;

such numbers refused, that the church was in danger of being disfurnished, which awakened the court, who had been told that the non-conformists were an inconsiderable body of men. Upon this surprising appearance the bishops were obliged to relax the rigor of the canons for a while and to accept of a promise from some, to use the cross and surplice; from others to use the surplice only; and from others a verbal promise that they might be used, not obliging themselves to the use of them at all; the design of which was to serve the church by them at present, till the universities could supply them with new men; for they had a strict eye upon those seminaries of learning, and would admit no young scholar into orders without an absolute and full subscription to all the articles and canons.

Bancroft, in a letter to his brethren the bishops, dated December 18th, 1604, giving the following directions: "As 'to such ministers as are not already placed in the church, 'the 36th and 37th canons are to be observed; and none 'are to be admitted to execute any ecclesiastical function 'without subscription. Such as are already placed in the 'church are of two sorts: 1. Some promise conformity, but are unwilling to subscribe again. Of these, forasmuch as 'the near affinity between conformity and subscription gives 'apparent hopes, that being men of sincerity, they will in 'a short time frame themselves to a more constant course, 'and subscribe to that again, which by their practice they 'testify not to be repugnant to the word of God; your lord'ship may (an act remaining upon record of such their of'fer and promise) respite their subscription for some short 'time. 2. Others in their obstinacy will yield neither to sub'scription, nor promise of conformity; these are either sti'pendary curates, or stipendary lecturers, or men beneficed, 'the two first are to be silenced, and the third deprived." He adds, "that the king's proclamation of July 16, 1604, 'admonishes them to conform to the church, and obey the 'same, or else to dispose of themselves and their families 'some other way, as being men unfit, for their obstinacy and contempt, to occupy such places; and beside they are within the compass of several laws."

The puritans who separated from the church, or inclined that way, were treated with yet greater rigor. Mr. Maunsel, minister of Yarmouth, and Mr. Lad, a merchant of that town, were imprisoned by the high commission, for a supposed conventicle, because that on the Lord's day, after sermon, they joined with Mr. Jackler, their late minister, in repeating the heads of the sermon preached on that day in the church. Mr. Lad was obliged to answer upon oath certain articles, without being able to obtain a sight of them beforehand; and after he had answered before the chancellor, was cited up to Lambeth to answer them again before the high commissioners upon a new oath, which he refusing, without a sight of his former answer, was thrown into prison, where he continued a long time, without being admitted to bail. Mr. Maunsel the minister was charged further, with signing a complaint to the lower house of parliament and for refusing the oath ex officio; for which he also was shut up in prison without bail. At length being brought to the bar upon a writ of habeas corpus, and having prevailed with Nic. Fuller, esq. a bencher of Gray's-Inn, and a learned man in his profession to be their counsel; he moved, that the prisoners might be discharged, because the high commissioners were not empowered by law to imprison, or to administer the oath ex officio or to fine any of his majesty's subjects. This was reckoned an unpardonable crime, and, instead of serving his clients, brought the indignation of the commissioners upon himself. Bancroft told the king, that he was the champion of the non-conformists, and ought therefore to be made an example, to terrify others from appearing for them; accordingly he was shut up in close prison, from whence neither the interces. sion of his friends, nor his own most humble petitions, could obtain his release to the day of his death.*

This high abuse of church power obliged many learned ministers and their followers, to leave the kingdom, and retire to Amsterdam, Rotterdam, the Hague, Leyden, Utrecht and other places of the Low Countries, where English churches were erected after the presbyterian model, and maintained by the States according to treaty with queen Elizabeth,as the French and Dutch churches were in Eng

* Pierce's Vindication, p. 174..

land. Besides, the English being yet in possession of the cautionary towns, many went over as chaplains to regiments, which, together with the merchants that resided in the trad ing cities, made a considerable body. The reverend and learned Dr. William Ames, one of the most acute controversial writers of his age, settled with the English church at the Hague; the learned Mr. Robert Parker, a Wiltshire divine, and author of the ecclesiastical policy, being distur bed by the high commission, retired to Amsterdam, and afterwards became chaplain to the English regiment at Doesburg, where he died. The learned Mr. Forbes, a Scots divine, settled with the English church at Rotterdam; as Mr. Pots, Mr. Paget, and others did at Amsterdam and other places.

But the greatest number of those who left their native country for religion were Brownists,* or rigid separatists, of whom Mr.Johnson, Ainsworth, Smith, and Robinson, were the leaders. Mr. Johnson erected a church at Amsterdam,

*These conscientious exiles, driven from their own country by persecution, instead of meeting with an hospitable reception or even a quiet refuge in Holland, were there" loaded with reproaches, despised and "afflicted by all, and almost consumed with deep poverty." The learned Ainsworth, we are told, lived upon nine-pence a week and some boiled roots, and was reduced to the necessity of hiring himself as a porter to a bookseller, who first of all discovered his skill in the Hebrew language, and made it known to his countrymen. The Dutch themselves, just emerged from civil and religious oppression, looked with a jealous eye on these suffering refugees. And though the civil power, commonly in every state more friendly than the ecclesiastic to toleration, does not appear to have oppressed them, the clergy would not afford them an opportunity to refute the unfavourable reports generally circulated against them, on the authority of letters from England; nor receive their confession of faith; nor give them an audience on some points, on which they desired to lay their sentiments before them. But with a man at their head, of no less eminence than James Arminius, judged that they ought to petition the magistrate for leave to hold their assemblies for the worship of God, and informed against them in such a way as might have rendered them the objects of suspicion. "They seemed 'evidently," it has been remarked, "to have considered them in the same light, in which serious and conscientious dissenters from the religious 'profession of the majority will ever be viewed, as a set of discontented, factious and conceited men, with whom it would be safest for them 'to have no connexion.”

