of mind to accept of and retain this Benefit which God by his Vicar's Legate did proffer them For now nothing else remained but that he being present with those Keys which should open the Gates of the Church they should also abrogate those Laws which lately Enacted to the prejudice of the Church had rended them from the rest of its Body Having spoken a great deal to this purpose and ransacked Antiquity for examples of our Forefathers devotion to the See of Rome his grave delivery excellent language and methodical contexture of his speech wrought so effectually in the minds of those who were addicted to Popery that they thought not themselves until this day capable of Salvation But many of the lower House who deemed it a rare felicity to have shaken off the yoak of Rome eagerly withstood the readmittance of it But by the endeavours of the King and Queen all things were at last composed to the Cardinal 's liking The Authority which the Popes heretofore usurped in this Realm is restored the Title of Supreme Head of the Church is abrogated and a Petition drawn by the whole Court of Parliament for the Absolution of the People and Clergy of England from Schism and Heresie is by the Bishop of Winchester presented to the Legate who they all kneeling by the Authority committed unto him absolved them This being done they went to the Chappel in Procession singing Te Deum and the next Sunday the Bishop of Winchester in his Sermon at Pauls Cross made a large relation of what had passed These things being thus setled the Queen intends an honorable Embassy to Rome whereof she had at her first coming to the Crown made promise For having resolved to replant the Religion of Rome she had privily written to Pool requiring his advice therein The Pope was therefore pleased to send into England Giovanni Francisco Commendono his Chamberlain afterward Cardinal for the more perfect notice of the estate of the Realm To him the Queen after much private conference did under her Hand promise Obedience to the See of Rome desiring withal that the Kingdom might be absolved from the Interdict for the obtaining whereof she would by a solemn Embassy petition his Holiness as soon as the Estate was setled So now about the end of this year the Bishop of Ely Sir Anthony Brown and Edward Carne Doctor of Law are by the Kings sent to proffer their Obedience to the See of Rome But these costs and pains were fruitless For before they came to Rome the Pope was dead In the mean time the Queen considering all her actions hitherto to have passed with full applause began to treat with the Nobility to condescend that if not the Royal at least the Matrimonial Crown of our Queens might be imposed on Philip. But it being a matter without precedent and that might perchance to an ambitious Prince give some colour for claim to the Kingdom they proved averse and she content to surcease The next care was of restitution of Church-Lands But Henry had so divided them and that among the Nobility that nothing could be done therein Only it was decreed that the First-Fruits and Tenths granted to the King by the Clergy Anno 1534 should be remitted which Decree upon consideration of the Treasuries poverty and of the many Pensions granted by Henry to the ejected Religious Persons was quickly revoked About the same time an absurd I might say ridiculous accident happened by the Queens own credulity and the flattery of fawning Courtiers By reason of a Disease which Physicians term a Mole her Belly began to swell and some other reasons giving her cause to conjecture that she was with Child she not entertaining the advice of any Physicians but of Midwives and old Women believing what she desired should be affirmed that she felt the stirring of the Embryo in her womb To those that are affected with this malady that fleshy and inform substance which is termed Mola doth seem sometimes to move but that slowly and with the general motion of the whole Belly By this and other symptoms Physicians would quickly have discovered her Disease which unless very maturely prevented is commonly incurable So that in process of time her Liver being over-cooled she fell into a Dropsie which as Fuchsius and other Physicians write doth usually happen But these flattering hopes betrayed her to the laughter of the World and to her Grave For on the seven and twentieth of November the Lords of the Council sent some Mandates to the Bishop of London to disperse certain forms of Prayers wherein after Thanks given to God for his Mercies to this Kingdom by giving hopes of an Heir to the Crown and infusing life into the Embryo they should pray for the preservation of the Queen and the Infant and her happy delivery and cause Te Deum to be sung every where Then by Parliament many things were Enacted concerning the Education of the Babe and much clutter was otherwise kept about preparations for the Child's Swadling-clouts Cradle and other things requisite at the Delivery until in June in the ensuing year it was manifested that all was little better than a Dream This year were many Barons created On the eleventh of March William Howard was created Lord Howard of Effingham he was Father to Charles Lord Admiral and late Earl of Nottingham on the fifth of April John Williams Lord Williams of Tame on the seventh of April Edward North Baron of Chartlege on the eighth of April John Bruges Lord Chandois on the fourteenth of May Gerard Fitz-Gerard of whom before Earl of Kildare and on the second of September Anthony Brown Viscount Mountague And in September deceased Thomas Duke of Norfolk ANNO DOM. 1555. REG. MARIAE 2 3 PHILIPPI 1 2. ON the eighteenth of January the Lord Chancellour coming to the Tower with six other Lords of the Council set many brave Prisoners at liberty viz. the Archbishop of York Sir John Rogers Sir James Croft Sir Nicholas Throckmorton Sir Nicholas Arnold Sir George Harper Sir William Sentlow Sir Gawin Carew Sir Andrew Dudley the Duke of Northumberland's Brother William Gibs Cutbert Vaughan Harington Tremaine and others The Archbishop having married a Wife was deprived and Nicholas Heath sometimes Bishop of Worcester but deprived by King Edward and Hooper being ejected and condemned to the Fire lately restored by Queen Mary was substituted in his place Rogers and Croft were afterward Privy Counsellors to Queen Elizabeth under whom they many years flourished in great Authority Throckmorton a subtil man was thought to have been the plotter of Wyat's Rebellion his Head was therefore especially aimed at But being indicted and ten whole hours spent in sifting him he by such witty answers voided the accusation of his Adversary that the Jurors found him Not guilty for which they were afterward soundly fined About the beginning of April the Marquess of Exceter and a little after the Lady Elizabeth were
