much welcomed by me; and Monsieur Tieleners also, one of the greatest scholars of his time; who, after they had perused it, and given it more commendations than is fit for me to repeat, exhorted me earnestly to print and publish it. Howbeit, as the frame of my whole book was so different from any thing which had been written heretofore, I found I must either renounce the authority of all that had written formerly concerning the method of finding out truth, and consequently insist upon my own way, or hazard myself to a general censure concerning the whole argument of my book. I must confess it did not a little animate me, that the two great persons above-mentioned did so highly value it, yet, as I knew it would meet with much opposition, I did consider whether it was not better for me a while to suppress it. Being thus doubtful in my chamber, one fair day in the summer, my casement being opened towards the south, the sun shining clear, and no wind stirring, I took my book, De Veritate, in my hand, and kneeling on my knees, devoutly said these words, "O thou eternal God, author of the light which now shines upon me, and giver of all inward illuminations, I do beseech Thee, of Thy infinite goodness, to pardon a greater request than a sinner ought to make. I am not satisfied enough whether I shall publish this book De Veritate; if it be for Thy glory, I beseech Thee give me some sign from heaven; if not, I shall suppress it." I had no sooner spoken these words, but a loud though yet gentle noise came from the heavens (for it was like nothing on earth), which did so comfort and cheer me, that I took my petition as granted, and that I had the sign I demanded, whereupon also I resolved to print my book. This, how strange soever it may seem, I protest before the eternal God is true, neither am I any way superstitiously deceived herein, since I did not only clearly hear the noise, but in the serenest sky that ever I saw, being without all cloud, did to my thinking see the place from whence it came. The book was remarkable for boldness of speculation upon sacred things, and for the difference it shows in bent of thought between Edward Herbert cution. When Harmensen, aged fifteen, was with his teacher at Utrecht, Æmilius died; but the boy was immediately cared for by another earnest Dutch Reformer, also a native of Oudewater, Rudolph Snell. Snell became Professor of Hebrew and Mathematics at Leyden, before his death in 1613. This learned fellow-town 3min took young Harmensen away with him, but soon hurried back to Oudewater upon hearing of the cruelties of the Spaniards, who had sacked the town and slain most of the inhabitants, including his mother, his sisters, his brothers, and his kindred. The sudden desolation is said to have caused him to spend fourteen days in passion of weeping. Snell with the boy left the scene of massacre on foot for Marburg, in Hesse Cassel; then, having heard of the opening (in 1575) of the University of Leyden by the Prince of Orange, he went to Rotterdam, and thence sent Harmensen to Leyden. The youth excelled among the students, and in 1582 was sent, at expense of the Senate of Amsterdam, to Geneva, where he became a zealous admirer of Theodore Beza, who was expounding the Epistle to the Romans. But Harmensen's regard for the philosophy of Peter Ramus stood in his way at Geneva, and he went to Basle, where he was soon thoroughly at home. At Basle he was offered the title of Doctor by the theological faculty before his return to Geneva, but declined it because he felt himself unripe. From Geneva he went with a Dutch fellow-student to Padua, for the benefit of the teaching of Giacopo Zabarella, then in the fulness of his fame there as Professor of Philosophy. The two young Dutchmen then travelled together for eight months in Italy, carrying the Greek Testament and Hebrew Psalter in their pockets. In the course of their travel they saw Rome, but the Senate of Amsterdam, with pious horror of Rome, was greatly displeased with Harmensen for going there. The young theologian, however, returned to Geneva, and thene carried to his patrons at Amsterdam clear testimony of his fitness for the reformed ministry. and his younger brother George, each thinking for himself on matters of religion. Edward, who was made after his return from Paris in 1625 an Irish baron, and afterwards an English peer as Lord Herbert of Cherbury, taught forcibly the existence of a spiritual power within man, supreme over all the faculties, which draws knowledge from the world around and reasons upon Revelation. He denied that the salvation of man could wholly depend on acceptance of a form of religion revealed only to a portion of the human race. God as the Father of mankind could not, he said, condemn a large part of the human race for ignorance of that which it had no opportunity of knowing. It has been said that his refusal to believe in revelation confined to a few is inconsistent with his belief that a revelation to himself alone communicated the assent of God to his diffusion of his book. But this would have only been inconsistent had he held that God in listening to him was deaf to the prayers of others. He believed that every man could, by true worship, draw near to God and bring God near to him, receiving aid and comfort. The supposition that God answered his prayer was, in fact, part of his supposition that the prayers of all who drew near to Him with spiritual worship found their way to heaven. Thus reasoning, Edward Herbert built up in this treatise upon Truth a creed of his own, containing the five points that he held to be the essentials of a true religion. These