to Skelton and Bletsoe in the same county, dying in 1671. He was twice married, and had a son John, who was born in 1647, at Skelton, a son Nathaniel (b. 1650), and a daughter Barnardiston (b. 1652). There is a tradition that our John Mason was the son of a minister, and this Nicholas may have been his father.

But the two brothers who survived him, and were curators to his children were named Thomas and Nicholas. Now, a Thomas and a Nicholas, sons of Thomas and Margaret Mason, were baptized at Irchester, Aug. 3, 1643, and Feb. 2, 1644, respectively, and in March, 1646, something happened to a son of the same couple; but the register is defective, and though it is almost certainly a baptism, it would be mere conjecture to assert that the name is John. John Mason himself had a son Thomas, which is some faint confirmation of this view. But against it must be set the consideration that Thomas Shepherd, the part author of "Penitential Cries" (page 20), who was born in 1665, was also the son of a Vicar of Tilbrook, and that his friendship with Mason may have begun in boyhood.

From whatever home, little John was sent to a grammar school kept by the Vicar of Strixton, not far from Irchester; where, again, a Robert Mason had been Vicar from 1622 to 1628. The registers at Strixton, down to 1729, have unfortunately been burnt, and no papers seem to be extant which relate to the school; so for this period, too, we are in darkness. The boy's health appears to have been delicate, but his strong character made itself felt already, and his master is reported to have said of him that "if he lived he was like to be a violent zealot.” 5

From Strixton young Mason went on to Cambridge, and was admitted a sizar of Clare Hall, on May 16, 1661.6 We still have no direct evidence about him; but so much that is characteristic of him seems to be referable to the Cambridge thought of the time, that we can see very plainly what were the ideas which chiefly influenced him.

3 "Notes and Queries," March 5, 1892, p. 186.

4 Act of Administration, Somerset House. Arch. Bucks Act Book, fol. 165, June, 1694.

5 I. A. 25.

6

Clare College Admission Register.

Since the Earl of Manchester's visitation in 1644, when nine royalist fellows had been ejected from Clare Hall alone, the strictest Calvinistic doctrines had been established in high places, and had become extremely popular; yet they did not seriously disturb the very moderate and liberal school which was led by Cudworth and Henry More. Meanwhile, the Nonconformist criticisms of the Liturgy, on which Mason never satisfied himself, were being met by the successors of Jeremy Taylor; and the singularly benevolent and gentle Joseph Mede, of Christ's, though he himself died in 1638, had initiated in the University a line of millenarian speculation, which will be of the first importance later on in our story.7

One of Mason's college friends, Gray by name, who was afterwards a minister in Northamptonshire, wrote, after his death, that he was 'careless in some part of his life' at Cambridge; and he himself excused his lucubrations at Isham on the ground that he had lost his time at the University, and must regain it; and would repeat in his sermons 'here stands one that has been as great a sinner as any of you, till it pleased God to open his eyes.' There was There was a rowdy set in Cambridge, even in the heart of the Puritan time, when the undergraduates raged like Diana's craftsmen' against George Fox, in 1655, 10 and the restoration of the Merry Monarch did not tend to improve. matters.

9

With Mason, however, this phase did not last long; for, after taking his B.A. degree in 1664, he entered the ministry, and was appointed curate to Rev. Mr. Sawyer, Rector of Isham, Northamptonshire. Here, 'with a most cheerful spirit, freed from moroseness or enthusiasm,' he went about his work earnestly and faithfully, while he endeavoured to make up for lost time by regular study far into the night.12 This excessive application at the beginning of his ministerial life must be held responsible, in great measure, for the broken health and loss of mental balance of his later years.

7Cf. Mullinger: 'Cambridge Thought in the Seventeenth Century.' 8 Imp. Acc. 26. 10 Journal, i. 290.

11 I. A. 26.

9 Ibid.

12 Ibid.

He returned to Cambridge for his M.A. degree in 1668;13 and on the 21st of October in the same year was presented to the Vicarage of Stantonbury, near Stony Stratford, where he remained more than six years.

Stantonbury (or Stanton Barry, as it was formerly called) lies on the south bank of the Ouse, three miles east of Wolverton. In the middle of the seventeenth century, the manor and advowson belonged to the family of Temple; but Mason was presented to the Vicarage by Sir John Wittewronge, of Rothampstead, in Hertfordshire, who had bought the manor shortly before.1 The new patron still lived, and in 1693 was buried, at Rothampstead; but he built a large house at Stantonbury for his son, the ground-plan of which can still be traced in the field north of the church, between the river on the west and an artificial mound on the east, which bounded the garden, and has half-a-dozen old hawthorns upon it still.

Even then, except for the large house and the outlying farms, Stantonbury seems to have been almost deserted.15 There is no trace of a vicarage, and it is not improbable that the Vicar lived at the Hall as Mr. Wittewronge's private chaplain. Now the place is quite deserted, and the old Church is only used for an occasional funeral. It is a very small building, consisting of chancel, nave, and north porch, all poor and mean; but the chancel arch is a magnificent specimen of the best Norman work; and the pulpit dates from the time of the Wittewronges, and is no doubt that which Mason himself used. The square pew on the north side opposite to it represents the seat of the Lord of the Manor, whose proper corner, however, with statue-niche and piscina, on the south side, is occupied by the pulpit and a later reading-pew.

It is clear enough, then, that at Stantonbury Mason had most of his time to himself; and he seems to have used it well. He still pursued his theological studies, and very probably began, in this leisure time, the "Critical Latin Commentary," which he only carried as far as the

13 Graduati Cantabrigienses.

14 Lipscomb, History of Buckinghamshire,' viii. 347-9.

15 Local tradition says that there were houses in the large field north of the Church.