OF

For's Book of Martyrs,

CRITICAL AND HISTORICAL. ·

No. 44. Printed and Published by W. E. ANDREWS, 3, Chapter Price 3d. house-court, St. Paul's Churchyard, London,

"tors, and Edward himself was as much engaged as could be expected "from so young a person; for both his knowledge and zeal for true "religion were above his age. Several of the bishops also declared for "a reformation, but Ridley, bishop of Rochester, was the person on "whom Cranmer most depended. Latimer remained with him at Lam. "beth, and did great service by his sermons, which were very popular; "but he would not return to his bishopric, choosing rather to serve the "church in a more disengaged manner. Assisted by these persons, "Cranmer resolved to proceed by degrees, and to give the reasons of "every advance so fully, that he hoped, by the blessing of God, to con"vince the nation of the fitness of whatsoever should be done, and "thereby prevent the dangerous opposition that might otherwise be "apprehended."

We have here some more of Gilbert's thumpers, but before we proceed to examine them, we must notice a trifling liberty the modern editors have taken with their text. We have more than once informed the reader that this account of the "progress of the reformation," in the modern Book of Martyrs, is taken from Gilbert Burnet's "Abridgement of the History of the Reformation," &c. We have compared the above quotation with the original work now before us, and we find that Burnet thus speaks of Cranmer. "But on the other hand Cranmer, "WHOSE GREATEST WEAKNESS WAS HIS OVER-OBSEQUI"OUSNESS TO KING HENRY, BEING NOW AT LIBERTY, "resolved to proceed more vigorously." Now, if the reader will turn to the last paragraph of the quotation, it will be seen that all the words we have put in capital letters have been omitted by the modern editors. So, then, these exciters of hatred against Popery were ashamed of the obsequiousness of their own dear Tom Cranmer, whose slavish compliance, under every circumstance, to the will of Henry, could not be passed over uncensured even by his greatest flatterer, Gilbert Burnet. Well, but Tom was now at liberty to set about the godly work of reformation, and it is time to see how he went to business. We are told that he "resolved to proceed by degrees," so that the nation might be convinced 'of the fitness of whatsoever should be done." The first proceeding, we are informed, was an order for "a general visitation of all "the churches in England, which was divided into six precincts: and "two gentlemen, a civilian, a divine, and a register, were appointed "for each of these. But before they were sent out, a letter was writ"ten to all the bishops, giving them notice of it, suspending their juris"diction while it lasted, and requiring them to preach no where but in "their cathedrals, and that the other clergy should not preach but in "their own churches, without licence; by which it was intended to "restrain such as were not acceptable, to their own parishes, and to grant the others licences to preach in any church of England. The greatest difficulty the reformers found, was in the want of able and pru"dent men; most of the reformed preachers being too hot and indiscreet, "and the few who were otherwise, were required in London and the "universities." Here we have more disclosures not very creditable to the performers in this scene of civil and religious innovation. The commissioners were appointed by the privy council, and consisted of laymen as well as divines. These commissioners, on their arrival in any diocess, assumed the spiritual authority over the bishop himself, who was not allowed to preach any where but in his own cathedral, and the other clergy were prohibited from preaching without license. The commissioners further summoned the bishops, the clergy, and householders before them, and not only compelled them to take the oaths of allegiance and supremacy, but also to answer such questions on oath as might be put to them. Here was a comfortable state of freedom for Englishmen to enjoy! But they had renounced the tyranny of the pope, and the slavery of the Catholic church, and therefore the despotic restrictions imposed upon them, being cloaked with the charm of evangelical liberty, the reformation of religion was hailed as a blessing. What a change was here worked for the downfall of England's liberties, and the happiness of Englishmen. Heretofore religion was held as of divine right

