the university, earnestly soliciting that Mr. Broughton, notwithstanding his preferment at Durham, might still continue to hold his fellowship. The Earls of Huntingdon and Essex, at the same time, warmly espoused his cause, and jointly addressed a letter, dated February 24, 1580, to the worthy chancellor, in his favour. The two noble persons speak in this letter in high commendation of Mr. Broughton's learning, obedience and circumspection; and observe, that only want of maintenance in the university had induced him to accept of the above prebend, which, however, he was more willing to resign than lose his place in the university. "This," it is added, "shewed the good mind that was in him." Lord Burleigh addressed a letter, dated October 20, 1580, to Dr. Hatcher, the vice-chancellor, and Dr. Hawford, master of the college, in which he expresses with great warmth his disapprobation of their conduct, and the conduct of the fellows, in their unjust treatment of Mr. Broughton. Therefore, after much opposition, he was, in 1581, by an order from this generous and worthy statesman, again admitted to his fellowship; though it does not appear whether he returned any more to the college. In the mean time he very generously resigned the office of taxer of the university.§

Mr. Broughton having left the university, removed to London, where he had many worthy friends, among whom were the two earls already mentioned; also Sir Walter Mildmay, and others. About the same time, he entered upon the ministerial function; but still pursued his studies with uncommon assiduity, usually spending fourteen or sixteen hours a day in the most intense application. In his preaching, he commonly took a text out of the Old Testament, and a parallel text out of the New Testament, and discoursed pretty largely upon them in their connexion, then concluded with a short and close application of the doctrine. His preaching soon rendered him exceedingly popular, and he was very much followed, particularly by persons celebrated for learning. But that which rendered him most known to the world was the publication of his book, entitled, "A Consent of Scriptures.' It was the fruit of immense labour and study, and is a kind of system of scripture chronology and genealogy, designed to shew from the scriptures, the chronological order of events from

* Baker's MS. Collec. vol. iv. p. 91. Strype's Annals, vol. ii. p. 612–614. Baker's MS Collec. vol. iii. p. 423.

+ Ibid. vol. x. p. 306.

Adam to Christ. The work was published in the year 1588; and, while it was printing, the famous Mr. John Speed superintended the press. It was dedicated to Queen Elizabeth, to whom it was presented by himself the 17th of November, 1589. In this dedication he says, " The whole Book of God, most gracious sovereign, hath so great an harmony, that every part of it may be known to breathe from one Spirit. All soundeth the same point, that by Christ the Son eternal, we are made heirs of life: whom they that know not abide always in wrath. Prophecies in every age, (the first ages larger, the later narrower,) all briefly told, all events fully recorded: these shew the constancy of this truth. The like revolutions are of Abraham, Jacob, and his children, together of Shem's house and again to Japheth's sons, and all families: wherein the former be stamps of the latter: so that in one speech another thing also is spoken. These shew the eye of Jehovah, and his Spirit. The kindreds, places, and times (the lights of narrations) are registered so profitably, that it should be a blasphemy to affirm any one to be idle. Our Lord's

fathers are recorded from Adam, by David and Nathan, to his grandfather Ely: likewise they, after whom he is heir to the kingdom of David: Solomon's line so long as it continued, and afterwards they who from Nathan were heirs to Solomon's house. So other families, who came all of one, as from them all come: they by Moses and the prophets be plentifully expressed. In like sort the places of their dwellings are clearly taught. The course of time is most certainly to be observed; even to the fulness, the year of salvation, wherein our Lord died. Of which time the very hour was foretold by an angel, not seven years before, but seventy times seven years, Dan. ix. 24. To this all other Hebrews, and profane Greeks, bear witness strongly against themselves. These helps be stars in the story. The frame

Mr. Speed, who was brought up a tailor, was, by his acquaintance with Mr. Broughton, become particularly studious, and, by his directions, was deeply versed in a knowledge of the scriptures. Also, by the generosity of Sir Fulke Gravile, his patron, he was set free from a manual employment, and enabled to pursue his studies, to which he was strongly inclined by the bent of his genius. The fruits of them were his " Theatre of Great Britain; Genealogies of Scripture; and History of Great Britain," works of immense labour; the last of which, in its kind, was incomparably more complete than all the histories of his predecessors put together. Mr. Broughton had a considerable share in the " Genealogies ;" but when the work came to be published, "because the bishops would not endure to have Mr. Broughton's name prefixed, Mr. Speed went away with all the credit and profit."-Clark's Lives, last vol. part i. p. 2.-Granger's Biog. Hist. vol. ii. p. 320.—Biog. Britan, vol. ii, p. 67.* Edit. 1778.

of all this, with coupling of joints and proportion of body, will much allure to study, when it is seen how about one work, (religion and God's way of salvation,) all families, countries, and ages, build or pull down: and find the kindness or severity of God."

The learned author took great pains to shew, that the heathen chronology contained numerous inconsistencies and contradictions, while the sacred history was perfectly clear from these imperfections. However, no sooner was his book published, than it met with great opposition. Archbishop Whitgift, at first, so exceedingly disliked the performance, that he would have called the author to an account for some things contained in it; but, to avoid the high commission, Mr. Broughton fled into Germany. This, indeed, greatly excited the general clamour against the book, and very much increased the number of its adversaries; nevertheless, Bishop Aylmer, in commendation of the work, said, "That one scholar of right judgment, would prove all its adversaries foolish."+ Notwithstanding this, Dr. Rainolds of Oxford, and Mr. Lively of Cambridge, both learned professors in those universities, read publicly against the book.

