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paration. He bad me to tell them I hoped they were all prepared, but wished they might be better; to exhort them to unity and concord; to love God first, and then their Prince and country; to look to the urgent necessities of the times and the miserable state of Christendom with Bis dat qui cito dat. Feb. 18th the first Sunday in Lent I preached at St. Margarets to them: and Feb. 27th the House sent Sir James Perrot and Mr. Drake to give me thanks, and to desire me to print the sermon, which was done accordingly; the text being upon the First of the Cor. x. 17. For we being many are one bread and one body, for we are all partakers of that one bread.'" The sermon' was judicious and forcible. In the first part treating of the Communion of Saints and the mystic body of the Church, he exhorts his hearers to preserve peace not less in civil than in ecclesiastical matters, and to unite in brotherly love not only with our own fellow-citizens, but with all those joined to us in the same faith; and he concludes this part with a compliment upon the liberality, with which they had voted supplies for the support of the Palatine and the Protestant religion. In the second part he puts forward clearly and distinctly the doctrine of the Church of England with respect to the Sacraments, that "they are signs and more than signs, even pledges and assurances of the interest we have in the heavenly things, that are represented by them;" and then more particularly enters into the question about the real presence, which is to be found not in the external symbols, but in the mind of the worthy recipient, and exposes the idolatry of the service offered by the Roman Catholics in their sacrifice of the mass. He concludes with some very strong remarks upon the Jesuits' doctrine with respect to oaths, and more particularly the oath of allegiance, and warns his hearers that "they must provide by all good means that God be not dishonoured by their ido

This sermon was printed in 1621. See Works, vol. ii. pag. 515. Dr. Parr says that this sermon and one upon Ephes. iv. 13, concerning the unity of the Catholic faith, were all the sermons he could find to have been published with his allowance.

latries, nor our King and State endangered by their secret treacheries."

The death of Bishop Montgomery had not only vacated the See of Meath, but also that of Clogher, to which James Spottiswood, brother of the celebrated Archbishop of St. Andrews, had been named. A serious dispute arose between him and Primate Hampton as to the exercise of episcopal jurisdiction, before he was consecrated. A letters is preserved from Ussher to the Primate professing his determination to respect his metropolitan authority, but at the same time urging his Grace not to bring the question into the courts of law, as he feared they would interpret the words of the Patent in a manner favourable to the King's prerogative, and not to the power of the Keys; that the Act of Elizabeth which took away the conge d'elire put the bishop who received the King's patent into the same situation, as if he were canonically elected and confirmed. The Archbishop in answer asserts his own opinion, and combats the arguments advanced by Ussher, but declares that he has no intention of bringing the matter into the courts of law, that he resists the exercise of jurisdiction, and that he will defend himself, if the Bishop of Clogher should feel aggrieved and bring an action against him. It is to be supposed that the Bishop did not feel himself justified in taking such a step, for there is no further notice of the proceedings. Before he returned to Ireland, the Bishop elect resigned the Professorship of Divinity in the University of Dublin. From the measures taken about the appointment of a successor, it appears that the same pernicious counsels, to which I have before alluded, influenced the government of the College. In the Registry Book there is the following entry "May 9, 1621. Mr. Preston of Queen's College Cambridge was chosen Professor of Theological Controversies, Mr. Dr. Ussher, who is now Bishop of Meath, having surrendered his interest to that place, which for many years together he performed with great credit and good to the College." Preston, whom Ward with great

See Letter xlii. vol. xv. p. 155.

justice calls the Patriarch of the Presbyterian party, declined the office. He no doubt preferred the chance of being chosen Master of Emmanuel College at Cambridge, to which station he soon after got himself appointed by a trick. Samuel Ward of Ipswich was then named Professor, but he also declined. The reason is not known, but it is tolerably certain that no loss was sustained by his refusal, for he was soon after silenced by the High Commission Court, and retired into Holland, where it is said that het rejected episcopal ordination, and that he and Mr. Bridge ordained each other. After the place being thus virtually vacant for four years Mr. Joshua Hoyle, one of the Senior Fellows, was appointed in March 1623. He was "a noted Puritan," fled to England in 1641 and became one of the Assembly of Divines. He assisted also in the evidence against Archbishop Laud for his conduct as Chancellor of the University of Dublin.

