Prayer was still permitted. 'MY VERY GOOD Lord, He returned to | Nash which I received by your Lordship's com- April 17, 1658. I have till now deferred to write to your Lordship, because I could not sooner give an account of the time when I could attend your Lordship at Ragley; but now that my wife is well laid and in a hopeful condition, I hope I shall not be hindered to begin my journey to my lady Chaworth on the 26th of this month, and from thence by the grace of God I will be coming the third of May towards Ragley, unless your affairs call your Lordship from thence before that time; but if they are like to do so, and I have intimation of it from your Lord ship, I will begin my journey that way and from thence go on to Nottinghamshire. My Lord, I suppose by the first return of the carrier you will receive those pieces of Thom. *See Taylor's letter of May, 1657, in 'Life,' p lxiv. 'I pray, my good Lord, present my humble service to your excellent and pious mother, and to good Mr. Whitby.' From this interesting document we learn for the first time that Taylor was acquaint ed with the family of Chaworth of Annesley, so well known in later times from their connexion with another man of very different stamp of genius. It gives us a glimpse of Taylor's book-hunting habits, when we find that his patron employed him to complete his collection of Tom Nash's workswhich, though not by any means of a theological character, were already in his own library-and to procure him a copy of Castalio against Beza. The latter was probably of Taylor's own recommending; for he sympathised with him both in his anti-Calvinistic theology and in his desire for freedom of religion. There is no denying that his expressions of gratitude to Lord Conway are, to our notions, hyperbolical and unsuited to the dignity of a great divine. Such expressions are quite in the manner of the time; yet Lord Conway seems to have been a little annoyed at their exuberance, for his manly reply contains something very like a reproof. This letter makes certain what Heber had already conjectured, that Taylor's letter of May 12, 1658, in which he declines a lectureship offered him by a friend of Evelyn's, on the condition of alternating with a presbyterian, like 'Castor and Pollux, the one up and the other down,' does not refer to Lord Conway's chaplaincy. In Lord Conway he had one of the kindest and most considerate of patrons, who did the best to smooth the way for him in his difficulties. Besides giving him the be nefit of his own influence, he procured for him introductions to some of the most considerable persons in Ireland, and Dr. Petty,* who had been employed in the survey of Ireland and knew the country well, 'promised to provide him a purchase of land at great advantage.' Moreover, my Lord Protector, who was perhaps not sorry to have so distinguished a royalist removed from London, 'gave him a pass and protection for himself and his family under his sign manual and privy signet.' The letter from which these expressions are taken is dated June 15, 1658, and Taylor had probably left London for Ireland a short time before. He settled at Portmore, a place,' says Rust, made for study and contemplation,' where he may have seen the round towers of other days' shining in the wave beneath him as he strayed on the banks of Lough Neagh. He evidently enjoyed this 'most * Afterwards Sir William Petty, author of the 'Political Anatomy of Ireland,' and founder of the English settlement at Kenmare. Printed in Heber's Life,' p. cclxxxvi. charming recess,' and writes in a tone of great contentment to Lord Conway, to whom a son and heir had just been born: 'since my coming into Ireland, by God's blessing and your Lordship's favour, I have had plenty of privacy, opportunities of studying much, and opportunities of doing some little good.' He is endeared with the neighbourhood,' he would count it next to a divorce to be drawn from it;' he would fain account himself fixed there during his life;' if his lordship will but come himself to reside on his Irish estates, he may bore Taylor's ear,* and make him his slave for ever. Yet he confesses, in the same letter, that, in the absence of Major Rawdon, Lord Conway's brotherin-law and agent, there was nothing around him but ingens solitudo' and 'the country like the Nomades, without law and justice.' In truth, the troubles of the time penetrated into his pleasant recess. In June, 1659, he writes to Evelyn:-a Presbyterian and a madman have informed against me as a dangerous man to their religion and for using the sign of the cross in baptism.' This information led to the issuing of a warrant by the Irish Privy Council, which brought him to Dublin early in 1659-60, 'in the worst of our winter weather,' to the serious detriment of his health. He seems, however, to have obtained an easy acquittal from the 'Anabaptist commissioners." On April 9, 1659, he writes to Lord Conways that his opus magnum, his great book on cases of conscience, is finished, except two little chapters, and that he had sent a servant to London with the copy; he begs his lordship to forward to him the sheets of his work as they were printed, Lord Conway having no doubt frequent communications with friends who resided on his Irish property. Meantime, Oliver Cromwell was dead, and