3. The Sufferings of the Ejected
In December 1662 Charles II again attempted to shield the nonconformists, with a Declaration of Indulgence; he was trying to use a “dispensing power” which he dearly wished to exercise, which would override the authority of Parliament. But Parliament, no doubt mindful of how Charles I had overreached himself in the exercise of his powers, wished to restrain any such dispensing power. So, when a bill was introduced into the House of Lords to put the King’s wishes into effect, it encountered fatal opposition, leaving the nonconformists open to severe persecution.
1The previous article described the 1662 Act of Uniformity and some of its results. This article concludes the series.
Among those who suffered was Joseph Alleine. He had been able to go about his ministry for nine months after the Act of Uniformity became law, usually preaching six or seven times a week and sometimes up to 14 times. Then on a Saturday evening in May 1663 he was arrested. “He rejoiced”, wrote his wife Theodosia, “that he was accounted worthy to suffer for the work of Christ, and he would labour to encourage the timorous and faint-hearted by his own and others’ experience of the mercy and goodness of God in prison, which was far beyond what they could have thought or expected. He was a cheerful observer of the rule of the Lord Jesus, ‘Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you’ (Mt 5:44).”2
Alleine was able to arrange to put his bed in a corner, curtain it off, and bring his wife to join him. And after a few weeks, he was allowed to go out for a mile-long walk each morning and evening, unless the weather was unsuitable or the jailer was in a bad mood. What is more, he and another minister, John Norman of Bridgwater, were able to preach every day in the prison, with many people coming to hear them from up to 10 miles away.
Alleine and his wife had just a corner for themselves in a crowded room; the large number of prisoners there included 50 Quakers, 17 Baptists and 13 ministers. Such a room, poorly ventilated, could become unbearably stuffy on a hot summer’s day; equally it could be fearfully cold in winter. Conditions were exacerbated by the lack of sanitation, especially if the jailer left scores of prisoners locked in the room for many hours at a time, and even for days. But by no means everyone enjoyed the degree of relative freedom that Alleine was granted. And many might have gone free if they had undertaken to refrain from preaching. This was John Bunyan’s position: he would have been released if he had promised not to preach, but he could not give that promise. So he had to go to prison, but, as he said, “with God’s comfort in my poor soul”.3 But if he had gone free, we might never have had The Pilgrim’s Progress, which he penned in Bedford jail.
In 1665 Charles proposed that the nonconformists should be permitted freedom of worship in return for a payment of money. Parliament’s response was to pass the Five Mile Act, forbidding ejected ministers to live within five miles of any place where they had been settled as pastors. It meant that many men who had already suffered much had to leave their homes, and this made it even more difficult for them to earn a living. This was the year of the Great Plague of London, when more than 100 000 died, when the court fled to Oxford and many of the clergy left the city also. However, godly ministers
2Life & Letters of Joseph Alleine, p 76.
3Quoted in Cragg, Puritanism 1660-1688, p 45.
came to occupy the vacant pulpits and preached to crowds who had nowhere to flee to. The godly could not fail to see this outbreak of disease as God’s judgement – as was also the case the following year, when the Great Fire of London caused so much damage. Among the London ministers who returned was Thomas Vincent, some of whose sermons at that time were published under the title, God’s Terrible Voice in the City. It seems that there were conversions under every one of his sermons at that period.
The devoted service of the nonconformist ministers at this time resulted in greater freedom for some time, as did various political factors, including Clarendon’s fall from power, but 1670 saw the passing of the Conventicle Act. One might not be surprised to find the animosities of the Civil War still influencing affairs, but one observer has described the Act as “the quintessence of arbitrary malice”.4 The losing side in the War was now in power and many were determined to exercise that power at whatever cost to their opponents.
The Act claimed to provide “further and more speedy remedies against the growing dangerous practices of seditious sectaries”. A justice of the peace, on the sworn evidence of two witnesses or “by notorious evidence and circumstance of the fact” could make a record of a nonconformist meeting for worship, and this record would be equivalent to a conviction. On the basis of, it might be, mere hearsay, a victim might be ruined (and in considering the amounts involved we must bear in mind the huge change in the value of money since that time). Five shillings was the penalty for a first conviction for attending a conventicle, and the amount of the fine was doubled for subsequent offences.
