No More Learning

It seems hard to impute
laxity of principle to persons who undoubtedly made a great sacrifice
to principle. And yet experience abundantly proves that many who are
capable of making a great sacrifice, when their blood is heated by
conflict, and when the public eye is fixed upon them, are not capable of
persevering long in the daily practice of obscure virtues. It is by no
means improbable that zealots may have given their lives for a religion
which had never effectually restrained their vindictive or their
licentious passions. We learn indeed from fathers of the highest
authority that, even in the purest ages of the Church, some confessors,
who had manfully refused to save themselves from torments and death
by throwing frankincense on the altar of Jupiter, afterwards brought
scandal on the Christian name by gross fraud and debauchery, [479] For
the nonjuring divines great allowance must in fairness be made. They
were doubtless in a most trying situation. In general, a schism, which
divides a religious community, divides the laity as well as the clergy.
The seceding pastors therefore carry with them a large part of their
flocks, and are consequently assured of a maintenance. But the schism of
1689 scarcely extended beyond the clergy. The law required the rector to
take the oaths, or to quit his living: but no oath, no acknowledgment of
the title of the new King and Queen, was required from the parishioner
as a qualification for attending divine service, or for receiving the
Eucharist. Not one in fifty, therefore, of those laymen who disapproved
of the Revolution thought himself bound to quit his pew in the old
church, where the old liturgy was still read, and where the old
vestments were still worn, and to follow the ejected priest to a
conventicle, a conventicle, too, which was not protected by the
Toleration Act. Thus the new sect was a sect of preachers without
hearers; and such preachers could not make a livelihood by preaching. In
London, indeed, and in some other large towns, those vehement Jacobites,
whom nothing would satisfy but to hear King James and the Prince of
Wales prayed for by name, were sufficiently numerous to make up a few
small congregations, which met secretly, and under constant fear of
the constables, in rooms so mean that the meeting houses of the Puritan
dissenters might by comparison be called palaces. Even Collier, who had
all the qualities which attract large audiences, was reduced to be the
minister of a little knot of malecontents, whose oratory was on a second
floor in the city. But the nonjuring clergymen who were able to obtain
even a pittance by officiating at such places were very few. Of the
rest some had independent means: some lived by literature: one or two
practised physic. Thomas Wagstaffe, for example, who had been Chancellor
of Lichfield, had many patients, and made himself conspicuous by always
visiting them in full canonicals, [480] But these were exceptions.
Industrious poverty is a state by no means unfavourable to virtue: but
it is dangerous to be at once poor and idle; and most of the clergymen
who had refused to swear found themselves thrown on the world with
nothing to eat and with nothing to do. They naturally became beggars and
loungers. Considering themselves as martyrs suffering in a public cause,
they were not ashamed to ask any good churchman for a guinea. Most of
them passed their lives in running about from one Tory coffeehouse to
another, abusing the Dutch, hearing and spreading reports that within
a month His Majesty would certainly be on English ground, and wondering
who would have Salisbury when Burnet was hanged. During the session
of Parliament the lobbies and the Court of Requests were crowded with
deprived parsons, asking who was up, and what the numbers were on the
last division. Many of the ejected divines became domesticated, as
chaplains, tutors and spiritual directors, in the houses of opulent
Jacobites. In a situation of this kind, a man of pure and exalted
character, such a man as Ken was among the nonjurors, and Watts among
the nonconformists, may preserve his dignity, and may much more
than repay by his example and his instructions the benefits which he
receives. But to a person whose virtue is not high toned this way of
life is full of peril. If he is of a quiet disposition, he is in danger
of sinking into a servile, sensual, drowsy parasite. If he is of an
active and aspiring nature, it may be feared that he will become expert
in those bad arts by which, more easily than by faithful service,
retainers make themselves agreeable or formidable. To discover the weak
side of every character, to flatter every passion and prejudice, to sow
discord and jealousy where love and confidence ought to exist, to watch
the moment of indiscreet openness for the purpose of extracting secrets
important to the prosperity and honour of families, such are the
practices by which keen and restless spirits have too often avenged
themselves for the humiliation of dependence. The public voice loudly
accused many nonjurors of requiting the hospitality of their benefactors
with villany as black as that of the hypocrite depicted in the
masterpiece of Moliere. Indeed, when Cibber undertook to adapt that
noble comedy to the English stage, he made his Tartuffe a nonjuror:
and Johnson, who cannot be supposed to have been prejudiced against the
nonjurors, frankly owned that Cibber had done them no wrong, [481]

There can be no doubt that the schism caused by the oaths would have
been far more formidable, if, at this crisis, any extensive change had
been made in the government or in the ceremonial of the Established
Church. It is a highly instructive fact that those enlightened and
tolerant divines who most ardently desired such a change afterwards saw
reason to be thankful that their favourite project had failed.

Whigs and Tories had in the late Session combined to get rid of
Nottingham's Comprehension Bill by voting an address which requested the
King to refer the whole subject to the Convocation. Burnet foresaw the
effect of this vote. The whole scheme, he said, was utterly ruined,
[482] Many of his friends, however, thought differently; and among these
was Tillotson. Of all the members of the Low Church party Tillotson
stood highest in general estimation. As a preacher, he was thought
by his contemporaries to have surpassed all rivals living or dead.
Posterity has reversed this judgment. Yet Tillotson still keeps his
place as a legitimate English classic. His highest flights were indeed
far below those of Taylor, of Barrow, and of South; but his oratory was
more correct and equable than theirs. No quaint conceits, no pedantic
quotations from Talmudists and scholiasts, no mean images, buffoon
stories, scurrilous invectives, ever marred the effect of his grave and
temperate discourses. His reasoning was just sufficiently profound and
sufficiently refined to be followed by a popular audience with that
slight degree of intellectual exertion which is a pleasure. His style
is not brilliant; but it is pure, transparently clear, and equally free
from the levity and from the stiffness which disfigure the sermons of
some eminent divines of the seventeenth century. He is always serious:
yet there is about his manner a certain graceful ease which marks him
as a man who knows the world, who has lived in populous cities and in
splendid courts, and who has conversed, not only with books, but with
lawyers and merchants, wits and beauties, statesmen and princes.
The greatest charm of his compositions, however, is deriven from the
benignity and candour which appear in every line, and which shone forth
not less conspicuously in his life than in his writings.

