observed Have the Heads and Governors resided as they ought Have they kept no Place nor been possest of Estates inconsistent with the Statutes of the House Have all Exercises been duly performed Diligence and Vertue duly encouraged What Lives do they lead And what Account can they give of Themselves and of their Time spent there What Lectures are read by the Professors and other Lecturers and whether all be done which the Statute requires Are those Studies pursued Diligently which tend to make Men useful to the Publick Are there no unstatutable Fees exacted No expensive Customs introduced No unnecessary Eating-Houses allowed c. Were these things looked into by Men of Authority were the Criminals severely punished and some of them that are most Guilty removed were this done frequently and with due Care we should soon see the good Effects of it There would be another Face of things quickly Prophaneness and Idleness would skulk presently and soon be banished and Diligence and Vertue would revive and hold up their Heads We have now many Men that have spent many Years there in order to serve the Church as they profess when they come for Orders they have not the Learning of some School-Boys This I know upon my certain Knowledge having been employed to Examine them when they offered themselves to be Ordained I could give your Lordship a great many Instances of those who have not had Skill enough to turn the Creed into true Latine or an Article of Religion And a great many others that had some of this Skill yet had not any Understanding at all of Theological Matters and yet were these Dunces admitted to Degrees and brought Testimonials under the College Seal My Lord you cannot imagine with what Grief I write this But thus it is And there must be due Care taken of it III. These Visitors might be of farther Use if they had Orders to require some Publick Exercises whilst they visited If they were obliged to bring with them a List of the most Pious and Deserving that should be kept in some publick Place If they had Power to appoint some Discipline and revive the Exercises of greatest Use that are now omitted A great many things might be named under this Head which I forbear One thing might easily be done viz. The requiring all the Students to speak the Latine Tongue within the Walls of their House with each other To do it at least at their Meals I remember well when this was done in a certain College and with that success that many of the House had gained that readiness and were arrived to that Elegance that they far exceeded all Foreigners 'T is a shame Men should be at a loss in this Matter when every Foreigner hath attained it that knows any thing of Letters IV. 'T will be necessary that greater Care be taken in bestowing Degrees to those only who deserve them That Testimonials be not given promiscuously That the Good and Bad have not the same Testimony That a Course and Method of Studies be contrived That there be greater Care taken to encourage Mathematical Learning and those Parts of it especially which are most for the Use of Life That those Theological Studies be commended which tend to make Men more Serviceable to the Church and better able to Defend our Common Christianity against all Gainsayers That particular Care be taken to Direct young Students in their Study of the Scriptures III. There ought to be very great Care taken in admitting to Holy Orders And this is a Care peculiarly belonging to the Bishops The want of this Care hath been attended with unspeakable Mischiefs The Church groans under them and is like to do so for some time The Bishops are the only Judges of the Fitness of Persons that come to be Ordained and may refuse them that they judge unfit without any danger of a quare impedit or any other Legal Molestation But when they are admitted a Bishop runs an hazard that refuseth to give them Institution If another Bishop Ordain an unfit Person and that Person be presented to your Lordship to a Cure you will find your self under great Difficulty If you admit him you deliver up the Cure of Souls to a Person you do not Approve If you refuse him you run the hazard of being sued at Law Indeed where you have Ordained a Person you cannot reasonably refuse him Institution when he desires it But 't is very hard you should be obliged to Institute him whom another Bishop hath without due Care admitted to Holy Orders This careless admitting Men to Holy Orders may by the united Agreement of all the Bishops be prevented for the future I need not tell you what good Laws are made on this behalf and how easie a thing 't will be for the future to take Care of this Matter But every Bishop must take the utmost Care and the Archbishops had need require a strict and constant Account that others do their Duty For if one Bishop be Careless as that Bishop will be resorted to and Ordain the greatest Number so the other Bishops and the Church will suffer greatly by it I know there have been some Bishops that have been very remiss And some who have had a small Diocess have had great Ordinations and that when they lived remote from their Diocess also This thing must be looked after Diligently and 't were well that every Bishop were obliged to give his Metropolitan an Account from time to time of the Number and Qualifications of all those whom he admits into Holy Orders and of the Places of their abode c. After all the Bishops had need be Careful that they be not imposed upon with false Titles a very common practice with slight Testimonials and the perfunctory Examination of a Chaplain He had need Examine them himself and require them that come for Orders to apply themselves to him some considerable time before-hand that he may be the better satisfied concerning them Every wise Man will be very tender in commending a Person as a Servant to his Friend much more if it be to a Place of any considerable Trust What Care then ought the Bishops to take when they Commend Men and Admit them to the Service of God and of his Church and the tremendous Care of Immortal Souls The utmost Care in this Matter will be little enough And were this Care taken by all the Bishops we should soon see the blessed Fruits of it young Men would ply their Studies and take care of their Lives and form themselves to some shew at least of Seriousness in Religion I know very well a certain excellent Prelate that hath in this Matter used Exemplary Care and Diligence and I am told by one that knows the good Effects of it too There are very few but have competently fitted themselves before they have offered themselves to him And for the Idle and Negligent that have heard of many such refused they have endeavoured with
