This alludes to the numerous schools and religious establishments which the Jesuits prepared to establish throughout England.[274] The chapel which housed them is obviously the royal chapel, where the priests were privileged to exercise their functions even during the subsistence of the penal laws. The transient gleam of sunshine which invited the Swallows forth from their retirement, is the Declaration of Indulgence, in consequence of which the Catholics assumed the open and general exercise of their religion. The Irish Catholics, with the sanguine Talbot at their head, may be the first who hailed the imaginary return of spring: they are painted as
I cannot help thinking, that our author, still speaking in the character of the English church, describes himself as the "foolish Cuckow," whose premature annunciation of spring completed the Swallow's delusion. Perhaps he intended to mitigate the scornful description of Petre, by talking of himself also as a Protestant would have talked of him. The foreign priests and Catholic officers, whom hopes of promotion now brought into England, are pointed out by the "foreign fowl," who came in flocks,
The fable concludes in a prophetic strain, by indicating the calamities which were likely to overwhelm the Catholics, as soon as the death of James, or any similar event, should end their temporary prosperity. It is well known, how exactly the event corresponded to the prophecy; even the circumstance of the rabble rising upon the Catholic priests was most literally verified. In most of the sea-port towns, they watched the coasts to prevent their escape; and when King James was taken at Feversham, the fishermen, by whom he was seized, were employed in what they called by the cant phrase of "priest-codding," that is, lying in wait for the fugitive priests.
The conclusion of the fable naturally introduces a discussion of the penal laws, which unquestionably were extremely severe towards Catholics. By the fourteenth of Queen Elizabeth, it was enacted, that whoever, by bulls of the pope, should reconcile any one to Rome, should, together with the person reconciled, be guilty of high treason; that those, who relieved such reconcilers, should be liable in the penalties of a premunire, and those who concealed them in misprision of treason. A still more severe law passed in the twenty-eighth of the same queen, upon discovery of Parry's conspiracy against her life, to which he had been stirred up by a book of Allen, or Parsons the Jesuit, written for the express purpose. It was thereby enacted, that all Jesuits and Popish priests should depart the kingdom within forty days; and that those who should afterwards return into the kingdom, should be guilty of high treason; and all who relieved and maintained them, of felony. There were other enactments of a similar nature made upon the discovery of the gun-powder plot. Samuel Johnson (I mean the divine) gives an odd justification of these laws, saying, that the priests are hanged, not as priests, but as traitors. But, as their being priests was the sole reason for their being held traitors, it does not appear, that the Protestant divine can avail himself of this distinction.
The fanatic author is John White, commonly called Century White. He was born in Pembrokeshire in 1590, was educated for the bar, and made a considerable figure in his profession. As he was a rigid puritan, he was chosen one of the trustees which that sect appointed to purchase impropriations to be bestowed upon fanatic preachers. This design was checked by Archbishop Laud; and White, among others, received a severe censure in the Star-Chamber. In the Long Parliament, White was member for Southwark, and distinguished himself by his vindictive severity against the bishops and Episcopal clergy, saying openly in a committee, he hoped to live to see the day, when there should be neither bishop nor cathedral priest in England. He was very active in the ejectment of the clergy, by which upwards of eight thousand churchmen are said to have lost their cures in the course of four or five years. In order to encourage and justify these violent measures, he published his famous treatise, entitled, "The First Century of Scandalous Malignant Priests, made and admitted into benefices by the Prelates, London, 1643;" a tract which contains, as may be inferred from its name, an hundred instances of unworthiness, which had been either proved to have existed among the clergy of the church of England, or had been invented to throw a slander upon them. When this satire was shown to Charles I., it was proposed to answer it by a similar exposition of the scandalous part of the puritanical teachers; but that monarch would not consent to give countenance to a warfare in which neither party could gain, and religion was sure to be a loser between them. Similar considerations are said to have prevented White himself from publishing "A Second Century," in continuation of his work. He wrote another tract, entitled, "The Looking Glass;" in which he attempted to prove, that the sin against the Holy Ghost was the bearing arms for the king in the civil war. His own party bestow on White a high character for religion and virtue; but the cavaliers alleged, that although he had two wives of his own, a large proportion of matrimony, he did not forbear to visit three belonging to his neighbours in the White Friars. He died in January 1644, and is said, in his last illness, to have bitterly lamented the active share which he had taken in ejecting so many guiltless ministers, and their families. This, however, may be a fiction of the royalists; for the death-bed repentance of an enemy is amongst the most common forgeries of party. White's body was attended to the grave by most of the members of Parliament, and the following distich inscribed on his tomb:
