he year 1514. He is believed to
have been educated at Oxford, and was trained for the law. In addition
to his legal business, he translated and compiled many law-books, the
most notable being the _Great Abridgement of the Statutes_. This book he
printed himself, and it is certainly one of the finest examples of
sixteenth century printing to be found. The work was divided into three
parts, each of which consisted of more than two hundred large folio
pages. When it is remembered that the method of printing books at this
period was slow, at the most only two folio pages being printed at a
pull, the time and capital employed upon the production of this book
must have been very great. The type was the small secretary in use at
Rouen, and it is just possible the book was printed there and not in
England.

John Rastell's first printing office in London was on the south side of
St. Paul's Churchyard. Williarn Bonham, the stationer with whom Rastell
was afterwards associated, had some premises there, and as late as the
seventeenth century there was a house in Sermon Lane, known as the
Mermaid, and it may be that in one or other of these Rastell printed the
undated edition of Linacre's _Grammar_, which bears the address, 'ye
sowth side of paulys.' But in 1520 he moved to 'the Mermayd at Powlys
gate next to chepe syde.' There he printed _The Pastyme of People_, and
Sir Thomas More's _Supplicacyon of Souls_, besides several interludes
and two remarkable jest-books, _The Twelve mery gestys of one called
Edith_ and _A Hundred Mery Talys_. The last named became one of the most
popular books of the time, but only one perfect copy of it is now known,
and that, alas! is not in this country. Rastell was brother-in-law of
Sir Thomas More, and up to the year 1530 a zealous Roman Catholic. So
strong were his religious opinions that in that year he wrote and
printed a defence of the Roman Catholic doctrine of Purgatory, under the
title of the _New Boke of Purgatory_. This was answered by John Frith,
the Reformer, who is credited with having achieved John Rastell's
conversion. By whatever means the change was brought about, John Rastell
did soon afterwards become a Protestant; but the change in his belief
made him many enemies. He was arrested for his opinions, and if he did
not die in prison, he was in prison just before his death, which took
place in 1536. During the last sixteen years of his life he does not
appear to have paid much attenti