transported even as in a Rapture to make this Digression For who could come near the Shrine of such a Saint and not offer up a few Grains of Glory upon it Or how durst I omit it For he was the first that planted me in my tender Studies and water'd them continually with his Bounty The Occasion that brings in this was the new Dean's addition to his Pattern that looking into such a Mirror he might keep up the Learning of that happy Plantation that it might never hear worse then as Mr. Camden testifies for it Felix eruditorum in Ecclesiam Rempublicam proventus Eliz. p. 61. Fol. In his Zeal to this Work as soon as he was possess'd of the Deanery he was assiduous in the School and miss'd not sometimes every week if he were resident in the College both to dictate Lectures to the several Classes and to take account of them The choicest Wits had never such Encouragement for Praise and Reward He was very Bountiful in both and they went always together scattering Money as if it had been but Dung to manure their Industry And seldom he did fail no not when he kept the Great-Seal to call forth some of them to stand before him at his Table that in those intervals of best Opportunity he might have account of their Towardliness which ripen'd them so fast made them so Prompt and Ingenuous that the number of the Promoted to the Universities which swarm'd out of that Stock was double for the most part to those that were Transplanted in the foregoing Elections 55. These were the first Fruits of his Care In tenut labor at tenuts non glovia Virg. Georg. 4. The Buildings of Abbat Islip Monuments of a great worth were the next Object of his Emulation That wife and holy Man was the Lord Abbat over the Benedictine Monks who profess'd their Vows within those Cloysfers in the Glorious Reign of King Henry the Seventh The Abbat was a Privy-Counsellor and for his Fidelity and Prudence was one of the Executors to the King his Master by his Last Will and Testament The Structure of the Abby was left imperfect from the Reign of King Henry the Third who had been very Sumptuous in advancing the Workmanship from the Altar to the lower-end of the Quire From his Death that stately Pile of Building had look'd for some to help and there was none that pitied it This Abbat a devout Servant of Christ and of a wakeful Conscience considered the Office he bore how he was the Chief who had that House of God in possession Therefore he enlarged the length of the Church at his own Cost from the entring in of the Quire or thereabout to the West-Gate that looks towards Tuttle-street and contrived the Lodgings with strength and handsomness at the South-end which after the Change made in King Henry the Eighth's Reign received the Dean and his Retinue But Eternal Fame doth best shine upon his Memory in the Rising-Sun or upon the Eastern part There this Abbat and John Fisher Bishop of Rochester the Executor to King Henry the Seventh joyned with him laid out such Sums of Money as that King had appointed for the Noble Enterring of his own Body and his Queens with the Stems of their Royal Line and none other These two like men of faithful and large Minds built the Chappel next behind the Chappel of Edward the Confessor called by King Henry the Seventh's Name which nothing can surmount for Cost and Curiosity There they set up his Monument in a Brazen Impalement which looks like the Work not of our Moderns but of Bezaleel Now though not the Soul yet the Piety and Liberality of the Abbat to this Domo came into Dr. Williams by Transmigration who in his entrance to that place found the Church in such decay that all that passed by and loved the Honour of God's House shook their Heads at the Stones that drop'd down from the Pinacles Therefore that the Ruines of it might be no more a Reproach this Godly Jehoiada took care for the Temple of the Lord to repair it to set it in his state and to strengthen it a Chren 4.3 He began at the South-east part which looked the more deformed with decay because it coupled with a latter Building I mean the Chappel of King Henry the Seventh which was tight and fresh The North-west part also which looks to the great Sanctuary was far gone in Dilapidations The great Buttresses were almost crumbled to Dust with the Injuries of the Weather which he re-edified with durable Materials and beautified with elegant Statues among whom Abbat Islip had a place so that 4500 Pounds were spent in a trice upon the Workmanship All this was his own Cost Neither would he Impatronize his Name to the Credit of that Work which should be raised up by other men's collatitious Liberality like Laonicus in Castilio his Courier Lib. 4. Vide quà m liberalis sit qui non sua solùm sed etiam aliena largiatur I do not expect that the Sacrilegious of our Times should commend him for disbursing so much upon a Building of Sacred Use who either make no difference between Holy and Prophane or Tender Prophane and Common Things before the Holy Never in the days of old was so much spent in private Buildings Enough is Erected upon new Foundations in the Skirts of London to make two large and beautiful Cities Yet we suffer all our Cathedrals of egregious Piety and stupendious Bravery to run to a general Decay which is all one as to put hands to their Demolishment What Christians would not tremble