warm, hafty, and paffionate temper, and of a difpofition fome what vindictive; but, in other refpects, his private life appears to fwelled and fallen, and he rotten already. This dream did trouble me. 66 1625. July 3. Sunday, in my fleep his Majefty King James appeared to me. I faw him only paffing by fwiftly. He was of a pleasant and ferene countenance. In paffing he saw me, beckoned to me, fmiled, and was immediately withdrawn from my fight. "Aug. 21. That night, in my fleep, it feemed to me, that the Duke of Buckingham came into bed to me; where he behaved himfelf with great kindness towards me, after that reft, wherewith wearied perfons are wont to folace themselves. Many also seemed to me to enter the chamber, who faw this. "Not long before, I dreamed that I saw the Dutchess of Buckingham, that excellent Lady, at firft very much perplexed about her husband, but afterwards cheerful, and rejoicing, that fhe was freed from the fear of abortion, fo that in due time he might be again a mother. "Sept. 4. Sunday. The night following I was very much troubled in my dreams. My imagination ran altogether upon the Duke of Buckingham, his fervants, and family. All feemed to be out of order that the Dutchefs was ill, called for her maids, and took her bed. GOD grant better things. "Sept. 26. Sunday. That night I dreamed of the marriage of I know not whom at Oxford. All that were prefent, were cloathed with flourishing green garments. I knew none of them but Thomas Flaxnye. Immediately after, without any intermiffion of fleep (that I know of) I thought I faw the Bishop of Worcester, his head and fhoulders covered with linen. He advifed and invited me kindly, to dwell with them, marking out a place, where the Court of the Marches of Wales was then held. But not ftaying for my answer, he subjoined, that he knew I could not live fo meanly, &c. "1626. Aug. 25. Friday. Two Robin-red-breafts flew together through the door into my ftudy, as if one pursued the other. That fudden motion almost startled me. I was then preparing a fermon on Ephef. iv. 30, and studying. Jan. 5. Epiphany Eve, and Friday. In the night I dreamed, that my mother, long fince dead, ftood by my bed, and drawing afide the clothes a little, looked pleasantly upon me; and that I was glad to fee her with fo merry an afpca. She then fhewed to me a certain old man, long fince deceased; whom, while alive, I both knew and loved. He feemed to lie upon the ground; merry enough, but with a wrinkled countenance. His name was Grove. While I prepared to falute him, I awoke. 66 1639. Feb. 12. Tuefday night. I dreamed that K. C. was to be married to a Minifter's widow; and that I was called upon to do it. No service-book could be found; and in my own book, which I had, I could not find the order for marriage. "1649. to have been free from reproach; though we can find in his actions but very few evidences of that IMMENSE VIRTUE, which Lord Clarendon attributes to him. He was of very arbitrary principles both in Church and State; extremely active in the promotion of the most illegal and defpotic measures of government; and inclined to very fevere methods in the ecclefiaftical courts, especially against the Puritans, and all who made apy oppofition to the doctrines or ceremonies established by authority. As to his theological principles, though he could not with propriety be termed a Papift, it is nevertheless certain, that he was a great favourer of many of the doctrines maintained by the Church of Rome; and that the religion which he laboured to establish, partook largely of the nature and genius. of Popery. Though he would not probably have chosen, that England fhould have been brought into fubjection to the Pope, "1640. Jan. 24. Friday. At night I dreamed that my father (who died forty-fix years fince) came to me; and, to my thinking, he was as well, and as cheerful, as ever I faw him. He asked me, what I did here? And after fome fpeech, I asked him, how long he would stay with me? He answered, he would ftay till he had me away with him. I am not moved with dreams; yet I thought fit to remember this. "1642. Nov. 2. Wednesday night. I dreamed the Parliament was removed to Oxford; the Church undone: fome old Courtiers came in to see me, and jeered: I went to St. John's, and there I found the roof off from fome parts of the college, and the walls cleft, and ready to fall down. GOD be merciful. "Tuesday, Simon