two Years since from the Lord Herbert's House in Lambeth upon some Discourse of St. Paul's Church then in their Eye upon the Water said to some young Lords that were with him that he hoped to live to see that one Stone of that Building should not be left upon another But that Church stands yet and that Eye is put out that hoped to see the Ruins of it Many heavy Accidents have already fallen out in these unnatural Wars and God alone knows how many more shall before they end But I intend no History but of my own sad Misfortunes nor would I have mentioned this but that it relates to the Church which for my Calling sake I take as a part and a near one of my self On Friday March 24. one Mr. Ford came to me to the Tower and told me there was a Plot to send me and my Lord of Ely Bishop Wren as Delinquents to New England within fourteen days And that Mr. Wells a Minister that came thence offer'd Wagers of it The Meeting where he heard this was he said at Mr. Barnes a Mercers House in Friday-Street a Son in Law of Mr. Fords This Gentleman told me he was a Suffolk man but I never saw him before and was doubtful of the Truth of his Relation Partly because I knew no motive he had to take such care of me being a Stranger to him And partly because it could not sink into me that the Honourable Houses after so long Imprisonment would send me into such a Banishment without hearing me or my Cause Yet he protested the truth of it very deeply and wished me to endeavour to prevent it That I knew not how to do For to Petition against it upon such a private Information might rather call it on than keep it off seeing what an edge there was against me Therefore I referred my self to God my constant Anchor and so rested my Thoughts as well as I could It was now known in the House to the Lord General 's Friends that I had a resolution not to give Chartham to Mr. Corbet And it may be it was thought also that I did but pretend the Kings Letters about it and that if some other Man were named against whom I had no Exception it might be that I would give it And if I did give it then they should discover that either I had no Letters from the King Or that I could make bold to dispence with them so Mr. Corbet were not the Man And if they could have gained this upon me that notwithstanding his Majesties Letters I would have given that Benefice to another man they would then have recalled their Order from him and commanded me for Mr. Corbet That this my Conjecture hath Truth in it seems evident to me by all the future carriage of this Business For one Mr. Hudson came and Preached at the Tower and gave all men very good content And on Tuesday March 28. he brought me an Order from the Lords requiring me to give Chartham to him And this Order was known in the Tower For some Prisoners of Note said I might do well to give it him being so good a Preacher My answer to him was fair yet I told him truly that the King had written to me for another That I had promised to give it or lapse it as his Majesty required me That the King never asked any of me till now That I hoped the Parliament would not take it ill that I gave this one at the Kings requisition since I had already given as many Benefices upon their Orders as came to above Eight hundred Pounds a year passing by my own Friends and Chaplains honest and able men And for his particular I might live to pleasure him with another so I were not over-pressed concerning this Hudson either mistook my Answer or wilfully misreported it and me to the House and thereupon came another Order to me of April 11. to give him Chartham I was not willing to be mistaken again and therefore desired Mr. Lieutenant to deliver me a Petition to the House on Thursday Apr. 13. in which I set forth my true Answer as is above expressed and in all Humility desired their Favour That very day another quick Order was made for Hudson and brought to me the next day April 14. I Petitioned the House again the same day with all submission yet professed that I could not disobey the King in so fair a Command When all this would not serve the Mask was pulled off and a peremptory Order bearing date April 21. was brought to me on Saturday April 22. to Collate Chartham upon Mr. Edw. Corbet And upon Monday April 24. I humbly gave my Answer as before but in the softest Terms I could express it and in a Petition Monday May 1. the Windows of my Chappel at Lambeth were defaced and the Steps to the Communion-Table torn up And on Tuesday May 2. the Cross in Cheapside was taken down to cleanse that great Street of Superstition The same day in prosecution of the former Plot March 24. it was moved in the House of Commons to send me to New England but it was rejected The Plot was laid by Peters Wells and others of that Crew that so they might insult over me Then followed an Exemplary piece of Justice and another of Mercy Of Justice For my Goods in Lambeth-House and my Books were seized upon and my Goods set to Sale by Captain Guest Dickins and Layton And my Goods were sold and scarce at a third part of their worth all save what Layton took to himself who usually said all was his House Land Goods and all This was on Tuesday May 9. And all this before any Proceedings had against me And of Mercy For the same day there came out an Order for my farther Restraint that I might not go out of my Lodging without my Keeper so much as to take Air. Much about this time I received another Letter from his Majesty in which he requires me as he had formerly done for Chartham in particular that as oft as any Benefice or other Spiritual Promotion whatsoever should fall void in my Gift I should dispose it only to such as his Majesty should name unto me Or if any Command lay otherwise upon me from either or both Houses of Parliament I should then let them fall into Lapse that he might dispose of them to Men of worth Upon Tuesday May 16. there came out an Ordinance of both Houses for now the Order was grown up into an Ordinance requiring me to give no Benefice or Spiritual Promotion now void or to be void at any time before my Trial but with leave and Order of both Houses of Parliament This Ordinance was delivered unto me the next day And upon the reading of it I foresaw a Cloud rising over me about this Business of Chartham for which I did assure my self the Ordinance was made And soon
promised to take all into Consideration And so I was dismissed Sine Die But here I may not go off from this Dream so since Mr. Pryn hath Printed it at the end of my Diary Where he shamelesly says This Dream was Attested from my own Mouth at my Tryal in the Lords House For I have set down all that pass'd exactly Nor did I then give any Attestation to it only before I could gather up my self to Answer the Earl of Pembroke in a fitting manner and not to hurt my self Mr. Nicolas fell upon me with that Unchristian bitterness as diverted me from the Earl to Answer him But once for all and to satisfie any Man that desires it That is all true which I have here set down concerning this Dream and upon my Christianity and hope of future Salvation I never had this Dream nor any like it nor did I ever tell it this Lord or any other any other way than in Relation to Badger and Pryn as is before related And surely if I had had such a Dream I should not have had so little Discretion as to tell it any Man least of all to pour it into that Sieve the Earl of Pembroke For that which follows and wherein his Charity and Words are almost the same with those of Mr. Nicolas I give him the same Answer and forgiving him all his most Unchristian and Insatiable Malice against me leave my self in the Hands of God not in his I Received an Order from the Lords that if I had a mind to make a Recapitulation as I had formerly desired of my long and various Charge I should provide my self for it against Munday next this Order came upon Friday and that I should give in my Answer the next Morning what I meant to do The next day in Obedience to this Order I gave in my Answer which was Humble Thanks that I might have liberty to make it referring the day to their Honourable Consideration with this that Munday next was a very short time for such a Collection Upon this Answer an Order was presently made that I should provide to make my Recapitulation upon Munday September the Second And about this time the certain day I know not it was Resolved in the House of Commons that according to my Plea I should enjoy the benefit of the Act of Oblivion and not be put to Answer the Thirteenth Original Article concerning the Scottish Business And truly I bless God for it I did not desire the benefit of that Act for any Sense of Guiltiness which I had in my self but in Consideration of the Times and the Malice of the now Potent Faction which being implacable towards me I could not think it Wisdom to lay by any such Power as might help to secure me Yet in the former part of this History when I had good Reason to think I should not be called to Answer such General Articles I have set down my Answer to each of them as much as Generals can be Answer'd And thereby I hope my Innocency will appear to this Thirteenth Article also Then came Munday Sept. 2. and according to the Order of the Lords I made the Recapitulation of my whole Cause in matters of greatest Moment in this form following But so soon as I came to the Bar I saw every Lord present with a New Thin Book in Folio in a blue Coat I heard that Morning that Mr. Pryn had Printed my Diary and Published it to the World to disgrace me Some Notes of his own are made upon it The first and the last are two desperate Untruths beside some others This was the Book then in the Lords Hands and I assure my self that time picked for it that the sight of it might damp me and disinable me to speak I confess I was a little troubled at it But after I had gathered up my self and looked up to God I went on to the Business of the Day and thus I spake CAP. XLIII My Recapitulation Mr. Lords my Hearing began March 12. 1643 4. and continued to the end of July In this time I was heard before your Lordships with much Honour and Patience Twenty Days and sent back without Hearing by reason of your Lordships greater Employments Twelve Days The rest were taken up with providing the Charge against me And now my Lords being come near an end I am by your Grace and Favour and the leave of these Gentlemen of the Honourable House of Commons to represent to your Lordships and your Memories a brief Summ of my Answers to this long and various Charge In which I shall not only endeavour but perform also all possible Brevity And as with much Thankfulness I acknowledge my self bound to your Lordships for your Patience So I cannot doubt but that I shall be as much obliged for your Justice in what I am innocent from Crime and for your Clemency in what the common Frailty of Mankind hath made me Err. And I Humbly desire your Lordships to look upon the whole Business with Honourable Care of my Calling of my Age of my long Imprisonment of my Sufferings in my Estate and of my Patience in and through this whole Affliction The Sequestration having been upon my Estate above Two Years In which notwithstanding I may not omit to give Thanks for the Relief which my Petitions found for my present necessities in this time of my Hearing at your Honourable Hands 1. First then I humbly desire your Lordships to remember the generality and by occasion of that the incertainty of almost every Article charged upon me which hath cast me into great streights all along in making my Defence 2. Next That your Lordships will be pleased to consider what a short space upon each Days Hearing hath been allowed me to make my Answer to the many Charges in each several Day laid against me Indeed some Days scarce time enough to peruse the Evidence much less to make and then to review and weigh my Answers Especially considering to my greatest Grief that such a Charge should be brought up against me from so Great and Honourable a Body as the Commons of England In regard of which and all other sad Occasions I at first did and do still in all Humility desire that in all Particulars concerning Law my Councel may be heard before your Lordships proceed to Sentence and that a Day may be assigned for my Councel accordingly 3. Thirdly I heartily pray also that it may be taken into your Honourable Consideration how I have all manner of ways been sifted to the very Bran for that what e're it amounts to which stands in Charge against me 1 The Key and use of my Study at Lambeth Books and Papers taken from me 2 A Search upon me at the Tower made by Mr. Pryn and One and Twenty Bundles of Papers prepared for my Defence taken from me and not Three Bundles restored to me again This Search made before any Particular Articles
Year 1634. 529 His Account for the Year 1635. 535 His Account for the Year 1636. 538 His Account for the Year 1637. 546 His Account for the Year 1638. 553 His Account for the Year 1639. 558 A Pamphlet published against the Arch-Bishop by Will. Pryn entituled Rome's Master-piece with the Arch-Bishop's Notes upon it 〈◊〉 Two Letters of the Arch-Bishop's then Chancellor of the Vniversity of Oxford to the Vice-Chancellor there charging him to enquire after prevent and punish the Practices of some Romish Emissaries in that Place 609 The Arch-Bishop's Letter to Sir Kenelm Digby upon the News of his Reconciliation to the Church of Rome 610 The Testimony of Mr Jonathan Whiston concerning the Joy expressed at Rome upon the News of the Arch-Bishop's Death 616 The Testimony of Mr John Evelyn concerning the same 616 AN INTRODUCTION To the Following HISTORY Containing the DIARY OF THE Most Reverend Father in God WILLIAM LAUD LORD Arch-Bishop of Canterbury EXTENDING From His Birth to the middle of the Year MDCXLIII Being the Seventieth Year of His Age. Faithfully and Entirely Published from the Original Copy Wrote with His own Hand The Latine part rendered into English and adjoined LONDON Printed for Ri Chiswell at the Rose and Crown in St Paul's Church-Yard 1694. AN INTRODUCTION To the following History CONTAINING THE DIARY OF THE Most Reverend Father in God WILLIAM LAUD Arch-Bishop of Canterbury Anno 1573. NATUS fui Octob 7 1573. Redingi In infantiâ penè perii morbo c. I WAS born Octob 7 1573. at Reading In my Infancy I was in danger of Death by Sickness c. Anno 1589. I came to Oxford July 1589. Anno 1590. I was chosen Scholar of St John's June 1590. Anno 1593. I was admitted Fellow of St John's June anno 1593. Anno 1594. My Father died April 11 1594. die Mercurii I proceeded Batchelour of Arts June 1594. Anno 1596. I had a great Sickness 1596. Anno 1597. And another anno 1597. Anno 1598. I proceeded Master of Arts July 1598. I was Grammar Reader that Year and fell into a great Sickness at the end of it Anno 1600. My Mother died November 24. 1600. I was made Deacon 4. Januar. 1600. comput Angl. Anno 1601. I was made Priest April 5. 1601. being Palm-Sunday both by Dr. Young Bishop of Rochester Viz. Both Orders were conferred by him Anno 1602. I read a Divinity Lecture in St. John's College anno 1602. It was then maintained by Mrs. Maye I was the last that read it Queen Elizabeth died at Richmond March 24. 1602. comput Angl. Anno 1603. I was Proctor of the University chosen May 4. 1603. I was made Chaplain to the Earl of Devonshire Septemb. 3. 1603. Adjecta est spes mea de A. H. Jan. 1. 1603. Which after proved my great happiness Incaepi sperare Januar. 21. 1600. comp Angl. Hope was given to me of A. H. Jan. 1. c. I first began to hope it Jan. 21. c. Anno 1604. I was Batchelour in Divinity July 6. being Friday 1604. Anno 1605. My cross about the Earl of Devon's Marriage Decemb 26 1605. die Jovis Anno 1606. The Quarrel Dr Ayry picked with me about my Sermon at St. Mary's Octob. 21. 1606. Anno 1607. I was inducted into the Vicaridge of Stanford in Northamptonshire November 13. 1607. Anno 1608. The Advowson of North-Kilworth in Leicestershire given to me April 1608. My acquaintance with C. W. began I proceeded Doctor in Divinity in the Act anno 1608. I was made Chaplain to Dr. Neile then Ld. Bishop of Rochester August 5. 1608. After my unfortunateness with T. whose death was in July 1604. the first offer in this kind that I had after was by M. Short June 1606. then by P. B. not accepted Anno 1609. My first Sermon to King James at Theobalds Septemb. 17. 1609. I changed my Advowson of North-Kilworth for West-Tilbery in Essex to which I was inducted Octob. 28. 1609. to be near my Ld. of Rochester Dr. Neile My next unfortunateness was with E. M. Decemb. 30. being Saturday 1609. A stay in this Anno 1610. My Ld. of Rochester gave me Cuckstone in 〈◊〉 Maii 25. 1610. I resigned my Fellowship in St John's Colledge in Oxford Octob 2 1610. and left Oxford the 8th of the same Month. I fell Sick of a Kenish Ague caught at my Benefice Novemb 5 1610. which held me two Months In the midst of this Sickness the Suit about the Presidentship of St John's began I left Kuckstone and was inducted in Norton Novemb 1610. by Proxy The Lord Chancellor Elsmere's Complaint against me to the King at Christmas 1610. He was incited against me by Doctor Abbot Lord Arch-Bishop of Canterbury Elect. Anno 1611. My next unfortunateness was by S. B. Feb 11 1611. It continued long I was chosen President of St John's May 10 1611. The King sat in Person three hours to hear my Cause about the Presidentship of St John's at Tichburne Aug 29 1611. It was Dies Decollat S Johannis-Bapt The Arch-Bishop of Canterbury was the Original Cause of all my Troubles I was Sworn the King's Chaplain Novemb 3. 1611. Anno 1612. My next unfortunateness was by S. S. June 13 1612. It ended quickly My next with A D which effected nothing and ended presently Septemb 1612. My great Business with E. B. began Januar 22 1612. It setled as it could March 5 1612. comp Angl It hath had many changes and what will become of it God knoweth Anno 1614. My great misfortune by M. S. began April 9 1614. A most fierce salt Rheume in my left Eye like to have indangered it Dr Neile then Bishop of Lincoln gave me the Prebend of Bugden April 18 1614. Anno 1615. Dr Neile the Bishop of Lincoln gave me the Archdeaconry of Huntingdon Decemb 1 1615. Anno 1616. The King gave me the Deanry of Gloucester Novemb 1616. I resigned my Parsonage of West-Tilbery I set forward with the King toward Scotland March 14 1616. Stilo nostro and returned a little before him 1617. My acquaintance began with W Sta. March 5 1616. comp Angl Anno 1617. .... Cum E. B. July 28 1617. Die Lunae primè St John's Colledge on fire under the stair-case in the Chaplain's Chamber by the Library Septemb 26 1617. die Veneris Both these days of Observation to me I was inducted to Ibstock in Leicestershire Aug 2 1617. in my return out of Scotland and left Norton Anno 1618. Lu. Bos. B. to E. B. May 2 1618. Et quid ad me My ill hap with E. Beg. June 1618. The great Organ in St. John's Chappel set up It was begun Febr. 5. 1618. comp Angl. Anno 1619. I fell suddenly dead for a time at Wickham in my return from London April 2. 1619. Anno 1620. I was Installed Prebendary of Westminster Januar. 22. 1620. comp Angl. having had the Advowson of it Ten Years the November before Anno 1621. The King 's Gracious Speech unto me June 3. 1621. concerning my
wished it had fallen upon that same day when I Consecrated the Chappel However I was pleased that I should perform that solemn Consecration at least on the Eve of that Festival For upon that day his Majesty King James heard my Cause about the Election to the Presidentship of St. John's Colledge in Oxford for three hours together at least and with great Justice delivered me out of the hands of my powerful Enemies Septemb. 4. Sunday The Night following I was very much troubled in my Dreams My Imagination ran altogether upon the Duke of Buckingham his Servants and Family All seemed to be out of order that the Dutchess was ill called for her Maids and took her Bed God grant better things Septemb. 11. Sunday I Preached at Carmarthen the Judges being then present The same Night I Dreamed that Dr Theodore Price admonished me concerning Ma 3. and that he was unfaithful to me and discovered all he knew and that I should therefore take heed of him and trust him no more c. Afterwards I dreamed of Sackville Crow that he was dead of the Plague having not long before been with the King Septemb. 24. One only Person desired to Receive Holy Orders from me and he found to be unfit upon Examination Septemb. 25. I sent him away with an Exhortation not Ordained It was then Saturday Septemb. 26. Sunday That Night I dreamed of the Marriage of I know not whom at Oxford All that were present were cloathed with flourishing green Garments I knew none of them but Thomas Flaxnye Immediately after without any intermission of Sleep that I know of I thought I saw the Bishop of Worcester his Head and Shoulders covered with Linnen He advised and invited me kindly to dwell with them marking out a place where the Court of the Marches of Wales was then held But not staying for my Answer he subjoyned that he knew I could not live so meanly c. Octob. 8. Saturday the Earl of Northampton President of Wales returned out of Wales taking his Journey by Sea Octob. 9. Sunday I Preached at Carmarthen Octob. 10. Munday I went on Horseback up to the Mountains It was a very bright day for the time of Year and so warm that in our return I and my Company dined in the open Air in a place called Pente-Cragg where my Registrary had his Country-House Octob. 30. Sunday Sir Thomas Coventry made Lord Keeper Novemb. 11. Friday I began my Journey to return into England Novemb. 17. Thursday Charles the Duke of Buckingham's Son was born Novemb. 20. Sunday I Preached at Honye-Lacye in Herefordshire Novemb 24. Thursday I came to the House of my great Friend Fr. Windebank There the Wife of my Freind for himself was then at Court immediately as soon as I came told me that the Duke of Buckingham then negotiating for the Publick in the Low-Countries had a Son born whom God bless with all the good things of Heaven and Earth Decemb. 4. Sunday I Preached at Hurst I stayed there in the Country until Christmas Decemb. 14. Wednesday I went to Windsor but returned the same day Decemb. 25. Sunday I Preached at Hurst upon Christmas day Decemb. 31. Saturday I went to the Court which was then at Hampton-Court There Januar. 1. Sunday I understood that I was Named among other Bishops who were to consult together on Wednesday following at White-Hall concerning the Ceremonies of the Coronation I was also at the same time informed that the bigger part of the Bishop of Durham's House was appointed for the Residence of the Ambassadour Extraordinary of the King of France Januar. 2. Munday I returned to Hains-Hill For there not then knowing any thing of these Matters I had left my necessary Papers with my Trunk When I had put these in order I went to Sir Richard Harrison's House to take leave of my Friends There if I mistake not I first knew what F. H. thought of me I told my mind plainly c. I returned Januar. 3. Tuesday I came to London and fixed my self at my own House at Westminster For the week before Christmas I had sent my Servant who had brought all my things out of the House of my good Friend the Bishop of Durham with whom I had abode as a Guest for Four Years compleat to my own House save only my Books the removal of which I unadvisedly put off till my own coming For the coming of the French Ambassadour forced me to make over-much haste and the multitude of business then laying upon me made it requisite that I should have my Books at hand In the Evening I visited the Duke of Buckingham Januar. 4. Wednesday We met at White-Hall to consult of the Ceremonies of the Coronation I sent my Servant to bring my Books who brought them That Night I placed them in order in my Study And it was high time For while we were in consultation about the Ceremonies the Right Honourable the Earl of Pembroke Lord Chamberlain of the Houshold to his Majesty came from the King to us and delivered to me the King's Order to be ready against the sixth day of February to Preach that day at the opening of the Parliament Januar. 6. Friday Epiphany day We met again to consult concerning the Ceremonies and gave up our Answer to the King Januar. 16. The Arch-Bishop of Canterbury made known to me the King's Pleasure that at the Coronation I should supply the place of the Dean of Westminster For that his Majesty would not have the Bishop of Lincoln then Dean to be present at the Ceremony It was then Munday The same day by the King's Command a Consultation was held what was to be done in the Cause of Richard Montague There were present the Bishops of London Durham Winchester Rochester and St. Davids Januar. 17. Tuesday We gave in our Answer in Writing Subscribed this day This day also the Bishop of Lincoln deputed me under his Hand and Seal to supply the place for him which he as Dean of Westminster was to Execute in the Coronation of King Charles Januar. 18. Wednesday The Duke of Buckingham brought me to the King to whom I shewed my Notes that if he disliked any thing therein c. The same day by the King's Command the Arch-Bishop of Cant. and the Bishops of London Durham Winchester Rochester and St. Davids consulted together concerning a Form of Prayer to give Thanks for the decrease of the Plague Januar. 23. I had a perfect Book of the Ceremonies of the Coronation made ready agreeing in all things with the Kings Book It was Munday Januar. 29. Sunday I understood what D. B. had collected concerning the Cause Book and Opinions of Richard Montague and what R. C. had determined with himself therein Methinks I see a Cloud arising and threatning the Church of England God of his Mercy dissipate it Januar. 31. Tuesday The Bishops and other Peers before nominated by the King to consult of the Ceremonies of the Coronation that
