OF ARCHB. EDMOND GRYNDAL.*

Or Mr. Edmond Grindhall, whereas my author wrytes he was blynde, I have heard by those that knew somwhat in those days, that he kept his house upon a straunge occasion, the secret whereof is known to few, and the certainty is not easie to find out; but thus I was told it.

There was an Italian Doctor (as I take it, of Physicke) that having a known wife alyve, yet bearing himself on the countenance of some great lord, did marry another gentlewoman, (which to doe now, is by his Maties most godly lawes made fellony.) This good archbishop, (not winking at so publique a scandall,) convented him for it, and proceeded by ecclesiasticall censures against him. Letters were pre

* Made Abp. of C. 1573. Died in 1583. Æt. 63. This learned reformer was, in the reign of Mary, one of the exiles for religion in Germany, but returning to England on the accession of Elizabeth, he was appointed one of the public disputants against popery. The Algrind of Spenser is said to be the name of Grindal anagrammatized. See Upton's Preface to the Faerie Queene.

"Lord Leicester.

sently written from this great lord to the archbishop, to stay the proceeding, to tolerate, to dispence, or to mitigate the censure; but the bishop remayned still unmoved and unmoveable. When no subjects intreaty could be found to prevaile, they intreat the soveraign to write in the doctors behalfe; but this John Baptist not only persisted in his non licet habere eam, but also in a reverent fashion, requyred an account of her Majesties faith, in that she would seeme to wryte in a matter that (if she were truly informed) was expressly against the word of God. The Queene in a gracious disposition was purposed to have yeilded an account in wryting; but the great lord not onely disswaded her from it, as too great an indignity, but incensed her exceedingly against him; whereupon, he was privately commaunded to keepe his house; where bycause he was somtime troubled with sore eyes, his frends gave out he was blynd. But if he were blynde, it was like to the southsayer Tiresias that foresaw and foretold Pentheus ruine, as Ovid wrytes,

Et veniet, (nec enim dignabere numen honore :) Meq; sub his tenebris nimiùm vidisse quereris.

6 Excnient: neque, &c. Met. lib. iii. Delph. edit.

For that lord, that so persecuted this prelate about his phisitians two wyves, dying twenty yeares since, left two 7wyves behind him, that can hardly be yet agreed which was his lawfull wife. And so much for Archbishop Grindall.

Lady Sheffield, and Lady Essex.

DOCTOR [JOHN] WHITEGIFT.

UPON the decease of Archbishop Grindall, (the state desirous to have a learned and discreet person, in so eminent a place, and the Queen resolved to admit none but a single man ;) choyce was made of Doctor Whitegift, then Bishop of Worster, a man in many respects very happy, and in the best judgements very worthie. He was noted for a man of great learning in Cambridge, and he was grown to his full ripeness of reading and judgement, even then, when those that they called Puritans (and some merely define to be Protestants skar'd out of their witts) did begin [not3] by the plott of some great ones, but by the pen of Mr. Cartwright, to defend their new discipline: their endevor (as was pretended) was to reduce all, in show at least, to

7 Ld. President of Ludlow Castle; made Abp, of C, 1585, and died in 1603, aged 72. There is a printed epitaph upon him in the Museum, which consists chiefly of acrostics on his name and titles. Some of his original letters occur in the cathedral library, Canterbury.

* Printed copy.

A Puritan divine, of considerable eminence, whose life has been given in the new edition of Biog. Britannica, Vol.iii.

the purity, but indeed to the poverty, of the primitive church.

These bookes of Mr. Cartwright, not unlearnedly written, written, were more learnedly answeared by Doctor Whitegift. Both had their reward for Mr. Cartwright, was by private. favour placed about Coventry, where he grew rich, and had great maintenance to live on, and honord as a Patriarcke, by manie of that profession. Doctor Whitegift was made Bishop of Worcester, and theare having a great good report of houskeeping, and governing the marches of Walles, he was (as my authour hath told,) called unto Canterbury.

While he was Bishop of Worcester, though the revenew of it be not verie great, yet his custom was to come to the Parliament very well attended, which was a fashion the Queen liked exceeding well. It happened one day, Bishop Elmer, of London, meeting this Bishop with such an orderly troope of Tawny Coats, de9 Bishop Godwin.

2 Tawny coats would seem to have been the livery given by bishops. Hence, in Shakspeare's Henry the Sixth, Part I. Winchester enters, attended by a train of servants in tawny coats.