york00orns

362 YORK.
which remains undimmed after the lapse of three long
centuries. The " Ecclesiastical Polity " of Richard
Hooker is a text-book still. It is the book, of all
others, which placed the reformed Church of England
on her true footing, as a witness against the meagreness
and narrowness of the Separatists and the
extravagant claims of the Church of Rome. English
theology underwent a gradual but decisive change in
the hands of Hooker. " The results of his publications
were great and presently perceptible. A school
of writers immediately sprung up, who by express
reference, or style, or tone of thought, betray their
admiration of Hooker ;
Covel, Edwin Sandys, Field,
Raleigh, and others ; and what was infinitely more
important, Hooker had his full share in training up
for the next generation Laud, Hammond, Sanderson,
and a multitude more such divines : to which succession
and series, humanly speaking, we owe it that
the Anglican Church continues at such a distance
from that of Geneva, and so near to primitive truth
and apostolical order."' ^
A few words must now be said concerning the
occupants of the archiepiscopal chair of York who
owed their elevation to Queen Elizabeth. Young
and Grindal have already been mentioned. When
the latter was translated to Canterbury after the death
of Parker, Sandys, Bishop of London, became his
successor. He was enthroned by proxy on the
15th March, 1577. The new Archbishop had been,
as we know, one of the refugees in Mary's reign, and
'
Preface to Keble's Hooker, p. civ.