(Thomson, Life of Dr. Owen. part 5)
it is not our province minutely to trace. Richard's feeble hand, as is
well known, proved itself unfit to control the opposing elements of the
state; and a few months saw him return not unwillingly, to the
unambitious walks of private life. Owen has been charged with talking
part in the schemes which drove Richard from the Protectorate; but the
charge proceeded upon a mere impression of Dr Manton's, produced from
hearing the fragment of a conversation, and was repeatedly and
indignantly denied by Owen during his life. Then followed the recalling
of that remnant of the Long Parliament which had been dispersed by
Cromwell,--a measure which Owen advised, as, on the whole, the most
likely to secure the continuance of an unrestricted liberty. But the
Parliament, unwilling to obey the dictation of a dominant party in the
Army, was once more dispersed by force, while the army itself began to be
divided into ambitious factions. A new danger threatened from the north
general Monk, marking the state of things in England, and especially the
divided condition of the army, was making preparations to enter England.
What were his designs? At one period he had befriended the Independents,
but latterly he had sided with the powerful body of the Presbyterians.
Would he now, then, endeavour to set up a new Protectorate, favouring the
Presbyterians and oppressing other sects or would he throw his sword into
the scale of the Royalists, and bring back the Stuarts? A deputation of
Independent ministers, consisting of Carol and others, was sent into
Scotland, bearing a letter to Monk that had been written by Owen,
representing to him the injustice of his entering England, and the danger
to which it would expose their most precious liberties. But the deputies
returned, unable to influence his movements, or even to penetrate his
ultimate designs. Owen and his friends next endeavoured to arouse the
army to a vigorous resistance of Monk, and even offered to raise 100,000
pounds among the Independents for their assistance;--but they found the
army divided and dispirited; and Monk, gradually approaching London,
entered it at length, not only unresisted, but welcomed by thousands, the
Long Parliament having again found courage to resume its sittings. In a
short while the Long Parliament was finally dissolved by its own content,
and soon after the Convention Parliament assembled. Monk at length threw
off his hitherto impenetrable disguise, and ventured to introduce letters
from Charles Stuart. It was voted, at his instigation, that the ancient
constitution of King, Lords, and Commons, should be restored, and Charles
invited back to the throne of his ancestors; and the great majority of
the nation, weary of the years of faction and turbulence, hailed the
change with joy. But in the enthusiasm of the moment, no means were taken
to secure an adjustment of those vital questions which had been agitated
between the people and the crown. The act, therefore, which restored the
king, restored the laws, both civil and ecclesiastical, to the state in
which they had been at the commencement of the war, reestablished the
hierarchy, and constituted all classes of separatists a proscribed class;
and Owen and his party had little to trust to for the continuance of
their religious liberties but the promise of Charles at Breda, that he
"would have a respect to tender consciences." A little time sufficed to
show that the king's word was but a miserable security; and the beautiful
words of Baxter now began to be fulfilled in their darkest part:
"Ordinarily, God would have vicissitudes of summer and winter, day and
night, that the church may grow externally in the summer of prosperity,
and internally and radically in the winter of adversity; yet usually
their night is longer than their day, and that day itself has its storms
and tempests." The night was now coming to the Puritans.
A few months before the restoration of Charles, Owen had been displaced
from the beanery of Christ Church, and thus his last official connection
with Oxford severed. He now retired to his native village of Stadham in
the neighbourhood, where he had become the proprietor of a small estate.
During his vice-chancellorship, it had been his custom to preach in this
place on the afternoons of those Sabbaths in which he was not employed at
St. Mary's; and a little congregation which he had gathered by this means
now joyfully welcomed him among them as their pastor. It was probably
while at Stadham that he finished the preparation of one of his most
elaborate theological works, whose title will supply a pretty accurate
idea at once of its general plan and of its remarkable variety of
matter,-- "Theologoumena, etc.; or, six books on the nature, rise,
progress, and study of true theology. In which, also, the origin and
growth of true and false religious worship, and the more remarkable
declensions and restorations of the church are traced from their first
sources. To which are added digressions concerning universal grace,--the
origin of the sciences,--notes of the Roman Church,--the origin of
letters,-- the ancient Hebrew letters,--Hebrew punctuation,--versions of
the Scriptures,--Jewish rites," etc. It is matter of regret that the
"Theologoumena" has hitherto been locked up in the Latin tongue; for
though parts have been superseded by more recent works, there is no book
in the English language that occupies the wide field over which Owen
travels with his usual power, and scatters around him his learned stores.
