or pen and ink. And now you let me loose to come and answer articles"! The indignant Bishop of Gloucester proceeded to explain, as to his book, that he was not there making a citation of Scripture, but merely arguing from Scripture, that if by the old law the priests had power to decide matters of controversy, much more the clergy had power by the new law. But Latimer still demurred. In reality both he and Brooks were wrong as to the passage of Scripture, which had no bearing on controversies of the faith.* Soon after, in answering to the articles, he acknowledged a change in the Bread and Wine by consecration: "such a change as no power but the omnipotency of God can make, a change not in nature but in dignity, in that that which before was bread should now have the dignity to exhibit Christ's Body." In his discourse he used the word "holy bread"; on which the Bishop of Lincoln smiled, and said, "You that most railed at holy bread now make your communion holy bread.”—“Tush, a rush for holy bread,"

* The passage in question came from a sermon preached by Brooks at Paul's Cross, 12 November, 1553. It is as follows: "The Catholic Church hath authority to judge and decide all matters of controversy in religion. For if the Scripture of the old law, in Moses' time, was not made the high judge of controversies, being a thing itself in divers points called in controversy, but authority in judgment was given always by God's own mouth to the learned and elders in the synagogue, to whose judgment all were bound to stand, and that under pain of present death, as appeareth in the book of Deuteronomy; if we Christians will not be counted in a worse state and condition than the Jews were, needs must we grant to the Catholic Church like authority for the decision of all controversies in our religion: when, if God did not assist evermore with the true intelligence of Scripture, then should the Scripture stand the Church in as good stead as a pair of spectacles should stand a blind friar." Soames gives this, iv. 459: remarking truly that the place in Deuteronomy xvii. only refers to civil and criminal cases: to "blood and blood, plea and plea, stroke and stroke," and ordering contending parties in doubt to go and ask the priests, Levites, and also the judge that then was, what the law said of such a case. It referred not to matters of religious controversy, and was nihil ad rem.

cried Latimer, "the bread in the communion is holy bread indeed."-"Oh, you make a difference between holy bread and holy bread," said Lincoln: and there was again a laugh. On his second appearance he found the cloth of tissue, that was on the table, removed in sign that he was not a doctor, as Ridley was who had just gone out whereupon he laid his old felt hat under his elbows, sat down and awaited his doom. His last answer in the brief conversation that ensued was part taken from the English service: "Christ made one oblation and sacrifice for the sins of the whole world, and that a perfect sacrifice; neither needeth there to be any other, neither can there be any other propitiatory sacrifice." He was then condemned: the three judges broke up their sessions, and dismissed the audience. But Latimer, as he waited with them in the room, asked whether he might appeal from their judgment. "To whom?" asked White. "To the next general council that shall be truly called in God's name." The bishop drily answered that he was content: but that "it would be a long season before such a convocation as he meant would be called."

In the interval between condemnation and degradation the assiduous Doctor Soto attempted to bring round Latimer, who would not speak with him, and Ridley, on whom he made no impression.* At length, October 15, after a fortnight, Bishop Brooks and Marshall the Vicechancellor, with others of the heads of the University, came to Irish's house, the Mayor, where Ridley was prisoner, to degrade him. After a renewed offer of the

"A Rev. P. Soto accepi litteras Oxonio datas, quibus me certiorem facit quid cum duobus illis hereticis egerit, qui jam erant damnati : quorum alter ne loqui quidem cum eo voluit, cum altero est locutus, sed nihil profecit, ut facile intelligatur a nemine servari posse quos Deus projecerit itaque de illis supplicium est sumptum non illibenter, ut ferunt, spectante populo, cum cognitum fuisset nihil esse pretermissum quod ad illorum salutem pertineret." Pole to Philip, Epist. v. 47.

Queen's pardon and solicitation's vainly repeated, they proceeded, in contradiction of the sentence pronounced upon him, to take from him the priesthood only, telling him that they "took him for no bishop." He refused to put on the habits, that they might be taken from him in the course of the painful ceremony: and when they were put on him by another, he inveighed vehemently against the foolish apparel. Of the degradation of Latimer there are no particulars remaining.* On the next day, October 16, they were taken to the ditch in front of Balliol College, and burned there at the same stake. The mournful procession escaped the eyes of Cranmer, who was engaged in conversation with the persuasive De Soto in the contiguous prison of Bocardo, the north gate of the city: but by ascending to the roof he is said to have beheld the final scene. The sermon was preached by Doctor Smith, who, from the text "Though I give my body to be burned" and the

