A PROTESTANT QUEEN, CATHERINE PARR.
(1542.)
[Sidenote: RICHARD HILLES.]
The principles of the Reformation were spreading more and more, and
especially among the London merchants; doubtless because they held more
intercourse than other classes with foreigners. These men of business
were much better informed than we in our days should suppose. One of
them, Richard Hilles, had large business transactions with Strasburg
and the rest of Germany; and while engaged in these he paid some
attention to theological literature. He not merely read, but formed
an opinion of the works which he read, and was thus at the same time
merchant and critic. He read the _Ecclesiastical History_ of Eusebius,
as well as his _Preparation_ and _Demonstration_; but he was not
satisfied with Eusebius. He found in his writings false notions on
free-will and on the marriage of ministers. Tertullian, on the other
hand, charmed him by his simplicity, his piety, and likewise by the
soundness of his judgment on the Eucharist; but he found much fault
with his work on _Prescriptions against Heretics_.[413] Cyprian edified
him by the fulness of his piety; but he was shocked by his overmuch
severity, and by his opinions on satisfaction, which in his view were
derogatory to the righteousness of Christ. Lactantius he loved as the
defender of the cause of God; but he sharply criticised his opinions on
the virtue of almsgiving, on the necessity of abstinence from flowers
and perfumes, _illecebræ istæ voluptatum arma_, on the method of making
up for evil works by good ones, on the millennium, and many other
subjects. Origen, Augustine, and Jerome were also included in the cycle
of his studious labors.[414] Hilles considered it a great loss, even to
a merchant, to pursue no studies. He found in them a remedy against the
too strong influences of worldly affairs.
For him, however, the essential matter was the study of the Word
of God. He used frequently to read and expound it in the houses of
evangelical Christians in London. Bishop Gardiner, when examining
one of Hilles' neighbors, said to him: 'Has not Richard Hilles been
every day in your house, teaching you and others like you?' Some
ecclesiastics one day called upon him, while making a collection for
placing tapers before the crucifix and the sepulchre of Christ in the
parish church. He refused to contribute. The priests entreated his
kinsmen and friends to urge him not to set himself against a practice
which had existed for five centuries. No custom, said he, can prevail
against the word of Christ--'They that worship Him must worship Him in
spirit and in truth.' The priests now increased their threatenings, and
Hilles left London and went to Strasburg, keeping up at the same time
his house of business in London. The reader of Tertullian, Cyprian,
Origen, and Augustine, on leaving the banks of the Rhine, went to
Frankfort and to Nürnberg to sell his cloth.[415] Moreover he made
a good use of the money which he received. 'I send herewith to your
piety,' he wrote to Bullinger, 'ten Italian crowns, which I desire to
be laid out according to your pleasure, as occasion may offer, upon the
poor exiles (rich, however, in Christ), and those especially, if such
there be, who are in distress among you.'[416]
The more Henry VIII. felt the loss which he had sustained by the death
of Cromwell, the more did he feel drawn to Cranmer and to the cause he
advocated. Already, in this same year, 1542, he addressed to Cranmer
some letters for the abolition of idolatry, ordering the disuse of
images, relics, tapers, reliquaries, tables and monuments of miracles,
pilgrimages and other abuses.[417]
While laymen thus joined knowledge with faith, and business with
teaching, Cranmer was slowly pursuing his task. When parliament met,
January 22, 1543, the archbishop introduced 'a Bill for the advancement
of true religion.' This Act at once prohibited and enjoined the reading
of the Bible. Was this intentional or accidental? We are disposed to
think it accidental. There were two currents of opinion in England, and
both of them reappeared in the laws. Only it is to be noted that the
better current was the stronger; it was the good cause which seemed
ultimately to gain the ascendency on this occasion. It was ordered
that the Bibles bearing Tyndale's name should be suppressed; but the
printers still issued his translation with hardly any alteration,
shielding it under the names of Matthew, Taverner, Cranmer, and even
Tonstall and Heath.[418] It was therefore read everywhere. The Act
forbade that any one should read the Bible to others, either in any
church or elsewhere, without the sanction of the king or of some
bishop. But at the same time the chancellor of England, officers of
the army, the king's judges, the magistrates of any town or borough,
and the Speaker of the House of Commons, who were accustomed to take a
passage of Scripture as the text of their discourses, were empowered
to read it. Further, every person of noble rank, male or female, being
head of a family, was permitted to read the Bible or to cause it to
be read by one of their domestics, in their own house, their garden
or orchard, to their own family. Likewise, every trader or other
person being head of a household was allowed to read it in private;
but apprentices, work-people, &c., were to abstain. This enactment,
thus interdicting the Bible to the common people, was both impious and
absurd; impious in its prohibition, but also absurd, because reading
in the family was recommended, and this might be done even by the
domestics. The knowledge of the Scriptures might thus reach those to
whom they were proscribed.[419]
[Sidenote: CRANMER'S ENDEAVORS.]
