In 1562 John Aylmer was made Archdeacon of Lincoln, and in 1576 Bishop of London, on the translation of Sandys to the see of York.

JOHN AYLMER.

From the Portrait prefixed to his Life by Strype.

Here let us recall a few more of those events which occupied the minds of Englishmen, and quickened energies of thought and feeling during the first twenty-one years of Elizabeth's reign. In 1564year of the birth of Shakespeare-Catherine de' Medici was visited by her daughter Elizabeth, who in 1560 had been married, aged fifteen, to Philip of Spain, aged thirty-four. The Duke of Alva came with the Spanish Queen Elizabeth, and was heard exhorting Catherine to strike down some leaders of the Huguenots, saying to her, "One head of salmon is worth ten thousand heads of frogs." In March of this year 1564, Cardinal Granvella was obliged by a league of nobles of the Netherlands, headed by William of Orange and Counts Egmont and Horn, to retire from the Government. In July, 1565, Mary

every contingency of life. To these I added Saint Cyprian and Melanchthon's Common Places, &c., as best suited, after the Holy Scriptures, to teach her the foundations of religion, together with elegant language and sound doctrine. Whatever she reads she at once perceives any word that has a doubtful or curious meaning. She cannot endure those foolish imitators of Erasmus, who have tied up the Latin tongue in those wretched fetters of proverbs. She likes a style that grows out of the subject; chaste because it is suitable, and beautiful because it is clear. She very much admires modest metaphors, and comparisons of contraries well put together and contrasting felicitously with one another. Her ears are so well practised in discriminating all these things, and her judgment is so good, that in all Greek, Latin, and English composition, there is nothing so loose on the one hand or so concise on the other, which she does not immediately attend to, and either reject with disgust or receive with pleasure, as the case may be. I am not inventing anything, my dear Sturm; it is all true: but I only seek to give you an outline of her excellence, and whilst doing so, I have been pleased to recall to my mind the dear memory of my most illustrious lady. St. John's College, Cambridge, April 4, 1550."

Queen of Scots married her cousin, Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley. In October, 1565, Philip of Spain wrote to require enforcement in the Netherlands of edicts against heresy. The nobles required Margaret of Parma, who was then Regent, to publish the letter. A storm of feeling was aroused. Thousands began to emigrate to England, and set up their looms among us. In 1566 Philip conceded to the Netherlands moderation of the law against heretics by substitution of hanging for burning. In March of that year occurred Darnley's murder of Rizzio, and on the 19th of June the birth of Mary Stuart's son James, afterwards James I. of England.

On the 22nd of August, 1567, the Duke of Alva entered Brussels. He then occupied other towns of the Netherlands, established the Council of Tumults -otherwise known as the Council of Blood. Margaret of Parma retired from the Regency, and Alva became Governor-General of the Netherlands. At the same time the second Huguenot civil war broke out in France. In this year, on the night of Sunday, the 9th of February, Lord Darnley, the husband of Mary Queen of Scots, was destroyed by a gunpowder plot. In May, the Earl of Bothwell was divorced from a wife to whom he had been married only fourteen months, and married to Queen Mary. Before the end of July, Mary had been compelled by her own subjects to sign her abdication in favour of her son James, and appoint the Earl of Murray-friend of Knox and the foremost Reformers - Regent during his minority. Mary escaped from Lochleven, raised her friends, was defeated at Langside, and turned to England: thus she became in 1568, and remained for eighteen years, a state prisoner to England, regarded by the Roman Catholics abroad as future Queen of England if their cause should triumph. In February, 1568, a sentence of the Inquisition condemned to death all the inhabitants of the Netherlands except some who were named, and Alva estimated at eight hundred the executions after Passion week. In June this year, also, Counts Egmont and Horn were executed. There was pause

