HENRY VIII. ATTACKS THE PARTISANS OF THE POPE AND THE REFORMATION.
(1532.)
[Sidenote: Franciscans Preach At Henry.]
The vital principle of the Reformation of Henry VIII. was its opposition
both to Rome and the Gospel. He did not hesitate, like many, between
these two doctrines: he punished alike, by exile or by fire, the
disciples of the Vatican and those of Holy Scripture.
Desiring to show that the resolution he had taken to separate from
Catherine was immutable, the king had lodged Anne Boleyn in the palace
at Greenwich, although the queen was still there, and had given her a
reception room and a royal state. The crowd of courtiers, abandoning the
setting star, turned towards that which was appearing above the horizon.
Henry respected Anne’s person and was eager that all the world should
know that if she was not actually queen she would be so one day. There
was a want of delicacy and principle in the king’s conduct, at which the
catholic party were much irritated, and not without a cause.
The monks of St. Francis who officiated in the royal chapel at Greenwich
took every opportunity of asserting their attachment to Catherine and to
the pope. Anne vainly tried to gain them over by her charms; if she
succeeded with a few, she failed with the greater number. Their
superior, Father Forest, Catherine’s confessor, warmly defended the
rights of that unhappy princess. Preaching at St. Paul’s Cross, he
delivered a sermon in which Henry was violently attacked, although he
was not named. Those who had heard it made a great noise about it, and
Forest was summoned to the court. ‘What will be done to him?’ people
asked; but instead of sending him to prison, as many expected, the king
received him well, spoke with him for half an hour, and ‘sent him a
great piece of beef from his own table.’
On returning to his convent, Forest described with triumph this
flattering reception; but the king did not attain his object. Among
these monks there were men of independent, perhaps of fanatical,
character, whom no favors could gain over.
One of them, by name Peto, until then unknown, but afterwards of great
repute in the catholic world as cardinal legate from the pope in
England,[204] thinking that Forest had not said enough, determined to go
further. Anne Boleyn’s elevation filled him with anger: he longed to
speak out, and as the king and all the court would be present in the
chapel on the 1st of May, he chose for his text the words of the prophet
Elijah to King Ahab: _The dogs shall lick thy blood_.[205] He drew a
portrait of Ahab, described his malice and wickedness, and although he
did not name Henry VIII., certain passages made the hearers feel
uncomfortable. At the peroration, turning towards the king, he said:
‘Now hear, O king, what I have to say unto thee, as of old time Micaiah
spoke to Ahab. This new marriage is unlawful. There are other preachers
who, to become rich abbots or mighty bishops, betray thy soul, thy
honor, and thy posterity. Take heed lest thou, being seduced like Ahab,
find Ahab’s punishment ... who had his blood licked up by the dogs.’
The court was astounded; but the king, whose features were unmoved
during this apostrophe, waited until the end of the service, left the
chapel as if nothing had happened, and allowed Peto to depart for
Canterbury. But Henry could not permit such invectives to pass
unnoticed. A clergyman named Kirwan was commissioned to preach in the
same chapel on the following Sunday. The congregation was still more
numerous than before, and more curious also. Some monks of the order of
Observants, friends of Peto, got into the rood-loft, determined to
defend him. The doctor began his sermon. After establishing the
lawfulness of Henry’s intended marriage, he came to the sermon of the
preceding Sunday and the insults of the preacher. ‘I speak to thee,
Peto,’ he exclaimed, ‘who makest thyself Micaiah; we look for thee, but
thou art not to be found, having fled for fear and shame.’ There was a
noise in the rood-loft, and one of the Observants named Elstow rose and
called out: ‘You know that Father Peto is gone to Canterbury to a
provincial council, but I am here to answer you. And to this combat I
challenge thee, Kirwan, prophet of lies, who for thy own vainglory art
betraying thy king into endless perdition.’
The chapel was instantly one scene of confusion: nothing could be heard.
Then the king rose: his princely stature, his royal air, his majestic
manners overawed the crowd. All were silent, and the agitated
congregation left the chapel respectfully. Peto and his friend were
summoned before the council. ‘You deserve to be sewn in a sack and
thrown into the Thames,’ said one. ‘We fear nothing,’ answered Elstow;
‘the way to heaven is as short by water as by land.’[206]
Henry having thus made war on the partisans of the pope, turned to those
of the Reformation. Like a child, he see-sawed to and fro, first on one
side, then on the other; but his sport was a more terrible one, for
every time he touched the ground the blood spurted forth.
