On the return of Origen to Alexandria, it would almost appear

as if he had wished to decline, for a time, the office of chief of the

Catechisms. The historian tells us that he only resumed it at the

strongly expressed desire of his bishop, Demetrius, who was anxious

for the "profit and advantage of the brethren." Perhaps he wished for

greater leisure than such a post would permit of, in order to carry

into execution certain projects that were forming in his mind. But

neither the patriarch nor his scholars would hear of his giving up,

and so he had to settle to his work again; "which he did," says

Eusebius, "with the greatest zeal," as he did everything. From this

time, with one or two short interruptions, he lived and taught in

Alexandria for twenty years. His life as an authoritative teacher and

"master in Israel" may be said to commence from this point. It was an

epoch resembling in some degree that other epoch, thirty years before,

when Pantaenus had been called upon to take the charge of chief

teacher in the Alexandrian Church. Now, as then, the winter of a

persecution had passed, and the season was sunny and promising. Now,

as then, men were high in hope, and set to work with valiant hearts to

repair the breaches the straggle had left, and to restore to the

rock-built fortress that glory and comeliness that became her so well;

but with which, if need was, she could securely dispense. But there

was no slight difference between 180 and 211. The tide of Christianity

had risen perceptibly all over the Church; most of all on the shores

of its greatest scientific centre. The possibility of appealing to

those who had heard the apostles had long been past, but now even the

disciples of Polycarp, Simeon, and Ignatius had disappeared; instead

of Irenaeus there was Hippolytus, and Demetrius of Alexandria was the

eleventh successor of St. Mark. Heretics had multiplied, questions had

been asked, tradition was developing itself, dogma was being fixed.

The form of teaching was, therefore, in process of change as other

things changed. Greater precision, more "positive theology," a more

constant look-out for what authority had said or might say--these

necessities would make the teacher's office more difficult, even if

more definite. The position of the Church toward its enemies, also,

was sensibly changing. The "gain-sayers" were not of the same class as

had been addressed by St. Theophilus or St. Justin. The state of

things had grown more distinctly marked. Christianity was no longer an

idea that might, in a burst of noble rhetoric, be made to set on fire,

for a moment, even the camp of the enemy. It was now known to the

Gentile world as a stern and unyielding praxis; susceptible, perhaps,

of scientific and literary treatment, but quite distinct from both

science and letters. Enthusiastic but timid _dilettanti_ had lost

their enthusiasm, and gave full scope to their fears. Amiable

philosophers took back the right hand of fellowship, and retreated

behind those who, by a {735} special instinct, had always refused to

be amiable, and now thought themselves more justified than ever. On

the Christian side the war had lost much of the adventure which

accompanies the first dashing inroads into an enemy's country.

Surprises were not so easy, systematic opposition was frequent, and

their writers were obliged to fight by tactics, and in the prosaic

array of argument for argument. Documents, moral testimony,

institutions, were the objects of attack from without. The apostles

were vilified, faith was proved to be irrational, the Bible was ranked

with Syrian impostures and Jewish charm-books. And here, in the matter

of the Bible, was a mighty enterprise for the Christian teacher. The

canon had not yet been officially promulgated. A generation that would

despise an apocryphal book of Homer or a false Orphic hymn would not

be easily satisfied with the credentials of a religion. Great, then,

would be that Christian teacher who should at once teach the faithful,

and yet not "take away from" the faith; win the philosophers, and yet

fight them hand to hand; and give to the world a critical edition of

the Bible, yet hold fast to ancient tradition. Such was the work of

Origen.

He began by external organization; he divided the multitudes that

flocked to the Catechisms into two grand classes; one of those who

were commencing, another of those who were more advanced. The former

class he gave to his first convert, Heraclas; the latter he kept to

himself. Heraclas was "skilled in theology," and "in other respects a

very eloquent man;" and, moreover, he was "fairly conversant with

philosophy," three qualifications in an Alexandrian catechist none of

which could be dispensed with. In any case, the division was a matter

of absolute necessity, for these extraordinary Alexandrian scholars,

models and patterns that deserve to be imitated more extensively than

they have been, gave him no respite and kept no regular school-hours,

but crowded in and out "from morning till night;" "not even a

breathing-space did they afford him," says his biographer. In such

circumstances theological study and scriptural labors were out of the

question, even if he had been the man of adamant that his admirers,

with the true Alexandrian passion for nicknames, had already begun to

call him. He therefore looked about among "his familiars," those of

his disciples who had attached themselves to him and lived with him a

life of study and asceticism; and from them he chose out Heraclas, the

brother of the martyred Plutarchus, to be the chief associate of his

work.

It need not be again mentioned that Origen's work, as that of

Pantaenus and of Clement before him, had three classes of persons to

deal with--catechumens, heretics, and philosophers. His dealings with

the heretics and philosophers will be treated of more appropriately

when we come to consider his journeys, the most important of which

occurred after the expiration of the twenty years with which we are

now concerned. As the school of Alexandria was chiefly and primarily

connected with the catechumens, the account of the twenty years of his

presidency will naturally be concerned chiefly and primarily with the

latter, that is to say, with those whom that great school undertook to

instruct in faith and discipline. And here we approach and stand close

beneath one side of that monumental fane that bears upon it for all

generations the name of Origen. The neophytes of Alexandria were

chiefly taught out of one book; it was the custom handed from teacher

to teacher; each held up the book and explained it, according to the

"unvarying tradition of the ancients." For two hundred and ten years

the work had gone on; but time has destroyed nearly every trace of

what was written and spoken. For the first time since St. Mark wrote

the gospel, Alexandria speaks now in history with a voice that shall

commence a new era in the history of {736} Holy Scripture. Pantaemus

had written "Commentaries" on the whole of the Bible; Clement had

left, in the _Hypotyposes_, a summary exposition of all the canonical

Scripture, not forgetting a glance at the "Contradictions" of

heretics. Both these writings have perished long ago. When Origen

came, in his turn, to take the same work in hand, a pressing want soon

forced itself upon his mind. There was no authentic version of the

sacred Word. The New Testament canon was still uncertain, one Church

upholding a greater number of books, another less. The Roman canon

was, indeed, from the first identical with the Tridentine (see

Perrone, _"De Locis Theologicis"_). But the Church of Antioch, _e.g._,

ignored no less than five of the canonical books. Alexandria, well

supplied with learned expositors, and not a little influenced by the

native Alexandrian instinct for criticism and grammar, had got further

in the development of the canon than the majority of its sisters. Yet,

so far, there had hardly been any distinct interference on the part of

authority, and though, as we shall see, Origen's New Testament canon

was the same as that of the Council of Trent, yet there were not

wanting private writers who expressed doubts about the Epistle to the

Hebrews or the Apocalypse. One thing, however, is very clear in all

these somewhat troublesome disputes about the canon; whether we turn

to Tertullian in Africa, to St. Jerome in Italy, to St. Irenaeus in

the West, or to Clement and Origen in the East, we find one grand and

large criterion put forth as the test of all authenticity, viz., the

tradition of the ancients. "Go to the oldest churches," says St.

