whearof was to manie that weare present soe lamentable, that it made them for verie sorrow thearof to weepe and

mourne.

Soe remained Sir Thomas More in the Tower more then a weeke after his judgment. From whence the daie before he suffered he sent his shirt of haire, not willing to have it seene, to my wife his deerlie beloved daughter, and a letter written with a cole, conteined in the foresaid booke of his workes, expressinge the fervent desire he had to suffer on the morrow in these wordes followeinge: I comber you, good Margaret, much, but I would be sory if it should be anie longer then to morrow. For it is Sainct Thomas even and the Utas of St Peeter: and therfore to morrow longe I to go to God; it weare a daie verie meet and convenient for me. Deere Megg, I never liked your manner towards me better then when you kissed me last. For I like when daughterlie love and deere charitie hath noe leasure to looke to worldlie courtesie. And soe uppon the next morrowe, Tuesdaie, beinge St Thomas his eve and the Utas of Saincte Peeter, in the yeere of our Lord 1535, accordinge as he in his letter the daie before had wished, earlie in the morninge came to him Sir Thomas Pope, his singular good freinde, on message from the Kinge and counsaile that he should the same daie before nine of the clock in the morninge suffer deathe, and that therfore he should forthwith prepare himself thearto. Mr. Pope, quoth Sir Thomas More, for your good tidings I hartelie thanke you. I have been alwaies muche bounden to the Kinge's Highnes for the benefites and honours that he hath still from time to time most bountifullye heaped uppon me; and yet more bounden am I to his Grace for puttinge me into this place wheare I have had convenient time and space to have remembrance of my end. And soe, God helpe me, most of all, Mr. Pope, am I bounden to his Highnes, that it pleaseth him soe shortlie to ridd me from the miseries of this wretched world, and therfore will I not faile earnestlie to praie for his Grace bothe heere and allsoe in the worlde to come. The Kinge's pleasure is farther, quoth Mr. Pope, that at your execution you shall not use manie wordes. Mr. Pope, quoth he, you doe well to give me warninge, of his Grace's pleasure, for otherwise at that time had I purposed somewhat to have spoken, but of noe matter whearwith his Grace or any should have had cause to be offended. Nevertheles, whatsoever I intended, I am readie obedientlie to conforme my selfe to his Grace's commandement; and I beseeche you, good Mr. Pope, to be a meane to his Highnes that my daughter Margaret maie be at my buriall. The Kinge is content allreadie, quoth Mr. Pope, that your wife and childeren and other your freinds shall have libertie to be present thearat. Oh how muche beholdinge then, said Sir Thomas More, am I unto his Grace, that unto my poore buriall vouchsafethe to have soe gratious consideracion ! Whearwithall Mr. Pope, takeinge his leave, could not refraine from weepinge. Which Sir Thomas More perceavinge comforted him in this wise.

Quiet your

selfe, good Mr. Pope, and be not discomforted: for I trust that we shall once in heaven see eache other full merrilie, wheare we shall be sure to live and love togeather in joyfull blisse eternallie. Uppon whose departure, Sir Thomas More, as one that had binne invited to some solemn feast, chaunged himselfe into his best apparrell. Which Mr. Lieutenant espieing advised him to put it of, sayeinge, that he that should have it

