there is any probability of the grievous want of qualified men for our missions being supplied, until some of the superior clergy, superior I mean in birth, talents, and education, set the example, and urge on, by their self-sacrifice, others to follow. Neither is this unreasonable to expect. The Lord is calling for men to perform a most arduous task. The first intellects need not contemn the requirements, nor the best-born the occupation.

Why are men easily found in England to leave their posts at home, and take a bishopric abroad? Why are distinguished and able men found without difficulty to fill our episcopal thrones in India, and yet men cannot be found to go out as ordinary missionaries ?

The question cannot be answered without convicting us, as a Church, of deep-seated worldliness.

Men in abundance are found to advocate the cause of Missions from the pulpit or platform. Men are found well capable of deploring the

existing reluctance to supply the gaps in the missionary ranks, in well written pamphlets, or eloquent harangues. But men are not found actually willing to go forth and do themselves what they regret that others will not do; and yet the men who deplore, are often the very men best fitted to supply the deficiency.

Surely, in the present state of the China Mission, no man either in public meeting, or through the press, ought to lament the present grievous want of missionaries, until, by prayer and study of God's holy word, he has assured himself that the Lord of the vineyard has not called him to take a part personally in supplying the wants of our missions abroad!

By the mouths of his servants, the chief pastors of the flock abroad, the voice of the Lord is clearly heard, demanding men to send to the heathen to preach the Gospel. Where are they to be found? Who amongst us are called to fight the Lord's battles? SIGMA.

1945.

It was after gathering all the instruction that could be collected, both at Oxford and Cambridge, from such meagre helps to the knowledge of the Greek tongue, as had just begun to be attainable in our universities, and perhaps without having as yet knowledge of Hebrew, inasmuch as there does not appear to have been any scholar in England capable of teaching it, that Tyndale found himself placed in such circumstances, as were made the means of inducing him to resolve on giving his countrymen the Scriptures in their mother tongue.

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At the time we now speak of (about 1518,) Tyndale was well nigh thirtyfive years of age, and living in the family of Sir John Walsh, at Little Sodbury, near Bristol, as tutor to his children. The study of the Scriptures had opened his eyes to some perception of the difference between what he read therein, and the idolatrous superstition which bore rule around

him;

and the Lord had prepared him for His service, by giving him a love for truth. At the well furnished table of his patron, the neighbouring beneficed clergy were not unfrequent guests, and Tyndale spoke to them of those things of which it befits beings endowed with immortal souls to converse. But when he shewed them that things done and taught by them, as ministers of the Romish Church, were contrary to the Scriptures of God, they were indignant, and thought to silence the poor scholar, whose learning stood in offensive contrast with their own ignorance, by threats, and commands that he should speak no more in that way, just as the Jewish priests and Sadducees would have silenced the Apostles. They could not bring him before their bishop, for Gloucestershire was then a part of the diocese of Worcester, which, embracing the largest portion of the MAY-1847.

Like

rich vale of the Severn, yielded its prelates so great a revenue as to have caught the attention of the court of Rome, ever thirsting for gold; and Pope Leo X. had consequently assumed authority to bestow it upon Giulio de Medici, a base-born son of one of his dissolute relatives. two other Italians who had preceded him in the possession of the bishopric of Worcester, and another who followed, Giulio fed upon the milk and sold the fleeces of his English flock, but had taken the pastoral charge without any intention of feeding them. In fact, he never saw either the cathedral, or the people of his English bishopric.* The chief authority, in the diocese of Worcester, was therefore in the hands of its chancellor, Dr. Parker, a nominee of Cardinal Wolsey; and in 1522 Tyndale was convened before Parker, à man who had such a hatred for Scriptural religion, that he, not long after, caused the body of Mr. Tracy, a gentleman of good repute, to be dragged out of its grave, and burnt to ashes, because he had spoken slightingly of prayers for the dead, in his will. "When I came before the chancellor," says Tyndale, "he threatened me grievously, and reviled me, and rated me as though I had been a dog; and laid to my charge [things] whereof there could be none accuser brought forth, as their manner is not to bring

"As wicked churches, like wicked men, will wax worse and worse, unless God send them a spirit of repentance, Giulio, when he became Pope Clement VII. was not ashamed to issue an order in 1534, by which a nephew of his, the Cardinal Hippolitus de Medici, was authorized to take and keep possession, for six months, of all vacant benefices throughout Papal Christendom, whether parochial or monastic, with power to convert all their reHist. of the Council of Trent; preface venues to his own use."-Father Paul's to debate on pluralities, under date of 1547.

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forth the accuser; and yet all the priests of the country were there the same day."-Annals of Eng. Bible, vol. i. p. 34.

Tyndale, however, was not terrified by these proceedings into the desertion of what a conscience enlightened by the Spirit and word of God shewed him to be the path of duty; and his resolution was presently strengthened by the secret confession of an aged dignitary, in the same diocese, to whom, however, God had not given the same courage. "Do you not know," said this old man, when Tyndale had opened his mind to him, "that the pope is the very Antichrist, whom the Scripture speaketh of? But beware what you shall say; for if you shall be perceived to be of that opinion, it will cost you your life." Not long after this, he had a discussion with another priest, of some repute for learning, who, being pressed with plain Scripture, gave open utterance to his preference for other words than that of God. "We were better,' said he, "to be without God's laws than the pope's."* On hearing this, Tyndale's zeal broke out in the following bold reply, and declaration of a blessed resolve, from which he never departed "I defy the pope," said he, "and all his laws; and if God spare my life, ere many years, I will cause a boy that driveth the plough to know more of the Scripture than you do." He could now stay no longer in a neighbourhood where he had spoken thus; and was therefore fain to say to Sir John Walsh, "Sir, I perceive that I shall not be suffered to tarry long here, in this country; neither shall you be able, though you would to keep me out of the hands

*The unhappy man might have reason enough for saying this, inasmuch as it was not an enemy of popery, but a sanctioned commentator on the pope's laws, who had said of them, in the gloss, upon Dist. xxxiv., can. vii. of the golden decree of Gratian, that they show more favour to the dissolute than to the chaste. And whereas the law of God requires all Christians to pay tribute to whom tribute is due, the pope's law lays a curse upon any civil power which shall dare to impose, or levy any tax upon ecclesiastics, without the pope's consent be previously obtained. -Sexti. Decret. lib. iii. Tit. xxiii. cap. .3.

of the spirituality; and also what displeasure might grow thereby to you, by keeping me, God knoweth; for the which I should be right sorry."