at length he must brag of the Jugler's promises as he did to a Gentleman named Charles Knevet to whom he boldly unmasked himself and gave a reason of his actions Upon Knevet's accusation he was arraigned and condemned the thirteenth of May and on the seventeenth publickly beheaded His death was lamented by many and the rather for that he was no way faulty but in his vanity and pride which overthrew him Being a child I have heard antient men say that by his bravery of Apparel and sumptuous Feasts he exasperated the King with whom in these things he seemed to contend But he could by no means bear with the intolerable pride of the Cardinal whose hatred not improbably proved fatal unto him rather than did the King's displeasure for many times Princes are with less danger offended than their Mignons There goes a tale That the Duke once holding the basin to the King the Cardinal when the King had done presently dipped his hands in the same water the Duke disdaining to debase himself to the service of a Priest shed the water in his shooes The Cardinal therewith incensed threatned him that He would sit upon his skirts The Duke to shew that he slighted his threats and withal that the King might take notice of the Cardinal's malice came the next day to Court richly as he usually was apparelled but without skirts to his Doublet The King and many others demanding what he meant by that strange fashion he answered readily That it was done by way of prevention for the Cardinal should not now sit upon his skirts He thought he had put a jest upon the Cardinal to whose informations as proceeding from envy and spleen he hoped the King would hereafter give the less credit But he missed his mark for most men were of opinion that the Cardinal's malice crushed him rather than did the weight of his own offences It was the saying of Charles the Emperour upon the report of his death That the Butcher's Dog had killed the fairest Hart of England Howsoever it came to pass the King who had hitherto ruled without bloodshed induced by the former reasons so the Records run permitted his hands to be stained with the blood of this poor Prince many lamenting that the indiscreet credulity of one man having not attempted ought against the Estate should be the overthrow of so noble a Family If I might lawfully pry so far into God's judgments which are indeed inscrutable I would be bold to impute the punishment of the Son to the Father's treachery who conspired with the Usurper against his lawful Prince Edward the Fifth who by his assistance was deprived of his Life and Kingdom But forasmuch as that being touched in conscience he manifestly repented this fact for seeking to oppress the Tyrant whom he himself had raised he perished miserably the Divine Justice I think so far regarded his repentance that his posterity are nevertheless Peers of the Realm by the title of Lord Stafford The first point of Wisdom is not to run into Errour the next quickly to amend it The King having written a Book against Martin Luther sent it as a Present to Pope Leo the Tenth This Leo not yet thirty eight years old was by the combination of the Junior Cardinals elected Pope In which dignity he behaved himself according to his years profusely spending the Treasures of the Church in hawking and hunting and other pleasures not deemed over-honest Need began at length to pinch him and money must be had Whereupon he resolves to make use of his Keys against the most subtil locks and strongest bars ever yet held prevalent Indulgences of all sorts without distinction of time or place must now publickly be set to sale St. Peter's Church this was the pretence was out of repair towards which a certain summ of money given would purchase Pardon of Sins not only for the Living but for the Dead also whose Souls should thereby be redeemed from the pains of Purgatory But whatsoever was pretended every one palpably saw that these Pardons were granted to get money for his own relief And forasmuch as the Commissioners demanded it after an impudent and shameless manner they in most places incurred the dislike and indignation of the people especially in Germany where they saw this faculty of redeeming Sould from Purgatory was either sold for little or nothing or played away in their Taverns But what speak I of the Commissioners That which made the Germans most impatient was that the heedless Pope had given to his Sister Magdalen the profit of the exactions of Indulgences in many parts of Germany and that so openly that every one must needs know it For all Germany spake it 〈◊〉 this money was not gathered for the Pope or the Treasury of the Church whereby peradventure some part of it might be employed to good uses but was exacted to satisfie the greediness of a Woman At that time lived Martin Luther a Doctor of Divinity and an Augustine Monk one who under a religious Habit did not consecrate himself to idleness but to God It is reported how truly I know not that recreating himself in the fields his companion with whom he then discoursed was suddenly stricken dead with Thunder He thereupon falling into due consideration of the uncertainty of death and of judgement left the study of the Civil Law to which he then applied himself and renouncing the world betook himself to a Cloister where for his deportment he was beyond exception for Learning especially divine he was scarce matchable Upon this horrible abuse of the authority of the Keys being inflamed with a pious zeal he could not contain himself but boldly and bitterly inveighed against this gross impiety Neither stayd he there but storm the Pope never so much proceeds to other enormities in the Church of Rome some whereof that Church hath since reformed the rest religious Princes by Luther awakened out of their dead sleep of Superstition notwithstanding the practices of Rome have God be thanked exploded New opinions especially in matters of Religion are of themselves always odious Henry being offended with Luther's new as the world then deemed them Tenets thought it would prove to his honour by writing against Luther to manifest his Learning and Piety to the world Hereupon under his name a Book was set forth better beseeming some antient and deep Divine than a youthful Prince whom although he earnestly endeavoured it yet his affairs would not permit to bury himself among his Books which many thought to have been compiled by Sir Thomas Moor some by the Bishop of Rochester and others not without cause suspected to be the work of some other great Scholar Whosoever wrote it Luther replied in such sort that although his holy zeal were approved by many yet those many could have wished him more temperate and respective of the Majesty of Kings This Book was so acceptable to the Pope that according to the example of Alexander
