ing it carefully against thieves. And certainly those hellish thieves, or the evil spirits, are over alarmed always when they see the almighty God give so great a treasure to men. You may therefore take it for granted that they will leave no stone unturned, and will use all the art and power they have, to rob you of this treasure. You must therefore guard it with the greatest caution; and you cannot do so more effectually than by a silent, true, and profound humility. In fine, however you may be placed, there will be no need for me to speak to you further as an instructor. For I now desire very much to be instructed by you, and shall stay here for a time till I have heard several sermons of yours. And because, as you have confessed, you have felt a great and new strength both in nature and grace, if God would allow it, I would much wish you to preach again.

THAULER. What advice then do you give me? for I have pawned some of my books, and have received not less than thirty pieces of gold for them.

came.

LAYMAN. Send some one for them, and I, on God's part, will take them out of pawn, and will give you as many pieces of gold. If there is anything over, after getting your books, you will restore it to God. So the books were redeemed and brought back. Upon this, Thauler gave notice that he would preach after three days. Every one was amazed, and on account of the novelty an immense crowd When Thauler arrived, and saw the concourse, he ascended the pulpit, and, covering his eyes with his hood, said within himself, "Oh, merciful God! if it please thee, grant me so to act and speak that thy blessed will may be done in me." When he had said this, involuntarily a fit of weeping seized him, and his eyes shed many sweet tears, which lasted so long that the people got weary, and one of the crowd called out very loud, "How long do you mean to keep us, doctor? It is getting late. If you do not mean to begin, say so, that we may get up and go home." Thauler himself felt that time was passing, and he said again to God, "Oh, most merciful Lord, if it is thy will, stop my tears, and grant that I may finish my sermon. If thou shalt not grant my prayer, I fear that thou thinkest I have not yet been sufficiently despised. But perfect all thy will in me, as shall seem good to thee." But whatever he said or prayed, it did no good, but rather his fit of tears increased. Seeing, therefore, that it thus pleased God, he said to the people, weeping, "I truly grieve, my brethren, that you have been detained so long. But on this occasion I cannot say one word." On hearing this, people got up and went away, and the thing was so talked of through the city that Dr. Thauler was now, for the first time, really despised, and every one said, It is now clearer than light that he is deprived wholly of his reason and senses.

In consequence, his brethren positively interdicted him from preaching, saying to him, You are inflicting on us great harm and confusion by choosing to live so strange a life, and thus weakening your mind. Under these circumstances, Thauler called his layman to him, and told him all that had happened. He said, "Be of good cheer, and do not be at all alarmed; it is clear that your affairs were never

in so good a state as they now are. For the Almighty God now wishes to be wholly your friend; and we must therefore believe that there was still some little pride latent in your heart, which God hath now mortified in you, when, being raised to a conspicuous place, after the example of your Master, you were mocked by men. You certainly ought to receive so great a favour from God with a willing mind; for you may be sure that whatever sinfulness lurked in you is now wholly eradicated. Be of good cheer, therefore, sir, and bear this humiliation with joy and humility; nor let it seem to you anything strange, for I have known it to happen to others also. Nay, beware diligently, lest you in any way despise the pressure of this cross which God has laid upon you. I advise you that, for the next five days, in honour of Christ's five wounds, you exclude all human society and comfort, and remain in solitude. After these days are passed, speak to the prior, and ask him to let you preach in some monastery. If he refuses, ask him first to try and prove you, and give you an opportunity of delivering a lecture to the brethren in the convent."

Thauler rigidly obeyed this advice; and after the five days, having got leave from the prior, he gave so capital a lecture to the brethren, that all very much admired his excellent, spiritual, and divine doctrine. It was therefore resolved in chapter that they should give him one more opportunity of addressing the people. They directed one of the brethren, who was about to preach at a convent, to give notice after his sermon that Dr. Thauler would preach again the next day in the same place. When the brother, then, had finished his own sermon, he said, "I have it in command to give you notice, that Dr. Thauler will preach here to-morrow before dinner. But if the like should befall him as on a late occasion, do not lay any blame on me, as I do only what I am ordered. Be assured, however, that in the mean time he has read to us, in our convent, a lecture so excellent, divine, profound, and spiritual, that many of us declared that they have not, for many years, heard such divine doctrine. I am, however, quite ignorant how he will act with you."

