1576 Edition | Book 11 | Page 1491 
CloseNow, by and by after, M. Browne commaunded one old Hūt to take his brother Robert Hunter, MarginaliaRob. Hunter set in the stockes.& lay him in the Stockes till hee returned from the burnyng of Higbed at Hornden on the hill, the same day. Whiche thyng old Hunt did. Then Maister Browne (MarginaliaRob. Hunter had before M. Browne.when Robert Hunter came before him) asked if he would do as his brother had dō. But Robert Hunter aunswered: if I do as my brother hath done, I shall haue as he hath had. Mary (quoth Maister Browne) thou mayest be sure of it.
[Back to Top]Then Maister Browne sayd, I maruayle, that thy brother stode so to his tacklyng: and moreouer, asked Robert if Williams Maister of London
CloseThis was Thomas Taylor, the silk weaver to whom William Hunter had been apprenticed. Obviously Brown suspected, rightly or wrongly, that Taylor had fostered William Hunter's evangelical convictions and he was trying to force Robert Hunter to implicate Taylor.
CloseThe Rerum contains an account of Causton and Higbed being taken toLondon and prints the confession of faith Causton and Higbed made in Consistory Court (Rerum, pp. 426 and 428-31). This material was reprinted in the 1563 edition. Foxe also added accounts of their sessions in the Consistory Court of St Pauls, the articles presented against them with their answers and their condemnation, all drawn from Bishop Bonner's official records. A description of their condemnation may have been taken from the description of a spectator. In the second edition Foxe added nothing, but he arranged the material in chronological order. He also eliminated material from this narrative, and more unusually rewrote it. The account of Causton and Higbed remained unchanged in the third and the fourth editions.
[Back to Top]
CloseStarting with a gloss recording the date of their martyrdoms (as appears to be Foxe's standard practice at the beginning of the lives of his martyrs), the glosses in this section serve the usual purpose of marking the events leading up to execution: interrogation, imprisonment, preparation for the end. The gloss 'Also sir Edmund Boner priest before the death of Cromwell, seemed to be of the opinion and was sworne twise agaynst the Pope' makes the point that Bonner's conduct under an earlier monarch cannot be reconciled with his actions under Mary, sustaining the all-important charge of hypocrisy. Foxe parodies the form of the article in calling Bonner 'sir Edmund Boner priest'. The glosses 'M. Causton and M. Higbed constant to death in their confession' and 'The constāt Martirdome of M. Thomas Caustō, and Maister Higbed Martyrs' emphasise the constancy of the martyrs, a virtue as important to the portrayal of the martyrs as hypocrisy was to that of their persecutors. The glosses relating to the confession of faith illustrate a common difference between 1563 and later editions. 1563 uses the most perfunctory form of annotation (numbers) while the later editions include the numbers in the text and have full glosses. The restrained, factual tone of the gloss 'M. Causton appealeth to the Cardinall' probably reflects Foxe feeling torn between the desire to expose procedural injustice with the tacit endorsement of Pole's, and therefore the pope's, authority that such an appeal implied. Several of the glosses (especially at the start of the 'confession' section) are badly placed, no more commonly in one edition than another.
[Back to Top]This Maister Higbed and Maister Causton, two worshypfull Gentlemen in the County of Essex,
ClosePraise of Essex as the county most fruitful in producing martyrs follows in the 1563 edition. This was dropped in subsequent editions, probably because Foxe became more aware of the contributions of the counties of Kent and Sussex. (Kent has the dubious distinction of being the countywith the most martyrs executed).
[Back to Top]
CloseIn effect, Foxe is saying that he does not know how Causton and Higbed came to be arrested. Despite their relative social prominence, the backgrounds of Causton and Higbed remain surprisingly obscure.
CloseThis was Henry Wye, who would later be martyred himself.
stian godlynes, was nothing inferiour to his Maister.
