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SMofcr. Sau/p. 
 
 JOSEPH HALL 
 
 SUCCESS IIVELY BISHOP OF EXETER AND HOKWICH, 
 
 Zondcrb.I'uJi.by L.£.Sed^%c Son,,169.rieec So-f^t.Jan'l.WZS. 
 
BISHOP HALL. HIS LIFE AND TIMES; 
 
 MEMOIRS OF 
 
 THE LIFE, WRITINGS, AND SUFFERINGS, OF 
 
 THE RIGHT REV. JOSEPH HALL, D. D. 
 
 SUCCESSIVELY BISHOP OF EXETER AND NORWICH ; 
 WITH 
 
 A VIEW OF THE TIMES IN WHICH HE LIVED; 
 AND AN APPENDIX, 
 
 CONTAINING SOME OF HIS UNPUBLISHED WRITINGS, 
 HIS FUNERAL SERMON, &C. 
 
 BY THE REV. JOHN JONES, 
 
 PBRPETUAL CURATE OF CRADLEY, WORCESTERSHIRE. 
 
 PRINTED FOR L, B. SEELEY AND SON, 
 FLEET-STREET, LONDON. 
 
 MDCCCXXVI. 
 
J. SEELEY, 
 Printer, Buckingham. 
 

 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAP. I. 
 
 Importance of the biography of excellent characters. " Obser- 
 vations of some Speciabties of Divine Providence in the 
 Life of Joseph Hall, Bishop of Norwich, written with his 
 own hand." His father. Character of his mother. Dedi- 
 cated from his infancy to the sacred ministry. Some of the 
 most eminent Divines indebted to the early instructions of 
 their mothers. Fraternal afifection of Mr. Jos. Hall's 
 brother. Mr. Jos. Hall's admission at Emmanuel College, 
 Cambridge. His election into a scholarship, into a fellow- 
 ship, and into the Rhetoric-Professorship. His intense 
 study at the university. His piety. His relinquishing the 
 Rhetoric-Professorship. His theological studies. His ordi- 
 nation. His frequent preaching, , . . . Page 1-14. 
 
 CHAP. If. 
 
 Mr. Jos. Hall's whole residence at College. His presentation 
 to the rectory of Halstead. His previous appointment to 
 the mastership of Tiverton school. His rebuilding of Hal- 
 stead rectory. His marriage. His children. Anecdote 
 respecting his family. A person of the name of Lilly 
 opposes him. His journey abroad with Sir E. Bacon. 
 Motive of this journey. Account of his Travels, in a letter. 
 His return. His dissatisfaction with Halstead. His 
 preaching before Prince Henry — is made one of his Chap- 
 lains. His intention of removing from Halstead. His accep- 
 tance of the Living of Walthara Holy Cross. His unwilling- 
 ness to leave Halstead. His taking his Doctor's degree : — 
 he was a principal instrument in promoting the establish- 
 ment of the Charter House. His Apology against the 
 
 787 
 
IV CONTENTS. 
 
 Brownfsts — Account of that sect. His modest refusal of 
 P. Henry's offers. His frequent preaching. His sermons. 
 Death of P. Henry. His character. Dr. Hall made Preben- 
 dary of Wolverhampton— recovers some emoluments belong- 
 ing to that church — resigns his prebend. His attendance 
 on the embassy to France. Is made Dean of Worcester. 
 His return from France. Accompanies the King to Scot- 
 land. Prejudices against him. Five articles proposed 
 towards promoting uniformity in the kirk. Correspondence 
 of Mr. Struthers with Dr. Hall. The five articles published 
 in Scotland. His Majesty's journey unsuccessful. The 
 kiny's return. The Book of Sports. Remarks upon it. 
 Religious debates in Holland. Dr. Hall deputed as one of 
 the English Divines to go to the Synod of Dort. His 
 Majesty's instructions to the English divines. Some 
 account of the Synod. The oath taken in it. Godwin's 
 charges against the con/r«-remonstrants refuted. Dr 
 Hall's Letter to Dr. Fuller. Dr. Hall's return from the 
 S^nod. His ill health. His latin speech on taking his 
 leave of the Synod. Public thanks given him. A gold 
 medal presented to him. His Latin Sermon before the 
 Synod. Quotation from. Results of the Synod. Opinions 
 of the British divines. The church of England troubled 
 with disputes. The king encourages Arminianism. Immo- 
 derate disputes between Arminians and Calvinists. His 
 Majesty restrains them. Doctrines of the church. Popery 
 increasing. Montague's writings. Death of James I. 
 Dr. Hall's remarks upon the growth of sects. Flattering 
 great personages fashionable in Dr. Hall's time. He is 
 guilty of this. Funeral sermon on James I. Dr. Hall's 
 sermon, entitled, " Noah's Dove, &c." in latin, translated 
 by Robert Hall, his son. His preaching at the re-opening 
 of St. John's Chapel, Clerkenwell. Parliament consider 
 Montague's books. The church disturbed by the Belgic 
 - disputes. Dr. Hall's reflections on them. His sentiments 
 moderate. His Fia Media. The object of this treatise. 
 The doctrines of the church contained in it. Dr. Hall's 
 . attempt of reconciling the points in dispute, . . p. 15-1 11. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAP. III. 
 
 Dr. Hall's refusal of the See of Gloucester. His promotion to 
 that of Exeter. Misunderstood in iiis writings against the 
 church of Rome. Vindication of himself. His episcopal 
 function attacked. His advice to his clergy. Recommends 
 catechizing. Spent much of his life in that exercise. 
 K.James's opinion of catechizing. Bishop Hall suspected 
 of favouring Popery and Puritanism. Lectures set up in 
 market-towns suppressed. Breach between the King and 
 Puritans widening. Factious clergy in the diocese of 
 Exeter. Most of them restored to order. Bishop Hall 
 accused of encouraging lectures. His troubles on this 
 account. He, and others of his brethren, charged with 
 giving advantage to the disaffected. Laud promoting the 
 second edition of the Book of Sports. A copy of it. The 
 ill effects of it. The hardship of imposing its publication 
 on the clergy. Many refused publishing it. Sufferings of 
 the clergy on this account. Remarks on the character of 
 Charles I. Persons in authority should promote the obser- 
 vance of the sabbath. The object of publishing the book 
 of sports. Bishop Hall did not encourage its publica- 
 tion. No mention of it in his works. Controversy 
 about the morality of the sabbath revived. The long 
 parliament insisted on the strict observance of the sabbath. 
 The Book of Sports burnt. Archbishop Laud leaning to 
 Popery. Communion tables ordered to be placed alfarwise. 
 The consequent disputes and troubles. Prynne's sentence 
 for writing his Histriomastix. Bastwick and Burton sen- 
 tenced for their writings. Dr. Williams, Bishop of Lincoln, 
 imprisoned. Osbaldeston severely treated, . . p. 112* 151. 
 
 CHAP. IV. 
 
 Scottish Bishops nominal. Attempts of establishing episco- 
 pacy ill Scotland unsuccessful. Bishop Hail undertaking 
 to write in defence of ** the Divine Right of Episcopacy." 
 Sketch of the work sent to Archbishop Laud. His Grace's 
 
Vi CONTENTS. 
 
 remarks and alterations. Bishop Hall did not insist on the 
 reading of the Book of Sports. Testimony of Heylin. 
 Bishop Hall dedicated his Treatise on Episcopacy, to 
 Charles I. Was one of the most celebrated writers in 
 defence of the church. His exhortation for adhering to 
 Episcopacy, The peace of the church disturbed. Bag- 
 shaw's attack on Episcopacy. Parliament meeting. Com- 
 mittees for religion and grievances. Subsidies to the King 
 not granted. Parliament dissolved. Lambeth palace 
 attacked by a mob. Convocation. Subsidies to his 
 Majesty. Canons made. Fury of the mob. Irregularity 
 of the convocation. Substance of the new canons. Ex 
 Officio oath. Bishop Hall's opinion of it. War with the 
 Scots. Cessation of arms, p. 152-185. 
 
 CHAP. V. 
 
 Long parliament. Committees appointed. Petitions for 
 redress of grievances. Complaints against the canons and 
 their compilers. Resolutions of the house. More auger 
 and prejudice than law and reason. Charges against 
 Archbishop Laud, — he is impeached of high treason, and 
 committed to the Tower. Convocation dwindled away. 
 Mr. Warmistre's motion against the late canons. Bishop 
 Williams released-resumes his seat in parliament — is trans- 
 lated to York. Prynne, Bastwick, and Burton remanded. 
 Evil designs against the church. Leigh ton and Osbaldeston 
 set at liberty. Dr. Cosins's sufferings. Petition against 
 Dr. Matt. Wren — he is voted unfit to iiold ecclesiastical 
 preferments — is imprisoned. His sufferings. Complaints 
 against the bishops. Clamours against the clergy. Lit- 
 urgy railed at. Petitions against the clergy. Unfair ways 
 of getting up these petitions. Outrageous spirit of the 
 populace. Communion rails pulled down. Surplice torn. 
 Liturgy abused. Sentence of parliament against these riots. 
 Factious preachers and lecturers. Commissioners to 
 demolish all ornaments, &c. in churches. St. Paul's cross, 
 and that in Cheapside, pulled down. Arbitrary power of the 
 
CONTENTS. w\k 
 
 Commons. Some Puritans tools of parliament. Destruc- 
 tion of the church intended. Seditious pamphlets. Bishop 
 Hairs remarks upon them. He laments the outrages against 
 the church. His speech in parliament, ... p. 186-204. 
 
 CHAP. VI. 
 
 Bishop Hall, a champion in defence of the church. Publishes 
 his " Humble Remonstrance/' Vindicates the antiquity of 
 Liturgies. His controversy with Smectymnuus. ** Defence 
 of the Remonstrance." His moderation and christian 
 temper. Terminates the controversy by publishing ** A 
 Short Answer to the Tedious Vindication of Smectymnuus." 
 His sentiments respecting forms of prayers. Demolition of 
 the church resolved. The Puritans assist its ruin. A warn- 
 ing to future ages. Disingenuous ways of getting signa- 
 tures to petitions. Clarendon's account of them. Mar- 
 shall's deception. Petitions against the church. Root and 
 Branch petition. Minister's petition. Petitions in favour of 
 the church. Apprentices' petition. Speeches of Lords 
 Digby and Falklaud. Bishop Hall's character described. 
 Substance of a petition in favor of the church. Minister's 
 petition presented to the house. Resolutions of the Com- 
 mons. A bill to exclude ecclesiastics from civil employ- 
 ments, and Bishops from parliament. Sentiments of the 
 King upon it. The bill passed the Commons — thrown out of 
 the house of Lords. Principal speakers on behalf of the 
 Bishops. Bishop Hall's speech on this occasion. Reso- 
 lute conduct of the Bishops. The bill for extirpating 
 Episcopacy. Sir E. Deering's speech. Much opposition 
 to it. Lord Clarendon's dexterity. The bill dropped. 
 Debates about abolishing deans and chapters. Dr. Hack- 
 ett's able defence of the cathedral clergy. Petitions of the 
 Universities. Resolutions of the Commons. Committee of 
 accommodation. Fuller's account of it. Many Puritans 
 desirous of retaining Episcopacy. Error of Rapin. Scott's 
 commissioners voting Episcopacy contrary to the word of 
 God. Rumour of the Army advancing to dissolve the 
 
▼Ill CONTENTS. 
 
 parliam^t. Proeeedings against Papists. Protestation of 
 the Commons — refused by two Peers. Explanation of it. 
 Rejected by the Peers. Votes against the bishops and the 
 church. Neal's remarks upon the protestation. The 
 changes since the commencement of this parliament. Earl 
 of Strafford's imprisonment and execution. The bill for not 
 dissolving parliament passed. The King's weakness. The 
 bills for abolishing the High Commission and the Star 
 Chamber passed. Account of the High Commission Court, 
 and that of the Star Chamber. Schemes to divide the 
 bishops. Thirteen bishops impeached. Their plea and 
 demurrer. Bishop Hall's speech, .... p. 205-253. 
 
 CHAP. VII. 
 
 Debates about the church — more involved and intricate. Par- 
 liament sitting on Sunday. Declaration of parliament. 
 His Majesty's journey into Scotland. Debate about the 
 book of Common Prayer. Resolutions of the Commons. 
 Opposed by the Peers. Unsettled state of religion. Dis- 
 affected lecturers. Dr. Walker's account of them. Neal's 
 opinion of them. Recess of Parliament. Bishop Hall 
 retires to Exeter — preaches in the Cathedral. Quotations 
 from his sermon. He pathetically laments the dissentions 
 in church and state. Scandalous means to render people 
 disaffected. False report of the King's intention to intro- 
 duce presbyterianism into England. The King's letter. 
 Vacant dioceses filled. Tlie commons much offended. 
 The most eminent men collated to the vacant sees. Bishop 
 Hall translated to Norwich. Invidious remarks of Neal. 
 The King inclined to promote the welfare of church and 
 state. Irish insurrection. Meeting of parliament after 
 recess. General remonstrance. His Majesty's answer. 
 Commons dissatisfied. Kinj^'s declaration. Commons 
 disappointed at the impeached bishops' {/twMrrer— in despair 
 of getting their ends. Petitions against Episcopacy encou- 
 raged. Public prayers for the success of the Apprentices' 
 petition. Riots and tumults about the Parliament-house. 
 
CONTENTS. IX 
 
 The Bishops' houses threatened to be pulled down. Arch- 
 bishop of York assaulted. The Bishops abused. Protes- 
 tation of the Bishops. Twelve of iheni accused of high 
 treason, and committed to the Tower. A mistake of Fuller 
 and Neal. Injustice of the Bishops' imprisonment. The 
 bill for taking away the Bishops' Votes before rejected---is 
 presented under another title — and passed. Bishop of 
 Rochester's defence of the Bishops. Earl of Bedford's 
 opposition to the bill. Petitions in favor of the Bishops. 
 Rejoicings in London at the passing of the bill. His 
 Majesty hesitating to sign it, is prevailed upon to do it. 
 Influence of the Queen. Sad consequences of passing this 
 bill. The King's party weakened. The nine reasons of the 
 commons against the Bishops' votes. Answered by Bishop 
 Hall. Harris's remarks. His Majesty's impeachment of 
 five members of the commons. Imprudent step. No hopes 
 of accommodation left. The royal standard hoisted at 
 Nottingham. The twelve imprisoned Bishops petition for 
 council —denied bail. Their trial postponed. Deprived of 
 their spiritual promotions. Their estates forfeited. Annual 
 allowance to the Bishops for life. They again petition to 
 be admitted to bail. They are released, but re-committed. 
 — at last set at liberty upon their bond. The protesting 
 Bishops alternately preached during their confinement in 
 the Tower. Bishop Hall's tranquillity of mind in the Tower. 
 The Treatise ** Free Prisoner," written in the Tower. 
 Quotation from it. Bishop Hall's Letter from the Tower. 
 A sermon of his preached in the Tower. When released, he 
 withdraws to Norwich. His reception there. He preaches 
 in the Cathedral. Hjs frequent preaching, p. 254-338. 
 
 CHAP. VIII. 
 
 Open rupture between the King and Parliament. Parliament's 
 declaration for further reformation. Nineteen propositions. 
 His Majesty's reply. Civil war begun. Reflections on the 
 state of things. The bill for extirpating Episcopacy. 
 Church government interrupted. Ordinance for calling the 
 assembly of divines. The royal prohibition of tt. Meeting 
 
X CONTENTS. 
 
 of the assembly. Episcopal divines forsaking it. Assist- 
 ance of the Scots solicited. The solemn league and cove- 
 nant. Royal proclamation against it. Sufferings of the 
 Clergy. Church concernis managed by the assembly. 
 Solemn league and covenant imposed on the University of 
 Cambridge. A number of Graduates banished. Sufferings 
 of the Clergy. Average number of sufferers. The fifths. 
 Sufferings of the Bishops. Cathedrals and churches defaced 
 and devastated. Norwich Cathedral devastated. Presby- 
 terianism introduced. Sects and parties arise. Licentious- 
 ness and Antinomianism brought in. Political principles of 
 the Puritans absurd. Presbyterianism advanced into a 
 divine institution. Erastians. Independents. Interreg- 
 num in the church. Sects, parties, and heresies spring up. 
 Oversight in the reformers. Religious confusion and disor- 
 ders. Fanaticism. Bishop Hall's account of the fanatics. 
 Their absurd and blasphemous opinions. Assembly of 
 divines provide a succession of ministers. Directory for 
 public worship. Common prayer books called in — prohi- 
 bited in private families. Severities of Presbyterian Unifor- 
 mity. Royal proclamation for the Common Prayer Book to 
 'be continued to be used. Catastrophe of Archbishop Laud. 
 His character. His munificent actions. Treaty of 
 Uxbridge. Bishop Hall's " Modest Offer" to the assembly 
 of divines. Presbyterians and Independents differ. His 
 Majesty's affairs decline. His Majesty's attachment to 
 the church. Delivers himself up to the Scots. Debates 
 between his Majesty and Mr. Henderson. Scots give up 
 his Majesty to the Parliament. England partitioned into 
 Presbyterian provinces. Military men preach. Enthusiasm 
 in the army. Neal's account of the enthusiasts. Confu- 
 sion and disorder of church and state. Quotations from 
 Bishop Hall. He laments the deplorable state of things. 
 His Majesty confined in Holmby-house, . . p. 305-338. 
 
 CHAP. IX. 
 
 The Army, not disposed to submit to Presbyterianism, insist on 
 a toleration. Persecuting spirit of the Presbyterians. 
 
CONTENTS. m 
 
 Intention to secure the person of Cromwell. His escape. 
 The Army seize the person of his Majesty. Army and 
 Parliament differ. Escape of the King. He is secured in 
 Carisbrook Castle. PubUc tranquillity precarious. Peti- 
 tion of the sutferiiig clergy to his Majesty. The King's 
 reply. Their petition to the General. Their expectations 
 cut off. Petition to the Presbyterian ministers. University 
 of Oxford visited. Cruel ordinance of the Presbyterians. 
 Insnrrection in fevor of the King. Second civil war. 
 Treaty of Newport. His Majesty's concessions. His 
 Majesty's mind much distressed. The remonstrance of the 
 Army. Consternation of the Parhament. His Majesty 
 secured in Hurst Castle. Presbyterian members excluded 
 from the Parliament-house. Impeachment of his Majesty. 
 His murder, p. 839-351. 
 
 CHAP. X. 
 
 House of Lords voted useless. Office of a king dangerous. 
 Oatiis of supremacy and allegiance abolished. The engage' 
 ment. The commonwealth. Independent interest prevails. 
 Sufferings of the Presbyterian ministers. Laxity of religious 
 principles. Bishop Hall's remarks upon divisions in reli- 
 gion. One hundred and eighty dangerous and blasphemous 
 opinions now held. General confusion in religion. State 
 of religion described. Quotation from Wilks' *• Christian 
 Essays." Engagement taken. Milton employed as a 
 writer on the side of the commonwealth. Dean and 
 Chapters' laud ordered to be sold. Salaries of incumbents 
 to be augmented. Public press under the direction of 
 Parliament. Sufferings of the Clergy of remote parts of 
 the kingdom. Propagation of the gospel in Wales. Origin 
 of the Quakers. George Fox. Charles IL crowned in 
 Scotland — defeated at Worcester. Cromwell turning the 
 Parliament out of doors. Barebone's parliament. Their 
 ludicrous proceedings. They dissolve themselves. Supreme 
 power vested in Cromwell. He is made Protector. Instru- 
 ment of Government. Toleration of alf sects and heresies. 
 Some of the episcopal clergy connived at. Two of Bishop 
 
XII CONTENTS. 
 
 Hall's sons, and others. Some of the Bishops allowed to 
 preach. Bishop Rennet's testimony in favor of Cromwell; 
 Parliament called. Debates of the Commons offensive to 
 Cromwell. A recognition forced on them. Declension of 
 Presbyterianism, Approbation of public ministers. Pre- 
 vention of the sequestered clergy to get into livings. Par- 
 tiality of the commissioners. Ordinance to humble the 
 clergy. Deplorable state of tlie church. Measures to crush 
 the loyal clergy. Extreme severities against them. Com- 
 pelled to remonstrate to Cromwell. Archbishop Usher's 
 intercession on behalf of the sufFeringv clergy. Interview 
 between Cromwell and Archbishop Usher. The Primate's 
 grief at not succeeding. Corporation for the sons of the 
 clergy. Origin of. Rev. George Hall, the bishop's son, 
 preached the first sermon before the Corporation. Quota- 
 tion from the sermon, . , p. 352-385. 
 
 CHAP. XI. 
 
 Bishop Hall's " Hard Measure,"~en joyed but a short respite as 
 Bishop of Norwich. Ordinance for sequestering the estates 
 of notorious delinquents — among whom, Bishop Hall is 
 enumerated. Cruelty of this ordinance. Sufferings of 
 Bishop Hall. Lenient measures towards him and others. 
 Negative oath. Bishop Hall ejected out of his palace. 
 Mrs. Hall offering to pay the rent out of the fifths. He 
 retires to Heigham. The Bishop's house still existing. He 
 spent his retirement in doing good. His readiness to preach 
 in the churches of Norwich. He was a diligent hearer as 
 well as a preacher. Extract from a sermon preached by 
 him in his eightieth year. His last years spent in devotion 
 and meditation. His charitable acts. His patience during 
 his last illness. His submission to the divine will. He 
 was afHicted with the stone and strangury — foretold the 
 night of his death. His legacies. Remarkable monition in 
 his will. Mistake of his being buried in Heigham church- 
 yard. His dislike of burials in churches. His sermon at 
 Exeter. Buried in the chancel of Heigham church. His 
 Tombstone. Inscription. Removal of his Tombstone. 
 
CONTENTS. xili 
 
 His mural monument. Inscription. Mrs. Hall's death. 
 Mr. J. Hall, the Bishop's son, buried. Tombstones of Mrs. 
 Hall and son. Bishop Hall's " Songs in the Night," occa- 
 sioned b^ Mrs. Hall's death. Quotations from them, 
 
 p. 386-424. 
 
 CHAP. XII. 
 
 A VIEW OF THE CHARACTER OF BiSHOP HaLL, AND OF 
 
 HIS WRITINGS. His character described. His character 
 by Richardson. Quotation from Godwin's De Presulibus. 
 Bishop Hall, a child of Providence. Owed his pieicrmfnts 
 to merit. Letters dedicatory. His grateful sense of kind- 
 nesses. His piety. Fondness of study. Manner of study. 
 His letter to Lord Denny. Mode of spending the sabbath. 
 Mildness uf disposition. His usual signature. His activity 
 and vigilance. His constancy and fortitude. A saying of 
 Fuller. He wrote valuable Treatises in his old age. His 
 time well employed. He was a wit and a poet. His 
 satires. Gray's and Warton's character of them. His 
 intended version of the Psalms. His prose works. He was 
 called the English Seneca. The English Chrysostom. His 
 character as a writer. Fuller's character of him. His 
 practical works. His contemplations. Substance of ser- 
 mons. Testimonies of Hervey and Dr. Doddridge. Cha- 
 racter of his Paraphrase on Scripture, by Dr. Doddridge. 
 Mant's and D'Oyly's Commentary, much indebted to Bishop 
 Hall's writings— also Scott's Conmientary. Bishop Hall's 
 character as a preacher. His sentiments evangelical. His 
 meditations. His son Robert's account of them. His own 
 account of them. His devotional writings. His Epistles. 
 His Polemical writings. Treatises in Latin. His works 
 first collected. Pratt's Edition. Sterne's plagiarisms, 
 
 p. 426-448. 
 
 CHAP. Xlll. 
 
 On Puritanism. Sketch of the history of Puritanism. 
 Reformers. First Separatists. Fuller's account of the 
 origin of the Puritans. Puritans not necessarily non-con- 
 
Xif CONTENTS. 
 
 formists. A term of reproach. Puritans not all dissenters. 
 Prominent trait in their character. Many of them gi-eat 
 sufferers. Many of bad principles. Eminent Puritans with 
 the Parliament. Many not less eminent with the King. 
 All Puritans not really pious. Their failings. Their rigid 
 behaviour. Their piety and devotion. Characteristics of 
 a Puritan. Many of them faithful friends to the church. 
 Puritanism productive of much good. Reformation of 
 manners. Games and plays suppressed. Sabbath day 
 strictly observed. State of religion during the long parlia- 
 ment. The grand rebellion and usurpation. Bishop Hall and 
 others of his brethren reckoned Puritans. Evangelical and 
 Methodist now terms of reproach, .... p. 449-468. 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 Unpublished Letters to Archbishop Usher and others, 
 
 p. 461-474. 
 
 Latin Sermon, preached by Bishop Hall, before the Synod of 
 Dort, p. 475. 
 
 Dr. Alibone's Satirical Latin Verses on the Visitation of Oxford 
 by the Antiloyalists, p. 493, 
 
 Death's Alarm, a Funeral Sermon on the Right Reverend 
 Joseph Hall, d.d. Bishop of Norwich, by J. Whitefoot, m.a. 
 
 p. 501. 
 
 Epitaph on the Monument of Mr. H. Bright, in Worcester 
 Cathedral, composed by Bishop Hall, . . . . p. 566. 
 
 Angelus e Coelo ad Angelum Ecclesiae N. ad Ccelum transeuntem, 
 
 p. 567. 
 
 Upon the much-lamented Death of the Rev. Father Joseph, late 
 Lord Bishop of Norwich, p. 569. 
 
 In Obitum araplissimi Patris J. H. Episcopi Norvicensis, 
 
 p. 572. 
 
 Recommendatory Verses composed by Bishop Hall, and pre- 
 fixed to Silvester's translation of Du Bartas, . . p. 574. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 The Author o£ this rolume has endeavoured, as well as 
 he could, to acquaint himself, with much labour and 
 research, with the histoiy of those eventful times in which 
 the celebrated Bishop Hall lived, with the view of giving 
 a full account of the life and sufferings of one of the most 
 worthy of the sons of the Church of England, and a narrative 
 of the principal events and transactions of that period. The 
 aim of the author has been to give an impartial account of 
 those times ; but he found it often a very difficult matter 
 to discriminate the ti*uth among a mass of confused and 
 contradictory account of writers biassed and influenced by 
 prejudice, faction, or party spirit. 
 
 The author is far from vindicating the arbitrary power 
 and the violent measures employed and adopted by the 
 rulers of church and state, to promote their religious or 
 secular ends in those times ; and he is bold also to affirm, 
 that the persecuting, violent, and unchristian conduct, and 
 evil practices of some of those called Puritans, of the 
 Presbyterians and Independents, when they got the power 
 in their own hands, have left upon them such an indelible 
 stigma, as will never be forgotten. 
 
 Bishop Hall has left us a brief account of his own life 
 and sufferings; but because of his great modesty, he 
 has touched but slightly on some most interesting inci- 
 dents ; the author has tiierefore endeavoured, from other 
 authentic sources, to give, in the following Memoirs, a 
 more copious detail ; leaving, however, the good old 
 Bishop, as much as possible, to be his own biographer. 
 His life, which was long and useful, is replete with impor- 
 
Xvi PREFACE. 
 
 tant incidents, which will always prove interesting and 
 instructive to all future generations. 
 
 In every period of the Christian Church, there have 
 been some eminent characters endued with primitive sim- 
 plicity and genuine excellence ; among these we may most 
 justly class the good, the pious, and the learned subject of 
 the following Memoirs. His devotedness to the service of his 
 divine Master, his great humility and patience under all his 
 sufferings, were distinguishing traits in his character. The 
 character given us of St. Augustin, may, with the greatest 
 propriety, be applied to Bishop Hall : Insignis erat sanc- 
 tissimi priesulis mansuetudo, ac miranda animi leuitas, 
 et quaedam invincibilis dementia. 
 
 In the Appendix to this volume there will be found 
 some unpublished pieces of Bishop Hall, particularly his 
 Letters to Archbishop Usher and others, and his Latin 
 Sermon before the Sjniod of Dort; which, it is hoped, 
 will prove very acceptable to all who possess the last edition 
 of his Works. Whitefoot's Funeral Sermon, inserted in 
 the Appendix, is also not only of rare occurrence, but is 
 highly valuable and interesting, as containing some striking 
 particulars in the life of the Bishop. 
 
 The author earnestly hopes that this volume may prove 
 a profitable addition to the large mass of biography of 
 good and excellent personages already before the public, 
 as well as instructive and edifying to every Christian 
 reader ; and it is his sincere prayer that all the sons of the 
 Church may imitate the example of Bishop Hall, — follow 
 htm as he followed Christ, — live above this vain and 
 troublesome world, — bear with patience all the trials and 
 sufferings of this mortal life, — and continually " mind 
 eternity." * 
 
 Cradley^ Worcestershire, 
 Oct. 4, 1825. 
 
 • See Inscriptions on Bishop Hall's Monument, and of Mrs. Hall^ 
 pp. 419, 430. 
 
BISHOP HALL, 
 
 HIS LIFE AND TIMES. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 J.F the memory of the wise, the pious, and 
 the good is blessed, and should be preserved 
 and illustrated for the advantage and improve- 
 ment of future ages ; the name of Joseph Hall, 
 successively Bishop of Exeter and Norwich, 
 ought undoubtedly to be held in perpetual 
 remembrance. Few, if any, of the fathers of the 
 Church of England, have left behind them more 
 lasting or exemplary proofs of learning, piety, 
 and unwearied labours in the cause of truth. The 
 purity of his life, the fervor of his charity, and the 
 variety and importance of his theological writings, 
 have ranked him among the brightest ornaments 
 of the church. He was indeed a star of the first 
 magnitude, alike admirable and eminent as an 
 author, as an advocate of the church, and as a 
 christian pastor and bishop of primitive simplicity 
 and piety. 
 
2 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 As Bishop Hall has left a brief account of his 
 life, under the title of " Observations of some 
 Specialities of Divine Providence in the Life of 
 Joseph Hall, Bishop of Norwich, written with 
 his owti hand," it appears advisable to adopt the 
 whole of this narrative into the present Memoir, 
 only pausing occasionally to introduce such other 
 incidents and details as other and equally authen- 
 tic accounts may furnish. 
 
 The Bishop thus commences the Memoirs of 
 himself. 
 
 '' NOT out of a vain affectation of my own 
 glory, which I know how little it can avail me 
 when I am gone hence ; but out of a sincere desire 
 to give glory to my God, whose wonderful provi- 
 dence I have noted in all my ways, have I 
 recorded some remarkable passage of my fore- 
 past life. What I have done is worthy of nothing 
 but silence and forgetfulness ; but what God hath 
 done for me, is worthy of everlasting and thank- 
 ful memory. 
 
 " I was born July 1, 1574, at five of the clock in 
 the morning, in Bristow-Park, within the parish 
 of Ashby de la Zouch, a town in Leicestershire, 
 of honest and well-allowed parentage. 
 
 ** My father was an officer uader that truly 
 honorable and religious Henry Earl of Hunting- 
 don, President of the North; and, under him. 
 
HIS YOUTH AND EDUCATION. 3 
 
 had the government of that market-town, wherein 
 the chief seat of that earldom is placed. 
 
 ** My mother Winifride, of the house of the Bam- 
 bridges, was a woman of that rare sanctity, that, 
 were it not for my interest in nature, I durst say, 
 that neither Aleth the mother of that just Honor of 
 Clareval, nor Monica, nor any other of those pious 
 matrons anciently famous for devotion, need to 
 disdain her admittance to comparison. She was 
 continually exercised with the afflictions of a 
 weak body, and oft of a wounded spirit: the 
 agonies whereof, as she would oft recount with 
 much passion, professing that the greatest bodily 
 sicknesses were but flea-bites to those scorpions ; 
 so, from them all, at last she found a happy and 
 comfortable deliverance. And that, not without 
 a more than ordinary hand of God : for, on a time, 
 being in great distress of conscience, she thought 
 in her dream, there stood by her a grave personage, 
 in the gown and other habits of a physician ; who, 
 inquiring of her estate, and receiving a sad and 
 querulous answer from her, took her by the hand, 
 and bade her be of good comfort, for this should 
 be the last fit that ever she should feel of this 
 kind; whereto she seemed to answer, that, on 
 that condition, she could well be content for the 
 time, with that or any other torment ; reply was 
 made to her, as she thought, with a redoubled 
 assurance of that happy issue of this her last trial ; 
 
 B 2 
 
4 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 whereat she began to conceive an unspeakable 
 joy ; which yet, on her awaking, left her more 
 disconsolate, as then conceiting her happiness 
 imaginary, her misery real ; when, the very same 
 day, she was visited by the reverend and (in his 
 time) famous divine, Mr. Anthony Gilby,* under 
 whose ministry she lived ; who, upon the relation 
 of this her pleasing vision and the contrary effects 
 it had in her, began to persuade her, that dream 
 was no other than divine, and that she had good 
 reason to think that gracious premonition was 
 sent her from God himself: who, though ordinarily 
 he keeps the common road of his proceedings, 
 yet, sometimes, in the distresses of his servants, 
 he goes unusual ways to their relief: hereupon she 
 began to take heart; and, by good counsel and 
 her fervent prayers, found that happy prediction 
 verified to her; and, upon all occasions in the 
 remainder of her life, was ready to magnify the 
 mercy of her God in so sensible a deliverance. 
 What with the trial of both these hands of God, 
 so had she profited in the school of Christ, that it 
 was hard for any friend to come from her discourse 
 no whit holier. How often have I blessed the 
 memory of those divine passages of experimental 
 
 * He was a pious and zealous Non-conformist; and was pro- 
 foundly learned in the Latin, Greek, and Hebrew languages. 
 He was patronized by the Earl of Huntingdon, and was pre- 
 sented to the Vicarage of Ashby de la Zouch. 
 
HIS YOUTH AND EDUCATION. 5 
 
 divinity, which I have heard from her mouth ! 
 What day did she pass, without a large task of 
 private devotion? whence she would still come 
 forth, with a countenance of undisserabled mor- 
 tification. Never any lips have read to me such 
 feeling lectures of piety : neither have I known 
 any soul that more accurately practised them 
 than her own. Temptations, desertions, and spiri- 
 tual comforts, were her usual theme. Shortly, 
 for I can hardly take off my pen from so exemplary 
 a subject, her life and death were saint-like.* 
 
 ** My parents had, from mine infancy, devoted 
 me to this sacred calling, whereto, by the blessing 
 of God, I have seasonably attained. For this 
 cause, I was trained up in the public school of 
 the place. 
 
 ** After I had spent some years, not altogether 
 
 * It is singular and remarkable that many of those divines, 
 who have proved most eminent for their piety and usefulness, 
 have, in a particular manner, experienced the benefit of parental 
 instruction ; and especially have imbibed religious principles 
 from the piety and example of I heir mothers. Dr. Doddridge, 
 before he was able to read, was instructed by his mother, in the 
 histories of the Old and New Testament, by the assistance of 
 some dutch tiles in the chimney of the room, where they usually 
 sat. The names of Augustin, Hooker, Newton, Cecil, Buchanan, 
 and Dwight, are here enumerated as instances of the happy and 
 blessed effects of parental instruction in religion. This shoidd 
 encourage parents to bring up their children in the nurture and 
 admonition of the Lord, Though the instructions and pious 
 examples of parents may not always seem to have immediate 
 effect upon their children ; yet the means should be used, and 
 the most untoward may, through the divine blessing, be brought 
 to the knowledge of the truth : for this is a course which has 
 been so often crowned with success, and which is seldom or 
 
6 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 indiligently, under the ferule of such masters as 
 the place afforded, and had near attained to some 
 competent ripeness for the university, my school- 
 master being a great admirer of one Mr. Pelset, 
 •who was then lately come from Cambridge to be 
 the public preacher of Leicester (a man very emi- 
 nent in those times, for the fame of his learning, 
 but especially for his sacred oratory), persuaded 
 my father, that if I might have my education 
 under so excellent and complete a divine, it might 
 be both a nearer and easier way to his purposed 
 end, than by an academical institution. The 
 motion sounded well in my father's ears, and 
 carried fair probabilities: neither was it other 
 than fore-compacted betwixt my schoolmaster 
 and Mr. Pelset; so as, on both sides, it was 
 entertained with great forwardness. 
 
 '* The gentleman, upon essay taken of my fitness 
 for the use of his studies, undertakes within one 
 seven years to send me forth, no less furnished 
 with arts, languages, and grounds of theoretical 
 
 never perhaps altogether in vain. " It is evident, that the pious 
 endeavours of Lois and Eunice, in bringing young Timothy 
 acquainted with the Holy Scriptures, laid the foundation of all 
 his subsequent eminence and usefulness, in which he was infe- 
 rior to none but the Apostles. It is probable, that, while they 
 were teaching the child to read, and treasure up in his memory 
 the oracles of God^ they little thought what a harvest, in future 
 life, would spring from the seed thus sown. But the Scripture 
 warrants high expectations in this respect." See Memoir of 
 Rev. Jeremiah Newell, annexed to his Funeral Sermon, by the 
 late Rev. Thomas Scott. 
 
HIS YOUTH AND EDUCATION. 7 
 
 divinity, than the carefullest tutor in the strictest 
 college of either university. Which that he 
 might assuredly perform, to prevent the danger 
 of any mutable thoughts in my parents or myself, 
 he desired mutual bonds to be drawn betwixt us. 
 The great charge of my father, whom it pleased 
 God to bless with twelve children, made him the 
 more apt to yield to so likely a project for a 
 younger sou. 
 
 " There and now were all the hopes of my future 
 life on blasting. The indentures were preparing: 
 the time was set: my suits were addressed for 
 the journey. 
 
 " What was the issue ? O God, thy providence 
 made and found it. Thou knowest how sincerely 
 and heartily, m those my young years,* I did cast 
 myself on thy hands : with what faithful resolu- 
 tion I did, in this particular occasion, resign 
 myself over to thy disposition ; earnestly begging 
 of thee in my fervent prayers to order all things 
 to the best, and confidently waiting upon thy 
 will for the event. Certainly, never did I, in all 
 my life, more clearly roll myself upon the Divine 
 Providence, than I did in this business. And it 
 succeeded accordingly. 
 
 '' It fell out in this time that my elder brother, 
 having some occasions to journey unto Cambridge, 
 
 * Anno 8Btatis 15. 
 
8 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 was kindly entertained there by Mr. Nath. Gilby, 
 fellow of Emanuel college : who, for that he was 
 born in the same town with me, and had conceived 
 some good opinion of my aptness to learning, in- 
 quired diligently concerning me ; and hearing of 
 the diversion of my father's purposes from the 
 university, importunately dissuaded from that new 
 course, professing to pity the loss of so good hopes. 
 My brother, partly moved with his words, and 
 partly won by his own eyes, to a great love and 
 reverence of an academical life, returning home, 
 fell on his knees to my father ; and, after the report 
 of Mr. Gilby's words and his own admiration of 
 the place, earnestly besought him, that he would 
 be pleased to alter that so prejudicial a resolution, 
 that he would not suffer my hopes to be drowned 
 in a shallow country channel ; but that he would 
 revive his first purposes for Cambridge ; adding, 
 in the zeal of his love, that if the chargeableness 
 of that course were the hinderance, he did there 
 humbly beseech him rather to sell some part of 
 that land, which himself should in course of nature 
 inherit, than to abridge me of that happy means 
 to perfect my education. No sooner had he 
 spoken those words, than my father no less pas- 
 sionately condescended ; not without a vehement 
 protestation, that, whatsoever it might cost him, I 
 should, God willing, be sent to the university. 
 Neither were those words sooner out of his lips. 
 
HIS YOUTH AND EDUCATION. 9 
 
 than there was a messenger from Mr. Pelset 
 knocking at the door, to call me to that fairer 
 bondage ; signifying, that the next day he expected 
 me, with a full dispatch of all that business : to 
 whom my father replied, that he came some 
 minutes too late, that he had now otherwise 
 determined of me; and, with a respective mes- 
 sage of thanks to the master, sent the man home 
 empty, leaving me full of the tears of joy for so 
 happy a change. 
 
 ** Indeed I had been but lost, if that project 
 had succeeded ; as it well appeared in the experi- 
 ence of him who succeeded in that room, which 
 was by me thus unexpectedly forsaken. 
 
 ** O God, how was I then taken up with a 
 thankful acknowledgment and joyful admiration 
 of thy gracious providence over me I 
 
 " And now I lived in the expectation of Cam- 
 bridge ; whither, ere long, I happily came, under 
 Mr. Gilby's tuition, together with my worthy 
 friend Mr. Hugh Cholmley, who, as we had been 
 partners of one lesson from our cradles, so were 
 we now for many years partners of one bed.* 
 
 ^' My two first years were necessarily charge- 
 able above the proportion of my father's power; 
 whose not very large cistern was to feed many 
 pipes besides mine. His weariness of expense 
 
 * See Bishop Hall's Works, vol. ix, p 333. 
 
10 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 was wrought upon by the counsel of some unwise 
 friends, who persuaded him to fasten me upon that 
 school as master, whereof I was lately a scholar. 
 
 " Now was I fetched home with a heavy heart : 
 and now, this second time, had mine hopes been 
 nipped in the blossom, had not God raised me 
 up an unhoped benefactor, Mr. Edmund Sleigh 
 of Derby, (whose pious memory I have cause 
 ever to love and reverence), out of no other 
 relation to me, save that he married my aunt. 
 Pitying my too apparent dejectedness, he volun- 
 tarily urged and solicited my father for my return 
 to the university ; and offered freely to contribute 
 the onehalf of my maintenance there, till I should 
 attain to the degree of master of arts ; which he 
 no less really and lovingly performed. The con- 
 dition was gladly accepted. 
 
 " Thither was I sent back, with joy enough ; 
 and, ere long, chosen scholar of that strict and 
 well-ordered college. 
 
 ** By that time I had spent six years there, now 
 the third year of my bachelorship should at once 
 both make an end of my maintenance, and in 
 respect of standing give me a capacity of further 
 preferment in that house, were it not that my 
 country excluded me: for our statute allowed 
 but one of a shire to be fellow there; and, my 
 tutor being of the same town with me, must there- 
 fore necessarily hold me out. 
 
HIS YOUTH AND EDUCATION. 11 
 
 ** But, O my God, how strangely did thy gra- 
 cious providence fetch this business about ! I was 
 now entertaining motions of remove. 
 
 ** A place was offered me in the island of Guern- 
 sey, which I had in speech and chase. It fell 
 out, that the father of my loving chamberfellow, 
 Mr. Cholmley, a gentleman that had likewise 
 dependence upon the most noble Henry Earl of 
 Huntingdon, having occasion to go to York, unto 
 that his honorable lord, fell into some mention of 
 me. That good Earl, who well esteemed my 
 father's service, having belikely heard some better 
 words of me than I could deserve, made earnest 
 inquiry after me, what were my courses, what 
 my hopes: and, hearing of the likelihood of my 
 removal, professed much dislike of it; not with- 
 out some vehemence, demanding why 1 was not 
 chosen fellow of that college, wherein by report I 
 received such approbation. Answer was returned, 
 that my country debarred me ; which, being filled 
 with my tutor, whom his Lordship well knew, 
 could not by the statute admit a second. The 
 Earl presently replied, that, if that were the 
 hinderance, he would soon take order to remove 
 it. Whereupon his Lordship presently sends for 
 my tutor Mr. Gilby unto York ; and, with profer 
 of large conditions of the chaplainship in his house, 
 and assured promises of better provisions, drew 
 him to relinquish his place in the college to a free 
 election. No sooner was his assent signified, 
 
12 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 than the days were set for the pubhc (and indeed 
 exquisite) examination of the competitors. By 
 that time two days of the three allotted to this, 
 trial were past, certain news came to us of the 
 inexpected death of that incomparably rehgious 
 and noble Earl of Huntingdon ; by whose loss my 
 then disappointed tutor must necessarily be left 
 to the wide world unprovided for. Upon notice 
 thereof, I presently repaired to the master of the 
 college, Mr. Dr. Chaderton ;* and besought him 
 to tender that hard condition to which my good 
 tutor must needs be driven, if the election 
 proceeded ; to stay any further progress in that 
 business ; and to leave me to my own good hopes 
 wheresoever, whose youth exposed me both to less 
 needs, and more opportunities of provision. 
 Answer was made me, that the place was pro- 
 nounced void however ; and, therefore, that my 
 tutor was divested of all possibility of remedy, 
 and must wait upon the providence of God for his 
 disposing elsewhere, and the election must neces- 
 sarily proceed the day following. Then was I, 
 with a cheerful unanimity, chosen into that 
 society ; which if it had any equals, I dare say 
 had none beyond it, for good order, studious 
 carriage, strict government, austere piety: in 
 
 * He was the first Master of Emanuel College; was for 
 many years Lecturer at St. Clement's in Cambridge, with great 
 profit to his auditors ; and was one of the translators of the 
 Bible. 
 
HIS YOUTH AND EDUCATION. 13 
 
 which I spent six or seven years more, with such 
 contentment, as the rest of my life hath in vain 
 striven to yield. 
 
 ** Now was I called to public disputations often, 
 ivith no ill success : for never durst I appear in 
 any of those exercises of scholarship, till I had 
 from my knees looked up to heaven for a bles- 
 sing, and renewed my actual dependence upon 
 that divine hand. 
 
 "In this while, two years together was I chosen 
 to the rhetoric lecture in the public schools ; 
 where 1 was encouraged with a sufficient frequence 
 of auditors: but, finding that well -applauded 
 work somewhat out of my way, not without a 
 secret blame of myself for so much excursion, I 
 fairly gave up that task, in the midst of those 
 poor acclamations, to a worthy successor, Mr. 
 Dr. Dod ; and betook myself to those serious 
 studies, which might fit me for that high calling 
 whereunto I was destined.* " 
 
 During his residence in the University, he stu- 
 died so intensely, that it appears from a letter of 
 
 * Fuller says in his " Worthies of England," that " he passed 
 all his degrees with great applause. First, noted in the Univer- 
 sity, for his ingenious maintaining (be it Tf-uth, or Paradox^) 
 that Mundus senesnt, ** The world groweth old." Yet, in 
 some sort, his position confuteth his position, the wit and 
 <iuicknes8 whereof did argue an increase rather than a decay of 
 parta in this latter age." 
 
J4 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 his to Mr. Hugh Cholmley, who had been his 
 school-fellow, and was also his intimate friend in 
 the same college, his friends were dissuading him 
 from immoderate study. " I have," says he, *' a 
 body, that controls me enough in these courses ; 
 my friends need not. There is nothing whereof 
 I could sooner surfeit, if I durst neglect my body, 
 to satisfy my mind : but, while I affect know« 
 ledge, my weakness checks me, and says, 
 * Better a little learning, than no health.' I yield, 
 and patiently abide myself debarred of my chosen 
 felicity." 
 
 '* Wherein" (he continues his narrative) " after 
 I had carefully bestowed myself for a time, I took 
 the boldness to enter into sacred orders: the 
 honor whereof having once attained, I was no 
 niggard of that talent which my God had intrusted 
 to me ; preaching often, as occasion was offered, 
 both in country villages abroad, and at home in 
 the most awful auditory of the university. 
 
 " And now I did but wait where and how it 
 would please my God to employ me." * 
 
 * He had resided at College, in the whole, about thirteen 
 years. He was presented to Halsted in the year 1601. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE Bishop continues his narrative. — '* There 
 was at that time a famous school erected at 
 Tiverton in Devon, and endowed with a very 
 large pension ; whose goodly fabric was answerable 
 to the reported maintenance : the care whereof 
 was, by the rich and bountiful founder, Mr. Blun- 
 del,* cast principally on the then Lord Chief 
 Justice Popham. That faithful observer, having 
 great interest in the master of our house. Dr. 
 Chaderton, moved him earnestly to commend 
 some able, learned, and discreet governor to that 
 weighty charge ; whose action should not need to 
 be 80 much as his oversight. It pleased our 
 master, out of his good opinion, to tender this 
 
 * Peter Blundel, a native and clothier of that town, founded 
 and endowed this school, which is a great ornament to the 
 place. He appointed a feast to be kept annually on St. Peter's 
 day in commemoration of him, for which he left a liberal 
 allowance. He also founded two fellowships and two scholar- 
 ships in Sidney College, Cambridge, and one fellowship and two 
 scholarships in Baliol College, Oxford, for the scholars educated 
 io this school. 
 
16 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL, 
 
 condition unto me: assuring me of no small 
 advantages, and no great toil; since it was 
 intended the main load of the work should lie upon 
 other shoulders. I apprehended the motion worth 
 the entertaining. In that severe society our times 
 were stinted : neither was it wise or safe to refuse 
 good offers. Mr. Dr. Chaderton carried me to 
 London; and there presented me to the Lord 
 Chief Justice, with much testimony of approba- 
 tion. The Judge seemed well apaid with the 
 choice. I promised acceptance ; he, the strength 
 of his favor. No sooner had I parted from the 
 Judge, than, in the street, a messenger presented 
 me with a letter, from the right virtuous and 
 worthy lady, of dear and happy memory, the 
 Lady Drury of Suffolk, tendering the rectory of 
 her Halsted, then newly void, and very earnestly 
 desiring me to accept of it. Dr. Chaderton, 
 observing in me some change of countenance, 
 asked me what the matter might be. I told him 
 the errand, and delivered him the letter ; beseech- 
 ing his advice : which when he had read, ' Sir, 
 quoth I, * methinks God pulls me by the sleeve; 
 and tells me it is his will, I should rather go to the 
 east than to the west' ' Nay,' he answered, ' I 
 should rather think that God would have you go 
 westward, for that he hath contrived your engage- 
 ment before the tender of this letter ; which there- 
 fore coming too late, may receive a fair and easy 
 
ENTRANCE ON THE MINISTRY. 17 
 
 answer." To this I besought him to pardon my 
 dissent ; adding, that I well knew, that divinity 
 was the end whereto I was destined by my 
 parents ; which I had so constantly proposed to 
 myself, that I never meant other, than to pass 
 through this western school to it : but I saw that 
 God who found me ready to go the further way 
 about, now called me the nearest and directest 
 way to that sacred end. The good man could no 
 further oppose; but only pleaded the distaste 
 which would hereupon be justly taken by the Lord 
 Chief Justice, whom I undertook fully to satisfy : 
 which I did with no great difficulty; commending 
 to his Lordship, in my room, my old friend and 
 chamber-fellow Mr. Chohnley : who finding an 
 answerable acceptance, disposed himself to the 
 place; so as we two, who came together to the 
 university, now must leave it at once.* 
 
 * See Sir John CuUum's History of the parishes of Hawsted 
 and Hardwick, second edition, p. 68, in the list of Rectors, 
 " 2 Dec. 1601. Joseph Hall, A. M. ad pres Rob. Drury, mil." 
 
 Sir Robert Drury was the son of Sir William Drury, who was 
 in 1589 killed in a duel in France: "even before he was out 
 of mourning for his father, he attended the Earl of Essex to 
 the unsuccessful siege of Rohan, in 1591, where lie was 
 knighted, when he could not exceed the age of fourteen years/' 
 Sir J. Cullum's History of Hawsted and Hardwick, pp. 16B, 170. 
 The family of Drury, which signifies in old English, a precious 
 Jewel, has been of great reputation at Halsted and elsewhere, 
 more especially since they were married with the heiress of 
 Fresil of Sexhara. — See Camden's Britannia, p. 370. Ed. 1695. 
 
 C 
 
18 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 " Having then fixed my foot at Halsted, I found 
 there a danger opposite to the success of my 
 ministry, a witty and bold atheist, one Mr. Lilly ;^ 
 who by reason of his travails, and abilities of 
 
 * Probably this Mr. Lilly was Joha Lilly, a dramatic writer, 
 born in Kent in 1553. At sixteen years of age, he became a 
 member of Magdalen College, Oxford ; in 1573 he took the 
 degree of Bachelor, and that of Master of Arts in 1575-6. He 
 seems afterwards to have travelled ; he published a celebrated 
 work, entitled " Euphues, or, the Anatomy of Wit." It is 
 ascertained by his verses prefixed to a book entitled *' Christian 
 Passions," by H. Lok, published in 1597, that Lilly was then 
 living. The exact time of his death is not known, but it probably 
 happened soon after the year 1600. No particulars of his 
 person, or private life, have come down to us, except that he 
 was married ; that he was a little man, and a great taker of 
 tobacco. His dramatic writings abound with perpetual allu- 
 sions to a kind of fabulous natural history, in which he, and 
 some of his contemporaries frequently indulged themselves, and 
 for which he has been justly censured by Drayton and others. 
 '* Lilly, when at Oxford, was so much distinguished for his wit 
 and vivacity, that one of his adversaries endeavoured to depre- 
 ciate him on this ground, as if his spriteliness and humour were 
 greater than became a scholar." 
 
 It is therefore highly probable that this Lilly was the identical 
 adversary of Hall ; his abilities of discourse, his wit, " his fabulous 
 natural history," and perhaps other profane writings, might 
 give occasion to Hall to call him '* a witty and bold atheist." 
 The want of a knowledge of his fate bespeaks him the same 
 person ; Hall in his " account of himself," says, " this malicious 
 man going hastily up to London to exasperate my patron against 
 me, was then and there swept away by the pestilence, and never 
 returned to do any farther mischief." His being patronized 
 by Sir R. Drury, the patron of poets and wits, is another strong 
 circumstance to identify him as the very person mentioned by 
 Hall. The learned and witty Dr. Donne was patronized by 
 him ; to whom and his family, apartments were assigned in Sir R. 
 Drury '« large house in Drury Lane. See Sir J. Cullum's History 
 of Hawsted, p. 170. 
 
AT HALSTED. 19 
 
 discourse and behaviour, had so deeply insinuated 
 himself into my patron, Sir Robert Drury, that 
 there was small hopes, during his entireness, for 
 me to work any good upon that noble patron 
 of mine; who, by the suggestion of this wicked 
 detractor, was set off from me before he knew me. 
 Hereupon, 1 confess, finding the obduredness and 
 hopeless condition of that man I bent my prayers 
 against him ; beseeching God daily, that he would 
 be pleased to remove, by some means or other 
 that apparent hinderance of my faithful labors: 
 who gave me an answer accordingly; for this 
 malicious man, going hastily up to London to 
 exasperate my patron against me, was then and 
 there swept away by the pestilence, and never 
 returned to do any farther mischief. Now the 
 coast was clear before me ; and I gained every 
 day of the good opinion and favourable respects 
 of that honourable gentleman and my worthy 
 neighbors. 
 
 " Being now therefore settled in that sweet and 
 civil country of Suffolk, near to St. Edmund's- 
 Bury, my first work was to build up my house, 
 which was then extremely ruinous. 
 
 " Which done, the uncouth solitariness of my 
 
 life, and the extreme incommodity of that single 
 
 housekeeping, drew my thoughts, after two years, 
 
 to condescend to the necessity of a married 
 
 estate, which God no less strangely provided for 
 
 c 2 
 
20 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 me ; for, walking from the church on Monday in 
 the Whit sun- week, with a grave and reverend 
 minister, Mr. Grandidge, I saw a comely and 
 modest gentlewoman standing at the door of 
 that house where we were invited to a wedding- 
 dinner; and, inquiring of that worthy friend 
 whether he knew her, ' Yes,' quoth he, ' I know 
 her well, and have bespoken her for your wife.' 
 When I further demanded an account of that 
 answer, he told me she was the daughter of a 
 gentleman whom he much respected, Mr. George 
 Winniff of Bretenham ; that, out of an opinion 
 had of the fitness of that match for me, he had 
 already treated with her father about it, whom he 
 found very apt to entertain it ; advising me not to 
 neglect the opportunity, and not concealing the 
 just praises of the modesty, piety, good disposi- 
 tion, and other virtues, that were lodged in that 
 seemly presence. I listened to the motion, as 
 sent from God ; and, at last, upon due prosecu- 
 tion, happily prevailed; enjoying the comfortable 
 society of that meet help for the space of forty- 
 nine years." 
 
 Bishop Hall had many children; his eldest 
 son Robert was christened at Halsted, 26th 
 Dec. 1605, and was educated at Exeter College, 
 Oxford. March 4, 1628, he was collated to a 
 prebend in the Cathedral of Exeter, was Rector 
 
HIS FAMILY. 21 
 
 of Stokeiutinny, Devon, which he resigned, and 
 to which his brother, Samuel Hall, succeeded. 
 He was a great sufferer in the time of the usurpa- 
 tion, but at the restoration, he was repossessed of 
 his preferments. He was a learned man, a con- 
 stant preacher, and very hospitable and pious. 
 The other son, the Rev. Samuel Hall, towards the 
 €nd of the year 1640, was a prebendary of 
 Exeter, he suffered during the usurpation, and 
 died in the year 1674. Another of his sons was 
 the Rev. George Hall, born at Waltham in Essex, 
 when his father was the incumbent there ; he was 
 educated at Exeter College, Oxford, of which he 
 became a fellow, and to which he was a consider- 
 able benefactor at his death. Dec. 23, 1639, he 
 was made prebendary of Exeter, and Oct. 8, 1641, 
 was made Archdeacon of Cornwall, on the resig- 
 nation of his eldest brother. After the restora- 
 tion, he was made Chaplain to Charles H, Canon 
 of Windsor, Archdeacon of Canterbury ; and in 
 1662, he was promoted to the See of Chester. 
 He died Aug. 23, 1668.* The cause of his death 
 was rather singular; he was killed by a knife 
 "which happened to be open in his pocket, when 
 he fell in his garden at Wigan. 
 
 The following anecdote respecting his large 
 family of children, his remarks, and parental 
 
 ♦ Walker's Sufferings of the Clergy, part II. pp. 25-27. 
 
22 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 affection, are highly interesting : " I remember," 
 says he, **a great man coming to my house at 
 Waltham, and seeing all my children standing in 
 the order of their age and stature, said, ' These 
 are they that make rich men poor,' but he straight 
 received this answer ; * Nay, my Lord, these are 
 they, that make a poor man rich ; for there is not 
 one of these, whom we would part with for all 
 your wealth.' Then he remarks ; " it is easy to 
 observe, that none are so gripple and hard fisted, 
 as the childless: whereas those, who, for the 
 maintenance of large families, are inured to fre- 
 quent disbursements, find such experience of 
 Divine Providence in the faithful managing of 
 their affairs, as that they lay out with more cheer- 
 fulness than they receive. Wherein their care 
 must be abated, when God takes it off from them 
 to himself; and, if they be not wanting to them- 
 selves, their faith gives them ease, in casting their 
 burden upon him, who hath both more power and 
 more right to it, since our children are more his 
 than our own. He that feedeth the young ravensy 
 Ps. cxlvii, 9. can' he fail the best of his creatures?" 
 " Worthy Master Greenham tells us of a gen- 
 tlewoman, who coming into the cottage of a poor 
 neighbour, and seeing it furnished with store of 
 children, could say. Here are the mouths, but 
 where is the meat? but, not long after, she was 
 paid in her own coin : for the poor woman, coming 
 
VISIT TO THE CONTINENT. 23 
 
 to her after the burial of her last and now only 
 child, inverted the question upon her, * Here is 
 the meat, but where are the mouths ? '" * 
 
 The Bishop continues. — " I had not passed two 
 years in this estate, when my noble friend, Sir 
 Edmund Bacon, with whom I had much entire- 
 ness, came to me ; and earnestly solicited me for 
 my company in a journey, by him projected to the 
 Spa in Ardenna : laying before me the safety, the 
 easiness, the pleasure, and the benefit, of that small 
 extravagance, if opportunity were taken of that 
 time, when the Earl of Hertford passed in 
 embassy to the Ar( hduke Albert of Brussels. I 
 soon yielded ; as for the reasons by him urged, 
 so especially for the great desire I had to inform 
 myself ocularly of the state and practice of the 
 Romish church; the knowledge whereof might 
 be of no small use to me in my holy station. 
 
 ** Having, therefore, taken careful order for the 
 supply of my charge, with the assent and good 
 allowance of my nearest friends, I entered into 
 this secret voyage. 
 
 " We waited some days at Harwich for a wind ; 
 which we hoped might waft us over to Dunkirk, 
 where our Ambassador had lately landed : but, 
 at last, having spent a day and half a night at sea, 
 
 ♦ Bishop Hall's Works, vol. viii, p. 177. 
 
24 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 we were forced, for want of favor from the wind, 
 to put in at Queenborough : from whence coast- 
 ing over the rich and pleasant country of Kent, 
 we renewed our shipping at Dover ; and, soon 
 landing at Calais, we passed after two days by 
 waggon to the strong towns of Gravehnes and 
 Dunkirk : where I could not but find much 
 horror in myself to pass under those dark and 
 dreadful prisons, where so many brave English- 
 men had breathed out their souls in a miserable 
 captivity. From thence we passed through Win- 
 noxberg, Ypres, Ghent, Courtray, to Brussels; 
 where the Ambassador had newly sat down 
 before us. 
 
 *' That noble gentleman, in whose company I 
 travelled, was welcomed with many kind visita- 
 tions. Amongst the rest, there came to him an 
 English gentleman, who, having run himself out 
 of breath in the inns of court, had forsaken his 
 country, and therewith his religion; and was 
 turned both bigot and physician, residing now in 
 Brussels. This man, after few interchanges of 
 compliment with Sir Edmund Bacon, fell into a 
 hyperbolical predication of the wonderful miracles 
 done newly by our Lady at Zichem, or Sherpen- 
 Heavell, that is Sharp- Hill, by Lipsius Apri- 
 colli,s : the credit whereof when that worthy 
 knight wittily questioned, he avowed a particular 
 miracle of cure wrought by her on himself, I, 
 
VISIT TO THE CONTINENT. 25 
 
 coming into the room in the midst of this dis- 
 course, habited not like a divine but in such 
 color and fashion as might best secure ray travel, 
 and hearing my countryman's zealous and con- 
 fident relations, at last asked him this question : 
 
 * Sir,' quoth I, put case this report of yours be 
 granted for true, I beseech you teach me what 
 difference there is, betwixt these miracles which 
 you say are wrought by this lady, and those 
 which were wrought by Vespasian, by some 
 vestals, by charms, and spells ; the rather, for 
 that I have noted, in the late published report of 
 these miracles, some patients prescribed to come 
 on a Friday, and some to wash in such a well 
 before their approach, and divers other such 
 charm-like observations.' The gentleman, not 
 expecting such a question from me, answered, 
 
 * Sir, I do not profess this kind of scholarship; 
 but we have in the city many famous divines, 
 with whom if it would please you to confer, you 
 might sooner receive satisfaction.' I asked him 
 whom he took for the most eminent divine of 
 that place. He named to me Father Costerus : 
 undertaking that he would be very glad to give 
 me conference, if I would be pleased to come up 
 to the Jesuits' college. I willingly yielded. In 
 the afternoon, the forward gentleman prevented 
 his time to attend me to the Father, as he styled 
 him ; who, as he said, was ready to entertain me 
 
26 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 with a meeting. I went alone up with him. The 
 porter, shutting the door after me, welcomed me 
 with a Deo gratias. I had not staid long in the 
 Jesuits' hall, before Costerus came in to me : 
 who, after a friendly salutation, fell into a formal 
 speech of the unity of that church, out of which 
 is no salvation : and had proceeded to lose his 
 breath and labor, had not I, as civilly as I might, 
 interrupted him with this short answer : * Sir, I 
 beseech you mistake me not. My nation tells 
 you of what religion I am. I come not hither, 
 out of any doubt of my professed belief, or any 
 purpose to change it ; but, moving a question to 
 this gentleman concerning the pretended miracles 
 of the time, he pleased to refer me to yourself 
 for my answer : which motion of his I was the 
 more willing to embrace, for the fame that I have 
 heard of your learning and worth : and, if you 
 can give me satisfaction herein, I am ready to 
 receive it.' Hereon we settled to our places, at 
 a table in the end of the hall ; and buckled to a 
 further discourse. He fell into a poor and 
 unperfect account of the difference of divine 
 miracles and diabolical; which I modestly 
 refuted. From thence he slipped into a choleric 
 invective against our church, which, as he said, 
 could not yield one miracle ; and when I 
 answered, that, in our church, we had manifest 
 proofs of the ejection of devils by fasting and 
 
VISIT TO THE CONTINENT. Ht 
 
 prayer, he answered, that, if it could be proved, 
 that ever any devil was dispossessed in our 
 church, he would quit his religion. Many 
 questions were incidently traversed by us, wherein 
 I found no satisfaction given me. The confer- 
 ence was long and vehement: in the heat whereof, 
 who should come in but Father Baldwin, an 
 English Jesuit, known to me, as by face (after I 
 came to Brussels) so much more by fame. He 
 sat down on a bench, at the further end of the 
 table, and heard no small part of our disserta- 
 tion; seeming not too well apaid, that a gentle- 
 man of his nation (for still I was spoken to in 
 that habit, by the style of Dominatio vesira) 
 should depart from the Jesuits' college no better 
 satisfied. On the next morning, therefore, he 
 sends the same English physician to my lodging, 
 with a courteous compellation ; professing to 
 take it unkindly, that his countryman should 
 make choice of any other to confer with than 
 himself, who desired both mine acquaintance and 
 full satisfaction. Sir Edmund Bacon, in whose 
 hearing the message was delivered, gave me secret 
 signs of his utter unwillingness to give way to my 
 further conferences : the issue whereof, since we 
 were to pass further and beyond the bounds of 
 that protection, might prove dangerous. I 
 returned a mannerly answer of thanks to F. 
 Baldwin; but, for any further conference, that 
 
28 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 it were bootless. I could not hope to convert 
 him, and was resolved he should not alter me ; 
 and, therefore, both of us should rest where 
 we were, 
 
 " Departing from Brussels, we were for Namur 
 and Liege. In the way we found the good hand 
 of God, in delivering us from the danger of free- 
 booters ; and of a nightly entrance, amidst a 
 suspicious convoy, into that bloody city. 
 
 " Thence we came to the Spadane Waters ; 
 where I had good leisure to add a second Cen- 
 tury of Meditations to those I had published 
 before my journey. 
 
 " After we had spent a just time at those 
 medicinal wells, we returned to Liege ; and, in 
 our passage up the river Mosa, I had a dangerous 
 conflict with a Sorbonist, a prior of the Carme- 
 lites, who took occasion, by our kneeling at the 
 receipt of the Eucharist, to persuade all the 
 company of our acknowledgment of a transub- 
 stantiation. I satisfied the cavil; showing on 
 what ground this meet posture obtained with us. 
 The man grew furious upon his conviction ; and his 
 vehement associates began to join with him, in a 
 right-down railing upon our church and religion. 
 I told them they knew where they were: for 
 me, I had taken notice of the security of their 
 laws, inhibiting any argument held against their 
 religion established, and therefore stood only on 
 
VISIT TO THE CONTINENT. 29 
 
 my defence ; not casting any aspersion on theirs, 
 but ready to maintain our own : which though I 
 performed in as fair terms as I might, yet the 
 choler of those zealots was so moved, that the 
 paleness of their changed countenances began 
 to threaten some perilous issue, had not Sir 
 Edmund Bacon, both by his eye and by his 
 tongue, wisely taken me off. I subduced myself 
 speedily from their presence, to avoid further 
 provocation. The Prior began to bewray some 
 suspicions of my borrowed habit ; and told them 
 that himself had a green satin suit once prepared 
 for his travels into England : so as I found it 
 needful for me to lie close at TVamur. 
 
 ** From whence travelling the next day towards 
 Brussels in the company of two Italian captains, 
 Signior Ascanio Negro, and another whose name 
 I have forgotten : who, inquiring into our nation 
 and religion, wondered to hear that we had any 
 baptism or churches in England ; the congruity 
 of my Latin, in respect of their perfect barbarism, 
 drew me and the rest into their suspicion : so as 
 I might overhear them muttering to each other, 
 that we were not the men we appeared. Straight 
 the one of them boldly expressed his conceit; 
 and, together with this charge, began to inquire 
 of our condition. I told him, that the gentleman 
 he saw before us was the grandchild of that 
 renowned Bacon, the great chancellor of England, 
 
30 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 a man of great birth and quality; and that 
 myself and my other companion travelled in his 
 attendance to the Spa, from the train and under 
 the privilege of our late ambassador : with which 
 just answer I stopped their mouths. 
 
 *' Returning through Brussels, we came down 
 to Antwerp, the paragon of cities: where my 
 curiosity to see a solemn procession on St. John 
 Baptist's day might have drawn me into danger, 
 through my willing unreverence, had not the hulk 
 of a tall Brabanter, behind whom I stood in a 
 corner of the street, shadowed me from notice, 
 
 " Thence, down the fair river of Scheldt, we 
 came to Flushing: where, on the resolution of 
 our company to stay some hours, I hasted to 
 Middleburgh, to see an ancient colleague. That 
 visit lost me my passage. Ere I could return, 
 I might see our ship under sail for England. 
 The master had with the wind altered his pur- 
 pose; and called aboard with such eagerness, 
 that my company must either away, or undergo 
 the hazard of too much loss. I looked long 
 after them in vain; and, sadly returning to Mid- 
 dleburgh, waited long, for an inconvenient and 
 tempestuous j>assage." 
 
 The following account of his travels, in an 
 epistle to Sir Thomas Challoner, tutor to Henry 
 Prince of Wales, in addition to the above, is well 
 worthy to be recorded here : 
 
VISIT TO THE CONTINENT. 31 
 
 " Beside my hopes, not my desires, I travelled 
 of late: for knowledge, partly; and, partly, for 
 health. There was nothing, that made not my 
 journey pleasant, save the labour of the way: 
 which yet was so sweetly deceived, by the society 
 of Sir Edmund Bacon, a gentleman truly honour- 
 able beyond all titles, that I found small cause to 
 complain. 
 
 *' The sea brooked not me, nor I it ; an unquiet 
 element, made only for wonder and use, not for 
 pleasure. Alighted once from that wooden con- 
 veyance and uneven way, I bethought myself how 
 fondly our life is committed to an unsteady and 
 reeling piece of wood, fickle winds, restless 
 waters ; while we may set foot, on steadfast and 
 constant earth. 
 
 " Lo, then every thing taught me, every thing 
 delighted me: so ready are we to be affected 
 with those foreign pleasures, which, at home, we 
 should overlook. I saw much, as one might in 
 such a span of earth, in so few months. The time 
 favoured me : for, now newly had the key of 
 peace opened those parts, which war had before 
 closed ; closed, I say, to all EngHsh, save either 
 fugitives or captives. All civil occurrences ; as 
 what fair cities, what strange fashions, entertain- 
 ment, dangers, delights we found ; are fit for other 
 ears, and winter evenings : what 1 noted, as a 
 divine, within the sphere of my profession, my 
 
32 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 paper shall not spare, in some part, to report ; 
 and that to yourself, which have passed a longer 
 way, with more happy fruit of observation. Even 
 little streams empty themselves into great rivers ; 
 and they, again, into the sea. Neither do I desire 
 to tell you, what you know not : it shall be suffi- 
 cient, that I relate ought, which others shall think 
 memorable. 
 
 " Along our way, how many churches saw we 
 demolished! Nothing left, but rude heaps, to 
 tell the passenger, there had been both devotion 
 and hostility. Oh, the miserable footsteps of war, 
 besides bloodshed, ruin and desolation! Fury 
 hath done that there, which Covetousness would 
 do with us; would do, but shall not: the 
 truth within, shall save the walls without. And, 
 to speak truly, whatever the vulgar exclaim, 
 idolatry pulled down those walls ; not rage. If 
 there had been no Hollander to raze them, they 
 should have fallen alone; rather than hide so 
 much impiety, under their guilty roof These are 
 spectacles, not so much of cruelty, as justice: 
 cruelty of jnan, justice of God. 
 
 *' But, which I wondered at. Churches fall, and 
 Jesuits' Colleges rise, every where : there is no 
 city, where those are not either rearing or built. 
 "Whence cometh this ? Is it, for that devotion is 
 not so necessary, as policy ? Those men, as we 
 say of the fox, fare best, when thev are most 
 
VISIT TO THE CONTINENT. 33 
 
 cursed: none, so much spited of their own; none, 
 so hated of all; none, so opposed by -ours: and 
 yet these ill weeds grow. Whosoever lives long, 
 shall see them feared of their own, which now 
 hate them ; shall see these seven lean kine devour 
 all the fat beasts, that feed on the meadows ot 
 Tiber, I prophesy, as Pharaoh dreamed: the 
 event shall justify my confidence. 
 
 ** At Bruxilles, I saw some Englishwomen pro- 
 fess themselves Vestals ; with a thousand rites ; 
 I know not whether more ridiculous, or magical. 
 Poor souls ! they could not be fools enough at 
 home. It would have made you to pity, laugh, 
 disdain, I know not which more, to see, by what 
 cunning slights and fair pretences, that weak sex 
 was fetched into a wilful bondage : and, if those 
 two can agree, willingly constrained to serve a 
 master, whom they must and cannot obey : whom 
 they neither may forsake for their vow, nor can 
 please for their frailty. What follows hence? 
 Late sorrow, secret mischief, misery irremediable. 
 Their forwardness for will-worship, shall condemn 
 our coldness for truth. 
 
 ** I talked there, in more boldness perhaps than 
 wisdom, with Costerus, a famous Jesuit; an old 
 man, more testy than subtle, and more able to 
 wrangle than satisfy. Our discourse was long 
 and roving; and, on his part, full both of words 
 and vehemency. He spake, as at home ; I, as a 
 
34 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 stranger : yet so, as he saw me modestly peremp- 
 tory. The particulars would swell my letter too 
 much : it is enough, that the truth lost less than I 
 gained. 
 
 '* At Gant, a city that commands reverence 
 for age and wonder for the greatness, we fell upon 
 a Capuchin Novice, which wept bitterly, because 
 he was not allowed to be miserable. His head 
 had now felt the razor; his back, the rod : all that 
 Laconical discipline pleased him well; which 
 another, being condemned to, would justly ac- 
 count a torment. What hindered then ? Piety, 
 to his mother, would not permit this, which he 
 thought piety to God. He could not be a willing 
 beggar, unless his mother must beg unwillingly. 
 He was the only heir of his father, the only stay 
 of his mother: the comfort of her widowhood 
 depended on this her orphan ; who now, naked, 
 must enter into the world of the Capuchins, as he 
 came first into this ; leaving his goods to the divi- 
 sion of the fraternity : the least part whereof 
 should have been her's, whose he wished all. 
 Hence those tears, that repulse. I pitied his ill- 
 bestowed zeal; and rather wished, than durst, 
 teach him more wisdom. These men for devout, 
 the Jesuits for learned and pragmatical, have 
 engrossed all opinions, from other Orders. O 
 hypocrisy! No Capuchin may take or touch 
 silver : for these are, you know% the quintessence 
 
VISIT TO THE CONTINENT. 35 
 
 of Franciscan spirits. This metal is as very an 
 anathema to these, as the wedge of gold to 
 Achan : at the offer whereof he starts back, as 
 Moses from the Serpent: yet he carries a boy' 
 with him, that takes and carries it; and never 
 complains, of either metal or measure. I saw, 
 and laughed at it; and, by this open trick of 
 hypocrisy, suspected more, more close. How 
 could I choose? while, commonly, the least 
 appears of that which is ; especially of that which 
 is loathsome in appearance, much more in nature. 
 At Namur, on a pleasant and steep hill -top, we 
 found one, that was termed a married hermit; 
 approving his wisdom above his fellows, that 
 could make choice of so cheerful and sociable a 
 soHtariness. 
 
 " Whence, after a delightful passage up the 
 sweet river Mosa, * we visited the populous and 
 rich clergy of Leodium.f The great city might 
 well be dichotomized into cloisters and hospitals. 
 If I might adventure, I could here play the critic ; 
 after all the ruins of my neglected philology. 
 Old monuments, and after them our Lipsius, call 
 this people Eburones. I doubt whether it should 
 not rather be written Ebriones; yet, without 
 search of any other records, save my own eyes : 
 
 ♦ The Maes. t Liege. 
 
 D 2 
 
56 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 while yet I would those streets were most moist 
 with wine, than with blood ; wherein no day, no 
 night is not dismal to some. No law, no magis- 
 trate lays hold on the known murderer, if himself 
 list : for, three days after his fact, the gates are 
 open, and justice shut : private violence may 
 pursue him ; public justice cannot : whence, some 
 of more hot temper carve themselves of revenge ; 
 others take up with a small pecuniary satisfaction, 
 O England, thought I, happy for justice, happy 
 for security! There, you shall find, m every 
 corner, a maumet ; at every door, a beggar ; in 
 every dish, a priest. 
 
 " From thence we passed to the Spa, a village 
 famous for her medicinal and mineral waters, 
 compounded of iron and copperas; the virtue 
 whereof yet the simple inhabitant ascribes to 
 their beneficial Saint, whose heavy foot hath 
 made an ill-shaped impression, in a stone of his 
 Savenir,*^ a water more wholesome than plea- 
 sant, and yet more famous than wholesome. 
 
 '* The wide deserts on which it borders, are 
 haunted with three kinds of ill cattle ; freebooters, 
 wolves, witches: although these two last are 
 ofttimes one. For, that savage Ardenna is 
 reputed to yield many of those monsters, whom 
 the Greeks call AuKuv^p-jiTnii ; they, Lougarous ; we 
 
 * The name of the upper well of the Spa. 
 
VISIT TO THE CONTINENT. 37 
 
 if you will, Witch-wolves : witches, that have put 
 on the shape of those cruel beasts. We saw a 
 boy there, whose half-face was devoured by one 
 of them, near the village : yet so, as that the ear 
 was rather cut, than bitten off. Not many days 
 before our coming, at Limburgh,was executed one 
 of those miscreants, who confessed, on the wheel, 
 to have devoured two and forty children in that 
 form. It would ask a large volume, to scan this 
 problem of lycanthropy. The reasons, wherewith 
 their relation furnished me, on both parts, would 
 make an epistle tedious. This, in short, I 
 resolved : a substantial change is above the reach 
 of all infernal powers ; proper to the same hand 
 that created the substance of both : herein the 
 Devil plays the double sophister: yea, the sor. 
 cerer with sorcerers : he both deludes the witch s 
 conceit, and the beholders' eyes. 
 
 " One thing I may not omit, without sinful over- 
 sight; a short, but memorable story, which the 
 Greffier of that town, though of different religion, 
 reported to more ears than ours. When the last 
 Inquisition tyrannized in those parts, and helped 
 to spend the faggots of Ardenna ; one of the rest, 
 a confident confessor, being led far to his stake, 
 sung psalms along the way, in a heavenly courage 
 and victorious triumph. The cruel officer, envy- 
 ing his last mirth, and grieving to see him merrier 
 than his tormentors, commanded him silence : he 
 
38 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 sings still, as desirous to improve his last breath 
 to the best : the view of his approaching glory, 
 bred his joy ; his joy breaks forth into a cheerful 
 confession. The enraged Sheriff causes his tongue, 
 drawn forth to the length, to be cut off near the 
 roots. Bloody wretch ! It had been good music, 
 to have heard his shrieks ; but, to hear his music, 
 was torment. The poor Martyr dies in silence, 
 rests in peace. Not many months after, our 
 butcherly officer had a son born with his tongue 
 hanging down upon his chin, like a deer after 
 long chase ; w^hich never could be gathered up, 
 within the bounds of his lips. O the divine hand, 
 full of justice, full of revenge ! Go now, Lipsius, 
 and write the new miracles of thy goddess ; and 
 confirm superstition, by strange events. Judge, 
 you that have seen, if ever the chapel of Halle or 
 Ziehen have yielded ought more notable. 
 
 *' We met, every where, '^ pilgrims to those his 
 Ladies : two Ladies, shall I call them ; or one 
 Lady, in two shrines ? If two, why do they wor- 
 ship but one ? If but one, why doth she that cure 
 at Zichem, which at Halle she could not ? Oh, 
 what pity it is, that so high a wit should, in the 
 last act, be subject to dotage ! All the masculine 
 
 * Hisloire et Miracles, &c. " Que le 8. jour du moisde Sep- 
 terabre au diet an. 1603, elant Feste de la Nativity de notre 
 Dame, le nombre de pelerins a ete environ 20000." Page 35. 
 
VISIT TO THE CONTINENT. 39 
 
 brood of that braia we cherished, and, if need 
 were, admired: but these his silly virgins, the 
 feeble issue of distempered age, who can abide? 
 One of his darlings, at Louau, * told me, from his 
 own mouth, that the elderf of these two daugh- 
 ters, was by him, in ten days, got, conceived, 
 born, christened. I believed ; and wondered not. 
 These acts of superstition have an invisible father 
 and midwife: besides, that it is not for an ele- 
 phant to go three years with a mouse. It was 
 told me, in the shop of his Moretus, not without 
 some indignation, that our king, when he had well 
 viewed the book, and read some passages, threw 
 it to the ground, with this censure : " Damnation 
 to him, that made it ; and to him, that believer 
 it:'' whether a true story, or one of their legends, 
 1 enquire not : I am sure, that sentence did not 
 so much discontent them, as it joyed me. 
 
 ** Let me tell you yet, ere I take off my pen, 
 two wonders more, which I saw in that wonder 
 of cities, Antwerp. 
 
 " One, a solemn mass in a shambles, and that 
 on God's day : while the house was full of meat, 
 of butchers, of buyers, some kneeling, others bar- 
 gaining, most talking, all busy. It was strange, to 
 see one house sacred to God and the belly ; and 
 how those two services agreed. The priest did 
 
 * Louvaine. t f^irgo Halleru^t, 
 
40 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 eat flesh, the butchers sold flesh ; in one roof, at 
 one instant. The butcher killed, and sold it by 
 pieces; the priest did sacrifice, and orally devour 
 it whole : whether was the more butcher ? The 
 like we might have seen at Malines 
 
 " The other, an Englishman,* so madly devout, 
 that he had wilfully mured up himself as an 
 anchorite ; the worst of all prisoners : there sat 
 he, pent up, for his further merit ; half hunger- 
 starved, for the charity of the citizens. It was 
 worth seeing, how manly he could bite in his 
 secret want; and dissemble his over-late repent- 
 ance. 1 cannot commend his mortification, if he 
 wish to be in heaven, yea, in purgatory, to be 
 delivered from thence. I durst not pity him; 
 because his durance was willing, and, as he hoped, 
 meritorious : but, such encouragement as he had 
 from me, such thank shall he have from God ; 
 who, instead of an '* Euge," which he looks for, 
 shall angrily challenge him, with '* Who required 
 this?'' I leave him now, in his own fetters ; you, 
 to your worthy and honourable employments. 
 
 " Pardon me this length. Loquacity is the 
 natural fault of Travellers : while I profit any, I 
 may well be forgiven." 
 
 * One Goodwin, a Kentish-man. 
 
HIS REMOVAL FROM HALSTEAD. 41 
 
 The Bishop continues the ** Account of him- 
 self."— 
 
 " After some year and half, it pleased God inex- 
 pectedly to contrive the change of my station. 
 ** My means were but short at Halsted ; yet, 
 such as I oft professed, if my then patron would 
 have added but one ten pounds by year, which I 
 held to be the value of my detained due, I should 
 never have removed. One morning, as I lay in 
 my bed, a strong motion was suddenly glanced 
 into my thoughts of going to London. I arose, 
 and betook me to the way. The ground, that 
 appeared of that purpose, was to speak with my 
 patron Sir Robert Drury ; if, by occasion of the 
 pubhc preachership of St. Edmund's-Bury then 
 offered me on good conditions, 1 might draw him 
 to a willing yieldance of that parcel of my due 
 maintenance, which was kept back from my not 
 over- deserving predecessor : who, hearing my 
 errand, dissuaded me from so ungainful a change, 
 which, had it been to my sensible advantage, he 
 should have readily given way unto ; but not 
 offering me the expected encouragement of my 
 continuance. 
 
 ** With him I staid, and preached on the Sunday 
 following. That day Sir Robert Drury, meeting 
 with the Lord Denny, fell belike into the com- 
 mendation of my sermon. That religious and 
 
4t LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 noble Lord had long harboured good thoughts 
 concerning me, on the reading of those poor 
 pamphlets which I had formerly published ; and 
 long wished the opportunity to know me. To 
 please him in this desire, Sir Robert willed me to 
 go and tender my service to his Lordship ; which 
 I modestly and seriously deprecated : yet, on his 
 earnest charge, went to his Lordship's gate; 
 where I was not sorry to hear of his absence. 
 
 " Being now full of cold and distemper in 
 Drury-lane, I was found out by a friend, in 
 whom I had formerly no great interest, one Mr. 
 Gurrey, tutor to the Earl of Essex. He told me 
 how well my Meditations were accepted at the 
 Prince's court, ^ and earnestly advised me to step 
 over to Richmond, and preach to his Highness. 
 I strongly pleaded my indisposition of body, and 
 my inpreparation for any such work; together 
 with my bashful fears, and utter unfitness for such 
 a presence. My averseness doubled his impor- 
 tunity: in fine, he left me not, till he had my 
 engagement to preach the Sunday following at 
 Richmond. He made way for me to that awful 
 pulpit ; and encouraged me by the favour of his 
 noble lord, the Earl of Essex. I preached. 
 Through the favour of my God, that sermon was 
 
 Prince Henry. 
 
HIS BEMOVAL FROM HALSTEAD. 45 
 
 not SO well given as takea ; insomuch as that 
 sweet prince signified his desire to hear rae again 
 the Tuesday following. Which done, that labor 
 gave more contentment than the former: so as 
 that gracious prince both gave me his hand and 
 commanded me to his service. 
 
 ** My patron, seeing me, on my return to Lon- 
 don, looked after by some great persons, began to 
 wish me at home; and told me, that some or other 
 would be snatching me up. I answered, that it 
 was in his power to prevent : would he be pleased 
 to make my maintenance but so competent as in 
 right it should be, I would never stir from him. 
 Instead of condescending, it pleased him to 
 fall into an expostulation of the rate of competen- 
 cies ; affirming the variableness thereof, according 
 to our own estimation, and our either raising or 
 moderating the causes of our expenses. I shewed 
 him the insufficiency of my means : that I was 
 forced to write books to buy books. Shortly, 
 some harsh and unpleasing answer so disheartened 
 me, that I resolved to embrace the first oppor- 
 tunity of my remove. 
 
 " Now, while I was taken up with these anxious 
 thoughts, a messenger (it was Sir Robert Wing- 
 field of Northampton's son) came to me from the 
 Lord Denny, now Earl of Norwich, my after 
 most honorable patron, entreating me from his 
 Lordship to speak with him. No sooner came I 
 
44 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 thither, than, after a glad and noble welcome, I 
 was entertained with the earnest offer of Waltham. 
 The conditions were, like the mover of them, free 
 and bonntifal. I received them, as from the 
 munificent hand of God : and returned , full of the 
 cheerful acknowledgments of a gracious provi- 
 dence over me." 
 
 The church of Waltham is neither rectory nor 
 vicarage, but a curacy or donative, cum curd 
 animariim, and, anciently had only a poor stipend 
 of £8. a year pertaining to it, till by the pious 
 bounty of Edward Earl of Norwich, £100. per 
 annum, with other considerable accommodations, 
 were settled upon the incumbent, and good lands 
 tied for the true payment thereof.* 
 
 How unwilling Mr. Hall was to be obliged to 
 remove from Halstead ; and his feelings on the 
 occasion, are particularly described in the follow- 
 ing letter to Sir Robert Drury, and his lady, con- 
 cerning his removal from them : 
 
 * See Magna Britannia, vol. i, p. 655. Ed. 1720. 4to. Dr. 
 Thomas Fuller, the Author of the Church History, History of 
 Waltham Abbey, " Worthies," &c. &c. was collated to this 
 donative by the Rt. Hon. John Haye, Earl of Carlisle. Fuller, 
 speaking of his predecessor Hall, says, ** Here I must pay the 
 tribute of my gratitude to his memory, as building upon his 
 foundation, beholding myself as his great-grand-child in that 
 place, three degrees from him in succession : but, Oh I how 
 many from him in ability !" Worthies, vol, i, p. 566. 4to, 
 Ed. 1811. 
 
HIS REMOVAL FROM HALSTEAD. 45 
 
 ** With how unwilHng a heart I leave you, He 
 knows, that searches the heart: neither durst I 
 go, but that I sensibly see his hand pulHng me 
 from you. Indeed, desire of competency betrayed 
 me, at first ; and drew mine eyes to look aside : 
 but, when I bent them upon the place, and saw 
 the number and the need of the people, together 
 with their hunger and applause, meeting with the 
 circumstances of God's strange conveyance of 
 this offer to me; I saw, that was but as the 
 fowler's feather, to make me stoop: and, con- 
 temning that respect of myself, I sincerely 
 acknowledged higher motives of my yielding ; and 
 resolved I might not resist. 
 
 " You are dear to me, as a Charge to a Pastor : 
 if my pains to you have not proved it, suspect me. 
 Yet I leave you. God calls me to a greater 
 work : I must follow him. It were more ease to 
 me, to live secretly hidden in that quiet obscurity, 
 as Saul amongst the stuff", than to be drawn out to 
 the eye of the world ; to act so high a part, before 
 a thousand witnesses. In this point, if I seem to 
 neglect you, blame me not : I must neglect and 
 forget myself. 
 
 " I can but labour, wheresoever I am. God 
 knows how willingly I do that ; whether there or 
 here. I shall dig, and delve, and plant, in what 
 ground soever ray Master sets me. If he take 
 
46 LIFE OP BISHOP HALL. 
 
 me to a larger field, complain you not of loss, 
 while the Church may gain. 
 
 *' But, you are my own charge : no wise father 
 neglects his own, in compassion of the greater 
 need of others : yet consider, that even careful 
 parents, when the prince commands, leave their 
 families, and go to warfare. 
 
 '* What if God had called me to heaven ? would 
 you have grudged my departure? Imagine that 
 I am there, where 1 shall be; although the case 
 be not to you altogether hopeless : for, now I 
 may hear of you, visit you, renew my holy coun- 
 sels, and be mutually comforted from you; there, 
 none of these. He, that will once transpose me 
 from earth to heaven, hath now chosen to trans- 
 pose me from one piece of earth to another : what 
 is here worthy of your sorrow ; worthy of com- 
 plaint? That should be for my own good: this 
 shall be for the good of many. If your experi- 
 eace have taught you, that my labours do promise 
 profit; obtain of yourself to deny yourself so 
 much, as to rejoice that the loss of a few should 
 be the advantage of many souls. Though, why 
 do I speak of loss ? I speak that, as your fear, 
 not my own : and your affection causes that fear, 
 rather than the occasion. 
 
 " The God of the Harvest shall send you a 
 labourer, more able ; as careful. That is my 
 prayer, and hope, and shall be my joy. I dare 
 
COLLATED TO WALTHAM. 47 
 
 not leave, but in this expectation, this assurance. 
 Whatever become of me, it shall be my greatest 
 comfort to hear you commend your change ; and 
 to see your happy progress in those ways, I have 
 both shewed you, and beaten. So shall we meet 
 in the end, and never part."* 
 
 About the time he was collated to Waltham 
 Holy Cross, that is about the year 1612, he took 
 his degree of Doctor in Divinity. He was also at 
 this time a principal instrument in determining 
 Thomas Sutton, Esq. the founder of the Charter- 
 house, to purchase and erect that famous hospital. 
 See his letter to Mr. Sutton in the 7th volume of 
 his Works, p. 243, wherein he excites " him, and 
 in him, all others, to early and cheerful benefi- 
 cence, shewing the necessity and benefit of good 
 works."! 
 
 He continues his own account. — ** Too late 
 now did my former noble patron relent; and 
 offer me those terms, which had, before, fastened 
 me for ever. 
 
 ♦ Bp. Hall's Works, vol. vii, p. 143. 
 
 t Hern, in vit. SuUon 59. Thomas Sutton, Esq. purchased 
 the dissolved Charter House, in 1611, for £ 13,000, and founded 
 the hospital as it now stands, with an intention of being the 
 tifst master, but died before its completion, Dec. 12, the same 
 year. At his death, he was the richest commoner in the 
 kingdom. 
 
48 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 ** I returned home, happy in a new master, and 
 in a new patron : betwixt whom I divided myself 
 and my labors, with much comfort and no less 
 acceptation." 
 
 About the year 1610, Mr. Hall appeared a 
 very able apologist for the Church of England 
 against the JBroivnists, a sect then newly sprung 
 up, and so denominated from one Robert Brown, a 
 fiery, hot-headed person, who, about the year 
 1580, and before, went about the country, inveigh- 
 ing against the discipline and ceremonies of the 
 church, and exhorting the people by no means to 
 comply with them. He boasted that for his 
 preaching against Bishops, ceremonies, &c. he 
 had been committed to thirty-two prisons, in 
 some of which he could not see his hand at noon- 
 day. He and several of his followers left the 
 kingdom, and settled at Middleburg in Zealand. 
 There he formed a church according to his own 
 model ; but his people began to quarrel so vio- 
 lently, and divide into parties, that he returned to 
 England in 1585. His father would not admit 
 him into his house, saying, " that he would not 
 own him for a son who would not own the Church 
 of England for his mother. After rambhng and 
 preaching against the church up and down the 
 country, he settled at Northampton. But here 
 
WRITINGS AGAINST THE BROWNISTS. 49 
 
 his preaching was so offensive that he was cited 
 before Dr. Linsdale, Bishop of Peterborough, 
 who, upon refusing to appear, publicly excommu- 
 nicated him for contempt. This made such an 
 impression upon the mind of Brown, that he 
 renounced his principles of separation, and having 
 obtained absolution, he was about the year 1592, 
 preferred to the rectory of a church near Oundle 
 in Northamptonshire. According to Fuller, that 
 far from the Sabbatarian strictness espoused by 
 his followers, he was rather dissolute and a liber- 
 tine; '* in a word," continues our historian, ** he 
 had a wife with whom he never lived, a church in 
 which he never preached, and as all the other 
 scenes of his life were stormy and turbulent, so 
 was his end."* For being poor, and proud and 
 very passionate, he struck the constable of his 
 parish for demanding the payment of a rate; and 
 being beloved by no body, he was summoned 
 before a magistrate Sir Rowland St. John, who 
 committed him to Northampton goal. The 
 decrepid old man not being able to walk, was 
 carried thither upon a feather bed in a cart, where 
 not long after he died, in 1630, in the 81st year 
 of his age. The Brownists, though they pre- 
 tended that they did not differ from the Church 
 of England in any article of faith, yet so far 
 
 • Fuller's Ch. Hist, ch.ix, p. 167. 
 E 
 
50 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 dissented from it, as not to allow it to be a true 
 church, nor its ministers to be rightly ordained. 
 They maintained the discipline of the Church to 
 be popish and anti-christian, and all her ordi- 
 nances and sacraments invalid. Hence they 
 renounced all communion with it in prayer, in 
 hearing the word, or in any part of pubhc 
 worship. And they not only renounced com- 
 munion with the Church of England, but with all 
 others, except such as should be of their own 
 model. So rigid and narrow they were in points 
 of discipline. 
 
 Mr. Hall, about the year 1608, wrote a Let- 
 ter to Mr. John Smith and Mr. John Robinson, 
 who separated from the Church, turned Brown- 
 ists, and settled at Amsterdam as ringleaders * 
 of the party there; in which letter he states 
 the injury done by them to the church, the 
 injustice of their cause, and fearfulness of their 
 offence, censuring and advising them thus : — 
 
 " We hear of your separation, and mourn ; yet 
 not so much for you, as for your wrong." 
 
 * Robinson, in his pamphlet, called, " an Answer to a Cen- 
 sorious Epistle," seemed displeased at being called ** a ringleader 
 of the late separation ;" Hall wittily retorts, '* Perhaps I 
 should have put him in the tail of this train. Perhaps I should 
 have endorsed my letter to Mr. Smith and his Shadow." Apology 
 against the Brownists, Works, vol. ix, p. 401. 
 
( 
 
 WRITINGS AGAINST THE BROWNIST3. 51' 
 
 " You could not do a greater injury to your 
 mother, than to flee from her. Say, she were 
 poor, ragged, weak ; say, she were deformed ; 
 yet she is not infectious : or, if she were, yet she 
 is yours. This were cause enough for you to 
 lament her, to pray for her, to labour for her 
 redress ; not to avoid her. This unnaturalness 
 is shameful ; and more heinous in you, who are 
 reported not parties in this evil, bat authors. 
 Your flight is not so much, as your misguidance. 
 
 " Plead not: this fault is past excuse : if we all 
 should follow you, this were the way of a Church, 
 as you plead, imperfect, to make no Church ; 
 and of a remedy, to make a disease. Still the 
 fruit of our charity to you, is, besides our grief, 
 pity. Your zeal of truth hath misled you, and 
 you others: a zeal, if honest, yet bhndfolded, 
 and led by self-will. Oh, that you loved peace, 
 but half so well as truth : then, this breach had 
 never been : and you, that are yet brethren, had 
 been still companions. 
 
 " * Go out of Babylon,' you say, * the voice, 
 not of schism, but of holiness.' Know you 
 where you are ? Look about you, I beseech 
 you : look behind you ; and see if we have not 
 left it upon our backs. She herself feels, and 
 sees, that she is abandoned : and complains to 
 all the world, that we have not only forsaken, 
 but spoiled her ; and yet you say, ' Come out of 
 
 E 2 
 
52 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL, 
 
 Babylon.' And except you will be willingly 
 blind; you may see the heaps of her altars, the 
 ashes of her idols, the ruins of her monuments, 
 the condemnation of her errors, the revenge of 
 her abominations. 
 
 ** And are we yet in Babylon? Is Babylon 
 yet amongst us ? Where are the main buildings 
 of that accursed city: those high and proud 
 towers, of their universal hierarchy; infallible 
 judgment ; dispensation with laws of God, and 
 sins of men ; disposition of kingdoms ; deposition 
 of princes; parting stakes with God in our 
 conversion, through freedom of will; in our 
 salvation, through the merit of our works? 
 Where are those rotten heaps (rotten, not 
 through age, but corruption) of transubstantiating 
 of bread, adoring of images, multitude of sacra- 
 ments, power of indulgences, necessity of con- 
 fessions, profit of pilgrimages, constrained and 
 approved ignorance, unknown devotions? Where 
 are those deep vaults, if not mines, of penances 
 and purgatories, and whatsoever hath been 
 devised by those popelings, whether profitable 
 or glorious, against the Lord and his Christ? 
 Are they not all razed, and buried in the dust? 
 Hath not the majesty of her gods, like as was 
 done to Mythra and Serapis, been long ago 
 offered to the pubUc laughter of the vulgar? 
 
WRITINGS AGAINST THE BROWNISTS. 53 
 
 What is this, but to go, yea to run, if not to fly, 
 out of Babylon? 
 
