here, again, the old practice being retained, but guarded, and in some degree corrected and checked, by the modern principle. The people were to be instructed that the use of images was warranted by Scripture, and that, serving as they did to represent good examples and to stir up devotion, it was meet that they should stand in the churches; but in order to the avoidance of such superstition as it was thought had been fallen into in times past, it was agreed that while censing, kneeling, offering, and performing other acts of worship before images should still be allowed, the worshippers should be told that they must really do the worship not to the image, but to God and his honour. As for the estimation in which the saints were to be held, it was laid down, with the like ingenious indentation and dovetailing of the two colours of opinion, first, that people were not to think to obtain those things at the hands of the saints which were to be obtained only of God; secondly, nevertheless, that it was good to pray to them to pray with and for us; and thirdly, that all the days appointed by the church for the memories of the saints were to be kept, but yet that the king might at any time lessen the number of the said days, and must be obeyed if he did so. Another article sanctioned as good and laudable, and as having mystical significations in them, as well as being useful to lift up the mind to God, all the old customary ceremonies of religious worship-the vestments of the priest, the sprinkling of holy water, the distribution of holy bread, the bearing of candles on Candlemas-day, the giving of ashes on Ash Wednesday, the bearing of palms on Palm Sunday, the creeping to the Cross and kissing it on Good Friday, the hallowing the font, and other exorcisms and benedictions. Upon these points of mere external observance the reforming party probably did not think it worth while to make a stand, nor indeed were they by any means all of one mind as to such matters. The last of the articles related to the much controverted questions of purgatory and prayers for the dead; and here, on the whole, the Protestant notions must be considered to have prevailed, although there was still something of the usual balancing and compounding together of adverse if not absolutely contradictory views and statements. To pray for the souls departed was declared to be a custom which had continued in the church from the beginning, and therefore the people were to be instructed that it was good and charitable to pray for them, and to make others pray for them, in masses and exequies, and to give alms to them for that end. But since, it was added, the place the souls of the dead were in, and the pains they suffered, were left by the Scripture uncertain, they ought to be wholly resigned to the mercy of God; and therefore all those abuses were to be put away which had arisen under the pretence of purgatory, such as that souls were to be delivered out of it either by the pope's pardons, or by masses said in certain places or before certain images. This may be described as the nearest

VOL. II.

approach to the denial of purgatory that could be made without absolutely denying it.

This mongrel religion, neither Romanism nor Protestantism, but an irregular patchwork or uncemented jumble of both, could not be expected, after it was manufactured and produced, to be perfectly acceptable to any part of the nation.* As soon as it was published, Burnet tells us, it "occasioned a great variety of censures ;"—that is, of expressions of opinion respecting it. On the whole, however, it was generally regarded as a decided advance in a Protestant direction. The Protestants, with that reliance on the productive efficacy of speculative principles which their whole system tended to beget and foster, no doubt felt an assured confidence that the old superstitious practices which the articles tolerated would ere long give way before the sound doctrines, in the soil of which they were so inartificially stuck, in the vain attempt to make them there take root and flourish. The adherents of the ancient faith, on the other hand, with their opposite instinct, may have allowed themselves to take some consolation in the hope that the popular mind was too gross and uninstructed to be much affected by any mere doctrinal explanations, and that the old ceremonial observances, addressing their senses and passions, and moulding their habits from infancy, would be more than a match for cold, abstract dogmata and arguments, that appealed only to their understandings. Still recent experience was not in favour of this way of viewing the matter, nor, indeed, did it take in more than a part of the case. Burnet, therefore, is probably correct in describing the Romanists

as

"unspeakably troubled" by the publication of the articles. "Four sacraments," he observes, were passed over, which would encourage illaffected people to neglect them. The gainful trade by the belief of purgatory was put down ; for though it was said to be good to give alms for praying for the dead, yet, since both the dreadful stories of the miseries of purgatory and the certainty of redeeming souls out of them by masses were made doubtful, the people's charity and bounty that way would soon abate; and, in a word, the bringing matters under dispute was a great mortification to them, for all concluded that this was but a preamble to what they might expect afterwards."

