family and household cares, that they were withheld, as by so many barriers, from rushing into all kinds of wickedness. Though himself living in perfect chastity, yet, of all in the list of offenders, he was less hard on those, were they priests or even monks, whose only offence was incontinence. It was not that he failed to abhor the vice of unchastity; but that he found such persons not nearly so bad, in comparison, as some others, who thought no small things of themselves, though overweening, envious, slanderous, backbiters, hypocrites, empty-headed, ignorant, given up heart and soul to money-making and ambition; while their acknowledged infirmity rendered the former more humble and unassuming. Covetousness and pride, he would say, were more detestable in a priest than keeping a hundred concubines.

I would not have anyone strain these opinions to such a degree as to suppose incontinence in a priest or monk to be a slight offence; but only to infer from them that those of the other kind are still further removed from true religion.

There was no class of persons to whom he was more opposed, or for whom he had a greater abhorrence, than those bishops who acted the part of wolves instead of shepherds; showing themselves off before the people with their guise of sanctity, their ceremonies, benedictions, and paltry indulgences, while at heart they were slaves to the world, that is, to ostentation and gain. He had a leaning to some opinions, derived from Dionysius' and the other early divines, though not to such a degree as to make him. contravene in any points the decisions of the Church.

1 An abstract of the Celestial Hierarchy and the Ecclesiastical Hierarchy, made by Colet, is preserved in the library of St. Paul's School. It was translated and published in 1869.

Still, they made him less hard on such as disapproved of the universal adoration of images in churches, whether painted, or of wood, or stone, or bronze, or silver; or again on those who doubted whether a priest, openly and notoriously wicked, had any efficacy in the administration of the sacraments. Not that he in any way leaned to this error of theirs, but he was indignant against such as, by a life of open and unmixed depravity, gave occasion to surmises of this kind.

The colleges established in England at a great and imposing cost he used to say were a hindrance to profitable studies, and merely centres of attraction for the lazy. And in like manner he did not attach much value to the public schools, on the ground that the race for professorships and

2

1 The age in which Colet lived was an age of foundation of colleges. At Oxford he saw the erection of Brasenose in 1509, and Corpus Christi in 1516; while the splendid foundation of William of Waynflete, Magdalen College and Hall, preceded the date of his birth by no more than eight years. At Cambridge, without reckoning the re-foundation of Queens' the year before his birth, he saw the rise of St. Catharine's in 1473, Jesus in 1496, Christ's in 1505, St. John's in 1511, and Magdalene in 1519. Why Colet should have thought unfavourably of the working of such institutions as those of Bishop Fisher or the Countess of Richmond and Derby, is not clear.

2 By "public schools" here, it need hardly be observed that Colet did not mean what we now commonly call by that name, but the University Schools, in which the public lectures were given by the regents, and the examination of candidates for "inception was held. In Matthew Stokys' Book, printed at the end of Peacock's Observations on the Statutes . of Cambridge (1841), many interesting particulars are given of the proceedings in these "common schooles." It must be remembered that, in Colet's time, the instruction now given by the colleges, or by private tuition, had to be sought almost entirely from the public lectures of the regent masters in arts and doctors. Moreover, 'all doctors, in whatever faculty, were called likewise professores, and

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fees spoilt everything, and adulterated the purity of all branches of learning.

While strongly approving of auricular confession, saying that there was nothing from which he derived so much comfort and spiritual advantage, he yet as strongly condemned its too solicitous and frequent repetition. It is the custom in England for priests to celebrate the Holy Eucharist every day. But Colet was content to do so on Sundays and festivals, or at the most on some few days in addition; either because it kept him away from the sacred studies by which he used to prepare for preaching, and from the necessary business of the Cathedral, or because he found that he sacrificed with devouter feelings if he let an interval elapse. At the same time he was far from disapproving of the principles of those who liked to come every day to the Table of the Lord.