Irenaeus. "The truest," says Tertullian, "is the oldest; the oldest is

what always was; what always was is from the apostles; go therefore to

the churches of the apostles, and find what is there held sacred." "We

must not transgress the bounds set by our fathers," says Origen. It

took several centuries to complete this process; but the principle was

a strong and a living one, and its working out was only a matter of

time. It was worked out something in this fashion. A provincial

presbyter, we will say from Pelusium, or Syene, or Arsinoe, came up to

Alexandria (he may easily have done so, thanks to the police

arrangements and engineering enterprise of Ptolemy Philadelphus);

having much ecclesiastical news to communicate, and perhaps important

business to arrange on the part of his bishop, he would be thrown into

close contact with the presbytery of the metropolitan Church. Let us

suppose that, in order to support some point of practical morality,

touching the "lapsed" or the converts, he quoted Hermas' "Shepherd" as

canonical Scripture. The archdeacon with whom he was arguing would

demur to such an authority; let him quote Paul, or Jude, or Peter, or

John, but not Hernias; Hernias was not in the canon. The presbyter

from the provinces would be a little amazed and even ruffled; how

could he say it was not in the canon when he himself had heard it read

on the Lord's day before the sacred mysteries in the patriarchal

Church, in the presence of the very patriarch himself, seated on his

throne, and surrounded by the clergy? A canonical book meant a book

within the Church's general rule ([Greek text]), and the rule of the

Church was that a book read at such a time was thereby declared true

Scripture. The archdeacon would reply that the presbyter was right in

the main, both as to facts and principles; but would point out that at

Alexandria they had a set of books which were read at the solemn time

he mentioned, beside regular Scripture; and if he had known their

usages better, or if he had asked any of the clergy, or the patriarch,

he would be aware that such writings were only _read to the people_ as

pious exhortations, not _defined_ as the repository of the faith. The

presbyter would consider this inconvenient, and would doubtless be

right in thinking so. The practice was {737} condemned by various

councils in the next century. But he would at once admit that if the

tradition were so, then the Alexandrian Church certainly appeared to

reject Hernias. But he would have another difficulty. Did not Clement,

of blessed memory, consider Hernias as authentic, or, at any rate, the

Epistle of Barnabas, which was quite a parallel case? And did not

Origen (whom we suppose to be then teaching) call the "Shepherd"

"divinely inspired?" It was true, the archdeacon would rejoin, that

both Clement in former years and Origen then spoke very highly of

several writings of this class; but he must refer him once more to the

authoritative tradition of the Alexandrian Church, to be learned, in

the last instance, from the lips of Demetrius himself: this would at

once show that Clement and Origen could not mean to put Hernias on a

level with Paul, and Origen himself would certainly admit so much, if

he were asked. The presbyter would inquire, during his stay, of the

heads of the Catechetical school, of the ancient priests, and of the

patriarch; he would be satisfied that what the archdeacon said was

true; and he would return to his city on the Red Sea, or at the

extremity of the Thebaid, or on the north-western coast of the

continent, with authentic intelligence that the Apostolic Church of

Alexandria rejected Hermas from the Scripture canon, and that,

therefore, it certainly ought to be rejected by his own Church. He

would, perhaps, in addition to this, bring the information that the

metropolitan Church, so he had found out in his researches, upheld the

Epistle to the Hebrews, or the Apocalypse of the Apostle John, to be

true and genuine Scripture; would it not, therefore, be well to

consider whether these also should not be admitted by themselves? In

this way, or in some way analogous, the Churches that lay within the

"circumscription" of a patriarchal or apostolic see would by degrees

be led to conform their canon to the canon of the principal Church. As

time went on, the great metropolitan sees themselves became grouped

round the three grand centres of Alexandria, Antioch, and Rome; and,

finally, in the process of the development of tradition, at least as

early as A.D. 800, the whole Church had adopted the canon as approved

by Rome in the decretal of Innocent I. It is, therefore, a remarkable

fact that Origen quotes the canon of the New Testament precisely as it

now stands in the Vulgate. It would hardly be true to say that he

formally states as exclusively authentic the complete list of the

Catholic canon; but that he does enumerate it is certain. Moreover, in

addition to the remarkable correctness of his investigations on the

canon, Origen did much, in other ways, for a book that was

emphatically the textbook of his school. The exemplars in general use

were in a most unsatisfactory state: there were hardly two alike.

Writers had been careless, audacious innovators had inserted their

interpolations, honest but mistaken bunglers had added and taken away

whenever the sense seemed to require it. It is Origen himself who

makes these complaints, and nobody had better occasion to know how

true they were. The manuscript used in the great Church probably

differed from that used by the chief catechist; his, again, differed

from every one of those brought to class by the wealthier of his

scholars. One would bring up a copy of St. Matthew's Gospel, which, on

investigation, would turn out to be full of Nazarite or Ebionite

"improvements"--another would have an Acts of the Apostles, which had

been bequeathed to him by some venerable Judaizant, and wherein St.

James of Jerusalem would be found to have assumed more importance than

St. Luke was generally supposed to have given him. A third would have

a copy so full of monstrous corruptions in the way of mutilation and

deliberate heretical glossing, that the orthodox ears of the {738}

master would certainly have detected a quotation from it in two lines:

it would be one of Valentine's editions. A fourth, newly arrived from

some place where Tertullian had never been heard of, would appear with

a bulky set of _volumina_, which Origen would find to his great

disgust to be the New Testament "according to Marcion." That first and

chief of reckless falsifiers had "circumcised" the New Testament, as

St. Irenaeus calls it, to such an extent that he had to invent a

quantity of new Acts and Apocalypses to keep up appearances, and what

he retained he had freely cut and tortured into Marcionism; for he

said openly that the apostles were moderately well-informed, but that

his lights were far in advance of them. Such examples as these are, of

course, extremes; but even in orthodox copies there must have been a

bewildering number of _variantes_. Origen's position would bring him

into contact with exemplars from many distant churches. The work of

copying fresh ones for the "missions," or to supply the wants of the

provinces, would necessitate some choice of manuscripts; and in a

matter so important, we may be sure that his catechists,

fellow-townsmen of Aristarchus, rather enjoyed than otherwise the

vigorous critical disputes which the collation of MSS. has a special

tendency to engender. It is nearly established--indeed, we may say, it

is certain--that Origen wrote a copy of the New Testament with his own

hand. It was not a new edition, apparently, but a corrected copy of

the generally received version. He corrected the blunders of copyists;

he struck out of the text everything that was evidently a mere gloss;

he re-inserted what had clearly dropped out by mischance, and adopted

a few readings that were unmistakable improvements. But he made no

alteration of the text on mere conjecture. However faulty a reading

might seem, he never changed it without authority; he had too much

reverence for Holy Scripture, and probably, also, too bitter an

experience of conjectural emendations, to sanction such dangerous

proceedings by his own practice. This precious copy, the fruit of his

labors and study, the depositary of his wide experience, and the

record of his "adamantine" industry, was apparently the one from which

he himself always quoted, and, therefore, we may conclude, which he

always used. It lay, after his death, in the archives of Caesarea of

Palestine, with his other Biblical MSS. Pamphilus the Martyr is

related to have copied it; and in the time of Constantine, Eusebius

sent many transcripts of it to the imperial city. Eusebius himself

copied it with all the reverence he would necessarily feel for his

hero, Origen; and by means of his copy, or of copies made by his

direction, it became the basis of that recension of the New Testament

known as the Alexandrine. St. Jerome was well acquainted with the

library of Caesarea, and often mentions the _"Codices Adamantii"_

which he was privileged to consult there; and we need not remind the

reader of the well-known agreement of the Latin versions with those of

Palestine and Alexandria. Now Palestine meant--first, Jerusalem, where

was the celebrated library formed by St. Alexander, Origen's own

college friend and an Alexandria man, as we should say, and partly

under Origen's influence; and, secondly, Caesarea, which inherited

Origen's traditions and teaching, at least equally with Alexandria, as

we shall see later on, and in which the originals of his works were

preserved with religious veneration, until war and sack of Persian or

Moslem destroyed them. Thus the work of Origen on the New Testament,

begun and mainly carried out during those twenty years at Alexandria,

is living and active at this very day. But if the New Testament needed

setting to rights, it was correct and accurate in comparison with the

Old. How he treated the Septuagint, and how the Hexapla and the

Tetrapla grew under nimble hands and learned heads, we must for the

present defer to tell.

{739}

From The Fortnightly Review.

MARTIN'S PUZZLE.

I.

There she goes up the street with her book in her hand,

And her "Good morning, Martin!" "Ay, lass, how d'ye do?"

"Very well, thank you, Martin!" I can't understand;

I might just as well never have cobbled a shoe!