[Sidenote: Christian Meetings In London.]
At that time there were many Christians in England to whom the Roman
worship brought no edification. Having procured Tyndale’s translation of
the Word of God, they felt that they possessed it not only for
themselves but for others. They sought each others company, and met
together to read the Bible and receive spiritual graces from God.
Several Christian assemblies of this kind had been formed in London, in
garrets, in warehouses, schools and shops, and one of them was held in a
warehouse in Bow Lane. Among its frequenters was the son of a
Gloucestershire knight, James Bainham, by name, a man well read in the
classics, and a distinguished lawyer, respected by all for his piety and
works of charity. To give advice freely to widows and orphans, to see
justice done to the oppressed, to aid poor students, protect pious
persons, and visit the prisons, were his daily occupations. ‘He was an
earnest reader of Scripture, and mightily addicted to prayer.’[207] When
he entered the meeting, every one could see that his countenance
expressed a calm joy; but for a month past his Bow Lane friends noticed
him to be agitated and cast down, and heard him sighing heavily. The
cause was this. Sometime before (in 1531), when he was engaged about his
business in the Middle Temple, this ‘model of lawyers’ had been arrested
by order of More, who was still chancellor, and taken like a criminal to
the house of the celebrated humanist at Chelsea. Sir Thomas, quite
distressed at seeing a man so distinguished leave the Church of Rome,
had employed all his eloquence to bring him back; but finding his
efforts useless, he had ordered Bainham to be taken into his garden and
tied to ‘the tree of truth.’ There the chancellor whipped him, or caused
him to be whipped: we adopt the latter version, which is more
probable.[208] Bainham having refused to give the names of the gentlemen
of the Temple tainted with heresy, he was taken to the Tower. ‘Put him
on the rack,’ cried the learned chancellor, now become a fanatical
persecutor. The order was obeyed in his presence. The arms and legs of
the unfortunate protestant were seized by the instrument and pulled in
opposite directions; his limbs were dislocated, and he went lame out of
the torture-chamber.[209]
[Sidenote: Bainham Persecuted.]
Sir Thomas had broken his victim’s limbs, but not his courage; and
accordingly when Bainham was summoned before the Bishop of London, he
went to the palace rejoicing to have to confess his Master once more.
‘Do you believe in purgatory?’ said Stokesley to him sternly. Bainham
answered: ‘_The blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth us from all sin_.’[210]
‘Do you believe that we ought to call upon the saints to pray for us?’
He again answered: ‘_If any man sin, we have an advocate with the
Father—Jesus Christ the righteous_.’[211]
A man who answered only by texts from Scripture was embarrassing. More
and Stokesley made the most alluring promises, and no means were spared
to bend him.[212] Before long they resorted to more serious
representations: ‘The arms of the Church your mother are still open to
you,’ they said; ‘but if you continue stubborn, they will close against
you forever. It is now or never!’ For a whole month the bishop and the
chancellor persevered in their entreaties; Bainham replied: ‘My faith is
that of the holy Church.’ Hearing these words, Foxford, the bishop’s
secretary, took out a paper. ‘Here is the abjuration,’ he said; ‘read it
over.’ Bainham began: ‘I voluntarily, as a true penitent returned from
my heresy, utterly abjure’.... At these words he stopped, and glancing
over what followed, he continued: ‘No, these articles are not heretical,
and I cannot retract them.’ Other springs were now set in motion to
shake Bainham. The prayers of his friends, the threats of his enemies,
especially the thought of his wife, whom he loved, and who would be left
alone in destitution, exposed to the anger of the world: these things
troubled his soul. He lost sight of the narrow path he ought to follow,
and five days later he read his abjuration with a faint voice. But he
had hardly got to the end before he burst into tears, and said,
struggling with his emotion: ‘I reserve the doctrines.’ He consented to
remain in the Roman Church, still preserving his evangelical faith. But
this was not what the bishop and his officers meant. ‘Kiss that book,’
they said to him threateningly. Bainham, like one stunned, kissed the
book; that was the sign; the adjuration was looked upon as complete. He
was condemned to pay a fine of twenty pounds sterling, and to do penance
at St. Paul’s Cross. After that he was set at liberty, on the 17th of
February.
