garments of popery, and would not, therefore, be persuaded to wear them." Previous to the year 1566, this worthy servant of Christ was suspended; and though the cause of his suspension is not mentioned, it was, undoubtedly, his nonconformity to those rites and ceremonies which he accounted popish, superstitious, and unlawful.

*

These

During the same year he was involved in other troubles. For in the month of April, seeing a corpse coming to be buried at his church, attended by clerks in their surplices singing before it, he threatened to shut the church-doors against them; but the singing-men resisted, being resolved to go through with their work, till the alderman's deputy threatened to put them in the stocks for breaking the peace. Upon this, they slunk away. But complaint was made to Archbishop Parker and other commissioners, and Mr. Crowley was summoned to appear before them. Accordingly, April 4th, he appeared before the Archbishop, the Bishop of London, and the rest of their colleagues. During his examination, says our author, there fell from his lips several fond paradoxes, tending to anabaptism. fond paradoxes, as he is pleased to call them, were the following: When speaking of a call to the ministry, he said, "A man may have a motion in his conscience to preach, without any external call. And, as pastor, he would resist the surplice-men." When the commissioners asked him whether he would resist a minister thus sent to him, (meaning in his surplice) he said, "That till he was deprived, his conscience would move him so to do." These are his fond paradoxes, said to be of so dangerous a tendency! When the archbishop discharged him from his flock and his parish, he refused to be deprived contrary to law, saying," he would be committed to prison, rather than suffer a wolf to come to his flock." The good man was, therefore, deprived of his living, separated from his flock, and committed to prison. Also, the alderman's deputy mentioned above, for taking his part against the surplicemen, was obliged to enter into a bond of a hundred pounds, to be ready when called. "So gentle," says Mr. "Strype, was our archbishop in his censure of so great a fault!"+

How long Mr. Crowley remained a prisoner, we have not been able to learn, Certain it is, that he continued under

confinement some time. The mild archbishop informed the secretary how he had dealt with him, and that he could. not have treated him otherwise, considering his behaviour, and especially his saying, that he would not suffer the wolf to come to his flock. By the wolf, Mr. Crowley appears to have meant a minister in a surplice; and this expression seems to have been a very material part of the crime for which he was censured. The Lord's day following his deprivation and commitment, the archbishop sent Mr. Bickley, his chaplain, to preach in his place.

In the year 1582, Mr. Crowley was very diligent in disputing with certain popish priests, confined in the Tower, under sentence of death. With one of them, named Kirby, he took much pains, and laboured to the utmost of his power, to convince him of his error, in maintaining the lawfulness of the pope's deposing princes. He attended them to the place of execution, where he used all his endeavours to convince Kirby of the absurdity of those principles for which he was about to suffer. He urged from Rom. xiii. and John xix., that, as princes receive their authority from God alone, they could not be deposed by any other power. When Kirby asked whether a prince guilty of turcism, atheism, or infidelity, might not be deposed, it is said, that Mr. Crowley and the rest of the ministers answered very learnedly in the negative. On this occasion, our divine observed, "That if a prince fall into any such errors, he is indeed punishable. But by whom? Not by any earthly prince; but by that heavenly prince, who gave him his authority; and who, seeing him abuse it, will, in justice, correct him for so doing."*

Mr. Crowley was a man of a most holy and exemplary life, a pious, learned, and laborious preacher, and much beloved by his people, Mr. Strype denominates him a learned and zealous man, possessing great parts and eminent piety.‡ Wood says, that he lived to a considerable age, and spent his life chiefly in labouring to propagate and settle the protestant religion. He was a most learned and laborious writer, as appears from his numerous works, many of which were written against the errors of popery. He died June 18, 1588, and his remains were interred in the chancel of St. Giles's church, where he had been vicar. The following

Strype's Parker, p. 219.

+ MS. penes me. Strype's Annals, vol. i. p. 136.-Life of Parker, p. 219. Wood's Athens Oxon. vol. i. p. 191.

monumental inscription, engraven on a brass plate, was afterwards erected to his memory:*

Here lieth the body

of ROBERT CROWLEY, clerk,
late vicar of this parish,

who departed this life the 18 day of June,
in the year 1588.

His WORKS.-1. The Supper of the Lord after the true meaning of the Sixth of John, and the xi of the 1 Epistle to the Corinthians, And incidentally in the Exposition of the Supper, is confuted the Letter of Mr. Thomas More against Joh. Frith, 1533.-2. Confutation of Nicholas Shaxton, Bishop of Sarum, his Recantation of 13 Articles at the Burning of Mrs. Anne Askew, 1546.-3. Explicatio petetoria (ad Parliamentum) adversus expilatores plebis, published in English in 1548.-4. Confutation of Miles Hoggard's wicked Ballad made in Defence of Transubstantiation of the Sacrament, 1548.5. The Voice of the last Trumpet blown by the seventh Angel, containing twelve Lessons, 1549.-6. Translation of the Psalms of David, 1549.-7. The Litany with Hymns, 1549.-8. David's Psalms turned into Metre, 1549.-9. The Visions of Pierce Plowman, 1550.-10. Pleasure and Pain, Heaven and Hell. Remember these four and all shall be well, 1550.-11. Way to Wealth, wherein is plainly a most present Remedy for Sedition, 1550.-12. One and thirty Epigrams, wherein are briefly touched so many Abuses, that may, and ought to, be put away, 1550.-13. An Apologie of those English Preachers and Writers, which Cerberus the Three-headed Dog of Hell, chargeth with false Doctrine under the name of Predestination, 1566.-14. Of the Signes and Tokens of the latter Day, 1567.—15. A Setting open of the subtle Sophistry of Tho. Watson, D. D. which he used in his twoSermons preached before Qu. Mary, in Lent 1553, concerning the real Presence in the Sacrament, 1569.+-16. Sermon in the Chappell at Gilde-hall in London, 29 Sept. 1574, before the Lord Mayor and the whole state of the Citie, on Psalme cxxxix. 21, &c., 1575.-17. Answer to Tho. Pound in six Reasons, wherein he sheweth that the Scriptures must be judged by the Church, 1581.-18. Brief Discourse concerning those four usual Notes whereby Christ's Catholick Church is known, 1581.-19. Replication to that lewd Answer which Frier Jo Francis (of the Minimies order in Nigeon, near Paris) hath made to a Letter that his Mother caused to be sent to him out of England, 1586.-20. Deliberate Aunsweare to a Papist, proving that Papists are Antichristian Schismatics, and that Religious Protestants are indeed true Catholicks, 1587.-21. The Schoole of Vertue and Book of good Nurture, teaching Children and Youths their Duties, 1588.-22. Dialogue between Lent and Libertie, wherein is declared that Lent is a meer Invention of Man.

