Lambeth Articles defining and elucidating the Reformation doctrines were sent down to Cambridge to promote peace, and commanded to be held as statutory at least to the extent, “that nothing should be publicly taught to the contrary.” The only rebel was Dr. Baro, who, on 12th January 1595, preached a sermon to the clergy (Concio ad Clerum), re-asserting his own theorems. Queen Elizabeth had heard of the Doctor’s former irregularities, and communicated her warm displeasure to Archbishop Whitgift, her Majesty being pleased to observe that “Dr. Baro, being an alien, ought to have carried himself quietly and peaceably in a country where he was so humanely harboured and enfranchised, both himself and his family.” Dr. Baro was touched by this appeal, and also by the Archbishop’s moderation; to the latter he wrote a letter dated 13th December 1595, expressing his adherence to his own pub- lished doctrines, making this promise — “I will keep peace as long as I shall be here”; as to the Queen he said, “I wish it may be known at length to the Queen’s Majesty what my piety and reverence is toward her; indeed for her, and for the defence of the state of this church which she defends, I would shed my blood, if need were, with as willing and ready a mind as her own faithful subjects ought to do, and as she would have me do, since she has been willing to make me free of her kingdom, and my wife and children, and to confirm it with her seal.” The death of Dr. Whitaker had just happened (viz., on 4th December), and Dr. Baro had desired to be promoted to the Regius Professorship of divinity thus left vacant. For the sake of peace, however, he refrained from making any application for that chair; and in 1596 he withdrew from Cambridge, having resigned his Lady Margaret professorship. He is said to have explained his reasons for retreating, in three Latin words, “Fugio ne fugarer.” He settled in London, in Crutched Fryers. There he died in April 1599, and was buried in the Church of St. Olave, Hart Street. The entry in the register of St. Olave’s is, “1599, April 17, Mr. Doctor Barrow, in the chancel.”[1] The city clergy attended his funeral (by order of the Bishop of London), and six Doctors of Divinity were his pall-bearers. Strype informs us that he left a large posterity behind him, and that his eldest son, Samuel Baro, was a physician, and lived and died in Lynn-Regis, in Norfolk. Anthony a Wood says, “The Baros, or Barons (as they are by some called), who do now, or did lately, live at Boston, in Lincolnshire, and at King’s Lynn in Norfolk, are descended from him.”
There was published in his lifetime a black letter volume, entitled, “A Special Treatise of God’s Providence, and of comforts against all kinde of crosses and calamities to be fetched from the same, with an Exposition of the 107th Psalme — hereunto is added an appendix of Certain Sermons and Questions, conteining sweet and comfortable doctrine as they were vttered and disputed ad clerum in Cambridge — by P. Baro, D. in Deuinitie. Englished by I. L., Vicar of Wethersfielde.”
*∗* In 1660, Dr. Peter Heylin, Archbishop’s Laud’s biographer (known in Scotland as Lee-ing Peter), published a book or huge pamphlet, entitled, “Historia Quinquarticularis, or a declaration of the judgement of the Western Churches, and more particularly of the Church of England, in the five controverted points, reproached in these last times by the name of Arminianism.” In 1673 a reply was published by Henry Hickman, B.D., entitled, “Historia Quinquarticularis exarticulata; [The History of the Five Points shown to be pointless.] Heylin could not deny that the Lambeth Articles were the publicly professed mind of the Church of England, but he makes much of the fact that King James refused to incorporate them within the Thirty-nine Articles. Hickman proves that King James, thinking the Thirty-nine Articles sufficient, and being told that the Lambeth Articles had been drawn up at a special crisis with a view to pacification, decided to leave them outside the Prayer-Book for the use of Divines only. “When such questions (said his Majesty) do arise among scholars, the quietest proceeding is to determine them in the University, and not to stuff the Book with conclusions theological.” One of Heylin’s arguments was that “Doctor Baro” was an avowed opponent of the Lambeth Articles, and “that Bishop Bancroft, when Baro died in London, three or foure yeares after his leaving Cambridge, took order to have most of the Divines in and about London to attend his Funeral — this plainly shows that there were many of both Universities that openly favoured Baroes doctrines” (p. 90). To this Hickman rejoins, “But do we indeed favour — and plainly declare that we favour — the opinions of those whose Funeralls we attend? If so, then we must never go to the Funeral of a Roman Catholick; then did Queen Elizabeth and her Bishop Grindal plainly discover themselves friends to Popery when they so magnificently celebrated the Funerals of the Emperor” (page 212, second edition).
- ↑ Colonel Chester’s MSS. [I had the advantage of the friendship and correspondence of the late Colonel Chester, and information received from him is thus acknowledged throughout this work.]
