Chapter V: Section IV

_Brief account of the rise and progress of the reformation in this kingdom_.

No sooner had the reformation begun to gain ground and spread on the continent than its effects began to be felt in this country. The court, or government was at first so far from being disposed to countenance it, that it seemed, on the contrary, quite determined to oppose and crush it. The sovereign himself appeared exceedingly hostile to it: which, from his known character, must have rendered the prospect of its admission and success here very dark and hopeless. So inimical was his majesty then to the cause of the reformers and so hearty in that of their opponents, that he actually took up his pen and wrote a book against Luther; for which important performance and acceptable service the pope thought proper to reward him, by conferring on him the dignified title of _Defender of the Faith_; a title which all his _protestant_ successors have tenaciously, if not proudly retained to this day. This was the book which Luther answered in the rude and uncourtly manner before described. {646}

Our royal polemic did not long continue to be that fond and dutiful son of his holy father at Rome of which he had at first exhibited so fair and hopeful a promise. His Holiness not readily favouring his inclination, or gratifying his wish to be divorced from his first wife and marry another Lady, whom he liked much better, he disdainfully threw off that paternal yoke, renounced his connection with Rome, and became himself a great and violent reformer; so as to deserve to be placed in the very first rank among his contemporaries of that denomination. A mighty revolution ensued throughout his dominions: and though we cannot boast of the purity of the source whence it sprung, or of its being distinguished, (at least in the outset,) by much, if any, real virtue; yet it proved eventually of no small advantage and benefit to these nations: and Henry ought to be commemorated as one of the chief and most meritorious of all our royal benefactors.

One of the chief objects of Henry’s reformation, like that of Lather, seems to have been to _spite the pope_. He had also in view, no doubt, the gratification of his ambition and caprice, which in a mind like his must have been very powerful springs of action. Nor did he miss his aims: he fairly expelled the pope, obtained full scope for his caprice, boundless as it was, and actually acquired far more power than ever, for he now became a complete and uncontrouled despot in temporal, and a pope in spiritual affairs. The two other branches of the legislature, from whom alone any effectual or legal opposition could have arisen, were so far from daring or attempting to check his soaring career, or cross his capricious humour, that they readily and obsequiously concurred in constituting him supreme head both of church and state.

Having reached the utmost point of elevation, or pinnacle of power, he set about reforming the religion, and rectifying the faith of his subjects, after the example of his brother-reformers on the continent; and a most curious, grotesque, and strange piece of work he certainly made of it. Yet it is supposed to be the true foundation or groundwork of our present national establishment, and that Henry himself was the father, or first patriarch of the English protestant Hierarchy. Nor has our established church any just ground or reason, apparently, to disown him in that character, for he was perhaps as holy and good a soul as most of her succeeding patriarchs. But this point we pretend not to determine.

King Henry made his own faith or creed the standard or model for all his subjects, male and female, young and old, learned and unlearned. It was at the utmost peril of any of his subjects if their religion did not exactly tally with his; at least, if he happened to find it out. If shorter or narrower than his, it was at the peril of their lives; and the same again if it proved longer or broader. It must not vary a single inch, or even a hair’s breadth from his, or his majesty would deem it a most grievous offence, and a crime deserving capital punishment. Hence he is known to have put some to death for _not_ going so far from Rome or popery as he did, and some again for _going_ further; and both were occasionally burnt in the same fire, or at the same time. In short, it was then a sad and dismal time in this country, and Henry’s reformation must have been a most strange and terrible work.

Even the bishops and other religious functionaries, who generally fare better than most other people, could not then have a very pleasant time of it; especially the better sort of them, who could have wished to lead honest lives and act somewhat conscientiously, had they been quietly permitted so to do. To that class bishop _Latimer_ is supposed to belong. He seemed more simple and downright than most of the rest, which might involve him in difficulties which his more wary brethren would naturally escape. Accordingly we find the correctness of his creed repeatedly called in question, and he got frequently into heretical scrapes, which he generally managed to get out of by abjuration: {649}—a method which some would be apt to deem not very creditable to his virtue or integrity, though in general looked upon as unimpeachable and of the first order.

“Admitting him” (says Milner to Sturges) “to have been conscientiously persuaded of the truth of the Reformation, was it consistent with christian integrity and virtue to dissemble his religion for twenty years together, and repeatedly abjure it, as he certainly did as often as he found himself threatened with any serious danger by adhering to it? Was it consistent with integrity and virtue to accept of one of the highest offices, the bishopric of Worcester, in a church which he so much reprobated, and even to take an oath of opposing, to the utmost of his power, all persons who dissented from, or were disobedient to it? But supposing you inclined to overlook all this, what will you say to the share he took in the religious persecutions both of Henry’s and of Edward’s reign? What excuse will you make for him when you find him sending christians and protestants to the stake for the very opinion which he himself holds?” {650} These are serious charges, and all apparently well-founded; but the chief and heaviest of them is his being a bloody persecutor. He was moreover one of our chief English reformers, on which account the above brief sketch of his character has been here introduced, along with the rest of his most conspicuous associates, to give the reader an opportunity to judge what veneration is due to their memory, or how well or ill they deserved of their contemporaries and of posterity.

