AFFAIRS OF CHURCH and STATE IN ENGLAND During the Life and Reign OF QUEEN MARY Heb. 11. 35 36 37. 35. Some of them were tortured not accepting deliverance that they might obtain a better Resurrection 36. And others had triall of cruell mockings and scourgings yea moreover of bonds and imprisonment 37. They were stoned they were sawn asunder were tempted were slain with the sword they wandred about in Sheep-skins and Goat-skins being destitute afflicted tormented c. Vell. Paterc Lib. 2. Hujus temporis fortunam ne deflere quidem quispiam satis dignè potuit nemo exprimere verbis potest Tantum Relligio potuit suadere malorum LONDON Printed for H. Twyford T. Dring J. Place and W. Palmer Anno 1660 The Parentage Birth and first Fortunes of the Princesse MARY The Eldest Daughter of K. Henry the Eighth before her comming to the CROWN With a brief Narrative of her Mother's Misfortunes from the first Agitating of the Divorce till the time of her Death and that which followed thereupon MARY the eldest Daughter of King Henry the Eighth and of Katherine his first wife daughter of Ferdinand and Issabella Kings of Spain was born at Greenwich on the 18 th day of February Anno 1516. Her Mother had before been married to Arthur Prince of Wales the elder Brother of King Henry but whether bedded by him or not more than as to some old Formalities of Court on the like occasions was not commonly known But he dying within few months after King Henry the Seventh the father of the deceased Prince was secretly dealt with by the Agents of the said Ferdinand and â—ssabella to proceed unto a second Marriage between Henry Duke of York his now onely son and their daughter Katherine To which King Henry readily condescendeth upon divers reasons partly to be assured of the assistance of the Kings of Spain against all practises of the French and partly that so great a Treasure as the Rents and Profits of the Princesse's Joynture might not be carried out of the Kingdom as needs must be if she should be married to a Prince of another Nation This being agreed on by the Parents of either side Pope Julius the 2 d. is sollicited for a Dispensation to the Grant whereof he willingly yielded knowing how necessary it was to the Peace of Christendom that those Kings should be united in the strictest Leagues of Love and Amity Which comming to the knowledge of the Princesse Katherine who understood her own condition better than her father or mother she caused those words vel forsan coâ—nitam to be inserted into the Bull or Dispensation and this she did for the preventing of all such disputes as might arise about the validity of the Marriage in case the consummation of it should be openly known though afterwards those words were used as the shrewdest Argument for the invalidating of the Marriage when it came in question And some such thing was thought to have prevailed with King Henry the seventh for deferring the advancement of Henry his second son to the Style Title and Dignity of Prince of Wales that he might first be well assued that no child was likely to be born of the former Marriage to whom that Title might more properly and of right belong The Dispensation being thus granted Prince Henry being then eleven years of age or thereabouts is solemnly contracted to the Princesse Katherine who must needs have a very great stock as well of Christian-Prudence as of Virgin-Modesty to wait the growing up of a Husband being then a child and one of whose affection to her when he should come to Man's estate she had no assurance and so it proved in the event For Henry had no sooner finished the fourteenth year of his age when either by the compunction of conscience the perswasion of some that wish'd him well or upon consideration of the disproportion of age which was then between them the Princesse being eight years the elder he resolved upon the breaking and annulling of the said Contract in which his Parents had engaged him To which end making his addresse to Doctor Richard Fox then Bishop of Winchester he openly renounceth the said Contract not by word onely but by the subscription of his name to a Legall Instrument containing the effect of that Renunciation his Resolution never to proceed any further in it and his Reasons for it Which Instrument he published in the presence of John Read a publick Notary the Bishop sitting then at Richmond as in Court or Consistory and witnessed unto by Miles Daâ—benâ—y Lord Chamberlain to King Henry the seventh and father of Henry Earl of Bridgwater Sir Charls Sommerset Banneret created afterwards Earl of Worcester Dr. Nicolas West after Bishop of Elâ— Dr. Thâ—mas Rowthall after Bishop of Durham and Sir Henry Mainiâ— The Instrument it self extant in the History of John Speed may be there consulted And in pursuance of this Act he waived the Consummation of the Marriage from one time to another till the death of his father which happened on the 22 of April An. 1509. he being then within two months of the age of eighteen years But being now come unto the Crown by the death of his father Reason of State prevailed so far beyond that of Conscience that he consented to the consummation of the Marriage which before he had solemnly renounced and did accordingly celebrate those unhappy Nuptialls the cause of so much trouble both to him and others on the second of June and caused her to be Crown'd with him on the 24 th of the same month This Marriage was blest within the year by the birth of a son whom the King caused to be Christned by the name of Henry and five years after with another who lived not long enough to receive his Baptism But Henry the first-born not living to be two months old the King remained childlesse till the birth of this daughter Mary the presumptive Heir of his Dominions committed in her Infancy to the care and charge of the Lady Margaret daughter of George Duke of Clarence and by the King in reference to her discent from the house of the Montacutes advanced unto the Style and Title of Countesse of Sarisbury An 1513. And herein it was thought that the Queen had a particular aim beyond that of the King and that she rather chose to commit her daughter to the care of that Lady than of any other in the Kingdom to the end that some affection growing to her by any of the Countesse's sons her daughter's Title to the Crown might be corroborated by the Interesse of the House of Clarence And so far her design succeeded that the Princesse Mary always carried such a dear affection to Reginald Pâ—le her second son best known by the name of Cardinal Pole in the following times that when she came unto the Crown she would have made choice of him for her husband before any other if the necessity of her affairs and
threatned more Danger then the other To which Request He did not onely refuse to hearken except the King would promise to restore the Catholick Religion as He called it in all His Dominions but expresly commanded that neither His Men noâ— Ammunition should go to the Assistance of the English An Ingratitude not easie to be marked with a fitting Epithete considering what fast Friends the Kings of England had alwaies been to the House of Burgundy the Rights whereof remained in the person of Charles with what sums of Money they had helped them and what sundry Wayâ— they had made for them both in the Nether-Lands to maintain their Authority and in the Realm of France it self to increase their Power For from the Marriage of Maximilian of the Family of Austriâ— with the Lady Mary of Burgundy which happened in the year 1478. unto the Death of Henry the Eight which fell in the year 1546 are just threescore and eight years In which time onely it was found on a just account that it had cost the Kings of England at the least six Millions of Pounds in the meer Quarrels of that House But the French being more assured that the English held some secret Practice with the Emperour then certain what the Issue thereof might be resolved upon a Peace with EDVVARD in hope of getting more by Treaty then he could by Force To this end one Guidolti a Florentine is sent for England by whom many Overtures were made to the Lords of the Council not as from the King but from the Constable of France And spying with a nimble Eye that all Affairs were governed by the Earl of Warwick he resolved to buy him to the French at what price soever and so well did he ply the Business that at the last it was agreed that four Ambassadours should be sent to France from the King of England to treat with so many others of that Kingdom about a Peace between the Crowns but that the Treaty it self should be held in Guisnes a Town belonging to the English in the Marches of Calice In pursuance whereof the Earl of Bedford the new Lord Paget Sir William Peter Principal Secretary of Estate and Sir John Mason Clerk of the Council were on the twenty first of January dispatched for France But no sooner were they come to Calice when Guidolâ—i brings a Letter to them from Mounsieur d' Rochpot one of the four which were appointed for that Treaty in behalf of the French In which it was desired that the English Ambassadours would repair to the Town of Bulloign without putting the French to the Charge and Trouble of so long a Journey as to come to Guisnes Which being demurred on by the English and a Post sent unto the Court to know the pleasure of the Council in that particular they received word for so the Oracle had directed that they should not stand upon Punctilioes so they gained the point nor hazard the Substance of the Work to preserve the Circumstances According whereunto the Ambassadours removed to Bulloign and pitch'd their Tents without the Town as had been desired for the Reception of the French that so they might enter on the Treaty for which they came But then a new Dâ—fficulty appeared for the French would not cross the Water and put themselves under the Command of Bulloign but desired rather that the English would come over to them and fall upon the Treaty in an House which they were then preparing for their Entertainment Which being also yielded to after some Disputes the French grew confident that after so many Condescensions on the part of the English they might obtain from them what they liâ—ted in the main of the Business For though it cannot otherwise be but that in all Treaties of this Nature there must be some Condescendings made by the one or the other yet he that yields the first inch of Ground gives the other Party a strong Hope of obtaining the rest These Preparations being made the Commissioners on both sides begin the Treaty where after some Expostulations touching the Justice or Injustice of the War on either side they came to particular Demands The English required the payment of all Debts and Pensions concluded on between the two Kings deceased and that the Queen of Scots should either be delivered to their Hands or sent back to Her Kingdom But unto this the French replyed That the Queen of Scots was designed in Marriage to the Daulphin of France and that She looked upon it as an high Dishonour that their King should be esteemed a Pensioner or Tributary to the Crown of England The French on the other side propounded That all Arrears of Debts and Pensions being thrown aside as not likely to be ever paid they should either put the higher Price on the Town of Bulloign or else prepare themselves to keep it as well as they could From which Proposals when the French could not be removed the Oracle was again consulted by whose Direction it was ordered in the Council of England That the Commissioners should conclude the Peace upon such Articles and Instructions as were sent unto them Most of them ordinary and accustomed at the winding up of all such Treaties But that of most Concernment was That all Titles and Claims on the one side and Defences on the other remaining to either Party as they were before the Town of Bulloign with all the Ordnance found there at the taking of it should be delivered to the French for the Sum of four hundred thousand Crowns of the Sun Of which four hundred thousand Crowns each Crown being valued at the Price of six Shillings and six Pence one Moity was to be paid within three days after the Town should be delivered and the other at the end of six Moneths after Hostages to be given in the mean time for the payment of it It was agreed also in relation to the Realm of Scotland That if the Scots razed Lowder and Dowglass the English should raze Rox-borough and Aymouth and no Fortification in any of those places to be afterwards made Which Agreement being signed by the Commissioners of each side and Hostages mutually delivered for performance of Covenants Peace was Proclaimed between the Kings on the last of March and the Town of Bulloign with all the Forts depending on it delivered into the power of the French on the twenty fifth day of April then next following But they must thank the Earl of Warwick for letting them go away with that commodity at so cheap a Rate for which the two last Kings had bargained for no less then two Millions of the same Crowns to be paid unto the King of England at the end of eight years the Towns and Territory in the mean time to remain with the English Nor was young Edward backward in rewarding his Care and Diligence in expenditing the Affair Which was so represented to him and the extraordinary Merit of the Service so highly magnified
symitry which showed it selfe in all her features and what she carried on that side by that advantage was over-ballanced on the other by a pleasing sprightfulnesse which gained as much upon the hearts of all beholders It was conceived by those Great Critticks in the schooles of Beauty that love which seemed to threaten in the eyes of Queen Jane did only seem to sport it selfe in the eyes of Queen Ann that there was more Majesty in the Gaâ—b of Queen Jane Seimour and more lovelinesse in that of Queen Ann Bollen yet so that the Majesty of the one did excell in Lovelyness and that the Lovelinesse of the other did exceed In majesty Sir John Russell afterwards Earle of Bedford who had beheld both Queens in their greatest Glories did use to say that the richer Queen Jane was in clothes the fairer she appeared but that the other the richer she was apparrelled the worse she looked which showes that Queen Ann only trusted to the Beauties of Nature and that Queen Jane did sometimes help her selfe by externall Ornaments In a word she had in her all the Graces of Queen Ann but Governed if my conjecture doth not faile me with an evener and more constant temper or if you will she may be said to be equally made up of the two last Queens as having in her all the Attractions of Queen Ann but Regulated by the reservednesse of Queen Katharine also It is not to be thought that so many rare perâ—ections should be long concealed from the eye of the King or that love should not worke in him it's accustomed effects of desire and hope In the prosecution whereof he lay so open to discovery that the Queen couâ—d not chuse but take notice of it and intimated her suspitioâ—s to him as appeares by a letter of hers in the Scrinia Sacra Iâ— which she signifies unto him that by hastning her intended death he would be left at liberty both before God and man to follow his affection already setled on the Party for whose sake she was reduced unto that condition and whose name she could some while since have pointed to his Grace not being ignorant of her suspicions And it appeared by the event that she was not much mistaken in the Mark she aimed at For scarce had her lementable death which happened on the nineteenth of May prepared the way for the Legitimating of this new affection but on the morrow after the King was secretly married to Mistress Seimour and openly showed her as his Queen in the Whitsontide following A Marriage which made some alteration in the face of the Court in the advancing of her kindred and discountenancing the Dependants of the former Queen but otherwise produced no change in Affaires of State The King proceeded as before in suppressing Monasteries extinguishing the Popes Authority and â—ltering divers things in the face of the Câ—uâ—ch which tended to that Reformation which after followed For on the eighth of June began the Parliament in which here past an Act for tâ—e finall extinguishing of the Power of the Popes of Rome Cap. 10. And the next day a Convocation of the Bishops and Clergy managed by Sir Thomas Cromwell advanced about that time unto the Title of Lord Cromwell of Wimbledon and made his Majesties Viccar Generall of all Ecclesiast â—all Matâ—ers in the Realme of England By whose Authority a book was published after Mature debate and Deliberation under the name of Articles Devised by the Kings Highness in which mentioned â—ut three Sacraments that is to â—ay Baptisme