ric of Lichfield. From hence, after a few months, he was CHARLES translated to London; and from thence, within a year, to the reign of Elizabeth, gave much offence; as resembling too nearly the practice of the Romish inquisition. "To show the great alienation from the Churches reformed after the Presbyterian model, Laud advised, that the discipline and worship of the Church should be imposed on the English regiments and trading companies abroad. All foreigners of the Dutch and Walloon congregations were commanded to attend the Established Church, and indulgence was granted to none after the children of the first denizens. Scudamore too, the king's ambassador at Paris, had orders to withdraw himself from the communion of the Hugonots. Even men of sense were apt to blame this conduct, not only because it gave offence in England, but because in foreign countries it lost the crown the advantage of being considered as the head and support of the Reformation. "On pretence of pacifying disputes, orders were issued from the council, forbidding, on both sides, all preaching and printing with regard to the controverted points of predestination and free-will. But it was complained of, and probably with reason, that the impartiality was altogether confined to the orders, and that the execution of them was only meant against the Calvinists. "In return for Charles's indulgence towards the Church, Laud and his followers took care to magnify, on every occasion, the regal authority, and to treat with the utmost disdain or detestation, all puritanical pretensions to a free and independent 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 the royal rights, the most incontestible; in order to exalt the hierarchy, and 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 charter 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 in spiritual subjects, was refused to profane laymen: ecclesiastical courts were held by the bishops in their own name, without any notice taken of the king's authority: and Charles, though extremely jealous of every claim in popular assemblies, seemed rather to encourage than repress those encroachments of his clergy. Having felt many sensible inconveniences from the independent spirit of parliaments, he attached himself entirely to those who professed a devoted obedience to his crown and person; nor did he foresee that the ecclesiastical power which he exalted, not admitting of any precise boundary, might in time become more dangerous to public peace, and no less fatal to royal prerogative, than the other. : "So early as the coronation, Laud was the person, according to general opinion, that introduced a novelty, which, though overlooked by Charles, made a deep impression on many of the bystanders. After the usual ceremonies, these words were recited to the king: Stand and hold fast, from henceforth, the place to which you have been heir by the succession of your forefathers, being now delivered to you by the authority of Almighty God, and by the hands of us and all the bishops and servants of God. And, as you see the clergy to come nearer the altar than others, so remember that, in all places convenient, you give them greater honour; that the Mediator of God and man may establish you on the kingly throne, to be a mediator betwixt the clergy and the laity; and that you may reign for ever with Jesus Christ, the King of kings, and Lord of lords.' "The principles which exalted prerogative, were not entertained by the king merely as soft and agreeable to his royal ears: they were also put in practice during the time that he ruled without parliaments. Though frugal and regular in his expense, he wanted money for the support of government; and he levied it either by the revival of obsolete laws, or by violations, some more open, some more disguised, of the privileges of the 1. Abp. Cant. ABBOT, Canterbury. He had passed through prosperity and adversity some very sensible instances. He has the character of a good preacher, of an unblemished conversation. As to the governing part, he was not altogether so happy he was apparently somewhat leaning towards the Puritan persuasion. Under this disposition, he is reported over remiss in his discipline. By holding the reins thus loose, the people were practised upon by the Dissenters, and gained over to Calvinism. The ceremonies of the Church were neglected; and thus, in many places, the worship of God being left too much at discretion, the pressing conformity afterwards was clamoured Hamond. against, and interpreted to rigour and innovation. Further: archbishop Abbot is taxed with unfriendliness to those of his own function; that he browbeat the inferior clergy, and discovered a partiality to the rich laity, in causes brought before him. To defend himself against this imputation, his answer was, "that he was so severe to the clergy on purpose to rescue them from the severity of others, and to prevent the punishment of them by lay-judges, to their greater shame.” L'Estrange, Hist. of Fuller's Ch. Hist. book 11. p. 128. But this excuse is a harsh reflection upon the conduct of the clergy, and supposes them remarkably defective, either in common honesty or common discretion. However, these singularities, together with his relaxation of discipline, are no disproofs of integrity: his meaning might be good, though his measures fell short of exactness. As for his benefactions, he built a fair hospital at Guildford, and settled a plentiful endowment. After Abbot's death, the king was at no loss about a nomination. He had already resolved upon his successor; and, ་ nation. Though humane and gentle in his temper, he gave way to a few severities in the Star-chamber and High Commission, which seemed necessary, in order to support the present mode of administration, and repress the rising spirit of liberty throughout the kingdom. Under these two heads may be reduced all the remarkable transactions of this reign, during some years: for, in peaceable and prosperous times, where a neutrality in foreign affairs is observed, scarcely any thing is remarkable, but what is, in some degree, blamed or blameable. And, lest the hope of relief or protection from parliament might encourage opposition, Charles issued a proclamation, in which he declared, That whereas, for several ill ends, the calling again of a parliament is divulged; though his majesty has shown, by frequent meetings with his people, his love to the use of parliaments yet the late abuse having, for the present, driven him unwillingly out of that course; he will account it presumption for any one to prescribe to him any time for the calling of that assembly.' This was generally construed as a declaration, that, during this reign, no more parliaments were intended to be summoned. And every measure of the king's confirmed a suspicion, so disagreeable to the generality of the people." when Laud-who travelled slower than the court-came off his CHARLES I. of Canter Scotland journey, and waited on the king, his majesty saluted Laud suchim with this expression,-" My lord's grace of Canterbury, ceeds him you are very welcome." In six weeks the