James I. came to the English throne in 1603. He had been raised a Puritan, and therefore that party supposed they would be greatly favored by him as king. Accordingly, before he reached London, they presented to him a petition signed by eight hundred and twenty-five ministers from various countries, desiring a redress of ecclesiastical "abuses," and asking for a conference.
On January 14, 15, and 16, 1604, the king summoned to Hampton Court the Archbishop of Canterbury, eight bishops, five deans, and two doctors, of the Church of England, "who were to oppose all innovation." To meet these he called four members of the Puritan party.
James, to avenge himself for the humiliations that had been put upon him by the Puritans in Scotland when he was a boy, sided with the Episcopalians, and became the chief talker in the conferences of the three days. This so pleased the bishops that one of them, (Bancroft, of the divine right contest before mentioned) fell upon his knees with his eyes raised to James, and cried out,
"I protest, my heart melteth for joy that Almighty God, of his singular mercy, has given us such a king as since Christ's time hath no been."
And the Archbishop (Whitgift) was so transported with joy as to declare that "undoubtedly his majesty spoke by the special assistance of God's Spirit." Whether these men were ex actly in the right in speaking thus may doubtless be questioned; but there was one grand result of this Conference: James ordered a new translation of the Scriptures by which we have our present "King James's" version.
When his delegates returned from Dort, and reported what had been done, James gave the Puritans another snub, by expressing in strong terms his dislike, and declared that the position of Arminius on the divine decrees was preferable to that of Calvin.
After James came Charles I., a rigid Episcopalian, and therefore a bitter opponent of all dissenters, Puritans as well as others; and through Laud carried things with a high-hand. He finally pushed civil matters so far that he brought upon his kingdom the civil war, and by that, through Cromwell, the complete ascendancy of the Puritans.
When affairs had grown somewhat quiet after the close of the civil war, there were peace-loving men in England who wished to heal the divisions between the Episcopalians and the Puritans; but about all the recognition they received was to be called Atheists, Deists, Socinians, and to cap the climax a new epithet was invented, Latitudinarians.
After the Commonwealth, came Charles II., who reduced everything again to the jurisdiction of bishops. After him came James II., who tried to bring the kingdom under the pa pal rule. This danger, of course, led all to make common cause against it, till finally to save the kingdom to Protestantism, William of Orange, with his wife Mary, daughter of James II., was invited to come over from Holland and take the kingdom and reign. In 1688 they came; James ran away to France, and the kingdom was settled upon William and Mary jointly, and pledged to a Protestant succession forever.
But as soon as James was out of the kingdom, and the bishops were required to take the oath of allegiance to the new king, many of them discovered all at once that James was king by "divine right," and that it was treason to swear allegiance to any other while he lived. It mattered not though he had, like the coward that he was, basely run away in disguise; no matter though he, in his flight, had thrown the great seal of the kingdom into the Thames, and by thus throwing away "that mystic symbol of legal government" had left the realm a prey to every unlawful element; no matter for all this and more, they refused to take the oath of allegiance to one of the best rulers that England ever saw.
This caused a division and endless discussion within the Episcopalian Church. Those who refused to take the oath were denominated Non-jurors and High Church; those who took the oath were called Low Church. This controversy lasted through the century, till James, William and Mary all were dead, and Anne succeeded.