PART IV. From the Reformation to the present time.

CHAP. I.

Miscellaneous remarks on the Reformation—its rise and progress on the continent—introduction into this island, and effects upon this town.

The reformation formed a new era in the history of the world, and was one of those mighty revolutionary events which have a most extensive and lasting effect on the affairs and destinies of mankind. But men have been ever since greatly divided in their ideas and judgments concerning it. While some have hailed it as a most happy, admirable, and glorious event, fraught with heaven’s choicest blessings, it has been deemed by others, and even by a large majority of the inhabitants of christendom, as an exceedingly unfortunate, pernicious, and execrable occurrence, which has produced all manner of mischief, and, like the opening of Pandora’s box, filled the world with calamities and miseries innumerable. The learned and the wise, as well as the illiterate and fly foolish, have been found among each of these opposite and contending parties: their respective opinions and allegations must therefore be entitled to a serious and candid hearing. But it is not intended here to go deeply or largely into this disputed subject: nor would it well accord with the plan or design of this publication. Some cursory hints, however, on a few of the most prominent facts will not, it is presumed, be either impertinent or uninstructive.

Section I.

Statement of different and opposite opinions respecting the reformation—with brief remarks.

The information, like the French revolution, seems to have been too much admired by its friends, and too much vilified by its enemies. The former, for the most part, perceive nothing in it but what is praise worthy and divine, and the latter nothing but what is detestable and devilish. The truth, probably, lies somewhere about midway between these two extremes, as is usual in most of the disputes that divide and agitate the world. The reformation had certainly some good points in it, as well as some very bad ones, that can never be too much reprobated and detested. Had they been all bad, its friends would have defended them, for they have actually and unblushingly defended its very worst points; [625a] and had they been all good, its enemies, on the other hand, would not fail to condemn them, for they have really done so with its very best parts, whose intrinsic or essential goodness and beneficial tendency are most obvious and demonstrable. [625b]

The friends of the reformation consider the original and chief actors in that great revolutionary work as excellent men, actuated by a right apostolical and christian spirit, with a view to the restoration of primitive christianity, and the promotion of the best interests of mankind. Their opponents, on the contrary, consider them in a very different light, and hold them up as persons of a disreputable character, who were actuated by very unworthy and base motives, from whose thoughts nothing could be further than the restoration of genuine christianity, or the promoting of real benevolence, philanthropy, or human happiness. It will not be safe to give implicit credit to either of these representations. There were, certainly, some good men concerned in the reformation, and there were also some very bad men concerned in it, whose misdeeds ought never to be palliated; and these were probably the most numerous and the most powerful, or the work, surely, would have been more worthy of our praise and admiration.

The reformation, in the judgment of its admirers, was eminently calculated to promote the cause of truth and virtue, and inculcate the practice of piety, morality, and all manner of good works. All this, however, is flatly contradicted by the champions of the opposite cause, who positively affirm that the doctrines of the reformers were, in the very nature of them, of an evil, immoral and impious tendency:—alluding to the grand Lutheran tenet of justification by faith without works, [626a] and to the famous Calvinian notion of predestination, as extending to all the deeds of men, bad and good, or that all human actions, even the very worst, originate in the Divine decrees, or will of God. [626b] This opinion of the evil tendency of the reformation, or of the reformed doctrine, they represent as further corroborated and established by undeniable facts, and authentic historical evidence; or in other words, by its immediate effects, or the very first fruits it produced wherever it did prevail.

Those who advocate the cause of the reformers say that their labours were abundantly fruitful of good works, and that their doctrine produced the happiest effects wherever it was received. But their opponents flatly deny it, and positively assert that the very reverse was actually the case: and they support their assertion, not only by referring to those long and bloody wars which resulted from the reformation, but also to the express testimony of credible witnesses, who affirm, that vice and immorality greatly increased wherever protestantism became predominant. Nor is it a little remarkable that these same witnesses are, for the most part, some of the very chief reformers; so that their evidence comes with a force that cannot well be resisted. Some of them belonged to the continent, and others to this kingdom; but we shall in this place bring forward only the former, reserving the latter till we come to exhibit the rise and progress of the reformation in this country.

We shall begin with Luther, whose testimony on this occasion is very strong and remarkable.—“The world (says he) grows worse and worse. It is plain that men are much more covetous, malicious, and resentful, much more unruly, shameless, and full of vice, than they were in the time of popery.” [628a] “Formerly, when we were suduced by the pope, men willingly followed good works, but now all their study is to get every thing to themselves by exactions, pillage, theft, lying, usury.” [628b] “It is a wonderful thing, and full of scandal, that from the time that the pure doctrine was first called to light, the world should daily grow worse and worse.” [628c]—The testimony of Bucer, another celebrated reformer, is to the same effect. “The greater part of the people” (says he) “seem only to have embraced the gospel, in order to shake off the yoke of discipline, and the obligation of fasting, penance, &c., which lay upon them in the time of popery; and to live at their pleasure, enjoying their lust and lawless appetites without controul. They therefore lend a willing ear to the doctrine that we are justified by faith alone and not by good works, having no relish for them.”—[628d] Musculus also, another eminent reformer, is said to have borne much the same testimony. [628e]

Calvin’s evidence in this case seems also to be equally forcible and decisive: “Of so many thousands (says he) seemingly eager in embracing the gospel, how few have since amended their lives? Nay, to what else does the greater part pretend, except by shaking off the heavy yoke of superstition to launch out more freely into every kind of lasciviousness?” [629a] Thus said Calvin. When the character of the reformation is duly and thoroughly considered, and especially that of Calvin’s own doctrine, it is no great wonder that such effects should follow. It would have been much more wonderful if they had not followed; at least, when we further consider the abominable conduct, the vile and bloody deeds that were sanctioned by the same reformer’s own example. Had he been a different sort of man, these unsightly fruits of his labours might have led him to doubt the soundness of his faith, or suspect that his creed did not altogether tally with the doctrine that is according to godliness. But from him it could not be expected.

Another testimony of no small weight in this case, and which must not be here omitted, is that of the celebrated Erasmus, one of the greatest luminaries and most eminent characters of that age, who has been reckoned among the principal authors of the reformation as well as restorers of literature. Let us listen then to his evidence on this subject: “What an evangelical generation is this? Nothing was ever seen more licentious and more seditious. Nothing is less evangelical than these pretended gospellers. [629b] Take notice of this evangelical people, and shew me an individual amongst them all who from being a drunkard has become sober, from being a libertine has become chaste. I, on the other hand, can shew you many who have become worse by the change. Those whom I once knew to have been chaste, sincere, and without fraud, I found, after they had embraced this sect, to be licentious in their conversation, gamblers, neglectful of prayer, passionate, vain, as spiteful as serpents, and lost to the feelings of human nature. I speak from experience.” [630]

Upon the whole, it seems impossible to evade the force of this evidence, or deny that vice and immorality increased where protestantism prevailed, and, consequently, that there must have been some radical and essential defect in that system from the very first: so that it must be the very height of folly, absurdity, and arrogance in our present pretended evangelical demagogues to attempt to hold it up to the people as a standard of unadulterated truth and model of christian perfection. It is remarkable enough that these good people, almost to a man, are very loud in their reprobation of the French revolution, although it might easily be proved that that same revolution was nearly, if not quite as honourable in its origin, and respectable in its progress as that which was excited and conducted by Martin Luther, John Calvin, and their coadjutors, and which they seem so much to admire, and so ready to commend and justify. While reprobating the Gallic revolution on account of the licentiousness and crimes it produced, they are not aware how much the protestant revolution is liable to the same imputation.

Section II.

The former subject continued, with occasional and brief remarks.

There does not seem on any point a greater difference of opinion between the admirers of the reformation and their opponents than that which relates to the real character of the reformers. Volumes have been written on both sides of the question: one party extolling them to the skies, as if they had been all perfect beings or angels of light, and the other degrading them to the lowest point, as if they had been no better than so many demons. Too much, no doubt, has been said both for and against them. We must not believe them to be quite so bad as some catholic writers have represented them; nor yet, on the other hand, altogether so good and perfect as they have been described by the generality of our protestant authors. What is unfounded on either side we wish to explode; but some apparently well established facts relating to the reformers, and not generally known among protestants, ought not here to be passed over unnoticed, as they are well calculated to correct the reader’s ideas, both as to the reformers and the reformation.

As to Luther, it seems to be the common opinion among protestants that he was convinced of the errors and corruptions of the church of Rome, and, of course, decidedly hostile to them before the appearance of Tetzel with his indulgences. But this opinion appears to be untenable. It is more likely that he had thought nothing about the said errors and corruptions before the arrival of that memorable vender of pardons; and that either wholly out of detestation of his extravagant and shameless pretensions, or partly also out of spite to the Dominicans, to which order he belonged, he then ventured to oppose that scandalous traffick, without any direct intention to declare against any others of the papal abominations, towards which it does not seem that he had yet begun to conceive any aversion.

