Aisle of the Choir of his own Cathedral; where is a tablet to his memory. He bequeathed £200 for the benefit of the Cathedral: and he left to Queen's College, the perpetual advowson of the Rectories of Cheverill Magna and Newton Toney, Wilts; and a rent charge of £31. 10s. per annum, to found two bible-clerkships, and buy books for the Library of the same College. The following is the inscription on his monument : Monumentorum omnium JOHANNIS DAVENANTII Minime perenne, quid loquatur audi. bonis literis opeam fælicem dedit, Cujus cum Societate esset meritissime donatus Quod ruinam sedis, cum superesse per ætatem non potuit, The following extract from Dr. Plume's Life of that zealous Churchman, and excellent Christian, Bishop Hacket, prefixed + Dr. Hacket is recorded as the last man in England who persisted to read the Liturgy in public, after it had been proscribed by the Parliament; and the following well-known anecdote is given by his biographer, illustrative alike of his attachment to the Church, and of his holy courage. ." One Sunday, while he was reading the Common Prayer in his church, a soldier of the Earl of Essex came, and clapt a pistol to his breast, and commanded him to read no further. The Doctor smiled at his insolency in that sacred place; and, not at all terrified, said, he would do what became a Divine, and he might do what became a Soldier:' so the tumult for that time was quieted, and the Doctor permitted to proceed." to his sermons, is worthy of citation, as well for its good sense, as for the testimony it bears to our Author. "In matters of doctrine, he (Hacket) embraced no private and singular opinions, as many great men delight to do, in vetere via novam semitam quærentes, says the father, (Jerome); but was in all points a perfect Protestant, according to the Articles of the Church of England; always accounting it a spice of pride and vanity to affect singularity in any opinions or expositions of Scripture, without great cause; and withal very dangerous to affect precipices, as goats use, when they may walk in plain paths. In the Quinquarticular Controversy, he was ever very moderate; but, being bred under Bishop Davenant and Dr. Ward, in Cambridge, was addicted to their sentiments. Bishop Usher would say, Davenant understood those controversies better than ever any man did since St. Austin. But He used to say, he was sure he had three excellent men of his mind in this controversy, 1. Padre Paulo,* whose letter is extant to Heinsius, anno 1604: 2. Thomas Aquinas: 3. St. Austin :-but, besides and above them all, he believed in his conscience, St. Paul was of the same mind likewise: yet would profess withal, he disliked no Arminian, but such a one as reviled and defamed every one that was not so: and would often commend Arminius himself for his excellent wit and parts, but only tax his want of reading and knowledge in antiquity: and ever held it was the foolishest thing in the world to say the Arminians were Papists, when so many Dominicans and Jansenists were Anti-Arminians: and so again to say the Anti-Arminians were Puritans or Presbyterians, when Ward, and Davenant, and Prideaux, and Brownrig, were Anti-Arminians, and also stout champions for Episcopacy ;† and Arminius himself was ever a Presbyterian :—and, therefore, he much commended the moderation of our Church, which made not any of these nice and doubtful opinions the resolved doctrine of The famous Historian of the Council of Trent. + To which might be added Hooker, Whitgift, Bancroft, Hall, Saunderson, Beveridge, and innumerable others. In fact, the ablest defences of our Church have proceeded from the pens of writers of these views. So true is the remark of Bishop Horsley : "If we would look for warm advocates of Church authority in general, and for able writers in defence of our own form of Church government in particular, such we shall find among those Divines of our Church who were called in their day the Doctrinal Calvinists." Charge at Rochester, 1800. It may be permitted us again to refer the Reader to Davenant's sentiments on this subject in the Question given at the end of this life. the Church: this, he judged, was the great fault of the Tridentine and late Westminster assemblies: but our Church was more ingenuous, and left these dark and curious points to the several apprehensions of learned men, and extended equal communion to both." That the views of Davenant were such as bear the name of sublapsarian Calvinism, all his writings prove. It has, however, been said, that with respect to the doctrine of Universal Redemption, he was led by Abp. Usher. This is distinctly stated by Baxter; and from this it has been inferred by many, that the views of Davenant underwent a change, and that he declined to the opinion that redemption is attainable by all. In fact, the extraordinary endowments of the Irish Primate, his stupendous and universal erudition, his extreme moderation, humility, fervent piety, and judgment, placed him in correspondence with all the learned men of Europe of all churches, who appealed to him for information and advice upon almost every topic of learning and theology. When in London, "the most eminent divines were wont to apply themselves to him as a father." Among others, Davenant was on close terms of intimacy with him; and to this the following passage of Baxter refers, in the year 1658, seventeen years after our Author's death: "In the time of my abode at Lord Broghill's, fell out all the acquaintance I had with the most • Yet, Mr. Cassan tells us (Lives of Bishops of Salisbury, part ii. p. 113) "Davenant had adopted the supralapsarian hypothesis, i. e. of unconditional predestination in the utmost sense." This gentleman's definition of the doctrine is well-suited to his accuracy of assertion. He has, however, favoured the world with more than one choice specimen of his theological attainment; suited, indeed, to what might be expected from a man, who, in narrating