I can't understand it. She talks like a song:

Her voice takes your ear like the ring of a glass;

She seems to give gladness while limping along;

Yet sinner ne'er suffered like that little lass.

II.

Now, I'm a rough fellow--what's happen'd to me?

Since last I left Falmouth I've not had a fight

With a miner come down for a dip in the sea;

I cobble contented from morning to night.

The Lord gives me all that a man should require;

Protects me, and "cuddles me up," as it were.

But what have I done to be saved from the fire?

And why does his punishment fall upon her?

III.

First, a fool of a boy ran her down with a cart.

Then, her fool of a father--a blacksmith by trade--

Why the deuce does he tell us it hah broke his heart?

His heart!--where's the leg of the poor little maid!

Well, that's not enough; they must push her downstairs,

To make her go crooked: but why count the list?

If it's right to suppose that our human affairs

Are all order'd by heaven--there, bang goes my fist!

IV.

For if angels can look on such sights--never mind!

When you're next to blaspheming, it's best to be mum.

The parson declares that her woes weren't design'd;

But, then, with the parson it's all kingdom-come.

"Lose a leg, save a soul "--a convenient text;

I call it "Tea doctrine," not savoring of God.

When poor little Molly wants "chastening," why, next--

The Archangel Michael might taste of the rod.

{740}

V.

But, to see the poor darling go limping for miles

To read books to sick people!--and just of an age

When girls learn the meaning of ribbons and smiles,--

Makes me feel like a squirrel that turns in a cage.

The more I push thinking, the more I resolve:

I never get further:--and as to her face,

It starts up when near on my puzzle I solve,

And says, "This crush'd body seems such a sad case."

VI.

Not that she's for complaining: she reads to earn pence;

And from those who can't pay, simple thanks are enough.

Does she leave lamentation for chaps without sense?

Howsoever, she's made up of wonderful stuff.

Ay, the soul in her body must be a stout cord;

She sings little hymns at the close of the day,

Though she has but three fingers to lift to the Lord,

And only one leg to kneel down with to pray.

VII.

What I ask is, Why persecute such a poor dear,

If there's law above all? Answer that if you can!

Irreligious I'm not; but I look on this sphere

As a place where a man should just think like a man.

It isn't fair dealing! But, contrariwise,

Do bullets in battle the wicked select?

Why, then it's all chance-work! And yet, in her eyes,

She hold's a fixed something by which I am check'd.

VIII.

Yonder ribbon of sunshine aslope on the wall,

If you eye it a minute, 'll have the same look:

So kind! and so merciful! God of us all!

It's the very same lesson we get from thy book.

Then is life but a trial? Is that what is meant?

Some must toil, and some perish, for others below:

The injustice to each spreads a common content;

Ay! I've lost it again, for it can't be quite so.

IX.

She's the victim of fools: that seems nearer the mark.

On earth there are engines and numerous fools.

Why the Lord can permit them, we're still in the dark;

He does, and in some sort of way they're his tools.

It's a roundabout way, with respect let me add,

If Molly goes crippled that we may be taught:

But, perhaps, it's the only way, though it's so bad;

In that case we'll bow down our heads, as we ought.

{741}

X.

But the worst of _me_ is, that when I bow my head,

I perceive a thought wriggling away in the dust,

And I follow its tracks, quite forgetful, instead

Of humble acceptance: for, question I must!

Here's a creature made carefully--carefully made

Put together with craft, and then stampt on, and why?

The answer seems nowhere: it's discord that's play'd.

The sky's a blue dish!--an implacable sky!

XI.

Stop a moment. I seize an idea from the pit.

They tell us that discord, though discord, alone,

Can be harmony when the notes properly fit:

Am I judging all things from a single false tone?

Is the universe one immense organ, that rolls

From devils to angels? I'm blind with the sight.

It pours such a splendor on heaps of poor souls!

Suppose I try kneeling with Molly to-night.

GEORGE MEREDITH.

------

Translated from Der Katholik.

THE TWO SIDES OF CATHOLICISM.

[Third and concluding Article.]

IV. THE HEART OF THE CHURCH.

Christ approves himself as the head of the Church inasmuch as her

individual members are subject to his guidance, and live and move in

him. [Footnote 151] This protracted influence of Christ is exercised

by means of an innate harmonizing and vivifying principle of the

Church. We have arrived at the heart of the Church. Our ancient

theology bestows this epithet on the Holy Ghost. [Footnote 152] The

Church receives the Holy Ghost through Christ. Such is the doctrine of

Scripture, clearly expressed. Jesus promises his disciples to send

them after his departure the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of truth, in whom

they will find a compensation for the Master. For it is the function

of the Spirit to testify of Christ, and to bring all things to the

remembrance of the Church, whatsoever Jesus has said. Thus are all

things taught unto the Church. This efficacy, which has the glory of

Christ for its aim, the Holy Ghost derives from the fulness of

Christ's Godhead, _de meo accipiet._ The Holy Ghost was not given

until after Jesus was glorified. Christ being exalted, and having

received the Holy Ghost promised of the Father, sheds forth the Spirit

upon the Church. Even the prior inspiration of the apostles was the

result of an act of Christ. Jesus breathed on them and said unto them,

Receive ye the Holy Ghost.

[Footnote 151: St. Thomas, iii. 93, a. 6.]

[Footnote 152: _Ibid, a. 1, ad. S: Caput habet manifestam eminentiam

respectu caeterorum exteriorum membrorum; sed cor habet quandam

influentiam occultam. Et ideo cordi comparatur Spiritus sanctus, qui

invisibiliter ecclesiam viviflcat et unit._]

The Spirit acts as the heart of the Church under the control and

influence of the head. The fundamental theological reason of this is

not difficult of demonstration. The external relations {742} of the

several divine persons, or their relations to the works of God, such

as the one just described of the Holy Ghost to the Church, are

intimately connected with the intro-divine relations of the members of

the most Holy Trinity to each other. It is in this sense that Holy

Writ makes mention of a _mission_ of the Son and of the Spirit. The

expression implies that the person concerning whom it is used,

occupies toward the remaining divine persons a position admitting of

the giving of a mission by them or one of them, that is to say, of a

particular work done by the one by the power and at the delegation of

the other. For one person of the Trinity to act in a mission,

therefore, it is requisite that the power and the will to act must

emanate from the person conferring the mission. Thus Jesus says that

his doctrine is not his own, but the doctrine of him by whom he was

sent. But one person of the Trinity can be a recipient from another in

so far only as the recipient issues from the giver for ever and ever,

or only in respect of the eternal procession. It follows that a divine

person can receive a mission only in emanating from another, that is

to say, none but the _personae productae_, the Son and the Holy Ghost,

can be sent; while, on the other hand, only the _personae

producentes_, the Father and the Son, can confer a mission. Hence the

fundamental reason why the sway of the Spirit in the Church is

exercised under the influence of Christ, is to be found in the manner

of the eternal procession, _i.e._, in the coming of the Spirit from

the Father and the Son.

The essence of Christianity consists in spiritual intercourse and

spiritual influence. As distinguished from the old covenant, the

characteristic of the New Testament dispensation consists in this:

that it is done by the agency of the Holy Ghost, sent down from

heaven. The Spirit of Christ was in the prophets; but the same Spirit

manifests a new activity since the mission from heaven. When the

apostle desires to make the true foundation of faith clear to the

Galatians, he contents himself with asking them whence they had

received the Spirit? By its descent the blessing of Abraham came on

the Gentiles through Jesus Christ, in fulfilment of the prophecies.

The pouring out of the Holy Ghost is the crowning work of Christ's

mediation.

But what is the badge of this more profuse dispensation of the Spirit,

thus recognized in Scripture as the peculiar mark of Christianity?

