ART. II.—The Court of King James the First. By Dr. Godfrey Goodman, Bishop of Gloucester. To which are added Letters illustrative. Now first published from the Original MSS. By John S. Brewer, M.A. Bentley. 1839.

[?] "Autograph list at Pusey House gives both Newman and Brewer, each with a '?' In Opuscula at B.O., N includes only p. 39."—Blehl.

[British Critic, vol. 27, January 1840.]

{24} THESE volumes contain a great deal of what may be called the gossip of the times to which they relate, or, in other words, of curious and interesting matter, for such gossip is, so far as it is true. The Memoirs of Bishop Goodman, of which the first volume consists, are published from the MS. copy preserved in the Bodleian Library; and the letters, which form the second, have been collected from various depositories, with a view of supplying a general illustration to the Memoirs. Mr. Brewer, to whom we are indebted for the publication, has added a number of apposite historical notes, which show much reading, and increase the attraction of the work.

Goodman, Bishop of Gloucester in the reign of Charles the First, lies under the odium of having conformed to the Church of Rome; and certain it is, he had a difference with Archbishop Laud, at the celebrated Convocation of 1640. In that convocation a canon was enacted against Papists, and Goodman would not sign it. In consequence he was committed to prison, "where he got by his restraint," says Fuller, "what he could never have gained by his liberty; namely, of one reputed Papist to become for a short time popular, as the only confessor suffering for not subscribing the canons."—Hist. iii. In the beginning of his episcopate a petition had been presented against him to the king, by Bastwick, Barton, and Prynne, for having, "at his proper cost," as they said, repaired the high cross in the town of Windsor, and made it a crucifix; also for putting up an altar in his cathedral, and introducing cushions and cloths with the crucifix worked upon them. Moreover, it seems, he had interfered with a clergyman who had been preaching against the "idolatries of the Papists," and declaring that either obstinate Papists, dying Papists, would not be saved, or else Protestants could not. The bishop is said to have wished him to own that in the eye of the law we were still one with the Church of Rome, though politically severed from it; that it was an offence, nay, a deadly and mortal wound against our own Church to say that members of the Roman Church cannot be saved, inasmuch as we have the same orders, church service, ceremonies, fasts, and feasts as they. Shortly before this he had been reprimanded for maintaining certain unsound opinions at Court, and was generally suspected of embracing the tenets of Romanism. In his Memoirs he advocates auricular confession. {25}

An editor is bound to feel chivalrously towards his author, and Mr. Brewer is not behind his duty. He meets ultra-Protestants with their own weapons,—severity in weighing and difficulty in admitting evidence; and fairly argues that it does not follow, it is not necessary, it is not certain, that, because Bishop Goodman said this or that, therefore he was other than "a sound Protestant."

"In his will he professed that as he had lived so he died, most constant in all the articles of our Christian faith, and in all the doctrine of God's holy Catholic and Apostolic Church, 'whereof,' he says, 'I do acknowledge the Church of Rome to be the mother Church. And I do verily believe that no other Church hath any salvation in it, but only so far as it concurs with the faith of the Church of Rome.' But a sound Protestant might even profess as much; the only question being what he meant by the terms 'mother Church,' and 'concurs with the faith of the Church of Rome.' A Romanist would rather have professed that the Church of Rome was the only true Church, and would scarcely have admitted the possibility of salvation in a Church separate and distinct from the Church at Rome. At least, if Goodman was consistent, he, having been so long a member of the Church of England, could scarcely say that he had lived most constant to the faith of the Church of Rome, if he considered the Church of Rome to be the only true Catholic and Apostolic Church."—Introd. xii. xiii.

However, it is certain that during the latter part of his life the bishop had been in habits of intimacy with the well-known Santa Clara, and died in his company. Wood calls him "a harmless man," "hurtful to none but himself," "faithful to the poor and hospitable to his neighbours." That he was kindhearted and placable is shown by his praising, in the course of his Memoirs, both Laud and Williams, though he had had differences with both.

Bishop Goodman was nephew of Dr. Gabriel Goodman, forty years Dean of Westminster, and one of the translators of the English Bible. He was born in 1583, and educated at Westminster School, under the historian Camden, of whom he has recorded some sayings in his Memoirs. From Westminster he was removed to Trinity College, Cambridge; and came into life about the time of King James's accession and the Raleigh and Gunpowder plots; the latter of which he calls "The most wicked and cursed attempt that ever was practised by man, and generally acknowledged for a truth on all sides."—vol. i. p. 160. There had been abundance of plots in Elizabeth's time, but from the ease and unconcern with which she went into public, the bishop argues, either that she did not fear much from them, or that she was, as was certain, "of a wonderful courage and undaunted spirit."—p. 161.