were belief (1) in God; (2) in Man's duty to worship Him; (3) in the Immortality of the Soul; (4) in Future Rewards and Punishments; (5) in the need of Repentance for Sin. So taught Edward, Lord Herbert of Cherbury, eldest brother and head of the house of "holy George Herbert," who, while the De Veritate was being read, maintained in his parsonage at Bemerton every ordinance and doctrine of the English Church, and quickened all with a pure spirit of devotion. Ther was still, with many Reformers, dread of the student who had gone so near to Antichrist, but when Harmensen began to preach he won golden opinions. At this time a book was in circulation written by some brethren of the church of Delft, called "An Answer to some Arguments of Beza and Calvin out of a Treatise concerning Predestination, on the 9th chapter to the Romans." Martin Lidyus, formerly a pastor in Amsterdam, but then a Professor in Friesland, sent the book to Harmensen, because he was able, and fresh from Beza's teaching at Geneva, requesting him to defend Beza by answering the brethren of Delft. But Harmensen was converted by their book, and he was led to join in argument against Calvin's form of the doctrine of predestination and election. His ability and piety soon made him a leader of the growing reaction among Dutch Reformers against what they took to be an unjust view of God's providence in Calvin's doctrine. The name of Arminian was then given to these dissenters from Calvinism. Arminius was, in September, 163, when James I. was newly become King of England, joined with Francis Goɔmar, a strict Calvinist, in the Professorship of Theology at Leyden. His predecessor in the chair was Francis Junius, the elder. Then followed bitterness of controversy, troubling a very gentle spirit, then disease, and in October, 1609, Arminius died, leaving a widow and n'ne childIn the year after his death, his followers set forth, in five articles, the opinions for which they were attacked. These articles they specified in a "Remonstrance to the Estates of Holland," and from it the Arminions came to be called "the Remonstrants," and their church at Amsterdam the" Church of the Remonstrants." The five opinions were:-1. Of Election; that God from all eternity determined the salvation of those in whom He foresaw that they would persevere to the end in their faith in Jesus Christ, and the eternal punishment of those in whom he foresaw continued unbelief and resistance of His aid; so that Election depended on the acts of men, ran. George Herbert, the fifth of Richard Herbert's seven sons, was born at Montgomery Castle on the 3rd of April, 1593, and was in his fourth year when his father died. He was educated at home by his mother for the next eight years, and then sent to Westminster School. In his fifteenth year, being a king's scholar, he was sent on to Trinity College, Cambridge, and, young as he was, he had already entered into controversy on church questions of the day. When, after the accession of James to the English throne, the Millenary Petition represented the desire of many of the clergy for further reformation in the Church, the Universities signified their displeasure. Cambridge passed a grace that whosoever opposed by word or writing or any other way the doctrine or discipline of the Church of England, or any part of it, should be suspended, ipso facto, from any degree already taken, and be disabled from taking any degree for the future. Oxford published a formal answer to the petition and condemnation of the petitioners. Andrew Melville, Rector of St. Andrews, a leading minister of the Scottish Church, then satirised the Universities (in 1604) in a Latin poem entitled " Anti-Tami-Cami-Categoria," that is, accusation against Thames and Cam-Oxford and Cambridge. George Herbert, as a schoolboy, retorted with "Epigrams Apologetical," which were not printed until 1662. They could only have been published by one who shared the unwisdom of a boyish partisan. George Herbert went to Cambridge in May, 1609, graduated as B.A. early in 1613, and as M.A., at the age of twenty-three, in 1616, year of the death of Shakespeare. In January, 1620, George Herbert was elected Public Orator, and thus obtained what he said was "the finest place in the University, though not the gainfullest, yet that will be about £30 per annum. free, though foreseen, and predestined only through foreknowledge. 2. Of Redemption; that Christ atoned for the sins of all men and of each man, though none but those who believe in Him can be partakers of the benefit. 3. Of Original Sin; that true faith cannot come to the natural man without help of the Grace of God—that is, regeneration by the Holy Ghost, which is the gift of God through Christ. 4. Of Effectual Grace; that this Divine Grace begins, advances, and perfects whatever is good in man; wherefore every good work proceeds from God alone, but His Grace, offered to all, does not force men to act against their inclinations, and may be resisted by the impenitent sinner. 