 " But, as every man is a hearty patron of his 
 own actions, and it is a desperate cause that hath 
 no plea, you allege our consorting in Ceremonies; 
 and say, still we tarry in the suburbs. Grant 
 that these were as ill, as an enemy can make 
 them, or can pretend them : you are deceived, 
 if you think the walls of Babylon stand upon 
 Ceremonies. Substantial errors are both her 
 foundation and frame. These ritual observations 
 are not so much as tile and reed : rather like to 
 some fane upon the roof; for ornament, more 
 than use : not parts of the building ; but not 
 necessary appendances. If you take them other- 
 wise, you wrong the Church : if thus, and yet 
 depart, you wrong it and yourself: as if you 
 would have persuaded righteous Lot, not to stay 
 in Zoar, because it was so near Sodom. I fear, 
 if you had seen the money-changers in the 
 Temple, however you would have prayed, or 
 taught there: Christ did it; not forsaking the 
 place, but scourging the offenders. And this is 
 the valour of Christian Teachers, to oppose 
 abuses, not to run away from them. Where 
 shall you not thus find Babylon? Would you 
 have run from Geneva, because of her wafers ? or, 
 from Corinth, for her disordered love-feasts r 
 
54 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 " Either run out of the world, or your flight is 
 in vain. If experience of change teach you not, 
 that you shall find your Babylon every where, 
 return not. Compare the place you have left, 
 with that you have chosen: let not fear of 
 seeming to repent over-soon, make you partial. 
 Lo there a common harbour of all opinions, of all 
 heresies; if not a mixture: here, you drew in 
 the free and clear air of the Gospel, without 
 that odious composition of Judaism, Arianism, 
 Anabaptism : there, you live in the stench of 
 these, and more. You are unworthy of pity, if 
 you will approve your misery. Say, if you can, 
 that the Church of England, (if she were not 
 yours) is not a heaven, to Amsterdam. How is 
 it then, that our gnats are harder to swallow, 
 than their camels ? and that, while all Christen- 
 dom magnifies our happiness and applauds it, 
 your handful alone so detests our enormities, that 
 you despise our graces? 
 
 " See, whether in this, you make not God a 
 loser. The thank of all his favours is lost, 
 because you want more : and in the mean time, 
 who gains by this sequestration, but Rome and 
 Hell? How do they insult in this advantage, 
 that our mother's own children condemn her for 
 unclean, that we are daily weakened by our 
 divisions, that the rude multitude hath so palpa- 
 ble a motive to distrust us ? Sure, you intended it 
 
WRITINGS AGAINST THE BROWNISTS. 55 
 
 not: but, if you had been their hired agent, you 
 could not have done our enemies greater service. 
 The God of Heaven open your eyes, that you 
 may see the injustice of that zeal, which hath 
 transported you ; and turn your heart to an 
 endeavour of all Christian satisfaction : otherwise, 
 your souls shall find too late, that it had been a 
 thousand times better to swallow a Ceremony, 
 than to rend a Church; yea, that even whore- 
 doms and murders shall abide an easier answer, 
 than separation. 
 
 " I have done, if only I have advised you of 
 that fearful threatening of the Wise Man : The 
 eye, that mocketh his father, and despises the 
 government of his mother, the ravens of the valley 
 shall pick it out, and the young eagles eat it'' 
 
 Smith was a person of unsettled principles, 
 and was for refining the Brownists' scheme. He 
 advanced and maintained the doctrines of free- 
 will and universal redemption, and similar tenets, 
 afterwards espoused by Arminius. — We are also 
 told that he entertained some extravagant notions, 
 as the unlawfulness of reading the Scriptures in 
 public worship — that no translation of the Bible 
 was the word of God — that singing the praises 
 of God in verses, or in set words, was without 
 authority— that flight in time of persecution was 
 unlawful — that the new creature needed not the 
 
5^ LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 support of Scripture and ordinances, but was 
 above them — and that perfection was attainable 
 in this life. * The consequence of such opinions 
 caused a serious division among the Brownists. 
 Smith declared for the principles of the Baptists, 
 and gave a proof of the absurdity of his conduct, 
 in performing the ceremony of baptism upon 
 himself, on which account he was stigmatized by 
 the name of se-baptist. Hall alludes to this 
 when he speaks in his dedication before his 
 " Apology against the Brownists," of one ivho 
 had washed off the font water, as unclean; and 
 in Sec. 2, of the same Treatise, " he ^hath 
 renounced our Christendom with our Church, 
 and hath washed off his former water, with 
 new." t 
 
 Robinson was a beneficed clergyman near Yar- 
 mouth, but seceded from the Church, embraced 
 Broivnism, and settled in Holland. In reply to 
 Hall's epistle, addressed to him and Smith, 
 he wrote a pamphlet, called '' An Answer 
 to a censorious Epistle," in which the *' blasphe- 
 mous imputations of apostacy, antichristianism, 
 whoredom, rebellion, &c." are cast upon the 
 Church of England. This scurrilous pamphlet 
 
 * Life of A ins worth, p. 38. 
 t Bishop Hall's Works, vol. ix, p. 384. 
 
PRINCE HENRY. 57 
 
 was the cause of Hall's writing his ** Coramon 
 Apology of the Church of England against the 
 unjust Challenges of the over-just Sect, com- 
 monly called Brownists." 
 
 The Narrative continues. 
 
 ** In the second year of mine attendance on his 
 Highness, when I came for my dismission from 
 that monthly service, it pleased the Prince to 
 command me a longer stay ; and, at last, upon mine 
 allowed departure, by the mouth of Sir Thomas 
 Challoner, his governor, to tender unto me a 
 motion of more honor and favour than 1 was 
 worthy of: which was, that it was his Highness' 
 pleasure and purpose, to have me continually 
 resident at the court as a constant attendant, 
 while the rest held on their wonted vicissitudes : 
 for which purpose, his Highness would obtain for 
 me such preferments as should yield me full con- 
 tentment. I returned my humblest thanks, and 
 my readiness to sacrifice myself to the service of 
 so gracious a master; but, being conscious to 
 myself of my unanswerableness to so great expec- 
 tation, and loath to forsake so dear and noble a 
 patron, who had placed much of his heart on me, 
 I did modestly put it off, and held close to my 
 Waltham : where, in a constant course, I preached 
 a long time, as 1 had done also at Halstead 
 before, thrice in the week ; yet never durst I 
 
58 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 climb into the pulpit to preach any sermon 
 whereof I had not before, in my poor and plain 
 fashion, penned every word in the same order 
 wherein I hoped to deliver it; although, in the 
 expression, I listed not to be a slave to syllables." 
 
 Prince Henry, the eldest son of James I. died 
 Nov. 6, 1612, aged eighteen years and eight 
 months. It has been rumoured that his death 
 was caused by poison, but his physicians declared 
 to the contrary. Welwood says, that " it was 
 the general rumour at that time, that this prince 
 was poisoned. Whatever was in it, there is yet 
 in print a sermon preached at St. James' upon the 
 dissolution of his family, that boldly insinuated 
 some such thing." * Now Hall preached a fare- 
 well sermon to the household of Prince Henry, 
 on the day of their dissolution at St. James', 
 March 25, 1613, when the loss of such an excel- 
 lent prince is pathetically lamented ;f but the 
 writer of this work can find not the least insinua- 
 tion alleged in this sermon that his death was 
 occasioned by poison. Prince Henry was of a 
 most amiable disposition, and excellent genius, 
 exceedingly beloved whilst living, and greatly 
 lamented after his death. He was one of the 
 
 * Memoirs, p. 20. t Bishop Hall's Works, vol. v, p. 65. 
 
PREBENDARY OF WOLVERHAMPTON. 59 
 
 most accomplished persons of his age, sober, 
 chaste, temperate, full of honor and probity, and 
 was never heard to swear. He was an ardent 
 lover of piety and religion, and accordingly the 
 lover of all good men.* Hall dedicated several of 
 his works to this prince, and touches with grati- 
 tude upon his kindness and virtues. Mr. (after- 
 wards Sir) Adam Newton was the tutor of this 
 prince, by whose instructions he is Said to have 
 greatly profited. In a letter of Dr. Joseph Hall 
 to Mr. Newton, upon the prince being put under 
 his tuition, there are some excellent rules and 
 valuable maxims highly worthy of the attention 
 of those who may have the charge of educating 
 any of the branches of the royal family, f 
 
 We return to the Bishop's Account. 
 
 ** In this while, my w^orthy kinsman, Mr. Samuel 
 Barton, archdeacon of Gloucester, knowing in 
 how good terms I stood at court, and pitying the 
 miserable condition of his native church of 
 Wolverhampton, was very desirous to engage me 
 in so difficult and noble a service as the redemp- 
 tion of that captivated church. For which cause 
 he importuned me to move some of my friends to 
 
 * See Harris's Life of James I. pp. 294-302. Neale's His- 
 tory of the Puritans, vol. ii, pp. 94, 95. Ed. 1794. 
 
 t Bishop Hall's Works, vol. vii, p. 126. 
 
60 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 solicit the Dean of Windsor, who by an ancient 
 
 annexation is patron thereof, for the grant of a 
 
 particular prebend, when it should fall vacant in 
 
 that church. Answer was returned me, that it 
 
 was fore-promised to one of my fellow-chaplains. 
 
 I sat down, without further expectation. Some 
 
 year or two after, hearing that it was become 
 
 void, and meeting with that fellow-chaplain of 
 
 mine, I wished him much joy of the prebend. He 
 
 asked me if it were void : I assured him so ; and, 
 
 telling him of the former answer, delivered to me 
 
 in my ignorance of his engagement, wished him to 
 
 hasten his possession of it. He delayed not'. 
 
 When he came to the Dean of Windsor for his 
 
 promised dispatch, the Dean brought him forth 
 
 a letter from the Prince, wherein he was desired 
 
 and charged to reverse his former engagement, 
 
 since that other chaplain was otherwise provided 
 
 for: and to cast that favor on me. I was sent 
 
 for, who least thought of it; and received the free 
 
 collation of that poor dignity. It was not the 
 
 value of the place, which was but nineteen nobles 
 
 per annum, that we aimed at; but the freedom of 
 
 a goodly church, consisting of a dean and eight 
 
 prebendaries competently endowed, and many 
 
 thousand souls lamentably swallowed up by wilful 
 
 recusants, in a pretended fee-farm for ever. 
 
 ** O God, what a hand hadst thou in the car- 
 riage of this work ! 
 
PREBENDARY OF WOLVERHAMPTON. 61 
 
 ** When we set foot in this suit (for another of 
 the prebendaries joined with me) we knew not 
 wherein to insist, nor where to ground a com- 
 plaint : only we knew that a goodly patrimony 
 was, by sacrilegious conveyance, detained from 
 the church. But, in the pursuit of it, such mar- 
 vellous light opened itself inexpectedly to us, in 
 revealing of a counterfeit seal, found in the ashes 
 of that burned house, of a false register; in the 
 manifestation of rasures and interpolations, and 
 misdates of unjustifiable evidences ; that, after 
 many years' suit, the wise and honorable Lord 
 Chancellor Ellesmere, upon a full hearing, adjudged 
 these two sued-for prebends, clearly to be returned 
 to the church, until, by common law, they could, 
 if possibly, be revicted. Our great adversary, 
 Sir Walter Leveson, finding it but loss and trouble 
 to struggle for litigious sheaves, came oflf to a 
 peaceable composition with me of forty pounds 
 per annum for my part, whereof ten should be to 
 the discharge of my stall in that church, till the 
 suit should by course of common law be deter- 
 mined : we agreed on fair wars. The cause was 
 heard at the King's Bench bar, where a special 
 verdict was given for us. On the death of my 
 partner in the suit, in whose name it had now 
 been brought, it was renewed; a jury empan- 
 nelled in the county : the foreman, who had 
 vowed he would carry it for Sir Walter Leveson 
 
(52 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 howsoever, was, before the day, stricken mad, 
 and so continued. We proceeded with the same 
 success we formerly had. While we were thus 
 striving, a word fell from my adversary, that gave 
 me intimation, that a third dog would perhaps 
 come in, and take the bone from us both : which 
 I finding to drive at a supposed concealment, 
 happily prevented ; for I presently addressed 
 niyself to his Majesty, with a petition for the 
 renewing the charter of that church ; and the full 
 establishment of the lands, rights, liberties, thereto 
 belonging; which I easily obtained from those 
 gracious hands. Now Sir Walter Leveson, seeing 
 the patrimony of the church so fast and safely 
 settled, and misdoubting what issue those his 
 crazy evidences would find at the common law, 
 began to incline to offers of peace ; and at last 
 drew him so far, as that he yielded to those two 
 main conditions, not particularly for myself, but 
 for the whole body of all those prebends which 
 pertained to the church : first, that he would be 
 content to cast up that fee-farm, which he had of 
 all the patrimony of that church ; and, disclaiming 
 it, receive that which he held of the said church 
 by lease, from us the several prebendaries, for 
 term, whether of years, or, which he rather 
 desired, of lives ; secondly, that he would raise 
 the maintenance of every prebend (whereof some 
 were but forty shillings, others three pounds, 
 
PREBENDARY OF WOLVERHAMPTON. 63 
 
 others four, &c.) to the yearly value of thirty 
 pounds to each man, during the said term of his 
 lease: only, for a monument of my labor and 
 success herein, I required that my prebend might 
 have the addition of ten pounds per annum above 
 the fellows. We were busily treating of this happy 
 match for that poor church : Sir Walter Leveson 
 was not only willing, but forward: the then 
 Dean, Mr. Antonius de Dominis, archbishop of 
 Spalato,* gave both way and furtherance to the 
 dispatch : all had been most happily ended, had 
 not the scrupulousness of one or two of the 
 number deferred so advantageous a conclusion. 
 In the meanwhile, Sir Walter Leveson dies ; 
 leaves his young orphan ward to the King: all 
 our hopes were now blown up; an office was 
 found of all those lands ; the very wonted pay- 
 ments were denied, and I called into the Court 
 of Wards, in fair likelihood, to forego my former 
 hold, and yielded possession. Bat the^e it w^s 
 
 * See an excellent leUer of Bishop Hall, in Latin, to this 
 Archbishop, in vol. ix. of his Works, p. 214, upon the Arch- 
 bishop's leaving the Church of England, to reconcile himself to 
 that of Rome, This letter is remarkably expressive of Bishop 
 Hall's piety, zeal, and integrity. The Archbishop left England 
 with permission from King James, went to Rome, and was 
 kindly entertained by Pope Gregory XV. After his death hs 
 was thrown into the inquisition, and died soon after, not without 
 suspicion of poison. The day following, his body was tied to 
 a stake, and burnt by the sentence of the inquisition. 
 
 See Dr. Cosins' Hist, of Transubs. ed. 1676. 
 
64 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 justly awarded by the Lord Treasurer, then 
 Master of the Wards, that the orphan could have 
 no more, no other right than the father : I was, 
 therefore, left in my former state : only upon public 
 complaint of the hard condition wherein the 
 orphan was left, I suffered myself to be over- 
 entreated, to abate somewhat of that evicted 
 composition. Which work having once firmly 
 settled, in a just pity of the mean provision, if not 
 the destitution of so many thousand souls, and a 
 desire and care to have them comfortably pro- 
 vided for in the future, I resigned up the said 
 prebend to a worthy preacher, Mr. Lee, who 
 should constantly reside there, and painfully 
 instruct that great and long neglected people : 
 which he hath hitherto performed with great 
 mutual contentment and happy success. 
 
 *' Now during this twenty-two years which I 
 spent at Waltham, thrice was I commanded and 
 employed abroad by his Majesty in public 
 service. 
 
 '* First, in the attendance of the Rt. Honorable 
 Earl of Carlisle, then Lord Viscount Doncaster, 
 who was sent on a noble embassy with a gallant 
 retinue into France: whose entertainment there, 
 the annals of that nation will tell to posterity. 
 In the midst of that service was 1 surprised with 
 a miserable distemper of body ; which ended in 
 a diarrhcea biliosa, not without some beginning 
 
PREBENDARY OF WOLVERHAMPTON. 65 
 
 and further threats of a dysentery : wherewith I 
 was brought so low, that there seemed small 
 hope of my recovery. Mr. Peter Moulin, to whom 
 I was beholden for his frequent visitations, being 
 sent by my Lord Ambassador to inform him of 
 my estate, brought him so sad news thereof, as 
 that he was much afflicted therewith ; well suppos- 
 ing his welcome to Waltham could not but want 
 much of the heart without me. Now the time of 
 his return drew on, Dr. Moulin kindly offered to 
 remove me, on his Lordship's departure, to his 
 own house ; promising me all careful tendance. 
 I thanked him ; but resolved, if I could but 
 creep homewards, to put myself on the journey. 
 A litter was provided ; but of so little ease, that 
 Simeon's penitential lodging, or a malefactor's 
 stocks, had been less penal. I crawled down 
 from my close chamber into that carriage: In 
 qua videharis mihi efferri, tanquam in sandapild, 
 as Mr. Moulin wrote to me afterward. That 
 misery had I endured in all the long passage 
 from Paris to Dieppe, being left alone to the surly 
 muleteers, had not the providence of my good 
 God brought me to St. Germains, upon the very 
 minute of the setting out of those coaches which 
 had staid there upon that morning's entertainment 
 
 * " In whicli you seemed tome to be cnrrieH, ns if in a coffin." 
 F 
 
 I 
 
0^ LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 of my Lord Ambassador. How glad was I, that 
 I might change my seat and my company ! In 
 the way, beyond all expectation, I began to 
 gather some strength. Whether the fresh air or 
 the desires of my home revived me, so much and 
 so sudden reparation ensued, as was sensible to 
 myself, and seemed strange to others. Being 
 shipped at Dieppe, the sea used us hardly : and, 
 after a night and a great part of the day following, 
 sent us back well wind-beaten to that bleak 
 haven whence we set forth, forcing us to a more 
 pleasing land-passage, through the coasts of 
 Normandy and Picardy : towards the end whereof 
 my former complaint returned on me : and, 
 landing with nae, accompanied me to and at my 
 long-desired home. In this my absence it pleased 
 his Majesty graciously to confer on me the 
 deanery of Worcester ; which, being promised to 
 me before my departure, was deeply hazarded 
 while I was out of sight, by the importunity and 
 underhand-working of some great ones. Dr. 
 Field, the learned and worthy Dean of Gloucester, 
 was by his potent friends put into such assur- 
 ances of it, that I heard where he took care for 
 the furnishing that ample house. But God 
 fetched it about for me, in that absence and 
 nescience of mine : and that reverend and better 
 deserving divine was well satisfied with greater 
 
JOURNEY TO SCOTLAND. 67 
 
 hopes, and soon after exchanged, tiiis mortal 
 estate for an immortal and glorious. 
 
 ** Before I could go down, through my continu- 
 ing weakness, to take possession, of that dignity, 
 his Majesty pleased to design me to his attendance 
 into Scotland; where the great love and respect; 
 that I found, botli from the ministers and people,, 
 wrought me no small envy from some of our own.* 
 Upon a commonly received supposition, that his 
 Majesty would have no further use of his chapr. 
 lains after his remove from Edinburgh (forasmuch 
 as the divines of the counti'y, whereof tbpre is. 
 great store and worthy choice, were allotted to 
 every station,) I easily obtained, through the 
 solicitation of my ever honoured Lord of Carlisle, 
 to return with him before my fellows. No sooner 
 was I gone, than suggestions were made to his 
 Majesty of my over-plausible demeanor and doc- 
 trine to that already prejudicate people : for which 
 his Majesty, after a gracious acknowledgment of 
 my good service there done, called me, upon his 
 return, to a favourable and mild account; not 
 more freely professing what informations had 
 been given against me, than his own full satisfac- 
 tion with my sincere and just answer ; as whose 
 excellent wisdom well saw, that such winning 
 carriage of mine could be no hinderance to those 
 
 * See Bishop Hall's Works, vol. y, p. 102. 
 F 2 
 
68 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 his great designs. At the same time his Majesty, 
 having secret notice that a letter was coming to 
 me from Mr. W. Struther, a reverend and learned 
 divine of Edinburgh, concerning the Five Points 
 then proposed and urged to the church of Scot- 
 land, * was pleased to impose on me an earnest 
 charge, to give him a full answer in satisfaction 
 to those his modest doubts, and at large to 
 declare my judgment concerning those required 
 observations : which I speedily performed, with so 
 great approbation of his Majesty, that it pleased 
 him to command a transcript thereof, f as I was 
 informed, publicly read in their most famous 
 
 * The Scots Ministers understanding that the king designed 
 to bring about an uniformity between the churches of England 
 and Scotland, appointed one Mr. William Struthers, a divine of 
 Edinburgh, to preach against such a proceeding ; who, in his 
 sermon in the principal Church of Edinburgh, not only con- 
 demned the rites and ceremonies of the Church of England, 
 but prayed God to save Scotland from the same.* The fol- 
 lowing five points or articles were then proposed and urged to 
 the kirk, as a step towards producing uniformity. 
 
 1. That the holy sacraments should be received kneeling. 2. 
 That ministers were to administer the sacrament in private 
 houses to the sick, if desired. 3. That ministers were to 
 baptize children privately at home, in cases of necessity. 4. 
 That ministers should bring such cliildren of their parishes, as 
 could say the Catechism, the Lord's Prayer, the Creed, and the 
 Ten Commandments, to the Bishop to be confirmed. 5. That 
 the festivals of Christmas, Easter, Whitsunday, and the Ascen- 
 sion, were to be commemorated in the Kirk of Scotland. 
 
 t This famous Letter to Mr. Struthers is in vol.ix. of Bishop 
 Hall's Works, p. 481-489. 
 
 • Heylin's Life of Laud, p. 73. Ed. 1668. 
 
THE BOOK OF SPORTS. 69 
 
 university : the effect whereof his Majesty vouch- 
 safed to signify afterwards unto some of my best 
 friends, with allowance beyond my hopes/' 
 
 The following year at an assembly convened at 
 Perth, Aug. 25, 1618, an Act was passed to 
 admit those five Articles, which his Majesty 
 had been courting the Scots for two years 
 together to receive. The king, therefore ordered 
 these articles to be read in all parish churches, 
 and required the ministers to preach upon the 
 lawfulness of them, and to exhort their people to 
 submission. And in order to give them a greater 
 authority, they were ordered to be published at 
 the market cross of the principal boroughs ; but 
 this proved not sufficient to enforce conformity as 
 was expected, so in the year 1621, it was enacted 
 by an Act of Parliament that those articles 
 should be observed ; which was certainly contrary 
 to the sense of the kirk and the Scots nation. * 
 
 The king's journey into Scotland was far from 
 answering the end he had in view ; " the king,'* 
 says Heylin, " gained nothing by that chargeable 
 journey, but the neglect of his commands, and a 
 contempt of his authority." 
 
 * Crawford's Lives, p. 174. Harris's Life of James L p. 280. 
 Neal's History of the Puritans, vol. ii, p. 110. Heylins's Life of 
 Laud, p. 74." 
 
70 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 His majesty, in his return from Scotland, in 
 1617, passing through Lancashire, imagined that 
 the strict observance of the Sabbath-day enjoined 
 by the magistrates and clergy, tended to preju- 
 dice the minds of papists against the strictness of 
 the Church of England. Complaints being made 
 to the king that the people were prohibited from 
 all sorts of diversions and sports on the sabbath- 
 day; wherefore in order to discourage Puritan- 
 ism and to silence the objections of Papists, his 
 Majesty published a declaration called " The 
 Book of Sports,^' to encourage recreations and 
 sports on the Lord's day ! 
 
 It is said that this book of sports was drawn up 
 by Bishop Morton ; it was dated, "Greenwich, 
 May 24, 1618." The substance of it is the fol- 
 lowing: " That for his good people's recreation, 
 his Majesty's pleasure was, that after the end of 
 divine service, they should not be disturbed, 
 letted, or discouraged from any lawful recrea- 
 tions ; such as dancing, either of men or women, 
 archery for men, leaping, vaulting, or any such 
 harmless recreations; nor having oi may-games, 
 whitsun ales, or morris dances, or setting up of 
 may poles, or other sports therewith used, so as 
 the same may be had in due and convenient 
 time, without impediment or let of divine service; 
 and that women should have leave to carry 
 rushes to the church for the decorating of it. 
 
THE BOOK OF SPORTS. 71 
 
 according to their old custpms ; withal prohibit- 
 ing all unlawful games to be used on Sundays 
 only, as bear-baiting, bull-baiting, interludes, and 
 at all times (in the meaner sort of people pro- 
 hibited) bowling'' A restraint was annexed to 
 this indulgence, that no papist or recusant was 
 to have the benefit of this declaration ; nor such 
 as were not present at the whole of divine ser- 
 vice, nor such as did not keep to their own parish 
 churches, i. e. puritans who probably frequented 
 other churches, instead of that of their own parish, 
 on account of the character of the several ministers. 
 Now this royal declaration was not only an inlet 
 for the gross violation of the divine command, 
 " Remember to keep holy the sabbath day ;" but 
 it tended to demoralize the people. It was con- 
 trary to the king's proclamation in the first year 
 of his reign, and to the articles of the Irish Church, 
 ratified under the great seal, 1615,, in which the 
 morality of the Lord's day is affirmed. * But the 
 Puritans, being the objects of his Majesty's aver- 
 sion and hatred, by their preaching and practice. 
 
 * Article 56. The first day of the week, which is the 
 Lord's day, is wholly to be dedicated to the service of God, and 
 therefore we are bound tiierein to rest from our common and 
 daily business, and to bestow that leisure upon holy exercises, 
 both public and private." 
 
 See tlie Articles at large in Neal's History of the Puritans, 
 vol. 5. Appendix iii. 
 
72 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 were inculcating the strict observance of the 
 sabbath ; and* therefore the fasts and festivals of 
 the church vrere rather neglected, and in order to 
 counteract this, his Majesty thought proper to 
 command those idle and vain sports on the Lord's 
 day; in order to prevent the growth of Puritanism 
 and Popery ! or, in other words, to prevent the 
 blessed effects of true religion in the minds of his 
 subjects, and to encourage all vice and immo- 
 rality ! 
 
 This royal declaration was ordered to be read 
 in all the parish churches of Lancashire, and was 
 intended to be read in all the churches of 
 England, but that Archbishop Abbot, being at 
 Croydon, the day on which it was ordered to be 
 read in the churches, expressly forbad it to be 
 read there. Several of the bishops also and clergy 
 declared their opinion against this hook of sports. 
 Most probably Dr. Hall disapproved of it highly, 
 as he afterwards did when Bishop of Exeter; 
 when he and several of the bishops would not urge 
 the reading of it, when a second edition of it, revised 
 and enlarged was set forth by royal authority in 
 the ninth year of Charles the first. * 
 
 The publishing of such a declaration, as it may 
 
 * That Bishop Hall was an advocate for the morality of the 
 sabbath, we raay see in an account of the manner of his spend- 
 ing it, in the 7th vol. of his Works, p. 256. 
 
THE BOOK OF SPORTS. 73 
 
 be well imagined, made a great noise : for it was 
 certainly an imprudent project as well as a source 
 of grief to all sincere protestants, and friends of 
 religion. And had the k ng persisted in ordering 
 it to be read publicly in all the churches, under 
 the penalty of suffering from the high commission, 
 it would probably have produced much greater 
 convulsions than it did in the following reign, 
 about fifteen years afterwards.* 
 
 It is difficult to account for the distinction 
 between lawful and unlawful sports on the Lord's 
 day ; if any sports are lawful, why not all ? No 
 reason can possibly be given why dancing, revels, 
 wakes, may games, and such like, should be more 
 lawful than hear or bull hailing, interludes, and 
 howls. The nature of both is immoral, for they 
 have equal tendency to promote vice and immo- 
 rality. The exceptions in his Majesty's declara- 
 tion are truly extraordinary ; could the king 
 believe that those who vf ere puritanically inclined, 
 or who went to other parish churches for their 
 better edification, would now make use of the 
 liberty of his declaration, when he must know 
 that they conscientiously beHeved in the morality 
 of the fourth commandment, and that no ordinance 
 
 * Warner's Eccles. Hist, of England, vol. ii, p. 500. Neal's 
 Hist, of the Puritans, vol. ii, p. 115. 
 
74 LIFE OF BISHOP HA.LL. 
 
 of man could make void the law of God ? His 
 majesty also debars recusants, i.e. papists, from 
 this liberty, which popery always had indulged 
 them with ; but the Papist is now to turn Puritan^ 
 with regard to the sabbath, being forbidden the use 
 of sports and recreations on the Lord s day, in 
 which he always indulged ; and protestants are to 
 dance and revel on that sacred day to preserve 
 them from Puritanism and Popery ; how absurd, 
 unreasonable, ungodly and profane was this book of 
 sports of King James I. * When a second edition 
 of it was set forth in the next reign, some further 
 particulars and remarks concerning it will be 
 given. 
 
 In the year 1618, the troubles and disputes 
 about rehgious matters began in Holland, between 
 the Calvinists and Arminians, or, as they were 
 ?\^oiev\nedi, remonstrants and contra-remonstrants. 
 Their controversies were reduced to the following 
 five points; — election — redemption — original sin — 
 effectual grace — and perseverance. In order to 
 decide these difficulties, the States -General 
 resolved to convene a national Synod at Dort. 
 
 * Dr. Warner in his Eccles. Hist, of England, gives the follow- 
 ing account of King James I, and his court — '* It was said that 
 the court gave a very ill example to the rest of the nation ; 
 nothing was to be heard there but oaths and language bordering 
 upon blasphemy, from which the king himself was not free." 
 Vol. ii, p. 500, 
 
SYJfOD (XF DORT. 75 
 
 And in order to give the greater lustre and 
 weight to their determination, they requested 
 some foreign princes to send to them the assist- 
 ance of their divines. King James I. was applied 
 to for some English divines to be sent over, who 
 was pleased to appoint George Carleton, D. D. 
 Bishop of Landaff, Joseph Hall, D. D. then 
 Dean of Worcester, John Davenant, D. D. Mar- 
 garet Professor, and Master of Queen's College, 
 Cambridge, Samuel Ward, D. D. Master of 
 Sydney College, Cambridge, and Archdeacon 
 of Taunton.* 
 
 These divines, according to their summons, 
 repaired to the King then at New Market, and 
 received from him the following instructions 
 relative to their conduct in the synod. 
 
 1. ** Our will and pleasure is, that from this 
 time forward upon all occasions, you inure your- 
 selves to the practice of the Latin tongue, that 
 -when there is cause, you may deliver your minds 
 with more readiness and facility. 
 
 2. " You shall, in all points to be debated and 
 disputed, resolve amongst yourselves beforehand. 
 
 * These four divines were distinguislied ** in their respective 
 eminences:" •* In Carletono praelucebat Episcopalis gravitas, 
 in Davenatitio subactum judicium ; in Wardo multa lectio ; io 
 Hallo e\pedita concionatio." Fuller's Worthies, vol. ii, p. 190, 
 ed. 1811, 4to. 
 
76 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL, 
 
 what is the true state of the question, and jointly 
 and uniformly agree thereupon. 
 
 3. "If in debating of the cause by the learned 
 men there, any thing be emergent, whereof you 
 thought not before, you shall meet and consult 
 thereupon again, and so resolve among yourselves 
 jointly what is fit to be maintained. And this to 
 be done agreeable to the Scriptures, and the 
 doctrine of the Church of England. 
 
 4. " Your advice shall be to those churches, 
 that their ministers do not deliver in the pulpit to 
 the people these things for ordinary doctrines, 
 which are the highest points of the schools, and 
 not fit for vulgar capacity, but disputable on both 
 sides. 
 
 5. " That they use no innovation in doctrine, 
 but teach the same things which were taught 
 twenty or thirty years past in their own churches, 
 and especially that which contradicteth not their 
 own confessions so long since published and 
 known unto the world. 
 
 6. ** That they conform themselves to the 
 public confessions of the neighbour reformed 
 churches, with whom to hold good correspond- 
 ency, shall be no dishonour to them. 
 
 7. " That if there be main opposition between 
 any who are over-much addicted to their own 
 opinions, your endeavours shall be, that certain 
 
SYNOD OF DORT. 77 
 
 positions be moderately laid down, which may 
 tend to the mitigation of heat on both sides. 
 
 8. *' That, as you principally look to God's 
 glory, and the peace of those distracted churches, 
 so you have an eye to our honour, who send and 
 employ you thither ; and consequently at all 
 times consult with our Ambassador there residing, 
 who is best acquainted with the form of those 
 countries, understandeth well the questions and 
 differences among them, and shall from time 
 receive our princely directions, as occasion shall 
 require. 
 
 9. *' Finally, in all other things, which we 
 cannot foresee, you shall carry yourselves with 
 that advice, moderation, and discretion as to 
 persons of your quahty and gravity shall apper- 
 tain." 
 
 These divines, after having received his Majes- 
 ty's instructions, prepared for the voyage; and 
 the United States sent over a man of war to 
 Gravesend, to convey them to Holland:* but 
 accidentally they missed the man of war, and so 
 were obliged to take their passage over in a small 
 
 * " I have even now letters from the Admiralty at Rotterdam, 
 that the ship, wherein I passed last into England, shall go pre- 
 sently over to fetch those reverend persons his Majesty doth 
 send to the Synod: and I do by this bearer appoint it to 
 attend their commodity at Gravesend." Letters from and to 
 Sir Dudley Carleton, 4to, p, 306. 
 
78 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 vessel, and safely landed Oct. 20, 1618, at Mid- 
 dleburgh. * 
 
 This famous Synod consisted of thirty-six 
 ministers of the United States, and five professors, 
 together with twenty elders : to these were added 
 twenty-eight foreign divines. Mr. Balcanqi^J,, a 
 Scots divine, w^as deputed by hi& Majesty to 
 represent the Kirk in the Synod. The ever- 
 memorable John Hales also attended the Synod, 
 not as a member, but was sent by Sir Dudley 
 Carleton, the English Ambassador in Holland, to 
 give him an account of what passed in the 
 Synod, f 
 
 The English divines being arrived at the Hague, 
 were introduced to the Assembly of the States on 
 the 5th of November, by the English Ambas- 
 sador. They were received with every mark of 
 distinction : and were allowed by the states, ten 
 pounds sterling a day: '* an entertainment," says 
 Fuller, far larger than what was appointed to any 
 other foreign Theologues; and politickly pro- 
 portioned in grateful consideration of the great- 
 ness of his Majesty who employed them. And 
 these English divines, knowing themselves sent 
 over not to gain wealth to themselves, but glory 
 
 * Fuller's Ch. Hist. c. 10, p. 78. 
 
 t Hale's Golden Remains, p. 454, 8vo, London, 1687. He 
 was Chaplain to the Ambassador. 
 
SYNOD OF DORT. 79 
 
 to God, and reputation to their Sovereign, freely 
 gave what they had freely received, keeping a 
 table general, where any fashionable foreigner was 
 courteously and plentifully entertained."* 
 
 It has been said that this Synod was not con- 
 ducted with impartiality ; and that its end and 
 design was to condemn the Remonstrants. Tlie 
 majority certainly were Calvinists, or Anti-remon- 
 strants, and on that account, it may be that the 
 Remonstrants had no fair play to defend them- 
 selves, and were also not admitted to a free 
 debate. 
 
 When all the members of the Synod were 
 assembled, the following Oath was taken by 
 them in the 23d Session, each person standing 
 up in his place, and laying his hand upon his 
 heart : 
 
 " I promise before God, whom I believe and 
 worship, as here present, and as the searcher of 
 the reins and heart, that during the whole course 
 of the transactions of this Synod, in which there 
 will be made an enquiry into, and judgment and 
 decision of, not only the w^ell-known Jive points, 
 and all the difficulties resulting from thence, but 
 likewise of all other sorts of doctrine, 1 will not 
 make use of any kind of human writings, but only 
 
 ♦ Faller's Cb. Hist. c. x, p. 79. 
 
80 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 of the word of God, as a sure and infallible rule of 
 faith. Neither will I have any other thing in 
 view throughout this whole discussion, but the 
 honour of God, the peace of the church, and 
 above all, the preservation of the purity of doc- 
 trine. So keep me my Saviour Jesus Christ, 
 whom I ardently beseech to assist me in this my 
 design, by his Holy Spirit." 
 
 John Goodwin, in his book termed Redemption 
 Redeemed, p. 395, charges the contra-remonstrants 
 with taking a previous oath to condemn the 
 opposite party on what terms soever. This must 
 have been an unjust insinuation. Fuller, the 
 writer of the Church History, about the time such 
 false reports were spread concerning the Synod, 
 wrote to Dr. Hall, Bishop of Norwich, who was 
 then alive, 1651, to ask the truth. The aged and 
 venerable Bishop returned the following full and 
 satisfactory reply : 
 
 " Whereas you desire from me a just relation of 
 the carriage of the business at the Synod of Dort, 
 and the conditions required of our Divines there, 
 at or before their admission to that grave and 
 learned Assembly : I, whom God was pleased to 
 employ, as an unworthy agent in that great work, 
 and to reserve still upon earth, after all my 
 reverend and worthy associates, do, as in the 
 presence of that God, to whom I am now daily 
 expecting to yield up my account, testify to you. 
 
SYNOD OF DORT. 81 
 
 and (if you will) to the world, that I cannot, 
 without just indignation, read that slanderous 
 imputation, which Mr, Goodwill, in his Redemp- 
 tion Redeemed, reports to have been raised, and 
 cast upon those Divines, eminent both for learn- 
 ing and piety, " That they suffered themselves 
 to be bound with an Oath, at, or before their 
 admission into that Synod, to vote down the 
 Remonstrants howsoever," so as they came 
 deeply pregnated to the decision of those unhappy 
 differences. 
 
 *' Truly, Sir, as I hope to be saved, all the Oath 
 that was required was this : after that the Mode- 
 rator, Assistants, and Scribes were chosen, and 
 the Synod formed, and the several members 
 allowed, there was a solemn Oath required to be 
 taken by every one of that Assembly, which was 
 publicly done in a grave manner, by every person 
 in their order, standing up, and laying his hand 
 upon his heart, calling the great God of heaven to 
 witness, that he would impartially proceed in 
 the judgment of these controversies, which should 
 be laid before him, only out of, and according to 
 the written word of God, and no otherwise, so 
 determining of them, as he should find in his 
 conscience most agreeable to the Holy Scriptures, 
 which Oath was punctually agreed to be thus 
 taken by the Articles of the States, concerning 
 
82 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 the indiction, and ordering of the Synod, as 
 appears plainly in their tenth Article; and this 
 was all the Oath that was either taken, or 
 required. And far was it from those holy 
 souls, which are now glorious in heaven, or mine 
 (who still for some short time survive, to give this 
 just witness of our sincere integrity) to entertain 
 the least thought of any so foul corruption, as by 
 any over-ruling power to be swayed to a prejudg- 
 ment in the points controverted. 
 
 " It grieves my soul therefore to see, that any 
 learned Divine should raise imaginary conjectures 
 to himself, of an interest and obligation of a 
 fancied Oath (working upon them, and drawing 
 them contrary to the dictation of their own con- 
 science, as it did Herod's in the case of John 
 Baptist's beheading) merely out of his own com- 
 parative construction of the different forms of 
 expressing themselves in managing those contro- 
 versies. Wherein if at any time they seemed to 
 speak nearer to the Tenet of the Remonstrants, 
 it must be imputed to their holy ingenuity, and 
 gracious disposition to peace, and to no other 
 sinister respect. 
 
 " Sir, since I have lived to see so foul an asper- 
 sion cast upon the memory of those worthy and 
 eminent Divines, I bless God that I yet live to 
 vindicate them, by this ray knowing, clear, and 
 
SYNOD OF DORT. 83 
 
 assured attestation ; which I am ready to second 
 with the solemnest Oath, if I shall be thereto 
 required. 
 
 Your much devoted friend, precessor, 
 and fellow labourer, 
 
 August »o, 1651. JOSEPH HALL, B.N. 
 
 Fuller makes the following pertinent remarks 
 upon the above epistle : " Let the reader weigh 
 in the balance of his judgment, how this purgation 
 of the Synod of Dort is positive, and punctual, 
 from one, an ear and eye witnes^ thereof, being 
 such an one as Dr. Hall, the aged ; so that his 
 testimonium herein, may seem testametituni : his 
 ivitness his willy and the truth therein delivered, a 
 legacy by him bequeathed to posterity. * 
 
 After being at the Synod for about two 
 months. Dr. Hall found that the air of Dort did 
 not agree with him : the noise and unquietness of 
 the place did also so disturb his rest, that he was 
 reduced to great debility. The other English 
 divines therefore wrote t© the English Ambas- 
 sador, Sir Dudley Carleton, that he desired leave 
 to return to England, and they recommended in 
 his room Dr. Goad, Chaplain to the Archbishop 
 
 • Ch. Hist. b. X, p. 86. 
 G 2 
 
84 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 of Canterbury ; they also requested his excellency 
 to write to the Archbishop, to procure that favor 
 from the King. But the Prince of Orange was 
 not willing that Dr. Hall should return, he there- 
 fore wished him to come to the Hague, to try 
 whether change of air would do him good ; and 
 in the mean time, if it would please the king to 
 send Dr. Goad, and if Dr. Hall would recover 
 his health, they might enjoy the benefit of the 
 assistance of both. 
 
 The assistance of the English divines in the 
 transactions of the Synod was considerable and 
 duly estimated. Upon several occasions they 
 gave satisfactojy proof of their abilities, suffi- 
 ciency, and discretion. The other Foreign and 
 Dutch divines were in a great measure guided by* 
 the English, so that they rather wished their 
 number augmented than diminished : particularly 
 they were very unwilling to spare Dr. Hall, who 
 was highly respected and esteemed by them.* 
 
 *' By that time," continues the narrative, " I 
 had staid some two months there, the unquietness 
 of the nights in those garrison towns working 
 on the tender disposition of my body, brought 
 me to such weakness through want of rest, that 
 
 * See Letters from and to Sir Dudley Carleton, 4to. 1775. 
 Second Edition. 
 
SYNOD OF DORT. 85 
 
 it began to disable me from attendiag the 
 Synod: which yet, as I might, 1 forced myself 
 unto; as wishing that my zeal could have dis- 
 countenanced my infirmity. Where, in the mean 
 time, it is well worthy of my thankful remem- 
 brance, that, being in an afflicted and languishing 
 condition for a fortnight together, with that sleep- 
 less distemper, yet it pleased God, the very night 
 before I was to preach the Latin sermon to the 
 Synod, to bestow on me such a comfortable 
 refreshing of sufficient sleep, as whereby my 
 spirits were revived, and I was enabled with much 
 vigor and vivacity to perform that service : which 
 was no sooner done, than my former complaint 
 renewed on me, and prevailed against all the 
 remedies that the counsel of physicians could 
 advise me unto ; so as, after long strife, I was 
 compelled to yield unto a retirement, for the time, 
 to the Hague; to see if change of place and 
 more careful attendance, which I had in the 
 house of our Right Honorable Ambassador, the 
 Lord Carletou, now Viscount Dorchester, might 
 recover me. But when, notwithstanding all means, 
 my weakness increased so far, as that there was 
 small likelihood left of so much strength remaining 
 as might bring me back into England, it pleased 
 his gracious Majesty, by our noble Ambassador's 
 solicitation, to call me off; and to substitute a 
 worthy divine, Dr. Goade, in my unwilUng for- 
 
86 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 saken room. Returning by Dort, I sent in my 
 sad farewell to that grave assembly; who, by 
 common vote, sent to me the president of the 
 Synod and the assistants with a respective and 
 gracious valediction. Neither did the deputies 
 of my lords the States neglect, after a very 
 respectful compliment sent from them to me by 
 Daniel Heinsius, to visit me : and, after a noble 
 acknowledgment of more good service from me 
 than I durst own, dismissed me with a honour- 
 able retribution ; and sent after me a rich medal 
 of gold* the portraiture of the Synod, for a pre- 
 cious monument of their respects to my poor 
 endeavours : who failed not, while I was at the 
 Hague, to impart unto them my poor advice con- 
 cerning the proceeding of that synodical meeting. 
 The difficulties of my return, in such weakness, 
 were many and great; wherein, if ever, God 
 manifested his special providence to me, in over- 
 ruling the cross accidents of that passage : and, 
 after many dangers and despairs, contriving my 
 safe arrival.'^ 
 
 * This medal, which the Bishop used to wear suspended on 
 his breast, as appears by some of his portraitures, came into 
 the possession of the family of Jermy, of Baylield Hall, near 
 Holt, in the County of Norfolk; and was bequeathed by 
 William Jermy, Esq. at his death, which happened in January 
 1750, (Gent. Magazine) to Emmanuel College, Cambridge. See 
 Master's History of Bene't College, Cambridge, p. 367. 
 
SYNOD OF DORT. 87 
 
 It was on Nov. 29, 1618, being the sixteenth 
 session of the Synod, that Dr. Hall preached 
 his Latin Sermon before this famous assembly. 
 But his disorder again recurred, which eventually 
 obliged him to return to his native air. He 
 preached from Eccles. vii, 10. Be not righteous 
 overmuch^ neither make thyself overwise. He 
 observed, among many excellent things, that 
 *' there were two sorts of theology, scholastic and 
 popular, the one respects the foundation, the 
 other the form and ornaments of the building: 
 the one relates to the things, which ought to 
 be known, the other to things which may be 
 known: the knowledge of the one makes a 
 christian ; of the other, a disputer. Or, the one 
 makes a divine, the other polishes him. That if 
 St. Paul should come into the world again, he 
 would not understand the subtle disputes between 
 the Jesuits and the Dominicans. That the 
 Catechism of the Apostles consisted only of six 
 articles : that the modern theology was like the 
 quantity of Mathematicians, which is divisible in 
 infinitum" He concluded with an earnest exhor- 
 tation to peace and unanimity among christians : 
 ** study to be quiet," said he, ^(XoTt/*£j<rda> myxoKsiv, 
 ** we are brethren, let us be fellow servants, 
 what have we to do with the infamous title of 
 remonstrants^ and contra-remonstrantiy of Calvin- 
 ists and Armimans, We are christians, let us be 
 
88 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 like-minded, lao^uxot. We are one body, let us be 
 of one mind. I beseech you, brethren, by the tre- 
 mendous name of God, by the pious and cher- 
 ishing bosom of our common mother, (the church;) 
 by your own souls, by the most holy bowels of 
 our Saviour Jesus Christ, promote peace." For 
 this excellent discourse, thanks were publicly 
 given him ; and it was printed in the transactions 
 of the Synod ;^ and it is for the first time printed 
 apart in the Appendix to this volume. 
 
 After being kindly taken care of, in the house 
 of the English Ambassador for some weeks. Dr. 
 Hall still continued very weak ; the king therefore 
 granted him leave to return as soon as his strength 
 would permit. When he so far recovered as to 
 be able to be removed, he returned by Dort, and* 
 " with a becoming gravity, publicly took his 
 solemn farewell of the Synod" with the following 
 Latin speech : 
 
 " Non facile vero mecum in gratiam redierit 
 cadaverosa haec moles, quam aegr^ usque cir- 
 cumgesto, quae mihi hujus Conventus celebritatem 
 toties inviderit, jamque prorsus invitissimum k 
 vobis importune avocat, et divellit. Neque 
 enim ullus est profect6 sub cceIo locus aequ^ cceli 
 
 * See Acta Sj'nodi Nationalis Dordrcchtonae, p. 38. ed. 
 1620. fol. 
 
SYNOD OF DORT. 89 
 
 aemulus, et in qao tentorium mihi figi maluerim, 
 cuj usque adeo gestiet mihi aniams meminisse. 
 Beatos ver6 vos, quibus hoc frui datum ! non 
 dignus eram ego (ut fidelissimi Romani querimo- 
 niara imitari liceat) qui et Christi, et Ecclesiae suae 
 nomine, sanctam hane provinciam diutius susti- 
 nerem. Illud vero Qen £v yava^j. Nempe audito, 
 quod res erat, non a\iX me qui\m adversissima hie 
 usum valetudine, Serenissimus Rex mens misertus 
 miselli famuli sui, revocat me domum, quippe 
 qu6d cineres meos, aut sandapilum vobis nihil 
 quicquam prodesse posse n6rit, succenturiavitque 
 mihi virum h suis selectissimum, quantum Theo- 
 logum. De me profecto (mero jam siHcernio) 
 quicquid fiat, viderit ille Deus mens, cujus ego 
 totus sum. Vobis quidem ita feliciter prospectum 
 est, ut sit cur infirmitati meae baud parum gratu- 
 lemini, quam hujusmodi instructissimo succedaneo 
 ccEtum hunc vestrum beaverit. Neque tamen 
 committam (si Deus mihi vitam, et vires indul- 
 seritj ut et corpdre siraul, et animo abesse videar. 
 Intere^ santi huic Synodo, ubicunque terrarum 
 sum, et vobis, consiliis conatibusque meis quibus- 
 cunque, res vestras me, pro virili, sedulo, ac seri6 
 promoturum, sanct^ voveo. Interim vobis omni- 
 bus, ac singuHs, Honoratissimi Domini Delegati, 
 Reverendissime Praeses, Gravissimi Assessores, 
 Scribae doctissimi, Symmystae colendissimi, Tibi- 
 que, Vencrandissima Synodus universa, aegro 
 
90 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 animo ac corpore aeternum valedico. Rogo vos 
 omnes obnixius, ut precibus vestris imbecillem 
 reducem facere, comitari, prosequi velitis." 
 
 The Synod continued from Nov. 13, 1618, to 
 May 29, 1619. The English divines agreed in 
 approving the Belgic confession of faith, and the 
 Heidelberg Catechism. The five points of differ- 
 ence between the Calvinists and Arminians were 
 decided in favor of the former. Afterwards the 
 remonstrant divines were dismissed the assembly, 
 and banished the country within a limited time. 
 The deprivations and banishments, which fol- 
 lowed the decision of the Synod, of such eminent 
 men, as Episcopius, Uytenbogart, Corvenus, &c. 
 and the persecution, which ensued throughout 
 the united states against the Arminians, greatly 
 diminish the good opinion we might otherwise 
 form of the Synod, and of its transactions. Many 
 of the divines undoubtedly meant well ; but the 
 mischief was, there were worldly views and state 
 policy interwoven with its religious acts. ^ 
 
 When the opinions of the British divines upon 
 the extent of Christ's redemption were read, it 
 was observed that they omitted the distinction 
 between the sufficiency and efficacy of it ; nor did 
 they touch upon the limitation of those passages 
 
 * See Harris's Life of James I, p. 152. 
 
SYNOD OF DORT. 91 
 
 of Scripture, which, speaking of Christ's dying, 
 for the whole world, are frequently interpreted of 
 the world of the elect. Dr. Davenant and some of 
 his brethren inchned to the doctrine of universal 
 redemption : he and Dr. Ward were for a middle 
 way between the two extremes ; they maintained 
 the certaiiity of the salvation of the elect, and that 
 offers of pardon were sent not only to all who 
 should believe and repent, but to all who hear 
 the gospel ; and that grace sufficient to convince 
 and persuade the impenitent (so as to lay the 
 blame of their condemnation upon themselves) 
 went along with these offers : diat the redemption 
 of Christ and his merits were applicable to these, 
 and consequently there was a possibility of their 
 salvation. They however complied with the 
 Synod, and agreed to their confession, as in 
 general agreeable to the word of God. But some 
 years after, a report arose that they had deserted 
 the doctrine of the Church of England, upon 
 which Dr. Hall expressed his concern to Dr. 
 Davenant in these words — '* I will live and die in 
 the suffrage of that Synod of Dort ; and I do 
 confidently avow, that those other opinions (of 
 Arminius) cannot stand with the doctrine of the 
 Church of England." To which Dr. Davenant 
 replied, " I know that no man can embrace 
 Arminianism in the doctrines oi predestiiiation and 
 giwice, but he must desert the articles agreed upon 
 
92 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 by the Church of England; nor in the point of 
 perseverance, but he must vary from the received 
 opinions of our best approved doctors in the 
 English Church." 
 
 The narrative continues : — 
 
 " After not many years' settling at home, it 
 grieved my soul to see our own church begin to 
 sicken of the same disease which we had endea- 
 voured to cure in our neighbors. Mr. Montague's 
 tart and vehement assertions of some positions, 
 near of kin to the remonstrants of Netherland, 
 gave occasion of raising no small broil in the 
 church. Sides were taken : pulpits every where 
 rang of these opinions: but parliaments took 
 notice of the division, and questioned the occa- 
 sioned Now, as one that desired to do all good 
 offices to our dear and common mother, I set my 
 thoughts on work how so dangerous a quarrel 
 might be happily composed : and, finding that 
 mistaking was more guilty of this dissention than 
 misbelieving (since it plainly appeared to me, that 
 Mr. Montague meant to express, not Arminius^ 
 but B. Overall, a more moderate and safe author^ 
 however he sped in delivery of him,) I wrote a 
 little project of pacification, wherein I desired to 
 rectify the judgment of men concerning this 
 mis-apprehended controversy ; showing them the 
 true party in this unseasonable plea : and, because 
 
HIS VIA MEDIA. 95 
 
 B. Overall ^ went a midway betwixt the two 
 opinions which he held extreme, and must needs 
 therefore somewhat differ from the commonly- 
 received tenet in these points, I gathered out of 
 B. Overall on the one side, and out of our English 
 divines at Dort on the other, such common pro- 
 positions concerning these five busy articles as 
 wherein both of them are fully agreed. All which 
 being put together, seemed unto me to make up 
 so sufficient a body of accorded truth, that all 
 other questions moved hereabouts appeared 
 merely superfluous ; and every moderate Chris- 
 tian might find where to rest himself, without 
 hazard of contradiction. These I made bold, by 
 the hands of Dr. Young the worthy Dean of 
 Winchester, to present to his excellent Majesty, 
 together with an humble motion of a peaceable 
 silence to be enjoined to both parts, in those 
 other collateral and needless disquisitions : which, 
 if they might benefit the schools of academical 
 disputants, could not certainly sound well from 
 the pulpits of popular auditories. Those recon- 
 ciliatory papers fell under the eyes of some grave 
 divines on both parts. Mr. Montague professed 
 that he had seen them, and would subscribe to 
 
 * He was one of the most profound school divines of the 
 English natioB. He was employed in the translation of the 
 Bible ; and wrote the sacramental part of the Church Catechism. 
 
JMr LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 them very willingly : others, that were contrarily 
 minded, both English, Scottish, and French 
 divines, proferred their hands to a no less ready 
 subscription. So as much peace promised to 
 result, out of that weak and poor enterprise, had 
 not the confused noise of the misconstructions of 
 those who never saw the work, crying it down 
 for the very name's sake, meeting with the royal 
 edict of a general inhibition, buried it in a secure 
 silence." 
 
 J " 1 was scorched a little with this flame, which 
 I desired to quench : yet this could not stay my 
 hand from thrusting itself into a hotter fire." 
 
 " Some insolent Romanists, Jesuits especially, 
 in their bold disputations (which, in the time of the 
 treaty of the Spanish match and the calm of that 
 relaxation, were very frequent,) pressed nothing 
 so much as a catalogue of the professors of our 
 religion to be deduced from the primitive times; 
 and, with the peremptory challenge of the impos- 
 sibility of this pedigree, dazzled the eyes of the 
 simple : while some of our learned men, under- 
 taking to satisfy so needless and unjust a demand, 
 gave, as I conceived, great advantage to the 
 adversary. In a just indignation to see us thus 
 wronged by misstating the question betwixt us, as 
 if we, yielding ourselves of another church, origi- 
 nally and fundamentally different, should make 
 good our own erection on the ruins, yea, the 
 
AGAINST THE PAPISTS. 96 
 
 nullity of theirs ; and well considering the inlBnite 
 and great inconveniences, that must needs follow 
 on this defence ; I adventured to set my pen on 
 work ; desiring to rectify the opinions of those 
 men, whom an ignorant zeal had transported, to 
 the prejudice of our holy cause: laying forth the 
 damnable corruptions of the Roman church, yet 
 making our game of the outward visibility 
 thereof; and, by this means, putting them to the 
 probation of those newly-obtruded corruptions, 
 which are truly guilty of the breach betwixt us. 
 The drift whereof being not well conceived by 
 some spirits that were not so wise as fervent, I 
 was suddenly exposed to the rash censures of 
 many well-affected and zealous Protestants ; as if 
 I had, in a remission to my wonted zeal to the 
 truth, attributed too much to the Roman church, 
 and strengthened the adversaries' hands, and 
 weakened our own. This envy I was fain to take 
 off, by my speedy Apologetical Advertisement; 
 and, after that, by my Reconciler, seconded with 
 the unanimous letters of such reverend, learned, 
 sound divines, * both bishops and doctors, as 
 whose undoubtable authority was able to bear 
 down calumny itself : which done, I did, by a 
 seasonable moderation, provide for the peace 
 
 * B. MoTtou, B. Daveaant, Dr. Prideaux, Dr. Priinrose. 
 
96 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 of the church, in silencing both my defendants 
 and challengers, in this unkind and ill-raised 
 quarrel." 
 
 To this hasty sketch of the Bishop's, some 
 further particulars may be added. 
 
 Popery at this time was gaining ground in many 
 places ; a book was published by a papist, enti- 
 tled, A New Gag for the Old Gospel^ which 
 Mr. Richard Montague, Rector of Stamford- 
 Rivers in Essex, undertook to answer in the year 
 162t3, by a book, called, A New Gag for an Old 
 Goose. This reply gave a great offence to many 
 of the clergy. It was written in a satyrical 
 manner, for Mr. Montague's ink was generally 
 mingled with much gall : and its tendency was, 
 in a great measure, to promote Popery and 
 Arminianism. This book occasioned much noise, 
 and " no small broil in the church." Two divines 
 of the diocese of Norwich, Mr. Ward and Mr. 
 Gates, undertook to extract the Popish and 
 Arminian tenets out of it, in order to lay them 
 before Parliament; and the charge of propagating 
 Popish and Arminian errors, and of deserting 
 instead of defending the cause of the church, was 
 made to Parliament against Mr. Montague. He 
 was therefore examined at the bar of the house, 
 and referred to the Archbishop of Canterbury, 
 who expressly prohibited him to write any more 
 
Montague's writings. 97 
 
 on such subjects. But the king openly protected 
 him, and approved of his sentiments. Being thus 
 encouraged by his Majesty, Mr. Montague wrote a 
 vindication of himself in a work, intitled, Appello 
 CiPsarem ; or Appeal to Ccesar, and designed 
 it for King James ; but he died before the book 
 was published, it was therefore dedicated to 
 Charles I. This appeal was calculated to attempt 
 a reconciliation with Rome, to promote Arminian- 
 isni, and to advance the king s prerogative above 
 law. The house appointed a committee to 
 examine into its errors ; — afterwards they voted it 
 contrary to the articles of the Church of England, 
 and bound the author in a recognizance of £2000 
 for his appearance.* 
 
 Dr. Laud, then Bishop of St. David's, and the 
 Bishops of Rochester and Oxford, joined in a 
 letter! to the Duke of Buckingham, to prevail on 
 his Majesty to take the cause of Mr. Montague 
 into his own hands. This letter had its desired 
 effect, and procured quietness to him. His 
 Majesty declared he would bring the cause before 
 the council, it being a branch of his supremacy to 
 determine matters of religion. He expressed his 
 
 • Neale's History of the Puritans, vol. ii, p. 161. 
 
 t See the Letter in Heylin's Life of Archbishop Laud, pp, 
 136, 137. 
 
 H 
 
98 LIFE OP BISHOP HALL. 
 
 displeasure against the commons for calling his 
 chaplain to their bar. 
 
 King James I. died March 27> 1625, in the 
 59th year of his age. " The Church of England/' 
 says Harris, " under James, was in a happy 
 state, being highly praised, protected, and favoured 
 by him."* Dr. Hall, in a sermon preached to his 
 Majesty, at the court of Whitehall, Aug. 8, 1624, 
 says, " England was once, yea, lately was, per- 
 haps is still, the most flourishing church under 
 heaven; that I may take up the prophet's words; 
 the glory of churches, the beauty of excellency, 
 Isa. xiii, 19. But sectaries were then increasing, 
 and threatening to disturb the peace and unity of 
 the church ; that he farther says, " what it may 
 be, what it will be, if we fall still into distractions 
 and various sects, God knows, and it is not hard 
 for men to foresee. Surely, if we grow into that 
 anarchical fashion of independent congregations, 
 which I see, and lament to see, affected by too 
 many, not without woeful success ; we are gone, 
 we are lost, in a most miserable confusion : we 
 shall be, as when God overthrew Sodom and 
 Gomorrah ; and it shall be with us, as the prophet 
 speaks of proud and glorious Babylon, the shep- 
 herds shall not make their fold there : wild beasts 
 
 * Life of James I. pp.267,<itc. 
 
PANEGYRICS ON JAMES I. 99 
 
 of the desert shall lie there, and our houses sJw.ll be 
 full of doleful creatures ; and owls shall dwell, and 
 satyrs shall dance there ; and tJ^e ivild beasts of the 
 islands slwil cry in our desolate palaces. Isa. xiii, 
 20, 21. I take no pleasure, God knows, to omi- 
 nate ill to my dear nation, and my dear mother 
 the Church of England ; for whose welfare and 
 happiness I could contemn my own life : but I 
 speak in a true sorrow of lieart to perceive our 
 danger, and in a zealous precaution to prevent 
 it."* Dr. Hall lived to see this prediction 
 fully accomplished, as it will be seen in the 
 subsequent pages of this volume, and- as he 
 himself with his own pen has narrated in his 
 ** Account of Himself, " and in his " Hard 
 Measure." 
 
 It was one of the errors of the times in which 
 Dr. Hall lived, to heap the most fulsome flattery 
 upon the sovereign, and great personages : and 
 it must be recorded that Hall has fallen, 
 as well as his contemporaries, into this then 
 fashionable error. His sermon, entitled, " a holv 
 PANEGYRIC," preached at Paul's Cross, upon the 
 anniversary of the inauguration of James I, March 
 24, 1613, is full of gross adulation, though in 
 other respects an excellent and elegant discourse. 
 
 * See Bishop Hall's Works, vol. v, p. 236, 
 H 2 
 
100 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 The same adulatory taint is perceivable here and 
 there in some other parts of Dr. Hall's writings. 
 But, that the reader may have a full specimen of 
 this error of the times, we shall here subjoin, as a 
 great curiosity, the funeral sermon of King James 
 I. preached by Dr.WilHams, Bishop of Lincoln, 
 and Lord Keeper. The sermon is in titled, 
 GREAT Britain's solomon, and is full of the 
 most gross flattery, and palpable untruths. The 
 text was I Kings xi, 41, 42, 43, And the rest of 
 the words of Solomon, and all that he did, and his 
 ivisdom, are they not written in the hook of the acts 
 of Solomon? And the time that Solomon reigned in 
 Jerusalem over all Israel was forty years. And 
 Solomon slept with his fathers, and was buried in, 
 the city of David his father. After having men- 
 tioned the text, the preacher begins tJius : " Most 
 high and mighty, most honourable, worshipful 
 and well-beloved in our Lord, and Saviour Jesus 
 Christ ; it is not I, but this woeful accident that 
 chuseth this text." He proceeds then to consider 
 it as applicable to Solomon ; and afterwards com- 
 pares him and James, " first as it were in one 
 general lump, or mould," says he, " that you may 
 see by the oddness of their proportion, how they 
 differ from all kings besides. And then with a 
 particular examination of the parts of my text, 
 that you may observe by the several members, 
 how well they resemble the one the other. 
 
PANEGYRICS ON JAMES I. 101 
 
 " For the bulke or the mould, I dare presume 
 to say, you never read in your lives, of two kings 
 more fully paralelled amongst themselves, and 
 better distinguished from all other kings besides 
 themselves. King Solomon is said to be Muigeni- 
 tus coram matre sua, the only son of his mother, 
 Prov. iv, 3. So was king James. Solomon was 
 of a complexion white and ruddy, Cant, v, 10. 
 So was King James. Solomon was an infant 
 king, puer parvulus, a little child, 1 Chron. xxii,5. 
 So was King James, a king at the age of thirteen 
 months. Solomon began his reign in the life of 
 his predecessor, 1 Kings i, 32. So, by the force 
 and compulsion of that state, did our late sovereign 
 King James. Solomon was twice crowned, and 
 anointed a king, 1 Chron. xxix, 22. So was King 
 James. Solomon s minority was rough through 
 the quarrels of the former sovereign. So was that 
 of King James. Solomon was learned above all 
 the princes of the east, 1 Kings iv, 30. So was 
 King James above all the princes in the universal 
 world. Solomon was a writer in prose and verse, 
 1 Kings iv, 32. So in a very pure and exquisite 
 manner was our sweet sovereign King James. 
 Solomon was the greatest patron we ever heard 
 of, to church and churchmen ; and yet no greater 
 f let the house of Aaron now confess) than King 
 James. Solomon was a main improver of his 
 home commodities, as you may see in his trading 
 
102 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 with Hiram, 1 Kings V, 9 ; and, God knows it 
 was the daily study of King James. Solomon 
 was a great maintainer of shipping and navigation, 
 1 Kings X, 14; a most proper attribute to King 
 James. Solomon beautified very much his capital 
 city, with buildings and water- works, 1 Kings ix, 
 15. So did King James. Every man lived in 
 peace under his vine, and his fig-tree, in the days 
 of Solomon, 1 Kings iv, 25 ; and so they did in the 
 blessed days of King James. And yet towards 
 his end, King Solomon had secret enemies, Razan, 
 Had ad, and Jeroboam, and prepared for a war 
 Upon his going to his grave. So had, and so did 
 King James. Lastly, before any hostile act we 
 read of in the history. King Solomon died in 
 peace, when he had lived about sixty years, and 
 so you know did King James." 
 
 The preacher proceeds according to the method 
 of his text, "to polish and refine the members of 
 this statue in their division and particulars." '* In 
 his stile," says he, " you may observe the Eccle- 
 siastes, in his figures the Canticles, in his sen- 
 tences the Proverbs, and in his whole discourse, 
 reliquum verborum SolomoniSj all the rest that was 
 admirable in the eloquence of Solomon. From 
 his sayings, I come to his doings. Qu(s fecerit, 
 all that he did. Every action of his sacred 
 majesty was a virtue, and a miracle to exempt 
 him from any parallel amongst the modern kings 
 
PANEGYRICS ON JAMES I. 103 
 
 and princes. Of all christian kings that ever I 
 read of, he was the most constant patron of 
 churches and churchmen. I will speak it boldly, 
 in the presence here of God and men, that I 
 believe in my soul and conscience, there never 
 lived a more constant, resolute, and settled pro- 
 testant in point of doctrine, than our late sove- 
 reign. Through all Europe, no more question 
 was made of his being just, than of his being 
 king. He was resolute enough, and somewhat 
 too forward in those unapproachable places, (the 
 Highlands,) scattering his enemies as much with 
 his example, as he did with his forces. Besides 
 these adventures of his person, he was unto his 
 people, to the hour of his death, another cheru- 
 bim with a flaming sword, to keep out enemies 
 from this paradise of ours." 
 
 After flourishing upon his political wisdom and 
 learned works, he goes on to let his hearers 
 know, " that as he lived like a king, so he died 
 like a saint. All his latter days he spent in 
 prayer, sending his thoughts before into heaven, 
 to be the harbingers of his happy soul. Some four 
 days before his end, he desired to receive the 
 blessed sacrament, and said he was prepared for 
 it by faith and charity. He repeated the articles 
 of the creed, and after the absolution had been 
 read and pronounced, he received the sacrament 
 with that zeal and devotion, as if he had not been 
 
104 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 a frail man, but a cherubim clothed with flesh 
 and blood, he twice or thrice repeated Domine 
 Jesu, veni cito ; and after the prayer usually said 
 at the hour of death was ended, his lords and 
 servants kneeHng, without any pangs or convul- 
 sions at all, dormivit Solomon, Solomon slept. 
 And his soul, severed from the dregs of the body, 
 doth now enjoy an eternal dreaming in the pre- 
 sence of God, environed no more with lords and 
 knights, but with troops of Angels, and the souls 
 of the blessed, called in this text his fore-runners 
 or fathers ; and Solomon slept with his fathers,'' * 
 
 This was the character given of King James I. 
 before an auditory, who must have known him 
 well: — every reader must think it nothing else 
 but a panegyrical harangue, full of adulation and 
 exaggeration. 
 
 At the convocation cotemporary with the par- 
 liament in the year 1623-4, Feb. 20, Dr. Hall 
 preached a Latin Sermon in St. Paul's cathedral. 
 The title of the sermon is Noah's dove bringing 
 an olive of peace to the tossed Ark of Christ's 
 church. The text is 1 Cor. xii, 4. There are 
 diversities of gifts, hut the same Spirit ; there are 
 diversities of ministers, but the same Lord; and 
 there are diversities of operations, hut the same God. 
 
 * Harris's Life of James I. pp. 288-291. 
 
SERMONS. 105 
 
 This sermon was composed and written in 
 elegant and pure Latin, and was translated into 
 English by Dr. Halls eldest son, Robert: " it 
 pleased my father," says the son, herein to 
 improve ray leisure; wherein howsoever I may 
 have somewhat failed of the first elegance, yet I 
 have not been far short of the sense." Prefixed 
 to this sermon are some commendatory Latin 
 verses, by Dr. Goad, chaplain to the Archbishop 
 of Canterbury. * 
 
 On St. Stephen's day, 1623, Dr. Hall preached 
 from Hag. ii, 9, " at the solemn reconciling" of 
 the restored and re-edified chapel of St. John's in 
 the house of the Rt. Hon. the Earl of Exeter in 
 Clerkenwell. This chapel was repaired by Lady 
 Elizabeth Drury, Countess of Exeter, to whom 
 Dr. Hall dedicated his sermon on the occasion, 
 and to whose family of the Drurys be was 
 indebted for his first patronage.* 
 
 ♦ Bishop Hall's Works, vol. v, p. 148. 
 
 * This chapel was on the site of the ruined choir of the 
 Priory of St. John of Jerusalem ; " a place," says Fuller, in his 
 Ch. Hist. b. vi, pp. 357, 360, ** in a pitiful plight, when the 
 hospitalers of St. John of Jerusalem were tirst restored by 
 Queen Mary ; for the bell tower of the church was undermined 
 and blown up with gun-powder, that the stones thereof might 
 build Somerset-house in the Strand." 
 
 Jordan Bisset, a pious and wealthy man, who died Nov. 16, 
 1110, and was buried in the Chapter House of this Priory, was 
 the founder of it. He built an house for the Knight's Hogpi- 
 
106 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 When the parliament met, Feb. 6, 1626, a 
 committee of religion was appointed, of which 
 Mr. Pym was the chairman, w^ith the view of 
 examining once more Mr. Montague's Gag, 
 Appeal, and his Treatise of the Invocation of the 
 Saints; out of these works they collected several 
 opinions contrary to the articles and homilies of 
 the church. But after all, Mr. Montague was not 
 brought to his trial ; King Charles I. intimated his 
 displeasure at the proceedings of the commons, 
 
 talers of St. John of Jerusalem, which was improved into the 
 stateliness of a palace, and had a very beautiful church with a 
 high tower so neatly carried up, that while it stood, it was a 
 singular ornament to the city. The Knight's Hospitalers of 
 St. John of Jerusalem, were instituted about the time Geoffrey 
 of Boulogne had recovered Jerusalem. They wore a white 
 cross upon their upper blacii garment, and by solemn profession 
 were bound to serve pilgrims and poor people in the hospital 
 of St. John, and to secure the passages thither: they charitably 
 buried the dead, were continual in prayer, mortified themselves 
 with watchings and fastings, were courteous and kind to the 
 poor, whom they called their masters, and fed with white 
 bread, while they lived themselves on brown, and practised 
 great austerity. At first they were but poor ; for their piety 
 and bravery in war, their condition was much changed through 
 the bounty of good princes and private persons, that they 
 became to abound in every thing. For about the year 1240 
 they had nineteen thousand Lordships or Manors within Chris- 
 tendora, as the Templars had nine thousand, whose revenues 
 here in England fell also afterwards to the Hospitalers. This 
 vast increase of revenues made them so effectual a passage to 
 great honors, that their Prior was reckoned the first Baron of 
 England, and lived in great state and plenty, till the dissolution 
 of religious houses by Henry VIII. See Camden's Britannia, 
 p. 321-2, fol. ed. 1695, and " Magna Britannia," vol. iii, p. 58, 
 ed. 1724. 
 
Montague's writings. 107 
 
 and that he would take the cause into his own 
 hands. Many books were written against Mr. 
 Montague, by Dr.Carleton, Bishop of Chichester, 
 Dr. Suthffe, Dean of Exeter, Dr. Featley, and 
 many others. After all, the differences were 
 rather increased than diminished. The points of 
 controversy became so much the subject of public 
 discussion, that his Majesty issued a proclama- 
 tion, prohibiting to preach or dispute upon the 
 points in controversy between the Calvinists and 
 Arminians, and threatening to proceed against all 
 who should maintain any opinions contrary to the 
 doctrines established by law. 
 
 The Church of England was now sick of the 
 Belgic disease : ** I mean," says Dr. Hall, " the 
 distemper arising from the difference about the 
 five controverted Articles of the Netherlands. 
 The pulpits and presses laboured of it, in much 
 extremity : it pleased wise and judicious sove- 
 reignty, upon knowledge of the woeful effects 
 which had followed those unhappy controversies 
 abroad, to give charge, that those questions 
 should not be further stirred in, whether in 
 sermons or writings; and the articles of the 
 Church of England should be the just limits of all 
 our public discourse in this kind." It appears 
 that this royal declaration had a good effect, for 
 he proceeds to say, " and what a calm followed 
 
108 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 upon this prudent declaration, our fresh memory 
 can abundantly testify." * 
 
 Dr. Hall was inclined to be moderate in the 
 controverted five points. During the broils and 
 disputes about the dogmas of Calvin and Armi- 
 nius at the end of James l.s reign, and the com- 
 mencement of that of Charles I. Dr. Hall wrote 
 and published his treatise upon the subject, under 
 the title of Via Media, the way of peace. This 
 excellent tractate was published in the reign of 
 King James, and probably previous to his 
 Majesty's injunctions, set forth in August 1622, 
 against meddling with the controverted points, as 
 it appears from the dedication *^ to the king's 
 most excellent majesty," prefixed to Via Media, 
 where the author implores his " Majesty's season- 
 able prevention," of the impending storm. ** I 
 see," says he, " every man ready to rank himself 
 unto a side, and to draw in the quarrel he affect- 
 eth; I see no man thrusting himself between 
 them, and either holding or joining their hands 
 for peace." The design of Dr. Hall in this trea- 
 tise, is to attempt pacifying and healing the violent 
 and extreme dissentions, which then so greatly 
 disturbed the peace of the church. It evinces the 
 " excellent moderation" of Dr. Hall " in those 
 
 Bishop Hall's Works, vol. viii, p. 97. 
 
HIS VIA MEDIA. 109 
 
 unhappy disputes. He here collects from the 
 writings of Bishop Overall on the one side, and 
 of the English divines at the Synod of Dort on 
 the other side, such propositions or arguments 
 respecting the five controversial points, upon 
 which both sides agree. This ** collection of 
 accorded truths," he presented to his Majesty, 
 " together with an humble motion of a peaceable 
 silence to be enjoined to both parts, in those 
 other collateral and needless disquisitions." Many 
 divines, and even Mr. Montague himself, offered 
 readily to subscribe them ; so that peace would 
 have been likely to be obtained, " had not the 
 confused noise of the misconstruction of those 
 who never saw the work, crying it down for the 
 very names sake,'' and his Majesty's prohibition 
 above mentioned, " buried it in a secure silence." 
 
 This admirable tractate breathes the very sen- 
 timents of our church, and is well adapted to 
 allay the disputes about the ^rminian and Cal- 
 vinistic points, which have too much disturbed 
 the peace of the religious world to this very day. 
 With respect to the controverted points, Dr. Hall 
 says, '* what place soever these differences have 
 found in foreign schools and pulpits, ours have 
 reason to be free : if we shall listen to that wise 
 and moderate voice of our church, that men are 
 so stirred and moved by grace that they may, if 
 they attend thereunto, obey the grace, which 
 
110 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 <^lleth and moveth them ; and that they may, by 
 their free will also resist it; but, withal that God, 
 when he will, and to whom he will, gives such an 
 abundant, such powerful, such congruous, other- 
 wise effectual grace, that, although the will may 
 in respect of the liberty thereof resist; yet it 
 resists not, but doth certainly and infallibly obey; 
 and that thus God deals with those, whom he 
 hath chosen in Christ, so far as shall be necessary 
 to their salvation." And, again, '* my brethren," 
 says he, " let our care be to study and to preach 
 Christ and him crucified : to work the souls of 
 men to faith, repentance, piety, justice, charity 
 temperance, and other heavenly virtues ; that they 
 may find cordial testimonies in themselves, of their 
 happy predestination to life, and their infallible 
 interest in the precious blood of their redeemer. 
 Let us beat down those sins in them, which make 
 them obnoxious to everlasting damnation, and 
 strip them of all comfortable assurances of the 
 favor of God. Let us not undiscreetly spend our 
 time and pains, in distracting their thoughts with 
 those scholastic disquisitions, whereof the know- 
 ledge or ignorance makes nothing to heaven. 
 The way to blessedness is not so short, that we 
 should find leisure to make outroads into needless 
 and unprofitable speculations. Never treatise 
 could be more necessary, in this curious and 
 quarrelsome age, than De pcmcitate credendorum. 
 
HIS VIA MEDIA. Ill 
 
 The infinite subdivisions of those points, which we 
 advance to the honour of being the objects of our 
 behef, confound our thoughts and mar our peace. 
 Peaceable discourse may have much latitude, but 
 matter of faith should have narrow bounds. If, 
 in the other, men will abound in their own sense, 
 always let unity of spirit he held in the bond of 
 peace. Since God hath given us change of 
 raiment and variety of all intellectual provisions, 
 as Joseph said to his brethren, let me to mine, 
 Let us not fall out by the way. Now, by the dear 
 bonds of brotherhood, by our love to our common 
 mother, the church, by our holy care and zeal of 
 the prosperous success of the gospel of our Lord 
 Jesus, let us all compose our hearts to peace; 
 and rest ourselves in those common truths, which 
 sober minds shall find abundantly sufficient, 
 whether for our knowledge or salvation." * 
 
 * See this excellent Tractate, called Via Media^ in vol. ix. of 
 the Bishop's Works. 
 
CHAPTER III, 
 
 The Bishop continues his narrative : — 
 ** Immediately before the publishing of thi^ 
 tractate (which did not a little aggravate the envy 
 and suspicion,) I v^^as by his Majesty raised to 
 the bishoprick of Exeter; having formerly, with 
 much humble deprecation, refused the see of 
 Gloucester earnestly proffered unto me. How, 
 beyond all expectation, it pleased God to place 
 me in that western charge ; which, if the Duke 
 of Buckingham's letters, he being then in France, 
 had arrived but some hours sooner, I had been 
 defeated of; and, by what strange means it 
 pleased God to make up the competency of that 
 provison, by the unthought-of addition of the 
 rectory of St. Breok ''^ within that diocese: if I 
 should fully relate the circumstances, would force 
 
 * The living of St. Breok, in Cornwall, according to Dr. 
 Walker, was then worth about £300. a year. Sufferings of the 
 Clergy, part ii, p. 24. 
 
SEE OF EXETER. 113 
 
 the confession of an extraordinary hand of God 
 in the disposing of those events. 
 
 " I entered upon that place, not without much 
 prejudice and suspicion on some hands : for some, 
 that sat at the stern of the Church, had me in 
 great jealousy for too much favor of Puritanism. 
 I soon had intelligence who were set over me for 
 espials. My ways were curiously observed and 
 scanned. However, I took the resolution to 
 follow those courses which might most conduce 
 to the peace and happiness of my new and weighty 
 charge. Finding, therefore, some factious spirits 
 very busy in that diocese, I used all fair and 
 gentle means to win them to good order; and 
 therein so happily prevailed, that, saving two 
 of that numerous clergy who continuing in their 
 refractoriness fled away from censure, they were 
 all perfectly reclaimed : so as I had not one 
 minister professedly opposite to the anciently 
 received orders (for I was never guilty of urging 
 any new impositions) of the church in that large 
 diocese. 
 
 " Thus we went on comfortably together, till 
 some persons of note in the clergy, being guilty 
 of their own negligence and disorderly courses, 
 began to envy our success ; and, finding me ever 
 ready to encourage those whom I found conscion- 
 ably forward and painful in their places, and 
 willingly giving way to orthodox and peaceable 
 
114 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 lectures in several parts of my diocese, opened 
 their mouths against me, both obhquely in the 
 pulpit and directly at the court ; complaining of 
 my too much diligence to persons disaffected, and 
 my too much liberty of frequent lecturings within 
 my charge. The billows went so high, that I was 
 three several times upon my knee to his Majesty, 
 to answer these great criminations: and what 
 contestation I had with some great lords con- 
 cerning these particulars, it would be too long 
 to report; only this; under how dark a cloud 
 I was hereupon I was so sensible, that I plainly 
 told the Lord Archbishop of Canterbury, that, 
 rather than I would be obnoxious to those 
 slanderous tongues of his misinformers, I would 
 cast up my rochet.* I knew I went right ways, 
 and would not endure to live under undeserved 
 suspicions. 
 
 " What messages of caution I had from some 
 of my wary brethren, and what expostulatory 
 letters I had from above, I need not relate. Sure 
 I am, I had peace and comfort at home, in the 
 happy sense of that general unanimity and loving 
 correspondence of my clergy, till, in the last year 
 of my presiding there, after the synodical oath 
 was set on foot (which yet I did never tender to 
 
 * White garment ; he means his episcopal dress. 
 
TRANSLATED TO NORWICH. 115 
 
 any ooe minister of ray diocese) by the incitation 
 of sonae busy interlopers of the neighbour countyy 
 some of them began to enter into an unkind con- 
 testation with me about the election of clerks of 
 the convocation ; whom they secretly, without 
 ever acquainting me with their desire or purpose, 
 as driving to that end which we see now accom- 
 plished, would needs nominate and set up in 
 competition to those whom 1 had, after the usual 
 form, recommended to them. That they had a 
 right to free voices in that choice, I denied not : 
 only I had reason to take it unkindly that they 
 would work underhand, without me, and against 
 roe ; professing, that, if they had beforehand made 
 their desires known to me, 1 should wilhngly 
 have gone along with them in their election. It 
 came to the poll. Those of my nomination car- 
 ried it. 
 
 " The parliament begun. After some hard 
 tugging there, returning home on a recess, I was 
 met on the way and cheerfully welcomed with 
 some hundreds. 
 
 " In no worse terms I left that my once dear 
 diocese: when, returning to Westminster, I was 
 soon called by his Majesty, who was then in the 
 North, to a remove to Norwich. 
 
 " But how I took the Tower in my way, and 
 how I have been dealt wdth since my repair 
 hither, I could be lavish in the sad report; ever 
 
 I 2 
 
116 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 desiring my good God to enlarge my heart in 
 thankfulness to him for the sensible experience 
 I have had of his fatherly hand over me in the 
 deepest of all my afflictions, and to strengthen 
 me for whatsoever other trials he shall be 
 pleased to call me unto ; that, being found faith- 
 ful unto the death, I may obtain that crown of 
 life which he bath ordained for all those that 
 overcome." 
 
 Thus closes the Bishop's '* Account of some 
 speciahties in his own life."- — We shall now 
 revert to some parts of the Narrative which 
 other sources of information enable us to fill up, 
 where the writer's modesty had rendered him 
 more brief than could have been wished. 
 
 By the death of Dr. Miles Smith, bishop of 
 Gloucester, * in the year 1624, that bishopric being 
 vacant, was offered to Dr. Hall, then dean of 
 Worcester : he was earnestly pressed to accept 
 that charge ; but, " with much humble depreca- 
 tion," he refused it. However, three years after, 
 1627, he was promoted by his Majesty to the 
 bishopric of Exeter, void by the death of Dr. 
 Valentine Gary, who had been careful of his charge, 
 and presided over that see about six years ; but 
 
 * Dr. Miles Smith was one of the translators of the Bible, 
 and wrote the Preface to it. 
 
WRITINGS AGAINST POPERYI 117 
 
 he resided very little in his palace at Exeter, on 
 account of the plague which raged very much there 
 in his tirae. Dr. Hall was consecrated December 
 23, and was allowed to hold with his bishopric in 
 commendam, the rectory of St. Breok in Cornwall. 
 At the time he was elevated to the See of Exeter, 
 he had the misfortune to be misunderstood by 
 several well-meaning but over-zeak)us protestants, 
 in defending the church of England against the 
 attacks of some papists. Soon after he was made 
 bishop, he published his Treatise entitled The 
 Old Religion, in which he exposes the corruptions 
 and errors of the church of Rome, and ably vindi- 
 cates the church of England. But some, through 
 envy or ignorance, unjustly accused him of remiss- 
 ness, and of giving his popish adversaries the 
 advantage of the contest, in allowing the church 
 of Rome to be a true visible church, though a cor- 
 rupt and an unsound one. In vindication of him- 
 self, he wrote An Apologetical Advertisement, 
 wherein he explains his views of the Roman 
 church, and refutes the calumny of his changing 
 his sentiments upon his promotion, and also repels 
 the charge of inconstancy : with respect to this, 
 he says, ** though, while we are here in this region 
 of mutability, our whole man is subject to change, 
 yet we do all herein affect a likeness to the God 
 of truth, in whom there is no shadow of turning 
 
118 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 especially in religion, so much more as that doth 
 more assimilate and unite us to that unchangeable 
 Deity.'"^ He states, that what he wrote then, was 
 the same in substance with what he had written 
 near twenty years before: *' how," says he, " doth 
 the addition of a dignity bring envy upon the same 
 truth? might that pass com mend ably from the pen 
 or tongue of a Doctor, which will not be endured 
 from the hand of a Bishop ? my brethren, I am 
 where I was, the change is yours."! Envious 
 clamour and prejudice against him did not abate, 
 but he was compelled further to vindicate himself, 
 by another Treatise, entitled. The Reconciler, 
 being a pacificatory Letter addressed to the Earl 
 of Norwich. After stating fully and clearly his 
 view of the seeming differences of opinion, concern- 
 ing the trueness and visibility of the Roman Church, 
 Bishop Hall says, " Alas, my Lord, I see, and 
 grieve to see it : it is my Rochet (episcopal habit) 
 that hath offended, and not I : in another habit, I 
 long since published this, and more, without dis- 
 like: it is this colour of innocence that hath 
 bleared some over-tender eyes. Wherein I know 
 not whether I should more pity their error, or 
 applaud my own sufferings. Although I may not 
 say with the Psalmist, What hath the righteous 
 
 * Works, vol. ix, p. 301. 
 t Works, vol. ix, p. 303. 
 
WRITINGS AGAINST POPERY. 119 
 
 done ? Let me, I beseech your Lordship, upon 
 this occasion, have leave to give a little vent to 
 my just grief in this point. 
 
 "The other day I fell upon a Latin pamphlet, 
 homely for style, tedious for length, zealously 
 uncharitable for stuff; wherein the author (only 
 wise in this, that he would be unknown) in a grave 
 fierceness flies in the face of our English prelacy ; 
 not so much inveighing against their persons, which 
 he could be oontent to reverence, as their very 
 places. I bless myself to see the case so altered. 
 Heretofore, the person had wont to bear off many 
 blows from the function: now the very function 
 wounds the person. In what case are we, when that, 
 which should command respect, brands us! What 
 black art hath raised up this spirit of iErius from 
 his pit? Woe is me, that zeal should breed such 
 monsters of conceit ! It is the honour, the pomp, 
 the wealth, the pleasure, he saith, of the episco- 
 pal chair, that is guilty of the depravation of our 
 calling; and, if himself were so overlaid with 
 greatness, he should suspect his own fidelity. 
 Alas, poor man, at what distance doth he see us ! 
 Foggy air useth to represent every object far big- 
 ger than it is. Our Saviour, in his temptation upon 
 the mount, had only the glory of those kingdoms 
 shewed to him by that subtle Spirit; not the cares 
 and vexations : right so are our dignities exhibited 
 
120 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 to these envious beholders : little do these men 
 see the toils and anxieties that attend this sup- 
 posedly-pleasing eminence. 
 
 **A11 the revenge, that I would wish to this 
 uncharitable censurer, should ,be this, that he 
 might be but for a while adjudged to this so glori- 
 ous seat of mine; that so his experience might 
 taste the bewitching pleasures of this envied great- 
 ness ; he should well find more danger of being 
 overspent with work, than of languishing with ease 
 and delicacy. For me, I need not appeal to 
 heaven : eyes enough can witness, how few free 
 hours I have enjoyed, since I put on these robes 
 of sacred honour. Insomuch as I could find in 
 my heart, with holy Gregory, to complain of my 
 change ; were it not, that I see these public troubles 
 are so many acceptable services to my God, 
 whose glory is the end of my being. Certainly, 
 my Lord, if none but earthly respects should 
 sway me, I should heartily wish to change this 
 palace, which the providence of God and the 
 bounty of my gracious Sovereign hath put me 
 into, for my quiet cell at Waltham, where I had 
 so sweet leisure to enjoy God, your Lordship, 
 and myself. But 1 have followed the calling of 
 my God, to whose service I am willingly sacri- 
 ficed ; and must now, in a holy obedience to his 
 Divine Majesty, with what cheerfulness I may, 
 ride out all the storms of envy, which unavoida- 
 
WRITINGS AGAINST POPERY. 121 
 
 bly will alight upon the least appearance of a 
 conceived greatness. In the mean time, what- 
 ever I may seem to others, I was never less in my 
 own apprehensions; and, where it not for this 
 attendance of envy, could not yield myself any 
 whit greater than 1 was."* 
 
 The above quotation very particularly pour- 
 trays the mind of Bishop Hall, when he was har- 
 assed by envy and calumny, and his sacred func- 
 tion so uncharitably attacked. Upon the misre- 
 presentation of his opinion respecting the visibility 
 of the church of Rome, Bishop Mall consulted 
 Bishop Morton, Bishop Davenant, Dr. Prideaux, 
 Dr. Primrose, &c. and requested each of them to 
 express their sentiments concerning the point in 
 dispute. They unanimously concurred with 
 Bishop Hall's view of the subject: so that the 
 Treatise, entitled the Reconciler, was seconded 
 with the letters of the above learned and sound 
 divines, " whose indubitable authority," says 
 Bishop Hall, "was able to bear down calumny 
 itself. Which done, I did by a seasonable modera- 
 tion provide for the peace of the church, in silenc- 
 
 • Works, vol. ix, pp. 316, 316.— This nmy be reckoned a 
 correct and fair representation of the general condition of the 
 Bishops of the Church of England : the weighty and anxious 
 cares of their vocation are better known to themselves than to 
 others. 
 
122 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 ing both my defendants and challengers, in this 
 unkind and ill-raised quarrel."^ 
 
 We learn from Bishop Hall's dedication of his 
 Treatise entitled The Old Religion, to the dio- 
 cese of Exeter, that during the time of the late 
 vacancy, papists had taken the advantage to dis- 
 seminate " the tares of errors" among the people : 
 he therefore expressed his resolution, and faith- 
 fully vowed his utmost endeavours to reform and 
 prevent all sins of practice, and errors of doctrine: 
 " I shall labour against the first, by preaching, 
 example, and censures: against the latter, my 
 pen hath risen up in this early assault." He 
 affectionately recommended to his clergy to lead 
 their flocks to the tender pastures, and to the still 
 waters: '* by the one," says he, '* I mean the 
 inuring of our people to the principles of whole- 
 some doctrine ; by the other, an immunity from 
 all faction and disturbance of the public peace." 
 He then proceeded strongly to recommend cate- 
 chizing. " It was," says he, " the observation of 
 the learnedest king that ever sat hitherto in the 
 English throne, that the cause of the miscarriage 
 of our people into popery and other errors, was 
 their ungroundedness in the points of catechism. 
 
 * A suspicion of leaning towards popery was attached at 
 that time to all who favoured episcopacy. But, it is evident 
 from the whole tenor of Bishop Hall's works, and the general 
 course of his life, that nothing was more abhorrent to his soul. 
 
IN THE SEE OF EXETER. 123 
 
 How should those souls be but carried about with 
 every wind of doctrine, that are not well ballasted 
 with solid informations ? Whence it was that his 
 said late Majesty, of happy memory, gave public 
 order for bestowing the latter part of God's day 
 in familiar catechizing, than which, nothing could 
 be devised more necessary and behoveful to the 
 souls of men. It was the ignorance and ill-dis- 
 posedness of some cavillers, that taxed this course 
 as prejudicial to preaching; since, in truth, the 
 most useful of all preaching is catechetical. This 
 lays the grounds ; the other raiseth the walls and 
 roof. This informs the judgment: that stirs up 
 the affections. What good use is there of those 
 affections, that run before the judgment? or of 
 those walls, that want a foundation ? For my part, 
 I have spent the greater half of my life in this sta- 
 tion of our holy service ; I thank God, not unpain- 
 fully, not unprofitably.* But there is no one thing, 
 whereof I repent so much, as not to have bestowed 
 more hours in this public exercise of catechism. 
 In regard whereof I could quarrel with my very 
 sermons, and wish that a great part of them had 
 been exchanged for this preaching conference."! 
 
 * Fuller says, in his Worthies of England, that Hall's little 
 Catechism had done ^reat good in the populous parish of 
 Waltham ; ** and I could wish," says he, ** that ordinance more 
 generally used all over England.'' 
 
 t Works, vol. ix, pp. 224, 225. 
 
124 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 These remarks on catechizing are worthy of the 
 attention of every Christian Minister, as they 
 come from such high authority, as Bishop Hall, 
 who spent so large a portion of his life in this 
 exercise, and who must have seen and expe- 
 rienced its beneficial effects. Undoubtedly it 
 is, in a great measure, owing to the neglect of 
 catechizing that so many erroneous doctrines and 
 unscriptural opinions prevail in the rehgious world : 
 it was so in Bishop Hall's time, when he said, 
 " we see catechizing of children, than which 
 nothing can be conceived more profitable and 
 necessary in God's church, is grown utterly out 
 of fashion. And what woeful distractions of opin- 
 ions, what horrible paradoxes of contradiction to 
 the Articles of Christian faith, have been and are 
 daily broached to the world, what good heart can 
 but tremble to consider ? Certainly, it was not 
 without great reason, that our wise and learned 
 King James, of blessed memory, when complaint 
 was made to him of the growth of popery in his 
 time, returned answer, that all this was for the 
 want of catechizing; for, surely, if the younger 
 sort were soundly seasoned with true know- 
 ledge of the grounds of religion, they could not 
 be so easily carried away with every wind of 
 doctrine.'' ^ 
 
 Bishop Hall's Works, vol. ix, pp. 780, 808. 
 
IN THE SEE OF EXETER. 125 
 
 Bishop Hall, at his first entering upon this 
 new dignity, met with much vexation and 
 uneasiness : he was not only suspected of favour- 
 ing popery, when he was made a bishop, but 
 there were persons disposed to charge him with 
 puritanism.* 
 
 About the time Bishop Hall was promoted 
 to the see of Exeter, a scheme was formed 
 by several gentlemen and clergy, to promote 
 preaching in the country, by setting li^ lectures 
 in market towns. They erected themselves 
 into a kind of a corporation, and by voluntary 
 contributions, purchased what impropriations 
 they could meet with in lay hands ; the profits 
 of which were to be divided into salaries to 
 these lecturers. The trustees had laid out be- 
 tween five and six thousand pounds in the pur- 
 chasing of impropriations. The design at first 
 was looked upon by most people as very lauda- 
 ble ; but as it was found that the preachers had 
 not those salaries for their lives, but were entirely 
 dependent on the good will and humour of their 
 patrons, who were considered as not very well 
 affected to the established church, and as most 
 of the lecturers were either non-conformists, or 
 
 • See above, p. 113. 
 
126 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 such as had been silenced for refusing to sub- 
 scribe the articles. Bishop Laud looked on these 
 proceedings with an evil eye, and represented 
 them to the king, as a conspiracy against the 
 church. An information was therefore brought 
 against the trustees, by Mr. Attorney-General 
 Noy, as an unlawful society formed into a body 
 corporate, without any grant from the king, and 
 it was decreed, that the impropriations should be 
 confiscated to the king, and the trustees fined 
 in the Star-Chanaber : — but, however, the pro- 
 secution for some reasons was dropt, as it 
 ultimately appeared, that the trustees already 
 were out of pocket above a thousand pounds in 
 this business. 
 
 The puritans thought this an odious prose- 
 cution, and exclaimed against the bishops as 
 designing to introduce Arminianism and Popery 
 into the church. The violences, which should 
 justly have been ascribed to the circumstances of 
 the time, were unhappily imputed to the Church 
 of England ; whilst Bishop Laud, and others, 
 who had great credit with the king, were con- 
 tinually representing to him all those as puritans, 
 who were not entirely submissive to the regal 
 power, and were using against them severities in 
 the High Commission, and Star Chamber, very 
 unbecoming the spirit of Christianity. Thus the 
 
IN THE SEE 0¥ EXETER. 127 
 
 breach grew wider daily between the king and 
 the puritans ; and after the death of Archbishop 
 Abbot, Bishop Laud was advanced into the pri- 
 macy : the breach still widened through this 
 Primate's intolerancy, till it ended in his own 
 destruction, and that of the king, and the Church 
 of England. 
 
 But some persons charged Bishop Hall with 
 too much indulgence of lecturings in his diocese : 
 these adversaries of the bishop were some clergy 
 of note, " guilty of negligence, and of disorderly 
 courses," and who envied his success, finding him 
 always ready to encourage conscientious and 
 laborious clei^ymen, and promoting orthodox 
 and peaceable lectures in various parts of his 
 diocese. We have already seen (p. 114) how he 
 met these complaints. 
 
 In these troubles and vexations of Bishop Hall, 
 the reader may perceive the persecuting spirit of 
 Archbishop Laud, who had his spies in every 
 quarter to find out those who were puntanically 
 inclined. Because Bishop Hall was, and always 
 had been a diligent preacher himself, and a great 
 encourager of preaching, and promoted regular 
 lectures in his diocese, he must be reckoned a too 
 great favourer of puritanisra ! He must be there- 
 fore complained of to his sovereign, and nearly 
 be compelled to give up his episcopal function! 
 