"In the year '88," he says, that is, when he was a boy of five years old, "I did then live at the upper end of the Strand near St. Clement's {26} Church, when suddenly there came a report unto us, (it was in December, much about five of the clock at night, very dark,) that the queen was gone to council, and if you will see the queen you must come quickly. Then we all ran; when the court gates were set open, and no man did hinder us from coming in. There we came where there was a far greater company than was usually at Lenten Sermons; and when we had staid there an hour and that the yard was full, there being a number of torches, the queen came out in great state. Then we cried, 'God save your majesty! God save your majesty!' Then the queen turned unto us and said, 'God bless you all, my good people!' Then we cried again, 'God save your majesty! God save your majesty!' Then the queen said again unto us, 'You may well have a greater prince, but you shall never have a more loving prince:' and so looking one upon another awhile the queen departed. This wrought such an impression upon us, for shows and pageants are ever best seen by torchlight, that all the way long we did nothing but talk what an admirable queen she was, and how we would adventure our lives to do her service. Now this was in a year when she had most enemies, and how easily might they have then gotten into the crowd and multitude to have done her a mischief! But here we were to come in at the court gates, and there was all the danger of searching.

"Take her then in her yearly journeys at her coming to London, where you must understand that she did desire to be seen and to be magnified ... The queen's constant custom was a little before her coronation-day to come from Richmond to London, and to dine with my Lord Admiral at Chelsea, and to set out from Chelsea at dark night, where the Lord Mayor and the Aldermen were to meet her; and here all the way long from Chelsea to Whitehall was full of people to see her, and truly any man might very easily have come to her coach. Now if she thought that she had been in danger, how is it credible that she should so adventure herself? King James, who was as harmless a king as any was in our age, and consequently had as few enemies, yet wore quilted doublets stiletto proof: the queen had many enemies: all her wars depended upon her life: she had likewise very fearful examples: the first Duke of Guise was shot; Henry the Third, the French king, was stabbed; the Duke of Orange was pistoled;—and these might make the Queen take heed."—vol. i. pp. 163-l65.

The queen preserved her spirit to the last. Bishop Goodman gives us a curious instance of it, in a different way, only two years before her death,

"when the French king, Henry the Fourth, matching with a daughter of Florence, many nobles of Italy came to attend her to Paris; and when the solemnity of the marriage was past, Duke Prusiano [Bracciano], a very courteous and brave nobleman, did resolve to come over to see England, and to come in a private way. Our ambassador in France, hearing thereof, gave notice to our secretary, who acquainting her majesty therewith, order was taken that one should come in his company, to be a spy upon him, to know his lodgings and to discover his person. The duke (as the fashion was) came to the court upon a Sunday, {27} to see the queen go to the chapel. The queen having notice of this, and knowing him by one that stood next to him, as she came by took some occasion to call the lord chamberlain, as I take it, to tie her shoe-strings, or to do some such like office; and there making a stay, she took the duke by the hand, who followed her into the privy chamber. She did then graciously use him, and after feasted him, and gave him great entertainment, which was very well taken by the French king and queen: and then did the queen dance a galliard very comely, and like herself, to show the vigour of her old age. Even the Italians did then say that it was a wonder to see an old woman, the head of the Church, being seventy years of age, to dance in that manner, and to perform her part so well."—vol. i. pp. 17, 18.

We are sorry to spoil the mirth, or diminish the wonderment, of the Italians, but we beg leave to state that the queen had no such dignity to support during her galliard as the headship of the Church; nay, that she herself had a great dislike of this title, as being an unwarrantable interference with religion: Henry the Eighth, indeed, among his other excesses, had been bold enough to assume it; but Mary had repealed Henry's statute; and though Elizabeth seems to have repealed Mary's with many others of her sister's statutes, and thus accidentally revived the title; yet that this was an accident, and that the title, if formally legal, does not constitutionally belong to the crown of England, is proved by a number of incontrovertible facts, and acknowledged by the most unbiassed authorities. Instead of "Head of the Church," Elizabeth took the title of "Supreme Governor," and that expressly as having, as Burnet informs us, "a scruple about it." Jewell says the same, writing at the time of Elizabeth's accession, and adds, suo periculo, that "that title could not be justly given to any mortal." This implies, of course, that the Zurich and Geneva people disliked it, as indeed might have been conjectured; and it is as certain that the title was offensive to Roman Catholics; indeed Burnet informs us, that Elizabeth declined it "to mitigate their opposition." No pretensions then could have met with a more rough protest, on all hands, than did those of the English Crown to be Head of the Church on the accession of Elizabeth.