It was

of civil war in France between Roman Catholics and Huguenots, but in 1569 it was resumed, and in that year young Walter Raleigh went to France, and joined the Huguenots as volunteer. in 1569 that Edmund Spenser went to Cambridge, entering Pembroke College as a sizar, and in that year also he first appeared in print, as contributor of verse to a religious miscellany by one of the refugees from persecution in the Netherlands, John Van der Noodt. Contribution to such a book shows clearly what was the bent of young Spenser's mind, and how he looked at the course of events. The book was called "A Theatre wherein be represented as well the Miseries and Calamities which follow the Voluptuous Worldling, as also the great Joys and Pleasures which the Faithful do enjoy. An Argu ment both Profitable and Delectable to all that sincerely love the Word of God."

In August, 1570, a treaty was made in France which conceded much to the Huguenots. In the spring of 1571 a Synod of the French Reformed Church was held, by the King's permission, at Rochelle. On the 24th of August, 1572, the French

Huguenots were struck down by the Massacre of St. Bartholomew.

In the Netherlands, in 1573, there was the siege of Protestant Haarlem, when three hundred women were among the defenders of the town. It ended with a treacherous slaughter of two or three thousand. Three hundred were drowned in the lake, tied back to back. In December of that year. (1573), the Duke of Alva was recalled by his own wish, and boasted on his way home that he had caused 16,000 Netherlanders to be executed. Hearing of such events was part of the education of Edmund Spenser while at Cambridge. He graduated as B.A. in 1573, then being about twenty years old. In 1575 Edmund Grindal-then aged fifty-six-became Archbishop of Canterbury.

Edmund Grindal was born in 1519, at St. Bees, in Cumberland, was educated at Cambridge, and was in 1550 chaplain to Bishop Ridley. In 1553 he was among those Reformers who fled from persecutions in England, and he went to Strasburg. At the accession of Elizabeth he returned, and he assisted in the drawing up of the new liturgy. In 1559 he was made Master of Pembroke Hall, and in the

EDMUND GRINDAL.
From the Portrait before his Life by Strype.

same year Bishop of London. In 1570 he became Archbishop of York, and in 1575 Archbishop of Canterbury. While maintaining generally the discipline established in the Reformed Church of England, Edmund Grindal agreed in some respects with those whom Matthew Parker is said to have first called Puritans and Frecisians for what he regarded as their over-precise reference of everything -whether fit subject of revelation or not-to Bible warrant. Edmund Grindal laid great stress on the importance of a faithful study and interpretation of God's Word. As Bishop of London, as Archbishop of York, and now as head of the Church of England,

he used what authority he might to encourage a form of meeting called "prophesying," from the schools of the prophets spoken of in the Old Testament, for the interpretation of the Word of God. The clergy in a district met to discuss difficulties with one another, that they might not be taken by surprise when these were propounded to them by parishioners, and that they might be trained to bring knowledge and thought to their preaching. Queen Elizabeth objected to the prophesyings as examples of division of opinion among the clergy, encouragements to a bold questioning among the laity, and destructive of a Unity of Doctrine, by which she hoped to secure peace in the Church. The Books of Homilies provided sermons enough, she thought, and the use of them caused a uniformity of preaching that would give small scope for heresies of private judgment. She therefore bade the new Archbishop issue letters to the clergy to forbid the "prophesyings," and restrain excess of zeal for original preaching. Grindal replied that his conscience would not suffer him to do this, and he was therefore, in 1577, sequestered from the exercise of his office. This is the letter that caused his disgrace :

LETTER TO THE QUEEN,

Concerning suppressing the Prophesies, and abridging the Number of Preachers.

