AND MEDITATIONS WITH OTHER EXERCISES BY JOHN BRADFORD Medytacyon composed by the faithfull and constant seruant of God J. B. Precher who latlye was burnte in Smytfelde for the testimonie of Jesus Christe by the tyrannye of Antechriste in his fylth y members. Psalme. 79. — O Lorde let the bengeaunce of thy seruauntes bloude that is shedde be o-penlye showed upon the ungodlye, in oure sight. O let the sorowful sighting of the prisoners come before thee: and accordinge to the greatnes of thy power preserbe thou those that are appoynted to dye. [From a copy in the Bodleian Library, Oxford.] [The following ‘Private prayers and meditations with other exercises’ were first printed by Copland, in a separate volume, March 15, 1559 .

This series was republished by J. Allde 1578, together with the ‘Godly Meditations’ (which occupy p. 116 — 220 above)first printed by Hall 1562, the pagination being continued from that collection as reissued in 1578, but with separate title and signatures. The Meditations of 1559 were afterward reprinted by E.

Allde, similarly appended, in 1604, 1607, 1614, 1622, and 1633.

The ‘prayer on the wrath of God against sin,’ p. 224-9, and some of the ‘ private prayers and meditations,’ p. 232-4, 239 — 41, follow respectively (as noted on the margin of each) the text of MSS. in Emmanuel College, Cambridge, which have supplied various words, and occasionally two or three lines, not in the printed editions. These MSS. have been collated with a copy of the very rare edition of Copland 1559, in the Bodleian Library, Oxford; and the differences are noted wherever a deviation from the Cambridge MSS. occurs.

The remaining prayers and meditations in the following series observe the text of the edition of 1559, which has been compared occasionally with those of 1578, 1604, 1607, 1614, and 1622: but the variations from the edition of Copland are only noted in special cases.

The ‘private prayers and meditations’ were, for the most part, translated by Bradford from the Excitationes animi in Deum of Ludovicus Vivos, a devout writer, and one of the chief restorers of learning, in the former part of the sixteenth century. The originals of Vivos are reprinted in the Appendix to this volume from a copy of the Excitationes, Lugduni 1558, in the Library of Archbishop Harsnet, Colchester.

Several of the ‘private prayers’ after appearing in the Meditations of Bradford 1559, were reprinted in the first edition of the ‘Book of Christian Prayers,’ ornamented with wood-cut borders, Day 1569, on signatures a 2 to 104:A copy of this edition, which is exceedingly scarce, is preserved in the archiepiscopal Library at Lambeth.

Many of the ‘private prayers’ (retranslated from Vives, and with extensive alterations) appeared in the after editions of that ‘Book,’ 1578, 1581, 1590, 1608, on signatures B 1 to D 2.