of dignity and something of command. He is always spoken of by contemporary and by nearly succeeding writers with marked respect and veneration. He is said 2 to have been "a man of a cholerick disposition," which one can easily conjecture from the fervour of his oratorical temperament and the frequent vehemency of his rhetoric. But the same authority which affirms his possession of a fiery spirit says also that "he had ordinarily as much government of his choler, as a man has of a mastiff dog in a chain ; he could let out his dog, and pull in his dog, as he pleased." Eulogiums of his benevolence, of his patience, his humility, as well as of his practical sagacity and wisdom in the management of the affairs of his own and of the neighbouring churches, are preserved on various pages of the pedantic writer to whom, with all his faults and not infrequent inaccuracies, we are indebted for so much that would be otherwise unknown, not only of Hooker, but of most of the fathers of our New England history. One interesting and suggestive illustration of this practical and kindly wisdom in the management of the concerns of his own church must conclude our chapter:

"As for ecclesiastical censures, he was very watchful to prevent all proceedures unto them, as far as was consistent with the rules of our Lord; for which cause (ex

1 This impression is well realized in the full-length statue ordered by the State of Connecticut for erection in the State Capitol, a representation of which constitutes the frontispiece of this volume. 8 Ibid.

2 Magnalia, i. 313.

cept in grosser abominations) when offences happened, he did his utmost, that the notice thereof might be extended no further than it was when they first were laid before him; and having reconciled the offenders with sensible and convenient acknowledgements of their miscarriages, he would let the notice thereof be confined unto such as were aforehand therewith acquainted; and hence there was but one person admonished in, and but one person excommunicated from the church of Hartford, in all the fourteen years, that Mr. Hooker lived there." 1

1 Magnalia, i. 316, 317.

VII.

THOMAS HOOKER'S WRITINGS.

'Twas of Genevahs Worthies said, with wonder,
(Those Worthies Three) Farell was wont to thunder;
Viret, like Rain, on tender grasse to shower,

But Calvin, lively Oracles to pour.

All these in Hookers spirit did remain :

A Sonne of Thunder, and a Shower of Rain,
A pourer-forth of lively Oracles,

In saving souls, the summe of miracles.

JOHN COTTON's Elegy.

WITH the single exception of the "Survey of the Summe of Church Discipline," spoken of in the last chapter, Mr. Hooker was not in primary purpose an author of books. Of his published writings some thirty titles are indeed extant.1 Yet all these volumes, with the exception of the one on Church Polity, to whose composition he had been "haled by importunity," were at first discourses, whose original and main use was oral delivery, and whose chief object was the immediately practical one of impressing, convincing, and persuading the hearers of his voice.

Some of these discourses were apparently printed from notes taken down by hearers of his Lectures at Chelmsford, or possibly still earlier at Emmanuel; and

1 Appendix II.

66

even of others, concerning which we have the assurance that they are as they were penned under his own hand," or "printed from his own papers written with his own hand," 1 we have no tokens of editorial revision by himself, and little of any intention in their composition that they should be printed at all. All his books—unless "The Poore Doubting Christian” be a possible exception — being published in England, either during his exile in Holland, his residence in America, or after his death, he saw none of them through the press; and though authorizing the issue of some of them, imparted to none the benefit of an author's customary review of the printed page. One of them-"The Saints Dignitie and Dutie," published in 1651-was compiled by his son-in-law, Shepard; two or three others as "A Comment upon Christs Last Prayer," published in 1656, and "The Application of Redemption," published in 1659 were issued under the prefatory supervision of Rev. Thomas Goodwin and Rev. Philip Nye; and some in all probability were printed from copies of Mr. Hooker's discourses made by Rev. John Higginson, of Guilford, who is said 2 to have "transcribed from his manuscripts near two hundred of these excellent sermons which were sent over into England that they might be published; but by what means I know not, scarce half of them have seen the light unto this

1 See Goodwin and Nye's preface, and the publisher's announcement to the "Comment upon Christs Last Prayer" and "The Application of Redemption."

2 Magnalia, i. 315.

day." Several of the volumes are altogether anonymous, a fact itself suggestive of the surreptitious use and publication of the materials of which they were compiled.

But though there is some diversity in the details of style and finish, such as this variety of manner in the appearance of the volumes would suggest, the family likeness is unmistakable. They obviously came, whatever verbal blemish may attach to them, from the same mind and pen.

Mr. Hooker was regarded by his associates themselves men of great learning as a learned man; and indications of the fact come out distinctly in his "Survey," and, in an exegetical way, to some extent in his discourses. But one looks in vain in his writings, as in the writings of his Puritan contemporaries generally, for any apparent knowledge of current secular literature. The poets of the Elizabethan period find not the slightest token of existence in his pages. Shakspeare died in Hooker's university days; Bacon while he was preaching at Chelmsford; but neither the poetry of the one nor the philosophy of the other, nor the literature which either of them stood in any wise the representative of, apparently came in the least degree within the ken of Hooker, any more than they did within the ken of most of his associates in the Puritan ministry of his time. Even the literature of the Prayer-book, with which they must have been familiar from childhood, is almost unreflected in their pages.

Of the graces of a literary style, therefore, Hooker