Under the ancient covenant, answers St. Gregory of Naziance, the Holy

Ghost was present only by its efficacy ([Greek text]); now it abides

among us [Greek text] _i.e._, in its essence, or _substantialiter_, as

our theologians phrase it. The efficacy of the Spirit in the prophets

is described by St. Cyril of Alexandria as a mere irradiation [[Greek

text]]; they received only the effulgence of the light, as those who

follow a torch-bearer [[Greek text]]; while the Spirit in proper

person enters into the souls of those who believe in Christ, and

dwells therein [Greek text]. It is only since the ascension of Christ

that the inhabitation of the Spirit in the souls of men has reached

its completion as [Greek text]. This is the reason assigned by St.

Cyril for the declaration of the Lord that he that is least in the

kingdom of heaven is greater than John the Baptist, than whom there

hath not risen a greater among them that are born of women. He

interprets the kingdom of heaven here referred to to be the impartment

[Greek text] of the Holy Ghost. From this interpretation he deduces

the reason wherefore the humblest citizen of the kingdom of heaven is

above the Baptist. For the latter is born of woman, the former of God.

In consequence of this regeneration we are partakers of the divine

nature, which St. Cyril interprets to mean neither more nor less than

the dwelling of the Holy Ghost in our souls. [Footnote 153 ]

[Footnote 153: _Comment, in Joann. Evangel._, lib. 5. _Oper Lutet_,

1638, A. IV., p. 474 et seq. ]

As the head of the Church, the Son {743} of man, being lifted up from

the earth, draws all men unto him. The Scripture concludes the

narration of the miraculous events of the first Christian Passover and

of their immediate results with the remark that the Lord added to the

Church daily such as should be saved. Therefore, immediately after the

outpouring of the Holy Ghost, began the daily increase of the Church

through the fructifying influence of the grace of its head. They were

multiplied in proportion as they walked in the comfort, the [Greek

text], of the Holy Ghost. By one Spirit the Church of Christ is

baptized into one body, which Spirit overflows it and saturates it

with its essence. In him we were sealed as the possession of Christ,

and we know that he abideth in us by the Spirit which he hath given

us. On being received into the Church the members are built into an

edifice, the foundation of which has its cornerstone in Christ. By

this incorporation they are united into a mansion of God in the

Spirit. In so far as we are joined unto the Lord we are one spirit

with him, and our bodies are temples of the Holy Ghost.

On account of its intimate relations with Christ, the Spirit is called

the Spirit of Christ. Even the Lord himself is directly called the

Spirit. By him, the Spirit of the Lord, we are transformed into his

image, the image the Lord. Thereby the Spirit evinces itself the

principle of our liberty.

The main result of the action of the Spirit in the Church is,

therefore, the union of the latter and of her individual members with

Christ, the Christ who is within us. The union between Christ and the

Church is effected by the Spirit, who acts as the connecting link,

while Christ himself is the efficient cause of the union, in so far as

he sends his Spirit to accomplish it. How, then, is the inhabitation

of the Spirit, which is identical with that of Christ, in the Church

brought about? The answer to this question involves results decisive

of the present investigation.

If the Church were an unattained ideal, according to the Protestant

acceptation, the promise of Christ to be with his followers even unto

the end of the world would admit of no more profound interpretation

than that, after his personal departure, the Lord would continue to

occupy the minds of his disciples, thus giving their thoughts a right

direction through all time. The presence of Christ in the visible

Church would no longer be vouchsafed by a _substantial_ pledge, making

the repletion of the Church with Christ, which is the ideal of that

institution, a historical reality even at the present day, in so far

as the pledge is actually present. If, on the other hand, the latter

view is the only scriptural one, then the true Church is not to be

handed over exclusively to the future and to the realm of ideas. She

is herself within the sphere of reality, she belongs to the living

present, if the inmost principle of her being is even now actually at

work, as a gift coeval with her establishment, not the mere object of

search and speculation.

The idea of Catholicism presupposes one thing more. Such a principle

dwelling in the Church as a reality must necessarily exercise its

functions in a single individual image only. Both of these positions

are the necessary results of the teachings of Holy Writ.

The Scriptures describe the Holy Ghost, by whom the love of God is

shed abroad in our hearts, as something conferred upon us, _per

spiritum sanctum qui datus est nobis_. In the capacity of abiding in

our souls as something bestowed upon us, as _donum_, the fathers

distinguish a personal attribute of the Holy Ghost, having its

foundation in the peculiar manner of its eternal emanation from the

Father and Son. This emanation is wrought as a common infusion of

being from Father and Son, as an intro-divine overflowing of love.

[Footnote 154] Together {744} with the Holy Ghost that is given unto

us, that is to say, by means of the love shed abroad in our hearts

through him, the two other persons of the Trinity likewise come and

take up their abode within our souls. The unity of the three divine

persons is not only the antetype of the unity of the Church, but is at

the same time its fundamental principle. In his high sacerdotal

invocation the Lord prays that all those who believe through the word

may be one, even as the Father is in him and he in the Father; and

that we may be one in the Father and the Son, _ut et ipsi eis nolis

unum sint_. The unity of the Father and the Son, who take up their

abode within us simultaneously with the Holy Ghost, is the foundation

of our own ecclesiastical unity. There is the fundamental, the

ultimate principle of Catholicism. In it, through the Holy Ghost, we

have a fellowship with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ.

[Footnote 154: _St. Augustinus, de Trinit._, lib. v., cap. 14:

_Exiit enim non quomodo natus, sed quomodo datus; et ideo non

dicitur filius._ Cap. 15: _Quia sic procedebat ut esset donabile,

jam donum erat et antequam esset cui daretur_. Cap. 11: _Spiritus

sanctus ineffabilis est quaedam Patris Filiique communio. . . . hoc

ipse proprie dicitur, quod illi communiter: quia et Pater spiritus

et Filius spiritus et Pater sanctus et Filius sanctus. Ut ergo ex

nomine, quod utrique convenit, utriusque communio significetur,

vocatur donum amborum Spiritus sanctus._]

The other functions ascribed to the Spirit by Holy Writ are also of

such a nature as to constrain us to assume that the essence of the

true Church is a reality even at this day. By the Holy Ghost we

receive even now an earnest of the inheritance in store for us. Its

testimony assures us that we are the children of God. We have become

such even now, and through him. We are born of the Spirit. The renewal

accomplished by him is a bath of regeneration, the putting on of a new

man. In the hearts of believers he is a well of water springing up

into everlasting life. In this sense our justification may be regarded

as a glorification in the germ. Christ has anointed the Church with a

chrism which abides and exerts itself in her as a permanent teacher.

It is an entire misapprehension of the creative power of Christianity

to ascribe to the Spirit of Christ which governs the Church no more

profitable efficacy than the barren, resultless chase of an ideal

which constantly eludes realization. The very idea that a law of

steady development is to be traced in Christianity itself, this very

favorite view of all the advocates of an ideal Church, ought to have

led to a more profound appreciation of the essence and history of the

Church. If the Church is to undergo a development, the realization of

her ideal should not be postponed to the end of time. What is its

course in history? This point is decisive of our position respecting

the ideal Church.

The doctrine relies upon Matt, xviii. 20. Here the Catholic

acceptation of a realization of the essence of the Church,

historically manifested, would appear to be directly excluded. The

passage adduced makes Christ abide among us, and accordingly makes the

true Church come into being simply in consequence of the casual

assemblage of two or three, so that it takes place in his name--a

condition the performance or breach of which is a matter by no means

patent to the senses. But these words are to be read in connection

with what precedes them. Verses 17 and 18 allude to the authority of'

the Church as historically manifest. The resolutions of that authority

are ratified in heaven, and are valid before God. For--such is the

logical thread of the discourse of Jesus--what the Church, as

historically manifested, ordains, is at the same time ordained by the

Holy Ghost dwelling within her. That such is actually the case, the

Lord then proceeds to show by the concluding illustration. The

agreement of two is alone sufficient to secure a fulfilment of the

prayer: for where two or three are assembled together in the name of

Christ, there is he in the midst of them: how much more amply then is

the presence and the countenance of Christ assured to the entire

Church, and to the organ intrusted with the execution of her {745}

power! [Footnote 55] True, Christ is present even where only two or

three are assembled in his name; but the result of his presence

corresponds to the extent of the assembly. There Christ simply effects

the fulfilment of the common prayer. That the arbitrary concourse of a

few individuals in the name of Christ is the realization of the

essence of the Church, nowhere in the whole passage is there a word to

confirm such an interpretation.