Penâ—ance and the Lords Supper Besides which book there were some Acts agreed upon in the Convocation for diminishing the superflâ—ous number of Holy dayes especially of such as happened in the time of Harvest Sâ—gnified afterwards to the people in certain Injunctions published in the Kings name by the new Viccar Generall as the first fruits of his Authority In which it was ordained amongst other things that the Curates in every Parish Church should teach the People to say the Lords Prayer the Creed the Ave-Mary and the Ten Commandments in the English Tongue But that which seemed to make most for the Advantage of the new Queen and her Posterity if it please God to give her any was the unexpected death of the Duke of Richmond the Kings naturall Son begotten on the body of the Lady Talboiâ— So dearly cherished by his Father having then no lawful Issuâ—-male that in the sixth yeare of his Age An. 1525. he created him Earl of Nottingham and not long after Duke of Richmond and Sommerset preferred him to the Honourable office of Earle Marshall elected him into the Order of the Garter made him Lord Admirall of the Royall Navy in an expedition against France and finally Affianced him to Mary the daughter of Thomas Howard Duke of Norâ—olk the most â—owerfull Subject in the Kingdom Now were these all the favours intended to him The Crown it selfe being designed him by the King in default of Lawfull Issue to be procreated and begotten of his Royall Body For in the Act of the Succession which past in the Parliament of this year the Crown being first setled upon the Issue of this Queen with the remainder to the Kings issue lawfully begotten on any following wife whatsoever there past this clause in favour of the Duke of Richmond as it was then generally conceived that is to say That for lack of lawfull heires of the Kings body to be procreated or begotten as is afore limitted by this Act it should and might be lawfull for him to confer the same on any such Person or Persons in Possession and Remainder as should please his Highnesse and according to such Estate and after such manner â—orme fashion order and condition as should be expressed declared named and lâ—mitted in his said Letters Patents or by his last Will the Crown to be enjoyed by such person or persons so to be nominated and appointed in as large and ample manner as if such Person or Persons had been his Highnesse Lawfull Heires to the Imperiall Crown of this Realm And though it might please God as it after did to give the King some Lawfull Issue by this Queen yet took he so much care for this naturall son as to enable himselfe by another Clause in the said Act to advance any person or persons of his most Royall Blood by Letters Patents under the Great Seale to any Title Stile or Name of any Estate Dignity or Honour whatsoever it be and to give to them or any of them any Castles Honours Mannours Lands Tenements Liberties Franchiefes or other Hereditaments in â—ee simple or Fee â—tail or for terme of their lives or the life of any of them But all these expectations and Provisions were to no effect the Duke departing this life at the age of 17 yeares or thereabouts within few dayes after the ending of this Session that is to say on the 22th day of July Anno 1536. to the
much at once upon the People it was thought sit to smooth the way to the intended Reformation by setting out some Preparatory Injunctions such as the King might publish by his own Authority according to the example of His Royal Father in the year 1536. and at some times after This to be done by sending out Commissioners into all parts of the Kingdom armed with Instructions to enquire into all Ecclesiastical Concernments in the manner of a Visitation directed by the King as Supreme Head on earth of the Church of England Which Commissioners being distributed into several Circuits were accompanied with certain Learned and Godly Preachers appointed to instruct the People and to facilitate the work of the Commissioners in all Towns and Places where they fate And that the People might not cool or fall off again in and from that which had been taught them by the Learned Preachers they were to leave some Homilies to the same effect with the Parish-Priest which the Arch-Bishop had composed not onely for the help of unpreaching Ministers but for the regulating and instructing even of Learned Preachers Which Injunctions being agreed upon by such of the Great Council as favoured the Design of the Reformation and the Commissions drawn in due form of Law by the Counsel learned they were all tendered to the Lord Chancellour Wriothsley that the Authority of the Great Seal might be added to them Which he who was not to be told what these matters aimed at refused to give consent unto and so lost the Seal committed as before is said to the Custody of the Lord Great Master by whom the said Commissions were dispatched and the Visitours thereby Authorised in due form of Law And here it is to be observed that besides the Points contained in the said Injunctions the Preachers above-mentioned were more particularly instructed to perswade the People from Praying to the Saints from making Prayers for the dead from Adoring of Images from the use of Beads Ashes and Processions from Mass Diriges Praying in unknown Languages and from some other such like things whereunto long Custome had brought a Religious Observation All which was done to this intent That the People in all places being prepared by little and little might with more ease and less opposition admit the total Alteration in the face of the Church which was intended in due time to be introduced Now as for the Injuctions above-mentioned although I might exemplifie them as they stand at large in the First Edition of the Acts and Monuments fol. 684. yet I shall choose rather to present them in a smoother Abstract as it is done unto my hand by the Church-Historian the Method of them onely altered in this manner following That all Ecclesiastical Persons observe and cause to be observed the Laws for the abolishing the pretended and usurped Power of the Bishop of Rome and Confirmation of the King's Authority and Supremacy and four times in the year at the least that they teach the People That the one was now justly taken away according to the word of God and that the other was of most Legal Duty onely to be obeyed by all the Subjects That once a Quarter at the least they sincerely declare the Word of God disswading the People from Superstitious Fancies of Pilgrimages Praying to Images c. exhorting them to the Works of Faith Mercy and Charity 3. And that Images abused with Pilgrimages and Offerings thereunto be forthwith taken down and destroyed and that no more Wax-Candles or Tapers be burnt before any Image but onely two lights upon the High Altar before the Sacrament shall remain still to signifie That Christ is the very Light of the World That every Holy-Day when they have no Sermon the Pater-Noster Credo and Ten Commandments shall be plainly recited in the Pulpit to the Parishioners 5. And that Parents and Masters bestow their Children and Servants either to Learning or some honest Occupation That within three Moneths after this Visitation the Bible of the Larger Volume in English and within twelve Moneths Erasmus his Paraphrases on the Gospels be provided and conveniently placed in the Church for the People to read therein 20. And that every Ecclesiastical Person under the Degree of a Batchelour of Divinity shall within three Moneths after this Visitation provide of his own The New Testament in Latine and English with Erasmus his Paraphrases thereon And that Bishops by themselves and their Officers shall Examine them how much they have profited in the study of Holy Scripture That such who in Cases express'd in the Statute are absent from their Benefices leave Learned and expert Curates to supply their places 14. That all such Ecclesiastical Persons not resident upon their Benefices and able to dispend yearly xx pounds and above shall in the presence of the Church-Wardens or some other honest men distribute the fourtieth part of their Revenues amongst the poor of the Parish 15. And that every Ecclesiastical Person shal give competent Exhibition to so many Scholars in one of the Universities as they have hundred pounds a year in Church-Promotions That a fifth part of their Benefices be bestowed on their Mansion-Houses or Chancels till they be fully repaired 8. And that no Ecclesiastical Persons haunt Ale-houses or Taverns or any place of unlawfull Gaming That they Examine such as come to Confession in Lent whether they can recite their Credo Pater-Noster and Ten Commandments in English before they receive the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar or else they ought not to presume to come to God's Board That none be admitted to Preach except sufficiently Licenced 11. That if they have heretofore extolled Pilgrimages Reliques Worshipping of Images c. they now openly recant and reprove the same as a Common Errour groundless in Scripture 12. That they detect and present such who are Lettours of the Word of God in English and Fautours of the Bishop of Rome his pretended Power That no Person from henceforth shal alter any Fasting-day or manner of Common-Prayer or Divine Service otherwise then is specified in these Injuâ—ctions untill otherwise Ordered by the King's Authority 21. And that in time of High Mass he that sayeth or singeth a Psalm shall read the Epistle and Gospel in English and one Chapter in the New Testament at Mattens another at Even-song And that when nine Lessons are to be read in the Church three of them shal be omitted with Responds And at the Even-song the Responds with all the Memories By which last word I understand the Anniversary Commemoration of deceased Persons on the day of their deaths which frequently were expressed by the name Obits That every Dean Arch-Deacon c. being a Priest Preach by himself personally every year at least 27. That they Instruct their People not obstinately to violate the Ceremonies of the Church by the King Commanded to be observed and not as yet abrogated And on the other side that whosoever doth Superstitiously abuse them doth
to the great Troubles in the Court began in the Destruction of the Duke of Sommerset but ending in the untimely death of this Hopeful King so signified as it was thought upon the Post-Fact by two strange Presages within the compass of this year and one which followed in the next The first of this year was a great and terrible Earthquake which happened on the twenty fifth of May at Croydon and some other Villages thereabouts in the County of Surrey This was conceived to have Prognosticated those Concussions which afterwards happened â—n the Court to the fall of the Great Duke of Sommerset and divers Gentlemen of Note and Quality who perished in the same ruin with him The last was of six Dolphins taken up in the Thames three of them at Queen Borough and three near Grenwich the least as big as any Horse The Rarity whereof occasioned some Grave men to dispence with their Prudence and some Great Persons also to put off their State that they might behold a Spectacle so unusual to them Their coming up so far beheld by Mariners as a Presage of foul weather at Sea but afterwards by States-Men of those Storms and Tempests which afterwards befell this Nation in the Death of King Edward and the Tempestuous Times of Queen Marie's Reign But the most sad Presage of all was the Breaking out of a Disease called the Sweating Sickness appearing first at Shrewsbury on the fifteenth of April and after spreading by degrees over all the Kingdom ending its Progress in the North about the beginning of October Described by a very Learned Man to be a new strange and violent Disease wherewith if any man were attached he dyed or escaped within nine hours of ten at most if he slept as most men desired to do he dyed within six hours if he took cold he dyed in three It was observed to Rage chiefly amongst men of strongest Constitution and years few aged Men or Women or young Children being either subject to it or dying of it Of which last sort those of most Eminent Rank were two of the Sons of Chaâ—ls Brandon both dying at Cambridg both Dukes of Suffolk as their Father had been before but the youngest following his dead Brother so close at the Heels that he onely out-lived him long enough to enjoy that Title And that which was yet most strange of all no Foreigner which was then in England four hundred French attending here in the Hottest of it on that King's Ambassadours did perish by it The English being singled out tainted and dying of it in all other Countries without any danger to the Natives called therefore in most Latine Writers by the name of Sudor Anglicus or The English Sweat First known amongst us in the beginning of the Reign of King Henry the Seventh and then beheld as a Presage of that troublesom and Laborious Reign which after followed the King being for the most part in continual Action and the Subjects either sweating out their Blood or Treasure Not then so violent and extreme as it was at the present such infinite Multitudes being at this time swept away by it that there died eight hundred in one week in London onely These being looked on as Presages we will next take a view of those sad Events which were supposed to be prognosticated by them beginning first with the Concussions of the Court by open Factions and ending in a Sweating Sickness which drew out some of the best Blood and most Vital Spirits of the Kingdom The Factions Headed by the Duke of Sommerset and the Earl of Warwick whose reconciliation on the Earl's part was but feigned and counterfeit though he had both given and taken Pledges for a faster Friendship The good success he found in his first attempt against the Duke when he degraded him from the Office of Lord Protectour emboldened him to make some further trial of his Fortune to which there could not be a stronger Temptation then the Servility of some Great Men about the Court in prostituting their affection to his Pride and Tyranny Grown absolute in the Court but more by the weakness of others then any virtue of his own he thought it no impossible matter to make that Weakness an improvement of his strength and Power And passing from one Imagination to another he fixed at last upon a Fancy of transferring the Imperial Crown of this Realm from the Royal Family of the Tudors unto that of the Dudlies This to be done by Marrying one of his Sons to the Lady Jane the eldest Daughter of Henry Lord Marquess Dorset and of the Lady Francis his Wife one of the Daughters and co-Heirs of Charls Brandon the late Duke of Suffolk by Mary Dowager of France and the beâ—t-beloved Sister of King Henry the Eighth In order whereunto he must first oblige the Marquess by some signal favour advance himself to such a Greatness as might render any of his Sons an agreeable match for either of the Marquess's Daughters and finally devise some means by which the Duke of Sommerset might be took out of the way whose life he looked on as the principal Obstacle to his great Aspirings By this Design he should not onely satisfie his Ambition but also sacrifice to Revenge The Execution of his Father in the first year of the Reign of the late King Henry would not out of his mind and by this means he might have opportunity to execute his just vengeance on the King's Posterity for the unjust Murther as he esteem'd it of his innocent Father Confirmed in these Resolves by Sir John Gates Lieutenant of the Band of Pensioners who was reported afterwards to have put this Plot into his Head at the first as he stood to him in the prosecution of it to the very last The Privy Council of his own thoughts having thus advised the Privy Council of the King was in the next place to be made sure to him either obliged by Favours or gained by Flatteries those of most Power to be most Courted through a smooth Countenance fair Language and other thriving Acts of insinuation to be made to all Of the Lord Treasurer Paulet he was sure enough whom he had found to have so much of the Willow in him that he could bend him how he pleased And being sure of him he thought himself as sure of the Publick Treasure as if it were in his own Pockets The Marquess of North-hampton was Captain of the Band of Pensioners encreased in Power though not in Place by ranging under his Command as well the Light-Horse as the Men at Arms which had served at Bulloign With him the Earl had peeced before drew him into his first Design for bringing down the Lord Protectour to a lower Level but made him faster then before by doing so many good Offices to Sir William Herbert who had Married his Sister Which Herbert being son of Richard Herbert of Ewias one of the Bastards of William Lord Herbert of Ragland the first
