kins, and a towel to wash before the consecration; three kneeling stools covered and stuffed, the foot-pace with three ascents, covered with a turkey carpet; three chairs used at ordinations, and the septum or rail with two ascents. Upon some altars there was a pot called the incense pot, and a knife to cut the sacramental bread.

The consecration of this furniture was after this manner; the archbishop in his cope, attended by two chaplains in their surplices, having bowed several times towards the altar, read a portion of scripture; then the vessels to be consecrated were delivered into the hands of the archbishop, who, after he had placed them upon the altar, read a form of prayer, desiring God to bless and accept of these vessels, which he severally touched and elevated, offering them up to God, after which they were not to be put to common use. We have seen already the manner of his grace's consecrating the sacramental elements at Creed-church; there was a little more ceremony in cathedrals, where the wafers and wine, being first placed with great solemnity on the credentia or side-table, were to be moved from thence by one of the archbishop's chaplains, who, as soon as he turns about his face to the altar with the elements in his hands, bows three times, and again when he comes to the foot of it, where he presents them upon his knées, and lays them upon the altar for consecration. How far the bringing these inventions of men into the worship of God, is chargeable with superstition, and with a departing from the simplicity of the christian institution, I leave with the reader; but surely the imposing them upon others under severe penalties, without the sanction of convocation, parliament, or royal mandate, was not to be justified.

The lecturers or afternoon preachers, giving his grace some disturbance, notwithstanding the attempts already made to suppress them, the king sent the following injunctions to the bishops of his province: 1. "That they ordain no clergyman without a presentation to some living. Or, 2. Without a certificate that he is provided of some void church. Or, 3. Without some place in a cathedral or 'collegiate church. Or, 4. Unless he be a fellow of some college. Or, 5. A master of arts of five years standing,

*Rushworth, vol. ii. part 2d. p. 214.

'living at his own charge. Or, 6. Without the intention of the bishop to provide for him."* By virtue of these injunctions no chaplainship to a nobleman's family, or any invitation to a lecture, could qualify a person for ordination without a living.

In the annual account the archbishop gave the king of the state of his province this year, we may observe how much the suppressing of these popular preachers lay upon his mind. The bishop of Bath and Wells (says his ' grace) has taken a great deal of pains in his late visitation, to have all the king's instructions observed, and par'ticularly he has put down several lecturers in market'towns, who were beneficed in other dioceses, because he 'found, when they had preached factious sermons, they "retired without the reach of his jurisdiction.

"And whereas his majesty's instructions require, that 'lecturers should turn their afternoon sermons into cate'chisings, some parsons or vicars object against their being (included, because lecturers are only mentioned; but the 'bishops will take care to clear their doubts, and settle their practice.

"The bishop of Peterborough† had suppressed a sedi'tious lecture at Repon, and put down several monthly 'lectures kept with a fast, and managed by a moderator. 'He had also suppressed a meeting called the running lec"ture, because the lecture went from village to village.

Dr. Grey truly observes, that none of these injunctions were new; but only an enforcement of the 33d canon of 1603. He refers the reader to Bishop Gibson's Codex, p. 162, and might have referred to his own work, entitled "A system of English Ecclesiastical Law" extracted from the Codex, p. 43-4. But though these injunctions were not formed for the occasion, the application of them at that time was particularly directed against the lecturers, who are pointed at, in the king's letter which accompanied the injunctions, as persons "wandering up and down to the scandal of their calling, and to get a maintenance falling upon 'such courses as were most unfit for them, both by humoring their auditors, and otherways altogether insufferable." It is easy to perceive what dictated this representation. "By reason of these strict rules" says Rushworth, "no lecture whatsoever was admitted to be a canonical title." Ed.

+ It should be of Litchfield and Coventry, says Dr. Grey, from Laud's Trials and Troubles, p. 527. Ed.

"The bishop of St. Asaph says, that his diocese is without exception, abating the increase of Romish recusants in some places, by their superstitious concourse to St. Winifred's well.

"The bishop of Landaff certifies, that he has not one 'stubborn non-conformist, or schismatical minister, within his diocese, and but two lecturers.

"All the bishops declare, that they take special care of that branch of his majesty's instructions relating to Calvinism, or preaching upon the predestinarian points; and the archbishop prays his majesty, that no layman whatsoever, and least of all the companies of the city of Lon'don or corporations, should under any pretence have pow'er to put in, or turn out, any lecturer, or other minister."

6

In this account the reader will observe very little complaint of the growth of popery, which we shall see presently was at a prodigious height; but all the archbishop's artillery is pointed against the puritan clergy, who were the most determined and resolved protestants in the nation.

