same plan is pursued in the present publication; the involved construction of sentences, common in writers of that period, has also been removed. Those words which have become unintelligible or offensive, are exchanged for others, or are explained by notes when it is desirable that they should be retained. These variations, if they may be so called, were as necessary to render this work generally useful, as the adoption of modern orthography. The utmost care has been taken that the meaning of the author should be strictly preserved, and the various pieces have been collated with the best and earliest editions, or with manuscript copies. This has been done, that the meaning of the author might be given as nearly as possible, not from the first editions being the most correct, as they often abound with errors, for which the hurried or careless manner in which they were for the most part passed through the press, will readily account. The present reprints, it is believed, will be found to present the most correct text of these writers that has hitherto appeared. More than half of the pieces included in this collection, have not been reprinted since the sixteenth century, and a considerable portion is now printed for the first time." The Volumes included under the title of THE BRITISH REFORMERS may be arranged in the following order: By order of the Executive Committee. Wм. M. ENGLES, EDITOR. Being a second Sermon preached before King Edward VI., Preached on the twenty-third Sunday after Trinity, 1552, 215 Preached on the twenty-fourth Sunday after Trinity, 1552, 235 Extract from the Sermon preached before the convocation of 1553, 376 Letter of King Henry VIII., for the restoring again the free liberty of reading the Holy Scriptures, Extracts from a Letter to M. Morice, concerning the articles A Letter sent to Mrs. Wilkinson, of London, widow, out of The Protestation of M. Hugh Latimer, rendered in writing, to Doctor Weston, and others of the queen's commissioners with him, concerning certain questions to him propounded, in an assembly at Oxford, holden the twentieth of April, A. D. 1554; faithfully translated out of Latin into English, 430 Α BRIEF ACCOUNT OF DR. HUGH LATIMER, Bishop of Worcester, and Martyr, 1555. DR. HUGH LATIMER was the son of a respectable farmer of Thurcaster in Leicestershire. He was born about the year 1480, and at an early age gave evidence of good abilities, so that his parents sent him to school, and afterwards to the University of Cambridge, where he was distinguished for his diligence in study. When ordained, he endeavoured to discharge his duties with much zeal; as he afterwards expressed, "I remember how scrupulous I was in my time of blindness and ignorance;" and he once had the intention of becoming a friar, thinking that by living a monastic life he should escape damnation. Fox adds "In this blind zeal he was a very enemy to the professors of Christ s gospel, as his oration against Philip Melancthon and his other works plainly declared." He used publicly to contradict Stafford, the lecturer in divinity at Cambridge, a follower of the truth, and exhorted the students not to believe the doctrines of the gospel taught in his lectures. This zeal had obtained for Latimer the approbation of his superiors, and he was appointed the cross-bearer to the university; whose office it was to carry the cross in the popish processions so frequent in those days. But the time for his conversion was at hand. Bilney heard Latimer's oration against Melancthon, and pitying his blindness, was anxious that this zealous but ignorant brother should be brought to the true knowledge of Christ. With this view Bilney went to Latimer's study, and entreated him to hear his confession. In this, the former took the opportunity to |