LIFE OF RICHARD BAXTER. 63 Baxter, retaining their connection with the church of England, were known to favor the cause of the parliament against the king, and to desire a thorough reformation. Several of the most learn- ed Episcopal divines, some of them prelates, among whom was the Irish primate, Archbishop Usher, were chosen as members ; but the king having declared himself against the assembly, they refused to take their seats. A few of that party, however, came ; but their leader, Dr. Featly, was after a while detected in a corre- spondence with the king, and for that offence was imprisoned.. And that all sides might be heard, six or seven Independents were added, five of whom took an active part in the proceedings of the assembly, and were known as the "dissenting brethren." "These," Baxter says, " joined with the rest till they had drawn up a con- fession offaith, and a larger and a shorter catechism. But when they came to church government, they engaged them in many long debates, and kept that business, as long as possibly they could, undetermined. And after that, they kept it so long un- executed in almost all parts of the land, saving London and Lancashire, that their party had time to strengthen themselves in the army and the parliament, and hinder the execution after all, and keep the government determined on, a stranger to most of the people of this land, who knew it but by hearsay, as it was represented by reporters." This view of the influence of the five dissenting brethren in the Westminster Assembly, seems to be somewhat extravagant. The fact was, the Scots were carried away with the hope of reducing Englandand Ireland, by law and conquest, to a uniformity ofreli- gion with them; and their partisans in the assembly and parlia- ment, and among the clergy, soon caught from the covenant the same spirit. Great mistakes as to the nature of church govern- ment, and as to the authority of civil magistrates in matters of reli- gion, were widely prevalent. Some politicians, and they had able divines to support them, held that there ought to be no church government, no power to debar from church privileges and ordi- nances, but in the hands or under thecontrol ofthecivil magistrate. These were called Erastians. Others held that the church was independent of the state; but with this vital truth they held the miserable error, that the magistrate is bound to sustain the church, and to enforce uniform obedience to what the church decides. This was the doctrine of the Presbyterians as a party. They claimed that Christ had established, in and over his church, agov- ernment entirely distinct from the civil magistracy ; that this gov- ernment was none other than that by parochial sessions, classical presbyteries, provincial synods, and national assemblies ; and that the government of the commonwealth was bound to support this
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