Robert Catlin

Robert Catlin was a puritan divine of great eminence, a person of exemplary piety, and for many years the venerable and faithful minister at some place in Rutlandshire. Being no longer able to attend to his numerous pastoral duties, he gave up the charge of his flock, and removed to Barham, near Ipswich, in Suffolk, that he might die among

• Watson's Hilt of Halifax, p. 385,501. Edit. H75.

his children. When he lay upon his death-bed, after hearing a relation of the cruel and barbarous sentence pronounced upon the Bishop of Lincoln in the star chamber, he broke out in these words in the presence of a number of respectable persons: " Alas! poor England," said he, " thou hast now seen thy best days. I, that am fourscore years old, and hare in all my time seen no alteration in religion, nor any foreign enemy setting foot in England, nor any civil wars among themselves, do now foresee evil days a coming, but shall go to the grave in peace. Blessed be that God whom I have served, who hath accepted my weak service, and will be my exceeding great reward;" and in a few hours after, he left this world of sin and sorrow, to enter upon the joy of his Lord. He died July 24, 1637, aged eighty years, and his remains were interred in Barham church, when Dr. Young of Stow-Market preached his funeral sermon. Mr. Cat fin had two sons in the ministry, William and Zachary. The former was witness in favour of Bishop Williams at his trial, for which he was deeply censured; and the latter was minister at Thurston in Suffolk, in the year 1652, when he was sixty-nine years of age. They both appear to have been puritans.*