234 LIVES OF THE PURITANS. Mr. Knewstubspreached his funeral sermon. Messrs. Daniel and Ezekiel Rogers, both eminent puritan divines, were his sons. Mr. Stephen Marshall was his immediate successor at Wethersfield. He was eminently faithful and laborious in the ministry ; and it is said, "the Lord honoured none more in the con- version of souls." He was styled the Enoch of his day, a man walking with Gods and he used to say, I should he sorry if every day were not employed as if it were my last, He was an admired preacher;* and Bishop Kennet says, " that England hardly ever brought forth a man who walked more closely with God."+ Mr. Rogers was always re- markable for seriousness and gravity, in all kinds of com- pany. Being once in company with a gentleman of respectability, who said to him, 46 Mr. Rogers, I like you and your company very well, only you are too precise :" " Oh, sir," repliedMr. Rogers, " I serve a precise God."t Mr. Rogers was author of " The Seven Treatises," 1603; which was highly esteemed. "A Commentry upon the whole Book of Judges," 1615. In his 'dedication of this work, he says hehad been in the ministry forty years. RANDALL BATES was a most holy man, an excellent preacher, and a zealous nonconformist, for which he was prosecuted in the ecclesiastical courts, and committed to the Gatehouse ; where; after a confinement of twenty months, he died through the hardships of the prison. Mr. John Cotton, who was his contemporary, denominates him " an heavenly saint ;" and says, ," he suffered in the cause of nonconformity, being choked in prison." Nor could his release be obtained, though Dr. Hering, a learned and ex- cellent physician, earnestly solicited Bishop Neile for his enlargement, declaring that his life was in danger.§ But the suit of the physician was repulsed with reproaches, and the blood of his patient was spilt through the extreme rigour of his confinement. He died in the year 1613.1 During Mr. Granger's Biog, Tlist. vol. i. p. 219. 1- Kennet's Chronicle, p. 593. Firmin's Real Christian, p. 67. Edit. 1670. BishOp Neile, it is said, " wasalways reputed a popish and Arminian; prelate, a persecutor of all orthodox and godly ministers, and one who pre- ferred popish and Arminian clergy, making choice of them for his chap- lains." He was accused of these things to his majesty by the house of commons, in 1628, and complained of in several parliaments.---Prynne's Cant. Doome, p. 531. I Cotton's Answer to Williams, p. 117.-Prince's Chron. Hist. vol. 1. P. 28.
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