published it to the Colledge about the end of March This day discovered unto me that which I was sorry to find in L. T. and F. C. sed transeat July 26. The first Stone was laid of my building at St. John's Aug. 23. In this June and July were the great disorders in Oxford by appealing from Doctor Smith then Vice-Chancellor The chief Ring-leaders were Mr. Foord of Magdalen-Hall and Mr. Thorne of Baliol Colledge The Proctors Mr. Atherton Bruch and Mr. John Doughty received their Appeals as if it had not been perturbatio pacis c. The Vice-Chancellor was forced in a Statutable way to Appeal to the King The King with all the Lords of his Council then present heard the Cause at Woodstock Aug. 23. 1631. being Tuesday in the After-noon The Sentence upon the Hearing was That Foord Thorne and Hodges of 〈◊〉 Colledge should be banished the University 〈◊〉 both the Proctors were commanded to come into the Convocation House and there resign their Office that two others might be Named out of the same Colledges Doctor Prideaux Rector of Exeter Colledge and Dr. Wilkinson Principal of Magdalen Hall received a sharp admonition for their mis-behaviour in this business Aug. 29. Munday I went to Brent-wood and the next day began my Visitation there and so went on and finished it Novemb. 4. Friday The Lady Mary Princess born at St. James's inter horas quintam sextam matutinas It was thought she was born three weeks before her time Decemb. 25. I Preached at Court Januar. 1. The extreamest wet and warm January that ever was known in memory February 15. I Preached at Court Ashwednesday February 19. D. S. came to my Chamber troubled about going quite from Court at Spring First Sunday in Lent after Sermon Anno 1632. April 1. I Preached at Court Easter-day Maij 26. Saturday Trinity-Sunday Eve I Consecrated the Lord Treasurer's Chappel at Roehampton Maij 29. Tuesday My meeting and setling upon express Terms with K. B. in the Gallery at Greenwich In which business God bless me Junij 15. Mr. Francis Windebancke my Old Friend was sworn Secretary of State which place I obtained for him of my Gracious Master King Charles Junij 18. Munday I Married my Lord Treasurer Weston's Eldest Son to the Lady Frances Daughter to the Duke of Lenox at Roehampton Junij 25. Munday D. S. with me at Fulham cum Ma. c. Junius This was the coldest June clean through that was ever felt in my memory Julij 10. Tuesday Doctor Juxon then Dean of Worcester at my suit sworn Clark of his Majesties Closet That I might have one that I might trust near his Majesty if I grow weak or infirm as I must have a time Julij 17. Tuesday I Consecrated the Church at Stanmore magna in Middlesex built by Sir John Wolstenham The cold Summer Harvest not in within forty miles of London after Michaelmas c. Decemb. 2. Sunday The small pox appeared upon his Majesty but God be thanked he had a very gentle Disease of it December 27. Thursday the Earl of Arundel set forward towards the Low-Countries to fetch the Queen of Bohemia and her Children Decemb. 25. I Preached to the King Christmas-day Januar. 1. My being with K. B. this day in the afternoon ..... troubled me much God send me a good issue out of it The warm open Christmas January 15. Tuesday K. B. and I unexpectedly came to some clearer Declaration of our selves Which God bless Febr. 11. Munday-night till Tuesday-morning the great Fire upon London Bridge ....... Houses burnt down Feb. 13. Wednesday The Feoffees that pretended to buy in Impropriations were dissolved in the Chequer-Chamber They were the main Instruments for the Puritan Faction to undo the Church The Criminal Part reserved Feb. 28. Thursday Mr. Chancellour of London Dr. Duck brought me word how miserably I was slandered by some Separatists I pray God give me patience and forgive them March 6. Ashwednesday I Preached at White-Hall Anno 1633. April 13. The great business at the Council-Table c. When the Earl of Holland made his submission to the King This April was most extream wet and cold and windy Maij 13. Munday I set out of London to attend King Charles into Scotland Maij 24. The King was to enter into York in State The Day was extream Windy and Rainy that he could not all day long I called it York-Friday Junij 6. I came to Barwick That Night I dreamed that K. B. sent to me in Westminster-Church that he was now as desirous to see me as I him and that he was then entring into the Church I went with Joy but met another in the middle of the Church who seemed to know the Business and laugh'd But K. B. was not there Junij 8. Saturday Whitsun-Eve I received Letters from K. B. unalterable c. By this if I return I shall see how true or false my Dream is c. Junij 15. Saturday I was sworn Counsellor of Scotland Junij 18. Tuesday after Trinity-Sunday King Charles Crowned at Holyrood-Church in Edinburgh I never saw more expressions of Joy than were after it c. Junij 19. Wednesday I received second Letters from K. B. no Changling c. Within Three Hours after other Letters from K. B. Believe all that I say c. Junij 29. Friday Letters from K. B. no D. true if not to my Contentment c. Junij 30. I Preached to his Majesty in the Chappel in Holy-rood-House in Edinburgh July 1. Munday I went over Forth to Brunt-Island July 2. Tuesday To St. Andrews Julij 3. Wednesday Over Taye to Dunde Julij 4. Thursday To Faukland Julij 7. Sunday To St. Johnston Julij 8. Munday To Dunblain and Sterling My dangerous and 〈◊〉 Journey crossing part of the Highlands by Coach which was a Wonder there July 9. Tuesday To Lithgow and so to Edinburgh July 10. Wednesday His Majesties dangerous Passage from Brunt-Island to Edinburgh Julij 11. Thursday I began my Journey from Edinburgh towards London Julij 12. Friday That Night at Anderweek I Dreamed that L. L. came and offered to fit above me at the Co. Ta. and that L. H. came in and placed him there Julij 20. Saturday The King came from Scotland to Greenwich having come Post from Barwick in four Days Julij 26. Friday I came to my House at Fulham from Scotland Julij 28. Sunday K. B. and I met All the strange Discourses mistaken And that which was a very High Tide at was then the lowest Ebb at Greenwich that ever I saw I went away much troubled But all setled again well Aug. 3. Saturday following Aug. 4. Sunday News came to Court of the Lord Arch-Bishop of Canterbury's Death and the King resolved presently to give it me Which he did Aug. 6. Aug. 4. That very Morning at Greenwich there came one to me Seriously and that avowed ability to perform it and offered me to be a Cardinal I went presently to the
After they had continued at York till Octob. 28. the King and the Lords returned and the Parliament sate down Novemb. 3. Great Heats appear'd in the very beginning On Wednesday Novemb. 10. Tho. L. 〈◊〉 Earl of Strafford was accused by the House of Commons of High Treason and Committed by the Lords to Mr. James Maxwell the Officer of the House And upon general Articles sent up He was upon Wednesday Novemb. 25. committed to the Tower It is thought and upon good Grounds that the Earl of Strafford had got Knowledge of the Treason of some Men and that he was preparing to accuse them And this Fear both hastned and heated the proceedings against him And upon Dec. 4. being Friday his Majesty at the great Importunity of some Lords of his Council gave way that his Council should be examined upon Oath in the Earl of Strafford's Case and I with others was examined that very Day There were great Thoughts of Heart upon this Business and somewhat vapoured out at Mens Tongues but the thing was done Now at and after the breaking up of the late Parliament Sir Hen. Vane at the private Committee concerning the Scotch Affairs before mentioned instead of setting down the Heads of the several Businesses then Treated of Writ down what every Man said at the Committee though it were but Matter of deliberation and debate Afterwards by a cunning conveyance between his Son who had been Governour in New-England and himself this Paper or a Copy of it was delivered to some Members of the House of Commons and in all probability was the Ground of that which was after done against the Lord Strafford my self and others and the Cause why the King was so hard pressed to have the Lords and others of his Council examined was that so Sir Henry Vane might upon Oath avow the Paper which his Son had seen and shewed and others be brought to witness as much had Truth and their Memories been able to say as much as his Paper After the examination of me and others concerning these Particulars there arose great and violent Debates in the House of Commons against the Bishops and particularly their Votes in Parliament After that Decemb. 16. 1640. they Voted against the late Canons as containing in them many Matters contrary to the fundamental Laws and Statutes of the Realm to the Rights of Parliaments to the Property and Liberty of the Subject and matters tending to Sedition and of dangerous Consequences I was made the Author of all and presently a Committee put upon me to inquire into my Actions and prepare a Charge The same Morning in the Upper-House I was Named as an Incendiary in an Accusation put in by the Scottish Commissioners For now by this Time they were come to that Article of the Treaty which reflected upon me And this was done with great noise to bring me yet further into Hatred with the People especially the Londoners who approved too well the Proceedings of their Brethren the Scots and debased the Bishops and the Church Government in England The Articles which the Scots put into the Upper House by the Hands of their Lords Commissioners against me Decemb. 15. were read there Decemb. 16. I took out a true Copy as it follows here And though I was to make no answer then till the House of Commons had digested them and taken as much out of them as as they pleased to fill my intended Charge withall yet because I after found that the House of Commons insisted upon very few of these particulars if any I thought my self bound to vindicate my Innocency even in these Particulars which shall now appear in their full strength against me if they have any in Wise and Learned Mens Judgments CAP. III THe Novations in Religion which are universally acknowledged to be the main Cause of Commotions in Kingdoms and States and are known to be the true Cause of our present Troubles were many and great besides the Books of Ordination and Homilies First some particular alterations in matters of Religion pressed upon us without Order and against Law contrary to the Form established in our Kirk Secondly a new Book of Canons and Constitutions Ecclesiastical Thirdly a Liturgy or Book of Common-Prayer which did also carry with them many dangerous Errours in matters of Doctrine Of all these we challenge the Prelate of Canterbury as the prime Cause on Earth I shall easily grant that Novations in Religion are a main Cause of Distempers in Commonwealths And I hope it will be as easily granted to me I am sure it should that when great Distempers fall into Kingdoms and Common-wealths the only way to ingage at home and get Credit abroad is to pretend Religion which in all Ages hath been a Cloak large enough to cover at least from the Eyes of the Many even Treasons themselves And For the present Troubles in Scotland Novations in Religion are so far from being known to be the true Cause as that it is manifest to any Man that will look upon it with a single Eye that Temporal Discontents and several Ambitions of the great Men which had been long a working were the true cause of these Troubles And that Religion was call'd in upon the bye to gain the Clergy and by them the Multitude For besides that which was openly spoken by the right Honourable James then Earl of Carlile that somewhat was a brewing in Scotland among some discontented there which wou'd break out to the Trouble of this Kingdom 't is most apparent there were many discontents among them Some whereof had no relation at all to Religion and were far antienter than the Troubles now began and were all Legally proved against the Lord Balmerino who was condemned of high Treason before any of these Stirs began For there were Grievances as they said propounded in the Convention Anno 1628. about Coyning and their black Money which they say were slighted again in the Parliament held 1633. Murmuring also there was as if the Articles and Parliament were not free Great Clamour likewise was there against the Bishops Power in choosing the Lords of the Articles though that Power belonged unto them by the fundamental Laws of that Kingdom As much against the Act of Revocation and the Taxations which yet were voluntarily offer'd and miscalled on purpose to edge the People As also for Applying as they said these Taxations to wrong uses With all which and more Religion had nothing to do Nay this discontented Party grew so High and so Bold that a very Base and Dishonourable Libel was made and spread against the King Anno 1633. by these and the like Pretences to alienate the Hearts of the People from him Of this Libel if one Hagg were the Authour Balmerino was the Divulger and so prov'd And though it be true that then also some things were to be done against the Church-government yet their
but an Act of Parliament and that no regard was had to the Canons I humbly conceive there was no offence in the Words For though the Superiority by far in this Kingdom belongs to the Acts of Parliament yet some regard doubtless is or ought to be had to the Canons of the Church And if nothing will down with Men but Acts of Parliament the Government cannot be held up in many Particulars For the other Words God forgive this Witness For I am well assured I neither did nor could speak them For is it so much as probable that I should say I would rescind all Acts that are against the Canons What power have I or any particular Man to rescind Acts of Parliament Nor do I think any Man that knows me will believe I could be such a Fool as to say That I hoped shortly to see the Canons and the Kings Prerogative equal to Acts of Parliament Since I have lived to see and that often many Canons rejected as contrary to the Custom of the Place as in choice of Parish-Clerks and about the Reparation of some Churches and the King's Prerogative discussed and weighed by Law Neither of which hath or can be done by any Judges to an Act of Parliament That there is Malice in this Man against me appears plainly but upon what 't is grounded I cannot tell Unless it be that in this business of Dr. Gill and in some other about placing Lecturers which in some Cases this Company of the Mercers took on them to do I opposing it so far as Law and Canon would give me leave crossed some way either his Opinion in Religion or his Purse-profit I was I confess so much moved at the Unworthiness of this Man's Testimony that I thought to bind this Sin upon his Soul not to be forgiven him till he did publickly ask me Forgiveness for this Notorious Publick Wrong done me But by God's Goodness I master'd my self and I heartily desire God to give him a sense of this Sin against me his poor Servant and forgive him And if these words could possibly scape me and be within the danger of that Statute then to that Statute which requires my Tryal within six Months I refer my self The Eleventh Charge of this day was the Imprisonment of Mr. George Waker about a Sermon of his Preached to prove as he said That 't is Sin to obey the greatest Monarchs in things which are against the Command of God That I had Notes of his Sermons for four or five Years together of purpose to intrap him That I told his Majesty he was Factious That Sir Dadly Carlton writ to keep him close That in this Affliction I protested to do him Kindness and yet did contrary My Answer was That for the Scope of his Sermon To Obey God rather than Man no Man doubts but it ought to be so when the Commands are opposite But his Sermon was viewed and many factious Passages and of high Nature found in it And yet I did not tell the King he was Factious but that he was so complained of to me and this was openly at the Council-Table And whereas he speaks of Notes of his Sermons for divers Years with a purpose to intrap him all that he says is that he was told so but produces not by whom And truly I never had any such Notes nor ever used any such Art against any Man in my Life For his Commitment it was done by the Council-Table and after upon some Carriage of his there by the Court of Star-Chamber not by me nor can that be imputed to me which is done there by the major part and I having no Negative And if Sir Dudly Carlton writ to keep him close at his Brother's House contrary to the Lords Order let him answer it And if he supposes that was done by me why is not Sir Dudly examined to try that Truth As for the Protestation which he says I made to his Wife and his Brother that I complained not against him it was no Denyal of my Complaint made against him at the first that I heard he was Factious but that after the time in which I had seen the full Testimony of grave Ministers in London that he was not Factious I made no Complaint after that but did my best to free him And the Treason in these two Charges is against the Company of the Mercers and Mr. Waker The next Charge was that Dr Manwaring having been Censured by the Lords in Parliament for a Sermon of his against the Liberty and Propriety of the Subject was yet after this preferred by me in Contempt of the Parliament-Censure both to the Deanery of Warcester and the Bishoprick of St Davids And my own Diary witnesses that I was complained of in Parliament for it And that yet after this I did consecrate him Bishop 1. To this I answered that he was not preferred by me to either of these and therefore that could not be done in contempt of the Parliament-Censure which was not done at all For as for St Davids 't is confessed Secretary Windebank signified the King's Pleasure not I. And whereas it was added that this was by my means That is only said but not proved And for Worcester there is no Proof but the Docket-Book Now my Lords 't is well known in Court that the Docket doth but signifie the King's Pleasure for such a Bill to be drawn it never mentions who procured the Preferment So that the Docket can be no Proof at all against me and other there is none 2. For the Sermon 't is true I was complained of in Parliament that I had been the Cause of Licensing it to the Press and 't is as true that upon that Complaint I was narrowly sifted and an Honourable Lord now present and the Lord Bishop of Lincoln were sent to Bishop Mountain who Licensed the Sermon to Examine and see whether any Warrant had come from me or any Message But when nothing appeared I was acquitted in open Parliament To some Body 's no small Grief God forgive them and their Malice against me for to my knowledge my Ruin was then thirsted for And as I answered Mr. Brown's Summary Charge when he pressed this against me could this have been proved I had been undone long since the Work had not been now to be done That he was after Consecrated by me is true likewise and I hope 't is not expected I should ruine my self and fall into a Premunire by refusing the King 's Royal Assent and this for fear lest it might be thought I procured his Preferment But the Truth is his Majesty commanded me to put him in mind of him when Preferments fell and I did so But withal I told his Majesty of his Censure and that I fear'd ill Construction would be made of it To this it was replyed That I might have refused to Consecrate the Cause why being sufficient and justifiable in Parliament and excepted
