Rhetor, Arithmeticus, Juris consultus et æqui, Legatusque fuit; denique Presul erat. Annorum satur, et magnorum plenus honorum, Vertitur in cineres aureus iste senex. ....... Obiit 18 Nov. MCCCCCLIX." "JOHN COSIN was the eldest son of Giles Cosin, Citizen of Norwich (of the family of Cosin of Seven Burnhams, in the County of Norfolk), by Elizabeth, daughter of Remington, of Castle Remington, in the same County. He was born at Norwich, on the 30th of November, 1595, and was educated at the free-school there till the age of fourteen. When he was thirteen years of age his father died, and left him several houses in Norwich, the whole of which he gave up to his mother, reserving only an annuity of 207. for his maintenance at Cambridge, where he was matriculated of Caius College in 1610. He was successively Scholar and Fellow of his College, took the degree of A. B.... A. M. and proceeded D. D. in 1626. In 1616 he had the offer of a Chaplaincy, about the same time, from Andrews, Bishop of Ely, and Overall, Bishop of Lichfield, and, by his tutor's advice, accepted the interest of the latter, who soon after appointed him his Chaplain and Librarian; at the same time permitting him from time to time to visit Cambridge and perform his academical exercises. In 1619 he lost his excellent Patron, and, with him, his first hopes of advancement; but he soon after found a still more powerful, and equally generous, friend in Neile, Bishop of Durbam, who appointed him one of his domestic chaplains. On the 4th of December, 1624, he was instituted to the 10th Prebend in the Cathedral Church of Durham, and on the 4th of September, in the same year, he was collated to the Archdeaconry of Cleveland. In 1626 he was collated to the Rectory of Brancepath; and soon after, Aug. 13, was married in the Parish Church of Crossgate, to Frances, daughter of Marmaduke Blakiston, of Newton Hall, Prebendary of Durham, and sometime Archdeacon of Cleveland. About this time Mr. Cosin, having frequent meetings with Laud, then Bishop of Bath and Wells, and other Divines who were distinguish ed by a zeal which was, perhaps, more ardent than judicious for the ceremonies of the Church of England, became exceedingly obnoxious to the Puritan party, whose strength and rancour were alike daily increasing. A Collection of Private Devotions, published in 1627, met with their peculiar censure.' In 1628 Mr. Cosin joined with the other Members of the Chapter in prosecuting Mr. Peter Smart, one of the Prebendaries, in the High Commission Court. About the same time he proceeded D. D. and on the 8th of February, 1634, was elected Master of Peter-house, in the room of Dr. Matthew Wren, promoted to the See of Hereford. In 1640 he served the office of Vice-Chancellor of the University, and on the 7th of November in the same year he was installed Dean of Peterborough; but he enjoyed his preferment a very short time. On the 10th of the same month, Smart, whose day of vengeance had now arrived, presented a petition to the House of Commons, complaining in most aggravated terms of Cosin's superstitious and Popish innovations in the Church of Durham, and of his own severe prosecution in the High Commission Court. On the 21st of the same month, Dr. Cosin was ordered into the custody of the Serjeant at Arms, and a Committee was appointed to prepare charges against him. On the 3d of December the prisoner was admitted to bail on his petition presented on the 28th of November, and gave security for his appearance, himself in 20001. and his sureties in 10007. each; and on the 22d of January, 1640-1, he underwent, by vote of the whole House, the severe sentence of sequestration from all his ecclesiastical benefices, being the very first victim of Puritanical vengeance who suffered by vote of the Commons. His persecutions did not end here on the 13th of March, 21 articles of impeachment against Dr. Cosin were exhibited by the Commons at the bar of the House of Lords. Some of these were frivolous in an extreme degree, and the most weighty of them related only to the introduction of some ceremonies which were thought to resemble the Romish ritual too closely; and, after a hearing of five days, Cosin was dismissed on bail, and never again called on to attend. Almost immediately after he was again committed to the Serjeant at Arms, on a charge made by a Member of the Commons, of having seduced a young scholar to Popery;' a charge which he not only refuted completely, but proved the very reverse of the accusation to be true, viz. that while he held the office of Vice-Chancellor of Cambridge, he had, after using every effort to reclaim the youth in question, obliged him to read a public recantation, and then punished him by expulsion from the University. In 1642 Dr. Cosin was an active