READER, 1. IHERE present thee with a piece of as great variety as can be easily comprehended in so narrow a compass; the history of an affair of such weight and consequence as had a powerful influence on the rest of Christendom. It is an History of the Reformation of the Church of England, from the first agitations in religion under Henry the Eighth, until the final settling, and establishing of it, in doctrine, government, and worship, under the fortunate and most glorious reign of Queen Elizabeth. Nor hast thou here a bare relation only of such passages as those times afforded, but a discovery of those counsels by which the action was conducted; the rules of piety and prudence upon which it was carried; the several steps by which it was promoted or retarded in the change of times; together with the intercurrence of such civil concernments, both at home and abroad, as either were coincident with it or related to it. So that we may affirm of this present History, as Florus doth of his compendium of the Roman stories, Ut non tam populi unius, quam totius generis humani; FB3 that is to say, that it contains not only the affairs of one state or nation, but, in a manner, of the greatest part of all civil governments. The work first hinted by a Prince of an undaunted spirit, the master of as great a courage as the world had any; and, to say truth, the work required it. He durst not else have grappled with that mighty adversary, who, claiming to be successor to St.

Peter in the see of Rome, and Vicar-general to Christ over all the Church, had gained unto himself an absolute sovereignty over all Christian kings and princes in the Western Empire. But this King, being violently hurried with the transport of some private affections, and finding that the Pope appeared the greatest obstacle to his desires, he first divested him by degrees of that supremacy which had been challenged and enjoyed by his predecessors for some ages past; and finally, extinguished his authority in the realm of England, without noise or trouble, to the great admiration and astonishment of the rest of the Christian world. This opened the first way to the Reformation, and gave encouragement to those who inclined unto it: to which the King afforded no small countenance, out of politic ends, by suffering them to have the Bible in the English tongue, and to enjoy the benefit of such godly tractates as openly discovered the corruptions of the Church of Rome. But, for his own part, he adhered to his old religion, severely persecuted those who dissented from it, and died, (though excommunicated) in that faith and doctrine which he had sucked in, as it were, with his mother’s milk, and of the which he shewed himself so stout a champion against Martin Luther, in his first quarrels with the Pope. 2. Next comes a minor on the stage, just, mild, and gracious;, whose name was made a property to serve turns withal, and his authority abused, (as commonly it happened on the like occasions), to his own undoing. In his first year, the Reformation was resolved on, but on different ends;— endeavored by some godly bishops, and other learned and religious men, of the lower clergy, out of judgment and conscience; who managed the affair according to the Word of God, the practice of the primitive times, the general current and consent of the old catholic doctors, but not without an eye to such foreign Churches as seemed to have most consonancy to the ancient forms:—promoted with like zeal and industry, but not with like integrity and Christian candor, by some great men about the court; who, under color of removing such corruptions as remained in the Church, had cast their eyes upon the spoil of shrines, and images, (though still preserved in the greatest part of the Lutheran churches), FB4 and the improving of their own fortunes by the chantry-lands: FB5 all which most sacrilegiously they divided amongst themselves, without admitting the poor King to his share therein; though nothing but the filling of his coffers, by the spoil of the one, and the increase of his revenue, by the fall of the other, was openly pretended in the conduct of it. But, separating this obliquity from the main intendment, the work was vigorously carried on by the King and his counsellors; as appears clear by the Doctrinals in the Book of Homilies, and by the practical part of Christian piety, in the first public Liturgy, confirmed by act of parliament in the second and third year of this King; and in that act, (and, which is more, by Fox himself), affirmed to have been done “by the especial aid of the Holy Ghost.” FB6 And here the business might have rested, if Calvin’s pragmatical spirit had not interposed. He first began to quarrel at some passages in this sacred Liturgy, FB7 and afterwards never left soliciting the Lord Protector, and practicing by his agents on the court, the country, and the universities, till he had laid the first foundation of the Zuinglian faction, who labored nothing more than innovation, both in doctrine and discipline. To which they were encouraged by nothing more than some improvident indulgence granted unto John a Lasco; who, bringing with him a mixed multitude of Poles and Germans, obtained the privilege of a Church for himself and his, distinct in government and forms of worship from the Church of England. FB8 3. This gave a powerful animation to the Zuinglian gospellers (as they are called by Bishop Hooper, and some other writers), to practice first upon the Church; FB9 who, being countenanced, if not headed, by the Earl of Warwick, (who then began to undermine the Lord Protector), first quarrelled the episcopal habit, and afterwards inveighed against caps and surplices, against gowns and tippets; but fell at last upon the altars, FB10 which were left standing in all churches by the rules of the Liturgy. The touching on this string made excellent music to most of the grandees of the court, who had before cast many an envious eye on those costly hangings, that massy plate, and other rich and precious utensils, which adorned those altars. And “What need all this waste?” said Judas; FB11 when one poor chalice only, and perhaps not that, might have served the turn. Besides, there was no small spoil to be made of copes, in which the priest officiated at the holy Sacrament; some of them being made of cloth of tissue, of cloth of gold and silver, or embroidered velvet; the meanest being made of silk or satin, with some decent trimming. And might not these be handsomely converted into private uses, to serve as carpets for their tables, coverlets to their beds, or cushions to their chairs or windows? Hereupon some rude people are encouraged underhand to beat down some altars, which makes way for an order of the council-table, to take down the rest, and set up tables in their places; FB12 followed by a commission, to be executed in all parts of the kingdom, for seizing on the premises to the use of the King.