[Footnote 155: This is the interpretation of this passage by the

council of Chalcedon, in its missive to Pope Leo the Great. Compare

_Ballerini, op. S. Leonis_ t. i., p. 1087.]

The advocates of the ideal Church also cite Eph. v. 27. [Footnote

156] There the Church is called holy and without blemish, not having

spot or wrinkle; a description supposed to be applicable exclusively

to the Church that is to be, and by no means to the Church as it is.

The remark is an idle one, and does not touch the real question. In

our view it is the work of the present to lay the foundation for the

future glory of the Church. This position is fully borne out by the

words of Scripture. For in verse 26 the apostle points out the

sanctification of the Church as the immediate object of the sacrifice

of Christ, and at the same time indicates the means by which the

Church is to be sanctified. This is done by the washing of water,

which owes its purifying efficacy to the simultaneous utterance of the

word. The presentation of the Church in unblemished holiness and

glory, the object of the sacrificial death of Christ, is therefore

gradually effected in the present world in proportion as the

purification by the sacrament, under the continued influence of

Christ, exerts its efficacy in he Church.

[Footnote 156: Hase, _Handbuch der prot. Polemik_ (Manual of

Protestant Polemics), p. 42. ]

If the apostle were here speaking simply of a remote future holiness

of the Church, his whole course of reasoning would lose its point. The

love of Christ is here presented to husbands and wives as a model for

their own connubial relations. As the self-sacrifice of Christ for the

Church has for its object the sanctification of the latter, so the

mutual self-devotion of husbands and wives is to invest their lives

with a higher grace. It is not the mere act of the self-sacrifice of

Christ which is to be emulated in marriage. No admonition would be

needed for such a purpose. Marriage is necessarily a type of this

relation. The discourse of the apostle tends, on the contrary, to

recommend the motive of the sacrifice of Christ, and its influence

upon the sanctification of the Church, to husbands and wives for

imitation. How feeble, how little calculated to fortify the admonition

of the apostle, would be their reference to the relation of Christ to

the Church, if the sanctification of the Church by Christ, thus held

up to husbands and wives for emulation, were something totally unreal,

a mere creature of reflection! If the purpose of the sacrifice of

Christ, the sanctification of the Church, were still unattained, how

could husbands and wives be expected to make their intercourse bear

those moral fruits by which it is to approve itself a type of the

relation of Christ to the Church?

The holiness of the Church, then, has its origin in the sacraments.

But that which makes the Church holy appertains to her essential

character. It follows that this character also is evolved by means of

the sacraments. This proves, finally, that this evolution of the

character of the true Church is only possible in a single, individual

historical manifestation, that is to say, only within, or at least by

the agency [Footnote 157] of, that visible body politic which is in

possession of the sacraments.

[Footnote 157: The means of grace administered by the Church

sometimes exert their influence beyond the pale, _i.e._, outside of,

her historical image. This is seen in the validity of the baptism of

heretics. ]

Protestantism is untrue to its own principle in representing the

administration of the sacraments according to their institution as an

index of the true Church. The whole force of this position lies in the

presumption of a {746} distinct historical organization as the

necessary exponent of the inward essence of the true Church. A

contrary doctrine is in danger of bestowing the name of the true

Church on a society which may possibly be composed exclusively of

hypocrites. The inference is obvious. If the essence of the true

Church is only to be found in the domain of the mind, or if it even

remains a mere ideal, where is the guarantee that the mantle of the

sacramental organization covers that silent, invisible congregation of

spirits in which alone the Protestant looks for the essence of the

true Church? The reformer's idea of the Church is here entangled in a

contradiction in terms. On the principle of justification by faith

alone, the character of the true Church must be wholly expressed in

something incorporeal. And yet the true Church is to be recognized by

the use of the sacraments according to their institution. Where is the

connecting link between the external and the internal Church? The

congruence of the Spirit and the body of the Church, if it occurs, is

purely accidental. The visible Church, taken by itself, is a mere

external thing, possibly void of all substantial essence. The doctrine

of _sola fides_ is incapable of a profound appreciation of the visible

Church. This, taken in connection with the old Protestant theory that

the phase of the Church manifested in preaching and in the sacraments

is of the essence of the Church, makes it clear that the attempt of

the reformers to spiritualize Christianity leads on the contrary to a

materialization of the idea of the Church.

The modern Protestant theology was far from being deterred by its

reverence for the reformers from laying bare this unsound portion of

their system. They attempted to make up for it by the well known

theory of the ideal Church, which begins by renouncing, in entire

consistency with the Protestant principle of justification by faith

alone, every outward manifestation of the essence of the Church.

The manifold forms in which Christianity becomes palpable as a power

in history are here treated as something purely accidental, easily

capable of severance from the essence of the true Church. How does

this explanation comport with the doctrine of Scripture just

expounded?

The Church of Christ, says Holy Writ, receives her unseen bridal

ornaments by means of the palpable sacraments. In consequence of their

efficacy she conceals the germs of her future glory under the guise of

her temporal image. The most profound and super-sensual characteristic

of the Church is, therefore, closely though mysteriously allied with

the palpable exterior. It is not our present task to show how this

alliance is formed. We simply inquire into the foundation of this

necessary combination of the spirit and the form of the Church. This

foundation we claim to discover in the sublimity of the principle

heretofore recognized by us as the marrow, the heart of the Church.

If that which constitutes the heart of the Church is supernatural, and

beyond the reach of the natural powers of the human mind, its

impartment and preservation necessarily presuppose a peculiar

influence of God upon man, different from the creative power. Under

these circumstances, the precise method of the divine influence

pervading the Church is only to be learned with certainty from

revelation. And here we find the most explicit teachings on this

subject. According to the testimony of Scripture, the Lord promotes

the growth of the Church by means palpable to the senses. This

suggests inquiry into the laws under which these means of grace find

their application. Those laws are derived from the object of their

institution. It consists in the adhibition of instrumentalities in the

production of a divine effect. Consequently the means employed, or the

sacraments, can manifest their efficacy only under certain conditions

divinely ordained.

The correct understanding of the {747} mutual relations subsisting

between the spirit and the body of the Church is further assisted by

reference to another idea also derived from the Church. The regular

growth of the Church is made intelligible to us as a self-edification

in love. The means required for the attainment of this purpose have

been given into the hands of the Church herself. For this end Peter

received the keys of the kingdom of heaven. He is not only the thread

of the historical development of the Church, but the interior

organization also necessarily presupposes a union with Peter. The

organs of this organization are the sacraments. But they manifest

their saving efficacy on those only who have not knowingly interrupted

the chain of union between themselves and Peter, and their use is

totally void of effect if the party by whom they are administered is

not actuated by the desire of doing that which is done in sacramental

ceremonies by the Church, united with Peter (_intentio faciendi quod

facit ecclesia._)

The inmost principle, the heart of the Church, is inseparably

connected with these visible actions, which are efficaciously

administered only according to the intention and in the name of the

visible Church, and in virtue of their efficacy the latter approves

herself as holy. Thus the present inquiry leads to the same result

already reached by other investigations. The spirit and the body of

Catholicism are not to be separated. The connecting link which binds

them together is Peter, the bearer of the keys of the kingdom of

heaven, who still lives in his successors. But the fountain-head of

this necessary relationship is in the vital principle of the Church,

in her supernatural principle.