When James II. ascended the throne, deceived by the general attachment of the church of England for his person, and the little jealousy which they seemed to entertain of his religion, he conceived there would be no great difficulty in procuring a reconciliation between the national church and that of Rome. With this view he made a favourable declaration of his intentions to maintain the church of England as by law established, and certainly expected, that, in return, they would consent to the repeal of the test act and penal laws;[275] and this, it was conceived, might pave the way for uniting the churches. An extraordinary pamphlet, already quoted, recommends such an union, founded upon the mutual attachment of both communions to King James, upon their success in resisting the Bill of Exclusion, and their common hatred of the dissenters. "This very stone, which was once rejected by the architects, is now become the chief stone in the corner. We may truly see in it the hand of God, and look upon it with admiration; and may expect, if fears and jealousies hinder not, the greatest blessings we can wish for. An union betwixt these two walls, which have been thus long separated, and now in a fair way to be united and linked together by this corner stone; after which, how glorious a structure may we hope for on such foundations!" A plan is therefore laid down, containing the following heads, of which it may be observed, that the very first is the abrogation of these penal laws, which Dryden states to be the principal bar between the alliance of the Hind and the Panther.
"First, that it may be provided, That those who are known to be faithful friends to the king and kingdom's good, may equally with us enjoy those favours and blessings we may hope for under so great and so just a king, without being liable to the sanguinary penal laws, for holding opinions noways inconsistent with loyalty, and the peace and quiet of the nation; and that they may not be obliged, by oaths and tests, either to renounce their religion, which they know they cannot do without sacrilege, or else to put themselves out of capacity of serving their king and country.
"Secondly, That, for healing our differences, it be appointed, that neither side, in their sermons, touch upon matters of controversy with animating reflections; but that those discourses may wholly tend to peace and piety, religion and sound morality; and that, in all public catechisms, the solid grounds and principles of religion may be solely explicated and established, all reflecting animosities being laid aside.
"Thirdly, That some learned, devout, and sober persons, may be made choice of on both sides, who may truly state matters of controversy betwixt us; to the end, each one may know others pretensions, and the tenets they cannot abandon, without breaking the chain of apostolic faith; which, if it be done, we shall, it may be, find that to be true, which the Papists often tell us, that the difference betwixt them and us is not so great as many make it; nor their tenets so pernicious, but if we saw them naked, we should, if not embrace them as truths, yet not condemn them as errors, much less as pernicious doctrines. Yet if, notwithstanding all this, we cannot perfectly agree in some points, let us, however, endeavour to live together in the bonds of love and charity, as becomes good Christians and loyal subjects, and join together to oppugn those known maxims, and pernicious errors, which destroy the essence of religion, loyalty, and good government."—Remonstrance, by way of Address, to the Church of England, 1685.
The Test-act was passed in the year 1678, while the popish plot was in its vigour, and the Earl of Shaftesbury was urging every point against the Catholics, with his eyes uniformly fixed upon the Bill of Exclusion as his crowning measure. It imposed on all who should sit in parliament, a declaration of their abhorrence of the doctrine of transubstantiation. The Duke of York, with tears in his eyes, moved for a proviso to exempt himself, protesting, that he cast himself upon the House in the greatest concern he could have in the world; and that whatever his religion might be, it should only be a private thing between God and his own soul. Notwithstanding this pathetic appeal, he carried his point but by two votes. With seven other peers he protested against the bill. Dryden therefore, and probably with great justice, represents this test as a part of his machinations against the Duke of York, whose party was at that time, and afterwards, warmly espoused by the church of England. But though the Test-act was devised by a statesman whom they hated, and carried by a party whom they had opposed, the high-church clergy were not the less unwilling to part with it when they found the advantages which it gave them against the Papists in King James's reign. Hence they were loaded with the following reproaches: "My business is to set forth, in its own colours, the extraordinary loyalty of those men, who obstinately maintain a test contrived by the faction to usher in the Bill of Exclusion: And it is much admired, even by some of her own children, that the grave and matron-like church of England, which values herself so much for her antiquity, should be over-fond of a new point of faith, lately broached by a famous act of an infallible parliament, convened at Westminster, and guided by the holy spirit of Shaftesbury. But I doubt there are some parliaments in the world which will not so easily admit this new article into their creed, though the church of England labours so much to maintain it as a special evidence of her singular loyalty."—New Test of the Church of England's Loyalty.
