larem Turba atque his pueâ—is famulisque decemque ministri Otia discentum qui bene semt er alant Magna quidem sunt haec tamen haec tam magna Lector adhuc tanto non potuere viro Namque opere exacto hoc vix proxima fluxerat placere Cum parat alterius tecta locare domus Quae prope Ventanae bene caepta Palatia sedis aestas Crevit in sexto vere parata stetit Ergo illic totidem studiosos esse jubebat Queis rectores pedonomosque dedit Qui simulac primos complerint fortiter annos Musarum in studiis rhetoricisque tropis Altius inque novas diducta colonia terras Oxonium semper lecta juventus eat Haec duo Pieriis collegia condita mistis Sunt in tutela diva Maria tua Idâ—irco nova dicta puto quod nulla vetustas Nulla dies morsus tentat in illa suos Hic potuit credi finem fecisse struendi Wickhamus sumptus jam tenuisse suos Non tenuit divi nam quicquid in aede Swithini Nolari occiduam spectat ab arce plagam Concio qua festis celebratur sacra diebus Quaque suo in tumulo conditus ipse jacet Totum hoc tam vastam molem tantasque columnas Impensis struxit restituitque suis Regis opes dicet propius qui spectat idem Vix regum tantas esse putabit opes Forsitan Gallis nam sic fama Monastis Quos rex a regno jussit abire suo Reddidit aequali praetio quaecunque recepit Parisiiis fundos Parisiisque lares Non tamen hoc sumptu minor esse domestica caepit Cura sed famulos pavit ut ante suos Pavit ipsius testatur script a sepulchro Littera gustavit dives inopsque cibum Huic it a viventi cum jam longaeva senectus Corporis effaeti debilitasset onus Grata quies venit vitae non discolor actae Ultima curarum linea grata quies Annus erat vitae decies octavus illis Henrici quarti sceptra diebus erant J am testamentum quaeris si fecerit ullum Fecit si fuer at quod daret ille fuit Quod fuerit factis reliquuÌ„ tot sumptibus ohe Inveniet nullum pagina nostra fidem Et tamen hoc dicam regales vincere gazas Quae dedit in scriptis ultima dona suis Extat opus Craesumque putes scripsisse vel illum Cujus facta haeres Roma superba fuit Vel cujus digitis mutatum fertur in aurum Quicquid in aurifluas contigit ire manus Nec tameÌ„ ignavos bona tanta reliquit in usus Successusque bonus propositum gresuit Namque diocesin ditavit templa per omnem Multaque cognatis pauperibusque ded it Multa quoque regi non fidis pauca ministris Sed neque gimnasiis muner a pauca suis Haec sunt ergo viri monument a perennia tanti Cujus dum vixit gloria tanta fuit Nec dubito qui sic vixit sic mortuus idem est Quin sit apud superos nobilis umbra deos Est etenim nam si caelestis clauditur aula Tot meritis nobis illa patere queat Hactenus ire libet de Magni laudibus Hosce Suscipe conatus Lector Amice meos And hereby your Highnesse may observe how vaine that foolish tradition is which my Author discreetly omitted as not beleeving that some will still maintaine that Wickham was unlearned and onely a Surveyer of buildings and by a kinde of fraud deceived King Edward 3. no likely Prince to be so deceived beging the Parsonage of Eastmeane to which by like Authority they will have the Bishoprick of Winchester annexed as unseparably as the Earledome of Arundell to Arundell-Castle for who could think that such a King as Edw. 3. would make Sir John Laclattin first his Secretary then Privie-Seale then Master of the Wards and Treasurer of France and lastly Prelate of the Garter and Chancellor of England and so much of the first Wickham Of Stephen Gardiner Because I will not be alwayes be praysing but sometimes when just cause is given reprehend mens demerits as well magnifie their merits I will take occasion to speake somewhat of Stephen Gardiner twice bishop of Winchester and therefore may challenge to be twice remembred though for some things of him that were to be wisht they were ever forgotten my Author derects this Reader to Mr. Foxes booke of Martyrs for a more full Relation of his doings but that is so full though I assure my selfe it is very faithfull that I doubt your Highnesse will find it over tedious to read my purpose is therefore but to note some important observations out of this Story and after as I did of Wickham in Latin so to adde some English poetrie written of him and to him which is not to be found in Mr. Fox though some of it helps to confirme something concerning him affirmed by Mr. Fox and called in question by others Mr. Fox therefore first greatly prayseth his naturall gifts of minde his sharpe wit his excellent memory which is indeed the store-house of all learning and knowledge for tantum scimus quantum meminimus But to these saith he he had great vices as pride envie cruelty flattering to his Prince submisse to his superiours envious to his equals namely to Cromwel and haughty to his inferiours these or the like are Mr. Foxes words It seemes further in relation of his Life and Death he was a Catholick-Protestant or a protesting Catholick for as he showes at large out of his Books Sermons though he received the Popes authority in Queen Maries time Yet his opinion was as his writings before declared and as the wiser sort I thinke do still hold of it that it is but a temporall constitution of Men and agreement of Princes to allow the same which upon just occasions they may restraine or exclude as they shall find cause but yet I observe this that although it was necessary for Queen Mary in respect of her Birth to admit of the Popes Authority as the contrary was as necessary for her Sister yet this so Catholicke Queen and this so popish Prelate could keep out the Popes Legat out of England by her royall Prerogative when he would have sent a Legat hither not to her liking again he was earnest against Marriage of Ministers yet he confesseth frankly that a married man may be a Minister he defended the reall presence yet he allowed the CoÌ„munion under both kinds he writ in defence of Images yet he publickly approved their pulling down when they were superstitiously abused Finally he said at his Death that that would marre all to teach the people that they are freely justified by the blood of Christ and yet even then when hee could not dissemble he confessed it to be true Doctrine Loe how farre this stout Prelate Cedere nescius as Mr. Fox saith of him
wizards to which kind of men that age was much affected concerning the new Prince who was after Henry the 8th of his incest ious marriage of the decay of his off-spring that he should pull down what the Kings had builded which no marvell if the Bishop being by Sirname a King mistrusted to pertaine also to his buildings I heard by one Flower of Phillips Nortor who said he saw Henry the seventh in this country that this Bishop would wish he paid above the price of it so it might have been finished for if he ended it not it would be pulled downe e're it were perfected As for the later predictions or rather postfictions since this Bishops death I willingly omit concerning the Successors of this Bishop as things worthier to be contemned then condemned written by Cole-prophets upon whited walls which the Italian calls the paper of fooles Muro bianco charta di matio of which sort many have beene made as well by our owne Country men as others but the best I remember was this written by an English gentleman since the three and fortieth yeare of Queen Elizabeth on the Church wall with a Charcole O Church I waile thy