He

Himself a most learned man, he did not approve of that painful and laborious erudition, which is made complete at all points, so to speak, by an acquaintance with all branches of learning and the perusal of every author. It was his constant remark, that the natural soundness and simplicity of men's intellects were impaired by it, and they were rendered less healthy-minded, and less fitted for Christian innocence, and for pure and simple charity. set a very high value on the Apostolic Epistles; but he had possessed an equal capacity to claim and occupy the chair (cathedra) on solemn inceptions and other occasions.”—Peacock, ut sup., p. 34 n. We can thus understand the rivalry and competition for fees that would prevail, when the schools (at least in Cambridge) had to be hired by the lecturer, and his remuneration depended on the fees paid by those resorting to him.-See further Mullinger's University of Cambridge (1873), p. 301.

such a reverence for the wonderful majesty of Christ, that the writings of the Apostles seemed to grow poor by the side of it. He had with great ability reduced almost all the sayings of Christ to triplets,' intending to make a book of them. The rule that priests, even though busily occupied, must say long prayers right through every day, no matter whether at home or on a journey, was a thing that he greatly wondered at. As to the public service of the Church, he was quite of opinion that that should be performed with proper dignity.

From numbers of the tenets most generally received in the public schools at the present day he widely dissented, and would at times discuss them among his private friends. When with others, he would keep his opinions to himself, for fear of coming to harm in two ways; that is to say, only making matters worse by his efforts, and sacrificing his own reputation. There was no book so heretical but he read it with attention. For from such, he said, he many a time received more benefit than from the books of those who so define er hing, as often to flatter their party-leaders, and not seldom her own selves as well.

He could endure that the faculty of speaking correctly should be sought from the trivial rules of grammarians. For he insisted that these were a hindrance to expressing oneself well, and that that result was only obtained by the

1 Ad terniones.-What these ternaries, or triplets, probably were, has been explained in the Appendix to the Letters to Radulphus, p. 311. As there stated, many of the sayings of Christ lend themselves readily to such an arrangement. Compare, for example, the three words to the Herodians, Matt. xxii. 20, 21; to Mary Magdalene, John xx. 15-17; to Paul, Acts ix. 4-6.

2 See the last note but one.

study of the best authors. But he paid the penalty for this notion himself. For, though eloquent both by nature and training, and though he had at his command a singularly copious flow of words while speaking, yet, when writing, he would now and then trip in such points as critics are given to mark. And it was on this account, if I mistake not, that he refrained from writing books: though I wish he had not so refrained; for I should have been glad of the thoughts of such a man, no matter in what language expressed.

And now, that nothing may be thought wanting to the finished religious character of Colet, listen to the storms by which he was harassed. He had never been on good terms with his bishop,' who was, to say nothing about his principles, a superstitious and impracticable Scotist, and thinking himself on that account something more than mortal. I may say that, whilst I have known many of this school whom

1 This was Dr. Richard Fitz-James, successively Bishop of Rochester, Chichester, and London. He was a native of Somersetshire, and, along with his brother, Sir John Fitz-James, Lord Chief Justice, founded and endowed the school of Bruton in that county. He is one of those to whom Erasmus has hardly done justice; for he must have been a man of ability. In 1469 he was Fellow of Merton. In 1481 he was ViceChancellor at Oxford. In 1483 he was Warden of Merton, and a great benefactor to his college, as also to St. Paul's, of which he was made Treasurer the same year. He became Bishop of Rochester in 1496, of Chichester in 1504, London in 1506. He died Jan. 15th, 1521-2. See Newcourt's Repertorium, i. p. 24. Besides being joint-founder of a Grammar School, we find him providing for the restoration of a divinitylecture in St. Paul's. See the extract from his register in Dr. Simpson's Registrum Statutorum, p. 413. His work was thus, in its way, not wholly out of harmony with Colet's. But it is likely enough, as is suggested in Knight's Life, p. 63, that the Bishop was driven to stir in reviving the old divinity-lecture by what Colet had done, and might not act in the matter with any good will.