Joseph Hall (poet)

Joseph Hall (1 July 1574 - 8 September 1656) was an Anglican bishop and an English poet, satirist, and moralist. His contemporaries knew him as a devotional writer, and a high-profile controversialist of the early 1640s.

Joseph Hall (1574-1656). Detail of engraving by John Payne (1607-1647), 1628. Courtesy Wikipedia.

Life

Youth and education

Hall was born at Bristow park, near Ashby de la Zouch, Leicestershire, on 1 July 1574. His father, John Hall, was agent in the town for Henry, earl of Huntingdon, and his mother, Winifred Bambridge, was a pious lady, whom her son compared to St Monica.

Joseph Hall received his early education at the local school, and was sent (1589) to Emmanuel College, Cambridge. Hall was chosen for a2 years in succession to read the public lecture on rhetoric in the schools, and in 1595 became fellow of his college. During his residence at Cambridge he wrote his Virgidemiarum (1597), satires written after Latin models. The claim he put forward in the prologue to be the earliest English satirist:—

“I first adventure, follow me who list

And be the second English satirist”—

— gave bitter offence to John Marston, who attacks him in the satires published in 1598.

The archbishop of Canterbury gave an order (1599) that Hall’s satires should be burnt with works of John Marston, Marlowe, Sir John Davies and others on the ground of licentiousness, but shortly afterwards Hall’s book, certainly unjustly condemned, was ordered to be “staied at the press,” which may be interpreted as reprieved (see Notes and Queries, 3rd series, xii. 436).

Priest

Having taken holy orders, Hall was offered the mastership of Blundell’s school, Tiverton, but he refused it in favour of the living of Halsted, Essex, to which he was presented (1601) by Sir Robert Drury. In his parish he had an opponent in a Mr Lilly, whom he describes as “a witty and bold atheist.” In 1603 he married; and in 1605 he accompanied Sir Edmund Bacon to Spa, with the special aim, he says, of acquainting himself with the state and practice of the Romish Church. At Brussels he disputed at the Jesuit College on the authentic character of modern miracles, and his inquiring and argumentative disposition more than once threatened to produce serious results, so that his patron at length requested him to abstain from further discussion.

His devotional writings had attracted the notice of Henry, prince of Wales, who made him a chaplain (1608). In 1612 Lord Denny, afterwards earl of Norwich, gave him the curacy of Waltham-Holy-Cross, Essex, and in the same year he received the degree of D.D. Later he received the prebend of Willenhall in the collegiate church of Wolverhampton, and in 1616 he accompanied James Hay, Lord Doncaster, afterwards earl of Carlisle, to France, where he was sent to congratulate Louis XIII on his marriage, but Hall was compelled by illness to return. In his absence the king nominated him dean of Worcester, and in 1617 he accompanied James to Scotland, where he defended the 5 points of ceremonial which the king desired to impose upon the Scots. In the next year he was an English deputy at the synod of Dort.

Bishop

In 1624 Hall refused the see of Gloucester, but in 1627 became bishop of Exeter.

He took an active part in the Arminian and Calvinist controversy in the English church. He did his best in his Via media, The Way of Peace, to persuade the 2 parties to accept a compromise. In spite of his Calvinistic opinions he maintained that to acknowledge the errors which had arisen in the Catholic Church did not necessarily imply disbelief in her catholicity, and that the Church of England having repudiated these errors should not deny the claims of the Roman Catholic Church on that account. This view commended itself to Charles I and his episcopal advisers.

At the same time Archbishop Laud sent spies into Hall’s diocese to report on the Calvinistic tendencies of the bishop and his lenience to the Puritan and low-church clergy. Hall says he was thrice down on his knees to the King to answer Laud’s accusations and at length threatened to “cast up his rochet” rather than submit to them. He was, however, amenable to criticism, and his defence of the English Church, entitled Episcopacy by Divine Right (1640), was twice revised at Laud’s dictation. This was followed by An Humble Remonstrance to the High Court of Parliament (1640 and 1641), an eloquent and forceful defense of his order, which produced a retort from the syndicate of Puritan divines, who wrote under the name of “Smectymnuus,” and was followed by a long controversy to which Milton contributed five pamphlets, virulently attacking Hall and his early satires.

