him to take a prominent part in the religious 6 While vehemently and incessantly pro claiming this new theory of ecclesiastical 6 6 Norwich but at Bury St. Edmunds that Browne had produced this effect, and it is probable that he had been led to move into Suffolk by finding that at Norwich the power of the bishop was too strong for him, or that the clergy of the city, then deeply affected with Genevan proclivities and as a body very zealous in their ministerial duties, were by no means willing to befriend or cooperate with a sectary who began by assuming that they were all in the bonds of iniquity. Lord Burghley returned a prompt reply to the bishop's letter of complaint, but as promptly sent back his kinsman to Bury with a kindly excuse for him, and a suggestion that his indiscretions proceeded of zeal rather than malice.' Browne was no sooner released than he returned to the old course, and the bishop every day received some fresh complaint and became more and more irritated. In the following August he again wrote a strong letter to the lord treasurer, in which he said that his duty enforced him most earnestly to crave his lordship's help in suppressing' this disturber of his diocese. Again Burghley stood his friend, and when, a little after, Browne was brought before the archbishop, even the primate could not keep his prisoner, and he was set at liberty only to return to his followers with his influence over them increased tenfold. The truth is that the time was hardly favourable for exercising exceptional severity against a zealot of this character, who was for ever declaiming against papistry and Roman errors. The Jesuit mission to England had only just collapsed by the apprehension of Campion on 10 July. Parsons was still at large, and the rack was being employed pretty freely in the Tower upon the wretched men who, if they had succeeded in nothing else, had succeeded in rousing the anti-papal feelings of the masses and the alarm of such statesmen as looked with apprehension upon a revival of catholic sentiment. Nevertheless it became evident that the little congregation, the church' which prized above all things human the privilege of having their pastor' present with them, could hardly continue its assembly if Browne were to be continually worried by citations and imprisonment at the will of one after another of the stiff sticklers for uniformity; and when they had sought about for some time for a retreat where they might enjoy liberty of worship unmolested, they emigrated at last in a body to Middleburg in the autumn of 1581. Cartwright and Dudley Fenner were the accredited ministers of the English puritan colony at Middleburg, but Browne and his exclusive congregation were in no mood to ally themselves with their fellow-exiles. All other professing christians might come to him, he certainly would not go to them. To the amazement and grief of Cartwright he found in the newcomers no friends but aggressive opponents, and a paper war was carried on, Browne writing diligently and printing what he wrote as fast as the funds could be found. Harrison too rushed into print, and the books of the two men were sent over to England and circulated by their followers so sedulously-for not all the Norwich congregation had emigrated— that a royal proclamation was actually issued against them in 1583, and two men were hanged for dispersing the books and one for the crime of binding them! Meanwhile the violent and imperious character of Browne led him into acts and words which were not favourable to harmony even in his own little company of devoted followers, and that which any outsider who watched the movement must have foreseen to be inevitable happened at last; the Middleburg 'church' broke up, and Browne towards the close of 1583 turned his back upon Harrison and the rest, and set sail for Scotland accompanied by four or five Englishmen with their wives and families,' so much already had the church' shrunk from its earlier proportions. Arrived in Scotland Browne began in the old way, denouncing everything and everybody concerned in matters religious or ecclesiastical, and he had scarcely been a month in the country before he was cited to appear before the kirk of Edinburgh, and on his behaving himself with his usual arrogance and treating the court with an insolent defiance he was thrown into the common gaol till time should be given to two theologians who were appointed to examine and report upon his books. Meanwhile some secret influences had been brought to bear in his favour, and just when it was confidently expected that this mischievous troubler would be condemned and silenced, to the surprise of all he was set at liberty, why, none could explain. Browne appears to have remained some months or even longer in Scotland, but he made no way, left no mark, and gained no converts. In disgust at his reception he delivered his testimony against the Scotch in no measured terms, shook off the dust of his feet against them, and setting his face southwards was once more printing and publishing books in the summer of 1584. Once more he was thrown into prison and kept there for some months, and once more Burghley interposed, became security