Print and Popularity in the Tolerationist Debates of the English Revolution
The Debates over Toleration in the English Revolution
During the 1640s, England was plunged into a Civil War between Parliamentarians and Royalists. The Personal Rule and the implementation of Laudian reforms in the 1630s acted to destabilise the uneasy religio-political consensus that had been constructed within the boundaries of the granular and plastic Elizabethan Religious Settlement (1559-1563). Laudian reforms emphasised the beauty of holiness, placing central emphasis on the sacred nature of the church. The movement of the altars and the setting up of railings visibly signified a change in Church of England practice that appeared to suggest a movement back towards Roman Catholic Mass. England was no longer ruled by James I who had legitimised his rule in apocalyptical opposition to the threat of the antichrist, the Pope; now England was ruled by Charles I whose embrace of Laudian reform appeared to many as the reintroduction of papal practice within the Church of England. For many, the policies of the antichrist were now in England, enforced by tyrannical prerogative powers.
Alongside the process of polarisation in England, control over the press was thrown into dispute. In the 1630s, Laudians dominated the licensing system. Most Puritan works would be repressed, and if they were licensed, they would be likely heavily edited to a Laudian standard. With the outbreak of the Civil War, the control of the press was undermined for both the Parliamentarians and Royalists and there was an explosion of cheap print. Although attempts would be made to re-establish control of the print trade, the period of the English Revolution (1642-1660) would continue to produce large quantities of cheap print. For many scholars, this print culture was a public sphere where open debate over the nature of the English polity and the religious settlement could take place.
The legitimacy of this new print culture was heavily contested in the debates over toleration. These debates were over both the liberty of the press and the religious toleration of separatist religious sects, who were forming in opposition to national Church hierarchies supported by the Presbyterians. The Parliamentarian infighting highlights the competing visions of print culture that were at stake. For tolerationists like John Saltmarsh, “free debates and open Conferences” were a positive, “where doors are not shut, there will be no breaking them no open… there is a way of vent and evacuation.” This view provoked vehement responses from Parliamentarian Presbyterians like Thomas Edwards, whose Gangraena (1646) detailed the horrors of sectarianism that print had enabled to grow. In opposition to the growing sectarian heresies, Edwards wanted to promote a Presbyterian national Church system through his own printed work.
The Paradox of the Post-Reformation Public Sphere
In reasserting the importance of print culture to the understanding of the English Revolution, post-revisionist scholars made recourse to Jürgen Habermas’ theory of the public sphere. For Habermas, the public sphere was a space in which rational public discourse driven by reason could occur, located between the private sphere and the sphere of public authority. Although Habermas dated the origins of the public sphere to the late seventeenth century, scholars like Peter Lake and David Zaret have argued that the culture of print that engulfed the English Revolution led to the formation of publics wherein public discourse and opinion were formed.
Post-revisionist conceptions of the public sphere have demonstrated how public opinion was formed and how it led to the creation of opposition resulting in revolution. However, they have failed to understand how contemporaries viewed their use of print and their engagement with print culture. The stark paradox of seventeenth-century contemporary engagement with the public sphere is namely that no one wanted it. Writers like the Presbyterian Thomas Edwards would denounce the use of print by his sectarian opponents whilst printing his Gangraena, detailing the horrors of sectarian heresy, that in turn stimulated further sectarian print reaction.
Although contemporaries of the English Revolution did not know of the public sphere, they did make frequent use of the concept of popularity. Archbishop Laud, for example, would often criticise the dangers of Puritan popularity that he believed undermined the authority of Charles I. For Thomas Wentworth, the “infamous and hellish libels” were “the diseases of a loose and remiss government,” and “all great ministers” were targets of the Puritan popular ridicule.
The early modern conception of popularity refers to a populist form of appeal to popular politics, such as regarding the popularity of the Elizabethan favourite Robert Devereux, the 2nd Earl of Essex, that many contemporaries connected to a fear of democratic notions. Through the lens of popularity, the engagement of writers like Thomas Edwards with print culture can be understood non-paradoxically. In the English Revolution, competing discourses of popularity clashed, such as in the print debates between Thomas Edwards and William Walwyn. On one side, the Presbyterian Thomas Edwards promoted a non-democratic popularity where his print aimed to foster a culture of fear and public obedience. On the other side, the tolerationist William Walwyn promoted a democratising popularity that sought to encourage open public debate, particularly regarding personal religious truths. Edwards’ and Walwyn’s engagement with print culture demonstrates how competing ideas of popularity were contested, and were a central point of tension between Parliamentary positions.
Popularity in Thomas Edwards’ Gangraeana
Thomas Edwards’s Gangraeana was written in three parts from 1645 to 1646. The extensive work detailed heresies that Edwards saw on the streets of London. Rather than discussing the heresies of the anabaptists of Münster, Edwards dealt solely with the English experience, emphasising the imminence of the sectarian threat to England.