In 1641 Hall was translated to the see of Norwich, and in the same year sat on the Lords’ Committee on religion. On the 30th of December he was, with other bishops, brought before the bar of the House of Lords to answer a charge of high treason of which the Commons had voted them guilty. They were finally convicted of an offence against the Statute of Praemunire, and condemned to forfeit their estates, receiving a small maintenance from the parliament. They were immured in the Tower from New Year to Whitsuntide, when they were released on finding bail for £5000 each.

On his release Hall proceeded to his new diocese at Norwich, the revenues of which he seems for a time to have received, but in 1643, when the property of the “malignants” was sequestrated, Hall was mentioned by name. Mrs Hall had difficulty in securing 20% of the maintenance (£400) assigned to the bishop by the parliament; they were eventually ejected from the palace, and the cathedral was dismantled.

Hall retired to the village of Higham, near Norwich, where he spent the time preaching and writing until “he was first forbidden by man, and at last disabled by God.” He bore his many troubles and the additional burden of much bodily suffering with sweetness and patience, dying on 8 September 1656. Thomas Fuller says: “He was commonly called our English Seneca, for the purenesse, plainnesse, and fulnesse of his style. Not unhappy at Controversies, more happy at Comments, very good in his Characters, better in his Sermons, best of all in his Meditations.”

Writing

Bishop Hall’s polemical writings, although vigorous and effective, were chiefly of ephemeral interest, but many of his devotional writings have been often reprinted. It is by his early work as the censor of morals and the unsparing critic of contemporary literary extravagance and affectations that he is best known. Virgidemiarum. Sixe Bookes. First three Bookes. Of Toothlesse Satyrs. (1) Poeticall, (2) Academicall, (3) Morall (1597) was followed by an amended edition in 1598, and in the same year by Virgidemiarum. The three last bookes. Of byting Satyres (reprinted 1599).

His claim to be reckoned the earliest English satirist, even in the formal sense, cannot be justified. Thomas Lodge, in his Fig for Momus (1593), had written 4 satires in the manner of Horace, and John Marston and John Donne both wrote satires about the same time, although the publication was in both cases later than that of Virgidemiae. But if he was not the earliest, Hall was certainly among the best.

He writes in the heroic couplet, which he manœuvres with great ease and smoothness. In the 1st book of his satires (Poeticall) he attacks the writers whose verses were devoted to licentious subjects, the bombast of Tamburlaine and tragedies built on similar lines, the laments of the ghosts of the Mirror for Magistrates, the metrical eccentricities of Gabriel Harvey and Richard Stanyhurst, the extravagances of the sonneteers, and the sacred poets (Robert Southwell is aimed at in “Now good St Peter weeps pure Helicon, And both the Mary’s make a music moan”).

In Book II. Satire 6 occurs the well-known description of the trencher-chaplain, who is tutor and hanger-on in a country manor. Among Hall's other satirical portraits is that of the famished gallant, the guest of “Duke Humfray.” Book VI consists of a long satire on the various vices and follies dealt with in the earlier books. If his prose is sometimes antithetical and obscure, his verse is remarkably free from the quips and conceits which mar so much contemporary poetry.

He also wrote The King’s Prophecie; or, Weeping joy (1603), a congratulatory poem on the accession of James I; Epistles, both the 1st and 2nd volumes of which appeared in 1608 and a 3rd in 1611; Characters of Virtues and Vices (1608), versified by Nahum Tate (1691); Solomons Divine Arts ... (1609); and, probably Mundus alter et idem sive Terra Australis antehac semper incognita . . . lustrata (1605? and 1607), by “Mercurius Britannicus,” translated into English by John Healy (1608) as The Discovery of a New World or A Description of the South Indies . . . by an English Mercury. Mundus alter is an excuse for a satirical description of London, with some criticism of the Romish church, its manners and customs, and is said to have furnished Swift with hints for Gulliver’s Travels. It was not ascribed to him by name until 1674, when Thomas Hyde, the librarian of the Bodleian, identified “Mercurius Britannicus” with Joseph Hall. For the question of the authorship of this pamphlet, and the arguments that may be advanced in favour of the suggestion that it was written by Alberico Gentili, see E.A. Petherick, "Mundus alter et idem," reprinted from the Gentleman's Magazine (July 1896).

