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A HISTORY OF LONDON Jeremy Collier officiated in an upper room in Broad Street ; Dr. Welton, the deprived rector of Whitechapcl, held service in a house in Goodman's Fields; and Robert Orme officiated at Trinity Chapel in the parish of St. Botolph without Aldersgate. Other conventicles were held on College Hill, at the Savoy, Spitalfields, Gray's Inn, Bedford Court Holborn, Fetter Lane, Great Ormond Street, St. Dunstan's Court Fleet Street, and Theobald's Road."' In fact CoUey Cibber had some justification for saying of the Nonjuror : — In close backrooms his routed flock he rallies, And reigns the Patriarch of blind lanes and alleys.^** Amid uncomfortable surroundings, in constant fear of government raids, the services of the Church were performed with devotion and greater attention to the rubrics and canons than was usual."" The Holy Communion was fre- quently celebrated,"' and on the great festivals was attended by country Non- jurors who came to London for the purpose."^ From the first there was a tendency towards elaboration of ritual, which resulted in the unfortunate split on ' the usages.' "' Though divided, the Church was still prosperous in 1730,"' and continued its episcopal succession throughout the i8th century, Gordon, the last bishop, dying in 1779."° By that time the numbers had greatly dwindled, indeed many Nonjurors had followed Nelson's example, and returned to the Established Church on the death of Queen Annc."^ The connexion between Church and State was so close that the Church in London of necessity took part in every movement and every struggle of the age. The formation of the parties of Whig and Tory was followed by that of the Low and High Churchmen."^ The political theory of passive obedience was an expression of the despotism of the Crown suited to the Tudors, but out of touch with the thought of the late 17th century, which was expressed by the new or Low Church theologians in contradistinc- tion to those of the High Church party."' But though Sherlock, Tillotson, Stillingfleet and their followers abandoned non-resistance, they emphasized the power of the sovereign in matters ecclesiastical ; "* while the High Church party developed the theory of the Church as a spiritual body,"' a conception which William III held much more dangerous than the indepen- dence shown by the bishops and London clergy in 1688, or the enthusiasm they evoked. The government therefore filled the vacancies caused by the deprivation of the nonjuring bishops with London clergymen "* of the newer school, by whose removal the position of the High Churchmen in the City was strengthened, and division was created between the episcopacy and the bene- ficed clergy. The favour shown by the bishops to the Comprehension Bill in 1689 and the efforts made to modify the Prayer Book so as to admit of its '" Overton, Nonjurors, 283-4. '" Colley Cibber, The Nonjuror, Prol. 11. 21-2. '" Bodl. Lib. Rawlinson MS. C. 983. "* John Bowdlcr, Mem. 86 ; Life of Ambrose Bonuiick, 112. "' Reliquiae Hearnianae, i, 89 ; Lindsay, op. cit. I. '^ Bowdler, Mem. 86, 88. "° Reliquiae Hearnianae, ii, 738. "" Doran, Lond. in Jacobite Times, ii, 352. "' Sharp, Life of John Sharf, ii, 33. "' Overton, Nonjurors, 171 ; A Letter from a Clergyman in the Country to a Min'tter in the City concerning Ministers intermeddling with State Affairs (B.M. Pressmark 698, g, 15, no. 2), p. 14, &c. '" High Church Politicks, or the Abuse of the 30/^ of January considered, 6. '" Secretan, Life of Nelson, 12 ; The Principles of the Loui-Church-Men (B.M. Tracts "jio, no. l),p. 3. '" Ibid. Pref. f.;A Private Conference between a Rich Alderman and a Poor Country yicar. "« Hearne, Coll. ii, 108. 350