open question was
actually in operation in the Established Church of the Protectorate,
and whether Infant Baptism thus fell into complete abeyance in some
parishes where Anabaptists of eminence were settled, or whether the
Paedobaptist parishioners in such eases quietly avoided that result by
having their children baptized by other ministers, are points of some
obscurity. On the whole, the difficulty can have been felt but
exceptionally and here and there, for it was obviated on the great
scale by the fact that most of the real Anabaptists, preachers and
people alike, were Voluntaries, disowning the State-Church
altogether, and meeting only in separate congregations. Even for
such, however, in localities where they were pretty numerous, there
seems to have been a desire to make some provision. Thus on March 13,
1655-56, it was ordered by His Highness and the Council "that it be
referred to General Desborough, Major-General for the County of
Devon, to take care that the Church under the form of Baptism at
Exeter have such one of the public meeting-places assigned to them
for their place of worship as is best in repair, and may with most
conveniency be spared and set apart for that use." The Exeter
Baptists may have thought it not inconsistent with their principles
to accept so much of State favour. Not the public buildings, so much
as the Tithes and Lay Patronage with which they were connected, were
the abominations of the State-Church in the eyes of the Anabaptist
Voluntaries. For let it not be forgotten that Cromwell's ardent
passion for a Church-Establishment under his Protectorate had come
more and more to involve, in his reasonings, the preservation of the
Tithe-system and the continuance of lay Patronage. The legal patrons
of livings retained their right of nominating to vacancies; the
Triers only checked that right by examination of nominees and the
rejection of the unfit. Cromwell himself combined in his own person,
to a most extraordinary extent, the functions both of Patron and
Trier. "It is observable that, his Highness having near one half of
the livings in England, one way or other, in his own immediate
disposal by presentation, he seldom bestoweth one of them upon any
man whom himself doth not first examine and make trial of in person,
save only that, at such times as his great affairs happen to be more
urgent than ordinary, he useth to appoint some other to do it in his
behalf; which is so rare an example