At the same time, on the demand of Cranmer, the Act of Six Articles was
somewhat modified. Those who had infringed its clauses were no longer
to be punished with death, if they were laymen; and priests were to
incur this penalty only after the third offence. This was certainly no
great gain, but the primate obtained what he could.
He also endeavored to render as harmless as possible the book 'A
necessary doctrine and erudition for any Christian Man,' which
was published in 1543,[420] and was called 'The King's Book,' to
distinguish it from 'The Institution of a Christian Man,' which was
called 'The Bishop's Book.' This book of the king held a middle course
between the doctrine of the pope and that of the Reformation, leaning,
however, towards the latter. The grace and the mercy of God were
established as the principle of our justification. Some reforms were
introduced with respect to the worship of images and of the saints;
the article on purgatory was omitted; large rights were granted to the
church of every country; the vulgar tongue was recognized as necessary
to meet the religious wants of the people. Still, many obscurities and
errors were to be found in this book.
An event was approaching which would draw the king more decisively to
the side of the Reformation. Although he had now made five successive
marriages, and had experienced, undoubtedly by his own fault, only a
long series of disappointments and vexations, he was once more looking
for a wife. A law which had been passed after the discovery of the
misconduct of Catherine Howard terrified the maidens of England, even
the most innocent among them; they would have been afraid of falling
victims to the unjust suspicions of Henry VIII. He now determined to
marry a widow.
Catherine Parr, the widow of Lord Latimer, was now at the court.
She was a woman of good sense, of virtuous and amiable character,
beautiful, and agreeable in manners,[421] and was past the prime
of youth. She had, however, one defect which often attaches to
noble characters,--a want of prudence. She did not always perceive
and practise what was best to be done under certain circumstances.
Especially was she wanting in that human prudence, so necessary at the
court, and particularly to the wife of Henry VIII.; and hereby she was
exposed to great danger. The king was now in a declining state; and his
bodily infirmities as well as his irritable temper made it a necessity
that some gentle and very considerate wife should take care of him. He
married the noble dowager[422] on July 12, 1543; and he found in her
the affection and the kind attentions of a virtuous lady. The crown
was to Catherine but a poor compensation; but she discharged her duty
devotedly, and shed some rays of sunshine over the last years of the
king. The queen was favorable to the Reformation, as was likewise her
brother, who was created earl of Essex, and her uncle, made Lord Parr
of Horton. Cranmer and all those who wished for a real reformation
were on the side of the new queen; while Gardiner and his party,
now including the new chancellor, Wriothesley, taking alarm at this
influence which was opposed to them, became more zealous than ever
in the maintenance of the old doctrine. These men felt that the power
which they had possessed under Catherine Howard might slip out of their
hands; and they resolved to spread terror among the friends of the
Reformation, not excepting the queen herself, by attacking Cranmer. It
was always this man at whom they aimed and struck their blows, nor was
this the last time they did so.
[Sidenote: PLOT AGAINST CRANMER.]
The prebendaries of Canterbury and other priests of the same diocese,
strongly attached to the Catholic doctrine, and disquieted and shocked
by the reforming principles of the archbishop, came to an understanding
with Gardiner, held a great many meetings among themselves, and
collected a large number of reports hostile to the archbishop. They
accused him of having removed images, and prohibited the partisans of
the old doctrines from preaching; and the rumor was soon everywhere
current that 'the bishop of Winchester had bent his bow to shoot at
some of the head deer.' The long list of charges brought against the
primate was forwarded to the king. Amongst the accusers were found
some members of Cranmer's church, magistrates whom he had laid under
obligation to him, and men who almost daily sat at his table. Henry was
pained and irritated; he loved Cranmer, but these numerous accusations
disturbed him. Taking the document with him, he went out, as if going
to take a walk alone on the banks of the Thames. He entered his bark.
'To Lambeth,' he said to his boatmen. Some of the domestics of the
archbishop saw the boat approaching: they recognised the king, and
gave information to their master, who immediately came down to pay
his respects to his Majesty. Henry invited him to enter the bark;
and when they were seated together, the boatmen being at a distance,
the king began to lament the growth of heresy, and the debates which
would inevitably result from it, and declared that he was determined
to find out who was the principal promoter of these false doctrines
and to make an example of him. 'What think you of it?' he added.
'Sir,' replied Cranmer, 'it is a good resolution; but I entreat you
to consider well what heresy is, and not to condemn those as heretics
who stand for the word of God against human inventions.' After further
explanations, the king said to him: 'You are the man who, as I am
informed, is the chief encourager of heresy.' The king then handed to
him the articles of accusation collected by his opponents. Cranmer took
the papers and read them. When he had finished, he begged the king
to appoint a commission to investigate these grievances, and frankly
explained to him his own view of the case. The king, touched by his
simplicity and candor, disclosed to him the conspiracy, and promised
to nominate a commission; insisting, however, that the primate should
be the chief member and that he should proceed against his accusers.
Cranmer refused to do this. The commission was nominated. Dr. Lee, dean
of York, made diligent inquiry, and found that men to whom Cranmer
had rendered great services were in the number of the conspirators.
Cranmer bore himself with great meekness towards them. He declined to
confound and put them to shame as the king had required him to do; and
the result was, that instead of condemning Cranmer, every one of them
acknowledged that he was the first to practise the virtues which he
preached to others, and thus showed himself to be a true bishop and a
worthy reformer.[423]
[Sidenote: PERSECUTION AT OXFORD.]
As Gardiner and his colleagues had failed in their attempt to bring
down the head deer, they determined to indemnify themselves by
attacking lesser game. A society of friends of the Gospel had been
formed at Oxford, the members of which were leading lowly and quiet
lives, but at the same time were making courageous confession of the
truth. Fourteen of them were apprehended by Doctor London, supported
by the bishop of Winchester. The persecutors chiefly directed their
attack against three of these men. Robert Testwood, famed for his
musical attainments and attached as a 'singing-man' to the chapel of
Windsor College, used to speak with respect of Luther, ventured to
read the Holy Scriptures, and exhorted his acquaintances not to bow
down before dumb images, but to worship only the true and living God.
Henry Filmer, a churchwarden, could not endure the fooleries which the
priests retailed in the pulpit; and the latter, greatly stung by his
criticism, accused him of being so thoroughly corrupted by heresy that
he alone would suffice to poison the whole nation. Antony Peerson, a
priest, preached with so much faith and eloquence, that the people
flocked in crowds to hear him, both at Oxford and in the surrounding
country places.
A fourth culprit at length appeared before the council. He was a poor
man, simple-minded, and of mean appearance. Some loose sheets of a book
lay upon the table in front of the bishop of Winchester. 'Marbeck,'
said the bishop, 'dost thou know wherefore thou art sent for?' 'No, my
lord,' he replied. The bishop, taking up some of the sheets, said to
him: 'Understandest thou the Latin tongue?' 'No, my lord,' he answered,
'but simply.' Gardiner then stated to the council that the book he held
in his hand was a Concordance, and that it was translated word for
word from the original compiled for the use of preachers. He asserted
'that if such a book should go forth in English, it would destroy
the Latin tongue.' Two days later Gardiner again sent for Marbeck.
'Marbeck,' said the bishop, 'what a devil made thee to meddle with the
Scriptures?[424] Thy vocation was another way ... why the devil didst
thou not hold thee there?... What helpers hadst thou in setting forth
thy book?' 'Forsooth, my lord,' answered Marbeck, 'none.' 'It is not
possible that thou should'st do it without help,' exclaimed the bishop.
Then addressing one of his chaplains: 'Here is a marvellous thing; this
fellow hath taken upon him to set out the Concordance in English, which
book, when it was set out in Latin, was not done without the help and
diligence of a dozen learned men at least, and yet will he bear me in
hand that he hath done it alone.' Then, addressing Marbeck, he said:
'Say what thou wilt, except God himself would come down from heaven and
tell me so, I will not believe it.' Marbeck was taken back to prison,
and was placed in close confinement, with irons on his hands and feet.
He was five times examined; and on the fifth occasion a new charge was
brought against him;--he had written out with his own hand a letter of
John Calvin.[425] This was worse than spending his time over the Bible.
Gardiner exerted himself to the utmost to secure the condemnation of
this man to death, in company with Testwood, Filmer, and Peerson. The
queen was now hardly on the throne. These three Christians were burnt
alive; and they met death with so much humility, patience, and devotion
to Jesus, their only refuge, that some of the bystanders declared that
they would willingly have died with them and like them.[426] But the
persecutors failed in their attempt with respect to Marbeck. Cranmer
was able to convince the king that the making of a Concordance to
the Bible ought not to be visited with death. It is well known that
Henry VIII. attached much importance to the Holy Scriptures, which
he considered the most powerful weapon against the pope. Marbeck,
therefore, was spared.
[Sidenote: WAR WITH FRANCE.]
It is, moreover, no wonder that there should still have been martyrs.
The queen, indeed, was friendly to their cause; but political
circumstances were not favorable. After forty years' alliance with
France, Henry VIII. was about to declare war against that kingdom. The
pretexts for this course were many. The first was the alliance of the
king of France with the Turks, 'who are daily advancing to destroy
and ruin our holy faith and religion, to the great regret of all good
Christians,' said the Council.[427] A second pretext was that the sums
of money which France was bound to pay annually to the king had fallen
in arrear for nine years; there was also the question of the subsidies
granted by France to Scotland during the war between Henry VIII. and
the Scots; the reception and protection of English rebels by Francis
I.; and the detention in French ports of faithful subjects of the king,
merchants and others, with their ships and merchandise. In the despatch
which we have just cited, the king also declared that, if within twenty
days the grievances set forth were not redressed, he should claim the
kingdom of France unjustly held by Francis I. The French ambassador
replied in a conciliatory manner. Diplomacy made no reference to other
grounds of complaint of a more private character, which perhaps throw
light upon those which occasioned the rupture. Francis I. had jested
about the way in which Henry VIII. dealt with his wives. Henry had
sought the hand of French princesses, and they had no mind for this
foreign husband; and lastly, Francis did not fulfil the promise which
he had made to separate from Rome. There were many other pretexts
besides, more or less reasonable, which determined the king to invade
France.
While withdrawing from alliance with Francis I., Henry could not but
at the same time enter into closer relation with Charles V. This
reconciliation seemed natural, for the king of England was really, in
respect to religion, more in harmony with the emperor than with the
Protestants of Germany, whose alliance he had for some time desired.
But Charles required first of all that the legitimacy and the rights of
his cousin, the princess Mary, should be acknowledged; and this Henry
refused to do, because it would have involved an acknowledgment of
his injustice to Catherine of Aragon. A solution which satisfied the
emperor was ultimately devised. It was provided by Act of Parliament
that if Prince Edward should die without children, 'the crown should
go to the lady Mary.'[428] But in this Act no mention was made of her
legitimacy. The result of the concession of this point to Charles V.
was to bring on England a five years' bloody persecution, and to give
her people Philip II. for their king. In default of any issue of Mary,
Elizabeth was to succeed to the throne. After the passing of this Act,
in March, 1543, a treaty of alliance was concluded between England and
the Empire.