This passage regards the situation of the Roman Catholic peers. Notwithstanding their religion, they had been allowed to retain their seats and votes in the House of Lords. So jealous were they, (as was but natural,) of this privilege, that, in 1675, when Danby proposed a test oath upon all holding state employments and benefices, the object of which was to acknowledge the doctrine of non-resistance, and disown all attempts at an alteration of government, the Roman Catholic peers, to the number of twenty, who had hitherto always voted with the crown, united, on this occasion, with the opposition, and occasioned the loss of the bill. This North imputes to the art of Shaftesbury, who dinned into their ears, "that this test (by mentioning the maintenance of the Protestant religion, though that of the royal authority was chiefly proposed) tended to deprive them of their right of voting, which was a birth-right so sacrosanct and radically inherent in the peerage, as not to be temerated on any account whatsoever." When the earl had heated the Catholic lords with this suggestion, he secured them to the opposition, by proposing, and carrying through, an order of the House, that no bill should be received, tending to deprive any of the peerage of their right. But when the Test-act of 1678 was moved, which had, for its direct purpose, that exclusion which that of 1675 was supposed only to convey by implication, Shaftesbury laughed at the order which he himself had proposed, saying, leges posteriores priores abrogant. And by this test, which required the renunciation of their religion as idolatrous, the Catholic peerage were effectually, and for ever, excluded from their seats in the House of Lords. Dryden intimates, in the following lines, that this test applied to the Papists alone, and complains heavily of this odious distinction, betwixt them and other non-conformists.
James II. and the established church set out on the highest terms of good humour with each other. This, as the king afterwards assured the dissenters, was owing to the professions made to him by some of the churchmen, whom he named, who had promised favour to the Catholics, provided he would abandon all idea of general toleration, and leave them their ancient authority over the fanatics. Moved, as he said, by these promises, the Declaration in council, issued upon his accession, had this remarkable clause: "I know the principles of the church of England are for monarchy, and the members of it have shewn themselves good and loyal subjects, therefore I shall always take care to defend and support it." This explicit declaration gave the greatest satisfaction to the kingdom in general, and particularly to the clergy. "All the pulpits of England," says Burnet, "were full of it, and of thanksgivings for it. It was magnified as a security far greater than any that laws could give. The common phrase was, We have now the word of a king, and a word never yet broken. This general feeling of gratitude led to a set of addresses, full of the most extravagant expressions of loyalty and fidelity to so gracious a sovereign. The churchmen led the way in these expressions of zeal; and the university of Oxford, in particular, promised to obey the king without limitations or restrictions." The king's promise was reckoned so solemn and inviolable, that those addresses were censured as guilty at least of ill-breeding, who mentioned in their papers the "religion established by law;" since that expression implied an obligation on the king to maintain it, independently of his royal grace and favour. But the scene speedily changed, as the king's intentions began to disclose themselves. Then, as a Catholic pamphleteer expresses himself, "My loyal gentlemen were so far out of the right bias, that, in lieu of taking off the tests and penal laws, which all people expected from them in point of gratitude and good manners, they made a solemn address to his majesty, that none be employed who were not capacitated by the said laws and tests to bear offices civil and military."[276]
If James, had viewed with attention the incidents of the former reign, he might have recollected, that, however devoted the clergy had then shown themselves to the crown, his brother's attempt at his present measure of a general indulgence had at once alarmed the whole church. This sensibility, when the interest of the church is concerned, is severely contrasted with the general indifference to the cause of freedom, into which they relapsed when the indulgence was recalled, in a party pamphlet of the year 1680-1. "You may easily call to mind, a late instance of the humanity and conscience of this race of men here in England: For when his majesty, not long since, attempted to follow his own inclinations, and emitted a declaration of indulgence to tender consciences, the whole posse cleri seemed to be raised against him: Every reader and Gibeonite of the church could then talk as saucily of their king, as they do now of the late honourable Parliament; nay, they began to stand upon their terms, and delivered it out as orthodox doctrine, that the king was to act according to law, and, therefore, could not suspend a penal statute; that the subjects' obedience was a legal obedience; and, therefore, if the king commanded any thing contrary to law, the subject was not bound to obey; with so many other honest positions, that men wondered in God how such knaves should come by them. But wherefore was all this wrath, and all this doctrine? merely because his majesty was pleased for a time to remove the sore backs of dissenters from under the ecclesiastical lash; the bloody exercise of which is never denied to holy church, but the magistrate is immediately assaulted with the noise and clamour of Demetrius and his craftsmen.
