The archbishop harbours learned

strangers.

CHAPTER XIII.

THE ARCHBISHOP ENTERTAINS LEARNED FOREIGNERS.

men.

THE archbishop had now in his family several learned Some he sent for from beyond sea, and some in pity he entertained, being exiles for religion. Among the former sort was Martin Bucerh, a man of great learning and moderation, and who bore a great part in the reformation of Germany. While he and the rest abode under his roof, the archbishop still employed them, sometimes in learned conferences and consultations held with them, sometimes in writing their judgment upon some subjects in divinity. Here Bucer wrote to the lady Elizabeth a letter, bearing date the 6th of the calends of September, commending her study in piety and learning, and exciting her to proceed therein; incited so to do, I make no doubt, by the archbishop, whom Bucer in that letter makes men195 tion of, and styleth "Patrem suum, et benignissimum hospitemi." Hence also he wrote another letter to the marquis of Northampton) (who was a patron of learning,

h[" Martin Bucer was one of the first reformers at Strasburgh; he was born in Alcaçe in 1491. At seven years old he took the habit of St. Dominic. He read Luther's works, and conferred with him in person at Heidelberg, in 1521: but although he agreed with him in many of his opinions, yet in the following year he gave the preference to those of Zuinglius. He was at the Interim at Augsburg in 1548, from whence the news of his piety, and sentiments upon matters of faith reached

England; and, at Cranmer's solicitation, he came to England in 1549, and taught divinity at Cambridge, where he died in 1551." [Feb. 27.]-Foxe's Acts and Monuments, vol. v. p. 704. n. 2. ed. Lond. 1843-48.]

i [MSS. C.C.C.C. No. cxiii.

P. 4.]

j [i. e. William Par, earl of Essex, marquis of Northampton, who was appointed an assistant to the executors of Henry VIIIth's will; he was a privycouncillor, and was sent against

and a professor of religion), in the behalf of Sleidan, who was promised a pension by the king, to enable him to write the history of the progress of religion, beginning at Luther. A part of the letter, translated into English, ran thus:

:

"Therefore if we should not take care that this so great act of divine goodness towards us, [viz. the reformation began in the year 1517], should be most diligently written and consecrated to posterity, we should lie under the crime of the neglect of God's glory, and most foul ingratitude. Therefore John Sleidan, a very learned and eloquent man, five years ago began to compile an history of this nature, as the work he had published did witness. But after he was much encouraged in this undertaking, and well furnished with matter, the calamities that befel Germany, for our own deserts, intercepted the pious attempts of this man, so very useful to the church. Nor doth it appear now from whence, besides the king's majesty, we may hope that some small benignity may be obtained for Sleidan; since the salaries, which he received for this purpose from the German princes, failed; and he was poor. That John Alasco, Dr. Peter Martyr, and he, considering these things, and weighing how the truly Christian king Edward was even born with a desire of illustrating the glory of Christ, and what need there was to set Sleidan again upon finishing the History of the Gospel restored to us; they had therefore presumed to

the Norfolk rebels, but was unsuccessful: he took part against the lord protector, and upon his removal was appointed one of the six governors of the king's person. He was brought to trial for taking part against queen Mary

but escaped, and was one of queen Elizabeth's first privycouncil. See above, p. 44. Burnet's Hist. of Reformat. vol. ii. pp. 7, 30, 36, 243, 246, 280, 286, 396, 471, 486, 487, 752. ed. Oxon. 1829.]

Bucer

writes in

the arch

bishop's family. MSS.

C. C. C. C.

supplicate the king in his behalf, and intreated the marquis to promote and forward their supplication, and to vouchsafe to contribute his help also." We shall hear more of this hereafter.

I find also annotations writ by the said Bucer upon St. Matthew, reaching as far as the eighth chapter, and there ending, in this method: There is the Latin translation, with large notes added in the margin; and at the end of Miscellan. each chapter common places collected from thence in the nature of inferences and observations: which I conclude the archbishop put him upon doing while he was now with him. The work was looked over and examined by the archbishop, notes and corrections of his own hand being here and there inserted. Also the gospel of St. Mark is handled in the same method, by another of the archbishop's guests: which writing hath this inscription by Cranmer's hand; "Petrus Alexander in Marcum."

The arch.

bishop's guests.

At this time therefore there were at the archbishop's house, (besides Bucer), Alascom, Peter Martyr", Paulus

1 [MSS.C.C.C.C. No. civ. p. 1.] m [John à Lasco, a nobleman of Poland, the nephew of an archbishop of that name, who had formerly lived and boarded with Erasmus, by whose conversation and writings he was led into the reformed systems. Having embraced the Reformation, he forsook his country and became preacher to a protestant congregation at Embden. In September 1548 he visited England" upon the invitation of Cranmer, with whom he resided at Lambeth six months. He returned to Embden in the spring of 1549; but the introduction of

the Interim into Friesland accelerated his departure from that country, which he quitted in October, and having resided for some time at Bremen and Hamburgh, he embarked from the last named town, and reached England in the spring of 1550, where on July 24th he was appointed the superintendant of the foreign protestant congregation established in London." His ministry was suppressed at the accession of queen Mary, and he himself, with most of the foreign protestants, upon orders to that effect, left the kingdom. He stood very high in the estimation

Phagius, Peter AlexanderP, Bernardine Oching, Mat. Negelinus, after a minister of Strasburgh, who accom

panied Bucer and Phagius into England, and others whose names do not occur. Three of these were soon after preferred to public places of reading in the universities. Peter Alexander was of Artois, and lived with the archbishop before Bucer came into England. He was a learned man, but had different sentiments in the matter of the Eucharist, inclining to the belief of a corporeal presence with the Lutherans. Though some years after he 196 came over to a righter judgment, as his companion Peter Calvin. Ep. Martyr signified to Calvin, in a letter wrote from Strasburgh'.

197.

Martyr

dedicates

at Oxon.

to the

Peter Martyr coming about the beginning of the year his lectures 1549 unto the university of Oxford, his first readings were upon the eleventh chapter of the first epistle to the archbishop. Corinthians; in which chapter is some discourse of the Lord's supper. The professor, when he came so far, took occasion to expatiate more largely upon that argument; and the rather, that he might state it aright in the midst of those hot contests that were then about it among learned men. These lectures on the sacrament he soon after printed at London, for the benefit of the world, (as they were two years after done at Zurich), and dedicated them to his patron the archbishop. And that partly to give a public testimony of his sense of the archbishop's great humanity and benefits towards him: "which were so large, that he must do nothing else but tell of them, to be sufficiently thankful for them. And known it was to

["Petrus Alexander, ut ad me scribit, est brevi te invisurus : quæso illum æquo ac libenti animo videas. Nam licet hactenus de re sacramentaria sit nobis adversatus, attamen in præsentia Deo monstrante totus est noster,

atque potest ecclesiæ nonnihil prodesse. Rursus vale, ac me precibus apud Deum juvato. Argentinæ, 24 Septembris." [A. D. 1554.-P. Martyr. Calvino.-Calvin. Epist. p. 91. ed. Amstel. 1667.]