Elizabeth died in 1603; and her death was followed by what is called the "Bye Plot," which was the occasion of Raleigh's trial. Mr. Brewer has given us a very painful letter from the library of All Souls College addressed by Raleigh to his wife, after his condemnation. It is not unlike a letter to her which is contained in the Biographia Britannica; but that letter was written from Winchester the night before his reprieve, when he was in immediate expectation of death, whereas the letter which Mr. Brewer has published, though written under a similar expectation, {28} is addressed to her from the Tower. The topics in both are remarkably the same; indeed it is difficult to make out when he could have been a second time in the circumstances described; or, on the other hand, how he could have composed on one occasion two letters so like each other. The Winchester letter observes, that his wife was receiving his last words in these his last lines. "I beseech you," he continues, "for the love you bear me living, that you do not hide yourself many days; but, by your travels, seek to help my miserable fortunes, and the right of my poor child." He goes on to speak of his estate and his debts. After this, occurs a sentence so like what is found in the Tower letter, that we wonder Mr. Brewer should not have noticed it as throwing suspicion upon the genuineness of the one or the other; all that can be said is, that every one gets into the way of repeating certain phrases and forms of speech, especially when under the influence of excitement. The sentence in the Winchester letter to which we refer is as follows: "Have a care of the fair pretences of man ... I speak not to dissuade you from marriage, for it will be best for you, both in respect to God and the world. As for me I am no more yours, nor you mine."

With these remarks we now set before our readers Mr. Brewer's document. He observes that it decides the much controverted question whether Raleigh attempted his life in prison.

"Receive from thy unfortunate husband these his last lines, these the last words that ever thou shalt receive from him. That I can live to think never to see thee and my child more, I cannot. I have desired God and disputed with my reason, but nature and compassion hath the victory. That I can live to think how you are both left a spoil to my enemies, and that my name shall be a dishonor to my child, I cannot, I cannot endure the memory thereof: unfortunate woman, unfortunate child, comfort yourselves, trust God, and be contented with your poor estate; I would have bettered it if I had enjoyed a few years. Thou art a young woman, and forbear not to marry again: it is now nothing to me; thou art no more mine, nor I thine. To witness that thou didst love me once, take care that thou marry not to please sense, but to avoid poverty, and to preserve thy child. That thou didst also love me living, witness it to others; to my poor daughter, to whom I have given nothing; for his sake, who will be cruel to himself to preserve thee. Be charitable to her, and teach thy son to love her for his father's sake. For myself, I am left of all men, that have done good to many. All my good turns forgotten, all my errors revived and expounded to all extremity of ill; all my services, hazards, and expenses for my country, plantings, discoveries, fights, councils, and whatsoever else, malice hath now covered over. I am now made an enemy and traitor by the word of an unworthy man; he hath proclaimed me to be a partaker of his vain imaginations, notwithstanding the whole course of my life hath approved the contrary, as my death shall approve it. Woe, woe, woe be unto him {29} by whose falsehood we are lost! he hath separated us asunder; he hath slain my honor, my fortune; be hath robbed thee of thy husband, thy child of his father, and me of you both. Oh, God! thou dost know my wrongs: know then thou my wife and child; know then thou, my Lord and King, that I ever thought them too honest to betray, and too good to conspire against. But my wife, forgive thou all as I do; live humble, for thou hast but a time also. God forgive my Lord Harry [Note 1], for he was my heavy enemy. And for my Lord Cecill I thought he would never forsake me in extremity; I would not have done it him, God knows. But do not thou know it, for he must be master of thy child, and may have compassion of him. Be not dismayed that I died in despair of God's mercies; strive not to dispute it; but assure thyself that God hath not left me, nor Satan tempted me. Hope and despair live not together; I know it is forbidden to destroy ourselves, but I trust it is forbidden in this sort, that we destroy not ourselves despairing of God's mercy.

"The mercy of God is immeasurable, the cogitations of men comprehend it not. In the Lord I have ever trusted, and I know that my Redeemer liveth: far is it from me to be tempted with Satan; I am only tempted with sorrow, whose sharp teeth devour my heart. O God, that art goodness itself, thou canst not be but good to me! Oh, God, that art mercy itself, thou canst not be but merciful to me!