As a theologian, Tillotson was certainly not less latitudinarian than
Burnet. Yet many of those clergymen to whom Burnet was an object of
implacable aversion spoke of Tillotson with tenderness and respect.
It is therefore not strange that the two friends should have formed
different estimates of the temper of the priesthood, and should
have expected different results from the meeting of the Convocation.
Tillotson was not displeased with the vote of the Commons. He conceived
that changes made in religious institutions by mere secular authority
might disgust many churchmen, who would yet be perfectly willing to
vote, in an ecclesiastical synod, for changes more extensive still; and
his opinion had great weight with the King, [483] It was resolved that
the Convocation should meet at the beginning of the next session
of Parliament, and that in the meantime a commission should issue
empowering some eminent divines to examine the Liturgy, the canons, and
the whole system of jurisprudence administered by the Courts Christian,
and to report on the alterations which it might be desirable to make,
[484]

Most of the Bishops who had taken the oaths were in this commission;
and with them were joined twenty priests of great note. Of the twenty
Tillotson was the most important: for he was known to speak the sense
both of the King and of the Queen. Among those Commissioners who looked
up to Tillotson as their chief were Stillingfleet, Dean of Saint Paul's,
Sharp, Dean of Norwich, Patrick, Dean of Peterborough, Tenison, Rector
of Saint Martin's, and Fowler, to whose judicious firmness was chiefly
to be ascribed the determination of the London clergy not to read the
Declaration of Indulgence.

With such men as those who have been named were mingled some divines who
belonged to the High Church party. Conspicuous among these were two
of the rulers of Oxford, Aldrich and Jane. Aldrich had recently been
appointed Dean of Christchurch, in the room of the Papist Massey, whom
James had, in direct violation of the laws, placed at the head of
that great college. The new Dean was a polite, though not a profound,
scholar, and a jovial, hospitable gentleman. He was the author of some
theological tracts which have long been forgotten, and of a compendium
of logic which is still used: but the best works which he has bequeathed
to posterity are his catches. Jane, the King's Professor of Divinity,
was a graver but a less estimable man. He had borne the chief part in
framing that decree by which his University ordered the works of Milton
and Buchanan to be publicly burned in the Schools. A few years later,
irritated and alarmed by the persecution of the Bishops and by the
confiscation of the revenues of Magdalene College, he had renounced
the doctrine of nonresistance, had repaired to the headquarters of
the Prince of Orange, and had assured His Highness that Oxford would
willingly coin her plate for the support of the war against her
oppressor. During a short time Jane was generally considered as a
Whig, and was sharply lampooned by some of his old allies. He was
so unfortunate as to have a name which was an excellent mark for the
learned punsters of his university. Several epigrams were written on the
doublefaced Janus, who, having got a professorship by looking one way,
now hoped to get a bishopric by looking another. That he hoped to get a
bishopric was perfectly true. He demanded the see of Exeter as a reward
due to his services. He was refused. The refusal convinced him that the
Church had as much to apprehend from Latitudinarianism as from Popery;
and he speedily became a Tory again, [485]

Early in October the Commissioners assembled in the Jerusalem Chamber.
At their first meeting they determined to propose that, in the public
services of the Church, lessons taken from the canonical books
of Scripture should be substituted for the lessons taken from the
Apocrypha, [486] At the second meeting a strange question was raised
by the very last person who ought to have raised it. Sprat, Bishop of
Rochester, had, without any scruple, sate, during two years, in the
unconstitutional tribunal which had, in the late reign, oppressed and
pillaged the Church of which he was a ruler. But he had now become
scrupulous, and expressed a doubt whether the commission were legal.
To a plain understanding his objections seem to be mere quibbles. The
commission gave power neither to make laws nor to administer laws,
but simply to inquire and to report. Even without a royal commission
Tillotson, Patrick, and Stillingfleet might, with perfect propriety,
have met to discuss the state and prospects of the Church, and to
consider whether it would or would not be desirable to make some
concession to the dissenters. And how could it be a crime for subjects
to do at the request of their Sovereign that which it would have been
innocent and laudable for them to do without any such request? Sprat
however was seconded by Jane. There was a sharp altercation; and Lloyd,
Bishop of Saint Asaph, who, with many good qualities, had an irritable
temper, was provoked into saying something about spies. Sprat withdrew
and came no more. His example was soon followed by Jane and Aldrich,
[487] The commissioners proceeded to take into consideration the
question of the posture at the Eucharist. It was determined to recommend
that a communicant, who, after conference with his minister, should
declare that he could not conscientiously receive the bread and wine
kneeling, might receive them sitting. Mew, Bishop of Winchester, an
honest man, but illiterate, weak even in his best days, and now fast
sinking into dotage, protested against this concession, and withdrew
from the assembly. The other members continued to apply themselves
vigorously to their task: and no more secessions took place, though
there were great differences of opinion, and though the debates were
sometimes warm. The highest churchmen who still remained were Doctor
William Beveridge, Archdeacon of Colchester, who many years later became
Bishop of Saint Asaph, and Doctor John Scott, the same who had prayed
by the deathbed of Jeffreys. The most active among the Latitudinarians
appear to have been Burnet, Fowler, and Tenison.

The baptismal service was repeatedly discussed. As to matter of form the
Commissioners were disposed to be indulgent. They were generally willing
to admit infants into the Church without sponsors and without the sign
of the cross. But the majority, after much debate, steadily refused
to soften down or explain away those words which, to all minds
not sophisticated, appear to assert the regenerating virtue of the
sacrament, [488]

As to the surplice, the Commissioners determined to recommend that a
large discretion should be left to the Bishops. Expedients were devised
by which a person who had received Presbyterian ordination might,
without admitting, either expressly or by implication, the invalidity of
that ordination, become a minister of the Church of England, [489]

The ecclesiastical calendar was carefully revised. The great festivals
were retained. But it was not thought desirable that Saint Valentine,
Saint Chad, Saint Swithin, Saint Edward King of the West Saxons, Saint
Dunstan, and Saint Alphage, should share the honours of Saint John and
Saint Paul; or that the Church should appear to class the ridiculous
fable of the discovery of the cross with facts so awfully important as
the Nativity, the Passion, the Resurrection, and the Ascension of her
Lord, [490]

The Athanasian Creed caused much perplexity. Most of the Commissioners
were equally unwilling to give up the doctrinal clauses and to retain
the damnatory clauses. Burnet, Fowler, and Tillotson were desirous to
strike this famous symbol out of the liturgy altogether. Burnet brought
forward one argument, which to himself probably did not appear to
have much weight, but which was admirably calculated to perplex his
opponents, Beveridge and Scott. The Council of Ephesus had always been
reverenced by Anglican divines as a synod which had truly represented
the whole body of the faithful, and which had been divinely guided in
the way of truth. The voice of that Council was the voice of the Holy
Catholic and Apostolic Church, not yet corrupted by superstition, or
rent asunder by schism. During more than twelve centuries the world
had not seen an ecclesiastical assembly which had an equal claim to the
respect of believers. The Council of Ephesus had, in the plainest terms,
and under the most terrible penalties, forbidden Christians to frame or
to impose on their brethren any creed other than the creed settled by
the Nicene Fathers. It should seem therefore that, if the Council of
Ephesus was really under the direction of the Holy Spirit, whoever
uses the Athanasian Creed must, in the very act of uttering an anathema
against his neighbours, bring down an anathema on his own head, [491]
In spite of the authority of the Ephesian Fathers, the majority of the
Commissioners determined to leave the Athanasian Creed in the Prayer
Book; but they proposed to add a rubric drawn up by Stillingfleet, which
declared that the damnatory clauses were to be understood to apply only
to such as obstinately denied the substance of the Christian Faith.
Orthodox believers were therefore permitted to hope that the heretic
who had honestly and humbly sought for truth would not be everlastingly
punished for having failed to find it, [492]