"But now, the tables being turned, the same mercenary tongues are again all Sibthorp, and all Manwaring; not a bit of law, or conscience either, is now to be had for love or money; not any limits to be put to the king's commands, or our obedience. It is a gospel truth with these men, that all which we have is the king's; and if he should command our estates, our wives and children, yea, and our religion too, we ought to resign them up, submit, and be silent."—The Freeholders' Choice, or, A Letter of Advice concerning Elections.
The first expression in these lines seems to have been a favourite with Dryden. In the Introduction to the Translation of Juvenal, he makes it his glory, "that, being naturally vindicative, he had suffered in silence, and possessed his soul in quiet."
The arguments used by the Panther in this passage seem to have more weight than her antagonist allows them. It was surely reasonable, that the church of England should rest upon her penal statutes and test act, as the sole mode of preventing the encroachments of her rival during a Catholic reign, and at the same time that she should look forward with pleasure to a future period, when such severe enactments might be no longer necessary for her safety; a time, of which it has been our good fortune to witness the arrival.
The argument of the Panther, in this speech, is, with the simile of the inundation, literally versified from an answer to Penn's pamphlet. "The penal laws cannot prejudice the Papists in this king's reign, seeing he can connive at the non-execution of them, and the repeal of them now cannot benefit the Papists when he is gone; because, if they do not behave themselves modestly, we can either re-establish them, or enact others, which they will be as little fond of. But their abrogation at this time would infallibly prejudice us, and would prove to be the pulling up of the sluices, and the throwing down the dikes, which stem the deluge that is breaking in upon us, and which hinder the threatening waves from overflowing us." Some reflections on a discourse, entitled, "Good Advice to the Church of England."—State Tracts, Vol. I. p. 368.
This conveys a perilous insinuation, which perhaps it would, at the time, have been prudent to suppress; since it goes the length of preparing a justification of the resumption of the power, authority, lands, and revenues, of the church of England, upon the footing of their having originally belonged to that of Rome. It cannot be supposed that this hint could be passed over at the time, without a strong feeling of a meditated revolution in church government and property.
Burnet, in the "History of his Own Times," gives the following account of the relief which James, either from inclination or policy, extended to the French Protestants, who were exiled by the recal of the edict of Nantes.
"But now the session of Parliament drew on, and there was a great expectation of the issue of it. For some weeks before it met, there was such a number of refugees coming over every day, who set about a most dismal recital of the persecution in France; and that in so many instances that were crying and odious, that, though all endeavours were used to lessen the clamour this had raised, yet the king did not stick openly to condemn it as both unchristian and unpolitic. He took pains to clear the Jesuits of it, and laid the blame of it chiefly on the king, on Madame de Maintenon, and the Archbishop of Paris. He spoke often of it with such vehemence, that there seemed to be an affectation in it. He did more: He was very kind to the refugees; he was liberal to many of them; he ordered a brief for a charitable collection over the nation for them all; upon which great sums were sent in. They were deposited in good hands, and well distributed. The king also ordered them to be denizen'd, without paying fees, and gave them great immunities. So that, in all, there came over, first and last, between forty and fifty thousand of that nation. There was such real argument of the cruel and persecuting spirit of popery, wheresoever it prevailed, that few could resist this conviction; so that all men confessed, that the French persecution came very seasonably to awaken the nation, and open men's eyes in so critical a conjunction; for upon this session of Parliament all did depend."—Burnet, Book IV.
These, and the following lines, contain a character of James II. most exquisitely drawn, though, it must be owned, with a flattering pencil. Bravery, economy, integrity, are the ingredients which Dryden has mixed for his colours. Without attempting a character of this unfortunate monarch, we may say a few words on each of the attributes ascribed to him. Bravery he unquestionably possessed; but it was of that ordinary kind, which, though unshaken by mere personal danger, is unable to sustain its possessor in great and embarrassing political emergencies. The economy of James, being one great engine by which he hoped to carry on his projects, was so rigid as sometimes to border upon avarice. His upright integrity, the virtue upon which he chiefly prided himself, and which was the usual theme of courtly panegyric, frequently deviated into obstinacy. When he had once resolved upon a measure, he often announced his resolution with imprudence, and almost always pressed it with an open disregard of consequences. No fault can be more fatal to an English king; because the stream of popular opinion, which would subside if unopposed, becomes irresistible when the obstinacy of a monarch persists in attempting to stem it.
