the issue of earth or hell to be the offspring of heaven, entitling their monstrous delusions to be miraculous operations.

II. OF FALSE MIRACLES, MANY BROODS WHEREOF WERE HATCHED IN MONASTERIES.

1-4. A Dichotomy of Miracles; reported, not done; done by Nature. St. Nun's Cure of Madmen.

SUCH false miracles are reducible to two ranks: 1. Reported, but never done. 2. Done, but true miracles, as either the product of nature, art, or satanical machination.

Of the former, whose being is only in report, were many thousands; whose scene, for the better countenancing thereof, is commonly laid at distance both of time and place. These, like the stuff called "stand-far-off," must not have the beholder too near, lest the coarseness thereof doth appear. Thus any reddish liquor, especially if near the eyes of the image of a saint, is reported blood; any whitish moisture, especially if near the breast of the image of a shesaint, is related to be milk; though both of them neither more nor less true, than what William of Newborough writes of the place near Battle Abbey, in Sussex, where the fight was fought between the Normans and English,-that on every shower fresh blood springeth out of the earth, as crying to God for vengeance; being nothing else than a natural tincture of the earth, which doth dye the rain red, as in Rutland, and in other places.*

Of pretended miracles which are really done, let precedency be allowed to those which proceed from natural causes; and here we will instance in one out of many thousands. St. Nun's Pool in Cornwall was formerly famous for curing mad folk, and this the manner thereof :

The water running from St. Nun's Well fell into a square and close-walled plot, which might be filled to what depth they listed.+ Upon the wall was the frantic person set, his back being towards the pool, and from thence with a sudden blow on the breast tumbled headlong into the pond; where a strong fellow, provided for the nonce, took him, and tossed him up and down along and athwart the water, until the patient, foregoing his strength, had somewhat forgot his fury. Then was he conveyed to the church, and certain masses said over him, and St. Nun had the thanks of his recovery. Amidst all this water there was not one drop of miracle, but mere

CAMDEN's Brit, in Sussex. † CAREW, in his Survey of Cornwall, page 123.

natural causes artificially managed; and that, not curing the frenzy, but abating the fit for the present.

5-7. Occult Qualities no Miracles: A Wonder akin to a Miracle in London: A Corpse unconsumed.

But other seeming miracles, done by nature and the concurrence of art, were spun with a finer thread, especially when they made advantage of occult qualities, the certain reason whereof no philosopher can render. Such casualties happen in some times and places, which properly are not miracles, though they puzzle all men to assign the cause whereby they are effected. One of which kind I here transmit to posterity, invested with all the circumstances thereof, which I have carefully (not to say curiously) inquired into :

In the year of our Lord 1646, on the 16th of February, this happened in the parish-church of St. Leonard's, Eastcheap, whilst Mr. Henry Roughborough was minister, and Mr. John Taylor, upper churchwarden thereof. Thomas Hill, the sexton of that parish, making a grave in the night-time for George Streaton in the south side in the passage into the chancel, and under the first stone opened a grave wherein he found two skulls, and (as he conceived) the proportionable bones of bodies belonging unto them. Under all these, he light on a corpse, whose coffin above was consumed, but the body, which he brought out of the grave, complete and entire, save that the nose thereof flatted with his spade, as the sexton believed. The flesh thereof, both for colour and hardness, like scalded bacon dried. His hair and nails complete with his eyes, (but sunk into his head,) and all his entrails entire, (for a young surgeon did open him,) save that shrunk very much within his body.

Some said, it was the corpse of Mr. Pountney in Soper-lane, a merchant, buried thirty-four years before; others, of one Paul, a wealthy butcher in Eastcheap, (which was averred both by his principal apprentice, as also by William Haile, the old surviving sexton,) interred four-and-twenty years ago. I read a memorial hereof entered in their parish-register, and thousands of people are alive to attest the truth thereof. Had this happened in the time of popery, what a stock had here been to graft a miracle on, the branches of the fame whereof would have spread all over Christendom!

8-10. Seeming Miracles done by Art. Mysterious Ventriloqui.

Such false miracles succeed which are effected by art alone; whereof several kinds. First. Such as are done by confederacy, wherein if but five complete [complot] together, they may easily deceive five thousand. Thus the Holy Maid of Kent was admired for telling men's secret sins, by keeping correspondency with the friars that formerly

had heard their confessions. Secondly. Others, done by legerdemain. Thus there was a rood at Bexley in Kent, made with devices to move the eyes and lips, (but not to see and speak,) which, in the year 1538, was publicly showed at St. Paul's by the preacher,* then bishop of Rochester, and there broken in pieces; the people laughing at that which they adored but an hour before. Such imposture was also used at Hailes-Abbey in Gloucestershire, where the blood of a duck (for such it appeared at the dissolving of the House) was so cunningly conveyed that it strangely spirted or sprang up, to the great amazement of common people, accounting it the blood of our Saviour.

Thirdly. Strange things are done by ventriloqui; which is a mysterious manner of uttering words, not out of the porch of the mouth and entry of the throat, (the common places of speech,) but out of the inward room or rather arched cellar of the belly; yet so that the hollowness thereof seemingly fixeth the sound at a distance, which, no doubt, hath been mistaken for the voice of images.

