Joined. The vigour of discipline they may then turn with better success upon the prostitute looseness of the times, when men, finding in themselves the infirmities of former ages, shall not be constrained above the gift of God in them to unprofitable and impossible observances, never required from the civilest, the wisest, the holiest nations, whose other excellencies in moral virtue they never yet could equal. Last of all, to those whose mind is still to maintain textual restrictions, whereof the bare sound cannot consist sometimes with humanity, much less with charity; I would ever answer, by putting them in remembrance of a command above all commands, which they seem to have forgot, and who spake it: in comparison whereof, this which they so exalt is but a petty and subordinate precept. "Let them go," therefore, with whom I am loath to couple them, yet they will needs run into the same blindness with the pharisees; "let them go therefore," and consider well what this lesson means, "I will have mercy and not sacrifice:" for on that "saying all the law and prophets depend;" much more the gospel, whose end and excellence is mercy and peace. Or if they cannot learn that, how will they hear this? which yet I shall not doubt to leave with them as a conclusion, that God the Son hath put all other things under his own feet, but his commandments he hath left all under the feet of charity.

CONCERNING DIVORCE:

WRITTEN TO EDWARD THE SIXTH, IN HIS SECOND BOOK OF THE KINGDOM OF CHRIST: AND NOW ENGLISHED. WHEREIN A LATE BOOK, RESTORING THE "DOCTRINE AND DISCIPLINE OF DIVORCE," IS HERE CONFIRMED AND JUSTIFIED BY THE AUTHORITY OF MARTIN BUCER.

TO THE PARLIAMENT OF ENGLAND.

John iii. 10, "Art thou a teacher of Israel, and knowest not these things?"

PUBLISHED BY AUTHORITY.

TESTIMONIES OF THE HIGH APPROBATION WHICH LEARNED MEN HAVE GIVEN OF MARTIN BUCER.

Simon Grinæus, 1533.

AMONG all the Germans, I give the palm to Bucer, for excellence in the scriptures. Melancthon in human learning is wonderous fluent; but greater knowledge in the scripture I attribute to Bucer, and speak it unfeignedly.

John Calvin, 1539.

Martin Bucer, a most faithful doctor of the church of Christ, besides his rare learning, and copious knowledge of many things, besides his clearness of wit, much reading, and other many and various virtues, wherein he is almost by none now living excelled, hath few equals, and excels most; hath this praise peculiar to himself, that none in this age hath used exacter diligence in the exposition of scripture.

And a little beneath.

Bucer is more large than to be read by overbusied men ; and too high to be easily understood by unattentive men, and of a low capacity.

Sir John Cheek, Tutor to King Edward VI. 1551.

We have lost our master, than whom the world scarce held a greater, whether we consider his knowledge of true religion, or his integrity and innocence of life, or his incessant study of holy things, or his matchless labour of promoting piety, or his authority and amplitude of teaching, or whatever else was praiseworthy and glorious in him.-Script. Anglican. pag. 864.

John Sturmius of Strasburgh

No man can be ignorant what a great and constant opinion and estimation of Bucer there is in Italy, France, and Eng land. Whence the saying of Quintilian hath oft come to my mind, that he hath well profited in eloquence whom Cicero pleases. The same say I of Bucer, that he hath made no small progress in divinity whom Bucer pleases; for in his volumes, which he wrote very many, there is the plain impression to be discerned of many great virtues, of diligence, of charity, of truth, of acuteness, of judgment, of learning. Wherein he hath a certain proper kind of writing, whereby he doth not only teach the reader, but affects him with the sweetness of his sentences, and with the manner of his arguing, which is so teaching, and so logical, that it may be perceived how learnedly he separates probable reasons from necessary, how forcibly he confirms what he has to prove, how subtilely he refutes, not with sharpness, but with truth.

Theodore Beza, on the Portraiture of M. Bucer.

This is that countenance of Bucer, the mirror of mildness tempered with gavity, to whom the city of Strasburgh owes the reformation of her church; whose singular learning, and eminent zeal, joined with excellent wisdom, both his learned books, and public disputations in the general diets of the empire, shall witness to all ages. Him the German persecution drove into England; where, honourably entertained by Edward the Sixth, he was for two years chief professor of divinity in Cambridge, with greatest frequency and applause of all learned and pious men until his death, 1551.-Bezæ Icones.

