So much was Tillotson impoverished by his bounties and charities, that his debts, when he died, could only be discharged by the remission of his first-fruits: while a pension from the King was found necessary for the subsistence of his widow. His vacated chair was well supplied by Dr. Tennison, whose similarity of character had long been publicly acknowledged.

IX. 1699. Watson, Bishop of St. David's, having been accused of simoniacal practices, in paying a valuable consideration for his preferment, and disposing of ecclesiastical benefices, was tried before the Primate, and six other Bishops, by whom he was convicted and deprived. He now pleaded his privilege, which at first he had waved, and thus brought his cause before the House of Lords; but that body refused to acknowledge him as a peer; alleging that he had forfeited his dignity by his deprivation. His next appeal was to the Court of Delegates, who confirmed the sentence of the Archbishop. The cause was now espoused by the Jacobite party, to which he belonged. They took exception against the jurisdiction of the Archbishop, who, they affirmed, could not sit in judgment on a Bishop, save only in a synod: composed of all the bishops in his province. On the other hand, it was shown, that from the ninth century, both Popes and Princes had placed this authority in the hands of the Arch

bishop; and that, at the Reformation, this power had been confirmed. In this manner

does a question of pure right and wrong become involved in party contests; and it was perhaps more owing to the worthless character of Watson, incapable of defence or gloss, than to acquiescence in the justice of these arguments, that his friends silently dropped the dispute.

X. With a view to mortify William, the Tories next assailed Bishop Burnet; whom they represented as an improper tutor for the Duke of Gloucester; not only as being a Scotsman, but likewise as author of that Pastoral Letter in which he had asserted that William had a right to the crown by conquest. The motion, however, for his dismissal was rejected. It appeared that this prelate had acted with the strictest integrity; having at first declined the trust; then offered to resign his bishopric as.. incompatible with it; and at length insisted on his pupil's residing all the summer within the diocese of Sarum; while he added to his private charities the whole income of his office as pre-A ceptor. Such was Burnet; such the man characterized by Smollett as a prelate of some parts and great industry, inquisitive, meddling, vain, and credulous. In the case of Sir John Fenwick, however, in 1696, he delivered sentiments contradictory to his former maxims of liberty.

XI. James II. died A. D.. 1700, Louis pro mising that his son should be appointed heir to all the British dominions. The expiring parent is said to have raised himself in his bed, to thank his royal benefactor. The young Prince was proclaimed King of Britain and Ireland; an honour, which only served to unite the discord, ant parties in determined opposition to his claims. William, A. D. 1702, followed the prince whom he had dispossessed, to their com mon mansion.

XII. Acts of Parliament were passed in this; reign, to admit, instead of an oath, the solemn affirmation of the Quakers; to effect the more easy; recovery of small tithes; and, to prevent mar-, riages without banns or license. Benefices in the gift of Papists, were placed in the patronage. of the Universities; those in the south being assigned to Oxford, and those in the north to Cambridge. Ministers flying from the disturbed state of Ireland, were rendered capable of holding any English living, without forfeiting their former preferments; on condition however, that, in the event of their restoration to their first benefice, that in England should be for-.. feited.

XIII. The reign of William III. is remarkable for the deaths of two eminent divines, CUDWORTH and STILLINGFLEET. Cudworth, professor of Hebrew in Cambridge, has left behind

1

him several minor publications: on the Sacrament, as a Feast upon a Sacrifice; on Liberty and Necessity; and on Daniel's Seventy Weeks. His famous work, "The true intellectual System of the Universe," was written in refutation of Hobbes's position, that the distinction between right and wrong is only perceived by considering, that what benefits society, must be indirectly of service to ourselves; and that the laws of the magistrate are the ultimate standards of morality. In the Intellectual System, it is contended that there is an immutable distinction betwixt right and wrong, as betwixt truth and falsehood; and that reason is equally the umpire in both cases. Hutchinson afterwards referred the origin of our moral ideas to a particular perception, which he termed the moral

sense.

Stillingfleet's first work was the Origines Sacræ; or, A rational Account of the Grounds of natural and revealed Religion; in which he exhibited great depth of erudition and power of argument. This admirable production, pub

lished in 1662, obtained for the author so much esteem in the learned world, that when a reply appeared, in the year following, to Laud's work against Fisher the Jesuit, he was appointed to answer it, a task which he ably performed. He soon obtained various preferments in London and Canterbury, and on being made Dean of

St. Paul's, engaged in several controversies with the Deists, Socinians, Papists, and Dissenters. But a life passed in the boiling water of controversy, is far from being a life of comfort. Afterwards, when Bishop of Worcester, Stillingfleet proposed objections to several positions in the celebrated Essay of Locke; and was replied to by that metaphysician in a vein of irony, which is reported to have hastened his end, 1699. His epitaph in Worcester Cathedral is written by BENTLEY, who was at that time his chaplain.

LLOYD, Bishop of Worcester, as though he loved to ride on the billow that hath scarce subsided after the storm, distinguished his zeal at this period by several excellent tracts against Popery. In answer to Blondell's Treatise against Episcopacy, he likewise wrote a History of the primitive Government of the Churches established in England and Ireland; in which the story of an ancient Scottish church, founded without episcopacy by monks called Culdees in the second or third century, is proved to be fabulous. Bishop Burnet represents Lloyd as a learned classical scholar, an historian, and a chronologist; yet carrying a concordance of the Scriptures in his mind, and never neglectful of his pastoral care *. The chief materials, and the last polish of the History of the Reforma

tion, were confessedly supplied by this prelate,

* Own Times, vol. i. p. 265.