Boner the foresayd bishop, perceiuyng these. ii. Gentlemē to be of worshypfull estate, and of great estimatiō in that countrey, lest any tumult should thereby aryse, came thether himselfe,MarginaliaB. Boner commeth himselfe to Colchester. accompanyed with M. Fecknam and certaine other, thinking to reclayme them to his faction and fashion:
CloseA description of Feckenham trying to convert Higbed and Causton was printed in the 1563 edition and subsequently dropped. It does appear that Foxe was trying to shorten this narrative in the 1570 edition; perhaps this concern was related to a shortage of paper for this edition (see Evenden and Freeman, pp.37-39).
[Back to Top]In fine, when nothyng could preuayle to make them assent to their doynges, at length they came to this poynt, that they required certaine respite to consulte with themselues what were best to do. Whiche tyme of deliberation beyng expired, and they remayning still constant and vnmoueable in their professed doctrine, and settyng out also their confessiō in writyng, the Byshop seyng no Good to be done in tarying any longer there, MarginaliaM. Higbed and M. Caustō caryed to London.departed thence and caried them both with him to London,
CloseThe accounts of the sessions in Consistory Court, together with the articles charged againt Causton and Higbed, and their answers, are taken from Bishop Bonner's official records, probably a court book which has now been lost.
CloseThe accounts of the sessions in Consistory Court, together with the articles charged againt Causton and Higbed, and their answers, are taken from Bishop Bonner's official records, probably a court book which has now been lost.
MarginaliaThe secōd dayes Session.On the whiche day, among many other thynges there sayd and passed, he read vnto them seuerally certaine articles and gaue them respite vntill the next day, to aunswere vnto the same, and so cōmitted them agayne to prison. The copy of which Articles here vnder foloweth.
MarginaliaArticles layd by B. Boner to M. Higbed and M. Causton.FIrst, that thou Thomas Causton (or Thomas Higbed) hast bene and art of the Dioces of London, and also of the iurisdiction now of me Edmund Byshop of London.
Item, that thou was in tyme past, accordyng to the order of the Church of England, baptised and christened.
Item, that thou haddest Godfathers and Godmother, accordyng to the sayd order.
Item, that the sayd Godfathers and Godmother dyd thē promise for thee, and in thy name, the fayth and religiō, that then was vsed in the Realme of England.
Item, that that fayth and Religion, which they did professe, and make for thee, was accompted and taken to be the faith and Religion of the Church, and of the Christen people: and so it was in very deede.
Item, thou commyng to the age of discretion, that is to say, to the age of xiiij. yeares, diddest not mislyke nor disallow that fayth, that Religion, or promise then vsed and approued, and promised by the sayd Godfathers and Godmother, but for a tyme diddest continue in it, as other (takyng themselues for Christen people) did likewise.
[Back to Top]Item, that at that tyme, and also before, it was taken for a doctrine of the Churche, Catholicke and true, and euery where in Christēdome thē allowed for Catholicke & true, and to be the profession of a Christen mā, to beleue that in the Sacrament of the aulter, vnder the formes of bread and wyne, after the cōsecration, there was and is, by the omnipotent power and wil of almighty God, and his word, without any substaunce of bread and wine there remayning, MarginaliaThe reall presence.the true and naturall body and bloud of our Sauiour Iesus Christ in substaunce, which was borne of the virgin Mary, and suffered vpon the Crosse, really, truely, and in very deede.
[Back to Top]Item, that at that tyme thy father and mother, all thyne aūcestors, all thy kindred, acquaintaūce and frendes, and thy sayd Godfathers and Godmother did then so beleue, and thinke in all the same, as the sayd Church did therin beleue.
Item, that thy selfe had no iust cause or lawfull grounde, to departe or swarue from the sayd Religion or fayth, nor no occasiō at all, except thou wilt follow and beleue the erroneous opinion or belief, that hath bene agaynst the common order of the Churche, brought in by certaine disordred persons of late, and at the vttermost within these xxx. or xl. yeares last past.
[Back to Top]Item, that thou doest know, or credibly hast heard and doest beleue, that D. Robert Barnes, Iohn Frith, Tho. Garrerd, Hierome, Lassels, Anne Askew, Iohn Hooper, late Bi-