he also offered him a gift of money through a bookseller, and without any written receipt. Both of Cromwell’s offers were refused with serene disdain. Our hero might have saved himself from poverty without any active compliance with the Commonwealth; yet we read with respect about his voluntary privations (including the loss of his livings), of which we obtain a glimpse, in his letter to Archbishop Usher, dated —
“London, Oct. 21, 1650.
“May it please your Grace, I was with Mr Selden after I had been with your Grace; whom upon some intimation of my present condition and necessities I found so noble as that he did not only presently furnish me with a very considerable sum, but was so free and forward in his expressions, as that I could not find in my heart to tell him much (somewhat I did) of my purpose of selling, lest it might sound as a further pressing upon him of whom I had already received so much. Neither, indeed, will I now sell so much as I intended; for I did not think (besides what I have in the country) to keep any at all that would yield any money. Now I shall, and among them those manuscripts I spoke of to your Grace, and Jerome’s Epistles particularly — the rather because I make use of it in my De cultu Dei (the first part whereof your Grace hath seen), which I think will shortly be printed. As for my father’s papers, I do seriously desire to dispose of them some way, if I can, to my best advantage, but with a respect to their preservation and safety — which I think would be, if some library, either here or beyond the seas, had them. I pray, good my Lord, help me if you can, and when you have an opportunity, confer with Mr Selden about it. I will shortly (within these few weeks, God willing) send a note to your Grace of what I have that is considerable, and will part with — not but that I had much rather keep them, had I any hopes at all ever to be accommodated with books, and leisure to fit them for public use myself. But that I have no hopes of; and certainly, so disposed of as I would have them in my lifetime, they will be safer than in my keeping, in that condition I am. It would be a great ease to my mind to see that well done, for I have always reckoned of them as of my life; and if any mischance should come to them whilst they are in my keeping (and indeed they have been in danger more than once, since this my tumbling condition), I should never have any comfort of my life.
“I have sent your Grace the Jerome that you might see it; and if you desire to keep it by you, I shall humbly crave a note of it under your Grace’s hand. So I humbly take my leave.
Your Grace’s in all humble duty,
Mer. Casaubon.”
In Anthony a Wood’s long list of this author’s works I do not find the De Cultu Dei. His only production now easily accessible consists of some annotations on the Psalms and Proverbs, reprinted in the last edition of the Westminster Assembly’s Annotations on the Bible. Passing over various pamphlets, I note his books on “Enthusiasme” (1655), and on Credulity and Incredulity, two volumes (1668-70). In 1656 there was published a Second edition, revised and enlarged, of his “Treatise concerning Enthusiasme, as it is an effect of nature, but is mistaken by many for either Divine Inspiration or Diabolicall Possession.” He writes with genuine pity, and says of one deluded enthusiast, p. 169, “Although I honour his sufferings, yet I do not think myself bound by that to approve his doctrine.” It was in 1664 that he published “Of the necessity of Reformation in and before Luther’s time.”
Dr. Meric Casaubon was restored to his spiritualities by Charles II., and spent a tranquil literary life; he, however, had lost his wife in 1649. He himself survived till 14th July 1671. He was the father of John Casaubon, surgeon in Canterbury, who died in 1693, aged 56, and whose son, Meric, had died in 1681. On the 21st July the learned and venerable prebendary was buried within his cathedral, where his epitaph contains the following encomium:—
| Sta et venerare, viator! Hic mortales immortalis spiritûs exuvias deposuit Meric Casaubon | ||||||||
| Magni Nominis Eruditique Generis |
par haercs | |||||||
| quippe qui | Patrem Isaacum Casaubonum Avum Henricum Stephanum Pro-avum Robertum Stephanum |
habuit | ||||||
| Heu quos viros! quae literarum lumina! quae aevi sui decora! ipse eruditionem per tot erudita capita traduce excepit, excoluit, et ad pietatis (quae in ejus pectore regina sedebat) ornamentum et incrementum feliciter consecravit, rempublicamque literariam multiplici rerum et linguarum supellectile locupletavit — | ||||||||
| Vir, incertum doctior an melior — in pauperes liberalitate. in amicos utilitate in omnes humanitate, in acutissimis longissimi morbi tormentis Christianâ patientiâ, insignissimus. | ||||||||
*⁎* Dr Parr’s sketch of his career, written (as that kind-hearted and precise writer declared) “for the credit of Oxford,” is worth quoting:—