was but a javell. What, Mr. Lieutenant, quothe he, shall I account him a javell that shall doe me this date soe singuler a benifit? Naie, I assure you, weare it cloath of gold, I should thinke it well bestowed on him, as Sainct Cyprian did, who gave his executioner thirtie peeces of gold. And albeit at length he through Mr. Lieutenant's importunate persuasion altered his apparrell, yet after the example of the holie Martyr Sainct Cyprian did he of that little money that was left him send an angell of gold to his executioner. And soe was he by Mr. Lieutenant brought out of the Tower to the place of execution. Wheare goinge up the skaffold, which was soe weake that it was readie to fall, he saide merrilie to the Lieutenant, I praie you see me up safe, and for my comminge downe let me shift for my selfe. Then desired he all the people thearabout to praie for him, and to beare witness with him that he should theare suffer deathe in and for the faithe of the Catholicke Churche. Which donne he kneeled downe, and after his prayers saide, turned to the executioner with a cheerfull countenance, and saide unto him, Plucke up thy spirits, man, and be not affraide to doe thine office: my neck is verie short, take heede therfore thou strike not awrie for savinge of thine honestie. Soe passed sir Thomas More out of this world to God uppon the verie same daie which he most desired. Soone after his deathe came intelligence thearof to the Emperor Charles. Whearuppon he sent for Sir Thomas Eliott, our Englishe Embassadour, and said to him; My Lord Embassadour, we understande that the Kinge your master hath put his faithfull servant and grave councellor Sir Thomas More to deathe. Whearuppon Sir Thomas Eliott answered, that he understoode nothinge thearof. Well, saide the Emperor, it is too true: and this will we saie, that had we binne master of such a servant, of whose dooings ourselves have had these manie yeeres noe small experience, we would rather have lost the best cittie of our dominions, then have lost such a worthie Councellor. Which matter was by the same Sir Thomas Eliott to my selfe, to my wife, to Mr. Clement and his wife, to Mr. John Heywood and his wife, and unto divers others his freindes accordinglie reported.

A cole is a bit of charcoal; utas, octave, eighth day after; javeli, a worthless fellow, scamp. The lieutenant's suggestion was in view of the fact that the executioner was entitled to the clothes worn by his victim at the time of the execution.

John Fisher, Bishop of Rochester (c. 14691535), wrote largely in Latin against the Lutheran doctrines, and left some valuable works in English too.

Born at Beverley, he studied at Cambridge. In 1502 Margaret, Countess of Richmond, Henry VII.'s mother, made him her chaplain and confessor, and in 1503 he was appointed first Lady Margaret Professor of Divinity. Next year he was elected chancellor of the university, and consecrated to the see of Rochester. He zealously promoted the New Learning, and advocated refor mation from within; as zealously he resisted the Lutheran schism. In 1527 he pronounced firmly against the divorce of Henry VIII.; and having lent too ready an ear to the 'revelations' of the Holy Maid of Kent, Elizabeth Barton, in 1534 he was attainted of treason, and, for refusing the oath of succession, was sent with More to the Tower. In May 1535 Pope Paul III. made him a

The

cardinal; on 17th June the old man, worn by sickness and ill-usage, was tried for denial of the king's supremacy; on the 22nd he was beheaded on Tower Hill. In 1886 he was beatified. English writings of Bishop Fisher consist of a treatise on the penitential psalms, sermons, and a few small religious tracts. Three of the sermons are of exceptional historical interest-one at the funeral of Henry VII.; one at the 'month's mind,' or memorial service for Henry's mother, the Countess of Richmond (1509); and one on occasion of the public burning of Luther's books, 'agayn ye pernicyous doctryn of Martin Luuther.' The treatise and the sermons alike contain, as Professor Mayor says, 'bursts of manly eloquence that entitle the writer to an honourable place among the early masters of English prose.' Fisher thus commemorated the Countess :

I wold reherce somwhat of her demeenyng in this behalve, her sobre temperaunce in metes and drynkes was knowen to al them that were conversaunt with her, wherin she lay in as grete wayte of herself as ony person myght, keping alway her strayte mesure, and offendyng as lytel as ony creature myght; eschewing banquets, rere-suppers, ioncyries betwex meales. As for fastynge for age and feblenes, albeit she were not bounde yet tho dayes that by the chirche were appoynted, she kept them diligently and sereously, and in especyall the Holy Lent thrughout, that she restrayned her appetyte tyl one fysshe on the day; besyde her other peculer fastes of devocion, as Anthony, saint Mary Maudeleyn, saynt Katheryn with other; and thorowe out all the yere, the friday and saterday she full truely observed. As to harde clothes wering she had her shertes and gyrdyls of heere, whiche whan she was in helth everi weke she fayled not certaine dayes to weare somtyme that one, somtyme that other, that full often her skynne as I herde her say was perced therewith. . . . In prayer every daye at her uprysynge, whiche comynly was not longe after v of the clok, she began certayne devocyons, and so after theym with one of her gentylwomen the matynes of our lady whiche she kepte her to; then she came into her closet, where then with her chapelayn she sayd also matyns of the daye. And after that dayly herde iiij or v masses upon her knees; soo contynuynge in her prayers and devocions unto the hour of dyner, whiche of the etynge daye was x of the clocke and upon the fastynge-day xi. After dyner full truely she wolde go her stacyons to thre aulters dayly; dayly her dyryges and commendacyons she wolde saye and her even songes before souper, both of the daye and of our lady, besyde many other prayers and psalters of Davyd thrugh out the yere. And at nyght before she wente to bedde, she faylled not to resorte unto her chapell, and there a large quarter of an hour to occupye her in devocyons. No mervayle though al this long tyme her knelinge was to her paynfull, and so paynfull that many tymes it caused in her backe payn and dysease. And yet nevertheles dayly whan she was in helth she fayled not to say the crowne of our lady, whiche after the marer of Rome conteyneth Ix and thre aves, and at every ave to make a knelynge. As for meditacyon, she had dyvers books in Frensshe, wherwith she wolde occupy herselfe whan she was wery of prayer. Wherefore dyvers she dyde translate out of Frensshe into Englysshe. Her mervailous wepynge

