This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
204
History of the Nonjurors.

the Case in Fact: for Ken actually resigned his pretensions and claims to Hooper, who succeeded Kidder in the diocese of Bath and Wells. Dodwell and others applied to Ken to know if he challenged their subjection: who replied, that he did not, and who further expressed his wish, that the breach might now be closed by their union with the Bishops in possession of the sees. The particulars connected with the return of Dodwell, Nelson, Brokesby, and others to the National Church, are so full of interest, that they demand our special notice. Dodwell writes to a friend, under the date of January 11th, 1709-10, Lloyd having died only ten days before, concerning the schism. The letter is as follows:

"I have received yours, and have already written to my Lord of Bath and Wells, as the only survivor of the invalidly deprived Bishops, and as thereby having it in his power now to free not only his private diocese, but the whole National Church, from the schism introduced by rilling the sees, which were no otherwise empty than by the invalid deprivations. This I take to be sufficient upon our principles, who cannot justify our separate communion on any other account than that of the schism, provided there be no other, whom we do not yet know of, who does claim, and can prove a better title to some one episcopal altar of our National Church by succession to some of our deceased fathers, than the present incumbents.

"This I had no mind to signify to Mr. K before others in his shop, when he would have me declare myself satisfied, that the schism would end with the life of my Lord of Norwich. I had no mind then to intimate the case of clandestine consecrations by our