Tenison was intrusted with the business of examining the Liturgy and
of collecting all those expressions to which objections had been made,
either by theological or by literary critics. It was determined to
remove some obvious blemishes. And it would have been wise in the
Commissioners to stop here. Unfortunately they determined to rewrite a
great part of the Prayer Book. It was a bold undertaking; for in general
the style of that volume is such as cannot be improved. The English
Liturgy indeed gains by being compared even with those fine ancient
Liturgies from which it is to a great extent taken. The essential
qualities of devotional eloquence, conciseness, majestic simplicity,
pathetic earnestness of supplication, sobered by a profound reverence,
are common between the translations and the originals. But in the
subordinate graces of diction the originals must be allowed to be far
inferior to the translations. And the reason is obvious. The technical
phraseology of Christianity did not become a part of the Latin language
till that language had passed the age of maturity and was sinking into
barbarism. But the technical phraseology of Christianity was found in
the Anglosaxon and in the Norman French, long before the union of those
two dialects had, produced a third dialect superior to either. The Latin
of the Roman Catholic services, therefore, is Latin in the last stage
of decay. The English of our services is English in all the vigour and
suppleness of early youth. To the great Latin writers, to Terence and
Lucretius, to Cicero and Caesar, to Tacitus and Quintilian, the noblest
compositions of Ambrose and Gregory would have seemed to be, not merely
bad writing, but senseless gibberish, [493] The diction of our Book of
Common Prayer, on the other hand, has directly or indirectly contributed
to form the diction of almost every great English writer, and has
extorted the admiration of the most accomplished infidels and of the
most accomplished nonconformists, of such men as David Hume and Robert
Hall.

The style of the Liturgy, however, did not satisfy the Doctors of the
Jerusalem Chamber. They voted the Collects too short and too dry: and
Patrick was intrusted with the duty of expanding and ornamenting them.
In one respect, at least, the choice seems to have been unexceptionable;
for, if we judge by the way in which Patrick paraphrased the most
sublime Hebrew poetry, we shall probably be of opinion that, whether he
was or was not qualified to make the collects better, no man that ever
lived was more competent to make them longer, [494]

It mattered little, however, whether the recommendations of the
Commission were good or bad. They were all doomed before they were
known. The writs summoning the Convocation of the province of Canterbury
had been issued; and the clergy were every where in a state of violent
excitement. They had just taken the oaths, and were smarting from the
earnest reproofs of nonjurors, from the insolent taunts of Whigs, and
often undoubtedly from the stings of remorse. The announcement that
a Convocation was to sit for the purpose of deliberating on a plan of
comprehension roused all the strongest passions of the priest who had
just complied with the law, and was ill satisfied or half satisfied with
himself for complying. He had an opportunity of contributing to defeat
a favourite scheme of that government which had exacted from him,
under severe penalties, a submission not easily to be reconciled to his
conscience or his pride. He had an opportunity of signalising his zeal
for that Church whose characteristic doctrines he had been accused of
deserting for lucre. She was now, he conceived, threatened by a danger
as great as that of the preceding year. The Latitudinarians of 1689 were
not less eager to humble and to ruin her than the Jesuits of 1688.
The Toleration Act had done for the Dissenters quite as much as was
compatible with her dignity and security; and nothing more ought to be
conceded, not the hem of one of her vestments, not an epithet from the
beginning to the end of her Liturgy. All the reproaches which had been
thrown on the ecclesiastical commission of James were transferred to
the ecclesiastical commission of William. The two commissions indeed
had nothing but the name in common. Put the name was associated with
illegality and oppression, with the violation of dwellings and the
confiscation of freeholds, and was therefore assiduously sounded with no
small effect by the tongues of the spiteful in the ears of the ignorant.

The King too, it was said, was not sound. He conformed indeed to the
established worship; but his was a local and occasional conformity. For
some ceremonies to which High Churchmen were attached he had a distaste
which he was at no pains to conceal. One of his first acts had been
to give orders that in his private chapel the service should be said
instead of being sung; and this arrangement, though warranted by the
rubric, caused much murmuring, [495] It was known that he was so
profane as to sneer at a practice which had been sanctioned by high
ecclesiastical authority, the practice of touching for the scrofula.
This ceremony had come down almost unaltered from the darkest of the
dark ages to the time of Newton and Locke. The Stuarts frequently
dispensed the healing influences in the Banqueting House. The days on
which this miracle was to be wrought were fixed at sittings of the Privy
Council, and were solemnly notified by the clergy in all the parish
churches of the realm, [496] When the appointed time came, several
divines in full canonicals stood round the canopy of state. The surgeon
of the royal household introduced the sick. A passage from the sixteenth
chapter of the Gospel of Saint Mark was read. When the words, "They
shall lay their hands on the sick, and they shall recover," had been
pronounced, there was a pause, and one of the sick was brought up to the
King. His Majesty stroked the ulcers and swellings, and hung round the
patient's neck a white riband to which was fastened a gold coin.
The other sufferers were then led up in succession; and, as each was
touched, the chaplain repeated the incantation, "they shall lay their
hands on the sick, and they shall recover. " Then came the epistle,
prayers, antiphonies and a benediction. The service may still be found
in the prayer books of the reign of Anne. Indeed it was not till some
time after the accession of George the First that the University
of Oxford ceased to reprint the Office of Healing together with the
Liturgy. Theologians of eminent learning, ability, and virtue gave the
sanction of their authority to this mummery; [497] and, what is stranger
still, medical men of high note believed, or affected to believe, in the
balsamic virtues of the royal hand. We must suppose that every surgeon
who attended Charles the Second was a man of high repute for skill; and
more than one of the surgeons who attended Charles the Second has left
us a solemn profession of faith in the King's miraculous power. One of
them is not ashamed to tell us that the gift was communicated by the
unction administered at the coronation; that the cures were so numerous
and sometimes so rapid that they could not be attributed to any natural
cause; that the failures were to be ascribed to want of faith on the
part of the patients; that Charles once handled a scrofulous Quaker and
made him a healthy man and a sound Churchman in a moment; that, if those
who had been healed lost or sold the piece of gold which had been hung
round their necks, the ulcers broke forth again, and could be removed
only by a second touch and a second talisman. We cannot wonder that,
when men of science gravely repeated such nonsense, the vulgar should
believe it. Still less can we wonder that wretches tortured by a disease
over which natural remedies had no power should eagerly drink in tales
of preternatural cures: for nothing is so credulous as misery. The
crowds which repaired to the palace on the days of healing were immense.
Charles the Second, in the course of his reign, touched near a hundred
thousand persons. The number seems to have increased or diminished as
the king's popularity rose or fell. During that Tory reaction which
followed the dissolution of the Oxford Parliament, the press to get near
him was terrific. In 1682, he performed the rite eight thousand five
hundred times. In 1684, the throng was such that six or seven of the
sick were trampled to death. James, in one of his progresses, touched
eight hundred persons in the choir of the Cathedral of Chester. The
expense of the ceremony was little less than ten thousand pounds a year,
and would have been much greater but for the vigilance of the royal
surgeons, whose business it was to examine the applicants, and to
distinguish those who came for the cure from those who came for the
gold, [498]

