by his Golden Remains. ORME, WILLIAM, 1824, Biblotheca Biblica.

John Hales was a man whose reputation was far higher among his contemporaries than his Remains (rather unmeaningly called Golden) seem to justify. He was admittedly the first Greek scholar of his day. Sir Henry Savill's grand edition of Chrysostom was in reality his work, but the one was Warden, the other Fellow of Merton, and the name of higher position was affixed to the work. In religious principles he was a latitudinarian, like Chillingworth. PERRY, GEORGE G., 1861, History of the Church of England, vol. 1, p. 566.

If by its political structure the English Church is persecuting, by its doctrinal structure it is tolerant; it needs the reason of the laity too much to refuse it liberty; it lives in a world too cultivated and thoughtful to proscribe thought and culture. John Hales, its eminent doctor, declared several times that he would renounce the Church of England to-morrow, if she insisted on the doctrine that other Christians would be damned; and that men believe other people to be damned only when they desire them to be so. It was he again, a theologian, a prebendary, who advises men to trust to themselves alone in religious matters; to leave nothing for authority, or antiquity, or the majority; to use their own reason in believing, as they use "their own legs in walking" to act and be men in mind as well as in the rest; and to regard as cowardly and impious the borrowing of doctrine and sloth of thought.-TAINE, H. A., 1871, History of English Literature, tr. Van Laun, vol. 1, bk. ii, ch. v, p. 381.

There is in all our author's writings exactly that which so many theological writings want, the light of a bright, openeyed, candid intelligence, which sees frequently far beyond the range of the most powerful systematic intellect straight to the truth "an acute and piercing wit," a wise, calm, and "profound judgment.'

His accumulated knowledge of books and systems never encumbers him. He never, or rarely, uses it as materials of exposition, or stuff for dilating and parading arguments in themselves worthless, after the prevailing fashion. But all his knowledge has become an enriching basis of his own thought, and raises him above "the vulgar reach of man" to see

for himself clearly and widely. It has entered into the very life of his quick and genial intellect, and contributes to the wealth of his meditative insight, and his tolerant, comprehensive, and sweetlytempered genius. The simplicity and breadth of his religious thought are astonishing for his time. He goes to the heart of controversies, and distinguishes with a delicate and summary skill the essential from the accidental in religion as in other things. In freedom of

thought and clearness of faith, he greatly excels the mere professional divine of any age. He is evangelical without dogmatism, and preaches grace without despising philosophy. At once conservative in feeling, and liberal in opinion, he hates all extremes, as of the nature of falsehood, and a prolific source of wrong. He is the representative-the next after Hookerof that catholicity yet rationality of Christian sentiment which has been the peculiar glory of the Church of England. -TULLOCH, JOHN, 1872, Rational Theology and Christian Philosophy in England in the 17th Century, vol. 1, pp. 221, 222, 260.

Andrew Marvel justly describes Hales. as "one of the clearest heads and best prepared breasts in Christendom." The richness of his learning impresses us even less than his felicity in using it. His humour enables him to treat disturbing questions with attractive lightness of touch. His strength lies in an invincible core of common sense, always blended with good feeling, and issuing in a wise and thoughtful charity.-GORDON, ALEXANDER, 1890, Dictionary of National Biography, vol. xxiv, p. 32.

Hales's literary style is, in the main, the reflection of his lucid manner of thinking. When he argues, he goes straight to the point, and, barring a certain looseness in the construction of his sentences, he is a master of exposition. His illustrations, though copious, never weary the reader, being always the natural overflow of a mind well stocked with learning, and not a mere display of pedantry. There runs through his writings a thin thread of humour characteristic of the man-himself in earnest, but scorning the earnestness about non-essentials which he discovers in others.-WALLACE, W., 1893, English Prose, ed. Craik, vol. II, p. 185.

The large and generous current of

scholar that he is remembered, and it is in that that he is linked to the leaders of the Caroline Church. Men of both parties turned from the turmoil of the war and of political change to talk of Ussher's manuscripts, of the Septuagint, the Samaritan Pentateuch, and the Syriac version, of the history of Episcopacy, and of the Ignatian letters. Literature, indeed, in him as in many others of the King's party, prevented the rift between the men of King and Parliament being very deep or lasting.—HUTTON, WILLIAM HOLDEN, 1895, Social England, ed. Traill, vol. IV, p. 291.