His controversial writings, not already mentioned, include:—A Common Apology ... against the Brownists (1610), in answer to John Robinson’s Censorious Epistle; The Olde Religion: A treatise, wherein is laid downe the true state of the difference betwixt the Reformed and the Romane Church; and the blame of this schisme is cast upon the true Authors ... (1628); Columba Noae olivam adferens ..., a sermon preached at St Paul’s in 1623; Episcopacie by Divine Right (1640); A Short Answer to the Vindication of Smectymnuus (1641); A Modest Confutation of ... (Milton’s) Animadversions (1642).

His devotional works include:— Holy Observations Lib. I. Some few of David’s Psalmes Metaphrased (1607 and 1609); three centuries of Meditations and Vowes, Divine and Morall (1606, 1607, 1609), edited by Charles Sayle (1901); The Arte of Divine Meditation (1607); Heaven upon Earth, or of True Peace and Tranquillitie of Mind (1606), reprinted with some of his letters in John Wesley’s Christian Library, vol. iv. (1819); Occasional Meditations ... (1630), edited by his son Robert Hall; Henochisme; or, A treatise showing how to walk with God (1639), translated from Bishop Hall’s Latin by Moses Wall; The Devout Soul; or, Rules of heavenly devotion (1644), often since reprinted; The Balm of Gilead ... (1646, 1752); Christ Mysticall; or the blessed union of Christ and his Members (1647), of which General Gordon was a student (reprinted from Gordon’s copy, 1893); Susurrium cum Deo (1659); The Great Mysterie of Godliness (1650); Resolutions and Decisions of Divers Practicall cases of Conscience (1649, 1650, 1654).

The chief authority for Hall’s biography is to be found in his autobiographical tracts: Observations of some Specialities of Divine Providence in the Life of Joseph Hall, Bishop of Norwich, Written with his own hand; and his Hard Measure, a reprint of which may be consulted in Dr Christopher Wordsworth’s Ecclesiastical Biography. The best criticism of his satires is to be found in Thomas Warton’s History of English Poetry, vol. iv. pp. 363-409 (ed. Hazlitt, 1871), where a comparison is instituted between Marston and Hall.

In 1615 Hall published A Recollection of such treatises as have been ... published ... (1615, 1617, 1621); in 1625 appeared his Works (reprinted 1627, 1628, 1634, 1662). The earliest complete Works appeared in 1808, edited by Rev. Josiah Pratt. Other editions are by Peter Hall (1837) and by Philip Wynter (1863). Many of Hall’s works were translated into French, and some into Dutch, and there have been numerous selections from his devotional works.

Critical introduction

by John Churton Collins

Hall boasts that he was the first English satirist. This is not true. To say nothing of the fathers of our tongue, and of the satires of Barklay, Skelton, Roye, and Gascoigne, he had been anticipated in his own walk by Thomas Lodge, whose Fig for Momus appeared in 1593. Hall has however a higher claim to praise. He was the founder of a great dynasty of satirists. He made satire popular, and he determined its form. Marston immediately succeeded him as his disciple; the author of Skialetheia, the author of Microcynicon, and innumerable other anonymous satirists followed in rapid succession, till we reach Donne and Jonson, Wither and Marvel, Dryden and Oldham. In all these poets the influence of Hall is either directly or indirectly perceptible. Dryden had in all probability perused him with care, and Pope was so sensible of his merits that he not only carefully interlined his copy of Hall, but expressed much regret that he had not been acquainted with his Satires sooner.

