Memoires of the lives, actions, sufferings & deaths of those noble, reverend and excellent personages that suffered by death, sequestration, decimation, or otherwise, for the Protestant religion and the great principle thereof, allegiance to their soveraigne, in our late intestine wars, from the year 1637 to the year 1660, and from thence continued to 1666 with the life and martyrdom of King Charles I / by Da. Lloyd ...

THE Life and Death OF Dr. WILLIAM BEAL.

PYramides are measured by their shadows, and this worthy Person is known to me only by an Inscripti∣on, designed by ab 1.1 Relation of his upon his Grave-stone.

Dr. William Beal, bred in Pembroke-hall under Dr. Ierome Beal, and Master of St. Iohns in Cambridge, Chaplain to King Charles the First, who said publickly of him in Saint Iohns-Colledge, after he had asked how he did? That he had a kindness for him for his Integrity: Adding graciously, that where he once loved, and took a good opinion, he was seldom moved from it. He wished, as his Predecessor Whitacre, he had lost Learning, as he had got in after-supper Studies, on condition, he might gain so much strength, as he had lost thereby: And with the same Dr. Whitacre found the inconvenience of being imposed upon a Colledg whereof he was no Member; that he would say, A Society will hardly be ruled by a Governor, but on the same terms the Welch would be governed by their King, that is, if he were born a∣mongst them, and spoke their Language: Besides that, it is a great discouragement to a Society, for the Members of it not to be sure in their turns of their own preferments. In his choice of Scholars he pitched upon Parts without good Manners, rather than good Manners without good Parts; because Civility might, but Abilities could not be counterfeited: God only can des••ry a good heart, but Men may discover a good head, and Discipline might correct the loose (whose very looseness in youth was to him an argument of their proficiency in their riper years, when wild∣ness would become activity) into temperance and sobriety, where∣as nothing could make the Dunce a Scholar. There was no Ele∣ction in the House without his Prefence, no Admission without his Examination, and no Audit or Progress without his own account; who aimed at three things.

• 1. The Decency and Advancement of the Colledge.
• 2. The Incouragement of Tenants, and the Improvement of their Woods and Lands.
• 3. The Inuring of Scholars to Discipline in their young days, that being accustomed to the yoke in their youth, they might not start in their elder years.

For being active in gathering the University Plate for his Maje∣sty, he was, with the excellent Dr. Stern, now Lord Archbishop of York, sent, surrounded in their respective Colledges, carried to London in triumph, in which persecution there was this circum∣stance remarkable: That though there was an express Order from the Lords, for their Imprisonment in the Tower, which met them at Tottenham high-Cross (wherein, notwithstanding there was no Crime expressed) yet they were led Captive through Bartholomew-Fare, and so as far as Temple-bar, and back through the City into the Tower, on purpose that they might be hooted at, or stoned; and so for three years together hurried from Prison to Prison (after they were Plundered anda 1.2 Sequestred, two words that signified an undoing) without any Legal Charge against them, or Tryal of them; it being supposed surely that they would be famished at Land, and designed that they should be stiffled, when kept ten days under De••k at Sea, or all failing, to be sent as Galli-slaves to Argiers, till this worthy person was exchanged, and had liberty to go to Oxford to serve his Majesty there, as he had done here, by a good Example, constant Fasts and Prayers, exact Intelligence, convincing and comfortable Sermons, as he did all the while he lived; till his heart broke to see (what he always feared, and en∣deavoured in vain to perswade the moderate part of the other side of) his Majesty murthered, and he died suddainly with these words in his mouth, which the standers by understood, with reference to the state of the publick, as well as the condition of his own private person. I believe the Resurrection.

Nor am I stir'd, that thy Pale Ashes have O're the dark Climate of a private Grave No fair Inscription: such distempers flow From poor Lay-thoughts, whose blindness cannot know, That to discerning Spirits Graves can be, But a large Womb to Immortality: And a fair vertuous Name, can stand alone, Brass to the Tomb, and Marble to the Stone.

Notes

• b 1.1

  Mr. G. 〈◊〉〈◊〉.
• a 1.2

  With him were Seque∣stred that in∣comparable Preacher, and sweet-natured man, Dr. Lake of Bishops∣gate London, the worthy and beloved Bishop Morgan of Bangor, the excellent Dr. Bote••er of the North.