." The Lord Jesus Christ as
serted his claim to power, as a man sent from the Father, to forgive s%ns. Now

372

the puritans and their principles.

These are the claims of Episcopacy in behalf of the preroga
tives of Apostolical succession. These are the avowed grounds
of the necessity of that succession.
Bishop Brownell, in his charge, says of this doctrine of Apos
tolical succession, that " no doctrine is more universally re
ceived by the whole body of our Church ;" and that he " knows
not a single clergyman who rejects it." On this ground
he boldly rests an issue concerning the whole claims of Episco
pacy. " If," says Bishop Brownell, " a regular ministerial succession
in the order of Bishops be not conformable to Scripture and
Apostolic usage, Episcopacy is an unjustifiable usurpation."
I accept this issue ; and affirm that this doctrine of Apostolical
succession is, as to its very basis, fundamentally contradictory
both to Scripture and to reason ; that the dogma upon which it is
built, is subversive of the true Gospel, and is the fundamental
dogma of Popery ; and that, as a matter of fact, this pretended
succession in the order of Diocesan Bishops, is both false and
absurd. If these positions can be sustained, then by the terms of Bishop
what he so claimed, we find that he afterwards conveyed in the most explicit terms
to those whom he left to represent himin the Church." " Eating his flesh and drink
ing his blood in the Supper of the Lord is the pre-requisite to the forgiveness of sins
which the Saviour gave his dpostles and their successors power to minister."
With regard to Baptism, our Episcopal neighbors are at some loss, and in no small
perplexity They claim that baptism confers regeneration. " The true economy of
the Christian religion," says Bishop Brownell, " regards men hy nature as the
children of wrath. It takes them from this state, which is called in Scripture,
' The kingdom of Satan,' and transfers them by baptism unto the family, house
hold, and kingdom of the Saviour." The baptism, he says, makes them " in deed
and in truth, children of God, and heirs of the kingdom of heaven." And yet they
admit the baptism of other ministers, as lay baptism, and do not ordinarily re-
baptize. It is, therefore, in their view, valid, and if there is no other way to get out
of the " kingdom of Satan," than by baptism, and if, lay baptism is not valid, then
several ofthe most considerable Bishops ofthe Episcopal Church are yet " children
of wrath," and subjects of the kingdom of Satan ; having received none other than
(in their view ) lay baptism.
Now one would think that taking a child of wrath out of the kingdom of Satan,
and converting him in deed and in truth into a child of God, and an heir of the
kingdom of heaven, must be one of the most stupendous works to be achieved by
any priesthood. What priest of the Apostolical succession can do more ? And yet
this it is admitted is done by lay baptism! But how is it, that the child so bap
tized and made a child ofthe covenant, is still destitute ofthe covenanted mercies
of God ? There seems to be some discrepancy between the claims and doctrines
of Prelacy here.
It is said that the irregular baptism is "confirmed" and rendered valid in, the con
firmation administered by the Bishop. This has been gravely argued by no less a
man than the learned Dr. Jarvis. But to this it has been well replied, " Was that
irregularly baptized person in deed and in truth regenerated in that irregular bap
tism? If so, does confirmation regenerate him over again % Is the confirmation
necessary in order to render that regeneration which is already so ? Or if he was
not regenerated in the irregular baptism, then the baptism was a nullity — a
nothing; does the confirmation make that a regeneration which was nothing?
And since confirmation is confessedly no regenerating ordinance, how can it make
that a valid regeneration which was no regeneration at all V

APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION*. 373
Brownell's alternative, " Episcopacy is an unjustifiable usurpa
tion." Protestantism and Popery are two great antagonistic and irre-
concileable systems ; not of order and polity, merely — but in the
fundamental doctrines of the respective schemes. Protestantism
sends the inquirer for salvation, directly to God's Word for in
struction ; and directly to Christ alone for help. Her doctrine is,
Justification by faith alone, requiring the soul only to embrace
and obey the Gospel, without resorting at all to the intervention
of a human priesthood as essential to salvation. Popery says,
No : you cannot go to the Bible alone for instruction ; nor to
Christ directly and alone for help. You cannot be justified by
faith alone, you must have the help of a human priesthood with
its valid sacraments, or you cannot be saved.
Here, then, are the two schemes of salvation ; justification by
faith alone ; and justification by priestly intervention for the for
giveness of sins. The last is the fundamental principle in the
dogma of the Apostolical succession, as held both by Papists
and by so called Protestant Episcopalians. Which doctrine is
" conformable to Scripture and Apostolical usage ?"
The Apostle Paul says, " Christ sent me not to baptize, but to
preach the Gospel." How strangely Paul talks, cries the Priest
of the Apostolical succession : " Sent me not to baptize .'" Why
"the true economy of the Christian religion," says Bishop
Brownell, " takes " men " from the kingdom of Satan," and from
"children of wrath" it "transfers them BY BAPTISM into
the family, household and kingdom of the Saviour !" Paul sent
not to baptize ! Why, Christ sent me to baptize, cries the High
Churchman : preaching is but a subordinate affair. And there
upon, Bishop Whittingham raises his voice : " Ministerial inter
vention for the forgiveness of sins, is the essence of the Priest
hood." " And hath given us the ministry of reconciliation," says the
Apostle Paul. What, then, is the essence of that ministry ?
Baptisms ? Confirmations ? Sacraments ? Priestly absolutions ?
Ministerial interventions ? So says the Apostolical succession.
But the Apostle Paul denies it. He talks not of the sacraments of
reconciliation ; but when he speaks of the " ministry of reconci
liation," he adds, " And hath committed unto us the word of
reconciliation." " So then," cries the Apostle Paul, " Faith
cometh by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God." "Of
his own will begat he us by the Word of Truth." Baptismal
regeneration ! Paul makes a distinction heaven-wide between
baptism and regeneration : " For in Christ Jesus neither circum
cision availeth anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creature."
Circumcision (or baptism, its substitute) then is no part of the

374 the puritans and their principles.
new creature, and does not, in this respect, avail " anything :" —
In the account of Apostolical succession, however, baptism avail
eth everything : it takes the children of wrath and " transfers "
them into the kingdom of God.
The scheme of Paul makes nothing of priestly intervention,
and much of faith : it makes very little indeed of any priestly
prerogatives or interventions, in the matter of forgiveness of sins.
Accordingly he says, " Who then is Paul, or who is Apollos, but
ministers by whom ye believed ?" Who is Paul ! Who ? Our
ministers are more than that: they are ministers by whose priest
ly interventions and valid sacraments ye were " transferred from
the kingdom of Satan, into the household, family and kingdom
of Christ." Who is Paul 1 who is Apollos 1—0ur ministers are
somebody. They have received their commission from Bishops,
who have received their commission from other Bishops, who
have received theirs from others, clear back, till the authority
comes at last directly from the Apostles.
Paul was an Apostle himself. His commission came through
no dubious links of a dubious succession. He was not com*
pelled to show a diploma of power received from a succession
running back through monsters of iniquity all over blackened
with lust and crimsoned with blood. He was an Apostle " nei
ther by man nor through man," but by the direct calling of God.
And yet Paul could say, " so then neither is he that planteth
anything, neither he that watereth ; but God that giveth the in
crease." He cuts up the claims of High-Church Prelates by the
roots, and throws them to the winds. He rejects the dogma on
which they build their arrogant claims, and counts it another
Gospel. Such is the dogma of Apostolical succession as a doctrine :
false, contradictory to the Scriptures, and subversive ofthe Gos
pel : the very opposite, and fundamentally opposite, to the scheme
of salvation preached by the Apostles, and recorded in the Word
of God.
Let us now test it by applying it to practice.
A man wishes to examine the grounds of his hope of personal
acceptance with Christ.
The Bible says, " Let a man examine himself." " Examine
your own selves, whether ye be in the faith. Prove your
own selves.' O no, says the Churchman; — not your "own
selves ;" — not " whether ye be in the faith ;" — but examine the
Diploma of your Priest : examine whether ye be in the Church;
in the words of our Right Reverend Father in God Bishop Ho-
bart; " Let it be thy supreme care, 0 my soul, to receive the sacra
ment of the body and blood of the Saviour, only from the hands
of those who derive their authority by regular transmission

apostolical succession. 375
from Christ." " Where the Gospel is proclaimed, communion
with the Church, by participation of its ordinances at the hands
of an authorized priesthood, is the indispensable condition of
salvation." It will not do, therefore, for the devotee of Prelacy to " know
nothing but Christ and him crucified." The Gospel, alone, can
not afford him a valid promise of salvation. It is equally impor
tant for him to show something about "the Church," and the
" endless genealogies " of the " succession." The diploma of
his priest is of equal consequence to him with the Gospel ;
since, if the pedigree of his priest is defective, he can have no
more assurance of salvation than a heathen. And though it
would appear somewhat ridiculous, for a Christian Priest, when
a poor sinner asks, "What shall I do to be saved ?" to hold up his
spiritual pedigree for that sinner's examination ; yet, to be consis
tent, he ought in all reason never to omit it> He should take the
table of the genealogies, as officially published by the Tract
Society of the Protestant Episcopal Church, or by Chapin, and
holding it up before the inquirer, he should say, " Behold here,
the security for salvation, through the Gospel preached and sacra
ments administered by me! See here, that sacraments adminis
tered by me are genuine. See how the succession runs : Valens,
Dolchianus, Narcissus, Dius, Gordias, Narcissus again ; Alex
ander, Mazabanes, Hymen^eus, Zambdas" "Gurnel,Lendwith,
Gornwist,Gorwan, Clendake, Eyny^en, Eludg.eth, Elvaoth,
Maelschewith," and so on. Do you understand ? These are
links in the " succession." Through links like these, power has
come down to Bishop Brownell, Bishop Onderdonk, Bishop Mc
Coskry, and to Bishop Hughes. Through the hands of such a
Bishop, the virtue has come down to me. If you have been bap
tized, and have received the Lord's Supper by my hands, or by the
hands of some one like me validly ordained, and no special un
belief or wickedness hinders, you have become indeed and in
truth a child of God. But if your minister was not of this suc
cession, no matter how sincerely you may repent and believe the
Gospel, the Gospel contains no covenant, or promise, or revealed
provision, by which you may be saved. Examine, therefore,
your Priest's spiritual pedigree ; and as Bishop Hobart says,
" Let it be thy supreme care."
Now, with regard to this system, I say it is the antagonist
system both of Protestantism and of Christianity. It is funda
mentally corrupt and anti-christian. It is essential Popery ; not
indeed in submission to the supremacy of the Pope, for this is
but a circumstance in the scheme ; it is Popery, inasmuch as it
holds out the way of justification, not by faith alone, but by the
efficiency of priestly prerogatives and offices. When you have

376 THE PURITANS and their principles.
turned the poor sinner away from Christ alone, to the sacraments,
and to the efficacy of priestly interventions, you have adopted all
that is fundamental in the system of Popery. Auricular confes
sion, penances, absolutions, and extreme unction, are mere ap
pendages to the scheme. The Greek Church, and other corrupt
forms of Christianity, though they differ in minor things from the
Roman, yet agree with it in this, that they make justification
dependent upon priestly offices and prerogatives, and with these
the High Church scheme (of late called the Puseyistic) fully
agrees. Go the world over, and you find that system the fruitful
mother of superstitions, the natural tendency of which is, to ob
literate the true character of the Gospel, and to bind men in the
chains of spiritual despotism. The doctrine of justification by faith
alone, in opposition to the dogma of justification by priestly offices
and interventions, was the great doctrine ofthe Reformation. Lu
ther declared it " The article of a standing, or of a falling
Church." The Oxford Tractarians understand this well, and
hesitate not to declare that the Reformation, in its fundamental
principle, is to be abandoned. I repeat it ; the very sc-urce of
all the abominations of Popery, is this doctrine of justification by
priestly offices, the doctrine fundamentally involved in the dogma
of Apostolical succession. All the other corruptions of Popery
are mere adjuncts and trappings of the scheme ; mere satellites
of this great planet of darkness. Whenever a man begins to
talk about valid ordinances, valid sacraments, valid ministry,
and Apostolical succession, he is, in principle, no longer
a Protestant ; henceforth, he appropriately belongs to the
same generic class with the followers of the Pope. With Lu
ther, I do not hesitate to declare the doctrine of Justification
by faith alone the " Articulus vel stantis vel cadentis ecclesia"
the point of demarkation between a standing or an Apostate
Church. This was the great battle ground of the Reformation ;
and it is my deep conviction that on this ground that battle is to
be fought again. It is to be the great contest of the age ; per
haps of several ages to come. The advocates of Prelacy have
fairly and unequivocally taken their ground, precisely where the
Pope and the Cardinals stood, when Luther raised his voice for
the great article of a standing or a falling Church. It is no dis
pute about robes, or liturgies, or ceremonies, or Lent, or Easter,
or saints' days, or angels' days, that is to determine this conflict ;
no, nor any dispute concerning the infallibility and supremacy of
the Pope. This principle prevailing, the question of the Pope's
supremacy is not worth a straw. To think of putting down
Popery by arguing against transubstantiation, the papal suprem
acy, and things of that sort, is as idle as to think of dipping the
river dry without ascending to its springs. The Reformation

apostolical succession. 377
was more radical than this ; it took its stand upon the great doc
trine of justification by faith alone, in opposition to justification
by priestly offices and interventions ; and to this basis the contro
versy is destined to descend once more.
But let us apply to this dogma of succession a further test;
not so much to try the principle, as to examine the proof of the
succession as a matter of fact, whether the doctrine can in any
sense become an article of faith.
A sinner inquires, What must I do to be saved ? We (I mean
we " Dissenters," Presbyterians, Baptists, Methodists, Congrega-
tionalists, and the whole Protestant world save the Prelatists)
say to him, The matter lies wholly between your own soul ana
your God. " No outward form can make you clean." No
earthly Priest can do you good.
" Behold I fall before thy face,
My only refuge is thy grace ;
No outward forms can make me clean,
The leprosy lies deep within.
" No bleeding bird, nor bleeding beast,
Nor hyssop branch, nor sprinkling priest,
Nor running brook, nor flood, nor sea,
Can wash the dismal stain away."
If you had the Apostles here themselves, instead of their pre
tended official successors, they could do you no good. You must
" Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ;" that is, with a penitent and
broken heart, despairing of all other help, commit your soul to the
efficacy of Christ's atoning blood, as set forth in the provisions
and promises of the Gospel. " With the heart man believetli unto
righteousness." If that man so believes, and is baptized, and keeps Christ's
ordinances with any portion of the people of God, we do not
suppose it will ever be inquired what was the pedigree of his
minister, or whether it was done in a Baptist, Methodist, Episco
pal, Presbyterian, or other church. We have our preferences ;
we think that some of these, in unessential respects, are laboring
under errors ; and they think so of us. We leave every man in
these respects to be fully persuaded in his own mind. To his
own master he standeth or falleth. But salvation is not depen
dent on Church folds, or denominational peculiarities. We sup
pose that one, laboring under the error of rejecting all outward
sacraments, and all official ministers (e. g., like the Quakers),
will not be rejected from salvation, provided he holds the head,
i- e., that he has penitently and obedientiy embraced the Lord
Jesus Christ, and sincerely endeavors to keep his command
ments.

378 the puritans and their principles.
We therefore point the anxious inquirer directly to the Lord
Jesus Christ, and to him alone. We do not hesitate to adopt
the language of Paul ; " The righteousness which is of faith
speaketh on this wise ; say not in thine heart, who shall ascend
into heaven (that is, to bring down Christ from above); or who
shall descend into the deep ? (that is, to bring up Christ again
from the dead.) — But what saith it ? The word is nigh thee, even
in thy mouth, and in thy heart; that is the word of faith which
we preach ; That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord
Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him
from the dead, thou shalt be saved."
No, says the Prelatist; something more than this is requisite.
" Communion with the priesthood of the Apostolic succession
is the indispensable condition of salvation." If saved without
this, it must be only as the heathen may be saved, by the un
known, unrevealed, uncovenanted mercies of God. The Gospel
affords you no promise of salvation without your coming under
the hands of a priest of the true Apostolical succession.
Be it so. Yes, be it so. The anxious inquirer concludes to
take that way to salvation, and inquires for the tables of
the genealogies.
Where are they ? he inquires. In the Bible ?
Oh no ; God has not revealed those tables, nor has inspira
tion kept the record.
Not in the Bible ! Why, really it seems strange that God
has revealed so much truth, and yet left out the truth of all truth,
the one which I want most, and on which my salvation abso
lutely depends ; at least on which it depends so far as the Gos
pel can be of any use to me at all! Not in the Bible? Why,
faith embraces truth on the authority of God; and here it seems
I am to rest my faith on something without the authority of
God. Not revealed that table of genealogies? How then is it
possible for me to know what I must do to be saved?
Oh no, anxious sinner, you must trust the Church.
What, your Protestant Church, that does not even pretend to
be infallible? A Church which, while it pretends to be Catholic,
is absolutely rejected by the immense majority of the Catholic
world ? Well, be it so, since there is no remedy ; but tell me ;
has your Church kept the record ? And has she, on her authori
ty, ever set that record forth as infallible and true ? Show me, at
least, the authentic record of her action in this case ; that I may
know that it is the Church that I trust, and not something set
forth by somebody, without any authority of hers.
In consistency with his principles, the priest ought to say : As
to these matters, anxious inquirer, the Church has never kept the
record ; the Church has never, by any act, set the record forth,

apostolical succession. 379
or authoritatively vouched for it. But then it runs pretty tolera
bly fair, through a tolerably fair tradition ; howbeit, in some of
the links, we confess, there are some discrepancies among dif
ferent authors. But learned men have, with great research and
pains, made out as accurate lists as may be ; and the Church, —
yes, the Church may be considered as having received them by
a sort of tacit consent. You may therefore rely upon it ; yes you
may rely upon it ; for although, if the Church had actually set
forth those lists she might have erred ; yet you may consider
her general tradition (i. e., not her tradition, but the tradition
generally received among her members), you may consider this
tradition, in a sort, infallible, and fearlessly venture your soul
upon it. Howbeit, should a link happen to fail, you are gone,
like a heathen, to the uncovenanted mercies of God. We can,
however, give you nothing more certain than this ; it is the best
the Church can do in the case.
Well, so be it, responds the inquiring sinner; but this seems
a strange sort of faith, believing on no revelation or warrant
of God; no, nor yet on any warrant of the Church, which, even
if she should warrant, is not infallible, nor able to make good
her guaranty ; and believing this on a tradition, I have not even
the sober action of the Church that it is her tradition at all. But
so it must be ; give me the lists of the succession ; the table of
" genealogies ;" show me this spiritual pedigree on which I
must hang the salvation of my soul.
Do I seem to trifle ? The trifling is not mine. I have done
no more than to state in plain language, the doctrine of Apos
tolical succession in its application ; a doctrine on which I
am told to my face, that I am no minister of Christ, but an in
terloper, a usurper, a son of Korah ; and that the Church to
which I minister is no Church, but an assembly of rebels and
schismatics; who in all their pretended sacraments wickedly
profane the ordinances of God. I have not trifled ; I have in
deed stated in plain language a doctrine which needs only to be
stated in plain language, to appear ridiculously absurd. If the
carcase is so monstrous when the cloak is off, blame the monster,
not him who uncovers it.
Let us, however, proceed, for these absurdities are not fully
exposed. The anxious inquirer takes the list ; and since it is not in the
Bible, and since the Church does not see fit to vouch for it, he
takes Chapin; and longing to find a ground on which he may
rest as the warrant of his salvation, he opens at p. 347, and reads,
as his eye glances along the list of the genealogy, thus :

380 the puritans and their principles.
" Linus, Anacletus, Clement, Evaristus, Alexander, Zephrynus, Pontianus, Dionysius, Caius, Miltiades, Damasus I.,
Zosinus, Gelasius, Hormisdas, Pelagius I.,"
and so on, till that single line has swelled to eight pages (which
of course we have not room here to repeat). This is the list
through which the present American Bishops derive their paternity
from Rome.
The inquirer now opens again at p. 325, and reads such names
as these :
"James Alpheus,
Simeon, Justus I.,
Tobias, Valens, dolchianus, Dius, Mazabanes, Zambdas, Herenius,"
and so on.
He turns again to p. 326, to the list once so essential to the
salvation of all who lived in Wales :
" David, Eliud, Keneva, Morv.el, Haernurier, Elvaeth, GURNEL, GORNWIST, GORWAN, Clendake, Eynyaen, Eludgaeth,"
and so on.

APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 381
He opens again at p. 331, to the names, without which salva
tion was unable to flow to the inhabitants of the Diocese of
York: " Paulinus, Vacancy 20 years,
Cedd, Wilfrid L,
Bosa, St. John of Beverly,
Eanbald, Wulsius, Wimundus, Ethelbald, Alfric Puttock."
Here then are the lists ; certain ; infallibly certain, say some
of the Prelatists ; and so they should be, since the salvation of
the world depends so largely upon them.
But suppose that one (i. e. that I myself) should, in all sin
cerity and earnestness, wish to know if I may hang my hopes
of salvation upon Ihe strength of this pedigree. I begin to
inquire. I would not, surely, suspend myself over a bottomless
gulf upon an old rope, or rusty chain, without seeing how it is
fastened, and what is the condition of the links. I begin to look
into this matter.
I see that according to Dr. Hook, our Episcopal Priests can
trace their pedigree up to Peter at Rome, or up to Paul through
the old line of British Bishops. But was Peter ever at Rome ?
Is it certain that Paul ordained any of the old Bishops in Britain ?
How is the chain fastened ? The most learned men who have
pushed their inquiries in that direction, deny that Peter was ever
at Rome ; others acknowledge that it is improbable ; and the
proof is absolutely wanting. Here the cltain hangs upon an old
rotten peg of a doubtful and improbable tradition. It is also a
matter of doubt, and very improbable, that Paul ever was in
Britain. The proof is absolutely wanting. The fastening here
is so uncertain that a prudent man would not risk a farthing
on it.
But waive the fastening : come to the succession. " Come
we to Rome," says Stillingfleet, " and here the succession is as
muddy as the Tiber; for here Tertullian, Ruffinus, and several
others, place Clement next to Peter : Irenseus and Eusebius set
Anacletus before him. Epiphanius and Ophtatus make both
Anacletus, and Cletus, and Linus, to precede him. What way
shall we find to extricate ourselves out of this labyrinth ?"
Bishop Jewell says, " But, wherefore, telleth us M. Harding
(the Jesuit], this lone; tale of succession ? Have these men their

