better.’”[230] Rowland Taylor, “a right perfect divine,” and parish priest, according to the manners of the time, was chaplain to Archbishop Cranmer; but on being appointed rector of Hadleigh, a small town in Suffolk, he quitted his patron’s family, to devote himself entirely to the care of his living; and by his diligent study, and preaching, and attention to the temporal as well as spiritual welfare of his people, he both recommended the doctrines which he taught, and acquired the esteem and love of his parishioners in an uncommon degree. Such was his occupation and character during the reign of Edward VI.: on the accession of Mary, he was one of the first to suffer for his adherence to the church and to the laws, in consequence of his resistance to the attempts made to reinstate Popish priests and Popish ceremonies in the parochial churches. In this scheme to reconcile England to the Pope, the renegade Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester, and the brutal and ferocious Bonner, Bishop of London, who figure prominently in the following narrative, were the most zealous actors. The length and prolix style of the original forbids us to extract the entire story from the Book of Martyrs; but we shall adhere to it as closely as we can, as well for the sake of giving (according to the principle laid down in our introduction) a specimen of the style of that remarkable work, as for the characteristic touches and intrinsic beauty of a great part of the narration. It begins with an account of Taylor’s character and parochial labours up to the death of Edward VI., and the subsequent attempts of his sister and successor Mary, to restore, by violence, the supremacy of the Roman Catholic religion. “In the beginning of this rage of Antichrist (1553), a certain petie gentleman, after the sort of a lawyer, called Foster, a bitter persecutor in those days, with one John Clerk, of Hadley, conspired to bring in the Pope and his maumetrie[231] again into Hadley Church. To this purpose they builded up with all haste possible the altar, intending to bring in their masse againe, about the Palme Sunday. But this their device took none effect; for in the night the altar was beaten down; wherefore they built it up againe the second time, and laid diligent watch, lest any should againe break it down. “On the day following came Foster and John Clerk, bringing with them their Popish sacrificer, who brought with him all his implements and garments to play his Popish pageant, whom they and their men guarded with swords and bucklers, lest any man should disturbe him in his missall sacrifice.