Mr. Fox's Book of Martyrs, vol. iii. p. 763.

Bucer, what by writing, but chiefly by reading and preaching openly, wherein, being painful in the word of God, he never spared himself, nor regarded his health, brought all men into such an admiration of him, that neither his friends could sufficiently praise him, nor his enemies in any point find fault with his singular life and sincere doctrine. A most certain token whereof may be his sumptuous burial at Cambridge, solemnized with so great an assistance of all the university, that it was not possible to devise more to the setting out and amplifying of the same.

Dr Fern, the Popish Vice-chancellor of Cambridge, his ad versary.

Cardinal Pool, about the fourth year of Queen Mary, intending to reduce the university of Cambridge to popery again, thought no way so effectual, as to cause the bones of Martin Bucer and Paulus Fagius, which had been four years in the grave, to be taken up and burnt openly with their books, as knowing that those two worthy men had been of greatest moment to the reformation of that place from popery, and had left such powerful seeds of their doctrine behind them, as would never die, unless the men themselves were digged up, and openly condemned for heretics by the university itself. This was put in execution, and Doctor Pern, vice-chancellor, appointed to preach against Bucer: who, among other things, laid to his charge the opinions which he held of the marriage of priests, of divorcement, and of usury. But immediately after his sermon, or somewhat before, as the Book of Martyrs for a truth relates, vol. iii. p. 770, the said Doctor Pern, smiting himself on the breast, and in manner weeping, wished with all his heart, that God would grant his soul might then presently depart and remain with Bucer's; for he knew his life was such, that if any man's soul were worthy of heaven, he thought Bucer's in special to be most worthy.-Histor. de Combust. Buceri et Fagii.

Acworth, the University-orator.

Soon after that Queen Elizabeth came to the crown, this condemnation of Bucer and Fagius by the cardinal and his doctors was solemnly repealed by the university; and the memory of those two famous men celebrated in an oration by Acworth, the University-orator, which is yet extant in the Book of Martyrs, vol. iii, p. 773, and in Latin, Scripta Anglican. p. 936.

Nicholas Carre, a learned man; Walter Haddon, master of the requests to Queen Elizabeth; Matthew Parker, after wards primate of England; with other eminent men, in thei funeral orations and sermons, express abundantly how grea a man Martin Bucer was; what an incredible loss England sustained in his death; and that with him died the hope of a perfect reformation for that age.-1bid.

Jacobus Verheiden of Grave, in his elogies of famous livines.
Though the name of Martin Luther be famous, yet thou,
Martin Bucer, for piety, learning, labour, care, vigilance, and
writing, art not to be held inferior to Luther.
Bucer was a

singular instrument of God, so was Luther. By the death of this most learned and most faithful man, the church or Christ sustained a heavy loss, as Calvin witnesseth; and they who are studious of Calvin are not ignorant how much he ascribes to Bucer; for thus he writes in a letter to Viretus: "What a manifold loss befell the church of God in the death of Bucer! as oft as I call to mind, I feel my heart almost rent asunder."

Peter Martyr Epist. to Conradus Hubertus.

He is dead, who hath overcome in many battles of th Lord. God lent us for a time this our father, and our teacher, never enough praised. Death hath divided me from a most unanimous friend, one truly according to mine own heart. My mind is overpressed with grief, insomuch that I have not power to write more. I bid thee in Christ farewell, and wish thou mayst be able to bear the loss of Bucer better than I can bear it.

Testimonies given by learned men to Paulus Fagius, who held the same opinion with Martin Bucer concerning divorce.

Paulus Fagius, born in the Palatinate, became most skilful in the Hebrew tongue. Being called to the ministry at Isna, he published many ancient and profitable Hebrew books, being aided in the expenses by a senator of that city, as Origen sometime was by a certain rich man called Ambrosius. At length invited to Strasburgh, he there famously discharged the office of a teacher; until the same persecution drove him and Bucer into England, where he was preferred to a professor's place in Cambridge, and soon after died. - Bezæ Icones.

Melchior Adamus writes his life among the famous German divines.

Sleidan and Thuanus mention him with honour in their history; and Verheiden in his elogies.