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    rously represented to him how far the interest of his master might depend upon his continuance in his post , was prevailed on to continue , * ' he declined all public worship , probably because

    he objected to join in the devotional services of the Church , though he had frequently qualified for an office , and thus had declared , if actions have any meaning , that he was a bond fide Churchman . This indecorous

    desertion of the public worship of the Church , to which every magistrate was considered , by law , as belonging , and confining himself to worship in his famil y *• for seven years / ' his bio * grapher , the Rev . Jeremiah Smith ,

    his Nonconformist minister , ( p . 58 , ) softly calls a " restraint , " which * ' he endured , ( though not without a pious grief , ) that he might be capable of serving his country , and securing the interest of King George . " Dr . Watts , in his Dedication to Sir Thomas

    Abney of two sermons , preached to his family at Theobalds , during that period , uses the same language , and denounces ( Works , 1800 , 1 . 155 ) "that unrighteous law , '' the Act against Occasional Conformity , of which , however , those who had qualified under

    the Test Act , and thus affected to be Churchmen , had no right to complain . Indeed , such Nonconformists as Sir Thomas Abney and his friend , another Alderman , Sir John Fryer , appear to have been as wise in their generation as any children of this world ; for while they received peculiar homage from their own party , as the heads of the Nonconformists , thev secured , bv their

    occasional Conformity , their full share of the honours which the law bestowed on Churchmen . " A Dissenter" ( p . 430 , Note ) " may sit in the House of Commons ; ' * but , 1 suspect , that all the members of the House are considered as members of

    that Church , of which they have sworn that the King is supreme head , and are all liable , though never likely to be called upon , to receive the communion . For the House , I apprehend , has power to repeat such orders , as have been frequently enforced in other

    times . In 1614 , the Commons made " order , that every member of their body should take the sacrament , at St . Margaret ' s . " { JParL Hist . V . 278 . ) In 1627 there was a similar order .

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    "enjoining the immediate receiving fa all who then * sate in the House and directing " those which have not sate in the House , not to come into the House till they have received the communion . " During the Short Par .

    liament , April , 1640 , there was the same order , and two such orders at the commencement of the Long Parliament . In 1661 , this order was repeated : It is resolved that , on a Sunday appointed , " the sacrament of the Lord ' s Supper shall be

    administered at St . Margaret ' s , accordin * to the form prescribed in the Lituryy , and that all the members shall then and there receive the said sacrament , and that whosoever shall not then and there receive the said sacrament , shall not , after that day , come into the House , until he shall have received

    the said sacrament . " A committee is then appointed , who are to receive from the members a notef describing their names and the places they represent , •* and the said persons , so appointed , are likewise to take particular notice of every member of this House , at such time as he receive the

    said sacrament ; " perhaps to detect any who might not actually receive , or not in both kinds . In 1666 , this order was repeated , probably for the last time . I quote all the above except the Order in 1614 , from a 12 nio . volume ,

    printed- 1756 , containing " Orders , &c . collected out of the Journals . To these may be added the following passage between James I . and Usher , communicated by the latter to Sulhj , and quoted from Parr ' s Life of IXsher ,

    ( p . 17 , ) in Harris ' s Lives , 1814 ( I . 91 ) . From the classical conclusion it appears that James wanted more money than the Commons chose to entrust with him . " I Was appointed , by the Lower House of Parliament , to preach at St . Margaret ' s , Westminster , Feb . 7 > l 6 $ 0 .

    Feb . 13 , being Shrove-Tuesday , I dined at court , and betwixt four and live kissed the king ' s hand , and had conference with him touching my sermon . He said , I had charge of an unruly flock to look unto the next Sunday . He asked me how I thought it could stand with true divinity , that

    so many hundred should be tied ( upon so short warning ) to receive the communion upon a day , all could not be

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    724 Mr * Rutt on Members of Parliament receiving tlie Sacrament

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Dec. 2, 1819, page 724, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1779/page/8/