WESTMINSTER ASSEMBLY OF DIVINES. One of five bills to which it was proposed by the parliamentary commissioners that King Charles I. should give his consent in the negotiations at Oxford (from 30th January to 17th April, 1643) was entitled A Bill for calling an Assembly of learned and godly Divines and others to be consulted with by the Parliament for the settling of the government and liturgy of the Church of England, and for the vindication and clearing of the doctrine of the said church from false aspersions and interpretations.' This bill was afterwards converted into An Ordinance of the Lords and Com- I mons in Parliament,' and passed 12th June, 1643.
The persons nominated in the ordi nance to constitute the assembly consisted of a hundred and twenty-one clergymen, together with ten lords and twenty com moners as lay assessors. Several other persons (about twenty in all) were ap pointed by the parliament from time to time to supply vacancies occasioned by death, secession, or otherwise, who were called superadded divines. Finally, two lay assessors, John Lord Maitland and Sir Archibald Johnson of Warriston, and four ministers, Alexander Henderson and George Gillespie of Edinburgh, Samuel Rutherford of St. Andrew's, and Robert Baillie of Glasgow, were, on the 15th of September, 1643, admitted to seats and votes in the assembly by a warrant from the parliament as commissioners from the Church of Scotland. They had been deputed by the General Assembly, to which body, and to the Scottish Conven tion of Estates, commissioners had been sent from the two houses of the English parliament, and also from the Assembly of Divines, soliciting a union in the cir cumstances in which they were placed. This negotiation between the supreme, civil, and ecclesiastical authorities of the two countries gave rise to the Solemn League and Covenant, which was drawn up by Henderson, moderator (or presi dent) of the General Assembly, and, having been adopted by a unanimous vote of that body on the 17th of August, was then forwarded to the English parliament and the Assembly of Divines at West minster for their consideration.
The ordinance of the Lords and Com mons by which the Assembly was consti tuted only authorized the members, until further order should be taken by the two houses, "to confer and treat among them selves of such matters and things touch ing and concerning the Liturgy, disci pline, and government of the Church of England, or the vindicating and clearing of the doctrine of the same," &c. as should be " proposed to them by both or either of the said houses of parliament, and no other," and to deliver their opinions and advices to the said houses from time to time in such manner anal sort as by the said houses should be re quired. They were not empowered to
enact or settle anything. As the dis cussions proceeded, a discordance of prin ciples and views upon various points be tween the ruling Presbyterian party in the Assembly and the growing Inde pendent or Erastian majority in the par liament became more evident; while the progress of events also tended to separate the two bodies more widely every day, and at last to place them almost in oppo sition and hostility to each other. The Assembly of Divines continued to sit under that name till the 22nd of Fe bruary, 1649, having existed five years, six months, and twenty-two days, during which time it had met 1163 times. The Scottish commissioners had left above a year and a half before. Those of the members who remained in town were then changed by an ordinance of the par liament into a committee for trying and examining ministers, and continued to hold meetings for this purpose every Thursday morning till Cromwell's disso lution of the Long Parliament, 25th of March, 1652, after which they never met again.
All the important work of the Assembly was performed in the first three or four years of its existence. On the 12th of October, 1643, the parliament sent them an order directing that they should "forthwith confer and treat among them selves of such a discipline and govern ment as may be most agreeable to God's holy word, and most apt to procure and preserve the peace of the church at home, and nearer agreement with the Church of Scotland and other Reformed churches abroad, to be settled in this church in stead and place of the present church government by archbishops, bishops, &c., which is resolved to be taken away ; and touching and concerning the directory of worship or Liturgy hereafter to be in the church." This order produced the As sembly's Directory for Public Worship, which was submitted to parliament on the 20th of April, 1644; and their Con fession of Faith, the first part of which was laid before parliament in the begin ning of October, 1646, and the remainder tat the 26th of November in the same Their Shorter Catechism was pre sented to the House of Commons on the 5th of November, 1647; their Larger Catechism on the 15th of September, 1648. The other publications of' the As sembly were only of temporary import ance, such as admonitory addresses to the parliament and the nation, letters to foreign churches, and some controversial tracts. What are called their Annota tions on the Bible did not proceed from the Assembly, but from several members of the Assembly and other clergymen nominated by a committee of parliament, to whom the business had been intrusted.