"For my state is conveyed to feoffees, to your cousin Brett and others; I have but a bare estate for a short life. My plate is at gage in Lombard Street: my debts are many. To Peter Vanlore, some £600. To Antrobus as much, but Cumpson is to pay £300 of it. To Michael Hext [Note 2], £100. To George Carew, £100. To Nicholas Sanders, £100. To John Fitz-James, £100. To Mr. Waddow, £100. To a poor man, one Hawker, for horses, £70. To a poor man, called Hunt, £20. Take first care of those for God's sake. To a brewer at Weymouth, and a baker for my Lord Cecill's ship and mine, I think some £80; John Renolds knoweth it. And let that poor man have his true part of my return from Virginia; and let the poor men's wages be paid with the goods, for the Lord's sake. Oh, what will my poor servants think at their return, when they hear I am accused to be Spanish, who sent them, to my great charge, to plant and discover upon his territory? Oh, intolerable infamy! Oh, God! I cannot resist these thoughts; I cannot live to think how I am derided, to think of the expectation of my enemies, the scorns I shall receive, the cruel words of lawyers, the infamous taunts and despites, to be made a wonder and a spectacle! Oh, death! hasten thee unto me, that thou mayest destroy the memory of these, and lay me up in dark forgetfulness. Oh, death! destroy my memory, which is my tormentor; my thoughts and my life cannot dwell in one body. But do thou forget me, poor wife, that thou mayest live to bring up thy poor child. I recommend unto you my poor brother, A. Gilbert. The lease of sanding is his, and none of mine; let him have it for God's cause; he knows what is due to me upon it. And be good to Kemis, for he is a perfect honest man, and hath much wrong for my {30} sake. For the rest, I commend me to them, and them to God. And the Lord knows my sorrow to part from thee and my poor child; but part I must by enemies and injuries, part with shame and triumph of my detractors; and therefore be contented with this work of God, and forget me in all things but thine own honor, and the love of mine. I bless my poor child, and let him know his father was no traitor. Be bold of my innocence, for God, to whom I offer life and soul, knows it. And whosoever thou choose again after me, let him be but thy politique husband; but let my son be thy beloved, for he is part of me, and I live in him, and the difference is but in the number, and not in the kind. And the Lord for ever keep thee and them, and give thee comfort in both worlds!"—vol. ii. p. 93-97.

We have already seen in what terms Bishop Goodman speaks of the gunpowder plot, making no question whatever of its real existence. He describes the principals in it to have been men full of zeal for their party, but destitute of personal religion. However, he speaks well of Garnet and some others, and gives the following account of his condemnation;—that the government apprehended him on the general ground of his being the provincial jesuit, and having no evidence against him, had recourse to artifice. They put him into a chamber where he could be overheard, and then introduced a confessor to him and set persons to listen. His confession was reported; in which he acknowledged that in hearing the confession of others, he had come to knowledge of the plot; and upon this evidence he was condemned and executed. Mr. Brewer adds nothing in elucidation of this point. The Bishop adds that "it hath since appeared that divers priests in their letters to Rome did much complain that they found Catholics very desperate, and that they could not persuade them to any obedience, but did much fear they intended mischief."—vol. i. p. 108. It would be a curious point to ascertain whether Garnet made his confessee renounce the plot, or had refused him absolution.

The despair of the Roman party was the consequence of the hopes which they had entertained of an easier time in England after the death of Elizabeth.

"They did live in some hope that after the old woman's life they might have some mitigation, and even those who did then persecute them were a little more moderate, as being doubtful what times might succeed, and fearing their own case; but now that they saw the times settled, having no hope of better days, but expecting that the uttermost rigour of the law should be executed, they became desperate; finding that by the laws of the kingdom their own lives were not secured, and for the coming over of a priest into England it was no less than high treason. A gentlewoman was hanged only for relieving and harbouring a priest; a citizen was hanged only for being reconciled to the Church {31} of Rome besides, the penal laws were such and so executed that they could not subsist;—what as usually sold in shops and openly bought, this the pursuivant would take away from them as being popish and superstitious. One knight did affirm that in one term he gave twenty nobles in rewards to the doorkeeper of the attorney general; another did affirm, that his third part which remained unto him of his estate did hardly serve for his expense in law to defend him from other oppressions; besides their children to be taken from home to be brought up in another religion. So they did every way conclude that their estate was desperate; they could die but once, and their religion was more precious unto them than their lives. They did further consider their misery, how they were debarred in any course of life to help themselves: they could not practise law, they could not be citizens, they could have no office, they could not breed up their sons—none did desire to match with them; they had neither fit marriages for their daughters, nor nunneries to put them into,—for those few which are beyond seas are not considerable in respect of the number of recusants, and none can be admitted into those without great sums of money, which they, being exhausted, could not supply. The Spiritual Court did not cease to molest them, to excommunicate them, then to imprison them; and thereby they were utterly disenabled to sue for their own.

"These, and many other their pretended grievances, did put that resolution into them as upon the first advantage either they would lose all, or vindicate their religion and their liberty."—vol. i. pp. 100, 101.

Horrible as the particular project fixed upon was, still such is the wickedness of man, it seems not even to have the praise of originality:—

"The Plot of the Gunpowder it was not so strange and new as some will make it; for Bishop Fisher, in Henry the Eighth's time, after his cook had been lured to poison his porridge, whereby, as I take it, sixteen of his family were poisoned, and himself not eating porridge that day escaped: afterwards there was a plot to blow him up in his study. So King James's father; the house where he was murdered was blown up with gunpowder. But the first plot that ever I heard of was this:—In Venice they have a custom, that if any man do find out a new invention or discover any danger, he shall be rewarded for it. Now it should seem the council house there hath certain shops below, and one of the citizens made this objection: what if a wicked traitor, instead of bringing in barrels of oil should bring barrels of powder, and while the senate were sitting should blow up the house? how easy might a foreign enemy then overthrow the state!"—vol. i. pp. 108, 109.

