BOOK racters given of CHAP. XVII. What Camden, Holinshed, Stow, and other historians have related concerning this Archbishop. Unfairly represented by Fuller. A passage of Dr. Heylin concerning him considered. Some further account given of him, from a MS. history in Pembroke hall, Cambridge. A dialogue written by him. The conclusion: The cha. To draw to a conclusion. In the discharge of this high function he lived and died unblameable, and was universally him by his- esteemed and beloved. Fair and honourable are the characters our best and most ancient historians give of him with torians. Camd. Eliz. 1675. P. 287. one consent. Camden, where he speaks of the new Bishops under p. 30. Edit. Queen Elizabeth, calleth Edmund Grindal, now appointed for London, "an excellent Divine." And where he comes to relate his death, saith, "he was a religious and grave "man, that flourished in great grace with the Queen, until "by the cunning artifices of his adversaries he quite lost "her favour; as if he had leaned to conventicles of turbu“lent and hot-spirited Ministers, and their prophecies, as "they called them; but in truth, because he had condemned "the unlawful marriage of one Julio, the Italian physician, 305" with another man's wife, while Leicester in vain opposed "his proceedings therein." Holinshed p. 1354 a. Stow. Holinshed, another of our historians, nearest to those times, gives this account of him: "This good man in his "life time was so studious, that his book was his bride, and "his study his bridechamber: whereupon he spent both "his eye-sight, his strength, and his health, &c. Of whom "much might be spoken for others imitation; but this shall "suffice, that as his learning and virtues were inseparable "companions, so the reward of both is the good name that " he hath left behind him, as a monument perpetual." This is all he saith of him without the least word to lessen him. Stow, another faithful historian, that was contemporary with him, where he mentions his death, speaks of his great and numerous benefactions; and so doth Godwin in his Ca- CHAP. XVII. talogue of Bishops, without any the least diminution of him. The next writer I shall name, that undertook to give Godwin. some historical account of this Archbishop, was Thomas Rogers. Rogers, who lived in his time, and was, as it appears, well acquainted with the emergencies of the Church in those days; Chaplain also to Archbishop Bancroft, (who was known not to be slack in discipline, nor partial to Puritans.) This reverend man was the author of a learned book, (and formerly much read and esteemed,) entitled, The Faith, Doctrine, and Religion, professed and protected in the Realm, &c. printed above an hundred years ago. In the preface whereof, dedicated to his patron, the abovesaid Archbishop, he related some history of the first Archbishops of Canterbury, that were the restorers of true religion among us, and through whose hands the reformation of it passed. Where coming to Archbishop Grindal, he express- Preface to eth him to be, “a zealous confessor and tried soldier,” [i. e. Doctrine, in respect of his sufferings for religion,] and, "a right fa- &c. profes"mous and worthy Prelate." And then he relates, "how tected in "the Queen advanced him after his return from his banish- this realm. "ment, first to London, and then to the two other archie 66 66 66 piscopal sees." And, "that the care of this Bishop was great to further the glory of God; but that through the "envy and malice of his ill-willers his power was but small; "his place high, but himself made low through some disgrace brought upon him by his potent adversaries, which "he meekly and patiently endured." And the same author adds his observation of two considerable inconveniences, that his troubles, and the prohibiting him from acting in his place and calling, occasioned: the one was, "the flocking of "Jesuits into the kingdom: the other, the insolence and "boldness of the home-faction." By which he meant, the brethren that opposed the government and discipline of this Church. And lastly, this historian ranks our Archbishop (without the least note of neglect in his function, or diminution of his character) with the rest of the excellent Archbishops of Can the Faith, sed and pro Pr. 1607. BOOK terbury, from Cranmer to Bancroft: all of famous and ve II. nerable memory, "in respect of the uniform doctrine by "them drawn up at first, and afterwards defended and 306" maintained; and, that the whole Church of England was "much bound unto them. And that, not they only that "were then alive, but their successors and posterity, should "have cause in all ages, while the world should continue, to "magnify Almighty God for his inestimable benefit, which they had and should receive from them; and who had inspired them with wisdom from above." Harrington. Pr. 1653. 