During the two years which followed the Duke of Norfolk's death I did
only see my Lady Surrey once, which was when she came to Arundel
House, on a visit to her lord's grandfather; and her letters for a
while were both scanty and brief. She made no mention of religion, and
but little of her husband; and chiefly touched on such themes as Lady
Margaret's nuptials with Mr. Sackville (Lord Dorset's heir) and
Mistress Milicent's with Sir Hammond l'Estrange. She had great
contentment, she wrote, to see them both so well married according to
their degree; but that for herself she did very much miss her good
sister's company and her gentlewoman's affectionate services, who
would now reside all the year at her husband's seat in Norfolk; but
she looked when my lord and herself should be at Kenninghall, when he
left the university, that they might yet, being neighbors, spend some
happy days together, if it so pleased God. Once she wrote in exceeding
great joy, so that she said she hardly knew how to contain herself,
for that my lord was coming in a few days to spend the long vacation
at Lord Sussex's house at Bermondsey. But when she wrote again,
methought--albeit her letter was cheerful, and she did jest in it
somewhat more than was her wont--that there was a silence touching her
husband, and her own contentment in his society, which betokened a
reserve such as I had not noticed in her before. About that time it
was bruited in London that my Lord Surrey had received no small
detriment by the bad example he had at Cambridge, and the liberty
permitted him.
And now, forsaking for a while the theme of that noble pair, whose
mishaps and felicities have ever saddened and rejoiced mine heart
almost equally with mine own good or evil fortune, I here purpose to
set down such occurrences as should be worthy of note in the more
obscure sphere in which my lot was cast.
When I was about sixteen, my cousin Kate was married to Mr. Lacy;
first in a secret manner, in the night, by Mr. Plasden, a priest, in
her father's library, and the next day at the parish church at
Holborn. Methinks a fairer bride never rode to church than our Kate.
Her mother went with her, which was the first time she had been out of
doors for a long space of time, for she feared to catch cold if the
wind did blow from the north or the east; and if from the south she
feared it should bring noxious vapors from the river; and the west,
infection from the city, and so stayed at home for greater safety. But
on Kate's wedding day we did all protest the wind blew not at all, so
that from no quarter of the sky should mischief arise; and in a closed
litter, which she reckoned to be safer than a coach, she consented to
go to church.
"Marry, good wife," cried Mr. Congleton, when she had been magnifying
all the dangers she mostly feared, "thou dost forget the greatest of
all in these days, which doth hold us all by the neck, as it were. For
hearing mass, as we did in this room last night, we do all run the
risk of being hanged, which should be a greater peril methinks than a
breath of foul air."
She, being in a merry mood, replied: "Twittle twattle, Mr. Congleton;
the one may be avoided, the other not. 'Tis no reason I should get a
cold to-day because I be like to be hanged to-morrow."
"I' faith," cried Polly, "my mother hath well parried your thrust,
sir; and methinks the holy Bishop of Rochester was of the same mind
with her."
"How so, Polly?" quoth her father; and she, "There happened a false
rumor to rise suddenly among the people when he was in the prison, so
I have heard Mr. Roper relate, that he should be brought to execution
on a certain day; wherefore his cook, that was wont to dress his
dinner and carry it daily unto him, hearing of his execution, dressed
him no dinner at all that day. Wherefore, at the cook's next repair
unto him, he demanded the cause why he brought him not his dinner.
'Sir,' said the cook, 'it was commonly talked all over the town that
you should have died to-day, and therefore I thought it but vain to
dress anything for you.' 'Well,' quoth the bishop merrily, 'for all
that report, thou seest me yet alive; and therefore, whatsoever news
thou shalt hear of me hereafter, prithee let me no more lack my
dinner, but make it ready; and if thou see me dead when thou comest,
then eat it thyself. But I promise thee, if I be alive, by God's
grace, to eat never a bit the less.'"
"And on the day he was verily executed," said Mistress Ward, "when the
lieutenant came to fetch him, he said to his man, 'Reach me my furred
tippet, to put about my neck.' 'O my lord!' said the lieutenant, 'what
need you be so careful of your health for this little time, being not
much above in hour?' 'I think no otherwise,' said this blessed father;
'but yet, in he mean time, I will keep myself as well as I can; for I
tell you truth, though I have, I thank our Lord, a very good desire
and a willing mind to die at this present, and so I trust of his
infinite mercy and goodness he will continue it, yet I will not
willingly hinder my health one minute of an hour, but still prolong
the same as long as I can by such reasonable ways as Almighty God hath
provided for me.'" Upon which my good aunt fastened her veil about her
head, and said the holy bishop was the most wise saint and
reasonablest martyr she had yet heard of.
