ABSTRACT
On 11 January 1643 the House of Lords heard "a petition from the ministers and elders of the Dutch and French congregations within the City of London, complaining of the disorders in their churches". This chapter suggests the Westminster French church's liturgical practice was significantly more traditional than consistent with the Westminster's Assembly's Directory. But the Herbert network around the church had subversive potential. In the absence from the Herbert archive of memoirs and correspondence, it is necessary to look elsewhere for reasons why Despagne attracted patronage and a congregation. An earl's habits of largesse or a fashionable desire to indulge for its own sake worship in a foreign language hardly seem sufficient explanation, although either or both might have played a part. When the church was re-inaugurated at the Savoy in July 1661 following the Restoration, it was authorised to use this liturgy before the conference on the future of the Church of England.
