Bath and Wells was, that he should endeavour to prevail with his grace the archbishop of Canterbury, and the rest of the bishops, to put the laws in execution, which are already made against clandestine marriages; for better laws cannot be contrived to reform this abuse, than those, which are already to be found in our ecclesiastical constitutions for this purpose: and were these laws duly observed, and vigorously prosecuted against all that violated them, there would be no need of making acts of parliament, or establishing sanguinary laws against the clergy for preventing this iniquity.

As to the bill itself, Dr. Prideaux in his letter declared, that should it pass into an act, it would be, in his opinion, the greatest hardship, that ever was put upon the clergy in any Christian state; for it would be a continual snare of ruin and destruction to them, since it would subject them to be tried for their lives, every marriage they solemnized. That it would not be a sufficient salvo, to say the license would be their security; for who would care to have the safety of his life depend on a slip of paper, which the rats might eat up, or an hundred other accidents happen to destroy; and then the minister must suffer death for want of it? And farther, for his part, the doctor declared to the bishop, that after the passing of this bill, whatever should be the consequence, he would never marry any more persons; and was of opinion, that all other ministers, who had any regard for their own safety, would take the same resolution; and then the bill, instead of preventing clandestine marriages, would operate so far, as to put a stop to all marriages whatsoever. These considerations, when offered to the house in the debate, were thought to carry such weight with them, that those, who brought in the bill, were content to drop it, and pressed it no further The bishop of Bath and Wells, on his perusal of this letter, forthwith sent it to the press, without Dr. Prideaux' knowledge or consent; and the next week after, to the doctor's great surprise, it came down to him in print. This he would have had great reason to be offended at, had not the bishop spared him so far, as not to put his name to it.

In the same year, 1691, towards the end of the long vacation, died Dr. Edward Pocock, the eminent Hebrew Professor at Oxford, in the eighty-eighth year of his age. On his death, Dr. Prideaux was offered to succeed him in his professor's place, but declined it for several reasons, which at that time made it inconvenient to him to accept it, but afterwards it prov ed much to his detriment, that he did not.

About Whitsunday, A. D. 1692, bishop Moor first came into his diocese, and Dr. Prideaux then attended him as one of his archdeacons for the examining of candidates, who offered themselves to be ordained, which afforded him matter of great concern; for he used frequently to lament the excessive ignorance he had met with, in such as offered themselves for holy orders, at their examinations; that men, who were themselves unacquainted with the common doctrines of christianity, necessary to the salvation of their own souls, should take upon them the sacred office of conducting others to salvation: and this he attributed in a great measure to the neglect of family devotion; for while religion remained in families, and God was daily worshipped, children were early bred up by their parents, and instructed in the knowledge of Him; and the principles of christianity, thus first instilled into them, continued to grow up with them into further knowledge, as themselves grew to be further capable of it. And whilst young men were thus educated, when any of them were sent to the university, there to be fitted by their studies, for the ministry of religion, they carried some knowledge of it thither with them, and thereby became the sooner and more effectually qualified, to become teachers of it. But since family devotion and family instruction, through the causes already mentioned, have been neglected, and this neglect, through the corruption of the times, has grown so fast, as now in a great measure to have overspread the land, young men frequently come to the university without any knowledge or tincture of religion at all; and having little opportunity of improving themselves therein, whilst under-graduates, because the course of their studies inclines them to

philosophy and other kinds of learning; they are usually admitted to their first degree of bachelor of arts, with the same ignorance as to all sacred learning, as when first admitted into the universities; and many of them as soon as they have taken that degree, offering themselves for orders, are too often admitted to be teachers in the church, when they are only fit to be catechumens therein. These considerations made the doctor often lament the loss of Dr. Busby's benefaction, who offered to found two catechistical lectures, one in each university, with an endowment of 1007. per annum, each, for instructing the under-graduates in the rudiments of the Christian religion; provided all the said under-graduates should be obliged to attend those lectures, and none of them be admitted to the degree of bachelor of arts, till after having been examined by the catechist, as to their knowledge in the doctrines and precepts of the Christian religion, and by him approved of. But this condition being rejected by both universities, the benefaction was rejected therewith; and the church hath ever since suffered for the want of it. He used likewise to complain of another abuse, which he frequently met with at ordinations; that is, false testimonials; for how defective soever any of the candidates may be in their learning, and how faulty and scandalous soever in their manners, they never want ample testimonials, with the full number of neighbouring ministers' hands thereto, vouching the contrary. By this means bishops are often so deceived, as to admit into orders such, as are notoriously unworthy of them. This the doctor thought was a scandalous abuse in those ministers, who misguided and imposed on bishops by such false testimonials; for the remedying of which it would be proper, that any minister, who should thus endeavour by unjustifiable means to procure orders for an undeserving person, should himself be suspended from his own, till he was made sensible of his error; and ever after stand unqualified for giving any more testimony in the like cases.