to see their Rubbish rise up in Judgment against them I appeal to found Judgment whether in an Heathenish but a Civil Republic the Aedils of Rome would not have saved such Structures from Ruine at the public Charge But I am indifferent to appeal to any man sound or corrupt against Art Will. in his History p. 191. who nibbles at the good Name of the magnificent Dean upon his magnificent Church-works because he could not bite it For this is his Censure These Works were Arguments of a great Mind but how far from Ostentation in this frail body of Flesh cannot be determined Such suspicious and ungrounded Glances discover more Rancor then direct Contumelies for which Macrobius hath a pretty Simile Lib. 7. c. 3. Hami angulosi quam directi mucrones tenacius infiguntur Ill-favoured Suspicion is like a crooked Hook where it enters it will stick in the Flesh though it make but a little wound But thus he serves King James and all his Courtiers of both Sexes of all Professions pelts them all along with rotten Surmises or palpable Untruths I will fit him with Spalatensis his Judgment upon Baronius the great Annalist who was Squint-eyed Omnia regum facta non rectis sed contortis oculis intuetur Lib. 7. c. 9. In all his Volumes he squinted at the famous Actions of Kings and Princes 56. For their further
hopeful Marriage When the Eyes of all our 〈◊〉 were set upon the Infanta of Spain he took into his House as it is formerly remembred a Spaniard by Birth and a Scholar John Taxeda by whose Conversation he grew expert in the Spanish Grammar in the Castilian Pronunciation and in the Knowledge of those Authors that in Ten Weeks he could not only understand the most difficult Writers of that Nation but was able to Entreat with the Ambassadors without an Interpreter How much will Fruit upon in one Mans Intellectuals before anothers who hath the advantage of so much Sun and Warmth in his Brains Now when the Glorious Nuptial Torch was in Election to be lighted from the Neighbour Kingdom of France he endeavour'd to make himself expert in that quaint and voluble Language and by parling often with a Servant whom he had listed into the Check of his House for that purpose a Frenchman that was continually at his Elbow in Three Months he was as ready at it to Read Write or Speak as he that had lyen Liegier Three years for it at Paris And to Evidence that he had a publick Soul in every thing where he put his Finger as he had caused a Translation of our Liturgy out of Latin into Spanish to be finish'd by Taxeda and Printed it at his own Costs so to go no less in his Preparations for this French Association he encourag'd a most able Divine Mr. Delaun Minister of the French Church in Norwich to turn that Excellent Liturgy into his Country Language which was effected and the accurate Translator greatly both Commended and Rewarded Hereupon how it hapned that our Liturgy now made legible to the French did clear the Church of England even to the Conscience of its Enemies especially from the gross Slanders of Fugitives that had gone out from us is a passage that may challenge Publication with the Attendance of its Circumstances 216. His Majesty having in the behalf of his Son begun the woing part to Madam Henrietta Maria with due Ceremony of State The Queen Mother Moderatrix of this and all other Solemn Negotiations in France at that time bethought seriously to have this Happiness and high Honour setled upon her Daughter And her First prudential forecast was not to loiter out time with a Spanish Pause nor to endanger the forfeiture of a Bond of such Royal Love for want of payment of Courtesie at the due day Therefore she dispatch'd Marquess Fiatte afterward the great Financer and Monsieur Villoclare one of the principal Secretaries Embassadors extraordinary into England to remove all Obstructions by their Commission and wise management of it and to entwine the Rose and Lilly upon one Matrimonial Stem When they Landed the King had removed himself from New-Market to Trinity College in Cambridge where he gave Audience to those Embassadors providing to their welcom this Grace more then ordinary That he receiv'd them where his choicest Darlings the liberal Arts were round about him Now that the Conferences about this Marriage were gone so far and seemed as it were to be over the last Fire and sit for Projection his Majesty would have the Lord Keeper taken into the Cabinet and to make him known by a Mark of some good Address to the French Gallants upon the return of the Embassadors to London he sent a Message to him to signifie that it was his pleasure that his Lordship should give an Entertainment to the Embassadors and their Train upon Wednesday following it being Christmass-Day with them according to the Gregorian Prae-occupation of ten days before our Account The King's Will signified the invitement at a Supper was given and taken Which was provided in the College of Westminster in the Room Named Hierusalem Chamber but for that Night it might have been call'd Lucullus his Apollo But the Ante-past was kept in the Abby as it it went before the Feast so it was beyond it being purely an Episcopal Collation The Embassadors with the Nobles and Gentletlemen in their Company were brought in at the North-Gate of the Abby which was stuck with Flambeaux every where both