382 the puritans and their principles.
own succession in so safe record ? Who then was Bishop of
Rome, next by succession unto Peter ? Who was the second ?
Who the third ? Who the fourth ? Irenaeus reckoneth them
together in this order, thus: Peter, Linus, Cletus, Clemens.
Ophtatus, thus : Petrus, Linus, Clemens, Anacletus. Clemens
says that he himself was next to Peter." [Chapin says Linus
was.] " Hereby it is clear," continues Bishop Jewell, " that of
the four first Bishops of Rome, M. Harding cannot certainly tell
who in order succeeded each other."
Stillingfleet shows that with regard to what was done in most
countries, after the Apostles, there are no authentic records.
" But," he says, " instead of this, we have a general silence of
antiquity, and nothing but the forgeries of later ages to supply
the vacuity ; whereby they fill up the empty places, as Plutarch
expresses it, as geographers do maps, with some fabulous crea
tures of their own." " For who dare with confidence believe the
conjectures of Eusebius, at three hundred years' distance from
Apostolic times, when he hath no other testimony to vouch* but
the hypothesis of an uncertain Clement (certainly not he of Al
exandria, if Jos. Scaliger may be credited), and the commenta
ries of Hegesippus, whose relations and authority are as ques
tionable as many of the reports of Eusebius himself are, in refer
ence to those elder times ; for which I need no other testimony
but Eusebius, in a place enough of itself to blast the whole credit
of antiquity as to the matier now in debate. For speaking of Paul
and Peter, and the Churches by them planted, and coming to
inquire after their successors, he makes this very ingenuous con
fession. " There being so many of them, and some of them
naturally rivals, it is not easy to say which of them were account
ed eligible to govern the Churches established, unless it be those
that we may select out of the writings of Paul ?" Such is the
testimony of Eusebius.
Here we have it ; these lists of genealogies rest mainly upon
the credit of Eusebius ; and Eusebius confesses that, beyond
the New Testament, there is no manner of certainty.
But hear the remarks of Stillingfleet upon this confession of
Eusebius : — " Say you so ? Is it so hard a matter to find out who
succeeded the Apostles in the Churches planted by them, un
less it be those mentioned by Paul ? What then becomes of our
unquestionable line of succession of the Bishops of several
churches, and the large diagrams made of the Apostolical
Churches, with every one's name set down in his order, as though
the writer had been Clarenceaulx" [king at arms] " to the Apos
tles themselves? Is it come to this, that we have nothing cer
tain but what is in Scripture ? And must then the tradition of
the Church be our rule to interpret Scripture by ? An excellent

apostolical succession. 383
way to find out the truth doubtless, to bend the rule to the crook
ed stick ; and to make the judge stand to the opinion of his lac
quey, what sentence he shall pass upon the cause in question ;
to make Scripture stand cap in hand to tradition, to show whe
ther it may have leave to speak or not ! Are all the great outcries
of Apostolical tradition, of personal succession, of unquestiona
ble records, resolved at last into the Scripture itself, by him from
whom all these long pedigrees are fetched ? Then let succession
know its place, and learn to vail bonnet to the Scriptures. And
withal, let men take heed of overreaching themselves, when they
would bring down so large a catalogue of Bishops from the first
and purest times of the Church ; for it will be found hard for
others to believe them, when Eusebius professeth it so hard to
find them. Well might Scaliger then complain, that the inter
val from the last chapter of Acts, to the middle of Trajan, was
" a mere chaos filled up with the rude conceptions of Papias,
Hermas, and others, who, like Hannibal, when they could not
find a way through, would make one by force or fraud."
So much for the tables of the genealogies. The accounts
are contradictory and fabulous. Eusebius, on whose authority
they chiefly rest, declares that there is no certainty about any of
them, beyond the record of the New Testament.
The anxious inquirer now wishes to know what he must do
to be saved. Instead of going to the Bible alone for instruc
tion, and to Christ, alone and directly, for help, he is told to
make it his "supreme care," to look for a priest who can help
him by valid and authorized " priestly interventioil-;" — that
" Christ is the way to the Father, and there is no way to Christ,
save by the Church ; and no Church without a Bishop of the
Apostolical succession," so that " The Bishop alone can unite
him to the Father." Sure enough, if this be true, the pedigree
of his priest must be his " supreme care."
Instead of the Bible, therefore, which gives him no light on
this most important of all questions, he takes up Perceval or
Chapin, or some list of the succession given in a tract of the
Protestant Episcopal Tract Society : He opens-and reads:
"Cedd, Wilifred I., Bosa, — Eanbald, Wulsius, Wimen-
dus;" — shall the dying sinner hang his salvation on this chain of
the succession? Had there been no blacksmith, St. Dunstan,
to pull the devil's nose with his hot pincers; — must the whole
of Old England — though ever so full of the Gospel — have gone
to remediless perdition ? But the genealogy ; — is one Christian,
in half a million, capable of examining this list ? Tell me,
plain Churchman — what do you know about " Oskilel, Alfric,
Pittock, Kinsius, Redwardus, Bleithenel, Sulghein, Ryth-
march, Galfuid, or Jorwith ? Take any one of these and prove

384 the puritans and their principles.
to me that such a man ever had any existence ; — that he ever
received the Apostolical succession ; — that he ever transmitted it.
Go to any one of the members of our neighboring St. Paul's,
who glory in nothing so much as in the succession, whereby
they are " the Church ;" and ask him to prove, concerning any
one of these, or any one of a hundred other links, that there was
such a man ; that he regularly received the succession ; that he
regularly transmitted it ; and I hazard nothing in saying not one
of these can do it. You may go to the Rector, or to the Bishop,
and ten thousand to one, that neither can tell you, off hand, any
thing about these men ; nor perhaps, should I enumerate a dozen
names as uncouth as these, could they tell whether any one of
that dozen other names is in the list or not. And I affirm, with
out hesitation, let them examine as much as they please, there is
no manner of certainty to be attained. Dr. Prideaux declares
that with regard to what persons filled such or such links in the
upper end of the chain, " it is a very doubtful question ;" and
that there is " no certainty to be had." Calamy declares that
" the head of the Nile is not more obscure " than the first part of
these tables. And when you come down five or six hundred
years, and take only the pretended succession in Britain, Stilling
fleet declares, " As to the British Churches," — " from the loss of
ancient records we cannot draw down the succession of Bishops
from the Apostolic times."
Besides this, there are lines where they can be traced branch
ing off like a river in a swamp, running and meandering diverse
ways, agreeing in nothing save in nourishing venomous mon
sters and reptiles : — There are lines of succession each claiming
the entire ground, and each denouncing and anathematizing the
other. With regard to those divided and dubious parts of the
Roman succession, Barordus himself, the great Romish historian
says that " for fifty years together there was not one pious man."
* * " O what was then the face of the holy Roman Church !
How filthy, when the vilest and most powerful harlots ruled in
the court of Rome ! by whose arbitrary sway Dioceses were
made and unmade ; Bishops were consecrated, and (which is in
expressibly horrible) false Popes, by their paramours, were thrust
into the chair of St. Peter." * * "In those elections no
mention is made of the acts of the clergy, either by choosing
the Pope at the time of his election, or of their consent afterward.
All the canons were suppressed into silence ; the ancient tradi
tions were proscribed ; the customs formerly practised in electing
the Pope, with the sacred rites and pristine usages, were all ex
tinguished. In this manner, lust, supported by secular power,
excited to frenzy in the rage for nomination, ruled all things.
Now observe what the anxious inquirer is obliged, in the out-

APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 385
set, to believe as the fundamental doctrines of his creed. First,
he must believe, that all these monsters of lust and butchery,
these infidels and atheists, were true Apostles of Jesus Christ ;
that they had power not only to confer the Holy Ghost, but that
they had the entire monopoly of all the covenanted mercies of
God; so that the poor witnesses, who perished in the dungeons
of the Inquisition, or were burned by this true line of the suc
cession, were probably lost as rebels and followers of Korah.
Skcondly, he must believe that through these turbid and filthy
waters the stream of succession ran canonically and pure ; that,
in spite of these disorders, the Apostolic office was regularly and
infallibly transmitted ; and, Thirdly, that no name in the list
is either fabulous or doubtful, but certain and true as the ever
lasting throne.
All this he must believe with a strong faith ; for if Christ was
not constantly with that succession of monsters ; if the Apostolical
virtue and office did not run uncontaminated through the filthy
waters ; if a name in the whole list be either fabulous or doubt
ful, the inquirer can have no secure ground of salvation. He
must hang the destiny of his soul on this chain, and hold to
these articles of belief with an unwavering faith, or he cannot be
a " sound Churchman" — he can have no security that he shall
ever be saved.
But the inquirer is told that he need not examine these matters ;
that the Church is his security for all this. I beg pardon ; " all
this" must be his security for the Church. Without a Church,
and before he can receive the witness of anything that claims to
be a Church, he must first test those claims by these doctrines.
He must believe these doctrines before he can believe that any
thing is a Church ; he must prove the Church by all this before
he can receive her testimony.
But as to receiving this list on the authority of the Church ;—
who speaks for the Church ? She has not spoken on the subject,
and we have already seen that we must, on the Prelatical scheme,
receive these lists before we can ascertain who has a right to
speak, either as the Church, or on her behalf. Who is the
Church ? Where does she speak ? Nothing that claims to be
the Church has ever spoken, in her own name, on these points.
If so, show us where ; when ; by what council, either of the
world, of a nation, or even of a Diocese. True it is that many
individuals, who pretend to be of the Church, gravely tell us
that the list is absolutely certain ; and as many more, acknow
ledged to be of the Church, tell us that the whole lists are not
worth a straw. Who speaks for the Church ? Why, even on
this ground, the testimony of the Church is as traditional, as un
certain, and as contradictory, as the very lists of the succession
25

386 the puritans and their principles.
to which she is called to bear witness. And were it true that the
Church had spoken, and that too the whole Church ; and that
she had spoken unanimously, and authoritatively ; I do not
know that the Church is infallible any more than the Pope.
Nothing is certain but God's word, and that is a rock. I re
fuse to build my salvation on the ground of any mere human
testimony. Baronius shows again, that for fifty or eighty years together,
there have been two or three popes at the same time ; one of them
denying to the other the very name of Christian, reproaching each
other with the appellation of heretic and an ti- Christ, and each
pronouncing the other an unlawful Pope ; that one cut off two
of the fingers of his predecessor ; dug up the bodies of others
from their graves, and having insulted their ashes, ordered
their bodies to be cast into the Tiber; that sometimes all the
three popes together were condemned and degraded by a gene
ral council as false popes, heretics, ungodly wretches, not even to
be reckoned in the number of Christians ; and that nevertheless
many of the Bishops and clergy were ordained by the false
popes. Did the current nevertheless run pure through all these?
I am aware that many Churchmen, not relishing the idea
of drawing their life-blood from the paps of what the reformers call
such " a foul, filthy, withered old harlot," endeavor to avoid that
channel, and to trace the succession in Britain directly up to the
Apostles. This is all idle and impossible. No mortal can tell
who first preached the Gospel in Britain. No one can prove
that either of the two pretended heads, Peter and Paul, was
ever on the island. No one can trace the early list of names.
If there were ever any records, they have all perished ; and were
they not so, the Roman flood came in and swept over the land,
overturning and commingling everything. The only pretence
that can possibly be made is,that peradventure some Homoeopathic
drop of the old succession may be mingled somewhere in this
turbid flood.
But the plea is otherwise all idle ; since they who make it, are
after all compelled to admit that the Romish succession is good,
or else to claim that the Anglican and the American Episcopal
Churches compose the entire Catholic Church, and are the only
parts of the true Church in the whole world. And if it be once
admitted that blood, and murder, and lewdness, and atheism,
and all manner of irregularity and false doctrine, can taint the
succession, then no one can be sure that the succession is not
entirely lost.
" Who can undertake," says Archbishop Whately, " to pro
mise that during that long period usually designated as the
dark ages, no such taint was ever introduced ? Irregularities

APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 3S7
could not have been wholly excluded without a perpetual
miracle ; and that no such miraculous interference existed, we
have even historical proof. Amidst the numerous corruptions
of doctrine and of practice, and gross superstitions that crept
in during those ages, we find recorded descriptions, not only
of the profound ignorance and profligacy of life of many of
the clergy ; but also of the greatest irregularities in respect of
discipline and form. We read of Bishops consecrated when
mere children; of men officiating, who barely knew their
letters ; of Prelates expelled, and others put in their places
by violence ; of illiterate drunkards, and profligate laymen
admitted to holy orders; and in short, of the prevalence
of every kind of disorder and reckless disregard of the decency
which the Apostle enjoins. It is inconceivable that any one,
even moderately acquainted with history, can feel a certainty, or
any approach to certainty, that amidst all this confusion and cor
ruption, every requisite form was in every instance strictly ad
hered to by men, many of them openly profane and secular, un
restrained by public opinion through the gross ignorance of
the population among which they lived, and that no one not
duly consecrated or ordained was admitted to sacred offi
ces." — "Even in the memory of persons now living, there
existed a Bishop concerning whom there was so much of
mystery and uncertainty prevailing as to when, and where, and
by whom, he had been ordained, that doubts existed in the minds
of many persons whether he had ever been ordained at all." —
" The ultimate consequence must be, that any one who sincerely
believes that his claim to the benefits of the Gospel covenant
depends on his own minister's claim to the supposed sacramental
virtue of true ordination ; and this again on perfect Apostolical
succession ; must be involved, in proportion as he reads and in
quires, and reflects, and reasons on the subject, in the most dis
tressing doubt and perplexity." " It is no wonder, therefore, that
the advocates of this theory studiously disparage reasoning, and
deprecate all exercise of the mind in reflection ; decry all appeals
to evidences, and lament that even the power of reading should
be imparted to the people. It is not without cause, that they
dread and lament an ' age of too much light,' and wish to in
volve religion in ' a solemn and awful gloom.' It is not with
out cause, that having removed the Christian's confidence from
a rock, to base it on sand, they forbid all prying curiosity to ex
amine its foundation."
Chillingworth takes the same view. " In fine, to know this
one thing (viz. that such or such a man is a Priest), you must
first know ten thousand others, whereof, not any one can be
known." * # "He that shall put them together, and maturely

383 the puritans and their principles.
consider all the possible ways of lapsing and nullifying such a
priesthood, will be inclinable to think that it is a hundred to one,
that amongst a hundred seeming Priests, there is not one true
one." Archbishop Whately roundly declares, that on this dogma of
succession, " there is not a minister in all Christendom who is
able to trace up, with any approach to certainty, his own spiritual
pedigree." The present English Bishop of Hereford says, in a charge
to his clergy, " You will exceed all just bounds, if you are con
stantly insisting upon the necessity of a belief in, and a certainty
of, the Apostolical succession in the Bishops of our Church, as
the only security for the efficacy of the sacraments."—" To spread
abroad this notion, would be to make ourselves the derision of the
world." We may now demand what possible security can any High
Church Prelatist have, on his own grounds, that he can be saved
by any provision or promise of the Gospel ? He must believe
in God's Word ; he must believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. But
it is more important that he believe, that his Priest derives a
sacerdotal virtue by a personal succession from the Apostles.
Does God's Word tell him anything of this succession ? Not a
syllable. Does any authentic record, divine or human, assure
him that the pretended list of the succession is true ? There is
no such record. Can he trace out the lists and satisfy himself,
by substantial evidence, with regard to even half of the particular
names in those lists, that they are names of persons who regularly
received and transmitted the Apostolical virtue ? No man living
can do it. The earliest, and most competent uninspired histo
rian of the early times of Christianity, confessed that it could not
be done with any certainty.
What then is "the belief of the jure divino Prelatist ? It is not
faith ; for faith must rest upon the Word of God. It is not
reason ; for reason bases her conclusions on evidence; of which
there is, in this case, an utter deficiency. The belief of the High
Church Prelatist, and of every one who, like Bishop Brownell,
builds anything upon this Apostolical succession in the Order of
Diocesan Bishops, is a paltry superstition ; a mere dogged
credulity ; the raving of bigotry and fanaticism ; for after all that
is said of fanaticism, there is no fanaticism on earth more wild
and baseless, than that of a man who coolly pretends to have re
ceived the Apostolic office, with power to confer the Holy Ghost;
to "transfer" men by virtue of his priestly prerogatives and
efficacious administration of sacraments, " out of the kingdom
of Satan into the kingdom of God." I speak soberly, when I
declare my conviction, that the Papist, when he blindly believes

APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 389
that his Priest, by virtue of transubstantiation, can create the body
and blood of his Saviour, and give it whole and entire to each
one of a hundred communicants, is not guilty of more credulity and
superstition, than the man who believes in the prelatic doctrine
of priestly prerogatives derived through a pretended Apostolical
succession ; and who ventures, in that faith, to commit his soul to
the efficacy of sacraments administered by the hands of any
particular man, in the confidence that that man possesses such
a transmitted Apostolical virtue.
Yet this is the ground on which it is claimed that there can
be no Church without a Bishop ! This is the ground on which
Episcopal clergymen tell the ministers of all other denomina
tions of Christians, that they are no ministers of Christ, but
followers of Korah ! And though low churchmen reject these
claims, yet they allow themselves, by the unchristian and
wicked canons of their Church, to be compelled into this un
kind and contemptuous treatment of all other ministers of the
Lord Jesus Christ ! They sometimes tell us, " We would if
we could treat you as ministers of Christ ; but the Canons for
bid us." Ought they not seriously to reflect upon the right of
any Christian men, and especially of Christian ministers, to treat
th«! Lord's ministers and people in this injurious manner, out
of obedience to any mere human canons ? Would not the same
principle have justified them in acquiescing in canons which
sent the people of Christ to the dungeon, or to the stake, had they
lived at the times when such canons were in force? " He
that * is unjust in the least, is unjust also in much."
Obedience to such canons, countenances the pestilent false
doctrine on which such canons are grounded ; it abets the
turning of the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ into substan
tial Popery ; and more than this, obedience to such canons,
contrary to one's own conviction of their justice, is treason
against one's own conscience and against the Lord Jesus
Christ. There is a great eternal law of truth and righteous
ness, which is paramount to all canons of Church enactment;
and low churchmen should see to it, that they do not, out of
obedience to the traditions of men, make void the law of God.
Such, then, is the Apostolical succession as a doctrine, and as a
fact : as a. doctrine, unfounded in Scripture, and contradictory to
it;— injurious to the sole and eternal priesthood of Christ, and con
stituting the fundamental principle of Popery. As a fact, it is ten
thousand times over a falsehood : the pretended succession being
broken and shivered at every turn. Rome may be challenged
to produce a doctrine more erroneous in theory, more false in
fact, or involving a greater amount of mischief and absurdity.
Mormonism itself is not a combination of greater superstition,

390 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
fanaticism, and folly. And yet this is the doctrine on which the
exclusive claims of Prelacy are all based ! The alternative of
Bishop Brownell is true and inevitable : " If a regular ministe
rial succession in the order of Bishops be not conformable to Scrip
ture and Apostolic usage, Episcopacy is an unjustifiable usurpa
tion." It is even so. Whoever receives a jure divino Episco
pacy, must of necessity swallow the doctrine of Apostolical
succession, with all its falsehoods and absurdities. Whoever
cannot swallow that doctrine, must of necessity throw the claims
of Episcopacy away as an " unjustifiable usurpation."
It is not surprising to find the same charge, in which the
" Bishop of Connecticut " advocates the doctrine of Apostolical
succession, rejecting the "Bible alone" as the sole and suffi
cient standard of faith, and placing over it the interpretations of
the Fathers, or of the Church. It is not surprising to find the
right of private judgment treated, in the same charge, as one of
" the errors of the times ;" and the doctrine of Baptismal Re
generation affirmed with all assurance. Pernicious doctrines,
unlike other ravenous beasts of prey, are not wont to go solitary.
Around the doctrine of Apostolical succession, these other false
doctrines concerning the Rule of Faith, the right of private judg
ment, and Regeneration, cluster, as around their natural centre
and sun.
In rejecting the idea that the Christian ministry is a propitia
tory priesthood, we of necessity reject the doctrine of Apostoli
cal succession. The contest comes inevitably on to the ground
of the Reformation : the very identical battle-ground between the
Reformation and Rome. Between the two schemes of justifica
tion by faith alone, and justification through the offices of a
human prieslhood, there can be no peace : and there never ought
to be peace between them, while the truth, the rights of con
science, and the way of salvation, are things of any interest in
the estimation of mankind.

XXXL

ECONOMY OF CHURCH GOVERNMENT.
Ordination. Headship of the Church. Episcopacy and Republicanism.
Episcopacy in the American Revolution. Reproaches against the Puri
tans. The tables turned. Comparative tendencies of Puritanism and
Prelacy. Conclusion.
Having disposed of the claims of the Bishops, and shown the
falsity and essential Popery of the doctrine of the Apostolical
succession, there are several other topics which call for a brief
but distinct examination. I. WHAT IS ORDINATION ?
Rejecting as we do the doctrine of Apostolical succession, as
well as the ghostly character which the rite of ordination is sup
posed to impress upon him who receives it, it will probably be
asked what we make of it. The answer is at hand.
Ordination is the solemn setting apart of a person to the work
of the ministry. We no more hold that any person may take
upon himself the office and work of the Christian ministry, than
that he may take upon himself the office and work of a civil
magistrate. But ordination no more impresses an internal char
acter upon a man, than does an induction to a civd office.
We have already seen that in the appointment of Matthias
to the Apostleship, and in the appointment of Deacons, the peo
ple were called to a popular election ; and this seems to be re
corded as a suitable precedent and warrant for a like manner of
proceeding in cases of a similar nature. And election by popu
lar suffrage happens to be the expression of the original, where it
is said, " And when they had ordained them elders."
Afler the election there is an induction to office. A magistrate
is to be sworn into office by an accredited magistrate; but the
President of the United States may be inducted into office by
any magistrate who may administer a lawful oath ; by a justice
of the peace, as well as by the Chief Justice of the nation. But
it is not from the inducting officer that he receives the power with

392 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
which he is clothed ; that comes from his election ; though till
he is regularly inducted he can exercise no power.
So, for the sake of order, one must ordinarily be inducted into
the ministry by ministers. Hence, the " laying on of the hands
of the Presbytery ;" and without this, it would be improper for
one to take upon himself the functions of the Christian ministry.
If it be said that Christian ministers act for God, and therefore
must receive their authority from him ; it is granted. So the
civil magistrate is the " minister of God ;" and " the powers that
be, are ordained of God ;" but must they always be ordained by
the instrumentality of superiors ? Must they always receive their
authority, not by the instrumentality of those below them, but by
a regular transmitted succession from those originally set in office
directly by the Divine hand ? The sage maxim which some are
so fond of harping on, viz. that " inferiors cannot ordain a supe
rior," nor " give an office that they do not possess," is a mere
sophism. The people, who have no office, elect their governors,
and inferior magistrates induct them into office ; yet the Gov
ernor of Connecticut and the President of the United Slates, are
as much " ordained of God," and as much " God's ministers,"
as though they had been elected and inducted by Queen Victo
ria, or the Emperor Nicholas, or by any other of the so called
" legitimate sovereigns," who can trace their gubernatorial suc
cession clear back to Nero, to Nebuchadnezzar, or to Nimrod.
Although magistrates must ordinarily be ordained by magis
trates, yet all people have a natural right of originating a civil
government, and of course, originating ordinations of powers, as
often as necessity requires. This was done when the Pilgrims
subscribed their Constitution in the cabin ofthe Mayflower.
At the American Revolution the people acted on the same
principle ; ihey went not begging at the foot of European thrones
for the grant of Rulers of the true legitimate succession ; they
originated their own magistracies, and their own laws. And
though there is no power but of God, yet who questions that
Washington, and the Trumbulls, were as much "ordained of God"
as any ruler that ever bore the sword of authority ; and that he
who resisted the magistrates and laws so instituted, resisted " the
ordinance of God."
Now, though for the sake of order, Christian ministers should
be ordained through the instrumentality of Christian ministers,
still Christ's people everywhere have a right, by Divine charter
and command, to keep all his commandments, and to enjoy all
his ordinances ; and, as in the case of the Pilgrims, and of our
fathers in the Revolution, when need requires, the right is inhe
rent, and the duty is imperative, to originate those institutions
and ordinations ; and he who is thus duly ordained a minister

WHAT IS ORDINATION. 393
in Christ's Church, is as much the minister of God as the present
magistrates in these United States. For example : when the
persecuted disciples of Christ met and worshipped in secret, in
the reign of bloody Mary, they had indeed a lawfully ordained
minister, but had he been slain, they might lawfully, if need re
quired, have appointed others. In fine, wherever the Gospel
goes, without Bishops, or Church officers of any sort, it may,
where need requires, originate true Churches, and valid ordina
tions. Christ's people have an ample charter for doing among
themselves, whatever is essential to the observing of his ordi
nances and the keeping of his commands.
While we hold this theory, it is proper to observe that none of
our ordinations were so originated in fact. The first ministers
of the Puritan Churches, both in the Old world, and in the
New, were regularly ordained and acknowledged ministers of
Christ; and from that time our ministers have been regularly
ordained by " the laying on of the hands " of the acknowledged
" Presbytery." Episcopacy rejects this yiew of ordination. In its view, ordi
nation must impress a ghostly character, and come down from
the Apostles by an official succession. Accordingly, at the Revo
lution, the Episcopalians in this country still remained in an
abject dependence on the King of Great Britain and his Parlia
ment ; a dependence for that which is more than liberty, for the
bread of life.
Unfortunately, the Bishops of England might not ordain any
person to the Episcopate without the royal mandate for the
election and consecration of a person nominated by the King as
head of the Church : nor then, without requiring such person to
take the oath of allegiance, and the oath of obedience to the
Archbishop of Canterbury. Our American Episcopalians were
in deep trouble. Civil independence was secured ; but for
dearer rights, they were still dependent on the will of a foreign
king. After due supplication, and after much difficulty and de
lay, an act of Parliament was passed for the consecration of
some American Bishops ; but under the restriction, that the per
sons appointed should be acceptable to the Archbishops of Can
terbury and York, and then obtain the royal license " by warrant
under his royal signet and sign manual."*
* The following letter of Dr. Franklin, exhibits a common sense view of the matter.
To Messrs. Weems and Grant, Citizens of the United States, in London ¦
Paris, 18th July, 17S4.
Gentlemen — On receipt of your letter acquainting me that the Archbishop of
Canterbury would not permit you to be ordained unless you took the oath of allegi
ance, lapplied to a clergyman of my acquaintance for information on the subject of
your obtaining ordination here. His opinion was, that it could not be done ; and

394 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
In our view, this begging for the succession at the hands of a
British king and Parliament, was the fruit of a grievous and
humiliating superstition. It was just as childish and absurd as
it would have been for the people, after their successful Revolu
tion, to go and beg the King to give to his revolted colonies, ru
lers of the true legitimate succession, under the notion that with
out such a succession from the order of Kings, there could not
be a state ; and that without this virtue flowing down through a
kingly succession, there could be no magistrates " ordaine'd of
God." Jure divino Episcopalians ought, in all reason, tobe jure
divino Legitimists. And he who should begin to charge all our
governors and magistrates as usurpers, declaring that the people
that if it were done, you would be required to vow obedience to the Archbishop of
Paris. I next inquired of the Pope's Nuncio whether you might not be ordained
by the Bishop of America, powers being sent him for the purpose — if he has them
not already. The answer was, the thing is impossible, unless the gentlemen be
come Catholics. This is an affair of which I know but very little, and therefore I
may ask questions and propose means that are improper or impracticable. But
what is the necessity of your being connected with the Church of England *
Would it not do as well, if you were of the Church of Ireland ? The religion is
the same, though there is a different set of Bishops and Archbishops. Perhaps if
you were to apply to the Bishop of Deny, who is a man of liberal sentiments, he
might give you orders, as of that Church. If both Britain and Ireland refuse you,
(and I am not sure that the Bishop of Denmark or Sweden would ordain you un
less you became Lutherans), what is then to be done ? Next to becoming Presby
terians, the Episcopalian clergy of America, in my humble opinion, cannot do bet
ter than to follow the example of the first clergy in Scotland soon after the conver
sion of that country to Christianity, when their king had built the Cathedral of St.
Andrews, and requested the king of Northumberland to lend his Bishops to ordain
one of them, that their clergy might not, as heretofore, be obliged to go to Northum
berland for orders ; and their request was refused. They assembled in the Cathe
dral, and the mitre, crozier, and robes of a Bishop being laid upon the altar, they,
after earnest prayers for direction in their choice, elected one of their own number,
when the king said to him, " Jtrise, go to the AUar, and receive your office at the hand
of God." His brethren led him to the altar, robed him, put the erozier in his hand,
and he became the first Bishop of Scotland.
If the British Islands were sunk in the sea (and the surface of the globe has suf
fered greater changes), you would probably take some such method as this ; and if
they persist in denying your ordination, it is the same thing. A hundred years
hence, when people are more enlightened, it will be wondered at, that men in Ame
rica, qualified by their learning and piety to pray for and instruct their neighbors,
should not be permitted to do it, till they had made a voyage of six thousand miles
out and home, to ask leave of a cross old gentleman at Canterbury, who seems by
your account to have as little regard for the souls of the people of Maryland, as
King William's attorney, general Seymour, had for those of Virginia. The Rever
end Commissary Blair, who projected the College of that province, and was in Eng
land to solicit benefactions and a charter, relates that the Queen, in the King's ab
sence, having ordered Seymour to draw up the charter, which was to be given with
£2000 in money, he opposed the grant, saying that the Nation was engaged in an
expensive war, that the money was wanted for better purposes, and he did not see
the least occasion for a College in Virginia. Blair represented to him that its in
tention was to educate and qualify young men to be ministers of the Gospel, much
wanted there, and begged Mr. Attorney would consider that the people of Virginia
had souls to be saved as well as those of England. " Souls " said he, " 
your souls : make Tobacco." I have the honor to be, gentlemen, &c, B. Fsahklih.