Accordingly, he appeared for some years after, to have no mighty objection to any thing in the popish religion but the abuse of the traffick of indulgences; and even on that point he actually consented to observe in future a profound silence, provided the same condition were imposed on his adversaries. Nay he went still further, and proposed to write a humble and submissive Letter to the Pope, acknowledging that he had carried his zeal and animosity too far: and such a Letter he actually did write. He even consented to publish a circular Letter, exhorting all his disciples and followers to reverence and obey all the dictates of the Roman church. He declared that his only intention, in the writings which he had composed was to brand with infamy those emissaries who abused its authority, and employed its protection as a mask to cover their abominable and impious frauds. [632]

Such was the hostility to the pope and his cause, and such the anxiety for religious reformation which Luther manifested for some years after he had assumed the character of a reformer, or rather after the commencement of his quarrel with Tetzel and the Dominicans. Had Leo X. been wise and politic enough to accept his proffered submission, about the time of the conferences with Miltitz, he would, to all appearance, immediately and gladly have returned into the bosom of holy church, and, most probably, never have given his holiness or the world any further trouble on the score of religious abuses and corruptions.

The haughty pontiff, however, instead of embracing the golden opportunity, and receiving readily and kindly his rebellious, but now repentant son, had recourse to the very opposite mode of proceeding. He fulminated his anathemas against him, had him solemnly excommunicated, declared an enemy to the church, and even to the holy Roman empire. Luther having now no alternative, was obliged to make virtue of necessity; and it is easy to see that he was actually forced to take that course which he afterwards pursued, and in the pursuit of which he displayed such wonderful address, and such extraordinary talents as have really immortalized his name. But as to real virtue, it seems hard to see or say how much of that there was in his opposition to the pope and church of Rome, except what is implied in the law of selfpreservation. Cromwell too, had that law on his side, to the full as much, perhaps, as Luther, even while engaged in what has been deemed the most criminal parts of his conduct, the dethronement of the king and attainment of the supreme power. But which of these two men was the most virtuous or most vicious, was the better or worse man, is a point that will not be presumed or attempted to be made here a subject of investigation. They certainly had, both of them, great talents and great defects.

Lutheran and other protestant writers have appeared not a little anxious to have Luther acquitted from the imputation of having opposed Tetzel out of spite to the Dominicans, or from resentment for the preference shewn them in the distribution or traffick of indulgences. We pretend not to say that that was the sole cause of his opposition; but that it might be partly the cause seems not at all improbable from what he himself has owned on other occasions. Thus he acknowledges that he had tried to persuade himself of there being no real presence of Christ in the sacrament, “on purpose to spite the pope, but that the words of scripture were too plain in favour of it.” Likewise, in his letter to the Vaudois, he says, “I have hitherto thought it of small consequence whether the bread remains in the sacrament or not, but now, to spite the papists, I am determined to believe that it does remain.” Thus also, writing against those who had presumed to alter the public service without his authority, he says, “I knew very well that the elevation of the sacrament was idolatrous, but 1 retained it out of pure spite to that devil Carlostadius.” [634] A very glaring and most odious trait in Luther’s character was the ungentlemanly and foul language in which he used to address his opponents, than which nothing could be more unbecoming in one who pretended to be engaged in, or anxious for the reformation of mankind, and the revival or restoration of genuine and primitive christianity. We have just now seen in what style he could speak of his quondam friend Carlostadius: “that devil Carlostadius:” and it seems he could be sometimes equally uncivil and foulmouthed when he had occasion to speak of Zuinglius and the rest of that party, who did not receive his favourite doctrine of consubstantiation, or the real presence; for whom he had no mercy, but consigned them all to everlasting perdition; just as his modern disciples, our present evangelicals, do to the poor Arians and Socinians.

As to the papists, it was not to be expected that he should be more civil or polite to them than to the Zuinglians. Accordingly, we are told that “the usual flowers of his speech, when addressing the pope and other catholic prelates, were: villain, thief, traitor, apostle of the devil, bishop of sodomites: and that the extent of his charity to them was to wish that their bowels were torn out, that they were cast into the Mediterranean sea or into the flames, and that they were hurried away to the devil. His treatment of the king of England, Henry VIII, with whom he had at one time a theological controversy, (though afterwards they grew into a better understanding with each other,) was not more respectful than his treatment of the pope. Luther makes no difficulty to call his royal antagonist, a Thomistical pig, an ass, a jakes, a dunghill, the spawn of an adder, a basilisk, a lying buffoon disguised in a king’s robe, a mad fool with a frothy mouth and a whorish face. He even addresses him as follows: You lie, you stupid and sacrilegious king.” [636a]

Another very unamiable and disgustful trait in Luther’s character was his assuming an extraordinary and apostolic dignity and authority, under the name or title of Ecclesiastes: “Martin Luther Ecclesiastes of Wittemberg.”—“It is not fitting, (said he,) that I should be without a title, having received the work of the ministry, not from man, or by man, but by the gift of God, and the revelation of Jesus Christ.” [636b] This was evidently putting himself upon a level, at least, with Peter and Paul, and the rest of the apostles, and claiming from professing christians the deference or submission due to them. Accordingly, “he plainly proclaims to the whole body of protestants, in case they presume to consult together and determine about their common belief, that he will return back to the ancient church, and revoke every word he had ever written or taught against it; telling them that even in acting right, when they acted without his authority, they were plunging themselves into the jaws of hell.” [636c]

It is not a little remarkable that this reformer pretended to have some extraordinary intercourse, not only with the Deity, but also with Satan. Accordingly, he has published to the world, not only that he held frequent communications with the devil, but also that he learned the most material part of the reformation, namely, the abolition of the mass from him. In his treatise on that subject there is an account of Satan’s appearing to him by night, and of a long dialogue that passed between them, in which Luther defends the mass, and the devil argues against it. The conclusion is that this new apostle yields to the motives suggested by his internal antagonist, and adopts the important reform which he proposes. We are also informed, that Luther in one of his Sermons, according to Cochleus, affirmed that he had “eat more than a bushel of salt with Satan;” and that in his Colloquies he describes himself as constantly haunted by the devil, who, he says, “sleeps nearer to me than my wife Catherine.” [637]

Luther bears testimony to the unfavourable effects of the reformed religion, not only upon his followers, (as we have seen before) but also upon himself. He says that whilst he continued a catholic monk he observed chastity, obedience and poverty; and that being free from worldly cares be gave himself up to fasting, watching, and prayer: whereas, after he commenced reformer, he describes himself as raging with the most violent concupiscence, to satisfy which he broke through his solemn vow of continency, in direct opposition to his former doctrine, by marrying a religious woman, who was under the same obligation. He then proceeded to teach what most people deem shameful and licentious lessons, such as the permission, in certain cases, of concubinage and polygamy, and that pestilential doctrine, which is the utter destruction of all morality, that there is no freedom in human actions—and that when the scripture commands good works, “we are to understand it to forbid them, because we cannot do them; that a baptized person cannot lose his soul, whatever sins he commit, provided he believe, inasmuch as no sin can damn except infidelity.” [638]

Section III.

Further remarks on the reformers and reformation—tenaciously adhered to, and retained the very worst part of popery, its intolerant, persecuting, and bloody spirit—the very first thing whose reformation or expulsion they ought to have attempted—its omission rendered their whole undertaking illfavored, preposterous, and ineffectual.

Defective in many parts as Luther’s character really was, he appears to have been, nevertheless, one of the best among the original and leading reformers. There seemed to be a frankness or unreservedness about him that was somewhat pleasing, and which it is not easy to discover in many of his coadjutors. He was also apparently not so bloodyminded as some of them were, at whose head, it is presumed, we may venture to place the apostle of Geneva, Calvin. This man (as is evinced by the tragical case of Servetus,) when his favourite dogmas were opposed, and his wisdom, learning, and infallibility set at naught, nothing would satisfy but the obstruction of his opponent: but Luther, (as appears from the affair of Carlostadius,) would be pretty well satisfied with the banishment only of those who happened so to offend him. The spirit of Luther, however, though less vindictive and diabolical than that of Calvin, was yet very dissimilar to that of Jesus Christ, whose followers they both professed themselves to be.

It seems to have been then the case, that those reformers who had gone the furthest from the church of Rome in doctrine, such as Calvin and the Swiss divines, who denied the real presence, were yet the nighest to that church in spirit: for they seemed more addicted to the practice of consigning to destruction those whom they deemed heretics than the Lutherans, though the latter did not depart near so far as the former from the grand popish doctrine of transubstantiation. Odd as this may be considered, it appears to be a fact; though to account for it may, perhaps, be attended with considerable difficulty. It cannot however, be supposed, that the denial of the real presence could have any tendency to make people more bloodthirsty, vindictive, or intolerant.

The reformers, in retaining the bigotry and intolerance, or the spirit of popery, retained in fact its very worst part, and what may be called its marrow and substance; which the world had most need to get rid of. All therefore that they did, or could do, in such a case, was only like giving a new edition, or an abridgment of an old and bad work, which still contained the essence of the former, and must, of course, have the same defective and evil tendency. They appeared like people undertaking the cure of a demoniac without casting out the demon, or pretending that the evil or scrophula may be healed and eradicated by the royal touch. In short, they began the work at the wrong end, and never meddled with that part at which they ought to have begun.