* Stow's Survey of London, b. iii. p. 83.

+ Mr. Strype says, that these sermons being very much admired, and preventing many from embracing the protestant religion, ought to have been answered much sooner.-Strype's Annals, vol. i. p. 540.

NICHOLAS CRANE was educated at Cambridge, a divine of great learning, and a zealous nonconformist. He was minister of Roehampton in Surrey, but falling under the displeasure of the prelates, he was more than once cast into prison, and at last he died in Newgate, for nonconformity. In the year 1569, Mr. Crane, and Mr. William Bonham, were licensed to preach by Bishop Grindal. Their licenses are said to have been granted upon condition that they should avoid all conventicles, and all other things contrary to the order established in this kingdom.

Afterwards, the two divines were apprehended and cast into prison for nonconformity, where they remained more than twelve months, and were then released. But persisting in their nonconformity, and not keeping to the exact order established in the church of England, Mr. Crane was silenced from preaching within the diocese of London, and Mr. Bonham was again committed to prison; but it does not appear how long they continued under the ecclesiastical

censure.+

Mr. Crane was a leading man among the nonconformists of his time, and, in the year 1572, united with his brethren in the erection of the presbyterian church at Wandsworth in Surrey. His exceptions against subscription to the Book of Common Prayer, are still on record. They were delivered most probably upon his appearance before the ecclesiastical commissioners, and were chiefly the following:-"He excepted against reading the apocryphal books in public worship, to the exclusion of some parts of canonical scripture:-Against that part of the ordination service, receive the Holy Ghost, &c. :-Against the interrogatories in baptism proposed to infants who cannot give any answer:Against the cross in baptism, which has been often used to superstitious purposes:-Against private baptism, which the Book of Common Prayer allows to be administered by persons not ordained :-Against the gospel appointed to be read the sabbath after Easter, which is taken from the mass book, and is manifestly untrue when compared with scripture. He concludes by observing, that if these and some other things equally erroneous, were reformed, it would please Almighty God; the ministers of Christ would be more firmly united against their common enemy, the papists; many of God's ministers and people now weeping,

See Art. Bonham.

+ Strype's Grindal, p. 153—155.—MS. Chronology, vol. ii. p. 405. (6.) Fuller's Church Hist. b. ix. p. 103.

would rejoice; many able students would be encouraged to enter the ministry; and the religion of Jesus Christ would more extensively prevail."

In the year 1583, Mr. Crane, with nine other learned divines of Cambridge, wrote to Mr. Thomas Cartwright, warmly recommending him to publish an answer to the Rhemist Translation of the New Testament. Afterwards, he was cast into prison for refusing conformity to the established church. He subscribed the petition presented to the lord treasurer, and signed by about sixty protestant nonconformists, then confined in the various prisons in and about London. Mr. Strype has placed this petition in the year 1592: but it should have been earlier. Mr. Crane died in Newgate, in the year 1588, where many of his suffering brethren shared the same fate.

LAWRENCE HUMPHREY, D.D.-This celebrated puritan was born at Newport-Pagnel in Buckinghamshire, about the year 1527, and educated first in the university of Cambridge, then in Magdalen college, Oxford, where, in 1549, he became perpetual fellow, and was chosen reader of Greek in 1552. Having applied himself closely to theological studies, he entered, about the same time, into the sacred function. He remained at Oxford, some time after the accession of Queen Mary and the commencement of her severities; but, at length, by the permission of the president, vice-president, and others of his college, was allowed to go abroad. "In the opinion of all," says the Oxford historian," he was much commended for his life and con

* Parte of a Register, p. 119–124. + See Art. Cartwright.

An abstract of this most moving petition is given in another place.See Art. John Greenwood.

§ Account prefixed to “Parte of a Register.”

Great numbers perished in the various prisons where they were long confined and most cruelly used. Among the rest, was one Mr. Roger Rippon; who, dying in Newgate, his fellow prisoners put the following inscription upon his coffin:

"This is the corpse of Roger Rippon, a servant of Christ, and her "majesty's faithful subject; who is the last of sixteen or seventeen which "that great enemy of God, the Archbishop of Canterbury, with his high "commissioners, have murdered in Newgate within these five years, manifestly for the testimony of Jesus Christ. His soul is now with the "Lord; and his blood crieth for speedy vengeance against that great enemy of the saints, and against Mr. Richard Young, (a justice of the peace in London) who in this and many the like points, hath abused his power, for the upholding of the Romish antichrist, prelacy, and priest"hood. He died Â, D. 1592.”—Strype's Annals, vol. iv. p. 133.

"