the Judges and chief Lawyers of the Realm at his left hand sate the Temporal Lords and behind them the Gentlemen of the Privy Chamber Lambert being brought to the Bar Day Bishop of Chichester by the King's appointment made an Oration wherein he declared the cause of this meeting saying That Lambert having been accused of Heresie before his Ordinary had made his Appeal unto the King as if expecting from his Majesty more favour for Heresie than from the Bishop So that he now found it to be true whereof he had been oft informed That the credulous People were verily perswaded that his Majesty abhorring the Religion of his Ancestors had embraced the new Tenets lately broached in Germany True it was the tyranny of the Court of Rome had been troublesom to his Predecessors but to Him intolerable and therefore had He shaken it off That Religion might no longer patronize Idleness He had expelled Monks who were no other than Drones in the Bee-hive He had taken away the idolatrous worship of Images had permitted to his Subjects the reading and knowledge of God's Word hitherto prohibited by the Church of Rome lest their wiles and cozenages should be discovered And had made reformation in some other things peradventure of less moment which no man could deny would much redound to the good both of Church and Commonwealth But as for other things He had determined there should be no change in the Church during his Reign Which his Resolution He now intended publickly to manifest His Majesty's desire was That the Delinquent renouncing his Errours should suffer himself to be received into the bosom of the Church To which end partly and partly to shew that He thirsted not after any one's blood out of his elemency He had procured the presence of those Grave and Learned men meaning the Bishops who by Authority and force of Arguments should if it were possible bring back this strayed Sheep into the Fold of the Church But if he perversly oppugned the Truth and all perswasions notwithstanding became immoveable He would by this man's exemplary punishment make known what others should in the like Case expect and instruct the Judges and Magistrates what they ought to do therein The Bishop having ended the King demanded of Lambert What he thought of the presence of Christ's Body in the Sacrament Whose answer being little to the King 's liking reasons and arguments were produced as if a Disputation in the Schools and not a Justiciary Session had been appointed Five whole hours this Disputation lasted the King being as it were Prior Opponent Archbishop Cranmer also and nine other Bishops forcibly pressing upon poor Lambert But neither this course nor the battery of threats and terrours prevailing against his constancy the King commanded the Lord Cromwell to pass sentence of condemnation upon him by virtue whereof within a day or two after he was burned Neither this dreadful Sentence nor his torturing death did any way appale him which he so little regarded that going to his death he merrily took his Breakfast with some Gentlemen into whose company he chanced as if he had been going to some sportful Game rather than his Execution ANNO DOM. 1539. REG. 31. ON the third of March Sir Nicholas Carew Knight of the Garter and Master of the Horse was beheaded for being of Counsel with the Marquess of Exceter and the Lord Mountague And on the eight and twentieth of April a Parliament began wherein Margaret Countess of Salisbury Mother to Cardinal Pool and Daughter to George Duke of Clarence who was Brother to Edward the Fourth was attainted of high Treason and condemned without hearing and with her the Cardinal her Son Gertrude Widow to the Marquess of Exceter Sir Adrian Fortescue and Sir Thomas Dingley Dingley and Fortescue were beheaded on the tenth of July and the Countess being then aged threescore and ten years suffered two years after In the same Parliament it was Enacted That the King might erect new Episcopal Sees in opportune places of the Realm For the performance whereof and of some other things no less specious the late dissolution of those Abbeys whereon the King seised was confirmed and all Religious Houses as yet unsuppressed were granted to the King for ever Upon notice whereof many either out of guilt of conscience or desirous to purchase the King's favour surrendred their charge even before they were required And first of all the Abbot and Convent of St. Albans the first Abbot of the Realm as St. Alban was the first Martyr which Honour was conferred on this House by Pope Adrian the Fourth whose Father had long lived a Monastical life therein forsake their rich Abbey seated near the ruins of Verolamium once a great and antient City and leave it to the mercy of the Courtiers Which dereliction afforded matter of example to many other few enjoying that security of conscience that they durst lay claim to their own Only three were found whose innocence made them so regardless of threats promises or reward that they could never be induced to betray the goods of their Churches to the merciless impiety of sacrilegious Harpies Which three were John Bech Abbot of Colchester in Essex Hugh Faringdon Abbot of the Abbey of Reding built by Henry the First for the place of his Sepulture and Richard Whiting Abbot of Glastonbury one of the stateliest and antientest Monasteries of Europe being first builded by Joseph of Arimathea who buried the Body of our Saviour Christ and is himself there interred as is also beside some Saxon Kings that most renowned King Arthur whose glorious Acts had they been undertaken by a fit Historian would have ranked him among the antient Worthies without the help of a fabulous Romance Against these men therefore other courses not availing that one was taken of administring the Oath of Supremacy which they refusing are as enemies to the Estate condemned of high Treason Bech was hanged at Colchester and Faringdon with two Priests named Rug and Ognion at Reding Whiting a man very aged and by reason thereof doating scarce perceiving that he had been condemned returning from the place of Judgment which was in the Bishop's Palace at Wells distant from Glastonbury four miles with conceit that he was restored to his Abbey was suddenly rapt up to the top of the Tor a Hill that surveys the Countrey round about and without leave of bidding his Convent farewel which he earnestly begged was presently hanged the stain of ingratitude sticking fast to the authors of this speedy execution of whom the poor Abbot is reported to have better deserved With Whiting were two Monks also executed named Roger James and John Thorn their Bodies all drawn and quartered and set up in divers places of the Countrey The punishment of these few so terrified the rest that without more ado they permitted all to the King's disposal The number of those that were supprest is not easily cast But the names of
