the order of sub-deacon was effected. The candlestick, taper, and urceole were taken from him as acolyte; the book of exorcisms as exorcist; the lectionary as reader: he then remained in a surplice as sexton, and with the key of the church-door; these also were taken from him: the priest's cap was then to be laid aside, the tonsure rased away, so that no outward mark whatever of his orders might remain; the cap of a layman was placed upon his head, and Arundel then delivered him, as a secular person, to the secular court of the High-Constable and Marshal of England there present, beseeching the court to receive favourably the said William Sautre, unto them thus recommitted; .. for with this hypocritical recommendation to mercy the Romish Church always delivered over its victims to be burnt alive! Sautre accordingly suffered martyrdom at the stake; leaving a name which is still slandered by the Romanists, but which the Church of England will ever hold in deserved respect.

The second victim upon whom Arundel laid his hands, was a priest of great ability and firmness, William Thorpe by name. The same searching question was put to him, concerning the material bread in the Sacrament. "Sir," he replied, "I know no place in Holy Scripture where this term, material bread, is written, and therefore, when I speak of this matter, I use not to speak of material bread." How then did he teach men to believe in this Sacrament? "Sir," he replied, "as I believe myself, so I teach other men." And being required to tell out plainly his belief, he answered in these impressive words :-" Sir, I believe that the night before that Christ Jesu would suffer for mankind, he took bread in his holy and most worshipful hands, and lifting up his eyes, and giving thanks to God his Father, blessed the bread, and brake it, and gave it to his disciples, saying to them, Take and eat of this, all you, this is my body. And that this is and ought to be all men's belief, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and Paul witnesseth. Other belief, Sir, I have none, nor will have, nor teach; for I believe that this sufficeth in this matter. For in this belief, with God's grace, I purpose to live and die, knowledging, as I believe and teach other men, that the worshipful Sacrament of the altar, is the Sacrament of Christ's flesh and his blood, in form of bread and wine." This, he said, had been accepted by the Church for a thousand years, as sufficient for sal

vation, till the Friar Thomas Aquinas introduced the term of an accident without subject," which term," said he, "since I know not that God's law approveth it in this matter, I dare not grant; but utterly I deny to make this Friar's sentence, or any such other, my belief. Do with me, God, what thou wilt!”

It is not related that Thorpe suffered; had he saved his life by recantation, it would not have been concealed; and, unless he had recanted, it is certain that no mercy would have been shown; probably, therefore, he died in prison. The second victim who was brought to the stake, was a tailor, from the diocese of Gloucester, by name John Badby. Prince Henry (afterwards Henry V.) was present at his execution, and urged him to save his life by submitting to the opinion of the Church. The pix was then brought forth by the prior of St. Bartholomew's, twelve tapers being carried before it: it was presented to Badby as he stood in an empty tub, chained to the stake, with faggots piled around him, . . . and he was asked how he believed in it? He answered, that it was hallowed bread, and not God's body; and upon that the pile was set on fire. His cry for mercy, whether it were addressed to God or man, touched the Prince with such compassion, that he ordered the fire to be quenched, and the sufferer to be taken down: and in that condition he offered him his life, if he would renounce his opinions, and a daily allowance from the treasury for his support. This poor man might well have gone through the world without troubling his conscience upon such subjects: but he had come to a point at which he rightly felt that insincerity was too dear a price to pay for life. . . and maintaining constantly his rejection of a tenet, which was now become as hateful as it was preposterous, he was replaced in the tub, and there, calling upon Christ to receive his soul, expired a martyr.

The statute upon which these inhuman executions were made, required that the heretics should be burnt "in an high place before the people, to the end that such punishment might strike in fear to the minds of others." To give farther efficacy to this bloody statute, Arundel set forth several provincial constitutions, whereby any persons preaching doctrines contrary to the determination of the Church, or calling in question what the Church had determined, were to be excommunicated ipso facto on the

first offence, and declared heretics for the second. Whoever read the books of Wicliffe or his disciples, without a license from one of the universities, was to suffer as a promoter of heresy. The greater excommunication was to be incurred by advancing propositions, even in the schools, which tended to subvert the Catholic faith. It was declared heresy to dispute the utility of pilgrimages, or the adoration of images and of the Cross. Because Oxford was greatly infected with Lollardy, the heads of every college were enjoined, on pain of excommunication and deprivation themselves, to inquire every month whether any scholars maintained doctrines against the determination of the Church; and if any such were found who remained obstinate, forthwith to expel them. The proceedings against offenders in this case, were to be as summary as in cases of treason. And because it was difficult to retain the true sense of Scripture in translations, whoever should translate it, or read such translations, particularly Wicliffe's, without the approbation of his ordinary, or of a provincial council, was to be punished as a promoter of heresy.

...

