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CHAP.
XLI.

Nov. 30. England reconciled

to Rome.

Lord
Chancellor
Gardyner

preaches at
Paul's
Cross.

Estimate of

his past conduct.

hither had been most wisely and gravely declared by my Lord Chancellor," delivered a long oration on the sin of schism and the wickedness of the proceedings in England, which had brought about the disruption from the true Church, and proclaimed his readiness, on due submission, to restore them to her bosom.

Both Houses agreed in an address, expressing their deepest contrition for what they and their fathers had done against the Pope, and praying that his supremacy might be re-established as the true successor of St. Peter and Head of the universal Church.

On the feast of St. Andrew, the Queen having taken her seat on the throne, the King seated on her left hand, the Legate, at a greater distance and a degree lower, on her right, the Chancellor read the address, and the Cardinal, after a speech of some duration, absolved "all those present, and the whole nation, and the dominions thereof, from all heresy and schism, and all judgments, censures, and penalties for that cause incurred, in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost." The Chancellor called out Amen! and this word resounded from every part of the hall.*

The Legate making his public entry into the City, the Lord Chancellor preached at Paul's Cross, and, lamenting in bitter terms his own misconduct under Henry VIII., exhorted all who had fallen through his means to rise with him and seek the unity of the Catholic Church.

Had Gardyner died that night, he would, upon the whole, have left a fair fame to posterity; he would have been the unqualified boast of the Roman Catholics; and Protestants could not have refused to do honour to his firmness and courage,―making due allowance for the times in which he lived, and comparing him with Cranmer, their own hero, who had been much more inconsistent, and almost as vindictive ;but his existence being unfortunately prolonged for another year, during which, under his direction, the fires blazed without intermission in Smithfield, and the founders of the re

This precedent is now probably frequently consulted by those who wish to bring about a similar reconciliation.

formed church in England suffered as martyrs,-Roman Catholics are ashamed of him, and his name, coupled with that of Bonner, whom he employed as his tool, is still used to frighten the children of Protestants.

CHAP.
XLI.

His plan

of extin

guishing

ism in

tion.

He deliberately formed the plan of entirely crushing the Reformation in England, by using the necessary degree of force for that purpose. However much we may abhor the Lutherancruel and relentless disposition evinced by such a plan, we England ought not, from the event, rashly to condemn it as foolish. by persecu The blood of martyrs is said to be the seed of the Church; Levertheless persecution, in a certain proportion to the numbers and spirit of those who are to be subdued, may prove effectual. Thus the Lutheran heresy was completely suppressed in Spain, and in Italy by the Inquisition. In England the higher ranks and the great bulk of the nation had so easily conformed to the religious faith or ecclesiastical caprice of the Sovereign for the time being, that a reasonable expectation might be entertained that there would be a general acquiescence in the renewed connection with Rome, and that strict inquiry into the profession of heretical opinions, with some terrible examples of severity when they were obstinately adhered to, might, in a short time, produce uniformity of faith throughout the realm. Cardinal Pole, though a much more sincere believer than Gardyner, took the opposite side, and wished that reason and persuasion only should be used to bring about the return to the Church of those who had erred.

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The matter being debated in the Council, and the conflicting opinions being submitted to Mary, after she had consulted with Philip, she returned to the Chancellor the following answer, which was a warrant to him, under very easy conditions, to proceed to any extremities: " Touching the punishment of heretics, we think it ought to be done without rashness,—not leaving in the mean time to do justice to such as by learning would seem to deceive the simple, and the rest so to be used that the people might well perceive them not to be condemned without just occasion; by which they shall both understand the truth, and beware not to do the like.

And

XLI.

CHAP. especially within London I would wish none to be burnt" (how mild and merciful!) " without some of the Council present, and both there and every where good sermons at the same time."

New Court for trial of heretics.

Bishop
Hooper

and others
tried before

the Chancellor,

and sen.

tenced to

Gardyner having got all the old laws against Lollardy and the denial of transubstantiation revived,-vigorously began his great enterprise. For the trial of heretics under these statutes he constituted a Court, of which he, as Lord Chancellor, was made the presiding Judge.

On the 22d of January, 1555, he mounted his tribunal assisted by thirteen Bishops and a crowd of Lords and Knights, and he ordered to be placed at the bar Hooper, the deprived Bishop of Gloucester,-Roger, a prebendary of St. Paul's,Saunders, rector of Allhallows, in London,-and Taylor, recthe flames. tor of Hadley, in Suffolk,-all charged with denying the Papal supremacy now re-established by law. They tauntingly replied, that the Lord Chancellor, before whom they were tried, had himself taught them to reject the authority of the Bishop of Rome, in his unanswerable treatise "De verâ Obedientiâ,” which had been so much approved of by the Queen's royal father, that renowned sovereign, Henry VIII. This argumentum ad hominem did not prevail, and the Lord Chancellor said they ought to have been reconverted by his subsequent treatise, entitled "Palinodia dicti Libri," which he now recommended to their perusal; and a delay of twenty-four hours was given them for consideration. At the end of that time, as they stuck to the text of the Lord Chancellor's earlier work, they were condemned to the flames. He, with professions of mercy, made out a conditional pardon for each of them, under the Great Seal, to be offered them on recantation at the stake. Those protomartyrs of the Reformed Church of England all displayed an equal constancy, and scorned to purchase the continuance of life by feigning an assent to doctrines which they did not believe.

