Undipped John. The parish register of his baptism was produced in
vain. His enemies still continued to complain that they had lived
to see fathers of the Church who never were her children. They
made up a story that the Queen had felt bitter remorse for the
great crime by which she had obtained a throne, that in her agony
she had applied to Tillotson, and that he had comforted her by
assuring her that the punishment of the wicked in a future state
would not be eternal.47 The Archbishop's mind was naturally of
almost feminine delicacy, and had been rather softened than
braced by the habits of a long life, during which contending
sects and factions had agreed in speaking of his abilities with
admiration and of his character with esteem. The storm of obloquy
which he had to face for the first time at more than sixty years
of age was too much for him. His spirits declined; his health
gave way; yet he neither flinched from his duty nor attempted to
revenge himself on his persecutors. A few days after his
consecration, some persons were seized while dispersing libels in
which he was reviled. The law officers of the Crown proposed to
institute prosecutions; but he insisted that nobody should be
punished on his account.48 Once, when he had company with him, a
sealed packet was put into his hands; he opened it; and out fell
a mask. His friends were shocked and incensed by this cowardly
insult; but the Archbishop, trying to conceal his anguish by a
smile, pointed to the pamphlets which covered his table, and said
that the reproach which the emblem of the mask was intended to
convey might be called gentle when compared with other reproaches
which he daily had to endure. After his death a bundle of the
savage lampoons which the nonjurors had circulated against him
was found among his papers with this indorsement: "I pray God
forgive them; I do."49