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our Bishop contended for the holy Scriptures being the CHAP. rule of Christian faith, and opposed that authority which was then claimed to the Church, according to which the determinations of the Clergy or Church were placed on a level with the holy Scriptures, and affirmed to be of the same authority; he yet did not side with the followers of Doctor Wiclif, but thought them in many things very much mistaken. But to return.

9. Notwithstanding all these wholesome severities or devout rigours, as these persecutions of reputed heretics were then called, it does not appear that the zealots of those times were able effectually to compass their ends, and entirely to root out those opinions to which they gave so hated a name. Though the difficulties and discouragements which they invented to suppress them were so terrible, there were yet a great many in the University of Oxford, and elsewhere in the kingdom, who were no ways awed by them; but chose rather to encounter them, than subject their necks to a yoke so intolerable as that of Popery, and to hold such superstitious vanities as are contended for by that sect. Nay, so zealous were even the common people for the knowledge of the holy Scriptures, (which had been translated into English by Dr. Wiclif and his fellow-labourers not many years before our Bishop's time,) that we are told, one Nicholas Fox's Acts, Belward gave for only the New Testament in English four marks and forty pence f, or 2l. 16s. 8d. a sum equal,

e This translation seems to have been dispersed in small written parcels, because of the expence in writing them, and their being the more easily purchased, viz. the four Gospels, St. Paul's, St. Peter's, St. James's Epistles, &c. See Strype's Memorials Ecclesiastical, vol. i. app. p. 38. I have one of these little books, written on fine vellum of the size of our books in twelves, in which are contained, 1. The Gospel according to St. John. 2. The Epistle of St. James. 8. The two Epistles of St. Peter. 4. The three Epistles of St. John. 5. The Epistle of Jude. 6. The book of the Revelations, &c.

f Not long after, when printing was invented and in use, the New Testament of Mr. Tindale's translation was sold for 3s. 2d. notwithstanding its being prohibited, and the danger on that account of selling it.

&c. vol. i.

p. 927.

CHAP. at least, to ten pounds, according to the present value of

VI.

A. D. 1512.

256.

money.

10. Not many years after our Bishop's death lived William Tindale. Being educated in Magdalen Hall in Oxford, he there became acquainted with some of those who favoured Doctor Wiclif's and our Bishop's opinions, in relation to the authority and sufficiency of the holy Scripture, with which he entirely closed. Thus does he exWorks, p. press himself: "Christ, and all the Apostles, with all the "angels in heaven, if they were here, could preach no "more, than is preached of necessity unto our souls: we ❝ cannot receive a new article of the faith without Scripture, as profitable unto our souls: all things necessary "to salvation are comprehended in Scripture, ever to en"dure: by this Scripture the councils general have con"cluded such things as were in them determined." In consequence of this he argued against the infallibility of the Church, or the impossibility of the Pope and Clergy's erring in their determinations; and very smartly exposed the folly and absurdity of such fictions and vain pretensions. In these points he agreed exactly with our Bishop, although in others he rather followed the sentiments of Doctor Wiclif. But as correction is very grievous to them that forsake the way, Mr. Tindale was so hated for these his endeavours to convince men of their sin and folly, and to persuade them to search the Scriptures, and make them their guide and rule, that his enemies never left him till they had got him to be destroyed; which was done A. D. 1536, by his being first strangled at a stake, and then burnt at Filford Castle in Flanders, to which country he had retired, as to a place of more liberty at that time than his own native land was. At his death he prayed, that God would open the King of England's eyes; which A. D. 1540. prayer of his was so far answered, that in a few years the King was graciously pleased to allow the use of the holy 8 Scriptures in English, and of the Hours in the same lan

Mr. Tindale printed without the name of any place, and without any date,

guage, which indulgence was soon followed by a more CHAP. thorough reformation in the next reign.

the New Testament in English, translated from the original Greek, which had never been done before; and in 1530 the Pentateuch, translated from the Hebrew, with marginal notes. In 1535 was the whole Bible with the Apocrypha printed at Hamburgh, translated into English by Will. Tindale, Miles Coverdale, and George Joye; and in 1537 another edition by John Rogers, but called Thomas Matthew's Bible, in the title-page of which was printed one line in red letters; Set forth with the King's most gracious licence. About the same time, if not before, was the New Testament printed in Latin and English by Miles Coverdale, and dedicated to the King. See History of the English Translations of the Bible, &c.