for his good conduct, effected his release, and actually interceded for him in a letter to his father, who was still alive. Browne returned to Tolethorpe much broken in health by his long imprisonment. On recovering his strength his former habits and temper returned, and old Anthony Browne, vexed and provoked by his son's contumacy, applied to Burghley and obtained his sanction for his son's removal to Stamford, possibly under the eye of some relatives, members of the Browne or Cecil families. But such men as this are incorrigible. In the spring of 1586 he had left Stamford and was preaching as diligently as ever at Northampton-as diligently and as offensively-and on being cited by Howland, bishop of Peterborough, to appear before him, Browne took no notice of the citation, and was excommunicated for contempt accordingly. his duty in his parish with scrupulous fidelity and preaching frequently and earnestly to his people; and though doubtless many unfriendly eyes were watching him, he never again brought upon himself the charge of nonconformity or of being a disturber of the peace of the church. His end was a sad one; it must be read in the words of Thomas Fuller, the facts of the narrative having never been disputed or disproved: '... As I am credibly informed, being by the constable of the parish (who chanced also to be his godson) somewhat roughly and rudely required the payment of a rate, he happened in passion to strike him. The constable (not taking it patiently as a castigation from a godfather, but in anger as an affront to his office) complained to Sir Rowland St. John, a neighbouring justice of the peace, and This seems to have been the turning-point Browne is brought before him. The knight, of his strange career. Whether it was that of himself, was prone rather to pity and parBrowne was prepared to suffer in his per-don, than punish his passion; but Browne's son all sorts of hardships, but had never behaviour was so stubborn, that he appeared thought of being cast out of the church obstinately ambitious of a prison, as desirous from which he gloried in urging others to (after long absence) to renew his familiarity go out, and thus was startled and con- with his ancient acquaintance. His mittifused by the suddenness and unexpected mus is made; and a cart with a feather-bed form of the sentence that had been pro- provided to carry him, he himself being too nounced; whether his disordered imagina- infirm (above eighty) to go, too unwieldy to tion began to conjure up some vague, mys- ride, and no friend so favourable as to purterious consequences which might possibly chase for him a more comely conveyance. ensue, and on which he had never reflected To Northampton gaol he is sent, where, soon before; or whether his fifteen years of rest- after, he sickened, died, and was buried in a less onslaught upon all religions and all reli- neighbouring churchyard; and it is no hurt gious men who would not follow nor be led to wish that his bad opinions had been inby him, had almost come to be regarded by terred with him' (FULLER, Church History, himself as a conspicuous failure, and he had bk. ix. sect. vi.) Fuller is wrong in the given up hope and lost heart, it is impossible date of Browne's death; an entry in his hand to say. Certain it is that from this time he is still to be seen in the parish register of ceased to be a disturber of the order of things Achurch made on 2 June 1631, and his sucestablished, and his 'church' or 'churches' cessor in the living was not instituted till were compelled to seek elsewhere for their 8 Nov. 1633. His burial-place is unknown. 'pastors and guides. In November 1586 | Browne's wife was Alice Allen, a Yorkshire Browne was elected to be master of Stam- lady; by her he had four sons and three ford grammar school, certain pledges being daughters. The hateful story that he illexacted from him for good behaviour and used his wife in her old age is in all probacertain conditions being extorted for the re- bility an infamous slander. Browne was straining him from troubling the world with very fond of music, and besides being himthe expression of his peculiar views. To self a singular good lutenist,' he taught his these conditions he affixed his signature, and children to become performers. On Sundays he began at once to discharge his new duties. he made his son Timothy bring his viol to He continued master of Stamford school for church and play the bass to the psalms that five years, and resigned his mastership only were sung.' Browne's issue eventually inon his being presented to the rectory of herited the paternal estate at Tolethorpe, Achurch in Northamptonshire, a benefice and his last descendant died on 17 Sept. which was in the gift of Lord Burghley, 1839, as widow of George, third earl Pomfret. who two years before had made interest, but to no purpose, with the Bishop of Peterborough to obtain some preferment for his kinsman. At Achurch Browne continued to reside for more than forty years, doing That so powerful and intelligent a body as the congregationalists should desire to affiliate themselves on to so eccentric a person as Browne, and to claim him as the first enunciator of the principles