Robert Horrobin, Archdeacon, Isle of Man, 1720, part 1

 This post is taken from E.B. Pusey, The Works of the Right Reverend  father in God, Thomas Wilson D.D. Lord Bishop of Sodor and Man Volume 2, 1722, pp. 499 onwards [here]. Volume 1 is here. Page numbering of the second volume is continuous with the first and begins at p493. 

This is the first of two posts. It outlines the sustained antipathy between Bishop and Archdeacon in the context of, in effect, a slow palace coup in the government of the Isle of Man. 

The accusation of heresy and eventual resolution of conflict are the focus of a second post. This post sets out something of the history.

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Thomas Wilson

Bishop Thomas Wilson (DNB) had been chaplain to William Stanley, ninth earl of Derby (wiki), and tutor to his son. Against Wilson’s reluctance,  the earl insisted that he be made Bishop of Sodor and Man. In the reckoning of dioceses this was a poor appointment: a troublesome and marginal diocese worth no more than £300pa. The post had been vacant since January 1693. 

Even before Wilson’s consecration there was a hint of trouble ahead: the Lloyds Evening Post for March 8th reported that Wilson was a supposed Jacobin (wiki). This was ignored. He was made Doctor of Law by Archbishop Tenison on January 10th 1697, confirmed Bishop  by the Dean of Arches on the 15th, and consecrated by the Archbishop of York on the 16th. To this point he had not set foot on the island.

The Church of England in the Isle of Man, like the island itself, was both part of Britain and also distinct and independent-minded. Wilson was appointed at a particularly disharmonious moment as the island’s Governor, Alexander Horne, was in the process of wresting power in the island from its government, the House of Keys, into the hands of himself and a small coterie. 

The Isle of Man was owned by the earls of Derby, by descent from Sir John Stanley who had been gifted the island by King John in 1405. 

The 9th Earl of Derby died in November 1702 and the Bishop lost his patron. He and the 10th Earl - brother to the 9th - were not well disposed to one another. That said, in 1704 the  Bishop was able to negotiate with the 10th Earl a settlement to the issue of land ownership which had been contested since the Restoration of 1660. Perhaps politics was not allowed to get in the way of business.

Robert Horrobin: first complaints and first case

Island politics were poisonous. A small cabal within the House of Keys (the Parliament), centred around the Governor of the Island, Alexander Horne, had effectively engineered a palace coup, excluding most of the 24 Keys (members of the island’s parliament) and Deemsters (judges) from any role in governing.

The Revd. Horrobin was the Governor’s ally and place-man. In 1720 he was inducted as parish priest and Archdeacon while the Bishop was away on business in England. His task was to make the Bishop’s life a misery and, with the Governor’s protection, he had considerable success. 

Complaints

The first theological complaints about Horrobin seem to have come from Mr William Ross, described as “the Academic Professor” a post created by Bishop Wilson (p.242f). He wrote to the Bishop about Horrobin’s sermon at Advent 1719, saying “he seemed to place all religion in the goodness of our actions, …” and that he advanced “that dangerous  opinion, that a man may be saved in any religion if he live well. … that great and good actions … were sufficient to obtain the rewards of another life.” (p.426) 

That Christmas, Ross said, Horrobin “... taught, or was generally thought to teach, ‘that the heathens are in a state of salvation, if they live according to the light of nature’.” He wrote to  the Bishop again to denounce Horrobin’s sermon for Palm Sunday, 1720. This, he said, had argued against anyone’s power to absolve sins, including the Apostles’ and priests’, on the grounds that forgiveness was God’s prerogative alone, and God immediately forgave the truly penitent (pp.427-8). Horrobin denounced Ross “as an injurious person and a calumniator.” (p.428)

The Bishop summoned all parties to his consistory court on March 21 1721. Horrobin declined to deposit his sermons with the court officers and the Bishop struggled to control the process. The Episcopal Registrar (the Bishop's legal officer), Mr Woods, was imprisoned apparently with the complicity of Mr. Horrobin (p. 438-9). Woods was fined and imprisoned again when he refused to pay. The Bishop paid for him and obtained his release.

The Independent Whig

1721 saw what might - anachronistically - be called a moral panic (wiki). Pusey opines that there was “... a systematic combination to spread immorality and profaness under the guise of free inquiry.” (p.449) And one work in particular The Independent Whig (Full text) carried the opprobrium of right-thinking people of the day. Bishop Wilson described it as “... a most pestilent book, which contains the poison of all the rest, being, as it were, an abstract of blasphemy and libertinism; ridiculing the clergy of all religions, the Sacraments, the Holy Scriptures, and all God's ordinances.” (p. 500)

 

James Stanley, the 10th Earl of Derby and brother to the Bishop’s patron (wiki), and now Lord of the Isle, was therefore making a loud, provocative and very public point when he sent

  “... a certain Mr. Richard Worthington, with a special commission to introduce into the Castletown Library a book then and for some time after notorious in that bad way, ‘The Independent Whig.’ - a collection of essays, published weekly, 1st dated 20/1/1720, last 11/1/1721.” (pp. 449-450) 

The library was an innovation on the island. It had been founded by Bishop Wilson and opened in 1710. Librarian and Bishop refused the donation. The Bishop wrote to all clergy in his diocese condemning this “pestilent book” which had been “industriously handed about, with a manifest intent to beguile ignorant and unstable souls, and to render the doctrine, the discipline, and the government of this Church contemptible;” (p.451). He summarised its offensive contents:

“ In short, the whole book is one continued design, in which the devil and the authors have shewed the utmost skill, to lay waste the Church of Christ; to overthrow all revealed religion; to reduce men to a state of nature, and to bring all things into confusion, both sacred and civil.” (p.452)

Bishop summoned

The island council summoned the Bishop and his Vicar-General. They complained that the Ecclesiastical Court was acting contrary to the statute law of the Island; that the Bishop called a convocation “at his pleasure, at times and for causes that are not comprehended in the law for calling a convocation, — for instance, the convocation called in the case of the Revd Archdeacon Horrobin.”; and, third, that his court had issued summons to people beyond its jurisdiction. (pp. 453-454).

(from Volume 2) 

Mrs Puller and Archdeacon Horrobin

There was a scattering of foci of friction. One Mrs Puller was said “to have spoken her mind about Horrobin and to him.” She had heard two sermons on the Atonement in two weeks, one by Rev Ross and the other by Rev Horrobin and they appeared to contradict one another. Horrobin, she said, “seemed to be making light of the foundation of our holy religion.”(p.454) Horrobin refused her communion on October 8th 1721 on the grounds, as he later informed the Bishop, that she had “done or said things as well injurious to himself as offensive to the congregation.” although he had personally forgiven her. 

After three weeks, during which nothing changed, the Bishop summoned the parties to a hearing in his Court (November 29, 1721). Horrobin was “required to give his reasons why he repelled Mrs. Puller from the Holy Sacrament”. He accused Mrs Puller of “undue familiarities” with Sir James Poole. He said he had learned this from the Governor's wife, Jane Horne, and this was the reason he had refused her communion. The Bishop reconvened the  court a  month later to hear witnesses. There both Sir James Poole and Mrs Puller, on their knees and on the Gospels, solemnly swore that “they never were guilty of any adultery or fornication together, nor of any immodesty whatsoever.” With no evidence to the contrary, they were believed. (p.460) 

Sentence was:

  … that the said Mrs. Jane Horne acknowledge her offence [perjury] accordingly, in St. Mary's Chapel of Castletown, or (if the parties shall be therewith satisfied) before the Vicar of the parish, asking forgiveness for the great injury done; and this in penalty of confinement in St. German's prison … until she give bonds to perform public penance, ... and also ask forgiveness, as the laws of this Church direct. (p.461; December 19, 1721)

and also 

  ... that Mrs. Rebecca Puller expressed herself after an irreverent and unbecoming manner in relation to Mr. Archdeacon; and though he, the said Archdeacon, has already under his hand declared he has heartily forgiven her: yet if he insist upon further satisfaction, we do order her to ask him forgiveness either in Castletown Chapel, or before the minister of the parish, provided he also at the same time ask her forgiveness for exposing her to public shame, by repelling her from the Lord's table, and terming her a hinderer and a slanderer of God's Word. (p.462)

While Horrobin would, no doubt, have accepted the first part of this judgement he refused the second, and the case ended in stalemate. Further legal action was not possible as neither party lodged an appeal. (p.463)

New trials

Simmering conflict between Bishop and Governor became open, unmediated warfare.

The Bishop demanded “the House of Keys ‘deem the law’ as between the two jurisdictions” (p.465) ie that they set out the formal relationship between the institutions of Church and State. The House of Keys preferred to create a relationship by force and summoned the Bishop and his Vicars General to answer for “crimes and misdemeanours by them committed against the Lord's prerogative, the laws of this isle, and the rights, liberties, and immunities of the subjects, and having appeared, obstinately and contemptuously refused to answer the said complaints, offering several frivolous and evasive allegations.”(p.466) In effect their crime was lese majesty. 

The court, having heard only one side of the case, found the Vicars-General guilty of “illegally suspending Mr. Bridson of Kirk Marowne”, of convening his clergy in a Convocation, and thereby “assuming to try and examine matters not cognizable before such assemblies;”. They found both Bishop and Vicars-General guilty

  “for exercising discipline upon Archdeacon Horrobin, the Lord's Domestic Chaplain, and Mrs. Horne, the Governor's wife, ‘contrary to the privileges and immunities which the Governor and his family ought to enjoy by the laws of this isle.’ “(p.466)

The court required the Bishop to undo his judgement against Horrobin.

In other words: all power resided with the Governor. The Bishop could only act within boundaries that the Governor deemed appropriate. The Bishop, of course, refused this conclusion. He demanded to be tried by the 24 Keys of the Island thus involving all members of the government of the island, not merely members of the Governor’s clique. This was rebuffed as ‘frivolous’ (p.468).

Two matters remained. The Governor had imprisoned John Stevenson for holding on to The Independent Whig instead of depositing it in the library. The Librarian, having read it, had refused to accept it. And a soldier Henry Halsall, was found guilty of adultery with the Governor’s housekeeper in the bishop’s court. The Governor deemed the Bishop’s action to be “undermining and subverting” (p484) of his authority over his soldiers. He punished the man again to deter others from submitting to the church’s jurisdiction. While the Bishop appealed to the Keys on the matter, Halsall died in his dungeon of a fever. (pp. 485-7)

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Part 2 of this story is here.