Mr. Broughton used to call this work," his little book of great pains:" for it cost him many years study; and when it was published, he had to write and publish in defence of it, against the exceptions of the above divines. By the allowance of the queen and council, he entered upon its defence, in public lectures in St. Paul's church, when the lord mayor, some of the most learned of the bishops, and other persons of distinction, were of his audience. Others of the bishops, however, could not endure these exercises, calling them dangerous conventicles; and therefore brought complaints against him, and put down his lecture. He and his friends afterwards assembled privately, at various places in the city, as they found opportunity.‡ During Mr. Broughton's continuance in London, he mostly resided in the house of Mr. William Cotton; whose son, afterwards Sir Rowland Cotton, he instructed in the Hebrew language. His young pupil obtained so exact a knowledge of the language, that at the age of seven or eight years he could translate almost any chapter of the Bible into English,

Biog. Britan. vol. ii. p. 606. + Strype's Aylmer, p. 249.
Clark's Lives, p. 3.

Mr. Roger Cotton, brother to this person, was one of Mr. Broughton's true scholars. He read the whole Bible through twelve times in one year. Ibid. p. 4.

Mr.

and converse with the greatest ease in Hebrew.* William Cowper, afterwards Bishop of Galloway, was another of his pupils.+

"In

Mr. Broughton was a zealous advocate for the purity of the sacred text both of the Old and New Testament. the prophet Daniel's time, and afterwards," says he, "the sacred tongues were changed: it will not therefore be amiss to speak something of God's counsel in this matter. Adam and Eve's tongue continued, commonly spoken by the Jews, until the captivity of Babylon, and the understanding thereof, when Haggai and Zachary prophesied, in the next age. In this tongue every book of the Old Testament is written in a style inimitable. The characters and points are the same as those written by God on the two tables. The Masorites, of whom Ezra was chief, with an Arguseyed diligence so keep the letters and words, that none of them can perish. The sense of the tongue is preserved for us by the LXX, the N. T. And the Talmudic phrase by them, who in their schools still kept their tongue. By the help of the LXX. and N. T. we may excel all the rabbins. For their study is more easy to us than to them, in regard that they imitate the Greeks in their fables and expressions, and we have above them God, an heavenly interpreter for us in all the N. T. which, both for the infinite elegance and variety of its words, is most divinely eloquent. In it are the choice words of all kind of all Greek writers, nor can they all, without some fragments of the ancients, and the LXX. shew all the words in it. It hath also some new-framed words, as all chief authors have, and all brave expressions; so that if any one would study in another tongue to express the like elegancy, he may as well fly with Dædalus's waxwing, and miscarry in the attempt. In the N. T. is a fourfold Greek, 1. common; 2. the LXX. Greek; 3. the Apostolic; 4. the Talmudic. The uncorruptness of the N. T. text is undoubted to all who know the Hebrew tongue, history, and the exact Athenian eloquence. And such as pretend to correct it, do debase the majesty of both

*This account may appear to some almost incredible. Mr. Broughton's method of instruction was singular. He had his young pupil constantly with him, and invariably required him to speak, both to himself and others, in Hebrew. He also drew up a vocabulary, which young Cotton constantly used. In this vocabulary he fixed on some place, or thing, then named all the particulars belonging to it: as, heaven, angels, sun, moon, stars, clouds, &c.; or, a house, door, window, parlour, &c.; a field, grass, flowers, trees, &c.—Ibid.

+ Clark's Eccl. Hist. p. 899.

Testaments, by unskilful altering what God spake most divinely. The reading, therefore, of the apostles in these matters will call together Homer, Hesiod, Eschylus, Pindarus, and others of the coasts of Illyricum: as also Sophocles, Euripides, Aristophanes, Aratus, Menander, Callimachus, Epimenides, Plato, Aristotle, and all the orators and historians of Grecian writing in the time when this tongue flourished."

He maintained that the gospel of St. Matthew was originally written in Greek. The New Testament," says he, "was all originally in Greek. St. Matthew's gospel was written at the first in that heavenly oratorious Greek which we now have: and if the Holy Ghost had written it in the Jews' Jerusalem Hebrew, the holy learned of old time would have kept it with more care than jewellers all precious stones. We accuse antiquity of great ungodliness, when we say St. Matthew wrote in Hebrew, but antiquity lost that gospel. So St. Paul wrote in Greek to the Hebrews, in those syllables which we have to this day; and the style hath allusions, which the Jews' tongue hath not: which sheweth the original to be in Greek. The apostles wrote the New Testament in Greek, with such skill, that they go through all kind of Greek writers. They have words in their little book, good Greek, which Greeks have only in fragments, reserved by God's providence to honour the New Testa ment."+

This is the high character which our divine gives of the elegance and purity of the apostolic writings. His sentiments were equally exalted concerning the sacred records of the Old Testament. He made the following observations upon the Book of Job: "There never was a book written," says he," since the pen became the tongue of a writer, of a more curious style than Job; in verse of many sorts, and use of words more nice than any Greek or Latin writeth; and for grammar, hath more tricks and difficulty than all the Bible beside, Arabizing much; but fuller of Hebrew depth of language. God saw it needful to honour with a style of all ornaments the particular case of Job, lest it should be despised or thought a feigned matter; and, therefore, gave that book a more curious style than any other part of the Bible; and such depth of skill in the tongue, as no rabbin could be thought ever to have in the holy tongue." Mr. Broughton, as we have already intimated, fled to + Ibid. p. 607.

* Biog. Britan. vol. ii. p. 606.

Ibid. p. 609.