He was succeeded by that illustrious theological scholar Dr. John Pearson—author of the Exposition of the Creed—who, from his studious habits, became easy and remiss in his Episcopal functions, for some years before the end of his episcopate, in 1686, when he died, having some time before sunk into a state of second childhood. His theological opinions will come under our review in the next volume.
The circumstances under which Dr. Edward Reynolds accepted a mitre have been described already. He did so professedly upon condition that the Worcester House Declaration should become law, which it never did; and that the Church of England should be modified, so as to meet Presbyterian scruples, which it never was. However, it does not appear that his Presbyterianism had at any time been so extreme as to prevent his adopting a modified form of Episcopacy; and Baxter does not charge him with inconsistency in going so far as he actually went. Indeed, Baxter persuaded him to accept a Bishopric, implying that he did not discover in his friend that repugnance to the position which he felt himself. Reynolds' inconsistency appears, not in his first qualified acceptance, but in his subsequent retention of the office, after the conditions on which avowedly he had entered upon it were completely disregarded. But the truth is, he was a man of little firmness, and the blame of his continued conformity has been ungallantly, but in accordance with a very ancient precedent, cast on his wife. "It was verily thought, by his contemporaries, that he would have never been given to change, had it not been to please a covetous and politic consort, who put him upon those things he did."[699] Throughout his episcopate in the diocese of Norwich, which lasted until 1676, he remained a Puritan, eschewing Court politics, leading a quiet life in the discharge of the duties of his calling, and in the retirement of his palace; to which, it may be observed, he added a new chapel on the ruins of the old one, which had been destroyed by the rabble after the fall of the Bishops in the year 1643. Affability and meekness are virtues generally ascribed to Reynolds; his abilities as a Divine, and his gifts as a preacher—with the drawback of a harsh and unpleasant voice—were acknowledged by his contemporaries to have been considerable.
1662–1677.
An unpublished letter sheds light on the state of the diocese of Norwich, and the character of the Bishop:—
"Having often complaints made unto me in general of the offensive lives of some of the clergy, I held it my duty to signify so much unto you, not thereby myself accusing any of my brethren, but conceiving it very needful, by occasion of such reports, earnestly to entreat them that they will be very tender of the credit of religion, of the dignity of their function, and of the success of their ministry; and endeavour, by their sober, pious, and prudent conversations, to stop the mouths of any that watch for their halting, to bear witness to the truth of that doctrine which they preach, to be guides and examples of holiness of life to the people over whom they are set, and to lay up for themselves a comfortable account against the time that we shall appear before the Great Shepherd and Bishop of Souls. So commending you to the guidance of God's Holy Spirit, and his gracious protection, &c."[700]
BISHOPS.
Dr. Herbert Croft—descended from an old English family, distinguished in the reigns of Edward IV. and Elizabeth—had in his youth been decoyed into the Church of Rome, whilst a student at St. Omer; but, on his return from the Continent, he had been reconciled to the Church of England by Morton, Bishop of Durham. He had held a Canonry in St. George's Chapel, Windsor, and had been made Dean of Hereford in the year 1644. His appointment to such a dignity at such a time suggests the fact that then he was a very Low Churchman, with Presbyterian tendencies; of course he was afterwards obliged to relinquish both the office and its revenues. When the King returned, to whose cause Croft had been attached, he recovered his Deanery, and on the death of Dr. Monk, in 1661, he succeeded to the Bishopric. His family had long been settled in Herefordshire, and he cherished a strong attachment to his native county; in consequence of which he preferred to remain in this inferior see, with its small revenues, rather than accept richer preferment at a distance. Weary of Court life he, in the year 1667, retired from the office of Dean to the Chapel Royal, to live entirely amongst his own clergy, like a primitive Bishop. Becoming a strict disciplinarian, he admitted none to stalls in his cathedral who did not dwell within the diocese, in the centre of which his own country residence was situated; and there he regularly relieved at his gates sixty poor people a week, besides assisting the indigent in other ways. The moderate ecclesiastical views which he expressed in his Naked Truth, he retained to the last, but he did himself no honour by submitting to the order of James II. in 1688.[701]
1662–1677.