"who were watching their flocks, making a great noise, singing and rejoicing about many fires which they had made in the plain, and a number of dogs, who, perceiving our being near to them, did not cease from growling, barking, and giving us apprehension of being discovered, and falling into the hands of these robbers."

Perhaps it may be thought that these fires, and all this noise, might be made to intimidate beasts of prey, which they might be apprehensive were about, and watching an opportunity of making depredations on their flocks; it is possible it might be so. The warmth how

ever of these fires must have been comfortable to themselves, who were watching in the open air, since Doubdan complains of his lodging that night at Rama, where the procurator of the Holy Land did not treat them with the greatest tender"but contented himself with ness, putting us into a miserable room, where there were only the four walls, giving us nothing but a mat to lie upon, a stone for a pillow, and no coverlid but the broken cieling, which exposed us to the weather, which was not the most favourable at that season, as the nights are always extremely cool." Yet the heat of the preceding day was so great, that it was assigned as one reason why they waited some hours at Joppa, in a poor Greek hovel, before they set out for Rama.

But the account he gives of his situation at Tyre, is much stronger still. On the 16th of May they found the heat near Tyre so great, that though they took their repast on the grass, under a large tree, by the side of a small river, yet he complains of their being burat up alive, and they were obliged to continue in that situation until six or seven in the afternoon, when they returned to their bark; but the wind failing, and the seamen not to be persuaded to row, they could get no further than the rocks and ruins of Tyre, when night overtook

them. Near those ruins they were obliged to pass a considerable part of the night, not without suffering greatly from the cold, which was as violent and sharp as the heat of the day had been burning. He goes on, "I am sure I shook, as in the depth of winter, more than two or three full hours;" to which he adds, their being quite wetted with a rime extremely thick and cold, which fell upon them all night. To this he subjoins, that the worst was, that they were that they were in the hands of four or five fishermen, who did nothing but throw their nets into the sea, often with no success, in the meanwhile roasting us in the day-time in the sun, and almost making us to perish with cold in the night, without at all getting forward. From the same.

Gen. xvi. 12.

And he will be a wild man ; his hand will be against every man, and every man's hand against him.

"About midnight (the soldiers being in the head of the caravan,) the Arabs assailed our rear; the clamour was great, and the passengers, together with their leaders, fled from their camels; I and my companion imagining the noise to be only an encouragement unto one another, were left alone, yet preserved from violence. They carried away with them divers mules and asses, laden with drugs, and abandoned by their owners, not daring to stay too long, nor cumber themselves with too much luggage, for fear of the soldiers. These are descended of Ishmael, called also Saracens of Sara, which signifieth a desert, and saken, to inhabit; and not only of the place, but of the manner of their lives, for Sarack imports as much as a thief, being given from the beginning as now, unto theft and rapine. They dwell in tents, which they remove like walking cities, for opportunity of prey and benefit of pasturage. They acknowledge no sovereign: not worth the conquering, nor can they be conquered, retiring to places im

whereof he so much desired to drink; and when they brought him of the waters, he refused it." The Same.

Micah v. 2.

But thou Beth-lehem Ephratab, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting.

And now we are come to Bethle. hem, first called Ephrat, of Ephrata,

the wife of Kaleb, a city of David, the long possession of his ancestors, and not the least amongst the Princes of Juda, seated on the utmost of the ridge of a hill; stretching east and west in a happy soil, and most delicate prospect.

Of cities greater than the great,
O Bethlehem, in the happy birth
Of God and man, from heaven's high seat
Come to incorporate with earth.
The Same.

No. 25.-Edward the Second.

THE reign of the second Edward is famous for nothing but its calamities. The repeated triumphs of the Scotch, and the repeated rebellions of the Barons, form a small part of the misfortunes by which the King and the kingdom were oppressed. Year after year we read of famine and pestilence. The cattle were carried away by murrain-bands of robbers set the law at defiance ;the resources of the people seem to have been suddenly exhausted, and a nation which was recently powerful and prosperous, became as weak and as wretched as the monarch by whom it was governed. The favourites of King Edward prepared the way for his downfall. A faithless wife contributed her share to his ruin and disgrace: and a violent and cruel death concluded the reign of one who was no bad general representative of his age.

Under such circumstances it was not to be expected that the Church should flourish; nor are we surprised at finding that there are few proofs of efficiency, improvement, or good-government, and many instances of superstition, neglect, aud ignorance.

The power of the Pope was materially increased by the unsettled state of the times, and the feeble

character of the King. He annulled the election of an Archbishop of Canterbury, and appointed another in his stead; pretending that the appointment had been specially reserved to himself, before the death of Winchelsey. These reservations constituted one of the principal grievances of the times. Whenever the Pope thought proper to declare that he had reserved any preferment to himself, the ordinary right of patronage went into abeyance. The custom proved so convenient, that prebendal stalls in every diocese were seized upon this pretence, and the vacancies filled for the most part with foreigners dependent on the Pope. Occasionally, however, as in the case just mentioned, the Court of Rome found it necessary to strengthen their usurpations by an alliance with the Crown: and the successor of Winchelsey, though deriving his appointment exclusively from the Pope, was the confidential minister and servant of King Edward.

