DE LA SALLE MONTHLY.

VOL. VII.-JULY, 1872.-No. 37.

BISHOP FISHER.

There are ages that stand out from model government; by his lonely lamp the common plane of time with certain Erasmus was accumulating his choice strongly marked features that have treasures of general knowledge; astute made them eras in history. Events statesmen were reducing the perplexing far removed from the ordinary circum- questions of polity to the precision of stances of human experience, and a science, and the researches of obscure fraught with a significance to be re- genius had already prepared for the cognized by the future, stamp a period intellectual triumphs of Bacon. with the indelible impress of greatness, The activity of the times was necesand consecrate it in the memory of sarily attended by a corresponding force succeeding generations as a more per- of character, and eminence was courted fect type of that past with which the by men of more varied erudition and soul loves to commune. Such was the wider acquaintance with the springs of age of the Eighth Henry-a time of human action, than those of any preepic virtues and monster vices; when ceding period. Less from that cirsociety passed through its transition cumstance, than from the fact of his state, and the elements, held in check by the prestige of a long established system, were broken up, and formed in a more congenial union the germs of a new social code.

being constantly associated with Sir Thomas More (than whom few men of even that day are more celebrated), Fisher, bishop of Rochester, has been more neglected by the eulogists of A revolution such as the world has contemporary worth than his merits seldom since or before experienced was deserve. Perhaps his intimacy with silently fermenting, and the doctrines of the learned statesman and polished the Augustan renegade had proven, by courtier, as well as the similarity of their ready reception, how ripe was their lives and opinions, may have society for change. England, the scene tended somewhat to obscure the aged of important events from the moment churchman's fame, or at least to merge the Roman trod her shore, was now to it in that of his friend and co-laborer. give a forecast of her future genius. Be that as it may, the records of that The facile pen of More had unfolded in century are evidences of the general a definite shape his conceptions of a esteem in which the bishop of RochVOL. VII.-1.

ester was held, and which his most passed-forty years of quiet study virulent enemies could not deny him. and Christian probity; but an event John Fisher was born, according to was soon to occur that would divert the most reliable statements, in the the current of his thoughts from sedenyear 1461, at Beverly, in the West tary pursuits, and assign him a more Riding of York. His father, a man brilliant sphere of action. The busiof considerable means, encouraged the ness of the university called him to aptness for study he early developed, court, and there he was presented to and caused him to receive a rudi- Lady Margaret, mother of the reigning mentary training in the collegiate sovereign. Impressed by his modest church of Beverly. Here his ad- demeanor and the splendor of his vancement was rapid. Possessed of acquirements, she made him her contalents of no common order, a mind fessor, and opened to him numerous attuned to habits of virtuous thought, chances of preferment. Of these and a judgment mature beyond his Fisher refused to avail himself. The years, he soon gained an honorable discharge of his priestly functions and distinction among his fellow students, the advancement of education, he and displayed, while yet a boy, those deemed his proper duties. He imqualities of mind and heart that were pressed upon his noble patron the to place him among the proudest of necessity of studying the interests of the state. the poor, and enjoined upon her grandIn his eighteenth year he was ad- son, the young Henry, practices of mitted to the university at Cambridge, charity as the virtue most becoming and after giving ample evidences of his royal birth. To the people he was scholarship, he graduated with many a kind adviser and willing advocate. flattering honors.

He visited them, strengthened their faith by wise precepts, and encouraged them to persevere in "the maintenance of the olden creed.”

In 1504 the bishopric of Rochester became vacant by the death of its incumbent, and Fisher was preferred to

After his subsequent ordination, Fisher applied himself more diligently to the acquisition of useful information. Already a proficient in the learning of the Fathers, he mastered the most abstruse problems of theology, and by constant reading greatly augmented that sec. his stock of general knowledge. As Henry VII, who proposed and ratihe had been at Beverly the favorite of fied the advancement of the virtuous his associates, so at Cambridge his churchman, had in view the beneficial genial disposition and furtive humor reforms he would institute, and the endeared him alike to tutors and effects of his example upon the lax students. Scarcely had he been morals of the age. This was expressed chosen fellow of the college, when he in a letter to the Lady Margaret, which was preferred to the proctorship, and is an eloquent commentary on the shortly after elected successively vice- character of Fisher, and an evidence chancellor and chancellor. of the repute in which even royalty Forty years of his life had now held him. With his consecration, his