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for the winning mildness of my administration, as in some others for a rough severity ?

• Can they say (for this aspersion is likewise common) that I barred the free course of religious exercises, by the suppression of painful and peaceable preachers? If shame will suffer any man to object it, let me challenge him to instance but in one name. Nay, the contrary is so famously known in the western parts, that every mouth will herein justify me. What free encouragement have I always given to all the sons of peace that came with God's message in their mouths! What mis-suggestions have I waved! What blows have I borne off in the behalf of some of them, from certain gainsayers! How have I often and publicly professed, that as well might we complain of too many stars in the sky, as too many orthodox preachers in the church!

'Can they complain that I fretted the necks of my clergy with the uneasy yoke of new and illegal impositions? Let them, whom I have thus hurt, blazon my unjust severity, and write their wrongs in marble. But if, disliking all novel devices, I have held close to those ancient rules, which limited the audience of our godly predecessors; if I have grated upon no man's conscience by the pressure, no, not by the tender of the late oath, or any unprescribed ceremony; if I have freely in the committee, appointed by the most honourable house of peers, declared my open dislike, in all innovations both in doctrine and in rites; why doth my innocence suffer?

'Can they challenge me, as a sly and back-stair friend to popery or arminianism, when I have in so many pulpits, and from so many presses, cried down both? Surely, the very paper I have spent in refutation of both these is enough to stop more mouths than can be guilty of this calumny.

Can they charge me with a lazy silence in my place, with infrequency of preaching? Let the populous

auditories where I have lived witness, whether, when having furnished all the churches near me with able preachers, I took not all opportunities of supplying such courses as I could get in my cathedral? And when my tongue was silent, let the world say, whether my hand was idle?

'Lastly. Since no man can offer to upbraid me with too much pomp, which is wont to be the common eyesore of our envied profession; can any man pretend to a ground of taxing me of too much worldliness? Surely, of all the vices forbidden in the decalogue, there is no one which my heart, upon due examination, can less fasten upon me than this. He that made it, knows that he hath put into it a true disregard (save only for necessary use) of the world, and of all that the world can boast of, whether for profit, pleasure, or glory. No, no! I know the world too well to dote upon it. While I am in it how can I but see it? But I never care, never yield to enjoy it. It were too great a shame for a philosopher, a christian, a divine, a bishop, to have his thoughts grovelling here upon earth. For mine, they scorn the employment; and look upon all these sublunary distractions as upon false censure, with no other eyes than contempt.

'And now, sir, since I cannot, how secretly faulty soever, guess at my own public exorbitances, I beseech you, when you hear my name traduced, learn of mine accusers, whose lyncean eyes would seem to see farther into me than mine own, what singular offence I have committed!

To shut up all, and to surcease your trouble, I write not this, as one that would pump for favour and reputation from the disaffected multitude; for I charge you, that what passeth privately betwixt us, may not fall under common eyes. But only with this desire and intention, to give you true grounds where you shall hear my name mentioned with a causeless offence, to

yield me a just and charitable vindication. Go you on still to do the office of a true friend; yea, the duty of a just man, in speaking in the cause of the dumb, in righting the innocent, in rectifying the misguided ; and, lastly, the service of a faithful and christian patriot, in helping the times with the best aid of your prayers, which is daily the task of

From the Tower, Jan. 24, 1641.

'JOSEPH NORWICH,'

CHAPTER V.

THE BISHOP OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY, IN HIS PRIVATE LIFE AND DEPORTMENT.

When we speak of the private life of the man, in any station or character, it cannot be understood that it means his secret communion with God. These are in the retirings between the Lord and the spirits of his people. But by the private life of any individual, is meant no more than what is detached from what is more open and exposed in the public transactions with the world. The bishop of the sixteenth century, therefore, is enquired after in this chapter, from such traits of conduct as may be discovered in his general walk and deportment, in the more retired situation of life. No doubt an uniformity pervades the whole. A godly man is the same in all. Nevertheless there is sometimes more of the real character discoverable at home than is seen abroad. We get into a closer acquaintacne with men when we are permitted to follow them into their retirements; and learn more of them when they are enabled to unbosom themselves there, than when we view them only at a distance in their public offices and characters.

