In the cases of Sibbes himself, and Airay, and King, and Stock, and Torshell, and Bernard, and Marbury, and indeed nearly all, I have had to deplore the paucity of materials for anything like adequate Memoirs. But more than ever have I to do so in relation to Thomas Brooks. If a pun, that he himself would have relished, may be allowed, his memory has passed away like the ' summer brooks.' This is all the more regret- table, in that his books are vital and influential as at first — his name still a venerable and loved one to myriads. Only the other day we chanced upon a mission- volume that tells of strength and comfort gained from his words, away on the other side of that India which in his days was as dream-land, as wonder-land. I may as well give the pathetic little bit. Mrs Mason among the Karens writes : ' Two days passed when they came again, saying the money was all gone. At first I felt disposed to rebuke them, but turned to my closet for an hour, giving the time to prayer, and to my dear little help-book " Precious Remedies against Satan's Devices." In that time God taught me what to do, and strength was given for the day.'2 Verily 'he, being dead, yet speaketh.'
Various explanations suggest themselves as to the absence of me- morial of Brooks's outward-life.
(I.) It so happens that the ' Registers ' of his University are singu- larly defective at the period of his attendance ; so much so that even the sweet-naturcd Historian was moved to these severe censures : ' Hither- to we have given in the list of the yearly Commencers, but now must break off. Let Thomas Smith, University-Register, bear the blame,
1 Works, Vol. I. ; Memoir, pp. xxiii, xxiv.
* Civilizing Mountain Men, or Sketches of Mission Work among the Karens. By Mrs Mason, of Burmah. 18C2. (Nisbet.)
MEMOIR OF THOMAS BROOKS. XXlll
who, about this year, entering into his office, was so negligent that, as one saith, Cum fuit Academics a memorid, omnia tradidit oblivioni. I can hardly in-hold from inveighing on his memory, carelessness being dishonesty in 'public persons so entrusted.' l
(2.) He was excluded from the ' Worthies ' of Fuller by his rule, that ' the living ' were ' omitted/ 2 How often the reader sighs over like dismissal of other names as still ' surviving.' 3
(3.) The ' Fire ' of London destroyed the MSS. of Ashe, and various fellow-labourers who had collected for the Lives of the elder and later Puritans, including 'The Ejected' of 1662.4 Beyond all question Thomas Brooks held an honoured place therein. Then again the same 'Fire/ destroying the different Churches in which Brooks officiated, destroyed with them all their Registers and Records. So that New- court and other authorities are blank in respect of dates, and almost everything else. Add to all this, his own singularly reticent and modest 'hiding' of self — his absolute indifference to fame, other than the love of those who might ' profit ' by his writings : and he yearned for that, as the close of his ' Epistles Dedicatory ' shew.
As it is, after having expended fully the maximum of labour and 'painfulness ' — as the old Divines say, — in seeking to illumine the memory of this ' dead Saint,' I can only offer a minimum of result : and yet our little is relatively large to what has hitherto been known.
It is not ascertained in what city, town, or village Thomas Brooks was born : not even in what county. The very nativeness of his name has multiplied the difficulties of determining it. In ' this fair England ' ' brooks ' flash by meadow and woodland everywhere ; and as familiar and frequent is his name. 5 Certain turns of expression, certain ap- parently local words, occurring in his volumes, have made us feel assured that in this County or in that we should discover his family : but lo ! the phrase and word proved to be common to many : and our toil went for nothing, save morsels of fact about others, unexpectedly turning up. From his ' Will ' — which we have discovered, and print for the first time — we fondly hoped to trace him to Berkshire : but again were dis- appointed, spite of complete and carefully preserved ' Registers,' and all courtesy and helpfulness from their custodiers. From a ' Memorial again, of Lancashire ' Worthies,' by the saintly Oliver Heywood — un-
1 Fuller's ' History of the University of Cambridge,' page 208.
2 Ibid., page 207. 3 Ibid., page 206. 4 Brook, ' Lives of the Puritans,' vol. iii., sub nominibus.
8 Mr Spurgeon plays on the name in his little volume of sentences from Brooks's writings, entitling it, ' Smooth Stones taken from Ancient Brooks. By the Rev. C. H. Spurgeon, of the Metropolitan Tabernacle. Being a Collection of Sentences, Illustra- tions, and Quaint Sayings, from the Works of that Renowned Puritan, Thomas Brooks. ' (32rno, pp. xv. 296.)
XXIV MEMOIR OF THOMAS BROOKS.
published — which notices his death, in a little record that is useful, we half anticipated to be able to claim him for it ; but all inquiries leave us in uncertainty. ' Besides, the orthography of the name confuses : for just as there were among Divines a John Howes as well as a John Howe, a John Owens as well as a John Owen, a Thomas Adam as well as a Thomas Adams, even a John Milton as well as the John Milton, so our Thomas Brooks is sometimes met with — even early — as now Thomas Brooke, and now Thomas Brookes and Brook — the penulti- mate being his own spelling on the title-page of ' Precious Remedies ' [2d ed. 1G53] and ■ Unsearchable Riches' [1657, 1st ed.], though in the ' Epistles ' he adheres to Brooks. Little do your arm-chair-easy critics know of the honest work spent in furnishing such ' Memoirs ' — slight and unsatisfying though they be — as they magisterially discuss and dismiss with penurious thanks ! Personally we have no plaint, much less complaint, to make : for our labours have been more than duly ap- preciated : but we feel constrained to remind those who may be tempted to regard a given ' Life ' as insufficient, that in ninety-nine cases of a hundred what appears is as the one to the ninety-nine of anxious though fruitless inquiries.
The Manuscript 'entry' of Oliver Hey wood referred to a short way back — and which will appear in its own place — gives his age at death as ' 72/ but by a clerical blunder probably, writes 1678 for 1680, the actual year of his decease. If 1680 was intended, then his birth-year must have been 1608 — John Milton's also ; if calculated from 1678, two years sooner, 1606. It seems likely that the former is the accurate date.