standings of the high church clergy, during the whole reign of king Charles II. while they were pursuing the non-conformists and their familes to destruction, for a long course of years? Did they not perceive the design of the papists? Or were they not willing rather to court them, at the expence of the whole body of dissenting protestants? Bishop Laud's scheme of uniting with the papists, and meeting them half way, was never out of their sight; however, when the reader calls to mind the oppression and cruelties that the conscientious non-conformists underwent from the high church party for twenty-five years, he will be ready to conclude they deserved no regard, if the protestant religion itself had not been at stake. Thus the allwise providence of God put a period to the prosecution of the protestant dissenters from the penal laws, though the laws themselves were not legally repealed, or suspended, till after the revolution of King William and Queen Mary. It may not therefore be improper to give the reader a summary view of their usage in this and the last reign, and of the damages they sustained in their persons, families, and fortunes. The QUAKERS, in their petition to King JAMES* the last year, inform his majesty, that of late above one thousand five hundred of their friends were in prison, both men and women; and that now there remain one thousand three hundred eighty-three, of which two hundred are women; many under sentence of præmunire; and more than three bundred near it, for refusing the oath of allegiance because they could not swear.†Above three hundred and fifty have died in prison since the year 1660, near one hundred of which since the year 1680.-In London, the gaol of Newgate has been crowded within these two years, sometimes with near twenty in a room, whereby several have been suffocated, and others, who have been taken out sick, have died of malignant fevers within a few days;—great * It was addressed not to King James only, but to both houses of parHament. They made also an application to the king alone; recommending to his princely elemency the case of their suffering friends. Sewel, p. 592. This was not so copious a state of their case as the petition to which Mr. Neal refers, and is called by Gough their first address. Vol. iii. p. 162; and the Index under the word ADDRESS. Ed. + Sewel, p. 588, 593. violences, outrageous distresses, and woeful havoc and spoil have been made on people's goods and estates, by a company of idle, extravagant, and merciless informers, by prosecutions on the conventiele act, and others, as may be seen in the margin.* Also on qui tam writs, and on other processes, for twenty pounds a month; and two-thirds of their estates seized for the king :-some had not a bed left to rest upon; others had no cattle to till the ground, nor corn for seed or bread, nor tools to work with: the said informers and bailiff's in some places breaking into houses, and making great waste and spoil, under pretence of serving the king and the church. Our religious assemblies have been charged at common law with being riotous routs, and disturbances of the peace, whereby great numbers have been confined in prisons, without regard to age or sex; and many in holes and dungeons :-the seizures for twenty pounds a month have amounted to several thousand pounds; sometimes they have seized for eleven months at once, and made sale of all goods and chattels both within doors and without, for payment :-several who have employed some hundreds of poor families in manufacture, are by those writs and seizures disabled, as well as by long. imprisonment; one in particular, who employed two hundred people in the woollen manufacture.-Many inform ers, and especially impudent women, whose husbands are in prison, swear for their share of the profit of the seizures the fines upon one justice's warrant have amounted to many hundred pounds; frequently ten pounds a warrant, The acts or penal laws on which they suffered were these: Some few suffered on 27 Henry VIII. cap. 20. Others on 1 Eliz. cap. 2, for twelve-pence a Sunday. Eliz. cap. 23, De excommu. capiendo. 23 Eliz. cap. 1, for 201. a month. 29 Eliz. cap. 6, for more speedy and due execution of last statute. 35. Eliz. cap. 1, for abjuring the realm on pain of death. 3 King James I. cap. 4, for better discovering and suppressing popish recusants. 13th and 14th of King Charles II. against quakers,&c. transportation. 17 Charles II. cap. 2, against non-conformists. 22 King Charles II. cap. 1, against seditious conventicles. N. B. The quakers were not much affected with the corporation and test acts, because they would not take an oath; Nor with the Oxford five-mile act, which cut the others to pieces. and five warrants together for fifty pounds to one man; and for non-payment, all his goods carried away in about ten cart loads. They spare neither widows, por fatherless, nor poor families; nor leave them so much as a bed to lie upon:-thus the informers are both witnesses and parties, to the ruin of great numbers of sober families; and justices of peace have been threatened with the forfeiture of one hundred pounds, if they do not issue out warrants upon their informations.