History of England from the fall of Wolsey to the death of Elizabeth Volume III Part 5

[Sidenote: Exertions of Cranmer.]

[Sidenote: The bishops are immoveable.]

All these were condemned with equal emphasis--all continued to spread.

The progress of the work of propagation had, in 1531, become so considerable as to be the subject of an anxious protest to the crown from the episcopal bench. They complained of the translations as inaccurate--of unbecoming reflections on themselves in the prefaces and side-notes. They required stronger powers of repression, more frequent holocausts, a more efficient inquisitorial police. In Henry's reply they found that the waters of their life were poisoned at the spring. The king, too, was infected with the madness. The king would have the Bible in English; he directed them, if the translation was unsound, to prepare a better translation without delay. If they had been wise in their generation they would have secured the ground when it was offered to them, and gladly complied. But the work of Reformation in England was not to be accomplished, in any one of its purer details, by the official clergy; it was to be done by volunteers from the ranks, and forced upon the Church by the secular arm. The bishops remained for two years inactive. In 1533, the king becoming more peremptory, Cranmer carried a resolution for a translation through convocation. The resolution, however, would not advance into act. The next year he brought the subject forward again; and finding his brother prelates fixed in their neglect, he divided Tyndal's work into ten parts, sending one part to each bishop to correct. The Bishop of London alone ventured an open refusal; the remainder complied in words, and did nothing.[76]

[Sidenote: Miles Coverdale publishes the first complete version with the king's sanction.]

Finally, the king's patience was exhausted. The legitimate methods having been tried in vain, he acted on his own responsibility. Miles Coverdale, a member of the same Cambridge circle which had given birth to Cranmer, to Latimer, to Barnes, to the Scotch Wishart, silently went abroad with a licence from Cromwell; with Tyndal's help he collected and edited the scattered portions; and in 1536[77] there appeared in London, published _c.u.m privilegio_ and dedicated to Henry VIII., the first complete copy of the English Bible. The separate translations, still anomalously prohibited in detail, were exposed freely to sale in a single volume, under the royal sanction. The canon and text-book of the new opinions--so long dreaded, so long execrated--was thenceforth to lie open in every church in England; and the clergy were ordered not to permit only, but to exhort and encourage, all men to resort to it and read.[78]

In this act was laid the foundation-stone on which the whole later history of England, civil as well as ecclesiastical, has been reared; the most minute incidents become interesting, connected with an event of so mighty moment.

[Sidenote: Coverdale's preface and dedication.]

"Caiphas," said Coverdale in the dedicatory preface, "being bishop of his year, prophesied that it was better to put Christ to death than that all the people should perish: he meaning that Christ was a heretic and a deceiver of the people, when in truth he was the Saviour of the world, sent by his Father to suffer death for man's redemption.

"After the same manner the Bishop of Rome conferred on King Henry VIII.

the t.i.tle of Defender of the Faith, because his Highness suffered the bishops to burn G.o.d's Word, the root of faith, and to persecute the lovers and ministers of the same; where in very deed the Bishop, though he knew not what he did, prophesied that, by the righteous administration of his Grace, the faith should be so defended that G.o.d's Word, the mother of faith, should have free course through all Christendom, but especially in his own realm.

"The Bishop of Rome has studied long to keep the Bible from the people, and specially from princes, lest they should find out his tricks and his falsehoods, lest they should turn from his false obedience to the true obedience commanded by G.o.d; knowing well enough that, if the clear sun of G.o.d's Word came over the heat of the day, it would drive away the foul mist of his devilish doctrines. The Scripture was lost before the time of that n.o.ble king Josiah, as it hath also been among us unto the time of his Grace. Through the merciful goodness of G.o.d it is now found again as it was in the days of that virtuous king; and praised be the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, world without end, which so excellently hath endowed the princely heart of his Highness with such ferventness to his honour and the wealth of his subjects, that he may be compared worthily unto that n.o.ble king, that lantern among princes, who commanded straitly, as his Grace doth, that the law of G.o.d should be read and taught unto all the people.

