The books composed by these fugitives, having stolen over to England, began to make converts every where; but it was a translation of the Scriptures by Tindal that was esteemed the most dangerous to the established faith.
The first edition of this work, composed with little accuracy, was found liable to considerable objections; and Tindal, who was poor, and could not afford to lose a great part of the impression, was longing for an opportunity of correcting his errors, of which he had been made sensible.

Tonstal, then bishop of London, soon after of Durham, a man of great moderation, being desirous to discourage, in the gentlest manner, these innovations, gave private orders for buying up all the copies that could be found at Antwerp; and he burned them publicly in Cheapside.

By this measure he supplied Tindal with money, enabled him to print a new and correct edition of his work, and gave great scandal to the people, in thus committing to the flames the word of God.[*] The disciples of the reformation met with little severity during the ministry of Wolsey, who, though himself a clergyman, bore too small a regard to the ecclesiastical order to serve as an instrument of their tyranny: it was even an article of impeachment against him,[**] that by his connivance he had encouraged the growth of heresy, and that he had protected and acquitted some notorious offenders.

Sir Thomas More, who succeeded Wolsey as chancellor, is at once an object deserving our compassion, and an instance of the usual progress of men's sentiments during that age.

This man, whose elegant genius and familiar acquaintance with the noble spirit of antiquity had given him very enlarged sentiments, and who had in his early years advanced principles which even at present would be deemed somewhat too free, had, in the course of events, been so irritated by polemics, and thrown into such a superstitious attachment to the ancient faith, that few inquisitors have been guilty of greater violence in their prosecution of heresy.