which are distinctive of their organisation, will always appear somewhat strange to outsiders. Into discussions on church polity, however, it is not our intention to enter. The last three works quoted among the authorities at the end of this article will give the reader as full a view as he can desire of the congregationalist standpoint. Mr. Dexter's most able and learned volume contains an exhaustive account of the literature and bibliography of the whole subject, and his elaborate monograph on Browne's life has materially added to our knowledge of the man's curious career. Here too will be found by far the most complete list of his writings and some valuable extracts from hitherto unknown works which prove him to have been a man of burning enthusiasm and one who, as we might have expected, could at times burst forth into passages of fiery and impetuous eloquence which must have been extraordinarily effective in their day, however much they may appear to us no more than vehement rhetoric. [Blore's Hist. and Antiq. of the County of Rutland, 1813, p. 93, &c.; Fuller's Worthies (Rutland); Lamb's Masters's Hist. of Corpus Christi Coll. Cambridge, pp. 123 et seq., 460; communication from Dr. Luard, Registrar of Camb. Univ. Cal. State Papers, Dom. 15471580, p. 421; Froude's Hist. Engl. x. 289-90; Strype's Parker, ii. 68; Cooper's Athenæ Cantab. ii. 177, 178; Fuller's Church Hist. bk. ix., cent. xvi., sect. vi., §§ 1-7, 64-9; Lansdowne MSS., quoted by all modern writers, No. xxxiii. 13, 20; Hanbury's Historical Memorials relating to the Independents, 1839, vol. i.ch. ii.; John Browne's Hist. of Congregationalism in Norfolk and Suffolk (1877), chs. i-iii.; Dexter's Congregation alism of the last Three Hundred Years, as seen in its Literature, New York, 1880.] A. J. BROWNE, SAMUEL (1575?-1632), divine, born at or near Shrewsbury, became a servitor or clerk of All Souls College, Oxford, in 1594, at the age of nineteen, graduated B.A. 3 Nov. 1601, and M.A. 3 July 1605, took orders, and in 1618 was appointed minister of St. Mary's Church, Shrewsbury, 'where he was much resorted to by precise people for his edifying and frequent preaching (WOOD). In spite, however, of this notice of his ministry in the 'Athenæ Oxon.,' Browne can scarcely have been a puritan, for in the curious little book entitled 'The Looking-glasse of Schisme, wherein by a briefe and true Narration of the execrable Murders done by Enoch ap Evan, a downe-right Nonconformist... the Disobedience of that Sect ... is plainly set forth' (1635), the author, Peter Studley, minister of St. Chad's, Shrewsbury, speaks of him with great respect, and says that during the thirteen years of his ministry he was rudely and unchristianly handled' by the disloyal and schismatical party in the town, and that finally, by an invective and bitter Libell, consisting of fourteene leaves in quarto cast into his garden, they disquieted his painefull and peaceable soule, and shortened the date of his troublesome pilgrimage.' Browne died in 1632, and was buried at St. Mary's on 6 May. He published 'The Sum of Christian Religion by way of Catechism,' 1630, 1637, 8vo, and 'Certain Prayers,' and left at his death several sermons which he wished printed. [Wood's Athenæ Oxon. (Bliss), ii. 531; Fasti (Bliss), i. 290, 306; Studley's Looking-glasse of Schisme, 180-1; Phillips's History and Antiquities of Shrewsbury, 100; Some Account of the Ancient and Present State of Shrewsbury (ed. 1810), 216, 217.] W. H. BROWNE, SAMUEL (d. 1668), judge, was the son of Nicholas Browne of Polebrooke, Northamptonshire, by Frances, daughter of Thomas St. John, third son of Oliver, lord St. John. He was thus first cousin to Oliver St. John, chief justice of the common pleas during the protectorate. He was admitted pensioner of Queens' College, Cambridge, 24 Feb. 1614, entered as a student at Lincoln's Inn 28 Oct. 1616, where he was called to the bar 16 Oct. 1623, and elected reader in Michaelmas term 1642. Two years previously he had been returned to parliament as member for the united boroughs of Clifton, Dartmouth, and Hardness in Devonshire. In the articles laid before the king at Oxford in 1642, with a view to negotiations for peace, the appointment of Browne to a seat on the exchequer bench was suggested. In November of the same year he was made one of the commissioners of the great seal. In March 1643-4 he was appointed one of the committee to which the management of the impeachment of Laud was entrusted. His speech on this occasion has not been preserved, but from the constant references which Laud makes to it he appears to have put the case against the archbishop in a very effective After the trial was ended (2 Jan. 1644–5) he was deputed, with Serjeants Wilde and Nicolas, to lay before the House of Lords the reasons which, in the opinion of the commons, justified an ordinance of attainder against the archbishop. This had already been passed by the commons, and the upper house immediately followed suit. In July 1645 a paper was introduced to the House of Commons, emanating from Lord Savile, and containing what was in substance an impeachment of Denzil Hollis and Whitelocke, way. 1722 a volume of sermons. In the