FB13 But, as the grandees of the court intended to defraud the King of so great a booty, and the commissioners to put a cheat upon the court lords, who employed them in it; so they were both prevented in some places by the lords and gentry of the country, who thought the altar-cloths, together with the copes and plate of their several churches, to be as necessary for themselves as for any others. This change drew on the alteration of the former Liturgy, FB14 reviewed by certain godly prelates, reduced almost into the same form in which now FB15 it stands, and confirmed by parliament in the 5th and 6th years of this King; but almost as unpleasing to the Zuinglian faction as the former was. In which conjuncture of affairs died King Edward the Sixth. From the beginning of whose reign the Church accounts the epoch of a Reformation. All that was done in order to it under Henry the Eighth, seemed to be accidental only, and by the by, rather designed on private ends, than out of any settled purpose to reform the Church; and therefore intermitted, and resumed again, as those ends had variance. FB16 But now the work was carried on with a constant hand, the prelates of the Church cooperating with the King and his council, and each contriving FB17 with the other for the honor of it. Scarce had they brought it to this pass, when King Edward died; whose death I cannot reckon for an infelicity to the Church of England: for, being ill-principled FB18 in himself, and easily inclined to embrace such counsels as were offered to him, it is not to be thought, but that the rest of the bishoprics, (before sufficiently impoverished), must have followed Durham, FB19 and the poor Church be left as destitute of lands and ornaments as when she came into the world in her natural nakedness. Nor was it like to happen otherwise in the following reign, if it had lasted longer than a nine days’ wonder. FB20 For Dudley of Northumberland, who then ruled the roast, and had before dissolved, and in hope devoured, the wealthy bishopric of Durham, might easily have possessed himself of the greatest part of the revenues of York and Carlisle.

By means whereof, he would have made himself more absolute on the north side of the Trent, than the poor titular Queen, (a most virtuous lady), could have been suffered to continue on the south side of it. To carry on whose interests, and maintain her title, the poor remainder of the Church’s patrimony was, in all probability, to have been shared amongst those of that party, to make them sure unto the side. But the wisdom of this great Achitophel being turned to foolishness, he fell into the hands of the public hangman, and thereby saved himself the labor of becoming his own executioner. 4. Now Mary comes to act her part, and she drives on furiously. Her personal interest had strongly biased her to the Church of Rome, on which depended the validity of her mother’s marriage, and consequently her own legitimation, and succession to the crown of this realm. FB21 And it was no hard matter for her, in a time unsettled, to repeal all the acts of her brother’s reign, and after to restore the Pope unto that supremacy of which her father had deprived him. A reign calamitous and unfortunate, to herself and her subjects: unfortunate to herself, in the loss of Calais; calamitous to her subjects, by many insurrections and executions; but more by the effusion of the blood of so many martyrs. For, though she gave a check to the rapacity of the former times, yet the professor of the Reformation paid dearly for it, whose blood she caused to be poured forth like water, in most parts of the kingdom, but nowhere more abundantly than in Bonner’s slaughter-house; which being within the view of the court, and under her own nose, (as the saying is), must needs entitle her to a great part of those horrid cruelties, which almost every day were acted by that bloody butcher.