himself wholly from the obedience of Rome for as much as it was a matter of great danger He would therefore advise him once more by Ambassadors to Rome to signifie that he was not utterly averse from a reconciliation which if he did he made no doubt but all things would succeed to his mind Henry was certain of enjoying his Love and let the Pope decree what he list was resolved to keep her He had been formerly abused by the Court of Rome and was loath to make farther trial of their dilatory proceedings Yet had Bellay prevailed so far with him that he would be content once more to submit himself to the Church of Rome if he could be assured of the Pope's intention to do him equity The Bishop conceiving some hopes of a peace although it were in the Winter time goes himself to Rome gives the Pope an account of his actions and certifies him that the matter was not yet desperate Whereupon a day is appointed by which a Post returning from the King was to give notice of an intended Embassy But the Consistory gave so short a time to have an answer that the Post came short two days at his return The term expired they proceed hastily to the confirmation of their Censures notwithstanding the Bishop's instance to obtain six days more for as much as contrary winds or some other chance might hinder the Messenger and six days would be no great matter considering the King had wavered six whole years before he fell The more moderate thought the Bishop demanded but reason but the preposterous haste of the greater sort prevailed Two days were scarce past after the prefixed time but the Post arriving with ample authority and instructions from England did greatly amaze those hasty Cardinals who afterwards would fain but could not find any means to mend what they had so rashly marred For the matter to please the Emperour was so hudled up as that which could not ritely be finished in three Consistories was done in one So the King and the whole Realm was interdicted the Bull whereof the Messengers not daring to come nearer was brought to Dunkirk The report hereof coming to the King he lays all the blame on the Lady Catharine Whereupon the Duke of Suffolk was sent to lessen her Houshold They who might be any way suspected to have been employed by her in this business are turned away the rest are commanded to take their Oaths to serve her as Princess of Wales not as Queen of England They that refuse are cashiered and they that are content to swear are by her cast off so that for a time she had few or no Attendants In the mean time on the three and twentieth of June died Mary Queen of France the King's Sister and was buried in the Abbey of St. Edmundsbury ANNO DOM. 1534. REG. 26. ABout this time was discovered the grand Imposture of Elizabeth Barton which brought her to a deserved end She had formerly been sick of a strange disease which not only afflicted her inwardly but as often as her fitt took her so wonderfully distorted her mouth and other parts of her body that most were of opinion it could not proceed from any natural cause But Custom growing to a second Nature the continuance of the disease had taught her to distort her body after her recovery in the same manner as when she was sick Hoping to make a profit of this her counterfeit Convulsion she imparted the secret to the Curate of the Parish by whose device after long deliberation between them it was agreed that she should often feign her self to be in an Ecstasie and whereas she was wont when the fitt seised her to lie still without motion as if she had been dead she should now sometimes utter some godly sentences inveigh against the wickedness of the times but especially against Hereticks and broachers of new Opinions and should relate strange Visions revealed by God to her in the time of her Ecstasie By these jugling tricks not only among the Vulgar who termed her the Holy Maid of Kent but among the wiser sort such as were Archbishop Warham Bishop Fisher and others her sanctity was held in admiration The Imposture taking so generally her boldness increased She prefixeth a day whereon she shall be restored to perfect health and the means of her recovery must be procured forsooth by a Pilgrimage to some certain Image of our Lady The day came and she being brought to the place by the like cozenage deceived a great number of people whom the expectation of the Miracle had drawn thither and at last as if she had just then shaken off her disease she appears whole and straight unto them all saying That by especial command from God she must become a Nun and that one Dr. Bocking a Monk of Canterbury there present was ordained to be her Confessor which office he willingly undertook under pretext whereof this Nun living at Canterbury Bocking often resorted to her not without suspition of dishonesty The intended Divorce from Catharine and Marriage with Ann Bolen had much appalled most part of the Clergy for then a necessity was imposed on the King of a divorce from the Papal See in which the Church and all Ecclesiastical persons were likely to suffer The apprehension whereof wrought so with Bocking that making others conscious of the intent he perswaded Elizabeth Barton by denuntiation of God's revealed judgments to deterr the King from his purposed change She according as she was instructed proclaims it abroad That the King adventuring to marry another Catharine surviving should if in the mean time he died not some infamous death within one month after be deprived of his Kingdom The King hears of it and causeth the Impostrix to be apprehended who upon examination discovered the rest of the Conspirators who were all committed to prison until the next Parliament should determine of them Elizabeth Barton Bocking Masters the afore mentioned Curate of the Parish Deering and Risby Monks with Gold a Priest are by the Parliament adjudged to die The Bishop of Rochester and Adeson his Chaplain one Abel a Priest Laurence the Archdeacon of Canterbury his Register and Thomas Gold Gentleman for having heard many things whereby they might guess at the intents of the Conspirators and not acquainting the Magistrate with them are as accessory condemned in a Praemunire confiseation of their goods and perpetual imprisonment Elizabeth Barton and her Companions having each of them after a Sermon at Pauls Cross publickly confessed the Imposture are on the twentieth of April hanged and their Heads set over the Gates of the City By the same Parliament the authority of the Convocation to make Canonical Constitutions unless the King give his Royal assent is abrogated It is also enacted That the Collocation of all Bishopricks the Sees being vacant should henceforth be at the King's dispose and that no man should be chosen by the Chapter or
