N20568:48
The new and complete book of martyrs; or, An universal history of martyrdom: being…
The new and complete book of martyrs; or, An universal history of martyrdom: being Fox's Book of martyrs, revised and corrected, with additions and great improvements. : Containing an authentic account of the lives, persecutions and sufferings of the holy martyrs; and the many dreadful persecutions against the Church of Christ in all parts of the world, by pagans, Jews, Turks, papists, and others, from earliest ages of the church to the present period. ... The whole forming at once a general Christian martyrology, and a complete history of persecutions. / By the Rev. Mr. John Fox, M.A. late of Magdalen College, Oxford. ; Now revised, corrected and improved, with many additional articles, relating to the acts and monuments of the church. By Paul Wright, D.D. ; Embellished with forty elegant copper plate engravings. ; In two volumes. Vol. I[-II].The new and complete book of martyrs; or, An universal history of martyrdom: being Fox's Book of marytrs, revised and corrected, with additions and great improvements. : Containing an authentic account of the lives, persecutions and sufferings of the holy martyrs; and the many dreadful persecutions against the Church of Christ in all parts of the world, by pagans, Jews, Turks, papists, and others, from earliest ages of the church to the present period. ... The whole forming at once a general Christian martyrology, and a complete history of persecutions. / By the Rev. Mr. John Fox, M.A. late of Magdalen College, Oxford. ; Now revised, corrected and improved, with many additional articles, relating to the acts and monuments of the church. By Paul Wright, D.D. ; Embellished with forty elegant copper plate engravings. ; In two volumes. Vol. I[-II].
New-York: printed by William Durell, 1794
Title page typeset from the transcription.
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.
CHAP. II. Containing an Account of the LIFE, SUFFERINGS, and cruel MARTYRDOM of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour JESUS CHRIST; together with that of his APOSTLES, EVANGELISTS, &c. and the TEN GREAT PERSECUTIONS in the PRIMITIVE CHURCH.
HEROD the Great being informed that a king of the Jews should be born in Bethlehem, sent a number of troops to destroy all the children, under two years of age, in that place, and throughout the neighbouring coast. By this cruel order he hoped to have destroyed the child Jesus; but in this he was not only disappointed, but punished with such a spirit of lunacy, that he slew his own wife, children, relations, friends, &c. He was afterwards visited by the most grievous maladies, particularly an inward burning, slow, but unremitting; an uncommon appetite, continually craving, but ever unsatisfied; a cramp that racked him with pain; a flux that reduced him to weakness▪ worms that bred in him and gnawed him; vermin that engendered about him and devoured him; a general putrefaction that consumed him; and, in fine, all those complicated disorders which could possibly render him hateful to himself, and odious to others. His torments at length became so intolerable, that not having either the comforts of religion, or the support of a good conscience to sustain his sinking spirits, he attempted to lay violent hands upon himself. Being prevented in this attempt by those about him, he at last sunk under the oppression of his afflictions, and expired in the most miserable manner.