a stick a dead stag, with the head upwards." For this account, the editor is indebted to Dr. Bandinel of the Bodleian Library.54

Should this, however, prove to be one of the edition now under consideration, there is another copy, and of a more extraordinary character, in the collection at Norwood-hill. Not only is it in the original hog-skin binding, which would be curiosity enough, but, to this hour, many of the leaves remain not yet cut open!—a peculiarity not to be expected in a book nearly three hundred and twenty years old, and one which, it may be safely presumed, will stamp the volume as unique, amongst all these rare early editions.

The following pages will throw still farther light on this interesting period, but we have now done for the present with the memorable year 1526.

Instead of having to be satisfied with only one edition of the New Testament, and that of doubtful or hitherto disputed origin, we have had three distinctly before us, besides, as will be more fully proved, a separate impression of Matthew and Mark, circulating through the country. We have seen all the authorities, from the King downwards, roused in opposition, and the people, though in secret, were reading with avidity. It was the season of entrance to Britain's greatest earthly treasure; and one should have imagined that it would have been marked in our calendar, with a red letter, or fully understood, long ere now. Viewing these first printed volumes in their ultimate effects, the year may well be regarded by all British Christians, as by far the most important, in the long and varied history of their native land.

A fire was then kindled by the Almighty, through the in

54 Lowndes' Bib. Manual. Following the authority of Lewis, the editor has dated this book in 1527, which, if it turn out to be the first after Tyndale, is a year too late. George Joye has, in his own way, professedly given an account of these early editions; and it has been the only authority by which others have been guided. Adopted as being correct, by Lewis, he has inserted certain years, by his own conjecture, as the dates of printing. We need scarcely add, that these are incorrect, or that Joye's account is, at the best, confused. It must ever be remembered, too, that the testimony of Joye was given in a very lame vindication of his having altered another, and subsequent copy of Tyndale's Testament, with nothing more than the vulgate before him. But his words may be quoted-" Anon, after," says he, "the Dutchmen (Germans) got a copy, and printed it again in a small volume, adding the calendar in the beginning, concordances in the margin, and the table in the end. But yet for that they had no Englishman to correct the setting; they themselves having not the knowledge of our tongue, were compelled to make many more faults than there were in the copy; and so corrupted the book, that the simple reader might oftimes be tarried, and stick." It is still questionable whether this small volume be not as creditable to the printers as that which was corrected by Joye himself, seven years later.

strumentality of his servant, which, in the highest exercise of his loving-kindness, He has never suffered to be extinguished; light was then introduced, which He has never withdrawn; and a voice was then heard by the people, which has sounded in the ears of their posterity to the present hour. For whatever may be said of men, as men, it is to the word of truth in the vulgar tongue that we owe everything in this highly-favoured country!

Many of these volumes, it is true, were consigned to the flames; and the wonder is that any of them escaped detection. But every one knows with what avidity men will read an interdicted book, while the call for its deliverance up would only make certain minds grasp it harder still. Besides, though in part detected, in such places as London and Oxford-for in Cambridge they were not-copies had gone, far and near, into the hamlets and towns in the country, where, no doubt, they were enjoyed by stealth, and hid with anxious care.

The preceding statements are not hypothetical; the reader has been entertained neither with mere conjectures or probability only; and as subsequent events will both illustrate and confirm the preceding, we presume it will now be conceded, as not a little extraordinary, that more than three centuries should have been allowed to pass away, before a year so full of incident, nay, of peculiar favour to Britain, has been investigated. We have said Britain, because it will appear, in its proper place, that, at this very period, Scotland was mercifully visited with the same favour.

SECTION IV.

THE TRANSLATOR'S PROGRESS HIS EARLIEST COMPOSITIONS-AGITATION OF EUROPE-SACK OF ROME-CONSEQUENCES-PERSECUTION IN ENGLAND -OPPOSITION TO THE NEW TESTAMENT-WARHAM AND THE BISHOPS BUYING IT UP-FRESH IMPORTATIONS-THE FOURTH EDITION-SCRIPTURES SINGULARLY INTRODUCED ONCE MORE.