and Jude's Eve, I went into my upper ftudy, to fee fome manuscripts which I was fending to Oxford. In that ftudy hung my picture, taken by the life; and coming in, I found it fallen down upon the face, and lying on the floor, the ftring being broken by which it was hanged against the wall. I am almost every day threatened with my ruin in Parliament. GOD grant this be no omen. "On Wednesday, Sept. 4, 1644, as I was washing my face, my nofe bled, and fomething plentifully, which it had not done, to my remembrance, in forty years before, fave only once, and that was juft the fame day and hour, when my most honourable friend the Lord Duke of Buckingham was killed at Portsmouth, myself being then at Westminster. And upon Friday, as I was washing after dinner, my nose bled again. I thank God I make no fuperftitious obfervation of this, or any thing elfe; yet I have ever used to mark And here I after came what and how any thing of note falls to me. to know, that upon both these days in which I bled, there was great agitation in the Houfe of Commons, to have me fentenced by ordinance; but both times put off, in regard very few of that House had heard either my charge or defence."-See Diary, p. 7, 20, 22. 23, 24, 35, 56, 57, 59, 64, and 421.' M 4 he appeared very defirous of being himself the Sovereign Pa triarch of three kingdoms.' The fixth of these volumes brings the work down to the times of Boyle, Dryden, South, Tillotfon, &c and we must not forget to obferve, that to many of the lives are prefixed prints of the perfons who are the fubjects of the respective narratives; which are chiefly copied from Houbraken and Vertue's heads of illuftrious men and they are not ill engraved. G. ART. II. The Lives of those eminent Antiquaries, Elias Afbmole, Efq; and Mr. William Lilly. Written by themselves. With Lilly's Life and Death of Charles the First; and feveral occafional Letters. By Charles Burman, Efq; new Edit. 8vo. 6 s. Davies. 1774. TH HE title of Eminent Antiquary is, no doubt, justly beftowed on the celebrated Mr. Afhmole; but we are not fo well fatisfied with Lilly's pretenfions to fo honourable a diftinction. Lilly was rather a conjurer than an antiquary; in the former character he fhone confpicuous among the numerous herd of aftrologers, who flourished in this country, in the earlier part of the 16th century; and was far from being confidered in the fame contemptible light with the Gadburys and Culpeppers, and other quacks and fortune tellers of thofe days. We find that he was vifited and patronized by fuch men as Afhmole, and Bulftrode Whitelocke; and was, indeed, confidered as a man of real learning, in an age wherein aftrology ftill maintained its footing among the fciences, although it hath. fince been, moft defervedly, laughed and punished into annihilation. But although Lilly was certainly an impoftor*, in his aftrological capacity, in common with the reft of his divining fraternity, yet he deferves to be confidered as a man of letters; and we must do him the justice to acknowledge, that in his Memoirs of Charles I. we meet with many curious obfervations on the character and conduct of that unhappy prince; and that if we ftrike out the nonfenfe about cafting figures, and calculating nativities, this tract may be read with as much fatisfaction as fome of the more celebrated hiftories, and with lefs danger of being mifled; for Lilly appears not only to have been ftrictly Lilly, throughout his Memoirs, fo very seriously afferts the utility and dignity of his profeffion, that fome have thought he really believed in it himself. We doubt not, however, that he acted, in this refpect, like many honeft men befide, who have no idea of betraying the fecrets of a craft by which they and their brethren obtain not only their wealth, but the esteem and reverence of mankind. impartial, impartial, but also to have been very well informed,-so far as he pretends to the knowledge of facts, or characters. With refpect to the worthy founder of the Afhmolean Mufeum at Oxford, his diary may be regarded as a curious fpecimen of those private journals which it was the fashion, in those days, for almost every body to keep, who knew how to use a pen; and, more especially, the divines. Vanity, perhaps, had not a little fhare in the production of thefe family pieces of cgotifm; which, in general, ferve to prove nothing fo much as the vast importance of a man to HIMSELF. Yet