that so, by death, you may purchase eternal life. Depend not on your youth for the continuance of your days; remembering that, when God appoints, the young are taken away as well as the aged. Stedfastly resist the allurements and temptations of the world, the flesh, and the devil. Be penitent for your sins, and yet despair not; be strong in faith, and yet presume not; and desire, like St. Paul, to be with Christ, with whom, even in death there is life. Rejoice in Christ, as I trust you do. Follow his footsteps; take up the cross; trust in him for the remission of your sins. "Respecting my death, rejoice with me, dear sister, that I shall be delivered from this corruptible state, and put on incorruption for I am assured that, by losing a mortal life, I shall obtain immortality.-I pray God to grant you his grace, that you may live in his fear, and die in the true Christian faith; from which I exhort you, in his name, never to swerve, either for hope of life, or dread of death: for if you deny his truth, he will deny you. May God receive me to glory now, and you hereafter, when it shall please him to call you!-Farewell, dear sister! Put your trust in God alone; for he alone can help you." During her imprisonment, Lady Jane composed a very devout prayer, containing the following expressions of the humble confidence in God, and submission to his blessed will, which she maintained to her last moments. "O Lord, thou God and Father of my life, hear a poor and desolate woman, who fleeth unto thee alone, in all her troubles, and her sufferings. Thou, O Lord, art the defender and deliverer of those who put their trust in thee: therefore, defiled with sin, encumbered with affliction, and overwhelmed with misery, I come unto thee, O blessed Saviour! craving thy mercy and help. Though it is expedient that we should sometimes be visited with adversity, that we may be tried whether we are of thy flock or not, and also become the better acquainted both with thee and with ourselves; yet, O thou, who saidst thou wouldst not suffer us to be tempted above our power, be merciful to me! Grant, I beseech thee, that I may neither be too much elated with prosperity, lest I should deny thee, my God; nor too much pressed down with adversity, lest I should despair, and blaspheme thee, my Lord and Saviour. O merciful God, my sufferings are best known unto thee; be thou my strong tower of defence, I humbly beg of thee. Suffer me not to be tempted above my power; but either deliver me from this great 1 misery, or give me grace patiently to bear thy afflicting hand, and sharp correction. Thou knowest better what is good for me than I do: therefore, deal with me in all things as thou wilt; and afflict me in the way that seemeth best unto thee. Only, in the mean time, arm me, I beseech thee, with thy armour, that I may stand fast; my loins being girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of righteousness: above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith I may be able to quench the fiery darts of the wicked; and the helmet of salvation; and the sword of the Spirit, which is thy most holy Word. Grant that, praying always with all manner of prayer and supplication, I may refer myself wholly to thy will, abiding thy pleasure, and comforting myself in those troubles which it shall please thee to send me; seeing such troubles are profitable to me; and being assuredly persuaded that all thou doest, cannot but be well. Hear me, O merciful Father, for his sake whom thou hast appointed a sacrifice for my sins; to whom, with thee, and the Holy Ghost, be all honour and glory!" On the day of her execution, her husband, Lord Guilford Dudley, obtained permission to see her: but she declined the interview, apprehensive, as she informed him by a message, that the tenderness of their parting would overcome the fortitude of both, and would too much unbend their minds from that constancy which their approaching end required; and earnestly hoping that they would soon meet, and be for ever united, in a blessed world, where death, disappointment, and misfortune, would no longer have access to them, nor disturb their endless felicity. It had been intended to execute Lady Jane and Lord Guilford on the same scaffold; but from an apprehension of the compassion which their youth, beauty, and noble birth, would excite in the minds of the people, it was ordered, that Lady Jane should be beheaded within the verge of the Tower. She saw her husband led to execution; and having given him from the window some token of her tender affection, she awaited with tranquillity till her own appointed hour should bring her to the like fate. She even saw his headless body brought back to the chapel, where it was to be buried; and found herself more confirmed by the report she heard of his pious end, than shaken by so affecting and melancholy a spectacle. Sir John Gage, constable of the Tower, when he led her to execution, desired her to bestow on him some small present, which he might keep as a memorial of her. She gave him her table-book, in which she had just written three sentences, on seeing her husband's dead body; one in Greek, another in Latin, and a third in English. The purport of them was, that human justice was against his body, but that divine mercy would be favourable to his soul; that if her offence deserved punishment, her youth at least, and her inexperience, were worthy of excuse; and that God and posterity, she trusted, would show her favour. Dr. Fecknam attended her to the scaffold. With inimitable sweetness she thanked him for his attention to her, though it had been so harrassing to her in her last moments. On