1540, when returning from an embassy to the Duke of Cleves, he fell sick at Dunkirk, it was thought from poison. Believing himself about to die, he directed that he should be buried in the church of Notre Dame at Calais. However, he lived to return to England, and died 3 Jan. 1541, and was buried in St. Botolph's, Aldgate. He acted as one of the king's ecclesiastical commissioners on some trials for heresy. His diocesan duties were generally performed by two suffragan bishops and by a bishop consecrated to the suffragan see of Taunton. He wrote 'Oratio pro Henrico VIII apud Leonem max. pontif.' 1521, translated into English, and published with Henry VIII's 'Assertio septem sacramentorum,' 1687, 1688. He was appointed to assist in drawing up the 'Institution of a Christian Man,' and is believed to have helped Cranmer in writing certain works on the king's supremacy and divorce.
[Letters and State Papers of Henry VIII, passim; Brewer's Reign of Henry VIII, passim; Friedmann's Anne Boleyn, i. 86; Wood's Athenæ Oxon. (Bliss), ii. 754; Ellis's Letters, 2nd and 3rd series; Strype's (8vo edit.) Memorials, i.i. 51, 83; Cranmer, 77, 568; Cooper's Athenæ Cantab. 77; Reynolds's Wells Cathedral, preface 92.]
CLERK, JOHN (d. 1552), catholic writer, said to have been descended 'from famous and noble lineage,' was educated for a time in 'grammaticals, logicals, and philosophicals among the Oxonians,' though in what college or hall Wood was unable to discover. He then travelled on the continent, and became proficient in the French and Italian languages. In Italy he was the intimate friend of the eminent divine and statesman Richard Pace. 'All things were in a manner common between them, and what was by either read or observed was forthwith communicated to each other's great advantage.' On his return to England he obtained the post of secretary to Thomas Howard, duke of Norfolk. At length he, like his patron, was accused of leze majesty, and committed to the Tower of London, where, to avoid public shame, as has been conjectured, he hanged himself in his cell with his girdle on 10 May 1552. Clerk, who was a steady adherent of the old form of religion, wrote:
- 'A Treatise of Nobility,' translated from the French, London, 1543, 12mo.
- 'Opusculum plane divinum de mortuorum resurrectione et extremo iuditio, in quatuor linguis succincte conscriptum. Latyne, Englysshe, Italian, Frenche,' London, 1545, 4to, 2nd edition 1547, 4to. Dedicated to Henry, earl of Surrey, K.G. Tanner notices a third edition in 1573, 4to. The English and French texts are in black letter, the Latin and Italian in Roman characters. This excessively rare book is printed in double columns, so that the four languages are apparent at one view.
- 'A Declaration briefly conteyning as well the true understandynge of tharticles ensuynge as allso a recitall of the capital errours against the same. Predestination, Ffree will, Faythe, Justification, Good woorkes, Christian libertye,' London, 1546, 8vo; dedicated in Italian to Thomas, duke of Norfolk.
- Meditations on death.
[Wood's Athenæ Oxon. (Bliss) i. 203; Bale, Script. Brit. Cat. part. post. 109; Pits, De Angliæ Scriptoribus, 747; Ames's Typogr. Antiq. (Herbert), 577, 587, 708; Lowndes's Bibl. Man. (Bohn), 480; Cat. of the Huth Library, i. 325; Tanner's Bibl. Brit. 184; Dodd's Church Hist. i. 379.]
CLERK, Sir JOHN (1684–1755), of Penicuik, judge and antiquary, was the eldest son of John Clerk of Penicuik, who was created knight bart. on 24 March 1679, by Elizabeth, daughter of Henry Henderson of Elvington. He early achieved some success as an advocate at the Scotch bar, and was elected to the Scotch parliament as member for Whithorn (in the Wigtown district) in 1702, which he continued to represent until 1707. In 1706-7 he was placed on the commission appointed to treat for the union of the realms, was returned to the first parliament of Great Britain in the same year, and next year was raised to the bench of the then newly constituted Scotch court of exchequer. On the death of his father, which occurred in 1722, he succeeded to the title and estates. His house, Penicuik, where he gathered together a very valuable collection of antiques, specially rich in inscriptions illustrative of the history of Great Britain, was long a centre of reunion for the cultivated society of Edinburgh. He enjoyed the intimacy of the great English antiquary, Roger Gale, and was one of the earliest and most constant patrons of Allan Ramsay, whom he used to invite year by year to spend a portion of the summer with him. Ramsay is said to have passed much of his later years under Clerk's roof, and to have bitterly felt his death, which took place on 4 Oct. 1755. He survived his patron for only three years, Clerk's son and successor, Sir James Clerk, erecting an obelisk to his memory at Penicuik. Sir John became a fellow of the Society of Antiquaries in 1725, of the Royal Society three years later, and of the Spalding Society in 1740. He married twice, viz. (1) on 23 Feb. 1700-1, Lady Margaret Stewart, eldest daughter of Alexander, third earl of Galloway, who died the same year (26 Dec.) after giving birth