William had too much sense to be duped, and too much honesty to bear a
part in what he knew to be an imposture. "It is a silly superstition,"
he exclaimed, when he heard that, at the close of Lent, his palace was
besieged by a crowd of the sick: "Give the poor creatures some money,
and send them away. " [499] On one single occasion he was importuned into
laying his hand on a patient. "God give you better health," he said,
"and more sense. " The parents of scrofulous children cried out against
his cruelty: bigots lifted up their hands and eyes in horror at his
impiety: Jacobites sarcastically praised him for not presuming
to arrogate to himself a power which belonged only to legitimate
sovereigns; and even some Whigs thought that he acted unwisely in
treating with such marked contempt a superstition which had a strong
hold on the vulgar mind: but William was not to be moved, and was
accordingly set down by many High Churchmen as either an infidel or a
puritan, [500]

The chief cause, however, which at this time made even the most moderate
plan of comprehension hateful to the priesthood still remains to be
mentioned. What Burnet had foreseen and foretold had come to pass. There
was throughout the clerical profession a strong disposition to retaliate
on the Presbyterians of England the wrongs of the Episcopalians of
Scotland. It could not be denied that even the highest churchmen had,
in the summer of 1688, generally declared themselves willing to give
up many things for the sake of union. But it was said, and not without
plausibility, that what was passing on the other side of the Border
proved union on any reasonable terms to be impossible. With what face,
it was asked, can those who will make no concession to us where we are
weak, blame us for refusing to make any concession to them where we are
strong? We cannot judge correctly of the principles and feelings of a
sect from the professions which it makes in a time of feebleness and
suffering. If we would know what the Puritan spirit really is, we must
observe the Puritan when he is dominant. He was dominant here in the
last generation; and his little finger was thicker than the loins of the
prelates. He drove hundreds of quiet students from their cloisters, and
thousands of respectable divines from their parsonages, for the crime of
refusing to sign his Covenant. No tenderness was shown to learning, to
genius or to sanctity. Such men as Hall and Sanderson, Chillingworth and
Hammond, were not only plundered, but flung into prisons, and exposed
to all the rudeness of brutal gaolers. It was made a crime to read fine
psalms and prayers bequeathed to the faithful by Ambrose and Chrysostom.
At length the nation became weary of the reign of the saints. The fallen
dynasty and the fallen hierarchy were restored. The Puritan was in his
turn subjected to disabilities and penalties; and he immediately found
out that it was barbarous to punish men for entertaining conscientious
scruples about a garb, about a ceremony, about the functions of
ecclesiastical officers. His piteous complaints and his arguments in
favour of toleration had at length imposed on many well meaning persons.
Even zealous churchmen had begun to entertain a hope that the severe
discipline which he had undergone had made him candid, moderate,
charitable. Had this been really so, it would doubtless have been our
duty to treat his scruples with extreme tenderness. But, while we were
considering what we could do to meet his wishes in England, he had
obtained ascendency in Scotland; and, in an instant, he was all himself
again, bigoted, insolent, and cruel. Manses had been sacked; churches
shut up; prayer books burned; sacred garments torn; congregations
dispersed by violence; priests hustled, pelted, pilloried, driven forth,
with their wives and babes, to beg or die of hunger. That these outrages
were to be imputed, not to a few lawless marauders, but to the great
body of the Presbyterians of Scotland, was evident from the fact
that the government had not dared either to inflict punishment on the
offenders or to grant relief to the sufferers. Was it not fit then that
the Church of England should take warning? Was it reasonable to ask
her to mutilate her apostolical polity and her beautiful ritual for the
purpose of conciliating those who wanted nothing but power to rabble her
as they had rabbled her sister? Already these men had obtained a boon
which they ill deserved, and which they never would have granted.
They worshipped God in perfect security. Their meeting houses were
as effectually protected as the choirs of our cathedrals. While
no episcopal minister could, without putting his life in jeopardy,
officiate in Ayrshire or Renfrewshire, a hundred Presbyterian ministers
preached unmolested every Sunday in Middlesex. The legislature had,
with a generosity perhaps imprudent, granted toleration to the most
intolerant of men; and with toleration it behoved them to be content.

Thus several causes conspired to inflame the parochial clergy against
the scheme of comprehension. Their temper was such that, if the plan
framed in the Jerusalem Chamber had been directly submitted to them,
it would have been rejected by a majority of twenty to one. But in
the Convocation their weight bore no proportion to their number.
The Convocation has, happily for our country, been so long utterly
insignificant that, till a recent period, none but curious students
cared to inquire how it was constituted; and even now many persons, not
generally ill informed, imagine it to have been a council representing
the Church of England. In truth the Convocation so often mentioned
in our ecclesiastical history is merely the synod of the Province of
Canterbury, and never had a right to speak in the name of the whole
clerical body. The Province of York had also its convocation: but,
till the eighteenth century was far advanced, the Province of York was
generally so poor, so rude, and so thinly peopled, that, in political
importance, it could hardly be considered as more than a tenth part of
the kingdom. The sense of the Southern clergy was therefore popularly
considered as the sense of the whole profession. When the formal
concurrence of the Northern clergy was required, it seems to have been
given as a matter of course. Indeed the canons passed by the Convocation
of Canterbury in 1604 were ratified by James the First, and were ordered
to be strictly observed in every part of the kingdom, two years before
the Convocation of York went through the form of approving them. Since
these ecclesiastical councils became mere names, a great change has
taken place in the relative position of the two Archbishoprics. In all
the elements of power, the region beyond Trent is now at least a third
part of England. When in our own time the representative system was
adjusted to the altered state of the country, almost all the small
boroughs which it was necessary to disfranchise were in the south. Two
thirds of the new members given to great provincial towns were given
to the north. If therefore any English government should suffer the
Convocations, as now constituted, to meet for the despatch of business,
two independent synods would be legislating at the same time for one
Church. It is by no means impossible that one assembly might adopt
canons which the other might reject, that one assembly might condemn as
heretical propositions which the other might hold to be orthodox, [501]
In the seventeenth century no such danger was apprehended.
So little
indeed was the Convocation of York then considered, that the two Houses
of Parliament had, in their address to William, spoken only of one
Convocation, which they called the Convocation of the Clergy of the
Kingdom.