FB22 The schism at Frankfort FB23 took beginning in the same time also,— occasioned by some zealots of the Zuinglian faction, who needs must lay aside the use of the public Liturgy, (retained by all the rest of the English exiles), the better to make way for such forms of worship as seemed more consonant to Calvin’s platform, and the rules of Geneva. Which woeful schism, so wretchedly begun in a foreign nation, they labored to promote by all sinister practices in the Church of England, when they returned from exile in the following reign. FB24 The miserable effects whereof we feel too sensibly and smartly, to this very day. 5. But the great business of this reign related to the restitution of the abbey-lands, endeavored earnestly by the Queen, FB25 and no less strenuously opposed by the then present owners, who had all the reason in the world to maintain that right, which, by the known laws of the land, had been vested in them. For when the monasteries and religious houses had been dissolved by several acts of parliament, in the time of King Henry, the lands belonging to those houses were, by those acts, conferred upon the King, and his successors, Kings and Queens of England. Most of which lands were either exchanged for others with the lords and gentry, or sold, for valuable consideration, to the rest of the subjects. All which exchanges, grants, and sales, were passed and confirmed by the King’s letters patents, under the great seal of England, in due form of law; which gave unto the patentees as good a title as the law could make them. This was well known unto the Pope, and he knew well upon what ticklish terms he stood with the lords and commons, then assembled in parliament; FB26 whom if he did not gratify with some signal favor, he could not hope to be restored by them to his former power: for, being deprived of his supremacy by act of parliament in the time of King Henry, he could not be restored unto it, but by act of parliament, in the time of Queen Mary; and no such act could be obtained or compassed for him, without a confirmation of church-lands to the present owners. FB27 To which necessity Pope Julius being forced to submit himself, he issueth a decree, accompanied with some reasons, which might seem to induce him to it, for confirming all such lands on the present occupants, of which they stood possessed justo titulo , “by a lawful title.”

