pass over in silence nor to speak in a jealous or controversial spirit of those who, separated from our communion, are labouring to promote the knowledge of Christianity in the same regions. I do not profess, indeed, to describe fully the operations either of the Roman Catholic Church, or of the various bodies of Protestant Dissent. Such a work is obviously impracticable, and fit only to be classed with those of which Bacon says that they cannot be done within the hour-glass of one man's life". But, as the history of the Church, in any and every place, is the history of her difficulties, and as those difficulties are greatest which arise from the unhappy divisions of the Christian world, the relation of them is unavoidable: it has occupied a large portion of the present Volume, and must continue to occupy a portion of those which are to follow. I have said, in another part of this Volume 2, that the record of these difficulties, howsoever painful and humiliating, will not be without profit, if, by teaching us to form a true estimate of the services performed, the errors committed, and the perils passed through, by the men of a former generation, we may be the better prepared to endure the trials, and discharge the duties, and surmount the obstacles, which await us in our own. It is the desire to learn and to communicate this needful lesson, which 11 Advancement of Learning, 12 At the end of the sixth Works, ii. 100. chapter. alone has animated me to enter upon the present enquiry. And, in commending this first portion of it to the consideration of others, let me entreat them to consider the vastness of that field of labour, to which their attention, their sympathy, their prayers, are herein directed. It is only a small share of it, indeed, which this Volume presents to their view; and, even of that share, the greater part no longer pays allegiance to those laws which first made it subject to the British Crown. Yet, after all the losses and gains of the last two centuries and a half, what is, at this hour, the extent of the British Empire 13? Is it not computed to embrace a seventh part of the world's inhabitants, and more than a seventh part of the earth's surface 11? Does not the foremost of American orators describe it as a power to which Rome, in the height of her glory, was not to be compared, a power which has dotted over the whole surface of the globe with her possessions and military posts, whose morning drum-beat, following the sun, and keeping company with the hours, circles the earth daily with one continuous and unbroken strain of its martial airs 15?' These words, assuredly, 13 See in the Appendix, No. III., the return of Colonies (Population, Trade, &c.) ordered by the House of Commons to be printed, 20 February, 1845. It must be borne in mind, that, extensive and various as are the places enumerated in this document, it does not include those vast and important re gions which are under the government of the East India Company and Hudson's Bay Company. 14 See Grant's Bampton Lectures, page 11, and the Tables referred to by him. 15 Webster's Speeches, quoted in Sir Richard Bonnycastle's Newfoundland, ii. 226. b are not a vain hyperbole, the mere effusions of a glowing, yet unsubstantial, rhetoric: they are words which, not less truly than vividly, depict the actual and ample circuit of our own possessions:-a paraphrase, in fact, of the saying which was literally descriptive of Spain herself in the zenith of her power 16. Woe be unto us, then, if tokens of the authority of Christ keep not pace with the colossal grandeur of the Empire which can be thus described! The bare thought is fitted to overwhelm the souls of all who give it access to their hearts. And who can with safety refuse access to it? The prayer "for the peace of" our "Jerusalem," must be the prayer of all who share her blessings and are protected by her power. And if, for their "brethren and companions' sakes," they "wish" her "prosperity," will they not, "because of the house of the Lord" their "God, seek" also "to do" her "good 17 ?" 16 As one saith in a brave kind of expression, the sun never sets in the Spanish dominions, but ever shines upon one part or other of Brighton, 17 CONTENTS. First Voyage of Discovery made by the English, under the command of John Cabot and his Sons-Letters Patent granted for that pur- pose by Henry the Seventh, March 5, 1496-Newfoundland, and part of the American Continent, then discovered-Second Letters Patent to John Cabot in 1498; and again to others in 1501-2-No permanent results followed, during the Reign of Henry the Seventh, from the Voyages of Discovery thus made under his authority- Reasons which prevented Henry the Eighth from making many attempts to discover and acquire foreign possessions-Failure of Expedition fitted out by him in 1517-Memorial from Robert Thorne, an English Merchant residing at Seville, in 1527, who urged Henry the Eighth to prosecute the work of discovery, but without effect-Increasing Trade of the English during his Reign to the Coast of Guinea and the Levant-Efforts of Henry to protect it— Ministrations of the Church in Calais, the only foreign possession of England, at the time of the Reformation-Letters of Archbishop Renewal of attempts to extend intercourse with foreign countries in the reign of Edward the Sixth-State of the Church and Nation at that time-The design of Edward to open a communication with the countries in the North-East of Europe-Letters Missive from Edward to the rulers of those countries-Sebastian Cabot's instruc- tions to Sir Hugh Willoughby's fleet sent by the North-East passage ― Recognition made therein of the sacred obligations resting upon a Christian people-Departure of the expedition, May 20, 1553— Death of Sir Hugh Willoughby-Chancelor, one of his colleagues, succeeded in reaching Archangel-Intercourse of English with the Levant, in the reign of Edward the Sixth-Commercial relations established by Mary between England and Russia, in consequence of the expedition fitted out in Edward's reign-Mary's reign not favourable to colonization-Causes thereof-Attempts made again towards the North-East passage in 1556, by Steven Burrough, and by others of Mary's subjects, in other directions, to extend their The reign of Elizabeth favourable to the renewal of commercial enter- prise The attempt to extend British commerce, through Russia into Bactria and Persia, by Anthonie Jenkinson in 1558-His second mission in 1561-These and other like attempts partially succeed- New Charter granted by Elizabeth to the Russia Company in 1566— Commercial relations with Russia checked by the death of the em- peror, in 1584-Attempt of Pet and Jackman to penetrate the North- East passage in 1580-Evidence of their attention to the ordinances of the Church of God-Intercourse of the English with Iceland and Greenland-The West Indies and parts of South America and Mexico visited by Drake and others-Drake, the first English com- mander who sailed round the world, 1577-1580-The discoveries |