Kate was dressed in a kirtle of white silk, her head attired with an
habiliment of gold, and her hair, brighter itself than gold, woven
about her face in cunningly wrought tresses. She was led to church
between two gentlemen--Mr. Tresham and Mr. Hogdson--friends of the
bridegroom, who had bride-laces and rosemary tied about their silken
sleeves. There was a fair cup of silver gilt carried before her,
wherein was a goodly branch of rosemary, gilded very fair, and hung
about with silken ribbons of all colors. Musicians came next; then a
group of maidens bearing garlands finely gilded; and thus we passed on
to the church. The common people at the door cheered the bride, whose
fair face was a passport to their favor; but as Muriel crept along,
leaning on my arm, I caught sound of murmured blessings.
"Sweet saint," quoth an aged man, leaning on his staff, near the
porch, "I ween thine espousals be not of earth." A woman, with a child
in her arms, whispered to her as she past, "He thou knowest of is
dead, and died praying for thee." A man, whose eyes had watched her
painfully ascending the steps, called her an angel; whereupon a beggar
with a crutch cried out, "Marry, a lame angel!" A sweet smile was on
her face as she turned toward him; and drawing a piece of silver from
her pocket, she bestowed it on him, with some such words as
these--that she prayed they might both be so happy, albeit lame, as to
hobble to heaven, and get there in good time, if it should please God.
Then he fell to blessing her so loud, that she hurried me into the
church, not content to be thanked in so public a manner.
After the ceremony, we returned in the same order to Ely Place. The
banquet which followed, and the sports succeeding it, were conducted
in a private and somewhat quiet fashion, and not many guests invited,
by reason of the times, and Mr. Congleton misliking to draw notice to
his house, which had hitherto been but little molested, partly for
that Sir Francis Walsingham had a friendship for him, and also for his
sister, Lady Egerton of Ridley, which procured for them greater favor,
in the way of toleration, than is extended to others; and likewise the
Portuguese ambassador was his very good friend, and his chapel open to
us at all times; so that priests did not need to come to his house for
the performance of any religious actions, except that one of the
marriage, which had taken place the night before in his library.
Howsoever, he was very well known to be a recusant, for that neither
himself, nor any belonging to him, attended Protestant worship; and
Sir Francis sometimes told him that the clemency with which he was
treated was shown toward him with the hope that, by mild courses, he
might be soon brought to some better conformity.
Mr. Lacy's house was in Gray's Inn Lane, a few doors from Mr. Swithin
Wells's; and through this proximity an intimate acquaintanceship did
arise between that worthy gentleman and his wife and Kate's friends.
He was very good-natured, pleasant in conversation, courteous, and
generous; and Mrs. Wells a most virtuous gentlewoman. Although he (Mr.
Swithin) much delighted in hawking, hunting, and other suchlike
diversions, yet he so soberly governed his affections therein, as to
be content to deprive himself of a good part of those pleasures, and
retire to a more profitable employment of training up young gentlemen
in virtue and learning; and with such success that his house has been,
as it were, a fruitful seminary to many worthy members of the Catholic
Church. Among the young gentlemen who resided with him at that time
was Mr. Hubert Rookwood, the youngest of the two sons of Mr. Rookwood,
of Euston, whom I had seen at the inn at Bedford, when I was
journeying to London. We did speedily enter into a somewhat close
acquaintanceship, founded on a similarity of tastes and agreeable
interchange of civilities, touching the lending of books and likewise
pieces of music, which I did make fair copies of for him, and which we
sometimes practiced in the evening; for he had a pleasant voice and an
aptness to catch the trick of a song, albeit unlearned in the art,
wherein he styled me proficient; and I, nothing loth to impart my
knowledge, became his instructor, and did teach him both to sing and
play the lute. He was not much taller than when I had seen him before;
but his figure was changed, and his visage had grown pale, and his
hair thick and flowing, especially toward the back of the head,
discovering in front a high and thoughtful forehead. There was a great
deal of good young company at that time in Mr. Wells's house; for some
Catholics tabled there beside those that were his pupils, and others
resorted to it by reason of the pleasant entertainment they found in
the society of ingenuous persons, well qualified, and of their own
religion. I had most days opportunities of conversing with Hubert,
though we were never alone; and, by reason of the friendship which had
existed between his father and mine, I allowed him a kindness I did
not commonly afford to others.
