Volume II Part 7 (1/2)

[Sidenote: Wolsey's judgment on the bishop's complaint.]

He became early famous as a preacher at Cambridge, from the first, ”a seditious fellow,” as a n.o.ble lord called him in later life, highly troublesome to unjust persons in authority. ”None, except the stiff-necked and uncirc.u.mcised, ever went away from his preaching, it was said, without being affected with high detestation of sin, and moved to all G.o.dliness and virtue.”[116] And, in his audacious simplicity, he addressed himself always to his individual hearers, giving his words a personal application, and often addressing men by name. This habit brought him first into difficulty in 1525. He was preaching before the university, when the Bishop of Ely came into the church, being curious to hear him. He paused till the bishop was seated; and when he recommenced, he changed his subject, and drew an ideal picture of a prelate as a prelate ought to be; the features of which, though he did not say so, were strikingly unlike those of his auditor. The bishop complained to Wolsey, who sent for Latimer, and inquired what he had said. Latimer repeated the substance of his sermon; and other conversation then followed, which showed Wolsey very clearly the nature of the person with whom he was speaking. No eye saw more rapidly than the cardinal's the difference between a true man and an impostor; and he replied to the Bishop of Ely's accusations by granting the offender a licence to preach in any church in England. ”If the Bishop of Ely cannot abide such doctrine as you have here repeated,” he said, ”you shall preach it to his beard, let him say what he will.”[117]

[Sidenote: Practical character of Latimer's mind, which protected him from speculative difficulties.]

Thus fortified, Latimer pursued his way, careless of the university authorities, and probably defiant of them. He was still orthodox in points of theoretic belief. His mind was practical rather than speculative, and he was slow in arriving at conclusions which had no immediate bearing upon action. No charge could be fastened upon him, definitely criminal; and he was too strong to be crushed by that compendious tyranny which treated as an act of heresy the exposure of imposture or delinquency.

[Sidenote: On Wolsey's fall, he is appointed royal chaplain.]

[Sidenote: Latimer addresses Henry in behalf of the Protestants.]

On Wolsey's fall, however, he would have certainly been silenced: if he had fallen into the hands of Sir Thomas More, he would have perhaps been prematurely sacrificed. But, fortunately, he found a fresh protector in the king. Henry heard of him, sent for him, and, with instinctive recognition of his character, appointed him one of the royal chaplains. He now left Cambridge and removed to Windsor, but only to treat his royal patron as freely as he had treated the Cambridge doctors,--not with any absence of respect, for he was most respectful, but with that highest respect which dares to speak unwelcome truth where the truth seems to be forgotten. He was made chaplain in 1530--during the new persecution, for which Henry was responsible by a more than tacit acquiescence. Latimer, with no authority but his own conscience, and the strong certainty that he was on G.o.d's side, threw himself between the spoilers and their prey, and wrote to the king, protesting against the injustice which was crus.h.i.+ng the truest men in his dominions. The letter is too long to insert; the close of it may show how a poor priest could dare to address the imperious Henry VIII.:

”I pray to G.o.d that your Grace may take heed of the worldly wisdom which is foolishness before G.o.d; that you may do that [which] G.o.d commandeth, and not that [which] seemeth good in your own sight, without the word of G.o.d; that your Grace may be found acceptable in his sight, and one of the members of his church; and according to the office that he hath called your Grace unto, you may be found a faithful minister of his gifts, and not a defender of his faith: for he will not have it defended by man or man's power, but by his word only, by the which he hath evermore defended it, and that by a way far above man's power or reason.

”Wherefore, gracious king, remember yourself; have pity upon your soul; and think that the day is even at hand when you shall give account for your office, and of the blood that hath been shed by your sword. In which day, that your Grace may stand steadfastly, and not be ashamed, but be clear and ready in your reckoning, and have (as they say), your _quietus est_ sealed with the blood of our Saviour Christ, which only serveth at that day, is my daily prayer to Him that suffered death for our sins, which also prayeth to his Father for grace for us continually; to whom be all honour and praise for ever. Amen. The Spirit of G.o.d preserve your Grace.”[118]

[Sidenote: His intercession was ineffectual,]

[Sidenote: But earned the increased regard of the king.]

These words, which conclude an address of almost unexampled grandeur, are unfortunately of no interest to us, except as ill.u.s.trating the character of the priest who wrote them, and the king to whom they were written. The hand of the persecutor was not stayed. The rack and the lash and the stake continued to claim their victims. So far it was labour in vain. But the letter remains, to speak for ever for the courage of Latimer; and to speak something, too, for a prince that could respect the n.o.bleness of the poor yeoman's son, who dared in such a cause to write to him as a man to a man. To have written at all in such a strain was as brave a step as was ever deliberately ventured. Like most brave acts, it did not go unrewarded; for Henry remained ever after, however widely divided from him in opinion, his unshaken friend.

[Sidenote: He retires from the court to West Kingston, but preaches widely about the country.]

