e.
"Take away this persecution, burning, cursing, damning of men for not
subscribing the words of men as the words of God; require of Christians
only to believe Christ and to call no man master but Him; let them leave
claiming infallibility that have no title to it, and let them that in
their own words disclaim it, disclaim it also in their actions. . . .
Protestants are inexcusable if they do offer violence to other men's
consciences."

From the denunciation of intolerance the Latitudinarians passed easily
to the dream of comprehension which had haunted every nobler soul since
the "Utopia" of More. Hales based his loyalty to the Church of England
on the fact that it was the largest and the most tolerant Church in
Christendom. Chillingworth pointed out how many obstacles to
comprehension were removed by such a simplification of belief as flowed
from a rational theology, and asked, like More, for "such an ordering of
the public service of God as that all who believe the Scripture and live
according to it might without scruple or hypocrisy or protestation in
any part join in it." Taylor, like Chillingworth, rested his hope of
union on the simplification of belief. He saw a probability of error in
all the creeds and confessions adopted by Christian Churches. "Such
bodies of confessions and articles," he said, "must do much hurt." "He
is rather the schismatic who makes unnecessary and inconvenient
impositions, than he who disobeys them because he cannot do otherwise
without violating his conscience." The Apostles' Creed in its literal
meaning seemed to him the one term of Christian union which the Church
had any right to impose.

[Sidenote: Hobbes.]

The impulse which such men were giving to religious speculation was
being given to political and social inquiry by a mind of far greater
keenness and power. Bacon's favourite secretary was Thomas Hobbes. "He
was beloved by his Lordship," Aubrey tells us, "who was wont to have him
walk in his delicate groves, where he did meditate; and when a notion
darted into his mind, Mr. Hobbes was presently to write it down. And his
Lordship was wont to say that he did it better than any one else about
him; for that many times when he read their notes he scarce understood
what they writ, because they understood it not clearly themselves." The
long life of Hobbes covers a memorable space in our history. He was born
in the year of the victory over the Armada; he died in 1679 at the age
of