powered it. The secret sins of men's hearts were never laid more bare than in the reigns of Henry VIII., Edward VI., and during the time of the Great Rebellion. The watchword was reform; but the end was gain. Never did that politic historian speak more advisedly true, than when he said, Cæterum, libertas, et speciosa nomina prætexuntur; nec quisquam alienum servitium, et dominationem sibi concupivit, ut non eadem ista vocabula usurparit3. It will ever be found that workers of iniquity turn "religion into rebellion, and faith into faction." There is no blotting out from our annals what led to the martyrdom of Charles I., and of the religious-hearted, but hasty-tempered, Laud *!

In disturbed towns the clergy can never be too cautious. Wary also they should be as regards a sort of people, who, when occasion serves, will make overtures of peace, whilst war and every dishonest motive is rankling in their hearts. There is an old saying, too, worthy to be borne in mind, that the devil is none the less the knave, when he seems to play the fool. Some such overtures of peace, and some such folly was attempted during the recent years of disturbance. Who remembers not how it was attempted, by a mock sort of pity, to raise what were called the working clergy, and working curates, into notice, by the depreciation of their ecclesiastical superiors? Who remembers not the whining, canting, tone with which the bitterest enemies of the Establishment, and of holy men, the bishops of the land, endeavoured to detract from their efficiency, as ministers of Christ, by showing, as they thought, the mean estate to which they consigned their inferior clergy? None can fail to remember this; and some, it may be, might have turned their school-boy lesson to account:

"Quidquid id est, timeo Danaos et dona ferentes!"

The

The words of sorrow and pity came from a wrong source. tears were over-miserably expressed, and were too globular, like

3 Tacit. Histor. lib. iv. c. 73.

4 Clarendon mentions his " hasty sharp way of expressing himself," adding in a subsequent page, “which, upon a short recollection, he was always sorry for, and most readily and heartily would make acknowledgment." Vol. i. pp. 159 and 176. Hist. of the Rebellion. See what South says, vol. iv. p. 95.

crocodiles'! But, in sober and serious strain, many no doubt were deluded; and the different letters written at that time in various periodicals and newspapers attest the fact. Youth was more readily led astray; and there were those again, whose poverty, it may be, rather than their will, consented. But the fact is none the less notorious; and ecclesiastical superiors, who were doing all they could, whether to turn or to moderate and guide the stream of democratic violence which had set in, were hardly supported as they ought to have been. Happily, well educated and thoughtful men saw through the flimsy veil of hypocrisy which was extended for the ruin of the thoughtless, and the evil hoped for by subtlety and deceit was in a great measure averted. Harm nevertheless was done; and there was rashness of speech, and a sort of concession made, which an adversary knew but too well how to make use of. But for the present this evil is overpast; and the simple truth, stripped of words, is acknowledged readily,—καὶ οὗτοι δὲ δοκιμαζέσθωσαν πρτоν. Proof of worth and ability should first be given, or ever higher advancement be looked for. When this is the case, the working clergy will seldom find themselves past by; or, should they be reproached, as was Socrates of old, for having no preferment in Athens, they may make answer with him,—It was enough for him to have fitted himself for preferment: it was other men's business to bestow it on him. But on this head, and on all others so closely connected with unity in our Church, the business of all is to follow their great Exemplar :

"And through obedience travel to perfection,
Studying their wills unto his will to bring,
Yield trust and honour both to his discretion:
And when they do from his example swerve,
Beare witnesse to themselves they ill deserve "."

When such was the state of things, it was not to be wondered at that a low sectarian spirit, combined with mean utilitarian notions, should have increased. It is, in fact, natural; and we may discern it to be the case, more or less, in all times of political excitement. Self-interest, and a Pharisaic spirit, personal

51 Tim. iii. 10.

6 Lord Brooke. Of Humane Learning.

advancement and schism, are quite compatible. Let the earliest instances of separation and dissent from the Holy Catholic Church be fairly looked to; let even what took place previous to the Council of Nice (A.D. 325) be impartially canvassed, and the same conclusion cannot fail to be arrived at, namely, that “Pope Self" has been a character more influential in the world, and has made greater conquests, than a Sesostris or an Alexander.

But one of the great peculiarities of later times is this, that individuals contrive to dissent from the Articles and the Liturgy of the Church to which they belong, and yet, by a dispensation from themselves, to remain members of the same, and to enjoy its emoluments". It was curious to observe this some few years ago with what is called the Low Church. It is none the less curious to observe it now in the case of those who designate themselves the High Church, discarding the very name of Protestant. There is no better proof of the trite observation that extremes meet. Of this, however, it will be necessary to speak again, and at greater length. Meanwhile let me point out what was aimed at by separatists, who were really such, but who, as before observed, had a sufficient regard to personal aggrandizement. And rightly, as some said, for the wicked, by which the members of the Establishment were very commonly intended::

"The wicked have no right

To th' creature, though usurp'd by might,
The property is in the saint,

From whom they injuriously detain't."

