"And I, brethren, when I came unto you, came not with excellency of
speech or wisdom.... For I determined not to know anything among
you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.... And my speech and my
preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration
of the spirit of power."
From this, he proceeded to lash the preacher of the day, who, if he
deigned at all to quote the words of the Gospel, was so taken up with
the manner of his discourse that the matter seemed of small import. And
if such an one read the Gospel of Christ, he must load each sentence
with evidences of his own learning, distort each saying to show off
his own cleverness, so that he doth liken himself more to a mountebank
who contorts himself before a crowd to earn its applause and catch its
pennies, than to a sober minister of God. He held to it stubbornly that
to tell of Christ and Him crucified, to spread the knowledge of "Goddes
Lawe," was the chief mission of Holy Church, and that to live by the
Gospel was complete salvation, without the observance of certain forms
set up by man.
"For sure it is," he said, "that they do punish more the men who
trespass against the Pope's bulls, than those who trespass against
Christ's Gospel."
Bold words, these! Words that caused the priests to writhe in their
seats and cast meaning glances at one another. The clearest Lollardry,
this! Forsooth! this one ragged priest to set himself up against
Ecumenical Councils, Synods of the Holy Church, Decretals, Canons,
Rubrics, Curias, Popes; against the whole Hierarchy with its hundreds
of priests, its thousands of Masses, its hundreds of thousands of
worshippers; with the strength of empires behind it, and the prestige
of the Imperial City,--this one ragged priest!
Cardinal Barsini, the Papal Legate, could scarce restrain his rage.
How dared Thomas of Ely to offer high office to this stirrer-up of
sedition and heresy? Thomas of Ely, forsooth! this canny Bishop will
bear close watching. To be sure, he had proved himself a very watch-dog
of the funds of the Church, and thus very useful to his Holiness the
Pope while the greedy Barons had been making their onslaughts on the
Church's Treasury. Yet this same prelate had been most outspoken in
his belief that these same moneys should be spent for the good of the
English Church, and not for the carrying on of foreign wars. "English
money must not help England's enemies," was the cry of the Bishop and
his followers. Basta! dangerous theories, these, to be crushed down
with a strong hand. And what nonsense was this insolent poor priest
prating of?--the simplification of the priestly office was just what
the priesthood did not want. If it were necessary merely to read the
Gospel without explaining and interpreting it, why, be a clerk and
have done with it. The aloofness, the dignity, the power of the clergy
would fall away instanter, the very fabric of the Church Visible would
crumble away before their eyes.
While they fumed and bit their lips, the deep, melodious voice of the
young poor priest rang through the church:--
"'And about this time there arose no small stir concerning the way.
For a certain man named Demetrius, a silversmith, which made silver
shrines of Diana, brought no little business unto the craftsmen; whom
he gathered together with the workmen of like occupation, and said,
Sirs, ye know that by this business we have our wealth. And ye see and
hear that Paul hath persuaded and turned away much people, saying that
there be no gods, which are made with our hands: and there is danger
that this our trade come into disrepute.'
"Now the priest that says unto himself, 'Behold, if the mere words of
Christ contain all of religion, what need is there for me?' is like
unto that Demetrius of old who feared to lose his trade of making the
silver gods. Shall we, then, continue to place Imagery and Incense
above the words of Christ in order that the priestly trade fall not
into disrepute? Verily, to understand and teach the word of Christ
requires not such great learning; it has been once understood by simple
fishermen. Now we are all more eager to appear versed in the writings
of the Fathers, than in the words of Christ Jesus. The opinion of
commentators hath grown to exceed in importance the opinion of Him
who is commented upon. To know Anathasius and Jerome and Augustine is
placed above knowing just Christ, and Him crucified. O my friends, help
me bring back the Church to Christ Jesus--help me bring her back to
the fountain head of inspiration that she may be baptized anew in the
reviving waters."
There was an instant's silence, and then through the vast interior
there sighed the exquisite benediction:--
"The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the
communion of the Holy Ghost, be with you all."
And slowly the people dispersed and went their several ways.
Long after the great church was empty, the young poor priest remained
before the altar, bowed in prayer. He prayed fervently for light. He
tried to fasten his mind upon the one essential question: Could he
be of greater service to the people as a poor priest going from town
to town, with the illimitable heavens, the waving trees, the only
cathedral; or as Archdeacon of the great church of Ely, preaching
a weekly sermon, helping the Bishop reform abuses, investigating
monasteries, probing into the administrations of abbots, visiting
infrequently the scattered villages within his diocese, striving to
hold the people within the Church? Perhaps he could prove to them that
not with all Churchmen--
"The poor to pill is all their pray;"
that there were exceptions to those described in the popular satire:--
"The pope maketh bishops for earthly thanke,
And nothing at all for Christ's sake,
Such that been full fat and ranke,
To soul-heale none heed they take."
