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HENRY WILKINSON, B. D.-This worthy divine was born in the vicarage of Halifax, Yorkshire, October 9, 1566, and educated in Merton college, Oxford. He was a near relation to Sir Henry Savile, by whose favour he was elected probationer fellow of the college; and in the year 1601, he became pastor of Waddesdon in Buckinghamshire, where he continued in the laborious and faithful exercise of his ministry forty-six years. He married the only daughter of Mr. Arthur Wake, another zealous puritan divine, by whom he had six sons and three daughters. She was a person of most amiable character, and they lived together in mutual affection upwards of fifty years. He was a man of considerable learning and piety, and being an old puritan, says Wood, was elected one of the assembly of divines. But it is said that he spent most of his time among his parishioners, by whom he was exceedingly beloved and revered.

Mr. Wilkinson was author of "A Catechisme for the use of the Congregation of Waddesdon," oftentimes printed. Also "The Debt-book; or, a Treatise upon Rom. xiii. 8. wherein is handled the civil debt of money or goods," 1625; and several other articles. The celebrated Dr. Henry Wilkinson, Margaret professor at Oxford, and ejected at the restoration, was his son.t Mr. Neal very much confounds the one with the other. Mr. Wilkinson died at Waddesdon, March 19, 1647, aged eighty-one years. His mortal remains were laid in the chancel of his own church, where, against the south wall, was a monumental inscription erected, of which the following is a translation :§

HENRY WILKINSON,

forty-six years the faithful pastor of this church,
was born the ninth day of October, 1566,
and died the nineteenth day of March, 1647.
He married SARAH

the only daughter of ARTHUR WAKE
of Sawey Forest in the county of Northampton,
with whom he lived in holy concord fifty-three years,
and by whom he had nine children,

six sons and three daughters.

The remains of the aforesaid SARAH WILKINSON,
who lived to the age of seventy years,
were laid by the side of her husband,
leaving us an example

of a most upright and holy life,

• Wood's Athenæ Oxon. vol. ii. p. 59. + Palmer's Noncon. Mem. vol. i. p. 241. Neal's Puritans, vol. iii. p. 54.

Ward's Gresham Professors, p. 213, 214.

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THOMAS COLEMAN, A. M.-This learned and pious divine was born in the city of Oxford, in the year 1598, and educated in Magdalen college, in that university. Having entered upon the ministerial work, he became vicar of Bliton in Lincolnshire; but he was persecuted, and afterwards driven from the place for nonconformity. On the commencement of the civil wars, he fled for refuge to London, was made rector of St. Peter's, Cornhill, and chosen one of the assembly of divines. He frequently preached before the parliament; and, October 15, 1643, when both houses took the covenant, he preached before the lords, giving some explanation of it. He observed on this occasion," that by prelacy, as used in the covenant, was not meant all episcopacy, but only the form therein described." In 1644, he was appointed one of the committee of examination and approbation of public preachers. The year following, in the grand debate of the assembly, concerning the divine right of the presbyterian mode of church government, he gave his opinion against it; and openly declared, both in the assembly and from the pulpit, that if the divine right of presbyterianism should ever be established by public authority, he was apprehensive it would prove equally arbitrary and tyrannical as the prelacy had been. He therefore proposed that, under present circumstances, the civil magistrate should have the power of the keys till the nation should be brought into a more settled state.t

Mr. Coleman was of erastian principles respecting church government; but he fell sick during the above debate; and some of the members waiting upon him, he desired they would not come to any conclusion till they had heard what he had further to offer upon the question. But his complaint increasing, he died in a few days, and the whole assembly paid the last tribute of respect to his memory by attending his funeral solemnities, March 30, 1647. Wood says, “he was so accomplished an Hebrean, that he was commonly denominated Rabbi Coleman;" and adds, " that he behaved

* Sylvester's Life of Baxter, part i. p. 49.

+ Neal's Puritans, vol. iii. p. 261.

both modestly and learnedly in the assembly." Fuller styles him "a modest and learned divine, equally averse to presbytery and prelacy."+

From the eminent talents, learning, and moderation of this excellent divine, we might suppose that even bigotry itself would lie dormant; but this unhappy temper, ever influenced by party principles, and to promote a party interest, will break through all difficulties, to blacken the memory of real worth. Mr. Coleman, in common with many of his brethren, is the subject of public calumny. The zealous historian, speaking of those divines who preached before the parliament, says, "Another of these brawlers, who seldom thought of a bishop, or the king's party, but with indignation, was Mr. Thomas Coleman. In one of his sermons, he thus rants against the church of England, and violently persuades the parliament to execute severe justice upon her children. Our cathedrals in a great part are of late become the nests of idle drones, and the roosting places of superstitious formalists. Our formalists and government, in the whole hierarchy, are become a fretting gangrene, a spreading leprosy, an insupportable tyranny. Up with it, up with it to the bottom, root and branch, hip and thigh: destroy these Amalekites, and let their place be no more found. Throw away the rubs; out with the Lord's enemies, and the land's. Vex the Midianites; abolish the Amalekites, or else they will vex you with their wiles, as they have done heretofore. Let popery find no favour, because it is treasonable; prelacy as little, because it is tyrannical.'