the reins of government were slipping from the slack hands of his son Richard. In the spring of the momentous year 1660 we find Taylor in London; on April 24 in that year he signed the famous 'Declaration' to Gen eral Monk; in May, Charles landed in England; and in June Taylor dedicated to his restored sovereign the work of many laborious years, his Ductor Dubitantium.' Charles probably did not bestow much attention on the learned work thus offered to him, for his was not a conscience troubled with doubts; but so eminent a royalist as fect disorder;' and in February he was made a member of the Irish Privy Council;* neither of these offices was a sinecure. Jeremy Taylor could not be passed over in | Dublin, where he found all things in a perthe distribution of ecclesiastical preferment. In August, 1660, he was appointed to the see of Down and Connor, to which that of Dromore was afterwards added. Various conjectures have been offered to account for his not having been nominated for an English see; as, that the King wished his natural sister, Taylor's wife, to be removed to a distance from the court; a conjecture which seems in the highest degree improbable, even if we grant the fact, not too well attested, that Joanna Bridges was a daughter of Charles I. It is, of course, possible that Taylor was appointed to an Irish see, simply because he had eminent qualifications for it. If we look to the interests of the diocese, we shall hardly find another man so qualified to preside over it; at once learned, able, and conciliatory; already acquainted with the district, and skilled in the controversy both with Roman Catholics and Presbyterians. Lord Conway, too, seems to have used his influence to procure the appointment of his much-esteemed friend-whom he thought the choicest person in England appertaining to the conscience' to the diocese in which he was himself most interested.* Yet we cannot help suspecting that Sheldon, the great manager of ecclesiastical patronage in those days, bore Taylor no good will. He had disliked his appointment at All Souls: he had been offended by what he thought his Pelagian theology, and there was perhaps some other cause of rancour in the background; for Taylor, in a piteous letter to Sheldon, in which he begs to be translated to England if his Grace does not wish him to die immaturely,' says that he had been 'informed by a good hand,' that his Grace had said that he (Taylor) was himself the only hindrance to his being removed to an English bishopric. That which was the hindrance to his being translated to an English bishopric may have been the cause of his being removed from England in the first instance. Whatever the cause of the appointment, we cannot but fear that he left the pleasant society of London, then bubbling with excitement, for his disturbed diocese, with somewhat the same feelings with which Gregory Nazianzen sought his see in dull and remote Sasima. He was consecrated with eleven other bishops, in the cathedral church of St. Patrick, Jan. 27, 1660-1, and himself preached the sermon. He had previously, on Ormond's recommendation, been chosen Vice-Chancellor of the University of Taylor says (letter to Lord Conway of March 2, 1660-1, in Mr. Murray's possession) that I am here. I owe to my relations to your Lordship.' 'Life,' p. cxix. The state of his diocese may well have filled with dismay a man who loved study and quiet, and shrank from heat and violence. In no part of Ireland had the clearance of the clergy of the Reformed Irish Church been more effectual. The new bishop found himself in the midst of a body of Presbyterians, led by Scotchmen of the school of Cameron, with their original fanaticism exasperated to the utmost by contact with the votaries of Popery and Prelacy. He was received with a storm of denunciation when he visited his diocese before his consecration; the Scotch ministers were implacable; they had agreed among themselves to preach vigorously and constantly against episcopacy and liturgy; they talked of resisting unto blood, and stirred up the people to sedition. The bishop-designate preached every Sunday among them, he invited them to a conference, he courted them with most friendly offers; but they would not even speak with him: they had newly covenanted to endure neither the person nor the office of a bishop. They bought his books, and appointed a committee of Scotch spiders to see if they could gather or make poison out of them;' they drew up a statement against him, and intended to petition the King against his appointment. Nay, his very life was not safe; not only did they try by every means to take the people's hearts from him, but they threatened to murder him outright. No wonder that he says in despair, 'It were better for me to be a poor curate in a village church than a bishop over such intolerable persons;' no wonder that he begs the Duke of Ormond to give him some parsonage in Munster, where he may end his days in peace. He had probably but little peace for the remainder of his days; for though many of the laity in his dioceses were well disposed, the opposition of the Presbyterian ministers, who were generally as disloyal to the Government as unfriendly to the bishop, never ceased. In the summer of 1663, we find him again complaining of the meetings of the 'pretended ministers,' of the refrac toriness of the people and their mutinous talkings; and a few months before his death he tells Ormond of the advance of the for *He begs Lord Conway's interest to get him placed on the Privy Council, because it would add so much reputation to him among the Scots, and be useful for settling the diocese.' (Letter of Jan. 2, 1660-1, in Mr. Murray's possession.) + Letter of Dec. 19, 1660, to the Duke of Ormond, in 'Life,' p. ci. mer mischiefs, and believes that the Scotch | the hungry, clothed the naked, and provided rebellion of 1655 was either born in Ire- for the fatherless. He was,' says Sir James land or put to nurse there.'