customary forms in the see for the translation were gone through, and the archbishop bury. settled at Lambeth, where, at his coming, he made a splendid Sept. 19, entertainment. A.D. 1633. The first directions he received from court referred to the business of ordinations. To secure the clergy from indigence and dependence, it was provided by the canons, that none Can. 33. should be ordained without a title. Now, a title for maintenance is thus settled by the Church. The person to be ordained must either exhibit his presentation to some benefice within the diocese of the bishop ordaining, or bring an unquestionable certificate of his being provided of a curacy in the said diocese, or that he is assured of officiating as deacon or priest in some cathedral or collegiate-church, or that he can make proof of his being a fellow or chaplain in some college in Cambridge or Oxford, or that he is five years standing master of arts and lives in one of the universities upon his own charge, or, lastly, the bishop who ordains him must engage to prefer him shortly to some cure then void. Notwithstanding the precaution of this canon, ordinations were sometimes passed to slender qualifications, either of title or merit; and thus these clergy, being unfurnished with a maintenance, turned lecturers or chaplains, and were frequently entertained upon terms of disadvantage. By being supported in a precarious manner, they lay more obnoxious to unhandsome compliance; and, when their patrons were factious or schismatical, they were in danger of deserting from their duty. By his majesty's instructions, in the year 1629, it was ordered, that no lay-gentleman, Ibid. not qualified by law, should entertain a chaplain. But it was not long before this order was disregarded in several families; and therefore, to retrench the number of lecturers and household priests, it was thought fit to stop the source of this inconvenience, and refresh the observing the canon above-mentioned upon the bishops. To this purpose, the king, at the instance of the archbishop, sent him the following letter: "CHARLES REX. The king's "Most reverend father in God, right trusty and right letter to the LAUD, entirely beloved counsellor, we greet you well. Abp. Cant. bishops touching There is nothing more dear to us than the preservation of true religion, as it is now settled and established in this our kingdom, to the ordinations. honour of God, the great comfort of ourself and our loyal people; and there can nothing more conduce to the advancement thereof than the strict observation of such canons of the Church as concern those who are to take orders in their several times, more especially of keeping that particular canon which enjoins that no man be made a priest without a title: for we find that many not so qualified do, by favour or other means, procure themselves to be ordained, and afterwards, for want of means, wander up and down, to the scandal of their calling, or, to get maintenance, fall upon such courses as are most unfit for them, both by humouring their auditors, and other ways altogether unsufferable. We have therefore thought fit, and we do hereby straitly command, require, and charge you to call such bishops to you as are now present in or near our city of London, and to acquaint them with this our resolution. And further, that you fail not, in the beginning of the next term, to give notice of this our will and pleasure openly in our High Commission Court; and that you call in to the said court every bishop respectively that shall presume to give orders to any man that hath not a title, and there to censure him as the canon aforesaid doth enjoin, (which is, to maintain the party so ordered till he give him a title,) and with what other censure you in justice shall think fit. And our further will is, that nothing shall be reputed a title to enable a man for orders but that which is so by the ancient course of the Church and the canon law, so far forth as that law is received in this our Church of England. And, as you must not fail in these our directions, nor in any part of them, so we expect that you give us from time to time a strict account of your proceedings in the 758. same. "Given under our signet, at our palace of Westminster, September 19th, in the ninth year of our reign, 1633." The archbishop, pursuant to his majesty's order, convened his suffragans in or near the town, acquainted them with the scandal and danger of uncautious ordinations, pressed their managing this affair by the strictness of the canon, and deli I. vered them a copy of his majesty's letters. These letters were CHARLES likewise transmitted to the bishops in the country, and others of the same tenor sent by the king to the archbishop of York. at the assizes Somerset About this time, the king published his declaration concern- The judges ing lawful sports. The occasion of it was this: some of the at Exeter judges had lately made orders at the assizes for suppressing all and in revels, church-ales, clerk-ales, and bid-ales', on the Sunday, shire supThe publishing this order was enjoined the parochial clergy on &c. press wakes, the first Sunday in February every year. These regulations were thought to exceed the restraints of the statutes made in the first and third years of this reign, for the better keeping the Lord's-day; and in this business sir Thomas Richardson, chief justice of the King's Bench, was particularly active at the Lent assizes in Somersetshire. The enjoining the clergy to publish the judges' orders in their churches was looked upon as an imposition, and an encroachment, over and above, on the ecclesiastical courts. Laud, then bishop of London, complained of this usage to the king, who commanded the chief justice to discharge the order at the next assizes. Richardson was so far from obeying his majesty, that he confirmed his former proceedings, and made them more menacing than before. This hardy step was resented by the principal gentry of the country. The king, likewise much displeased with Richardson's resolution, commanded the bishop of London to write to the bishop of Bath and Wells for an account of matter of fact, and in what manner the wakes and other festivals were managed. Upon the receipt of this letter, Bath and Wells sent for above seventy clergymen of character, living in the country. These divines certified under their hands, "that, on the festivals, (which commonly fell on the Sunday,) divine service was most solemnly performed, and the congregation fuller, both in the forenoon and in the afternoon, than upon any other Sunday; that the people desired they might be continued; and that the clergy in most places were of the same sentiment. They believed these annual solemnities serviceable for preserving the memory of the dedication of churches, for making up differences by the meeting of friends, for cultivating a good correspondence among neighbours, and for refreshing the poor with the entertainments made upon those anniversaries." Whether these reasons for keeping up the wakes, &c., were stronger than the Ale, a merry meeting used in country places.-Warton. |