2»d S. V. 1.28., June 12. '6?.] 



jJ^OTES AHD QUERIES. 



477 



happy to observe is at last completed by the 

 venerable Mr. J. B. Nichols, the worthy son of a 

 worthy father. But I do not know the date even 

 of Roger Laurence's death — eheu ! * A. S. A. 

 Barrackpore, E. I. 

 April 15, 1858, 



[The following notice of Laurence occurs in The Annals 

 of Queen Anne, xi. 377., a work of no very high autho- 

 rity : — " This unhapp3' controversy began upon the 

 practice of one Mr. K. Laurence, a book-keeper, who 

 having been born, baptized, and bred in the dissenting 

 way, did, after his return out of Spain, declare himself a 

 convert to the Church of England ; and to express his 

 abhorrence of tlie friends he left, he declared that he 

 thought his baptism among them was invalid, null, and 

 void ; and accordingly he was rebaptized by the Curate 

 of Christ Church in London, without the consent of the 

 Bishop, and without order or knowledge of the parish 

 priest." 



This most important circumstance of his life, Laurence 

 alludes to in the Preface of the third edition of his Lat/ 

 Baptism Invalid, p. xii. ; but the passage is omitted in 

 the fourth edition: — "He [Mr. Bingham] is pleased to 

 call the priest wlio baptized R. L. ' an irregular curate, 

 who acquainted neither the minister of the parish, nor the 

 bishop, with the true state of the case,' &c. I must needs 

 say, in defence of that gentleman, that it would be happy 

 for our Church if this author and some of bis friends 

 were but as regular as he. He was by no law of our 

 Church obliged to acquaint the minister of the parish 

 where R. L. was baptized with the case ; for he was none 

 of his underlings, neither did he receive any pay from him ; 

 he had his proper diocesan's general licence to baptize adult 

 persons, without giving anj' particular notice first to the 

 bishop. By virtue of that licence he regularly baptized 

 E. L., without first acquainting the bishop, the 31st of 

 March, 1708, being Wednesday in Passion week, and 

 therefore on a holyday, in public, immediately after the 

 second lesson at evening prayer, in presence of a great 

 congregation, the church doors being open ; he did it 

 hypothetically, i.e. 'If thou art not already baptized, I 

 baptize thee,' &c. ; and this, not that the case required it, 

 but because R. L. would not let him know the case itself, 

 but begged baptism at his hands, only upon this general 

 account, that he had discovered sufficient reasons to con- 

 vince him that he had not been yet validly baptized ; 

 that he desired the said curate not to be too curious in 

 inquiring of him the reasons, because it was not fit for 

 him to discover them to him ; and those to whom he had 

 discovered them could give him no satisfactory argu- 

 ments to convince him that he might desist from endea- 

 vouring to obtain catholic baptism ; that he would, 

 therefore, only inquire into K. L.'s faith and manners, 

 and upon due satisfaction about them give him hypothe- 

 tical baptism, to avoid the imputation of being irregular; 

 which accordingl}-, upon such satisfaction, he did ; for 

 which T praise and glorify God, and reverence and esteem 

 him, His regular and rightly ordained minister." 



Some trouble has been taken to procure the register of 

 his baptism under the date which he himself gives ; and 

 the books of Christ Church, Newgate Street, to which the 

 above extract seems to refer, have been in vain searched 

 for this purpose. Either, therefore, the baptism was 

 never entered on the register (and this, perhaps, because 

 Laurence was an adult), or the annalist is incorrect in his 

 information ; and it is the rather suspected that this is 

 the case, because there seems an obvious inconsistency 

 between the statement that Lawrence was ' a book-keeper 



[* Laurence died on March 5, 1736, at Beckenham in 

 Kent.] 



in London,' if the occupation be that which is now go 

 called, and the fact that in the fourth edition of his Lay 

 Baptism he is styled on the title-page " R. Laurence, 

 M.A." 



In 1841, the Rev. William Scott, of Christ Church, 

 Hoxton, edited a new edition of Lay Baptism Invalid, 

 with Additions and Illustrations, to whose valuable In- 

 troduction we are indebted for the preceding account of 

 Laurence. The following work, attributed to Laurence, 

 contains some curious notices of the discussions among 

 the later Nonjurors relative to the usages: "The Indis- 

 pensable Obligation of Ministring expressly and mani- 

 festly the great Necessaries of Publick Worship in the 

 Christian Church : together with a Detection of the 



False Reasonings in Dr. B t's [Brett's] printed Letter 



to the Author of Two Discourses ; and that Doctor's in- 

 consistent Notions of the present Liturgy of the Church 

 of England. Addressed to the Doctor by one of his 

 Friends." London, 1732. Dr. Brett published a Reply 

 to Laurence in 1733.1 » 



Minat cauertejS, 



Alexander Hamilton. — It is said that Alexander 

 Hamilton of Kerelaw or Grange in Scotland mar- 

 ried about 1730 Elizabeth, eldest daughter of Sir 

 Robert Pollok, Can the date of that marriage 

 be ascertained ? His children are said to have 

 been : first, Jolm ; second, Robert ; third, Alex- 

 ander; fourth, James. What was the date of the 

 birth of the fourth son James ? where, and wiien, 

 did he die ? and is there any evidence existing in 

 Scotland or elsewhere that the James Hamilton 

 referred to was the father of the American Alex- 

 ander ? W. N. S. 



Medical Men at Funerals. — In Erasmus (CoUoq. 

 Funus) I find the following passage : — ■ 



" Subduxit sese static medicorum. Negant enim £as 

 esse ut, qui vitse solent opitulari, mortis sint spectator's, 

 aut exequiis intersint." 



Is it still the custom in any part of Europe for 

 medical men not to attend funerals ? T. H. P. 



Academical Dresses. — What reason can be as- 

 signed for the different dresses of different de- 

 grees ? Was it like a decorative order, a badge, 

 that the wearer mijiht be known as a graduate, 

 and of this or that University ? X, P. 



The Jesuit Osorius. — Can any of your readers 

 give me any information as to the above author ? 

 I have in my possession two volumes of sermons, 

 of which this is the title : — 



" Conciones R. P. Joannis Osorii, Soc. Jes. in quinque 

 tojnos distinctae, etc. Colonise Agrippinae. Anno mdcv." 



The two volumes I have contain sermons for all 

 the Sundays and greater holidays of the year. In 

 the advertisement, " ad Lectorem,"' prefixed to the 

 second volume, I find the following promise : — 



" Tertium de Sanctis, reliquaque deinceps Concionum 

 volumina, brevi, ut spero, mandabo praelis." 



Was this promise ever fulfilled, and the quinque 