The body which they thus not very accurately designated is divided into
two Houses. The Upper House is composed of the Bishops of the Province
of Canterbury. The Lower House consisted, in 1689, of a hundred and
forty-four members. Twenty-two Deans and fifty-four Archdeacons sate
there in virtue of their offices. Twenty-four divines sate as proctors
for twenty-four chapters. Only forty-four proctors were elected by
the eight thousand parish priests of the twenty-two dioceses. These
forty-four proctors, however, were almost all of one mind. The elections
had in former times been conducted in the most quiet and decorous
manner. But on this occasion the canvassing was eager: the contests were
sharp: Rochester, the leader of the party which in the House of Lords
had opposed the Comprehension-Bill, and his brother Clarendon, who had
refused to take the oaths, had gone to Oxford, the head quarters of that
party, for the purpose of animating and organizing the opposition, [502]
The representatives of the parochial clergy must have been men whose
chief distinction was their zeal: for in the whole list can be found not
a single illustrious name, and very few names which are now known even
to curious students, [503] The official members of the Lower House,
among whom were many distinguished scholars and preachers, seem to have
been not very unequally divided.

During the summer of 1689 several high ecclesiastical dignities became
vacant, and were bestowed on divines who were sitting in the Jerusalem
Chamber. It has already been mentioned that Thomas, Bishop of Worcester,
died just before the day fixed for taking the oaths. Lake, Bishop of
Chichester, lived just long enough to refuse them, and with his last
breath declared that he would maintain even at the stake the doctrine
of indefeasible hereditary right. The see of Chichester was filled by
Patrick, that of Worcester by Stillingfleet; and the deanery of
Saint Paul's which Stillingfleet quitted was given to Tillotson. That
Tillotson was not raised to the episcopal bench excited some surprise.
But in truth it was because the government held his services in the
highest estimation that he was suffered to remain a little longer a
simple presbyter. The most important office in the Convocation was that
of Prolocutor of the Lower House. The Prolocutor was to be chosen by the
members: and the only moderate man who had a chance of being chosen was
Tillotson. It had in fact been already determined that he should be the
next Archbishop of Canterbury. When he went to kiss hands for his new
deanery he warmly thanked the King. "Your Majesty has now set me at ease
for the remainder of my life. " "No such thing, Doctor, I assure you,"
said William. He then plainly intimated that, whenever Sancroft should
cease to fill the highest ecclesiastical station, Tillotson would
succeed to it. Tillotson stood aghast; for his nature was quiet and
unambitious: he was beginning to feel the infirmities of old age: he
cared little for money: of worldly advantages those which he most
valued were an honest fame and the general good will of mankind: those
advantages he already possessed; and he could not but be aware that, if
he became primate, he should incur the bitterest hatred of a powerful
party, and should become a mark for obloquy, from which his gentle
and sensitive nature shrank as from the rack or the wheel. William was
earnest and resolute. "It is necessary," he said, "for my service; and
I must lay on your conscience the responsibility of refusing me your
help. " Here the conversation ended. It was, indeed, not necessary that
the point should be immediately decided; for several months were still
to elapse before the Archbishopric would be vacant.

Tillotson bemoaned himself with unfeigned anxiety and sorrow to Lady
Russell, whom, of all human beings, he most honoured and trusted, [504]
He hoped, he said, that he was not inclined to shrink from the service
of the Church; but he was convinced that his present line of service was
that in which he could be most useful. If he should be forced to accept
so high and so invidious a post as the primacy, he should soon sink
under the load of duties and anxieties too heavy for his strength. His
spirits, and with his spirits his abilities, would fail him. He gently
complained of Burnet, who loved and admired him with a truly generous
heartiness, and who had laboured to persuade both the King and
Queen that there was in England only one man fit for the highest
ecclesiastical dignity. "The Bishop of Salisbury," said Tillotson, "is
one of the best and worst friends that I know. "

Nothing that was not a secret to Burnet was likely to be long a secret
to any body. It soon began to be whispered about that the King had
fixed on Tillotson to fill the place of Sancroft. The news caused cruel
mortification to Compton, who, not unnaturally, conceived that his own
claims were unrivalled. He had educated the Queen and her sister; and
to the instruction which they had received from him might fairly be
ascribed, at least in part, the firmness with which, in spite of the
influence of their father, they had adhered to the established religion.
Compton was, moreover, the only prelate who, during the late reign, had
raised his voice in Parliament against the dispensing power, the only
prelate who had been suspended by the High Commission, the only prelate
who had signed the invitation to the Prince of Orange, the only prelate
who had actually taken arms against Popery and arbitrary power, the
only prelate, save one, who had voted against a Regency. Among the
ecclesiastics of the Province of Canterbury who had taken the oaths,
he was highest in rank. He had therefore held, during some months, a
vicarious primacy: he had crowned the new Sovereigns: he had consecrated
the new Bishops: he was about to preside in the Convocation. It may be
added, that he was the son of an Earl; and that no person of equally
high birth then sate, or had ever sate, since the Reformation, on the
episcopal bench. That the government should put over his head a priest
of his own diocese, who was the son of a Yorkshire clothier, and who was
distinguished only by abilities and virtues, was provoking; and Compton,
though by no means a badhearted man, was much provoked. Perhaps his
vexation was increased by the reflection that he had, for the sake of
those by whom he was thus slighted, done some things which had strained
his conscience and sullied his reputation, that he had at one time
practised the disingenuous arts of a diplomatist, and at another time
given scandal to his brethren by wearing the buff coat and jackboots of
a trooper. He could not accuse Tillotson of inordinate ambition. But,
though Tillotson was most unwilling to accept the Archbishopric himself,
he did not use his influence in favour of Compton, but earnestly
recommended Stillingfleet as the man fittest to preside over the Church
of England. The consequence was that, on the eve of the meeting of
Convocation, the Bishop who was to be at the head of the Upper House
became the personal enemy of the presbyter whom the government wished to
see at the head of the Lower House. This quarrel added new difficulties
to difficulties which little needed any addition, [505]