Mr. Lacy had had his training in that house, and, albeit his natural
parts did not title him to the praise of an eminent scholar, he had
thence derived a great esteem for learning, a taste for books, of the
which he did possess a great store (many hundred volumes), and a
discreet manner of talking, though something tinctured with
affectation, inasmuch as he should seem to be rather enamored of the
words he uttered, than careful of the substance. Hubert was wont
to say that his speech was like to the drawing of a leaden sword out
of a gilded sheath. He was a very virtuous young man; and his wife had
never but one complaint to set forth, which was that his books took up
so much of his time that she was almost as jealous of them as if they
had been her rivals. She would have it he did kill himself with study;
and, in a particular manner, with the writing of the life of one
Thomas à Kempis, which was a work he had had a long time on hand. One
day she comes into his library, and salutes him thus: "Mr. Lacy, I
would I were a book; and then methinks you would a little more respect
me." Polly, who was by, cried out, "Madam, you must then be an
almanac, that he might change every year;" whereat she was not a
little displeased. And another time, when her husband was sick, she
said, if Mr. Lacy died, she would burn Thomas a Kempis for the killing
of her husband. I, hearing this, answered that to do so were a great
pity; to whom she replied, "Why, who was Thomas a Kempis?" to which I
answered, "One of the saintliest men of the age wherein he lived."
Wherewith she was so satisfied, that she said, then she would not do
it for all the world.
Methinks I read more in that one year than in all the rest of my life
beside. Mine aunt was more sick than usual, and Mistress Ward so taken
up with the nursing of her, that she did not often leave her room.
Polly was married in the winter to Sir Ralph Ingoldby, and went to
reside for some months in the country. Muriel prevailed on her father
to visit the prison with her, in Mistress Ward's stead, so that
sometimes they were abroad the whole of the day; by reason of which, I
was oftener in Gray's Inn Lane than at home, sometimes at Kate's
house, and sometimes at Mistress Wells's mansion, where I became
infected with a zeal for learning, which Hubert's example and
conversation did greatly invite me to. He had the most winning tongue,
and the aptest spirit in the world to divine the natural inclinations
of those he consorted with. The books he advised me to read were
mostly such as Mistress Ward, to whom I did faithfully recite their
titles, accounted to be not otherwise than good and profitable, having
learned so much from good men she consulted thereon, for she was
herself no scholar; but they bred in me a great thirst for knowledge,
a craving to converse with those who had more learning than myself,
and withal so keen a relish for Hubert's society, that I had no
contentment so welcome as to listen to his discourse, which was
seasoned with a rare kind of eloquence and a discursive fancy, to
which, also, the perfection of his carriage, his pronunciation of
speech, and the deportment of his body lent no mean lustre. Naught
arrogant or affected disfigured his conversation, in which did lie so
efficacious a power of persuasion, and at times, when the occasion
called for it, so great a vehemency of passion, as enforced admiration
of his great parts, if not approval of his arguments. I made him at
that time judge of the new thoughts which books, like so many keys
opening secret chambers in the mind, did unlock in mine; and I mind me
how eagerly I looked for his answers--how I hung on his lips when he
was speaking, not from any singular affection toward his person, but
by reason of the extraordinary fascination of his speech, and the
interest of the themes we discoursed upon; one time touching on the
histories of great men of past ages, at another on the changes wrought
in our own by the new art of printing books, which had produced such
great changes in the world, and yet greater to be expected. And as he
was well skilled in the Italian as well as the French language, I came
by his means to be acquainted with many great writers of those
nations. He translated for me sundry passages from the divine play of
Signor Dante Alighieri, in which hell and purgatory and heaven
are depicted, as it were by an eye-witness, with so much pregnancy of
meaning and force of genius, that it should almost appear as if some
special revelation had been vouchsafed to the poet beyond his natural
thoughts, to disclose to him the secrets of other spheres. He also
made me read a portion of that most fine and sweet poem on the
delivery of the holy city Jerusalem, composed by Signor Torquato
Tasso, a gentleman who resided at that time at the court of the Duke
of Ferrara, and which one Mr. Fairfax has since done into English
verse. The first four cantos thereof were given to Mr. Wells by a
young gentleman, who had for a while studied at the University of
Padua. This fair poem, and mostly the second book thereof, hath
remained imprinted in my memory with a singular fixity, by reason that
it proved the occasion of my discerning for the first time a special
inclination on Hubert's side toward myself, who thought nothing of
love, but was only glad to have acquired a friend endowed with so much
wit and superior knowledge, and willing to impart it. This book, I
say, did contain a narration which bred in me so great a resentment of
the author's merits, and so quick a sympathy with the feigned subjects
of his muse, that never before or since methinks has a fiction so
moved me as the story of Olindo and Sophronisba.
