Never, surely, was designation more just; for never had any man a better claim to the title of the Reformer of his country, than the subject of these memoirs. After having stated the advantages enjoyed in executing this undertaking, the author thus modestly expresses himself:

I wish not to be understood as intimating that the reader may expect, in the following work, much information which is absolutely new. He who engages in researches of this kind must lay his account with finding the result of his discoveries reduced within a small compass, and should be prepared to expect that many of his readers will pass over with a cursory eye what he has procured with great, perhaps with unnecessary labour. The principal facts respecting the Reformation and the Reformer are already known. I flatter myself, however, that I have been able to place some of them in a new and more just light, and to bring forward others which have not hitherto been generally known.'

It is, we conceive, here satisfactorily proved that Knox was descended from a respectable family, and that he had a liberal education. He was brought up at the grammar-school of Haddington, and thence sent to St. Andrew's, which was deemed at that period the first University in Scotland; where he was employed for a considerable time in teaching philosophy, and which he quitted only from a fear of the danger that might arise to him from heretical opinions, which he had embraced, and did not conceal. At the University, he was the cotemporary of George Buchanan; and it is here shewn that, in future life, these distinguished persons mutually held each other in high respect but it does not appear that any intimacy prevailed between them while at college. The professor of theology and philosophy, under whom both these celebrated men studied, was John Mair; (better known, says the author, by his Latin name of Major;) and we agree with the Doctor in thinking that to this respectable source may be traced the political tenets which were afterward entertained by them.

In opposition to Dr. Cook, the present biographer believes that the Reformer was admitted into priest's orders before he quitted the Catholic church, and at an early period of his residence at St. Andrew's. To us, however, this appears doubtful; and, although Dr. M'Crie adduces proofs in support of his opinion which are intitled to weight, they do not seem in our judgment to be decisive. Knox himself never mentions nor alludes to such orders; and the whole of his conduct, before his call to exercise the protestant ministry, strongly rebuts the supposition because, although his zeal for the new doctrines led him to take an active part in the propagation of them, he never preached, but limited himself to catechizing, pre

viously

viously to his call. To many persons, it may be a matter of little importance whether he had or had not the hands of a profligate . prelate laid on him; yet, as others may view the question in a very different light, we wish that it had been more absolutely

determined.

In order to impress the reader's mind with the important services rendered to their own age and to subsequent times by the Reformers, and particularly by Knox, an able and happy sketch of the religious state of Scotland occurs early in the first of these volumes; in which we meet with a curious detail of the abuses of religion, and of clerical enormities. It hence appears that in no country had these evils been carried to a greater height, or were their abettors more determined to keep out by forcible means the light which was breaking forth upon the world. While assigning the causes which rendered such efforts vain, the author mentions traits of the times which are so singular as to deserve our notice. It is said that

The poets who flourished before the Reformation used very great freedom with the church, and there were not wanting many persons of exalted rank who encouraged them in this species of composition. The same individuals who were ready, at the call of the pope and clergy, to undertake a crusade for extirpating heresy, entertained poets who inveighed against the abuses of the court of Rome, and lampooned the religious orders. One day they assisted at an Autoda-fé, in which heretics were committed to the flames for the preservation of the Catholic church; next day they were present at the acting of a pantomime or a play, in which the ministers of that church were held up to ridicule. Intoxicated with power, and lulled asleep by indolence, the clergy had either overlooked these attacks, or treated them with contempt; it was only from experience that they learned their injurious tendency; and before they made the discovery, the practice had become so common that it could no longer be restrained. This weapon was wielded with great success by the friends of the reformed doctrine in Scotland.'

We

In the interval between Knox's first departure from St. Andrew's and his being carried into France with the garrison of that place, he made an open profession of the reformed religion, engaged in the education of the children of two lairds, and at the same time publicly catechized young men. behold him also much attached to the amiable and accomplished George Wishart the martyr; and during the same period he was called to exercise the pastoral office. The objections to his entering the castle of St. Andrew's are here obviated, and that transaction is placed in its true light. The garrison, it is well known, capitulated, and by the agreement was to be carried into France, and then to be set at liberty: but the capitu

lation was violated, many were thrown into prison, and Knox was sent to the gallies. Here he displayed his characteristic firmness, and employed the intervals of suffering in re-asserting, and supporting by his writings, those doctrines which he had inculcated during his ministry. As a specimen of the fairness of the biographer, we quote a passage from his account of this period. Speaking of the charge brought against Knox, for having defended the assassination of the Cardinal of St. Andrew's, he says;

I know that some of Knox's vindicators have denied this charge, and maintain that he justified it only so far as it was the work of God, or a just retribution in Providence for the crimes of which the Cardinal had been guilty, without approving the conduct of those who were the instruments of punishing him. The just judgment of Heaven is, I acknowledge, the chief thing to which he directs the attention of his readers; at the same time, I think no one who carefully reads what he has written on this subject, can doubt that he justified the action of the conspirators. The truth is, he held the opinion, that persons who, according to the law of God, and the just laws of so ciety, had forfeited their lives, by the commission of flagrant crimes, such as notorious murderers and tyrants, might warrantably be put to death by private individuals; provided all redress, in the ordinary course of justice, was rendered impossible, in consequence of the offenders having usurped the executive authority, or being systematically protected by oppressive rulers. This was an opinion of the same kind with that of tyrannicide, held by so many of the ancients, and defended by Buchanan in his dialogue, De jure regni apud Scotos. It is a principle, I confess, of very dangerous application, extremely liable to be abused by factious, fanatical, and desperate men, as a pretext for perpetrating the most nefarious deeds. It would be unjust, however, on this account, to confound it with the principle, which, by giving to individuals a liberty to revenge their own quarrels, legitimates assassination, a practice which was exceedingly common in that age.'