they can bere wytnes of whiche here before have herde her confessyon, which be dyvers and many, and at many seasons in the yere lyghtly every thyrd daye. Can also recorde the same tho that were present at ony tyme when she was housylde, which was ful nye a dosen tymes every yere: what flodes of teres there yssued forth of her eyes.

Rere-suppers, second suppers; ioncyries, junketings; tho, those; was housylde, received the sacrament; dyryges, dirges, offices for the dead; commendacyons, commemorative services.

Fisher's Latin works were published in a folio at Würzburg in 1597; his English works were edited for the Early English Text Society by Mayor (vol. i. 1876) and Bayne (vol. ii. 1900). See the Life of the Blessed Thomas Fisher, by Father Bridgett (1888).

Sir Thomas Elyot was born about 1490 in Wiltshire, in 1511 became a clerk of assize, and in 1523 clerk of the king's council. In 1531-32, as ambassador to Charles V., he visited the Low Countries and Germany, having orders to procure the arrest of Tyndale. In 1535 he went on a second embassy to the emperor, whom he seems to have followed to Tunis and Naples. Member for Cambridge in 1542, he died at Carlton, Cambridgeshire, 20th March 1546. His chief work, The Boke named the Gouernour (1531), is the earliest English treatise on moral philosophy, and deals largely with education. Elyot protests against 'cruel and yrous schoolmasters, by whom children's wits be dulled' -a protest much needed in his generation. His main purpose was to emphasise the necessity of better education for the young nobles destined to govern the nation; his second to lay down principles of morality for the ruling classes. Other works were of the Knowledge which maketh a Wise Man (1533); Pasquil the Playne (1533); Isocrates' Doctrinal of Princes (1534); Pico de Mirandola's Rules of a Christian Lyfe (1534); The Castel oj Helth (1534); The Bankette of Sapience (1534); Bibliotheca (1538), the first Latin-English dictionary; The Image of Governance (1540); Defence of Good Women (1545); and Preservative against Deth (1545).

Elyot based the Governour largely on the Italians Pontano, De Principe, and Patrizi, De Regno, although much in him is quite original. The Governour passed through eight editions in forty years, was more popular than even the Utopia, and entered largely into the literature and life of the sixteenth century. Ascham's Scholemaster and Locke's Thoughts concerning Education develop theses laid down by Elyot. Apparently both Budæus and Sturmius learnt from him.

Elyot is the sole 'authority' we have for the story so admirably worked up in Shakespeare's Henry IV., Part Second, about the riotous Prince Hal and Judge Gascoigne. According to Mr Croft, who has given us an admirable edition of the Governour, with elaborate notes (2 vols., 1880), the story is utterly unhistorical; but the first English Prince of Wales, afterwards Edward II., was sent away from the court for an insult to a royal minister, and some chronicler's record of this fact may by misapprehension or design have been transferred to Prince Hal. From Elyot the

incident passed to Hall, whence no doubt Shakespeare took it. The story is thus given in Mr Croft's edition of the Governour, in the chapter discussing 'How noble a vertue placabilitie is':

We lacke nat of this vertue domistical examples, I meane of our owne kynges of Englande; but moste specially one, whiche, in myne oppinion, is to be compared with any that euer was written of in any region or countray.