* The North Ware,*. so charitable to the poor, that, exof Ireland immediately after the Restoration cept moderate portions to his daughters, he was certainly no place for a bishop who spent all his income on alms and public loved peace. works.' Yet his misery was not without alleviations; the great Ormond supported and encouraged him, and Lord Conway was a steady and sympathising friend. He hoped in the first instance to live at Lisnegarvy [Lisburn], and got 'a very pretty design for his house' from a gentleman in Dublin that had 'very good skill in architecture.' Probably, this design was found for the time impracticable, for he continued to reside at Portmore, where he had a house and farm, as we learn from a curious story preserved in Glanvil's Sadducismus triumphatus,' of the ghost seen by David Hunter, 'neatherd at the bishop's house at Portmore.' Still, however, he does not seem to have abandoned the hope of having a cathedral and a palace at Lisburn. The church of that place was made a cathedral for the united sees of Down and Connor by letters patent October 22, 1662, the old cathedral of Down having been burnt by Lord-Deputy Gray in 1538, and still lying waste in 1637, when it was the subject of a correspondence between Laud and Strafford, § which had no result in consequence of the troubles soon following. In 1665, we find him urging upon Lord Conway the care of their great concern, the cathedral of Lisburn,' and proposing to his Lordship to give lands in Lisburn in exchange for Church lands, that the bishops may have a 'convenient seat' there. It was important for them to have a strong, as well as a convenient house, for it was not improbable that they might have to maintain themselves in it by force against a rebellion. Again, in a later letter (probably of 1666) he hopes that by this time his Lordship hath some account of the King's letter for their cathedral. He rebuilt the choir of the ruined cathedral of Dromore at his own expense, and the handmaid of the Lord,' Joanna Taylor, the bishop's wife, presented the chalice and paten. Nor was this the only form in which his liberality showed itself; all accounts agree, that now that he was able, for the first time in his life, to dispense instead of receiving bounty, he fed All this time his health appears to have been delicate. We find constantly in his letters that he is suffering from a 'great cold,' with pain and feverishness; more than once he complains, as in the letter to Sheldon above referred to, that the climate in which he lived was unsuitable for him. And he was not without heavy domestic affliction. Of the sons of his second marriage, only one survived the sickness which attacked the household in Wales, and him he buried at Lisburn. Two sons of the first marriage grew up to manhood, both of whom seemed to have shared in the wild follies of the Restoration period. The eldest, a captain of horse, fell in a duel with a brother officer named Vane, who also died of his wounds; and the good bishop almost sank under the blow. The second became secretary to Villiers, Duke of Buckingham, and died at his house in Baynard's Castle a few days before his father, who was probably spared the pain of hearing of his death. The bishop himself was attacked by fever at Lisburn, on the 3rd of August, 1667, and died after ten days' illness, in the seventh year of his episcopate. He was fifty-four years of age, if we suppose him to have been born in 1613, or fifty-six, if, as the records of Caius College seem to indicate, he was born in 1611. Whatever his age, his fancy had not grown dim, nor the natural force of his intellect abated. Probably no English divine, even in those days when so many were cast out of their stalls or their parsonages, led a more chequered life than Jeremy Taylor. Cambridge, London, Oxford, Uppingham, the royal army, the retreat in Wales, the lectureship and the bishopric in Ireland, all pass before us in a life not prolonged much beyond middle age. No doubt these many changes, with their attendant miseries, and the feeling of being constantly under suspicion, must have been very grievous to the soul of one who loved study and evidently enjoyed the refinements of courtly society. In fact, a tone of querulousness does appear here and there in his letters; yet on the whole we believe that Taylor, in the midst of his distresses and * See the Letters in Life,' p. ciii. Letter of March 2, 1660-1, in Mr. Murray's wanderings, was a happy man; he had the possession, Reprinted in Life,' p. ccxciv. Mant's 'Hist. of the Ch, of Ireland,' p. 512. Letter of Jan. 28, 1664-5, in Mr. Murray's possession. 