A REFORMER CHOOSES RATHER TO LOSE HIS LIFE THAN TO SAVE IT.
(MAY TO JULY 1533.)
The enemy was on the watch: the second period of Fryth’s captivity, that
which was to terminate in martyrdom, was beginning. Henry’s bishops,
who, while casting off the pope to please the king, had remained devoted
to scholastic doctrines, feared lest the reformer should escape them:
they therefore undertook to solicit Henry to put him to death. Fryth had
on his side the queen, Cromwell, and Cranmer. This did not discourage
them, and they represented to the king that although the man was shut up
in the Tower of London, he did not cease to write and act in defence of
heresy. It was the season of Lent, and Fryth’s enemies came to an
understanding with Dr. Curwin, the king’s chaplain, who was to preach
before the court. He had no sooner got into the pulpit than he began to
declaim against those who denied the material presence of Christ in the
host. Having struck his hearers with horror, he continued: ‘It is not
surprising that this abominable heresy makes such great progress among
us. A man now in the Tower of London has the audacity to defend it, and
no one thinks of punishing him.’
[Sidenote: Fryth Ordered For Trial.]
When the service was over, the brilliant congregation left the chapel,
and each as he went out asked what was the man’s name. ‘Fryth’ was the
reply, and loud were the exclamations on hearing it. The blow took
effect, the scholastic prejudices of the king were revived, and he sent
for Cromwell and Cranmer. ‘I am very much surprised,’ he said, ‘that
John Fryth has been kept so long in the Tower without examination. I
desire his trial to take place without delay; and if he does not
retract, let him suffer the penalty he deserves.’ He then nominated six
of the chief spiritual and temporal peers of England to examine him:
they were the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Bishops of London and
Winchester, the lord chancellor, the Duke of Suffolk, and the Earl of
Wiltshire. This demonstrated the importance which Henry attached to the
affair. Until now, all the martyrs had fallen beneath the blows either
of the bishops or of More; but in this case it was the king himself who
stretched out his strong hand against the servant of God.
Henry’s order plunged Cranmer into the cruellest anxiety. On the one
hand, Fryth was in his eyes a disciple of the Gospel; but on the other,
he attacked a doctrine which the archbishop then held to be Christian;
for, like Luther and Osiander, he still believed in consubstantiation.
‘Alas!’ he wrote to Archdeacon Hawkins, ‘he professes the doctrine of
Œcolampadius.’[317] He resolved, however, to do everything in his power
to save Fryth.
The best friends of the young reformer saw that a pile was being raised
to consume the most faithful Christian in England. ‘Dearly beloved,’
wrote Tyndale from Antwerp, ‘fear not men that threat, nor trust men
that speak fair. Your cause is Christ’s Gospel, a light that must be fed
with the blood of faith. The lamp must be trimmed daily, that the light
go not out.’[318] There was no lack of examples to confirm these words.
‘Two have suffered in Antwerp unto the great glory of the Gospel; four
at Ryselles in Flanders. At Rouen in France they persecute, and at Paris
are five doctors taken for the Gospel. See, you are not alone: follow
the example of all your other dear brethren, who choose to suffer in
hope of a better resurrection. Bear the image of Christ in your mortal
body, and keep your conscience pure and undefiled.... _Una salus victis,
nullam sperare salutem_: the only safety of the conquered is to look for
none. If you could but write and tell us how you are.’ In this letter
from a martyr to a martyr there was one sentence honorable to a
Christian woman: ‘Your wife is well content with the will of God, and
would not for her sake have the glory of God hindered.’
[Sidenote: Cranmer Would Save Fryth.]
