The Appello
Controversy around Montagu's positions played an important part in the period 1625–9, both in publications and in political moves, and was one of the issues setting the tone for the reign of Charles I. Montagu had the open support of three bishops (John Buckeridge, John Howson, and William Laud). His Appello Caesarem: a just Appeale from two unjust Informers (London, 1625) came out with an imprimatur from Francis White, dean of Carlisle, after George Abbot's refusal to license it. It was partly written in self-justification, but also attacked some Calvinist tenets, including the perseverance of the saints. Francis Rous defended double predestination against Montagu in Testis Veritatis (1626).
The House of Commons took up the matter, and accused the author of dishonouring the late king (James I). A debate on the matter was followed by Montagu's committal to the custody of the serjeant-at-arms. He was, however, allowed to return to Stanford Rivers on giving a bond. Charles then made Montagu one of his chaplains, and let the Commons know on 9 July that he was displeased. On 11 July parliament was prorogued. On 2 August, when the parliament was sitting at Oxford, Montagu was too ill to attend, and after discussion in which Edward Coke and Robert Heath took part, the matter was allowed to drop. But the question was too serious to rest for long. On 16 and 17 January 1626 a conference was held by Charles's command, as the result of which the bishops of London (George Montaigne), Durham (Richard Neile), Winchester (Lancelot Andrewes), Rochester (Buckeridge), and St. David's (Laud) reported to George Villiers, 1st Duke of Buckingham that Montagu had not gone further than the doctrine of the Church of England, or what was compatible with it.
This first meeting was followed shortly by a watershed conference beginning 11 February, prompted by Robert Rich, 2nd Earl of Warwick in Buckingham's house, York House, Strand, and later called the York House conference. It took place with the Bishop of Lichfield (Thomas Morton) and the master of Emmanuel College, Cambridge (John Preston), representing the opposition to Montagu and Francis White. Buckeridge, supported by White and John Cosin, defended Montagu's orthodoxy. Buckeridge even denied that the Council of Trent had erred in any directly fundamental article of faith. A second conference was held a few days later, at which Montagu defended his theses in person against Morton and Preston. The two days of discussion, attended by nobility, changed no minds.
The committee of religion renewed their censure of the Appeal, and the House of Commons voted a petition to the king that the author might be fitly punished and his book burned. The king issued a proclamation (14 June 1626) commanding silence on points of controversy. In March 1628 the House of Commons again appointed a committee of religion to inquire into the cases of Montagu, Roger Mainwaring, and Cosin.
Montagu still had the strongest supporters at court in Laud and Buckingham himself; and on the death of George Carleton, bishop of Chichester and an opponent, he was appointed to the vacant see. He was elected on 14 July 1628 and received dispensation to hold Petworth with his bishopric. On 22 August Montagu was confirmed in Bow Church. During the ceremony one Jones, a stationer, made objection to the confirmation but the objection was overruled as informal; and on 24 August he was consecrated at Croydon, on the same day that news came of Buckingham's assassination. A bitter pamphlet, called Anti-Montacutum, an Appeale or Remonstrance of the Orthodox Ministers of the Church of England against Richard Mountague, was published in 1629 at Edinburgh. The House of Commons again took up the matter, and attempts were made at conciliation, by the issue of the declaration prefixed to the Thirty-nine Articles and printed in the Book of Common Prayer, by a letter from Montagu to Abbot disclaiming Arminianism, by the grant of a special pardon to Montagu, and by the issue of a proclamation suppressing the Appello Caesarem.
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