Re-establishment of the College of Manchester.

Soon after the accession of Queen Mary, George Collyer was recalled from his retirement in Staffordshire to again resume the wardenship of Manchester. The queen then "refounded the college, appointed one master or keeper, eight fellowes chaplains, four clarkes, six choristers, and did also confirm and re-establish the statutes of the first foundation."-Hollingworth's Mancuniensis.

But although, on the re-establishment of the college, the number of fellows were the same, two only were nominated in the foundation of Philip and Mary, viz. Lawrence Vaux, (afterwards warden,) and John Coppage.

Upon the reinstatement of Warden Collyer, the queen restored to the college six messuages which she had in her hands in Manchester, Newton and Kirkman's hulme, with the tithes of the parish."-Ancient MS. penes the Rev. J. Brookes.) The Earl of Derby, however, still retained possession of the collegiate house, and of some of the lands.

A. D. 1554, Thomas West, Lord Delaware, died, who at his death was seized of the manor and advowson of the church at Manchester. *

On the circumstance of the advowson remaining with the barony, Mr Whittaker has the following remarks. "When the church of Manchester was erected, the temporalities of it would naturally claim the protection and guardianship of the baron. And, to engage the protection, and insure the guardianship more effectually, the latter was indulged with the liberty of recommending a clerk to the bishop. This power of recommendation soon settled into a right of nomination. And it retains to the present moment the reason of the original indulgence in the continuing name of advowson, patronage, or guardianship. Coeval with the commencement of the church, and granted to the baron for the better security of it, the right became annexed to the manor with the power of patronage. And, under all the revolutions of government, and all the extinctions of families, it remained the appendant right of the barony even to the reign of Queen Mary."-Whittaker's History of Manchester, 4to, Vol. II. p. 435.

It will be now necessary to return to Dr Pendleton, originally a papist, who, in the reign of Edward, having recanted in Manchester, and having become one of the preachers earnest for the reformed doctrine, was maintained out of the revenues of the dissolved college. Hollingworth gives the following account of Dr Pendleton's secession from the reformed church, and his relapse into popery. "In Queen Mary's days, he meeting with Mr Saunders in the country about Coventry, (its like where Saunders lived, and Dr Pendleton went that way to London,) and discoursing of

* Jacob's Peerage.

the persecution then arising, Saunders complaining that though his spirit was ready to suffer, his flesh was weak and loath to taste of that bitter cuppe, Pendleton being a fat man, over self-confidently said, I will see the utmost drop of mine molten away, and the last gibbet of this flesh consumed to ashes, before I will forsake God and his truth.' But the issue proved otherwise when they came to London. Saunders boldly preached Christ, opposed antichrist, and sealed his doctrine with his blood at Coventry. Pendleton,' saith Mr Fox,' changed his tippet, preached popery; and being learned, was a great disputer for it alone, and was sent, or of his own accord came down, to Manchester and other places to recant his recantation, and to preach up popery.

Hollingworth adds, that it was in the year 1555, when John Bradford, in his native town, was actively denouncing the errors of popery, that Dr Pendleton came into Manchester, being attended in this mission by Warden Collyer. Their object was to enter into a disputation with this great reformer concerning the true faith. The result of the conference is not stated. Bradford was in the same year imprisoned on a charge of riot, when Bourne, a canon of St Paul's, preached in justification of Bonner, though he was the very person that preserved the preacher from the outrage of the people, and appeased the tumult. As Mr Bradford would not admit of any tenets or practices, except those which were founded on Scripture, and not on human tradition, he was, in the first place, deemed a heretic, and excommunicated. Much correspondence during his imprisonment took place between him and his Christian friends in Lancashire. "There is a letter," says Mr Hollingworth, "from the Counter in the Poultrey to Mr Shawcrosse and his wife, dwelling in Lancashire, exhorting to constancy and perseverance in keeping themselves undefiled in God's service, in fighting the good fight.-He desires to be recommended to Sir William Chorleton, who, saith he, I trust hath kept himself free from idolatry. God grant he may so continue: and to Thomas Ridlestone, though, I fear, saith he, he hath defiled himself in this false service. He mentions also a booke which James Bradshawe had of him, probably the same good man that went to George Marsh, another of our Lancashire martyres. There is alsoe, in the MS. of Immanuel College, a letter from Elizabeth Longshee to Mr Bradford, mentioning his preaching in Lancashire, and blessing God for it, and the benefit and comfort she received by it; and in the postscript she desires him to have remembrance in his prayer of a maid, in the parish of Prestwich, whose name is Alice Seddon, who doth not cease to pray for him night nor day.'

