CHAP. IV - Religious differences. The Coronation. A new Parliament

Summary

After the settlement of the Indemnity Bill, by far the most important question before the Convention Parliament was undoubtedly the religious one. The Restoration had been the joint work of the Presbyterians and the Episcopalians; but beyond this nothing had as yet been decided as to their subsequent relations, first of all with each other, and then with the separatist sects whom they had ousted from power, and above all with the Catholics whom they had excluded from any direct share in bringing that event about. The European mind was still steeped in religious ideas. As the result of the intimate connexion which had subsisted from the earliest times between Church and State, religious questions were everywhere, but particularly in England, the very kernel of the political. We may fairly ask whether this is not still the case in our own day; though the fact is less noticed.

In order to understand the controversies which were then pending it will be necessary to look back a few years.

When first the King's restoration was discussed in London, a friend of Monk's, hitherto regarded as a zealous Presbyterians mooted in conversation the kindred question of the reinstatement of the bishops. Monk however objected that the estates of the Episcopal Church had been sold.