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The Seven Bishops and their Petition, 18 May 1688

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 March 2011

Roger Thomas
Roger Thomas
Affiliation:
Dr. Williams's Library, London
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Extract

Late at night on 18 May 1688 the bishops, granted an audience by James II, handed him their petition. ‘When he looked upon it he said he knew whose handwriting it was, as well he might, for it was the Archbishop's.’ It certainly was the archbishop's hand, but it was not wholly his work, nor that of the other six bishops who had signed it with him and who now presented it to their king. How this document came into being is the subject of this paper.

Type
Articles
Information
The Journal of Ecclesiastical History , Volume 12 , Issue 1 , April 1961 , pp. 56 - 70
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1961

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References

page 56 note 1 The quotation is taken from a MS. in Dr. Williams's Library, which amongst much else contains information about the Bishop's petition and subsequent trial, not hitherto, so far as the writer knows, made use of. The MS. is a diary of events, running from 1679 to 1693, kept by Roger Morrice (see A. G. Matthews, Calamy Revised). Morrice was remarkable in a number of ways; we hear of no wife or family; we do not hear that he preached or kept up a conventicle after his ejection in 1662; and in his will he directed that nine large folio manuscript volumes of divinity should be destroyed. He evidently prized more highly the collections he had made for a history of Puritanism (a project afterwards achieved by Daniel Neal) and fortunately did not give directions for their destruction. He was a trusted friend of a number of Anglican clergy, notably in this connexion, with Edward Fowler, who was to become bishop of Gloucester, from whom some of the information with which we are concerned was derived. At the same time he was an intimate friend of Richard Baxter and was well qualified to be his right-hand man, if Baxter had been capable of a right-hand man.

References to information from Morrice and from other sources quoted more than once are as follows:

Morrice, ii. The second of three volumes, called by Morrice, ‘Entry Books’, containing the diary of events alluded to above.

Johnston Letters written by James Johnston (D.N.B.) when Dutch agent in England shortly before the Revolution of 1688. These letters were used by James

Mackintosh Mackintosh in his A view of the reign of James II …, 1835, and quoted as from the ‘Welbeck MSS’, which suggests that they should still be preserved amongst the ‘Portland Loan Collection’ in the British Museum. They were used again later by

Macaulay Lord Macaulay for his History of England from the accession of James II, 1849 (references here from vol. ii. of C. H. Firth's edition, 1914). Macaulay quoted from Mackintosh's own Historical Collections, which are now in the British Museum (Add. MSS. 34,487–34,526, the Johnston letters being in 34,515). Quotations in the present paper are from the same source. Despatches of the

van Citters Dutch ambassador, Aarnout van Citters, of which Mackintosh obtained copies and translations, now in the British Museum, Add. MSS. 34,507–34,512.

Clarendon, ii. The Correspondence of Henry Hyde, Earl of Clarendon … with the diary of Lord Clarendon from 1687 to 1690, 1828, ii.

Patrick Works, ed. A. Taylor, 1853, (9 vols.), ix.

Burnet Gilbert Burnet. Bishop Burnet's History of His Own Times, 1823, in 6 vols., but references are by the pagination, given in the margin, according to the two volume first edition.

Buccleugh Historical Manuscripts Commission, Report on Manuscripts of the Duke of Buccleugh …, 1903, ii. 31–3. A letter from the Earl of Clarendon to the Princess of Orange, dated 21 May 1688.

page 57 note 1 Morrice, ii. 269 (under 16 June 1688).

page 57 note 2 van Citters (22 May/1 June 1688) reports that the general opinion was that Penn and others ‘who advised the king to this step [making the order of 4 May] intended by it to bring the clergy into disgrace with their community if they read it [the Declaration] … or, by not reading it, as has been the case, to estrange the Nonconformists the more from the Church of England’.

page 57 note 3 Morrice writes (ii. 259) of the Churchmen: ‘They could not forget, and the Dissenters could not but to their great grief remember that most of the Nobility, Gentry, and Clergy of England in the yeare 1660 did … give the Dissenters … assurance … that … all matters of conformity that were grievous to them … should be taken away … if they who alone could bring in the king [should lend their aid (the sentence is left incomplete)], and when the Presbyterians had done so, then the Prelatists, contrary to their solemne engagements and promises did fall upon them like tigers…. And after that when his Majesty had issued out his Declaration for Liberty of Conscience dated 1672, the Prelatists came to them and told them it was grounded upon a Dispensing power, and if they would concur to the nulling of it for that reason, they would grant them as great or greater Liberty by a Law. In the … Parliament … the Presbyterians and all their friends in the house of commons did concur … [but] the Prelatists did not only faile to promote their Liberty … but … after raised a … persecution against them.’

page 58 note 1 Morrice, ii. 84 (26 March 1687), 86; Massachusets Hist. Soc., Collections, 4th Series, viii. 26 February 1686/7.

