LOWESTOFFE CHURCH.

LOWESTOFT, or Lowestoffe, is a market-town and seaport in the county of Suffolk, 44 miles N.E. by N. from Ipswich, and 115 N.E. by N.

from London. Lowestoffe is said to be situated on the most eastern point of land in England, upon an eminence, commanding an extensive prospect of the German ocean. It is a place which nurtures many hardy fishermen.

The parish church, dedicated to St. Margaret, stands about half a mile to the west of the town. It is of the later style of English architecture, and it would seem that it was erected in the early part of the fourteenth century. It is built of flint and stone, and consists of a nave and sideaisles, a chancel, with a spire steeple at the west end, and a southern porch. The entire length, from east to west, is 182 feet; the breadth, 47; the height, 43. The tower is 70 feet, the spire (which is of wood, covered with lead), 50; making, in all, 120 feet. Externally this church presents a handsome appearance. The great eastern window is a fine one, the lights into which it is divided having trefoil-headed arches; and in many of the other windows there is delicate tracery. The buttresses are faced with architectural ornaments of flint and stone, after a fashion frequently to be observed in this and the neighbouring coun

ties.

The southern porch forms the principal entrance to the church: over it is a room called the "maids' chamber," from a tradition that two maiden sisters retired to it for religious seclusion. These sisters, named Elizabeth and Katharine, caused, it is also said, two wells to be dug between the church and the town, which bear the name of "Basket wells"; so called, the story goes on to tell, from the sisters Bess and Kate. On the ceiling of this porch is a carved boss, representing the Trinity; also two shields, charged with emblems of the redemption.

No. 927.

The nave is separated by lofty pillars, and each side. At the entrance of the chancel was lighted by a clerestory with eight windows on formerly a rood-loft: the ascent to this was some years ago accidentally discovered by the falling

out of some stones from one of the southern butnarrow arch, supposed to have been originally tresses. At the west end of the nave is a lofty used as the penitents' porch. The chancel is 51 years vicar, who was brother to bishop Tanner: elegant: it was repaired by the rev. John Tanner, the east window was painted and presented to the church by Mr. Robert Allen, a townsman.

The font is curious, but has been much defaced: it has an ascent of three steps, on the uppermost of which was an inscription, which is adorned this font, were damaged and mutilated in now illegible. Several figures, which formerly the time of the great rebellion. There are several monuments in various parts of this church.

Lowestoffe, being in a corner of the kingdom, does not seem to have participated to an equal extent with many other towns in the various events which are recorded in the national history. It may be said, however, that in 1349 it was so ravaged by plague that not more than one-tenth of the inhabitants escaped; in 1605 it suffered severely from fire; in 1643 it was entered by Cromwell, when several persons were seized and sent to Cambridge; and in 1665 and 1666 two naval engagements with the Dutch were fought off this coast.

In the centre of the High-street are some vestiges of a religious house, comprising a Norman arch, and cellars with groined roof; part, probably, of an ancient crypt. The surrounding cliffs abound with organic remains.

It may be added that Lowestoffe is a vicarage in the diocese and patronage of the bishop of Norwich; and that, at the census of 1841, it contained 4,647 inhabitants.

HOW SHOULD PROTESTANTS MEET THE AGGRESSION OF ROMANISTS?

. A DIALOgue.

BY THE REV. S. HOBSON, LL.B., Incumbent of Butley, Suffolk.

No. XI.-PART 2.

THE TRIAL OF THE CARDINAL.

