most despotic sovereign; and the weakness of a minority, while it afforded more indulgence to the efforts of the reformers, allowed the constitution to recover from the injury, which it had sustained in the preceding reign. Edward VI. was however no ordinary minor. Though he was not able to hinder that struggle of political parties, which served to reduce within its proper bounds the royal authority, he was sufficiently enlightened to interest himself in the religious question of his time, and is believed to have exerted an influence in effecting the ecclesiastical arrangements, by which his brief reign has been distinguished.

To Cranmer especially we look with gratitude as the father of the English Reformation, as it was he who principally conducted it, from its imperfect commencement under Henry to its completion under Edward, cautiously employing for this purpose the ascendency, which his learning and piety gave him over the former, and openly and directly exercising the influence, which he possessed during the more favourable reign of the latter. The young prince, with a maturity of understanding beyond his years, was by his education strongly attached to the new opinions; and the greater part of the council appointed by the will of his father, particularly his uncle the duke of Somerset, who was soon after the death of Henry chosen pro

tector of the kingdom, were favourable to the views of Cranmer. In such circumstances the archbishop was at length enabled to give form and consistency to the English church, first by a careful arrangement of its liturgy, and then by a determination of those articles of religious belief, in which its clergy should be required to concur. The offices of the church had been very imperfectly reformed in the reign of the preceding sovereign, and it was necessary that they should at this time be rendered conformable to the more correct sentiments of religion which had been introduced. A new liturgy was accordingly published in the year 1548, and four years afterwards a revised form of it was issued, which with (r) slight alterations has since continued to be used. In the same year with the revision of the liturgy articles (s) of belief, forty-two in number, were also published, which, though with some omissions, were not only the basis of those afterwards authorised in the reign of Elizabeth, but almost verbally the

same.

The period which I have reviewed in this lecture, may, as I have already observed, be considered as having completed that part of the English Reformation, which belonged to the form and doctrine of the established church, for Elizabeth, when she undertook to restore it, after the suppression which it had suffered in

the reign of Mary, was with some difficulty persuaded to proceed even as far as Edward had before advanced, being influenced partly by a reverence for the rites which her father had retained, partly by a love of magnificence in public celebrations, and partly by a political desire of uniting her people. Edward indeed and his adviser Cranmer had prepared † a system of ecclesiastical government and discipline for the church, in many particulars characterised by extreme severity; but the plan was defeated by the death of the former and the accession of Mary. The reigns of this queen and of her sister and successor Elizabeth, a review of which will be the subject of the next lecture, form a distinct period of the history of the English Reformation, which gave birth to the important body of protestant dissenters. These had indeed their fore-runner in the reign of Edward, bishop Hooper having given considerable opposition to the use of the vestments of the episcopal order in his consecration: that prelate was however induced to submit by a compromise, which permitted him to decline the use of these vestments on ordinary occasions; and he does not appear to have differed in (t) doctrine or discipline from the established church. It was reserved for the succeeding period to form a body of dissenters, adverse at Burnet, vol. 2. p. 348. + Ibid. p. 187 etc.

once to its forms, its doctrine, and its discipline, a body which subsequently exercised a most important influence on all the political interests of the nation.

The reformation of religion on the continent of Europe was divided into two great branches, that which had been first formed in Germany by Luther, and that which was afterwards formed by Calvin in the little republic of Geneva. Of these it has been remarked in * a preceding lecture, that their influences have been contrasted both in a religious and in a political view, while they have jointly contributed to the improvement and adjustment of the system of Europe, so long as it was fitted to subsist, and the latter of them to its dissolution, when its functions had been discharged. Among the numerous and curious particularities, by which the history of the English government is characterised, it is not the least worthy of observation, that the English Reformation has had a double origin, that of the established church having been derived (u) from Germany, and that of the protestant dissenters from Geneva, the doctrine of the former being however (v) corrected in regard to the eucharist agreeably to the more scriptural conception of the Genevan church. A Lutheran reformation was indeed best adapted to coalesce with the political ar

VOL. VI.

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* Vol. 5. of these Lect. p. 88 etc.

rangements of the English monarchy, and a Calvinistical one to form a republican party opposed to the royal authority, while the coexistence of the two systems among the same people rendered it expedient that the former should experience the correction, which it received from the piety and the wisdom of Cranmer.

I shall conclude this lecture with repeating an interesting remark of Burnet on the administration of the divine providence in the general progress of the Reformation. In the beginning of the reign of Edward the Reformation seemed to be almost extinguished in Germany by the dissolution of the league of Smalkalde, by the capture of its protectors the elector of Saxony and the landgrave of Hesse, and by the Interim, which Charles V. had published and enforced. In England however it was then favoured, and an asylum was there afforded to those, who were forced to fly for their religion. Again, a year before the death of Edward, when the persecution of Mary's bigoted reign was approaching in England, the Protestants obtained in Germany, by the peace of Passau, a firm and lasting establishment, and were enabled in their turn to afford protection to the fugitives of England.

* Hist. of the Reform. vol. 3. p. 219.