the scaffold, she addressed the spectators in very pathetic terms. She fully acknowledged her offence, in not having rejected, with sufficient firmness and constancy, the crown that was tendered to her. She did not utter one complaint of the severity with which she had been treated. She declared that she died a true Christian; and that she had no hope of salvation but in the mercy of God, through the blood of his only Son Jesus Christ. She confessed that she had too much neglected the Word of God; too much loved herself, and the world; and, therefore, had justly merited the punishment inflicted on her: but she thanked God it had been the means of leading her to true repentance. She concluded by desiring the people to pray for her. She then knelt down; and, in the most devout manner, repeated the fifty-first Psalm. Being disrobed, she prepared, with unshaken fortitude, to submit herself to the executioner. Having laid her head on the block, she meekly said, "Lord, into thy hands I commend my spirit!" and received the fatal stroke. Thus died, on the twelfth of February, 1554, in the seventeenth or eighteenth year of her age, this illustrious lady; a most lovely pattern of innocence, wisdom, and piety; a bright and distinguished ornament of the female sex, and of the age and country in which she lived. Her character is judiciously summed up by Bishop Burnet in the following words: "She was a lady who seemed indeed born for a noble fortune; for she was a beautiful and graceful person, she had great parts, and greater virtues. She had learned the Latin and Greek tongues to great perfection. She read the Scriptures much; and had attained great knowledge in divinity. But with all her advantages of birth and parts, she was so humble, gentle, and pious, that all people, and none more than the young king, both admired and loved her. She had a mind wonderfully raised above the world; and at an age when others are but imbibing the notions of philosophy she had attained to the practice of its highest precepts. She was neither lifted up with the hope of a crown, nor cast down when she saw her palace made afterwards her prison; but demeaned herself with an equal temper of mind, in those great inequalities of fortune that so suddenly exalted and depressed her. All the passion she expressed was that which was of the noblest kind, and was the indication of a tender and generous nature, being much affected with the troubles which her father and husband incurred on her account." MRS. KNOWLES. This lady was a literary Quaker, and born in Staffordshire, about the year 1727. Her parents being of the society of Friends, she was carefully educated in substantial and useful knowledge; but this alone could not satisfy her active mind; for she was long distinguished by various works in the polite arts of poetry, painting, and more espe cially the imitation of nature in needle-work. Some specimens of the latter having accidentally fallen under the observation of their majesties, they expressed a wish to see her. She was accordingly presented in the simplicity of her Quaker dress, and graciously received. This and subsequent interviews led to her grand undertaking, a representation of the king in needle-work, which she completed to the entire satisfaction of their majesties, though she had never before seen any thing of the kind. About this time she had the honour to introduce her son, then about five years of age, to their majesties; and upon this occasion the little fellow delivered, with singular boldness, the following lines, which Mrs. K. wrote for the occasion: Here, royal pair, your little Quaker stands, Since peace on earth sweet angels sang in heav's. As loyal subjects, then, great. George, by thee Mrs Knowles next accompanied her husband, a very respectable physician, and a rigid Quaker, on a scientific tour through Holland, Germany, and France, where they obtained introductions to the most distinguished personages. Mrs. K. was admitted to the toilet of the late unfortunate Queen of France, by the particular desire of the latter. The appearance of a Quaker was an extraordinary spectacle to that princess, who eagerly enquired concerning their tenets, and acknowledged that these heretics were at least philosophers. Mrs. K. wrote on various subjects, philosophical, theological, and poetical. Some of her performances have been published with her name, but more anonymously; and it is said, that she modestly retained in manuscript far more than she submitted to the public. When urged on these subjects, she would reply: "Even arts and sciences are but evanescent splendid vanities, if unaccompanied by the Christian virtues.' Mr. Boswell has preserved a conversation between Mrs. K. and Dr. Johnson, upon the subject of a young lady who became a convert to Quakerism; but, as Miss Seward (in her Letters, lately published) undertakes to exhibit it with more accuracy than Boswell has manifested, we shall transcribe the letter in which this dialogue is detailed: "Wellsburn, near Warwick, Dec. 31, 1785. "Behold, dear Mrs. Mompessan, the promised minutes of that curious conversation which once passed at Mr. Dilly's, the Bookseller, in a literary party, formed by Dr. Johnson, Mr. Boswell, Dr. Mayo, and others, whom Mrs. Knowles and myself had been invited to meet, and in which Dr. Johnson and that lady disputed so earnestly. It is, however, previously necessary that you should know the history of the very amiable young woman who was the subject of their debate. Miss Jenny Harry that was, for she afterwards married, and died ere the first nuptial year expired, was the daughter of a rich planter in the East Indies. He |