The publication of the articles was immediately followed by a royal proclamation, abolishing, in conformity with the authority given by one of them, a considerable number of holidays, including most of those in the harvest season,—a measure of policy which, however calculated to be ultimately beneficial, was, perhaps, not very wise in the temper of the popular mind at the moment, and is admitted to have had as great an effect as any of

"It is yet but a mingle-mangle, a hotch-poteh," said Latimer of the Reformation, in one of his sermons; "I cannot tell what; partly popery, and partly true religion mingled together. They say in my country, when they call their hogs to the swine-trough, Come to thy mingle-mangle,-come, pur, come!' Even so do they make a mingle-mangle of the gospel." 4 z

the sudden innovations that were now made in provoking the Pilgrimage of Grace and the other serious insurrectionary movements that took place in the close of this year. A set of injunctions to the clergy was also issued by Cromwell as vicegerent, in the king's name, "which," says Burnet, "was the first act of pure supremacy done by the king; for in all that went before he had the concurrence of the two convocations." The injunctions, which are supposed to have been penned by Cranmer, after exhorting the clergy to see, as far as in them lay, to the observance of the new articles, and of the laws and statutes made for the extirpation of the usurped power of the Bishop of Rome, directed that all children and servants should be taught from their infancy to repeat and understand their Paternoster, the Creed, and the Ten Commandments in their mother tongue, for which purpose the curates were, in their sermons, deliberately and plainly to recite one clause or article of the said forms one day, and another another day, till they should be taught and learned by little, and were also to deliver the same in writing, or show where printed books containing them were to be sold, to those that could read and should desire to have such copies. In another paragraph it was thought necessary to order that parsons, vicars, curates, and other priests should in nowise, at any unlawful time, nor for any other cause than their honest necessity, haunt or resort to any taverns or ale-houses; and that after their dinner or supper they should not give themselves to drinking or riot, spending their time idly, by day or by night, at tables or card-playing, or any other unlawful game, but at such times as they should have such leisure, should read or hear somewhat of holy scripture, or should occupy themselves with some other honest exercise.

In the following year, 1537, the war of reformation began to be carried on by Cromwell and his associates after a new fashion, by the destruction of images, relics, and shrines, which had long been the objects of popular veneration,-a measure which was rather facilitated than originally provoked by the discoveries that were made in the course of the visitation of the monasteries now commenced. One of the orders given to the visitors was to make a minute examination of all the relics and images in any of these houses to which pilgrimages were wont to be made. "In this," says Burnet, "Dr. London (the same who has already been mentioned for his alleged practices in corrupting the nuns of Chepstow) did great service. From Reading he writes that the chief relics of idolatry in the nation were there :an angel with one wing, that brought over the spear's head that pierced our Saviour's side. To which he adds a long inventory of their other relics, and says there were as many more as would fill four sheets of paper. He also writes from other places that he had everywhere taken down their images and trinkets. At St. Edmundsbury, as John ap Rice informed, they found some of the

coals that roasted St. Lawrence, the parings of St. Edmund's toes, St. Thomas Becket's penknife and boots, with as many pieces of the cross of our Saviour as would make a large whole cross. They had also relics against rain, and for hindering weeds to spring. But to pursue this further were endless, the relics were so innumerable. And the value which the people had of them may be gathered from this-that a piece of St. Andrew's finger, set in an ounce of silver, was laid to pledge by the house of Wastacre for forty pounds; but the visitors, when they suppressed that house, did not think fit to redeem it at so high a rate." Some of the images were brought to London, and, for the purpose of exposing the juggling impostures of the monks, were broken up at St. Paul's Cross in the sight of all the people. One in particular is mentioned, a crucifix of enormous size, commonly called the Rood of Grace, which was kept at Boxley, in Kent. This image was no mere stock, but was endowed with the faculty of replying to the worship and oblations offered to it by various significant gestures, rolling its eyes, bending its brows, moving its lips, shaking its head, hands, and feet, courteously inclining its whole body when it was pleased with what was set before it, and by some other equally expressive piece of pantomime denoting its dissatisfaction and rejection of the supplicant's prayers. This must be admitted to have been an ingenious piece of mechanism, for an age in which the general ignorance of mechanical science was gross enough to allow of its being put forward as something supernatural. No wonder that so long as its pretensions were believed pilgrims came to it in crowds, and were lavish in their offerings to so accomplished an image. One Nicholas Partridge has the credit of having been the first to suspect the cheat, and of having followed up the conception of that brilliant original idea by an examination of the crucifix, which at once discovered to him the material springs and wheelwork by which its performances were set in motion. On this it was first brought to Maidstone, and shown to the people there; then it was sent up to London, and made to go through its various movements in presence of the king and the whole court; and, finally, it was carried to St. Paul's, and there publicly broken up and buried, after the delivery, by order of the council, of a sermon upon the subject by the Bishop of RochesAnother famous miracle which was now detected was that of the crystal vial at Hales, in Gloucestershire, containing, as was pretended, the blood of Christ, which the people sometimes saw, and sometimes could not see, the cause of which latter "effect defective," they were told, was their being at the moment in mortal sin, which meant that they must make further offerings. The miraculous blood was found to be the blood of a duck, which was renewed every week, and was made visible or invisible, as the occasion called for, by a person placed behind it turning to the spectator the thin or thick side of the glass. Mention has been

ter.

