CONGREGATIONALISTS. BY THE REV. E. W. ANDREWS, PASTOR OF THE BROADWAY TABERNACLE, NEW YORK. THE origin of the Congregationalists, as a modern sect, is commonly ascribed to Robert Browne, who organized a church in England, in 1583. But it appears probable that there were churches formed upon congregational principles in the reigns of Edward VI. and Queen Mary, although it is impossible to speak with any certainty respecting them. It is well known that Cranmer, the chief promoter of the Reformation in England, admitted the right of the churches to choose their own pastors, and the equality of the clergy; and it is worthy of note that, in the Bible published by him, the word ecclesia is always rendered congregation. Some of the bishops went further, and advanced opinions which would now be regarded as amongst the distinctive principles of the Congregationalists. But the right of any individual to judge for himself what the scriptures taught in matters of religion was not recognised. The government insisted upon an entire conformity to the established church, both in doctrines, and in rites and ceremonies. The Reformation advanced slowly; for its progress was controlled by subtle statesmen, who sought the reasons of any innovation, not in the word of God, but in the calculations of state policy. Many of the leading early reformers were greatly dissatisfied at the slow progress of the Reformation, aud would gladly have introduced a more simple and scriptural form of worship. Even Edward VI., popular as he deservedly was with the Protestant party, did not escape censure for the indulgence he showed to Popish superstitions. It was evident in this reign, that a portion of the Protestants in England were far in advance of the standard set up by the king and the prelates; and that the distance between them was daily widening. But the dividing line between the supporters of the hierarchy and the non-conformists was not distinctly drawn, until the Acts of Supremacy and Uniformity passed, in the early part of Elizabeth's reign. From this period, there was little hope of perma nent reconciliation between the two parties, although it was not until about the year 1565 that separate assemblies were held. It is from this time that the Puritans are to be regarded as a distinct party. The first open attempt to suppress these assemblies seems to have been made two years after, when a congregation was arrested at Plumbers' Hall, and thirty of them confined in Bridewell for more than a year. Without enumerating all the points of difference between the prelates and the Puritans, it may perhaps be doubted whether an abrogation of all the rites and ceremonies complained of as superstitious, would not have allayed the storm that was rising against the Establishment, and prevented, for many years at least, the separation that afterwards took place. However this might have been, the attempt to enforce these ceremonies led the Puritans to examine more closely, than they had hitherto done, the ground of that authority so arbitrarily exercised over them. The dogmatic Cartwright assailed Episcopacy with great boldness, and asserted the Presbyterian to be the only scriptural form of church government. The cruelty and intolerance of the bishops had produced a directly opposite effect from what they had intended. Instead of coercing the nonconformists into submission, a spirit of resistance was aroused; and, as is well said by Hallam, "the battle was no longer to be fought for a tippet and a surplice, but for the whole ecclesiastical hierarchy, interwoven as it was with the temporal constitution of England." The first church formed upon Congregational principles, of whose existence we have any accurate knowledge, was that established by Robert Browne; but it was soon broken up, and Browne, with many of his congregation, fled to Holland. He subsequently returned to England, and is said by some historians to have renounced the principles he had so earnestly maintained. In the latter part of his life, he seems to have been openly immoral and dissolute. The church planted by him in Holland, after his departure, fell into dissensions, and soon perished. The character of Browne is thus drawn by Bancroft: "The most noisy advocate of the new system was Browne; a man of rashness, possessing neither true courage nor constancy; zealous, but fickle; dogmatical, but shallow. He has acquired historical notoriety, because his hot-headed indiscretion urged him to undertake the defence of separation. ... The principles, of which the intrepid assertion had alone given him distinction, lay deeply rooted in the public mind; and as they did not draw life from his support, they did not suffer from his apostacy." The opinions of Browne respecting church polity are the same in 186 many respects as those now held by the Congregationalists of New England. He maintained,* "that each church, or society of Christians meeting in one place, was a body corporate, having full power within itself to admit and exclude members; to choose and ordain officers; and when the good of the society required it, to depose them, without being accountable to classis, convocations, synods, councils, or any jurisdiction whatever." He denied the supremacy of the queen; and the claim of the Establishment to be a scriptural church. He declared the scriptures to be the only guide in all matters of faith and discipline. The labours of a pastor were to be confined to a single church, and beyond its bounds he possessed no authority to administer the ordinances. One church could exercise no jurisdiction over another, except so far as to advise or reprove it, or to withdraw its fellowship from such as walked disorderly. Five orders, or offices, were recognised in the church: those of pastor, teacher, elder, deacon, and widow; but he did not allow the priesthood to be a distinct order from the laity. How far these views have been since modified, will appear hereafter. Such are the outlines of a system promulgated by Browne, in tracts published by him in 1680 and in 1682. The separating line, between the conforming and the non-conforming Puritans, now became broad and distinct. The former, recognising the Church of England as a true church, and unwilling to separate themselves from the Establishment, demanded only that her discipline should be further reformed, and her bishops ranked as the head of the presbyters. Neither by the supporters of the hierarchy, nor