"ters, and to let in an inundation of vice and wick

"edness upon the nation."

mi aber.

XIII. 7.

Religious Persecution during the Reign of Edward VI.

"THE hardships, which the reformers underwent "in the preceding reign, should," according to Mr. Neale's just observation," have made them "tender of the lives of those who differed from the

present standard." But their conduct showed a very different feeling.

1900

Complaint being made to the council against the anabaptists, a commission was ordered to six of the bishops, and to some other divines, to search after all anabaptists, heretics, and all contemners of the common prayers, with injunctions, that the commissioners should endeavour to reclaim them; and, after due penance, to give them absolution; but that if they should continue obstinate, the commissioners should excommunicate, imprison, and deliver them over to the secular arm. Many were brought before them some abjured the errors imputed to them, and were dismissed; others persisted in their opinions and were burned. Among these, Joan Bocken particularly attracted the commiseration of the public; she maintained that Christ was not incarnate of the virgin, not having taken any of her flesh. For this opinion she was sentenced to the flames. The humane prince was so struck with the cruelty of the sentence, that he refused, for a long

time, to sign the warrant for her execution. "Cran"mer," says Mr. Hume, "was employed to per"suade him to compliance. He said that there "was great difference between errors in other points "of divinity, and those which were in direct con"tradiction to the apostolic creed. These latter were impieties against God, which the monarch,

66

being God's deputy, ought to repress, in like "manner as inferior magistrates were bound to punish offences against the king's person. Ed"ward, overcome by importunity, at last submitted, though with tears in his eyes; and he told Cran

mer, that if any wrong were done, the guilt "should lie entirely on his head. The primate, "after making a new effort to reclaim the woman "from her errors, and finding her obstinate to all "his arguments, at last committed her to the "flames."

CHAP. XIV.

PRINCIPAL ECCLESIASTICAL OCCURRENCES IN

THE REIGN OF QUEEN MARY.

1553.

EDWARD the sixth died on the 6th July 1553. Dudley, earl of Warwick, who had supplanted the duke of Somerset, the protector, in the favour of the young monarch, had induced him, not long

before his decease, to exclude the princesses, Mary and Elizabeth, from the succession, and to substi tute in their place lady Jane Grey. The protector had married her to Lord Guilford Dudley, his fourth son. She was the daughter of Frances, duchess of Suffolk, and descended, by Charles Brandon, from Mary, the dowager queen of France, and sister to Henry the eighth. She was singularly accomplished, and universally respected and beloved. Henry's testamentary disposition having set aside the Scottish line, lady Jane Grey stood next in succession to the crown, after the princesses Mary and Elizabeth. The duke of Northumberland, her father-in-law, with the concurrence of Cranmer, and of the whole privy council, except the lord chief justice, caused her to be proclaimed queen. She did all that depended upon her to refuse the crown; but, at length overpowered by her father-in-law and husband, accepted it with sincere and evident reluctance. Her adherents endeavoured to support her title by arms, but they were soon discomfited, and Mary was proclaimed queen. The duke of Northumberland, and two persons with him, were put to death, while eight more were tried and condemned for high treason. Among these were lady Jane and her husband, lord Guilford Dudley. Their execution was more than once put off, and probably would not have taken place, had not the subsequent rebellion of sir Thomas Wyatt caused it to be thought a necessary measure, for the tranquillity of the state.

Mary thus became peaceably possessed of the

throne. I. The return of the English nation to communion with the see of Rome: II. The persecution of the Protestants for heresy and III. the condemnation and death of archbishop Cranmer; are the ecclesiastical events in this reign, which seem to require particular notice.

XIV. 1.

The return of the English nation to communion with the See of Rome.

IMMEDIATELY on her accession to the throne, Mary avowed her attachment to the catholic religion, and very soon made public her intention to restore it. She formally signified this to the pope, and his holiness appointed cardinal Pole his legate to England, and furnished him with the most ample powers for effecting the object of his legation. In August 1554, the marriage between the queen and Philip was celebrated. On the 28th of the following November the king and queen, the spiritual and temporal peers, and the commons, assembled in the house of lords. Gardiner, who had been recently restored to the bishopric of Winchester, and advanced to the dignity of Chancellor, announced the arrival of the cardinal, with legatine authority. Being introduced with great ceremony into the assembly, the cardinal addressed the members in a conciliating speech. The chancellor replied, expressing his own wishes, and the general wish of the nation, to return to communion with the see of Rome.

On the following day, the king, the

queen, and

both houses of parliament, being again assembled in the house of peers, the cardinal was ushered into the house, dressed in his legatine robes. The king was placed on the left-hand of the queen, and the legate on her right, but at a greater distance than the king. All three were placed on seats covered with rich tapestry, and under a very costly canopy. The chancellor then addressed the houses of parliament; recapitulated what he had said the day before, and solemnly asked them, if they desired to return to the unity of the church, and to the obedience due to their chief pastor. The whole assembly assented, by acclamation, to the proposal. The chancellor then presented to their majesties a petition, on behalf of the members of both houses, as the representatives of the whole nation, expressing their sorrow for the schism, and for whatever they had enacted against the see of Rome and the catholic religion, declaring that they now annulled it; and beseeching those, whom God had preserved from the general guilt, to obtain from the lord legate that he would pardon them, and restore them as true and living members to that body, from which they had been separated by their misdeeds.

The king and queen having perused the petition, returned it to the chancellor; he read it distinctly and audibly. The whole assembly then rose, and the queen, in the name and behalf of herself, and of the king, petitioned the legate to grant the par don and reconciliation sued for. The legate rose from his seat, and every one, except the king and queen, being on their knees, he pronounced the