Page:The Church of England, its catholicity and continuity.djvu/150

 of the Court, and he would not be drawn into the evils that went hand in hand with familiarity with the Court. An anecdote lets us into Andrewes' character. Neale, the Bishop of Durham, and Andrewes were one day with the king, when the king asked, "My lords, cannot I take my subjects' money when I want it, without all the formality of Parliament?" Neale replied, "God forbid, sir, but you should, you are the breath of our nostrils." Andrewes sat silent. The king pressed him for an answer. "Sir," he replied, "I think it is lawful for you to take my brother Neale's money, because he offers it." A very pretty story, which shows us Andrewes' integrity, and that he would not be false to his convictions even to please his king.

We must next notice Andrewes' relations to the Roman Catholics. The time of King James was the age of papal plots, and Roman controversialists arose to poison the mind of the Church of England. They found a worthy opponent in Andrewes, although controversy was not what be loved. No man, however, had as much learning as he to meet the arguments of Bellarmine, the champion of the Pope of Rome. Andrewes disposed of the claims put forward by him by appealing to history. And it was acknowledged that Andrewes' work was unanswerable.

Andrewes could express himself in vigorous language, as the following quotation from this controversy will show. He was speaking of the popish plot of the 5th of November, and said it was "an abomination of desolation standing in the Holy Place." It was, he said, "undertaken with a holy oath; bound with the Holy Sacrament (that must needs be