And this was only reckoned by him for a lawful title:—first, that they were possessed of the said lands juxta leges hujus regni pro tempore existentes , “according to the laws of the land which were then in force,” whether by purchase, or gift, or in the way of exchange; which are the words of the decree: and secondly, if the said lands were warranted and confirmed unto them by letters patents from the two last Kings, qui per literas patentes easdem terras warrantizarunt , as is declared in the second of the following reasons. For which consult the book entitled, “No Sacrilege nor Sin to purchase Cathedral-lands,” etc. p. 52. FB28 Where still observe, that nothing made a lawful title in the Pope’s opinion, but the Kings letters patents, grounded on the laws of the land, as is expressed more clearly in the former passages. But this can no way serve the turn of some present purchasers, though much insisted on by one of that number, to justify his defacing of an episcopal palace, and his pretensions to the wealthy borough which depended on it; for certainly there must needs be a vast disproportion between such contracts as were founded upon acts of parliament, legally passed by the King’s authority, with the consent and approbation of the three estates, and those which have no other ground but the bare votes and orders of both houses only, and perhaps not that. And by this logic, he may as well justify the late horrid murder committed on the most incomparable majesty of King Charles the First, as stand upon the making good of such grants and sales as were contracted for with some of those very men who voted to the setting up of the high court of justice, as, most ridiculously, they were pleased to call it. When I shall see him do the one, I must bethink myself of some further arguments to refute the other. 6. And so Queen Mary makes her exit, and leaves the stage to Queen Elizabeth, her younger sister—a princess which had long been trained up in the school of experience, and knew the temper of the people whom she was to govern; who, having generally embraced the reformed religion, in the time of her brother, most passionately desired the enjoyment of it under her protection: and she accordingly resolved to satisfy the piety of their desire, as soon as she had power and opportunity to go through with it. In prosecution of which work, she raised her whole fabric on the same foundation which had been laid by the reformers in the reign of King Edward; that is to say, the Word of God, the practice of the primitive times, the general current of the fathers, and the example of such Churches as seemed to retain most in them of the ancient forms. But then she added thereunto such an equal mixture both of strength and beauty, as gave great lustre to the Church, and drew along with it many rare felicities on the civil state, both extraordinary in themselves, and of long continuance, as the most excellent King James FB29 hath right well observed: so that we may affirm of the Reformation of the Church of England, as the historian FB30 doth of the power and greatness of the realm of Macedon; that is to say, that the same arts, by which the first foundations of it were laid by Philip, were practiced in the consummation and accomplishment of it, by the care of Alexander. For in the first year of her reign, the Liturgy, being first reviewed, and qualified in some particulars, was confirmed by parliament; FB31 in her fifth FB32 year, the articles of religion were agreed upon by the convocation; FB33 and in the eighth, the government of the Church, by Archbishops and Bishops, received as strong a confirmation as the laws could give it. And for this last, we are beholden unto Bonner, the late Bishop of London, who, being called upon to take the oath of supremacy, by Horn, of Winton, refused to take the oath, upon this account, because Horn’s consecration was not good and valid by the laws of the land: which he insisted on, because the Ordinal established in the reign of King Edward, (by which both Horn and all the rest of Queen Elizabeth’s Bishops received consecration), had been discharged by Queen Mary, and not restored by any act of parliament in the present reign. Which being first declared by parliament, in the eighth of this Queen, to be casus omissus ,—or rather, that the Ordinal was looked upon as a part of the Liturgy, which had been solemnly confirmed in the first of this Queen’s reign,—they next enacted and ordained, “that all such Bishops as were consecrated by that Ordinal in the times precedent, or should be consecrated by it in the time to come, should be reputed to be lawfully ordained and consecrated, to all intents and purposes in the law whatever.” FB34 Which added as much strength to the episcopal government, as the authority of man, and an act of parliament, could possibly confer upon it. This made the Queen more constant to her former principles, of keeping up the Church in its power and purity, without subjecting it to any but herself alone. She looked upon herself as the sole fountain of both jurisdictions, which she resolved to keep in their proper channels; neither permitting them to mingle waters upon any occasion, nor suffering either of them to invade and destroy the other. And to this rule she was so constant, that when one Morrice, FB35 being then attorney of the duchy of Lancaster, had offered a bill, ready drawn, to the house of commons, in the thirty-fifth of her reign, for the retrenching of the ecclesiastical courts in much narrower bounds,—she first commanded Coke, then speaker, (and afterwards successively chief justice of either bench), not to admit of any such seditious bills for the time to come. And, that being done, she caused the person of the said attorney to be seized upon, deprived him of his place in the duchy-court, disabled him from practicing as a common-lawyer, and, finally, shut him up in Tutbury castle, where he continued till his death. By which severity, and keeping the like constant hand in the course of her government, she held so great a curb on the puritan faction, that neither her parliaments nor her courts of justice were from thenceforth much troubled with them, in the rest of her reign. 7. This is the sum and method of the following History; in the particulars whereof thou wilt find more to satisfy thy curiosity and inform thy judgment than can be possibly drawn up in this general view. As for myself, and my performance in this work,—in the first place, I am to tell thee, that, towards the raising of this fabric, I have not borrowed my materials only out of vulgar authors, but searched into the registers of the convocation; consulted all such acts of parliament as concerned my purpose; advised with many foreign writers of great name and credit; exemplified some records and charters of no common quality, many rare pieces in the famous Cottonian library, FB36 and not a few debates and orders of the counciltable; which I have laid together in as good a form, and beautified it with a trimming as agreeable, as my hands could give it. And, next, I am to let thee know, that, in the whole carriage of this work, I have assumed unto myself the freedom of a just historian: concealing nothing out of fear, nor speaking any thing for favor; delivering nothing for a truth without good authority; but so delivering that truth, as to witness for me, that I am neither biased by love or hatreds, nor over-swayed by partiality and corrupt affections. If I seem tart at any time, as sometimes I may, it is but in such cases only, and on such occasions, in which there is no good to be done by lenitives, and where the tumor is so putrefied as to need a lancing. For in this case a true historian must have somewhat in him of the good Samaritan, in using wine or vinegar, to cleanse the wound, as well as oil, to qualify the grief of the inflammation. I know it is impossible (even in a work of this nature) to please all parties, though I have made it my endeavor to dissatisfy none, but those that “hate to be reformed,” FB38 (in the Psalmist’s language), or otherwise are so tenaciously wedded to their own opinions, that neither reason nor authority can divorce them from it.

And thus, (good reader), I commend thee to the blessings of God, whom I beseech to guide thee in the way to eternal life, amongst those intricate windings and uncertain turnings, those crooked lanes and dangerous precipices, which are round about thee.

And so fare thee well.