William Cartwright

the most noted Poet, Orator and Philosopher of his time, was born at Northway near T [•] wksbury in Glocestershire in Sept. 1611. (9. Jac. 1.) and baptized there on the 26 day of the same month. His father Will. Cartwright was once a Gent. of a fair Estate, but running out of it, I know not how, was forced to keep a common Inn in Cirencester in the same County, where living in a middle condition, cansed this his son, of great hopes, to be educated under Mr. Will. Topp Master of the Free-school there. But so great a progress did he make in a short time, that by the advice of friends, his father got him to be sped a Kings-scholar at Westminster; where compleating his former learning to a miracle under Mr. Lambert Osbaldeston, was elected Student of Ch. Ch. in 1628, put under the tuition of Jerumael Terrent, went thro the Classes of Logic and Philosophy with an unwearied industry, took the degrees in Arts (that of Master being compleated in 1635) holy orders, and became the most florid and seraphical Preacher in the University. He was another Tully and Virgil, as being most excellent for Oratory and Poetry, in which faculties, as also in the Greek tongue, he was so full and absolute, that those that best knew him, knew not in which he most excell’d. So admirably well vers’d also was he in Metaphysicks, that when he was Reader of them in the University, the exposition of them was never better performed than by him and his Predecessor Th. Barlow of Qu. Coll. His preaching also was so graceful, and profound withal, that none of his time or age went beyond him. So that if the Wits read his Poems, Divines his Sermons, and Philosophers his Lectures on Aristotles Metaphysicks, they would scarce believe that he died at a little above thirty years of age. But that which is most remarkable, is that these his high parts and abilities, were accompanied with so much candour and sweetness, that they made him equally beloved and admired of all persons, especially those of the Gown and Court, who esteemed also his life a fair copy of practick piety, a rare example of heroick worth, and in whom Arts, Learning and Language made up the true complement of perfection. He hath written,

The Lady-errant. Trag. Com.

Royal Slave. Trag. Com. Oxon. 1640. second edit. Acted before the K. and Q. by the Students of Ch. Ch. 30 Aug. 1636. See in Hist. & Antiq. Univ. Oxon. lib. 1. p. 344. b. 345. a.

The Ordinary. Com.

Siedge: or Love’s convert. Trag. Com.

Poems—All which were gathered into one Vol. and printed at Lond. 1651. oct. usher’d then into the world by many copies of Verses, mostly written by Oxf. men; among whom were Jasper Mayne D. D. Joh. Castilion B. D. (afterwards Dean of Rochester) Robert Waring, Mart. Lluellin, Joh. Fell, Franc. Palmer, Rich. Goodridge, Tho. Severne, &c. all of Ch. Church. Hen. Earl of Monmouth, Sir Rob. Stapylton, Edw. Sherbourn (afterwards a Knight) Jam. Howell, Franc. Finch, Joh. Finch of Ball. Coll. Brethren to Sir Heneage Finch sometimes Lord Chanc. of England, Will. Creed of S. Joh. Coll. Joh. Birkenhead of Alls. Coll. Hen. Vaughan the Silurist and Eugenius Philalethes his brother, both of Jesus Coll. Josias How and Ralph Bathurst of Trin. Coll. Mathew Smallwood of Brasnose, Hen. Bold of New, and Will. Bell of S. Johns, Coll. &c. Our Author Cartwright also wrot,

Poemata Graeca & Latina.

An Off-spring of mercy, issuing out of the womb of crueltie. Or, a passion serm. preached at Ch. Ch. in Oxon, on Acts 2.23. Lond. 1652. oct.

Of the signal days in the month of Nov. in relation to the Crown and Royal Family. A poem. Lond. 1671. in one sh. in qu. besides Poems and Verses, which have Ayres ((*))((*)) See in a book intit. Ayres and Dialogues for one, two, and three Voices. Lond. 1653. fol. composed by the said Hen. Lawes; and in another intit. Select Ayres and Dialogues to sing to the Theorbo-Lute and Bass Viol. Lond. 1669. fol. composed also by the said Hen. Lawes. for several Voices set to them by the incomparable Henry Lawes servant to K. Ch. 1. in his publick and private musick; who outliving the tribulations which he endured for the royal cause, was restored to his places after the return of K. Ch. 2. and for a short time lived happy, and venerated by all lovers of musick. He was buried by the title of Gentleman of his Majesties Chappel, in the Cloister belonging to S. Peters Church within the City of Westminster, 25 Octob. 1662. As for Cartwright, who had the Succentors place in the Church of Salisbury confer’d on him by Bishop Duppa, in the month of Octob. 1642, was untimely snatch’d away by a malignant fever call’d the Camp-disease, that raged in Oxon. (he being then one of the Proctors of the University) to the great grief of all learned and vertuous men, and to the resentment of the K. and Qu. then there (who very anxiously enquired of his health in the time of his sickness) on the 29 of Nov. in sixteen hundred forty and three, and was buried on the first day of Dec. towards the upper end of the south isle joyning to the Choire of the Cathedral of Ch. Church. 1643. In his Proctorship succeeded Joh. Maplet M. A. of the same house, who served out the remaining part of the year, and in his Succentorship Rob. Joyner of Oxford.