The moste renomed prince, kynge Henry the fifte, late kynge of Englande, durynge the life of his father was noted to be fierce and of wanton courage. It hapned that one of his seruantes whom he well fauored, for felony by hym committed, was arrayned at the kynges benche; wherof he being aduertised, and incensed by light persones aboute hym, in furious rage came hastily to the barre, where his seruant stode as a prisoner, and commaunded hym to be ungyued and sette at libertie, where at all men were abasshed, reserued the chiefe iustice, who humbly exhorted the prince to be contented that his seruaunt mought be ordred accordyng to the auncient lawes of this realme, or if he wolde haue hym saued from the rigour of the lawes, that he shuld optaine, if he moughte, of the kynge, his father, his gracious pardone; wherby no lawe or iustice shulde be derogate. With whiche answere the prince nothynge appeased, but rather more inflamed, endeuored hym selfe to take away his seruaunt. The iuge consideringe the perilous example and inconuenience that moughte therby ensue, with a valiant spirite and courage commaunded the prince upon his alegeance to leue the prisoner and departe his waye. With whiche commandment the prince, being set all in a fury, all chafed, and in a terrible maner, came up the place of iugement-men thinkyng that he wolde haue slayne the iuge, or haue done to hym some damage; but the iuge sittyng styll, without mouynge, declarynge the maiestie of the kynges place of iugement, and with an assured and bolde countenance, hadde to the prince these words folowyng: Sir, remembre your selfe; I kepe here the place of the king, your soueraigne lorde and father, to whom ye owe double obedience, wherfore eftsones in his name I charge you desiste of your wilfulnes and unlaufull entreprise, and from hensforth gyue good example to those whiche hereafter shall be your propre subiectes. And nowe for your contempt and disobedience, go you to the prisone of the kynges benche, where unto I committe you; and remayne ye there prisoner until the pleasure of the kyng, your father, be further knowen. With whiche wordes beinge abasshed, and also wondrynge at the meruailous grauitie of that worshipful Justice, the noble prince, layinge his waipon aparte, doinge reuerence, departed and wente to the kynges benche as he was commaunded. Wherat his seruants disdainyng, came and shewed to the kynge all the hole affaire. Wherat he a whiles studienge, after as a man all rauisshed with gladness, holdyng his eien and handes up towarde heuen, abrayded, sayinge with a loude voice, O mercifull god, howe moche am I, aboue all other men, bounde to your infinite goodnes; specially for that ye haue gyuen me a iuge, who feareth nat to ministre iustice, and also a sonne who can suffre semblably and obey iustice!

Domesticall is domestic, native; renomed, renowned; ungyued, released from gyves or fetters; reserued, excepted-i.e. except; abrayded, broke suddenly into speech, cried out. D. P.

The English Bible.

Mention has already been made (page 123) of More's controversy with Tyndale as to the translation of the Bible into English, and we must now attempt the history of the great work in which the latter took so prominent a part. Although the possession of a copy of the Wyclifite version had been forbidden by the Convocation held at Oxford in 1408, throughout the first half of the fifteenth century the book seems to have circulated freely, and of the one hundred and seventy manuscripts of it which have been examined, the greater number, on the evidence of their handwriting, appear to have been produced between 1420 and 1450. The troubles of the next quarter of a century diminished the production of these as of other manuscripts, and almost alone among the countries of Europe, England made no use of the new invention of printing for the multiplication of copies of the Bible, whether in the original Hebrew and Greek, in Latin, or in the vernacular. By 1490 twelve different editions had been published of the Bible in German, and two in Low German. At Venice the Italian translation by Niccolo Malermi was printed at least eight times during the fifteenth century, though no other Italian town produced an edition. A French New Testament was printed at Lyons about 1474, a Dutch Bible at Delft in 1477, and a Bohemian at Prague in 1488. Of this last there was a second edition the next year, but outside Germany and Venice it is clear that reprints were not encouraged, and in face of the condemnation of 1408 it is not surprising that in England no vernacular edition was produced. Yet Caxton at least did something, for in his translation of the Golden Legend of Jacobus de Voragine he included not only sermons on the feasts commemorating the chief events in the life of Christ, but also the 'hystoryes' of Adam, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, the Giving of the Law, Joshua, Samuel, Saul, David, and Solomon, taken, with little omitted or added, from the Bible itself. As an example of this fifteenth-century version we may take the beginning of the history of Jacob, as printed in the original edition of 1483 :