Earl of Pembroke of that House was of himself a Man of a daring Nature Boisterously bold and upon that account much favoured by King â—enry the Eighth growing into â—ore Credit with the King in regard of the Lady Ann his Wife the Sister of Queen Katâ—â—in Par and having mightily raised hâ—msâ—lf in the fall of Abbies he was made chief Gentleman of the Privy-Chamber and by that Title raâ—ked amongst the Executours of the King 's last Will and then appointed to be one of the Council to the King now Reigning Being found by Dudly a fit man to advance his ends he is by his Procurement gratâ—fiâ—d for I know not what Service unless it were for furthering the Sale of Bulloign with some of the King's Lands amounting to five hundred pounds in yearly Rents and made Lord Prâ—sident of Wales promoted afterwards to the place of Master of the Horse that he might be as considerabâ—e in the Court as he was in the Country It was to be presumed that he would not be wanting unto him who had so preferred him By these three all Affairs of Court were carried plotâ—ed by Dudley smoothed by the Courtship of the Marquess and executed by the bold hand of the new Lord President Being thus fortified he revives his former Quarrel with the Duke of Sommerset not that he had any just ground for it but that he looked upon him as the onely Block which lay in the way of his Aspirings and â—herefore was to be removed by what means soever Plots are lai'd therefore to entrap him Snares to catch him Reports raised him as a Proud and Ambitious Person of whose Aspirings there would be no other end then the Crown it self and common Rumours spread abroad that some of his Followers had Proclaimed him King in several places onely to finde how well the People stood affected to it His Doors are watched and Notice took of all that went in and out his Words observed made much worse by telling and aggravated with all odious Circumstances to his Disadvantage No way untravailed in the Arts of Treachery and Fraud whâ—ch might bring him into Suspicion with the King and Obloquie with the common People The Duke's Friends were not ignorant of all these Practises and could not but perceive but that his Ruin and their own was projected by them The Law of Nature bound them to preserve themselves but their Adversaries were too cunning for them at the Weapon of Wit and had too much Strength in their own Hands to be easily overmastered in the way of Power Some dangerous Counsels were thereupon infused into him more likely by his Wife then by any other to invite these Lords unto a Banquet and either to kill them as they sate or violently to drag them from the Table and cut of their Heads the Banquet to be made at the Lord Pageâ—'s Hoâ—se near Saint Clement's Church and one hundred stout Men to be lodged in Sommerset-Place not far off for the Execution of that Mâ—rther This Plot confessed if any Credit may be given to such Confessions by one Crane and his Wife both great in the Favour of the Duchess and with her committed And after justâ—fied by Sir Thomas Palmer who was committed with the Duke in his Examination taken by the Lords of the Council There were said to be some Consultations also for raising the Forces in the North for setting upon the Gens'd arms which served in the Nature of a Life-Guard as before was said upon some day of General-Muster two thousand Foot and one hundred Horse of the Duke's being designed unto that Service and that being done to raise the City by Proclaiming Liberty To which it was added by Hammond one of the Duke 's false Servants That his Chamber at Greenwich had been strongly guarded by Night to prevent the Surprisal of his Person How much of this is true or whether any of it be true or not it is not easie to determâ—ne though possibly enough it is that all this Smoak could not be without some Fire which whosoever kindled first there is no doubt but that Earl Dudly blew the Coals and made it seem greater then it was Of all these Practises and Designs if such they were the Earl is conâ—tantly advertised by his Espials whom he had amongâ—â— them and gave them as much Linâ— and Leisure as they could desire till he had made all things ready for the Executing of his own Projectments But first there must be a great day of bestowing Honours as well for gaining the more Credit unto him and his Followers as by the jollity of the Time to take away all Fear of Danger from the Opposite Party In Pursuit whereof Henry Lord Gray Marquess of Dorset descended from Elizabeth Wife of King Edward the Fourth by Her former Husband is made Duke of Suffolk to which he might pretend some Claim in Right of the Lady Frances his Wife the eldest Daughter of Charls Brandon Duke of Suffolk and Sister of Henry anâ— Charls the two late Dukes thereof who dyed a few Moneths since at Cambridg of the Sweating Sickness The Earl himself for some Reasons very well known to himself and not unknown to many others is made Duke of Northumberland which Title had lain Dormant ever since the Death of Henry Lord Percy the sixth Earl of that Family who dyed in the year 1537. or thereabouts of whom more anon The Lord Treasurer Pawlet being then Earl of Wiltshire is made Marquess of Winchester Sir William Herbert created at the same time Lord Herbert of Cardiff and Eâ—rl of Pembroke Some make Sir Thomas Darcie Captain of the Guard to be advanced unto the Title of Lord Darcy of Chich on the same day also which others place perhaps more rightly on the fifth of April The Solemnity of which Creations being passed over the Order of Knighthood is conferred on William Cecil Esquire one of the Secretaries of Estate John Cheek Tutour or Schole-Master to the King Henry Dudley and Henry Nevil Gentlemen of the Privy-Chamber At or about which time Sir Robert Dudley the third Son of the new Duke of Nâ—rthumberland but one which had more of the Father in hâ—m then all the rest is sworn of the Bedâ—Chamber to the King which was a place of greatest Trust and Nearness to His Majestie 's Person The Triumphs of this Day being the eleventh day of October were but a Porlogue to the Tragedy which began on the fifth day after At what time the Duke of Sommerset the Lord Gray Sir Thomas Palmer Sir Ralph Vane Sir Thomas Arundel together with Hammond Newdigate and two of the Seimours were seised on and committed to Custody all of them except Palmer Vane and Arundel being sent to the Tower And these three kept in several Chambers to attend the pleasure of the Council for their Examinations The Duchess of Sommerset Crane and his Wife above-mentioned and one of the Gentlewomen of her Chamber were sent unto the Tower on the morrow
Sermon wrought so far upon Him that He caused the Bishop to be sent for gave him great Thanks for his good Exhortation and thereupon entred into Communication with him about the devising of some Coâ—rse by which so great and good a Work should be brought to pass His Advice was That Letters should be written to the Lord Mayour and Aldermen for taking the Business into Consideration in Reference to such Poor as swarmed in great numbers about the City To which the King so readily hearkened that the Letters were dispatched and Signed before He would permit the Bishop to go out of His Presence Furnished with these Letters and Instructions the Bishop calls before him Sir Richard Dobbs then Lord Mayour of London with so many Aldermen as were thought fit to be advised with in the present Business By whom it was agreed upon That a General Contribution should be made by all wealthy and well-affected Citizens towards the Advancement of a work so necessary for the publick good For the effecting whereof they were all called to their Parish-Churches where by the said Lord Mayour their several Aldermen and other grave Citizens they were by Eloquent Orations perswaded how great and how many Commodities would ensue unto them and their City if the Poor of divers sorts were taken from out their Streets Lanes and Allyes and were bestowed and provided for in several Hospitals It was therefore moved that every man would signifie what they would grant towards the preparing and furnishing of such Hospitals as also what they would contribute weekly towards their Maintenance untill they were furnished with a more Liberal Endowment Which Course prevailed so far upon them that every man subscribed according to his Ability and Books were drawn in every Ward of the City containing the Sum of that Relief which they had contributed Which being delivered unto the Mayour were by Him humbly tendred to the King's Commissioners on the seventeenth of February This good Foundation being lai'd a Beginning was put to the Reparation of the decayed Buildings in the Gray-Friers on the twenty sixth of July for the Reception of such poor fatherless Children as were then to be provided for at the publick Charge The like Reparation also made of the Ruinous Buildings belonging to the late dissolved Priory of Saint Thomas in the Burough of Southwark which the Citizens had then newly bought of the King to serve for an Hospital of such Wounded Sick and Impotent Persons as were not fit to be intermingled with the Sound The Work so diligently followed in both places at once that on the twenty third of November the sick and maimed People were taken into the Hospital of Saint Thomas and into Christ-Hospital to the number of four hundred Children all of them to have Meat Drink Lodging and Cloths at the Charge of the City till other means could be provided for their future Maintainance And long it was not before such further Means was provided for them by the Bounty and Piety of the King then drawing as near unto his End as his Father was when he lai'd the first Foundation of that Pious Work For â—earing with what chearfulness the Lord Major and Aldermen had conformed themselves to the effect of His former Letters and what a great advance they had made in the Work commanded them to attend Him on the tenth of April gave them great thanks for their Zeal and forwardness and gave for ever to the City his Palace of Bridewel erected by King Henry the Eight to be employed as a relieving house for such Vagabounds and thriftless Poor as should be sent thither to receive Chastisement and be forced to labour For the better maintainance whereof and the more liberal Endowment of the other Hospitals before remembred it was suggested to him that the Hospital founded in the Savoy by King Henry the seventh for the Relief of Pilgrims and Travellers was lately made the Harbour or relieving Place for Loytereâ—s Vagabonds and Strumpets who sunned themselves in the Fields all Day and at Night found entertainment there The Master and Brethren of the House are thereupon sent for to the King who dealt so powerfully and effectually with them that they resigned the same into His Hands with all the Lands and Goods thereunto belonging Out of which He presently bestowed the Yearly Rent of Seven Hundred Marks with all the Beds Bedding and other Furniture which he found therein towards the maintainance of the said Work-House and the Hospital of St. Thomas in Southwark The Grant whereof He confirmed by His Letters Patents bearing Date the 26th of June adding thereunto a Mort-Main for enabling the City to purchase Lands to the value of four thousand Marks per annum for the better maintainance of those and the other Hospitals So that by the Donation of Bridewel which He never built and the suppression of the Hospital in the Savoy which He never endowed He was entituled to the Foundation of Bridewel St. Bartholomew's and St. Thomas without any charge unto himself But these last Passages concerning the Donation of Bridewel the suppression of the Hospital in the Savoy and the Endowment of the said three Houses with the Lands thereof hapned not till the year ensuing Anno 1553. though lai'd unto the rest in the present Narrative in regard of the Dependence which it hath on the former Story Nothing else memorable in the course of this present Year but the coming of Cardanus the death of Leland and the preferment of Doctor John Taylor to the See of Lincoln The See made void by the death of Doctor Henry Holbeach about the beginning of August in the former year and kept void by some powerful men about the King till the 26th of June in the year now present At what time the said Doctour Taylor who before had been Dean of that Church was Consecrated Bishop of it During which interval the Patrimony of that great and wealthy Bishoprick one of the richest in the Kingdom was so dismembred in it self so parcelled and marked out for a Prey to others that when the New Bishop was to be restored unto his Temporals under the Great Seal of England as the Custom is there was none of all his Maours reserved for him but his Manour of Bugden together with some Farms and Impropriations toward the support of his Estate The rest was to be raised out of the profits perquisits and emoluments of his Jurisdict â— on yet so that nothing was to be abated in his Tenths and first-fruits which were kept up according to the former value As for John Leland for whose death I finde this year assigned he had his Education in Christ's Colledg in Cambridg Being a man of great parts and indefatigable industry he was imployed by King Henry the Eight to search into the Libraries and Collect the Antiquities of Religious Houses at such time as they lay under the fear of suppression Which work as he performed with more
Proficiency in all parts of Learning she became very dear to the young King Edward to whom Fox not onely makes Her equal but doth acknowledge her also to be His Superiour in those Noble Studies And for an Ornament superadded to Her other Perfections she was most zealously affected to the true Protestant Religion then by Law established which She embraced not out of any outward compliance with the present current of the Times but because Her own most Excellent Judgment had been fully satisfied in the Truth and Purity thereof All which together did so endear her to the King that he took great Delight in Her Conversation and made it the first step to that Royal Throne to which He afterwards designed Her in the Time of His Sickness Thus lived she in these sweet Contentments till she came unto the years of Marriage when she that never found in Her self the least Spark of Ambition was made the most unhappy Instrument of another man's Dudly of Warwick a Person of a proud deceitfull and aspiring Nature began to entertain some Ambitious thoughts when Edward first began to Reign but kept them down as long as his two Uncles lived together in Peace and Concord But having found a means to dissolve that knot occasioned by the Pride and Insolency of the Duchess of Sommerset one as ill-Natured as himself he first made use of the Protectour to destroy the Admiral and after served himself by some Lords of the Court for humbling the Lord Protectour to an equal Level with the rest of the Council Finding by this Experiment how easie a thing it was to serve his Turn by them on all other Occasions he drew unto himself the managing of all Affairs none being so hardy as to question any of his Actions and much less to cross them But not content with being looked on as the Chief in Power he is resolved to make himself the first in Place thinking no private Greatness to be answerable to so great a Merit as he had fancied in himself Thus busying his unquiet thoughts upon new Designs and passing from one imagination to another he fixed at last upon a purpose of Husbanding the Opportunities to his best Advantage in transferring the Crown into his own Family which he thought Capable enough of the highest Honours For why said he within himself should not the Son of a Dudly being the more Noble House of the two be thought as Capable of the Imperial Crown of this Realm as the Son or Grand-Childe of a Seimour Though I pretend not to be born of the Race of Kings yet I may give a King to England of my Race and Progeny on as good ground as any which derive themselves from Owen Tudor the Ancestour of the Boy now reigning That Family pretended onely from a Daughter to the House of Sommerset and there are now some Daughters of the House of Suffolk which may pretend as much as she If by a Match into that House I can finde a way to bring the Crown into mine own I shall want no Presidents at home and finde many abroad Some Dangers may present themselves in the Pursuit of this Enterprise but Dangers are to be despised as in all great Actions so chiefly when a Crown is aimed at It is resolved that I will try my Fortune in it which if it prosper to my wish I shall live Triumphantly if I sink under the Attempt I shall perish Nobly Which being concluded and resolved on he first insinuates himself into the good affections