BABINGTON, Gervase (1549/50-1610)

Although he was a cousin of the Elizabethan Catholic plotter Anthony Babington, Gervase Babington came from a branch of the family which generally conformed to the established Church. He took his name from his maternal grandfather, the Nottinghamshire squire Sir Gervase Clifton^‡. In 1567 Babington entered Trinity College, Cambridge as a humble sizar, but acquired the patronage of the new master, John Whitgift^† (later bishop of Worcester and archbishop of Canterbury). He secured a fellowship in 1573, and was assigned to help tutor the young Robert Devereux^†, 2nd earl of Essex upon the latter’s arrival at the college in 1577.20 Top. and Gen. i. 335; Al. Cant.; Lansd. 25/46. In the 1580s he moved to Wiltshire as chaplain to Henry Herbert^†, 2nd earl of Pembroke, one of Whitgift’s former pupils; many of his works of biblical commentary date from this period.21 CCEd; Babington, Works, sig. A3. The patronage of Whitgift and Pembroke, perhaps combined with support from Essex, doubtless explains Babington’s appointment as bishop of Llandaff in 1591, a poorly endowed see where his income was augmented by revenues from several other posts. Translated to Exeter in 1595, he transferred to Worcester, valued at £833 a year, two years later.22 Le Neve, Fasti (1854), ii. 262; Trans. Congregational Hist. Soc. vi. 56; Harington, 129; B. Usher, Ld. Burghley and Episcopacy, 1577-1603, pp. 119 n.60, 135, 139, 149-51.

As a diocesan, Babington was cast in the Whitgiftian mould, an orthodox Calvinist and a tireless preacher: the dedication of his Works commended his ‘zeal and assiduity in preaching’; while a later commentator termed him ‘an excellent pulpit man’.23 Babington, Works, sig. A3v; T. Fuller, Church Hist. of Britain (1656), x. 56; K. Fincham, Prelate as Pastor, 88, 233. Keen to promote religious instruction among his flock, at Landaff he sponsored a school during his time there, and some of his catechetical writings were translated into Welsh; while as bishop of Worcester he was active against recusants at local level, holding private conferences to persuade them to conform, and sequestrating those who did not.24 G. Williams, Wales and the Reformation. 341, 388; M.C. Questier, Conversion, Pols. and Religion in Eng., 1580-1625, pp. 122-3, 172. He was also a careful steward of episcopal revenues and fabric, both at Llandaff and Worcester.25 Williams, 334, 371; C3/295/17. In 1600 he brought a Star Chamber suit against the Worcester corporation in order to uphold the immunity of episcopal tenants from arrest by city officials,26 STAC 5/W45/7; A.D. Dyer, City of Worcester in the 16th Century, 232-3. and in 1605-6, when he learned that the corporation sought jurisdiction over the cathedral precincts as part of their new charter, he successfully lobbied to have its progress halted; when it eventually passed the great seal in 1616, it included an amendment to preserve the immunities of the cathedral close.27 Chamber Order Bk. of Worcester, 1602-50 ed. S. Bond (Worcs. Hist. Soc. n.s. viii), 88, 90; SP46/61, f. 148; HMC Hatfield, xviii. 459-60; xxiv. 96-7; SP14/28/138; Fincham, 92-3.

Babington was clearly a familiar figure at court, but he damaged his prospects in March 1600 with a sermon in the Chapel Royal defending his former pupil, the disgraced earl of Essex, although when called to account by the queen, ‘he flatly forswore that he had any such meaning’. This, and Pembroke’s death a year later, ended his chances of further promotion under Elizabeth, but as only a handful of bishoprics were worth more than his own, the incentive to seek further promotion was small. Nor did his career progress during the next reign: he preached at least twice at court under James, but never caught the king’s eye.28 Chamberlain Letters ed. N.E. McClure, i. 92-3; P. McCullough, Sermons at Ct. (suppl. cal. 83, 106, 152). In the autumn of 1603 he promulgated Whitgift’s orders as archbishop to secure the conformity of puritan ministers – then mounting a petitioning campaign against the hierarchy – but the radical preacher Stephen Egerton speculated that Babington and three other bishops might prove sympathetic. Such hopes were disappointed at the Hampton Court Conference in January 1604, when Babington intervened only once, echoing Whitgift’s disapproval of emergency baptism by women and laymen.29 Worcs. RO, 716.02/BA2056 (unnumbered item); Sloane 271, f. 23v; Barlow, 14-15.

During the parliamentary session which followed the Hampton Court Conference, Babington attended 90 per cent of the Lords’ sittings, despite taking two days off to go to Croydon to preach at Whitgift’s funeral; he was also one of four bishops who shared the proxy of William Overton^*, bishop of Coventry and Lichfield. He played a minor role in several important debates: at the start of the session he was included in the delegation which met with MPs to discuss Sir Robert Wroth’s^‡ wide-ranging reform agenda, which raised the prospect of a cash composition for wardship. This proposal ultimately came to nothing, but Babington was also appointed to attend two conferences at which King James laid out his initial agenda for the Union, which produced a cross-border conference that autumn.30 Fuller, x. 26-7; LJ, ii. 263a, 266b, 277b, 282b. His agenda in attending a conference about ecclesiastical reform was presumably negative: led by Richard Bancroft^*, bishop of London, the prelates delayed its proceedings, during which time Convocation passed a fresh set of Canons to force puritan ministers to conform. He was also included on committees for two drafts of the recusancy bill, and two drafts of a bill to prevent the import of ‘seditious, popish, vain and lascivious books’.31 LJ, ii. 282b, 290a, 301b, 314a, 324b; RICHARD BANCROFT. It was presumably at the request of his old college that he secured a nomination to the committee for a private bill to confirm their land exchange with Sir Thomas Monson^‡.32 LJ, ii. 281a.