made in the preceding chapter of the huge Welsh wooden image, called Darvel Gatheren, which was among those brought up to London at this time, and which was made to serve for fuel to burn Friar Forest. According to an account of this image by the visitors of the diocese of St. Asaph, it was the general belief of the people of the country that it had the power to deliver from hell the souls of those who could secure its favour, in consequence of which notion so many as five or six hundred pilgrims would sometimes flock to it in a day, some bringing money, others oxen-all coming with something in their hands. The rich shrines of our Lady of Walsingham, of Ipswich, of Islington, and many others, were also now brought to London, and burned by order of Cromwell. The particulars of the demolition of Becket's shrine at Canterbury, the richest of all, have been already detailed.+ "The riches of that," as Burnet expresses it," together with his disloyal practices, made the king resolve both to unshrine and unsaint him at once." So, not only was his shrine broken down and carried away, but "the king also ordered his name to be struck out of the calendar, and the office for his festivity to be dashed out of all breviaries."

The abolition of images and pilgrimages occupied a principal place in a new set of instructions which Cromwell issued to the clergy in 1538. Every parish priest, once in the three months at the least, was now directed to preach a sermon exhorting his hearers "not to repose their trust or affiance in any other works devised by men's fantasies besides scripture; as in wandering to pilgrimages, offering of money, candles, or tapers to images or relics, or kissing or licking the same over, saying over a number of beads, not understanded or minded on, or in suchlike superstition." Further, continued the zealous vicegerent," such feigned images as ye know in any of your cures to be so abused with pilgrimages or offerings of any thing made thereunto, ye shall, for avoiding of that most detestable offence of idolatry, forthwith take down, and without delay; and shall suffer from henceforth no candles, tapers, or images of wax to be set afore any image or picture, but only the light that commonly goeth across the church by the rood-loft, the light before the sacrament of the altar, and the light above the sepulchre, which, for the adorning of the church, and divine service, ye shall suffer to remain." The people were, moreover, to be admonished that images were of no other use except to serve as a sort of substitute for books to the unlearned, that knew no letters, whereby they might be reminded of the lives and conversation of the persons represented by the images. If the images were abused to any other purpose, it was idolatry; "and, therefore," it was added, "the king's highness, graciously tendering the weal of his subjects' souls, hath in part already, und more will hereafter, travail for the abolishing such images as might be an occasion of so

great an offence to God, and so great danger to the souls of his loving subjects." Another clause imposed rather an awkward office-ordering the clergyman, if he had ever in time past declared anything to his parishioners to the extolling or setting forth of pilgrimages, images, or feigned relics, now openly before them to recant and condemn the same; showing them, as was the truth, that in making the former statement he had proceeded upon no ground of Scripture, but as one led and seduced by a common error and abuse crept into the church through the avarice of those to whom it was a source of profit. One of the present injunctions also levelled a side-blow at the practice of praying to the saints: it was directed, that whereas, in times past, people in their processions had been used to say Ora pro nobis to so many of the saints that they had not time to sing the good suffrages addressed to God that followed, they should now be taught that it was better to omit the Ora pro nobis, and to sing the other suffrages.

At this point, however, the state of matters, as Burnet expresses it, "began to turn." The sequel of Henry's course in regard to doctrinal changes, was, with the exception perhaps of some momentary starts of caprice or passion, rather a going back than a going forward. Although he had thrown off the authority of the Roman pontiff, indeed, he had no notion that the English church should be left without a pope; his objection was not to the thing, but to the person; and his main object in displacing the Bishop of Rome evidently was, that, in so far at least as the religion of his own subjects was concerned, he might mount the same seat of absolute and not to be questioned authority himself. The ancient head of the Roman church never put forward greater pretensions to infallibility than were, if not distinctly advanced in words, yet constantly acted upon by the new head of the English church in his narrower empire of spiritual despotism. And, singularly enough, he found his account in thus setting up a rival pope, not only with the most violent opponents of the Roman supremacy, who were gratified by seeing that thrown down, but even with many of the Catholics themselves, who found that if they had lost the successor of St. Peter for their pope, they had yet not lost a pope altogether-that the thing remained, though the person was changed. The latter, seeing they could do no better in the state to which matters had been brought, were now contented even to affect a satisfaction with the changes that had been already made, in the hope of thereby preventing further innovations. After the trial and condemnation of Lambert, the Sacramentary, in November, 1538,* in which Henry took personally so conspicuous a part, "the party that opposed the Reformation," says Burnet, "persuaded the king that he had got so much reputation to himself by it, that it would effectually refute all aspersions which had been cast on him as if he intended to See aute, p. 406.

