As an example of those means, Froude (Hist. of England, ed. 1870, x. 410) has selected the faculties granted for minors to succeed to benefices, a survival of abuses which had prevailed under the Roman church, and which Grindal, on his accession to the primacy, altogether abolished. In justice to Parker, it is to be noted that this practice appears to have gone on as a tradition which, as Strype says, he 'liked not of,' and he even offered in convocation to use his endeavours to have the court of faculties dissolved. This offer was not approved; but Parker, on becoming aware of certain irregularities which had sprung up in connection with the practice, issued 'Observations for Orders to be taken in the Court of Faculties,' whereby the conditions under which faculties were granted and the fees made payable were strictly determined (Strype, bk. iv. c. 2). In reality it was one of Parker's chief difficulties as primate that he found himself under the necessity of systematically opposing the rapacity of Elizabeth's courtiers, especially in connection with impropriations. Their plundering was, however, encouraged by Leicester; and Parker, when on his deathbed, addressed a letter to the queen (which appears never to have been sent) protesting against the spoliation of the revenues of the church, which was still going on, and censuring both Burghley and Lord-keeper Bacon for their complicity in these acts of malversation.
His private fortune had been considerably diminished by generous benefactions during his lifetime, and the remainder was bequeathed in a like spirit. 'He was never of that mind,' says Strype, 'to scrape together to leave great possessions to children.' Prior to his death a handsome new street in Cambridge, which he named University Street, leading from the schools to Great St. Mary's, had been constructed at his sole expense, and a legacy to the master and fellows of Corpus Christi College provided for its maintenance in good repair. To the university library he presented in 1574 twenty-five manuscripts and twenty-five volumes printed on parchment, all provided with chains, together with fifty volumes of commentators on the Old and New Testament; of these a complete list is printed at the end of the edition of his 'De Antiquitate Britannicæ Ecclesiæ' by Drake, published in 1729. To his own college, from the day when, a humble bible-clerk, he had plastered the ceiling of the room below the library, down to the bequest of his magnificent collection to the library itself, he was an untiring benefactor. Gifts of ground, more liberal commons, numerous repairs, valuable plate, a gallery adjoining the master's lodge, a fund for the maintenance of the hall fire, and, finally, the 'History' of the college, as compiled under his directions by his secretary, John Josselin, successively attested his munificence.
The manuscripts which he bequeathed to the library, styled by Fuller 'the sun of English antiquity,' must, however, in the estimation of posterity, outweigh all his other benefactions. The original list of the books, transcribed on vellum, is preserved in Corpus Christi College Library, with a note (6 Aug. 1593) by John Parker, that the missing volumes 'weare not found by me in my father's Librarie, but either lent or embezeled, whereby I could not deliver them to the colledge.' Of this collection some account is given by Strype (bk. iv. c. 2); and a catalogue was drawn up and printed by Thomas James (1573?-1629) [q. v.] in his 'Ecloga,' the numerous defects of which induced William Stanley, master of the college (1693-8), to publish in 1722 a fresh catalogue in folio. But this, again, although a great improvement on the former, was wanting in critical accuracy, and was superseded by the publication in 1777 of the catalogue by James Nasmith, a former fellow of the society. 'Parker's appreciation of what would be interesting to posterity,' says the Rev. S. S. Lewis (the late accomplished librarian of the college), 'is nowhere more clearly shown, than in the volume (No. 119) of autograph letters of his contemporaries; these include signed letters by King Edward VI, bv queen Anna de Bouillon [sic], by Colet, Luther, Calvin, and almost every notable character of the Reformation age.'
He also founded the grammar school at Rochdale in Lancashire, the deed of foundation of which is preserved in the college library; and rebuilt the great hall at Canterbury.
It is, indeed, greatly to Parker's honour that, amid the onerous duties and envenomed controversies which so largely absorbed his time and energies throughout his primacy, his love for learning and care for his college and his university remained unimpaired. His position gave him exceptional opportunities for securing and preserving literary treasures, and he turned them to the best account. Within a few months after his consecration we find him instructing John Bale [q. v.] to use his best endeavours to secure such manuscripts as were still to be rescued from the wreck of the monasteries, and Bales reply (July 1560) is one of the most interesting documents relating to the learning of the period (Cambr. Ant. Soc. Comm. iii.