of the Marquess of Dorset whom he assisteth in his Suit for the Title of Suffâ—lk which without him was not to be gained exalts himself to the like Glorious Title of Duke of Northumberland that he might stand on equal â—round with the proudest of them and in a word so cunningly prepareth his Toils for the Duke of Sommerset that at the last he fell into them never to be set free again untill Death released him all which Particulars have been at large laid down in the former History And this being done he suffered the young King to wear out all the following year the better to avoid all Popular suspition that His Uncle's Death was onely hastened to make way for His. And possible it is that he might have tired it out a little longer but for a smart Jest which He put upon this Ambiâ—ious Minister The King took great delight in his Bow and Arrows and shooting one day at the Butt as He used to do hit the very White Well aimed my Liege said Merrily the Mighty Duke But you aimed better said the King when you shot off the head of My Vncle Sommerset which words so stang the Conscience of the guilty man that he could not think himself secure but by accelerating his Design for settling the Crown upon the Head of one of his Children according to the Plot which he had hammered in the Forge of his Wretched Brain For now the King beginning sensibly to decay he takes his time to enter into Communication with the Duke of Suffolk about a Marriage to be made betwixt the Lord Guilford Dudly his fourth Son and the Lady Jane Gray the Duke's eldest Daughter which with the rest of the Marriages before-mentioned being propounded and concluded for he was grown too great and known to be too dangerous to be denied in any reasonable Suit a day was set in which this Excellent Lady was to be transplanted into the Family of the Dudlies A day which she expected with a Virgin Modesty and after the Solemnity of the Nuptial Rites delivers Her pure Body to the chast Embraces of a Vertuous Conâ—ort who of all Dudlie's Brood had nothing of the Father in him All which succeeding to his wish he sets himself to the accomplishing of that Project which he had long before designed The King was now grown weak in Body and decayed in Spirits and in that weak Estate he takes his Opportunities to inculcate to Him what infinite Blessings had been derived from Him on this Church and Nation by the Blessed Reformation of Religion so happily began and brought to such Perfection by Him That it must therefore be His Care so to provide for the Continuance of those infinite Blessings that Posterity might enjoy the Benefit and Comfort of it which would gain Him a more pretious Memory amongst His Subjects then all His other Princely Virtues That nothing was more feared by all Sorts of People then that the Crown Imperial if it should please Almighty God to call Him to a Crown of Glâ—ry would fall upon the Head of the Lady Mary a Princess passionately affected to the Interess of the Church of Rome and one who by Her Marriage with some Potent Prince of that Religion might Captivate the Free-Born English Nation to a Foreign Servitude That both His Sisters being born of disputed Marriages and howsoever being but his half Sisters onely and by several Ventures could neither be Heirs to Him nor to
rather add to His Afflictions then encrease that Quiet wherewith they had possessed their souls for the stroke of Death that He demanded a Lenitive which would put fire into the Wound and that it was to be feared Her Presence would rather weaken then strengthen Him that He ought to take courage from his Reason and derive constancy from his own heart that if his soul were not firm and setled She could not settle it by Her eyes nor confirm it by Her words that He should do well to remit this Interview to the other World that there indeed Friendships were happy and Unions undesolvable and that theirs would be Eternal if their souls carried nothing with them of Terrestrial which might hinder them from rejoycing All She could do was to give Him a Farewell out of a Window as He passed toward the place of His dissolution which He suffered on the Scaffold on Tower-Hill with much Christian meekness His Dead body being lai'd in a Car and His Head wrapped up in a Linen-cloth were carried to the Chapel within the Tower in the way to which they were to pass under the Window of the Lady Jane where She had given Him His Fare-well A Spectacle sufficient to disanimate a couragious Heart not armed with the Constancy and Resolution of so brave a Vertue The Spectacle endured by Her with the less Astonishment because She knew She was upon the point of meeting with Him in a better Conjuncture where they should never finde the like Intermission of their Joys and Happinesses It was once resolved on by the Court that She should dy on the same Scaffold with Her Husband but it was feared that being both pittied and beloved by the common People some suddain Commotion might be raised if She were publickly brought forth to Her Execution It was therefore held the safer course that a Scaffold should be erected for Her within the Verge of the Tower on which She might satisfie the greatest severity of the Law without any danger to the State Towards which being to be led by Sir John Gage who was then Constable of the Tower he desired Her to bestow some small Gift upon him to be kept as a Memorial of Her To gratifie which desire She gave him Her Table-Book in which She had written three Sentences in Greek Latine and English as She saw Her Husband's Body brought unto the Chapel which She besought him to accept as Her last Bequest The Greek to this effect That If His Executed Body should give Testimony against Her before men His most blessed Soul should give an eternal Proof of Her Innocence in the presence of God the Latine added that Humane Justice was against His Body but the Divine Mercy would be for His Soul and then concluded thus in English that If Her fault deserved Punishment Her Youth at least and Her Imprudence were worthy of Excuse and that God and Posterity would shew Her Favour Conducted by Feckman to the Scaffold She gave not much heed unto his Discourses but kept Her Eyes upon a Prayer-Book of Her own And being mounted on the Throne from which She was to receive a more excellent Crown then any which this vile Earth could give Her She addressed Her self in some few words to the standers by letting them know that Her Offence was not for having lay'd Her Hand upon the Crown but for not rejecting it with sufficient Constancy That She had less erred through Ambition then out of Respect and Reverence to Her Parents acknowledging nevertheless that Her Respect was to be accounted as a Crime and such Reverence to deserve a Punishment That She would willingly admit of Death so to give satisfaction to the injured State that by Obedience to the Laws She might voluntarily take off the Scandal which She had given by Her constrained Obedience to Her Friends and Kindred concluding finally that She had justly deserved this Punishment for being made the instrument thugh the unwâ—lliâ—g Instrument of another's Ambition and should leave behind Her an Examplâ— that Innâ—â—ence excuseth not great Mâ—sdeeds if they any way tenâ— to the Destruction of the Commonâ—Wealth Which said and desiring the people to recommend Her in their Prayers to the mercies of God She caused Her self to be disrobed by some of Her Women who with wâ—â— Eyes and heavy Hearts performed that Office which was to Her no more unwelcome then if it had been nothing but the preparation to the Death of Sleep and not unto the Sleep of Death And being now â—eady for the Blâ—ck with the same clear and untroubled Countenance wherewith She had acted all the rest of Her Tragedy She said aloud the Psalm of Miseâ—ere mei â—eus in the English Tongue and so submitted Her pure Neck to the Exâ—cutioner Touching the Bonds Recognâ—scances Grants Conveyances and other Lâ—gal Instruments which â—ad been made in the short Reign of this Queen a doubt was raâ—sed amongâ—â— our Lawyers whither they were good and valid in the Law or not The Reason of which Scruple was because that Interval of time which passed between the Death of King Edward on the sixth of July and the Proclaiming of Queen Mary in all Parts of thâ— Realm was in the Law to be esteemed as a part of Her Reign without any notice to be taken of the interposing of the Lady Jane in the fiâ—st year of whose Reign the said Bonds Recogniscances Grants c. had their several Dates And thereupon it was Enacted in the following Parliament That all Statutes Recogniscances and other Writings whatsoever knoledged or made by or to any Person or Persons Bodies Politick or Corporate being the Queen's Subjects since the sixth day of July last past untill the fiâ—st day of August then next following under the Name of the Reign of any other Person then under the Namâ— of the said â—ueen's Majesty with the Stile appropriated or united to Her Majestie 's Imperial Crown shall be as good and â—ffectual in the Law to all intents purposes coâ—structions and meanings as if upon the mâ—king thereof the Name of the said Queen Mary with Her Stileâ—appropâ—â—ated had been fully and plainly expressed in the same Wâ—â—h a Proviso notwithstanding that all Grants Letters Patents and Commissions made by the said Lady Jane to any Person or Persons whatsoever should be reputed void and of none â—ffâ—ct Whâ—ch Proviso seems to have been added not onâ—ly for the making void of all such Grants of the Crown-Lands as had passed in the Name of the said Queen Jane if any such Grants were ever made but for invalidating the Commiâ—â—â—on granted to the Duke of Northumberland for raising Arms in Her behalf The pleading whereof though it could not be allowed for his Indâ—mnity when he stood at the Bar might possibly have raised some Reproach or Trouble to his Peers and Judges if the Integrity of their Proceedings had been called in Question Such was the end of the short Life but far shorter Reign of the Lady Jane
had been reduced into a narrower number than at any other time before The Sees of Salisbâ—ry and Oxon had been made vacant in the year 1557. by the death of Capâ—n in the one and of King in the other neither of which Churches had since been filled and that of Oxon not in ten years after Pacefew of Hereford Holyman of Bâ—istow and Glyn of Bangor died some few weeks before the Queen Cardinal Poâ—e of Canterbury on the same day with her Hopton of Norwich and Broâ—ks of Glâ—cester within few weeks after Gryssin of Rochester departed this life about the beginning of the Parliament about which time also Paâ—es of Worcester forsook the Kingdom and was followed by Goldwel of St Asaph in the end of May so that there were no more than fifteen living of that sacred Order And they being called in the beginning of July by certain of the Lords of the Council commissionated thereunto in due form of Law were then and there required to take the oath of Supremacy according to the law made in that behalf Kitchin of Landaff only takes it who having formerly submitted unto every change resolved to shew himself no Changling in not conforming to the pleasure of the Higher Powers By all the rest it was refused that is to say by Dr Heath Archbishop of York Bonner of London Tonstall of Duâ—ham White of Winchester Thirlby of Ely Watson of Lincoln Pool of Peteâ—borough Christopherson of Chichester Bourn of Wels Turbervile of Exeter Morgan of St Davids Bain of Lichfield Scot of Chester and Oglethorp Bishop of Carlisle And yet these men which makes it seem the greater wonder had either taken the like oath as Priests or Bishops in some part or other of the Reign of the two last Kings But now they had hardened one another to a resolution of standing out unto the last and were thereupon deprived of their several Bishopricks as the Law required A punishment whiâ—h came not on them all at once some of them being borne withall in hope of their conformity and submission till the end of September And when it came it came accompanied with so much mercy that they had no reason to complain of the like extremity as they had put upon their brethren in the late Queens time So well were they disposed of and accommodated with all things necessary that they lived more at ease and in as prosperous a condition as when they were possessed of their former dignities Archbishop Heâ—th was suffered to abide in one of his own purchased houses never restrained to any place and died in great favour with the Queen who bestowed many gratious visits on him during this retirement Tonstall of Durham spent the remainder of his tâ—â—e with Archbishop Parker by whom he was kindly entertained and honourably buried The like civility afforded also in the same house to â—hirlby of Ely and unto Bourn of Wâ—lls by the Dean of Exon in which two houses they both dyed about ten years after White though at first imprisoned for his hauts and insolencies after some cooling of himself in the Tower of London was suffered to enjoy his liberty and to retire himself to what friend he pleased Which favour was vouchsafed unto Tuâ—bervile also who being by birth a Gentleman of an ancient Family could not want friends to give him honest entertainment Wâ—tson of Lincoln having endured a short restraint spent the remainder of his time with the Bishops of Rochester and Ely till being found practising against the State he was finally shut up in Wisbich Castle where at last he died Oglethorp died soon after his deprivation of an Apoplexy Bayne of the Stone and Morgan of some other disease in December following but all of them in their beds and in perfect liberty Poole by the clemency of the Queen injoyed the like freedom courteously treated by all persons amongst whom he lived and at last died upon one of his own Farms in a good old age And as for Christopherson he had been in his time so good a Benefactor to Trinity College in Cambridge whereof he had been sometimes Master that he could not want some honest and ingenuous retribution if the necessity of his estate had required the same Bonner alone was doomed to a constant imprisonment which was done rather out of care for his preservation than as a punishment of his crimes the prison proving to that wretch his safest sanctuary whose horrid tyrannies had otherwise exposed him to the popular fury So loud a lie is that of Genebrard though a good Chronologer that the Bishops were not only punished with imprisonment and the loss of their livelihoods but that many of them were destroyed by poyson famine and many other kinds of death The Bishops being thus put to it the Oath is tendered next to the Deans and Dignitaries and by degrees also to the Rural Clergy refused by some and took by others as it seemed most agreeable to their consciences or particular ends For the refusal whereof or otherwise for not conforming to the publick Liturgy I find no more to have been deprived of their preferments than fourteen Bishops six Abbots Priors and Governours of Religious Orders twelve Deans and as many Arch-Deacons fifteen Presidents or Masters of Colleges fifty Prebendaries of Cathedral Churches and about eighty Parsons of Vicars The whole number not amounting to 200 men which in a Realm consisting of nine thousand Parishes and 26 Cathedral Churches could be no great matter But then we are to know withall that many who were cordially affected to the interess of the Church of Rome dispensed with themselves in these outward conformities which some of them are said to do upon a hope of seeing the like revolution by the death of the Queen as had before hapned by the death of King Edward and otherwise that they might be able to relieve their brethren who could not so readily frame themselves to a present compliance Which notwithstanding so it was that partly by the deprivation of these few persons but principally by the death of so many in the last years sickness there was not a sufficient number of learned men to supply the cures which filled the Church with an ignorant and illiterate Clergy whose learning went no further than the Liturgy or the Book of Homilies but otherwise conformable which was no small felicity to the Rules of the Church And on the other side many were raised to great preferments who having spent there time of exile in such forein Churches as followed the platform of Geneva returned so disaffected to Episcopal Government unto the Rites and Ceremonies here by law established as not long after filled the Church with most sad disorders not only to the breaking of the bond of peace but to the grieving and extinguishing of the spirit of Unity Private opinions not regarded nothing was more considered in them than their zeal against Popery and their abilities in learning to confirm that zeal On which account