confessed that in the first Business the Church-Wardens had Remedy by their Appeal to me but that then the Bishop began again as the former Witness declared Nor knew I any thing of this Business till the Appeal came As for my Answer to himself that under Favour is quite mistaken For I did not say That in this Particular but that in his General Proceedings in his Diocess the Bishop of Bath carried himself like an Obedient Bishop to his Metropolitan Nor can my Words be drawn to mean this Particular For how could I say that in this Particular he carried himself like an Obedient Bishop to me when after Remedy given to these Men by their first Appeal into my Court he began with them again upon the same Cause Besides my Lords this is not the first time Mr. Ash hath mistaken me Mr. Browne in summing up this Charge against me falls twice very heavily upon this Business of Beckington First for the point of Religion And there he Quoted a passage out of my Speech in the Star-Chamber where I do reserve the indifferency of the standing of the Communion-Table either way and yet saith he they were thus heavily Sentenced for that which I my self hold indifferent But first this Sentence was laid upon them by their own Bishop not by me Secondly the more indifferent the thing was the greater was their Contumacy to disobey their Ordinary And had it not been a thing so indifferent and without danger of advancing Popery would Queen Elizabeth who banished Popery out of the Kingdom have endured it in her own Chappel all her time Thirdly the heaviness of the Sentence so much complained of was but to confess their Contumacy in three Churches of the Diocess to Example other Men's Obedience Secondly for the same Point as it contained Matter against Law I answered Mr. Browne as I had before answered the Lords The third Charge was about certain Houses given to S. Edmunds Lumbard-street where old Mr. Pagett is Parson The Witnesses are Two 1. The first is Mr. Symms who says that after a Verdict Mr. Pagett the Incumbent upon a pretenc that these Tenements were Church-Land got a Reference to the Lord Bishop of London then Lord Treasurer and my self My Lords we procured not the Reference But when it was brought to us under the King's Hand we could not refuse to sit upon it Upon full Hearing we were satisfied that the Cause was not rightly stated and therefore we referred them to the Law again for another Tryal and for Costs to the Barons of that Court. And this was the Answer which I gave to Mr. Browne when he instanced in this Case He says the Houses were given to Superstitious Vses But Possessions are not to be carried away for saying so If Men may get Land from others by saying it was given to Superstitious Uses they may get an easie Purchase And Mr. Symms is here in his own Case But whether the Houses were given to Superstitious Uses or not is the thing to be tryed in Law and not to be Pleaded to us He complains that I would not hear his Petition alone And surely my Lords I had no reason since it was referred to another with me And yet I see though I was not in the Reference alone nor would hear it alone yet I must be alone in the Treason And here I desired that Mr. Pagett the Incumbent might be heard 2. The other Witness was Mr. Barnard He says he was present at the Hearing and that Mr. Symms said he was undone if he must go to a new Tryal But my Lords so many Men say that by their troublesomness in Law-Suits go about to undo others He says that Mr. Pagett named his own Referees If that be so 't is no fault of mine He says the Reference was made to us only to Certifie not to make any Order in it If this be so here 's no Proof so much as offer'd that we did not Certifie as we were required and then had Power given to order it which we did And he confesses the Councel on both sides had full Hearing before ought was done The Fourth Charge of this Day was concerning the Imprisonment of one Grafton an Upholster in London The Witnesses Three Of which 1. The first is Grafton in his own Cause and 't is much if he cannot tell a plausible Tale for himself He says first That twelve Years ago he was Committed and Fined Fifty Pounds by other Commissioners By others my Lords therefore not by me And an Act of the High Commission by his own Words it appears to be He says He was continued in Prison by my procurement as he verily believes First as he verily believes is no Proof And the ground of his Belief is as weak For he gives no reason of it but this That Dr. Ryves the King's Advocate spake with the Barons But he doth not say about what or from whom He adds farther that Mr. Ingram Keeper of the Fleet would not give way to his Release notwithstanding the Barons Orders till he heard from me Here 's no Man produced that heard Mr. Ingram say so Nor is Mr. Ingram himself brought to Testifie Lastly he says that he then made Means in Court and so repaired to the Barons again but all in vain And that Baron Trevor cryed out O the Bishop O the Bishop First here 's a Confession of Means in Court made to the Judges So belike they may have Means made to them so it be not by me For the Particular I did humbly desire the Baron being then present might be asked He was asked he blushed and fumbled the Lords laughed and I could not hear what he said 2. The second Witness was Mr. Lenthall But he said nothing but that there was an Order for Grafton's Liberty which is not denied 3. The third was Mr Rivett He says that Mr. Ingram said that Grafton was a Brownist and must be brought into the Fleet again because he did much hurt among the King's Subjects This is a bare Report of a Speech of Mr. Ingram it no way concerns me And a Separatist he is from the Church of England but whether a Brownist or no I cannot tell there are so many Sects God help us And much harm he hath done among weak People For most true it is which S. Cyril observes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That the Devil prepares these Schismatical Separations that so much the more easily the Enemy may be received As for this Man he was in his way cunning enough for under pretence that he suffer'd by me he got Madam Vantlett and other of the French to Negotiate with the Queens Majesty in his behalf And this I found that sometimes when her Majesty knew not of it they sent to the Barons for Favour for him And yet I never heard that Baron Trevor ever cryed out O the French O the French Nor can I tell what stopped his Mouth in this Cry and
some known Bounds might be set to each Court that the Subject might not to his great Trouble and Expence be hurried as now he was from one Court to another And here I desired a Salvo till I might bring Arch-Bishop Parker's Book to shew his Judgment in this Point in the beginning of the Reformation if it shall be thought needful According to whose Judgment and he proves it at large there is open Wrong done to the Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction by Prohibitions The next Charge is about my undue taking of Gifts A Charge which I confess I did not think to meet here And I must and do humbly desire your Lordships to remember that till this Day I have not been Accused in the least for doing any thing Corruptly And if I would have had any thing to do in the base dirty Business of Bribery I needed not have been in such Want as now I am But my Innocency is far more to my Comfort than any Wealth so gotten could have been For I cannot forget that of Job That Fire shall consume the Tabernacles of Bribery And in the Roman Story when P. Rutilius a Man Summâ Innocentiâ of greatest Integrity was Accused Condemned and Banished 't is observed by the Story that he suffered all this not for Bribery of which he was not Guilty but Ob Invidiam for Envy against which when it Rages no Innocency no Worth of any Man is able to stand 1. But to come to the Particulars the first is the Case of Sir Edward Gresham's Son unhappily Married against his Father's will a Suit in the High Commission about it and that there he had but Fifty Pounds Damages given him That was no fault of mine my Vote gave him more but it was carried against me The Bond of two Hundred Pounds which was taken according to Course in the Court was demanded of me by Sir Edward to help himself that way and 't is confessed I granted it But then 't is Charged that in my Reference to Sir John Lambe to deliver him the Bond I required him to demand one half of the Forfeiture of the Bond toward the Repair of St. Pauls 'T is true I did so But First I desire it may be considered that it was wholly in my Power whether I would have delivered him the Bond or not Secondly That upon this gross Abuse I might have sued the Bond in my own Name and bestowed the Money upon what Charitable Uses I had thought fit Thirdly That I did nothing herein but what the Letters-Patent for Repair of St. Pauls give me power to do Fourthly That this is the third time St. Pauls is urged against me Which I am not sorry for because I desire since 't is once moved it may be sifted 〈◊〉 the uttermost And whereas to make all Ecclesiastical Proceedings the more odious it was urged that the Rubrick in the Common-Prayer Book mentions no License but asking of Banes That Rubrick is to be understood where no License is granted For else no License at all for Marriage without Banes-asking can be good which is against the Common both Law and Practice of the Kingdom 2. The second Particular was Charged by one Mr. Stone of London who said he sent into Lambeth two Butts of Sack in a Cause of some Chester-Men whom it was then in my Power to relieve and mitigate their Fine set upon them in the High Commission at York about Mr. Pryn's Entertainment as he passed that way And that this Sack was sent in before my Composition with him what should be mitigated and so before my return of the Fine mitigated into the Exchequer The Business my Lords was thus His Majesty having taken the Repair of the West End of St. Pauls to himself granted me to that end all the Fines in the High-Commission Court both here and at York and left the Power of Mitigation in me The Chester-Men which this Witness speaks of were deeply Sentenced at York for some Misdemeanours about Mr. Pryn then lately Sentenced in the Star-Chamber One or more of them were Debtors to this Mr. Stone to the value of near Three Thousand Pounds as he said These Men for fear of the Sentence kept themselves close and gave Mr. Stone to know how it was with them and that if he could not get me to moderate the Fine they would away and save themselves for they had now heard the Power was in me Upon this Mr. Stone to save his own Debt of three Thousand Pounds sends his Son-in-Law Mr. Wheat and Dr. Bailie Men that were bred in the College of S. John under me and had ever since good interest in me to desire my Favour I at first thought this a pretence and was willing to preserve to St. Pauls as much as fairly I might But at last upon their earnest pleading that the Men were not Rich and that Mr. Stone was like without any fault of his to be so much damnified I mitigated their Fines which were in all above a Thousand Pounds to two Hundred I had great Thanks of all Hands and was told from the Chester-Men that they heartily wished I had had the Hearing of their Cause from the beginning While Mr. Wheat and his Brother Dr. Bailie were Soliciting me for Favour to Mr. Stone He thinks upon sending Sack into my House and comes to my Steward about it My Steward acquaints me with it I gave him absolute Command not to receive it nor any thing from any Man that had Business before me So he refuses to admit of any Mr. Stone presses him again and tells him he had no Relation to the Chester-Men's Cause but would give it for the great Favour I had always shew'd to his Son-in-Law But still I Commanded my Steward to receive none When Mr Stone saw he could not fasten it he watches a time when my Steward was out of Town and my self at Court and brings in his Sack and tells the Yeoman of my Wine-Cellar he had leave to lay it in My Steward comes home finds the Sack in the Cellar tells me of it I Commanded it should be taken out and carried back Then Mr. Stone comes intreats he may not be so Disgraced protests as before that he did it meerly for my great Favour to his Son-in-Law and that he had no Relation to the Chester-Men's Business And so after he protested to my self meeting me in a Morning as I was going over to the Star-Chamber Yet afterwards this Religious Professour for so he carries himself goes Home and puts the Price of the Sack upon the Chester-Men's Account Hereupon they complain to the House of Commons and Stone is their Witness This is the truth of this Business as I shall answer it to God And whether this do not look like a thing Plotted by the Faction so much imbittered against me let understanding Men judge Mr. Wheat his Son-in-Law was present in Court and there avowed that he Transacted the Business
of the said pretended Canons enjoyned to be taken by all the Clergy and many of the Laity of this Kingdom I Composed no Book of Canons The whole Convocation did it with unanimous Consent So either I must be free or that whole Body must be guilty of High-Treason For in that Crime all are Principals that are guilty Accessory there is none Neither did I publish or put in Execution those Canons or any of them but by Lawful Authority And I do humbly conceive and verily believe there is nothing in those Canons contrary either to the King's Prerogative the Fundamental Laws of the Realm the Rights of Paliament the Propriety and Liberty of the Subjects or any matter tending to Sedition or of dangerous consequence or to the establishment of any vast or unlawful Power in my self and my Sucessors Neither was there any Canon in that Convocation surreptitiously passed by any practice of mine or without due Consideration and Debate Neither was there any thing in that Convocation but what was voted first and subscribed after without fear or compulsion in any kind And I am verily perswaded there never sate any Synod in Christendom wherein the Votes passed with more freedom or less practice than they did in this And for the Oath injoyned in the sixth Canon as it was never made to confirm any unlawful or exorbitant Power over his Majesty's Subjects so I do humbly conceive that it is no Wicked or Ungodly Oath in any respect And I hope I am able to make it good in any learned Assembly in Christendom that this Oath and all those Canons then made and here before recited and every Branch in them are Just and Orthodox and Moderate and most necessary for the present Condition of the Church of England how unwelcom soever to the present Distemper 6. He hath traiterously assumed to himself a Papal and Tyrannical Power both in Ecclesiastical and Temporal Matters over his Majesty's Subjects in this Realm of England and other places to the Disinherison of the Crown Dishonour of his Majesty and Derogation of his Supreme Authority in Ecclesiastical Matters And the said Arch-Bishop claims the King 's Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction as incident to his Episcopal and Archiepiscopal Office in this Kingdom and doth deny the same to be derived from the Crown of England which he hath accordingly exercised to the high contempt of his Royal Majesty and to the destruction of divers of the King's Liege-People in their Persons and Estates I have not assumed Papal or Tyrannicl Power in matters Ecclesiastical or Temporal to the least Disinherison Dishonour or Derogation of his Majesty's Supream Authority in matters Ecclesiastical or Temporal I never claimed the King's Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction as incident to my Episcopal or Archiepiscopal Office in this Kingdom Nor did I ever deny that the exercise of my Jurisdiction was derived from the Crown of England But that which I have said and do still say concerning my Office and Calling is this That my Order as a Bishop and my Power of Jurisdiction is by Divine Apostolical Right and unalterable for ought I know in the Church of Christ. But all the Power I or any other Bishop hath to exercise any the least Power either of Order or Jurisdiction within this Realm of England is derived wholly from the Crown And I conceive it were Treasonable to derive it from any other Power Foreign or Domestick And for the Exercise of this Power under his Majesty I have not used it to the Contempt but to the great Advantage of his Royal Person and to the Preservation not the Destruction of his People Both which appear already by the great Distractions Fears and Troubles which all Men are in since my Restraint and which for ought I yet see are like to increase if God be not exceeding Merciful above our Deserts 7. That he hath traiterously endeavoured to alter and subvert God's true Religion by Law established in this Realm and instead thereof to set up Popish Superstition and Idolatry and to that end hath declared and maintained in Speeches and Printed Books divers Popish Doctrines and Opinions contrary to the Articles of Religion established by Law He hath urged and injoyned divers Popish and Superstitious Ceremonies without any warrant of Law and hath cruelly persecuted those who have opposed the same by Corporal Punishment and Imprisonment and most unjustly vexed others who refused to conform thereto by Ecclesiastical Censures of Excommunication Suspension Deprivation and Degradation contrary to the Law of the Kingdom I never endeavoured to alter or subvert God's true Religion established by Law in this Kingdom or to bring in Romish Superstition Neither have I declared maintained or Printed any Popish Doctrine or Opinion contrary to the Articles of Religion established or any one of them either to the end mentioned in this Article or any other I have neither urged nor injoyned any Popish or Superstitious Ceremonies without warrant of Law nor have I cruelly persecuted any Opposers of them But all that I laboured for in this particular was that the external Worship of God in this Church might be kept up in Uniformity and Decency and in some Beauty of Holiness And this the rather because first I found that with the Contempt of the Outward Worship of God the Inward fell away apace and Profaneness began boldly to shew it self And secondly because I could speak with no conscientious Persons almost that were wavering in Religion but the great motive which wrought upon them to disaffect or think meanly of the Church of England was that the external Worship of God was so lost in the Church as they conceived it and the Churches themselves and all things in them suffered to lye in such a base and slovenly Fashion in most places of the Kingdom These and no other Considerations moved me to take so much care as I did of it which was with a single Eye and most free from any Romish Superstition in any thing As for Ceremonies all that I injoyned were according to Law And if any were Superstitious I injoyned them not As for those which are so called by some Men they are no Innovations but Restaurations of the ancient approved Ceremonies in and from the beginning of the Reformation and setled either by Law or Custom till the Faction of such as now openly and avowedly separate from the Church of England did oppose them and cry them down And for the Censures which I put upon any I presume they will to all indifferent Men which will Understandingly and Patiently hear the Cause appear to be Just Moderate and according to Law 8. That for the better advancing of his Traiterous Purpose and Designs he did abuse the great Power and Trust his Majesty reposed in him and did intrude upon the Places of divers great Officers and upon the Right of divers his Majesty's Subjects whereby he did procure to himself the Nomination of sundry