Dr. Ussher" was consecrated in St. Peter's Church, Drogheda, by Primate Hampton. The assisting bishops were Robert Bishop of Down, Thomas Bishop of Kilmore, and Theophilus Bishop of Dromore. His high promotion rather increased than diminished his zeal to spread the true doctrines of Christianity through the land, and he directed his attention to the conversion of the numerous Roman Catholics who were spread over his diocese. He preached with indefatigable constancy, following, as Dr. Bernard remarks, the example of St. Augustine, who "episcopatu suscepto multo instantius ac ferventius majore authoritate, non in una tantum regione sed ubicunque rogatus, verbum salutis æternæ alacriter et suaviter, pullulante atque crescente Domini ecclesia, prædicabat:" and he still further

The only defence Mr. Brooke, in his History of the Puritans, can make for Ward is, that the story is not probable.

u I cannot ascertain the date of the consecration. The writ of consecration bears date June 27, 1621. Harris, in his edition of Ware, says that Dr. Ussher was presented to the living of Trim on the 17th of April, 1620, but was never instituted. This is a mistake. The patent granted him the Rectory of Trim, to hold in commendam with the Bishoprick.

Theophilus Buckworth, brother-in-law to Dr. Ussher.
Posidon. in Vita August.

bound himself to the observance by the motto of his episcopal seal, "Væ mihi si non Evangelizavero," which he continued after his appointment to the Primacy. When the Roman Catholics expressed a wish to hear him preach, but hesitated at going into the church, he went so far as to indulge their prejudices, and preached to them in the Sessions' House. The sermons produced such an effect, that the priests prohibited the members of their congregation from listening to them in any place whatever. His conferences with the Roman Catholics led him to perceive that one of the strongest holds which their religion had upon their minds, was the notion of its antiquity, the notion that they held unimpaired the doctrines handed down from generation to generation. To eradicate these false opinions the Bishop composed his tract upon the religion of the ancient Irish, designed to shew that the creed of Pope Pius was as unlike the creed of their ancestors, as it was to that of the Protestants whom they regarded as heretics, and this work he published some years afterwards in London.

In the commencement of the year 1622 a Royal Commission was issued for the visitation of the province of Armagh, and the several bishops made a return of the state of their several dioceses. The report for the diocese of Meath was of course drawn up by the new Bishop, and is still preserved in the Library of the University of Dublin. As this document was the first episcopal act of Bishop Ussher and contains very curious information with respect to the state of the Church at that period, I have printed the return at length in the Appendix. Though the diocese of Meath was at that time the best arranged and most civilized part of Ireland, the description affords lamentable proof of the want of adequate religious instruction for the people, and gives a ready answer to the question, why the Reformation did not make greater progress; want of churches, want of residences, and want of income for the clergy.

* Dr. Bernard says that an anagram was given to him of his name James Meath, I am the same.

y See Appendix V. p. li.

In this year the clamour unjustly raised against him procured the removal of the Lord Deputy Grandison. His conduct in enforcing the Penal Statutes against the Roman Catholics and obliging the Regulars to leave the country, had been grossly exaggerated into crimes of enormous oppression and tyranny. The clamour thus excited by the Roman Catholics was industriously extended by many of the most powerful members of the State, whom the Lord Deputy with more honesty than caution had forced to disgorge the plunder, which they had iniquitously made of the Church lands. This was an offence not to be forgiven, and these lawless titled plunderers joined the cry of the Roman Catholics, and beset the throne with applications to remove the Lord Deputy. Their complaints were successful, and the King removed the Deputy, though with strange inconsistency he at the same time heaped honours upon him as the reward of his services.

The success of these schemes was attributed by the Roman Catholics solely to their own influence, and raised their spirits to such a height that they could no longer be restrained within the limits of decent order and subordination. While the country was in this state of excitement, Henry Cary Viscount Falkland arrived in Dublin, and was sworn in Lord Deputy on the 8th of September. On this occasion the Bishop of Meath was called upon to preach, and in a letter to Lord Grandison gives the following account of the sermon and of the reasons which induced him to deliver such advice. "The day that my Lord of Falkland received the sword I preached in Christ Church, and fitting myself to the present occasion took for my text these words in the thirteenth to the Romans' He beareth not the sword in vain.' There I shewed, 1. What was meant by this sword. 2. The subject wherein that power vested. 3. The matters wherein it was exercised. 4. Thereupon what it was to bear the sword in vain. Whereupon falling upon the duty of the magistrate in seeing those laws executed that were made for the furtherance of God's service, I first declared that no more was to be expected herein from the subordinate magistrate, than he had received in commission from the supreme; in whose power it lay to limit the other

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