In 1531, the king gave him the living of West Kingston, in Wilts.h.i.+re, where for a time he now retired. Yet it was but a partial rest. He had a special licence as a preacher from Cambridge, which continued to him (with the king's express sanction)[119] the powers which he had received from Wolsey. He might preach in any diocese to which he was invited; and the repose of a country parish could not be long allowed in such stormy times to Latimer. He had bad health, being troubled with headache, pleurisy, colic, stone; his bodily const.i.tution meeting feebly the demands which he was forced to make upon it.[120] But he struggled on, travelling up and down to London, to Kent, to Bristol, wherever opportunity called him; marked for destruction by the bishops, if he was betrayed into an imprudent word, and himself living in constant expectation of death.[121]

[Sidenote: He is cited before Stokesley,]

[Sidenote: And expects death.]

At length the Bishop of London believed that Latimer was in his power.

He had preached at St. Abb's, in the city, ”at the request of a company of merchants,”[122] in the beginning of the winter of 1531; and soon after his return to his living, he was informed that he was to be cited before Stokesley. His friends in the neighbourhood wrote to him, evidently in great alarm, and more anxious that he might clear himself than expecting that he would be able to do so;[123] he himself, indeed, had almost made up his mind that the end was coming.[124]

[Sidenote: January 10.]

[Sidenote: Method of prosecution in cases of suspected heresy.]

[Sidenote: The charge against Latimer submitted to convocation.]

[Sidenote: The efforts for his conviction baffled by his skill in reply.]

The citation was delayed for a few weeks. It was issued at last, on the 10th of January, 1531-2,[125] and was served by Sir Walter Hungerford, of Farley.[126] The offences with which he was charged were certain ”excesses and irregularities” not specially defined; and the practice of the bishops in such cases was not to confine the prosecution to the acts committed, but to draw up a series of articles, on which it was presumed that the orthodoxy of the accused person was open to suspicion, and to question him separately upon each. Latimer was first examined by Stokesley; subsequently at various times by the bishops collectively; and finally, when certain formulas had been submitted to him, which he refused to sign, his case was transferred to convocation. The convocation, as we know, were then in difficulty with their premunire; they had consoled themselves in their sorrow with burning the body of Tracy; and they would gladly have taken further comfort by burning Latimer.[127] He was submitted to the closest cross-questionings, in the hope that he would commit himself. They felt that he was the most dangerous person to them in the kingdom, and they laboured with unusual patience to ensure his conviction.[128] With a common person they would have rapidly succeeded. But Latimer was in no haste to be a martyr; he would be martyred patiently when the time was come for martyrdom; but he felt that no one ought ”to consent to die,” as long as he could honestly live;[129] and he baffled the episcopal inquisitors with their own weapons. He has left a most curious account of one of his interviews with them.

[Sidenote: Latimer before the bishops.]

”I was once in examination,” he says,[130] ”before five or six bishops, where I had much turmoiling. Every week, thrice, I came to examination, and many snares and traps were laid to get something. Now, G.o.d knoweth, I was ignorant of the law; but that G.o.d gave me answer and wisdom what I should speak. It was G.o.d indeed, for else I had never escaped them. At the last, I was brought forth to be examined into a chamber hanged with arras, where I was before wont to be examined, but now, at this time, the chamber was somewhat altered: for whereas before there was wont ever to be a fire in the chimney,[131] now the fire was taken away, and an arras hanging hanged over the chimney; and the table stood near the chimney's end, so that I stood between the table and the chimney's end.

There was among these bishops that examined me one with whom I had been very familiar, and took him for my great friend, an aged man, and he sate next the table end. Then, among all other questions, he put forth one, a very subtle and crafty one, and such one indeed as I could not think so great danger in. And when I would make answer, 'I pray you, Master Latimer,' said he, 'speak out; I am very thick of hearing, and here be many that sit far off.' I marvelled at this, that I was bidden to speak out, and began to misdeem, and gave an ear to the chimney; and, sir, there I heard a pen walking in the chimney, behind the cloth. They had appointed one there to write all mine answers; for they made sure work that I should not start from them: there was no starting from them: G.o.d was my good Lord, and gave me answer; I could never else have escaped it. The question was this: 'Master Latimer, do you not think, on your conscience, that you have been suspected of heresy?'--a subtle question--a very subtle question. There was no holding of peace would serve. To hold my peace had been to grant myself faulty. To answer was every way full of danger. But G.o.d, which hath always given me answer, helped me, or else I could never have escaped it. _Ostendite mihi numisma census._ Shew me, said he, a penny of the tribute money. They laid snares to destroy him, but he overturneth them in their own traps.”[132]

[Sidenote: He appeals to the king, and is saved.]

The bishops, however, were not men who were nice in their adherence to the laws; and it would have gone ill with Latimer, notwithstanding his dialectic ability. He was excommunicated and imprisoned, and would soon have fallen into worse extremities; but at the last moment he appealed to the king, and the king, who knew his value, would not allow him to be sacrificed. He had refused to subscribe the articles proposed to him.[133] Henry intimated to the convocation that it was not his pleasure that the matter should be pressed further; they were to content themselves with a general submission, which should be made to the archbishop, without exacting more special acknowledgments. This was the reward to Latimer for his n.o.ble letter. He was absolved, and returned to his parish, though s.n.a.t.c.hed as a brand out of the fire.