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MATTHEW WREN, D. D.
In a short Time, these misguiding hypocritical Zealots obtain’d theirseditious Ends, to their Heart’s Desire ; they saw the Church in thegreatest; outward Desolation, her Truth questioned, her Glory vanished,her Buildings falling, her Revenues devoured, one of her chief Prelatesfor Dignity and Learning, driven from the See and Palatinate of Ely intoa close melancholy Prison, under continual Threats of a violent Death:
The Metropolitan and Primate of all England , one of the most innocent, de-vout, and magnificent Men of that Age, beheaded in the View of fortythousand Men ; and too many of them so inhuman, as to rejoice at theDeath of a Bishop ; against whom, their chief Objection was, his being aBishop. So certain it is, that an erroneous Devil in the Understanding, becomesa furious Devil in Men’s Practice.
> The grand Charge of Innovation so fiercely urged against Arch-bishop Laud,
Bishop Wren, and the Orthodox Clergy of thzEngliflj Church, in those Timesof Fanaticfn, was no more than what has been occasionally taken up, and
made uie of in Service of blind Zeal, illiterate and obstinate Bigottry.-
To give a memorable Instance, —" Before the Reformation , in the dark Age of Dr. Knight’*“ Ignorance and Superstition, polite Literature, and the true Use of the learned LRf *>'**" Languages, made stow Advances in the World j the Knowledge of the ’ ^ s ‘" Greek. Tongue was very low,-and the Schoolmen endeavour’d to run it down" in their Pulpits, under the Notion and Charge of Heresy : This Aversion" to good Learning remained all the Reign of King Henry the Vllth. and" the Beginning of King Henry the VHIth. about which Time, even at Ox-" ford, a Preacher declaimed openly at St. Mary's , against the pernicious In~
“ novation of the Greek Tongue.
Sir Thomas WiddringtonV * Speech (before notified , p. 12.) at * o/ Gray’s-a Conference between both Houses on Tuesday the lath of of iofULJuly, 1641, at the Trans mis ion of the Impeachment againftMatthew Wren, Tool or in Divinity , late Bishop of Nor-vdch, and nova Bishop of Ely.
My Lords,
I Am commanded by the Knights, Citizens, and Burgesses now assembled
for the Commons in Parliament, to deliver these Articles against the 'Bishop of Ely.
May it please your Lordships first to hear them read.
My Lords,
These Articles are dipped in those Colours, in which this Bishoprendered himself to the Diocese of Norwich ; they need no Gloss, orVarnish : In them you may behold the Spirit and Disposition of this Bishop ;hear the Groans and Cries of the People ; fee a Shepherd scattering (I hadalmost said) devouring his own Flock : He that desir’d to paint Hercules,thought he had done enough, when he made a Resemblance of the Lion’sSkin, which he was wont to carry about him, as a Trophy of his Honour.
I will not fay, that in these, you will find a Resemblance of the Lion'sSkin, 1 am sure you will find the Resemblance of the Skins ; that is to say,the tatter'd, and ruin’d Fortunes of poor innocent Lambs, who have extreme-ly suffer’d by the Violence of this Bishop.
In