When released from his captivity in France, Knox did not return to his native country, but came to England, (which was then under Edward VI.,) continued there during the whole of that reign, and was employed in disseminating the Reformation.

At the time of which we are speaking, Protestant pastors were very scarce in this part of our island; the reason of which circumstance is given in a passage that well deserves the attention of the student of English history.

When Henry suppressed the monasteries, and seized their revenues, he allotted pensions to the monks during life; but to relieve the royal treasury of this burden, small benefices in the gift of the crown were afterwards substituted in the place of pensions. The example of the monarch was imitated by the nobles who had procured monastic lands. By this means a great part of the inferior livings were held

by

by ignorant and superstitious monks, who were a dead weight upon the English church, and a principal cause of the nation's sudden relapse to popery, at the subsequent accession of Queen Mary.

Cranmer had already adopted measures for remedying this alarming evil. With the concurrence of the Protector and the Privy Council, he had invited a number of learned Protestants from Germany into England, and had placed Peter Martyr, Martin Bucer, Paul Fagius, and Emanuel Tremellius, as professors in the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge. This was a wise measure, which secured a future supply of useful preachers, trained up by these able masters. But the necessity was urgent, and demanded immediate provision. For this purpose, instead of fixing a number of orthodox and popular preachers in particular charges, it was judged most expedient to employ them in itinerating through different parts of the kingdom, where the clergy were most illiterate or disaffected to the Reformation, and where the inhabitants were most addicted to superstition.

In these circumstances, our zealous countryman did not remain long unemployed. The reputation which he had gained by his preaching at St. Andrew's, and his late sufferings, recommended him to the English Council; and soon after his arrival in England, he was sent down from London to preach in Berwick.'

In this employment, he gave the King and council so much satisfaction as to cause him to be appointed one of the Royal chaplains, and preferment to be bestowed on him, which he declined; and it is said that even a bishopric was offered to him. The nature of his connection with the church of England is here fully explained, and the course of his sentiments on church-polity investigated; and it is satisfactorily shewn that these were not originally derived from foreign divines, though they might have been afterward confirmed by intercourse with them. In our progress through the volumes, also, we meet with many important observations, and curious facts, relating to the respective church-politics of the northern and the southern parts of this island. It required not the foresight of the Reformer to perceive the inevitable fate which he would have undergone, had he continued in England after the accession of Mary; yet so tardy was he in quitting it, that he rendered his situation very critical, and was obliged to accelerate his flight to the continent without visiting his wife and her family. After various peregrinations while abroad, he became one of the pastors of the English church at Francfort, where he found dissensions prevailing, which he was able to heal; but they were again kindled by fresh refugees, and in consequence of them Knox was obliged to leave that place. He then betook himself to Geneva, where he was well received by Calvin, with whom he had previously formed an intimacy.

Here he devoted his hours to study and it is said that it was not without reluctance that he quitted the literary leisure which he enjoyed, in order to visit his wife, and to avail himself of the favourable opportunities which the state of Scotland now offered for advancing the Reformation: but, however reluctant he might feel, he arrived in Scotland at the end of the harvest in 1555, and lost no time in employing his uncommon energies in disseminating the new doctrines. In the course of the en suing year, he received an invitation from the English church at Geneva to become their pastor, which he accepted; and in July 1556, with this view, he again took leave of his native

country.

The Reformer's residence at Geneva is represented by this author as the most tranquil part of his public life: but he was scarcely settled in his new charge, when he received an invitation from the nobility to come back to Scotland, and was informed that affairs were in a favourable train for the progress of the Reformation. He was not tardy in obeying this summons: but, on his arrival at Dieppe, he was met by letters which represented the state of things as having become highly adverse, and his return was discouraged. Deeply chagrined by this intelligence, he wrote to his countrymen in a most animating style, and did not judge it proper to proceed in his journey, but again repaired to Geneva; whence, on receiving another invitation, he once more departed, and arrived at Edinburgh in May 1559.

During his stay abroad, the Reformer published a tract which he called "The first Blast of the Trumpet against the monstrous · Government of Women." Here he maintained the general thesis with considerable ability and force; and, we are assured, he was provoked to pen it by the enormities of our Queen Mary. However this may have been, it is well known that this performance rendered him ever afterward very obnoxious to Elizabeth and her courtiers. On his arrival in Scotland, he saw that the grand struggle was approaching; and in this pros pect he seems to have rejoiced, and to have resolved in no way to spare himself. He looked forwards, indeed, with joy to the decisive moment, and was ready for life or death; and, sensible that the hour for action was come, he laid aside the wariness and circumspection which occasionally he shewed himself capable of employing. The reformed party about this time passed by the name of the Congregation, and he was its grand He rescued it from being terrified by its enemies; it could adopt no great and decisive measure without his sanction; when it was in the utmost despondency, he gave it fresh spirits; and his activity and his character eminently contributed to obtain for it foreign aid.

mover.

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