"Basilicon Doron ;" and their Orator was to acknowledge this great honour, and return their gratitude to his Majesty for such a condescension, at the close of which letter he writ, "Quid Vaticanam Bodleianamque objicis hospes ! This letter was writ in such excellent Latin, was so full of conceits, and all the expressions so suited to the genius of the King, that he inquired the orator's name, and then asked William Earl of Pembroke, if he knew him? whose answer was, * Or "His Majesty's Instructions to his dearest son, Henry "the Prince," 1599. It has been considered as the best of the King's works, and in the opinion of Lord Bacon is excellently written. (Bacon's Works, Vol. III. p. 223, 118.) "In this "book," says Mr. Camden, " is most elegantly pourtrayed and set forth the pattern of a most excellent, every way accom"plished, king. Incredible it is how many men's hearts and " affections he won unto him by his correcting of it, and what an "expectation of himself he raised amongst all men even to ad"miration." And Archbishop Spotswood observes, that it is said to have contributed more to facilitate the King's accession to the throne of England, than all the discourses published by other writers in his favour. The famous Andrew Melvin, or rather Melville, having obtained a copy of the "Doron Basilicon" in manuscript, thought some passages so very exceptionable, that he directed several copies to be circulated in different parts of Scotland. In consequence of this, a libel was drawn up against the work and laid before the Synod of St. Andrew's, by a minister of the kirk. To vindicate himself, James caused it to be published in 1599. It may not be improper here to mention an instance of courtly address noticed by Bishop Hacket in his "Life of Archbishop "Williams," "That he knew him very well, and that he was "his kinsman; but he loved him more for his "learning and virtue, than for that he was of his "name and family." At which answer the King smiled, and asked the Earl leave, "That he might "love him too; for he took him to be the jewel "of that University." The next occasion he had and took to shew his great abilities was with them, to shew also his great affection to that church in which he received his baptism, and of which he professed himself a member; and the occasion was this: There was "Williams," p. 175. Having remarked that the King, on opening the Parliament in 1623, feasted the two houses with a speech, than which nothing could be apter for the subject, or more eloquent for the matter; he adds, "All the helps of that faculty were extremely perfect in him, abounding in wit by nature, in "art by education, in wisdom by experience. Mr. Geo. Herbert, "being Prælector in the Rhetorique School in Cambridge, "anno 1618, passed by those fluent orators that domineered in "the pulpits of Athens and Rome, and insisted to read upon an "oration of King James, which he analysed, shewed the con cinnity of the parts, the propriety of the phrase, the height and "power of it to move the affections, the style utterly unknown to "the ancients, who could not conceive what kingly eloquence "was ; in respect of which those noted demagogi were but hire"lings, and triobulary rhetoricians." Let it not be forgotten that Mr. Herbert was then a very young man, flushed with hopes of obtaining promotion in a court where all the blandishments of adulation were practised.-Time, experience, and serious contemplation, effectuated a change in his mind, and totally alienated him from every ambitious pursuit. one Andrew Melvin, a minister of the Scotch Church, and rector of St. Andrews, who, by a long and constant converse, with a discontented part of that clergy which opposed Episcopacy, became at last to be a chief leader of that faction; and had proudly appeared to be so to King James, when he was but King of that nation, who, the second year after his coronation in England, convened a part of the Bishops and other learned Divines of his church to attend him at HamptonCourt, in order to a friendly conference with some dissenting brethren, both of this, and the Church of Scotland: Of which Scotch party, Andrew Melvin was one'; and he being a man of learning, and inclined to satirical poetry, had scattered many malicious bitter verses against our liturgy, our ceremonies, and our church government; which. were by some of that party so magnified for the wit, that they were therefore brought into Westminster School, where Mr. George Herbert then, and often after, made such answers to them, and such reflections on him and his kirk, as might un ANDREW MELVILLE was not present at the celebrated conference held at Hampton-Court, in the first year of King James I. upon the complaint of the Puritans against the ceremonies and the liturgy of the Church of England. He was summoned to appear before the King and Council in 1604. In the first edition of " Mr. Walton's Life of Mr. George Herbert," Melville is de scribed to be "Master of a great wit; a wit full of knots and "clenches; a wit sharp and satirical; exceeded, I think, by none "of that nation, but their Buchanan." beguile any man that was not too deeply preengaged in such a quarrel. But to return to Mr. Melvin at Hampton-Court Conference, he there appeared to be a man of an unruly wit, of a strange confidence, of so furious a zeal, and of so ungoverned passions, that his insolence to the King, and others at this Conference, lost him both his rectorship of St. Andrews, and his liberty too: For his former verses, and his present reproaches there used against the church and state, caused him to be committed prisoner to the Tower of London, where he remained very angry for three years. At which time of his commitment, he found the Lady Arabella, an innocent prisoner there; and he pleased himself much in sending the next day after his commitment, these two verses to the good Lady; which I will under This unfortunate Lady ARABELLA STUART, daughter of Charles Earl of Lenox, the younger brother of Henry Darnley, the King's father, died in prison, Sept. 27th, 1615, and was interred at Westminster, without any funeral pomp, in the night, in the same vault wherein Mary Queen of Scots and Prince Henry were buried. The following epitaph was written upon her by Bishop Corbet. She is supposed to be the speaker, "How do I thank thee, Death, and bless thy power, “And a small coffin my poor carcase hath. "Enlarg'd at last, secure from hope and fear. write, because they may give the reader a taste of his others, which were like these "Causa tibi mecum est communis, carceris, Ara- I shall not trouble my reader with an account of his enlargement from that prison, or his death; but tell him Mr. Herbert's verses were thought so Owen the epigrammatist dedicates a Book of Epigrams to this lady, whom he styles "excellentissimam et doctissimam "heroinam." "Regia progenies, genere illustrissima virgo, "Consecrat, ingenium sacrificatque suum." AUDOENI EPIGR. L. IV. Ep. 1. The lines quoted by Mr. Isaac Walton were inscribed by Andrew Melville, not to Lady Arabella Stuart, but to Sir William Seymour, afterwards Marquis of Hertford, who was then imprisoned in the Tower, for marrying her without the King's consent. Fuller has transcribed them differently: "Causa mihi tecum communis carceris, ara Edward Philips, a nephew of Milton, published his "Lives of "the Poets" in 1615. He thus quotes this distich: "Causa mihi tecum communis carceris, Ara "Bella tibi causa est carceris, Ara mihi.” This seems to be the better reading. Melville did not hold the altar to be sacred. |