Thomas Edwards was committed to religious truth. He was sceptical of the liberty of conscience labelling it as the “mis-shaped Bastard-monster of a toleration” that would undermine the “Ministry of the Word.” This scepticism was informed from his real world experience where sects were on the rise. Edwards was opposed to debating and giving licence to these heretics who were against both “Church-Government” and “Civill government.” For Edwards, the commonly ascribed sectarian belief in antinomianism had translated to a political worldview wholly antithetical for a Commonwealth to establish itself on.
Rather than placing his trust in reasoned debate, Edwards published his Gangraena as a Presbyterian guide. It was styled as a textbook for readers to be able to quickly identify heretical groups and doctrines. For example, Gangraeana had an extensive contents page and cross-referencing, allowing a reader to quickly place a name to a heretical group that they may see on the streets of London. In doing so, the reader was subsumed in the Presbyterian categories that Edwards proposed.
Edwards’s Gangraena categorised the sects in a terrifying manner. For Edwards, his work aimed to “discern the mischief of Ecclesicasticall Anarchy, the monstrousenesse of the much affected Toleration,” and warn his readers to “fear and suspect the pretended New Lights… the Gangrene of so many strange Opinions.” Edwards was promoting a culture of fear where heretical sects such as the “Brownists,” “Anabaptists,” “Antinomians,” “Socinians,” and “Libertines” were spreading across England. Edwards did not encourage his audience to debate with these sects but rather he categorised their heresies and spread the Presbyterian glossary of the sectarians “fearful Anarchy.” The popularity courted by Edwards was not democratising or reasoned in a Habermasian manner, rather it sought to squash debate and reinforce Presbyterianism in his audience.
Democratic Popularity in the Pamphlets of William Walwyn
When Thomas Edwards Gangraena was published, Walwyn was eager to take offence at the work. Gangraena referred to Walwyn calling him “a seeker, and a dangerous man, a strong head.” This singular comment was enough for Walwyn to engage Edwards in the debate over the question of toleration in five separate pamphlets from 1646 to 1649. These pamphlets aimed to court popular affection as Edwards would later point out that “I suppose that beside his pride… it was to engratiate and endear himself to all the Sectaries.” The debates between Edwards and Walwyn highlight two competing visions of Parliamentary popularity.
Within these pamphlets, Walwyn constructed his vision of popularity in opposition to Edwards’s denunciation of toleration for sectarians. Walwyn would exclaim his support for a universal liberty of conscience. It was for Walwyn a “common freedome every man ought to aim at.” This liberty of conscience was not to be repressed; it was “to speake and doe.” Thus, the sectarians had every right to practise their religious convictions.
Walwyn’s support of a liberty of conscience came from his reading of the French Catholic, Montaigne, who had emphasised a sceptical understanding of dogmatic religion. Walwyn was also sceptical of the presumption of an “unerring spirit” as the “possibility of errour” was always present. This pessimistic view translated to Walwyn’s understanding of the wider public; they were “easie and ignorant,” being swayed by false doctrines. He suggested that it was “not Gods way to bring men to truth by force,” looking to the example of Jesus and the debate with the Sadducees, where Jesus used “no means but argument and perswasion to alter or controle their judgements.” This recourse to popularity was democratic. It encouraged the wider public to debate on an equal footing. No one could be sure of themselves and thus had to listen to others and use their reason. This was for Walwyn the only way to religious truth.
The democratic popularity of Walwyn is replicated in his literary style. Walwyn’s A Parable (1646) took the form of a dialogue between Love, Justice, Patience, and Truth who discussed the best course of action for curing Thomas Edwards’s gangrene. The satirical pamphlet underscores the necessity of debate for a healthy commonwealth. As Walwyn would voice, writing through the character of Policy, “I speake my conscience, and the very truth from my heart and am confident no hurt can come to him, but a great deale of good to the publique.”
Conclusion
By disregarding the notion of the public sphere, we can see that the pamphlet debates of Edwards and Walwyn demonstrate competing conceptions of popularity within the English Revolution. Edwards used print to court popularity but avoided its potentially democratic undertones by enforcing his defined heretical categories upon his audience. Edwards was aiming to stem the tide of sectarianism in England and instead spread Presbyterianism to his audience. It did not seek to encourage public debate and reason but instead quell dissent. This is in stark contrast to the democratising popularity of Walwyn which encouraged reasoned debate to avoid error. The paradox of post-reformation print culture falls away, instead revealing tensions over competing understandings of popularity that combined religious fervour and political impact within Parliamentarian factions.
Written by Jack Crosswaite
Bibliography
Images
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