George Bancroft, History of the United States from the Discovery of the American Continent, Vol. 2, 17th edition.

[201] of tile wilderness without comeliness,¹ yet the laws

Chap XIV.} 1662

demanded strict conformity, and required of every one to contribute to the support of the established church. 1662 For assessing parish taxes twelve vestrymen were now to be chosen in each parish, with power to fill all vacancies in their own body. Here was a revolution in church affairs; the control passed from the parish to a close corporation, which the parish could neither alter nor overrule. In England, dissenters were attempting changes in the liturgy; Virginia required the whole liturgy to be thoroughly read; no nonconformist might teach, even in private, under pain of banishment; no reader might expound the Catechism or the Scriptures. The obsolete severity of the laws of Queen Elizabeth was revived against the Quakers. Absence from church was for them an offence, punishable by a monthly fine of twenty pounds sterling. To meet in conventicles of their own, was forbidden under further penalties.

Nor did the law remain a dead letter. A large number of Quakers was arraigned before the court, as recusants. ‘Tender consciences,’ said Owen firmly,

April 4.

‘must obey the law of God, however they suffer.’— ‘There is no toleration for wicked consciences.’² was the reply of the court.

The reformation had diminished the power of the clergy by declaring marriage a civil contract, not a sacrament. The Independents allowed no marriage but by the magistrates; Virginia tolerated none but according to the rubric in the Book of Common Prayer

Religious bigotry recovered all the advantages