HEADSHIP OF THE CHURCH. 395
—under penalty of the divine displeasure — must abandon their
present rulers, and submit to exactors and officers deriving their
legitimate gubernatorial virtue through some lineal successor of
Nimrod or Nebuchadnezzar, would not be guilty of a more ridi
culous fanaticism than those are, who gravely maintain that there
cannot be " a Church without a Bishop " — of the true Apostoli
cal succession. II. HEADSHIP OF THE CHURCH.
Late Episcopal works largely and frequently insist that non-
Episcopal sects are without a visible headship. To this and
kindred objections, we answer :
1. That the ends of Church government are few and sim
ple. They are simply to observe Christ's ordinances, and to
promote the spiritual edification of his members. If aDy turn
heretics or walk disorderly and cannot be reclaimed, the congre
gation of Christians to which they belong, may cast them out of
their society. The public worship of God and the enjoyment
of his ordinances, require nothing beyond a single congrega
tion. This is all the law-making and government for which
the Lord Jesus Christ has made provision. These Churches
may associate for mutual counsel, edification and security ; but
no universal or provincial legislature is needed over these
Churches. Christ established none. No new laws are to be
made ; no canons are to be framed or enforced beyond the Word
of God.
2. All further headship is not only unauthorized, but it has
proved the source of nearly all the persecutions, superstitions,
and corruptions that have infested and distracted the Church of
Christ. Had there been no Prelatical power, how early and how
surely would the Reformation have been accomplished? Had
there been no Henry VIII., or Mary, or Elizabeth, or Bonner,
or Gardiner, to lord it over the consciences of men, how rapidly
would the Reformation have chased away all Popish darkness
from England ? And with all the power and energy of earthly
heads and Prelates, in spite of all their dungeons and faggots,
how hard the usurping Prelates found it, to keep the people down ?
Had not Prelacy suppressed the rising Reformation in Italy, in
Spain, in France, and in Austria, how would those benighted
nations, long ere this, have rejoiced in the light and freedom of
the children of God ? Prelacy has ever been, as a system, hos
tile to religious freedom, and hostile to Gospel truth. And
therefore, aud the more, since Christ did not establish, but for
bade the assumption of Prelatical power, we admit no earthly
head over the Churches of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ
3. The ends and powers of Church government being so

396 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
simple, and Christ not only having given no legislative authori
ty, but having denounced a wo upon those who shall add to the
things written in his Book, we acknowledge the Bible as the
only authoritative statute book over the Church.
But turn to the Prelatical scheme. Look at its Diocesan, and
its National Canons. For ages it was much as any strong-
minded man could attain in a fife time, to make himself master
of the science of canon" law. The Episcopal Church in this
country is yet in its infancy ; and taking advantage of our civil
Revolution, and of some important lessons which both Congrega
tional and Presbyterian Republicanism had taught her, she shook
off at once, a mountain load of incumbrances, which yet burden
the Episcopal establishments of Europe. But let any one take
up the work of Dr. Hawkes on the Constitutions and Canons,
and he will be struck with the immense amount of tinkering
already expended in mending, and altering, and simplifying, and
correcting, the canons of that infant Church. Even Dr. Hawkes
confessedly staggers under the load. He apologizes for his ina
bility to fix the meaning and to settle the conflicts of these re
spective sets of canons. Like a pioneer in a tangled wilderness,
he says of his work : " It may make a road in the wilderness,
which, though rough, will not be useless to future travellers."
There are Diocesan Canons, and National Canons. Some
Bishops have an absolute veto upon the enactment of canons in
their territories ; others have not. " Primitive Bishops,' ' says Dr.
Hawkes, " knew but little of Conventions like ours." And with
all this lumber of canons, Dr. Hawkes complains that, "in the
Church," they have " no judicial system ;" " Uniformity in ju
dicial proceedings is wanting." "But there is a greater evil in
the want of uniformity of interpretations." He applies the max
im, " Miser a est servitas ubijus est vagum aut incertum." [It is
a miserable slavery where the law is either vague or uncertain.]
And he shows that such is the state of their Canon law,
that the actual interpretation of their Canons makes the law
one thing in Massachusetts, and another thing in South
Carolina. " In vain," says he, " will any one ask, what is
the law ? Nowhere in the Church is there any tribunal com
petent to adjust these conflicting interpretations." He shows
that there is no relief, either in a General Convention, or in the
House of Bishops ; that this is a question " practically of great
difficulty ;" that they need something like a Supreme Court ;
and protests that the members of that court ought to be selected
for their fitness, and that this work cannot safely be entrusted,
ex-officio, " to the Bishops."
How long will it be ere our Episcopal brethren will need, like
the Papists, doctors of Canon law ? So cumbersome has the

EPISCOPACY AND REPUBLICANISM. 397
scheme already become, in consequence of departing from the
simplicity of Christ!
But the mischief of having no head ! Is Protestant Episco
pacy free from this difficulty ? The Pope will tell them, No.
With a general government, and National laws, they have no
National court, and no National head. Even the house of Bish
ops, the very apex of the system, has borrowed from Congrega
tionalism its simple moderator. What is the one indivisible
Catholic Church on their plan ? A huge disjointed body with
out a head ; not even a Cerberus with three heads, nor yet a
hydra with fifty, but a body covered all over with some thou
sand headlings, over which there is no real head! Why,
truly, on this argument, our Episcopal brethren should either
resort to Queen Victoria, or to the Pope, to assume the headship
over them ; or else they should forthwith meet and create a Me
tropolitan, or Archbishop, or a Patriarch.
III. EPISCOPACY AND REPUBLICANISM.
It is further claimed, that Episcopacy bears the strongest re
semblance to, and is most in accordance with, our Republican
Institutions. The House of Bishops is compared to the United
States Senate, and the several Bishops, to the governors of the
several States ; then there are lay delegates, and vestrymen, de
riving their authority from popular elections.
It is true, that those who see Prelacy in this country, see it
greatly modified by our republican institutions. But this is the
only country on earth, where Prelacy admits of any such thing
as popular rights. Dr. Hawkes has recorded what strenuous
efforts were made, by Bishop Seabury, against admitting any
popular clement into the government of the Church. That dis
tinguished Prelate " disapproved of committing the general con
cerns of the American Church to any other than Bishops," and
considered the introduction of the Laity as " incongruous to every
idea of Episcopal government" Such, in theory, is the doc
trine of High-Churchmen : the laity hold their privileges as lib
erties, not as rights : mere concession, held by sufferance of the
Bishops. But let us look a little into the actual system. I will venture
to ask what sort of resemblance to our Republican institutions, a
Bystem of government would bear, if framed on the following
principles :
(1.) Give to each state a Governor for life, to be removed
only on an impeachment before a house of Governors for life.
Let him hold his authority not from the people, but by Divine
right, having received a gubernatorial grace and character from
the sole gubernatorial succession.

398 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
Let him hold a veto upon every appointment of judge or jus
tice. Give the franchises of every citizen into this man's hands
alone, that by his single sentence be may excommunicate every
man from all rights and privileges as a citizen, and render any
man incapable of holding any office, or of acting in any primary
election. Give him power to pack a court of such justices as he may
select, to try, depose, or degrade any officer in the state whom he
may order to appear before that tribunal.
(2.) Bring these perpetual Governors into a perpetual Senate,
with an absolute veto upon everything proposed by the Repre
sentatives of the people : — Give all executive authority into their
hands: — Let there be no Independent Judiciary, — no Supreme
Court ; — but let these perpetual Governors, these perpetual mem
bers of a perpetual Senate ; these members of an exclusive Execu
tive department, be also the sole expounders of the law, over
the whole land, in their associate capacity, — and each the supreme
judge as well as sole Governor in his own domain.
Such is the draft of a system of Civil Polity, which should
be a parallel to our American Episcopacy. How does it com
pare with the institutions of our American Republic ? There is
no resemblance. A more miserable oligarchy never existed on the
earth, than such a scheme would be, if its analogy were faithfully
carried out in the form of civil government. What dolts does
Dr. Hawkes take the American people to be, that he presumes so
complacently to claim a close and essential resemblance, between
the Episcopal scheme and our Republican government ?
IV. EPISCOPACY IN THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION.
But let us pass to another extraordinary claim put forth by
Episcopal writers.
The Tract, " Why I am a Churchman," " calls attention " to
another fact showing the Republican spirit and tendencies of
Episcopacy : — Washington, Jay, Madison, Marshall, and others,
were Episcopalians.
Is not this a strange sort of logic, to argue from afew isolated
facts — altogether exceptions to the state of the facts in general —
the general tendencies of any particular scheme ? La Fayette,
Montgomery, Steuben, Pulaski, and De Kalb, are said to have
been Roman Catholics. Is Popery, therefore, the friend of free
dom ? Shall the exception of these great and honorable names
weigh down the dismal conclusions to be drawn from the present
state, and the past history of Spain, Italy, Portugal, and Austria,
for so many hundred years ? Washington was an Episcopalian.
So be it. We venerate him none the less. He was less an
Episcopalian than a Christian. Washington was no High

EPISCOPACY IN THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION. 399
Churchman ; he communed at the Lord's table with Presbyte
rians. His religion, as well as his patriotism, rose above the
narrow limits of High Church Episcopacy. It is an outrage
upon his memory, it is a libel upon his principles to use that hal
lowed name to gild the low superstition of modern Puseyism.
Was Washington an Episcopalian ? So the revolutionary Gen
eral Greene was bred a Quaker ; and Quaker, it is said, he re
mained, till the battle of Lexington set his patriotic soul on fire.
But is the tendency of Quakerism, therefore, warlike ?
Washington, and Greene, and Jay, and Madison, and La Fay
ette, and Pulaski, and De Kalb, would all have stood among the
staunchest of the Puritans, had they existed in their day. It is
impossible that such men should ever have entered into the ty
rannical principles of Strafford, or have sided with the persecuting
measures and low superstitions of Archbishop Laud.
But since our " attention " is so earnestly invited to this topic,
let us look away from a few incidental cases, to the wide array
of facts which more accurately show the spirit and tendencies of
the system. And, as if so long a history, from Henry VIII. to
Queen Anne, were not sufficient to determine this point, let
us look to that field to which our attention is specially called,
the Ameripan Revolution.
It had long been the avowed expectation and design of Epis
copalians in this country, that Diocesan Bishops should be placed
over the whole land. Had Bishops been so appointed, they
would not have been like the present American Diocesans, shorn of
all civil prerogatives, and limited in powers to their own denomi
nation. They would have been possessed of powers belonging to
British Bishops by common law. Already had the Archbishop of
Canterbury taken it upon himself, as the prerogative of his
See, to appoint Notaries Public in Puritan New England. In
New York the marriage licenses were stamped with the mitre,
in recognition ofthe Bishop's claim to legal authority over causes
matrimonial. The Governor of New Jersey held the Archbish
op's formal commission to act for him in matrimonial and testa
mentary affairs. An active correspondence was going on between
Episcopalians here and the authorities in Great Britain, for set
ting up Bishops over the whole land, with authority over all the
inhabitants. John Adams declared (and no man better knew)
that this was one of the principal causes that originated the
Revolution. Our fathers dreaded and feared such an event;
and had reason to suppose that they saw it approaching. In
this very town,* was one of the conventions of Presbyterian
and Congregational ministers, of New England and the Middle
Colonies, held (which conventions were continued for several
* Norwalk.

400 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
years previous to the Revolution), for guarding against and de
feating the wily schemes of Prelatists, for setting up Bishops
over the American people.* Such was the state of things
before the American Revolution.
And when the conflict came, where was every Congregational
and Presbyterian minister in the land ? At his post, embarking
everything for liberty. But where was Episcopacy then ? I
love not to tear open old wounds ; I surely would never have
adverted to these things, had not Episcopacy been so forward of
late, to make these preposterous claims. Where then were the
Episcopal clergy of this land ? There were, indeed, honorable
exceptions, but what was the general fact ?
Most of their churches throughout the country were closed.
They had no liturgy to pray for their country ; and without the
authority of the Lord Bishop of London, they might not indite
such a prayer. They could not canonically worship without
praying for the success of the tyrant king, and his more tyranni
cal ministry. Bishop Hobart, who lived too early for these
new claims of Episcopacy, gives the following statement con
cerning those times : " Many of her clergy were attached in prin
ciple to the Church and monarchy of Great Britain ; and not
caring to effect a separation from her, abandoned their cures, and
returned for refuge to what till then had been termed the mother
country." Ask the aged people on these shores, who were the
most dreaded foes of freedom here ? Who were the guides of
their enemies, in their nightly incursions for plunder and rapine ?
Who stole upon their dwellings, to seize the husbands, or fathers,
or sons, and to carry them off to the jails and prison-ships, many
of them never to return ? Who ambushed the sanctuary on the
Sabbath, and with bayonets invaded the house of God, to seize
upon the. unarmed worshippers ?f The answer will declare the
actual influence of the Prelatical system, in the days that tried
men's souls.
I say not these things to make those who hold to the Prelatic
scheme in these days responsible for the deeds of Iheir predeces
sors, but simply to meet the issue which Episcopacy has herself
been the first to raise and urge. Had that system been generally
received in that day, the American Revolution could not have
taken place. Had that system possessed adequate strength in
New England, the great contest would have proved unsuccessful,
* The Journal of these Conventions has been published by order of the General
Association of Connecticut, and is a most interesting document of those stirring
t The congregation at Darien was surrounded, while engaged in public worship
Dr Mather was dragged from the pulpit, and with the men of his congregation
carried off into captivity. The day that saw the town of Norwalk laid in ashes,
saw also the Rector of St. Paul's retiring with the marauders to the British fleet.

REPROACHES AGAINST THE PURITANS. 401
and the sun of our country's hope would have gone down in a
long and dreary night.
The truth is, that Prelacy, as a system, is naturally, and ever
has been, hostile to civil liberty. The principles of Puritanism,
and of civil liberty, rose and flourished together. The doctrine
of the Divine right of Bishops has ever been, and by nature
must ever be, the ally of despotism. After a contest scarcely re
mitted for three hundred years, in which Prelacy strained every
nerve to put the principles of civil and religious freedom down,
she now coolly turns about and claims that she, above all others,
is the best friend of civil and religious liberty.
V. REPROACHES AGAINST THE PURITANS.
Let us -proceed to a still more common and favorite claim upon
which Episcopacy is wont to vaunt itself. I refer to those re
proaches, which are, in some quarters, perpetually cast upon the
Puritan founders of New England, and upon their principles,
viz. their austerity, bigotry, " Blue Laws," persecution of the
Quakers and Baptists, " hanging witches," and things of that
sort- Our Puritan Fathers were men. We freely confess, and la
ment, that they fell into some grievous errors, which, however,
were not so peculiarly theirs, as the common errors of the times.
Witches were hung at that day in Old England as well as in the
New. If the Puritan inhabitants of New England did this, so
did the great and good Sir Matthew Hale ; yet the annals of
human judiciaries know no purer name.
Why do not those who insist upon these mournful errors,
sometimes have the candor to say, that in this, not only did the
Puritans err in common with the whole civilized world, but also
to tell how large a minority of the magistrates and people of
New England, grieved and were indignant at these things, at
the time ; how soon the magistracy themselves corrected their
errors ; how ingenuously they confessed, and how bitterly they
mourned over these temporary delusions ? Where else in the
wide world was such an amende, so speedily and so honorably
given to right reason, and to truth ?
The Puritans had some erroneous laws, which, in some in
stances, they put in execution. Yet even then, their code was
liberal and tolerant beyond anything that had ever been known
in Old England. All their persecutions were as a drop in the
ocean compared with those carried on at the same period, and
long after, in their Father-land. It was a brief evil, soon corrected,
and bitterly repented. A bare majority for a time carried these
unhappy measures. Sorrow and indignation filled the hearts of
26

402 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
an almost equal minority, till the good sense and better feelings
of the people prevailed.
In one respect I am not sorry that such a soot and blackness
should appear for a season upon the escutcheon of Puritanism,
so recently borne out from the smoke and darkness of ancient
systems of intolerance and abuse. It afforded an opportunity to
show how soon the principles of Puritanism could purge that
blackness off. The Old World has not yet seen an example of
a single denomination holding an absolute and controlling pow
er, and yet correcting her own errors by an entire toleration
of foreign hostile sects. The nearest approach ever made to this
in Old England, was under Cromwell, and during the ascenden
cy of the Independents. That is a glory to which the Church
of .England has never yet had the honor to attain.
But how early did liberal views and measures prevail among
the Puritans of New England ? Take some examples and proofs.
The first Episcopal Church in Connecticut was established in
1723. It was only four years from this period, before a law of
the colony provided, that whatever tax should be paid for the
support of religion by any person belonging to, and worshipping
with an Episcopal Church, it should be paid over to the clergy
man of the Church of England, upon whose ministry such per
son should attend. Those who conformed to the Church of
England, were authorized to tax themselves for the support of
their clergy, and were excused from all taxes for building meet
ing-houses, and for other purposes of the Churches of the pre
vailing denomination.
In 1729, the Quakers, a very few of whom lived in the parts
adjacent to Rhode Island, were, by law, exempted from paying
taxes for the support of Congregational ministers, and for build
ing meeting-houses. In the same year, the Baptists, who had
two small congregations in the county of New London, received
the same indulgence. At this time there were in Connecticut
but two or three congregations of Episcopalians, and two of
Baptists; all of which were small; and no congregation of
Quakers in the colony.*
This relaxation in the laws, made so soon after dissent assumed
a regular form, and probably on its first application to the Legis
lature for relief, shows that there prevailed in Connecticut, at the
time, no serious disposition to persecute or oppress the people ol
other denominations.
Is it replied, that they erred in making any ecclesiastical estab
lishment at all: and that there should have been an entire
equality of all denominations? Granted; that is undoubt
edly the only correct system. But that principle was not at
* Professor Kingsley's Historical Discourse, p. 95.

THE TABLES TURNED. 403
that period understood. It was yet to be brought forth, as the
legitimate deduction from the great Puritan principle, that to
every man belongs the right of entire freedom to worship God,
according to his own conscience ; a principle which the Church
of England, which still demands her tithes of all Dissenters, and
still presses them down by numerous and intolerable disabilities
—has yet to learn ; a right, which she has yet to yield, or it will
ere long be wrested from her unwilling hands.
VI. THE TABLES TURNED.
And now, since the bigotry and intolerance of the Puritans is
so much insisted on, suppose we turn the tables, and inquire
whether American Prelacy, where she had the power, was more
tolerant Episcopacy was originally established by law in the colony of
Virginia. In 1618, a law was enacted there, that " every person
should go to church on Sundays and Holy Days, or lie neck and
heels that night, and be a slave to the colony the following week."
For the second offence, he was to be a slave for a month ; and for
the third offence, a year and a day.*
In 1642, a law was passed forbidding any other than an Epis
copal minister to officiate in the colony.
" The established clergy," says Dr. Miller (Life of Rodgers, p.
31), " were many of them notoriously profligate in their lives ; and
very few among them preached, or appeared to understand the
Gospel of Christ." A revival of religion broke out in Hanover
and the adjoining counties, from the perusal of some religious
books; one of which was Boston's Fourfold State. People
found the Gospel to be a different thing from lhat which was
taught in the pulpits of the establishment. Many were awaken
ed and converted. This was between A. D. 1730 and 1740.
The people continued to meet and to read books and printed
sermons. At length, private houses became too small, and they
erected a house for their accommodation. The vengeance of
the established Church fell upon them, in the shape of fines, and
whatever other molestations the laws gave power to inflict
This was the origin of Presbyterianism in Virginia. In 1743,
these inquiring people sent for Mr. Robinson, a Presbyterian
Evangelist. Multitudes began to inquire, What must we do to
be saved ? Other preachers succeeded Mr. Robinson : but the
established Church was now aroused. The celebrated Messrs.
Tennent and Finley, obtaining license of the Governor, began
to preach to those inquirers in 1745. A proclamation was some
time after set up about the meeting-house on a Lord's day, strict
ly requiring all magistrates to suppress and prohibit all itinerant
* Miller's Life of Dr. Rodgers.

404 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
preachers. The celebrated President Davies preached to the
same people, having obtained the Governor's license for himself
and four meeting-houses. But this good nature on the part of
the governor, met with a prompt and stern rebuke. With great
difficulty he prevailed on the court not to revoke the license of
Davies, and send him out of the colony. The venerable John
Rodgers, afterwards of New York, was forbidden to preach in
Virginia, " under penalty of £500, and a year's imprisonment
without bail or mainprize." And all this was not so very long
ago ; for Dr. Rodgers died so recently as 1811.
The exclusive spirit of Episcopacy reigned triumphant in
New York down to the very close of the Revolution. Some
Presbyterians in Jamaica, had erected a commodious house of
worship, and procured a handsome parsonage and glebe, which
they had held some years previous to 1702. A few Episcopa
lians having settled in the town, considering the Presbyterians
defenceless by law, seized the church, between a morning and
afternoon service, and endeavored to hold it for their own sect.
Lord Cornbury, the governor, retiring that year from New York,
on account of a malignant fever, was courteously granted the
use of the parsonage : but when he returned to New York he
delivered it into the hands of the Episcopalians, who deemed it
not dishonorable to receive it.*
The first Presbyterian minister who preached in the city of
New York, in a private house, and baptized a child on that oc
casion, was pursued to Newtown, and led a prisoner in triumph,
by a circuitous route, through Jamaica, and committed to prison
in New York. Nor was he suffered to depart till there had been
extorted from him a sum equal to all the fees and expenses of
his prosecution ; amounting to between two and three hundred
dollars. After a Presbyterian Church had been organized in New York,
" for the greater part of a century they were compelled, besides
supporting their own Church, to contribute their quota toward
the support of the Episcopal Church, already enriched by gov
ernmental favor."f
While these governmental benefactions were laying the foun
dation of the present enormous wealth of Trinity Church, the
Presbyterians suffered under every discouragement which the
ruling powers could interpose. In 1719, the first Presbyterian
Church in New York was erected, in no small share by public
collections taken up in the colony of Connecticut and in Scotland.
The direct and strenuous efforts of the vestry of Trinity Church,
defeated their repeated applications for a charter. The Presby
terian Church, thus holding their edifice by an uncertain tenure,
? Miller's Life of John Rodgers. t Ibid.

