thereof, we were content, that he should have with us present CHAP. IV. at his examination two or thre of his frends in the universitye, unto whose judgment and approbation of him we would stand. The which he refused, and would not be examined, but deferreth the same until the tyme hereafter, as a fellow- Rooth de ship may be voyd whereunto he maye be elected, at which mit to the tyme he is content to be examined by us, and then upon our examination approbacion to be preferred or not. clines to sub orical of as strances Burch's by the univer evils result practice: That this frequent interference of the Crown in elections R. mon to fellowships and scholarships was found to be productive to of serious evils, is proved by the fact that, only two years it on the after the above correspondence between Norgate and Burgh- the ley, we find the vice-chancellor and Heads addressing to the A, 15:9. chancellor a grave remonstrance on the practice, 'whereby,' they say, 'the right of free election is snatched away,' that is, as we interpret it, the rewards of merit and studiousness are withheld, scholars being induced to look for preferment to the favour of courtiers rather than to their true deserts at the hands of the university. The sentiment thus plainly expressed was shared by all who had the interests of the colleges at heart. Even Dr Perne, notwithstanding his tem- pe Perne's porising disposition, was foremost in resisting all royal interference at Peterhouse. In the year 1581, the claims of one of the students to a fellowship were pressed upon the autho rities by a letter from the Crown. Richard Betts, for such was his name, might well have been elected on his own deserts, for he had been brought up at Peterhouse, was poor, and at the same time an exemplary student". There was CHAP. IV. however room for doubt whether the election of another fellow was not discretionary, and as the college at that time was in difficulty owing to the inadequacy of its revenues, Dr Perne availed himself of the fact as a plea for declining to lay an additional burden on the society'. In the sequel Betts was elected to the fellowship which he so well deserved, but we may infer that he himself disapproved on principle of royal nominations, for when, a few years later, another letter from the Crown arrived, recommending one The society John Tenison, a master of arts, for the next vacant fellowTenship, Richard Betts's name was appended to a reply in which Dr Perne and the fellows jointly deprecated the constraint thus put upon them. In this instance, however, the college had a stronger case; for, as it was pointed out in the protest, it was required by the statutes that a candidate for a fellowship should be poor and of a humble and quiet spirit,' 'whereas,' say the petitioners, in particularising Tenison's disqualifications, of late the thirds of his mother have fallen to him. Besides a lease, as we are informed, yielding a yearly rent, exceeding the rate of living allowed by our statutes: having otherwise of certain worshipful friends very good and sufficient allowance by the year. And during the time of this his suit, he hath shewed some manifest tokens of disposition neither quiet nor humble.' A still more cogent argument was the statement that the next four vacancies had been already set apart for four young men, very poor and utterly destitute of maintenance; yet very studious, and of hope afterwards to do some good The colledge being poore and the howse and a means to bringe it farther into dette: for the primative fundation which allowed us riti fel. lowes and a master it allowed us but x4, in the weke to lyve uppon, nowe our visyters have made it ir. (litle enongh) and our revenues not inercased, gevinge us leve by statute as we allendged yesterday to increase or dyminish the number of the fel lowes, accor ling to the welth or want of the colledge.' Ibid. cit, no. 68. He was admitted 9 Sept. 1581; there was consequently but a short delay in his admission. of great towardness in vertue and learning, and brought up CHAP. IV. among us in the places of poor scholars'.' of Canter bury: August, 1561 The position of Burghley between contending parties at white this time was sufficiently trying, but its difficulties were ash prie now to be enhanced by an additional complication. In ur August, 1583, Whitgift succeeded to the primacy,-an event gladly hailed by the university as no slight presage of good'. His promotion was immediately followed by the appearance of his well-known Articles. Into the history of the important controversy to which they gave rise we cannot here enter, but the divergence of opinion of which they were the occasion between himself and Burghley is closely connected with events that ensued at Cambridge. Activity of the party. The defeat which the archbishop had inflicted on the Renewed Puritan party in the university had produced only a tem- Pu porary impression. Their spirit was again rising, and they were still hopeful of effecting within the Church itself those changes which they afterwards embodied in their own organ izations as Separatists. Their leaders were now actively jengaged in endeavouring to obtain, through the cooperation of those who favoured their views in Parliament, precisely that licence and impunity of which Whitgift