It was not till the twentieth of November that the Convocation met for
the despatch of business. The place of meeting had generally been Saint
Paul's Cathedral. But Saint Paul's Cathedral was slowly rising from
its ruins; and, though the dome already towered high above the hundred
steeples of the City, the choir had not yet been opened for public
worship. The assembly therefore sate at Westminster, [506] A table was
placed in the beautiful chapel of Henry the Seventh. Compton was in
the chair. On his right and left those suffragans of Canterbury who
had taken the oaths were ranged in gorgeous vestments of scarlet
and miniver. Below the table was assembled the crowd of presbyters.
Beveridge preached a Latin sermon, in which he warmly eulogized the
existing system, and yet declared himself favourable to a moderate
reform. Ecclesiastical laws were, he said, of two kinds. Some laws were
fundamental and eternal: they derived their authority from God; nor
could any religious community repeal them without ceasing to form a part
of the universal Church. Other laws were local and temporary. They had
been framed by human wisdom, and might be altered by human wisdom. They
ought not indeed to be altered without grave reasons. But surely, at
that moment, such reasons were not wanting. To unite a scattered flock
in one fold under one shepherd, to remove stumbling blocks from the path
of the weak, to reconcile hearts long estranged, to restore spiritual
discipline to its primitive vigour, to place the best and purest of
Christian societies on a base broad enough to stand against all the
attacks of earth and hell, these were objects which might well justify
some modification, not of Catholic institutions, but of national or
provincial usages, [507]

The Lower House, having heard this discourse, proceeded to appoint
a Prolocutor. Sharp, who was probably put forward by the members
favourable to a comprehension as one of the highest churchmen among
them, proposed Tillotson. Jane, who had refused to act under the
Royal Commission, was proposed on the other side. After some animated
discussion, Jane was elected by fifty-five votes to twenty-eight, [508]

The Prolocutor was formally presented to the Bishop of London, and
made, according to ancient usage, a Latin oration. In this oration the
Anglican Church was extolled as the most perfect of all institutions.
There was a very intelligible intimation that no change whatever in her
doctrine, her discipline, or her ritual was required; and the discourse
concluded with a most significant sentence. Compton, when a few months
before he exhibited himself in the somewhat unclerical character of
a colonel of horse, had ordered the colours of his regiment to be
embroidered with the well known words "Nolumus leges Angliae mutari";
and with these words Jane closed his peroration, [509]

Still the Low Churchmen did not relinquish all hope. They very wisely
determined to begin by proposing to substitute lessons taken from the
canonical books for the lessons taken from the Apocrypha. It should seem
that this was a suggestion which, even if there had not been a single
dissenter in the kingdom, might well have been received with favour. For
the Church had, in her sixth Article, declared that the canonical books
were, and that the Apocryphal books were not, entitled to be called Holy
Scriptures, and to be regarded as the rule of faith. Even this reform,
however, the High Churchmen were determined to oppose. They asked,
in pamphlets which covered the counters of Paternoster Row and Little
Britain, why country congregations should be deprived of the pleasure of
hearing about the ball of pitch with which Daniel choked the dragon,
and about the fish whose liver gave forth such a fume as sent the devil
flying from Ecbatana to Egypt. And were there not chapters of the
Wisdom of the Son of Sirach far more interesting and edifying than
the genealogies and muster rolls which made up a large part of the
Chronicles of the Jewish Kings and of the narrative of Nehemiah?
No grave divine however would have liked to maintain, in Henry the
Seventh's Chapel, that it was impossible to find, in many hundreds of
pages dictated by the Holy Spirit, fifty or sixty chapters more edifying
than any thing which could be extracted from the works of the most
respectable uninspired moralist or historian. The leaders of the
majority therefore determined to shun a debate in which they must have
been reduced to a disagreeable dilemma. Their plan was, not to
reject the recommendations of the Commissioners, but to prevent those
recommendations from being discussed; and with this view a system of
tactics was adopted which proved successful.

The law, as it had been interpreted during a long course of years,
prohibited the Convocation from even deliberating on any ecclesiastical
ordinance without a previous warrant from the Crown. Such a warrant,
sealed with the great seal, was brought in form to Henry the Seventh's
Chapel by Nottingham. He at the same time delivered a message from the
King. His Majesty exhorted the assembly to consider calmly and without
prejudice the recommendations of the Commission, and declared that
he had nothing in view but the honour and advantage of the Protestant
religion in general, and of the Church of England in particular, [510]

The Bishops speedily agreed on an address of thanks for the royal
message, and requested the concurrence of the Lower House. Jane and
his adherents raised objection after objection. First they claimed the
privilege of presenting a separate address. When they were forced to
waive this claim, they refused to agree to any expression which imported
that the Church of England had any fellowship with any other Protestant
community. Amendments and reasons were sent backward and forward.
Conferences were held at which Burnet on one side and Jane on the other
were the chief speakers. At last, with great difficulty, a compromise
was made; and an address, cold and ungracious compared with that which
the Bishops had framed, was presented to the King in the Banqueting
House. He dissembled his vexation, returned a kind answer, and intimated
a hope that the assembly would now at length proceed to consider the
great question of Comprehension, [511]

Such however was not the intention of the leaders of the Lower House.
As soon as they were again in Henry the Seventh's Chapel, one of them
raised a debate about the nonjuring bishops. In spite of the unfortunate
scruple which those prelates entertained, they were learned and holy
men. Their advice might, at this conjuncture, be of the greatest service
to the Church. The Upper House was hardly an Upper House in the absence
of the Primate and of many of his most respectable suffragans. Could
nothing be done to remedy this evil? [512] Another member complained of
some pamphlets which had lately appeared, and in which the Convocation
was not treated with proper deference. The assembly took fire. Was it
not monstrous that this heretical and schismatical trash should be cried
by the hawkers about the streets, and should be exposed to sale in the
booths of Westminster Hall, within a hundred yards of the Prolocutor's
chair? The work of mutilating the Liturgy and of turning cathedrals into
conventicles might surely be postponed till the Synod had taken measures
to protect its own freedom and dignity. It was then debated how the
printing of such scandalous books should be prevented. Some were
for indictments, some for ecclesiastical censures, [513] In such
deliberations as these week after week passed away. Not a single
proposition tending to a Comprehension had been even discussed.
Christmas was approaching. At Christmas there was to be a recess. The
Bishops were desirous that, during the recess, a committee should sit to
prepare business. The Lower House refused to consent, [514] That House,
it was now evident, was fully determined not even to enter on the
consideration of any part of the plan which had been framed by the Royal
Commissioners. The proctors of the dioceses were in a worse humour than
when they first came up to Westminster. Many of them had probably never
before passed a week in the capital, and had not been aware how great
the difference was between a town divine and a country divine. The sight
of the luxuries and comforts enjoyed by the popular preachers of the
city raised, not unnaturally, some sore feeling in a Lincolnshire or
Caernarvonshire vicar who was accustomed to live as hardly as small
farmer. The very circumstance that the London clergy were generally for
a comprehension made the representatives of the rural clergy obstinate
on the other side, [515] The prelates were, as a body, sincerely
desirous that some concession might be made to the nonconformists. But
the prelates were utterly unable to curb the mutinous democracy. They
were few in number. Some of them were objects of extreme dislike to the
parochial clergy. The President had not the full authority of a primate;
nor was he sorry to see those who had, as he concerned, used him ill,
thwarted and mortified. It was necessary to yield. The Convocation
was prorogued for six weeks. When those six weeks had expired, it was
prorogued again; and many years elapsed before it was permitted to
transact business.