within and without the Quire that strangers might cast their Eyes upon the slateliness of the Church At the Door of the Quire the Lord Keeper besought their Lordships to go in and to take their Seats there for a while promising in the Word of a Bishop that nothing of ill Rellish should be offered before them which they accepted and at their Entrance the Organ was touch'd by the best Finger of that Age Mr. Orlando Gibbons While a Verse was plaid the Lord Keeper presented the Embassadors and the rest of the Noblest Quality of their Nation with our Liturgy as it spake to them in their own Language and in the Delivery of it used those few Words but pithy That their Lordships at Leisure might Read in that Book in what Form of Holiness our Prince Worshipp'd God wherein he durst say nothing savour'd of any Corruption of Doctrine much less of Heresie which he hoped would be so reported to the Lady Princess Henrietta The Lord Embassadors and their Great Train took up all the Stalls where they continued about half an Hour while the Quire-men Vested in their Rich Copes with their Choristers sung three several Anthems with most exquisite Voices before them The most honourable and the meanest persons of the French Attended all that time uncover'd with great Reverence except that Secretary Villoclare alone kept on his Hat And when all others carried away the Looks of Common Prayer commended to them he only lest his in the Stall of the Quire where he had sate which was not brought after him Ne Margarita c. as if had forgot it 217. At the same time among those Persons of Gallantry that came into England to make up the Splendor of the Embassage and were present at this Feast d'Amours as some of themselves call'd it there was an Abbat but a Gentleman that held his Abbacy â—lla mode de France in a lay Capacity He had receiv'd the Gift of our Service Book and to requite the Doner having much of a Scholar and of ingenuous Breeding he laid aside all other business to read it over Like a Vowed Person to another Profession he was not hasty to praise it but suspended his Sentence till he might come in Place to see the practice of it It was well thought of by him that the Tryal of the soundness in Religion consists not all together in the Draught of a Book but in the motion likewise and Exercise of it The Abbat made his mind known to the Lord Keeper by Sir George Goring now Earl of Norwich that he would gladly be present in the Abby of Westminster upon our Christmass Day in the morning to behold and hear how that great Feast was solemnized in our Congregations which heard very ill beyond the Seas for Profaneness Whereas the Book for Uniformity of Publick Prayer which he had receiv'd though
that they kept Centinel at all Hours and Seasons to expect the second coming of the Lord Jesus Arch-bishop Spotswood tells us of the like Anno. 510. p. 11. That St. Mungo founded a Monastery in Wales and took order that the Monks had day and night divided among them one Company succeeding another so that there were some always in the Church praying and praising God In which and in all the rest What was there offensive Nay What not to be admir'd To leave it off or to lessen it for the Girds of lavish Tongues were like the Man in the Dutch Epigram That would eat nothing but Spoon-meat for fear of wearing out his Teeth God be glorified for such whose Prayers were powerful and uncessant to pierce the Heavens The whole Land was the better for their Sanctity They fasted that Famine might not be inflicted upon our common Gluttony They abridg'd themselves of all Pleasures that Vengeance might not come down upon the Voluptuousness of this riotous Age. They kept their Vigils all Night that the Day of the Lord might not come upon us like a Thief unawares that sleep in security The whole World was the better for their Contempt of the World As Philostratus says of the Hilobii Lib. 3. vit Apollonii 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They were in the World not of the World All their Practice was heavenly a great deal of it had some Singularity by the Custom of our corrupt ways who do not strive to enter in at the strait Gate to come to Blessedness 51. The Fame of the Dispensations of this worthy Family the further it was heard abroad the more it sounded like Popery Envy or Ignorance could guess no better at it but that it was a Casa Professa a Convent pack'd together of some Superstitious Order beyond Seas or a Nunnery and that the Sufferance of it look'd towards a change in Religion After the Sentence of Salust Boni quà m mali susâ—ectiores sunt semperque aliena virtus formidolosa est A Crew of Bawds and Gamesters might have set up a Standing with less prejudice than these Devotionaries But God help us if the best Protestants for these may be called so do look like Papists Had they been hired with Gold that so mistook them they could not have done more Credit and Honour to our Adversaries Speak Sir Cenjurâ—r we the true Children of the Church of England were we not without departing from our own Station capable of Mortification of vowing our selves to God of renouncing the World of Fasting of Vigils of Prayer limited to Canons and Hours as any that say and do not that call themselves from St. Basil St. Bennet or such other Institution Not our Reformation