The Register for these years presents a connected series of benefactions
on the part of Archbishop Laud.
On May 22, 1635, he sent to the Library the first instalment of his
magnificent gifts of MSS. which consisted of 462 volumes and five rolls.
Among these were 46 Latin MSS., 'e Collegio Herbipolensi [Würtzburg] in
Germania sumpti A.D. 1631, cum Suecorum Regis exercitus per universam
fere Germaniam grassarentur.' Laud directs, in his letter of gift, that
none of the books shall on any account be taken out of the Library,
'nisi solum ut typis mandentur, et sic publici et juris et utilitatis
fiant,' upon sufficient security, to be approved by the Vice-Chancellor
and Proctors; the MS., in such cases, being immediately after printing
restored to its place in the Library[95]. This permission was acted upon
in the year 1647-8, when Patrick Young, the Librarian of the Royal
Library at St. James's, was allowed to have the use of several
volumes[96].
In 1636, 181 MSS. formed the Archbishop's second gift, which were
accompanied by five cabinets of coins in gold, silver, and brass, with a
list arranged chronologically; an Arabic astrolabe, of brass[97]; two
idols, one Egyptian, the other from the West Indies; and the fine bust
of King Charles I, 'singulari artificio ex purissimo ære conflatam,'
which is now placed under the arch opening into the central portion of
the Library. This beautiful work of art is believed by Mr. John Bruce,
the learned Vice-President of the Society of Antiquaries, who is engaged
in researches into the life and productions of Hubert Le Sœur, the
artist of the statue at Charing Cross, to be, (as well as the bust given
by Laud to St. John's College,) a specimen of the skill of that famous
craftsman. The existing arrangements of the Library being found
insufficient for such large accessions, the lower end was fitted up in
1638-9 for the reception of Laud's books, for the cost of which £300 was
voted by Convocation[98]. In the following year, 555 more MSS. were
received, together with a magical wand or staff, and some additional
coins. The wand is of dark polished wood, 2 feet 9 inches long, with a
grotesquely-carved figure at the head, apparently of Mexican
workmanship: it is now kept in one of the Sub-Librarians' studies. The
last gift from the munificent Chancellor of the University came in the
next year, 1640, and consisted of no more than 81 MSS.; for troubles
were beginning to gather now around the head of the Archbishop, and the
Library at Oxford felt the blows which were levelled at Lambeth. This
was accompanied with the following touching letter:--
'Viris mihi amicissimis Doctori Potter, Vice-Cancellario,
reliquisque Doctoribus, Procuratoribus, necnon singulis in domo
Convocationis intra almam Universitatem Oxon. congregatis.
'Non datur scribendi otium. Hoc tamen quale quale est arripio
lubens, ut pauca ad vos transmittam, adhuc florentes Academici.
Tempora adsunt plusquam difficillima, nec negotia quæ undique urgent
faciliora sunt. Quin et quo loco res Ecclesiæ sint nemo non videt.
Horum malorum fons non unus est; unus tamen, inter alios, furor est
eorum qui sanam doctrinam non sustinentes (quod olim observavit S.
Hilarius) corruptam desiderant. Inter eos qui hoc œstro perciti
sunt quam difficile sit vivere, mihi plus satis innotescit, cui (Deo
gratias!) idem est vivere et officium facere.
'Sed mittenda hæc sunt, nec enim quo fata ducunt datur scire. Nec
mitiora redduntur tempora aut tutiora querimoniis. Interim velim
sciatis me omnia vobis fausta et felicia precari, quo tuti sitis
felicesque, dum hic inter sphæras superiores stellæ cujuslibet
magnitudinis vix motum suum tenent, aut præ nubium crassitie debile
lumen emittunt.
'Dum sic fluctuant omnia, statui apud me in tuto (id est, apud vos
spero) MS. quædam, temporum priorum monumenta, deponere. Pauca sunt,
sed prioribus similia, si non æqualia, et talia quæ, non obstantibus
temporum difficultatibus, in usum vestrum parare non destiti. Sunt
vero inter hæc Hebraica sex, Græca undecim, Arabica tringinta
quatuor, Latina viginti et unum, Italica duo, Anglicana totidem,
Persica quinque, quorum unum, folio digestum ampliori, historiam
continet ab orbe condito ad finem imperii Saracenici, et est
proculdubio magni valoris. Hæc per vos in Bibliothecam Bodleianam
(nomen veneror, nec superstitiose) reponenda, et cæteris olim meis
apponenda, cupio, et sub eisdem legibus quibus priora dedi. Non opus
est multis donum hoc nostrum nimis exile ornare, nec id in votis
meis unquam fuit. Hoc obnixe et quotidie a DEO Opt. Max. summis
votis peto, ut Academia semper floreat, in ea Religio et Pietas et
quicquid doctrinam decorare potest in altum crescat, ut
tempestatibus quæ nunc omnia perflant sedatis, tuto possitis et
vobis et studiis et, præ omnibus, DEO frui. Quæ vota semper erunt
'fidelissimi et amantissimi Cancellarii vestri,
'W. CANT.[99]
'Dat. ex ædibus meis
'Lambethanis, 6^to Nov. 1640.'
