Latitudinarianism in the Seventeenth-Century Church of England

The Latitudinarian Influence on Early English Liberalism

“…Moral principles were "common notions" instead of ones that were enforced by a clerical hierarchy. 66 A superior position in the Church hierarchy could not supersede individual inquiry into rightness. Indeed, the emphasis on individual discovery through exercise of human reason was also evident in another one of Tillotson's sermons, in which he exhorted that God hath given us Understandings, to try and examine things, and the light of his Word to direct us in this tryal; and if we will judge rashly and suffer our selves to be hurried by Prejudice or Passion, the Errours of our Judgement become the Faults of our Lives.…”

“…In contrast to "physical certainty" which could be verified by the senses and "mathematical certainty" which could be verified by the human faculties, "moral certainty," according to Wilkins, was "less simple." 69 If humans were equally capable of exercising their endowed gifts to discover God, there was hardly any reason for a single person-ordained or not-to claim complete religious rectitude. That moral certainty was "not as great as mathematical and physical" was clear to Stillingfleet too.…”

“…In other words, a person could use a particular religious interpretation for personal gain. 70 Glanvill, though not a named Latitudinarian of Burnet's work, was a cleric who contributed to Latitudinarianism through literature that explained the power and limits of human inquiry. A member of the Royal Society, his writing took foremost concern with the impropriety of using the heavy hand of authority to enforce religious principles that relied on "scant and limited" proof.…”

“…81 Some scholars go so far as to argue the Latitudinarians believed that all religions could lead to salvation, but I am skeptical of this since it is almost undisputed within all branches of Christianity, except the Unitarian, that the Christian God alone saves. 82 In any case, there was a definite transition in the locus of the Christian calling: while Laudianism was concerned with the outward appearance of Anglicanism, which included the "beautifying and adoring of all English churches" and a service that displayed the glory of the Church's spiritual leaders in sacrilegious awe, the Latitudinarians were partial to the Low Church understanding of Christian duty. 83 They were much less ritualistic and for them a relationship with God was just as much horizontal, pertaining to love between members of the Church, as it was vertical, pertaining to obedience to God.…”

The Uses of Natural Theology in Seventeenth-Century England

“…11 The first, at Oxford, was dominated by the personality and approach of John Wilkins and blossomed in time with the experimental philosophy of Robert Boyle. As More put it, our Reason being well aware that corporeal matter is the proper object of the sensitive faculty, she gives full belief to the information of Sense in her own particular sphear, 13 See Rivers 1991;Spurr 1991;Hunter 1992;Griffin 1992;Spellman 1993. Both Cudworth and More were also closely involved with the revival of Platonic philosophy then in vogue at Cambridge.…”