In all likelihood Owen hoped that he would be permitted to remain
unmolested in his quiet village, and that his very obscurity would prove
his protection; but he had miscalculated the leniency of the new rulers.
An act passed against the Quakers, declared it illegal for more than five
persons to assemble in any unauthorized place for religious worship; and
this act admitting of application to all separatists, soon led to the
expulsion of Owen from his charge, and to the dispersion of his little
flock. In a little while he saw himself surrounded by many companions in
tribulation. The Presbyterians, who had shown such eagerness for the
restoration of Charles to his throne, naturally expected that such
measures would be taken as would comprehend them within the
establishment, without doing violence to their conscientious
difficulties; and Charles and his ministers flattered the hope so long as
they thought it unsafe to despise it; but it was not long ere the Act of
Uniformity drove nearly two thousand of them from their churches into
persecution and poverty, and brought once more into closer fellowship
with Owen those excellent men whom he had continued to love and esteem in
the midst of all their mutual differences.
Sir Edward Hyde, the future Lord Clarendon, was now lord chancellor,
and the most influential member of the government, and means were used to
obtain an interview between Owen and him, with the view, it is probable,
of inducing him to relax the growing severity of his measures against the
Nonconformists. But the proud minister was inexorable. He insisted that
Owen should abstain from preaching; but at the one time, not ignorant of
the great talents of the Puritan, strongly urged him to employ his pen at
the present juncture in writing against Popery. Owen did not comply with
the first part of the injunction, but continued to preach in London and
elsewhere, to little secret assemblies, and even at times more publicly,
when the vigilance of informers was relaxed, or the winds of persecution
blew for a little moment less fiercely. But circumstances soon put it in
his power to comply with the latter part of it; and those circumstances
are interesting, both as illustrative of the charter of Owen and of the
spirit and tendencies of the times.
John Vincent Cane, a Franciscan friar, had published a book entitled,
"Fiat Lux; or, a Guide in Differences of Religion betwixt Papist and
Protestant, Presbyterian and Independent;" in which, under the guise of
recommending moderation and charity, he invites men over to the Church of
Rome, as the only infallible remedy for all church divisions. The work
falling in to some extent with the current of feeling in certain
quarters, had already gone through two impressions ere it reached the
hands of Owen, and is believed to have been sent to him at length by
Clarendon. Struck with the subtile and pernicious character of the work,
whose author he describes as "a Naphtali speaking goodly words, but while
his voice was Jacob's voice, his hands were the hands of Esau," Owen set
himself to answer it, and soon produced his "animadversions on Fiat Lux,
by a Protestant;" which so completely exposed its sophistries and hidden
aims, as to make the disconcerted friar lose his temper. The friar
replied in a "Vindication of Fiat Lux,"--in which he betrayed a
vindictive wish to detect his opponent, and bring upon him the resentment
of those in power; describing him as "a part of that dismal tempest which
had borne all before it,--not only church and state, but reason, right,
honesty, and all true religion." To which Owen rejoined, now manfully
giving his name, and, according to his custom, not satisfied with
answering his immediate opponent, entered largely into the whole Popish
controversy. Few things are more remarkable in Owen than the readiness
with which he could thus summon to his use the vast stores of his
accumulated learning.
But, even after this good service had been done to the common cause of
Protestantism, there seemed a danger that this second work would not be
permitted to be published; and it is curious to notice the nature of the
objections, and the quarter whence they came. The power of licensing
books in divinity was now in the hands of the bishops; and they were
found to have two weighty objections to Owen's treatise. First, That in
speaking of the evangelists and apostles, and even of Peter, he withheld
from them the title of "saint;" and, secondly, That he had questioned
whether it could be proved that Peter had ever been at Rome. Owen's
treatment of these objections was every way worthy of himself In
reference to the former, he reminded his censors that the titles of
evangelist and apostle were superior to that of saint, inasmuch as this
belonged to all the people of God; at the same time, he expressed his
willingness to yield this point. But the second he could only yield on
one condition,--namely, that they would prove that he have been mistaken.
Owen's book at length found its way to the press; not, however, through
the concessions of the bishops, but through the command of Sir Edward
Nicolas, one of the principal secretaries of state, who interposed to
overrule their scruples.