We do not need more than the sad history of Lord Bacon to show us that bribery and corruption were no strangers to the age of King James, any more than to our own, before that marvellous remedy, the Reform Bill, was administered to the nation, and made us one and all, parliament and people, immaculate. It is curious to look back from our exalted position upon the state of things in the times of Bishop Goodman, when laymen neglected {32} to defend the rights and properties of the Church, even when sworn to do so, except upon mere conservative or acquisitive principles. It must be observed that the Bishop was Canon of the Church to which the following narrative relates:

"The church of Windsor stands within the castle of Windsor; our houses did abut or were contiguous to the walls of the castle; the walls fell, whereby the house were not habitable; we petitioned the King, we had commissions out of the Exchequer, and many orders, that repairing was to be at the King's charge, yet still we could get nothing done; we lost time and expense in soliciting the business: at length, sitting in chapter, one of our canons made a speech to this purpose: 'The times are such that we churchmen are thought to be very simple and weak in judgment in respect of lawyers and great officers, and the reason is because our wit is bounded with honesty, whereas theirs having no such bounds and limitations, it seems therefore to be of a larger extent than ours. Not to speak, then, what is fit to be done, but to speak according to the ordinary practice of the world, men must now bribe that they may have and enjoy their own; and therefore, instead of letters or making means or friends, I could wish that one might buy a purse and put in it one hundred pieces, and present it to such a great officer, and desire his favour.' The dean and the rest of the canons, being wearied and tired out with soliciting the business, hearkened to this man's motion, and it was concluded that the dean in his own person should present the money, only with this message, that the Church of Windsor, remembering their humble duties and service to his lordship, made bold, according to their poor abilities, to present his lordship with a small token, which they did humbly desire his lordship to accept, and to afford them his lawful favour in such a business. The dean did perform the message accordingly, and the lord received the money and said nothing to him. The dean, at his return, as the manner is, instantly called a chapter, to give an account of the business, and there gave his account, that he had done all things punctually according to their desires, and that the lord did not speak one word to him, neither did he add one word but according to his commission: 'Indeed,' said he, 'I thought something more, I confess; but that was private to myself.' 'Then,' quoth one of the canons, 'Mr. Dean, we must have quid pro quo: we have parted with our monies, and if we have not actions yet we must have words; and if we have not words, it is fit we should have thoughts; and therefore, to deal plainly with you, I am auditor, and I will not pass this money in our accompts unless you will be pleased to impart your thoughts unto us.' Then said other canons, 'A very good motion: Mr. Dean, we must have your thoughts, or else you must repay the monies.' The dean being pressed, said, that when he delivered the money and the lord received it and said nothing, he looked upon him and thought thus within himself: 'Thou base knave! when thou wert made Knight of the Garter, thou didst swear to protect the Church of Windsor: hast thou so many thousands of thine own, and wilt thou not do us justice without a bribe? What we have is spent in hospitality, for the relief of the poor, {33} and for the honour of God and God's Church; some of us are not worth one hundred pounds: the money shall perish with thee and thine.' And so truly it did, for it did not prosper. This was before Salisbury's time; and so you see it hath been the practice of all times."—vol. i. pp. 205-208.

Nor was Church building either much in fashion among the laity in those young and palmy days of Protestantism:

"I did once intend to have built a church; and a lawyer in my neighbourhood did intend to build himself a fair house, as afterward he did. One sent unto him to desire him to accept from him all his timber, another sent unto him to desire him that he might supply him with all the iron that he spent about his house. These men had great woods and iron mills of their own. The country desired him to accept of their carriage. What reason had this man not to build? Truly I think he paid very little but the workmen's wages. Whereas, on the contrary, in the building of my church, where it was so necessary, for without the church they had not God's service, and no church was near them within four or five miles, truly I could not get the contribution of one farthing."—vol. i. pp. 295, 296.

We must not, however, lay the whole blame to the laity, who have in no age been found backward to make sacrifices so far as the clergy have led the way. If my "Lord of Middlesex" is to be trusted, his Majesty was in fault in making puritans bishops, "who," he observed, "with their parsimony providing for their wives and children, and by all the courses of their life, did more resemble puritans than bishops, who were wont to be given to hospitality and all charitable works; but now he did fear lest these puritans took their bishoprics to make their uttermost profit of them, and in effect to undo their successors."—vol. i. p. 314. By way of contrast, it is seldom that the Church has had prelates so princely in their benefactions as Laud and Williams were at this very time, men differing from each other in many points, but agreeing together in the observance of those duties which were as essential to their station as archbishops, as holiness was to their calling as clerks. Bishop Goodman, as has been observed, enjoyed the favour or countenance of neither; yet he is eager in bearing witness to their bountifulness. He speaks with admiration of their great hospitality in inviting and entertaining strangers, and of their charitable works; Laud's in his university and college, and Williams's libraries at Cambridge, Westminster and Lincoln, his repairs at Westminster, his care of the young scholars, and his endowments at Cambridge.