with Truth and preserve all the Foundations of Religion entire For I have Learned from a Prime School-Man of their own That every Vnion doth not perfect the true Reason or Definition of that which is good but that only upon which depends Esse perfectum Rei the perfect Essence of that thing So that in this particular if the substance of Christian Religion be not perfected by any Vnion that Vnion it self cannot have in it Rationem boni the true Being and Nature of Good And therefore I did never desire that England and Rome should meet together but with forsaking of Errour and Superstition especially such as grate upon and frett the Foundations of Religion But were this done God forbid but I should Labour for a Reconciliation if some Tenets of the Roman Party on the one side and some deep and imbittered Disaffections on the other have not made it impossible as I much doubt they have But that I shou'd practice with Rome as now it stands and to that end should confederate with Priests and Jesuits or hold secret intelligence with the Pope or treat with him or any Instruments Authorised by him or by any Agents is utterly untrue As I hope may fully appear by that which follows vid. init libri And First in hope that they which have observed my Life in times past will give me Credit in this time of my Affliction I do here make my solemn Protestation in the Presence of God and this great Court that I am Innocent of any thing greater or less that is charged in this Article or any part of it And I do here offer my Corporal Oath Please it the Lords to give it me in the strictest form that any Oath can be conceived that I am wholly Innocent of this Charge And let nothing be tendred against me but Truth and I do challenge whatsoever is between Heaven and Hell to come in and Witness whatsoever they can against me in this Particular For all that I have feared in all this Charge against me is not Guilt but Subornation of Perjury Against which Innocency it self cannot be safe And I have found the deadly Hatred of some Men against me to be such as that though I cannot suspect the House of Commons of such an Irreligious Baseness yet I have great Cause to suspect some particular Men which I see make no Conscience of the Way so they may compass their End Secondly Should I practice be it with whom you will to superinduce Romish Tyranny and Superstition over the true Religion established in England I have taken a very wrong way to it For I have hindred as many from going to the Roman Party and have reduced as many from it and some of great Quality and some of great Learning and Judgment as I believe any Divine in England hath done And is this the way to bring in Romish Superstition to reduce Men from it Or is this the Reward from the State which Men must look for that have done these Services Thirdly The Book which I have Written against Mr. Fisher the Jesuit must of Necessity either acquit me of this Calumny or proclaim me a Villain to the World And I hope I have so lived as that Men have not that Opinion of me sure I am I have not deserved it And had this Book of mine been written according to the Garb of the Time fuller of Railing than Reason a Learned Jesuit would have Laughed at it and me and a Learned Protestant might have thought I had Written it only to conceal my self and my Judgment in those Difficulties But being Written in the way it is I believe no Romanist will have much Cause to Joy at it or to think me a Favourer of their Cause And since I am thus put to it I will say thus much more This Book of mine is so Written by God's great blessing upon me as that whensoever the Church of England as they are growing towards it apace shall depart from the Grounds which I have therein laid she shall never be able before any Learned and disingaged Christian to make good her Difference with and her Separation from the Church of Rome And let no Man think I speak Pride or Vanity in this For the Outrages which have been against me force me to say it and I am confident future times will make it good unless Profaneness break in and over-run the whole Kingdom which is not a little to be feared Fourthly I must confess I am in this Particular most unfortunate For many Recusants in England and many of that Party beyond the Seas think I have done them and their Cause more Harm than they which have seemed more fierce against them And I doubt not but I shall be able to prove that I have been accounted beyond Sea the greatest Enemy to them that ever sat in my Place And shall I suffer on both sides Shall I be accounted an Enemy by one part for opposing the Papist and accused for a Traytor by the other for Favouring and Complying with them Well If I do suffer thus 't is but because Truth usually lies between two Extreams and is beaten by both As the poor Church of England is at this day by the Papist and the Separatist But in this and all things else in despight of all Malice Truth shall be either my Protection from Suffering or my Comfort while I suffer And by God's gracious assistance I shall never depart from it but continue at the Apostle's Ward 2 Cor. 13. Nihil possum contra veritatem I can do nothing against the Truth and for it I hope God will enable me patiently to suffer any thing Fifthly If I had practised with the Pope or his Agents for the alteration of Religion in England surely I must have used many great and dextrous Instruments to compass my end And in a business of so great Consequence Difficulty and Danger to all that should have a Hand nay but a Finger in it no Man would venture to meddle without good pay And 't is well known that I have filled no Purse nor laid up any store to set ill Instruments on work upon that or any other unworthy design Sixthly I am a Man in Years great Years for a Man so loaded with business as I have been all my Life And it cannot be long before I must go to give God Almighty an account of all my Actions And whatsoever the Malignity of the Time may put upon me yet they which know me and my ways will easily believe that I have not so little Conscience or care of my Soul as to double with God to my very Death Nay could I have doubled thus I could easily have seen a way through all this difficulty and how to have been as gracious with the People as any even the worst of my Predecessours But I have ever held that the lowest depth of Baseness to frame Religion to
a great deal of Thanks in the Name of that Nation Nor did I labour to introduce into the Kingdom of Scotland any Innovations in Religion or Government Neither do all or the most part or indeed any of those pretended Innovations tend to Popery or Superstition as hath before been sufficiently proved Neither did I upon their refusal to submit to these Advise his Majesty to Subdue them by force of Arms but the Counsels which I gave were open either at the Committee or the Council-Table Neither did I by my own Power and Authority contrary to Law procure any of his Majesty's Subjects or inforce the Clergy of England to contribute to the maintenance of that War But the Subsidies which were given to his Majesty at that time were given freely and in open Convocation and without any practice of my self or any other as appears by what I have formerly laid down But because so much noise hath been made against me both in the Scottish Charge before answered and in this Article about Popish Innovations in that Service-Book and that I laboured the introducing both of it and them I think it fit if not necessary to set down briefly the Story what was done and what I did and by what Command in all that Business And it follows Dr. John Maxwel the late Bishop of Ross came to me from his Majesty it was during the time of a great and dangerous Fever under which I then laboured It was in the Year 1629. in August or September which come that time is Thirteen Years since The Cause of his coming was to speak with me about a Liturgy for Scotland At his coming I was so extream Ill that I saw him not And had Death which I then expected daily as did my Friends and Physicians also seized on me I had not seen this heavy time After this when I was able to sit up he came to me again and told me it was his Majesty's Pleasure that I should receive Instructions from some Bishops of Scotland concerning a Liturgy for that Church and that he was imployed from my Lord the Arch-Bishop of St. Andrews and other Prelates there about it I told him I was clear of Opinion that if his Majesty would have a Liturgy setled there it were best to take the English Liturgy without any variation that so the same Service-Book might be established in all his Majesty's Dominions Which I did then and do still think would have been a great Happiness to this State and a great Honour and Safety to Religion To this he replyed that he was of a contrary Opinion and that not he only but the Bishops of that Kingdom thought their Country-men would be much better satisfied it a Liturgy were framed by their own Clergy than to have the English Liturgy put upon them yet he added that it might be according to the Form of our English Service-Book I answered to this that if this were the Resolution of my Brethren the Bishops of Scotland I would not entertain so much as Thoughts about it till I might by God's Blessing have Health and Opportunity to wait upon his Majesty and receive his farther directions from himself When I was able to go abroad I came to his Majesty and represented all that had passed His Majesty avowed the sending of Dr. Maxwell to me and the Message sent by him But then he inclined to my Opinion to have the English Service without any alteration to be established there And in this Condition I held that Business for two if not three Years at least Afterwards the Scottish Bishops still pressing his Majesty that a Liturgy Framed by themselves and in some few things different from ours would relish better with their Countrymen They at last prevailed with his Majesty to have it so and carried it against me notwithstanding all I could say or do to the contrary Then his Majesty Commanded me to give the Bishops of Scotland my best Assistance in this Way and Work I delayed as much as I could with my Obedience and when nothing would serve but it must go on I confess I was then very serious and gave them the best help I could But wheresoever I had any doubt I did not only acquaint his Majesty with it but Writ down most of the Amendments or Alterations in his Majesty's Presence And I do verily believe there is no one thing in that Book which may not stand with the Conscience of a right Good Protestant Sure I am his Majesty approved them all and I have his Warrant under his Royal Hand for all that I did about that Book And to the end the Book may be extant and come to the view of the Christian World and their Judgment of it be known I have caused it to be exactly Translated into Latin and if right be done it shall be Printed with this History This was that which I did concerning the Matter and Substance of this Service-Book As for the way of Introducing it I ever advised the Bishops both in his Majesty's Presence and at other times both by Word and by Writing that they would look carefully to it and be sure to do nothing about it but what should be agreeable to the Laws of that Kingdom And that they should at all times be sure to take the Advice of the Lords of his Majesty's Council in that Kingdom and govern themselves and their Proceedings accordingly Which Course if they have not followed that can no way reflect upon me who have both in this and all things else been as careful of their Laws as any Man who is a Stranger to them could be And in a Letter of mine after my last coming out of Scotland thus I wrote to the late Reverend Arch-Bishop of S. Andrews Septemb. 30. 1633. concerning the Liturgy That whether that of England or another were resolved on yet 〈◊〉 should proceed Circumspectly Because his Majesty had no intendment to do any thing but that which was according to Honour and Justice and the Laws of that Kingdom And a Copy of this Letter I have yet by me to shew And for the truth of this Narration I know His Majesty and my Lord of Ross himself will avow it And here I take leave to acquaint the Reader That this was no new Conceit of His Majesty to have a Liturgy framed and Canons made for the Church of Scotland For he followed his Royal Father King James his Example and Care therein who took Order for both at the Assembly of Perth An. 1618. And now to return again to the Article There is one Charge more in it and that 's concerning the Pacification made the 〈◊〉 Year The Article says I did Censure it as Dishonourable and Advise for a new War But I did neither That which I spake was openly at the Council-Table and in His Majesty's presence And it was this There arose a debate at the Table about these Affairs and the Pacification and I
Conclusion that they might refer all to Treason and so they be suffer'd to give me no Councel at all in matter of Fact Hereupon they drew me another Petition to the same effect which I caused to be delivered Novemb. 6. But it received the same Answer Then Novemb. 7. being Wednesday I Petitioned the House of Commons to the same purpose And Novemb. 8. this my Petition was read in the House of Commons and after a short Debate the Resolution was that they being my Accusers would not meddle with any thing but left all to the Order of the Lords before whom the Business was and my Councel's own Judgment thereupon This seemed very hard not only to my self and my Councel but to all indifferent Men that heard it In the mean time I could resort no whither but to Patience and God's Mercy Novemb. 13. I appeared in the Parliament-House according to the Order and was at the Bar. That which I spake to the Lords was this That I had no Skill to judge of the Streights into which I might fall by my Plea which I had resolved on being left without all assistance of my Councel in regard of the nature and form of the Impeachment that was against me That yet my Innocency prompted me to a ready Obedience of their Lordships Order casting my self wholly upon God's Mercy their Lordships Justice and my own Innocency Then I humbly desired that their Lordships Order first and the Impeachment after might be read This done I put in my Answer in Writing as I was ordered to do and humbly prayed it might be entred My Answer was All Advantages of Law against this Impeachment saved and reserved to this Defendant he pleads Not Guilty to all and every part of the Impeachment in manner and form as 't is Charged in the Articles And to this Answer I put my Hand My Answer being thus put in I humbly besought their Lordships to take into their Honourable Consideration my great Years being Threescore and ten compleat and my Memory and other Faculties by Age and Affliction much decayed My long Imprisonment wanting very little of three whole Years and this last year little better than close Imprisonment My want of skill and knowledge in the Laws to defend my self The Generality and Incertainty of almost all the Articles so that I cannot see any Particulars against which I may provide my self In the next place I did thankfully acknowledge their Lordships Honourable Favour in assigning me such Councel as I desired But I told their Lordships withal that as my Councel were most ready to obey their Lordships in all the Commands laid upon them so there were certain Doubts arisen in them how far they might advise me without Offence considering the Charges against me were so interwoven and left without all distinguishment what is intended as a Charge of Treason and what of Crime and Misdemeanour That to remove these Doubts I had humbly besought their Lordships twice for distinguishment by several Petitions That their Lordships not thinking it fit to distinguish I have without advice of Councel put in my Plea as their Lordships see But do most humbly pray that their Lordships will take me so far into Consideration as that I may not lose the Benefit of my Councel for Law in all or any and for Law and Fact in whatsoever is not Charged as Treason when it shall be distinguished As still my Prayers were that by their Lordships Wisdom and Honourable Direction some way might be found to distinguish them And that having not without much difficulty prevailed with my Councel to attend their Lordships would be pleased to hear them speak in this perplexed Business While I was speaking this the Lords were very attentive and two of them took Pen and Paper at the Table and took Notes And it was unanimously granted that my Councel should be heard and so they were And the Order then made upon their Hearing was that they should advise me and be heard themselves in all things concerning matter of Law and in all things whether of Law or Fact that was not Charged as Treason and that they would think upon the distinguishment in time convenient This was all I could get and my Councel seem'd somewhat better content that they had gotten so much Not long after this I heard from good Hands that some of the Lords confessed I had much deceived their expectation for they found me in a Calm but thought I would have been stormy And this being so I believe the two Lords so careful at their Pen and Ink made ready to observe any Disadvantages to me which they thought Choler and Indignation might thrust forth But I praise God the Giver I am better acquainted with Patience than they think I am So this my main Business staid a while In the mean time that I might not rust I was warned Decemb. 8. to appear in Parliament the 18th of that Month as a Collateral Defendant in a Case of Smart against Dr. Cosin formerly heard in the High Commission This Cause had been called upon both in this and former Parliaments but I never heard that I was made a Defendant till now Nor do I know any thing of the Cause but that in the High Commission I gave my Vote according to my Conscience and Law too for ought I know and must refer my self to the Acts of that Court. On Wednesday Decemb. 13. I Petitioned for Councel in this Cause and had the same assigned me And on the 18. day I appeared according to my Summons but I was not called in and the Business put off to that day three Weeks On Thursday Decemb. 28. which was Innocents day one Mr. Wells a New-England Minister came to me and in a boisterous manner demanded to know whether I had Repented or not I knew him not till he told me he was Suspended by me when I was Bishop of London and he then a Minister in Essex I told him if he were Suspended it was doubtless according to Law Then upon a little further Speech I recalled the Man to my Remembrance and what care I took in Conference with him at London-House to recall him from some of his turbulent ways but all in vain And now he inferred out of the good words I then gave him that I Suspended him against my Conscience In conclusion he told me I went about to bring Popery into the Kingdom and he hoped I should have my Reward for it When I saw him at this heighth I told him he and his Fellows what by their Ignorance and what by their Railing and other boisterous Carriage would soon actually make more Papists by far than ever I intended and that I was a better Protestant than he or any of his Followers So I left him in his Heat This Man was brought to my Chamber by Mr. Isaac Pennington Son to the Lieutenant By this time something was made
be the Letters mentioned were sent down for Poole And if the Lord Keeper that now is then his Majesty's Solicitor could not or durst not meddle but gave back his Fee as was farther urged his Lordship is living to tell the Cause himself for here was none set down though it were urged as if he did it because I was a Referree And in the mean time this is but a bare Report concerning him If the thirteen Lords to whom it was after referred were of another Opinion that was nothing to us who without any touch of Corruption did as our Knowledge and Conscience guided us And my Lords it seems this Title was very doubtful for after all this it came into this Parliament was referred to a Committee where Mr. Rich was very willing to compound the Business And well he might for I was since certified by a Gentleman a Lawyer that understood well and was at the Hearing of that Cause that it was one of the foulest Causes on Rich's side that ever he heard And out of this I took the Summ of my Answer which I gave to Mr. Browne when he Summed up my Charge The Witnesses to this Charge were Mr. Rich his Brother and my good Friend Mr. Talboys But this latter witnesses nothing but that he heard me say that Poole's Behaviour was unfit so there I checked the one Party And that upon some words given me by Rich I should say do you throw dirt in my face And why might I not ask this Question if his words deserved it So upon the Matter here is Rich single in his Brother's Case and nothing throughout that looks like Treason Here I had a snap given me that I slighted the Evidence whereas they as 't was said did not urge these Particulars as Treason but as things tending to the violation of Law and should be found to make Treason in the Result The Truth is I did then think within my self that such Evidence might very well be slighted in an Accusation of Treason But I thought better to forbear and so in my continued patience expected the next Charge Which was Mr Foxlie's Imprisonment about Popish Books That he was tender'd the Oath ex Officio then brought before the Council and imprisoned again by a Warrant under my Hand and others and my Hand first to the Warrant his Wife not suffer'd to come to him till he was sick that the chief Cause of all this was the Impropriations because he desired to Name the Men for the Feoffment My Lords This Man confesses he was called in question about Popish-Books but expressing no more I cannot tell what to make of it nor can I tell how to Accuse him of Popish Books For I cannot tell which is least his Understanding of them or his Love to them And for tendring him the Oath ex Officio that was the usual proceeding in that Court When he was brought before the Lords of the Council he says the Warrant for his Imprisonment was under my Hand and others This was according to course So the Commitment of him was by the Lords not by me But my Hand was first so was it in all things else to which I was to set it And the restraint of his Wife from coming to him was by the same Order of the Lords And upon her Petition when her Husband was sick both of them confess she had admittance But whereas he says The chief Cause of his Commitment was the Feoffment he is much mistaken Himself says before it was about Popish Books This I am sure of the Feoffment was not so much as mentioned against him Though he freely confesses that he got twelve Men to undertake that Feoffment which was a great deal more power than he could take to himself by Law And his Wife speaks not one word to the Cause of his Imprisonment So he is single and in his own Cause and no Treason unless it be against Mr. Foxlye The next Charge of this day was Mr Vassall's Imprisonment And to save Repetition I shall weave all the circumstances of Aggravation and my Answer together First he is single in all both Substance and Circumstance Secondly he says that he conceives I was the cause of his Imprisonment But his Conceit is no proof He says again that I said at the Council-Table whither he was called Why sit we here if we be not able to Judge It may be my Lords I said so I remember not now but if I did say so it was of such things only as were fit and proper for that Honourable Board to judge of Then he Charged me that I should there say That he did eat the Bread out of the King's Childrens Mouths and that if he were in another Country he would be Hang'd for it I doubt this Gentleman has borrowed some of Sir Hen. Vane's Memory But I remember no such thing Yet if I did say it it was no Treason For if I did say he might be Hang'd for the like in some other Country it was because the Laws and Customs of other Countries and this of ours differ in many things So that by this Speech he was to thank the Law of the Land for his preservation notwithstanding his opposition against Majesty which where the Laws were not so favourable to the Subject would not be indured He says He was fain to deposite 300 l. into the Hand of Sir Abra. Dawes and that it was taken out the next day But he says withal it was done by a Decree at the Council-Board and I hope I shall not be held Author of all Decrees which passed there He says that I called him Sirrah A high Crime if I did so High Treason at least But sure this Gentleman's Spleen swell'd up Sir into Sirrah For that is no Language of mine to meaner Men than Mr. Vassal is The main of this Charge is Words and those if utter'd hasty not Treasonable And as M. Lepidus spake in the Case of C. Lutorius Priscus Vana à scelestis dicta à maleficiis differunt vain things differ from wicked and words from malicious deeds and let any Man else be sifted as I have been for all the time I have been a Bishop which is now upon the point of Twenty and three Years and I doubt not but as high Words as these will be heard fallen from him upon less occasion and of greater Personages than Mr. Vassal is Besides Mr. Vassal at the end of his Testimony desired the Lords he might have Reparation which altogether in Law infirms that which he Testified After this followed a Charge about a Grant passed from his Majesty to one Mr. Smith The difference was between Mrs. Burrill and him As far as I can recall it was thus The King had made a Grant to Mr. Burrill in his Life time of a Wharf or something else belonging to the Thames Mr. Smith conceals this and gets a Grant from his Majesty over the Head of the