Methinks this was partly ascribable to a certain likeness between the
scenes described by the poet and some which take place at this time in
our country. In the maiden of high and noble thoughts, fair, but
heedless of her beauty, who stood in the presence of the soldan, once
a Christian, then a renegade, taking on herself the sole guilt,--O
virtuous guilt! O worthy crime!--of which all the Christians were
accused, to wit, of rescuing sacred Mary's image from the hands of the
infidels who did curse and blaspheme it, and, when all were to die for
the act of one unknown, offered herself a ransom for all, and with a
shamefaced courage, such as became a maid, and a bold modesty
befitting a saint--a bosom moved indeed, but not dismayed, a fair but
not pallid cheek--was content to perish for that the rest should
live;--in her, I say, I saw a likeness in spirit to those who suffer
nowadays for a like faith with hers, not at the hands of infidels, but
of such whose parents did for the most part hold that same belief
which they do now make out to be treason.
Hubert, observing me to be thus moved, smiled, and asked if, in the
like case, I should have willed to die as Sophronisba.
"Yes," I answered, "if God did give me grace;" and then, as I uttered
the words, I thought it should not be lawful to tell a lie, not for to
save all the lives in the world; which doubt I imparted to him, who
laughed and said he was of the poet's mind, who doth exclaim, touching
this lie, "O noble deceit! worthier than truth itself!" and that he
thought a soul should not suffer long in purgatory for such a sin.
"Maybe not," I answered; "yet, I ween, there should be more faith in a
sole commitment to God of the events than in doing the least evil so
that good should come of it."
He said, "I marvel, Mistress Constance, what should be your thoughts
thereon if the life of a priest was in your hands, and you able to
save him by a lie."
"Verily," I answered, "I know not, Master Rookwood; but I have so much
trust in Almighty God that he would, in such a case, put words into my
mouth which should be true, and yet mislead evil-purposed men, or that
he shall keep me from such fearful straits, or forgive me if, in the
stress of a great peril, I unwittingly should err."
"And I pray you," Hubert then said, as if not greatly caring to pursue
the theme, "what be your thought concerning the unhappy youth Olindo,
who did so dote on this maiden that, fearful of offending there where
above all he desired to please, had, greatly as he loved, little
hoped, nothing asked, and not so much as revealed his passion until a
common fate bound both to an equal death?"
"I thought not at all on him," I answered; "but only on Sophronisba."
At which he sighed and read further: "That all wept for her who,
albeit doomed to a cruel death, wept not for herself, but in this wise
secretly reproved the fond youth's weeping: 'Friend,' quoth she,
'other thoughts, other tears, other sighs, do beseem this hour. Think
of thy sins, and God's great recompense for the good. Suffer for his
sole sake, and torment shall be sweet. See how fair the heavens do
show, the sun how bright, as it were to cheer and lure us onward!'"
"Ah!" I exclaimed, "shame on him who did need to be so exhorted, who
should have been the most valiant, being a man!" To the which he
quickly replied:
"He willed to die of his own free will rather than to live without her
whom he jewelled more than life: but in the matter of grieving love
doth make cowards of those who should else have been brave."
"Me thinks, rather," I answered, "that in noble hearts love's effects
should be noble."
"Bethink you, Mistress Constance," he then asked, "that Sophronisba
did act commendably, insomuch that when an unlooked-for deliverance
came, she refused not to be united in life to him that had willed to
be united to her in death."
"You may think me ungrateful, sir," answered; "but other merits
methinks than fondness for herself should have won so great a heart."
"You be hard to content, Mistress Constance," he answered somewhat
resentfully. "To satisfy you, I perceive one should have a hard as
well as a great heart."
"Nay," I cried, "I praise not hardness, but love not softness either.
You that be so learned, I pray you find the word which doth express
what pleaseth me in a man."
"I know not the word," he answered; "I would I knew the substance of
your liking, that I might furnish myself with it."
Whereupon our discourse ended that day; but it ministered food to my
thoughts, and I fear me also to a vain content that one so gifted with
learning and great promise of future greatness should evince something
of regard beyond a mutual friendship for one as ignorant and young as
I then was.
Some months after Kate's marriage, matters became very troublesome, by
reason of the killing of a great store, as was reported, of French
Huguenots in Paris on St. Bartholomew's day, and afterward in many
cities of France, which did consternate the English Catholics for more
reasons than one, and awoke so much rage in the breasts of
Protestants, that the French ambassador told Lady Tregony, a friend,
of Mistress Wells, that he did scarce venture to show his face; and
none, save only the queen herself, who is always his very good friend,
would speak to him. I was one evening at the house of Lady Ingoldby,
Polly's mother-in-law, some time after this dismal news had been
bruited, and the company there assembled did for the most part
discourse on these events, not only as deploring what had taken place,
and condemning the authors thereof,--which, indeed, was what all good
persons must needs have done,--but took occasion thence to use such
vile terms and opprobrious language touching Catholic religion, and
the cruelty and wickedness of such as did profess it, without so much
as a thought of the miseries inflicted on them in England, that--albeit
I had been schooled in the hard lesson of silence--so strong a passion
overcame me then, that I had well nigh, as the Psalmist saith, spoken
with my tongue, yea, young as I was, uttered words rising hot from my
heart, in the midst of that adverse company, which I did know, them to
be, if one had not at that moment lifted up his voice, whose
presence I had already noted, though not acquainted with his name; a
man of reverent and exceedingly benevolent aspect; aged, but with an
eye so bright, and silvery hair crowning a noble forehead, that so
much excellence and dignity is seldom to be observed in any one as was
apparent in this gentleman.
