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

[441] between those who invoked religion on the side

Chap XVII.}

of passive obedience, and those who esteemed religion superior to man, and held resistance to tyranny a Christian duty. If the whig aristocracy looked to the stadtholder of aristocratic Holland as the protector of their liberties, Baxter and the Presbyterians saw in William the Calvinist their tolerant avenger.

Of the two great aristocratic parties which led the politics of England, both respected the established British constitution. But the tory opposed reform, and leaned to the past; he defended his privileges against the encroachments of advancing civilization. The bishops, claiming for themselves a divine right by direct succession, were his natural allies; and to assert the indefeasible rights of the bishops, of the aristocracy, and of the king, against dissenters, republicans, and whigs, was his whole purpose.

The whigs were also a party of the aristocracy, bent on the preservation of their privileges against the encroachments of the monarch. In an age that demanded liberty, the whigs, scarce proposing new enfranchisements, gathered up every liberty, feudal or popular, known to English law, and sanctioned by the fictitious compact of prescription. In a period of progress in the enfranchisement of classes, they shared political influence with the merchants and bankers; in an age of religious sects, they embraced the more moderate and liberal of the Church of England, and those of the dissenters whose dissent was the least glaring; in an age of speculative inquiry, they favored freedom of the press. How vast was the party, is evident, since it cherished among its numbers men so opposite as Shaftesbury and Sidney, as Locke and Baxter.

These two parties embraced almost all the wealth