1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Matthew, Tobias

MATTHEW, TOBIAS, or Tobie (1546–1628), archbishop of York, was the son of Sir John Matthew of Ross in Herefordshire, and of his wife Eleanor Crofton of Ludlow. He was born at Bristol in 1546. He was educated at Wells, and then in succession at University College and Christ Church, Oxford. He proceeded B.A. in 1564, and M.A. in 1566. He attracted the favourable notice of Queen Elizabeth, and his rise was steady though not very rapid. He was public orator in 1569, president of St John’s College, Oxford, in 1572, dean of Christ Church in 1576, vice-chancellor of the university in 1579, dean of Durham in 1583, bishop of Durham in 1595, and archbishop of York in 1606. In 1581 he had a controversy with the Jesuit Edmund Campion, and published at Oxford his arguments in 1638 under the title, Piissimi et eminentissimi viri Tobiae Matthew, archiepiscopi olim Eboracencis concio apologetica adversus Campianam. While in the north he was active in forcing the recusants to conform to the Church of England, preaching hundreds of sermons and carrying out thorough visitations. During his later years he was to some extent in opposition to the administration of James I. He was exempted from attendance in the parliament of 1625 on the ground of age and infirmities, and died on the 29th of March 1628. His wife, Frances, was the daughter of William Barlow, bishop of Chichester.

His son, Sir Tobias, or Tobie, Matthew (1577–1655), is remembered as the correspondent and friend of Francis Bacon. He was educated at Christ Church, and was early attached to the court, serving in the embassy at Paris. His debts and dissipations were a great source of sorrow to his father, from whom he is known to have received at different times £14,000, the modern equivalent of which is much larger. He was chosen member for Newport in Cornwall in the parliament of 1601, and member for St Albans in 1604. Before this time he had become the intimate friend of Bacon, whom he replaced as member for St Albans. When peace was made with Spain, on the accession of James I., he wished to travel abroad. His family, who feared his conversion to Roman Catholicism, opposed his wish, but he promised not to go beyond France. When once safe out of England he broke his word and went to Italy. The persuasion of some of his countrymen in Florence, one of whom is said to have been the Jesuit Robert Parsons, and a story he heard of the miraculous liquefaction of the blood of San Januarius at Naples, led to his conversion in 1606. When he returned to England he was imprisoned, and many efforts were made to obtain his reconversion without success. He would not take the oath of allegiance to the king. In 1608 he was exiled, and remained out of England for ten years, mostly in Flanders and Spain. He returned in 1617, but went abroad again in 1619. His friends obtained his leave to return in 1621. At home he was known as the intimate friend of Gondomar, the Spanish ambassador. In 1623 he was sent to join Prince Charles, afterwards Charles I., at Madrid, and was knighted on the 23rd of October of that year. He remained in England till 1640, when he was finally driven abroad by the parliament, which looked upon him as an agent of the pope. He died in the English college in Ghent on the 13th of October 1655. In 1618 he published an Italian translation of Bacon’s essays. The “Essay on Friendship” was written for him. He was also the author of a translation of The Confessions of the Incomparable Doctor St Augustine, which led him into controversy. His correspondence was published in London in 1660.

For the father, see John Le Neve’s Fasti ecclesiae anglicanae (London, 1716), and Anthony Wood’s Athenae oxonienses. For the son, the notice in Athenae oxonienses, an abridgment of his autobiographical Historical Relation of his own life, published by Alban Butler in 1795, and A. H. Matthew and A. Calthrop, Life of Sir Tobie Matthew (London, 1907).