instrument in sending the College plate from Cambridge to supply the royal mint at York, and he was, in con sequence, sequence, ejected from his Mastership of Peter-house, by warrant from the Earl of Manchester, dated the 16th of March, 1642-3. The day of trial had now arrived when Cosin was to prove, by his admirable patience and constancy in poverty and in exile, his sincere attachment to that Church whose interests he had been accused of an intention to betray. Being deprived of all his preferments, and entertaining very rational fears of some personal restraint or danger, he determined on leaving England, and withdrew to Paris, where, by order from King Charles, he officiated as Chaplain to such of Queen Henrietta Maria's household as were Protestants. With them and other English exiles who were daily resorting to Paris, he formed a congregation, who assembled at first in a private house, and afterwards at the residence of Sir Richard Brown, the English Ambassador. At the same time Dr. Cosin bad lodgings assigned him in the Louvre, together with a small pension from France, on account of his connexion with the Queen of England. Cosin's conduct during 17 years of exile was the best refutation of the aspersions which had been cast on him for a supposed attachment to the Church of Rome. Assailed by argument and by sophistry, with poverty on one hand and offers of splendid preferment on the other, an exile in a foreign land, he defended his own principles, confirmed those of his wavering brethren, and adhered, not only to the profession, but to the ceremonials and discipline of the English Church, with exemplary boldness and fidelity. In 1651, after the battle of Worcester, King Charles escaped to Paris, and resided there for three months, during which period Cosin officiated alternately with Erle, afterwards Bishop of Salisbury, as Ministers of the Royal Chapel. When the King was afterwards obliged to leave France, Cosin had determined on following the fortunes of his Sovereign; and it was only at the King's own request or order that he remained at Paris as Pastor to the Members of the English Church then in exile there. Immediately on the return of the King, Cosin was restored to his Deanery of Peterborough, and was the first Minister who read the Common Prayer in that Cathedral after the Restoration. He was soon after designated for the Deanery of Durham, but before his actual institution was nominated to the vacant Bishoprick of the same Diocese. Bishop Cosin was received in his Diocese with respect and affection. Twenty years of poverty and privation had not taught him to forget the true use of riches; and, amongst the very many liberal and high-minded Prelates who had held the See of Durham, the name of Cosin stands eminently distinguished for munificence and public spirit. During the late usurpation nearly the whole of the Episcopal Palaces had been ruined and dismantled. The Castle of Stockton, to which Bishop Morton fled in 1641, had been levelled with the ground, and was never after restored. Auckland had become the seat of Sir Arthur Hesilrigge, who plucked down the old pile and Anthony Beke's Chapel,' and began a new palace within the East curtain wall. The whole of this new building Cosin, from some strange superstition, pulled down, and reared almost from the ground the noble palace which now exists on the site of the old castle. To this he added the Chapel, with all its splendid inventory of books, plate, and ornaments, for the service of the altar. He placed the castle of Durham in complete repair, and restored the Bishop's house in Darlington from a state of entire dilapidation. At Durham he also rebuilt and augmented the endowment of Bishop Langley's Hospital and Schools on the Palace Green, and he built the Bishop's library adjoining the Exchequer, and stored it with books for the use of his successors, and the Clergy of his Diocese. In 1664 he was chiefly instrumental in procuring the re-building of the Guild-hall, or Town-house, at Durham, as well as in repairing the Courts of Justice, the Exchequer, and the Court of Chancery. In the University of Cambridge he rebuilt the East end of the Chapel in Peterhouse, gave 10007. in books to the library of the same Society, and founded eight Scholarships, five in Peter-house, and three in Gonvil and Caius. Besides almost innumerable benefactions of less value, he gave at different times during his life, 5007. towards the redemption of Christian captives in Algiers, 800l. to the fund for relief of distressed loyalists, 50l. towards the re-building of St. Paul's Cathedral, and 1007. towards repairing the sea banks in Howdenshire. He founded two alms-houses at Auckland and Durham, increased the Curacy of St. Andrew's, Auckland, with 167. per annum, and gave