"Good friends," he said, and at the sound of his voice the speakers
hushed their eager discoursing, "God defend I should in any way differ
with you touching the massacres in France; for verily it has been a
lamentable and horrible thing that so many persons should be killed,
and religion to be the pretence for it; but to hear some speak of it,
one should think none did suffer in this country for their faith, and
bloody laws did not exist, whereby Papists are put to death in a
legal, cold-blooded fashion, more terrible, if possible, than the
sudden bursts of wild passions and civil strife, which revenge for
late cruelties committed by the Huguenots, wherein many thousand
Catholics had perished, the destruction of churches, havoc of fierce
soldiery, and apprehension of the like attempts in Paris, had stirred
up to fury; so that when the word went forth to fall on the leaders of
the party, the savage work once begun, even as a fire in a city built
of wood, raged as a madness for one while, and men in a panic struck
at foes, whose gripe they did think to feel about their throats."
Here the speaker paused an instant. This so bold opening of his speech
did seem to take all present by surprise, and almost robbed me of my
breath; for it is well known that nowadays a word, yea a piece of a
word, or a nod of the head, whereby any suspicion may arise of a
favorable disposition toward Catholics, is often-times a sufficient
cause for a man to be accused and cast into prison; and I waited his
next words (which every one, peradventure from curiosity, did likewise
seem inclined to hear) with downcast eyes, which dared not to glance
at any one's face, and cheeks which burned like hot coals.
"It is well known," quoth he, "that the sufferings which be endured by
recusants at this time in our country are such, that many should
prefer to die at once than to be subjected to so constant a fear and
terror as doth beset them. I speak not now of the truth or the falsity
of their religion, which, if it be ever so damnable and wicked, is no
new invention of their own, but what all Christian people did agree
in, one hundred years ago; so that the aged do but abide by what they
were taught by undoubted authority in their youth, and the young have
received from their parents as true. But I do solely aver that Papists
are subjected to a thousand vexations, both of bonds, imprisonments,
and torments worse than death, yea and oftentimes to death itself; and
that so dreadful, that to be slain by the sword, or drowned, yea even
burned at the stake, is not so terrible; for they do hang a man and
then cut him down yet alive, and butcher him in such ways--plucking out
his heart and tearing his limbs asunder--that nothing more horrible can
be thought of."
"They be traitors who are so used," cried one gentleman, somewhat
recovering from the surprise which these bold words had caused.
"If to be of a different religion from the sovereign of the country be
a proof of treason," continued the venerable speaker, "then were the
Huguenots, which have perished in France, a whole mass and nest of
traitors."
A gentleman seated behind me, who had a trick of sleeping in his
chair, woke up and cried out, "Not half a one, sirs; not so much as
half a one is allowed," meaning the mass, which he did suppose to have
been spoken of.
"And if so, deserved all to die,' continued the speaker.
