TYNDALE'S NEW TESTAMENT, &c. 31

ere many yeares I wyl cause a boye that dryueth the plough shall knowe more of
the scripture than thou doest '. Finding it advisable to leave Gloucestershire, Tyndale
came to London in 1523 and, after vainly seeking employment from the Bishop of
London as one of his chaplains, stayed for some time in the house of a charitable
merchant, Humphrey Monmouth. In 1524 he fled to Germany, staying in the first
instance at Hamburg, afterwards at "Wittenberg, and then at Cologne. When his
translation of the New Testament was ready, in 1525, he employed either Peter
Quentell, a well-known Cologne printer, or possibly some workman connected with
Quentell's firm, to print it for him. At the instance of Johann Dobneck, better
known as Cochlaeus, a controversialist on the Roman side, the civic authorities
intervened; and Tyndale, with his amanuensis, William Roy, was obliged to fly,
taking with him the stock often sheets already printed. Proceeding up the Rhine to
Worms, Tyndale caused two editions of his translation to be printed there by Peter
Schoeffer, one (presumably a completion of that begun at Cologne) in quarto with
side-notes, the other in octavo with no side-notes, but with prefaces to the different
books and an epilogue. One copy and a large fragment of another of the octavo have
survived ; the quarto (save for a single copy of eight of the Cologne sheets) and also
several Antwerp reprints have perished utterly. In 1530 Tyndale issued a translation
of the Pentateuch ; in 1531 a version of the book of Jonah with an introduction ; in
November, 1534, a revised edition of his New Testament, together with translations of
all the passages from the OJd Testament appointed to be read in the Communion
Service in place of Epistles ; in 1535 another revision of his New Testament. In
May of this year he was enticed, from the house of the English merchants at
Antwerp, where he had been staying for some time, and as soon as he was beyond
the jurisdiction of the free city was arrested by the officials of the Emperor. He
•was at once thrown into prison at Vilyorde, and on October 6, 1536, strangled and
burnt there as a heretic. In addition to his published editions, he left behind him
a version of the books Joshua — Chronicles II, and Nehemiah. 