Cromwell required that a public funeral should be accorded to the great Archbishop, and that he should be buried with all honours in Westminster Abbey. The spot chosen for his final resting-place was in St. Paul's Chapel, close to the monument of his first teacher, Fullerton, and near the steps leading to Henry Seventh's Chapel. We are told that a large concourse of people met the funeral cortége, including many of the nobility and London clergy. So great was the concourse that a military guard was found necessary. Only on this occasion was the Burial Service of the Church of England read within the Abbey walls during the entire period of the Commonwealth. The sermon was preached by the Archbishop's chaplain, Dr. Bernard, and afterwards published. He took for his text the suitable words, "And Samuel died, and all Israel were gathered together and lamented him, and buried him." No stone marks the spot where the Archbishop sleeps. The funeral expenses, it may be observed, reached at far higher sum than the £200 voted for the purpose by Cromwell, and the deficit was made good by his family, who could ill spare the expense.-CARR, J. A., 1895, The Life and Times of James Ussher, p. 370.

ANNALS

1650-54

I have with no small eagerness and delight turned over these your learned and accurate "Annals," wondering not a little at that your indefatigable labour which you have bestowed on a work fetched together out of such a world of monuments of antiquity; whereby your Grace hath better merited the title of χαλκεύτερος and puλonovos than those on whom it

was formerly bestowed.-HALL, JOSEPH, 1650? Letter to Archbishop Usher.

Along with the reading of the historical books of the Scripture I would recommend Usher's Annals, which is a work perfect in its kind, and which well digested will give a very sound knowledge of the history of the world, sacred and profane, to the destruction of the second temple; which knowledge will upon innumerable occasions be of unspeakable use.-WOTTON, WILLIAM, 1726-34? Thoughts Concerning a Proper Method of Studying Divinity.

This is a work of great labour and research, which has been followed by the greater part of modern chronologers. though the system of Dr. Hales is perhaps more correct. ORME, WILLIAM, 1824, Bibliotheca Biblica, p. 442.

Our learned Archbishop Usher might there have been named, since the first part of his "Annals of the Old Testament," which goes down to the year of the world 3828, was published in 1650. The second part followed in 1654. This has been the chronology generally adopted by English historians, as well as by Bossuet, Calmet, and Rollin, so that for many years it might be called the orthodox scheme of Europe. No former annals of the world has been so exact in marking dates, and collating sacred history with profane. It was therefore exceedingly convenient for those, who, possessing no sufficient leisure or learning for these inquiries, might very reasonably confide in such authority. HALLAM, HENRY, 1837-39, Introduction to the Literature of Europe, pt. iv, ch. i, par.

23.

GENERAL

Archbishop Usher, that prodigy of learning and industry.-NICOLSON, WILLIAM, 1724, Irish Historical Library, Appendix.

All that learning can extract from the rubbish of the Dark Ages is copiously stated by Archbishop Usher in his "Britannicarum Ecclesiarum Antiquitates. GIBBON, EDWARD, 1776-78, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, ch. xxxvii, note. The first writer who instituted a systematic inquiry into the Septuagint version was Archbishop Usher. This is

a work of great merit; it displays much orignial inquiry, and may be regarded as

the ground-work of later publications on the Septuagint.-MARSH, HERBERT, 180911, Lectures on Divinity, Part II., Lectures xii, p. 121.

The writings of our Irish primate, Usher, who maintained the antiquity of his order, but not upon such high ground as many in England would have desired, are known for their extraordinary learning, in which he has perhaps never been surpassed by an English writer. But for judgement, and calm appreciation of evidence, the name of Usher has not been altogether so much respected by posterity as it was by his contemporaries. HALLAM, HENRY, 1837-39, Introduction to the Literature of Europe, pt. iii, ch. ii, par. 66.

He was one of the most wonderful men

of that wonderful age. . . . His writings contain an invaluable mass of historical and ecclesiastical information and of controversial and practical divinity. BICKERSTETH, EDWARD, 1844, The Christian Student, pp. 245, 246.

His preference had been for the lighter forms of literature. He knew Spenser, and did not think it impossible that he might himself be a poet. As he grew older, Nature corrected the mistake. Struck one day by Cicero's saying: "Nescire quid antea quam natus sis acciderit, id est semper esse puerum" ("Not to know what happened before you were born, is to be always a child'), he found his genius revealed to him in the fascination of the phrase, and from that day devoted himself to history Before he had reached his thirtieth year he was profound in universal chronology, and known to Camden and other English scholars as the most learned of Irishmen.

was the pride of the English Calvinists about the year 1632, when the learning of Laud and other prelates of his school was mentioned, to point across the Channel to the great Calvinistic Primate as a scholar who outweighed them all.-MASSON, DAVID, 1858, The Life of John Milton, vol. I, ch. vi.

Usher's works are numerous, and were regarded by his contemporaries as marvels of research. It may be said of the majority of them, however, that the growth of knowledge has thrown them decidedly into the shade. HART, JOHN S., 1872, A Manual of English Literature, p. 169.

