It has been generally supposed by the Romanist writers that these solicitations of Cranmer were made with a view to spare his life as well as to convert him. On the other hand, some extreme protestants have represented it as a deliberate design to seduce him into apostasy, that they might ruin his character with the reformed party. There seems to be no ground for either of these opinions. It could not have been the intention of the queen, her advisers, or agents, to spare his life, for he was brought to execution before they were at all aware that he would retract his recantation. On the other hand, there is no reason to think that they intended him less mercy than the inquisition afforded to convicted heretics who shewed signs of penitence. Had Cranmer not retracted his recantation, he would probably have died like Agustin Cazalla, at Valladolid, in May, 1559, whose case would then have been precisely similar. He had recanted probably with some faint hope of life; but he only obtained the mercy of the cord before his body was committed to the flames.* Carranza therefore directed his two pupils Soto and Villagarcia to use that course which was commonly adopted towards the convicts of the inquisition.

The statement of his biographer that the court was at this time afraid of some powerful supporters of the suffering archbishop, is supported by a passage in the dispatches of the French ambassador, Noailles, dated on the 12th of March, 1555-6, a few days only before the execution of Cranmer, in which he mentions that the lords of the council had just at that time strongly reprimanded John de Vere, Earl of Oxford, hereditary lord high chamberlain, Henry Neville, Earl of Westmoreland, Lord Willoughby, and other powerful protestant noblemen, so that it was reported that the first of these peers was likely to lose his office.+ It seems most probable that this public censure was called for by some demonstration made by these parties in favour of Cranmer.

There are some singular facts on record respecting Cranmer's recantations, which must ever make it difficult to assign the parts to the several agents, or explain the motives for all that was done. In the first place, the publication of the submissions and recantations, as it would seem, under the authority of Boner, before the execution of Cranmer, and their subsequent suppression. Was the cause of this

Feyjoo. Theatro Critico. Vol. ix. p. 261.

+"Les seigneurs de ce conseil despuis huict jours en ça, ont faict de grandes reprimandes pour le faict de ladicte religion, aux comtes d'Oxfort, grand chambelland d'Angleterre, de Westmerland, millord Wileby, et aultres grande seigneurs de ceste nation protestans; de sorte que aulcuns disent que ledict comte d'Oxfort eu perdra son dict estat, encores qu'il soit hereditaire aux siengs, &c." Noailles, vol. v. p. 319. The De Veres, Earls of Oxford, had been hereditary lords high chamberlains from the time of Richard I. John De Vere was not one of those noblemen who had been enriched by the spoils of the abbeys, only receiving back two small religious houses which had been founded by his ancestors. Henry Neville, whose sister was married to John De Vere, was father of the unfortunate nobleman who joined in the rising of the north, and consequently must have had little sympathy with his father's principles.

I am supposing, with Archdeacon Todd, that the publication suppressed was the identical tract, of which one or two copies only remain in the libraries of collectors. If this supposition is not correct, as Mr. Le Bas seems to suppose—if

suppression only that the publication had not been premature? Yet it proves that the parties concerned had in good time prepared the part the sufferer was to act; and, as Fergus MacIvor said on a similar occasion, "it was well got up for a closing scene." The only other cause to be assigned would be, that they had then some reason to suspect Cranmer's adherence to the recantation he had made. But this is not consistent with the narrative of his last hours; it is clear that Dr. Cole in his sermon, and the other Romanists present, all expected another close to the archbishop's dying speech, and were then taken completely by surprise.

The original tract published under the authority of Boner is extremely scarce, very few copies having got abroad before its suppression. It has, however, been reprinted by Strype; and by Mr. Jenkyns, in his appendix to Cranmer's works, from a copy in the library of Archdeacon Todd. Some writers seem to suppose that if we admit the documents contained in this tract to be authentic, exclusive of that which Cranmer acknowledged, and which was the only recantation known to Foxe and Burnet, we strengthen the case against Cranmer for duplicity as well as inconstancy. Not at all. The tract contains, first of all, four very short declarations in English, the three first of which are simply submissions; these he might have signed at any former period of his life, his principles being in the point of regal supremacy always too Erastian. The fourth is such a statement of his adherence to the catholic faith as he made in his appeal at his degradation. There is nothing in all these in which the enemies of his memory can find any apostasy from the principles he had always professed. The last of these four being dated the 16th of February, no further progress seems to have been made till nearly a month later.