woofull plight Whom King nor Cardinal Clark nor Knight Have yet restored to ancient right Subscribed Ignoto Whereunto a Captaine of an other Country wrot this for the comfort of this Church and I wish him to prove a true prophet though perhaps he dyed rather a Martyr Be blythe faire Kirk when Hempe is past Thine Olive that ill winds did blast Shall flourish greene for aye to last Subscribed Cassadore But to proceed in this sad story and leave this pleasant poetry to pursue truths and eschue fictions to imbrace reason and refuse rime it is most apparent that after the death of this Oliver King his Successors Cardinall Adrian Cardinall Woolsey Bishop Clerke and Bishop Knight all succeeded in five and thirty yeares of which the first two were supposed to poyson themselves the third to be poysoned by others the last survived to see the death or at least the deadly wound of this Church for while the builders were ready to have finisht it the destroyers came to demolish it yet to give the Devill his right as the Proverb is it is said that the Commissioners in reverence and compassion of the place did so far strain their Commission that they offered to sell the whole Church to the Town under 500 Marks But the Townsmen fearing they might be thought to couzen the King if they bought it so cheap or that it might after as many things were be found conceal'd utterly refused it whereupon certain Merchants bought all the glasse Iron Bells and Lead of which Lead alone was accounted for as I have credibly heard 480 tun worth at this day 4800 But what became of these spoiles and spoylers Desit in hac miki parte fides neque credite factum Aut si credetis facti quoque credite paenam For I may well say Non possum quin exclamem But in a word soonafter the sellers lost their heads the buyers lost their goods being laid up in the great Treasury of Antichrist I mean drowned in the Sea from whence as some write by the Devills power he shall recover all lost treasures for the maintaining of his unmeasurable guists Thus speedily it was pull'd down but how slow it hath risen again I may blush to write Collections have been made over all England with which the Chancel is covered with blew slate and an Alms house built ex abundantia but the whole body of the Church stands bare ex humilitate The rest of the money never coming to the Townsmens hands is laid up as I suppose with that money collected for Pauls Steeple which I leave to a melius inquirendum And thus the Church lies still like the poor Traveller mentioned in the 10 of Luke spoiled and wounded by theeves The Priests go by the Levites go by but do nothing Onely a good Samaritan honest M. Billet worthy to be billited in the new Jerusalem hath powr'd some Qyl in the wounds and maintained it in life In so much as a wealthy Citizen of London hath adventured to set his Tomb there whom I commend more worthily then the Senate of Rome did thank Karra at his return from Cannas quod de salute reipublicae non desperasset for it seems this honest Citizen did not despair of the reedifying this Church that gave order to be richly entomb'd therein and thus much be said of this last Church of Bath Bishop Barlow The next I am to write of is Bishop Barlow of whom my Authour in this Book saith little in the Latin Treatise there is somewhat more and I will add a word to both Bath as I have noted before is but a title in this Bishoprick so as for many years Bath had the Name but Wells had the game but yet that one may know they be Sisters Your Highness shall understand that this game I speak of which was one of the fairest of England by certein booty play between a Protector and a Bishop I suppose it was at Tictak was like to have been lost with a why not and to use rather another mans word then mine own to explain this Metaphor thus saith the latine Relation of him He was a man no less godly then learned but not so markable in any thing as in his fortunate off-spring for which Niobe and Latona might envy them happy in his own Children more happy in their Matches to let passe his Sonnes of whom one is now Prebend in Wells and esteemed most worthy of such a Father He had five Daughters whom he bestowed on five most worthy men of which three are Bishops at this hour the other for their merit are in mens expectation designed to the like dignity hereafter Howbeit saith he in one thing this Prelate is to be deemed unfortunate that while he was Bishop his Sea received so great a blow losing at one clap all the Rents and Revenues belonging to it Thus he and soon after he tells that for his Mariage he was deprived and lived as a man banisht in Germany Here is his praise here is his dispraise If he were deprived for a lawfull Act no marvel if he be deprived for an unlawful sith then my Authour compares his felicity with that of Niobe I will also compare his misfortune with Peleus making Ovids verse to serve my turn in changing but a word or two Faelix Natis faelix conjuge Barlow Et cuisi demas spoliati crimina templi Omnia contiger ant hoc tanto crimine sontem accepit profugum patria Germanica tellus But God would not suffer this morsell to be quite swallowed but that it choaked the feeders to say nothing in this place but how the Protector was foretold by a Poet that he should lose his head Aestatis sedes qui sacras diruis aedes pro certo credes quod
nine dayes yet in a while he found means to pacifie her so well as she promised to come and I think did come to a house he had at Chelsey For there was a stayre and a dore made of purpose for her in a bay window of which pleasant wits descanted diversly some said that was for joy to shew he would as the Proverb is cast the house out at window for her welcome some more bitingly called it the Impresse or Emblem of his entry into his first Bishoprick viz. not at the doore but at the window But certain it is that the Queen being pacified and hee in great jollity with his faire Lady and her Carpets and Cushions in his bed-chamber he died suddenly taking Tobacco in his chaire saying to his man that stood by him whom he loved very well Oh boy I die whereupon many bolts were roved after him and some spitefully fether'd which both for charity sake as wel as brevity I wil omit but this blunt one not knowing out of whose Quiver it first came but fitting a gray goose wing I wil produce as his most vulgar Epitaph Here lies the first Prelate made Christendom see a Bishop a husband unto a Ladee The cause of his death was secret and hid He cry'd out I die and ev'n so he did He was buried in the Church the Dean and Chapter of Pauls not being so scrupulous as they of York were the 9. of Hen. 1. who because their Archbishop died suddenly buried him without the Church-porch notwithstanding he had been their great benefactor Bishop Vaughan Mr. Richard Vaughan is the next I have to speak of being the last man nam'd in my Authors Book and of him he hath but two lines onely declaring him to have been the Bishop of Chichester Upon the remove of my Lord of Canterbury that now isâ— he succeeded him in London as is not unknown to your Highnesse His beginning of preferment was under the Lord Keeper Puckering being his examiner of such as sued for the benefices in my Lords gift in which though some complaine he was too precise yet for my part I ascribe to that one of