not be affirmed of England in the times preceding so neither can it now be said of any State or Nation in the Christian world in all which there are several sorts of copper mony as current with them for publick uses as the purest metal She provided also in like manner for her peoples safety and the encrease of Trade and Merchandise in English Bottoms For towards the end of this second year she made great preparation of Ordinance Arms Munition and Powder of her own materials to be in a readiness to defend her Realm in all emergencies of danger For the advancing of which service it so pleased the divine Providence which watched over her actions that a rich Mine of Brass was found near Keswick in Cumberland such as sufficed not onely for furnishing her own Forts and Ships with all manner of Ordinance but for supplying other Countries as their wants required And to compleat so great a mercy in her preservation the Stone called Lapis Calaminaris exceeding necessary for all Brass-works was at the same time also found in England in most plentiful manner And whereas complaint was made unto her by the Merchants of the Hans-towns or Merchants of the Stilyard as then commonly called that King Edward had first ceized their Liberties and that afterwards Queen Mary had raised their Customs upon all sorts of Merchandises from one to twenty in the Hundred her Answer was That as she was resolved not to Innovate any thing so she could grant no other privileges and immunities to them than those in which she found them when she came to the Crown Their Trading hereupon being intermitted the English Merchants took the managing of it upon themselves and thrived therein so well after some adventures that Cloth and other Manufactures heretofore transported in the ships of those Merchants were from henceforth fraughted and dispersed in English Vessels By means whereof the English in a very short time attained unto the reputation of being the wealthiest Merchants the most expert Mariners and the ablest Commanders for Sea-fights of any Nation in the world I shall conclude this year with a work of piety in the foundation of the Collegiat Church of St. Peter in Westminster which in the space of twenty years had been changed from an Abbey to a Deanry from a Deanry to a See Episcopal reduced unto a Deanry again and finally restored to the state of an Abbey But the Abbey being dissolved in the foregoing Parliament an offer was made to Fecknam and the rest of the Convent if Sanders be to be believed in this particular for continuing in their places and possessions as before they did clogged with no other conditions than the taking of the Oath of Supremacy and officiating all divine Offices by the English Liturgy But this offer being by them rejected the Act of dissolution passed in both Houses of Parliament Concerning which there goes a story that the Lord Abbot being then busied in planting some young Elms in the Deans yard there one that came by advised him to desist from his purpose telling him That the Bill was just then passed for dissolving his Monastery To which the good old man replied That he resolved howsoever to go on with his work being well assured that that Church would be always kept for an encouragement and seat of Learning And so it proved in the event for the Queen having pleased her self in the choice of some of the best Lands which remained unto it confirmed the rest upon that Church which she caused to be called the Collegiat Church of St. Peter in Westminster as appears by her Letters Parens bearing date in the second year of her most gracious and most prosperous Reign A foundation of a large capacity and as amply privileged consisting of a Dean and twelve secular Canons two School masters and forty Scholars petit Canons and others of the Quire to the number of thirty ten Officers belonging to the Church and as many servants appertaining to the College diet and twelve Alms-men besides many Officers Stewards Receivers and Collectors for keeping Courts and bringing in of their Revenue the principal of which called the High Steward of Westminster hath ever since been one of the prime Nobility and in great favour at the Court The Dean entrusted with keeping the Regalia honored with a place of necessary service at all Coronations and a Commissioner for the Peace within the City of Westminster and the Liberties of it by Act of Parliament The Dean and Chapter vested with all manner of jurisdiction both Ecclesiastical and Civil not onely within the City and liberties of Westminster but within the precinct of St. Martins le grand and some Towns of Essex exempted in the one from the Bishop of London and in the other from the power of the Archbishop of Canterbury The Scholars annually preferred by election either to Christ-Church in Oxon or Trinity College in Cambrige each College being bound by an Indenture made with Queen Elizabeth to take off yearly two or three at the least though since that number is extended to four or five to be preferred to Scholarships Fellowships in their several Houses A College founded as it proved in such a happy conjuncture that since this new foundation of it it hat given breeding and preferment to four Archbishops two Lord Chancellors or Lord Keepers of the Great Seal of England twenty two Bishops and thirteen Deans of cathedral Churches besides Archdeacons and Prebendaries and other dignitaries in the Church to a proportionable number which is more than can be said of either of the two famous Colleges of Aeton and Winchester or of both together though the one was founded 168 and the other 114 years before it Anno Reg. Eliz. 3. A. D. 1560 1561. WE shall begin this third year of the Queen with the death of Francis the second King of the French who deceased on the 5th day of December when he had scarce lived to the end of his 17th year and had Reigned but one year and five months or thereabouts His death much altered both the counsels and affairs of Christendom distracting the French Nation into schisms and â—actions incouraging the Sâ—ots to proceed with confidence in their Reformation and promising no small security to Queen Elizabeth in regard of the pretensions of the Queen of Scots But so little was her condition bettered by it that she seemed to be in more danger by the acts of her enemies after his decease than formerly in the time of his life and government Francis of Gâ—ise a man of great abilities for Camp and Counsel had made himself a very strong party in the Court of France which he intended to make use of for the Queen of Scots whose Mother the late Queen Regent of Scotland was his only sister And this he might the better do by reason of a division in the Court of France about the government of the Kingdom during the minority of Charls
desire to gain the more time for finishing his Book against Bishop Gardiner whiâ—h he alledged for himself in a Letter to one of his friends Certain it is that it had too much in it of a sinful compliance so much as might have blasted both his fame and memory to all times succeeding if he had not taken off the scandal and expiated the offence in so brave a manner And thus he dyed leaving an excellent example to all posterity as well of mans infirmity in so strange a fall as of Gods infinite grace and mercy by which he was enabled to recover his former standing These goodly Cedars of the Forest being thus â—ut down it was not to be hoped that any favour could be shown to the Shrubs and Underwoods which were grubbed up and felled without any distinction as well the yourg Sapling as the decayed and withered Tree but more in some parts than in others according to the sharpness of the Tools and the edge of the Woodman The waste so great in no place as in Bonner's waâ—k who seemed to be resolved that whatsoever could not serve for Timber toward the builâ—ing or re-edifying of the Papal palace should be mark'd for Puel No fewer than two hundred are reported to have been burnt within three years by this cruel and unmerciful Tyrant without discrimination of sex or age his fury reaching from John Fetty a lad of eight years old by him sâ—ourged to death even to Hugh Lavecork a cripple sixty eight years old whom he caused to be burned The most eminent of all which number was Mr. John Philpot Archdeacon of Winchester who though of Gardiners Diocesse was condemned by Bâ—nner Gardiner being well enough contented to find out the Game and leave it to be followed by that bloody Hunter His rage not slackned by the interposings of Alphonso a Spanish Frier inveighing sharply in a Sermon before the King against the savage and unprofitable cruelty of the English Bishops but as it seems he measured all the rest by that London-Tyrant though in most other places they were far more moderate He that came nearest to him was Doctor John Christopherson Bishop of Chichester who is recorded to have burnt no lesse than ten in one fire at Lewis and seventeen others at several times in sundâ—y places But still the nearer London the more the heaâ— insomuch that Harpsfield Archdeacon of Canterbury and Thornton the Suffragan of Dover are said to have poured out blood like water As was also done by Griffin of Rochester and Downing Chancellor of Norwich though somewhat further off from the scene of cruelty in their several Diocesses Which character I find of Bishop Bain of Coventry and Lichfield the gentle birth and breeding of Mrs. Joyce Lewis not being too high for him to reach at nor the poor condition of Joan Wast a blind woman in Darby too low for him to stoop too whom he condemned unto the fire as he did many faithfull Ministers and others of the Masculine sex But on the other side in all the Province of York I find none brought unto the Stake but George March of Chester condemned thereto by Bishop Coles and not much more to have been done in the four Welch Diocesses in which besides the burning of Bishop Farrar at Carmarthen by Bishop Morgen and of Rawlins and White at Cardiff by Bishop Kitching no extraordinary cruelty seems to have been acted In the Diocesses of Exceter Wells Peterborough and 〈◊〉 though this last the greatest in the Kingdome I find mention but of one apiece of two in that of Eâ—y and of no mote than three apiece at Bristol and Sarisbury In those of Oxon Glocester Worcester and Hereford I find none at all which made those Counties look like the land of Goshen where there was nothing but fair weather when there was so much thunder and lightning in the rest of Aegypt Nor were these storms and tempests in other places of a short continuance but held on more or less till the death of the Queen as appeareth by those five persons which were burnt at Canterbury on the 10th of November 1558. being but one full week before the day of her own dissolution The difference was that these poor wretches were consumed by the rage of fire whereas she was caried out of the world in a deluge of water falling into a Dropsie in the time of her supposed childing of which she was never perfectly cured till she came to her grave Nor were these all that suffered in the fury of this persecution For besides those that suffered Martyrdome in the sight of the world many are thought to have been made away in prison but many more to the number of some scores or hundreds supposed to have been killed by starving stinks and other barbarous usages in their several Jayls To which if we should add a Catalogue of all those who fled the Kingdom and put themselves into a voluntary exile amounting to the number of 800. or thereabouts I suppose it may be well concluded that though many persecutions have lasted longer yet none since Dioclesian's time ever raged so terribly So terribly it raged in one particular that no persecution of the ten can afâ—ord a parallel Katherine Gouches a poor widdow of St. Peter's Port in the Isle of Guernsâ—y was noted to be much absent from the Church and her two daughters guilty of the same neglect Upon this they were presented before Jaques Amy then Dean of the Island who finding in them that they held opinions contrary to those then allowed about the Sacrament of the Altar pronounced them Hereticks and condemned them to the fire The poor women on the one side pleaded for themselves that that doctrine had been taught them in the time of King Edward but if the Queen was otherwise disposed they were content to be of her Religion This was fair but this would not serve for by the Dean they were delivered to Eli'er Gosling the then Bayliff and by him unto the fire July the 8th 1556. One of the daughters Perotine Massey she was called was at that time great with child her husband a Minister being in those dangerous times fled the Island In the middle of the flames and anguish of her torments her belly brake in sunder and her child a goodly boy fell down into the fire but was presently snatched up by one W. House one of the By standers Upon the noise of this strange accident the cruel Bayliff returned command that the poor infant must be cast again into the flames which was accordingly performed and so that pretty babe was born a Martyr and added to the number of the Holy innocents A cruelty not parallel'd in any story not heard of amongst the Nations But such was the pleasure of the Magistrate as once in the Massacre of the younger Maximinus viz. that not any issue should be left of an Heretick Parent But to go back again to Cranmer it is to
he was not able to resist and thereby gained so much displeasure from the Cardinal Legate that before the end of the next year Anno 1557. he was outed of his Deanry of Windsor and all his other Ecclesiastical promotions upon an information of his being taken in the act of adultery which otherwise perhaps might have been pardoned or connived at in him as in many others But willing or unwilling he had first surrender'd the Church of Westminster which the Queen stocked with a new Convent of Benâ—dictines consisting of an Abbot and fourteen Monks which with their officers were as many as the Lands then left unto it could well maintain And for the first Abbot she made choice of Dr John Fecknam a learned grave and moderate man whom she had formerly made Dean of St Paul's in the place of Dr William May and now made choice of Dr Henry Cole Arch-Deacon of Ely and Prolocutor of the Convocation Anno 1555. to succeed him in it It was upon the 21 of November that the new Abbot and his Monks entred on the possession of their ancient Convent which they held not fully out three years when it was once again dissolved by Act of Parliament of which more hereafter Which fate befel the rest of her foundations also two of which cost her little more than this at Westminster A Convent of Observants being a reformed Order of Franciscan Friers had been founded by King Henry the 7th neer the Mannor of Greenwich and was the first which felt the fury of King Henry the 8th by reason of some open opposition made by some of the Friers in favour of Queen Katherine the mother of the Queen now reigning Which moved her in a pious gratitude to re-edifie that ruined house and to restore as many as could be found of that Order to their old habitations making up their Corporation with some new Observants to a competent number She gathered together also a new Convent of Dominicans or black Friers for whom she provided an house in Smithfield in the City of London â—itting the same with all conveniences both for divine Offices and other necessary uses And having done this she was at no more charges with either of them for both the Observants and Dominicans being begging Fryers might be resembled not unfitly to a swarm of Bees which being provided of an hive are left to make their combs and raise themselves a livelyhood by their natural industry But so she went not off in her other foundations which were to be provided of some proportionable endowment out of the revenues of the Crown towards their support Aâ— Sion nere Brentford in the Country of Middlesex there had been anciently a house of religious women Nuns of the Order of St Bridget dissolv'd as were all teh rest by King Henry the 8th Most of the old ones dead and the younger maried Yet out of such of the old Nuns as remained alive and the addition of some others who were willing to embrace that course of life a competent number was made up for a new Plantation but seated as before at Sion which the Queen repaired and laid unto it a sufficient estate in Lands for their future maintenance Which house being afterwards dissolved also by Queen Elizabeth came first to the possession of Sir Thomas Perrot who gave it to his wife the Lady Dorothy one of the daughters of Walter Divereux Earl of Essex by whom being after married to Henry Lord Percy Earl of Northumberland it was left for a retiring house to that Noble Family who