ance they needed to enable them to attain their political ends,* would within a few months be hastening to the same conclusion. Anticipating what might ensue, our Bishop, almost immediately after the assembling of that Parliament, followed up his work just now mentioned by a short tract of a more popular kind, entitled, "An humble Remonstrance to the High Court of Parliament in Defence of the Liturgy and Episcopacy, by a dutiful Son of the Church."+ In this second publication he explains what he meant by his previous assertion of "Divine Right" in terms which would scarcely perhaps have been altogether approved by the censor and reviser of his former work :— "When we speak of Divine Right, we mean not an express law of God, requiring it upon the absolute necessity of the being of a Church, what hindrances soever may interpose; but a divine institution, warranting it where it is, and requiring it where it may be had. Every Church therefore which is capable of this form of government both may and ought to affect it, as that which is, with so much authority, derived from the Apostles to the whole body of the Church upon earth; but those particular Churches, to whom this power and faculty is denied, lose nothing of the true essence of a Church, though they miss something of their glory and perfection, whereof they are barred by the necessity of their condition."§ If any human voice could have arrested the assailants of the Church in their mad career, it would have been the voice of one who came before them with such claims to be heard as Hall possessed. The domineering spirit of Laud had made him enemies, especially among all classes of the Laity, who felt themselves ex* See Hallam's "Constitutional History," vol. ii., p. 158, sq. + Ibid., p. 273. This tract received an answer by five opponents, who assumed the name of Smectymnus, a word coined to embody their several initials. Hall replied in "A Defence of the Humble Remonstrance," Works, vol. x., p. 287. Smectymnus rejoined in "A Vindication of the Answer." Hall again replied in "A Short Answer to the Tedious Vindication," ibid., p. 271. Thus busily was he engaged during the year 1641. Milton, our great poet, but then a young man of thirty-three, was equally busy on the other side. In the same year he wrote his tracts "Of Prelatical Episcopacy," "The Reason of Church Government urged against Prelacy,' ," "Animadversion upon the Remonstrant's (Hall's) Defence against Smectymnus," and, in the following year, An Apology for Sinectymnus." In the last named work he alludes to Hall's Satires thus: "The Remonstrant, when he was as young as I, could teach each hollow grove," &c. He was in fact ten years younger. Hall does not appear to have taken any notice of Milton's publications. Bishop Sanderson, one of the ablest, most exact, and most judicious of English divines, avoided the term Jus Divinum (in relation to Episcopacy) as being ambiguous, and therefore subject to be mistaken. See Works, vol. v., p. 151, and compare ibid., p. 11 and p. 191. In the latter place he writes: "Leaving other men to the liberty of their own judgment, my opinion is, that Episcopal government is not to be derived merely from apostolical practice or institutions, but that it is originally founded in the person and office of the Messias, our blessed Lord Jesus Christ; who, being sent by his heavenly Father to be the great Apostle, Shepherd, and Bishop of his Church......and anointed to that office...... with power and the Holy Ghost......did afterwards......send and empower his holy Apostles, giving them the Holy Ghost likewise......to execute the same apostolical, episcopal, and pastoral office for the ordering and governing of his Church until his coming again, and so the same office to continue in them and their successors unto the end of the world. This I take to be so clear from Heb. iii. 1; 1 Pet. ii. 25; Acts x. 37, 38; Luke iii. 22; John xx. 21; Matt. xxviii. 18-20, and other like texts of Scripture, that if they shall be compared together, both between themselves, and with the following practices of all the Churches of Christ, as well in the Apostles' times as in the purest and primitive times nearest thereunto, there will be left little cause why any man should doubt thereof." And Hall maintains the same opinion, vol. x., pp. 242, 269. § Works, vol. x., p. 282. See also ibid., p. 340; vii., p. 58, and below, p. xxxvi, sq.; and compare Laud's Works, vol. v., p. 369. cluded from their proper functions in the State through his overpowering political influence; while, at the same time, he was bent upon introducing into the Church much-needed reforms, with which, for the most part, in their ignorance or prejudice, they had no sympathy. But Hall was influenced by no such spirit. He had now been Bishop of one of the most extensive dioceses for thirteen years, and he could appeal not only to the mildness and impartiality, but to the success of his administration. He could also point to the manifold labours of his pastoral life, by which he had endeavoured to instil into the minds of his people the saving lessons of the Gospel. He had sought to draw them away from the dry husks of unprofitable disputes to the fresh waters and pastures of the Word of God. Besides the continued issue from time to time of the following "Contemplations," which appear to have been completed in 1634, he had published in 1633 “ A Plain and Familiar Explication, by way of Paraphrase, of all the hard Texts of the whole Divine Scripture of the Old and New Testaments."