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Being thus flushed with power and fuccefs, there is little reafon for doubting that he gave way to his natural vehemence, and indulged himself in the utmost exceffes of raging zeal, by which he was indeed fo much distinguished, that, in a fatire mentioned by Wood, he is dignified by the title of Arch-vifitor; an appellation which he feems to have been industrious to deferve by severity and inflexibility: for, not contented with the commiffion which he and his col. leagues had already received, he procured fix or feven of the members of parliament to meet privately in Mr. Roufe's lodgings, and affume the ftyle and authority of a committee, and from them obtained a more extenfive and tyrannical power, by which the visitors were enabled to force the folemn League and Covenant and the negative Oath upon all the members of the Univerfity, and to profecute thofe for a contempt who did not appear to a citation, at whatever diftance they might be, and whatever reasons they might affign for their absence.

By this method he eafily drove great numbers from the university, whofe places he supplied with men of his own opinion, whom he was very induftrious to draw from other parts, with promifes of making a liberal provifion for them out of the fpoils of heretics and malignants.

Having in time almost extirpated those opinions which he found fo prevalent at his arrival, or at least obliged those, who would not recant, to an appearance of conformity, he was at leifure for employments which deferve to be recorded with greater commendation. About this time, many Socinian writers began

to publish their notions with great boldness, which the Prefbyterians confidering as heretical and impious, thought it neceffary to confute; and therefore Cheynel, who had now obtained his doctor's degree, was defired, in 1649, to write a vindication of the doctrine of the Trinity, which he performed, and published the next year.

He drew up likewife a confutation of fome Socinian tenets advanced by John Fry; a man who spent great part of his life in ranging from one religion to another, and who fat as one of the judges on the king, but was expelled afterwards from the house of commons, and difabled, from fitting in parliament. Dr. Cheynel is faid to have fhewn himself evidently fuperior to him in the controverfy, and was answered by him only with an opprobrious book against the Prefbyterian clergy.

Of the remaining part of his life there is found only an obfcure and confufed account. He quitted the presidentship of St. John's, and the profefforfhip, in 1650, as Calamy relates, because he would not take the engagement; and gave a proof that he could fuffer as well as act in a cause which he believed just. We have, indeed, no reason to question his resolution, whatever occasion might be given to exert it; nor is it probable that he feared affliction more than danger, or that he would not have borne perfecution himself for those opinions which inclined him to. profecute

others.

He did not fuffer much on this occafion; for he retained the living of Petworth, to which he thenceforward confined his labours, and where he was very

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affiduous,

affiduous, and, as Calamy affirms, very fuccessful in the exercise of his miniftry, it being his peculiar character to be warm and zealous in all his undertakings.

This heat of his difpofition, increased by the uncommon turbulence of the times in which he lived, and by the opposition to which the unpopular nature of fome of his employments expofed him, was at laft heightened to distraction, fo that he was for fome years diforded in his understanding, as both Wood and Calamy relate, but with fuch difference as might be expected from their oppofite principles. Wood appears to think, that a tendency to madness was difcoverable in a great part of his life; Calamy, that it was only tranfient and accidental, though, in his additions to his firft narrative, he pleads it as an extenuation of that fury with which his kindeft friends confefs him to have acted on some occafions. Wood declares, that he died little better than diftracted; Calamy, that he was perfectly recovered to a found mind before the Restoration, at which time he retired to Preston, a small village in Suffex, being turned out of his living at Petworth.

It does not appear, that he kept his living till the general ejection of the Nonconformifts; and it is not unlikely that the afperity of his carriage, and the known virulence of his temper, might have raised him enemies, who were willing to make him feel the effects of perfecution which he had fo furiously incited against others; but of this incident of his life there is no particular account.

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After his deprivation, he lived (till his death, which happened in 1665) at a small village near Chichester, upon a paternal estate, not augmented by the large preferments wafted upon him in the triumphs of his party; having been remarkable, throughout his life, for hofpitality and contempt of money.

CAVE

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DWARD CAVE was born at Newton in War

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wickshire, Feb. 29, 1691. His father (Joseph) was the younger fon of Mr. Edward Cave, of Cave's in the Hole, a lone houfe, on the Street-road in the fame county, which took its name from the occupier; but having concurred with his elder brother in cutting off the intail of a small hereditary eftate, by which act it was loft from the family, he was reduced to follow in Rugby the trade of a fhoe-maker. He was a man of good reputation in his narrow circle, and remarkable for strength and ruftic intrepidity. He lived to a great age, and was in his latter years fupported by his fon.

It was fortunate for Edward Cave, that, having a difpofition to literary attainments, he was not cut off by the poverty of his parents from opportunities of

This life first appeared in the Gentleman's Magazine for 1754, and is now printed from a copy revised by the author, at the request of Mr. Nichols, in 1781.

cultivating

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