Then, the following day, Thauler went to the monastery, of which notice had been given. It was a nuns' convent. On arriving, he commenced his sermon:*-The text was from Matt. xxv., "Behold, the bridegroom cometh; go ye out to meet him." He began with saying, that it was two years since he had addressed them; that he had divided his last sermon into twenty-four heads; that it was then his custom to mix up a great deal of Latin in his sermons, but that he should do so no more, for that when he wished to use the Latin language he would use it before those who were skilled in it. He then entered on his subject, saying, that our Lord was the bridegroom, and human nature the bride. After shewing how human nature was to be disciplined by sufferings to fit it for these nuptials, (under the form of a dialogue between the two) he described the joy which they would give when the bride was pronounced worthy. At these words some one called out, with a very loud voice, "It is true,

The sermon is omitted here.

VOL. XIII.-June, 1838.

4 H

it is true, it is true!" and having uttered these words fell on the ground as if dead. On this, a woman called out loudly to the preacher, "Cease, Sir, or the man will die in our arms." He answered, "If, my beloved brethren, it hath seemed good to the Bridegroom to take this bride with him, we ought gladly to leave her to him. But now be silent, and I will conclude," which he accordingly did very shortly. After sermon, Thauler, entering the church, said mass, and gave the venerable sacrament of our Lord's body to very many good men. But above forty men remained sitting in the garden of that monastery, which the layman had observed. When mass was over, going to Thauler, he pointed this out to him, and took him to the place, that he might see this for himself. But while mass had been said, all had got up but twelve, whom they found sitting there. On seeing this, Thauler said, "My dear son, what shall we do to these men?" The layman went up to them severally, touched and shook them, but they did not feel it, and seemed like dead men. Thauler was struck

with amazement, never having seen such a thing before; and he said to the layman, "Think you, my son, that they are dead?" The layman, quietly smiling, said, " If they were dead, it would be your fault, and that of the Bridegroom." Thauler replied, that "If the Bridegroom were on his side, the evil would easily be remedied." "Doubt not," said the layman, "but all of them will live; and I much wish you would tell the nuns to take them within the outer circuit of their monastery, to a warm place, lest they contract some infirmity in this cold ground." And it came to pass that the nuns, with great modesty, ordered them to be carried to a warm place, and told Thauler, that one of their own body was, in like manner, in an ecstacy, and lying in her bed, to which they had carried her as if dead. Thauler said, "I beseech you, my sisters, not to be annoyed at this; and be kind enough, when any of the men comes to himself, to give him a little broth, if he will take it." They readily promised this; and then Thauler and the layman retired to his cell, where the layman thus addressed him :

LAYMAN. What think you, Sir? Did the like ever happen to you before? Do you now see how great things God works with a fit instrument? I have no doubt that many besides your hearers will have a knowledge of your sermon, and of all that has happened about it; for one will tell another. Therefore, if you please, I should very much wish that you would let these feeble sons and daughters of yours rest for a time. Your sermon has given them enough business for a long time. But if the Lord allows it, I think it would be for the good of very many if you would preach to secular men. And as this is Lent, people go more willingly to sermons; and I think that you will have a great audience, in consequence of your last sermon.

THAULER. If you advise this, I shall willingly obey. And on the next Saturday is the feast of the virgin St. Gertrude.

LAYMAN. And what is the gospel for that day?

THAULER. The history of the woman taken in adultery. But whatever the appointed gospel was, it is not my purpose to confine myself to it. I shall easily get some theme from it, to which my whole sermon can have a view, and on occasion of which I can put

men's vices and defects before their eyes, according to the aid I receive from divine grace. Nor do I much care what may follow. But I think it very likely that the consequence may be, that my brethren may be very anxious to send me out of this monastery elsewhere, since I have resolved with myself not to spare them, or any one, but simply to speak the truth, as God gives me power; nor will I omit it, even if I should die for it.

LAYMAN. I certainly think that it has not been so necessary for two or three centuries, or more, to set the truth simply and seriously before men as it is now. Do not, therefore, care for anything which may arise from doing so. If you cannot be here you will be elsewhere; and wherever you are, God will not leave you.

Thauler therefore, at the end of a sermon, gave notice that he should preach on St. Gertrude's day. On that day a great crowd was collected to hear him. He came, and thus began :

(To be continued.)

FOX'S ACTS AND MONUMENTS.-No. XII.

