Selden (that great writer on international law, whose "Mare clausum" was a reply to the "Mare liberum" of Grotius) is buried to the left of the altar, the spot being marked by a monument of white marble. "His grave," says Aubrey, "was about ten feet deepe or better, walled up a good way with bricks, of which also the bottome was paved, but the sides at the bottome for about two foot high were of black polished marble, wherein his coffin (covered with black bayes) lyeth, and upon that wall of marble was presently lett downe a huge black marble stone of great thicknesse, with this inscription—'Hic jacet corpus Johannis Seldeni, qui obijt 30 die Novembris, 1654.' Over this was turned an arch of brick (for the house would not lose their ground), and upon that was throwne the earth," &c.
There is a monument in the triforium to Edmund Gibbon, a herald and an ancestor of the historian. The great writer alluding to this monument says—"My family arms are the same which were borne by the Gibbons of Kent, in an age when the College of Heralds religiously guarded the distinctions of blood and name—a lion rampant gardant between three schollop shells argent, on a field azure. I should not, however, have been tempted to blazon my coat of arms were it not connected with a whimsical anecdote. About the reign of James I., the three harmless schollop shells were changed by Edmund Gibbon, Esq., into three ogresses, or female cannibals, with a design of stigmatising three ladies, his kinswomen, who had provoked him by an unjust lawsuit. But this singular mode of revenge, for which he obtained the sanction of Sir William Seager, King-at-Arms, soon expired with its author; and on his own monument in the Temple Church the monsters vanish, and the three schollop shells resume their proper and hereditary place."
At the latter end of Charles II.'s reign the organ in the Temple Church became the subject of a singular contest, which was decided by a most remarkable judge. The benchers had determined to have the best organ in London; the competitors for the building were Smith and Harris. Father Smith, a German, was renowned for his care in choosing wood without knot or flaw, and for throwing aside every metal or wooden pipe that was not perfect and sound. His stops were also allowed by all to be singularly equal and sweet in tone. The two competitors were each to erect an organ in the Temple Church, and the best one was to be retained. The competition was carried on with such violence that some of the partisans almost ruined themselves by the money they expended. The night preceding the trial the too zealous friends of Harris cut the bellows of Smith's organ, and rendered it for the time useless. Drs. Blow and Purcell were employed to show the powers of Smith's instrument, and the French organist of Queen Catherine performed on Harris's. The contest continued, with varying success, for nearly a twelvemonth. At length Harris challenged his redoubtable rival to make certain additional reed stops, vox humana, cremona, double bassoon and other stops, within a given time. The controversy was at last terminated by Lord Chief Justice Jefferies—the cruel and debauched Jefferies, who was himself an accomplished musician—deciding in favour of Father Smith. Part of Harris's rejected organ was erected at St. Andrew's, Holborn, part at Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin. Father Smith, in consequence of his success at the Temple, was employed to build an organ for St. Paul's, but Sir Christopher Wren would never allow the case to be made large enough to receive all the stops. "The sound and general mechanism of modern instruments," says Mr. Burge, "are certainly superior to those of Father Smith's, but for sweetness of tone I have never met in any part of Europe with pipes that have equalled his."
In the reign of James I. there was a great dispute between the Custos of the Temple and the two Societies. This sinecure office, the gift of the Crown, was a rectory without tithes, and the Custos was dependent upon voluntary contributions. The benchers, irritated at Dr. Micklethwaite's arrogant pretensions, shut the doctor out from their dinners. In the reign of Charles I., the doctor complained to the king that he received no tithes, was refused precedence as Master of the Temple, was allowed no share in the deliberations, was not paid for his supernumerary sermons, and was denied ecclesiastical jurisdiction. The doctor thereupon locked up the church and took away the keys; but Noy, the Attorney-General, snubbed him, and called him "elatus et superbus;" and he got nothing, after all, but hard words, for his petition.
The learned and judicious Hooker, author of "The Ecclesiastical Polity," was for six years Master of the Temple—"a place," says Izaak Walton, "which he accepted rather than desired." Travers, a disciple of Cartwright the Nonconformist, was the lecturer; so Hooker, it was said, preached Canterbury in the forenoon, and Travers Geneva in the afternoon. The benchers were divided, and Travers being at last silenced by the archbishop, Hooker resigned, and in his quiet parsonage of Boscombe renewed the contest in print, in his "Ecclesiastical Polity."
When Bishop Sherlock was Master of the Temple, the sees of Canterbury and London were vacant about the same time (1748); this occasioned an epigram upon Sherlock,—
"At the Temple one day, Sherlock taking a boat,
The waterman asked him, 'Which way will you float?'
'Which way?' says the Doctor; 'why, fool, with the stream!'
To St. Paul's or to Lambeth was all one to him."
The tide in favour of Sherlock was running to St. Paul's. He was made Bishop of London.
During the repairs of 1827 the ancient freestone chapel of St. Anne, which stood on the south side of the "Round," was ruthlessly removed. We had less reverence for antiquity then. The upper storey communicated with the Temple Church by a staircase opening on the west end of the south aisle of the choir; the lower joined the "Round" by a doorway under one of the arches of the circular arcade. The chapel anciently opened upon the cloisters, and formed a private way from the convent to the church. Here the Papal legate and the highest bishops frequently held conferences; and on Sunday mornings the Master of the Temple held chapters, enjoined penances, made up quarrels, and pronounced absolution. The chapel of St. Anne was in the old time much resorted to by barren women, who there prayed for children.
In Charles II.'s time, according to "Hudibras," "straw bail" and low rascals of that sort lingered about the Round, waiting for hire. Butler says:—