to witness this protestation; that in that disquisition and search, he proceeded with humility and diffidence in himself; and by that which he took to be the safest way; namely, frequent prayers, and an indifferent affection to both parties; and indeed, Truth had too much light about her to be hid from so sharp an enquirer; and he had too much ingenuity, not to acknowledge he had found her.

Being to undertake this search, he believed the Cardinal Bellarmine* to be the best defender of the Roman cause, and therefore betook himself to the examination of his reasons. The cause

was weighty, and wilful delays had been inexcusable bcth towards God and his own conscience: he therefore proceeded in this search with all moderate haste, and about the twentieth year of his age, did show the then Dean of Gloucester-whose name my memory hath now lost-all the Cardinal's works marked with many weighty observations under his own hand; which works were bequeathed by him, at his death, as a legacy to a most dear friend.

About a year following he resolved to travel; and the Earl of Essex going first the Cales, and after the Island voyages, the

* One of the most celebrated controversial writers of his time; he was born in Tuscany in 1542, and became a Jesuit in 1560. Until 1576, he was a teacher of Divinity in the Low Countries, but he then commenced reading controversial Lectures at Rome; and with such success, that Sixtus V. sent him with his Legate into France, to assist in the event of any religious dispute. In 1599, Clement VIII. created him a Cardinal, and he resided in the Vatican from 1605 till 1621, when he left it in declining health, and died in the House of the Jesuits, Sept. 17th. His work alluded to, is entitled " Disputationes de Controversiis Christiana Fidei, adversus sui temporis Hæreticos," Cologne, 1610, 4 vol. fol.

+ Dr. Anthony Rudde, a native of Yorkshire, and Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge; died Bishop of St. David's in 1613-14.

This was an expedition consisting of a fleet of 150 sail, with twenty-two Dutch ships, and seven thousand soldiers; Charles Howard, Earl of Nottingham, being Lord High Admiral, and the Earl of Essex, General of the Land forces. On June 21st, the Spanish squadron was destroyed, and Cadiz taken, with an immense treasure and stores; in addition to which the inhabitants redeemed their lives at the price of 520,000 ducats. The Island voyage was also an expedition to oppose the King of Spain invading Ireland, in 1597; and it consisted of 120 sail, and 6,000 land forces under the Earl of Essex. It was

first anno 1596, the second 1597, he took the advantage of those opportunities, waited upon his Lordship, and was an eyewitness of those happy and unhappy employments.

But he returned not back into England, till he had staid some years, first in Italy, and then in Spain, where he made many useful observations of those countries, their laws and manner of government, and returned perfect in their languages.

The time that he spent in Spain, was, at his first going into Italy, designed for travelling to the Holy Land, and for viewing Jerusalem and the Sepulchre of our Saviour. But at his being in the furthest parts of Italy, the disappointment of company, or of a safe convoy, or the uncertainty of returns of money into those remote parts, denied him that happiness, which he did often occasionally mention with a deploration.

Not long after his return into England, that exemplary pattern of gravity and wisdom, the Lord Ellesmere,* then Keeper of the Great Seal, the Lord Chancellor of England, taking notice of his learning, languages, and other abilities, and much affecting his person and behaviour, took him to be his chief Secretary; supposing and intending it to be an introduction to some more weighty employment in the State; for which, his Lordship did often protest, he thought him very fit.

Nor did his Lordship in this time of Master Donne's attendance upon him, account him to be so much his servant, as to forget he

his intention first to have destroyed the ships preparing, and then sailing to the Azores, or Western Islands, to have waited for, and captured the Spanish India Fleet. This scheme, however, failed, through contrary winds, storms, and a dispute between the Earl of Essex and Sir Walter Raleigh.

* Sir Thomas Ellesmere of Tatton in the County of Chester, Knight, the natural son of Sir Richard Egerton of Ridley, was born about 1540, and was entered of Brazen Nose College, Oxford, at the age of 17, whence he removed to Lincoln's Inn. On June 28th, 1581, he was made Solicitor-General, and was soon afterwards knighted; in April, 1594, he was appointed Master of the Rolls: and in 1596, he received the Great Seal, and was sworn of the Privy Council. In 1604, James I. created him Baron of Ellesmere and Lord Chancellor, which office he held till the age of 76, when he addressed two pathetic letters to the King for his dismissal. The Sovereign first created him Viscount Brackley, and then received the Seals from him in person upon his death-bed. He died at York House in the Strand, March 15th, 1617.

was his friend; and, to testify it, did always use him with much courtesy, appointing him a place at his own table, to which he esteemed his company and discourse to be a great ornament.

He continued that employment for the space of five years, being daily useful, and not mercenary to his friend. During which time, he,—I dare not say unhappily-fell into such a liking, as, with her approbation,-increased into a love, with a young gentlewoman that lived in that family, who was niece to the Lady Ellesmere, and daughter to Sir George More, then Chancellor of the Garter and Lieutenant of the Tower.

*

Sir George had some intimation of it, and, knowing prevention to be a great part of wisdom, did therefore remove her with much haste, from that to his own house at Lothesley, in the County of Surrey; but too late, by reason of some faithful promises which were so interchangeably passed, as never to be violated by either party.