Their first work ought to have been to exhibit to the religious world the meekness and gentleness of Christ, and endeavour to bring those who professed to be his servants back to the spirit of his religion. Had they done so, and succeeded, their work would have beep more than half done. The rest would have followed of course, or, at least, with little comparative difficulty. For when men have once imbibed the spirit of the New Testament, it will not be very hard to persuade them to renounce such doctrines or practices as are not enjoined or countenanced in that sacred volume: and if any errors or misconceptions happen still to remain, they will become in a great measure harmless, through the influence of that divine spirit by which they are now led and governed.

The reformers in foisting into their system the impious and horrid principle of intolerance and persecution, gave it a most monstrous and shocking aspect, even more so than that of the centaurs, or minotaurs of ancient fable; for it was like joining God with the devil, or Christ with Belial. But nothing better, perhaps, could be expected from men who knew so little of the temper which christianity produces; and who never discerned the difference between the wisdom that is from above and that which is from beneath; or considered that Jesus Christ came not to destroy men’s lives, but to save them. For men who knew so little of the genius of christianity to take it upon them, as they did, to lord it over the faith of professing christians, was certainly a most gross and iniquitous piece of presumption.

The power which the reformers acquired was very great and formidable, and the authority which they sometimes assumed and exercised was not a little remarkable and extraordinary, as appears not only from the permission of concubinage, &c. already mentioned, but also from the Dispensation granted by Luther, Melancthon, Bucer, and five others, to the prince of Hesse Cassel to have two wives at a time, and which was afterwards published by a descendant of that prince. This was certainly taking a great deal upon them, and placing themselves, not indeed upon a level with the apostles, as was before observed, but much above them, even with the pope himself. Yet they seemed very angry with his holiness, calling him antichrist, and many other bad names. They appeared very desirous to pull him down, but had no manner of objection to do his work, or act the pope themselves when it suited them, and that was not unfrequently.

It is curious enough to hear these men inveigh against the intolerant and persecuting spirit of the church of Rome, at the very time when they themselves were manifesting the selfsame spirit, and pursuing the same tyrannical and murderous course which they so much condemned in the papists. In our own country, John Fox, the martyrologist, was employed in writing huge folios to describe the horrors of popish persecution, while his own protestant sovereign and her bishops and clergy were persecuting the poor puritans with unfeeling and relentless rigour. Protestants can see the hatefulness of persecution in the papists, but very often are quite blind to it in themselves, or those of their own party. [642] They can discern what is bad in their opponents, but overlook what is equally so in themselves.

Christianity, in its first aspect and fundamental principles, is a religion of peace and good will towards men, which forbids any to domineer over their brethren, or exercise authority over their consciences, and requires, in all things whatsoever, to do to others as we would they should do to us. But the reformers overlooked all this, and discovered either an entire ignorance of, or a fixed aversion to these godlike principles. In either case they must have been wretchedly qualified to reform and christianize the world, or form a religion worthy the reception of mankind. A religion, however, they would and did form, and never rested till they got it established by the civil power, and enforced by penal sanctions; and this rendered its native intolerance doubly pernicious and detestable.

“No religion” (says an excellent writer) “can be established without penal sanctions, and all penal sanctions in cases of religion are persecutions. Before a man can persecute he must renounce the generous tolerant dispositions of a christian. No religion can be established without human creeds; and subscription to all human creeds implies two dispositions contrary to true religion, and both expressly forbidden by the author of it. These two dispositions are, love of dominion over conscience in the imposer, and an abject preference of slavery in the subscriber. The first usurps the rights of Christ; the last swears allegiance to a pretender. The first domineers, and gives laws like a tyrant; the last truckles like a vassal. The first assumes a dominion incompatible with his frailty, impossible even to his dignity, yea even denied to the dignity of angels; the last yields a low submission, inconsistent with his own dignity, and ruinous to that very religion, which he pretends by this mean to support.” [644]

It is very remarkable, and no less true and disgusting, that protestantism was ushered into the world in the very spirit of the religion it strove to supplant. Yet its authors expected to be thought commissioned by heaven to do what they did, and clearly entitled to the gratitude and reverence of mankind, as well as their ready submission to their dictates and authority. But to one who has carefully examined the New Testament, they appear so very different from the first disseminators or propagators of christianity, that they can hardly be supposed to belong to the same cause or family. When Luther is seen banishing conscientious people who differed from him, and Calvin, and the Swiss reformers, burning or hanging them, and the French protestants, or Calvinists of France solemnly soliciting their popish sovereign to inflict severe punishment on those whom they were pleased to deem heretics: [645]—when one recollects these acts, and that they were all done in the name of the Lord, one is ready to sicken at the thought of the pretensions of the actors, to reform the world and restore christianity to its original state. Nor is it less disgusting to hear our flaming advocates for modern orthodoxy extolling these men, as models of christian sanctity, and unexceptionable or safe guides to pure, undefiled, and evangelical religion.

Section IV.

Brief account of the rise and progress of the reformation in this kingdom.

No sooner had the reformation begun to gain ground and spread on the continent than its effects began to be felt in this country. The court, or government was at first so far from being disposed to countenance it, that it seemed, on the contrary, quite determined to oppose and crush it. The sovereign himself appeared exceedingly hostile to it: which, from his known character, must have rendered the prospect of its admission and success here very dark and hopeless. So inimical was his majesty then to the cause of the reformers and so hearty in that of their opponents, that he actually took up his pen and wrote a book against Luther; for which important performance and acceptable service the pope thought proper to reward him, by conferring on him the dignified title of Defender of the Faith; a title which all his protestant successors have tenaciously, if not proudly retained to this day. This was the book which Luther answered in the rude and uncourtly manner before described. [646]

Our royal polemic did not long continue to be that fond and dutiful son of his holy father at Rome of which he had at first exhibited so fair and hopeful a promise. His Holiness not readily favouring his inclination, or gratifying his wish to be divorced from his first wife and marry another Lady, whom he liked much better, he disdainfully threw off that paternal yoke, renounced his connection with Rome, and became himself a great and violent reformer; so as to deserve to be placed in the very first rank among his contemporaries of that denomination. A mighty revolution ensued throughout his dominions: and though we cannot boast of the purity of the source whence it sprung, or of its being distinguished, (at least in the outset,) by much, if any, real virtue; yet it proved eventually of no small advantage and benefit to these nations: and Henry ought to be commemorated as one of the chief and most meritorious of all our royal benefactors.

One of the chief objects of Henry’s reformation, like that of Lather, seems to have been to spite the pope. He had also in view, no doubt, the gratification of his ambition and caprice, which in a mind like his must have been very powerful springs of action. Nor did he miss his aims: he fairly expelled the pope, obtained full scope for his caprice, boundless as it was, and actually acquired far more power than ever, for he now became a complete and uncontrouled despot in temporal, and a pope in spiritual affairs. The two other branches of the legislature, from whom alone any effectual or legal opposition could have arisen, were so far from daring or attempting to check his soaring career, or cross his capricious humour, that they readily and obsequiously concurred in constituting him supreme head both of church and state.

Having reached the utmost point of elevation, or pinnacle of power, he set about reforming the religion, and rectifying the faith of his subjects, after the example of his brother-reformers on the continent; and a most curious, grotesque, and strange piece of work he certainly made of it. Yet it is supposed to be the true foundation or groundwork of our present national establishment, and that Henry himself was the father, or first patriarch of the English protestant Hierarchy. Nor has our established church any just ground or reason, apparently, to disown him in that character, for he was perhaps as holy and good a soul as most of her succeeding patriarchs. But this point we pretend not to determine.

King Henry made his own faith or creed the standard or model for all his subjects, male and female, young and old, learned and unlearned. It was at the utmost peril of any of his subjects if their religion did not exactly tally with his; at least, if he happened to find it out. If shorter or narrower than his, it was at the peril of their lives; and the same again if it proved longer or broader. It must not vary a single inch, or even a hair’s breadth from his, or his majesty would deem it a most grievous offence, and a crime deserving capital punishment. Hence he is known to have put some to death for not going so far from Rome or popery as he did, and some again for going further; and both were occasionally burnt in the same fire, or at the same time. In short, it was then a sad and dismal time in this country, and Henry’s reformation must have been a most strange and terrible work.

Even the bishops and other religious functionaries, who generally fare better than most other people, could not then have a very pleasant time of it; especially the better sort of them, who could have wished to lead honest lives and act somewhat conscientiously, had they been quietly permitted so to do. To that class bishop Latimer is supposed to belong. He seemed more simple and downright than most of the rest, which might involve him in difficulties which his more wary brethren would naturally escape. Accordingly we find the correctness of his creed repeatedly called in question, and he got frequently into heretical scrapes, which he generally managed to get out of by abjuration: [649]—a method which some would be apt to deem not very creditable to his virtue or integrity, though in general looked upon as unimpeachable and of the first order.