"Ay, and so they do, sir," quoth the sleeper. "I pray you let them all
be hanged." Upon which every one laughed, and the aged gentleman
also; and then he said,
"Good my friends, I ween 'tis a rash thing to speak in favor of
recusants nowadays, and what few could dare to do but such as cannot
be suspected of disloyalty to the queen and the country, and who,
having drunk of the cup of affliction in their youth, even to the
dregs, and held life for a long time as a burden which hath need to be
borne day by day, until the wished for hour of release doth come--and
the sooner, the more welcome--have no enemies to fear, and no object
to attain. And if so be that you will bear with me for a few moments,
yea, if ye procure me to be hanged to-morrow" (this he said with a
pleasant smile; and, "Marry, fear not, Mr. Roper," and "I' faith,
speak on, sir," was bruited round him by his astonished auditors), "I
will recite to you some small part of the miseries which have been
endured of late years by such as cannot be charged with the least
thought of treason, or so much as the least offence against the laws,
except in what touches the secret practice of their religion. Women
have, to my certain knowledge, been hung up by the hands in prisons
(which do overflow with recusants, so that at this time there
remaineth no room for common malefactors), and cruelly scourged, for
that they would not confess by which priest they had been reconciled
or absolved, or where they had heard mass. Priests are often tortured
to force them to declare what they hear in confession, who harbor
priests and Papists, where such and such recusants are to be found,
and the like questions; and in so strenuous a manner, that needles
have been thrust under their nails, and one man, not long since, died
of his racking. O sirs and gentle ladies, I have seen with mine own
eyes a youth, the son of one of my friends--young Mark Typper, born of
honest and rich parents, skilful in human learning, having left his
study for a time, and going home to see his friends--whipped through
the streets of London, and burnt in the ear, because, forsooth, a
forward judge, to whom he had been accused as a Papist, and finding no
proof thereof, condemned him as a vagabond. And what think you, good
people, of the death of Sir Robert Tyrwit's son, who was accused for
hearing of a mass at the marriage of his sister, and albeit at the
time of his arrest in a grievous fever, was pulled out of the house
and thrust into prison, even as he then was, feeble, faint, and
grievously sick? His afflicted parents entreat, make intercession, and
use all the means they can to move the justices to have consideration
of the sick; not to heap sorrow upon sorrow, nor affliction on the
afflicted; not to take away the life of so comely a young gentleman,
whom the physicians come and affirm will certainly die if he should be
removed. All this is nothing regarded. They lay hold on the sick man,
pull him away, shut him up in prison, and within two days next after
he dies. They bury him, and make no scruple or regard at all. O sirs,
bethink you what these parents do feel when they hear Englishmen speak
of the murders of Protestants in France as an unheard of crime. If, in
these days, one in a family of recusants doth covet the inheritance of
an elder brother--yea, of a father--he hath but to conform to the now
established religion (I leave you to think with how much of piety and
conscience), and denounce his parent as a Papist, and straightway he
doth procure him to be despoiled, and his lands given up to him. Thus
the seeds of strife and bitter enmity have been sown broadcast through
the land, the bands of love in families destroyed, the foundations of
honor and beneficence blown up, the veins and sinews of the common
society of men cut asunder, and a fiendly force of violence and a
deadly poison of suspicion used against such as are accused of no
other crime than their religion, which they yet adhere to; albeit
their fortunes be ruined by fines and their lives in constant
jeopardy from strenuous laws made yet more urgent by private malice.
My friends, I would that not one hair of the head of so much as one
Huguenot had been touched in France; that not one Protestant had
perished in the flames in the late queen's reign, or in that of her
present majesty; and also that the persecution now framed in this
country against Papists, and so handled as to blind men's eyes and
work in them a strange hypocrisy, yea and in some an innocent belief
that freedom of men's souls be the offspring of Protestant religion,
should pass away from this land. I care not how soon (as mine honored
father-in-law, and in God too, I verily might add, was wont to say),--I
care not how soon I be sewn up in a bag and cast into the Thames, if
so be I might first see religious differences at an end, and men of
one mind touching God's truth."
Here this noble and courageous speaker ceased, and various murmurs
rose among the company. One lady remarked to her neighbor: "A
marvellous preacher that of seditious doctrines, methinks."
And one gentleman said that if such talk were suffered to pass
unpunished in her majesty's subjects, he should look to see massing
and Popery to rear again their heads in the land.
And many loudly affirmed none could be Papists, or wish them well, and
be friends to the queen's government, and so it did stand to reason
that Papists were traitors.
And another said that, for his part, he should desire to see them less
mercifully dealt with; and that the great clemency shown to such as
did refuse to come to church, by only laying fines on them, and not
dealing so roundly as should compel them to obedience, did but
maintain them in their obstinacy; and he himself would as lief shoot
down a seminary priest as a wolf, or any other evil beast.
I noticed this last speaker to be one of those who had spoken with
most abhorrence of the massacres in France.
One lady called out in a loud voice that Papists, and such as take
their part, among which she did lament to see Mr. Roper, should be
ashamed so much as to speak of persecution; and began to relate the
cruelties practised upon Protestants twenty years back, and the
burning at Oxford of those excellent godly men, the bishops of London
and Worcester.
Mr. Roper listened to her with an attentive countenance, and then
said:
"I' faith, madam, I cannot choose but think Dr. Latimer, if it be he
you speak of, did somewhat approve of such a method of dealing with
persons obstinate touching religion, when others than himself and
those of his own way of thinking were the subjects of it, if we judge
by a letter he wrote in 1538 to his singular good friend the Lord
Privy Seal Cromwell, at the time he was appointed to preach at the
burning at Smithfield of Friar Forest of Greenwich, a learned divine I
often did converse with in my young years."