any thing to the Barber that trimmed him affirming That head about which he had bestowed his pains was the Kings if he could prove it to be his that did bear it he would well reward him To his Keeper demanding his upper garment as his fee he gave his Hat Going up the Scaffold he desired him that went before him To lend him his hand to help him up as for coming down he took no care Laying his head upon the block he put aside his beard which was then very long saying The Executioner was to cut off his head not his heard The executions of so many men caused the Queen to be much maligned as if they had been done by her procurement at least the Papists would have it thought so knowing that it stood her upon and that indeed she endeavoured that the authority of the Pope of Rome should not again take footing in England They desired nothing more than the downfal of this virtuous Lady which shortly after happening they triumphed in the overthrow of Innocence In the mean time they who undertook the subversion of the Monasteries invented an Engin to batter them more forcibly than the former course of torture and punishment They send abroad subtil-headed fellows who warranted by the King's authority should throughout England search into the lives and manners of Religious persons It would amaze one to consider what villanies were discovered among them by the means of Cromwell and others Few were found so guiltless as to dare withstand their proceedings and the licentiousness of the rest divulged made them all so odious to the people that never any exploit so full of hazard and danger was more easily atchieved than was the subversion of our English Monasteries ANNO DOM. 1536. REG. 28. THis year began with the end of the late Queen Catharine whom extremity of grief cast into a disease whereof on the eighth of January she deceased Queen Ann now enjoyed the King without a Rival whose death notwithstanding not improbably happened too soon for her For the King upon May-day at Greenwich beholding the Viscount Rochfort the Queens Brother Henry Norris and others running a-Tilt arising suddenly and to the wonder of all men departing thence to London caused the Viscount Rochfort Norris the Queen her self and some others to be apprehended and committed The Queen being guarded to the Tower by the Duke of Norfolk Audley Lord Keeper Cromwell Secretary of Estate and Kingston Lieutenant of the Tower at the very entrance upon her knees with dire imprecations disavowed the crime whatsoever it were wherewith she was charged beseeching God so to regard her as the justness of her cause required On the fifteenth of May in the Hall of the Tower she was arraigned the Duke of Norfolk sitting high Steward to whom were adjoined twenty six other Peers and among them the Queens Father by whom she was to be tryed The Accusers having given in their evidence and the Witnesses produced she sitting in a Chair whether in regard of any infirmity or out of honour permitted to the Wife of their Sovereign having an excellent quick wit and being a ready speaker did so answer to all objections that had the Peers given in their verdict according to the expectation of the assembly she had been acquitted But they among whom the Duke of Suffelk the King's Brother-in-Law was chief one wholly applying himself to the King's humour pronounce her guilty Whereupon the Duke of Norfolk bound to proceed according to the verdict of the Peers condemned her to death either by being Burned in the Green in the Tower or Beheaded as his Majesty in his pleasure should think fit Her Brother George Viscount Rochfort was likewise the same day condemned and shortly after Henry Norris William Brierton and Francis Weston Gentlemen of the King 's Privy Chamber and Mark Smeton a Musician either as partakers or accessory were to run the same fortune The King greatly favoured Norris and is reported to be much grieved that he was to die with the rest Whereupon he offered pardon to him conditionally that he would confess that whereof he was accused But he answered resolutely and as it became the progenitor of so many valiant Heroes That in his conscience he thought her guiltless of the objected crime but whether she were or no he could not accuse her of any thing and that he had rather undergo a thousand deaths than betray the Innocent Upon relation whereof the King cryed out Hang him up then hang him up then Which notwithstanding was not accordingly executed For on the thirteenth of May two days after his condemnation all of them viz. the Viscount Rochfort Norris Brierton and Smeton were Beheaded at Tower-hill Norris left a Son called also Henry whom Queen Elizabeth in contemplation of his Father's deserts created Baron of Ricot This Lord Norris was Father to those great Captains William John Thomas and Edward in our days so famous throughout Christendom for their brave exploits in England France Ireland and the Netherlands On the nineteenth of May the Queen was brought to the place of Execution in the Green within the Tower some of the Nobility and Companies of the City being admitted rather to be witnesses than spectators of her death To whom the Queen having ascended the Scaffold spake in this manner Friends and good Christian people I am here in your presence to suffer death whereto I acknowledge my self adjudged by the Laws how justly I will not say for I intend not an accusation of any one I beseech the Almighty to preserve his Majesty long to reign over you a more gentle or mild Prince never swayed Scepter his bounty and clemency towards me I am sure hath been especial If any one intend an inquisitive survey of my actions I intreat him to judge favourably of me and not rashly to admit of any hard censorious conceit And so I bid the World farewel beseeching you to commend me in your Prayers to God To thee O Lord do I commend my Soul Then kneeling down she incessantly repeated these words Christ have mercy on my soul Lord Jesus receive my soul until the Executioner of Calais at one blow smote off her Head with a Sword Had any one three years before at what time the King so hot in the pursuit of his love preferred the enjoying of this Lady beyond his Friends his Estate his Health Safeguard and his only Daughter prophetically foretold the unhappy fate of this Princess he should have been believed with Cassandra But much more incredible may all wise men think the unheard of crime for which she was condemned viz. That fearing lest her Daughter the Lady Elizabeth born while Catharine survived should be accounted illegitimate in hope of other especially male Issue whereof she despaired by the King now near fifty years old she had lasciviously used the company of certain young Courtiers nay not therewith content had committed Incest with her
