Archbishop Affecting anec dote of his last use of the Book of Common Prayer. Nov. 1, 1649. Censured by the ruling powers. persevering in the discharge of his episcopal functions®. Connected with this subject is an affecting anecdote concerning Bulkeley, archbishop of Dublin, then in the eighty-first year of his age. Sinking under his sense of the calamities of the time, which, the following year, brought down his gray hairs with sorrow to the grave, and looking forward, as it should seem, to his early dissolution, on the 1st of November, 1649, he took an affectionate leave of the wellaffected clergy in Dublin, and addressed to them a valedictory sermon in St. Patrick's cathedral. There were present two brothers of the name of Parry, John and Benjamin, sons of the Bishop of Killaloe, who has been already noticed as having taken the lead in subscribing the petition for the use of the Common Prayer-Book, and afterwards successively bishops of Ossory; Thomas Seele, afterwards provost of Trinity College, and dean of St. Patrick's, Dublin; Mr. Boswell, prebendary of St. John's, Christ Church; and William Pilsworth, a minister who read the Common Prayer'. With the exception, perhaps, of a very few obscure and unascertained instances, and with the probable exception of Bishop Martin, in the College Chapel, this was the last time that the Liturgy was publickly read, until the Restoration of King Charles the Second. The action, however, did not escape the jealous vigilance or the severe animadversion of the ruling powers; and the venerable archbishop, together with all those who were present at the solemnity, was visited with censure and confinement for the offenceR. • WARE'S Bishops, i, 190. 7 Ib., p. 356. 8 lb. ministers of the During these times of consternation to the Dangers of ministers of the Church, they were exposed to Church. personal dangers alike from Papists and Puritans. hall. Thus in 1648, Bishop Bramhall was in imminent Bishop Bramperil of his life from the Romanists of Limerick, because the Earl of Roscommon, who, having met with a fatal accident, survived only so long as to make open declaration of his faith, professed, at the instance of the bishop, that he died in communion with the Church of Ireland. On his departure from Ireland, he experienced another great deliverance from the other faction; for he was closely pursued by two parliamentarian frigates; and, being nearly overtaken, was only preserved by a sudden and providential change of the wind. Soon afterwards, Remarkable intending a journey into Spain, he stopped for re- Spain. freshment at a house, where the hostess addressed him by his name. On his expressing astonishment at being discovered, she revealed to him the secret, showed him his picture, and assured him there were several of them on the road, in order that being thus made known, he might be carried before the Inquisition. She informed him also, that her husband, amongst others, had power to apprehend him, and would certainly execute the commission, if he found him'. occurrence in counted for. This narrative has been lately commented upon Probably acby Dr. Kippis, in his new edition of the Biographia Britannica, as "very extraordinary: for unless he had done something relative to that kingdom, of which we have now no account, it seems scarcely conceivable that such measures should have been adopted for apprehending him." Yet the wellknown character of the individual, his station in the 9 WARE'S Bishops, pp. 123, 127. Dean Margetson. Church, his former connexion with those of the highest authority in his own country, and the influence of which he was probably still possessed, may be sufficient to account for the hostility of that jealous and watchful tribunal, and leave unsuspected the statement of the contemporaneous historian. His journey should seem to have been connected with some object relating to the then state of religion. But whether "the purpose of drawing a parallel, between the Liturgy of the Church of England and the publick forms of the Protestant Churches," was likely, as has been stated (in the Rawdon Papers, p. 107, note), to lead to the design of a journey into Spain, may seem questionable. Thus, again, Margetson, dean of Christ Church, having fled into England in 1647, was overtaken by unexpected evils, as great and general as those from which he fled. Amongst other sufferings, he was by the parliamentary party taken prisoner and thrown into confinement, until he was at last set at liberty Bishop Williams. in exchange for some military officers. The like disaster befell Williams, bishop of Ossory, on his flight from Ireland, in 1641; being intercepted by a party of the parliamentary troops, and carried a prisoner to Northampton". Episcopal revenues se JUCE= tered. Of the sees, which became vacant during the Usurpation, it was the sacrilegious practice of the then rulers of the state, to sequestrate the revenues, and to leave the bishopricks unoccupied: partly that the property of the Church might be confiscated and appropriated by power, as it could not be by right, to secular purposes; and partly, that the constitution of the Church might be broken up and annihilated, as her episcopacy by degrees should cease to exist. 10 WARE'S Bishops, p. 422. sees unsupplied, Of sixteen vacancies, which had occurred at various Sixteen vacant periods, between the assumption of the sovereign power by the parliament, and the restoration of the lawful king, all continued unsupplied at the latter epoch; so that eight bishops only were at that time surviving, to maintain and perpetuate the Apostolical succession and government in the Church. plunder. In the mean time, the property of those, who Legalized rightfully possessed it, was liable to a sort of legalized plunder. Thus the possessions of the Archbishop of Dublin. Dublin and of the Dean and Chapter of St. Patrick's Cathedral, were confided to certain trustees, by whom the church was occasionally converted to profane uses". The church of Galway was greatly injured by the Galway. soldiery, who converted the chapels and aisles into stables, and destroyed almost the entire of the ancient and venerable monuments, insomuch that at the Restoration it was found altogether in a state of dilapidation, and in total want of repair". Ossory. Of this abuse a memorable example also is re- Bishoprick of corded in the case of Williams, bishop of Ossory, to whose see belonged several houses and lands in the immediate neighbourhood of Kilkenny, rendered especially valuable by that situation. Certain commissioners having been appointed by the parliament to dispose of the land of delinquents, for paying the arrears of the soldiers, made no difference between the Church lands and the lands of the rebels; but distributed among the indigent soldiery the best houses, gardens, orchards, and lands, of the bishop, and other clergy, which one of the com12 HARDIMAN'S Galway, p. 247. 11 MASON'S St. Patrick's, p. 191. General distress of the clergy. Archbishop Bishop Bramhall. Allowance to bishops from the government. 1658. missioners bought up at an easy and inconsiderable value13. But, not to dwell upon such cases as this, the condition of the clergy was, no doubt, one in general of great penury and distress. Archbishop Ussher, after various situations of more or less embarrassment, was fain to accept a home from the hospitable bounty of the Countess of Peterborough, whose lord he had, many years before, been the happy instrument of converting from Popery, and who now gratefully acknowledged her obligation by an asylum in her house for nine or ten years preceding his death". The unexpected payment of a debt of 700%., long due to Bishop Bramhall, and made "in his greatest necessity," was a very seasonable relief, both to himself and to many confessors of the royal cause, "to whom even of his penury he distributed so liberally, that the blessing of such as were ready to perish fell upon him"." A case, however, of such self-evident truth, as the privations and distresses, to which the clergy of the Church of Ireland must have been exposed during the Usurpation, hardly needs a fuller exemplification. But that, however, is a memorable fact, as stated in the life of Williams, bishop of Ossory, that Henry Cromwell, governor of Ireland under his brother Richard, in 1658, being informed that the bishop often preached in Dublin, was desirous of hearing him at his own house: and that, when the sermon was ended, Henry Cromwell invited him to dinner, and afterwards sent him a message, that, as he allowed the rest of the bishops each a hundred pounds a year for their maintenance, so he offered 13 WARE'S Bishops, p. 425. 14 PARR'S Life of Ussher. 15 VESEY'S Life of Bramhall. |