Note 669 — Chapter VII

Hallam's Const. Hist. vol. ii. pp. 142, 143, 153–156; from which it appears that this movement began about 1681. The clergy, as a body, are naturally favourable to this doctrine; and the following passage, published only twelve years ago, will give the reader an idea of the views that some of them entertain. The Rev. Mr. Sewell (Christian Politics, Lond. 1844, p. 157) says, that the reigning prince is ‘a being armed with supreme physical power by the hand and permission of Providence; as such, the lord of our property, the master of our lives, the fountain of honour, the dispenser of law, before whom each subject must surrender his will and conform his actions…. Who, when he errs, errs as a man, and not as a king, and is responsible, not to man, but to God.’ And at p. 111, the same writer informs us that the church, ‘with one uniform, unhesitating voice, has proclaimed the duty of “passive obedience.”’ See also on this slavish tenet, as upheld by the church, Wordsworth's Ecclesiast. Biog. vol. iv. p. 668; Life of Ken, by a Layman, vol. ii. p. 523; Lathbury's Hist. of Convocation, p. 228; Lathbury's Nonjurors, pp. 50, 135, 197; and a letter from Nelson, author of the Fasts and Festivals, in Nichols's Lit. Anec. vol. iv. p. 216. With good reason, therefore, did Fox tell the House of Commons, that ‘by being a good churchman, a person might become a bad citizen.’ Parl. Hist. vol. xxix. p. 1377.