Towards the close of this year came on the famous trial of Wm. Prynne, esq. barrister at law, and a member of Lincoln's-inn, for his Histriomastix,* a book written against

This book is a thick quarto, containing 1006 pages. It abounded with learning, and had some curious quotations; but it was a very tedious and heavy performance; so that it was not calculated to invite many to read it. This circumstance expose the weakness, as the severity of the sentence against him does the wickedness, of those who pursued the author with such barbarity. He was a man of sour and austere principles, of great reading, and most assiduous application to study. It was supposed, that, from the time of his arrival at man's estate, he wrote a sheet for every day of his life. "His custom," Mr. Wood informs us," was, when he studied, to put on a long quilted cap, which came an inch over his eyes, serving as an umbrella to defend them 'from too much light; and seldom eating a dinner, would every three hours, or more, be maunching a roll of bread, and now and then refresh 'his exhausted spirits with ale." To this Butler seems to allude in his

་

· muse:

"Thou that with ale or viler liquors,

"Didst inspire Withers, Prynne, and Vicars ;

"And teach them, though it were in spite,

"Of nature and their stars to write."

His works amounted to forty volumes folio and quarto. The most valuable, and a very useful performance, is his "Collection of Records" in four large volumes. Harris's Life of Charles I. p. 226-7. Wood's Athenæ

plays, masques, dancing, &c. The information sets forth. that though the author knew that the queen and lords of the council were frequently present at those diversions, yet he had railed against these and several others, as maypoles, christmas-keeping, dressing houses with ivy, festivals, &c. that he had aspersed the queen, and commended factious persons; which things are of dangerous consequence to the realm and state. The cause was heard in the Star-chamber, Feb. 7th, 1633. The council for Mr. Prynne were Mr. Atkyns, afterwards a judge of the common-pleas, Mr. Jenkins, Holbourne, Herne, and Lightfoot. For the king was Mr. attorney-general Noy. The council for the defendant pleaded, that he had handled the argument of stage-plays in a learned manner, without designing to reflect on his superiors ; that the book had been licensed according to law; and that if any passages may be construed to reflect on his majesty, or any branch of his government, he humbly begs pardon. But Mr. Attorney aggravated the charge in very severe language, and pronounced it a malicious and dangerous libel. After a full hearing he was sentenced to have his book burnt by the hands of the common hangman, to be put from the bar, and to be for ever incapable of his profession, to be turned out of the society in Lincoln's-Inn, to be degraded at Oxford, to stand on the pillory at Westminister and Cheapside, to Oxon, vol. ii. p. 315; and Granger's Biog. Hist. vol. ii. p. 280, 8vo. The prosecution of Mr. Prynne originated with archbishop Laud, who on a Sunday morning went to Noy, the attorney-general, with the charges against him. Prynne had instigated the resentment of Laud and other prelates by his writing against arminianism and the jurisdiction of the bishops, and by some prohibitions he had moved and got to the high commission court. -Tantæne animis cœlesibus iræ. Whitlocke's Memoirs, p. 18. Ed.

+ Rushworth, vol. ii. part 2d, p. 221.

SA passage quoted by Dr. Grey, from lord Cottington's speech, at the trial of Mr. Prynne, will afford a specimen of the spirit and stile of the Histriomastix: "Our English ladies," he writes, "shorn and 'frizzled madams, have lost their modesty; that the devil is only hon'ored by dancing; that they that frequent plays are damned; and so 'are all that do not concur with him, in his opinion, whores, panders, 'foul incarnate devils, Judas's to their Lord and Master." But this way of speaking was in the taste of the times; and the speech of lord Dorset, given above, shews that a nobleman did not come behind him in severe and foul language. Ed.

lose both his ears, one in each place, to pay a fine of five thousand pounds, and to suffer perpetual imprisonment. Remarkable was the speech of the earl of Dorset on this occasion: "Mr. Prynne, (says he) I declare you to be a schism-maker in the church, a sedition-sower in the com'monwealth, a wolf in sheep's clothing; in a word, omnium malorum nequissimus. I shall fine him ten thousands 'pounds, which is more than he is worth, yet less than he deserves. I will not set him at liberty, no more than a 'plagued man or a mad dog, who though he can't bite will 'foam: he is so far from being a social soul, that he is not 'a rational soul. He is fit to live in dens with such beasts of prey, as wolves and tygers, like himself; therefore I 'condemn him to perpetual imprisonment; and for corpo'ral punishment I would have him branded in the forehead, slit in the nose, and have his ears chopt off."* A speech more fit for an American savage than an English nobleman!

A few months after, Dr. Bastwick, a physician at Colchester, having published a book, entitled Elenchus religionis papistica, with an appendix, called Flagellum pontificis & episcoporum Latialium, which gave offence to the English bishops, because it denied the divine right of the order of bishops above presbyters, was cited before the high commission, who discarded him from his profession, [1634,] excommunicated him, fined him one thousand pounds, and imprisoned him till he recanted.†

Mr. Burton, B. D. minister of Priday-street, having published two exceptionable sermons, from Prov. xxiv. 21, 22, intitled, For God and the King, against the late innovations, had his house and study broke open by a serjeant at arms, and himself committed close prisoner to the Gatehouse, where he was confined several years.

These terrible proceedings of the commissions made many conscientious non-conformists retire with their fam* Rushworth, vol. ii. part. 2d, p. 233, 240.

† Dr. Grey's remark here as doing credit to himself, deserves to be quoted: "The severity of the sentence," says the doctor, "I am far from justifying." Ed.

S"The punishment of these men, who were of the three great professions," says Mr. Granger, "was ignominious and severe: Though