A website from the Massachusetts Historical Society; founded 1791.

Papers of the Winthrop Family, Volume 1

311
John Winthrop to John Winthrop, Jr.1
Winthrop, John Winthrop, John, Jr.

1624-03-07

To my lovinge sonne John Winthrop at Trinity Colledge in Dublin Ireland dd Receyve Mar: 29. 1624

2 longe to be assured of thy health againe. I sent you in January last, the Books which you wrote for Imagines Deorum is very deare and hard to gett,3 I could not finde a seconde in London: It is a booke that may be of some vse, for the prase, and antiquity of the monumentes, abused by the superstition of succeeding tymes, but you must read it with a sober minde and sanctified heart. Your grandmother and mother are in healthe (I blesse God) and doe salute and bless you: your brothers and sister and the rest of your friendes are likewise in healthe, onely Adam hathe a sore ague. Lett me heare by your next how your Aunt beares this longe absence of your vncle, and how thinges goe in Irelande, at mont wealy and els where, and what successe hathe been of the proclamation.4 Our Parliament heere is begunne with exceedinge muche comfort and hope: the treatye about the Spanish matche is now concluded by king prince and Parliament to be at an ende, and it is very like we shall not holde longe with Spain. The Duke of Richmond and Lenox died suddainly that morninge the Parliament should have begunne,5 the Duke of Buckingham hathe quitt himself worthely and given great satisfaction to the Parliament. God sende a good ende to these happie beginninges. This bearer comes suddainly vpon me and is but a stranger therefore here I ende, and with my lovinge salutations to your Reverend Tutor, and your kinde friend his substitute, with Mr. Downes, your little cosins, Richard etc: I rest your loving father

John Winthrop Groton, March 7th 1623–24.
1.

W. 7A. 14; Savage (1825), I. 344–345; (1853), I. 413; L. and L. , I. 183–184.

2.

A few lines are missing.

3.

Robert C. Winthrop thought this was perhaps Roger Hutchinson’s Image of God, London, 1550; but it clearly refers to a work on the gods of Greece and Rome. We owe to Mr. H. M. Lydenberg and Mr. Frank Weitenkampf, of the New York Public Library, the proper identification as Vincenzo Cartari’s Imagines Deorum qui ab antiquis colebantur, ex Italico in Latinum per Antonium Venderium. Lugduni, 1581. The first issue was printed at Venice in 1556, and the work passed through a number of editions and translations.

4.

Dated January 21, 1623–24, to remedy the abuses caused by Jesuits and seminary priests. Bibliography of Royal Proclamations of the Tudor and Stuart Sovereigns, II (Bibliotheca Lindesiana, VI), 26.

5.

Ludovick Stuart (1574–1624), second Duke of Lennox and Duke of Richmond, eldest son of Esmé, first Duke of Lennox, and Catherine de Balsac d’ Entragues. He died on the morning of February 16. D. N. B. , LV. 107–108.