THE aspect of Fox's work with reference to the church of Englandor I might of course say, with regard to the whole nature and system of the Christian church, were it not that I am writing more particularly with a view to the powerful influence which is at work to force the book into circulation in our own country, in our own times, and under the peculiar circumstances in which the church exists in England and Ireland, and therefore I say, the aspect of the book as it regards the orders and constitution of that church of which the editor, the recommenders, and a great portion of the subscribers are ministers, may be easily judged of and fully understood by those who have paid any attention to the times of Fox, to his personal history, and the proceedings of the party to which he belonged. It is not necessary to enter on this subject at present; and indeed it is the less requisite, because even those readers who have no particular acquaintance with these points, may have derived sufficient information from a letter which recently appeared in this Magazine,* and which contains quite enough to raise their suspicion on the subject.

I wait, however, with some curiosity, to see whether Fox's conduct, in regard to his personal circumstances, is to be vindicated in the "memoir of the martyrologist himself," which is to be appended; and in the meantime it may assist those who are unacquainted with the book and its period, to say that there were two classes of reformers and martyrs, and other persons to whom we ought not perhaps even for a moment, or for the sake of brevity, or by conventional use, to give such respectable names, who differed very considerably in theory about the constitution of the church.

among

The first of these classes, whatever differences might exist them, all agreed in a very strong and pointed objection to BISHOPS. They could not bear that they should be so great lordes, and exercise

April, p. 412, under the signature "E. C."

such dominion, or indeed any dominion, in the church. Fox tells us that Marsilius of Padua in his "worthy work entitled 'Defensor Pacis' ... in that book (both godly and learnedly disputing against the pope) he proveth all bishops and priests to be equal, and that the pope hath no superiority above other bishops," ii. 705. This writer, perhaps, did not mean that bishops and priests are equal, but only that all bishops are equal among themselves, so as merely to exclude all popes, patriarchs, and archbishops; the language of others, however, is plainer. By plain language I do not mean that coarse foulmouthed ribaldry which loved to grin and hoot at prelacy, and amused itself with such apt alliterations as the blind bishop,' the bloody bishop,' the beastly bishop,' and such sly drollery as talking of bishop Judas Iscariot,' iii. 84. The language, too, which Fox adopts in his marginal notes-such as, "Belly-cheer of ill-disposed prelates and of monasteries, not to be nourished with temporalities and appropriations," iii. 290; and "mark reader the practice of prelates, for thy learning," ii. 378-illustrates the spirit in which he wrote, and which is still more apparent when he has to relate the practising of these prancing prelates. It is indeed so important to notice this, that I must give one out of many specimens which I select because I do not know that it contains (as I suspect that some others do, which may perhaps be vindicated, and which I therefore reserve,) any falsification or exaggeration as to facts;

"What can be more convenient for a true pastor ecclesiastical than humility of heart and spirit, according to the example of the head bishop himself? so what greater show of arrogancy and pride could there be, than in this, whom I have oft named before, Thomas Arundel, archbishop of Canterbury? who, passing by the high street of London, did not only look and wait for the ringing of the bells, for a triumph of his coming, but took great snuff, and did suspend all such churches in London (not only with the steeple and bells, but also with the organs), so many as did not receive his coming with the noise of bells, according as out of his own registers may appear, the words whereof written to his own somner, I have hereto annexed in his own form, as followeth.

"A commission directed to the somner, to suspend certain churches of London, because they rung not their bells at the presence of my lord the archbishop of Canterbury.

"Thomas, by the permission of God, &c. To our well-beloved Thomas Wilton, our somner sworn, health, grace, and blessing. The comeliness of our holy church of Canterbury, over which we bear rule, deserveth and requireth, that while we pass through the province of the same our church, having our cross carried before us, every parish church in their turns ought, and are bounden, in token of special reverence that they bear to us, to ring their bells: which notwithstanding, yea on Tuesday last past, when we, betwixt eight and nine of the clock before dinner, passed openly on foot as it were, through the midst of the city of London, with our cross carried before us, diverse churches, whose names are here beneath noted, shewed towards us willingly, though they certainly knew of our coming, unreverence rather than reverence, and the duty that they owe to our church of Canterbury, ringing not at all at our coming. Therefore we, being willing to revenge this injury, for the honour of our spouse, as we are bounden, command you, that by our authority you put all those churches under our indictment, suspending God's holy organs and instruments in the same: which we also suspend by the tenour of these presents, till the ministers of the aforesaid churches be able hereafter to attain of us the benefit of more plentiful grace.-Given, &c.'

"What great reason was in this, why this archbishop either should thus look for the ringing of the bells, or why he should be so displeased with not ringing, I do not see. Belike, his mind, in the mean time, was greatly occupied with some great