By this act,
about two thousand dissenting ministers were ejected from their
livings, and the most cruel persecution followed. The Five-mile and
Conventicle acts imposed various fines, imprisonment, and death upon
all persons above sixteen years of age, who attended divine service
where the liturgy was not read; ordained that no non-conformist
minister should live within five miles of any town; and aimed to
suppress all meetings for worship among the non-conformists. These
in a short time made frightful desolations, and all the jails in the
kingdom soon became filled with men who were the brightest ornaments
of Christianity. The persecuted included both sexes and all ages,
from the child of nine or ten years, to the hoary-headed saint of
eighty. In Picart's Religious Ceremonies, it is stated that the
number of dissenters of all sects, who perished in prison under
Charles II., was EIGHT THOUSAND. On the accession of William III.,
these penalties and disabilities were removed by the Toleration act.
The Corporation and Test acts, however, disgraced the statute-book
of England till the year 1828, when they were triumphantly repealed.
Offer's Introduction, Hume's History, and Ency. Amer. it. If any man
hath received a gift of tinkering, as thou hast done, let him follow
his tinkering; and so other men their trades, and the divine his
calling, etc.
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