RAY AND WILLUGHBY 101 



him to declare that the oath was not binding upon those 

 who had taken it, and this Eay could not in conscience 

 do. No scruples of this or any other kind were respected 

 by the High Churchmen who were then dominant in 

 church and state. Ray held no benefice, but he was 

 turned out of his fellowship ; Cambridge and the church 

 were closed to him ; he was deprived of his livelihood, 

 and forced to seek a new calling. 



Henceforth Eay's life was, in the main, a life of poverty 

 and seclusion. For some years he was supported by 

 his wealthy associate, Francis Willughby, whose children 

 he helped to educate, but Willughby died in 1672, and 

 then Ray was compelled to serve as a tutor under less 

 agreeable conditions. At the age of fifty- two he returned 

 to his native village, to subsist upon a small pension 

 bequeathed to him by Willughby. During the last 

 twenty years of his life he was often kept close to the 

 fireside by painful sores upon his legs. He continued 

 to write and publish to the very last. His works were 

 highly valued by those who could judge, and some of 

 them passed through several editions. But the pub- 

 lishing trade was then very imperfectly organised ; an 

 author had usually to be satisfied with whatever the 

 bookseller chose to allow him, and Ray was probably 

 wretchedly paid for his labours. At his death in 1705 

 he had less than forty pounds a year to bequeath to his 

 widow and daughters. 



I have found no single passage in which Ray 

 speaks reproachfully of his persecutors. He seldom 

 mentions his sufferings at all, and then uses particularly 

 calm expressions. In the preface to his Wisdom of God 

 in the Creation he explains that "being not permitted to 

 serve the Church with my Tongue in Preaching, I know 

 not but it may be my Duty to serve it with my Hand 



