laudable Practice

George Washington and Charles Inglis. They seem to be ideological opponents. Washington, the enlightened Virginian gentleman and commander of the Continental Army. Inglis, the Loyalist parson in New York and critic of Paine's Common Sense . While both were members of the Church of England, JCD Clark in The Language of Liberty 1660-1832 (1994) has portrayed the Revolutionary War as a 'war of religion', with contrasting Anglican visions taking opposing sides. Washington represented the low church, latitudinarian ethos of the Church of England in the southern colonies. Inglis, by contrast, represented the high church orthodoxy and Toryism of the clergy of the northern colonies.  There is good reason, however, to suggest that Clark's contrast between two opposing Anglican visions is much too heavily drawn. As much recent scholarship has demonstrated, 18th century Anglicanism was defined much more by 'unity and accord' than by High v. Low conflict. William Gibson, f...

With the approach of the Fourth of July and the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, Laudable Practice  this week will have a series of posts considering aspects of 18th century Anglicanism in the context of the American Revolution. We begin today with a figure at the centre of that Revolution, the Virginian gentleman George Washington.  Two rival portrayals of Washington are conventionally invoked. The first is that of Washington as the icon of the founding of Christian nation. To quote a Southern Baptist publication : America’s greatest hero and first President was no deist, but a devout, Bible-believing Christian. US Secretary of War Pete Hegseth echoed this in a recent statement invoking the iconography of Washington praying at Valley Forge: Amid all the bleak nights, the loss and despair, the lack of proper support, George Washington performed a profound act — he prayed. And on this day of Rededicate 250, let us follow George Washington's example. Let us...

... and one thing more I shall remark, that at his leaving those parts upon the King's return; some of the Remonstrant Ministers of the Low Countries coming to take their leaves of this great Man, and desiring that by his means the Church of England would be kind to them, he had reason to grant it, because they were Learned Men, and in many things of a most excellent belief, yet he reprov'd them, and gave them caution against it, that they approached too near and gave too much countenance to the great and dangerous errors of the Socinians.  This was Jeremy Taylor, preaching at the funeral of Archbishop John Bramhall in 1663. I have previously pointed to this reference as evidence of Taylor's willingness to critique Remonstrant theology. Recent reading, however, has made me look afresh at this extract. That there is a critique of the Remonstrants here is, of course, obvious: they have been willing to draw too close to the Socinians. Alongside this, however, is high praise f...

Continuing with his account of the doctrine of Absolution in A Critical and Practical Elucidation of the Book of Common Prayer, Volume I (1796), John Shepherd turns to the Holy Communion: The sacrament of the Lord's Supper was likewise an absolution, and was called το τελειον, the perfection of a Christian. To all who had never fallen into the greater sins, which required public penance, it was a general absolution. It was likewise an absolution from the penalties of excommunication. To faithfully partake of the Lord's Supper is "a general absolution". This, Shepherd notes, was a patristic understanding: To penitents at the point of death, it was, what the Latin fathers call viaticum, or provision for the passage from this life to the future. In case the sick penitent recovered, he was obliged to perform the rest of the prescribed penance: at least he was to receive the imposition of hands at the altar, which was accompanied with prayers for his absolution. But if he...

In a recent post , I highlighted how Charles Inglis, in a 1768 work, referred to how the Sacrament of Baptism bestows a regeneration which brings us into the covenant of Jesus Christ, but not that grace which renovates, or regenerates, the heart. He described the former as "relative and federal" regeneration, the latter "internal and moral". This is the understanding that Inglis sees in the Restoration divine William Falker (d.1682), in his Libertas Ecclesiastica (1674). In the very closing years of the 'long 18th century', in his 1826 primary visitation charge , Thomas Burgess, Bishop of Salisbury, we see this understanding of Holy Baptism again set forth. Burgess states that he desires "to remove some of the difficulties, in which the important subject of regeneration is involved by its opposite disputants": one party being charged with making baptism alone sufficient for our salvation, the other, with reducing it to a formal and almost unnecess...

After addressing the matter of the rite of Confirmation, Robert Nelson - in his 1713 Life of Bull - turns to Ordination: The September after the Bishop came into The Care his Diocese, he had a publick Ordination; and the same time every Year, was employed after the same manner. After the other Ember Seasons he Ordain'd but a small Number, more or less, as occasion required. September Embertide, then, was the usual Ordination season in the diocese of St Davids under Bishop Bull. His requirement was that candidates for holy orders presented themselves to him in "at least a Month before Ordination Sunday" (indicating that the rite of Ordination occurred on the Sunday of the Embertide): The first thing therefore that Bishop required of such Candidates, was, that they should make their personal Appearance before him, at least a Month before Ordination Sunday. At such their Appearance, they produced their Testimonials and Titles, and were examined by one of his Chaplains, and ...

