A67926:64
Acts and monuments of matters most special and memorable, happening in the Church. [vol.…Actes and monuments of matters most speciall and memorable, happenyng in the Church. [vol.…
Acts and monuments of matters most special and memorable, happening in the Church. [vol. 2, part 1] with an universal history of the same, wherein is set forth at large the whole race and course of the Church, from the primitive age to these latter times of ours, with the bloody times, horrible troubles, and great persecutions against the true martyrs of Christ, sought and wrought as well by heathen emperors, as now lately practised by Romish prelates, especially in this realm of England and Scotland. Newly revised and recognised, partly also augmented, and now the fourth time again published and recommended to the studious reader, by the author (through the help of Christ our Lord) John Fox, which desireth thee good reader to help him with thy prayer.Actes and monuments of matters most speciall and memorable, happenyng in the Church. [vol. 2, part 1] with an vniuersall history of the same, wherein is set forth at large the whole race and course of the Church, from the primitiue age to these latter tymes of ours, with the bloudy times, horrible troubles, and great persecutions agaynst the true martyrs of Christ, sought and wrought as well by heathen emperours, as nowe lately practised by Romish prelates, especially in this realme of England and Scotland. Newly reuised and recognised, partly also augmented, and now the fourth time agayne published and recommended to the studious reader, by the author (through the helpe of Christ our Lord) Iohn Foxe, which desireth thee good reader to helpe him with thy prayer.
London: printed by John Daye, 1583London: printed by Iohn Daye, 1583
No title page in the transcription: set from the catalogue record.
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
¶The death and Martyrdom of William Sweating, and John Brewster.
¶The death and Martyrdome of William Swetyng, and Iohn Brewster.
IN searching and perusing of the Register,1 for the collection of the names & Articles before recited, I find that within the compass of the same years, there were also some others, who after they had once showed themselves as frail & unconstant as the rest (being either therewith pricked in conscience, or otherwise zealously overcome with the manifest truth of Gods most sacred word) became yet again as earnest professors of Christ, as ever they were before, and for the same profession were the second time apprehended, examined, condemned, and in the end were most cruelly burned. Of the which number were, William Sweating, and John Brewster, who were both burned together in Smithfield, the xviij. day of October in the year of our Lord. 1511. the chiefest case of religion alleged against them in their Articles, was their faith concerning the Sacrament of Christs body and blood. Which because it differed from the absurd, gross, and Caparniticall opinion of the new Schoolmen, was counted as most heinous heresy.2 There were other things besides objected against them: as the reading of certain forbidden books, and accompanying with such persons as were suspected of heresy. But one great and heinous offence counted amongest the rest, was their putting & leaving of the painting fagots, which they were at their first abjuring, enjoined to wear, as ⟨p. 805⟩badges, during their lives, or so long as it should please their Ordinary to appoint, and not to leave them off, upon pain of relapse, until they were dispensed withal for the same.3 The breach of this injunction was esteemed to be of no small weight, and yet the matter well & throughly considered, it seemeth by their confessions, they were both thereunto by necessity enforced. For the one, named Sweating, being for fear of the Bishops cruelty constrained to wander the countries to get his poor living, came at length unto Colchester, where by the parson of the parish of Mary Magdalen, he was provoked to be the holy water clerk, and in that consideration had that infamous badge first taken away from him. The other (which was Brewster) left off his, at the commandment of the Controller of the Earle of Oxfords house: who hiring the poor man to labour in the Earls household business, would not suffer him, working there, to wear that counterfeit cognisance any longer: