Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 31.djvu/9

 not obtain possession of St. Botolph's without a lawsuit. On 15 Feb. 1701 he was installed in the prebend of Combe and Harnham, in the church of Salisbury (, Fasti, ed. Hardy, ii. 665).

Kennett's historical and antiquarian researches had meanwhile procured him some reputation. From Dr. George Hickes [q. v.] (afterwards nonjuring bishop of Thetford), who lived for a time in seclusion with him at Ambrosden, Le received instruction in the Anglo-Saxon and other northern tongues. For several years the two scholars were on the most friendly terms, but eventually their was an open rupture between them, owing to religious and political differences. Kennett contributed a life of William Somner to the Rev. James Brome's edition of that antiquary's 'Treatise of the Roman Ports and Ports In Kent' (1693), and the biography was enlarged and reissued in Somner's 'Treatise of Gravelkind,' 2nd edition 1726. His reputation as a topographer and philologist was enhanced by his 'Parochial Antiquities attempted in the History of Ambrosden, Burcester, and other adjacent parts in the counties of Oxford and Bucks, With a Glossary of Obsolete Terms,' Oxford. 1696, 4to, dedicated to his patron. Sir W. Glynne. A new edition, greatly enlarged from the author's manuscript notes, was issued at Oxford (2 vols. 1818, 4to) under the editorship of Berkeley Bandinel. While engaged on this work the question of lay impropriations had come much under his notice, and he published 'for the terror of evil-doers' the 'History and Fate of Sacrilege, discovered by examples of Scripture, of Heathens, of Christians,' London, 1698, 8vo, written by Sir Henry Spelman in 1632, but omitted from the edition of that author's 'Posthumous Works.'

Kennett was now chaplain to Bishop Gardiner of Lincoln, and on 15 May 1701 became archdeacon of Huntingdon. Thereupon he entered into the famous controversy with Atterbury about the rights of convocation, and ably supported Dr. Wake and Edmund Gibson in their contention that convocation had few inherent rights of independent action. In Warburton's view, Kennett's arguments were based on precedents, while Atterbury's rested on principles. On Archbishop Tenison's recommendation he was appointed in 1701 one of the original members of the Society for Propagating the Gospel in Foreign Parts. In a sermon preached in his parish church of Aldgate on 31 Jan. 1703–4, the fast day for the martyrdom of Charles I, Kennett acknowledged that there had been some errors in his reign, owing to a 'popish' queen and ministry, whose policy tended in title of 'A Compassionate Enquiry into the Causes of the Civil War,' London, (three editions), 1704, 4to. It elicited many angry replies from his high-church opponents.

In 1704 he published 'The Case of Impropriations, and of the Augmentation of Vicarages, and other insufficient Cures, stated by History and Law, from the first Usurpations of the Popes and Monks, to her Majesty's Royal Bounty lately extended to the poorer Clergy of the Church of England.' A copy of this work, bound in two vols., with copious additions by the author, was formerly in the possession of Richard Gough, and is now in the Bodleian Library. In 1705 some book-sellers undertook a collection of the best works on English history down to the reign of Charles II, and induced Kennett to write a continuation to the time of Queen Anne (Notes and Queries, 2nd ser. viii. 343). Although it appeared anonymously as the third volume of the 'Compleat History of England,' 1700, fol., the author's name soon became known, and he was exposed to renewed attacks from his Jacobite enemies. A new edition, with corrections, was published in 1719, but it was not until 1740 that there appeared Roger North's 'Examen, or on Inquiry into the Credit and Veracity of a pretended Complete History, viz. Dr. White Kennett's "History of England."' His popularity at court was increased by the published denunciations of his views, and he was appointed chaplain in ordinary to her majesty (cf., Brief Relation, vi. 207). He was installed in the deanery of Peterborough 21 Feb. 1707–8 (, Life of Tillotson, ed. 1753. p. 212 ;, vi. 223, 254). A few days previously he had been collated to the prebend of Marston St. Laurence, in the church of Lincoln.

A sermon which he preached at the funeral of the first Duke of Devonshire on 5 Sept. 1707, and which laid him open to the charge of encouraging a deathbed repentance, was published by Henry Hills, without a dedication, in 1707. To a second edition, published by John Churchill to William, second duke of Devonshire, was appended 'Memoirs of the Family of Cavendish,' a separate edition of which was published by Hills in the same year. A new edition of the sermon, with the author's manuscript corrections, was published by John Nichols in 1797, but very few copies were sold the remainder were destroyed by fire (, Lit. Anecd. i. 396 n.) The imputation against Kennett was fresh in the