preferments, to make a handsome provision for a numerous progeny of sons, daughters, nieces, &c. The former thought themselves oblig'd, out of their small revenues, to be extensive in their · acts of liberality and beneficence; and even to impoverish themselves, for the relief of distressed strangers. The latter have so conscientious a regard for that œconomical precept, which injoins them especially to provide for those of their own household, or family, that they seldom bestow their charity abroad.

"As the advancement of a primitive priest to the episcopal dignity was entirely founded upon his own intrinsic merit, abstructed from any worldly consideration; so, in promoting others, he had respect to nothing but learning and diligence in the discharge of the ministerial office, together with an exemplary purity and integrity of life. He countenanc'd no cringers, sycophants, or informers; gave no encouragement to bribery, smock-simony, or any of those mean arts, by which too many of the clergy now a-days, if not grossly misrepresented, endeavour to recommend themselves to the patronage of the Right Reverends.*

"The antient Bishops, in imitation of John the Baptist, would boldly rebuke the vices of courtiers and princes. AMBROSE, a prelate of the fourth century, excluded the Emperor Theodosius from the eucharist; nor could he be persuaded to absolve and readmit him to church communion, till he had sate upon the stool of repentance for eight months, and testify'd the deepest contrition for revenging the extrajudicial proceedings against Buthericus, a great officer at court, who had been assaulted by popular fury.

Lastly, the antients entertain'd such an insuperable antipathy to pluralities, that no motive could influence them to accept of any appendage to a Bishopric.-The wiser moderns, in conjunction with their Bishoprics commonly hold either a Deanery, or u comfortable Prebend, together with a good fut Parsonage, and perhaps half a dozen Sinecures, in commendam.†

• Mr. NELSON says, in his life of BISHOP BULL, that a certain Clergy. man applied to him for preferment, and had the impudence to offer him a purse of gold. The good Bishop saw it, and trembled; and immediately sent away this abandoned prostitute with great indignation.

A writer hath drawn the character of such a great, overgrown Pluralist, in the following words:"It is really odd enough to see an idle creature rolling in wealth, luxury, and ease; living voluptuously every day; preaching, perhaps, once a year, (even then probably) not the gospel, but some favourite point of power, or revenue; daily accumulating riches; changing almost yearly from diocese to diocese; still aiming at a better, and the highest of all; hardly visiting any, or staying long enough with any one

A

"The Greeks may have excell'd us in the art of rhetoric, or poetry, but we have fairly outstripp'd them in refining upon Bishopcraft. A modern hath as much the advantage of an antient Prelate, as riding in an easy coach is preferable to trudging through the dirt on foot. Who therefore but a stiff-rump'd disciple of Jack Calvin will be so absurd as to deny that he, who desir'd the office of an English, nay, of a Welsh, Bishop, desireth a good thing.”

Marvell frames an ingenious apology for the freedom of his humour, in his attack on the morals and person of his adversary.

"To write against him (Parker) is the most odious task I ever undertook, for he has looked to me all the while like the cruelty of a living dissection; which, however it may tend to public instruction, and though I have picked out the most noxious creature to be anatomized, yet doth this scarce excuse the offensiveness of the scent, and fouling of my fingers; therefore I will hero break off abruptly, leaving many a vein not laid open, and many a passage not searched into. But if I have undergone the drudgery of the most loathsome part already, which is his personal character, I will not defraud myself of what is more truly pleasant, the conflict with (if it may be so called) his reason."

In 1675, Dr. CROFT, Bishop of Hereford,* published

flock to know them; scarce seeing them, much less feeding them; yet still calling them by that tender name, without blushing; to see him multiplying benefices and commendams, holding several great cures, without attending apon one; yet declaiming after, and in the midst of all this, against the prevalence of deism and loose principles."-See an Examination of the Bishop of Chichester's Sermon before the Lords, Jan. 30th, 1731-2.

Mr. WHISTON also observes, in his Memoirs of Dr. CLARKE, that till our Bishops leave off procuring commendams, and heaping up riches and preferments on themselves, their relations, and favourites; nay, till they correct their non-residence; till they leave the court, the parliament, and their politics, and go down to their several dioceses, and there labour in the vineyard of Christ, instead of standing most part of the day idle, at the Metropolis; they may write what learned vindications and pastoral letters they please. The observing unbelievers will not be satisfyed they are in earnest; and, by consequence, will be little moved by all their arguments and exhorta

tions.

HERBERT CROFT was descended from an ancient family in Herefordshire. He was born October 18, 1603, at Great Milton, near Thame in Oxfordshire, in the house of Sir Wm. Green, where his mother was then on a visit. Being carefully educated in his early years, and possessing unwearied application, he soon qualified himself for academical studies, and was, in 1616, sent to Oxford. But he had not been long there, before his father Joned the Church of Rome, and became a Lay Brother in the Benedictine monastery, at Douay. Upon his father's command, he went over into France, and was sent to the English college of Jesuits at St. Omers, where, by the persuasion

a discourse in quarto, entitled "The naked Truth, or the. true state of the Primitive Church. By an humble Moderator." This work was written when the controversy with the Nonconformists was at its greatest height, and the quarrel so artfully widened, that the Papists entertained hopes of coming in through the breach. The Bishop's book, though no more than a pamphlet of four or five sheets, made a great noise in the world, and was read and studied by all men of sense and learning in the kingdom. Though it has often been reprinted, it was never common, and is now scarce. In this work, the Bishop shows the danger of imposing more than is necessary, especially as to terms of communion, and proceeds through all the great points in dispute between the Church of England and the Dissenters; labouring throughout to prove, that Protestants differ in nothing truly essential to religion; and that, for the sake of union,

of FATHER LLOYD, he was reconciled to the Church of Rome, and by the insinuations of the same person, and some others, contrary to his father's advice in that particular, was wrought upon to enter into "the order." Some time before his father's death, he returned to England to manage some family affairs, and becoming acquainted with Dr. MORTON, Bishop of Durham, he was, by his arguments, brought back to the Church of England, and soon after, at the desire of LAUD, he went a second time to Oxford, and was admitted of Christ Church.

