Why Were Our Reformers Burned?

THERE are certain facts in history which the world tries hard to forget and ignore. These facts get in the way of some of the world’s favourite theories, and are highly inconvenient. The consequence is that the world shuts its eyes against them. They are either cut dead as vulgar intruders, or passed by as tiresome bores. Little by little they sink out of sight of the students of history, like ships in a dis- tant horizon, or are left behind like a luggage train in a siding. Of such facts the subject of this paper is a vivid example:—“The Burning of our English Reformers; and the Reason why they were Burned.”