“ HISTORY OF THE REFORMATION.” 193 
state by principle, gratitude, and interest ; for without an assump- 
tion of this kind it is difficult to furnish a clue to so 255) calabtingt 
an event in the literary history of these times. 
But if the reader should be inclined to think that the duke, or his 
party, made no direct or indirect attempt to discountenance Burnett’s 
project,* we should still be loath to believe, that there could be 
found in Sancroft that union of rancorous activity, of persecuting bi- 
gotry, and dull torpor of pedantic bad taste, to have done so, how- 
ever positively it may be asserted by Antony Woodt that the arch- 
him with the title of “the champion of the Common Prayer Book among the 
laity."—See Hamper’s Life of Sir William Dugdale, p. 431. 
« <The Duke of York did put on his agents, Duke Lauderdale and Sir 
John Cotton, particularly to mar the goodly design of Dr. Burnett which he 
had in penning his noted work on the History of the Reformation.” —A Scratch 
against Popery and the Duke of York, p.3. In the second volume of the His- 
tory of his Own Time, p. 66, the bishop refers to their unity of design against 
his literary project; but there is not the slightest allusion to James pursu- 
ing that object through these indirect and tortuous courses. In one of the 
Observators, a paper to which it is well known Burnett was a contributor, he 
complains of this imbecile despot having acted in the manner mentioned. 
Soon after James became acquainted with Burnett, he seems to have con- 
tracted a dislike towards him, which in the end blazed forth into perfect ha- 
tred. The following extracts from the correspondence between James and 
the Prince of Orange will show the determined hostility to the bishop, and 
what dread the former entertained of his religious and political counsels. In 
one of the letters, dated Nov. 23rd, 1686, at which period our historian was 
an exile in Holland, the royal bigot represents him as a man not to be 
trusted, and an ill-man. In December 7th, 1686, he complains of the doctor 
as “a dangerous man, though he would seem to be an angel of light.” The 
princess, in her answer, Hague, December 28th, 1686, endeavours to vindi- 
cate him to her father; but on July 28th, 1687, the king desires that his 
daughter “ will not let him come tc her chapel.” If arguments drawn from 
the general principles of our nature are to be taken for data, I am greatly 
disposed to think that these documents will materially tend to confirm the 
assertion of James’s sinister design to discourage or suppress the History of 
' the Reformation. 
+ See Life of A. Wood, written by himself. Dr. Kennett thus refers to 
this appointment :—“ The king was under some difficulty to find a proper 
successor on the death of Archbishop Sheldon; but at last, through the re- 
commendation of his brother, the Duke of York, he resolved upon Dr. Sancroft, 
Dean of St. Paul, as a person of great prudence and moderation. “But in 
matters of this nature,” says Dr. D’Oyley, “it is seldom possible to attain a 
correct knowledge of the truth ; for it rarely happens that recommendations 
which are made in the interior of a royal closet are disclosed truly to the 
public.”—Life of Sancrofl, vol. i, p- 151—152. There can be no doubt, gene- 
rally speaking, that we see but very imperfectly the little capricious fluctu- 
VOL. 1X., NO. XXVI. 25 
