'Repose and toleration in the maternal bosom of Christian charity': the Burkean vision of 18th century Anglican comprehension

In a 1773 speech, Edmund Burke responded to a petition, laid before the House of Commons, from a Methodist congregation, opposing a Bill for the Relief of Protestant Dissenters, perhaps on the grounds that many Dissenting congregations had become heterodox. The petition claimed that the defence of the Church of England (from which Methodism had not yet legally separated) was incompatible with toleration for such Dissenting congregations. 

Burke's response, rejecting and refuting the assumptions of the petition, offered not only a defence of toleration ("I would have toleration a part of establishment, as a principle favorable to Christianity, and as a part of Christianity") but also an account of the principled comprehension of 18th century Anglicanism, defined by the generous orthodoxy of the Articles ("the security of her own doctrines"), as a confident, robust, and meaningful alternative to sectarianism:

Sir, the Church of England, if only defended by this miserable petition upon your table, must, I am afraid, upon the principles of true fortification, be soon destroyed. But, fortunately, her walls, bulwarks, and bastions are constructed of other materials than of stubble and straw, - are built up with the strong and stable matter of the gospel of liberty, and founded on a true, constitutional, legal establishment. But, Sir, she has other securities: she has the security of her own doctrines; she has the security of the piety, the sanctity, of her own professors, - their learning is a bulwark to defend her ... 

I wish to see the Established Church of England great and powerful; I wish to see her foundations laid low and deep, that she may crush the giant powers of rebellious darkness; I would have her head raised up to that heaven to which she conducts us. I would have her open wide her hospitable gates by a noble and liberal* comprehension, but I would have no breaches in her wall** ...

(*'Liberal' is defined in Johnson's dictionary as "munificent; generous; bountiful; not parsimonious".

**A reference to Burke's defence of clerical subscription to the Articles of Religion.)

Such "noble and liberal comprehension" within Anglicanism is a consistent theme in Burke's thinking. It was also widely reflected in the self-understanding of 18th century Anglicanism. Consider, for example, the charge given by Charles Inglis to the clergy of his new Diocese of Nova Scotia in 1788:

It is truly painful and mortifying to see a furious Bigot, pretending a zeal for the Gospel; yet wholly destitute of that temper required by the Gospel, and ignorant of the two first and principal lessons taught by it, Humility and Benevolence ... The members of our Church have always been distinguished by liberal sentiments - may they ever continue to be so distinguished.

Burke continues by highlighting the wider cultural significance of such peaceable, gracious comprehension:

I would have her cherish all those who are within, and pity all those who are without; I would have her a common blessing to the world, an example, if not an instructor, to those who have not the happiness to belong to her; I would have her give a lesson of peace to mankind, that a vexed and wandering generation might be taught to seek for repose and toleration in the maternal bosom of Christian charity, and not in the harlot lap of infidelity and indifference. Nothing has driven people more into that house of seduction than the mutual hatred of Christian congregations.

Anglican comprehension, therefore, is to "give a lesson of peace" in place of sectarian strife and contention. This too was a well-established theme in 18th century Anglicanism. As the High Church Bishop Horsley declared in an episcopal charge of 1800:

I know not what hinders but that the highest Supralapsarian Calvinist may be as good a churchman as an Arminian; and if the Church of England in her moderation opens her arms to both, neither can with a very good grace desire that the other should be excluded.

The Burkean vision of "a noble and liberal comprehension", flowing from and returning to the "repose and toleration ... of Christian charity", provides not only a significant insight into 18th century Anglicanism - it also recalls contemporary Anglicans to a meaningful comprehension, a comprehension that is radically different to a banal invocation of diversity and inclusion: a comprehension rooted in a recognition of the gift of charity bestowed in and through Christ, and in a modesty required in the face of the fallibility of ecclesiastical institutions and schools of theological thought. This is to overflow in a gracious generosity towards other Christian traditions, those whom Burke in this speech describes as "the honest and candid disciples of the religion we profess in common".

It is certainly the case that Burke's words regarding a "vexed and wandering generation" have deep contemporary resonance, and that the "mutual hatred of Christian congregations" continues to be destructive of Christian cultural presence and witness. Heeding Burkean wisdom, therefore, we might offer a peaceable, gracious alternative to sectarianism, a "repose and toleration in the maternal bosom of Christian charity".