or BOXER, EDMUND, an English prelate, notorious for his persecutions of the Protestants during the reign of Queen Mary, was born at Hanley in Worcestershire about the end of the fifteenth century, and generally passed for the natural son of George Savage, a priest, who was the natural son of Sir John Savage of Clifton in the same county. Strype, however, says he was positively assured that Bonner was the legitimate offspring of a poor man, who lived in a cottage long afterwards known by the name of Bonner's Place. About the year 1512 he entered as a student of Broadgate Hall (now Pembroke College), Oxford; and in 1519 was admitted as bachelor of the canon and of the civil law. Having been admitted into orders, he obtained some preferment in the diocese of Worcester. In 1525 he took his degree as doctor; and having attracted the notice of Wolsey, that prelate took him under his patronage. Bonner was with the cardinal at Ca'wood when he was arrested on a charge of high treason. After the death of Wolsey he saw his way towards adopting Lutheran sentiments, and found means to insinuate himself into the favour of Henry VIII., who made him one of his chaplains, and employed him in several embassies abroad. In 1532 he was sent to Rome with Sir Edward Carne, to answer for the king, who had been cited to appear in person or by proxy. In 1533 he was again despatched to Pope Clement VII., then at Marseilles, to intimate Henry's appeal to a future general council from the sentence which had been pronounced against his divorce. On this occasion he threatened the pope with so much resolution, that His Holiness talked of having him burned alive or thrown into a cauldron of melted lead. Bonner accordingly judged it prudent to decamp without the ceremony of taking leave. His Holiness did not foresee that the man whom he had thus menaced with the flames was destined to burn heretics in England in support of the very faith which, under Henry, he had lent his aid to overthrow. In 1538, being then ambassador at the court of France, he was nominated bishop of Hereford; but, before consecration, he was translated to the see of London, and enthroned in April 1540. Henry VIII. died in 1547; at which time Bonner was ambassador at the court of the emperor Charles V. During this reign he was constantly zealous in his opposition to the pope; and, in compliance with the king, favoured the Reformation. Henry VIII. was a man to exact a rigid compliance with all his whims and caprices; but on the accession of young Edward, Bonner refused to take the oath of supremacy, and was committed to the Fleet, where he remained until he thought fit to promise obedience to the laws. After his release he continued to comply with the Reformation, but with such manifest neglect and reluctance, that he was twice reprimanded by the privy council, and in 1549 was, after a long trial, committed to the Marshalsea, and deprived of his bishopric. The succeeding reign, however, gave him ample opportunity of revenge. Mary was scarcely seated on the throne when Bonner was restored to his bishopric, and soon afterwards appointed vicegerent and president of the convocation. From this time he became the chief instrument of persecuting cruelty, and is said to have condemned no less than 200 Protestants to the flames in the space of three years. Nor was this vindictive and persecuting priest less remarkable for his impudence than his cruelty. On the accession of Elizabeth he appeared with the rest of the bishops at Highgate, to congratulate her on the occasion; but the queen refused to permit him to kiss her hand. Having, in the second year of her reign, refused to take the oath of allegiance and supremacy, he was again deprived and committed to the Marshalsea, where he died, Sept. 5, 1559, after a confinement of ten years' duration. The character of Bonner was remarkable for obstinacy and inflexibility in everything save principle; yet even in this respect it exhibits some striking contrasts. In the early part of his career he accommodated his principles to his convenience and ambition; in the latter, after his return to Catholicism, he remained steadfast in his adherence to the church, and, when disgraced, bore his deprivation and imprisonment with apparent calmness and resignation. The charge of atheism brought against one so defiled with blood was superfluous. He was constitutionally merciless and austere; fitted by nature for a persecutor of all opinions adverse to his own; and equally capable of employing the same burning zeal either against or in favour of any cause that he espoused.