If we begin, on this ground, our contemplation of the bishop's portait, in his study, though we do not

indeed follow him step by step in all his employments there, yet the prelates of the sixteenth century, in the voluminous publications which they sent forth from thence, most plainly and loudly proclaim how intense their applications must have been while there engaged. And if we may form a judgment from the savour of their writings, how much engaged their hearts were also in the work of studying Christ, we are compelled to conceive the highest veneration for them: not only on account of the greatness of their labours, but also for the greatness of their zeal; in that their writings carry with them so much of the name, and grace, and spirit of Christ. Nothing can be more evident than that they first tasted in their own souls what they so affectionately recommended to others. They remind one of those faithful men of old who brought down a good report from the promised land, when they shewed the rich clusters of fruit the country bore, in order to invite the Lord's people to go up and take possession of it. So, those holy men of God persuade by their writings to the love of Jesus; while we discover so much of the savour of Jesus in all their accounts of him.

In respect to the greatness of their labours, it is incredible from whence they gathered time, from the demands of their public ministry, to attend so closely, as their numerous publications manifest they must have done, to those private employments. And amidst the general mass of folio writings, which this early age of the reformed church produced, there is one immense work which surpasseth every other in point of greatness and importance; which is itself a prodigy of learning; and was then, and is now, and to the end of the world will be, the greatest glory of those times; I mean the translation of the bible. When it be considered, the long darkness under which the christian world had been involved from papal influence; the slenderness of mate

rials from any former aid to a work of this magnitude; the small and inconsiderable progress at that time made in the art of printing; to behold so vast an undertaking, and so divinely executed, as the very first impression of the English bible proved to be; can only be referred into the sovereign grace of God watching over the work, and preventing all errata. For, surely, no one divinely taught will hesitate to conclude, that the next great gift of God in the scriptures themselves, is the translation of them into our mother tongue; and of all national blessings England ever knew, it stands unrivalled as the first and best.*

* The limits of this work will not admit of enlargement on the histories of those great men, to whom the church of God is so highly indebted; yet I hope the reader's indulgence if, in a way by note, I detain him to a short outline concerning one of those translators of our bible, which to me is I confess highly interesting. The person, I mean, is Myles Coverdale, sometime bishop of Exeter. He was among the first, if not the very first, which took the lead in this labour of love. And when it be considered, that so elegant a writer as bishop Lowth, in modern times, hath not only borrowed from bishop Coverdale, but adopted the very words in the most interesting parts of his translations of Isaiah: I cannot but hope that a paragraph or two concerning him will be acceptable to the reader.

Myles Coverdale, as appears from his memoirs, was born in Yorkshire, in the reign of Richard the third, about 1484. He was educated in the Roman heresy, and became a monk of the order of St. Augustine. At the reformation, he abjured popery, and entered into holy orders. He appears to have been but little known or noticed, during the reign of Henry the eighth. But soon after the accession of Edward the sixth, he was among the leaders who taught the pure religion. In the year 1550, on the death of Dr. John Harman, bishop of Exeter, he was consecrated to that see; being promoted (according to Wood's history) for his singular knowledge in divinity, and his unblemished character. ' Propter singularem sacrarum literarum doctrinam morseque probatissimos.'

The first English bible (saith the editor of Calmet's dictionary; Addenda et corrigenda) or complete translation of the scriptures printed, was that of Myles Coverdale. The first edition of which bears date 1535, dedicated to king Henry the eighth. The title is Biblia, and marked MDXXXV.

The sequel of this great man's history is truly affecting. We know not which to admire most, the firmness of his mind, or the ill-requited treatment he met. He was ejected from his see of Exeter, and thrown into prison on the death of Edward, and during the reign of Mary. But, by the powerful intercession of some who loved him then at court, his imprisonment was changed into banishment. Upon the demise of Mary, he returned to England: but he never recovered his bishopric. He was, however, collated to the benefice of St. Magnus church, London bridge. It appears from a letter of his own, still on record, addressed to Cecil, queen Elizabeth's secretary, that he was too poor to pay the first fruits, and therefore he pleaded for an exemption. It was granted him. The concluding