The war which Henry VIII., 'king of England, _France_, and Ireland,'
said the parliament, now carried on against Francis I. has little to
do with the history of the Reformation. The king, having named the
queen regent of his kingdom, embarked for France, on July 14, 1544,
on a vessel hung with cloth of gold. He was now feeble and corpulent,
but his vanity and love of display were always conspicuous, even when
setting out for a war. Having arrived on the frontier of France he
found himself at the head of 45,000 men, 30,000 of whom were English.
The emperor, who had got the start of him, was already within two
days' march of Paris; and the city was in alarm at the approach of the
Germans. 'I can not prevent my people of Paris from being afraid,' said
Francis, 'but I will prevent them from suffering injury.' Charles paid
little respect to his engagement with Henry VIII., and now treated
separately with Francis at Crespy, near Laon, September 19, and left
the king of England to get out of the affair as well as he could.
Henry captured Boulogne, but this was all that he had of his kingdom of
France. On September 30 he returned to London.
[Sidenote: SYMPATHIES OF THE ITALIANS.]
The war, however, continued until 1546. England, abandoned by the
emperor, found sympathy in a quarter where it might least have been
expected,--in Italy. The Italians, who were conscious of the evils
brought on their own land by the papacy, were filled with admiration
for the prince and the nation which had cast off its yoke. Edmund
Harvel, ambassador of Henry VIII. in Italy, being at this time at
Venice, was continually receiving visits from captains of high
reputation, who came to offer their services. Among these was Ercole
Visconti of Milan, a man of high birth, a great captain, and one who,
having extensive connections in Italy, might render great services
to the king.[429] The French were now making an attempt to retake
Boulogne; but the Italian soldiers who were serving in their army were
constantly going over to the English, at the rate of thirty per day.
The Italian companies were thus so largely reduced that the captains
requested permission to leave the camp for want of soldiers to command;
and permission was given them.[430] In this matter the pope was
involved in difficulty. He had undertaken to furnish Francis I. with a
body of four thousand men; but as the king was afraid that these Roman
soldiers would pass over to the English army,[431] he requested Paul
III. to substitute for these auxiliaries a monthly subsidy of 16,000
crowns. 'As the Italian nation,' added the English ambassador in his
letter to Henry VIII., 'is alienate from the French king, so the same
is more and more inclined to your Majesty.' From this episode it is
evident that Italy was at this time favorably disposed towards the
Reformation.
But if in Italy there were many supporters of Protestantism, in England
its opponents were still more numerous. The fanatical party had
attempted in 1543 to expel Reform from the town of Windsor by means of
martyrdom. But the account was not settled; it still remained to purify
the castle. It was known that Testwood, Filmer, Peerson, and Marbeck
himself had had patrons in Sir Thomas and Lady Cardine, Sir Philip
and Lady Hobby, Dr. Haynes, dean of Exeter, and other persons at the
court. Dr. London, who was always on the look-out for heretics, and a
pleader named Simons, sent to Gardiner one Ockam, a secretary, with
letters, accusations, and secret documents as to the way in which they
intended to proceed. But one of the queen's servants reached the court
before him and gave notice of the scheme. Ockam on his arrival, was
arrested, all the papers examined, and evidence was discovered in them
of an actual conspiracy against many persons at the court. This aroused
great indignation in the king's mind. It is highly probable that these
gentlemen and their wives owed their safety to the influence of the
queen and of Cranmer. London and Simons, unaware that their letters
and documents had fallen into the hands of their judges, denied the
plot, and this even upon oath. Their own writings were now produced, it
was proved that they were guilty of perjury, and they were condemned
to ignominious punishment. London, that great slayer of heretics,
and his colleague, were conducted on horseback, facing backwards,
with the name of perjurer on their foreheads, through the streets of
Windsor, Reading, and Newbury, the king being now at the last named
town. They were afterwards set in the pillory and then taken back to
prison. London died there of distress caused by this public disgrace.
It was well that the wind should change, and that persecutors should
be punished instead of the persecuted; but the manners of the time
subjected these wretches to shocking sufferings which it would have
been better to spare them.[432]