was intent on depriving them. It has already been noted that Cartwright, in his exile at Geneva, had been engaged some years before on a translation of Travers's Disciplina, to which indeed he prefixed a preface of more than ordinary acrimony. That epoch-making treatise,-which in the latter part of the sixteenth and earlier half of the seventeenth century exercised an influence on religious thought in England unsurpassed by that of any other single work,-was thus both in its Latin original (which was the production of one fellow of Trinity) 1 Strype, Anno Is, 1 ii, Append. [No. 39). John Tenison was ultimately elected fellow, but not until after Dr Perne's death, being first fellow on Dr Perre's foundation and admitted 9 Oct. 1589. This would appear to imply that Perne had been favourable afterwards to the consider. ation of his claims, Nunc enim (clarissime Cantuariensis) campum habes in quo virtus tua erga universam remp, et pietas in parentem academiam excurrat latissime.' See the whole letter in Strype, Life of Whatgut, bk, m, Ap. pend. no. 1. That their expectation was not disappointed is proved by another letter. Ibid. bk. iv, no. 19. CHAP. IV. and in its English translation (which was the performance of another) the direct embodiment of the views of the Puritan party at Cambridge. It is, however, not a little remarkable. that, though two editions of Cartwright's version had already appeared, one in the same year (1574) that the Latin original was printed at Rochelle, and the latter six years later (1580) at Geneva'-they both appear to have been unknown. to the ecclesiastical authorities in England. Either the impressions were small, and circulated almost exclusively among the English residents abroad, or the book was carefully kept from the general view. But, not withstanding, it was already producing a very considerable effect; and not a few of the Puritan party regarded it as the weapon which would prove most effective in enabling them to carry out their projects of ted Church reform. It was accordingly resolved to reprint it in England, where hitherto it had been difficult to find a printer who would venture, under the vigilant watch maintained by gland the Stationers' Company in London, to run the risks attendant upon such a task; and here it will be necessary to make a slight digression in order to explain how it was that ultimately a printer was found in the very centre where the theories of the Disciplina had first been conceived,—in the town of Cambridge itself. to jet Cart . The long inactivity of the university press since the time when John Siberch put forth his modest volumes has already been noted. Others of the same craft appear to have occasionally carried on like labours in the town, but in the year 1557 the Stationers' Company was incorporated, and its 1 For the bibliography and general character of this notable work, see Appendix (C). The Stationers' Company, says Mr Cooper (u. 8.), had been invested by the charters of queen Mary and her successor with inquisitorial pow. ers. They were at liberty to search for and carry away any books which they considered of a selitions or improper nature. They likewise had the exclusive privilege of printing many classes of works, and were naturally incensed at the university claiming a concurrent right.' 3 See vol. 1, p. 626: since the publication of my first volume, the history of the Cambridge Press has received additional illustration in the admirable facsimiles of John Siberch's volumes now in course of publication by Messrs Macmillan and Bowes, of Cambridge. In the sermon by James Pilkington already quoted (supra, p. 1×2) on the exhumation of the remains of the Stat pany. of . jealousy seems to have effectually prevented for a time the CHAP. IV/S re-establishment of the university press'. Twenty years Hot later, the project of bringing the exercise of printing into Com the university' was brought forward by the vice-chancellor and Heads, but was directly discountenanced by Burghley, who professed his reluctance to prejudice the Queen's grants,' although he intimated that he saw no objection to the employment of an artificer for 'printing matters pertaining to the schools, the travails of the students, etc.' The design was therefore temporarily abandoned, but soon again to be revived; and the appointment in 1582 of Thomas Thomas, Thomas a fellow of King's College, as university printer, is another and indication of the university's determination to assert its legiti- printer. mate independence. From the time of Thomas's appointment, this honourable and important office has been regularly maintained and uninterruptedly filled. Thomas univerally of the Company. The circumstances that attended Thomas's first year of Interference office were however by no means of favourable augury. Among the most rising scholars at Cambridge at this time was the eminent William Whitaker, a fellow of Trinity Col lege, who had succeeded in 1580 to the Regius professorship of divinity. In the year 1583, Thomas was entrusted with a work by Whitaker' for publication, and the reputation already acquired by the author caused its appearance to be awaited with some interest. Other works were also in pro Bucer and Fagius, he enumerates Hu italics by Ward, the printer.' A 1 Baker MSS. xxx 374. |