INTRODUCTORY NOTICE

TO THE PRESENT EDITION.

THE established character of Burnet's History of the Reformation as a standard work, and most valuable historical authority, renders it unnecessary to apologise for its re-publication, or to enter into a defence of the author against those attacks which his well-known political opinions drew upon him from the wits of the time. The gibes and sarcasms of Swift and Parnell *, which after all were directed not against the work itself, but to those introductory portions which referred to the topics of the day, are now little more than literary curiosities; while the merits and fidelity of the historical portion have received ample confirmation in the continued approbation of successive generations.

It therefore only here remains for the editor to point out the means which have been taken to obviate, as far as possible, the inconveniences arising from the peculiar mode in which the original volumes were published, and to make a few remarks calculated to assist those who have hitherto been unacquainted with the work, in the most advantageous method of perusing it.

The History of the Reformation was first published in three folio volumes; the first appearing in the year 1679, the second in the year 1681. These two volumes complete the History; the third volume, which was not published until 1714, being merely supplementary to the former volumes, and consisting chiefly of additional facts relating to the transactions already noticed, and of corrections of inadvertent errors. Thus, it will be perceived that it is necessary to read the third volume (or Part, as it is otherwise designated) in connexion with its predecessors, and not as a continuation of the history contained in them.

In a work of such magnitude it was impossible to avoid errors, and it

* We allude to Swift's witty "Preface to the B-p of S's Introduction to the third volume of the History of the Reformation," and Parnell's lines on the bishop's narrowly escaping being burnt in his closet.

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is therefore not surprising to find the bishop guilty of several inaccuracies; he is however deserving of great praise for the candour with which he acknowledged and corrected his mistakes when they were pointed out. The means he adopted for this purpose were, however, of a nature to cause much embarrassment to the reader, and it has been a main object with the editor to supply these defects. At the end of the first Part the bishop supplied several corrections in the form of "Addenda ;" and as these could not with propriety be introduced into the text, care has been taken to make them accessible at the proper moment by references at the passages to which they relate. At the end of the second volume a long list of corrections of errors in the former part, sent to the bishop by Mr. Fulman, rector of Hamton Meysey, in Gloucestershire, was printed ; and in the appendix to the third volume similar corrections furnished by Mr. Granger, Mr. Strype, and an anonymous contributor (Mr. Baker, author of the Reflections on Learning), were inserted,—an arrangement which rendered them almost useless to the reader. All these corrections, together with some drawn from other sources, and such as were made by the author himself in subsequent parts of his work on what he had written before, have been either silently introduced into the text, or given in notes at the foot of the page, and are thus rendered immediately available.

The want of such an arrangement, and especially of a reference to the author's numerous and important corrections of himself,—a want which has led even our best historians into error*,-is so obvious, that it is surprising to find that it was not until 1820, when the corrections furnished by Mr. Granger alone were incorporated in an edition of the work published in that year, that anything of the kind was attempted. In 1839, Dr. Nares set the example of incorporating the whole of the corrections, omitting however, for what reason we know not, the name of the commentator when he introduced his corrections as notes. In the present edition we have taken care to give our authority in every case where we have offered corrections, save in such cases as were so indisputable as to prevent all hesitation in transferring them at once and without comment to the text. We may then claim for the present edition the merit of being (if we except that by Dr. Nares) the only complete, and we may add, useable edition of Burnet's History of the Reformation.

TO THE KING.

SIR,

THE first step that was made in the reformation of this church was the restoring to your royal ancestors the rights of the crown, and an entire dominion over all their subjects, of which they had been disseised by the craft and violence of an unjust pretender; to whom the clergy, though your Majesty's progenitors had enriched them by a bounty no less profuse than ill managed, did not only adhere, but drew with them the laity, over whose consciences they had gained so absolute an authority that our kings were to expect no obedience from their people but what the popes were pleased to allow.

It is true, the nobler part of the nation did frequently in parliament assert the regal prerogatives against those papal invasions; yet these were but faint endeavours, for an ill-executed law is but an unequal match to a principle strongly infused into the consciences of the people.

But how different was this from the teaching of Christ and his apostles! They forbade men to use all those arts by which the papacy grew up and yet subsists: they exhorted them to obey magistrates, when they knew it would cost them their lives: they were for setting up a kingdom not of this world, nor to be attained but by a holy and peaccable religion. If this might everywhere take place, princes would find government both easy and secure; it would raise in their subjects the truest courage, and unite them with the firmest charity; it would draw from them obedience to the laws, and reverence to the persons of their kings. If the standards of justice and charity which the gospel gives, of doing as we would be done by, and loving our neighbours as ourselves, were made the measures of men's actions, how steadily would societies be governed, and how exactly would princes be obeyed!

The design of the Reformation was to restore Christianity to what it was at first, and to purge it of those corruptions with which it was overrun in the later and darker ages.

GREAT SIR, this work was carried on by a slow and unsteady progress under King Henry VIII.; it advanced in a fuller and freer course under the short but blessed reign of King Edward; was sealed with the blood of many martyrs under Queen Mary; was brought to a full settlement in the happy and glorious days of Queen Elizabeth; was defended by the learned pen of King James ; but the established frame of it, under which it had so long flourished, was overthrown with your Majesty's blessed father, who fell with it, and honoured it by its unexampled suffering for it; and was again restored to its former beauty and order by your Majesty's happy return.

What remains to complete and perpetuate this blessing, the composing of our differences at home, the establishing a closer correspondence with the reformed churches abroad, the securing us from the restless and wicked practices of that party who hoped so lately to have been at the end of their designs, and that which can only entitle us to a blessing from God, the reforming of our manners