But while Mulcaster was building up securely the reputation of the school, his own position was not always comfortable, and in the end the friction between himself and the governing body became so great that he felt constrained to resign the headmastership. This was no doubt partly due to his own somewhat hasty and masterful temper, for on one occasion at least it is recorded in the minutes of the Council that he had made open apology for things said and done in anger, but there were more lasting causes of dispute. After the first eight years the promised supplement to his official income was no longer forthcoming, apparently owing to the declining circumstances of the member of the Council who had contributed it, and Mulcaster having on the strength of this extra sum increased the salary of his first assistant, conceived that he was entitled to its continuance from the Company. There were besides disputes between the Council and the authorities of St. John’s College, Oxford, where its founder, a member of the Guild, had reserved certain free places for orphans coming from the school, and in these Mulcaster was involved. While the Council seems to have acted throughout within its rights, and in the end showed a desire to deal even generously with its headmaster, it is easy to understand the difficulties of the situation, especially to a man like Mulcaster, whose natural impatience of control would not be diminished by his evident sense that in birth as well as in learning he was above his official superiors. So necessary did he feel it to regain his freedom that in 1586 he tendered his resignation, without apparently having any definite prospect of other work.
During the next ten years scarcely anything is known of Mulcaster’s life, except that he was in straitened circumstances. By 1588 his claim on the Merchant Taylors’ Guild had been adjusted by a compromise, and friendly relations must have been restored, for we find him acting as examiner to the School in that year. For part of this time at least he was out of London, for he seems to have been for a year vicar of Cranbrook in Kent, and he was afterwards granted by the Queen the prebend of Yatesbury, in the diocese of Salisbury.
In 1596 came a return of prosperity in a settled position. The headmaster of St. Paul’s School, which had been founded at the beginning of the century by John Colet, and bequeathed by him to the management of the Silk Mercers’ Guild, had resigned his post, as a result of similar differences with the governing body to those which occurred in the Merchant Taylors’ School, and Mulcaster, whatever misgivings he may have had, had learned enough from his recent experience not to decline the vacant office when it was offered to him. He was already in his sixty-fourth year when he received the appointment, and he continued to hold it till he was seventy-six. The conditions were much the same as those under which he had formerly worked, the statutes of St. Paul’s School having indeed served as a model to the later foundation, but the number of scholars was limited to 153, and the salary of the headmaster was £36 (equal to about £300 now), in addition to a residence in the school. In 1602 the salaries of all the teachers were doubled, in recompense for certain restrictions imposed by a new set of regulations, and when Mulcaster resigned his position in 1608, presumably on account of failing strength, he received a yearly pension of £66 3s. 4d. until his death three years later. There is little to record of his labours during his twelve years’ service at St. Paul’s School, the only outstanding event being in connection with the accession of James I. in 1603. It was the privilege of his scholars to welcome the Sovereign to the capital, and we read that on this occasion a Latin speech, prepared by the headmaster, was delivered by one of the scholars at the door of the School.
It is painful to learn that the closing years of Mulcaster’s life were clouded by distressing poverty. Nor is this easy to understand, for besides his pension, he was not without resources. He had some time before been granted by Queen Elizabeth the living of Stanford Rivers in Essex, but had been precluded from entering on it while he remained at St. Paul’s School. On his retirement from the headmastership he took up the duties of his country charge, notwithstanding his advanced age, though without striking success, according to Fuller’s account: “I have heard from those who have heard him preach that his sermons were not excellent, which to me seems no wonder, partly because there is a different discipline in teaching children and men, partly because such who make divinity not the choice of their youth but the refuge of their age seldom attain to eminency therein.” In spite of these two sources of income we find Mulcaster in 1609 making a pitiful but unsuccessful appeal to his old patrons, the Merchant Taylors, and when he died two years later he left his son burdened with debts, from which he was only relieved by the aid of some of his father’s former scholars, and of the two Guilds under which he had served. His wife had died two years before him, after fifty years of wedded life, and her virtues are recorded in a commemorative tablet.
Mulcaster’s educational writings were produced towards the close of the period spent at Merchant Taylors’ School, the Positions appearing in 1581, and the First Part of the Elementarie in 1582. The completion of the latter, and the further works promised on higher education, were never accomplished. He also wrote numerous Latin verses, including an address to Queen Elizabeth at the Kenilworth pageant of 1575, and a catechism, also in Latin, for the use of his pupils at St. Paul’s School, while he is mentioned as the author of a work entitled Cato Christianus, which has not come down to us.
All the sources of information regarding Mulcaster’s life and writings have been collected and compared with exhaustive industry by Dr. Theodor Klähr in a pamphlet entitled Leben und Werke Richard Mulcaster’s (Dresden, 1893).