Chap.

(2) that it should not attempt or make any Canons XXXVI. without his license. *

Meeting of

1690-1702. Meantime, however, the object of Atterbury Convocation, and his friends had been abundantly obtained. Whatever were the rights inherent in Convocation as a body, it seemed clear to all reasonable men that there was no sufficient reason why the Synods of the Church should be kept in an enforced silence. The King was now served by ministers not committed to the Whig antagonism to the Church. In consequence of their advice, it was intimated to the members of the Synod of Canterbury that no opposition would be offered to their meeting for discussion.† Accordingly, the Convocation of the prelates and clergy of the Province of Canterbury, called by the archbishop's mandate in pursuance of the King's writ, met in the Cathedral of St. Paul's, on Monday, February 10, 1701, where, after the Litany, in the Latin tongue, and an eloquent sermon in the same language, delivered by Dr. Haley, Dean of Chichester, and the hymn sung, 'O pray for the peace of Jerusalem,' the archbishop, followed by his suffragans, went out of the choir and proceeded to the Chapter House: where, after reading the royal writ and the certificate of the Bishop of London for executing the archiepiscopal mandate, his

* Wake's State of the Church and Clergy of England, &c., pp. 30, 35, 535, 536, &c.

+ Hallam's Constitutional History, ii., 393, note. "When the new ministry undertook to serve the King, one of their demands was that a Convocation should have leave to sit, which was promised."-Burnet's Own Time, p. 689.

Grace, in a Latin speech, admonished the lower Chap. clergy then present to retire and choose a Pro- XXXVI. 1690-1702. locutor, and present him on Friday, the 21st instant."* The choice of the Lower House fell upon Dr. Hooper, Dean of Canterbury.† Doubtless, Dr. Jane, the Prolocutor of the last Convocation, who had so successfully withstood the designs of the Comprehension party, would have been re-elected, but his health was failing, and he himself had signified his approval of Dr. Hooper.‡ The Prolocutor having been presented and approved, the next Session of Convocation took place on February 25.

the arch

It was now that the spirit which had produced The Lower the Letter to a Convocation Man and Atterbury's House resists book-the spirit which asserted for the Convoca- bishop's protion inherent and independent powers, and for the rogation. Lower House the status of a spiritual House of Commons,§ showed itself. The archbishop's schedule of prorogation had hitherto been considered as the proper and legal dismissal of the Lower House as well as the Upper; but among the advocates of the new views, it was determined to resist this custom. The archbishop, it was held, could no more legally prorogue the Lower House of Convocation, than the Speaker of the Lords *Kennett's Complete History, iii., 797.

† Burnet calls Dr. Hooper "reserved, crafty, and ambitious." There is no proof of the truth of these assertions. Hooper was so highly esteemed by the venerable Bishop Ken, that on his promotion to the See of Bath and Wells, Ken at once resigned his episcopal rights in his favour.

Lathbury's History of Convocation, 346, note. § Prideaux's Life, p. 102.

Chap. could order an adjournment of the Commons.* XXXVI. The Lower House of Parliament could sit and 1690-1702. deliberate when the Upper House was not sitting, and so, it was contended, could the corresponding House in Convocation. The majority of the members, animated by these views, refused to adjourn when the archbishop's schedule was brought down to them; and, after remaining sitting sufficiently long, as they considered, to assert their rights, the Prolocutor, by consent of the House, adjourned them to Henry VII. Chapel, whereas the place intended, though not expressed in the archbishop's mandate, was the Jerusalem Chamber.t On February 28, the Upper House met but the Lower House did not appear. The archbishop sent for the Prolocutor and required him to answer, 1. Whether the Lower House continued sitting on the 25th after they had been prorogued by the schedule. 2. Whether they had met that morning in a place different from that indicated in the schedule. The Prolocutor replied that the Lower House was preparing something to lay before their lordships concerning the methods of prorogation and some other things of forms. The archbishop responded that "he and his brethren were ready to receive whatsoever should be offered by them, and

*"We say that the Continuatio præsentis Convocationis in the Upper House does no more adjourn the Lower than the like Continuatio præsentis Parliamenti in the Lords' House adjourns the House of Commons."-Hooper's Narrative of the Proceedings of the Lower House of Convocation (London, 1701), p. 8.

Kennett, iii., 797. Burnet's Own Time, p. 699. Hooper's Narrative, p. 12.

would consider of it, and do upon it whatsoever should appear to them to be just and right; but, in the meantime, he and his brethren thought fit to continue the usual practice." Accordingly, that the phrase of proroguing, in hunc locum, might admit of no dispute, it was in the schedule of this day expressly specified in hunc locum vulgo vocat. Jerusalem Chamber, to which the Lower House submitted with a salvo jure.

Chap. XXXVI. 1690-1702.

At the next Session, on March 6, the Prolocutor, Presents a accompanied by several members of the Lower report on the point of House, attended upon the archbishop in the prorogation. Jerusalem Chamber, according to the schedule. Being sent to their own House, they soon after returned with a report which they had drawn up on the precedents, with respect to the manner of adjourning. This report stated: 1. That it was the common usage for the Lower House of Convocation to be prorogued by its Prolocutor, with the consent of the House, and that there were instances of the Lower House not adjourning on the same day as the Upper. 2. That when the words in bunc locum were used in the Schedule of Prorogation, the Lower House always met in the place of its own Session, and not in the place where the Upper House sat; also that it was the constant practice for the Lower House first to meet, and then to attend their Lordships with business of its own motion, but not to attend them previously to its own sitting.* "To this paper," says Burnet,

*Kennett, iii., 798. Calamy's Baxter, i., 573, sq. Burnet's Own Time, p. 690. Hooper's Narrative, p. 16.

Chap. "the bishops drew a very copious answer, in which XXXVI. all their precedents were examined and answered, 1690-1702. and the matter was so clearly stated, and so fully

proved, that we hoped we had put an end to the Lower House dispute."* This, however, was a vain hope. The claims a free Lower House replied, not in writing, but by their conference.

Censures Toland's book.

Prolocutor, who said that "their Lordships' reply did not give them the satisfaction they desired, and, therefore, they prayed a free conference with their Lordships upon the subject-matter in dispute." To demand a free conference was exactly to imitate the proceedings of the House of Commons. This, of course, was resisted by the bishops. They had begun the matter in writing, they said, and had been answered in writing; in writing the controversy must continue. The Lower House, however, would only put into writing their reasons for desiring a free conference-" a word," says Kennett, "that never appeared in the Acts of any former Convocation."+

Thus matters were at a standstill. But it was before all things desirable for the Lower House, in the prosecution of their scheme for obtaining independent rights, to do something proprio motu. Nothing seemed so suitable for their purpose as to censure a book. This they had done in former

*Own Time, p. 690-" As to their requiring that the Lower House should break up immediately the schedule was brought down, and appoint no committees to sit and act in the intermediate days, he (Dean Prideaux) was clearly of opinion that they were wholly in the wrong."-Prideaux's Life, p. 103. Dr. Prideaux belonged to the moderate party, which acted with the bishops. Kennett, iii., 836. Hooper's Narrative, p. 43.