I was among them they seemed to me all new folks, I knew no person: the time was sore changed in twenty-eight year, and with the king as then was none of his uncles; the duke of Lancaster was in Aquitaine, and the dukes of York and Gloucester were in other businesses, so that I was at the first all abashed, for if I had seen any ancient knight that had been with King Edward or with the prince, I had been well recomforted and would have gone to him, but I could see none such. Then I demanded for a knight called sir Richard Seury, whether he were alive or not? and it was shewed me yes, but he was at London. Then I thought to go to the lord Thomas Percy, great seneschal of England, who was there with the king: so I acquainted me with him, and I found him right honourable and gracious, and he offered to present me and my letters to the king, whereof I was right joyful, for it behoved me to have some means to bring me to the presence of such a prince as the King of England was. He went to the king's chamber, at which time the king was gone to sleep, and so he shewed me, and bade me return to my lodging and come again, and so I did; and when I came to the bishop's palace, I found the Lord Thomas Percy ready to ride to Ospring, and he counselled me to make as then no knowledge of my being there, but to follow the court; and said he would cause me ever to be well lodged, till the king should be at the fair castle of Ledes in Kent. I ordered me after his counsel and rode before to Ospring; and by adventure I was lodged in a house where was lodged a gentle knight of England, called sir William Lisle; he was tarried there behind the king, because he had pain in his head all the night before ; he was one of the king's privy chamber; and when he saw that I was a stranger, and as he thought, of the marchesse of France, because of my language, we fell in acquaintance together; for gentlemen of England are courteous, treatable, and glad of acquaintance; then he demanded what I was, and what business I had to do in those parts; I shewed him a great part of my coming thither, and all that the lord Thomas Percy had said to me, and ordered me to do. He then answered and said, how I could not have a better mean, and that on the Friday the king should be at the castle of Ledes; and he shewed me that when I came there, I should find there the duke of York, the king's uncle, whereof I was right glad, because I had letters directed to him, and also that in his youth he had seen me in the court of the noble King Edward his father, and with the queen his mother.

JOHN FISHER

[John Fisher, Bishop of Rochester, was born some years before 1470, and was executed in 1535. He was a native of Yorkshire, and was educated at Cambridge, where he obtained the patronage of Margaret, Countess of Richmond, foundress of Christ's College. Fisher was her chief agent in the foundation of this college, and from her bequest he afterwards founded St. John's College. He stood aloof from the dominant faction attached to Wolsey; but when Henry's breach with the Papacy became pronounced, Fisher stood forward as one of the chief of the anti- reform party, steadfastly opposed Henry's divorce from Catherine, and subsequently refused to take the oath in favour of the King's supremacy over the Church. For this he was imprisoned, and while under the royal ban was created Cardinal by Pope Paul III. The high estimation in which he was held is proved by the widespread feeling of outraged sentiment which Henry aroused throughout Christendom by the execution of Fisher in 1535.]

A FULL consideration of Fisher's life would force us to enter upon all the most controverted questions of the stormy time in which he lived. Our business here is concerned solely with his position as a writer of English prose, and in this connection he is of interest, not only for his personal character and attitude, but also as marking a decided advance upon all writers on religious topics who preceded him. Adhering to the old creed, he yet treats it with an originality and a raciness which are all his own. A scholar and student, he is yet careful to be clear and lucid in his sermons to a mixed audience. A courtier, attracted by the dignity of constituted authority, and keenly alive to the grace of aristocratic refinement, he is yet by his very nature honest, instinctively independent, and unswerving in his love for the purity of a religious life. He has the eloquence and fervour of an enthusiastic supporter of the Church, with a copious and flowing diction; but yet is careful and fastidious in his selection of epithets, and shows the balance, rhythm, and harmony that were to be the most characteristic features of English prose when it reached that highest development, towards which he himself greatly assisted. His constant effort to draw some symbolical meaning from the phrases of the Scriptures leads him into refine