and in the exercise of their spiritual functions the clergy had always been independent of the crown. Unfettered with the cares of wives and families, and enjoined, not only by the canons of the church, but by the laws of the kingdom, to follow the spiritual and corporal works of mercy, by visiting the sick, comforting the houseless, entertaining the stranger, and supporting the poor, their interests became identified with the privileges of the people, and they formed a barrier against the encroachments of the crown and the ambition of the nobles. Thus we see in the tenth century, king Edgar, while acting by the advice and counsels of an archbishop of Canterbury, St. Dunstan, governing his people like a father, and watching the administration of justice with a jealous eye. Falling into the foul sin of adultery, he was brought to a sense of his crime, and retraced his steps by making atonement for the scandal he had given to Religion and Morality. We are aware that the conduct of St. Dunstan has been censured as arrogant and insolent by many of our modern writers, who wrote for profit and not for truth ; but did the courageous and noble-minded archbishop do more than Nathan, who reproved king David to his face for the offence he had committed? And would St. Dunstan have dared to reprove the king had he taken out a commission from Edgar, as the reforming bishops did under Edward the sixth?

Again, in the eleventh century, we see St. Anselm withstanding the innovations attempted by William Rufus, who, like his Norman father, governed the kingdom more by his own capricious and despotic will than by the laws and customs of the country, established and confirmed by the Saxon monarchs. No threats nor persuasions could induce the holy Anselm to relinquish his own rights, or sanction the violation of others. He preferred banishment and poverty to ease and riches in his see, and he outlived the tyrant by whom he was persecuted. But had Anselm been a man of the world, like Tom Cranmer; had he been encumbered with a wife and family, like our Protestant prelates; had he held his high possessions through the influence and will of the sovereign, would he have had the courage to withstand the power of the monarch, and brave the storms which gathered around him, in the rigid performance of his duty? Oh, no! the endearments of his wife, the cries of his children, the love of pleasure, and the fear of distress, would have crowded upon him, and he would probably have been as ready a slave to the whims of Rufus, as Tom Cranmer is acknowledged by Burnet to have been to the will of Henry, and as we shall shew him to have been 'to the will of the protector.

So, in the next century, we find St. Thomas à Becket resisting the encroachments meditated by Henry the second in the constitution of the country. St. Thomas was the first Englishman who rose to any considerable station under the Norman race of kings. He was well versed in the canon and civil law, was made lord chancellor, and afterwards archbishop of Canterbury. On being raised to the primate's chair, he resigned his civil office, considering the two offices to be incompatible with each other. Henry, like other ambitious sovereigns, meditated pretensions contrary to the established privileges of the constitution, and he required the assent of the archbishop. St. Thomas had taken an oath to preserve these privileges, and he refused to violate that oath and

the constitution at the same time. This was the head and front of the archbishop's offence, and yet to this day his memory is maligned, and his patriotic firmness misrepresented. Even the great sir Walter Scott, in his last novel, those famous vehicles for calumny and abuse of the Catholic church, has spoken of the conduct of St. Thomas in the most injurious and unjustifiable terms. The archbishop is represented by the popular novelist, who, by-the-by, is a thorough-paced tory, as a proud and imperious prelate, which impression we suppose he borrowed from his countryman, Hume. The latter base and unprincipled writer, insinuates that St. Thomas à Becket was proud and ambitious, and covered his vicious inclinations with the cloak of sanctitý and zeal for religion. Had St. Thomas not been a churchman, he would probably have been held in as high esteem as the most renowned of our statesmen since the reformation, but it was his misfortune, as the world will say, to be a Catholic prelate, and therefore, though his resistance to the will of Henry was purely conscientious, and he refrained from entering into any party strife, yet is he foully attacked by the infidel Hume, and the rage and violences of Henry, which ended in the archbishop's death, are extenuated. Had St. Thomas been a panderer and base violator of his oaths, like Cranmer; had he renounced the visible head of that divine religion, through whose influence we owe all that is valuable and venerable in our constitution; had he consented, like Cranmer, to become the mere tool and lieutenant of the king, exercising the functions of his office to cheat the people of their rights and customs, and enrich the hungry expectants that crowd a vicious court, out of the patrimony of the poor, we should have seen him extolled as one of the best benefactors of mankind, though he would have been, as Cranmer was, the disgrace of his sacred profession, and the curse of this once happy country. But St. Thomas was a disinterested and firm supporter of the laws and privileges of his country, and a Catholic prelate; it was not fit therefore that the Protestant people should be told the truth. Cranmer was a base truckler, a vicious sensualist, and a traitor to the constitution; but he was an instrument in bringing about that reformation which has led to all the evils the country has suffered, and will yet suffer-it is there-fore necessary that the truth should here too be disguised;-thus the stout and good prelate is represented as ambitious and arrogant for doing his duty; while the corrupt and dissembling prelate, who basely betrayed his trust, is described as the paragon of excellence and perfection.

