he married to prove, that the grace of a perpetual continency is neither given to all, nor for ever.

He published only some disputations, which he had held at Basil and Bern; being, as we observed before, much more considerable as a preacher than a writer.

MILES COVERDALF,

BISHOP OF EXETER.

THIS pious Reformer was born in Yorkshire, in the reign of Henry VIII. and being educated in the Romish religion, became an Augustine monk. He took his doctor's degree at Tubingen in Germany, and was admitted ad eundem at Cambridge. By GOD's grace embracing the Reformation, he entered into holy orders; and, as Bale tells us, he was one of the first, who, upon the delivery of the church of England from the see of Rome, together with Dr Robert Barnes, taught the purity of the gospel, and dedicated himself wholly to the service of the Reformed religion. He assisted Tindale and Rogers in the English version of the Bible, published in the years 1532 and 1537, which he afterwards revised and corrected for another edition in a larger volume, with notes, which was printed in or about the year 1540. Dr Coverdale succeeded Dr John Harman, alias Voysey, in the see of Exeter, August the fourteenth, in the year 1551, being promoted propter singularem sacrarum literarum doctrinam, moresque probatissimas; i. e. on account of his extraordinary knowledge in divinity, and his unblemished cha⚫racter.' The patent for conferring this bishopric on him, though a married man, is dated August 14th, 1551, at Westminster. Upon the accession of Q. Mary to the throne, bishop Coverdale was ejected from his see, and thrown into prison; out of which he was released at the earnest request of the King of Denmark, and, as a very great favour, permitted to go into banishment. In his confinement, he was one of those who signed the famous confession of faith, which we have given our Readers in the first volume, under the article of Ferrar. Upon this ejection, Harman was reinstated. Soon after Q. Elizabeth's

accession to the throne, he returned from his exile, but refused to be restored to his bishopric, and passed the remainder of his time in a private manner. He died May 20, 1567, in a good old age, viz. at the age of eighty-one, at London, and lies buried in the church of St Bartholomew by the Exchange, attended to his grave by vast crouds of people. He was a celebrated preacher, justly admired, and very much followed.

He was Author of several TRACTS. He wrote, 1. "The Christen Rule, or State of all the Worlde from the highest to the lowest and how every Man Shulde lyve to please God in his callynge. 2. The Christen State of Matrymonye, wherein Husbandes and Wyfes maye lerne to keepe House together with Loue. The original of holy Wedloke; when, where, how, and of whom it was instituted and ordeyned; what it is; how it ought to proccade; what be the occasions, frute, and commodities thereof contrarywyse how shamefull and horrible a thing Whoredome and Aduoutry [Adultery] is; how one ought also to chose hym a mete and convenient Spouse to keep and increace the mutual Loue, Trouth and Dewtye of Wedloke; and how maried Folkes shulde bring up theyer Chyldren in the Feare of God. 3. A Christen Exhortation to customable Swearers. What a ryghte and lawfull Othe is; whan, and before whome it oughte to be. 4. The Maner of sayenge Grace, or gyvyng Thankes to God, after the Doctrine of Holy Scrypture. 5. The old Fayth an evident Probacion out of the Holy Scrypture, that the Christen Fayth (which is the ryghte, true, olde, and undoubted Fayth) hath endured sens the beginnyng of the Worlde. Herein hast thou also a short summe of the whole Byble, and a Probacion, that al vertuous Men have pleased God, and wer saved through the Christen Fayth. These pieces are printed together in a small duodecimo, and a black letter, in the year 1547. 6. A faythfull and true Prognostication upon the year M.CCCC.xlix. and parpetualy after to the Worldes Ende, gathered out of the Prophecies and Scryptures of God, by the Experience and Practice of hys Workes, very comfortable for all Christen Hertes; divided into Seven Chapters. 7. A spirituall Almanacke, wherein every Christen Man and Woman may see what they oughte daylye to do, or leaue undone. Not after the Doctrine of the Papistes, not after the Lernynge of Ptolomy, or other Heythen Astronomers, but out of the very true and wholsome Doctryne of God our Almyghty heavenly Fa

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ther,