on the episcopal bench, Fox, Bishop of Hereford, had died in May of this year; and "for the other bishops that adhered to Cranmer," says Burnet, "they were rather clogs than helps to him. Latimer's simplicity and weakness made him be despised; Shaxton's proud and litigious humour drew hatred on him; Barlow was not very discreet; and many of the preachers whom they cherished, whether out of an unbridled forwardness of temper, or a true zeal that would not be managed and governed by politic and prudent measures, were flying at many things that were not yet abolished." To counteract these disturbers letters were sent to all the bishops, directing them to take care that the people should not be unwarily charged with too many novelties, the publication of which, if it were not tempered with great discretion, might be productive of very dangerous consequences. The only ally Cranmer had at court upon whom he could place any reliance was Cromwell, and he had enough to do to take care of himself; for, as the right reverend historian remarks, there was not a queen now in the king's bosom to favour their motions." In these circumstances, as Henry "was observed to be much guided by his wives, as long as they kept their interest with him," Cromwell conceived the scheme of recovering his interest by bringing over Anne of Cleves. How disastrous this project proved in the issue to its contriver, and in some degree also to the party of which he was the main stay at court, has been already related. But, even before Henry's new marriage, Cromwell's influence had been greatly weakened by the growing ascendancy of the able and crafty Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester, who at this moment professed himself precisely as much a reformer and as much a follower of the old faith as his royal master, and in that way was easily enabled to guide Henry's course more and more back towards the latter, without suffering him to feel that he was either driven or drawn. In 1539 was passed by the parliament the famous act for abolishing diversity in opinions (31 Henry VIII. c. 14), popularly called the Statute of the Six Articles, or the Bloody Statute, confirming the resolutions which had already been carried in the convocation in favour of transubstantiation, against communion in both kinds, against the marriage of priests, and in favour of vows of chastity, of private masses, and of auricular confession.* The prime instigator of this new law was undoubtedly the Bishop of Winchester, now the king's chief counsellor. Yet Henry took himself a prominent part in carrying it through. The preamble of the statute records that "the king's most royal majesty, of his most excellent goodness, not only commanded that the said articles should deliberately and advisedly, by his said archbishops, bishops, and other learned men of his clergy, be debated, argued, and reasoned, and their opinions therein to be understood, declared, and known, but also most graciously vouchsafed in his own princely person to

See ante, p. 410,

descend and come into his said high court of parliament and council, and there, like a prince of most high prudence, and no less learning, opened and declared many things of high learning and great knowledge touching the said articles, matters, and questions."

The six articles of the Bloody Statute remained the established rule of faith of the English church, upon the several points to which they related, for the rest of Henry's reign-and a bloody faith they proved, as was shown by the many martyrdoms, already recounted, of subsequent years. At this point, therefore, the history of the changes in the national religion made by Henry comes to a close, in so far as it forms a continuous narrative; but there are still a few scattered incidents in the history of the church, and of the regulation of doctrine and worship during the last years of his reign, that require a short notice.

In 1541, Cranmer, the faults of whose own character did not incline to the side of ostentation or luxurious indulgence, attempted a small reform, in which, however, he showed more of good intention than of discretion or enlarged wisdom. The revenues of many of the bishoprics had been greatly reduced by the operation of certain of Henry's reforms, and were now in most cases insufficient to enable their possessors to keep up the old accustomed hospitality of their high station, which placed them among the nobles of the land, as well as at the head of the church. Cranmer's notion also probably was that, now the religious houses, by whose alms so many of the poor used to be fed, were swept away, it became the bishops to be more liberal even than formerly in their charities, and for that purpose to retrench the expenses of their tables. He therefore issued an order, in which it was laid down that an archbishop should never be served with more than six dishes of meat, and four of bellariu, or dessert; a bishop with five of meat, and three of dessert; a dean, or archdeacon, with four of meat, and two of dessert; and any other clergyman with two of meat, without any dessert. This regulation, of course, shared the fate of all sumptuary laws:-it is stated that no attention whatever was paid to it.

Some injunctions issued by Bonner to his clergy of the diocese of London, in 1542,-which Burnet thinks "have a strain in them so far different from the rest of his life, that it is more probable they were drawn by another pen, and imposed on Bonner by an order of the king,"-contain a few things worthy of notice. Among the duties imposed upon all parsons, vicars, curates, and other parish priests, one is, that they read over and diligently study, every day, one chapter of the Bible, with the ordinary gloss, or that of some other approved doctor or expositor; another is, that they shall instruct, teach, and bring up in learning, in the best way that they can, all such children of their parishioners as shall come to them for that purpose, at least teaching them to read English,for which they were to be moderately paid by such