responsibilities as proprietary were just beginning. But this word was never spoken. And the path of the men of Maryland, and the path of Maryland's proprietary, began from the first to diverge more and more. CHAPTER XXI. THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND ESTAB LISHED AND ENDOWED. 1675-1692. Founded in truth; by blood of martyrdom -WORDSWORTH. Upon Charles Calvert succeeding to the Lord Proprietaryship of Maryland he immediately prepared to return to England. Arriving there in the following year he found that his presence was very timely, Yeo's letter of the 25th of May, 1676, being in the hands of the Bishop of London-to whom as the bishop interested in the colonies the archbishop had referred the letter-and by whom he was at once called upon to meet its statements. Lord Baltimore replied that the Act of 1649, confirmed in 1676 tolerated and protected every sect, an answer which was hardly to the point as the charge was not that the Church in Maryland was being persecuted, but that it had not the means of subsistence. However, after quoting the Act, the lord proprietary addressing himself to that grievance, informed the bishop that "four ministers of the Church of England were in possession of plantations which offered them a decent subsistence." He was, moreover, under the impression that in an Assembly, such as that of Maryland, it would be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to induce it to consent to a law that should oblige any sect to maintain other ministers than its own." It will be here observed from his use of the word sect that Charles was not acquainted with the position of the Church in Maryland as an integral portion of the Church of England. The matter came finally before the Privy Council which decided that Lord Baltimore's position was not well taken. The Council probably reminded him of the conditions of his charter, and of the duties it imposed upon him, bidding him not to forget that to the services of their national Church his Maryland tenants were justly entitled. It was therefore fitting that he should see to it that they were not left as sheep without a shepherd. Nor was this so strange a predicament for a Roman Catholic proprietary to find himself in as some have thought. His charter had created that obligation for him; but if he found it burdensome to his conscience to comply with its provisions, there was an easy way out of the predicament. He could readily throw it up, and refuse any longer to hold a position which he deemed incompatible with his profession of Roman Catholicisın. As long as he did not choose to avail himself of this privilege, the Privy Council was abundantly justified in insisting that "he should propose some means for the support of a competent number" of the clergy of the English Church in that province from which he was drawing a princely income as a gift from the English Crown. Presently Charles returned from England, but on his arrival in Maryland he forgot all about the ruling of the Privy Council, and the warning he had received. At any rate, with the exception of passing laws for the suppression of vice, and the better observance of Sunday, he did nothing at all. He would have acted with more wisdom if he had done what was required of him. But the man who could cut off his own son's annual allowance, and leave him dependent upon charity,2 merely because 1 Fisher, Men, Women and Manners, Vol. II, P. 195. 2 Benedict Leonard Calvert abjured Roman Catholicism, he had become an Anglican, was not likely to be found providing clergy for his Anglican tenants, though his not doing so would be a distinct breach of trust. Rather was he more likely to be found giving to his co-religionists whatever advantages his official position enabled him to give. We shall not therefore be at all surprised to find that soon after he had been accused of neglecting the spiritual interests of the Church people committed to his care, it was alleged he was showing undue partiality to Roman Catholics. There seems to have been no great reason for the accusation, nevertheless there was enough truth in it-so the English Government considered-to justify, and in fact to require, its taking the extreme position of ordering that all public offices in Maryland should be given to Protestants, "the feeling that the country was being governed in the interest of a small coterie of papists having rapidly increased.” 3 The third Lord Baltimore was a decidedly differ "much to the wrath and disgust of his aged father, who at once withdrew his annual allowance of four hundred and fifty pounds. Benedict was obliged to apply to the Crown for a pension, which was granted by Anne and continued by George I. until on February 20, 1715, the situation was completely changed by the father's death." Old Virginia and Her Neighbors, Fiske, Vol. II, P. 168. Fiske, Old Virginia and Her Neighbors, Vol. II, P. 155. |