Dr Owen's reputation was greatly extended by these writings; and this
led to a new interview with Clarendon. His lordship acknowledged that he
had done more for the cause of Protestantism than any other man in
England; and, expressing his astonishment that so learned a man should
have been led away by "the novelty of Independency," held out to him the
hope of high preferment in the church if he would conform. Owen undertook
to prove, in answer to any bishop that he might appoint, that the
Independent form of church order, instead of being a novelty, was the
only mode of government in the church for the first two centuries; and as
for his wish to bestow upon him ecclesiastical honours, what he had to
ask for himself and his brethren was, not preferment within the church,
but simple toleration without it. The dazzling bait of a mitre appears to
have been set before all the leading Nonconformists; but not one of them
yielded to its lure. This led the chancellor to inquire what was the
measure of toleration he had to ask;--to which Owen is reported to have
answered, "Liberty for all who assented to the doctrine of the church of
England." This answer has been remarked on by some at the expense of his
consistency and courage; and the explanation has been suggested, that he
now asked not all that he wished, but all that there was the most distant
hope of receiving. It should be remembered, however, in addition, that
many of the most liberal and enlightened men among the Nonconformists of
those days objected to the full toleration of Papists; not, indeed, on
religious, but on political grounds;--both because they were the subjects
of a foreign power, and because of the bearings of the question on the
succession of the Duke of York to the throne; and to, that Owen's plan
would actually have comprehended in it almost the whole of the Protestant
Nonconformists of that age.
A more honorable way of deliverance from his troubles than conformity
was, about the same time, presented to Dr Owen, in an earnest invitation
from the first Congregational church of Boston, in New England, to become
their pastor. They had "seen his labours, and heard of the grace and
wisdom communicated to him from the Father of lights;" and when so many
candles were not permitted to shine in England, they were eager to secure
such a burning light for their infant colony. It does not very clearly
appear what sort of answer Owen returned. One biographer represents him
as willing to go, and as even having some of his property embarked in a
vessel bound for New England, when he was stopped by orders of the court;
others represent him as unwilling to leave behind him the struggling
cause, and disposed to wait in England for happier days.
But neither the representations of Owen nor of others who were friendly
to the Nonconformists, had any influence in changing the policy of those
who were now in power. The golden age to which Clarendon and his
associates sought to bring back the government and the country, was that
of Laud, with all the tortures of the Star Chamber, the dark machinery of
the High Commission, and the dread alternative of abject conformity, or
proscription and ruin. And the licentious Charles, while affecting at
times a greater liberality, joined with his ministers in their worst
measures; either from a secret sympathy with them, or, as is more
probable, from a hope that the ranks of Nonconformity would at length be
so greatly swelled as to render a measure of toleration necessary that
would include in it the Romanist along with the Puritan. Pretexts were
sought after and eagerly seized upon, in order to increase the rigours of
persecution; and new acts passed, such as the Conventicle Act, which
declared it penal to hold meetings for worship, even in barns and
highways, and offered high rewards to informers,--and whose deliberate
intention was, either to compel the sufferers to conformity, or to goad
them on to violence and crime.
In the midst of these growing rigours, which were rapidly filling the
prisons with victims, and crowding the emigrant ships with exiles, the
plague appeared, sweeping London as with a whirlwind of death. Then it
was seen who had been the true spiritual shepherds of the people, and who
had been the strangers and the hirelings. The clerical oppressors of the
Puritans fled from the presence of the plague, while the proscribed
preachers emerged from their hiding-places, shared the dangers of that
dreadful hour, addressed instruction and consolation to the perishing and
bereaved, and stood between the living and the dead, until the plague was
stayed. One thing, however, had been disclosed by these occurrences; and
this was the undiminished influence of the Nonconformist pastors over
their people, and the increased love of their people to them; nor could
the pastors ever be cut off from the means of temporal support, so long
as intercourse between them and their people was maintained. This led to
the passing of another act, whose ingenious cruelty historians have vied
with each other adequately to describe. In the Parliament at Oxford,
which had fled thither in order to escape the ravages of the plague, a
law was enacted which virtually banished all Nonconformist ministers five
miles from any city, town, or borough, that sent members to Parliament,
and five miles from any place whatsoever where they had at any time in a
number of years past preached; unless they would take an oath which it
was well-known no Nonconformist could take, and which the Earl of
Southampton even declared, in his place in Parliament, no honest man
could subscribe. This was equivalent to driving them into exile in their
own land; and, in addition to the universal severance of the pastors from
their people, by banishing them into remote rural districts, it exposed
them not only to the caprice of those who were the instruments of
government, and to all the vile acts of spies and informers, but often to
the insults and the violence of ignorant and licentious mobs.