do still enjoy it At Sheen on the other side of the water there had been anciently another religious house not far from a mansion of the Kings to which they much resorted till the building of Richmond This house she stock'd with a new Convent of Carthusians corruptly called the Charter-hoâ—se-Moncks which she endowed with a revenue great enough to maintain that Order which profest more abstemiousness in diet and sparingness of expence in all other things than any others which embraced a Monastical life And the next year having closed up the West end of the Quire or Chancel of the Church of St Johns neer Smithfield which was all the Protector Sommerset had left standing of it she restored the same to the Hospitalry of Knights of St John to whom it formerly belonged assigning a liberal endowment to it for their more honourable subsistence Over whom she placed Sir Thomas Treshaâ—â— for the first Lord Prior a Gentleman of an ancient Family and one that had deserv'd exceeding well of her in defence of her claim against Queen Jane who on the 30th of November 1557. received the Order of the Crosse at Westminster and took possession of his place which having scarce warmed he was taken from it by the stroke of death and left it by the Queen to be disposed of to Sir Râ—chard Shellie the last great Master of that Order in the Realm of England But this expiring with the rest within two years after there remained nothing of all Queen Mary's foundations but her new Hoâ—pital in the Savoy An Hospital had formerly been founded in thaâ— House by her Grandfather King Henry the seventh for the relief of such pilgrims as either went on their Devotions to the shrine of St. Thomas Becket of Canterbury or any other eminent Shrine or Saint in those parts of the Kingdom On a suggestion made to King Edward the sixth that it served onely for a recepracle of vagrant persons it was surrendred to him in the last year of his Reign by the Master and Brethren of the same out of the Lands whereof he assigned the yearly Rent of seven hundred Marks for the maintenance of his new working house of Bridewel which he had given for ever to the Lord Mayor and City of London as hath been signified before in the life of that King together with all the beds bedding and other furniture which were found in this Hospital And though this Grant bare date on the 26 of June in the last year of his Reign Anno 1553. yet the Lord Mayor and Aldermen entred not on the possession of it till the month of February now last past Anno 1555. But having took possession of it and so much of the Lands of this Hospital being setled on it the Hospital in the Savoy could not be restored to its first condition but by a new Endowment from such other Lands belonging to Religious Houses which were remaining in the Crown But the Queen was so resolved upon it that she might add some works of Charity unto those of Piety or else in honour of her Grandfather whose foundation she restored at Greenwich also the Hospital was again refounded on the third of November and a convenient yearly Rent allotted to the Master and Brethren for the entertainment of the Poor according to the tenour and effect of the first Institution Which Prince-like Act so wrought upon the Maids of Honor and other Ladies
and the magnificent Procession of the Knights of the Garter he takes his leave of the King and Queen is re-conveyed unto his lodging and on the 3d. of May embarks for Russiâ— accompanied with four good ships well frought with Merchandise most proper for the trade of that Country to which they were bound The costly presents sent by him from the King and Queen to the Russian Emperour and those bestowed upon himself I leave to be reported by him at his coming home and the relation of John Stow in his Annals of England fol. 630 Nor had I dwelt so long upon these particulars but to set forth the ancient splendor and magnificence of the State of England from which we have so miserably departed in these latter times Worse entertainment found an agent from the French King at his coming hither because he came on a worse errand Stafford an English Gentleman of a Noble Family having engaged himself in some of the former enterprises against this Queen and finding no good fortune in them retired with divers others to the Court of France from whence they endeavoured many times to create some dangers to this Realm by scattering and dispersing divers scandalous Pamphlets and seditious papers tending to the apparent defamation of the King and Queen And having got some credit by these practices amongst the Ministers of that King he undertakes to seize upon some Fortress or Port Town of England and put the same into the hands of the French In prosecution of which plot accompanied with some English Rebels and divers French Adventurers intermingled with them he seizeth on the strong Castle of Scurborough in the Coâ—nty of York From thence he published â— most traiterous and seditious Manifest in which he trayterously affirmed the Queen neither to be the Rightful Queen of this Realm nor to be worthy of the Title affirming that the King had brought into this Realm the number of twelve thousand Spaniards who had possess'd themselves of twelve of the best Holds in all the Kingdome upbraiding the Queen with her misgovernment and taking to himself the Title of Protector of the Realm of England But the Queen being secretly advertised of the whole design by the diligence of Dr Nicholas Wotton Dean of Canterbury who was then Ambassador in that Court Order was taken with the Earl of Westmorland and other Noble men of those parts to watch the Coasts and have a care unto the safety of those Northern Provinces By whom he was so closely watch'd and so well attended that having put himself into that Castle on the 24th he was pulled out of it again on the last of April from thence brought prisoner unto London condemned of Treason executed on the Tower Hill May 28. and on the morrow after three of his accomplices were hanged at Tyburn cut down and quartered But as it was an ill wind which blowes no body good so this French Treason so destructive to the chief conspiratours redounded to the great benefit and advantage of Philip. He had for three years borne the Title of King of England without reaping any profit and commodity by it But being now engaged in war with King Henry the 3d. though in pursute rather of his fathers quarrels than any new ones of his own he takes this opportunity to move the Queen to declare her self against the French to assist him in his war against that King for the good of her Kingdoms It was not possible for the Queen to separate her interest from that of her husband without hazarding some great unkindness if not a manifest breach between them She therefore yields to his desire and by her Proclamation of the 7th of June chargeth that King in having an hand not only in the secret practices of the Duke of Northumberland but also in the open rebellion of Wâ—at and his confederates She also laid unto his charge that Dudley Ashton and some other male contents of England were entertained in the house of his Ambassadors where they cotrived many treasons and conspiraâ—ies against her and her Kingdom that flying into France they were not only entertained in the Court of that King but relieved with pensions Finally that he had aided and encouraged Stafford with shipping men mony and munition to invade her Realm thereby if it were possible to dispossess her of her Crown She therefore gives notice to her subjects that they should forbear all traffick and commerce with the Realm of France from which she had received so many injuries as could admit no reparation but by open war And that she might not seem to threaten what she never intended she causeth an army to be raised consisting of one thousand horse four thousand foot and two thousand pioners which she puts under the command of the Earl of Pembrook and so dispatcheth them for Flanders to which they came about the middle of July King Philip had gone before on the 6th of that month and all things here were followed with such care and diligence that the army staid not long behind but what they did falls not within the compass of this present year All which remains to be remembred in this present year relates unto such changes and alterations as were made amongst the Governors of the Church and the Peers of the Realm It hath been signified before that White of Lincoln had prevailed by his friends in Court to be translated unto Winchester as the place of his Nativity and Education To whom succeeded Dr Thomas Watson Master of St John's College in Cambridge and Dean of Durham elected to the See of Lincoln before Christmass last and acting by that name and in that capacity against the dead body of Martin Bucer To Day of Chichester who deceased on the 2d of Aug. in the beginning of his year succeeded Dr John Christopherson a right learned man Mr of Trinity College in Cambridge and Dean of Norwich elected about the same time when the other was and acting as he did against Bucer and Fagius as also did Dr Cuthbert Scot who at that time was actually invested in the See of Chester upon the death of Dr â—oats the preceding Bishop And finally in the place of Aldrick Bishop of Carlisle who died on the 5th of March 1555. Dr Owen Oglethorp President of Magdalen College in Oxon and Dean of Windsor receives Consecration to that See in that first part of this year but the particular day and time thereof I have no where found Within the compass of this year that is to say the 4th year of the Reign of this Queen died two other Bishops Salcot or Capon Bishop of Salisbury and Chambers the first Bishop of Peterborough to the first of which there was no successor actually consecrated or confirmed for the reasons to be shewed anon in the Reign of this Queen But to the other succeeded Dr David Pool Dr of both laws Dean of the Arches Chancellor to the Bishop of Lichfield and Arch-Deacon of Derby elected
that he was made General Warden of the North gratified with a thousand Marks of good Rent in Land and the Command of an hundred Hors-men at the King's Charge Such is the Fortune of some Princes to be most Bountifull to those who are falsest to them Guidolti also was rewarded with Knighthood a Present of a thousand Crowns and an Annual Pension of as much to maintain his Honour besides a Pension of two hundred and fifty Crowns per annum which was given to his Son What Râ—compense he had of the Crown of France I have no where found but have good Reason to believe that he did not serve their Turn for nothing Great Care was also taken for the preventing of such Disorders as the dissolving of great Garisons and the disbanding of Armies do for the most part carry with them And to this end the Lord Clinton Governour of the Town and Territoâ—y of Bulloign was created Lord Admiral the Officers and Captains rewarded with Lands Leases Offices and Annual Pensions all foreign Forces satisfied and sent out of the Kingdom the Common Souldiers having all their Pay and a Moneths-Pay over dismissed into their several Countries and great Charge given that they should be very well observed till they were quietly settled at home the Light-Hors-men and Men-at-Arms put under the Command of the Marquess of North hampton then being Captain of the Band of Pensioners and finally some of the Chief Captains with six hundred Ordinaries disposed of on the Frontiers of Scotland All Things thus quieted at Home and composed Abroad in reference to the Civil State we must next see how Matters went which concerned Religion all Parties making use of the Publick Peace for the advancing of their Private and particular Ends. And the first Matter of Remark which occurs this year is the Burning of John Butcher by others called John Knell but generally best known by the Name of Joan of Kent condemned for Heresie in the year last past about the time that so many Anabaptists were convented in the Church of Saint Paul before Arch-Bishop Cranmer and his Assistants whereof mention hath been made already Her Crime was That she denied Christ to have takâ—n Flâ—sh from the Virgin Mary affirming as the Valentinians did of old that he onely passed through her Body as Water through the Pipe of a Conduit without participating any thing of that Body through which He passed Great Care was taken and much Time spent by the Arch-Bishop to perswade her to a better sence but when all failed and that he was upon the Point of passing Sentence upon her for persisting obstinate in so gross an Heresie she most maliciously reproached him for passing the like Sentence of Condemnation on another Woman called Ann Aâ—kew for denying the Carnal Presence of Christ in the Sacrament telling him That he had condemned the said Ann Aâ—kew not long before for a piece of Bread and was then ready to condemn her for a piece of Flesh. But being convicted and delivered over to the Secular Judges she was by them condemned to be burnt but no Execution done upon it till this present year The Interval was spent in using all Means for her Conversion and amendment which as it onely seemed to confirm her in her former Obstinacy so it was found to have given no small encouragement to others for entertaining the like dangerous and un-Christian Errours His Majesty was therefore moved to sign the Warrant for her Death To which when the Lords of the Council could by no means win Him the Arch-Bishop is desired to perâ—wade Him to it The King continued both in Reason and Resolution as before He did notwithstanding all the Arch-Bishop's Arguments to perswade the contrary the King affirming that He would not drive her headlong to the Devil and thinking it better to chaâ—tise her with some corporal Punishment But when the Gravity and Importunity of the Man had prevailed at last the King told him as He signed the Warrant that upon him He would lay all the Charge thereof before God Which Words of His declare sufficiently His Aversness from having any hand in shedding of that Womans Blood how justly soever she deserved it But that the Arch-Bishop's Earnestness in bringing her to exemplary Punishment should contract any such guilt in the sight of God as to subject him to the like cruel Death within few years after as some would bear the World in hand is a Surmise not to be warranted by any Principle of Piety or Rule of Charity The Warrant being signed and the Writ for Execution Sealed she was kept a whole Week before her Death at the Lord Chancellour's House daily resorted to both by the Arch-Bishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of London who spared no pains to bring her to a â—ight belief in that Particular But the same Spirit of Obstinacy still continued with her and held her to the very last For being brought to the Stake in Smithfield on the second of May Dr. Scoâ—y not long after made Bishop of Rechester was desired to Preach unto the People who insisting on the proof of that Point for denyal whereof the obstinate Wretch had been condemned she interrupted him and told him with a very loud Voice that He lied like c. And so the Sermon being ended the Executioner was commanded to do his Office which he did accordingly And yet this terrible Execution did not so prevail as to extirpate and exterminate the like impiouâ— Doâ—ages though it suppressed them for a time For on the twenty â—ourth of April in the year next follâ—wing I finde one George Paris a Dutch man to have been burnt for Arianism in the very same place Better Success had John à Lasco a Polonian born with his Congregation of Germans and other Strangers who took Sanctuary this year in England hoping that here they might enjoy that Liberty of Conscience and Safety for their Goods and Persons which their own Countrey had denyed them Nor did they fall short in any thing which their Hopes had promised them For the Lords of the Council looking on them as afflâ—cted Strangers and persecuted for the same Religion which was here professed interceded for them with the King And He as Gracioâ—sly vouchsafed to give them both Entertainment and Protection assigned them the West-part of the Church belonging to the late dissolved House of Augustineâ— Friers for the Exercise of Religious Duties made thâ—m a Corporation consisting of a Super-intendent and four other Ministers with power to fill the vacant Places by a new Succession whensoever any of them should be void by Death or otherwise the Parties by them chosen to be approved by the King and Council And this he did with a Command to the Lord Mâ—your of London the Aldermeâ— and Sheriffs thereof as also to the Arch-Bishop of Canterbury and all other Bishops of this Realm not to disturb them either in the Free Exercise of their Religion and Ecclesiâ—stical Government