From what has since transpired, there can be little doubt, I think, but that very many amongst what might be called the wildest dissenters were encouraged in the hope that the time was come when the Church of England was to be counted but as one sect, amongst many, and no longer denominated a branch of

7 South says of the conforming Puritan that "He is one who lives by the altar, and turns his back upon it; one who catches at the preferments of the Church, but hates the discipline and orders of it; one who practises conformity, as papists take oaths and tests, that is, with an inward abhorrence of what he does for the present, and a resolution to act quite contrary when occasion serves.”—Sermons, vol. iv. p.

192.

8 Hudibras, Part I. ii. 1010.

that Holy Catholic Church throughout all the world, which had numbered saints and martyrs in her pale, and whose chief glory it was to be truly and rightfully apostolic, through that ordination which Christ had enjoined. For this reason all rites and ordinances were made light of, authority was disregarded, and, by a specious fallacy, all traditional knowledge, soberly and religiously received, was confounded with tradition, as received in the Romish Church, hereby intimating that the Church of England was no true mother, but that she held still to vain and superstitious practices, and needed liberty, almost as much as did the Jewish Church of old, from the yoke of human ordinances. Such notions were industriously spread abroad, not only in our great towns, but even in our most secluded hamlets. "Under the

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existing parochial system," said the party, every village is a see, as well as Rome;" and yet again-so curiously do the phrases which Butler has preserved in his striking poem come round-whether as regards Churchman, Presbyterian, or Independent :

"Every hamlet's governed

By's Holiness, the Church's head,
More haughty and severe in's place
Than Gregory and Boniface "."

And then, again, the old game was resorted to of declaring that the Gospel was not preached. This, as observers are well aware of, is the constant watchword of a separatist. Without it he can have no ground to stand on. It was thus that the Great Rebellion was blown up, and the "Gospel trumpeter" to battle sounded. It was our separatists and dissenters-as South' declares over and over again, in his inimitable (though sometimes bitter) Sermons, which contain perhaps the best religious history of those sad and melancholy days-that were the Pope's journeymen to carry on his work. They looked, it may be, different ways, but their end was one.

9 Hudibras, Part I. iii. 1209.

By crying down the

1 See especially a Sermon on Gal. ii. 5. Vol. vii. p. 514. "So that let all our separatists and dissenters know that they themselves are the Pope's artificers, to carry on his work, and do that for him, which he cannot do for himself," &c. &c.

Church of England, and depreciating her ministry, they led the way, as many of them no doubt intended, to those secessions towards Rome, which followed them, as they have done in more recent times. The poor ignorant multitude were deluded and led astray, as is ever the case-the leaders only became grand muftis-whether after Geneva's fashion or Rome's. These were they who styled themselves the godly, arrogating and engrossing all holiness unto themselves and their party, and doing more harm in this distracted kingdom than ever had been done before. Happy will that day be for the nation and the national Church when the ranks of Rome shall no more be fed by dissent and separation, and by those insidious distinctions of High and Low Church, which are the ruin of all peace, and a death-blow to unity! South, in an epistle dedicatory to Narcissus, Archbishop of Dublin, never spoke with deeper foresight than in the words which follow: :- "Those of the ancienter members of her communion, who have all along owned, and contended for a strict conformity to her rules and sanctions, as the surest course to establish her, have been of late represented, or rather reprobated, under the inodiating character of High Churchmen, and thereby stand marked out for all the discouragement that spite and power together can pass upon them; while those of the contrary way and principle are distinguished, or rather sanctified, by the fashionable endearing name of Low Churchmen, not from their affecting, we may be sure, a lower condition in the Church than others, (since none look so low, but they can look as high,) but from the low condition which the authors of this distinction would fain bring the Church itself into,—a work in which they have made no small progress already. And thus by these ungenerous, as well as unconscionable practices, a fatal rent and division is made amongst us; and being so, I think those of the concision who made it, would do well to consider whether that, which our Saviour assures us will destroy a kingdom, be the likeliest way to settle and support a Church. But I question not but that these dividers will very shortly receive thanks from the Papists for the good services they have done them, and in the mean time they may be sure of their scoffs "." Sad and no less melancholy truth!

2 Sermons, vol. ii. p. 226.