Who Said that King James "Did Most Wonderfully Play the Puritan" at the Hampton Court Conference?

Lancelot Andrewes

Part I
It is not uncommon for scholars to repeat statements that they find in other writers, apparently without checking the accuracy of their sources. Some remarks are treated so often that their truth comes to be taken for granted. There is an example of this in the historiography of the conference at Hampton Court in 1604. From time to time one reads that Lancelot Andrewes said that at the first session of the conference King James I “did most wonderfully play the puritan” for five hours. This quip recently appeared in Adam Nicolson’s God’s Secretaries: “To the bishops’ horror, James began to lecture them, ‘playing the puritan’ as Andrewes later described it.”[1] A very little examination shows, however, that Nicolson was mistaken, for this quip was not at first attributed to Andrewes at all. The error crept in in the work of an eighteenth century historian. A minor error, and very easily cleared up, but it is more important than it seems at first, for the quip has been taken as evidence that the quasi-official account of the Hampton Court Conference by William Barlow[2] was a biased and partisan work, which misrepresented the speeches of King James I.
The question of Barlow’s reporting of the king’s speeches at Hampton Court will be treated in a later instalment of this paper, the present part of which deals only with the origin of the quip, its attribution to Andrewes, and its meaning.

The Earliest Attribution of the Remark

Like many popular histories God’s Secretaries is not annotated, so that finding what sources Nicolson used can be an exercise in scholarly sleuthing. He may have found the remark attributed to Andrewes in two articles in the older Dictionary of National Biography. In the life of Patrick Galloway, who wrote a brief account of the conference, Alexander Gordon cites Andrewes’s remark as confirming Galloway's "statement of the 'great fervency' with which James urged instances of 'corruptions' in the Anglican church", of which William Barlow "gives no hint.” Edmund Venables, in his life of Barlow in the same series, observed that the gravest charge against Barlow was that of "having suppressed the strong charges brought by James against 'the corruptions of the church’ and the practice of prelates, when Bishop Andrewes was reported to have said ‘for five hours his majesty did wonderfully play the puritan.’”[3] If that seems nicely settled, a very little more searching will unsettle it all again. The life of Lancelot Andrewes in the DNB makes no mention of the quip, and it is not found in other biographies of Andrewes, or in studies of his thought and work. Furthermore, as far as I can see, it is not found anywhere in the new Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. It is surely odd, if Andrewes indeed made such a pithy remark, that it is only found in the lives of other people. Both Venables and Gordon apparently found this remark in Daniel Neale’s History of the Puritans, which states that

It is very certain, that Bishop Barlow has cut off and concealed all the speeches that his majesty made against the corruptions of the church, and the practices of the prelates, for five hours together, according to the testimony of Dr Andrews dean of the chapel, who said, that his majesty did that day wonderfully play the puritan.[4]

The original quip, then, was simply “that his majesty did that day wonderfully play the puritan”: it was Venables who joined Neale’s reference to “five hours” to the quip.[5] Neale himself gives no source for this story, but it is found in an earlier work which quotes it verbatim from Henry Jacob’s 1606 Christian and Modest Offer of a most indifferent Conference, where it appeared for the first time.[6] Neither of these earlier works mentions Andrewes. Henry Jacob, who has been described as a “semi-separatist”, had been a leader of the petitioning campaign of 1603 and is thought to have helped to draw up the Millenary Petition.[7] He had not been summoned to the conference but was one of the ministers who assembled somewhere near Hampton Court at the time of the conference and gave instructions to the four ministers who had been summoned to the meeting. [8] The conference disappointed Jacob, and he did not accept that it had answered the puritans’ request. He was particularly displeased with the account of the conference by Barlow,

Wherein, sith [since] the Kings own speeches be, as it seemeth, grossly abused by the author, it is much more likely that speeches of other men are abused. Besides, none but Prelates, and such as were partial, being present at the first day’s Conference, there can be no credit at all given to the report thereof: for it is more than apparent, that they have fraudulently cut off, and concealed all the speeches (which were many) that his Majesty uttered against the corruptions of our Church, and practice of the Prelates: as appeareth by the testimony of the Dean of the Chapel, which he gave thereof, saying, That his Majesty did that day wonderfully play the Puritan.[9]