66 66 Sir John Harrington (who lived in these times of Queen Elizabeth, and some time after) undertakes to give some strictures of her Bishops; but they are commonly but light rumours of court, and often idle and trifling. Yet what he says of Archbishop Grindal points not to any misgovernment of the Church: but that whereas it was commonly Brief View. said, that he was blind some years before his death, this writer would make a mystery of it, telling us, that he was not blind, but that when Queen Elizabeth enjoined him to keep his house, his friends gave out that he was blind; and that he kept at home the better to conceal this punishment the Queen had laid upon him. Very likely, had the report of his blindness happened at the same time that the Queen had commanded his confinement: but he was not blind till five years after, at least: and that he was then blind, I have seen the subscription of his name, that evidently shews it to be writ by a blind man. Some other passages he ventures to write of the Archbishop so slight and improbable, that I shall not repeat them. But this author writes not one word of his remissness in government, or countenance towards such as opposed the constitutions of the Church. Full. Church Hist. b. ix. p. 130. Till Mr. Fuller came, a man within memory, and first broached this notion (as far as I can perceive) concerning Grindal. And his relations seem to be more hearsays, than built upon any authentic authority, either of records or good MSS. He says, "he was generally condemned for "remissness in parting with more from the see, than ever "his successors thanked him for:" this is a hard charge, but XVII. spoken in general terms. If he means exchanges with the CHAP. Queen, he and all the rest of the Bishops were forced to make these exchanges by an act that passed for that purpose in the beginning of her reign. And what endeavours he and two or three more of the first Elects made, by a secret letter to her Majesty, and by a voluntary proffer of a large yearly equivalent, to forbear the making use of that power the Parliament had given her, hath been before shewn. But that Grindal was not so easy to part with the revenues of his bishopric this historian shews himself, by relating how stoutly he opposed parting with the palace at Lambeth to the great favourite; which made the Leicestrian faction (he saith) to malice him. 66 This writer speaks also of some, "who strained a parallel "between Eli and Grindal, in respect of his being guilty of dangerous indulgence to offenders: and as a father of the "Church, he was accused of too much conniving at the fac"tious disturbers thereof." But he gives not one instance thereof. Indeed Fuller seems to note these things concerning the Archbishop, rather as reports and rumours taken up in his times, than as matters of undoubted truth. At length he placeth the Archbishop's remissness and neglect in requiring subscription to the last year of his life but one: 307 and attributes it to his age and impotency. Though he adds, (to make what he had said before consistent,) that in greater strength he did but weakly urge conformity. He should not have forgot to mention the Archbishop's suspension; whereby his hands were very much tied up from acting in his place and function: during which time great liberty was taken by such as were disaffected to the Church and its constitution. What truth is in the foregoing passages, and how our Archbishop discharged himself in his office, I refer the reader to what hath been before impartially written: yet in conclusion, this historian calls him, "a Pre"late most primitive in all his conversation." There is yet another of our modern historians, namely, Dr. Heylin. Dr. Heylin; who, speaking of those English Protestants that in the beginning of our Reformation stood affected to II. BOOK the discipline of Geneva, writes, that they made use of Bíshop Grindal to bring about their purpose, by making him instrumental to the setting up of a church in London for the French Protestant Refugees, to worship God together in, according to the manner used in their own reformed churches Hist. of the at home: viz. "that Grindal, the new Bishop of London, Reform. p. 305. Ep. Calv. 295. was known to have a great respect to the name of Calvin," [and so he had, no doubt, to that of Luther, Melancthon, Bucer, Peter Martyr, Bullinger, Zanchy, and the rest of the pious foreign reformers of religion.] "That the busi"ness therefore was so ordered, that by Calvin's letter unto "Grindal, and the friends they had about the Queen, way "should be granted to such of the French nation that had "repaired hither to enjoy the freedom of their own religion, "to have a church unto themselves: and in that church "not only to erect the Genevian discipline, but to set up "a form of prayer, that should hold no conformity with the English Liturgy." [And this liberty to these foreigners was no more, than but a little before was granted to Grindal and his fellow exiles in the cities and places where they sojourned.] "And Calvin gave Grindal thanks for his fa66 vour therein." 66 There is a letter indeed extant among Calvin's Epistles, whence Dr. Heylin had what is said above; bearing date, May the 15th, 1560. The import whereof is only this: that that pious Pastor of Geneva returned his thankful acknowledgments unto our Bishop for that care he had taken of those poor French Protestants that had settled themselves in the City of London, by his obtaining for them a liberty from the Queen of worshipping God purely, [i. e. without the superstitions of the Romish Church,] and that they might have a faithful Minister of their own to preach God's word, and perform other ministerial offices among them. And it appears, that to this civil letter of Calvin, the Bishop gave as respectful an answer: and withal desired him accordingly to recommend some able and fit Minister unto that congregation. And not long afterwards Calvin sent, by consent, Nicolas Galasius, an elderly and very reverend |