Flanked by angels, Christ the Judge presides at the top of this title page woodcut. The lower panels depict the opposition between the "true" Protestant and "false" Roman Catholic churches. The lower left illustrates a Protestant preacher delivering a sermon to a congregation, the members of which read open books that symbolize Bibles. Protestants worship God, who appears as the Hebrew Tetragrammaton. In the next panel, Protestant martyrs burn and ascend to heaven in an upward movement, carrying palm fronds that signify their martyrdoms. The lower right depicts a Roman Catholic priest instructing a congregation. Members of this audience hold beads, which symbolize the Catholic devotional practices attacked by Foxe and other English Protestants. A procession progresses behind, evoking celebrations such as the Feast of Corpus Christi that Foxe and his co-religionists rejected. In an upper panel, monks and priests honor the elevated host and demons are driven from heaven in a downward movement that indicates divine disapproval for Roman Catholic doctrine and devotion. The complete title reads, "Actes and Monuments of these latter and perillous dayes, touching matters of the Church, wherein ar comprehended and described the great persecutions & horrible troubles, that have bene wrought and practiced by the Romishe Prelates, speciallye in this Realme of England and Scotlande, from the yeare of our Lorde a thousande, unto the tyme nowe present. Gathered and collected according to the true copies & wrytinges certificatorie, as wel of the parties them selves that suffered, as also out of the Bishops Registers, which wer the doers therof, by John Foxe, Imprinted at London by John Day, dwellyng over Aldersgate. Cum privilegio Regi[a]e Majestatis [i.e., With the prerogative of the Queen's majesty]." This woodcut appears in the first through fourth editions (1563, 1570, 1576, and 1583). In the second (1570), third (1576), and fourth (1583) editions, it illustrates the opening of volumes one and two of the work. The phrase "Come ye blessed, Go ye cursed" appears on the image in the second edition (1570), where it corresponds to "The Image of the persecuted Church" and "The Image of the persecuting Church." No Luborsky and Ingram #. JPEG file (2.7 MB).
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