128 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 Undoubtedly such men as Archbishop Laud,when 
 placed at the helm of ecclesiastical affairs, have 
 been the cause of very much harm to the Chris- 
 tian church. Such circumstances must have 
 made the assuming the government of the see of 
 Exeter extremely difficult to Bishop Hall; but 
 by his prudent measures, and mild, unaffected 
 behaviour, he soon obtained the confidence and 
 affections of his numerous clergy. The reader is 
 referred to the affecting " Account of Himself," 
 and to his " Letter from the Tower," wherein 
 his character is truly delineated, and the unjust 
 charges of all his adversaries refuted. Our his- 
 torians have blamed Bishop Hall, Archbishop 
 Usher, Bishop Prideaux, Bishop Brownrigge, 
 and some others, for their moderation, as giving 
 the disaffected in those times some advantage 
 against the established church. But such accu- 
 sations were generally made by those who were 
 of high church principles, and were disposed to 
 carry their own rigid views to an extreme. Bishop 
 Hall has been accused very undeservedly of 
 favoring any irregularity in the church : he inva- 
 riably used his moderation in order to win over 
 the enemies of the church. While engaged in 
 controversy, he always conducted himself with 
 such spirit and temper, that his antagonists could 
 not but allow, that he acted from love to them 
 
ARCHBISHOP LAUD. 129 
 
 and to the truth. If therefore, on any occasion, 
 his Christian moderation was made a wrong use 
 of, it should not be imputed as a fault to him, 
 but to those who abused it. 
 
 As soon as Dr. Laud was made Archbishop of 
 Canterbury, there was one thing in particular 
 advised by him, which very justly gave great 
 offence to all serious people in the church and 
 out of it. The occasion of it was this. A com- 
 plaint having been made to the Lord Chief 
 Justice Richardson, and Baron Denham, in their 
 Western circuit, of the great inconvenience arising 
 from revels, sports, church ales, and clerk ales,* on 
 Sundays : the two judges, at the request of the 
 justices of the peace, made an order for sup- 
 pressing these occasions of riot and debauchery 
 on the Lord's day, and enjoined every parish 
 minister to publish this order yearly in his church, 
 the first Sunday in February, and the two Sun- 
 days before Easter. Upon the return of the 
 circuit, the judges punished some few persons for 
 
 * Church ales were, when the people went from afternoon 
 prayers on Sunday to their sports and pastimes in the church 
 yard, or in some other place, as a public house, where they 
 drank and made merry. 
 
 Clerk ales were so called, because they were for the benefit 
 of the parish clerk : the people used to send him provisions, 
 and then come on a cerlain Sunday, and feasted with him, by 
 which means he used to sell a great quantity of ale, the profits 
 of which aided his salary. 
 
 K 
 
130 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 their disobedience of their order. The Arch- 
 bishop, being informed of this proceeding of the 
 two judges, complained to the king of their 
 invading the episcopal jurisdiction, and prevailed 
 on his Majesty to summon them before the Coun- 
 cil. When they appeared, Richardson pleaded 
 that the order was made at the request and 
 unanimous consent of the bench of justices, and 
 justified it by producing precedents in the two 
 foregoing reigns, as well as the present.^' But 
 all he could say signified nothing ; he was sharply 
 reprimanded, and enjoined to revoke the order at 
 the next assizes, which he did contrary to his 
 inclinations, as well as those of all good men, 
 who could not but think such revels, sports, &c. 
 on the sabbath-day, dishonourable to God, and 
 extremely prejudicial to bis Majesty and the 
 country. This circumstance almost broke the 
 judge's heart, for when he came out of the Coun- 
 cil Chamber, he told the Earl of Dorset, with 
 tears in his eyes, *' that he had been miserably 
 shaken by the Archbishop, and was like to be 
 choaked with his lawn-sleeves." 
 
 The primate having thus humbled the judge, 
 
 * Eliz. 38, Sep. 10, the justices assembled at Bridgwater 
 ordered that no church ale, clerk ale, or bid ale, be sutiered. 
 Signed by Popham, Lord Chief Justice, aud ten others. The 
 same order was repeated 1599, and Eliz. 41 ; and again at 
 Exeter, 1615, Jac. 13, and Anno 1627. 
 
BOOK OF SPORTS, 131 
 
 and taken this affair into his own bands, pre- 
 vailed on his Majesty to republish his father's 
 declaration of the year 1618, " concerning lawful 
 sports to be used on Sundays after divine service." 
 This was called the Book of Sports. This in- 
 famous declaration for sports on the sabbath day 
 was republished, Oct. 18, 1633, with additions or 
 improvements. As this Book of Sports is so 
 frequently mentioned by writers, in order to 
 satisfy the curiosity of the reader, and that he 
 might be able to judge of its merits, I have here 
 annexed a copy of it : it was to this effect : — 
 
 ** That king James, of blessed memory, in his 
 return from Scotland, coming through Lancashire, 
 found that his subjects were debarred from lawful 
 recreations upon Sundays, after evening-prayers 
 ended, and upon holydays. And he prudently 
 considered, that if these times were taken from 
 them, the meaner sort, who labour hard all the 
 week, should have no recreations at all to refresh 
 their spirits. And, after his return, he further 
 saw, that his loyal subjects, in all other parts of 
 his kingdom, did suffer in the same kind, though 
 perhaps not in the same degree ; and did there- 
 fore, in his princely wisdom, publish a declara- 
 tion to all his loving subjects, concerning lawful 
 sports to be used at such times, which was 
 printed and published by his royal command- 
 
 K2 
 
J32 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 ment, in the year 1618, in the tenor which here- 
 after followeth : — 
 
 " Whereas, upon his Majesty's return last year 
 out of Scotland, he did publish his pleasure, 
 touching the recreations of his people in those 
 parts, under his hand. For some causes him 
 thereunto moving, hath thought good to command 
 these his directions, then given in Lancashire, 
 with a few words thereunto added, and most 
 applicable to these parts of the realm, to be pub- 
 lished to all his subjects. 
 
 " Whereas he did justly, in his progress through 
 Lancashire, rebuke some puritans and precise 
 people: and took order, that the like unlawful 
 carriage should not be used by any of them here- 
 after, in the prohibiting and unlawful punishing 
 of his good people, for using their lawful recre- 
 ations, and honest exercises, upon Sundays, and 
 other holidays, after the afternoon sermon or 
 service. His Majesty hath now found, that two 
 sorts of people, wherewith that country is much 
 infected, viz. papists and puritans, hath mali- 
 ciously traduced ; nd calumniated those his just 
 and honourable proceedings : and therefore, lest 
 his reputation might, upon the one side, (though 
 innocently,) have some aspersion laid upon it; 
 and that, upon the other part, his good people in 
 that country be misled by the mistaking and 
 
BOOK OF SPORTS. 133 
 
 misinterpretation of his meaning, his Majesty 
 hath therefore thought good hereby to clear and 
 make his pleasure to be manifested to all his 
 good people in those parts. 
 
 " It is true, that, at his first entry to this crown 
 and kingdom, he was informed, and that truly, 
 that his county of Lancashire abounded more in 
 popish recusants than any county of England, 
 and thus hath still continued since, to his great 
 regret, with little amendment; save that, now of 
 late, in his last riding through his said county, 
 hath found, both by the report of the judges and 
 of the bishop of that diocese, that there is some 
 amendment now daily beginning, which is no 
 small contentment to his Majesty. The report 
 of this growing amendment amongst them, made 
 his Majesty the more sorry, when, with his own 
 ears, he heard the general complaint of his people, 
 that they were debarred from all lawful recrea- 
 tions and exercise upon the Sundays' afternoon, 
 after the ending of all divine service, which cannot 
 but produce two evils: the one, the hindering 
 the conversion of many, whom their priests will 
 take occasion hereby to vex, persuading them 
 that no honest mirth or recreation is lawful or 
 tolerable in the religion which the king professeth, 
 and which cannot but breed a great discontent- 
 ment in his people's hearts, especially of such as 
 are, peradventure, upon the point of turning. 
 
134 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 The other mconvenience is, that this prohibition 
 barreth the common and meaner sort of people 
 from using such exercises as may make their 
 bodies more able for war, when his Majesty or 
 his successors shall have occasion to use them ; 
 and in place thereof, sets up tippling and filthy 
 drunkenness, and breeds a number of idle and 
 discontented speeches in their alehouses. For 
 when shall the common people have leave to 
 exercise, if not upon the Sundays and holidays, 
 seeing that they must apply their labour, and win 
 their living, in all working days ? 
 
 '' The king's express pleasure therefore is, that 
 the laws of this kingdom, and canons of the 
 church, be as well observed in that county, as in 
 all other places of this his kingdom. And, on 
 the other hand, that no lawful recreation shall be 
 barred to his good people, which shall not tend 
 to the breach of the aforesaid laws and canons of 
 his church ; which, to express more particularly 
 his Majesty's pleasure, is, that the bishops, and 
 all other inferior churchmen, and churchwardens, 
 shall, for their parts, be careful and diligent, both 
 to instruct the ignorant, and convince and reform 
 them that are misled in religion ; presenting them 
 that will not conform themselves, but obstinately 
 stand out, to the judges and justices, whom he 
 likewise commands to put the laws in due execu- 
 tion against them. 
 
BOOK OF spokrs. 135 
 
 " His Majesty's pleasure likewise is, that the 
 bishop of the diocese take the like strict order 
 with all the puritans and precisians within the 
 same : either constrain them to conform them- 
 selves, or to leave the country, according to the 
 laws of this kingdom, and canons of this church, 
 and so to strike equally on both hands against 
 the contemners of his authority, and adversaries 
 of the church. And as for his good people's law- 
 ful recreation, his pleasure likewise is, that, after 
 the end of divine service, his good people be not 
 disturbed, letted, or discouraged from any lawful 
 recreation ; such as dancing, either men or 
 women ; archery for men, leaping, vaulting, or 
 any other such harmless recreations ; nor from 
 having of May-games, Whitsun-ales, and Morice- 
 dances, and the setting up of May-poles, and 
 other sports therewith used ; so as the same be 
 had in due and convenient time, without impedi- 
 ment or neglect of divine service. And that 
 women shall have leave to carry rushes to the 
 church, for the decorating of it, according to 
 their old custom. But withal his Majesty doth 
 hereby account still as prohibited, all unlawful 
 games to be used upon Sundays only, as bear 
 and bull-baitings, interludes, and, at all times, 
 in the meaner sort of people by law prohibited, 
 bowling. 
 
 " And likewise bars from this benefit and 
 
136 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 liberty, all such known recusants, either men or 
 women, as will abstain from coming to church or 
 divine service ; being therefore luiworthy of any 
 lawful recreation after the said service, that will 
 not first come to the church and serve God : 
 prohibiting in like sort the said recreations to any 
 that, though conform in religion, are not present 
 in the church at the service of God, before their 
 going to the said recreations. His pleasure like- 
 wise is, that they, to whom it belongeth in office, 
 shall present and sharply punish all such as, in 
 abuse of this his liberty, will use these exercises 
 before the end of all divine services for that day. 
 And he doth Hkewise straightly command, that 
 every person shall resort to his own parish-church 
 to hear divine service, and each parish by itself 
 to use the said recreation after divine service : 
 prohibiting likewise any offensive weapons to be 
 carried, or used, in the same times of recreation. 
 And his pleasure is, that this his declaration 
 shall be published, by order from the bishop of 
 the diocese, through all the parish churches; and 
 that both the judges of the circuits, and the jus- 
 tices of the peace, be informed thereof. 
 
 " Given at the manor of Greenwich, the 24th 
 of May, in the 16th year of his Majesty's 
 reign, of England, France, and Ireland, and 
 of Scotland, the one and fiftieth." 
 
BOOK OF SPORTS. 137 
 
 " Now out of a like pious care for the service 
 of God, and for suppressing of any humours that 
 oppose truth, and for the ease, comfort, and re- 
 creation of his well-deserving people, his Majesty 
 doth ratify and publish this his blessed fathers 
 declaration ; the rather, because of late, in some 
 counties of this kingdom, his Majesty finds that, 
 under pretence of taking away abuses, there hath 
 been a general forbidding, not only of ordinary 
 meetings, but of the feasts of the dedication of 
 the churches, commonly called Wakes. Now 
 his Majesty's express will and pleasure is, that 
 these feasts, with others, shall be observed ; and 
 that his justices of the peace, in their several 
 divisions, shall look to it, both that all disorders 
 there may be prevented or punished, and that all 
 neighbourhood and freedom with manlike and 
 lawful exercises, be used. And for this his 
 Majesty further commands all justices of assize, 
 in their several circuits, to see that no man do 
 trouble or molest any of his loyal and dutiful 
 people, in or for their lawful recreations, having 
 first done their duty to God, and continuing in 
 obedience to his Majesty's laws. And for this 
 his Majesty commands all his judges, justices of 
 peace, as well within liberties as without, majors, 
 bailiffs, constables, and other oflGicers, to take 
 notice of, and to see observed, as they tender his 
 displeasure. And doth further will, that pub- 
 
138 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 lication of this his command be made, by order 
 from the bishops, through all the parish churches 
 of their several dioceses respectively. 
 
 " Given at the palace of Westminster, the 
 18th day of October, in the ninth year of 
 his reign. 
 
 ^* God save the King." 
 
 The publication of this declaration for sports 
 on the Lord's day, was to be by order from the 
 bishops, through all the parish churches of their 
 respective dioceses. This opened a flood-gate 
 to all manner of licentiousness among the popu- 
 lace, and became the means of unspeakable 
 oppression to a great number of worthy clergy- 
 men. The ruling prelates, though unauthorized 
 by law, required the clergy to read it publicly 
 before the congregation : and those clergy who 
 refused, felt the iron rod of oppression, suspen- 
 sion, deprivation, &c. It struck the sober part of 
 the nation with horror, to see themselves invited 
 by the authority of the king and church, to that 
 which seemed so contrary to the command of 
 God. It was certainly out of character for 
 bishops a::d clergymen, who should support and 
 encourage religion, to draw men off from the 
 practice of it, by inviting them to public sports 
 and pastimes upon the day which God himself 
 
BOOK OF SPORTS. 1S9 
 
 has commanded mankind to remember to keep 
 holy. Such were the piety and wisdom of these 
 times ! The court had their balls, masquerades, 
 and plays, on the Sunday evenings ; whilst the 
 country people were at their revels, morrice- 
 dances. May-games, church-ales, and all kinds 
 of diversion. 
 
 The bishof)s were ordered to take care of its 
 publication in all parish churches. Archbishop 
 Laud knew it would distress the puritans, and 
 would tend to purify the church of a set of men, 
 for whom he had a perfect aversion. The im- 
 posing this declaration to be published by the 
 clergy was a great hardship, and was the cause of 
 sad havoc amongst them for above seven years. 
 Many poor clergymen strained their consciences 
 in submission to their superiors. Some after 
 publishing it, immediately read the fourth com- 
 mandment to the people. Remember the sabbath 
 day to keep it holy ; adding, " This is the laic of 
 God; the other, the injunction of man,''' Great 
 numbers refused to comply at all to read the 
 declaration. Fuller says, " that the arch bis? hop's 
 moderation in his own diocese was remarkable, 
 silencing but three, in whom also was a con- 
 currence of other non-conformities ; but tliat his 
 adversaries imputed it not to his charity, but 
 policy, foX'like, preying farthest from his own 
 
140 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 den, and instigating other bishops to do more 
 than he would appear in himself."* 
 
 A great number of clergymen were, during the 
 space of about seven years, silenced, suspended, 
 and deprived of their livings for refusing to read 
 the book of sports. It would be too tedious to 
 relate in this volume all the particulars of the 
 suspensions, deprivations, and other persecutions 
 in the High Commission Court for not read- 
 ing it. 
 
 When we consider that Charles I. has been 
 represented as remarkable for his piety, and the 
 diligent performance of the external acts of reli- 
 gion, *' setting a pattern to others in what related 
 to the worship and service of Almighty God;" 
 it would be hardly credible, did not historians 
 unanimously concur in recording the fact, that 
 he should revive the declaration of his father 
 concerning sports on the Lord's day, and dis- 
 countenance such as were for a strict observance 
 of it. But so it was ; and the charge of repub- 
 lishing this declaration is a great blemish in the 
 character of Charles I, though undoubtedly, he 
 was instigated and recommended to do it by 
 Archbishop Laud. The public licence and en- 
 couragement of sports and diversions, after divine 
 
 * Ch. Hist. b. xi, p. 148. 
 
BOOK OF SPORTS. 141 
 
 service on Sundays, was a thing of ill report, 
 destructive to the morals of the common people, 
 and even contrary to a statute made in this 
 reign. 1 Caroli, c. 1.* It tended to efface any 
 good impressions received in the worship of God, 
 and it was so inconsistent with the petition or 
 prayer subjoined in the Liturgy to the fourth 
 commandment — Lord, have mercy upon us, and 
 incline our hearts to keep this law ! It there- 
 fore left a bad impression on the minds of 
 the people, with respect to the king's regard 
 to religion and morality ; especially since his 
 Majesty made use of the liberty he gave to his 
 subjects. He scrupled not giving a masquerade 
 on a Sunday : f and it must be allowed that it 
 
 * It was the only act relating; to religion, which his Majesty 
 passed in the Parliament of 1625, and was entitled, An Act 
 to prevent unlawful Pastimes on the Lord's day. The preamble 
 sets forth, That the holy keeping of the Lord's day is a prin- 
 cipal pari of ihe true service of God — "Therefore it is enacted, 
 that there shall be no assemblies of people out of their own 
 parishes, for any sports or pastimes whatsoever; nor any bear- 
 baiting, bull-baiting, interludes, common plays, or other unlaw- 
 ful exercises or pastimes, within their own parishes, on for- 
 feiture of three shillings and sixpence for every such offence to 
 the poor." ** However," says Neal, ** this law was never put 
 in execution. Men were reproached and censured for too strict 
 an obseiAation of the Lord's day, but none that I have met 
 with, for the profanation of it." It was suspended and abro- 
 gated by the publication of the book of sports. See Neal's 
 Hist, of the Puritans, vol ii, pp. 1G2, 1()3. 
 
 t " The French and Spanish Ambassadors were both at the 
 king's mask, but not received as Ambassadors. The French 
 
142 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 was a very strange way to express a pions care 
 for the service of God, by eiicourajjjing Morice- 
 dances, May-games, May-poles, and revels, on 
 the day set apart for divine worship. The people, 
 possessing even common sense, could not be 
 brouglit to believe, that the practice of virtue 
 could be promoted by the inixt dancing of men 
 and women on village greens, or in other places on 
 Sunday evenings, and at wakes and Whitsun-ales. 
 When the common people were encouraged to 
 spend the sabbath in idleness or in diversions, 
 the natural consequence must necessarily have 
 been, that a loose turn of mind would be con- 
 tracted, and a demoralization, or a great depra- 
 vity of manners ensue. Therefore it always 
 behoves persons in authority to promote the 
 observance of the Lord's day, and to shew 
 themselves an exemplary and a regular behaviour 
 on that sacred day: for by a strict observance 
 of the sabbath by men in power, decency of man- 
 ners will be generally increased, knowledge 
 
 sat amongst the ladies, the Spanish in a box. It was performed 
 on a Sunday ni«;ht, the day after the twelfth night, in very cold 
 weather, so that the house was not tilled according to expecta- 
 tion. 'I he act of council to drive all men into the country, the 
 coldness of the weather, the da\ Sunday, and the illness of the 
 invention of the scenes, were given for causes why so small 
 a company came to see it. My Lord-Treasurer (Bishop 
 Juxton) was there by command." Strafforde's Letters and 
 Dispatches, vol. ii, p, 148. 
 
BOOK OF SPORTS. 143 
 
 advanced, and a sense of religion (a thing of the 
 greatest importance to society as well as to indi- 
 viduals) will be promoted in the minds of men. 
 This is the duty of men in power : if they neglect 
 it, they are not to wonder at the demoralized 
 state and wickedness of the lower classes, or 
 complain of the breach of social duties.* 
 
 Though several of the bishops urged the reading 
 of the book of sports in their dioceses, and caused 
 many of the clergy for refusing to do it, to be sus- 
 pended and to be oppressed, yet, with respect to 
 the diocese of Exeter, there is no account of any 
 one clergyman suffering on account of it. As one 
 object of publishing the book of sports was to sup- 
 press afternoon sermons, so we know that Bishop 
 Hall was a very great encourager of sermons and 
 of lectures ; therefore there is strong probability 
 that he did not countenance sports on the sabbath, 
 nor urge his clergy to read the declaration. Con- 
 sidering his gn at moderation, we may suppose 
 that he left it entirely to the discretion of his clergy 
 to comply or not with the reading of it. In his 
 Works we find no allusion to, or any remarks 
 made upon this declaration for sports ; the good 
 bishop probably passed over such a violation of 
 God's law in silence, out of respect, and from 
 
 * Harris's Life of Charles I. pp. 59, 60. 
 
144 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 obedience, to the powers that he for cofiscience' sake. 
 Btlt it would have been well, if he had left us a 
 testimony of his decided disapprobation of such a 
 violation of the sabbath ; or that he had written 
 purposely on the morality of the Lord's day. 
 
 When the declaration for sports was repub- 
 lished, the controversy of the morality of the sab- 
 bath w^as revived. Mr. Theophilus Bradbourne, a 
 Suffolk Minister, had published in the year 1628, 
 a Defence of the most ancient and sacred ordinance 
 of God, the Sabbath day ; and dedicated it to the 
 king. But Fuller observes, '* That the poor 
 man fell into the ambush of the high commission, 
 whose well-tempered severity so prevailed with 
 him, that he became a convert, and conformed 
 quietly to the church of England" Francis 
 White, bishop of Ely, was commanded by the king 
 to confute Bradbourne : after him appeared Dr. 
 Pocklington, with his Sunday no sabbath ; and 
 after him Heylin and others.* These divines, 
 instead of softening some rigours in Bradbourne's 
 Sabbatarian strictness, ran into the contrary ex- 
 treme, denying all manner oidivijie right ov moral 
 obligation to the observance of the whole, or any 
 part of the Lord's day, making it to depend entirely 
 upon ecclesiastical authority, and to oblige no 
 
 » Ch. Hist. b. xi, p. 144. See also Heylin's Life of Laucl> 
 pp. 257, 268. 
 
BOOK OF SPORTS. 145 
 
 further than to the few hours of public service : 
 and that, in the intervals, all kinds of revels and 
 diversions were lawful and expedient. 
 
 It must be acknowledged that the long Parlia- 
 ment paid a particular regard to the strict and 
 due observation of the Lord's day, and so passed 
 several ordinances or acts to that purpose. All 
 kinds of sports, either before pr after divine ser- 
 vice, were discountenanced ; the preaching of 
 God's word was promoted in the afternoon on 
 Sundays, in the several churches and chapels, 
 and ministers were encouraged thereunto. And 
 it does the long Parliament credit so far as to 
 shew their abhorrence of the infamous hook of 
 sports, which was ordered. May 5, 1643, to be 
 burnt by the hands of the common hangman in 
 Cheapside, and other places; and all persons 
 having any copies in their hands, were required to 
 deliver them to one of the Sheriffs of London to 
 be burnt. 
 
 Archbishop Laud was so far from undeceiving 
 those who were disposed to imagine that the church 
 was leaning to popery, that he seemed at this 
 time to have taken care to confirm them in their 
 suspicion, by conforming to the Romish church in 
 matters of little moment. There was scarce a 
 church then in England, except the cathedrals, 
 and the king's chapel, where the communion table 
 was placed altarwise at the upper end of the chan- 
 
146 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 eel. The communion-table was usually placed in 
 the middle of the chancel, and the people received 
 the sacrament of the Lord's Supper round it, or in 
 their places thereabouts.* The dean and chapter 
 of St. Paul's ordered the communion table in St. 
 Gregory's church near St. Paul's to be removed 
 from the middle of the chancel to the upper 
 end of it, and to be placed there in form of an 
 altar. This was complained of by the parishion- 
 ers in the Court of Arches. The king some- 
 time after commanded this cause to be heard 
 before the council ; where his Majesty himself 
 directed the Dean of the Arches to confirm 
 what had been done. In consequence of this 
 sentence, pronounced by the king's authority, 
 without the judgment of the court, to which the 
 cognizance of this affair belonged, all communion- 
 tables were ordered to be fixed under the east- 
 wall of the chancel, with the ends north and south 
 in form of an altar; and to be raised two or three 
 steps above the floor, and encompassed with rails. 
 This proved a source of oppression to many minis- 
 ters and parishes who were unwilling to comply 
 with such an order. It is almost incredible what 
 a great ferment this trifling alteration occasioned 
 over the kingdom. Books were written for and 
 
 * The cornmunioD-table of the cliurch of Great Gransden, 
 Hunts, remains still (1824) in the raiddle of the Chancel. 
 
PRYNNE. 147 
 
 against it, with the same earnestness and conten- 
 tion for victory, as if the very existence of rehgion 
 had been in danger. This occasioned a sort of 
 schism or division among the bishops, " and a great 
 deal of uncharitableness in the learned and mode- 
 rate clergy towards one another."* Those who 
 opposed the alterations were called doctrmal 
 puritans, and the promoters of them doctriiial 
 papists. As the Archbishop and his party >vere 
 thus indiscreet on the one side, so the zeal of the 
 puritans, on the other, betrayed them into very 
 intemperate and indecent practices towards the 
 established government of the church. But they 
 were not the only people who were dissatisfied 
 with the innovations which were introduced, and 
 who were jealous that something more was in- 
 tended than was as yet proposed, f 
 
 About the beginning of the year 1634, the 
 severe sentence of the Star-chamber was pro- 
 nounced against William Prynne, barrister and 
 member of Lincoln's-inn, for writing a book inti- 
 tled Histriomastix, J against plays, masquerades. 
 
 * Clarendon. 
 
 t Warner's Eccles. Hist, of England, vol. ii, p. 526. 
 
 X This book is a thick quarto of 1006 pages. It abounds 
 with learning, and has some curious quotations ; but it is a very 
 tedious and heavy performance ; had he been let alone, few 
 people would have read his book. He was a person of austere 
 principles, and, perhaps, was one of the hardest students that 
 ever existed. He was called one of the greatest paper-worms that 
 
 L 2 
 
148 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 dancing, &c. He was sentenced to have his 
 book burnt, to be disabled from the practice of 
 the law, be degraded from his degree in the 
 university, be set in the pillory, have both his 
 ears cut off, to pay a fine of £ 5000. and to be 
 imprisoned during life." A short time after, Dr. 
 Bastwick a physician, and Mr. Burton a clergy- 
 man, were imprisoned ; the former for writing a 
 book entitled Elenchus Religionis Papisticce, with 
 Appendix, called Flagellum Pontijicis et Episcopo- 
 rum JLatialium, which gave a great offence to Laud 
 and others ; the latter, for having published two 
 exceptionable sermons, from Pro v. xxiv, 21, 22, 
 entitled. For God and the King, against the late 
 innovations. *' The punishment of these men, 
 who were of the three great professions," observes 
 
 ever crept into a library. Wood supposes that he wrote a sheet 
 for every day of his life, computing from the time of his arrival 
 to man's estate to the day of his death. He says, **his custom 
 was, when he studied, to put on a long quilted cap, which came 
 an inch over his eyes, serving as an umbrella to defend them 
 from too much light; and seldom eating a dinner, would every 
 three hours, or more, be mounching a roll of bread, and now 
 and then refresh his exhausted spirits with ale." He wrote 
 about two hundred books, which he gave in 40 vols, fol. and 4to. 
 to the public Library of Lincoln's Inn. On the restoration of 
 Charles II. some asked the king what mnst be done with 
 Prynne to make him quiet. " Why," said his Majesty, " let 
 him amuse himself with writing against the Catholics, and in 
 poring over the records of the Tower." To enable him to do 
 the latter, he was appointed Keeper of the Records of the 
 Tower, with a salary of £500. a year. He died Oct. 24, 1669. 
 Wood's Athen. Oxon, vol. ii, pp. 311-327. 
 
BURTON, PRYNNE, AND BASTWICK. 149 
 
 Mr. Granger, " was ignominious and severe: 
 though they were never objects of esteem, they 
 soon became objects of pity. The indignity and 
 severity of their punishment gave general offence ; 
 and they were no longer regarded as criminals, 
 but confessors."* 
 
 During imprisonment, the above three persons 
 were charged with writing several libellous pam- 
 phlets, and in the year 1637| were sentenced to 
 suffer perpetual imprisonment; Burton to be 
 deprived of his living, and to be degraded from 
 his ministry, as Prynne and Bastwick had been 
 from their profession of law and physic — each of 
 them to pay a fine of £ 5000 — to stand in the 
 pillory at Westminster, and have their ears cut off: 
 and because Prynne had already lost his ears, it 
 was ordered that the stumps should be cut off; 
 and that he should be stigmatized on both cheeks 
 with the letters S. L. viz. Seditious Libeller, 
 Prynne was imprisoned in Carnarvon castle, but 
 afterwards removed to Montorguiel Castle in 
 Jersey: Bastwick in Launceston Castle, but 
 removed to the castle in the isle of Scilly ; and 
 Burton in the castle of Lancaster, but was removed 
 to Castle-cornet in the island of Guernsey ; where 
 they were kept without the use of pen, ink and 
 
 ♦ Biog. Hbt. of Eng. vol. ii, p. 192. 
 
150 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 t 
 
 paper, or the access of their friends, till they were 
 released by the long parliament.* 
 
 Dr. Williams, bishop of Lincoln, and the Rev. 
 Mr. Osbaldeston, head-master of Westminster 
 school, met with severe hardships by means of 
 Archbishop Laud. Bishop Williams had been so 
 good a friend to Laud as to persuade King James 
 to advance him to a bishopric. But upon the 
 accession of King Charles, Laud turned upon his 
 benefactor, and supplanted him from favour 
 and preferments at court. Upon which Bishop 
 Williams retired to his diocese, and spent his time 
 in reading and in the good government of his 
 diocese. He said once in conversation, " that the 
 puritans were the kings best subjects, and he was 
 sure would carry all at last ; and that the king 
 had told him, " that he w^ould treat the puritans 
 more mildly for the future." Laud being informed 
 of this expression, caused an information to be 
 lodged against him in the Star-Chamber, for 
 revealing the king's secrets ; but the charge not 
 being well supported, a new bill was exhibited 
 against him, for tampering with the king's witnesses. 
 Consequently the bishop was suspended from all 
 his offices and benefices,was fined eleven thousand 
 
 * Neal's Hist, of the Puritans, vol. ii, p. 280. 
 See a full accouat of these sufferers in Brook's Lives of the 
 Puritans, vol. iii. 
 
OSBALDESTON. 151 
 
 pounds, and to be imprisoned in the Tower during 
 the king's pleasure. He was kept a close prisoner 
 about four years, till the meeting of the long parlia- 
 ment. The Rev.Mr.Osbaldeston was charged ivith 
 plotting with the bishop of Lincoln to divulge false 
 neivSy and to breed a difference beliveen the JLord 
 TreasurerWestonand the Archbishop of Canterbury 
 as long ago as the year 1633. The information 
 was grounded upon two letters of Mr. Osbaldeston 
 to BishopWilliams, found among the papers of the 
 latter, in which were some expressions, which the 
 jealous Archbishop interpreted as concerning 
 himself. Though there was no foundation for 
 conviction, yet the court fined him £ 5000 to the 
 Kingy and £5000. to the Archbishop : to be de- 
 prived of all his spiritual dignities and promotions, 
 to be imprisojied during the King's pleasure, and to 
 stand in the pillory in the Dean's yard before his 
 oivn school, and have his ears nailed to it. How- 
 ever, Mr. Osbaldeston so effectually concealed 
 himself till the beginning of the long parliament, 
 that he fortunately escaped this very severe 
 sentence. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 Though there had been bishops in Scotland 
 for some years, they were, in a great measure, but 
 nominal, being subject to a presbyterian assembly. 
 The attempt of establishing episcopacy in that 
 country in the time of king James, and king 
 Charles, was carried on in a rather arbitrary, and 
 so unsuccessful a manner. A man of archbishop 
 Laud's temper was very unfit to introduce that 
 primitive mode of church government among a 
 people remarkable for their love of liberty, and 
 for sobriety and moral conduct. To impose upon 
 that nation a set of canons, a liturgy of Laud's 
 revision, and a declaration for sports on the sab- 
 bath, were such measures as " proved the fatal 
 torch that put the two kingdoms into a flame." * 
 
 When, in the year 1637, the liturgy, revised 
 and altered by Laud, was sent into Scotland, and 
 accompanied with a royal proclamation, com- 
 
 * Welwood's Memoirs, p. 46. 
 
EPISCOPACY IN SCOTLAND. 153 
 
 inanding all his majesty's subjects to receive it; 
 the Scots tumultuously refused it, and afterwards 
 assumed to themselves the liberty and power of 
 holding a general assembly of their church, in 
 which they passed an act for abjuring and abolish- 
 ing episcopacy. They also passed sentence of 
 deposition against the bishops; eight of them 
 were excommunicated, four excluded from the 
 ministerial function, and two only allowed to 
 officiate as pastors or presbyters. Upon this, most 
 of the bishops withdrew from Scotland, only four 
 remained in the country, three of whom renounced 
 their episcopal orders, viz. Alexander Ramsey, 
 bishop of Dunkeld, George Graham, bishop of 
 Orkney, and James Fairby, bishop of Argyle; 
 but the fourth, George Guthrey, bishop of Murray, 
 kept his ground, and weathered the storm. 
 
 In consequence of the Scots' assembly abolish- 
 ing episcopacy as unlawful, Bishop Hall, at the 
 recommendation of Archbishop Laud, undertook 
 to write a book in defence of the divine right 
 OF EPISCOPACY, as a counterbalance to the pro- 
 ceedings of the Scots. Bishop Hall sent a rude 
 draught or skeleton of his intended work to Arch- 
 bishop Laud for his inspection and approbation. 
 The following, according to Heylin,* were the 
 original points and propositions submitted to the 
 
 * Heylin't Life of Laud, pp. 398, 399. 
 
154 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 Archbishop, together with his Grace's remarks, 
 and alterations : —" That episcopacy is a lawful, 
 most ancient, holy, and divine institution, (as it is 
 joined with imparity, and superiority of jurisdic- 
 tion) and therefore where it hath through God's 
 providence obtained, cannot, by any human power, 
 be abdicated without a manifest violation of God's 
 ordinance. 
 
 " That the presbyterian government, however 
 vindicated under the glorious names of Christ's 
 kingdom, and ordinance, hath no true footing 
 either in Scripture, or the practice of the church 
 in all ages from Christ's till the present ; and that 
 howsoever it may be of use, in some cities or 
 territories, wherein episcopal government through 
 iniquity of times cannot be had ; yet to obtrude it 
 upon a church otherwise settled under an acknow- 
 ledged monarchy, is utterly incongruous and 
 unjustifiable." 
 
 In order to prove these two points, he was to 
 lay down some propositions or postulata, as the 
 ground work of his proceedings ; which were the 
 following, before they were altered and revised: — 
 
 (1) " That government, which was of apostolical 
 institution, cannot be denied to be of divine right. 
 (2.) Not only that government which was directly 
 commanded and enacted, but also that which 
 was practised and recommended by the apostles 
 to the church, must justly pass for an apostolic 
 
DIVINE RIGHT OF EPISCOPACY. 155 
 
 institution. (3.) That which the apostles by 
 Divine inspiration instituted, was not for the pre- 
 sent time, but for continuance. (4.) The univer- 
 sal practice of the church, immediately succeed- 
 ing the apostles, is the best and surest commen- 
 tary upon the practice of the apostles, or upon 
 their expressions. (5.) We nyay not entertain so 
 irreverent an opinion of the saints and fathers of 
 the primitive church, that they who were the 
 immediate successors of the apostles would, or 
 durst set up a government, either faulty, or of 
 their own heads. (6.) If they would have been 
 so presumptuous, yet they could not have diffused 
 an uniform form of government through the world 
 in so short a space. (7.) The ancient histories 
 of the church, and writings of the eldest fathers, 
 are rather to be believed in the report of the primi- 
 tive form of the church government, than those of 
 this last age. (8.) Those whom the ancient 
 church of God, and the holy and orthodox fathers 
 condemned for heretics, are not fit to be followed 
 as authors of our opinion or practice for church 
 government. (9.) The accession of honourable 
 titles or privileges, makes no difference in the 
 substance of the calling. (10.) Those scriptures 
 wherein a new form of government is grounded, 
 have need to be very clear and unquestionable, 
 and more evident than those whereon the former 
 rejected polity is raised. (11.) If that order 
 
156 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 which, they say, Christ set for the government of 
 the church (which they call the kingdom and 
 ordinance of Christ) be but one, and undoubted, 
 then it would, and shall have been ere this, agreed 
 upon against them, what, and which it is. (12.) If 
 this (which they pretend) be the kingdom, and 
 ordinance of Christ, then if any essential part of it 
 be wanting, Christ's kingdom is not erected in the 
 church. (13.) Christian polity requires no impos- 
 sible or absurd thing. (14.) Those tenets which 
 are new and unheard of in all ages of the church, 
 (in many and essential points) are well worthy to 
 be suspected. (15.) To depart from the practice 
 of the universal church of Christ, (even from the 
 apostles' times) and to betake ourselves volunta- 
 tarily to a new form, lately taken up, cannot but 
 be odious and highly scandalous." 
 
 ** These first delineations of the portraiture," 
 says Heylin, '' being sent to Lambeth in the end 
 of October, 1639, were generally well approved 
 of by the Metropolitan, Some lines there were 
 which he thought too much shadoiv and umbrage 
 might be taken at them, if not otherwise qualified 
 with a more perfect ray of light. And thereupon 
 he takes the pencil in his hand, 'and with some 
 alterations, accompanied with many kind expres- 
 sions of a fair acceptance, he sent them back 
 again to be completely limned and coloured by 
 that able hand." 
 
DIVINE RIGHT OF EPISCOPACY. 157 
 
 The following were the remarks and alterations 
 made by Laud, in a letter to Bishop Hall. 
 
 " Since you are pleased so worthily and bro- 
 ther-like to acquaint me with the whole plot of 
 your intended work, and to yield it up to my 
 censure and better advise, (so you are pleased to 
 write) I do not only thank you heartily for it, but 
 shall in the same brotherly way, and with equal 
 freedom, put some few animadversions, such as 
 occur on the sudden, to your further considera- 
 tion, aiming at nothing but what you do, the 
 perfection of the work in which so much is 
 concerned. And first, for Mr. George Graham, 
 (whom Bishop Hall had signified to have re- 
 nounced his episcopal function) I leave you free 
 to work upon his business and his ignorance as 
 you please, assuring myself that you will not 
 depart from the gravity of yourself, or the cause 
 therein. Next you say in the first head. That 
 episcopacy is an ancient, holy, and divine institu* 
 lion. It must needs be ancient and holy if divine. 
 Would it not be more full went it thus ?— So 
 ancient, as that it is of divine institution. Next 
 you define episcopacy by being joined with 
 imparity and superiority of jurisdiction, but this 
 seems short; for every archpresbyter's or arch- 
 deacon's place is so ; yea, and so was Mr. Hen- 
 derson in his chair at Glasgow, unless you will 
 define it by a distinction of order. I draw the 
 
158 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 superiority, not from the jurisdiction which is 
 attributed to bishops jure positivo, in their audi- 
 ence of ecclesiastical matters ; but from that 
 which is intrinsical and original in the power of 
 excommunication. Again, you say in the first 
 point. That where episcopacy hath obtained, it 
 cannot be abdicated without violation of God's 
 ordinance. This proposition I conceive is inter 
 minus habenies; for never w^as there any church 
 yet, where it hath not obtained. The christian 
 faith was never yet planted any where, but the 
 very first feature of a church was by, or with 
 episcopacy. And wheresoever now episcopacy 
 is not suffered to be, it is by such an abdication, 
 for certainly there it was a principio. In your 
 second head, you grant that the presbyterian 
 government may be of use, where episcopacy 
 may not be had. First, I pray you consider 
 whether this conversion be not needless here, 
 and in itself of a dangerous consequence. Next 
 I conceive there is no place where episcopacy 
 may not be had, if there be a church more than in 
 title only. Thirdly, since they challenge their 
 presbyterian fiction to be Christ's kingdom and 
 ordinance, (as yourself expresseth) and cast out 
 episcopocy as opposite to it, we must not use any 
 mincing terms, but unmask them plainly; nor 
 shall I ever give way to hamper ourselves for fear 
 of speaking plain truth, though it be against 
 
DIVINE RIGHT OF EPISCOPACY. 159 
 
 Amsterdam or Geneva: and this luust be sadly 
 thought on. 
 
 Concerning your postulata, 1 shall pray you to 
 allow me the like freedom ; amongst which the 
 two iirst are true, but, as exprest, too restrictive. 
 For episcopacy is not so to be asserted unto 
 apostolical institution, as to bar it from looking 
 higher, and from fetching it materially and origi- 
 nally in the ground and intention of it, from Christ 
 himself; though perhaps the apostles formalized it. 
 And here give me leave a little to enlarge. The 
 adversaries of episcopacy are not only the furious 
 Arian heretics, (out of which are now raised 
 Prynne, Bastwicky and our Scottish masters) but 
 some also of a milder and subtiler alloy, both in 
 the Genevaii and Roman fact,ion. And it will 
 become the Church of England so to vindicate it 
 against the furious Puritans, as that we may not 
 lay it open to be wounded by either of the other 
 two, more cunning, and more learned adver- 
 saries. Not to the Roman faction, for that will 
 be content, it shall be Juris divini mediati, by, 
 far from, and under the pope, that so the govern- 
 ment of the church may be monarchical in him ; 
 but not immediati, which makes the church aris- 
 locratical in the bishops. This is the Italian 
 rock, not the Genevan; for that will not deny 
 episcopacy to be Juris divini, so you will take it, 
 ut suadentis vel approbantis, so you will not take 
 
160 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 it as iiniversaliter imperantis ; for then Geneva 
 might escape ; et citra considerationem durantis ; 
 for then, though they had it before, yet now upon 
 wiser thoughts they may be without it, which 
 Scotland, says now, and who will may say it after, 
 if this be good divinity: and then all in that time 
 shall be democratical. I am bold to add, because 
 in your second posttdatum, I find that episcopacy 
 is directly commanded ; but you go not so far as 
 to meet with this subtilty of Beza, which is the 
 great rock in the lake of Geneva, In your nine 
 poslidatum, that the accession of honourable 
 titles, or privileges, makes no difference in the 
 substance of the calling, you mean the titles of 
 Archbishops, Primates, Metropolitans, Patriarchs, 
 &c. 'Tiswell; and I presume you do so; but 
 then in any case take heed you assert it so, as 
 that the faction lay not hold of it, as if the bishops 
 were but the title of honour, and the same calling 
 with a priest ; for that they all aim at, &c. The 
 eleventh postulatum is larger, and I shall not 
 repeat it, because 1 am sure you retain a copy of 
 what you write to me, being the ribs of the work; 
 nor shall I say more to it, than that it must be 
 warily handled for fear of a saucy answer, which 
 is more ready with them a great deal than a 
 learned one. I presume I am pardoned already 
 for this freedom by your submission of all to me. 
 And now I heartily pray you to send me up, 
 
DIVINE RIGHT OF EPISCOPACY. 16J 
 
 (keeping a copy to yourself against the accidents 
 of carriage) not the whole work together, but 
 each particular head or postulatum, as you finish 
 it ; that so we here may be the better able to 
 consider of it, and the work come on faster. So 
 to God's blessed protection," &c. &c. 
 
 Such was the freedom Archbishop Laud took 
 with Bishop Hall, and the judgment he passed 
 upon the outhnes of the work ; and Heylin tells 
 us ** that the bishop of Exon found good cause to 
 correct the obliquity of his opinion,'" according to 
 the above animadversions. When Bishop Hall 
 finished his treatise, he submitted it, before it went 
 to press, to the final perusal of the archbishop, 
 who read it over with care and diligence. The 
 treatise was, in some places, altered by the arch- 
 bishop, contrary to Bishop Hall's inclinations. 
 Notice was taken that Bishop Hall had spoken 
 too favourably of the morality of the sabbath ; and 
 that the superstition of the Sabbatarians was but 
 slightly touched upon; whereas the archbishop 
 ** thought that some smarter plaister to that sore 
 might have done no harm.*' His Grace disap- 
 proved of Bishop Hall's waving the question, 
 Whether episcopacy was a distinct order, or only 
 an higher degree of the same order ; and of his 
 advancing the divine right of episcopacy no higher 
 than the apostles ; whereas he would have it derived 
 
 M 
 
162 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 from Christ himself. Upon this the archbishop 
 observed, that *' in the judgment of such learned 
 men as he had consulted, it was the main ground 
 of the whole cause ; and therefore he desired him 
 to weigh it well, and to alter it with his own pen 
 as soon as might be." His Grace also was not 
 pleased with the sentiment, that presbytery tvas of 
 use, where episcopacy could not he obtained. But 
 that which gave him the greatest offence was, 
 that Bishop Hall had positively and determi- 
 nately bestowed the title of Antichrist upon the 
 pope : this His Grace would by no means allow, 
 as being so contrary to the judgment of many 
 learned protestants, as well as his own. The arch- 
 bishop thought fit to acquaint the king with this,and 
 so to submit it to the royal will and pleasure: and 
 respecting which, he wrote thus to Bishop Hall : 
 " The last (with which I durst not but acquaint 
 His Majesty) is about Antichrist, which title in 
 three or four places you bestow upon the pope 
 positively and determinately; whereas king James 
 of blessed memory, having brought strong proof 
 in a work of his, as you well know, to prove the 
 pope to be Antichrist ; yet being afterwards chal- 
 lenged about it, he made this answer, when the 
 king, that now is, went into Spain, and acquainted 
 him with it. That he writ that not concludingly, 
 hut by way of argument only, that the pope and 
 his adherents might see, there was as good and 
 
DIVINE RIGHT OF EPISCOPACY. 163 
 
 better arguments to prove him Antichrist, than 
 for the pope to challenge temporal jurisdiction 
 over kings. The whole passage being known to 
 me, I could not but speak with the king about it, 
 who commanded me to write unto you, that you 
 might qualify your expression in these particulars, 
 and so not differ from the known judgment of his 
 pious and learned father. This is easily done 
 with your own pen, and the rather, because all 
 protestants join not in this opinion oi Antichrist'^ 
 According to this advice, Bishop Hall complied, 
 though contrary to his own sentiments, to qualify 
 some of his expressions, and to expunge others, 
 ** to the contentment of his sovereign, the satis- 
 faction of his metropolitan, and his own great 
 honour."* So, in some few things, the celebrated 
 treatise upon the Divine Right of Episcopacy, was 
 modelled according to the views and sentiments 
 of Laud. It is evident from the above remarks 
 of the archbishop, that Bishop Hall was one of 
 those bishops, who did not insist upon reading 
 the book of sports, but duly regarded the morality 
 of the sabbath. Heylin informs us, that all the 
 bishops did not join their hearts and hands 
 together in carrying on the work of unijormity 
 according to Archbishop Laud's plan, but threw 
 
 ♦ Heylin's Life of Laud, pp. 400, 405, 406. Neal's Hist, 
 of the Puritans, vol. ii, p. 322. 
 
 M % 
 
164 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 obstacles in the way, and exposed the measures 
 of Laud to the public hatred. " For such was 
 their desire," says he, ** to ingratiate themselves 
 amongst the people, that some of them being 
 required to return the names of such ministers as 
 refused the reading of the book, (of sports) made 
 answer, that they would not turn injorrners against 
 their brethren, there being enough besides them- 
 selves to perform that office. Others conceived, 
 that they had very well performed their duty, and 
 consulted their own peace and safety also, by 
 waving all proceedings against them in their own 
 consistories, wherein they must appear as the 
 principal agents, and turning them over to be 
 censured by the High Commission, where their 
 names might never come in question."* 
 
 Bishop Hall himself tells us, that he had been 
 charged with being too favourable to those who 
 were denominated puritans, merely because they 
 were conscientious and diligent in the discharge 
 of their duties : and on that account that he had 
 been misrepresented and complained of to his 
 metropolitan. We may probably conclude, that 
 one reason why Laud recommended Bishop Hall 
 to write on the Divine Right of Episcopacy was 
 to try him whether his view of episcopacy was 
 
 Heylin's Life of Laud, p. 313. 
 
DIVINE RIGHT OF EPISCOPACY. 165 
 
 what it should be; for he was suspected, on 
 account of his moderation and piety, to entertain 
 some " obliquity of opinion,^' * 
 
 Bishop Hall dedicated his Treatise on the 
 Divine Right of Episcopacy to Charles I. in which 
 he states that he undertook the work on account 
 that episcopacy had suffered in the north, mean- 
 ing Scotland, " to the height of patience ;" that it 
 was ** reported that one George Grahame, bishop 
 of Orkney, had openly, before the whole body of 
 the assembly, renounced his episcopal function, 
 and craved pardon for having accepted it, as if 
 thereby he had committed some heinous offence." 
 The Bishop also intimates that he had **met with 
 some affronts'' within his own diocese of Exeter 
 and jurisdiction. 
 
 Bishop Hall was the most celebrated writer of 
 his times in defence of the Church of England; 
 and his Treatise on the Divine Right of Episco- 
 pacy is a proof of his deep research, erudition, 
 and piety; he brings forward such proofs and 
 arguments for episcopacy as cannot be shaken, 
 and in the conclusion of the Treatise he recapitu- 
 lates the several heads of the subject, and, with 
 zeal and pious earnestness, addresses his readers 
 and brethren, saying, " for Christ's sake, for the 
 
 * See Heylin's Life of Laud, p. 402. 
 
166 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 church's sake, for your souls' sake, be exhorted 
 to hold fast to this holy institution of your blessed 
 Saviour and his unerring Apostles ; and bless God 
 for episcopacy. Do but cast your eyes a little 
 back, and see what noble instruments of God's 
 glory he hath been pleased to raise up in this very 
 church of ours, out of this sacred vocation : what 
 famous servants of God ; what strong champions 
 of truth, and renowned antagonists of Rome and 
 her superstitions; what admirable preachers; 
 what incomparable writers ; yea, what constant 
 and undaunted martyrs and confessors; men, 
 that gave their blood for the Gospel; and 
 embraced their faggots flaming, which many gre- 
 gary (ordinary, or common) professors held 
 enough to carry cold and painless, to the wonder 
 and gratulation of all foreign churches, and to the 
 unparallelled glory of his church and nation? 
 
 " What christian church under heaven hath, in 
 so short a time, yielded so many glorious lights of 
 the gospel, so many able and prevalent adver- 
 saries of schism and antichristianism, so many 
 eminent authors of learned works, which shall out- 
 bid time itself. Let envy grind her teeth: the 
 memory of these worthy Prelates shall be ever 
 sweet and blessed. 
 
 " Neither doubt I, but that it will please God, 
 out of the same rod of Aaron still to raise such 
 blossoms and fruit, as shall win him glory to all 
 
BAGSHAW. 167 
 
 eternity. Go you on to honour these your reve- 
 rend pastors; to hate all factious withdrawings 
 from that government, which comes the nearest 
 of any church upon earth to the apostolical."* 
 
 Through the overbearing conduct of Laud, both 
 in civil and ecclesiastical affairs on the one hand, 
 and the factious and turbulent spirit of the separa- 
 tists on the other, the tranquillity of the church 
 was much disturbed. Bagshaiv, a lawyer of some 
 standing in the Middle Temple, being elected a 
 Reader or Lecturer in that house for the Lent 
 vacation, boldly laid the axe to' the root of episco- 
 pacy, by calling into question the right of bishops 
 to have place and vote in Parliament, and their 
 power and authority altogether. In his Lectures 
 on the 25th Edw. III. c. 7, he maintained that 
 Acts of Parliament were valid without the assent 
 of the lords spiritual. That no beneficed clerk 
 was capable of temporal jurisdiction at the mak- 
 ing that law ; and, that no bishop, without calling 
 a synod, had power as a diocesan, to convict a 
 heretic. — Laud, when informed of this, told the 
 king that Bagshaw had justified the Scots Cove 
 nanters in decrying the temporal jurisdiction of 
 churchmen, and the undoubted right of the 
 bishops to their seats in parliament : upon which 
 
 * See Bishop Hall's Works, vol. ix, pp. 623, 624. 
 
168 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 Bagshaw was immediately interdicted all further 
 reading on those points; and though he humbly 
 petitioned the Lord Keeper and the Archbishop 
 for liberty to proceed, he could get no other 
 answer, than **it had been better for him not to 
 have meddled with that argument, which should 
 stick closer to him than he was aware of."'^ 
 Whereupon he retired into the country. 
 
 The year 1 640 began with a Parliament and 
 Convocation. Such was now the state of affairs, 
 that the king was under the necessity of calling a 
 parliament, after an intermission of nearly twelve 
 years, in order to renew the war with Scotland. 
 The two houses assembled according to their 
 summons, in the month of April, with the usual 
 formalities. The king condescended to open the 
 parliament with only the following short speech 
 from the throne : — 
 
 " My Lords and Gentlemen, 
 
 ** There never was a king that had a more 
 great and weighty cause to call his people together 
 than myself. I will not trouble you with the 
 particulars : I have informed my Lord Keeper 
 and commanded him to speak, and to desire 
 your attention." 
 
 * Heylin's Life of Laud, pp. 406, 407. Neal's Hist, of the 
 Puritaos, vol. ii, p, 323. 
 
MEETING OF PARLIAMENT. 169 
 
 This short speech appears a kind of preface to 
 Sir John Finch, the Lord Keeper's long speech, 
 in which he commented on the proceedings of the 
 Scots against the king, and his Majesty's urgent 
 want of supply towards vindicating his honour, 
 and intimated to them also at the same time that 
 his Majesty was far from intending to preclude 
 them from their right of enquiring into the state 
 of the kingdom, and of offering him petitions for 
 redress of grievances. But the Commons, instead 
 of beginning with the supply according to his 
 Majesty's wish, appointed committees for reli- 
 gion and grievances^ which disobliged the king so 
 much, that after several fruitless attempts to per- 
 suade them to grant him a subsidy, he dissolved 
 the parliament in displeasure, without passing a 
 single act, after they had sat about three weeks. 
 
 But other means of obtaining a subsidy were 
 employed, which were highly offensive and griev- 
 ous to. the people. The odium of these proceed- 
 ings fell on Laud and Strafford, who were libelled 
 and threatened with the fury of the populace. In 
 the month of May, 1640, the archbishop's palace 
 at Lambeth was attacked by the mob ; one of the 
 ringleaders was apprehended and suffered death. 
 During this month, and the whole summer, there 
 
 * Warner's Eccles. Hist, of England, vol. ii, p. 528. 
 
170 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 was much disturbance both in London and in the 
 country. 
 
 The convocation which sat with this parha- 
 was opened April 14, next day after opening of 
 parhainent, with much more splendour and mag- 
 nificence than the situation of affairs required. 
 The convocation sermon was preached by Dr. 
 Turner, Canon Residentiary of St. Paul's, from 
 Matt, xvi, 16. " Behold, I send you forth as sheep 
 among wolves :" after which they adjourned to 
 the Chapter House, where the king's writ of 
 summons being read, the archbishop, in a Latin 
 speech, recommended to the lower house the 
 electing of a prolocutor, to be presented to him- 
 self or his commissary in the chapel of Henry VII. 
 on Friday following, to which time and place the 
 convocation was adjourned. 
 
 On April 17, after divine service, Dr. Steward, 
 Dean of Chichester and Clerk of the Closet, was 
 presented to the archbishop as prolocutor, whom 
 his Grace approved of, and then produced his 
 Majesty's commission under the great seal, autho- 
 rizing him to *' consult and agree upon the expla- 
 nation or amendment of any canons then in force, 
 or for making . such new ones, as should be 
 thought convenient for the government of the 
 church." The commission was to remain in force 
 during the present session of parliament, and no 
 longer ; and by a singular clause, nothing was to 
 
CONVOCATION. 171 
 
 be concluded without the archbishop being a 
 party in the consultation. The latitude of this 
 commisssion was very acceptable to the majority 
 of the convocation ; and in return for this testi- 
 mony of his Majesty's confidence, they voted him 
 six subsidies, to be paid him in six years, at the 
 rate of four shillings in the pound. The arch- 
 bishop brought in some other canons against 
 papists, against the spread of Socinian heresy ; 
 and it was also then decreed that the proceedings 
 and penalties against popish recusants should, as 
 far as they are applicable, stand in full force 
 against all separatists and sects, who refuse 
 repairing to their parish churches, for hearing 
 divine service, and receiving the holy commu- 
 nion. 
 
 Thus far the convocation proceeded, when the 
 parliament was suddenly dissolved. The convo- 
 cation, according to ancient custom, should have 
 broke up at the same time ; but that one of the 
 lower house having acquainted Laud with a pre- 
 cedent in the 27th year of Queen Elizabeth, of 
 the convocation's granting a subsidy to be raised 
 upon all the clergy, after the breaking up of 
 parliament, and levying it by their own synodical 
 act only, under the penalty of ecclesiastical cen- 
 sures. Hence it was concluded that the convo- 
 cation might sit independent of the parliament, 
 
172 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL, 
 
 and therefore, instead of dissolving, they only 
 adjourned for a few days to take further advice.* 
 
 Laud relying upon this single precedent, ap- 
 plied to the king for a commission to continue 
 the convocation during his Majesty's pleasure, in 
 order to finish the canons and constitutions, and 
 to grant the subsidies already voted. The case 
 being referred to the judges, the majority of 
 whom gave it as their opinion, *' that the convo- 
 cation, being called by the king's writ under the 
 great seal, doth continue till it be dissolved by 
 writ or commission under the great seal, notwith- 
 standing the parliament be dissolved." 
 
 Signed May 14, 1640, by John Finch, C.M.S. 
 
 H.MANCHESTER, [ ROB. HEATH, 
 
 J. BRAMSTON, EDW. LITTLETON, 
 
 RALPH WHITFIELD, > J. BANKS. 
 
 Upon this a commission under the great seal was 
 granted, and the' convocation was re-assembled, 
 though the opinion of several gentlemen of the 
 long robe, and of many others, was against it.f 
 But the convocation was further encouraged to 
 proceed by his Majesty's message sent by Sir 
 H. Vane, Secretary of State, who acquainted 
 
 * Warner's Eccles. Hist, of England, vol. ii, pp. 528, 529. 
 
 t See Fuller's Church Hist. b. ix, p. 168. Neal's Hist, of 
 the Puritans, vol. ii, p. 327, &c. Heylin's Life of Laud, pp. 
 42«-429. 
 
CONVOCATION. 173 
 
 them, " that it was his royal pleasure that none 
 of the prelates or clergy should withdraw from 
 the synod or convocation till the affairs they had 
 in command from the king were perfected and 
 finished." 
 
 Upon this dubious foundation the convocation 
 was continued, and a committee of twenty-six 
 appointed to prepare matters for the debate of 
 the house ; but the mob being so furious as to 
 threaten to pull down the convocation house, 
 the king ordered a guard of the Middlesex 
 militia, commanded by Endymion Porter, groom 
 of the bed-chamber, a papist, to protect the 
 Synod. It was dissolved on the 29th of May by 
 a special mandate or wnt from his Majesty, after 
 it had continued twenty-five sessions. The 
 Canons, after being approved by the privy coun- 
 cil, were subscribed by as many of both houses 
 of convocation as were present, and then trans- 
 mitted to the provincial Synod of York, by which 
 they were subscribed at once, without so much 
 as debating either matter or form. Neal says in 
 his History of the Puritans, vol. ii, pp. 328-329, 
 that ** Dr. John Williams, bishop of Lincoln, 
 was in the Tower, and had no concern with the 
 Canons. Dr. Goodman, bishop of Gloucester, 
 a concealed papist, was the only prelate who 
 declined the subscription; till the Archbishop 
 threatened him with deprivation, and the rest of 
 
174 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 his brethren pressing him to comply, he was 
 persuaded to put his name to the book: but 
 several of the members of the lower house 
 avoided the test by withdrawing before the day 
 of subscription ; for, of above one hundred and 
 sixty, of which both houses of convocation con- 
 sisted, there were not many more than one 
 hundred names to the book." Heylin, in his 
 Life of Archbishop Laud, contradicts the above 
 account of Neal, and says that the Canons were 
 approved by all the Clergy, " who were called 
 up to the house of bishops to be present at the 
 subscribing of them, which was accordingly per- 
 formed May 29th, by the bishops, deans, and 
 archdeacons in their seniority, and promiscuously 
 by the rest of the clergy, till all the members had 
 subscribed; every man's heart going together 
 with his hand, as it is to be presumed from all 
 men of that holy profession. Recusant there was 
 none, but the bishop of Gloucester.* 
 
 The irregularity however of continuing the 
 synod after the dissolution of parHament has been 
 concluded hence, that the convocation consisting 
 of bishops, deans, archdeacons, and clerks, the 
 three former act in their personal capacities only, 
 and may give for themselves what subsidies they 
 
 Heylin's Life of Laud, pp. 446, 446. 
 
CANONS. 175 
 
 please. But the clerks being chosen for their 
 respective cathedrals or dioceses, to sit as long as 
 the parliament continues, desist from being publiC' 
 persons, as soon as it is dissolved, and lose the 
 character of representatives ; they are then no 
 more than private clergymen, who, though they 
 may give the king what sums of money they please 
 for themselves, cannot vote away the estates of 
 their brethren, unless they are re-elected. It wa* 
 also contrary to all law and customy both before 
 and since the act ot> submission of the clergy to 
 Henry VIII, except -in the single instance of 
 Queen Elizabeth.* 
 
 The canons of this synod consisted of seventeen 
 articles, and were published June 30, 1640. The 
 following is an abstract of those canons, which 
 were made the subject of so much contention and 
 debate in the next parliament. The reader may 
 judge for himself about the offence given on ona 
 side, and the revenge taken on the other. <^ ,- < 
 
 1. The first Canon is concerning regal power, 
 where it is decreed that the order of kings is of 
 divine right, being the ordinance of God himself, 
 founded on the Laws of nature and revelation, by 
 which the supreme power over all persons, eccle- 
 siastical and civil, is given to them; that they 
 
 * Warner's Eccles. Hist, of England, vol. ii, p. 530. Neal's 
 Hi»t. of the Puritans, vol. ii, p. 329. 
 
176 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 have the care of God's church, and the power of 
 dissolving both national and provincial councils : 
 that for any persons to set up in the king's realms 
 any independent coercive power, either papal or 
 popular, is treasonable against God, and the king; 
 and for subjects to bear arms against the king, 
 either offensive or defensive, upon any pretence 
 whatever, is at least to resist the powers ordained 
 of God ; and though they do not invade but only 
 resist, St. Paul says, " They shall receive damna- 
 tion." Though tribute, custom, aid, and subsidy 
 be due to the king by the law of God, nature and 
 nations, yet subjects have a right and property in 
 their goods and estates, &c. That if any clergy- 
 man should neglect to publish these explications, 
 upon one Sunday in every quarter of the year, he 
 shall be suspended ; or if in any sermon, or public 
 lecture, he shall maintain any position contrary 
 to it, he shall be excommunicated and suspended 
 for two years ; and offending a second time, shall 
 be deprived. 
 
 2. Here it is decreed that the day of the king's 
 inauguration should be observed with morning 
 prayers and a sermon, at which all persons shall 
 be present. 
 
 3. In this, the suppressing of the growth of 
 Popery is intended, &c. 
 
 4. This decrees that no person shall import, 
 
CANONS. 177 
 
 disperse, or print any Socinian books, on pain of 
 excommunication, &c. 
 
 5. This ordains that the canon against Papists, 
 shall be in force against sectaries, as far as it 
 is applicable; and the clause against the books 
 of Socinians, should be in force against all the 
 books that are written against the doctrine and 
 government of the church. 
 
 6. This decreed the following oath to be taken 
 by all archbishops, bishops, priests, and deacons, 
 before a public notary within six months: — I, 
 A.B. do swear, that I do approve the doctrine, 
 and discipline, or government established in the 
 Church of England, as containing all things 
 necessary to salvation ; and that I will not endea- 
 vor, by myself or any other, directly or indirectly, 
 to bring in Popish doctrine, contrary to that 
 which is established ; nor will 1 ever give my 
 consent to alter the government of this church by 
 archbishops, bishops, deans, and archdeacons, 
 &c. as it stands now established, and as by right 
 it ought to stand, nor yet ever to subject it to the 
 ursurpations and superstitions of the see of Rome. 
 And all these things I do plainly and sincerely 
 acknowledge and swear, according to the plain 
 and common sense and understanding of the 
 same words, without any equivocation, or mental 
 evasions, or secret reservation whatever; and 
 this I do heartily, willingly, and truly, upon the 
 
 N 
 
178 LIFE OF BISHOP MALL. 
 
 faith of a Christian. So help me God in Jesus 
 Christ." 
 
 If any beneficed person in the church refused 
 this oath, he was, after a month, suspended from 
 his office ; after a second month, from his bene- 
 fice ; and after a third, deprived. All the 
 members of the universities, or those who have 
 taken a degree, as lawyers, physicians, &c. were 
 required to take this oath : and all governors of 
 halls and colleges, all schoolmasters, candidates 
 for holy orders, and those who have licence to 
 preach. 
 
 7. This canon declares that the placing the 
 communion table at the east end of the church 
 is in its own nature indifferent ; nor does it imply 
 that it is, or ought to be esteemed a proper altar, 
 though it may be called so in the sense of the 
 primitive church: but as Queen Elizabeth's in- 
 junctions have ordered it to be placed where the 
 altar was, it was judged proper that all churches 
 and chapels should conform to that order. And 
 it is recommended to all people, that they do 
 reverence at their entries in and going out of the 
 church ; and that all communicants come to the 
 rails to receive the communion, which has been 
 heretofore carried up and down. 
 
 8. This canon enjoins all public preachers to 
 declare positively and plainly, twice a year, that 
 
CANONS. 179 
 
 the rites and ceremonies of the church are lawful, 
 to which it is the duty of all people to conform. 
 
 9. By this it was decreed that no other articles 
 of enquiry should be used at visitations, than 
 what were contained in a book to be drawn up 
 by this synod. 
 
 10. The subject of this is the regular and moral 
 conversation of the clergy. 
 
 11. The bishops were to grant no patent to 
 chancellors, or officials, for any term longer than 
 their lives, and to reserve in their own hands the 
 power of instituting to benefices, and of licensing 
 to preach. 
 
 12. No lay chancellor, or commissary, shall 
 inflict any censure upon the clergy, for any crimi- 
 nal causes, except neglect of appearing: all 
 others are to be heard by the bishop, or with the 
 assistance of his chancellor, and if the bishop 
 cannot attend, by the chancellor assisted with two 
 grave divines of the diocese, appointed by the 
 bishop. 
 
 13. No sentence of excommunication, or abso- 
 lution, is allowed to be pronounced by any but a 
 priest, either in open consistory or in the church, 
 having first received it under the seal of an eccle- 
 siastical judge. 
 
 14. This admits of no commutation of penance, 
 without consent of the bishop ; and the money to 
 be disposed of to charitable uses. 
 
180 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 15. No executor shall be cited into any court 
 or office, within ten days after the death of the 
 testator, though he may prove the will within such 
 a time. 
 
 16. No other licence to marry, but the arch- 
 bishop's, is allowed by this canon to any party ; 
 unless the man or woman shall have lived in the 
 jurisdiction of the ordinary to whom they apply, 
 a month before the licence is desired. 
 
 17. The last canon forbids a citation from 
 spiritual courts, except under the hand and seal 
 of one of the judges within thirty days after the 
 crime is committed ; and until the party is con- 
 victed by two witnesses, he may purge himself 
 by oath, without paying any fee, provided the 
 canon does not extend to schism, incontinence, 
 misbehaviour at divine service, obstinate incon- 
 formity, or the like."* 
 
 When these canons were published, they were 
 generally disliked ; and several pamphlets were 
 written against them. Some objected to the first 
 as subversive of the English constitution, because 
 it declares in favour of the absolute power of 
 kings, and that it is unlawful to use defensive arms 
 on any pretence whatever against the king. The 
 
 * Warner's Ecclcs. Hist, of England, vol. ii, pp. 630-533. 
 Heylin's Life of Laud, fol. ed. pp. 422-440. Neai's liist. of 
 the Puritans, vol. ii, pp. 329-336. 
 
CANONS. 181 
 
 puritans disapproved of the fifth, sixth, seventh, 
 and eighth canons : but all the clergy were nearly 
 concerned in the sixth, being required by the 2d 
 of November to take the oath mentioned therein. 
 The London clergy and others drevir up a petition 
 against the oath to the privy council. Petitions 
 from most counties in England were made against 
 it : some complaining of it as contrary to the oath 
 of supremacy, and others of the et cetera in the 
 middle. Others objected to the authority of the 
 synod to impose an oath ; and many confessed 
 that they wished some things in the discipline of 
 the church might be altered, and therefore could 
 not swear never to attempt it in a proper way. 
 Some of the bishops endeavoured to satisfy the 
 scruples of their clergy by giving the most favour- 
 able interpretation of the oath. Bishop Hall told 
 them that it only meant as follows : " That I do 
 so far approve of the discipline and doctrine of 
 this church, as that I do believe there is nothing 
 in any other pretended discipline or doctrine 
 necessary to salvation, besides that which is con- 
 tained in the doctrine and discipline of the church 
 of England. And as I do allow the government 
 by archbishops, bishops, deans, archdeacons, so 
 I will not, upon the suggestion of any factious 
 persons, go about to alter the same as it now 
 stands, and as by due right (being so established) 
 
182 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 it ought to stand in the church of England."* — 
 But many of the bishops compelled their clergy 
 to take the oath ; and Fuller, in his Church His- 
 tory, tells uSj-f- that to his certain knowledge 
 some of the bishops obliged them to take it kneel- 
 ing, a ceremony never required in taking the oaths 
 of allegiance and supremacy. Such severe and 
 unbecoming degree of power some of the bishops 
 then assumed ! 
 
 Dr. Sanderson, afterwards bishop of Lincoln, 
 acquainted the archbishop, by letter, with the 
 difficulties of enforcing the oath; he observed, 
 " that multitudes of churchmen, not only of 
 the preciser sort, but of such as were regular 
 and conformable, would utterly refuse to take 
 the oath, or be brought to it with much diffi- 
 culty and reluctance; so that, unless by his 
 Majesty's special direction, the pressing the oath 
 may be forborn for a time ; or that, a short expla- 
 nation of some passages in it, most liable to 
 exception, be sent to the several persons who are 
 to administer the same, to be publicly read before 
 the tender of the said oath, the peace of this 
 church is apparently in danger to be more dis- 
 quieted by this one occasion, than by any thing 
 that has happened within our memories." 
 
 * Nahon's Collection, p. 496, &c. 
 t Book xi, p. 171. 
 
CANONS. 183 
 
 It is certain that this oath was much disHked 
 by almost all the clergy, who, with others, joined 
 in petition against it to the king, who was pleased 
 to send the following letter to the archbishop of 
 Canterbury, under the hand of the secretary of 
 state. 
 
 " May it please your Grace : 
 
 I am by his Majesty's command to let you 
 know, that upon many petitions presented by 
 divers churchmen, as well in the diocese of Can- 
 terbury as York, to which many hands are sub- 
 scribed, as the mode of petitions now are, against 
 the oath in the canons made in the last synod, his 
 Majesty's pleasure is, that as he took order before 
 his coming into these parts, that the execution of 
 neither should be pressed on those that were 
 already beneficed in the church, which was 
 ordered at the council board in your Grace's 
 presence, but that it should be administered 
 to those who were to receive orders and to be 
 admitted ; it is his Majesty's pleasure, that those 
 should be dispensed with also, and that there be 
 no prosecution thereof till the meeting of the 
 convocation. 
 
 York, Sept. 30, 1640. " H. VANE."* 
 
 * Nalson's Collection, p. 600. Ncal's Hist, of the Puritans, 
 vol. ii, p. d37. 
 
184 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 We have seen above* the opinion of Bishop Hall 
 with regard to this troublesome oath, and he tells 
 us also in the tract called, " Some Specialities in 
 his Life," written by himself, that in consequence 
 of this oath, and some other opposition, his peace 
 was much disturbed : ** What messages of caution 
 I had from some of my wary brethren, and what 
 expostulatory letters I had from above, ffrom 
 Archbishop Laud) I need not relate. Sure I am, 
 I had peace and comfort at home, in the happy 
 sense of that general unanimity and loving cor- 
 respondence of my clergy, till, in the last year of 
 my presiding there, (as bishop of Exeter) after the 
 synodical oath was set on foot, (ividch yet 1 did 
 never tender to any one minister of my diocese) by 
 the incitation of some busy interlopers of the 
 neighbour country." 
 
 With regard to this unpopular oath, we dis- 
 cover in Bishop Hall such moderation and temper 
 highly becoming a christian bishop. 
 
 Amidst much factious and discontented spirit 
 of many of the English, the king was obliged to 
 prepare to go to war with the Scots, who had 
 now a second time marched an army to the bor- 
 ders, and were ready to invade the English side. 
 An army was raised, and the king in person 
 commanded it: the Earls of Northumberland 
 
 * Page 181. 
 
WAR WITH THE SCOTS. 185 
 
 and Strafford were appointed generals, and Lord 
 Conway general of the cavalry. It soon appeared 
 that some of the English nobility were not for 
 conquering the Scots, and the soldiers manifested 
 no zeal for his Majesty's cause ; so that after a 
 small skirmish, the Scots ?irmy passed the Tweed, 
 Aug. 21, and on the 30th took possession of New- 
 castle, the king's army retreating as far as York, 
 leaving them masters of Northumberland, Cum- 
 berland, and Durham, where they subsisted their 
 army, and raised what contributions they pleased. 
 In this situation of affairs, a petition, signed by 
 twelve English peers, was sent to his Majesty, to 
 discontinue the war, complaining of many griev- 
 ances, as the inconveniences of carrying on the 
 war with the Scots, the increase of popery, &c. 
 and of the canons made in the last convocation. 
 The city of London also petitioned, and the Scots 
 themselves tendered to his Majesty certain terms 
 of accommodation. The king, finding it impossi- 
 ble to carry on the war, appointed commissioners 
 to treat with the Scots at Rippon, who agreed to 
 a cessation of arms for two months from the 
 26th of October, the Scots to have £850. a day 
 towards the subsistence of their army ;* and the 
 treaty to be adjourned to London, where a par- 
 liament was immediately to be convened. 
 
 * Sc€ Harrii't Lif« of CharUi I. p. 364, Ed. 1814. 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 On the 3d of November, 1640, this famous 
 parliament met, which has beea called the long 
 parliament, because it continued sitting with some 
 little intermission for above eighteen years : it 
 occasioned such extraordinary revolutions in 
 church and state, as were the scandal of their 
 own country, and the surprise of other countries* 
 On the day of opening the parliament, his Majesty 
 declined the usual way of riding in state from 
 Whitehall to Westminster, but went by water, 
 accompanied with several peers of the realm. 
 The king, in his speech from the throne, declared 
 his readiness to redress all just grievances ; but 
 some offence was taken, by his Majesty calling 
 the Scots, REBELS, whcu there was a pacification 
 subsisting. 
 
 * Heylin's Life of Laud, pp. 454-458. Neal's Hist, of the 
 Puritans, vol. ii, p. 338. Dugdale's Short View, pp. 63, 64, 
 66. Harris' Life of Charles I, p. 360, &c. Ed. 1«14. Warner's 
 Eccles. Hist, of England, vol. ii, p. 533. 
 
M££TING OF PARLIAMENT. 187 
 
 Before the session of parliament " the principal 
 members consulted measures for securing the 
 frequency of parliaments ; for redressing of griev- 
 ances in church and state : and for bringing the 
 king's arbitrary ministers to justice," in order to 
 accomplish which, it was thought expedient to set 
 some bounds to the prerogative, and to diminish 
 the power of the bishops : probably they did not 
 at first intend to overturn the civil and ecclesiasti- 
 cal constitutions, and that they would have been 
 satisfied with a certain degree of reform in church 
 and state ; but in their proceedings, they went to 
 such extremes as involved both in ruin. 
 
 At their first entrance^upon business, four com- 
 mittees were appointed : the first to receive peti- 
 tions about religious grievances ; the second, for 
 the affairs of Scotland and Ireland ; the third, 
 for civil grievances; and the fourth, concerning 
 popery, plots, &c.* About the 9th of November, 
 
 * Both houses petitioned his Majesty to appoint a fast for a 
 divine blessing upon their councels, which was observed Nov. 17. 
 Rev. Mr. Marshall and Mr. Burgess, two eminent puritan 
 divines, preached before the Connuons, the former on 2Chron. 
 XV, 2, " The Lord is with you, while you are with him ; if you 
 seek him he will be found of you, but if you forsake him he will 
 forsake you.'* The latter on Jer. 1, 6, *' They shall ask the way 
 to Zion with their faces thitherward, saying, Come, and let us 
 join ourselves to the Lord in a perpetual covenant that shall 
 not be forgotten." The sermons were long, but delivered, 3ays 
 Neal, witha great deal of caution: the house gave them thanks, 
 and a piece of plate for their labors. The bishops of Durham 
 and Carlisle preached before the House of Lords in the Abbey 
 
188 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 ** a great number of petitions was presented both 
 from particular persons, and some from multi- 
 tudes, and brought by troops of horsemen from 
 several counties, craving redress of grievances in 
 church and state."* 
 
 Among the grievances of religion, one of the 
 first things that came before the house was the 
 acts and canons of the late convocation. Several 
 virulent speeches were made against the compi- 
 lers. Neal says that no one stood up in the behalf 
 of the canons but Mr. llolbourn, who is said to 
 have made a speech of two hours in their vindi- 
 cation ; t but his arguments made no impression 
 on the house, so that at the close of the debate 
 it was unanimously resolved, — 
 
 " That the clergy of England, convened in any 
 convocation or synod, or otherwise, have no 
 power to make any constitutions, canons, or acts 
 
 Church of Westminster, On the following Sunday all the 
 members received the sacrament from the hands of Bishop 
 Williams, Dean of Westminster. See Neal's Hist, of the Puri- 
 tans, vol. ii, p. 348. 
 
 * Walker's Sufferings of the Clergy, part i, p. 3. " The 
 first step they made was the entertaining petitions of grievances 
 from all parts of the realm, which made such a noise, as if the 
 subjects of England had suffered under the greatest slavery and 
 oppression that had ever been heard of; and, (being devised 
 and framed by themselves,) were received with such great 
 acceptance, as that the people began to shew no small expres- 
 sions of joy in their new reformers." Dugdale's Short View of 
 the Troubles in England, p. 66. 
 
 t History of the Puritans, vol. ii, p. 360. 
 
GRIEVANCES OF RELIGION. 189 
 
 whatsoever, in matters of doctrine, discipline, or 
 otherwise, to bind the clergy or laity of the land, 
 without consent of parliament. 
 
 " That the several constitutions and canons 
 ecclesiastical, treated and agreed upon with the 
 king's licence, by the archbishops, bishops, and 
 clergy of the provinces of Canterbury and York 
 in their several synods in the year 1640, do not 
 bind the clergy or laity of the land, or either of 
 them. 
 
 " That the several constitutions or canons, 
 made and agreed to in the convocations or synods 
 above mentioned, do contain in them many mat- 
 ters contrary to the king's prerogative, to the 
 fundamental laws and statutes of this realm, to 
 the rights of parliament, to the prosperity and 
 liberty of the subject, and matters tending to 
 sedition, and of dangerous consequence. 
 
 ** That the several grants of benevolences 
 or contributions, granted to his most excellent 
 Majesty by the clergy, in the several convoca- 
 tions or synods above mentioned, are contrary to 
 the laws, and ought not to bind the clergy." 
 
 Upon the same day that the house of commons 
 passed the above resolutions, of which it may be 
 said, that they manifested more of anger and 
 prejudice, than of law or reason, several warm 
 speeches were made against the archbishop of 
 Canterbury, as the chief author of them ; and a 
 
190 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 committee was appointed to enquire more parti- 
 cularly, how far His Grace had been concerned in 
 the proceedings of the late convocation, and in 
 the treasonable design of subverting the religion 
 and laws of his country, in order to draw up 
 articles or charge against him. At the same time 
 a charge was laid against him in the house of 
 peers by the Scots commissioners, which being 
 read by Lord Paget, was then reported to 
 the commons at a conference between the two 
 houses. This charge consisted of divers griev- 
 ances, which occasioned much disturbance in 
 Scotland. When this charge was reported to the 
 commons, the resentment of the house against the 
 archbishop immediately broke out into aflame, 
 and many severe speeches were made against his 
 late conduct. Sir Harbottle Grimstone, speaker 
 of that parliament which restored Charles II. 
 moved that the charge of the Scots commissioners 
 might be supported by an impeachment of their 
 own ; and that the question might now be put, 
 whether the archbishop had been guilty of high 
 treason? Which being voted, Mr. HoUis was 
 immediately sent up to the bar of the house of 
 Lords to impeach him in the name of all the 
 commons of England. Afterwards the arch- 
 bishop was delivered to the custody of the Usher 
 of the Black Rod, till the house of commons 
 should deliver in their articles of impeachment. 
 
IMPEACHMENT OF ARCHBISHOP LAUD. 191 
 
 Mr. Pyni, Mr. Hampden, and Mr. Maynard, by 
 order of the commons, presented at the bar of the 
 house of Lords, fourteen articles in support of 
 their former charge of high treason against the 
 archbishop, which being read, the archbishop 
 made a short reply, and the lords voted him to 
 the tower, where he continued three or four years 
 before his trial came on. 
 
 As to the convocation which attended this par- 
 liament, it was, as usual, summoned and opened 
 Nov. 4th, 1640. Dr. Bargrave, dean of Canterbury 
 preached, and Dr, Steward, dean of Chichester, 
 was chosen prolocutor, and was presented to the 
 archbishop's acceptance in King Henry VHth's 
 chapel, when His Grace made a pathetic speech^ 
 lamenting the danger of the church, and exhort- 
 ing every one present to perform the duty of their 
 places with resolution, and not to be wanting to 
 themselves, or to the cause of religion. Nothing 
 of importance was transacted in this convocation, 
 the times being so turbulent, and there being no 
 commission from the king. The bishops discon- 
 tinued their meeting, and the lower house gra- 
 dually dwindled away. A Mr. Warminstre, a 
 clergyman of the diocese of Worcester, convinced 
 of the invalidity of the late canons, moved in this 
 convocation, that " they might cover the pit 
 which they had opened," and so prevent a par- 
 liamentary inquisition, by petitioning the King 
 
192 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 for leave to review them;— his motion was 
 rejected, for they would not appear so mean as 
 to condemn themselves before they were accused. 
 Mr. Warminstre published a defence of his motion, 
 wherein he bitterly speaks against the canons and 
 proceedings of the late convocation : but in the 
 sufferings of the clergy he was not spared from 
 being sequestered.* 
 
 Before archbishop Laud was confined in the 
 tower, the parliament released most of the church 
 and state prisoners. Nov. 16th, Dr. Williams, 
 bishop of Lincoln, was discharged from his impri- 
 sonment in the tower, and his fine remitted. The 
 following day being a public fast, he officiated as 
 dean in the abbey church of Westminster. 
 
 When Dr. Williams, after his release, resumed 
 his seat in the house of Lords, he conducted him- 
 self with more temper than could be expected; 
 whereupon his Majesty sent for him, aud endea- 
 voured to gain him over, by promising to make 
 him full satisfaction for his past sufferings: in 
 order to which, his Majesty commanded all the 
 judgments that were entered against him to be 
 discharged, and within a twelvemonth translated 
 him to the archbishoprick of York, with leave to 
 
 ♦ Heylin's Life of Laud, p. 460. Warner's Eccles. Hist, 
 b. XV, p 557, &c. Neai's Hist, of the Puritans, vol. ii, p. 354, 
 Walker's Sufferings of the Clergy, part i, p. 7 ; and part ii, 
 p. 408. 
 
RELEASE OF PRYNNE. 193 
 
 hold his deanery of Westminster in commendani 
 for three years. 
 
 Mr. Prynne, Mr. Burton and Dr. Bast wick, 
 being remanded from the several islands to which 
 they had been confined, upon their petition to the 
 house of commons, were met some miles out of 
 London by a great number of people on horseback, 
 with rosemary and bays in their hats, and escorted 
 into the city in a kind of a triumph. Though 
 these persons were severely punished, and perhaps 
 in a great measure unjustly, yet the factious and 
 hostile disposition of their deliverers manifests 
 such a rancour as nothing could allay but the 
 total destruction of church and state. In a few 
 weeks after, the house of commons, in order to 
 shew that they were in earnest about overthrowing 
 the church, came to the follo^ving resolutions : 
 " That the several judgments against them were 
 illegal, unjust, and against the liberty of the sub- 
 ject: that their several fines be remitted: that 
 they be restored to their several possessions : and 
 that for reparation of their losses, Mr. Burton 
 ought to have £6000, and Mr. Prynne and Dr. 
 Bastwick £5000. each, out of the estates of the 
 archbishop of Canterbury, the high commis- 
 sioners, and those lords, who have voted against 
 them in the star-chamber; but the confusion of 
 the times prevented the payment of the money. 
 
 o 
 
194 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 About the same time, Dr. Alexander Leighton, 
 Dr. Osbaldeston, and others were set at liberty. 
 
 As the house of commons declared the impri- 
 sonment of these persons illegal, consequently 
 they made enquiry after their persecutors. In 
 the month of January, 1640--1, Dr. Cosins, pre- 
 bendary of Durham, afterwards bishop of Dur- 
 ham, was one of the first persons, who suffered 
 in the cause of the church of England in those 
 troublesome times: he was taken into custody 
 by order of the house, and was voted unfit to hold 
 any ecclesiastical promotion, on account of some 
 pretended innovations which he had introduced 
 into the cathedral of Durham. He, foreseeing the 
 impending storm, withdrew into France, where 
 he remained till the restoration of Charles II, by 
 whom he was made bishop of Durham. 
 
 Dr. Matthew Wren, late bishop of Norwich, 
 and now of Ely, having used much severity 
 against the puritan clergy in his diocese, the inha- 
 bitants of Ipswich drew up a petition against him, 
 and presented it to the house, Dec. 22, 1640.^ 
 Upon which a charge was exhibited against him, 
 consisting of twenty-five articles. It stated, that 
 
 ♦ Nalson's Collections, p. 692. Neal's Hist, of the PuritaHS, 
 vol. ii, p. 370. See Brook's Lives of the Puritans, vol. ii, 
 p. 410. 
 
DR. WREN, BISHOP OF ELY. 195 
 
 during the time of his being the bishop of Norwich, 
 which was about two years, fifty ministers Had 
 been excommunicated, suspended, and deprived, 
 for not reading the second service at the commu- 
 nion table, for not reading the hook of sports, for 
 using conceived prayers before the afternoon 
 sermon, &c : and that by his rigorous severities, 
 many of his Majesty's subjects, to the number of 
 three thousand, had removed themselves and 
 families into Holland, and set up their manufacto- 
 ries there, to the great injury of the trade of this 
 kingdom. The bill was carried to the house of 
 lords, and the bishop gave bond for his appear- 
 ance. Some time after, the commons voted him 
 unfit to hold any ecclesiastical preferment. Both 
 lords and commons petitioned the king to remove 
 him from his person and service ; after which he 
 was imprisoned with the other protesting bishops. 
 When released, he retired to his house at Down- 
 ham in the isle of Ely, where he was apprehended 
 by a party of soldiers, and conveyed to the Tower, 
 where he continued till the end of the year 1659, 
 without being brought to his trial, or any charge 
 or accusation formed against him. He was the 
 first bishop that was deprived by the parliament : 
 however, he survived all his troubles and suffer- 
 ings, and was restored by Charles H. to his 
 
 bishoprick. He bore his troubles with much 
 
 o 2 
 
196 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 patience and magnanimity, and died in the eighty- 
 first year of his age.'* 
 
 Complaints were made against several other 
 bishops and clergymen, as Dr. Pierce, bishop of 
 Bath and Wells ; Dr. Montague, bishop of Nor- 
 wich; Dr. Owen, bishop of LlandafF; and Dr. 
 Manwaring, bishop of St. David's : but the house 
 was now too much occupied with other affairs, 
 to have time to prosecute them, and vote them 
 unfit for ecclesiastical promotions. 
 
 The clamour against the clergy was now become 
 so violent, that they could hardly officiate in the 
 established form, or walk the streets without 
 being insulted. The Liturgy was called a lifeless 
 form of worship, and a, quenching of the Holy 
 Spirit. Immense numbers of petitions were sent 
 up to '' the committee of religion" from all parts 
 of the country against the clergy, complaining of 
 superstitious impositions, the immoral conduct of 
 the clergy, and neglect of their cures. Lord 
 Clarendon observes, that many of these petitions 
 were got up in very unfair ways, in those times of 
 iniquity and confusion : and Dr. Warner says, 
 that, " encouraged by the appearances of a favour- 
 rable disposition in the commons to redress the 
 grievances of religion, the petulant humour of 
 
 * Neal's Hist, of llie Puritans, vol. ii, p. 370. Walker's 
 SuiFerings of the Clergy, part ii, p. 31. 
 
RIOTS IN CHURCHES. 197 
 
 every enthusiast was indulged in subscribing 
 petitions against the church; and the greatest 
 unfeirness was made use of to swell the list."* 
 
 The spirit of the populace was now such, that 
 it was difficult to prevent their outrunning autho- 
 rity, and tearing down in a tumultuous manner 
 what they were told had been set up illegally. 
 At St. Saviour's, Southwark, the mob pulled 
 down the rails about the communion table. At 
 Halsted, in Essex, they tore the surplice, and 
 abused the liturgy: and when the commons 
 were assembled in St. Margaret's, Westminster, 
 as the clergyman was commencing the commu- 
 nion service at the communion table, some 
 of the rabble at the lower end of the church 
 began to sing a psalm, in which the congregation 
 joined, so that the minister was obliged to desist. 
 But in order to prevent any such disorders in 
 future, the lords and commons passed a severe 
 sentence on the rioters, and published the follow- 
 ing order, dated Jan. 16, 1C)40--1, appointing it to 
 be read in all the churches of London, Westmin- 
 ster, and Southwark — " That divine service shall 
 be performed as it is appointed by the acts of 
 parliament of this realm; and that all such as 
 
 * Hist, of the Rebellion, vol. i, p. 203. Warner's Eccles. 
 Hist, of England, vol, ii, p. 537. See also Walker'i Sufferings 
 of the Clergy, part i, p. 8. 
 
198 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 disturb that wholesome order shall be severely 
 punished by law."* And it was also added, 
 " That the parsons, vicars, and curates of the 
 several parishes shall forbear to introduce any 
 rites or ceremonies that may give offence, other- 
 wise than those which are estabhshed by the laws 
 of the land." 
 
 About this time the house of commons arbitra- 
 rily settled puritanical preachers and lecturers in 
 most of the considerable churches, so that the 
 pulpits now sounded with abundance of faction- 
 and fanaticism. Commissioners were also ordered 
 to be sent into every county, to " deface, demo- 
 lish, and remove out of churches and chapels, all 
 images, altars, or tables turned altarivise, cruci- 
 fixes, pictures, and other monuments and relics of 
 idolatry.'" In consequence of this commission, 
 the Cross in Cheapside, Charing Cross, was 
 taken down; and also the famous St. Paul's 
 Cross w^as demolished.* 
 
 * Walker's Sufferings of the Clergy, part i, pp. 24, 26, 
 Nalson's Collections, vol. ii, p. 271. Neal's Hist, of the 
 Puritans, vol. ii, p. 372. 
 
 t St. Paul's Cross " was a pulpit of wood, covered with lead in 
 the form of a cross, and mounted on several flights of stone 
 steps, and placed about the middle of St. Paul's churchyard, in 
 which more learned men appeared, and out of which more 
 sound and good divinity had been delivered, than perhaps any 
 one pulpit since the first preaching of the Gospel could ever 
 glory in ; and particularly under that (now idolatrous) banner 
 
ARBITRARY POWER OF THE COMMONS. 199 
 
 It is easy to perceive that the commons, who 
 were so forward to complain on all occasions of 
 the arbitrary power of the king, exceeded, in this 
 instance, their own authority, and placed arbitrary 
 power in the hands of those commissioners. In 
 order to maintain this arbitrary power, the house 
 of commons judged it requisite to encourage their 
 friends particularly to countenance the puritans, 
 to whose assistance and influence they were 
 already so much obliged, and thus to contrive to 
 overawe their enemies. To every one who im- 
 partially views the political factions of those 
 times, it is evident that many of the puritans, 
 though pious, good, and conscientious men, were 
 made tools to promote the designs of this parlia- 
 ment. Every meeting of the commons was now 
 productive of some vehement harangue against 
 the usurpation of the bishops, the high commis- 
 sion, the late convocation, and the new canons. 
 Such invectives were received without any con- 
 troul. And no distinction at first appeared 
 between those who desired only to reform the 
 abuses which had crept into the church, and 
 those who wished totally to annihilate episcopal 
 jurisdiction.* 
 
 of the cross, more learning against popery and all real idolatry 
 had been shewn, than those new reformers were ever masters 
 of." — Walker's Sufferings of the Clergy, part i, p. 24. 
 
 * Warner's £x;cles. Hist, of England, vol. ii, pp. 636, 537. 
 
200 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 It was manifest that the destruction of the 
 church was intended, since its ministers and 
 Hturgy were so virulently attacked. The debates 
 in parliament concerning the liturgy and episco- 
 pacy, now engaged the attention of the whole 
 nation. A great number of seditious pamphlets 
 issued from the press against the church, written in 
 the most scurrilous and indecent language. Bishop 
 Hall, in his ** Defence of the Humble Remon- 
 strance against the frivolous and false Exceptions 
 oi Smectymnuus,'' says, *' Fain would you excuse 
 that which the world cries shame on : the multi- 
 tude of the late seditious pamphlets; whereat 
 you might well blush in silence, when an honour- 
 able person, in open parliament, could reckon up 
 no less than seven score that had passed the press 
 since the beginning of this session." ^ Bishop Hall, 
 lamenting the iniquitous attacks on the church, 
 made, on this occasion, the following earnest 
 appeal to the house of lords in behalf of the 
 church. 
 
 " My Lords : 
 
 I have long held my peace, and meant to have 
 done so still: but now, like to Craesus's mute son, 
 I must break silence. I humbly beseech your 
 Lordships to give me leave, to take this too just 
 
 * Bishop Hall's Worki, toI. ix, p. 644. 
 
SPEECH IN THE HOUSE OF LORDS. 201 
 
 occasion to move your Lordships to take into 
 your deep and serious consideration the woeful 
 and lamentable condition of the poor Church of 
 England, your dear Mother. 
 
 My Lords, this was not wont to be her stile. 
 We have, heretofore, talked of the famous and 
 flourishing Church of England : but now, your 
 Lordships must give me leave to say, that the 
 poor Church of England humbly prostrates her- 
 self, next after his Sacred Majesty, at your Lord- 
 ships' feet; and humbly craves your compassion 
 and present aid. 
 
 My Lords, it is a foul and dangerous insolence, 
 this, which is now complained of to you ; but it 
 is but one of a hundred of those, which have been 
 of late done to this Church and Government. 
 
 The Church of England, as your Lordships 
 cannot choose but know, hath been and is miser- 
 ably infested on both sides: with Papists, on 
 the one side; and Schismatics, on the other. 
 The Psalmist hath, of old, distinguished the 
 enemies of it, into wild boars out of the wood, 
 and little foxes out of the burrows: the one 
 whereof goes about to root up the very founda- 
 tion of religion ; the other to crop the branches, 
 and blossoms, and clusters thereof: both of them 
 conspire the utter ruin and devastation of it. 
 
 As for the former of them, I do perceive a 
 great deal(of good zeal, for the remedy and sup- 
 
202 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 pression of them : and I do heartily congratulate 
 it; and bless God for it; and beseech hiin to 
 prosper it, in those hands, that shall undertake 
 and prosecute it. 
 
 But, for the other, give me leave to say, I do 
 not find many, that are sensible of the danger of 
 it ; w^hich yet, in my apprehension, is very great 
 and apparent. Alas ! my Lords, I beseech you 
 to consider what it is: That there should be 
 in London and the Suburbs and Liberties, no 
 fewer than fourscore congregations of several 
 sectaries, as I have been too credibly informed ; 
 instructed by guides fit for them, Coblers, Tailors, 
 Feltmakers, and such like trash : which are all 
 taught to spit in the face of their Mother, the 
 Church of England ; and to defy and revile her 
 government. From hence have issued those 
 dangerous assaults of our Church-Governors : 
 from hence, that inundation of base and scurrilous 
 libels and pamphlets, wherewith we have been of 
 late overborne; in which Papists and Prelates, 
 like oxen in a yoke, are still matched together. 
 O my Lords, I beseech you, that you will be 
 sensible of this great indignity. Do but look 
 upon these reverend persons. Do not your 
 Lordships see here, sitting upon these benches, 
 those, that have spent their time, their strength, 
 their bodies and lives, in preaching down, in 
 writing down Popery ? and which would be ready 
 
SPEECH IN THE HOUSE OF LORDS. 203 
 
 if occasion where offered, to sacrifice all their 
 old blood that remains to the maintenance of that 
 truth of God, which they have taught and writ- 
 ten ? And shall we be thus despitefully ranged 
 with them, whom we do thus professedly oppose? 
 But, alas ! this is but one of those many scan- 
 dalous aspersions and intolerable affronts, that 
 are daily cast upon us. Now whither should 
 we, in this case, have recourse for a needful and 
 seasonable redress ? The arm of the Church is, 
 alas! now short and sinewless: it is the inter- 
 posing of your authority that must rescue us. 
 You are the eldest sons of your dear Mother, the 
 Church ; and, therefore, most fit and most able 
 to vindicate her wrongs. You are Amici Sponsce; 
 give me leave, therefore, in the bowels of Christ 
 humbly to beseech your Lordships, to be tenderly 
 sensible of these woeful and dangerous conditions 
 of the times. And, if the Government of the 
 Church of England be unlawful and unfit, aban- 
 don and disclaim it; but if otherwise, uphold and 
 maintain it. Otherwise, if these lawless outrages 
 be yet suffered to gather head, who knows where 
 they will end ? My Lords, if these men may, with 
 impunity and freedom, thus bear down Ecclesi- 
 astical Authority, it is to be feared they will not 
 rest there; but will be ready to affront Civil 
 Power too. Your Lordships know, that the Jack 
 Straws, and Cades, and Wat Tylers of former 
 
204 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 times, did not more cry down learning than 
 nobility : and those of your Lordships, that have 
 read the history of the Anabaptistical tumults at 
 Munster, will need no other item: let it be 
 enough to say, that many of these Sectaries are 
 of the same profession. Shortly, therefore, let 
 me humbly move your Lordships to take these 
 dangers and miseries of this poor Church deeply 
 to heart : and, upon this occasion, to give order 
 for the speedy redressing of these horrible inso- 
 lencies; and for the stopping of that deluge of 
 libellous invectives, wherewith we are thus impet- 
 uously overflown. Which, in all due submission, 
 I humbly present to your Lordships' wise and 
 religious consideration." ^ 
 
 * Bishop Hall's Works, vol. x, pp. 65, 66. 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 Upon the gathering of the present storm, 
 Bishop Hall came forward a second time as a 
 strenuous champion in defence of the church of 
 England. He published "An Humble Remon- 
 strance to the High Court of Parliament," in 
 which treatise he vindicated the antiquity of litur- 
 gies and episcopacy with admirable skill, meek- 
 ness, and simplicity ; yet with such strength of 
 argument, that five presbyterian divines " clubbed 
 their wits together to frame an answer." These 
 dissenting ministers were Stephen Marshall, 
 Edmund Calamy, Thomas Young, Matthew New- 
 comen, and William Spurstow. Their perform- 
 ance bore the strange title of " Smectymnuus, or 
 An Answer to an Humble Remonstrance, &c." 
 This fictitious word is made up of the initial 
 letters of the names of the above authors. Bishop 
 Hall, in his reply entitled " A Defence of that 
 Remonstrance," alluding to his antagonists, mer- 
 rily says," My single Remonstrance is encountered 
 with a plural adversary^ that talks in the style of^ 
 
206 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 " We" and " Us." Their names, persons, qualities, 
 numbers, I care not to know: but could they 
 say, '* my name is Legion, for we are many ,•" or, 
 were they as many legions as men; my cause, 
 yea God's, would bid me to meet them undis- 
 mayed, and to say with holy David, '' Though a 
 host should encamp against me, my heart shall 
 not fear." Ps. xxvii, 3. Bishop Hall proceeds 
 with much composure to point out the bulk of his 
 adversaries' performance, their trifling cavils, and 
 their inveterate malice against episcopacy : and, 
 with his usual ability and learning, demonstrates 
 the antiquity of forms of prayers, and the Aposto- 
 lical institution of episcopacy. In a word, this 
 reply is a complete refutation of the arguments of 
 the bishop's adversaries. 
 