"In my life I did never know more honest, more virtuous, more pious, or wiser men than I have known bishops and churchmen. God hath committed his Church into their charge, and to expose them to scorn and {34} contempt is to overthrow God's Church. But I will now instance in the two archbishops, Laud and Williams. There was not a man in England that kept a more orderly house than Laud did, or bred up his servants better. Take all the enemies of the Church throughout the whole kingdom, and I dare undertake that all of them put together have not done so many good works as these two archbishops have done in their time. And so I may truly say for the former archbishops,—Archbishop Abbot at Guildford and Canterbury, Whitgift at Croydon. Or show me any archbishop that left any great estate behind him. How many bishops have I heard protest that they spent all that they had, and, as they thought, to the best uses! One bishop told me, who had but a very poor bishopric, that he did every day constantly relieve one hundred of his poor neighbours. If I might but see the enemies of bishops and churchmen do but half so much, I should think they had some religion in them. I dare boldly say, that one Londoner did leave behind him more wealth than all the bishops, all the deans, all the archdeacons, all the canons and prebendaries—that is, all the dignities of the church—throughout all England left behind them. It is well known that a Londoner died worth three hundred thousand pounds; which I do verily believe is more than all the dignified men in the Church have; and therefore they were not much to be envied, if those who now have the possessions of the Church shall spend the means and revenues better than churchmen did."—vol. i. pp. 287, 288.

All this is very good and satisfactory; though, considering the solemn duties to which the clergy are set apart and the end for which wealth is given them, it ought to be no great praise to a priest or bishop that he does not make a fortune out of the Church revenues. We wish, however, Goodman had as clear views about the odiousness of seeking, as of misusing, the preferments of the Church, whereas, in common with a number of his brethren of the day, perhaps of other days too, he avows a desire of promotion, which little savors of the Christian spirit in primitive times. We would not indeed measure this weakness by exactly the same standard which might fairly be applied to it now. It was a very different thing to court and look out for the royal favour at a time when the divine right and patriarchal power of kings was believed in, and in this dull age. Then the clergy came to the king as the direct representative of God, and the shepherd both of themselves and their people in religious matters. The power of the keys, indeed, as regards the administration of the sacraments, was ascribed solely to the ministerial office; but jurisdiction was believed to be the king's prerogative, and in jurisdiction the office of teaching was more or less involved, though not immediately. The king of England was the source of ecclesiastical active power; he was believed to have had from Edward the Confessor's time a miraculous gift of healing, authenticating his royal commission, {35} and his smile or his bounty might almost be regarded as of a sacramental nature. Surely such a view of the supremacy was at least an ingredient in the assemblage of thoughts and feelings with which many a clergyman approached the face of majesty. But the case was altered, when, on the accession of the Georges, the king himself disowned the special sacredness of his office, refused to accept his higher functions, gloried in the social compact, and looked at the Church as a part and parcel of the Constitution. Hence, while we are not at all pleased with the tone of an extract which we are about to give from Goodman, we do not put it on a level with the well-known complaints and longings of Bishop Newton, the suspiria non sancta with which he woos the good offices of persons in power and influence, and almost worships at a distance the congé d'élire and the seat in parliament. "When he waited on the archbishop at Kew," he says, speaking of himself, after he was made subalmoner, "his grace informed him that the king had said that, as he would now preach often before him, he must desire that he would be particularly short, especially on the great festivals, for he was an old man ... The doctor," i.e. himself, the writer, "had before taken care in his sermons at court to come within the compass of twenty minutes, but after this, especially on the great festivals, he never exceeded fifteen; so that the king sometimes said to the clerk of the closet, 'a short good sermon.' Stories such as this certainly do not imply any high mystical view of the office of the supreme governor and patriarch of the English Church. But this is not the place to enlarge upon the tone of mind which distinguished the author of the well-known and popular Commentaries on the Apocalypse.

All this is not pleasant, and sets off Bishop Goodman to advantage; yet we allow that the following passage is not pleasant either:

"Give me leave, for the discharge of my own conscience, and in my thankfulness to God and the memory of King James, to relate a truth, and so let God be merciful to my soul as I shall relate nothing but the truth. Being a little known to King James, when I never used any means unto him, nor to my knowledge did ever any man speak one word in my behalf, then did King James in a morning send John Packer unto me, to tell me, that his majesty had a full resolution to prefer me, and to bring me to some good place in the Church; and lest his majesty should forget me, he had therefore commanded Buckingham to put him in mind of me; and lest Buckingham, having many suitors, might forget me, the King commanded John Packer to put him in mind of me; and lest John Packer should forget me, the King had sent him unto me, to engage himself unto me that he would solicit my business. Hereupon I never came unto John Packer but I had instantly access: I never proposed anything unto him but I had a true and real answer; no dilatory or complimental words. The year following, I displeased his majesty, {36} and thereby I lost a very good preferment; the year after, I had the deanery of Rochester, which was a very good preferment and very agreeable to my disposition, for I did ever love seamen, and those of the King's navy were my special friends. When I came to give his majesty thanks, his majesty did seem to be more joyful in giving it than I could express joy in receiving it, using these words,—that I should not give a farthing. When I was made bishop, in my instruments there was the mistaking of some words, which I did fear was wilfully done, only to draw on a fee; then the secretary had for mending those words twenty pieces; then I sent a piece of plate to Buckingham, which I think cost me between forty and fifty pounds. This he would not receive, but sent it back again and rewarded the messenger with three pieces. So that I think no honest man could blame King James or the Duke of Buckingham."—vol. i. p. 355-357.

While on the subject of love of lucre and preferment-hunting, we are reminded of the well-known De Dominis, of whom the bishop gives us almost a memoir, part of which we will extract, and after doing so, shall consider we have given the reader sufficient idea what he is to expect from these volumes.

Antonio de Dominis was Archbishop of Spalato, a poor see in the Venetian territory. The Venetians have not the reputation of being very good Catholics, and so it was that in Paul the Fifth's time they were ranged against the Pope, and the Archbishop of Spalato with them. Henry the Fourth of France managed to reconcile them, and in such reconciliations, as Bishop Goodman observes, it is as "with great trees falling one upon another," which "do themselves little hurt, but the bushes and shrubs which are between both are beaten down or shivered to pieces."—p. 337. And so in this case the higher powers, Pope and Republic, did not scruple to "fall heavily upon those who were active on both sides, and did nourish the differences." Spalato being one of these, betook himself to the English ambassador at Venice, Sir Dudley Carleton, and candidly confessed to him his conviction of the corruptions of the Church of Rome, and of his own inability to reform them, yet his desire to live in a pure reformed communion, and above all his great admiration and love of the Church of England, and his regret that his own preferment did not happen to lie within her happy patrimony; and he added, that "if my lord ambassador could but procure an exchange," he would with joy live and die an Anglican, and would daily pray for his lordship." The ambassador entered into his views, and they settled upon these terms, that De Dominis was to have a pension of 2001. a year, which the English bishops were to make up among themselves, Abbott, the archbishop, offering him a maintenance at Lambeth. He was received in England very honourably, and precedence was {37} allowed him next but one to the Archbishop of York. In course of time he became Master of the Savoy and Dean of Windsor, and in the latter capacity collated himself to the living of Illesley in Berkshire; King James rejoicing in so rare a convert, and having thought from the first that the quarrel of the Venetians with the Pope had been the effect of one of his own books.

After a time, however, the pleasure of novelty ceased on both sides; first, the bishops and then the king got tired of him. His precedence was with difficulty allowed, and his views developed upon the Protestant basis more than the king approved. He defended in a sermon the sleep of the soul between death and judgment. The prince went to Spain; symptoms of good understanding with the Roman party appeared at court; Paul the Fifth died, and an early friend, if not relative, of De Dominis succeeded him in the popedom. The Archbishop accordingly made secret overtures to the new Pontiff.

"He wrote unto him to congratulate his election, and that he did assure himself that God had a hand therein, and that it was for the great good of the Christian world, and that he himself should think himself very happy to die a member of that Church wherein God had made him his high priest; that himself was never alienated in mind and affection from the Catholic Church, only did desire to fly from persecution, and the more to ingratiate himself unto them who were to receive him, he did only palliate some plausible opinions, yet with no contumacious mind, but a full desire and resolution to submit himself to better judgments, that is, to the voice of the Shepherd and to the determination of the Catholic Church. Notwithstanding his interest in the pope, yet he durst not commit himself to his mercy, but he went to the several Catholic ambassadors that were then resident about London, and began to comply with them, telling them, that his coming over into England was to do some great good service to God's Catholic Church, which he thought he might be the better enabled to do if he were but an eye-witness and present in person, and so to procure the peace of God's Church; but having now had sufficient experience, he finds that the time is not yet come, that things are not ripened for the settlement and establishment of that peace, and himself being now grown very old, not fit for labours and employments, he did desire to return to his own country, to die a member of the Church of Rome, and to be buried with his fathers: and whereas he had offended the Church, he desired the several ambassadors to be means to their masters and princes that they would procure his pardon; which they promised very effectually to do, so desirous they were to make a convert, and that his return to the Church might take way that scandal and offence which was occasioned by his fall; and this they did very speedily, and their masters returned their answer that they would interpose for him."—vol. i. p. 345-347.

