Proof of the true Father and Mother of the Pretended Prince of Wales, &c. 1700; (5) Mr. Fuller's Answer to the Jacobites. Lond. 8vo.; (6) A Full Demonstration, &c. 1701. In this year Fuller was questioned and punished by the Houses of Parliament. He is referred to in the following letter written by one of the members for the University of Oxford (Ballard MSS. vol. xxxviii. p. 75, Bodl.): 66 "Westminster, Jan. 20, 1701. If anything extraordinary had occurred here worth comunicating, besides wt the votes contain, you should have heard from me before this time. And now I have little to adde to this excuse for my silence more than to tell you that the famous or rather infamous Mr. Fuller has not been able to produce to the Lds any of his 26 Deponents, nor can tell before whom the Depositions were taken, nor could he produce Mr. Tho. Jones, neither could he name any Person, besides himself, that knew him; upon the whole I believe no Person doubts his villany, and that the Contents of his Books are False and Scandalous. He has stood once in the Pillory upon a Prosecution directed by ye H. of C.; what will be his next punishment I cannot tell: I fear our Laws are so defective he will not yet have his Desert. "If I can serve you in anything, I hope you'l favour with yr comands. "To the Revd Dr Charlet, Master of University College in Oxford." S', Your obliged humble servant, Fuller now wrote: (7) Life of William Fuller, Gent., written by his own hand. Lond. 1701,8vo. In this pamphlet there is nothing said as to his descent from Dr. Thomas Fuller; (8) The Second Part. Lond. 1701, 8vo. ; (9) Fuller's Non-recantation to the Jacobites, by William Fuller, Gent. Lond. 1701, 8vo. ; (10) A Trip to Hampshire and Flanders. 8vo., 1701. Fuller continued the publication of his libels: (11) Original Letters of the late King, 1702; (12) Twenty-Six Depositions of Persons of Quality, 1702; (13) Letter to John Tutchin. 66 In June, 1703, Fuller, “ Cheat-Master General of England,” was convicted by the Court of Queen's Bench for publishing Nos. 6 and 7 above-mentioned; and he was fined, pilloried, and imprisoned. His imprisonment gave him the opportunity for writing an amusing narrative, (14) The Whole Life of Mr. William Fuller, &c. 1703. Some existing copies of this autobiography contain his portrait (as here copied in photo-lithography), exhibiting his arms quartering three lions for Herbert, and the Fuller coat; but other copies are without this heraldic distinction. He also wrote (15) Mr. William Fuller's Trip to Bridewell, with a true Account of his barbarous Usage in the Pillory. The Characters of the several People who came to see him beat Hemp, &c. Written by his own Hand, 1703. In this pamphlet, which is not mentioned in the bibliographies, he refers to his two former narratives of his "unhappy life." Two other pamphlets are ascribed to him: (16) Sincere and Hearty Confession, 1704; (17) Letter to the Earl of Oxford, in the Tower, 1716. (Lowndes, p. 849; Watt, 392; Hone's Year Book, vol. iv. 734. There are other tracts relating to Fuller in the Bodleian Library.) CHAPTER XVIII. "THE CHURCH-HISTORY OF BRITAIN." (1655.) 66 66 HISTORY OF THE PROJECT.-POPULAR EXPECTATION OF THE HISTORY."-ITS DESIGN TWICE EXTENDED.-AN HISTORIAN'S DUTY.-THE "HISTORY" IMPARTIAL AND LOYAL.-ITS CONTEMPORARY VALUE.-FULLER'S TEMPERANCE OF MIND. FULLER'S CHRONOLOGY: HIS STRENGTH OF MEMORY.-THE HISTORY AN ENDEAVOUR."-ITS ARRANGEMENT.-THE DUKE OF RICHMOND AND OTHER NOBLE PATRONS.-" LITERARY MENDICITY."-FULLER'S DEDICATIONS. -HIS INTERVIEW WITH THE LORD KEEPER FIENNES.-THE HERALDRY OF THE WORK, THE SUPPLEMENTARY HISTORIES,-THE SOURCES OF THE "CHURCH-HISTORY."-FULLER'S ANTIQUARIAN FRIENDS.-PRESERVATION OF STATE-PAPERS IN THE HISTORY."-ITS WIT: WALTON AND FULLER.-ITS PROVERBIAL SENTENCES.-ITS DIGRESSIONS.-CONTEMPORARY COMMENDATIONS AND CENSURES. 66 "Were it in my power I would have built a church where I only made my Church. History." (Appeal, pt. i. p. 51.) HE publication of the Church-History soon after March, 1655, was the great literary event of Fuller's life, it being unquestionably his greatest work. The smaller histories and biographies which he had already issued, make it clear that the bias of his mind was towards ecclesiastical story. There is reason to believe that the design of an adequate national History of the Church was conceived by Fuller at an early period in life. By 1642 he had surveyed the whole project, and thenceforward he regarded it as a life-work. In the year named he made prayerful promise that if he fell on better days, it would "then encourage me to count it freedom to serve two apprenticeships (God spinning out the thick thread of my life so long) in writing the Ecclesiastical History from Christ's time to our days, if I shall from remote! parts be so planted as to enjoy the benefit of walking and standing libraries, without which advantages the best vigilancy doth but vainly dream to undertake such a task." His unsettled life during the succeeding eight or ten years, when (as 1 Holy State: To the Reader. he put it) he had rather to study to live than live to study, freed him, in his view, from the self-imposed obligation. "I had ever since," he says, "quitted all thoughts of writing any church-history." His gradual collection of materials shows, however, that he had never wholly laid aside the favourite project, at which at first he only worked fitfully. Two inducements urged him to complete his task. He had, firstly, created an expectation which was not to be easily allayed. The Muse of the Cotswold Hills and the Principal of a Scotch University' had already given expression to a general feeling. Moreover, about the time of its publication, the author was again reminded of the work, already long over due, in the following punning lines :— 3 "Vpon Mr. Fullers Booke called Pisgah-sight. Fuller of wish, than hope, methinks it is, Yet dare I not be bold, to intitle this The fullest work; the Author fuller is, Who, though he empty not himself, can fill Another fuller, yet continue still Fuller himself, and so the Reader be Always in hope a fuller work to see." There was, secondly, room for an adequate work of the kind; for although, as Fuller pointed out in 1660, our land since the Reformation had yielded ecclesiastical historians "of as tall parts and large performances as any nation in Christendom," a native Eusebius had not yet appeared as the predecessor of Strype, Collier, and Milner, in the succeeding centuries. Many English scholars, during their long leisure in the troubles, made attempts to supply what was want. Among others, Bishop Mountagu, the author of Apello Caesarem, laboured at such a project, but was unable to mature it. "Had it been finished," says Fuller, "we had had Church annals to put into the balance with those of Baronius; and which would have swayed with them for learning, and weighed them down for truth." Elsewhere Fuller regretted that, through the civil distempers, English historians were seldom See pp. 492 and 502. 2 Page 62 of Choyce Drollery: Songs and Sonnets. Being a collection of divers excellent pieces of Poetry, of severall eminent Authors. Never before printed. London. Printed by J. G. for Robert Pollard, at the Ben Johnson's head behind • Worthies, chap. x. 27. |