ART. VIII. 4 Sermon preached before the University of Oxford in the year 1624, on the Text found upon the Pope, now a Prisoner in the Cockpit. By Thomas Lushington, B. D.

"His disciples came by night and stole him away." Matt. xxviii. 13.

London. Printed in the year 1711. Price 2d. pp. 16.

"To the Reader.

"The following Sermon is so very entertaining and ingenious, that, lest the reader should imagine he is imposed on by the title, and should rashly conclude from his own experience, that so much wit never proceeded from the pulpit, I refer him to my Lord Clarendon's "Animadversions on Cressy's Fanaticism,* * &c. p. 22, where he tells us he was present when it was preached."

Thomas Lushington was born at Sandwich, in Kent, about 1590, and related to a family seated about that time at Sittingbourne, in the same county, and still remaining there and elsewhere. He was of Broadgate Hall, Oxford, and a great friend of the witty Bishop Corbet; became in 163: Prebendary of Salisbury, and in 1632 Rector of Burnham Westgate in Norfolk, and Chaplain to Charles I. He died 22 Dec. 1661, aged 72, and was buried at Sittingbourne, where a handsome monument was erected to his memory. "He was," says Wood, "esteemed a right reverend and learned theologist, yet in many matters imprudent, and too

* London, 1674, 8vo. See Wood's Ath. II. 535.

much

much inclined to the opinions of Socinus. His preaching also, while he remained in the University, was generally well esteemed, and never gave distaste, but in one sermon, which, though esteemed by some to be admirable, yet by more, blasphemous. An account of which you shall have, as it followeth. In the year 1624, (22 Jam I.) nothing but war with Spain sounding in the ears of the vulgar upon the breaking off of the Spanish Match with Prince Charles, it pleased this our author to utter in his Sermon on Matth. xxviii. 13, at St. Mary's, on Easter Monday, these words: Now the peasant thinks it comes to his turn under pretence of his privilege in parliament, that he should dispose of Kings and commonwealths, &c.' Afterwards also thus: Nothing now contents the Commonalty but war and contention, &c. For which and for several other passages reflecting on the Spanish Match, he was called into question by Dr. Piers the ViceChancellor, and by him was a time appointed for him to recant what he had said. Which being done, not without the consent of certain Doctors, the Repetitioner was commanded to leave out diverse passages of the said sermon, which he, according to custom, was to repeat the Sunday after, commonly called Low Sunday," &c.*

6

"The truth is," Wood goes on to say, "this our preacher was a person more ingenious than prudent, and more apt upon most occasions to display his fancy, than to proceed upon solid reason; if not, he would not in his said sermon have descanted on the whole life of our Saviour, purposely to render him and his at

* Wood's Ath. II. 261, 262.

VOL. IV.

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tendants,

tendants, men and women, objects of scorn and aver sion, as if they had been a pack of dissolute vagabonds and cheats. But the best of it was, that though he then assumed the person of a Jewish Pharisee and persecutor of Christ, yet presently after changing his stile, as became a disciple of Christ, he with such admirable dexterity, as it is said, answered all the cavil lations and invectives before made, that the loudly repeated applauses of his hearers hindered him a good space from proceeding in his sermon."

It seems doubtful, by Wood's expressions, whether he himself had ever seen this curious performance. It appears to have been originally published, together with his recantation sermon, under the following title:

"The Resurrection rescued from the Soldier's Calumnies, in two Sermons at St. Mary's in Oxon. on Matth. xxviii. 13. and on Acts ii. latter part of the first verse. London. 1659. 12mo." Then published under the name of Rob. Jones, D. D.

It certainly exhibits proofs of banter and levity, which must astonish all serious readers. The following is its commencement:

"What's the best news abroad? So we must begin: 'Tis the garb, (les novelles,) the grand salute, and common preface to all our talk. And the news goes not as things are in themselves, but as men's fancies are fashioned, as some lust to report, and others to believe. The same relation shall go for true or false, according to the key, wherein men's minds are tuned ;

but

but chiefly as they stand diverse in religion, so they feign and affect different news. By their news ye may know their religion, and by their religion foreknow their news. This week the Spanish Match goes forward, and Bethlem Gabor's troops are broken; and the next week Bethlem Gabor's troops go forward, and the Spanish Match is broken. The Catholic is for the Spanish Match, and the Protestant for restoring the Palatinate; and each party think that the safety of the church and success of religion depends upon the event of one or other; and therefore they cross and countertell each other's news. Titius came from London yesterday; and he says that the new chapel at St. James's is quite finished: Caius came, thence but this morning and then there was no such thing on building. False news follows true at the heels, and oftimes outstrips it.

"Thus goes the Chronicle news, the talk of the factious and pragmatic; but the Christian news, the talk of the faithful, is spent in evangelic, in hearing and telling some good news of their Saviour; and now all the talk is of his resurrection. The Christian current goes, News from Mount Calvary, the sixteenth day of Nisan, in the year thirty-four, old-stile,' as the three holy matrons deliver it at the eighth verse of this chapter. But, since, there are certain soldiers arrived, and they say, there was no such matter as the resurrection, 'twas but a gull put upon the world by his disciples; for it fares with spiritual news as with temporal; it is variously and contradictorily related, till the false controuls the true. And as our modern news comes neither from the court, nor from the camp, nor from the place where things are acted, but is forged in conventicles by

priests, or in some Paul's assembly, or such like place, and the divulge committed to some vigilant and watchful tongue: so it is with the news of the non-resurrection; it came not from Mount Calvary; but the priests are the authors of it at the eleventh verse; and at the twelfth they frame and mould it to the mouth of the watch. The divulgers, men of double credit, they know the truth, for they are of the watch; and they will not lie, for they are soldiers; nay, they will maintain it, for they are Knights, Milites, Knights of the Post; they are hired to say, saying, and they did say, His disciples came by night, and stole him away, whilst we slept.'

"The words are so plain they need no opening. May it please you, that I make three cursories over them; one for the soldiers; another for the disciples; and the third for our Saviour. In the two first, we will beat the point, pro and con; and in the latter reconcile it, for that's the fashion also. No error so absurd but finds a patron; nor truth so sound, but meets with an adversary; no point controverted but the opposite tenet may be reconciled. Be they distant as heaven and hell; as incompatible as Jew and Christian, yet they shall meet with a moderator, and a cogging distinction shall state the question on the absurder side."*

The curious pamphlet from whence these extracts are taken, was furnished by an anonymous friend, to whom the Editor returns his thanks.

ART.