THE TABLES TURNED. 405
were compelled for a series of years, in order to secure it, to cause
the title to be conveyed to the moderator of the General Assem
bly of the Church of Scotland. Suffering under other legal dis
abilities, they again applied for a charter in 1759, and were again
opposed and defeated by the strenuous opposition of the Episco
pal Church. In 1774, and 1775, they laid their embarrassments,
with their complaint and petition, at the foot of the throne. A
charter was drawn, and passed the Council: but on this side of
the water, the influence which had opposed, now withheld the
gift of the sovereign.
Thus, up to the very year of the Revolution, was this intoler
ance exercised by Prelacy in New York, till that Revolution
came and broke the sceptre of her power for ever. Such was
Puritanism, and such was Prelacy, with regard to the matter of
toleration in the provinces, where, for a season, each held the con
trolling power ; the first voluntarily and promptly correcting her
errors, and granting all other denominations every privilege, con
sistent with the views of religious establishments, unfortun
ately everywhere prevalent at that day ; the last, grasping the
sceptre with an iron hand, yielding nothing, holding on to the
last gasp, till the resistless tide of revolution sweeps away her
aceptre and her throne together.
Even now, look at England ; where half her people who regu
larly attend the public worship of God, worship in the ranks ofthe
Dissenters ; possessing such toleration as has been, from time to
time, wrung from the hand of power, yet still laboring under every
obloquy and discouragement, which the established Church is able
to cast upon them, and which the times allow ; and in addition
to their own burdens, compelled to pay tithes for the support of
that very Church-establishment, which spares no effort to crush
them to the dust.
And yet the vision of some people can look over all the3e
things, to fasten upon the few transient errors of their own Puri
tan Fathers ! And there are soii3 of New England, whose dear
est privileges are owing, under God, entirely to the faith and toil,
and indescribable sufferings of their fathers ; who yet seem to de
light in hearing the names and principles of those fathers men
tioned with reproach! The principles of freedom which those
fathers struck out and maintained, the mighty benefits which
have resulted from their labors to their posterity, and to the world ;
the forecast and virtue which laid the foundations of everything
peculiar in our American institutions, and which have made this
American people the freest and happiest of all nations, since the
foundation of the earth ; all these things go for nothing in the
estimation of these misguided and degenerate sons ! They di
rect their vision, as if to some little spots on the glorious sun, and

406 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
tell how that sun disfigures the Heavens, and how glorious the
Heavens would be if that dismal sun were not there. They dwell
npon some idle gossip, some stale slander, a thousand times re
futed. They talk about lhat mass of impudent forgeries so often
set forth, and so extensively believed, the " Connecticut Blue
Laws ;" just as though the code set forth under that name had
once had a real existence, as a part of the Connecticut laws.
The wonder is that the very name of Blue Laws does not blis
ter the tongue of every Prelatist, when he remembers the origin
of that lying history, in which the code of Blue Laws had their
first introduction to the world.
VII. COMPARATIVE TENDENCIES OF PURITANISM AND PRELACY.
But we scarcely need history to determine the respective fruits
of Prelacy and Puritanism. These fruits must inevitably result
from the nature of the two systems. On the one side, a hier
archy, claiming a monopoly of all the covenanted mercies of
God ; a divine right to rule over all people who bear allegiance
to Christ; asserting their authority to make Canons, and devise
ceremonies, and to impose the same by law, upon all Christ's
people ; forbidding all congregations of Christians to offer a
prayer in public, save according to a prescribed liturgy ; charging
all Christians, who question their authority, and refuse to con
form to their ordinances, as schismatics and dissenters, and de
nouncing all their ministers as sons of Korah, with whom it is
unlawful for a true Christian to hold communion in divine
ordinances, or to join in public worship. What toleration can
result from these principles as their natural fruit? What tolera
tion did they yield our fathers for years before they fled to these
then desolate shores ? What are their fruits in Old England to
the present day ? What in Italy ? In Spain ?* or anywhere
else in the wide world ?
On the other hand, what is the Puritan principle ? The divine
right and duty of every man to go to the Word of God for him
self ; the Word of God the sole standard of faith, order, and
duty ; the divine right of every Christian community orderly to
associate together in congregations for the observance of the
worship and ordinances of God, with no power anywhere on
earth to prescribe to them the manner of their worship, or to over-
* The system has courage to speak out in Canada. The present Protestant Epis
copal Bishop of Toronto says in his Charge : " In all the British colonies, we [the
Episcopal clergy] are alone entitled, as holding the divine commission, to be their
[the dissenters] teachers, guides, and directors in divine things. Nor does it alter
the matter that they refuse obedience and resist our authority. The right is not
less ; nor can we without sin neglect to exercise it, whenever it can be done with
any prospect of success." What Pope ; what minion of the Bloody Bonner ever
carried the theory of divine right to persecute farther than this ¦

COMPARATIVE TENDENCIES. 407
rule their own judgment and conscience ; a liberty claimed, and
a liberty allowed, to every man and to every congregation of
men ; a liberty which none can deny, with which none can in
terfere, without infringing upon the great charter granted by the
Almighty to all his people, and without, at the same time, im
piously usurping the prerogatives of Heaven.
Is this a system of superstition, of bigotry, of persecution, of
intolerance ? The farthest from it possible. The discoverers of
this simple but sublime system of religious rights, were — more
than the Newtons — the benefactors of the world. Like the great
laws of nature, this law is beautiful in its simplicity, and awful
in its grandeur. Its first discoverers might not have comprehend
ed, at once, all its length and breadth : they may, in particular
instances, have greatly erred from its precepts ; but the principle
remains. It will continue to shed abroad its richer benefits the
more it is understood, and the better it is obeyed. It will gradu
ally purge away the mists and defilements of error. The present
entire equality of all sects of worshippers, which characterizes our
American Institutions, was as sure to result from these principles,
as the sun is to break through the shadows of a misty morning.
But from the opposite, the prelatical principle, what can come ?
It cannot allow men freedom to worship God. It trusts not its
own children, but seeks to bind them by the authority of Canons,
and to fence them in by Liturgies and prescribed ceremonies ;
and then talks about the misery of the poor people left with the
Bible and their own conscience alone, without the benefit of such
authoritative fences and canons ! What can come from this
system ? What has come of it ? Too well have we seen, as
we have traced its course in the history of hundreds of years.
Leave the soul of man and the mind of man free. Let him
be responsible for his faith only to God. Persecution is at an
end. Bigotry expires. If religious principle, and a regard to
his eternal interests, cannot keep him to the truth, it is in vain to
keep him in — like a being to whom reason and conscience are
both an incumbrance — by prelatical prerogatives, fences, liturgies,
and ceremonial forms.
That the Puritanic principle is the principle of reason and of
the Word of God, we entertain no shadow of doubt ; and there
fore we trust, in entire confidence, that as the advancing kingdom
of Christ brings the souls of men to a clearer perception of their re-
sponsibities and rights, the Puritan principle is destined to pre
vail. That the despotism of the Greek and Roman Hierarchies
over so large a portion of Christendom, is destined to decline,
what Protestant can doubt, who believes that the light and free
dom of the Gospel are one day to fill the world ? As little ought
it to be doubted, that tin* very root of these despotisms, the su-

408 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
perstition of a Christian Priesthood, and of authority derived
from Apostolical succession, and all the powers claimed by a hier
archy to frame rites, and ceremonies, and canons, and to impose
the same upon God's people, are destined to vanish away. That
Prelacy may live and flourish for a time, no one ought to doubt,
who looks at the causes that contribute to its support. The reli
gion of priestly interventions, of ceremonies and forms, of grace
conferred by rituals, is the religion of human nature. People
who want the benefits of religion on terms requiring little heart-
work and little self-denial ; who wish for nothing that presses
heavily on the conscience, or that forbids a good degree of con
formity to the world, will always exhibit a tendency to fall in
with a religion essentially of the Prelatic cast. Such a religion
will of course be the religion of the fashionable and the gay, the
worldly, and the ambitious. Even the absurdities, the supersti
tions, and the abominations of Popery, do not prevent its holding
an almost unbroken sway, over a large portion of the cultivated
intellect of the earth. Archbishop Whately has a work charac
terized by his usual vigor and discrimination, entitled, " The er
rors of Romanism traced to their source in human nature ;" in
which he shows that monstrous scheme to be the result, not so
much of the imposture of a designing priesthood, as of a sin-
loving, God-hating, human nature ; its dislike of a spiritual reli
gion, and its natural tendency to resort to priestly offices, as an
easier mode of salvation ; less troublesome to the conscience, less
irksome to a heart that loves the indulgence of sin, than the spir
itual religion of the Lord Jesus Christ. It is but natural, that
wherever the absurdities of Popery are seen to be too monstrous,
the same corrupt human nature should seek a religion of the
same species, but a religion more decent in some of its details.
Such is the system of Puseyism, and the system of High Church
Prelacy ; and he who reads the work of Archbishop Whately,
will be at no loss to account for the rapidity with which Pusey
ism has swept over so large a portion of the Episcopal Church.
The same causes will doubtless continue to swell the ranks
of the votaries of that system. Argument and light have lit
tle intrinsic power, where men by nature love darkness rather
than light. The Evangelical party have the Gospel on their
side ; Puseyism has human nature and the offices ofthe Church.
While human nature remains corrupt, its instinctive tendencies
are either wholly to reject the Gospel, or to deny its eternal retri
butions, or to contrive a religion of forms and priestly interven
tions ; and he will find himself mistaken, who thinks that be
cause this last scheme is based on palpable error, it will not,
therefore, long contrive to have its votaries. So long as men
continue careless, such a religion will be popular; but when the

CONCLUSION. 409
Spirit of God descends in his might, to convince the world of sin,
of righteousness, and of judgment to come, then men will flee
from these refuges of lies, and earnestly inquire what they shall
do to be saved. The religion of salvation by priestly interven
tions is destined finally to vanish away ; and light, and liberty,
and salvation, to fill the earth.
To the advancement of pure religious truth, as well as of just
principles of freedom, the labors of the Puritans have, next to
the Reformation, contributed more than anything else since the
labors of the Apostles. Their labors are destined to form one of
the great eras in the history of man.
CONCLUSION.
And now our work is done. We have seen our fathers in
their conflicts ; we have visited them in their prisons ; we have
traced them in their wanderings, and come with them to their
first rude dwellings in the wilderness. We have looked at the
foundations rising under their hands. In two hundred years,
the wilderness is converted into a fair and fruitful field. In all
time, the sun never before shone on a people so free, and blessed
so abundantly with all the elements of human happiness. Save
for the principles which our Puritan fathers maintained at every
hazard and every sacrifice, all these fair fruits of freedom and of
religion would never have been.
We have shown these principles of the Puritans to be based
on fundamental truths — truths which are eternal in their nature,
and which can never cease to be of unspeakable importance to
the best interests of mankind.
These were the principles of men who feared God : the prin
ciples of sober, intelligent, and steadfast men : and by successive
generations of such men, and such alone, are these principles to
be perpetuated in the world. The time is coming when the
principles and institutions of our Puritan fathers will be appre
ciated in this land, and when their influence will be felt all over
the globe. We are quite willing to point to their results in
New England, and to ask whether it would be any loss to man
kind, should such principles and institutions be extended
throughout the world.
We owe something to these principles. We owe everlasting
thanks to God, that he has made us the descendants of such
ancestors, and allowed us to enter into their labors. May it
never be said that we forsook the principles of our fathers, or
our fathers' God. They would be the first of all to rise up and
condemn us, if, pretending to prize their principles, we should
fail in that which was the main end and crown of all their in-

410 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES.
stitutions — piety to God, and a living, fruitful, faith in our Lord
Jesus Christ.
The conflict of human opinions and human principles will
soon be over. All human institutions, and all human taber
nacles of worship, are soon to vanish away. If our privileges
and institutions contribute to our salvation, and to make us
meet for the inheritance of the saints in light, this is the fruit
most of all to be desired. May God make them such to us,
and preserve them to our children and to our children's chil
dren, to the end of time.

APPENDIX.

« PURITANISM, BY T. W. COIT."
JnsT before this work was ready for the press, there appeared a work entitled
" Puritanism, or, A Churchman's defence against its Aspersions. By
Thomas W. Coit, D.D., Rector of Trinity Church, New Rochelle, N. Y., and a
member ofthe New York Historical Society."
As in duty bound, I hastened to procure the work, that I might avail myself
of whatever additional light it might throw upon the subject.
The honorary titles appended to the name of the author of the work
("D.D., Member of the New York Historical Society") led me to expect some
thing. I turned to its (what shall I call it ?) Ante-Preface ; in which, in a
quotation from Mather, the author anticipates the " furious tempest, — a tem
pest of rain, hail, and horrid thunder-claps," which his work is about to raise.
Well, thought I, the good man expects, at the least, to make a noise in the
world. origin of the work.
I turned to the Preface, in which I found that the work was prepared at the
special call of " several of the Bishops, and a large number of the Clergy,"
and that this was " not the first, nor the twentieth time, that he had been
approached on the subject." It seems that the author had tried his hand at
the same sort of labor, ten years before, in a series of letters in the Church
man : but the recollection of the " rain, hail, and horrid thunder-claps," which
had been " poured upon him," " determined him never to resume, on his indi
vidual responsibility." "Several of the Bishops, and a large number of the
clergy," now approached him, " willing to share with him the responsibility ,"
" hy giving their signatures ;" and under this high authority, he girds himself
for the work. " But another work, which," says he, " the Church was
pleased to ask of me, interfered (the editing of a Standard Prayer-Book)."
Accordingly, as soon as the Prayer-Book is published, in obedience to this
new call of the Church, he takes the Puritans in hand. I confess, that after
all this note of preparation, I did expect something,— that a decent edifice, at
least, should follow so notable a porch.

412 REVIEW.
GENERAL FEATURES OF THE WORK.
But on reading the book, what did I find .' A manful discussion of the
great principles for which the Puritans contended ? A denial of the persecu
tions inflicted upon them hy the government and Church of England ? A vin
dication of the principles on which the Church of England claimed a right to
persecute ; i. e., to make canons for the U6e of ceremonies, and to impose the
same hy law ? Nothing like it. He wanders over the whole history, as if
utterly unconscious that any principles at all are at stake. He roamB over
those most stirring times of the whole range of English history, — the period
more prodigal in genius, in intellectual and moral greatness, more pregnant
with great events, and more productive of great and glorious results, more fruit
ful in instructive lessons of history, than any other period in the whole unin
spired history of man. But what lessons of truth ; what maxims of political
wisdom ; what principles of civil or religious freedom, does he bring forth to
light .' Just none at all. He is all unconscious of the great events transpiring
around him. He is unable to comprehend the tremendous results depending —
of freedom or of despotism, of truth or superstition, of light or of darkness, —
to the English nation, and through them, to so large a portion of the family of
man. He cannot see what makes these times stormy. He cannot comprehend
what has wakened up so many minds to such prodigious efforts of genius ;
and what has roused them to such dauntless courage, and self-sacrificing endur
ance. Oh, no ; he cannot comprehend it : in his view, this is all wilfulness,
or money-making, or at the utmost, a mere squabble for political power. He
goes through the field, as has been well expressed, " mousing" after the faults,
or follies, or inconsistencies of the great actors in those events ; and he can see
nothing else. DESIGN OF THE WORK.
But I forget : it was to the work of mousing, that he was specially called
by the Bishops and clergy ; who it seems had known their man. It was not
to discuss any great principles ; not to act the part of a fair and generous his
torian, that " The Church" had called the Dr. into the field : Oh, no, but
in his own account of the matter, — " to tell unwelcome truths concerning
our opponents" — " in defence of the Church." So then, it is not history, no,
nor discussion, that the Bishops and clergy ask of Dr. Coit ; but to rake in
these old kennels, and throw filth ; to blacken the characters (not controvert
the principles) of the Puritan founders of New England !* Dr. Coit himself,
* " Years ago, says Dr. Coit (j>. 276), " I awakened the apprehension of some of
my fellow-churchmen, lest I should tell too much for my brethren, and too much
against their enemies." * * * " Doubtless, those who are undeservedly tender of
Puritan reputation, would have these sketches inscribed on silken velvet. Frater
nal condolence 1 verily it will have its reward. Its commiserated objects will
grasp any concession with characteristic avidity, trample it under their feet, and
turning again rend the giver. I know the mode of requital hy melancholy experi
ence." * * * " I am under small obligations to extenuate," * * * " I would much
rather give my ' two mites' unalloyed into the treasury of their praise, who toiled

REVIEW. 413
confesses, p. 13, that he "at first acted" under "provocation;" and that "a
fresh and bitterer provocation induced him to continue writing." Like the old
Athenian, who was tired of always hearing Aristides called the just, Dr. Coit
had long been indignant at bearing " the infliction" of " harangues" (p. 22),
about Plymouth Rock, and the Pilgrim Fathers ; and so he is determined
never to cease throwing javelins (-if, at this distance, I can remember rightly
a sentence in his original letters in the Churchman) " as long as an eye can
point, or an arm can hurl." But let us come to
THE MAIN POINT.
The main point in Dr. Coit's book, is to inquire " simply and plainly why
did the Puritans come to these shores ? Did they abandon England solely or
even principally on account of religious considerations?" (p. 16.) "My
answer," he says, " is an immediate negative."
To this inquiry he is induced under " provocation" (p. 13). And this pro
vocation was that, " the celebrity of the Plymouth Rock heroes is expatiated
on year by year" (p. 15). " Why?" Oh ! because — " they were persecuted" —
" they fled from persecution" — " they came in suffering and poverty to a deso
late shore ;" — " because they were striving to escape from the tyranny of
unjust kings, and the domination of lords spiritual," — " and were willing to
endure all this, that they might throw off the yoke of despotism, and cast aside
the mummeries of superstition. — "
Here he demands, " Is the tyranny by which public opinion is swayed — the
yoke under which it is bowed — the mummery by which it is worked, neveT to
cease ?" This " tyranny" of " public opinion," he is now about to overthrow.
HE MORE PRECISELY DEFINES HIS POSITION.
On p. 73, he more precisely lays down his great position : " The represen
tation which depicts the Puritans as having ' transported' (unlucky phrase !)
themselves for a purely religious cause, is one which, with New England sturdi-
ness, I must positively deny, and continue to deny till I can read history back-
and sacrificed and died in and for the faith which my heart cherishes, and my mind
reveres." " And of the Church to which they cling with such firm zeal, would I
exclaim in the beautiful apostrophe of the dying Tobit (Tobit xiii. 14)," &c.
He fully carries out his plan of saying nothing in favor of the Puritans. In his
" Cosolusion" {p. 247), he says, " And now, I suppose the question will be asked,
Having said all which one of the ' Malignant Party' can say to disparage the Puri
tans, are you going to part with them, and utter no words in their praise 1
" And my reply will be shorter, much shorter, than many expect." First, he de
clares that he has praised the Huguenots, Gov. Winthrop, and Roger Williams.
In the second place, he says, " I have as full faith in the piety, in the honesty, and
in the Protestantism of Ap. Laud, &c." And in case the descendants of the
Puritans shall ever honor him, " the example," he says, " may so captivate me that
I may forget it is my duty to silence Puritan clamors, by enumerating Puritan fautis."
So ends his book. He has stuck manfully — through thick and thin, to his design ;
lo blacken the character of the Puritans, and to be careful to concede nothing to
their praise.

414 REVIEW.
wards." " My fellow-churchmen, I am equally positive, will give me a hearty
Amen." He does well to call the attempt to substantiate such a denial, an
" adventure." It is so indeed ; and very much like the adventure of Don
Quixote with the windmills, — thus to fly in the face of the amplest and most
undeniable documents of the times, as well as of the concurrent and settled
testimony of all received history. It is, indeed, an adventure, and altogether
Quixotic, — on the strength of such nameless or obsolete histories as he
adduces — by the revival of slanders which gained no credit in their day, and
which were therefore consigned to oblivion, — and upon the strength of such
arguments as Dr. Coit advances, — to " deny," that the Pilgrim Fathers of
New England came to this country, " solely, or even principally for a religious
cause." Dr. Coit, however, nothing daunted, having received in anticipation the
" Amen" of his " fellow-churchmen," further strengthens himself for his ad
venture hy a quotation from the Apocrypha : " Strive for the truth unto
death, and the Lord shall fight for thee." — Ecclus. iv. 28. " It speaks the sense
of inspiration, if not its words," says Dr. Coit ; " and I can act on it with
uplifting confidence in my brethren, and of my cause." (He has not only the
anticipated " Amen" of his " fellow-churchmen," but what is better, he has the
sign manual of several of the Bishops and many of the clergy. He is the
champion specially called to this work by the Church ; and why should he not
be bold ?) HE PREPARES TO MAKE HIS ONSET.
Thus fortified, and with these invocations, this historical Don Quixote rushes
on the windmills. He adopts " good old Owen Fellfham's definition of a Puri
tan" — Church-Rebel, p. 74. "They deserted England," says he, "because
this ascendency ['in Church and State'] was beyond their control." — "True,
they conjured up a storm and went away in the midst of it." — " They were
compelled to retreat." — " Yes, they sailed for Holland." — " There they were
tolerated, indeed, but watched." — " Their smothered ambition at last breaks
out ; and we find them pushing for a theatre, where they might be free from
watching, and wield the rod of empire, with none to make afraid." — " But,
after all, they were too wary to be content with a skeleton form of government,
not clothed upon with wholesome muscle, embraced with nerve and sinew." —
" They never braved a billow till they had attempted to drive a favorable bar
gain with a company of merchants." " They and their emissaries went to
and fro, like the raven, upon the waters, till they obtained, under sign and seal,
a Charter, whose munificent compass and unqualified endowments, rivalled,
in their construction of it, the powers of Parliament, and every court within
the realm."—" And being such, and attempting such things in England, and
failing r/tere— failing, too, in their fond schemes in Holland— then compacting
with an avowed band of money-getters, and fortified by this all-embracing
Charter, they set up their standard on this distant shore : and alL this for
' a religious cause.' " " They profess freely, that they came here to ' win the
natives of the country to the knowledge and obedience of the only true God

REVIEW. 415
and Saviour of Mankind ' (see the Charter) , and all this for ' a purely religious
cause.' " In this strain of ribaldry he continues from page to page ; winding
up each of his successive paragraphs of invective with the repeated sneer, " And
all for a religious cause 1" — " They tolerated such grossness in the pulpit and
in the press," " as might disgrace a bar-room, and all this for a purely religious
cause !"* THE ARRAY OF HIS ANTAGONISTS.
And now Dr. Coit arranges some select specimens of the common historical
statements which he is about to assail : "Says John Norton, in 1657, with a
dogmatism inherent in his race, ' It concerns New England always to remem
ber, that originally, they are a plantation religious, and not a plantation of
trade.' " — " Increase Mather hath this : ' It was with regard to Church order and
discipline that the good old Puritan Non-Conformists transported themselves
and their families over the vast ocean to the going down of the sun.' " — " Says
Judge Story, ' The Puritans, persecuted at home, and groaning under the weight
of spiritual bondage, cast a longing eye toward America, as an ultimate retreat
for themselves and their children.' "
" Says a Unitarian minister (Mr. Francis), ' The enterprise was, strictly
speaking, an ecclesiastical concern.' "
" And lastly, says even a Baptist 'Dr. Wayland), ' The Puritans, a title of
intellectual as well as of moral nobility, left all the endearments of
home for a purely religious cause.' "
* Strange laws of association seem to reign in Dr. Coit's mind. He cannot close
this tirade against the Pilgrims without running into his favorite theme, the eulogy
of Archbishop Laud ; one would think, from the frequency with which he intro
duces this name, that the canonization of Laud was the great collateral design of
this book It is his favorite theme. To this retreat he constantly withdraws to
breathe himself, after spending his fury upon the Puritans. Ever and anon the
"murdered prelate and his still assassinated memory" (p. 122), stalk forth to view
throughout the book. The eulogy on p. 78, of Dr. Coit's book, is a curiosity worth
transcribing : " I well know that my advocacy of this ill-omened name [Laud] , how
slight soever, will be atrocious guilt before that livid implacability, which will never
admit that its offences against man, have to man been deeply atoned for, by a trial,
to which the rack were a mercy, and by death (earth's latest boon to him) under
the executioner's axe. But I feel as it were anything but sin to defend him, (noble
defender as he was ofthe Protestant faith, &c.) when, even at this late day, I dis
cover a very positive assertor, declaring that " but for the Puritans, England had
never become Protestant." [Bancroft] " Venerable, but, alas, Episcopal Lambeth !
the blood of two of your archbishops, martyred by Romanists and by Puritans, pro
claims who were your worst enemies, and how earnestly you have contended for
Ihe faith once delivered to the saints, by the ' armor of righteousness on the
kioht band and on the left.' " As Laud fell in attempting to make the king
an absolute despot, and in endeavoring to establish, practically, as well as theoreti
cally, the dogma of passive obedience and non-resistance, Dr. Coit should seem
bound to tell us, whether he thinks these among the doctrines once delivered to the
wnU ; and whether he deems it " the armor of righteousness," to gird one's self
with panoply for the maintenance of such tenets.