We then come to the fifth paper, which is in Latin, and is certainly a most specific and complete recantation, anathematizing Luther and Zuingli, acknowledging one only church, of which the pope is head, the vicar of Christ, to whom all the faithful must submit themselves, clearly admitting transubstantiation, seven sacraments, and purgatory, the wholesome custom of praying to saints, and an agreement in all things with the catholic and Roman church's belief. This is attested by the counter-signatures of Henry Syddall, a man who is mentioned in one of Bishop Jewell's letters to Peter Martyr as having afterwards subscribed to Reformation, and "of one called Frater Johannes de Villa Garcina, a notable learned man.” There is no question that this paper was signed by Cranmer, as it was publicly known at the

the suppressed paper was merely a copy of the fifth paper-we must consider the whole collection, as it now stands in Boner's Tract, to have been published subsequently to Cranmer's death, a supposition inadmissible, not only from the great scarcity of the tract, which was unknown till the time of Strype, but from the manifest impossibility that the Romanists should have put out a publication stating that Cranmer died converted, when the fact was notoriously otherwise.

Mr. Soames' conjecture that this fourth paper was drawn up by Boner in equivocal terms, that he might so proclaim Cranmer an apostate if he signed it, against his own will and intent, is hardly worth consideration. Boner was not accustomed to mince matters.

VOL. XVII.-Jan. 1840.

C

time. It is translated by Foxe, and a copy of it appears to have been sent by Noailles to the King of France. It is without a date, but must have been executed previously to the 12th of March, on which Noailles's dispatch is dated.*

The sixth follows, also in Latin, dated, if the tract is correctly printed,† on the 18th of March, and said to be signed by Cranmer, but without any attesting witnesses.

Lastly comes the Prayer and Saying of Thomas Cranmer before his Death, agreeing in the main with the report in Foxe, except the last paragraph, on which the whole question turned.

It is scarcely possible for any one to suppose but that this was printed before Cranmer's execution. If then the Roman agents prepared one document for the press before it had actually been spoken by Cranmer, there seems no difficulty in supposing that they prepared another before it had been actually signed by him. Whether he actually did sign it or not must be in some degree doubtful. But the supposition that he did will be here admitted, under the impossibility of proving a negative; when or with what purpose will be presently considered.

The next point is to trace as far as possible the agency by which these papers were presented to Cranmer, and what was the inducement to make this trial of his constancy.

The process might indeed have been the same if there had been no particular circumstances in Cranmer's case to give it a probability of success, as we are told that the martyr Bradford was visited in prison by some of the English bishops and doctors, as well as by Carranza and Alphonso de Castro ;§ but that devout and resolute man was proof against their solicitations. Ridley and Latimer had also been thus attended, but to no purpose. But it has been commonly supposed that Cranmer himself had given some indications of a want of firmness before the last proceedings with him. The four English declarations are indeed exhibited by the editor of the tract as if they were gained from him with difficulty-the first gained, and afterwards revokedthe rest apparently drawn up at different intervals. They are given as so many proofs of unstableness. But, as already observed, the language of none of these goes further than to promise submission to the pope in obedience to the will of the prince; it is no recognition of the papacy as a point of religion, or due in conscience, any otherwise than as commanded by the civil power. At least, if there is an expression which might seem doubtful in the second, it is corrected by the third. They are all so far from approaching to a recantation, that they could hardly have led to the hope being entertained. It seems

Noailles, as before, vol. v. p. 319.

The tract contains a few misprints. In this sixth document the mass is described by the words "jugi et celeberrimo sacrificio." Probably we should read "saluberrimo."

Mr. Jenkyns speaks of it as "published afterwards." Cranmer's Remains, iv. p. 139. If so, the paper suppressed must have been a copy of the fifth document. But for this there could be no reason, as it was certainly signed by Cranmer, and Noailles had received a copy of it.

§ Burnet, vol. iii. p. 566.

that they were produced by conferences with Boner, or at least offered to him for his consideration; and the two first were by him forwarded to the council. There can be no doubt that Cranmer, by putting his hand to them, wished to try how far they might avail in his favour; and perhaps, with some knowledge of the fears of the court, he might have expected they would not immediately reject a plea which might thus be made for his deliverance. It seems not improbable, as the time would agree, that the Earls of Oxford and Westmoreland may have interposed on this plea in his behalf, and have drawn upon themselves the censure just now mentioned, which took place before the signature of Cranmer to the fifth paper.

However, there seems to have been another agency at work. It has been asked why these recantations are in Latin, while the submissions are in English. One reason is obvious. The probability is that Villagarcia could not speak English, or not fluently enough to converse, and that the conferences with Cranmer were held in Latin.* But it is strange that he should have succeeded, as it appears, in overcoming the archbishop's resolution, when so many of his own countrymen, some of them his personal friends, had been heard with indifference. It has indeed been supposed that Cranmer's fortitude had first given way on the execution of Latimer and Ridley; but the passage from Pole's correspondence, which is alleged to prove this, does not assert so much, and the tenour of Pole's letters to Cranmer, written afterwards, proves that he was then unshaken. There is no evidence of another kind till after his degradation on the 14th of February. It seems probable, however, that Pole at this period engaged in the correspondence with a sincere intention to preserve his life, as he expresses himself very strongly in a second letter, that "if he could by any means rescue him from that dreadful sentence of death, not only of body, but of his soul, which was hanging over him, he would gladly prefer it, God knows, to all the riches and honours which this life could afford." Yet it is more than once asserted by Archbishop Parker, or the compiler of the "Antiquitates Britan

* Mr. Le Bas makes use of the fact of its being in Latin to support a suspicion against its genuineness, vol. ii. p. 364. There seems to be no ground whatever for doubting that Cranmer signed the fifth paper; and if he had not, there could have been no reason for the strong self-condemnation he pronounced in the last affecting

scene.

