he asks, "are all people damned that are cast in a capital indictment? If so, to what purpose are they visited by divines; why are they exhorted to repentance, and have time allowed them to fit them for death?" He asserts that he considered Sir William to have a right to the privileges of communion; and that, in refusing him absolution, he should have failed in his duty. In reply to the objection alleged against the publicity of the ceremony, Collier declares, that it would have been performed in private, if the authorities had admitted him to the prison. He also denies, that Sir William confessed to him that he was privy to the Assassination. The first Paper was dated April 9th, 1696.
The second paper was printed a fortnight later, in consequence of the Declarations of the Bishops. Collier regards their paper as an unsupported censure. In this paper he enters, at some length, on the defence of the practice of the imposition of hands, on the ground of its primitive use. To the charge, that no such ceremony is enjoined by the rubric, he replies: "true; neither is there any prohibition. The Rubric is perfectly silent both as to posture and gesture, and yet some circumstances of this nature must of necessity be used. Now since our Church allows the priest imposition of hands in another case, and does not forbid it in this, is it any harm if our liberty moves upward, and determines itself by general usage and primitive practice?"[1] Some "Animadversions" on Collier's Two Papers were speedily published. They were written by Hody, and at the command of the Archbishop, Tennison. Collier, who seldom allowed an opponent to remain
- ↑ Defence, &c. p. 9.