416 REVIEW.
This is the array of authorities which Mr. Coit himself sets up as the mark
of his point-blank contradictions.
Now, before examining Dr. Coit's authorities, we may venture to remark,
that here is a combination of knowledge, and talent, and weight of character
in the very opponents against which he has set himself in battle array, enough
to warn him of the necessity of seeing that his steed be good, and his blade
true steel, before he ventures the onset. He needs the most indubitable facts,
and the best of arguments, to set aside the concurrent testimony of whole gene
rations of such men as he has here attempted to contradict. John Norton was
one of the early Massachusetts colonists ; he knew, and he addressed those
who knew, for what reason they left their homes. They did not contradict
him ; but lived and died in the full persuasion, that they came from their coun
try, in flight from persecution, and for freedom to worship God. No lesson
was more thoroughly instilled into the minds of their children. The sermons,
letters, histories, of that generation, are full of this fact. They contradict the
aspersers of their character, who fabricate the slanders which Dr. Coit has with
so much pains raked from the dust of oblivion, to which the verdict of the
world had consigned them.
Increase Mather, too, was hut a step distant from the transactions which he
recorded, and could not he mistaken with regard to the considerations which
brought the Puritans to these shores.
Judge Story, too, the profoundest jurist of his age, inferior to none in a tho
rough acquaintance with the early history of his native land, and of integrity
beyond reproach : one would think that he was no mean authority on a matter
of history so easily ascertained.
And then, Dr. Wayland, who can accuse him of ignorance ? What well-in
formed American has not been delighted with the productions of his genius,
admired the profoundness of his views, and revered him as one of the deepest
and most accurate thinkers of the' age ? One would suppose that such an en
comium as he has passed upon the Puritan founders of New England, is entitled
to some little weight. And Dr. Coit seems to wonder that such a testimony
should be home, " even " by a " Baptist ;" thus acknowledging that Dr. Way-
land speaks under no improper bias. Truly, Dr. Coit needs well " his adaman
tine coat girt well," for such an encounter.
THE ENCOUNTER.
Having witnessed the array, let us now observe the encounter. This con
current testimony concerning the motives that brought the Pilgrim Fathers to
these shores, Dr. Coit attempts to meet by arguments drawn from authorities
and facts. Let us examine them.
I. His Authorities.— " My answer," says he, " is an immediate negative ;
and I think it can easily be made out from a single work I have at hand, and
might as well, or better, be from many others, had I at this moment access to
them." This " single work " figures largely on his pages, and is his great gun
— his " Peace-Maker" — among his other authorities. Listen to its description :
" The work alluded to, is entitled, ' An account of the European settlements in

REVIEW. 417
America, in six parts. London: 1757, 2 vols., 8vo.'" This is Dr. Coit's
great authority. And what is this authority ?
1. It conies to us without a name ; at least, Dr. Coit does not give us the name
of its author, or any vouchers for its character or authenticity.
2, Its date is 1757 ; which is nearly one hundred years too late to be of any
authority at all.
3. Dr. Coit tells us that it is a " rare " work : prima, facie evidence that it
has for one hundred and thirty years been generally considered a worthless
one. 4. The quotations adduced by Dr. Coit bear the clearest and most demon
strable evidences either of error or of falsehood, with regard to the plainest mat
ters of fact : as I shall presently show, under the next head.
And this is the authority on which Dr. Coit ventures to put forth his denial
of the unanimous declarations of the actors of those times, together with the
concurrent testimony of all received history ! On such authority as this, he
rakes up old and thrice-refuted slanders against the Puritans ! With " uplift
ing confidence " in his " fellow-churchmen " — in certain expectation of their
approving " Amen," he delves into the neglected rubbish, but declares, that as
to " those without," he must " expect no quarter for rousing/acts from a sleep
which they had fain hoped to make eternal." " My facts will live," quoth
Dr. Coit, " even though I should be ' rhetorically crucified.' "
I come, then,
II. To ms Facts. — Not to make too long a Btory, by stopping to castigate
a thousand and one of his statements, in minor things, which, in my view,
are equally deserving of castigation, I come at once to the main prop and pillar
of his entire proof that the Pilgrims came to America, not from religious con
siderations. I refer to what Dr. Coit alleges to be the facts in the matter of
the Charter, which he represents the Pilgrims as bringing with them from
Holland to America ; and which, he argues, contains the prime moving cause
that brought them hither.
"Now," says Dr. Coit (p. 16), "if they merely wanted freedom of con
science, they liad it in Holland, ex-abundanti." * * * " And, moreover,
as their Charter for a settlement in America, which they had wit or influence
to obtain, even when tbey had left England, as this Charter 6hows," &c. —
" These formidable denouncers " * * " took precious good care that thh
Charter should cover the exclusive trade," " from Nova Scotia to the south
ern parts of Carolina," " and," " that it should guarantee ' the entire property
ofthe soil besides.'" (" See vol. ii., 138, of the work above,") — [the old
authority of 1757 2 vols. 8vo., which he had already twice quoted in this
connection— thus, "It states unequivocally, vol. ii., 137, 138," — "As our
author affirms with unquestionable truth."] " Nay," continues Dr. Coit,
"as this same work shows (p. 140), 'the then profitable trade of furs
and skins,' and the ' fisheries,' induced not a few, ' uneasy at home upon a reli
gious account,' to go where they might enjoy the valuable opinion of free
thought, and the invaluable one of making money a little faster."
On pp. 74 and 75, as I have already quoted, he recurs to the same subject
•gain : " They were compelled to retreat— yes, and they sailed for Holland."
27

418 REVIEW.
* * * " There they were tolerated indeed, hut watched," " says the philo
sophical and impartial author of ' European Settlements,' whose work has been
already quoted" — [the old nameless author of 1757, 2 vols. 8vo.]. "Eleven
long tedious years " were quite enough to make them ' devoutly tired of the
indolent security of their sanctuary." — " Their smothered ambition at last
breaks out ; and we find them pushing for a theatre where they might be free
from watching." — " They and their emissaries went to and fro, like the raven
upon the waters, till they obtained under sign and seal, a Charter, whose mu
nificent compass rivalled, in their construction of it, the powers of Parliament,
and every court within the realm." — " And being such, and attempting such
'hings in England, and failing there — failing, too, in their fond schemes in Hol
land — then compacting with an avowed band of money -getters, and fortified by
this all-embracing Charter, they set up their standard on this distant shore."
I have made these quotations so long, for the purpose of showing indubita
bly, what it is that he declares, viz. : that these Pilgrims who went to Holland,
" after they had left England," and before they sailed for America — "fortified
themselves by such an all-embracing Charter," whose munificent compass
*' rivalled, in their construction of it, the powers of Parliament, and every court
within the realm."
From these " facts," thus substantiated by numerous appeals to volume and
page of his nameless old author of " 1757, 2 vols. 8vo.," he argues that the
Pilgrims came from no religious considerations, but from motives of simple
ambition and avarice — mere adventurers in a paltry speculation in furs and
fish.' Fortified by this all-embracing Charter, conveying an exclusive title to the
soil, and an exclusive trade " from Nova Scotia to the south parts of Carolina,"
after eleven tedious years, these Pilgrims in Holland, " hoist the mainsail to
the wind," " and steer for a land where they may be unrivalled and supreme."
" Verily, this is a plain case, and the whole of it," quoth Dr. Coit.
Now, what becomes of this great "fact" about the '• Charter," upon which
Dr. Coit rests the main pillar of his argument — if it shall turn out that the Ply
mouth Colony never had any such charter as Dr. Coit describes ; and that they
• Hear his conclusion in his own words (p. 18) :"Such evidence" (of which the
Facts about the Charter constitute the main pillar) — "Such evidence (and it
might be piled up in heaps, if necessary) establishes incontestably the fact, that
persecution for religious opinions never drove the Puritans from home, to seek the
inhospitable shelter of a howling wilderness. They might have had comfortable
homes by good Dutch peat-fires, and lived and died unmolested and unfearing : al
though, perhaps, with less stock at the banker's than ' exclusive trade ' in furs and
fisheries might secure; But they wanted a little more notoriety, a little more power,
a little more money. They who wielded the government of England, and enjoyed
its offices, were Episcopalians ; those who were at the helm in Holland were Pres
byterians." * * " The ascendency in Holland would be as hard to gain as the
ascendency at home (I mean the ascendency in politics, money-making and reli
gion) ; and so nothing remained but to ' hoist the mainsail to the wind ' and to
steer for a land where they might be unrivalled and supreme !"— " Verily, this is a
plain case, and the whole of it."

REVIEW. 419
sailed from Holland without any charter at all ? Such was the fact ; none of
the New England colonies ever had any such charter ;• and the Plymouth
colonists came to this country without any charter at all. What becomes of
Dr. Coit's nameless author of " 1757, 2 vols. 8vo. ?" What becomes of the
historical accuracy of Dr. Coit, who can build so much upon a " fact," which
he thinks will never die, but which, after all, turns out to be a sheer ridiculous
blunder of his own ?
" The adventurers," says Noah Webster, with entire truth (Hist., p. 100),
" attempted to procure a patent under the Virginia Company, but they found it
very difficult, on account of the odiousness of their principles. They finally
obtained one in the name of John Wincob, but he failing to remove to Ame
rica, it was of no use, and they came without one."
Save this patent from the Virginia Company, there is no sense in which the
Colonists had any pretensions to, or expectation of, any Charter at all. This
Virginia Charter, moreover, is, as I shall show, not the one to which Dr. Coit
refers, in the statements in question ; so that, so far forth as his statements
and facts are concerned, it is in the fullest sense absolutely true, that they came
without any Charter at all. '
But Dr. Coil's blunders about this famous Charter, are not yet half revealed.
So far, he had written and published ten years ago ; and now, at the instance
of the Bishops and clergy, and under their signatures, that they may share
with him the responsibility, — he puts forth the same statements again into the
* Dr. Coit here manifestly mistakes the Council established at Plymouth, in the
county of Devon (to whom this magnificent Charter belonged), for the Plymouth
colonists. But, even so, he quotes the wrong Charter; for the Charter ofthe Ply
mouth Council extended from the 40th to the 48th degree north latitude, while the
onewhich Dr. Coit attributes to the Leyden rilgrims, he says (p. 16), extended from
" Nova Scotia to the southern parts of Carolina." Here he evidently blunders again,
mistaking the Virginia Charter of 1602, for that of the Council at Plymouth, of
1620. Moreover, the Charter of the Plymouth Council was not granted to Puri
tans, but to " The Duke of Lenox, the Marquesses of Buckingham and Hamilton,
the Earls of Arundel and Warwick, Sir F. Georges," and their associates. More
over, it was not the Patent of the Plymouth Council that was transferred to Ame
rica, as Dr. Coit represents, but the Patent of Massachusetts, which the Plymouth
Council sold to Endicott and his associates, and which King Charles confirmed
by Charter, March 4, 1629.
t The Patent which the Plymouth Colonists received, was granted Jan. 13,
1630, by "The Council for New England,"— in "consideration that William Brad
ford and his associates have for these nine years lived in New England, and have
there planted a town called New Plymouth, at their own charges, and now seeing
by the special providence of God and their extraordinary care and industry, they
have increased their plantations to near 300 people." The boundaries of this
Patent, wen; "between Cohasset rivulet on the north, and Narragansett river
towards the south ;" the Atlantic on the east, and westward " to the utmost bounds
of a country in New England called Pacanokit, alias Swamset.'' [" Book of
Charters," l'rince, p. 270. Prince shows the mistakes of Hubbard and Dudley—
with regard to another grant from the King, which miscarried ; and with regard to
" successive Patents from "King James and Charles."]

420

REVIEW.

light. On pp. 130, 133, he again puts the provision of this famous Charter
into the hands of the Plymouth colonists — " Robinson forsakes Smith. He
goes to Leyden, where he and his preach a ten years' homily to Calvinists, or
breakers of the Sabbath," &c. " The prospect becomes weary," " and they
determine to go away" — " This is the plain short tale." " They style them
selves voluntary exiles from our dear native country," — " that the people of
Holland did not drive them out." " Pass we now from this, to the next
advance in our Pilgrim's Progress, and let us inquire there" * * " stepping
out upon that memorable Rock" [of Plymouth]. " Now by the side of" this
[Plymouth Rock] " is the fit place to examine that wondrous piece of parchment"
[the Charter] " to which I have again and again referred." But at this period, he
has discovered a part of his former blunder ; and the Charter belongs not now
to the Pilgrims — who went, like the raven, upon the waters till they had
obtained it : — it belongs now to the " Council established at Plymouth in the
county of Devon," in England ; under " the ban of whose princely privileges,"
he says these Pilgrims expect to grow, &c. Here he quotes the glowing lan
guage of Bancroft, describing the extent and richness of the grant, — from the
40th to the 48th degree of north latitude — from the Atlantic to the Pacific—
In this connection, he again 'p. 135) quotes his old author of " 1757 — 2 Vols.
8vo." ii., 140 — to show, that " This Colony [Plymouth] received its principal
assistance from the discontent of several great men of the Puritan party ; — to
wit, of those who had obtained this Charter, and " who entertained a design of
settling among them in New England, if they should fail," in their ambitious
designs " in their mother country."
After this famous charter has figured so largely in his book, he at length, in
tie notes at the end of his volume, discovers that his original statement is
erroneous; and says, Note 5, " There is a technical inaccuracy here, which,
however, redounds not to the credit of the Puritans, but the contrary. The
charter under which they first acted, was the charter of the Plymouth council
in England ; and it is from this, and not from the charter of 1629 (obtained
after they had left England) that the quotations of the text come." (He refers
in his note to (p. 17) his original statement, representing the Pilgrims as led
across the waters from Holland, by the splendid provisions of this charter.)
What a blundering author is this, who after ten years' study cannot correct
his former blunder, without falling into a half a dozen other blunders still
more ridiculous ! Here is a concession, that he aimed at quoting from the
charter of 1629 — but by "a technical inaccuracy" he blundered into the
Charter of the English Company in the county of Devon,— instead of faking
his extracts from the one he should have quoted ! And really, Dr. Coit now
confesses, that he should have quoted,— and supposed he had quoted— from the
Charter of 1629, to account for the motives which actuated the Pilgrims in
1620! And this is "a technical inaccuracy"— " which, however, redounds
not to the Puritan credit, but rather the contrary 1" And the good Bishops
and clergy have given him " their signatures" to share with him the " respon
sibility" of publishing disagreeable facts !"— {p. 1.) And that too, after they
had had his remarkable discovery about the Charter before them for ten years !

REVIEW. 421
But we are not yet at the end of Dr. Coit's blunderings about the Charter.
He says in his note, that the Charter under which the Puritans in question (viz.
the pilgrims from Holland) " first acted, was the Charter of the Plymouth
council in England ; and it is from this" " that the quotations in the text come."
Very well : from what Charter should they come, save from the one under
which the Pilgrims " first acted ?" Is there any " technical inaccuracy" here ?
Ought he rather to account for the motives of their action, by a Charter given
nine years after they had acted ? Be it so, that the true reasons were given
after all — since Dr. Coit leaves it as true in the text ; be it eo, that they came
induced by the provisions of that splendid Charter " under which" they " first
acted." What will Dr. Coit say now to the small fact, that the Plymouth
company in England, under whose auspices he represents the Holland Puri
tans as " acting first," was not in existence till the Pilgrims were already well
nigh across the ocean ? Says Prince (p. 130), " I have now only to remind
the reader, that utterly unsought, and then, unknown to them, on Nov. 3,
about a week before their arriving at Cape Cod, King James signs a Patent for
the incorporation of the adventurers to the Northern colony of Virginia,
between 40 and 48 degrees north ;  styling them the Council established
at Plymouth in the county of Devon, for the planting, &c, of New England,
in America." Surely, surely, the provisions of that Charter, and the favor of
that Company, could not be among the reasons which led the Holland Pil
grims to America, when neither was that Charter, nor that Company in exist
ence, till these Pilgrims were almost across the ocean !•
Once more, I say, what a blundering historian is this ; who with ample
* Nor is it possible for Dr. Coit to retreat, by saying that he meant not the Plymouth
Puritans, but those of Massachusetts ; he expressly, repeatedly, and in the most
direct and strongest terms applies these things to the Plymouth Colonists by name ;
moreover, he cuts himself off from escaping through any possible loop-holes — by
saying that he meant, in a general and indefinite way, to extend these particular
specifications to the Pilgrims who came, in after days, to the Massachusetts
colony;— he cuts himself off from this in the text (p. 17), by specifying the
Charter " which they had wit or influence enough to obtain, even when they had left
England:" and in the Note (5), he expressly says the Charter " obtained after they
had left England." Now whatever Charter the Massachusetts Colonists had, they
obtained before they left England. On March 19, 1628, the Council for New Eng
land sold Endicott and others the tract between the Merrimack and the Charles,
with three miles beyond each, and westward to the Pacific ocean.
Some time after this " Mr. White brings these grantees into acquaintance with
several other religious persons in and about London, who are first associated to
them, then buy their right in the Patent, and consult about settling some plantation
in the Massachusetts Bay, on the account of religion" (jUcis*. Col. Records in Prince,
T- 248). Their pioneer, Mr. Endicott, sails June 20, 1628. March 4, 1629, King
Charles confirms the Charter— and makes them a. body corporate and politic.
March 23, 1629, they hear of " Mr. Higginson, an eminent minister silenced for
non-conformity," who might probably he obtained to go with the colony. April 16,
" sixly women and maids, twenty-six children, and 300 men, with victuals, arms,
'Pparel, tools, and 140 head of cattle," sail for New England. This was the first
Massachusetts Colony.

422 REVIEW.
documents before him, and after ten years' study, and so sure that his facts
will be scrutinized, that he expects to be " rhetorically crucified," — is yet
incompetent to come at the truth in so simple a matter of fact ; but writes a
whole book, basing its main argument upon a series of blunders so gross, that the
least of them would, in Dr. Busby's time, have earned for the unlucky tyro
who should make it, a thorough birching ! And this is the advocacy
which " several of the Bishops, and many of the clergy," have called in, to the
precious work of blackening the character of the Puritans, for the benefit of
the Church ! This is the work, which, Dr. Coit fondly thinks, is to cause
such a " tempest of rain, hail, and horrid thunder-claps ;" but which is, never
theless, to overturn not only the records of the Pilgrims themselves, but the
current and settled history, received by the whole world 1 " It was necessary,"
says Dr. Coit, " that some one should bring these facts into open view." " My
facts will not be extinguished." Yes ; his facts are to give him immortality !
DR. COIT ON THE ORIGIN AND GENERALSHIP OF THE PURITANS.
But it is time to proceed to other " Facts."
Dr. Coit maintains that " the fanatics of Germany are the first fathers of
Puritanism — " (p. 26), that " the term Roundhead " was well known in
England long before its appearance on the English shores ; and if the outside
of its head was imported from a land of fierce fanaticism, it is hard to suppose
that some of the inside of it did not come from the same source /'* that " these
pretenders to tenderness of conscience." (p. 27) " would have meted out and
trodden down Church and State, as straw is trodden down for the dunghill ;"
(p. 29) ; that this was foreseen and dreaded by Laud" (p. 38) ; that by " expert"
generalship, they " commenced their warfare on such jots and tittles as caps
and surplices" — as " an expert general attacks a fortress, almost impregnable"
" by drawing his lines of circumvallation, cutting off a bastion here, and a
redoubt there ; till he can bring his guns to bear upon its citadel, and beat that
* On p. 25, Dr. Coit says, "It is generally supposed, that Puritanism took its
rise from the exiles, who were compelled to fly the kingdom in the reign of Queen
Mary." This however Dr. C. denies, and refers to two authorities — a " folio" of
"Dugdale," who was bom half a century after the reign of Queen Mary; and to
Bishop Hall in the time ofthe Long Parliament. Dugdale, he says, "advances the
opinion'' that they [the Puritans] " were first imported into England from the
Continent, in the reign of King Edward VI.," — and that " Calvin would have had
Somerset, the Protector, restrain them by the avenging sword." He then quotes
Bishop Hall, who after talking about " Jack Straws, and Cades and Wat Tylers"—
says, " Those of your Lordships that have read the history of the Anabaptistical
tumults at Munster, will need no other item ; let it be enough to say that many of
these sectaries are ofthe same profession " (p. 26). Here then is Dr. Coit's author
ity for the fact ; that "the Fanatics of Germany" "imported into England,"— are
the first fathers of English Puritanism 1 — an " opinion" of Dugdale, expressed in his
" folio," and the assertion of Bishop Hall— that " many of these sectaries " are"—
what? German Anabaptists ¦? imported from the Continent? No — but are ofthe
same profession I" On this authority Dr. Coit ventures roundly to contradict what
has " been generally supposed" on the credit of the generally received history of the
times ! How very astute !

REVIEW. 423
to pieces about the ears of his opponents, unless they surrender at discretion.
And so did the Puritans begin in England ;" — that " Charles I. comprehended
the game," so did King Jamie, for he " had all the shrewdness of a Scotch
man, if he did sometimes exhibit the fooleries of a pedant."
But here are " facts" enough for one digestion ; let us pause a moment.
As to the design and generalship of the Puritans in England, who ." began"
about " such jots and tittles as caps and surplices," it is well known who, if
anybody, began this artful warfare. One would scarcely suppose — if it did
not appear from Dr. Coit's immortal " facts," that the venerable Bishop and
martyr Hooper, who " began" to scruple such " jots and tittles as caps and
surplices," could have entertained such an ulterior and nefarious design against
the Church and State of England. One would scarce suppose that Miles
Coverdale the Bishop, and Fox the Martyrologist, were only acting the part of
" expert generals" when they doomed themselves to obscurity and poverty by
refusing the habits, rather than to roll in honor and wealth as dignitaries of
the Church by a timely conformity. But so it seems, it must have been. Dr.
Coit's " facts" cannot live without this, and Dr. Coit's facts " will not die 1"
And yet one would suppose that Dr. C. would find some difficulty with such
names as Hooper, Coverdale, and Fox. Not at all : Dr. Coit sees no difficulty
here; or if he does, he can dispose of it with a sneer. " Hooper," says Dr.
Coit {p. 45), " chameleon like, caught the color of his ecclesiastical associa
tions" [on the Continent]. " He returned with a passion for stark simplicity.
He protested against the Episcopal robes when about to be consecrated — "
" Possibly he was a little proud of his plainness, as Plato told Diogenes he
was of his rags." Indeed, as a shrewd writer has observed, Satan himself
regards, as his darling sin, ' the pride that apes humility.' " So " Old Miles
Coverdale" — " shrunk from Episcopal drapery, with the same sensitiveness
which had afflicted the epidermis of his Rt. Rev. brother." And " John Fox,
summoned by the Primate and Metropolitan of all England to subscribe to the
Liturgy, Articles, and Canons" — " the sturdy old non-conformist thrust a New
Testament into his face, and said he would subscribe to that, and that alone;"
and Dr. C. appears to think it a marvellous instance of mercy in the " highest
magnate in the land," that Fox was not sent to the " dungeons of the Tower;"
but " died quietly in his nest."
Now, although Dr. Coit does not directly charge these nefarious designs
upon Hooper, Coverdale, and Fox, — the scope of his argument must needs
include them. These, as I have said, " began" the war against " such jots
and tittles as Caps and Surplices." Dr. Coit's " facts" weigh as heavily against
them as against any others. If these were not guilty of aiming, with expert
generalship, at the overthrow of Church and State, then the charge surely
does not lie against the people, who, for several generations, were plundered,
imprisoned, or banished for non-conformity. The charge surely cannot lie
against the company of Puritans, — who were seized, plundered, and separated
from their wives and children, — as they were about to flee into Holland.
Their persecutors, and the persecutors of the generations before them, alleged
no suck criminal designs against them, as Dr. Coit charges upon tliem, but openly

