XV THE CONVOCATION DISPUTES 281 Convocation, by Francis Atterbury, D.D., 1700; Reflections on a Book entitled the Rights, etc. by Gilbert, Bishop of Sarum, 1700; Kennett, Ecclesiastical Synods and Parliamentary Convocations, 1701; Forma sive descriptio Convocationis celebrandæ, etc. n.d.; The Power of the Lower House of Convocation to adjourn itself, etc. 1701; The right of the Archbishop to continue or prorogue the whole Convocation, 1701; A narrative of the proceedings of the Lower House, drawn up by order of the House [written by Dr. Hooper], 1701; The present state of Convocation, etc. 1702; The Case of the Schedule stated, 1702; The Parliamentary original and Rights of the Lower House, etc. 1702; A Faithful Account, etc. (two numbers), 1702; A Summary Defence of the Lower House, etc. 1703; The Pretended Independence of the Lower House, etc. 1703; The state of the Church and Clergy of England in their Convocation, by William Wake, D.D., 1703; Gibson, Synodus Anglicana; Nicholson, Correspondence; Lathbury, History of Convocation; Wilkins, Concilia, vol. iv. CHAPTER XVI THE CHURCH IN RELATION TO POLITICAL THEORY THE close association between politics and religion which had marked alike the personal government of Charles I. and the rule of Commonwealth and Protector, though it received a severe blow at the Restoration by the legal acceptance of dissent from the religion established by law, and a blow still more severe by the Toleration Act of the Revolution, remained till the death of Queen Anne an important feature in the national history. While men were searching for a satisfactory theory which might define the relations of Church and State in practice their spheres were constantly confused. is well before we speak of the theory to note how closely the practice was related to it during the years of the later Stewarts. Instances have already been given of the interference of William III. and Anne, directly or indirectly, in what may be regarded as the specially spiritual work of the and the clergy. It must not be imagined, that even after the Church, 1662. Restoration, there were no precedents for such action. On October 14, 1662, for example, a letter was addressed by the king to the archbishops which is thus summarised in the Calendar of State Papers: "The extravagance of preachers has much heightened the disorders, and still continues so to do, by the diligence of factious spirits, who dispose them to jealousy of the government. Young divines, in ostentation of learning, handle the deep points of God's eternal counsels, or wrangle about gestures and fruitless controversies. To put a timely stop to these abuses he has, as The State CHAP. XVI THE CHURCH AND THE STATE 283 done by former kings, drawn up directions for preachers, which are to be communicated to every minister." To this letter were annexed directions concerning preachers: "None are in their sermons to bound the authority of sovereigns, or determine the differences between them and the people; nor to argue the deep points of election, reprobation, free will, etc.; they are to abstain as much as possible from controversies; catechise the children according to the Prayer-book; stir up the people to the practice of religious and moral duties; at afternoon service to expound the Church Catechism and prayers; read publicly the Canons and Thirty-nine Articles twice a year; no minister is to preach without special licence from the archbishop or bishop. Attendance at Divine service on the Lord's Day is to be enforced, and frequenters of taverns and unlawful sports punished according to law." Such a letter was indeed a close imitation of some of the instructions issued by Charles I. to Laud. A later one, of 1665, follows on much the same lines. In July, during the height of the plague, Arlington wrote to the Bishop of London that the king was informed that many incumbents and lecturers had deserted their posts and that nonconformists had thrust themselves into their pulpits, and preached sedition and doctrines contrary to the Church; wherefore the bishop is ordered to prevent such mischiefs to Church and State. On the other hand, instances were not wanting of a scrupulous observance by the civil authorities of the rights of the Church. During the period of discussion about the revision of the Prayer-book in 1662, for example, at a conference between the Houses of Parliament a suggestion was brought forward to make a provision for "reverend and uniform gestures and demeanours to be used at the time of divine service"; but it was agreed that this was a matter for the Convocations, and they were requested "to prepare some rule or canon for that purpose, to be humbly presented unto his Majesty for his assent." Other and less trivial examples might be quoted; the general attitude of Parliament towards the Church is indeed well illustrated by the position assumed during