Chap. XXXVII. 1702-1705. Accession of Queen Anne an important era to the Church. CHAPTER XXXVII. Accession of Queen Anne an important era to the Church-The opportunity lost-The Queen supersedes the Commission for Church Preferment-Unpopularity of the bishops-Bishop of Worcester charged with Breach of Privilege-Archbishop Sharp -The Tory character of the House of Commons-Occasional Conformity-Bill to prevent it brought into the House of Commons-The Bill sent to the House of Lords-The free conference-The Bill lost-The Queen's Speech-Occasional Conformity Bill revived-Bishop Burnet's Speech-Bill rejected a second time-Queen Anne's Bounty-The attempt to carry the Occasional Conformity Bill by a tack-Debate in the Lords before the Queen-Parliament dissolved-Disputes in the first Session of Convocation-The Declaration on the divine right of Episcopacy-The Lower House petitions the Queen-Disappointment of the High Churchmen-The representation about scandals-The premonentes clause-Speech of the Archbishop in proroguing Convocation-Dr. Binks chosen Prolocutor of Convocation-Violent attack on the bishopsThe archbishop reproves the lower clergy-Continuance of the disputes-The archbishop's speech at the conclusion of Convocation-Excited temper of the clergy-The " Church in danger "The Memorial of the Church of England-Its great effect-False impressions regarding the Queen-Promotion of Bishop Bull; of Bishop Beveridge; of Bishop Wake; of Bishop Hooper. HE reign of Queen Anne is a most important period in the history of the Church of England. Never before nor since have so many circumstances of power, prestige, and influence combined in its favour. 1702-1705. At no other period has it been so heartily and Chap. earnestly supported by the Sovereign, and, at the XXXVII. same time, so popular in the nation. The first Stuarts had zealously upheld the Church; but the people, alienated by their tyranny, had learned to invest it with the odium belonging to the arbitrary measures of the Government. Under James II. the Church had been highly popular, but its popularity had arisen from its being oppressed by a monarch who was detested by his people. Under Anne the Church was loved, partly because the Queen loved it, and partly from other causes which had procured for it consideration and regard. King William III. had never been liked in the country. His unsocial habits and peevish manners had been exaggerated in the stories told of him, and hatred of the King and his Dutchmen had been the prevailing sentiment. Jacobitism had been growing in consequence. The tyranny of James, softened by distance, seemed preferable to the foreign manners of his successor, for which the country had to pay in costly wars, without any glorious successes to lighten the burdens of the expenditure. The clergy, dissatisfied with the way in which patronage had been administered, and with the favour shown by the King to Dissenters, declared that the Church was oppressed and endangered, and the country rallied boisterously round the Tory parsons, and gave them the benefit of their dislike of the Dutch. The Princess Anne ascended the throne in opposition to the policy of the late reign. Her heart, she was eager to say, 1702-1705. * Chap. was truly English. She had been on bad terms XXXVII. with William, and was thought by some to have been unkindly used by him. She was known to have no Presbyterian or Whig bias, but to be a Churchwoman and a Tory. Against her the Jacobites had no dynastic prejudices, as after the death of James, and during the minority of his son, she was the natural regent of the country.† Being without children herself, it was confidently hoped that she would be succeeded by her brother. The burst of popularity with which her accession was received by all classes extended to the Church, which it was known she loved and reverenced. And now a great opportunity was given to the Church of England. Freed from the odium of enforcing penal and coercive laws, cherished by the Sovereign, acceptable to the people, it might seem not chimerical to hope that she might win back from the Nonconformists the allegiance of the whole nation. The opportunity lost. The opportunity, however, was lost through the prevalence of bitter disputes and angry passions. The feud which had been commenced in the late reign between the bishops and the inferior clergy raged only the more furiously now. The High Churchmen became more outrageous in their claims and pretensions, the Whig bishops more Latitudinarian. Churchmen wasted their energies * Burnet's Own Time, p. 704.-" Many were highly offended at the expression in her Speech that her heart was truly English, which was a glaring insinuation that the late King's heart was not so."-Boyer's Reign of Queen Anne, p. 12. † Dalrymple's Memoirs, iv., i., 245. in preaching up non-resistance and abusing the Toleration Act and the Dissenters, until their opportunity was gone, and the Church had drifted into the hopeless negligence of the Georgian era. Chap. XXXVII. 1702-1705. the Commis ferment. One of the first acts of Queen Anne was to The Queen supersede the Commission for Ecclesiastical Prefer- supersedes ments, which had been appointed by William after sion for the death of Queen Mary.* It is probable that no Church Presmall portion of the discontent and ill-feeling then prevalent among the clergy was due to the working of this Commission. The men appointed by it were, doubtless, able and distinguished; but being carefully selected from those who belonged to one school of opinions, the great body of the clergy felt themselves neglected, and cut off from all hope of rising. Embittered by this, they exag- Unpopugerated the failings of their more fortunate bre- larity of the bishops. thren, and for a man to be a bishop was enough to draw down upon him a mighty load of vituperation and scorn. Bishop Burnet complains that the prelates were charged as "enemies of the Church, and betrayers of its interests;" and even such a man as Bishop Hough, who stood so high for his bold resistance to the arbitrary measures of King James, mentioned in the House of Lords "the opprobrious names the clergy gave their bishops, and the calumnies they laid on them as if they were in a plot to destroy the Church, and had compounded to be the last of their order, and when the plot was ripe, to resign their bishoprics and accept pension for life."† * Burnet's Own Time, p. 708. † Parliamentary History, vi., 497. Chap. breach of privilege. In the first Session of Queen Anne's first ParXXXVII. liament, Sir John Pakington, an ultra Tory mem1702-1705. ber of the House of Commons, charged the Bishop Bishop of Worcester of Worcester (Lloyd) with a breach of privilege charged with in interfering in elections; and so strong was the feeling against the bishops in the House, that a violent resolution, praying the Queen to remove him from the office of almoner, was voted without any pretence of hearing the other side of the question. The Lords endeavoured to protect the bishop, and voted that it was an injustice to condemn any subject unheard, but the Queen listened to the remonstrance of the angry Commons and did as they desired. "And thus," says Boyer, "this pious and learned prelate fell a sacrifice to the prevailing High Church party.' Shortly afterwards, the same member of Parliament who had attacked Bishop Lloyd, thus enunciated the Tory views about the bishops: "One would be provoked, by the late behaviour of the bishops, to bring in a Bill for the toleration of Episcopacy, for, since they are of the same principles with the Dissenters, it is but just, I think, that they should stand on the same foot."† Archbishop The Queen at once showed herself on the High Church side. Passing by Tenison she selected as the preacher of her Coronation sermon, and as her chief adviser in ecclesiastical matters, Dr. John Sharp, Archbishop of York. The archbishop was *Reign of Queen Anne, p. 36. See Somerville's Queen Anne, p. 24. † Parliamentary History, vi., 154. Tindal's Continuation of Rapin, iii., 357. |