unto that Honour by the King's Letters Patenâ—s As for Ridley we have spoke before and as for Poynet he is affirmed to have been a Man of verâ— good Learning with Reference to his Age and the Time he lived in well studied in the Greek Tongue and of no small Eminence in the Arts and Mathematical Sciences A Change was also made in Cambridg by the Death of Bucer which I finde placed by Fâ—x on the twenty third of December by others with more Truth on the nineteenth of January both in the Compass of this year and by some others with less Reaâ—â—n on the tenth of March But at whâ—t time sover he died certain it is that he was most Solemnly Interred in Saint Marie's Church attended to Fu his â—rave by all the Heads and most of the Graduates in that Vniversity his neâ—al Sermon Preached by Dâ—ctâ—ur Parâ—er â—he first Arch-Bishop of Canterbury in Queen Elizâ—beth'â— Time the Panegyrick made by one of the Haddons a Man of a moâ—â— Fluenâ— and Rhetorical Sâ—yle all that pretended to the Muses in both Vniverâ—ities setting forth his great Worth and their own Loss in him with the best of their Poetry Anno Regni Edw. Sexti 5 o. An. Dom. 1550 1551. WE must begin this year with the Deprivation of Bishop Gardiner whom we left committed to the Tower the last of June in the year 1548. There he remained almost two years without being pressed to any particular Point the yielding unto which might procure his Liberty or the Refusal justifie such a long Imprisonment On the tenth of June this year the Publick Liturgie now being generally executed in all Parts of the Kingdom was offered to his Consideration that some Experiment might be made whether he would put his Hand unto it and promise to advance the Service Upon the fourth day after the Duke of Sommerset with five other of the Lords of the Council was sent unto the Tower to receive his Answer Which he returned to this effect That he had deliberately considered of all the Offices contained in the Common-Prayer-Book and all the several Branches of it That Though he could not have made it in that Manner had the Matter been referred unto him yet that he found such things therein as did very well satisfie his Conscience and therefore that he would not onely execute it in his own Person but cause the same to be Officiated by all those of his Diocess But this was not the Answer which the Courtiers looked for It was their Hope they should have found him more averse from the King's Proceedings that making a Report of his Perversness he might be lifted out of that Wealthy Bishoprick which if it either were kept Vacant or filled with a more Tractable Person might give them opportunity to enrich themselves by the Spoil thereof Therefore to put him further to it the Lord Treasurer the Earl of Warwick Sir William Herbert Master of the Horse and Mr. Secretary Petre are sent upon the ninth of July with certain Articles which for that end were Signed by the King and the Lords of the Council According to the Tenour hereof he was not onely to testifie his Consent to the Establishing of the Holy-Days and Fasting-Days by the King's Authority the Allowance of the Publick Liturgie and the Abrogating of the Statute for the Six Articles c. but to Subscribe to the Confession of his Fault in his former Obstinacy after such Form and Manner as was there required To which Articles he Subscribed without any great Hesitancy but refused to put his Hand to the said Confession There being no reason as he thought and so he answered those which came unto him from the Court on the Morrow after that he should yield to the Confâ—ssion of a Guilt when he knew himself Innocent He is now faln into the Toil out of which he finds but Little Hope of being set free For presently on the neck of this a Book of Articles is drawn up containing all the Alteration made by the King and His Father as well by Acts of Parliament as their own Injunctions from the first Suppression of the Monasteries to the coming out of the late Form for the Consecration of Arch-Bishops Bishops c. Of all which Doings he is required to signifie his Approbation to make Confession of his Fault with an Acknowledgment that he had deserved the Punishment which was aid upon him Which Articles being tendered to him by the Bishop of London the Master of the Horse Mr. Secretary Petre and Goodrick a Counsellour at Law appeared to him to be of such an hard Digestion that he desir'd first to be set at Liberty before he should be pressed to make a particular Answer This being taken for a Refusal and that Refusal taken for a Contempt the Profits of his Bishoprick are Sequestered from him for three Moneths by an Order of the Council-Table bearing date the nineteenth of the Moneth the said Profits in the mean time to be collected or received by such Person or Persons as the King should thereunto appoint with this Intimation in the Close that if he did not tender his Submission at the end of that Term he should be taken for an Incorrigible Person and unmeet Minister of this Church and Finally to be procceeded against to a Deprivation The Term expired and no such humble Submission or Acknowledgment made as had been required at his Hands a Commission is directed to the Arch-Bishop of Canterbury the Bishops of London Ely and Lincoln Sir William Peter c. authorised thereby to proceed against him upon certain Articles in the same contained Convented before whom at Lambeth on the fifteenth of December he received his Charge Which being received he used so many Shifts and found so many Evasions to elude the Business that having appeared six Days before them without coming to a plain and Positive Answer he was upon the fourteenth of February Sentenced to a Deprivation and so remitted to the Tower But Gardiner did not mean to die so tamely and therefore had no sooner heard the Definitive Sentence but presently he Protesteth against the same makes his Appeal unto the King and causeth both his said Appeal and Protestation to be Registred in the Acts of that Court. Of all which he will finde a time to serve himself in the Alâ—eration of Affairs It was presumed that the Report of this Severity against a Man so eminent for his Parts and Place would either bring such other Bishops as had yet stood out to a fit Conformity or otherwise expose both them and their Estates to the like Condemnation But some there were so stiff in their old Opinions that neither Terrour nor Perswasion could prevail upon them either to give their Approbation of the King's Proceedings or otherwise to advance the Service And some there were who though they outwardly complyed with the King's Commands yet was it done so coldly and with such Reluctancy as laâ—'d them open to the
more inclinable to the Lutheran but where his profit was concerned in the spoil of Images then thâ—â— Zuinglian Doctrines so well beloved in general by the Common People that divers dipt their Handkerchiefs in his Blood to keep them in perpetual Remembrance of him One of which being a sprightly Dame about two years after when the Duke of Northumberland was led through the City for his opposing the Title of Queen Mary ran to him in the Streets and shaking out her bloody Handkerchief before him Behold said she the Blood of that worthy man that good Vncle of that Excellent King which shed by thy malicious Practice doth now begin apparently to revenge it self on thee The like Opinion also was conceived of the business by the most understanding men in the Court and Kingdom though the King seemed for the present to be satisfied in it In which opinion they were exceedingly confirmed by the Enlargment of the Earl of Arundel and restoring of Crane and his Wife to their former Liberty but most especially by the great Endearments which afterwards appeared between the Duke of Northumberland and Sir Thomas Palmer and the great confidence which the Duke placed in him for the Advancement of his Projects in behalf of the Duke of Suffolk of which more hereafter But the Malice of his Enemies stayed not here extending also to his Friends and Children after his Decease but chiefly to the eldest Son by the second Wife in favour of whom an Act of Parliament had been passed in the thirty second year of the late King Henry for the entailing on his Person all such Lands Estates and Honours as had been or should be purchasâ—d by his Father from the twenty fifth day of May then next foregoing Which Act they caused to be repealed at the end of the next Session of Parliament which began on the morrow after the Death of the Duke whereby they strip'd the young Gentleman being then about thirteen years of Age of his Lands and Titles to which he was in part restored by Queen Elizabeth who in pity of his Father's Suffâ—rings and his own Misfortunes created him â—arl of Hertford Viscount Beauchamp c. Nor did the Duke's Fall end it self in no other ruin then that of his own house and the Death of the four Knights which suffered on the same account but drew along with it the â—emoval of the Lord Rich from the Place and Office of Lord Chancellour For so it happened that the Lord Chancellour commiserating the Condition of the Duke of Sommerset though formerly he had shewed himself against him dispatched a Letter to him concerning some Proceedings of the Lords of the Council which he thought fit for him to know Which Letter being hastily superscribed To the Duke with no other Title he gave to one of his Servants to be carried to him By whom for want of a more particular direction it was delivered to the hands of the Duke of Norfolk But the Mistake being presently found the Lord Chancellour knowing into what hands he was like to fall makes his Address unto the King the next morning betimes and humbly prays that in regard of his great Age he might be discharged of the Great Seal and Office of Chancellour Which being granted by the King though with no small difficulty the Duke of Northumberland and the Earl of Pembroke forward enough to go upon such an Errand are sent on the twenty first of December to receive the Seal committed on the morrow after to Doctour Thomas Goodwin Bishop of Ely and one of the Lords of the Privy Council Who afterwards that is to say on the two and twentieth of January was sworn Lord Chancellour the Lord Treasurer Paulet giving him the Oath in the Court of Chancery Next followed the Losses and Disgraces suffered by the Lord Paget on the Duke's account To whom he had continued faithfull in all his Troubles when Sir William Cecil who had received greater Benefits from him and most of the Dependants on him had either deserted or betrayed him His House designed to be the place in which the Duke of Northumberland and the rest of the Lords were to be murthered at a Banquet if any credit may be given to the Informations for which Committed to the Tower as before is said But having no sufficient Proof to warrant any further Proceeding to his Condemnation an Enquiry is made not long after into all his Actions In the return whereof it was suggested That he had sold the King's Lands and Woods without Commission That he had taken great Fines for the King's Lands and applyed them to his proper use and That he had made Leases in Reversion for more then one and twenty years Which Spoyl is to be understood of the Lands and Woods of the Dutchy of Lancaster of the which he was Chancellour and for committing whereof he was not onely forced to resign that Office but condemned in a fine of six thousand pounds not otherwise to be excused but by paying of four thousand pounds within the year This Punishment was accompanied with a Disgrace no less grievous to him then the loss both of his Place and Money He had been chosen into the Society of the Garter An. 1548. when the Duke of Sommerset was in Power and so continued till the fifteenth of April in the year next following Anno 1552. At what time Garter King of Aâ—ms was sent to his Lodging in the Tower to take from him the Garter and the George belonging to him as a Knight of that most Noble Order Which he suffered willingly to be done because it was His Majestie 's Pleasure that it should so be More sensible of the Affront without all question then otherwise he would have been because the said George and Garter were presently afâ—er sent by the King to John Earl of Warwick the Duke of Northumberland's eldest Son Admitted thereupon into that Society So prevalent are the Passions of some Great Persons that they can neither put a measure upon their Hatred nor an end to their Malice Which two last Passages though more properly belonging to the following year I have thought fit to place in this because of that dependance which they have on the Fall of Sommerset The like Ill-Fortune happened at the same time also to Doctour Robert Farrar Bishop of St. David's who as he had his Preferments by him so he suffered also in his Fall not because Guilty of the Practice or Conspiracy with him as the Lord Paget and the rest were given out to be but because he wanted his Support and Countenance against his Adversaries A Man he was of an unsociable disposition rigidly self-willed and one who looked for more Observance then his place required which drew him into a great dislâ—ke with most of his Clergy with none more then the Canons of his own Cathedral The Faction headed amongst others by Doctour Thomas Young then being the Chantour of that Church and afterwards advanced by Queen
of ordinary attendance about his Person which was on the same Day when his Father was created Duke For whereas most men gave themselves no improbable hopes that betwixt the Spring time of his life the Growing season of the year and such Medicinal applications as were made unto him the disease would wear it self away by little and little yet they found the contrary It rather grew so fast upon him that when the Parliament was to begin on the first of March the Lords Spiritual and Temporal were Commanded to attend him at White-Hall instead of waiting on him from thence to Westminster in the usual manner Where being come they found a Sermon ready for them the Preacher being the Bishop of London which otherwise was to have been Preached in the Abby-Church and the Great Chamber of the Court accomodated for an House of Peers to begin the Session For the opening whereof the King then sitting under the Cloth of State and all the Lords according to their Ranks and Orders he declared by the Lord Chancellor Goodrick the causes of his calling them to the present Parliament and so dismist them for that time A Parliament which began and ended in the Month of March that the Commissions might the sooner be dispatched to their several Circuits for the speedier gathering up of such of the Plate Copes Vestments and other Furnitures of which the Church was to be spoyled in the time of his sickness Yet in the midst of these disorders there was some care taken for advancing both the honour and the interest of the English-Nation by furnishing Sebastian Cabol for some new discoveries Which Sebastian the Son of John Cabol a Venetian born attended on his first imployment under Henry the seventh Anno 1497. At what time they discovered the Barralaos and the Coasts of Caenada now called New-France even to the 67½ degree of Northern Latitude Bending his Course more toward the South and discovering a great part of the shoars of Florida he returned for England bringing with him three of the Natives of that Country to which the name of New-Found-Land hath been since appropriated But finding the KING unhappily Embroyled in a War with Scotland and no present Encouragements to be given for a further Voiage he betook himself into the service of the KING of SPAIN and after fourty years and more upon some distast abandoned SPAIN and offered his service to this KING By whom being made Grand Pilot of England in the year 1549. he animated the English-Merchants to the finding out of a passage by the North-East Seas to Cathay and China first enterprised under the Conduct of Sr. Hugh Willoughby who unfortunately Perished in the Action himself and all his Company being Frozen to Death all the particulars of his Voiage being since committed to Writing as was certified by the Adventures in the year next following It was upon the twentith of May in this present year that this Voiage was first undertaken three great Ships being well manned and fitted for the Expedition which afterwards was followed by Chancelour Burrought Jackman Jenkinson and other noble Adventurers in the times Succeding Who though they failed of their Attempt in finding out a shorter way to Cathay and China yet did they open a fair Passage to the Bay of S. Nicholas and thereby layd the first foundation of a Wealthy Trade betwixt us and the Muscovites But the KING'S Sickness still encreasing who was to live no longer then might well stand with the designs