the Church which 'by usurpation did ever at any time appertain to the Pope.'
Two other controversies arose in these closing years of Elizabeth's reign, both of which had certain relations, direct or indirect, with the governing powers of the State. One of these, viz. the predestinarian controversy, arose with a sermon by a Fellow of Caius College Cambridge, Barret by name, who called in question in the University pulpit some of the dogmas of the prevailing Calvinism of the period. This sermon, and the disputes which followed it, showed how completely these opinions were at the time in possession of the field in the English Church; Whitgift himself, Whitaker (the Regius Professor of Divinity), together with the great majority of the bishops and heads of houses, taking part against Barret. It showed also, at the same time, that there were, even then, especially among the younger divines, a few who were beginning to revolt against them, with one notable leader among the seniors in the person of Dr. Baro, the Margaret Professor. The point, however, with which we are concerned is this, that the controversy gave rise to a somewhat singular proceeding on the part of the archbishop, who seems to have assembled a meeting of bishops and clergy at Lambeth, which drew up a series of Calvinistic propositions since known as the 'Lambeth Articles.' It is impossible to read Strype's account of the proceeding, and especially the archbishop's letter[1] to the heads of houses at Cambridge, without a feeling that he must have been conscious that he was dealing with the whole matter in a perfunctory and irregular way, and endeavouring to keep matters quiet by a tacit assumption of an authority which he felt to be more than doubtful
- ↑ Strype, Whitgift, vol. ii. p. 282.