Perhaps, after all, as the Bishop had suggested, his mission lay in
stemming the tide of scorn and distrust that was turning the people
away from Holy Church. After all, it was a stirring thought. The
sermon delivered, his whole being quivered with a new-born sense of
power. The delight of swaying great multitudes was upon him. The pomp
and pride of the place had entered into his veins. A mighty ambition
swept through him which was by no means a mere carnal desire after
great wealth or position. It was not that he craved the Bishopric of
Ely with its ten palaces of residence scattered through Hertfordshire,
Huntingtonshire, and Cambridgeshire, as well as on the isle of Ely. It
was not that he longed to ride forth in state with banners flying and
men arrayed in his livery, and the arms of the See blazoned on many a
shield. Well was he familiar with the sight of the arms of the noble
house to which Thomas of Ely belonged: Quarterly, first and fourth
gules a Lion rampant Or; second and third Checquy Or and Azure; all
within a Bordure engrailed Argent. These he displayed beside the arms
of the See of Ely. But it was the power that went with the state that
bit into him, the sitting in Westminster Hall as a Peer of the realm,
and framing laws for the good of the land. Once Bishop of Ely (for he
knew the archdeaconate was but a step preparatory to that), who could
tell but the great See of Canterbury might be his some day, and with it
the Primacy of all England? Primate of England, Adviser of the King.
Ay! and more than Adviser, for when Kings were weak and Primates
strong, who, then, was the true Ruler of the Realm? The great names
of the English Primacy rushed through his mind: Theodore the monk of
Tarsus, who had been first to lift the throne of Canterbury above all
the others, and Dunstan, Abbot of Glastonbury, and Anselm, Lanfranc,
adviser to the Conqueror, and Theobald and Thomas Beket, all men who
had shaped the policy of England as truly as ever King had done. And
once Primate of England, who knew but a second Englishman might come to
sit in the chair of St. Peter? Even so, he the poor student, arriving
ten years before at Oxford with not a groat in his possession and with
only a few rags to hide the garment of haircloth which he had promised
his mother to wear on Fridays and fast-days, he the unknown student
might rise to be Vicar of Christ, Supreme Pontiff, Successor of the
Prince of Apostles! Stranger things than that had happened--was not
the present Pope, Urban VI, but a coarse Italian peasant, Bartholommeo
Prignano by name? Was not the great Hildebrand himself the son of a
Tuscan carpenter? The sons of carpenters had played a not unimportant
part in the history of the Church.
Pope! what tumultuous thoughts swept through him with the very name!
What visions of Majesty, of Power, of Imperial Might! The full title
he rolled upon his tongue: Bishop of Rome, Vicar of Jesus Christ,
Successor of the Prince of Apostles, Supreme Pontiff of the Universal
Church, Patriarch of the West, Primate of Italy, Archbishop and
Metropolitan of the Roman Province, Sovereign of the Temporal Dominion
of the Holy Roman Church.
Pope, Pappa, or _Father_. Even then there came to him the recognition
that, after all, that was the proudest title of them all--Father of the
People. Protector! What could Archbishop or Primate more than to obey
that beautiful mandate of the Saviour, "Feed my lambs"?
Indeed, too often had the Pope tried rather to fleece them than to
feed them, so that a Mediæval wit was led to remark that the Papal
staff should be shaped as a pair of shears, rather than as a shepherd's
crook. But he, Robert Annys, once Pope, he would enforce Reform, he
would bring back the Holy Spouse to its lost purity and singleness of
purpose; with his indomitable energy he would wage a merciless war on
that terrible Antichrist, Robert of Geneva, who, under the name of
Clement VII, was holding shameful court at Avignon. With relentless
hand he would put down Simony and Licentiousness; he would put a stop
to one prelate holding more than one See. Above all, he would seek to
spiritualize the Church, so that men might know that temporal power was
not its true life, for, as the popular song had it:--
"Christ bad Peter keepe his sheepe,
Swerde is no toole with sheep to keepe.
* * * * *
Holy Churches rich clothing shall be rightwiseness;
Her treasure true life shall be;
Charity shall be her richesse;
Her lordship shall be unite;
Hope in God her honeste;
Her vessel clean conscience;
Poore in spirit and humilite--
Shall be Holy Churches defence."
And yet other Popes had started with such noble intentions. Who knows
but perhaps the man who holds a thousand thousand reins between his
fingers may not, in the end, find that, instead of being the driver,
he is really being driven? There was the proudest Pope the world knew,
Gregory VII, the indomitable Hildebrand, whose power seemed to have
no bounds,--what was his end? A lonely death in exile, with one enemy
crowned Emperor and another established as his successor in the throne
of Rome.
