96

HISTORY OF ENGLAOT.

CHAP.

II.

16S9.

of Puritanism in England bears a close analogy to the history ofProtestantism in Europe. The Parliament of 1689 could nomore put an end to nonconformity hy tolerating a garb or aposture than the Doctors of Trent could have reconciled theTeutonic nations to the Papacy hy regulating the sale of in-dulgences. In the sixteenth century Quakerism was unknown;and there was not in the whole realm a single congregation ofIndependents or Baptists. At the time of the Revolution, theIndependents, Baptists, and Quakers w’ere a majority of thedissenting body; and these sects cduld not be gained over onany terms which the lowest of Low Churchmen would have beenwilling to offer. The Independent held that a national Church,governed by any central authority whatever, Pope, Patriarch,King, Bishop, or Synod, was anunscriptural institution, andthat every congregation of believers was, under Christ, a so-vereign society. The Baptist was even more irreclaimable thanthe Independent, and the Quaker even more irreclaimable thanthe Baptist. Concessions, therefore, which w'ould once have-extinguished nonconformity would not now satisfy even onehalf of the nonconformists; and it was the obvious interest ofevery nonconformist whom no concession w T ould satisfy thatnone of his brethren should be satisfied. The more liberal theterms of comprehension, the greater was the alarm of everyseparatist who knew that he could, in no case,be comprehended.There was hut slender hope that the dissenters, unbroken andacting as one man, would be able to obtain from the legislaturefull admission to civil privileges; and all hope of obtaining suchadmission must be relinquished if Nottingham should, by thehelp of some wellmeaning but shortsighted friends of religiousliberty, be enabled to accomplish his design. If his bill passed,there would doubtless he a considerable defection from the dis-senting body; and every defection must be severely felt by aclass already outnumbered, depressed, and struggling against