* Speaking of that work in the dedication to King Charles I., he says: "As I durst not undergo it without the aid of the best commenters, ancient and modern, so I do in all humility subject it to the grave and holy judgment of this renowned Church.” And in the close of the preface to the Christian reader his prayer is: "May that good God who hath so graciously enabled me, notwithstanding the throng of other occasions, to go through with this well-meant work, bless it to the behoof of his Church, and the glory of his own name!"+ Having thus provided for the edification of his Lay people, he also, in 1634 (when he obtained more than usual leisure, in consequence of the Visitation of his diocese being held that year by Laud as metropolitan), put forth in Latin, for the benefit of his Clergy, a devotional treatise, "Henochismus, sive Tractatus de modo ambulandi cum Deo;" and together with it a Latin version of his "Occasional Meditations," consisting of religious reflections on common occurrences § (which his son Robert had previously published in the original English)—a labour which he was content to impose upon himself, rather than undergo the risk of the book being ill translated by some foreigner; as had been the case, he complains, with several of his former works, of which versions had appeared both in French and Latin.|| How feelingly do the following sentences, taken from the dedication of the "Henochismus," "to the learned and famous clergy of the diocese of Exeter," exhibit the reluctance with which he must have been drawn, through the necessities of the times, to engage in controversies :-"The pens of almost all our writers are now employed on certain polemical questions. In the meantime piety starves, and a religious course of life is generally contemned as something quite irrelevant and supererogatory. For my own part, I am both weary and ashamed of these disputes, by which the Christian world is miserably agitated. I only wish it were in my power to allay them; I say not by my prayers, my sighs, my tears, but by any fatigue or labour I could endure, by any sacrifice I could make, even unto blood. May God, may God (for he alone is able) provide a remedy for our disorders! But let us meanwhile, my brethren, do our best endeavours to recall the minds of men from these vain jarrings and wranglings to the serious pursuit of practical religion. This it is which you see me here attempting to * Works, vols. iii., iv. + Ibid., vol. iii., pp. vii, ix. "The Way of Enoch; or, a Treatise on the Manner of Walking with God." Works, vol. xi., p. 185. § Ibid., See the Latin Dedication, ibid., p. 49. From the fact stated above, we learn incidentally that Hall was a writer of more extensive celebrity among his contemporaries, abroad as well as at home, than we might otherwise have supposed. accomplish, and which I solemnly promise I will continue to attempt, so long as it shall please God to entrust me with the charge of this diocese.” * The pledge thus given was indeed amply redeemed, not only by his faithfulness as a frequent preacher, + but also by the publication of two of his most valuable practical treatises-viz, "The Remedy of Profaneness; or, and Fear of the Almighty" (1637);‡ and "Christian Moderation" (1639)—in two the true Sight books:§ of which the former book treats of the duty of moderation in matters of practice; the latter in matters of judgment, including rules of much value to be observed by all who engage in religious controversies. It might have been hoped that a man of a character such as this, and with claims so weighty and so various upon the esteem and gratitude of his countrymen, could not have been treated otherwise than with respect even in the most distempered times. But it was the will of God, in the fulfilment of his wise and righteous purposes, that for the remainder of his life this saintly and apostolic character (in companionship with others, his brethren in the highest offices of the Church) should be tried in a furnace of affliction, so that it might shine with still greater lustre throughout all ages. One of the first causes of offence taken by the disaffected party against the Church was the action of Convocation, or rather Synod (for so it was called), in sitting and making canons by the king's leave, after the Parliament had been hastily dissolved under his displeasure in the spring of 1640. The sixth of those canons contained an oath which all the Clergy were required to take within six months, to the effect