 It is said of the treatise of Smectymnuus that it 
 is " certainly written with great fierceness of spirit 
 and much asperity in language, containing eighteen 
 sections, in the last of which the differences 
 between the prelatists and puritans are aggravated 
 with great bitterness."^ Bishop Hall, at the end 
 of his " Defence of the Humble Remonstrance," 
 speaks of the last section of Smectymnuus thus: 
 *' The rest that remains, is but mere declamation, 
 not worthy of any answer, but contempt and 
 silence," 
 
 • Brook's Lives of the Puritans, vol. iii, p. 246. 
 
ANSWER TO SMECTYMNUUS. 207 
 
 In this controversy, no one can say that Bishop 
 Hall has used " asperity of language," or mani- 
 fested bitterness of spirit: on the contrary, he 
 has written with the simplicity of a primitive 
 christian bishop ; with confidence of the goodness 
 of the cause; with brotherly respect to his 
 opponents: his language is energetic, yet tem- 
 perate, courteous, and chaste. 
 
 The bishop terminates this controversy by a 
 tract called " A Short Answer to the Tedious 
 Vindication of Smecti/mnuus/' in which he vindi- 
 cates, with great strength of argument, what he 
 had already advanced in defence of liturgies and 
 episcopacy: refutes his opponents' cavils and 
 subterfuges, and challenges them to produce any 
 settled national church in the whole christian 
 world that has been otherwise governed than by 
 bishops, in a meet and moderate parity, ever since 
 the time of Christ and his apostles, until this pre- 
 sent age." * 
 
 It is proper here to observe, that, though 
 Bishop Hall proves that there always had been a 
 /orm of prayer used in the public worship of God, 
 both in the Jewish and christian church ; yet he 
 does not disapprove of the use of extemporary 
 prayer on certain occasions, but confesses that he 
 made use of both ways. ** Far be it from me," 
 
 * Bishop Hall's Works, vol. ix, pp. 591, 768. 
 
208 LIFE OP BISHOP HALL, 
 
 says he, " to dishearten any good christian from 
 the use of conceived prayer, in his private devo- 
 tions, and upon occasion also in public. I would 
 hate to be guilty of pouring so much water upon 
 the Spirit; to which I shall gladly add oil rather. 
 No; let the full soul freely pour out itself in 
 gracious expressions of its holy thoughts, into the 
 bosom of the Almighty. Let both the sudden 
 flashes of our quick ejaculations, and the constant 
 flames of our more fixed conceptions, mount up 
 from the altar of a zealous heart unto the throne 
 of grace : and if there be some stops or solecisms 
 in the fervent utterance of our private wants, these 
 are so far from being offensive, that they are the 
 most pleasing music to the ears of that God unto 
 whom our prayers come. Let them be broken off 
 with sobs, and sighs, and incongruities of our 
 delivery, our good God is no otherwise affected 
 to this imperfect elocution, than an indulgent 
 parent is to the clipped and broken language of 
 his dear child, which is more delightful to him 
 than any other's smooth oratory. This is not to 
 be opposed in another, by any man, that hath 
 found the true operation of this grace in himself"* 
 " What have I professed," says he again, con- 
 cerning conceived prayer, **but that which I ever 
 allowed, ever practised, both in private and 
 
 * Bishop Hall's Works, vol, ix, p. 629, &c. 
 
ON EXTEMPORE PRAYER. 209 
 
 public ? God is a free Spirit, and so should ours 
 be, in pouring out our voluntary devotions upon all 
 occasions. Nothing hinders, but that this liberty 
 and a public liturgy should be good friends, 
 and may go hand in hand together. And whoso- 
 ever would forcibly sever them, let them bear 
 their own blame.'* And again, in his ** Answer 
 to Smectymnuus' Vindication," he says, " you tell 
 me of thousands, who desire to worship God with 
 devout hearts, that cannot be easily persuaded 
 that these set forms, though never so free from 
 just exceptions, will prove so great a help to their 
 devotion : I tell you of many more thousands than 
 they, and no less devoutly affected, that bless 
 God to have found this happy and comfortable 
 effect in the fore-set prayers of the church. 
 Neither doth this plead at all against the use of 
 present conception, whether in praying or preach- 
 ing ; or derogate any thing from that reverent and 
 pious esteem of conceived prayer, which I have 
 formerly professed. Surely I do from my soul 
 honour both : I gladly make use of both ; and 
 praise God for them, as the gracious exercises of 
 christian piety, and the effectual furtherances of 
 salvation. There is place enough for them both : 
 they need not justle each other." * 
 
 * Bishop Hall's Works, vol. ix, pp. 651, 760. 
 While this controversy was debating at home, letters were 
 
 P 
 
210 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 Perhaps the controversy between Bishop Hall 
 and these dissenting divines might have been 
 compromised, if there had not been a determined 
 resolution in several persons then in power to 
 demoHsh the estabhshed church : in which resolu- 
 tion they were greatly assisted by many of those 
 called puritans, who were of turbulent spirits, 
 and inveterate against church and state. And at 
 the same time it must be allowed, that if the rest 
 of the bishops and clergy had been of the same 
 spirit and temper as Bishop Hall, probably 
 things would not have been carried to such 
 extremes. But divine providence so ordered it. 
 
 sent from both sides to obtain the judgment of foreign divines ; 
 but most of them gave no reply. Dr. Piume, in the life of 
 Bishop Racket, writes, that Blondei, Vossius, Horn beck, and 
 Sahiiasius, were sent to by his Majesty's friends in vain. 
 Blondei published a treatise on the dissenters' side; but 
 Deodote of Geneva, Amyraldus of France, wished an accom- 
 modation, and were for episcopal government. The papists 
 triumphed, and their expectations were raised on account of 
 these differences, as appears by a letter of T. White, a papist, 
 to the Lord Viscount Gage, of Dublm, Feb. 12, 1639: "We 
 are in a fair way to assuage heresy and her episcopacy ; for 
 Exeter's book has done njore for the catholics than they could 
 have done for themselves, he having written that episcopacy in 
 office and jurisdiction is absolutely Jwre divino^ (which was the 
 old quarrel between our bishops and King Henry Vlil, during 
 his heresy ;) which book does not a little trouble our adver- 
 saries, who declare this tenet of Exeter's to be contrary to the 
 laws of this land. All is like to prosper here, so 1 hope with 
 you there." These were the wishes, and the sentiment of the 
 papists then respecting Bishop Hall's writings on episcopacy. 
 —See ** Foxes and Firebrands," part ii, p. 81 ; and Neal's 
 Hist, of the Puritans, vol. ii, p. 389. 
 
PETI^pNS. 211 
 
 that the arbitrary power then in church and state 
 sjiould be punished, and that the unrestrained 
 outrages of civil a|id religious faction should be at 
 the same time exemplified, that all future ages 
 might take warning ^gainist fostering a seditious, 
 factious, and party spirit. 
 
 As this parliament increased in power, the 
 puritan divines took advantage of it, and stiffened 
 in their demands, till methods of accommodation 
 were utterly impracticable.* And, as the utter 
 subversion of the church was contemplated, the 
 industry of the several parties to get signatures to 
 petitions, is almost incredible : and, as it was then 
 the fashion to judge of the sense of the nation this 
 way, messengers were sent all over England to 
 promote petitions and procure signatures. Lord 
 Clarendon, Dr. Nalson, and others, complain of 
 great disingenuity on the side of those who were 
 ill-affected to the church. The noble historian 
 says, " That the paper which contained the 
 minister's petition was filled with a very few 
 hands, but that many other sheets were annexed 
 for the reception of numbers, that gave credit to 
 the undertal^ing : but that when their names were 
 subscribed, the petition itself was cut off, and a 
 new one of a very different nature annexed to the 
 
 • Neal's Hist, of the Puritans, vol. ii, p. 388. 
 P 2 
 
212 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 long list of names : and when some of the minis- 
 ters complained to the Rev. Mr. Marshall, with 
 whom the petition was lodged, that they never 
 saw the petition to which their hands were 
 annexed, but had signed another against the oath 
 enjoined in the new canons. When they found 
 their names set to a petition for an alteration in the 
 government of the church, they remonstrated for 
 this disingenuity. Mr. Marshall, it is said, replied, 
 that it was thought fit by those who understood 
 business better than they, that the latter petition 
 should rather be preferred than the former."^ 
 
 It must be allowed that very unfair means were 
 employed to get signatures to petitions at this 
 time: and many subscribed their names who 
 were not at all capable of judging the merits of 
 the cause. There were two kinds of petitions 
 against the church. Some petitioned the destruc- 
 tion of the whole fabric : a petition, therefore, 
 was got up, and subscribed by above fifteen 
 thousand inhabitants of London ; this complained 
 of the government of the church by archbishops, 
 bishops, deans, &c. and prayed that the said 
 government, with all its dependencies, Root and 
 Branch, might be abohshed. This extraordinary 
 
 * Clarendon, vol. i, p. 204. Walker's Sufferings of the 
 Clergy, part i, p. 8. Neal's Hist, of the Puritans, vol. ii, 
 p. 390. 
 
** ROOT AND branch" PETITION. 213 
 
 bill was therefore cantingly termed the Root and 
 Branch petition. There were also others who 
 only aimed at the reformatiom of some things in 
 the government of the church : a petition, there- 
 fore, called the miidsters* petition, was drawn up, 
 and signed by seven hundred beneficed clergy- 
 men ; this was followed by others, signed by a 
 vast nun»ber of hands, from Kent, Gloucester- 
 shire, Lancashire, Nottinghamshire, and other 
 counties. Though the enemies of episcopacy 
 were extremely busy, yet there were great efforts 
 made in favor of the constitution; for, in 1641 
 and the following year, there were no less than 
 nineteen petitions presented to the king, and the 
 house of lords, from the two universities, from 
 Cheshire, Nottinghamshire, Somersetshire, Rut- 
 landshire, Staffordshire, Kent, North Wales, Lan- 
 cashire, Herefordshire, Huntingdonshire, Corn- 
 wall, Oxfordshire, &c. There was also a petition 
 from the diocese of Exeter, signed by about eight 
 thousand names ; which, of course, was promoted 
 by Bishop Hall and his clergy. The petitions in 
 favor of the church were subscribed by above 
 one hundred thousand hands ! six thousand were 
 nobility, gentry, and dignified clergy.* 
 
 These petitions in favor of the church, signed 
 
 * Walker's Sufferings of the Clergy, part i, p. 10. 
 
214 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 by SO vast a liurnber, carried no weight with them ; 
 they were not at all countenanced, but were, in 
 fact, rejected. The house was displeased with 
 those who made them, discouraged any more 
 attempts of the kind, and was presumptuous 
 enough to complain to, and remonstrate with the 
 king for his receiving them. * 
 
 It would be too tedious to give an account of 
 all the petitions against episcopacy : let it suffice, 
 however, to add, that even the apprentices of 
 London made a petition to the king, desiring 
 among other things, *' that prelacy might be rooted 
 up."" The very porters also petitioned against 
 episcopacy as a burthen too heavy for their 
 shoulders, f 
 
 The root and branch petition, mentioned above, 
 was presented to the committee of religion, Dec. 
 11, 1640, by Alderman Pennington, in the name 
 of his Majesty's subjects in and about the city 
 of London, and adjacent counties. It inclosed a 
 schedule of eight and twenty grievances: the 
 chief of which were, the suspension and depriva- 
 tion of ministers by the bishops, for not conforming 
 to the rites and ceremonies of the church — the 
 discouragement of preaching — the bishops' claim 
 of divine right —the Oath ex officio — and the 
 
 • Walker's Sufferings of the Clergy, part ii, p. 10. 
 t Fuller's Church Hist. cent. 17, p. 185. 
 
SPEECH OF LORD DIGBY. 215 
 
 exorbitant power of the high commission court. 
 In order to obtain redress of these grievances, the 
 petitioners were so very modest as only to desire 
 that episcopacy with all its dependances, root and 
 branchy might be abolished. 
 
 At this time, however, the house was not of 
 that malignant spirit against the church, which it 
 afterwards manifested, for the utmost which 
 could be obtained, after a long debate upon the 
 petition, was, that it should not he rejected — that 
 it should remain in the hands of tJie clerk of the 
 Jiouse, and that no copy of it should be given,''* 
 
 The following extracts from the speeches of 
 Lords Digby and Falkland on this occasion, shew 
 us the malignity and presumption of this petition. 
 Lord Digby says, '* I know not whether it be 
 more preposterous to infer the extirpation of 
 bishops from such weak ai^uments, or to attri- 
 bute, as they do, to church government all the 
 civil grievances; not a patent, not a monopoly, 
 not the price of a commodity raised, but these 
 men make the bishops the cause of it. For the 
 bold part of this petition, Sir, what can be of 
 greater presumption than for the petitioners not 
 only to prescribe to the parhament what and how 
 it shall do, but for a multitude to teach a parlia- 
 
 * Walker's Sufferings of the Clergy, part i, p. 8. Warmer's 
 Eocles. Hist, of England, vol. ii, p. 537. 
 
216 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 ment what is, and what is not, the government 
 according to God's word. Besides, what is the 
 petition against? Is it not against the government 
 of the church of England estabhshed by acts of 
 parhament, against the liturgy, and against the 
 several forms of divine service, ratified by the 
 same authority? Episcopacy is a function, 
 deduced through all ages of Christ's church from 
 the apostles' times, and continued the most vene- 
 rable and sacred order ecclesiastical ; a function 
 dignified by the learning and piety of many fathers 
 of the church, glorified by so many martyrdoms 
 in the primitive times, and some since our own 
 blessed reformation ; a government admired, I 
 speak it knowingly, by the learnedest of the 
 reformed churches abroad ; and lastly, a govern- 
 ment under which, till these late years, this 
 church hath so flourished and fructified." Lord 
 Falkland, who, according to Clarendon's opinion, 
 was the most extraordinary man of his age, after 
 speaking with severity against some of the bishops, 
 adds, " And now, even in this great defect of the 
 order, there have been some that have been 
 neither proud nor ambitious ; some that have 
 been learned opposers of popery, and zealous 
 suppressors of Arminianism ; between whom and 
 their inferior clergy, there have been no distinc- 
 tions in frequent preaching; whose lives are 
 untouched, not only by guilt, but by malice, 
 
LORD FALKLAND'S SPEECH. 217 
 
 scarce to be equalled by those of any condition, 
 or excelled by those in any calendar."* This 
 part of Lord Falkland's speech is truly descrip- 
 tive of Bishop Hall's character, and in every point 
 agrees with what the bishop says of himself in his 
 '* Letter sent from the Tower to a private friend:" 
 it is highly probable that Lord Falkland had 
 Bishop Hall particularly in view. Both Lord 
 Digby and Lord Falkland were at this time very 
 zealous for redress of grievances in the church ; 
 Bishop Hall also, and some others of the bishops, 
 were disposed to remove every offensive innova- 
 tion out of the church, and to comply with every 
 requisite reform ; but unhappily on the one hand 
 nothing would satisfy but the demohtion of the 
 church root and branch, and on the other, many 
 
 • Warner's Eccles. Hist, of Eng. vol. ii, p. 638. During 
 this debate the following repartees passed between Mr. Grim- 
 stone and Mr. Seldon: — Mr. G. argued ** that bishops are 
 jure divino is a question; that archbishops are not jure divino 
 is out of question ; now that bishops which are questioned 
 whether jure divino, or archbishops which out of question are 
 notjur^ divinOf should suspend ministers which &Te jure divino, 
 I leave to >'ou to be' considered." Mr. Seldon replied, *' that 
 the convocation is jure divino is a question; that parliaments 
 are hot Jure divino is out of the question ; that religion is jure 
 divino is no question ; now that the convocation which is 
 questionable whether Jure divino, and parliaments which out of 
 the question are not jure divino^ should meddle with religion 
 which questionless is Jure divino, I leave to your consideration." 
 Seldou's argument is considered by Bishop Warburton, as a 
 thorough confutation of Grimstone's. Vide Neal, vol. ii, p. 406. 
 
21B LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 of the bishops were not at all disposed to comply 
 with any reforni; 
 
 In the petition in favour of the church, signed 
 by a great number of the nobility, gentry, and 
 dignified clergy, in opposition to the root and 
 branch petition, it was stated, "That episcopacy 
 is as ancient as Christianity itself in this kingdom 
 — that bishops were the chief instruments in the 
 reformation of the church against popery, and 
 afterwards the most eminent martyrs for the pro- 
 testant religion, and since, the best and ablest 
 champions for the defence of it. That since the 
 reformation the times have been very peaceable, 
 happy, and glorious, notwithstanding the episco- 
 pal government in the church, and therefore that 
 this government can be no cause of our unhappi- 
 ness. That not only many learned, but divers 
 other godly persons, would be much scandalized 
 and troubled in conscience, if the government of 
 episcopacy, conceived by them to be an apostolical 
 institution, were altered; and since there is so 
 much care taken, that no man should be offended 
 in the least ceremony, we hope there will be 
 some, that such men's consciences may not be 
 pressed upon in a matter of an higher nature 
 and consequence, especially considering that this 
 government by episcopacy is not only lawful and 
 convenient for edification, but likewise suitable 
 to, and agreeable with the civil policy and govern- 
 
PETITIONS FOR EPISCOPACY. 219 
 
 ment of this state. That this government is 
 lawful, it appears by the immediate, universal, 
 and constant practice of all the christian world, 
 grounded upon scripture, from the apostles' time, 
 to this last age, for above fifteen hundred years 
 together, it being utterly incredible, if not impos- 
 sible, that the whole church, for so long a time, 
 should not discover, by God's word, this g'overtt- 
 nient to be unlawful, if it had been so ; to which 
 may be added, that the most learned protestants, 
 even in those very churches which now are not 
 governed by bishops, do not only hold the 
 government by episcopacy to be lawful, but wish 
 that they themselves might enjoy it. That the 
 government by episcopacy is not only lawful but 
 convenient for edification, and as much or more 
 conducing to piety and devotion than any other, 
 because no modest man denies that the primitive 
 times were most famous for piety, constancy and 
 perseverance in the faith, notwithstanding more 
 frequent, and more cruel persecutions than ever 
 have been since, and yet it is confessed that the 
 church in those times was governed by bishops. 
 That the government of the church by episcopacy 
 is most suitable to the form and frame of the civil 
 government here in this kingdom, it appears by 
 the happy and flourishing union of them both for 
 so long a time together; whereas no man can give 
 us an assurance how any church government 
 
220 LIFE OF BISftOP HALL. 
 
 besides this (whereof we have had so long^ expe- 
 rience) will suit and agree with the civil policy of 
 the state." 
 
 The humble request of the petitioners was, 
 " that they may still enjoy that government which 
 most probably holds its institution from the apos- 
 tles, and most certainly its plantation with our 
 christian faith itself in this kingdom, where it hath 
 ever since flourished and continued for many ages 
 without any interruption or alteration ; whereby 
 it plainly appears, that as it is the most excellent 
 government in itself, so it is the most suitable, 
 most agreeable, and every way most proportion- 
 able to the civil constitution and temper of this 
 state." 
 
 The petition called the ministers' petition was 
 presented to the house Jan. 23, 1640-1, by ten 
 or twelve clergymen: it was pretended to be 
 signed by about seven hundred ministers of 
 London and of the adjacent counties. It prayed 
 for a reformation of certain grievances in the 
 establishment, and was referred to the committee 
 of religion. The three following articles were 
 reported as proper to the consideration of the 
 house: — " 1. The secular employments of the 
 clergy. 2. The sole power of the bishops in 
 ecclesiastical affairs, and particularly in ordina- 
 tions and church censures. 3. The large reve- 
 nues of deans and chapters, with the incon- 
 
ATTACKS ON THE CHURCH. 221 
 
 veniences that attend the application of them."* 
 The house having debated upon the first article, 
 agreed " That the legislative and judicial power 
 of bishops in the house of peers, is a great 
 hinderance to the discharge of their spiritual 
 function, prejudicial to the commonwealth, and 
 fit to be taken away : that for bishops or any other 
 clergyman to be in the commission of the peace, 
 or to have any judicial power in the star-chamber, 
 or in any civil court, is a great hinderance to the 
 discharge of their spiritual function, and preju- 
 dicial to the commonwealth, and fit to be taken 
 away; and that a bill be brought in to that 
 purpose. 
 
 According to these resolutions, a bill was 
 brought into the house of commons, to exclude 
 all ecclesiastics from civil employments, and the 
 bishops in particular from a right of sitting in 
 the house of lords. The noble historian informs 
 us, that this bill ** was contrived with great 
 deliberation and preparation, to dispose men to 
 consent to it," and that the reception of it was 
 " the first design that was entertained against 
 the church." The leaders among the puritan- 
 nical party took great pains to dispose the minds 
 
 * Warner's Eccles. Hist, of Eug. vol. ii, p. 638. Walker's 
 Sufferings of the Cler<>y, part i, p. 15. Neal's Hist, of the 
 Puritans, vol. ii, p. 395. 
 
222 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 of members well affected to the church, to con- 
 cur with them in this bill. Indeed many persons 
 of integrity and judgment then believed that the 
 passing this bill was the only ej^pedient (o pre- 
 serve the church. Mr. Hampden assured Lord 
 Falkland, "that if this ,hW iflight pass, there 
 would be nothing more attempted to the preju- 
 dice of the church, which he thought, as the 
 world then went, would be no ill composition." 
 The same insidious artifice was probably em- 
 ployed with other members ; to which it was 
 added, *^ how advantageous it would be for the 
 king to have at his pleasure so great a number 
 of voices among the Lords, and consequently 
 how improbable it would be to succeed in the 
 reformation of abuses, while the bishops had 
 votes in the house of peers." As the rigid 
 puritans dared not as yet openly to discover 
 their destructive vows against the church, and 
 seemed to have no other view in the expulsion 
 of the bishops than to facilitate the redress of 
 grievances, so there were churchmen who were 
 of opinion it would do no harm, if ecclesiastical 
 persons had fewer avocations from tfieir .profes- 
 sion, and that the passing of this bill would be 
 an expedient to prevent any further attempts 
 against the church. 
 
 The king, being informed of these proceedings, 
 declared in a speech his readiness to concur 
 
BILL AGAINST THE BiaHOPS. 2^3 
 
 with the parliament in a redress of grievances 
 in church and state ; but, though he was for a 
 reform, he would not consent to a change of 
 government. He was not unwilling that tbp 
 exorbitant power and encroachments of the 
 bishops, if there had been any such, should be 
 redressed like all other abuses ; but he should 
 not consent that their voices in parliament should 
 be taken away, which they had eiyoyed ever 
 since the conquest. However, the royal speech 
 being looked upon as unparliamentary, did the 
 cause no service ; it was premature, as the house 
 as yet was not disposed to bring in a bill for the 
 subversion of the church. 
 
 It seemed also, that, in case this bill should be 
 rejected, the puritanical party would be exceed- 
 ingly displeased, who, as being supported by the 
 Scots, were now^ very powerful : it was indeed by 
 their means in a great measure that the parlia- 
 ment was enabled to proceed m the work of 
 redressing grievances. Wherefore the bill for 
 suppressing the temporal jurisdiction of the 
 bishops and clergy, and excluding the former 
 from the house of lords, passed the commons by 
 a great majority : but when it was sent up to the 
 house of lords, May 1, 1641, it met with vigorous 
 opposition.* Many of the greatest men in that 
 
 * Fuller says, (Ch. Hist. b. ix, p. 185.) that Lord Kinibohon 
 
224 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 house grew weary of the malignant presumption of 
 the commons, and observed that they had ** worse 
 designs than they owned :" so those peers, who 
 had hitherto concurred with them, deserted them 
 on this occasion, and severely inveighed against 
 their projects. The bill, therefore, after a second 
 reading, was thrown out, without so much as 
 being committed, even by a majority of temporal 
 lords, without the votes of the bishops being 
 reckoned. If the lords temporal were so far 
 disposed as to comply to exclude the bishops 
 and clergy from all secular offices and employ- 
 ments in the state, they would not at all comply 
 to deprive them of their votes in parliament. 
 
 The principal speakers in the house of lords 
 in behalf of the bishops, were Lord Viscount 
 Newark, afterwards the Earl of Kingston, the 
 Marquis of Hereford, the Earls of Southampton, 
 Bath and Bristol, Dr. Williams bishop of Lincoln, 
 afterwards archbishop of York, and Bishop Hall, 
 who on this occasion, made the following excel- 
 lent speech concerning the power of bishops in 
 secular things : 
 
 would have persuaded the bishops to resign their votes, adding, 
 that then the temporal lords would be obliged in honor to 
 preserve their jurisdiction and revenues. But they would 
 hearken to no such thing, resolving to keep possession of their 
 seats till a superior force should dispossess them. 
 
SPEECH IN THE HOUSE OF LORDS. 225 
 
 " My Lords : 
 
 This is the strangest bill, that ever I heard, since 
 I was admitted to sit under this roof: for it 
 strikes at the very fabric and composition of this 
 house; at the style of all laws: and, therefore, 
 were it not that it comes from such a recommen- 
 dation, it would not, I suppose, undergo any long 
 consideration; but, coming to us from such 
 hands, it cannot but be worthy of your best 
 thoughts. 
 
 And, truly, for the main scope of the bill, I 
 shall yield it most willingly, that ecclesiastical 
 and sacred persons should not ordinarily be taken 
 up with secular affairs. The minister is called 
 Vir Dei, ** a man of God :" he may not be Fir 
 Seculi. He may lend himself to them, upon 
 occasion : he may not give himself over purposely 
 to them. Shortly, he may not so attend worldly 
 things, as that he do neglect divine things. This 
 we gladly yield. Matters of justice, therefore, are 
 not proper, as in an ordinary trade, for our func- 
 tion ; and, by my consent, shall be, as in a gen- 
 erality, waved and deserted: which, for my part, 
 I never have meddled with, but in a charitable 
 way ; with no profit, but some charge to myself, 
 whereof I shall be glad to be eased. Tractent 
 fabriliafahri; as the old word is. 
 
 But, if any man shall hence think to infer, that 
 some spiritual person may not occasionally be in a 
 
226 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 special service of his king or country ; and, when 
 he is so required by his prince, give his advice in 
 the urgent affairs of the kingdom, which I sup- 
 pose is the main point driven at ; it is such an 
 inconsequence, as I dare boldly say cannot be 
 made good, either by divinity or reason ; by the 
 laws either of God or man ; whereas the contrary 
 may be proved and enforced by both. 
 
 As for the grounds of this bill, that the minis- 
 ter s duty is so great, that it is able to take up the 
 whole man, and the Apostle saith, rtj neavog, Who 
 is sufficient for these things? and that, he, who 
 warfares, to God, should not entangle himself with 
 this world ; it is a sufficient and just conviction 
 of those, who would divide themselves betwixt 
 God and the world, and bestow any main part of 
 their time upon secular affairs : but it hath no 
 operation at all upon this tenet, which we have in 
 hand ; that a man, dedicate to God, may not so 
 much as, when he is required, cast a glance of his 
 eye, or some minutes of time, or some motions of 
 his tongue, upon the public business of his king 
 and country. Those, that expect this from us, 
 may as well, and upon the same reason, hold that 
 a minister must have no family at all ; or, if he 
 have one, must not care for it : yea, that he must 
 have no body to tend ; but be all spirit. 
 
 My lords, we are men of the same composition 
 with others ; and our breeding hath been accor- 
 
SPEECH IN THE HOUSE OF LORDS. 227 
 
 dingly. We cannot have lived in the world, but 
 we have seen it, and observed it too ; and our 
 long experience and conversation, both in men 
 and in books, cannot but have put something into 
 us for the good of others : and now, having a 
 double capacity, qua Cives, qua Ecclesiastici ; as 
 members of the commonwealth, as ministers and 
 governors of the church; we are ready to do 
 our best service in both. One of them is no way 
 incompatible with the other : yea, the subjects of 
 them both are so united with the church and 
 commonwealth, that they cannot be severed : yea 
 so, as that, not the one is in the other, but the one 
 is the other, is both : so as the services, which we 
 do, upon these occasions, to the commonwealth, 
 are inseparable from our good offices to the 
 church: so as, upon this ground, there is no 
 reason of our exclusion. 
 
 If ye say that our sitting in parliament takes up 
 much time, which we might have employed in our 
 studies or pulpits; consider, I beseech you, that, 
 while you have a parhament, we must have a 
 convocation ; and that our attendance upon that 
 will call for the same expence of time, which we 
 afford to this service: so as, herein, we have 
 neither got nor lost. 
 
 But, I fear it is not, on some hands, the tender 
 regard of the full scope to our caUing, that is so 
 much here stood upon ; as the conceit of too 
 
 Q 2 
 
228 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 much honour, that is done us, in taking up the 
 roona of peers, and voting in this high court ; for, 
 surely, those that are averse from our votes, yet 
 could be content we should have place upon the 
 w^oolsacks ; and could allow us ears, but not 
 tongues. 
 
 If this be the matter, I beseech your lordships 
 to consider, that this honour is not done to us, 
 but our profession; which, whatever we be in 
 our several persons, cannot easily be capable of 
 too much respect from your lordships. JSon tibi 
 sed Isidi; as he said of old. 
 
 Neither is this any new grace, that is put upon 
 our calling ; which if it were now to begin might 
 perhaps be justly grudged to our unworthiness ^ 
 but it is an ancient ri^ht and inheritance, inherent 
 in our station : no less ancient than these walls, 
 wherein we sit: yea, more: before ever there 
 were parliaments, in the Magna Concilia of the 
 kingdom we had our places. And as for my pre- 
 decessors, ever since the conqueror's time, I can 
 shew your Lordships a just catalogue of them, 
 that have sat before me here : and, truly, though 
 I have just cause to be mean in mine own eyes, 
 yet why or wherein there should be more 
 unworthiness in me than the rest, that I should be 
 stripped of that privilege which they so long 
 enjoyed, though there were no law to hold me 
 here, I cannot see or confess. 
 
SPEECH IN THE HOUSE OF LORDS. 229 
 
 What respects of honour have been put upon 
 the prime clergy of old, both by Pagans, and 
 Jews, and Christians, and what are still both 
 within Christendom and without, I shall not need 
 to urge: it is enough to say, this of ours is not 
 merely arbitrary ; but stands so firmly established 
 by law and custom, that I hope it neither will nor 
 can be removed, except you will shake those 
 foundations, which I believe you desire to hold 
 firm and inviolable. 
 
 Shortly, then, my lords, the church craves no 
 new honour from you; and justly hopes you will 
 not be guilty of pulling down the old. As you 
 are the eldest sons, and, next under his majesty 
 the honourable patrons of the church : so she 
 expects and beseeches you to receive her into 
 your tenderest care ; so to order her affairs, that 
 ye leave her to posterity in no worse case than 
 you found her. 
 
 It is a true word of Damasus, Uti vilescit 
 nomen JEpiscopi, omnis statua perturbatur Eccle- 
 sicB, If this be suffered, the misery will be the 
 church's : the dishonour and blur of the act in 
 future ages will be yours. 
 
 To shut up, therefore, let us be taken off from 
 all ordinary trade of secular employments ; and, 
 if you please, abridge us of intermeddling with 
 matters of common justice : but leave us pos- 
 sessed of those places and privileges in parliament, 
 
230 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 which our predecessors have so long and peace- 
 ably enjoyed." * 
 
 The rejection of this bill was the first check the 
 commons met with in this parliament : and they 
 were not a little disconcerted at it. The reso- 
 lute conduct of the bishops at this time in defend- 
 ing their rights and privileges, so inflamed the 
 enemies of the church, that they came to a 
 conclusion that there was no hope of obtaining 
 their end as long as a root and branch of episco- 
 pacy remained. Some of their leading members 
 therefore brought in a bill for *' the utter extirpa- 
 tion of all bishops, deans, chapters, archdeacons, 
 prebendaries, chaunters, with all chancellors, 
 officials, and officers belonging to them ; and for 
 the disposing of their lands, manors, &c. as the 
 parliament should appoint."! This extraordinary 
 bill was drawn up by Mr. St. John, and was 
 delivered to the speaker by Sir Edward Bering 
 from the gallery, with a short speech, in which 
 he quoted two verses from Ovid, the application 
 of which, it is said, was his greatest motive : 
 
 *' Cuncta prius tentanda : sed iminedicabile vulnus 
 Ense recidendum, ne pars sincera trahatur." 
 
 Sir Edward observed, that the moderation and 
 
 * Bishop Hall's Works, vol. x, pp. 70-72. 
 t Nalson*s Collections, vol. ii, pp. 248-300. 
 
BILL FOR DESTROYING EPISCOPACY. 231 
 
 candour of the house were great in applying so 
 gentle a remedy by the late bill ; as pruning and 
 taking off a few unnecessary branches from the 
 bishops was likely to make the tree prosper the 
 better: but since this soft method proved inef- 
 fectual by reason of their (the bishops') incorrigi- 
 ble obstinacy, it was now necessary to put the 
 ** axe to the root of the tree.'' " I never was 
 for ruin," said he, " as long as there was any 
 hopes of reforming; and I now profess that if 
 these hopes revive and prosper, I will divide my 
 sense upon this bill, and yield my shoulders to 
 to underprop the primitive, lawful, and just 
 episcopacy." 
 
 There was a great opposition to the reading of 
 this bill, because it was not introduced in a par- 
 liamentary way, viz. without first asking leave; 
 and because its tendency was to overthrow and 
 disannul so many acts, and to change the consti- 
 tution in church and state. But, as there were 
 many very desirous of hearing it merely out of 
 curiosity, and others from worse motives, it was 
 read once, and then adjourned for nearly two 
 months. 
 
 A little before the king went into Scotland in 
 the I eginning of Aug. 1641, it was carried by a 
 majority of thirty-one voices to read it a second 
 time, and deliver it to a committee of the whole 
 house, of which Mr. Hyde, afterwards Lord 
 
232 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 Clarendon, was chairman, who so dexterously 
 managed the matter, that in about twenty days 
 the bill was dropt, and was not resumed till the 
 civil war commenced.^ 
 
 When it was debated in the house of commons 
 to abolish deans and chapters, and to apply their 
 revenues to better purposes, the cathedral clergy 
 exerted themselves to the utmost to ward off the 
 impending danger: they drew up a petition to 
 both houses of parHament ; and for this end, one 
 divine was deputed from each cathedral to solicit 
 their friends on behalf of their respective founda- 
 tions. They intended to retain council to plead 
 for them, but being informed that the parliament 
 would not allow them that benefit, but that they 
 must appear and plead their own cause. Upon 
 this, Dr. John Hacket, prebendary of St. Paul's 
 and archdeacon of Bedford, was selected as their 
 advocate, who, being admitted to the bar of the 
 bouse, May 12, 1641, " Spoke with so much 
 strength of reason and argument, with so much 
 learning and courage, that it was not without its 
 effect on the house, and seemed to put the busi- 
 ness to a stand for the present. It was then 
 thought by some, that had the question been then 
 
 * Walker's Sufferings of the Clergy, part i, p. 11. Warner's 
 Eccles. Hist, of Eng. vol. ii, p. 540. Neal's Hist, of the 
 Puritans, vol. ii, p. 426. Harris's Life of Charles I. pp. 379- 
 881. Ed. 1814. 
 
VOTE OF THE COMMONS. 233 
 
 put, it would have been carried in favour of the 
 cathedrals by a great majority.* Petitions were 
 also presented by the two universities; " but," 
 says Heylin, " neither of them could prevail so 
 far as take off the edge of the axe, which had 
 been thus laid at the root of the tree, though it 
 did blunt it at the present. For they, who 
 managed the design, tiii(i::jg that the cathedral 
 churches were too strongly cemented to be demo- 
 lished in an instant, considered that the farthest 
 way about, did many times prove the nearest way 
 to the journey's end/'t A bill was therefore pre- 
 pared, by which it was to be enacted that the 
 bishops should have no votes in parliament, &c. of 
 which we shall have occasion to speak more at 
 large hereafter. 
 
 After a long debate upon the bill for abolishing 
 deans and chapters, the commons passed the fol- 
 lowing resolutions or votes, which did not pass 
 into a law, as the house of lords would not con- 
 cur in an act so detrimental to the interest of the 
 church: — **That all deans and chapters, arch- 
 deacons, prebendaries, chanters, canons, and 
 
 * See Dr. Hacket's incomparable speech in his Life by Dr. 
 Plume, prefixed to his Sermons ia fol. and in Nalson's Collec- 
 tion, vol. ii, p. 240. See also Fuller's Church Hist. cent. 17, 
 b. xi, pp. 176, 177. Walker's Sufferings of the Clergy, part i, 
 p. 9. Heylin's Life of Laud, p. 475. 
 
 t Heylin's Life of Laud, p. 476. 
 
234 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 their officers, shall be utterly abolished out of the 
 church, and the lands taken from them, put in the 
 hands of trustees, in order to support a fit number 
 of ministers for the service of the church, and the 
 reparation of the cathedrals." 
 
 As long as the bishops were in the house of 
 lords, they stood like a strong bulwark or wall 
 against every attempt of the commons to subvert 
 the church; but when they were forced out of 
 the house, the commons carried all before them, 
 and accomplished all their iniquitous designs 
 against the church. 
 
 In the month of March, 1640—1, the lords 
 ordered that a committee of ten earls,ten bishops, 
 and ten barons should be nominated to settle the 
 affairs of the church : this was denominated the 
 Committee of Accommodation, At their first 
 meeting they appointed a sub-committee of bishops 
 and divines of diffierent persuasions, to consider 
 such innovations in religion as were proper to be 
 taken away. Dr. Williams, bishop of Lincoln, was 
 chairman to both, and was ordered to summon 
 the committee, which he did by the following 
 circular :— - 
 
 " I am commanded by the lords of the com- 
 mittee for innovation in matters of i eligion, to let 
 you know, thai iheir said lordships have assigned 
 and appointed you to attend them, as assistants 
 in that committee; and to let you know in 
 
COMMITTEE OF ACCOMMODATION. 235 
 
 general, that their lordships intend to examine all 
 innovations in doctrine and discipline introduced 
 into the church, without law, since the reforma- 
 tion ; and (if their lordships shall find it behove- 
 ful for the good of the church and state) to 
 examine after that, the degrees and perfection of 
 the reformation itself, which I am directed to 
 intimate to you, that you may prepare your 
 thoughts, studies, and meditations accordingly, 
 expecting their lordships' pleasure for the parti- 
 cular points as they shall arise." 
 Dated March 12, 1640-1.* 
 
 The names of those bishops and divines, who 
 attended, were these — 
 
 Dr. Williams, bishop of Lincoln. Dr. Holdsworth. 
 
 Dr. Ustier, archbishop of Armagh. Dr. Hackett. 
 
 Dr. Hall, bishop of Exeter. Dr. Twisse. 
 
 Dr. Morton, bishop of Durham. Dr. Borgess. 
 
 Dr. Samuel Ward. Mr. White. 
 
 Dr. John Prideaux. Mr. Marshall. 
 
 Dr. Sanderson. Mr. Calaniy. 
 
 Dr. Featley. Mr. Hi.l. 
 Dr. Brownrigge. 
 
 They consulted together in the Jerusalem 
 Chamber at Westminster, and were entertained 
 all the while at the dean s table. The result of 
 
 ♦ The date in Heylin's Life of Laud, p. 472, is March 21, 
 and Dr. Walker, in his Sufferings of the Clergy, part i, p. 29, 
 has March 16. See his authorities in the margin, i*. 
 
236 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 their conference was drawn up for the debate of 
 the committee, in a number of propositions and 
 queries ; but before they could bring their consul- 
 tations to any issue, the meeting was dispersed 
 about the middle of May by the bringing in of the 
 bill for abolishing deans and chapters. This 
 caused such a division in this committee, even in 
 their persons and affections, that they never after 
 met together.^ 
 
 Fuller, speaking of the prelates and divines 
 which formed the committee of accommodation, 
 says, " that the moderation and mutual compli- 
 ance of these divines might have saved the body 
 of episcopacy, and prevented the civil war ; but 
 the court bishops expected no good from them, 
 suspecting the doctrinal puritans (as they nick- 
 named those bishops and episcopal divines) 
 joined with the disciplinary puritans, would 
 betray the church between them. Some hot 
 spirits would abate nothing of episcopal power or 
 profit, but maintained, that the yielding any thing 
 was granting the day to the opposite party." 
 There may be much truth in the above remarks : 
 yet, though the bishops and divines of this com- 
 mittee were persons of great moderation and 
 
 * Heylin's Life of Laud, p. 475. Walker's Sufferings of the 
 Clergy, part i, p. 29. Neal's Hist, of the Puritans, vol. ii, 
 p. 432. 
 
COMMITTEE OF ACCOMMODATION. 237 
 
 piety, and perhaps their scheme of accommoda- 
 tion would have done much good, there were not 
 only " hot spirits'* in favor of episcopacy, who 
 would " abate nothing of episcopal power or 
 profit," but others of the opposite party, who 
 would be satisfied with nothing less than the 
 extirpation of episcopacy, root and branch. — I 
 think, that though many of the puritan divines 
 would have wished to retain episcopacy, it is 
 evident that there existed a party, since the 
 beginning of this parliament, who conspired 
 the subversion of the church. — Rapin repre- 
 sents the whole body of the puritans, which 
 he calls preshyterians, as having formed a con- 
 spiracy against the church.* This is how- 
 ever not correct. The most respectable puri- 
 tans were only for reducing episcopacy into 
 its primitive state, and for removing innovations 
 in ihe church. But it must be acknowledged, 
 that many were then hostile to the constitution 
 of th^ church, being supported by the Scots 
 commissioners, who had conceived a strong 
 antipathy against episcopacy, and had actually 
 voted it contrary to the word of God ! This was 
 not the case with many of the best of the puritans, 
 who only desired to get rid of the exorbitant 
 power exercised by some of the bishops. As the 
 
 ♦ HisUofEng. vol.ii, pp.369,447» fol. ed. 
 
238 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 influence of the Scots increased, presbyterian 
 discipline prevailed ; and when the parHament 
 were at their mercy, and forced to submit to what 
 conditions they would impose upon them for 
 their assistance, the Kirk discipline gained the 
 ascendant, and at last it was advanced into a 
 divine right in the assembly of divines !* 
 
 It is said that about this time a plot was dis- 
 covered to bring up from the north the army to 
 dissolve the parliament: this rumour caused 
 much ferment among the people ; whether there 
 was any truth in it or not, it was made a handle 
 to alienate the affection of the people from the 
 king. Thus every kind of fuel was accumulated 
 to kindle the fire of civil war and rebellion. 
 
 While the commons were thus making prepara- 
 tions for the subversion of the establishment, they 
 were also active in proceeding against papists. 
 It is said that they had a considerable share in the 
 present calamities. They were numerous, and 
 were become insolent and proud. The queen 
 being a papist, protected and countenanced them. 
 And the king, though he was undoubtedly 
 attached firmly to the protestant religion, yet 
 partly from the mildness and humanity of his 
 temper, and chiefly from respect to the queen, 
 
 * Neal's Hist, of the Puritans, vol. ii, p. 443. 
 
MEASURES AGAINST PAPISTS. 239 
 
 was rather remiss in executing the laws against 
 them ; so his enemies made it a pretence that 
 he himself countenanced and protected them : 
 that there existed a secret design of introducing 
 popery, and that several bishops and clergymen 
 were in the plot. There was no truth in this. 
 But it was evident that the face of things was 
 very much changed since the commencement of 
 this parliament, and that it was not in the king's 
 power even to protect the catholics. All the 
 officers of that persuasion were therefore removed 
 from the army ; the judges and magistrates were 
 ordered to put the laws in execution against 
 popish priests and Jesuits : and catholics 
 throughout the kingdom were commanded to be 
 disarmed. In order more effectually to increase 
 the popular fear of popery, Mr. Pym gravely 
 alleged the discovery of a conspiracy against the 
 parliament, and moved " that a protestation 
 might be entered into by the members of both 
 houses." A protestation was therefore made to 
 this effect, that they did in the presence of 
 Almighty God, promise, vow, and protest to 
 maintain and defend, with their lives, power and 
 estates, the true reformed protestant religion 
 expressed in the doctrine of the church of 
 England, against all popery, and popish innova- 
 tions within this realm, contrary to the same 
 
240 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 doctrine ; and also his Majesty's . person, the 
 power and privilege of parliament, the rights and 
 liberties of the subjects, &c. &c. After being 
 subscribed by all the conimons, it was sent up 
 to the house of lords, and was readily assented 
 to by all the lords spiritual and temporal, except 
 the Earl of Southampton and Lord Roberts, who 
 positively refused it, since there was no law that 
 enjoined it, and since the consequence of such 
 engagements might produce effects which were 
 not then intended. Within two days after, with- 
 out acquainting the peers, and contrary to the 
 intention of most who took the protestation, the 
 house of commons voted an explanation of it, as 
 it was now in their power to put what sense they 
 pleased upon it ; their explication of it, therefore, 
 was, that it did not extend to the maintaining of 
 any form of worship or government in the church 
 of England. And lest it should not be sub- 
 scribed voluntarily by the whole nation, as they 
 desired, a bill was prepared and passed to coin- 
 pel all his Majesty's subjects to subscribe it. The 
 lords however rejected such a bill. And the 
 commons in anger, imputed it to the bishops and 
 popish lords, immediately resolved, that who- 
 soever should not take the protestation, was unfit 
 to bear office in the church or commonwealth. 
 At the same time they passed several severe 
 
IMPEACHMENT OF THE EARL OF STRAFFORD. 241 
 
 votes against the bishops and the church.* — 
 ^ * This was," says Neal, " carrying matters to a 
 ^' very extraordinary length ; there had been a 
 \ parliamentary association in the reign of Queen 
 
 ^//'^ Elizabeth, which her Majesty confirmed ; and a 
 t solemn league and covenant in Scotland, which 
 
 the king had complied with ; but the enforcing 
 a protestation or vow upon his Majesty's subjects 
 without his consent, was assuming a power, 
 which even this dangerous crisis of affairs, and 
 the uncommon authority with which this parlia- 
 ment was invested by the Act of Continuance^ 
 can by no means support or justify."! 
 
 The changes, which took place since the com- 
 mencement of this parliament, and during its 
 continuance, were truly astonishing and prodi- 
 gious. It will be proper here to take a brief view 
 of some civil occurrences, which paved the way 
 for them. The parliament, designing to bring 
 corrupt ministers to justice, began with Thomas 
 Wentworth, Earl of Strafford, an able statesman, 
 but hostile to the laws and liberties of his country, 
 and impeached himof high treason, Nov. 11, 1640. 
 Upon this he was taken into custody, committed 
 to the tower, and brought to trial the 22d of 
 
 * Warner's Eccles. Hist, of Erig. vol. ii, p. 642. Walker's 
 SufFerings of the Clergy, part i, p. 22. 
 t Hist, of the Puritans, vol. ii, p. 410. 
 
 R 
 
242^ LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 March following. Harris says, that the king and 
 queen attended his trial incog,^ The king made 
 some attempts to save his life, but through fear 
 or irresolution, he was at last prevailed upon to 
 sign the bill of attainder. And on the 12th of 
 May, 1641, the unhappy Thomas Wentworth was 
 beheaded upon Tower-hill, and submitted to the 
 axe with a Roman bravery and courage : — the 
 writer would have been glad to add rather that 
 he died with Christian fortitude, and in a hope 
 full of immortality ; but he cannot find any such 
 account in the historians of the day. 
 
 During the trial, as being a case of blood, the 
 bishops did not attend ; consequently the bill of 
 attainder passed with the dissent of only eleven 
 peers. 
 
 About this time, that most extraordinary bill, 
 in which it was stated, " that this present parlia- 
 ment shall not he adjourned, or dissolved, without 
 their own consent,'' passed both houses with very 
 little opposition, and obtained the royal assent ! ! 
 
 All men stood amazed at the king's weakness 
 on this occasion: for by this hasty and unadvised 
 measure he concurred in a change of the whole 
 constitution, giving to parliament a legislative 
 power as long as they pleased ! If the king had 
 
 Life of Charles I, p. 370, ed. 1814. 
 
STAU CHAMBER, &C. ABOLISHED. 243 
 
 fixed the continuance of this parliament to a 
 limited time, it might probably have been satis- 
 factory, and the prerogative be saved ; bat by 
 making them perpetual, he parted with the 
 sceptre out of his own hands, and put it into the 
 hands of this parliament, which had already 
 shewn such hostile disposition to the constitution 
 in church and state. 
 
 Two other bills were now ready for the royal 
 assent— one to abolish the court of high com- 
 mission, and regulate the privy council; the other 
 to take away the star-chamber. These bills 
 passed and obtained the royal assent about the 
 latter end of July, 1641. The high commission 
 court was erected by Queen Elizabeth: its juris- 
 diction extended over the whole kingdom ; it 
 suspended and deprived men of their livings. 
 Instead of producing witnesses in open court 
 to prove a charge against a person, the commis- 
 sioners assumed a power of administering an oath 
 ex officio, by which a person was bound to answer 
 all questions, and might thereby be obliged to 
 accuse himself or his most intimate friend. If he 
 refused this oath, he was imprisoned for con- 
 tempt ; and if he took it, he was convicted upon 
 his own confession. Though this court was 
 intended to reform ecclesiastical errors, and to 
 check heresies and schisms, yet it was often 
 abused to vex and harass persons upon trivial 
 
 R 2 
 
244 
 
 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 occasions ; so that it was become a kind of inqui- 
 sition; as Granger says, " it was armed with an 
 inquisitorial power to force any one to confess 
 what he knew, and to punish him at discretion:'* 
 The star chamber was also a court consisting: 
 of certani noblemen, bishops, judges and coun- 
 sellors, nominated by the sovereign who was the 
 sole judge when present; the other members 
 were only to give their opinion by way of advice. 
 But in the absence of the sovereign, the deter 
 mination was by a majority, the lord chancellor 
 or keeper having a casting vote. This court was 
 grown so unmerciful in its censures and punish- 
 ments, that it was a great oppression to the 
 nation, t 
 
 * Granger's Biog. Hist. vol. i, p. 206. See also Hume's 
 Hist, of England, vol. v, p. 189. 
 
 t See Clarendon, vol. i, pp. 74, 68, &c. — In the ancient 
 year books, it is called Camera Stdlata, not because the cham- 
 ber where the court was kept was adorned with stars, but 
 because it was the seat of the great court, and the name was 
 given according to the nature of its judges. '* It was a glorious 
 sight upon a star-day when the Knights of the Garter appear 
 with the stars on their garments, and the judges in their scarlet; 
 and in that posture they have sat sometimes from nine in the 
 morning till live in the afternoon. And it was usual for those 
 that came to be auditors, to be there by tliree in the morning to 
 get convenient places and standing. The Warden of the Fleet, 
 or his deputy, constantly attended in court to receive their 
 Lordships' commands, as there was occasion." " This court 
 often inflicted fines and punishments ; but it was only in the 
 days of Charles I. thdii cropping of earsy slitting of noses ^ brand- 
 ing of faces y whippings and gagging, were heard of in it." 
 Rushworth, vol. ii, p. 473. 
 
 t Harris's Life of Charles I, p. 308, ed. 1814. 
 
IMPEACHMENT OF THE BISHOPS. 245 
 
 By the passing of the act for abolishing these 
 courts, the whole authority and power of spiritual 
 courts were effectually destroyed. When the 
 king hesitated to give his royal assent to this bill, 
 some of the bishops persuaded him to sign it, 
 in order to take off the odium from that bench, 
 that they were averse to reformation. 
 
 When these two courts were abolished, which 
 were the principal cause of the grievances com- 
 plained of, and the chief engines of arbitrary 
 proceedings in church and state, one might have 
 supposed that surely now the church should have 
 rest and quietness : — but no : it must be destroyed 
 root and branch. Reformation could not be per- 
 fected till episcopacy was abolished, and " the 
 sroodlv lands and revenues" of the church be 
 enjoyed by the reformers. 
 
 The commons were not able to devise any 
 effectual method to accomplish their intended 
 change, while the bench of bishops remain- 
 ed united in the house of peers. Several 
 schemes were contrived to divide them, but 
 proved unsuccessful. It was first proposed to 
 impose large fines upon both houses of convoca- 
 tion for compiling the late canons, and a bill for 
 that purpose was introduced, but laid aside. For 
 it was thought more effectual for the present to 
 make examples of those bishops only who were 
 the principal actors in these matters. Accord- 
 
24t) LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 ingly a committee was appointed July 31, 1641, 
 to draw up an impeachment against thirteen of the 
 bishops, viz. Dr. Curie, bishop of Winchester; 
 Dr. Wright, bishop of Coventry and Lichfield ; 
 Dr. Goodman, bishop of Gloucester ; Dr. Jos. 
 Hall, bishop of Exeter; Dr. Owen, bishop of St. 
 Asaph ; Dr. Pierse, bishop of Bath and Wells : 
 Dr. Coke, bishop of Hereford ; Dr.Wren, bishop 
 of Ely; Dr. Roberts, bishop of Bangor; Dr. 
 Skinner, bishop of Bristol ; Dr.W^arner, bishop 
 of Rochester ; Dr. Towers, bishop of Peter- 
 borough; Dr. Owen, bishop of Landaff.''^ The 
 impeachment was of high crimes and misde- 
 meanours ; — " For making and publishing the late 
 canons, contrary to the king's prerogative, to the 
 fundamental laws of the realm, to the rights of 
 parliament, and to the property and liberty oj the 
 subject; and containing matters tending to sedition, 
 and of dangerous consequence ; and for granting a 
 benevolence or contribution to his Majesty, to be 
 paid by the clergy of that province, contrary to law'' 
 It was carried up to the house of Lords about the 
 beginning of August, by serjeant Wild, who 
 demanded in the name of all the commons of 
 England, that the bishops might be forthwith 
 
 .* Neal includes Dr. Laud archbishop of Canterbury in this 
 list, and leaves out the bishop of Hereford ; but Dr. Laud at 
 this time was in the Tower. — See Walker's Sufferings of the 
 Clergy, parti, p. 7; part ii, p. 34. 
 
bishops' defence. 247 
 
 put to answer the crimes and misdemeanours 
 above mentioned, in tlie presence of the house of 
 commons; and that such further proceedings 
 might be had against them as to law and justice 
 appertained. The commons were in hopes that 
 the bishops would now have quitted their votes in 
 parliament in order to be discharged of the priB' 
 munire: but they determined and resolved to 
 abide by their right, and therefore only desired 
 time to prepare their answer and council. They 
 were allowed accordingly three months' time to 
 put in their answer, and to prepare council : for 
 this purpose they nominated Serjeant Jermyn, 
 Mr. Chute, Mr. Heme, and Mr. Hales, as their 
 council. 
 
 Nov. 12, 1641, the bishops deHvered in their 
 answers in writing, except the bishop of Glouces- 
 ter, who pleaded not guilty by word of mouth. 
 Their answers, consisting of a plea and demurrer y 
 were drawn up for them by their council Mr. 
 Chute, with such strength of argument and learn- 
 ing, that their impeachment sunk away in silence.* 
 The bishops' defence was made by a demurrer, 
 with a view to prove that what they had done in 
 the late convocation, could not amount to a 
 
 • Fuller's Church Hist. b. xi, p. 183.— Neal's Hist, of the 
 Puritans, vol. ii, p. 449.- Walker's Sufferings of th« Clergy, 
 part i, p. 7. 
 
248 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 prtsmunire. Bishop Hall, on this occasion, made 
 the following impressive speech in defence of the 
 canons made in convocation : 
 
 "My Lords: 
 
 ** I cannot choose but know, that whosoever 
 rises up in this cause must speak with the disad- 
 vantage of much prejudice ; and, therefore, 1 do 
 humbly crave your lordships' best construction. 
 Were it, my lords, that some few doubting per- 
 sons were to be satisfied in some scruples about 
 matter of the canons, there might be some life in 
 the hope of prevailing; but, now that we are 
 borne down with such a torrent of general and 
 resolute contradiction, we yield : but yet, give us 
 leave, I beseech you, so to yield, that posterity 
 may not say we have wilHngly betrayed our own 
 innocence. 
 
 " First, therefore, let us plead to your lordships 
 and the world, that, to abate the edge of that 
 illegality, which is objected to us, it was our 
 obedience, that both assembled and kept us 
 together, for the making of synodical acts. We had 
 the great seal of England for it ; seconded by the 
 judgments of the oracles of law and justice : and, 
 upon these, the command of our superior, to 
 whom we have sworn and owe canonical obe- 
 dience. Now in this case, what should we do? 
 Was it for ns to judge of the great seal of 
 
SPEECH IN PARLIAMENT. 249 
 
 England? or to judge of our judges? alas! we 
 are not for the law, but for the gospel ; or to dis- 
 obey that authority, which was to be ever sacred 
 to us? I beseech your lordships, put yourselves 
 a while into our condition. Had the case been 
 yours, what would you have done? If we obey 
 not, we are rebels to authority: if we obey, 
 we are censured for illegal procedures. Where 
 are we now, my lords? It is an old rule of cas- 
 uists, Nemo tenetur esse perplexus. Free us, one 
 way or other: and shew us, whether we must 
 rather hazard censure, or incur disobedience. 
 
 ** In the next place, give us leave to plead our 
 good intentions. Since we must make new^ canons, 
 I persuade myself we all came, I am sure I can 
 speak for one, with honest and zealous desires to 
 do God and his church good service; and 
 expected to have received great thanks, both of 
 church and commonwealth : for your lordships 
 see, that the main drift of those canons was to 
 repress and confine the indiscreet and lawless 
 discourses of some either ignorant or parasitical, 
 I am sure offensive preachers ; to suppress the 
 growth of Socinianism, Popery, Separatism; to 
 redress some abuses of ecclesiastical courts and 
 officers : in all which, I dare say your lordships 
 do heartily concur with them. And if, in the 
 manner of expression, there have been any failings, 
 I shall humbly beseech your lordships, that those 
 
250 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 may not be too much stood upon, where the main 
 substance is well meant, and in itself profitable. 
 .: " In the third place, give me leave to put your 
 Jordships in mind of the continual practice of the 
 Christian church, since the first synod of the 
 Apostles, Acts xv. to this present day : wherein I 
 suppose it can never be showed, that ever any 
 ecclesiastical canons made by the bishops and 
 clergy in synods, general, national, provincial, 
 were either off*ered or required to be confirmed 
 by parliaments. Emperors and princes, by whose 
 authority those synods were called, have still 
 given their power to the ratification and execu- 
 tion of them ; and none others: and, if you please 
 to look into the times within the ken of memory 
 or somewhat beyond it, Linwood's constitutions, 
 what parliaments confirmed? The injunctions of 
 Queen EHzabeth, the canons of King James, were 
 never tendered to the parliament for confirmation ; 
 and yet have so far obtained hitherto, that the 
 government of the church was by them still regu- 
 lated. Compare, I beseech you, those of King 
 James with the present : your lordships shall find 
 them many, peremptory, resolute; standing upon 
 their own grounds, in points much harder of 
 digestion than these, which are but few and only 
 seconds to former constitution. If, therefore, in 
 this we have erred, surely the whole christian 
 church of all places and times hath erred with 
 
SPEECH IN PARLIAMENT. 251 
 
 us: either, therefore, we shall have too good 
 company in the censure; or else we shall be 
 excused. 
 
 " Fourthly, give me leave to urge the authority 
 of these canons. In which regard, if I might 
 without offence speak it, I might say that the 
 complainants have not, under correction, laid a 
 right ground of their accusation. They say we 
 have made canons and constitutions: alas! my 
 lords, we have made none. We neither did nor 
 could make canons, more than they can make 
 laws. The canons are so to the church, as laws 
 are for the commonwealth. Now they do but 
 rogare legem: they do not ferre or sancire legem: 
 that is only for the king to do : it is le roi le veut, 
 that of bills makes laws. So was it for us to do 
 in matter of canons ; we might propound some 
 such constitutions, as we should think might be 
 useful : but, when we have done, we send them 
 to his Majesty; who perusing them cum avisa- 
 meiito Consilii sui, and approving them, puts life 
 into them, and of dead propositions makes them 
 canons. As, therefore, the laws are the king's 
 laws, and not ours ; so are the canons the king's 
 canons, and not the qlergy's. Think thus of 
 them; and then draw what conclusions you 
 please. 
 
 " As for that pecuniary business of our contribu- 
 tion, wherein we are said to have trenched upon 
 
252 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 the liberty of subjects and propriety of goods ; I 
 beseech your lordships, do but see the difference 
 of times. We had a precedent for it. The same 
 thing was done in Queen Elizabeth's time, in a 
 mulct of three shillings the pound, and that after 
 the end of the parliament, with the same clauses 
 of suspension, sequestration, deprivation, without 
 noise of any exception ; which now is cried down 
 for an unheard-of encroachment. How legal it may 
 be, I dispute not; and did then make bold to 
 move : but, let the guide of that example, and the 
 zeal that we had to the supply of his Majesty's 
 necessities, excuse us a tanto at least; if, having 
 given these as subsidies fitting the parliament, and 
 the bill being drawn up for the confirmation of 
 the parliament, we now, upon the unhappy disso- 
 lution of it, as loth to retract so necessary a grant, 
 were willing to have it continued to his Majesty's 
 use. 
 
 " But, my lords, if I may have leave to speak my 
 own thoughts, I shall freely say, that, whereas 
 there are three general concernments, both of 
 persons and causes, merely ecclesiastical, merely 
 temporal, or mixt of both ecclesiastical and tem- 
 poral: as it is fit, the church by her synod should 
 take cognizance of and order for the first, which 
 is merely ecclesiastical ; so, next under his 
 Majesty, the parliament should have the power of 
 ordering the other. 
 
SPEECH IN PARLIAMENT. 253 
 
 " But, in the mean time, my lords, where are 
 we? The canons of the church, both late and 
 former, are pronounced to be void and forceless. 
 The church is a garden or vineyard enclosed: the 
 laws and constitutions of it are as the wall or 
 hedge: if these be cast open, in what state are 
 we? Shall the enemies of this church hare such 
 an advantage of us, as to say, we are a lawless 
 church? or shall all men be left loose to their 
 licentious fredom ? God in heaven forbid ! 
 
 " Hitherto, we have been quietly and happily 
 governed by those former canons : the extent 
 whereof we have not, I hope, and for some of us, 
 I am confident we have not, exceeded. Why 
 should we not be so still? Let these late canons 
 sleep, since you will have it so, till we awake 
 them, which shall not be till doomsday ; and let 
 us be where we were, and regulate ourselves by 
 those constitutions which were quietly submitted 
 to on all hands: and, for this, which is past, since 
 that which we did was out of our true obedience, 
 and with honest and godly intentions and accor- 
 ding to the universal practice of all Christian 
 Churches, and with the full power of his Majesty's 
 authority, let it not be imputed to us as any way 
 worthy of your Lordships' censure."* 
 
 • Bishop Hall's Works, vol. x, pp. 67-69. 
 
CHAPTER VII. 
 
 The time was now come, within two or three 
 days, for the king's intended journey into Scot- 
 land : the commons therefore thought proper to 
 lay aside their debates about the church, which 
 were becoming daily more involved and intri- 
 cate, and to attend to other affairs more necessary 
 for the public good. The business of both houses 
 being very urgent and the time short, they voted, 
 that, in this case of necessity, they would sit the 
 next day, being Sunday, by six o'clock in the 
 morning. After having first heard a sermon, 
 they returned to the house about nine, and sat all 
 day. (Sunday, Aug. 8, 1641.) The house of lords 
 were also prevailed upon to do the same. There 
 never was any other such instance known before, 
 since the first institution of parliament. How- 
 ever, lest this might be misconstrued as a profa- 
 nation, or be drawn into example, they published 
 the following declaration : 
 
 " Whereas both houses of parliament found 
 it fit to sit in parliament upon the 8th of August, 
 
255 
 
 being Lord's day, for many urgent occasionsii 
 being straitened in time, by his Majesty's resolu- 
 tion to go within a day or two to Scotland, they 
 think it fit to declare that they would not have 
 done this but upon inevitable necessity; the 
 peace and safety of both church and state being 
 so deeply concerned, which they do hereby 
 declare to this end, that neither any other inferior 
 court or council, or any other person, may draw 
 this into example, or make use of it for their 
 encouragement, in neglecting the due observance 
 of the Lord'g day." 
 
 The king set out for Scotland, Aug. 11, 1641, 
 and arrived in Edinburgh in three or four days. 
 During the king's absence, both houses of parlia- 
 ment continued their sittings. But, as the sum- 
 mer was drawing to a close, and the plague 
 increasing in London, many members of both 
 houses went down to the country. And those 
 who remained in town, were not very solicitous to 
 attend parliament. This was an opportunity, 
 which the enemies of the church did not fail to 
 improve. When therefore there were only about 
 one hundred and twenty members present, they 
 entered on a debate about the book of Common 
 Prayer. They pretended that, as many things in it 
 gave great offence, or at least, umbrage to tender 
 consciences, they proposed that there might be a 
 liberty to disuse it. But such a motion, at this 
 
256 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 time, was of so unacceptable a nature, that 
 though the house was so thmly attended, and it 
 was much urged by persons of the greatest autho- 
 rity and power, yet it was so far from being 
 assented to, that it was resolved by a great majo- 
 rity, that the book of Common Prayer should be 
 duly observed. However, the next day, contrary 
 to all rules and order of parliament, many being 
 absent, who had a share in the debate the day 
 before, the house suspended the above order, and 
 resolved, " that the standing of the communion 
 table in all churches should be altered, the rails 
 should be pulled down, the chancels should be 
 levelled, and that no man should presume to bow at 
 the name of Jesus."* Having digested these godl^ 
 resolutions into an order, they carried it to the 
 house of lords, presuming that, on account of the 
 paucity of number in the house of peers, there 
 would be no dissent. But the lords were much 
 offended at such presumption relating to an affair, 
 which had so plain a tendency to disturb the 
 peace of the church, and interrupt its settled and 
 legal government ; and they not only refused to 
 concur with them, but directed an order made 
 about seven months before to be printed and dis- 
 persed ; requiring " divine service to be per- 
 formed as it is appointed by acts of parliament, 
 
 * Clarendon, vol. i, b.iv, p. 292. 
 
LECTURERS. 257 
 
 and all such as shall disturb that wholesome 
 order to be punished severely according to law." 
 The commons, enraged at this refusal, pursued 
 their former order, and declared that this of the 
 lords should not be obeyed. In the midst of this 
 ferment and opposite councels, the sword having 
 been taken out of the hands of the spiritual courts, 
 it is no wonder that the state of religion was so 
 unsettled, and that the proper forms of worship in 
 the church were but negligently observed. Under 
 pretence of encouraging preaching, the commons 
 licensed lecturers in every parish; and recom- 
 mended such lecturers in all populous places, as 
 were not well affected to the government in 
 church and state. Dr. Walker, in his " Sufferings 
 of the Clergy,' gives a curious account of these 
 factious lecturers, with some no less curious and 
 strange specimens of their lectures. These lec- 
 turers were designed as a kind of tools in the 
 hands of the commons, to undermine the fabric of 
 the church.* Neal, speaking of these lecturers, 
 says, " far be it from me to apologize for the 
 furious preachers of these times : though the 
 complaints of the royalists are very much exag- 
 gerated." f 
 
 Both houses now consented to a recess, and so 
 
 * Part i, pp. 16-20. 
 
 + Hist, of the Puritans, vol.ii, p. 463. 
 
 S 
 
258 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 adjourned for about six weeks. Bishop Hall, 
 during his Majesty's absence in Scotland, and this 
 recess, went down to Exeter ; and upon the day 
 of thanksgiving for the pacification between the 
 Scots and the Enghsh, Sep. 7, 1641, preached in 
 the cathedral of Exeter, from Ps. xlvi, 8, 9. " Come, 
 behold the works of the Lord, ivhat desolations he 
 hath made in the earth. He maketh wars to cease 
 unto the ends of the earth'' The good bishop, in 
 this excellent discourse, after taking a general 
 survey of God's wonderful works, and then a 
 special view of the divine justice, took occasion 
 to consider the mercy of God in appeasing all 
 broils and tumults, and pathetically adverted to 
 the troubles of the church and state: "Are we 
 troubled with the fears or rumours of war? Are 
 we grieved with the quarrels and dissensions, that 
 we find within the bosom of our own nation or 
 church? Would we earnestly desire to find all 
 differences composed, and a constant peace settled 
 amonirstus? We see whither to make our 
 ADDRESS, evien to that Omnipotent God, ** ivho 
 maketh tvars to cease unto the ends of the earth ; 
 who breaketh the bow, and snappeth the spear in 
 sunder'' And, surely, if ever any nation had 
 cause to complain in the midst of a public peace, 
 of the danger of private distractions and factious 
 divisions, ours is it; wherein 1 know not how 
 many uncouth sects are lately risen out of hell, 
 
SERMON AT EXETER. 
 
 to the disturbance of our wonted peace ; all of 
 them eagerly pursuing: their own various fancies, 
 and opposing our formerly received truth. What 
 should we do then, but betake ourselves in our 
 earnest supplications to the God of peace, with a 
 * help, Lord^' Never ceasing to solicit him with 
 our prayers, that he would be pleased so to order 
 the hearts of men, that they might incline to a 
 happy agreement ; at least to a meek cessation of 
 those unkind quarrels, wherewith the church is 
 thus miserably afflicted." 
 
 Hence it appears how grieved Bishop Hall 
 'vas at the present sad state of the church, and 
 how much he lamented the deplorable discords, 
 which were threatening destruction to the consti- 
 tution in church and state. He again feelingly 
 observed, " Woe is me, with what words should I 
 bewail the deplorable estate of these late times in 
 this behalf! Let me appeal to your own eyes 
 and ears. I know I speak to judicious christians. 
 Tell me whether ever you lived to sere such an 
 inundation of hbellous, scandalous, mahcious 
 pamphlets, as ha\e lately broke in upon us; not 
 only against some particular persons which may 
 have been faulty enough ; but against the lawful and 
 established government itself; against the ancient, 
 allowed, legal forms of divine worship. Cer- 
 tainly, if we love the peace of this church and king- 
 dom, we cannot but lament, and, to our power, 
 
 s 2 
 
260 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 oppose these insolencies. If reformation be the 
 thing desired and aimed at, let not that man 
 prosper, which doth not affect it, pray for it, bend 
 his utmost endeavours to accomplish it : but is 
 this the way to a christian reformation, to raise 
 slanders, to broach lying accusations against the 
 innocent, to calumniate lawful and estabHshed 
 authority? God forbid! These are the acts of him, 
 that is the manslayer from the beginning. The 
 Holy God hates to raise his kingdom by the aid 
 of the devil. Be as zealous as you will : but be, 
 withal, just: be charitable; and endeavour to 
 advance good causes, by only lawful means. 
 And then, let him come within the compass of the 
 curse of Meroz, that is not ready to assist and 
 second you.^" 
 
 These extracts from the bishop's sermon cast a 
 considerable light upon the iniquitous proceed- 
 ings then carried on for the subversion of the 
 church. The means employed at this time to 
 render people disaffected towards the rulers in 
 church and state were certainly very scandalous, 
 and so very reverse to that meek and peaceable 
 disposition, the characteristic of genuine Chris- 
 tianity: " Pray for the peace of Jerusalem,'' says 
 the Psalmist, '* they shall prosper thai love thee.'' 
 " Certainly, thus it should be," says Bishop Hall, 
 
 * Bishop- Hall's Works, vol. v, pp. 479-481. 
 
THE VACANT DIOCESES FILLED. 261 
 
 ** but, alas, we are fallen upon times, wherein 
 it is cause enough for a quarrel, to plead for 
 peace!" 
 
 Whilst the king was in Scotland, a report was 
 circulated, that, as he had conceded so much to 
 the Scots in abolishing episcopacy, he would be 
 persuaded to introduce presbytery into England 
 at his return ; upon which, the king sent a letter 
 to the clerk of the council, "commanding him to 
 assure all his servants, that he would be constant 
 to the doctrine and discipline of the church of 
 England, and that he resolved by the grace of 
 God to die in the maintenance of it." This was 
 dated Edinburgh, Oct. 18, 1641. 
 
 His Majesty, during his stay in Scotland, 
 resolved to fill up those sees which were become 
 vacant by death or translation; he therefore 
 ordered several Conge delires to be drawn up for 
 that purpose. 
 
 But when the commons heard of this designa- 
 tion, they were much disturbed and troubled, that, 
 at a time when they were intent upon taking away 
 the old bishops, the king should presume to make 
 new ones. They therefore voted a committee to 
 draw up reasons to be presented to the house of 
 lords, for joining with them in a petition to his 
 Majesty, that he would suspend his commands 
 till he returned home. The king, however, in a 
 short time after, collated to the vacant sees, and 
 
262 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 translated to others, men of great eminence in the 
 church, frequent preachers, and not one to whom 
 the faults of the governing clergy were then im- 
 puted, or against whom the least objection could 
 be made. The promotions and translations, 
 which accordingly tben took place, were the 
 following, viz. Dr. Williams, bishop of Lincoln, 
 was made archbishop of York in the room of 
 Dr. Neile deceased. Dr. Winniffe, dean of St. 
 Paul's, a grave and moderate divine, was made 
 bishop of Lincoln. Dr. Duppa, bishop of Chi- 
 chester was translated to Salisbury, vacant by 
 the death of Dr. Davenant : and Dr. King, dean 
 of Rochester was promoted to Chichester. Dr. 
 Jos. Hall was now translated from Exeter to 
 Norwich, in the room of Dr. Montague deceased. 
 Dr. Brownrigge, master of Catherine Hall, Cam- 
 bridge, an eminent and learned divine, was 
 advanced to Exeter. Dr. Skinner was translated 
 from Bristol to Oxford, vacant by the death of 
 Dr. Bancroft. And Dr. Westfield, archdeacon 
 of St. Albans, a very popular preacher, was pro- 
 moted to Bristol. Dr. Prideaux, king's professor 
 of divinity in Oxford, was made bishop of Wor- 
 cestor, in the room of Dr. Thornborough decea- 
 sed. The see of Carlisle being also vacant by 
 the death of Dr. Barnabas Potter, who was called 
 the penitential preacher, was given in commendam 
 to the most reverend Dr. Usher, archbishop of 
 
INSURRECTION IN IRELAND. 263 
 
 Armagh and primate of Ireland. All these were 
 very eminent and excellent divines, and were 
 ornaments of their profession. It was a proof of 
 the king's consulting the welfare of the church in 
 this very critical time, to promote such characters. 
 Neal invidiously remarks that ** most of these 
 divines stood well in the opinion of the people, 
 but their accepting bishoprics in this crisis did 
 neither the king nor themselves any service."* 
 But was not their accepting of bishoprics at such 
 a time a proof of their determination to stand up 
 in defence of the church to the last extremity ? 
 Was it not a proof of their sincerity, of their 
 undiminished attachment and affection to the 
 Church ? And was there not here a demonstra- 
 tion of his Majesty's disposition of'promoting the 
 prosperity of the church and the welfare of his 
 subjects to the utmost ? 
 
 Before the king left Scotland, news arrived in 
 London, Nov. 1, 1641, that the papists of Ireland 
 had made a general insurrection, and committed 
 a most cruel and bloody massacre of the pro- 
 testants of that kingdom. Neal and other histo- 
 rians insinuate that the king was not unacquainted 
 with these barbarities : but there is no sufficient 
 proof that his Majesty was at all a promoter of 
 
 * Hist, of the Puritans, vol. ii, p. 480. 
 
264 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 such enormities. However, through the dis- 
 sentions between the king and parliament, effec- 
 tual means of suppressing it were delayed too 
 long: so that, because a timely relief was not 
 afforded to Ireland, it proved ultimately very 
 disadvantageous to the king. 
 
 The two houses of parliament were no sooner 
 assembled after the recess, than a motion was 
 made in the house of commons to revive the com- 
 mittee appointed at the beginning of this parlia- 
 ment, in order to draw up a general remonstrance 
 of the state of the nation, and the particular 
 grievances it had sustained. This extraordinary 
 bill was presented to the king at Hampton Court, 
 Dec. 1, 1641, about a week after his return from 
 Scotland. 
 
 Some such remonstrance was probably season- 
 able and proper, when the parliament first met 
 after a scene of arbitrary power and oppression 
 for so many years : but at this time it was unne- 
 cessary and unseasonable, when the grievances 
 complained of had been redressed, and since the 
 king had already made so many concessions. 
 The remonstrance was read in the house of com- 
 mons, Nov. 22, when it met with so strong an 
 opposition, that it was carried only by nine voices. 
 Clarendon says : but Harris, in his life of Crom- 
 well, p. 73, says, that " the numbers for passing 
 the remonstrance were one hundred and fifty nine. 
 
REMONSTRANCE OF THE COMMONS. 265 
 
 against it one hundred and forty eight, so it was 
 carried by eleven voices,"* after a long debate of 
 twelve hours, from three in the afternoon till three 
 in the morning, which made one of the members 
 to say, " It looked like the verdict of a starved 
 jury.'t This remonstrance contained a long and 
 bitter representation of all the illegal acts of admini- 
 stration from his Majesty s accession to that time. 
 It was accompanied with a petition for redress of 
 the grievances therein contained. As far as it 
 concerned the church, it was stated in the peti- 
 tion, " that his Majesty would concur with his 
 people in a parliamentary way, for depriving the 
 bishops of their votes in parliament, and abridging 
 their immoderate power usurped over the clergy, 
 and other his good subjects, to the hazard of reli- 
 gion, and the prejudice of the just liberties of his 
 people: — for the taking away such oppressions 
 in religion, church governiiient and discipline, as 
 
 ♦ Journal, 22 Nov. 1641. 
 
 t Harris, in his Life of Cromwell, p. 70, suj)poses the per- 
 son who made this remark was Sir Benj. Rudyard, who, accord- 
 ing to Willis, was in thr<!fe parliaments, the representative for 
 Portsmouth, afterwards returned for old Sarum, for Downton, 
 and for Wilton, See Whitlock's Memorials, p. 51 ; and Neal's 
 History of the Puritans, vol. ii, p. 481. Welwood, in his 
 "Memoirs," p. 62, says, that " the debate lasted from three 
 o'clock in the afternoon till ten o'clock next morning !!" A 
 bill for depriving the bishops of their scats and votes in parlia- 
 ment had before been cast out and rejected by the peers: it 
 was certainly not only unreasonable, but very unparliamentary^ 
 to presume to introduce such a bill again in the same session. 
 
266 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 have been brought in and fermented by them ; and 
 for uniting all such loyal subjects as agree in 
 fundamentals against papists, by removing some 
 oppressions and unnecessary ceremonies, by which 
 divers weak consciences have been offended, and 
 seemed divided from the rest." And lastly, his 
 Majesty was requested " to remove from his 
 councils all favourers of popery and arbitrary 
 power, and promoters of the above-mentioned 
 pressures and corruptions, and to employ such as 
 his parliament might confide in; and that in his 
 princely goodness he would reject all solicitations 
 to the contrary, how powerful and near soever.''^ 
 
 The king,in his answer to this petition about a week 
 after, remonstrated with great justice against the 
 disrespect of the commons in printing their remon- 
 strance before he had time to return an answer. 
 His Majesty declared, " that he was very wiUing 
 to concur with all the just desires of his people in a 
 parliamentary way, for preserving the peace of 
 the kingdom from the designs of the popish 
 party. He thought the right of the bishops to 
 vote in parliament was grounded on the funda- 
 mental laws of the kingdom, and constitutions of 
 parliament; and there needed no other answer 
 to that at present, since they desired his concur- 
 
 * NalsoQ's Collections, vol.ii, p. 69*2. Welwood's Memoirs, 
 p. 243. 
 
REPLY OF THE KING. 267 
 
 rence in a parliamentary way. As for abridging 
 the extraordinary power of the clergy, his 
 Majesty said, that he thought the abolishing the 
 High Commission, with that clause relating to all 
 ecclesiastical jurisdiction, had already moderated 
 that power; but if there continued any usurpa- 
 tions, or excesses, in their jurisdiction, he neither 
 had, nor would protect them. Concerning church 
 corruptions, as they were styled, and removing 
 unnecessary ceremonies, the king told them, that 
 he was willing to concur in the removal of any 
 illegal innovations, which have crept in ; and if 
 the parliament advised to a national synod, he 
 would consider of it, and apply himself to give 
 satisfaction in it. But he was sorry to hear 
 in such general terms of corruption in religion, 
 since he was persuaded in his own conscience, 
 that no church can be found upon earth, that 
 professes the true religion with more purity of 
 doctrine, than the church of England does ; nor 
 where the government and discipline are jointly 
 more beautiful, and free from superstition, than 
 they are here established by law ; which by the 
 grace of God he would with constancy maintain 
 in their purity and glory, not only against all 
 invasions of popery, but also from the irreverence 
 of those many schismatics and separatists, where- 
 with of late this kingdom and this city abound, 
 to the great dishonour and hazard of church and 
 
268 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 state ; for the suppression of whom he required 
 their timely aid, and active assistance."* 
 
 This answer, of course, could not be satisfac- 
 tory to the commons, and their leaders, who were 
 intent upon abolishing the hierarchy in toto : but 
 the king treated them with much greater respect 
 than they deserved. 
 
 The matters contained in the petition and 
 rendonstrance of the state of the nation presented 
 to the king by the commons, and in the king's 
 answer, and the declaration he afterwards pub- 
 lished to the same purpose, were some of the real 
 causes of the ensuing civil war, and of the cala- 
 mities sustained by the nation. 
 
 December 15, 1641, the king published a 
 declaration f to all his loving subjects, with the 
 advice of his privy council, in which he professed 
 himself fully satisfied " that the religion of the 
 church of England is most agreeable to the word 
 of God, and that he should be ready to seal it 
 with his blood, if God should call him to it. That 
 as for ceremonies in religion, which are in their 
 own nature indifferent, he is willing in tenderness 
 to any number of his subjects, that a law should 
 
 * See Welwood's Memoirs, p. 286. 
 
 t This declaration was drawn up by Mr. Hyde, afterwards 
 Lord Clarendon; it was so ably done, that it considerably 
 counteracted the mischief of the remonstrance. See Lord 
 Clarendon's Life, vol. i, pp. 86-87. 
 
ROYAL DECLARATION. 269 
 
 be made for the exemption of tender consciences, 
 from punishment or prosecution for such cere- 
 monies, as by the judgment of most men are held 
 to be indifferent, and of some to be absolutely 
 unlawful, provided the peace of the kingdom be 
 not disturbed, nor the present decency and 
 comeliness of God's service established in the 
 church discountenanced : nor the pious, sober, 
 and devout actions of those reverend persons, 
 who were the first labourers in the blessed refor- 
 mation, be scandalized and defamed. That he 
 cannot, without grief of heart, and some tax upon 
 himself and his ministers for not executing the 
 laws, look upon the bold licence of some men, in 
 printing pamphlets and sermons so full of bitter- 
 ness and malice against the present government, 
 and the law established, so full of sedition against 
 himself and the peace of the kingdom, that he is 
 many times amazed to consider by what eyes 
 these things are seen, and by what ears they are 
 heard ; he therefore commands again all his 
 officers and ministers of justice to proceed against 
 them with all speed, and put the laws in 
 execution."* 
 
 It was expected that the issue of the impeach- 
 ment of the thirteen bishops for compiling and sub- 
 
 * Welwood's Memoirs, pp. 291-302. Rushworth, part iii, 
 vol. i, p. 466. Neal, vol. ii, p. 487. 
 
270 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 scribing the late canons, which were published at 
 the conclusion of the former parliament, would 
 have tended greatly to weaken the court interest 
 in the house of peers. But the impeached bishops 
 having put in their answer by way of demurrer, as 
 we have above related, dissatisfied and greatly 
 disappointed the commons, who expected their 
 lordships would have pleaded directly to the 
 accusation. The peers were moved by Serjeant 
 Glyn to set aside the demurrer ^ and to admit the 
 commons to prove the charge, or else proceed 
 immediately to judgment. But the peers, instead 
 of complying with this request of the commons, 
 agreed that the bishops should abide by their 
 demurrer, as they desired, and appointed the 
 Monday following, Dec. 11, to hear them by 
 their council in the presence of the commons. 
 The commons resented this way of proceeding, 
 and so would not appear. Many of the most 
 active members now declared among their friends, 
 with a sort of despair, that they would be con- 
 cerned no further against the bishops, for they 
 saw it was in vain. The truth is, as Bishop Hall 
 observes in his " Hard Measure," '* there was a 
 general plot and resolution of the faction to alter 
 the government of the church especially ;" which 
 object was not to be accomplished as long as the 
 bishops were in the way. And it is not impro- 
 bable, the malignity of the factious party being 
 
PETITIONS. 271 
 
 considered, that there was also a design fonned 
 against the king, which could not be executed, 
 as long as the bishops, by the number of their 
 votes, were able to oppose and prevent it. In 
 this case they saw that they must either give up 
 their project, or undertake some more effectual 
 means to obtain by force, what they were not able 
 to accomplish in any other way. They imagined 
 that they could by one bold and vigorous assault, 
 possess i themselves of the entire sovereignty, 
 therefore, says Bishop Hall, "it was contrived to 
 draw petitions accusatory from many parts of 
 the kingdom, against episcopal government : and 
 the promoters of the petitions were entertained 
 with great respects." Petitions were encouraged 
 from all sorts and orders of people ; " even the 
 city dames," says Dr. Walker, " sent an address 
 against the votes of the bishops and the popish 
 lords."* The apprentices of London sent a peti- 
 tion directed " to the King's most excellent 
 Majesty ;" desiring that prelacy might be rooted 
 out, that so the work of reformation might be 
 prosperously carried on.'' Dugdale says, in his 
 " Short View of the Toubles in England,"! that 
 there was a paper delivered to the minister at 
 Christ Church, the Sunday following, desiring that 
 
 * Sufferings of the Clergy, part, i, p. 60. 
 fvP. 80. 
 
272 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 prayers might be made to God to assist the 
 apprentices with strength to root out superstition, 
 and to extirpate the innovations of the bishops and 
 clergy." " Such stuff," slanderous pamphlets, 
 libels, canting and factious discourses were 
 printed and dispersed in abundance with great 
 industry among the people. The next step taken 
 was the procuring of a mob to beset the two 
 houses of parliament. When these petitions 
 were carried up to Westminster by the aldermen 
 and common council of London, who went in a 
 procession of sixty coaches, attended by a vast 
 concourse of the rabble and baser sort; great 
 tumults and disturbance were occasioned about 
 the parliament house, particularly when the 
 apprentices brought up their petition against the 
 bishops. Sir Richard Wiseman, who was at their 
 head, was killed by a tile or stone from the bat- 
 tlements of Westminster Abbey. The house of 
 lords exerted themselves to disperse the mob, by 
 sending the Gentleman Usher of the Black Rod 
 to command the people to disperse, and go to 
 their respective homes. His Majesty also pub- 
 lished a proclamation, Dec. 28, 1641, forbidding 
 all tumultuous assemblies of the people. But the 
 commons were very backward in making an 
 exertion to suppress disturbances; the rabble 
 therefore *' were animated to the height of inso- 
 lence, and would make a stand before Whitehall; 
 
TUMULTS. 273 
 
 and when the bishops were passing to Westmin- 
 ster, would cry, " iVb bishops!"' ''No popish 
 lords r It was pretended that this concourse 
 of people only waited for an answer to their 
 petition; but it rather appears that it was designed 
 to terrify the bishops and their friends from 
 attending parliament. Certainly no reason can 
 be assigned that these tumults were accidental, 
 as Neal, and others, tell us. The whole process 
 evidences that it was a contrivance of the party 
 inimical to the church and state. Even Mr. 
 Pym said publicly, when it was proposed to 
 suppress those tumults, ** God forbid the house 
 of commons should in any way proceed to dis- 
 hearten people to obtain their just desires in this 
 way! " * Such was the zeal of the patriot, and his 
 friends, for the privileges of parliament, when the 
 privileges of parliament should have been used in 
 favour of the church and constitution. 
 
 The tumults still continued about the parlia- 
 ment house ; and the commons encouraged them, 
 by voting the guard set by the magistrates to 
 prevent and suppress disorder, to be a breach of 
 privilege, though there was a legal writ under 
 the great seal for appointing such guard. The 
 
 * Clarendon, vol. ii, p. 336. Dugdale's Short View of the 
 Troubles in England, p. BO. Warner's Eccles. Hist. vol. ii» 
 p. 549. 
 
274 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 rage and fury of the rabble against the bishops 
 grew so great, that they threatened to pull down 
 their lodgings. The bishops could not now go into 
 or out of the parliament house without abuse and 
 insults, and without manifest danger of their lives. 
 Dr. Williams, archbishop of York, going to the 
 house of peers in company with the Earl of Dover* 
 and hearing one of the rabble crying out louder 
 than the rest, " no bishops^'' '' no popish lords T 
 stept from the earl, and laid hands on him ; but 
 his companions rescued him, assaulted the 
 archbishop, and tore his robes from his back, 
 and, it was believed, if he had not been timely 
 rescued he would have been murdered.* The 
 bishops were now advised to forbear their atten- 
 dance in the house ; but they were determined to 
 maintain their rights, till they were forced to 
 relinquish them. The streets being crowded with 
 the rabble, the bishops agreed to go by water to 
 the house; but, as soon as their barges came 
 near the shore, the mob saluted them with stones 
 and other missiles, so that they were forced to 
 return to their lodgings, and to forbear their 
 attendance " out of a real apprehension of endan- 
 gering their lives." Upon this, the archbishop of 
 York calling together as many of the bishops as 
 
 Clarendon's Hist, of the Rebellion, vol. ii, p. 338. 
 
PROTESTATION OF THE BISHOPS. 275 
 
 were in town (it being now within few days to 
 Christmas) to the number of twelve,consulte(l with 
 them what measures were best to be taken in 
 this critical juncture. He advised not to attempt 
 to go to the house any more, and hastily drew up 
 n protestation against whatsoever should be done 
 in both houses in their absence, addressed to the 
 king and the house of lords ; this all the other 
 bishops approved and signed. Heylin says, ** as 
 this protestation was the last flash of their dying 
 light, it is proper to keep it from expiring as long 
 as possible ;" therefore the reader is here presented 
 with a copy of it. 
 
 ** To the king's most excellent majesty, and 
 the lords and peers now assembled in parHament. 
 *^ The humble petition and protestation of 
 all the bishops and prelates now called by his 
 Majesty's writs to attend the parliament, and 
 present about London and Westminster for that 
 service. — 
 
 ** Whereas the petitioners are called up by- 
 several and respective writs, and under great pen- 
 alties to attend the parlianient, and have a clear 
 and undubitable right to vote in bills, and other 
 matters whatsoever debateable in parliament, by 
 the ancient customs, laws, and statutes of this 
 realm, and ought to be protected by your Majesty 
 quietly to attend and prosecute that great service: 
 
 T 2 
 
276 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 they humbly remonstrate and protest before God, 
 your Majesty, and the noble lords and peers now 
 assembled in parliament, that as they have an 
 indubitative right to sit and vote in the house of 
 lords, so are they, if they may be protected from 
 force and violence, most ready and w^illing to 
 perform their duties accordingly : and that they 
 do abominate all actions or opinions tending to 
 popery and the maintenance thereof; as also, all 
 propension and inclination to any malignant party, 
 or any other side or party whatsoever, to the 
 which their own reasons and conscience shall not 
 move them to adhere. But whereas they have been 
 at several times violently menaced, affronted, and 
 assaulted, by multitudes of people in their coming 
 to perform their services in that honourable 
 house, and lately chased away and put in danger 
 of their lives, and can find no redress or protection 
 upon sundry complaints made to both houses 
 in these particulars : they humbly protest before 
 your Majesty, and the noble house of peers, that 
 saving unto themselves all their rights and interest 
 of sitting and voting in that house at other times, 
 they dare not sit or vote in the house of peers 
 until your Majesty shall further secure them 
 from all affronts, indignities, and dangers, in the 
 premises. Lastly, whereas their fears are not 
 built upon fantasies and conceits, but upon such 
 
PROTESTATION OF THE BISHOPS. 277 
 
 grounds and objections as may well terrify men of 
 good resolution and much constancy, they do, in 
 all duty and humility, protest before your majesty, 
 and the peers of that most honourable house of 
 parliament, against all laws, orders, votes, resolu- 
 tions, and determinations as in themselves null, 
 and of none effect, which in their absence, since 
 the 27th of this instant month of December, 1641, 
 have already passed ; as likewise against all such 
 as shall hereafter pass in that most honourable 
 house, during the time of this their forced and 
 violent absence from the said most honourable 
 house ; not denying, but if their absenting them- 
 selves were wilful and voluntary, that most 
 honourable house might proceed in all these 
 premises, their absence on this their protestation 
 notwithstanding. And humbly beseeching your 
 most excellent Majesty to command the clerk of 
 the house of peers, to enter this their petition and 
 protestation among their records, 
 
 '* And they will ever pray God to bless, &c. 
 
 John Eborac. Geo. Hereford. 
 
 Thos. Dunelm. Rob. Oxon. 
 
 Ro. Cov. Lichf. Mat. Ely. 
 
 Jos. Norwich Godfrey Gloucester. 
 
 Jo. Asaph. Jo. Peterborough. 
 
 Gul. Bath and WelU. Mor. Undaff. 
 
 This protestation was presented by Archbishop 
 
378 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 Williams to the king, who hastily perused it,* 
 and sent it to the lord keeper Littleton, " with a 
 command to present it to the house of peers," as 
 Lord Clarendon says: but Hacket, the biogra. 
 pher of archbishop WiUiams, says, '* that his grace 
 put it into the hands of the lord keeper to be read 
 when his Majesty was at the house." However, 
 the bishops, who signed this protestation, con- 
 fided in the archbishop's experience in the rules 
 of the house, where he sat as speaker for many 
 years. But it was not difficult to discern that in 
 such a juncture, some advantage and ill use 
 would have been made of it, and that it could not 
 produce any good effect. Upon the reading of 
 the protestation in the house of lords the next 
 morning, and after some debate, the peers re- 
 quested a conference with the commons, when 
 the lord keeper in the name of the peers declared 
 that *' the protestation of the bishops contained 
 matters of high and dangerous consequence, 
 
 * The bishops, after liaving subscribed the protestatioB, 
 intended to have further consultation concerning the legal 
 mode of delivering it. But it appears from Bishop Hall's 
 ** Hard Measure," that the archbishop was too hasty and pre- 
 cipitate; and that the lord keeper also did take undue advan- 
 tage of this irregularity, to aggravate *• the matter, as highly 
 oftensive and of dangerous consequence," with a view of ingra- 
 tiating himself wilh the house of commons and the faction. 
 Se© Bishop Hall's "Hard Measiwe" for further particulars. 
 
IMPEACHMENT OF THE BISHOPS. 279 
 
 extending to the intrenching upon the fundamen- 
 tal privileges and being of parliaments, and there- 
 fore the lords thought fit to communicate it to the 
 commons." 
 
 The house of commons took very little time to 
 consider the matter ; but, within half an hour, 
 resolved to accuse the twelve bishops of high 
 treasoTiy and sent up their impeachment to the 
 house of lords by Mr. Glyn. 
 
 Upon this the usher of the black rod was 
 ordered to go immediately in search of them, and 
 bring them to the bar of the house of lords. " We 
 poor souls,'' says Bishop Hall in his " Hard 
 Measure," ** who little thought that we had done 
 any thing that might deserve a chiding, are now 
 called to our knees at the bar, and charged 
 severally with high treason; being not a little 
 astonished at the suddenness of this crimination, 
 compared with the perfect innocence of our own 
 intentions, which were only to bring us to our due 
 places in parhament with safety and speed, with- 
 out the least purpose of any man's offence." 
 
 As the bishops' lodgings were scattered, it was 
 eight o'clock at night, Dec. 30, *' in all the 
 extremity of frost," when all the bishops appeared, 
 except the bishop of Landaff, who was ordered 
 to be brought up the next day. They were seques- 
 tered from parliament and committed to the 
 Tower. But the bishops of Durham and Lich- 
 
180 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 field found the favour to stand committed to the 
 custody of tiie gentleman usher of the black 
 rod, the former, on account of his eminent learn- 
 ing, and both, in regard of their great age and 
 infirmities. The same favour v^^as solicited for 
 Bishop Hall by a noble lord, but was not granted. 
 Respecting this circumstance. Bishop Hall tells 
 us, " wherein I acknowledge and bless the 
 gracious providence of God, for had I been grati- 
 fied, I had been undone both in body and purse ; 
 the rooms being strait, and the expence beyond 
 the reach of my estate." Fuller therefore and 
 Neal must be mistaken in telling us that Bishop 
 Hall was one of the two bishops, who obtained 
 this favour, and had an allowance of five pounds 
 a day for their expences.''^ 
 
 Though there might be some indiscretion in too 
 precipitately drawing up the above protestation 
 at such a time, some expressions probably might 
 be rather unwarrantable, and unfortunately the 
 manner of presenting it might be irregular; yet 
 there could not be the least treason whatever in it. 
 Therefore, the injustice, cruelty, and impiety of 
 committing twelve venerable bishops to the Tower 
 
 * Fuller's Church Hist. b. xi, p. 188.— NeaKs Hist, of the 
 Puritans, vol. ii, p. 497.— See also Walker's Sufferings of the 
 Clergy, part, i, p. 54. 
 
