In less than twenty-four hours after the queen's death, her distinguished kinsman, and one of the wisest and best of her counsellors, Cardinal Pole, archbishop of Canterbury, closed his checkered and eventful life, in the fifty-ninth year of his age.* He died, according to Fuller, "neither of Italian physic, wilfully taken by himself, as an English author insinuates, nor of poison given to him by the protestants, as a Spanish writer suggests, but of a quartan fever, then epidemical in England, and malignant above the ordinary nature of that disease." +

Parliament was in session at the time of Mary's death; and at about nine o'clock on the 17th of November, the lord chancellor went to the house

* Mary died between five and six o'clock, A. M., November 17th, 1558, and Pole died at about three o'clock the following morning. Soames' Hist. Ref., Iv. 595; Fuller's Church History, vol. iv. bk. vIII. p. 244, note b. The author of the note says, "he [Pole] outlived the queen but sixteen hours; she dying between five and six o'clock in the morning, and he about three o'clock the succeeding morning." This would make the time between their deaths, not sixteen, but about twenty-one or two hours. Burnet (ut sup. p. 741-) speaks in respectful and kind terms of Pole, or Pool, as he calls him. He says: "He was a learned, modest, humble, and good-natured man; and had indeed such qualities, and such a temper, that, if he could have brought the other bishops to follow his measures, or the pope and queen to approve of them, he might have probably done much to have reduced this nation to popery again. But God designed better things for it; so he gave up the queen to the bloody counsels of Gardiner and the rest of the clergy. It was the only thing in which she was not led by the cardinal."

† Church History, ut sup. pp. 245, 246.

of lords and informed them of the event. Soon after, a message was sent by the lords to the lower house, requiring the speaker and the whole house to come to them, when they should hear certain matters of importance that the lords had to communicate to them.* The speaker and the commons accordingly repaired to the lords, and were told by the lord chancellor, "that God had taken the queen to his mercy, but had furnished them with another sovereign lady, my Lady Elizabeth, her grace; and then willed the commons to resort to the palace, where the lords would come and cause her grace to be proclaimed queen of England. And immediately after, the said proclamation was there made.'

Just before her death, Mary sent a message to Elizabeth, to the effect that the throne was to be left to her; and in consideration thereof, she was desired to retain all her sister's old councillors, to promise that no alterations should be made in religion, and that the queen's debts should all be paid. The impudence of this message was suit

* Burnet (ut sup. p. 747) says: "Mary's death was concealed for some hours. What the secret consultations were upon it is not known; but the issue of them appeared about nine o'clock." But if Mary died between five and six o'clock, A. M., and the event was officially declared to parliament "about nine o'clock” the same day, it could hardly be said in truth to have been "concealed for some hours." There would seem, too, a propriety in reserving the first public knowledge of the queen's death for the parliament; and they could not have been long in session at nine A. M. † Parl. Hist., 1. 632.

ably appreciated and answered by Elizabeth, who sent the queen word that she did not thank her majesty for leaving the crown to her, for it was hers by right. As to councillors, Mary had chosen her own, and she should do the same. In religion, she would be governed by God's word. The queen's debts should be paid. Elizabeth had suffered enough from Mary's religion and councillors, to make her cautious about committing herself to either.

CHAPTER X.

CONGREGATIONALISM IN QUEEN MARY'S REIGN.

IN preceding chapters, the slender thread of Congregationalism has been followed through successive periods of English history, down to the commencement of Mary's reign. We have now to inquire: Is that thread still distinguishable, amidst the fire and blood of this period? The answer is, that it is; and, what is more, that it has become broader and plainer, more marked and distinctive, than ever before. Through the entire reign of the bloody Mary, distinct bodies of dissenting Christians maintained their existence in the kingdom; and these bodies had some of the essential features of Congregational churches. The names of members were enrolled; they had pastors and deacons ; they held stated meetings for religious conference and worship, and the celebration of the Lord's Supper, on which occasions they took up contributions for their poor and imprisoned brethren, and attended to matters of discipline among themselves Let us now gather up the evidence which justifies these statements.

We learn from Fox, that on new year's day, 1554-5, in the evening, certain honest men and

women of the city of London, to the number of thirty, and a minister with them, named Master Rose, were taken in a house in Bowe churchyard, at the communion, and committed to prison.* And under date of December 12th, 1557, the same author gives an account of the arrest, at a tavern at Islington, of John Rough and Cuthbert Sympson, and others, "members of the secret society and holy congregation of God's children," in London. They were betrayed "through the crafty and traitorous suggestion of a false hypocrite and dissembling brother, called Roger Sargeant, tailor; and were apprehended by the vice-chamberlain of the queen's house, at the Saracen's Head, in Islington, where the congregation had then proposed to assemble themselves to their godly and accustomable exercises of prayer and hearing the word of God."† Strype thus speaks of this same congregation: "On December 12th, being Sunday, at Islington, there met certain persons that were gospellers, and

* Acts and Mons., III. 93.

† Acts and Mons., 111. 723.

This secret society and holy congregation of God's children we probably have had a glimpse of before. Fox speaks of "the congregation" which met "in a warehouse in Bow Lane," in 1531-32, before which Bainham made his confession. - Vol. 11. p. 247; and Anderson's Annals English Bible, vol. 1. pp. 333, 334, compared with vol. 11. pp. 265-71. Anderson says of this " congregation of the faithful, assembling for worship in the days of Queen Mary with all its imperfections, there certainly never was in England a body of Christians more highly honored by God, ' in resisting unto blood, striving against sin.'