2««» S. Vil. Jajt. 15. Sft] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



49 



natural and undesigned manner that the writer 

 had attained the episcopate early in the reign of 

 Henry VIII. Is it not an outrage upon all pro- 

 bability to suppose that any man would subscribe 

 himself " Bishop of St. David's " in letters ad- 

 dressed to the jealous Henry's Secretary of State, 

 if he had not a legal and canonical right to the 

 title ? I have passed over all the intermediate 

 translations of Bishop Barlow, whether from 

 Haverford Priory to Bisham ; from St. Asaph 

 Diocese to St. David's ; from St. David's to 

 " Bath and Wells" in King Edward's time; and 

 ultimately his designation as " Bishop Elect of 

 Chichester " on his return from beyond seas after 

 the Marian persecution ; because I submit to the 

 judgment of your readers, and especially of Mr. 

 Massingbbrd, that unless the documents in the 

 National Archives be forgeries^ the main point, 

 namely, " that no proof exists of Barlow's having 

 been consecrated himself" is conclusively disposed 

 of. A. B. R. 



Belmont. 



The question asked by Mb. Massingberd is an 

 important one, and worthy of the most careful 

 consideration. For if Bishop Barlow did not re- 

 ceive consecration himself, the part he took in the 

 consecration of Archbishop Parker (he being the 

 senior bishop, and at the head of the commission) 

 would tend greatly to invalidate that consecration 

 itself. On the 6th of December, 1559, Queen 

 Elizabeth issued a commission to " Anthony, 

 Bishop of Llandaff, William (Barlow) formerly 

 Bishop of Bath, John (Scory) formerly Bishop of 

 Chichester, Miles (Coverdale) Bishop of Exeter, 

 John of Bedford, and John (Hodgskins) of Thet- 

 ford, Suflfragan Bishops, and John Bale, Bishop of 

 Ossory, to the end that all, or at least four of them, 

 should proceed to the consecration of Parker." 

 According to Bramhall and Burnet, Parker was 

 consecrated at Lambeth on Sunday, Dec. 17, 1559, 

 by Bishops Barlow, Scory, Coverdale, and Hodg- 

 skins. 



To confine our attention now to Bishop Barlow. 

 Before the Reformation he was a canon regular of 

 the order of St. Augustine, trained in the house of 

 St. Osyth's, Essex. At an early period of his life 

 he was elected Prior of Bisham in Berks. Henry 

 VIII. employed him on an embassy in Scotland in 

 1535 ; on which occasion he was accompanied by 

 Robert Warton, afterwards his successor in the 

 see of St. Asaph ; whilst in Scotland he was 

 elected Bishop of St. Asaph, and whilst he still re- 

 mained there, before he had been consecrated or had 

 taken possession of his see (Lingard, vi. 671., 

 ed. 1849), he was transferred, probably at the in- 

 stance of his patron, from the diocese of St. Asaph 

 to that of St. David's, by free transmutation, " per 

 liberara transmutationem " (Rymer, xiv. 570.). 

 If this statement be correct, and be it remem- 



bered it is made by an eminent Roman Catholic 

 historian, we need not look for any record of the 

 consecration of Barlow to the see of St. Asaph ; 

 indeed, in the commission to consecrate Robert 

 Warton his successor at St. Asaph, dated June 

 24, 1536, he is spoken of as " Willielmi Barlowe 

 ultimi Episcopi ibidem electi" which would tend 

 to show that Barlow had never been consecrated 

 to that see. 



H. J. Rose, in his Biographical Dictionary, 

 states that he was consecrated Nov. 22, 1535, and 

 translated to St. David's the following year, but 

 there seems no authority for this, and Godwin, as 

 Mr. Massingberd mentions, states that he was 

 consecrated Feb. 22, 1535, meaning thereby Feb. 

 22, 153|^, which was probably the true date of 

 his consecration, as appears from the following tes- 

 timonies. Wharton, in his Anglia Sacra, in his 

 catalogue of the Bishops of St. Asaph, says : — 



" William Barlowe, at that time Prior of the Canons 

 Regular of Bisham, of the Order of St. Augustine, having 

 been elected -Bishop by the Dean and Chapter of St. 

 Asaph in the year 1536, January the sixteenth, was con- 

 firmed on the twenty-third of February following by 

 Thomas, Archbishop of Canterbury." 



Le Neve, in his Fasti Eccles. Anglic, p. 22., 



" William Barlow, S. T. P., was elected Jan. 16, 1535, 

 confirmed Feb. 23 following." 



Both these authors agree entirely, save that 

 Wharton, reckoning by the New Style, speaks of 

 Barlow as being consecrated 1536 ; he beginning 

 the year from Jan. 1st: LeNeve, reckoning by the 

 Old Style, which did not begin the year till March 

 25th, speaks of it as taking place in 1535. 



Here, then, is evidence of Barlow's election and 

 confirmation in the see of St. Asaph, but there is 

 no record of his consecration to that see. This is the 

 chief ground of the Romanists for denying that he 

 was ever consecrated. True indeed it is that no re- 

 cord of his consecration is to be found in the re- 

 cords of Canterbury : but what of that ? In these 

 records there is no register of the consecration of 

 Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester, or of Hugh Lati- 

 mer, Bishop of Worcester, or John Hilsey, Bishop of 

 Rochester (the last two being consecrated in 1535, 

 the year of Barlow's election to St. Asaph) : were 

 they, therefore, never consecrated? But these 

 last consecrations have never been denied by the 

 Romanists themselves. Why, then, was Barlow's? 

 Merely to serve the purpose of the Nag's Head 

 Fable. For seventy years no author accused 

 him of usurping the episcopate without consecra- 

 tion. He was a bishop for thirty years, yet dur- 

 ing that period no such charge was ever brought 

 against him. Champney first broached it in 1616, 

 and he has been followed by various other writers 

 of the Roman communion. 



But if the record of his consecration is wanting, 

 as it is in the case of many other bishops, the vali- 



