THE PREFACE. I HAD in my Introduction to this volume, which I published a year ago, said all that then occurred to me in the way of preface: but some particulars coming to my knowledge since that time, give me an occasion to add a little to what was then copiously deduced. I begin with Mr. Le Grand, who I understand is now in a considerable post in the court of France. He, being lately at Geneva, explained himself to my friends in these terms; "that he was young when he wrote against me, and "that the heat of youth had carried him to some expres❝sions, from which he would abstain, if he were to write "now: he was glad to hear that I was upon the reviewing "the History of the Reformation ;" and named to them a Life that he had seen in Spain of Bartholomew Caranza, archbishop of Toledo, who was king Philip's confessor, and went with him to England; and was particularly employed in reforming (as they called it) the universities: and, as he said, he died when he was to be delivered out of the prison of the inquisition. He added, that he had also seen a collection of cardinal Pole's letters, with an account of what passed in England after the death of king Edward, which he believed I had not seen, and that could inform me of many particulars; but that he himself had other employments than to think of the affairs of England. If I had received this civil message from Mr. Le Grand before I had published my Introduction, I would have said nothing at all with relation to him; but what is past cannot be recalled: so I hope he will accept of this for all the reparation I can now make him. As for Anthony Harmer, some have doubted if he could. be capable of making three capital errors in one line: and since Mr. Strype has suggested to me that, in which I was under some reserve before, as having it from another hand, I am now free to set it down. For capitulum ecclesiæ cathedralis, he has printed, epistolam conventus ecclesiæ catholicæ. If the abbreviations may seem to excuse the reading epistolam for capitulum, and catholicæ for cathedralis, nothing can excuse the adding the word conventus, which he thought wanting to make a complete title, having read the others as he did: so I hope I have reason to have no regard to any thing that comes from him upon his bare authority. The weak and ill-natured attempts that some among ourselves have of late made upon me, give me no sort of concern, unless it is to pray for those who have despitefully used me. There was also a great poem lately prepared, and, I suppose, designed to be published, when that which our enemies hoped was near accomplished should have been effected. It was written in imitation of Hudibras, and so was a mock poem on the reformation, composed by one Thomas Ward, of whom I can give no other account, but that it is said he is a priest. In it, Sanders's work was made the plot of the fable: it was full of impious abuse, put in a strain apt enough to take with those who were disposed to divert themselves with a show of wit and humour, dressed up to make the reformation appear both odious and ridiculous; not doubting of equal success with Butler's admired performance. It was no wonder, if, upon such a design, my History was treated with all the characters of scorn and contempt. This was what I might justly expect from those of that side but I was sorry to find so much censure from those from whom I had no reason to expect it, and which seemed to be the effect only of envy and ill-nature: God forgive them for it. I must say a little more, with relation to a learned and copious writer of our ecclesiastical history, who finds my History often in his way: he treats me decently as to his expressions, but designs all through to set such remarks on my work, as, if they were well grounded, must destroy the credit that it has hitherto obtained. I will first give some instances to shew what the spirit, the principles, and the design of that writer must be: I will name but four out of a great many. Vol. II. Col. I. When he sets forth king Henry the Eighth's proceedings P. 150. against the memory of Thomas Becket, he has these words; "And though his conduct in this dispute was not altoge"ther defensible, he was far, however, from being guilty of "that gross mismanagement with which he is charged." I will leave the judgment that must be passed upon this period to all who are in any sort acquainted with the history of that time. Col. II. When he gives the character of king Edward the Sixth, P. 332. immediately before he tells of his death, it is in these words: "His conscience was not always under a serviceable direc"tion;" (the meaning of this dark expression I do not reach ;) "he was tinctured with Erastian principles, and under "wrong prepossessions as to church government; he seems "to have had no notion of sacrilege;—and, which is "somewhat remarkable, most of the hardships were put upon "ecclesiastics in the latter end of his reign, when his judg"ment was in the best condition :" and without adding one word of his good qualities, or to correct those severe reflections, he concludes with the account of his death. He gives