With most humble remembrance of my bounden duty to your Majesty: It may please the same to be advertised. that the speeches which it hath pleased you to deliver unt me, when I last attended on your Highness, concerning abridging the number of preachers, and the utter suppress of all learned exercises and conferences among the ministers of the Church, allowed by their bishops and ordinaries, hav exceedingly dismayed and discomforted me. Not so much for that the said speeches sounded very hardly against mine own person, being but one particular man, and not much to be accounted of; but most of all for that the same might be tend to the public harm of God's Church, whereof your Hish ness ought to be nutricia,' and also to the heavy burdening a your own conscience before God, if they should be put in strict execution. It was not your Majesty's pleasure then, the t not serving thereto, to hear me at any length concerning the said two matters then propounded: I thought it therefore my duty by writing to declare some part of my mind un your Highness: beseeching the same with patience to res over this that I now send, written with mine own rade scribbling hand; which seemeth to be of more length than a is indeed: for I say with Ambrose, Scribo manu mea, sola legas.2

MADAM,

First of all, I must and will, during my life, confess, that there is no earthly creature to whom I am so much bound as to your Majesty; who, notwithstanding mine insuffice (which commendeth your grace the more), hath bestowe upon me so many and so great benefits as I could never hope for, much less deserve. I do therefore, according to zr most bounden duty, with all thanksgiving, bear towards your Majesty a most humble, faithful, and thankful hurt and that knoweth He which knoweth all things. Neither i I ever intend to offend your Majesty in any thing, unless

1 Nurse.

2 "I write with mine own hand, what you alone may read "

the cause of God or of His Church, by necessity of office, and burden of conscience, I shall thereunto be enforced and in those cases (which I trust in God shall never be urged upon me), if I should use dissembling or flattering silence, I should very evil requite your Majesty's so many and so great benefits; for in so doing, both you might fall into peril towards God, and I myself into endless damnation.

The prophet Ezekiel termeth us, ministers of the Church, speculatores,' and not adulatores.2 If we see the sword coming by reason of any offence towards God, we must of necessity give warning, or else the blood of those that perish will be required at our hands. I beseech your Majesty thus to think of me, that I do not conceive any evil opinion of you, although I cannot assent to those two articles then propounded. I do with the rest of all your good subjects acknowledge, that we have received by your government many and most excellent benefits, as, among others, freedom of conscience, suppressing of idolatry, sincere preaching of the Gospel, with public peace and tranquillity. I am also persuaded, that even in these matters, which you seem now to urge, your zeal and meaning is to the best. The like hath happened to many of the best princes that ever were: yet have they not refused afterwards to be better informed out of God's Word. King David, so much commended in the Scriptures, had no evil meaning when he commanded the people to be numbered: he thought it good policy, in so doing, to understand what forces he had in store to employ against God's enemies, if occasion so required. Yet afterward (saith the Scripture) his own heart stroke him; and God, by the prophet Gad, reprehended him for his offence, and gave him, for the same, choice of three very hard penances, that is to say, famine, war, and pestilence. Good king Ezechias, of courtesy and good affection, showed to the ambassadors of the king of Babylon the treasures of the house of God and of his own house; and yet the prophet Esay told him that God was therewith displeased. The godly king Jehoshaphat, for making league with his neighbour king Achab (of like good meaning, no doubt), was likewise reprehended by Jehu the prophet in this form of words: Impio præbes auxilium, et his qui oderunt Dominum amicitia jungeris, &c.3 Ambrose, writing to Theodosius the emperor, useth these words: Novi pietatem tuam erga Deum, lenitatem in homines; obligatus sum beneficiis tuis. And yet, for all that, the same Ambrose doth not forbear in the same epistle earnestly to persuade the said emperor to revoke an ungodly edict, wherein he had commanded a godly bishop to re-edify a Jewish synagogue, pulled down by the Christian people.

And so, to come to the present case: I may very well use unto your Highness the words of Ambrose above written, Novi pietatem tuam, &c. But surely I cannot marvel enough, how this strange opinion should once enter into your mind, that it should be good for the Church to have few preachers.

Alas, Madam! is the Scripture more plain in any one thing, than that the Gospel of Christ should be plentifully preached; and that plenty of labourers should be sent into the Lord's harvest; which, being great and large, standeth in need, not of a few, but many workmen ?