However, the fines of those who could not afford to pay them could be imposed on those who had the means to do so, subject to a maximum of £10 on each occasion. The minister taking the service was subject to a fine of £20 on the first occasion he was caught, and £40 afterwards. Likewise the person whose property was used for the service was subject to a fine of £20. These higher fines could also be charged to those who could afford to pay them. People could have their property seized if they did not have the money to pay a fine, which might make it impossible for them to follow their trade if their tools were seized, or even to cook their food if their pans were taken.
One of the nastiest features of this legislation was the encouragement it gave to informers, who might not be overly scrupulous about the accuracy of their allegations. These informers would be granted a share in the penalties exacted on the worshippers, and it often provided a lucrative sideline for dishonest men and women. John Owen complains that because of “the vilest persons being encouraged . . . to swear for their own advantage, there have
4Quoted in Cragg, Puritanism 1660-1688, p 16.
been in a short time more public perjuries before magistrates than can be proved or suspected to have been, in some ages before”.5 Many openly boasted that they would live in luxury on the spoils of those whom they informed against. And, in Cragg’s words, to see “a Puritan harvesting a good crop was hailed as a foretaste of certain profit” for informers.6 However, in spite of this draconian legislation, magistrates in some cases reported that it was almost impossible to enforce the laws, so determined were the non-conformists to meet together for worship. On the other hand, prominent ministers such as Giles Firmin and Richard Gilpin remained unmolested because their neighbours valued their medical skills.
Enforcement of the Act varied from place to place, but Cragg suggests that no “single act caused as much suffering among nonconformist communities as the Conventicle Act of 1670”.7 Cragg also points out: “It was clear that malice and revenge played a large part in prompting the clamour for the repression of dissent”;8 the Royalists in Church and state had suffered in various ways during the Civil War, and in the years that followed they felt the indignity of being out of power. Now they were bent on making it clear that the tables had been turned, and those who refused to submit to the tyrannical and unscriptural settlement within the Church were made to feel the rigours of Royalist power. Yet Sir Richard Browne, one of the worst persecutors in London, was not alone in thus seeking to show how sound a Royalist he now was, though he had taken the other side in the Civil War.
We may listen to Cragg as he describes the enforcement of the Conventicle Act: “A dissenter might be apprehended in the street or at his home, but the impact of persecution was most likely to strike him in his meeting house. Usually with violence, but often quietly and with consideration, the officers of the law would appear. The mayor and constables would enter, cry for silence, order the minister to desist, and command the people to disperse. Frequently the congregation would ignore them. Sometimes the minister would engage them in debate and set against their appeal to royal authority the command of the King in whose name the congregation had met. In either case the patience of the authorities was usually soon exhausted.
“By violence they tried to compel obedience. The commands of the officers would be drowned by the singing of the worshippers; attempts to disperse the congregation would be met with passive resistance, and in the face of stubborn non-co-operation tempers quickly flared. The constables, adding
5 Works, Edinburgh, 1852, vol 13, p 586.
6 Puritanism 1660-1688, p 34.
7 Puritanism 1660-1688, p 18.
8 Puritanism 1660-1688, p 33.
to the din with oaths, swearing as they pulled and shoved at the unyielding mass of worshippers, would begin to lay about them with sticks and staves or any improvised weapons that might come to hand.