“Admitting him” (says Milner to Sturges) “to have been conscientiously persuaded of the truth of the Reformation, was it consistent with christian integrity and virtue to dissemble his religion for twenty years together, and repeatedly abjure it, as he certainly did as often as he found himself threatened with any serious danger by adhering to it? Was it consistent with integrity and virtue to accept of one of the highest offices, the bishopric of Worcester, in a church which he so much reprobated, and even to take an oath of opposing, to the utmost of his power, all persons who dissented from, or were disobedient to it? But supposing you inclined to overlook all this, what will you say to the share he took in the religious persecutions both of Henry’s and of Edward’s reign? What excuse will you make for him when you find him sending christians and protestants to the stake for the very opinion which he himself holds?” [650] These are serious charges, and all apparently well-founded; but the chief and heaviest of them is his being a bloody persecutor. He was moreover one of our chief English reformers, on which account the above brief sketch of his character has been here introduced, along with the rest of his most conspicuous associates, to give the reader an opportunity to judge what veneration is due to their memory, or how well or ill they deserved of their contemporaries and of posterity.

Ridley is another of our protestant prelates that appeared at the head of our English Reformation. Dr. Sturges describes him as “active in the conduct of ecclesiastical affairs.” To which his keen and able opponent replies: “I think, sir, you will grant that he shewed rather too much activity in these affairs, to be consistent with integrity, after I shall have reminded you, that when bishop of Rochester in Henry’s days, and when bishop of London in those of Edward, he was as forward in persecuting protestants and anabaptists as Cranmer, Latimer, and the rest of the prelates were; and that he was one of the most zealous and forward of Dudley’s partisans in endeavouring to interrupt the regular succession of the throne, and in raising that rebellion which was attended with the loss of so much blood.” [651]

Hooper, another of our chief reformers, was much less active than Ridley in the conduct of ecclesiastical affairs. He was somewhat scrupulous about certain vestments and ceremonies; and he might have some scruples too on the subject of persecution: at least it is not in the present writer’s recollection that he was very forward, like the others, in harassing those who were called heretics. His character, however, seems not so indefectible as to entitle him to be held up as a mirror of evangelical soundness, or an object of universal admiration. He has been charged with being the founder of the sect called puritans, which proved so troublesome to our rulers in church and state for a whole century or more: but this is not mentioned here as a blemish in his character. The following circumstances are of a more blamable nature: 1. His obtaining and holding the bishopric of Worcester, in addition to his former bishopric of Gloucester, after having inveighed very strongly in his sermons against pluralities: 2. His consenting to wear the vestments, after having engaged the young king to write to Cranmer that they “were offensive to his conscience;” and his taking the oath of supremacy, after having made his patron, Dudley, write to the same prelate that “it was burdensome to his conscience,” when he found that he could not get promotion otherwise. [652a]

But in our English reformation, under Henry VIII, and Edward VI, the chief agent was confessedly archbishop Cranmer, whose character, as exhibited by eminent protestant writers, abounded with great and glaring blemishes. “The first remarkable circumstance we meet in the life of Cranmer is his privately marrying a woman of low condition, whilst he was fellow of Jesus College, Cambridge, [652b] contrary to the engagements of his admission. He afterwards, when a priest, [and while his first wife was alive] married a second wife in Germany, by a much more flagrant violation of his vow of celibacy, and having brought her privately into England, he continued to live with her, in equal opposition to the laws of the church and of the land,” [and though he had assured the king that he had sent her home to Germany.] “Being a Lutheran in principle, as far back as the year 1529, he afterwards accepted the office of pope’s penitentiary, and when named to the archbishopric of Canterbury he was content to accept different bulls from the pontiff to take upon himself the character of his legate in England, and even to make a solemn oath of obedience to him, [652c] with an obligation of opposing all heretics and schismatics, that is to say, according to the received sense of the words, all persons of his own religious persuasion. In like manner he must have said mass, which, in his opinion, was an idolatrous worship, both at his consecration, and frequently at other times, during the fourteen years that he governed the church of England under Henry. He must also necessarily, from time to time, have ordained other priests to perform the same worship, and imposed upon them the obligation of that continency which he himself did not observe. In a word, we see his subscription still affixed to a great variety of doctrinal articles and injunctions, issued during that reign, which we know to have been in direct opposition to his real sentiments.”

“Every one knows that Cranmer owed his rise in the church to the part which he took in Henry’s divorce from queen Catherine of Arragon. Henry tired out with the opposition of Rome, and impatient to be united with his beloved Ann Boleyn, privately marries her Nov. 14, 1532, and Cranmer himself is one of the witnesses of the contract. [653a] On the 11th. of the following March this same prelate writes a letter to Henry, from “pure motives of conscience” as he declares, [653b] but from a preconcerted scheme as the fact proves, representing the necessity there was of determining the long depending cause between him and his queen, and demanding of him the necessary ecclesiastical jurisdiction to decide it. [653c] This being granted, he on the 20th of May pronounces a sentence of divorce between the royal pair, and authorises Henry to take another wife; [653d] six months after he himself had officiated as witness to his marriage with Ann Boleyn, and only four months before the latter was delivered of an infant who was afterwards queen Elizabeth. [654a] What a scandalous collusion in so important a matter of conscience and public example!”

“In less than three years however [his sacred majesty] grows weary of the consort whom he had moved heaven and earth to gain, [654b] and becomes enamoured of a new beauty. Nevertheless appearances must be saved; and therefore Cranmer presents himself as the ready instrument in smoothing the way to the gratification of [his sovereign’s] passions. After a feint effort to save Ann, to whose family he had such infinite obligations, in a cold adulatory letter to the king, which he wrote on the occasion, [655a] he lent all his aid to ruin and oppress her, permitting, if not persuading, her, (standing as she then did upon the verge of eternity) to confess what he knew to be false; [655b] and pronouncing a sentence of divorce, which contained that she had never been validly married to Henry, at the very time when she was lying under sentence of death for violating his bed by adultery!” [655c]

In the transactions relating to Ann of Cleves, Henry’s fourth queen, Cranmer’s conduct appears scarcely less dishonourable than in those relating to Ann Boleyn. Nor does it seem that the death of Henry produced in him any real or material amendment: so that there can be no validity in the excuse usually made for his former misconduct by ascribing it chiefly to that monarch’s despotic will. He appeared just as obsequious to the will of the protector Seymour as he had been before to that of Henry. “To gratify this he consented to set aside in a great measure the last will of his old master, of which he was the first-named executor. [655d] Having raised this ecclesiastical no less than civil idol to undue power, he was ready to pay homage to him with all the essential authority of the church, taking out a new commission for his archbishopric, under the pretext that his former power had expired with the deceased king, and professing to be a prelate no longer than the child Edward, or rather Seymour himself, should acknowledge him to be so.” [656a]

“Cranmer concurred no less in other [misdoings] and disorders of this infant reign, than he did in those stated above. He gratified Somerset by subscribing to the death warrant of his brother. He was afterwards as forward as any of the other courtiers in paying his homage to the rising power of Dudley, when he found the interest of the latter growing stronger than that of Seymour: and he carried his ingratitude to his deceased benefactor Henry, and his infidelity in the discharge of that prince’s last will, to such a length as to concur in excluding his two daughters from their lawful inheritance and right to the crown, in order to place it on the head of Dudley’s daughter-in-law, the lady Jane. If Elizabeth [therefore] had succeeded to the throne immediately after Edward, she would no more have spared Cranmer and Ridley than Mary did.” [656b]

“In conclusion, if Cranmer was burnt to death for heresy, instead of being beheaded for rebellion, [his advocates ought to] reflect, how many persons he himself, whilst he had power in his hands, had condemned to this punishment, on the selfsame accusation.” For it is undeniable that be was instrumental in the execution of many persons for religions opinions, and that some of them held the very tenets for which he himself afterwards suffered. “Though this part of his conduct has keen kept out of sight as much as possible, yet we have certain proofs of his having been one of the chief instruments, under Henry, in bringing to the stake John Lambert, Ann Askew, John Frith, and William Allen, [657a] for denying the real presence of Christ in the sacrament, besides a great number of anabaptists, &c. for their respective opinions.”