The virulent and abusive character which our author here draws of the clergy, and particularly those of the metropolis, differs so much from his description of the church of England, in the person of the Panther, that we may conclude it was written after the publishing of the Declaration of Indulgence, when the king had decidedly turned his favour from the established church. Their quarrel was now irreconcileable, and at immediate issue; and Dryden therefore changes the tone of conciliation, with which he had hitherto addressed the heretic church, into that of bitter and unrelenting satire. Dryden calls them doves, in order to pave the way for terming them, as he does a little below, "birds of Venus;" as disowning the doctrine of celibacy. The popular opinion, that a dove has no gall, is well known. In Scotland, this is averred to be owing to the dove which Noah dismissed from the ark having flown so long, that his gall broke; since which occurrence, none of the species have had any.
The Roman Catholic pamphlets of the time are filled with complaints, that their principles were misrepresented by the Protestant divines; and that king-killing tenets, and others of a pernicious or absurd nature, were unjustly ascribed to them. A tract, which is written on purpose to explain their real doctrine, says, "Is it not strange and severe, that principles, and those pretended of faith too, should be imposed upon men which they themselves renounce and detest? If the Turks' Alcoran should, in like manner, be urged upon us, and we hanged up for Mahometans, all we could do or say, in such a case, would be, to die patiently, with protestations of our own innocence. And this is the posture of our condition; we abhor, we renounce, we abominate, such principles; we protest against them, and seal our protestations with our dying breath. What shall we say, what can we do more? To accuse men as guilty in matters of faith, which they never owned, is the same thing as to condemn them for matters of fact which they never did."[277] Another author, speaking in the assumed character of the established church, says, that the Catholic controvertists have often told us, that "we behave ourselves like persons diffident of our cause, decline disputes on equal terms, and either misrepresent their tenets, as appears manifestly in their doctrines of justification and merit, satisfaction and indulgences; or else play the buffoons, joking, scoffing, and relating stories, which, if true, would not touch religion."—A Remonstrance, by way of Address, &c.
Emblems, like puns, being the wit of a heavy people, the Dutch seem to have been remarkable for them; of which, their old-fashioned prints, and figured pan-tiles, are existing evidence. Prior thus drolls upon the passage in the text:
"Bayes. Oh! dear Sir, you are mighty obliging: but I must needs say at a fable, or an emblem, I think no man comes near me; indeed I have studied it more than any man. Did you ever take notice, Mr Johnson, of a little thing that has taken mightily about town, a cat with a top-knot?[278]
John. Faith, Sir, 'tis mighty pretty; I saw it at the coffee-house.
Bayes. 'Tis a trifle hardly worth owning. I was t'other day at Will's, throwing out something of that nature; and, i'gad, the hint was taken, and out came that picture; indeed the poor fellow was so civil to present me with a dozen of 'em for my friends. I think I have one here in my pocket; would you please to accept it, Mr Johnson?
John. Really 'tis very ingenious.
Bayes. Oh, Lord, nothing at all! I could design twenty of 'em in an hour, if I had but witty fellows about me to draw 'em. I was proffered a pension to go into Holland and contrive their emblems; but, hang 'em, they are dull rogues, and would spoil my invention."—Hind and Panther Transprosed.