the Warrants The next Witness concerning this Charge was Tho. Edwards He says That three Hampers of Mr. Pryn's Books were taken out of his House whither it seems they were conveyed for Safety and no Warrant shewed to take them The weaker Man he to let his Friends Books go so But this Witness hath not one Word of me 4. The next Witness was William Wickens he says he knew of no Warrant neither but that License was given by the Sheriffs about Six Years since Here 's never a Word concerning me nor am I to Answer for the Sheriffs Act. And whereas it is an Aggravation in the Charge That all Mr. Pryn's Books were sold Tho. Edwards says there were but Three Hampers of them and this Witness says he bought them for Two and Thirty Pounds And these neither by Number nor Price could be half of Mr. Pryn's Books if I have heard Truth of his Library 5. After this Man's Testimony comes Mr. Pryn himself in his own Cause He made a long relation of the Business and full of Bitterness against me This I doubt not was purposely done to represent me as Odious as he could to the Lords and the Hearers But I shall assume nothing to my self that was done by Order of the Court of Star-Chamber Whatsoever was done there by Common Consent was their Act not mine and if any Treason be in it they are as guilty as I for Treason admits no Accessories Nor will I meddle with the Language God forgive him that and what ever else he hath done against me Only I shall answer to all such particulars of his as seem to touch upon my self 1 First then he says he brought a Prohibition An. 1629. and that was the Ground of my Hatred against him For Prohibitions I shall Answer when they are Charged But as I remember not this so I bare him no Hatred and bearing him none it could not be for that Cause Nor doth he so much as offer to prove it was 2 Next he says I gave Direction to Mr. Attorney Noy and that Dr. Heylin drew some Informations for him Dr. Heylin was well acquainted with Mr. Attorney but how long or upon what grounds I know not Nor did I give Mr. Attorney any direction What Dr. Heylin did if he did any thing is nothing to me unless I set him on which is not Proved nor Sworn 3 He farther says That Mr. Attorney read his Book twice over and said that he found nothing amiss in it I know not what Mr. Attorney said to him nor what he may say of Mr. Attorney now he is dead This I am sure of and 't is well known to some of your Lordships he said far otherwise in open Court 4 He says That his Book was Licensed to the Press and after that seized and that the Messenger told him it was done by me This was done by Warrant of the High Commission not by me Nor doth he offer any Proof against me but that the Messenger told him so which is a bare Hearsay and no Proof 5 Then he says That there was another Order given about his Business and that I did it But he brings no Proof for this but that Mr. Ingram the then Keeper of the Fleet told him so But this is as bare a Hearsay as the former and Mr. Ingram not produced to make out the Proof 6 Then he says He writ me a Letter and that I sent it to Mr. Attorney to have him yet farther proceeded against 'T is true my Lords he did Write unto me but whether it were a Letter or a Libel I leave other Men to Judge This Letter I did send to Mr. Attorney but only to let him see how I was used not to have any farther proceeding against him But Mr. Attorny was so moved at the sight of it that when he saw me next he told me he would call him Ore tenus for it Therefore it seems somewhat was very much amiss in it call the Writing what you will 7 He says Mr. Attorney thought he had not kept the Letter but he was deceived for he had it But how was Mr. Attorney deceived I 'le tell your Lordships what himself told me When Mr. Attorney saw that I would not agree to any farther Prosecution he sent for Mr. Pryn shewed him the Letter and thought after he had Read it to give him some good Counsel to desist from that Libelling Humour of his But Mr. Pryn after he had got the Letter into his Hands went to the Window as if he meant to read it and while Mr. Attorney was otherwise busied he tare it into small Pieces and threw it out at the Window and then said unto him This shall never rise in Judgment against me Now he confesses he hath the Letter still and that Mr. Attorney was deceived Belike he tare some other Paper for it and put the Letter in his Pocket But that you may see the Honesty of this Man and what Conscience he makes of that which he speaks upon his Oath Here he says he had the Letter still and that Mr. Attorney was deceived And yet after this when he sets out his Breviate of my Life he confesses in an unsavoury Marginal Note That he Tare it Mr. Attorney having need of such a Paper And for this Breviate of his if God lend me Life and Strength to end this first I shall discover to the World the Base and Malicious Slanders with which it is fraught 8 He went on and said There was an Order made against him when Term was done so that he could have no Remedy This is directly against the Court and their Order not against me 9 Then he cites out of the Epistle before my Speech in the Star-Chamber that I Censured him for having his Hand in the Pamphlets of those times and yet was doubtful of it The Words are For I doubt his Pen is in all the Pamphlets But first 't is acknowledged I gave no Vote at all in his Censure And if I did not Judicially Censure him then sure I was not doubtful and yet Censured Secondly he was Censured upon his own Pamphlet And his Hand was certainly in his own what doubt soever I might make of it's being in theirs And Thirdly if the Words be extended to their Pamphlets also that 's nothing to prove I doubted of the Justness of the Sentence For the Words are not I doubt his Pen is in all those Pamphlets of Mr. Burton and Dr. Bastwick but in all the Pamphlets whether their Libels or any others so I might be doubtful of the one and yet certain enough of the other 10 And whereas he adds That he was joyntly Charged with Dr. Bastwick and Mr. Burton yet could not be suffered to speak together for a joynt Answer and that his Cross Bill was refused All this was done by the Court of Star-Chamber not by me And your Lordships know well the Lord Keeper managed the Affairs of that Court not
and not follow it in his own Name himself confesses was made in open Court by Mr. Bierly and that from me he had no Instructions at all 2. The second Witness is Adams in his own Cause To the place of Scripture I have spoken already And the next that he says is That Sir Nath. Brent in my Visitation commanded the setting of the Communion Table at the upper end of the Chancel That upon his not blotting out the passage of Scripture he had an Action and that his Solicitor was Committed by J. Jones till he relinquished his Suit In all this there is not one word of any thing that I did And for that which Sir Nath. Brent did about placing the Communion Table 't is answered before He says also that when he saw that he must Prosecute his Suit against Commissary Dade in his own Name he left the Kingdom And surely my Lords if he would leave the Kingdom rather than Prosecute his Cause in his own Name 't is more than a sign that his Cause was not very good 3. The third Witness was Mr. Cockshot one of Mr. Attorney Banks his Servants He says that Adams moved him and he Mr. Attorney and that thereupon Mr. Attorney gave his Warrant against Dade By which your Lordships may see how active Mr. Cockshot was against a Church-Officer and in so foul a Scandal He says also that Mr. Dade came to Mr. Attorney and told him that I did not think it fit a Prosecution in such a Cause should be followed in Mr. Attorney's Name First 't is true I did not think it fit nor did Mr. Attorney himself when upon Mr. Bierlye's Motion he fully understood it Secondly the Cause being so scandalous to a Church-Officer I conceive I might so say to Mr. Dade or any other without offence But then thirdly here 's not one word that I sent Mr. Dade to Mr. Attorney about it He came and used my Name so Mr. Cockshot says but not one word that I sent him Lastly he says That Mr. Attorney told him that I blamed him for the business and that thereupon he chid this Witness and sent him to me and that I rebuked him for it but he particularly remembers not what I said Nor truly my Lords do I remember any of this But if I did blame Mr. Attorney for lending his Name in such a Scandalous Cause as this I did as I conceive what became me And if he chid his Man he did what became him And if I rebuked Mr. Cockshot when he was sent to me sure he deserved it and it seems it was with no great sharpness that he cannot remember any thing of it And so I answer'd Mr. Browne when he instanced in this 4. The last Witness was Mr. Pryn who says no Appeal was left him But that under Favour cannot be For if my Courts refused him which is more than I know he might have Appealed to the Delegats He says That he advised Adams to an Action of the Case that he blamed Lechford for deserting the Suit and that he advised him to go to Mr. Attorney So here 's no assistance wanting to Adams but the Church-Officer Mr. Dade must have none Yet I blame not Mr. Pryn because he says he did it as his Councel He says farther That when Adams was put to prefer his Bill in his owne Name that then the Excommunication was pleaded in Bar But he doth not say it was pleaded by me or my Advice nor do I hear him say it was unjustly pleaded And had not Adams been wilful he might have taken off the Excommunication and then proceeded as it had pleased him Then the Charge went on against me about the stop of Mr. Bagshawe the Reader of the Middle-Temple The Witnesses are two Lawyers which accompanied Mr. Bagshawe to Lambeth Mr. White and Mr. Pepys They say that Mr. Bagshawe insisted upon these two points First that a Parliament might be held without Bishops and Secondly that Bishops might not meddle in Civil affairs My Lords these things are now setled by an Act of this Parliament but then they were not And I conceive under Favour that Mr. Bagshawe the Crasiness of these Times considered might have bestowed his time better upon some other Argument And sure no Man can think that either my self or any Church-Governour could approve his Judgment in that Particular And whereas they say that the Lord Keeper Finch and the Lord Privy Seal told them that I was the Man that complained of it to the King and the Lords 'T is most true I did so and I think I had been much to blame if I had not done it And if when they came over to Lambeth about it they heard me tell Mr. Bagshawe as they also say they did that he should answer it in the High-Commission Court next Term I humbly conceive this no great Offence but out of all Question no Treason to threaten the High-Commission to a Reader of the Inns of Court The last Charge of this Day was concerning the Lord Chief Justice Richardson and what he suffered for putting down Wakes and other disorderly Meetings in Sommersetshire at the Assises there holden The single Witness to this is Edward Richardson a Kinsman of the Judges as I suppose He says That Complaints were made to the Judge of Wakes and Feasts of Dedication that his Majesty writ Letters about it to Sir Robert Philips and others They Certify a Command comes by the Lord Keeper to revoke the Order next Assises First 't is not done Then by Command from the Lords of the Council the Judge upon that second Command revokes it but as 't is Certified not fitly In all this here 's not one Word that concerns me Then he says That upon this last Certificate the business was referred to the Lord Marshal and my self and the Judge put from that Circuit I cannot now remember what Report we made But what e're it was the Lord Marshal agreed to it as well as I. Then a Letter of mine was produced of Octob. 4. 1633. But the Letter being openly read nothing was found amiss in it And under your Lordships Favour I am still of Opinion that there is no Reason the Feasts should be taken away for some Abuses in them and those such as every Justice of Peace is able by Law to remedy if he will do his Duty Else by this kind of proceeding we may go back to the old Cure and Remedy Drunkenness by rooting out all the Vines the Wine of whose Fruit causes it As for the Pretences which this Witness spake of they were none of mine as appears Evidently by the Letter it self As an Appendix to these was added a Letter of my Secretary Mr. Dell to Sir John Bridgman Chief Justice of Chester in a Cause of one Ed. Morris It was as I think it appears upon an Incroachment made in the Marches Court upon the Church In which Case I conceive by my Place
with me and that he went not out of Town till I had agreed to the Mitigation that in all that time there was no Tender of Sack or any thing else unto me and he and Dr. Bailie the only Men with whom I Transacted the whole Business And so much could Dr. Bailie also witness but that as the Times are I could not bring him from Oxford With Mr. Stone himself I never treated For my Steward he is dead three Years since who could have been my Witness clean thorough the Business And when I pressed Mr. Stone at the Bar with the Protestation which he made to me that he had no Relation herein to the Chester-Men he that remembred every Circumstance else said he remembred not that Then I offer'd to take my voluntary Oath of the Truth of it but that was not admitted Then it was pressed that this Bribe must needs be before the Agreement for he says the Sack was sent in to my House ......... and the Mitigation of the Fine into the Exchequer not till ...... But that is nothing For my Agreement was passed and I medled no more with it Yea but he says that Mr. Holford my Servant had Forty Pound more than I agreed upon before he would finish their Business Mr. Holford was the King's Officer for those Returns into the Exchequer And if after my Agreement made he either unduely delaid their Business or Corruptly took any Money from them he is living and must answer for his own Fault Me it cannot concern who did not so much as know of it Mr. Wheat having thus testified in open Parliament before the Lords was within a Day or two called before the Committee there re-examined in private and very strictly touching the time of my Agreement made Then not without some Harshness Commanded not to depart the Town till he heard farther from them This himself afterwards told me Hereupon I resolved to call him again for farther Evidence and if I saw cause to acquaint the Lords with this usage And I did call upon it divers times after but one Delay or other was found and I could never obtain it And such a kind of calling my Witnesses to a private afterreckning is that which was never offer'd any Man in Parliament And here Mr. Brown in summing up my Charge did me a great deal of Right For neither to the Lords nor in the House of Commons did he vouchsafe so much as to name this false base and unworthy Charge of which my greatest Enemies are ready to acquit me 3. The Third Particular was charged by one Mr. Delbridge Who says he was oppressed at the Council-Table by the Lord Keeper Finch That he was advised by Mr. Watkins to give my Secretary Mr. Dell Money to get my Hand to a Petition to the Lord Keeper who he said would not oppose me That Dell took of him One Hundred and Fifty Pounds and procured my Hand to his Petition I remember nothing of this Business and it lies wholly upon my Secretary who being my Sollicitor is here present in Court and desires he may answer the Scandal There 's no touch at all upon me but that he says my Secretary got my Hand to his Petition to the Lord Keeper This Petition of his was either just or unjust If just I committed no Fault in setting my Hand to it If unjust he must confess himself a Dishonest Man to offer to get my Hand to help to Boulster out his Injustice And yet if the Injustice of it were Varnished over with fair Pretences and so kept from my knowledge the Crime is still his own and nothing mine but an Error at most As for Mr. Watkins he did me much wrong if he sent any Man to my House on such an Errand Here my Secretary had leave to speak denied the whole Business and produced Mr. Hollys with whom it was said the Hundred and Fifty Pounds before named should be deposited who to my remembrance said he knew of no such thing 4. The Fourth Instance was A Bond for the Payment of Money as a Fine The Bond found in Sir Jo Lamb's Chamber with a Note upon the back of it for One Hundred Pound received and Sir John by my direction was to call for the rest And here it was said that I used the Name of St Pauls in an illegal way to get Money which might well have been spared For as is aforesaid I had a Broad Seal which gave me all Fines in the High Commission Court to the repairing of the West End of St Pauls and with Power to mitigate And the Fines are the Kings and he may give them by Law The Broad Seal is in the Hands of Mr Holford who is thereby appointed Receiver of all such Fines But is upon Record to be seen and if it be doubted I humbly desire a Salvo till the Record can be taken out and shewed But I presume these Gentlemen have seen it And Commutations for such Crimes as Sir James Price's was are according to Law and the Ancient Custom and Practice in this Kingdom especially where Men of Quality are the Offendors And the Power of Commuting is as Legal in that Court as any other And if that be doubted I humbly desire my Councel may Argue it 5. The Fifth Instance was a Charge concerning a Lease in Lancashire held in three Lives by Sir Ralph Ashton 'T is said by his Son Mr. Ashton the only Witness in the Cause That I by Power at Chester and York and the High-Commission here being Landlord in right of my Arch-Bishoprick did violently wrest this Lease of the Rectory of Whally in Lancashire out of his Hands against Law and made him take a Lease for Years and Pay a great Fine besides and other Fines besides toward the Repair of St Pauls and raised the Rent Sixty Pound Truly my Lords I am not any whit solicitous to answer this Charge I challenged this Lease as void and had great Reason so to do both for the Invalidity of the Lease it self and the unworthiness of the Tenant both to me and my See If in the Preparations for Tryal at Law the Judge at Chester altogether unknown to me and unlaboured by me did say as Mr. Ashton says he did That for higher Powers above he durst not he was the more unworthy And for York I needed no Power there for I resolved to have him called into the High-Commission here which was after done This Gentleman his Son came to me about the Lease I told him plainly it was void in Law and that I meant to overthrow it That if his Father would surrender I would renew it for Years at a reasonable rate but if he put me to Expence in Law I would secure my self as well as Legally I might He replyed That Mr. Solicitor Littleton for so then he was said he durst not be against me And there was good Reason for it he was my Councel and Feed in that Particular And what
Secondly he confesses that when Dr. Bray made stay of them he never complained to me and I cannot remedy that which I do not know Thirdly he confesses that all the time he was in Lambeth-House my Predecessor ever left that care of the Press upon his Chaplains and why I might not do it as well as my Predecessor I do not yet know But he said that he complained to Sir Edmund Scott and desired to be advised by him what he should do And that he Answer'd he thought I would not meddle with that troublesome Business more than my Predecessors had done Be this so yet Sir Ed. Scott never told me this nor is there any the least Proof offer'd that he did But because this and the like passages about Expunging some things out of Books makes such a great Noise as if nothing concerning Popery might be Printed And because Mr. Brown in Summing up of the Charge in the House of Commons warmly insisted upon this Particular I thought it necessary to Answer as follows That what moved my Chaplain to Expunge that large passage against Images I knew not nor could I now know my Chaplain being Dead But that this I was sure of that else-where in those very Sermons there was as plain a passage and full against Images left in And in another place a whole Leaf together spent to prove them Idolaters and that as gross as the Baalists and so he terms them Yea and that the Pope is Antichrist too and not only called so but proved by divers Arguments And not so only but in plain Terms that he is the Whore of Babylon And these passages I then Read out of the Book it self in the House of Commons And many other-like to these there are So my Chaplain might see good Cause to leave out some passages Where so many upon as good Cause were left in But to the Business of leaving the Care of these Books and the overview of them to my Chaplains it was then urged That the Commissary of John Lord Arch-Bishop of York had Excommunicated the Lord Bishop of Durham being then in the King's Service And that the Arch-Bishop himself was deeply Fined for this Act of his Commissary And that therefore I ought much more to be answerable for my Chaplain's Act whom I might put away when I would than he for his Commissary who had a Patent and could not be put out at pleasure Mr. Brown also followed this Precedent close upon me But first there is a great deal of difference in the thing it self My Chaplain's Case being but the leaving out of a passage in a Book to be Printed But his Commissary's Case being the Excommunicating of a great Bishop and he in the King's Service of whose Honour the Laws of this Realm are very tender And Secondly the Bishop and his Official call him Chancellor or Commissary or what you will make but one Person in Law and therefore the Act of the Commissary to the full extent of his Patent is the Act of the Bishop in legal Construction and the Bishop may be answerable for it But the Bishop and his Chaplain are not one Person in any Construction of Law And say he may put away his Chaplain when he will yet that cannot help what is past if ought have been done amiss by him And this was the Answer I insisted on to Mr. Brown Upon my entrance on this days Defence I found my self aggrieved at the Diurnal and another Pamphlet of the Week wherein they Print whatsoever is Charged against me as if it were fully proved never so much as mentioning what or how I Answer'd And that it troubled me the more because as I conceived the passages as there expressed trenched deep upon the Justice and Proceedings of that Honourable House And could have no Aim but to incense the Multitude against me With some difficulty I got these Pamphlets received but there they dyed and the Weekly abuse of me continued to keep my Patience in Breath CAP. XXXV The Thirteenth Day of my Hearing THE First Charge of this Day was the Opinion which was held of me beyond the Seas The first Witness was Sir Henry Mildmaye who as is before related told me without asking That I was the most Hateful Man at Rome that ever sate in my See since the Reformation Now he denied not this but being helped on by good Preparation a Flexible Conscience and a fair leading Interrogatory by Mr. Nicolas Mr. Serjeant Wilde was Sick and came no more till the last day when I made my Recapitulation he minced it And now he says that there were two Factions at Rome and that one of them did indeed speak very ill of me because they thought I aimed at too great a Power here in England But the other Faction spake as well of me because they thought I endeavoured to bring us in England nearer to the Church of Rome But first my Lords this Gentleman's Words to me were Round and General That I was hated at Rome not of a Party or Faction there And my Servants heard him at the same time and are here ready to witness it that he then said the Pope was a goodly Gentleman and did use to ride two or three great Horses in a Morning and but that he was something taller he was as like Auditor Philips who was then at Dinner with me as could be But I pray mark what Wise Men he makes them at Rome One Faction hates me because I aim at too much Power And the other loves me because I would draw England nearer Rome Why if I went about to draw England nearer Rome can any among them be such Fools as to think my Power too great For if I used my Power for them why should any there Condemn me And if I used it against them why should any here Accuse me Non sunt haec benè divisa temporibus These things suit not with the Times or the Dispositions of Rome But the plain Truth is I do not think that ever he was at Rome I after heard a whisper that he only stepped into France for another Cure not to Rome for Curiosity which was the only cause he gave the Lords of his going thither 2. The second Witness was Mr. Challoner He says not much of his own knowledge but of Fame that tatling Gossip yet he told the Lords I was a very Obscure Man till within these Fifteen Years Be it so if he please Yet I have been a Bishop above Three and Twenty Years And 't is Eighteen Years since I was first Dean of his Majesty's Chappel Royal. He says that after this time there was a strong Opinion of Reconciliation to Rome A strong Opinion but a weak Proof For it was an Opinion of Enemies and such as could easily believe what they over-much desired He farther said that some of them were of Opinion that I was a good Roman-Catholick and that