his greatest praises For this I know that a Preacher being a Noblemans Chaplaine and therefore qualified for two Benefices came to him â—recommended in good sort and brought with him a Gentleman of both their acquaintance that sometime had been an University man to speak for his approbation Mr. Vaughan examined him of no very deep points and found him but shallow and not very ready in the Roman Tongue his friend having been fain to help him up in two or three foule stumbles both of language and matter whereupon he dismist him without all hope of the Benefice and after told the Gentleman seriously that if he would have it himselfe he would allow him sufficient but the suitor by no means He was in those daies very prompt and ready in speech and withall factious he was an enemy to all supposed miracles insomuch as one arguing with him in the Closet at Greenwich in defence of them and alledging the Queens healing of the Evil for an instance asking him what he could say against it he answered that he was loth to answer arguments taken from the Topick place of the Cloth of estate but if they would urge hiâ— to answer he said his opinion was she did it by vertue of some precious stone in possession of the Crown of England that had such a naturall quality But had Queen Elizabeth been told that he had ascribed more vertue to her Jewels though she loved them wel then to her person she would never have made him Bishop of Chester He grew heavy and corpulent of a sudden not so much with too much ease as with too little exercise Corpus quod corrumpitur aggravat animam soon after his remove to London he fell into that drousie diseasâ— of which he afte died growing thereby unfit for the place that requires a Vigilantius and not a Dormitantius He was held a milde man and was well spoken of in the City which sometime hapneth not to them that deserve the best To conclude being taken with an Apoplexie he may be properly said to have slept with his forefathers Doctor Ravis Within a few moneths there succeeded him Doctor Ravis Bishop of Gloucester who is not formerly mentioned in this book because Mr. Goldborow his predecessor in Gloucester was then living His preferment to Gloucester makes me remember a story that some record of Scipio who being made Generall of the Roman Army was to name his Questor or Treasurer for the wars whom he thought fit being a place in those daies as is now in these of great importance one that took himselfe to have a speciall interest in Scipios favour was an earnest suitor for it but by the delay mistrusting he should have a deniall he importuned him one day for an answer Think not unkindness in me said Scipio that I delay you thus for I have been as earnest with a friend of mine to take it and yet cannot prevaile with him Noting hereby that offices of charge and conscience are fittest for such as shunne them modestly rather then such as seek them greedily And even so did my Lords of the Councell deale with Mr. Ravis who being then Dean of Christ-Church which lightly is not held but by some choise man of the University being a place of good valew and reputation was requested by them to take this Bishoprick when many that sued to have it were put by But as he was not willing to goe thither so they of Gloucester were more unwilling he should goe thence he was in a short space in so good liking of all sorts insomuch as some that can scaut well brook the name of a Bishop yet can be content to give him a good report For my part I have observed a great change in Gloucester from that it seemed nine yeers since about the Earle of Essex going into Ireland for at that time neither their Bishop seemed to care for them lying at a Prebends in Worcester which methought was very inconvenient nor they seemed much to care for themselves all their buildings both publique and private looking old and ruinous whereas of late yeeres their Bishop keeping his house neere them and being daily with them they have built them a new Market-place and are now building a faire Hall for justice which commendable and comfortable disposition of the people there and elsewhere though it be principally ascribed to the joy and comfort that all wel affected persons took of his Majesties happy entrance and peaceable government and of the succession established in his hopefull issue yet is not the leaft to be imputed to the discretion and diligence of the Pastors that waken and stirre up their charity and make them more sensible of Gods good blessings bestowed on them and the rather by this good Bishops means The Lord of Shrewsbury hath very Nobly and
verified indeed in the Kings Majesty that now is who was then unborn and hath since so happily united these Kingdoms yet least that which I would make in him a Prophecy others will take in me for flattery I will proceed to the next or rather I should say to another for of the two next I need add nothing my Authour having testified by both their Epitaphs that they lived and died well Doctor Thomas Cooper I intend therefore to speak next of Dr. Cooper because of Bishop Herne and Bishop Watson I cannot add any thing upon sure ground for of the former times I have either Books of stories or relation of my Fathers that lived in those dayes but or these that lived in the first twenty yeeres of the Queens Raign when I was at school or at the University I could hear little yet at my first coming to the Court I heard this pretty tale that a Bishop of Winchester one day in pleasant talk comparing his Revenue with the Arch-bishops of Canterbury should say your Graces will showe better in the Rack but mine will be found more in the Manger upon which a Courtier of good place said it might be so in diebus illis But saith he the Rack stands so high in sight that it is fit to keep it full but that may be since that time some have with a provideatur swept some provender out of the Manger and because this Metaphor comes from the Stable I suspect it was meant by the Mr. of the Horse To come then to Bishop Cooper of him I can say much and I should do him great wrong if I should say nothing for he was indeed a reverent man very well learned exceeding industrious and which was in those dayes counted a great praise to him and a chief cause of his preferment he wrote that great Dictionary that yet bears his name his Life in Oxford was very commendable and in some sort Saint-like for if it be Saint-like to live unreprovable to bear a cross patiently to forgive great injuries freely this mans example is sampleless in this age He maried a Wife in Oxford for that speciall just cause I had almost said onely cause why Clergymen should mary viz. for avoiding of sin Melius est enim nubere quam uri yet was that his very hard hap that she proved too light for his gravity by many grains or rather many pounds At the first he winkt at that with a Socraticall and Philosophicall patience taking or rather mistaking the equivocating counsel of Erasmus Ecchoe Quid si mihi veniat usu quod his qui incidunt in uxores parum pudicas parumque frugiferas Feras At qui cum talibus morte durior est vita vita wherein I observe in the two Ecchos how in the first Feras signifies either the verb suffer or that Nown wild beasts or shrews In the latter vita signifieth the Nown life or the verb shun or eschew so he good man construed