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cy of masses for the souls in purgatory; of prayers to the dead saints, of pilgrimages to their sepulchres and reliques, the pope's power to forgive sins, the doctrine of merit, the seven sacraments, and the worship of images; which, when he refused to sign, the archbishop, with a frown, begged he would consider what he did. "We intend not, said he, Mr. Latimer, to be hard upon you; we dismiss you for the present; take a copy of the articles; examine them carefully, and God grant, that at our next meeting we may find each other in better temper." The next, and several succeeding meetings, the same scene was acted over again. He continued inflexible, and they continued to distress him. Three times every week they regularly sent for him, with a view either to elicit something from him by captious questions, or to teaze him at length into compliance. Tired out with this usage, after he was summoned at last, instead of going, he sent a letter to the archbishop, in which, with great freedom he tells him, "that the treatment he had lately met with, had fretted him into such a disorder, as rendered him unfit to attend that day; that in the mean time he could not help taking this opportunity to expostulate with his grace for detaining him so long from his duty; that it seemed to him most unaccountable, that they, who never preached themselves, should hinder others; that, as for their examination of him, he really could not imagine what they aimed at; they pretended one thing in the beginning, and another in the progress; that if his sermons were what gave offence; which he persuaded himself were neither contrary to the truth, nor to any canon of the church, he was ready to answer whatever might be thought exceptional in them: that he wished a little more regard might be had to the judgment of the people; and that a distinction might be had between the ordinances of God and man; that if some abuses in religion did prevail, as was then commonly supposed, he thought preaching the best means to discountenance them; that he wished all pastors might be obliged to perform their duty; but that, however, liberty might be given to those who were willing; but as to the articles proposed to him, he begged to be excused subscribing them; while he lived he never would abet superstition; and that, lastly, he hoped the archbishop would excuse what he had written; he knew his duty to his superiors, and would practice it; but in that case he thought a stronger obligation laid upon him."

The bishops, however, continued their persecutions, but their schemes were frustrated in an unexpected manner: Latimer being raised to the see of Worcester, in the year 1533, by the favor of Anna Bolyn, then the favorite wife of Henry, to whom, most probably, he was recommended by Lord Cromwell. And now he had a more extensive field to promote the principles of the reformation, in which he labored with the utmost pains and assiduity. All the historians of those times, mention him as a person remarkably zealous in the discharge of his new office; and tell us that in overseeing the clergy of his diocese, he was uncommonly active, warm and resolute, and presided in his ecclesiastical court with the same spirit. In visiting, he was frequent and observant; in ordaining, strict and wary; in preaching, indefatigable; in reproving and exhorting, severe and persuasive.

In 1536 he received a summons to attend the parliament and con Vocation, which gave him a further opportunity of promoting the work of reformation, whereon his heart was so much set. Many alterations were made in religious matters, and a few months after the bible was translated into English, and recommended to a general perusal, in Oct. 1537.

In the mean while the bishop of Worcester, highly satisfied with the prospect of the times, repaired to his diocese, having made no longer stay in London than was absolutely necessary. He had no talents, and he pretended to have none, for state affairs. His whole ambition was to discharge the pastoral function of a bishop, neither aiming to display the abilities of a statesman, nor those of a courtier. How very unqualified he was to support the latter of these characters, the following story will prove. It was the custom in those days for the bishops to make presents to the king on new-years day, and many of them would present very liberally, proportioning their gifts to their expectancies. Among the rest, the bishop of Worcester, being in town, waited upon the king, with his offering; but instead of a purse of gold, which was the common oblation, he presented a new testament, with a leaf doubled down in a very conspicuous manner, to this passage, "Whoremongers and adulterers God will judge."

In 1539 he was summoned again to attend the parliament; the bishop of Winchester, Gardiner, was his great enemy; who, upon a particular occasion, when the bishops were with the king, kneeled down and solemnly accused bishop Latimer of a seditious sermon preached at court. Being called upon by the king with some sternness, to vindicate himself, Latimer was so far from denying or palliating what he had said, that he boldly justified it; and turning to the king, with that noble unconcern, which a good conscience inspires, "I never thought myself worthy, said he, nor did I ever sue to be a preacher before your grace; but I was called to it, and would be willing, if you mislike it, to give place to my betters: for I grant there may be a great many, more worthy the room than I am. And if it be your grace's pleasure to allow them for preachers, I can be content to bear their books after them. But if your grace allow me for a preacher, I would desire you to give me leave to discharge my conscience, and to frame my doctrines according to my audience. I had been a very dolt indeed to have preached so at the borders of your realm, as I preach before your grace." The greatness of this answer baffled his accusers' malice; the severity of the king's countenance changed into a gracious smile, and the bishop was dismissed with that obliging freedom, which this monarch never used but to those he esteemed.

However, as the bishop could not give his vote for the act of the six papistical articles, drawn up by the Duke of Norfolk, he thought it wrong to hold any office in a church where such terms of communion were required, and therefore he resigned his bishopric, and retired into the country, where he purposed to live a sequestered life. But in the midst of his security, an unhappy accident carried him again into the tempestuous weather which was abroad. He re

cy of masses for the souls in purgatory, of prayers to the dead saints, of pilgrimages to their sepulchres and reliques, the pope's power to forgive sins, the doctrine of merit, the seven sacraments, and the worship of images; which, when he refused to sign, the archbishop, with a frown, begged he would consider what he did. "We intend not, said he, Mr. Latimer, to be hard upon you; we dismiss you for the present; take a copy of the articles; examine them carefully, and God grant, that at our next meeting we may find each other in better temper." The next, and several succeeding meetings, the same scene was acted over again. He continued inflexible, and they continued to distress him. Three times every week they regularly sent for him, with a view either to elicit something from him by captious questions, or to teaze him at length into compliance. Tired out with this usage, after he was summoned at last, instead of going, he sent a letter to the archbishop, in which, with great freedom he tells him, "that the treatment he had lately met with, had fretted him into such a disorder, as rendered him unfit to attend that day; that in the mean time he could not help taking this opportunity to expostulate with his grace for detaining him so Jong from his duty; that it seemed to him most unaccountable, that they, who never preached themselves, should hinder others; that, as for their examination of him, he really could not imagine what they aimed at; they pretended one thing in the beginning, and another in the progress; that if his sermons were what gave offence; which he persuaded himself were neither contrary to the truth, nor to any canon of the church, he was ready to answer whatever might be thought exceptional in them: that he wished a little more regard might be had to the judgment of the people; and that a distinction might be had between the ordinances of God and man; that if some abuses in religion did prevail, as was then commonly supposed, he thought preaching the best means to discountenance them; that he wished all pastors might be obliged to perform their duty; but that, however, liberty might be given to those who were willing; but as to the articles proposed to him, he begged to be excused subscribing them; while he lived he never would abet superstition; and that, lastly, he hoped the archbishop would excuse what he had written; he knew his duty to his superiors, and would practice it; but in that case he thought a stronger obligation laid upon him."

The bishops, however, continued their persecutions, but their schemes were frustrated in an unexpected manner: Latimer being raised to the see of Worcester, in the year 1533, by the favor of Anna Bolyn, then the favorite wife of Henry, to whom, most probably, he was recommended by Lord Cromwell. And now he had a more extensive field to promote the principles of the reformation, in which he labored with the utmost pains and assiduity. All the historians of those times, mention him as a person remarkably zealous in the discharge of his new office; and tell us that in overseeing the clergy of his diocese, he was uncommonly active, warm and resolute, and presided in his ecclesiastical court with the same spirit. In visiting, he was frequent and observant; in ordaining, strict and wary; in preaching, indefatigable; in reproving and exhorting, severe and persuasive.

In 1536 he received a summons to attend the parliament and con Tocation, which gave him a further opportunity of promoting the work of reformation, whereon his heart was so much set. Many alterations were made in religious matters, and a few months after the bible was translated into English, and recommended to a general perusal, in Oct. 1537.

In the mean while the bishop of Worcester, highly satisfied with the prospect of the times, repaired to his diocese, having made no longer stay in London than was absolutely necessary. He had no talents, and he pretended to have none, for state affairs. His whole ambition was to discharge the pastoral function of a bishop, neither aiming to display the abilities of a statesman, nor those of a courder. How very unqualified he was to support the latter of these characters, the following story will prove. It was the custom in those days for the bishops to make presents to the king on new-years day, and many of them would present very liberally, proportioning their gifts to their expectancies. Among the rest, the bishop of Worcester, being in town, waited upon the king, with his offering; but instead of a purse of gold, which was the common oblation, he presented a new testament, with a leaf doubled down in a very conspicuous manner, to this passage, "Whoremongers and adulterers God will judge."

