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Stephenson:Neal:Quicksilver:49:…John Comstock, drawn up an Act of Uniformity (Alan Sinder)

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exploring the Act of Uniformity

Stephensonia

“Nugget: The night before Daniel rode up to Cambridge to begin his four-year Cram Session for the End of the World ... England had a King, who was called Charles II, and that King had courtiers. One of them, John Comstock, had drawn up an Act of Uniformity, and the King had signed it—with one stroke of the quill making all Independent ministers into unemployed heretics. ...”

Authored entries

Act of Uniformity

To tie it all together - a modified Arminianism replaces Laud's Popish Calvinism in the Church of England. It is 1662, the restored king is back with his court. While Charles II is a secret Roman Catholic (known to many, suspected by his opponents). To act with more than lip service to the Protestant cause - his Cavalier Parliament, overwhelmingly royalist shows a revival of games and more luxurious fashions and enactment of the Clarendon Code included the Corporation Act, Act of Uniformity, Conventicle Act, and Five-Mile Act between Jan. 24 1661 to May 8–1679.

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The Puritan Pastoral Dream

The Act of Uniformity was an English statute, 14 Charles II c. 4 (1662), which required the use of all the rites and ceremonies in the Book of Common Prayer in church services. (The '16 Charles II c. 2' nomenclature is reference to the statute book of the numbered year of the reign of the named King in the stated chapter. The Act of Uniformity (1662) required episcopal ordination for all ministers. As a result, nearly 2,000 of 9,000 clergymen were purged from the established church. The Test and Corporation Acts, which lasted until 1828, excluded all nonconformists from holding civil or military office. They were also prevented from being awarded degrees by the universities of Cambridge and Oxford. The term dissenter came into use, particularly after the Toleration Act (1689), which exempted nonconformists who had taken the oaths of allegiance and supremacy from penalties for nonattendance at the services of the Church of England.

This is the method used for Acts of Parliament from before 1662. The Book of Common Prayer is the official Church of England prayerbook, and also the name for similar books used in other churches of the Anglican Communion. It has been through many revisions over the last few centuries. It contains the order to be followed in church services.

The 1662 Prayer Book

The 1662 prayer book was printed but two years after the restoration of the monarchy, and, given the mildly Catholic leanings of these two rulers, the 1662 was surprisingly Protestant for the time. Under the influence of the Puritans, a number of ecclesiastical scholars in England saw some merit in their ideals and worked some into the prayer book. This revision survives today as the Parliament-approved Book of Common Prayer in England, with only minor revisions (mostly due the changes in the monarchy and in the dominion of the Empire).

The language of the 1662 revision was much unchanged from its earlier inspiration, with the exception of updates to only the most archaic language from his works. This book was the one which also existed as the official Book of Common Prayer during the greatest amounts of growth of the British empire, and, as a result, has been a great influence on the prayer books of Anglican churches worldwide today, not to mention the development of the English language. After the 1662 prayer book, development did not cease in England. A subsequent, far more Protestant revision was developed later in the 17th Century, but was mostly scrapped as the various developing denominations pressed for tolerance within England as opposed to inclusion in the liturgy of the Anglican Church. However, the works from this book greatly influenced the Prayer Books in the British colonies.

Reaction to the Act

A convocation was held soon after the termination of the conference, in which a few alterations were made in the Book of Common Prayer, not all for the better; This was done by the Act of Uniformity, which, after passing both Houses, by small majorities, received the royal assent on the 19th of May 1662, and was to take effect from the 24th of August following. The terms of conformity specified by this act were: 1. Re-ordination, if they had not been episcopally ordained. 2. A declaration of unfeigned assent and consent to all and every thing prescribed and contained in the Book of Common Prayer, and administration of sacraments and other rites and ceremonies of the Church of England, together with the psalter, and the form and manner of making, ordaining, and consecrating of bishops, priests, and deacons. 3. To take the oath of canonical obedience. 4. To abjure the Solemn League and Covenant. 5. To abjure the lawfulness of taking arms against the king, or any commissioned by him, on any pretense whatsoever.

“… Such were the terms of the infamous and tyrannical Act of Uniformity, which was to come into force on what is termed the Feast of St. Bartholomew. In one respect the day of St. Bartholomew was a glorious day. It testified to a wondering world the strength and the integrity of Presbyterian principles, in their triumph over every earthly influence; or rather, let us say, it proved that the essential spirit of the Presbyterian Church is the spirit of Christianity itself, and therefore it received divine strength in the day of sore trial, that it might finish its testimony in behalf of the sole sovereignty of Christ over his own spiritual kingdom, to the laws and institutions of which man has no right to add, and which he cannot without sin diminish. Yes, for the Presbyterian Church, and even for the Westminster Assembly, by which that Church had been introduced into England, it was a glorious day. But what was it for Prelacy? A day of everlasting infamy, stamping upon its character indelibly the charge, proved by so many repeated facts, of being essentially A PERSECUTING SYSTEM. …”[1]

While the majority of Protestants dearly felt the need to counter the Roman Catholics — they had few means of direct confrontation — and they fought amongst themselves bitterly.

Conventicle Act

The Conventicle Act of 1664, 16 Charles II c. 4, was an English statute that forbade religious assemblies of more than five people outside the auspices of the Church of England. This law was part of the programme of Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon, to discourage nonconformism and to strengthen the position of the Established Church. In this early part pf his reign, the king's chief advisor was Edward Hyde, whom he created Earl of Clarendon in 1661. Clarendon was also the father-in-law of Charles's younger brother, the Duke of York. However, by 1667, after a disastrous war with the Dutch, Clarendon had fallen out of favour and was sent into exile. In the Quicksilver universe, Comstock sometimes is a stand-in, sometimes not - he is not exiled as is Hyde; IE the acronym CABAL, , refers to Charles II 's ministers. In the story, the ministers are Comstock, Anglesey, Bolstrood, Apthorp, and Lewis. In actual history, the CABAL was Clifford, Arlington, Buckingham, Ashley, and Lauderdale.

  • Other statutes that were part of Clarendon's program include:
    • the Five Mile Act, 17 Charles II c. 2, (1665), which sought to prevent nonconformists from living in incorporated and chartered towns.

The operation of these laws at least as far as Protestants were concerned was mitigated somewhat by Charles II's Royal Declaration of Indulgence in (1672), which suspended the execution of penal laws and allowed a certain number of non-conformist chapels to be staffed and constructed, with the pastors subject to royal approval.

The Conventicle Act and Five Mile Act were repealed in 1689.

Nonconformism

A nonconformist is an English Protestant of any non- Anglican denomination, chiefly advocating religious liberty. Methodists, Quakers, Baptists, Unitarians, Congregationalists, and members of the Salvation Army are well known nonconformists. Add Barker for the Quicksilver universe.

The religious census of 1851 revealed that total nonconformist attendance was very close to that of Anglicans. Nowadays, churches independent of the Anglican Church in England or the Presbyterian Church in Scotland are often called Free Churches.

Quote

As Enoch says: War between Protestants is a mainly English phenomena.

  1. Act of Uniformity