In its earliest appearance, then, Henry Jacob attributed this quip to the Dean of the Chapel Royal, but not by name. This was a common practice, and it is usually not difficult to identify the office holders. We do know to whom Jacob was referring: it was not Lancelot Andrewes. In 1604, and indeed until 1618, the deanery of the Chapel Royal was held by James Montagu, Master of Sydney Sussex College and Dean of Lichfield. The deanery of the Chapel had lapsed under Elizabeth I, but James revived it for Montagu in December 1603, probably at the suggestion of Richard Bancroft.[10] In 1604 Lancelot Andrewes was Dean of Westminster; he did not become Dean of the Chapel until 1619 when he was appointed Bishop of Winchester. Writing in 1606, Henry Jacob must be referring to James Montagu and not Lancelot Andrewes. The error of attributing the quip about the King’s “playing the puritan” to Andrewes seems to have been first made by Daniel Neale, who mistakenly identified Andrewes as Dean of the Chapel.[11] So if anyone said that the King played the puritan at Hampton Court, it was not Lancelot Andrewes but James Montagu. However, since the quip is reported only by Henry Jacob and does not appear in any other contemporary account of the conference, we may still wonder whether even Montagu really said it.

Is there Other Evidence that the King "Played the Puritan"?

Although the quip is not found in any of the accounts, a comment bearing some resemblance to it appears in a letter dated at the end of January 1604 from a certain Ortelio Renzo to Gio. Ant. Frederico, neither of whom is otherwise known. It has been preserved in the State Papers because it fell into the hands of the King’s principal secretary, Robert Cecil.[12] This letter is clearly not a first hand account, but shows how the conference was perceived by some. It states that at the conference, “it pleased his Matie to take vpon him the defence of the Puritanes, arguing alone wth the Bishops and pressing them further then it was thought the Puritanes could have done.” It adds, however, that “The next day it pleased the King in like manner to scourge the Puritans on the Protestants behalf” “It pleased his Majesty to take upon him the defence of the Puritans” may be equivalent to “played the Puritan”, but with the description of James’s treatment of the Puritans the next day a tone quite different from Henry Jacob’s is achieved. Nonetheless, it is impossible to say where Ortelio Renzo got his information, and other detail. This letter suggests that the quip shows that it was widely understood that at Hampton Court; the king was not so much playing the puritan as playing his own game. Neither the quip, nor anything like it, is found in the letter James Montagu wrote to his mother describing the conference ended on its last day.[13] One might expect that, had he made the famous remark, he might have said it more than once: people tend to repeat their clever quip. But he never mentioned it at all. What of King James? He does not seem to have thought he had been “playing the puritan.” When he wrote about the conference to Lord Henry Howard he spoke of it “a revel with the puritans” in which he “peppered them” and was disappointed with their performance.[14] Frederick Shriver says that the letter "expresses James I's fundamental dislike and mistrust of the puritans.”[15] Since this letter must refer to the second session of the conference, when the four ministers were present, it says nothing in particular about his attitude to the bishops. Nonetheless, it is significant that he said nothing them in this letter: perhaps all he had really had in mind was what he said, to consult them “about some special points, wherein himself desired to be satisfied.”[16] Henry Jacob may well have heard the quip, and may sincerely have believed that the Dean of the Chapel Royal said it, but we cannot know if he heard it directly from Montagu, or from someone who claimed to have heard it from Montagu. But sincerity does not really count as accuracy. We cannot tell whether Jacob was acquainted with the Dean of the Chapel. We do know that he complained that the ministers of whom he was one knew nothing of the conference, and so he cannot be taken as a first-hand witness of what was said or done there.
Nevertheless, Montagu or even someone else at the conference might have said that James “played the puritan”. Even so, does this show that the quip really means what Jacob thought it meant, that Barlow had “fraudulently cut off, and concealed all the speeches (which were many) that his Majesty uttered against the corruptions of our Church, and practice of the Prelates.” Must it mean this, or might it not mean simply that James had asked for explanations of certain ceremonies and argued against some, such as baptism by lay persons. That he did so is agreed on by all accounts, including Barlow’s.
Notes
This paper is excerpted and adapted from part of my unpublished ThD dissertation, The King's Own Conference: A Reassessment of Hampton Court 1604 (Toronto, 2006). It is te first of a series excerpts meant to bring particular points raised in the thesis to a wicer audeince is a speedy manner.
[1] Adam Nicolson, God’s Secretaries (New York: Harper Perennial, 2005), p.50.