In Autumn the Earl of Rutland with three thousand Lansquenets and some Bands drawn out of the frontier Garrisons arrives at Hadington Who duly considering that this Town could not be kept any longer without the excessive charges of a just Army forasmuch as the Countrey about being miserably forraged it could not be victualled without great difficulty and danger rased the Walls fired the Houses brought away the Artillery and finding no resistance returned in safety to Berwick Buchanan refers it to the ensuing year but I follow the record of our own Historians And having thus far spent the year abroad I at length return home where I find Stephen Gardiner Bishop of Winchester in the Tower He was a man very learned and no less subtil adhering to the Popish Faction yet so as that he would be content to accommodate himself to the current of the times King Henry had employed him in many Embassages and that with ample authority under whom he durst not oppose the proceedings confirmed by enacted Laws And under Edward he repressed himself for a time seemingly consenting to the commenced Reformation But his dissimulation was at length manifestly discovered to the Privy Council who had commanded him in a Sermon at Pauls Cross to signifie his approbation of the present estate of the Church which he accordingly did on the nine and twentieth of June but so ambiguously and obscurely that he satisfied them not And being expresly forbidden to speak any thing concerning the Eucharist he knowing that by the Laws nothing was definitively determined in that point did so eargerly assert that Papistical I will not say Capernaitical Corporal and Real Presence of Christ in the Sacrament that he wonderfully offended the minds of many but especially of the Lords of the Council Wherefore he was on the thirtieth of June committed and obstinately refusing to acknowledge his errour was two years after deprived of his Bishoprick and as he was of a turbulent spirit lest he should practise any thing against the Estate detained nevertheless in prison until the death of Edward In the mean time Archbishop Cranmer by writing oppugned that gross and carnal assertion of the Church of Rome concerning Christ's Presence in the Sacrament whom Gardiner secretly answered under the fictitious name of M. Constantius Neither did that Blood-sucker Boner Bishop of London who in Queen Maries Reign so heated the Kingdom with the Funeral Piles of so many Saints speed any better than Winchester For being likewise enjoyned to Preach at the Cross he did it so coldly omitting many of those points whereof he was commanded to speak that he was likewise committed deprived of his Bishoprick and so lived until Queen Mary set them both at liberty What the Objections were against Cutbert Tonstall Bishop of Duresm and George Day Bishop of Chichester I do not find but that they ran the same fortune is manifest They were both very Learned Prelates but especially Tonstall a mild man and of most sweet conditions in regard whereof I do not a little wonder that he was so hardly dealt with But the drift of the punishments of such men who in Henry's time were accounted the chief Lights of our Church I conceive to have been that the rest of that Order might by their example be admonished without dissimulation either to resign their Bishopricks to others that were thought more worthy or be induced to conform themselves to the present Reformation of the Church according to the prescript of the Laws in that behalf lately Enacted And yet I would there were not sufficient cause to suspect that this was but a made opportunity the removal of these obstacles making way for the Invasion of these widow Seas For as soon as Tonstall was exautorated that rich Bishoprick of Duresm by Act of Parliament was wrecked the chief revenues and customs of it being incorporated to the Crown and the rest in despight of the Tenants so gelded that at this day it scarce possesseth the third part of its antient Revenues Yet did Queen Mary seriously endeavour the restitution of those religious portions Queen Elizabeth would hardly consent that it should lose any of its plumes yet some it did and King James hath lately enacted against the Alienation of Church-lands yea even to the Crown otherwise than upon reservation of a reasonable Rent and the return of them to the Church after the expiration of three lives or one and twenty years The hungry Courtier finding how good a thing the Church was had now for some years become acquainted with it out of a zealous intent to Prey Neither could the horridness of her sacred Skeleton as yet so work on him as to divert his resolutions and compassionately to leave the Church to her religious poverty Beside the infancy of the King in this incertain ebb and flow of Religion made her opportune to all kind of Sacriledge So that we are deservedly to thank the Almighty Guardian of the Church that these Locusts have not quite devoured the Maintenance of the Labourers in this English Vineyard For we yet retain that antient form of government in the Primitive Church by Bishops who have for the most part wherewith to support their honourable Function as likewise have other those subordinate Prelates Deans Archdeacons and Canons of Cathedral Churches And as for our Preachers of the more polite and learned sort we think him little befriended by Fortune who long liveth in expectation of a competent preferment I would the residue of the Reformed Churches of Christendom had not been pared so near the quick by precise hands that but some few of them might in this kind be paralleled with ours And now behold two Brothers acting their several Tragedies Jealousie Envy and Ambition infernal Furies had armed them against each other and the Pride of the Feminine Sex prepared them for the Lists A lamentable exigent wherein the loss of his Adversary must be the destruction of each wherein the Kingdom must groan at the loss of one both being in the Estate incompatible wherein the King himself must as most suspect he did suffer that he might not suffer Thomas Seymour Lord Admiral had married Catharine Parr the Widow of the deceased King What correspondence there might be between Her who had been the Wife of the late Sovereign and the Duchess of Somerset whose Husband being Protector of the Realm in point of command little differed from a Sovereign and had over his Brother the Admiral the Advantages of Age Dignity and general Esteem if any man cannot without difficulty conjecture I refer him to the first Book of Herodian where let him observe the contentions arising between Crispina the Wife of Commodus and Lucilla who had been formerly married to L. Verus the Emperour But in this the divers dispositions of the Brothers set on edge on the emulous humours of their Wives The Duke was mild affable free open and no way malicious the Admiral was naturally turbulent
