Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 33.djvu/265

Rh arose, which threatened, according to Lilly, to blow down the west end of the church, but he managed to dismiss the demons, who were thus marking their displeasure, and nothing further followed. He attributed the fiasco to the irreverent laughter of the spectators. On 18 Nov. 1634 Lilly married a second wife, Jane Rowley, who brought him 500l. and a shrewish temper. The purchase soon afterwards of a moiety of thirteen houses in the Strand involved him in lawsuits. After teaching astrology to many promising pupils, and practising the art himself with success, he fell a victim to hypochondriac melancholy; removed in the spring of 1637 to Hersham, near Walton-on-Thames, in Surrey, and remained there five years. In 1639 he wrote a treatise upon ‘The Eclipse of the Sun in the eleventh Degree of Gemini 22 May 1639,’ which he presented to his ‘bountiful friend,’ William Pennington (d. 1652) of Muncaster, Cumberland. In September 1641 he settled again in London, ‘perceiving there was money to be got’ there, and studied his astrological books anew. In 1643 he attended Sir Bulstrode Whitelocke, M.P., during a severe sickness, and he claims to have foretold his patient's recovery. In April 1644 he published his first almanac, which he entitled ‘Merlinus Anglicus Junior, the English Merlin Revived, or a Mathematicall Prediction upon the affairs of the English Commonwealth’ (two editions), and sold the first edition within a week (cf. Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1645–7, p. 135). From this time he prepared an almanac each year until his death. In 1644 he also began the issue of a long series of pamphlets of prophecy. On 12 June 1644 appeared ‘The English Merlin Revived, or his Predictions upon the affairs of the English Commonwealth, and of all or most Kingdoms of Christendom, this present year 1644’ (London, 12 June 1644, 4to). Here Lilly's arts and divinations enabled him to foresee nothing more novel than ‘a troubled and divided court, an afflicted kingdom, a city neere a plague, and Ireland falling into discontent.’ In July there followed ‘Supernaturall Sights and Apparitions seen in London, June 30, 1644, interpreted.’ In the same year Lilly printed ‘A Prophecy of the White King and Dreadfull Deadman explained.’ The first part, drawn from an old manuscript in the Cottonian Library, was published by many other astrologers. The obscure sentences were paraphrased to apply to Charles I. The ‘Dreadfull Deadman’ was reprinted from the ‘Probleme concerning Prophecies’ (1588), by John Harvey [q. v.] the astrologer. A fuller commentary by Lilly on these predictions appeared in 1646 (cf. Notes and Queries, 3rd ser. ii. 351). ‘England's Propheticall Merline, foretelling to all Nations of Europe untill 1663 the Actions depending upon the Influence of the Conjunction of Saturn and Jupiter, 1642–3’ (London, 16 Oct. 1644), was dedicated to Sir William Wittypoll. In 1645 Lilly appended to his ‘Anglicus or Ephemeris for 1646’ a nativity of Prince Rupert, whom he described as not born to be fortunate, and likely to die when twenty-eight years old.

In 1645 a rival almanac-maker, Captain George Wharton, attacked Lilly as ‘an impudent, senseless fellow.’ Wharton was a pronounced royalist, and in order to answer him with better effect, Lilly, who disclaims any earlier interest in politics, promptly became a parliamentarian. The quarrel lasted long, and in many pamphlets issued in 1647 and following years Wharton claimed to expose Lilly's errors. On the day of the battle of Naseby (14 June 1645) Lilly published his ‘Starry Messengers, or an Interpretation of that strange Apparition of Three Suns seene in London 19 Nov. 1644, being the Birth of Prince Charles.’ Some reflections there and in his almanac for 1645 on the commissioners of excise led to his being summoned before the parliamentary committee of examinations, over which Miles Corbet [q. v.] presided, but the charge was not pressed. In 1646 he published nativities of Laud and Strafford, and in 1647 the work which he chiefly prized, ‘Christian Astrology modestly treated in three Books,’ London, 1647, dedicated to Whitelocke. This book he made his text-book for his pupils. In the same year he defended himself from a charge of having brought about a marriage between John Grubham Howe and Annabella Scroope by undue means, in ‘The late Storie of Mr. William Lillie,’ London, January 1647–8 [cf. ]. He there asserted that his fame had reached to France, Italy, and Germany, and denied that he had received at any time money from the parliament. In 1648 H. Johnsen, ‘student in astrology,’ renewed, in his ‘Anti-Merlinus,’ the assaults on Lilly.

In 1647 a lady named Jane Whorwood, wife of Brome Whorwood of Halton, Oxfordshire, a devoted partisan of the king, consulted Lilly, according to his own story, respecting the possibility of the king escaping from Hampton Court and remaining concealed in any part of the country. Lilly suggested a place in Essex, twenty miles from London, and received 20l. (, Life and Times, ed. Clark, i. 227). Fairfax seems to have suspected that Lilly was applying his art improperly, and sent for him and another