The following is the farewell letter which Bradford wrote to his mother in Manchester before his death:

K

"God's mercy and peace in Christ be more and more perceived of us. Amen. My most dear mother, in the bowels of Christ I heartily pray and beseech you to be thankful for me unto God, who now taketh me unto himself. I die, not as a criminal, but as a witness of Christ, for the truth of whose Gospel I have hitherto confessed, I thank God, both by preaching and imprisonment, and now I am willing to confirm the same by fire. I acknowledge that God might justly have taken me hence for my sins, which are many, great, and grievous; but the Lord, for his mercy in Christ, I hope, hath pardoned them all: But now, dear mother, he taketh me hence by this death as a confessor and witness, that the religion taught by Christ Jesus, the prophets, and the apostles, is God's truth. The prelates in me do persecute Christ, whom they hate, and his truth, which they will not abide, because their works are evil. They do not care for the light, lest men thereby should discover their darkness. Therefore, my dear mother, give thanks to God for me, that he hath made the fruit of your womb to be a witness of his glory, and attend to the truth which I have truly taught out of the pulpit of Manchester. Use often continual prayer to God the Father through Jesus Christ. Hearken to the Scriptures, and serve God according to them, and not according to the custom. Beware of the Romish religion in England; defile not yourself with it; carry the cross of Christ, as he shall lay it upon your back; forgive them that kill me; pray for them, for they know not what they do; commit my cause to God our Father; be mindful of both your daughters, and help them as well as you can.

"I send all my writings to you by my brother Roger. Do with them as you will, because I cannot, as I would. He can tell you more of my mind. I have nothing to give you, or to leave behind me for you, only I pray to God, my Father, for Christ's sake, to bless you, and keep you from evil. May he make you patient and thankful, that he will take the fruit of your womb to witness the truth, wherein I confess to the whole world I die and depart this life in hope of a much better, which I look for at the hands of God my Father, through the merits of his dear Son, Jesus Christ.

"Thus, my dear mother, I take my last farewell of you in this life, beseeching the Almighty and Eternal Father, by Christ, to grant us to meet in the life to come, where we shall give him continual thanks and praise for ever and ever. Amen.

John Bradford soon afterwards received a crown of martyrdom. It was at first intended that he should suffer in Manchester, his native town. But this design was abandoned. A young prentice boy of the name of John Leaf was condemned to the flames along with him. The great Lancashire martyr was accompanied to the place of execution by his brother-in-law Roger Bexwicke of Manchester, who was unfeelingly withheld by blows dealt him by Woodruffe, the sheriff of London, from holding with his kinsman a free communion. At the hour of death Bradford exhorted the people to repentance, which so enraged the brutal officer that the hands of the victim were ordered to be tied. The martyr then kissed the stake; and the last words he was heard to utter were "Strait is the way and narrow is the gate that leads to salvation, and few there be that find it."-Mr Hollingworth has paid an excellent tribute to his memory. "As Cramner was for his place the most renowned and eminent of the martyrs, so Dr Ridley was accounted the most learned, and Mr Bradford the most pious." ▾

