celebrated a council at this time, but to have waited till God had put the Christian commonwealth in a better disposition; rather than to have celebrated one after this manner, with so little fruit, to the great sorrow of catholics, the scorn of heretics, and the prejudice of the present and of all future councils." So much may serve to show the sense that Vargas had of the first as well of the second session of the council of Trent.

Malvenda, one of the emperor's divines that was there, complains in one letter (Oct. 12), "that the decrees, but especially the matters of doctrine, were communicated to them very late. So that, notwithstanding the substance of these decrees may be sound, which it is well if it is, nevertheless, considering that they are to correct them upon a bare hearing them read, on the eve of a session, that must in my opinion hinder them from having that authority and majesty which such matters do use to have. I pray God give them grace to mend this. He confesses, it was not fit any thing should be done without the pope's consent: yet that ought to be managed with all possible secrecy, in order to prevent the Lutherans, if they should come to know it, from reflecting on the liberty of the council, and the freedom that the prelates ought to have; who might safely enjoy more, without having any thing pass to the prejudice of his Holiness."

In another (Nov. 22) he writes, "As there will not want those that write of this council, so, for my own part, I pray God it may not do more harm than good, and especially to the Germans that are here: who, seeing how little liberty it enjoys, and how much it is under the dominion of the legate, cannot possibly have that respect and esteem for it as is convenient."

There are some letters from the bishop of Oren, written in the same strain. In one (Octob. 12) he writes, "that for what concerns a reformation, the emperor must set himself about it in earnest, both with the pope and the fathers for if he does it not, we shall have our wounds only skinned over, but shall have the rotten core left, to the corrupting of all quickly again. The prelates here are all very much troubled to see with how ill a grace people that say any thing of a reformation are heard." In another (Nov. 28) he writes, "They discover here little or no inclination for to do any thing that deserves the name of a true reformation. Several things might be done that would be of great advantage to the people, and would be no prejudice to his Holiness, or to his court. May God remedy things! under whom, unless his majesty and your lordship labour very

hard, there will be no remedy left for the church. In a postcript, he tells the same story that Vargas had told, of the legate's treating the bishop of Verdun so ill, for his calling the reformation offered, a pretended reformation: and he commanded him to be silent when he was about to say somewhat in his own justification. The bishop answered, that at this rate there was no liberty; and having obtained leave of the emperor, by whom he was sent thither, he would be gone. The legate told him he should not go, but should do what he commanded him. He writes, that it was a great reproach to the bishops, from whom the world expected canons of reformation, that in truth they could give them nothing but what the legate pleases. It were just with the people, if we do not treat about their interest more in earnest than we have done hitherto, for to stone us when we return home."

I have set all this out so copiously, that it may appear from what those, who were far from being in any sort favourers of the Reformation, who were in Trent, and were let into the secret of affairs, wrote of the council to the emperor's chief minister, how little not only of liberty, but even of common decency, there appeared in the whole conduct of that council.

This digression is, I hope, an acceptable entertainment to the reader; and it must entirely free every considering person from a vulgar but weak prejudice, infused into many by practising missionaries, which was objected to myself by a great prince, that no nation ought to have reformed itself, in a separation from the rest of the church: but that there ought to have been a general acquiescing in such things as were commonly received, till by a joint concurrence of other churches the Reformation might have been agreed and settled in a general council. These letters do so effectually discover the vanity of this conceit, that at first sight it evidently appears, that even those abuses and corruptions that could not be justified, yet could not be effectually reformed, at Trent; and that every thing was carried there, partly by the artifices of the legates, and partly by the many poor Italian prelates, who were all pensioners of the court of Rome: so that no abuse, how gross or crying soever, could be amended, but as the popes for their own ends thought fit to give it up. This appears so evidently in the letters, out of which I have drawn this abstract, that I hope any prejudice formed upon the prospect of an universal reformation is by it entirely removed. I turn next to the affairs of England.

The earl of Hertford, advanced to be duke of Somerset,

depended much on Paget's advices. He told him, on the day that King Henry died, that he desired his friendship; and promised to him, that he would have a great regard to his advice. But though Paget put him oft in mind of this, he forgot it too soon. His great success in his first expedition to Scotland was a particular happiness to him, and might have established him; but his quarrelling so soon with his brother was fatal to them both.

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Thirlby was still ambassador at the emperor's court: he studied to make his court to the protector, and wrote him a very hearty congratulation upon his exaltation; and added, that the bishop of Arras seemed likewise to rejoice at it. At the same time, he warned him of the designs of the French against England. He gave him a long account of the Interim, in which he writes, that Malvenda had secretly a great hand he himself seems to approve of it; and says, that it was as high an act of supremacy as any in all King Henry's reign; for by it, not only many of the doctrines of popery had mollifying senses put on them, different from what was commonly received, but the sacrament was allowed to be given in both kinds, and the married priests were suffered to officiate. It is true, all was softened by this, that it was only a prudent connivance in the Interim till the council should be re-assembled to bring all matters to a final settlement.

