FOX, EDWARD (c. 1496-1538), bishop of Hereford, was born at Dursley, Gloucestershire; he is said on very doubtful authority to have been related to Richard Fox (q.v.). From Eton he proceeded to King's College, Cambridge, and after grad uating was made secretary to Wolsey. In 1528 he was sent with Gardiner to Rome to obtain from Clement VII. a decretal com mission for the trial and decision of the case between Henry VIII. and Catherine of Aragon. On his return he was elected provost of King's College, and in Aug. 1529 conveyed to the king Cran mer's historic advice that he should apply to the universities of Europe rather than to the pope. After a brief mission to Paris in Oct. 1529, Fox in Jan. 1530 befriended Latimer at Cambridge, and took an active part in persuading that university and Oxford to decide in the king's favour. He was sent to employ similar methods of persuasion at the French universities in 1530-31, and was also engaged in negotiating a closer league between England and France. In April 1533 he was prolocutor of convocation when it decided against the validity of Henry's marriage with Catherine, and in 1534 published his treatise De vera differentia regiae potestatis et ecclesiae (2nd ed. 1J38, Eng. tr. 1548). He received the archdeaconry of Leicester (1531) and the bishopric of Hereford (1535). In 1535-36 he was sent to Germany to dis cuss the basis of a political and theological understanding with the Lutheran princes and divines, and had several interviews with Luther, who could not be persuaded of the justice of Henry VIII.'s divorce. Bucer dedicated to him in 1S36 his Commentaries on the Gospels, and Fox's Protestantism was also illustrated by his pat ronage of Alexander Aless, whom he defended before Convocation. Fox died on May 8, 1538. He was the most Lutheran of Henry VIII.'s bishops, and was largely responsible for the Ten Articles of 1S36.