This sect, in order to make itself national, having
gone so far as to raise a Rebellion, murder their
king, destroy monarchy and the Church, was afterwards
broken in pieces by its own divisions; which made
way for the king’s return from his exile.
However, the zealous among them did still entertain
hopes of recovering the “dominion of grace;”
whereof I have read a remarkable passage, in a book
published about the year 1661 and written by one of
their own side. As one of the regicides was going
to his execution, a friend asked him, whether he thought
the cause would revive? He answered, “The
cause is in the bosom of Christ, and as sure as Christ
rose from the dead, so sure will the cause revive also."[3]
And therefore the Nonconformists were strictly watched
and restrained by penal laws, during the reign of
King Charles the Second; the court and kingdom looking
on them as a faction, ready to join in any design against
the government in Church or State: And surely
this was reasonable enough, while so many continued
alive, who had voted, and fought, and preached against
both, and gave no proof that they had changed their
principles. The Nonconformists were then exactly
upon the same foot with our Nonjurors now, whom we
double tax, forbid their conventicles, and keep under
hatches; without thinking ourselves possessed with
a persecuting spirit, because we know they want nothing
but the power to ruin us. This, in my opinion,
should altogether silence the Dissenters’ complaints
of persecution under King Charles the Second; or make
them shew us wherein they differed, at that time,
from what our Jacobites are now.
Their inclinations to the Church were soon discovered,
when King James the Second succeeded to the crown,
with whom they unanimously joined in its ruin, to
revenge themselves for that restraint they had most
justly suffered in the foregoing reign; not from the
persecuting temper of the clergy, as their clamours
would suggest, but the prudence and caution of the
legislature. The same indulgence against law,
was made use of by them and the Papists, and they
amicably employed their power, as in defence of one
common interest.
But the Revolution happening soon after, served to
wash away the memory of the rebellion; upon which,
the run against Popery, was, no doubt, as just and
seasonable, as that of fanaticism, after the Restoration:
and the dread of Popery, being then our latest danger,
and consequently the most fresh upon our spirits,
all mouths were open against that; the Dissenters
were rewarded with an indulgence by law; the rebellion
and king’s murder were now no longer a reproach;
the former was only a civil war, and whoever durst
call it a rebellion, was a Jacobite, and friend to
France. This was the more unexpected, because
the Revolution being wholly brought about by Church
of England hands, they hoped one good consequence
of it, would be the relieving us from the encroachments
of Dissenters, as well as those of Papists, since