* Dodd has some remarks on the degradation of the two bishops that may be noticed. 1. He says that "Latimer's consecration was indisputable, there being at the time (1535) no alteration in the ordinal, that we know of, besides the omission of the canonical obedience to the pope, which was not an essential part," adding that "if it is true that Brooks refused to degrade Latimer from his episcopal character (the account whereof depends upon Fox, a man of but slender authority) he might be induced by reasons we are strangers to." As it happens, Fox says nothing about the matter, and Latimer may have been degraded from his episcopal character, for what we know.--2. He says that "Ridley's case was quite different : he and some others were consecrated the first of Edward VI. (September 5, 1547), when both the doctrine and discipline of the former reign were entirely changed. And though the new Ordinal had not a legal establishment till after the date of their consecration, yet very probably they made use of such a ceremony as was either the same or conformable to it. And Bishop Brooks and the rest of the delegates, having considered it, found it defective in some essential part." Ch. Hist. of Engl. I. 499. The English Ordinal was not composed until two years after Ridley's consecration, so that he could not have been consecrated according to it: but if he had been, or could have been, he would have been properly consecrated (Vol. III. 195 huj. op.). To say that some essential was omitted in Ridley's consecration is mere assumption.

rest, briefly explained that to die in an unworthy cause was no martyrdom, illustrating the argument by the comparison of Judas Iscariot and of a woman who had lately hanged herself. A spectator, who afterwards rose to some eminence as a polemic on the Roman side, beheld with contempt the humane preparation of gunpowder by which compassion would have shortened suffering for to the stern Dorman such a precaution appeared unworthy of the dignity of character assigned to the victims, and contrary to the example of the primitive martyrs.* In the case of Latimer it succeeded; the explosive flame quenched his breath for ever in a moment: but the torment of Ridley was most horrible. Resolved that he should not suffer like some others from lack of fuel, the mistaken kindness of a brother-in-law had piled the faggots under and around him in an impenetrable mass; the fire crackled and spread slowly with thick smoke, seizing the lower limbs of the sufferer, whose agonized entreaties for despatch were heard from within. A second cargo of wood, heaped on the first by his unhappy friend, redoubled Ridley's misery: and when at last an intelligent bystander opened a passage for the fire, it was seen that his extremities had been consumed, while the shirt about his trunk was yet unscorched. The flame sprang fiercely upward: the martyr wrested himself into it: the powder burst, and he breathed his last. His body stood upright some time after life was extinct: then fell, it was observed, into the ashes that remained of Latimer. So died two of the

* "A kind of practice among Christ's martyrs never, I trow, heard of, the sooner to despatch themselves, as with my own eyes I saw Latimer and Ridley burned." And in the margin, "This agreeth not with the martyrdom of Polycarpus," Dorman's Disproof. To this Dean Nowell answered by the martyrdom of Ignatius, who said that he would provoke the beasts that they might the more quickly kill him. See Strype, v. 387.

most illustrious martyrs of the Church of England in the time of the Reformation.*

The vicinity of Cambridge, on the same day, October 16, was illuminated by a less effectual but not less constant torch: nor must William Wolsey, constable, and Robert Pigot, painter, who were burned together, be altogether forgotten in the more resplendent sacrifice at Oxford. Their learning could not be great: but perhaps this only the more notably displayed the amazing inadequacy of the cause for which so many were visited with cruel death, which cause was put most categorically in one of the Articles which they denied: "I do believe that after the words of consecration spoken by the priest there remaineth no more bread and wine, but the very Body and Blood of Christ really and substantially." Their history repeated many of the usual circumstances.† Thus, laymen first began their

*The history of the death of Ridley and Latimer is in Fox, and in their works and remains.

+ Fox, iii. 358. The case is in the Ely Register in Cole's Add. MSS. 5828, p. 15. Brit. Mus. Perhaps the reader may accept it, as a specimen of such proceedings.

Acta habita coram rever. John Fuller L.D. Dni Epi Elien. vicario in Spiritualibus Generali et ad negotia infrascripta Comissario specialiter deputato, Die Mercurii 9 Oct. 1555. in Capella beatæ Marie ex parte boreali Ecclesiæ Cath. Elien. Hora nona ante meridiem, assedentibus et assistentibus ei tunc ibidem rev. Patre in Christo Nicholao quondam Sarum. et modo Suffraganeo Episcopo, necnon Magis. Roberto Steward Decano Eliens. Iohn Christoferson S.T.B. Decano Norwicen, necnon Thoma Bacon, Thoma Peacocke, et Thoma Parker S.T.B. iis

Officiuin Domini contra Willm. Wollsey de Wisbeche St. Petri. Quibus die et Hora et Loco productus fuit in Iudicio Wills Wollsey, Cui Dominus recitavit ejus Errores, Hereses, &c. Quæ quidem Errores sequuntur.

First that you have said, affyrmed and holden opynyons many Tymes and in diverse Companyes in 1553, 4, and 5, that the naturall Bodye and Bloud of our Saviour Ihū Christ is not really present in the Sacrament of the Alter, (wch he called an Idoll).

Item that after you wer comytted to Pryson for the Premisses at Elye ab