that they approved of and would maintain the doctrine of the Church of England and its discipline or government "by Archbishops, Bishops, Deans, Archdeacons, &c.," an expression which caused it to be ridiculed as the "et cætera oath." It was contended that the making of those canons and the enforcement of the oath, without the consent of Parliament, was illegal; and meanwhile petitions were got up and presented to Parliament from all parts of the country against pretended abuses in the Church, and especially against the authority of the Bishops. Bishop Hall, though he thought it expedient not to tender the canonical oath to any one clergyman of his diocese, || was not to be deterred from doing his duty as a member of the House of Lords. On one occasion, when an offensive petition had been presented, he deprecated and exposed the dangerous tendency of such attacks; on another occasion he delivered an able speech in defence of the conduct of Convocation and of the obnoxious canons; and again, in the following year (May 1641), when the Bill for excluding the Bishops from the House of Lords was first sent up from the Commons, he argued manfully against its unconstitutional, and, as it was advocated by its supporters, its fanatical character. Meanwhile, however, so much encouragement was given to the assailants of the Bishops, that it became dangerous for them to appear in public; and being thus precluded from taking their proper share in the proceedings of Parliament, they entered a protest against the legality of any measures that might be passed during their enforced absence. This step, which, though perhaps imprudent under the circumstances,** * Works, vol. xi., p. 187. + See Works, vol. v., p. xxxix, "Letter from the Tower," where he speaks of the "many pulpits" in which he had preached Eleven of his published sermons (vol. v., pp. 327-461) belong to the period during which he was Bishop of Exeter; of these, however, six were preached before the Court, and two before the House of Lords. Works, vol. vi., p. 309. § Ibid., p. 367. I See his Autobiography, vol. i., p. xxxvi, and "Letter from the Tower," ibid., p. xxxix. ** So Clarendon considered it. See "History of Rebellion," vol. ii., p. 102. was thoroughly justifiable,* served only to increase the exasperation of their adversaries. All the bishops who signed the protest-including Dr. Williams, Archbishop of York, who first suggested it, and eleven others, of whom Hall was one -were committed to the Tower under a charge of high treason, on December 30th, "in all the extremity of frost, at eight o'clock in the dark evening." These last particulars are mentioned by Hall himself in an interesting letter dated from the Tower, January 24th, 1642,† and addressed to a friend, Mr. H. S., who had written to commiserate his misfortune, and, as it would seem, had intimated, like the friends of Job, that it could not have been altogether undeserved. Nothing could be more noble, nothing more truly Christian, than the whole tone and tenor of the Bishop's reply. The reader will be pleased to see the following extracts : "You tell me in what fair terms I stood not long since with the world; how large room I had in the hearts of the best men: but can you tell me how I lost it? Truly I have in the presence of God narrowly searched my own bosom; I have impartially ransacked this fag-end of my life, and curiously examined every step of my ways; and I cannot, by the most exact scrutiny of my saddest thoughts, find what it is that I have done to forfeit that good estimation wherewith you say I was once blessed." He then, in the true spirit of a prophet like Samuel, or of an apostle like St. Paul, appeals in detail to the manner in which he had discharged his Episcopal functions; after which he proceeds :— "If, perhaps, my calling be my crime, it is no other than the most holy Fathers of the Church in the primitive and succeeding ages, ever since the Apostles (many of them also blessed Martyrs), have been guilty of; it is no other than all the holy doctors of the Church in all generations ever since have celebrated as most reverend, sacred, inviolable; it is no other than all the whole Christian world, excepting one small handful of our neighbours (whose condition denied them the opportunity of this government), is known to enjoy without contradiction. How safe is it erring in such company! "If my offence be in my pen, which hath (as it could) undertaken the defence of that apostolical institution (though with all modesty and fair respects to the Churches differing from us), I cannot deprecate a truth, and such I know this to be, which is since so cleared by better hands, that I well hope the better informed world cannot but sit down convinced; neither doubt I but that, as metals receive the more lustre with often rubbing, this truth, the more agitation it undergoes, shall appear every day more glorious. Only, may the good Spirit of the Almighty speedily dispel all those dusky prejudices from the minds of men which may