NEW BILL AGAINST THE BISHOPS. 281 
 
 for the charge of high treason, whereby their 
 honour, lives, and fortunes were Hable to be for- 
 feited, their names exposed to infamy, and their 
 families to want, rendered the factious party more 
 odious, their base designs more manifest, and the 
 respect shewn to parliament much less. Indeed, 
 after the factious party had once resolved to- 
 subvert the established government, it could not 
 be expected that their proceedings would be 
 either regular or just. In their attacks upon the 
 church, they scrupled not to transgress all bounds 
 of justice, charity, and moderation, in the most 
 open, base, and shameless manner.* 
 
 Immediately after the bishops were committed 
 to the Tower, the commons sent up to the peers 
 to desire they would take into consideration the 
 bill, which had been before them for some months, 
 for taking away the bishops' votes. The faction 
 now had a fair opportunity to accomplish their 
 iniquitous designs, which they improved to the 
 utmost. As it is well known that a bill once 
 rejected, cannot be regularly presented in the 
 same session of parliament, therefore the bill for 
 taking away the bishops' votes, " which had been 
 twice before rejected since the beginning of this 
 
 * Warner's Eccles. Hist, of England, vol. ii, p. 660. 
 
282 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 session," ^ was now entitled " A Bill for taking^ 
 away all Temporal Jurisdiction from those in Holy 
 Orders." The house of lords being now no 
 longer the same since the exclusion of the bishops, 
 and this extraordinary bill being resumed at such 
 a juncture, after a few debates, it passed in the 
 house of lords by a great majority. Dr. Warner, 
 bishop of Rochester, was the only bishop present 
 left to defend the cause when the bill passed. 
 This prelate strongly and valiantly defended the 
 antiquity and justice of bishops' votes in parlia- 
 ment. The Earl of Bedford also took a part in 
 making a vigorous defence against the bill: it 
 was urged that it was contrary to the usage of 
 parliament, when a bill had been once rejected, 
 to bring it in a second time in the same session ; 
 to which it was replied, that it had now another 
 title, and therefore not the same bill, though it was 
 to accomplish the same end! 
 
 In order to avoid the odium of innovating in so 
 extraordinary a manner upon the constitution, the 
 Earl of Essex and Baron Kimbolton had before 
 endeavoured to prevail with the bishops volun- 
 tarily to relinquish their right of voting in parlia- 
 ment in order to gratify the importunity of the 
 commons, assuring ti:em that the temporal lords 
 
 * See Bishop Hall's " Hard Measure." 
 
PETITIONS IN FAVOUR OF EPISCOPACY. 283 
 
 would be bound in honour to support them in all 
 the essentials of their character, if they would 
 give up their right in this particular. But the 
 bishops would not divest themselves of their 
 peerage in order to gratify the malignancy of the 
 factious party, who were so intent upon the 
 destruction of the constitution in church and 
 state.* 
 
 We have before mentioned that there have been 
 srreat exertions made in favour of the church- 
 Petitions had been sent from different parts of the 
 kingdom, signed with nearly one hundred thou- 
 sand hands in favour of the bishops, desiring some 
 speedy course might be taken to suppress such 
 schismatics and separatists, whose factious spirits 
 endangered the peace of church and state. Nov. 
 18, 1641, a petition from Rutlandshire was pre- 
 sented to the house, signed by about eight hun- 
 dred and forty hands, praying for the continuance 
 of episcopacy, as the only government of aposto- 
 lical institution, sealed with the blood of martyrs, 
 admirably suited to the civil government of this 
 kingdom, and affirming that no presbyter ever laid 
 on hands without a bishop. Dec. 8th, a similar 
 petition from Huntingdonshire was presented. 
 
 • See Fuller's Church Hist. b. ix, p. 185. 
 
284 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 and two days after another from Somersetshire, 
 signed with above fourteen thousand signatures. 
 There were also petitions from Cheshire, Notting- 
 hamshire, Devon, Stafford, Kent, North Wales, 
 the counties of Lancaster, Cornwall, and Here- 
 ford. The Devon petition had eight thousand 
 signatures; that from Stafford, three thousand; 
 and those from North Wales, thirty thousand.* 
 
 Notwithstanding all efforts to preserve the 
 church, the bill against the bishops passed, and the 
 city of London celebrated the event with hells and 
 bonfires. His Majesty, when strongly importuned 
 and strongly urged to give his royal assent to it, 
 replied, that it was a matter of so great concern, 
 that therefore he would take time to consider and 
 advise, and would let them know his mind in a 
 convenient time. But this delay was extremely 
 unpleasant to those who could not well attack the 
 sovereignty, till the bishops' votes were abolished. 
 They therefore sent again the same day to the 
 king, who was at Windsor, to urge his compliance 
 for these reasons — "because of the grievances 
 the subjects suffered by the bishops' exercise of 
 temporal jurisdiction, and their making a party in 
 
 * Neal's Hist, of the Puritans, vol. ii, p. 490.— Warner's 
 Eccles. Hist, of England, vol. ii, p. 651. — Nalson's Collections, 
 vol. ii, pp. 726, 727. — Dr. Grey's Exam, of Neal, vol. i, pp. 
 312, 314. 
 
BILL PASSED. 285 
 
 the house of lords — because of the great content 
 it would give by the happy conjunction of both 
 houses in their absence — and because the passing 
 this bill would be a comfortable pledge of his 
 Majesty's gracious assent to the future remedies 
 of those evils which were to be presented to 
 him." * 
 
 Thus was his Majesty persuaded to pass this 
 bill, after which he was not in a situation to deny 
 them any thing. 
 
 There were some of the greatest trust about 
 his Majesty, who, being ** faithful enough to his 
 service," though weak enough in their judgments, 
 and ignorant of the constitution, persuaded him 
 to pass this bill, as the only way to preserve the 
 church. The king thought upon this subject in a 
 far more able manner than his councellors : and, 
 though it was a fault which ran through his 
 government, because he yielded upon many occa- 
 sions his own understanding, which in general 
 was superior to that of his ministers ; yet, upon 
 this point, he was long inflexible: and had his 
 Majesty persevered, probably he would have 
 prevented much of that confusion, which his 
 compliance with this bill let in, like an inundation 
 
 * Clarendon's Hist, of ihe Rebellion, vol. i, p. 427. 
 
286 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 upon church and state, and which- ended in the 
 ruin of both. But unfortunately he could refuse 
 nothing to the solicitations of the queen, who 
 being persuaded that her own preservation de^ 
 pended on his Majesty's passing the bill, exerted 
 all her influence for his assent : so that the queen 
 prevailed on his Majesty, that he sent a commis- 
 sion for enacting this and another bill then ready 
 for the royal assent. The many sad effects, which 
 the passing this bill, brought upon the church and 
 state, are too well known, and are fully narrated 
 by our historians. The passing of this bill was 
 " one of the three things which laid heaviest on 
 his Majesty in the time of his solitude and suffer- 
 ings, as appears by the following passage in one 
 of his prayers : " Was it through ignorance that I 
 suffered innocent blood to be spilt by a false pre^ 
 tended justice ? or that I permitted a wrong way 
 of worship to be set up in Scotland? or injured 
 the bishops in England?''' By which we see, 
 that the injury done unto the bishops of England 
 is put into the same scale with his permitting 
 a wrong way of worship in Scotland, and the 
 shedding of the innocent blood of the Earl of 
 Strafford." * 
 
 By the passing of this bill the king's party was 
 
 Heyliu's Life of Archbishop Laud, p. 493. 
 
REASONS AGAINST THE BISHOP's VOTES. 287 
 
 exceedingly weakened : and, as they never after- 
 wards put any confidence in him that he would 
 deny the parliament any act whatsoever that 
 would be urged with importunity, so they partly 
 withdrew or suffered themselves to be carried 
 along with the stream. 
 
 The house of commons pu Wished their reasons 
 against the bishops' votes in parliament, which 
 were ably answered by Bishop Hall in his Trea- 
 tise entitled A short answer to those nine argu- 
 mentSy which are brought against the bishops sit- 
 ting in parliament'' Afterwards, by order of a 
 committee of the house of commons, there was 
 published " An humble examinatimi of a printed 
 abstract of the ansivers to nine reasons of the house 
 of commons, against the voles of bishops in parlia- 
 ments* 
 
 As a curiosity, the nine reasons of the commons 
 are here given, and the reader is referred to 
 Bishop Hall's short answer to them in vol. x. of 
 his Works, pp. 62-64. 
 
 1. Reason of the house of commons against the 
 votes of bishops in parliament: " Because it is a 
 very great hinderance to the exercise of their 
 ministerial function. 
 
 2. " Because they do vow and undertake at 
 
 Lond. printed for P. Stephens and C. Mel'edith, 1641, 4to. 
 
288 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 their ordination, when they enter into holy orders, 
 that they will give themselves wholly to that 
 vocation. 
 
 3. ** Because councils and canons/ in several 
 ages, do forbid them to meddle with secular 
 affairs. 
 
 4. '* Because the twenty-four bishops have a 
 dependency upon the archbishops, and because 
 of their canonical obedience to them. 
 
 5. ** Because they are but for their lives, and 
 therefore are not fit to have legislative power over 
 the honours, inheritances, persons, and liberties 
 of others. 
 
 6. " Because of bishops' dependency and 
 expectancy of translations to places of greater 
 profit. 
 
 7. " The several bishops have of late much 
 encroached upon the consciences and properties 
 of the subject; and they and their successors 
 will be much encouraged still to encroach, and 
 the subject will be much discouraged from com- 
 plaining against such encroachments, if twenty- 
 six of that order be to be judges upon these com- 
 plaints. The same reason extends to their legis- 
 lative power, in any bill to pass for the reforma- 
 tion of their power upon any inconvenience by it. 
 
 8. " Because the whole number of them is 
 interested to maintain the jurisdiction of bishops, 
 which hath been found so grievous to the three 
 
IMPEACHMENT OF THE FIVE MEMBERS. 289 
 
 kingdoms, that Scotland hath utterly abolished 
 it, and multitudes in England and Ireland have 
 petitioned against it. 
 
 9. *' Because bishops being lords of parliament, 
 it setteth too great a (iistance between them and 
 the rest of their brethren in the ministry, which 
 occasioneth pride in them, discontent in others, 
 and disquiet in the church." * 
 
 His Majesty, having been assured that Lord 
 Kimbolton, and five members of the house of 
 commons, viz l)enzill Hollis, Sir Arthur Hasle- 
 rigge, John Pym, John Hamden, and William 
 Stroud, Esqrs. Iiad invited the Scots into England, 
 and were now the chief encouragers of those 
 tumults, which occasioned the exclusion of the 
 bishops from parliament ; that they had aspersed 
 his government, were endeavouring to deprive 
 him of his royal power, and were conspiring to 
 levy war against him, resolved to impeach them 
 of high treason. Accordingly, Jan. 2, 1641-2, 
 Sir Edward Herbert, the Attorney General, by 
 his Majesty's command, accused the above-men- 
 tioned persons of high treason; but the members 
 not being ordered into custody, as his Majesty 
 expected, the king went himself the following 
 day into the house with his guard, in order to 
 seize them. Being apprized of the king's coming. 
 
 • Harris'! Life of Charles I, p. 382, ed. 1814. 
 U 
 
^90 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 the members had just time enough to make their 
 escape into the city. While the king was in the 
 chair, the house was in a terrible panic, the door 
 and all the avenues being filled with officers and 
 soldiers. After a little while the king withdrew, 
 when he found that those members had escaped : 
 and as soon as his Majesty was gone, they 
 adjourned till the next day, and then for a week. 
 The king proclaimed the accused members trai- 
 tors ; but they were vindicated by the parhament, 
 as well as protected and entertained by the city 
 of London, who conducted them, Jan. 11, in 
 great pomp to Westminster, from whence the 
 king, with his family, had retired the day before 
 to Hampton Court. In this situation of affairs, 
 the king resolved to retire to York, whither be 
 travelled by easy stages, and never returned to 
 London, till he was brought thither as a criminal 
 to execution. 
 
 The king's coming to the house of commons in 
 person to demand five of their members impeached 
 of high treason, was the most unlucky step that 
 could have been taken at that juncture; and the 
 indiscretion of some that attended the king to the 
 lobby of the house, was insisted upon as an 
 argument that the king was resolved to use vio- 
 lence upon the parliament, which it is to be pre- 
 sumed was a thing far from his thoughts. It is 
 said that the persons who advised the king to this 
 
COMMENCEMENT OF HOSTILITIES. 291 
 
 fash attempt, are justly chargeable with all the 
 blood that was afterwards spilt daring the ''grand 
 rebellion.'* 
 
 Though endeavours on both sides have not 
 been wanting to accommodate matters by soft 
 and healing methods, yet now, after the above 
 circumstance, scarce any hopes of a conciliation 
 remained. When, after several removals from 
 place to place, his Majesty set up his standard aft 
 Nottingham, there ensued a fatal and bloody war, 
 which probably was at first not designed by either 
 side.* 
 
 The twelve bishops, confined in the Tower, 
 petitioned the peers for council, which was granted 
 them : and abont a fortnight after their commit- 
 ment, Jan. 17, 1641-2, they appeared at the bar 
 of the house of lords, and pleaded not guilty, in 
 manner and form. They presented a petition also, 
 praying for a speedy trial, and that in the mean 
 time they might be admitted to bail. Accord- 
 ingly, the 25th of January was appointed for their 
 trial ; but their request of being admitted to bail 
 was now denied them, and so they were remanded 
 back to the Tower. It appears that the principal 
 design of their impeachment, and of proroguing 
 their trial, was to keep them from the house, till 
 
 * Welwood'* Memoirs, pp. 63-65. 
 
 U % 
 
292 LIFE OF BISHOP MALL. 
 
 the bill for taking [away their votes was passed, 
 for the commons must have been conscious that it 
 was as easy to charge them with murder, or adul- 
 tery, as with high treason.* When the day of 
 their trial arrived, the Lieutenant of the Tower 
 brought them again to the bar of the house ; but, 
 after severe and bitter declamations made against 
 them, they were told that it was then too late in 
 the day to proceed in their trial, and that another 
 day should be fixed, ** which day, to this day," 
 says Bishop Hall in his " Hard Measure," " never 
 came." f 
 
 However, after some weeks, as the charge of 
 high treason against the bishops could not be 
 maintained, the commons drew up another bill, 
 wherein they declared them "to be delinquents 
 of a very high nature," and that it should be 
 enacted that they should lose their spiritual pro- 
 motions for life, only there should be an annual 
 allowance to each bishop for his maintenance. 
 
 Feb. 21, 1641-2, it was ordered that a bill 
 should be drawn up for the forfeiture of the tem- 
 poral diud spiritual estates of these twelve prelates, 
 and for the imprisonment of their persons during 
 
 * Walker's Sufferings of the Clergy, part i, p. 64. 
 
 t The reader is referred to the Bishop's ** Hard Measure," for 
 a more particular account of the circumstances of this mock 
 trial aod unjust imprisonment. 
 
THE BISHOPS ADMITTED TO BAIL. 293 
 
 their lives, and for the disposal of all livings that 
 might fall within their gifts : but afterwards it was 
 resolved that the archbishop of York should not 
 forfeit his temporals, and that he should be allowed 
 £100. a year out of his ecclesiastical incomes. 
 The bishop of Durham was to be allowed £800. 
 a year. The bishop of Ely £100. The bishop of 
 Norwich £400. The bishop of Bath and Wells 
 £100. The bishop of Lichfield and Coventry 
 £800. The bishop of Gloucester £200. The 
 bishop of Hereford £500. The bishop of Peter- 
 borough £100. The bishop of Oxford £100. The 
 bishop of St. Asaph £500. And the bishop of 
 Landaff^200. "This bill was sent up to the 
 lords, and by them also passed ; and there hath 
 ever since lain," says Bishop Hall, in his ** Hard 
 Measure." Of how little effect this order proved 
 for the maintenance of these venerable prelates, it 
 may be guessed from the account Bishop Hall 
 gives us of his own case.* 
 
 The twelve bishops again, after some weeks, 
 petitioned the Lords to be admitted to bail, and 
 have liberty to return to their respective homes. 
 At the Earl of Essex's motion, the lords admitted 
 them to bail. Their release so offended the com- 
 mons, that they expostulated with the lords in 
 
 * See " Hard Measure. 
 
294 ^IF£ Q? 9ISH0P HALL. 
 
 terras of great indignation, and caused the bishops 
 to be recommitted to the Tower, where they 
 remained about six weeks longer, till the 5th of 
 May, 1642, when, upon their earnest petition, 
 they were set at liberty, upon giving five thousand 
 pounds bond. 
 
 During their confinement in the Tower, the 
 bishops preached in their turn every Lord's-day 
 to a large auditory of citizens. One of the ser- 
 mons, which Bishop Hall preached in the Tower, 
 March 20th, 1642, is the thirty-sixth sermon in 
 the fifth volume of his Works, from James iv, 8. 
 Draw nigh unto God, and he will drawn nigh to 
 you. Cleanse your hands, ye sinners; and purge 
 your hearts, ye double-minded. 
 
 Bishop Hall has given us a very lively 
 portraiture of the placid state of his mind, his 
 patience, innocence, and conscious integrity, not 
 only in his " Letter from the Tower,'' and in 
 his '' Hard Measure,'' but also in his treatise 
 entitled " The Free Prisoner, or the Comfort of 
 Restraint," written by him in the Tower, and 
 addressed to a certain friend : he considered 
 this restraint as safely. " This strong tower/' 
 says he, " serves not so much for our prison, 
 as for our defence ; what honor soever the name 
 may carry in it. I bless God for these walls, 
 out of which, I know not where we could for 
 the time have been safe from the rage of the 
 
LETTER FROM THE TOWER. 295 
 
 mis-incensed multitude. Poor seduced souls! 
 They were taught it was piety to be cruel ; and 
 were mispersuad^d to hate and condemn us for 
 that, which should have procured their reverence 
 and honour, even that holy station, which we 
 hold in God's church ; and to curse those of us 
 who had deserved nothing but their thanks and 
 prayers, railing on our profession in the streets, 
 and rejoicing in our supposed ruin. " Father, 
 forgive them, for they know not what they did'' 
 Here we were out of the danger of this mis-raised 
 fury ; and had leisure to pray for the quenching 
 of those wild fires of contention and causeless 
 malice, which, to our great grief, we saw wicked 
 incendiaries daily to cast amongst God's dear and 
 well-minded people. Here we have well and 
 happily approved, with the blessed Apostle, that 
 whatever our restraint be, the word of God is not 
 bound. With what liberty, with what zeal, with 
 what success, hath that been preached to all 
 comers ! Let them say, whether the Tower had 
 ever so many such guests, or such benedictions ; 
 so as, if the place have rendered us safe, we have 
 endeavoured to make it happy. Wherein our 
 performances have seemed to confute that, which 
 Cornelius, bishop of Rome, long since observed, 
 " that the mind laden with heavy burdens of 
 afflictions, is not able to do that service, which it 
 can do, when it is free and ^t ease." Our 
 
596 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL» 
 
 troubles, through God's mercy, made us more 
 active, and our labours more effectual."* 
 
 But his " Letter sent from the Tower, to a 
 private friend, and by him thought fit to be pub- 
 lished," indicates in a particular manner the state 
 of his mind, and his sense of integrity, during his 
 unjust confinement. This celebrated letter is 
 here inserted : — 
 
 "To my much-respected good friend, Mr. H. S. 
 
 " Worthy Sir, 
 
 *' You think it strange, that I should salute you 
 from hence. How can you choose, when I do 
 yet still wonder to see myself here? My inten- 
 tions and this place are such strangers, that I 
 cannot enough marvel how they met. 
 
 ** But, howsoever, I do in all humility kiss the 
 rod wherewith I smart ; as well knowing whose 
 hand it is that wields it. To that Infinite Justice, 
 who can be innocent? but to my king and 
 country never heart was or can be more clear ; 
 and I shall beshrew my hand, if it shall have, 
 against my thoughts, justly offended either : and 
 if either say so, 1 reply not; as having learned 
 not to contest with those that can command 
 legions. 
 
 * Bishop Hall's Works, vol.vii, pp. 619, 620. 
 
LETTER FROM TiTE TOWER. 297 
 
 ** In the mean time, it is a kind but a cold com- 
 pliment, that you pity me; an affection well 
 placed, where a man deserves to be miserable : 
 for me, I am not conscious of such merit. 
 
 ** You tell me in what fair terms I stood, not 
 long since, with the world; how large room I 
 had in the hearts of the best men : but can you tell 
 me how I lost it? Truly, I have, in the presence 
 of my God, narrowly searched my own bosom. 
 I have unpartially ransacked this fag-end of my 
 life, and curiously examined every step of my 
 ways ; and I cannot, by the most exact scrutiny 
 of my saddest thoughts, find what it is that I 
 have done to forfeit that good estimation where- 
 with you say I was once blessed. 
 
 " J can secretly arraign and condemn myself 
 of infinite transgressions before the tribunal of 
 heaven. Who, that dwells in a house of clay, 
 can be pure in his sight that charged his angels 
 with folly ? O God, when I look on the reckon, 
 ings betwixt thee and my soul, and find my 
 shameful arrears, I can be most vile in my own 
 sight, because I have deserved to be so m thine: 
 yet, even then, in thy most pure eyes, give me 
 leave the while not to abdicate my sincerity. 
 Thou knowest my heart desires to be right with 
 thee, whatever my failings may have been : and 
 I know what value thou puttest on those sincere 
 
298 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 desires, notwithstanding all the intermixtures of 
 our miserable infirmities. These I can penitently 
 bewail to thee: but, in the mean time, what havo 
 1 done to men ? Let tJiem not spare to shame 
 g)§ with; thq late sinful declinations of my age ; 
 and fet^h blushes, if they can, from a wrinkled 
 fece. 
 
 " Let my enemies (for such I perceive I have, 
 2LU^ those are the surest monitors) say what X 
 b^ye oflfended. For their bitter irritation, my 
 qlear conscience bids me boldly to take up the 
 challenge of good Samuel, ' Behold, here I am! 
 Witness against me before the Lord, and before 
 his anointed : whose ox have I taken ? or whose 
 ass have I taken ? or whom have I defrauded ? 
 whom have I oppressed ? or of whose hand have I 
 received any bribe, to blind mine eyes therewith? 
 and I will restore it you.' 
 
 " Can they say, that 1 bore up the reins of 
 government too hard ; and exercised my juris- 
 diction in a rigorous and tyrannical way, inso- 
 lently lording it over my charge ? Malice itself, 
 perhaps, would, but dare not speak it ; or, if it 
 should, the attestation of so grave and numerous 
 a clergy would choke such impudence. Let 
 them witness, whether they were not still enter- 
 tained by me with an equal return of reverence, 
 s,^ if they had been all bishops with me, or I only 
 a presbyter with them ; according to the old rule 
 
LETTER Fl^QM TH^ TqW,]^R. ^^ 
 
 of Egbert, archbisbop of York, Intra domum 
 efiscopus coUegam se presbyterorum esse cognoscaL 
 Let them ^ay, whether agght here looked like 
 despotical ; or souuded rather of imperious com- 
 mands, than of brptherly complybjg : whethi^r 
 I have not rather, from some behplders, under- 
 gone the censure of a too humble remissness; as 
 perhaps, stooping too low beneath the eminence 
 of episcopal dignity: whether 1 have not, su|; 
 fered as much in some opinions, for the v^inain^ 
 mildness of nay administration, as some oth^qpa 
 for a rough severity. 
 
 " Can they say, for this aspersion is likewise 
 common, that I barred the free course of religious 
 exercises, by the suppression of painful and 
 peaceable preachers? If shame will suffer apj 
 man to object it, let me challenge him to instance 
 but in one name. Nay, the contrary is so 
 famously known in the w^estern parts, that every 
 piouth will herein justify me. What free admisr 
 sion and encouragement have I always given to 
 ^U the sons of peace that came with God's 
 message in their mouths ! What missuggestions 
 ha^ve I waved! What blows have X borne off 
 in the behalf of some of them, from some gajur 
 sayers ? How have I often and publicly pro- 
 fipssed, that, as well might we complain of too 
 many stars in the sky, as too many qjrthodojf 
 preachers in the church ? 
 
300 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 " Can they complain, that I fretted the necks of 
 my clergy with the uneasy yoke of new and 
 illegal impositions! Let them, whom I have 
 thus hurt, blazon my unjust severity, and write 
 their wTongs in marble : but if, disliking all novel 
 devices, I have held close to those ancient rules 
 which limited the audience of our godly prede- 
 cessors ; if I have grated upon no man's conscience 
 by the pressure, no not by the tender, of the late 
 oath, or any unprescribed ceremony ; if I have 
 freely, in the Committee appointed by the most 
 honourable house of peers, declared my open 
 dislike in all innovations, both in doctrine and 
 rites ; why doth my innocence suffer ? 
 
 *' Can they challenge me as a close and back- 
 stair friend to Popery or Arminianism, who have, 
 in so many pulpits and so many presses, cried 
 down both? Surely, the very paper, that I have 
 spent in the refutation of both these, is enough 
 to stop more mouths than can be guilty of this 
 calumny. 
 
 " Can they check me with a lazy silence in my 
 place ? with infrequence of preaching ? Let the 
 populous auditories, where 1 have lived, witness, 
 whether, having furnished all the churches near 
 me with able preachers, I took not all oppor^ 
 tunities of supplying such courses, as I could get, 
 in my cathedral; and, when my tongue was silent,. 
 let the world say whether my hand were idle. 
 
LETTER FROM THE TOWER. 301 
 
 ** Lastly, since no man can offer to upbraid me 
 with too much pomp, which is wont to be the 
 <;ommon eye-sore of our envied profession, can 
 any man pretend to a ground of taxing me, as I 
 perceive one of late hath most unjustly done, of 
 too much worldliness? Surely, of all the vices 
 forbidden in the decalogue, there is no one, which 
 my heart, on due examination, can less fasten on 
 me, than this. He, that made it, knows that he 
 hath put into it a true disregard (save only for 
 necessary use) of the world ; and of all that it 
 can boast of, whether for profit, pleasure, or 
 glory. No, no : I know the world too well to 
 dote on it. While I am in it, how can 1 but use 
 it ? but I never care, never yield to enjoy it. 
 It were too great a shame for a philosopher, a 
 christian, a divine, a bishop, to have his thoughts 
 grovelling here upon earth : for mine, they scorn 
 the employment; and look upon all these sublu- 
 nary distractions, as upon this man's false censure, 
 with no other eyes than contempt. 
 
 "And now. Sir, since I cannot, how secretly 
 faulty soever, guess at my own public exorbi- 
 tances, I beseech you, where you hear my name 
 traduced, learn of mine accusers, whose lyncean 
 eyes would seem to see further into me than my 
 own, what singular offence I have committed. 
 
 " If, perhaps, my calling be my crime ; it is no 
 other than the most holy fathers of the church in 
 
S62 "life of BliSHOP HALL. 
 
 1the'p(rimitive and succeeding ages, ever^ince the 
 Sipostles, many of them also blessed martyrs, 
 have been guilty of: it is no other than all the 
 holy doctors of the church in all generations 
 '6ver since hav6 celebrated, as most reverend, 
 sacred, inviolable: it is no other than all the 
 whole christian world, excepting one small 
 handful of our neighbours, whose condition denied 
 tbem the opportunity of this government, is 
 known to enjoy, without contradiction. How 
 safe is it erring in such company ! 
 
 " If my offence be in my pen, which hath, as it 
 could, undertaken the defence of that apostolical 
 institution, though with all modesty and fair 
 respects to the churches differing from us, I 
 cannot deprecate a truth ; and such I know this 
 to be : which is since so cleared by better hands, 
 that I well hope the better informed world can- 
 not but sit down convinced. Neither doubt I, 
 but that, as metals receive the more lustre with 
 often rubbing, this truth, the more agitation it 
 undergoes, shall appear every day more glorious. 
 Only, may the good Spirit of the Almighty 
 speedily dispel all those dusky prejudices from 
 the minds of men, which may hinder them from 
 •discerning so clear a light. 
 
 " Shortly, then, knowing nothing by myself, 
 whereby I have deserved to alietfate any good 
 
RELEASE. 303 
 
 heart from me, 1 shall resolve to rest securely upon 
 the acquitting testimony of a good coiisciencfe, 
 and the secret approbation of my gracious God ; 
 who shall one day cause mine innocence to break 
 forth as the morning light and shall give nle 
 beauty for bonds; and, for a light and momentary 
 affliction, an eternal weight of glory. 
 
 ** To shut up all, and to surcease your trouble, 
 1 write not this as one that would pump for favor 
 and reputation from the disaffected multitude ; 
 for I charge you, that what passes privately 
 betwixt us may not fall under common eyes: 
 but only with this desire and intention, to give 
 you true grounds, where you shall hear my name 
 mentioned with a causeless offence, to yield me 
 a just and charitable vindication. Go you on 
 still to do the office of a true friend, yea, the duty 
 of a just man, in speaking in the cause of the 
 dumb, in righting the innocent, in rectifying the 
 misguided ; arid, lastly, the service of a faithful 
 and christian patriot, in helping the times with 
 the best aid of your prayers ; which is daily the 
 task of 
 
 " Your much devoted 
 
 and thankful friend. 
 
 From the Tower «* JQS. NORVIC." 
 
 Jan. 24, 1641-2. 
 
304 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 As soon as Bishop Hall was released from the 
 Tower, he immediately withdrew to Norwich, to 
 which See he was translated in November, 1641. 
 He was not released from the Tower till May 5, 
 1642, in a few days after he came for the first 
 time to his new diocese ; and he tells us that he 
 was at first received with much greater respect 
 than might have been expected in such trouble- 
 some times. The day after his arrival in Nor- 
 wich, he preached in the Cathedral "to a 
 numerous and attentive people," and he " was 
 not sparing of his pains in this way," till he was 
 forbidden by men, and at last disabled by God." 
 
 An account of his sufferings and deprivations 
 are given in a subsequent part of this volume, 
 together with the treatise entitled his " Hard 
 Measure," containing a history of his own suf- 
 ferings, written by himself; a Treatise which it i& 
 impossible to read without a degree of honest 
 indignation at the meanness, as well as the bar- 
 barity, of his merciless persecutors. 
 
CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 After the king had retired to York, as it has 
 been before mentioned, every thing tended to an 
 open rupture between his Majesty and the parha- 
 ment, since the legislature was divided, and the 
 constitution broken. At this time a long paper 
 war (the prelude to one of a far more fatal 
 consequence) ensued, between the king and 
 parliament: both sides were loading each other 
 with abundance of reproaches and bitter lan- 
 guage, and neither was now thinking about an 
 accommodation. 
 
 Ill order to encourage the factious and schis- 
 matical, who were imagining that the reformation 
 was carried on too slowly, the parlianjent pub- 
 lished a declaration, *' that they intended a due 
 and necessary reformation of the government 
 and liturgy of the church, and to take away 
 nothing in the one or other, but what should be 
 evil and justly offensive, or at least unnecessary 
 and burdensome ; and would speedily have con- 
 sultation with godly and learned divines : but 
 
306 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 because that would never of itself attain the end, 
 they would use their utmost endeavours to 
 establish learned and preaching ministers with 
 a good and sufficient maintenance through the 
 kingdom." 
 
 This declaration, which was intended to en- 
 courage their friends who were anxious about 
 their intended reformation of the church, as well 
 as to all^y the fears of others, whose eyes were 
 beginning to open and to see the destruction 
 threatened to church and state, was printed 
 and dispersed in every market-town in the king- 
 dom. June 2, 1642, the parliament, by a com- 
 mittee, presented the king with the sum of all 
 their desires for the reformation and safety of 
 church and state, in nineteen propositions. Those 
 relative to the church were the following: — 
 " That his Majesty would be pleased to consent, 
 that such a reformatibn be made of the church 
 government and liturgy, as both houses of par- 
 liament shall advise, wherein they intend to have 
 consultation with divines, according to the decla- 
 ration above ; and that his Majesty will contribute 
 his best assistance for the raisinsr a sufficient 
 maintenance for preaching ministers through the 
 kingdom ; and will give consent to the laws for 
 the taking away innovations, superstition, and 
 pluralities, and against scandalous ministers." 
 In answer to these propositions, his Majesty 
 
CIVIL WAR. 307 
 
 referred them to what he has said in his answer 
 to their petition and n monstrance in his first 
 declaration, and to his message sent on passing 
 the bill against the bishops' votes. But as for 
 the bills against superstitions, innovations, &c. 
 his Majesty declared he could say nothing to 
 them till he saw them * 
 
 It was now manifest that the controversy 
 between the king and parliament, which had been 
 hitherto carried on with the pen, must be decided 
 with the sword. Both sides collected as much 
 strength as possible, and the horrible scene of 
 civil war began, and the land was deluged with 
 blood. The writer of this volume refers his 
 courteous readers to Lord Clarendon's History 
 of the Grand Rebellion, and other historians for 
 a copious and detailed account of that scene of 
 confusion, of blood-shedding, and miseries, which 
 now ensued in consequence of the unhappy dif- 
 ferences between the king and parliament. Truly 
 it was a scene as horrible and shocking to 
 humanity, as it was scandalous, cruel, and dis- 
 honourable to the English nation. Those times 
 will be an indelible blot on the page of English 
 history, and a disgrace to our country. But the 
 troubles of those times, may, however, be viewed 
 
 ♦ Warner's Eccles. Hist, of England, vol. ii, p. 662. 
 X t 
 
308 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 as wisely ordered by Providence, as a memorable 
 lesson and warning to posterity, to guard against 
 factious parties in religion and politics. The 
 result of those troubles and confusion brought 
 then upon the church and state, teaches us how 
 delusive and destructive must have been the 
 principles of those patriots and puritans, who 
 were the authors and promoters of those con- 
 vulsions. 
 
 If any ways or means could have been adopted 
 in time to restore a mutual confidence between 
 the king and the parliament, the remaining 
 differences in the church might easily have been 
 reconciled and accommodated. But as the 
 flames of the civil war spread wider and grew 
 fiercer, the wounds of ,the church were also 
 aggravated and enlarged. And when the par- 
 liament called in the Scots to their assistance, 
 and the solemn league and covenant was sub- 
 scribed, these wounds became incurable. The 
 state of the controversy was then entirely changed, 
 and the mask was stript off. The puritans no 
 longer sought for a reformation of the hierarchy, 
 and for liberty of conscience, but for the same 
 spiritual power which had been exercised by 
 the bishops, and to introduce the presbyterian 
 government in its full extent, as the established 
 religion of England. To this purpose a bill was 
 passed by the Commons, for the utter abolition 
 
ASSEMBLY OF DIVINES. 309 
 
 and extirpation of episcopacy. And it was 
 determined by them, that no overtures for peace 
 should be made to the king till this bill was 
 passed in the house of lords, where it would 
 never otherwise have been submitted to. 
 
 From the year 1642 till the end of the civil 
 war, the established form of government in the 
 church was interrupted. So the ancient hier- 
 archy of England was suspended, and lay pros- 
 trate for about eighteen years : but it was never 
 legally dissolved, for the king would not, and did 
 not give his royal assent. 
 
 The parliament now having usurped the 
 sovereignty, by still requiring new concessions, 
 and a further abridgment of the regal power, 
 prevented the king from all possibility of an 
 accommodation. Besides the nineteen propo- 
 sitions already mentioned, they requested the 
 king in express terms to abolish episcopacy 
 entirely, and that all ecclesiastical disputes should 
 be decided by an assembly of divines : but the 
 king would not, by any means, assent to such 
 measures. The parliament therefore passed an 
 ordinance in June, 1643, " for the calling an 
 assembly of learned and godly divines, and others, 
 to settle the government and liturgy of the church 
 of England, &c." 
 
 Before this assembly met, the king issued a 
 proclamation to forbid their meeting, declaring 
 
110 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 that no acts done by them ought to be received 
 by his subjects, and threatening to proceed 
 against them with the utmost severity of the law. 
 Sixty-nine, however, out of one hundred and 
 twenty, of which the assembly was to consist, 
 assembled on the day appointed, July 1, 1643, 
 in King Henry Vllth's chapel, according to 
 their summons. Few of the episcopal divines 
 appeared, and those who did, withdrew in disgust. 
 Lord Clarendon says, that out of the one hundred 
 and twenty, there were not above twenty who 
 were not declared and avowed enemies to the 
 doctrine and discipline of the Church of England; 
 some of them infamous in their lives and conver- 
 sations, and most of them of very mean parts 
 in learning, if not of scandalous ignorance, and 
 of no other reputation than of malice to the 
 church of England."^ Perhaps the noble his- 
 torian is rather too severe here; as certainly 
 many of the divines of that assembly were 
 men of exemplary piety and devotion, who had 
 a zeal for the glory of God, and the purity 
 of the christian faith and practice, f All the 
 episcopal divines soon left this assembly: some 
 disdained to sit at all with them, as Dr. Brown- 
 rigge, bishop of Exeter, Dr. Westfield, bishop 
 
 * Hist, of the Rebellion, vol. i, p. 630. 
 t See a full list of the members of this Assembly, in Neal's. 
 Hist, ©f the Puritans, vol. iii, p. 60, 61. 
 
SOLEMN LEAGUE AND COVENANT. 311 
 
 of Bristol, Dr. Hacket, Dr. Morley, Dr. Saun- 
 derson, Dr. Hararaond, Dr. Holdsworth, &c. — 
 Archbishop Usher condescended to appear for a 
 little while in the assembly : they did justice to 
 that most learned prelate in expelling him from 
 the assembly for his attending the king at Oxford, 
 and refusing to return ; by so doing they honored 
 him and scandalized themselves. — Dr. Featley 
 continued to attend, till he was imprisoned by 
 the parliament on account of his attachment to 
 episcopacy, and for holding a correspondence 
 with Dr. Usher. 
 
 The parliament finding themselves unable to 
 contend with the royal forces, had solicited, as 
 it was before observed, the assistance of the 
 Scots. But they were not disposed to form any 
 alliance, except parliament would engage to 
 establish the presbyterian form of government 
 in the church of England. The English Com- 
 missioners agreed to these terms, and accordingly 
 a solemn league and covenant * was drawn up, 
 agreed to by the convention of the states, and 
 the general assembly of the church of Scotland ; 
 and, being approved of by the Westminster 
 assembly, it was sworn to, and subscribed by 
 both houses of parliament, and by the assembly, 
 
 * See this Covenant at large in Neafs Hist, of the Puritans, 
 vol. iii, pp. 66-70, and the mode of taking it. 
 
312 LIFE 6f bishop hall. 
 
 with great solemnity, Monday, Sept. 25, 1643, in 
 the church of St. Margaret's, Westminster.'^ 
 
 This " solemn league and covenant,'' besides 
 mutual defence against all opponents, bound the 
 subscribers to endeavour the extirpation of popery 
 and prelacy, superstition, heresy, schism, and 
 profaneness — to maintain the rights and privi- 
 leges of parliament, together with the king's 
 authority — and to discover and bring to justice all 
 incendiaries and malignants. 
 
 It was ordered to be taken by all persons above 
 eighteen years of age ; and the assembly were com- 
 manded to draw up an exhortation to persuade 
 the people to it.f Orders also were issued by 
 the Commons to disperse the covenant through- 
 out the whole kingdom ; and the names of those 
 who refused it, were to be returned to the house. 
 
 As this covenant contained obligations upon 
 conscience, which honest persons might scruple 
 as contrary to the laws, so the imposing of it as^ 
 a test wdiS very oppressive:— it was truly a great 
 
 * Dr. Walker describes the proceedings at taking this cove- 
 nant thus— "Two or three divines successively "went up" 
 into the pulpit to proi/ : others to make orations upon the work 
 of the day, where they uttered such extravagant things in com- 
 mendation of the covenant, as cannot easily be imagined ; Mr. 
 Henderson concluding the solemnity with as extravagant com- 
 mendations of what they had done." 
 
 Sufferings of the Clergy, part i, p. 34. 
 
 t See tha Exhortation in Neal's Hist, of the Puritans, vol. iii, 
 P. 71. 
 
DISSOLUTION OF THE HIERARCHY. 313 
 
 abuse of that sovereign power, which so was much 
 complained of in the king. 
 
 His Majesty issued a proclamation to forbid 
 the taking of this covenant, but it was of no 
 effect. However, many and heavy complaints 
 were made of the grievances and oppression 
 which this test inflicted upon the clergy through- 
 out the kingdom. It proved a weapon in the 
 hands of the Commons, enabling them with more 
 ease and certainty to discover malignant or dis- 
 affected mi7iisters ^the modest appellation given 
 now to all the episcopal and loyal clergy. When 
 this covenant was tendered, and any of the clergy 
 refused it, they were upon this turned out of their 
 livings. 
 
 From the time of taking this covenaiUy we may 
 date the dissolution of the hierarchy ; though as 
 yet it was not abolished by an ordinance of 
 parliament. There were now no ecclesiastical 
 courts, no visitations, no regard to the canons, 
 ceremonies, nor even to the liturgy itself. 
 
 The assembly of divines now did all the 
 business of the church : the parishes chose their 
 own ministers, the assembly examined and ap- 
 proved them, and the parliament confirmed them 
 in their livings. But in order to secure a suc- 
 cession of ministers trained up in the principles 
 which the parliament had adopted, the earl of 
 
314 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 Manchester * was ordered to purify the university 
 of Cambridge, the head quarters of the forces 
 under his command. Accordingly, the earl 
 requested the attendance of the masters, fellows, 
 and scholars, on a certain day, and the covenant 
 was tendered to all, who were suspected of 
 disaffection to the parliament, that is, to all those 
 who had any regard to the ancient constitution 
 in church and state. A great number of graduates 
 were despoiled of their livelihood, and banished 
 the university, merely for refusing the solemn 
 league and covenant. 
 
 It is difficult to compute the number of clergy- 
 men who suffered severely, and lost their livings 
 by order of parliament during the civil war. But 
 whether more or fewer suffered, the arbitrary 
 power was the same ; and the not executing it, 
 might be for want of opportunity, in many 
 instances, or because they could not. According 
 to the best computation, the number of suffering 
 clergy could not be less than two thousand, 
 whom the parliament ejected out of their livings, 
 for their obedience to the laws and constitution of 
 their country. K fifth part of the revenues of these 
 ejected clergy was reserved for the maintenance 
 
 * The Earl of Manchester, in the life-time of his father, was 
 styled Lord Kimbolton, and was one of the members impeached 
 by the king. 
 
SUFFERINGS OF THE CLERGY. 315 
 
 of their families, which, in such calamitous and 
 tumultuous time, was a charitable act; but it 
 does not appear that due and proper attention 
 was observed that such destitute families should 
 be paid this pittance of Ji ft /is. 
 
 It is truly deplorable that many pious, worthy, 
 and learned bishops and clergymen, who with- 
 drew from the world, and were desirous to live 
 peaceably, suffered dreadfully in these times — 
 their estates and livings were sequestered, their 
 houses and goods ransacked and plundered by 
 disorderly soldiers, and they themselves and 
 families reduced to live upon the fifths, or a small 
 pension from parliament, because they continued 
 firm in their attachment to the constitution of 
 church and state, and would not take the covenant, 
 or sanction the neiv directory * for public wor- 
 ship, which was introduced after abolishing our 
 venerable liturgy. Among these sufferers, the 
 most reverend Archbishop Usher, Bishop Morton, 
 Bishop Hall, and many others, may be reckoned 
 as some of the chief. To take away the whole 
 property of these divines, only for obedience to 
 the laws of their country, and reduce them to a 
 fifth, and even this at the mercy of sequestrators, 
 was extremely rigorous, cruel, and oppressive.f 
 
 * See the New Directory, in Neal's Hist, of the Puritans^ 
 vol. V, p. 52, Appendix. 
 
 t See Neal's Hist, of the Puritans, vol. iii, p. 37. 
 
316 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 A great and barbarous devastation was now 
 made of all the decorations, ornaments, and 
 painted windows in cathedrals and churches. 
 The monuments of the dead were violated and 
 mutilated, the organs were taken down and de- 
 molished, and the truly venerable remains of 
 antiquity were damaged and destroyed. In 
 short, every outrage which ignorance, fanatic rage, 
 and enthusiasm could inspire, was committed on 
 the churches. — The account of the reformation 
 of Norwich cathedral by these Goths and Vandals, 
 as given us by Bishop Hall in his Hard Measure, 
 is a fair specimen of the rude violence and 
 indiscriminate devastations committed on other 
 cathedrals and churches : it gives us the character 
 of these Gothic reformers, and shews us the 
 spirit by which they were actuated.'^ 
 
 Though the majority of the commons had at 
 first agreed to reduce episcopacy to the standard 
 of the first or second century, yet they had not 
 determined to lay aside the name and function of a 
 bishop, and to establish a presbyterian government, 
 till application was made to the Scots for assistance 
 against the king. As it was highly probable that 
 the major part had no intention at first to extir- 
 pate episcopacy, so there can be no doubt but 
 
 * Dr. Grey, in his Examination of Neal, gives several instances 
 of those barbarities committed on the cathedrals and churches. 
 
ORIGIN OF SECTS. 817 
 
 that some few puritanical members fiilly intended 
 it, though they industriously concealed their 
 intention till an opportunity of carrying their 
 design into execution should offer itself 
 
 Parliament was convinced that the war against 
 the king could not be successfully carried on 
 without the aid of the Scots : therefore, in order 
 to obtain this aid, they complied to receive the 
 presbyterian form of church government, and the 
 assembly of divines were ordered to agree upon 
 such a form of discipline as would preserve an 
 union with the kirk. 
 
 The puritans had now the direction of every 
 thing in the church, and actually had demolished 
 the hierarchy before they had agreed what sort of 
 building to erect in its room. When therefore the 
 ancient order of worship and discipline observed 
 in the Anglican church was extirpated, the several 
 parties or sects among the puritans, which had 
 laid before concealed under that general name, 
 began to shew themselves; and each of them 
 claimed a share in laying the foundation stone of 
 the new model. Many of the puritan divines were 
 rigid Calvinists, and in their sermons and writings 
 inculcated those dogmas by which they eventually 
 opened a wide door for licentiousness and anli- 
 nominnism ; so that many took upon them to 
 justify the hidden works of darkness and dis- 
 honesty. The political principles of many of 
 
318 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 these men were not less absurd, nor less destruc- 
 tive of order and good government, than those 
 they were actuated by in religion. 
 
 From the time it was agreed that the presby- 
 terian model should be adopted, the name of 
 puritans is to be sunk ; and they were afterwards 
 distinguished under the denomination of Presby- 
 terians, Erastians, and Independents, who all had 
 their own different views. 
 
 The Presbyterians had taken their plan from 
 Scotland, and advanced it into jus divinum, or 
 a divine institution, derived expressly from Christ 
 and his apostles; but this met with as much 
 opposition from the other sectaries as episcopacy 
 itself. 
 
 The Erastians believed church government to 
 be a creature of the state, would not admit the 
 pastoral office to be anything more than persua- 
 sive; and denied any spiritual jurisdiction or 
 coercive power over the conscience, or that 
 any one form of church government was pre- 
 scribed in scripture as a rule for future ages. For 
 this opinion they had the authority of several of 
 our first reformers. * 
 
 * Cranmer, Redmayne, Cox, &c. The erainently-learned Dr. 
 Lightfoot was a principal advocate of this scheme in the Assem- 
 bly of Divines. — Erastians were so called from Erastus, a 
 German physician and divine of the 16th century. 
 
INDEPENDENTS. 319 
 
 The Independents formed another party. The 
 principles upon which they founded their church 
 government, were confined to scripture precedent, 
 without any regard to ancient practice, or modern 
 innovations ; they did not tie themselves to any 
 resolutions, without room for alteration upon any 
 further views and enquiry. On these principles 
 they built a system, " that every particular con- 
 gregation of christians has an entire and complete 
 jurisdiction over its members, to be exercised by 
 the elders thereof within itself. They did not, 
 however, claim such an entire independency as 
 that an offending church is not to submit to an 
 open examination by other neighbouring churches: 
 they practised no church censures but admo- 
 nition; and upon obstinate offenders, excommu- 
 nication. They professed an agreement in doc- 
 trine with the articles of the church of England ; 
 atid their officers or rulers in the church were 
 pastors, teachers, and elders with deacons. 
 Though they did not approve of a prescribed 
 form of worship, yet they thought public prayers 
 should be framed by the meditation and study 
 of their ministers; and they offered up public 
 prayers for kings and all that were in authority, 
 read the scriptures in their assemblies, adminis- 
 tered the sacraments, sung psalms, and made a 
 collection for the poor every sunday. It has 
 been thought proper here to give this particular 
 
 L 
 
320 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 account of this sect, as most of our historians did 
 not understand their reHgious nor political princi- 
 ples, and so have confounded them with the 
 Anabaptists, who about this time appeared in 
 England, who were republican in their political 
 principles, and despised learning and ordination 
 in their teachers. ^ 
 
 It was certainly a grand mistake of these 
 reformers to destroy one building before they had 
 agreed upon another. But so it was that the 
 ancient and venerable order of worship and dis- 
 cipline in the church of England was set aside 
 above a year before any other form was appointed. 
 During this inter-regnmn in the church, sects, 
 parties, and heresies sprung up like mushrooms, 
 which grew so luxuriant and strong, that after- 
 wards it was not possible to destroy them. Such 
 an oversight in persons, who pretended to possess 
 so much light, and to have so pious a care of the 
 church, is rather to be wondered at. When all 
 the bounds of order in church and state were 
 thrown down ; when the hedges of God's vineyard 
 were broken down, the natural consequence was, 
 that the wild hoar of the forest should root it up. 
 Every man now, as he was prompted by the 
 warmth of his temper, excited by emulation or 
 
 * Neal's Hist, of the Puritans, vol. iii, pp. 130-136. War- 
 ners' Eccles. Hist, of England, voi. ii, pp.562, 563. 
 
FANATICISM. 321 
 
 vanity, or supported by hypocrisy, endeavoured 
 to distinguish himself beyond his fellows, and 
 to arrive at a superior pitch of fanaticism ; the 
 soldier, the merchant, the mechanic, indulging 
 the fervour of an holy zeal, and guided by tlie 
 influence of the Spirit, as lie pretended, gave him- 
 self up to an inward and superior direction, and 
 was, in a manner, consecrated by an immediate 
 intercourse with heaven.* Bishop Hall, about 
 two years before this time, when a prisoner in the 
 Tower, accounted it no small benefit that he was 
 then placed, where, says he, " I hear no invectives, 
 no false doctrines, no sermocinations of ironmon- 
 gers, feltmakers, cobblers, broom men, grooms, 
 or any other of those inspired ignorants.'t" And 
 in his sermon in titled " The Mourner in Sion,'* 
 he gives a description of the deplorable state of 
 religion and morality during those years of con- 
 fusion; " one beats the keys into the sword, or 
 hangs them at the magistrate's girdle; so as 
 he suspends religion upon the mere will and 
 pleasure of sovereignty. One allows plurality 
 or community of wives : another allows a man to 
 divorce that wife he hath, upon slight occasions, 
 and to take another. One is a hunter, another 
 is a seeker, a third is a shaker. One dares 
 
 * Warner's Eccles. Hist, of England, vol. ii, p. 564. 
 t Bishop Hall's Works, vol. vti, p. 518. 
 
 Y 
 
322 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 question, yea, disparages the sacred scriptures 
 of God ; another denies the soul's immortality ; 
 a third, the body's resurrection. One spits his 
 poison upon the blessed Trinity; another blas- 
 phemes the Lord Jesus, and opposes the eternity 
 of his Godhead. One is altogether for inspira- 
 tions, professing himself above the sphere of all 
 ordinances, yea, above the blood of Christ him- 
 self. Another teaches, that the more villany he 
 can commit, the more holy he is ; that only confi- 
 dence in sinning is perfection of sanctity ; that 
 there is no hell but remorse. To put an end to 
 this list of blasphemies, the very mention whereof 
 is enough to distemper my tongue and your ears; 
 one miscreant dares give himself out for God 
 Almighty; another, for the Holy Ghost; another, 
 for the Lord Christ; another, (a vile adulterous 
 strumpet) for the Virgin Mary." * 
 
 The assembly of divines having given their 
 advice to the parliament relative to providing a 
 succession of ministers, an ordinance for that 
 purpose w^as therefore passed, October, 1644. 
 Ten members of the assembly, and thirteen pres- 
 byters of the city of London, were appointed to 
 examine, and ordain by imposition of hands, all 
 candidates thought quahfied to be admitted into 
 the ministry. 
 
 * Work«, Tol. V, p. 566. 
 
THE DIRECTORY. 323 
 
 The assembly proceeded in the next place 
 about a form of public worship. The liturgy 
 being abolished about a year before, at length, in 
 January, 1644—5, a Directory for public worship 
 was published, sanctioned by an ordinance of 
 parliament. This ordinance repealed the acts of 
 King Edward VI, and Queen Elizabeth, by which 
 the hturgy had been established, and prohibited 
 the use of it in every church or chapel in England 
 and Wales. So the Directory continued till the 
 restoration of Charles II, when our scriptural 
 liturgy was restored, the ordinance for its aboli- 
 tion having never obtained the royal assent. 
 
 It was a considerable time before this great 
 revolution in the form of public worship took 
 place over the kingdom. In some places the 
 churchwardens could not or would not procure a 
 Directory: in others they despised it and con- 
 tinued the liturgy. Some would read no form ; 
 and others would use one qf their own. In order 
 to establish the Directory, the parliament called 
 in all the Common Prayer Books, and imposed a 
 fine upon such ministers as should read any other 
 form than that contained in the Directory. The 
 use of the liturgy in any private place or family 
 was also prohibited, under the penalty of £b. for 
 the first offence, £10. for the second, and for the 
 third, a year's imprisonment. Such ministers as 
 would not observe the Directory , were to forfeit 
 
 Y t 
 
324 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 forty shillings ; and those who wrote, preached, 
 or printed any thing in derogation of it, were to 
 forfeit not less than £5. and not more than £50. 
 to the use of the poor. 
 
 These were the primary acts oi presbyterian uni- 
 formity^ equal to any severities or oppressions com- 
 plained of under the government of Charles I. and 
 of his royal predecessor: for, if the parliament had 
 a right to abrogate the use of the liturgy in churches 
 and chapels, which most certainly they had not, 
 where was the liberty of conscience, which they 
 made so much noise about, when they prohibited 
 the liturgy to closets and private families ? When 
 the presbyterians were going on to press the use 
 of the Directory over the kingdom, his Majesty 
 published a proclamation, requiring the Book of 
 Common Prayer to be observed and used in all 
 churches and chapels, and that the Directory 
 should not be admitted or observed. His Majesty 
 also issued warrants, under his own hand, to the 
 heads of the university of Oxford, commanding 
 them to read divine service as usual, and assuring 
 the peers then at Oxford, ''that he was still 
 determined to live and die for the privileges of 
 his crown, for his friends, and for church govern- 
 ment." * 
 
 Here it may be proper to give a brief account of 
 
 * Warner's Eccies. Hist, of England, vol. ii, pp.564, 565. 
 
DEATH OF LAUD. 325 
 
 the sad catastrophe of Archbishop Laud, who 
 had becQ imprisoned in the Tower nearly four 
 years, on an \mpe?ichinent oUiiorh treason. The 
 trial of this famous prelate was pending five 
 months, upon the general charge that he endea- 
 voured to subvert the constitution, the protestant 
 religion, and the rights of parliament. His Grace 
 defended himself undauntedly and fully for above 
 twenty days with much art, vivacity, oratory, and 
 firmness ; and, considering the animosity and 
 malignancy of his adversaries, with much more 
 patience and discretion than could have been 
 expected from a man of his warm and imperious 
 temper. The lords acquitted him of high treason, 
 and so deferred giving judgment. The commons 
 upon this, had recourse to their old expedient of 
 procuring petitions from the city of London, pray- 
 ing for speedy justice ; in other words, menacing 
 and terrifying the two houses into their measures. 
 But lest this should not prevail, the commons 
 changed their attack into a bill of attainder, 
 against which Dr. Laud spoke at their bar for 
 several hours. The lords consented to this bill, 
 though his Grace produced a pardon from his 
 Majesty under the great seal. They pretended 
 that the king could not pardon a judgment o^ 
 parliament, when the nation was in a state of war. 
 The commons with difficulty were prevailed upon 
 that the sentence of hanging should be changed 
 
326 LIFE or BISHOP HALL. 
 
 into beheading ; which circumstance, as the pri- 
 soner was a bishop, a privy counsellor, and the 
 first peer of the realm, shews the rancour and 
 inveteracy with which he was persecuted even to 
 death. His Grace was beheaded on Tower-hill, 
 Jan. 10, 1644-5. 
 
 Our historians in general speak of this famous 
 person with great partiality, either in his favour or 
 dispraise. He was certainly neither the saint 
 which some have described him, nor the devil 
 which others have painted him. With openness 
 and sincerity there was joined an ungovernable 
 heat and impetuosity of temper, which often drove 
 him off' his guard, and betrayed him into indiscre- 
 tions, which afforded a handle against him. As 
 he possessed such a natural temper, it was a mis- 
 fortune to him to be placed in the high rank of a 
 Metropolitan and Prime Minister. On account 
 of his high principles in church and state, he was 
 no friend to the constitution of his country, and 
 so he made many to be his implacable enemies. 
 Though his Grace was a learned man, yet he was 
 more a man of business than of letters. Lord 
 Clarendon allows that he retained too keen a 
 memory of those who had ill used him ; and that 
 there was something very boisterous and turbulent 
 in his disposition.* Let his adversaries say what 
 
 '* History of the Kebellion, vol. i, p. 91. 
 
CHARACTER OF LAUD. 327 
 
 they will, he was undoubtedly a siacere and firm 
 protestant, and had no inclination to become a 
 papist. However, if he was the person to 
 whom Bishop Hall addressed the fifth Epistle of 
 the third Decade, (Works, vol. vii, p. 184.) his 
 religious notions seem to have been once very 
 unsettled. As his high and immoderate zeal for 
 the church of England made him a great enemy 
 to all the sectaries, so in order to remove himself 
 as far as he could from these, he countenanced 
 and introduced some ceremonies, which too much 
 resembled those iu the church of Rome; and 
 which he pressed with as much vigour as if they 
 were essentials of religion. This was his very 
 great foible. From his diary he seems also to 
 have been in some respects very superstitious. 
 His virtue consisted perhaps more in the severity 
 of his manners, and an abstinence from pleasure, 
 than in any real affections of benevolence or a 
 true goodness of heart. Nothing could equal his 
 resolution, but his zeal for the king and the 
 hierarchy : and in obeying the impulse of that 
 zeal, he trusted entirely to his good intentions, 
 without any regard to prudence or politeness; 
 that is, he took no care to make these intentions, 
 appear in their best colours, nor paid any defer- 
 ence to the sentiments of those around him, but 
 rested satisfied in his own integrity. He was 
 extremely impatient of contradiction, even in the 
 
328 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 council; nor could he debate any momentous 
 argument with the patience and temper becoming 
 his character. He was a great benefactor to St. 
 John's college, Oxon. where he was educated ; 
 he enriched it with a variety of valuable MSS. in 
 Hebrew, Syriac, Chaldaic, Egyptian, ^Ethiopian, 
 Armenian, Arabic, Persian, Turkish, Greek, 
 Latin, Italian, French, Russian, Chinese, Japanese, 
 Saxon, English, Irish. These MSS. were pur- 
 chased at a prodigious expence. He gave, besides, 
 £500. in money to his college. He founded an 
 Arabic Lecture in the university of Oxford; 
 settled the impropriation of Cuddesden on the 
 see of Oxford ; annexed commendams to several 
 other bishoprics ; obtained the advow^son of the 
 living of St. Laurence in Reading, for St. John's 
 college, Oxon. ; procured a charter for Reading, 
 his native place, and founded and endowed an 
 hospital in that town with £200. a year. Oxford 
 also owed to his influence a large charter, con- 
 firming its ancient, and investing it with new privi- 
 leges. He expended large sums in the repairs 
 and rebuilding of St. Paul's cathedral, and left 
 several other legacies. It is but justice to his 
 memory to record these acts of munificence and 
 public utihty. But with all his virtues and accom- 
 plishments which his most partial friends have 
 attributed to him, it must be allowed that he was 
 v«ry unfit for either of the stations which he filled 
 
UXBRIDGE TREATY. 329 
 
 in church and state, especially in such turbulent 
 times, and under such a monarch as Charles 1.* 
 
 About the latter end of January, 1644-5, a 
 treaty of peace between the king and parliament 
 was entered upon at Uxbridge by commissioners. 
 The parliament commissioners proposed, with 
 respect to religion, **that a bill should be passed 
 for abolishing episcopacy — for confirming the 
 ordinance for calling the assembly of divines 
 — that the Directory and the presbyterian govern- 
 ment be confirmed — that his Majesty shall take 
 the solemn league and covenant — and that an act 
 should be passed to enjoin it to be taken by all 
 subjects in the three kingdoms. "f After many 
 disputes and much time spent, his Majesty's com- 
 missioners consented to these particulars — " that 
 the penal laws enjoining ceremonies shall be 
 suspended, and every body left to their own 
 freedom — that the bishops shall exercise no act 
 of jurisdiction or ordination, without the consent 
 of a council of presbyters, to be chosen out of the 
 diocese—that the bishop shall constantly reside 
 in his diocese, except when required to attend his 
 Majesty on any occasion, and if not hindered by 
 
 * Warner's Ilccles. Hist, of England, vol. ii, pp. 565-567. 
 Goadby's Brit. Biog. vol. iv, p. 280. 
 
 t Dugdale's View of the Troubles in England, p. 766. 
 
330 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 sickness, preach every Sunday— that great care 
 shall be taken in conferring holy orders: about 
 the sufficiency and other qualifications of the 
 candidates — that a competent maintenance shall 
 be provided by act of parliament for vicarages 
 belonging to bishops, deans and chapters, out of 
 the impropriations— that no man for the future 
 shall have two benefices with cure of souls — that 
 an hundred thousand pounds shall be raised out 
 of the lands belonging to bishops, deans, and 
 chapters, towards settling the public peace — and 
 that visitations, fees of ecclesiastical courts, and 
 abuses in spiritual jurisdiction, shall be regulated 
 by parliament." But these great concessions at 
 this time from his Majesty made no impression; 
 and the parliament commissioners having no 
 liberty to relax a tittle from their demands, the 
 treaty came to nothing. 
 
 Before the parliament and the assembly of 
 divines had made up their minds about adopting 
 the presbyterian mode of church government. 
 Bishop Hall tendered " a Modest Offer of some 
 Considerations to the Learned Prolocutor, and to 
 the rest of the Assembly of Divines met at West- 
 minster,''^ in which the good bishop shewed him- 
 
 * Dr.Williani Twisse, vicar of Newbery, was then the Prolo- 
 cutor — He died July 20, 1646. He was allowed to be a person 
 of extensive knowledge, modest, humble, and religious. 
 
PRESBYTERIANISM. 331 
 
 self stil! a champion in advocating episcopacy, 
 and strongly recommended them seriously to 
 consider the advantages, expediency, antiquity, 
 and universality of episcopacy, its ancient estab- 
 lishment in this country, its incorporating and 
 enwovening itself into the very municipal laws of 
 the land, and the difficulty of utterly removing it 
 Virithout a total change in the w^hole body of our 
 laws. The bishop also very ably pointed out the 
 intrinsic value of episcopal government. This 
 tract is dated Sept. 12, 1644, and signed Philale^ 
 thirencBus, or, A Lover of Truth and Peace, * 
 
 It does not appear that this excellent treatise 
 of Bishop Hall made any successful impression 
 upon the assembly; for, when the presbyterian 
 government was judged to be jus divinum, there 
 could afterwards be no chance for episcopacy to 
 be retained. 
 
 The directory was no sooner established after 
 abolishing the liturgy, and the presbyterian form 
 of church government adopted in the room of 
 episcopacy, than the presbyterians and indepen- 
 dents, who agreed in the subversion of the church, 
 differed and quarrelled about the divine institution 
 of presbyterianism. The independents being joined 
 by the Erastians in this dispute, and having the 
 
 * Bishop Mali's Worlis, vol. ix, p. 773. 
 
332 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 army on their side, compelled the presbyterians 
 to give way in the point of coercive power, which 
 they had hitherto grasped at with all their might. 
 
 If the leading presbyterian divines had come to 
 an accommodation with the independents about a 
 limited toleration, they would probably have pre- 
 vented the disputes between the parliament and 
 the army, which at length proved the ruin of 
 both. 
 
 After the battle of Naseby, the king's affairs 
 declined rapidly. His Majesty, in the beginning 
 of November, 1645, returned to Oxford, when his 
 adherents gave him some hopes that peace might 
 be obtained, provided he would consent to the 
 abolition of episcopacy, and make some other 
 concessions. Though his Majesty then was will- 
 ing to yield to the emergency of things, yet he 
 could not be prevailed upon to give up the 
 church. The circumstances of his Majesty being 
 now reduced to such extremities, he thought 
 proper to deliver himself up. May 5, J 646, to the 
 hands of the Scots, then besieging Newark. 
 His Majesty probably expected that the Scots 
 would have joined with him, and employed their 
 forces to obtain peace ; and, if his Majesty would 
 have submitted to embrace presbyterianism, and 
 taken the covenant, they would have joined 
 him, and acknowledged him as their sovereign. 
 
THE KING SUPPORTS EPISCOPACY. 333 
 
 When his Majesty was entreated to establish 
 presbyterianism in both kingdoms, and to take 
 the covenant, he declared that, though he was 
 willing the Scots should enjoy their own disci- 
 pline, he was obliged by conscience and in honour 
 to support episcopacy in England, because it had 
 been established from the reformation ; and that 
 he was bound by his coronation oath to uphold 
 it. In order to endeavour to make his Majesty a 
 convert to presbyterianism, the Scots employed 
 The Rev. Alex. Henderson of Edinburgh, to enter 
 into a debate with the king respecting these points. 
 The debate was carried on in writing; and it is 
 said that the king was much too hard for his 
 opponent in argument, so that he soon afterwards 
 died of grief, and heart broken.* Bishop Burnet 
 speaking of the king's superiority in this contro- 
 versy, says, " Had his Majesty's arms been as 
 strong as his reason was, he had been every way 
 unconquerable, since none have the disingenuity 
 to deny the great advantage his Majesty had in 
 all these writings ; and this was when the help of 
 his chaplains could not be suspected, they being 
 far from him ; and that the king drew with his 
 own hand all his papers without the help of any, 
 
 * Clarendon's Hist, of the Rebellion, vol. v, p. 31, 
 
334 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 is averred by the person who alone was privy 
 to the interchanging* of them — that worthy and 
 accomplished gentleman, Robert Murray." ^ 
 
 His Majesty proposed to admit the estabHsh- 
 ment of episcopacy and presbyterianism, in order 
 to destroy the influence of the independents and 
 the other sectaries. He declared that he would 
 be content to restrain episcopal government to 
 the dioceses of Oxford, Winchester, Bath and 
 Wells, and Exeter, leaving all the rest of England 
 to the presbyterian discipline:! but the Scots 
 would abate nothing with regard to religion, and 
 so they shortly afterwards placed his Majesty in 
 the hands of the parliament. The king being now 
 the prisoner of the presbyterians, as they had a 
 majority in the house of commons, they might 
 have made their own terms with his Majesty ; but 
 they were still so enchanted with the " beauties 
 of covenant uniformity, and the divine right of 
 their presbytery,'' which ultimately the parliament 
 would not allow in its full extent. His Majesty 
 very sagaciously endeavoured to take advantage 
 of the divisions between the presbyterian and 
 independent parties, by favouring the latter, and 
 
 * Bishop Burnet's Memoirs of the Dukes of Hamilton, 
 p. 277, fol. ed. 1677. 
 
 + Duke of Hamilton's Memoirs, pp. 286, 287. Rushworth, 
 p. 328. 
 
ESTABLISHMENT OF PRESBYTERIANISM. 335 
 
 promising some of them valuable compensations for 
 any services they should do him; and intimating 
 to them that it was not possible for them to obtain 
 relief in their scruples, from those who were per- 
 suaded they were erecting the kingdom of Christ. 
 However, though the independents were enemies 
 to the presbyterian discipHne, they would not 
 trust the king. 
 
 England was now divided, instead of so many 
 dioceses, into a certain number of provinces, 
 made up from the several classes within their 
 boundaries. Every parish had a congregational, 
 or parochial presbytery, for the affairs of the 
 parish. The parochial presbyteries were combined 
 into classes, and these chose representatives for 
 the provincial, as the provincial did for the 
 national assembly : but, though this presbyterian 
 model was thus settled and erected in the room 
 of episcopal government, there never was a pro- 
 vincial assembly, except in London and Lanca- 
 shire; the parliament never heartily approved of 
 it, and the influence and interest by which it was 
 supported, soon afterwards became ineffectual.* 
 
 * Warner's Eccles. Hist, of England, vol. ii, pp. 568, 569. 
 Dr. Walker, in his Sufferinj^s of tlie Clergy, part i, pp. 36, 37, 
 calls the Presbyterian discipline, ** that goldm idol, to which 
 they had offered so many human sacrifices, of which an imper- 
 fect image was raised at last, and stood (where it ought not) 
 
336 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 The officers of the army, Sir Thomas Fairfax, 
 general, and Oliver Cromwell, lieutenant-general, 
 were of the party of the independents, and dis- 
 liked the presbyterian model, as more tyrannical 
 than the episcopal. Having but few preachers 
 or chaplains in the army, the officers undertook 
 to preach and to pray publicly to the troops ; and 
 even the common soldiers not only prayed and 
 preached publicly among themselves, but also 
 mounted the pulpits in all the churches where 
 they happened to be quartered, and harangued 
 the people with great fervour and zeal. This 
 enthusiastic spirit diffused itself like a pestilence : 
 it was caught by all ranks of men, and even the 
 women " would not restrain the Spirit." " It was 
 pleaded," says Neal, ''in excuse for this practice, 
 that a gifted brother had better preach and pray 
 to the people than nobody ; but now learning, 
 good sense, and the rational interpretation of 
 scripture, began to be cried down, and every bold 
 pretender to inspiration was preferred to the 
 most grave and sober divines of the age ; some 
 
 in the place of the church." And (ibid, p. 41.) the same 
 writer says, " Thus fell episcopacy, the only government of the 
 christian church, from the days of the Apostles, before the 
 lame and imperfect pattern of Scots Presbytery — the ark of 
 God, (to increase our misery beyond that of God's church 
 among the Jews, in one of its greatest calamities) before an 
 headless and bandless Dagon.'^ 
 
STATE OF ENGLAND. 337 
 
 advanced themselves into the rank of prophets, 
 and others uttered all such crude and undigested 
 absurdities as came first into their minds, calHng 
 them the dictates of the Spirit within them ; by 
 which the pubHc peace was frequently disturbed, 
 and great numbers of ignorant people led into the 
 belief of the most dangerous errors." * 
 
 At the close of the year 1(346, both church and 
 state were in the utmost disorder and confusion 
 and continued so more or less till the restoration 
 in 1660. Bishop Hall, feelingly lamenting the 
 deplorable state of the country, thus speaks : 
 ** Was there ever a more fearful example of divine 
 vengeance against any nation, than to be armed 
 a^inst each other to their mutual destruction ? 
 that christian compatriots, brethren, should pour 
 out each other's blood like water in our streets, 
 and leave their mangled carcases for compost in 
 our fields? that none but the sharper sword 
 should be left to be the arbiter of our deadly 
 differences ? that fathers and sons should so put 
 off all natural affection, as to think it no violation 
 of piety to cut the throats of each other? Oh ! 
 that we had lived to see the woeful havoc, that the 
 
 ♦ Neal's Hist, of the Puritans, vol. iii, pp. 339, 340. The Rev. 
 Thomas Edwards, Minister of Christ Church, London, a rigid 
 presbyterian, rendered himself notorious at this time for a 
 rancorous and furious book, intitled GangrcBtui, 4to, in 3 parts, 
 against the Sectaries of this period. 
 
 Z 
 
338 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 hellish fury of war hath made, every where, in this 
 flourishing and populous island; the flames of 
 hostile fury rising up in our towns and cities; the 
 devastation of our fruitful and pleasant villages; 
 the demolition of our magnificent structures ; the 
 spoils and ruins of those fabrics that should be 
 sacred ; in a word, this goodly land, for a great 
 part of it, turned to a very Golgotha and Acel- 
 dema!"* 
 
 The parliament, after the Scots consented to 
 deliver up the king, appointed commissioners to 
 convey his Majesty to Holmby-house in North- 
 amptonshire, Feb. 1646-7. He was treated 
 with some respect, but his trusty servants were 
 not allowed to attend him ; and it was not even 
 permitted to him to have any of his own chaplains 
 to assist him in his devotions, though he earnestly 
 desired to have any two out of thirteen, which he 
 nominated, to attend him. This was refused 
 him ; and two presbyterian ministers were ordered 
 to officiate in the chapel ; but his Majesty never 
 gave his attendance, and so was compelled to be 
 his own chaplain, using the liturgical service of 
 the church in his own chamber, f 
 
 * Works, vol. V, p. 663. 
 
 t Clarendon, vol. iii, p. 39. Neal's Hist, of the Puritans, 
 vol. iii, p. 335. 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 The army had hitherto acted in subordination 
 to the parliament ; but now, the war being over, 
 and the king a prisoner, they were unwilHng to be 
 entirely at the disposal of the parliament, and to 
 submit to presbyterian uniformity. The army 
 consisted chiefly of independents, few presbyte- 
 rians, anabaptists, and men of unsettled religious 
 principles. They however consented that presby- 
 terianism should be the established religion, but 
 insisted on a toleration of all sects and parties. 
 The disposition of the presbyterians was to perse- 
 cute and harass every sect with as much severity 
 and bitterness as they did the church. The 
 presbyterians thought that through their superior 
 influence in both houses, they should be able to 
 get the better of the army : they came therefore 
 to a resolution of seizing the person of Cromwell, 
 whose dissimulation and hypocrisy were now 
 evident ; but he, having notice of their design the 
 night before, made his escape to the army. At 
 
 Z 2 
 
340 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 the same time, the army, by the advice and 
 direction of Cromwell, took the king by force 
 from the custody of the parliament at Holmby- 
 house, and conveyed him to the head quarters 
 at Newmarket. His Majesty now met with 
 some kind treatment and respect. Many of his 
 friends had free access to him; and four of his 
 chaplains, viz. Dr. Sheldon, Dr. Morley, Dr. 
 Saunderson, and Dr. Hammond, were permitted 
 to attend him. 
 
 The king being now in the possession of the 
 army, they therefore began to be more contuma- 
 cious with the parliament; and Cromwell, on this 
 occasion said, that ** now he had got the king into 
 his hands, he had the parliament in his pocket."* 
 The army made liberty of conscience their great 
 charter, and till they obtained it, they resolved 
 not to lay down their arms : they had fought the 
 battles of the parliament, and so considered it 
 unreasonable to be told that except they would 
 conform with the presbyterian discipline, they 
 should be persecuted and punished as sectaries, 
 and driven out of the land. In order to prevent 
 this, they treated with the king, and offered him 
 much better terms, and behaved towards him 
 with much more courtesy, than he ever met with 
 
 * Rushworth, p, 646, 649. Neal, vol. iii, p. 369. 
 
ESCAPE OF THE KING. 341 
 
 from the parliament. But his Majesty was afraid 
 to trust them. And besides, we are told that he 
 had adopted a maxim, from which his best friends 
 could not dissuade him, viz. that it was in his 
 power to turn the scale, and that the party mus^ 
 sink which he abandoned. This, together with 
 some insincerity, which he practised towards 
 Cromwell and Ire ton, who themselves were not 
 sincere in their treaty with him, proved the ruin of 
 Charles I. and which, it is said, he repented of 
 when too late.* 
 
 His Majesty, thinking that some design was 
 intended to murder him, escaped from the army» 
 intending to cross the sea, but was secured in 
 Carisbrook Castle in the Isle of Wight. The 
 public tranquillity was now in a very precarious 
 situation, as there was a general distrust and 
 suspicion on all sides, and every party resolved to 
 carry their point without any abatement. The king 
 continued resolute in adhering to the constitution 
 of church and state. The Scots and English 
 presbyterians, though divided in some political 
 points, thought themselves bound to stand by the 
 solemn league and covenant; and the army was 
 under an engagement to agree with neither without 
 a toleration* If his Majesty would have submitted 
 
 * Warner's Eccles. Hist, of Eiig. vol, ii, p, 570. Neal's Hist, 
 of the Puritans, vol, iii, p. 379. 
 
342 LIFE OF BliSHOP HALL. 
 
 ^& covenant uniformity, the presbyterians might 
 have restored him : or, if the king or parliament 
 would have declared for a toleration, peace might 
 have been restored by military force. But so 
 it was, that such terms of accommodation as could 
 reconcile such opposite and clashing interests* 
 could not now be contrived at this time. 
 
 When the king was with the army in some state 
 of honor, want and misery obliged many thou- 
 sands of the parochial clergy to present a petition 
 to his Majesty, July 17, 1647, stating " that 
 whereas they had a long time been destitute of all 
 livelihood, by means of sequestration of their 
 estates, and other losses, and " then" driven Xo 
 extreme necessities, how to provide for themselves 
 and their families; and the season, " then" 
 approaching for the receiving the benefits of the 
 harvest, before which time, if some charitable 
 course be riot taken, they were hke tO" starve or 
 beg another year, " and therefore praying his 
 Majesty to take their sad condition into his gra- 
 cious consideration and care, that some speedy 
 course might be taken to preserve them alive," 
 &c. 
 
 To this petition the king returned a gracious 
 answer, though he was then so circumstanced, as 
 being hardly capable of doing any service to the 
 suffering clergy : he however recommended their 
 distressed case to the general, and told them 
 
DISTRESSES OF THE CLERGY. 343 
 
 ** how deeply sensible he was of their condition, 
 and desired them to rest assured, that whatsoever 
 was in his power for their reUef, should not be 
 wanting ; but for the present, all that he could do, 
 was to recommend the petition to the general and 
 commanders of the army." They therefore peti- 
 tioned in form the general, Sir Thomas Fairfax, 
 who received their petition respectfully, and pro- 
 posed to the parliament that the estates of all 
 sequestered persons, including the clergy, should 
 remain in the hands of the tenants till a general 
 peace. Upon which some of the clergy made 
 attempts to recover their benefices, and dispos- 
 sess the intruders. But this turned out to their 
 disadvantage, and caused them new troubles. At 
 that juncture, when the army and the parliament 
 had been for some time at variance, the distressed 
 clergy had some hopes of redress: but when the 
 differences were now nearly compromised, all 
 their expectations were entirely cut off. 
 
 Aug. 12, 1647, the presbyterian ministers peti- 
 tioned the general, complaining " that divers 
 delinquent ministers, who had been put out of their 
 livings, did now trouble, and seek to turn out 
 those ministers, whom the parliament had put in, 
 &c." Sir Thomas Fairfax and the parliament 
 disapproved of these proceedings ; and an ordi- 
 nance was passed that those delinquent ministers 
 and others, who would trouble or molest the 
 
344 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 ministers put into livings by the parliament, should 
 be punished."* 
 
 When the university of Oxford fell into the 
 hands of the parliament, they ordered a visitation 
 of it, in order to make the colleges to take the 
 covenant y so as to reduce them to obedience. But 
 the university, which had continued firm in its 
 loyalty to the king, passed a public act and decla- 
 ration against the covenant, and refused to submit 
 to the authority of the visitors, till they were sub- 
 dued and compelled by a military force, f 
 
 The parliament, having been strengthened by 
 the return of some presbyterian members, who 
 either had absconded, or deserted their stations, 
 when the army was in the neighbourhood, now 
 resumed their courage. Though the independents 
 had persisted in requiring an unlimited toleration, 
 the presbyterians at this time took an opportunity 
 of discovering their principles, by passing a most 
 cruel ordinance against sects and heretics. It 
 was ordained that all persons, who should main- 
 
 * Walker's Sufferings of the Clergy, part i, pp. 145, 146. 
 Neal's Hist, of the Puritans, vol. iii, pp.892, 393. 
 
 t See a full and particular account of the visitation of the 
 University of Oxford by the Parliament, in Clarendon's Hist, of 
 the Rebellion, vol. iii, b. x, p. 73, &c. Walker's Sufferings of 
 the Clergy, part i, pp. 122-144. Neal's Hist, of the Puritans, 
 vol. iii. pp. 395-438 See in the appendix to this vol. Rustica 
 AcademiiB Oxoniensis nuper t^eformatiC descriptio, by Dr. Alibone, 
 a very curious satyrical piece. 
 
OVERTURES OF THE KING. 345 
 
 tain, publish, or defend, by preaching or writing, 
 the heresies which were after mentioned, with 
 obstinacy, should be committed to prison without 
 bail till the next gaol delivery ; and if the indict- 
 ment should then be found, and the party not 
 abjure, he should suffer death as a felon. This 
 was in titled an ordinance against blasphemy and 
 heresy, and was dated May 2, 1648. This single 
 ordinance is sufficient to shew, that the presbyte- 
 rians would have made a dreadful use of their 
 power, if it had been supported by the sword of 
 the civil magistrate. * 
 
 The king was kept a close prisoner in Caris- 
 brook Castle ; but, in consequence of a secret 
 treaty with the Scots, an army was raising in that 
 kingdom to join the royalists in England, in order 
 to rescue the king from his confinement. This 
 circumstance caused another dreadful civil war, 
 and hastened the horrible catastrophe of his 
 Majesty. In this calamitous state of affairs, no 
 hope seemed to be left to the parliament but to 
 treat with the king. Therefore a treaty was held 
 with his Majesty at Newport in the Isle of Wight, 
 during the months of September, October, and 
 November, 1648. Before the treaty began, the 
 commissioners from the parliament informed his 
 Majesty, that they could not permit any other 
 
 * Neal's Hist, of the Puritans, vol. iii, p. 458. Warner's. 
 Eocles. Hist, of England, ?ol. ii, p. 571. 
 
346 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 persons besides himself to confer with them 
 respecting their demands; and all the help he 
 could obtain from the bishops and divines, who 
 had been allowed to attend upon him, was, that 
 they might stand behind a curtain, and upon any 
 point of difficulty, his Majesty might retire to his 
 chamber for their advice. * This was the unrea- 
 sonable preliminary, to which the king was 
 obliged to submit, before the treaty commenced : 
 and afterwards he saw that the commissioners 
 could not, or would not, relax any point whatever 
 in what they had to propose. Wherefore, to 
 shorten the negotiation, and to let the parliament 
 know how far his Majesty could comply with 
 their demands, he sent a message to explain his 
 intentions. iWith regard to religion he made the 
 following concessions : viz. That the assembly of 
 divines at Westminster may be confirmed for 
 
 * Neal says, that ** several noblemen, gentlemen, divines, and 
 lawyers, were appointed to assist him in the treaty, who wei'e 
 to stand behind his Majesty's chair and hear the debates, but 
 not to speak, except when the king withdrew into another room 
 for their advice ; the names of his divines were Dr. Juxon, 
 bishop of London, Dr. Duppa, bishop of Salisbury, Dr. Sheldon, 
 Dr. Hammond, Dr.Oldisworth, Dr. Saunderson, Dr. Turner, 
 Dr. Haywood: and towards the end of the treaty Dr. Usher, 
 arclibishop of Armagh, Dr. Bramhali, Dr. Prideux, Dr.Warner, 
 Dr. Feme, and Dr. Morley : Dr. Brownrigge, bishop of Exeter, 
 was also sent for, but he was under restraint. And Dr. Sheldon, 
 Dr. Hammond, and Dr. Oldisworth, being also under restraint, 
 were not permitted to stand." Hist, of the Puritans, vol. iii, 
 p. 462. 
 
DISCUSSIONS. 347 
 
 three years, and the directory, and presbyterian 
 government continue for the same [>eriod ; pro- 
 vided that neither himself, nor his adherents, 
 should be obliged to conform to it — that during 
 that period, a consultation should be had with the 
 assembly, and with twenty divines of his own 
 nomination, to determine upon a form of govern- 
 ment to be established afterwards in the church, 
 with a provision for the ease of tender consciences 
 — that his Majesty would consent that legal 
 estates for lives, or for a term of years, not 
 exceeding ninety-nine, might be made from the 
 lands and revenues of bishops, for the satisfaction 
 of those who have purchased them; provided that 
 the inheritance may still remain in the church, 
 and the residue be reserved for their maintenance. 
 These, with some other concessions of less impor- 
 tance, his Majesty delivered to the commissioners 
 as his final answer. In conclusion, his Majesty 
 challenged the parliament divines, who were 
 assistants to the commissioners, to shew, that 
 either there is no form of church government 
 prescribed in scripture ; or, if there be, that the 
 civil power may alter it as they see cause ; or, if 
 it was unchangeable, that it was not episcopal ; 
 and till this was done, he should think himself 
 excusable for not consenting to the abolition of 
 that church government, which he found settled 
 at his coronation, which is so ancient, has been so 
 
348 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 universally received in the christian world, con- 
 firmed by so many acts of parliament, and been 
 subscribed by all the clergy of the church of 
 England. But the presbyterian divines did not 
 think fit to enter on this debate. 
 
 The parliament spent several days in deliberat- 
 ing on the above concessions of his Majesty, 
 and at last voted them unsatisfactory with regard 
 to episcopacy. The king made some further 
 concessions, which were not approved of. The 
 time of the treaty was prolonged, and some new 
 propositions' made to the king. At last, there 
 being but one day left to determine the fale of 
 the whole kingdom, the commissioners pressed 
 his Majesty to satisfy the demands of the parlia- 
 ment. His own council, and his divines, besought 
 him to consider the safety of his person for the 
 sake of the church and people ; because they 
 had some hope still left, whilst his Majesty was 
 preserved, that they should enjoy many blessings; 
 whereas if he was destroyed, there was scarce a 
 possibility to preserve them : — that, upon the 
 best judgment they could make, the order, which 
 his Majesty endeavoured to preserve with so 
 much zeal and piety, was much more likely to be 
 ruined by his not complying, than by his sus- 
 pending it till a future government could be 
 settled. The mind of the unhappy king was 
 much distressed on account of these considera- 
 tions, so that he told the commissioners, " that 
 
REMONSTRANCE OF THE ARMY. 349 
 
 after the condescensions he had already made in 
 the business of the church, he had expected not 
 to be further pressed : it being his judgment and 
 his conscience. He could not consent to abolish 
 episcopacy out of the church." * 
 
 This treaty, in the end, proved unsuccessful in 
 promoting the peace of the country ; and a short 
 time before its conclusion, the army had sent a 
 remonstrance to the parliament to express their 
 high dissatisfaction with the treaty, because no 
 provision was made for liberty of conscience and 
 toleration. This remonstrance of the army plainly 
 discovered the intentions of the independents, to 
 blow up the constitution, and to bury the king, 
 episcopacy, and presbytery in its ruins. In a 
 kind of despair, and under the influence of a 
 religious phrenzy, the army entered upon the 
 most desperate measures, resolving to take the 
 SOVEREIGN POWER into their own hands — to 
 bring the king io justice -io set aside the covenant 
 — and to change the government into a common- 
 wealth. In order to accomplish these horrible 
 resolutions, the remonstrance was presented to 
 the parliament, Nov. 20, 1648. It was accom- 
 panied with many petitions from different parts 
 of the kingdom, tending to the same purpose. 
 The parliament, upon this, was struck with the 
 
 * Warner's Eccles. Hist, of England, vol. ii, p. 572, &c. 
 
350 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 utmost consternation, and, though a few days 
 before voted the king's concessions unsatisfactory, 
 again took his answer into consideration; and 
 after a violent debate for three days, it was 
 carried by a majority of forty-two, that his 
 Majesty's concessions were a sufficient founda- 
 tion for the houses to proceed upon an the settle- 
 ment of the kingdom: but it was then too late. 
 The army had now secured the person of the 
 king, and he was conveyed by a party of horse 
 to Hurst Castle, where he continued till he was 
 conducted to Windsor in order to his trial. The 
 general had marched the army to London ; and 
 the next day the presbyterian members were 
 excluded from the house by a mihtary force; 
 and the independent members, who wereadmitted, 
 voted the king's answer to the propositions not 
 satisfactory. The question now was, what was 
 next to be done? It was high time to settle 
 some form of government, under which the nation 
 was to live. So in order to gain popularity, they 
 declared that parliament should be dissolved on 
 the last day of April following : and that in the 
 mean time they would bring those delinquents 
 to justice, who had disturbed the peace of the 
 kingdom, and put it to such an expence of blood 
 and treasure. But the height of all iniquity and 
 fanatical extravagance yet remained to be acted : 
 it was determined to impeach the king of high 
 treason, as having been the cause of all the blood 
 
DEATH OF THE KING. 351 
 
 spilt during the rebellion. The sovereign was 
 tried and executed by a set of desperate officers 
 of the army, and their dependents.* There was 
 nothing in the common or statute law which 
 could direct or warrant this iniquitous proceed- 
 ing, they therefore made a new form never 
 before heard of — ''A71 high court of justice to 
 try his Majesty for high treason in levying war 
 against his parliament^ '\ He fell a sacrifice to 
 the rage and enthusiasm of the fanatic leaders of 
 the army, who, proceeding from one licentiousness 
 to another, had arrived at an implacable, repub- 
 lican, virulent spirit, regardless of all laws, divine 
 and human. The particulars of the murder of 
 King Charles I. on the 30th of Jan. 1648'"9, and 
 his character, need not here be related ; they are 
 so fully narrated by Lord Clarendon, Dugdale, 
 and other historians.:}; 
 
 * They have been described as a " swarm ot' armed enthu- 
 siasts, who outwitted the patriots, out-prayed the puritans, 
 and out-fought the cavaliers." Bishop Warburton's Sermon 
 before the House of Lords, Jan. 30, 1760. 
 
 t Clarendon's Hist, of the Rebellion, vol. Hi; b. xi, p. 244. 
 
 X See a very interesting character of Kin«» Charles I. in War- 
 ner's Eccles. Hist, of England, vol. ii, pp. 574-577: but the 
 excellent and pious Bishop Home, in his sermon intitled the 
 CHRISTIAN KING, has given us a very striking and interesting 
 view of the character of Charles I. as a king, a christian, 
 and a martyr. See Bishop Home's Works, vol. iii, p. 
 
CHAPTER X, 
 
 The constitution, having been so much muti- 
 lated and reduced in the progress of the rebel- 
 lion, at the execution of the king was totally dis- 
 solved. The small remains of an house of commons 
 prohibited the proclaiming of the Prince of Wales, 
 or any other person whatsoever, under the pain 
 of high treason, and voted the house of lords 
 to be useless, and the office of a king dangerous 
 to the state. The oaths of allegiance and supre- 
 macy were abolished, and a new one, called the 
 engagement, was appointed, by which all persons 
 who held any place or office in church or state, 
 were required to swear, " that they would be 
 true and faithful to the government estabhshed, 
 without king, or house of peers." The form of 
 government for the future, was declared to be 
 a free commonwealth, of which the executive 
 power was to be lodged in the hands of a council 
 of state of about forty persons, any nine of whom 
 were to take care of the administration for one 
 
RUMP PARLIAMENT. 353 
 
 year. Such was the foundation of this new 
 government, which neither had the consent of the 
 nation, nor their representatives in parliament. 
 The parHament, as it was, consisted only of about 
 eighty members, all of them 'independents. And 
 these few members voted the exclusion of all the 
 other members, unless they took the engagement 
 A licentious, republican, and fanatic army, which 
 had spread an universal terror, had got this extra- 
 ordinary and excessive power to this parliament, 
 which, consisting of so inconsiderable a number of 
 members, obtained in derision the appellation of 
 the rump parliament. * 
 
 The Independent interest, by means of the 
 army, now prevailed in and over the parliament : 
 not only the loyal clergy began to suffer afresh 
 *' under a new set of tyrants," but even the pres- 
 byterians ** became fellow-stifferers, and were 
 involved in one common calamity, with those 
 many thousands of ruined loyahsts, over whom 
 they had themselves for such a long course of 
 years, lorded it with so much rigour and 
 cruelty." f 
 
 * Walker, the author of the History of Independency, first 
 gav« them this name, in allusion to a fowlf all devoured but the 
 rump. They were also compared to a man who would never 
 cease to whet and whet his knife, till there was no steel left to 
 make it useful. Dr. Grey and Rapih. 
 
 t Walker's Sufferings of the Clergy, part i, p. 146. 
 
 Aa 
 
354 LIFK OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 It is not necessary in this work to enter fully 
 into the measures which were taken for settling 
 this usurped government. In such a time of 
 universal confusion, the transactions which con- 
 cerned then the church and state ought rather to 
 be razed out of the page of history, than particu- 
 larly related, lest the success of so much villany, 
 dissimulation, and enthusiasm, should in after 
 ages encourage the same horrible and iniquitous 
 factions against the established constitution of 
 church and state. 
 
 Now every man was at liberty to profess any 
 principles of religion, and to teach what he pro- 
 fessed. Bishop Hall in these distracted times, 
 speaking of those who cause divisions, says, " they 
 have much to answer for to the God of peace and 
 unity, who are so much addicted to their own 
 conceits, and so indulgent to their own interest, 
 as to raise and maintain new doctrines, and to set 
 up new sects in the church of Christ, varying from 
 the common and received truths; labouring to 
 draw disciples after them, to the great distraction 
 of souls, and scandal of Christianity: with which 
 sort of disturbers I must needs say this age, into 
 which we are fallen, hath been and is, above all 
 that have gone before us, most miserably pestered : 
 what good soul can be other than confounded, to 
 hear of and see more than a hundred and four 
 score new, and some of them dangerous and bias- 
 
DIVISIONS IN THE CHURCH. 355 
 
 phemous opinions, broached and defended in one, 
 once famous and unanimous church of Christ? 
 Who can say other, upon the view of these wild 
 thoughts, than Gerson said long since, that the 
 world, now grown old, is full of doting fancies; 
 if not rather, that the world, now near his end, 
 raves and talks nothing but fancies and frenzies? 
 How arbitrary soever these self-willed fanatics 
 may think it, to take to themselves this liberty of 
 thinking what they list, and venting what they 
 think, the blessed Apostle hath long since branded 
 them with a heavy sentence : Now I beseech you, 
 brethren, maik tJiem which cause divisions and 
 offences, contrary to the doctrine which you have 
 learned, and avoid them : for they that are such, 
 serve not our Lord Jesus Christ, but their own 
 belly; and by good words and fair speeches, 
 deceive the hearts oj the simple, Rom. xvi, 17, 18." 
 Again, our author justly lamenting the manifold 
 and grievous distractions of the church of Christ 
 then both in judgment and affection, says, " Woe 
 is me, into how many thousand pieces is the 
 seamless coat of our Saviour rent! Yea, into 
 what numberless atoms, is the precious body of 
 Christ torn and minced ! There are more reli- 
 gions than nations upon earth ; and in each reli- 
 gion, as many different conceits, as men. If St. 
 Paul, when his Corinthians did but say, / am oj 
 Paul, I am of Apollos, lam ofCeplias, could ask, 
 
 Aa2 
 
356 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 Is Christ divided? (1 Cor. i, 12, 13.) when there 
 was only an emulatory magnifying of their own 
 teachers, though agreeing and orthodox; what, 
 think we, would he now say, if he saw a hundred 
 of sect-masters and heresiarchs, some of them 
 opposite to other, all to the truth, applauded by 
 their credulous and divided followers, all of them 
 claiming Christ for theirs, and denying him to 
 their gainsayers? Would he not ask, " Is Christ 
 multiplied? Is Christ subdivided? Is Christ 
 shred into infinites ?" O God ! what is become of 
 Christianity? How do evil spirits and men labour 
 to destroy that creed, which we have always 
 constantly professed! For if we set up more 
 Christs, where is that one ? And if we give way 
 to these infinite distractions, where is the commu- 
 nion of saints ? " ^ 
 
 The churches and pulpits were now open to all 
 sorts of people, who would wish to display their 
 gifts of praying and preaching there. A general 
 distraction and confusion in reHgion overspread 
 the whole kingdom. An ingenious, elegant, and 
 pious living author thus describes the state of 
 religion then in England ; " During the time of 
 the interregnum, the prevailing sentiments in reli- 
 gion had been of a very singular, not to say of a 
 
 * Bishop Hall's Works, vol. viii, pp. 241, 244. 
 
RELIGIOUS EXTRAVAGANCE. 357 
 
 very extravagant nature. The doctrines of reve- 
 lation w^ere disjoined from its precepts, so that 
 one half of the bible became useless, except, per- 
 haps, in the hands of an unusually skilful allego- 
 rizer, who had the art of extracting a speculative 
 theorem from the most practical command. The 
 language even of secular intercourse was modelled 
 upon that of the received translation of the sacred 
 volume. The most unchristian acts were described 
 in the most christian terms. Men thought them- 
 selves religious, if they used the language of the 
 Bible, how flagrantly soever they might oppose 
 its spirit. He who could give to a text the most 
 fanciful twist, the most recondite allusion, was 
 esteemed the ablest divine. The union of a sound 
 creed with an irreligious life, of a clear insight 
 into revelation with a neglect of all its duties, 
 became alarmingly common; so that hypocrisy 
 and the most vulgar affectation were every where 
 apparent."* 
 
 There is nothing which can give a better idea 
 of the total dissolution of all principles of order 
 and moral rectitude at that time, than the act 
 which was then passed against blasphemous, 
 atheistical, and execrable opinions. In the pre- 
 amble of this act, it appears that there were then 
 
 * Wilks' Christian Essays, vol. i, p. 21. 
 