The idea of a supernatural principle, and that of the papacy, together

constitute the principle of Catholicism. In the former we behold its

fundamental essence, in the latter the cement of its historical unity,

as well as the connecting link between the interior and the exterior

catholicity of the Church.

------

From The Month.

SONNET.

UNSPIRITUAL CIVILIZATION.

We have been piping, Lord; we have been singing;

Five hundred years have passed o'er lawn and lea,

Marked by the blowing bud and falling tree,

While all the ways with melody were ringing:

In tented lists, high-stationed and flower-flinging,

Beauty looked down on conquering chivalry;

Science made wise the nations; laws made free;

Art, like an angel ever onward winging,

Brightened the world. But, O great Lord and Father!

Have these, thy bounties, drawn to thee man's race,

That stood so far aloof? Have they not rather

His soul subjected? with a blind embrace

Gulfed it in sense? Prime blessings changed to curse

'Twixt God and man can set God's universe.

AUBREY DE VERE.

------

{748}

From The Month

CONSTANCE SHERWOOD.

AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.

BY LADY GEORGIANA FULLERTON.

CHAPTER XI.

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."

{749}

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.

{750}

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 {751} 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 a 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 {752} 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 {753} 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 {754} 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 {755} 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 {756} 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 {757} 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 {758} 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 {759} 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.

CHAPTER XII.

It was some time before I could restore myself to my countenance,

after so much moving discourse, so as to join with spirit in the

sports and the dancing which did ensue among the young people that

evening. But sober thoughts and painful themes after a while gave

place to merriment; and the sound of music, gay tattle, and cheerful

steps lured me to such enjoyment as youth is wont to take in these

kinds of pastimes. It was too much my wont to pursue with eagerness

the present humor, and drink deeply of innocent pleasure wherein no

harm should exist if enjoyed with moderation. But like in a horse on

whose neck the bridle is cast, what began in a gentle ambling ends in

wild gallopping; so lawful merriment, if unrestrained, often ends in

what is unbeseeming, and in some sort blameable. So this time, when

dancing tired, a ring was formed for conversation, and the choice of

the night's pastime yielded to my discretion; alack, rather to my

imprudence and folly, methinks I might style it. I chose that

arguments should be held by two persons of the company, turn by turn,

and that a judge should be named to allot a reward to the worthiest,

and a penance to the worst. This liked them all exceedingly, and by

one consent they appointed me to be judge, and to summon such as

should dispute. {760} There were there two young gentlemen which

haunted our house, and Lady Ingoldby's also. One was Martin Tregony,

Lady Tregony's nephew, an ill-favored young man, with manners worse

than his face, and so apish and foppish in his dress and behavior,

that no young woman could abide him, much less would receive his

addresses, or if she did entertain him in conversation, it was to make

sport of his so great conceit. He had an ill-natured kind of wit, more

sharp than keen, more biting than sarcastic. He studied the art of

giving pain, and oftentimes did cause shamefaced merit to blush. The

other was Mr. Thomas Sherwood, who, albeit not very near in blood to

my father, was, howsoever, of the same family as ourselves. He had

been to the English College in Douay, and had brought me tidings a

short time back of my father and Edmund Genings' safe arrival thither,

and afterward came often to see us, and much frequented Lady Tregony's

house. He had exceedingly good parts, but was somewhat diffident and

bashful. Martin Tregony was wont to make him a mark, as it were, of

his ill-natured wit, and did fancy himself to be greatly his superior

in sharpness, partly because Mr. Sherwood's disposition was retiring,

and partly that he had too much goodness and sense to bandy words with

so ill-mannered a young man. I pray you who read this, could aught be

more indiscreet than, in a thoughtless manner, to have summoned these

two to dispute? which nevertheless I did, thinking some sport should

arise out of it, to see Master Martin foisted in argument by one he

despised, and also from his extravagant gestures and affected

countenances. So I said:

"Master Tregony, your task shall be to dispute with Master Sherwood;

and this the theme of your argument, 'The Art of Tormenting.' He who

shall describe the nicest instances of such skill, when exercised by a

master toward his servant, a parent to his child, a husband to his

wife, a wife to her husband, a lover to his mistress, or a friend to

his friend, shall be proclaimed victorious; and his adversary submit

to such penance as the court shall inflict."

Master Sherwood shook his head for to decline to enter these lists;

but all the young gentlemen and ladies cried, he should not be

suffered to show contempt of the court, and forced him to stand up.

Master Martin was nothing loth, and in his ill-favored countenance

there appeared a made smile, which did indicate an assurance of

victory; so he began:

"The more wit a man hath, the better able he shall be at times to

torment another; so I do premise, and at the outset of this argument

declare, that to blame a man for the exercise of a talent he doth

possess is downright impiety, and that to wound another by the

pungency of home-thrusts in conversation is as just a liberty in an

ingenious man, as the use of his sword in a battle is to a soldier."

Mr. Sherwood upon this replied, that he did allow a public

disputation, appointed by meet judges, to come under the name of a

fair battle; but even in a battle (he said) generous combatants aim

not so much at wounding their adversaries, as to the disarming of

them; and that he who in private conversation doth make a weapon of

his tongue is like unto the man who provokes another to a single

combat, which for Christians is not lawful, and pierces him easily who

has less skill in wielding the sword than himself.

"Marry, sir," quoth Master Martin, "if you dobring piety into your

discourse, methinks the rules of just debate be not observed; for it

is an unfair thing for to overrule a man with arguments he doth not

dare to reply to under pain of spiritual censures."

"I cry you mercy, Master Martin," quoth the other; "you did bring in

_im_piety, and so methought piety should not be excluded." At the which

we all applauded, and Martin began to perceive his adversary to be

less {761} contemptible than he had supposed.

"Now to the point," I cried; "for exordiums be tedious. I pray you,

gentlemen, begin, and point out some notable fashion wherewith a

master might torment his servant."

Upon which quoth Martin: "If a man hath a sick servant, and doth note

his fancy to be set on some indulgence not of strict necessity, and

should therefore deny it to him, methinks that should be a rare

opportunity to exercise his talent."

"Nay," cried Master Sherwood, "a nicer one, and ever at hand

afterward, should be to show kindness once to a dependent when sick,

and to use him ten times the worse for it when he is well, upbraiding

him for such past favors, as if one should say: 'Alack, be as kind as

you will, see what return you do meet with!'"

This last piece of ingenuity was allowed by the court to surpass the

first. "Now," I cried, "what should be the greatest torment a parent

could inflict on a child?"

Martin answered: "If it should be fond of public diversion, to confine

it in-doors. If retirement suits its temper, to compel it abroad. If

it should delight in the theatre, to take it to see a good play, and

at the moment when the plot shall wax most moving, to say it must be

tired, and procure to send it home. Or, in more weighty matters,--a

daughter's marriage, for instance,--to detect if the wench hath set her

heart on one lover, and if so, to keep from her the knowledge of this

gentleman's addresses; and when she hath accepted another, to let her

know the first had sued for her hand, and been dismissed."

Here all the young gentlewomen did exclaim that Master Sherwood could

by no means think of a more skilful torment than this should prove. He

thought for an instant, and then said:

"It should be a finer and more delicate torment to stir up in a young

gentlewoman's mind suspicions of one she loved, and so work on her

natural passions of jealousy and pride, that she should herself, in a

hasty mood, discard her lover; and ever after, when the act was not

recallable, remind her she herself had wrought her own unhappiness,

and wounded one she loved."

"Yea, that should be worse than the first torment," all but one young

lady cried out; who, for her part, could better endure, she said, to

have injured herself than to be deceived, as in the first case.

"Then do come husbands," quoth Mr. Martin; "and I vow," he cried, "I

know not how to credit there be such vile wretches in the world as

should wish to torment their wives; but if such there be, methinks the

surest method they may practise is, to loving wives to show

indifferency; to such as be jealous, secrecy; to such as be pious,

profaneness; and the like in all the points whereon their affections

are set."

