rom his usual solemn matter-of-fact
style.]

Of Erbury who, being originally in holy orders and a beneficed
clergyman, deserted the Established Church and ran into all the
excesses of Antinomianism, Webster was a great admirer, and has in a
preface, hitherto unnoticed, prefixed to a scarce tract of Erbury's,
entitled "The great Earthquake, or Fall of all the Churches,"
published in 1654, 4to, left a sketch of his opinions and character,
in which his defence is undertaken with great zeal and no small
ingenuity. One of his apologist's conclusions most of Erbury's readers
will find no difficulty in assenting to, "the world is not ripe for
such discoveries as our author held forth." The verses which are
appended to this sketch, characterizing Erbury--

"As him
Who did the saintship sever
From the opinion; this fails, that shall never,
Chymist of Truth and Gospel;"--

are, also, evidently Webster's, and their quality is not such as to
make us unreasonably impatient for any further manifestations of his
poetical skill. In the year 1654 he published another tract of
singular interest and curiosity, in which he attacks the Universities
and the received system of education there, always with vigour and
various learning, and frequently with success. It is entitled
"Academiarum Examen, or the Examination of Academies; wherein is
discussed and examined the matter, method, and customes of academick
and scholastic learning, and the insufficiency thereof discovered and
laid open; as also some expedients proposed for the reforming of
schools, and the perfecting and promoting of all kind of science;
offered to the judgment of all those that love the proficiencie of
arts and sciences and the advancement of learning. By Jo. Webster. In
moribus et institutis academiarum, collegiorum et similium conventium
quo ad doctorum hominum sedes et operas mutuas destinata sunt, omnia
progressui scientiarum in ulterius adversa inveniri. Franc. Bacon de
Verulamio lib. de cogitat. et vis. pag. mihi. 14. London: Printed for
Giles Calvert, and are to be sold at the sign of the Black
Spread-Eagle, at the west end of Paul's. 1654." 4to. In this tract,
which, like some other attacks upon the seats of learning, displays
more power in objection than in substitution, in pulling down than in
building up again, he shews the same fondness for the philosophers of
the Hermetic school, for Paracelsus, Dee, Fludd and Van Helmont, a