If friends were thinking of Fryth on the banks of the Scheldt, they were
equally anxious about him on the banks of the Thames. Worthy citizens of
London asked what was the use of England’s quitting the pope to cling to
Christ, if she burnt the servants of Christ? The little Church had
recourse to prayer. Archbishop Cranmer wished to save Fryth: he loved
the man and admired his piety. If the accused appeared before the
commission appointed by the king, he was lost: some means must be
devised without delay to rescue him from an inevitable death. The
archbishop declared that, before proceeding to trial, he wished to have
a conference with the prisoner, and to endeavor to convince him, which
was very natural. But at the same time the primate appeared to fear that
if the conference took place in London the people would disturb the
public peace, as in the time of Wickliffe.[319] He settled therefore
that it should be held at Croydon, where he had a palace. The primate’s
fear seems rather strange. A riot on account of Fryth, at a time when
king, commons, and people were in harmony, appeared hardly probable.
Cranmer had another motive.
Among the persons composing his household was a gentleman of benevolent
character, and with a leaning towards the Gospel, who was distressed at
the cruelty of the bishops, and looked upon it as a lawful and Christian
act to rob them, if possible, of their victims. Giving him one of the
porters of Lambeth palace as a companion, Cranmer committed Fryth to his
care to bring him to Croydon. They were to take the prisoner a journey
of four or five hours on foot through fields and woods, without any
constables or soldiers. A strange walk and a strange escort.[320]
Lord Fitzwilliam, first Earl of Southampton and governor of the Tower,
at that time lay sick in his house at Westminster, suffering such severe
pain as to force loud groans from him. On the 10th of June, at the
desire of my Lord of Canterbury, the archbishop’s gentleman, and the
Lambeth porter, Gallois, surnamed Perlebeane, were introduced into the
nobleman’s bedchamber, where they found him lying upon his bed in
extreme agony. Fitzwilliam, a man of the world, was greatly enraged
against the evangelicals, who were the cause, in his opinion, of all the
difficulties of England. The gentleman respectfully presented to him the
primate’s letter and the king’s ring. ‘What do you want?’ he asked
sharply, without opening the letter. ‘His grace desires your lordship to
deliver Master Fryth to us.’ The impatient Southampton flew into a
passion at the name, and cursed Fryth and all the heretics.[321] He
thought it strange that a gentleman and a porter should have to convey a
prisoner of such importance to the episcopal court: were there no
soldiers in the Tower? Had Fitzwilliam any suspicion, or did he regret
to see the reformer leave the walls within which he had been kept so
safely? We cannot tell: but he must obey, for they brought him the
king’s signet. Accordingly, taking his own hastily from his finger:
‘Fryth,’ he said, ‘Fryth.... Here, show this to the lieutenant of the
Tower, and take away your heretic quickly. I am but too happy to get rid
of him.’
A few hours later Fryth, the gentleman, and Perlebeane entered a boat
moored near the Tower, and were rowed speedily to the archbishop’s
palace at Lambeth. At first the three persons preserved a strict
silence, only interrupted from time to time by the deep sighs of the
gentleman. Being charged to begin by trying to induce Fryth to make some
compromise, he broke the silence at last. ‘Master Fryth,’ he said, ‘if
you are not prudent you are lost. What a pity! you that are so learned
in Latin and Greek and in the Holy Scriptures, the ancient doctors, and
all kinds of knowledge, you will perish, and all your admirable gifts
will perish with you, with little profit to the world, and less comfort
to your wife and children, your kinsfolk and friends.’... The gentleman
was silent a minute, and then began again: ‘Your position is dangerous,
Master Fryth, but not desperate: you have many friends who will do all
they can in your favor. On your part do something for them, make some
concession, and you will be safe. Your opinion on the merely spiritual
presence of the body and blood of the Saviour is premature: it is too
soon for us in England; wait until a better time comes!’
Fryth did not say a word: no sound was heard but the dash of the water
and the noise of the oars. The gentleman thought he had shaken the young
doctor, and, after a moment’s silence, he resumed: ‘My lord Cromwell and
my lord of Canterbury feel great affection for you: they know that, if
you are young in years, you are old in knowledge, and may become a most
profitable citizen of this realm.... If you will be somewhat advised by
their counsel, they will never permit you to be harmed; but if you stand
stiff to your opinion, it is not possible to save your life, for as you
have good friends so have you mortal enemies.’
[Sidenote: Attempt At Conciliation.]