These promises were only known to themselves; and the friends of both parties used much diligence, and many arguments, to kill or cool their affections to each other: but in vain; for love† is a flattering mischief, that hath denied aged and wise men a foresight of those evils that too often prove to be the children of that blind father, a passion, that carries us to commit errors with as much ease as whirlwinds move feathers, and begets in us an unwearied industry to the attainment of what we desire. And such an industry did, notwithstanding much watchfulness against it,

* Sir George was the only son and heir of Sir William More, and was born Nov. 28th, 1552; educated at Exeter College, Oxford, whence he removed to the Inns of Court. About 1597, he was knighted, in 1610, was made Chancellor of the Garter, and in 1615, Lieutenant of the Tower. He frequently sat in Parliament for the Borough of Guildford, and he died Oct. 16th, 1632. His sister, the Lady Ellesmere, was the eldest daughter of Sir William More, and was born April 28th, 1552. She was thrice married, the last of her husbands being Chancellor Egerton; and the second Sir John Wolley of Pirford, Knt. Losely House, the seat of the More family, is situate in the Hundred of Godalming, and County of Surrey, about two miles south-west of Guildford. It consists of a main body, facing the north, and one wing extending northward from its western extremity; the whole being built of the ordinary country stone. + This fine passage on the rashness of youthful passion was not inserted till Walton's second edition.

bring them secretly together, I forbear to tell the manner how -and at last to a marriage too, without the allowance of those friends, whose approbation always was, and ever will be, necessary, to make even a virtuous love become lawful.

And, that the knowledge of their marriage might not fall, like an unexpected tempest, on those that were unwilling to have it so; and that pre-apprehensions might make it the less enormous when it was known, it was purposely whispered into the ears of many that it was so, yet by none that could affirm it. But, to put a period to the jealousies of Sir George,-doubt often begetting more restless thoughts than the certain knowledge of what we fear the news was, in favour to Mr. Donne, and with his allow. ance, made known to Sir George, by his honourable friend and neighbour Henry, Earl of Northumberland ;* but it was to Sir George so immeasurably unwelcome, and so transported him, that, as though his passion of anger and inconsideration might exceed theirs of love and error, he presently engaged his sister, the Lady Ellesmere, to join with him to procure her lord to discharge Mr. Donne of the place he held under his Lordship. This request was followed with violence; and though Sir George were remembered, that errors might be over punished, and desired therefore to forbear, till second considerations might clear some scruples; yet he became restless until his suit was granted, and the punishment executed. And though the Lord Chancellor did

* Henry Percy, ninth Earl of Northumberland, born in April, 1564; succeeded to the title in June, 1585. In 1588, he was one of those gallant young noblemen who hired ships at their own charge, and joined the fleet despatched against the Spanish Armada ; and in 1593, he was made Knight of the Garter. He was greatly attached to the House of Stuart, and was active in the interests of James I.; but as one of the conspirators in the Gunpowder Plot was related to his Lordship, he was prosecuted, fined £30,000. by Sir Edward Coke in the Sar-Chamber, and sentenced to imprisonment in the Tower during life. The Earl's fine was reduced to £20,090. and his liberty restored after fifteen years confinement, in July, 1621. He died, Nov. 5th, 1632. Wood calls him "a learned man himself, and the generous favourer of all good learning;" during his imprisonment he allowed salaries for eminent scholars to attend upon him, and he also enjoyed the converse of Sir Walter Raleigh, then a prisoner in the Tower. He had a peculiar talent for mathematics; and on account of his love for the occult sciences, he was sometimes entitled Henry the Wizard.

not, at Mr. Donne's dismission, give him such a commendation as the great Emperor Charles the Fifth did of his Secretary, Eraso, when he parted with him to his son and successor, Philip the Second, saying, "That in his Eraso, he gave to him a greater gift than all his estate, and all the kingdoms which he then resigned to him" yet the Lord Chancellor said, "He parted with a friend, and such a Secretary as was fitter to serve a king than a subject."

Immediately after his dismission from his service, he sent a sad letter to his wife, to acquaint her with it and after the subscription of his name, writ,

John Donne, Anne Donne, Un-done;

And God knows it proved too true;* for this bitter physic of Mr. Donne's dismission, was not enough to purge out all Sir George's choler; for he was not satisfied till Mr. Donne and his sometime com-pupil in Cambridge, that married him, namely, Samuel Brooke,† who was after Doctor in Divinity, and Master of Trinity College and his brother Mr. Christopher Brooke, sometime Mr. Donne's chamber-fellow in Lincoln's Inn, who gave Mr. Donne his wife, and witnessed the marriage, were all committed to three several prisons.

Mr. Donne was first enlarged, who neither gave rest to his body or brain, nor to any friend in whom he might hope to have an

* The passage beginning" and though the Lord Chancellor"-down to"it proved too true," is not entire in either of Walton's first two editions.

+ Son of Robert Brook, an eminent merchant, and Lord Mayor of York, in 1582 and 1595. He was admitted of Trinity College in Cambridge, in 1596, and Sept. 26th, 1612, was chosen Divinity Professor in Gresham College, being then Chaplain to Prince Henry. In 1615, he was made D.D.; in 1618, Rector of St. Margaret's Lothbury, in London; in 1629, Master of Trinity College; and Archdeacon of Wells, in 1631, in which year he died. Of his writing there remains one Latin discourse, and a Latin Pastoral, called Melanthe, acted before King James at Cambridge. Christopher Brook was a Bencher and Summer Reader at Lincoln's Inn, and is much commended as a poet by Ben Jonson, Drayton, &c. He wrote an Elegy to the never-dying memory of Henry, Prince of Wales, Lond. 1613, 4to.; and he also published a volume of Eclogues, Lond. 1614. In Dr. Donne's Poe's are two addressed to this gentleman, "the Storme." and "the Calme."