-With this petition, they presented to the king and parliament a list of their friends in prison in the several counties, amounting to one thousand four hundred and sixty. But it is impossible to make an exact computation of the number of sufferers, or estimate of the damages his majesty's dissenting subjects of the several denominations sustained, by the prosecutions of this and the last reign; how many families were impoverished, and reduced to beggary; how many lives were lost in prisons and noisome gaols; how many ministers were divorced from their people, and forced to live as they could, five miles from a corporation: how many industrious and laborious tradesmen were cut off from their trades; and their substance and household goods plundered by soldiers, or divided among idle and infamous informers. The vexatious suits of the commons, and the expences of those courts, were immense. The writer of the preface of Mr. Delaune's plea for the non-conformists, says,* that Delaune was one of near eight thousand protestant dissenters, who had perished in prison in the reign of King Charles II. and that merely for dissenting from the church in some points, which they were able to give good reason for; and yet for no other cause, (says he) were they stifled, I had almost said, murdered in gaols. As for the severe penalties inflicted on them, for seditious and riotous assemblies, designed only for the worship of God, he adds, that they suffered in their trades and estates, within the compass of three years, at least two millions; and doubts, whether in all the times since the reformation, including the reign of Queen MARY, there can be produced any thing like such a number of christians who have suffered death; and such numbers who have lost * Preface to Delaune's Plea, p. 5. 21 VOL. V. their substance for religion. Another writer adds,* that Mr. Jeremy White had carefully collected a list of the dissenting sufferers, and of their sufferings; and had the names of sixty thousand persons who had suffered on a religious account, between the restoration of King Charles II. and the revolution of king William; five thousand of whom died in prison. That Mr. White told lord Dorset, that King James had offered him a thousand guineas for the manuscript, but that he refused all invitations and rewards, and concealed the black record, that it might not appear to the disreputation of the church of England, for which some of the clergy sent him their thanks, and offered him an acknowledgment, which he generously refused. The reader will form his own judgment of the truth of these facts. It is certain, that besides those who suffered in their own country,great numbers retired to the plantations of New England, Pennsylvania, and other parts of America. Many transported themselves and their effects into Holland,† and filled the English churches of Amsterdam, the Hague, Utrecht, Leyden, Rotterdam, and other parts. If we admit the dissenting families of the several denominations in England, to be one hundred and fifty thousand, and that each family suffered no more than the loss of three or four pounds per annum, from the act of uniformity, the whole will amount to twelve or fourteen millions; a prodigious sum for those times! But these are only conjectures; the damage to the trade and property of the nation was undoubtedly immense; and the wounds that were made in the estates of private families were deep and large; many of whom, to my certain knowledge, wear the scars of them to this day. History of the Stuarts, p. 715. † Among these were Mr Howe, Mr. Shower, Mr. Nat. Taylor, Mr. Papillon, Sir John Thompson, (afterwards lord Haversham) Sir John Guise, and Sir Patience Ward. The States of Holland treated the English Refugees with particular respect. But as it has been pertinently observed, it was a reproach to this nation, that, in particular, so excellent a person as Mr. Howe, whose unaffected piety, polite and profound learning, and most sweet, ingenious and genteel temper, entitled him to the esteem of the greatest and best men in the land of all persuasions; that such a one at that time could not have a safe and quiet habitation in his native country. Tong's Life of Shower, p. 51. Ed. When the protestant dissenters rose up into public view as a distinct body, their long sufferings had not very much diminished their numbers, which, though not to be compared with those of the establishment, or the tories and Roman catholics, were yet so considerable, as to be capable of turning the scale on either side, according as they should throw in their weight, which might possibly be owing, amongst others, to the following reasons: 1. To their firmness and constancy in a long course of suffering, which convinced the world, that they were not actuated by humor, but conscience. 2. To their doctrine and manner of preaching, which was plain and practical, accompanied with a warm and awakening address to the conscience. Their doctrines were those of the first reformers, which were grown out of fashion in the church; and their way of worship was simple and plain; without the ornament of rites and ceremonies. 3. To the severity of their morals, at a time when the nation was sunk into all kinds of vice and luxury, from which they preserved themselves in a great measure untainted. Their conversation was sober and virtuous.They observed the Lord's day with religious strictness, and had an universal reputation for justice and integrity in their dealings. 4. To the careful and strict education of their children, whom they impressed with an early sense of scriptural religion, and educated in their own way, as they had opportunity, under private school-masters of their own principles. 5. To a concern for a succession of able and learned ministers; for which purpose they encouraged private academies in several parts of the kingdom; and it is remarkable that many gentlemen and substantial citizens devoted their children to the ministry, at a time when they had nothing in view but worldly discouragements. 6. To the persecuting zeal of the high church party, attended with an uncommon licentiousness of manners. If their zeal against the non-conformists had produced a greater sanctity of life, and severity of morals, amongst themselves, it had been less offensive: but to see men destitute of common virtue, signing warrants of distress upon |