VI.

CHAP. VII.

Of the Bishop's Writings.

1. OUR Bishop having spent, as he assures us himself, more than twenty years in writing controversial books against the Lollards, or Wiclifists, (who, as has been said, were very numerous, notwithstanding the sanguinary laws then in force against them, and the rigorous execution of them,) must have written a great many. Accordingly we have seen, that no fewer than fourteen volumes of our Bishop's works, viz. three in folio, and eleven in quarto, were burnt at St. Paul's. Of the titles of some of these our Bishop makes mention in two of his books yet remaining, viz. The Repressour of overmuch blaming the Clergy, and his Book of faith. These were written in English and Latin, and are as follows.

In English.

1. The Forcrier, alias, The bifore crier.

2. The book of Cristen religioun, alias, The rule of Cristen religioun. A copy of this is yet remaining in the Bodleian Library. It is a fair parchment MS. in quarto, consisting of about two hundred pages; it contains two parts, and is written in a catechetical way in a dialogue between a father and his son, the son asking, and the father answering the question. In it the Bishop treats of man, his body, soul, senses, and faculties, in a very distinct and orderly manner; of the Creed, and the Ten Commandments; of prayer, the Pater-noster, the seven virtues, and seven deadly sins. He protests most earnestly and often against maintaining any heresies, professes to submit all his writings to the Fathers of the Church, and complains grievously, that some of his books have been published by the forwardness and indiscretion of his friends, before he had revised them himself, and committed them to the Bishops for their approbation. He owns

VII.

no articles of faith to be contained in Scripture, but the CHAP. twelve of the Apostles' Creed, in reciting which he quite leaves out the declaration of Christ's descent into hell. This book is said to have been written by him A. D. 1457, which must be not long before his troubles.

R. Jamesii.

3. The donet into Cristen religioun. A transcript of Collectanea this on paper, made by Doctor Richard James, is in the Bodleian Library; it is in quarto, and consists but of thirty-one pages. It seems to be a reference to his larger book of Cristen Religioun, and written by way of supplement and appendix to it; but it refers to seven or eight of his other books besides. In it the Bishop repeats with great vehemence the complaint he had made before in his rule of Cristen religioun, of the too hasty publication of some of his writings by his friends. In the first page are these words, which shew the reason of its title, the donet. As the comoun doneta berith himsilfe towards the full kunninge of Latyn, so this booke for Goddis laws; therfore this booke might be conveniently called the donet or key to Cristen religioun.

4. The folewer to the donet. In the Oxford catalogue of the manuscript books here in England, this book is mentioned, among the MSS. of Charles Theyere in Gloucestershire, No. 6627, 257. Only devout is there misprinted for donet.

5. The booke of matrimonie. The design of this might possibly be to defend, in opposition to the Wiclifists, the practice of the Church in making contracts by words de presenti, and the Priests taking fees for marriage, both which were found fault with by Dr. Wiclif.

6. The filling up of the four tables. This seems to

a In the account given by John Andrews to Pope Sixtus IV. of the books printed by Conradus Sweynheim and Arnoldus Pannartz, by his direction, the first mentioned is, Donati pro puerulis, of which he says they had printed 300. Ut inde principium dicendi sumamus, unde imprimendi initium sumpsimus. Cotgrave thus explains the French word donat, The name of a certain grammarian read in some schools, whence the proverb, Les diables étoient encore à leur donat, The devils were then but in their accidence, or grammar.