Feras Vita suffer during life and I should take that vita Feras shun shrews But this Fera whom his Feras made Feram committed wickedness even with greediness more then was in power of flesh and blood to bear wherewith being much afflicted having warned his Brother privatly and born with him perhaps 70. times seven times In the end taking him both in a place and fashion not fit to be named that would have angred a Saint he drave him thence not much unlike as Tobias drove away the spirit Asmoâ—eus for that was done with a Roste and this with a spit It was high time now to follow the Counsel Dic Ecclesiae so as all Oxford knows her Paramor was bound from her in a bond of one hundred pound but they should rather have been bolts of an hundred pound The whole University in reverence of the man and indignity of the matter offered him to separate his wife from him by publique authority and so to set him free being the innocent party But he would by no means agree thereto alledging he knew his own infirmity that he might not live unmarried and to divorce and marry againe he would not charge his conscience with so great a scandall After he was Bishop mad Martin or Marprelate wrote his book or rather Libell which some playing with Martin at his own weapon answered pleasantly both in Ryme and Prose as perhaps your Highnesse hath seen or I wish you should see for they are short and sharp But this Bishop with authority and gravity confuted him soundly whereupon Martin Madcap for I think his cap and head had like proportion of wit replying and anabaptized his bastard book by the name of Work for the Cooper and had not the wisdome of the State prevented him I think he and his favourers would have made work for the Tinker And so much of Bishop Cooper though I could adde a report that a great Lord dying in his time bequeathed him a great Legacy but because I have not seen his last testament I cannot precisely affirm it William Wickham This Bishop my Authour professeth to reverence for his names sake and his predecessors sake and I much more for his own sake and his vertues sake About the yeere 1570. he was Vice-provost of Eaton and as the manner was in the Schoolmasters absence would teach the schoole himselfe and direct the boyes for their exercises of which my selfe was one of whom he shewed as fatherly a care as if he had been a second Tutor to me He was reputed there a very milde and good natured man and esteemed a very good Preacher and free from that which St. Paul calleth Idolatry I mean covetousnesse so that one may say probably that as the first William Wickham was one of the richest Prelates that had been in Winchester a long time and bestowed it well so this was one of the poorest and endured it well He preached before the Queen at a Parliament I think the last time that ever he preached before her and indeed it was Cygnea vox sweetest being neerest his end which if I could set down as he delivered were well worth the remembring But the effect was this that the Temporalities of Bishopricks and Lands of Colledges and such like were from the beginning for the most part the graces gifts and Almes of Princes her Majesties progenitors that for some excesses and abuses of some of them they had been and lawfully might be some quite taken away some altered some diminished and that accordingly they were now reduced to a good mediocrity for though there were some farre greater Bishopricks in France Spaine and Germanyâ— yet there were some also lesse and meaner even in Italy But yet he most humbly besought her Majesty to make stay of them at least in this mediocrity for if they should decay so fast in thirty yeeres to come as they had for thirty yeeres past there would hardly be a Cathedrall Church found in good repaire within England
peace at home give heart to the enemy abroad Among the surveyors of these first Leaders that past so many pikes the first in time and the highest in place was Doctor Matthew Parker who as by this Author is noted having lost all his Livings for his marriage now being made Archbishop of Canterbury dissembled not his marriage as Cranmer in King Henry the eighths time was found to doe which because some have taken occasion to note with too black inke to exclude him from the reputation of a rubricated Martyr and have cited the testimony of his sonnes widdow yet living that she was carried in a trunk and by misfortune almost stifled by being set by an ignorant Porter with her head downward which tale goes very current among the Papists I can truly affirme that this is a meere fiction for I have examined the Gentlewoman her selfe being of kin to my wife and a Rogers by name and she hath sworn to me she never reported nor ever her selfheard of any such misfortune But now though this Arch-Bishop Parker dissembled not his Marriage yet Queen Elizabeth would not dissemble her dislike of it For whereas it pleased her often to come to his house in respect of her favour to him that had been her Mothers Chaplain being once above the rest greatly feasted at her parting from thence the Arch-bishop and his Wife being together she gave him very speciall thanks with gratious and honourable termes and then looking on his Wife and you saith she Madam I may not call you and Mrs. I am ashamed to call you so as I know not what to call you but yet I do thank you It is true she misliked Marriage in Bishops and was not very forward to allow that in some of the Layety for I knew one of good place about her that had contracted himself to a rich Widdow and yet would not adventure to marry her till he had gotten the Queen to write for that which he had obtained before to the intent that the Queen reputing that as her benefit might not dislike with her own act But for Clergy men caeteris paribus and sometime imparibus too she prefer'd the single man before the married Of Arch-bishop Edmond Grindal Of Mr. Edmond Grindal whereas my Authour writes he was blind I have heard by some that knew somewhat in those dayes that he kept his house upon a strange occasion the secret whereof is known to few and the certainty is not easie to find out but thus I was told that There was an Italian Doctor as I take that of Physick that having a known Wife a Lyar yet bearing himself on the countenance of some great Lord did marry another Gentlewoman which to do now is by most godly Laws since made fellony This good Arch-bishop not winking at so publick a scandall convented him for that and proceeded by Ecclesiasticall censures against him Letters were presently written from this great Lord to the Arch-bishop to stop the proceeding to tolerate to dispense or to mitigate the censure but the Bishop remained still unmoved and unmoveable when no subjects intreaty could be found to prevail they intreat the Soveraign to write in the Doctors behalf but this John Baptist not only persisted in his Non licet habere eam but also in a reverent fashion required an account of her Majesties faith in that she would seem to write in a matter that if sh were truly informed was expresly against the word of God The Queen in a gracious disposition was purposed to have yielded an account in writing but the great Lord not onely disswaded her from that as too great an indignity but incensed her exceedingly against him whereupon he was privately commanded