but our Slothfulness doth indispose us that we let others run faster than we in Temperance in Chastity in Scleragogy as it was call'd The Diocesan and their Neighbour to this Family in a few Miles was asham'd at these Scandals which he knew to be spiteful and temerarious He knew the Occurrences of his Precinct as Apelles was wont to fit behind the Pictures hung up in his Shop to hear what Passengers that went to and fro did approve or discommend These were known to the Bishop by right Information from the time that they sealed a Charter among themselves as it were to be constant and regular in their Spiritual Discipline But their Heavenly mindedness was best discover'd to him when two Sons of Mrs. Farrar the Mother and Matron of the Houshold treated with the Bishop to endow the Church with the Tythes which had been impropriated this was in Sept. 1633. as appears by a Smack of that which fell from the Pen of the Donor as followeth Right Reverend Father in God THE Expectation of Opportunities having some Years whealed me off from the Performance of this Business I now think it necessary to break through all Impediments and humbly to present to your Lordship the Desires and the Intentions of my Heart Beseeching you on God's behalf to take them into your Fatherly Consideration and to give a speedy Accomplishment to them by the Direction of your Wisdom and the Assistance of your Authority The rest is too much to be rehearsed save a little of her Prayer to God in the end of the Papers BE graciously pleased Lord now to accept from thy Hand-maid the Restitution of that which hath been unduely heretofore taken from thy Ministers And as an earnest and pledge of the total Resignation of her self and hers to thy Service vouchsafe to receive to the use of thy Church this small Portion of that large Estate which thou hast bestowed upon her the unworthiest of thy Servants Lord redeem thy Right whereof thou hast been too long disseized by the World both in the Possessions and in the Person of thy Hand-maid And let this outward Seizure of Earth be accompanied with an inward Surprizal of the Heart and Spirit into thine own Hands So that the Restorer as well as that which is restored may become and be confirm'd thine Inheritance c. The Bishop pray'd to God that many such Customers might come to him so commended her free-will Offering to God and confirm'd it To make them some amends for their Liberality to the Church he devised how to give them Reputation against ad Detraction Therefore in the Spring that came after he gave them warning on what Sunday he would Preach in their Church whither an extreme Press of People resorted from all the Towns that heard of it In his Sermon he insisted most what it was to die unto the World that the Righteous should scarce be saved that our right Eye and our right Hand and all our fleshly Contentments must be cut off that we may enter into Life All tended to approve the dutiful and severe Life of the Farrars and of the Church that was in their House After Sermon the Bishop took their Invitation to Dine with them But they were so strict to keep that day holy that they left not a Servant at home to provide for the Table Yet it was handsomely furnish'd with that which was boil'd and bak'd that requir'd no Attendance to stay any one from Church to look to it By this visit the Bishop had the Means to see their way of serving God to know the Soundness of Doctrine which they maintain'd to read their Rules which they had drawn up for Fasts and Vigils and large Distributions of Alms In which he bad them proceed in the Name of God and gave them his Blessing at his departing From thenceforth these faithful ones flourish'd in good opinion For it is certain what Quintilian hath stated in Gratory Lib. 5. Nulla sunt firmiora quà m quae ex dubiis facta sunt corta The more a Case was doubted the clearer it is when the Doubt is resolv'd 52. Yet nothing is so sound but in time it will run into Corruption For I must not hold it in that some Persons in Little Giding
would witness against me for my Council-Table Opinion I would say to him as Gallus did to Tyberius Caesar Good Sir speak you first for I may mistake and you may witness against me for it in the next Parliament Some did make Laws with Ropes about their Necks What Must men give their Counsel as it were with Ropes about their Necks Solomon says When thou comest to a rich man's table put a knife to thy Throat But what 's here When we give Judgment as we are able among the Lords of the Council must we put an Ax to our Necks Beware of such Traps pittying the case of human Weakness 145. The fourth Question is thus comprized Whether some Members of the House of Commons may be present at the Examination Judicially they cannot the Judicature is in your Lordships but whether organically and ministerially is the Scruple to be satisfied I will be brief in my Conceptions what is against the claim of the House of Commons and what is for them This is not for them That 50 Edw. 3. one Love was a Witness in Lord John Nevile's Case Love denied what he had confest before two Knights Members of the Lower House The House of Commons send them to the Lords to confront Love which they did and Love was thereupon committed Now their being here was only to confront not to assist the Lords