The protector either mistrusted Thirlby, or he called him home to assist Cranmer in carrying on the Reformation. He sent Sir Philip Hobbey in his stead. He was a man marked in King Henry's time as a favourer of the preachers of the new learning, as they were then called. There was one Parson, a clerk, known to have evil opinions (so it is entered in a part of the council-book for the year 1543), touching the sacrament of the altar; who was maintained by Weldon, one of the masters of the household, and by Hobbey, then a gentleman-usher, for which they were both sent to the Fleet; but they were soon after discharged.

Hobbey was therefore sent over ambassador, as a person on whose advices the government here might depend, with relation to the affairs of Germany. I have seen a volume of the letters writ to him by the protector and council, with copies of the answers that he wrote.

His first dispatch mentioned a particular dispute between the emperor and his confessor. The confessor refused to give him absolution, unless he would recall the decree of the Interim; and, instead of favouring heresy, would with the sword extirpate heretics. The emperor said, he was satisfied with what he had done in the matter of the Interim, and that he would do no more against the Lutherans: if the friar

would not give him absolution, others would be found who would do it. So the friar left him.

At that time a proposition of a marriage for the Lady Mary was made by the emperor, who seemed to apprehend that she was not safe in England. It was with the brother of the king of Portugal. He was called at first the prince of Portugal; and it was then hearkened to: but when the council understood he was the king's brother, they did not think fit to entertain it. And in the same letter mention is made of Geoffrey Pole, who was then beyond sea, and desired a pardon the council wrote, that he was included in the last act of pardon; yet, since he desired it, they offer him a special pardon. This letter is signed T. Cant., Wiltshire, Northampton, Wentworth, T. Ely, T. Cheyne, A. Wyngfield, Herbert, N. Walton, J. Gage.

The next dispatch to him has a particular account of two persons, whom the king of France had corrupted to betray one of their forts to him. The king of France had said to their ambassador, Par la foy de gentilhomme, by the faith of a gentleman, he would make no war, without giving warning first. This he promised on the 20th of July; yet hearing of the commotions that were in England, he began hostilities against Bulloigne within three or four days after. This is signed E. Somerset, T. Cant., R. Ryche Can., W. St. John's, W. Paget, W. Petre, J. Smith, E. Watton. So long ago did it appear, that the bona fide of that court was not a thing to be much relied on. I would have printed these letters, if they were in my power: but having had the originals in my hands about thirty years ago, I did not then copy them out, but contented myself with taking extracts out of them, to which I shall upon other occasions have recourse.

As for the progress in the Reformation at home, Cranmer was delivered from too deep a subjection, in which he had lived to King Henry. The load of great obligations is a weight on a generous mind: the hope he had of gaining on the king, to carry him to a further reformation, did, no doubt, carry him too far in his compliances to him. He did perhaps satisfy himself, as I have reason to believe many in the Roman communion do to this day, that he did not in his mind, or with his thoughts, go along in those devotions that they cannot but think unlawful; but what through a fearfulness of temper, or an ill-managed modesty, they do not depart from established practices, even though they think them unlawful. The compliances that we find in the apostles, particularly in St. Paul himself, the apostle of the Gentiles, in order to the gaining the Jews, might all meet together, to carry him too far in his submissions to King Henry. This can neither be denied nor justified; but the

censures passed on it may be much softened when all these things are laid together. Now he was delivered from that servitude, so he resolved to set about a further reformation with much zeal, though perhaps still with too great caution. He studied if it was possible to gain upon Gardiner he had reason to believe, from his forwardness in complying with King Henry, that he had no great scrupulosity in his own thoughts; so he tried to draw him to assist, at least not to oppose the steps that were to be made; and judging that it was necessary to give the people due instruction, to carry them to a further measure of knowledge, he set about the preparing a book of Homilies to be read in churches and to give some more light into the meaning of the New Testament, he chose Erasmus's Paraphrase as the most unexceptionable book that could be thought on: since he had been so much favoured in England; and as he had written against Luther, so he lived and died in the Roman communion.

Cranmer communicated his designs, with the draught of the Homilies, to Gardiner; but he was resolved to set himself at the head of the popish party: he had no doubt great resentments, because he was left out of the council, which he imputed to the Seymours. Cranmer tried if the offer of bringing him to sit at that board could overcome these; yet all was in vain. He insisted at first on this, that during the king's minority it was fit to keep all things quiet, and not to endanger the public peace by venturing on new changes. He pressed the archbishop with the only thing that he could not well answer; which was, that he had concurred in setting forth the late king's book of a necessary doctrine: Gardiner wrote, that he was confident Cranmer was a better man than to do any such thing against his conscience upon any king's account; and if his conscience agreed to that book, which he himself had so recommended, he wished things might be left to rest there. Cranmer pressed him again and again in this matter, but he was intractable. In particular he excepted to the homily of justification, which was thought to be of Cranmer's own composing: because justification was ascribed to faith only, in which he thought charity had likewise its influence; and that without it faith was dead, and a dead thing could not be the cause of justification. But the archbishop showed him his design in that was only to set forth the freedom of God's mercy, which we relying on, had by that the application of it to ourselves; not meaning that justifying faith was ever without charity; for even faith did not justify as a meritorious condition, but only as it was an instrument applying God's mercy to sinners. Upon this there was perhaps too much of subtilty on both