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A true relation of the Life and Death, of the Right Reverend Father in God William Bedell, Lord Bishop of Kilmore, in Ireland

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 December 2009

Abstract

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Type
Life and Death of William Bedell, Lord Bishop of Kilmore, in Ireland
Copyright
Copyright © Royal Historical Society 1872

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References

page 1 note * The year of William Bedell's birth is here correctly given as 1571, but a statement, which I have omitted, as to the time of the year is erroneous. It was his elder brother John, who was no doubt born on Michaelmas Day, seeing that he was baptized on the 23rd of October, whereas William, who was baptized on the 14th of January, 1571–2, had most likely been born at Christmas time, possibly on Christmas day. See Supplementary Chapter I.—T.W. J.

page 3 note * He was admitted November 1,1584, and appears to have been chosen Scholar on the 12th of March following.—T.W.J.

page 4 note * Mr. William Perkins, Fellow of Christ's College, and Incumbent of St. Andrew's Church, Cambridge, was of a Puritanical turn, and much esteemed as a preacher. He died in 1602, aged ii.—T.W.J.

page 4 note † See this letter, infra, p. 25.

page 5 note * Mr. Bedell was ordained Priest by Dr. John Stern, Bishop Suffragan of Colchester, on the 10th of January, 1596–7, being at that time twenty-five years of age.—T.W.J.

page 6 note * After Mr. Perkins' death in 1602, Mr. Bedell purchased his library.—T.W. J.

page 8 note * The Life of the most Learned Father Paul, of the Order of the Servie. Councellour of State to the most Serene Republicke of Venice, and Author of the History of the Counsell of Trent. Translated out of the Italian by a Person of Quality. London, 1651.

From this statement it may be inferred that the MS. of the “Relation of the Life and Death of Bishop Bedell ” before us, was written after 1651, though perhaps not much more than ten years.—T. W. J.

page 9 note * See an instance of this in the anecdote of the Prince of Condé's visit to Father Paulo in 1622, in “The Life,” ut supra, p. 152.—T. W. J.

page 10 note * The meaning of this appears to be that the author of this present History of Bishop Bedell's Life intended, in the event of its being published, to reprint along with it Bedell's Letters to Wadsworth.—T. W. J.

page 19 note * William Perkins, Fellow of Christ's College, Cambridge, A Direction for the Government of the Tongue, according to God's Word. 8vo. Lond. 1593.—T. W. J.

page 23 note * The date of the election was February 13, 1623. See Memoranda by Rev. W. Cole, in Add. MS. 5832, in British Museum. In Bishop Goodman's Court of King James I. there is, at page 325 of Volume II., a letter to Dr. Samuel Warde, Master of Sidney College, Cambridge, dated from London April 16, 1624, in which Mr. Bedell refers to his attendance in Convocation. The original of this letter is in the Tanner Collection lxxiii. 425, in the Bodleian Library, Oxford.—T. W. J.

page 24 note * In the supplement hereto annexed it will be found that many of the letters from Mr. Bedell to others of his friends have been preserved.—T. W. J.

page 25 note * In a letter (Public Record Office) from Venice dated August 14, 1609, to King James, Sir Henry Wotton says: “My chaplain (whom I am bound to commend unto your Maties goodness for a person of singular lerning and zeale) hathe translated the whole work (King James' Apologie' and ‘Premonition ’) into this Vulgar (Italian language).”—T. W. J.

page 25 note † “The Copies of Certain Letters which have passed between Spaine and England in Matter of Religion.” Dedicated to the King when Prince of Wales, 1624.

“Interdicti Veneti Historia.” A translation into Latin from the Italian of Father Paulo. Dedicated to the King, 1626.—T. W. J.

page 26 note * Mr. Bedell “was admitted and chosen by the unanimous consent of the Fellowes the xvith of August, 1627.” Register of the University.—T. M. J.

page 28 note * A disturbance in the College similar to that here alluded to, appears to have occurred also about the end of the year 1627, while Mr. Bedell was absent in England arranging his affairs there preparatory to his final departure and settlement in Ireland.—T.W.J.

page 28 note † Dr. Joshua Hoyle became Fellow of Trinity College, Dublin, in 1609. He was Professor of Divinity in the College, and tutor to Sir James Ware. Afterwards, in 1641, he removed to Oxford, where he was Master of University College, and Professor of Divinity in the University. Dr. Joshua Hoyle's name occurs in the list of the Divines who met in the Assembly at Westminster. He died in 1654.—T.W. J.

page 29 note * After his admission as Provost, August 16, 1627, Mr. Bedell returned to England and remained there until June, 1628; when, having settled his affairs in England he returned to Dublin with his family and took up his settled residence in the College as Provost. The patent by which he was appointed to the Bishoprics of Kilmore and Ardagh was dated May 29,1629.—T.W. J.

page 30 note * He was consecrated on the 13th of September, 1629.—T.W. J.

page 34 note * The patent was not sealed with the Bishop's great seal, though confirmed by the Dean and Chapter. Letter from Bp. Bedell, dated August 7, 1630, to Bishop Laud, in the Public Becord Office. See Supplementary Chapter VII.—T. W. J.

page 35 note * The copy of Bishop Laud's answer to Bishop Bedell's letter of the 7th of August, 1630, is in the Public Record Office. See Supplement.—T. W. J.

page 40 note * This was written subsequently to 1659, the date of the publication of Dr. N. Bernard's book, “Certain Discourses, &c.”—T. W. J.

page 47 note * Bishop Bedell's resignation of the See of Ardagh is dated the 28th of February, 1632–3. See Copy of the Instrument in Supplementary Chapter VII.—T. W. J.