5. Of Perseverance; that God helps the truly faithful to remain so, though-and upon this at first opinion among Arminians differed-the regenerate may lose true justifying faith, fall from a state of Grace, and die in their sins. These opinions were, it will be seen, mainly protests against Calvin's views of Predestination. The Remonstrants were left free to hold their opinions until 1618, when the States General convoked at Dort a Synod of thirty-eight Dutch and Walloon divines, five professors from different universities, and twenty-one lay elders, with ecclesiastical deputies from most of the States of the United Provinces, and from the churches of the Palatinate, Hesse, Switzerland, Bremen, England, and Scotland. The Synod of Dort condemned the Arminians, banished their ministers, and submitted to trial their ablest defenders, Barnevelt, Grotius, and Hoogarbetz. Barnevelt was executed; Grotius and Hoogarbetz were condemned to perpetual imprisonment. Arminian opinion spread through the Reformed Churches of Europe, and was favoured by James I. and Charles I. because they looked upon the Calvinistic Puritans as enemies, and had more trust in a body of Reformers who had parted from them and were persecuted by them. The strict Calvinist disliked an Arminian almost as much as a Roman Catholic. Under the Stuarts royal preference of a divine tinged with Arminian opinions was so marked, that when Bishop George Morley was asked "what the Arminians held," his answer was, "All the best bishoprics and deaneries in England." But the commodiousness is beyond the revenue, for the Orator writes all the University letters, be it to the king, prince, or whoever comes to the University." The commodiousness of the office was, that it enabled a man who sought advancement at court to show his ability to the king, and make himself agreeable. Public orators before him had used the post as a stepping stone to court preferment, and during the rest of the reign of James I. George Herbert waited upon his Majesty, a courtly and a witty fortunehunter. He got in 1623-as a layman-the sinecure rectory of Whitford in Flintshire, which was worth £120 a year, and had once been given to Philip Sidney when he was a boy of ten. But the death of James I. on the 27th of March, 1625, put an end to all George Herbert's further hopes in that direction. CHAPTER IX. UNDER CHARLES I. AND THE COMMONWEALTH.GEORGE HERBERT, RICHARD SIBBES, THOMAS FULLER, JOHN HOWE, GEORGE FOX, RICHARD BAXTER, JEREMY TAYLOR, JOHN MILTON, AND OTHERS.-A.D. 1625 TO A.D. 1660. GEORGE HERBERT, still a layman, was in July, 1626, of the death of Francis Bacon, made a prebenyear dary of Leighton Ecclesia or Leighton Bromswald, in Huntingdonshire, with a stall in Lincoln. He repaired the church of the place. In 1627 his mother died, and George Herbert retired from his office of Public Orator. He left Cambridge, weak in health, for he was consumptive, and stayed for a time with his brother, Sir Henry Herbert, at Woodford, in Essex. In 1629 he was at Dauntsey, in Wiltshire, the seat of the Earl of Danby, with whom he was connected by his mother's second marriage. She had married Sir John Danvers. At Dauntsey his health improved. In March, 1629, he married Jane Danvers, a kinswoman of his stepfather and of Lord Danby. George Herbert had resolved now to take holy orders. His kinsman Philip, Earl of Pembroke, obtained for him the living of Bemerton, with a little church within a mile or two of the great house at Wilton, half way between Wilton and Salisbury. George Herbert found Charles I. and his Court with the Earl, at Wilton, when he went there, and on the 26th of April, 1630, the Bishop of Salisbury inducted him into his living. George Herbert's church at Bemerton supplied the needs of a thinlyscattered population, though it would perhaps have been overcrowded by a congregation of fifty. There he laboured for not quite three years, marked for death by consumption, lodged in a slight hollow of pleasant but over-watered meadow-land, most favourable to the growth of his disease. The supreme beauty of George Herbert's life was in its close at Bemerton from the beginning of his ministration there in April, 1630, when he was thirty-seven years old, to his death at the age of forty. He was buried under the altar of his church on the 3rd of March, 1633. According to his wish, no word of inscription marks his resting-place. The little church remains, and is still used for week-day prayers, but near it there has been built a handsome memorial church. For his own use he set down in a little book his view of the duties of "the Country Parson," treating of his knowledge; the parson on Sundays; his praying; his preaching; his charity; his comforting the sick; his arguing; his condescending; the parson in his journey; the parson in his mirth; the parson with his churchwardens; the parson blessing the people. "His chiefest recreation," says Izaak Walton, "was music, in which heavenly art he was a most excellent master, and composed many divine hymns and anthems, which he set and sung to his lute or viol; and though he was a lover of retiredness, yet his love to music was such that he went usually twice every week, on certain appointed days, to the cathedral church in Salisbury, and at his return would say, 'that his time spent in prayer and cathedral music elevated his soul, and was his heaven upon earth.' But before his return thence to Bemerton he would usually sing and play his part at an appointed private music-meeting; and to justify this practice he would often say, Religion does not banish mirth, but only moderates and sets rules to it.'" George Herbert's sacred poems, expressing a pure spirit of worship that shone in these last years of his life through all his actions, were published under the title of "The Temple" in 1633, soon after his death. The opening verses, entitled The Church Porch," are counsels as to the mind with which the temple should be entered, of which these are a few examples that may serve as an abridgment of the whole : 66 FROM GEORGE HERBERT'S CHURCH PORCH. Thou whose sweet youth and early hopes inhance Thy rate and price, and mark thee for a treasure, Hearken unto a Verser, who may chance Rhyme thee to good, and make a bait of pleasure: |