'Life,' cix. ccxci. VOL. CXXXI. L-5 *Hist. of Ireland,' Ed. Harris, ii. 210. This rests on the authority of Lady Wray, Taylor's granddaughter, who, making her statement at an advanced age, has probably confused some of the details. See 'Life,' pp. ccxx. ccxcviii. disposition which instinctively withdraws | Madame de Scuderi, or Whetstone, or Tom itself from the contact of the petty roughnesses of life and seizes suck enjoyments as are attainable. He would walk in the sunshine while sunshine was to be found, and not voluntarily seek the bleak hill-side. The works of so very imaginative a writer give but an imperfect reflection of the character of the man; when a man can so readily throw himself into the mood which beseems the occasion, we hardly know what mood is natural to him: Garrick's Hamlet gives no indications of Garrick's own personality. Nevertheless, with all Taylor's changes of style and even of thought, the undercurrent of sweetness, gentleness, and tolerance is so constant that we can hardly doubt that these did indeed form an essential part of his character. And to this sweetness we have a better testimony than that of his works his power of attracting friends. We have seen in the course of this sketch how John Evelyn, Lord Carbery, and Lord Conway valued him as a friend and spiritual adviser, and were ready on all occasions to forward his interests. And these were not all; another of his noble friends was Christopher, Lord Hatton, to whom he dedicated the 'Life of Christ;' that he was received in the mansion of the Chaworths we find from the letter quoted above; and in Ireland, he seems to have lived on the most friendly terms with the Rawdons and the Hills of Hillsborough. If the richness of his conversation at all corresponded to that of his writings, he must have been a most charming companion; and he had that instinctive sympathy which adapts itself without effort to the disposition of the person addressed. Probably his episcopate was the least happy portion of his life; but such a man, with such friends, was not likely to be altogether miserable. It is even pathetic to see how, in the midst of the distractions of his changeful life, he continues with indomitable perseverance his study and his writing. Besides Greek and Latin, he understood French and Italian; and not only was he extremely well read in patristic and scholastic theology, but he was constantly in communication with Mr. Royston, the bookseller, and contrived to keep himself acquainted with the current literature of the day, both English and foreign. He would rather furnish his study with Plutarch and Cicero, with Livy and Polybius, than with Cassandra and Ibrahim Bassa;'* yet he did not despise either Essay on Friendship,' p. 81. Promos and Cassandra' is a 'comical discourse,' by G. Whetstone. Ibrahim Bassa' is a romance by Madame de Scuderi (Mr. Eden's note, in loco). Nash; he read Dante, but he was not averse to pass an hour with Poggio Bracciolini; he would recreate himself after his meditations on Holy Dying with a story of Petronius. His cry is still, how is any art or science likely to improve? What good books are lately public? What learned men abroad or at home begin anew to fill the mouth of fame in the places of the dead Salmasius, Vossius, Mocelin, Sirmond, Rigaltius, Des Cartes, Galileo, Peirese, Petavius, and the excellent persons of yester day?'* When he hears that Lord Conway is likely to reside on his Irish estates, his hope is that his lordship will bring his li brary with him. Never was there a more eager devourer of books; if he kept a common-place book, it must have been at least as remarkable as Southey's; but we are inclined to think, from the way that his illus trations are introduced, that he drew most of them from the stores of his memory. Yet there were considerable gaps in his vast reading; he does not seem to have had much sympathy with the great philosophical movement of his own time; he refers, as we have seen, to Des Cartes; yet that intrepid spirit, who undertook to reconstruct philosophy from its foundations, does not seem to have influenced his writings; he is scarcely quoted, though he wrote on Taylor's favourite science of Ethics. He refers to Galileo, but we doubt whether, even in passing, he alludes to any discovery of the Tuscan artist. He always gives us the impression that he loved belles lettres, rhetoric, and casuistic theology, rather than the severer pursuits of philosophy. When he talks 'metaphysically,' he is rather apt to talk 'extravagantly' also. Of the books which he thought most essential for a student of theology we have a list in a letter to Mr. Graham, a Fellow of Trinity College, Dublin. § From this we find that, in his opinion, the works of Episcopius, the great leader of the Arminians in the Low Countries, 'contained the whole body of orthodox religion;' and there are manifest traces of the influence of this remarkable man upon his theology, and, indeed, upon a considerable portion of the contemporary theology of England. Other continental writers whom he commends are Chemnitz, Gerhard, Du Moulin, Chamier, Vossius, and Casaubon. For school divinity he prefers Occam on the *To Evelyn, in 'Life,' p. lxxxi. + Letter of April 9, 1659, in Mr. Murray's pos session. Letter to Lord Conway, Feb. 26, 1658–9, in |