to about £30,000, and their plate, jewels, furniture, and other goods, were estimated at £100,000; probably both these estimates were considerably below their real value. A new court was instituted, called the court of augmentation, the business of which was to dispose of the lands, receive the rents, and bring the profits into the exchequer. Every religious person that was turned out of his cell received forty-five shillings in money, and every governor had a pension. To relieve the government of this expense, the monks and friars were put into benefices as they became vacant; consequently the body of the inferior clergy became the avowed enemies of the Reformation. A violent clamour was made among the people by the monks and friars, who were preaching every where against the injustice of the suppression. To prevent the effects their representations were calculated to produce on the public mind, the king gave them back fifteen abbeys, and sixteen nunneries, for perpetual alms; but several of the abbots being convicted of forming plots and conspiracies against his majesty's government, he, two years after resumed the grants, and obtained an act of parliament empowering him to erect a number of cathedral churches and bishoprics, and endow them out of the profits of the religious houses. The king proposed to convert £18,000 a year into a revenue for eighteen bishoprics and cathedrals, but six only were erected.

The clergy had prevailed upon the king to pro

hibit the reading of Tindal's translation of the New Testament into English, which they represented as being full of errors and heresies. A copy of this book found in the possession of any person at that time was sufficient to convict him of heresy, and subject him to the flames. But the more violently the clergy opposed the reading of Tindal's translation, the more importunate were the laity of all ranks to have the use of the Scriptures in their native language. At length Cranmer obtained the king's permission to prepare a translation of the Bible to be published by authority. For a speedy accomplishment of this work, Cranmer divided the New Testament into nine parts, and, having chosen nine of the best Greek scholars he could find, he committed the translation of one of those parts to each. When they had been all translated, he distributed those parts separately amongst the most learned of his brethren the bishops, to be corrected and returned by each of them with his observations. All the bishops complied with the archbishop's request, except Stokesley, bishop of London, who returned his part, the Acts of the Apostles, with a very unkind message, saying, "that he disapproved of allowing the use of the Scriptures to the people, which would betray them into damnable errors, and disturb the peace of the church." This message quite surprised the good primate, when one of the company observed, that Dr. Stokesley would never be troubled about any testament in which he had no legacy; and besides,

said he, the Apostles were so poor, that they are quite below the notice of my lord of London.

The archbishop, having brought the translation of the Scriptures to a state of completion, sent it to be printed at Paris, in the year 1537. Bonner was then ambassador at Paris, to whose care he recommended it. He obtained permission of the French king to have it printed in one large folio volume; but, upon a complaint made by the French clergy, the press was stopped, and most of the copies were seized and publicly burnt. A few copies escaped the flames, and were brought over to England, with the workmen and materials, where it was finished. The first complete edition of the Scriptures printed in England was executed in London, by Grafton, A. D. 1539, who printed one thousand five hundred copies at his own expense. Cromwell presented a copy of this Bible to the king, and requested his majesty's permission to allow his subjects, in all his dominions, to read the translation without control or hazard. Cromwell's proposal, for the free use of the Scriptures in the English language, met with a powerful opposition at court. It was represented to the king that if he allowed the people the free use of the Scriptures it would be impossible for him to govern his subjects in matters of faith, as the supreme head of the church. This objection was calculated to make an impression on the king's mind, as he was very tenacious about the supremacy. To meet this argument it was suggested,

that nothing could so effectually establish his supremacy in the minds of his subjects as the discovery that the popes had been imposing a blind obedience to an authority which had no foundation in Scripture, and that his majesty had brought them into the light of truth, in favouring them with the free use of the Word of God in their own native language. The bishops were equally divided for and against the measure. Cranmer of

Canterbury, Goodrich of Ely, Fox of Hereford, Shaxton of Sarum, Latimer of Worcester, Hilsley of Rochester, and Barlow of St. David's, were all in favour of a reformation, both in the doctrines and ceremonies of the church, and for the free use of the Scriptures. In all these they were zealously opposed by Lee of York, Stokesley of London, Tunstall of Durham, Gardiner of Winchester, Sherborne of Chichester, Nix of Norwich, and Kite of Carlisle. A similar division of sentiment pervaded the inferior clergy, and the laity of all ranks. But the archbishop's request in favour of allowing the Bible to be read prevailed with the king, and a proclamation was published in the king's name, requiring all curates and parishes to procure themselves a copy of it before All-hallowtide, under the penalty of forty shillings a month, so long as they neglected compliance. The eagerness of the people to read the Bible rendered the last clause unnecessary. The king declared that he "set forth the Bible, that his subjects by reading it might perceive the power, wisdom, and good

ness of God, observe his commandments, obey the laws and their prince, and live in goodly charity among themselves."

On

Though by this special act of grace the people were permitted to read the sacred volume, they were not allowed to enter into disputes about its meaning, nor to expound what they read to such as flocked around them. But these admonitions rather excited than prevented discussion. reading the words of our Lord on the institution of the sacrament, Drink ye all of it, the natural conclusion drawn by the people was that the priests had deprived them of the cup contrary to his express command, "Drink ye all of it." Nor was that passage in St. Paul against worship in an unknown tongue less calculated to awaken inquiry. They clearly saw that the church of Rome, by performing worship in an unknown tongue, had changed the institution of the apostolic church, consequently they could not say Amen, either in the collects or hymns.

Great complaints were made at court about the "abuses, errors, and damnable heresies," which some had published in every part of the country, and which the popish party represented as one of the evils arising out of the favour granted to the people of reading the Scriptures. They presented a list of those "abuses, errors, and damnable heresies," to the amount of sixty-seven. Many of these pretended errors and abuses are now the established doctrines and practices of the church of