amongst this class of the Puritans, was the great doctrine of liberty of conscience recognised. A different standard of uniformity was indeed set up by each; but the principle of ecclesiastical tyranny was as plainly to be seen in the implicit obedience required to the decrees of synods, as in the oath of supremacy. The non-conforming Puritans would enter into no compromise with the Establishment. They desired its total overthrow, with all its cumbrous and complex machinery, its ceremonies and its forms; and to build upon its ruins churches after the simple, pure model of the apostolic days. The first martyrs to these opinions were two clergymen, Thacker and Cokking, who were executed in 1583; ostensibly for denying the queen's supremacy, but in fact for dispersing Browne's tracts. Ten years afterward, Henry Barrow and John Greenwood were put to death for non-conformity. Barrow was somewhat distinguished by * I abbreviate from Punchard's Hist. Cong. p. 247. his publications in defence of his sentiments; and from him his followers were sometimes called Barrowists. Percy, an intimate friend of Barrow and Greenwood, was executed soon after. In 1592 an act was passed, aimed at the separatists, by which it was enacted that whoever, over the age of sixteen, should refuse to attend upon common prayer in some church or chapel, for the space of one month, should be imprisoned, and if still refusing to conform, should be banished the realm. This law, cruel and oppressive as it was, was yet a relief to the separatists, who had long languished in prison, and who now, as banished exiles, might hope to find in other lands that religious freedom which was denied them in their own. How many left England at this time is unknown, most of those thus banished went to Holland; but even by the Dutch, who at that time understood and practised, far better than any other people, the principles of religious toleration, they were treated with little favour. The cause of this ill-reception seems to have been the slanders spread abroad respecting them by the English prelates, by which the Dutch were made to believe that they were factious, quarrelsome, and enemies to all forms of government. A better acquaintance soon removed these bad impressions, and churches were planted by the exiles in Amsterdam, Leyden, and several other cities, which continued to flourish more than a hundred years. In the discussion which took place in Parliament on the passage of this act, Sir Walter Raleigh estimated the number of Brownists in England at twenty thousand, a number, probably, short of the truth. The separatists who remained in England were, in common with the great body of the Puritans, much more kindly treated, and allowed greater liberty of conscience during the last years of the queen's life. The prelates, ignorant of the religious opinions of James, her successor, were unwilling, by fresh acts of severity, to irritate and exasperate their non-conforming brethren. James had been educated in the Presbyterian faith, and the Puritans fondly hoped that, upon his accession to the throne, free permission would be given them to worship God as they pleased. But their hopes were bitterly disappointed. Won by the fulsome flatteries of the bishops, and made to believe that the demands of the Puritans were alike inconsistent with the preservation of the hierarchy, and the undisturbed exercise of the royal prerogatives, James was even more oppressive than his predecessor. At a convocation held in 1604, of which the bigoted Bancroft was president, new canons were drawn up, by which conformity was rigidly enforced. Excommunication, with all its civil penalties and disabilities, was pronounced against any one who should dare to deny the divine authority of the established church, the perfect conformity of all its rites and ceremonies to the scriptures, or the lawfulness of its government; or who should separate from its communion, and assert that any other assembly or congregation was a true or lawful church. To these canons, by a royal proclamation, dated in July, 1604, all were required to conform; the Puritan ministers before the last day of November," or else to dispose of themselves and families some other way." During this year between three and four hundred Puritan ministers were silenced or exiled, and for many years few summers passed by in which numbers did not seek safety in flight. It is at this period that we first meet the name of John Robinson, who has, not inappropriately, been called the father of modern Congregationalism. Of his early life little is known. Probably he was at first a conforming Puritan. We first hear of him among the separatists, as the pastor of a church which had been formed in the north of England the year previous to Elizabeth's death. Harassed by 'the bishops, and seeing no prospect of peace at home, he and his congregation determined to leave their native land, and fly to Holland. But it was not without hazard and suffering that they were able to leave their own country behind them and escape. The first attempt was unsuccessful through the treachery of the captain of their vessel, who betrayed their plans to their enemies, and the whole company was imprisoned for a month. Upon the second attempt a part of the church reached Amsterdam in safety. Mr. Robinson and the remainder of the church, made another unsuccessful attempt, in the spring of 1608, which is thus graphically described by Bancroft: "An unfrequented heath in Lincolnshire was the place of secret meeting. As if it had been a crime to escape from persecution, the embarkation was to be made under the shelter of darkness. having encountered a night storm, just as a boat was bearing a part of the emigrants to their ship, a company of horsemen appeared in pursuit, and seized upon the helpless women and children, who had not yet ventured on the surf. Painful it was to see the heavy case of these poor women in distress; what weeping and crying on every side. But when they were apprehended, it seemed impossible to punish and imprison wives and children, for no other crime than that they would go with their husbands and fathers. They could not be sent home, for they had no home to go to! so that, at last, the magistrates were glad to be rid of them on any terms,'' though in the mean time they, poor souls, endured misery enough.' Such was the flight of Robinson and Brewster, and their followers, from the land of their fathers." After |