Dr Owen suffered in the midst of all these troubles; and one anecdote,
which most probably belongs to this period, presents us with another
picture of the times. He had gone down to visit his old friends in the
neighbourhood of Oxford, and adopting the usual precautions of the
period, had approached his lodging after nightfall. But notwithstanding
all his privacy, he was observed, and information given of the place
where he lay. Early in the morning, a company of troopers came and
knocked at the door. The mistress coming down, boldly opened the door,
and asked them what they would have.--"Have you any lodgers in your
house?" they inquired. Instead of directly answering their question, she
asked "whether they were seeking for Dr Owen?" "Yes," said they; on which
she assured them he had departed that morning at an earlier hour. The
soldiers believing her word, immediately rode away. In the meantime the
Doctor, whom the woman really supposed to have been gone, as he intended
the night before, arose, and going into a neighbouring field, whither he
ordered his horse to be brought to him, hastened away by an unfrequented
path towards London.
A second terrible visitation of Heaven was needed, in order to obtain
for the persecuted Puritans a temporary breathing-time: and this second
visitation came. The fire followed quickly in the footsteps of the
plague, and the hand of intolerance was for the moment paralysed, if,
indeed, its heart did not for a time relent. The greater number of the
churches were consumed in the dreadful congregation. Large wooden houses
called tabernacles were quickly reared, amid the scorched and blackened
ruins; and in these, the Nonconformist ministers preached to anxious and
solemnized multitudes. The long silent voices of Owen, and Manton, and
Carol, and others, awoke the remembrance of other times; and earnest
Baxter
"Preached as though he never should preach again;
And like a dying man to dying men."
There was no possibility of silencing these preachers at such a moment.
And the fall of Clarendon and the disgrace of Sheldon soon afterwards
helped to prolong and enlarge their precarious liberty.
Many tracts, for the most part published anonymously, and without even
the printer's name, had issued from Owen's pen during these distracting
years, having for their object to represent the impolicy and injustice of
persecution for conscience' sake. He had also published "A Brief
Instruction in the Worship of God and Discipline of the churches of the
New Testament, by way of question and answer,"-- a title which
sufficiently describe9 the book; and some years earlier, a well compacted
and admirably reasoned "Discourse concerning Liturgies and their
Imposition," which illustrates the principle on which, when a student at
Oxford, he had resisted the impositions of Laud,--a principle which
reaches to the very foundation of the argument between the High Churchman
and the Puritan. And his publications during the following year show with
what untiring assiduity, in the midst of all those outward storms, he had
been plying the work of authorship, and laying up rich stores for
posterity. Three of Owen's best works bear the date of 1668.
First, there is his treatise "On the Nature, Power, Deceit, and
Prevalence of Indwelling Sin in Believers;" on which Dr Chalmers has well
remarked, that "there is no treatise of its learned and pious author more
fitted to be useful to the Christian disciple; and that it is most
important to be instructed on this subject by one who had reached such
lofty attainments in holiness, and whose profound and experimental
acquaintance with the spiritual life so well fitted him for expounding
its nature and operations." Next came his "Exposition of the 130th
Psalm,"--a work which, as we have already hinted, stood intimately
connected with the history of Owen's own inner life; and which,
conducting the reader through the turnings and windings along many of
which he himself had wandered in the season of his spiritual distresses,
shows him the way in which he at length found peace. When Owen sat down
to the exposition of this psalm, it was not with the mere literary
implements of study scattered around him, or in the spirit with which the
mere scholar may be supposed to sit down to the explanation of an ancient
classic; but, when he laid open the book of God, he laid open at the same
time the book of his own heart and of his own history, and produced a
book which, with all its acknowledged prolixity, and even its occasional
obscurity, is rich in golden thoughts, and instinct with the living
experience of "one who spoke what he knew, and testified what he had
seen."
