Lord Strafford says: "I take it to heart to continue the Provost in the College howbeit the Primate is or shortly will be bitterly out with him, and the Bishop of Derry affectionate for Mr. Howlet to succeed in the Provostship." Archbishop Laud, in answer to Lord Strafford, says: "My last gave your Lordship notice that both the Primate and my Lord of Derry were earnest with me by their several letters, not against the Provost but for Mr. Howlet, in regard they thought the Statute would no way bear his continuance in the College. I likewise acquainted you what answer I had given both of them. But I am very heartily sorry to hear that there is like to be a new quarrel between the Primate and the Provost. And if your Lordship take his stay in the College to heart, as you write you do, you must prevent that quarrel, or else you will have a party raised in the College to hinder all the good which the Provost might do, which is the chief aim of your wishing his stay there. And methinks you might speak privately with the Primate, and so do what you would with him. As for the Bishop of Derry, I presume you can rule him; but mandamus the preceding year, was presented to a living by Lord Strafford, which obliged him, in compliance with his oath, to vacate his Fellowship. He accordingly did resign, but immediately produced a King's letter to be restored to his fellowship without taking the oath of a Fellow. The reason assigned for this extraordinary favor was, that he was tutor to Lord Strafford's son, and to the sons of some other Privy Councillors. I Strafford's Letters, vol. ii. pag. 194. m The Provostship was again held with a bishopric, when, in 1644, the Bishop of Meath (Martin) was appointed Provost, and held the place till he died of the plague in 1650. An attempt was made by the Lord Lieutenant, in 1794, to make the Bishop of Cloyne (Bennet) Provost, but was prevented by the determined resistance of the Fellows, who presented a petition to the King in person. Of the attempt to force the Bishop of Cloyne upon the College Edmund Burke thus speaks: "One Dr. Bennet, not content with his Bishopric, was so greedy and so frantic at this time when the Church labours under so much odium for avarice, as to wish to rob the members of its seminary, men of the first character in learning and morals, of their legal rights, and by dispensation to grapple to himself, a stranger and wholly unacquainted with the body, its lucrative Provostship as a commendam."- See Epist. Corres. with Rt. Hon. Ed. Burke and Dr. Laurence, pag. 307. The Fellows, hearing that the recommendation of the Bishop of Cloyne had actually been sent over by the Lord Lieutenant, the Earl of Westmoreland (and it appears, from the correspondence of if this be not done, you were better send the Provost with honor to his bishoprick, and think of as good a successor as you can for the College." Lord Strafford would not yield; he had determined to keep Chappell Provost, and he braved all the evils which resulted from such an unwise measure. He seems, however, to have taken Archbishop Laud's advice in one particular, and to have conferred with the Primate, as appears from the following curious passage in a subsequent letter: "The Primate hath not been here this winter how beit I was one night with his Grace at Drogheda where his Lordship made me a noble welcome. Found there the best house I have seen in Ireland, built by Primate Hampton; yet not so much as a communion table in the Chapel, which seemed to me strange: no bowing there I warrant you." Upon this the Archbishop remarks: "I am glad your Lordship hath been at Drogheda and that there you find one of the best houses in Ireland. It seems Primate Hampton did that good to the see. And truly I would wonder, that the Chapel should have never a Communion table in it, save that I know some divines are of opinion, that nothing belonging to that Sacrament is ought extra the Bishop with Dr. Parr, that they were rightly informed), took the bold step of presenting a petition to the Bishop of Cloyne himself, and explaining the incompatibility of a commendam with the Statutes. The following is the Bishop's account of the transaction: "I did not answer the College address argumentatively but gave them their own words, that I should both for their sakes and my own weigh maturely the reasons for my determination.' I hear they were astonished at the politeness of their reception: I conclude they were conscious of the malice concealed in their address and expected to be kicked down stairs."-Parr's Works, vol. i. pag. 480. It certainly was sufficient reason to petition against the Bishop's fitness for the Provost ship, if they expected that he would kick down stairs two clergymen who waited upon him. The facts, however, were totally different. The two individuals who waited upon him were a Senior and Junior Fellow, Dr. Hall and Mr. Elrington, who were afterwards successively Provosts. They gave no copy of their address, and the Bishop received them under the idea that they were frightened at their useless opposition, and came now to conciliate. As Dr. Hall read on the Bishop became aware of the real nature of the address, and appeared greatly disconcerted. He was taken so much by surprise, that he could only give them back their own words, and sent them away, saying he would send an answer, which never arrived. usum, and do therefore set the table aside in any corner (good enough for it) save only at the time of administration. Now I pray you tell me in good earnest, may not Churches and Chapels be thought so too, might they be as easily removed and set up again as the tables may? But I take myself bound to give you an account, why I think all will not be quiet between my Lord Primate and my Lord of Cork. The truth is when I understood your Lordship's mind so fully set to have my Lord of Cork continue Provost, I writ to my Lord Primate a very fair answer to a letter" of his, which he had written against it. In that my letter I made a fair interpretation for the Provost's holding the College in commendam, and as I thought then and do still a just one to this I added this clause that it was fit for his Lordship and myself to give your Lordship all content in any thing we might possibly do, considering