Concerning the Time of Rebellion’
The common sorrow of this present time?, dearly beloved brethren in Christ, if I cii. should be more led thereby, than by reason and zeal to my country, would move me rather to hold my peace, than to speak. For the great evils, which we now suffer at this present time, are to be bewailed with tears and silence, rather than with words. And hereunto I might allege for me the example of Job, who when he came to his extreme misery, he lying upon a dunghill, and three of his friends sitting upon the ground by him, for the space of seven days for great sorrow not one of them opened his mouth to speak a word to another. If then the miserable state of Job, like a most hard and sharp bit, stopped his mouth from speaking, and the lamentable case of their friend stayed those three men, being of speech most eloquent, that they could not utter their words; surely it seemeth that I have a much more cause to be still and hold my peace. For there was the piteous lamentation of no mo but of one man, or one household, and that only concerning temporal and worldly substance; but we have cause to bewail a whole realm, and that most noble, which lately being in that state, that all other realms envied our wealth and feared our force, is now so troubled, so vexed, so tossed and deformed, (and that by sedition among ourselves, of such as be members of the same,) that nothing is left unattempted to the utter ruin and subversion thereof. And besides this, the eternal punishment of God threateneth sore as well the authorers and procurers of these seditions, as all other that join themselves unto them. So that we be constrained day and night to bewail the decay, not only of a worldly kingdom and most noble realm, but also the eternal damnation of innumerable souls.
These reasons perchance might move some men to be quiet and hold their peace; but me they do not so much move, which know right well that our common sorrow and lamentable state cannot be remedied with silence, nor good counsel can be given with holding my peace. Now therefore, in this common sorrow, I know nothing that is more able to suage our griefs, and to comfort our heaviness, than is the word of God. For as the sun many times with his beams driveth away great thick and dark clouds, and stayeth great storms of winds; so doth the light of God’s word stay men’s minds, bringing them from [ Dr Jenkyns supposes that, «although this pared in Latin, he drew up the English sermon sermon has been placed among Cranmer’s works, his which follows.” It is probably the same which claim to itis not indisputable.” It is here printed Burnet says was preached by Cranmer on a fastfrom the C. C. C. C. MS. written by a secretary, day at court, and which he saw at C. C. C. C. but corrected throughout by the archbishop; re- under the archbishop’s own hand, being the only specting which the following memorandum at the sermon of his that he ever saw.” He was uncommencement of the MS. has been left by arch- doubtedly mistaken with respect to the hand-writing, bishop Parker: Hic sermo prius descriptus Latine and he gives no authority for the rest of his state Petro Martyre.” The Latin sermons referred ment, which the expressions of the concluding prayer to are found in the same collection, cCCXL, Arti- somewhat corroborate. Strype appears to think a cles 4 and 6. The English sermon is founded on fast-day was appointed on account of the insurrecthe two in Latin by P. Martyr, but is not a trans- tions, that the archbishop directed sermons on the lation of them, sentences being omitted and new occasion to be composed for the curates to read to matter added. They contain “descriptions of the the people, and that this was one of them which disturbed state of the country, and of the angry was printed for common use.” See note, p. 188. feelings existing between the gentry and the lower Strype’s Mem. of Abp. Cranmer, Vol. I. pp. 266—8. orders.” Both the Latin and English sermons con- Burnet’s Hist. of Reformat. Vol. II. Part 1. p. 242, tain the same topics and examples as the rough and Part τι. pp. 239—41. App. B. i. No. 36. Jen-notes of the archbishop. Dr Jenkyns conjectures kyns’ Remains of Abp. Cranmer, Vol. 11. p. 248.] that Cranmer placed these brief notes in the hands (? This sermon was probably directed against of P. Martyr, to be expanded into a regular homily; the Norfolk rebellion headed by Ket. Vid. p. 189. and that afterwards, from the materials thus pre- =. 10.]
[Vid. p. 188.]
trouble to quietness, from darkness to brightness, from heaviness and desperation to gladness, joy, and comfort. Wherefore I most humbly beseech Almighty God to grant me by his Spirit, that out of holy scripture I may plainly set out before your eyes the principal causes of all these tumults and seditions: for if the causes be once known, it shall be the more easy to provide remedy therefore.