5. Triumph of High-church Principles Under Stuarts

indications of which showed them selves in the Puritan controversies of church the Elizabethan period, with a con- Principles sequent uncompromising resistance Under to all dissent in ritual and doctrines, Stuarts. culminating in the repressive legislation of Charles II. Under James I. (1603-25), who came from Scotland to England with a cordial hatred of Presbyterianism, the Puritan party was completely humiliated. All the Puritan hopes expressed in the famous Mille nary Petition, signed by eight hundred clergy men, and asking for the removal of "superstitious usages" from the Prayer-Book, etc., were doomed to disappointment; although James won the approval of Churchmen and dissenters alike by the preparation, under his auspices, of the au thorized version of the English Bible which ap peared in 1611 (see Hampton Court Conference). James retained relations with the Reformed Churches of the Continent, and sent five commis sioners to represent the Church of England at she Synod of Dort, with instructions to " favor no innovations in doctrine, and to conform to the con fessions of the neighboring Reformed churches." But full sympathy with the Continental churches was hereafter impracticable, and recognition of their orders (as was the case under Elizabeth) impossible, by the High-church views of episcopacy which were spreading, and which, under Charles I. (1625-49) and Archbishop Laud (q.v.; 16335), assumed an extreme form. The latter taught that episcopacy was not only necessary to the well being, but essential to the very existence of the Church. His administration revived, to the Low church and Puritan mind, the ritual of Rome, and displayed so much sympathy with it that he was said to have been offered a cardinal's hat. Abbot, archbishop of Canterbury (1611-35), was a strict Calvinist, but he could not check the growth of the Arminian views advocated by Laud, whose fidelity to his principles brought him to the block in 1645. He and Charles I. have since been re garded as martyrs by a school of Anglicans who reprobate everything that savors of Puritanism as contrary to the Church and to God. Since his day a large liberty of opinion has been allowed and practised in the Church of England on the question of ritual and episcopacy; the High-church views of Laud, and the Low-church views of Parker and Grindal, both having their representatives.

6. The Commonwealth, the Restoration, the House of Hanover

and discontinued the use of the Lit- monwealth, orgy (Sept. 10, 1642). Puritanism the Restoration triumphed for a time, and the Westminster Assembly (q.v.) in 1643 the House of established a Presbyterian kingdom; Hanover. but in spite of the strong theological intellects which supported it, and in spite of the massive will of Cromwell, who was not a Presbyterian, but an Independent, Puritanism

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was a failure in England. The accession of Charles II. (1660) restored the Church of England to the national position which it has ever since held. Stern measures against the Puritans soon followed, By the Act of Uniformity (q.v.) of 1662, the use of the Prayer-Book was rigidly enforced; and two thousand English clergymen, among them some of the most scholarly and pious divines of the time (such as Baxter and Howe), were deprived of their benefices. These penalties for dissent were increased by the Five-Mile Act (q.v.) of 1665, while the Test Act (q.v.) of 1673, by excluding all Puritans from office, marked the culmination of legislation against dissenters. Charles II. died, it is commonly held, a Roman Catholic, and his brother, James II., lived as one; but the nation was against him, and his efforts to restore confidence and toleration for the Roman Church failed. The accession of William and Mary in 1688 ushered in a new epoch. The principle that the Established Church had an exclusive right to existence and protection was abrogated. The movement in favor not only of toleration but of absolute freedom of worship and political equality without reference to ecclesiastical connection began with this reign. Put into more and more extensive practise, this principle has effected the abolition of most, if not all, political disabilities on account of religious differences. The first legislation in this direction was the Act of Toleration (q.v.) of 1689 establishing freedom of worship. The nineteenth century witnessed the repeal of the Test Act (1828), the removal of the disabilities of the Roman Catholics (1829) and Jews (1858), and the dieeatabliahment of the Irish Church (1868).

The eighteenth century was characterized by a wide-spread religious apathy and worldliness among the clergy, and witnessed the cuhni7. Deism, nation of Deism, which identified

Rise of Christian revelation with natural re Methodism. ligion, and excluded from Christianity, as ungenuine and false, all that was not contained in the latter (see Deism). But the influence of Deism was more than counteracted by the Evangelical spirit and activity of Whitefield and the Wealeys, graduates of Oxford, which worked with irresistible power upon the masses, sad aroused the clergy out of their indifference to a new sense of their spiritual obligations. John Wesley (q.v.; 1702-91), the founder of the movement, a man of notable, power of organization as well as a great preacher, reached the masses and spoke as no single individual had spoken to England since Wyclif. Charles Wesley (q.v.) gave the English people some of its beat hymns. Whitefield (q.v.) in America as well as in England made the reputation of the greatest popular preacher England had produced. Against his will John Wesley founded a new church organization (see Methodists). Fresh life sprang up in the Church of England as a result of this revival of practical religion. The so-called Evan gelicals, including some of the most famous pastors, fervent preachers, devout poets, and self-sacrificing philanthropists-men like Vena and Newton and Cowper and Wilberforce-brought a warm conse cration to their work and vied with the more elo- quent and equally devoted leaders of the Methodist movement in spreading the truths of vital religion. The century closed with an intense sympathy for the heathen abroad and the depraved classes at home. Sunday Schools were organized by the layman Robert Raikea of Gloucester in 1780, and in 1799 the Church Missionary Society was founded, while later still the movement which resulted in the abolition of the sle,ve-trade was inaugurated by Wilberforce.