put in were Persons disaffected to the Discipline if not the Doctrine too of the Church of England 3. Thirdly because no small part was given to School-Masters to Season Youth ab Ovo for their Party And to Young Students in the Universities to purchase them and their Judgments to their side against their coming abroad into the Church 4. Fourthly because all this Power to breed and maintain a Faction was in the Hands of Twelve Men who were they never so Honest and free from Thoughts of abusing this Power to fill the Church with Schism yet who should be Successors and what use should be made of this Power was out of Humane reach to know 5. Because this Power was assumed by and to themselves without any Legal Authority as Mr. Attorney assured me He farther said that the Impropriation of Presteen in Radnorshire was specially given to St Antolins in London I say the more the pity considering the poorness of that Country and the little Preaching that was among that poor People and the plenty which is in London Yet because it was so given there was care taken after the Decree that they of St Antolins had consideration and I think to the full He says that indeed they did not give any thing to the present Incumbents till Good Men came to be in their Places Scarce one Incumbent was better'd by them And what then In so many places not one Good Man found Not one Factious enough against the Church for Mr White to account him Good Yet he thinks I disposed these things afterwards to Vnworthy Men. Truly had they been at my disposal I should not wittingly have given them to Mr. White 's Worthies But his Majesty laid his Command upon his Attorney and nothing was done or to be done in these things but by his direction For Dr. Heylin if he spake any thing amiss concerning this Feoffment in any Sermon of his he is Living to Answer it me it concerns not Mr. Brown in the Summ of the Charge omitted not this And I Answer'd as before And in his Reply he turned again upon it that it must be a Crime in me because I projected to overthrow it But under favour this follows not For to project though the word Projector sound ill in England is no more than to forecast and forelay any Business Now as 't is lawful for me by all good and fit Means to project the Settlement of any thing that is good so is it as lawful by good and Legal means to project the overthrow of any thing that is cunningly or apparently Evil. And such did this Feoffment appear to my Understanding and doth still As for reducing of Impropriations to their proper use they may see if they please in my Diary whence they had this another Project to buy them into the Churches use For given they will not be But Mr. Pryn would shew nothing nor Mr. Nicolas see any thing but what they thought would make against me Here this day ended and I was Commanded to Attend again July 15. But was then put off to July 17. which day held CAP. XL. The Eighteenth Day of my Hearing THis day they charged upon me the Twelfth Original Article which follows in these words He hath Trayterously endeavoured to cause Division and Discord between the Church of England and other Reformed Churches and to that end hath Suppressed and Abrogated the Priviledges and Immunities which have been by his Majesty and his Royal Ancestors granted to the French and Dutch Churches in this Kingdom and divers other ways hath expressed his Malice and Disaffection to those Churches that so by such dis-union the Papists might have more advantage for the overthrow and extirpation of both The First Charge is That I deny them to be a Church For they say that I say plainly in my Book against Fisher that No Bishop no Church Now 't is well known they have no Bishops and therefore no Church The Passage in my Book is an Inference of 〈◊〉 Jerom's Opinion no Declaration of my own And if they or any other be agrieved at St. Jerom for writing so they may Answer him Mr. Nicolas added that this was seconded by Bishop Mountague's Book which Mr. Pryn carefully witnessed was found in my Study and Licensed by Dr. Braye Is this Argument come again that Bishop Mountague's Book was in my Study Leave it for shame But they have now left me never a Book in my Study so I cannot make them any fuller Answer without viewing the place than themselves help me to by their own Confession Which is that he adds this Exception that none but a Bishop can Ordain but in Casu Necessitatis which is the Opinion of many Learned and Moderate Divines Yet this is very considerable in the Business whether an inevitable Necessity be cast upon them or they pluck a kind of Necessity upon themselves The Second Charge is out of a Letter of mine to Bishop Hall upon a Letter which he had formerly sent me In which it seems is something about the Case of Necessity in point of Ordination which they say I disliked And it seems I disliked upon good ground For he had given me power under his Hand to alter what I would in that which he sent unto me I would not take that power but writ back to him what passages I thought might be better expressed if it could agree with his Judgment also Hereupon he sent me another Letter of Jan. 18. 1639. In which he altered those things which I put to his farther Consideration Could any thing be more fairly carried And this Letter was read to the Lords Yea but they say I disliked the giving of this Title Antichrist to the Pope No I did not simply dislike it but I advised Bishop Hall if he thought it good not to affirm it so positively And the Reason I gave was this That King James being pressed upon a great occasion that he had maintained that the Pope was Antichrist which might much trouble if not quite cross some Proceedings much desired by that Prudent King His Majesty made Answer I maintain it not as a point of Faith but as a probable Opinion And for which I have more grounds than the Pope hath for his Challenge of Temporal Power over Princes Let him recall this Opinion and I 'll recall that This I writ to the Bishop but left him free to do what he pleased Here Mr. Nicolas fell extream foul upon me in so much that I could not but wonder at their patience which heard him Among other Titles bestowed upon me many and gross he called me over and over again Pander to the Whore of Babylon I was much moved and humbly desired the Lords that if my Crimes were such as that I might not be used like an Arch-Bishop yet I might be used like a Christian And that were it not for the Duty which I owe to God and my
Chamber-Fellow in Oxford when we were Boys together I am sure he was then no Priest and he was but a Boy when he left the College He confesses that I gave Order to observe who and how many resorted to Embassadours Houses and Signior Conn's and says he thought I could prove it But I believe he would never have confessed it but that he knew I could prove it And thereupon I shewed the Lords many Papers certifying me what Numbers were found resorting to each place respectively And Thomas Mayo's Hand to many of those Papers He says he took one Peter Wilford and brought him to me to Whitehall while Sir Jo. Lambe was with me But he confesses withal that Wilford then shewed Mr. Secretary Windebank's Warrant to Discharge him And then what could I do to him Nay I have some Cause to think he would never have apprehended him had he not known he had that Warrant Lastly he says that once at the Star-Chamber I told him he was too quick and nimble for me And I hope it is no Treason if I did say so Nor could I mean he was too quick in apprehending Priests for I found both him and his Fellows after Crosse's Death slow enough at that But if I said so it was because I could not tell how to trust his Shifting and his Wyliness 4. The Fourth Witness was Elizabeth Graye Wife to another Messenger And this is a very fine Witness For first she says Her Husband was committed by my Means And then with a Breath she says She doth not know by whom he was committed but she thinks by Secretary Windebank and me But since she doth not know but think only I hope her Thinking can be no Evidence She says that she delivered me a Petition and that I flung it away saying I would not meddle with any Priest-catching Knave The Witness single and I doubt doating and the Words far from Treason 5. The Fifth Witness was John Cooke a Messenger too and one that for his Misdemeanour had stood in the Pillory This I urged against him as unfit to witness against me My Witness that saw him in the Pillory was so threatned that he sent me word he durst not come I may not say from whom this Threatning came But the thing was so true that Cooke himself confessed it but excused the Cause And his Testimony received He told how Fisher the Jesuit was taken by Graye That when he was brought to the Council-Table Secretary Cooke and I went to the King to know his Pleasure about him That we brought back word from his Majesty to the Lords that he should be Banished All this while here 's no hurt done Then he says that notwithstanding this Order of his Majesty Graye and he met Fisher at Liberty by a Warrant from Secretary Windebank That hereupon Graye repaired to Secretary Cooke and to me and that Dell told him I would not meddle with it My Secretary must answer this I remember it not But if Mr. Dell received any such Answer from me that I would not meddle with it there were two apparent Reasons for it One that I would not meddle with it alone his Majesty's Order being to all the Lords The other that Fisher was the Man I had written against and Men would have been apt to say that when I could not answer I sought means to destroy So I no way fit alone at least to meddle with him of all Men. He says that Graye was committed to the Fleet for Railing on me in my own House Yet he confesses that he was not committed by me And I presume your Lordships will think there was Cause of his Commitment if he did Rail upon me And 't is confessed by Mr. Pryn though he had then received no Answer from my self that he said he saw now how the Game went and hoped e're long to see better Days c. He says that Smith alias Fludd desired Sir Kenelm Digbye as he was going to Lambeth to tell me that he could not Dine with me that Day but desired his Business might be remembred No such Man ever Dined at my Table to my knowledge And if any Priest would say so to Sir Kenelm how could I possibly hinder it And Sir Kenelm when this Cooke was Examined was a Prisoner in Winchester-House why was not he Examined to sift out this Truth If Truth be in it 6. The Sixth Witness was John Thresher a Messenger too He says that he took Mors and Goodwin two Priests and that Secretary Windebank took away his Warrant and dismissed them saying he would speak with me about it And that when he came to me I was angry with him about the Warrant Mr. Secretary Windebank will I hope be able to answer for his own Actions Why he dismiss'd the Priests I know not But he had great Reason to take away his Warrant And I a greater Reason to be angry with him for it For no Warrant can issue from the High-Commission Court but under three of their Hands at least Now Thresher having gotten my Hand to the Warrant never goes for more Hands but proceeds in his Office upon this unwarrantable Warrant Had not I Reason to be offended at this He says that at the same time I said that Graye was an ill-tongued Fellow and that if he kept him Company I should not regard him I had good Cause to say this and more considering how Graye had us'd me And I believe no Arch-Bishop would have born his Words Lastly he says that by a Warrant from me he Arrested Sir Toby Matthewe and that the Earl of Strafford stayed him from going to Prison saying he should answer it before the Lords Here by the Witness himself it appears that I did my Duty And Sir Toby did appear before the Lords as was assumed he should In the mean time I was complained of to the Queen And a great Lady who perhaps made the Complaint stood by and made her self Merry to hear me chid The Queen was pleased to send to the Lords and Sir Toby was released Where my Fault was in all this I do not yet see 7. The last of these famous Witnesses was Goldsmith Who says nothing but that one Day before the High-Commission Court began I forewarned the Messengers of that Court of Graye in regard he was openly spoken against at the Council-Table Which all things considered I had great Reason to do He says likewise that then Graye's Wife tender'd me a Petition which I rejected saying I would meddle with no Priest-catching Knaves I think his Carriage deserv'd no better of me than to reject his Petition But as for the Words I cannot own them let the Goldsmith look to it that he have not Forged them And I would very willingly know whether when the Apostle required that an Accusation should not be received against an Elder but under two or three Witnesses 1 Tim. 5. he had any meaning they should be such as
were brought up against me My very Pockets searched and my Diary nay my very Prayer-Book taken from me and after used against me And that in some Cases not to prove but to make a Charge Yet I am thus far glad even for this sad Accident For by my Diary your Lordships have seen the Passages of my Life And by my Prayer-Book the greatest Secrets between God and my Soul So that you may be sure you have me at the very bottom Yet blessed be God no Disloyalty is found in the one no Popery in the other 3 That all Books of Council-Table Star-Chamber High-Commission Signet-Office my own Registeries and the Registeries of Oxford and Cambridge have been most exquisitely searched for matter against me and kept from me and my use and so affording me no help towards my Defence 4. I humbly desire your Lordships to remember in the Fourth Place That the things wherein I took great Pains and all for the Publick Good and Honour of this Kingdom and Church without any the least Eye to my own Particular nay with my own great and large Expences have been objected against me as Crimes As namely the Repair of S. Pauls and the Setling of the Statutes of the Vniversity of Oxford 1 For S. Pauls not the Repair it self they say no for very shame they dare not say that though that be it which Galls the Faction but the Demolishing of the Houses which stood about it Yea but without taking down of these Houses it was not possible to come at the Church to repair it which is a known Truth And they were taken down by Commission under the Broad Seal And the Tenants had Valuable Consideration for their several Interests according to the number of their Years remaining And according to the Judgment of Commissioners named for that purpose and named by his Majesty and the Lords not by me Nor did I ever so much as sit with them about this Business And if the Commission it self were any way Illegal as they urge it is that must reflect upon them whose Office was to Draw and Seal it not on me who understood not the Legality or Illegality of such Commissions nor did I desire that any one circumstance against Law should be put into it nor is any such thing so much as offered in Proof against me And because it was pressed that these Houses could not be pulled down but by Order of Parliament and not by the King's Commission alone I did here first read in part and afterwards according to a Salvo granted me deliver into the Court Three Records two in Ed. 1. Time and one in Ed. 3. Time in which are these Words Authoritate nostra Regali prout opus fuerit cessantibus quibuscunque Appellationum Reclamationum diffugiis Juris Scripti aut Patriae strepitu procedatis Nova AEdificia quae c. amoveri divelli penitus faciatis c. And a little after Quousque per nos cum deliberatione avisamento nostri Consilii super hoc aliter fuerit Ordinatum c. Here 's no staying for a Parliament here 's no Recompence given here 's Barring of all Appeal nay all remedy of Law though written And all this by the King 's own Authority with the Advice of his Council And is a far more moderate way taken by me yet under the same Authority and for the removal of far greater Abuses and for a more noble End become Treason 2 As for the Statutes of Oxford the Circumstances charged against me are many and therefore I craved leave to refer my self to what I had already answered therein 5. Fifthly Many of the Witnesses brought against me in this Business are more than suspected Sectaries and Separatists from the Church which by my place I was to punish and that exasperated them against me whereas by Law no Schismatick ought to be received against his Bishop And many of these are Witnesses in their own Causes and pre-examined before they come in Court At which pre-examination I was not present nor any for me to cross-interrogate Nay many Causes which took up divers Days of Hearing in Star-Chamber High-Commission and at Council-Table are now upon the sudden easily overthrown by the Depositions of the Parties themselves And upon what Law this is grounded I humbly submit to your Lordships And such as these are the Causes of Mr. Pryn Mr. Burton Mr. Wilson Alderman Chambers Mr. Vassal Mr. Waker Mr. Huntly Mr. Foxlye and many other Where I humbly represent also how impossible it is for any Man that sits as a Judge to give an account of all the several Motives which directed his Conscience in so divers Causes and so many Years past as these have been and where so many Witnesses have been Examined as have been here produced against me My Lords above a Hundred and Fifty Witnesses and some of them Three Four Six Times over and Mr. Pryn I know not how often Whereas the Civil Law says expresly that the Judges should moderate things so that no Man should be oppressed by the multitude of Witnesses which is a kind of Proof too that they which so do distrust the truth and goodness of their Cause Besides my Lords in all matters which came before me I have done nothing to the uttermost of my Understanding but what might conduce to the Peace and Welfare of this Kingdom and the maintenance of the Doctrine and Discipline of this Church established by Law and under which God hath blessed this State with so great Peace and Plenty as other Neighbouring Nations have looked upon with Admiration And what Miserie 's the overthrow of it which God in Mercy forbid may produce he alone knows 6. Sixthly my Lords there have been many and different Charges laid upon me about Words But many of them if spoken were only passionate and hasty And such upon what occasion soever drawn from me and I have had all manner of Provocations put upon me may among humane Errours be pardoned unto me if so it please your Lordships But for such as may seem to be of a higher Nature as those witnessed by Sir Henry Vane the Elder I gave my Answer again now fully to the Lords but shall not need to repeat it here 7. Then my Lords for my Actions not only my own but other Mens have been heavily Charged against me in many Particulars and that Criminally and I hope your Lordships will think Illegally As Secretary Windebank's Bishop Montague's my Chaplains Dr. Heilyn's Dr. Cosens Dr. Pocklinton's Dr. Dove's Mr. Shelford's and divers others And many of these Charges look back into many Years past Whereas the Act made this present Parliament takes no notice of nor punishes any Man for any thing done and past at the Council-Table Sar-Chamber or High-Commission much less doth it make any thing Treason And out of this Act I am no way Excepted Besides as I have often Pleaded all Acts done in in the Star-Chamber