358 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 persons, who professed, that all sorts of iniquity 
 were " in their own nature as holy and righteous 
 as the duties of prayer, preaching, or giving thanks 
 to God ; that happiness consisted in the commis- 
 sion of such crimes ; and that there was really no 
 such thing as heaven or hell, nor any unrighteous- 
 ness or sin independent of conscience and opinion." 
 Miserable and distracted indeed was the state of 
 religion at this time in England ; " when the 
 church was defaced and overspread wdth errors 
 and blasphemies, defiled with abominations, rent 
 in pieces with divisions, and so swallowed up in 
 confusion and disorder." ^ 
 
 The enffagement, which might be properly called 
 the Independent covenant, as it was intended to 
 supersede the solemn league and covenant of the 
 presbyterians, was appointed to be taken by all 
 civil, ecclesiastical, and military officers whatso- 
 ever, on pain of forfeiting their several offices, and 
 was now referred to a committee, in order that 
 the whole kingdom should take it. A bill was 
 therefore passed in the beginning of the year 1650, 
 to exclude from the benefit of the law, and to 
 disable from sueing in any court of law or equity, 
 every person of the age of eighteen and upwards, 
 
 Warner's Eccles. Hist, of England, vol. ii, p. 579. 
 
THE ENGAGEMENT. 359 
 
 who should refuse to take and subscribe the 
 engagement. The presbyteriau ministers, though 
 they enforced the covenant in as arbitrary a manner, 
 yet when it came now to their turn to suffer, 
 could perceive the iniquity of such a violence done 
 to law and conscience. They inveighed bitterly 
 in their sermons against the engagement^ and 
 refused to observe the days of humiliation 
 appointed by the parliament for a blessing on 
 their arms. The body of the conmion people 
 being now weary of a civil war, and willing to 
 live quiet under any government, submitted to the 
 engagement. Many of the presbyterian ministers, 
 however, chose rather to relinquish their prefer- 
 ments in the church and universities, than comply. 
 The parliament tried several methods to recon- 
 cile them to the present administration; but when 
 they found it was all in vain, an order was pub- 
 lished, that ministers in the pulpits should not 
 meddle with state affairs. The famous Milton 
 was then appointed to write for the common- 
 wealth, who severely and satirically lashed every 
 party adverse to the measures of the new admi- 
 nistration. An act was also passed to sequester 
 from ecclesiastical preferments all, who vilified 
 and aspersed in the pulpit the authority of par- 
 liament. 
 
 A declaration was also published complaining 
 
360 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 of the revolt of English and Scots presbyterians 
 to the enemy, because the discipline of the parlia- 
 ment was not the exact standard of reformation. 
 The parliament did all they could to satisfy them : 
 they determined that all the ordinances for the 
 promoting a reformation of religion, in doctrine, 
 discipline and worship, should continue in full 
 force; and that the government in the church 
 should be the presbyterian. They ordered the 
 lands belonging to deans and chapters to be sold : 
 and the bishop's lands, which had been seques- 
 tered, were vested by an ordinance in the hands 
 of new trustees, and appropriated to the augmen- 
 tation of small livings. The first-fruits and tenths 
 of all ecclesiastical promotions, formerly payable 
 to the crown, were vested in the same hands, free 
 from all incumbrances, on trust, that they should 
 pay yearly all such salaries and stipends as had 
 been settled and confirmed in parliament; pro- 
 vided the assignment to any one did not exceed 
 an hundred pounds. The commissioners of the 
 great seal were empowered to enquire into the 
 yearly value of all ecclesiastical livings to which 
 any cure of souls was annexed, that some course 
 might be taken for providing a better maintenance 
 where it was wanting, and that the salary of no 
 incumbent should be less than one hundred 
 pounds a year. A part also of the money arising 
 from the sale of the bishops' lands, and those of 
 
DISCONTENTS. 361 
 
 the deans and chapters,* was appropriated for 
 the support and maintenance of the bishops, and 
 members of the cathedrals, who were deprived of 
 their promotions and dignities. Such regulations 
 were laudable, if they were effectually put in 
 practice : but still the pulpit and the press sounded 
 high the discontents both of the royalists and 
 presbyterians. An ordinance was therefore pub- 
 lished, to put the press entirely under the direc- 
 tion of the parliament; and the monthly fast, 
 which had subsisted above seven years,, and had 
 been, in a great measure, a fast for strife and 
 debate, was abrogated by another ordinance, that 
 there might be no censures published on the pre- 
 sent government. 
 
 Remote parts of the kingdom, as North and 
 
 • The money raised by the sale of those lands amounted to a 
 large sum. The return of the value of the lands, contracted for 
 to Aug. 29, 1650, made to ihe committee for the sale of them, 
 fixed it at the sum of £948,409, 18*. 2J</. of which, on Aug. 
 81, the total of the purchasers' acquittances amounted to 
 £658,501, 2«. 9(/. See Dr. Grey's Exam, of Neal, vol. iii. 
 Appendix, p. 18. Dr. Walker says in his Sufferings of tiie Clergy, 
 p. 14, that the value of bishops' lauds forfeited and sold 
 amounted to a million of money. " The revenues allotted to the 
 support of cathedrals and their appendages, were seized with a 
 view to augment the smaller livings. But mark the event : when 
 the estates were sold, the presbyterian ministers, who had taken 
 possession of the livings, and expected the augmentation, were 
 told, to their utter astonishment, that the money was wanted to 
 support public credit. It was wanted, and it was applied 
 accordingly." Bp. Home's Works, vol. iv, p. 41. 
 
362 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 South Wales, had not as yet experienced the 
 effects of the reformation^ which had been carried 
 on since the commencement of the long parlia- 
 ment. The clergy of those parts had not as yet 
 suffered with the rest of their brethren ; but the 
 parliament at last made them to compensate for 
 the delay of their sufferings. Feb. 22, 1649-50, 
 an Act was passed for the better propagation, and 
 preaching of the gospel in Wales, for ejecting 
 scandalous ministers and schoolmasters, and 
 redress of some grievances ; it was to continue in 
 force for three years. Dr. Walker, in his *' Suffer- 
 ings of the Clergy," has given a full and curious, 
 though perhaps rather exaggerated account of the 
 propagation of the gospel in Wales by the mission- 
 aries of the commonwealth; to which account 
 the author refers his readers. 
 
 About this time we are to date the rise of the 
 people called Quakers, from George Fox, born at 
 Drayton in Lancashire, and bred a shoemaker. 
 He pretended that all the qualifications necessary 
 for ministers were the anointing of the Spirit, 
 " that people should receive the inward divine 
 teachings of the Lord, and take that for their rule." 
 He apprehended the Lord had forbad him to put 
 off his hat to any one, and that he was to speak 
 to the people without distinction, in the language 
 of thee and thou, &c. In such pecuharities many 
 of the enthusiasts of this time concurred; and 
 
QUAKERS. 363 
 
 George Fox had soon a great number of followers. 
 Whenever he spoke in public, it was with con- 
 vulsive agitations and shakings of the body, 
 asserting it to be the character of a good man to 
 tremble before God. Hence the name of Quakers 
 is given to these people. If they had at first any 
 other design than to gratify an enthusiastic spirit 
 which was then so prevalent, it was to reduce all 
 revealed religion to allegory, and to extirpate all 
 order, ceremony, and rite out of divine service, 
 leaving every thing to the impulse of their own 
 spirit. Their public meetings were occasional, at 
 which one or Other spoke, as they were moved 
 from within; sometimes they departed without 
 any one being moved to speak at all. They 
 denied the scriptures to be the only rule of faith, 
 and maintained that every man had a light within 
 himself, which was a very sufficient rule. They 
 were great disturbers of the public religion at that 
 time; but now they are become an inoffensive, 
 benevolent, and respectable denomination.* 
 
 During these transactions in England, the 
 young king, Charles II. was crowned in Scotland. 
 This occasioned a war between the two nations. 
 The king entered England at the head of an 
 army, and being proclaimed in several places, was 
 
 * For a full and interesting account of the principles of the 
 Quakers, see Clarkson's Portaiture of Quakerism, 3 vols. 8vo. 
 
364 LIFE or BISHOP HALL. 
 
 defeated by Cromwell at the battle of Worcester, 
 Sept.3, 165] . His Majesty providentially escaped, 
 and passed over into France. 
 
 The war being over, the parliament therefore 
 intended to reduce the army ; but, in this case, 
 Cromwell could easily discern that this would 
 prove his ruin, by disarming him of his power, and 
 by reducing him from a general to the condition 
 of a private gentleman. Upon this, he judged that 
 there was no other way of maintaining his power 
 than to make himself master of the parliament, by 
 means of his council of officers in the army. The 
 officers, therefore, combined together, and would 
 not suffer any change to be made in the army, till 
 the arrears of their pay were fully paid. They 
 reminded the house of commons how many years 
 they had sat, to the exclusion of others, who 
 ought to have a share in the government of their 
 country ; and then recommended them to settle 
 a new council of state for the present administra- 
 tion of affairs, to summon a new parliament and 
 dissolve themselves. But the house, instead of 
 taking this advice, at which being much irritated, 
 appointed a committee to prepare a bill imme- 
 diately, to make it high treason for any one to 
 present any more such petitions. This precisely 
 was what Cromwell looked for. Being sure that 
 the parliament were as odious to the nation, as 
 they were disagreeable to the army, he went to 
 
DISSOLUTION OF THE PARLIAMENT. 365 
 
 the house with some officers and a file of mus- 
 keteers, on the 20th of April, 1653, and without any 
 ceremony told the members, that he came to put 
 an end to their power, of which they had made an 
 ill use, and that they must depart immediately. 
 
 " In this manner, did Cromwell, without the 
 least opposition, or even murmur, annihilate that 
 famous assembly, which had filled all Europe with 
 the renown of its actions, and with astonishment 
 at its crimes ; and whose commencement was not 
 more ardently desired by the people, than was its 
 final dissolution." * 
 
 The parliament being thus dissolved, the sove- 
 reign power was necessarily to be lodged some- 
 where; and Cromwell might have taken it into 
 his own hands by the same authority as he dis- 
 solved the parliament. But it was not time yet 
 to put his plan into execution. Cromwell brought 
 his council of officers to a resolution, that one 
 hundred and forty-four persons should be entrusted 
 with the sovereign power, and be nominated by 
 himself, t At the same time that he displayed 
 his abilities in the choice of these persons, he 
 seemed that he had a design in view, which, 
 though then concealed, would in time discover 
 
 * Warner's Eccles. Hist, of England, vol. ii, p. 682. 
 t See a list of the persons in Dugdale's View of the Trouble* 
 in England, pp. 406-409. 
 
366 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 itself. These persons selected to be set at the hel rn 
 of the state, were no politicians, and were mostly 
 of low and obscure birth, with no particular merit, 
 and no experience in affairs. * • Cromwell could 
 foresee that such characters would soon grow 
 tired, and find themselves obliged to place the 
 government in his hands. And so every thing 
 succeeded as he expected. This singular parHa- 
 ment was called in contempt Barebone's parlia- 
 ment, from a leatherseller of that name, t who was 
 one of the most active members. Lord Claren- 
 don says, that the members of this parliament 
 " were generally a pack of weak senseless fellows, 
 fit only to bring the name and reputation of par- 
 haments lower than it was yet." % 
 
 Having voted themselves to be called the Par- 
 
 * ** Of these," says Dugdale, " many were illiterate and of 
 mean condition, divers fanatic sectaries, and of that kind the 
 most busy and mischievous ; yet here and there mixt with con- 
 fiding men, and such whose interest was firmly twisted with 
 Cromwell." View of the Troubles in England, p. 409. 
 
 t There were three brothers of the family of the Barebones, 
 each of whom had a sentence for his name, viz. Praise God 
 Barebone. Christ came into the world to save Barebone. And 
 if Christ had not died, thou hadst been damned Barebone. In 
 this style were the christian names of very many persons formed 
 during the Rebellion and Interregnum. It was said that the 
 genealogy of Jesus Christ might be learnt from the names of 
 Cromwell's regiments ; and that the muster-master used no other 
 list than the 1st chap, of St. Matthew. See Granger's Hist, of 
 England, vol. iii, p. 68. Dr. Grey's Exam, of Neal, pp. 286, 
 287. Neal's Hist, of the Puritans, vol. iv, pp. 72, 73. 
 
 X Hist, of the Rebellion, vol. iii, b«14, p. *82. 
 
barebone's parliament. 367 
 
 liament of England, ** they vigorously fell to work 
 for a thorough reformation, dreaming of nothing 
 less, than that Jesus Christ must shortly reign 
 with them here on earth. To prepare the way 
 therefore to his personal coming, they considered 
 of abolishing the ministerial function, as savour- 
 ing, in their opinion, of popery. Likewise for the 
 taking away of tithes, as the relics of Judaism. 
 Also to abrogate the old English laws, as badges 
 of conquest and Norman slavery. And lastly to 
 suppress the Universities, and all schools for 
 learning, as heathenish and unnecessary, with all 
 titles of honour and distinctions, as not agreeable 
 to Christianity. All which they had, without 
 question, soon effected, but that some few of 
 them, of better judgments, gave a stop to their 
 frenzy."* 
 
 The noble historian gives us the following 
 account of this parliament of Cromwell's nomina- 
 tion : " These men thus brought together continued 
 in this capacity near six months, to the amaze- 
 ment, and even mirth of the people. In which 
 time they never entered into any grave and serious 
 debate, that might tend to any settlement, but 
 generally expressed great sharpness and animosity 
 against the clergy, and against all learning, out of 
 
 * Dugdale's View of the Troubles in England, p. 409. 
 
36S LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 which they thought the clergy had grown, and 
 still would grow. There were now no bishops 
 for them to be angry with: they had already 
 reduced all that order to the lowest distress. 
 But their quarrel was against all who had called 
 themselves ministers, and who, by being so called, 
 received tithes and respect from their neighbours. 
 They looked upon the function itself to be anti- 
 christian, and the persons to be burdensome to 
 the people ; and the requiring, and payment of 
 tithes, to be absolute Judaism, 'and they thought fit 
 that they should be abolished together. And that 
 there might not for the time to come be any race 
 of people who might revive those pretences, they 
 proposed, that all lands belonging to the univer- 
 sities, and colleges in those universities, might be 
 sold, and the monies that should arise thereby, 
 be disposed for the public service, and to ease the 
 people from the payment of taxes and contribu- 
 tions." ^ 
 
 After a session of nearly six months, little 
 or nothing had been done, besides establish- 
 ing the legal solemnization of marriage by the 
 civil magistrate, on the 12th of December, 1653. 
 
 * Hist, of the Rebellion, vol. iii, b. 14, p. 484. 
 
 Neal, Harris, and some others say, that no such proposals 
 were made in this parliament ; but the authority of such men as 
 Dugdale, Clarendon, and Mr. Eachard, is so respectable, that it 
 is unjust to tax them with falsehoods. 
 
PROTECTORATE. 369 
 
 Some of them, who were in Cromwell's secret, 
 rose up, and said that men of their abihties were 
 not equal to the weight of government; and there- 
 fore proposed a dissolution of themselves, and a 
 re-delivery of their authority into the hands from 
 which they had it. This motion was no sooner 
 made, than approved and executed. Cromwell 
 and his council of officers were no sooner invested 
 with the sovereign power, than they planned a 
 new form of government. The supreme authority 
 should be placed in Cromwell, who should have 
 the title of Lord Protector of the Common- 
 wealth of England, Scotland and Ireland, and 
 should be assisted by a council of one and twenty 
 persons. The protector was installed with great 
 magnificence, not much inferior to a coronation, 
 on the 16th of December, 1653. 
 
 In the instrument of government drawn by the 
 council of officers, when Cromwell was invested 
 with the protectorship, we find the following 
 articles respecting religion : viz. " That the chris- 
 tian religion, contained in the Scriptures, be held 
 forth and recommended as the public profession 
 of these nations ; that as soon as may be, a pro- 
 vision less subject to contention and more certain 
 than the present, be made for the maintenance of 
 ministers; and that till such provision be made, 
 the present maintenance continues. That none 
 be compelled to conform to the public religion by 
 
 Bb 
 
370 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 penalties or otherwise, but that endeavours be 
 used to win them by sound doctrine, and the 
 example of a good conversation. That such as 
 profess faith in God by Jesus Christ, though 
 differing in judgment from the doctrine, worship, 
 or discipHne, pubUcly held forth, shall not be 
 restrained from, but shall be protected in the 
 profession of their faith and exercise of their 
 religion, so as they abuse not this liberty to the 
 civil injury of others, and to the actual disturbance 
 of the public peace on their parts; provided this 
 liberty be not extended to popery, nor prelacy, 
 nor to such as, under a profession of Christ, hold 
 forth and practise licentiousness. That all laws, 
 statutes, and ordinances —contrary to the afore- 
 said liberty, shall be esteemed null and void."^ -^ 
 Thus a legal toleration was granted to all 
 errors, heresies, and sectaries whatever, and was 
 denied to nothing but popery, prelacy, and immo- 
 rality, which three were put upon a level. f *' It 
 was familiar," saysDn Walker, " with them (as in 
 truth it was with most of the writings, sermons, 
 discourses, orders, and resolves of parliament, and 
 other public acts of these times) to join popery 
 and prelacy together, and sometimes to rank it 
 
 * Dugdale, p. 416. 
 
 t Neal says, that in this respect this instrument of government 
 was ** undoubtedly faulty." Hist, of the Puritans, vol.iv, p. 80. 
 
INDULGENCE TO THE CLERGY. 371 
 
 with every thing else that was odious or detes- 
 table," as particularly when in Jan. 1654, " the 
 parliament debating the point of liberty of con- 
 science, gravely resolved to allow it to all who 
 should not maintain Atheism, Popery, prelacy, 
 Profaneness, or any damnable heresy." * 
 
 Though episcopacy was totally abolished, yet 
 the assembly of the adherents of the church were 
 connived at : it must be allowed that the members 
 of the church of England had at this time much 
 more favor and indulgence than under the parlia- 
 ment. Several of the clergy publicly exercised 
 their ministry, without the fetters of oaths, sub- 
 scriptions, or engagements. Dr. Robert Hall, the 
 eldest son of Bishop Hall, was permitted to keep 
 the rectory of Clystheydou, Devon. " all the time 
 of the usurpation, and there continued a great 
 patron and supporter of the sequestered clergy." 
 Dr. George Hall, another of Bishop Hall's sons, 
 afterwards bishop of Chester, was allowed to 
 preach towards the end of the usurpation, at St. 
 Bartholomew's Exchange, and at St. Botolph's 
 Aldersgate, London. When he was sequestered 
 from his preferment in Cornwall, he would have 
 kept a small school for his subsistence, but he 
 was not permitted to do it. Dr. George Wilde, 
 " during some part of the usurpation, kept up a 
 
 Sufferings of the Clergy, part i, p. 9. 
 Bb 2 
 
372 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 religious meeting for the loyalists in Fleet- street, 
 where the whole service of the church of England 
 was constantly and solemnly performed." Dr. 
 John Pearson, afterwards bishop of Chester in 
 1650, was minister of St. Clement's Eastcheap, 
 where he preached the substance of his celebrated 
 Exposition of the Creed .^ Several of the bishops, 
 who had been kept from public services by the 
 covenant and the engagement, preached again 
 publicly, as Archbishop Usher, Bishop Brown- 
 rigge, and others : Bishop Hall also preached and 
 published some sermons about this time. 
 
 Bishop Kennet is pleased to give this testimony 
 to the liberality of Cromwell in this respect: " it 
 is certain that the protector was for liberty, and 
 the utmost latitude to all parties, so far as con- 
 sisted with the peace and safety of his person 
 and government; and therefore he was never 
 jealous of any cause or sect on the account of 
 heresy and falsehood, but on his wiser accounts 
 of political peace and quiet: and even the 
 prejudice he had against the episcopal party 
 was more for their being royalists, than for being 
 of the good old church. Dr. Gunning, afterwards 
 bishop of Ely, kept a conventicle in London, in 
 as open a manner as dissenters did after the 
 
 * Walker's Sufferings of the Clergy, part ii, pp. 25, 26, 
 67, 117. 
 
ANOTHER PARLIAMENT. 373 
 
 toleration ; and so did several other episcopal 
 divines/'* 
 
 The time was now arrived, when, by the 
 instrument of government, the protector was 
 obliged to call a parliament; he accordingly issued 
 writs, omitting many of the small boroughs and 
 inserting large towns in their stead, and making 
 more members for counties in proportion to their 
 extent. This was an alteration generally expected 
 as proper to be made with more authority, and m 
 better times. The only restriction laid upon the 
 election of members to this parliament, was, that 
 none who had been in arms on the side of the 
 king, nor their sons, should be capable of being 
 elected. This parliament met with the usual for- 
 malities, Sept. 3, 1654; and Cromwell made them 
 a long speech. But the commons no sooner 
 entered upon business, than they took into con- 
 sideration the form of the present government, 
 and the authority which had convened them. 
 This was warmly debated for eight days together, 
 with many severe reflections upon the person of 
 the protector. All the influence of his party could 
 not divert the debate. Cromwell, mortified and 
 
 * Conform. Plea, part iv, p. 510. Neal's Hist, of the 
 Puritans, vol. iv, p. 137. Warner's Eccles. Hist, of England, 
 vol. ii. p. 586. See also Walker's Sutferings of the Clergy, 
 part ii, p. 142. 
 
374 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 exasperated exceedingly, sent for the commons to 
 the painted chamber ; and reprehending them for 
 their freedom in debating on the instrument of 
 government, the fundamentals of which, he said, 
 were never to be called in question, he told them 
 that he found it necessary to appoint a recognition 
 of the authority by which they were made a 
 pariiament, before they went any more into the 
 house. So when they returned, they found a 
 guard placed at the door, denying entrance to all 
 who would not subscribe the following recogni- 
 tion : *' I do hereby freely promise and engage, to 
 be true and faithful to the Lord Protector of the 
 commonwealth of England, Scotland, and Ireland, 
 and will not propose or give my consent to alter 
 the government, as it is settled in one single 
 person, and a parliament." 
 
 Though this was signed by about three hundred 
 members, yet they looked upon it as a violation 
 of the privileges of parliament ; and were so far 
 from settling his highness in the government, io 
 the Avay he wished for, that after five months 
 spent in wrangling and ill humour, the time they 
 were required to sit according to the instrument 
 of government, he sent for them again, and in a 
 tedious, embarrassed, angry speech, dissolved 
 them, without confirming any act they had passed.* 
 
 • See Dugdale's View, pp. 423-429. 
 
TRIERS. 375 
 
 Though the presbyterian discipline was now at 
 a low ebb, it was still the established religion of 
 the nation ; but the affairs of religion at this 
 period were in a more unsettled, distracted con- 
 dition, if possible, than those of the state. The 
 approbation of public ministers had been hitherto 
 reserved to the several presbyteries in city and 
 country ; but Cromwell, observing some inconve- 
 nience in this method, and not willing to trust the 
 qualifications of candidates, and the admission 
 into benefices, to the presbyteries only, who 
 might refuse all but their own party, by an ordi- 
 nance of council, appointed commissioners of 
 both denominations, with eight or nine laymen. 
 Any five of which had power to approve, but no 
 number under nine to reject a person as unquali- 
 fied. The committee, in their approbation, gave 
 them an instrument sealed with a common seal, 
 equivalent to letters of institution and induction, 
 which put them into full possession of the livings 
 to which they were nominated, or elected. But 
 as there was no standard, or rule of examination 
 for the Triers, as they were called, to go by, they 
 either examined the candidates as to their 
 advances only in grace and the time of their con- 
 version ; or if they questioned them in any parts 
 of learning, it was only in the system of Calvin, 
 which was made the door of admission into all 
 church preferments, and they exercised a power 
 
376 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 greater than that of the bishops.* In this way 
 many illiterate laymen, mechanics, and pedlars 
 were admitted into livings, and persons of greater 
 merit were rejected. 
 
 In order to prevent any of the sequestered 
 clergy to get admission, another ordinance was 
 passed by the protector and his council, requiring 
 these commissioners, " not to give admission to 
 any ministers who had been ejected for delin- 
 quency, till by experience of their conformity and 
 submission to the present government, his high- 
 ness and his council should be satisfied of their 
 fitness to be admitted into ecclesiastical promo- 
 tions."! 
 
 Many complaints were made, and as it appears 
 
 very justly, respecting these commissioners, for 
 their partiality to the independents, anabaptists, 
 fifth monarchy men, and separatists, and against 
 Arminians, and the loyal clergy. Accusations 
 were brought against them for bribery, and other 
 corrupt practices ; but such were probably rather 
 founded in resentment or malice, than in truth. 
 
 As there was now an insurrection intended and 
 attempted for the restoration of the king, and it 
 
 * See a specimen of such examinations in Walker's Suiferings 
 of the Clergy, part i, pp. 176, 177. 
 
 t Scobel, p. 366. Neal's Hist, of the Puritans, vol. iv, p. 
 104. Warner s Eccles. Hist, of England, vol. ii, p. 585, &c.^ 
 
EXTREME DISTRESS OF THE CLERGY. 377 
 
 was thought that many of the clergy were stirring 
 up the people to that purpose ; in order to humble 
 them still further, and to keep them within the 
 bounds of their spiritual function, another ordi- 
 nance was passed by the protector and his 
 council, Aug. 28, 1654, appointing lay commis- 
 sioners in every county, with ten or more minis^ 
 ters for their assistants, and empowering any fi\e 
 to call before them public preachers, lecturers, 
 parsons, vicars, curates, and schoolmasters, who 
 might be reputed scandalous, ignorant^ and insuffi- 
 cient or negligent; and to examine into their 
 offences upon oath of witnesses, and if they were 
 found guilty, they were ejected, 2, fifth of their 
 benefice or income being allowed for the support 
 of their wives and children.* 
 
 The venerable and apostolic church of England 
 was now reduced to the most deplorable state. 
 The injunctions of the above ordinance reduced 
 the few remaining loyal clergy to the extremity of 
 distress and oppression. Some few of the loyal 
 clergy had been connived at during some periods 
 of the usurpation in the use of the liturgy, both in 
 private and in public ; but now by this cruel ordi- 
 nance, such as had read or used the common prayer 
 hook in public since Jan. 1653-4, or should at any 
 
 • Walker's Sufferings of the Clergy, part i, p. 178, &c. 
 Neal's Hist, of the Puritans, vol. iv, p. 109. 
 
378 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 time hereafter do the same, were to be accounted 
 scandalous, and were to be summoned before this 
 inquisition-court established in every county! 
 Thus, effectual measures were adopted *' to turn 
 the few remaining loyal clergy out of their livings, 
 and to prevent their getting into any others for the 
 future." Providence, however, directed many of 
 them to procure subsistence for themselves and 
 families by being chaplains and tutors in private 
 families, and by keeping schools. But as they 
 were accused of being turbulent, of publishing 
 libels against the present government, and of 
 threatening to assassinate the protector, he there- 
 fore determined to crush them, and accordingly 
 an order was published, Nov. 24, *^ that no per- 
 sons, after Jan. 1st, 1655-6, shall keep in their 
 houses or families, as chaplains or schoolmasters, 
 for the education of their children, any sequestered 
 or ejected minister, fellow of a college, or school- 
 master, nor permit any of their children to be 
 taught by such. That no person, who hath been 
 sequestered or ejected out of any benefice, college, 
 or school, for delinquency or scandal, shall keep 
 any school either public or private, nor any person, 
 who after that time, shall be ejected for the afore- 
 said causes. That no such persons shall preach 
 in any public place, or at any private meeting of 
 any other persons than those of his own family, 
 nor shall administer baptism, or the Lord's supper, 
 
MISERIES OF THE LOYAL CLERGY. 379 
 
 nor marry any persons, nor use the book of 
 common prayer, or the forms of prayer therein 
 contained, upon pain of being prosecuted, accor- 
 ding to the orders lately published by his highness 
 and council, for securing the peace of the com- 
 monwealth. Nevertheless his highness declares, 
 that towards such of the said persons as have, 
 since their ejectment or sequestration, given, or 
 hereafter shall give, a real testimony of their god- 
 liness, and good affection to the present govern- 
 ment, so much tenderness shall be used, as may 
 consist with the safety and good of the nation."* 
 
 " The severities of this declaration," says Dr. 
 Walker, " seem to have completed the miseries of 
 the loyal clergy, and were, on this account, more 
 the effect of pure and unmixed cruelty, than any of 
 the former ordinances. Forasmuch as the poor 
 livelihoods now taken from the royalists, were of 
 such a nature, that they could not be distributed 
 (as the rich livings had been) among their own 
 clergy. Nor were they of so much consideration, 
 as to move either their envy, or their covetous- 
 ness. Several of the former ordinances had indeed 
 ejected them from the schools, as well as the 
 livings, and taken care that they should not be 
 employed again in either of them. But this 
 
 • Harleian Miscellany, vol. v, p. 249. Walker's Suffering* 
 of the Clergy, part, i, p. 194, 
 
380 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 declaration first hunted them out of the private 
 famihes of such as were wiUing to entertain them 
 for chaplains or tutors. And, though the peace 
 of the kingdom was made the pretence, the plain 
 effect was, the starving both of themselves and 
 their famihes, as far as the directions and orders 
 of this declaration could do it."* Neal and 
 Harris, both not very friendly to the loyal clergy, 
 acknowledge the cruelty of this ordinance : the 
 former says, " This was a severe and terrible 
 order upon the episcopalians, and absolutely 
 unjustifiable in itself:" the words of the latter 
 are the following: This *' edict against the epis- 
 copal clergy was very cruel, as it deprived them 
 in a good measure of their maintenance, and of 
 their liberty of worshipping God according as 
 appeared best to their own understanding." " It 
 would be useless to spend words in exposing the 
 cruelty of this declaration. Persecution is written 
 on the face of it ; nor is it capable of a vindi- 
 cation, "f 
 
 These last degrees of extremity, to which the 
 
 * Sufferings of the Clergy, part, i, p. 194. 
 
 It is also said that Crorawell took care that the Loyalists 
 should have no employment at home or abroad ; that they 
 should have nothing to subsist by ; and also enacted, that it 
 should be penaly if they went about to beg ! ! Ibid, supra, 
 
 t See Hist, of the Puritans, vol. iv, p. 136, and Life of 
 Oliver Cromwell, p. 429, ed. 1814. 
 
PETITIONS TO THE PROTECTOR. 381 
 
 injunctions of this declaration reduced the loyal 
 clergy, compelled some of their brethren, to ven- 
 ture themselves before Cromwell in behalf of those 
 miserable sufferers. Dr. Gauden presented a 
 petitionary remonstrance to the protector against 
 this order: and some of the most considerable 
 episcopal clergy on the issuing forth of this decree, 
 applied to Archbishop Usher to use his interest 
 with the protector : " that as he granted liberty 
 of conscience to almost all sorts of religions, so 
 the episcopal divines might have the same freedom 
 of serving God in their private congregations, 
 (since they were not permitted the public 
 churches) according to the liturgy of the church 
 of England ; and that neither the ministers, nor 
 those that frequented that service, might be any 
 more hindered or disturbed by his soldiers. So 
 according to their desires, continues Dr. Parr, 
 the biographer of Archbishop Usher, ** he went 
 and used his utmost endeavours with Cromwell, 
 for the taking off this restraint, which was at last 
 promised, (though with some difficulty) that they 
 should not be molested, provided they meddled 
 not with any matters relating to his government:'' 
 but when the primate went to him again, to get 
 this promise ratified and put into writing, he found 
 the protector under the hands of his surgeon, who 
 was dressing a great boil that he had then upon 
 his breast. He desired the primate to sit down, 
 
382 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 and said he would speak with him when the 
 dressino^ was over. Whilst "it was doing, he said 
 to the primate, ' if this core, (pointing to the boil) 
 were once out, I should quickly be well.' To 
 which the primate replied, " 1 doubt the core lies 
 deeper ; there is a core at the heart that must be 
 taken out, or else it will not be well." * Ah! 
 replied Cromwell,' seemingly unconcerned, ' so 
 there is indeed,' and sighed. But when the pri- 
 mate began to speak of the business he came 
 about, he answered to this effect, * that he had 
 since better considered it, having advised with 
 his council, who thought it not safe for him to 
 grant liberty of conscience to those sort of men, 
 who are restless and implacable enemies to him 
 and his government,' and so took his leave with 
 good words and outward civility. The Lord 
 Primate seeing it was in vain to urge it any further, 
 said little more to him, but returned to his 
 lodgings very much troubled, and concerned that 
 his endeavours had met with no better success. 
 When he was in his chamber, he said to some of 
 his relations, and Dr. Parr who came to visit him, 
 *' This false man hath broken his word with me, 
 and refuses to perform what he promised. Well, 
 he will have little cause to glory in his wicked- 
 ness, for he will not continue long. The king 
 will return : though I shall not live to see it, you 
 may. The government, both in church and state, 
 
SONS OF THE CLERGY. 38S 
 
 is in confusion. The papists aire advancing their 
 projects, and making such advantages as will 
 hardly be prevented."* 
 
 *'This truly venerable primate," says Harris, 
 **had reason to be out of humour. For whatever 
 might have been the practices of many of the 
 episcopal clergy, it is certain there were amongst 
 them wise, pious, learned, and peaceable men, 
 who merited a very different treatment from this 
 which was given them by Oliver." However it 
 has been before mentioned that some worthy 
 episcipal clergy were connived at, or permitted to 
 officiate in the churches, and probably all of them 
 did not suffer inconveniences on account of this 
 severe declaration. It must be allowed that 
 some small degree of tenderness was used towards 
 some, though there is no doubt but many innocent 
 and worthy men must have received very hard 
 measure, f 
 
 The charitable society for the relief of the 
 widows and children of clergymen, since known 
 by the name of the Corporation for the Sons of the 
 Clergy y commenced in the year 1655. The first 
 sermon was preached by the Rev. George Hall, 
 M. A. son of Bishop Hall, then minister of St. 
 Botolph's, Aldersgate, afterwards chaplain to King 
 
 * Dr. Parr's Life of Usher, p. 76. 
 
 t See Harris's Life of Oliver Cromwell, pp. 430, 431. 
 
384 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 Charles II. Archdeacon of Canterbury and Bishop 
 of Chester. The sermon was entitled, '' God's 
 
 APPEARING FOR THE TRIBE OF LEVI, improved 
 
 in a sermon preached at St. PauVs, Nov. 8, 1655, 
 to the sons of ministers then solemnly assembled, 
 from Numb, xvii, 8. The rod of Aaron bud- 
 ded, AND bloomed blossoms, AND YIELDED 
 
 ALMONDS. The preacher's design was to enforce 
 the necessity and usefulness of a settled ministry ; 
 though his sermon discovered him to be a 
 minister of the church of England, yet it breathed 
 moderation and christian charity : " Let those 
 ill -invented terms," said he, *' whereby we have 
 been distinguished from each other, be swal- 
 lowed up in that name which will lead us hand 
 in hand to heaven — the name of christians. 
 If my stomach, or any of yours, rise against the 
 name of brotherly communion, which may consist 
 with our several principles retained, not differing 
 in substantials, God take down that stomach, and 
 make us see how much we are concerned to keep 
 the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace. Why 
 should some, in the height of their zeal for a 
 liturgy, suppose there can be no service of God 
 but where that is used ? Why should others, 
 again, think their piety concerned and trespassed 
 upoH, if I prefer, and think fit to use a set form? 
 There must be abatements and allowances of 
 each other ; a coming down from our punctilios, 
 
SONS OF THE CLERGY. 385 
 
 or we shall never give up a good account to God. 
 This noble charity from that time gradually 
 increased, by collections at annual sermons, and 
 other large contributions and donations, and was 
 established by charter in the reign of Charles II. 
 and so the society became a body corporate : and 
 their present flourishing condition is well known 
 to the whole nation.* 
 
 From this time to the death of Bishop Hall in 
 the following year, and ^indeed to the restoration, 
 the general calamity continued. 
 
 • Neal's Hist, of the Puritans, vol. iv, pp. 142, 143. War- 
 ner's Eccles. Hist, of England, vol. ii, p. 586. 
 
 C c 
 
CHAPTER XI. 
 
 As a review of the proceedings of the long 
 parliament against the church, and of the suf- 
 ferings of the bishops and clergy, it may be 
 proper here to annex 
 
 BISHOP HALL'S HARD MEASURE. 
 
 '* Nothing could be more plain, than that, on 
 the call of this parliament, and before, there was a 
 general plot and resolution of the faction to alter 
 the government of the church especially. The 
 height and insolency of some church governors, as 
 was conceived, and the ungrounded imposition of 
 some innovations on the churches both of Scot- 
 land and England, gave a fit hint to the project. 
 
 " In the vacancy, therefore, before the sum- 
 mons, and immediately after it, there was great 
 working secretly for the designation and election, 
 as of knights and burgesses, so especially, beyond 
 all former use, of the clerks of convocation : 
 when now the clergy were stirred up to contest 
 with and oppose their diocesans, for the choice 
 
HARD MEASURE. 387 
 
 of such men as were most inclined to the favour 
 of an alteration. 
 
 " The parliament was no sooner sat, than many 
 vehement speeches were made against established 
 church government, and enforcement of extirpa- 
 tion both root and branch. 
 
 " And, because it was not fit to set upon all at 
 once, the resolution was to begin with those 
 bishops which had subscribed to the canons then 
 lately published, upon the shutting up of the for- 
 mer parliament: whom they would first have had 
 accused of treason ; but that not appearing 
 feasible, they thought best to indict them of very 
 high crimes and offences against the king, the 
 parliament, and kingdom : which was prosecuted 
 with great earnestness by some prime lawyers in 
 the house of commons, and entertained with 
 like fervency by some zealous lords in the house 
 of peers ; every of those particular canons being 
 pressed to the most envious and dangerous 
 height that was possible : the archbishop of York 
 (was designed for the report) aggravating Mr. 
 Maynard's criminations to the utmost, not with- 
 out some interspersions of his own. The counsel 
 of the accused bishops gave in such a demurring 
 answer, as stopped the mouth of that heinous 
 indictment. 
 
 " When this prevailed not, it was contrived to 
 draw petitions accusatory from many parts of 
 
 Cc 2 
 
388 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 the kingdom against episcopal government; and 
 the promoters of the petitions were entertained 
 with great respects : whereas the many petitions 
 of the opposite part, though subscribed with many 
 thousand hands, were sHghted and disregarded. 
 
 " Withal, the rabble of London, after their 
 petitions cunningly and upon other pretences pro- 
 cured, were stirred up to come to the houses 
 personally to crave justice both against the earl 
 of Strafford, first; and, then, against the arch- 
 bishop of Canterbury; and, lastly, against the 
 whole order of bishops ; which, coming at first 
 unarmed, were checked by some well-willers, 
 and easily persuaded to gird on their rusty 
 swords ; and, so accoutred, came by thousands 
 to the houses, filling all the outer rooms, offering 
 foul abuses to the bishops as they passed, crying 
 out * No bishops, no bishops ! ' and, at last, after 
 divers days' assembling, grown to that height of 
 fury, that many of them, whereof Sir Richard 
 Wiseman professed (though to his cost) to be 
 captain, came with resolution of some violent 
 courses, insomuch that many swords were drawn 
 hereon at Westminster, and the rout did not stick 
 openly to profess that they would pull the 
 bishops in pieces. Messages were sent down to 
 them from the lords. They still held firm, both 
 to the place and their bloody resolutions. It 
 now grew to be torch light. One of the lords, 
 the Marquis of Hertford, came up to the bishops' 
 
HARD MEASURE. 389 
 
 form, told us, that we were in great danger, 
 advised us to take some course for our own 
 safety; and, being desired to tell us what he 
 thought was the best way, counselled us to con 
 tinue in the parHaraent house all that night: 
 ' For,' saith he, * these people tow they will 
 watch you at your going out, and will search 
 every coach for you with torches, so as you 
 cannot escape.' Hereupon the house of lords was 
 moved for some order for the preventing their 
 mutinous and riotous meetings. Messages were 
 sent down to the house of commons to this 
 purpose more than once : nothing was effected ; 
 but, for the present (forsomuch as all the danger 
 was at the rising of the house) it was earnestly 
 desired of the lords that some care might be 
 taken of our safety. The motion was received 
 by some lords with a smile. Some other lords, 
 as the earl of Manchester, undertook the protec- 
 tion of the archbishop of York and his company 
 (whose shelter I went under) to their lodgings. 
 The rest, some of them by their long stay, others 
 by secret and far-fetched passages, escaped home. 
 "It was not for us to venture any more to the 
 house without some better assurance. Upon our 
 resolved forbearance therefore, the archbishop of 
 York sent for us to his lodging at Westminster ; 
 lays before us the perilous condition we were 
 in ; advises for remedy, except we meant utterly 
 to abandon our right and to desert our station in 
 
390 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 parliament, to petition both his Majesty and the 
 parliament, that, since we were legally called by 
 his Majesty's writ to give our attendance in par- 
 liament, we might be secured, in the performance 
 of our duty and service, against those dangers that 
 threatened us ; and, withal, to protest against any 
 such acts as should be made during the time of 
 our forced absence: for which he assured us 
 there were many precedents in former parlia- 
 ments ; and which, if we did not, we should 
 betray the trust committed to us by his Majesty, 
 and shamefully betray and abdicate the due right 
 both of ourselves and successors. 
 
 ** To this purpose, in our presence, he drew up 
 the said petition and protestation ; avowing it to 
 be legal, just, and agreeable to all former pro- 
 ceedings; and, being fair written, sent it to our 
 several lodgings for our hands : which we accor- 
 dingly subscribed, intending yet to have had some 
 further consultation concerning the delivering and 
 whole carriage of it. But, ere we could suppose 
 it to be in any hand but his own, the first news 
 we heard was, that there were messengers 
 addressed to fetch us in to the parliament, on an 
 accusation of high treason. For, whereas this 
 paper was to have been delivered, first to his 
 Majesty's secretary ; and, after perusal by him, 
 to his Majesty ; and, after, from his Majesty to 
 the parhament; and, for that purpose, to the Lord 
 
HARD MEASURE. 391 
 
 Keeper, the Lord Littleton, who was the speaker 
 of the house of peers ; all these professed not to 
 have perused it at all : but the said Lord Keeper, 
 willing enough to take this advantage of engratiat- 
 ing himself with the house of commons and the 
 faction, to which he knew himself sufficiently 
 obnoxious, finding what use might be made of it 
 by prejudicate minds, reads the same openly in 
 the house of the lords : and, when he found some 
 of the faction apprehensive enough of miscon- 
 struction, aggravates the matter, as highly offen- 
 sive and of dangerous consequence; and, there- 
 upon, not without much heat and vehemence, and 
 with an ill preface, it is sent down to the house of 
 commons: where it was entertained heinously; 
 Glynne, with a full mouth, crying it up for no less 
 than a high treason ; and some comparing, yea 
 preferring, it to the powder plot. 
 ' ^* We, poor souls, who little thought that we had 
 done any thing that might deserve a chiding, are 
 now called to our knees at the bar, and charged 
 severally with high treason; being not a little 
 astonished at the suddenness of this crimination, 
 compared with the perfect innocence of our own 
 intentions, which were only to bring us to our due 
 places in parliament with safety and speed, 
 without the least purpose of any man's offence. 
 
 " But, now, traitors we are in all the haste, and 
 must be dealt with accordingly : for, on January 
 
392 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 301h,* in all the extremity of frost, at eight o'clock 
 in the dark evening, are we voted to the Tower : 
 only two of our number had the favor of the black 
 rod, by reason of their age; which, though 
 desired by a noble lord on my behalf, would not 
 be yielded. Wherein I acknowledge and bless 
 the gracious providence of my God : for, had I 
 been gratified, I had been undone both in body 
 and purse; the rooms being strait, and the 
 expense beyond the reach of my estate. 
 
 " The news of this our crime and imprisonment 
 soon flew over the city; and was entertained 
 by our well-willers, with ringing of bells and 
 bonfires : who now gave us up, not without great 
 triumph, for lost men ; railing on our perfidious- 
 ness, and adjudging us to what foul deaths 
 they pleased. And what scurrile and malicious 
 pamphlets were scattered abroad, throughout the 
 kingdojB and in foreign parts, blazoning our 
 infamy, and exaggerating our treasonable practices ! 
 What insultations of our adversaries was here ! 
 
 " Being caged sure enough in the Tower, the 
 faction had now fair opportunities to work their 
 own designs. They, therefore, taking the advan- 
 tage of our restraint, renew that bill of theirs, 
 
 * It should be December 30, for the date of the Letter from 
 the Tower is January 24, 1641. See Bishop Hall's Works, 
 ▼ol. i, p. liii, and p. 398 of this volume. 
 
HARD MEASURE. 393 
 
 which had been twice before rejected since the 
 beginning of this session, for taking away the 
 votes of the bishops in parHament ; and, in a very 
 thin house, easily passed it: which once conde- 
 scended unto, I know not by what strong impor- 
 tunity, his Majesty's assent was drawn from him 
 thereunto. 
 
 ** We now, instead of looking after our wonted 
 honor, must bend our thoughts on the guarding of 
 our lives ; which were, with no small eagerness, 
 pursued by the violent agents of the faction. 
 Their sharpest wits and greatest lawyers were 
 employed to advance our impeachment to the 
 height, but the more they looked into the busi- 
 ness, the less crime could they find to fasten on 
 us: insomuch as one of their oracles, being 
 demanded his judgment concerning the fact, pro- 
 fessed to them, they might with as good reason 
 accuse us of adultery.* Yet, still, there are we 
 fast: only, upon petition to the lords, obtaining this 
 favor, that we might have counsel assigned us : 
 which after much reluctation, and many menaces 
 from the commons against any man of all the 
 commoners of England that should dare to be 
 seen to plead in this case against the representa- 
 tive body of the commons, was granted us. The 
 lords assigned us five very worthy lawyers, which 
 
 * See Walker's Sufferings of the Clergy, part i, p. 7. 
 
394 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 were nominated to them by us. What trouble 
 and charj^e it was to procure those eminent and 
 much employed counsellors to come to the 
 Tower to us ; and to observe the strict laws of 
 the place, for the time of their ingress, regress, 
 and stay ; it is not hard to judge, 
 
 *' After we had lain some weeks there, however, 
 the house of commons, on the first tender of our 
 impeachment, had desired we might be brought 
 to a speedy trial ; yet now, finding belike how 
 little ground they had for so high an accusation, 
 they began to slack their pace, and suffered us 
 rather to languish under the fear of so dreadful 
 arraignment: insomuch as now we are fain to 
 petition the lords that we might be brought to our 
 trial. 
 
 " The day was set: several summons were sent 
 unto us : the lieutenant had his warrant to bring us 
 to the bar: our impeachment was severally read : 
 we pleaded * not guilty,' modo et forma ; and 
 desired speedy proceedings: which were accord- 
 ingly promised, but not too hastily performed. 
 
 " After long expectation, another day was 
 appointed for the prosecution of this high charge. 
 The lieutenant brought us again to the bar; but, 
 with what shoutings, and exclamations, and 
 furious expressions of the enraged multitudes, it 
 is not easy to apprehend. Being thither brought, 
 and severally charged on our knees, and having 
 
HARD MEASURE. 395 
 
 given our negative answers to every particular, 
 two bishops, London and Winchester, were called 
 in as witnesses against us, as in that point, 
 whether they apprehended any such cause of fears 
 in the tumults assembled, as that we were in 
 danger of our lives in coming to the parliament : 
 who seemed to incline to a favourable report of 
 the perils threatened ; though one of them was 
 convinced out of his own mouth, from the relations 
 himself had made at the archbishop of York's 
 lodging. After this. Wild and Glynne made 
 fearful declamations at the bar against us; 
 aggravating all the circumstances of our pretended 
 treason to the highest pitch. Our counsel were 
 all ready at the bar to plead for us, in answer of 
 their clamorous and envious suggestions : but it 
 was answered, that it was now too late, we should 
 have another day : which day, to this day, never 
 came. 
 
 ** The circumstances of that day's hearing were 
 more grievous to us than the substance : for we 
 were all thronged so miserably in that strait room 
 before the bar, by reason that the whole house of 
 commons would be there to see the prizes of 
 their champions played, that we stood the whole 
 afternoon in no small torture ; sweating and strug- 
 gling T\nth a merciless multitude ; till, being dis- 
 missed, we were exposed to a new and greater 
 danger. For now, in the dark, we must to the 
 
396 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 Tower ; by barge, as we came : and must shoot 
 the bridge, with no small peril. That God, under 
 whose merciful protection we are, returned us to 
 our safe custody. 
 
 *' There now we lay some weeks longer, expect- 
 ing the summons for our counsels' answer ; but, 
 instead thereof, our merciful adversaries, well 
 finding how sure they would be foiled in that 
 unjust charge of treason, now, under pretences of 
 remitting the height of rigor, wave their former 
 impeachment of treason against us, and fall on an 
 accusation of high misdemeanors in that our 
 protestation, and will have us prosecuted as guilty 
 of a Premunire: although, as we conceive, the 
 law hath ever been in the parliamentary proceed- 
 ings, that, if a man were impeached, as of treason, 
 being the highest crime, the accusant must hold 
 him to the proof of the charge, and may not fall 
 to any meaner impeachment on failing of the 
 higher. 
 
 " But, in this case of ours, it fell out otherwise : 
 for, although the lords had openly promised us, 
 that nothing should be done against us, till we 
 and our counsel were heard in our defence ; yet 
 the next news we heard was, the house of com- 
 mons had drawn up a bill against us, wherein 
 they declared us to be delinquents of a very high 
 nature, and had thereon desired to have it enacted 
 that all our spiritual means should be taken 
 
HARD MEASURE. 397 
 
 away : only there should be a yearly allowance 
 to every bishop for his maintenance, according to 
 a proportion by them set down; wherein they 
 were pleased that ray share should come to four 
 hundred pounds per annum. This bill was sent 
 up to the lords, and by them also passed : and 
 there hath ever since lain. 
 
 ** This being done, after some weeks more; find- 
 ing the Tower, besides the restraint, chargeable; 
 we petitioned the lords, that we might be admitted 
 to bail, and have liberty to return to our homies. 
 The Earl of Essex moved : the lords assented, 
 took our bail, sent to the lieutenant of the Tower 
 for our discharge. How glad were we to fly out 
 of our cage ! 
 
 " No sooner was I got to my lodging, than I 
 thought to take a little fresh air in St. James's 
 Park; and, in my return to my lodging in the 
 Dean's Yard, passing through Westminster Hall, 
 was saluted by divers of my parliament acquaint- 
 ance, and welcomed to my liberty ; whereupon 
 some, that looked upon me with an evil eye, run 
 into the house, and complained thai the bishops 
 were let loose :• which, it seems, was not well 
 taken by the house of commons; who presently 
 sent a kind of expostulation to the lords, that 
 they had dismissed so heinous offenders without 
 their knowledge and consent. 
 
 Scarce had 1 rested me in my lodging, when 
 
398 LIFE OP BISHOP HALL. 
 
 there comes a messenger to me with the sad 
 news, of sending' me and the rest of my brethren 
 the bishops back to the Tower again: from 
 whence we came, thither we must go ; and thither 
 I went with a heavy, but I thank God, not impa- 
 tient heart. 
 
 " After we had continued there some six weeks 
 longer, and earnestly petitioned to return to our 
 several charges, we were on five thousand pound 
 bond dismissed ; with a clause of revocation at a 
 short warning, if occasion should require. 
 
 " Thus having spent the time betwixt new year's 
 even and whitsuntide in those safe walls, where 
 we by turns preached every Lord's day to a large 
 auditory of citizens, we disposed of ourselves to 
 the places of our several abode. 
 
 " For myself, addressing myself to Norwich, 
 whither it was his Majesty's pleasure to remove 
 me, I was at the first received with more respect 
 than in such times I could have expected. 
 There I preached, the day after my arrival, to a 
 numerous and attentive people : neither was 
 sparing of my pains in this kind ever since; till 
 the times, growing every day more impatient of 
 a bishop, threatened my silencing. 
 
 " There, though with some secret murmurs of 
 disaffected persons, I enjoyed peace till the ordi- 
 nance of sequestration came forth, which was in 
 the latter end of March following ; then, when 
 
HARD MEASURE. 399 
 
 I was in hope of receiving the profits of the fore- 
 going half year for the maintenance of my family, 
 were all my rents stopped and diverted ; and, 
 in the April following, came the sequestrators, 
 viz. Mr. Sotherton, Mr.Tooley, Mr. Raw ley, Mr. 
 Greenwood, &c. to the palace ; and told me, 
 that, by virtue of an ordinance of parliament, 
 they must seize on the palace, and all the estate 
 I had, both real and personal ; and, accordingly, 
 sent certain men appointed by them, whereof 
 one had been burnt in the hand for the mark of 
 his truth, to apprise all the goods that were in 
 the house : which they accordingly executed with 
 all diligent severity ; not leaving so much as a 
 dozen of trenchers, or my children's pictures, 
 out of their curious inventory. Yea, they would 
 have apprised our very wearing clothes, had not 
 Alderman Tooley and Sheriff Rawley, to whom 
 I sent to require their judgment concerning the 
 ordinance in this pointy declared their opinion to 
 the contrary. 
 
 "These goods, both library and household stuff 
 of all kinds, were appointed to be exposed to 
 public sale. Much inquiry there was when the 
 goods should be brought to the market; but, in 
 the mean time, Mrs. Goodwin, a religious good 
 gentlewoman, whom- yet we had never known or 
 seen, being moved with compassion, very kindly 
 offered to lay down to the sequestrators that 
 
400 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 whole sum which the goods were valued at; and 
 was pleased to leave them in our hands for our 
 use, till we might be able to re-purchase them : 
 which she did accordingly, and had the goods 
 formally delivered to her by Mr. Smith and Mr. 
 Greenwood, two sequestrators. As for the books, 
 several stationers looked on them ; but were not 
 forward to buy them : at last, Mr. Cook, a worthy 
 divine of this diocese, gave bond to the sequestra- 
 tors, to pay to them the whole sum whereat they 
 were set : which was afterwards satisfied out of 
 that poor pittance that was allowed me for my 
 maintenance. As for my evidences, they required 
 them from me. I denied them, as not holding 
 myself bound to deliver them. They nailed and 
 sealed up the door, and took such as they found 
 with me. 
 
 " But, before this, the first noise that I heard of 
 my trouble was, that, one morning, before my 
 servants were up, there came to my gates one 
 Wright, a London trooper, attended with others, 
 requiring entrance : threatening, if they were not 
 admitted, to break open the gates : whom I 
 found, at my first sight, struggling with one of my 
 servants for a pistol which he had in his hand. I 
 demanded his business at that unseasonable time. 
 He told me, he came to search for arms and 
 ammunition, of which I must be disarmed. I 
 told him I had only two muskets in the house, 
 
HARD MEASURE. 401 
 
 and no other military provision. He, not resting 
 upon my word, searched round about the house, 
 looked into the chests and trunks, examined the 
 vessels in the cellar. Finding no other warlike 
 furniture, he asked me what horses I had, for his 
 commission was to take them also. I told him 
 how poorly I was stored, and that my age would 
 not allow me to travel on foot. In conclusion, he 
 took oile horse, for the present : and such accompt 
 of another, that he did highly expostulate with 
 me afterwards, that I had otherwise disposed of 
 him. 
 
 " Now not only my rents present, but the arrear- 
 ages of the former years which I had in favor 
 forborne to some tenants, being treacherously 
 confessed to the sequestrators, were by them 
 called for, and taken from me. Neither was there 
 any course at all taken for my maintenance. I 
 therefore addressed myself to the committee sit- 
 ting here at Norwich ; and desired them to give 
 order for some means, out of that large patrimony 
 of the church, to be allowed me. They all thought 
 it very just; and, there being present Sir Thomas 
 Woodhouse and Sir John Potts, parliament men, 
 it was moved, and held fit by them and the rest, 
 that the proportion which the votes of the parlia- 
 ment had pitched on, viz. four hundred pounds 
 per annum, should be allowed to me. My Lord 
 
 D d 
 
402 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 of Manchester, who was then conceived to have 
 great power in matter of these sequestrations, was 
 moved herewith. He apprehended it very just 
 and reasonable ; and wrote to the committee 
 here, to set out so many of the manors belonging 
 to this bishoprick, as should amount to the said 
 sum of four hundred pounds annually ; which was 
 answerably done, under the hands of the whole 
 table. 
 
 *' And now 1 well hoped, I should yet have a 
 good competency of maintenance out of that 
 plentiful estate which I might have had : but 
 those hopes were no sooner conceived than 
 dashed ; for, before I could gather up one 
 quarter's rent, there comes down an order 
 from the committee for sequestrations above, 
 under the hand of Sergeant Wild the chairman, 
 procured by Mr. Miles Corbet, to inhibit any 
 such allowance; and telling our committee 
 here, that neither they, nor any other, had 
 power to allow me any thing at all : but, if 
 my wife found herself to need a maintenance, 
 on her suit to the committee of lords and 
 commons, it might be granted that she should 
 have a fifth part, according to the ordinance, 
 allowed for the sustentation of herself and 
 her family. Hereupon she sends a petition up to 
 that committee ; which, after a long delay, was 
 
HARD MEASURE. 403 
 
 admitted to be read, and an order was granted for 
 the fifth part. * 
 
 V ^*But still the rents and revenues, both of my 
 spiritual and temporal lands, were taken up by 
 the sequestrators, both in Norfolk, and Suffolk, 
 and Essex, and we kept off from either allowance 
 or accompt. 
 
 ** At last, upon much pressing, Beadle the solici- 
 tor, and Rust the collector, brought in an account 
 to the committee, such as it was ; but so confused 
 and perplexed, and so utterly unperfect, that we 
 could never come to know what a fifth part 
 meant : but they were content that I should eat 
 my books, by setting off the sum engaged for 
 them out of the fifth part. Meantime, the syno- 
 dalls, both in Norfolk and Suffolk, and all the 
 spiritual profits of the diocese, were also kept 
 back : only ordinations and institutions continued 
 awhile. 
 
 ** But after the covenant was appointed to be 
 taken, and was generally swallowed of both 
 clergy and laity, my power of ordination was, 
 with some strange violence, restrained : for when 
 I was going on in my wonted course, which no 
 law or ordinance had inhibited, certain forward 
 volunteers in the city, banding together, stir up 
 
 * See Walker's Sufferings of the Clergy, for a full account of 
 the^ifApart allowed to delinquents, pp. 99-104, part i. 
 
 D d 2 
 
404 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 the mayor and aldermen and sheriffs to call me to 
 an account for an open violation of their covenant. 
 " To this purpose, divers of them came to my 
 gates at a very unseasonable time; and, knocking 
 very vehemently, required to speak with the 
 Bishop. Messages were sent to them to know 
 their business : nothing would satisfy them but 
 the Bishop's presence. At last, I came down to 
 them, and demanded what the matter was: they 
 would have the gate opened, and then they would 
 tell me. 1 answered that I would know them 
 better first : if they had any thing to say to me, I 
 was ready to hear them. They told me they had 
 a writing to me, from Mr. Mayor, and some other 
 of their magistrates. The paper contained both a 
 challenge of me for breaking the covenant, in 
 ordaining ministers ; and, withal, required me to 
 give in the names of those, which were ordained 
 by me both then and formerly since the covenant. 
 My answer was, that Mr. Mayor was much 
 abused by those who had misinformed him, and 
 draw^n that paper from him ; that I would the 
 next day give a full answer to the writing. They 
 moved that my answer might be by my personal 
 appearance at the Guildhall. I asked them when 
 they ever heard of a bishop of Norwich appearing 
 before a mayor. I knew mine ow n place ; and 
 would take that way of answer which I thought 
 fit ; and so dismissed them, who had given out 
 
HARD MEASURE. 405 
 
 that day, that had they known before of mine 
 ordaining, they wonld have fiulled nie and those 
 whom I had ordained out of the chapel by the 
 ears. 
 
 *' While I received nothing, yet something was 
 required of me. They were not ashamed, after 
 they had taken away and sold all my goods and 
 personal estate, to come to me for assessments 
 and monthly payments for that estate which they 
 had taken ; and took distresses from me, upon my 
 most just denial ; and vehemently required me to 
 find the wonted arms of my predecessors, when 
 they had left me nothing. 
 
 " Many insolencies and affronts were, in all this 
 time, put upon us. One while, a whole rabble of 
 volunteers came to my gates late, when they were 
 locked up, and called for the porter to give them 
 entrance : which being not yielded, they threat- 
 ened to make by force ; and, had not the said 
 gates been very strong, they had done it. Others 
 of them clambered over the walls, and would 
 come into my house : their errand, they said, was 
 to search for delinquents: what they would have 
 done 1 know not, had not we by a secret way 
 sent to raise the officers for our rescue. Another 
 while, the Sheriff' Toftes and Alderman Linsey, 
 attended with many zealous followers, came into 
 my chapel, to look for superstitious pictures 
 and relics of idolatry ; and sent for me, to let me 
 
406 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL, 
 
 know they found those windows full of images, 
 which were very offensive, and must be demo- 
 lished.^ I told them they were the pictures of 
 some ancient and worthy bishops, as St. Ambrose, 
 Austin, &c. It was answered me, that they 
 were so many popes; and one younger man 
 amongst the rest (Townsend, as I perceived after- 
 wards) would take on him to defend that every 
 diocesan bishop was pope. I answered him with 
 some scorn ; and obtained leave that I might, 
 with the least loss and defacing of the windows, 
 give order for taking off that offence ; which I did, 
 by causing the heads of those pictures to be taken 
 off, since I knew the bodies could not offend. 
 
 " There was not that care and moderation used 
 in reforming the cathedral church bordering on 
 my palace, f It is no other than tragical, to relate 
 the carriage of that furious sacrilege, whereof our 
 eyes and ears were the sad witnesses, under the 
 authority and presence of Linsey, Toftes the 
 sheriff, and Greenwood. Lord, what work was 
 here ! what clattering of glasses ! what beating 
 down of walls ! what tearing up of monuments ! 
 what pulling down of seats I what wresting out of 
 irons and brass from the windows and graves ! 
 
 * See Walker's Sufferings of the Clergy, p. 24, part i. 
 
 t This sacrilegious outrage was committed on June 10, 1644. 
 
HARD MEASURE. 407 
 
 what defacing of arms! what demolishing of 
 curious stone-work, that had not any representa- 
 tion in the world, but only of the cost of the 
 founder, and skill of the mason ! what tooting and 
 piping on the destroyed organ pipes ! and what a 
 hideous triumph on the market-day before all the 
 country; when, in a kind of sacrilegious and 
 profane procession, all the organ pipes, vestments, 
 both copes and surplices, together with the leaden 
 cross which had been newly sawn down from 
 over the Green-yard pulpit, and the service-books 
 and singing-books that could be had, were carried 
 to the fire in the public market-place; a lewd 
 wretch walking before the train, in his cope trail- 
 ing in the dirt, with a service-book in his hand, 
 imitating in an impious scorn the tune, and usurp- 
 ing the words pf the litany used formerly in the 
 church. Near the public cross, all these monu- 
 ments of idolatry must be sacrificed to the fire 
 not without much ostentation of a zealous joy, in 
 discharging ordnance, to the cost of some, who 
 professed how much they had longed to see that 
 day. Neither was it any news upon this Guild-day, 
 to have the cathedral, now open on all sides, to be 
 filled with musketeers, waiting for the Major's 
 return ; drinking and tobacconing as freely, as if 
 it had turned alehouse. 
 
 ** Still yet I remained in my palace, though with 
 but a poor retinue and means ; but the house was 
 
408 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 held too good for me. Many messages were sent 
 by Mr. Corbet to remove me thence. The first 
 pretence was, that the committee, who was now 
 at charge for a house to sit in, might make their 
 daily session there; being a place both more 
 public, roomy, and chargeless. The committee, 
 after many consultations, resolved it convenient to 
 remove thither : though many overtures and offers 
 were made to the contrary. Mr. Corbet was 
 impatient of my stay there; and procures and 
 sends peremptory messages, for my present dis- 
 lodging ; we desired to have some time allowed 
 for providing some other mansion, if we must 
 needs be cast out of this ; which my wife was so 
 wiUing to hold, that she offered, if the charge of 
 the present committee house where the thing stood 
 upon, she would be content to defray the sum of the 
 rent of that house of her fifth part : but that might 
 not be yielded : out we must, and that in three 
 weeks' warning by Midsummer day then approach- 
 ing; so as we might have lain in the street for 
 aught I know, had not the providence of God so 
 ordered it, that a neighbour in the close, one Mr. 
 Gostlin, a widower, was content to void his house 
 for us. * 
 
 * In 1G42, or 1643, William Gostlin, the mayor of Norwich, 
 was sent, a prisoner to Cambridge, for refusing to sanction the 
 outrages of these reformers, — Topograph, and Histor. Account 
 of Norwich, p. 242. 
 
HIS SUFFERINGS. 409 
 
 "This hath been my measure; wherefore, I 
 know not : Lord, thou knowest, who only canst 
 remedy, and end, and forgive or avenge this 
 horrible oppression. 
 
 Scripgi, May 29, 1647. " JOS. NORVIC." 
 
 Bishop Hall, on account of the distractions 
 and calamities of the times, enjoyed but a very 
 short respite of peace and quietness, as bishop of 
 Norwich ; the aspect of the times threatened the 
 utmost severity against his order. He spent a 
 considerable portion of his old age under a perse- 
 cution, which has consigned his oppressors to 
 infamy ; many of whom would have been forgot- 
 ten, even in name, but for their unchristian-like 
 treatment of this eminent and meek divine. 
 Under all the scenes of oppression and violence, 
 his writings evince the spirit of the christian philo- 
 sopher, and are indeed his truest testimony. 
 About the beginning of April, 1643, the ordinance 
 for sequestering the estates of notorious delin- 
 quents having been passed, in which Bishop Hall, 
 and the other prelates, who had been committed 
 to the Tower, were included, the real and per- 
 sonal estates of those twelve prelates by name, 
 together with those of the archbishop of Canter- 
 bury, and the bishop of Norwich, were ordered to 
 be sequestered into the hands of commissioners. 
 
410 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 The estates also of all persons, whether ecclesi- 
 astical or temporal, who had discovered any affec- 
 tion to his Majesty, or any dislike to thei pro- 
 ceedings of this parliament, were ordered to be 
 sequestered. Many clergymen of eminent learn- 
 ing, and of blameless lives and conversations, who 
 were sound protestants and excellent preachers, 
 lost their estates and livelihoods through this 
 merciless ordinance. Even the piety, modera- 
 tion, and years of Bishop Hall could not save his 
 property from the rapacious hands of these 
 sequestrators, or protect his person from insult 
 and abuse. All his property, both real and per- 
 sonal, was seized upon and sequestered. The 
 doleful account which the bishop gives of his cruel 
 treatment in his '^ Hard Measure,'' cannot be 
 read without indignant emotions against his merci- 
 less oppressors. 
 
 If it may be asked, What crime or offence could 
 have induced them to treat a christian bishop in 
 so oppressive and cruel a manner ? The answer 
 is, he had been a strenuous advocate of - episco- 
 pacy, and of the church of England ; he had been 
 loyal to the king, and a faithful friend of the con- 
 stitution ; and had exposed by his excellent writ- 
 ings the evils and mischiefs of factious parties. 
 
 He was therefore harassed, sequestered, and 
 abused most cruelly. Half a year's rents, and 
 arrears of rents, which in compassion to his 
 
INSULTS. 411 
 
 tenants he had given them time to pay, were taken 
 from him. An inventory of all his goods in and 
 out of the palace was taken, even to a dozeit of 
 trenchers, and his children's pictures; even the 
 wearing apparel of himself and family would have 
 been appraised, had not two of the sequestrators, 
 to whom he appealed, forbidden it. All his fur- 
 niture, library, and goods would have been pub. 
 licly sold, had not some friends bought them at a 
 valuation, and so kindly left them to him, till he 
 should have been able to repurchase them. A 
 bond was given to the sequestrators to the full 
 value of the books, which they were appraised at ; 
 and it was paid out of that poor pittance oi fiftlis 
 allowed to his family. His synodals were for 
 some time kept from him, and afterwards all the 
 profits of the bishopric. He was several times 
 insulted in his palace at unseasonable hours. 
 Once, a London trooper, and others with him, 
 came very early to the palace before the family 
 were up, and threatened to break the gates, if 
 they were not admitted. When he got entrance, 
 he ransacked the whole house, under the pretence 
 of searching for arms and ammunition. After 
 having examined the chests, trunks, and vessels 
 in the cellar, and finding only two muskets, he 
 took away with him one of the bishop's two 
 horses, when the venerable and aged prelate told 
 him, " that his age would not allow him to travel 
 
412 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 on foot." When this trooper afterwards under- 
 stood that the bishop sold the other horse, he 
 highly expostulated with him for so doing. At 
 another time the palace was beset by a mob, 
 because he ordained some persons in his chapel 
 contrary to the covenant, and so insolently sum- 
 moned him to appear before the mayor. One while 
 a whole rabble of volunteers came to his gates at 
 a late hour, when they were locked up, demanding 
 admittance, and threatening to break the gates. 
 Some of them clambered over the walls, and 
 wanted to go into the palace to search for delin- 
 quents. These insolences, affronts, and many 
 other hardships almost impossible to be enume- 
 rated, Bishop Hall endured with astonishing 
 patience and resignation. 
 
 Parliament had agreed that £400. a year should 
 be given towards the support of himself and 
 family, in lieu of what they had deprived him of; 
 but no care was taken for the payment of this 
 money ; and when he applied to the committee in 
 Norwich, and had it confirmed to him by them, 
 an order was received from the superior committee 
 in London, prohibiting this allowance ; but inform- 
 ing the Norwich committee, that if the bishop's 
 wife was necessitated for a maintenance, upon 
 her suit to the lords and commons, it might be 
 granted, that she should have a fifth part. Appli- 
 cation was accordingly made, and, after a long 
 
FORTITUDE. 413 
 
 delay, the request was granted. But the accounts 
 of those godly sequestrators were so confused, 
 that it could not be said what a fifth was ; and 
 '* they were content that I should eat my books," 
 says the bishop, **by setting off the sum engaged 
 for them out of the fifth part.'' " Yet," says he 
 again, " while I received nothing, something was 
 required of me. They were not ashamed, after 
 they had taken away and sold all my goods and 
 personal estate, to come to me for assessments 
 and monthly payments for that estate which they 
 had taken ; and took distresses from me, upon 
 my most just denial, and vehemently required me 
 to find the wonted arms of my predecessors, when 
 they had left me nothing." 
 
 Bishop Hall published his Hard Measure about 
 the latter end of May, 1647, which probably 
 raised some commiseration in the hearts of those 
 who had usurped the authority in church and 
 state; for this year some small favor was shewn 
 to those bishops and others, who had lived peace- 
 ably, and had been only spectators of the distract- 
 ing miseries of their country. The committee 
 was ordered to pay the £800. a year granted to 
 Dr. Morton, bishop of Durham. Neal says that 
 Bishop Hairs real estate was discharged, but 
 Walker says, " 1 find indeed an order of Feb. 15, 
 1647, for taking off the sequestration, (which 
 doubtless was from \i\^ lemporals onXy ,) but I pre- 
 
414 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 sume it had just the same effect, (that is, just none 
 at-all) with the order for his pension of £400. per 
 afinum ; for his Hard Measure, wherein he so 
 justly complains of his horrible oppression, bears 
 date. May 29, following ; and he mentions not one 
 word there of any thing restored to him."* 
 Probably there was some lenity shewn him about 
 this time, though his hardships were very great, 
 which he bore with christian fortitude and 
 patience. " I have heard him oft," says Whitefoot 
 in his funeral sermon, ''bewail the spoils of the 
 church, but very rarely did he so much as mention 
 his own losses, hut took joyfully the spoiling of his 
 goods'' Archishop Usher had now an allowance 
 of £400. a year, till he could be otherwise pro- 
 vided for, and was soon after allowed to be a 
 preacher at Lincoln's Inn, upon his taking the 
 negative oath, f 
 
 * See Neal's Hist, of the Puritans, vol. iii, p. 394; and 
 Walker's Sufferings of the Clergy, part ii, p. 56. 
 
 t The negative oath was voted April 5, 1642. It ran thus : 
 " I, A. B. do swear from my heart, that I will not, directly or 
 indirectly, adhere unto or willingly assist the king in this war, 
 or in this cause against the parliament, nor any forces raised 
 without consent of the two houses of parliament, in this cause 
 or war. And I do likewise swear, that my coming and submit- 
 ting myself under the power and protection of parliament, is 
 without any manner of design whatsoever to the prejudice of the 
 proceedings of this present parliament, and without direction, 
 privity, or advice of the king, or any of his council or officers, 
 other than I have made known. So help me God."&c. 
 
LAST DAYS. 415 
 
 At last Bishop Hall was driven out of his 
 palace, without allowing him sufficient time to look 
 out for another residehce: though he requested 
 the favour of hiring the palace, and Mrs. Hall 
 offered to pay the rent out of the fifths allowed to 
 her, yet so much favor would not be shewn to 
 him ; he was turned out in three weeks' notice. 
 Being thus dispossessed, " we might," says he, 
 have lain in the street, for ought I know, had not 
 the providence of God so ordered it, that a neigh- 
 bour in the close, one Mr. Gostlin, a widower, was 
 content to void his house for us." 
 
 Afterwards the bishop and his family retired to 
 a small estate, which he rented at Heigham, a 
 hamlet in the western suburbs of Norwich, where 
 he terminated his earthly pilgrimage, after all the 
 outrages, persecutions, and hardships he endured 
 in those turbulent times, and entered into that rest 
 which remaineth for the people of God; where the 
 tvicked cease from trouhlvng, and' where ihetveary 
 are at rest. The bishop's house is still existing, 
 and is now a public house, whose sign is the 
 Dolphin. It is an ancient house built of flint, near 
 the church ; and has for about a century back 
 been a public house. Bloomfield says it was not 
 the bishop's private property, but hired. There 
 are the dates of 1587 and 1015 on it. Initials, B. 
 with a merchant's mark, and a coat of arms, 
 three herons. During his retirement at Heigham, 
 
416 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 our good bishop spent the remainder of his 
 days in doing all the good he could. He was 
 ready on all occasions to preach in any of the 
 churches in Norwich, as appears from several 
 sermons still extant, '' till he was first forbidden 
 by men, and at last disabled by God." And 
 when he could not preach as often, and as long as 
 he was able, he was " as diligent a hearer as he 
 had been a preacher ; how oft have we seen him," 
 says Whitefoot, " walking alone, like old Jacob, 
 with his staff, to Bethel, the house of God ! " 
 When he was in the eightieth year of his age, he 
 preached in Heigham church the forty-second 
 sermon in the fifth volume of his Works, intitled, 
 " Life a sojourning," on Sunday, July 1st, 1655, 
 from 1 Pet. i, 17. If ye call on the Fat her , who, 
 without respect of persons, judgeth according to 
 every mans work, pass the time of your sojourning 
 here in fear. The venerable and aged bishop on 
 this occasion observed to his audience, that " it 
 hath pleased the providence of my God so to 
 contrive it, that this day, this very morning, 
 fourscore years ago, I was born into the world. 
 ' A great time since,' ye are ready to say : and so 
 indeed it seems to you, that look at it forward ; 
 but to me, that look at it past, it seems so short, 
 that it is gone like a tale that is told, or a dream 
 by night, and looks but hke yesterday. It can 
 be no offence for me to say, that many of you. 
 
LAST YEARS. 417 
 
 who hear me this day, are not like to see so many 
 suns walk over your heads, as I have done. Yea, 
 what speak I of this ? There is not one of us, that 
 can assure himself of his continuance here one 
 day. We are all tenants at will ; and, for ought 
 we know, may be turned out of these clay cottages 
 at an hour's warning. Oh, then, what should we 
 do, but, as wise farmers, who know the time of 
 their lease is expiring and canaot be renewed, 
 carefully and seasonably provide ourselves of a 
 surer and more during tenure?" The minds of 
 the audience could not fail to be impressed by 
 such pertinent remarks from so venerable and aged 
 a pastor: indeed, it was the bishop's endeavour in 
 his last years to keep in view that house not made 
 with /laiids, eternal in the heavens, and to prepare 
 others for that change by his last writings and 
 sermons, which particularly treated "upon the 
 last things — death and judgment, heaven and 
 hell." 
 
 He spent much of his last years in devotion and 
 meditation, lamenting the sufferings and calami- 
 ties of church and state. Under all his sufferings, 
 he distributed a weekly charity to a certain num- 
 ber of poor widows out of the little which was 
 left him. He observed also a weekly fast with 
 his whole family, for the safety and preservation of 
 the king's person, until his Majesty was murdered. 
 During his last illness, he evinced extraordinary 
 
418 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 patienc'e and submission to the Divine will. He 
 was afflicted with violent and acute pains of 
 the stone and strangury, which he bore most 
 patiently, till death put an end to all his suf- 
 ferings and troubles. It is said that he punc- 
 tually foretold the night of his death, and accord- 
 ingly gave orders for the time and manner of his 
 funeral. He wf^jgathered to his fathers in a good 
 old age, dyli^ Sept. 8th, J 656, in the eighty- 
 second year l6f his age. In his will he bequeathed 
 to the town where he was born, and to the city 
 where he died, thirty pounds a-piece for the 
 benefit of poor widows. By his will, also, he 
 desired to be buried without any funeral pomp, 
 at the discretion of his executors, with this only 
 monition, That he did not hold God's house a 
 meet repository for the dead bodies of the greatest 
 saints.'^ From this clause it has been inferred 
 that he was buried in the churchyard of Heigham: 
 and from what we learn from his Works, how 
 that he particularly disliked burials in churches ; 
 especially from his sermon preached in the city of 
 
 * His will thus begins:—" In the rtame of God, Amen. I, 
 Joseph Hall, D.D. not worthy to be called Bishop of Norwich, 
 &c. First, I bequeath my soul, &c. My body I leave to be 
 interred, without any funeral pomp, at the discretion of my 
 executors; with this only monition, that 1 do not hold God's 
 house a meet repository for the dead bodies of the greatest 
 saints." — Fuller's Worthies, vol. i, p. 666. 
 
BURIAL. 419 
 
 Exeter, at the consecration of a burial ground 
 there, Aug. 24, 1637, it might be gathered that he 
 would not have been buried in the church ; for he 
 has very expressly and strongly pointed out in the 
 above sermon, the impropriety of the practice of 
 burying in churches.* But there is no doubt that 
 he was buried in the chancel of Heigham church, 
 under the mura] monument erected to his memory 
 on the south-side wall. Over his grave or vault 
 was a black marble stone, on which the Arms of 
 the see of Norwich impaling Hall's, surmounted 
 by a mitre, are engraved, with the following 
 inscription — 
 
 INDUVUE JOSEPHI HALL 
 
 GLIM NORVICENSIS 
 
 ECCLESI^ SERVl 
 
 REPOSITiE 8° DIE MENSIS 
 
 SEPTEMBRIS ANNO DOMINI 
 
 1656 ;ETATI8 SVJE 
 
 ANNO 82° 
 
 VALE LECTOR ET 
 
 iETERNITATI 
 
 PROSPICE. 
 
 This stone was removed a few years since into 
 the middle of the chancel, in consequence of a 
 pew being erected over the bishop's grave. In 
 excavating the adjoining ground in the month 
 of January 1823, for the interment of the widow 
 of a late rector, the side wall of the grave or 
 
 * See Bishop Hall's Works, vol. v, p. 42(i. 
 Ee S 
 
420 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 vault, apparently of considerable solidity, was 
 uncovered, and exactly corresponded to the 
 former situation of the above stone. 
 
 The mural monument, placed directly above 
 the grave on the south wall, is of stone inter- 
 mixed with black marble, of rather coarse work- 
 manship. The pediment, in which it finishes, 
 is surmounted with a mitre in relief, and the 
 arms of Hall singly (Sable 3 Talbots' heads 
 erased Arg.) are under the pediment. The 
 principal feature of the monument is the figure 
 of a skeleton executed in gilding on an arch- 
 headed black marble tablet, which occupies the 
 whole space from the pediment to a plinth at 
 the bottom. The figure holds in its right hand 
 a scroll with a seal attached to it, inscribed 
 " Debemus Morti Nos Nostraque :" and in its 
 left hand another scroll, from which a seal has 
 been torn, inscribed " Persolvit et quietus est." 
 On the tablet, between the legs of the figure, 
 is engraved, — 
 
 OBIIT 8 SEPTEM. ANO iERiE CHRISTIANjE 1656. >ET. 
 
 SUiE 82. 
 
 On the plinth of black marble is engraved, 
 josephus hallus glim huilis ecclesi^ servus. 
 
 Mrs. Hall died Aug. 27, 1652, and was buried 
 in Heigham church: her tombstone is now 
 
DEATH OF HIS WIFE. 421 
 
 covered by pews against the south wall, and on 
 it is the following inscription — 
 
 M.S. 
 
 ELIZ4BETH THE DEARE AND VERTUOUS 
 CONSORT OF JOSEPH HALL B: N: WITH 
 WHOM SHE COMFORTABLY LIVED 
 FOURTY EIGHT YEARS CHANGED THIS 
 MORTALL LIFE FOR AN ETERNALL, AUGUST 
 27. 1662. IN THE YEAR OF HER AGE 69 
 FAREWELL READER AND MIND 
 ETERNITIE. 
 
 Mr. John Hall, a son of Bishop Hall, was 
 buried on the 12th of Feb. 1650.* Blomefield, in 
 his history of Norfolk, under Heigham, not only 
 mentions the inscribed tombstone of the bishop's 
 wife, but also of his son : but the latter does not 
 now remain ; some years ago it was the stepping 
 stone of a stile into the church yard. 
 
 Bishop Hall had been the husband of one wife, 
 " a grave, virtuous matron, with whom he lived 
 forty-nine years." On occasion of her death he 
 wrote his Tractate, entitled Songs in the Nighty 
 or Cheerfulness under Affliction. In the letter 
 addressed to ** a dear and worthy friend," prefixed 
 to this Treatise, the bishop observes, " indeed, 
 it pleased my God lately to exercise me with a 
 double affliction at once ; pain of body, and 
 
 * In Norwich cathedral there is a monument for £dward Hall, 
 son of the bishop, who died young in 1642. — Vide Magna 
 Britannia, vol. iti, p. 316. 
 
422 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 grief of mind for the sickness and death of my 
 dear consort. I struggled with them both, as 
 I might; and by God's mercy, attained to a 
 meek and humble submission to that just and 
 gracious hand, and a quiet composedness of 
 thoughts: but yet, methought, 1 found myself 
 wanting in that comfortable disposition of heart 
 and lively elevation of spirit, which some holy 
 souls have professed to feel in their lowest 
 depression, fetching that inward consolation from 
 heaven, which can more than counterpoise their 
 heaviest crosses. Upon this occasion, you see 
 here how I held fit to busy my thoughts, labour- 
 ing by their holy agitation, to work myself, 
 through the blessing of the Almighty, to such 
 a cheerful temper, as might give an obedient 
 welcome to so smarting an affliction ; and, that 
 even while I weep, I might yet smile upon the 
 face of my heavenly Father, whose stripes I do 
 so tenderly suffer. If in some other discourses 
 I have endeavoured to instruct others, in this I 
 mean to teach myself, and to win my heart to a 
 willing and contented acquiescence in the good 
 pleasure of my God, how harsh soever it seems 
 to rebellious nature." In the seventh section of 
 this excellent treatise, speaking of his heavy 
 afflictions and losses, the pious and aged bishop 
 says, " Come then, all ye earthly crosses : and 
 muster up all your forces against me. Here is 
 
DEATH OF HIS WIFE. 423 
 
 that, which is able to make me more than 
 conqueror over you all.*' (He had spoken before 
 of that blessed eternity which he wished to keep 
 in view.) " Have I lost my goods, and fore- 
 gone a fair estate ? Had all the earth been mine, 
 what is it to heaven r Had I been the lord of 
 all the world, what were this to a kingdom of 
 glory ? Have I parted with a dear consort ; the 
 sweet companion of my youth ; the tender nurse 
 of my age : the partner of my sorrows, for these 
 forty-eight years ? she is but stept a little before 
 me to that happy rest, which I am panting 
 towards ; and wherein I shall speedily overtake 
 her. In the mean time, and ever, my soul is 
 espoused to that glorious and immortal husband, 
 from whom it shall never be parted. Am I 
 bereaved of some of my dear children, the sweet 
 pledges of our matrimonial love; whose parts 
 and hopes promised me comfort in my declined 
 age? Why am I not rather thankful it hath 
 pleased my God, out of my loins to furnish 
 heaven with some happy guests ? Why do I not, 
 instead of mourning for their loss, sing praises 
 to God, for preferring them to that eternal 
 blessedness? Am 1 afflicted with bodily pain 
 and sickness, which banisheth all sleep from my 
 eyes, and exercises me with a lingering torture? 
 Ere long, this momentary distemper shall end 
 in an everlasting rest. Am I threatened by the 
 
424 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 sword of an enemy? Suppose that man to be 
 one of the guardians of paradise, and that sword 
 as flaming as it is sharp, that one stroke shall 
 let me into that place of unconceivable pleasure, 
 and admit me to feed on the tree of life for ever. 
 
 " Cheer up, then, O my soul ; and upon the 
 fixed apprehension of the glory to be revealed, 
 while thy weak partner, my body, droops and 
 languishes under the sad load of years and 
 infirmities, sing thou to thy God, even in the 
 midnight of thy sorrows, and in the deepest 
 darkness of death itself, songs of confidence, 
 songs of spiritual joy, songs of praise and thanks- 
 giving: saying, with all the glorified ones, — 
 JBkssing, honor, glory, and power, be unto Him 
 that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamby 
 for ever and ever. Amen.'' Rev. v, 13.* 
 
 Bishop Hall's Works, vol. viii, ad fin. 
 
CHAPTER XII. 
 
 A VIEW OF THE CHARACTER OF BISHOP HALL, 
 AND OF HIS WRITINGS. 
 
 The character and mind of Bishop Hall are 
 prominently delineated and pourtrayed in his 
 admirable and numerous writings. Every atten- 
 tive reader of his works will easily discover the 
 humility of the christian, united with great talents, 
 and extensive literary attainments. ** He is 
 universally allowed to have been a person of 
 incomparable piety, meekness and modesty, a 
 thorough knowledge of the world, and of great 
 wit and learning." Richardson, in his edition of 
 Godwin's De Presulibus, p. 444, gives the fol- 
 lowing character of Bishop Hall: — " Fir rerum 
 usu peiitus, ingenio sublili el exercitato, eruditione 
 muliiplici ijistructus, nee interim minor erat modes- 
 li€e et indolis mansuetissimcB latis.'- 
 
 He was from his birth, in a peculiar manner, 
 a child of providence; and he tells us in the 
 beginning of his " Account of Himself/* that he 
 
426 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 noted the wonderful providence of God in all his 
 ways: — " What I have done is worthy of nothing 
 but silence and forgetfulness ; but what God 
 hath done for me, is worthy of everlasting and 
 thankful memory." 
 
 For his preferments and promotions in the 
 church he was indebted to no patronage what- 
 ever, but such as his own abilities, and eminent 
 qualities, under Providence, procured him: by 
 these he was introduced to the notice and pro- 
 tection of Prince Henry; and, after the lamented 
 death of that excellent prince, of his brother 
 Charles I. In the several dedications prefixed 
 to detached portions of his works, according to 
 the custom of that age, he dwells with sincere 
 and unaffected gratitude on the favors he received 
 from his royal patrons, and he always mentions 
 most gratefully the kindnesses of bis other 
 friends and patrons towards him. 
 
 He was pious from his youth ; and being 
 devoted by his parents to serve God in the sacred 
 ministry, he particularly directed his studies to 
 that end. He was so great a lover of study, 
 that he earnestly wished his health would have 
 allowed him a more unceasing application. The 
 following extracts from a letter to his patron 
 Lord Denny, exhibit to us his usual manner of 
 study and of spendhig each day. 
 
 " Every day is a little life ; and our whole life 
 
CHARACTER AND WRITINGS. 427 
 
 is but a day repeated : whence it is, that old 
 Jacob numbers his life by days; and Moses 
 desires to be taught this point of holy arithmetic, 
 to number not his years but his days. Those 
 therefore that dare lose a day, are dangerously 
 prodigal ; those that dare mispend it, desperate. 
 We can teach others by ourselves : let me tell 
 your Lordship how I would pass my days, 
 whether common or sacred; and that you, or 
 whosoever others over-hearing me, may either 
 approve my thriftiness, or correct my errors. — 
 When sleep is rather driven away than leaves 
 me, I would ever awake with God. My first 
 thoughts are for him: if my heart be early 
 seasoned with his presence, it will savour of him 
 all day after. While my body is dressing, not 
 with an effeminate curiosity, nor yet with rude 
 neglect; my mind addresses itself to her ensuing 
 task, bethinking what is to be done, and in what 
 order, and marshalling, as it may, my hours with 
 my work. That done, after some meditation, 
 I walk up to my masters and companions— my 
 books; and sitting down amongst them, with 
 the best contentment, I dare not reach forth my 
 hand to salute any of them, till I have first 
 looked up to heaven, and craved favor of him, 
 to whom all my studies are duly referred: 
 without whom, I can neither profit nor labor. 
 After this, out of no over great variety, I call 
 
428 , LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 forth those, which may best fit my occasions; 
 wherein I am not too scrupulous of age : some- 
 times 1 put myself to school to one of those 
 ancients, whom the church hath honoured with 
 the name of Fathers ; whose volumes, I confess 
 not to open, without a secret reverence of their 
 holiness and gravity : sometimes, to those latter 
 doctors, which want nothing but age to make 
 them classical:— ALWAYS to god's book. That 
 day is lost, whereof some hours are not improved 
 in those divine monuments : others I turn over, 
 out of choice ; these out of duty. Ere I can have 
 sat unto weariness, my family, having now over- 
 come all household distractions, invites me to our 
 common devotions ; not without some short pre- 
 paration. These heartily performed, send me up 
 with a more strong and cheerful appetite to my 
 former work, which I find made easy to me by 
 intermission and variety. One while mine eyes 
 are busied ; another while my hand ; and some- 
 times my mind takes the burden from them both. 
 One hour is spent in textual divinity; another 
 in controversy: histories relieve them both. When 
 the mind is weary of other labours, it begins to 
 undertake her own ; sometimes it meditates and 
 winds up for future use : sometimes it lays forth 
 her conceits into present discourse ; sometimes for 
 itself, often for others. Neither know I whether 
 it works or plays in these thoughts. I am sure 
 
CHARACTER AND WRITINGS. 429 
 
 no sport hath more pleasure ; no work more use : 
 only the decay of a weak body, makes me think 
 these delights insensibly laborious. Before my 
 meals and after, I let myself loose from all 
 thoughts, and would forget that I ever studied. 
 Company, discourse, recreations, are now season- 
 able and welcome. I rise not immediately from 
 my trencher to my book, but after some inter- 
 mission. After my latter meal, my thoughts are 
 slight; only my memory may be charged with 
 the task of recalling what was committed to her 
 custody in the day ; and my heart is busy in 
 examining my hands and mouth, and all other 
 senses, of that day's behaviour. The evening is 
 come : no tradesman doth more carefully take in 
 his wares, clear his shopboard, and shut his win- 
 dows, than I would shut up my thoughts and clear 
 my mind. That student shall live miserably, 
 which, Hke a camel, lies down under his burden. 
 All this done, calling together my family, we end 
 the day with God. Such are my common days." 
 
 This may be considered as a specimen of the 
 habitual mode of Bishop llaU's employing his 
 time. He proceeds to describe his way of spend- 
 ing the sabbath day. " But God's day calls for 
 another respect. The same sun arises on this 
 day, and enlightens it : yet, because that Sun of 
 Righteousness arose upon it, and gave a new life 
 unto the world in it, and drew the strength of God's 
 
430 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 moral precept unto it; therefore, justly do we 
 sing with the Psalmist, This is the day which the 
 JLordhath made. Now, I forget the world , and, in 
 sort, myself : and deal with my wonted thoughts, 
 as great men use, who, at some times of their 
 privacy, forbid the access of all suitors. Prayer, 
 meditation, reading, hearing, preaching, singing, 
 good conference, are the businesses of this day ; 
 which I dare not bestow on any work or plea- 
 sure, but heavenly. 1 hate superstition on the 
 one side, and looseness on the other ; but I find 
 it hard to offend in too much devotion ; easy in 
 profaneness. The whole week is sanctified by 
 this day ; and according to my care of this, is my 
 blessing on the rest." * 
 
 For mildness and peaceable disposition, joined 
 with candour, moderation, and charity, he was 
 singular and exemplary : " in the distracted and 
 distempered times" he lived, he laboured hard 
 for peace among christians. " It was ever the 
 desire of my soul," says he, " even from my first 
 entrance upon the public service of the church, 
 according to my known signature, with Noah's 
 dove, to have brought an olive-branch to the 
 tossed ark ; and God knows how sincerely I have 
 endeavoured it : but, if my wings have been too 
 short, and the wind too high for me, to carry it 
 
 * Works, vol, vii, pp 254-256. 
 
CHARACTER AND WRITINGS. 431 
 
 home, I must content myself with the conscience 
 of my feithful devotions." * 
 
 During the time of his presiding over the see 
 of Exeter, for the space of about fourteen years, he 
 was active and vigilant in reforming his numerous 
 clergy, in correcting vi^hat was amiss, in promot- 
 ing piety in general, and in suppressing and dis- 
 countenancing all violent measures. He never 
 molested any of his clergy for not complying with 
 certain innovations then crept into the church; 
 but, by his mild temper and active influence, 
 succeeded in promoting the " general unanimity 
 and loving correspondence" of his clergy. 
 
 The superior manner in which he conducted 
 himself against a host of the most violent assail- 
 ants of the church, and of episcopal government, 
 entitles him to the gratitude of posterity. Though 
 he survived to see his sacred function proscribed, 
 and his property and means of subsistence taken 
 from him, he stood firm to the last extremity in 
 defence of the church, contending for the best 
 interests of his country. He was " one of the 
 most worthy, able, and learned of the sons" of 
 the Church of England, (as an eminent prelate 
 observes) " who sealed his attachment by httle 
 less than martyrdom in her cause. " t 
 
 ♦ Works, vol. viii, p. 43. 
 
 t Bishop of Lichfield and Coventry's Primary Charge, p. 11 
 
432 LIFE OF BISHOP pALL. 
 
 Well might Fuller say that " he may be said to 
 have died with his pen in his hand ;" for after he 
 was sequestered and silenced, he wrote and pub- 
 lished several useful treatises even in his old age. 
 In order to prepare men for the last change, his 
 last books and his last sermons, as we have 
 before observed, were all upon the last things ; — 
 death and judgment, heaven and hell. 
 
 His long and useful life furnishes a variety of 
 important incidents, highly interesting, instructive 
 and edifying to the christian world. In his case 
 we find that preferment to the highest dignities 
 in the church had no influence to make him abate of 
 his wonted industry and active zeal in the cause of 
 truth. He has given to the world a good account 
 of his time in his numerous and admirable Works, 
 which have long praised him in the gate, and 
 which will be held in due esteem, as long as 
 genuine piety and true devotion command respect 
 among mankind. 
 
 He distinguished himself as a wit and a poet at 
 an early period of his life ; for when he was about 
 twenty- three years old, in the years 1597, 1598, 
 he published his Satires, under the title of Virgi- 
 demiarum,'^ in sixe Bookes. First three Bookes of 
 
 * This uncooth and uncommon word signifies a Gathering, 
 or Harvest of Rods, in reference to the nature of the subject. 
 See Warton. 
 
CHARACTER AND WRITINGS. 433 
 
 Tooth-lesse Satyrs; 1. Poetical; 2. Academicall; 
 3. Morall; printed by T. Creede, for R. Dexter, 
 1597. The three last Bookes, of By ting Satyrs, 
 by R. Bradock, for Dexter, 1598. Both parts 
 were reprinted together in 1599, and first part in 
 1602. Ritson, in his *' Bibliographia Poetica," 
 says that " HalTs Satires were stay'd at the press, 
 by order of the archbishop of Canterbury and 
 bishop of London ; and such copys as could be 
 found were to ' bee presentlye broughte to the 
 bishop of London to bee burnte.' " 
 
 These Satires were republished at Oxford in 
 1753, by the Rev. William Dodd, afterward D.D. 
 or rather by the Rev. William Thompson, M.A. 
 of Queen's college, Oxon,* as Read appears to 
 have suggested to Dr. Farmer. His Satires have 
 certainly conferred upon him a just claim to the 
 appellation of one of the earliest and best satiric 
 poets in England : they have been a model for 
 succeeding English satirists ; and though he was 
 not the first who attempted this species of poetry 
 in England, it must be granted that he certainly 
 was the first legitimate satirist of our country. 
 It appears, however, from his Postscript, that he 
 
 * This Oxford reprint of Bishop Hall's Satires, in 12mo. 
 is a neat and excellent editioB : but the last edition, 1824,12ino. 
 by Sir W. Singer, with Warton's Illustrations and additional 
 Notes, is the best. 
 
 Ff 
 
454 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 had seen no English satires ; and only those of 
 Ariosto and " one base French Satire," of modern 
 writers ; therefore, in the opening of his Prologue, 
 he tells us, — 
 
 " I first adventure, with fool-hardy might, 
 To tread the steps of perilous despigbt : 
 I first adventure, follow me who list. 
 And bee the second English Satyrist." 
 
 Hemight justly pride himself in having given us 
 the first example of genuine and legitimate satire. 
 Upon the republication of the Virgidemiarum at 
 Oxford in 1753, Gray, speaking of Hall's Satires 
 in a Letter to Dr.Warton, says, ** They are full 
 of spirit and poetry; as much of the first as 
 Dr. Donne, and far more of the latter.'* * 
 Dr.Warton also, at the commencement of an 
 elaborate and masterly analysis of, and criticism 
 upon Hall's Satires and poetic genius, which it is 
 to be lamented is only a fragment, in his fourth 
 volume of The History of English Poetry, gives 
 the following character of these satires : '* They are 
 marked," he observes, " with a classical precision, 
 to which English poetry had yet rarely attained. 
 They are replete with animation of style and 
 sentiment. The indignation of the Satirist is 
 always the result of good sense. Nor are the 
 
 * Mason's Gray, p. 224. 
 