Bainham returned to the midst of his brethren: they looked sorrowfully
at him, but did not reproach him with his fault. That was quite
unnecessary. The worm of remorse was preying on him; he abhorred the
fatal kiss by which he had sealed his fall; his conscience was never
quiet; he could neither eat nor sleep, and trembled at the thought of
death. At one time he would hide his anguish and stifle it within his
breast; at another his grief would break forth, and he would try to
relieve his pain by groans of sorrow. The thought of appearing before
the tribunal of God made him faint. The restoration of conscience to all
its rights was the foremost work of the Reformation. Luther, Calvin, and
an endless number of more obscure reformers had reached the haven of
safety through the midst of such tempests. ‘A tragedy was being acted in
all protestant souls,’ says a writer who does not belong to the
Reformation—the eternal tragedy of conscience.
Bainham felt that the only means of recovering peace was to accuse
himself openly before God and man. Taking Tyndale’s New Testament in his
hand, which was at once his joy and his strength, he went to St.
Austin’s church, sat down quietly in the midst of the congregation, and
then at a certain moment stood up and said: ‘I have denied the
truth.’... He could not continue for his tears.[213] On recovering, he
said: ‘If I were not to return again to the doctrine I have abjured,
this word of Scripture would condemn me both body and soul at the day of
judgment.’ And he lifted up the New Testament before all the
congregation. ‘O my friends,’ he continued, ‘rather die than sin as I
have done. The fires of hell have consumed me, and I would not feel them
again for all the gold and glory of the world.’[214]
Then his enemies seized him again and shut him up in the bishop’s
coal-cellar, where, after putting him in irons, they left him for four
days. He was afterwards taken to the Tower, where he was scourged every
day for a fortnight, and at last condemned as a relapsed heretic.
[Sidenote: Bainham Executed.]
On the eve of the execution four distinguished men, one of whom was
Latimer, were dining together in London. It was commonly reported that
Bainham was to be put to death for saying that Thomas à Becket was a
traitor worthy of hell. ‘Is it worth a man’s while to sacrifice his life
for such a trifle?’ said the four friends. ‘Let us go to Newgate and
save him if possible.’ They were taken along several gloomy passages,
and found themselves at last in the presence of a man, sitting on a
little straw, holding a book in one hand and a candle in the other.[215]
He was reading; it was Bainham. Latimer drew near him: ‘Take care,’ he
said, ‘that no vainglory make you sacrifice your life for motives which
are not worth the cost.’ ‘I am condemned,’ answered Bainham, ‘for
trusting in Scripture and rejecting purgatory, masses, and meritorious
works.’—‘I acknowledge that for such truths a man must be ready to die.’
Bainham was ready; and yet he burst into tears. ‘Why do you weep?’ asked
Latimer. ‘I have a wife,’ answered the prisoner, ‘the best that man ever
had. A widow, destitute of everything and without a supporter, everybody
will point at her and say, That is the heretic’s wife.’[216] Latimer and
his friends tried to console him, and then they departed from the gloomy
dungeon.
The next day (30th of April, 1532) Bainham was taken to the scaffold.
Soldiers on horseback surrounded the pile: Master Pave, the city clerk,
directed the execution. Bainham, after a prayer, rose up, embraced the
stake, and was fastened to it with a chain. ‘Good people,’ he said to
the persons who stood round him, ‘I die for having said it is lawful for
every man and woman to have God’s book. I die for having said that the
true key of heaven is not that of the Bishop of Rome, but the preaching
of the Gospel. I die for having said that there is no other purgatory
than the cross of Christ, with its consequent persecutions and
afflictions.’—‘Thou liest, thou heretic,’ exclaimed Pave; ‘thou hast
denied the blessed sacrament of the altar.’—‘I do not deny the sacrament
of Christ’s body,’ resumed Bainham, ‘but I do deny your idolatry to a
piece of bread.’—‘Light the fire,’ shouted Pave. The executioners set
fire to a train of gunpowder, and as the flame approached him, Bainham
lifted up his eyes towards heaven, and said to the town clerk: ‘God
forgive thee! the Lord forgive Sir Thomas More ... pray for me, all good
people!’ The arms and legs of the martyr were soon consumed, and
thinking only how to glorify his Saviour, he exclaimed: ‘Behold! you
look for miracles, you may see one here; for in this fire I feel no more
pain than if I were on a bed of roses.’[217] The primitive Church hardly
had a more glorious martyr.
Pave had Bainham’s image continually before his eyes, and his last
prayer rang day and night in his heart. In the garret of his house, far
removed from noise, he had fitted up a kind of oratory, where he had
placed a crucifix, before which he used to pray and shed bitter
tears.[218] He abhorred himself: half mad, he suffered indescribable
sorrow, and struggled under great anguish. The dying Bainham had said to
him: ‘May God show thee more mercy than thou hast shown to me!’ But Pave
could not believe in mercy: he saw no other remedy for his despair than
death. About a year after Bainham’s martyrdom, he sent his domestics and
clerks on different errands, keeping only one servant-maid in the house.