of the DVKE of Northumber-land some Marriages are resolved on for the Daughters of the DVKE of Suffolk in which the KING appeared as forward as if he had been one of the Principalls in the Plot against him And so the matter was Contrived that the Lady IANE the eldest Daughter to that DVKE should be Married to the Lord Guilford Dudly the fourth Son then living of Northumberland all the three Elder Sons having Wives before that Katherine the second Daughter of Suffolk should be Married to the Lord Henry Herbert the Eldest Son of the Earl of Pembrock whom Dudly had made privy to all his Counsels and the third Daughter named Mary being Crook-Backed and otherwise not very taking affianced to Martin Keys the KING'S Gentleman-Porter Which Marriages together with that of the Lady Katherine one of the Daughters of Duke Dudly to Henry Lord Hastings Eldest Son of the Earl of Huntington were celebrated in the end of May or the beginning of June for I finde our Writers differing in the time thereof with as much Splendour and solemnity as the KING' 's weak Estate and the sad Condition of the Court could be thought to bear These Marriages all solemnized at Dâ—rham House in the Strand of which Northumberland had then took possession in the name of the Rest upon a Confidence of being Master very shortly of the whole Estate The noise of these Marriages bred such Amazement in the Hearts of the common People apt enough in themselves to speak the worst of Northumberland's Actions That there was nothing left unsaid which might serve to shew their hatred against him or express their Pity toward the KING But the DVKE was so little troubled at it that on the contrary he resolved to Dissemble no longer but openly to play his Game according to the Plot and Project which he had been Hammering ever â—ince the Fall of the DVKE of Somerset whose Death he had Contrived on no other Ground but for laying the way more plain and open to these vast ambitions The KING was now grown weak in Body and his Spirits much decaied by a languishing Sickness which Rendred him more apprehensive of such fears and Dangers as were to be presented to him then otherwise he could have been in a time of strength In which Estate Duke Dudly so prevailed upon him that he conâ—ented at the last to a transposition of the Crown from his natural sisters to the Children of the Dutchess of Suffolk Confirming it by Letters Patents to the Heirs Males of the Body of the said Dutchess And for want of such Heirs Males to be Born in the lifetime of the KING the Crown immediately to descend on the Lady IANE the eldest Daughter of that House and the Heirs of her Body and so with several Remainders to the rest of that Family The carriage of which Business and the Rubs it met with in the way shall be reserved to the particular story of the Lady IANE when she is brought unwilling upon the Stage there on to Act the part of a Queen of England It sufficeth in this place to note that the KING had no sooner caused these Leters Patents to passe the Seal but his Weakeness more visibly encreased then it did before And as the KING'S Weakeness did encrease so did the Northumberland's Diligence about him for he was little absent from him and had alwaies some well-assured to Epy how the State of his Health changed every Hour And the more joyful he
end whereof he was restored to liberty by the death of the Lady who died a prisoner in the Tower And though the Lady Francis Dutchess of Suffolk might hope to have preserved her self from the like Court-thunder-claps by her obscure marriage with Adrian Stokes who had bin Gentleman of the Horse to the Duke her husband yet neither could that save her from abiding a great part of the tempest which fell so heavily upon her and all that family that William the nephew of this Earl by Edward Viscount Beauchamp his eldest son was prudently advised by some of his friends to procure a confirmation of his grand-fathers honors from the hand of King James which without much difficulty was obtained and granted by his Majesties Letters Patents bearing date the 14th of May in the 6th year of his Reign But such was the fortune of this House that as this Earl being newly restored unto the Title of Hertford by the great goodness of the Queen incurred her high displeasure and was thereupon committed prisoner for his marriage with the Lady Katherine Gray the onely heir then living of Mary the youngest daughter of King Henry the 7th so William above mentioned being confirmed in the expectancy of his grand-fathers honors by the like goodness of King James was committed prisoner by that King for marrying with the Lady Arabella daughter and heir of Charls Earl of Lennox descended from the eldest daughter of the said King Henry Such were the principal occurrences of this present year relating to the joynt concernments of Church and State In reference to the Church alone nothing appears more memorable than the publishing of an elegant and acute Discourse entituled The Apology of the Church of England first wait in Latin by the right reverend Bishop Jewel translated presently into English French Italian Dutch and at last also into Greek highly approved of by all pious and judicious men stomached by none excepting our own English fugitives and yet not undertook by any of them but by Harding only who had his hands full enough before in beating out an answer to the Bishopâ— challenge By him we are informed if we may believe him that two Tractats or Discourses had been writ against it the one by an Italian in the Tongue of that Country the other in Latine by a Spanish Bishop of the Realm of Naples both finished and both stopped as they went to the Press out of a due regard â—orsooth to the Church of England whose honour had been deeply touched by being thought to have approved such a lying unreasonable slanderous and ungodly Pamphlet which were it true the Church was more beholden to the modesty of those Spaniards and Italians than to our own natural English But whether it were true or not or rather how untrue it is in all particulars the exchange of writings on both sides doth most plainly manifest In general it was objected That the Apology was published in the name of the Church of England before any mean part of the Church were privy to it as if the Author either were ashamed of it or afraid to stand to it that the Inscription of it neither was directed to Pope nor Emperor nor to any Prince not to the Church nor to the General Council then in being as it should have been that there was no mans name seâ— to it that it was printed without the privilege of the Prince contrary to the Law in that behalf that it was allowed neither by Parliament nor Proâ—lamation nor agreed upon by the Clergy in a publick and lawful Synod and therefore that the Book was to be accounted a famous Libel and a scandalâ—us Writing To which it was answered in like Generals by that learned Prelate That the profession of the Doctrine contained in it was offered unto the whole Church of God and so unto the Pope and the Council too if they were any part or member of the Church that if names be so necessary he had the names of the whole Clergy of England to confirm that Doctrine and Harding's too amongst the rest in the time of King Edward that for not having the Princes privilege it might easily be disproved by the Printer that it was not conceived in such a dark corner as was objected being afterwards imprinted at Paris in Latine and having since been translated into the French Italian Dutch and Spanish Toungs that being sent afterwards into France Flanders Germany Spain Poland Hungary Denmark Sweden Scotland Italy Naples and Rome it self it was tendred to the judgment of the whole Church of God that it was read and seriously considered of in the convent of Trent and great threats made that it should be answered and the matter taken in hand by two notable learned Bishops the one a Spaniard and the other an Italian though in fine neither of them did any thing in it and finally that certain of the English Papists had been nibling at it but such as cared neither what they writ nor was cared by others And so much may suffice in general for this excellent Piece to the publishing whereof that learned Prelate was most encouraged by Peter Martyr as appears by Martyr's Letter of the 24th of August with whom he had spent the greatest part of his time when he lived in Exile And happy had it been for the Church of England if he had never done worse offices to it than by dealing with that reverend Bishop to so good a purpose But Martyr onely lived to see the Book which he so much longed for dying at Zurick on the 12th day of November following and laid into his grave by the Magistrates and People of that Town with a solemn Funeral Nothing remains for the concluding of this year but to declare how the three vacant Bishopricks were disposed of if those may say to be disposed of which were still kept vacant Glocester was onely filled this year by the preferment of Mr. Râ—chaâ—d Cheny Archdeacon of Hereford and one of the Prebendaries of the Collâ—giat Church of St. Peter in Westminster who received hâ—s Episcopal consecration on the 19th of April Together with the See of Glocester he held that of Bristol in commendam as did also Bullingham his Successor that is to say the Jurisdiction with the Profits and Fees thereof to be exercised and enjoyed by them but the temporal Revenue of it to continue in the hands of some hungry Courtiers who gnawed it to the very bone in which condition it remained under the two Bishops till the year 1589. when the Queen was pleased to bestow the remainders of it together with the title of Bishop on Doctor Richard Flesher Dean of Peterborough whom afterwards she preferred to the See of London And as for Oxon it was kept vacant from the death of King the first Bishop of it who died on the 4th of December 1557. till the 14th of October 1567. at which time it was conferred on Dr. Hugh Curwyn Archbishop of Dublin
and Chancellor of the Realm of Ireland who having held it but a year it was again kept vacant twenty years together and then bestowed on Dr. John Underhil who was consecrated Bishop thereof in Dâ—cember 1589. but he dying also shortly after viz. Anno 1592. it was once more kept void till the year 1603. and then took up by Dr. John Bridges Dean of Salisbury rather to satisfie the desires of others than his own ambition So that upon the point this Church was filled but little more than three years in forty sâ—x the Jurisdiction of it was in the mean time managed by some Officers thereunto authorised by the Archbishop of Canterbury the Patrimony and Revenues of it remaining in the hands of the Earl of Leicester and after his decease of the Earl of Eâ—â—ex by whom the Lands thereof were so spoiled and wasted that they left nothing to the last Bishops but Impropriations by means of which havock and destruction all the five Bishopricks erected by King Henry the 8th were so impoverished and destroyed that the new Bishops were necessitated to require the benevolence of their Clergy at their first comming to them to furnish their Episcopal Houses and to enable them to maintain some tolerable degree of Hospitality in their several Diocesses of which we shall hear more hereafter from the pen of an Adversay An. Reg. Eliz. 5. An. Dom. 1562 1563. THe last years practices of the Papists and the dangers thereby threatning both the Queen and State occasioned her to call a Parliament on the 12th of January in which first passed an Act For assurance of the Queens Royal power over all Estates and Subjects within her Dominions In the body whereof it was provided That no man living or residing in the Queens Dominions under the pains and penalties therein appointed should from thenceforth either by word or writing or any other open deed willingly and advisedly endeavour to maintain the Power and Jurisdiction of the Bishop of Rome heretofore claimed and usurped within this Realm And for the better discovery of all such persons as might be popishly affected it was enacted That none should be admitted unto holy Orders or to any Degree in either of the Universities or to be Barrester or Bencher in any of the Inns of Court c. or to practise as an Atturney or otherwise to bear any Office in any of the Courts at Westminster Hall or any other Court whatsoever till he or they should first take the Oath of Supremacy on the holy Evangelists With a Power given to every Archbishop and Bishop within this Realm and the Dominions of the same to tender or minister the Oath aforesaid to all and every spiritual person in their proper Diocesses as well in places exempt as else-where Of which last clause the Reader is to take especial notice because of the great controversie which ensued upon it of which more hereafter And because many of the Popish party had lately busied themselves by Conjurations and other Diabolical Arts to enquire into the length or shortness of her Majesties life and thereupon had caused some dark and doubtful prophecies to be spread abroad There passed two other Statutes for suppressing the like dangerous practices by which her Majesties person might be endangered the people stirred to rebellion or the peace otherwise disturbed For which consult the Acts of Parliament 5 Eliz. c 15 16. By which three Acts and one more for the better executing of the Writ de Excommunicato capiendo the Queen provided very well for her own security but more provoked the Pope his adherents to conspire against her in the time to come against whose machinations back'd by the power and counsels of forein Princes nothing was more conducible than her strength at Sea for the encrease whereof and the continual breeding of a Seminary of expert Mariners an Act was made for adding Wednesday to the number of the weekly Fasâ—s which from thenceforth was called Jejunium Cecilianum as being one of the devices of Sir William Cecil In reference to Religion and the advancement of the service and worship of God it had been declared by the Bishops and Clergy assembled at the same time in their Convocation To be a thing plainly repugnant to the Word of God and the custom of the Primitive Church to have publick prayer in the Church or to minister the Sacraments in a Toung not understood by the people To comply with which pious Declaration and take off all retortion which possibly might be made by those of Rome when they were charged with the administration of the Service and Sacraments in an unknown Toung it was enacted That the Bishops of Hereford St. Davids Bangor Landaff and St. Asaph should take care amongst them for translating the whole Bible with the Common-Prayer Book into the Weâ—ch or British Toung on pain of forfeiting 40 l. a piece in default thereof And to encourage them thereunto it was ordered That one Book of either sort being so translated and imprinted should be provided and bought of every Cathedral or Parish Church as also for all Parish Churches Chapels of Ease where the said Toung is commonly used the Ministers to pay one half of the price and the Parishioners the other The like care was also taken for translating the Books of Homilies but whether it were done by any new order from the Queen or the piety of the four Welch Bishops or that they were considered as a necessary part of the publick Lituâ—gy by reason of the Rubrick at the end of the Nicene Creed I have no whâ—â—e found As for the Convocation which accompanied the present Parliament it began on the 13â—h day of Jaâ—uary in the Cathedral of St. Paâ—l the Latine Sermon 〈◊〉 by Mr. William Day then Provost of Eaton College afterwards 〈◊〉 of 〈◊〉 also and Bishop of Winchester which being finished the Bishop of Lâ—ndâ—â— presents a list of the several Bishops Deans and Chapters which had been cited to appear the catalogue of the Bishops ending with Gabriel Goodman Dean of Westminster that of the Deans beginning on another file with Alexander Novel Dean of St. Pauls elected by the Clergy for their Prolocutor The Convocation after this is adjourned to Westminster for the conveniency of the Prelates by reason of their attendance on affairs of Parliament Goodman the Dean of Westminster had made his Protestation in the Church of St. Paul that by appearing as a Member of the Convocation by veâ—tue of the Arch-bishops Mandat he subjected not himself nor the Church of Westminster to the authority or jurisdiction of the See of Canterbury And now on the Archbishops personal comming to the Church of Westminster he delivers the like Protestation in writing for preserving the Liberties of the Church in which it was declared according to the privilege just rights therof that no Archbishop or Bishop could exercise any Ecclesiastical jurisdiction in it without leave of the Dean for the time