The gentleman stopped and looked at the prisoner. It was by such
language that Bilney had been seduced; but Fryth kept himself in the
presence of God, ready to lose his life that he might save it. He
thanked the gentleman for his kindness, and said that his conscience
would not permit him to recede, out of respect to man, from the true
doctrine of the Lord’s Supper. ‘If I am questioned on that point, I must
answer according to my conscience, though I should lose twenty lives if
I had so many. I can support it by a great number of passages from the
Holy Scriptures and the ancient doctors, and, if I am fairly tried, I
shall have nothing to fear.’—‘Marry!’ quoth the gentleman, ‘if you be
fairly tried, you would be safe; but that is what I very much doubt. Our
Master Christ was not fairly tried, nor would he be, as I think, if he
were now present again in the world. How, then, should you be, when your
opinions are so little understood and are so odious?’—‘I know,’ answered
Fryth, ‘that the doctrine which I hold is very hard meat to be digested
just now; but listen to me.’ As he spoke, he took the gentleman by the
hand: ‘If you live twenty years more, you will see the whole realm of my
opinion concerning this sacrament of the altar—all, except a certain
class of men. My death, you say, would be sorrowful to my friends, but
it will be only for a short time. But, all things considered, my death
will be better unto me and all mine than life in continual bondage. God
knoweth what he hath to do with his poor servant, whose cause I now
defend. He will help me, and no man shall prevail on me to step
backwards.’
The boat reached Lambeth. The travellers landed, entered the
archbishop’s palace, and, after taking some refreshment, started on foot
for Croydon, twelve miles from London.
The three travellers proceeded over the hills and through the plains of
Surrey. Here and there flocks of sheep were grazing in the scanty
pastures, and to the east stretched vast woods. The gentleman walked
mournfully by the side of Fryth. It was useless to ask him again to
retract; but another idea engrossed Cranmer’s officer,—that of letting
Fryth escape. The country was then thinly inhabited: the woods which
covered it on the east and the chalky hills might serve as a
hiding-place for the fugitive. The difficulty was to persuade
Perlebeane. The gentleman slackened his pace, called to the porter, and
they walked by themselves behind the prisoner. When they were so far off
that he could not hear their conversation, the gentleman said: ‘You have
heard this man, I am sure, and noted his talk since he came from the
Tower.’—‘I never heard so constant a man,’ Perlebeane answered, ‘nor so
eloquent a person.’—‘You have heard nothing,’ resumed the gentleman, ‘in
respect both of his knowledge and his eloquence. If you could hear him
at the university or in the pulpit, you would admire him still more.
England has never had such a one of his age with so much learning. And
yet our bishops treat him as if he were a very dolt or an idiot.... They
abhor him as the devil himself, and want to get rid of him by any
means.’—‘Marry!’ said the porter, ‘if there were nothing else in him but
the consideration of his person both comely and amiable, his disposition
so gentle, meek, and humble, it were pity he should be cast away.’—‘Cast
away,’ interrupted the gentleman, ‘he will certainly be cast away if we
once bring him to Croydon.’ And lowering his voice, he continued:
‘Surely, before God I speak it, if thou, Perlebeane, wert of my mind, we
should never bring him thither.’—‘What do you mean?’ asked the
astonished porter. Then, after a moment’s silence, he added: ‘I know
that you have a great deal more responsibility in this matter than I
have; and therefore, if you can honestly save this man, I will yield to
your proposal with all my heart.’ The gentleman breathed again.
[Sidenote: Attempt To Save Fryth.]
Cranmer had desired that all possible efforts should be made to change
Fryth’s sentiments; and these failing, he wished to save him in another
way. It was his desire that the Reformer should go on foot to Croydon;
that he should be accompanied by two only of his servants, selected from
those best disposed towards the new doctrine. The primate’s gentleman
would never have dared to take upon himself, except by his master’s
desire, the responsibility of conniving at the escape of a prisoner who
was to be tried by the first personages of the realm, appointed by the
king himself. Happy at having gained the porter to his enterprise, he
began to discuss with him the ways and means. He knew the country well,
and his plan was arranged.
