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THE OCCASIONAL CONFORMITY CONTROVERSY, MODERATION, AND THE ANGLICAN CRITIQUE OF MODERNITY, 1700–1714*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 January 2014

BRENT S. SIROTA
BRENT S. SIROTA*
Affiliation:
North Carolina State University
*
Department of History, North Carolina State University, Withers Hall, Raleigh, North Carolina, 27695[email protected]
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Abstract

The occasional conformity controversy during the reign of Queen Anne has traditionally been understood as a straightforward symptom of the early eighteenth-century ‘rage of party’. For all the pious rhetoric concerning toleration and the church in danger, the controversy is considered a partisan squabble for short-term political gain. This traditional interpretation has, however, never been able to account for two features of the controversy: first, the focus on ‘moderation’ as a unique characteristic of post-Revolutionary English society; and second, the prominence of the Anglican nonjurors in the debate. This article revisits the occasional conformity controversy with an eye toward explaining these two related features. In doing so, it will argue that the occasional conformity controversy comprised a referendum on the Revolution settlement in church and state. Nonjurors lit upon the practice of occasional conformity as emblematic of the broader malady of moderation afflicting post-Revolutionary England. From their opposition to occasional conformity, the nonjurors, and soon the broader Anglican high-church movement, developed a comprehensive critique of religious modernity that would inform the entire framework of debate in the early English Enlightenment.

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Articles
Information
The Historical Journal , Volume 57 , Issue 1 , March 2014 , pp. 81 - 105
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2014 

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Footnotes

*

I thank James Vaughn, Steve Pincus, Bill Bulman, Robert Ingram, and the participants in the ‘God and the Enlightenment’ conference at Ohio University in October 2012 for their generous engagement with earlier drafts of this article. Thanks also to Phil Withington and the anonymous reviewers for their assistance in shaping this article into its final form. All pre-1800 works were published in London unless otherwise stated.

References

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4 ‘The critics of occasional conformity’, Flaningam writes, ‘were primarily High Churchmen’, Flaningam, ‘Occasional conformity controversy’, p. 44. Sarkela does indeed note ‘Many supporters of the Occasional Conformity Bill were nonjurors … seeing in Queen Anne an opportunity to undue [sic] some of the policies and practices initiated by the 1688 revolution’, although she does not indicate where exactly they diverged from the mainstream of Anglican toryism, Sarkela, ‘The rhetoric of occasional conformity’, p. 71; Greig routinely lists nonjurors as high churchmen or ‘leading figures amongst the High Church party’; Greig, ‘Burnet and occasional conformity bills’, pp. 254–5, 259–60.

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17 Francis Atterbury, Letter to a convocation-man, concerning the rights, powers and privileges of that body (1697), p. 21.

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31 Sacheverell, Political union, pp. 61–2.

32 Henry Sacheverell, The character of a low-churchman (1702), p. 6; a response to an attack by another Fellow at Magdalen Richard West, The true character of a church-man (n.p., 1702); and see also Leslie, Charles, The new association of those called, moderate church-men, with the modern whigs and fanaticks (2nd edn, 1702), pp. 10–14Google Scholar, 21.

33 Sacheverell, Political union, pp. 37–45.

34 William Bromley to Arthur Charlett, 22 Oct. 1702, Bodleian Library (Bodl.), Ballard MS 38, fo. 107; James Drake, Some necessary considerations relating to all future elections of members to serve in parliament (1702), pp. 19–21.

35 Feiling, History of the Tory party, p. 363.

36 Proceedings, pp. 4–6.

37 Peter Birch to Arthur Charlett, 14 Nov. 1702, Bodl., Ballard MS 34, fo. 58; William Moore to Arthur Charlett, 2 Dec. 1702, Bodl., Ballard MS 32, fo. 179; Luttrell, Narcissus, A brief historical relation of state affairs (6 vols., Oxford, 1857), v, pp. 232Google Scholar, 236, 237, 239, 240, 241; Abel Boyer, The history of the reign of Queen Anne: year the first (1703), pp. 154–5.

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39 Boyer, History of Queen Anne: year the first, pp. 184–91.

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41 A letter to a peer concerning the bill against occasional conformity (1702), p. 18; The case of the dissenters as affected by the late bill proposed in parliament for preventing occasional conformity (1703), p. 30; Charlwood Lawton, A letter to a member of parliament, relating to the bill against occasional conformity, in the last session (1703), pp. 4–5.

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43 Daniel Defoe, The shortest-way with the dissenters: or, proposals for the establishment of the church (1702), pp. 2, 4, 13–14, 19–24, 26–7; and see also Novak, Maximilian E., ‘Defoe's Shortest way with the dissenters: hoax, parody, paradox, fiction, irony and satire’, Modern Language Quarterly, 27 (1966), pp. 402–17CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

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46 Boyer, History of Queen Anne: year the first, pp. 173, 179.

47 The case of toleration recogniz'd (1702), pp. 3–4, 13.

48 Civil security, not conscience concern'd in the bill concerning occasional conformity (1702), pp. 5, 7; A dialogue between conformity, non-conformity and occasional conformity concerning a late bill in parliament (1703), pp. 6–7, 8.

