BISHOP AYLMER. Ill 



was his co-exile in Queen Mary s days, and his Lordship s CHAP, 

 countryman, (that is, of Lincolnshire,) and his faithful well- _ 

 wilier. This man our Bishop had not long before recom 

 mended to something else, but succeeded not ; it being not 

 his luck, as he said with some discontent, to further any 

 of his good friends in any suit of his : yet however, he 

 added, he could not be wanting to his friends, and to God s 

 Church. But neither of these two were preferred to this 

 bishopric, nor indeed any else during the reign of the Queen. 



Now our Bishop hath not above two years more to finish Desirous to 

 his pilgrimage, when he had a great mind to resign his re 

 bishopric to Dr. Bancroft, a rising man, and acceptable to 

 the Queen. And three times this year he offered him a re 

 signation upon certain conditions, perhaps in respect of the 

 dilapidations, to allow him such a sum in satisfaction : for 

 the Bishop seemed to foresee a considerable burden like to 

 fall upon his estate on that account, and so thought it his 

 best way to compound it in his life-time : but Bancroft re 

 fused. But questionless Bishop Aylmer s main inducement 

 in labouring Bancroft s succession to the see of London was, 

 that he knew him to be a person long used in the ecclesias 

 tical Commission, and strait for the observation of the rites 

 and prescriptions of the Church established, against such as 

 would have trampled upon them. Therefore it was but 

 the day before our Bishop died, that he signified how sorry 

 he was that he had not written to the Queen, and com 

 mended his last suit unto her Highness, viz. to have Ban 

 croft his successor : and being dead, none was so commonly 

 talked of to succeed, as he. But the Queen bestowed it 

 upon another, to wit, a courtly Prelate, Fletcher Bishop of 

 Peterborough ; for such the Queen delighted in : who en 

 joying it two or three years, it came to pass according to 

 Bishop Aylmer s last desires. Yet however Bancroft s suc 

 cession proved prosperous to the Church, it light heavy 

 upon Aylmer s heir ; as we may see hereafter. 