[2] Barlow, William, The Summe and Substance of the Conference which it pleased his Excellent Maiestie to haue with the Lords, Bishops, and other of his Clergie, (at which the most of the Lordes of the Councell were present) in his Maiesties Priuy-Chamber, at Hampton Court. Ianuary 14. 1603 ... Whereunto are added some Copies (scattered abroad, vnsauory, and vntrue. (London, Printed by John Windet for Mathew Law, 1604) [3] DNB, vols. i. 1152; vii, 826.

[4] Daniel Neale, The History of the Puritans or Protestant Nonconformists, Second edition, (London, 1754), volume 1, p. 414.

[5] Most of the contemporary accounts are agreed that the first day’s conference lasted from three to four hours. Neale must have taken the figure of five hours from Galloway’s letter to the Edinburgh Presbytery, which says, "Always after five hours dispute had by his Majesty against them, and his Majesty’s resolution for a Reformation intimated to them, [the bishops] were dismissed that day." However, Galloway was apparently not present at the first session.

[6] James Peirce. A vindication of the dissenters: in answer to Dr. William Nichol’s Defence of the doctrine and discipline of the Church of England. (London, 1717), p. 155. [7] Stephen Wright, ‘Jacob, Henry’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004. The role of the Millenary Petition as catalyst of the Hampton Court Conference is treated in "Hampton Court Again: The Millenary Petition and the Calling of the Conference," Anglican and Episcopal History, 77:1 (March, 2008), 46-70
[8] U. K. Historic Manuscripts Commission, MS of Lord Montagu of Beaulieu, pp 32f. Patrick Collinson, The Elizabethan Puritan Movement (Berkley: University of California Press, 1967), pp. 456-8.

[9] Jacob, p. 29.

[10] The Old Cheque Book or Remembrancer of the Chapel Royal from 1561-1744, edited by E. F. Rimbault (Camden Society, 2nd ser. iii. 1872), pp. 37, 107, 161-73. Peter McCullough, following Heylyn, suggests that the revival of the office of Dean of the Chapel had been Bancroft's idea, and that Montagu was "probably hand-picked to please both the Scots and the English", Sermons at Court, pp. 107f. and ‘Montagu, James (1568–1618)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004. This goes against Nicolson’s assertion that Bancroft hated Montagu.

[11] Neal, p. 231.

[12] UK Public Records Office, SPD James I 14/6/37, 'Ortelio Renzo to Il molto mag[nifico] Gio Ant. Frederico”: endorsed: "Letters intercepted" and in Cecil's hand, "Lines written by Phelippes and suggested by him to be counterfeit”(microfilm in the CRRS Library, University of Toronto).

[13] Montagu’s letter is printed in Edward Cardwell, A History of Conferences and other proceedings connected with the revision of the Book of Common Prayer... 3rd edition (Oxford: Univerity Press, 1849), pp. 138-142.

[14] BL Cotton MSS Vespasian F III, f. 76, printed in G. V. Akrigg, Letters of King James VI & I. (Berkley, Los Angeles, London: University of California Press, 1984) p. 221 Akrigg gives the date of "17? January" to this letter.

[15] F. Shriver, "Hampton Court Revisited: James I and the Puritans", Journal of Eccelsiastical History 33:1 (January 1982), pp. 48-71, p. 65.

[16] Barlow, p. 6.