a witty story of Bishop Thomas, concerning a Lutheran divine who refused to bury a Calvinist, sagely observes: "Although the Calvinism of the dead be not contagious, it may fairly be doubted whether a known heretic is entitled to have the service read over him, and to receive the same honours with one dying in the true faith of the Church. In this case, no doubt, the Clergyman was acting in conformity to the spirit of the Rubric. For a Calvinist must, ipso facto, be excommunicate:' and such, we know, are not entitled to Christian burial." The Reader will positively find this delectable passage in part ii. p. 316, of the above-mentioned volume. + We need go no farther than a mere glance at the invaluable selection of letters which his Chaplain, Dr. Parr, selected from the vast mass of his correspondence, and published at the end of his life. Dr. Bernard's Funeral Sermon on Usher. reverend, learned, humble, and pious Primate of Ireland, Abp. Usher, then living at the Earl of Peterborough's house, in St. Martin's-lane. Sometimes he came to me, and oft I went to him. And Dr Kendal, who had wrote pettishly against me, about Universal Redemption and the specification of Divine grace, desired me (when I had answered one of his invectives, and had written part of the answer to the other), to meet him at Bishop Usher's lodgings, and refer the matter to him for our reconciliation and future silence; which I willingly did. And when the Bishop had declared his judgment for that doctrine of Universal Redemption which I asserted, and gloried that he was the man who brought Bishop Davenaut and Dr. Preston to it, he persuaded us, who were both willing, to silence for the time to come.” (P. 205.) In the same book, referring to the same conference, he delivers the opinion more fully : "In my book called R. B.'s Judgment about the Perseverance of Believers, I shewed the variety of opinions about Perseverance, and that Augustin and Prosper themselves did not hold the certain perseverance of all the elect; but held that there are more sanctified than are elect, and that perseverance is affixed to the elect as such, and not to the sanctified as such; which Bp. Usher averred to Dr. Kendal, before my face, to be most certainly Austin's judgment, though both he and I did incline to another. From hence, and many other arguments, I inferred that the sharp censures of men against their brethren, for not holding a point which Austin himself was against, and no one author can be proved to hold from the Apostles' days till long after Austin, doth argue less of judgment and charity than many of the censurers seem to have." Upon a topic so important, a few observations may be made. That Usher became less partial to the strict points of Calvinism in later life, rests upon evidence too distinct to be questioned; and Mr. Todd, in his life of Bp. Walton, has given some interesting letters on the subject. Nevertheless, so early as 1617, when yet a private divine, he maintained Universal Redemption, and his correspondence contains two powerful letters on the subject. But, perhaps, he would not then have so fully allowed what he afterwards maintained in one of his last conversations, when, having preached what he called "a soul-saving sermon," upon the words "Whom he called, them he justified," and being asked by Walton, whether "God, with his word, doth give internal grace to all that are called by it, that they may repent if they will; and that they certainly can will?" he answered, "Yes, they all can will; and that so many will not, is because they resist God's grace:" adding, "Bishop Overall was in the right, and I am of his mind." It is from this, that a supposed change in Davenant's opinion has been inferred. Hence Mr. Jackson, in his able life of the great Puritan divine John Goodwin (the most profound Arminian theologian that this country has produced,) tells us, (and Mr. Nicholls, in the Preface to his works of Arminius, repeats the remark,) that " Bp. Davenant appears to have undergone a change of sentiment similar to that of Baxter."-There is no difficulty in refuting this; but there is much difficulty in reconciling Baxter's remark with the fact. Davenant's views at the Synod of Dort, prior to his acquaintance with Usher, are distinctly stated in his "Reasons," and in many of his works: and his reply to Hoard, just before his death, is in strict accordance with them. He held Universal Redemption, as we have seen, at Dort; but he held it as inseparable from Reprobation, or Preterition; and he maintains against Hoard the same doctrine, and the same inseparable Reprobation. The truth, or error, of the doctrine is, of course, not affected by this: but, as a matter of fact, the evidence is too distinct to be doubted for a moment, that not a shadow of change occurred in his opinions. How, therefore, to understand Baxter's remark I know not. In 1650 was published a thin folio, containing Dissertationes Dua; prima, de Morte Christi; (of which a translation is annexed to this work,) altera, De Prædestinatione et Electione, &c. ; to which is appended, Sententia de Gallicana Controversia, de gratiosa et salutari Dei erga homines Peccatores voluntate, &c. These treatises, selected from our Author's papers, had been sent to Abp. Usher, by Dr. Edward Davenant, for the purpose of publication. But the wretched state of the times prevented their appearing for some years; and it does not seem that the Archbishop was the Editor: for the preface is signed with the initials T. B. The French Controversy had arisen upon the opinions of Cameron, a divine of the Gallican Protestant Church: Davenant's sentiments were applied for, and are here given. At the end of this volume, but not named in the title-page, is Sententia Ecclesiæ Anglicana de Predestinatione et capitibus annexis, ab eodem (ut fertur,) Authore, jussu Regis Serenissimi conscripta. How this can be imputed to Davenant, and received as such by the Editor, |