424 REVIEW.
and boldly, and avowedly, inflicted these things upon them for non-conformity
I humbly submit, to the judgment of the reader, whether this fact is not con
clusive against the charges of Dr. Coit, that they are mere gratuitous slanders.
MARVELLOUS PREACHING OF THE PURITAN MINISTERS.
Dr. Coit has another " fact" to prove the original and nefarious designs of
the Puritans. " The end which the Puritans did finally lay hold on,
and the manner in which they rode down Episcopalians, and rode round
Presbyterians, satisfies me completely," says he, " that the end was foreseen
(in hope at least) long before they attained the prize of their calling" (p. 34).
" It was not enough for them to annihilate offices, they must cut off heads also.
The blood of Strafford and Laud, and Charles I. will stain their annals for ever."
" It will never answer, therefore, for the Puritan ministers to resist the imputa
tion of blood-guiltiness." " The Puritan ministers preached down Strafford,
and Laud, and Charles ; and Puritan emissaries of State dragged them to the
block." {p. 36.)
What has all this to do with " Plymouth Rock Harangues," and with the
Puritan Fathers of New England ? The Pilgrims fled to Holland in 1608.
They landed at Plymouth in 1620. The first emigrants to Massachusetts
colony came in 1628, 1629, and 1630. Charles I. was beheaded in 1649. And yet
" the end," which was finally attained in England in 1649, convinces Dr. Coit of
the original nefarious designs of the Puritans, — of these fugitives to Holland, and
of those who had been settled in New England 29 years ; — a period wanting
only one year of the life-time of a generation. Truly, Dr. Coit must be in dis
tress for "facts," and for arguments, too !
But there are two or three small facts more against these conclusions of Dr.
Coit. The Puritan pulpits had been emptied again and again; the Puritan
people had been imprisoned or banished, till, at the time when the Pilgrims
were driven to Holland, it was supposed that not twenty ministers, known to be
favorable to their principles, were left in the Church of England, in all her ten
thousand parishes. What mighty preachers these must have been, to out-
preach the nine thousand church-preachers, with all the deacons, arch-deacons,
bishops, and archbishops to boot ! — nay, with the civil courts, and all the jails
and prisons in old England to aid the church clergy, besides ! — to preach down
the Archbishop, the Premier, and the King together 1 Wonderful preaching
this ! and all in the very worst cause ; with neither truth nor reason on their
side ! Dr. Coit, however, forgets that known and avowed Puritans were not
suffered to preach at all ; not in the churches of the Establishment, nor yet in
the fields. They were silenced, fined, imprisoned, and glad, if they might so
far escape the vigilance of the hierarchy, as to steal away to the wilds of
America. No, the truth was, that after the Puritans had been as far as pos
sible subdued and driven off, those who had remained staunch churchmen,
rose upon their tyrant king and his ministers, and, after a noble and glori
ous conflict for the rights of Englishmen, put them down. In standing for the
rights of conscience and for freedom, they were necessarily led to the adoption
of some of the main principles of the Puritans ; and at length many of theiu

REVIEW. 425
became Puritans outright ; but, glorious as the struggle was — we cannot claim
its honors for the Fathers of New England. They were away, three thou
sand miles distant ; — exiles for conscience' sake, and for freedom to worship
God. DR COIT ON THE PRESENT DESIGNS OF ENGLISH DISSENTERS.
Yet Dr. Coit insists upon these original and ulterior designs of the Puritans.
"Yes," he says (p. 349), " Puritanism would have done, in ages past, what Dis
sent is ready to do, and.striving to do, in this current hour. Dissent would
blithesomely overturn a government, which keeps the balance in a hemisphere ;
even though it must die in the entombment of its accounted foe. And die it
will, if it succeed in bringing England to the desolation of an agrarian level.
Like the sinner who perishes utterly in his own corruption, it will be crushed
in the ruin it will have wrought."
Here is another of Dr. Coit's " facts ;" that the Dissenters in England are
" striving' " in this current hour," to " overturn" the British " Government !"
There is doubtless just as much truth in this accusation, as there is in Dr.
Coit's assertions concerning the ulterior and original designs of the old Puritans.
Half the people who regularly attend upon the public worship of God in England,
are Dissenters. If Dr. Coit were there — in the seat of Archbishop Laud, and
possessed of his power, these wicked Dissenters should doubtless know what
it is to aim at overturning the State, and to provoke an Archbishop.
COURTEOUS AND LENIENT DISPOSITION OF THE CHURCH IN PERSECUTING THE
PURITANS.
I say doubtless, for Dr. Coit contends further: 1, That "there was the
greatest disposition to treat the moderate party of the Puritans with indul
gence" (p. 43) ; and 2, That the Church had a right to enforce upon them her
requirements, by such penalties as she did.
With regard to the first of these positions he says, " If anything be wanting"
[to substantiate this allegation] " it is supplied by the fact" that old Queen
Bess was most politely conciliatory," in offering " to acquiesce in an omission
of three superlatively dismal exactions," — "provided there were uniformity in
other things." — " In view of such evidence," he says (p. 49), " a man must be
voracious in appetite, and fastidious in digestion, beyond all reasonable dys
peptic liberty, if he could still demand proof of the lenient and courteous dispo
sition of the Government, towards all who were moderate and gentlemanly in
their objections, &c." " That they treated a hirsute and greedy generation,
who would have handled them with the paw of the lion, and the paw of the bear,
with less amenity, may not be, possibly among the world's seven wonders."
This position he advances as a Fact, not only in his own eyes but those of
Dr. Jarvis also.
With the leave of Dr. Coit, and of Dr. Jarvis, I would humbly suggest that
these things are matters of opinion rather than of fact. It depends very much
upon what is thought to he moderate, and lenient, and gentlemanly in these
matters ; and upon what degree of " indulgence" is thought to be due to rights

426 REVIEW.
of conscience. If it be " lenient" and " courteous," to set spies in every par
ish, to report every omission of a ceremony, of a cap, or surplice, or tippet ;—
if it be thought " courteous" to compel men, by the oath ex-officio, to accuse
themselves and their neighbors ; if it be thought " indulgent" to fine, distress,
and imprison the most quiet citizens who shall be guilty of non-conformity, —
and to retain them in prison till the unwholesome air, and hunger, and cold,
cause pestilence and death — all for simple non-conformity ; — and if it be not
" gentlemanly" for such prisoners to send their humble petition that they " may
not perish without trial, but have the benefit of the laws," as well as some
"relief for their distressed consciences;" if these things be so, then I sub
missively concede to Drs. Coit and Jarvis, that the Puritans were not " gen
tlemanly ;" and that because they were not gentlemanly, the bearing of the
Bishops towards this " hirsute and greedy generation," was " lenient" and
" courteous." But when I concede this to the Doctors, they, of necessity,
must avow this to be their doctrine concerning what is lenient, and courteous,
and gentlemanly, in matters pertaining to the Rights of Conscience, touching
the worship of God. DR. COIT ON THE RIGHT TO PERSECUTE.
I say, they must admit this to be their doctrine ; and Dr. Coit will probably
find no difficulty in doing so, since, 2, He lays down this doctrine concerning
the right of the National Church to persecute non-conformists. On p. 67
he asks, " What possibly consistent argument can be urged, that this govern
ment should have yielded to their demands ?" (They demanded nothing but
liberty to worship God without doing violence to their own consciences.) "A
great nation," continues Dr. Coit, " not to manage its concerns in its own way,
but to submit to the dictation of a petty clan, whose best commendation is, that
themselves think themselves holier, wiser, and worthier." And because it will
not, — and arrests (it may be not with a nurse's gentleness to a queasy baby)
that unruly evil — are " its acts" to be " denounced, not to the third and fourth
(the Divine limit), but to the thirtieth and fortieth generation, as the quintes
sence of tyranny ? 0 modesty ! truth, and candor ! is such a perversion of
right reason one of the illustrations of Total Depravity?" "But does not sim
ple fact authorize me to draw this picture, of the restless demands, the sour
aspersions, and the demolishing schemes of the thorough-bred Puritans ?"
Here we have it : the " great nation" had a right to impose these ceremonies
and habits, hy law ; and to enforce them upon those " queasy babies," the Puri
tans ; and " What possibly consistent argument can be urged why this Govern
ment should have yielded to their demands ?" And " such a perversion of
right reason," as to denounce these acts of the government as " the quintessence
of tyranny," is " one of the illustrations of the Doctrine of Total Depravity."
Verily, it becometh Dr. Coit to be earnest in his eulogies of the Earl of Straf
ford and of Archbishop Laud.*
* He finds another argument ofthe wickedness of the Puritans in the wilfulness
of their discontent ; which, both as a testimony and as an argument, is very amus
ing. He interweaves it here, on his 69th page ; " I know not the people beneath the

REVIEW. 427
Dr. Coit continues his justification of the severities practised hy the Church
of England (p. 71). " The Church of England was in the field before them
[the Puritans]. " This Church, then, had the right, the vested right of pos
session. It had, what a Puritan taste so much desired to see confirmed by
Charter." " What right can be pretended by these men, to attempt innovations
in Church and State ?" " But these self-satisfied advocates of liberty and
equality were nothing daunted by such considerations, " " and" " when even
force and cunning fail," " they abandon England in vexation, to play their
favorite game on a more open theatre — oh, they are persecuted by those
caterpillars of the world, who consume yearly twenty-five hundred or three
thousand pounds," and fly in pious horror from their father-land, for "a purely
religious cause" (p. 72).
DR. COIT CONTRADICTS THE PILGRIMS TO THEIR FACE.
Not content with assigning his own " Reasons for the erection of a Puritan
economy on American soil," Dr. Coit {p. 104) sets himself to contradict the
reasons assigned by the Puritans themselves. Here he pitches battle with
Morton, " the prim apologetic secretary" of the Plymouth Colony — " a Puri
tan indeed, in whom there is no Churchmanship at all," — who published his
"Memorial" in 1669. Whoever will take the trouble to compare the five
reasons of Morton with those assigned by Governors Bradford and Winslow
(both among the most prominent actors in the scenes in question), will find,
that Morton takes his reasons wholly from Gov. Bradford's history, and from
Winslow's " True Grounds or cause of the first planting of New England," and,
for the most part, in their precise words. Dr. Coit either did not know, or
else he did not see fit to disclose the fact, that he is here setting himself to con.
tradict by argument, the statements of the very actors of the events in ques
tion ; and that, too, of men whose word is unimpeached and unimpeachable.
The sum of the reasons assigned by Bradford and Winslow, and repeated by
Morton, is : " The hardness of the place" — " few of their friends in England
could come to them — and fewer that would bide it out, and continue with them."
" For many, though they desired to enjoy the ordinances of God in their
sun, so zealous for their peculiar habits, institutions, and privileges," " as New
Englanders — not the people who would sooner resent or repel any encroachment
on their freedom, as they understand it, not the people, who would more stoutly,
fiercely, unshrinkingly, unfailingly defend it (true freedom or false) to the utmost
impulse of strength, and the latest beat of the heart. South Carolina has had her
Nullification, and New England her Hartford Convention; but having lived in a
Southern state as well as in a Northern one, I am free to say, that if rebellion must
come, my most earnest prayer would be, Let it not be among the posterity of the
Puritans. The little finger of rebellion there would be thicker than the loins of
nullification elsewhere." " And this makes me think, that the government of Eng
land must have had a struggle of dread anxiety with those who have transmitted
Purilnn tempers and principles to our distant times."
You are right there, Dr. Coit, there is some Puritan blood left in us ; and that is
" a Fuel." The Puritan Principles are those of men who know their rights, and
knowing, dare defend them.

428 REVIEW.
purity, and the liberty of the Gospel with them, yet, alas! they admitted of
bondage, with danger of conscience, rather than to endure those hardships ;
yea, some preferred and chose prisons in England, rather than this liberty in
Holland." — {Bradford, in Young's Chronicles of the Pilgrims," p. 45.)
Again, " Old age began to come on some of them ; and their great and con
tinual crosses and sorrows hastened it before the time ; so as it was not only
probably thought, but apparently seen, that within a few years they were in
danger to scatter by necessity pressing them, or sink under their burdens, or
both :"* * " and therefore thought it better to dislodge betimes to some place
of better advantage and less danger, if any could be found." — (Bradford.)
Again, " As necessity was a task-master over them, so they were forced to
be such, not only to their servants, but in a sort to their dearest children."
" For many of their children, that were of the best dispositions" — " willing to
bear part of their parents' burden, were oftentimes so oppressed with their
heavy burden" — " that their bodies bowed under the weight of the same, and
became decrepit in their very youth." Then there was " the licentiousness
of the youth in the country," some of their children " were drawn away by
evil examples" — " some became soldiers, others took them upon long voyages
by sea." Winslow adds ; " How grievous it was to live from under the pro
tection of the State of England ; how like we were to lose our language and
our name of English ; how little good we did, or were like to do to the Dutch
in reforming the Sabbath ; how unable there to give such education to our
children, as we ourselves had received." He adds also the desire of showing
these friends — " no less burdened" than themselves, where they might com
fortably subsist, and enjoy the like liberties with us, being freed from the anti
christian bondage, keep their names and nation, and be not only a means to
enlarge the dominions of the State, but the Church of Christ also.* Bradford
adds another reason, and a nobler sentiment was never expressed by man :
" Lastly (and that which was not the least), a great hope and inward zeal they
had of laying some good foundation, or at least to make some way thereunto,
for the propagating and advancing the Gospel of the Kingdom of Christ in
these remote parts of the world ; yea, though they should be but as stepping-
stones unto others for performing of so great a work."
Such is the sum of the reasons copied by Morton, and which Dr. Coit sets
himself to contradict.
Now, it may safely be left to any mortal, in whose breast there is one
emotion of generosity, or of love either of country, of freedom, of truth, or of
the cause of religion, — to determine whether here are not ample and praise
worthy motives assigned, why men, who had already suffered losses, exile,
and poverty, for conscience sake — should remove, to find a home where they
might still retain their character of Englishmen, and secure for themselves and
for their posterity, freedom to worship God.
But Dr. Coit appears to be incapable of appreciating any such motives.t
* In Young's Chronicles ofthe Pilgrims,^. 282.
t This inability may be, in part, "natural-." for Dr. Coit (p. 232) deems it a
matter of sufficient importance, to tell us the origin of his " Episcopal blood."

REVIEW. 429
He does not think it possible that men, under such circumstances, can have
such a regard for conscience, for their posterity, and the cause of true religion !
Oh — no ; he cannot find it in his heart to imagine that such motives could have
operated. In his view, nothing but wilfulness, ambition, and money-making
can account for the conduct of the Pilgrims. For twenty-six pages of his
work, he sets himself to ridicule these reasons, and to show that they cannot
possibly be the true ones. He ridicules their notions of the Sabbath, and their
efforts to persuade the Dutch to keep holy the Sabbath day : affirms that the
"Dutch did not neglect the Sabbath," though "doubtless" they "were as
liberal" as those other " Continental Protestants," who — like " Calvin," allow
" old men" to " play at bowls," and " young men to train on the Sabbath."
The hardships endured by the Pilgrims in Holland he turns off with a sneer :
" There were sorrows connected with their pockets, and their palates, more
terrible than the sorrows of a harassed conscience, to the Puritans at Leyden"
(p. 111). As to their losing the name and language of English, Dr. Coit says,
"Become Dutch ? Well, what if they did, could it be such a formidable dis
aster ?" As to enlarging the bounds of the British State, Dr. Coit says, " And
must it be my iron fate to keep a perfectly sober countenance, under such argu
mentation as this, recorded, as it no doubt was, with edifying sedateness .'"
No doubt it was so recorded ; for Winslow, from whom Morton copies it,
was no trifler nor scoffer. Dr. Coit may not be able to appreciate such motives ;
but every heart capable of feeling one throb of patriotism, will be able to
appreciate them. Bradford's last reason, he parries with a charge of simple
bigotry upon " these bending down pilgrims," willing " to be made stepping-
stones for their betters."
Having thus disposed of these reasons, and shown, as he supposes, that
they cannot be the true ones, he adds two other reasons, which he declares
contained the real motives that induced the Leyden Pilgrims to sail to
America, »B. C»IT'8 REASONS, WHY THE PILGRIMS SAILED FROM HOLLAND.
The first of these is {p. 123), " That the Puritans in Holland were not harmo
nious among themselves, and therefore it became desirable for them to separate."
Now, if this has any pertinency to the subject in hand, it means that the Ley
den Pilgrims were not harmonious among themselves. If there is any
truth established, beyond the possibility of successful question ; jf there
His Quaker ancestor married a daughter of Dea. J. B., of Scituate. " To this
match there had been several objections, the Quakers disapproving of his marrying
out of the society, and the Congregationalists of his marrying into theirs." " How
ever, the sanguine temperament of  was not to be foiled, and he is said to have
addressed the young woman, in the presence of her family, in the following words :
' Ruth, let us break away from this unreasonable bondage. I will give up my reli
gion, and thou shalt give up thine, and we will go to the Church of England, and go
to the D  1 together.' They fulfilled this resolution, adds my annalist, so far
as going to the Church of England during life."
The amount of this is, that Dr. Coit is descended from ancestors of very loose
principles in religion, and hence his " Episcopal blood."

430 _ REVIEW.
is any matter of fact pertaining to this history, — which one who pre
tends to have been over the ground, is inexcusable for not knowing —
it is the fact of the uninterrupted and precious harmony that always subsisted
among the Leyden Puritans. A writer, whose name figures in Dr. Coit's
book as one of his authorities (Robert Baylie), had ventured, in the days of the
Pilgrims, to make the assertion which Dr. Coit has now revived, concerning
the divisions among the Leyden Puritans. Edward Winslow gave the follow
ing answer to this aspersion. It is " alleged (though upon a great mistake) by
a late writer, that division or disagreement in the Church of Leyden was the
occasion, nay cause, of the first plantation in New England ; for, saith the
author, or to this effect, when they could no longer agree together, the one
part went to New England, and began the plantation at Plymouth" — " as if
the foundation of our New England plantations had been laid upon division or
separation, than which nothing is more untrue. For I persuade myself, never
people on earth lived more lovingly together, and parted more sweetly than
we, the Church at Leyden, did ;* not rashly, in a distracted humor, but upon
joint and serious deliberation, often seeking the mind of God by fasting and
prayer." So Bradford says, in his Dialogue ; " They lived together in love and peace all
their days, without any considerable differences, or any disturbance that grew
thereby, but such as was easily healed in love ; and so they continued, until
with mutual consent they removed into New England." — In Youngs Chronicles.
So, this first reason alleged by Dr. Coit is proved to be no reason at all, but
an inexcusable untruth.
His other reason he himself appears to regard as a rather queer one. " And
now," says he (p. 128), "for * * the last reason. It reminds me, in name at
least, of what the lawyers call the ' negative pregnant' " — " It is this ; Tlie
Pilgrims did not sail for New England because they were persecuted."
Not persecuted ! Is it possible that there is a mistake about this, — that the
Pilgrims were plundered, fined, imprisoned in England, and scarcely escaped
to Holland ? Oh ! no, that is all true, nor was it possible for them to return to
England without suffering like persecution again. What then can Dr. Coit
mean by saying that " the Pilgrims did not sail for New England because
they were persecuted ?" Oh — that they were not persecuted in Holland! Dr
Coit even proves that they went " of their own free choice and motion."
And now hear with what indignation he breaks forth upon the Plymouth
Rock orators, and others, who pretend that the Pilgrims were driven by perse
cution to America — " With what sort of countenance, then, can an honest
chronicler, or a truthful orator, look at Plymouth Rock as the first American
foothold for harried victims of persecution ? Why does the cry rise, louder
* Baylie ; one of Dr. Coit's chief authorities, a name which figures largely through
his book : but an author whose mistakes and misrepresentations were so thoroughly
exploded by Winslow and Cotton (" Way of the New England Churches") that,
for nearly two centuries, they have, by the verdict of the world, been consigned to
a dishonored grave. Dr. Coit has once more disinterred this mass of rottenness,
and— for the benefit of the Church, and at the call of her bishops and clergy,—
brought it forth in his bosom, as a sweet smelling savor, to the world

REVIEW. 431
if anything than ever, from New England Societies ?" — (stand from under, •
Leonard Bacon ! stand from under, Mr. Senator Choate !) — •• orations, songs,
and dinner tables. The Pilgrims landed at Plymouth, fugitives, escaping for
actual life from persecution ?" " Shame upon such misrepresentation ! by the
solemn testimony of facts, and their own lips, they did not ! And yet the cry
is undiminished, and the speech, and the lyric, and the feast, go their annual
round." Who ever supposed, or asserted, that the Pilgrims were persecuted in Hot-
land ? Who does not know that they fled thither from persecution in Eng
land? Has anybody, under the wide canopy of heaven, ever affirmed, that
the Pilgrims were persecuted in Holland ? How childish Dr. Coit's cry of
shame ? What a paltering — what a childish paltering — unworthy of a school
boy — is his solemn denial that the Pilgrims " sailed for New England because
they were persecuted ?" What a sheer — inexcusable misrepresentation is that,
which charges orators and New England Societies with affirming that the
Pilgrims fled from persecution in Holland ? And last of all, how supremely
ridiculous is this " negative pregnant" reason, why the Pilgrims did sail from
Holland to America ?
I cannot fear that Dr. Coit's " facts" in this matter, or his reasons, will have
any weight at all against the straightforward declarations of Bradford and
Winslow. But I do suppose that they may possibly create no very favorable
impressions as to Dr. Coit's own tact in logic and in history, to say nothing
about the moral qualities which incapacitate him from appreciating the motives
assigned by the Puritans, for leaving Holland.
HE DENIES THE SUFFERINGS OF THE PILGRIMS.
Dr. Coit is in such a humor of denying the commonly received history, and
60 bent not only upon destroying the character of the Pilgrims, but also of
cutting them off from all share in our sympathies, that he takes it upon him to
deny their sufferings in New England. " The current version of their ro
mance," says he, p. 137, " is, that their sufferings in New England were almost
intolerable."* This he denies on the authority of Gorges ; and adds, " This
account mars the poetry and sinks the pathos of the scheme for leaving Hol
land; but it is too simple, sensible, self-consistent, and disinterested, to be
otherwise than true." — " Puritan fancy, Puritan rhymes, Puritan orators, and
Puritan historians, may put a fairer and more spiritual representation upon
these unpoetic facts, but the plain unvarnished statement of Gorges will
always look a hundred fold more like the naked, natural truth."
One knows not which the most to wonder at, the heartlessness or the brazen
presumption with which this denial of the sufferings of the Pilgrims is put
* " And much poetry and rhetoric too is often wasted (says Dr. Coit, p. 14),
upon the sufferings which the Puritans first endured from the inhospitable clime
and soil of young New England. Many a sentimental eye sees nothing but parched
corn upon their table, and an avalanche of snow upon their roof. Gorges admits,
that when they landed at Plymouth, many of them were weak and feeble. But he
goes on to say, ' they were not many days ashore before they had gotten both health
and strength.' "

432 REVIEW.
forth. Why grant it, that the very journals of the Pilgrims are unworthy of
credit ; journal? in which, in the simplest language, they relate how one half their
number died in the first five months, " the greatest part in the dead of winter,
when there were not well ones enough to tend the sick," or scarcely to bury
the dead : — how in subsequent times, W inslow relates — " I have seen strong
men stagger for want of food." I say, even granting that these Pilgrims were
such liars that their journals and letters are not to be trusted ; — I would not
even then forbear to cry out — For shame Dr. Coit ! — Does not even nature
teach you, that one hundred men, women and children, coming three thousand
miles over a stormy ocean, in one little ship of one hundred and eighty tons,
with all their supplies, — and supplies for the crew on their return voyage, —
and landing in the depth of 'winter on the shore of a measureless wilderness,
absolutely beyond the reach of all human aid, — without a hut, or shelter, or
hearth — save such as their scanty tools shall fabricate out of the materials
yielded by the forest : — and that too when they are weary and wayworn, and
many of them entirely disabled hy sickness from their first landing : — does not
even nature teach you, that their sufferings must be " almost intolerable ."'
What heart have you, — for any shame, what front have you, to deny it; and
to pour out upon people in that condition, such unfeeling ribaldry about their
pretended sufferings ?
" BROWNISM" AND " UTTER EXCLUSIVENESS" OF THE PILGRIM CHURCH.
On pp. 38, 39, Dr. Coit labors with great heat, to prove that the " New
England Puritans are descended" — from the Brownists ;" that " Brownists they
were up to that ultimate hour of their European existence ;" — that " they
never departed from one of Brownism's worst peculiarities, its utter exclusive
ness." " Like that charter," says he, " it fastens upon them as indelibly as the
brand of the actual cautery." Here he cites " a Presbyterian witness," in
these words : " What tenets are held by the Independents of New England ?
They reckon all Reformed churches, except themselves, profane and unclean."
Now, this, of course, cannot be true of Higginson, Winthrop, and their com
peers ; who, up to the last hour of their European existence, had never sepa
rated from the English Church. It was Higginson, who, standing on the deck of
the ship, and taking his last look of his native land, said, " We will not say,
as the Separatists were wont to say, Farewell Babylon, farewell Rome ; but
we will say, Farewell dear England, Farewell the Church of God in England."
" We do not go to New England as separatists from the Church of England."
It was Winthrop and his company, who, in 1630, in their address " to the rest
of their brethren in the Church of England," used that expression which Dr.
Coit loves so frequently to quote ; — they called the Church of England their
" Dear Mother." These, therefore, were no Brownists, in the sense of separa
tion and exclusiveness, which Dr. Coit intends.*
* Here, again, occurs another of Dr. Coit's innumerable perversions. He says,
" Mr. Young, the compiler of the Chronicles, knows well enough, that to claim
some of the Puritans as bis ecclesiastical ancestry, would be to boast a pedigree that
would do him no honor. And so he vainly enters the caveat, that the Plymouth