to his successors for ever the Prebend of Auckland, with which King Charles II. had presented him on the forfeiture of Sir Arthur Hesilrigge. Towards his Clergy Bishop Cosin acted as a strict and vigilant, but kindly, guardian. Soon after his consecration he visited the whole of his extensive Diocese, anxiously enforcing the residence of the Parochial Ministry, and pressing, pressing, with firmness, the restoration of the ruined and neglected Chapels in the North as the best and most lawful means of resisting the inroads of sectaries of all descriptions. He restored the service of the Cathedral of Durham to its original splendour and purity, reforming the various irregularities which had been admitted into the Church during the Usurpation, and anxiously pressing, at his several Visitations, the repairs of the fabric, the restoration of the antient discipline, and the completion of the full number of the Minor Canous and Choir of the Cathedral. In 1662 Bishop Cosin bore a part in the conference with the Dissenters at the Savoy, and though very little progress was made in the business of reconciliation, the Bishop at least earned from his opponents the praise of deep and solid learning, and a frank and generous disposition. In Parliament Bishop Cosin frequently spoke with dignity and effect on subjects connected with the Ecclesiastical interests or discipline, and both there and in every other circumstance of his life, public and private, maintained an upright and unbending integrity and independence of character, which commanded the respect even of his adversaries. Towards the gentry of the county he exercised a noble and unremitting hospitality, and whether he was present or absent, the gates of his castle stood always open as a place of rest or entertainment for the Royal Commissioners and other great Officers who passed betwixt England and Scotland. After all that has been said of Bishop Cosin's munificence, and after the long list of charitable bequests contained in his will, it may seem extraordinary that he should have been able to leave to his family possessions in lands, leases, and money, which cannot be estimated at less than 20,000l. a circumstance which can only be accounted for by supposing that most of the leases held under the See had expired since 1641, and that, consequently, Cosin received the sole profit of the renewals. In private life Cosin was not always fortunate; the character of one of his daughters was marked at least with levity, and he frequently, both in his letters, and more solemnly in his last will, laments over his lost, and only son, John Cosin, who twice forsook the Protestant religion, and at last took orders in the Church of Rome. Add to these domestic afflictions the heavy burthen of painful and habitual disease, with which the Bishop's declining years were weighed down, and there can be no difficulty in accounting, without much derogation from the genuine ex cellence of his character, for a little vein of harshiness and asperity which pervades Cosin's private correspondence, and frequently mingles itself, in a manner sufficiently strange and quaint, amongst sentiments of a very generous and elevated nature. Bishop Cosin died in London, worn out with age and acute disease, on the 15th of January, 1671. His corpse was conveyed into the North, with great funeral pomp, and was interred on the 29th of April following, in the spot already designated for his sepulture in his own Chapel of Auckland. Bishop Cosin is described as tall and unbending under the weight of years, of an open manly demeanour, with even some mixture of country plainness and occasional asperity of manner; of a commanding presence, and a countenance in which frankness and dignity were mingled, yet somewhat verging, if we may trust his portraits, towards severity.This I am sure of, he was no dwarf, neither in stature, dignity, nor bounty' *.” The present excellent Prelate is thus briefly, but appropriately, noticed: "HON. SHUTE Barrington, D. D. On the 10th of June, 1791, the Hon. Shute Barrington was translated from the See of Salisbury to that of Durham. Sixth and youngest son of John, first Viscount Barrington, Student of Christ Church, and Fellow of Merton College, Oxford; Canon of Christ Church 1761. He proceeded LL.D. in 1762; and in 1768 was appointed Residentiary of St. Paul's; consecrated Bishop of Llandaff Oct. 2, 1769; and translated to SalisHis Lordship is one of the bury 1782. Trustees of the British Museum. He married, first, Lady Diana Beauclerk, daughter of Charles, Duke of St. Alban's; she deceasing in 1766, he married, secondly, June 20, 1770, Jane, only daughter of Sir John Guise, of Rendcombe, in the county of Gloucester, bart. Besides having edited the works of his noble father, the Bishop has published several occasional Sermons and Charges, and 'A letter to the Clergy of the Diocese of Sarum;''Grounds of Union between the Churches of England and Rome considered, in a Charge delivered to the Clergy of the Diocese of Durham, at the Ordinary Visitation of that Diocese, 1810;' and an octavo volume of Sermons, Charges, and Tracts.'