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773 [749]

K. Henry. 7. A prayer against the Turkes. Wil. Tilsworth. Martyr.
¶ A Prayer agaynst the Turkes.  
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This prayer is Foxe's composition.

MarginaliaA prayer agaynst the Turkes. O Eternall Lord God, father of our Lord Iesus Christ, creator and disposer of all thinges, iust, gracious, and wise only, in the name and reuerence of thy sonne Iesus, we prostrate our selues, desiring thine omnipotent maiestie, to looke downe vpon these afflicted tymes of thy poore creatures and seruauntes: reieue thy Church, increase our fayth, and confound our enemies: And as thou hast geuen thine onely begotten sonne vnto vs, promising with hym lyfe to all that shall beleue vpon his name: so incline the obedience of our fayth to thy promises in him, that our hartes may be farre of from all other sinnefull additions and prophane inuentions, which are besides him, and not in hym grounded vpō thy will and promise. And graunt (we besech thee) to thy Church, more and more to see how horrible a thing it is, to set vp any other meanes or helpe of saluation, but onely in him, whom thou onely hast sent and sealed. Reforme thy church with perfect doctrine and faithfull teachers, that we seing our own weakenes, may put of our selues, and put on him without whom we can do nothing. So shall we stand strong, when nothing standeth in vs, but thy sonne alone, in whom thou art onely pleased. Renew in this thy Church agayne, the decayed faith of thy sonne Iesus, which may plentifully bryng forth in vs, not leaues onely, but fruites of Christian lyfe: And forgeue our wretched Idolatry and blinde phantasies past, wherwith we haue prouoked manifold wayes thy deserued indignatiō against vs: For our hartes haue bene full of Idoles, our temples full of Images, our wayes full of hypocrisie: thy Sacramentes prophaned, and thy religion turned to superstition, because the lanterne of thy word went not before vs, therfore we haue stumbled.MarginaliaPsal. 119. Miserably we haue walked hetherto, lyke sonnes not of Sara, but of Agar,MarginaliaGalat. 4. and therfore these turkish Agarens haue risen vp against vs. Many hard & straight wayes we haue passed, but the wayes of the Lord we haue not found.MarginaliaSapien. 5. Much coste we haue bestowed on bread that swageth no hunger, but that bread which onely feedeth and commeth freely, we haue not tasted.MarginaliaEsai. 55. We haue sayled farre & nere in barkes of our owne buildyng, but haue not kept within the Arke onely of thy promise, and therfore these floudes haue taken vs.MarginaliaGenes 6. We haue prayed much, but not in thine appointed temple, and therfore haue not bene heard. We haue plowed & tilled, but without thy haiffer, and therfore this vntydie ground of ours, bringeth forth so many weedes.MarginaliaIudic. 14. We do fish apace and that all night, but because we fishe not on the right side of the boate, in our fishing we catch neuer a finne.MarginaliaIoa. 22: Our buildinges be full of good intentions and great deuotions, but because the groundworke is not surely layd vpon the rocke of thy promise, the East winde ryseth and shaketh them all to shiuers.MarginaliaLuke. 6. We walke and haue walked long after the preceptes and doctrines of men, hauyng a shew of wisedome, but not as holding the head, where lieth all our strength,MarginaliaColos. 2. and therfore these Philistian Turkes, haue hetherto so preuayled agaynst vs. Briefly all the partes and bones of the body be shaken out of place. Wherfore we beseech thee (O Lord) put to thy holy hande, and set them in the right ioynt agayne: And finally reduce this same thy mysticall body agayne, to his perfect and naturall head, which is thine onely sonne Iesus Christ, and none other. For hym onely hast thou annoynted and appoynted. Neither is there any other head, that can minister strength and nutriment to this body, but he alone: for as much as all other heds be sinnefull, and are not able to stande in thy sight, but make this bodie rather worse then better. Onely this thy welbeloued & perfect sonne is he, in whome onely dwelleth all our strength & fulnesse: hym onely we confesse and knowledge. For whom, and with whom, we beseech thee (O Lord God of hostes) graunt to thy Church strength and victory agaynst the malicious furye of these Turkes, Saracens, Tartarians, agaynst Gog and Magog, and all the malignaunt rabble of Antichrist, enemies to thy sonne Iesus our Lorde and Sauiour. Preuente their deuises, ouerthrow their power, and dissolue their kyngdome, that the kyngdome of thy sonne so long oppressed, may recouer and florish ouer all: and that they which wretchedly be fallē from thee, may happely bee reduced agayne into the fold of thy saluation, through Iesus Christ our onely mediatour & most mercifull aduocate. Amē.

