And now he seems to rest like Lazarus in Abraham's bosom. Let me here draw his curtain, till with the most glorious company of the patriarchs and apostles, the most noble army of martyrs and confessors, this most learned, most humble, holy man, shall also awake to receive an eternal tranquillity, and with it a greater degree of glory than common Christians shall be made partakers of.

In the meantime, bless, O Lord! Lord bless his brethren, the clergy of this nation, with effectual endeavours to attain, if not to his great learning, yet to his remarkable meekness, his godly simplicity, and his Christian moderation; for these will bring peace at the last. And, Lord, let his most excellent writings be blest with what he designed when he undertook them which was, glory to Thee, O God, on high, peace in Thy Church, and goodwill to mankind. Amen, Amen. IZAAK WALTON.

THIS following epitaph was long since presented to the world, in memory of Mr. Hooker, by Sir William Cowper, who also built him a fair monument in Bourne Church, and acknowledges him to have been his spiritual father:

"Though nothing can be spoke worthy his fame,
Or the remembrance of that precious name,
Judicious Hooker; though this cost be spent,
On him, that hath a lasting monument
In his own books; yet ought we to express,
If not his worth, yet our respectfulness.
Church ceremonies he maintained; then why
Without all ceremony should he die?
Was it because his life and death should be
Both equal patterns of humility?

Or that perhaps this only glorious one
Was above all, to ask, why had he none?
Yet he, that lay so long obscurely low,
Doth now preferred to greater honours go.
Ambitious men, learn hence to be more wise,
Humility is the true way to rise:

And God in me this lesson did inspire,

To bid this humble man, 'Friend, sit up higher.'"

APPENDIX.

AND now, having by a long and laborious search satisfied myself, and I hope my reader, by imparting to him the true relation of Mr. Hooker's life, I am desirous also to acquaint him with some observations that relate to it, and which could not properly fall to be spoken till after his death, of which my reader may expect a brief and true account in the following Appendix.

And first, it is not to be doubted but that he died in the forty-seventh if not in the forty-sixth year of his age; which I mention because many have believed him to be more aged, but I have so examined it as to be confident I mistake not, and for the year of his death Mr. Camden, who in his "Annals of Queen Elizabeth," 1599, mentions him with a high commendation of his life and learning, declares him to die in the year 1599; and yet in that inscription of his mounment, set up at the charge of Sir William Cowper in Bourne Church, where Mr. Hooker was buried, his death is there said to be in anno 1603; but doubtless both are mistaken, for I have it attested under the hand of William Somner, the archbishop's registrar for the province of Canterbury, that Richard Hooker's will bears date October 26th in anno 1600, and that it was proved the 3rd of December following.

And that at his death he left four daughters, Alice, Cicely, Jane and Margaret; that he gave to each of them a hundred pounds; that he left Joan, his wife, his sole executrix; and that by his inventory his estate, a great part of it being in books, came to £1092 95. 2d., which was much more than he thought himself worth, and which was not got by his care, much less by the good housewifery of his wife, but saved by his trusty servant, Thomas Lane, that was wiser than his master in getting money for him, and more frugal than his mistress in keeping of it. Of which will of Mr. Hooker's I shall say no more but that his dear friend Thomas, the father of George Cranmer-of whom I have spoken, and shall have occasion to say more-was one of the witnesses to it.

One of his elder daughters was married to one Chalinor, sometime a schoolmaster in Chichester, and are both dead long since. Margaret, his youngest daughter, was married unto Ezekiel Charke, Bachelor in Divinity, and rector of St. Nicholas in Harbledown near Canterbury, who died about sixteen years past, and had a son Ezekiel, now living and in sacred Orders, being at this time rector of Waldron in Sussex. She left also a daughter, with both whom I have spoken not many months past, and find her to be a widow in a condition that wants not, but very far from abounding. And these two attested unto me that Richard Hooker, their grandfather, had a sister, by name Elizabeth Harvey, that lived to the age of 121 years, and died in the month of September 1663.

For his other two daughters I can learn little certainty, but have heard they both died before they were marriageable. And for his wife, she was so unlike Jephtha's daughter that she stayed not a comely time

to bewail her widowhood, nor lived long enough to repent her second marriage, for which, doubtless, she would have found cause, if there had been but four months betwixt Mr. Hooker's and her death. But she is dead, and let her other infirmities be buried with her.

Thus much briefly for his age, the year of his death, his estate, his wife, and his children. I am next to speak of his books, concerning which I shall have a necessity of being longer, or shall neither do right to myself or my reader, which is chiefly intended in this Appendix.

I have declared in his Life that he proposed eight books, and that his first four were printed anno 1594, and his fifth book first printed, and alone, anno 1597, and that he lived to finish the remaining three of the proposed eight; but whether we have the last three as finished by himself, is a just and material question, concerning which I do declare that I have been told almost forty years past, by one that very well knew Mr. Hooker and the affairs of his family, that, about a month after the death of Mr. Hooker, Bishop Whitgift, then Archbishop of Canterbury, sent one of his chaplains to inquire of Mrs. Hooker for the three remaining books of Polity writ by her husband, of which she would not, or could not, give any account; and that about three months after that time the bishop procured her to be sent for to London, and then by his procurement she was to be examined by some of her Majesty's Council concerning the disposal of those books; but, by way of preparation for the next day's examination, the bishop invited her to Lambeth, and after some friendly questions she confessed to him that one Mr. Charke, and another minister that dwelt near Canterbury, came to her, and

desired that they might go into her husband's study, and look upon some of his writings: and that there they two burnt and tore many of them, assuring her that they were writings not fit to be seen; and that she knew nothing more concerning them. Her lodging was then in King Street in Westminster, where she was found next morning dead in her bed, and her new husband suspected and questioned for it; but he was declared innocent of her death.

And I declare also that Dr. John Spencer-mentioned in the Life of Mr. Hooker-who was of Mr. Hooker's college, and of his time there, and betwixt whom there was so friendly a friendship that they continually advised together in all their studies, and particularly in what concerned these books of Polity— this Dr. Spencer, the three perfect books being lost, had delivered into his hands (I think by Bishop Whitgift) the imperfect books, or first rough draughts of them, to be made as perfect as they might be by him, who both knew Mr. Hooker's handwriting and was best acquainted with his intentions. And a fair testimony of this may appear by an Epistle, first, and usually printed before Mr. Hooker's five books-but omitted, I know not why, in the last impression of the eight printed together in anno 1662, in which the publishers seem to impose the three doubtful books, to be the undoubted books of Mr. Hooker-with these two letters, J. S., at the end of the said Epistle, which was meant for this John Spencer: in which Epistle the reader may find these words, which may give some authority to what I have here written of his last three books.

"And though Mr. Hooker hastened his own death by hastening to give life to his books, yet he held out with his eyes to behold these Benjamins, these sons of his