-Addressed to living merit, the voice of legitimate praise can scarcely be distinguished from that of flattery. The Author may once more, without incurring the charge of adulation, be per *Basire's Sermon, p. 38. mitted to offer his sincere thanks to the Bishop of Durham for his constant attention to the progress of the present work." The Plates illustrative of the General History are, Plate I. of a Series of Episcopal Seals from Bp. William to Nicholas Farnham, elegantly drawn by Mr. E. Blore, from the originals in the Chapter-house at Durham; and most beautiful Portraits of Bishops Cosin, Butler, and Barrington, all of which were munificently presented to the Work by the latter Prelate. As this article is already extended beyond our usual limits; we are compelled to defer, for the present, the notice of the Second Part of the Volume, containing the Topographical History of Easington Ward. 36. A Guide to Burghley House, Northamptonshire, the Seat of the Marquis of Exeter; containing a Catalogue of all the Paintings, Antiquities, &c. with Biographical Notices of the Artists. 8vo. pp. 296. Nichols, Son, and Bentley. THE object of the present Publication, the Author observes, is, "To afford a descriptive key to the treasures of a mansion which has long been estimated among the most distinguished residences in a kingdom deservedly celebrated for its baronial establishments." We heartily wish that such of our countrymen as are enthusiastically fond of visiting the Continent would first peruse the following sensible observations: "Whatever is eminent among domestic edifices in other Countries, as illustrative of the wealth, the dignity, and the hospitality of their aristocracies, is for the most part to be found in their respective capitals; but the traveller would very imperfectly describe the grandeur of English habitations without personally visiting those baronial mansions with which its provinces are so thickly studded. Among these, the princely residence which these pages are devoted to describe has long been celebrated not less as exhibiting a singularly perfect specimen of Elizabethan architecture, than on account of the exquisite works of art with which its chambers abound. Nor is it possible to visit this magnificent pile, and examine its various treasures, without associating in the reflections which they suggest the venerated character of the illustri ous founder of the palace; as well as of the fortunes and honours of its possessors; - a statesman of the most solid and useful talents, to whose prudent and judicious counsels, under the most trying circumstances, England owes much, perhaps, even of her present grandeur and security." "The Patriarch of the family having laid broad and deep the foundations of his own and his country's fame and security, left to his descendants the pleasing office of fostering the arts,―of ornamenting the superstructure which his care had raised. How well they have executed this task, this catalogue of their collections abundantly proves." Of this splendid mansion the reader will not be displeased to see a brief character from the pen of Mr. Gilpin. "Burghley House is one of the noblest monuments of British Architecture in the times of Queen Elizabeth, when the great outlines of magnificence were rudely drawn, but unimproved by taste. It is an immense pile, forming the four sides of a large court; and though decorated with a variety of fantastic ornaments according to the fashion of the time, before Grecian Architecture had introduced symmetry, proportion, and elegance into the plans of private houses, it has still an august appearance. The inside of the court is particularly striking. The spire is neither, I think, in itself an ornament; nor has it any effect, except at a distance, where it contributes to give this immense pile the consequence of a town." Thus much for the House; a word or two now on its Noble Owners. "Sir William Cecil was Secretary of State under King Edward VI. and Queen Elizabeth; and was by the latter created Baron of Burghley, in the 14th year of her reign, (1571,) and made a Knight of the Garter, and appointed Lord High Treasurer of England, in the year fol. lowing. He held the office of Treasurer nearly 26 years, a much longer term than it has ever since been held by one person. His residence was for the most part at Theobalds, in Hertfordshire, which, on account of its vicinity to London, was an easier and