the early years of Queen Anne. (See above, p. 276.) When we pass from practice to theory we find the field occupied by one great writer, whose work has an influence as Political theory. Hobbes. In the widespread as profound; and with whose opinions all political and ecclesiastical writers of the age found themselves compelled to deal, whether in support or in opposition. We have seen (above, p. 213) the view which was taken by the University of Oxford of the works of Hobbes. Though his great work deals hardly more than indirectly with the Church, it must receive at least brief mention here. Of the rights of sovereigns it was his cue to argue for the most part, as he said, from "the principles of nature only," in other words, from experience he would make a distinction of Christian politics, as depending "much upon supernatural revelations of the will of God," and thus, in his elaborate manneroften, very plainly, with his tongue in his cheekLeviathan. he considers whether Christian sovereigns are absolute in their own territories, immediately under God, and then rejects the assumptions of "a vicar of Christ constituted of the Universal Church": he dismisses metaphorical, spiritual, or ecclesiastical interpretations of "the kingdom of God," and decides that it is a civil kingdom in which the Christian sovereign is the representative of God, and His prophet. From this he was able, by quaint and devious paths, to pass to the definition of a Church as "a company of men professing the Christian religion, united in the person of one sovereign; at whose command they ought to assemble, and without whose authority they ought not to assemble." This leads to an identification of the Church in each country with the civil commonwealth and it involves an explicit denial of the existence of "such universal Church as all Christians are forced to obey," and an emphatic declaration that "there is no other government in this life, neither of State nor religion, but temporal; nor teaching of any doctrine, lawful to any subject, which the government both of the State and of the religion forbiddeth to be taught." Thus "temporal and spiritual government are but two words brought into the world to make men see double and mistake their lawful sovereign," and so the civil sovereign is chief pastor of the Church as well as chief ruler of the State. As such he has power to ordain what pastors he please, and they are simply his ministers, in the same manner as are the civil magistrates, and derive XVI HOBBES'S VIEW OF THE CHURCH 285 from him their "right of teaching, preaching, and other functions pertaining to that office." It is sovereigns alone who have their authority jure divino: and bishops ought to describe themselves as "by the favour of the king's majesty bishop of such a diocese." And from this Hobbes, that there might be no doubt of his position in regard to the existing Church of England, claimed for every Christian sovereign authority "not only to preach (which perhaps no man will deny), but also to baptize and to administer the sacrament of the Lord's Supper, and to consecrate both temples and pastors to God's service." No sooner has he decided that the sovereign is head of the Church than he falls into the temptation, which no seventeenth-century controversialist seems able to avoid, of arguing with Bellarmine, from which he emerges only to conclude that this subjection to the sovereign, whether he be Christian or infidel, in no way touches anything "necessary to salvation." The Church feeling evoked by the book. The Leviathan was published in 1651, and was well known, to all who had time amid the distractions of practical politics to study religious and political theories, before the Restoration brought its author into something of intimacy, as well as favour, with the king. There could be no doubt how the Church would receive such doctrines; though Hobbes quaintly identified his opinions with those of some of the strongest among the Royalist clergy, telling Aubrey "that Bishop Manwaring preached his doctrine, for which, among others, he was sent prisoner to the Tower." Aubrey adds, "there was a report (and surely true) that in Parliament not long after the king was settled some of the bishops made a motion to have the good old gentleman burnt for a heretique." The worthy biographer exaggerates, for the clergy were content to attack Hobbes with their pens, which they did, indeed, without intermission for more than half a century. But it seems certain that, in spite of what were regarded as the effects of his teaching, in the growth of immorality which Burnet speaks of with so much vehemence, he was not regarded as outside the Church, for he received the sacrament from Pearson and made his confession to Cosin when he thought he was dying, and in the autobiographical note which he wrote two years before his death he spoke of himself as a |