The news of what was going on came to the king's ears, and perplexed him much. He thought it would not stand with his {38} honour to hinder or imprison a stranger coming with leave to his kingdom, an old man too and an archbishop, alleging moreover conscience and religion and accused of no crime. His deliberations how to proceed were cut short by a letter from De Domninis, thanking him for his favours and begging to resign them. He expressed his great gratitude to his majesty for his hospitality, assured him that he should spread the fame of it on the continent, alleged that his reason for coming over was to bear ocular testimony of the state of the English Church, that he had received great satisfaction from the sight, should report favourably of it, and doubted not he should do it more good abroad by returning home than by remaining in it. He added that he was now old, and had the infirmities of age, and he desired to close his days in his own country. He followed up this representation by hiring a house, near Greenwich at the water-side, convenient for flight, and conveying his plate and property to the house of an ambassador who was leaving the country.

The termination of the drama was as follows:—

"But, like a provident man, be left his trunks and his treasure, no doubt but with the ambassador's leave, in the custody of some of his followers, his steward not knowing thereof. And when the trunks were come to Gravesend and the steward was ready to convey them to the ship, an officer came to him, and told him, that sometimes when ambassadors had had great entertainment of the king and had been richly rewarded, yet their servants did colour and transport other men's goods; therefore they had command to search whether any other goods were there but the lord-ambassador's. The steward did assure them that there were none others. This did not suffice, they would search; and so coming to Spalato's trunks, they knew them very well and seized upon them. In the trunks there was what he had in New-year's gifts, and what he had saved out of his pensions, the sum of sixteen or seventeen hundred pounds. Moneys to be transported out of the kingdom are forfeited by law, and so the King did him no wrong in seizing and detaining them. Whenas once Spalato heard that his trunks were intercepted, lying now in Holland in expectation of his trunks, he wrote to the King and procured all the ambassadors to join with him, that seeing it was all his stock and treasure and the means that he had to live upon, which he confessed he had by the King's own bounty and free benevolence, that therefore the same goodness would permit him to enjoy it, whereby he might live and subsist daily to pray for his majesty, and that he might not starve in his old age. When the King had made it appear that he was as provident as Spalato was deceitful, and what he had, as it was his own free gift, so the carrying away was but his courtesy, then he permitted him, and caused his trunks to be restored.

"Now Spalato having his trunks, posted to Rome, where the princes had procured his pardon, so that he lived securely; but most of the cardinals would not vouchsafe to look upon him or have any acquaintance {39} with him. Some of the inferior clergy were appointed to treat with him and to cause him to make a recantation, which he did in a very strange manner and so lived there very contemptibly. Some English came sometimes to visit him, to whom be gave this counsel, that they should forbear coming, for it was not safe for them to come, nor safe for him to give them access. And not living long, when he was upon his deathbed, they that were about him sent up and down all Rome to find out Englishmen, and that they should repair there at such an hour; and at that time the ghostly father brings them all into Spalato's chamber, and speaks to Spalato to this effect: 'My lord, by your forsaking the Catholic Church and going to the Church of England, you have thereby given great offence, and many are much scandalized thereby; and by your printing of books and your opinions therein many still doubt how you stand affected in religion. You are now passed hope of life, and here are many English gentlemen come to see you. It is fit that now you should declare in what faith and religion you die, that so you may make some satisfaction for your former revolt.' Whereupon Spalato took a crucifix which then lay upon the bed and kissed it, and used these words: 'I do die a member of the Roman Catholic Church.' And when he was dead, his study was searched, and there were found certain papers which did imply his opinion to be that there was Inequalitas personarurn in Sanctâ Trinitate. This being added to his former revolt, it was thought fit to proceed against him. Advocates were retained on both sides, and after much discussion it was resolved that he died in a state of heresy, and so his body was burned."—Vol. i. pp. 351-354.

Hacket, in his Life of Archbishop Williams, makes mention, as Mr. Brewer reminds us, of a visit paid to De Dominis, after his return to Rome, by Sir E. Sackvile, afterwards Earl of Dorset. He found him shut up in a ground-chamber, narrow and dark, and looking out upon a blank wall about three paces distant. In the course of the conversation, Sir Edward said to him: "My Lord of Spalato, you have here a dark lodging; it was not so with you in England: there you had at Windsor as good a prospect by land as was in all the country; and at the Savoy you had the best prospect upon the water that was in all the city." "I have forgot those things," he made answer: "here I can best contemplate the kingdom of heaven." Sir Edward was accompanied by Dr. Fitzherbert, rector of the English college, and moved by this reply he took his companion aside, and asked him whether he thought the archbishop really was so occupied. Hacket proceeds: "Says the father rector, I think nothing less: for he was a malcontent knave when he fled from us, a railing knave while he lived with you, and a motley, parti-coloured knave now he is come back!" Such is the uncomfortable history of De Dominis, and with it we take our leave of Mr. Brewer.

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Notes

1. Cobham.
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2. Hickes.—See Lodge's Illust. iii. 218.
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