Burnet is mainly concerned with the men who in his opinion had the
greatest influence during the time of which he is writing, and who
were known to him personally. By way of introduction he speaks of
the Cambridge Platonists under whom his great contemporaries had been
formed. Incidentally he expresses his views on Hobbes's _Leviathan_,
and he concludes with a valuable account of the reform in preaching.
The passage as a whole is an excellent specimen of Burnet's method and
style.

Page 246, ll. 6, 7. John Owen (1616-83), made Dean of Christ Church by
Cromwell in 1651, Vice-Chancellor of the University, 1652-8, deprived
of the Deanery, 1659. Thomas Goodwin (1600-80), President of Magdalen
College, 1650-60, likewise one of the Commission of Visitors to the
University appointed by the Parliament. Both were Independents. See
H.L. Thompson, _Christ Church_ (College Histories), 1900, pp. 69, 70;
and H.A. Wilson, _Magdalen College_, 1899, pp. 172-4.

Page 248, l. 5. Simon Episcopius, or Bischop (1583-1643), Dutch
theologian and follower of Arminius: see p. 101, l. 3, note.

Page 249, l. 12. _Irenicum_. _A Weapon-Salve for the Churches Wounds_,
published 1661.

Page 252, l. 10. The following sentence is in the original manuscript
(folio 98) before 'But I owed': 'and if I have arrived at any faculty
of writing clear and correctly, I owe that entirely to them: for as
they joined with Wilkins in that Noble tho despised attempt at an
Universall Character, and a Philosophicall Language, they took great
pains to observe all the common errours of language in generall, and
of ours in particular: and in the drawing the tables for that work,
which was Lloyds province, he had looked further into a naturall
purity and simplicity of stile, than any man I ever knew: into
all which he led me, and so helpt me to any measure of exactnes
of writing, which may be thought to belong to me.' The sentence is
deleted in the transcript that was sent to the printer; but whether it
was deleted by Burnet himself, or by the editor, is uncertain. There
are other minor alterations in the same page of the transcript (p.
140).

The book referred to in the omitted passage is Wilkins's _Essay
Towards a Real Character And a Philosophical Language_, presented
to the Royal Society and published in 1668. Lloyd's 'continual
assistance' is acknowledged in the 'Epistle to the Reader'.

75.

Burnet's History of His Own Time. Vol. i. (pp. 168-70.)

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