"Alack!" cried Mistress Frances Bellamy, "what a study the man hath

made of this fine art! Gentlewomen should needs beware of such a one

for a husband. What doth Master Sherwood say?"

Whereupon he: "Methinks the greatest torment a husband might inflict

on a worthy wife should be to dishonor her love by his baseness; or if

he had injured her, to doubt her proneness to forgive."

"And wives," quoth Mistress Southwell,--"what of their skill therein,

gentlemen?"

"It be such," cried Martin, "as should exceed men's ability thereof to

speak. The greatest instance of talent of this sort I have witnessed

is in a young married lady, whose husband is very willing to stay in

his house or go abroad, or reside in town, or at his seat in the

country, as should most please her, so she would let him know her

wishes. But she is so artful in concealing them, that the poor man can

never learn so much as should cause him to guess what they may be; but

with a meek voice she doth reply to his asking, 'An it please you,

sir, let it {762} be as you choose, for you very well know I never do

oppose your will.' Then if he resolve to leave town, she maketh not

much ado till they have rode twenty or thirty miles out of London.

Then she doth begin to sigh and weep, for that she should be a most

ill-used creature, and her heart almost broken for to leave her

friends, and be shut up for six months in a swamp, for such she doth

term his estate; and if she should not have left London that same day,

she should have been at the Lord Mayor's banquet, and seen the French

princes, which, above all things, she had desired. But some husbands

be so hard-hearted, if they can hunt and hawk, 'tis little count they

make of their wives' pleasures. Then when she hath almost provoked the

good man to swear, she hangeth down her head and saith, 'Content you,

sir--content you; 'tis your good fortune to have an obedient wife.'

And so mopes all the time of the journey."

Whilst Martin was speaking, I noted a young gentlewoman who did deeply

blush whilst he spoke, and tears came into her eyes. I heard afterward

she had been lately married, and that he counterfeited her voice in so

precise a manner, so that all such as knew her must needs believe her

to be the wife he spoke of; and that there was so much of truth in the

picture he had drawn, as to make it seem a likeness, albeit most

unjust toward one who, though apt to boast of her obedience, and to

utter sundry trifling complaints, was a fond wife and toward lady to

her dear husband; and that this malice in Mr. Tregony, over and above

his wonted spite, was due to her rejection of his hand some short time

before her marriage. Master Sherwood, seeing the ungracious

gentleman's ill-nature and the lady's confusion, stood up the more

speedily to reply, and so cut him short. "I will relate," he said, "a

yet more ingenious practice of tormenting, which should seem the

highest proof of skill in a wife, albeit also practised by husbands,

only not so aptly, or peradventure so often. And this is when one hath

offered to another a notable insult or affront, so to turn the tables,

even as a conjuror the cards he doth handle, that straightway the

offended party shall seem to be the offender, and be obliged to sue

forgiveness for that wherein he himself is hurt. I pray you, gentlemen

and ladies, can anything more ingenious than this practice be thought

on?"

All did admit it to be a rare example of ability in tormenting; but

some objected it was not solely exercised by wives and husbands, but

that friends, lovers, and all sorts of persons might use it. Then one

gentleman called for some special instance of the art in lovers. But

another said it was a natural instinct, and not an art, in such to

torment one another, and likewise their own selves, and proposed the

behavior of friends in that respect as a more new and admirable theme.

"Ah," quoth Master Martin, with an affected wave of his hand, "first

show me an instance of a true friendship betwixt ladies, or a sincere

affection betwixt gentlemen; and then it will be time for to describe

the arts whereby they do plague and torment each other."

Mr. Sherwood answered, "A French gentleman said, a short time since,

that it should be a piece of commendable prudence to live with your

friend as looking that he should one day be your enemy. Now we be

warranted, by Master Tregony's speech, to conclude his friendships to

be enmities in fair disguise; and the practices wherewith friends

torment each other no doubt should apply to this case also; and so his

exceptions need in no wise alter the theme of our argument. I pray

you, sir, begin, and name some notable instance in which, without any

apparent breach of friendship, the appearance of which is in both

instances supposed, one may best wound his friend, or, as Mr. Tregony

hath it, the disguised object of his hatred."

I noticed that Master Martin glanced {763} maliciously at his

adversary, and then answered, "The highest exercise of such ability

should be, methinks, to get possession of a secret which your friend,

_or disguised enemy_, has been at great pains to conceal, and to let

him know, by such means as shall hold him in perpetual fear, but never

in full assurance of the same, that you have it in your power to

accuse him at any time of that which should procure him to be thrown

into prison, or maybe hanged on a gibbet."

A paleness spread over Master Sherwood's face, not caused, I ween, by

fear so much as by anger at the meanness of one who, from envy and

spite, even in the freedom of social hours, should hint at secrets so

weighty as would touch the liberty, yea, the life, of one he called

his friend; and standing up, he answered, whilst I, now too late

discerning mine own folly in the proposing of a dangerous pastime,

trembled in every limb.

"I know," quoth he,--"I know a yet more ingenious instance of the

skill of a malicious heart. To hang a sword over a friend's head, and

cause him to apprehend its fall, must needs be a well-practised

device; but if it be done in so skilful a manner that the weapon shall

threaten not himself alone, but make him, as it were, the instrument

of ruin to others dearer to him than his own life,--if, by the

appearance of friendship, the reality of which such a heart knoweth

not, he hath been to such confidence as shall be the means of sorrow

to those who have befriended him in another manner than this false

friend, this true foe,--the triumph is then complete. Malice and hatred

can devise naught beyond it."

Martin's eyes glared so fearfully, and his voice sounded so hoarse, as

he hesitated in answering, that, in a sort of desperation, I stood up,

and cried, "Long enough have these two gentlemen had the talk to

themselves. Verily, methinks there be no conqueror, but a drawn game

in this instance."

But a murmur rose among the company that Master Sherwood was

victorious, and Master Tregony should do penance.

"What shall it be?" was asked; and all with one voice did opine Master

Sherwood should name it, for he was as much beloved as Master Tregony

was misliked. He (Sherwood), albeit somewhat inwardly moved, I ween,

had restrained his indignation, and cried out merrily, "Marry, so will

I! Look me in the face, Martin, and give me thy hand. This shall be

thy penance."

The other did so; but a fiendly look of resentment was in his eyes;

and methinks Thomas Sherwood must needs have remembered the grasp of

his hand to forgive it, I doubt not, even at the foot of the scaffold.

From that day Martin Tregony conceived an implacable hatred for Master

Sherwood, whom he had feigned a great friendship for on his first

arrival in London, because he hoped, by his means and influence with

his aunt, to procure her to pay his debts. But after he had thrown off

the mask, he only waited for an opportunity to denounce him, being

privy to his having brought a priest to Lady Tregony's house, who had

also said mass in her chapel. So one day meeting him in the streets,

he cried out, "Stop the traitor! stop the traitor!" and so causing him

to be apprehended, had him before the next justice of the peace;

where, when they were come, he could allege nothing against him, but

that he suspected him to be a Papist. Upon which he was examined

concerning his religion, and, refusing to admit the queen's

church-headship, he was cast into a dungeon in the Tower. His lodgings

were plundered, and L25, which he had amassed, as I knew, who had

assisted him to procure it, for the use of his aged and sick father,

who had been lately cast into prison in Lancaster, was carried off

with the rest. He was cruelly racked, we heard, for that he would not

reveal where he had heard mass; and kept {764} in a dark filthy hole,

where he endured very much from hunger, stench, and cold. No one being

allowed to visit him--for the Tower was not like some other prisons

where Mistress Ward and others could sometimes penetrate--or afford

him any comfort, Mr. Roper had, by means of another prisoner, conveyed

to his keeper some money for his use; but the keeper returned it the

next day, because the lieutenant of the Tower would not suffer him to

have the benefit of it. All he could be prevailed upon to do was to

lay out one poor sixpence for a little fresh straw for him to lie on.