Gilbert Burnet, well known as an historian, was born of a good family in Scotland, in 1643. He went through his studies with success; and, being ordained by the Bishop of Edinburgh, obtained the living of Salton, in East Lothian, in 1665. While in this living, he drew up a memorial of the abuses of the Scotch bishops, and was instrumental in procuring the induction of Presbyterian divines into vacant churches; a step which he afterwards condemned as imprudent.[279] To measures so unfavourable for Episcopacy, Dryden seems to allude, in these lines:
Burnet's opinion, or rather indifference, concerning forms, may be guessed at, from the applause with which he quotes a saying of Dr Henry More; "None of them are bad enough to make men bad, and I am sure none of them are good enough to make men good." He was next created professor of divinity at Glasgow; but as his active temper led him to mingle much in political life, he speedily distinguished himself rather as a politician than a theologian. In 1672 he was made one of the king's chaplains, and was in high favour both with Charles and his brother. He enjoyed much of the countenance of the Duke of Lauderdale; but a quarrel taking place between them, the duke represented Burnet's conduct in such terms, that he was deprived of his chaplainry, and forced to resign his professor's chair, and abandon Scotland. He had an opportunity of revenging himself upon Lauderdale, as will be noticed in a subsequent note. During the time of the Popish plot, he again received a portion of the royal countenance. He was then preacher at the Rolls Chapel, under the patronage of Sir Harbottle Grimstone, master of the rolls, as also lecturer at St Clement's, and enjoyed a high degree of public consideration. Having, as he conceived, a fit opportunity to awaken the conscience of Charles, he ventured upon sending him a letter, where he treated his personal vices, and the faults of his government, with great severity,[280] and by which he forfeited his favour for ever. This freedom, with his low-church tenets, gave also offence to the Duke of York, who was, moreover, offended with him for some interference in the affair of the Exclusion, in which, if he did not go all the length of Shaftesbury, he recommended the appointment of a prince-regent; a measure scarcely more palatable to the successor. At length, his regard for Lord Russell, and the share which he took in penning, or circulating, his dying declaration, drew upon him the full resentment of both brothers. To this, a whimsical accident, in the choice of a text for the day of the gun-powder plot, happened to contribute. The preacher chanced (for we must believe what he assures us, ex verbo sacerdotis) to pitch on these words: "Save me from the lion's mouth; thou hast delivered me from the horns of the unicorn." This was interpreted as referring to the supporters of the royal arms; and Burnet was discharged, by the king's command, both from lecturing at St Clement's, and preaching at the Rolls Chapel. After this final breach with the court he went abroad, and, having travelled through France and Italy, settled in Holland at the court of the Prince of Orange. Here he did not fail, with that ready insinuation which seems to have distinguished him, to make himself of consequence to the prince, and especially to the princess, afterwards Queen Mary. From this place of refuge he sent forth several papers, in single sheets, relating to the controversy in England; and the clergy, who had formerly looked upon him with some suspicion, began now to treat with great attention and respect a person so capable of serving their cause. He was consulted upon every emergency; which confidence was no doubt owing partly to his situation near the person of the Prince of Orange, the Protestant heir of the crown. He stood forward as the champion of the church of England, in the controversy with Parker concerning the Test.[281] In the "History of his Own Times," the bishop talks with complacency of the sway which circumstances had given him among the clergy, and of the important matters which fell under his management; for, by express command of the Prince of Orange, he was admitted into all the secrets of the English intrigues. These insinuations of Burnet's importance, although they afterwards drew the ridicule of Pope, and the Tory wits of Queen Anne's reign, may, from the very satire of Dryden, be proved to have been well founded. This acquired importance of Burnet is the alliance between the Pigeon-house and Buzzard, which Dryden reprobates, believing, or wishing to make others believe, that Burnet held opinions unfavourable to Episcopacy. James considered this divine as so formidable an enemy, that he wrote two very severe letters to his daughter against him, and proceeded so far as to insist that he should be forbidden the court; a circumstance which did not prevent his privately receiving a double degree of countenance. A prosecution for high treason was next commenced against Burnet, and a demand was made that he should be delivered up; which the States evaded, by declaring that he was naturalized, by marrying a Dutch lady. The court of England were then supposed to have formed some plan, as they had attempted in the case of Peyton, of seizing, or perhaps assassinating him, and a reward of L. 3000 was offered for the service. Burnet, however, confident in the protection of the prince and states of Holland, answered, replied, and retorted, and carried on almost an immediate controversy with his sovereign, dated from the court of his son-in-law. This active politician had a very important share in the Revolution, and reaped his reward, by being advanced to the see of Salisbury. He died on the 17th of March, 1714-15.
His writings, theological, political, and polemical, are very numerous; but he is most remarkable as an historian. The "History of the Reformation," but more especially that of "His Own Times," raises him to a high rank among our English historians.
The following song, which is preserved in the "State Poems," gives a similar account of Burnet's personal appearance:
A new Ballad, called, The Brawny Bishop's Complaint.
To the Tune of—Packington's Pound.
I.
II.
III.