“In the reign of Edward VI, besides other most severe persecutions which he carried on against Gospellers, Anabaptists, and other sectaries, amongst whom two at least were Sacramentarians, he was the active promoter and immediate cause of the burning of Joan Knell, [657b] and George Paris or Van Parr, [657c] for certain singular opinions. Amongst those who escaped with their lives, a great part of them were forced to recant, through the fear of torments, and to carry lighted tapers and faggots, in testimony of their having merited burning. [658a] As to the fate of Joan Knell, or Butcher, commonly called Joan of Kent, (and whose innocent blood was evidently shed by the procurement of Cranmer,) Dr. Milner thinks that when it is considered with all its attendant circumstances, a more cruel and wanton act of persecution (he might have said murder,) is not to be found upon record. [658b] “The doctrine for which she suffered (he adds) was of an abstract nature, not calculated to gain proselytes or to occasion any public disturbances. She was barely accused of maintaining, that “Christ passed through the blessed Virgin’s body as water through a conduit, without participating of that body through which he passed.” [659a] For no other cause than persisting in this opinion, she was convented in the church of St. Paul, before archbishop Cranmer and his assistants, convicted and delivered over to the secular arm. We have the sentence that he pronounced on the occasion, which is rigorous beyond the usual terms; and we have a certificate of it, addressed to the king, in which instead of petitioning for mercy, in the usual style of such instruments, the convict heretic is expressly recommended “to receive due punishment.” Nor is this all, for the royal youth being unwilling to sign the warrant for her execution, Cranmer employs all his theological arguments to induce him to comply; amongst other things telling him that “princes, being God’s deputies, ought to punish impieties against God.” In the end Edward sets his hand to the warrant, but with tears in his eyes, telling Cranmer, that “if he did wrong, he (the said Cranmer) should answer for it to God.” At length, by a change in circumstances, the archbishop himself being condemned as a heretic to suffer that cruel death, to which he had condemned so many others on the same account, “he was far from imitating the firmness of the greater part of them.” [659b]

His recantation of his former or protestant principles, at Mary’s accession, is well known. The prevailing notion is, that it was the effect of “a momentary weakness,” or the act and deed of “an unguarded hour:” but that appears very far from being correct or true. On the contrary, “he is proved to have deliberately subscribed six different forms of recantation, at so many different periods, [660a] each one of which was more ample and express than the preceding one; and he remained during the whole five or six last weeks of his life, and until the very hour of his death, either a sincere catholic or an egregious hypocrite. At length finding that, notwithstanding so many retractations, he was upon the point of being executed, he revoked them all, and shewed a resolution at his death which he had exhibited in no one occurrence of his life.” [660b]

Section V.

View of the first fruits of the English reformation, or its immediate and subsequent effects on the public manners and morals—system defective—reasons for introducing these subjects into this work.

We have seen already what were the first fruits, or immediate effects of the continental reformation; and as our own reformation was only the counterpart of that, or, as we might say, its offspring, it was hardly to be expected but that the effects or fruits of both would be similar. We accordingly meet with undeniable evidence that that was really the case. Among those competent witnesses who describe the effects of the reformation in this kingdom, the first place or first hearing, no doubt, is due to that memorable prince who laid the foundation of it, Henry VIII. His majesty speaks very plainly and pointedly upon this subject, in a speech which he delivered to parliament the year before his death. Having then complained of the abuse which the people made of the permission he had granted them to read the scriptures in the vulgar tongue, by “their own phantastical opinions and vain expositions,” instead of consulting him their spiritual head, he goes on: “I am sure that charitie was never so faint amongst you, and vertuous and godlie living was never less, nor God himselfe amongst christians was never less reverenced, honored, or served.” [661]

“That the state of morality was not rendered better, but rather infinitely worse, in the following reign, when the protestant religion was fully developed and established, we have abundant and undeniable evidence in the confessions of the most zealous advocates and abettors of that cause. The following is bishop Burnet’s account of the state of morality under Edward VI: “The sins of England did at that time call down from heaven heavy curses on the land. They are sadly expressed in a discourse that Ridley wrote soon after, under the title of The Lamentation of England: he says that “lechery, oppression, pride, covetousness, and a hatred and scorn of all religion were generally spread amongst all people, but chiefly those of the higher ranks.” [662a]

Ridley’s fellow-bishop, Latimer, speaks still more openly as to one particular vice, in a sermon preached before the king, and quoted by Heylin. His words are these: “Lechery is used in England, and such lechery as is used in no other part of the world. And it is made a matter of sport, a trifle not to be passed on or reformed.” To remedy this he begs that the church may be reinstated in “her right of excommunicating notable offenders, by putting them out of the congregation.” [662b] In another of his court sermons he seems to glance at corruption in high places or offices—such as judges taking bribes: “I would wish,” (says he) “that of such a judge in England now we might have the skin hanged up. It were a goodly sight, the sign of the judge’s skin.” [662c]

“The laborious collector Strype, though a most zealous advocate for the cause of the reformation, yet draws the most frightful picture of the wickedness which prevailed throughout the nation after its first establishment that is to be met with in history. The account is too long to be here inserted at length, but it is comprised under the following heads: “The covetousness of the nobility and gentry; the oppression of the poor; no redress at law; the judges ready to barter justice for money; impunity of murders; the clergy very bad from the bishops to the curates; and above all, the increase of adulteries and whoredom. [663a] The historian Camden’s description of these times agrees with that of the former writers. He says, “The sacrilegious avarice of the times rapaciously seized upon colleges, chantries, and hospitals, under the pretence of superstition: whilst ambition and jealousy amongst the great, and insolence and sedition amongst the people, swelled to such a pitch that England seemed to be raging mad with rebellions, tumults, party zeal, &c.” [663b]

During the reign of Elizabeth, when Camden wrote, and when the reformation had arrived at full maturity, though the civil state of the realm was better regulated, yet in private life, as Dr. Milner observes, “the vices of individuals in every rank rose to the same height of profligacy as before.” In corroboration of this he refers to contemporary protestant testimonies. Stubbs, the author of a piece entitled “Motives to Good Works,” with an epistle dedicatorie to the lord major of London, an. 1596, asserts, among other things, that the observation of Luther, (quoted above, p. 628,) still holds good: and he further says; “For good works who sees not that they (the papists of former times) were far beyond us, and we far behind them.” p. 44. To the same effect speaks R. Jeffery, in his sermon at Paul’s Cross, an. 1604. Many other writers, particularly of the puritan party, have given similar testimonies in reference to the reign both of Elizabeth and also of her successor James. [664]

From the preceding facts or premises we may venture to affirm that the effects of the reformation on those who first embraced it were not such as might be expected, or such as would have appeared, had the religion which the reformers introduced been of divine origin, or the same with that which the apostles promulgated, and which is contained in the New Testament. The latter, like a good tree, produced good fruit; and its effects, wherever it prevailed, or was heartily received, were very different from those above described, and of the very opposite character. It must follow therefore, that the religion of the reformers was so radically and materially defective as not to be adapted to answer some of the chief or most important ends which the religion of Christ was designed to promote—and even that its whole scope and tendency were actually subversive of those very ends.

This will not appear very wonderful when it is considered what manner of spirit the reformers were of, or how their religion was constituted, and that they appear to have paid far more attention to the sayings and dictates of Athanasius and Jerom, Ambrose and Austin, and the rest of those old women called fathers, than they did to those of the apostles and evangelists, or even of Jesus Christ himself. Nothing therefore very good and excellent could be expected from them; nor indeed any thing superior to, or better than such a farrago as they did produce, or such articles, creeds, confessions, directories, formulas, &c. as they thought proper to impose on their disciples and followers. To have produced what was right good, and excellent, they must have drawn from a purer fountain, and partaken of another and very different spirit.

The reformation being destitute of the spirit of christianity, and full of that of popery, which constituted its grand defect, it could not possibly prove that blessing to mankind which it otherwise would have done. It usurped the same dominion over conscience as the old religion did, and persecuted with equal bitterness and violence those who dared to think and judge for themselves, and refused to yield obedience to its authority, or submit to its usurpation. It is difficult therefore to see on what that mighty reverence claimed for the names and memory of the reformers can be founded. Had they actually published and granted liberty of conscience to the people, and allowed every honest man to think and judge for himself, and to serve and worship God according to the conviction of his own mind—then, indeed, might love and gratitude and reverence be justly claimed to their memory, and their names be enrolled among the best and most eminent benefactors of their species. But such was not their conduct.—In fine, considering the spirit which they breathed and the effects which their doctrines produced, it seems impossible to look upon them as promoters of the religion of the New Testament, or promulgators of the genuine gospel of Jesus Christ.

But it may, and probably will be asked, Why introduce these subjects into the present work? To this we beg leave to answer: 1. Because they are in general ill understood, and supposed to be so by many who will probably peruse these sheets, to whom an attempt to place them in a right and true light would be, as it was thought, a reasonable and acceptable service.—2. Because we are now entering upon that part of the work which commences at the reformation, in which of course, many things will occur which have resulted from that event; an introductory sketch of which therefore seemed necessary for the right conception or illustration of such occurrences.—3. Because the discussion of these subjects here will enable the reader to perceive the living image and offspring of the original reformers in those of the present day who assume the character of evangelical, and sole promoters of vital religion. Their principles and spirit evince the stock whence they are sprung: and so also do those filial feelings so very visible in their readiness at all times to defend or palliate the very worst actions of those reformers, and even the murderous deeds of a Calvin and a Cranmer.—4 Because it afforded the author an opportunity to bear his testimony against some of the greatest existing evils that have sprung from the reformation, bigotry and intolerance; which have ever since, even in this protestant country and town, and among most of our tolerated sects, usurped the place of religious liberty, and trampled upon the sacred rights of conscience.

