48

HISTORY OF ENGLAND.

CHAP.

VII.

1C87.Feelingof theChurchof Eng-land.

yokes; and he might not unnaturally think the yoke of theKing lighter than that of the Church.

While thoughts like these were working in the minds ofmany Dissenters, the Anglican party was in amazement andterror. This new turn in affairs was indeed alarming. TheHouse of Stuart leagued with republican and regicide sectsagainst the old Cavaliers of England; Popery leagued withPuritanism against an ecclesiastical system with which thePuritans had no quarrel, except that it had retained too muchthat was Popish; these were portents which confounded allthe calculations of statesmen. The Church was then to beattacked at once on every side; and the attack was to be underthe direction of him who, by her constitution, was her head.She might well be struck with surprise and dismay. Andmingled with surprise and dismay came other bitter feelings;resentment against the perjured Prince whom she had servedtoo well, and remorse for the cruelties in which he had beenher accomplice, and for which he was now, as it seemed,about to - be her punisher. Her chastisement was just. Shereaped that which she had sown. After the Restoration, whenher power was at the height, she had breathed nothing butvengeance. She had encouraged, urged, almost compelledthe Stuarts to requite with perfidious ingratitude the recentservices of the Presbyterians. Had she, in that season of herprosperity, pleaded, as became her, for her enemies, shemight now, in her distress, have found them her friends.Perhaps it was not yet too late. Perhaps she might still beable to turn the tactics of her faithless oppressor against him-self. There was among the Anglican clergy a moderate partywhich had always felt kindly towards the Protestant Dis-senters. That party was not large; but the abilities, acquire-ments, and virtues of those who belonged to it made it re-spectable. It had been regarded with little favour by th.ehighest ecclesiastical dignitaries, and had been mercilesslyreviled by bigots of the school of Laud: but, from theday on which the Declaration of Indulgence appeared tothe day on which the power of James ceased to inspire