ry principle of
Gospel charity, men of Belial, delighting in deeds of violence and
blood; and that the victim of their cruelty, persecuted even to the
death solely for his religious sentiments, was a pattern of every
Christian excellence, the undaunted champion of Gospel truth, the
sainted martyr of the Protestant faith. This were the more easy task,
for little further would need to be done in its accomplishment than to
select from former writers passages of indiscriminate panegyric on the
one hand, and equally indiscriminate vituperation on the other. The
investigation of doubtful and disputed facts, to the generality of
minds, is irksome and disagreeable; and its results, for the most part
removed, as they are, from extreme opinions on either side, are
received with a far less keen relish than the glowing eulogy of a
partisan, and the unsparing invective of an enemy. Truth, (p. 350)
nevertheless, must be our object. Truth is a treasure of intrinsic
value, and will retain its worth after the adventitious and forced
estimate put upon party views and popular representations shall have
passed away.

Sir John Oldcastle, who derived the title of Lord Cobham from his
wife, was a man of great military talents and prowess, and at the same
time a man of piety and zeal for the general good. He was one of the
chief benefactors towards the new bridge at Rochester, a work then
considered of great public importance; and he founded a chantry for
the maintenance of three chaplains. Oldcastle was by no means free
from trouble during the reign of Richard II. Indeed, so unsettled was
the government, and so violent were the measures adopted against
political opponents, and so cheap and vile was human life held, that
few could reckon upon security of property or person for an hour. One
day a man was seen in a high civil or military station; the next
arrested, imprisoned, banished, or put to death. Oldcastle was very
nearly made an early victim of these violent proceedings. Among the
strong measures to which parliament had recourse about the year 1386,
they appointed fourteen lords to conduct the administration, among
whom was Lord Cobham. Just ten years afterwards he was arrested, and
adjudged to death by the parliament;[266] but his punishment, at the
earnest request of certain lords, was commuted for perpetual (p. 351)
imprisonment,[267] a sentence from which the lords of parliament
revolted,--and he was exiled.[268] From