As soon as his wife had gone to church, he went out himself, bought a
rope, and hiding it carefully under his gown, went up into the garret.
He stopped before the crucifix, and began to groan and weep. The servant
ran upstairs. ‘Take this rusty sword,’ he said, ‘clean it well, and do
not disturb me.’ She had scarcely left the room when he fastened the
rope to a beam and hanged himself.
The maid, hearing no sound, again grew alarmed, went up to the garret,
and seeing her master hanging, was struck with terror. She ran crying to
the church to fetch her mistress home;[219] but it was too late: the
wretched man could not be recalled to life.
[Sidenote: The True Church Of God.]
If the deaths of the martyrs plunged the wicked into the depths of
despair, it often gave life to earnest souls. The crowd which had
surrounded the scaffold of these men of God dispersed in profound
emotion. Some returned to their fields, others to their shops or
workrooms; but the pale faces of the martyrs followed them, their words
sounded in their souls, their virtues softened many hearts most averse
to the Gospel. ‘Oh! that I were with Bainham!’ exclaimed one.[220] These
people continued for some time to frequent the Romish churches but ere
long their consciences cried aloud to them: ‘It is Christ alone who
saves us;’ and they forsook the rites in which they could find no
consolation. They courted solitude; they procured the writings of
Wickliffe and of Tyndale, and especially the New Testament, which they
read in secret, and if any one came near, hid them hastily under a bed,
at the bottom of a chest, in the hollow of a tree, or even under stones,
until the enemy had retired and they could take the books up again. Then
they whispered about them to their neighbors, and often had the joy of
meeting with men who thought as they did. A surprising change was taking
place. While the priests were loudly chanting in the cathedrals the
praises of the saints, of the Virgin, and of the _Corpus Domini_, the
people were whispering together about the Saviour _meek and lowly in
heart_. All over England was heard a still, small voice such as Elijah
heard, and on hearing it wrapped his face in his mantle and stood silent
and motionless, because the Lord was there. Great changes were about to
take place.
It is not without reason that we describe in some detail in this history
the lives and deaths of these evangelical men. We desire to show that
the Church in England, as in all the world, is not a mere ecclesiastical
hierarchy, in which prelates exercise dominion over the inheritance of
the Lord; nor a confused assemblage of men, whose spirit imagines about
religion all kinds of doctrines contrary to the revelation from heaven,
and whose profession of faith comprehends all the opinions that are
found in the nation, from catholic scholasticism to pantheistic
materialism. The Church of God, raised above the human systems of the
superstitious and the incredulous alike, is the assembly of those who by
a living faith are partakers of the righteousness of Christ and of the
new life of which the Holy Ghost is the creator—of those in whom
selfishness is vanquished, and who give themselves up to the Saviour to
achieve with their brethren the conquest of the world. Such is the true
Church of God; very different, it will be seen, from all those invented
by man.
Footnote 204:
Tyndale, _Treatises_, p. 38; Strype, _Memorials_, i. 257, iii., bk. i.
p. 257; bk. ii. pp. 30, 136.
Footnote 205:
1 Kings xxi. 19.
Footnote 206:
Tyndale, _Treatises_, p. 38. Stowe, _Annals_, 562.
Footnote 207:
Foxe _Acts_, iv. p. 697.
Footnote 208:
Both Strype (_Memorials_, i. p. 35) and Foxe (_Acts_, iv. p. 698) say,
_and whipped him_; but More denied it.
Footnote 209:
‘Sir Thomas More being present himself, till in a manner he had lamed
him.’—Foxe, _Acts_, iv. p. 698.
Footnote 210:
1 John i. 7.
Footnote 211:
Ibid. ii. 1.
Footnote 212:
Foxe, _Acts_, iv. p. 700.
Footnote 213:
‘Stood up there before the people in his pew with weeping
tears.’—Foxe, _Acts_, iv. p. 702.
Footnote 214:
‘He would not feel such a hell again as he did feel.’—Ibid.
Footnote 215:
Strype, _Annals_, i. p. 372.
Footnote 216:
Ibid.
Footnote 217:
Foxe, _Acts_, iv. p. 705.
Footnote 218:
Ibid.
Footnote 219:
Foxe, _Acts_, iv. p. 706.
Footnote 220:
Ibid. v. p. 32.