"May it be found a general comfort to all Christian hearts--a continual subject of thankfulness, both of old and young, unto G.o.d and to his Grace, who, being our Moses, has brought us out of the old aegypt, and from the cruel hands of our spiritual Pharaoh. Not by the thousandth part were the Jews so much bound unto King David for subduing of great Goliah as we are to his Grace for delivering us out of our old Babylonish captivity. For the which deliverance and victory I beseech our only Mediator, Jesus Christ, to make such mean with us unto his heavenly Father, that we may never be unthankful unto Him nor unto his Grace, but increase in fear of G.o.d, in obedience to the King's Highness, in love unfeigned to our neighbours, and in all virtue that cometh of G.o.d, to whom, for the defending of his blessed Word, be honour and thanks, glory and dominion, world without end."[79]

[Sidenote: The frontispiece.]

Equally remarkable, and even more emphatic in the recognition of the share in the work borne by the king, was the frontispiece.

This was divided into four compartments.

In the first, the Almighty was seen in the clouds with outstretched arms. Two scrolls proceeded out of his mouth, to the right, and the left. On the former was the verse, "the word which goeth forth from me shall not return to me empty, but shall accomplish whatsoever I will have done." The other was addressed to Henry, who was kneeling at a distance bareheaded, with his crown lying at his feet. The scroll said, "I have found me a man after my own heart, who shall fulfil all my will." Henry answered, "Thy word is a lantern unto my feet."

Immediately below, the king was seated on his throne, holding in each hand a book, on which was written "the Word of G.o.d." One of these he was giving to Cranmer and another bishop, who with a group of priests were on the right of the picture, saying, "Take this and teach;" the other on the opposite side he held to Cromwell and the lay peers, and the words were, "I make a decree that, in all my kingdom, men shall tremble and fear before the living G.o.d." A third scroll, falling downwards over his feet, said alike to peer and prelate, "Judge righteous judgment. Turn not away your ear from the prayer of the poor man." The king's face was directed sternly towards the bishops, with a look which said, "Obey at last, or worse will befal you."

In the third compartment, Cranmer and Cromwell were distributing the Bible to kneeling priests and laymen; and, at the bottom, a preacher with a benevolent beautiful face was addressing a crowd from a pulpit in the open air. He was apparently commencing a sermon with the text, "I exhort therefore that, first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks be made for all men--for kings"--and at the word "kings" the people were shouting "Vivat Rex!--Vivat Rex!"

children who knew no Latin lisping "G.o.d save the King!" and, at the extreme left, at a gaol window, a prisoner was joining in the cry of delight, as if he, too, were delivered from a worse bondage.

[Sidenote: The entire translation substantially the work of Tyndal.]

This was the introduction of the English Bible--this the seeming acknowledgment of Henry's services. Of the translation itself, though since that time it has been many times revised and altered, we may say that it is substantially the Bible with which we are all familiar. The peculiar genius--if such a word may be permitted--which breathes through it--the mingled tenderness and majesty--the Saxon simplicity--the preternatural grandeur--unequalled, unapproached, in the attempted improvements of modern scholars--all are here, and bear the impress of the mind of one man--William Tyndal. Lying, while engaged in that great office, under the shadow of death, the sword above his head and ready at any moment to fall, he worked, under circ.u.mstances alone perhaps truly worthy of the task which was laid upon him--his spirit, as it were divorced from the world, moved in a purer element than common air.

[Sidenote: Tyndal's martyrdom.]

His work was done. He lived to see the Bible no longer carried by stealth into his country, where the possession of it was a crime, but borne in by the solemn will of the king--solemnly recognised as the word of the Most High G.o.d. And then his occupation in this earth was gone.

His eyes saw the salvation for which he had longed, and he might depart to his place. He was denounced to the regent of Flanders; he was enticed by the suborned treachery of a miserable English fanatic beyond the town under whose liberties he had been secure; and with the reward which, at other times as well as those, has been held fitting by human justice for the earth's great ones, he pa.s.sed away in smoke and flame to his rest.