a very different account of the death of Mary P. 601. queen of Scots, in these words; "Her fortitude and devo- Col. II. ❝tion were very remarkable: she supported her character "with all imaginable decency: she died like a Christian, and "like a queen." And, to mention no more, when he comes to queen Elizabeth's death and character, he runs a parallel between the two sisters, Mary and Elizabeth, in these words; "The one P. 671. "made martyrs, the other made beggars: the one executed Col. II. "the men, and the other the estates: and therefore, reserv“ing the honour of the reformation to queen Elizabeth, the "question will be, Whether the resuming the first-fruits "and tenths, putting many vicarages in a deplorable condi Hist. of the Vol. II. P. 290. Col. II. ❝tion, and settling a perpetuity of poverty on the church, 66 was not much more prejudicial than fire and fagot? Whe"ther destroying bishoprics was not a much greater hard"ship than the destroying bishops? because this severity "affects succession, and reaches down to future ages. And "lastly, Whether, as the world goes, it is not more easy to "recruit bishops, than the revenues to support them?" These words give such an indication of the notion that the author has of the happiness or misery of a church, that they want no commentary. I will add this one remark of a fact upon a passage that I had writ concerning the book of Ordination, published in the third year of king Edward, which was in these words: "Another difference between the ordination-book set out at "that time, and that we now use, was, that the bishop was "to lay his one hand on the priest's head, and with his other "to give him a Bible, with a chalice and bread in it, saying "the words that are now said at the delivery of the Bible. "In the consecration of a bishop, there is nothing more "than what is yet in use, save that a staff was put into his "hand with this blessing, Be to the flock of Christ a shep"herd." Upon this his remark is in these words: "But "here, as it happens, this learned person has been led into a "mistake; for the two first editions of the Ordinal made in "king Edward's reign have none of the different rites men❝tioned by this gentleman." I was indeed surprised when I read this, and went to look into the first edition of that Ordinal, which I knew was in the Lambeth library: for, by archbishop Sancroft's order, I had the free use of every thing that lay there. There I went to examine it, and I found indeed a small variation from my History. The whole is in these words: In the ordination of a priest, after the imposition of hands, with the words still used, follows this rubric; "Then the bishop shall deliver to every one "of them the Bible in the one hand, and the chalice, or cup, with the bread, in the other hand, and say, Take "thou authority, &c." In the consecration of a bishop, this rubric is; "The elected bishop, having upon him a 66 66 66 66 surplice and a cope, shall be presented by two bishops, "being also in surplices and copes, having their pastoral "staves in their hands." And after the form of the consecration, this rubric follows; "Then shall the archbishop lay the Bible upon his neck, saying, Give heed to reading." The next rubric is, "Then shall the archbishop put "into his hand the pastoral staff, saying, Be to the flock of "Christ a shepherd;" on to the end of the charge, now given all together, but then divided in two. This book was printed by Richard Grafton, the king's printer, in March 1549; or by the Roman account, 1550. I have given this full account of that matter in my own justification: I am sorry that I cannot return this learned person his compliment to myself, that he was led into a mistake. P. 310. The next, and indeed the last particular, that out of many more I will mention, is, the setting down the explanation, that was made upon the order for kneeling at the sacrament in king Edward's time, wrong in a very material word: for in that the words were, "That there was not in the sacra"ment any real or essential presence of Christ's natural Col. II. "flesh and blood;" but he instead of that puts, "corporal "presence." It seems in this he only looked at the rubric, as it is now at the end of the communion service, upon a conceit that it stands now as it was in king Edward's book, though it was at that time changed: and we know who was D. P. G. the author of that change, and who pretended that a corporal presence signified such a presence as a body naturally has, which the assertors of transubstantiation itself do not, and cannot pretend is in this case; where they say the body is not present corporally, but spiritually, or as a spirit is present. And he who had the chief hand in procuring this alteration had a very extraordinary subtilty, by which he reconciled the opinion of a real presence in the sacrament with the last words of the rubric, "That the natural body " and blood of Christ were in heaven, and not here; it "being against the truth of Christ's natural body to be at "one time in more places than one." It was thus: a body is in a place, if there is no intermediate body but a vacuum |