Section VI.

Further remarks on the effects of the Reformation, especially as they appeared in this town.

The effects of the reformation were very great and remarkable, not only on those who were rationally proselyted to it, or who received it upon conviction, but also on them who went with the tide without exercising their reason or troubling their heads at all about the comparative merits of the two religions. Neither party had their morals improved, but on the contrary rendered much more dissolute by the change, as we have already seen. The same event had likewise effects no less visible and remarkable on the very aspect or appearance of both town and country; as must necessarily have been the case from the dissolution and demolition of so many religious houses, and the suppression and expulsion of such a multitude of monks, friars, and nuns, who must have had no small influence in preserving social order, regulating the morals, and restraining many of the vicious propensities of the community.

In fact, the licentiousness which appears to have resulted from the reformation is seemingly to be ascribed to the three following causes—1. The real, apparent, or supposed loose tendency of certain leading doctrines of the reformers, as was observed before.—2. The suppression of the religious houses, whose inhabitants used to be the means of promoting public decency, and checking the influence of licentious principles. [668]—3. The revolutionary character of the reformation. All great revolutions, from their very nature, tend to weaken the ties, and loosen the bands which preserve the good order of society and strengthen the moral habits of its members.—It may be reasonably concluded that each of these causes had a material effect on this town and country at the memorable era of reformation, and long after.

We can discover no appearance or indication that the character or disposition of the Lynn people was further christianized, mollified, or any way improved by that extraordinary event; but rather the contrary. Among the principal transactions left upon record as having taken place here since the reformation, one of the first is “the burning of a Dutchman in the Market place for heresy.” This is said to have happened in the year 1335, and so at an early period of our protestantism. It is remarkable enough that the only instance that occurred in this town of putting a man to death for heresy, or burning him for his religion, happened after the reformation, or since the town became protestant; which shews that people may bear that honourable name and at the same time be very far from humanity and righteousness.

The poor hapless sufferer had probably fled to England and made choice of Lynn as a place of refuge from the persecution which then raged in his own country. He might be induced to take this step from the favourable reports he had heard at home of the generosity and hospitality of our nation towards strangers, and particularly the oppressed and friendless. If such was actually the case, he found himself at last miserably disappointed, and learnt by dear bought and bitter experience, that however abundant the liberality and tender mercies of England and of Lynn might be towards some descriptions of oppressed or distressed people, yet that they by no means extended to those called heretics:—an appellation which has too often meant no more than that those branded with it differed from the ruling or predominant party, and were consigned by them to the ill opinion and detestation of the public.

The deplorable fate of this friendless stranger must stamp indelible disgrace on the memory of his brutal murderers? and it shews what little reason Lynn then had to congratulate itself on its change from popery to protestantism. We have no account what the dreadful heresy was, with which this unpitied victim to protestant bigotry and persecution was charged, and for which he suffered. Whatever it was, it could not be very dangerous or alarming; for as he was a foreigner there could be no danger of his disseminating it here among a people of whose language he can be supposed to have little or no knowledge. In short, every feeling heart must be shocked at the aggravated atrocity of this diabolical deed.

It is sad and mortifying enough to think how much this town has been under the influence of religious bigotry and intolerance, and the most pitiful narrowmindedness almost ever since. The harmless Quakers were here imprisoned and cruelly treated, and the Baptists were harassed in the most unjust and shameful manner even after the revolution. Poor creatures, most wrongfully branded with the odious name of witches, were here also for no short period since the reformation, subjected to rigorous prosecutions and capital punishments. These facts are now just glanced at, but shall be more fully related hereafter in the course of the work.

Unfavourable as some of the reformed doctrines undoubtedly were to moral improvement, it cannot be said to be the case with all of them. Some were evidently of the opposite tendency, as were also some of the romish doctrines. But they could not be expected to produce the desired effect unless they were extensively promulgated; and that does not appear to have been the case in this country, at least till a long while after the commencement of the reformation. It was one of the great and glaring defects of the reforming system in England, that it did not provide a sufficient number of religious or public instructors in lieu of those of the old religion who had been suppressed and silenced at the dissolution of the monasteries and other religious houses, or in consequence of their aversion to the new order of things. These are known to have been very numerous, but the number of the reformed ministers, or protestant clergy, who were appointed to succeed them and supply their places as public instructors, appears to have been very inconsiderable; comparatively at least: and, what is not a little remarkable, they were also, for the most part, far less competent than their predecessors for the charge they undertook. In such circumstances, and with such a ministry, it might be expected that vice and licentiousness would increase and abound.

The state of things at Lynn, at, and long after the reformation, does not appear to have been at all favourable to moral and religious improvement. Before that period the town abounded with religious and moral instructors, such as they were, who certainly contributed in no small measure to preserve social order and public decency; and when they were afterwards superseded, their successors did not appear to greater advantage. They were not their superiors in abilities, and they were far inferior to them in number, and probably no less so in the public estimation, and the weight and extent of their influence over the minds of the inhabitants at large, especially those of the middling and lower orders, who constituted the main body or majority of the inhabitants. For among these there did not appear to be many then, as there had been formerly, who were dissatisfied with the old order of things, and anxious for a religious revolution. [672]

Before the reformation the number of ecclesiastics or religious functionaries at Lynn was very considerable, amounting perhaps to sixty or seventy at least. Of them fifteen belonged to the Austin Convent, twelve to the Dominican, ten to the Franciscan, and eleven to the Carmelite: making in all forty eight. To these may be added the monks of the Benedictine Priory, those who belonged to the Convent de Penitentia, and to the College of Priests, amounting, it may be supposed, on a moderate computation, to twenty or thirty more. Such a number as seventy or eighty, or even sixty clergymen, or public teachers of religion, for this town, would now be thought too large of all reason and conscience. But they were no fewer here before the reformation, if indeed they were so few; and the influence of such a number of ghostly guides and instructors, to restrain immoral excesses, and preserve public decency and social order, must certainly have been very considerable.

At the reformation they were all silenced and suppressed. They were also succeeded, when successors could be found, (which was not always the case) [673] by men who had renounced the spiritual supremacy of the pope, and acknowledged that of the king, which was always an indispensible requirement and qualification. But very generally, it seems, throughout the nation, the protestant successors of the priests, monks, and friars, were poor hands, and ill qualified to instruct and enlighten the people; [674] and such, it is probable, were those who succeeded in this town. There is reason to think that their number too was very small, not exceeding perhaps three or four, or half a dozen at most, which, considering also their deficiency in other respects, was not likely to render them in the eyes of the public of any thing like equal consideration with their expelled predecessors. The state of society therefore could not be expected to be much benefited or improved, or the progress of the reformation facilitated and advanced by their ministration.

To supply the wants or defects, and remedy in some measure the insufficiency of that new race of clergy, the Book of Homilies was composed and introduced; portions of which were directed to be read in the churches instead of sermons. This seems to have been a wise and commendable contrivance, as things then stood. The generality of the clergy were not allowed to preach, owing, it is presumed, to their known or supposed incapacity, or insufficiency to perform that task properly, or to edification. Those of a superior class, who were judged equal to that task, were allowed to take out licences to empower or authorize them to preach to the people. Their preaching was extempore, or without book, as had always been the case before, in this as well as every other country. They could not therefore be objected to on that account.

But it so happened that their preaching did not give general satisfaction; owing, perhaps, partly, if not chiefly, to its containing what Burnet calls “very foul and indiscreet reflections on the other party;” [675a] (meaning the papists;) a party which still contained a large majority of the nation, with not a few of its first families. However that was, the sermons gave great offence, and the preachers were much blamed. Complaints against them were made to the king, “by hot men on both sides,” [675b] as the writer above mentioned expresses himself. On what ground those of their own side, the protestants, objected to their preaching, it is not easy to discover: nor does it appear to be very material. They must however have been rather unfortunate, to incur the displeasure of their friends as well as their enemies. But what makes this of most importance is what resulted from it, and which we will now proceed to relate.

Of the charges and accusations brought against those preachers it is very probable that not a few were utterly unfounded and false, the offspring of envy and malice. Others might be mere misrepresentations or exaggerations, proceeding from unintentional mistake or strong prejudice. But as the discourses referred to and complained of were delivered extemporaneously or off hand, the accused could not easily and effectually disprove what their accusers had alleged against them, as they could do little more than oppose their own word or testimony to those allegations, which was not likely to prove always satisfactory to their superiors. In order therefore to justify themselves, and be secure in future from misrepresentation and false accusation, they came generally to write and read their sermons. [676] This was the beginning of preaching from notes, and thus was the reading of sermons introduced among the clergy of the church of England, which has universally prevailed there ever since, with the exception of the puritans in former times, and those called evangelical clergy in the present day.