Then appeared the first volume of Owen's greatest work, his "Exposition
of the Epistle to the Hebrews,"--a work which it would be alike
superfluous to describe or to praise. For more than twenty years his
thoughts had been turned to the preparing of this colossal commentary on
the most difficult of all the Pauline epistles; and at length he had
given himself to it with ripened powers,--with the gathered treasures of
an almost universal reading, and with the richer treasures still of a
deep Christian experience. Not disdainful of the labours of those who had
gone before him, he yet found that the mine had been opened, rather than
exhausted; and, as he himself strongly expressed it, that "sufficient
ground for renewed investigation had been left, not only for the present
generation, but for all them that should succeed, to the consummation of
all things" The spirit and manner in which he pursued his work is
described by himself, and forms one of the most valuable portions of
autobiography in all Owen's writings:--
"For the exposition of the epistle itself, I confess, as was said
before, that I have had thoughts of it for many years, and have not been
without regard to it in the whole course of my studies. But yet I must
now say, that, after all my searching and reading, prayer and assiduous
meditation have been my only resort, and by far the most useful means of
light and assistance. By these have my thought been freed from many an
entanglement, into which the writings of others had cast me, or from
which they could not deliver me. Careful I have been, as of my life and
soul, to bring no prejudicate sense to the words,--to impose no meaning
of my own or other men's upon them, nor to be imposed on by the
seasonings, pretences, or curiosities of any; but always went nakedly to
the Word itself, to learn humbly the mind of God in it, and to express it
as he should enable me. To this end, I always considered, in the first
place, the sense, meaning, and import of the words of the text,--their
original derivation, use in other authors, especially in the LXX of the
Old Testament, in the books of the New, and particularly the writings of
the same author. Ofttimes the words expressed out of the Hebrew, or the
things alluded to among that people, I found to give much light to the
words of the apostle. To the general rule of attending to the design and
scope of the place, the subject treated of, mediums fixed on for
arguments, and methods of reasoning, I still kept in my eye the time and
season of writing this epistle; the state and condition of those to whom
it was written; their persuasions, prejudices, customs, light, and
traditions I kept also in my view the covenant and worship of the church
of old; the translation of covenant privileges and worship to the
Gentiles upon a new account; the course of providential dispensations
that the Jews were under; the near expiration of their church and state;
the speedy approach of their utter abolition and destruction, with the
temptations that befell them on all these various accounts;--without
which it is impossible for any one justly to follow the apostle, so as to
keep close to his design or fully to understand his meaning." The result
has been, a work unequalled in excellence, except, perhaps, by Vitringa's
noble commentary on Isaiah. It is quite true, that in the department of
verbal criticism, and even in the exposition of some occasional passages,
future expositors may have found Owen at fault,--it is even true that the
Rabbinical lore with which the work abounds does far more to cumber than
to illustrate the text; but when all this has been conceded, how amazing
is the power with which Owen has unfolded the proportions, and brought
out the meaning and spirit, of this massive epistle! It is like some vast
monster filled with solemn light, on whose minuter details it might be
easy to suggest improvement; but whose stable walls and noble columns
astonish you at the skill and strength of the builder the longer you
gaze; and there is true sublimity in the exclamation with which Owen laid
down his pen when he had finished it: "Now, my work is done; it is time
for me to die." Perhaps no minister in Great Britain or America for the
last hundred and fifty years has sat down to the exposition of this
portion of inspired truth without consulting Owen's commentary. The
appalling magnitude of the work is the most formidable obstacle to its
usefulness; and this the author himself seems to have anticipated even in
his own age of ponderous and portly folios; for we find him modestly
suggesting the possibility of treating it as if it were three separate
works, and of reading the philological, or the exegetical, or the
practical portion alone. We are quite aware that one man of great
eminence has spoken in terms of disparagement almost bordering on
contempt of one part of this great work,--"The Preliminary
Exercitations;" but we must remember Hades love of literary paradoxes, in
common with the great lexicographer whom he imitated; and those who are
familiar with the writings of Owen--which Hall acknowledges he was not,--
will be more disposed to subscribe to the glowing terms in which his
great rival in eloquence has spoken of Owen's Exposition: "Let me again
recommend your studious and sustained attention," says Dr Chalmers to his
students, "to the Epistle to the Hebrews; and I should rejoice if any of
you felt emboldened on my advice to grapple with a work so ponderous as
Owen's commentary on that epistle,--a lengthened and labourious
enterprise, certainly, but now is your season for abundant labour. And
the only thing to be attended to is, that, in virtue of being well
directed, it shall not be wasted on a bulky, though at the same time
profitless erudition. I promise you a hundredfold more advantage from the
perusal of this greatest work of John Owen, than from the perusal of all
that has been written on the subject of the heathen sacrifices. It is a
work of gigantic strength as well as gigantic size; and he who has
mastered it is very little short, both in respect to the doctrinal and
the practical of christianity, of being an erudite and accomplished
theologian."
