he is said to be, in sciptis theologicis quam plurimis orbi notus, i. e. well known to the world by many theological writings. After the Restoration he resigned his presidentship, and retired to London, where be continued the exercise of his ministry till his death, which happened Feb. 23, 1679-80, in the eightieth year of his age. He was a good scholar, an emineut divine and textuary. His works are since printed in five folios.†

ness.

The last parliament being dissolved abruptly, a new one was convened for Oct. 17, 1680, in which the elections went pretty much as in the last, the cry of the people being, No popery, no pensioners, no arbitrary government. But the king prorogued them from time to time for above a twelve-month, without permitting them to finish any busiHis majesty falling sick in the summer, the duke of York returned immediately to court without the king's leave, which alarmed the people, and made them eager for the sitting of the parliament to regulate the succession.§ This gave rise to sundry petitions, signed by a great himself, boldly and enthusiastically confident of the Protector's recovery; and when he found himself mistaken, to exclaim. in a subsequent address to God, "Thou hast deceived us, and we were deceived." was a man much addicted to retirement and deep contemplation, which dispose the mind to enthusiastical confidence. He and Dr. Owen are called by Wood, "the two Atlasses and Patriarchs of Independency." In the fire of London he lost half of his library, to the value of 5001. but he was thankful that the loss fell on the books of human learning only, those on divinity being preserved. He is supposed to be the independent minister and head of a college described by the "Spectator," No. 494. Birch's Life of Tillotson, p. 16. Grey, vol. i. p. 185. Granger, vol. iii. p. 303. Ed.

He

+ Calamy's Account, vol. ii. p. 61. Palmer's Non. Mem. vol. i. p. 183.

If we may credit Sir John Reresby, who says he had the whole story from Feversham, to whose intervention the revocation of the duke was principally owing; the king's illness was pretended, and the duke was sent for with his privity, though not above four persons knew any thing of the matter. The duke of Monmouth, who thought he had the king to himself, knew nothing of it, till his highness actually arrived at Windsor: "So close and reserved," says Sir John, "could the king be, when he conceived it to be necessary." Memoirs, p. 97, 8. Ed.

§ Eachard, p. 982, 987.

Dr. Grey, by a quotation from Hornby's "Caveat against the Whigs," brings a charge against these petitions, that the signatures were obtained by bribes and impositions. Such practices, if truly stated in this

number of hands both in city and country, which the king received with the utmost displeasure, telling the petitioners, that he was sole Judge of what was fit to be done: you would not take it well (says he) if I should meddle with your affairs, and I desire you would not meddle with mine. After this the king issued out his proclamation, declaring them to be illegal, and forbidding his subjects to promote any subscriptions, or to join in any petitions of this kind, upon peril of the utmost rigor of the law. Warrants were issued against several of the petitioners, and indictments preferred against others. But at the next sessions of the common-council of London, Jan. 21, the court agreed that no such petition should be presented from them; and the king returned them thanks for it.* Upon which addresses were procured from divers parts of the nation, expressing their detestation and abhorrence of the seditious practice of the late PETITIONERS, and referring the sitting of the parliament absolutely to the king's sovereign pleasure, from whence they obtained the name of ABHORRERS. In these addresses, they offer their lives and fortunes for the preservation of his majesty's person and goverament, and for the succession of the duke of York. They renounce the right of the subjects, petitioning, or intermeddling in affairs of state, and lay their liberties at the feet of the prerogative, promising to stand by it, and to be obedient without reserve to his majesty's commands; which addresses were printed in the Gazettes, and dispersed over the kingdom. These proceedings threw the people into a ferment; several of the privy-council deserted their stations, and desired to be excused their attendance at council; some in the admiralty resigned,and because they might not petition, an ASSOCIATION was formed by sundry persons, and copied after the example of that in Queen Elizabeth's time, for the defence of his majesty's person, and the security of the protestant religion, and to revenge his majesty's death upon the papists, if he should come to any violent death. A model of which was said to be found among the earl of

instance, have not been confined to that occasion, or those times; but it is not easy to conceive, that a man of integrity, in any party, can have recourse to them. The proposal of adopting them ought to be rejected with contempt and indignation. Ed. * Burnet, vol. ii. p. 276.

VOL. V.

9

Shaftesbury's papers. This was resented very highly at court, as done without the royal authority, and produced the next year another set of ranting addresses from all parts of the kingdom, in which their lives and fortunes were given up to the king, and the association branded with the names of damnable, cursed, execrable, traiterous, seditious, and a bond of rebellion, which they detest and abhor from their very souls; in most of which the non-conformists are marked as enemies of the king and his government, and their conventicles as the encouragement and life of the associations. They promise to stand by the duke's succession, and to choose such members for the next parliament as shall do the king's business according to his mind. But notwithstanding the utmost efforts of the court, the near approach of a popish successor awakened men's fears, and kept them upon their guard.