CHAPTER XIII.

THE PILGRIMAGE OF GRACE.

[Sidenote: Condition of society.]

The Nun of Kent's conspiracy, the recent humour of convocation, the menaces of Reginald Pole, alike revealed a dangerous feeling in the country. A religious revolution in the midst of an armed population intensely interested in the event, could not be accomplished without an appeal being made at some period of its course to arms; and religion was at this time but one out of many elements of confusion. Society, within and without, from the heart of its creed to its outward organization, was pa.s.sing through a transition, and the records of the Pilgrimage of Grace cast their light far down into the structure and inmost const.i.tution of English life.

[Sidenote: Waning influence of the House of Lords.]

[Sidenote: Their jealousy of Cromwell.]

[Sidenote: Conservative confederacy to check the Reformation.]

[Sidenote: Displeasure of the country families at the suppression of the abbeys.]

[Sidenote: Who missed the various conveniences which the abbeys had furnished.]

The organic changes introduced by the parliament of 1529 had been the work of the king and the second house in the legislature; and the peers had not only seen measures pa.s.s into law which they would gladly have rejected had they dared, but their supremacy was slipping away from them; the Commons, who in times past had confined themselves to voting supplies and pa.s.sing without inquiry such measures as were sent down to them, had started suddenly into new proportions, and had taken upon themselves to discuss questions sacred hitherto to convocation. The upper house had been treated in disputes which had arisen with significant disrespect; ancient and honoured customs had been discontinued among them against their desire;[80] and, const.i.tutionally averse to change, they were hurried powerless along by a force which was bearing them they knew not where. Hating heretics with true English conservatism, they found men who but a few years before would have been in the dungeons of Lollards' Tower, now high in court favour, high in office, and with seats in their own body. They had learnt to endure the presence of self-raised men when as ecclesiastics such men represented the respectable dignity of the Church; but the proud English n.o.bles had now for the first time to tolerate the society and submit to the dictation of a lay peer who had been a tradesman's orphan and a homeless vagabond. The Reformation in their minds was a.s.sociated with the exaltation of base blood, the levelling of ranks, the breaking down the old rule and order of the land. Eager to check so dangerous a movement, they had listened, some of them, to the revelations of the Nun. Fifteen great men and lords, Lord Darcy stated, had confederated secretly to force the government to change their policy;[81] and Darcy himself had been in communication for the same purpose with the Spanish amba.s.sador, and was of course made aware of the intended invasion in the preceding winter.[82] The discontent extended to the county families, who shared or imitated the prejudices of their feudal leaders; and these families had again their peculiar grievances. On the suppression of the abbeys the peers obtained grants, or expected to obtain them, from the forfeited estates. The country gentlemen saw only the desecration of the familiar scenes of their daily life, the violation of the tombs of their ancestors, and the buildings themselves, the beauty of which was the admiration of foreigners who visited England, reduced to ruins.[83] The abbots had been their personal friends, "the trustees for their children and the executors of their wills;"[84] the monks had been the teachers of their children; the free tables and free lodgings in these houses had made them attractive and convenient places of resort in distant journeys; and in remote districts the trade of the neighbourhood, from the wholesale purchases of the corndealer to the huckstering of the wandering pedlar, had been mainly carried on within their walls.[85]

[Sidenote: The Statute of Uses another grievance.]

[Sidenote: Difficulty of providing for younger children under the old common law.]

[Sidenote: The objects and the evils of the system of Uses.]

