CHAPTER V.

THE GROWTH OF TOLERATION (1714-1784).

GE

EORGE I., on the assembling of his first Privy Council, declared: "Having been willing to omit no opportunity of giving all possible assurances to a people who have already deserved so well of me, I take this occasion also to express to you my firm purpose, to do all that is in my power for the supporting and maintaining the Churches of England and Scotland, as they are severally by law established, which I am of opinion may be efficiently done without the least compromise; in the toleration allowed by law to Protestant Dissenters, so agreeable to Christian charity, and so necessary to the trade and riches of this great kingdom."

The Church had been left by Anne, not only unfriendly to the Hanoverian family, but far too powerful to suit the purposes of the Government; to weaken the Church, therefore, was its chief endeavour. We have seen how Convocation was suppressed. But before the suppression of Convocation was effected, the Government, in 1714, during the primacy of Tenison, issued Directions to the Clergy against intermeddling with affairs of State in their sermons or lectures; "Whereas

unusual liberties have been taken by several of the said Clergy in intermeddling with the affairs of State and Government and the Constitution of the Realm, which may be of very dangerous consequence if not timely prevented, we direct that none of the Clergy, in their sermons or lectures, presume to intermeddle in any affairs of State or Government, or the Constitution of the Realm, save only on such special feasts and fasts as are or shall be appointed by public authority, and then no further than the occasion of such days shall strictly require."

The abortive insurrection of 1715 on behalf of the Pretender was easily suppressed; Jacobitism was discouraged, and the Hanoverian interests strengthened. The same feeling which biassed the government against the Church led it to favour Dissent. As early as 1715 the Dsssenters began to urge their claims upon the new government for a greater Toleration, and demanded (as they said), in the interest both of themselves and of the House of Hanover, the repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts, as well as of the Occasional Conformity and Schism Acts 2. By the commencement of 1717 the agitation had assumed a more systematic form; the Dissenters, encouraged by marks of royal favour, and feeling that the sun was rising on them "after a night of tempest and horror," moved the King for

a

Calamy, ii. 344.

7

a redress of their grievances; and meetings to promote the object which they had in view, were held in various parts of the country. On December 13, 1718, Lord Stanhope, who had become Principal Secretary of State, brought forward in the House of Lords, under the title of "An Act for strengthening the Protestant interests in these kingdoms," a Bill for the relief of Protestant Dissenters, which proposed the repeal, not only of the Occasional Conformity and Schism Acts, but also of some clauses in the Test and Corporation Acts. The Bill was opposed not only by High Churchmen and Tories, but that part relating to the Test and Corporation Acts by the Whigs also. Wake, Archbishop of Canterbury, declared that these Acts were "the main bulwarks and supporters of the Established Church;" he expressed great tenderness for the Dissenters, although he thought at the same time that, by the practice of Occasional Conformity, they made a wrong use of the Toleration granted them at the Revolution. Dawes, Archbishop of York, followed on the same. side. Hoadly, then Bishop of Bangor, maintained that all religious tests were an invasion of the natural rights of man, an injury to the State, and a scandal to religion; he contended that the Occasional Conformity and Schism Acts were in effect persecuting laws, and that if they could be defended, then that all the persecutions of Christians, and even the Inquisition itself, could be defended also. Hoadly was

ably answered by Smalridge, Bishop of Bristol: but the Bill was advocated by Gibson, Bishop of Lincoln, and Willis of Gloucester, who were on the road to preferment, Gibson to London and Willis to Winchester, and by White Kennet, Bishop of Peterborough. In vain Robinson, Bishop of London, contended that "all places of trust are in the hands of those of the National Church." In vain Atterbury remarked on the mischief which the Dissenters were bringing on the Church; the Bill, but not till the clauses relating to the Test and Corporation Acts had been withdrawn in Committee, passed the House of Lords by 53 to 33 votes, and the Commons by 243 to 202, the majority in the latter House being chiefly due to the Scotch members. Stanhope promised the Dissenters that the full measure was only deferred to a more convenient season; his premature death occurred soon afterwards; the convenient season did not arrive for 109 years, although we shall see that nearly every year from the accession of George II. an Indemnity Act was passed, which enabled Dissenters to hold office just as if there had been no law against it. So that the Dissenters thenceforward enjoyed the privilege of joining in the highest offices of the Church

b A clause, however, was inserted in the Act that no Mayor, nor Bailiff, nor other Magistrate, should attend any conventicle with the ensigns of his office, under pain of being disqualified from holding any public post.

D d

for one hour, and the liberty of endeavouring to undermine it for the rest of the year.

In 1721 the Quakers presented a petition to Walpole, imploring relief from certain disabilities under which they fancied that they laboured on account of the form in which they made their affirmations . Walpole had especial reasons for favouring the Quakers. A large body of them was established in Norfolk, and especially in Norwich, who had always voted for his candidates at the elections d. A Bill was accordingly brought into the Commons in December, 1721, and had an easy passage through that House. But the London Clergy were strongly opposed to the relief; they presented a petition against it on the ground that "an oath was instituted by God Himself as the surest bond of fidelity amongst men." It expressed their "serious concern lest the minds of good men should be grieved and wounded, and the enemies of Christianity triumph, when they shall see such condescensions made by a Christian. Legislature to a set of men who renounce the divine institutions of Christ, particularly that by which the faithful are initiated into His Religion and denominated Christians, and who, on that account, according to the uniform judgment of the Catholic Church,

The form imposed by the Statute of William III. contained the words "In the presence of Almighty God," which the Quakers objected to as equivalent to an oath.

d Coxe's Life of Walpole, i. 478.