onies, soon after
distinguished by the appellation of Puritans, he exercised his authority
with unsparing rigor; and even stretched it by degrees so far beyond all
legal bounds, that the queen herself, little as she was inclined to
tolerate this sect or to resent any arbitrary conduct in her
commissioners, was moved at length to interpose and reverse some of his
proceedings. The archbishop, now become incapable of yielding his own
will even to that of his sovereign, complained and remonstrated instead
of submitting: reproaches ensued on the part of Elizabeth; and in May
1575 the learned prelate ended in a kind of disgrace the career which he
had long pursued amid the warmest testimonies of royal approbation.

The fairest, at least the most undisputed, claim of this eminent prelate
to the gratitude of his contemporaries and the respect of posterity, is
founded on the character which his high station enabled him to assume
and maintain, of the most munificent patron of letters of his age and
country. The study which he particularly encouraged, and to which his
own leisure was almost exclusively devoted, was that of English
antiquities; and he formed and presented to Corpus Christi college a
large and valuable collection of the manuscripts relative to these
objects which had been scattered abroad at the dissolution of the
monasteries, and must have been irretrievably lost but for his diligence
in inquiring after them and the liberality with which he rewarded their
discovery. He edited four of our monkish historians; was the first
publisher of that interesting specimen of early English satire and
versification, Pierce Plowman's Visions; composed a history in Latin of
his predecessors in the see of Canterbury, and encouraged the labors of
many private scholars by acts of generosity and kindness.

Grindal, a divine of eminence, who during his voluntary exile at
Frankfort had taken a strong part in favor of king Edward's
Service-book, was named as the successor of Bonner in the bishopric of
London; but a considerable time was spent in overcoming his objections
to the habits and ceremonies, before he could be prevailed upon to
assume a charge of which he deeply felt the importance and
responsibility.

To the reputation of learning and piety which this prelate enjoyed in
common with so many of his clerical contemporaries, he added an
extraordinary earnestness in the promotion of Christian knowledge, and a
courageous inflexibil