"These two things are certain, and I do particularly recommend them to your observation: One, that this way of praying by the Spirit, as they call it, was begun, and first brought into use here in England, in Queen Elizabeth's days, by a Popish priest and Dominican friar, one Faithful Commin by name. Who, counterfeiting himself a Protestant, and a zealot of the highest form, set up this new spiritual way of praying, with a design to bring the people first to a contempt, and from thence to an utter hatred and disuse of our Common Prayer; which he still reviled as only a translation of the mass, thereby to distract men's minds, and to divide our Church. And this he did with such success, that we have lived to see the effects of his labours in the utter subversion of Church and State; which hellish negociation, when this malicious hypocrite came to Rome to give the Pope an account of, he received of him, as so notable a service well deserved, besides a thousand thanks, two thousand ducats for his pains."
Also, who was W. W., the author of "a virulent and insulting pamphlet, entitled, A Letter to a Member of Parliament, printed in the year 1697, and as like the author himself, W. W., as malice can make it," referred to in a note by South at the end of his sermon on The Recompence of the Reward, vol. ii. p. 152. Is this pamphlet still in existence?
W. H. Gunner.
Winchester.
Minor Queries.
Norwich, Kirkpatrick Collection of MSS. for the History of.—Mr. Simon Wilkin, in the preface to the Repertorium, contained in his fourth volume of his valuable edition of the works of Sir Thomas Browne, p. 4., having spoken of the large collections for the History of Norwich made by Mr. John Kirkpatrick, who died in 1728, and gave the said collections by will to the mayor, sheriffs, citizens, and commonalty of the city of Norwich, in order that "some citizen hereafter, being a skilful antiquary, may, from the same, have an opportunity of completing and publishing the said history," &c., goes on to say, "the MSS. referred to were some years ago in the possession of the corporation, but we fear the original intention of the donor has been lost sight of, and that these valuable MSS. are for ever lost to the lover of local antiquities." This was printed in 1835. But the subject ought not to be permitted to drop and rest there. Up to that date, can it be ascertained that the papers remained in the keeping of the Corporation? Are they still in their hands, though inaccessible? Can any information be obtained as to the when and the how they passed out of their possession? Or, above all, can any clue be found to their subsequent history and present resting-place? It may be suggested to any patriotic citizen and antiquary of the fair city of Norwich, that, inasmuch as the Corporation, by the terms of the will, are only trustees for the property, the Court of Chancery might be moved to assist in the recovery thereof.
T. A. T.
Florence, March, 1854.
Corbet.—Can any of your readers furnish information relative to the Scottish family of Corbet, one member of whom emigrated to America, about the year 1705, from the neighbourhood of Dumfries?