In the spring of 1839, he attended the EARL OF NORTHUMBERLAND as Chaplain, in an expedition to Scotland, and, in 1640, he was admitted to the degree of Doctor of Divinity.. He was afterwards employed by the King upon various occasions, in those dangerous times, and always discharged his duty with fidelity, though sometimes at the hazard of his life. In the year 1844, he was nominated Dean of Hereford, when he married Mrs. ANN BROWN, the daughter of his predecessor. His circumstances were very nar. row for some years, notwithstanding he had several preferments, for the dissolution of Cathedrals took place about this time; but, in 1859, by the successive deaths of his elder brothers, he became possessed of the family estate. Upon the death of Dr. NICHOLAS MONK, Bishop of Hereford, Ire was promoted to that see in December, 1661. He frequently officiated in the King's Chapel, and was remarkable for his practical preaching, and for the corresponding sanctity of his manners. Charles 11. offered him, more than once, a better see, which he conscientiously refused. Being weary of a Court life, and finding but little good effects from his plons endeavours, in 1669, he retired to his Bishopric, where he was exceedingly beloved for his constant preaching, edifying conversation, hospitable manner of living, and most extensive charity. At length, full of years, and in the highest reputation, this venerable prelate ended his days at Hereford, on the 18th of May, 1991. The late Rev. HERBERT CROFT was his descendant.

compliances would be more becoming and effectual, than in enforcing uniformity by penalties and persecution. The whole is written with great plainness and piety, as well as with much force of argument and learning. If we consider the temper of those times, we need not wonder that this work was immediately replied to with much heat and zeal, not to use the harsher terms of fury and resentment. It was first attacked by Dr. FRANCIS TURNER, Master of St. John's College, Cambridge, a great defender of ecclesiastical tyranny, and the imposition of human creeds, in a pamphlet entitled " Animadversions on the Naked Truth." This pamphlet was penned, like all the rest of the writings of the same author, in an affected, but flowing style. It was replied to, with great vivacity, by Marvell, in a work entitled "Mr. Smirke, or the Divine in Mode." He made him a second Bayes, as he had done Parker before, in "The Rehearsal Transprosed." Marvell, in speaking of Bishop Croft's works, says,

"It is a treatise which, if not for its opposer, needs no commendation: being writ with that evidence and demonstration of truth, that all sober men cannot but give their assent, and consent to it unasked. It is a book of that kind, that no Christian can peruse it without wishing himself to have been the author, and almost imagining that he is so: the conceptions therein being of so eternal iden, that every man finds it to be but a copy of the original in his own mind."

Marvell had a peculiar knack of calling names: it

FRANCIS TURNER, was the son of Dr. Thomas Turner, Dean of Canter. bury. He received his education at New College, in Oxford. In 1670 he was preferred to the Mastership of St. John's College, Cambridge. He was afterwards advanced to the Deanery of Windsor, which he held together. with the Bishopric of Rochester. He was deprived for not taking the new oaths, 1st February, 1689--90. The next year he was accused of being a conspirator in a plot of Nonjurors, for restoring King James, for which some of that party were imprisoned; but he thought it prudent to abscond. A proclamation was soon after issued for apprehending him as a traitor.

consisted in appropriating a ludicrous character in some popular comedy, and dubbing his adversaries with it. In this spirit, he ridiculed Dr. TURNER, by giving him the name of a chaplain in ETHEREGE's "Man of Mode," and thus, with a stroke of the pen, conveyed an idea of "a neat, starched, formal, and forward divine." This application of a fictitious character to a real one-this christening a man with ridicule-though of no difficult invention, will prove not a little hazardous to inferior writers; for it requires not less, wit than Marvell's to bring out of the real character, the ludicrous features. which mark the prototype.

In return for this defence of his work, the Bishop of Hereford wrote the following letter to Marvell:

"SIR,

I choose to run some hazard of this, (having noe certain information) rather than incurre your censure of ingratitude to the person who hath set forth Mr. Smirke in so trim and proper a dresse, unto whose hands I hope this will happily arrive, to render him due thanks for the humane civility, and christian charity shewed to the author of Naked Truth, so bespotted with the dirty language of foule-mouthed beasts, whoe, though he feared much his own weaknesse, yet, by God's undeserved grace, is so strengthened, as not at all to be dejected, or much concerned with such snarling curs, though sett on by many spightfull hands and hearts, of a high stamp, but as base alloy. I cannot yet get a sight of what the Bisor or ELY (Turner) hath certainly printed; but keeps very close, to put forth, I suppose the next approaching Session of Parliament, when there cannot be time to make a reply; for I have just cause to feare the session will be short. Sir, this assures you, that you have the zealous prayers, and hearty service of the author of Naked Truth, your humble servant.

July, 1676.

H. C."