There was appointed to the building of Salomon's material temple an hundred and fifty thousand artificers and labourers, besides three thousand three hundred overseers; and shall

we think that a few preachers may suffice to build and edify the spiritual temple of Christ, which is his Church?

Christ, when he sendeth forth his apostles, saith unto them, Ite, prædicate evangelium omni creaturæ.5 But all God's creatures cannot be instructed in the Gospel, unless all possible means be used to have multitude of preachers and teachers to preach unto them.

Sermo Christi inhabitet in vobis opulente, saith St. Paul to the Colossians; and to Timothy, Prædica sermonem, insta tempestive, intempestive, argue, increpa, exhortare. Which things cannot be done without often and much preaching.

To this agreeth the practice of Christ's apostles, Qui constituebant per singulas ecclesias presbyteros. St. Paul likewise, writing to Titus, writeth thus, Hujus rei gratia reliqui te in Creta, ut quæ desunt pergas corrigere, et constituas oppidatim presbyteros. And afterwards describeth, how the said presbyteri were to be qualified; not such as we are sometimes compelled to admit by mere necessity (unless we should leave a great number of churches utterly desolate), but such indeed as were able to exhort per sanam doctrinam, et contradicentes convincere.10 And in this place I beseech your Majesty to note one thing necessary to be noted; which is this, If the Holy Ghost prescribe expressly that preachers should be placed oppidatim,11 how can it well be thought that three or four preachers may suffice for a shire?

Public and continual preaching of God's Word is the ordinary mean and instrument of the salvation of mankind. St. Paul calleth it the ministry of reconciliation of man unto God. By preaching of God's Word the glory of God is enlarged, faith is nourished, and charity increased. By it the ignorant is instructed, the negligent exhorted and incited, the stubborn rebuked, the weak conscience comforted, and to all those that sin of malicious wickedness the wrath of God is threatened. By preaching also due obedience to Christian princes and magistrates is planted in the hearts of subjects: for obedience proceedeth of conscience; conscience is grounded upon the Word of God; the Word of God worketh his effect by preaching. So as generally, where preaching wanteth, obedience faileth.

No prince ever had more lively experience hereof than your Majesty hath had in your time, and may have daily. If your Majesty come to the city of London never so often, what gratulation, what joy, what concourse of people is there to be seen! Yea, what acclamations and prayers to God for your long life, and other manifest significations of inward and unfeigned love, joined with most humble and hearty obedience, are there to be heard! Wherefore cometh this, Madam, but of the continual preaching of God's Word in that city, whereby that people hath been plentifully instructed in their duty towards God and your Majesty? On the contrary, what bred the rebellion in the north? Was it not Papistry, and ignorance of God's Word, through want of often preaching. And in the time of that rebellion, were not all men, of all states, that made profession of the Gospel, most ready to offer their lives for your defence? insomuch that one poor parish in Yorkshire, which by continual preaching had been better instructed than the rest (Halifax

5 "Go ye, preach the Gospel to every creature." (Mark xvi. 15.) 6"Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly." (Colossians iii. 16.) 7" Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort." (2 Timothy iv. 2.)

8 Who "ordained them elders in every church." (Acts xiv. 23.) 9"For this cause left I thee in Crete, that thou shouldest set in order the things that are wanting, and ordain elders in every city." (Titus i. 5.)

10"By sound doctrine, and to convince gainsayers." 11 In every city.

I mean), was ready to bring three or four thousand able men into the field to serve you against the said rebels. How can your Majesty have a more lively trial and experience of the contrary effects of much preaching and of little or no preaching? The one working most faithful obedience, and the other most unnatural disobedience and rebellion.