CHARACTER AND WRITINGS. 435 
 
 thorns of severe invective unmixed with the 
 flowers of pure poetry. The characters are 
 delineated in strong and lively colouring, and 
 their discriminations are touched with the mas- 
 terly traces of genuine humour. The versifica- 
 tion is equally energetic and elegant, and the 
 fabric of the couplets approaches to the modern 
 standard. It is no inconsiderable proof of a 
 genius predominating over the general taste of an 
 age, when every preacher was a punster, to have 
 written verses, where laughter was to be raised, 
 and the reader to be entertained with sallies of 
 pleasantry, without quibbles and conceits. His 
 chief fault is obscurity, arising from a remote 
 phraseology, constrained combinations, unfamiliar 
 allusions, elliptical apostrophes, and abruptness 
 of expression. Perhaps some will think that his 
 manner betrays too much of the laborious exact- 
 ness and pedantic anxiety of the scholar and the 
 student. Ariosto in Italian, and Regnier in 
 French, were now almost the only modern 
 writers of satire; and I believe there had been 
 an English translation of Ariosto's Satires. But 
 Hall's acknowledged patterns are Juvenal and 
 Persius, not without some touches of the urbanity 
 of Horace.* His parodies of these poets, or 
 
 The First Satire of the Third Book strikingly resembles the 
 Ff 2 
 
436 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 rather his adaptations of ancient to modem 
 manners, a mode of imitation not unhappily 
 practised by Oldham, Rochester, and Pope, 
 discover great facility and dexterity of invention. 
 The moral gravity and the censorial declamation 
 of Juvenal, he frequently enlivens with a train of 
 more refined reflection, or adorns with a novelty 
 and variety of images." * 
 
 Mr. Campbell is not deficient in a just estima- 
 tion of the talents of this eminent divine and 
 satirist: "in many instances," says he, "Hall 
 redeems the antiquity of his allusions, by their 
 ingenious adaptation to modern manners: and 
 this is but a small part of his praise ; for in the 
 point, and volubility, and vigour of Hall's num- 
 bers, we might frequently imagine ourselves 
 perusing Dryden." See Specimens, &c. vol. ii, 
 pp. 256-261. 
 
 In the third Satire of his fifth Book, Hall 
 ^exhibits the true design of this kind of poetry ; 
 and, as his editor, Mr. Pratt, justly remarks, 
 ** laments at the same time, the untempered 
 genius of his age ; which, while it encouraged 
 the graces and subdued imagination of classic 
 
 Sixth Satire of Juvenal. It exhibits a forcible contrast of the 
 temperance and sinnplicity of former ages, with the luxury and 
 <effeminacy of the Poet's own times. 
 
 * Vid^ tChalmer's English Poets, vol. v, p. 226. 
 
CHARACTER AND WRITINGS. 437 
 
 elegance, could not brook its bolder and more 
 nervous efforts." It begins thus : 
 
 ** The Satyre should be like the porcupiue, 
 
 That shoots sharp quilles out in each angry line. 
 And wounds the blushiug cheeke and tiery eye, 
 Of him that heares and readeth guiltily. 
 Ye antique Satyres, how 1 blessc your daies. 
 That brook'd your bolder still, their own dispraise ; 
 And well-neare wish, yet joy my wish is vaine, 
 I had beene then, or they were now ajjaine I 
 For now our eares beene of more brittle mold. 
 Than those dull earthen eares that were of old : 
 Sith theirs, like anvilles, bore the hammer's head. 
 Our glasse can never touch unshivered." 
 
 His " last Book and Satire is a humorous and 
 ironical recantation of the former satires ; as the 
 author here pretends there can be no just ground 
 for one in such times as his own. In one part 
 he glances at the sorry poets of his time, and 
 makes some terse allusions to poets of a former 
 day. Afterwards, when enumerating some of 
 the festive tales of our ancestors, he gives a close 
 and spirited imitation from Juvenal : and closes 
 the whole by a few remarks on the prevailing 
 dialect of poetry, with a vigour of fancy scarcely 
 rivalled by the finest poets of his time."* The 
 following lines form part of it : 
 
 ** Was never age I weene io pure as this ! 
 
 • •«««» 
 
 Seeke over all the world, and tell mee where 
 Thou tind'st a proud man, or a flatterer; 
 
 ♦ Sat. I, b. vi. Note. 
 
438 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 A theefe, a drunkard, or a parricide, 
 A lechour, Iyer, or what vice beside. 
 Marchants are no whit covetous of late, 
 Nor make no mart of time, gaine of deceit* 
 Patrons are honest now, ore they of old ; 
 Can now no benefice be boughte or sold." 
 
 The Satires of Hall exhibit a very minute and 
 curious picture of the literature and manners, the 
 follies and vices of his times ; they amply prove 
 the wit, the sagacity, and the elegance of his 
 Muse. Poetry was the occupation merely of 
 his youth ; the vigour and decline of his days 
 were employed in the composition of professional 
 works, calculated by their piety, eloquence, and 
 originality, to promote, in the most powerful 
 manner, the best interests of true religion and 
 morality.''^ 
 
 Though he more particularly exercised his 
 poetical genius in his youthful years, yet at one 
 period he intended to make a poetical version 
 of the Book of Psalms, and signified his intention 
 to his relative, the Rev, Samuel Burton, arch- 
 deacon of Gloucester, and to his friend the Rev. 
 Hugh Cholmley, requesting their judgment of 
 bis design, and intimating his readiness to pro- 
 ceed in the work, provided he met with due 
 encouragement from those in authority. He 
 
 t Vide Dr. Drake's Shakspeare and his Times, vol. i, part 2, 
 chap, iv, p. 627. Mr. Pope said high things of Hall's Satires. 
 See Granger's Biog. Hist, of England, vol. ii, p. 157, 8vo. 
 
CHARACTER AND WRITINGS. 439 
 
 says that he had been solicited by some reverend 
 friends to undertake this task, as well according 
 with the former exercises of his youth and his 
 profession. However, he only proceeded as far 
 as the ten tirst Psalms: but this specimen shews 
 that he was very capable of the undertaking.* 
 
 The prose works of Bishop Hall are written 
 in such a style of eloquence, as justly entitles 
 him to a place amongst our best authors; but 
 the distance of nearly two centuries since he 
 wTote has necessarily occasioned some of his 
 phrases to appear rather obsolete. 
 
 A judicious writer of his own times, Sir Henry 
 Wotton, in his letter to Dr. Collins, distinguished 
 him by the name of the English Seneca, for the 
 pureness, plainness, and fulness of his style. 
 He might have proceeded further, and might 
 have denominated him the English Chrysostom. 
 Fuller, in his " Worthies," describes him as " not 
 unhappy at Controversies, more happy at Com- 
 tnenlSy very good in his Characters, better in his 
 Sermons, best of all in his Meditations,'^ f 
 
 The practical works of Bishop Hall have been 
 always held in great esteem by the Christian 
 world : many of his works are not only eminently 
 
 • See his Works, vol. x, p. 259; vii, p. 157. 
 
 t Worthies of l':ngland, vol, i, p, 566, 4to. ed. 1811. 
 
440 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 practical and devotional, but also contain much 
 biblical criticism and general literature. 
 
 His CONTEMPLATIONS are acknowledged in- 
 comparably excellent and valuable, both for 
 style, criticisms, and genuine piety. In the 
 compilation of these admirable productions, the 
 bishop seems to have consulted all the most 
 eminent commentators and interpreters of the 
 Sacred Writings then extant, and appropriately 
 to have introduced their best remarks and obser- 
 vations in the most pleasing, elegant, yet unaf- 
 fected and simple manner. Now and then some 
 passages, from the peculiarity of his style, and 
 distance of time, may appear abstruse or obscure 
 to common readers ; but a degree of close 
 attention will be well repaid in comprehending 
 his meaning, which will generally be worth some 
 pains to be acquainted with. 
 
 His CONTEMPLATIONS, he tclls US, are the 
 substance of sermons : " The reader may be 
 pleased to understand, that my manner hath still 
 been, first to pass through all these Divine 
 Histories by way of sermons ; and then after, to 
 gather the quintessence of those larger discourses 
 into these forms of meditations which he sees."* 
 
 The CONTEMPLATIONS, being the substance 
 and abridgments of the sermons of this eminent 
 
 * Bishop Hall's Works, vol. ii, p. ^66. 
 
CHARACTER AND WRITINGS. 441 
 
 prelate, are not only particularly useful to chris- 
 tian ministers, therein they will find such a 
 variety of remarks and observations, as cannot 
 fail to afford important assistance for the pulpit, 
 and prove highly edifying to an audience; but, 
 through the divine blessing, they may be very 
 useful and profitable to all serious readers, whose 
 delight and meditation is in the word of God. 
 
 The subjects of Bishop Hall, and his manner 
 of treating them, will be approved by christians 
 of all denominations ; for none of the low and 
 little bigotry of a party, nothing of the narrow 
 spirit and prejudice of a sect, is to be perceived 
 here. True genuine Christianity shines here in 
 its native lustre and simplicity. The truth 
 appears in a beauty, which must captivate 
 the most prejudiced and enslaved to particular 
 sentiments or opinions. His contemplations 
 are so excellent in their kind, so entertaining, 
 and breathe a spirit of universal benevolence, 
 which is equally averse to bigotry and enthusiasm, 
 and knows no master but Christ, and obeys no 
 law but love.* 
 
 The following testimonies to the excellencies 
 of Bishop Hall are highly interesting. The pious 
 and eloquent Hervey, speaking of his Works, 
 
 * Dr.Dodd's Preface to his Edition of Bishop Hall's Con tem- 
 platioDs, 2 vols. 12mo. 
 
442 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 says, " where the reader will find a happy mix- 
 ture of true oratory and sound divinity ; a rich 
 vein of fancy, and a sweet spirit of piety; 
 Contemplations upon the Histories of Scripture 
 (which I think are our prelate's master- piece) 
 almost as entertaining and instructive, as the 
 subjects illustrated are important and wonderful. 
 Notwithstanding a few stiff or antique phrases, 
 I cannot but esteem the works of this author 
 among the most valuable compositions extant in 
 our language." * Dr. Doddridge (a no mean 
 judge) says of his contemplations, that they 
 " are incomparably valuable for language, criti- 
 cisms, and devotion ;" characterises the bishop 
 as " pious, moderate, and eloquent ;' and observes 
 that, " allowing something for the pecuharities of 
 the age in which he lived, he had met with no 
 devotional wi^itings on the historical part of 
 Scripture, which have generally given him so 
 much entertainment as his, particularly his 
 Contemplations."! 
 
 His Paraphrase upon the hard texts of the 
 whole scriptures, is highly esteemed : Dr. Dod- 
 dridge pronounces these expository notes to be 
 
 * Hervey's Theron and Aspasio, DiaL viii. — Works, 8vo. 
 Ed. 1797, vol. ii, p. 288. JSote. 
 
 t Doddridge's Lectures en Preaching. His Family Expositor, 
 sec. Ixxxv. Note. 
 
CHARACTER AND WRITINGS. 443 
 
 ** very valuable, especially for shewing the spirit 
 and force of many expressions that occur." 
 Most of them, if not all, are inserted in the 
 valuable commentary of Bishop Mant, and Dr. 
 D'Oyly, published under the sanction and pat- 
 ronage of the venerable Society for Promoting 
 Christian Knowledge.* The late Rev. Thomas 
 Scott made much use of Bishop Hall's Contem- 
 plations and notes in his invaluable commentary. 
 
 As a PREACHER, Bishop Hall was popular, 
 ingenious, eloquent, and devout. His sermons 
 possess uncommon merit : they rank high both 
 for matter and language: even his sermons at 
 court indicate singular faithfulness, and a great 
 benevolence of heart. They are interspersed 
 with interesting anecdotes, brilliant allusions, and 
 happy illustrations. The doctrines which he 
 taught in the pulpit, and in his admirable Works, 
 were the doctrines of Christian verity, contained 
 in the articles and homilies of the church, of 
 which he was so great an ornament. His Works 
 may be well classed among those which give us a 
 fair specimen of the doctrines of the church of 
 England. He was a true and " a dutiful son of 
 the church." His sentiments were decidedly 
 evangelical, and, as they are discovered in his 
 
 * Vide Home's Introduction, vol. ii, p. 831. 
 
444 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 Works, may be considered as a fair and ample 
 exhibition of the doctrines of our church. 
 
 His MEDITATIONS, may be enumerated among 
 the best of his writings: herein, according to 
 Fuller, he excels. Such appears to have been 
 the habitual piety of his mind, that every object, 
 and the most common occurence or incident, 
 afforded him a subject or matter for spiritual 
 improvement, or religious and moral application. 
 In this he copied and imitated the example of his 
 Divine Master. The meditations, aphorisms, 
 and maxims of persons remarkable for their learn- 
 ing, wisdom, and piety, have always been con- 
 sidered as ranking high among the most select 
 treasures of literature. Those of Bishop Hall have 
 been esteemed the most valuable, both for the 
 importance of their instruction, spirituality, and 
 the energetic style in which they are written. 
 The following interesting account of Bishop 
 Hall's Meditations is given by the Rev. Robert 
 Hall, the bishop's eldest son: "The expres- 
 sions of these voluntary and sudden thoughts 
 of his, shall testify how faithfully he is wont to 
 improve those short ends of time, which are stolen 
 from his more important avocations. Thus, 
 methinks, we should still be climbing up in our 
 thoughts, from earth to heaven ; and suffer no 
 object to cross us in our way, without some spiri- 
 tual use and application. Thus it pleased my 
 
CHARACTER AND WRITINGS. 445 
 
 Reverend Father, sometimes to recreate himself; 
 whose manner it hath been, when any of these 
 meditations have unsought offered themselves 
 unto him, presently to set them down."* 
 
 "The intent of this labour," says the bishop 
 himself, '* is to put some good thoughts. Reader, 
 into thy mind; such as I hope may not a little 
 further thee on thy journey to heaven. And if, 
 in my labouring thitherward, I shall, through 
 .God's mercy, bee a means of forwarding any soul, 
 but some steps up that steep way, how happy am 
 I! To which purpose, I know no means more 
 effectual, than those Meditations, which conduce 
 to the animation and vigour of Christian practice : 
 it must be true contrition, pure consciences, holy 
 affections, heavenly dispositions, hearty devotions, 
 sound regeneration, faith working by love, an 
 humble walking with God, that shall help us into 
 heaven; and whatsoever may tend to the advancing 
 of any of these gracious works in us, is worthy 
 to be dear and precious."! 
 
 It may be farther said respecting his Medita- 
 tions, that the remarks and observations con- 
 tained in them are generally very striking; and 
 throughout they exhibit fervent piety, and much 
 
 * Bishop Hall's Works, vol. vi, p. 104. 
 t Ibid, p. 246. 
 
446 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 originality of thought. It has been said that 
 Bishop Hall seems to have imitated Augustine and 
 Seneca in their style ; if that be true, he has done 
 so more particularly in his Meditations. 
 
 His other devotional writings are equally val- 
 uable, spiritual, and edifying: they discover 
 throughout the Christian experience and heavenly- 
 mindedness of the author. 
 
 His EPISTLES exhibit a pleasing specimen of 
 his spirit and manner : they unfold his mind and 
 heart : and they are particularly interesting for the 
 remarks upon men and things, cases of conscience, 
 and the occurrences of his times. 
 
 In his CONTROVERSIAL Writings he has invari*- 
 ably manifested the charity and moderation of 
 the real Christian: innumerable traces of the 
 benignity and gentleness of his dis[)osition are 
 apparent. He was very zealous against popery, 
 and no less so against those who separated from 
 the church without extreme necessity. He feel- 
 ingly lamented the divisions of protestants, and 
 wrote some tractates with a view of putting an 
 end to them. The several controversial pieces 
 against those dissenting ministers, quaintly styled 
 SmectymnuuSy " are written in a very handsome, 
 lively, and witty manner : bat his adversaries too 
 much distinguished themselves by a peculiar 
 fierceness of spirit, and asperity of language: they 
 wrote with confidence, like persons supported by 
 
CHARACTER AND WRITINGS. 447 
 
 the secular arm, and who could depend upon 
 stronger and more irresistible arguments than 
 those upon paper." * 
 
 He has composed some treatises and pieces in 
 Latin, which are written in a very elegant, pure> 
 and classical style. Of these, the Sermon intitled 
 ** Columba Noae," and ** Inurbanitati Pontificiae 
 Responsio,"were translated by the Rev. Rob. Hall, 
 the bishop's son. But his admirable treatise enti- 
 tled " Henochismus," carelessly and inaccurately 
 translated by the Rev. Henry Brown, vicar of 
 Nether Sevell, has been revised throughout, and 
 brought nearer to the original by the Rev. Josiah 
 Pratt But the curious treatise entitled ** Mun- 
 dus alter et idem," i.e. The world different^ yet 
 the same, has never yet been given in a suitable 
 English dress. There has never been but one 
 translation of it by John Healey, a copy of which 
 is now of very rare occurrence. The Rev. Josiah 
 Pratt did intend to give a translation of it, taking 
 the singular and humorous version of Healey as 
 the ground work : " but he found the translator 
 so often degenerating into ribaldry, and the origi- 
 nal to require so much delicacy and elucidation, 
 that he abandoned the design; not without hopes 
 that some person of leisure and ability may be 
 
 * Middleton's Biog. Evangel, vol, iii, p. 356. 
 
44a LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 induced to give this fine piece of irony a suitable 
 English dress." In this singular treatise, Hall, 
 under an agreeable fiction, satirises and ridicules 
 the vicious manners of several nations. It is to 
 be regretted that so excellent a piece of satire 
 and irony should be nearly inaccessible to the 
 English reader. 
 
 The Works of Bishop Hall were first collected 
 by the Rev. Josiah Pratt, B.D. and published in 
 ten volumes 8vo, in 1808. This edition is very 
 correctly printed, is arranged and revised with 
 much judgment and accuracy, and is also illus- 
 trated with occasional notes, table of contents, 
 glossary, and a copious index to the whole. 
 
 The ingenious and acute Dr. Ferriar has excited 
 a degree of attention to the Contemplations of 
 Bishop Hall, among critics, by detecting the 
 plagiarisms of Sterne, who has stolen hints and 
 remarks from Hall, Burton, and Rabelais, without 
 any acknowledgment. See Dr. Ferriar s Illustra- 
 tions of Sterne, Bvo. 
 
CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 ON PURITANISM. 
 
 It is thought proper here to give a short sketch 
 of the history of Puritanism, and to shew that all 
 who were denominated Puritans from the time of 
 Queen Elizabeth to the usurpation, were not sepa- 
 ratists or dissenters from the church of England; 
 but in many instances, true and attached friends 
 of the church. From the account of some histo- 
 rians, it may appear as if all the puritans were 
 dissenters. This was far from being the case: 
 many of the puritans kept in the church to the 
 last ; indeed the most eminent of them for learning, 
 piety, and usefulness, did not separate. 
 
 Though the reformers were of one faith, yet 
 they were far from agreeing about discipline ; 
 while one party was disposed only to withdraw 
 from the church of Rome no further than was 
 necessary to recover the purity of the faith, and 
 the independency of the church, looking upon 
 rites and ceremonies as indiflerent, and non- 
 
450 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 essential ; others were for relinquishing all kinds 
 of rites and ceremonies, and for adopting as a 
 model, the plan of the Genevan church. This 
 latter party separated when the act of Uniformity 
 was rigorously executed in Queen EHzabeth's 
 time. 
 
 Many of those, who did separate then, were 
 neither peaceable nor judicious; when they found 
 
 thev could not reduce the church to their own 
 
 t/ 
 
 narrow model, they conferred with their friends 
 about a separation from the church, and agreed, 
 " That it was their duty in their present circum- 
 stances to break off from the public churches, 
 and to assemble as they had opportunity in private 
 houses, or elsewhere, to worship God in a manner 
 that might not offend against their consciences." 
 
 This was the first separation from the church of 
 England ; and it was as much owing to the 
 weakness and want of judgment in the separatists, 
 who could believe those things to be sinful, upon 
 which the scriptures were silent, and expected 
 the majority to give way to the humour of a few; 
 as to the rigour and intemperate zeal of the ruling 
 powers in imposing and pressing indifferent rites 
 and ceremonies with too much severity. * 
 
 Those, who refused to subscribe the Hturgy, 
 
 * Warner's Eccles. Hist, of Eng. vol. ii, pp. 436, 437. 
 
ON PURITANISM. 451 
 
 ceremonies, and discipline of the church, in the 
 year 1563, and the fifth of Queen Elizabeth, were 
 branded with the name of Puritans; because they 
 aimed at a purer form of discipline and worship, 
 as they imagined, than that which was yet 
 established. 
 
 *• But profene mouths," says Fuller, '* quickly 
 improved this nic-name therewith on every occa- 
 sion to abuse pious people, some of them so far 
 from opposing the liturgy, that they endeavoured, 
 according to the instructions thereof in the pre- 
 parative to the confession, " to accompany the 
 minister with a pure heart," and laboured, as it 
 is in the absolution, for a life pure and holy.* 
 
 A puritan, therefore, was not necessarily a non- 
 conformist, but one who endeavoured in his devo- 
 tions to accompany the minister with a pure 
 heart, and was remarkable and singular for 
 holiness of heart and life. In the reigns of James 
 I. and Charles I. if a man, though a conscientious 
 churchman, kept the sabbath, and frequented 
 sermons, if he maintained family religion, and 
 would neither swear nor get drunk, nor comply 
 with the fashionable vices of the times, he was 
 immediately stigmatized with the name of a 
 Puritan, 
 
 * Church Hist, b. ix, p. 76. 
 G g 2 
 
452 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 When the infamous declaration for sports on the 
 Lord's day was published, the clergy and people, 
 who were averse to such profanation of the 
 sabbath, and discountenanced vice and immo- 
 rality, were branded with the name of Puritans ; 
 thus it is evident that the term Puritans, was a 
 general term of reproach cast on all who lived 
 soberly, righteously, and godly ; and did not more 
 belong to pious dissenters than to pious church- 
 men. Every reader of the civil and ecclesiastical 
 history of the period from Queen Elizabeth, to the 
 restoration of Charles II. should keep this in 
 view ; for some writers have so represented the 
 puritans as being all dissenters from the church of 
 England. This is a great error, and should be 
 guarded against. 
 
 One prominent trait in the character of the 
 
 puritans, whether churchmen or dissenters, was 
 
 an adherence to the doctrinal Articles of the 
 
 church of England, in the sense of the compilers ; 
 
 and also a strong aversion to popery. Many of 
 
 them became great sufferers for their not complying 
 
 with some rites and ceremonies urged upon them 
 
 by the rulers of the church. Though there were 
 
 men eminent for their piety among the puritans, 
 
 and were upright, sincere, and genuine christians, 
 
 yet during the long parliament and the usurpation, 
 
 many men of bad principles sheltered themselves 
 
 under the name of puritans, with the view of 
 
ON PURITANISM. 453 
 
 accomplishing more effectually the ruin of the 
 constitution in church and state. 
 
 It must be acknowledged that numbers of the 
 puritan divines sided with the parliament, among 
 whom were some superlatively eminent for litera- 
 ture, as Selden, Lightfoot, Cudworth, Pocock, 
 Witchcots, Arrowsmith ; but among all the 
 bishops and clergy who espoused the cause of 
 the king, were also men of the first rank for 
 learning, politeness, piety, and probity of manners, 
 as Usher, Hall, Moreton, Westfield, Brownrigge, 
 Prideaux, Hammond, Saunderson, &c. 
 
 We must not presume that all who were called 
 puritans were really pious and good men; for 
 undoubtedly there were among them hypocrites 
 and infamous characters : the best of them were 
 not without their failings, for they were men of 
 like passions and infirmities with others; and 
 while many of them endeavoured to avoid one 
 extreme, they fell into another. The behaviour 
 of many of them was severe and rigid, far removed 
 from the fashionable liberties and vices of the 
 age. But in general they were the most pious 
 and devout people in the land : they were men 
 of prayer, both in secret and public, as well as in 
 their families: their manner of devotion was 
 fervent and solemn, depending on the assistance 
 of the Divine Spirit not only to teach them how 
 to pray, but what to pray for as they ought. 
 
454 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 They had a profound reverence for the holy 
 name of God, and were utterly averse not only 
 to profane swearing, but to " foolish talking and 
 jesting which are not convenient." They were 
 strict observers of the Lord's day, spending the 
 wh61e of it in acts of pubhc and private devotion. 
 It was the distinguished characteristic of a 
 puritan in those times, to see him going to church 
 twice a day with his bible under his arm. While 
 others were at plays, interludes, revels, sports, 
 and diversions, on the Sunday evenings, the 
 puritans with their families were employed in 
 reading the Scriptures, singing psalms, catechizing 
 their children, repeating sermons, and in prayer. 
 Thus the puritans, many of whom were faithful 
 friends of the church, were accustomed to spend 
 the Lord's day. They had also their hours of 
 family devotion on the week days, and considered 
 it their duty to take care of the souls as well as 
 the bodies of their domestics. They were cir- 
 cumspect as to all excesses in food and raiment ; 
 abstemious in lawful diversions; industrious in 
 their respective avocations ; honest and exact in 
 their dealings ; and solicitous to give every one 
 his own.* 
 
 During the troubles of the times on account 
 
 * Vide Neal's Hist, of the Puritans, voi. i, p. 612. 
 
ON PURITANISM. 455 
 
 of the differences between Charles I. and the 
 parliament, puritanism, in one sense, was pro- 
 ductive of much good ; the reformation of man- 
 ners was then very remarkable. The Jaws 
 against vice and profaneness were so strict, and 
 so vigorously put in execution, that vice was 
 forced to hide itself in corners. The magistrates 
 did their duty in suppressing all kind of games, 
 stage plays, and abuses in public-houses. There 
 was not a play acted on any theatre in England 
 for almost twenty years. Profane swearing, 
 drunkenness, or any kind of debauchery, were 
 not to be heard or seen in the streets. The 
 Lord's day was observed with unusual reverence : 
 the churches were crowded with numerous and 
 attentive hearers, three or four times in the day. 
 The peace officers patroled the streets of Lon- 
 don; and all the public-houses were shut up: 
 there was no travelling on the road, or vi^alking 
 in the fields, except in cases of absolute necessity, 
 Religious exercises were set up in private families, 
 as reading the Scriptures, family prayer, repeat- 
 ing sermons, and singing of psalms. This was 
 so general a custom, that, we are told, a person 
 might walk through the city of London on the 
 evening of the Lord's day, without seeing an idle 
 person, or hearing any thing but the voice of 
 prayer or praise from churches and private houses. 
 It is also said, that there was hardly a single 
 
456 LIFE OF BISHOP HALL. 
 
 bankruptcy to be heard of in a year ; and that 
 even in such a case, the bankrupt had a mark 
 of infamy set upon him that he could never 
 vv^ipe off. 
 
 Some historians have described and represented 
 the religion of those times to be no otherwise 
 than hypocrisy and dissimulation; and that a 
 vast portion of people made the form of godliness 
 a cloak to iniquity and dishonesty : undoubtedly 
 there was then too much hypocrisy, as there is 
 at all times, and many covered their abominable 
 practices with the cloak of an outward profes- 
 sion of religion.— Most probably hypocrisy and 
 hidden immorality were the prevailing sins of 
 those times. It was the fashion of the day to 
 appear religious ; and so, under the mask of 
 religion, the most infamous crimes were com- 
 mitted. But it cannot be denied, that there was 
 a large portion of people, both churchmen and 
 dissenters, who were sincerely religious and 
 devoutly pious.* 
 
 Bishop Hall, and others of his order, for their 
 eminent piety, were reproached as being puri- 
 tanically inclined : so it has always been that 
 the scandal of the cross is perpetually attached 
 to all, whether they hold eminent or humble 
 
 * Vide Rushwortb, vol. ii, part 3, p.l. Neal, vol. ii, p. 
 ;553. Ibid. 555. vol. iv, pp. 268, 269. 
 
ON PURITANISM. 457 
 
 Stations in the church of Christ. Real Christians, 
 in the days of Bishop Hall, were denominated 
 Puritans, a name derived from purity, as it 
 has been before observed: in the present day 
 EVANGELICAL is the term of reproach, a name 
 derived from the christian ministers being desirous 
 to do the work of evangelists; see 2 Tim. iv, 5. 
 Though worldly men may give the term evan- 
 gelical to religious persons as a name of reproach, 
 it is certainly an honourable appellation. Another 
 usual name of religious reproach in these days 
 is Methodist; a term used at Oxford, and 
 derived from the method which some pious stu- 
 dents observed in employing their time. The 
 term is now applied to every person of real and 
 sincere piety, and may almost be considered as 
 another term for a christian.* 
 
 Many christian ministers of the present day are 
 distinguished and stigmatized by the name of 
 evangelical, or methodistical, because they adhere 
 closely to the standard of Scripture, of the 
 Liturgy, Articles, and Homilies of our church; 
 and because they make a full proof of their 
 ministry. Had Bishop Hall lived in these days, 
 he would have been held *' in great jealousy for 
 too much favour of" evangelism^ as he was " of 
 
 * See Dr. C. Buchaoao's Sermons, pp. 58, 59. Note, 
 
458 LIFE OF BI«HOP HALL. 
 
 puritanism:'' but Bishop Hall may, with the 
 greatest propriety, be considered as exhibiting in 
 ihis whole life and writings a fair specimen of what 
 B. bishop and a minister of the church of England 
 should be : — he was strictly canonical and con- 
 sistent — a strenuous maintainer of christian god- 
 liness and christian order — a genuine son of the 
 church, who lived and preached the doctrines of 
 our Liturgy, Articles, and Homihes. 
 
 ¥ 1 W I S. 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
BISHOP HALL'S 
 LETTERS TO ARCHBISHOP USHER. 
 
 No. I. 
 
 TO THE MOST REVEREND JAMES USHER, ARCHBISHOP 
 OF ARMAGH. 
 
 Gratulor vero ex animo, te Antistitum decus, 
 Sancto Ignatio tuo : Gratulor tibi im6, imiverso 
 orbi Christiano, Igaatium, iiieritissim6 tuum; 
 sed quidem et tuo beneficio nostrum? Gratioreni 
 profecto operam navare Dei Ecclesiae nullus 
 unquam potuisset quam tantum, tani antiquum 
 sanctumque Apostolicae Tr^oaTatnag patronum, ac 
 tam egregium primaevaB pietatis exemplar ab 
 injuria temporis vindicando. Inciderat nempe 
 bonus iste viator Hierosolymitanus in Latrones 
 quosdam Hierochuntinos, qui ilium non spolia- 
 rant modo, sed miser^ etiam pen^que ad mortem 
 vulnerarant; praeterierant saucium ac fer^ mori- 
 bundum, nescio quot Parkeri, Coci, Salmasii, 
 aliique nuperae sectae coryphaei; vestra vero 
 
462 APPENDIX. 
 
 (molliora uti sunt) viscera tam dur^ hominis 
 a^iokou sorte misericorditer commota sunt; vestra 
 unius pietatis (optimi instar Samaritae) vinum 
 oleumque infudit tam patentibus vulneribus, 
 abstersit saniem, foed^que hiulca plagarum ora, 
 manu tener^ fasciavit ; fer^que exauimem vestro 
 typorum jumento imposuit; ac communi denique 
 Ecclesiae hospitio, non sine maximis impensis, 
 commendavit. Profecto hoc uno nomine assur- 
 gent Amplitudini tuee boni (quotquot sunt) 
 omnes ; manusque tam salutares piis labiis exos- 
 culabuntur. Intelligent jam novitiae paritatis 
 assertores quid illud sit quod tanto molimine 
 usque machinantur, sentientque quam probe 
 illis cum sanctissimo Martyre, ac celeberrimo 
 Apostolorum Discipulo conveniat. Illud vero, 
 inter Doctissimas Annotationes vestras saliente 
 et corde et occulo legisse me fateor, quo egre- 
 gium illud o-^aA^ Salmasianum de tempore sup^ 
 positicii Ignatii, leni ilia quidem, sed castigatrice 
 manu corripueris : Fieri ne potuit ut tantus 
 author in re tanti momenti Chronologica, tam 
 foede laberetur, aut num forte, hoc pacto, (quan- 
 doquidem hsec causae disciplinariae Arx merito 
 habeatur) dominis suis palpum obtrudere maluit ? 
 Quicquid sit, bis Martyrium passus Ignatius 
 noster ; tua demum opera Praesul honoratissime, 
 j-eviviscit; causamque iniquissime jam abdicatae 
 
APPENDIX. 463 
 
 tmcrno'Tnfi in Ecclesiae totius foro tam cat^ agit, 
 ut non pudere non possit hestemae Disciplinae 
 astipulatores, tam male-suscepti, litis injustae 
 patrocinii. Quod si nullum aliud foret nostrae 
 senteutiae propugnaculum, nobis quidem abund^ 
 suflficeret habuisse {<ruv ©eoj) nostrae veritatis patro- 
 nos, te et Ignatium. Vale Primatum a^iovo/jux<rTe 
 et Ecclesiae laboranti, et precibus, et operis 
 (quod facis) subvenire perge, et fave, 
 
 Cultori tuo, ac malorum tuorum 
 Socio, et praeconi Meritorum, 
 
 E TMgMTiolo Sostro Highmnensi, JQS. NORVICENSI. 
 
 MaU 25, 1647: 
 
No. II. 
 
 TO THE MOST REVEREND JAMES USHER, ARCHBISHOP" 
 OF ARMAGH. 
 
 SALUTEM IN CHRISTO. 
 
 Grata: admodum et manu et ment6 accepi 
 heri, Primatmn Reverendissime, a manibus Hono- 
 randi plurimum Episcopi Diinelmensis, literas 
 tuas, sed et donaria longe pretiosissima, libros 
 tuos : Deus bone ! quam elaborates quam recon- 
 ditiore literatura refertos quos stupebunt exteri, 
 gratulabunturqne author! felicitatem banc et otii 
 et eruditionis: Nostri vero quo tandem non 
 possunt non erubescere, tantum viruni neglectui 
 habuisse ? At, O te omni et invidia et tyrannide 
 superiorem; quern divinior mens supra terrena 
 quaeque ita longe extulit, ut ingratissimi aevi sive 
 incuriam sive contemptum nihil quicquam ad te 
 pertinere sentias : lUud tibi unum curae est ut 
 bene merearis : I licet hoc animo resides in 
 obscuro Lincolniensis Hospitii angulo, qui totius 
 
APPENDIX. 465 
 
 Occidentis Patriarchatu dignissimum te praes- 
 titisti. 
 
 Mihi vero homitii pauperculo quid tandem 
 suppetit quod munificentiae tuae retribuani? Ex- 
 ciderat mihi pridem opella quaedam, ita quidem 
 minutula, ut me plan^ puduerit ejusmodi stre- 
 nulam tanto paesuli obtulisse ; tandem tamen eo 
 prorupi audaciae, ut id facerem : Tu pro singulari 
 candore tuo ignosces erroribus quib usque sive 
 scriptiunculae, sive authoris ; qui se 
 
 Reverendissimae Paternitatis vestrae 
 
 clientem profitetur devotissimum 
 
 E Tugurio meo Highamensi, JQS. N ORVIC. 
 
 Febr. 26) 1647-8. 
 
 Hh 
 
No. III. 
 
 ARCHBISHOP USHER'S LETTER TO 
 BISHOP HALL. 
 
 TO THE RIGHT REV. JOSEPH HALL, BISHOP OF 
 NORWICH. 
 
 Admodum Reverendo in Christo Patri, Fratri- 
 que charissimo D. Josepho Hallo, Norwicensi 
 Episcopo. 
 
 Quem tui in me amoris et judicii (Antistes 
 optirae) friictum ceperim ; Ignatiana Appendix 
 ista declarabit: ad quam perficiendam, et in 
 lucem proferendam majorem mihi animum quam 
 unquam habuissem, elegantissimas et suavissimas 
 tuas ad me literas dedisse, non possum non 
 agnoscere. Cum ea mitto et de Fidei Symbolis 
 Diatribam, et de Macedonum atque Asianorum 
 anno dissertatiunculam; non alio a te aestimandas 
 pretio, quam quod profectae sunt a 
 
 Fratre tuo amantissimo et 
 cultore summo 
 
 Lond. vii' Kalend. 
 ilfflrfm, ^w, MDcxLvii. JACOBO USSERIO Armachano, 
 
No. IV. 
 
 TO THE MOST REVEREND JAMES USHER, ARCHBISHOP 
 OF ARMAGH. 
 
 AccEPi k te pridem, Honorandissime Praesul, 
 munus egregium, teque uno dignum, Annales 
 sacros Veteris Testanienti accuratissim^ digestos. 
 Non enim mihi traditum est voluuien, qui\m 
 oculi mei in tarn gratum, diiique expetitum opus 
 irruerint illico, neque se exiiide avelli patiuntur. 
 
 Obstupui san^ indefessos Labores, industriam 
 incredibilem, reconditissimse eruditionis monu- 
 menta, quae se istic passim vel snpino lectori 
 ultro objiciunt; Praecipu^ vero subit animuin 
 mirari felicitatem otii tui, quo inter tam continuam 
 concionum doctissimarum seriem studiis hisce 
 paul6 asperioribus, et abstrusissimarum quarum- 
 cunque (utpote ex imae antiquitatis caligine eru- 
 tarum) historiarum indagini vacare potueris: Hoc 
 fieri non potuisset ilicet sine numine mirum in 
 modum et tibi propitio, et Ecclesiae: in cujus 
 unius gratiam hajc tibi singularia et artium et 
 linguarum charismata tam ubertim coUata fuisse, 
 
 Hh2 
 
468 APPENDIX. . - 
 
 facile persentisces. Perge porro, Decus praesu- 
 lum, ita et nos beare, et adornare tibi coronam 
 glorise sempiternae : et faxis mirentur posteri tale 
 lumen tarn infelici seculo indultum. Expectare 
 nos jubes Chronologicum opus toti Christiano 
 orbi exoptatissimum, sed et Annales, insuper 
 alios: Quid non a tanto authore speremus? Deus 
 modo protrahat tibi dies, ut agvi maturus hinc 
 tandem demigres, seroque in cselum redeas. Misit 
 mihi librum nuper a se editum Christophorus 
 Elderfeldius noster, non, uti fatetur, injussu suo ; 
 sane doctum, ac prob^ elaboratum, et nisi in 
 deploratum incidissimus aevum, non inutilem: 
 Quantum debeo ei Authori et Patrono ? Habeat 
 suas a me uterque gratias. Ego quod superest 
 Paternitatae vestrse Reverendissinise pieces meas 
 animitus vovcjo quin et meipsura. 
 
 E Tuguriolo nostra Highamtnsi, JOS. INOKvICENS. 
 
 In festo Sancti Jacobi 
 Anno MDCL. 
 
No. V. 
 
 TO THE MOST REVEREND JAMES USHER, ARCHBISHOP 
 OF ARMAGH. 
 
 MOST REVEREND, AND HONOURABLE, 
 
 With never enow thanks for this precious 
 gift which I receive from your Grace's hand, I 
 have, with no small eagerness and delight, turned 
 over these your learned and accurate Annals, 
 wondering not a little at that your indefatigable 
 labour, which you have bestowed upon a work 
 fetched together out of such a world of monu- 
 ments of antiquity; whereby your Grace hath 
 better merited the title of xa^^cvTEfo? and (pi^oTrovogy 
 than those on whom it was formerly imposed ; 
 but in looking over this admirable pile of history, 
 my curiosity cast me upon the search of two 
 over-famous persons, Simon Magus, and Apol- 
 lonius TyancBus ; the particularities of whose 
 story seem so much to be concerned in the dis- 
 quisition of that antichrist lately set on foot by 
 
470 APPENDIX. 
 
 Grotius and Dr. Hammond. I had hoped to 
 have found a just account, both of their times, 
 and their actions, and events, in this your com- 
 plete collection : which missing of, I have taken 
 the boldness to give this touch of it to your 
 Grace, as being desirous to know, whether you 
 thought good to omit it, upon the opinion of the 
 invalidity of those records, which mention the 
 acts and issue of those two great Juglers; or 
 whether you have pleased to reserve them for 
 some further opportunity of relation. Howsoever, 
 certainly, my Lord, it would give great satisfac- 
 tion to many, and amongst them, to myself, if 
 by your accurate search, I might understand 
 whether the chronology of Simon Magus, his 
 prodigies and affectation of Deity, may well stand 
 with St. PauVs prediction of an o avTiKBi(jt,mi, as 
 following it in time, after the writing of that 
 second Epistle to the Thessalonians. I must con- 
 fess, if the times may accord, there may seem to 
 be some probability in casting antichrist upon an 
 age not so far remote from the apostolic, as hath 
 been commonly reputed ; since the apostle speaks 
 of it as a thing so near at hand, that the ordinary 
 christians of Thessalonica were well acquainted 
 with the bar of his revelation. 
 
 I beseech your Grace to pardon this bold 
 importunity of him, who out of the consciousness 
 
APPENDIX. 471 
 
 of his deep devotion to you, and his dependence 
 upon your oracular sentence in doubts of this 
 nature, have presumed thus to interrupt your 
 higher thoughts : In the desire and hope whereof, 
 I humbly take leave, and profess myself. 
 
 Your Grace's in all Christian 
 
 observance and fervent devotion, 
 
 H^fcom, May 1,1654. JQS. NORVIC. 
 
No. VI. 
 
 BISHOP HALL'S 
 
 ATTESTATION TO [THE CHARACTER OF THE REV. JOHN 
 DOWNE, B. D. IN A LETTER TO DR. HACKWELL. 
 
 WORTHY DR. HACKWELL, 
 
 I DO heartily congratulate to my dead frieftd 
 and collegian, this your just and noble commemo- 
 ration. It is much that you have said ; but, in 
 this subject, no whit enough. 1 can second 
 every w^ord of your praises, and can hardly 
 restrain my hand from an additional repetition. 
 How much ingenuity, how much learning and 
 worth, how much sweetness of conversation, how 
 much elegance of expression, how much integrity 
 and holiness, have we lost in that man? No 
 man ever knew him, but must needs say, that 
 one of the brightest stars in our west is now set ; 
 the excellent parts that were in him, were a fit 
 instance for your learnedly defended position, of 
 the vigour of this last age ; whereinto he gave his 
 accurate and witty astipulation. I do much 
 
APPENDIX. 473 
 
 rejoice, yet, to hear, that we shall be beholden 
 to you for some mitigation of the sorrow of his 
 loss, by preserving alive some of the posthuine 
 issue of that gracious and exquisite brain; which, 
 when the world shall see, they shall marvel that 
 such excellencies could lie so close, and shall 
 confess them as much past value as recovery. 
 Besides those skilfull and rare pieces of divinity, 
 tracts, and sermons ; I hope (for my old love to 
 those studies) we shall see abroad some excellent 
 monuments of his Latin poesy: In which faculty 
 I dare boldly say, few, if any, in our age exceeded 
 him. In his polemical discourses, (some whereof 
 I have by me) how easy is it for any judicious 
 reader to observe the true genius of his renowned 
 uncle, Bishop Jewell? Such smoothness of 
 style, such sharpness of wit, such interspersions 
 of well-applied reading, such grave and holy 
 urbanity : shortly (for I well foresaw how apt 
 my pen would be to run after you in this pleasing 
 tract of so well-deserved praise) these works 
 shall be as the cloak, which our prophet left 
 behind him in his rapture into heaven. What 
 remains, but that we should look up after him, 
 in a care, and endeavour of readiness for our day; 
 and earnestly pray to our God, that as he hath 
 pleased to fetch him away in the chariot of death, 
 so that he will double his spirit on those he hath 
 
474 APPENDIX. 
 
 thought good to leave yet below : In the mean 
 time, I thank you for the favour of this your 
 grave, seasonable, and worthy sermon, which I 
 desire maybe prefixed, as a meet preface, to the 
 pubhshed labours of this happy author. Fare- 
 well, from your loving friend, and fellow-labourer, 
 
 Exon. Palace, JQS. EXON'. 
 
 Mar. 22, 1631. 
 
No. VII. 
 A LATIN SERMON, 
 
 PREACHED 
 
 BY THE VERY REV. JOSEPH HALL, D. D. 
 
 THBN DEAN OF WORCESTER, 
 
 Before the Synod of Dor t, Nov. 29, 1618. 
 
 xxix Novembris, Die Jovis ante meridiem. 
 
 ** Habita fuit in Conventu Synodico a Reverendo et Clarissimo, D. 
 Josepho Hallo Wigorniensi Decano, docUssima atque accuratissima 
 exhortatio Latina, ex Eccles. Salomonis, c. vii, v. 16. Pro qu^ 
 pablice ei gratise sont actae.'' Acta Synodi Dordrechti, p, 38. 
 
EccLES. vii, 16. 
 Ne sis Justus nimisy neque sis nimis sapiens. 
 
 De justitia mihi hodie, cum bono Deo, et de 
 sapientia sermo erit. Quid vero occnrrere potuit 
 opportunius? De justitia coram aequissimis 
 Reipub. moderatoribus, de sapientia coram am- 
 plissima doctissimorum Theologorum Synodo, 
 sed et vice versa de sapientia in prndentissimoruni 
 Ordinum vicariorum consessu; de justitiil in 
 sanctissimil coronii Prophetarum. Nee est quod 
 dubitem ne non aure bibula, lubentiq animo 
 recipiantur ista ab utroq vestrum ordine (Nobi- 
 lissimi Ordinum Deputati, Theologi gravissimi) 
 qua3 utruraque ex ajquo spectare videbuntur. 
 Justitia se vobis offert primuliim, deque ilhl tres 
 mirse profecto clausulae conveoere istic, seque 
 oculis auribusque vestris spont^ ingerunt : Justus 
 perity ver. 15. Ne sis Justus nimis, 16. Non est 
 ju^tuSy 20. Euge concionatrix anima, quid medi- 
 taris? ut e sacro illo ore pugnantes effluant 
 sententiae, seque uti Cadmasa proles mutuo peri- 
 mant; dum negat ultima, quod prima asseruit; 
 secunda vetat fieri, quod ultima posse fieri negat? 
 
478 APPENDIX. 
 
 Si non sit Justus, qut potest perire? Qui potest 
 esse quis Justus nimis, si Justus nemo est? Mi 
 homo, amic^e sunt semper scripturarum lites: 
 utinam tales semper fuissent nostrge. Neque 
 hie opus est Mose aliquo Mediatore, qui frater- 
 nitatem inculcet. Pulcherrim^, scilicet, his inter 
 se ultro convenit, ubi tribus clausulis, tria justitise 
 genera accommodare libuerit. Justitia absoluta 
 est: sic nemo Justus. Justitia inchoata, inque 
 suogenere: sic Justus perit. Justitia eequivoca; 
 sic ne sis Justus nimis. Ita facile et nimium 
 Justus est, qui Justus non est, et qui Justus est, 
 perit. Non ergo vel animum adimit justitia 
 asseclis summum justitise exemplar, dum justum 
 perire ait, vel veram justitiam deprimit, dum 
 nimietatem vetat. Facile quidem omnes deter- 
 remur a bono, qui vix ullis sen monitorum seu 
 minarum frsenis nos h malo divelli patimur. 
 Quim avid^ alacriterque omnes arripimus hoc 
 quicquid est consilii ! Nempe hoc xgre nobis 
 est, ac si quis febricitanti amico, jamque merum 
 ignem spiranti, poculum frigidae pleniusculum 
 propinaverit. Perplacet naturas nostra? libertas, 
 et quicquid banc sapit, cordi est. Nos quidem 
 onagrorum more (Jobi verbum agnoscitis) per 
 haec mundi deserta soluti discurrimus, nee jugo 
 assueti, nee fr^no. Tota religio ligat nobis et 
 mentem et manum. Unde et nomen illi indidit 
 
APPENDIX. 479 
 
 vetustas, et fraenurn appinxit in manu inter 
 Theologos nostri seculi Poeta maximus. Nullum 
 non mandatum hami instar est et retinaculi, quo 
 vaga haec, et in scelus omne solutissima mens 
 coercetur aKXnpog xoyoi est quicquid jubet. lllud 
 vero imprimis, Estote perfectly siciU Pater vester. 
 Quod Petrus olim de rituum lege, idem caro et 
 sanguis de lege morum: jiigum impar cervicibus 
 et Patrum et nostris. Laxare nunc habenas 
 hasce videtur Salomon, et pro blandi alicujus 
 Mitionis more indulgere aliquid parum flagitiosae 
 licentiag ; Ne sis Justus yiimis. Falleris et bic, 
 quisquis es. Parasite tui. Perditissimaj huic 
 naturae obblandiri velit sanctus concionator, ut 
 modum imperet veras sanctimonije, improbulum 
 ut esse sinat, ut jubeati— Apage blaspbemiam! 
 dixisset modo, noli Justus esse, baberes profect6, 
 quo petulantem bunc animum demulceres. Sed 
 cum ait. Noli Justus esse nimis, justitiam praecipit, 
 damnat excessum. Excessus justitize justitia 
 non est. Ut desit vocabulum quo hoc exprima- 
 tur, res constat: satis Justus nemo potest esse, 
 nedum nimis; etiam dum servat justitias modum. 
 Molesta quaedam animi pendentis anxietas et 
 laifxovia nomen hoc fortean induit, aut opinio justi- 
 tiae. Quot vitia, virtutum titulis insignita vulgo 
 prodeunt, prassertim ubi nota additur excessus ? 
 Nimis liberalis, prodigus est: nimium fortis, 
 audax: frugi nimis, avarus. Potius istic pro- 
 
480 APPENDIX. 
 
 batur fMEo-orng dum v7rspQo-Ky\ prohibetur. Ut ubi 
 Paulus immoderatum pro mortuis luctum vetat, 
 moderatum jubet. Imprimis ergo Justus esto. 
 Da operam, ut ia te Justus sis, ut ia Chris to. 
 Regula justitias lex est, summa legis justitia. 
 Oportet impleri omnem justitiam, inquit verus 
 a^x^TUTTog Melchisedechi. Suum cuique, Justus. 
 Vis igitur Justus esse? Da Deo timorem, amorem, 
 fideui. Proximo, et suum semper, et aliquando 
 etiam ipsius tuum. Illi enim et tuum cedit : ubi 
 tibi superfluit, ipsi defit. Tibi, quantum et 
 naturse sufficiat, et personam. Utinam vero hoc 
 unum addiscere possemus aliquando : utinam 
 hac in parte baud parum peccaretur gravius ! 
 Non satis justi sumus, qui justitiam profitemur. 
 Quisque sibi fere totum tribuit, proximo parum, 
 minimum Deo ; utrique certe horum, quantulum 
 expediat sibi. Vos appello (viri fratres) testes 
 communis hominum vita^ ac morum, quam peri- 
 erint penitissime justitia et Veritas, a filiis homi- 
 num. Quippini et vos seque provocem, (viri 
 Magnates) censores judicesque facinorum, qu£e 
 oculos plebeculse vel spectando fatigarint. Con- 
 queremini licet omnes cum Beato Martyre 
 Cypriano : Flagrant ubique delicta, et passim 
 multiformi genere peccandi, per improbas mentes 
 nocens virus operatur. Quin et innocentia, nee 
 ilhc ubi defenditur, reservatur. Consensere jura 
 peccatis, et coepit esse licitum, quod publicum 
 
APPENDIX. 481 
 
 est. Sed, O si possitis in ilia sublimi specula 
 constituti, oculos vestros iuserere. secretis, reclu- 
 dere cubiculoriiin obductas fores, et ad conscieu- 
 tiam luminum penetralia occulta reserare, aspice- 
 retis profecto ab impudicis geri, quod aspicere 
 non possit frons pudica ; videretis, quod crimen 
 sit et videre, turpes Aretinismos libidinum, crudas 
 nauseabundiB ebrietatis reliquias. Filii honiinum, 
 usque quo gravi corde, quousque diligitis vanita- 
 tem et quajritis mendacium ? Estote justi satis. 
 Succurrite vos interim laboranti Reipubl. qui 
 sedetis ad 'clavum, et . date operam sedulo, ut 
 grassantibus hominum vitiis, tempestivis ali- 
 quando tandem censuris occurratur. Quin claves 
 manu exerit exercetque Ecclesia, qua3 giadium 
 oris liber^ usque vibraverit? Quin fulminum 
 spiritualium vim omnem ac horrorem sacrum 
 redintegratis, facitisque ut qui Dei Ministros 
 ftocci fecerint, ad lictorum vestrorum fasces 
 contremiscant ? Supponitur hoc primum (Justus 
 est!) sequitur, quod vetatur postmodum, Ne 
 quid fiimis ; sen opinione, sen vero reipsa. Non 
 opinione : facile qui pauxillum in se habent 
 justitiae, intestino quodam fermento sute (pi^s^unai 
 efferentur, jamque se plus nimio abundare autu- 
 mant. Ita Justus erat jactator sui Pharisasus, 
 Gratias tibi, Dominey non sum ut alii, non ait, ut 
 aliqui : modestiae fuisset istud, humique repentis 
 r<x7r£ivo(ppo(Tuvni. Sunt cnim aliqui profecto Dujmones, 
 
 I i 
 
482 APPENDIX. 
 
 huinana specie larvati, ut vere Hieronymus : sed 
 ut alii, universalis naturam sortitur indefinitus 
 enunciandi modus. Parem cum Pompeio ferre 
 non vult, nedum cum Cassare superiorem. Jun- 
 gant vero huic man us (si volunt Pontifii Thra- 
 sones, homines sacerrimi, qui legem se ex amussi 
 servare et supererogare demum aliquid se Deo 
 posse jactitant. llicet hi veri sunt horum tem- 
 porum, (quos exprobare solent aliis) Puritani. 
 Ingenue (quod solet) Espensajus, sunt qui hodi^, 
 status et homines in perfectione justitise tantum 
 non sequent Angelis, novae veteris Pelagianismi 
 reliquiae. Qu^ hasresi, ut nulla vel periculosior 
 vel perniciosior, aut perpetuas gratias Christi 
 recessitati magis contraria, ita nulla vel minus 
 exstincta, vel plus rediviva. Sed et suos denique 
 Gratianus, istos prob^ sugillat, qui si nomen 
 suum, inquit, cognoscere vellent, mundanos se 
 potius quam mundos appellarent. Erigant isti 
 sibi cum Acesio scalam, qua in caelum ascendant, 
 (monitore Hieronymo) ab irato interim omnis 
 superbiag vindice, in imum barathrum prsecipi- 
 tandi. Mittamus opinionem. Sunt qui reipsa 
 nimium ambiant justitiae, idque vel publice, vel 
 privatim. Puhlich, vel qui ipsum legis rigorem 
 sectantur paulo severius in judicando, neglecta 
 interim omnis imBWEiOL^ ratione : pessimi amanu- 
 enses, qui leges etiam lacteas sanguine transscri- 
 bunt. Carnifices plane legales, qui dum non tarn 
 
APPENDIX. 483 
 
 in men tern legislatoris, quain in juris apicis in ten- 
 dun t, magistram vitie, uiatrem pacis saluberrimani 
 voixohaiav ill ministrani mortis iniqu^ convertunt. 
 Quo referri dicereni, qui sic pcenis fuic solent, ut 
 in aliorum delicta atrocius animadvertant, nisi 
 ilJud palani esset, nullo graviore morbo sa^culum 
 hoc, quam lenitate nimia laborare. Neque tam 
 lenientibus, cutimve blande reducentibus lini- 
 mentis indiget commune improbitatis ulcus, quam 
 igne et ferro. Eliam virtus ipsa nimia licentia 
 languescil, quce mode rata co'ercione vires perennat, 
 imo reduplicat. Animosissimus equorum, si sem- 
 per laxantur frsni, medio itinere deficit : neque 
 jam virgjB respondet satis, nee calcaribus. Siqui- 
 dem vobis publicje rei salus curoc sit, eritis quidem 
 hac in parte justiores. Vel qui sacrae legis 
 interpretes ita se literis ac syllabis mancipio dare 
 solent, ac si (contra quod olim Tertullia^ius) 
 ratio divina non in medulla esset, sed in superjicie, 
 Ita Scribae olim et Pharisaei, censore Christo. 
 Ita Origines, paenam dans merits tot allegori- 
 arum, Emiuchatum plaiie allegoricum ad literam 
 paulo servilius interpretatus, sibi vim tulit. Qui 
 non minus vim intulerat Scriptuns, virque esse 
 desiit, qui non desiit esse malus interpres, Ita et 
 Monachus ille olim Evangelium ipsum vendidit, 
 a quo jussus est omnia vendere. Utinam vero 
 Doctores Pontificii immunes se praestarent ab 
 hoc crimine, quibus nimis solenne est caelum terras 
 
 I i 2 
 
484 APPENDIX. 
 
 raiscere, humanitatem Christi in monstrum, in 
 nihilnm redigere potius, quam in sacramentali 
 loquendi forma figuram nobisciun admittere 
 veliut, qui tanien ipsi multas inibi fateri coguntur. 
 Non infimum est apopbthegmatum sapientissimi 
 Regis, quod tamen vulgata Papicolarum versio. 
 ridiculum facit, Emulsor lactis educit hutyrum ; 
 emunctor nasi educit sangiiinem. Et quid est boc 
 aHud, quam ya-Ka o^q-kov sincerum lac veritatis, ita 
 nimis agitare ut in butyrura congelescat: naresque 
 scripturarum adeo graviter comprimere, ut san- 
 guis demum eliciatur. Et horum quidem uterque 
 nimis Justus est ; in sententiis sen ferendis seu 
 interpretandis. Quin et hue revocamus illos 
 mal^ cautos justitias divinae vindices, qui causam 
 Dei non abter agendam censent, quam suam. 
 Quasi ille ipse omnis justitise et bonitatis fons 
 ac scaturigo immundum tluat, nisi ab istorum 
 puteis humorem petat ilicet: vel qui ex altera 
 parte prodigiosan! justitiam, piisque auribus ne 
 ferendam quidem Deo adfingunt. O homo, O 
 lutum ; sat est : sis tu illi quern te esse voluit : sit 
 tihi ille, quern se fore revelavit. 
 
 Privatus justiticB excessus sequitur, vel £v tw 
 aTTsxziv vel vttex^iv ut imitemur Epictetum, sive in 
 evitandis rebus legitimis, quarum nobis usum 
 liber^ concessit Deus, sive in agendis suspicien- 
 disque quae Deus nusquam praescripserit. lUud 
 meticuiosie cujusdam est ac rigidiusculas anxieta- 
 
APPENDIX. 485 
 
 tis : hoc vero superstitiosic nimiumque affectatae 
 sanctimoni^e. Qua3 dc utroqiie horuni meditatus 
 eram qiiam miiita prudens omitto, iie niiiiius sim. 
 Cum iustituto nostro conjunctior est paulo qua3 de 
 sapientia sequitur oratio. Ne sis sapiens nimis. 
 Qui, data optione, sapieutiam sibi elegit, et 
 supra quam mortales solent, sortitus est, nimium 
 dainnat sapienticc; Ecquid melle dulcius? vere 
 Sampson. Ne nimium lamen mellis comedito^ 
 prudenter Salomon. Ipse rationis morbus est 
 cnriositas, quo vel ad mortem usque laborarunt 
 primi generis humani parentes : nobis quidem 
 ideo hitTeditarius cognatusque. Esdras ille sup- 
 posititius aliud protitetur, aliud praestat. Non 
 proposui mihi, inquit, inlerrogare de superioribus 
 iuis, Et tamen eodem loci, Nunquid plus Jutu- 
 rum est, quam prceteriil? Sed et bonus ille 
 Dionysius, ita de Angelorum ordinibus (uti nostis) 
 disserit, quasi cum Paulo raptus fuisset in caelum 
 Imo qua3 B. Apostolus vidit et conticuit, iste non 
 minus profecto conticuit, quam vidit. Neque 
 defuit alter, qui coelestium spirituum numerum 
 sequ^ certo designavit. Quin et Matilda, una h 
 minorum gentium divis, fratris cujusdam rogatu 
 ansa est nimis quidem familiariter sciscitari, quid 
 de anima Sampsonis, quid de Salomonis, Trajani, 
 Origenis, demum fieret. Qui ad pedes CJjristi 
 diutule sederunt Apostoli, ubi de fidei mysteriis 
 sermo inciderat, audiunt illico, vobis datum est 
 
486 APPENDIX. 
 
 nosse : sed ubi de rebus parum necessariis percon- 
 tantur, ovx vfiav yvavai. Absorptus est ab ilia vora- 
 gine Plinius, quam proprius peniliusque voluit 
 intueri. JSt JBethsemitce, dum sacram Dei sedem 
 l(Bti perlustrant oculis siiis, periere. Sciomejam 
 ulcus tangere hujus asvi, quod tamen faciam levi 
 manu. Liceat mihi, fratres reverendi, coram vobis 
 merito queri, seculum illud prius, nimium igno- 
 rantise perdidisse. O crudeles plane illorum tem- 
 porum Scribas et Phariseeos, qui claves ccelorum 
 sibi servantes, nee intrarint ipsi, nee alios intrare 
 diseupientes sustiniierint : nostrum vero hoc nimio 
 perire sapientige. Generosior quidem paulo est 
 iste morbus, sed nihilominus lethalis. Omnes 
 omnia scire volumus; et ne quid forte lateat, 
 etiam in arcanissima De concilia temer^ irruimus 
 ac praecipitamur. Date veniam huic parrhesias. 
 Et plebem et doc tore reos perago hujusce mali. 
 Est sane (nequis nesciat) Theologia duplex, 
 scholastica et popularis. Hsec religionis basin 
 spectare videtur, ilia tectorii ipsius formam et 
 ornamenta respicit. H^ec, quae sciri debent; 
 ilia quas sciri possunt. Hujus cognitio Christia- 
 num facit, illius disceptatorem. Vel, si quis 
 mavult, et base Theologum facere solet, ilia 
 polire. Ut omnes utriusque sententiam ex aequo 
 ambiant, periculi plena res est, et quse vulgo in 
 3umma rerum omnium confusione desinat. Nulla 
 profecto ars est, cujus intima ac secretiora 
 
APPENDIX. 487 
 
 mysteria non soleant, peculiari quidain ratione, 
 solis artificibus relinquit. Neirio est quin tantum 
 sibi patrii juris notum esse velit, quantum hteredi- 
 tati sua) sive adeundae, sive tutanda^ inservire 
 posse putet, qui tamen summos juris apiculos 
 sibi parum disquirendos autumet: hos vero potius 
 consul tissimis legum doctoribus lubentissim^ 
 remittat. Pari modo fit in medicina. Ecquis 
 est, qui non eo usque se ^sculapio in disciplinam 
 tradere velit, ut quid corpori suo noxium, quid 
 valetudini accommodum esse soleat, satis intelli- 
 gat? qui tamen interim omnes pharmacopolag 
 pixides, herbarum vires, morborum rationes, 
 medendique methodos, susque deque habeat? 
 Quin et hoc idem in artium omnium Domina ac 
 Regina animie cum jurisprudentia tum medicina, 
 sacrosanctissima Theologia usu venit. Scitu ad 
 salutem necessaria qusquae imbibant omnes, et 
 licet et juvat. Saturate animas vestras, quotquot 
 estis EcclesinD filii, sacris hisce deliciis; subtili- 
 ores scholarum argutias, alio ablegaturi. T< vfjuv 
 Kat fjuxx^oi; avT^oi; ; Quanto miuus cxpedit, ut pie- 
 beium quodque ingenium summas casli arces 
 scandat profano pede, ibique sacra Dei penetralia 
 audaci oculo perlustret, deque profundissimis 
 consilii divini arcanis, judicum ferat? Ut qui vis 
 h plebe nautarum bajulorumve, de abditissima 
 prasdestinationis ratione, ratiocinari pr^esumat? 
 Regulam Cossicam in Arithmetica dixit nonnemo 
 
488 APPENDIX. 
 
 pr^edestinationem in Theologia, de qua doctam 
 quandam ignorantiam fateri nori piiduit illumina- 
 tissiinos Ecclesige doctores, Etiam rapta in 
 Goelum anima clamavit n ^aQogl Nos vero, brevi- 
 cula intellectus nostri ulniila decreti divini abys- 
 sum inetiri audebimus, quaeque ipsi Angeli stupent, 
 nos conculcabimus ? Neque tam plebem incuso 
 istic, quam doctores ipsos, qui hiec tain parum 
 tempestiv^ populi auribus animisque obgesserint. 
 Imprudenter sane factum, ita Hjec abstrusissima 
 mysteria h suggestis palam sonuisse, quasi in iis 
 solis Christianorum res unica constitisset. Quan- 
 quam, ut vere dicam, etiam in causis religionis, 
 nemo tenetur secundum ictum expectare. Ferire 
 non licuit, licuit impetum hosticura propulsare. 
 Sed neque tam imprudentia peccatur istic, quam 
 nimio forsan sapientias. Duo sunt, si quid ego 
 animadverti, huic Ecclesi^e admodum infesta, 
 nihil enim est cum malis quorundam politicorum 
 artibus negotii, nimium acumen, et hinc orta 
 nimia prophetandi libertas. O mutata baud 
 parum Batavorum ingenia, quibus hebescit jam 
 plan^ orbis reliquus : dignus ilicet, qui vulgaria 
 consectetur! Hinc fit, ut spreta communi prin- 
 cipiorum via, altiores quasdam speculationum 
 semitas, de Ordine, de Numero de Subjecto 
 decreti divini, de Phisica moralive inclinatione, 
 de Actuum habituumque methodo ac discrimine, 
 tanto cum strepitu inire maluistis. Paulo aliter 
 
APPENDIX. 489 
 
 magnus ille gentium doctor Paulus, qui profecto 
 si revivisceret, spinosam Jesuitarum ac Dominica- 
 norum Theologiaiu iioii intelligeret. Nihil ille 
 inter suos scire curavit, praeter Jesuni Christum 
 eumque crucifixum. Figendie sunt hie scholis 
 ipsis susB metae, quas nefas fuerit transiliisse. 
 Quantum nos, mei fratres, k primigenia ilia 
 Chris tianorum simplicitate defleximus ! Sex 
 tantum capitibus constabat Catechismus Apos- 
 tolicus. Theologia vero hodierna, quje homi- 
 num curiosa mens est, se habet instar quanti, 
 seu mathematici sen physici, divisibilis in semper 
 divisibilia. Illud quidem vere Erasmus, banc 
 vix finitam quajstionum subinde emergentium 
 decisionumque farraginem, hoc quicquid est 
 turbarum, in EcclesiA. Dei concitasse. Neque 
 dubitarim ego non neminem scholasticorum, 
 verbis Festi compellare, unaque ad Anticyras 
 relegare. Quos nimium eruditionis ad pessimum 
 usque insaniiE genus redegerit. At nos, mei 
 fratres, edocti melius, sobrie sapiamus. Hoc est, 
 uno verbo, non supra scriptum, non supra patres. 
 Nos homuli ut progrediamur porro ubi pedem 
 fixeritDeus? Audi caro et sanguis; Scrutator 
 Majestatis, opprimetur a gloria. Quindecim sunt, 
 ut Judaei odservant, in tota scripture, loci, singu- 
 laribus quibusdam intentionis notulis insigniti. 
 Quorum ille et uuus, et primus est, Secreta Deo. 
 Si nihil quicquam consilii sui nobis innotescere 
 voluisset Deus, prorsus siluisset; si totum, dilu- 
 
490 APPENDIX. 
 
 cidius profecto ac plenius rationem illius omnem 
 explicuisset. Jam scire nos ista voluit, sed par- 
 cius. Quantum scilicet nostrae tenuitatis modulo 
 suajque gloricC expedire judicavit. Hucusque 
 sapere et sanum et tutum est. Et certe, ut 
 liceat mihi hac de re paulo liberius loqui) quan- 
 doquidem nullarura partium homo sum ego, neque 
 adversarium ago, sed monitorem benevolum) 
 judicem esse debere controversiarum Spiritum S. 
 in sacra Scriptura loquentem, nemo est qui 
 ambigat. Quo nemp^ recurrant fratres de jure 
 hasreditatis contendentes, nisi ad Patris testa- 
 mentum ? Gratulabor vero hoc consilii lUustris. 
 Ordinibus, quorum nos decretum hue pi^ pruden- 
 terqu^ manu duxerit. Neque minus illud constat, 
 ea Scripturse loca, qu^ quid obscurius, vel tran- 
 seundo enunciare videntur, ad illustriora, quasque 
 studio rem ipsam tractant exigenda. Sed neque 
 hoc denique a quoquam negari potest, nullum 
 esse paginal utriusvis locum, qui xquh plene, 
 perspicue, deditave oper4 disquisierit hoc prasdes- 
 tinationis caput, ac celeberrimus ille, qui habetur 
 ad Romanos nono. Agite ergo, viri judices, si 
 me auditis, jubete, ut pars utraque litigantium, 
 brevem, claram, apertamque, sine fuco, sine 
 ambagibus illius loci paraph rasin Sancta^ Synodo, 
 fraterna manu exhibeat. Fieri non potest, quin 
 praseunte hac face divina, se Veritas piis ingenu- 
 isque oculis conspiciendam sit prasbitura. Non 
 
APPENDIX. 491 
 
 supra patres, fidissiraos Scriptural interpretes, 
 lucidissima Ecclesix^ sydera. Sed et rex noster, 
 sereuissimus noster rex Jacobus, cujus nomine 
 exultare mihi videtur tota Ecclesia Dei ; regum 
 quos sol unquani vidit, post unum Salomonem 
 Oso^i^ajcrov, sapientissjmus, in sud \\\k aured Epistold 
 nionuit Illustris. Ordines, nobisque in mandatis 
 dedit, illud totis viribus urgere, illud unum incul- 
 care, ut recepta) hactenus lidei communique et 
 vestra? et aliarum Ecclesiarum confessioni adh^ii- 
 rere usque velitis omnes. Quod si feceritis, O 
 felicem Belgicam ! O intemeratam Christi spon- 
 sam ! O rempublicam florentissimam ! Navi- 
 gabit profecto in portu demum haec afflictata 
 opiniouum undis Ecclesia, tempestatesque a 
 maligno illo excitatas, tuto ridebit ac contemnet. 
 Illud vero ut jam tandem fiat, (pi>^TifiEia'k vcrvxa^siv 
 Fratres sumus, simus et collegae. Quid nobis 
 cum illo iufami Remonstrantium, contra- Remon- 
 strautium, Calvinianorum, Arminianorum titulo? 
 Christiani sumus, simus et la-o^vxoi. Unum corpus 
 sumus, simus et unanimes. Per tremendum 
 illud omnipotentis Dei nomen, per pium blan- 
 dumque communis matris nostrae gremium, per 
 vestras ipsorum animas, perque sanctissima Jesu 
 Christi Servatoris nostri viscera, pacem ambite, 
 fratres, pacem inite; et ita nos componite, ut 
 seposito omni praejudicio, partiumque studio ac 
 malo affectu, in eadem omnes veritate feliciter 
 
492 APPENDIX. 
 
 conspiremiis. Apage vero vesanam illam pro- 
 phetandi libertatem, imp licentiam blasphemandi ; 
 lit liceat male feriato cuique Tyroni, prodigiosis- 
 sima cerebri sui phantasmata in apricum produ- 
 cere, et populo commendare et praelo. Ridente 
 Mauro, nee dolente JudcBo ! Quid vis licet, modo 
 hoc liceat: in Scholis quidem philosophicis 
 iudultum hoc semper fuit luxuriantibus adoles- 
 centum ingeniis, ut liceret se thesibus, paradoxis, 
 doctisque argutationibus exercere ; sed ut in 
 SS. Theologiae veritatis negotio istud obtineat, 
 moliri, audaciae est plane diabolicae ; et quod 
 merito nobis extorqueat illud prophetae, " Ohstu- 
 pescite ccsli, confundere O terra. Popidus mens 
 deseruit me, font em viviim, et effodit sibi cisternas, 
 imo puteos immundos, lutulentos.'' INobiliss. viri, 
 vosque Sancta Synodus, si quis pudor, si qua 
 pietas, reprimite banc petulantissimam insaniendi 
 libidinem, modum imperate hominum et linguis 
 et calamis. Et facite, ut qui vera sentire nolunt, 
 falsa divulgare non ausint. Ut error haeresisve, 
 si denasci non potest, discat tamen latere, et 
 invisum caelo caput tenebris occultare. Ita ut 
 sola Veritas lucem adspiciat, regnet sola; vobis 
 salutem, gloriam Ecclesia^, Reipub. pacem alla- 
 tura. Quod utique efficiat ille pacis autor, 
 veritatis Deus, Rex gloriae, cui triuni Deo, Patri, 
 Filio, Spiritui S. sit omnis laus, honor, gloria, in 
 saecula sa^culorum. Amen. 
 
No. VIII. 
 
 Rustica Academiae Oxoniensis nuper reformataB 
 descriptio, ia visitatione fanatica Octobris sexto, 
 &c. A. D. 1648, cum Comitiis ibidem Anno 
 sequente : et aliis notatu non indignis. Doctore 
 Alibo7ie nuper Lincolnice Oxon, Authore. 
 
 1. RuMORE nuper est delatum 
 
 Dum agebamus run, 
 
 Oxoniam iri reformat am 
 
 Ab iis qui dicti^wri. 
 
 2. Decrevi itaque, confestim, 
 
 (Obstaculis sublatis) 
 Me Oculatum dare testem 
 Hujusce novitatis. 
 
 3. Ingressus urhem juxta morem, 
 
 Scrutaodi desiderio : 
 Nil praeter maciem, et squalorem, 
 Foedissimum comperio. 
 
 4. A Decio in specum jacti. 
 
 Qui tantum dormierunt, , 
 Post seculum expergefacti. 
 Tot mira non viderunt. 
 
 6. Erectas illi crebras cruces, 
 Et templa conspexere, 
 Quae prisci pietatis duces 
 Tunc primum coustruxere. 
 
494 APPENDIX. 
 
 6. Nos autem sanctiora uuper 
 Incidimus in seciila. 
 Qui tolluDt ista tanquam Super- 
 Stitionis symbola. 
 
 7c Ad Scholas primum me trahebat 
 Comitiorum Norma, 
 Queis olim quisq. peragebat 
 Solenniter pro forma. 
 
 8. Expecto Regios prefessores, 
 
 Coraparuere nulli : 
 Nee illic adsunt Inceptores, 
 Nee TogcBy nee cucullL 
 
 9. Calcavi Atrium Quadratum, 
 
 Quo juvenum examen 
 Confluxit olim ; video pratum 
 Quod densum tegit gramen. 
 
 10. Adiban^ lubens Scholam Musices, 
 
 Quam Fcemince et Joci 
 Ornassent pridem, sed Tibicines 
 Jam nusquam erant loci. 
 
 11. Conscendo Orbis illud deeus 
 
 Bodleio fundatore : 
 Sed intus erat nullum pecus, 
 Exeepto Janitore. 
 
 12. Neglectos vidi Libros multos, 
 
 Quod minime mirandum: 
 Nam inter Bardos tot et Stultos 
 
 13. Dominico sequente die, 
 
 Ad sacra celebranda. 
 Ad sedes propero Marice 
 Nam divce vox nefanda. 
 
 14. Tenebar mox intrandi metu, 
 
 Solicitus ut ante : 
 Sed frustra prorsus, nuUo caetu 
 Introitum negante. 
 
APPENDIX. 495 
 
 15. Ingressus sedes seuioribus 
 
 Togatis destinatas : 
 Videbam Cocis et Sartorihus 
 Et Lixis, usurpatas. 
 
 16. Procancelarius * recens prodit. 
 
 Qui satis literarum, 
 Quod vero quisque probus odit, 
 Est ConscientiiB parum. 
 
 17. Procurartoes sine clavibus, 
 
 Quserentibus ostendas : 
 Bedellos dovos sine Stavihus ; 
 Res protinus ridendas. 
 
 18. Suggestum conscendebat fungus f 
 
 lusulsa quaeq. fundens: 
 So dull a fool was ne'er among us, 
 Pulvinar sic contundens, 
 
 19. Quicquid in buccam evenivit, 
 
 Minaci utens dextra, 
 Boatu magno effutivit 
 Et nuuquam fuit EXTRA. 
 
 20. Defessus hac Dulmanitatef 
 
 Decrevi venerandos 
 Non adhuc pulsos civitate 
 Amicos visitandos. 
 
 21. Collegium petii Animarum 
 
 Nunc proprie sic dictum : 
 Nam rerum hie coiporearum 
 Vix quicquam est relictum. 
 
 22. Hie quaero virum % suavitate 
 
 Omuimodo politum : 
 Responsum alibi ingrate, 
 CUSTODEM custoditum. 
 
 ♦ Dr. Reynolds. t Dr. Stanton. 
 
 I Dr. Sheldon postea Cant. Arch. Episc. 
 
496 APPENDIX. 
 
 23. Ad Corpus Christi flecto gressum 
 
 Qua brevitate possum : 
 Jiirares novis probris pressum 
 Et furihus confossum. 
 
 24. Ecclesiam Christi susque deque 
 
 Jactatam mox et versam, 
 . Et sobolem, heu ! louge lateque 
 Percipimus dispersam. 
 
 25. Etogavi ubi sit Orator * 
 
 Divinas plane mentis : 
 Pro facinus ! incarceratur 
 Facundoe decus gentis. 
 
 26. Hinc domum peto prcBcur sorts, 
 
 Quern triste passum fatum, 
 Recenti n arrant vi tortoris 
 Secundo decollatum. 
 
 27. Tarn Sancto preside f cadente 
 
 Discipuli recedunt : 
 Et Ccecodemone J regente, 
 Nee bibuut jam, nee edunt. 
 
 28. Heu ! pulehra domus, nuper laeta 
 
 Dulcissunis fluentis, 
 Nunc ceeno penitus oppleta 
 Canalis putrescentis. 
 
 29. Adire nolui Trinitatem, 
 
 Quam nostis prope stare : 
 Haereticam soeietatem 
 Ne videar damnare. 
 
 30. Nam tanta desolatione, 
 
 Quam quis nefaridam dicet, 
 Oeeurrunt nusquam tres personae 
 Scruteris usque licet. 
 
 * Dr. Hammond. t Dr. Bayly. 
 
 X Mr. Channel. 
 
APPENDIX. 497 
 
 31. Reverso, tristis fertur casus, 
 
 Et miserandum omen 
 CoUegii cui Rubens Nasus 
 Prae foribus dat uomen. 
 
 32. Dederunt illi Principalem * 
 
 Rectores hi severi, 
 Distortis oculis, et qualem 
 Natura vult caveri. 
 
 33. Mox ^des ingredi conatus 
 
 Noil unquam seuesceotes, 
 Stupescens audio ejulatus 
 Horrenda sustinentisf 
 
 34. Quod dulce nuper domicilium 
 
 Ingenuis alendis ; 
 Nunc merum est ergastulum 
 Innocuis toiqueudis. 
 
 35. Ad flentem me recipio tandem 
 
 Flens ipse Magdelenam : 
 Et gemens video eandem 
 Vacuitate pleuam. 
 
 36. Quae faelix dudum ornabatur 
 
 Frequentibus Alumnis, 
 Quae suaviter innitebatur^ 
 Doctissimis columnis. 
 
 37. Num lapsis fulcris queis vigebat 
 
 Videres humi stratam : 
 Et prole densa qua gaudebat, 
 En miser^ orbatam. 
 
 38. Haft sedes comptiores mus% 
 
 Quas habuere sibi 
 Nunc densis tenebris offusas 
 Et Zim et Ozim ibi.J 
 
 • Dr. Greenwood Lippus, 
 
 t Mr.Coliier postca Bedellus qui tortus fuerat perCliiliarcb; 
 Kellei/, 
 
 I Vide Isa. xiii, 21. 
 
 Kk 
 
498 APPENDIX. 
 
 39. Pro * prseside (cui quemquam parem 
 
 Vix aetas nostra dedit) 
 En vobis stultum Capularem f 
 Ad clavum jam qui sedet. 
 
 40. Quam vereor ne diro omine 
 
 Septem regrediantur 
 Daemonia, divino numine 
 Quae quondam pellebantur. 
 
 41. Quocunque breviter flectebam, 
 
 Aut dirigebam Visum : 
 Id totum induit quod videbam 
 Aut lachrimas aut risum. 
 
 42. Ingemui, dum viros video 
 
 Doctissimos ejectos : 
 Et contra, alternatim rideo, 
 Stolidulos suffectos, 
 
 43. O probam reformandi Artem ? 
 
 Quae medicina datur? 
 Quae curat, ut curamus partem 
 Cum totum exscindatur. 
 
 44. Quadrat OS homines quae jubet 
 
 Et doctos extirpandos ; 
 Et nebulones prout lubet 
 Rotundos surrogandos. 
 
 45. Collegia petis ? Leges duras 
 
 Habes, nil fas videri, 
 Praf^ter aedes et structuras ; 
 Scholares abiere. 
 
 46. Culinas illic frigescentes, 
 
 Capellas sine precibus, 
 In Cellis cernas sitientes, 
 Et Aulas sive Messihus. 
 
 * Dr. Oliver. 
 
 t Dr. Goodwin, mlgo vocatus Dr. iViwe Caps. 
 
APPENDIX. 499 
 
 47. In templis quoevis Conciones, 
 
 Aut quicquid est decorum ? 
 Habebis hx^sitationes 
 Extemporaneorum. 
 
 48. Interea quid oppidaui 
 
 With all their quaint devices 
 Qui novas hasce (male sani) 
 Exoptavere vices? 
 
 49. Erecta cornua gerebant, 
 
 Dum montes hi parturiunt : 
 Et nunc fastidiunt, quae voiebant 
 Et fortitur esuriunt. 
 
 50. Heu ! ingens rerum ornamentum 
 
 Et aevi decus pridem ; 
 Quo tandem pacto hoc perventum, 
 Ut idem non sit idem ? 
 
 51. Nam vix a quoquam quod narratur 
 
 Obventum olim Somnio, 
 Compertum erit si quseratur 
 Oxonium in Oxonio, 
 
 KkS 
 
No. IX. 
 DEATH'S ALARUM: 
 
 ▲ 
 
 ON THE RIGHT REVEREND JOSEPH HALL, BISHOP 
 OF NORWICH. 
 
 BY J. WHITEFOOT. 
 
TO THE REVEREND HIS MUCH-HONORED FRIEND 
 ROBERT HALL, D.D. 
 
 ELDEST SON TO THE RIGHT REVEREND JOSEPH, 
 LATE L. B. OF NORWICH. 
 
 SIR, 
 
 It is an undoubted Canon of the Apostles, That the 
 Elder that rules well, and especially that labours too 
 in the word and doctrine, should be counted worthy of 
 double honour ; such an one was your reverend father, 
 by the good report of all men, and of the truth itself 
 And the double honour that the Apostle allowed him, 
 he was once, by the bounty of his Christian Prince, 
 worthily possessed of; though of late, as we all know, 
 he was muzzled from the enjoyment thereof But envy 
 itself (and if there be any thing worse) cannot deprive 
 him of his double honour : one part whereof he hath 
 already enjoyed in his life-time, in the hearts, tongues, 
 and pens of those that lived with him, in this and other 
 nations. The second part remains still due to him, after 
 his death ; which he cannot want, whiles there are any 
 living whose tongues are capable of giving a true praise. 
 
 This poor piece was designed to that just end; that is, 
 next to the glory of God, to the due honour of his faithful 
 servant. That it is no more worthy of his name, is a 
 
504 APPENDIX. 
 
 second part of my sorrow, for his death. It contains a 
 short representation of him taken in haste, as all pictures 
 are which are done after the party's death ; yet might it 
 have been done nearer to the life, had it not fallen into a 
 very unskilful hand: hut besides that, if hath the common 
 disadvantage of all writings, which are but the dead 
 shadows of the living voice ; and therefore no marvel, 
 if this wants much of that little grace and vivacity, 
 which it might seem to have in the delivery. 
 
 Such as it is, Sir, it was, without consulting my voice, 
 voted to the Press, by them that heard it, and as much 
 desired by them that heard it not, because they heard 
 not of it, till it was past the reach of the ear. A nd 
 they were neither few, nor slight persons that were much 
 discontented at their absence from the too private Com- 
 memoration of so worthy a person, caused by the sudden 
 determination of the time. To give them some satis- 
 faction, I was enforced to yield to the publication of 
 these notes. Whereto I was also encouraged, because 
 promised, by the hind judgements of them that heard 
 them, that they could not but find some good entertain- 
 ment from most men, for his sake, of whom they repre- 
 sent so willing, though weak, a remembrance. I hope 
 also they may afford some present satisfaction to the 
 many, that justly expect a better account of his Life ; 
 which in your name, by whom it is best able to be done, 
 I here presume to promise, in convenient time ; and that 
 the rather, because I am not ignorant of your being 
 furnished of some modest and yet remarkable collections 
 thereof, left by his own Pen. I doubt not but that you 
 esteem it a special part of your owne duty, as well as 
 your honour, to follow the straight steps of his industrious 
 and holy life. And to afford the president thereof to the 
 imitation of others, will be a kindness very seasonable in 
 
APPENDIX. 505 
 
 these evil days. And very useful it may be after many 
 others of the ancient Bishop's lives, now forgotteti, than 
 which it is certain there never were any more saint-like, 
 since those of their predecessors the Apostles, towards a 
 demonstration that prelacy, and piety, are not such 
 inconsistent things, as some would make them ; and that 
 the men which are of or for, that order, should not he 
 excluded (as by the monopolizers of that name they now 
 are) from the number of saints ; and consequently not 
 debarred from that which is now asserted to be the 
 common interest, and indefesible right of all saints 
 of whatever persuasion; that is the ]iherty'(if not of 
 discipline, yet) q/* worshiping God, according to their con- 
 science, and the best light of their own understanding. 
 
 To conclude: your nearest relation, claims the prime 
 interest in whatsoever shall pretend to your Father*s 
 name ; and therefore, this, Sir, which is to be reckoned 
 inter parentalia, is with the Author, 
 
 Your*s at command. 
 
 To serve you in the Lord, 
 
 From my Study in St. Peter, 
 
 Norwich, A'oc. 10, 1656. J. W. 
 
Genesis xlvii, 29. 
 And the time drew nish that Israel must die. 
 
 <5 
 
 In the funeral sermons of the ancients, the 
 person deceased was the only text; and the 
 sermon nothing but an anatomy lecture upon the 
 dead man's life. Should I have imitated that 
 custom upon this occasion, by taking no other 
 text, than that of this saint's life ; that which the 
 psalmist saith of the life of man, would, very 
 like, have been the censure of my sermon : 
 namely, that it was but as a tale that was told. 
 Ps. xc, 9. But methinks I might have had a 
 sufficient apology for that, not from the custom 
 of the fathers only, but from Scripture itself; a 
 good part whereof is altogether taken up with a 
 narrative of the lives of saints ; and those too, 
 not altogether canonical in every line. And we 
 have a saint to speak of, (1 think I may presume 
 to say) as eminent an one as some of them. 
 
 But yet I hold myself by modern custom 
 obliged to chuse another text, first, or last ; and 
 I thought it would do best to give it the prece- 
 
508 APPENDIX. 
 
 dence ; you have heard already what it is, short 
 and plain, agreeable to the design of my discourse 
 upon it, which must be short, because I have 
 another text to take up, when I have done with 
 this ; and plain, because that suits best with my 
 own abilities, and the sadness of the occasion. 
 And the time drew nigh that Israel must die. So 
 it is in the English paraphrase; for a verbal 
 translation according to the Hebrew text, would 
 run thus : And the days of Israel drew near to 
 die. And so our translator renders the same 
 words, 1 Kings ii,l ; Deut. xxxi,14. But I shall 
 not take upon me to correct the present transla- 
 tion, because it agrees well enough with the 
 sense, and better with the words too, than that 
 of the vulgar latin, as I shall have occasion to 
 shew by and by. 
 
 Four things I have to consider in this text : 1. 
 The necessity of Israel's death, Israel must die, 
 2. The time of his death, there was a certain 
 time when Israel must die. 3. The appropin- 
 quation of that time, the time drew nigh, 4. 
 Israel's foresight, and consideration of the ap- 
 proach of that time. This the vulgar Latin hath 
 distinctly expressed, Cumque appropinquare ceme- 
 ret diem mortis suce. When he saw the day of his 
 death drew nigh. That Cerneret, 1 confess, is an 
 addition to the words, but not to the sense of 
 the text. For that Israel did foresee and con- 
 
APPENDIX. 509 
 
 sider the approach of his death, is plainly 
 imphed, as the reasoo why he took such a 
 careftil order with his son Joseph, about the 
 place of his burial, as you may read in the words 
 following my text. The like order did Joseph 
 himself give to his sons, about his burial, when 
 he saw his time to die drew nigh. Gen. 1, 25, 26 
 Both of them were very solicitous to be buried 
 in the land of Canaan. Lyra thinks it was, 
 because they foresaw, by a spirit of prophecy, 
 that in that country there would be a resurrection 
 of many saints with Christ, when he should rise 
 again, and they hoped to be of the number, and 
 therefore would be buried there. This conceit is 
 scarce so much as probable. 
 
 But that reason which the Rabbins give, is a 
 ridiculous absurdity; namely, because there shall 
 be no resurrection at all of any but Jews, and of 
 them only in the land of Canaan ; whither all 
 bodies that are not buried there must be rolled 
 through some secret burrows of the earth, from 
 their most distant places of burial, before they 
 can be raised to life:* this fancy is near akin to a 
 multitude more of those men's. But the author 
 to the Hebrews hath told us the true reason of 
 their desires in this point : By faith Joseph wlien 
 
 * Buxtoriii Synagoga Jud. c. 1. 
 
^5l0 APPENDIX. 
 
 he died made mention of the departing of the chil- 
 dren of Israel out oj Egypt, and gave command- 
 ment concerning his bones ; (Heb. xi, 22.) namely, 
 that they should be carried with them into 
 Canaan : thereby declaring his own, and con- 
 firming their faith, concerning their deliverance 
 out of the Egyptian thraldom, which for some 
 time they were yet to indure, and their certain 
 possession of the land of promise. 
 
 I am now to begin with the first particular 
 fore-mentioned ; the death of Israel, and the 
 necessity thereof, Israel must die. I told you 
 before the vulgar translator had taken the bold- 
 ness to put in a word into the text, and that I 
 excused, for its agreement with, and explication 
 of the sense. But I must tell you also, he hath 
 left out another word, instead of that, which 
 cannot so well be excused. For he reads, Cumq; 
 appropinquare cerneret diem mortis, leaving out 
 the name of Israel, which is found in the original. 
 I am not so great a friend to that translation, as 
 to excuse that presumption, if such it were, and 
 not rather an oversight, left yet uncorrected, in 
 all the copies that I have seen. 
 
 The name of Israel is too considerable a word 
 to be left out in the text, whether we respect the 
 person signified by that name, or the signification 
 of the name. 
 
 First, consider the person signified by that 
 
APPENDIX. 511 
 
 name, and you shall find he was as eminent an 
 one, as any that is named in Scripture. And for 
 the signification of the name, you shall hear also, 
 that is very considerable, and so declared by 
 God himself, who both gave the name, and the 
 true interpretation thereof. First, let us a little 
 inquire after the person signified by this name, 
 Israel : who was he ? The man was a Binomius, 
 one that had two names : his original name was 
 Jacob, and there was a mystery in that name, as 
 you may find. Gen. xxv, 26; Hos. xii, 3. This 
 name of Israel was an agfiomen, an alias to the 
 name of Jacob ; a new name given him by his 
 godfather the angel, at his confirmation: you 
 may read the story of it, (Gen. xxxii, 28.) T/i^ 
 name shall be no more called Jacob, but Israel, 
 
 fAiya juu jifiiov ovofjLa otBxov mi eua-E^siag. rsaz, A great 
 
 and honorable name given him for a reward of his 
 piety. So the Lord changed the name of Abram 
 his grandfather, into Abraham. Gen. xvii, 5. And 
 he was the first man in the world, whose name 
 was ever given, or changed by God. And it is 
 well noted, there never was any man received a 
 name immediately from God, but was either an 
 eminent person, or a type of some great and 
 notable matter in the church. 
 
 There is no name in Scripture more famous, 
 than tliat of Israel. Pererius puts the question, 
 why the story of Israel's hfe, is more fully set 
 
512 APPENDIX, 
 
 forth than any of the Patriarchs : and gives this 
 reason for it ; because he was, totius et solius 
 populi Dei Parens, the Father of all, and the 
 onely people of God, having no other children 
 besides the twelve patriarchs, the heads of the 
 twelve tribes of Israel: which cannot be said 
 either of Abraham or Isaac : for Abraham we 
 know had Ishmael as well as Isaac : and so was 
 not the father of the faithful only, but of the 
 Ishmaelites too. And Isaac had Esau as well 
 as Jacob, and so was father of the Edomites, as 
 well as Israelites ; but Jacob was father of the 
 Israelites only : and that ye know in the Old 
 Testament is the common name of the people of 
 God ; who are sometimes called the Children of 
 Israel, sometimes Israel, and sometimes Israelites. 
 As we are now called Christians from Christ, ^o 
 were the people of God of old called Israelites 
 from this Israel. And it is observed, when 
 speech is of the infirmities of the church, she is 
 called Jacob ; but when her glory and valour is 
 signified, she is called Israel. Israel had the 
 honour first to receive his name from God him- 
 self, and then to give a name to all the people of 
 God ; yea, and to God himself too, for he is fre- 
 quently called The God of Israel, The Hope of 
 Israel, The Strength of Israel, The Rock of 
 Israel, The King of Israel, The Saviour of 
 Israel, &c. And Christ is called. The Holy One 
 
APPENDIX. 513 
 
 of Israel, The Glory of Israel. Many and 
 glorious things are spoken of this name, too 
 many to be here recounted. The sum of all is 
 comprehended in the words that were put into 
 Moses' mouth, to speak unto Pharaoh, (Exod. 
 iv, 22.) Thou shall say unto Pharaoh, thus saith 
 the Lord, Israel is my son, my Jirst-born : or in 
 that of the prophet, quoted by the apostle, Tlie 
 Lord said, I have loved Jacob, (that is Israel,) 
 and I hated Esau. Mai. i, 2; Rom. ix, 13. He 
 was the famous instance of God's free and eternal 
 election. One that was sanctified from the 
 womb, and in it, as is thought. The blessings oj 
 Israel prevailed above the blessings of his fathers. 
 Gen. xlix, 26. Such was tlie honour of the 
 person signified by this name. 
 
 Now for the signification of the name, I find 
 some variety in the opinion of the ancients : some 
 will have it to signify, Homo videns Deum, a 
 man seeing God, as Philo, and most of the fathers 
 after him. Some translate it. Rectus Dei, a right 
 (or upright) man of God. This signification is 
 oft mentioned, and sometimes approved by S. 
 Hierom. And very true it is, that both these 
 significations of the name will agree very well to 
 the person of Israel ; and well enough with the 
 name itself, as it may be written and pointed in 
 Hebrew. Israel was indeed ^k nxn ^^ a man that 
 saw God, and that oftener than any of the 
 
 L I 
 
514 APPENDIX. 
 
 patriarchs : we have seven or eight of his visions 
 recorded in Scripture, and one of them was then 
 when he received this name, whereupon he called 
 the place Peniel, (Gen. xxxii, 30.) giving the 
 interpretation, For I have seen God face to face, 
 
 2. Israel was Rectus Dei, a right upright man, 
 bR nu' & cDn ir-K, Vir simplex, aTry^a^r^, in the Sept. 
 aTTT^Hg, saith Aquila, (Gen. xxv, 27.) a plain down- 
 right man: our Saviour alludes to this place, 
 (John i, 47.) where he saith of Nathanael, that he 
 was a true Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile. 
 
 But the truth is, these are but human conceits 
 of the Etymology of his name. The special and 
 proper signification and reason of this name is 
 given by the angel himself, that gave him that 
 name, (Gen. xxxii, 28.) Thi/ name shall be no 
 more called Jacob, (that is, Jacob only,) but 
 Israel; for as a prince hast thou power with God, 
 and with men, and hast prevailed. This is the 
 true interpretation of his name, Princeps cum 
 Deo, a prince with God. He prevailed with 
 God, first for the blessing, and by that blessing 
 he prevailed with men, with Laban, and with 
 Esau, when the one followed, and the other met 
 him with their threatening troops; and prevail 
 he did like a mighty prince with other men too; 
 for with his sword and his bow, he conquered 
 from the Amorite, (Gen. xlviii, 22.) that country 
 which he gave to his son Joseph for a possession : 
 
APPENDIX. 515 
 
 Israel and Jacob too, had both names from 
 striving and from prevailing. The first name 
 Jacob, he received in token that he should prevail 
 over his brother Esau : the second name, Israel, 
 he had in testimony that he had prevailed with 
 God, and he that prevails with God cannot be 
 overcome by men. 
 
 But this victorious prince, this famous victor 
 that prevailed both with God and men, was 
 supplanted, was overcome at last by death, as is 
 signified in my text : Israel must die, as well as 
 Esau, he whom God loved, as well as he that 
 ,was hated. Death is no argument of God's 
 hatred, Neither death nor life can separate Israel 
 from the love of God, He that was loved of God 
 before he was born, was no less beloved when he 
 was dead. If any man might have prevailed 
 against death, or been excused from it, one 
 should have thought Israel should : but there is 
 no such privilege belongs to Israel ; no privilege 
 from death, that death which the text speaks of, 
 the death of the body. But in another sense it 
 is true, Israel did prevail over death: death 
 itself, with his sting, was and shall be swallowed 
 up in victory by him — the gates of hell did not 
 prevail over him. For the living God is the God 
 of Abraham, and of Isaac, and of Israel, (Matt, 
 xxii, 32.) And God is noit the God of the dead, 
 
516 APPENDIX. 
 
 but of the living. Israel therefore is not quite 
 dead, but still lives, and shall do for ever. 
 
 But for all that, it was true, Israel must die. 
 Though the word must is not in the original 
 letter, yet it is in the sense : and if there had not 
 been a necessity for Israel to die, we had not 
 been here now to mourn over our Father Israel, 
 that is dead. But why must? What necessity 
 was there that Israel must die? The original 
 cause of death we may read in the first mention 
 that is made of death, (Gen. ii, 17.) The day 
 thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die. Thou, 
 and all thine, (non uni, sed universitati dicitur 
 moriendo morierisj in dying thou shalt die : that 
 is, certainly without remedy. The blasphemous 
 Jews say, Adam and his posterity were therefore 
 condemned to die, because out of his posterity 
 there was a man to come that would make him- 
 self a God : many such there were, but they 
 meant it of Christ. Whereas the Scriptures, as 
 well theirs as ours, tell us it was because they 
 would have made themselves gods, listening too 
 ambitiously to the serpent that promised them 
 the preferment, in his eritis sicut dii, ye shall be 
 as Gods. But you will say, hath not Christ 
 then redeemed Israel ? We trust he hath, nay 
 we are sure of it : as sure as we are that him- 
 self the Holy One of Israel, is risen from 
 the dead ; so sure we are that Israel is, and 
 
APPENDIX. 517 
 
 shall be redeemed from death. The soul is 
 redeemed from the gates of hell, aud the body 
 shall be redeemed from the ffrave in due time 
 by a blessed resurrection, which is called the 
 redemption of the body; (Rom. viii, 23.) but for 
 that redemption we must wait till the appointed 
 time come. But is that any privilege of Israel's? 
 Shall not Esau be partaker of that redemption 
 as well as Israel ? I answer, no ; and yet it is 
 true, (and an heresie in the Socinians to deny it) 
 his body shall be raised again from the grave; 
 but that will be no redemption from prison, but 
 a bringing forth to execution. We never read of 
 a wicked man raised from the dead in Scripture, 
 though there be many examples of resurrection in 
 both testaments. 
 