Address of Counsel for the Prosecution. My learned friend, gentlemen, has alluded to the fact that Henry III. offered to the pope one-tenth of the moveable property of both the laity and clergy of England, as another proof that the papal supremacy was regarded as a divine right.' I wonder the learned counsel did not blush while he was thus telling us that a successor of St. Peter required a bribe from the king to induce him to decide a dispute against the refractory monks of Canterbury. Such was really the case. This infallible pontiff affected to consider the question very difficult to determine, until he received the magnificent offer of Henry; and then his holiness saw very clearly, and, of course, decided in the king's favour. Thus was this spiritual supremacy used by the pope as an instrument to bring both kings and people into bondage, and to overwhelm them by grievous exactions. Henry was indeed treated as the vassal of the pope, and this kingdom as the patrimony of St. Peter's pretended successor, which his holiness might parcel out into ecclesiastical divisions, and confer on whom he pleased. By various means he got into his hands the patronage of all the valuable livings in England, which he bestowed on Italian priests. And in the year 1237 the pope sent what the historian very properly calls "one of those birds of ill omen". a cardinal-into England; and, during the three years of his residence, no fewer than three hundred Italians came over to be provided for in the church. So grasping and insatiable was this personification of papal supremacy, that the archbishop of Canterbury, finding it impossible to check his exactions, left the kingdom, and soon after died broken-hearted in a French monastery. But, although Henry III. too often acted as the submissive vassal of the pope, his barons did not, and they were at length determined to put a stop to the papal encroachments. They sent orders to the wardens of the seaports to seize all persons who brought any bulls or mandates from Rome. The king weakly commanded that the bulls which had been thus seized should be delivered up to the legate; and, even when his barons informed him what enormous sums of money were drawn from his subjects, when they proved that the churchpreferments held by Italians in England exceeded the ordinary revenues of the crown, he was too much the pope's slave to restrain these abuses.

Would the learned counsel like to see our present gracious sovereign reduced to this abject condition? The same power is at work now, the same principles avowed, which produced such deplorable effects at that period. Only let the pope's subjects so increase in this empire as to give them a reasonable prospect of establishing a similar tyranny, and the attempt will surely be made. If the pope has ventured upon so insulting and arro

gant a measure as that contemplated by his recent bull, while his adherents are comparatively powerless, what may we not expect when his devoted slaves shall have crept into the chief posts, civil and military, of the empire? We might then complain of our grievances, but we should be unable to apply a remedy. We should be treated as our forefathers were at the time to which I refer. A spirit of indignation was sometimes aroused by the papal exactions even in that dark age. Although the sufferers regarded the pope as holding the keys of heaven and hell, and therefore able to save or destroy their souls, yet they did venture to remonstrate; for even the crawling worm will turn against the hoof which is crushing it to the dust. The barons made a statement of the griev ances under which their church and nation had long been labouring; and, after enumerating the insults and oppressions cast upon them, they concluded: "We can no longer with any patience bear the foresaid oppressions, which, as they are detestable to God and man, are intolerable to us; neither, by the grace of God, will we any longer endure them"*. It is said that when these griev ances were read to the pope, in the Council of Lyons, and he found that the insatiable avarice of the court of Rome was depicted in glowing colours, he was observed to blush at the dark picture set before him; but this was all the satisfac tion he gave. He would not recede a step. Nay, his extortions became more grievous than ever; for he proceeded so far as to demand at once the half of all the revenues of the non-resident clergy, and a third of the revenues of those who were resident. He also tried to compel the prelates to furnish a certain number of armed men to fight against the emperor Frederic II., whom he had excommunicated, although he was brother-in-law to the king of England. But the pope had now stretched his spiritual supremacy beyond the limits of endurance; and not only the barons, but even the clergy, and the hitherto vacillating monarch himself, became unanimous in resisting his demands; and the papal mandate was ineffectual.

The learned counsel adverted to king John; and, while he was calling your attention to that disgraceful page in our aunals, I carefully observed bis countenance, in the hope of seeing something like a blush upon it; but neither blush nor downcast eye was to be seen. Nor even did his voice falter. The triumph of papal supremacy over the right and dignity of the crown of this realm is to him, as a devoted servant of the pope, a matter only for exultation. There can be no patriotism in a heart which yields only a divided allegiance. But does my learned friend really imagine that to remind Englishmen of this transaction is the readiest way of reconciling them to papal supremacy? Does he bring that astounding fact to their minds for the purpose of showing how purely spiritual a power the Roman pontiffs exercise over their subjects? Does he advance this as satisfactory and convincing evidence that the vassals of the pope can be faithful and obedient to his holiness, and at the same time loyal to their temporal prince? Will the learned counsel still maintain that papal supremacy never can trample on the prerogatives of the crown or the liberties of the * M. Paris, p. 666.

† Henry's Hist. Eng., vol. viii. pp. 4-10.