what a great benefactor under God and the King you have been to the Church of Ireland. But since these letters of mine, sent four months at least, I never heard word from my Lord Primate. And I take it his Grace hath printed a book since that and sent me never a copy, unless perchance it have miscarried." The book to which Archbishop Laud alludes was "Immanuel or the Mystery of the Incarnation of the Son of God." That the Primate did not resent, however he might have disapproved, the continuance of Bishop Chappell as Provost, is evident from this very book, for it is dedicated to Lord Strafford as "Grati animi qualecunque testimonium." This treatise, as it has been before stated, was the substance of several sermons preached by the Primate at Drogheda, and is as simple as the nature of the subject would " The letter is given in the Works, vol. xvi. pag. 36. • This is no excuse for Archbishop Laud, the Chancellor of the University, to suffer the Statutes to be trampled upon. It is quite evident he felt himself wrong, for he says in the very same letter: "And yet further I believe this business of my Lord of Corkes holding the College thrives never the better, because I know my Lord of Derry was as earnest with me as the Primate himself was, that the College could not be held in commendam by the Statutes." The Bishop of Cork did hold the Provostship till July, 1640. permit; it consists principally of a collection of texts from Scripture skilfully arranged. There does not seem any thing peculiar in his view of the subject. At this time the Primate was again involved in a dispute with Bishop Bedell, and it must be acknowledged, that his Grace allowed his ancient friend to be most unjustly trampled upon by his Court. The Primate had particularly recommended to Bishop Bedell Mr. King, a convert from Popery, as the fittest person to assist him in translating the Bible into Irish. The Bishop was so pleased with Mr. King, that he gave him a living in his diocese, where he finished his translation. But soon a stop was put by violence to this most useful undertaking. Representations were made to the Archbishop of Canterbury, that King was not a person fit to be intrusted with such an undertaking, and his Grace informed Bishop Bedell, that "the man whom he employed to translate the Bible into Irish was a man so ignorant that the translation cannot be worthy publick use in the Church, and besides obnoxious, so as the Church can receive no credit from any thing that is his." Bishop Bedell, in a letter to Lord Strafford, vindicates him from this charge, by appealing for his character to Archbishop Ussher, the Bishop of Meath, Lord Dillon, and Sir James Ware. He then proceeds to detail the various outrages that have been perpetrated under the color of law. It appears that a young man named Bailey pretended that the living, which the Bishop had given to Mr. King, had lapsed to the Crown, obtained a grant of it under the Great Seal, and thrust the legal incumbent out of his benefice. The Bishop cited Bailey before him, and remonstrated with him upon his violent intrusion into another man's benefice, and upon his having perjured himself, for he had taken an oath on receiving a vicarage not to accept any other. Bailey procured a dispensation from the Prerogative Court, notwithstanding his oath, to hold more benefices. The Bishop considering this as one of the worst and most scandalous abuses of Popery, and having tried all gentler methods of influencing Bailey, finally proceeded to deprive him of his benefice, and excommunicated him. Bailey appealed to the Prerogative Court, and the Bishop was cited to appear before them. He appeared, but declined the authority of the Surrogates. He gave in his reasons in twenty-four articles for refusing to answer to any person but the Primate. The Court, however, persevered, declared the Bishop contumacious, absolved the offender from his sentence, and restored him to his benefice. "The strangest part," says Bishop Burnett, "of this transaction was that which the Primate acted, who though he loved the Bishop beyond all the rest of his order, and valued him highly for the zealous discharge of his office, that distinguished him so much from others; yet he could not be prevailed on to interpose in the matter nor to stop the unjust prosecution that this good man had fallen under for so good a work." It cannot be ascertained what was the cause of the Primate's conduct. His biographers are silent upon the subject. From a letter of Lord Strafford's, already quoted, it appears that the Primate had not been in Dublin, and he might, therefore, not be fully acquainted with the proceedings of the High Commission Court; but it is not within the limits of possibility, that one of his Suffragan Bishops could have been summoned to his Court without notice having been given him of such a remarkable circumstance. It has been already remarked, that the Primate had P The unfortunate Mr. King, now far advanced in years, suffered even more than the Bishop. His sufferings are thus detailed by Bishop Bedell to Lord Strafford: "Touching his being obnoxious, it is true there is a scandalous information put in against him in the High Commission Court by his despoiler Mr. Baily (as my Lord of Derry told him in my hearing he was) and by an excommunicate despoiler, as myself before the execution of any sentence declar'd him in the Court to be. And Mr. King being cited to answer and not appearing (as by law he was not bound) was taken pro confesso, deprived of his ministry and living, fined an hundred pound, decreed to be attached and imprisoned. His adversary Mr. Baily, before he was sentenced, purchased a new dispensation to hold his benefice, and was the very next day after (as appears by the date of the institution) both presented on the Kings title (although the benefice be of my collation) and instituted by my Lord Primate's Vicar: shortly after inducted by an Archdeacon of another diocess, and a few days after he brought down an attachment and delivered Mr. King to the Pursuvant : He was haled by the head and feet to horseback, and brought to Dublin, where he hath been kept, and continued under arrest there four or five months and hath not been suffered to purge his supposed contempt by : |