to thefe details we are obliged for the knowledge of many useful particulars relative to the lives of eminent perfons; but they have been brought into difcredit, through the imprudence of those who have committed them to the prefs, with all their native imperfections on their heads. The Writers may be excufed for noting many frivolous particulars, which, however, could not be communicated to the Public, without expofing the whole compofition to ridicule it was therefore, undoubtedly, the Editor's duty to expunge all fuch trifling paffages; preferving nothing but what, it might be fuppofed, the Public would with to know. Not fo, however, has the faithful if not judicious Editor of Mr. Afhmole's diary proceeded. Every word feems to have been moft religiously committed to the fafe cuftody of the prefs, and many an anecdote is thus depofited in the temple of Fame, which ought rather to have been conveyed to the temple of Cloacina: thus we are carefully informed when Mr. A. took phyfic, how many times it operated; at what periods he had the tooth-ach; on what day his wife quickened; and how he once unluckily fcratching his back fide, fell foul of a pimple, and made a fore place. In fhort, it was with good reason that (as the original Editor, Mr. Burman, informs us) a near relation of Mr. Afhmole's deemed thefe papers a curiofity for their exactness and fingularity.'-They contain, however, a number of particulars which, to the lovers of the ftudy of antiquity, and the friends of literature in general, will be very acceptable and therefore we heartily forgive Dr. Plott + who transcribed them, and the Rev. Mr. Parry who collated them; notwithstanding that, in the difcharge of this duty, they have manifefted lefs tafte than fidelity. Perhaps, indeed, as true antiquarians, they thought it their efpecial duty to be most religiously careful not to rub off the ruft. 6 The famous Author of the Natural Hiftory of Staffordshire, &c. and Secretary to the Royal Society. Of Jefus College, Oxford, and Head Keeper of the Ashmolean Museum. ART. ART. II. Confiderations on the State of Subfcription to the Articles and WE E know not who the perfon is to whom the friends of but, whoever is the Writer, he appears, from his manner of treating the fubject before him, to be a fincere Chriftian, a Confiftent Proteftant, and an able advocate for the great cause in which he is fo worthily engaged. So much has been published of late, fays he, concerning the propriety or impropriety of fubfcribing to human articles of faith, and particularly concerning thofe fubfcriptions which are required in this kingdom; that it might feem unnecessary to add to the bulk of a controverfy already too large. Yet till the matter is brought to an issue, it is an affair of such importance to the peace of many confcientious men, the honour of our Church, and the interefts of true Christianity, that no man, who is fatisfied of its importance, can well be juftified if he does not lend a helping hand towards its decifion. What has paffed, has thrown new light on the fubject; and though nothing has yet been judicially determined, nor any one ftep been taken towards legally removing the difficulty under which we labour; yet it cannot be faid, that nothing has been done by our altercations. And it may lead us nearer to fome conclufion, to have it known. how far the cause has imperceptibly advanced, notwithstanding every art to defer it. This I fhall endeavour to fhew, by a fhort review of the queftion and I choose to begin ab ovo, that every one into whofe hands this pamphlet fhall be put, may have the fubftance of the whole cafe before him: and that if the parliament fhall do nothing in this feffion, towards giving relief to a large body of confcientious Chriftians, the world may judge between us; who is most in the right, he who feeks it, or they who shall ftill perfift in refufing to comply with fo pious a request. Few are at leifure, or willing, to wade through volumes of controverfy, or even to turn over what has appeared of late on the fubject: but I fhould apprehend this fuccinct account may fuffi to let even a ftranger into the most material points on which the debate turns (which he may purfue to advantage, if he find himself inclined, elfewhere) and I appeal to the warmeft advocates for our fubfcription themselves, whether the facts I fhall relate (however melancholy the truth) be not true.' Our |