CHAPTER X.

FROM HENRY VIII. TO THE REIGN OF ELIZABETH, INCLUSIVE.

Henry VIII. acquires the title of Defender of the Faith.-Origin of the reformation in England.— Henry's persecution of Catholics and Protestants.-Destruction of Lewes and other Monasteries.Descent of the French at Brighton and Newhaven in 1545-Accession of Mary-Lewes Martyrs.Martyrs throughout Sussex.-Accession of Elizabeth.-Persecution of the Puritans.-Persecution of the Catholics.-Documents relative to recusants in the neighbourhood.-Letters of the Privy Coancil with respect to the union of the Sessions, Regulations of the Iron Furnaces, &c.-Extracts from the Town Records.

THE reign of Henry VIII. is distinguished in the annals of this country, as the era of its reformation from popery. Whilst the nations of the continent enlightened by the labours of Martin Luther and his undaunted coadjutors, were making rapid progress towards religious freedom, England had been comparatively dormant. Its inhabitants heard occasionally of the heretical enemies to the holy see, and though some enlightened spirits might secretly hope that the flame of religious liberty would extend towards this kingdom, yet the great mass of its people, thought of no such event. It was not to be expected that their monarch, who had distinguished himself by his antipathy to the reforming sentiments, and who had obtained from the Pope in full Consistory, the title of Defender of the Faith, (for his Treatise on the Seven Sacraments, designed as a death blow to the head of the Reformers), would be the means of shaking the faith of his subjects, and of overthrowing the time-hallowed hierarchy, that he had so zealously defended. But so inscrutable are the ways of Providence, that even Henry, arbitrary, bigoted, and licentious as he was, became the main instrument of uprooting the poison tree of Rome, so long planted and nourished in this country, and of liberating the minds of thousands from the thraldom of popish superstition.

It is needless to trace the steps that led to this glorious consummation. We have only to do with the result. The refusal of the Pope to ratify the sentence of divorce, which the unprincipled monarch was bent upon procuring, in order

that his unsteady affections might be legally transferred from his then Queen to Anna Boleyn, of whom he was enamoured, prompted Henry to shake off the papal yoke, to constitute himself the supreme head on earth of the Church of England, and to convert to the use of the crown, the revenues formerly exacted by the Roman Pontiff.

There would have been no great cause for joy, had the benefits of the reformation ended in thus setting up another ecclesiastical rule, instead of that of the Pope. But Henry by thus appearing at open enmity with the holy see, and rudely snapping asunder the bonds that had for ages fettered the minds of the people, opened new views to the astonished multitude, and taught them, though undesignedly and unwillingly on his part, to think more freely for themselves. He put an avalanche in motion, which all his power was unable afterwards to stop. Vainly did he attempt by the decrees of Convocations and Acts of Parliament, to set boundaries to the freedom of thought, and fix the standard of faith by the measure of his own mind: the stimulus that he had given, continued to operate, when his own energies ceased; the light of truth shone brighter in succeeding ages, and the right of free inquiry in matters of religion, became recognized as the invaluable birth-right of man.

Although Henry had separated from the church of Rome, he was far from entertaining a wish to relinquish its faith. Heresy was a crime which he could not pardon; and to think differently from himself on topics of religion, was deemed by him an act of culpability, that warranted the extremes of punishment. Whilst, therefore, on the one hand, the merciless tyrant was inflicting tortures and death on those who could not conscientiously approve of his assumption of spiritual supremacy; on the other, he pursued with unrelenting persecution, those who had advanced farther than himself, and who had ventured to question the divinity of some of those dogmas of the Roman church, which had the authority of councils, rather than of scripture, to support them. Protestantism was deemed a pestilent heresy by the ambiguous monarch, and many of the favourers of it, paid the penalty of their lives, for daring to believe otherwise than was appointed by authority.

The mass of the people were averse to the changes that Henry had made in the government of the English church; but they had little power to put a stop to the encroachments of the sacrilegious monarch. They were, however, supported in their disaffection to the new order of things, by the numerous and powerful religious, who were scattered throughout the kingdom, in the various orders of monasteries that had been erected under the immediate sanction of the church of Rome. The king, therefore, resolved to check this growing ani

mosity, by striking at its very root, and for that purpose issued orders for a general visitation of the lesser monasteries. Thomas Cromwell, the secretary of state, and master of the rolls, was appointed his vicegerent in ecclesiastical affairs, and by him commissioners were sent out. The report of the emissaries was such as the king had anticipated and wished. The disorders and enormities that prevailed in the monasteries, were fully described in the report of the commissioners; and even allowing for some exaggeration and warmth of colouring, the facts that came to light, were such as to warrant the most decisive measures for checking the luxury and licentiousness that reigned in the monastic institutions. Ten thousand religious were turned into the world, with no larger a provision than the sum of forty shillings and a gown each; whilst the churches and monasteries from which they had been expelled were destroyed, and the materials sold. At this time only the minor monasteries were suppressed: in other words, those whose incomes did not exceed two hundred pounds per annum. Henry's designs did not, however, rest here. The wealth that had accrued to his treasury by the appropriation of the revenues of the lesser religious houses, came in aid of his other motives, in determining him to effect a total suppression of the monastic institutions. For this purpose another visitation was appointed, and the result was as before. The abbots and monks well knew the danger to which they were exposed; for they had learnt from the example of the lesser monasteries, the inutility of attempting to withstand the aggressions of the king: and for the purpose of warding off royal resentment, and in some cases, doubtless, to ensure to themselves a pension for their ready compliance, they were most of them induced to make a voluntary surrender of their houses. "Where promises failed of effect, menaces and even extreme violence were employed, and as several of the abbots, since the breach with Rome, had been named by the court with a view to this event, the king's intentions were the more easily effected1:" so that in the course of two years, Henry had got possession of all the monastic revenues.

