of his temper, added to his wit and learning, made him generally beloved. In short, he was so engaging and had such a fruitful faculty of begetting wit in others, when he exerted it himself, that he made his associates pleased with their own conversation as well as his; his blaze kindled sparks in them, till they admired at their own brightness; and when any melancholy hours were to be filled up with merriment, it was said, in the vein he could sometimes descend to, that the Doctor made every one Fuller.-In 1645, he published at Exeter his "Good Thoughts in Bad Times."*

When Exeter was obliged to surrender to the Parliament forces under Sir Thomas Fairfax, in 1646, Fuller was permitted, without any loss or interruption, to remove to London. Here he met with a cold reception from his former parishioners at the Savoy, probably on account of the part which he had taken in politics; and found his lectureship filled by another person. In 1650, he published "A Pisgah-Sight of Palestine, and the Confines thereof, with the History of the Old and New Testament, acted thereon," (folio); in 1651, "Abel Redivivus, or the Dead yet Speaking the Lives and Deaths of the modern Divines." (4to); and in 1656, "The Church History of Britain from the Birth of Jesus Christ until the Year 1648;" to which were subjoined, "The History of the University of Cambridge since the Conquest,"

* In 1647, appeared his "Good Thoughts in Worse Times," and at the Restoration in 1660, "Mixt Contemplations in Better Times." These three pieces have lately been republished in a small volume by William Pickering, London, 1830.

and "The History of Waltham Abbey in Essex, founded by King Harold." (folio.) Bishop Nicolson, in his English Historical Library, observes of Fuller's Church History, "Through the whole he is so full of his own wit, that he does not seem to have minded what he was about. If a pretty story comes in his way that affords scope for clinch and droll, off it goes with all the gaiety of the stage, without staying to inquire whether it have any foundation in truth or not; and even the most serious and most authentic parts of it are so interlaced with pun and quibble, that it looks as if the man had designed to ridicule the annals of our church into fable and romance. Yet if it were possible to refine it well, the work would be of good use; since there are in it some things of moment, hardly to be had elsewhere."*

In 1660, Fuller accompanied his patron, Lord Berkley, to the Hague, to congratulate Charles II. on his restoration to the throne. Soon afterwards he was appointed chaplain to the King, created Doctor of Divinity at Cambridge, by mandamus, and destined to the Episcopal bench. This last preferment, however, was prevented by his death, which took place Aug. 16, 1661, in the fiftyfourth year of his age. The year after his death was published his principal literary work, "The History of the Worthies of England," (folio,)† a work valuable alike for the solid in

* An elaborate vindication of Fuller from Nicolson's and Heylin's attacks on his writings, may be seen in the Biographia Brittanica.

† A new edition of "The Worthies," was published in London, 1811, in two volumes quarto, with a few explanatory notes, by John Nichols.

formation it affords relative to the provincial history of the country, and for the profusion of biographical anecdote of men and manners; though Bishop Nicolson says, that "the lives of his greatest heroes are commonly mis-shapen scraps, mixed with tattle and lies."*

Dr. Fuller's person was tall and well-made; his presence stately and majestic; and his manner frank and unaffectedly polite. His disposition was amiable and benevolent, and his conduct highly commendable in his domestic and social relations. We have already noticed the esteem in which he was held as an instructive and entertaining companion. His learning and ingenuity were considerable, his imagination lively, and his memory remarkably retentive. "He was a walking-library," says his Biographer, "but sometimes required turning over to attain the contents.”

Of the strength of Fuller's memory such marvellous stories are recorded as almost stagger credibility. It is said that he could repeat five hundred strange and unconnected words, after twice hearing them; and could preach a sermon verbatim, which he had heard only once. In passing to and fro, from Temple Bar to the farthest end of Cheapside, he once undertook to mention all the signs over the shops, as they stood in order, on both sides of the way, repeating them either backwards or forwards; and performed his task with perfect exactness.-In the Diary of Samuel Pepys, Esq. recently published, the writer says, "Jan. 22, 1661, I met with Dr. Thomas Fuller. He tells

* See note on page xix.

1

me of his last and great book that is coming out: that is, the History of all the Families in England; and could tell me more of my own than I knew myself. And also to what perfection he hath now brought the art of memory; that he did lately to four eminently great scholars dictate together in Latin upon different subjects of their proposing, faster than they were able to write, till they were tired; and that the best way of beginning a sentence, if a man should be out, and forget, his last sentence, (which he never was,) that then his last refuge is to begin with an Utcunque."

66

The Doctor making a visit to the committee of sequestrators sitting at Waltham, in Essex, they soon fell into a discourse and commendation of his great memory; to which he replied, ""T is true, gentlemen, that fame has given me the report of a memorist, and, if you please, I will give you an experiment of it." They all accepted the motion, and told him they should look upon it as an obligation, praying him to begin. "Gentlemen," says he, "I will give you an instance of my memory in the particular business in which you are employed. Your worships have thought fit to sequester an honest, but poor cavalier parson, my neighbor, from his living, and committed him to prison. He has a large family of children, and his circumstances are but indifferent. If you will please to release him out of prison, and restore him to his living, I will never forget the kindness while I live."

"But what was most strange and rare in him,"

* Basil Montagu's Selections, p. 316.

says his Biographer, "was his way of writing, which was somewhat like the Chinese, from the top to the bottom of the page. The manner thus: he would write next the margin the first word of every line, down to the foot of the paper; then beginning at the head again, would so perfectly fill up every one of the lines, as, without spaces, interlineations or contractions, but with the full and equal length, would so aptly connect and conjoin the ends and beginnings, that the sense would appear as complete and as much to his mind, he would say, as if he had writ it after the ordinary manner, in a continued series."

"*

The following delineation of Fuller's character as a writer, is extracted from the Retrospective Review, vol. III. p. 50.

"If ever there was an amusing writer in this world, the facetious Thomas Fuller was one. There was in him a combination of those qualities which minister to our entertainment, such as few have ever possessed in an equal degree. He was, first of all, a man of extensive and multifarious reading; of great and digested knowledge, which an extraordinary retentiveness of memory preserved ever ready for use, and considerable accuracy of judgment enabled him successfully to apply. He was also, if we may use the term, a very great anecdote-monger; an indefatigable collector of the traditionary stories related of eminent characters, to gather which, his biographers inform

* Burnett's Specimens of the old English Prose Writers, vol III. p. 172, and Biographia Britannica.