Ysaac began to wexe old and his eyen faylled and dymmed that he myght not clerly see, and on a tyme he called Esau his oldest sone and said to hym, Sone myne,' which answerde, 'Fader, I am here redy.' To whom the fader saide, 'Beholde that I wexe old and knowe not the day that I shal dye and departe out of this world; wherfore take thyn harneys, thy bowe and quyver, with takles, and goe forth an huntynge. And whan thou hast taken ony venyson, make to me therof suche maner mete as thou knowest that I am woned [wont] to ete, and brynge it to me that I may ete it, and that my sowle may blesse the or I dye.' Whiche all thise wordis Rebecca herde, and Esau wente forth for to accomplyish the comandement of his fader, and she saide thenne to Jacob, 'I have herde thy fader saye to Esau thy brother, Brynge to me of thy venyson and

make therof mete that I may ete and that I may blesse the to-fore our lord er I dye. Now my sone take hede to my conceyll, and goo forth to the flock and brynge to me two the beste kyddes that thou canst fynde, and I shal make of them mete suche as thy fader shal gladly ete, whiche whan thou hast brought to hym and hath eten he may blesse the er he dye.' To whom Jacob answerd, Knowest thou not that my brother is rowhe and heery [rough and hairy] and I smothe? Yf my fader take me to hym and taste me and fele, I drede me that he shal thynke that I mocke hym, and shal gyve me his curse for the blessyng.' The moder thenne said to hym: 'In me,' said she, 'be this curse, my sone. Nevertheles, here me, go to the flocke and doo that I have said to the.' He wente and fette [fetched] the kyddes and delyverd them to his moder, and she wente and ordeyned them in-to suche mete as she knewe wel that his fader lovyd, and toke the beste clothes that Esau had and dyde hem on Jacob, and the skynnes of the kyddes she dyde aboute his necke and handes there as he was bare, and delyveryd to hym brede and the pulmente [stew] that she had boyled, and he wente to his fader and saide, 'Fader myn,' and he answerd, 'I here. Who art thou, my sone?' Jacob saide, 'I am Esau, thy fyrste begoten sone. I have don as thou comaundest me. Aryse, sitte and ete of the venyson of myn huntyng, that thy soule may blesse me.'

The Golden Legend was frequently reprinted, and through this, through Lives of Christ, sermons, and popular books of devotion, the broad outlines of the Bible story were probably as well known as they are now. But save for the Psalms, of all in the Bible that is not story, notably the Prophets in the Old Testament and the Epistles in the New, there was small opportunity for any one ignorant of Latin to gain knowledge, and this was the case also with the whole Bible in respect of its text as distinct from its general purport. Meanwhile, however, materials for an accurate translation were accumulating. Between 1514 and 1517 Cardinal Ximenes had printed at Alcala his splendid Polyglot Bible, which received the papal sanction in 1520 and was published in or before 1522. In 1516, under the title Novum Instrumentum, Erasmus had published at Basel the Greek text of the New Testament, with a new and scholarly Latin version. In September 1522 Martin Luther published at Wittenberg his German New Testament, the first instalment of his new translation of the entire Bible. In 1523 a French translation of the New Testament by Jacques Le Fèvre d'Étaples was printed at Paris, and other portions of the Bible followed till the translation was completed in six volumes in 1528. But the Parlement of Paris condemned the first instalments of the book, and this was no good omen for the work of translation in England. The man who undertook this task was William Tyndale, a member of a family which, on its migration to Gloucestershire from the north during the Wars of the Roses, had assumed as an alternative name that of Huchyns or Hychyns, which was used also by Tyndale himself. The date of his birth is unknown, but as William