from what they saw in their Master's Lives and from that goodly Idea of Religion which they laid before them conceived aright and been formed into a Conformity to the excellent Pattern laid in their way I have the honour to know some Persons of Quality of singular Vertue that do own the good which they received this way II. The Care of the Universities This Care perhaps may not be thought to belong to the Bishops but to the Heads of Houses and Fellows of Colleges But still it must be granted that the united Endeavours of the Bishops may do much in this matter For some of them are Heads of Colleges themselves others of them are Visitors of them and many of them have a great Influence upon those Heads and Fellows as they are Deans or Dignitaries of their Churches Chaplains in their Families and have their Dependencies or Expectances from them And very certain it is that the want of good Discipline in the University is the Source of unspeakable Mischief to the whole Kingdom For want of due Care in this Matter the Gentry have been corrupted at least not improved The Country hath been filled with ignorant and indiscreet Ministers and Curates The People have taken occasion to forsake our Church Schism hath been continued and is like to be so There are those who durst not trust their Children there and therefore have chosen to send them to St. Omers or else have commended them to the Care of Dissenters who have taught Schools and undertaken to Instruct them in the University Learning By this means they have been prejudiced against the Church of England and many of them become the professed Enemies of it I am under no temptation to speak hardly of our Universities having had a Relation to both of them and also being under great Obligations to them But yet I cannot but say that their Discipline of late Years hath been very lax I have been sometimes desired to recommend a Number of young Gentlemen to the Care of Tutors and have found it a very difficult Task to place them safely 'T is notorious and not to be concealed I have in passing through one of them heard more Oaths sworn by the Students and more of them in or coming out of a Tavern than I had observed whiles I lived there in many Years time I make no doubt but some in each University have used great Care But yet this could not avail much when the greater Number were negligent And some of the Governing part gave Example of great Intemperance by frequenting Taverns or apointing drinking Clubs in their Colleges I know very well both the Men and Places where they met and did not only debauch themselves but reproached better Men than themselves over their Bottles as Men not true to the Interest of their Church The young Scholars were in the mean time neglected permitted to frequent publick Houses daily and not called to a strict account of their Studies or Manners The Exercises required by the Statute have been huddled over or bought off Degrees given without any merit Preferments bestowed by Friendship and Letters of great Persons The Charity of Pious Benefactors perverted Offices both publick and in particular Colleges not performed thô the Salary were received Preferments kept that were inconsistent with the Local Statutes The Studious and Vertuous have been disheartned Eating and drinking to excess hath been the practice for many Years I could say much more and am very sure I could prove it also I had rather proceed to offer at some Remedy I lay before your Lordship the following Particulars I. That the first Care should be to make the Universities Nurseries of Piety and Vertue The Learning which the young Student gets will do him or the World little good if his Morals be not secured And indeed if his Vertue be preserved he is in a fairer way to get Learning also This ought to be the first and greatest Care I wish it were not upon the matter wholly neglected Your Lordship remembers the Words of Socrates before Hippias Xenoph. Mem. l. IV. 'T is says he a wonderful thing that whereas if a man would put one out to learn a Trade or Art he may easily find a Place where this may be learned Nay more 't is said he may easily find those who will teach an Ox or an Horse to be tractable and useful But if a Man were himself disposed to learn what is Righteous or would place out his Son or Servant to be taught it he would not be able to find where to place himself or them I believe there is nothing so hard and difficult a matter as to find a School of Vertue We have often seen those who went innocent to the Universities come thence depraved And this hath many times happened through want of Care and diligent Application That part of our Age which we spend there requires the utmost Care and generally is neglected There are very many that there have lost their Vertue and Modesty That have been so far from Improvement there that they have been ruined 'T will stand you in hand to procure such a Discipline and order that it shall be an hard matter for a young Student to miscarry This will never be whiles they that are sent thither for Instituton have the Liberty to live as they list There must be great Care taken to form their Manners to possess them with the Fear of God and Sense of a World to come To convince them of the Difference of things to principle them in true Religion and every Vertuous thing They must be kept from Wine and Wantonness inured to Labour and Exercise restrained from the Conversation of the Town not suffered to go out of their Walls without leave They must be strictly kept to Prayers and taught to pray by themselves instructed with exact Care for the Holy Sacrament and kept to frequent Communion the idle and vicious must be Carefully removed and all ill Examples taken out of the way The Heads and Governours of Colleges may with due Care turn their Colleges into Religious Houses and 't is hoped your Lordship and the other Bishops will take this Matter into Consideration and do your utmost toward the effecting it II. 'T will be highly fit that the Heads and other Governors should be visited Indeed there are Visitors appointed by the several Founders for some Colleges and for some Number of them in one of the Universities But we have not seen any great Fruits of this Power My meaning is that some Number of Men should be Commissioned from time to time to Visit both Universities Men that should be Impowered to Examine strictly into Things and make Report that the Negligent may be punished severely I will not undertake to make Articles of Enquiry but I think I may name some that will be needful viz. How the Estates of the Founder and Benefactors have been dispensed How the Statutes of the House have been