"The Statute of Uses," again, an important but insufficient measure of reform, pa.s.sed in the last session of parliament but one,[86] had created not unreasonable irritation. Previous to the modification of the feudal law in the year 1540, land was not subject to testamentary disposition and it had been usual to evade the prohibition of direct bequest, in making provision for younger children, by leaving estates in "use," charged with payments so considerable as to amount virtually to a transfer of the property. The injustice of the common law was in this way remedied, but remedied so awkwardly as to embarra.s.s and complicate the t.i.tles of estates beyond extrication. A "use" might be erected on a "use"; it might be extended to the descendants of those in whose behalf it first was made; it might be mortgaged, or transferred as a security to raise money. The apparent owner of a property might effect a sale, and the buyer find his purchase so enc.u.mbered as to be useless to him.

The intricacies of tenure thus often pa.s.sed the skill of judges to unravel;[87] while, again, the lords of the fiefs were unable to claim their fines or fees or liveries, and the crown, in cases of treason, could not enforce its forfeitures. The Statute of Uses terminated the immediate difficulty by creating, like the recent Irish Enc.u.mbered Estates Act, parliamentary t.i.tles. All persons ent.i.tled to the use of lands were declared to be to all intents and purposes the lawful possessors, as much as if such lands had been made over to them by formal grant or conveyance. They became actual owners, with all the rights and all the liabilities of their special tenures. The embarra.s.sed t.i.tles were in this way simplified; but now, the common law remaining as yet unchanged, the original evil returned in full force. Since a trust was equivalent to a conveyance, and land could not be bequeathed by will, the system of trusts was virtually terminated. Charges could not be created upon estates, and the landowners complained that they could no longer raise money if they wanted it; their estates must go wholly to the eldest sons; and, unless they were allowed to divide their properties by will, their younger children would be left portionless.[88]

Small grievances are readily magnified in seasons of general disruption.

A wicked spirit in the person of Cromwell was said to rule the king, and everything which he did was evil, and every evil of the commonwealth was due to his malignant influence.

[Sidenote: Grievances of the commons.]

[Sidenote: Local limitation of English country life.]

[Sidenote: Each district self-supporting.]

The discontent of the n.o.blemen and gentlemen would in itself have been formidable. Their armed retinues were considerable. The const.i.tutional power of the counties was in their hands. But the commons, again, had their own grounds of complaint, for the most part just, though arising from causes over which the government had no control, from social changes deeper than the Reformation itself. In early times each petty district in England had been self-supporting, raising its own corn, feeding its own cattle, producing by women's hands in the cottages and farmhouses its own manufactures. There were few or no large roads, no ca.n.a.ls, small means of transport of any kind, and from this condition of things had arisen the laws which we call short-sighted, against engrossers of grain. Wealthy speculators, watching their opportunity, might buy up the produce not immediately needed, of an abundant harvest, and when the stock which was left was exhausted, they could make their own market, unchecked by a danger of compet.i.tion. In time no doubt the mischief would have righted itself, but only with the a.s.sistance of a coercive police which had no existence, who would have held down the people while they learnt their lesson by starvation. The habits of a great nation could only change slowly. Each estate or each towns.h.i.+p for the most part grew its own food, and (the average of seasons compensating each other) food adequate for the mouths dependent upon it.

[Sidenote: Suffering occasioned by the introduction of large grazing farms.]

The development of trade at the close of the fifteenth century gave the first shock to the system. The demand for English wool in Flanders had increased largely, and holders of property found they could make their own advantage by turning their corn-land into pasture, breaking up the farms, enclosing the commons, and becoming graziers on a gigantic scale.

I have described in the first chapter of this work the manner in which the Tudor sovereigns had attempted to check this tendency, but interest had so far proved too strong for legislation. The statutes prohibiting enclosures had remained, especially in the northern counties, unenforced; and the small farmers and petty copyholders, hitherto thriving and independent, found themselves at once turned out of their farms and deprived of the resource of the commons. They had suffered frightfully, and they saw no reason for their sufferings. From the Trent northward a deep and angry spirit of discontent had arisen which could be stirred easily into mutiny.[89]

[Sidenote: The rough character of the Yorks.h.i.+re gentleman.]

[Sidenote: Encroachment upon local jurisdiction increases the expense of justice.]