ments which are often curiously quaint and far-fetched, but which forced him to use, by the very necessity of the subject, an exact and graphic diction, the essential qualities of which are apparent in spite of the primitive deficiencies of ordered or regular composition. "When our Lord," he says in a typical passage, "of His goodness shall change and turn the soft and slippery dust (signifying wretched sinners) into tough earth by weeping and true penitence for their sins, and after that make them hard as stones by burning charity, apt and able for to suffer great labours"; and a similar tendency to pourtray religious thoughts by some graphic imagery from the material world is visible in every page. He has an artistic and poetical faculty for catching the picturesque aspects of the outer world, and employing them as literary instruments, and no faculty was more serviceable in developing forcible and vivid prose. The following is only one of many such descriptions to be found in Fisher's writings :—“What_marvellous virtue, what wonderful operation, is in the beams of the sun which, as we see this time of the year spread upon the ground, doth quicken and make lively many creatures, the which appeared before as dead! Who that viewed and beheld in the winter season the trees when they be withered and their leaves shaken from them, and all the moisture shrunk into the root, and no lust of greenness nor of life appeareth outwardly-if he had had none experience of this matter before, he would think it an unlike thing that the same trees should revive again and be so lustily clad with leaves and flowers as we now see them." The art of the orator is seen in the direct reference of his hearers to the aspect of nature then before them; and if we overlook, as it is easy to do, the small tincture of archaicism, the structure of the sentence is so perfect, and the selection of epithets so artistic, that the most finished master of our language, as developed by many generations of practice, need not disdain the turn or rhythm of the sentence. Fisher shared with the composers of the English liturgy a peculiarity which greatly contributed to the richness and variety of their diction that coupling of the Saxon word with its classical synonym, which has become familiar to our ears through the Prayer Book. Fisher's prose style may, indeed, be considered as a corner-stone in the foundation of the best type of English pulpit eloquence— simple almost to an extreme, but yet instinct with earnestness and feeling, and at the same time with the balance that comes from careful scholarship and fastidious taste.

H. CRAIK.

DEPENDENCE UPON DIVINE MERCY

THAT man were put in great peril and jeopardy that should hang over a very deep pit holden up by a weak and slender cord or line, in whose bottom should be most woode and cruel beasts of every kind, abiding with great desire his falling down, for that intent when he shall fall down anon to devour him, which line or cord that he hangeth by should be holden up and stayed only by the hands of that man, to whom by his manifold ungentleness he hath ordered and made himself as a very enemy. Likewise, dear friends, consider in yourself. If now under me were such a very deep pit, wherein might be lions, tigers, and bears gaping with open mouth to destroy and devour me at my falling down, and that there be nothing whereby I might be holden up and succoured, but a broken bucket or pail which should hang by a small cord, stayed and holden up only by the hands of him to whom I have behaved myself as an enemy and adversary by great and grievous injuries and wrongs done unto him. Would ye not think me in perilous conditions? yes, without fail. Truly all we be in like manner. For under us is the horrible and fearful pit of hell, where the black devils in the likeness of ramping and cruel beasts doth abide desirously our falling down to them. The lion, the tiger, the bear, or any other wild beast never layeth so busily await for his prey, when he is hungry, as doth these great and horrible hell hounds, the devils, for us. Of whom may be heard the saying of Moses: Dentes bestiarum immittam in eos cum furore trahentium atque serpentum. I shall send down among them wild beasts to gnaw their flesh, with the woodness of cruel birds and serpents drawing and tearing their bones. There is none of us living but that is holden up from falling down to hell in as feeble and frail vessel, hanging by a weak line as may be. I beseech you what vessel may be more bruckle and frail than is our body that daily needeth reparation. And if thou

refresh it not, anon it perisheth and cometh to nought. An house made of clay, if it be not oft renewed and repaired with putting to of new clay shall at the last fall down. And much more this house made of flesh, this house of our soul, this vessel wherein our soul is holden up and borne about, but if it be refreshed by oft feeding and putting to of meat and drink, within the space of three days it shall waste and slip away. We be daily taught by experience how feeble and frail man's body is. Also beholding daily the goodly and strong bodies of young people, how soon they die by a short sickness. And therefore Solomon, in the book called Ecclesiastes, compareth the body of man to a pot that is bruckle, saying, Memento creatoris tui in diebus juventutis tuæ, antequam conteratur hydria super fontem. Have mind on thy Creator and Maker in the time of thy young age, or ever the pot be broken upon the fountain, that is to say, thy body, and thou peradventure fall into the well, that is to say into the deepness of hell. This pot, man's body, hangeth by a very weak cord, which the said Solomon in the same place calleth a cord or line made of silver. Et antequam rumpatur funiculus argenteus. Take heed, he saith, or ever the silver cord be broken. Truly this silver cord whereby our soul hangeth and is holden up in this pot, in this frail vessel our body, is the life of man. For as a little cord or line is made or woven of a few threads, so is the life of man knit together by four humours, that as long as they be knit together in a right order so long is man's life whole and sound. This cord also hangeth by the hand and power of God. For as Job saith, Quoniam in illius manu est anima (id est vita) omnis viventis. In this hand and power is the life of every living creature. And we by our unkindness done against His goodness have so greatly provoked Him to wrath that it is marvel this line to be so long holden up by His power and majesty, and if it be broken, this pot our body is broken, and the soul slippeth down into the pit of hell, there to be torn and all to rent of those most cruel hell hounds. O good Lord how fearful condition stand we in if we remember these jeopardies and perils, and if we do not remember them we may say, O marvellous blindness, ye our madness, never enough to be wailed and cried out upon. Heaven is above us, wherein Almighty God is resident and abiding, which giveth Himself to us as our Father, if we obey and do according unto His holy commandments. The deepness of hell is under us, greatly to be abhorred, full of devils. Our sins and