After the act of toleration had passed the royal asgent, the first of king William and queen Mary, many

people foolishly imagined, that they had thereby full liberty given them, either to go to church or stay away, and idly dispose of themselves elsewhere, as they should think fit; and accordingly, the public assemblies for divine worship on the Lord's day were much deserted, and ale-houses much more resorted to than the churches. Dr. Prideaux, in order to put a stop to this growing evil, drew up a circular letter, directed to the ministers of his archdeaconry, in which, after he had informed them, that the said act gave no toleration to absent from church, but only to such, who, dissenting from the established religion, worshipped God elsewhere, with one of the dissenting sects mentioned in the said act, and that all who absented themselves from church, and did not thus worship God elsewhere, were under the same penalties of law as before, and ought to be punished accordingly; he desired them to send for their churchwardens, and having fully instructed them in this matter, exhort them to do their duty herein, and present, at all visitations for the future, all such profane and irreligious absenters from church, in the same manner as formerly used to be done before this act was made. This circular letter he sent to London, and having there gotten as many copies of it to be printed, as there were parishes in the archdeaconry; on his next visitation, which was Michaelmas, A. D. 1692, dispersed them among the ministers of the said parishes, giving each of them one. It was afterwards published at the end of his Directions to Churchwardens, and underwent several editions. This letter, he found, had, in some measure, its intended effect, though it could not wholly cure this evil.

On Michaelmas, 1694, he thought proper to leave Saham, and return again with his family to Norwich, after he had resided there about four years. His reasons for leaving this place were, that the country thereabouts subjecting people to agues, his family were hardly ever free from that distemper, all the time he lived there. He was himself sick of it a considerable time; and two of his children were so long ill, and contracted so bad a state of health from it, as after

wards cost them both their lives. Besides, being obliged to leave most of his books at Norwich, as not having room for them in his house at Saham, this hindered him from carrying on his studies according to his inclinations; and in these he was further interrupted, whilst he tarried there, by the avocations he frequently met with in country business, which made him weary of the place; and on all these considerations, he determined to leave it. On his quitting Saham, he gave it up altogether, without reserving to himself any of the profits, as he might have done, by putting a curate on the parish; and resolving that as far as in him lay, the benefice and the office should go together, he resigned both into the hands of the bishop, and wrote to the warden and fellows of New-college, in Oxford, who were patrons of the living, to present another, which they did accordingly.

On the doctor's return to Norwich, the whole business of the cathedral fell again into his hands, and he was obliged to undertake the burden of it, to prevent all from running to confusion. The dean resided mostly at London, and hardly ever came to Norwich till towards the latter end of his time; and Dr. Prideaux, after he had left Saham, being constantly there, this gave him a full opportunity to make himself master of the affairs of that church; which he continued to take care of till the time of his death.

On the 12th of February, A. D. 1696, he was instituted into the vicarage of Trowse, on the presentation of the dean and chapter of Norwich. It is a little village, within a mile of Norwich, and a very small benefice, being hardly worth to him more than 401. per annum. However, having no cure, since he had resigned Saham, he took this small vicarage, rather for the sake of exercising the duties of his function in that parish, than out of any regard to the small profits arising therefrom: for though his prebendship of Norwich, and archdeaconry of Suffolk, which were all the preferments he had at this time, fell very much short of a sufficiency to support him, yet, as he had private fortunes of his own, he needed not so small an accession for his maintenance. Having taken upon himself this