"This," our author adds, "was rare stuff for the blades at Westminster, and pleased them admirably well. Therefore they straitly order Sir Edward Aiscough and Sir John Wray, to give the zealot hearty thanks for his good directions, and to desire him by all means to print it; which accordingly he did, and, in requital of thanks, dedicates his fury to their worships; where he falls to his old trade again, very prettily by his art of rhetorick, calling the king's army partakers with atheists, infidels, and papists; saying, it hath popish masses, superstitious worships, cold forms in the service of God: it is stored with popish priests: it persecutes God's ministers, painful preachers: it doth harbour all drunken, debauched clergy, or idle, non-preaching, dumb ministry, our ambitious tyrannical prelacy, and the sink and dregs of the times; the receptacle of the filth of the present and former ages, our * Athenæ Oxon, vol. ii. p. 52.

+ Fuller's Church Hist. b. xi. p. 213.

spiritual court's-men.' This man's railing," he adds, " pleased the commons so well, that they could think of no man fitter to prate when their wicked league and covenant was taken than he; which accordingly he did to the purpose, tickling their filthy ears with the same strains of malice; impudently affirming, That none but an atheist, papist, oppressor, rebel, or the guilty, desperate cavaliers, and light and empty men, can refuse the covenant:' and so concludes with reflection upon the king's party, as idolaters. And for this stuff, Colonel Long must be ordered to give him thanks from the house."*

Admitting the correctness of our author's extracts, there was certainly too much truth in many of Mr. Coleman's remarks, though some of them perhaps require a degree of limitation. It is, however, a certain fact, which many of our zealous historians scem willing to forget, that " their worships, the blades at Westminster," whose "filthy ears were tickled with the preacher's strains of malice," and who thanked him for his sermons, desiring him to print them, even the commons in parliament, as well as the lords, were, according to Clarendon, all members of the established church. Yet, such is the foul language of the above bigotted and peevish writer, that his prejudices and party feelings appear without restraint, while he pours forth his abundant slander and contempt upon men of the worthiest character.

His WORKS.-1. The Christian's Course and Complaint, both in the pursuit of Happiness desired, and for Advantages slipped in that pursuit; a Sermon preached to the Honourable House of Commons on the monthly Fast, Aug. 30, 1643; at St. Margaret's Westminster, 1643.-2. The Heart's Engagement, a Sermon preached at St. Margaret's Westminster, at the public entering into the Covenant, 1643.— 3. God's unusual Answer to a Solemn Fast, a Sermon preached to both Houses of Parliament, at their public Fast, Sep. 12, 1644— 1644.-4. A Brotherly Examination Examined: or, a clear Justification of those Passages in a Sermon, against which Mr. Gillespie did preach and write, 1646–5. A short Discovery of some Tenets which intrench upon the Honour and Power of Parliaments.—6. A Modell, &c.

EPHRAIM PAGET was born in Northamptonshire, in the year 1575, and educated in Christ's college, Oxford. He was the son of Mr. Eusebius Paget, a celebrated puritan divine, and a great sufferer for nonconformity. He was so great a proficient in the knowledge of the languages, that

* Foulis's Hist. of Plots, p. 183, 184. + Clarendon's Hist. vol. i. p. 184.

upon his admittance into the university, the Greek professor sought his acquaintance, and derived much assistance from him. At the age of twenty-six years, he understood and wrote fifteen or sixteen languages. Having completed his studies at the university, he became minister at St. Edmund's church, Lombard-street, London, where he continued many years. While in this situation, he entered into the conjugal state, and married Lady Bord, widow of Sir Stephen Bord, of a worthy family in Sussex. Upon the commencement of the civil wars, he was a great sufferer; and he was so much troubled and molested, says Wood, that, merely for the sake of quietness, he left his benefice in his old age, being then commonly called old father Ephraim. He retired to Deptford in Kent, where he spent the remainder of his days in retirement and devotion. He entered upon the joy of his Lord in the month of April, 1647, aged seventy-two years. His remains, according to his last will and testament, were laid in Deptford church-yard.+

Though his name is enrolled among the sufferers in the royal cause, he is with justice classed among the puritans. Many excellent divines, who were dissatisfied with the ecclesiastical discipline and ceremonies, and even with episcopacy itself, were nevertheless, during the national confusions, great sufferers on account of their loyal attachment to his majesty and the civil constitution. Their zeal for the king and his cause exposed them to the severity of the opposite party. This appears to have been the case with Mr. Paget. He was decided in his attachment to his majesty's interest and the civil constitution, for which he was a sufferer in those evil times; yet he was opposed to the ecclesiastical establishment, as well as the cruel oppressions of the prelates. Therefore, in the year 1645, being only two years before his death, he united with his brethren, the London ministers, in presenting a petition to the lords and commons in parliament, for the establishment of the presbyterian discipline. He wrote with great bitterness against the independents, baptists, and other sectaries, by which he exposed himself to the resentment of his enemies. "Error and heresy," it is said, "began to take deep root, and to spread far and wide over the face of the earth; he, therefore, set himself to discover them, and root them up, when he published his Heresiography.' Hence sprung his trouble;"

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* Paget's Heresiography, Pref. Edit. 1662.

+ Wood's Athenæ Oxon, vol. ii. p. 52.

‡ Grey's Examination, vol, ii. Appen. p. 87-89.

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