So ended, and for ever, the hope that the Church of England might be
induced to make some concession to the scruples of the nonconformists. A
learned and respectable minority of the clerical order relinquished
that hope with deep regret. Yet in a very short time even Barnet and
Tillotson found reason to believe that their defeat was really an
escape, and that victory would have been a disaster. A reform, such as,
in the days of Elizabeth, would have united the great body of English
Protestants, would, in the days of William, have alienated more hearts
than it would have conciliated. The schism which the oaths had produced
was, as yet, insignificant. Innovations such as those proposed by the
Royal Commissioners would have given it a terrible importance. As yet
a layman, though he might think the proceedings of the Convention
unjustifiable, and though he might applaud the virtue of the nonjuring
clergy, still continued to sit under the accustomed pulpit, and to kneel
at the accustomed altar. But if, just at this conjuncture, while his
mind was irritated by what he thought the wrong done to his favourite
divines, and while he was perhaps doubting whether he ought not to
follow them, his ears and eyes had been shocked by changes in the
worship to which he was fondly attached, if the compositions of
the doctors of the Jerusalem Chamber had taken the place of the old
collects, if he had seen clergymen without surplices carrying the
chalice and the paten up and down the aisle to seated communicants, the
tie which bound him to the Established Church would have been dissolved.
He would have repaired to some nonjuring assembly, where the service
which he loved was performed without mutilation. The new sect, which
as yet consisted almost exclusively of priests, would soon have been
swelled by numerous and large congregations; and in those congregations
would have been found a much greater proportion of the opulent, of the
highly descended, and of the highly educated, than any other body of
dissenters could show. The Episcopal schismatics, thus reinforced, would
probably have been as formidable to the new King and his successors as
ever the Puritan schismatics had been to the princes of the House of
Stuart. It is an indisputable and a most instructive fact, that we are,
in a great measure, indebted for the civil and religious liberty which
we enjoy to the pertinacity with which the High Church party, in
the Convocation of 1689, refused even to deliberate on any plan of
Comprehension, [516]




CHAPTER XV

The Parliament meets; Retirement of Halifax--Supplies voted--The Bill
of Rights passed--Inquiry into Naval Abuses--Inquiry into the Conduct of
the Irish War--Reception of Walker in England--Edmund Ludlow--Violence
of the Whigs--Impeachments--Committee of Murder--Malevolence of John
Hampden--The Corporation Bill--Debates on the Indemnity Bill--Case of
Sir Robert Sawyer--The King purposes to retire to Holland--He is induced
to change his Intention; the Whigs oppose his going to Ireland--He
prorogues the Parliament--Joy of the Tories--Dissolution and General
Election--Changes in the Executive Departments--Caermarthen Chief
Minister--Sir John Lowther--Rise and Progress of Parliamentary
Corruption in England--Sir John Trevor--Godolphin retires; Changes at
the Admiralty--Changes in the Commissions of Lieutenancy--Temper of
the Whigs; Dealings of some Whigs with Saint Germains; Shrewsbury;
Ferguson--Hopes of the Jacobites--Meeting of the new Parliament;
Settlement of the Revenue--Provision for the Princess of Denmark--Bill
declaring the Acts of the preceding Parliament valid--Debate on the
Changes in the Lieutenancy of London--Abjuration Bill--Act of Grace--The
Parliament prorogued; Preparations for the first War--Administration of
James at Dublin--An auxiliary Force sent from France to Ireland--Plan
of the English Jacobites; Clarendon, Aylesbury,
Dartmouth--Penn--Preston--The Jacobites betrayed by Fuller--Crone
arrested--Difficulties of William--Conduct of Shrewsbury--The Council of
Nine--Conduct of Clarendon--Penn held to Bail--Interview between William
and Burnet; William sets out for Ireland--Trial of Crone--Danger of
Invasion and Insurrection; Tourville's Fleet in the--Channel--Arrests
of suspected Persons--Torrington ordered to give Battle to
Tourville--Battle of Beachy Head--Alarm in London; Battle of
Fleurus--Spirit of the Nation--Conduct of Shrewsbury

WHILE the Convocation was wrangling on one side of Old Palace Yard, the
Parliament was wrangling even more fiercely on the other. The Houses,
which had separated on the twentieth of August, had met again on the
nineteenth of October. On the day of meeting an important change struck
every eye. Halifax was no longer on the woolsack. He had reason to
expect that the persecution, from which in the preceding session he had
narrowly escaped, would be renewed. The events which had taken place
during the recess, and especially the disasters of the campaign in
Ireland, had furnished his persecutors with fresh means of annoyance.
His administration had not been successful; and, though his failure was
partly to be ascribed to causes against which no human wisdom could have
contended, it was also partly to be ascribed to the peculiarities of his
temper and of his intellect. It was certain that a large party in the
Commons would attempt to remove him; and he could no longer depend
on the protection of his master. It was natural that a prince who was
emphatically a man of action should become weary of a minister who was a
man of speculation. Charles, who went to Council as he went to the play,
solely to be amused, was delighted with an adviser who had a hundred
pleasant and ingenious things to say on both sides of every question.
But William had no taste for disquisitions and disputations, however
lively and subtle, which occupied much time and led to no conclusion. It
was reported, and is not improbable, that on one occasion he could
not refrain from expressing in sharp terms at the council board his
impatience at what seemed to him a morbid habit of indecision, [517]
Halifax, mortified by his mischances in public life, dejected by
domestic calamities, disturbed by apprehensions of an impeachment, and
no longer supported by royal favour, became sick of public life,
and began to pine for the silence and solitude of his seat in
Nottinghamshire, an old Cistercian Abbey buried deep among woods. Early
in October it was known that he would no longer preside in the Upper
House. It was at the same time whispered as a great secret that he meant
to retire altogether from business, and that he retained the Privy Seal
only till a successor should be named. Chief Baron Atkyns was appointed
Speaker of the Lords, [518]