Hall’s abilities, not only as a satirist, but as a descriptive writer and as a master of style, are of a high order. His models were, he tells us, Horace, Juvenal, and Persius. With the first he has little in common; he has none of his sobriety, none of his grace, none of his urbanity. To the influence of the third is to be attributed his most characteristic defect, obscurity, an obscurity which arises not from confusion or plethora of thought, but from affectation in expression, from archaic phraseology, from unfamiliar combinations, from recondite allusions, from elliptical apostrophes, and from abrupt transitions. To Juvenal his obligations were great indeed. He borrows his phrases, his turns, his rhetorical exaggerations, his trick of allusive and incidental satire, his reflections, his whole method of dealing with and delineating vice. But borrowing he assimilates.

Hall’s satire is distinguished by its vehemence and intrepidity. He has himself described the savage delight with which he applied himself to satirical composition, and every fervid page testifies the truth of his confession. He never seems to flag: his energy and fertility of invective are inexhaustible. He has in his six books bared and lashed every vice in the long and dreary catalogue of human frailty; but the reader, soon surfeited, is glad to leave him to pursue his ungrateful task alone. Nor is Hall more attractive when painting the minor foibles of mankind; for his humour is hard, his touch heavy, and his wit saturnine. As a delineator of men and manners he will always be interesting. His Satires are a complete picture of English society at the end of the sixteenth century. His sketches are vivid and singularly realistic, for he has the rare art of being minute without being prolix, of crowding without confusing his canvas; and he united the faculty of keen observation to great natural insight. History is indeed almost as much beholden to him as satire.

His style is, for the age at which his poems appeared, wonderful. Though marred by the defects to which we have referred, it is as a rule at once energetic and elegant, at once fluent and felicitous, at once terse and ornate. He carried the heroic couplet almost to perfection. His versification is indeed sometimes so voluble and vigorous, that we might, as Campbell well observed, imagine ourselves reading Dryden. To cull one or two examples:—

‘Fond fool! six feet shall serve for all thy store,

And he that cares for most shall find no more.’

‘Nay, let the Devil and St. Valentine

Be gossips to those ribald rhymes of thine.’

‘And each day dying lives, and living dies.’

He is the first of our authors to evince decided powers of epigrammatic expression, and to diversify the heroic couplet by the introduction of the triplet. It is much to be regretted that Hall’s most vigorous and most successful writing is of such a character as makes it impossible to be presented to general readers in our day. The conclusion of the first satire of the fourth book, and of the fourth satire of the same book, are passages in question. In consulting the interests of propriety we are, we must add, not consulting the interests of Hall’s fame as a satirist, though the shade of a Father of the Church will we trust forgive the injury.

Besides these Satires he was the author of a few miscellaneous poems, chiefly of a religious and elegiac character, but they are not of much value.

Publications

Poetry

• Virgidemiarum. Satires in six books. Oxford, UK: printed for R. Clements, 1753.
• Complete Poems (edited by Alexander Balloch Grosart). Blackburn, Lancashire, UK: privately published, printed by C.E. Simms, 1879.
• The Poems of Joseph Hall, bishop of Exeter and Norwich (edited by A. Davenport). Liverpool, UK: Liverpool University Press, 1969.

Non-fiction

Controversial

• The Olde Religion: A treatise, wherein is laid downe the true state of the difference betwixt the Reformed and the Romane Church; and the blame of this schisme is cast upon the true Authors. London : William Stansby for Nathaniel Butter & Richard Hawkins, 1628.
• A Short Answer to the Tedious Vindication of Smectymnuus. London: Nathaniel Butter, 1641.
• A Modest Confutation of a Slanderous and Scurrilous Libell, entitvled: Animadversions vpon the remonstrants defense against Smectymnuus London: 1642.