The collection, which contains in the whole nearly 1300 MSS., comprises
works in very many languages: Hebrew, Chaldee, Syriac, Arabic, Persian,
Turkish, Armenian, Ethiopic, Chinese, Russian, Greek, Latin, French,
German, Italian, Irish, Anglo-Saxon, and English are all represented. It
is impossible, in the limits of this survey, to point out many of the
treasures with which the collection abounds; but that which is
pre-eminently styled 'Codex Laudianus' (numbered Laud, Gr. 35) must not,
of course, be omitted. It is a MS. of the Acts of the Apostles, in
quarto, consisting of 227 leaves, and containing the text in both Greek
and Latin, in parallel columns. Its date has been variously fixed by
critics, from the sixth to the eighth century; Mr. Coxe places it
towards the end of the seventh century, with whom Dr. Tischendorf, who
examined it in 1865, and for whom some photographs of portions were
executed, is believed to coincide. Some leaves are wanting at the end,
commencing at chap. xxvi. 29. It is the only MS. known to be extant
which contains the peculiar readings (in number 74) cited by Bede in his
Commentary as existing in the copy which he used; it has consequently
been conjectured, with much reason, that this was the very MS. which he
possessed. It was published by Thomas Hearne in 1715, printed in
capitals corresponding line for line with the MS., but not with entire
correctness; only 120 copies were printed, and it is therefore one of
the rarest in the series of his works. A very fairly engraved facsimile
of one verse (vii. 2) is to be found in Horne's _Introduction_.
Another famous MS. (No. 636) is a copy of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle,
which ends at the year 1154, and appears to have been written in, and to
have belonged to, the abbey of Peterborough, from its containing many
additions relating thereto. And a third treasure calling for special
mention is an Irish vellum MS. (No. 610), which contains the Psalter of
Cashel, Cormac's Glossary, Poems attributed to SS. Columb-kill and
Patrick, &c.[100] The Greek MSS. of the collection are fully described
in vol. i. of the _Catal. Codd. Bibl. Bodl._, by Mr. H. O. Coxe,
published in 1853; the Latin, Biblical, and Classical, with the
Miscellaneous, in Part I of the second volume, published by the same
gentleman in 1858; the Oriental, in the various Catalogues of Uri,
Nicoll, Pusey, Dillmann, and Payne Smith.
One of the Würtzburg books rescued from the Swedish soldiery is a
magnificent Missal printed on vellum by Jeorius Ryser in 1481, with
illuminated initials. On a fly-leaf is the following note: '1481,
Johannes Kewsch, vicarius in ecclesia Herb[ipolensi] hunc librum
comparavit propriis expensis, et pro omnibus, scil. pergameno,
impressura, rubricatione, illinatura, et ligatione, xviii. flor.' Then
follows a bequest, in his own hand, in 1486, of the book to the
successive vicars of St. Bartholomew, which is repeated at the end of
the 'Canon Missæ.' In the latter place four subsequent possessors, from
1565 to 1580, have written their names, the last of them adding, 'Omnis
arbor qui non facit fructum bonum excidetur et in ignem mittetur.' The
Library reference is now Auct. i. Q. i. 7.
[95] Reg. Conv. R. 24. f. 109^b. MS. note by Dr. P. Bliss.
[96] Entry at the end of the Register of Readers, 1638-9.
[97] This was given to Laud by Selden, 'vir omni eruditionis genere
instructissimus,' as Laud styles him in his letter of gift on June 16.
Reg. Conv. R. 24. f. 128.
[98] Reg. Conv. R. 24. 156^b. 169^b. The agreements with one Thomas
Richardson for the work are found there.
[99] Reg. Conv. R. 24^b, 182^b.
[100] Four volumes of the miscellaneous collection on Irish affairs made
by Sir G. Carew, afterwards Earl of Totness, are also to be found here.
A list of their contents, as of those of the other volumes preserved at
Lambeth and in University College, is printed in Mr. T. Duffus Hardy's
_Report to the Master of the Rolls on the Carte and Carew Papers_, 8^o,
Lond. 1864.