About six months after, he was brought to trial, and condemned to die,

for denying the queen's supremacy, and was executed at Tyburn,

according to sentence, being cut down whilst he was yet alive,

dismembered, bowelled, and quartered.

Poor Lady Tregony's heart did almost break at this his end and her

kinsman's part in it; and during those six months--for she would not

leave London whilst Thomas Sherwood was yet alive--I did constantly

visit her, almost every day, and betwixt us there did exist a sort of

fellowship in our sorrow for this worthy young man's sufferings; for

that she did reproach herself for lack of prudence in not sufficient

distrust of her own nephew, whom now she refused to see, at least, she

said, until he had repented of his sin, which he, glorying in, had

told her, the only time they had met, he should serve her in the same

manner, and if he could ever find out she heard mass, should get her a

lodging in the Tower, and for himself her estate in Norfolk, whither

she was then purposing to retire, and did do so after Master

Sherwood's execution. For mine own part, as once before my father's

apprehended danger had diverted my mind from childish folly, so did

the tragical result of an entertainment, wherein I had been carried

away by thoughtless mirth, somewhat sicken me of company and sports. I

went abroad not much the next year; only was often at Mr. Wells's

house, and in Hubert's society, which had become so habitual to me

that I was almost persuaded the pleasure I took therein proceeded from

a mutual inclination, and I could observe with what jealousy he

watched any whom I did seem to speak with or allow of any civility at

their hands. Even Master Sherwood he would jalouse, if he found me

weeping over his fate; and said he was happier in prison, for whom

such tears did flow, than he at liberty, for whom I showed no like

regard. "Oh," I would answer, "he is happy because, Master Rookwood,

his sufferings are for his God and his conscience' sake, and not such

as arise from a poor human love. Envy him his faith, his patience, his

hope, which make him cry out, as I know he doth, 'O my Lord Jesu! I am

not worthy that I should suffer these things for thee;' and not the

compassionate tears of a paltry wench that in some sort was the means

to plunge him in these straits."

In the spring of the year which did follow, I heard from my father,

who had been ordained at the English College at Rheims, and was on the

watch, he advertised me, for an opportunity to return to England, for

to exercise the sacred ministry amongst his poor Catholic brethren.

But at which port he should land, or whither direct his steps, if he

effected a safe landing, he dared not for to commit to paper. He said

Edmund Genings had fallen into a most dangerous consumption, partly by

the extraordinary pains he took in his studies, and partly in his

spiritual exercises, insomuch that the physicians had almost despaired

of his recovery, and that the president had in consequence resolved to

send him into England, to try change of air. That he had left Rheims

with great regret, and went on his journey, as far as Havre de Grace,

and, after a fortnight's stay in that place, having prayed to God very

heartily for the recovery of his health, so that he might return, and,

without further {765} delay, continue his studies for the priesthood,

he felt himself very much better, almost as well as ever he was in his

life; upon which he returned to his college, and took up again, with

exceeding great fervor, his former manner of life; "and," my father

added, "his common expression, as often as talk is ministered of

England and martyrdom there, is this: _'Vivamus in spe! Vivamus in

spe!_'"

This letter did throw me into an exceeding great apprehension that my

father might fall into the hands of the queen's officers at any time

he should land, and the first news I should hear of him to be that he

was cast into prison. And as I knew no Catholic priest could dwell in

England with out he did assume a feigned name, and mostly so one of

his station, and at one time well noted as a gentleman and a recusant,

I now never heard of any priest arrested in any part of England but I

feared it should be him.

Hubert Rookwood was now more than ever at Mr. Lacy's house, and in his

library, for they did both affection the same pursuits, albeit with

very different abilities; and I was used to transcribe for them divers

passages from manuscripts and books, taking greater pleasure, so to

spend time, than to embroider in Kate's room, the compass of whose

thoughts became each day more narrow, and her manner of talk more

tasteless. Hubert seemed not well pleased when I told him my father

had been ordained abroad. I gathered this from a troubled look in his

eyes, and an increasing paleness, which betokened, to my now observant

eyes, emotions which he gave not vent to in words at all, or leastways

in any that should express strong resentment. His silence always

frighted me more than anger in others. He had acquired a great

influence over me, and, albeit I was often ill at ease in his company,

I ill brooked his absence. He was a zealous Catholic, and did adduce

arguments and proofs in behalf of his religion with rare ability. Some

of his writings which I copied at that time had a cogency and

clearness in their reasons and style, which in my poor judgment

betokened a singular sharp understanding and ingenuity of learning;

but in his conversation, and writings also, was lacking the fervency

of spirit, the warmth of devout aims, the indifferency to worldly

regards, which should belong to a truly Christian soul, or else the

nobleness and freedom of speech which some do possess from natural

temper. But his attainments were far superior to those of the young

men I used to see at Mr. Wells's, and such as gave him an

extraordinary reputation amongst the persons I was wont to associate

with, which contributed not a little to the value I did set on his

preference, of which no proofs were wanting, save an open paying of

his addresses to me, which by reason of his young age and mine, and

the poorness of his prospects, being but a younger son of a country

gentleman, was easy of account. He had a great desire for wealth and

for all kind of greatness, and used to speak of learning as a road to

it.

In the spring of that year, my Lord Surrey left Cambridge, and came to

live at Howard House with his lady. They were then both in their

eighteenth years, and a more comely pair could not be seen. The years

that had passed since she had left London had greatly matured her

beauty. She was taller of stature than the common sort, and very fair

and graceful. The earl was likewise tall, very straight, long-visaged,

but of a pleasant and noble countenance. I could not choose but admire

her perfect carriage, toward her lord, her relatives, and her

servants; the good order she established in her house; the care she

took of her sister's education, who in two years was to be married to

Lord William Howard; and her great charity to the poor, which she then

began to visit herself, and to relieve in all sorts of ways, and was

wont to say the angels of that old house where God had been served by

so many prayers and alms must needs assist her in her care for {766}

those in trouble. My lord appeared exceedingly fond of her then. One

day when I was visiting her ladyship, he asked me if I had read the

life of that sweet holy Queen Elizabeth of Hungary; and as I said I

had not met with it, he gifted me with a copy fairly printed and well

ornamented, which Mr. Martin had left behind him when he went beyond

seas, and said:

"Mistress Sherwood, see if in this book you find not the likeness of a

lady which you mislike not any more than I do. Beshrew me, but I fear

I may find some day strange guests in mine house if she do copy the

pattern herein set down; and so I will e'en send the book out of the

house, for my lady is too good for me already, and I be no fitting

husband for a saint, which a very little more of virtue should make

her."

And so he laughing, and she prettily checking his wanton speech, and

such sweet loving looks and playful words passing between them as

gladdened my heart to see.

Some time after, I found one day my Lady Surrey looking somewhat grave

and thoughtful. She greeted me with an affectionate kiss, and said,

"Ah, sweet Constance, I be glad thou art come; for methinks we shall

soon leave London."

"So soon?" I answered.

"Not _too_ soon, dear Constance," she said somewhat sadly.

I did look wistfully in her sweet face. Methought there was trouble in

it, and doubt if she should further speak or not; for she rested her

head on her hand, and her dark eyes did fix themselves wistfully on

mine, as if asking somewhat of me, but what I knew not. "Constance,"

she said at last, "I have no mother, no sister of mine own age, no

brother, no ghostly father, to speak my mind to. Methinks it should

not be wrong to unbosom my cares to thee, who, albeit young, hast a

thoughtful spirit, and, as I have often observed, an aptness to give

good counsel. And then thou art of that way of thinking wherein I was

brought up, and though in outward show we now do differ, I am not

greatly changed therein, as thou well knowest."

"Alack!" I cried, "too well I do know it, dear lady; and, albeit my

tongue is silent thereon, my heart doth grieve to see you comfortless

of that which is the sole source of true comfort."