to keep his house where because he was sometime troubled with sore eyes his friends gave out he was blind But if he were blind that was like to the soothsayer Tiresias that foresaw and told Pentheus ruine as Qvid writes Et veniet nec enim dignabere numen honore Meque sub his tenebris nimium vidisse quereris For that Lord that so persecuted this Prelate about his Physitians two wives dying twenty years since left two Wives behind him that can hardly be yet agreed which was his lawfull Wife and so much for Arch-Bishop Grindall Doctor Whiteguift Upon the decease of Arch-bishop Grindall the State desirous to have a learned and discreet person in so eminent a place and the Queen resolved to admit none but a single man choyce was made of Doctor Whiteguist then Bishop of Worcester a man in many respects very happy and in the best Judgements very worthy He was noted for a man of great learning in Cambridge and he was grown to his full ripeness of reading and judgement even then when those that they called Puritans and some meerely define to be Protestants scar'd out of their wits did begin by the plot of some great ones but by the Pen of Mr. Cartwright to defend their new discipline Their indeavour as was pretended was to reduce all in show atleast to the Purity but indeed to the poverty of the primitive Churches These Books of Mr. Cartwright not unlearnedly written were more learnedly answered by Doctor Whiteguift Both had their reward For Mr. Cartwright was by private favour placed about Coventry where he grew rich and had great maintenance to live on and honoured as a Patriarck by many of that Profession Doctor Whiteguift was made Bishop of Worcester and there having a great good report of Houskeeping and governing the Marches of Walles he was as my Authour hath told called unto Canterbury While he was Bishop of Worcester though the revenew of that be not very great yet his custom was to come to the Parliament very well attended which was a fashion the Queen liked exceeding well It hapned one day Bishop Elmer of London meeting this Bishop with such an orderly Troop of Tawny Coats and demanding of him how he could keep so many men he answered it was by reason he kept so few women Being made Arch-bishop of Canterbury and of the privy Councel he carried himself in that mild and charitable course that he was not onely approved greatly by all the Clergy of England but even by some of those whom with his pen he might seem to have wounded I mean these called Puritans of whom he won divers by sweet perswasions to conformity In the Star-chamber he used to deliver his sentence in a good fashion ever leaning to the milder censure as best became his Calling He was a great stay in Court and Councel to all oppressions of the Church though that current was some time so violent as one mans force could not stop that He founded an Hospitall in or nigh Croyden and placed poor men therein in his own life time and being grown to a full age that he might say with St. Paul Bonum certamen certavi cursum confeci c. he was so happy as to give to his
speak much good of all and no ill of any and say for mine excuse I doe not know them Accordingly of the Bishoprick and Bishop of Exceter I can say but little namely that it is since Bishop Harmans time as my Author noted pag. 337. reduced to a good mediocrity from one of the best Bishopricks of England so as now it is rather worthy of pitty then envy having but two Mannors left of two and twenty and I will adde thus much to your Highnesse that as in publique respect your Highnesse should specially favour this Bishop in whose Diocesse your Dutchy of Cornwall and your Stanneries are so the Duke may uphold the Bishop and the reverend Bishop may blesse the Duke Of NORWICH Concerning Norwich whether it be the praise of the Bishops or the people or both I know not or whether I have here a partiall relation But by that I have heard I shall judge this city to be another Utopia The people live all so orderly the streets kept solemnly the Trades-men young and old so industrious the better sort so provident and withall so charitable that it is as rare to meet a begger there as it is common to see them in Westminster For the four Bishops that were in Queen Elizabeths time I know nothing in particular but that they lived as Bishops should doe Sine querela and were not warriours like Bishop Spencer their predecessor in Henry the fourths time nor had such store of Gold and Silver as he had that could leavy an Army But for the present Bishop I knew him but few yeeres since Vicechancellor of Cambridge and I am sure he had as good Latine as any of his Predecessors had and accounted there a perfect Divine in both which respects he is to be thought very fit for the place being a Maritine Town and much frequented with strangers very devoutly given in Religion and perhaps understands Latine as well as English WORCESTER Doctor Gervase Babington WOrcester hath been fortunate in this last age to many excellent Bishops of which but two in an hundred yeeres have died Bishops thereof the rest having been removed Also in lesse then fourteen yeeres that had one Bishop became Pope namely Clement the seventh another that was a Protestant as Hugh Ladymer Of the seven therefore that were in Queen Elizabeths time I shall in this place speak but of one and that is him now living who by birth is a Genman of a very good house for Learning inferiour to few of his rank Hee was sometime Chaplaine to the late Earle of Pembrooke whose Noble Countesse used this her Chaplaines advice I suppose for the translation of the Psalmes for it was more then a womans skill to expresse the sence so right as she hath done in her verse and more then the English or Latine translation could give her They first were means to place him in Landaffe neere them where he would say merrily his true Title should be Aff for all the Land was gone thence He came back over the Sea to the Sea of Exeter and thence on terra firma to Worcester a place where both the Church and Town are at this day in very flourishing estate and the Church especially in good Reparations which I take ever for one good argument of a good Bishop for where the sheep be ragged and the folds rotten there I straight suppose is no very good shepheard yet as every generall Rule hath commonly some exceptions so hath this in some places in England and many more in Wales of which I shall in their due place note somewhat in the insuing Treatise And thus much of Worcester Of HEREFORD John Scory OF this twice Bishop Scory I have heard but little yet it hath been my fortune to read something that will not be amisse to acquaint your Highnesse with that you may see how Satan doth sift the lives and doings of English Bishops with the Quills sometimes of strangers and Forraigners For whereas this our English modest writer onely reports how he was first Bishop of Chicester being but Batchelour of Divinity and deprived for no fault but that he continued not a Batchelor whereupon he fled for Religion as the phrase was till comming home in the yeare 1560 he was preferred to Hereford the French writer stayeth not there but telleth how that being setled there though he professed to be a great enemy to Idolatry yet in another sence according to St. Paul he became a worshipper of Images