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were indifferent to their fate; and where plunder of them was the general aim;-the immediate expectation of many, and the sanguine hope of almost all!

X. 6.

The loss which Learning sustained by the Dissolution of Monasteries.

THE loss, which learning sustained by the destruction of books and manuscripts, was great. Bale, a man remarkably hostile to the Roman-catholic religion, and to monastic institutions, says*, that "a "number of them, which purchased these supersti"tious mansions, reserved of those library books, "some to form their jakes; some to scour their "candlesticks; and some, to rub their boots. And

some, they sold to grocers, and soap-sellers; and some they sent over the sea to the book-binders, "not in small numbers, but at times in ships. I know a merchant, (who shall, at this time, be "nameless), that bought the contents of two noble "libraries, for forty shillings price. A shame it "is to be spoken. This stuff has been occupied "instead of grey paper. I judge this to be true, ❝and utter it with heaviness,-that neither the "Britains, under the Romans and Saxons; nor yet "the English people under the Danes and Normans, had ever such damage of their learned monuments, as we have, in this our time. Our

*Declaration upon Leland's Journal, ann. 1549. Fuller's Church History, book vi. p. 333.

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posterity may well curse the wicked fall of our age; this unreasonable sport of England's most "noble antiquities."

CHAP. XI.

POPE PAUL THE THIRD EXCOMMUNICATES HENRY THE EIGHTH.

IT has been related, that, when Clement the seventh pronounced his sentence for the validity of Henry's marriage with Katherine of Aragon, it was accompanied with a threat of excommunication, in case he refused to adhere to the marriage. "But the 66 pope lived not," says Echard*, says Echard*, "to execute any censures against the king. So that, instead "of the matter's being past reconciliation, there "was only a sentence, annulling what the arch"bishop of Canterbury had done." Moderate men, therefore, still hoped, that an amicable adjustment between the parties might yet be effected.

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Clement the seventh died about six months after he had pronounced the sentence on the divorce. He was succeeded by Paul the third, of the illus trious family of Farnese; and the hopes of a satisfactory arrangement between the monarch and the see of Rome were increased by his elevation; as, when cardinal, he had favoured the cause of Henry.

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But they vanished on the execution of bishop Fisher. Soon after the news of this event had reached Rome, the pope issued a bull, by which he cited Henry to appear before him within ninety days; failing which, he declared the monarch excommunicated, and laid the whole kingdom under an interdict. Whatever a catholic may think of the prudence of the excommunication, he must admit, thus far,—that a right to excommunicate a member of the catholic church, be he sovereign, or be he subject, belongs to the pope. But, unfortunately, the pontiff did not confine himself to excommunication. By an assumption of authority, of which, subsequently to the elevation of Gregory the seventh, the papal history affords but too many examples, he deprived Henry of his crown; dissolved all leagues of catholic princes with him; gave away his kingdom to any invader; commanded his nobility to take up arms against him; freed his subjects from all oaths of allegiance; cut off their commerce with foreign states; and declared it lawful for any one to seize them, to make slaves of their persons, and to convert their effects to their own use.

It remains to add, that the pope withheld the publication of the bull till the act of parliament for the dissolution of the greater monasteries had passed, and was carried into execution. Then, by another bull, he confirmed, and established, the former. A full account of each of these bulls is given by Dodd, in his Church History of England *. The separation from the church was now con

* Vol. i. p. 294, 297.

summated. May the writer be permitted to suggest, that, amid the various causes of this great calamity, not any, perhaps, had greater influence, than the mistaken notions, entertained on both sides, respecting the nature of spiritual, and temporal power. When the pope assumed the temporal, and the king assumed the spiritual, each was equally in the wrong. If, by a happy anticipation, a Bossuet had arisen, and explained to the pope, that he had no right to legislate in temporal concerns, or to enforce his spiritual legislation by temporal power,and to the monarch, that he had no right to legislate in spiritual concerns, or to enforce his temporal legislation by spiritual power, it is possible, that the schism might have been avoided; and a moderate scheme of reformation adopted, which would have satisfied the wise, and the good, of both parties.

CHAP. XII.

ECCLESIASTICAL REGULATIONS IN THE REIGN OF HENRY.

To give the reader a notion of the religious alterations introduced into England by Henry, and his successors, it seems proper to state, succinctly, I. The different religious systems of the primitive Lutherans, Zuinglians, Calvinists, and Anabaptists:

11. A summary account of the ecclesiastical regulations, in the reign of Henry the eighth, respecting the general reading of the bible in the English language, by the laity: III. His guidance of the faith, and devotions of his subjects: IV. His persecutions: V. and death.

XII. 1.

Preliminary view of the different religious systems;— 1st. Of the Lutherans; 2dly. Zuinglians; and 3dly. Calvinists; 4. Their different notions respecting the ceremonial of religion; and the subjection of its ministers to the state; 5. A short mention will then be made of the religious tenets of the primitive Anabaptists.

THE author's historical and literary account of the Formularies, Confessions of Faith, or symbolic books, of the Roman-catholic, Greek, and principal Protestant Churches, 1 vol. 8vo., will, perhaps, be found to present a distinct outline of the creeds of the founders of these religious communions.

1. The tenets of the Lutherans are accurately, and fully, expressed, in the confession of Augsburg: -a solemn formulary of faith, presented, in 1530, by the Lutheran princes of Germany to the emperor Charles V. at a diet, holden in that city. The distinctive articles of the Lutheran creed are, that, in the sacrament of the eucharist two things are exhibited, and received together;-the one, earthly, which is bread and wine; the other, heavenly, which is the body and blood of Christ :That, in Christ, there are two distinct natures,

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