"Tenderness and sympathy were indeed prominent features of Bradford’s character. Fuller remarks: “It is a demonstration to me that he was of a sweet temper, because Parsons, who will hardly afford a good word to a Protestant, saith “that he seemed to be of a more soft and mild nature than many of his fellow." Indeed he was a most holy and mortified man, who secretly in his closet would so weep for his sins, one would have thought he would never have smiled again; and then, appearing in public, he would be so harmlessly pleasant, one would think he had never wept before.” The familiar story, that, on seeing evil-doers taken to the place of execution, he was wont to exclaim, “But for the grace of God there goes John Bradford," is a universal tradition, which has overcome the lapse of time. And Venning, writingin 1653, desirous to show that, “by the sight of others' sins, men may learn to bewail their own sinfulness and heart of corruption,” instances the case of Bradford, who, “when he saw any drunk or heard any swear, &c., would railingly complain, 'Lord, I have a drunken head; Lord, I have a swearing heart!'” His personal appearance and daily habits are graphically described by Foxe. “He was, of person, a tall man, slender, spare of body, somewhat a faint sanguine colour, with an auburn beard“). He slept not commonly above four hours a night; and in his bed, till sleep came, his book went not out of his hand. ...His painful diligence, reading, and prayer, I might almost account it his whole life. He did not eat above one meal a day, which was but very little when he took it; and his continual study was upon his knees. In the midst of dinner he used oftentimes to muse with himself, having his hat over his eyes, from whence came commonly plenty of tears, dropping on his trencher. Very gentle he was to man and child.... His chief recreation was, in no gaming or other pastime, but only in honest company and comely talk, wherein he would spend a little leisure after dinner at the board, and so to prayer and his book again. He counted that hour not wellspent, wherein he did not some good, either with his pen, study, or exhortation to others.”"