Lastly. Such as are done by the power of satan, who hath a high title and large territory, as termed "prince of the power of the air," Ephes. ii. 2. Now, the air being satan's shop, he hath therein many tools to work with, and much matter to work on. It is the magazine of meteors, lightning, thunder, snow, hail, wind, rain, comets, &c. wherewith many wonders may be achieved; and it is observable, that air is required to those two senses,-sight and hearing, which usher in most outward objects into the soul. False lights are of great advantage to such as vent bad wares. Satan's power must needs be great in presenting shows and sounds, who can order the air, and make it dark or light, or thick or thin, at pleasure.

11-13. Plenty of false Prophecies. A Forest-burning Image. Hæret Delphinus in Ulmo.

We will conclude with one particular kind of miracles, wherein monks by the devil's help did drive a great trade; namely, predictions, or pretended prophecies. Of these some were postnate, cunningly made after the thing came to pass; and that made the invention of Prometheus which was the act of Epimetheus. Others were languaged in such doubtful expressions, that they bore a double sense, and commonly came to pass contrary to the ordinary acceptance of them. However, hereby satan saved his credit, who loves to tell lies, but loathes to be taken in them; and we will only instance in two or three, which we may write and hear with the more patience, because the last in this kind, which, at the Dissolution of abbeys, brought up the rest of monastical prophecies.

STOW's "Chronicle" in that year.

There was in Wales a great and loobily image, called Darvell Gatherene; of which an old prophecy went,-that it should burn a forest; and on that account was beheld by the ignorant with much veneration. Now, at the Dissolution of abbeys, it was brought up to London, and burned at the gallows in Smithfield, with friar Forrest, executed for a traitor.

A prophecy was current in the abbey of Glastonbury,—that a whiting should swim on the top of the Torr thereof, which is a steep hill hard by; and the credulous country people understood it of an eruption of the sea, which they suspected accordingly. It happened that abbot Whiting (the last of Glastonbury) was hanged thereon for his recusancy to surrender the abbey, and denying the king's supremacy; so swimming in air, and not water, and waved with the wind in the place.

14. Prophetical Mottoes inscribed in Gloucester Church.

We will close all with the prophetical mottoes (at leastwise as men since have expounded them) of the three last successive abbots of Gloucester, because much of modesty, and something of piety, contained therein.

1. ABBOT BOULERS: Memento, memento; that is, as some will have it, "Remember, remember, this abbey must be dissolved."

2. ABBOT SEBRUCK: Fiat voluntas Domini; that is, "If it must be dissolved, the will of the Lord be done!"

3. ABBOT MAUBORN: Mersos reatu suscita; "Raise up those which are drowned in guiltiness." Which some say was accomplished, when this abbey found that favour from king Henry VIII. to be raised into a bishopric. But I like the text better than the comment; and there is more humility in their mottoes, than solidity in the interpretations.

III. THAT MANY PRECIOUS BOOKS WERE EMBEZZLED AT THE DISSOLUTION OF ABBEYS, TO THE IRREPARABLE LOSS OF LEARNING.

1. English Libraries excellently furnished.

THE English monks were bookish of themselves, and much inclined to hoard up monuments of learning. Britain, we know, is styled "another world;" and, in this contradistinction, though incomparably less in quantity, acquits itself well in proportion of famous writers, producing almost as many classical Schoolmen for her natives, as all Europe besides. Other excellent books of foreign authors were brought hither, purchased at dear rates; if we consider that the

press, which now runs so incredibly fast, was in that age in her infancy, newly able to go alone; there being then few printed books, in comparison of the many manuscripts. These, if carefully collected and methodically compiled, would have amounted to a library exceeding that of Ptolemy's for plenty, or many Vaticans for choiceness and rarity. Yea, had they been transported beyond the seas, sent over, and sold entire to such who knew their value and would preserve them, England's loss had been Europe's gain, and the detriment the less to learning in general. Yea, many years after, the English might have repurchased for pounds what their grandfathers sold for fewer pence into foreign parts.

2. The miserable Martyrdom of innocent Books.

But alas! those abbeys were now sold to such chapmen, in whom it was questionable whether their ignorance or avarice were greater; and they made havoc and destruction of all. As brokers in Longlane, when they buy an old suit, buy the linings together with the outside; so it was conceived meet, that such as purchased the buildings of monasteries should, in the same grant, have the libraries (the stuffing thereof) conveyed unto them. And now these ignorant owners, so long as they might keep a ledger-book or terrier, by direction thereof to find such straggling acres as belonged unto them, they cared not to preserve any other monuments. The covers of books, with curious brass bosses and clasps, intended to protect, proved to betray them, being the baits of covetousness. And so, many excellent authors, stripped out of their cases, were left naked, to be burned or thrown away. Thus sop's cock, casually lighting on a pearl, preferred a grain before it; yet he left it as he found it; and as he reaped no profit by the pearl, it received no damage by him. Whereas these cruel cormorants, with their barbarous beaks and greedy claws, rent, tore, and tattered these inestimable pieces of antiquity. Who would think, that the Fathers should be condemned to such servile employment, as to be scavengers, to make clean the foulest sink in men's bodies? Yea, which is worse, many an ancient manuscript Bible cut in pieces, to cover filthy pamphlets! So that a case of diamond hath been made to keep dirt within it; yea, "the Wise Men of Gotham," bound up in the Wisdom of Solomon."

3. John Bale lamentably bemoaneth this Massacre.

But hear how John Bale, a man sufficiently averse from the least shadow of popery, hating all monkery with a perfect hatred, complained hereof to king Edward VI.

"Covetousness was at that time so busy about private commodity,