‘You see yonder hill before us,’ he said to Perlebeane; ‘it is Brixton
Causeway, two miles from London. There are great woods on both sides.
When we come to the top, we will permit Fryth to escape to the woods on
the left hand, whence he may easily get into Kent, where he was born,
and where he has many friends. We will linger an hour or two on the road
after his flight, to give him time to reach a place of safety, and when
night approaches, we will go to Streatham, which is a mile and a half
off, and make an outcry in the town that our prisoner has escaped into
the woods on the right hand towards Wandsworth; that we followed him for
more than a mile, and at length lost him because we were not many
enough. At the same time we will take with us as many people as we can
to search for him in that direction; if necessary we will be all night
about it; and before we can send the news of what has happened to
Croydon, Fryth will be in safety, and the bishops will be disappointed.’
The gentleman, we see, was not very scrupulous about the means of
rescuing a victim from the Roman priests. Perlebeane thought as he did.
‘Your plan pleases me,’ he answered; ‘now go and tell the prisoner, for
we are already at the foot of the hill.’
The delighted gentleman hurried forward. ‘Master Fryth,’ he said, ‘let
us talk together a little. I cannot hide from you that the task I have
undertaken, to bring you to Croydon, as a sheep to the slaughter,
grieves me exceedingly, and there is no danger I would not brave to
deliver you out of the lion’s mouth. Yonder good fellow and I have
devised a plan whereby you may escape. Listen to me. The gentleman
having described his plan, Fryth smiled amiably, and said: ‘This, then,
is the result of your long consultation together. You have wasted your
time. If you were both to leave me here and go to Croydon, declaring to
the bishops you had lost me, I should follow after as fast as I could,
and bring them news that I had found and brought Fryth again.’
The gentleman had not expected such an answer. A prisoner refuse his
liberty! ‘You are mad,’ he said: ‘do you think your reasoning will
convert the bishops? At Milton Shone you tried to escape beyond the sea,
and now you refuse to save yourself!’—‘The two cases are different,’
answered Fryth; ‘then I was at liberty, and, according to the advice of
St. Paul, I would fain have enjoyed my liberty for the continuance of my
studies. But now the higher power, as it were by Almighty God’s
permission, has seized me, and my conscience binds me to defend the
doctrine for which I am persecuted, if I would not incur our Lord’s
condemnation. If I should now run away, I should run from my God; if I
should fly, I should fly from the testimony I am bound to bear to his
Holy Word, and I should deserve a thousand hells. I most heartily thank
you both for your good will towards me; but I beseech you to bring me
where I was appointed to be brought, for else I will go thither all
alone.’[322]
Those who desired to save Fryth had not counted upon so much integrity.
Such were, however, the martyrs of protestantism. The archbishop’s two
servants continued their route along with their strange prisoner. Fryth
had a calm eye and cheerful look, and the rest of the journey was
accomplished in pious and agreeable conversation. When they reached
Croydon, he was delivered to the officers of the episcopal court, and
passed the night in the lodge of the primate’s porter.
[Sidenote: Fryth On The Real Presence.]
The next morning he appeared before the bishops and peers appointed to
examine him. Cranmer and Lord Chancellor Audley desired his acquittal;
but some of the other judges were men without pity.
The examination began:
‘Do you believe,’ they said, ‘that the sacrament of the altar is or is
not the real body of Christ?’ Fryth answered, simply and firmly: ‘I
believe that the bread is the body of Christ in that it is broken, and
thus teaches us that the body of Christ was to be broken and delivered
unto death to redeem us from our iniquities. I believe the bread is the
body of Christ in that it is _distributed_, and thus teaches us that the
body of Christ and the fruits of his passion are distributed unto all
faithful people. I believe that the bread is the body of Christ so far
as it is _received_, and thus it teaches us that even as the outward man
receiveth the sacrament with his teeth and mouth, so doth the inward man
truly receive through faith the body of Christ and the fruits of his
passion.’