"What wrote the good bishop?" two or three persons asked; and the lady
who had spoken before said she should warrant it to be something
pious, for a more virtuous Protestant never did live than this holy
martyr.
Whereupon Mr. Roper: "This holy bishop did open his discourse right
merrily, for in a pleasant manner he thus begins his letter: 'And,
sir, if it be your pleasure, as it is, that I shall play the fool in
my customable manner when Forest shall suffer, I would wish my stage
stood near unto Forest; for I would endeavor myself so to content the
people that therewith I might also convert Forest, God so helping.'
And further on he doth greatly lament that the White Friars of
Doncaster had access to the prisoner, and through the fault of the
sheriff or jailers, or both, he should be allowed to hear mass and
receive the sacrament, by which he is rather comforted in his way than
discouraged. And _such is his foolishness_, this good doth
humbly say, that if Forest would abjure his religion, he should yet
(for all his past obstinacy) wish him pardoned. O sirs, think you that
when at Oxford this aged man, seventeen years after, did see the
flames gather round himself, that he did not call to mind what time he
preached, playing the fool, as he saith, before a man in like agonies,
and never urged so much as one word against his sentence?"
"Marry, if he did not," said one, whom I take to have been Sir
Christopher Wray, who had been a silent listener until then, "if his
conscience pricked him not thereon, it must needs have been by the
same rule as the lawyer used to the countryman, who did put to him
this question: 'Sir, if my cow should stray into your field and feed
there one whole day, what should be the law touching compensation
therefor?' 'Marry, friend, assuredly to pay the damage to the full,
which thou art bounden at once to do.' 'Ay,' quoth the countryman;
'but 'tis your cow hath strayed into my field.' Upon which, 'Go to, go
to,' cries the lawyer; 'for I warrant thee that doth altogether alter
the law.'"
Some smiled, and others murmured at this story; and meanwhile one of
the company, who from his dress I perceived to be a minister, and
moreover to hold some dignity in the Protestant Church, rose from his
place, and crossing the room, came up to Mr. Roper (for that bold
speaker was no other than Sir Thomas More's son-in--law, whose great
charity and goodness I had often heard of), and, shaking hands with
him, said: "I be of the same mind with you, friend Roper, in every
word you have uttered tonight. And I pray to God my soul may be with
yours after this life, and our end in heaven, albeit I should not sail
there in the same boat with thou."
"Good Mr. Dean," quoth Mr. Roper, "I do say amen to your prayer." and
then he added somewhat in a low voice, and methinks it was that there
is but one ship chartered for safety in such a voyage.
At the which the other shook his head and waved his hand, and then
calling to him a youth not more than twelve or thirteen years old, his
son, he did present him to Mr. Roper. I had observed this young
gentleman to listen, with an eagerness betokening more keenness for
information than is usually to be found in youths of his years, to the
discourses held that evening. His father told Mr. Roper that this his
son's parts and quick apprehension in learning did lead him to hope he
should be one day, if it pleased God, an ornament to the church. Mr.
Roper smiled as he saluted the youth, and said a few words to him,
which he answered very readily. I never saw again that father or that
son. The one was Dr. Mathews, whom the queen made Bishop of Durham;
and the other, Toby Mathews, his son, who was reconciled some years
ago, and, as I have heard from some, is now a Jesuit.
The venerable aspect of the good Mr. Roper so engaged my thoughts,
that I asked Lady Tregony, by whose side I was sitting, if she was
acquainted with him, and if his virtue was as great as his appearance
was noble. She smiled, and answered that his appearance, albeit
honorable and comely, was not one half so honorable as his life had
been, or so comely as his mind. That he had been the husband of Sir
Thomas More's never-to-be-forgotten daughter, Margaret, whose memory
he so reverently did cherish that he had never so much as thought of a
second marriage; and of late years, since he had resigned the office
of sub-notary in the Queen's Bench to his son, he did give his whole
substance and his time to the service of the poor, and especially to
prisoners, by reason of which he was called the staff of the
sorrowful, and sure refuge of the afflicted. Now, then, I looked on
the face of this good aged man with a deeper reverence than
heretofore. Now I longed to be favored with so much of his
notice as one passing word. Now I watched for an opportunity to
compass my desire, and I thank God not without effect; for I do count
it as a chief blessing to have been honored, during the remaining
years of this virtuous gentleman's life, with so much of his
condescending goodness, that if the word friendship may be used in
regard to such affectionate feelings as can exist between one verging
on four-score years of age and of such exalted merit, and a foolish
creature yet in her teens, whom he honored with his notice, it should
be so in this instance; wherein on the one side a singular reverence
and humble great affection did arise almost on first acquaintance, and
on the other so much benignity and goodness shown in the pains taken
to cultivate such good dispositions as had been implanted in this
young person's heart by careful parents, and to guard her mind against
the evils of the times, that nothing could be greater.