hinder them from discerning so clear a light!" While confined in the Tower he also wrote a short tract entitled, “The Free Prisoner, or the Comfort of Restraint;" by which he showed how well he could * See Hallam's "Const. History," vol. ii., p. 195, who speaks of it as "a protest not, perhaps, entirely well expressed, but abundantly justifiable in its arguments by the plainest principles of law." + Works, vol. i., p. xxxvii. This probably alludes to two tracts published at Oxford in 1641: one entitled, "A Summary view of the Governments both of the Old and New Testaments, whereby the Episcopal Government of Christ's Church is vindicated out of the rude draught of Lancelot Andrewes, late Bishop of Winchester" (see Andrewes' Works, vol. vi., p. 339); the other, "The original of Bishops and Metropolitans, briefly laid down by Martin Bucer, John Rainoldes, and James Usher, Archbishop of Armagh." See Usher's Works, vol. vii., pp. 41-85. Usher had written at Hall's request. See ibid., vol. i., p. 225. The larger work of Bishop Jeremy Taylor on Episcopacy, of which the first edition is dated 1642, had probably not yet appeared, as Hall was writing on January 24th of that year. B observe in his own practice the lessons of the highest Christian philosophy which he prescribed to others; for in the second decade of his Epistles, written more than thirty years before, there is one upon the "Comfort of Imprisonment," inscribed to Stanislaus Buchinski, late secretary to Demetrius, Emperor of Russia.* After the bishops had been confined in the Tower for about five months, during which they preached by turns every Sunday to a large auditory of citizens, the Parliament shrunk from further prosecution of the charge against them, and allowed them to be released (Whitsuntide 1642) upon giving a bond of £5000 as security for their reappearance if required. Alas, for England! when it could treat its chief ministers of religion with such indignity, with such injustice! Bishop Hall did not again return to Exeter. Just before his imprisonment, he had been translated by the king to the See of Norwich; and he at once proceeded to his new diocese. What presently befell him there will best be told in his own words, taken from a paper which he drew up some years afterwards (in 1647), under the title," Bishop Hall's Hard Measure." It will be desirable to give the narrative entire, as affording an authentic specimen (from which a most instructive lesson may be drawn) of the treatment to which the best of men, no less than the most worthless, may become liable when faction and fanaticism have been allowed to obtain the ascendant, as they obtained it in that distempered time. "I was at the first received with more respect than in such times I could have expected. I preached the day after my arrival to a numerous and attentive people; neither was sparing of my pains in this kind ever since, till the times, growing every day more impatient of a Bishop, threatened my silencing. There, though with some secret murmurs of disaffected persons, I enjoyed peace till the ordinance of sequestration came forth, which was in the latter end of March following. Then, when I was in hope of receiving the profits of the foregoing half-year for the maintenance of my family, were all my rents stopped and diverted; and in the April following came the sequestrators-viz., Mr. Sotherton, Mr. Tooly, Mr. Rawley, Mr. Greenwood, &c.—to the palace, and told me that by virtue of an ordinance of Parliament they must seize upon the palace, and all the estate I had, both real and personal; and accordingly sent certain men appointed by them (whereof one had been burned in the hand for the mark of his truth), to appraise all the goods that were in the house; which they accordingly executed with all diligent severity, not leaving so much as a dozen of trenchers, or my children's pictures, out of their curious inventory. Yea, they would have appraised our very wearing clothes, had not Alderman Tooly and Sheriff Rawley (to whom I sent to require their judgment concerning the ordinance in this point) declared their opinion to the contrary. "These goods, both library and household stuff of all kinds, were appointed to be exposed to public sale. Much inquiry there was when the goods should be brought to the market; but in the meantime Mrs. Goodwin, a religious good gentlewoman, whom yet we had never known or seen, being moved with compassion, very kindly offered to lay down to the sequestrators that whole sum which the goods were valued at, and was pleased to leave them in our hands for our use till we might be able to repurchase them; which she did accordingly, and had the goods formally delivered to her by Mr. Smith and Mr. Greenwood, two sequestrators. As for the books, several stationers looked on them, but were not * Works, vol. vi., p. 168. + See "Hard Measure," vol. i., p. 1, and compare vol. vi., p. 514. One of his published sermons was preached in the Tower, March 20, 1642,-vol. v., p. 475. Works, vol. i., p. 44. |