page 58 note 2 Johnston, 23 May: ‘Baxter, Bates and Griffiths, and some say How, are the Dissenters that have been honest on this occasion.’ In November 1687 Williams was ‘lately come out of Ireland’: Morrice, ii. 207. Howe arrived back in London 10 May 1687: Morrice, ii. 129.

page 58 note 3 Churchmen had been disturbed, too, by the ever-lengthening series of addresses of thanks from Dissenters to the king for his Declaration of Liberty in 1687. Few would perhaps notice that in the addresses from Dissenters not many had a good word for the dispensing power. Nor would the absence of presbyterian addresses in certain districts be noted.

page 59 note 1 Morrice, ii. 255: ‘the fiercer men were rather more fervent for the refusal than the other sort’. When it was all over Philip Henry in Shropshire still believed that the real reason for refusal to read the Declaration in the churches was dislike of toleration for Dissenters.

page 59 note 2 It may well have been the pamphlet attack against Roman Catholicism on the part of such Churchmen as these, quite early in the reign, that, as much as anything, led James to turn away from the Church and look for support from Dissenters.

page 59 note 3 And he may not have been asked for his advice in these early consultations.

page 59 note 4 Clarendon, ii. 177.

page 59 note 5 Morrice, ii. 255. Morrice continues ‘for that Nobleman is of the same temper with his father and the rest of the family, plausible but obsequeous in all things, if the Government favour not a reformation’. Johnston (27 May 1688) says, ‘Halifax and Nottingham have wavered at first which had almost ruined the business…. Clarendon was firm and resolute against reading. Rochester I am told was for doing it’. He also (23 May) speaks of the early ‘coldness and wavering of some of the nobility … who now pretend to all the honour of it’.

page 60 note 1 The order of 4 May was published in the London Gazette of 7 May.

page 60 note 2 Patrick, Works, ix. 510 Morrice (ii. 255) speaks of meetings ‘about the 7, 8 and 9 of … May’ and mentions no meeting on 11 May. Patrick speaks of ‘many meetings: twice at Ely House with the bishop, and on the 11th May’.

page 60 note 3 Clarendon, ii. 171.

page 60 note 4 Tanner MSS. xxviii. 21, quoted from J. Gutch, Collectanea Curiosa, 1781, i. 329.

page 60 note 5 Patrick, Works, ix. 510.

page 61 note 1 Johnston (23 May) speaks of ‘15 Doctors and 2 Bishops’. Morrice (ii. 255) gives the date (13 May) and the names of most of those present as follows: ‘the Bp. of Ely, the Bp. of Peterborough, Dr. Tillotson Deane of Canterbury, Dr. Stillingfleet Dean of St. Paul's Dr. Sharp Dean of Norwich, Dr. Hestcard Dean of Windsor, Dr. Patrick Dean of Peterborough, Dr. [Stratford] Dean of St. Asaph, Dr. Scott, Dr. Grove, Dr. Fowler, Dr. Sherlock, Dr. Beveridge, Mr Pain, Mr. Pelling and two more’.

page 61 note 2 Johnston, 23 May.

page 61 note 3 Morrice, ii. 255. Others named are (ii. 258) Dr. Scott, Dr. Grove, Dr. Dove, Mr. Pelling, Dr. Onely, Dr. Killigrew, and Dr. Slater, ‘an old Cavalier’.

page 61 note 4 Johnston, 23 May. Cf. Morrice, ii. 344.

page 61 note 5 Patrick, Works, ix. 510. Italics mine.

page 61 note 6 Morrice, ii. 255–7; E. Stillingfleet, Miscellaneous Discourses, 1735, 368–71. This paper is not stated to have been produced for this occasion, but it is difficult to believe that it was not. Cf., for another paper, The history of King William the third [by A. Boyer], 1703, i. 282–4.

page 62 note 1 Morrice, ii. 255.

page 62 note 2 Morrice, ii. 258.

page 62 note 3 Morrice, ii. 259.

page 62 note 4 Johnston, 23 May. It cannot be positively asserted that these assurances were given between the meetings on 13 May and 15 May, for Johnston gives no dates; they could have been before 13 May, but it is on the whole more likely that they belong with the consultations reported by Morrice.

page 63 note 1 Complete History, iii [by White Kennett], 1714, 510, note c. B.M. Lansdowne MS. 1024 fol. 40(b). Kennett quotes no source.

page 63 note 2 Morrice, ii. 259. The full text is given below.

page 63 note 3 Complete History, iii [by White Kennett], 1714, 510, note c.

page 63 note 4 Patrick, Works, ix. 510.

page 63 note 5 Patrick, Works, ix. 510. When Patrick speaks of five bishops he must mean the bishops of Ely and Peterborough, who were in town on 12 May and the bishops of St. Asaph, Bristol, and Bath and Wells, who we know from Clarendon (172) arrived in London on 16 and 17 May. Patrick records that ‘about two o'clock came another bishop’, who must have been the bishop of Chichester. He later mentions the bishop of London as present, who, having been suspended, is left out of Patrick's count of five, ‘The Bishops of Gloster and Norwich came to town on Saturday, who are of the same mind with the rest’. (Clarendon, in Buccleuch, 32, 21 May).