In the thirteenth century we have another example of the great: advantages derived to civil freedom and the people's rights, by an independent and disinterested clergy. To whom does England owe so much, next to Alfred and Edward the confessor, as to cardinal Langton, archbishop of Canterbury, who advised and instructed the barons of England to curb the despotic conduct of an unprincipled king, and demand a restoration of the Saxon laws, which the Norman conqueror and his successors had abrogated? As might be expected, John, the reigning monarch, resisted this demand; but, encouraged by the counsels and example of the patriotic and inflexible primate, the barons persisted in their claims, and at length compelled the king to sign the great charter of English liberties, which was faithfully preserved till the

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bloody reign of Henry, the wife and priest slaughterer, when Cranmer and his associates in the work of reform, or rather of devastation, consented to its violation, by making the church the footstool of the state, -and placing its ministers in subserviency to the will of the king and his courtiers.

Burnet has confessed that Cranmer was over obsequious to the will of Henry, nor was he less compliable to the will of the lord protector, after he was released from the control of the lustful and inexorable despot. On attaining the summit of power, Hertford allowed Cranmer to make some progress in what they called a reform, without the consent of parliament, and Cranmer, in return, assured the protector that he would find the episcopal order, who now held their sees during the pleasure of the crown, ready instruments to fulfil the wishes of their masters. Gardiner was the only bishop who stood out for episcopal rights, and he soon found himself in a prison. But what does Burnet say himself of the capabilities and character of the reformers? "The greatest difficulty the reformers found was the want of able and prudent men; most "of the REFORMED PREACHERS being TOO HOT and INDIS"CREET, and the few who were otherwise were required in London "and the universities. Therefore (he adds) they intended to make "those as common as was possible, and appointed them to preach as ITI"NERANTS and VISITORS." The latter sentence of this quotation the wise editors of the modern Book of Martyrs have suppressed, thinking, we suppose, it reflected no great credit on the work they were extolling. But what, gentle reader, will you say of that reformation which was not performed by "able and prudent men," but was the work of "hot and indiscreet" preachers? Could a change of religion be good and true that had such hands to produce it? The Catholic religion was first founded by the apostles, who were inspired men, and renowned for their virtues, prudence, and invincible constancy. They selected others equally eminent for piety, integrity, and purity of conduct, to carry the faith delivered to them to other nations, and we find by the page of history, that kingdom after kingdom was subdued to the Catholic faith by holy, able, and prudent men, till in a word the whole world had been converted from Paganism and acknowledged the cross of Christ. We have it in the annals of our own country, that at the close of the sixth century, St. Gregory the great, who then filled the chair of St. Peter at Rome, sent a holy and prudent man, St. Augustin, to preach the Catholic faith to the Saxon inhabitants of Britain, and that, aided by other able and prudent men, the whole island in a short space of time became Catholic, and so continued through a series of nine hundred years, producing, during that period, the most just laws, the most valiant and wise kings, nobles, and legislators, the most pious and charitable pre-lates and priests, and the most learned and experienced scholars. And now we are unblushingly told, by the panegyrists of what is called REFORMATION," that the change from Catholicism to Protestantism was the work of men who were wholly destitute of the qualities requisite to be a true servant of religion, being devoid of prudence and ability, and influenced by passion and indiscretion. From such a tree is it possible that good fruit could come? Need we wonder at the numerous evils that have sprung from this unhappy change from good to bad; from a

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