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Encyclopedia Britannica



WHITGIFT, JOHN (c. 1530-1604)

This article appears in Volume V28, Page 609 of the Encyclopedia Britannica.

Encyclopedia Britannica - Main :: WAT-WIL
WHITGIFT, JOHN (c. 1530-1604) , English archbishop, was the eldest son of Henry Whitgift, merchant of Great
Grimsby
 , Lincolnshire, where he was born, according to one account in 1533, but according to a calculation founded on a statement of his own in 1530. At an early age his education was entrusted to his uncle, Robert Whitgift, abbot of the neighbouring monastery of Wellow, by whose advice he was afterwards sent to St Anthony's school, London. In 1549 he matriculated at Queens' College,
Cambridge
 , and in May 1550 he migrated to Pembroke
Hall
 , where he had the
martyr
  John Bradford for a tutor. In May 1555 he became a fellow of Peterhouse. Having taken orders in 156o, he became in the same year chaplain to Richard Cox, bishop of Ely, who collated him to the rectory of Teversham, Cambridgeshire. In 1563 he was appointed Lady Margaret professor of divinity at
Cambridge
 , and his lectures gave such
satisfaction
  to the authorities that on the 5th of July 1566 they considerably augmented his stipend. The following year he was appointed regius professor of divinity, and also became master first of Pembroke
Hall
  and then of Trinity. He had a principal share in compiling the statutes of the university, which passed the great seal on the 25th of September 1570, and in November following he was chosen vice-chancellor. Macaulay's description of Whitgift as " a narrow, mean, tyrannical priest, who gained power by servility and adulation," is tinged with rhetorical exaggeration; but undoubtedly Whitgift's extreme High Church notions led him to treat the Puritans with exceptional intolerance. In a pulpit controversy with Thomas
Cartwright
 , regarding the constitutions and customs of the Church of England, he showed himself
Cartwright
 's inferior in oratorical effectiveness, but the balance was redressed by the exercise of arbitrary authority. Whitgift, with other heads of the university, deprived Cartwright in 1570 of his professorship, and in September 1571 exercised his prerogative as master of Trinity to deprive him of his fellowship. In June of the same year Whitgift was nominated dean of Lincoln. In the following year he published An Answere to a Certain Libel intituled an Admonition to the Parliament, which led to further controversy between the two divines. On the 24th of March 1577, Whitgift was appointed bishop of Worcester, and during the absence of Sir Henry Sidney in Ireland (1577) he acted as vice-president of Wales. In August 1583 he was appointed archbishop of Canterbury, and thus was largely instrumental in giving its
special
  complexion to the church of the Reformation. Although he wrote a letter to Queen Elizabeth remonstrating against the alienation of church property, Whitgift always retained her
special
  confidence. In his policy against the Puritans, and in his vigorous enforcement of the subscription test, he thoroughly carried out the queen's policy of religious uniformity. He drew up articles aimed at
nWhitgift is described by his biographer, Sir G. Paule, as of " middle stature, strong and well shaped, of a grave countenance and brown complexion, black hair and eyes, his beard neither long nor thick." He was noted for his hospitality, and was somewhat ostentatious in his habits, sometimes visiting Canterbury and other towns attended by a retinue of 800 horsemen. He left several unpublished works, which are included among the MSS. Angliae. Many of his letters, articles, injunctions, &c. are calendared in the published volumes of the " State Paper " series of the reign of Elizabeth. His Collected Works, edited for the Parker Society by John Ayre (3 vols., Cambridge, 1851-1853), include, besides the controversial tracts already alluded to, two sermons published during his lifetime, a selection from his letters to Cecil and others, and some portions of his unpublished MSS.
A Life of Whitgift by Sir G. Paule appeared in 1612, 2nd ed. 1649. It was embodied by John Strype in his Life and Acts of Whitgift (1718). There is also a life in C. Wordsworth's Ecclesiastical Biography (1810), W. F. Hook's Archbishops of Canterbury (1875), and vol. i. of Whitgif t's Collected Works. See also C.H. Cooper's Athenae Cantabrigienses.


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