not Saints but Angels belike he feared some future tempest and therefore â—his hâ— to provide better for himselfe then he had at Chichester so as what with pulling downe houses and selling the Lead and such loose ends what with setting up good husbandries what with Leases to his Tenants with all manner of viis et modis he heaped together a great Masse of wealth He that hath store of mettle must have also some drosse and no marvaile if this Bishop then according to his name had much Scoria with this Treasure A Noble and Honourable councellour and thenLord President of Wales hearing so frequent complaints made of him for oppressions extortions symonies and the like caused a bil to preferred into the Star-chamber against him in which bill was contained such matter as was enough not onely to disgrace him but to degrade him if it had been accordingly followed His Sollicitour of his causes brings him a Copy of the bill and in reading it with him seemed not a little dismaid in his behalfe much like to the servant of Elisha that came trembling to his Master and told him how they were beleagred with a huge Army But this Bishop though not indewed with the spirit of a Prophet yet having a spirit that could well see into his profit bids his Sollicitour who was his kinsman perhaps his sisters brothers sonne to be of good comfort adding it may be the very words of Elisha for there are more of our side then against us But when his Gehezi for the comparison suits better to the man then to the Master could see as yet no comfortable vision The good Bishop did not open his eyes to let him see as Elisha did the Chariots of fire on the tops of the mountaines but he opened his own bags and shewed him some legions or rather chiliads of Angells who entring all at once not into a herd of Swine but into the hoard of a Lady that then was potent with him that was Dominus fac totum cast such a Cloud into the Star-chamber that the bill was never openly heard of after This or the like and much more to the like effect writes this French Author of the said Bishop of Hereford though the Treatise it selfe was not specially meant against the Bishop but against a temporall Lord of a higher ranck that was not a little netled with the same In so much as many travelling Gentlemen and among other this Bishops son was called in question for the
publishing of this booke belike because some particularities of this matter were discovered that could come from none but him But to come againe to this Bishop I hope it shall be no just scandall to other good Bishops Judas will have Successors as well as James and Simon Magus as well as Simon Peter and sometime perhaps both in one chaire This man indeed had been brought up in the age of the Fryars that made much of themselves and relinquisht their Cels that read in the old Testament laetare fac but left out bonum for so he followed the Text in the New Testament Make you friends of the wicked Mammon but left out that part that should have brought him to everlasting Tabernacles For if Gods mercy be not the greater I feare his friend and he are met in no pleasant mansion though too too durable if the vision of Henry Lord Hunsdon were true as an honest Gentleman hath often reported it But all this notwithstanding his posterity may doe well for God himselfe forbids men to say That the fathers eate soure grapes and the childrens teeth be on edge and if the worst be the English Proverb may comfort them which lest it want reason I will cite in rime It is a saying common more then civill The son is blest whose sire is with the divel After his decease a great and long suit was held against him about his dilapidasions which makes the former report to eem the moreprbable Doctor Herbert Westphaling There succeeded him a learned famous Doctor indeed Dr. Westphaling who after he had been a Bishop divers yeeres yet to showe that good Bishops do not quite discontinue their studies but rather increase their knowledge with their dignity came to Oxford at her Majesties last being there and made an eloquent and copious Oration before her for conclusion of the Divinity disputations among which one speciall question that bred much attention was this whether it be lawfull to dissemble in cause of Religion and one Argument more witty then pithy produced by an opponent was this it is lawfull to dispute of Religion therefore it is lawfull to dissemble and urging it further he said thus I my self now do that which is lawfull but I do now dissemble Ergo it is lawfull to dissemble at which her Majesty and all the Auditory were very merry I could make a rehearsall of some of the Bishops oration concerning this question how he allowed a secrecy but without dissimulation a policy but not without piety least men taking too much of theSerpent have too little of the Dove but I am sure in all his speech he allowed no equivocation Howbeit if I should-insist long hereon I might commit the same fault to your Highness that the Queen at that time found in him which was that she thought him too tedious For she had sent twice to him to cut short his Oration because her self went to make a publique speech that evening but he would not or as some told her could not put himself out of a set methodicall speech for fear he should have marr'd it all and perhaps confounded his memory Wherefore she forbare her speech that day and more privately the next morning sending for the heads of Houses and a few others she spake to them in Latin and among othere she school'd Doctor Reynolds for his preciseness willing him to follow her Laws and not to run before them But it seemed he had forgotten it when he came last to Hampton Court so as there he received a better schooling I may not forget how the Queen in the midst of her oration casting her eye aside and seeing the old Lord Treasur er Burleigh standing on his lame feet for want of a stool she call'd in all hast for a stool for him nor would she proceed in her speech till she saw him provided of one then fell she to it again as if there had been no interruption upon which one that might be so bold with her told her after that she did it of purpose to showe that she could interrupt her speech and not be put out although the Bishop durst not adventure to do a less matter the day before But this Bishop was every way a very sufficient man and for such esteemed while he was of Christ-Church Trifling accidents showe as good proof of times as the waightiest occasions Such a one hapned this Doctor while he was of the University as a Scholar of that time hath told me and it was this There had been a very sharp frost such as have been many this year and a sudden rain or sleet falling with it from the South-East had as it were candied all that side of the Steeple at Christ-church with an ice mixed with snow which with the warmth of the Sun soon after 10. of the clock began to resolve and Doctor Westphaling being in the middle of his Sermon it fell down altogether upon the Leads of the Church with such a noyse as if indeed it would have thrown down the whole Church The people as in sudden terrors is usuall fill'd all with tumult and each man hasted to be gonē so fast that they hindered one another He first kneeling down and recommending himself to God as in the apprehension of a sodain danger straight rose