under Elizabeth. In 1644, John Canne, a baptist separatist, compiled the first English Bible with marginal references throughout. It was published at Amsterdam.

The triumphant mental development of the Elizabethan age was grounded on heartfelt reverence for the Scripture, and large use of its divine teachings; and when all else that was peculiar to the times had passed away, the influence of these remained. Their results outlasted the generation, and produced a state of things under which England rose to a pitch of mental, moral, and spiritual greatness before unknown. The controversial literature of the day, though still disfigured by passion and conceit, partook of the improvement. In the ancient times of the Church, the disputes of theologians imperfectly served to eliminate and vindicate the truth; but after the Reformation, improved methods, and fuller subjection to the authority of Scripture, rendered the later productions incomparably superior in utility to those of the Fathers. Hardly an error now springs up in the fertile weed-bearing soil of theology, which has not been already intelligently and exhaustively dealt with, in some portion of the religious literature of the Reformed Church. Good works followed in the train. About the year 1600, some members of the University of Cambridge set on foot a home mission in the villages around that town, which they carried on for many years with much benefit to themselves and the district.*

In the year 1602, Mr. Crook, Fellow of Emanuel College, exchanged the congenial learning of Cambridge for the *Clarke's Life of Gataker, p. 132.

task of imparting the Gospel to the people living on the Mendip Hills, who had never before, it is said, enjoyed the blessing of a preaching minister. For forty-seven years, he continued to show how a cultivated, active mind, imbued with the love of Christ, may be a means of imparting blessing throughout a large district by efforts and influence exerted in the direct promulgation of Scriptural truth. Other ministers with similar equipments went out to combat the ignorance which still existed in dark spots over the land. The result was a decided and general augmentation of Christian knowledge and piety.

Lord Bacon, in his "Advancement of Learning, Divine and Humane," pays a high compliment to the preaching in his days, when he says, "For I am persuaded that if the choicest and best of these observations upon texts of Scripture, which have been made dispersedly in sermons, within this your Majesty's island of Britain, by the space of these forty years, and more, had been set down in a continuance, it had been the best work on divinity which had been written since the Apostles' times."*

At this time it became the practice of a few serious merchants in the city of London, to select a godly minister, and send him for three years to preach in some town destitute of the Gospel. If his ministry proved acceptable to the people, so as to induce them to desire his continuance, matters were so arranged; but if otherwise, he was removed to be sent elsewhere. This sound Scriptural method of carrying out mission work amidst * Page 330.

the masses, may well teach a lesson to the promoters of modern missionary enterprise.

Purchas, who published his quaint geographico-theological History of the World in 1613, thus declaims, in his preface, against the appointment of ministers unable to preach : "And let mee have leave to speake it for the glorie of God, and the good of our church, I cannot find any priests in all this my pilgrimage, of whom wee have any exact historie, but take more bodily paines in their devotions, than is performed by not-preaching ministers, especially in countrie villiages, where on the week daies they cannot have occasion for publique prayers; and therefore if they onely read the service then, and never study for more (which I would it were not the practice of some), even the heathen shall rise up in judgement against them. I subscribe with hand and practise to our Liturgie, but not such Lethargie; whose darknesse is so much the more intolerable, in the sunshine of the Gospell, wherein we have a gratious king, so diligent a frequenter of sermons; and reverend bishops (notwithstanding other their weighty ecclesiasticall employments) yet diligent preachers." *

About the year 1605, the obscure village of Cawk, lying between Ashby-de-la-Zouch and Derby, was the scene of assemblies similar to those which in so many places, and at so many times, have characterized the progress of religion. A good preacher was unknown in those parts, until Mr. Julines Herring came to the parish. His sermons were popular from their faithful exhibition

* Purchas's Pilgrimage. Preface.

of divine truth. The people from the towns and villages within a circle of twenty miles flocked to hear the building in which he preached could not contain themthey crowded around the windows. After the morning service, an ordinary took place; singing and religious conversation occupied the interval until the afternoon service; after which the multitude dispersed, many having received durable impressions. This continued for many years; and similar results followed Mr. Herring's preaching on his removal to Shrewsbury. A marvellous power has this divine message, vindicating its own character as worthy of all acceptation" by the fact of its ordinary history!

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We read in the records of the Baptist Church at Broadmead, that "there were raised up divers holy and powerful ministers and preachers, in and about this time, in the nation; whereof, in these parts, was one Mr. Wroth, in Monmouthshire, not far from this city of Bristol, who for the powerfulness and efficaciousness of his preaching, with the exemplary holiness of his life, was called the Apostle of Wales; for the Papists, and all sorts almost, honoured him for a holy man.'

Mr. Wroth was educated at Oxford. About the year 1620, he became convinced of the vanity of all earthly pleasures by the sudden death of a friend, and thenceforth devoted himself with great success to the ministry of the Word. He was instrumental in the conversion of numbers, during a long series of years, and retained, through trouble and calm alike, the reputation of holiness and wisdom,* * Broadmead Records, p. 7.

The same record gives us a pleasing picture of the religious habits of some of the good citizens' wives of Bristol;-how they met to repeat sermon-notes; how they kept days of prayer together; how they grew in humility, spirituality, and faith; how, for twenty years, they went on increasing in numbers and influence, until their gatherings became a mark for persecution.

Dr. Harris, for forty years, from about 1600, was preacher at Hanwell, near Oxford; and he, with Mr. Wheatley, at Banbury, established preaching services on market and on festival days, to which multitudes resorted; upon which the biographer of these worthies observes, in his quaint style,-"In these days godly preachers stuffed not their sermons with airy notions and curious speculations, but sought out profitable matter, which they delivered in sound words, and in plain method of doctrine, reason and use, accommodating themselves to every man's capacity; and God gave them a plentiful harvest in that country."

The same divine lectured at Stratford-on-Avon every other week, "to which there was a great resort both of the chief gentry, and choicest preachers and professors in those parts; and amongst them, that noble and learned knight, Sir Thomas Lucy, of Charlecote, had always a great respect for him.”

As Shakspeare lived in his native town, in the wellearned enjoyment of the competency which had raised him to the position of one of its chief inhabitants, from about 1603 to the time of his death in 1616, it is more

* Clarke's Ten Lives, p. 285.