"And the soul of Jonathan was knit to the soul of David, and he
loved him as his own soul."
These words often came into the mind of the priest, Thomas Garret,
during the three days which Anthony Dalaber spent at his house,
hard by the rushing river, in the city of London.
There were ten years in age between them. Dalaber was a youth who
had seen little of life beyond what he had learned in Oxford,
whereas Garret had already passed through strange and perilous
experiences. The one had so far lived amongst books, and with
youthful companions of his own standing; the other had been a
pioneer in one of the most dangerous movements of the day, and had
seen what such courses might well lead him to. Storm and stress had
been the portion of the one, a pleasant life of study and pleasure
that of the other. It was only during the past six months that
association with Clarke and some others of his way of thinking had
aroused in Dalaber's mind a sense of restless discontent with
existing ordinances, and a longing after purer, clearer light,
together with a distaste and ofttimes a disgust at what he saw of
corruption and simony amongst those who should have been the salt
of the earth.
Had it not been for the talks he had heard of late, in Dr.
Langton's house, he might have passed through his divinity studies
at Oxford as his brother had done before him, content to drift with
the stream, ignorant of the undercurrents which were already
disturbing its apparently tranquil surface, and ready in due course
to be consecrated to his office, and to take some benefice if he
could get it, and live and die as the average priest of those times
did, without troubling himself over the vexed questions of papal
encroachment and traffic in pardons and indulgences which were
setting Germany in a flame.
But he had been first aroused by seeing the light in Freda's eyes
as these questions had been discussed in the hearing of her and her
sister. From the first moment of his presentation to Dr. Langton's
family Dalaber had been strongly attracted by the beautiful
sisters, and especially by Freda, whose quick, responsive eagerness
and keen insight and discrimination made a deep impression upon
him. The soundness of her learning amazed him at the outset; for
her father would turn to her to verify some reference from his
costly manuscripts or learned tomes, and he soon saw that Latin and
Greek were to her as her mother tongue.
When she did join in the conversation respecting the interpretation
or translation of the Holy Scriptures, he had quickly noted that
her scholarship was far deeper than his own. He had been moved to a
vivid admiration at first, and then to something that was more than
admiration. And the birth and growth of his spiritual life he
traced directly to those impulses which had been aroused within him
as he had heard Freda Langton speak and argue and ask questions.
That was how it had started; but it was Clarke's teaching and
preaching which had completed the change in him from the careless
to the earnest student of theology. Clarke's spirituality and
purity of life, his singleness of aim, his earnest striving after a
standard of holiness seldom to be found even amongst those who
professed to practise the higher life, aroused the deep admiration
of the impulsive and warm-hearted Dalaber. He sought his rooms, he
loved to hear his discourses, he called himself his pupil and his
son, and was the most regular and enthusiastic attender of his
lectures and disputations.
And now he had taken a new and forward step. Suddenly he seemed to
have been launched upon a tide with which hitherto he had only
dallied and played. He was pushing out his bark into deeper waters,
and already felt as though the cables binding him to the shores of
safety and ease were completely parted.
It was in part due to the magnetic personality of Garret that this
thing had come to pass. When Dalaber left Oxford it was with no
idea that it would be a crisis in his life. He wished, out of
curiosity, to be present at the strange ceremony to be enacted in
St. Paul's Churchyard; and the knowledge that Clarke was going to
London for a week on some private business gave the finishing touch
to his resolution.
But it was not until he sat with Thomas Garret in his dark
lodgings, hearing the rush of the river beneath him, looking into
the fiery eyes of the priest, and hearing the fiery words which
fell from his lips, that Dalaber thoroughly understood to what he
had pledged himself when first he had uttered the fateful words, "I
will be a member of the Association of Christian Brothers."
True, Clarke had, on their way to town, spoken to him of a little
community, pledged to seek to distribute the life-giving Word of
God to those who were hungering for it, and to help each in his
measure to let the light, now shrouded beneath a mass of
observances which had lost their original meaning to the unlettered
people, shine out in its primitive brilliance and purity; but
Dalaber had only partially understood the significance of all this.
Clarke was the man of thought and devotion. His words uplifted the
hearts of his hearers into heavenly places, and seemed to create a
new and quickened spirituality within them. Garret was the man of
action. He was the true son of Luther. He loved to attack, to
upheave, to overthrow. Where Clarke spoke gently and lovingly of
the church, as their holy mother, whom they must love and cherish,
and seek to plead with as sons, that she might cleanse herself from
the defilement into which she had fallen, Garret attacked her as
the harlot, the false bride, the scarlet woman seated upon the
scarlet beast, and called down upon her and it alike the vials of
the wrath of Almighty God.
And the soul of Dalaber was stirred within him as he listened to
story after story, all illustrative of the corruption which had
crept within the fold of the church, and which was making even holy
things abhorrent to the hearts of men. He listened, and his heart
was hot as he heard; he caught the fire of Garret's enthusiasm, and
would then and there have cast adrift from his former life, thrown
over Oxford and his studies there--and flung himself heart and soul
into the movement now at work in the great, throbbing city, where,
for the first time, he found himself.
But when he spoke words such as these Garret smiled and shook his
head, though his eyes lighted with pleasure.
"Nay, my son; be not so hot and hasty. Seest thou not that in this
place our work for the time being is well-nigh stopped?
"Not for long," he added quickly, whilst the spark flew from his
eyes--"not for long, mind you, ye proud prelates and cardinal. The
fire you have lighted shall blaze in a fashion ye think not of. The
Word of God is a consuming fire. The sword of the Spirit, the Word
of God, pierces the heart and reins of man; and that sword hath
been wrested from the scabbard in which it has rusted so long, and
the shining of its fiery blade shall soon he seen of all men.
"No," added the priest, after a moment's pause to recover himself
and take up the thread of his discourse; "what was done at Paul's
Cross yesterday was but a check upon our work. The last convoy of
books has been burnt--all, save the few which we were able to save
and to bide beneath the cellar floor. The people have been cowed
for a moment, but it will not last. As soon seek to quench a fire
by pouring wax and oil upon it!"
"You will get more books, then? The work will not cease?"
"It will not cease. More books will come. Our brave Stillyard men
will not long be daunted. But we must act with care. For a time we
must remain quiet. We may not be reckless with the holy books,
which cost much in money and in blood--or may do, if we are rash or
careless. But nothing now can stop their entrance into a land where
men begin to desire earnestly to read them for themselves. Not all,
mind you. It is strange how careless and apathetic are the gentry
of the land--they that one would have thought to be most eager,
most forward. They stand aloof; and the richer of the trades'
guilds will have little to say to us. But amongst the poor and
unlettered do we find the light working; and in them are our
chiefest allies, our most earnest disciples."
"Yet we have many at Oxford, learned men and scholars, who would
gladly welcome changes and reforms in the church; and there are
many amongst the students eager after knowledge, and who long to
peruse the writings of Luther and Melancthon, and see these new
versions of the Scriptures."
"Ay, I know it. I was of Oxford myself. It is but a few years that
I left my lodging in Magdalen College. I love the place yet. The
leaven was working then. I know that it has worked more and more.
Our good friends Clarke and Sumner have told as much. Is not your
presence here a proof of it? Oh, there will be a work--a mighty
work--to do in Oxford yet; and you shall be one of those who shall
be foremost in it."
"I?" cried Dalaber, and his eyes glowed with the intensity of his
enthusiasm. "Would that I could think it!"
"It shall be so," answered Garret. "I read it in your face, I hear
it in your voice. The thought of peril and disgrace would not daunt
you. You would be faithful--even unto death. Is it not so?"
"I would!--I will!" cried Dalaber, stretching out his hand and
grasping that of Garret. "Only tell me wherein I can serve, and I
will not fail you."
"I cannot tell you yet, save in general terms; but the day will
come when you shall know. Oxford must have books. There will soon
be no doubt as to that. And when we have books to scatter and
distribute there, we want trusty men to receive and hide them, and
sell or give them with secrecy and dispatch. It is a task of no
small peril. Thou must understand that well, my son. It may bring
thee into sore straits--even to a fiery death. Thou must count the
cost ere thou dost pass thy word."
"I care nothing for the cost!" cried Dalaber, throwing back his
head. "What other men have done and dared I will do and dare. I
will be faithful--faithful unto death."
"I shall remember," answered Garret, with a smile upon his thin
ascetic face--"I shall remember; and the day will come--a day not
far distant, as I hope--when I shall come to thee and remind thee
of this promise."
"I shall not have forgotten," spoke Dalaber, holding out his hand;
"whenever the Brotherhood calls upon me it will find me ready."
There was silence for a while, and then Dalaber looked up and
asked:
"What of Clarke, and Sumner, and others there? Will they not help
also in the good work?"
"Yes; but in a different fashion," answered Garret. "It is not
given to all to serve alike. Those men who dwell within college
walls, overlooked by dean and warden, waited on by servants in
college livery, bound by certain oaths, and hemmed about by many
restrictions, cannot act as those can do who, like yourself, are
members of the university, but dwellers in small halls, and under
no such restraints. Clarke has done great service, and will do
more, by his teachings and preachings, which prepare the hearts of
men to receive the good seed, and awaken yearnings after a deeper,
purer, spiritual life than that which we see around us in those who
should be the bright and shining lights of the day. That is their
work, and right well do they perform their tasks. But to such as
you belongs the other and arduous labour of receiving and
distributing the forbidden books. When the time comes, wilt thou,
Anthony Dalaber, be ready?"
"I will," spoke the youth in earnest tones; and it was plain that
he spoke in all sincerity.
The position of students living in colleges and living in halls, as
they were called, was, as Garret had said, altogether different.
Graduates and undergraduates of the colleges which had sprung up
were fenced about with rules and restrictions which have been
modified rather than changed with the flight of time. But the hall
of olden Oxford was merely a sort of lodging house, generally kept
by a graduate or master, but not subject to any of the rules which
were binding upon those students who entered upon one of the
foundations. Indeed, the growth of colleges had been due in great
part to the desire on the part of far-seeing men and friends of
order as well as learning to curb the absolute and undesirable
freedom of the mass of students brought together at Oxford and
Cambridge, and in the middle ages living almost without discipline
or control, often indulging in open riots or acts of wholesale
insubordination.
Anthony Dalaber was not at present a member of any college, nor
even of one of the religious houses where students could lodge, and
where they lived beneath a sort of lesser control. He and Hugh
Fitzjames, both of them youths of limited means, shared a lodging
in a house called St. Alban Hall, and were free to come and go as
they pleased, none asking them wherefore or whither. He saw at once
that what would not be possible to a canon of Cardinal College
would be feasible enough to him and his friend, if Fitzjames should
sympathize with him in the matter. And, so far, he believed his
friend was with him, though without, perhaps, the same eager
enthusiasm.
When the visit to Garret came to an end, and Anthony Dalaber said
farewell to him at the water side, where a barge was to convey them
some distance up the river, the priest held his hands long and
earnestly, looking into his eyes with affectionate intensity, and
at the last he kissed him upon both cheeks and said: "God be with
thee, my young brother! May He keep thee firm and steadfast to the
last, whatever may befall!"
"I am very sure He will," answered Dalaber fervently. "I am yours,
and for the good cause, for life or death."
They parted then, and the voyage began; but little was spoken by
the travellers so long as they remained in the barge. Clarke seemed
to be thinking deeply, his eyes fixed earnestly upon Dalaber's face
from time to time; whilst the latter sat gazing behind him at the
city, sinking slowly away out of his sight, his eyes filled with
the light of a great and zealous purpose.
They left the water side in the afternoon, and walked towards a
certain village, and Clarke, turning towards his companion, said:
"I have promised to preach this evening in a certain house yonder.
I trow there will be no peril to me or to those who hear me. But of
that no man can be certain. What wilt thou do? Come with me, or
walk onwards and let us meet on the morrow?"
Dalaber hesitated no single moment; Clarke's preaching was one of
his keenest delights. And upon this evening he was moved beyond his
wont as the young master spoke from his heart to his listeners, not
striving to arouse their passions against tyranny or bigotry, but
rather seeking to urge them to patience, to that brotherly love
which endures all things and hopes all things, and turns to the
Almighty Father in never-ceasing faith and joy, imploring His help
to open the eyes of the blind, soften the hearts that are puffed
up, and cleanse the church, which must be made pure and holy as the
bride of Christ, for that heavenly marriage supper for which her
spouse is waiting.
Nothing was spoken which the orthodox could well complain of; yet
every listener knew that such a discourse would not have been
preached by any man not "tainted" with what was then called heresy.
But the hearts of the hearers burnt within them as they listened;
and when, after some further time spent in discussion and prayer,
the preacher and his companion found themselves alone for the night
in a comfortable bed chamber, Dalaber threw himself upon Clarke's
neck in an outburst of fervid enthusiasm.
"Oh, let me be ever your son and scholar," he cried, "for with you
are the words of life and light!"
Then the elder man looked at him with a great tenderness in his
eyes, but his voice was full of gravity and warning.
"Dalaber," he said, "you desire you know not what. And I fear
sometimes that you seek to take upon yourself more than you wot
of--more than you are able. My preaching is sweet unto you now, for
that no persecution is laid upon you. But the time will come--of
that I am well assured, and that period peradventure shortly--when,
if ye continue to live godly therein, God will lay upon you the
cross of persecution, to try whether you, as pure gold, can abide
the fire."
"I know it! I am ready!" cried Dalaber, with the characteristic
backward motion of his head. His face was like the face of a young
eagle. He was quivering from head to foot.
Clarke looked at him again with his fatherly smile, but there was
trouble also in his eyes.
"Be not over confident, my son; and seek not to take upon you more
than you are able to bear."
Dalaber understood instantly to what Clarke was alluding.
"I trust I have not done so. But men will be wanted. I am a
Christian Brother. I must not shrink. My word is passed. Not to
you, my master, alone, but to Master Garret also."
"To whom I did make you known," spoke Clarke, with a very slight
sigh. "My son, I would not speak one word to discourage your godly
zeal; but bethink you what this may mean. You shall (it may be) be
judged and called a heretic; you shall be abhorred of the world;
your own friends and kinsfolk shall forsake you; you shall be cast
into prison, and none shall dare to help you; you shall be accused
before bishops, to your reproach and shame, to the great sorrow of
all your friends and kindred. Then will ye wish ye had never known
this doctrine; then (it may be) ye will curse Clarke, and wish you
had never known him, because he hath brought you into all these
troubles."
But Dalaber could bear that word no longer; he flung himself at the
feet of his master, and the tears broke from his eyes.
"Nay, nay, speak not so, I beseech you; you cut me to the heart! I
boast not of myself as being wiser or braver or more steadfast than
other men; I only pray of you to try me. Send me not away. Let me
be pupil, and scholar, and son. I cannot turn back, even if I
would. My heart is in the good work. Let me follow in the path I
have chosen. I have put my hand to the plough; how can I turn
back?"
Clarke looked down upon the youth with a world of tender love in
his eyes, and raising him up in his arms he kissed him, the tears
standing on his own cheeks.
"The Lord God Almighty give you grace and steadfastness now and
ever," he said in a deep voice, full of feeling, "and from
henceforth and ever take me for your father in Christ, and I will
take you for my son!"
So the compact was sealed between the two; and when on the morrow
they took their way towards Oxford, the heart of Anthony Dalaber
was joyful within him, for he felt as though he had set his foot
upon the narrow path which leads to life everlasting, and he reeked
little of the thorns and briers which might beset the way,
confident that he would be given grace to overcome.
He was happier still when he was able to obtain the exclusive
companionship of Freda Langton in the sunny garden of the Bridge
House, and pour into her willing ears all the story of his visit
and its wonderful consequences. To Anthony Dalaber some sympathetic
confidante was almost a necessity of existence; and who so well
able to understand him as the girl he loved with every fibre of his
being, and who had almost promised him an answering love? There was
no peril to her in knowing these things. The day for making
rigorous inquisition in all directions had not yet come, and there
was no danger to himself in entrusting his safety to one as true
and stanch as this maiden.
Freda's sympathies from the outset had been with those independent
thinkers, who were in increasing peril of being branded as
heretics; and she listened with absorbing interest to the story of
the hidden books, the little band of Christian Brothers, the work
going on beneath their auspices, and the check temporarily put upon
it by the holocaust of books which Dalaber had witnessed at St.
Paul's.
"And you saw it--you saw them burn the books! You saw the great
cardinal sitting on his throne and watching! O Anthony, tell me,
what was he like?"
"His face I could not well see, I was too far away; but he walked
with stately mien, and his following was like that of royalty
itself. Such kingly pomp I have never witnessed before."
"And our Lord came meek and lowly, riding upon an ass, and had not
where to lay His head," breathed Freda softly. "Ah, ofttimes do I
wonder what He must think of all this, looking down from heaven,
where He sits expecting, till His enemies be made His footstool. I
wonder what yonder pageant looked like to Him--a prelate coming in
His place (as doubtless the cardinal would think) to judge those
whose crime has been the spreading abroad of the living Word, and
now watching the burning of countless books which contain that
living Word, and which might have brought joy and gladness to so
many. When I think of these things I could weep for these proud
men, who never weep for themselves. I can better understand the
words of Master Clarke when he says, 'Plead with your mother--plead
with her.'"
"We will plead. We have pleaded already; we will plead again and
yet again!" cried Dalaber, with a flash in his dark eyes. "But
methinks a time will come when the day of pleading will be past,
and the day of reckoning will come; and she will have to learn that
her children will not always suffer her impurities and abominations,
but that they will rise up and cleanse the sanctuary from the
filthiness wherewith it is defiled."
"Yet let them not cease to love her," spoke Freda gently, "for, as
Master Clarke truly says, we are all one body--the Body of Christ;
and if we have to war one with another, and rend that body for its
own healing, we must yet remember that we are all members one of
another even in our strife."
"It is a hard saying," spoke Dalaber, "yet I believe it is the
truth. God send us more men like John Clarke, to show us the way
through this tangle of perplexities!"