The judges were not satisfied: they wanted a formal and complete
retraction. ‘Do you not think,’ asked one of them, ‘that the natural
body of Christ, his flesh, blood, and bones, are contained under the
sacrament and are there present without any figure of speech?’—‘No,’ he
answered; ‘I do not think so;’ adding with much humility and charity:
‘notwithstanding I would not have that any should count my saying to be
an article of faith. For even as I say, that you ought not to make any
necessary article of the faith of your part; so I say again, that we
make no necessary article of the faith of our part, but leave it
indifferent for all men to judge therein, as God shall open their
hearts, and no side to condemn or despise the other, but to nourish in
all things brotherly love, and to bear one another’s infirmities.’[323]
The commissioners then undertook to convince Fryth of the truth of
transubstantiation; but he quoted Scripture, St. Augustine and
Chrysostom, and eloquently defended the doctrine of the spiritual
eating. The court rose. Cranmer had been moved, although he was still
under the influence of Luther’s teaching.[324] ‘The man spoke
admirably,’ he said to Dr. Heath as they went out, ‘and yet in my
opinion he is wrong.’ Not many years later he devoted one of the most
important of his writings to an explanation of the doctrine now
professed by the young reformer; it may be that Fryth’s words had begun
to shake him.
Full of love for him, Cranmer desired to save him. Four times during the
course of the examination he sent for Fryth and conversed with him
privately,[325] always asserting the Lutheran opinion. Fryth offered to
maintain his doctrine in a public discussion against any one who was
willing to attack it, but nobody accepted his challenge.[326] Cranmer,
distressed at seeing all his efforts useless, found there was nothing
more for him to do; the cause was transferred to the ordinary, the
Bishop of London, and on the 17th of June the prisoner was once more
committed to the Tower. The bishop selected as his assessors for the
trial, Longland, Bishop of Lincoln, and Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester:
there were no severer judges to be found on the episcopal bench. At
Cambridge, Fryth had been the most distinguished pupil of the clever and
ambitious Gardiner; but this, instead of exciting the compassion of that
hard man, did but increase his anger. ‘Fryth and his friends,’ he said,
‘are villains, blasphemers, and limbs of the devil.’[327]
[Sidenote: Fryth Sentenced To Death.]
On the 20th of June, Fryth was taken to St. Paul’s before the three
bishops, and though of a humble disposition and almost timid character,
he answered boldly. A clerk took down all his replies, and Fryth,
snatching up the pen, wrote: ‘I, Fryth think thus. Thus have I spoken,
written, defended, affirmed, and published in my writings.’[328] The
bishops having asked him if he would retract his errors, Fryth replied:
‘Let justice have its course and the sentence be pronounced.’ Stokesley
did not keep him waiting long. ‘Not willing that thou, Fryth, who art
wicked,’ he said, ‘shouldst become more wicked, and infect the Lord’s
flock with thy heresies, we declare thee excommunicate and cast out from
the Church, and leave thee unto the secular powers, most earnestly
requiring them in the truth of our Lord Jesus Christ that thy execution
and punishment be not too extreme, _nor yet the gentleness too much
mitigated_.’[329]
Fryth was taken to Newgate and shut up in a dark cell, where he was
bound with chains on the hands and feet as heavy as he could bear, and
round his neck was a collar of iron, which fastened him to a post, so
that he could neither stand upright nor sit down. Truly the
‘gentleness’ was not ‘too much mitigated.’ His charity never failed
him. ‘I am going to die,’ he said, ‘but I condemn neither those who
follow Luther nor those who follow Œcolampadius, since both reject
transubstantiation.’[330] A young mechanic of twenty-four, Andrew
Hewet by name, was placed in his cell. Fryth asked him for what crime
he was sent to prison. ‘The bishops,’ he replied, ‘asked me what I
thought of the sacrament, and I answered, “I think as Fryth does.”
Then one of them smiled, and the Bishop of London said: “Why Fryth is
a heretic, and already condemned to be burnt, and if you do not
retract your opinion you shall be burnt with him.” “Very well,” I
answered, “I am content.”[331] So they sent me here to be burnt along
with you.’
