368 A TOPOGRAPHICAL 



church ; and John Goodwin, among others, was denounced for a 

 breach of canons, in 1637.* 



In the year L640, the king having allowed the convocation to 

 continue its sittings, after the dissolution of Parliament, the clergy 

 were busily occupied upon two subjects of considerable magnitude. 

 One of these was to grant a subsidy for six years, to meet the exi- 

 gency of the public affairs. This was proposed to be done, by a 

 tax of four shillings in the pound upon the estates of the clergy. 

 Another object of this prolonged convocation was the enactment of 

 certain canons, or articles, amounting in number to seventeen. 

 These were published on the 30th of June.f The first of these 

 canons, " concerning the royal power," asserts the absolute autho- 

 rity of kings, and the unlawfulness of taking arms, even in self- 

 defence. Many of the other canons bore peculiarly hard on the non- 

 conformists. The fourth, in particular, has been remarked to have 

 a singularly intolerant character. It is there decreed, that no 

 person shall import, print, or disperse, any books written by Soci- 

 nians, on pain of excommunication, and of being further punished 

 in the Star-chamber. That " no minister shall preach any such 

 doctrines in his sermons, nor students have any such books in his 

 study, except he be a graduate in divinity, or have episcopal, or 

 archidiaconal, ordination ; and if any layman embrace their opi- 

 nion, he shall be excommunicated, and not absolved without re- 

 pentance or abjuration." Though Mr. Goodwin does not appear 

 to have had any peculiar bias to Socinianism, he, along with otber* 

 of the London clergy, drew up a petition to the Privy council ; and 

 so great was the outcry against the proceedings of the bishops, 

 that the King thought it prudent to issue an order to Laud to 

 soften his severity. 



Mr. Goodwin, refusing to baptize the children of the parish pro- 

 miscuously, and also to administer the eucharist to his whole parish, 

 was ejected from his living in 1645. He then set up a private 

 meeting in Colemau-street parish, on the plan of the Independents. 

 Being thus in a manner freed from the restraints of episcopacy, he 

 attacked his adversaries with considerable warmth ; and being a 

 zealous defender of Arminianism, against the rigorous and disso- 



Neale's History of the Puritans, Vol.11, p. 263. 



t " Constitutions and canons ecclesiastical, treated upon by the archbishops 

 of Canterbury and York, president of the convocation for their respective pro- 

 vinces, and agreed upon with the king's majesty's licence, in their respective 

 synods, begun at London and York, 1640." 