The PETITIONERS for the sitting of the parliament, and their adversaries, the ABHORRERS of such petitions, gave rise to the two grand parties which have since divided the nation, under the distinguishing names of WHIG and TORY.

The WHIGS OF LOW CHURCHMEN were the more zealous protestants, declared enemies of popery, and willing to remove to a farther distance from their superstitions: they were firm to the constitution and liberties of their country; and for an union, or at least a toleration, of dissenting protestants. The clergy of this persuasion were generally men of larger principles, and therefore were distinguished by the name of Latitudinarian Divines; their laity were remarkable for their zeal in promoting the bill of exclusion, as the only expedient to secure the protestant establishment in this kingdom. They were for confining the royal prerogative within the limits of the law, for which reason their adversaries charged them with republican principles, and gave them the reproachful name of WHIGS or sour milk, a name first given to the most rigid Scots cov

enanters.

The TORIES OF HIGH CHURCHMEN stood on the side of the prerogative, and were for advancing the king above law; they went into all the arbitrary court measures, and adopted into our religion, (says Dr. Welwood*) a Mahometan

* Memoirs, p. 125.

principle under the names of passive obedience and nonresistance, which since the times of that impostor, who first broached it, has been the means to enslave a great part of the world. These gentlemen leaned more to a coalition with the papists, than with the presbyterians.* They cried up the name and authority of the church, and were for foreing the dissenters to conformity, by all kinds of coercive methods but with all their zeal, they were many of them. persons of lax and dissolute morals, and would risk the whole protestant religion rather than go into any measures of exclusion, or limitation of a popish successor. Most of the clergy (says a member of parliament) are infected with the Laudean principles of raising money without parliament; one or two bishops give measures to the rest, and they to their clergy, so that all derive their politics from one or two, and are under the influence of an over-awing power. No men did more to enslave the nation, and introduce popery into the establishment than they: their adversaries therefore gave them the name of TORIES, a title first given to Irish robbers, who lived upon plunder, and were prepared for any daring or villainous enterprize.

The non-conformists fell in unanimously with the whigs or low churchmen, in all points relating to liberty and the civil constitution, as they must always do if they are consistent with themselves; but these with their allies were not a sufficient balance for the tories, the road to preferment lying through the territories of power; but they were kept in heart with some secret hopes, that by a steady adherence to the constitution they should one time or other obtain a legal toleration. But the superior influence of the tories above the whigs, was the occasion of the severities which befel the non-conformists in the latter part of this reign.

When the parliament met Oct. 21, 1680, the commons were very warm in maintaining the protestant religion and the privileges of parliament. They asserted the rights of the people to petition for the sitting of parliaments, and Foted the abhorrers betrayers of the liberties of the nation. Among other grievances they complained, that the edge of

Burnet, Collect. Debates, p. 163.

+ Rapin, vol. ii. p. 714. Eachard, p. 995.

the penal laws was turned against protestant dissenters, while the papists remained in a manner untouched-That the test act had little effect, because the papists, either by dispensations obtained from Rome, submitted to those tests, and held their offices themselves; or those put in their places were so favorable to the same interest, that popery itself had rather gained than lost ground by that act. They declared for that very ASSOCIATION, to revenge the king's death upon the papists, if his majesty should happen to be assassinated, which the tories had abhorred; and in the month of November revived the bill to disable the duke of York from inheriting the imperial crown of these realms. It was introduced by lord Russel, and passed the commons by a great majority, but was thrown out of the house of lords by a majority of thirty voices,* noes 63, yeas 33, the bench of bishops being in the negative, and the king present during the whole debate. It has been said, king Charles came into the bill at first, the favorite mistress having prevailed with him to abandon his brother, for-a large sum of money, and for an act of parliament to enable him to dispose of the crown by will, under certain restrictions; but a foreign popish court offering more money, he opposed it to the last.f

The parliament being inclined to relieve the non-conformists, appointed a committee, Nov. 18, who agreed upon a comprehension with the dissenters, upon much the same terms with those already mentioned; they were to subscribe the doctrinal articles of the church; the surplice was to be omitted, except in cathedrals and the king's chapel; the ceremonies to be left indifferent. And as for such protestants as could not be comprehended within these terms, they were to have a toleration, and freedom from

* Lord Halifax, a man of the clearest head, finest wit, and fairest eloquence, who was in judgment against the bill, appeared as leader in opposition to it, and made so powerful a defence, that he alone, by the confession of all, influenced the house, and persuaded them to throw out the bill. "One would have thought," says Sir John Reresby, "that so signal a piece of service had been of a degree and nature never to be forgotten." But when the duke afterwards came to be king, he removed lord Halifax from the privy seal to the presidency of the Council, purely to make room for another, and in the end quite laid him aside. Mem. p. 104, 5. Ed. † Welwood's Memoirs, p. 127.