The monastery of Lewes, which was one of the larger houses, was surrendered to the king in 1538, by Thomas Crowham, the then prior, who was rewarded for his compliance to the well-known wishes of the monarch, with a Prebendary at Langford, in the County of Lincoln. As a future chapter of this work will be dedicated to a history of the Priory of Saint Pancras, it is unnecessary in this place to say more respecting it.

Hume's Hist. of Eng. c. 31, who calculates that at different times the king suppressed 645 monasteries of which twenty-eight had abbots that enjoyed a seat in parliament. Ninety colleges

were demolished in several counties; 2374 chantries and free chapels, and 110 hospitals. The whole revenue of these establishments amounted to 161,100 pounds.

The dissolution of the monasteries, was a death blow to the power of Rome in England. The appointments which were given to the heads of the suppressed houses, weakened their animosity and destroyed their opposition to the measures that were pursued; and though great murmurs were every where excited on account of these violences, Henry had sufficient plausibility to cajole the people by promises, and to stop the clamours of the nobility, by grants of the revenues which he had wrested from the monastic establishments1.

In 1545, the 36th year of Henry VIII., during the war which was waging against the Scots in conjunction with their continental allies, the King of France, eager to recover Boulogne, levied a numerous army for carrying on the seige of that city, and equipped a considerable fleet in order to prevent any succour being obtained by it from sea. This armament was placed under the command of Claude d'Annabant, who was at that time high admiral of France. This nobleman having with his powerful fleet scoured the English Channel, presented himself before the Isle of Wight, and succeeded in landing about two thousand men: several villages were burnt, and the enemy retired to their ships, when a council of war was called, to consider the propriety of retaining possession of the island: but the proposition was overruled. The admiral, was therefore, satisfied with ordering a descent on the Sussex coast, imagining, that by this means, he should draw out from its secure station, the English fleet, at that time anchored in Portsmouth harbour. In this expectation, he was disappointed. A few days after the enemy had left the Isle of Wight, they made a descent "at Bright-hamstead, (says Stowe), where they set several of their souldiers a land to burne: but the beacons were fired, and the men came down so thicke, that the Frenchmen fled, and did little hurt." Shortly after they made another descent at Newhaven, about eight miles eastward of the former place, and there landed many captaines and souldiers, who, by the valiantnesse of the gentlemen and yeomen of Sussex, were slaine and drowned in the haven a great number of them, and the rest hardly recovered their ships and galleyes'.' From Newhaven the enemy seem to have sailed eastward to Seaford, where they effected a landing, but were unable to resist the attacks made

'In 1529 died Henrie Jacobson, of Lewes. | This extraordinary man was born in the year 1405, and was consequently 124 years of age at the time of his death. He had been four times married, and by his first three wives had eight children, all of whom he survived. His early days were spent in agricultural pursuits, but becoming enamoured with the fascinations of a military life, he entered the army, and was at the battle of Agincourt, where he was wonnded. When in his 120th year he distinctly remembered being informed of the

upon them by the forces that had been gathered together, and were commanded by Sir Nicholas Pelham. They escaped to their ships, and without attempting further depredations, returned with their diminished forces to France1.

Henry died on the 27th of January in the year 1547, leaving all parties dissatisfied with his conduct1.

The steps that were taken during the short reign of the youthful Edward, led to a much greater freedom of thought, than what had been enjoyed under his farher. The act of the six articles, which had been passed in the preceding reign, was repealed, the statutes against the Lollards and other opponents of popery were abrogated, the use of the mass was prohibited, and various regulations adopted, tending to insure the pre-eminence of the protestants.

The brilliancy of the prospect now enjoyed by the reformers, was, however, soon obscured. Mary ascended the throne, and with her accession came days of darkness. She had been nurtured in the very bosom of the Catholic Church, had imbibed all its doctrines, and inhaled its merciless spirit. The measures which had been taken to destroy its power, and to favour the protestants, had been regarded by her with heartfelt aversion, and no sooner had she obtained the power, than she resolved to crush the hated sect, that had risen to importance on the ruins of her favourite hierarchy. The spendid rites and gaudy ceremonies of the Romish church were again publicly enjoined; the catholics were every where favoured, and the protestants put down; and an act passed for repealing all the laws relative to religion, that had been enacted during the former reign. A legate appeared from the court of Rome, a plenary absolution was obtained for the erring nation, and the papal supremacy was again established. Not less than two hundred and eighty two persons were burned alive during his reign to satiate the vengeance of the monster queen, and her not less barbarous husband sixty died in prison, or of the tortures to which they were exposed, and numbers fled to Frankfort and other cities of Germany, to escape from the cruelties which were meditated against them.

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In the latter end of the year 1554, Derrick Carver, of Brighthelmston, John Launder, of Godstone, and others, were apprehended by Edward Gage, of Firle, gentleman, whilst assembled together for the purpose of devotion in the house of Carver. After being sent up to the queen's council, they were committed as prisoners to Newgate, there to await the leisure of the detested Bishop Bonner, whose time seems, at this period, to have been completely occupied in furnishing victims to appease the sanguinary spirit of his royal mistress. For the space of eight months they continued in prison, daily expecting the visi'A funeral monument of Sir Nicholas Pelham | town. It will be more particularly noticed hereis preserved in Saint Michael's Church, in this after.