In December 1604, King James and Bancroft (now archbishop of Canterbury) sought to enforce conformity to the 1604 Canons among the puritan clergy; 83 ministers were deprived nationally. The patchy records for Worcester diocese suggest that Babington proceeded with little enthusiasm – only two puritans were replaced in his diocese, in the summer of 1605. He seems to have pursued Catholics more vigorously: in 1603 he sent the names of over 300 recusants reported by his diocesan officials to the assize judges, and in the summer of 1605, when the king encouraged a fresh crackdown against Catholics, Babington advised Richard Fiennes^*, 7th Lord Saye and Sele, where his best prospects lay for finding wealthy recusants whose fines he could beg from the crown.33 HMC Hatfield, xvi. 176-7 [should be dated 1605]; xvii. 331-2.

The fate of deprived ministers was naturally addressed by their friends in the Commons at the next parliamentary session, who delivered a list of ecclesiastical grievances to the Lords on 5 Apr. 1606; Babington was included among the delegation sent to confer with MPs about these grievances. Bancroft and the puritans clashed over this issue on several occasions in the succeeding month, but the king settled the matter when he rejected the grievance petition on 14 May.34 Fincham, 326; LJ, ii. 407b; Bowyer Diary, 102-3, 169-70; RICHARD BANCROFT. The discovery of the Gunpowder Plot propelled recusancy legislation up the parliamentary agenda, and as a result Babington was included both on several bill committees and the delegation for a conference on this issue. In April it was reported in Devon that when Bancroft had suggested a provisional toleration be allowed to Catholics for four years, Babington had retorted, ‘a pity they should be tolerated for seven days’. However, there is no record of this exchange in the sparse records of the Lords’ debates.35 LJ, ii. 360b, 367b, 401a, 419b; Diary of Walter Yonge ed. G. Roberts (Cam. Soc. xli), 6.

Babington took no part in this session’s extensive debates over purveyance and wardship, but his assiduous attendance was reflected in his involvement in committee work. A number of his nominations concerned bills of local interest: to confirm the endowment of two divinity lectureships at Cambridge University; to confirm the rentals of weavers’ houses in Worcester; and to repeal a clause of the 1543 Act of Union that allowed the crown to make laws for Wales by proclamation. He was also included on the committees for bills to settle the estates of three recently deceased Marches landowners: Thomas Windsor^*, 5th Lord Windsor; William Brydges^†, 4th Lord Chandos; and Charles Blount^*, earl of Devonshire.36 LJ, ii. 376b, 386b, 368a, 392a, 406b, 433b.

The proposed Union with Scotland dominated the agenda of the next parliamentary session in 1606-7: Babington was included on the large delegation sent to prod the Commons into action at the start of the session, and on the committee to scrutinize the sole item of legislation which reached the Lords, for repeal of hostile laws against the Scots.37 Ibid. 453a, 520a. Once again, he regularly attended the Lords’ sittings, and was nominated to committees for a wide range of legislation, including a bill to confirm a 1559 statute for exchange of lands between the crown and the archbishopric of Canterbury (which had cost the see several hundred pounds in revenue), and another to confirm titles granted by the commissioners for concealed lands – impropriate rectories and ex-chantry lands, particularly liable to concealment proceedings, formed the bulk of many episcopal estates.38 Ibid. 494a, 504a; J.I. Daeley, ‘Episcopal Admin. of Matthew Parker, Abp. of Canterbury, 1559-75’ (Univ. London Ph.D. thesis, 1967), 324-30. Babington was also included on committees for two bills involving estates held by Oxford colleges;39 LJ, ii. 468a (All Souls’), 518a (Northleach school, overseen by Queen’s Coll. Oxf.). two local bills relating to his own diocese; another to regulate the making of cloth, a major industry in Worcester;40 Ibid. 512b (pasture in Herefs.), 514b (cloth), 519b (highways in Salop). and a bill for converting the revenues of an Exeter prebend to the maintenance of a preacher and schoolmaster.41 Ibid. 489a.

Babington did not attend the next parliamentary session, which began in the spring of 1610, but instead awarded his proxy to Archbishop Bancroft.42 Ibid. 548a. With his health presumably declining, he persuaded his dean, Arthur Lake^* (later bishop of Bath and Wells), to allow him refurbish the cathedral library at his own expense, and to augment the new facilities with a generous gift of 440 volumes from his own library. However, he died on 17 May, before the work was finished. Although Lake claimed he left an estate of over £2,000, the bishop’s wife and son refused to honour his bequest to the cathedral library, pleading that they were liable for £500 of tenths and clerical subsidies due to the crown, and claiming that they were also bound to pay other debts ‘in great sums of money’. Despite suspicions that they had suppressed a will, they were granted letters of administration. Dean Lake nevertheless sued them to uphold this bequest, and some part of Babington’s library was eventually deposited in the cathedral.43 REQ 2/397/59; Ath. Ox. ii. 509; PROB 6/7, p. 202; D. Pearson, ‘Libraries of Eng. Bps. 1600-40’, The Library (6th ser.), xiv. 234. Babington’s chief monument was his collected works, edited by his erstwhile chaplain Miles Smith^*, bishop of Gloucester, and published in 1615, which included the final two books of his commentaries on the Pentateuch, not hitherto printed.44 Babington, Works.