But it is thought of some, that many are admitted to preach, and few be able to do it well. That unable preachers be removed is very requisite, if ability and sufficiency may be rightly weighed and judged: and therein I trust as much is, and shall be, done as can be; for both I, for mine own part (let it be spoken without any ostentation), am very careful in allowing such preachers only as be able and sufficient to be preachers, both for their knowledge in the Scriptures, and also for testimony of their good life and conversation. And besides that, I have given very great charge to the rest of my brethren, the bishops of this province, to do the like. We admit no man to the office that either professeth Papistry or Puritanism. Generally, the graduates of the university are only admitted to be preachers, unless it be some few which have excellent gifts of knowledge in the Scriptures, joined with good utterance and godly persuasion. I myself procured above forty learned preachers and graduates, within less than six years, to be placed within the diocese of York, besides those I found there; and there I have left them: the fruits of whose travail in preaching, your Majesty is like to reap daily, by most assured, dutiful obedience of your subjects in those parts.

1

But, indeed, this age judgeth very hardly, and nothing indifferently of the ability of preachers of our time; judging few or none in their opinion to be able. Which hard judgment groweth upon divers evil dispositions of men. St. Paul doth commend the preaching of Christ crucified, absque eminentia sermonis. But in our time many have so delicate ears, that no preaching can satisfy them, unless it be sauced with much fineness and exornation of speech: which the same apostle utterly condemneth, and giveth this reason, Ne evacueter crux Christi

Some there be also, that are mislikers of the godly reformation in religion now established; wishing indeed that there were no preachers at all; and so by depraving the ministers impugn religion, non aperto Marte, sed cuniculis : 5 much like to the Popish bishops in your father's time, who would have had the English translation of the Bible called in, as evil translated; and the new translating thereof to have been committed to themselves; which they never intended to perform.

A number there is (and that is exceedingly great), whereof some are altogether worldly-minded, and only bent covetously to gather worldly goods and possessions: serving Mammon, and not God. And another great sum have given over themselves to all carnal, vain, dissolute, and lascivious life, roluptatis amatores, magis quam Dei: et qui semetipsos dediderunt ad patrandum omnem immunditiam cum aviditate. And

1 Indifferently. Impartially, without applying different measures to different persons. So in the Homily on Reading of the Scriptures, "God receiveth the learned and unlearned, and casteth away none, but is indifferent unto all." And part of the Prayer for Magistrates in the English Church Liturgy is "that they may truly and indifferently minister justice."

"Without excellency of speech." Euphuism; artificial ingenuity.

"Lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect." (1 Corinthians i. 17.)

Not by open war, but by burrowings.

Lovers of pleasure more than of God, "who have given themselves over to work all uncleanness with greediness." (Ephesians iv. 19.

because the preaching of God's Word, which to all Christian consciences is sweet and delectable, is to them, having cauteriatas conscientias,7 bitter and grievous (for, as St. Ambrose saith, Quomodo possunt verba Dei dulcia esse in faucibus tuis, in quibus est amaritudo nequitia ?), therefore they wish also that there were no preachers at all. But because they dare not directly condemn the office of preaching, so expressly commanded by God's Word (for that were open blasphemy), they turn themselves altogether, and with the same meaning as the other do, to take exceptions against the persons of them that be admitted to preach.

But God forbid, Madam, that you should open your ears to any of these wicked persuasions, or any way go about to diminish the preaching of Christ's Gospel: for that would ruinate altogether at the length. Quum defecerit prophetia, dissipabitur populus, saith Salomon.