Salters" Hall controversy (1719) Browne had taken the side of the non-subscribers, who resisted the imposition of a Trinitarian test. This led to a rather sharp controversy in 1723 with the Rev. Mr. Thomas Reynolds in regard to the dismissal of a preacher. About the same time the simultaneous loss of his wife and only son (or, according to another story, the accidental strangling of a highwayman) unhinged his mind; and though his faculties remained perfect in other respects he became persuaded that God had 'annihilated in him the thinking substance,' and that his words had no more sense than a parrot's. He tried by earnest reasoning to persuade his friends that he was a mere beast.' He gave up his ministry, retired to Shepton Mallet, and amused himself by translating classical authors, writing books for children, and composing a dictionary. I am doing nothing,' he said, 'that requires a reasonable soul. I am making a dictionary; but you know thanks should be returned to God for everything, and therefore for dictionary-makers.' He took part, however, in the controversies of the time, as an opponent of the deists from a rationalist point of view. In 1732 he published of high treason in betraying the trust reposed in them in connection with the recent negotiations at Oxford, of which they had had the conduct. After some discussion the matter was referred to a committee, of which Browne was nominated chairman. The affair is frankly described by Whitelocke as a machination of the independents, designed to discredit the presbyterian party, of which both Hollis and himself were members; and as he accuses Browne of displaying a strong bias in favour of the impeachment, it may be inferred that at this time he had the reputation of belonging to the advanced faction. The charge was ultimately dismissed. In October of the following year Browne delivered the great seal to the new commissioners then appointed, the speakers of the two houses. In September 1648 he was one of ten commissioners nominated by the parliament to treat with the king in the Isle of Wight. On the receipt of letters from the commissioners containing the king's ultimatum, the House of Commons, after voting the king's terms unsatisfactory, resolved that notice be taken of the extraordinary wise management of this treaty by the commissioners. Next day Browne was made a serjeant-at-law and justice of the king's bench by accumulation. The latter dig-a sober and charitable disquisition concernnity, however, he refused to accept, whether out of timidity or on principle it is impossible to determine. After this no more is heard of him until the Restoration, when he was readmitted serjeant-at-law (Trinity term 1660), and shortly after (Michaelmas term) raised to the bench as justice of the common pleas, and knighted 4 Dec. He died in 1668, and was buried at Arlesey in Bedfordshire, where he had a house. He married Elizabeth, daughter of John Meade of Nortofts, Finchingfield, Essex. [Wotton's Baronetage, iv. 178; Dugdale's Orig. 256, 324; Willis's Not. Parl. iii. 243; Dugdale's Chron. Ser. 114, 115; Parl. Hist. ii. 606, iii. 70, 182; Cobbett's State Trials, iv. 347, 443, 449, 464470, 509, 554-7, 599; Whitelocke's Mem. 154, 156, 160, 226, 334, 342, 378; Commons' Journ. iii. 734; Siderfin's Rep. i. 3, 4, 365; Le Neve's Pedigrees of Knights (Harleian Society, vol. viii.), 122; Cal. State Papers, Dom. (1640), 103; Morant's Essex, ii. 366; Lysons's Bedfordshire, 40; Foss's Lives of the Judges.] J. M. R. ing the importance of the doctrine of the Trinity,' &c., ' A Fit Rebuke to a Ludicrous Infidel, in some remarks on Mr. Woolston's fifth discourse,' &c., with a preface protesting against the punishment of freethinkers by the magistrate; and a 'Defence of the Religion of Nature and the Christian Revelation,' &c., in answer to Tindal's Christianity as old as the Creation,' a concluding part of which appeared in 1733 posthumously. To the last of these works he had prefixed a dedication to Queen Caroline, asking for her prayers in his singular case. He was once a man,' but his very thinking substance has for more than seven years been continually wasting away, till it is wholly perished out of him.' This was suppressed at the time by his friends, but afterwards published by Hawkesworth in the Adventurer,' No. 88. Browne died at the end of 1732, leaving several daughters. [Biog. Britannica; Atkey's Funeral Sermon ; Town and Country Magazine for 1770, p. 689; Adventurer, No. 88; Gent. Mag. xxxii. 453; Protestant Dissenters' Magazine, iv. 433, v. 111; Leland's View. i. 110, 130; Wilson's Dissenting Churches, i. 165, iii. 338-57, where is a full list BROWNE, SIMON (1680-1732), divine, was born at Shepton Mallet, Somersetshire; educated under Mr. Cumming, and at the academy of Mr. Moor at Bridgewater. He of his works.] began to preach before he was twenty, and after being a minister at Portsmouth became, in 1716, pastor of the important congregation in the Old Jewry, London. In 1720 he published Hymns and Spiritual Songs,' and in L. S. BROWNE, THEOPHILUS (17631835), unitarian clergyman, born at Derby in 1763, entered as a student at Christ's College, Cambridge, graduated B.A. and M.A., took |