Rector Prideaux and Chancellor Laud, 1630–6

Abstract

The focus of this chapter is on the increasingly difficult relationship between Prideaux and William Laud, Oxford’s chancellor from 1630 and Canterbury’s archbishop from 1633. It describes a series of initial minor conflicts culminating in the much larger conflict of 1631, when Prideaux appears to have promoted an unsuccessful Calvinist rebellion against the growing Arminian presence within the university. Particular attention is paid to the enmity between Prideaux and Peter Heylyn, Laud’s leading henchman, who maliciously foisted on Prideaux radically sabbatarian views designed to turn his puritan supporters against him. A related conflict set Prideaux against his College for the first and only time in his life. Laud was also at odds with Prideaux over relations with the foreign Protestant churches, which Laud wished to keep at arm’s length but which Prideaux supported––though not to the extent of giving his backing to the ecumenist John Dury, who vainly sought Prideaux’s help in promoting the reunion of the churches. The chapter also analyses Prideaux’s opposition to the heretical Socinians and, unrelatedly, to Laud’s revision of the university statutes, the culminating triumph of his chancellorship and one which, in 1636, brought the king to Oxford for a grand celebration.