_Ridley_ is another of our protestant prelates that appeared at the head of our English Reformation. Dr. _Sturges_ describes him as “active in the conduct of ecclesiastical affairs.” To which his keen and able opponent replies: “I think, sir, you will grant that he shewed rather too much activity in these affairs, to be consistent with integrity, after I shall have reminded you, that when bishop of Rochester in Henry’s days, and when bishop of London in those of Edward, he was as forward in persecuting protestants and anabaptists as Cranmer, Latimer, and the rest of the prelates were; and that he was one of the most zealous and forward of Dudley’s partisans in endeavouring to interrupt the regular succession of the throne, and in raising that rebellion which was attended with the loss of so much blood.” {651}

_Hooper_, another of our chief reformers, was much less active than Ridley in the conduct of ecclesiastical affairs. He was somewhat scrupulous about certain vestments and ceremonies; and he might have some scruples too on the subject of persecution: at least it is not in the present writer’s recollection that he was very forward, like the others, in harassing those who were called heretics. His character, however, seems not so indefectible as to entitle him to be held up as a mirror of evangelical soundness, or an object of universal admiration. He has been charged with being the founder of the sect called _puritans_, which proved so troublesome to our rulers in church and state for a whole century or more: but this is not mentioned here as a blemish in his character. The following circumstances are of a more blamable nature: 1. His obtaining and holding the bishopric of Worcester, in addition to his former bishopric of Gloucester, after having inveighed very strongly in his sermons against pluralities: 2. His consenting to wear the vestments, after having engaged the young king to write to Cranmer that they “were offensive to his conscience;” and his taking the oath of supremacy, after having made his patron, Dudley, write to the same prelate that “it was burdensome to his conscience,” when he found that he could not get promotion otherwise. {652a}

But in our English reformation, under Henry VIII, and Edward VI, the chief agent was confessedly archbishop _Cranmer_, whose character, as exhibited by eminent protestant writers, abounded with great and glaring blemishes. “The first remarkable circumstance we meet in the life of Cranmer is his privately marrying a woman of low condition, whilst he was fellow of Jesus College, Cambridge, {652b} contrary to the engagements of his admission. He afterwards, when a priest, [and while his first wife was alive] married a second wife in Germany, by a much more flagrant violation of his vow of celibacy, and having brought her privately into England, he continued to live with her, in equal opposition to the laws of the church and of the land,” [and though he had assured the king that he had sent her home to Germany.] “Being a Lutheran in principle, as far back as the year 1529, he afterwards accepted the office of pope’s penitentiary, and when named to the archbishopric of Canterbury he was content to accept different bulls from the pontiff to take upon himself the character of his legate in England, and even to make a solemn oath of obedience to him, {652c} with an obligation of opposing all heretics and schismatics, that is to say, according to the received sense of the words, all persons of his own religious persuasion. In like manner he must have said mass, which, in his opinion, was an idolatrous worship, both at his consecration, and frequently at other times, during the fourteen years that he governed the church of England under Henry. He must also necessarily, from time to time, have ordained other priests to perform the same worship, and imposed upon them the obligation of that continency which he himself did not observe. In a word, we see his subscription still affixed to a great variety of doctrinal articles and injunctions, issued during that reign, which we know to have been in direct opposition to his real sentiments.”

“Every one knows that Cranmer owed his rise in the church to the part which he took in Henry’s divorce from queen Catherine of Arragon. Henry tired out with the opposition of Rome, and impatient to be united with his beloved Ann Boleyn, privately marries her Nov. 14, 1532, and Cranmer himself is one of the witnesses of the contract. {653a} On the 11th. of the following March this same prelate writes a letter to Henry, from “pure motives of conscience” as he declares, {653b} but from a preconcerted scheme as the fact proves, representing the necessity there was of determining the long depending cause between him and his queen, and demanding of him the necessary ecclesiastical jurisdiction to decide it. {653c} This being granted, he on the 20th of May pronounces a sentence of divorce between the royal pair, and authorises Henry to take another wife; {653d} six months after he himself had officiated as witness to his marriage with Ann Boleyn, and only four months before the latter was delivered of an infant who was afterwards queen Elizabeth. {654a} What a scandalous collusion in so important a matter of conscience and public example!”