set at liberty Concerning Lady Elizabeth it was long consulted what course to take with her wherein the resolutions of the Papists were bloodily bent to make her away when any colourable occasion should present it self The Bishop of Winchester upon any speech concerning the punishment of Hereticks is reported to have said We strip off the leaves or lop off the branches but unless we strike at the Root that hope of Hereticks meaning Lady Elizabeth we do nothing But after long search into her Actions no sufficient matter of Accusation being found although there wanted not those who sought to perswade the Queen that her liberty would endanger the Queen yet Philip aspiring to the opinion of Clemency by his intercession toward the end of April she had her liberty but so that she was bound to admit of into her Family Sir Thomas Pope a Privy Counsellor Gage and some others who should always keep watch over her Actions This small sparkle of Clemency was obscured by a greater flame of Cruelty a multitude of godly men suffering this year for their Conscience only On the fourth of February John Rogers the Protomartyr of those times was Burned at London He was Tindall's Companion after whose death fearing persecution he would not return into his Countrey but went with his Wife to Wirtenberg where having attained to the German Tongue he undertook the Cure of a certain Church there which he faithfully discharged until under King Edward he was recalled from Exile by Ridley Bishop of London made a Prebend of Pauls and Lecturer there Queen Mary having attained the Crown the Papists endeavoured to affright him and so to have once more forced him to a voluntary Exile commanding him not so much as to peep into the streets and in this manner lived he a year until at last refusing to flie he was imprisoned and condemned to the Fire which cruel Death notwithstanding that he was to leave a Wise and ten Children he did most constantly undergo The like end on the ninth of February made John Hooper Bishop first of Glocester and then of Worcester too holding both Sees in Commendam who took much pains about Boner's deprivation which thing now hastened him to a Stake For as soon as Queen Mary was enthroned he was sent for to London committed to the Tower and condemned for an Heretick Henry reigning he he spent part of his life in Germany where he took to Wife a Burguignon and among other devout Learned men had intimate familiarity with Henry Bullinger by whom for his Learning godly and sweet conversation he was held in dear esteem After his condemnation he was sent to Glocester there to suffer where he was thought most to have sinned in sowing seeds of Errour He himself not a little rejoycing that he should by the testimony of his Blood confirm that Doctrine before their Eyes into whose Ears he had so often inculcated it The same course was taken with Ferrar Bishop of St. Davids who was brought down from London to his own Diocess there to be judged by the new Bishop Morgan by whom he was condemned and Burned at Caermarden the third of March He was a man rigid and of a rough behaviour which procured him much trouble under King Edward and now I believe proved his bane For having been by the Duke of Somerset advanced to that Dignity after his death this good and learned man by his sowr behaviour drawing near to arrogance which with that Nation is a great indignity raised against himself many accusers two whereof under Queen Elizabeth became Bishops who after the death of the Duke of Somerset easily prevailed with the adverse Faction for his Imprisonment Being found in Prison when Mary came to the Crown and brought before the Bishop of Winchester he might I believe by pleasing answers and a little yielding to the season have honestly escaped their bloody Hands as did many others who having not waded too far in Lady Jane's cause nor otherwise given any grand affront to any of the Popish Prelates by this means without impediment going into voluntary exile or being taken had their liberty easily procured at the intercession of Friends But Ferrar according to his innate tartness answering freely I will not say waiwardly to his interrogatories did so enrage the Bishop of Winchester that I do not much wonder at the hard proceedings against him Beside these Roland Taylor Doctor of Divinity suffered at Hadley the ninth of February Laurence Sanders an Excellent Preacher on the eighth at Coventry John Cardmaker Chancellour of the Church of Wells on the last of May at London where also on the first of July that godly and learned man John Bradford underwent the tortures of his Martyrdom But not to go to a particular enumeration of all that suffered for their Faith the number of them was almost incredible the greater part whereof were Executed out of Boner's butchery But among others we cannot omit those Worthies Ridley and Latimer who having been condemned the year before were now on the sixteenth of October conducted to Execution and at Oxford in the aspect of the Academicks were in the Town-ditch near Baliol Colledge tied to a stake and Burned Cranmer is reported from the higher part of his Prison to have beheld this doleful spectacle and with bended Knees and elevated Hands to have prayed for their constancy of Hope and Faith as also for himself who was shortly he knew to tread their path But his Execution was for a time deferred by the Bishop of Winchester's means and that not out of pity but ambition and regard of his own profit On the four and twentieth of March died Julius the Third after whose death the Conclave elected Marcello Cervino a man of excellent learning wisdom and sanctity of life and under whom there was great hope of the Reformation of that Church Whos 's that memorable saying was That he did not see how it was possible for a Pope to be saved who having sate two and twenty days only died and left the Chair to Cardinal Caraffa of whose contention with Pool we have spoken already who succeeded him by the name of Paul the Fourth Gardiner being not ignorant of this contention and the differences between them deals underhand with this new Pope to honour him with a Cardinal's Hat and to transfer on him the authority Legatine by Julius conferred on Pool The Pope in regard of his hatred to Pool easily condescended thereto determining also to cite him to Rome there to force him to acquit himself of Heresie and to suffer as did Cardinal Morono Pool's great Friend whom this Pope detained in Prison as long as himself lived Hereby Gardiner well hoped to attain to be Archbishop of Canterbury the Revenues of which Bishoprick Pool received as a Sequestrator and would no otherwise as long as Cranmer lived This was the reason that Cranmer's Execution was deferred to work means that Pool