not to the Commons Yet how to help my self I knew not for when the Warrant came to me the Lords House was risen and I was commanded to the House of Commons the next Morning before the Lords came to Sit So I could not Petition them for any Priviledge And had I done it I doubt it would have been interpreted for an Endeavour to make a Breach between the Houses And should I have under any Pretence refused to go Mr. Lieutenant would have carried me Therefore on Saturday Novemb. 2. I went according to the Warrant to the House of Commons So soon as ever I was come to the Barr Mr. Speaker told me There was an Ordinance drawn up to Attaint me of High Treason but that they would not pass it 'till they had heard a Summary of the Charge which was laid against me and that I was sent for to hear it also I humbly besought them that my Councel and my Solicitor who were always present with me in the Lords House might stand now by me But it would not be granted Then Mr. Brown by Order from the Speaker delivered the Collection and Sum of the Charge against me much at one with that which he formerly made in the Lords House Now I took Notes of it as exactly as I could He had no sooner done but Mr. Speaker pressed me to make Answer presently I humbly besought the House I might not be put to that the Charge being long and various but that I might have Time and that my Councel might be heard for Matter of Law I was commanded to withdraw And when I was called in again I received an Order peremptory to Answer the Munday sev'n-night after To such Things as the Reporter was mistaken in But not a word of Hearing my Councel I returned to my Prison This Wednesday Novemb. 6. I got my Prayer-Book by the help of Mr. Hern and Mr. Brown out of Mr. Pryn's hands where it had been ever since the last of May 1643. Munday Novemb. 11. I came to the House of Commons again and according to their peremptory Order made my Answer to the Summary Charge which Mr. Brown made against me But here I shall advertise the Reader That to avoid troublesom and tedious Repetition I shall not set down my Answer at large as there I spake it because there is nothing in it but what is in my former Answers the Beginning and the End only excepted But it was necessary for me then to make a whole and an entire Answer because the House of Commons had then heard no Part of my Defence But I presume the Charitable Reader will look upon my Answers in their proper place rather than be troubled a second time with the same thing Yet because Mr. Brown went a different way in his Summary from the Charge largely given I shall represent a Skeleton of my Answer with all the Limbs of it entire that it may be seen as it were together though I report nothing which hath been already said And thus I began Mr. Speaker I was here Novemb. 2. It was the first time that ever I came within these Doors And here then you gave me the most uncomfortable Break-fast that ever I came to namely That this Honourable House had drawn up an Ordinance against me of High Treason but that before they would proceed farther I should hear the Sum of the Charge which was against me which was the cause I was sent for then And to give my Answer to that which was then said or rather mistaken in saying and inferring is the cause of my coming now 1. And first Mr. Speaker I give Thanks to this Honourable House that they have given me leave to speak for my self 2. Secondly I do humbly desire if any Word or Thing should be mistaken or unadvisedly expressed by me which shall be sore against my Will I may have liberty to re-call and expound my self 3. Thirdly That you will favourably consider into what Straits I am cast that after a long and tedious Hearing I must now come to answer to a Sum or an Epitome of the same Charge which how dangerous it may be for me all Men that know Epitomes cannot but understand Mr. Speaker I am come hither to make a Brief of my Answer to a Sum of my Charge wherein I may receive as much Detriment by my own Brief for want of larger Expression as by the other of my Charge by omission or mistake Yet since your Command is upon me I shall without farther Preface which I conceive would be as tedious to you as to me troublesom address my self and with as much Brevity as the many Heads of the Charge will bear And that my Answer may be the clearer both to this Honourable House and to the Gentleman who reported the Charge I shall follow every thing in the same order he proceeded in So far forth at least as an old slow Hand could take them a heavy Heart observe them and an old decayed Memory retain them This worthy Gentleman hath pressed all things as hardly against me as the Cause can any way bear That was his Duty to this Honourable House and it troubles me not But his Carriage and Expressions were civil towards me in this my great Affliction And for this I render him humble and hearty Thanks having from other Hands pledged my Saviour in Gall and Vinegar and drunk up the Cup of the Scornings of the People to the very bottom This Gentleman began with four Generals which he said I complained of and I say I had cause so to do The first Complaint was That I had lain three Years in Prison before I was heard And this he said was my own fault because I delayed the putting in of my full Answer when I was called But herein he is quite mistaken For I could not answer till I was called and I was not called in three Years Nor then could I plead to more Articles than were put to me Nor did this delay Three Months of the Three Year Yet this Gentleman in his Reply said still it was my Fault because I did not Petition to be brought to Hearing But this under Favour is a Weaker Reason than the former For the condition of the Times considered neither my Councel nor my other Friends nor my self could think that a fit or a discreet way Besides it is well known that had I Petitioned I could not have been Heard my Business being in a manner cast aside till Mr. Pryn's Malice actuated by a Search into my own Papers undertook it The Gentleman said my Second Complaint was That my Papers were Seized But he said that was done by Authority And I never denyed that But that which he added is much mistaken namely that I ever Seized any Man's Papers without Authority or by my own Power but what was done in that kind was by the Joynt Authority of that Court in which I then sat Nor
trouble him indeed For there 's cause enough why he should fear that he may lie under not Misapprehensions but very just Apprehensions in respect of Matters of this nature since 't is manifest that he separates himself as Sectaries use to do from the Common Prayers of the Church And those such as were composed by such Bishops and other Divines as suffered some of them to Martyrdom for the Truth of CHRIST And those such also as were a second time under the prosperous Reign of Queen Elizabeth confirmed by Act of Parliament So that his Lordship separating himself from those Prayers which were made by the One and confirmed by the Other must needs be apprehended as a Sectary whether you look upon Church or State But my Lord tells you That you will perceive by that which he shall say how far this concerns me And therefore I pray you observe it diligently for I cannot yet conceive how any thing else that belongs to a Sectary can concern me or any thing else much which his Lordship can say against me My Lord of Canterbury A Man of mean Birth Bred up in a College and that too frequently falls out to be in a Faction whose narrow Comprehension extended it self no farther than to carry on a Side in a College or canvas for a Proctor's Place in the Vniversity This concerns me indeed and very nearly for I see his Lordship resolves to rake me up from my very Birth a way unusual for Men well-bred and little beseeming a Person of Honour especially thus to insult upon a Fallen Fortune But yet it concerns me not in any relation to a Sectary unless his Lordship would possess the World that I was bred in Faction and so like enough to prove one But how my Lord is mistaken in this will plainly appear First then 't is true I am a Man of ordinary but very honest Birth and the Memory of my Parents savours very well to this day in the Town in Reading where I was born Nor was I so meanly born as perhaps my Lord would insinuate for my Father had born all Offices in the Town save the Mayoralty And my immediate Predecessor whom I am sure my Lord himself accounted very worthy of his Place was as meanly born as my self his Father being of the same Trade in Guilford that mine was of in Reading But all this of my Birth might well have been spared for my Lord knows well enough Miserum est aliorum incumbere famae Ne collapsa ruant subductis tecta columnis And that which follows in the Satyrist And had my Birth been meaner than it was that would not have impaired me among Men of Understanding And howsoever this Advantage I have I have done Honour to my Birth which every Man hath not done that hath had an Honourable Descent To my Birth his Lordship adds That I was bred up in a College That 's true But 't is as true that his Lordship was bred up in a College also and of the same Vniversity And therefore so far he speaks as much against Himself as me But I hope he intends not to charge being bred in a College as a Fault upon either of us And though it too frequently falls out that Colleges be in a Faction for that also is too truly observed by his Lordship yet that is no Fault in any Man who neither Causes nor Nourishes the Faction But that which his Lordship charges next upon me is both a Weakness and a Fault if true Weakness That my Comprehensions are narrow And a Fault because they extended no farther than to carry on a Side in the College or a canvas for a Proctor's Place in the Vniversity For the Weakness first My Comprehensions as narrow as they are are yet as large as God hath been pleased to make them and as large as my hard Study accompanied with his Grace hath been able to stretch them And so large I am sure they are as that I have ever looked carefully upon the whole Catholick Church of Christ spread upon the Face of the whole Earth And therefore certainly my Comprehensions are not so narrow as theirs whose largest cannot or will not look upon one entire National Church nay a Parochial is too big for them and a Conventicle big enough Nor did my narrow Comprehensions ever reject that great Body the Catholick Church out of the Creed as some of late have done whose Comprehensions are not for all that censured by his Lordship for their Narrowness Next for the Fault That 's twofold First My Comprehensions went no farther says my Lord than to carry on a Side in a College Here my Lord is either utterly mistaken or which is worse in a wilful Errour For while I was Fellow of St. John Baptist's College where I was bred it is well known I never made nor held up any Side Indeed when I was Chosen President of that College there was a bitter Faction both Raised and Countenanced against me I will forbear to relate how and by whom But this is certain I made no Party then For Four being in Nomination for that Headship I lay then so sick at London that I was neither able to go down nor so much as write to my Friends about it yet after much Tumble a major part of the Votes made choice of me Thus I was chosen President May 10. 1611. After this my Election was quarrelled at and great means made against me insomuch that the most Gracious King King James sate to hear the Cause Himself for the space of full three Hours Aug. 28. at Tichburn in Hampshire as he returned out of the Western Progress Upon this Hearing his Majesty approved my Election and commanded my Settlement which was done accordingly at Michaelmas following But the Faction in the College finding such Props above as they had continued very eager and bitter against me The Audit of the College for the Year's Accompts and Choice of New Officers followed in November There so God Blessed me with Patience and Moderation in the Choice of all Offices that I made all quiet in the College And for all the Narrowness of my Comprehensions I Govern'd that College in Peace without so much as the shew of a Faction all my Time which was near upon Eleven Years And the Truth of all this is notoriously known and many yet living of great Worth in the Church able and ready to avow it And this I hope was not to lead on a Side Secondly My Lord charges my narrow Comprehensions as reaching no farther than a canvas for a Proctor's Place I was with Thanks to their Love that thought me Worthy chose Proctor of the Vniversity so soon as by Statute I was capable of it But I never medled in the managing of the canvas for it for my self Nor afterwards for any other while I continued Fellow of the College When I was chosen President I continued so for two Years and medled not in
apply this term unto are the Brownists as they call them by another Name and they know their Tenents The truth is they differ with us in no Fundamental Point of Doctrine or saving Truth I know Here then my Lord is 〈◊〉 to say that all that he hath hitherto said is so far from making him the greatest Separatist in England that it cannot argue him to be any at all For my part I would to God it were so But let 's examine whether it be so or not First then this I humbly conceive is certain That he whoever he be that will not Communicate in Publick Prayers with a National Church which serves God as she ought is a Separatist But the Church of England as it stands established by Law serves God as she ought Therefore my Lord by his general absenting himself from her Communion in Prayers is a Separatist And this is by his own confession For he says a little before and that expresly that this is a Separation which every Man must make that will keep himself pure from other Mens Sins And I cannot doubt but his Lordship hath made that which he says he must make All that can be said for my Lord herein is this First That my Lord Charges the Church of England with Corruptions in the Worship of God and such Corruptions as he must Separate from her But is it sufficient for a Separation for a particular Man barely to say there are such Corruptions in the Liturgy when he doth neither prove them to be such nor so much as name them what they are Surely no. And I think these Gnats which his Lordship strains at may be swallowed without any Offence to God or Man So far are they from being a just Cause of Separation Therefore for all this my Lord is a Separatist Yea but my Lord charges upon the Church of England that she injoyns her Liturgy upon all Men by a certain Number of Men usurping Authority to themselves and imposing this Injunction under the name of the Church I have made answer already to this Power of the Church to compose a set Form for publick Service and I hope made it manifest that this Authority is not usurped And then that can be no just Cause of a Separation Nay I must doubt whether if such Authority were usurped by some Church-Men in any National Church the injoyning of the Service after it is made supposing always that it contain no Idolatry or Fundamental Error be for the Injunction alone a sufficient Warrant to my Lord or any other to Separate Therefore my Lord 's forsaking the publick Service of the Church upon no better Grounds than these makes him a Separatist by his own Confession without any Man calling him so As for his Lordship's being the greatest Separatist in England I have at the beginning of this Tract clearly related to the uttermost of my Memory what and upon what occasion I spake of his Lordship in this kind But whether I said it or not my Lord for ought I see will hardly escape being so For he is the greatest Separatist from the Church that absents himself with most will and least cause And this if I mistake not is my Lord's Case for he separates with most will that says Men must and ought to Separate And upon least Cause because as yet he hath Named none at all but Corruptions in general which any Man may say and the Injunction of a set Form which is no cause Therefore for ought I yet see it may truly be said of his Lordship that he is the greatest Separatist in England Especially if you add to this how busie and active his Lordship is and for many Years hath been to promote this Cause of Separation And I have some very good grounds to think that his Lordship hath been and is the great Cause and enlarger of all the Separation that now is in Church Affairs And of all the Disobedience thereby bred or cherished against Soveraign Power Next my Lord appeals to my Lords the Bishops and tells them that they know that they whom they usually apply this Name Separatist unto are the Brownists as they call them by another Name I know not all things which the rest of my Learned Brethren the Bishops know Yet I think both they and I know this that the Name Separatist is a common Name to all Hereticks or Schismaticks that separate for their Opinions sakes either from the Catholick or from any particular Orthodox Church And if my Lord himself who it seems is well acquainted with them or any of my Lords the Bishops do know that this Name is usually applyed to the Brownists be it so That I am sure is not material unless it be for that which my Lord closes this passage withal Namely that my Lords the Bishops know the Tenents of the Brownists and that the truth is they differ from us in no Fundamental Point of Doctrine or Saving Truth that his Lordship knows I doubt not but my Lords the Bishops know the Tenents of the Brownists so far forth at least as they be Tenents and not varied from and so far as they are their General Tenents to which all or most of them agree And so far as they are plain and univocal Tenents and not such as shall equivocate with the very Faith it self But such Tenents of the Brownists as these are it may be all my Lords the Bishops know not Now if the Truth be as my Lord says it is for ought he knows that the Brownists differ from us in no Fundamental Point of Doctrine or saving Truth Then out of all doubt Majus peccatum habent their Sin and my Lord 's too is the greater that they will so Uncharitably and with so great Heat and setled Violence and to the great scandal of Religion first separate themselves from and now labour utterly to overthrow that Church which by my Lord 's own Confession here differs not from them in any Fundamental Point of Doctrine or saving Truth For sure if they differ not from us we differ not from them But this is only Argumentum ad Hominem and is sufficient to convince this Lord I think in his own way But I doubt the Truth is quite another thing Namely that the Church of England is very Orthodox and that the Brownists or Separatists call them as you will do Separate upon false and unchristian Opinions And that besides Matters of Opinion and breach of Charity they do differ from us in some Fundamental Points of Doctrine and saving Truth My Lord a little before tells us of Corruptions in the Liturgy of the Church but names none And should I charge the Brownists with difference from the Church in Fundamental Points of Doctrine and yet name none I should run into the same fault for which I there taxed my Lord I shall therefore give some Instances of some of their Opinions and then leave the indifferent Reader to judge whether
he hath made stay of that they may be reduced into Years for the good of that See which abundantly needs it My Lord Bishop of Winchester Certifies that there is all Peace and Order in his Diocess and that himself and his Clergy have duly Obeyed your Majesty's Instructions But he Informs that in the Parish of Avington in Hampshire one Vnguyon an Esquire is Presented for a new Recusant as also Three others whereof Two are in Southwark These Three Bishops for their several Diocesses respectively make return that all Obedience is yielded to every of your Majesty's Instructions The late Bishop of St Davids now of Hereford hath in his time of Residence taken a great deal of pains in that See and hath caused Two to be questioned in the High Commission and Suspended one Roberts a Lecturer for Inconformity Three or four others which were Suspended he hath released upon hope given of their Obedience to the Church and hath absolutely deprived Two for their exceeding Scandalous Life He complains much and surely with cause enough that there are few Ministers in those poor and remote places that are able to Preach and Instruct the People My Lord the Bishop informs that that County is very full of Impropriations which makes the Ministers poor and their Poverty makes them fall upon Popular and Factious courses I doubt this is too true but it is a Mischief hard to cure in this Kingdom yet I have taken all the care I can and shall continue so to do From the rest of the Bishops of my Province I have received no Certificat this Year viz. Covent and Litchfield Worcester Bangor So I humbly submit this my Certificat W. CANT The Arch-Bishop's Accounts of his Province to the King for the Year 1636. May it please your Sacred Majesty ACcording to your Royal Commands expressed in your late Instructions for the good of the Church I do here most humbly present my Yearly Account for my Diocess and Province of Canterbury for this last Year ending at Christmass 1636. And First for my own Diocess I have every Year acquainted your Majesty and so must do now that there are still about Ashford and Egerton divers Brownists and other Separatists But they are so very mean and poor People that we know not what to do with them They are said to be the Disciples of one Turner and Fennar who were long since apprehended and imprisoned by Order of your Majesty's High Commission Court But how this part came to be so infected with such a Humour of Separation I know not unless it were by too much connivence at their first beginning Neither do I see any Remedy like to be unless some of their chief Seducers be driven to Abjure the Kingdom which must be 〈◊〉 by the Judges at the Common Law but is not in our power I have received Information from my Officers that the Walloons and other Strangers in my Diocess especially at Canterbury do come orderly to their Parish Churches and there receive the Sacraments and Marry c. according to my Injunctions with that limitation which your Majesty allowed There have been heretofore many in Canterbury that were not conformable to Church Discipline and would not kneel at the Communion but they are all now very Conformable as I hear expresly by my Officers and that there is no falling away of any to Recusancy There hath been a Custom that some Ministers thereabouts have under divers pretences lived for the most part at Canterbury and gone seldom to their Benefices which hath given a double Scandal both by their absence from their several Cures and by keeping too much Company and that not in the best manner I have seen this remedied in all save only one Man and if he do not presently Conform I have taken order for his Suspension In the Diocess of London I find that my Lord the Bishop there now by your Majesty's Grace and Favour Lord High Treasurer of England hath very carefully observed those Instructions which belong to his own Person And for the Diocess his Lordship Informs me of three great Misdemeanours The one committed by Dr Cornelius Burges who in a Latin Sermon before the Clergy of London uttered divers insolent passages against the Bishops and Government of the Church and refused to give his Lordship a Copy of the Sermon so there was a necessity of calling him into the High Commission Court which is done The second Misdemeanour is of one Mr Wharton a Minister in Essex who in a Sermon at Chelmesford uttered many unfit and some scurrilous things But for this he hath been Convented and received a Canonical Admonition And upon his sorrow and submission any farther Censure is forborn The third Misdemeanour which my Lord complains of is the late spreading and dispersing of some Factious and Malicious Pamphlets against the Bishops and Government of the Church of England And my Lord farther Certifies that he hath reasonable ground to perswade him that those Libellous Pamphlets have been Contrived or Abetted and dispersed by some of the Clergy of his Diocess and therefore desires me to use the Authority of the High Commission for the further discovery of this Notorious practice to prevent the Mischiefs which will otherwise ensue upon the Government of the Church This God willing I shall see performed But if the High Commission shall not have Power enough because one of those Libels contains Seditious Matter in it and that which is very little 〈◊〉 of Treason if any thing at all then I humbly crave leave to add this to my Lord Treasurer's Motion and humbly to desire that your Majesty will call it into a higher Court if you find Cause since I see no likelyhood but that these Troubles in the Church if they be permitted will break out into some Sedition in the Common-wealth My Visitation is yet depending for this Diocess and by reason of the Sickness I could not with safety hold it nor think it fit to gather so much People together but God willing I shall perform that Duty so soon as conveniently I may and then Certifie your Majesty at the next return what shall come under mine own view In this Diocess I find by my Lord's Report from his Officers that there are divers Recusants in several parts of the Country and that some of them have been seduced away from the Church of England within these two or three Years For all things else I receive no complaint thence save only of three or four Ministers that are negligent in Catechising and observe it not at all or but in the Lent only But I shall call upon the Bishop to see this remedied and to be as vigilant as he can against any farther increase of Recusants From Bath and Wells I have received a very good and happy Certificat both that all your Majesty's Instructions have been exactly performed throughout that whole Diocess And
