religion is in great peril." Another petition complained that the ministers who were competent had been silenced for non-conformity, and that such as were left were unfit for the office, "having been either popist priests, or shiftless men thrust in upon the ministry when they know not how else to live, serving-men, and the basest of all sorts, men of no gifts. So they are of no common honesty, rioters, dicers, drunkards, and such like, of offensive lives." The Council made an examination of the statements contained in this petition, and they reported that the statements were correct. With such a state of things within the Church, the best men of the nation made common cause with the Puritans in their demand for a thorough reformation. "Why," asked Lord Bacon, "should the civil state be purged and restored by good and wholesome laws, made every three years, in Parliament assembled, devising remedies as fast as time breweth mischief, and the ecclesiastical state still continue upon the dregs of time, and receive no alteration these forty-five years or more?

X.

THROUGH the later years of Elizabeth the Puritans had waited, in the hope that when her successor, James the First, should ascend the throne, the way would be open for the reformation of the 1 Campbell, vol. i. 466.

2 Strype's Whitgift, 167-168.

The Millenary

Church. James had hardly crossed the border, on his way to London for his coronation, when he was met by what was called the MilPetition. lenary Petition, with the signatures of some eight hundred of the English clergy. This contained the proposals of the Puritan ministers for the reformation of the Church. They did not ask for any change in the government or the organization of the Established Church. The great body of the Non-Conformists would have been satisfied to continue under the rule of bishops, and to use the Book of Common Prayer in worship. The proposals which have been recently made by the Lambeth Conference for the union of all branches of the Church under the Historic Episcopate would have been entirely satisfactory to the Puritans. What they asked was: the Requests of the omission of the sign of the Cross in Puritans. baptism, of the ring in marriage, of bowing at the name of Jesus, of the lessons from the Apocrypha in public worship, and the omission of the cap and surplice; that the music used in the churches be made plainer and simpler; that the Lord's day be hallowed; that none be made ministers who were unable to preach; that candidates for the Communion be examined as to their fitness; and that discipline be attended to more strictly.1

1 Gardner's History of England from the Accession of James I., vol. i. 163.

These proposals were certainly moderate; the most of them have been long ago adopted by the English Church. The Petition was an honest effort at comprehension which would have led to important results if it had been welcomed by the king and the bishops. Lord Bacon, who was far from being a Puritan, sent forth at that time a plea that things which are not essential be left "to the holy wisdom and spiritual discretion of the master builders and inferior builders in Christ's Church." He advised the king that it would be proper and expedient to institute such reforms as those which the Puritans had asked for.1

King James received the Millenary Petition graciously, and promised a conference of bishops and divines in which it should be discussed. Ten months later, he summoned four Puritan ministers to meet the Archbishop of Canterbury, and eight of the bishops, and seven deans, at Hampton Court. The proposals of the Puritans were discussed for three days; the King himself, who has been called the "wisest fool in Christendom," took the leading part in the discussion. One suggestion of the Puritan divines for a new translation of the Bible was received with favor. This was afterwards carried out, and the author

1 Bacon's Works. Montagu's Edition, vol. ii. 420-430, on the Pacification of the Church.

ized version of 1611 was the result. But the propositions for a reform in the Church met the decided opposition of the king and of all the bishops. They were unwilling that any matters of form or ceremony should be left to the discretion of the clergyman who conducted the public services. "I will have one doctrine, one discipline, one religion, in substance and in ceremony," said King James; "I will make them conform, or I will harry them out of the land, or else worse." The aged Archbishop of Canterbury exclaimed: "Undoubtedly your Majesty spake by the special assistance of God's spirit." And Bancroft, the Bishop of London, fell on his knees, and said, "There has been no such king since Christ's time." Soon after, the Convocation, with the approval of the king, passed a series of canons which forbade, on penalty of excommunication, the least deviation from the Prayer Book, or any disparagement of the established system of gov ernment and worship in the Church.

XI.

THE Puritans were disappointed, but not cast down. They had hoped for favorable changes from the new king. He had been bred a Presbyterian, and a Calvinist; he had subscribed to the Solemn League and Covenant, and had

praised the Scottish Church as the "sincerest in the world." He had spoken, while in Scotland, of the Anglican Service as "an evil said Mass in English." They had hoped that one coming from another Protestant nation would be prepared to mediate between the parties in the English Church; and they expected that he would receive with favor the proposals for union with liberty, and mutual charity. The grand opportunity of uniting English-speaking Protestants in one Church, with one way of worship, was lost, and the divisions, which have lasted till our own time, have resulted from the mistakes of that critical time.

The half century, that followed the accession of James the First, was the great age of Puritanism. The contest soon passed beyond ecclesiastical matters, and became political as well as religious.

The king opposed his prerogative to the Constitutional rights of Parliament, and of the people of England. The Puritans took the lead in this contest on the side of liberty in the state as well as in the Church.

XII.

THE causes which led to this broadening of the questions in debate are not far to seek. The first is to be found in the fact of the union of

1 Neal's Puritans, part ii. ch. 1.