Lancelot Andrewes, who died today in 1626, was one of the most gifted scholars of his day. He contributed to and edited the Authorized or King James Version of the Bible, published in 1611, and was renowned both for his learning and his piety.
Andrewes was a fierce defender of the Church of England against what he saw as the excesses both of Roman Catholicism and extreme Protestantism. He was one of those who questioned the Congregationalist Henry Barrow, who had called for a separation between church and state; Barrow spent years in prison and was executed for his views, and his account of the interrogation makes sad reading.
Andrewes was a great preacher admired by James I and VI. His sermons were published in 1631 and his Preces Privatae or 'Private Prayers' in 1648.
Here are seven quotes from Lancelot Andrewes.
1. Two things I recognise, O Lord, in myself: Nature, which thou hast made; Sin, which I have added.
2. Take away, O Lord, the veil of my heart while I read the Scriptures.
3. A cold coming they had had of it, at this time of the year; just the worst time of the year to take a journey, and specially a long journey, in (ie the journey of the Magi).
4. Pray we for the Clergy; that they may rightly divide, that they may rightly walk; that while they teach others, themselves may learn.
5. 'Gratitude is the praise we offer God: for teachers kind, benefactors never to be forgotten, for all who have advantaged me, by writings, sermons, converse, prayers, examples, for all these and all others which I know, which I know not, open, hidden, remembered, and forgotten.'
6. Let not hurtful pleasures overcome me; at the least let not any perverse habit overwhelm me; from evil and unlawful desires; from vain, hurtful, impure imaginations; from the illusions of evil spirits; from pollutions of soul and of body; Good Lord, deliver me.
7. Behold, O Lord, that I am indignant with myself, for my senseless, profitless, hurtful, perilous passions; that I loathe myself, for these inordinate, unseemly, deformed, false, shameful, disgraceful passions; that my confusion is daily before me, and the shame of my face hath covered me. Alas! woe, woe! O me, how long?