In his  Instructions in Reading the Liturgy of the United Church of England and Ireland (1826), the Rev'd John Henry Howlett (1781–1867) described the most appropriate tone for the reading of Prayer Book divine service - "mild, tranquil, and dignified": What can be more so, than to hear the language of the meek and lowly Jesus, delivered with a stern, haughty, authoritative tone? "In our blessed Lord's discourses and instructions, (says Paley) all was calmness. No emotions, no violence, no agitation, when he delivered the most sublime and affecting doctrines, and most comfortable or most terrifying predictions. The prophets before him fainted and sunk under the communications which they received from above; so strong was their impression, so unequal their strength: but truths that overwhelmed the servants of God, were familiar to his Son" (Paley's Sermons, edited by E. Paley, Vol. ii. p. 34.) This striking peculiarity in our Lord's discourses and in...

Jeremy Taylor's 1647 The Liberty of Prophesying has often been interpreted as an aberration in his body of works. For those who present Taylor as a straightforward 'Laudian', The Liberty of Prophesying  is to be dismissed as the unfortunate influence of Chillingworth and Great Tew, quickly forgotten by its author, who returned to conventional 'Laudian' ways. For those who praise The Liberty of Prophesying as an anticipation of the Broad Church tradition, it is a matter of regret that Taylor abandoned this spirit for conventionally harsh High Church tendencies. What both approaches overlook, however, is how central themes of The Liberty of Prophesying echo throughout Taylor's work. The place it gives to the conscience and reason, and a scepticism about excessive claims for ecclesiastical tradition, are both prominent in  Ductor Dubitantium, or the Rule of Conscience , published in 1660. Likewise, the critique of Augustine, fundamental to Taylor's 1655  Unu...

As he reviews the doctrine of Absolution in A Critical and Practical Elucidation of the Book of Common Prayer, Volume I (1796), John Shepherd notes that "the ancient church" saw Absolution embodied in four practices: The dispensation of Absolution, as practised in the ancient church, is reducible to these four heads: 1. The Absolution of Baptism, and of the Supper of the Lord, or sacramental Absolution. 2. The Absolution of reconciliation to the church, and re-admission into its communion. 3. The Absolution of word and doctrine, or declaratory Absolution. 4. The Absolution of prayer, or precatory Absolution. These four heads shape his review, as he addresses each in turn. We begin, then, with the Sacrament of Baptism: The sacrament of baptism was esteemed by the Fathers the most universal Absolution. To adopt the words of antiquity, it was the grand, the divine indulgence in the Christian church. It was the Absolution, or remission of all those sins, which the party baptized...

He told them that the house of theirs to which he alluded was this their church, in which he now addressed them for the first time; that their most welcome and proper manner of bidding him God-speed would be their patient obedience to his teaching of the gospel; but that he could put forward no claim to such conduct on their part unless he taught them the great Christian doctrine of works and faith combined. Thus did Mr. Arabin preach himself into the living of St. Ewold's in Barchester Towers . Trollope here echoes what was a significant critique of Solafidianism. That critique was the mainstream view of the 18th century Church of England and maintained by the 'Orthodox' into the 19th century. A fine representation of this critique is seen in the primary visitation charge of Thomas Burgess, Bishop of Salisbury (received holy orders in 1784, consecrated to the episcopate 1803), delivered to his clergy in August 1826. In the preface to the published version of the charge, B...

The fact that George Bull was 71 when he was consecrated Bishop of St Davids has already been referenced in our readings from Nelson's 1713 Life of Bull . Bull's age had a particular impact on one aspect of his episcopal ministry - the administration of Confirmation: It was matter of great Grief to the good Bishop, that by the Decay of his Strength, and by his frequent Indispositions, he was prevented from Travelling over his Diocese, in order to administer in all the Parts of it, that Holy Apostolical Rite grounded upon Scripture, as expounded by Catholick Tradition, which for some time hath been known and distinguished in the Church, by the Name of Confirmation ... Nelson's description - "that Holy Apostolical Rite" - reflects the settled, consistent understanding of Confirmation found amongst Anglican divines across the 'long 18th century'. The apostolic nature of the rite is seen in, for example, a 1693 sermon in the Diocese of London, ' A Sermon...