might not be invested in the Archbishoprick which he himself for the former reasons hoped to attain But while Gardiner was wholly intent to this project Death had a project on him and cut him off by the extremity of a Dropsie which swelling from his Feet and Legs up to his Belly dispatched him on the twelfth of November who was with great Solemnity interred in his Cathedral at Winchester The Emperour Charles the Fifth having determined to resign the Empire and his Kingdom on the five and twentieth of October at Brussels where all the Estates of his Realms were assembled transferred all his Kingdoms and Dominions on his Son Philip whom he had formerly made King of Naples and Sicily and betook himself to the rest of a private life ANNO DOM. 1556. REG. MARIAE 3 4 PHILIPPI 2 3. TO begin the year with its first day on the first of January Nicholas Heath Archbishop of York was made Lord Chancellour In March a Comet in the twentieth degree of Libra was seen from the fifth to the seventeenth of the same month On the thirteenth of March a counterfeit Edward whose true name was William Fetherstone was Executed for a Traytor He being a Miller's Son in stature and lineaments of Body not much unlike the deceased King Edward and his Age also agreeable had been the last year publickly whipped through London for affirming himself to be the King But not sufficiently terrified by the smart of this punishment he again betakes him to the same Imposture privately affirms himself to be King Edward and causes Letters to be cast abroad that King Edward was alive for which he was at length deservedly Hanged And now we are at length come to the narration of the memorable Martyrdom of the Archbishop Cranmer Stephen Gardiner Bishop of Winchester being dead Cardinal Pool as yet the Pope's Legate appointed James Brooke Bishop of Glocester for Cranmer's Tryal forasmuch as they judged it unlawful to punish an Archbishop but by leave from his Holiness John Story and Thomas Martin Doctors of Law Commissioners for the Queen accompanied the Bishop to Oxford that the Authority Royal might countenance the Delegates proceeding In St. Maries Church they had high Seats purposely erected for them Brooke sitting under the place where the consecrated Host did usually hang in a Pix beside him sate Martin and Story but a little lower and Cranmer habited like a Doctor of Divinity not like a Bishop was brought before them Being told that there were those who represented not only her Majesties person but also of the most holy Father the Pope he with due reverence saluted Story and Martin but would not so much as vouchsafe to cast his Eyes toward Brooke and that not as he afterward confessed out of contempt of the man whom he formerly loved but that he might not seem to acknowledge the Pope's Authority he having by Oath to King Henry obliged himself to the contrary especially in England where he could make no pretence of right Then each of them exhorted him to change his Opinion and return to the Union of the Church But he not regarding their admonition they cite him to appear within fourscore days before his Holiness which with her Majesties consent he promised he would But the Pope not expecting his coming within twenty days after by Letters to the King and Queen commanded him to be Condemned and committed to the Secular power After the intercourse of a few days new Authority is by the Pope granted to Boner Bishop of London and Thirlby Bishop of Ely for Cranmer's degradation from Orders both Presbyterial and Archiepiscopal and he then to be delivered over to the secular Magistrate to suffer for Heresie which was accordingly performed on the fourteenth of February Those Saint-like men Cranmer Ridley and Latimer as long as they lived did by Letters exhort each other to a generous Constancy for the maintenance of the truth of the Christian Faith But the other two Champions having made their way to Heaven and left him alone not plied with such firm Exhortations out of desire of longer Life his Constancy began at length to be shaken and that by the subtilty and daily perswasions of a Spanish Frier So being seduced with hope of pardon he retracts what-ever he had before written in defence of his Religion which Retractation was after printed and published But that little availed him For whether that Pool would not be longer excluded from the possession of the Archbishoprick or that which seems more probable the Queens inveterate hate and desire of revenge for her Mothers Divorce which could not be otherwise satiated than with the Blood of this grave man were the cause He being now confident of Life is presently rapt to the place of Execution and there cruelly Burned where Ridley and Latimer had five months before been crowned with Martyrdom On the day appointed for his Execution a Sermon by the appointment of the Cardinal was Preached by Dr. Cole Thither was Cranmer brought and placed conveniently near the Pulpit where Cole exhorted him to a constancy in that Faith which he was now content to acknowledge and that even unto Death which was now by the appointment of the Magistrate to be inflicted on him this very day God's wrath for the Death of Fisher and More could not otherwise be appeased but by his Blood But before his Death would he by a publick Confession testifie his sincere Conversion to the Union of the Church he should do an act most acceptable to God and men If with this unexpected news Cranmer were amazed I do not at all wonder But he recollecting himself stood up and without any sign of fear made a quick Oration to the Assembly wherein having premised many things concerning morality and amendment of life he repeats the principal points of his Doctrine briefly explains his Faith affirmeth That under the authority Papal the Kingdom of Antichrist was contained and established and lastly demonstrates how much he had offended God by the abnegation of the Truth He professeth therefore that he had resolved that his right Hand wherewith he had so horribly sinned by Subscribing to the Doctrine proposed by the enemies of Truth should first feel the smart of punishment when he would have proceeded to speak more the multitude of Romanists whose expectation he had so finely deluded with clamours and scoffs interrupted him and hurried him away presently to the place of Execution There was then to be seen a sad Spectacle and such as would I will not say have extorted pity from his very Enemies but have expressed tears from a Flint The chief Prelate of the Realm lately flourishing by reason of his power and favour of Princes a man of most holy conversation for his age aspect feature learning gravity and rare gifts of mind deservedly most Reverend clad out of intent to expose him to mockery in an obsolete garment for so had the Papists