either judicially or ministerially Many things make for them why they may be there ministerially at least First Originally both Houses were together and so the Commons heard all Examinations Considerent inter se Modus ten Pl. and sate so till Anno 6 Edw. 3. by Mr. Elsing's Collections which are not over-authentick Secondly After that time they have all the House of Commons been present when Witnesses were sworn here Anno 5 Hen. IV. Rot. 11. swears his Fealty before the Lords and Commons and two or three days after by the same Oath and before the same persons clears the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Duke of York from a Suspicion of Treason laid to their charge The Commons were by and heard all this The third Reason is Mr. Attorny-General if this Lord were arraigned of Treason as I pray God bless him from deserving it would be by and observe his Defence and such Witnesses as he should produce for himself and would no doubt bring Counter proofs Sur le Champ and upon the sudden against the same if he were able The House of Commons is in this case the King's Attorny who make and maintain the charge So far out of brief Notes for take them to be no other you have a strong Judgment pass'd upon four Questions Says Tully in his Brutus of Caesar's Eloquence Tabulam benè pictam collocat in bono lumine He draws his Picture well and hangs it out to be well seen So here 's a Piece well drawn and placed in the light of Perspicuity His next Argument is very long but of that use to the Reader that he shall not sind so much Learning in any Author on that Theme that I know a Scholar would not want it They that fostered deadly Enmities against E. Strafford laboured to remove the Bishops from the hearing of his Cause This Bishop and his Brethren minding to him all the Pity and Help they could shew him the Opposites began to vote them out of Doors and would not admit them in the Right of Peers in this Cause because it was upon Life and Blood Lincoln maintains that the Lords did them Injury and that Bishops in England may and ought to vote in causâ sanguinis That they were never inhibited by the Law of this Land never by the Peers of the Land before this time That their voluntary forbearance in some Centuries of the Ages before proceeded from their Fears of the Canons of the Court of Rome and by the special Leave of the King and both Houses who were graciously pleased to allow of their Protestations for their Indemnity as Church-men when the King and Parliament might have rejected their Protestations if they had pleas'd And much he insisted upon it that the opponent Lords grounded their Judgment upon the corrupt Canons of the Church of Rome Indeed I find in my own Papers that the Monks of Canterbury complain'd against Hubert their Archbishop to the Pope for sitting upon Tryals of Life and Blood They could not complain that he went against the Laws and Customs of England but their Appeal was to the Pope's Justice and it was more tolerable for Monks to rake in the Rubbish of the Roman Courts than for English Barons And say in sooth must not Divines of the Reformed Church meddle in Cause of Blood 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Amph. Would they be laugh'd at for this Hypocrisie or abhorr'd For who more forward to thrust into the Troops of the late War than the Ministers whom they countenanc'd Have I not seen them prance about the Streets in London with Pistols in their Holsters and Swords by their sides And so for Edg-hill and Newberry c. Could they rush into so many Fights and be clear from cause of Blood Nay the Pontisical part make but a Mockery of this Canon for anno 1633 a Book was printed in Paris sill'd with a Catalogue of Cardinals Bishops and Priests who had been brave Warriours most of them Leaders in the Field the Author a Sycophant aimed to please Cardinal Richlieu and a Fig for the Canons Reason Canons Parliamentary Privileges nay Religion are to corrupt men as they like them for their own ends Now hear how this Bishop did wage his Arguments for the affirmative 146. It is to be held for a good Cause against which nothing of moment can be alledg'd such is this concerning the Right of Bishops to vote in causâ sanguinis First It is not prohibitum quia malum not any way evil in it self no more than it is an evil thing in it self to do Justice Secondly It was in use from the Law of Nature when the eldest of the Family was King Priest and Prophet Thirdly It was in use under Moses's Law and so continued in the Priests and Levites down to Annas and Caiaphas and after Christ's death till the Temple was destroyed as appears by the scourging of the Apostles by the stoning of Stephen and commanding St. Paul to be smitten on the Mouth Fourthly It was in use in the persons of the Apostles themselves as in that Judgment given upon Ananias and Saphira in the delivery up to Satan as most of the ancient Fathers expound that Censure to be a corporal Vexation And generally in all the Word of God there is no one Text that literally inhibits Church-men more than Lay-men to use this kind of Judicature For that Precept to be no striker 1 Tim. 3.3 is no more to be appropriated to a Bishop distinct from the rest of Christian men than that which is added not to be given to Wine that is immoderately taken Proceed we