Twelve Inquisitors of heresy, . . . for this dreadful name had been introduced among us! were appointed at Oxford, to search out heretics and heretical books. They presented, as heresies, two hundred and forty-six conclusions, deduced, some truly and some falsely, from the writings of Wicliffe's followers and of the Lollards; and they represented that Christ's vesture without seam could not be made whole again, unless certain great men, who supported the disciples of Wicliffe, were removed; particularizing Sir John Oldcastle, who in right of his wife, was Lord Cobham, a man of high birth, and at that time in favour with Henry V. Him they accused to the King of holding heretical opinions concerning the Sacrament, penance, pilgrimages, the adoration of images, and the authority of the Romish Church, declaring their intention of proceeding against him as a most pernicious heretic. Henry V. was of a noble, but immitigable nature. He knew and admired the noble qualities of Lord Cobham, and requested the prelates, that, if it were possible, they would reduce him to obey the Church, without rigour or extreme handling, saying, that if they would defer their proceedings, he would commune the matter with him seriously.

It happened, on that very day, that a pile of heretical books

was burnt at St. Paul's Cross, Arundel preaching to the people, and stating why they were thus destroyed. Among these was a volume belonging to Lord Cobham, which had been seized at a limner's in Paternoster-row, whither it had been sent to be illuminated. Certain extracts from this volume were laid before the King; he declared that they were the most perilous and pestilent that he had ever heard; and demanded of Lord Cobham, whether the volume had not justly been condemned? Cobham owned that it had; and being asked why then he had kept and perused such a book? replied, that he had never read in it more than two or three leaves. That the book might have contained propositions which he condemned, though he approved of its general tendency, is a probability which every man may understand; and that Lord Cobham was not one who would seek to shelter himself by a paltry subterfuge, is proved, not only by his final but by his immediate conduct. For when Henry admonished him, that as an obedient child he should acknowledge himself culpable and submit to his mother, the Holy Church, the Christian knight made this magnanimous answer : "You, most worthy Prince, I am always prompt and willing to obey; unto you (next my eternal God) owe I my whole obedience; and submit thereunto (as I have ever done) all that I have either of fortune or nature, ready at all times to fulfil whatsoever ye shall in the Lord command me. But as touching the Pope and his spirituality, I owe them neither suit nor service; for so much as I know him by the Scriptures to be the great Antichrist, the son of perdition, the open adversary of God, and the abomination standing in the holy place." Upon this the King turned angrily away, and authorized Arundel to proceed against him to the uttermost.

Lord Cobham, perhaps, relied at this time upon his popularity and his strength. He retired to Cowling Castle in Kent, which was his favourite place of residence; and though the age was past in which a Baron could, from his strong hold, defy with impunity the royal power, the sumner, who was sent to cite him before the ecclesiastical authorities, was afraid to perform his errand. Upon this the Archbishop introduced his sumner under the protection of a person in the King's service, who informed Cobham it was the King's pleasure that he should obey the cita

tion. But he, who knew his life was aimed at, and for po offence, except that of disbelieving a gross and palpable superstition, replied that he would not consent to these devilish practices of the priests. His feelings were these of a powerful Baron in turbulent times; he thought himself strong in the attachment of his vassals and of the surrounding country; and the system of persecution which had been introduced with the Lancastrian dynasty, he regarded as a new and intolerable tyranny, which it behoved him to resist. It was soon represented, and probably understood, that any person who should attempt to cite him personally, would be in danger of death. Letters citatory were therefore twice affixed upon the great gates of Rochester Cathedral, and they were twice taken down and destroyed. But the ecclesiastical power was too strong to be thus baffled. Arundel excommunicated him, cited him afresh, with a threat, that if the summons were not obeyed, he would proceed to extremities, . . . and called upon the secular power, on pain of the Church's censures, to assist him against this seditious apostate, schismatic, and heretic, the troubler of the public peace, enemy of the realm, and great adversary of all holy Church.

These measures, if he had persisted in his course, must soon have involved him in a hopeless struggle with the King's power. In better reliance, therefore, upon a good cause, than upon popular favour and his own means of resistance, he wrote a paper, which he entitled, "The Christian Belief of the Lord Cobham;" and with this he went to the King, trusting, it is said, to find mercy and favour at his hand. The writing began with the Apostles' creed, to which a larger declaration of his faith was added. Like Wicliffe, he expressed an opinion that the Church was divided into three parts, the Saints in Heaven, the Souls in Purgatory,' and the Faithful on Earth: but he qualified this admission of a Purgatory, by saying, if any such place be in the Scriptures. The latter, or Church Militant, he said, was divided, by the just ordinance of God, into the three estates, of Priesthood, Knighthood, and the Commons, who, by the will of God,

1 These constituted the Church Dormant. So, after Wicliffe, John Huss taught, L'Enfant, Concile de Pise, t. ii. 237. Council of Constance. (Eng. Trans.) vol.

i. 14.