I. 1638. CHAP. utterly vanished. For consider of all the liturgies that are or ever have been, and remove from them whatsoever is scandalous to any party, and leave nothing but what all agree on, and the event shall be that the public service and honour of God shall no ways suffer; whereas to load our public forms with the private fancies upon which we differ is the most sovereign way to perpetuate schism unto the world's end. Prayer, confession, thanksgiving, reading of Scripture, exposition of Scripture, administration of sacraments in the plainest and simplest manner, were matter enough to furnish out a sufficient liturgy, though, nothing else of private opinion, or of church pomp, of garments, of prescribed gestures, of imagery, of music, of matter concerning the dead, of many superfluities which creep into churches under the name of order and decency, did interpose itself."1 Hales sent for by Laud. The tract on schism in which these words occur was circulated in manuscript in the spring of 1638. No wonder that when a copy fell into Laud's hands he sent for the author to Lambeth. And yet he could not but know that Hales, if not his ally, was at least the assailant of his enemies. A few years. before, perhaps, he would have dealt harshly with him. He could not find it in his heart now to visit very severely a man whose thrusts were directed against Puritan and Papist alike. The two men walked up and down the garden in friendly, if sometimes in warm, argument. Laud breathed a word of caution. The time, said the Archbishop, was very apt to set new doctrines on foot, of which the wits of the age were too susceptible.' There could not 1 Tract concerning schism. 2 6 Works, i. 114. Life, i. 55. 6 HALES AND LAUD. be too much care taken to preserve the peace and unity of the Church.' As Hales came away he met Heylyn, and fooled him to the top of his bent,1 assuring him that the Archbishop had proved far superior in controversy, ferreting him from one hole to another till there was none left to afford him any further shelter; that he was now resolved to be orthodox, and to declare himself a true son of the Church of England both for doctrine and discipline.’2 Hales, no doubt, was laughing in his sleeve at the pompous chaplain. Yet it must be remembered that it is not from men of Hales's stamp that vigorous selfassertion is to be expected. In writing to Laud he did not, it is true, retract any of his positive opinions, but he certainly explained away some of his utterLaud was satisfied with his explanation, and in the following year he procured for him a canonry at Windsor. ances. 53 CHAP. 1. 1638. ence of La anism not In the days of conflict Falkland and Chillingworth The influand Hales would be found on Charles's side. In the titudinarilong run the spirit which inspired them would be immediate. found a far more powerful dissolvent of Laud's system than the Puritanism which he dreaded. Its time was not yet come. Two theories of the religious life were in presence of one another, and those theories were entwined with a whole mass of habits which could not readily be shaken off. The strife was approaching, and it was not till the combatants had measured their strength with one another that they would be ready to listen to the words of peace. Even when that time came the solution would not be altogether such as Hales would have approved. The 1 This is Principal Tulloch's explanation, and is, I have no doubt, the right one. 2 Heylyn, Cyprianus Anglicus, 340. CHAP. 1. 1638. religious conscience would demand a more definite creed, and a more definite ceremonial, than that for which he had asked. By the side of the idea of comprehension would arise the idea of toleration. The one would soften down asperities, and teach the assured dogmatist to put on something of that humility in which the controversialist of all periods is so grievously deficient. The other would prepare room for the unchecked development of that individuality which is the foundation of all true vigour in Churches and in nations. 55 CHAPTER II. THE CONSTITUTIONAL OPPOSITION. II. 1637. Political Ship money met an ac tual need, THE ecclesiastical grievances were only felt by a part CHAP. of the community. Financial burdens were felt by everyone who had property. In the summer of 1637 the outcry against ship money had become general. grievances. No unprejudiced person can deny that the existence of a powerful fleet was indispensable to the safety of the State, or that the amount of money demanded by Charles for the equipment of that fleet was no more than the case required. The charge which has frequently been brought against him of spending the money thus levied on objects unconnected with its ostensible purpose is without a shadow of foundation; and it is perfectly certain that, though the grant of tonnage and poundage had originally been made in order to provide the Crown with the means of guarding the seas, the expenses of government had so far increased that if tonnage and poundage were to be applied to that purpose on the scale that had now become necessary, the Exchequer would soon be in a condition of bankruptcy. If such But was imposed without the Even the most just and necessary taxation, however, is sometimes received with murmurs. murmurs are not to lead to actual resistance, it is the tax consent of incumbent on those who impose the tax to explain to payers. the tax-payer the necessity under which they are placed, and if possible to find some way of obtaining CHAP. 1637. Services of the fleet. his consent. It was the very thing that Charles had not dared to do. He well knew that to summon a Parliament would be to endanger the success of his ecclesiastical policy, and he had no mind to run the risk. The fleet obtained by the levy of ship money had done nothing sufficiently striking to make men forget the faults of its origin. The maintenance of trade with Dunkirk in the face of threats of a Dutch or French attack upon that nest of privateers interested only a few traders in London or Dover, and the exploits of the King's ships amongst the Dutch fishermen in the summer of 1637 would, if the truth had been known, have awakened scorn rather than admiration. If a less inglorious success was achieved in the same summer by a squadron of six vessels The expedi- under Captain Rainsborough at Sallee, it was due to other causes than the skill of the commander or the efficiency of the armament. Rainsborough was sent to deliver from slavery the European captives of the Barbary pirates, but his efforts to overcome their stronghold by attack or blockade were entirely ineffectual. Luckily, however, a civil war broke out amongst the Moors, and the King of Morocco purchased the neutrality of the English fleet by the surrender of 271 prisoners.2 tion to Sallee. Ship money at tacked as illegal. Yet it was not because ship money was badly spent that the impost was assailed in England. Voices were raised on every side declaring it to be utterly illegal. Ship money, it was loudly declared, was 1 Personal Government of Charles I., ii. 336. 2 Brissenden to Nicholas, Sept. 21. Rainsborough's journal. S. P. Dom. ccclxviii. 6, ccclxix. 72; Carteret to Coke, Sept. 21. List of prisoners released. S. P. Morocco. Garrard's statement (Straf. Letters, ii. 118) that Rainsborough 'put the new town of Sallee into the King of Morocco's hands ' is exaggerated. |