PREFACE. AT no period has biographical history been so much esteemed and promoted as in these days of christian freedom. The memoirs of wise and good men, especially such as have suffered for the tes- timony of a good conscience, afford interesting entertainment and valuable instruction. To rescue from oblivion impartial accounts of their holy actions, their painful sufferings, and their triumph- ant deaths, will confer a deserved honour upon their memory : and there is, perhaps, no class of men whose historybetter deserves to be transmitted to posterity than that of the persons stigmatized by the name of Puritans. The cruelties exercised upon there were indeed very great. THEY SUFFERED FOR THE TESTIMONY OF A GOOD CONSCIENCE, and an AVOWED ATTACH- MENT TO THE CAUSE OF CHRIST. The proofs which they gave of their zeal, their fortitude, and their integrity, were certainly as great as could be given. They denied themselves those honours, prefer-
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