most abject submission, he bewailed in private,
with abundance of bitter tears, their cruelty, and still more his own
criminal compliance. The savage zealots knew not how to set bounds to
their triumph over a man whom learning and acknowledged talents and
honorable employments had rendered so considerable.

Even when at length he was set free, and flattered himself that he had
drained to the dregs his cup of bitterness, he discovered that the
masterpiece of barbarity, the refinement of insult, was yet in store. He
was required, as evidence of the sincerity of his conversion and a token
of his complete restoration to royal favor, to take his seat on the
bench by the side of the savage Bonner, and assist at the condemnation
of his brother-protestants. The unhappy man did not refuse,--so
thoroughly was his spirit subdued within him,--but it broke his heart;
and retiring at last to the house of an old and learned friend, whose
door was opened to him in Christian charity, he there ended within a few
months, his miserable life, a prey to shame, remorse and melancholy. A
sadder tale the annals of persecution do not furnish, or one more
humbling to the pride and confidence of human virtue. Many have failed
under lighter trials; few have expiated a failure by sufferings so
severe. How often must this victim of a wounded spirit have dwelt with
envy, amid his slower torments, on the brief agonies and lasting crown
of a courageous martyrdom!

It is happily not possible for a kingdom to flourish under the crushing
weight of such a tyranny as that of Mary. The retreat of the foreign
protestants had robbed the country of hundreds of industrious and
skilful artificers; the arbitrary exactions of the queen impoverished
and discouraged the trading classes, against whom they principally
operated; tumults and insurrections were frequent, and afforded a
pretext for the introduction of Spanish troops; the treasury was
exhausted in efforts for maintaining the power of the sovereign,
restoring the church to opulence and splendor, and re-edifying the
fallen monasteries. To add to these evils, a foreign marriage rendered
both the queen and country subservient to the interested or ambitious
projects of the Spanish sovereign. For his sake a needless war was
declared against France, which, after draining entirely an already
failing treasury, ended in the loss of Calais, the last remaining trophy
of the victories by which the Edwards and the Henrys