On the 4th of July they were both taken to Smithfield: the executioners
fastened them to the post, back to back; the torch was applied, the
flame rose in the air, and Fryth, stretching out his hands, embraced it
as if it were a dear friend whom he would welcome. The spectators were
touched, and showed marks of lively sympathy. ‘Of a truth,’ said an
evangelical Christian in after days, ‘he was one of those prophets whom
God, having pity on this realm of England, raised up to call us to
repentance.’[332] His enemies were there. Cooke, a fanatic priest,
observing some persons praying, called out: ‘Do not pray for such folks,
any more than you would for a dog.’[333] At this moment a sweet light
shone on Fryth’s face, and he was heard beseeching the Lord to pardon
his enemies. Hewet died first, and Fryth thanked God that the sufferings
of his young brother were over. Committing his soul into the Lord’s
hands, he expired. ‘Truly,’ exclaimed many, ‘great are the victories
Christ gains in his saints.’
So many souls were enlightened by Fryth’s writings, that this reformer
contributed powerfully to the renovation of England. ‘One day, an
Englishman,’ says Thomas Becon, prebendary of Canterbury and chaplain to
Archbishop Cranmer, ‘having taken leave of his mother and friends,
travelled into Derbyshire, and from thence to the Peak, a marvellous
barren country,’ and where there was then ‘neither learning nor yet no
spark of godliness.’ Coming into a little village named Alsop in the
Dale, he chanced upon a certain gentleman also named Alsop, lord of that
village, a man not only ancient in years, but also ripe in the knowledge
of Christ’s doctrine. After they had taken ‘a sufficient repast,’ the
gentleman showed his guest certain books which he called his _jewels_
and _principal treasures_: these were the New Testament and some books
of Fryth’s. In these godly treatises this ancient gentleman occupied
himself among his rocks and mountains both diligently and virtuously.
‘He did not only love the Gospel,’ adds Cranmer’s chaplain, he ‘_lived
it also_.’[334]
Fryth’s writings were not destined to be read always with the same
avidity: the truth they contain is, however, good for all times. The
books of the apostles and of the reformers which that gentleman of Alsop
read in the sixteenth century were better calculated to bring joy and
peace to the soul than the light works read with such avidity in the
world.
Footnote 317:
Cranmer’s _Letters and Remains_, p. 246.
Footnote 318:
Tyndale to Fryth: Foxe, v. p. 132; Anderson, _Annals of Bible_, i. p.
357.
Footnote 319:
‘For there should be no concourse of citizens.’—Foxe, _Acts_, viii. p.
696.
Footnote 320:
The narrative from which we learn these particulars is given in the
eighth volume of Foxe’s _Acts_, and seems to have been written by the
gentleman himself. The circumstance that it is drawn up so as to
compromise neither himself nor Cranmer is of itself a confirmation.
Footnote 321:
Foxe, _Acts_, viii. p. 696.
Footnote 322:
Foxe, _Acts_, viii. Appendix.
Footnote 323:
Foxe, _Acts_, v. p. 12.
Footnote 324:
‘Mit den Zähnen zu bissen.’—Plank. iii. p. 369.
Footnote 325:
‘And surely I myself sent for him three or four times to persuade
him.’—Cranmer, _Remains_, _Letters_, p. 246.
Footnote 326:
‘There was no man willing to answer him in open disputation.’—Foxe,
_Acts_, viii. p. 699.
Footnote 327:
Bishop Hooper, _Early Writings_, p. 245.
Footnote 328:
‘Ego Frythus ita sentio, ita dixi, scripsi, affirmavi, &c.’—Foxe,
_Acts_, v. p. 14.
Footnote 329:
Ibid. p. 15.
Footnote 330:
‘All the Germans, both of Luther’s side and also of
Œcolampadius.’—Tyndale and Fryth, _Works_, iii. p. 455.
Footnote 331:
Foxe, _Acts_, v. p. 18.
Footnote 332:
Becon, _Works_, iii. p. 11.
Footnote 333:
Foxe, _Acts_, v. p. 10.
Footnote 334:
Becon, _Jewel of Joy_ (Parker Soc.), p. 420.