It is very creditable to George Collyer, the warden, that, though a strict catho

y Mr Hollingworth thus recounts Mr Bradford's labours as an author: "He wrote several tracts and letters besides those mentioned by Mr Fox. Some are printed, some are not, (viz.) His meditations and prayers ;—A Meditation and Instruction of ye Providence of God to me, J. B. -A Meditation of ye presence of God;-A Meditation of ye Flesh and Spirit, or a Declaration how those words Flesh and Spirit are to be understood in Scripture ;-A Sermon of Repentance; -A Sermon of ye Lord's Supper, in wch are nine reasons against transubstantiation. In ye end it is more practicall, and hath a word of satisfaction to a poore sinner yt thinks himself unworthy;-A Treatise on Election and Free Will, of wch nature there is another letter alsoe to certain men not wrightly perswaded in the doctrine of God's election and predestination ;-A Meditation of Death out of Ludovicus Vives;-A Meditation for ye true Exercise of Mortification ;A Meditation upon ye passion of our Saviour Jesus Christ, and most earnest prayer upon the said passion ;-A Meditation upon ye Ten Commandments and ye Lord's Supper while he was in Prison;-A Meditation upon the Sacrament;-Sundry other Prayers;-A Letter of his own hand, beginning Jesus Immanuel, to my dearest sister in ye Lord (Joyces Hales,) John Bradford wisheth all encrease of Godliness in Christ. The Sume of it is to explaine that place in Rom. 8th chap. 19, 20, 21, verses, That it is to be understood of ye renovation of ye world, and of ye better condicion of all Creatures. This discource he Stileth Cignea Cantia.—It was not long before his Suffering;-A letter to a Christian friend about Christ's Sufferings ;-A letter to Mr Philpot about Unity;-A letter to Mr Coker in Malden, in Essex, intreating him to harbour one John Searchfield, a book-binder, who, in Queen Marye's day, did wander to keep a good conscience; -A letter to Dr Ridley, subscribed by himself, Mr Philpot, and others, in wch is this expression: "All here (God therefore be praised) prepares to pledge their Captaine Christ even when he will and how he will."-A letter written from ye Counter in ye Poultrey to Mr Shawerosse and his wife, dwelling in Lancashire, and to Thomas Riddlestone.

3

lic, he does not appear to have aided persecution. An old writer has paid the following honourable tribute to his memory: He continued in his wardenship to the period of his death, whose exceeding great bounty is yet fresh, by the writing of many that then knew him, both in his first and second wardenship. This Sir George Collyer was a resolved papist, and could not be brought to comply with the present world, though he was held to be the most bountiful and generous warden that had been in this church.-Anc. MS. p. J. B.

He was the last warden upon the original foundation, and is buried in the chapel of THE VIRGIN MARY, at the east of the church.

CHAPTER IX.

ANNALS OF THE WARDENSHIP OF LAWRENCE VAUX, A. d. 1557 to 1560.

From HOLLINGWORTH'S MS. and Mr GRESWELL's collections, with Additions.

LAWRENCE VAUX, B. D. chaplain to his friend and patron the Bishop of Glocester, and one of the fellows who had been nominated in the new charter of foundation of the college of Manchester, was, upon the death of George Collyer, made warden. He was born at Blackrod in Lancashire; was a member first of Queen's College, Oxford, afterwards of Corpus Christi; and about A. D. 1540 had been ordained. He was a strenuous catholic, and very popular in Manchester, and the county in general. Being admitted a fellow of the college of Manchester, he was next, according to the said foundation, "canonically instituted, and inducted ad curam et regimen animarum, to the cure and government of souls, in the office of being master and keeper of St Mary's Church in Manchester." (Hollingworth's Mancuniensis.)

Hollingworth remarks, on the history of the wardenships which occurred during the reign of Mary, that "God did wonderfully hide his people in Lancashire.” John Bird, the Bishop of Chester, had been deprived of his see on account of his having married, and his successor, George Cotes, was not preferred to the bishopric until the third of Queen Mary; and after having burned George Marsh of the parish of Dean, near Bolton, sate but a short time. "Cuthbert Scott, D.D. who had been imprisoned in the Fleet, and had escaped to Louvaine, was then

z Wood, Vol. I. p. 166.