It has been remarked, that there is no lesson so difficult to learn as
that of true religious toleration, for almost every sect in turn, when
tempted by the power, has resorted to the practice of persecution; and
this remark has seldom obtained more striking confirmation than in what
was occurring at this time in another part of the world. While in England
the Independents, and Nonconformists generally, were passing from one
degree of persecution to another, at the hands of the restored adherents
of Prelacy; the Independents of New England were perpetrating even
greater severities against the Baptists and Quakers in that infant
colony. Whipping, fines, imprisonment, selling into slavery, were
punishments inflicted by them on thousands who, after all, did not differ
from their persecutors on any point that was fundamental in religion. One
of Owen's biographers has taken very unnecessary pains to show that the
conduct of these churches had no connection with their principles as
Independents; but this only renders their conduct the more inexcusable,
and proves how deeply rooted the spirit of intolerance is in human
nature. Owen and his friends heard of these events with indignation and
shame, and even feared that they might be turned to their disadvantage in
England; and, in a letter subscribed along with him by all his brethren
in London, faithfully remonstrated with the Near England persecutors. "We
only make it our hearty request," said they, "that you will trust God
with his truth and ways, so far as to suspend all rigorous proceedings in
corporeal restraints or punishments on persons that dissent from you, and
practice the principles of their dissent without danger or disturbance to
the civil peace of the place." Sound advice is here given, but we should
have relished a little more of the severity of stern rebuke.
We have seen that the great fire of London led to a temporary
connivance at the public preaching of the Nonconformist ministers; "it
being at the first," as Baxter remarked, "too gross to forbid an undone
people all public worship with too great rigour." A scheme was soon after
devised for giving to this liberty a legal sanction, and which might even
perhaps incorporate many of the Nonconformists with the Established
Church,--such men as Wilkins, bishop of Chester, Tillotson, and
Stillingfleet, warmly espousing the proposal. But no sooner did the
scheme become generally known, as well as the influential names by which
it was approved, than the implacable adversaries of the Nonconformists
anew bestirred themselves, and succeeded in extinguishing its generous
provisions. It became necessary, however, in the temper of the nation, to
do something in vindication of these severities; and no readier expedient
suggested itself than to decry toleration as unfriendly to social order,
and still more to blacken the character of the Nonconformist sufferers. A
fit instrument for this work presented himself in Samuel Parker, a man of
menial origin, who had for a time been connected with the Puritans, but
who, deserting them when they became sufferers, was now aspiring after
preferment in the Episcopal Church, and whom Burnet describes as "full of
satirical vivacity, considerably learned, but of no judgment; and as to
religion, rather impious." In his "Discourse of Ecclesiastical Polity,"
the "authority of the civil magistrate over the consciences of subjects
in matters of external religion is asserted, the mischief and
inconveniences of toleration are represented, and all pretences pleaded
in favour of liberty of conscience are fully answered." Such is the
atrocious title-page of his book, and to a modern reader, the undertaking
to which it pledges him must seem rather bold; but the confident author
is reported to have firmly believed in his own success. Holding out his
book to the Earl of Anglesea, he said, "Let us see, my lord, whether any
of your chaplains can answer it;" and the bigoted Sheldon, sympathizing
with its spirit, naturally believed also in the exceeding force of its
arguments. Dr Owen was chosen to reply to Parker; which he did, in one of
the noblest controversial treatises that were ever penned by him,--"Truth
and Innocence Vindicated, in a Survey of a Discourse on Ecclesiastical
Polity," etc. The mind of Owen seems to have been whetted by his deep
sense of wrong, and he writes with a remarkable clearness and force of
argument; while he indulges at times in a style of irony which is
justified not more by the folly than by the baseness and wickedness of
Parker's sentiments. There is no passage, even in the writings of Locke,
in which the province of the civil magistrate is more distinctly defined
than in some portions of his reply; and it is curious to notice how, in
his allusions to trade, he anticipates some of the most established
principles of our modern political economy. Owen's work greatly increased
his celebrity among his brethren;--even some of Parker's friends could
with difficulty conceal the impression that he had found more than a
match in the strong-minded and sturdy Puritan; and Parker, worsted in
argument, next sought to overwhelm his opponent with a scurrility that
breathed the most undisguised vindictiveness. he was "the great
bellwether of disturbance and sedition,"--"a person who would have vied
with Mahomet himself both for boldness and imposture,"--"a viper, so
swollen with venom that it must either burst or spit its poison;" so that
whoever wished to do well to his country, "could never do it better
service than by beating down the interest and reputation of such sons of
Belial." On this principle, at least, Parker himself might have ranked
high as a patriot.