shorter retirement from his official duties: but about the year 1575 he began to erect the mansion at Burghley, which has since been the principal residence of his posterity. Thomas, Lord Burghley, the Treasurer's eldest son, was created Earl of Exeter, on the 4th of May, 1605; and Henry, tenth Earl of Exeter and eleventh Lord Burghley, his lineal descendant, was created Marquis of Exeter, on on the 30th of December, 1800; whose son and heir, Brownlow, Marquis of Exeter, inherits the estates and honours of his family." We regret that our limits will not allow us to accompany this excellent Guide through the interior of Burghley House," of the elegance and splendour of which we cannot speak too highly." Though we here use the Author's words, we use them in our own character, when we remark that "Those who have, like ourselves, been spectators of it, we are sure will agree with us when we remark, that seldom will the curious visitor, or the lover of the fine arts, meet with more to indulge his research, or gratify and improve his taste, than in this antient and magnifi cent seat." The traveller will find the present volume no superficial companion. Every thing that can be desired or expected is concisely and accurately described; and the catalogue of the numerous pictures is as satisfactory as it is scientific. An Essay on Painting, and its origin and progress in England, chiefly extracted from Mr. Horace Walpole's Anecdotes," is annexed; together with a brief sketch of the "Lives and Anecdotes of the Artists," and an Index to the several Portraits. 37. The Chichester Guide; comprising an Account of the antient and present State of that City and its Neighbourhood; together with a more full and particular History and Description of the Cathedral, than has yet been offered to the Publick. 12mo. pp. 92. LEAVING the princely mansion of Burghley, we now turn our attention to the venerable structure to which this "Guide" (the production of the Rev. Thomas Valentine) attracts our notice; and which is still more elaborately described in Mr. Hey's History of Chichester;" noticed in our vol. LXXV. p. 433. 66 After a brief but correct account of the antient and present state of the City of Chichester, Mr. Valentine proceeds more at large in his account of the foundation and history of its Cathedral, which, 1 "Though a large and splendid building, is not either in extent or magnifi-, cence equal to York, Lincoln, Winchester, or some others of the Cathedrals of GENT. MAG. September, 1816. this Country; it must, however, be remembered, that it has suffered in its appearance more than any other, by the damages it received in the great rebellion, from the sacrilegiou violence of the fanaticks, who by de troying every pane of painted glass aroughout the Church, have deprived it of that mellow gloom which is so well calculated to excite devotion, and so particularly ornamental to buildings of this kind. They who may peruse the history of these ravages, or view the sacred pile, and are well affected to religion and the constitution of their country, will return their humble thanks to that Omnipotent Being by whose protection it has been preserved from entire destruction: thanks, to which will be added a prayer, that it may please God never again to permit his temples to be profaned by the unhallowed hands of impious schismaticks; but that the stole-clad priest may still stand at the altar, and the holy accents ever ring through the fretted vaults and long-drawn ailes." In this wish we heartily concur. We shall not stop to make further extracts; but it may be right to observe, that, in addition to the historical particulars which usually accompany publications like the present, are some biographical articles of eminent natives-Bp.Juxon; John Selden; William Collins, the celebrated lyric Poet; the three Smiths, brothers and painters, William, George, and John (not natives, but resident here from earliest infancy); Mr. Hayley, "the sweetest and most tuneful Poet of the present day, who never prostituted his Muse to wealth and power, but great in conscious dignity, reserved his praise and protection for virtue and talents," and from whose "Triumph of Music" we are presented with the following beautiful sonnet : "Ye Powers, most kind to man's autumnal day [leaf, When his frail form is like the yellow When time on talents plays the subtle thief, [prey: And fretful fancies make the mind their Devotion! and Tranquillity! display Your heavenly right to give repose to grief! To health, enjoyment! to disease, relief! Safety to strength! and mildness to decay! [plann'd, In this calm scene, for meditation Friend of all seasons! in the last be mine! Here, while your marble forms, my Lares! [band, stand From moral sculpture's life-bestowing Here |