The distinguished ecclesiastics in this reign were not numerous, and the honours that were conferred upon the most deserving of them exhibit the gross ignorance and superstition of the people. Archbishop Winchelsey has received a high character from his biographers, and he evidently enjoyed it

from his contemporaries. During the life of Edward the First he was exposed to many troubles; banished by the King, suspended by the Pope, and rescued with great difficulty from the hands of his enemies. These persecutions originated in Winchelsey's attachment to the Barons, who insisted upon setting bounds to the power of the Crown and upon the observance of Magna Charta. The immediate occasion of the quarrel was the refusal of nis Provincial Synod to grant King Edward a supply. Their conduct was excused by appealing to the Pope's prohibition: but if this had been the Archbishop's real motive, the matter could not have terminated in his suspension. The mask was subsequently thrown aside both by the Primate and the King. Ed. ward publicly accused Archbishop Winchelsey of high-treason, and of plotting with the discontented Barons. And, when upon the King's decease, the Prelate returned to his See, be became a leader in all the opposition which was made to Gavestone, and is praised by the earlier writers for his fidelity to the cause of freedom. Firmus exactor fuerat regni libertatum,' says Walsingham. In another passage the same historian explains the close connection between the civil and ecclesiastical grievances of the age. The Earl of Lancaster was the great leader of the Barons, and his merits were admitted, and his death deplored, by the weak and ill-advised Prince against whom he so often took up arms. This nobleman revolted from Edward at the instigation of his father-in-law the Earl of Lincoln, and the arguments used upon the occasion, were that the Church was enslaved both by the Pope and the King, the people impoverished by tributes and talliages, and reduced from the condition of free-men to that of slaves; and the nobility, who had been formerly respected throughout Christendom, insulted by foreigners even on REMEMBRANCER, No. 61.

their own soil. The result was a civil war; during which Winchelsey adhered faithfully to the Barons, who in their turn indignantly rejected the proffered mediation of the Pope, and told his legates that they had honest and learned Bishops of their own, by whose counsels alone they would consent to be guided. It is certain therefore that the Archbishop, as well as a large proportion of his suffragans, espoused the cause of the malcontents; and it is probable that his popularity did not suffer from this circumstance.

But whatever may have been his merits as a subject or as a patriot, there can be no question respecting his conduct as an ecclesiastic. It is extolled by every writer who mentions it, and it is summed up with good taste and eloquence in an Epistle from Drokenesford, Bishop of Bath and Wells, to Walter Raynal, the successor of Winchelsey in the Metropolitan See. "He was a man of holy life and honest conversation; of high character and pure morals; just, chaste, and diligent; kind to good men; devout and constant in the worship of God; true himself, and a lover of truth in others; an indefatigable disseminator of the Word of God; notorious, far and near, for his adherence to the Catholic faith, filling up his benefices and ecclesiastical dignities with deserving and learned theologians, and preferring them from no temporal motive, but out of a sincere regard for their merits; a munificent alms-giver, feeling for every one that was in want and misery, and affording abundant assistance to poor and diligent scholars of Oxford and Cambridge. work of piety and charity was neglected; many and various were the persecutions which he underwent for defending the rights and liberties of the Church, and particularly of his own province of Canterbury. Constantly withstanding the spoiler and persecutor, fighting the fight C

No

of a good and unwearied soldier of Christ, he has been rendered illus. trious by many plain proofs of his virtues; and it is reported that miracles, wrought by the Almighty for his sake, have been and are a bright attestation to his worth."

The miracles thus reported, form a curious chapter in Archbishop Winchelsey's history. They were gravely examined a short time after his decease, and the result has been preserved in the Canterbury Register, and published in the Concilia of Wilkins. The affair commences somewhat suspiciously. Three letters are preserved from the Chapter of Canterbury to the Earl of Lancaster. From these it appears that the Earl, the leader of Winchelsey's political party, requests information respecting the miracles wrought by God in honour of their deceased Prelate, as well during his life as since his death. The Prior and Chapter of Christ Church reply in the first instance, that they cannot yet certify any thing upon the subject, but that inquiry shall be made before a notary, assisted by one of the Earl's chaplains. Such inquiry was accordingly instituted, and the parti-, culars of the reputed miracles in vestigated. By far the greater number were wrought at the tomb of the Archbishop, and consisted of restoring raving women to their senses, curing blindness, lameness, and other bodily infirmities. The only miracle which Winchelsey was stated to have wrought during life, was of the nature of exorcism. An adultress, being interrogated respecting her crimes, perjured her self, and was afterwards, as she sup. posed, possessed by an evil spirit. The Archbishop being on his visitation, received this woman as a pe. nitent, heard her confession, and gave her absolution. Upon which she was relieved from the possession under which she had laboured. These circumstances being duly attested by witnesses, both clerical

and lay, and being declared public, notorious and manifest, the Chapter affix their seal to a copy of the proceedings. The third letter from the Prior and Chapter to the Earl of Lancaster informs him, that a commission has issued to the Bishops' of London, Chichester, and Rochester, requiring them to make farther inquiry into the miracles connected with Archbishop Winchelsey, and that until the result of their investigation was made known, the Chapter could proceed no farther in the business. Of this commission nothing more is known; but there is a Confirmation by the Chapter, which appears to refer to it, and declares that the facts reported by the Bishop of Rochester are sufficiently proved, and are contrary to the ordinary course of nature.

From these repeated confirmations it would naturally be supposed that the Prior, &c. believed in the miracles; and the supposition is strengthened when we hear that they petitioned the Pope for the canonization of their late Primate. But that petition has been preserved, and it states, that although the miracles which, according to the pious credulity of the people, God has wrought for Winchelsey's sake, are budding and flourishing before their eyes and ears, yet that they wish to submit these proofs of superior sanctity to the examination of the Apostolic See. They therefore request the Pope to inform himself on the subject, to receive the evidence of the Prelates, Nobles, and other respectable persons, and to decree the canonization of Archbishop Robert of Winchelsey, an event that must contribute to the exaltation of the Catholic Faith, the increase of divine worship, the excitement of more fervent devotion, and a more speedy reformation of the entire realm of England.

This singular specimen of artful suggestion is followed up after an interval of five years, by a similar