REVIEW. 433
As to the Plymouth colonists, the charge of Dr. Coit, concerning their " utler
exclusiveness," and their " remaining Brownists up to the last hour of their
European existence," is utterly untrue. Such a story was early circulated by
the calumniators of the Leyden colony, but the colonists not only declared it
an "aspersion," but by a long array of indisputable facts, amply proved their
declaration true. Says Gov. Winslow (and he is quite as good authority as
Dr. Coit's " Presbyterian witness," who had no personal knowledge of the
facts), " Some say, the Church of Plymouth, which went first from Leyden,
were schismatics, Brownists, rigid separatists, having Mr. Robinson for their
pastor, who made, and to the last professed, separation from other churches of
Christ, &c. And the rest of the churches in New England, holding communion
with that Church, are reputed to be such as they are."
This Gov. Winslow declares an " aspersion." As to Mr. Robinson, he says,
" I living three years under his ministry, before we began the work of planta
tion in New England, it was always against separation from any of the churches
of Christ ; professing and holding communion with most of the French and
Dutch churches, yea, tendering it to the Scotch also."*
" The Church of Leyden made no schism or separation from the Reformed
churches." " As for the Dutch, it was usual for our members * * * * * to
communicate with them." Yea, at this very instant — Moses Symonson;
' * * * * because he is a child of one that was in communion with the Dutch
Church at Leyden, is admitted into church-fellowship at Plymouth, in New-
England, * * * * * and other Dutch, also in communion at Salem." He
notices instances, by name, of individual members of the French Churches,
and of the Walloons, who were received into communion with the church at
Plymouth," by virtue of communion of churches: " which has continued, down
to the present day, the universal practice of all the Puritan Churches. Win-
slow further adduces the parting counsel of Mr. Robinson, in which he ex
horted them by " all means, to avoid and shake off the name of Brownist, a
mere nickname, and brand to make religion odious." This Dr. Coit, with his
usual perversion, endeavors to convert into a proof-positive, that they were at
Puritans (alas for Boston, Salem, and New Haven!) are the only ones who
merit the name of Pilgrim. But the demurrer will not save his precarious cause."
Now, this is said as though Mr. Young were warily entering a caveat, lest he
should be considered as descended from Brownists ; and as though Mr. Young feared
that the charge might lie against all, save the Plymouth colonists, — which is in no
respect the case. The Massachusetts colonists never had been Brownists, as Mr.
Young well knew, and as Dr. Coit well knows, provided he knows anything about
the subject, as he ought to know. Mr. Young has no manner of reference to any
»uch thing as Dr. Coit pretends ; but is simply writing the historical fact, that the
name " imlorim" strictly belongs to the Plymouth colonists alone, as they were the
only ones who sojourned in a foreign land previous to their coming to America.
Or. Coit says, " Let his claim be granted,— the claim will not save his precarious
cause,''— for (he argues) " even the Plymouth colonists were Brownists ^'—imply
ing that Mr. Young's cause had been, to save himself the dishonor of being ranked,
as a descendant of the Brownist colonists of Massachusetts !
* In Young's Chronicles of the Pilgrims, p. 387.
28

434 REVIEW.
that time Brownists ; " They are implored not to be Brownists," says he. Mr
Robinson does not implore them "not to oe" Brownists (Mr. Winslow has
already proved that they were not), but " to shake off the name," which their
enemies unjustly put upon them.
VIPERS FASTENING ON APOSTOLIC HANDS
But Dr. Coit here brings in the Puritans of the present day, for a share of
the castigation which he is bestowing upon their fathers. He continues
(p. 39), "The name, indeed, of Brownism was abandoned; — but its spirit —
alas its spirit ! even at this distant day, do not its vipers come out of many a
heat to fasten on Apostolic Hands ?" Gentle reader, can you conjecture who
this Apostle is, whose hands are, at the present day, so infested with vipers ?
" I here allude," says Dr. Coit, " among other things, to the harsh assaults
upon the present Bishop of Connecticut, for a charge delivered, in the ordinary
course of duty, to the clergy of his own diocese — a prelate who has meekness
enough (if it could be imputed to them) to make amiable even the reviewers in
the testy New Englander."
It is time that Dr. Coit should know, that we regard the " present Bishop of
Connecticut" as no Apostle. A charge publislied to tlie world, aiming, by its very
title, to assail the faith of all other churches around him, and applying to
them unsparingly, the odious epithets of " dissenters," " incongruous sects,"
concerning whom, as compared with the Episcopal Church, the Bishop says,
" Surrounded by all this desolation, the Protestant Episcopal Church appears
as an oasis in the desert ;" — a charge, perverting and misrepresenting the doc
trines of the churches around him, ridiculing " the Bible alone" as a " standard
of faith," and setting up the interpretations of the Church, as the only safe
authority : — I say such a charge, so published to the world, cannot be deemed
a matter simply in the discharge of the Bishop's ordinary duty, nor simply a
matter between him and his Presbyters, with which (as Dr. Coit insinuates)
nobody else has a right to interfere. When the Bishop has put forth to the
world these anti-christian doctrines (as we deem them) concerning the rule of
faith, and made these assaults upon the faith and order of our churches; we
deem it no breach of decorum, or of Christian charity^o deal with such
assaults and misrepresentations, as their atrocity deserves. If Dr. Coit, for
this, sees fit to call us " Vipers," that come out of the heat, " to fasten upon
Apostolic hands," we will conclude that he has no better answer to give.
THE " UTTERLY EXCLUSIVE" CHURCH
But what is all this to the charge of " utter exclusiveness ?" Is utter ex
clusiveness such a sin in Dr. Coit's eyes ? Does he know, then, of a church,
which claims to he " the only true church," which utterly refuses to acknow
ledge any other bodies of Christians, as churches at all; and which " utterly
excludes," and denounces all other ministers as no ministers, but as sons of
" Korah, Dathan, and Abiram ?" Does he know a church one of whose Presby
ters recently put forth, with the knowledge and sanction of his " meek" bishop,
a tract, showing the impropriety and sin of Episcopalians joining in comma-

REVIEW. 435
nion, or attending public worship with other denominations ? Does he know
of a church, whose convention, with their bishop at their head, not long
since, solemnly advised all churchmen, where they were too few to maintain
public worship by themselves, to withdraw from the worship of other denomina
tions, and seclude themselves in their private households ? Does he know of
any such church ? If not, let him know, that there is one church (denomina
tion) in New England (besides the Popish), whose " utter exclusiveness" entirely
fulfils the description of his" Presbyterian witness;" — " They reckon all Re
formed Churches, except themselves, profane and unclean." All Reformed
Churches, I say : they hold the Church of Rome as a sister, or a mother.
How strange it would be, if it should turn out that Dr. Coit, after all his out
cry about " utter exclusiveness," had actually betaken himself to the embraces
of that very church !
ACT OF UNIFORMITY AND ST. BARTHOLOMEW'S DAY.
On p. 64, Dr. Coit says, "The Act of Uniformity— 0 the Act of Unifor
mity, consummated on that awful day of the month, the 24th of August, when
the Huguenots were massacred in France, — that direful, desolating act, which
thrust two thousand * godly and painful' ministers from their comfortable
livings," &c. — " Two thousand ' godly and painful' ministers dispossessed of
their livings ? Why, the Puritans themselves dispossessed probably ten thou
sand of the ministers of the Church of England. These two thousand also,
were interlopers, — not even ecclesiastical squatteTs, as we Americans would
say — absolute interlopers, who had driven away the lawful shepherds of the
flock, and were covering themselves with the fleece full warmly. The minis
ters of the Church of England were the real victims of banishment; and the
Act of Uniformity was but an actof simple justice, to give them hack their own."
These " facts'' of Dr. Coit need a little sifting. He says the Puritans dis
possessed probably ten thousand ministers of the Church of England. His
authority, " Walker," sets it down in round numbers at eight thousand. In the
actual list at the end of his book he makes out a little more than one fifth of
that number." Among his cathedral clergy he reckons up several prebends,
and canonries, in which he supposes sufferers without any evidence. Of this
sort Dr. Calamy has reckoned above two hundred.*
Where a clergyman was possessed of half a dozen benefices, more or less,
Walker reckons him as half a dozen men. " For example, Richard Stuart,
LL.D.,is set down as a sufferer in the deanery of St. Paul's,"* * " St. Pancras
— both prebendary and residentiary," — " in the deanery and prebend of the
third stall in Westminster," " royal chapel," " provostship of Eton College,"
and " prebend of Northalton in the church of Salisbury." So Richard Stuart,
LL.D., counts seven. Walker's list underwent some scrutiny in its day. " An
exact computation," made in Suffolk, Norfolk, and Cambridgeshire, in which
there were 1398 parishes, " showed that there were 253 sequestrations."
Similar examinations elsewhere showed that Walker's list was greatly exag
gerated. * Neale.

436 REVIEW.
Dr. Coit says of the Puritan ministers, that they were " absolute interlopers,
who had driven away the shepherds of the flock." The fact was, that Ihe
ejected church-clergy were such as had been, by an ordinance of both houses
of parliament, upon trial, turned out of their livings for beirif< " scandalous in
their lives, ill-affected to the parliament, fomenters of this unnatural war," or
for having " deserted their cures." The " interlopers" were such as were
" chosen by the parishioners," and inducted into office after careful examination,
both of character and qualifications, by the constituted tribunals.
Neale says with regard to Walker's list, that " when such were deducted as
were fairly convicted upon oath of immoralities of life, * * * and all such as
took part with the Icing in the war, or disowned the authority of parliament ;
preaching up doctrines inconsistent with the cause for which they had taken
arms, and exciting the people to an absolute submission to the authority of the
crown, the remainder that were displaced * * * * must be very inconsider
able."* Baxter says, " They cast out the grosser sort of insufficient and scandalous
clergy, and some few civil men that had acted in the wars for the king, * " '
but left in near half of those that were but barely tolerable," — and that " in all
the counties in which he was acquainted, six to one, at least, if not more, that
were sequestered by the committee, were, by the oaths of witnesses, proved
insufficient, or scandalous, or both."
Dr. Coit says, " The act of Uniformity was but an act of simple justice, to
give them back their own." An act of simple justice, designed simply to give
ousted clergymen their own, would have turned out simply the " interlopers,"
and simply restored the injured to their rights. The act of Uniformity did
neither ; and was designed for no such end. It made no distinction between
interlopers and such as had been established in the ministry before the wars.
It proceeded upon no such principle, but upon driving from 'the ministry all
such as would not observe an exact conformity, and subscribe their " unfeigned
assent and consent" to everything contained in, and prescribed by, The Book of
Common Prayer; or who would not take the oath of canonical obedience,
abjure the solemn league and covenant, and declare their assent to the doctrines
of passive obedience and non-resistance. The sufferings of the church-clergy,
as says one of their own number, " were inflicted in a time of tumult and
confusion, so that the plundering and ravaging endured by the church minis
ters, were owing, many of them at least, to the rudeness of the soldiers and
the chances of war ; they were plundered, not because they were Conformists,
but cavaliers, and of the king's party."
Dr. Coit's " interlopers," worse even than " ecclesiastical squatters," were such
men as Gilpin, Bates, Manton, Jacomb, Owen, Goodwin, Baxter, Newcomen,
Calamy, Pool, Caryl, Charnock, Gouge, Jenkins, Corbet, Mead, Howe,
Vincent, Flavel, Philip Henry, and others of like character, though less known
to fame. If the reader will turn to the biography of any in this list, he will
observe that they were not, even in Dr. Coit's sense, " interlopers" or " squat
ters," but, in most cases, ministers of the most regular stamp, even before the
times of the civil war.
* Vol. ii., p. 262. t In Calamy's Church and Dissenter — Neale, ii., p. 263.

REVIEW. 437
KING CHARLES II.
Dr. Coit not only eulogizes Archbishop Land, and the Apocrypha,* hut takes
into his special protection the character of Charles II. 'pp. 37, 54, and else
where). " The same king" [Charles IL] " laughed at, sneered at, and de
nounced as he has been a thousand times, by Puritans." On p. 37 Dr. Coit
says, referring to the good deeds of Charles II., " There may be mercy in the
day of judgment, for those who could not find it here."' Doubtless this is a
charitable sentiment ; but its design here, is to raise some doubts in favor of
the real character of King Charles II. If Dr. Coit means to express a doubt,
whether the unbelieving and profane, perjurers, drunkards, liars, and adulterers
shall not inherit the Kingdom of God, let him know that the word of God is
decisive against such an allowance of charity. Charles II. through his whole
life was all that : given to lewdness and lying, an adulterer, a drunkard, a per
jurer; nor is there any evidence that he ever was reformed, or ever repented. t
He had thirteen children by his seven mistresses, whom he kept at different
times, to the end of his life. This was hut a part of his irregularities in this
way. " He told me," says Bishop Burnet, that " he could not think God
would make'a man miserable, only for taking a little pleasure out of the way."
The Bishop adds, " He seemed to have no sense of religion. "§
Bishop Burnet says, also, that the " restoration of the king" was followed
by " the throwing off of the very professions of virtue and piety : all ended
in entertainments and drunkenness, which ran over the three kingdoms, *****
there were great disorders and much riot everywhere."* Says the editor of
Burnet's History of his Life and Times, " If the character of Charles II. had
to be summed up in three appellations, they might justly be, wit, hypocrite,
and profligate." Living thus in adultery and debauchery, a scoffer at all re
ligion, given to profanity and lying, and withal, a persecutor unto blood, — as
the " Tales of the Scottish Covenanters" unfold in narratives of horror, " after
having," says Bishop Burnet, " disguised his Popery to the last, on his death
* He quotes frequently from the Apocrypha, " And moreover," says he, p. 316,
" the earlier and less rabid Puritans always treated the Apocrypha with courtesy,"
***** " 1 may be pardoned for saying thus much on this incidental matter;
since the use ofthe Apocyrpha was, in a Puritan view, a crying sin of the Church
of I'ngland, and ofthe sternly Calvinistic Dutch Church.''
\ He gave Dr. Owen a thousand guineas to distribute among those who had suf-
ieri-cl most by the late severities, and yet his recompense was, to be called " a pro
fligate tyrant," p. 37. Wonderful liberality of King Charles II. ! Just as though,
when a villain has burnt my house, and spoiled my goods, and continues to shut
me out, as far as lies in his power, from all means of livelihood, my neighbors are
bound to praise him for his goodness, because he has once given me a sixpence in
charily. t" He could not help letting himself out," says Burnet, " against the liberty, that,
under the reliirmatior., all men took of inquiring into matters of religion, for .. .
they carried the humor 1'uther, to inquire into matters of state. He said often, he
thought government was a much safer and easier thing, where the authority was
btlieved infallible, and the faith and submission ofthe people was implicit."
k Life and Times, Lond. Ed., INj'.i, pp. 60,01.

438 REVIEW.
bed he sent for a Popish priest to give him ' absolution and extreme unction.' "
The Protestant Bishop Ken, when the king was in the agonies of death, press
ed him to take the sacrament from him, which the king declined. " Ken pressed
him to declare that he died in the communion of the Church of England. To that
he answered nothing. Ken asked him if he desired absolution of his sins.
It seems the king, if he then thought anything at all, thought that would do
him no hurt. So Ken pronounced it over him ; for which he was much
hlamed, since the king expressed no sense of sorrow for his past life, nor
any purpose of amendment."
Thus died King Charles II., his last care, and his last words about his mis
tresses : and there stood Bishop Ken, presenting one of the king's illegitimate
children to be blessed by him. Of his sins, of Christ, of eternity, the king
spoke not, save once he said he " hoped he should climb up to heaven's gates ;"
" which," says Bishop Burnet, " was the only word savoring of religion
that he was heard to speak."
SUFFERINGS OF THE NEW ENGLAND CHURCHMEN.
Dr. Coit has a chapter or two, about the persecutions suffered by the early
New England Churchmen. Those who are acquainted with the Episcopal
claims of the present day, will scarcely need history to enable them to form
some idea of the bearing of the Churchmen of those times, when they could
look back to the mother country, with the hope that her power would yet give
them the kingdom and the dominion here. The sentence which Dr. Coit
quotes from Bancroft, shows the views of that historian on this point, p. 187 :
" But now, the apparent purpose of advancing religious freedom, was made to
disguise measures of the deadliest hostility to the frame of civil government.
The Nationality of New England was in danger." Can we wonder that those
who had retreated three thousand miles, to a wilderness, for the sake of reli
gious freedom, should be somewhat jealous for its preservation ? The Puritans
justly feared that the success of the prelatists would be destruction to their own
civil and religious liberties. Dr. Coit quotes another sentence from President
Quincy, concerning the bearing of the Churchmen (p. 206): " Their proceed
ings indicate a spirit sufficiently lofty and determined ; excluding from their
records all recognition of the authorities of Massachusetts, not even referring
to the Colony by name, they laid hold of the horns of the transatlantic altar, and
placed their society under the shadow of the sceptre of the monarch." Dr.
Coit also quotes (p. 207), the Address of the " Rector and Wardens of King's
Chapel," Boston, sent to the King in 1691, in which they speak of the Colonial
government, as " a disloyal, prevailing party amongst us, who, under pretence
of the public good, design nothing but ruin to us and the whole country."
Dr. Coit also has a chapter 'p. 260), on the " Puritanic Efforts to defeat an
American Episcopate." Can we wonder at this? The Churchmen, on both
sides of the water, were perpetually plotting to establish an Episcopate over
these colonies. All parties well knew, that Lord Bishops once established here
under the British government, would have had, even by common law, ecclesi
astical jurisdiction, including all causes matrimonial and testamentary, over the

REVIEW. 439
whole people. The question of the establishment of an American Episcopate
was a question of life or death to all the immunities and liberties which the
Pilgrims sought, in coming across the ocean. Can the people be blamed for
looking to a matter thus deeply affecting their own rights, and not simply per
taining to the Episcopalians alone ? What would not an American Episcopate
have done then, when, even at this late day, it claims " every inch of the
ground," and denounces the ministers of all other churches, as sons of Korah ?
PURITANIC TREATMENT OF THE PRESBYTERIANS.
On p. 361, Dr. Coit has a chapter on the " Puritanic treatment of the Pres
byterians." Glancing over its pages, the reader will observe its character by
such expressions as these—" Intolerance towards Presbyterianism." — " Con
gregationalism was as good as its word. . . Its rival was routed from the
land." Having raked up what old offences were to be found, Dr. C. says
{p. 390), " And at last the question came up before me, can I not put my finger
on something which displays the belligerent aspect of Puritanism and Presbyterian
ism in the times amid which we actually live ?"
In great distress for some hard thing to say, by hard raking, Dr. Coit does at
length find something, that, after a sort, answers his purpose. " If, thought I,"
sayB he, " the testimony I want, cannot he found in the cross fire of the Theo
logical Review, . . and the Christian Spectator, then, . I make a
strange guess." " To that Review I went, and . discovered a criticism
upon a volume which has not escaped some comments of my own — the His
torical Discourses of Mr. Leonard Bacon." From this, Dr. Coit proves indu
bitably, " how little love is lost between the old litigants ; and how, in fact, the
breach has widened."
Well, if the breach has widened, the ancient breach could have been no great
affair. Says Dr. Coit again (p. 374), " Many weakly suppose that Puritanism
and Presbyterianism are identical. They have yet to learn, and perhaps to
their cost, that genuine Presbyterianism has not had a deadlier foe."
Now, it is very true, that in old times there was some foolish sparring
between Congregationalists and Presbyterians. But since the peace, which
" was patched up between the Independents and Presbyterians in England, in
1690, and their concordat adopted for all that it was worth in the Colony of
Connecticut," as says Dr. Coit (p. 390), the words of Cotton Mather have
been amply verified in the history of the two denominations. The words of
Mather are these : " The brethren of the Presbyterian way in England, are
lately come into such a happy union with those of the Congregational, that all
former names of distinction are lost in that one of L*nited Brethren. As
Dr. Coit well knows, those " Heads of Agreement, by the Ltmted Min
isters, FORMERLY CALLED PRESBYTERIAN AND CONGREGATIONAL," Constitute a
part of our " Saybrook Platform." This treaty of peace is, therefore, one of
the fundamental laws of the land, in our part of what Dr. Coit is pleased to
name " Puritania," — otherwise called New England. The Presbyterians, so
far from being " routed 1 om the land" (New England), still possess two entire
Presbyteries* within out borders; the descendants of the early Presbyterian
* Londonderry and Newburyport.

440 hi; view.
settlers, who still preferred the Presbyterian organization. Dr. Coit shonld
remember that the First Presbyterian Church in the city of New York (and that
not long ago), was built in no small part by the funds contributed by the Con
gregational Churches of Connecticut. He should remember the Plan of Union,
for mingling Presbyterians and Congregationalists in the new settlements. He
should remember, that though one part of the Presbyterian body chooses
rather to dispense with that arrangement, yet there still subsists between them
and us, an unbroken harmony, and the most cordial esteem. The other parts of
the Presbyterian family are bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh. Our minis
ters and church members, as Providence changes their habitation, never hesi
tate reciprocally to unite with each other's churches, as though both denomina
tions were one. We both have our preferences ; and when occasion calls, we
can both manfully defend our peculiarities; but our mutual toleration, esteem,
and hearty good-will, are unbroken. God grant that it may be unbroken for ever.
Dr. Coit may cease his efforts in this quarter ; he will certainly lose his labor in
endeavoring to stir up a dissension between us and our more than neighbors —
the Presbyterians.
But I must bring this review to a close ; not for lack of materials, but from
dislike to the sort of work ; more errors and misrepresentations than I have
exposed, yet remain ; hut he who would duly clear them all away, the same
might cleanse the stables of Augeas. I close with commending one or two
things to the notice of Dr. Coit's brethren,
THE LOW CHURCHMEN.
The first is, to those good evangelical clergymen, who, after having done
good service, have at length been made Bishops. What need there may be, 1
know not ; but it may do them no harm to look in Dr. Coit's glass. Says Dr.
Coit (p. 382), " But then, as was natural, these low-church Puritans in New
England, finding themselves here at the head of affairs like a low Churchman
when made a Bishop, turned a somerset, and came up high Churchmen of the tall
est sort."
The second thing may be especially commended to the notice of the evan
gelical party in the Church, and especially of that good Bishop, who not long
since wrote several pamphlets against Puseyism, entitled " The Novelties which
disturb our peace." The good Bishop will see that his evangelism is the troubler ;
and that it bears, in Dr. Coit's eyes, a. pretty close resemblance to Puritanism.
Says Dr. Coit, after speaking of Tertullian, and saying that Tertullian was no
doubt somewhat Puritanical, and was " classed" by " the Catholic Church
among the heretics," — " a pretty fair proof that Puritanism was then, as after
wards, one of the ' Novelties which disturb our peace.' "*
* On p. 276, Dr. Coit has a cut at the " Puritanism" ofthe excellent author of
" The Mysteries opened." " Much rather," says Dr. C, " would I endure the re
proaches of the New Englander, than enjoy such equivocal praise as it bestows on
the author of the ' Mysteries opened.' Unblessed are all those plaudits which are
given to one's intellect, at the expense of his consistency.". . . "A single clear
' Well done,' of conscience, is worth ten thousand of them." I take this as a pretty
clear avowal that Puseyism is the only " consistent" Episcopacy.

VALUABLE BOOKS,
PUBLISHED AND FOR SALE BY
Saker & 0cribner,
145 NASSAU STREET, NEW YORK.

CHARLOTTE ELIZABETH'S WORKS, Uniform Edition, 12 vols.
12mo. $6 00
CHARLOTTE ELIZABETH'S JUVENILE WORKS (not included
in the above 12 vols.), 7 vols. 18mo., 3 00
opinions of the press.
We have received numerous commendatory notices of our edition of Charlotte
Elizabeth's Works, from the religious papers of all denominations of Christians ir..
this country, and for the benefit of those who have not supplied themselves with
her books, we insert here a few which are believed to be a fair specimen of the opi
nions of the press. From the Morning News.
Works of Charlotte Elizabeth. — Mrs. Charlotte Elizabeth Tonna is one
of the most gifted, popular, and truly instructive writers of the present day. In
clearness of thought, variety of topics, richness of imagery, and elegance of ex
pression, it is scarcely too much to say, that she is the rival of Hannah More, or
to predict that her works will be as extensively and profitably read, as those of the
most delightful female writer of the last generation. All her writings are pervaded
by justness and purity of sentiment, and the highest reverence for morality and re
ligion; and may safely be commended as of the highest interest and value to every
family in the land. From the Religious Spectator.
If Charlotte Elizabeth were not one of the most attractive and useful writers of
the age, we might perhaps be ready to say that she was in danger of surfeiting the
public appetite, by her numerous productions; but as it is, we are constrained to
say the oftener she shows herself as an author the better. Her works never tire ;
and we are never even in doubt in respect to their useful tendency.
From the Albany Argus.
Charlotte Elizabeth's works have become so universally known, and are so highly
nnd deservedly appreciated in this countrv, that it has become almost superfluous
lo mention them. We doubt exceedingly whether there has been any female writei
miicc Mrs. Hannah Moore, whose works are likely to be so extensively and so pro
fitably read as hers. She thinks deeply and accurately, is a great analyst of 'he
human heart, and withal clothes her thoughts in most appropriate and eloquent
language. From tlie Journal of Commerce.
These productions constitute a bright relief to the bad and corrupting literature
°f which our a;;e is so prolific, full of practical instruction, illustrative of the beauty
of Protestant Christianity, and not the less abounding in entertaining description
and narrative.

