Page:A Biographical Dictionary of the Celebrated Women of Every Age and Country (1804).djvu/92

78 of Winchester, Dr. Cox, and Dr. Robinson, upon the old topics; but not being able to convince her of her supposed errors, she was sent to Newgate, though extremely ill.

She was soon after condemned to be burnt, as a heretic, which she denied being. "But, as concerning the faith which I uttered and wrote to the council, I would not (I said) deny it, because I knew it true. After that, they willed me, to have a priest, and then I smiled; then they asked me if it were not good? I said, I would confess my faults unto my God. For I was sure he would hear me with favour. And so we were condemned with a quest."

After her condemnation, her chief support was the goodness of her cause, which afforded her great consolation; and even seems to have made her entertain some hopes of a pardon, even from this unjust tribunal, as appears from two letters which she wrote to the king and the lord chancellor; asserting, in a general but simple way, her own innocence: that she abhorred all heresies, and believed, concerning the supper of the Lord, all that he himself said, and all that was taught by the true church.

Then she proceeds to give an account of her examination and inhuman treatment after her departure from Newgate: that she went from thence to the sign of the Crown, where Mr. Rich and the bishop of London endeavoured, with all their power, to pervert her from the faith, charging her to discover all those she knew of her opinion, particularly some ladies of quality, which, by evasive answers, she refused to do. Then they sent her to the Tower, and put her upon the rack, and kept her on it a long time, because she would make no confession. "And because," says she, "I lay still