On some important points there appeared to be no difference of opinion
in the legislature. The Commons unanimously resolved that they would
stand by the King in the work of reconquering Ireland, and that they
would enable him to prosecute with vigour the war against France, [519]
With equal unanimity they voted an extraordinary supply of two millions,
[520] It was determined that the greater part of this sum should be
levied by an assessment on real property. The rest was to be raised
partly by a poll tax, and partly by new duties on tea, coffee and
chocolate. It was proposed that a hundred thousand pounds should be
exacted from the Jews; and this proposition was at first favourably
received by the House: but difficulties arose. The Jews presented a
petition in which they declared that they could not afford to pay such a
sum, and that they would rather leave the kingdom than stay there to
be ruined. Enlightened politicians could not but perceive that special
taxation, laid on a small class which happens to be rich, unpopular and
defenceless, is really confiscation, and must ultimately improverish
rather than enrich the State. After some discussion, the Jew tax was
abandoned, [521]

The Bill of Rights, which, in the last Session, had, after causing
much altercation between the Houses, been suffered to drop, was again
introduced, and was speedily passed. The peers no longer insisted that
any person should be designated by name as successor to the crown, if
Mary, Anne and William should all die without posterity. During eleven
years nothing more was heard of the claims of the House of Brunswick.

The Bill of Rights contained some provisions which deserve special
mention. The Convention had resolved that it was contrary to the
interest of the kingdom to be governed by a Papist, but had prescribed
no test which could ascertain whether a prince was or was not a Papist.
The defect was now supplied. It was enacted that every English sovereign
should, in full Parliament, and at the coronation, repeat and subscribe
the Declaration against Transubstantiation.

It was also enacted that no person who should marry a Papist should be
capable of reigning in England, and that, if the Sovereign should marry
a Papist, the subject should be absolved from allegiance. Burnet boasts
that this part of the Bill of Rights was his work. He had little reason
to boast: for a more wretched specimen of legislative workmanship will
not easily be found. In the first place, no test is prescribed. Whether
the consort of a Sovereign has taken the oath of supremacy, has signed
the declaration against transubstantiation, has communicated according
to the ritual of the Church of England, are very simple issues of
fact. But whether the consort of a Sovereign is or is not a Papist is
a question about which people may argue for ever. What is a Papist?
The word is not a word of definite signification either in law or in
theology. It is merely a popular nickname, and means very different
things in different mouths. Is every person a Papist who is willing to
concede to the Bishop of Rome a primacy among Christian prelates? If so,
James the First, Charles the First, Laud, Heylyn, were Papists, [522] Or
is the appellation to be confined to persons who hold the ultramontane
doctrines touching the authority of the Holy See? If so, neither Bossuet
nor Pascal was a Papist.

What again is the legal effect of the words which absolve the subject
from his allegiance? Is it meant that a person arraigned for high
treason may tender evidence to prove that the Sovereign has married
a Papist? Would Whistlewood, for example, have been entitled to an
acquittal, if he could have proved that King George the Fourth had
married Mrs. Fitzherbert, and that Mrs. Fitzherbert was a Papist? It
is not easy to believe that any tribunal would have gone into such a
question. Yet to what purpose is it to enact that, in a certain case,
the subject shall be absolved from his allegiance, if the tribunal
before which he is tried for a violation of his allegiance is not to go
into the question whether that case has arisen?

The question of the dispensing power was treated in a very different
manner, was fully considered, and was finally settled in the only way in
which it could be settled. The Declaration of Right had gone no further
than to pronounce that the dispensing power, as of late exercised, was
illegal. That a certain dispensing power belonged to the Crown was a
proposition sanctioned by authorities and precedents of which even Whig
lawyers could not speak without respect; but as to the precise extent
of this power hardly any two jurists were agreed; and every attempt
to frame a definition had failed. At length by the Bill of Rights the
anomalous prerogative which had caused so many fierce disputes was
absolutely and for ever taken away, [523]

In the House of Commons there was, as might have been expected, a series
of sharp debates on the misfortunes of the autumn. The negligence
or corruption of the Navy Board, the frauds of the contractors, the
rapacity of the captains of the King's ships, the losses of the London
merchants, were themes for many keen speeches. There was indeed reason
for anger. A severe inquiry, conducted by William in person at the
Treasury, had just elicited the fact that much of the salt with which
the meat furnished to the fleet had been cured had been by accident
mixed with galls such as are used for the purpose of making ink.
The victuallers threw the blame on the rats, and maintained that the
provisions thus seasoned, though certainly disagreeable to the palate,
were not injurious to health, [524] The Commons were in no temper
to listen to such excuses. Several persons who had been concerned
in cheating the government and poisoning the sailors were taken into
custody by the Serjeant, [525] But no censure was passed on the chief
offender, Torrington, nor does it appear that a single voice was raised
against him. He had personal friends in both parties. He had many
popular qualities. Even his vices were not those which excite public
hatred. The people readily forgave a courageous openhanded sailor for
being too fond of his bottle, his boon companions and his mistresses and
did not sufficiently consider how great must be the perils of a country
of which the safety depends on a man sunk in indolence, stupified by
wine, enervated by licentiousness, ruined by prodigality, and enslaved
by sycophants and harlots.

The sufferings of the army in Ireland called forth strong expressions
of sympathy and indignation. The Commons did justice to the firmness
and wisdom with which Schomberg had conducted the most arduous of all
campaigns. That he had not achieved more was attributed chiefly to the
villany of the Commissariat. The pestilence itself it was said, would
have been no serious calamity if it had not been aggravated by the
wickedness of man. The disease had generally spared those who had warm
garments and bedding, and had swept away by thousands those who were
thinly clad and who slept on the wet ground. Immense sums had been drawn
out of the Treasury: yet the pay of the troops was in arrear. Hundreds
of horses, tens of thousands of shoes, had been paid for by the public:
yet the baggage was left behind for want of beasts to draw it; and the
soldiers were marching barefoot through the mire. Seventeen hundred
pounds had been charged to the government for medicines: yet the common
drugs with which every apothecary in the smallest market town was
provided were not to be found in the plaguestricken camp. The cry
against Shales was loud. An address was carried to the throne,
requesting that he might be sent for to England, and that his accounts
and papers might be secured. With this request the King readily
complied; but the Whig majority was not satisfied. By whom had Shales
been recommended for so important a place as that of Commissary General?
He had been a favourite at Whitehall in the worst times. He had been
zealous for the Declaration of Indulgence. Why had this creature of
James been entrusted with the business of catering for the army of
William? It was proposed by some of those who were bent on driving all
Tories and Trimmers from office to ask His Majesty by whose advice a
man so undeserving of the royal confidence had been employed. The most
moderate and judicious Whigs pointed out the indecency and impolicy
of interrogating the King, and of forcing him either to accuse his
ministers or to quarrel with the representatives of his people.