The Bishop waited for his answer. He stood at the parting of the
ways. Clearly he must decide without further delay. Perhaps this very
indecision was but a sign of the dangers of coming within the spell of
the Church. Perhaps this stirring desire to keep within, this fierce
ambition which struggled in his breast for mastery, was but a new
temptation of the Evil One to lure him into Vanity and a Love of Power
for its own sake. Oh, if only on the one side lay the path of perfect
right-doing, and on the other the path of evil-doing, how easy were the
decision. But, alas! the devil works not in that way. He so mixes up
the good with the evil, and the evil with the good, that one knows not
which way to turn.
What should he answer to the Bishop? Was he strong enough to stand
alone, with only the Bible in his hand, and say in the face of Bishops
and Archbishops, Cardinals, Legates, the Pope himself: "Man needs not
all these offices and ceremonials, these stately places of worship,
these Bishops' palaces. Man should live by the Book alone; then would
there be no need for priests to shrive or Popes to anathematize"? The
Pope--the people did not need him:--
"What knoweth a tillour at the plow the popes name?"
He sought the answer in prayer. He implored fervently for some miracle
to show him the divine way. Hours passed, and still he remained there
before the altar, bowed in prayer. The shadows in the great interior
changed places as the sun travelled its course. Where in the morning
the sun had glorified great windows of painted glass, there now rested
cold gloom; what had stood out white and clear now hid itself in
shadow; a weird procession of the Apostles and Virgins and Saints took
place, one after another silently emerging from dim recesses, and after
standing out for a while white and clear-cut, slowly fading away into
the gray walls.
Still Annys prayed.
On the altar lay the Gospels beautifully bound in gold. To the Book's
ornamentation went twenty sapphires, six emeralds, eight topazes, eight
salmandine stones, eight garnets, and twelve pearls. Annys could not
but think of the cheeks he had seen that morning sunken from hunger. He
could not but reflect how many mouths those jewels might have fed. His
eyes fell upon the cruet which contained the consecrated oil. It was
enclosed in an exquisitely jewelled reliquary of finest silver gilt;
the curtains of the altar were of blue cloth of tissue, with images of
the Crucifixion most delicately embroidered on it. Something seemed
to whisper within him that Jesus Christ, could He now look on the
condition of His Church to-day, would not approve of all the splendor
within, while without men died by the hundred for lack of brotherly
service. He prayed for light. How would Christ have acted? Would He
have been persuaded to take high office within the Sanhedrim, and not
go down among His people who waited for Him? Surely not. Could all the
gilt and glory of Solomon's temple have made Him forsake the cross? No,
a thousand times no! O for some manifestation of the divine will that
would make clear his way beyond peradventure!
"Grant it, dear Lord, for the sake of Thy Son who died on the rood."
Far up over the altar, above the most beautiful reredos in all
England, stood the patient Christ looking down upon him. On either
side, slightly lower, stood the solemn figures of Moses and Elijah.
The arches in which they stood were supported by shafts of alabaster
curiously entwined with spiral belts of agates and crystals on a golden
ground. On the reredos was the sculptured story of the wonderful life,
the entry into Jerusalem, washing the feet of the disciples, the Last
Supper, the Agony in the Garden, and finally, Bearing the Cross;
yet the central figure of the Christ, high up in its gable, easily
dominated all. Majestic as were the figures of the prophets, there was
a certain simpler majesty of the Christ that appealed more intimately
to the human soul.
The patient Christ looked down upon the kneeling form, and to the tired
eyes of the young priest, it seemed that He smiled upon him. He saw the
gentle lips move and heard a low whisper:--
"Patience, dear son. Have I not pleaded with My Father, 'Lord, Lord,
I came not to earth, that these great cathedrals be reared, nor that
superbly robed priests genuflect before My image'?
"Nevertheless, I have faith that surely the time will come when the
hearts of the people are ripe for the knowledge of Me. If the Lord hath
seen to it that the seeds of the flowers are blown by the winds of
heaven at the appointed time and scattered into the fields that await
their coming, surely He will see that My words yet fall on fertile
soil."
Annys sprang to his feet, and gazing into the face of the Christ, cried
ecstatically:--
"But is the appointed time now come? Am I the one to scatter the seed
and cause it to fall upon the right soil? Oh, vouchsafe me a sign, a
sign, dear Lord, to show me the way."
For answer, softly there crept into the shadowed apse the faint sound
of voices, as of many men chanting a hymn, but far, far away. Slowly it
gathered in strength until it touched the walls of the great church and
made them speak, ever growing stronger and stronger until at last the
words could be distinguished, and the whole vast interior rang with the
refrain:--
"Jack Miller asketh help to turn his mill aright.
He hath grounded small, small, small:
The King's Son of Heaven He shall pay for all.
Look thy mill go aright with the four sails,
And the post stand with steadfastness."