Lingard, and myself, respecting Archbishop Cranmer. With his charges against the two former gentlemen, I have no concern: all his charges against me, I shall produce and examine.

I shall first insert the whole of the passage in "the Book of the Roman Catholic Church,” which is the subject of them.

PRELIMINARY OBSERVATION.

I beg leave to premise one remark: -In what I said of Cranmer, I omitted any mention of what Dr. Milner* notices in one of his letters to the late Dr. Sturges,-" The archbishop's privately "marrying a woman of low condition, whilst he was fellow of Jesus College, Cambridge, contrary to the engagement of his admission;" but I did notice Cranmer's subsequent marriage, when a priest, with a second wife. This was a flagrant violation of his vow of celibacy at his ordination; it was in equal opposition to the law of the Church and the law of the State. Mr. Todd does not inform us, whether Cranmer's conduct in this respect, has, or, has not his approbation: I cannot think he can approve these violations of a solemn engagement and a solemn vow.

I must now beg leave to observe to him, that, by the mere circumstance of Cranmer's marrying two wives, successively, he incurred Irregularity, by the laws then in force in England, and by the

* Fourth letter to a prebendary. Ed. 1815. pp. 170, 171.

laws of all the eastern and the western churches*. Having called these circumstances to Mr. Todd's attention, I beg leave to notice the great fraud which the archbishop practised upon all with whom he dealt in spirituals.—It was, in consequence of their believing him a bishop and priest, according to the laws of the church and state, and in full possession of his faculties, that the faithful held communication with him in their spiritual concerns. If his bigamy, thus the canon law termed these second successive marriages-had been known to them, not one would have approached him in confession, would have received from him holy orders, would have taken the eucharist, or any other sacrament of the church from his hands, or even heard his mass. Mr. Todd's acquaintance with the canon law, and ecclesiastical history, and his knowledge of life and manners, must make him sensible of the unavoidable consequences of such a concealment. His honourable mind must, I am sure, shudder at them. I cannot imagine to myself

* See Van Espen, Tit. Irregularitas. Dr. Milner queries, whether this point of the canon law be not in full force in England in the present time. It certainly does not appear, that the antient law of the land, in this particular, has been expressly or formally repealed; but it seems probable, that in consequence of their legalizations of the marriages of priests, it is considered in every Protestant state to be virtually abrogated. See Bohemer's Jus Ecclesiasticum Protestantium. Lib. I. Tit. xxi. s. 3. Mr. Hargrave, (1 Inst. 80 b. n. 1.), remarks, that in cases upon the benefit of clergy, the question may still arise.

greater baseness, than that of a person, who holds himself out to the faithful to be a regular priest, and a sincere believer of the efficacy of sacerdotal powers, and who, by this false pretension, attracts to himself religious* confidence ;-he himself, all the while, knowing that his powers are suspended, and that the exercise of them is nugatory.

The whole Passage commented on by Mr. Todd. +

I shall now copy the passage in "the Book of "the Roman Catholic Church," which is the subject of Mr. Todd's animadversions; numbering, for the sake of perspicuity, the sentences which Mr. Todd adverts to. I shall afterwards examine the charges which he has brought against me, in the order of the sentences to which he applies them.

My opinion, that the sentence, which, after the "pardon of their treason condemned them to the "flames for heresy, was execrable, I have expli

citly averred in my Memoirs of the English, "Irish, and Scottish Catholics.' I now delibe"rately repeat it. And, in respect to Cranmer, I "also willingly repeat, that his protection of the "Princess Mary from the fury of her father, his ex"ertions to save Sir Thomas More, Bishop Fisher, " and Lord Cromwell; his long resistance to the

*The Pope declared Cranmer his Penitentiary in England. Burnet's Hist. of Reformation, Vol. I. Book II. p. 95. 2 Edit.

+ Book of the Roman Catholic Church. 2 Ed. p. 218. Cranmer and Latimer.

"passing of the Six Sanguinary Articles, and his encouragement of literature, are entitled to a high degree of praise; no person can give it more willingly than I do, or wish more sincerely "that his failings should rest interred with his "bones. But, when he is described as a model "of virtue, and every effort of composition is "used to exalt him, at the expense of the Roman "Catholics and their religion, and, by highly co"loured relations of his virtues and sufferings, to "raise a storm of public indignation against us*, "-then

"Facit indignatio versum,"And I must ask some questions."

I.

"Although Cranmer adopted the Lutheran prin"ciples, so early as his residence in Germany, on "the business of the divorce, he yet continued, during the fifteen subsequent years of Henry's

reign, in the most public profession of the Ca"tholic religion, the article of the supremacy of "the Pope alone excepted ;-was this justifiable "before God or man?

IL

"Although, when he was consecrated Archbishop of Canterbury, he took the customary "oath of obedience to the see of Rome, did he not

just before he took it, retire into a private room, "and protest against it?-was this honourable?

* As in Doctor Southey's "Book of the Church."

III.

"Although he subscribed and caused his clergy "to subscribe to the Six Articles, the third and "fourth of which enjoined celibacy to the clergy, "and the observance of the vow of chastity, was " he not married, and did he not continue to co"habit with his wife?-was not this dissimulation?

IV.

"Although he knew Anne Boleyn was under no pre-contract of marriage, did he not, to use

Bishop Burnet's expression*, extort from her, "standing as she then did, on the very verge of "eternity, a confession of the existence of such a "contract?-was not this culpable subserviency to "his master's cruelties?-was it not prevailing on "the unhappy woman to die with a lie upon her lips?

* "But now, she lying under so terrible a sentence, it is "most probable that either some hopes of life were given her, 66 or at least she was wrought on by the assurances of miti"gating that cruel part of her judgment of being burnt, into "the milder part of the sentence of having her head cut off; so that she confessed a pre-contract, and on the 17th of May "was brought to Lambeth, and in court, the afflicted arch"bishop, sitting judge, some persons of quality being present, "she confessed some just and lawful impediment by which it 66 was evident that her marriage with the king was not valid. "Upon which confession, her marriage between the king and "her was judged to have been null and void."

The substance of these lines of the bishop's history, is thus given in the margin of it, "Upon an extorted confession, is "divorced."-Burnet's Hist. Vol. I. Book III.2 Ed. p. 203.