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Marginalia1500. IN this long digression  

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Persecution of Lollards

These accounts of Lollards executed or disciplined during the reign ofHenry VII were important to Foxe, as they helped him to demonstrate (to Foxe'ssatisfaction at least) that there was a True Church before Luther. (Foxe makes thispoint explicitly later). Yet Foxe had to rely on the co-operation ofothers to obtain this information. On one level, there were reports by individualinformants, some of whom were eyewitnesses to the events described, and some ofwhom were repeating what they had heard from others. Foxe based his account ofthe Lollards tried at Coventry in 1486 and 1488 on a transcription (possibly atranslation) of extracts in the register of John Hales, the bishop of Coventry and Lichfield; this was almost certainly sent to Foxe. And for information about other Lollards, Foxe also relied on chronicles and documents supplied tohim by antiquaries such as William Bowyer and William Cary.

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Thomas S. Freeman
University of Sheffield

, wherin sufficiently hath ben described the greuous and tedious persecution of the Saracens, and Turkes agaynst the Christians,  
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Persecution of Lollards

These accounts of Lollards executed or disciplined during the reign ofHenry VII were important to Foxe, as they helped him to demonstrate (to Foxe'ssatisfaction at least) that there was a True Church before Luther. (Foxe makes thispoint explicitly later). Yet Foxe had to rely on the co-operation ofothers to obtain this information. On one level, there were reports by individualinformants, some of whom were eyewitnesses to the events described, and some ofwhom were repeating what they had heard from others. Foxe based his account ofthe Lollards tried at Coventry in 1486 and 1488 on a transcription (possibly atranslation) of extracts in the register of John Hales, the bishop of Coventry and Lichfield; this was almost certainly sent to Foxe. And for information about other Lollards, Foxe also relied on chronicles and documents supplied tohim by antiquaries such as William Bowyer and William Cary.

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Thomas S. Freeman
University of Sheffield

thou hast to vnderstand (good reader) and behold the image of a terrible Antichrist euidently appearing both by his own doynges, & also by the scriptures, prophesied and declared to vs before.MarginaliaA question whether is the greater Antichrist the Turke or the Pope Now in comparing the Turke with the Pope, if a question be asked whether of them is the truer or greater Antichrist, it were easye to see and iudge, that the Turke is the more open and manyfest enemye agaynst Christ and hys Churche. But if it be asked, whether of them two hath bene the more bloudy and pernitious aduersary to Christe and his members, or whether of them hath consumed and spilt more Christian bloud, he with sworde, or this with fire & sword together, neither is it a light matter to discerne, neither is it my part here to discusse, which do but onely write the hystorie, and the Actes of them both.  
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This is yet another example of Foxe considering the 'persecution'of Christians as a basis for identifying them with Antichrist.

Wherfore after the storye of the Turkes thus finished, nowe to reenter agayne there, wheras we left, in describing the domesticall troubles and persecutions here at home vnder the Byshop of Rome:MarginaliaBabram and an olde mā, Martyrs.
Vide supra. pag. 706.
after the burnyng of Babram in Northfolke aboue declared. pag. 706. I signified also of an other certaine aged man mentioned in an old written Chronicle borowed of one in the tower,  
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Foxe obtained a manuscript copy of Ranulf Higden's Polychroniconfrom William Bowyer, the keeper of the Tower records from 1563-1570. Thismanuscript, with Foxe's annotations, is now College of Arms, Arundel MS 7.

intituled Polychron. (although I finde not hys name in the sayd Chronicle expresed) which suffered the paynes of burnyng in smithfield, about the same tyme, which was the yeare of our Lorde. 1500.MarginaliaEx scripto Polychronico. Ex Polychron.

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This aged father, I suppose, be he of whome I fynde mention made in certaine olde papers and recordes of William Carye  

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This is one of a number of occasions when Foxe acknowledged hisdebt to William Cary, a London clothworker and antiquary. (On Cary and his manuscript collection, see Andrew G. Watson, 'Christopher and William Carye, Collectors of Monastic Manuscripts, and "John Carye"', The Library Fifth series,20 (1965), pp. 135-42). Foxe's purpose in stating his sources was to demonstrateto potential critics of his work that he had evidence to support his narrative.