From Gloucestershire, therefore, Tyndale betook himself to London, carrying with him letters of recommendation from Sir John Walsh to an officer of the king's household, and a specimen of his ability, being such as was then very rare, to translate Greek into English. He had hoped that this would procure him the countenance of Tunstal, then Bishop of London, whom Erasmus had flattered, by describing him as a liberal patron of scholars. "But God," says Tyndale," which knoweth what is within hypocrites, saw that I was beguiled, and that this was not the nighest way to my purpose. And therefore he gave me no favour in my lord's sight." Trusting thus in God, he was not forsaken. The priest of St. Dunstan's, in Fleet Street, allowed Tyndale to preach from his pulpit; and amongst his hearers, there was Humfrey Munmouth, a generous London merchant, who took pity on the poor scholar, kept him in his house for half-a-year, and presented him with a sum equivalent to £150 in our days, when he had resolved on quitting his native land for Hamburgh, under the painful conviction, "that there was no place in all England" for a person who had resolved to employ himself in translating the Holy Scriptures.

For thus promoting such a work, Munmouth was afterwards in peril of forfeiting his property and life; and indeed he was guilty, as the enemies of the word of God would deem it, of contributing not only once, but again, to the necessity of this our English apostle; after he had left his native land, to see it no more, but to spend, and finally to lose his life, in the service of a country, then so ungrateful to her noblest patriot, and best benefactor.

It was in the beginning of 1524 that Tyndale sailed for Hamburgh; and in that free commercial city, he might either find German scholars or Jews, capable of communicating to him that knowledge of Hebrew which scarcely any other people could, and

which we find a learned German testifying that Tyndale had acquired, within two years from this date. Being thus well prepared for his blessed task, Tyndale removed to Cologne, where there was a printing firm connected with a publisher who had bookselling establishments both in Paris and London. It was, therefore, in the popish city of Cologne, that Tyndale secretly began to print a translation of the New Testament, in 4to, with here and there a brief instructive note in the margin, and with a luminous introductory preface,* in which he set forth the doctrines of grace, with a force and correctness admirably adapted for the instruction of readers who had yet to learn the way of salvation. In this preface Tyndale said to his countrymen, to whom the Scriptures had been literally a sealed book, and who had never been taught such truths by men: 'It is not possible for a natural man to consent to the law that it should be good, or that God should be righteous which maketh the law. Man's wit, reason, and will are so fast glued, yea nailed and chained unto the will of the devil, that not any creature can loose the bonds, save the blood of Christ. This is the captivity and bondage, whence Christ delivered us, redeemed and loosed us. His blood, his death, his patience in suffering rebukes and wrongs, his prayers and fastings, his meekness and fulfilling of the uttermost point of the law, appeased the wrath of God; brought the favour of God to us again; obtained that God should love us first, and be our Father, and that a merciful Father, that will consider our infirmities and weakness, and will give us his Spirit again (which was taken away in the fall of Adam,) to rule, govern, and strengthen us, and to break the bonds of Satan, wherein we were so strait bound. When Christ is thus-wise preached, and the promises rehearsed, which

*This preface, or prologe, as Tyndale styled it, was afterwards published as a separate Tract, with some additions and alterations, under the title which it bears in the ordinary collection of his works, viz., "A pathway into the Holy Scripture."

are contained in the prophets, in the Psalms, and in divers places of the five books of Moses, then the hearts of them which are elect and chosen begin to wax soft, and melt at the bounteous mercy of God, and kindness showed of Christ. For when the Evangelion is preached, the Spirit of God entereth into them which God hath ordained and appointed unto eternal life; and openeth their inward eyes, and worketh such belief in them. When the woeful consciences feel and taste how sweet a thing the bitter death of Christ is, and how merciful and loving God is, through Christ's purchasing and merits, they begin to love again, and to consent to the law of God, now that it is good, and ought so to be, and that God is righteous which made it; and they desire to fulfil the law, even as a sick man desireth to be whole, and are an hungered, and thirst after more righteousness, and after more strength to fulfil the law perfectly. And in all that they do, or omit and leave undone, they seek God's honour and his will, with meekness, ever condemning the unperfectness of their deeds by the law."

It was not to be expected that Satan would suffer such an onset as this to be made upon his kingdom, without making a struggle to ward off the attack. Now it so happened that John Cochlæus, a bitter and active opponent of Luther and the Reformation, arrived at Cologne not long after Tyndale, and, being engaged in preparing some controversial theology for the press, he learnt, from the unguarded language of certain printers, that there was a secret work going on, at the cost of English merchants, which was expected to convert England to Lutheranism in despite of its king; who had recently gained great credit with the priests by drawing his pen against Luther. Upon this hint, Cochlæus, according to his own account, pressed the printers with wine till their secret broke out, and they told him that two Englishmen, "skilful in languages," (meaning Tyndale and an assistant,) had engaged their masters to print 3000 copies of an English translation of the New Testament, and that some sheets were