In 1539 he was summoned again to attend the parliament; the bishop of Winchester, Gardiner, was his great enemy; who, upon a particular occasion, when the bishops were with the king, kneeled down and solemnly accused bishop Latimer of a seditious sermon preached at court. Being called upon by the king with some sternness, to vindicate himself, Latimer was so far from denying or palliating what he had said, that he boldly justified it; and turning to the king, with that noble unconcern, which a good conscience inspires, "I never thought myself worthy, said he, nor did I ever sue to be a preacher before your grace; but I was called to it, and would be willing, if you mislike it, to give place to my betters: for I grant there may be a great many, more worthy the room than I am. And if it be your grace's pleasure to allow them for preachers, I can be content to bear their books after them. But if your grace allow me for a preacher, I would desire you to give me leave to discharge my conscience, and to frame my doctrines according to my audience. I had been a very dolt indeed to have preached so at the borders of your realm, as I preach before your grace." The greatness of this answer baffled his accusers' malice; the severity of the king's countenance changed into a gracious smile, and the bishop was dismissed with that obliging freedom, which this monarch never used but to those he esteemed.

However, as the bishop could not give his vote for the act of the six papistical articles, drawn up by the Duke of Norfolk, he thought it wrong to hold any office in a church where such terms of communion were required, and therefore he resigned his bishopric, and retired into the country, where he purposed to live a sequestered life. But in the midst of his security, an unhappy accident carried him again into the tempestuous weather which was abroad. He re

ceived a bruise by the fall of a tree, and the contusion was so dangerous, that he was obliged to seek out for better assistance than could be afforded him by the unskilful surgeons of those parts. With this view he repaired to London, where he had the misfortune to see the fall of his patron, the Lord Cromwell; a loss he was soon made sensible of. For Gardiner's emissaries quickly found him out in his concealment, and something, which he had been heard to say, against the six articles, being alledged against him, he was sent to the tower; where, without any judicial examination, he suffered, through one pretence or another, a cruel imprisonment for the remaining six years of king Henry's reign.

Upon the death of Henry, the protestant interest revived, under his son Edward; and Latimer, immediately on the change of the government, was set at liberty. An address was made by the parnament to the protector, to restore him to his bishopric: the protector was very willing to gratify the parliament, and proposed the reassuption of his bishopric to Latimer; who now thinking himself unequal to the weight of it, refused to resume it, choosing rather to accept an invitation from his friend archbishop Cranmer, and to take up his residence with him at Lambeth; where his chief employment was to hear the complaints and redress the grievances of the poor people; and his character, for services of this kind, was so universally. known, that strangers from every part of England would resort to him. In these employments he spent more than two years, during which time he assisted the archbishop in composing the homilies, which were set forth by authority, in the first year of king Edward. He was also appointed to preach the Lent sermons before his majesty, which office he also performed during the three first years of his reign.

Upon the revolution, which happened at court after the death of the Duke of Somerset, he seems to have retired into the country, and to have made use of the king's licence as a general preacher in those parts, where he thought his labors might be more serviceable. He was thus employed during the remainder of that reign, and continuedin the same course, for a short time, in the beginning of the next; but as soon as the re-introduction of popery was resolved on, the first step towards it was the prohibition of all preaching, and licencing only such as were known to be popishly inclined. The bishop of Winchester, who was now prime minister, having proscribed Mr. Latimer from the first, sent a messenger to cite him before the council. He had notice of their design some hours before the messenger's arrival, but he made no use of the intelligence. The messenger found him equipped for his journey, at which, expressing his surprise, Mr. Latimer told him, that he was as ready to attend him to London, thus called upon to answer for his faith, as he ever was to take any journey in his life; and that he doubted not but that God, who had enabled him to stand before two princes, would enable him to stand before a third. The messenger then acquainting him, that he had no orders to seize his person, delivered a letter and departed. However, opening the letter, and finding it a citation from the council, he resolved to obey it, and set out immediately. As he passed

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