“And when the soldiery dispersed a meeting, violence broke out more quickly and with less restraint. To drive the worshippers into the street was merely the initial step, though often accomplished with so little ceremony that a dozen men and women would be dragged out to recover consciousness in the gutter. Once outside the meeting house the soldiers would lay about them with pike staffs and musket butts, and often men and women alike were so severely beaten that even the spectators cried out in protest. When mounted troops were used, the horsemen might attempt to ride down the dissenters; slashing at them their scabbards, or even with drawn swords, they pursued fugitives up alleys and struck at them as they cowered in doorways. So detailed and so circumstantial are the accounts that we are scarcely surprised to read that some of the victims died as a result of the treatment, while many others were maimed for life.”9
One should note, however, that the persecuted were not sent to the scaffold or shot in cold blood, as happened in Scotland, but the deaths that took place were the result of the kind of violence just mentioned and of the terrible conditions people endured after being imprisoned, often aggravated by disease, which could spread easily in crowded conditions. Among those who suffered in this way were Richard Flavel and his wife – John Flavel’s parents. During the Great Plague they were arrested for attending a prayer meeting. While in prison they came in contact with those suffering from the disease and, although they were quickly granted bail, they both died. It is estimated that 5000 died from their sufferings before deliverance came in 1688.10
In 1656 John Flavel became a minister in the port of Dartmouth in southwest England. He was among those ejected in 1662. It is said that “he did not thereupon quit his relation to his church; he thought the souls of his flock to be more precious than to be so tamely neglected; he took all opportunities of administering the Word and sacraments to them in private meetings, and joined with other ministers in solemn days of fasting and humiliation, to pray that God would once more restore the ark of His covenant unto His afflicted Israel”. However, when the Five Mile Act forced him to leave Dartmouth, he settled in a place called Slapton, and there he preached twice every Sabbath. Many of his people came to hear him in spite of the danger they faced because of the Conventicle Act. He often slipped into Dartmouth itself
11 The Works of John Flavel, Banner of Truth Trust reprint, 1968, vol 1, p. vii.
to visit his flock and preach to them, but he had to leave again quickly as there were people watching out for him.
On one occasion, when people in Exeter invited Flavel to preach to them in a wood three miles outside the city, they were discovered. The hearers made sure that the preacher got away, and those who escaped arrest brought him to another wood, where he continued his sermon. Many of the congregation, however, were carried away, brought before a magistrate and fined. Among them was a tanner whose fine amounted to £40, although he had a large family and only a small stock of goods. Yet he told a friend that “he took the spoiling of his goods joyfully, for the sake of his Lord Jesus”.11
In a short treatise written during the time of persecution and subtitled, “A Serious and Seasonable Caveat to all the Saints in this Time of Temptation”, Flavel gave the following counsels: (1.) “Cleave fast to Christ and the profession you have formerly made of Him, what aspect soever the times have upon you.” (2.) “Touch not with idolatry and superstition, under what name or notion soever it be presented to you.” (3.) “Beware of such persons as are . . . agents for Antichrist and keep off from such a ministry, the tendency and scope of which is to entice and draw you to idolatry.” (4.) “Give your utmost diligence to promote religion and the power of godliness in your respective families and neighbourhoods, and the rather do this with all your might because the ordinary and more public means of their conversion and education is cut off.” (5.) “Study to keep yourselves pure from the corruptions of the present world.” (6.) “Prepare for fiery trials, whilst the Lord gives you such a gracious season of peace and liberty.” (7.) “Get your hearts deeply affected with Zion’s misery and strive earnestly with the Lord on its behalf.” (8.) “Seeing a day of great trouble is approaching, and all outward comforts ready to take their farewell of you, you should now give all diligence to clear up your title to Christ and interest in the kingdom which cannot be shaken.”12
Charles II died in 1685 and was succeeded by his brother James II. His efforts to move the nation in a Roman Catholic direction brought about a reaction which resulted in his flight to the Continent. The Glorious Revolution in England under the new monarchs, William and Mary, gave the dissenters freedom to worship according to their consciences but left them under various restrictions, some of which remained in force until the nineteenth century. However, much of the power of the Puritan movement had been destroyed through persecution, and few of the giants of that period were still alive – one of the exceptions being Flavel, but he passed to his eternal reward in 1691. Even in 1680, Owen was preaching about “woeful decays in churches,
13Works, Edinburgh, 1851, vol 9, p 510. The sermon is entitled: “The use of faith in a time of general declension in religion”.
in church members, in professors of all sorts, and in the gradual withdrawing of the glory of God from us all on that account”.13
Although England has since seen evidence of God’s saving power on a wide scale, the Puritan period remains unique in England’s religious history. But we have reason to believe that that country which has experienced so much divine blessing, and at the present time is so emphatically turning its back on the Most High, will yet “see greater things than these”.