page 47 note † Mr. Murtagh King, Vicar of Templeport, who made the Irish translation of the Old Testament, under the auspices of Bishop Bedell, was thus treated. See Supplement, Chapter X.—T. W. J.

page 49 note * The agents were Sir Andrew Stewart and Sir Arthur Forbes, Knts. and Baronets.—T.W.J.

page 49 note † The directions from the Lords Justices and Council for levying the contributions here referred to were dated the 12th of February 1632–3. See the copy of the Petition annexed to Bishop Bedell's letter of the 5th of November, 1633, to the Lord Deputy Wentworth, printed in Strafford's Letters and Dispatches, vol. i. pp. 146–151, folio, London, 1739. See also William Prynne's Breviate of the Life of William Laud, Archbishop of Canterbury;—Necessary Introduction to the Archbishop of Canterbury, his Tryall, discovering the Practises used to usher Popery into our Bealme, pp. 113, folio, London, 1644.— T. W. J.

page 50 note * This was on the day after Lent Assizes, 1633.—T. W. J.

page 50 note † Lord Wentworth, who had been appointed Lord Deputy, did not arrive in Ireland and “take the sword ” until July 1633.

page 51 note * Dated the 14th of October, 1633, in which he said: “I was, under God, the man that put your name to his Majesty for preferment, and, therefore, must needs in part suffer for any thing that shall be deemed a miscarriage in you. I never saw your Lordship to my knowledge, nor did I ever know you but by a little tract of yours against Wadsworth ; and were it but for that alone, I should be very sorry you should do any thing in your place unlike it, for that is very full of judgment and temper.” See Stafford's Letters and Dispatches, ut supra. Archbishop Laud here passes over in silence the share which Sir Thomas Jermyn had in Bedell's preferment. See above, p. 29.—T. W. J.

page 51 note † Dated Kilmore, the day of our deliverance from the Popish Plot, 1633.

page 52 note * In the rear 1639.—T.W. J.

page 54 note * Sir George Radcliffe, the intimate friend of the Earl of Strafford (in a letter preserved in the Public Record Office, dated the 3rd of March, 1639–40), gives a report to his Lordship who was in England at the time, of the proceedings of the High Commission Court on passing sentence: “The cause being hearde,” says Sir George, “ye sentence was yt the Bp. should be degraded by his metropolitane with his Provintiall Clergy, by Comission under ye great Seale; with a fine of 1000li, imprisonment and costs. The Judges declared some of his wordes, if they had bene found by a Jury, to have been high treason. The Bp. of Corke was very sharpe against ye offence, yet leaft ye pearson to expect ye Kings mercy wth censure or fine as conceiving him cracked in his Braine. The Bp. of Kilmore exercised his wit (as boyes doe in Schoole declamations, endeavouring to maintaine a paradox), for he commended or excused him in all the particular charges layed against ye deft. All ye rest agreed unanimously.”

In pursuance of the sentence, Bishop Adair was deprived on the 18th of May, 1640; but the King, considering the Bishop to have been too hardly dealt with, appointed him Bishop of Waterford and Lismore on the 13th of July, 1641, and on the 7th of June, 1642, wrote to the Lords Justices and Lord Chancellor in Bishop Adair's favour, commanding them to expunge and vacate the sentence of deprivation passed against him by the High Commission Court.—T. W. J.

page 55 note * See a letter to Archbishop Laud (in the Public Record Office), dated Dublin, May 24, 1639; and one to Dr. Samuel Warde of Cambridge (in the Bodleian Library) dated May 30,1639.—T. W. J.

page 56 note * Dr. Bulkeley.

page 59 note * Archbishop Land ?—T. W. J.

page 61 note * Mr. Murtagh King, according to another account (Supplementary Chapter X.), is stated to have been converted some time in the preceding reign. Bishop Bedell ordained Mr. Murtagh King Deacon on the 23rd of September, 1632, and Priest on the 22nd of September, 1633, and collated him to the vicarage of Templeport on the 29th.—T. W. J.

page 62 note * In Additional MS. No. 4436 in the British Museum, there is at page 314 “A description of Lough Erne,” written about the year 1740 by the then Vicar of “Killasher,” in which an interesting account of the region referred to in the text is given. For reference to this I am indebted to a correspondent in Notes and Queries, signing himself C. S. K.—T. W. J.

page 62 note † This expression shows that the writer lived in England.—T. W. J.

page 66 note * The name of the daggers used by the Irish and also by the Scotch Highlanders.—T. W. J.

page 70 note * Sir Francis Hamilton of Castle Keilagh ; and Sir James Craig of Castle Croghan.—T. W. J.

page 73 note * Or Castledyne, according to Mr. Clogie.—T. W. J.

page 76 note * The Vicarage of Killasser. See Supplementary Chapter XVI.—T. W. J.

page 77 note * There is no mention here of the saving of the MS. of the Irish translation of the Old Testament also by Denis Sheridan.—T. W. J.

page 78 note * From the description here given it is to be inferred that the f ever was malignant typhus, which prevailed in Ireland in 1641 and subsequent years. It had nothing in common with ague or intermittent fever, which is extremely rare in Ireland and not contagious. See Supplementary Chapter XII. for further observations on the nature of Bishop Bedell's last illness.—T. W. J.

page 78 note † Mr. Edward Mawe.

page 82 note * Haser minni col hedili. On the seal the Hebrew superscription is without points. In the Public Record Office, there are several letters from Bishop Bedell to Archbishop Laud, with this seal attached. From one of them, I made the drawing for the annexed wood-cut.—T. W. J.