CATALOGUE. OF BOOKS.
charlotte Elizabeth's works
cts. ctSi
Personal Recollections, 1 vol. 12mo., 50 J Osric, a Missionary Tale, 38
Helen Fleetwood, 50 \ The Convent Bell, a Tale, 38
Judah's Lion, 50 1 Glimpses of the Past, or the Museum, 3S
Judaea Capta, 50 < Philip and his Garden, 38
The Siege of Derry, 50 < The Flower of Innocence, 38
Letters from Ireland, 50 ( The Simple Flower, 38
The Rockite, 50 \ Alice Benden, and other Tales, 38
Floral Biography, .50 } Female Martyrs, 38
Principalities and Powers, 50 ! Tales and Illustrations, 38
English Martyrs, 50 J Dressmakers and Milliners, 25
The Wrongs of Women, 50 ! The Forsaken Home, 25
The Church Visible in all Ages, 18mo., 50 S The Little Pin- Headers, 25
Passing Thoughts, 38 ) The Lace Runners, 25
Falsehood and Truth, 38 5 Letter Writing, 25
Conformity, 38 > Back-Biting, 25
Izram, a Mexican Tale, 38 j Promising and Performing, 25

THE PEEP OF DAY, or a series of the earliest religious Instruction, the
Infant Mind is capable of receiving, with verses illustrative ofthe sub
jects, 1 vol. 18mo. with engravings, $0 50
LINE UPON LINE, by the author of" Peep of Day," a second series, 50
PRECEPT UPON PRECEPT, by the author of " Peep of Day," etc., a
third series, 50
This is probably the best and most popular series of Juvenile Books ever pub
lished- The publishers refer with the most entire confidence to all parents and
teachers who have introduced these books into their families or schools, who will
testify as to the useful and correct religious instruction which they contain.

D'AUBIGNE'S HISTORY OF THE GREAT REFORMATION,
abridged by the Rev. Edward Dalton, 1 vol. 18mo. 447 pages.
Price, $0 50
Probably no book of modern date has obtained such a wide-spread popularity, and
been so extensively read as D'AubignfTs History of the Great Reformation of the
sixteenth century, in Germany, Switzerland, &c. Engrossing and enduring as must
be the interest connected with the details of the historical incident of the Great
Reformation, the author of this work has invested them with all the charm and
fascination of romance.
The Abridgment retains most of the attractions of the larger work, and brings
it within the means, as to time and expense, of a still larger body of readers. Of
the faithfulness with which this abridgment has been made, the following testimo
nial from the New York Observer of Oct. 21, is abundant and satisfactory evidence.
It is from the pen of a distinguished clergyman of New York, whose opinions on
such subjects are entitled to universal confidence.
" I have read the Rev. Mr. Dalton's Abridgment of D'Aubigne's History, as re
printed hy Mr.Taylor, and have fully compared it with Mr. Carter's edition of the
original work. 1 am free to say that I think the abridgment is made with great
fidelity and sound judgment. It consists almost wholly of the author's own words,
and embraces those parts which are of the most prominent interest. Doubtless
those who can command the time will prefer to read the original work ; but those
whn wish to have the substance of the work in less compass, will here find it faith
fully condensed by one who entered into the true spirit of D'Aubigne. Both edi
tions, I believe calculated to be eminently useful, and I wish to both the widest
circulation." This work is printed on good type, contains 447 pages, and is sold at the exceed
ingly low price of 50 cents."

CATALOGUE OF BOOKS.
From the American Protestant.
D'AUBIGNE'S HISTORY OF THE REFORMATION.— Cheap edition.
Abridged by the Rev. Edwaed Dalton. Second edition.
This edition of D'Aubigne", abridged by a skilful hand, has received the commen-
dauons of the press, and of men of talent, for the rare merit it presents in the pre
sent form. It is admirably adapted for Sunday School and Common School Libra
ries, and for the family. None of the important facts of the original history are
omitted, or even mutilated ; while all that is extraneous and common-place, has
been dropped. It is useless to talk about the advantage a child will reap from the
reading of the full edition ; the same argument should hold good for all purposes,
and we would have to banish books wholly from our School Libraries — for, of the
historical portion of those Libraries, hardly a single volume can be found, that is
not an abridgment of a more voluminous work. Children must have the facts, and
the stirring interest of unbroken narrative ; their age, and their unripe minds, im
peratively demand them, and we might as well forbid them to study Astronomy ex
cept through the barren formulas of La Place, as to forbid them to read history ex
cept in the philosophic voluminousness of original productions.

THE CHURCH IN THE WILDERNESS, and other Fragments from the study
of a Pastor, by Gardiner Spring, D. D., Pastor ofthe Brick Presbyterian Church,
in the city of New York.
The following notice of Spring's Fragments is extracted from the New York
Commercial Advertiser.
The first piece, entitled the " Church in the Wilderness," is one of the most beau
tiful sketches in our language. It is in every respect a finished production — a pic
ture complete in all its parts, that for a time captivates the affections, enchains the
powers of the mind, and fills the soul with the most exalted conceptions. The
Church is represented, under the various circumstances of her earthly allotment,
leaning on the arm of her Beloved, and deriving all her strength from this unfailing
lource. The chastened but glowing fancy, elegance of diction, and purity of thought,
conspire to give beauty to the image, and make us dwell upon it with delight.
The other pieces in the collection are scarcely of inferior merit. " The Inquir
ing Meeting" portrays with great vividness some of the phases which the human
heart exhibits, when under the influence of religious excitement. The " Letter to
a Young Clergyman" abounds in instructions of inestimable value. It may per
haps be doubted whether the author attaches sufficient importance to pastoral visit
ation. " The Panorama" is an affecting delineation of the employment of men as
they usually appear on the stage of active life. " The Useful Christian" contains
lound practical suggestions for informing the mind, legulating the heart, and inspir
ing energy of action.

MEMOIRS OF MRS. SARAH LOUISA TAYLOR, by Rev. Lot
Jones, A. M. Fifth edition, 18mo., $0 50
From the Christian Mirror.
MEMOIR OF MRS. SARAH LOUISA TAYLOR: or an Illustration of the
work of the Holy Spirit, in awakening, renewing, and sanctifying the heart By
Lot Jones, A. M.
Memoirs of individuals have become so common, that not a few may be ready to
ask, Why publish another ? We have no fears that the above question will be asked
bv any one after reading this volume. If he does not feel '- reproved, corrected, or
instructed in righteousness," it will be because he has made pre-eminent attain
ments in scriptural knowledge, and holy, useful living; or else because his con
science has lost its susceptibility. In Mrs. Taylor religion appears with dignity as
well a9 grace, in power as well as beauty. Hers was the faith which "works by
l»ve, purities the heart, and overcomes the world." Its fruits were choice and abun
dant. Nor were her virtues cancelled, or their influence more than destroyed by
gross defects and blemishes. She had uncommon symmetry and harmony of char-

CATALOGUE OF BOOKS.
acter. With - uniform and controlling desire to do good, she never lacked the
means and opportunity, and did much, in the best and highest sense ofthe expres
sion. She won not a few to righteousness. Her religion was a religion of diligence
and energy, rendering her " steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of
the Lord ;" and her labor was " not in vain."
We see in Mrs. Taylor the same religion, in its essential elements, and in its more
important developments, which glowed in and beamed forth from the " great cloud
of witnesses ;" — the same faith, the same humility, the same dependence on atoning
blood, the same susceptibility to the constraining influence of Christ's love : " We
thus judge, that if Christ died for all, then all were dead ; and that he died for all
that they who live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him who
died for them." We see deep religious experience, but no extravagance — strong
feelings, but no fanaticism — absorbing devotion, but no cant — firmness of principle,
but no parly bigotry. We have here, not only holiness in its principle, but the
beauty of holiness adorning and perfecting Ihe character.
Mr. Jones was greatly favored in the subject ofhis narrative ; and he has wrought
up his materials with great skill and judgment. Nothing has been inserted, which
would have been better omitted ; and nothing appears to be wanting, which was
necessary to a just appreciation of her character.
We unhesitatingly commend this Memoir to all females, in all ranks of society.
The most refined and best educated will rise from its perusal, improved in literary
taste, intellectual expansion, and correct thinking; and the less favored will learn
from it what it is in their power to become by diligence, by prayer, by studying the
Scriptures, by a whole-hearted devotedness to the duties which they owe to God
and their fellow-men. From the Boston Recorder.
MEMOIR OF MRS. SARAH LOUISA TAYLOR: or an Illustration of the
work of the Holy Spirit, in awakening, renewing, and sanctifying the heart. By
Lot Jones, A. M.
It is not possible to do justice to this captivating and instructive volume within
the compass of the few lines to which our notice must be confined. And perhaps
it is best to desist altogether from an attempt to convey a correct impression of it to
our readers; for it must he confessed that our own emotions on the perusal of it are
too strong to permit the exercise of the most cool and deliberate judgment, as to its
intrinsic merits. To follow a lovely youth through the scenes of childhood and ri
pening years ; to mark the various traits of intellectual and moral character, as they
are developed in the relations of the child, the sister, the friend, the wife, the mo
ther, the teacher and the disciple of Jesus : and then to group the whole, and con
template the triumphs of faith over natural affeclion, and the heart's corruptions,
and the power of death itself; cannot fail to excite very strong emotion in any bo
som not petrified, even though the execution of the work were marked with many
imperfections. But Mr. Jones has not failed in the fulfilment of the task he has
assumed. The simplicity and clearness of his delineations ; the richness and ful
ness of evangelical sentiment diffused through the whole, and arising naturally from
his subject, the dignified tenderness of style, and the accurate discrimination made
between spurious and genuine religion in his incidental remarks, show him to be a
workman that needeth not to be ashamed, and leave an impress on the volume that
will render it very precious to every evangelical reader Any Christian who de
sires above all things to grow in grace, to learn the nature ofthe Christian conflict,
and to use successfully the weapons that shall give him the victory over his spirit
ual enemies ; or, in one word, to learn " the mind of the Spirit" on these points,
will do well to study this volume.
From the Episcopal Sunday School Visitor.
Sometimes the usefulness of religious biography is lessened by a redundancy of
ornament in ihe style, by too many digressions, which are continually breaking into
the interest which the reader feels in the narrative, and driving away the profitable
reflections which it suggests to the mind.
It is very seldom that we meet with a book so entirely free from blemishes of

CATALOGUE OF BOOKS.
this kind, as the one before us. It is the simple portrait of an amiable, enlightened,
and devotedly pious Christian, drawn by a most judicious and faithful hand.
The young Christian who is just commencing his course, and whose temptations
and trials are sometimes leading him to despondency, will read this book with
thankfulness; and those who are yet strangers to vital religion may be induced,
from this lovely instance of its powerful effects in sustaining the soul, under Ihe
heaviest afflictions of life, and in the hour of sickness and death, to seek for them
selves an interest in the Lord Jesus Christ.
Mrs. Taylor evidently possessed a fine and cultivated mind. Of this the beauti
ful fragments of poetry which are given in the course of the book, and the extracts
from her correspondence, are evidence. Had those talents been cultivated for the
world and iis approbation, she might, perhaps, have attained all that this world can
give— fame — applause — and celebrity. But what would they avail her now ? She
has chosen the better part, which cannot be taken from her.
It would be injustice to the publishers not to notice the beautiful manner in which
the work has been executed. The paper and type are excellent, and the engravings
good : but still the matter of the book is its main recommendation.
From the Episcopal Recorder.
This is a new work just issued from the press, and well worthy the altention of
Christians. It describes, mainly from her own writings, the character of a Chris
tian, whose experience of the power of sin and of the power of grace, was deeper
than is usual, and whose example of usefulness to others gives beautiful evidence
of the reality of her own principles of character. We have been much interested
in looking over this volume, and rejoice in recommending it to our readers. They
will find it an uncommonly interesting and instructive biography, worthy of its ex
cellent author, and adapted to be eminently useful to themselves.
From the Christian Intelligencer.
This is a well-written biography of an amiable and devoted Christian, who pleas
antly and beautifully exhibited the Christian character in the different relations of
life and in her early death. The reader will be pleased with the spirit and sentiments
of her early correspondence introduced and scattered throughout the volume. It is
calculated to be useful and edifying, and we freely recommend it to our readers. It
is published in a beautiful style. From tho Christian Watchman.
The interesting subject of this memoir was born at East Haddam, Conn., Janua
ry 18, 1809, and died August 2, 1830. Books of this description are sure to obtain
readers, and therefore we sincerely wish they always combined as much solid in
struction with affecting and interesting narrative, as we find in this volume. " He
that winneth souls is wise." Every endeavor, therefore, to secure so important an
object, which is not at variance with the principles and the spirit of revelation, is
wise also. As the author fervently prays, so we sincerely hope this work " may
subserve the interests of our holy religion, and be the means of leading many to the
fountain of eternal life."
It isa lamentable fact, but one we suppose no one will venture to deny, that there
ore persons who, though they cannot be prevailed upon to read a few pages of a
book of this kind, would need no persuasion to sit down and peruse any of Bul-
wer's novels, from the preface to the finis, without suffering their attention to be
interrupted. A person can hardly read this volume without feeling that, for the
time at least, ho is a wiser and a better man. The author has produced a book
alike creditable to the powers of his mind and to the devotional feelings of his
heart; and which, in our opinion, justly entitles him to the thanks of the religious
public, among whom we sincerely hope it will obtain an extensive circulation and
an attentive perusal. From the New York Evangelist.
In the memoir of Mrs. Taylor, the reader will see chiefly " an illustration of the
work of the Holy Spirit in awakening, renewing, and sanctifying the heart." He

CATALOGUE OF BOOKS.
will see an humble female, born in Connecticut, and reared under the genial influ
ence of that blessed atmosphere so prevalent in the land of the Pilgrims, becoming
first a teacher of youth in her native state, then in New York city. With a mind
well cultivated and of a respectable order of talent, with a heart formed for friend
ship, and keenly alive to ihe purest and tenderest sensibilities ; she was such a one
as almost any one would wish their daughters to be. Her piety was of a high order
even from the first, and no wonder ; she had been an object of the prayers and ex
hortations of Harlan Page. The closing scenes exhibit, in no small degree, the tri
umphs of Christian faith. The biographer has done his work well, interweaving,
page by page, in an easy, natural manner, delightful lessons from real life.
The book is a beautiful specimen of the printer's art, and shows also, in the por
trait prefixed and the vignette title-page, the engraver's skill. The bookurcU be read,
and seldom, we hope, without profit.
From the Christian Advocate and Journal.
This memoir is an illustration of the work of the Holy Spirit, in awakening, re
newing and sanctifying the heart. Mrs. Taylor was in many respects an extraor
dinary woman ; and her biographer has performed his task in a style of great excel
lence. The narrative of her conviction and contrition, which is here given, is deeply
affecting and instructive, by reason of its protracted character, as well as the circum
stances which kept her so long without the "joy in believing," which she after
wards found to have been her privilege. That her's was the true " godly sorrow
which worketh repentance unto salvation," no one can doubt; and yet she was for
many years, the subject of its anguish and mental agony, before she received the
" spirit of adoption, or had the " witnesses in herself" of which the apostle speaks.
Subsequently, her enlightened piety, her growth in grace, and her experience ofthe
fulness of the blessing ofthe Gospel of peace, made her a " burning and a shining
light." In these days of degeneracy, her memoir is a most timely publication,
showing, as it does, an eminent example of Christian experience and practice, un
sophisticated by any of the dogmas of scholastic divinity.
Mrs. Taylor was an humble, sincere, fervent, and consistent Christian, in sickness
and in health, living and dying, exemplifying the truth, power, and preciousness of
our holy religion. Intellectually, she was a woman of high order ; and her early
and devoted piety, her patience and resignation in affliction, her victory over death,
all demonstrate that she was a witness of the washing and regeneration, and the
renewal of the Holy Ghost.
Would that our young ladies would read her memoir, imbibe her spirit, share her
enjoyments, and participate in her blessedness here and hereafter.

CATALOGUE OF BOOKS.
THEOPNEUSTY, or the Plenary Inspiration ofthe Holy Scriptures, by S.
R. L. Gaussen, Professor of Theology in the new Theological School of
Geneva, Switzerland. Third American, from the second French edition,
revised and enlarged by the author. Translated by the Rev. Edward
Norris Kirk, 1 vol. 12mo., - - $0 75
AIDS TO PREACHING AND HEARING, by Rev. Thos. H. Skinner,
D. D., 1 vol. 12mo. - 1 00
MEMOIR OF THE LATE REV. WM. NEVINS, D. D., 1 vol. 12mo., 75
LECTURES ON UNIVERSALISM, by Rev. Joel Parker, D. D., President
of the New York Theological Seminary, 12mo., - - 75
JACOB WRESTLING WITH THE ANGEL, and SOLOMON THE
8HULAMITE, by Krummacher, author of Elijah the Tishbite, 1 vol.
12mo., - - - - - 75
CORNELIUS THE CENTURIAN, by Krummacher, 1 vol. 12mo., - 75
SERMONS ON REVIVALS, by Rev. Albert Barnes, with an Introduction
by Rev. Joel Parker, D. D., 1 vol. ISmo., ... 38
A VOICE FROM ANTIQUITY, to the Men of the Nineteenth Century;
or, Read the Book. By J. H. Merle D'Aubigne, author of the " History
of the Reformation in the Sixteenth Century," 1 vol. 18mo., - 25
THE VOICE OF THE CHURCH ONE, Under all the Successive Forms
of Christianity ; by J. H. Merle D'Aubigne", D. D., 1 vol. 18mo., - 25
PUSEYISM EXAMINED, by J. H. Merle D'Aubigne, D. D ; with an In
troductory Notice of the Author, by Robert Baird, 1 vol. ISmo. 25
THE CONFESSION OF CHRIST, by J. H. Merle A'Aubigne, D. D., 1
vol. 18mo., - - - - ... 25
FAITH AND KNOWLEDGE, by J. A. Merle D'Aubigne', D. D., 1 vol.
18mo., - - 25
THE CHURCH IN THE WILDERNESS, and other Fragments, from
the Study of a Pastor, by Gardiner Spring, Pastor of the Brick Presby
terian Church in the City of New York, 1 vol. 12mo., - . 50
THE BACKSLIDER, by Andrew Fuller, with an Introduction by John
Angell James, ISmo., ' - ... . gj
SERMONS, by Hugh Blair, D. D., to which is prefixed the Life and Char
acter of the Author, by James Finlayson, D. D., 1 vol. 8vo. - - 2 00
OBLIGATIONS OF THE WORLD TO THE BIBLE, by Gardiner
Spring, D. D., 1 vol. 12mo., . . j qq
A VISIT TO NORTHERN EUROPE, or Sketches, Descriptive, Histori
cal, Political, and Moral, of Denmark, Norway, Sweden, and Finland,
and the Free cities of Hamburg and Lubeck; containing notices of the
Manners and Customs, Commerce, Manufactures, Arts, and Sciences
Education, Literature, and Religion of those Countries and Cities. By
the Rev. Robert Baird, with Maps and numerous Engravings, 2 vols
12mo, - - - -' 2 00
HEROINES OF SACRED HISTORY, by Mrs. Steel, 1 vol. 18mo, 50
A SUMMER JOURNEY IN THE WEST, by Mrs. Steel, author of " He
roines of Sacred History," 1 vol. 12mo,

EMANUEL ON THE CROSS, AND IN THE GARDEN, by R P Bud-
dicom, 1 vol. 12mo. - ... .
THE FAMILY OF BETHANY, by L. Bonnot; with an Introductory Es
say, by the Rev. Hugh White, 1 vol. 18mo., - ...
THE ADOPTED CHILD, or the necessity of Early Piety, by the author
ol " Emma, or the Lost Found," 1 vol. ISmo., - . .
THE STORY OF GRACE, the Little Sufferer, 1 vol. 18mo
AmlTl^A^t; by the Rev- N-p°Ieon R-u--!-. -~*« *»
THE LILY OF THE VALLEY, by Mrs. Sherwood, - . . ." 3,
SHANTY, THE BLACKSMITH, by Mrs. Sherwood, • - . . 50

50
6338
3131
31

CATALOGUE OF BOOKS.
THE TRAVELLER or the Wonders of Art, 1 vol. 18mo.
MEMOIR OF THE TELLSTORM, the first Swedish Missionary to Lap
land, with an Appendix giving an account of the Stockholm Mission,
by the Rev. George Scott, 1 vol. 18mo., ....
FLOWER FADED, by the Rev. John Angell James, 1 vol. ISmo., -
MEMOIR OF MARTHA, by John Angell James, 1 vol. 18mo„
.MEMOIR OF CHARLES LATHROP WINSLOW, 1 vol. 18mo.,
CLOSING SCENES OF THE LIFE OF SAMUEL WISDOM, illus
trating the usefulness of Tract Distribution, and Sabbath School In
struction, 1 vol. ISmo., -
THE SABBATH SCHOOL TEACHER'S PATTERN, AND A WORD
FOR ALL, by John Angell James,
COUNSELS TO THE YOUNG, by Rev. A. Alexander. D. D., -
SELF CULTIVATION, by Tryon Edwards,
EARLY PIETY, by Rev. Jacob Abbott, - - - -
THE CHRISTIAN POCKET COMPANION, selected from the works of
President Edwards and otheis,
The above four vols. 32mo., in gilt edges, at 31 cts. each,
HISTORY OF THE SANDWICH ISLANDS, by the Rev. Shelden Dib
ble, Missionary to those Islands, 1 vol. 12mo.,
GENEVA AND ROME, by S. R. L. Gaussen, 1 vol. 18mo.,
REFLECTIONS ON FLOWERS, by Rev. James Hervey, authorof "Medi
tations Among the Tombs," 1 vol. 18mo.,
TRANSPLANTED FLOWERS, or Memoirs of Mrs. Rumff, and the
Duchesse de Broglie, with an appendix, by the Rev. Robert Baird,!
vol. 18mo., - - - - -
HINTS FOR MOTHERS, by a Lady, 1 vol. 18mo.,
A TALE OF THE HUGUENOTS, or Memoirs of a French Refugee Fam
ily ; translated from the Manuscripts of James Fontaine, by a Lady —
with an introduction, by Francis L. Hawkes, D. D., 1 vol. 18mo.,
ROCKY ISLAND, and other Parables, by Samuel Wilberforce, M. A., I vol.
18mo.,
THE LITTLE WANDERERS, by Sam'l Wilberforce, M. A., 1 vol. 18mo.
THE KING AND HIS SERVANTS, by Samuel Wilberforce, M. A., 1
vol. 18mo., - 
THE PROPHET'S GUARD, by Samuel Wilberforce, M. A., 1 vol. 18mo,
ADVICE TO A YOUNG CHRISTIAN, by a village Pastor, with an In
troduction, by Rev. Dr. Alexander (new edition), 1 vol. 18mo.,
THE WAY OF SAFETY, by the Rev. L. E. Lathrop, D. D., 1 vol. 18mo.,
BIOGRAPHY OF THE SAVIOUR AND HIS APOSTLES, with Por
traits done on Steel, 1 vol. 18mo.,
POETRY FOR THE YOUNG, in two parts, Moral and Miscellaneous, 1
vol. ISmo.,
THE WORLD'S RELIGION, as contrasted with genuine Christianity, by
Lady Colquhoun, 1 vol. 18mo.,
THE CHRISTIAN CITIZEN, by the Rev. A. D. Eddy, of Newark, 1 vol.
12mo.,
THE ELEMENTS OF ASTRONOMY, designed as an Introduction to the
Study, 1 vol. 18mo.,
MURRAYS INTRODUCTION TO THE ENGLISH READER, 12mo.,
large type, - -
MURRAY'S ENGLISH READER, 12mo., large type,
MURRAY'S SEQUEL TO THE ENGLISH READER, 12mo., large type,
THE SHORTER CATECHISM of the Reverend Assembly of Divines,
with proofs thereof out of the Scriptures, in words at length, 18mo., $5
per 100.

YALE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY

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