✦ Lingard refers to the letter of Pole quoted before, in which, after speaking of the death of Ridley and Latimer, he says, "Qui olim Cantuarensi Ecclesiæ præfuit, cujus damnationis sententia Roma nunc expectatur, is non ita se pertinacem ostendit, aitque se cupere mecum loqui." Here Lingard's quotation ends; but the following words are important, as they shew that Cranmer had expressed nothing more than a desire for a conference. "Si ad pœnitentiam revocari possit, non parvum lucrum ex unius animæ salute Ecclesia fecerit; quid autem sperari possit, ex proximis literis Patris Soti expectamus." Pole Epist. tom v. p. 47. The letter of Pole to Cranmer, written upon this message, is said by Phillips, Life of Pole, ii. 203, to be preserved in its original Latin in the King of France's library; and by Mr. Soames a copy is said to be among the Harleian MSS. Quirini gives a French translation by Le Grand. It is full of the most bitter reproof, "Vous avez imité le Serpent," &c., and very unlike an address to a penitent.

See Phillips, ubi supr.

nicæ," published under his sanction, that Pole eventually hastened his death. And the passage in Pole's Latin Biographer, his friend Dudith, though it has been quoted to prove that the cardinal had once obtained a promise from the queen that his life should be spared, seems also to imply that at a later period he advised the extreme penalty to be inflicted :

"Non minorem antea curam et studium Polus adhibuerat, ut saluti Thomæ Crammeri, qui ante se Archiepiscopus Cantuarensis fuerat, quique tune Oxonii, quod oppidum bidui iter Londino distat, in custodia asservabatur, consuleret, ad eumque bis scripserat, si posset, pravis ejus opinionibus contra Sacramentum Altaris et Primatum Pontificis Romani confutatis, ad sanitatem illum perducere. Cujus rei magnam quidem spem initio dederat, eique veniam Polus ab ipsa Regina impetraverat. Verum postea, cognita ejus simulatione, ad quam natus et factus esse videbatur, et qua omnibus in rebus tota vita usus semper fuerat, ca tandem pœna est affectus, quæ ejus regni legibus in hæresim constituta erat, vivusque crematus est." Vit. Reg. Poli a Dudith, in Præf. Epist. Poli, vol. i. p. 43.

The reproachful terms here applied to the character of Cranmer seem evidently intended to excuse the consent of Pole to his execution. And here again the truth may lie between the extreme statements. It is not necessary to suppose that Pole was insincere in the solemn declaration made in his second letter; but finding that his harsh reproofs had by no means terrified the prisoner into repentance, he had satisfied his own conscience as easily as when he spoke of the execution of Ridley, and considered Cranmer's obduracy a sign that God had forsaken him; "neminem servari posse, quem Deus projecerit !" It is only one of many marks of the cold fanaticism of a character not otherwise devoid of moral elevation.

This view is corroborated by a passage in the earlier biography of Beccatello, who speaks of Pole as if he had been somewhat weary of the butcheries, civil and religious, enacted by the government. He says his wish was to have retired from the court, and to have resided at Canterbury, but he was prevented by the persuasions of " many able divines," who assured him that they could not do without his assistance in crushing the heretics and aiding the catholic cause.† seems not improbable that Carranza had a share in this advice, as he appears to have been in constant attendance on the queen, and was in frequent correspondence with Pole. The sum of these authorities would prove that the cardinal, after the degradation of Cranmer, was fully consentient to his death.

It

As to Carranza, he appears at this time to have been almost the only Spaniard left in attendance upon the queen ;§ but there is every reason to suppose that he was confidentially employed by Philip; and,

"Eo Legato et accelerante crematus est." Antiq. Brit. p. 533.

"Tanto bisogno si trovava, per opprimere li eretici ed aiutare i catolici." Beccatello. See Pye's Transl. p. 109.

Poli Epist. vol. v. Epist. xxvi. p. 59, &c. It appears, however, from a passage in a letter to Carranza at a later date, that he had advised Pole to visit his diocese ; but this letter is dated in 1558, after Carranza had left England.

Philip, says Noailles, "a arraché piece à piece tout ce qui restoit du sieng de delà, tant hommes que meubles, de sorte qu'il n'est demouré pres ladicte Royne sa femme que son Confesseur." Vol. v. p. 266. Letter dated Dec. 30, 1555. Carranza remained till July, 1557.