Answer and assures me that by his care and vigilancy they shall all be rectified and that out of hand My Lord informs me that in his Predecessor Bishop Whites absence he living most commonly at London being your Majesty's Almoner there was cut down and wasted above a Thousand Loads of Wood. For all other businesses they are in good condition within that Diocess saving that my Lord the Bishop humbly craves leave hereby to represent a great grievance to your Majesty which concerns the Bishoprick the Dean and Chapter and all other Clergy Men or indeed rather all your Majesty's Liege People inhabiting within the Isle of Ely In this Diocess the Bishop found out one Jeffryes who commonly Administred the Blessed Sacrament of the Eucharist being either not in Holy Orders at all or at least not a Priest So soon as he was discovered he slipt out of the Diocess and the Bishop thinks that he now serves in a Peculiar under the Dean and Chapter of Wells I will send thither to know the certainty and see the abuse punished if I can light upon the Person The Bishop further Certifies me that there are very many within that small Diocess who stand Excommunicate and divers of them only for not payment of Fees And again that many of these are not able to pay them I think it were not amiss that once every Year in Lent the Chancellor were commanded to take an Account of all the Excommunicats in the Diocess and to cause all to be Absolved that shall be fit for Absolution and particularly to see that no Man be suffered to continue Excommunicated where nothing but Poverty hinders the payment of Duties or other Fees The Bishop likewise informs me that Monuments even of obscure and mean Persons are grown very common in those Parts and prejudicial both to the Walls and Pillars and Liberty of Churches which the Bishop opposes as much and as fairly as he can But all is too little There were in this Diocess the last year but two Refractory Ministers known to the Bishop Mr. Wroth and Mr Erbury The former hath submitted but the other would neither submit nor satisfie his Parishioners to whom he had given publick offence so he resigned his Vicarage and hath left thereby the Diocess in peace For this Diocess the Bishop humbly craves your Majesty's Pardon for his longer stay in London than ordinary and professes his Excuse formerly made to your Majesty to be most true viz. That he was forced to it by extremity of Sickness falling upon him in those parts and forcing his change of Air. That Diocess hath been a little out of quiet this year by some Mens medling with those nice Questions which your Majesty hath forbidden should be commonly preached in the Pulpit But the Relation being somewhat imperfect I shall inform my self farther and then give your Majesty such Account as I receive In this Diocess the Bishop Certifies me two considerable things and both of them are of difficult Cure The one concerns his Bishoprick where every thing is let for Lives by his Predecessors to the very Mill that Grinds his Corn. The other concerns the Diocess in general where by Reason of the Poverty of the Place all Clergy-Men of Hope and Worth seek Preferment elsewhere And he tells me plainly some weak Scholars must be Ordained or else some Cures must be left altogether unsupplied My Lord of Glocester confesseth he hath been absent from his Diocess a good part of this Year being kept from his Dwelling-Houses by the Infection at Glocester which just Cause of Absence he humbly submits to your most gracious Majesty Concerning that Diocess the Bishop speaks not much more But the Arch-Deacon at his Visitation finding the Clergy conformable gave them this grave and fitting Admonition viz. That no Man should presume his conformity should excuse him if in the mean time his Life were Scandalous Which was very necessary for that Place and these Times And the Arch-Deacon certifies farther that there are divers which as far as they dare oppose Catechising and but for fear of losing the Livings would almost go as far as Burton and Bastwick did which is his own expression under his Hand My Lord the Bishop there complains much of the Decay of his Houses and the impoverishing of that Bishoprick by some of his Predecessors And this partly by letting of long Leases before the Statute restrained it and partly by a coarse exchange of some Lands in former times This latter cannot now be helped but for the decay of his Houses if he pursue that faculty which I granted to his immediate Predecessor he may help a great part of that decay without much charge And this God willing I shall put him in mind to do and give him the best assistance that I can by Law For the Churches in that Diocess which are very many my Lord acknowledges that they are in very decent and good order generally The only thing which he saith troubles his Diocess is that the People have been required to come up and receive at the Rail which is set before the Communion-Table and that heretofore many have been Excommunicated or Suspended for not doing so For the thing it self it is certainly the most decent and orderly way and is practised by your Majesty and by the Lords in your own Chappel and now almost every where else And upon my knowledge hath been long used in St Giles his Church without Cripplegate London with marvellous Decency and Ease and yet in that Parish there are not so few as Two Thousand Communicants more than within any Parish in Norwich Diocess And when your Majesty had the Hearing of this Business in the now Bishop of Ely's Time you highly approved it And therefore I presume you will be pleased to command that the present Bishop continue it and look carefully to it And whereas they plead that many stood suspended for it the Bishop of Ely in whose Time it was doth assure me that in above One Thousand Three Hundred Parishes there were not Thirteen either Excommunicated or Suspended for refusing of this In this Diocess the Bishop gives a fair Account to all your Majesty's Instructions so that I have cause to hope that that Diocess is in reasonable good Order Only he complains that his Predecessors have Leased out part of his House at Lichfield which puts him to very great Annoyance But he is entring into a Legal way for redress of his Abuse in which I presume your Majesty will give him all fair and just Assistance if he shall be forc'd to crave the same My Lord the Bishop came but lately to this See and hath not as yet found much amiss The Bishop of that Diocess is Dead and no other yet setled so I can have no Account from thence this Year These Four Bishops Certifie that all things are orderly and well
Time to write it again out of my scribled Copy but I dare trust the Secresie in which I have bound him To others I am silent and shall so continue till the thing open it self and I shall do it out of Reasons very like to those which you give why your self would not divulge it here In the last place you promise your self That the Condition you are in will not hinder me from continuing to be the Best Friend you have To this I can say no more than that I could never arrogate to my self to be your Best Friend but a poor yet respective Friend of yours I have been ever since I knew you And it is not your Change that can change me who never yet left but where I was first forsaken and not always there So praying for God's Blessing upon you and in that Way which He knows most necessary for you I rest Lambeth March 27 1636. Your very Loving Friend To serve you in Domino I have writ this Letter freely I shall look upon all the Trust that ever you mean to carry with me that you shew it not nor deliver any Copy to any Man Nor will I look for any Answer to the Quaeries I have herein made If they do you any good I am glad if not yet I have satisfied my self But leisure I have none to write such Letters nor will I entertain a Quarrel in this wrangling Age and now my Strength is past For all things of moment in this Letter I have pregnant places in the Council of Trent Thomas Bellarmin Stapleton Valentia c. But I did not mean to make a Volume of a Letter Endorsed thus with the Archbishop's own Hand March 27 1636. A Copy of my Answer to Sir Ken Digby's Letters in which he gives me an account of his Return to the Ro Communion The Testimony of the Reverend Mr Jonathan Whiston concerning the Opinion had of the Archbishop at Rome and with what Joy the News of his Death and Suffering was there received I Do remember that being Chaplain to the Honourable Sir Lionel Tolmach Baronet about the Year 1666. I heard him relate to some Person of Quality how that in his younger days he was at Rome and well acquainted with a certain Abbot which Abbot asked him Whether he had heard any News from England He answered No. The Abbot replied I will tell you then some Archbishop Laud is Beheaded Sir Lionel answered You are sorry for that I presume The Abbot replied again That they had more cause to rejoice that the Greatest Enemy of the Church of Rome in England was cut off and the Greatest CHAMPION of the Church of England silenced Or in Words to that purpose In witness whereof I have hereunto set my Hand this 28th Day of September 1694. Jona Whiston Vicar of Bethersden in Kent The Testimony of the Learned and Worthy John Evelyn Esq Fellow of the Royal Society concerning the same Matter I Was at Rome in the Company of divers of the English Fathers when the News of the Arch-Bishop's Suffering and a Copy of his Sermon made upon the Scaffold came thither They read the Sermon and commented upon it with no small Satisfaction and Contempt and looked upon him as one that was a great Enemy to them and stood in their Way whilst one of the blackest Crimes imputed to him was his being Popishly affected John Evelyn FINIS BOOKS Printed for RICHARD CHISWELL SCriptorum 〈◊〉 Historia Literaria a Christo nate usque ad seculum xiv facili 〈◊〉 Digesta Qua de Vita illorum ac Rebus Gestis de Secta Dogmatibus 〈◊〉 Style de Scriptis Genuinis Dubiis Suppositiis Ineditis Deper ditis Fragmentis Deque Variis Operum Editionibus perspicue Agitur Accedunt Scriptores Gentiles Christianae Religionis 〈◊〉 Cujusvis Seculi Breviarum Inseruntur suis Locis Veterum 〈◊〉 Opuscula Fragmenta tum Graeca tum Latina hactenus inedita Premissa denique 〈◊〉 quibus plurima ad Antiquitatis Ecclesiasticae Studium spectantia Traduntur Opus indicibus necessariis Instructum Authore Gulielmo Cave SS Theol. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Windesoriensi Accedit Hen. Whartoni Appendix ab ineunte Secula xiv ad Annum usque MDX VII 〈◊〉 Disquisitiones Criticae de Variis per Diversa 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Bibliorum Editionibus Quibus Accedunt Castigationes Theologi Cujusdam Parisiensis ad Opusculum Is Vossii de Sybillinis Oraculis Ejusdem responsionem ad Objectiones nuperae Critica Sacra 4to Censura Celebriorum Authorum sive tractatus in quo Varia Virorum 〈◊〉 de Claris. Cuiusque Seculi Scriptoribus Judicia traduntur Unde Facilimo 〈◊〉 Lector 〈◊〉 queat quid in singulis quibusque istorum Authorum Maxime Memorabile sit qucnam in pretio apud Eruditos 〈◊〉 Habiti Fuerunt Opera Thomae Pope-Blunt Baroneti Fol V Cl Gulielmi Camdeni Illustrium 〈◊〉 ad G. Camdenum Epistolae cum Appendice Varii Argumenti Accesserunt Annalium Regni Regis Jacobi 〈◊〉 Apparatus 〈◊〉 de Antiquitate Dignitate Officio Comitis Marescali Angliae Premittitur G. Camdeni Vita Scriptore Thoma Smitho S T D Ecclesiae Anglicanae Presbytero 4to Jacobi Usserii Armachani Archiepiscopi Historia Degmatica Controversiae inter Orthodoxos 〈◊〉 de Scripturis Sacris Vernaculis nunc primum Edita Accesserunt ejusdem Dissertationes duae de Pseudo-Dionysii seriptis de 〈◊〉 ad Laodiceos antehac 〈◊〉 Descripsit Digessit notis atque auctario Locupletavit Henricus Wharton A M Rev in Christo Pat ac 〈◊〉 Archiepisc Cantuariensi a sacris Domesticis 4to 1690. Anglia 〈◊〉 sive Gollectio Historiarum Antiquitus Scriptarum de Archiepiscopis 〈◊〉 Angliae a Prima Fidei Christianae susceptione ad Annum 1540. in duobus Voluminibus per Henricum Whartonum Fol. 1691 Some Remarks upon the Ecclesiastical History of the Ancient Churches of 〈◊〉 By Peter Allix D D Treasurer of Sarum 4to his Remarks upon the Ecclesiastical History of the Ancient Churches of the Albigenses 4to Dr Burnet's now Lord Bishop of Sarum Vindication of the Ordinations of the Church of England 4to History of the Rights of Princes in disposing of Ecclesiastical Benefices and Church Lands 〈◊〉 8vo Life of William Bedel D D Bishop of Kilmore in Ireland together with the Copies of certain Letters which passed between Spain and England in matter of Religion concerning the general Motives to the Roman Obedience Between Mr James 〈◊〉 a late Pensioner of the Holy Inquisition in Sevil and the said William Bedel 8vo Some Passages of the Life and Death of John late Earl of Rochester 8vo A Collection of Tracts and Discourses from 1678 to Christmas 1689 inclusive In 2 Volumes 4to Examination of the Letter writ by the late Assembly-General of the Clergy of France to the 〈◊〉 inviting them to return to their Communion together with the Methods proposed by them for their Conviction 8vo Pastorall Letter to the Clergv of his Diocess concerning the
Church as appeared in the taking down of his House was broken or pared away to make room for the uncleanness to pass into the Vault And surely were I to sit again in the High-Commission I should give my Vote to Censure this Prophanation But himself confesses he paid but Thirty Pound of it which was too little for such an Offence And besides my Lords this was the Act of the High-Commission and cannot be charged singly upon me And I cannot forbear to add thus much more That the Bishop and Dean and Chapter whoever they were did ill to give way to these Buildings and to increase their Rents by a Sacrilegious Revenue No Law that I know giving way to Build upon Consecrated Ground as that Church-Yard is But howsoever the present Tenants being not in Dolo I ever thought fit they should have Recompence for their Estates and they had it The next Charge was about the Shops of the Goldsmiths in Cheapside and Lumbard-street An Order was made at the Council-Table Novemb. 12. 1634. That within Six Months the Goldsmiths should provide themselves Shops there and no where else till all those Shops were furnished And this under a Penalty and to give Bond. These two were the ancient Places for Goldsmiths only Time out of Mind And it was thought fit by the Lords for the Beauty of the Place and the Honour of the City to have these Places furnished as they were wont and not to have other Trades mixed among them Beside it concerned all Mens Safety For if any Plate were stoln the enquiry after it might be made with more ease and speed Whereas if the Goldsmiths might dwell here and there and keep their Shops in every by-place of the City stoln Plate might easily be made off and never heard of But howsoever if in this Order there were any thing amiss it was the Order of the Council-Table not mine And far enough off from Treason as I conceive 1. Upon this Charge there were two Instances The first is Mr Bartley who said his House was taken from him by Order to the Lord Mayor 1637. That my Hand was to the Order That he was Imprisoned Six Months and recovered 600. l. Damages of Sir Ed. Bromfield That after this he was Committed to Flamsted a Messenger belonging to the High Commission about Dr. Bastwick's and Mr. Burton's Books That after this he was sent for to the Council and there heard my Voice only That when he desired some help Sir Tho. Ailsbury's Man told him he were as good take a Bear by the Tooth That all this was for his entertaining a Man that came out of Scotland and lastly That Dr. Haywood my Chaplain had Licensed a Popish Book To which I gave this Answer That if the Lord Mayor put him from his house by Order from the Lords being a Stationer among the Goldsmiths then it was not done by me And though my Hand were to the Order yet not mine alone and I hope my Hand there subscribed no more Treason than other Lords Hands did And if he did recover 600 l. against Sir Ed. Bromfield who I think was the Lord Mayor spoken of surely he was a Gainer by the Business And whereas he says he was after seized again and Committed to Flamsted about the Books Named If he were as was informed a great Vender of those and such like Books less could not be done to him than to call him to Answer He says farther that he was sent for to the Council-Table and there he heard my Voice only against him It may be so and without all fault of mine For that heavy Office was usually put upon me and the Lord Keeper to deliver the Sense of the Board to such as were called thither and Examined there And by this Means if any sour or displeasing Sentence passed how just soever it mattered not it was taken as our own and the Envy of it fell on us And that this was so many Lords here present know well He adds what Sir Thomas Ailsbury's Man said when he would have Petitioned again But since Mr. Bartley is single here and in his own Cause why doth he rest upon a Hearsay of Sir Thomas Ailsbury's Man Why was not this Man Examined to make out the Proof And if this Man did so far abuse me as to speak such Words of me shall I be Abused first and then have that Abuse made a Charge That he was troubled thus for a Scotchman's coming to him is nothing so nor is any Proof offered Though then the Troubles were begun in Scotland and therefore if this had any relation to that Business I pleaded again the Act of Oblivion For that of Dr. Haywood I shall give my Answer in a more proper Place for 't is objected again 2. The second Instance was in Mr Manning's Case He speaks also of the Order of the Council Novemb. 12. 1634. That the Goldsmiths in their Book make an Order upon it June 15. 1635. That they which obey not should be suspended I think 't is meant from use of their Trade That when some intreated them to Obedience I should say This Board is not so Weak but that it can Command or to that effect For the Council's Order it was theirs not mine For the Order which the Company of Goldsmiths made upon it It was their own Act I had nothing to do with it For the Words If I did speak them which is more than I remember he is single that Swears them and in his own Cause But my Lords I must needs say whether I spake it then or not most true it is that the Council-Table is very weak indeed if it cannot Command in things of Decency and for Safety of the Subject and where there is no Law to the contrary And this was then my Answer The Third Charge of this Day was That I forced Men to lend Money to the Church of St Pauls And Mrs Moore was called upon But this was deserted The next Charge was concerning a long and tedious Suit between Rich and Poole about the Parsonage of North-Cerny in Glocestershire That Rich was turned out after three Years Possession by a Reference procured by Poole to the Lord Keeper Coventry and my self And that I did in a manner Act the whole Business at the Reference That Letters were sent from the Council to Sir William Masters one of the Patrons to see Poole Instituted and to Imprison Rich if he refused Obedience That after by the Lord Marshal's procurement there was another Reference obtained to thirteen Lords who awarded for Rich. I was never more weary of any Business in my Life than I was of this Reference And I was so far from Acting the whole Business as that I did nothing but as the Lord Keeper directed the Cause was so entangled with Quare Impedits and many other Businesses of Law Our Judgments upon full Hearing went with Poole and we certified accordingly And upon this it may