Hugo Grotius' Affection for the Church of England

The following are the affections expressed by Remonstrant advocate Hugo Grotius (1583-1645), an ally of James Arminius (1559-1609), and a close friend to John Locke (1632-1704).

Henry Newton (1618-1701) remarked regarding Grotius' godly character, his high regard for the Anglicans, as well as "how greatly he suffered in goods, honour, and report from the Calvinists, both in his own country and in his banishment."¹ Grotius' son, also a godly man, dedicated his father's compliments of the British Protestants to then King of England Charles II.  

Henry Newton records Grotius' words regarding the Church of England from his letter to Johannes Corvinus (1582-1650), a Dutch-Remonstrant minister, jurist, and theologian, in the year 1638:

You see how great a progress they have made in England, in purging out pernicious [Romish] doctrines; chiefly for this reason, because they who undertook that holy work [i.e., the Reformation], admitted of nothing new, nothing of their own, but had their eyes wholly fixed upon another world. 

Then was it in a flourishing condition, before the civil war broke out, before the king was vanquished, taken captive, condemned and beheaded; and it afterwards sprung up and flourished again, contrary to all human hopes, when his son returned to the throne of his ancestors, to the surprise of all Europe, and, after various turns, threats, and fears, continues still to flourish secure and unhurt.²  

Newton adds that Grotius' good opinion of the Church of England inspired him to exhort the Arminians to take holy orders from their bishops.³

Exiled by the religiously-intolerant Calvinists after the conclusion of the Synod of Dort, 1619 (link) -- a blight on the history of Calvinists -- Newton encouraged the banished Arminian ministers to "receive the laying on of hands from the Irish Archbishop . . . and that when they are so ordained they afterwards ordain their pastors."⁴

If the Calvinists of Holland did not want these godly, Arminian ministers, then the Protestants in England and Ireland would heartily embrace them in their churches!

Hugo Grotius was also affectionate toward William Laud (1573-1645), Archbishop of Canterbury from 1633 to 1645. The Ambassador of England in France remarked about Grotius:

Certainly . . . I am persuaded that he doth unfeignedly and highly love and reverence your [William Laud's] person and proceedings. Body and soul he professeth himself to be for the Church of England, and gives this judgment of it, that it is the likeliest to last of any church this day in being.⁵ 

I was asked recently if I think Arminians find any place within Anglicanism. I was immediately reminded of Grotius' relationship with many in the Church of England, as well as those Arminian brothers, John and Charles Wesley, both of whom always remained Anglicans, and claimed to be Church of England men to their deaths.

An individual known as Fr. Cholmondly wrote the following excerpt to Alexander Forrester with regard to Grotius' affection for the Anglican faith and the Church of England:

That which you desire to know of me concerning Hugo Grotius, who was one of the greatest men that ever any age produced, is this. It happened that I came to Paris [where Grotius fled when the Calvinists banished the Arminian ministers and theologians] a little while after the transaction of that matter. Being very well acquainted with Dr. Crowder, he often told me with assurance that it was the last advice this great man gave to his wife, as he thought it was his duty, that he declared he died in the communion of the Church of England, in which church he wished her to live.⁶ 

This wish was fulfilled after Grotius' death. She "received the sacrament of the Lord's Supper at the hands of Dr. Crowder, then Chaplain to the Duke of York."⁷ Archbishop Bramhall (1594-1663), Primate of Ireland from 1634 to 1641, concludes:

He [Grotius] was a friend in his affection to the Church of England, and a true Son in his love for it; he commended it to his wife and other friends, and was the cause of their firmly adhering to it as far as they had opportunity. I myself, and many others, have seen his wife obeying the commands of her husband, as she openly testified, in coming to our prayers and the celebration of the sacrament.⁸  

You may wonder why Grotius did not join the Communion of the Church of England, given his intense desire to do so. A man named Matthew Turner gave the answer: the Ambassador to Sweden hindered the process. He remarks: "Otherwise he very highly approved of our doctrine and discipline, and wished to live and die in our communion."⁹ Never would I have imagined myself a desire toward the same affection for Anglicanism as that of Grotius, but I did, and unapologetically.           

__________ 

¹ Hugo Grotius, The Truth of the Christian Religion, ed. John le Clerc (Edinburgh: Thomas Turnbull, 1819), 300.

² Ibid., 301.

³ Ibid.

⁴ Ibid.

⁵ Ibid., 303.

⁶ Ibid., 303-04.

⁷ Ibid., 304.

⁸ Ibid.

⁹ Ibid.