Devotional

• Holy Observations Lib. I: Also some fewe of Davids Psalmes metaphrased, for a taste of the rest. London: H.L. for Samuel Macham, 1607.
• The Arte of Divine Meditation. London: Tho: Purfoot for Samuell Macham, & Lawrence Lyle, 1609.
• Heaven upon Earth, or of True Peace and Tranquillitie of Mind (1606)
  • Heaven upon earth : and Characters of vertues and vices (edited by Ruolf Kirk). New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1970.
• The Passion Sermon: Preached at Paules Crosse, on Good-Friday. Apr. 14. 1609. London: W. Stansby for Samuell Macham, 1609.
• Meditations and Vowes, Divine and Morall. London: Humfrey Lownes, for Arthur Iohnson, Samuell Macham, & Lawrence Lisle, 1614;
  • (edited by Charles Edward Sayle). New York: Dutton, 1901; London: Grant Richards, 1904.
• Occasional Meditations (edited by his son, Robert Hall). London: [B. Alsop and T. Fawcet?] for Nath Butter, 1630.
  • Occasional Meditations; also, The breathings of the devout soul. London: William Pickering, 1851.
• The Devout Soul; or Rules of Heavenly Devotion. London: W.H. for George Latham, Junior, 1650.
• The Balm of Gilead; or, Comforts for the distressed, both moral and divine. London: Thomas Newcomb for John Holden, 1650.
• Christ Mysticall; or the blessed union of Christ and his Members. London : Printed by M. Flesher, and are to be sold by William Hope, Gabriel Beadle, and Nathaniel Webbe, 1647; London: E. Withers, 1755; London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1908.
• Resolutions and Decisions of Divers Practicall cases of Conscience. London: London: M.F. for Nath. Butter, 1649; London: R. Hodgkinson & J. Grismond, 1654.
• The Great Mystery of Godliness. London: E. Cotes for John Place, 1659.

Collected editions

• A Recollection of Such Treatises as Haue Bene Heretofore Seuerally Ppublished: And are nowe reuised, corrected, augmented. London: Samuel Macham, 1615.
• The works of Joseph Hall B. of Exceter. London: T. Pauier, M. Flesher, & I. Haviland, 1625; London: I.H. for Ed. Brewster, 1628.
• The Shaking of the Olive-tree: The remaining works of that incomparable prelate Joseph Hall D.D. late lord bishop of Norwich. London: J. Cadwel for J. Crooke, 1660.
• The Works of the Right Reverend father in God Joseph Hall, Lord Bishop of Norwich. London: Tho. Hodgkin, 1714.
• Extracts from Various Devotional Writings. Birmingham, UK: T. Chapman, 1784.
• A Selection from the Writings. Andover, NH: Allen, Morrill, & Wardwell, 1845; New York: Robert Carter, 1850.
• The Works (edited by Phillip Wynter). Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1863; New York: AMS Press, 1969.

Except where noted, bibliographical information courtesy WorldCat.

See also

• List of British poets

References

• In 1826 John Jones published Bishop Hall, His Life and Times.
•  Chisholm, Hugh, ed (1911). "Hall, Joseph". Encyclopædia Britannica. 12 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 847=848.  Wikisource, Web, June 6, 2020.
• A recent biography of Joseph Hall is Bishop Joseph Hall: 1574–1656: A biographical and critical study by Frank Livingstone Huntley, D.S.Brewer Ltd, Cambridge, 1979.
• Criticism of his satires is to be found in Thomas Warton's History of English Poetry, vol. iv. pp. 363–409 (ed. Hazlitt, 1871), where a comparison is instituted between Marston and Hall.
• Richard A. McCabe, Joseph Hall: A study in satire and meditation (1982)

External links

Poems

• Hall, Joseph (1574-1656) (1 satire) at Representative Poetry Online
• Hall in The English Poets: An anthology: "The Golden Age," "Hollow Hospitality," "A Coxcimb," "A Deserted Mansion," Advice to Marry Betimes"
• Bp. Joseph Hall (1574-1656) info & 6 poems at English Poetry, 1579-1830
• Joseph Hall at PoemHunter (8 poems)

Books

• Ian Laurenson. Mundus Alter Et Idem: A Satirical Utopia in The La Trobe Library

Books

• Joseph Hall at Amazon.com

About

• Joseph Hall in the Encyclopædia Britannica
• Hall, Joseph in the Dictionary of National Biography
• Joseph Hall (1574-1650) at Luminarium

 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain, the 1911 Edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica. Original article is at Hall, Joseph