Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 57.djvu/415

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preface dated August 1644. In 1653 he prepared for press Sir Robert Filmer's ‘Quæstio Quodlibetica, or a Discourse whether it may bee Lawfull to take use for Money’ (1653), prefixing a long argument in favour of usury ‘To the Reader’ (dated East Peckham, 9 Oct. 1652). This was reprinted in 1678, and in the ‘Harleian Miscellany’ (vol. x.). Prefixed to the British Museum copy of the 1653 edition is a list of 180 works published by Humphrey Moseley in St. Paul's Churchyard.

Twysden's unfinished treatise on ‘The Beginners of a Monastick Life in Asia, Africa, and Europe,’ was first prefixed to the 1698 edition of Spelman's ‘History and Fate of Sacrilege,’ and it does not seem to have been reprinted. He maintains ‘with Latimer’ that a few monasteries of good report might well have been saved in every shire, and deprecates the extirpating ‘zeal of those in love with the Possessions Religious People were endowed with.’

Among the Roydon manuscripts that have been since printed are (i.) ‘An Account of Queen Anne Bullen from a Manuscript in the Handwriting of Sir R. Twysden, 1623, with the Endorsement, “I receaued this from my uncle Wyat, who beeing yonge had gathered many notes towching this Lady not without an intent to have opposed Saunders”’ (Twysden's grandfather, Roger, had married Anne, eldest daughter of Sir Thomas Wyatt [q. v.], the rebel). This was privately printed about 1815. The original manuscript has some interesting notes by Sir Roger upon the margin. (ii.) ‘Certaine Considerations upon the Government of England,’ first edited for the Camden Society in 1849, with a most able ‘Introduction’ by John Mitchell Kemble [q. v.], the historian. Of more interest than these, however, is (iii.) Twysden's own manuscript journal, formerly among the papers at Roydon House, and now in the British Museum (Addit. MSS. 34163–5), entitled ‘An Historical Narrative of the two Houses of Parliament, and either of them their Committees and Agents' violent Proceedings against Sr Roger Twysden.’ This document, which constitutes the main authority for the middle portion of Twysden's life, was first printed (with a facsimile of the front page) in the ‘Archæologia Cantiana’ (1858–61, vols. i–iv.).

A large portion of Twysden's cherished books and manuscripts, many of them annotated, were, together with those of Edward Lhwyd [q. v.], in the library of Sir John Sebright of Beechwood, Hertfordshire, and were sold by Leigh & Sotheby on 6 April 1807. Among the books then acquired by the British Museum is a copy of Sarpi's ‘Historia del Concilio Tridentino,’ London, 1619, with Twysden's autograph signature under the date 1627, and a large number of marginal notes in his own hand; these are pronounced by Lord Acton to be ‘in part of real value’ (1876, manuscript note); among the manuscripts is an excellent one of Ovid's ‘Metamorphoses,’ which was used by Thomas Farnaby [q. v.] for his edition of 1637. Sir Roger possessed the rare unexpurgated edition of John Cowell's ‘Interpreter’ (Cambridge, 1607); this he interleaved, and his valuable ‘Adversaria’ are described in ‘Archæologia Cantiana’ (ii. 221, 313).

[Kemble's Introduction to Twysden's Government of England (Camden Soc.), 1849; Proceedings in Kent in 1640, ed. Larking, for the same society, 1862; Betham's Baronetage, i. 126–9; Cotton's Baronetage, i. 214; Carew's Works, ed. Ebsworth; Berry's Kent Genealogies, p. 310; Burke's Extinct Baronetage; Hasted's Kent, ii. 213, 275, 728; Harleian Miscellany, vol. x.; Nichols's Progresses of James I; Gent. Mag. 1859, ii. 245; Brydges's Restituta, iii.; Cotton's Fasti Eccl. Hib. iii. 356; Evelyn's Diary, ed. Wheatley, ii. 188; Gardiner's Hist. of England, x. 182 sq.; Notes and Queries, 2nd ser. x. 471; Archæologia Cantiana, i–iv., v. 89 n., 105, 110, viii. 59, 69, x. 211, 213, xviii. 124, 138; Addit. MSS. 34147–78 (Twysden family of East Peckham Collections); Brit. Mus. Cat. The name Twysden is conspicuous by its absence from the Encyclopædias, from the Britannica downwards.]

T. S.

TWYSDEN or TWISDEN, Sir THOMAS (1602–1683), judge, second son of Sir William Twysden, bart., by his wife, Anne, daughter of Sir Moyle Finch, bart., of Eastwell, Kent, was born at Roydon Hall, East Peckham, in that county, on 2 Jan. 1601–2. Dr. John Twysden [q. v.] and Sir Roger Twysden [q. v.] were his brothers. He entered as a fellow commoner on 8 Nov. 1614 Emmanuel College, Cambridge, to which he afterwards gave 10l. towards the rebuilding of the chapel. In November 1617 he was admitted a member of the Inner Temple, where he was called to the bar in 1626, and elected a bencher in 1646. He appears in Croke's ‘Reports’ as arguing in Michaelmas term 1639 a point of law concerning the Kentish custom of gavelkind. His name is there and thenceforth always spelt Twisden, a fashion which he adopted by way of distinction from the rest of his family, upon his marriage in that year with Jane, daughter of John Thomlinson of Whitby, Yorkshire, and sister of Matthew Thomlinson [q. v.]

To his brother-in-law's interest Twisden probably owed something during the Com-