“In less than three years however [his sacred majesty] grows weary of the consort whom he had moved heaven and earth to gain, {654b} and becomes enamoured of a new beauty. Nevertheless appearances must be saved; and therefore Cranmer presents himself as the ready instrument in smoothing the way to the gratification of [his sovereign’s] passions. After a feint effort to save Ann, to whose family he had such infinite obligations, in a cold adulatory letter to the king, which he wrote on the occasion, {655a} he lent all his aid to ruin and oppress her, permitting, if not persuading, her, (standing as she then did upon the verge of eternity) to confess what he knew to be false; {655b} and pronouncing a sentence of divorce, which contained that she had never been _validly married to Henry_, at the very time when she was lying under sentence of death for violating his bed by adultery!” {655c}

In the transactions relating to Ann of Cleves, Henry’s fourth queen, Cranmer’s conduct appears scarcely less dishonourable than in those relating to Ann Boleyn. Nor does it seem that the death of Henry produced in him any real or material amendment: so that there can be no validity in the excuse usually made for his former misconduct by ascribing it chiefly to that monarch’s despotic will. He appeared just as obsequious to the will of the protector Seymour as he had been before to that of Henry. “To gratify this he consented to set aside in a great measure the last will of his old master, of which he was the first-named executor. {655d} Having raised this ecclesiastical no less than civil idol to undue power, he was ready to pay homage to him with all the essential authority of the church, taking out a new commission for his archbishopric, under the pretext that his former power had expired with the deceased king, and professing to be a prelate no longer than the child Edward, or rather Seymour himself, should acknowledge him to be so.” {656a}

“Cranmer concurred no less in other [misdoings] and disorders of this infant reign, than he did in those stated above. He gratified Somerset by subscribing to the death warrant of his brother. He was afterwards as forward as any of the other courtiers in paying his homage to the rising power of Dudley, when he found the interest of the latter growing stronger than that of Seymour: and he carried his ingratitude to his deceased benefactor Henry, and his infidelity in the discharge of that prince’s last will, to such a length as to concur in excluding his two daughters from their lawful inheritance and right to the crown, in order to place it on the head of Dudley’s daughter-in-law, the lady Jane. If Elizabeth [therefore] had succeeded to the throne immediately after Edward, she would no more have spared Cranmer and Ridley than Mary did.” {656b}

“In conclusion, if Cranmer was _burnt_ to death for heresy, instead of being beheaded for rebellion, [his advocates ought to] reflect, how many persons he himself, whilst he had power in his hands, had condemned to this punishment, on the selfsame accusation.” For it is undeniable that be was instrumental in the execution of many persons for religions opinions, and that some of them held the very tenets for which he himself afterwards suffered. “Though this part of his conduct has keen kept out of sight as much as possible, yet we have certain proofs of his having been one of the chief instruments, under Henry, in bringing to the stake John Lambert, Ann Askew, John Frith, and William Allen, {657a} for denying the real presence of Christ in the sacrament, besides a great number of anabaptists, &c. for their respective opinions.”

“In the reign of Edward VI, besides other most severe persecutions which he carried on against Gospellers, Anabaptists, and other sectaries, amongst whom two at least were Sacramentarians, he was the active promoter and immediate cause of the burning of Joan Knell, {657b} and George Paris or Van Parr, {657c} for certain singular opinions. Amongst those who escaped with their lives, a great part of them were forced to recant, through the fear of torments, and to carry lighted tapers and faggots, in testimony of their having merited burning. {658a} As to the fate of Joan Knell, or Butcher, commonly called Joan of Kent, (and whose innocent blood was evidently shed by the procurement of Cranmer,) Dr. Milner thinks that when it is considered with all its attendant circumstances, a more cruel and wanton act of persecution (he might have said _murder_,) is not to be found upon record. {658b} “The doctrine for which she suffered (he adds) was of an abstract nature, not calculated to gain proselytes or to occasion any public disturbances. She was barely accused of maintaining, that “Christ passed through the blessed Virgin’s body as water through a conduit, without participating of that body through which he passed.” {659a} For no other cause than persisting in this opinion, she was convented in the church of St. Paul, before archbishop Cranmer and his assistants, convicted and delivered over to the secular arm. We have the sentence that he pronounced on the occasion, which is rigorous beyond the usual terms; and we have a certificate of it, addressed to the king, in which instead of petitioning for mercy, in the usual style of such instruments, the convict heretic is expressly recommended “to receive due punishment.” Nor is this all, for the royal youth being unwilling to sign the warrant for her execution, Cranmer employs all his theological arguments to induce him to comply; amongst other things telling him that “princes, being God’s deputies, ought to punish impieties against God.” In the end Edward sets his hand to the warrant, but with tears in his eyes, telling Cranmer, that “if he did wrong, he (the said Cranmer) should answer for it to God.” At length, by a change in circumstances, the archbishop himself being condemned as a heretic to suffer that cruel death, to which he had condemned so many others on the same account, “he was far from imitating the firmness of the greater part of them.” {659b}

His recantation of his former or protestant principles, at Mary’s accession, is well known. The prevailing notion is, that it was the effect of “a momentary weakness,” or the act and deed of “an unguarded hour:” but that appears very far from being correct or true. On the contrary, “he is proved to have deliberately subscribed six different forms of recantation, at so many different periods, {660a} each one of which was more ample and express than the preceding one; and he remained during the whole five or six last weeks of his life, and until the very hour of his death, either a sincere catholic or an egregious hypocrite. At length finding that, notwithstanding so many retractations, he was upon the point of being executed, he revoked them all, and shewed a resolution at his death which he had exhibited in no one occurrence of his life.” {660b}