Argument means for Ussher the accumulation of authorities; authorities, indeed, weighed with precision, criticised as to their authenticity, but in the last result accepted as authoritative. And with this is connected his renunciation of style; for to style the abundance of quotations must needs be fatal. Fragments pieced together from other men's works, even where translation is freely used, cannot but lack the unity which the impress of a single personality gives. Ussher's writing is always a mosaic of quotations. His learning is immense. At an early age, so his biographers tell us, he sat down and read the fathers straight through. Chroniclers, schoolmen, the writers of Greece and Rome, all are at his fingers' ends. He has wandered in the byeways of Celtic and And in this he was Scandinavian lore. happy, that by his time the sum-total of things knowable had not so swelled as to be beyond the compass of one intellect; so that he does not appear a mere specialist, but a true scholar, with a wide sweep and an adequate survey of knowledge. Moreover, he has at least one gift-an architectonic gift of style.-CHAMBERS, EDMUND K., 1893, English Prose, ed. Craik,vol. II, p. 158.

Selden calls him "learned to a miracle" ("ad miraculum doctus"). To estimate his labours aright would be the work of a company of experts. His learning was for use; and his topics were suggested by the controversies of his age, which he was resolved to probe to their roots in the ground of history. As a writer,

his passion for exactness (which made him extremely sensitive on the subject of unauthorised publication) exhibits itself in his use of materials. He lets his sources tell their story in their own words, incorporating them into his text with clear but sparing comment. Few faults have been found with his accuracy; his conclusions have been mended by further application of his own methods. His merits as an investigator of early Irish history are acknowledged by his countrymen of all parties; his contributions to the history of the creed and to the treatment of the Ignatian problem are recognised by modern scholars as of primary value; his chronology is still the standard adopted in editions of the English Bible.-GORDON, ALEXANDER, 1899, Dictionary of National Biography, vol. LVIII, p. 70.

PERSONAL

He did delight to be in the darke, and told me he could then best contemplate. He had a house heretofore at Combe, in Surrey, a good aire and prospect, where he had caves made in the earth, in which in summer time he delighted to meditate. -He was pretty well versed in the Mathematiques, and had made himselfe master of Mr. Oughtred's Clavis Math. in his old age; and I have seen him perusing it, and working problems, not long before he dyed, and that booke was alwayes in his meditating apartment. . . He was not tall; but of the lowest stature, round faced olivaster complexion; little eie, round, very black, full of spirit; his haire was black as a raven, but quite white 20 yeares before he dyed. I have heard him say, that after his booke of the Circulation of the Blood came-out, that he fell mightily in his practize, and that 'twas beleeved by the vulgar that he was crack-brained; and all the physitians were against his opinion, and envyed him; many wrote against him, as Dr. Primige, Paracisanus, etc. (vide Sir George Ent's booke). With much adoe at last, in about 20 or 30 yeares time, it was received in all the Universities in the world; and, as Mr. Hobbes sayes in his book "De Corpore," he is the only man, perhaps, that ever lived to see his owne doctrine established in his life time. He understood Greek and Latin pretty well, but was no critique, and he wrote very bad Latin.

All his profession would allowe him to be an excellent anatomist, but I never heard of any that admired his therapeutique way. I knew severall practisers in London that would not have given 3d. for one of his bills; and that a man could hardly tell by one of his bills what he did

aime at.-AUBREY, JOHN, 1669-96, Brief Lives, ed. Clark, vol. 1, pp. 298, 300, 302.

Dr. Harvey was not only an excellent physician; he was also an excellent man: his modesty, candour, and piety, were equal to his knowledge: the farther he penetrated into the wonders of nature, the more was he inclined to venerate the author of it.-GRANGER, JAMES, 17691824, Biographical History of England, vol. III, p. 115.

Twice in the past thirty years, I have visited the vault at Hempstead, and viewed the receptacle that holds, like an Egyptian mummy-case, the remains. In 1848 the leaden case was lying with several others -there are over forty of them-near one of the open gratings of the vault. There were many loose stones upon it, and a large hole in the lead, which let in water. In 1859 Drs. Quain and Stewart, who went to the vault by request of the fellows of the Royal College of Physicians, found the remains in even a worse state, for the leaden case was then almost full of dirty water. In 1868 I found the case removed from its previous position, and lying apart in the vault, which had been repaired. In the case there was still an opening, but the water had either been removed or had escaped by evaporation. I was able to throw a reflected light into this opening, but I could see no remains, and I think that there is little left of what was once the bodily form of our greatest English anatomist. I would that what there may be, were safely placed in the mausoleum of the illustrious, -the Abbey of Westminster. John Hunter and David Livingstone were nobly companioned by William Harvey.-RICHARDSON, BENJAMIN W., 1878, William Harvey, The Gentleman's Magazine, vol. 242, p. 477.