REIGN OF MARY.

On the accession of Queen Mary to the throne, all the Protestant pulpits were shut up; the most eminent preachers in London were put in confinement, and all the married clergy throughout the kingdom were deprived of their benefices. Dr. Parker calculates, that out of sixteen thousand clergymen, not less than twelve thousand were turned out. A few days after the queen had been proclaimed, there was a tumult at St. Paul's, in consequence of Dr. Bourne, one of the canons of that church, preaching against the reformation. He spoke in

praise of Bishop Bonner, and was making some severe reflections on the late King Edward, when the whole audience rose in confusion. Some called out, "Pull down the preacher;" others threw stones; and one person aimed a dagger at the doctor, which stuck in the pulpit. Had it not been for the exertions of Mr. Bradford and Mr. Rogers, two popular preachers for the reformation, he had certainly been sacrificed. These men, at the hazard of their lives, rescued him, and conveyed him in safety to a neighbouring house. This act of kindness was afterwards repaid by their imprisonment and death at the stake.

SINCERITY.

La Bruyere is strong in his commendation of Father Seraphin, an apostolical preacher. The first time (he says) that he preached before Louis XIV.,

he said to this monarch, "Sire, I am not ignorant of the custom according to the prescription of which I should pay you a compliment. This I hope your majesty will dispense with; for I have been searching for a compliment in the Scriptures, and unhappily, I have not found one."

NOVELTY.

When M. le Tourneau preached the Lent sermons at St. Benoit, in Paris, in the room of Father Quesnel, who had been obliged to abscond, Louis XIV. enquired of Boileau if he knew any thing of a preacher called Le Tourneau, whom every body was running after? 'Sire," replied the poet, "your majesty knows that people always run after novelties; this man preaches the gospel." The king then pressing him to give his opinion seriously, Foileau added, "When M. le Tourneau first ascends the pulpit, his ugliness so disgusts the congregation, that they wish he would go down again; but when he begins to speak, they dread the time of his descending."

It is a singular fact, that this very successful preacher, after he had entered into orders, thought himself so ill-qualified for the pulpit, that he actually went and renounced all the duties of the priesthood; but was afterwards, by the earnest persuasions of M. de Sacy, induced to resume them.

Boileau's remark, as to the novelty of "preaching the gospel" at that period, brings to remembrance the candid confession of a preacher at Mols, near Antwerp, who in a sermon delivered to an audience

wholly of his own order, observed, "We are worse than Judas; he sold and delivered his master; we sell him to you, but deliver him not."

CONTRAST.

Carracciolo, a celebrated Italian preacher, once exercised his talents before the Pope, on the luxury and licentiousness which then prevailed at court. "Fie on St. Peter! fie on St. Paul!" exclaimed he, "who having it in their power to live as voluptuously as the Pope and the cardinals, chose rather to mortify their lives with fasts, with watchings, and labours."

QUEEN ELIZABETH.

With all the strength of mind which Queen Elizabeth possessed, she had the weakness of her sex as far as related to her age and her personal attractions. "The majesty and gravity of a sceptre," says a contemporary of this great princess, "could not alter that nature of a woman in her. When Bishop Rudd was appointed to preach before her, he wishing in a godly zeal, as well became him, that she should think some time of mortality, being then sixtythree years of age, he took his text fit for that purpose out of the Psalms, 90, v. 12. O teach us to NUMBER our days, that we may incline our hearts unto wisdom;' which text he handled most learnedly. But when he spoke of some sacred and mystical numbers, as three for the Trinity, three times three for the heavenly hierarchy, seven for the sabbath, and seven times seven for a jubilee; and, lastly, nine times seven

for the grand climacterical year (her age), she perceiving whereto it tended, began to be troubled with it. The bishop discovering all was not well, for the pulpit stood opposite to her majesty, he fell to treat of some more plausible numbers, as of the number 666, making Latinus, with which, he said, he could prove Pope to be Antichrist, &c. He still, however, interlarded his sermon with Scripture passages, touching the infirmities of age, as that in Ecclesiasticus, 'When the grinders shall be few in number, and they wax dark that look out of the windows, &c. and the daughters of singing shall be abased;' and more to that purpose. The queen, as the manner was, opened the window; but she was so far from giving him thanks or good countenance, that she said plainly, 'He might have kept his arithmetic for himself; but I see the greatest clerks are not the wisest men ;' and so she went away discontented."

ROYAL WIT.

Fuller has enrolled among his Worthies, Dr. Field, Dean of Gloucester, a learned divine," whose memory," he says, "dwelleth like a field which the Lord hath blessed." He was an excellent preacher, and used often to preach before James I., especially in his progress through Hampshire in 1609. The first time his majesty heard him, he observed in the same punning spirit with Fuller, and which was indeed characteristic of the age, "This is a field for the Lord to dwell in." His majesty gave him a promise of a bishopric, but never fulfilled it. When he heard of the doctor's death, his conscience appears to

have smote him. He expressed his regret, and said, "I should have done more for that man.'

Another divine, whom his majesty used to style "the King of preachers," was John King, who became Bishop of London in 1611; and was so great a preacher, that even after his elevation to the mitre, he never missed delivering a sermon on Sunday when his health permitted. Lord Chief Justice Coke used to say of Bishop King, that "he was the best preacher in the Star Chamber in his time."

RESOLUTE NONCONFORMIST.

About the year 1644, a party of the Parliament horse came to the village of Laugharn, and enquired whether its popish vicar, Mr. Thomas, was still there, and whether he continued reading the liturgy and praying for the queen? One of them added, that he would go to church next Sunday, and if Mr. Thomas dared to pray for that —, he would certainly pistol him. Information of the threat having been conveyed to Mr. Thomas, his friends earnestly pressed him to absent himself; but thinking this would be a cowardly departure from his duty, he resolutely refused. He had no sooner began the service, than the soldiers came, and placed themselves in the pew next to him; and when he prayed for the queen, one of them snatched the book out of his hand, and threw it at his head, saying, "What do you mean by praying for a ?" The preacher bore the insult with so much christian meekness and composure, that the soldier who had been guilty of it immediately slunk away ashamed and confused. Mr. Thomas continued