OF

THE REFORMATION.

MEMOIRS OF

DISTINGUISHED FEMALE CHARACTERS,

BELONGING TO THE PERIOD OF

THE REFORMATION IN THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.

BY THE

REV. JAMES ANDERSON,

AUTHOR OF "THE LADIES OF THE COVENANT," ETC.

ILLUSTRATED BY J. GODWIN, J. W. ARCHER, &c.

LONDON, EDINBURGH, GLASGOW, AND NEW YORK.

MDCCCLV.

PREFACE.

No revolution, since the age of Christ and his apostles, can be compared in magnitude and beneficial results with that of the Reformatan in Europe in the 16th century. By elevating the authority of the Sacred Scriptures above human authority, and asserting the git of every man to judge of their contents for himself, it released the human mind from the fetters of Popish implicit faith, and rested it to the free exercise of its powers. It was thus to the ad of man like a resurrection from the dead; and from the terrible ck it gave to the Papacy, wherever established, entirely overthrowa that system in some countries, together with its powerful influence advancing civil liberty, commerce, science, and literature, it forms the commencement of a new era in the history of Europe. From recent events in England, particularly from the progress of Oxford Tractarianism, and the Papal aggressions, the study of this great eration has become anew important, that, under a deeper impreswo of the blessings we have derived from it, our gratitude may be

ned, first to the Great Ruler of the church and the world, to

a

whom, as the efficient cause, it is to be attributed, and next to th distinguished individuals who, under Him, were the instruments achieving it.

The new claims which, from these circumstances, the history the Reformation has upon our attention, suggested to the author composition of the present work. A series of biographical mem of distinguished females in the principal countries of Europe, supported or contributed to this great revolution by sympat action, or heroic suffering, when adherence to the principles of Reformation exposed them to peril, and even to death, had hitherto been written, though the lives of particular individuals 1 engaged the pen of the biographer, and such a work seemed to o an opportunity of presenting various of the leading facts in history of the Reformation in a somewhat new connection, as wel of introducing notices of the characteristics of the period, a episodes in real life, altogether omitted, or only slightly touch upon, in general history, though partaking sometimes even o romantic interest.

The amount of materials for such an undertaking varies as to different lives. In some it is scanty and fragmentary; in other is so voluminous that a single life might easily have been exten to a volume. In the composition of the lives the materials which are most abundant, the author has endeavoured to select most interesting portions; and, while compressing his matter wit as narrow limits as possible, to give, at the same time, a degre fulness to the narrative. The authorities from which he has deri his facts will be seen in the course of the biographies. Whene

practicable he has consulted the original sources of information, the grat importance of which must be obvious to all conversant with historical inquiry.

These memoirs being in a great measure historical, it seemed Becessary to their being the more clearly understood, that the reader should have placed before him the contemporaneous events and characters with which the subjects of the memoirs were conpected. This information the author has endeavoured to supply, sometimes in the course of the lives themselves, and, as this was at always practicable without too great a digression from the pint in hand, at other times in the general introductions prefixed to the biographies under each country, which embrace, for the most para general view of the history of the Reformation in the respecve countries to which they relate. This, it is hoped, will leave the rear at no loss as to the general course of the events of the period, As far as connected with the ladies brought under review.

Had the author's limits permitted, he would have included under the English portion notices of some of the female martyrs who exfered during the reign of Queen Mary, and under the Netherlands ption notices of several other females who underwent martyrdom a that country. Multitudes of the tender sex in these, as well in other parts of Europe, thus signalized themselves for God; and durch martyrology has preserved the memorials of the marof various of them, though even the names of by far the Pater number have not been transmitted to posterity, and are to fd recorded only in the registers of the Lamb under the The author's object has not been to write a martyrology;