Now, where it is thought, that the reading of the godly Homilies, set forth by public authority, may suffice, I continue of the same mind I was when I attended last upon your Majesty. The reading of Homilies hath his commodity; but is nothing comparable to the office of preaching. The godly preacher is termed in the Gospel fidelis servus et prudens, qui novit famulitio Domini cibum demensum dare in tempore; 10 who can apply his speech according to the diversity of times, places, and hearers, which cannot be done in Homilies: exhortations, reprehensions, and persuasions, are uttered with more affection, to the moving of the hearers, in Sermons than in Homilies. Besides, Homilies were devised by the godly bishops in your brother's time, only to supply necessity, for want of preachers; and are by the statute not to be preferred, but to give place to Sermons, whensoever they may be had; and were never thought in themselves alone to contain sufficient instruction for the Church of England. For it was then found, as it is found now, that this Church of England hath been by appropriations, and that not without sacrilege, spoiled of the livings, which at the first were appointed to the office of preaching and teaching. Which appropriations were first annexed to abbeys; and after came to the crown; and now are dispersed to private men's possessions, without hope to reduce the same to the original institution. So as at this day, in mine opinion, where one church is able to yield sufficient living for a learned preacher, there are at the least seven churches unable to do the same: and in many parishes of your realm, where there be seven or eight hundred souls (the more is the pity), there are not eight pounds a year reserved for a minister. In such parishes it is not possible to place able preachers, for want of convenient stipend. If every flock might have a preaching pastor, which is rather to be wished than hoped for, then were reading of Homilies

7 Consciences seared.

8"How can the word of God be sweet in thy mouth, in which is the bitterness of sin?" (Serm. 13 in Psal. cxviii.)

9" When prophecy shall fail, the people shall be scattered." 10"A faithful and wise servant, who knoweth how to give his Lord's household their meat in due season." (Matthew xxiv. 45.)

u More in Sermons than in Homilies. A Homily is so called from the Greek ouXia, which has for its first sense a being together, thence intercourse and instruction, and meant such setting forth of doctrine as could be understood in an assembly of the people. The word was applied in the Church of England to the two books of Homilies issued in 1547 and 1563, and appointed to be read on "any Sunday or bely day when there is no Sermon." The Sermon, from Latin "sermo." a speaking or discourse, was direct from the mind of the minister, and could be suited to the audience and occasion. Such a sermon was in the ancient Church called also a Homily, sometimes a tractate, and the preachers "tractatores," The restricted use of the word Homily in the English Reformed Church was only for the convenience of distinction between the sermons of the minister and those provided by the state.

altogether unnecessary. But to supply that want of preaching of God's Word, which is the food of the soul, growing upon the necessities afore-mentioned, both in your brother's time, and in your time, certain godly Homilies have been devised, that the people should not be altogether destitute of instruction: for it is an old and a true proverb, "better half a loaf than no bread."

Now for the second point, which is concerning the learned exercise and conference amongst the ministers of the Church: I have consulted with divers of my brethren, the bishops, by letters; who think it the same as I do, viz., a thing profitable to the Church, and therefore expedient to be continued. And I trust your Majesty will think the like, when your Highness shall have been informed of the manner and order thereof; what authority it hath of the Scriptures; what commodity it bringeth with it; and what incommodities will follow, if it be clean taken away.

The authors of this exercise are the bishops of the diocese where the same is used; who both by the law of God, and by the canons and constitutions of the Church now in force, have authority to appoint exercises to their inferior ministers, for increase of learning and knowledge in the Scriptures, as to them seemeth most expedient: for that pertaineth ad disciplinam clericalem. The times appointed for the assembly is once a month, or once in twelve or fifteen days, at the discretion of the ordinary. The time of the exercise is two hours the place, the church of the town appointed for the assembly. The matter entreated of is as followeth. Some text of Scripture, before appointed to be spoken of, is interpreted in this order: First, the occasion of the place is shewed. Secondly, the end. Thirdly, the proper sense of the place. Fourthly, the propriety of the words: and those that be learned in the tongues shewing the diversities of interpretations. Fifthly, where the like phrases are used in the Scriptures. Sixthly, places in the Scriptures, seeming to repugn, are reconciled. Seventhly, the arguments of the text are opened. Eighthly, it is also declared what virtues and what vices are there touched; and to which of the commandments they pertain. Ninthly, how the text hath been wrested by the adversaries, if occasion so require. Tenthly, and last of all, what doctrine of faith or manners the text doth contain. The conclusion is, with the prayer for your Majesty and all estates, as is appointed by the Book of Common Prayer, and a psalm.

