with untiring zeal after the phantom of conformity Chap. XVI. for which he had sacrificed the Church. Mean

1640.

while, his oldest friend and most constant ally, the Death of Archbishop man who had at first patronized him, and then been Neile. beholden to his good offices, the Churchman who, by skilful acts and adroit flatteries, had risen from an unknown schoolmaster to an Archbishop-from the shop of a tallow-chandler to the primacy of the north-Richard Neile, Archbishop of York, prevented, by a timely death, the ruin which he would otherwise have shared with his more illustrious colleague. Bishop, in succession, of Rochester, Litchfield and Coventry, Lincoln, Durham, Winchester, and York, he yet was neither conspicuous for learning, nor for diligence in his office. He did not preach once in twelve years, but he was Clerk of the Closet both to James and Charles, and knew how to please them both. He was one of a class of men of whom the Church of England can never be proud.

But there were men at this period among the The clergy of ministers of the English Church whose names will the period. ever be held in affectionate remembrance. There were learned scholars, deep thinkers, clever writers. And besides these, who have set a mark upon history, there were hundreds of men who "left no memorial, who have become as though they never had been, and perished as though they had not been born; but these were merciful men whose righteousness hath not been forgotten." These were the men who redeemed and restored to the affections of the nation a Church ruined by the

Chap. XVI. tyranny and impolicy of its governors.

1640.

During

the ascendency of their order, loyalty and devotion seemed sycophancy and self-seeking, but amidst the disruption of all things, in misfortune and reproach, the same qualities, still constantly cherished, shone forth as the brightest virtues. The fatal gift of power overthrew the English Church, but the sweet uses of adversity renewed and revived it. The bishops, in their pride of place, cast it down, but the humble, patient, longsuffering parish-priests of England raised it up. To tell the story of its fall and of its rise, of the meek endurance of the clergy, and of its reward, of the religious mania of the nation, and its gradual resipiscence, is the difficult but grateful task which we propose to ourselves in the next volume.

CHAPTER XVII.

Great divines and writers in the Church at this time-Dr. Chap. XVII.
Thomas Jackson-Bishop Hall-Bishop Morton-Bishop
Davenant-Archbishop Usher-Bishop Bedell-Sir Thomas
Browne-Clergy not generally distinguished for learning-
Laud's munificence-Yet his influence baneful on letters-
Number of poets at this period-Quarles-George Herbert-
Dr. Donne Donne's sermons-Troublous times beginning.

and writers

in the

HE majority of the bishops pro- Great divines
moted by Archbishop Laud were
not theologians, but disciplinarians. Church at
They belong rather to the external this time.

than the internal history of the
Church. But the Church was by

no means barren of great divines at this epoch.
The three bishops whose theology was most op-
posed to that of the primate, though in practice his
eager zeal had brought them to uphold his discipli-
narian views, Hall, Morton, and Davenant, were
all writers whose works demand some notice at our
hands. In Ireland flourished that "colossus of
learning," James Usher, Archbishop of Armagh,
and in our universities there were living men who
are to be reckoned among the leading theological
writers of our Church.

Chap. XVII.

*

Foremost among these we place Dr. Thomas Dr. Thomas Jackson, president of Corpus Christi college, OxJackson. ford, a worthy successor to the great Reynolds. The works of this voluminous author are not so well known as those of his contemporary, Bishop Hall, or as the witty sermons of Bishop Andrewes, or the unapproachable treatise of Hooker. They well deserve, however, the attention of all theological students. "It is to be expected," says Barnabas Oley, "that two objections will militate against this great author. The one, that his style is obscure; § the other, that his doctrine is Arminian. To the former of these, I answer that his style is full and deep, which makes the purity of it seem a kind of blackness and darkness; and though it abound in substantial adjectives, yet it is more short than other authors in relatives, in eking and helping particles, because he writ to scholars. His stream runs full, but always in its own channel and within the banks. His pen drops principles as frequently as ordinary men's do sense. His matter is rare. His notions, uncouth particles of truth

* A personal sketch of Dr. Thomas Jackson will be found given above, chap. xii.

† I suspect Mr. Hallam had never read him. "Jackson had a considerable name," says he, "but I do not think he has been much quoted in modern times."—Hist. Lit. Europe, ii., 357. This is all he has to say of him.

"They were once thought inestimable by everybody but the Calvinists."-Anthony Wood, Athenæ Oxonienses, ii., 664.

"Of all his adversaries, none put him to greater trouble than Dr. Jackson, whose sense and meaning he could hardlier find out than confute his errors, all things in him being hidden in such dark expressions and deep obscurity."-Clarke's Life of Dr. Twiss, p. 16.

digged è profundo, and so at first aspect look like Chap. XVII. strangers to the ordinary intellect, but with patience and use will cease to be so. The second objection is mere noise. He is religiously careful to give God the glory of his grace.' But from such as teach that 'all events are so irresistibly decreed by God that none can fall out otherwise than as they do,' or that nothing can be amended that is amiss,' he justly differs. For besides that the tenets be Turkish; being pressed, they yield a morbid, bitter juice, and put out a forked sting. This great author having framed to himself an idea of that complete body of divinity, which he intended, did direct all his lines in the whole periphery of his studies, unto the heads contained in the creed as unto their natural centre."* He published in his lifetime nine books of comment upon the great doctrines of the creed, and left many others unpublished.

As a theologian, Dr. Jackson occupies a middle place between the patristic school of Laud, Cosin, and Montagu, and the latitudinarian school of Chillingworth and Hales. The former argued against the Romanist from the Fathers and the practice of the Primitive Church, the latter overthrew his dogmata from Scripture and Reason. But Chillingworth had no positive theology, and did not assert the existence of a guide which could direct all religious opinions without fail into perfect truth. His view was that an honest interpretation of Scripture was a sufficient, not a complete di

* Barnabas Oley's Account, prefixed to Dr. Jackson's Works, ed. 1653.