Ainsworth's Two Treatises on The communion of Saints,' and' An Arrow against Idolatry,' printed at Edinburgh, 1789, preface p. 15. 16, 17, ED.

after the model of the Brownists, having the learned Mr. Ainsworth for doctor or teacher. These two published to the world a confession of faith of the people called Brownists, in the year 1602, not much different in doctrine from the harmony of confessions; but being men of warm spirits, they fell to pieces about points of discipline ;* Johnson excommunicated his own father and brother for trifling mat

* A late writer, who appears to have accurately investigated the history of the Brownists, represents Mr. Neal as incorrect in his account of the debates, which arose among them. The principal leaders of this party, were the two brothers Francis and George Johnson, Mr.Ainsworth, and Mr. John Smith, who had been a clergyman in England. Three principal subjects of controversy occasioned dissentions in the Brownist churches. The first ground of dissention was the marriage of Francis Johnson, with a widow of a taste for living and dress; particularly unsuitable to times of persecution; his father and his brother opposed this connexion. This occasioned such a difference, that the latter proceeded from admonitions and reproofs, to bitter revilings and reproaches: and Francis Johnson, his colleague Ainsworth, and the church,at length, passed a sentence of excommunication against the father and brother. Mr. Neal, it seems, confounds this unhappy controversy with another that succeeded to it, but distinct from it, between Francis Johnson and Ainsworth. It turned upon a question of discipline. The former placing the government of the church in the eldership alone, the latter in the church, of which the elders are a part. This dispute was carried to an unchristian height, but, according to Mr. John Cotton of NewEngland, who was the contemporary of Johnson and Ainsworth, and had lived amidst the partisans of each side, they did not, as Mr. Neal represents the matter, mutually excommunicate cach other; but Ainsworth and his company withdrew and worshipped by themselves, after Johnson and those with him had denied them communion. In the interim of these debates, a schism had taken place in the church, headed by Mr. John Smith, who advanced and maintained opinions similar to those afterwards espoused by Arminius; and besides his sentiments concerning baptism, to which Mr. Neal refers in the next paragraph several singular opinions were ascribed to him: as, that no translation of the Bible could be properly the word of God, but the original only was so: that singing set words or verses to God was without any proper authority that fight in time of persecution was unlawful: that the new creature needed not the support of scriptures and ordinances,but is above them: that perfection is attainable in this life, &c. There arose against him a whole host of opponents; Johnson, Robinson Clifton, Ainsworth, and Jessop. His character as well as his sentiments were attacked with a virulence of spirit and an abusive language, that discredit the charges and expose the spirit of the writers.

See some account of Mr. Ainsworth, prefixed to a new edition of his two treatises, p. 27-42; and Crosby's History of English Baptists,vol. i. p. 3, &c. and p. 265, &c.

Ed.

ters, after having rejected the mediation of the presbytery of Amsterdam. This divided the congregation, insomuch that Mr. Ainsworth and half the congregation excommunicated Johnson, who after sometime returned the same compliment to Ainsworth. At length the contest grew so hot, that Amsterdam could not hold them; Johnson and his followers removed to Embden, where soon after dying, his congregation dissolved. Nor did Mr. Ainsworth and his followers live long in peace, upon which he left them and retired to Ireland, where he continued sometime; but when the spirits of his people were quieted, he returned to Amsterdam, and continued with them to the day of his death. This Mr. Ainsworth was author of an excellent little treatise, entitled, an Arrow against Idolatry, and of a most learned commentary on the five books of Moses, by which he appears to have been a great master of the oriental languages and of Jewish antiquities. His death was sudden, and not without suspicion of violence; for it is reported, that having found a diamond of very great value in the streets of Amsterdam, he advertised it in print, and when the owner, who was a Jew, came to demand it, he offered him any acknowledgment he would desire; but Ainsworth, though poor, would accept of nothing but a conference with some of his Rabbies upon the prophecies of the Old-Testament relating to the Messiah, which the other promised; but not having interest enough to obtain it, and Ainsworth being resolute, it is thought he was poisoned.* His congregation remained without a pastor for some years after his death, and then chose Mr. Canne, author of the marginal references to the bible, and sundry other treatises.

Mr. Smith was a learned man, and of good abilities, but of an unsettled head, as appears by the preface to one of his books, in which he desires that his last writings may always be taken for his present judgment. He was for refining upon the Brownist scheme, and at last declared for the principles of the baptists; upon this he left Amsterdam,

* Others say, that he obtained this conference, and so confounded the Jews, that from pique and malice they in this manner put an end to his life. He died in 1622, or 1623, leaving an exemplary character for humility, sobriety, discretion, and unblameable virtue. See an account prefixed to his two Treatises, p. 60, 62. Ed.