IN returning to Tyndale, whom we left alone at Worms, after having completed his New Testaments, we do so with

abundant evidence, that he had not laboured in vain. Much has vaguely been ascribed to Latin works then imported from the Continent, and in consequence of even their effects, the "spirituality" of the day no doubt dreaded almost every leaf; but the history already given clearly shows, that the New Testament in the vulgar tongue was the great object of apprehension. While yet in his native land, Tyndale “ had perceived by experience how that it was impossible to stablish the lay people in any truth, except the Scriptures were plainly laid before their eyes in their mother tongue, that they might see the process, order, and meaning of the text :" and so now, as the Word of the Lord was enlightening the minds, "converting the soul, and making wise the simple," it had proved also" like a fire or a hammer," and was breaking the rocks in pieces.

Very soon, through whatever medium, Tyndale was made intimately acquainted with the storm that raged in England, and, amidst all its tumultuous howling, he had ample encouragement to proceed with his Old Testament from the Hebrew; but in the year 1526, he must have been also very busy in preparing for the press, as we shall find that the year 1527 was distinguished by the first appearance of two publications, namely, his exposition of "the Parable of the Wicked Mammon," and his "Obedience of a Christian man."

Sometime, however, before the appearance of anything else in print, we may now safely assert, that Tyndale had been favoured by the company, consolation, and assistance of his devoted Christian friend, John Fryth, who had fled from Oxford to the Continent about September 1526, and no doubt fully reported progress. An affection subsisted between these two eminent men, akin to that between Paul and Timothy of old, though in one point the parallel fails-the youngest died first. Fryth was not only Tyndale's own son in the faith, but he had no man so dear to him; and as all parties, even his enemies, agreed in bearing testimony to the attainments of Fryth as a scholar, nothing could be more opportune than his arrival; but before saying more of him, some notice must be taken of William Roye, whom Tyndale had found it necessary to dismiss from his service in 1525.

In 1526, as already hinted, circumstances having suggested to our Translator, the necessity of encouraging those to whom

it had been sent, by some exposition of his own views of Divine Truth, he commenced by writing out" The Parable of the Wicked Mammon;" but before it appeared, there had come to his possession the copy of a Dialogue, translated out of Latin into English, which had been printed at Strasburg by his late amanuensis, with a prologue of his own composition.

This singular character, Roye, as well as another named Jerome, were two Franciscan friars from the noted monastery at Greenwich, close by the favourite palace of Henry VIII. The inmates of this monastery, as well as of another at Richmond, with whom they were occasionally in league, were a great annoyance to the King. Thus the residence of Roye and Jerome, in immediate vicinity to the Court, and to all the gorgeous feats of Henry and his Cardinal, afforded such opportunities as fully account for the very graphic poetical satire already quoted, and to which we now refer. After leaving Tyndale's service, Roye had proceeded to Strasburg, where he published his "Dialogue between the Father and the Son," about the end of 1526. Soon after this came his "Rede me, and be not wrothe," or Satire on Wolsey and the Monastic orders, frequently denounced as " The burying of the Mass," one of the most extraordinary satires, it has been said, of this or any other age. It was first published in small octavo, black letter, with a wood-cut of the Cardinal's coat-ofarms. Wolsey was so annoyed by it, that he spared neither pains nor expense to procure the copies, employing more than one emissary for the purpose. Hence its extreme rarity; a copy of this original edition having been sold for as high a sum as sixteen or twenty guineas! It is reprinted, however, in the Harleian Miscellany by Park.2

1 The prologue to the Romans, already in England, will come before us afterwards.

2 Vol. ix., p. 1.-In the second edition printed at Wasel in 1546, the edge of its satire is blunted, by transferring to the entire prelacy, such charges as were originally designed only for Wolsey. It is there said to have been printed 16 or 17 years before, which places its first appearance in 1529 or 1530. But this is a mistake. Sir Thomas More, when writing his "Dialogue," in 1528, was well acquainted with it, so that it must have been printed by 1527. See note 5.