Mr. Roper chancing to come near us, Lady Tregony said somewhat, which
caused him to address me in this wise:
"And are there, then, maidens in these days not averse to the sight of
gray hairs, and who mislike not to converse with aged men?"
This was said with so kindly a smile that timidity vanished, and
confidence took its place.
"Oh, sir," I cried, "when I was not so much as five years old, my good
father showed me a picture of Sir Thomas More, and told me he was a
man of such angelic wit as England never had the like before, nor is
ever like to have again, and of a most famous and holy memory; and
methinks, sir, that you, being his son-in-law, who knew his doings and
his mind so well, and lived so long in his house, must needs in many
things resemble him."
"As to his doings and his mind," Mr. Roper replied, "no man living
knoweth them so well, and if my mean wit, memory, and knowledge could
serve me now, could declare so much thereof. But touching resemblance,
alas! there was but one in all the world that represented the likeness
of his virtues and perfections; one whom he loved in a particular
manner, and who was worthiest of that love more than any creature God
has made."
Here the good man's voice faltered a little, and he made a stop in his
discourse; but in a little while said that he had thought it behoved
him to set down in writing such matters concerning Sir Thomas's life
as he could then call to remembrance, and that he would lend me the
manuscript to read, which I did esteem an exceeding great favor, and
one I could not sufficiently thank him for. Then he spoke somewhat of
the times, which were waxing every day more troublesome, and told me
he often called to mind a conversation he once had with Sir Thomas,
walking along the side of the Thames at Chelsea, which he related in
these words:
"'Now would to God, my son Roper,' quoth Sir Thomas, 'I were put in a
sack, and presently cast into the Thames, upon condition that three
things were well established throughout Christendom.' 'And what mighty
things are those, sir?' I asked. Whereupon he: 'Wouldst thou know, son
Roper, what they be?' 'Yea, marry, sir, with a good will, if it please
you,' quoth I. 'I' faith, son, they be these,' he said: 'The first is
that, whereas the most part of Christian princes are at mortal wars,
they were all at peace; the second that, whereas the church of Christ
is at present sorely afflicted with so many heresies, it were settled
in perfect uniformity of religion; the third that, where the matter of
the king's marriage is now come in question, it were, to the glory of
God and the quietness of all parties, brought to a good conclusion.'
'Ay, sir,' quoth I, 'those were indeed three things greatly to be
desired; but'--I continued with a certain joy--'where shall one see a
happier state than in this realm, that has so Catholic a prince that
no heretic durst show his face; so virtuous and learned a
clergy; so grave and sound a nobility; and so loving, obedient
subjects, all in one faith agreeing together?' 'Truth it is indeed,
son Roper,' quoth he; and in all degrees and estates of the same went
far beyond me in commendation thereof. 'And yet, son Roper, I pray
God,' said he, 'that some of us, as high as we seem to sit on the
mountains, treading heretics under our feet like ants, live not the
day that we would gladly be at league and composition with them, to
let them have their churches quietly to themselves, so that they would
be contented to let us have ours quietly to ourselves.' After I had
told him many considerations why he had no cause to say so: 'Well,'
said he, 'I pray God, son Roper, some of us will live not to see that
day.' To whom I replied: 'By my troth, sir, it is very desperately
spoken.' These vile terms, I cry God mercy, did I give him, who,
perceiving me to be in a passion, said merrily unto me, 'It shall not
be so; it shall not be so.' In sixteen years and more, being in the
house conversing with him, I could not perceive him to be so much as
once out of temper."
This was the first of many conversations I held, during the years I
lived in Holborn, with this worthy gentleman, who was not more pleased
to relate, than I to hear, sundry anecdotes concerning Sir Thomas
More, his house, and his family.
Before he left me that day, I did make bold to ask him if he feared
not ill consequences from the courageous words he had used in a mixed,
yea rather, with few exceptions, wholly adverse, company.
"Not much," he answered. "Mine age; the knowledge that there are those
who would not willingly see me roughly handled, and have power to
prevent it; and withal no great concern, if it should be so, to have
my liberty constrained, yea, my life shortened by a few years, or
rather days,--doth move me to a greater freedom of speech than may
generally be used, and a notable indifference to the results of such
freedom."
Having whispered the like fears I had expressed to him to Lady
Tregony, she did assure me his confidence was well based, and that he
had connexions which would by no means suffer him to be thrown into
prison, which should be the fate of any one else in that room who had
spoken but one half, yea one tenth part, as boldly as he had ventured
on.