49 The case fairly stated: in a dialogue between moderation and constitution (1702), pp. 3–4.

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51 Burnet, History of his own time, p. 740; Gregg, Queen Anne, p. 177.

52 Charles Davenant, Essays upon peace at home, and war abroad (1704), pp. 239–64; Feiling, History of the Tory party, p. 371.

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55 Burnet, History of his own time, p. 740; Proceedings upon the bill to prevent occasional conformity, p. 38.

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57 Sir John Packington, A speech for the bill against occasional conformity (1703); a copy of the speech may also be found at Bodleian Ballard MS 11, fos. 78–9.

58 Atterbury to Trelawny, 9 Dec. 1703, Nicols, ed.,Epistolary correspondence of Atterbury, iii, pp. 146–7.

59 Hoadly, Letter to a clergy-man in the country, pp. 5–9; Proceedings upon the bill to prevent occasional conformity, p. 53; Boyer, History of Queen Anne: year the second, p. 189.

60 See A letter to my lords the bishops concerning the bill for preventing occasional conformity (n.p., n.d.).

61 Boyer, History of Queen Anne: year the second, p. 254; ‘The first parliament of Queen Anne: second session – other matters (begins 7/2/1704)’, in The history and proceedings of the House of Commons, iii:1695–1706 (1742), pp. 388–92 www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=37668.

62 Atterbury to Bishop Trelawny, 18 Oct. 1704, Nicols, ed., Epistolary correspondence of Atterbury, iii, p. 254; Defoe to Harley, 2 Nov. 1704, BL Add. MS 70291; George Smalridge to Arthur Charlett, 23 Dec. 1704, Bodl., Ballard MS 7, fo. 5; Feiling, History of the Tory party, p. 377; for Defoe's excoriation of ‘the tack’, see his Review, 28 (8 May 1705).

63 Proceedings upon the bill to prevent occasional conformity, pp. 60–1.

64 Shagan, ‘Thinking with moderates’, p. 492.

65 James Owen, Moderation still a virtue, in answer to several bitter pamphlets (1704), p. 49.

66 James Owen, Moderation a virtue: or, the occasional conformist justify'd from the imputation of hypocrisy (1703), p. 12.

67 John Hooke, Catholicism without popery: an essay to render the Church of England a means and pattern of union to the Christian world (1704), p. 5.

68 Francis Tallents, A short history of schism; for promoting of Christian moderation and the communion of saints (1705), p. 118; Reasons humbly offered to the conformists, why they should hold occasional communion with Protestant dissenters (4th edn, n.p., n.d.) pp. 2, 8.

69 Proceedings upon the bill to prevent occasional conformity, p. 39.

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71 See, for instance, John Caryll, ‘A review of the state of ye British nation, Saturday, Dec 31, 1709’, BL Add. MS 28252, fos. 91–2.

72 Mary Astell, Moderation truly stated (1704), p. 9.

73 Ibid., p. 5; Charles Leslie, The wolf stript of his shepherds clothing (1704), p. 1; Samuel Grascome, The mask of moderation pull'd off the foul face of occasional conformity (1704), p. 10.

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76 Astell, Moderation truly stated, pp. 41–2; and see Owen, Moderation still a virtue, p. 16.

77 Thomas Wagstaffe, The case of moderation and occasional communion represented by way of caution to the true sons of the Church of England (1705), pp. 32–3.

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79 Wagstaffe, Case of moderation, p. 26; Grascome, Mask of moderation pull'd off, p. 43.

80 Grascome, Mask of moderation pull'd off, pp. 13–14.

81 Henry Dodwell, Occasional communion fundamentally destructive to the discipline of the primitive catholick church (1705), p. 8; Samuel Grascome, Schism triumphant: or, a rejoinder to a reply of Mr. Tallents (1707), p. 6.

82 Robert Nelson, A companion for the festivals and fasts of the Church of England (2nd edn, 1704), pp. 487–8.

83 William Newton, The principles of the low-church-men fairly represented and defended (1714), p. 52.

84 A letter from a dissenter in the city to his country-friend (1705), p. 6; and see No-church establish'd: or, the schismatic unmasked (1706), pp. 30, 56; and see John Hancocke, The low-church men vindicated from the unjust imputation of being no-church men (2nd edn, 1706), p. 23.

85 The principle of the Protestant Reformation explain'd in a letter of resolution concerning church-communions (1704), p. 14.

86 Robert Nelson, The necessity of church communion vindicated (1705), pp. 13, 24.

87 Leslie, The wolf stript, pp. 6, 79–80, 82.

88 Nelson, Necessity of church communion, p. 9.

89 An English monster, or, the character of an occasional conformist (1703), p. 4.

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92 White Kennett, Moderation maintain'd (1704), p. 23.

93 William Shippen, Moderation display'd (1705); The devil upon dun: or, moderation in masquerade (1705); and see the whig riposte, Moderation vindicated.

94 Newton, Principles of the low-church-men, p. 48.

95 Feiling, History of the Tory party, pp. 443–5; on the brief existence of this law, see Wykes, David L., ‘Religious dissent, the church and the repeal of the occasional conformity and schism acts, 1714–1719’, in Cornwall, Robert D. and Gibson, William, eds., Religion, politics and dissent, 1660–1832: essays in honour of James E. Bradley (Farnham, 2010), pp. 165–83Google Scholar.

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