again and with so chearfull both voice and countenance encouraged them as they all returned and he quietly finished his Sermon But his chief praise I reserve for the last which was this for all such benefices as either were in his own guift or fell into his hand by Lapse which were not few and some of great value he neither respected Letters nor commendations of Lords nor Knights nor Wife nor friends in preferment of any man but onely their sufficiency and their good conversation so as to sue for a benefice unto him was rather a means to miss then to attain it Doctor Robert Bennet This Bishop was preferr'd to this place since my Authour wrote his Catalogue so as he is not therein specified yet must I not do him that wrong to omit in this relation This is he if your Highness do remember it of whom his Majesty said if he were to chuse a Bishop by the aspect he would chuse him of all the men he had seen for a grave reverent and pleasing countenance Concurring herein in a sort though by contraries with the judgement of Henry the foūrth Emperour who comming from hunting one day as Malmesbury writeth went for devotion sake into a Church where a very ill-favoured faced Priest was at service The Emperour thinking his virtues suted his visage said to himself how can God like of so ugly a fellows service But it fortuned at that instant the Priests boy mumbling of that versicle in the hundred Psalm Ipso nos fecit non ipsi nos and because he pronounced it not plainly the Priest reproved him and repeated it again aloud Ipse nos fecit non ipsi
intended to name Stapletons stay and for that cause invited the Arch-bishop in good kindness to see it and requested him for the more credit and as it were blessing to the house that his grace would give it the foresaid name But when the Arch-bishop had fully beheld it and in his Judgement found it fitter for a Lord Treasurer of England then for a Knight of York-shire He said to him would you have me call this intended House Stapletons Stay Nay rather let me say to you stay Stapleton for if you go forward to set up this House it will pull you down How often a man loses a friend with a jest and how grievous it is for a mans vanity to be crost in the humour This speech of my Lords that I should think intended friendly uttered faithfully and applyed even fatherly unto him he took in so deep disdain and despite that howsoever he smothered it for the present from that time forward he sought a mean to revenge it And wanting neither wit to devise nor courage to execute his design he found out or at least he supposed he had found a stratagem not onely to wreak this scorn on the good Bishop that mistrusted nothing but also to make the old mans purse pay for the finishing of the new house He acquaints him with an Officer in my Lords house some malecontent that had been denyed a Lease These two devise that when my Lord should lie next at Doncaster where the Hostess of the house having been formerly I suppose Mistriss Sands Maid was bold sometimes to bring his Lordship a Cawdle to his Beds side for in charity I may surmise no worse Sir Robert should also by chance come and host at the same house This bad Wife and her good man are made partakers and parties of this stratagem her part was but a naked part viz. to slip into my Lords Bed in her smock mine Hoast must sodainly be jealous and swear that he holds his reputation though he be but a poor man more dear then that he can indure such an indignity and thereupon calls Sir Robert Stapleton brings him to the Bishops Chamber in his Night-gown takes them in bed together with no small exclamation The Knight that acted his part with most art and leaft suspition takes great pains to pacifie the Hoast conjures all that were admitted to secresie and silence and sending all to their Lodgings without tumult asketh of my Lord how this came to passe The Bishop tells him with a great Protestation that he was betrayd by his man and his Hoast little suspecting the Knight to be of the Quorum The Knight sooths him in all he said condoles the great mischance is sorrowfull for the danger and carefull for the honour of the Bishop and specially the Church Proh superi quantum mortalia pecior a caecae Noctis habent ipso sceleris molimine Miles Creditur esse pius The distressed Archbishop distrusting no fraud in him asketh his advise in this disaster and following his counsel from time to time gives the Hoast a peece of money the false Officer a Farm and the Knight for his travail in this matter many friendly recompences But when he found after all this smoothing and soothing that he grew so bold at last to presse him beyond all good manner for the good Mannour of Soothwell then he found that in sooth all was not well and was even compell'd too late to that he might much better have done much sooner viz. To complain to the Lords of the Councel and to his ancient and dear friend the Earl of Leicester for whose Father he had almost lost his life by whose help he got them call'd to the Star-chamber Ore tenus where they were for this conspiracy convicted fined and imprisoned The fame or rather the infamy of this matter specially before their conviction was far and diversly spread according as the Reporters favoured or disfavoured either and the friends of each side had learned their tale so perfect that many long time after held the first impression they had received notwithstanding the censure and sentence in the Starr-chamber Part whereof being that the Knight should publickly acknowledge how he had slandered the Arch-bishop which he did in words conceived to that purpose accordingly yet his friends gave out that all the while he carried a long Whetstone hanging out at the Pocket of his sleeve so conspicuous as men understood his meaning was to give himself the lie which he would not in another matter have taken of any man But thus the Bishop had a Conquest which he had no great comfort of and lived but few years after it and the Knight had a foile that he would not seem much daunted with and lived to have part of his fine releast by his Majesties clemency but yet he tost up and down all his life without any great contentment from Wiltshire into Wales and thence to the Isle of Man a while to Chelsey but little to York-shire where his stay should have been so that of this story I could collect many documents both for Bishops and Knights but that I shun prolixity in a matter no way pleasing Howbeit because one P. R. or R. P. for he can turn his name as Mountebank turns his Capp in his Epistle before the Resolution a Book much praised by Sir Edwin Sand hath a scoffe after his manner at this Hostess of Doncaster I would pray him but to peruse the Life of St. Bernard not that of their lying Legend but that which unworthily perhaps goeth among his most worthy works written by William Abbot in five Books There he shall find in the third Chapter of his first Book how that same maidenly Saint was subject to the like manner of scandall first of a young woman lying by him in naked bed half a night when himself was not 30 year old and yet we must believe he toucht her not and next of his Hostess also offering three timesin one night to come to his Bed and he crying out each time Latrones Latrones Theeves Theeves which our Bishop had much more cause to have cryed and had he but remembred it as I doubt not but he had read it he might peradventure have dissolved the pack with it To utter mine own conceit franckly if Parsons conjecture were true that by humane frailty this Prelate had in his younger dayes been too familiar with this woman which is said to passe but as a veniall sin among those of his Profession yet was the Knights practise very foul and the Lords censure very just that condemned him for I heard Judge Anderson a learned and stout Judge condemn one for a Rape upon the Oath of a Woman notwithstanding the man affirmed and the Woman denyed not but she had often in former times yielded her self to his lust because it seemed she had repented that course of life in betaking her to a Husband So my Lord if he had once