These orders following are also observed in the said exercise. First, two or three of the gravest and best learned pastors are appointed of the bishop to moderate in every assembly. No man may speak, unless he be first allowed by the bishop, with this proviso, that no layman be suffered to speak at any time. No controversy of this present time and state shall be moved or dealt withal. If any attempt the contrary, he is put to silence by the moderator. None is suffered to glance openly or covertly at persons public or private; neither yet any one to confute another. If any man utter a wrong sense of the Scripture, he is privately admonished thereof, and better instructed by the moderators, and other his fellowministers. If any man use immodest speech, or irreverent gesture or behaviour, or otherwise be suspected in life, he is likewise admonished, as before. If any wilfully do break these orders, he is presented to the bishop, to be by him corrected.

The ground of this, or like exercise, is of great and ancient authority. For Samuel did practise such like exercises in his time, both at Naioth in Ramatha, and at Bethel. So did Elizæus the prophet, at Jericho. Which studious persons in

1 To the discipline of the clergy.

those days were called filii prophetarum, that is to say, the disciples of the prophets, that being exercised in the study and knowledge of the Scriptures, they might be able men to serve in God's Church, as that time required. St. Paul also doth make express mention, that the like in effect was used in the primitive Church; and giveth rules for the order of the same; as namely, that two or three should speak, and the rest should keep silence.

That exercise of the Church in those days St. Paul calleth prophetiam, and the speakers prophetas: terms very odious in our days to some, because they are not rightly understood. For indeed prophetia, in that and like places of St. Paul, doth not, as it doth sometimes, signify prediction of things to come, which gift is not now ordinary in the Charch of God; but signifieth there, by the consent of the best ancient writers, the interpretation and exposition of the Scriptures. And therefore doth St. Paul attribute unto those that be called prophetæ in that chapter, doctrinam ad ædificationem, exhortationem, et consolationem.3

This gift of expounding and interpreting the Scriptures was, in St. Paul's time, given to many by special miracle, without study: so was also, by like miracle, the gift to speak with strange tongues, which they had never learned. But now, miracles ceasing, men must attain to the knowledge of the Hebrew, Greek, and Latin tongues, &c., by travail and study, God giving the increase. So must men also attain by like means to the gift of expounding and interpreting the Scriptures. And amongst other helps, nothing is so necessary as these above-named exercises and conferences amongst the ministers of the Church: which in effect are all one with the exercises of students in divinity in the universities; saving that the first is done in a tongue understood, to the more edifying of the unlearned hearers.

Howsoever report hath been made to your Majesty concerning these exercises, yet I and others of your bishops, whose names are noted in the margin hereof, as they have testified unto me by their letters, have found by experience, that these profits and commodities following have ensued of them-1. The ministers of the Church are more skilful and ready in the Scriptures, and apter to teach their flocks. 2. It withdraweth them from idleness, wandering, gaming, &c. 3. Some, afore suspected in doctrine, are brought hereby to open confession of the truth. 4. Ignorant ministers are driven to study, if not for conscience, yet for shame and fear of discipline. 5. The opinion of laymen, touching the idleness of the clergy, is hereby removed. 6. Nothing by experience beateth down Popery more than that ministers (as some of my brethren do certify) grow to such good knowledge, by means of these exercises, that where afore were not three able preachers, now are thirty, meet to preach at St. Paul's Cross; and forty or fifty besides, able to instruct their own cures. So as it is found by experience the best means to increase knowledge in the simple, and to continue it in the learned. Only backward men in religion, and contemners of learning in the countries abroad, do fret against it; which in truth doth the more commend it. The dissolution of it would breed triumph to the adversaries, and great sorrow and grief unto the favourers of religion; contrary to the counsel of Ezekiel, who saith, Cor justi non est contristandum. And although some few have abused this good and necessary exercise, there is no reason that the malice of a few should prejudice all. Abuses may be