292 THE ESSEX NATURALIST.
Chichester, whom four years later he followed also in that see.
The cares of his dual office rendered the earlier one less successful
than it might have been and led to many, possibly not unfounded,
complaints.
As Vice Chancellor of the University he entertained
King James, the British Solomon, accompanied by Prince
Charles, with apostolic hospitality and noticeable dignity. He
evinced his sturdy independence by his refusal to sanction the
bestowal of honorary degrees indiscriminately, and went so
far as to refuse the royal request made on behalf of John Donne,
afterwards Dean of St. Paul's, notable alike as a preacher and a
poet.
In 1619 he was translated to Norwich in succession to
his friend Overall. Impartiality can hardly be predicated
among 17th century historians, so we can scarcely expect
a true picture of his rule over his two dioceses, of which
the latter was one of the most puritan in the kingdom. We
may at any rate remember that what his critics complained of
was, not the enforcement of discipline in the abstract, but that
it was enforced on the wrong people, that is, themselves. Be
that as it may, the bishop was able to satisfy a strongly puritan
Parliament that his course of action had been correct and
justifiable.
Whatever the ultimate verdict of history may be as to the
traditional position taken up by the Church of England as the
via media, it was, with Harsnett and his better known, but not
abler colleagues, Bancroft, Andrewes and Laud, the "articulus
stantis aut cadentis Ecclesiae" the very foundation of a standing
or a falling church.
In 1628 Harsnett was again translated, now to the Chair of
St. Paulinus and the archiepiscopal throne at York. His rule
here was scarcely long enough to make much impression on
his province, still the stronghold of the Roman Catholic party:
His work was done, his health had become undermined and his
spirits sank before the prospect, which as a Privy Councillor
was now more than ever patent to his view, of the growth of
opposition to the King's policy.
The Archbishop shared the political aspirations which led
statesmen, in most European countries as well as here, to see
in the strengthening of the royal prerogatives the only sure