Gardyner did not personally preside at the subsequent trials; but he felt no hesitation in persevering in the line of policy he had adopted, and (perhaps with a view to a favourable contrast) he was represented in Court by Bonner, Bishop of

London, the most brutal and bloody persecutor who ever ap-
peared in this island; but the Chancellor himself actively di-
rected almost all the arrests, examinations, and punishments of
the Protestants. Cranmer, Ridley, and Latimer, now suffered
under circumstances familiar to us all from early infancy; and
in the course of a few months, by Gardyner's orders, there
perished at the stake, as heretics, in different parts of England,
above seventy persons, some of them of the softer sex, and
some of tender
years.

CHAP.

XLI.

established.

of the

Not satisfied with punishing those who taught, or openly Inquisition dogmatised contrary to the established creed, men's thoughts were scrutinised; and, to do this more effectually, Gardyner issued a commission, bearing a close resemblance to the Spanish Inquisition, authorising twenty-one persons, or any three of them, "to search after all heresies, the bringers in, the sellers, and the readers of all heretical books, to punish all persons that did not hear mass or come to their parish church to service, or that would not go in processions, or would not take the holy bread or holy water, and to force all to make oath of such things as ought to be discovered, and to put to the torture such obstinate persons as would not confess."* While these atrocities were going forward, an occurrence Conduct took place, of which Gardyner took immediate advantage to further his designs. Mary, supposing herself pregnant, he pronounced the prospect of an heir to be the reward of Heaven for her piety; and as she fancied that she felt the infant stir in her womb when the Pope's Legate was introduced to her, he compared it to what happened to the mother of John the Baptist at the salutation of the Virgin. The Chancellor, with nine others of the Cabinet Council, immediately addressed a letter to Bonner, as Bishop of London, ordering "Te Deum" and masses to be celebrated on the occasion; he sent messengers to foreign courts to announce the event; and he settled the family of the young prince, as he confidently predicted the child would be a male. Some have said that he was aware from the beginning that Mary's infirmities rendered

• Burnet, vol. iii. p. 243. 246.

Chancellor

on Mary's supposed

pregnancy.

XLI.

CHAP. her incapable of having children, and that he resorted to à political artifice for the purpose of strengthening his power. He certainly kept up the delusion in the nation long after the physicians had declared that her Majesty's increased size arose from a dropsy. It was probably a knowledge of her real condition which induced him very readily to oblige her, by bringing in and supporting a bill constituting Philip, in case of her death, unlimited Regent during the minority of her son. What might have been the effect of this system of persecution on the reformation in England, had Gardyner long survived to carry it into vigorous execution, we cannot tell. His career was near its close.

A. D. 1555.
A new

session of

Chancellor.

On the 21st of October parliament again met, and Mary, now deserted by her husband, rode to the parliament-house parliament. all alone in a horse-litter, to be seen of every one. The Eloquence Lord Chancellor, by her direction, produced a Papal bull of the Lord confirming the grants of Church property, and delivered a speech to both Houses, detailing the great exertions of the Government for the good of the Church, and explaining the wants of the Crown and the clergy. It was remarked that on this and the following day, when he was again in his place, he displayed uncommon ability in unfolding and deHis sudden fending his measures. But on his return from the House, on the second day, he was suddenly taken ill in his chamber, and, without being ever able to leave it, on the 12th of November he expired. Strange and groundless stories were propagated respecting the nature of his malady; and in the next age it was said he had been struck by it, as a judgment from Heaven, on the day that Bishop Ridley and Bishop Latimer were burnt, when, waiting for the joyful news, though the old Duke of Norfolk was to dine with him, he would not go to dinner till the unexampled hour of four in the afternoon t;

death.

A. D. 1555.

"His duobus diebus ita mihi visus est non modo seipsum iis rebus superasse quibus cæteros superare solet, ingenio eloquentia prudentia pietate sed etiam ipsas sui corporis vires." - Bale.

At this time it was a mark of gentility and fashion to dine early instead of late. "With us the nobility, gentry, and students, do ordinarily go to dinner at eleven before noon, and to supper at five, or between five and six at afternoon. The merchants dine and sup seldom before twelve at noon and six at night. The husbandmen also dine at high noon as they call it, and sup at seven or eight; but out of term in our universities the scholars dine at ten."- Hall,

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