Roye's rhymes unquestionably went the length of sinful excess, and are not all to be justified in denouncing any man, however wicked; but they are not to be confounded with those "godly rhymes" which, though so uncouth, were productive of great effect, some years after, at least in Scotland. Besides these, Roye was certainly the author of other publications. Sir T. More has, by mistake, ascribed to him, an exposition of 1 Cor. viith chapter, (which was by Tyndale ;) and the Psalter, after the text of Feline or Bucer, under the feigned name of Francis Foxe, not Foye, as it has frequently been copied from Lewis. There is, however, no doubt of his having been the author of a book against the Seven Sacraments; and these four publications were all included among the books early denounced in England. Whatever may be said of the man-for

With a modesty and prudence, highly characteristic, our Translator had put forth the New Testament without his name, and he earnestly wished to have gone on, through life, with anonymous publication; but the sight of Roye's Dialogue and Prologue, in connexion with his previous conduct, had fully convinced Tyndale that there was an imperative necessity, not only for affixing his name to what he now published, but for his disclaiming all connexion or even intercourse with Roye, after a certain period. This accounts for the pointed style of the following passage, which we must repeat more fully; and for his very marked reference to a period of two years previously to the publication of his "Parable.”

"The cause why I have set my name before this little treatise, and have not rather done it in the New Testament, is, that then I followed the counsel of Christ, which exhorteth men to do their good deeds secretly, and to be content with the conscience of well-doing, and that God seeth us; and patiently to abide the reward of the last day, which Christ hath purchased for us: and now would I fain have done likewise, but I am compelled otherwise so to do.

"While I abode (at Hamburgh ?) a faithful companion, which now hath taken another voyage upon him, to preach Christ, where, I suppose, he was never yet preached-God, which put in his heart thither to go, send his Spirit with him, comfort him, and bring his purpose to good effect!-one William Roye, a man somewhat crafty, when he cometh unto new acquaintance, and before he be thorough known, namely, when all is spent, came unto me and offered his help. As long as he had no money, somewhat I could rule him; but as soon as he had gotten him money, he became like himself again. Nevertheless, I suffered all things, till that was ended which I could not do alone without one, both to write and to help me to compare the text together. When that was ended, I took my leave, and bade him farewell for our two lives, and, as men say, a day longer. After we were departed (separated,) he went and gat him new friends, which thing to do, he passeth all that I ever yet knew. And then, when he had stored him of money, he gat him to Argentine (Strasburg) where he professeth wonderful faculties, and maketh boast of no small things.

"A year after that, and now twelve months before the printing of this work, came one Jerome, a brother of Greenwich also,3 through Worms to Argentine, (Strasburg,) saying that he intended to be Christ's disciple another while, and to keep as nigh, as God would give him grace, the profession of his baptism, and to get his living with his hands, and to live no longer idly, and of the sweat and labour of those captives, which they had taught not to believe in Christ, but in cut shoes and russet coats. Which Jerome, with all diligence, I warned

his character appears, at the best, to have been questionable-these were more than sufficient to mark him out as an heretic, and, as such, he is said to have suffered at the stake in Portugal, the year after Wolsey's death, or 1531. Yet we shall find him in England, if not in London, next year! 3 In a recent account of Tyndale, prefixed to the reprint of his New Testament, this expression is quoted, and as a proof of Tyndale himself having been a friar! But there is here evidently no reference whatever to himself. "First came Roye, then came Jerome, a brother of Greenwich also," i. e. as well as Roye. This, however, is decided evidence that they were two friars from the same monastery, as well as that Tyndale in 1526 was in Worms, and not at Wittenberg, as so loosely asserted.