This practice seems to be still confined to the clergy of the church of England, and the English presbyterians; which may account for the small effect the ministry of either has on the lower orders of the community. By the Scotch Presbyterians, or the church of Scotland it has never been adopted, nor would it be deemed, beyond the Tweed, worthy the name of preaching: all there is extempore, or from memory; yet the common people there are of far superior morals, and infinitely better informed than those of this country; which furnishes at least a strong presumption that the ancient practice is abundantly preferable to the other in its tendency, aptitude, or adaptation to attract the attention, impress the minds, improve the manners and character, and promote the moral and religious proficiency of the lower ranks of society, which constitute the great body of the nation.

Such was the practice of the Lollards, or Wickliffites formerly, when they brought half the nation over to their way of thinking; such also was the practice of the puritans and nonconformists afterwards, whose success was by no means inconsiderable, notwithstanding the grievous opposition and persecution which they had to encounter: and such, we all know, has been and is the practice of the popular dissenters and methodists of the present day, who seem to bid fair soon to bring two thirds of the thinking and serious part of the nation to enlist under their banners. In short, we know of no preaching, but what has been extempore or without book, that has ever made very deep impression, or produced any mighty and salutary effect upon the minds of the common people. If therefore this kind of preaching were to cease, or be discontinued among us, there is every reason to believe that the lower orders of our countrymen would soon become heathenized, barbarized, and brutalized to a most deplorable degree; and that the profession of religion would ere long be confined within narrow limits, and to a comparatively small party among our middling classes.

This modern device, or, as it may be called, the English mode of promoting religious knowledge by reading sermons, which excludes half the nation from almost any chance of receiving instruction, has yet had its warm admirers and encomiasts among us, who have not failed most lavishly to congratulate or compliment their dear country on the important result of this contrivance, in the unequalled number of English printed sermons, of a cast and merit superior to those of any other nation. Now allowing all this to be true, and that the generality of the clergy have aimed at excelling in the same way in all their unprinted discourses, must it not follow that they have taken pains to compose such elaborate productions as will be, after all, of little or no use to the greatest part of those who have been committed to their charge? This seems to be one reason why so many are seen to withdraw from the church and resort to the conventicle. May it not be said therefore, that the practice in question, or this change which commenced at the reformation, has proved unfavourable, not only to the interest of the common people of this country, but even to that of the established church itself?

As to this town, at and for some time after the reformation, it does not seem likely, from the character of that event, and the complexion and small number of the reformed successors of the priests, monks, and friars, that it derived much, if any, moral or intellectual improvement from that change. Its few officiating protestant clergymen, with their humdrum reading of homilies or illsuited sermons, could prove but poor substitutes for the numerous friars that preceded them, whose preaching, like that of our modern methodists, &c. was always animated and energetic, directed chiefly and powerfully to affect the feelings, and move and rouse the passions of their auditors: and it was delivered in a plain familiar style, and a language suited to the weakest understanding and meanest capacity. Here the friars excelled, and here the preachers of our modern popular sects excel also, and succeed abundantly, like their prototypes. [678]

It seems very probable, though it may be thought not a little strange, that the impression and influence of moral and religious principles have never been so general or extensive among the common people of this town and country since the reformation, as they were before, in the time and by means of the friars. They used to go about unweariedly, and dispense their precepts to all ranks of people, in a language suited to every capacity, so that those of the lowest condition appear to have been as much the objects of their attention, and as completely under their discipline as any of the rest. This cannot be said to have been the case at any one period with our established protestant clergy. One half, if not two thirds of those committed to their charge have generally lain beyond the range of their ministry, with little chance of deriving any benefit or advantage from their labours. They would therefore have remained from generation to generation in a state of mere barbarism or heathenism, but for the laudable exertions of some of our religious sectaries, who yet have been always viewed by our rulers with an evil eye, when they certainly ought to have been looked upon with approbation and gratitude, as richly entitled to their good opinion and encouragement.

We know of no period in the history of this town, from the reformation to the present time, when a great majority of its population was not involved in deplorable and heathenish darkness. Nor do we know of any period when the town was favoured with a more respectable clergy than those who officiate in the churches here at present. Yet the state of the town, even now, appears to answer to the above description; though there are here several dissenting chapels, besides the established places of worship, which are all well attended. In fact, more than two thirds of our population, at this very time, notwithstanding all the labours and efforts of our established and dissenting ministers, appear still to remain as destitute of any sense of religion as if religion had been actually abolished, or as if a law had passed to prohibit the public profession of it.

As to our churches and chapels, though they may be thought by some too numerous and too spacious, yet they are certainly very inadequate to the want or accommodation of the inhabitants, in case they were generally disposed to attend the public worship. The present writer has lately learnt and ascertained, that but little more than one third of our population could be held or accommodated for the purposes of religious worship in all these places. [680] How very unreasonable therefore must those little jealousies be which our religious parties too often manifest towards each other, as if religion had been no more than a trade, and they thought it allowable to vilify their brother-tradesmen in order to draw more customers to their own shops. This evil spirit has been more manifest and predominant here of late years among Dissenters than among Churchmen.

Section VII.

Effects of the reformation at Lynn further exemplified—dissolution of the convents, chapels, and gilds—suppression and expulsion of the monks and friars—the consequences.

It seems very probable, and even morally certain, that all the inhabitants of this town, before the reformation, were in the habit of paying attention to religious institutions and observances, or to the externals of the religion that was then in vogue. The numerous friars and other religious functionaries would not fail to keep them to that, as they had, without doubt, sufficient inclination, influence and power so to do. From this state of things we may reasonably conclude that a change for the worse would, and actually did take place after the reformation, when so many convents and chapels were shut up, which were before much resorted to: in consequence of which the bulk of the people were necessarily deprived of any fair chance or opportunity to attend upon, and profit by the public ministrations of their new or protestant pastors: and this, as was before observed, has really been the case here to this day.

The shutting up and demolition of the chapels must have been a very strange, impolitic, and unaccountable measure; and the suppression of the gilds was perhaps not much less so. The former measure deprived more than half the inhabitants of an opportunity to receive public instruction, or to attend public worship; and the latter dissolved and abolished a number of fraternal institutions, or friendly societies, of long standing, most of which, if not all, seem to have been very harmless, and many of them apparently of the same useful tendency as our modern benefit clubs, whose general utility is unquestionable, and universally acknowledged. Were our present government to abolish or prohibit these, it would certainly be, not only an unjustifiable deed, but a real and very serious grievance. How much less so the suppression of the Gilds may have been, it is perhaps not very easy to determine. Though the possessions of some of these Gilds were very considerable, yet they were all sequestered, and no part of them, that we know of applied to any public advantage, or real benefit to the community. [682] As it was with the sequestration of the possessions of the gild companies, so it was also with that of the possessions of our convents, or different religious orders. They were lavishly bestowed and thrown away on a certain royal minion, or court favourite, of the name of Eyre, from whom they soon passed into different hands as regardless as himself of the public welfare. Had a due regard been paid to the public good, these possessions might have been laid out, or applied, so as to form such foundations and establishments as might have proved of great and lasting benefit to the community, and amply compensate for any detriment that accrued to the lower ranks of society, or to the public morals, from the expulsion of the friars, or shutting up of their houses. But Henry was not the only sovereign of these realms who appeared more bent upon the gratification of his own caprice and waywardness than the promotion or advancement of the public weal.

The poor of this town must have sustained a most serious loss by the expulsion of the monks and friars and the sequestration of their revenues; which deprived them of their best friends, at whose houses they were entertained, not only with moral and religious instruction, but also with food for their bodies. For it is well known that the monasteries and convents were eminent for their hospitality, and furnished the poor with their chief support in those days. The friars also were very remarkable for the attention which they paid the poor and the rest of the common people, over whom they maintained no small influence, even in seasons of public commotion, distraction and anarchy. It is no wonder therefore that those of the lower orders long regretted their disappearance, and had songs composed to celebrate the superior felicity of the times when the country was honoured with their residence. [684a]

We know of but two periods at which Lynn appears to have materially suffered from the circumstance of unoccupied or empty houses. One of those periods is the present, when the number of such houses amounts to some scores, owing to the extreme pressure of burdens brought upon the inhabitants by the inexcusable misdoings of some of their own townsmen. [684b] The other period was at the reformation, or after the dissolution of the monasteries, when all the convents in this town with many chapels and other religious houses were shut up, and afterwards demolished; so that the people, for the most part, were left without places where they might attend public worship and receive religious instruction; which must have proved very unfavourable to the public morals, from its obvious and powerful tendency to deprave and barbarize those who were so situated.

Previously to the actual dissolution of the monasteries, &c. a formal surrender and resignation, and also a confession, generally took place. This was solemnly declared to have been done voluntarily, though the contrary was well known to have been the fact. These deeds of surrender are still in being, with some also of the confessions; but most of them are said to have been destroyed in Mary’s reign: it being then, probably, in contemplation, if circumstances would admit, to restore those places to their former occupants.—The instruments or deeds of surrender from Lynn are supposed to be still extant in the Augmentation Office. But as the present writer has not seen them, he can only guess what their tenor was from such as have fallen in his way, which he has met in Burnet’s History of the Reformation, and Martin’s History of Thetford.