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Citizen (albeit the day of the moneth doth a litle differ) wherin is thus testified,MarginaliaDiuers Kentishmen bearing fagots. that on the xx. day of Iuly, an. 1500. vpon the day of S. Margaret, there was an old man burned in smithfield for an hereticke,  
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The execution of an unnamed old man at Smithfield is recorded in anumber of sources (e.g., The Great Chronicle of London, ed. A. H. Thomas andI. D. Thornley [London, 1938], p. 294 and Fabyan's Chronicle, ed. H. Ellis [London,1911], p. 687). None of the surviving sources supply the details of the man's attempted escape and injury, so it must be assumed that whatever the source that Cary supplied to Foxe was, it was subsequently lost.

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& the same person vpō the tenth day before he was burned, would haue stolen out of the Lolardes tower, and so fallyng out of the tower, did fowlye hurt him selfe: wherupō he was caryed in a carte to his death, as he went to his burning.

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In the foresayd papers  

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No record of these trials survives, but the Milanese ambassador and aa number of contemporary chronicles mention the abjurations (J. A. F. Thomson, TheLater Lollards, 1412-1520 [Oxford, 1965], pp. 158-9).

of auncient recorde, is furthermore declared, how in the yeare aboue prefixed, whiche was. an. 1499. in the tyme of one Perseuel, many were taken for heretikes in Kent, and at Paules crosse they bare faggottes and were abiured, and shortlye after the same yeare, there went xiij. lolardes afore the procession in Paules, and there were of them viij. wemen and a young ladde, and the laddes mother was one of the viij. and all the xiij. bare faggottes in their neckes afore the procession.

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William Tilsworth Martyr.

MarginaliaWill. Tilsworth, Martyr. FOr so much as the worlde is come now to such a morositie and peuishe insensibilitie in these contentious and cauillyng dayes of ours, that nothyng can be so circumspectly written and storyed, but shall lye in daunger of one Sycophant or an other, whiche neuer will credite there, where they list not to lyke: neither will they euer lyke that, which seemeth preiudiciall to their faction, or not to serue the humor wherewith their phantasies be infected: therefore to stoppe the mouthes of such carpyng cauillers with as much possiblitie as I may, be it knowne to all and singular suche persons, who by euidence of truth and witnes will be satisfied, that in the towne of Amersham, be yet alyue both men and women, whiche can and do beare witnes of this that I shall declare. Also there is of the sayd companye one named William Page, an aged father and yet alyue, witnes to the same. Also an other named Agnes wetherley wydowe, beyng about the age of an hundreth yeares, yet lyuing and wytnes hereof: That in the dayes of kyng Henry vij. an. 1506.  

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The date is incorrect; the signification of Tilesworth's excommunica-tion and commitment to the secular authority survives and is dated 10 August 1511(TNA C 85/115/10). But this document - which lists Robert Cosin, William Scrivener, Nicholas Collins and Thomas Man as also being condemned - shows that,in this case, apart from the date, the information from Foxe's aged informants was essentially accurate.

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in the dioces of Lyncolne in Bukynghā shyre (William Smith beyng Byshop of the same dioces) one William Tylseworth was burned in Amersham, in a close called Stādley about 60. yeares agoe.MarginaliaThe daughter compelled to set fire to her father. At whiche tyme one Ioane Clerke, beyng a maryed woman, whiche was the onely daughter of the sayd W. Tylseworth & a faythful woman, was compelled with her owne handes to set fire to her deare father: and at the same tyme her husband Iohn Clerke dyd penaunce at her fathers burning, and bare a fagot, as did also.  
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The family names of many of those listed below (Chase, Harding,Phipp and Scrivener) will recur in Foxe's account of the 1521investigations into heresy in the Chilterns. TNA C 85/ 115/10 lists a William Scrivener condemned todeath as a relapsed heretic on 10 August 1511; he may be the William Scrivener included in this list.

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Robert Bartlet. Iohn Mumbe and hys
Richard Bartlet. wife
Iohn Bartlet. Richard Bennet.
Thomas Hardyng, and Roger Bennet.
his wife. Iohn Fip.
Henry Hardyng. William Grinder.
Richard Hardyng. Thomas Homes.
Robert Hardyng. Yomand Dorman.
Iohn Milsent and his William Scriuener.
wyfe. Iohn Scriuener.
William Whyte. Thomas Chase.
Iohn Cracher.

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All
TT.iij.