 But why might not Israel be excused from 
 dying at all, and so this miraculous redemption 
 of the body be spared? I answer, because the 
 Holy One of Israel, (that was as well the exam- 
 ple, as the author of our redemption) was not 
 excused : and we are predestinate to be made 
 conformable to the image of Christ, that he might 
 he the first-born among many brethren^ (Rom. 
 viii, 29.) conformable to his sufferings, and to his 
 
 death, cry/xftop^oy/xEVO? tw 6avaru aurtt. Phil, lii, 10. 
 
 Obedient, as he was, so must we be, u7ito the 
 death. Our bodies are not to be made like unto 
 his glorious body, till they be made vile by death 
 as his was. 
 
518 APPENDIX. 
 
 Irsael must die in Egypt, before he can be 
 carried into Canaan, (ver 30.) Flesh and blood 
 cannot inherit the kingdom of heaven. That 
 the Apostle saith of Israel, is true in another 
 sense than he meant: All is not Israel, that is qf 
 Israel. Rom. ix, 6. There is an Esau struggling 
 with Jacob whiles we are in the flesh, a body of 
 flesh striving with the spirit, and though it be 
 supplanted by Jacob in the new birth, yet it will 
 not be quite extirpate, till by death we shall be 
 delivered from this body of death. Ciim hac 
 controversia nati sumus (saith Augustine,) these 
 two twins make a perpetual war in us, and no 
 peace is to be expected till they be parted by 
 death. The nerve of the flesh is shrunk and 
 lamed in the combat with the spirit, but not 
 quite cut asunder; and Israel halts all his life- 
 time in the flesh : H^on enim est rectipes virtus in 
 corpore mortali, saith Philo. Divines are of 
 opinion, that in all those that Christ cured of 
 any bodily disease he made a perfect cure, not 
 of that disease only, but of all others, and did 
 integrant corporis sariitatem conferre; left no 
 relics of infirmity behind him. How true that 
 is, 1 know not ; but sure we are, it is not so in 
 the spiritual cure ; the spirits of the just are not 
 made perfect till death. There is a sin that 
 cleaves close to us, that will not be put off tifl 
 we be uncloathed by death. Israel tkerefore 
 
APPENDIX. 519 
 
 must die, that he may be free from sin. Death 
 came in by sin, and sin goes out by death. So 
 do the sorrows of life by those of death : We 
 must die once^ that we may die unto sin. It is the 
 only panacea or all- /teal: nothing but the winding- 
 sheet can wipe away all tears from our eyes. 
 A barbarous kind of mercy it was of Tamberlainj 
 to cause all the lepers of the country to be put 
 to death, to rid them of their misery : but in God 
 it is a real mercy, as well as justice, to soul and 
 body too, to let men die, to free them from the 
 leprosy of the soul, and the miseries of the body. 
 Israel must die that he may rest from his labours, 
 and reap the fruits of them. There is no enter- 
 ing into God s rest, but by this sleep. Job calls 
 man an hireling, (chap, xiv, 6.) so doth our 
 Saviour in the parable : (Matt, xx, 1 .) and the 
 hireling servant may not betake him to his rest, 
 nor receive his wages till night. When Moses 
 was to die, the Lord bid him first come up, and 
 then die, (Deut. xxxii,48,49.) Ascende et morere;* 
 but we must first die before we can ascend to 
 tlie mount of the Lord. There can be no perfect 
 visions of God, but in the night of death : so 
 darkness was before light, and the evening is 
 before the morning. 
 
 * Na2. in land. Basilii. 
 
520 APPENDIX. 
 
 We can never be perfectly possessed of the 
 glorious liberty of the sons God, till we get out 
 of the prison of the body, and so be as the 
 Psalmist speaks, jree among the dead. Ps. 
 Ixxxviii, 5. fji^ccxapnr^s, was a common Euphe- 
 7msmus among the Greeks for a dead man ; but 
 it is indeed the proper title of a saint. Ante 
 ohitum nemo, Sfc. The spirit, in truth, is never 
 perfectly alive till the body be dead. It is but 
 as it were buried alive in the body. A kind of 
 mortification it is to the soul to live in the body : 
 TO (Tuixa (rr\[A,a, Ptato. It doth neither know nor 
 see itself, whiles it is the flesh. 
 
 Death indeed is called sleep usually ; but as 
 Tertullian excellently shews in his book De 
 Anima, it is rather an awaking of the soul, which 
 in the body is asleep, and doth but dream of 
 things, and therefore is grossly mistaken in all its 
 notions. De oppanso corporis erumpit in apertum 
 ad meram, et pur am, et suam lucem — ut de somno 
 emergens ab imaginihus ad veritates.^ 
 
 To conclude this point: the bird in the 
 breast can never be perfectly taught to sing its 
 heavenly note of Hallelujah till it gets out of 
 its cage, and be set upon the tree of life, which 
 is in Paradise. 
 
 * "^rtullian, cap. 63. 
 
APPENDIX. 521 
 
 We have heard of the necessity of Israel's 
 death, and some reasons of it : but what is that 
 to us ? What use may we make of this point ? 
 why this : it will afford us a double argument 
 to reconcile us to the thoughts of death. The 
 first is that which Elijah used in his petition for 
 death, ( 1 Kings xix, 4.) It is enough now, O 
 Lord, take away my life, for I am not better than 
 my fathers. It is enough to make us content to 
 die, though perhaps not ground enough to warrant 
 us to pray for it, as Elijah did, not without some 
 spice of impatience, as is judged : but to make 
 us content to die, this is enough, that we are not 
 better than our Fathers. It is a forlorn error 
 to think, that company will abate the misery of the 
 second death ; but of the first it may, especially 
 when it is so good. Israel is dead, and so is 
 Isaac, and Abraham, and all the Fathers: and 
 are we better than they? We shall fare no 
 worse than they in dying, if we be their children ; 
 and to desire to fare better than any of them, 
 were worse than a vanity. It were too much 
 pride to think ourselves so good as they. And 
 as we are not so good in our lives, so neither 
 is our condition so good as their's whilst we live, 
 but when we die it may, for then we shall be 
 gathered to our fathers. 
 
 And that is another good argument to reconcile 
 us to death; because thereby we shall be 
 
522 APPENDIX. 
 
 gathered to our fathers; as is said of Abraham and 
 many others of the holy fathers ; so it is said of 
 Israel when he died, he was gathered to his 
 people. Gen. xlix, 33. That phrase is primarily 
 meant of the body, which goeth to the grave, 
 the house appointed for all living, as Job calls it, 
 chap. XXX, 23. Yet may it be understood of the 
 soul too, which by death is gathered to aJ^n^, the 
 congregation-house of* souls, or the World of 
 Souls: nws3n xzb^]}y as the Hebrews call it. And 
 the souls of God's saints are gathered Travyv^Et 
 
 jtui sKHXy^cnix wpcoToloKcav ev Hpocvoig ocTToyEy^afxiJLEvaVy J. O the 
 
 general assembly and church of the first-horny 
 which are written (in albo coelesti) in heaven, and 
 to the spirits of just men made perfect, Heb. xii, 13, 
 There we shall meet with Abraham, and Isaac, 
 and all the Fathers ; with the glorious company 
 of the Apostles, the goodly fellowship of the 
 prophets, and the noble army of martyrs. 
 
 Israel rejoiced much for the hopes he had to 
 see his son Joseph, though it were in Egypt: 
 (Gen, xliv, 27, 28.) how much more cause have 
 we to rejoice for the hopes we have to see 
 Israel himself, his, and our Joseph, and all the 
 rest of our fathers and brethren in the heavenly 
 Canaan, and to see the Holy One of Israel, the 
 glory of Israel, the Lord Jesus. 
 
 When the disciples saw but two of the fathers 
 with Christ on Mount Tabor, covered with a 
 
APPENDIX. 523 
 
 slight veil of glory, such as their bodily eyes 
 were capable of, they were so ravished with the 
 sight, that they said, it was good being there, 
 (Matt, xvii, 4.) and would therefore have been 
 building tabernacles there to dwell, and yet them- 
 selves were but mere spectators of that glory; 
 they were not transfigured: how much better 
 will that Being be, where we shall not only 
 be with Christ where he is, and behold his glory, 
 as he prayed for us: (John xvii, 14.) and that 
 with open face too, as St. Paul speaks, but shall 
 be changed into the same image, from glory to 
 glory. 2 Cor. iii, 18. 
 
 Christ is said to be with us here, (Matt, 
 xxviii, 29.) but we are never said to be with him 
 in this world : he is with us by his Spirit here, but 
 we shall be with him by our spirits when we 
 die. Esse Christum cum Paulo magna securitas ; 
 esse Paulum cum Christo summa feliciias. Ber- 
 nard. Christ's presence with us by his Spirit is 
 a great comfort to ours, but the heighth of glory 
 is for us to be with him. 
 
 When Israel had seen the face of Joseph, he 
 was content to die. Gen. xlvi, 30. Now let me 
 die, since I have seen thy face. And old Simeon, 
 when he had seen Christ in the temple, sings his 
 own requiem, JSuiic dimittis, — Now lettest thou 
 thy servant depart in peace, for mine eyes have see7i 
 thy salvation. Luke ii, 29. And have not we 
 
524 APPENDIX. 
 
 as good reason to be willing, at least with our 
 dismission, that so we may come to see him, and 
 his (that is, our own) salvation? Israel must die, 
 that he may fully make good the first- mentioned 
 signification of his name, that he may see God; 
 for the beatifical vision can never be, till death 
 hath closed the bodily eyes. It was a speech of 
 the heathen orator, in his Book De Senectute, 
 that he was much taken with a desire to see the 
 Roman patriots, that were dead, vihom he loved 
 and honoured ; and not them only whom he had 
 seen and known before, but those that he had 
 read and heard of.^ How much more reason 
 have we to desire to see our fathers, and holy 
 friends, with all the eminent saints of God, that 
 we have read, and heard of; to see them, I say, 
 in such a state of glory as he never dreamed of? 
 PrcBstolatur nos Ecclesia Primitivorum, desi- 
 derant nos Sancti, expectant nos Justi, &c. They 
 expect us, saith the devout Abbot of Claraval, 
 It is part of their hopeful desires to see us, and 
 bid us welcome ; and shall we then be unwilling 
 to go to them, that so kindly long and wait for 
 us? We find in the Old Testament many of the 
 saints singing Loth to depart^ and deprecating 
 
 * Equidem efFeror studio patres vestros, quos colui' et dilexi 
 videndi. Neque vero eos solum convenire aveo quos ipse 
 cognovi, sed ilios etiani de quibus audivi et legi. Cic de Sen. 
 
APPENDIX. 525 
 
 their threatened dissolutions ; which some think 
 was, because the promise of eternal hfe was but 
 obscurely known to them : the sight of heaven 
 clouded from them, as the type of it in the 
 temple was hidden from the people by the veil : 
 but this cloud is cleared up by the gospel, and 
 Moses' veil is taken away, Christ hath brouglU 
 life and immortality to light, 2Tim. i, 10. It 
 becomes not Christians therefore to retain the 
 Old Testament spirit still to shrink at the sight 
 of death, but to be ready to say as St. Paul did, 
 / desire to be dissolved^ and to be with Christ, 
 which is, TToT^u ixa>o^ov x^eia-a-ovy Jar better. The 
 phrase looks like a Solecism in the Greek, but 
 we should not have gone about to mend it in 
 English, by abating the sense, in giving but one 
 adverb for two ; very far or very much better, the 
 words signify. 
 
 What long and tedious journeys have many a 
 devout Pilgrim taken, to see nothing but the old 
 land of Canaan, now turned into jEgypt; the 
 place where sometimes the Fathers lived and 
 died, but so long since, that their very graves are 
 buried, and not to be found. 
 
 To conclude this point : 
 
 Brethren, let us but be sure we are true Israel- 
 ites indeed, in faith and holiness, and then never 
 let us fear death. 
 
526 APPENDIX. 
 
 11. 1 have done with the first point, Israels 
 death, with the necessity, reason, and use of it. 
 The second follows ; and that is, the time of 
 Israel's death. The royal preacher, (Eccles. iii,l.) 
 saith, To every thing there is a season, and a time to 
 every purpose under the heaven ; and then by way 
 of induction sets down a large catalogue of 
 things that have their time here below. I may 
 call it his Fasciculus temporum, as an old author 
 calls his book : all his instances are no other than 
 the ordinary changes of an earthly life. And it 
 is well noted by St. Ambrose upon the first verse, 
 where he saith, that there is a time for every thing 
 under the heaven : that all things under heaven 
 are temporal, and by consequence, mutable. But 
 the Psalmist saith, The heavens themselves shall 
 he changed. Ps. cii, 26. He means those visible 
 heavens: the sun itself, and the stars that are 
 above it, as well as all things under it, shall be 
 changed. But in the heaven of heavens there 
 will be no change, because no such thing as 
 time will be there : all is eternal in heaven : but 
 under heaven all things have their time. The 
 lowest story of the heavens, by the philosophers' 
 account, is that of the moon, which is the com- 
 mon emblem of mutabihty : and if you eount the 
 particulars of Solomon's changes in that chapter, 
 you shall find just as many as are the days in a 
 
APPENDIX. 527 
 
 common lunary month, twenty-eig-ht, and all of 
 them like the changes of the moon, nothing but 
 increasing and decreasing. The whole set of his 
 changes is drawn chequerwise, by a just division 
 of white and black, good and evil things, after 
 the pattern that God gave when he first set the 
 division of times, by dividing of light from dark- 
 ness, and making each day to divide itself into 
 an evening and a morning : and the first instance 
 that Solomon gives of his temporalities, is that of 
 the morning and evening of man's life : a time to 
 be do7'n, and a time to die. The primitive 
 Christians confounded the distinction of these 
 two times, by calling the days of their martyr's 
 deaths their Natalitia, or birth-days. And the 
 holy preacher, (chap, vii, 1.) prefers the time of 
 death before that of birth : the coffin before the 
 cradle. And though that be a paradox, as some 
 other things are, which he there adds, yet it is no 
 Paralogy in reason; but so evidently true, as 
 some mere naturalists have found reason to grant 
 it ; else would not the Thracians have wept at 
 their births, and rejoiced at their funerals. I 
 have no leisure now to unriddle that paradox: 
 but in the mean time it is certain there is a time 
 to die^ as sure as a tiine to he born ; nay, more 
 sure indeed ; never man was born, but either is 
 dead, or must die; except some one or two, 
 Enoch and £lias, that were privileged by miracle; 
 
528 APPENDIX. 
 
 and that privilege, said Tertullian, was but a 
 reprieve or a suspension for a time, till Antichrist 
 comes, and then they must be slain for the two 
 witnesses, spoken of by St. John, Rev. xi, 7. But 
 St. Paul hath given us another exce[)tion ; namely, 
 of all those which shall be found alive at the 
 resurrection, when the Lord Jesus shall com^ again 
 to judge both the quick and the dead : that is, not 
 the righteous that lived by faith, and the wicked 
 that died in their sins, as Augustine and Chrysos- 
 tome allegorize the words; nor yet the immor- 
 tal soul, and the mortal body, as Theophylact 
 glosseth the text: but as St. Paul interprets, 
 those that are alive at his coming, and those that 
 shall be dead before. 1 Thess. iv, 15, 17. For 
 we shall not all sleep, hut we all shall be changed, 
 1 Cor. XV, 52, The vulgar latin denies that 
 change, and therefore hath strangely changed 
 the text, as may be seen. The Pontificians will 
 not admit their exemption from death : and we 
 shall not now dispute the point. But with these 
 exceptions, and possibly some few others not 
 recorded in Scripture, it is certain never man was 
 born, nor shall be, but had, or must have, a time 
 to die. But many an one hath found a time to 
 die that never was born : their time to die having 
 prevented their time to be born. Many have 
 been seen dead, that never were seen alive ; and 
 many are dead that never were seen at all. It is 
 
APPENDIX. 529 
 
 too plain a point to spend time upon : if Israel 
 must die, he must have a time for it. But 
 whether that time were certain and fixed, or not, 
 is a solemn question ;* large and learned debates 
 are made about it, and strong contests between 
 the physician and the divine. The question is 
 not to be resolved from this text, and 1 have 
 now no leisure to look into many others : but 
 seeing the hairs of our head are numbered , it is 
 more than probable so are the days, yea the 
 hours, and minutes of- our lives. A sparrow 
 falls not to the ground without God's Providence, 
 much less doth a man. The great world hath 
 its last day set and certain to him that made it : 
 so sure hath every little world ; but of that day 
 and hour knoweth no man. But certain it is, to 
 God nothing is uncertain : the doctrine of his 
 prescience (except with the Socinians, we will 
 deny the universal extent of it) will demonstrate 
 the truth in this question, in the affirmative : for 
 that which is not certain, cannot be certainly 
 foreseen. Yet will it not follow that this event, 
 and all things else, are absolutely necessary, by 
 a fatal connexion, or necessary operation and 
 efficacy of their particular causes, according to 
 the opinion of the new Stoic, to whom 1 can 
 
 * Beverovitius de termiuo vitae. 
 Mm 
 
530 APPENDIX. 
 
 allow the name of a philosopher,* but not of a 
 Christian, till he hath recanted his Leviathan of 
 heresies : wherein he allows men the liberty of 
 an express denial of Christ, if the infidel magis- 
 trate commands it if so making all martyrs rebels 
 to their princes, and murtherers of themselves. 
 The man is no professed Turk, (thank a christian 
 magistrate) but hath told us in effect he would 
 be so, as well in other points as that of his fatality, 
 if his prince would have him : for the Alcoran 
 with the civil sanction, is by his doctrine as 
 canonical as the Gospel. Whether it be certain 
 which Cajetan and Alvarez have resolved, namely, 
 that to comprehend how the decrees and con- 
 course of God's will, doth agree with the liberty 
 of man's will; (whereupon the time of death 
 seems much to depend) is above the understand- 
 ing of any man in this life, I well know not : but 
 I am willing to confess it is above mine. Above 
 my understanding I say it is, so are divers other 
 mysteries of our religion, but I thank God not 
 above my faith. For this I believe, that neither 
 God's prescience, nor his decrees, do infer, much 
 less cause any necessity in the manner of the 
 production of their objects: because God hath 
 decreed, and therefore foreseen that many things 
 
 * Mr. T. H. t Pag. 271, 
 
APPENDIX. 531 
 
 shall not l>e necessarily but contingently, and yet 
 certainly produced. 
 
 But to turn to the prefixed parts of my dis- 
 course. We have dispatched two of them, — The 
 necessity of Isi^eVs death, and the time of it : two 
 more are remaining, wherein I must be brief. 
 
 The next is the appropinquation of the time; 
 7^he time drew nigh, or the days drew nigh, that 
 Israel must die. When Pharaoh asked him how 
 old he was, (ven 9.) he told him, his days were 
 few, and spake it not in reference only to the 
 time past of his life, but, as he is commonly 
 understood with respect to the whole expected 
 term thereof; and that being so, the time of his 
 death could never be far off. Indeed nothing 
 can be far off, that is within the bounds of time : 
 much less can the day of death be so, in a life 
 that is short; and such is the longest mortal life. 
 Israel's days were few ni comparison of the 
 days of his fathers, as he interprets himself, yet 
 were they as many again as the ordinary num- 
 ber of man's days, by Moses's reckoning: for 
 Israel lived one hundred and forty-seven years, 
 as you may read in the verse before my text: 
 and the days of our years, saith Moses, (Ps. xc, 
 10.) are but seventy years, and scarce the 
 seventieth person lives so long; and yet Moses 
 himself lived almost twice as long, and so did his 
 brother Aaron, but they were extraordinaiies. 
 
 Mm 2 
 
532 APPENDIX. 
 
 The life of man in Scripture is usually reckoned 
 by days, which are the shortest natural divisions 
 of time ; and sometimes it is called but one day: 
 and the longest mortal life that ever was, came 
 short of one day, by God's account, to whom 
 a thousand years are hut as one day. And now 
 he that lives longest, seldom attains to one hour, 
 or the twelfth part of such a day. The known 
 shortness of life, set forth in Scripture by a multi- 
 tude of similitudes, is demonstration enough to 
 any man, that his time to die draws nigh. But 
 that is a comparative word admitting of many 
 degrees : in a short way the end is always near, 
 but grows nearer the more steps a man hath set 
 in it. So was it with Israel, he had multiplied 
 his steps till he was come to the stage that 
 David spake of, (iSam. xx, 3.) There is but a 
 step betiveen me and death. 
 
 The time drew nigh that Israel must die ; now 
 when he spake to Joseph about his burial, as 
 followeth in the verse : but how nigh we know 
 not precisely, no more perhaps did he. All 
 the Astrologers in ^gypt could not precisely 
 tell him the day and hour of his death : yet have 
 we a company of gypsies of that profession, that 
 will pretend to do it. But they are well con- 
 futed by S. Augustine,* from the example of 
 
 * De Civit. Dei. I. 5. 
 
APPENDIX. 333 
 
 these twins, Jacob and Esau, whose birthtime 
 was as near, as in nature it was possible: for 
 Esau was not quite born before Jacob ; Jacob*s 
 hand was born before Esau's foot : and yet we 
 know the disposition of their bodies, and of their 
 minds, with the manner of their lives, was as 
 contrary, as if they had been born under the 
 most opposite horoscopes that are in the whole 
 sphere of heaven. Moses was brought up in all 
 the wisdom and learning of jEgypt, (as St. 
 Stephen saith, Acts vii, 22.) that is, in the 
 sciences of Physic and Astrology, the most 
 famous learning of ^gypt ; and yet could he not 
 number his own days, but prays to God in his 
 Psalm to teach him that art. Ps. xc, 12. Nor 
 did he desire to know the precise number of his 
 days, but only the wisdom to consider the paucity 
 of them, so as to improve them to the honor of 
 God, and the good of himself and his church. 
 To know the just time of our death, is not pos- 
 sible without a revelation ; and therefore not to 
 be desired without presumption. It is a thing 
 that depends much upon the arbitrary acts of 
 the will of both a man's self, and of others (as 
 constant experience teacheth) the knowledge 
 whereof is the peculiar property of Omniscience : 
 and therefore for men to pretend to this know- 
 ledge from the stars is an impiety, not much 
 less than that of worshipping them, being a bold 
 
534 APPENDIX. 
 
 intrusion into the most peculiar and essential 
 privilege of divine knowledge. It is enough for 
 us to know as much as Israel did, that our time 
 to die draws nigh, and so much every man doth 
 know, that knows any thing at all. 
 
 Lyra thinks Israel did know the precise time 
 of his death by a spirit of prophecy: and such a 
 spirit we know he had, about that time especially 
 when his time to die drew nigh ; as appeared by 
 the prophetical blessings which he then gave to 
 his sons. But to know that his time to die was 
 nigh, he needed no prophetic spirit now, when 
 he was an old man, and bed-rid, as you may 
 find in the end of the chapter, ver. 31. Well 
 might he tell that his few days were almost 
 spent, when his evil days (as Solomon calls 
 them, Eccles. xii, 1.) were come, and the years 
 did not draw near, but were upon him, wherein 
 he might say, / have no pleasure in them. The 
 sun arid the light, the moon and the stars, were 
 darkened. All the faculties of his soul and 
 body were weakened. The keepers of the house 
 trembled, and the strong men bowed themselves. 
 His arms were so weak that he could scarce 
 strengthen them to lay them upon the heads of 
 his nephews, to bless them ; and his legs could 
 no longer bear his body, so that he was fain to 
 lie by it. 27iei/ that looked out of the windows 
 (which some understand of glass windows or 
 
APPENDIX. 535 
 
 spectacles) were darkened. His eyes were dim 
 with age ; and when a man comes to that once, 
 that he is almost bUnd with age, he cannot but 
 see that his time to die draws nigh. A man 
 needs not to be told his lamp is nigh out, when 
 he sees and feels that the oil is spent, and 
 knows there is no more to be bought; to 3^ 
 
 9ra^aj«/x£V0v mm yn^euniov, sfyuf o^avifffMHf Heb. viii, 13. 
 
 There are many warnings of death, in diseases 
 of the body, perils and troubles of life, such as 
 David met withal, when he said, Mi/ soul is full 
 of troubles, and my life draws 7iear to the grave. 
 Ps. Ixxxviii, 3. And some extraordinary warn- 
 ings we read of, which some have had from God 
 himself. Such as Moses, Aaron, and Hezekiah 
 had ; and the rich fool in the Gospel, S tulle, hac 
 node; Thou fool, this night shall thy soul be 
 required of thee. In human story there are 
 multitudes of examples of them, that have had 
 warnings, predictions, presages, and omens of 
 approaching death, especially great persons : the 
 Historian* hath some of them almost in everyone 
 of his Twelve Caesars. But few men were ever 
 the wiser or the better for such uncertain, and 
 for the most part unregarded warnings. There 
 is no warning so infallible as that of old age ; all 
 
 Suetonius. 
 
536 APPENDIX. 
 
 others may prove but false alarums, useful to 
 awaken men out of security, and move them to 
 make ready: but when the old man comes once, 
 especially that same rufA^oyn^aVf Silicernium, when 
 he comes upon crutches, when he is blind and led, 
 be brings certain tidings that death is at hand. 
 
 There are many affirmative signs of the near- 
 ness of death, that are certain, and old age is one 
 of them : but negative signs there are none, that 
 is, to shew that it is not near. A young man 
 doth not, cannot know, but that his time to die 
 may be nigh, but an old man knows it is so. 
 
 Life in Scripture is sometimes compared to a 
 
 shadow, so is death too ; and the heathen poet 
 
 made it less, but the dream of a shadow, and 
 
 that but of smoak.^ Now shadows we know are 
 
 not all of a length, some are longer and some are 
 
 shorter, as life also is. But the longer the shadow 
 
 is, the more like, and the more near, to night. 
 
 Jer. vi, 4. Longiores factce sunt umhrce vesperi. 
 
 Life is a vanishing shadow at all times, but the 
 
 longer it is, the nearer is the night of death. 
 
 Indeed our present life in the flesh is but the 
 
 shadow of life to the soul, darkened as now it 
 
 is oppanso corporis,'f (^Tertullian's word) with the 
 
 ^ l^Kiag ovap av^pcoTTog. Pindar. Kai wirov ahv fjtaXXov n 
 xaTniia-Hia, Msebylus, 
 
 t Ti^^ ot^Ev u TO Kw Efi ualhavEiVt TO Kal^aa/Eiv SV (nv, 
 ^uripid. 
 
APPENDIX. 537 
 
 opacity of the body. The Greek tragedian could 
 not tell whether it should be called life or no. 
 The ghosts or spirits of men when they are out 
 of the body are usually called umbrce, shadows, 
 and that most like because of their incorporiety ; 
 bat so termed they are too, from the imaginary 
 configuration with the body, which in visions 
 they have appeared to have, and which TertuUian 
 and Irenceus {uj^ovi the parable of Lazarus and 
 Dives,) thought they really have. In which 
 respect they are also called u'^coxa xa/xovluvy in 
 Homery as images of the body ; and that they 
 are not altogether incorporeal themselves, but 
 have a kind of avyosi^si aco/jui, a splendid or lucid 
 body,, hath been the opinion of some divines, 
 as well as philosophers. We use to compare 
 old thin bodies to ghosts and shadows in com- 
 mon speech ; and so not the old man himself, 
 but every body that meets him, knows that his 
 time to die draws nigh. Other men may see it, 
 but himself must needs feel the cold-numbed 
 hands of death coming upon him, before they give 
 the fatal gripe. 
 
 Thus Israel knew that his time drew nigh that 
 he must die. So doth every old man, and every 
 young one too ; but every one doth not consider 
 it as Israel did. That is the last point in my 
 method ; Israel's foresight or consideration of the 
 appropinquation of death. This I told you I 
 
538 APPENDIX. 
 
 would note from the word cerneret in the vulgar 
 latin, because it agrees well with the sense, 
 though it be not in the original text. To see 
 death in Scripture phrase is to die: but in strict- 
 ness of sense death cannot be seen, because it is 
 nothing but darkness; and when it comes, it 
 doth not only close, but put out the eyes. The 
 Angel of Death, as the Jews call it, is invisible : 
 but though it be so to bodily sense, yet is there 
 a reasonable theory to be had of death, and 
 nothing more unreasonable than not to foresee it. 
 That old prayer in the Litany is without excep- 
 tion in the Latin phrase, A morte improvisa libera 
 nos Domine. He that doth not foresee death, 
 cannot be provided for it ; and he that is not, 
 must needs be eternally undone by it. 
 
 We complain all, of shortness of Hfe, and need 
 not hear so often of the physician's aphorism, or 
 the rabbin's sentence, to persuade the truth of 
 it: and yet so little do we consider it, that we 
 spend it as prodigally, as if it were too long, as 
 indeed it is, for them that abuse it. And who 
 almost doth not ? ^ The time we have is not so 
 little, as that we lose is much : we commonly 
 use it as if we knew not what to do with it> 
 and therefore we throw away the best part of it. 
 
 Non parum temporis habemus^ sed raultum perdiraus. Sen, 
 
APPENDIX. 539 
 
 What large shares of it do we squander away 
 upon vain and idle company, and trifle away 
 upon foolish mirth, miscalled recreations, vain 
 and worse pastimes, balls and revels, drolleries, 
 and amorous courtships? What a great deal of 
 it do we let the world steal from us, besides all 
 that is necessarily due to it? How great a part 
 of it do we suffer the devil to run away with? 
 How many of our few days do we utterly waste 
 in doing nothing, or worse than nothing? And 
 is it not justice then in God to afford but a short 
 allowance of that, which he sees, is and will be 
 so much abused to his own dishonour, and the 
 hurt of the unhappy possessors ? Nay, is it not 
 mercy indeed, rather than justice, to shorten their 
 days, that will make no other use of them than 
 to their eternal ruin r And how few are they 
 that make any better improvement of their time ? 
 Such Abaddons and Apollyons men are of their 
 time, and therein of their own souls. 
 
 No time is long enough to bewail, nor words 
 enough, or sharp enough, to reprove the wretched 
 waste that is made of this invaluable treasure, 
 which so many men spend only to treasure up 
 wratii against the day of ivrath. It is a dreadful 
 thing to say, but more dreadful to see, that the 
 main business that many men spend their lives in, 
 is scarce any other, or better, than such as tends 
 to the assuring of their everlasting death, and 
 
540 APPENDIX. 
 
 the certain prevention of that life, which only 
 is long. Oh that men should be so caitively 
 disposed, so malicious to their own souls, and so 
 kind to the devil ! 
 
 Who knows not that it is as impossible to secure 
 his life for one day, while he enjoys it, as it is to 
 recover it for another, when it is once lost ? And 
 who will not grant that his end may be nearer 
 than the end of the present day ? and yet where 
 is the man that will be persuaded to consider 
 how near his time to die is, or may be ? Every 
 man puts it far off, few are willing to hear of the 
 approach of it, at any hand. When the physician 
 tells men that death is near, many are not willing 
 to believe him. But for the Divine's warning, 
 who hath regarded it? Did men regard the 
 admonition of the divine, concerning the approach 
 of death, they should not be so much troubled 
 at the physician's warning. 
 
 Did the old man consider, as well as know, 
 that his time to die draws nigh, one would think 
 he could not, in despite of his own reason, be 
 such a sot, as still to dote so much upon the 
 world, to carp and care to load himself with a 
 viaticum of thick clay, when his journey is at an 
 end : to fraught his old leaking vessel, when he 
 is either in sight of his port, or splitting upon 
 the sands? Nay, did the young man consider 
 how near his time to die may be, he would think 
 
APPENDIX. 541 
 
 it no such unseasonable counsel that Solomon 
 gives him, To remember his Creator in the days of 
 his youth, before the evil days (of old age) come, 
 which perhaps shall never come : perhaps, did I 
 say? nay, it is very great odds they shall not! 
 Say thou wantest yet forty years or more of the 
 seventy, it is more than forty to one thou never 
 comest at that number. What is the reason that 
 men generally do so wilfully and obstinately 
 neglect the great business of working out their 
 own salvation? That they do so slight and 
 vilify their spiritual and eternal interest, as if it 
 were a matter of no valuable concernment : a sin 
 which no pagan can parallel, nay, which the 
 devil himself cannot be guilty of, and perhaps 
 would not, if he might be so happy as to be 
 but once more tried. What is the reason men do 
 so little regard that word of God, which is able to 
 make them wise unto salvatiojiy as either not to hear 
 it at all, or with so little affection, as if it were no 
 more than a good fashionable piece of rehgious 
 invention? What is the reason we can prevail 
 no more with men, by all our pressed exhorta- 
 tions, admonitions, public and private, to for- 
 sake their sins, by a sincere repentance, and 
 thorough reformation, to make good that solemn 
 vow which they made in baptism, to be christians 
 indeed, and not to deceive their own souls with 
 a mistaken notion of a mere fruitless, ineffectual 
 
542 APPENDIX. 
 
 pretence or presumption of faith ? What is the 
 reason men are so inexorable to the practice of 
 an holy life, without which (we tell them from 
 Scripture, and they do not, cannot deny it,) it is 
 as impossible for them to be saved, as it is for 
 God to lie? Heb. xii, 14. Is not this the com- 
 mon reason of all this damnable obstinacy, and 
 worse than diabolical wretchedness? Namely, 
 because men will not believe or consider that 
 their time to die draws nigh. As much as 
 Atheism is now increased in this nation, by the 
 Antiperistasis of a pretended reformation, I am 
 yet confident the absolute infidels are much the 
 fewest in number. Most men do yet retain an 
 opinion at least of the verity of the Scriptures, 
 and of the common doctrines of a judgment to 
 come, after this life, of the happiness of heaven, 
 and of the contrary miseries of hell : and there- 
 fore are presumable to intend some better care 
 of their own souls, than they seem yet to have. 
 But a pernicious presumption of the duration of 
 life is that which invincibly hardens them against 
 aM exhortations to a present repentance. Such 
 is the lamentable dotage, stupid, and stupendous 
 irrationahty of men in this point, as no tongue 
 can express. 
 
 I will yet close with a few words of exhor- 
 tation : though I have already expressed my little 
 experience, or hopes of success therein. Since 
 
APPENDIX. 543 
 
 Israel (the best men) must die, let us make 
 much of them whilst they live, and labour to 
 get as much of their blessings as we can before 
 they be gone. 
 
 And since we all must find a time to die, Oh! 
 let us be careful to find a time to live: and let 
 us not make our lives short, by not living till we 
 be ready to die. Seeing we know our time to 
 die is nigh, let us not be so mad as to put it far 
 off. Take heed of setting death at a far distance, 
 lest we be fatally deceived, as millions have been 
 to their eternal perdition. Oh! let the time past 
 of our lives suffice us to have wrought the will 
 of the flesh, and let us no longer live the rest 
 of our time after the lust of men, but after the 
 will of God. Oh! let us be so wise as to redeem 
 the time, seeing our days have been so many and 
 evil, and are now so few. 
 
 What a desperate wretched thing it is to put 
 off the time of repentance still, when our time to 
 die is so near ! To trust upon to-morrow, when 
 we cannot call this whole day our own without 
 a revelation. To leave the great work to do 
 till night, when our Saviour hath told us, 7io man 
 can work. 
 
 Never man repented him of repenting too soon ; 
 but every true penitent, as well as St. Augustine, 
 will heartily bewail, and confess with shame his 
 
644 APPENDIX. 
 
 deferring of it too long, though it hath been but 
 for a few years in his youth. 
 
 It may be in some sense true, which some 
 divines will scarce acknowledge, that it can 
 never be too late to repent : but it is much more 
 evident, and more safe to consider, that it can 
 never be too soon. It is a very great folly (and 
 fault too) in them that have estates to defer the 
 making of their wills, till the time to die draws 
 so nigh, that either they can make none, or no 
 other than such as may be questioned whether 
 it was their's or no : so hath many a man undone 
 the greatest part of his posterity, by leaving them 
 tinder a violent temptation of hazarding their 
 souls to provide for their bodies. But infinitely 
 more desperate is their adventure, that defer the 
 disposing of their souls till the same straits of 
 time : hereby many a forlorn soul have been 
 utterly prevented of any possibility of repentance, 
 by the sudden loss either of life or understand- 
 ing ; and many more infinitely hazarded by being 
 able at last to act that one thing necessary, after 
 no better fashion than such as is extremely 
 doubtful, whether it be to any purpose. Yet 
 is this the epidemical madness of men, to be as 
 unwilling to dispose of their souls, as of their 
 estates, till they see or fear they can keep neither 
 any longer: and then in their wills (but scarce 
 
APPENDIX. 545 
 
 with them) they make a formal bequest of both 
 together. And if God had no more right to the 
 one, than men have to tlie other, this practice 
 were tolerable: but considering God's interest 
 in the soul, which ought ever to have been 
 devoted to his service, for men to give it or sell 
 it to the world, or the devil all their life-time; 
 and then at last (in an hypocritical imitation of 
 our blessed Lord, and his first martyr's last 
 words, to bequeath it to God, is no other than 
 a wicked sacrilege, under such a possibility only 
 of pardon, as remains for the sin unto death, that 
 St. John speaks of. 
 
 Two or three serious and sad considerations 
 I have to propound by way of query to him that 
 defers his repentance till his time to die draws 
 nigh : — 1. Whether it be not a direct mocking of 
 God, and of a man's own reason, to resolve to 
 continue in a course of sin, with a purpose to 
 repent of it at last? Would riot we think 
 ourselves impudently mocked by him that should 
 tell us, he would first do us an injury, or an 
 affront, and afterward repent him of it and cry 
 us mercy? And is not this the plain sense of 
 every wicked heart, that pretends to any resolu- 
 tion of a future repentance ? Besides, what can 
 be more grossly absurd in reason, than for a man 
 to resolve at the present upon the doing of that 
 
 Nn 
 
546 APPENDIX. 
 
 which he knows he must, and therefore resolves 
 he will afterward repent of? 
 
 2. If true repentance in Scripture sense sig- 
 nifies an amendment or reformation of life, as 
 certainly it doth, what difference is there between 
 resolving never to repent at all, and resolving not 
 to do it till his life is at an end ? 
 
 3. Whether he that puts off his repentance till 
 
 his death bed, doth not run the evident hazard of 
 
 at least an hundred to one never to repent at all ? 
 
 Upon this common and notorious experiment, 
 
 that not one of an hundred of the sick-bed 
 
 penitents do prove true penitents, if ever they 
 
 recover out of their sickness. But as I desire 
 
 upon these (I think) very weighty considerations, 
 
 that every soul should hasten his repentance." 
 
 so will I the end of my present admonition to it : 
 
 let us therefore labour so to live, as the nearer 
 
 our time is to die, the better it may be for us. 
 
 A good man never dies too soon : for others he 
 
 may, but not for himself. Immature death is 
 
 but improperly applied to a virtuous life : if we 
 
 get to heaven when we die, we shall never 
 
 complain of the shortness of the time of our exile 
 
 from thence; nay, sure we shall rejoice it was 
 
 no longer. But if we should be so woefully 
 
 unhappy as to miss of heaven, we shall have 
 
 much reason to lament that our life here was so 
 
APPENDIX. 547 
 
 long: for though the reprobate's punishment 
 cannot be prolonged, because it is eternal, yet 
 it will be much augmented by the many days of 
 his ill-spent life. 
 
 Let us be studious to provide with Israel for 
 our transportation into Canaan when we are 
 dead : and to this end, let us wrestle stoutly with 
 our spiritual adversaries, to avoid the curseof sin 
 and death; and tvresfle tvith God, as he did, for 
 the blessing of the grace of life, and that in time : 
 so doing we shall be sure to be Israels to prevail 
 with God, who is ever more than willing to yield 
 us the victory, if he could see us strive for it. 
 
 We read of many ingenious devices the hea- 
 thens had to put them in mind of death, as their 
 feasts^ and other opportunities of greatest joy; 
 but all was for an heathenish end : namely, to 
 excite them to seize greedily upon the present, 
 and not to lose anything of the present enjoy- 
 ments of this life, than which they knew no better. 
 St. Paul hath given us their true meanings, in 
 those evil words, as he calls them, corrupting 
 good manners ; let us eat and drink, for to-morrow 
 we shall die. 1 Cor. xv, 32. We cannot here 
 want expedients to mind us of death, to a better 
 purpose; since if we go abroad, in every street 
 we meet with a church-yard full of graves, and 
 within doors we cannot sit or lie many hours 
 without hearing ^owAbells, as we call them. 
 
 Nn2 
 
548 APPENDIX. 
 
 We generally dread the thought of dying 
 extempore, as one of the greatest infelicities that 
 can befall us : Oh ! let us seek to prevent it, by 
 preparing daily for that hour, upon a just and 
 prudent consideration that it draws nigh. J can- 
 not say that we are precisely bound (according 
 to the ordinary advice, as well of heathens as 
 divines, to account every day our last, or in all 
 things so to spend it, as we would think it 
 necessary or fit to do, if we knew, or did posi- 
 tively believe it were so. All purposes, promises, 
 and provisions for to-morrow were then unlawful, 
 because unreasonable ; and by this rule, no man 
 should take a journey further than the house of 
 God : but the meaning is, we should so spend 
 every day, as considering it may be the last; 
 and therefore be sure so to act, as if it should 
 prove so, we might neither be afraid nor ashamed 
 to be found so doing. 
 
 I know not whether I be strictly bound to 
 all those thoughts, and that mind, whilst I am 
 writing this sermon, which Seneca saith he had, 
 whilst he was writing one of his epistles ; Hoc 
 animo tibi hanc Epistolam scribo tanquam cum 
 maximh scribentem mors evocatura sit : ^ namely, 
 that death should call me away whilst I am 
 
 * Sen. Ep. 62. 
 
APPENDIX. 549 
 
 writing. But so I write, as if I were now writing 
 my last will, in a perfect state of health ; that is 
 (though not without hopes of time and opportunity, 
 to express myself better in some other copies 
 hereafter, yet) with present seriousness, and 
 sincerity of intention and desire, so to bequeath 
 my talent, as God may be glorified, and my 
 reader edified ; remembering that my own time 
 to die draws nigh, and desiring he may do so too. 
 Oh ! that men tvere wise, that they would under- 
 stand this, that they would consider their latter end ! 
 The Lord teach me and thee to number our days, 
 and to apply our hearts ufito wisdom. Amen. 
 
 I have now done with my text : but, as I told 
 you, I have another to take in hand, and ye all 
 know it. But something I must tell you, which 
 perhaps you know not, by way of preface to what 
 is to be spoken concerning that reverend person 
 whose memory we are now to solemnize ; namely, 
 that it was a strict charge of his own, given to 
 his son, whom he made his executor, and inserted 
 into his last will, that he should be buried 
 privately, without any solemnity: which order 
 was agreeable to his known singular modesty and 
 humility. And lest we should seem to transgress 
 that command which we have thus made public, 
 1 must also tell you, that upon entreaty, his con- 
 
550 APPENDIX. 
 
 sent was obtained for a sermon to be preached 
 for him after his funeral. 
 
 Having then obeyed his first order in the day 
 of his funeral, which was as private as could be, 
 we think we are nevertheless obliged, juslafacere, 
 to do him some right in the interest of his name : 
 and I heartily wish there had been one appointed 
 that had been better able to do it. But seeing 
 the task is fallen upon me, who must acknow- 
 ledge my extreme insufficiency for such an office, 
 I think I may, without ambition, take up for a 
 wish the petition that Elisha made to his master 
 Elijah, when he was to be taken away from him ; 
 namely, that a double portion of the Spirit of my 
 Lord might he upon me : that is, not that I might 
 have double his gifts, that were too ambitious a 
 wish ; but as I think the prophet meant, and as 
 the same phrase is elsewhere used, that two parts 
 of his spirit, the portion of a first-born son, might 
 be upon me. The Hebrew word for portion in 
 that text signifies properly a mouth, *33. And to 
 be able to give this holy man his due, no mouth 
 or tongue were so much to be wished as his 
 own.* The world well knows he had a double 
 portion of the gifts of the tongue above his 
 brethren : and it is as well known he made a 
 
 ^ Mov>}5 >j/ot{v i^u T»if EX£(v« ^wvnj £x«vov erKUfMa^aa-iv. Naz. 
 de Basil, 
 
APPENDIX. 551 
 
 proportionable improvement thereof, for the ser- 
 vice of the Lord and his Church. 
 
 Two years together he was chosen rhetorick 
 professor in the University of Cambridge, and per- 
 formed the office with extraordinary applause. 
 
 He was noted for a singular wit from his youth; 
 a most acute rhetorician, and an elegant poet. 
 He understood many tongues ; and in the rheto- 
 ric of his own, he was second to none that lived 
 in his time. But, 
 
 That which I shall further say of this holy man, 
 shall be with reflection upon my text, in a short 
 parallel of him with the patriarch Israel, of 
 whom you have heard. And many things there 
 are wherein they may be specially compared : 
 
 First, the significations of the name Israel, 
 which I mentioned, are notably agreeable to this 
 eminent person. Israel, I told you, signifies 
 either a man seeing God, or a right (upright) 
 man of God, or one that had power ivith God 
 like a Prince, Each of these things were emi- 
 nently agreeable to this person : first, Israel was 
 a priest, and so was every Pater-familias in those 
 times, as is said. We read of his offering sacri- 
 fice several times: and a prophet he was too, 
 one of those which the Psalmist speaks of in 
 that known place, (Ps. cv, 15.) Touch not mine 
 anointed, do my prophets no harm. You may 
 find him named there in the context: (ver. 10.) 
 
552 APPENDIX. 
 
 And here in the next chapter but one, you may 
 read his prophetical blessings that he gave to his 
 sons, when the time drew nigh that he was to 
 die. So was our father a priest, and that of the 
 higher order ; a seer, a prophet, and a father of 
 the prophets. One that always made it his 
 business to see and search into the things of 
 God, with a zealous diligence, rather than a bold 
 curiosity. He was one that conversed as much 
 with God, and drew as nigh to him in divine 
 meditation, which is the only ordinary way of 
 seeing God in the flesh, as any man of his time. 
 You all know he was a master in Israel, and 
 another manner of one than Nicodemus, Op^oMiai 
 walvi^ Hai Ai^ao-Ha?.©-, as Gregory said of his father; 
 a father and a master of the orthodox faith, A 
 great master he was, and one of the first that 
 taught this church the art of divine meditation. 
 Few men of his age have ascended so high upon 
 Jacob's ladder as he did : he was one that with 
 Israel lived and died. in a Goshen of light in the 
 midst of Egyptian darkness. 
 
 Secondly, he was a right upright man too 
 before God, a true Israelite indeed, in whom was 
 no guile ; ^k itr, Rectus Dei, tan u^k, as was said 
 of Israel, Vir antiqua probitate simplicitateq ; 
 prceditus, Et eruditis pietate, et piis eruditionis 
 laude antecellens, ita secundas doctrine ferens, ut 
 pietatis primas obtineret, as Nazianzen saith of 
 
APPENDIX. 553 
 
 Basil. Those that were most eminent for learn- 
 ing, he excelled in piety ; and those that were 
 most famous for piety, he excelled in learning. 
 This high priest's breast was richly adorned with 
 the glorious Clrini, and with the more precious 
 jewel of the Thummim, 
 
 Thirdly, he was one that wrestled with God 
 much, and often in prayer, and prevailed much: 
 and if we be yet capable of the blessing, I hope 
 we shall one day enjoy the fruit of those prayers 
 wherein he wrestled with God for this poor 
 church. We read of Jacob's vows as well as of 
 his visions, (Gen. xxviii, 20.) and it is the first 
 vow that we read of in Scripture: and who 
 hath not read, or heard at least, of this holy 
 man's vows ? 
 
 Thus the name agrees punctually in each sig- 
 nification. 
 
 We will now go on with the parallel of the 
 persons. Israel was a smooth man of body, as 
 himself saith, (Gen. xxxii, 11.) and a man of 
 a plain, even, and modest spirit, as appeared by 
 his scruples that he made about the way that his 
 mother directed him to get his father's blessing. 
 Such an one was our father, a man of a smooth; 
 terse wit, and tongue, and of a calm, gentle, 
 meek, and moderate spirit, as they all know that 
 
 know anything of him: ;rpa^, aopyr^l®-, yaMvo;, to 
 
 «3bj, ^BfiMi TO 'jnitviJM, as Nazianzen saith oiCcesarius; 
 
554 APPENDIX. 
 
 a man of a mild, serene, and calm aspect, (who 
 ever saw it ruffled into any appearance of dis- 
 orderly passion?) and of a quick and lively spirit. 
 He was not twice a child, though he Hved long- 
 enough to have been so,) but always one in our 
 Saviours sense, namely, in humility and inno- 
 cence: one that much excelled in those dove- 
 like fruits of the Spirit, which St. Paul mentions, 
 (Gal. V, 22.) love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gen- 
 tleness, goodness, meekness, &c. As loving, and 
 as much beloved, as any man of his order in the 
 three nations. One that got the birthright from 
 heaven, and the blessing from men too, without 
 dissembling for it ; whilst other rough Esaus were 
 hunting abroad for wild venison, thinking to 
 please their father, he stayed quietly at home, 
 and observing the directions of his mother the 
 Church, went away smooth with the venison. 
 Some strugglings he had with his rougher 
 brethren, whom he did not strive so much to 
 supplant, as to supple with his smooth moderation 
 and humility: and so far he prevailed in this 
 design, as that instead of ill words or knocks, 
 he met with a kiss and respectful embracement 
 from many of them that had been his adversaries, 
 because they envied him the birthright of his 
 order and dignity; and all men honoured the 
 Doctor, though some loved not the Bishop. 
 
APPENDIX. 555 
 
 Israel travelled into several countries, and wsls 
 kindly entertained and respected wherever he 
 came; so did, and so was cJur father. He 
 travelled with persons of honour into France, 
 Germany, Holland, and Scotland ; and God was 
 ever with him, wherever he went, as he was with 
 Israel. Some troubles and perils he met with in 
 his journeys, as Jacob did, when Laban pursued 
 him with one troop, and Esau met him with 
 another. But a kind Providence was ever ready 
 to redeem him ; and God hath always holpen his 
 servant Israel. 
 
 Israel was a shepherd, and a faithful one, that 
 took special care of his dock, (Gen. xxxi, 40.) 
 and great pains night and day in watching over 
 them for twenty years together : and our Israel 
 was a faithful shepherd, that diligently watched 
 over the flocks that his master committed to his 
 charge, and took extraordinary pains in feeding 
 them for above twenty years together. Whilst 
 he was the private pastor first of Halstead in 
 Suffolk, and after of Waltham in Essex, he 
 preached thrice a week in a constant course: yet, 
 as himself witnessed, ** never durst climb up into 
 the pulpit to preach any sermon, whereof he had 
 not before penned evei^y word in the same order 
 wherein he hoped to deliver it ; although in his 
 expresssions he was no slave to syllables, neither 
 made use of his notes'' 
 
d56 appendix. 
 
 Nor did his industry either cease, or so much 
 as abate at his preferments. He hath given the 
 world as good an account of his time as any man 
 in it ; as one that knew the value of time, and 
 esteemed the loss of it more than a temporal loss, 
 because it hath a necessary influence upon eter- 
 nity. It is well known in this city how forward 
 he was to preach in any of our churches, till he 
 was first forbidden by men, and at last disabled 
 by God. 
 
 And when he could not preach himself as oft 
 and as long as he was able, this learned Gamaliel 
 was not content only, but very diligent to sit at 
 the feet of the youngest of his disciples ; as dili- 
 gent an hearer as he had been a preacher. How 
 oft have we seen him walking alone, like old 
 Jacob, with his stafl', to Bethel, the house of 
 God? 
 
 Israel was fruitful in children, and so was our 
 father, and that without the polygamy of Israel ; 
 being the husband but of one wife, a grave, virtu- 
 ous matron, with whom he lived forty-nine years. 
 But Israel at last wanted bread for himself and 
 his family : I cannot say this man did so, but 
 how near he came to it, and by what means we 
 all know; but must not complain because he 
 never did. He had not the kindness that Israel 
 had in Egypt, to have any allowance for his 
 maintenance from the lord of the country, yet he 
 
APPENDIX. 557 
 
 never wanted. He was indeed a rare mirror of 
 patience under all his crosses, which toward his 
 latter end were multiplied upon him. The loss 
 of his estate he seemed insensible of, as if he had 
 parted with all with as good content as Jacob 
 did with a good part of his to pacify his angry 
 brother, having well learned as well to want as 
 to abound. I have heard him oft bewail the 
 spoils of the church, but very rarely did he so 
 much as mention his own losses, hut took joy fully 
 the spoiling of his goods. When he was laid 
 among the pots J that is, saith the Septuagint and 
 the vulgar latin, inter cleros, yet was he as the 
 wings of a dove coveted with silver, and her 
 feathers with yellow gold. Ps. Ixviii, 13. 
 
 Of late years, and especially the last, he was 
 sorely afflicted with bodily diseases, and bore 
 them all with as much patience, as hath been 
 seen in any flesh, except that of our Saviour's. 
 We have heard of the patience of Job, but never 
 saw a fairer copy of it, than was in this man. 
 
 Israel lived to be very old, as you may read 
 in the verse before my text, and at last grew so 
 weak, that he was scarce able to rise up upon 
 his bed to bless his children ; (Gen. xlviii, 2.) so 
 was it with our father. Methinks 1 see him yet, 
 as he was upon his bed, how he strengthened 
 himself to confirm others that sought it, with his 
 fatherly blessing, as Israel did the sons of Joseph ; 
 
558 APPENDIX. 
 
 and that too with the same good old ceremony 
 which Jacob first used, namely, the laying on of 
 his hands. His days were few and evil, in Jacob's 
 comparative sense ; and yet many and good, for 
 he died in a good old age, full of days, and full 
 of good works : canus virtutibus, white with vir- 
 tues. He came to his grave in a full age, like as 
 a shock of corn cometh in his season. Job v, 26. 
 He was crowned with the silver crown of age in 
 his grey hairs, (Prov. xvi, 31.) and now is crowned 
 with the golden crown of immortality. 
 
 When his time drew nigh that he must die, he 
 much longed for death, and was ready to bid it 
 welcome, and spake always very kindly of it. 
 It was an odd word of St. Francis when the 
 physicians told him the time of death drew nigh, 
 JBene veniat, inquit, soror Mors, welcome, my sister 
 death. The expression of Job is not much unlike, 
 (Job xvii, 14.) 1 have said to corruption, thou art 
 my father; to the worm, thou art my mother and 
 my sister : so did this good man welcome death, 
 as if he had been toembrace a mother or a sister 
 He took good notice of the approach of death, 
 and set his house in order as Israel did, by dis- 
 tributing the blessings that God had left him to 
 his children. He endeavoured also to prepare 
 others for that change by his last books, and last 
 sermons that he preached, which were all upon 
 
APPENDIX. 559 
 
 the last things, Death and Judgment, Heaven 
 and HelL 
 
 Israel left his children in Egypt when he died, 
 but with a prophetical promise of their return 
 into Canaan : our Israel hath left us, I may not 
 say in bondage, but in a sad condition, and left 
 us without a prophecy, though not without his 
 prayers for our happy return into Canaan. Well, 
 he is gone : Non nobis ereptus sed penculis, as 
 Ambrose said of his brother (in that most elegant 
 oration which he made, J)e obitu fratns,) taken 
 atvay not so much from w*, cw from the perils of 
 i/ie times. It was some comfort to him that he 
 lived not to see the funeral of the church, though 
 he saw it drawing home, almost at last gasp. 
 And if there could be as much sorrow in heaven 
 for the perverseness of sinners, as there is joi/ at 
 their conversion, doubtless this holy man could 
 not yet be at rest. But Abraham is ignorant of 
 us, and Israel knows us not. Isa. Ixiii, 16. And 
 the more happy is he if he doth not, and I hope 
 we are never the more unhappy, for whether he 
 knows of our state or not, it is piously to be 
 believed, he prays for us, wj oifxou, as Nazianzen 
 said of Basil. 
 
 When Israel died, the Egyptians mourned for 
 him : (Gen. 1, 3.) and I am persuaded so do some 
 of the worst of men for our father. 
 
560 APPENDIX. 
 
 The streights of time both for preparing and 
 dehvering this testimony of his hfe, hath enforced 
 me to pass over the particulars of his preferments, 
 dignities, and honourable employments by his 
 prince; amongst which, that to the Synod of 
 Dort would not else have been forgotten ; 
 especially for the great respect he had there from 
 the foreign divines and states. And his excellent 
 moderation shewed in those unhappy disputes, 
 concerning which he afterward drew up such a 
 collection of accorded truths, as was offered to 
 be subscribed by some of the most eminent 
 parties on both sides : which reconciliatory papers 
 then unhappily buried, are very much to be desired, 
 and may be hoped for in time, together with a 
 completer account of his life written by himself. 
 But whatever becomes of them, he was one 
 whose moderation ivas known to all men; and his 
 zeal for an holy peace in the church, is abundantly 
 manifested by those writings of his, which are 
 already extant. 
 
 I cannot so much as mention all his virtues, 
 but must not forget so great an one as that of his 
 charity: which above and before all things, as the 
 two great Apostles exhort,'^ he was careful to put 
 on : besides his spiritual alms of prayers, godly 
 
 * E^n TTooi, Col. iii, 14. iro^ Travlm^ 1 Pet. iv, 8. 
 
APPENDIX. 561 
 
 admonitions, comforts, and holy counsels, whereof 
 he was very liberal. 
 
 His bodily alms were constant and bountiful. 
 In the parish where he last lived, he gave a 
 weekly voluntary contribution of money to certain 
 poor widows to his dyin*:^ day, over and above 
 his imposed rates, wherein he was never spared. 
 And as the Widow's handful of meal, and her 
 cruise of oil did not waste by feeding the old 
 prophet; so did this prophet's barrel that was 
 low, and his cruise that was little, not hold out 
 only, but seemed to increase by feeding* the 
 widows, as appeared by that liberal addition of 
 alms which he gave by his will to the town where 
 he was born, and to this city where he died. 
 
 If ever there were a man that could speak with 
 the tongues of men ajid angels, he was one. But 
 such there are who are, as Justin Martyr calls 
 them, ou fjLEv (pi>^a-o(poiy aWia ^l^o4/o^oi, or, as the apostle 
 saith, no better than a sounding bra^s, or a tink- 
 ling cymbal, being without charity. But our 
 father was one that had learned of St. Paul that 
 same xa& vTrsf^oxr^v o^ov, (1 Cor. xii, 31.) the more 
 excellent way of charity, which he also shewed 
 mito others. He was one, that, as St. John 
 exhorts, loved not in word, or in tongue only, but 
 in deed and in truth, (iJohn iii, 18.) and shewed 
 it plentifully upon all occasions One that had 
 
 Oo 
 
562 APPENDIX. 
 
 Jacob's voice, but could never endure so much 
 as the disguise of Esaus churlish hands. 
 
 Four things are yet remaining with us below, 
 of this heavenly saint : his children, his works, 
 his body, and his name. First, his children. T 
 may say of him, as St. Ambrose said of Theodo- 
 sius the Emperor, Non totus recessit, 7'eUqtnt nobis 
 liheros in quihus eum debemus agnoscere, et in 
 quibus eum cernimus et tenemus, he is not all gone, 
 he hath left us a good portion of himself behind 
 in his sons, in whom we may yet see him, and 
 hold him. I shall not wish any one of them the 
 double portion of their father's spirit, but rather 
 that they may be, as indeed they are, all co-heirs 
 thereof, 
 
 For his works, I hope with reverence I may 
 lawfully say of them, as the Psalmist doth of 
 God's, that the^ all praise him, because all men 
 praise them. At least I may say, as the Spirit 
 doth in the Apocalypse, Blessed is the dead that 
 died in the Lord, for he resteth from his labours, 
 and his works jollow him. Blessed is he, because 
 his works, that is, the reward of them, follow him; 
 and we are blessed because they are left behind 
 him. That which Nazianzen said of Basil's 
 works, may truly be said of this man s, etiei km 
 
 TO. TrapEpya, t8 av^poq rav TTOvHfAsvuv Erepoig ttoXu ri/xiore^a xai 
 Tre^i^acvErepa, 
 
 His by-businesses, his occasional meditations, 
 
APPENDIX. 663 
 
 are more precious than the elaborate works of 
 other men. 
 
 For his body, that is already laid up in his 
 dormitory, without the honourable ceremony of 
 embalming, which Israel had. Gen. 1, 2. But 
 though he wanted that, and other ceremonies of 
 deserved honour, which his own humility and 
 the envy of the times denied him, yet doth he 
 not want that which the wise man saith is better 
 than a precious oil or ointment, (Eccles. vii, 1.) 
 namely, a good name. For I may say of this 
 man's name, as the spouse speaks of the name of 
 her beloved, that it is an ointment poured forth. 
 Cant, i, 3. An ointment that carrieth with it all 
 the excellencies of a precious oil ; that is, besides 
 the rich ingredients wherewith it is substantially 
 compounded; these three accidental qualities 
 too, of a fragrant and far-spreading odor or scent, 
 the gentle and pleasing Icevor or smoothness, 
 the bright shining nitor or lustre. 
 
 My task at this time hath been to break a 
 small box of ointment to pour upon his feet; and 
 I hope there is no body will accuse me of any 
 waste, either of my time or my oil ; especially 
 considering both were little. If there should be 
 any murmurers, I hope to find them that will 
 excuse me with this apology, saying, / have done 
 a good work upon him, I have done what I could, 
 and done it for his burial, Mark xiv, 8 ; Matt. 
 
 () o 2 
 
664 APPENDIX. 
 
 xxvi, 10, 12. And sure we do all well to help to 
 embalm his name, especially since we may do it 
 at his own cost, for he hath provided the spices 
 in his life. When he lived, his lips dropped 
 myrrh, and his pen the oil of calamus and cinna- 
 mon; the smell whereof hath filled the house of 
 God with such perfume, as I hope this age, as 
 ill-scented as it is, will never wear out. 
 
 His life was so well acted, as, had not his 
 modesty forbidden it, he might have taken his 
 leave of the world, as Augustus did, with Valete 
 et plaudite, farewell, and speak well of me. 
 
 He is now silent, and so must I be, for the 
 time will not allow me to protract my speech. 
 An angel from heaven hath translated the soul of 
 this angel of the church, and placed it among the 
 twenty -four elders, which St. John saw about the 
 throne of God, (Rev. iv, 4.) which good inter- 
 preters have taken to be a type of the twenty- 
 four chief priests under the law, and of their 
 analogical successors, the bishops of the christian 
 church, attired with a tvhite robe of glory, instead 
 of his earthly rochet ; and instead of his crosier, 
 he hath a branch of the peaceful and victorious 
 palm put into his hands ; and for his mitre, which 
 fell with the royal crown, (when the time was 
 come that his old master's prophecy was to be 
 fulfilled, No Bishop, no King,) he hath a crown 
 of glory set upon his head. A Pisgah sight he 
 
APPENDIX. 565 
 
 often had of this heavenly Canaan, when he 
 was upon his mount of contemplation ; but now 
 he is gotten up to the top of the ladder, and 
 seeth the face of God indeed in the true Peniel, 
 
 Methinks now I l^ear some of you say with 
 Balaam, O that I might die the death of the 
 righteous J and that my latter end might be like his! 
 I shall tell you, in a few words, how that may, 
 and I have done. 
 
 Follow the steps of his holy life, and the 
 instructions of his godly books ; learn of Israel 
 and of this parallel father, to prize the spiritual 
 birthright, above any present fleshly enjoyments, 
 and to wrestle with God for it in prayer : medi« 
 tate much and often of heaven and heavenly 
 things, as he did ; imitate him in his holy vows, 
 and be careful to pay them: follow, J say, the 
 steps of his faith and charity, and you cannot 
 miss of such an end : For as many as walk 
 according to this rule, peace shall be upon them, 
 and upon th0 Israel of God. Amen. 
 
566 APPENDIX. 
 
 EPITAPH 
 
 ON THE MONUMENT OF MR. HENRY BRIGHT, IN 
 WORCESTER CATHEDRAL, 
 
 Composed by Doctor Jos. Hall, then Dean of Worcester. * 
 
 Mane, Hospes, & lege. 
 Magister Henricus Bright, 
 
 celeberrimus Gymnasiarcha, 
 
 qui Scholae Regiae istic fundatae 
 
 per totos Qudraginta Aonos summ^ cum 
 
 laude prsefuit : 
 
 Quo non alter magis sedulus fuit scitusve aut dexter 
 
 in Latinis, Graecis, Hebraicis, 
 
 Literis feliciter edocendis : 
 
 Teste utraque Academia, quam instruxit affatim numerosa 
 
 pube literarid : 
 
 Sed et totidem annis eoque amplius Theologiam 
 
 professus, 
 
 et hujus Ecclesiae per septemnium Canonicus major, 
 
 Ssepissime bic & alibi sacrum Dei Praeconem magno cum 
 
 zelo & fructu egit : 
 
 Vir pius, doctus, integer, frugi, de Republic^ 
 
 deque Ecclesi^ optim^ meritus, 
 
 k laboribas perdiu 
 
 pernoctuque ab anno 1562 ad 1626, 
 
 strenu^ usque extant latis, 4to Martii suaviter requievit 
 
 in Domino. 
 
 * See Fuller's Worthies of England in Worcestershire. 
 
ANGELUS E CGELO AD ANGELUM ECCLESI^E N. AD 
 CCELUM TRANSEUNTEM. 
 
 Ave Pater Sancte, Pro«>-inetric». 
 
 Gratis dilecte, gratis jam plene, 
 Dorainns tecum, tiiq ; cum Domino, 
 Semper fuit, semper es futurus. 
 Benedictus tu inter viros, inter angelos. 
 
 En age, ociils banc uostram ascendas alam, 
 Simulq; ascendamus banc scalam H^avoKXi/xaKa : 
 
 Quin et properare jussit expectans Dominus, 
 Idemq; cupiunt conservi omnes, 
 
 Gestieutes videre, aventes exosculari. 
 Uterq; te manet gratulabundus Adamus 
 
 Et qui perdidit, et qui servavit* 
 
 Jamjam aperuit sinum, 
 Fidus Fidorum Pater Abraham : 
 Bracbiisq ; extensis adstat Parallelus Israel, 
 Cum cbarissimo filio cognomine Josepho. 
 Fratresq; omnes in amplexum ruituri. 
 
 lu A»cen«o. 
 
 Quid moraris, quid miraris 
 Lumina baec pervia ? 
 Quid Lunam argenteam uoctis reginamf 
 
 Quid aureum solem diei regem? 
 In sidera enrantia quid errant oculi ? 
 
 In fixa quid iigis Lumina? 
 Quorsum (post solem) duodena signa pervagaris? 
 
 Non est boc veri nominis, nee numinis Ceelum 
 Non baec aula Jovis * A^irofAsyirH : 
 Sed ejusdem camerata cella. 
 
568 APPENDIX. 
 
 Nec sunt haec lumina ver^ coelestia 
 Sed umbra luminum super-ccelestium. 
 
 Attolle oculos, aspice justitiee solem, 
 Suo jam culminantem 
 Fixo aeternoq. meridie. 
 Hujusq; radiis g\onk plenam, 
 Formosam lunam ver^ lucinam, 
 Scilicet quae peperit lucem parentem. 
 Ecce Patriarcharum bis sena signa 
 Totidemq; Apostolorum antitypum Senatum. 
 Ecce Saturnum grandaevum Adamum : 
 Jovemq ,- iegiferum Mosen : 
 
 Martemj bellicosum Josuam : , 
 
 Eliam, Mercurium, post ccelica peracta jussa 
 
 Ad coeltjm impigre revolantem. 
 Ecce Hesperum solis praecursorem 
 
 Johannem Baptistam. 
 Ecce Pleiades Empyreos, 
 Septem Fratres, stellas Asiaticas : 
 Ecce agmina minorum syderum, 
 
 Variantis magnitudinis. 
 Omnia libi lucem praebent Venture 
 
 Adjunge latus debito choro, 
 Auge destinatam constellationem, 
 Sed primum, coeli amicus, induas amictum coelestem. 
 Hanc scilicet gloriae albam, 
 Pro terre^ direpta pall^ ; 
 lUam victricem palmam. 
 Pro extorto pastorali pedo : 
 Istam coronam sideream. 
 Pro tenui decussa cydari. 
 Vide Arborem vitae de qu^ toties legisti, 
 Hujus nunc fructum legas, 
 Et aeteruum vivas. 
 
 J.W. M.A. 
 
UPON THE MUCHLAMENTED DEATH OF THE 
 
 REV. FATHER JOSEPH, LATE LORD 
 
 BISHOP OF NORWICH. 
 
 Our Father dead? can any dumb-born sou 
 Forbear to cry, Die, and we are undone ? 
 Ah ! could our cries his flying ghost recall, 
 'T had soon returned to its wonted stall : 
 
 But since 
 From hence 
 
 It must ; blow high our deep-fetch'd sighs, and land 
 This high-priz'd treasure on the heav'nly strand. 
 That's all we can, for without his own skill 
 Of tongue and /ancy, can*t the briskest quill 
 
 His worth 
 Set forth. 
 
 Yet cry we must, and though in uncouth tones. 
 And dreary accents of confused groans. 
 Tell the mis-deeming world — 
 What rich embroidery of wit and grace, 
 like sparkling diamonds set in golden case. 
 Like the pure white and red, in beauty's cheek, 
 "With sweet contention that precedence seek, 
 
 Possest 
 That breast. 
 
 How sweet a dresse of smiling gravity 
 Sate on that reverend brow ; now solidly 
 Fraughted with Gospel treasure at its home, 
 That soul's arriv'd like ship from Indies come. 
 See in that mind a land-skip of all graces 
 Pourtray'd to life, rank'd in their proper places. 
 
570 APPENDIX. 
 
 Here love and peace imbrace, there meekness, sanctity 
 
 Below at distance sits humility; 
 
 See yonder charity, with arms expanded, 
 
 With tender bowels open-handed ; 
 
 There patience stoops, and bends her shoulders low 
 
 To bear that load the unworthy world will throw 
 
 On wronged innocence. Then tap'ring to the sky 
 
 You'l see pure zeal, devotion, piety. 
 
 All these unfucus'd, candid, and serene ; 
 
 Not like the modern garb, to serve the scene 
 
 Of ends and interests ; mere pageantry, 
 
 To gull such souls as see with half an eye. 
 
 Such stales of vertue's, but a saint-like cheat, 
 
 Glasse to his chrystal, glowworms to his heat. 
 
 Was ever soul ravish'd in meditation. 
 
 Wound up on high in contemplation 
 
 Divine, 
 Like thine? 
 
 Such know the beating of thy pulse whose traffick 
 
 Was wholly so cherubick and seraphick, 
 
 That it evince, 'tis not hceretical 
 
 To say, angels may he corporeal. 
 
 His holy life, a silent check to all 
 
 The rout of vices, was : his pen the maul 
 
 Of sects 
 And smects. 
 
 His name did more perfume the church, than gum 
 Of Stacte, Onycha, and Galhanum 
 Did Moses'' sacred tent ; and certainly 
 Whilst Hall's remembered, Bishop cannot die* 
 And that will be, till books shall be calcin'd. 
 With the elements above ; and all refin'd. 
 
 At the last conflagration 
 
 Learned Armagh * to honour this his day. 
 His Usher was, and heaven-ward led the way. 
 When aged Durham f shall remove his station. 
 How great, how glorious a Constellation 
 
 • Abp. Usher. t Bp, Morton. 
 
APPENDIX. 571 
 
 In th' orh empyreal will they make, those three 
 
 That will outshiue the radiant Cassiopee, 
 
 But stay: these blundering lines do wrong the blest. 
 
 Let Yare and Isca murmur out the rest : 
 
 Only our dropping tears shall never stint. 
 
 Till on his marble they these words imprint : 
 
 Maxigre the peevish world's complaint. 
 Here lies a Bishop and a saint. 
 
 Whom Ashby *hredy and Granta nurs'd 
 Whom Halsted, and old Waltham first 
 To rouz the stupid world from sloth, 
 Heard thund'ring with a golden mouth, 
 Whom Wor'ster next did dignifiey 
 And honoured with her Deanry : 
 Whom Exon lent a mitred wreath^ 
 And Norwish, where he ceas'd to breath. 
 
 These all with one joint voice do cry. 
 Death's vain attempt, what doth it mean? 
 My Son, my Pupil, Pastor, Dean, 
 My rev'rend Father, cannot die. 
 
 Deflevit H.N. b.d. 
 
 • de-la-zouch. 
 
IN OBITUM AMPLISSIMI PATRIS J. H. EPISCOPI 
 NORVICENSIS, 
 
 lAMBX RECTI. 
 
 Indulte coeli tarn benigno munere, 
 Quantis tuorum luctibus refers pedem, 
 Facunde Praesul ! quo domante multiceps 
 Pecu, profanas ordini intentans sacro 
 Lat^ ruinas, coDcidit; quo vindice, 
 Census secundi Flamen anctus inful^ 
 Nondum superbit ; siquibus distinguere 
 Humana brutis arma jam cordi fiet ; 
 Mentisq ; doctae si tropsea viribus 
 Nequam protervis praeferant. Olim tuos 
 Sensit lacertos factio Brownistica: 
 Antistes ille septicolli culmine, 
 Superbus olim sensit. Ut tan turn cluat 
 Sagata virtus, neutiquam toga minor 
 Tncedis, hinc te duplicis serti decus, 
 Oliva, laurus, glorid pari beat. 
 Tricisque praepedita conscientia 
 Qu^m dexter adsis perpetim fatebitur, 
 Qu^m luculentd nubilam ducas fide, 
 Cujusq; scripti quse venusta luminal 
 Qualesque nervi! cuncta quam normaliter 
 Concinna, queis sunt attributa partibus ! 
 Pi^q ; suavitate quem non detinent ! 
 Sed quae Camaena, dulcibus fastigiis 
 Dignanda coeli, pergat exiles domos 
 Rectoris alti, spiritus et accolas 
 Referre tecum ? quando pene libera 
 Mens jam senilis corticem perrumpere. 
 
APPENDIX. 573 
 
 Coepit catastae, et limpido vesci aRthere, 
 
 O quanta pomis indidem mysteria! 
 
 At vita qualis sanctitatis ! qu^m pii 
 
 Foecunda amoris! qu4mq; nuUis seculi 
 
 Exulcerata cladibus, quas ordine ♦ 
 
 LoDgo furentes, miles infractus pati! 
 
 Loetisque possis impiger cervicibus. 
 
 Partes in omnes qui volet te prosequi 
 
 Laudum canenti quanta cresceret seges! 
 
 Sed nos Gaienus. 
 
 Instantibus amicis extempore profudit, 
 
 J.W. M.D.C.L. 
 
To MASTER JOSUAH SYLVESTER, OF HIS BARTAS 
 N METAPHRASED. 
 
 I DARE confess, of muses more than nine. 
 
 Nor list, nor can I envy none but thine. 
 
 She, drencht alone in Sion's sacred spring 
 
 Her Maker's praise hath sweetly chose to sing. 
 
 And reacheth nearest th' angel's notes above ; 
 
 Nor lists to sing or tales or wars or love. 
 
 One while I find her, in her nimble flight. 
 
 Cutting the brazen spheres of heaven bright : 
 
 Thence, straight she glides, before I be aware 
 
 Through the three regions of the liquid air : 
 
 Thence rushing downe, through Nature's closet door, 
 
 She ransacks all her grandame's secret store ; 
 
 And diving to the darkness of the deep, 
 
 Sees there what wealth the waves in prison keep ; 
 
 And, what she sees above, below, between. 
 
 She shows and sings to others ears and eyne. 
 
 'Tis true, thy muse another's steps doth press 
 
 The more's her pain, nor is her praise the less. 
 
 Freedom gives scope unto the roving thought ; 
 
 Which, by restraint, is curb'd. Who wonders aught. 
 
 That feet unfettered, walken far, or fast? 
 
 Which, pent with chains, mote want their wonted haste. 
 
 Thou followest Bartasses diviner streine ; 
 
 And singst his numbers in his native vein. 
 
 Bartas was some french angel, girt with bayes 
 
 And thou, a Bartas art, in English lays. 
 
 Whether is more ! me seems (the sooth to sayn) 
 
 One Bartas speaks in tongues, — in nations twain. 
 
 JOS. HALL. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 ACT for th« propagation of religion in Wales, 302. 
 
 Apprentices, ot London, their petition against the church, 214, 271, 272. 
 
 Armtff insisting on toleration, 339 taking the sovereign power into their 
 
 own hands, 349. Remonstrance of, ibid. Secure the person of the 
 
 king in Huist castle, 350. Shut out tlie presbyterian members from 
 
 parliament, determine to impeach the king, t6. 
 Asaemhly ef DinneSj 309. prohibited by the king. ib. forsaken by the 
 
 episcopal divines, 310. manage church matters, 313. 
 
 BagshaWy 167. 
 
 Burebone's parliament, 3G6. their intended reformation, 367. described 
 by Clarendon, ib. dissolve themselves, 369. 
 
 Barton, 148, 149, 193. 
 
 Bastwickj ib. 
 
 Billy to exclude ecclesiastics from civil employments, 221. Clarendon's 
 remarks upon it, ib. His majesty's opinion of it, 223. passed the 
 commons, ib. opposed and thrown out in the house of lords, 224. 
 Bishop Hall's speech on the occa^^ion, 224-230. 
 
 Bill, for abolishing deans and chapters, 233. for the extirpation of epis- 
 copacy, 230. opposed, 231. read a second time, ib. Clarendon's 
 manoeuvre respecting it, 232. 
 
 — For taking away the bishops' votes, passed, 282. opposed by the 
 Bishop of Rochester and the Earl of Bedford, ib. obtained the royal 
 assent, 285. 
 
 —To continue parliament, 242. to abolish the high commission, and the 
 star chamber, 243. for the abolition of episcopacy. 308, 309, 329. 
 
 Bishops, many of them disposed to remove offensive innovations, 217. 
 Their cares and anxieties, 121, note. Their protestation, 275—277. 
 Their pZ^a and t/ewurrcr, 247, 270. Their houses threatened to be pulled 
 down, 274. determine not to quit the parliament, t^. Twelve protest- 
 ing impeached, 279. entreated to relinquish their right of voting, 282. 
 Twelve protesting petition for council, 291. Their trial, ib. 292. are 
 released, 293. when prisoners in the lower, preach every Sunday, 294. 
 
 Blundel, Peter, 15. 
 
 Book of Sports, 72. repubUshed, 131. Copy of, 131-138. bad effects 
 of it, 138-142. refused to be read by many of the clergy, 139. the 
 cause of much trouble to them, 139, 140. not mentioned in the Works 
 of Bishop Hall, 143. 
 
 Broicn, Robert, some account of, 48,49. 
 Brownufts, 48, 49, 50. 
 Burnet, Bishop, quoted, 333. 
 
568 INDEX. 
 
 Cambridge^ university of, purified by the parliament, 314. 
 
 Canonsy subscribed, 174. published, 175. Abstract of them, 175--180. 
 generally disliked, 180, 181. Re&olutions of the commons against them, 
 188, 189. Speech of Bishop Hall in their defence, 248-253. against 
 papists and socinians, 171. 
 
 Catechizing^ recommended, 123, 124. 
 
 Cathedrals and Churches^ devastated, 316. 
 
 Commissioners for defacing the ornaments, «&c. of churches, 198. 
 
 Committee of Accommodation, 234, 235. Fuller's opinion of, 236. 
 
 Committees for religion and grievances, 169, 187, 188. 
 
 Communion tables^ disputes about, 146, 147. 
 
 CommonSf their reasons against the bishops' votes, 287—289. 
 
 Commonwealth established, 352. 
 
 Complaints against the bishops, 196. 
 
 Corporation of the sons of the clergy, 383. 
 
 CosinSf Dr. the first sufferer, 194. 
 
 Convocation, continued after dissolution of parliament, 172. Disturbance 
 in consequence, 173. 
 
 Charles I, a blemish in his character, 140, 141. 
 
 Charles II, crowned in Scotland, 363. 
 
 Chaderton, Dr. 12. 
 
 Chomley, Mr. H. 9. 
 
 Church ales, what, 129, note. 
 
 Church, destruction of, intended, 200, 210, 211, 237, 245, 270, 817. 
 troubled by controver.sie«, 107. managed by the assembly of divines, 
 313. 
 
 Clamour against the clergy, 196. 
 
 Cullum, Sir John's, History of Hawsted and Hardwick, 17, note. 
 
 Clergy, their sufferings, 314. their number no less than two thousand, 
 ib. 315. Connived at in the exercise of their ministry, 371. 
 
 Clarendon, Lord, his observations on the mode of getting up petitions, 
 196, 211, 212. 
 
 Clerk ales, what, 129, note. 
 
 Cromwell, Oliver, near being seized by the presbyterians, 339. saying 
 of his, 340. his cruel oppression of the loyal clergy, 380, wo^f?. Anec- 
 dote ef, 382. turning the parliament out of doors, 365. dissolving 
 another, 374. 
 
 Cross, St. Paul's, description of, by Dr. Walker; and Cross in Cheapside, 
 demolished, 198. 
 
 Denhatn, Baron, 129, 130. 
 
 Deering, Sir Edward, his speech on the delivery of the bill for extirpating 
 
 episcopacy, 230, 231. 
 Differences, arising between the presbyterians and independents, 321. 
 Directory, for public worship, 323. 
 Disorder of church and state, 337. pathetically deplored by Bishop 
 
 Hall, ib. 
 Disputes, religious, in Holland, 74. ' 
 Disturbances, in London and in the country, 170. on presenting petitions, 
 
 272. 
 Divine Service, disturbed by the rabble, 197. 
 Divisions in religion, evil of, 354, 355, 358. 
 Drury, account of the family of the, 17, note. 
 DuGDALE, quoted, 271. 
 Doddridge, Dr. 5, note, 442. 
 Dort, Synod of, 74-92. 
 
INDEX. 577 
 
 J^ngagementj appointed, 352, 368. 
 
 English Divines, deputed to the Synod of Dort. receive instructions from 
 
 the king, 75. 76. Their opinions, 90, 92. 
 Enthusiasts J springing up, 320, 321. 
 Episcopacy, divine right of, 153—107. Attempt uf establishing in Scot* 
 
 land, 152, 153. abolished by the Scots' assembly, ib. abolished in 
 
 England, 371. 
 Erasiians, described, 318. 
 Falkland, Lord, his character by Clarendon, 216. 
 
 Featley, Dr. imprisoned for his attachment to e|;iscopacy, 311. 
 
 Form of prayer in use in the Jewish and Christian church, 207. 
 
 fox, George, 363. 
 
 Fifths, 314, 316. 
 
 Fuller, his remarks on Bishop Hall's Letter respecting the Synod of Dort, 
 
 83. his mention of Bishop Hall's Catechism, 123, note. A mistake of 
 
 his, 280. 
 Flattery, instance of, 99, 100. 
 
 GangTtfTw, of Edwards, 337, «o/e. 
 
 Gt76y, Mr. Anthony, 4. 
 
 Government of the church interrupted for eighteen years, S09, 317, 820. 
 
 Godwin, de Pre.suiibus, 425. 
 
 Goodwin, John, his Redemption Redeemed, 80. his ui]UU8t inBinuatioos 
 
 respecting the Synod of Dort, refuted, 80, 81, 82. 
 Greenham, anecdote of, 22, 23. 
 Great Gransden, 1 46, note. 
 Granger, quoted, 149. 
 GrimstonCj Sir Harbottle, moves the impeachment of Land, 190. 
 
 Hacket, Dr. defends the clergy, 232, 233. 
 
 Hall, Bishop, specialities of divine providence in his life, 2. Time 
 and place of his birth, ib. His parents, ih. 3. placed at school, 6. 
 enters at Cambridge, 6. elected scholar of Emmanuel college, 10. 
 elected fellow, 12. appointed professor of rhetoiic, 13. His intense 
 study, ib. 426—430. Anecdote of, by Fuller, ib. note, enters into holy 
 orders, 14. Appointed to the rectory of Halstead. 16. Opposed by 
 Lilly, 18. Marries, 20. his children, account of, 20, 21. Anecdote 
 of his family, 21,22. Accompanies Sir Edm. Bacon to the Spa, 23. 
 disputes with Costerus, 25, 26, 33. Writes his second century of 
 meditations, 28. disputes with a Carmelite prior, ib. returns to 
 England, 30. his travels, account of, in an epistle, 31-40. declines 
 the preachership of St. Edm. Bury, 41. preaches at Richmond, 42. 
 resolves to leave Halstead, 43. presented to the living of Wallham by 
 Lord Derry, 44. His reluctance to leave Halstead, 44-17. was 
 an instrument in influencing Tho. Sutton, to establish the charter 
 house, ib. Writes against the Brownists, 48. His letter to Smith 
 and Robinson, 50-55. Decline.H constant residence at court, 67. His 
 sermon on the death of Prince Henry, 58. is appointed to a prebend 
 of Wolverhampton, 60. recovers the patrimony of that collegiatg 
 church, 61-64. relinquishes his Wolverhampton prebend, i6. Ac 
 companies Lord Doncastei abroad, ib. is collated to the deanery o^ 
 Worcester, 66. Attends the king to Scotland. 67. Writes to Mr^ 
 Struthers, 68. nrges not the reading of the Book of Sports, 72. goes* 
 
 P p 
 
578 INDEX. 
 
 to the Synod of Dort, 75. His letter to Fuller respecting the Synod* 
 80, 83. returns from the Synod, ih. is presented by the S\nod with a 
 gold medal, 86. preaches before the Synod, 87. quotations from his 
 sermon, i^. His latin speech before the Synod, 88-90. draws up his 
 Via Media, 92, 93, 108, 109. asserts the outward visibility of the church 
 of Rome, 95,117,118,121. His sermon before the king, quoted, 98,99. 
 preaches in latin at the convocation, 104. His sermon translated by 
 his son Robert, 105. prearhes at the reo[)eninaj of the re-edified 
 chapel of St. John's, Clerkenwell, ib. His moderation with respect to 
 the five points, 108. is raised to the See of Exeter, 112. is charged 
 with Puritanism, 113, 125, 165. 
 
 —Reclaims his factious clergy, 1 13. is charged with too much indulgence 
 ofleclures, 114, 125,127. 
 
 —is opposed in his nomination of the clerks of the convocation, 115. is 
 translated to Norwich, ib. His mind pourtrayed, 121. His Cate- 
 chism, 123, note, recommends catechizing, 123, 124. was a diligent 
 preacher, 127. His ctreat moderation, 128, 148, 184 His Divine 
 Right of Episcopacy, 153. revised by Laud, 154. altered con- 
 trary to his own mind, 161, 163. Quotations from, 165,167. was 
 the most celebrated writer in defencr of the church, 165. His speech 
 in parliament in behalf of the church, 200--204, His '* Humble 
 Remonstrance," 205. His controversy with Smectymnuus, 205—209. 
 His sentiments upon extemporary prayer, 207—209. His speech in 
 parliament upon the bill to exclude all ecclesiastics from civil employ- 
 ments, 224--230. retires to Exeter, preaches in the cathedral, remarks 
 on his sermon, 258—261. Extract from his sermon, ib. His sermon in 
 the tower, 294. His letter from the tower, 296. His state of mind 
 described when a prisoner, 295-303. retires to Norwich, 304. 
 preaches in the cathedral, ib. His curious account of the enthusiasts 
 of his time. 321, 322. His *' Modest offer of some considerations to the 
 Prolocutor of the Assembly of Divines," 320. His Hard Measure, 
 386—409. His persecution in his old age, 409. His patience, 414, 
 418. driven out of his palace, 415. retires to Heigham, iA. His house 
 now a public house, ib. spent the remainder of his days in doing 
 good, and in devotion, 416, 417. preaches in his 80th year, ib. a 
 striking passage from his sermon, ib. His charity, 417, 418. His 
 weekly fast, ib. foretels the night of his death, ib. His death, ib. 
 dislike of burials in churches, ib. buried in the chancel of Heighara 
 church, 419. His will, extract from, 418, note. Inscription on his 
 tomb-stone, 419. His mural monument described, 420, His character, 
 425—432. his writings, i6. His mode of spending each day, 426-430. 
 His Satires, character of, 433-438. His intention of making a metri- 
 cal version of the Psalms, 438, 439. His prose works, character of, by 
 Sir H.Wotton, Fuller, Hervey, and Dr. Doddridge, 439-443. His 
 Sermons, 443. His Contemplations and Meditations, 442-444. His 
 other pieces, 446-448. 
 
 Hall, Mrs. 20. Her death, 420. buried in Heigham church, ib. 
 Inscription on her tomb stone, 421. 
 
 Hall, Dr. Robert, 21, 371. 
 
 Hall, Dr. George, 21, 371. preaches before the Corporation of the Sons 
 of the Clergy, 383. Extract from his sermon, 384, 385. 
 
 Harris, his character of Archbishop Usher, 383. 
 
 Henry, Prince, his death and character, 68. 
 
 Heylin, Dr. quoted, 233. 
 
 High Commission Court, account of, 243. 
 
INDEX. 579 
 
 House of LordSy voted useless, 851. 
 
 Hervey, Rev. James, 441. 
 
 Hornef Bishop, his sermon on King Charles I. 351, noie. 
 
 Impeachment of thirteen b'lshopSy 246. their names, il>. 
 
 Independejtts, account of, 319. 
 
 Instruine)U of govenitnenty 369. 
 
 Inttructions ol the king to the divines sent to the Synod of Dort. 75-77. 
 
 Inmtrection in Ireland, 203. 
 
 Interregnum in the church, 320. 
 
 Jambs I. his death, 98. his funeral sermon, 100-104. 
 John, St. ehapel> Clerkenwell, account of, 105, note. 
 
 Kennet, Bishop, his testimony to the liberality of Cromwell, 372. 
 
 King, (Charles I.) his speech, 168. his journey to Scotland, 255. His 
 attachment to the church, 261, 363, 268, 269. collates bishops to the 
 vacant Sees, and translates others, 261, 262. impeaclies five members 
 of the commons, 289. a wrong step, 290. sets up his standard at 
 Nottingham, 291. retires to York, 305. is persuaded to give his assent 
 to the bill for taking away the bishops' votes, 285. sad enects of it, ib. 
 286, 287. delivers himself up to the Scots, 332. disputes with Hen- 
 derson, 333. is given up to the parliament, 334. is conveyed to 
 Holmby house, 338. is taken by force to the army at Newmarket, 340. 
 escapes, 341. secured in Carisbrook castle, ib. conveyed to Hurst 
 castle, 350. is murdered, 351. 
 
 Kirk discipline advanced into a divine right, 238. 
 
 Lambeth palace attacked by the mob, 169. 
 
 Lands of bishops, deans, and chapters, sold, 360. amount of the money, 
 
 361, note. 
 Latin sei'mon of Bishop Hall before ttie Synod of Dort, in Appendix, 476. 
 Laud, Archbishop, patronises Monta^^ue, 97. disapproves of lectures, 
 
 126. His intolerancy, 126. Chief promoter of the Book of Sports, 
 
 131, 139. Voted to the Tower, 191. His catastrophe, 326, S62. His 
 
 character, 326, 327. His munificence, 328. 
 Lecturers, disaffected, appointed, 257. 
 Leighton, Dr. Alex. 194. 
 
 Letter of Bishop Hall to Fuller about the Synod of Dort, 80-83. 
 Letters of Bisliop Hall to Archbishop Usher, in Appendix, 461. 
 Lilly, opponent of Bishop Hall, account of, 18, note. 
 Liturgy, abased, 196. Debates about in parUament, 256. disused, 323. 
 
 king's proclamation for its continuance, 324. 
 Long parliament, 186. 
 
 ManVs, Dr. Bible, 413. 
 Maternal instmction, benefit of, 5, note. 
 Milton, employed to write in defence of commonwealth, 359. 
 Minister's petition, 213, 220. 
 
 Montague's New Gap, 6cc. 96. his appeal, 97. his writings examined 
 before parUament, 106. 
 
 Neal, an invidious remark of his, 263. a probable mistake of his, 272. 
 another, 280. 
 
580 INDEX. 
 
 Negative Oath^ 414, note. 
 Newport, treaty'of, 345, 349. 
 
 Oath at the Synod of Dort, 79, 81. in 6th Canon, explained by Bishop 
 Hall, 181. Difficulties of enforcing it, 182. Petitions against it, 183. 
 Synodical, Bishop Hall's moderation respecting it, 184. 
 
 Officers of the Army, preach, 336. 
 
 Opinions, false, multiplied, 354, 355. Bishop Hall's remarks upon, ib. 
 
 Ordinance, most cruel, of parliament, against sects and heretics, 344, 345. 
 
 Osbaldestori, 151. 
 
 Oxford, visitation of, by the disloyalists, 344. 
 
 Pamphlets, seditious and scurrilous against the church, 200. 
 
 Papists, their opinions and wfshes respectiag Bishop Hall's writings in 
 defence of episcopacy, 210, note, proceeded against, 238, 239. 
 
 Parliament, long, strictly urged the due observance of the sabbath, 145. 
 sitting on a Sunday, 254. Their declaration for the reformation of 
 government and liturgy, 305, 306. 
 
 Parties, in religion and politics, a warning to future ages, 308. 
 
 Pearson, bishop, 372. 
 
 Petitions, 188. described by Dugdale, ih. note. Of " the city dames" 
 against the bishops' votes, 271. Of the porters of London, against 
 episcopacy, 214. Of the apprentices, 214, 271, 272. Root and Branch, 
 213. in favour of the church, 213. rejected, 214. Their substance, 
 218, 220, 283. Of the snifering clergy to the king, 342. His Majesty's 
 reply, ib to Sir Thomas Fairfax, ib. Of the presbyterian, ministers 
 against the loyal clergy, 343. 
 
 Petitionary remonstrance of the loyal clergy to Cromwell, 381. 
 
 Popery, gaining ground, 96. 
 
 Porters, of London, petition against episcopacy, as too heavy a load, 214. 
 
 Pratt's, Rev. Josiah, edition of Bishop Hall's Works, 448. 
 
 Prayer, extemporary, 207-209. 
 
 Press, placed under the direction of parliament, 361. 
 
 Presbyterianism, its oppression, 324. the established religion, 375. 
 
 Presbyterian model, adopted, 318. advanced into jus divinum, ib. 
 
 ministers refuse the engagement, 359. 
 
 Presbyterians, suffering of the, from the independents, 353. 
 
 Protestation, entered upon, 239. disapproved by Earl of Southampton 
 and Lord Roberts, 240. Bill to compel all to subscribe it, ib. re- 
 jected by the peers, ib. Of the bishops, 276. presented to the king, 
 278. its irregularity, ib. 280. 
 
 Prynne, Wm. his Histriomastix, 147, 148, 149, 193. 
 
 Piilpits, sounding with faction, and fanaticism, 198. 
 
 Puritans, their intemperate practices, 147. many of them tools of par- 
 liament, 199. 
 
 Puritanism, described, 449—458. 
 
 Pym, Mr. 239, 273. 
 
 Quakers, their origin, 362, 363. 
 
 Rapin, an error of his, 237. 
 
 Religion, unsettled state of, 257, 354, 356. Bishop Hall's remarks, ib. 
 
 Remonstrance, of the stale of the nation, 264,265. His Majesty's reply, 
 
 266-268. 
 Repartee, of Grimstone and Selden, 217, note. 
 Richardson, Lord Ciii«f Justice, 129, 130. 
 
INDEX. 581 
 
 Root and Branch petition, 212. 214. 
 Rump Parliament, 353, itote. 
 
 Sabbath, morality of, controverted, 144. 
 
 Sandeison, Ur. rciuaiks upon the oath in 6th canon, 182. 
 
 Sects, springing up, 37. increasing, 98. 
 
 Scott'sj Rev. Tliomas, Bible, 413. 
 
 Scots y aid of, called in, 317. 
 
 SmectymnuuSf reply to " Humble Remonstrance/' 205. 
 
 Smithy the Brownisl, extravagant notions of, 55. 
 
 Solemn league and covenant, 311. mode of taking it, described by Dr. 
 
 Walker, 312. King's proclamation against it, 313. tendered to the 
 
 University of Cambridge, 314. to the kins;, 333. to Oxford, 344. 
 Songs in the Night, occasioned by the death of Mrs. Hall, extract from, 
 
 421-424. 
 Spalato, Archbishop of, 63. 
 Speeches, of Lords Digby and Falkland, 216. 
 Steward, Dr. 170. 
 Suffciings, extreme, of the clergy, 353, 377, 378. Dr. Walker's remarks 
 
 upon, 379, 380. Neal and Harris' remarks, ib. 
 Sunday, profaned by revels and royal masquerade, 141. 
 Spoj-ts, see under Book of, remarks upon, 71, 73. 
 Strafford, Earl of, impeached, 241. beheaded, 242. 
 Star chamber, description of, 244, note. 
 Sterne, his plagiarisms, 448. 
 Sutton, Thomas, Esq. 47. 
 Struihers, Mr. 68. 
 Synod of Dort, 78-90. 
 
 Titer ton, school, 15. 
 
 Toleration, to all heresies, errors, &c. 370. denied to popery and prelacy, ib. 
 
 Travels of Bishop Hall, account of, 31, 40. 
 
 Triers, 375. 
 
 Turner, Dr. his sermon before convocation, 170. 
 
 ITsA^, Archbishop, expelled from the Assembly of Divines for his loyalty, 
 311. endeavours to prevail on Cromwell to relent his cruel oppression 
 of the clergy, 381. succeeds not. very much hurt at Cromwell's con- 
 duct, 382. 
 
 Uxbridge, treaty of, 329. 
 
 Via Media, 92, 93, 108, 109, 111. 
 
 IValtham, church of, account of, 44. 
 
 War, with Scotland, 168, 184, 185. civil begin, .307. 
 
 Warminstre, his motion against the canons, 191. 
 
 Warner, Dr. quoted, 196. 
 
 Williams, Dr. Archbishop of York, ill treated by Laud, 150. his funeral 
 
 sermon on James I. 100-114. Attacking one of the rabble, 274. 
 Wren, Dr. Matthew, 194, 195. 
 Wilks' Christian Essays, quoted, 367. 
 
 Winniffe, Miss, afterwards Mrs. Hall, 20. Mr. George, ib. 
 WhitefooVs funeral sermon on Bishop Hall, in Appendix. 
 Woi'cester, battle of, 364. 
 Walton, Sir H. 439. 
 
ERRATA. 
 
 Page 193, line 11 from the top, for " manifests," read manifested. 
 217, note, for '< Seldon/' read Selden. 
 
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