The work last mentioned contains a copy of the surrender of the Dominican Convent at Thetford, addressed “To all the Faithful in Christ,” and solemnly declaring that “the Prior and Convent of the House or Priory commonly called The Black Friars and Convent of the same, with unanimous assent and consent, with minds deliberate, and with our free will and certain knowledge, and for certain just and reasonable causes, our souls and consciences in a special manner moving, freely and of our own accord have given, granted, and by these presents do give, grant and restore, release and confirm to the most illustrious prince, our lord Henry VIII, by the grace of God of England and France king, defender of the faith, lord of Ireland, and on earth supreme Head of the English church, all our said Priory or House called the Black Friars, in Thetford aforesaid, together with all and singular the messuages, gardens, tofts, lands, tenements, meadows, feeds, pastures, woods, rents, reversions, services, mills, &c. &c.”

This Surrender was dated 30. Henry VIII, and subscribed by the Prior Richard Cley, Robert Baldry, Edward Dyer, Edmund Palmer, and two more.—“Those mercenary monks (says Martin) were obliged by royal authority to resign what they valued most upon earth, and declare the will of their sovereign to be the motion of their own minds; whereas their possessions were extorted from them contrary to their wishes and inclinations. They acquired their wealth by hypocrisy, and parted with it under the influence of the same principle.” [687] But he should have remembered that hypocrisy of much the same sort was displayed by the corporations, or the different cities and boroughs, in the reign of James II, in the surrender of their respective charters: and the hypocrisy of the latter was perhaps much less excusable than that of the poor friars, because they were in much less peril.—The mayors and aldermen ran no risk of hanging, but several of the others were actually hanged, for refusing to surrender and play the hypocrites.

A copy of the Surrender of the Carmelites in Stamford has been preserved by Burnet, and is as follows—

“Forasmuch as we the Prior and Friers of this House of Carmelites in Stamford, commonly called the White Friers in Stamford, in the County of Lincoln, do profoundly consider that the perfection of Christian living doth not consist in some Ceremonies, wearing of a white Coat, disguising ourselves after strange fashions, dockying and becking, wearing Scapulars and Hoods, and other-like Papistical Ceremonies, wherein we have been most principally practised and noseled in times past; but the very true way to please God, and to live a true Christian Man, without all hyprocrisy and feigned dissimulation, is sincerely declared to us by our Master Christ, his Evangelists and Apostles; being minded hereafter to follow the same, conforming ourselves to the will and pleasure of our supreme Head, under God, on Earth, the King’s Majesty; and not to follow henceforth the superstitious traditions of any forinsecal potentate or power, with mutual assent and consent, do submit ourselves unto the mercy of our said Sovereign Lord, and with the Like mutual assent and consent do surrender,” &c. [688]—signed by the Prior and six Friers.

The poor monks and friars and nuns, previously to their expulsion, were forced to play the hypocrites and tell lies to save their necks, which was certainly very hard upon them. But rulers have seldom minded or commiserated hardships of that sort. With whatever they ordain or impose they always expect a ready compliance, however unreasonable in itself, or however hard it may bear on the consciences of their subjects. The above religious orders, by falsely declaring that they surrendered voluntarily and of their own accord, saved their lives, but lost their livelihood. A few abbots &c. were provided for; but thousands of friars and nuns were turned out into the wide world pennyless; which must have been very inhuman and cruel. We are assured that the arts flourished in the convents to the last. Many of the abbots and other heads of houses had been terrified, persuaded, or bribed, as it is said, to surrender their trusts. Three only (those of Colchester, Reading and Glastonbury) resisted to the last, and fell by the hands of the executioner. [689]

With respect to Lynn, it does not appear that the heads of the houses or convents, or any of the brethren, made the least difficulty to surrender in the form and manner prescribed to them. They therefore ran no risk of the gallows: they saved their lives, but lost their living; for they were turned adrift and thrown upon the wide world. Many of them, and of their fellow sufferers, had a pretty good chance of obtaining subsistence by their own ingenuity; for they had among them some excellent penmen, some notable carvers, some admirable embroiderers, some intelligent gardeners; and, in short, some that excelled in every useful art, and in all handycraft employments. There they had greatly the advantage of our modern clergy, many of whom, it is to be feared, know little beyond what appertains to the occupation of sportsmen or foxhunters, which would afford but a poor prospect of subsistence, if they had nothing else to depend upon.

Moreover, we must reckon among the most striking and memorable effects which the reformation had upon Lynn the very visible and degrading change it produced in the aspect or appearance of the town, reducing it, as it evidently did, to a most mean and paltry object, compared to what it was previously to that event. For the demolition and disappearance of so many stately edifices, which had long been the pride and boast of the inhabitants, must have had a most strange, humiliating and transforming effect upon the place, both with respect to its external aspect, or as it appeared without from the adjacent country, and also as it looked within, to those who passed through its streets, or observed it internally. It must have looked somewhat like a town that had undergone a close and successful siege, and which had been left half demolished and ruined by a victorious and exasperated enemy. In short, the present Lynn, or this town since the reformation, must have always made a far inferior, or much meaner figure than the former or papal Lynn, with its four large and stately convents, adorned with lofty towers, and ranged along the whole town from south to north. Besides them we must also reckon the Benedictine Priory, the convent of the friars de Penitentia, the College, the churches or chapels of St. John, St. James, St. Catherine, St. Anne, those of our Lady at the Bridge and on the Mount, and undoubtedly other venerable structures, whose sites and very names are now forgotten and unknown.

In fine, there were perhaps not many towns in the kingdom, if indeed there were any at all, whose appearance underwent a greater change than this, at, and in consequence of the reformation. Had two persons, a papist and a protestant, who remembered the town in its former state, now visited and jointly surveyed it, one would have been apt to take up his lamentation and pronounce Ichabod! its glory is departed! while the other would be no less apt exultingly to exclaim “Babylon is fallen, is fallen!”—But a third person, accustomed to view things with the eyes of a christian philosopher, would have given way to neither lamentation nor exultation, but would have considered the whole as the natural effect of a mighty revolution, and an additional proof of the changing and perishing nature of all human productions and sublunary magnificence.

CHAP. II.

History of Lynn for the first hundred years after the reformation; or rather, from the dissolution of the monasteries to the meeting of the long parliament and commencement of the civil wars.

In the preceding account of the immediate effects of the reformation upon this town little or nothing occurs that appears of a very pleasing or favourable nature. No symptoms are discernable of either moral or intellectual improvement. The town had become protestant, but superstition and ignorance still remained, and licentiousness and barbarism seemed rather to increase than diminish. The former religious functionaries or instructors were expelled, and they were succeeded by men less competent than themselves for the tuition or instruction of the people: and therefore it was not to be expected that the latter should be better taught, or further enlightened under their guidance and management. On the contrary, we may suppose them to have gone in a retrograde rather than in a progressive direction: and so it seems really to have happened. In fact, very little appears to have been done here of reformation work, or for the advancement of protestantism during the long period now under consideration, besides the expulsion of the monks and friars and demolition of their Houses. Of that little, some account shall be given in the following section.

Section I.

Statement of the progress of protestantism, or of the most remarkable and memorable acts or works of reformation which took place at Lynn during the first century after its renunciation of the papal supremacy.

The first fruits of the reformation at Lynn seem to be the burning of the Dutchman before mentioned, and hanging, sometime after, a certain friar, of the name of William Gisborough. The former suffered for what was called heresy, but we cannot find what the crime was that was laid to the charge of the latter. It seems most probable however, that it was denying the king’s spiritual supremacy, or maintaining that the pope, and not his majesty, was the supreme head of the church. This was a crime, or heresy, which Henry never would tolerate, after he had set up for himself in competition with the Roman pontiff, as a kind of antipope, or pontifex maximus of England. Many a luckless wight was put to death, during the latter part of his reign, for no other fault, or offence, but that of being unconvinced of his majesty’s right and title to be on earth the supreme head of the English church. They could not, it seems, help their scruples; and therefore it was, surely, very hard and cruel to put them to death. But kings and courtiers are seldom disposed to be very tender, or shew much mercy to those who do not think well of their pretensions, however doubtful, unreasonable, or absurd they happen to be: and they come not unfrequently under one or other of these denominations.

In Edward’s reign, very little if any reformation work appears to have been carried on at Lynn. At his death we are told that Lord Audley came here and proclaimed Lady Jane Grey queen of England; which seems to imply that this town was favourable to her succession. However that was, her succession was frustrated, and she came soon after to an untimely and tragical end, though she appears to have been worthy of a better fate.—Mary succeeded; in whose reign the very name of reformation was exploded: its favourers were persecuted with the utmost rigour, hundreds of them suffered at the stake, and a still greater number fled their native country, and found an asylum in foreign parts, where they staid till the storm was blown over, or, in other words, till Mary was no more. She was succeeded by a sovereign that was more favourable to a certain description of reformation and reformers, though in other respects of an equally intolerant and unamiable character.