Hychyns he matriculated at Oxford in 1510, and took his degree as Master of Arts five years later. From Oxford he removed to Cambridge, where Erasmus had recently been acting as Lady Margaret Professor of Divinity. By 1522 (having in the meanwhile taken holy orders) he had become tutor to the children of Sir John Walsh, of Old Sodbury in Gloucestershire; was preaching in the neighbouring villages; holding controversies with the clergy, for which he had to answer to the Chancellor of the diocese; and translating the Enchiridion Militis Christiani of Erasmus. If Foxe, the martyrologist, may be trusted, he declared at this time that if God granted him life he would cause 'a boye that dryveth the plough' to know more of the Scriptures than his opponents.

In the summer of 1523 Tyndale came to London, with an oration of Isocrates translated from Greek into English, as a proof of his scholarship, and tried to obtain a post in the household of Cuthbert Tunstall, the Bishop of London, himself a man of learning. Repulsed by Tunstall, he was employed as a preacher at the church of St Dunstan's-in-theWest, and hospitably entertained for six months by one of his hearers, Humphrey Monmouth. But his mind was bent on translating the Bible. 'Even in the Bisshope of London's house,' he tells us (Preface to the Fyrst boke of Moses called Genesis), I intended to have done it;' and now, from what he saw of London and the London clergy, he 'understode at the laste not only that there was no rowme in my Lorde of London's palace to translate the New Testament, but also that there was no place to do it in all Englonde,' and from England accordingly he fled, sailing for Hamburg in May 1524. After a visit to Luther at Wittenberg, and a return to Hamburg for money, probably supplied him by some of the London merchants, he betook himself, with his assistant, William Roy, to Cologne, and there arranged with Peter Quentel and Arnold Byrckman for the production of his New Testament, the former being a well-known printer, and the latter a publisher who had special relations with the English book-trade. But at Cologne at this time there was staying a prolific pamphleteer on the papal side, Johann Dobneck (better known by his Latin nom de guerre ‘Cochlæus'), who also was negotiating with Cologne printers. A story came to Dobneck's ears that all England was to be Lutheranised through the exertions of two learned Englishmen; and on inquiry he found that three thousand copies of an English New Testament had already been printed in quarto as far as sheet K, a matter of eighty pages. The case was promptly brought before the Cologne Senate, and to escape arrest the 'two English apostates,' as Dobneck calls them, had to take boat quickly up the Rhine to Worms, bearing with them what they could of their unfinished work. Of the edition thus interrupted a solitary fragment

survives in the Grenville Library at the British Museum. This consists of sheets A-H—that is, eight out of the ten printed off-and contains Tyndale's Prologge' and his translation of St Matthew's Gospel to the beginning of chapter xxii. The Prologue is partly Tyndale's own, partly borrowed from Luther; and this is the case also with the marginal glosses, of which there are some ninety in this fragment-about forty by Tyndale, and about fifty translated more or less closely from Luther. As a specimen of the translation we may take a passage to which, and to the side-note on it, we may be sure that Tyndale's critics themselves promptly turned, Matthew xvi. 5-28:

And when his disciples were come to the other syde of the water, they had forgotten to take breed with them. Then Jesus said unto them: Take hede and beware of the leven of the pharises, and of the saduces. They thought a-monge themselves sayinge: we have brought no breed with us. When Jesus understode that he saide unto them, O ye of lytell fayth, why are youre myndes cumbred because ye have brought no breed; Do ye not yet perceave, nether remember those v. loves when there were v. M. men, and howe many basketts toke ye up? Nether the vii. loves when there were iiii. M. and howe many baskets toke ye uppe, why perceave ye not then that y spake not unto you of breed when I sayde, beware of the leven of the pharises and of the saduces? Then understode they howe that he bad not them beware of the leven of breed: butt off the doctryne of the pharises and of the saduces.

