5 February 1649: The Puritan John Sharp of Bradford, on military service at Hull, writes passionately to his “cousin” at York
William Cudworth. 1889. Life and Correspondence of Abraham Sharp, the Yorkshire Mathematician and Astronomer, and Assistant of Flamsteed. London: Sampson Low, Marston, Searle and Rivington. Get it:
.Unedited excerpt
The excerpt in the book is shorter, edited and, where applicable, translated.
If ever I sit in the porphyry chair I will grant you an indulgence for your otherwise unpardonable compliment of kissing my foot. You writ and unwrit, the while I thank you for nothing. These dividing times may divide our affections if we be such foolish wakelings to be hailed [tugged] by passion and prejudice beyond the medium of reason and judgement. I thank you for your kind invite to York. When the recruiting from Hull stands in competition with my riveted affections to you I doubt not but to have a candid construction of my carriage if I do not see you at York at the time set. If Walkinton could furnish me with a horse, which it cannot, I would not therefore conceive that I had as good friends at Walkinton as at home, nor yet the contrary. Every man is most possessed with his own grievance. I’m sure mine own touches me, and where is my help? The Lord support us all is the desire of him who is though not perfectly yet sincerely.
Your affectionate cozen,
John Sharp
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Comment
Lots of puzzles here. The porphyry chair is a sign of Rome’s determination never to be fooled again as they allegedly were by Pope Joan:
Succeeding popes were placed in a porphyry-chair with a hole in the bottom, and immediately after the election, their genitals were to be searched by the youngest deacon (Baron 1768).
But here it is just metonymy for the absurd notion that this English Puritan should become pope.
Until the practice was abolished at some point in the 20th century, those granted an audience with the pontiff would kiss his slipper.
I am not sure that “wakeling” is “weakling.”
“You writt and unwritt” may be an allusion to Foxe’s Book of Martyrs re that “viper’s bird,” Bishop Gardiner:
And as touching divinity, he was so variable, wavering with time, that no constant censure can be given what to make of him. If his doings and writings were according to his conscience, no man can rightly say whether he was a right protestant or papist. If he wrote otherwise than he thought, for fear, or to bear with time, then was he a double deep dissembler before God and man, to say and unsay, to write and unwrite, to swear and forswear, so as he did (Foxe 1847)
The editor tells us that “Walkinton” refers to John Nelson, Rector of Walkington, 11 miles northwest of Hull, who married John Sharp’s sister Sarah.
I take Sharp’s “cousin” to be like those of The Huff:
He is a Protector to all distressed Damsels called in our Vulgar Tongue Common Whores, and that he may put a better Gloss on the matter, calleth them Cozens (Head 1673).
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Tags
Tags are assigned inclusively on the basis of an entry’s original text and any comment. You may find this confusing if you only read an entry excerpt.
- 📌Bradford (73) W/G ·
- Catholic Church (57) W/G ·
- Commonwealth of England (8) W/G ·
- English Civil War (1642-1651) (27), a series of civil wars and political machinations between Parliamentarians ("Roundheads") and Royalists ("Cavaliers"), mainly over the manner of England's governance and issues of religious freedom W/G ·
- Foxe’s Book of Martyrs (2) W/G ·
- Foxe, John (1516/1517-1587) (2), historian and martyrologist, author of Actes and Monuments (aka Foxe's Book of Martyrs), telling of Christian martyrs throughout Western history, and particularly the sufferings of English Protestants and proto-Protestants from the 14th century and in the reign of Mary I, widely owned and read by Puritans W/G ·
- Indulgence (2) W/G ·
- 📌Kingston upon Hull (74) W/G ·
- Papal slippers (1) W/G ·
- Pope Joan (1) W/G ·
- Prostitution (15) W/G ·
- Puritans (15) W/G ·
- Sharp, John (1604-72) (2), Bradford clothier and merchant, financial secretary to Fairfax, father of Abraham Sharp W/G ·
- Walkington (1) W/G ·
- 📌York (164) W/G ·
Comment
Comment
Lots of puzzles here. The porphyry chair is a sign of Rome’s determination never to be fooled again as they allegedly were by Pope Joan:
Succeeding popes were placed in a porphyry-chair with a hole in the bottom, and immediately after the election, their genitals were to be searched by the youngest deacon (Baron 1768).
But here it is just metonymy for the absurd notion that this English Puritan should become pope.
Until the practice was abolished at some point in the 20th century, those granted an audience with the pontiff would kiss his slipper.
I am not sure that “wakeling” is “weakling.”
“You writt and unwritt” may be an allusion to Foxe’s Book of Martyrs re that “viper’s bird,” Bishop Gardiner:
And as touching divinity, he was so variable, wavering with time, that no constant censure can be given what to make of him. If his doings and writings were according to his conscience, no man can rightly say whether he was a right protestant or papist. If he wrote otherwise than he thought, for fear, or to bear with time, then was he a double deep dissembler before God and man, to say and unsay, to write and unwrite, to swear and forswear, so as he did (Foxe 1847)
The editor tells us that “Walkinton” refers to John Nelson, Rector of Walkington, 11 miles northwest of Hull, who married John Sharp’s sister Sarah.
I take Sharp’s “cousin” to be like those of The Huff:
He is a Protector to all distressed Damsels called in our Vulgar Tongue Common Whores, and that he may put a better Gloss on the matter, calleth them Cozens (Head 1673).
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Similar
15 March 1586: Offered a jury acquittal, Margaret Clitherow of York, concealer of priests, chooses martyrdom and is crushed under her own front door
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Comment
The letter then details the replacement its authors have in mind, who is willing to pay a substantial bribe for the privilege:
There is a monk of the house called Marmaduke [Bradley], to whom Mr Timmes lent a prebend in Ripon church, now abiding upon the same prebend, the wisest monk within England of that cote and well learned, 20 years officer and ruler of all that house, a wealthy fellow, which will give you six hundred marks to make him abbot there, and pay you immediately after the election, without delay or respite, at one payment, and as I suppose without much borrowing. The first fruits to the king is a thousand pounds, which he with his policy will pay within three years, and owe no man therefore one groat, as he saith, and his reason therein is very apparent.
William Thirsk was implicated in Bigod’s rebellion in early 1537, and hanged, drawn and quartered at Tyburn and his head displayed on the London walls on Whit Friday (25 May) of that year (Wriothesley 1875). Bradley surrendered the monastery in 1539 during the Dissolution of the Monasteries.
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