Sir Christopher Wren: His Family and His Times: With Original Letters and a Discourse on Architecture Hitherto Unpublished. 1585-1723.Phillimore, Lucy
History
Sir Christopher Wren: His Family and His Times: With Original Letters and a Discourse on Architecture Hitherto Unpublished. 1585-1723.
Phillimore, Lucy
Great Britain -- History -- Stuarts, 1603-1714 -- Biography; Wren family; Wren, Christopher, Sir, 1632-1723
While young Christopher was thus delighting his father with his
'first-fruits,' his uncle the Bishop was encountering many adversities.
While he was busied in Norwich, and in the midst of his work, Dr. White,
Bishop of Ely, died; he had resided mostly in London, as was then too
commonly the habit of the bishops, and it is to be supposed that there
was plenty of work to be done in the diocese. Laud reckoned it as a very
important one on account of its university, and could think of no one so
well suited to the post as Bishop Wren, who was a distinguished
Cambridge scholar. To Ely accordingly the Bishop was translated, May 5,
1638, and rejoiced in renewing his connection with the university where
his early years had been spent. The expenses attending so many removals
must have fallen heavily upon him; all the more, as in Norwich the
palace was out of repair and he lived for some time in a house of his
own at Ipswich, which was probably a part of Mrs. Wren's property,
finding that much attention was required by that part of his diocese.
Prynne was born at Ipswich, and though shut up in the Tower of
London,[29] retained friends in his native town; thus the Bishop knew he
was entering a hornet's nest. Prynne speedily produced his
'Quench-Coal,' which professed to answer a tract called 'A Coal from the
Altar,' wherein were explained the reasons for placing the Holy Table
altarwise, and railing it in. Next came 'The News from Ipswich,' which
reviled all bishops under the names of 'Luciferian Lord Bishops,
execrable Traytors, Devouring Wolves,' and the like; especially
attacking Wren, and declaring, that, 'in all Queen Marie's time, no such
havoc was made in so short a time of the faithful ministers in any part,
nay in the whole Land, than had been made in his Diocese.' There was one
great riot at Ipswich, which the Bishop was able to quell. Prynne was
fined, branded, and imprisoned in Carnarvon Castle, and the town was for
the time tranquil, but Prynne was destined to be a deadly and utterly
unscrupulous enemy.
For nearly two years after his translation to Ely, Dr. Wren was able to
govern his new diocese in comparative peace. Little opposition seems to
have been made, for the factious spirit which was rampant in Norfolk and
Suffolk was less violent here. In his beloved university there were many
points which needed amendment. When he was master of Peterhouse and
built the chapel, he gave it that which many colleges then lacked, and
were lacking still when he returned, to visit Cambridge.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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