But the controversy was not over. Parker had not time to recover from
the ponderous club of Owen, when he was assailed by the keen edged wit of
Andrew Marvell. This accomplished man, the undersecretary and bosom
friend of Milton, reviewed Parker's work in his "Rehearsal Transposed,"--
a work of which critics have spoken as rivaling in some places the
causticity and neatness of Swift, and in others equalling the eloquent
invective of Junius and the playful exuberance of Burke. The conceited
ecclesiastic was overwhelmed, and a number of masked combatants
perceiving his plight, now rushed to his defense; in all whom, however,
Marvell refused to distinguish any but Parker. In a second part of his
"Rehearsal," he returned to the pen-combat, as Wood has called it; and
transfixed his victim with new arrows from his exhaustless quiver. It is
impossible to read many parts of it yet, without sharing with the
laughers of the age in the influence of Marvell's genius. Ridiculing his
self-importance, he says, "If he chance but to sneeze, he prays that "the
foundations of the earth be not shaken". Ever since he crept up to be but
"the weathercock of a steeple", he trembles and cracks at every puff of
wind that blows about him, as "if the Church of England were falling."
Marvell's wit was triumphant; and even Charles and his court joined in
laughing at Parker's discomfiture. "Though the delinquent did not lay
violent hands on himself," says D'Israeli, "he did what, for an author,
may be considered as desperate a course,-- withdraw from the town, and
cease writing for many years," secretly nursing a revenge which he did
not dare to gratify until he knew that Marvell was in his grave.
It was one thing, however, to conquer in the field of argument, and
another thing to disarm the intolerance of those in power. The Parliament
which met in 1671, goaded on by those sleepless ecclesiastics who were
animated by the malign spirit of Parker, confirmed all the old acts
against the Nonconformists, and even passed others of yet more
intolerable rigour. It is impossible to predict to what consequences the
enforcement of these measures must soon have led, had not Charles, by his
declaration of indulgence, of his own authority suspended the penal
statutes against Nonconformists and Popish recusants, and given them
permission to renew their meetings for public worship on their procuring
a license, which would be granted for that purpose. This measure was, no
doubt, unconstitutional in its form, and more than doubtful in the
motives which prompted it; but many of the Nonconformists, seeing in it
only the restoration of a right of which they ought never to have been
deprived,--and some of them, like Owen, regarding it as "an expedient,
according to the custom in former times, for the peace and security of
the kingdom, until the whole matter might be settled in Parliament,"
joyfully took shelter under its provisions.
The Nonconformists were prompt in improving their precarious
breathing-time. A weekly lecture was instituted at Pinner's Hall by the
Presbyterians and Independents, in testimony of their union of sentiment
on fundamental truths, and as an antidote to Popish, Socinian, and
Infidel opinions. Owen began to preach more publicly in London to a
regular congregation; and his venerable friend, Joseph Carol, having died
soon after the declaration of indulgence, the congregations of the two
ministers consented to unite under the ministry of Owen, in the place of
worship in Leadenhall Street. Owen's church-book presents the names of
some of the chiefs of Nonconformity as members of his flock, and
"honorable women not a few." Among others, there have been found the
names of more than one of the heroes of the army of the Commonwealth,--
such as Lord Charles Fleetwood and Colonel Desborough; certain members of
the Abney family, in whose hospitable mansion the saintly Isaac Watts in
after times found shelter for more than thirty years; the Countess of
Anglesea; and Mrs Bendish, the granddaughter of Cromwell, in whom, it is
said, may of the bodily and mental features of the Protector remarkably
reappeared. Some of these might be able at times to throw their shield
(continued in part 6...)
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