CHAPTER III

CHURCH AND STATE IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY

I

The Revolution of 1688 drew its main source of strength from the traditional dislike of Rome, and the eager desire to place the Church of England beyond the reach of James’ aggression.  Yet it was not until a generation had passed that the lines of ecclesiastical settlement were, in any full sense clear.  The difficulties involved were mostly governmental, and it can hardly even yet be said that they have been solved.  The nature of the relation between Church and State, the affiliation between the Church and Nonconformist bodies, the character of its internal government—­all these had still to be defined.  Nor was this all.  The problem of definition was made more complex by schism and disloyalty.  An important fraction of the Church could not accept at all the fact of William’s kingship; and if the larger part submitted, it cannot be said to have been enthusiastic.

Nor did the Church make easy the situation of the Nonconformists.  Toleration of some kind was rapidly becoming inevitable; and with a Calvinist upon the throne persecution of, at any rate, the Presbyterians became finally impossible.  Yet the definition of what limits were to be set to toleration was far from easy.  The Church seemed like a fortress beleaguered when Nonjurors, Deists, Nonconformists, all alike assaulted her foundations.  To loosen her hold upon political privilege seemed to be akin to self-destruction.  And, after all, if Church and State were to stand in some connection, the former must have some benefit from the alliance.  Did such partnership imply exclusion from its privilege for all who could not accept the special brand of religious doctrine?  Locke, at least, denied the assumption, and argued that since Churches are voluntary societies, they cannot and ought not to have reciprocal relation with the State.  But Locke’s theory was meat too strong for the digestion of his time; and no statesman would then have argued that a government could forego the advantage of religious support.  And William, after all, had come to free the church from her oppressor.  Freedom implied protection, and protection in that age involved establishment.  It was thus taken for granted by most members of the Church of England that her adoption by the State meant her superiority to every other form of religious organization.  Superiority is, by its nature exclusive, the more especially when it is united to a certainty of truth and a kinship with the dominant political interest of the time.  Long years were thus to pass before the real meaning of the Toleration Act secured translation into more generous statutes.