page 63 note 6 ‘The petition was presented by the six Bishops who signed it…. It was all written in the Archbishop's handwriting. He did not go with it, because he has not been at Court almost these two years … for the King told him long since that he need not come thither. The Bishop of London was of the same opinion with the rest, but ‘twas not thought convenient for him to sign the Petition, in regard to his suspension.’ (Clarendon in Buccleuch).

page 65 note 1 The petition was delivered late in another sense, a fortnight after the order was made and two days before it was due to be carried out. James later complained that this delay looked as if the bishops ‘had been numbering the people, to see if they would stick by them, and finding it in their power to whistle up the wind were resolved to rais a storme’: Life of James II by himself, ed. J. S. Clarke, ii. 155, quoted from A. Tindal Hart, William Lloyd, 1952, 102. Cf. An answer to a paper importing…. 1688.

page 66 note 1 Morrice, ii. 261. The explanation given hitherto of the king's change of countenance has been that ‘the king, having been told by the Bishop of Chester, that they would desire no more than recurrence to the former practice of sending declarations to chancellors and archdeacons’ (Mackintosh, 249, citing Burnet, i. 239). But this explanation is unlikely for several reasons. (1) It is true that there had been criticism of the order not following the usual procedure, but it was a little late to leave it until two days before the time of reading to ask for an alteration. (2) A fortnight was a long time to take to come to a decision about making so small a request. (3) In London at least a change had already been made in the required direction, and the order had been sent to the clergy by ‘Mr Newcourt, Register of Drs Commons, to whom such orders are usually sent to be distributed’ (Morrice, ii. 258). (4) Moreover Morrice is quoting the opinion of the bishops themselves, who were as likely to guess right as anyone, whereas Burnet was at the time far away from the scene of action, in Holland, and less likely to be well informed.

page 66 note 2 Morrice, ii. 232 (28 January 1687/8).

page 66 note 3 Morrice, ii. 90 (9 April 1687).

page 66 note 4 Tanner MSS., quoted from Clarendon, ii. 480.

page 66 note 5 From Bevill Higgons's Short view, 1727, 333, quoted from Burnet, i. 741.

page 67 note 1 A Tindal Hart, William Lloyd, 1952, 100; Edward F. Carpenter, The Protestant Bishop, 1956, 117.

page 67 note 2 A photograph of this sheet is in Macaulay (C. H. Firth's ed., 1914) ii. 999. The Dutch ambassador, van Citters, writing his despatch home the same night (18 May) had no more information. He quotes from the ‘Comprehensive Sense’ but describes it correctly, and before closing his letter, he is able to give a list of the petitioning bishops, but does so correctly, not putting the bishop of Norwich for the bishop of Chichester, as the printed paper had done. Evelyn, too, under the same date (de Beer's ed. of the Diary, 1955, iv. 583–4), quotes from the ‘Comprehensive Sense’ apparently without knowing it is not the petition, but gives the list of bishops correctly. On the other hand Morrice (under date 19 May) has a correct copy of the petition, but there is nothing to indicate that he had it from a printed source, and it is likely enough that he had it in manuscript form, from a friend, possibly Fowler, possibly from a certain Richard Collinge, one of the king's attendants.

page 67 note 3 Morrice, ii. 260; Buccleuch, Clarendon's letter of 21 May. It is always possible that Morrice did not make up his entry book on the date he gives, but also there is no reason to think that he did not.

page 67 note 4 Publick Occurrences was a pro-Court weekly journal begun on 21 February 1688, supposed to be the work of Henry Care.

page 67 note 5 Howell, T. B., A Complete Collection of State Trials, xii (1812) 347Google Scholar.

page 68 note 1 Buccleuch, 32.

page 68 note 2 Publick Occurrences, 12 June.

page 68 note 3 Letter from a Dissenter in Somers, A Collection of Scarce and Valuable Tracts, 2nd ed., 1813, ix. 118.

page 68 note 4 Publick Occurrences, 22 May.

page 68 note 5 van Citters. 11/20 June.

page 68 note 6 Evelyn's Diary, ed. de Beer, iv. 590.

page 68 note 7 Sir John Reresby, Memoirs, ed. 1904, 302.

page 69 note 1 Morrice, ii. 263.

page 69 note 2 Edmund Calamy, Memoirs of the Life of … John Howe, 1724, 134–5.

page 69 note 3 Daniel Williams, Practical Discourses, 1738, (Life of Williams by W. Harris) p. x.

page 69 note 4 There was however an address from the Quakers (London Gazette June 7–11 1688).

page 69 note 5 Morrice, ii. 263, 269. The account of what took place at the meeting is pieced together from various accounts with a fair amount of probability. Morrice concealed a number of the names given above in shorthand.

page 69 note 6 Quoted by Mackintosh, 253.

page 70 note 1 Lloyd had also been in touch with William Bates in November 1687 on the subject of ‘good understanding or coalition’: Morrice, ii. 214.

page 70 note 2 G. Every, The High Church Party, 1956, 19–60.