all their Skill to find means to be admitted into Holy Orders by some other hand A due Care of this Matter would go a great way in that Reformation which all good Men desire and justly hope from the present Bishops And this is no more than what is in your Power to do IV. A due Care of the Lives of the Clergy and to see that they Reside on their Cures and do their Duty This is a great part of the Bishops work And they may do very much in it and the Necessities of the Church and the Souls of Men call for it at your Hands A wicked Clergy-Man does unspeakable Mischief I know a considerable Town that was some Years since in good order the People came constantly to Church and they all did so At the usual times they came to the Sacrament also But a lewd and scandalous Minister is now the Incumbent of that Place one that is often disordered with Drink and swears commonly The People are now dispersed They are run into separate Meetings and in a word the Town is ruined I know the Truth of this and can name several Places in your Lordship's Diocess where there is something of this thô I know no Place where it is so notorious as in that considerable Town 'T will be needful that some Remedy be found out for so great an Evil. I will not undertake to Direct your Lordship 'T is too evident how much the Church hath lost by such bad Men. Another Care is that of Residence which is notoriously neglected There are a great Number of Parishes that have no resident Minister or Curate Instead of that the Minister comes or sends every Sunday and the Parishioners are destitute the rest of the Week There are many more Parishes which are great and have a considerable Revenue which are supplied by some cheap and very unfit Curates By reason whereof the People are scattered Parsonage-Houses are dilapidated Hospitality disused and which is the saddest Consideration of all the Souls neglected There are a Number of Ministers in England that do not Reside on their Livings Some chuse to live from their People in some great Towns at a distance for the sake of Conversation or Air or upon some other Pretence Some become Curates or Lecturers in other Places and forsake their own Charge Some are at the Universities on pretence of better fitting themselves Some lie about London hunting after another Living or some Lecture there Some are in the Families of Persons of Honour others hang about the Court and some are in Cathedral-Churches in some Employment there and notoriously neglect their cure of Souls in the mean time I know some that are perfect Strangers to their People that see them not in several Years and upon the matter never preach with them I know a Person that hath one of the best Livings in England and hath had for sixteen Years last past and never preached among them not for want of Ability or Leisure or because he hath any other Cure or Publick Employment but because he is not reconciled to the Labour of his Calling I could enlarge very much on this Head and yet not borrow Materials from others I have seen and do very well know many of the Neglects of this kind I am amazed when I seriously consider it and wonder how these Men can look up to Heaven or with what Brow they can look honest Men in the Face when they are conscious of so great a Sin 'T is time for the Bishops to look after this Matter as they would not have the Blood of the neglected Souls lie upon them But your Lordship will say How can this be prevented For a great Number of these Persons have Qualifications and Dispensations and some others are absent for Health or Studies and other reasonable Causes To which I answer That this will not excuse them that have no reasonable Cause for their Absence nor any longer than that Cause continues I know several Men that live at the Universities to a considerable Age and are never like to be more fit than they are These Men ought to go to their Cures and so should those Men too who withdrew for want of Health when their Health is restored The Dispensations to hold two Livings will not excuse a Man from not residing upon either And that hath too often been the Case Besides 't is very fit those Dispensations should be very rarely given and 't is in the Power of the Archbishop to restrain them 'T is no creditable thing for a Man to need a Dispensation generally speaking And thô where one Living is not a Maintenance and another small one is near it a Dispensation to hold those two may be a very allowable thing yet this will not excuse the promiscuous allowance of Dispensations I know a great Number of Men that have Plurality of the best Livings and those too at a considerable distance and the same Men that have two great Livings apiece have many of them besides one some two or three Dignities apiece Great have been the Mischiefs of Non Obstante's and Dispensations They were first used in the Court of Rome Vid. Godolphin Repertor Canonic p. 300. 'T was an ill President and Mischievous to all the Commonwealths of Christendom For the Temporal Princes perceiving that the Pope dispensed with Canons in imitation thereof have used their Prerogative to Dispense with their Penal Laws and Statutes when as before they caused their Laws to be Religiously observed like the Laws of Medes and Persians which cannot be dispensed with For this reason it was that a Canonist said Dispensatio est vulnus quod vulnerat jus commune Another saith That all Abuses of this kind would be reformed Si duo tantùm verba non Obstante non Impedirent And Matth. Paris having recited certain Decrees made in the Council of Lyons which were beneficial for the Church of England addeth Sed haec omnia alia per hoc repagulum non Obstante infirmantur After all 't is certain that there are very many Non-residents who have no Dispensation nor Excuse that is reasonable 'T is pity but these should be obliged to reside or proceeded against according to the Statutes in that behalf If they were duly punished according to Law we should soon find the good Effects of it I have heard some wise Men affirm who understand the present Posture of things in the City of London that there are a considerable Number of Men there who are Curates or Lecturers or Readers or at least Candidates for such Places that have Cures in the Country which they leave and some of those Cures not well provided for If this be so I am sure 't is a great Evil But this is an Evil easily cured The Bishop of London may put a stop to it when he pleaseth And I believe he will do it because I know he is a Prelate of great Vertue of most Exemplary Diligence and Care