:

When Jesus came into the coosts of the cite which is called cesarea philippi, he axed hys disciples sayinge : whom do men saye that I the sonne of man am? They saide, some saye that thou arte Jhon baptiste, some helyas, some Jeremyas, or won [sic] of the prophetts. He seyde unto them, butt whom saye ye that I am? Symon Peter answered and sayde: Thou arte Christ the sonne of the levynge god. And Jesus answered and sayde to him happy arte thou simon the sonne of Jonas, for fleshe and bloud have not opened unto the that, but my fater which ys in heven. And I saye also unto the, that thou arte Peter, And apon thys roocke I wyll bylde my congregacion: and the gates of hell shall not preveyle ageynst it. And I wyll yeve unto the the keyes of the kyngdom of heven, and whatsoever thou byndest uppon erth, yt shall be bounde in heven, and what soever thou lowsest on erthe yt shalbe lowsed in heven.

This

1 Peter in the greke, sygnifyeth a stoone in englysshe. confession is the rocke. Nowe is simon barjona or simon jonas sonne, called Peter because of hys confession. Whosoever then this wyse confesseth of Christe, the same is called Peter. Nowe is this confession come too all that are true christen. Then ys every christen man and woman peter. Rede Bede, Austen and hierome, of the maner of lowsinge and bynding and note howe hierome checketh the presumcion of the pharises in his tyme, which yet had nott so monstrous interpretacions as oure new goddes have feyned. Rede Erasmus annotacions. Hyt was noot for nought that Christ badd beware of the leven of the pharises, noo thynge is so swete that they make not sowre with there tradicions. The evangelion, that joyfull tidynges, ys nowe biterer then the olde lawe. Christes burthen is hevier then the yooke of moses, oure condicion and estate ys ten tymes more grevious then was ever the iewes. The pharises have so levended Christes sweet breed.

Then he charged his disciples, that they shulde tell no man that he was Jesus christ. From that tyme forth, Jesus began to shewe unto his disciples howe that he must go unto Jerusalem and suffer many things of the seniors and of the hye prestes and of the scribes, and must be killed and ryse againe the thyrde day. toke him asyde, and began to rebuke hym sayinge: master faver thy sylfe, this shall nott come unto the Then turned he aboute, and sayde unto peter: 1 go after me satan, thou offendest me, because thou perceavest nott godly thinges but worldly thinges.

1

Peter

Jesus then sayde to hys disciples, Yf eny man wyll folowe me leet him forsake him sylfe, and take his crosse and folowe me. For who-soever wyll save hys lyfe shall loose yt. And who-soever shall loose hys lyfe for my sake, shall fynde yt. Whatt shall hit proffet a man, yf he shulde wyn all the hoole worlde: so he loose hys owne soule? Or els what shall a man geve to redeme hys soule agayne with all? For the sonne of man shall come in the glory of hys father, with hys angels, and then shall he rewarde every man accordinge to hys dedes. Verely I saye unto you, some there be a-monge them that here stonde whych shall nott taste of deeth, tyll they shall have sene the sonne of man come in hys kyngdom.

Arrived at Worms, Tyndale arranged with a printer, who appears to have been Peter Schöffer, a descendant of the prototypographer of Mainz, and we learn from a contemporary diary that an edition of no fewer than six thousand copies was now printed. Of all these only two remain; and from the more perfect of the two, now in the library of the Baptist College at Bristol, a facsimile reprint was edited by Mr Francis Fry in 1862. From this facsimile we see that the text of the Cologne fragment was set up again with the correction of misprints, but that the side-notes are altogether omitted. There are references, however, to separate editions of the Gospels of St Matthew and St Mark which have now perished, and it is possible that these were annotated.

Dobneck and others had warned Henry VIII. and Wolsey what Tyndale was about, and on 24th October 1526 Bishop Tunstall threatened with excommunication all who kept copies of his translation in their possession. But the importation of them into England, and their sale at from two to four shillings apiece (pence being then of the present value of shillings), proceeded apace, till the agency was discovered and the sale checked in 1528. In the same year Tyndale shifted his quarters from Worms to Marburg, and there published in April his treatise on Justification by Faith entitled The Parable of the Wicked Mammon. This was succeeded in the following October by The Obedience of a Christen man and how Christen rulers ought to governe, in which he maintains the paramount authority of the Scripture in matters of faith, and of the king in matters of government,

1 Itt soundeth [means] yn greke, away from me sathan, and are [sic] the same words which Christe spake unto the devyll when he woolde have had him fall doune and worshippe hym, luc. L