Pen would never have given it what may we think of him now that for preaching may say with St. Paul I have laboured more then ye all for reading lets no Book passe which for Authour matter or wit hath any fame who hath so happy a memory that no occasion slips him whether premeditate or sudden either in publick or private to make use of that he hath read But it is worth the hearing which he answers to this calumniation as well as commendation which answer being in a long and learned latine Sermon Ad Clerum I will not wrong so much to abbreviate in this place but only for that same point Qui in concionibus domininatur his sharp and modest return I could not let passe being but a line Neque enim nostrū ministeriū est dominatio neque dominatio vest ministeriū For neither is our Ministery any Lordly Authority nor your Lordly command a true Ministery But his Reading Learning preaching is so well known to his Highness as I do but lose labour in recounting either generall or particular prayses thereof I will descend now to some personall matters which though commonly they are more captious for the writer yet are they withall more pleasing and acceptable to the Reader He was born of honest rather then honourable parents in the City of Bristol which City standing in two Counties Somerset and Gloucester might move both Counties hereafter to challenge him for their Countreyman as divers Cities of Greece did Homer if himself would not somtime clear it by saying that he is a Somersetshire man or to write it as he spake sportingly a Zomersetshire man showing a towardliness in his very infancy to learning he was set very young to school at Wells but over-running his School-masters Doctrine with his docility he went quickly to Oxford yet ere he went he had a marvellous misfortune for even as if Sathan had foreseen that he should one day prove some excellent instrument of his service that must bruise the Serpents head he forgot not to attempt his part Insidiari calcaneo procuring him in a plain easie way so terrible a fall as brake his foot and small of his legg and ankle almost to pieces But if the strong man procured this harm a stronger granted the remedy for he was soon after so soundly cured as there remained after no sign or scar no effect or defect either for fight or use of this rupture After his coming to Oxford he took all his degrees so ripe in learning and so young in age as was half a miracle There it seems also the Colledges strove for him he removed so oft till he rested in that for which he was ordained a principall Vessel Christs Church during his abode there being Dean of ChristsChurch it was hard to say whether he was more respected for his great Learning Eloquence Authority countenance given by the Queen and the great Ones or beloved for his sweet conversation friendly disposition bounty that even then showd it self and above all a chearfull sharpness of wit that so sawced all his words and behaviour that well was he in the University that could be in the Company of Thoby Matthew and this name grew so popular and plausible that they thought it a derogation to their love to add any title of Doctor or Deane to it but if they spake of one of his men as he was ever very well attended they would say Mr. Matthew or Mr. Thoby Matthews man yea even since he was Bishop and Archbishop some cannot leave that custom yet Among some speciall men that enjoyed and joyed most in his friendship and company in Oxford and in remembrance of it since they were sundred was Doctor Eedes late Dean of Worcester one whose company I loved as well as he loved his Thoby Matthew He for their farewell upon his remove to Durham intending first to go with him from Oxford but one dayes Journey was so betrayed by the sweetness of his Company and their old friendship that he not onely brought him to Durham but for a pleasant penance wrote their whole Journey in Latine verse which Poem himself gave to me and told me so many pretty Apophthegmes of theirs in their younger years as might make a Book almost by it self And because I wrote onely for your Highness pleasure I will hazard my Lords displeasure to repeat one or two of his of one two hundred that Doctor Eedes when he lived could remember being Vice-chancellor in Oxford some slight matters men coming before him one was very importunate to have them stay for his Councel who is of your Councel saith the Vice-Chancellor saith he Mr. Leasteed alas said the Vice-Chancellor no man can stand you in less stead no remedy saith the other necessity hath no Law Indeed quoth he no more I think hath your Councellor In a like matter another was to be bound in a bond very like to be forfeited and came in hast to offer it saying he would be bound if he might be taken yes saith he I think you will be taken what 's your name Cox saith the party and so prest as the manner is to come into the Court make him more room there said he let Coxcome in Such facetious passages as these that are as delightfull to the hearer as a fair course at tilt is to the beholders where the staffe breaks both at the point and counterbuffe even to the hand such I say a man might collect a volum of not at the second hand but at the first that had been so much in his company and so oft at his board as I have been but that I must keep good manners remembring the Greek Proverb {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Odi memorem compotorem And if your Highness had a fancy to hear more of them Mr. Doctor Dromond can as well relate them as my self both of us having met in his graces dish sometimes and tasted of this sawce Yet this kind of pleasantness that I repeat as one of his prayses himself will most seriously check in himself sometime as his fault and infirmity which he confesses he is inforced to use sometime as a recreation of his wearied spirits after more painfull and serious studies and though in these conceits the wit might seem to labour as much as in these gravest and had need to carry as it were a good bent to send them so smartly as they come from him ordinarily yet methinks it may be fitly compared to a bow that will endure bending the contrary way and thereby come to cast the better in his right bent or by a more homly comparison to a true and tough Laborer in our Countrey that having sweat at hard labour all the week asketh no better refreshing then to sweat as fast with dancing about the May-pole or running at Base or wrestling upon the Holiday Wherefore let himself call it his fault as I have heard him oft and say he knows