Polity.'"
This treatise is not creditable either to the heart or
the head of the anonymous writer or writers, and is remembered
only because Hooker read it and meditated an answer, and his
copy, copiously annotated by his own hand, is in the library of
Corpus Christi College, Oxford. The tract is referred to in the
notes of Books I. to V. of the "Polity" as Chr. Letter," and
many of Hooker's caustic comments are quoted. At the end of
Book V. certain longer fragments of Hooker's contemplated
answer are printed as Appendix I. The fragments are pre-
served in the library of Trinity College, Dublin. These notes
of Hooker's are of unexpected interest, because they exhibit him
as it were in undress, and prove how much fire and point and
pungency his mind retained at the very end of his life, when
undoubtedly his body was becoming frail and ailing. They
show us the foundation of mother-wit and pithy English upon
which the towers and temples of his “ great argument" were
raised. One sentence scribbled on the title-page of the tract
was chosen by Keble in 1836 as a motto for his edition of
Hooker's works: "All things written in this book I humbly
and meekly submit to the censure of the grave and reverend
Prelates within this land, to the judgment of learned men, and
the sober consideration of all others. Wherein I may haply
err as others before me have done, but an heretic by the help
of Almighty God I will never be."

It is, no doubt, partly because Hooker wrote nearly twenty
years after the controversy he sums up that there is in his book
such a fine spirit of candour and tolerance; but his own
singularly sweet and fair-minded temperament is the first cause
of this. Hooker is a representative Elizabethan in the scope
of his mind and sympathies. He contrived to unite and hold
in a real equilibrium a deep sympathy with the three great
spiritual currents of his time. He was sincerely and deeply an
Evangelical, a Catholic, and a Rationalist. Low Churchmen,
High Churchmen, and Broad Churchmen, can all find them-
selves to-day in Hooker, and claim him as their master.
for all of them the lesson of his personality is its inclusiveness,
its harmony of apparently opposite qualities and habits of
mind, which the intense national vitality of the age fused into
a unity.

1907.

But

RONALD BAYNE.

LIST OF WORKS BY RICHARD HOOKER

Of the Lawes of Ecclesiastical Politie. Eyght Bookes by Richard Hooker. Printed by John Windet, without date (1592, 1594?). Only four books were given in this edition; these were re-issued in 1604. The Fifth Book, the last to be published in Hooker's lifetime, was published in 1597; the Sixth and Eighth in 1648 and 1651. The Seventh Book first appeared in Gauden's edition of Hooker's works, 1662. The "Works" were re-issued, with Life by Izaak Walton, 1666, 1676, 1682; and there have been several later re-issues. The "Works" were edited by Keble and published 1836; revised edition (Church and Paget), 1888. The First Book of the Polity, ed. Church (Clarendon Press), 1876; the Fifth Book, ed. by R. Bayne ("English Theological Library"), 1902; An Introduction to Fifth Book, by F. Paget, 1899; Selections, by Keble, 1839. There have been several abridgments of the "Politie."

In 1612 several sermons were published separately, and in the same year appeared "A Learned Discourse of Justification, etc., on Habak. i. 4," and an "Answer to the Supplication that Mr. Travers Made to the Council"; two further sermons were published 1613. Finally, as an Appendix to Launcelot Andrewes' work, "A Summarie View of the Government, etc.," appeared "A Discovery of the Causes of these Contentions touching Church Government, out of the fragments by Hooker," but the authorship of this is questioned.

Izaak Walton's Life of Hooker was first published in 1665.

A

LEARNED AND COMFORTABLE

SERMON

OF

THE CERTAINTY AND PERPETUITY OF FAITH IN THE ELECT:

ESPECIALLY OF THE PROPHET HABAKKUK'S FAITH

HABAK I. 4.

["Therefore the law is slacked, and judgment doth never go forth."] Whether the Prophet Habakkuk, by admitting this cogitation into his mind, "The law doth fail," did thereby shew himself an unbeliever.

We have seen in the opening of this clause which concerneth the weakness of the prophet's faith, first what things they are whereunto the faith of sound believers doth assent: secondly wherefore all men assent not thereunto: and thirdly why they that do, do it many times with small assurance. Now because nothing can be so truly spoken, but through misunderstanding it may be depraved; therefore to prevent, if it be possible, all misconstruction in this cause, where a small error cannot rise but with great danger, it is perhaps needful, ere we come to the fourth point, that something be added to that which hath been already spoken concerning the third.

1 [This and the Discourse of Justification, are now placed first among Hooker's Opuscula, as having probably been earliest written. See Travers's Supplication to the Council, in Dobson's Hooker, ii. p. 464. "Upon . . . occasion of this doctrine of his, that the assurance of that we believe by the word is not so certain as of that we perceive by sense, I... taught the doctrine otherwise.-According to which course of late, when as he had taught, 'that the church of Rome is a true church,' &c." Compare Hooker's Answer, § 9, 10, 11. It should seem as if these two, and the Sermons on Pride, were portions of a series on the Prophecy of Habakkuk preached in the Temple Church, 1585-6 ; and · the present arrangement sets them in the order of their texts.]

That mere natural men do neither know nor acknowledge the things of God, we do not marvel, because they are spiritually to be discerned; but they in whose hearts the light of grace doth shine, they that are taught of God, why. are they so weak in faith? why is their assenting to the law so scrupulous? so much mingled with fear and wavering? It seemeth strange that ever they should imagine the law to fail. It cannot seem strange if we weigh the reason. If the things which we believe be considered in themselves, it may truly be said that faith is more certain than any science. That which we know either by sense, or by infallible demonstration, is not so certain as the principles, articles, and conclusions of Christian faith. Concerning which we must note, that there is a Certainty of Evidence, and a Certainty of Adherence. Certainty of Evidence we call that, when the mind doth assent unto this or that, not because it is true in itself, but because the truth is clear, because it is manifest unto us. Of things in themselves most certain, except they be also most evident, our persuasion is not so assured as it is of things more evident, although in themselves they be less certain. It is as sure, if not surer, that there be spirits, as that there be men; but we be more assured of these than of them, because these are more evident. The truth of some things is so evident, that no man which heareth them can doubt of them: as when we hear that " a part of any thing is less than the whole," the mind is constrained to say, this is true. If it were so in matters of faith, then, as all men have equal certainty of this, so no believer should be more scrupulous and doubtful than another. But we find the contrary. The angels and spirits of the righteous in heaven have certainty most evident of things spiritual: but this they have by the light of glory. That which we see by the light of grace, though it be indeed more certain; yet is it not to us so evidently certain, as that which sense or the light of nature will not suffer a man to doubt of. Proofs are vain and frivolous except they be more certain than is the thing proved: and do we not see how the Spirit every where in the Scripture proveth matters of faith, laboureth to confirm us in the things which we believe, by things whereof we have sensible knowledge? I conclude therefore that we have less certainty of evidence concerning things believed, than concerning sensible or naturally perceived. Of these who doth doubt