Cranmer, Latimer, Knox, and Others. A much nobler figure is this, to my mind, than that of Cranmer,* who appears in such picturesque lights in the drama of Henry VIII. who gave adhesion to royal wishes for divorce upon divorce; who always colored his religious allegiances with the colors of the King; who was a scholar indeed -learned, eloquent; who wrought well, as it proved, for the reformed faith; but who wilted under the fierce heats of trial; would have sought the good will of the blood-thirsty Mary; but who gave even to his subserviencies a half-tone that brought distrust, and so-finally- the fate of that quasi-martyrdom which has redeemed his memory. He stands very grandly in his robes upon the memorial cross at Oxford: and he has an even more august presence in the final scene of Shakespeare's play, where amidst all churchly and courtly pomp, he christened the infant-who was to become the * Cranmer, b. 1489; d. 1556. Complete edition of his works published 1834 (Rev. H. Jenkyns). Cranmer's Bible so called, because accompanied by a prologue, written by Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop, etc. Royal Elizabeth, and says to the assembled digni taries : "This royal infant Tho' in her cradle, yet now promises Upon this land a thousand thousand blessings, A pattern to all princes living with her, And all that shall succeed her. Truth shall nurse her, She shall be loved and feared. A most unspotted lily shall she pass To the ground, and all the world shall mourn her.” * Tennyson, in his drama of Queen Mary (a most unfortunate choice of heroine) gives a statuesque pose to this same Archbishop Cranmer; but Shakespeare's figures are hard to duplicate. He was with Henry VIII. as counsellor at his death; was intimate adviser of the succeeding Edward VI. : and took upon himself obligations from that King * There are many reasons for doubting if these lines were from Shakespeare's own hand. Emerson (Representative Men) — rarely given to Literary criticism, remarks upon "the bad rhythm of the compliment to Queen Elizabeth" as unworthy the great Dramatist: so too, he doubts, though with less reason the Shakespearean origin of the Wolsey Soliloquy. See also Trans. New Shakespere Society for 1874. Part I. (Spedding et al.) (contrary to his promises to Henry) which brought him to grief under Queen Mary. That brave thrust of his offending hand into the blaze that consumed him, cannot make us forget his weaknesses and his recantations; nor will we any more forget that he it was, who gave (1543) to the old Latin Liturgy of the Church that noble, English rhythmic flow which so largely belongs to it to-day. It is quite impossible to consider the literary aspects of the period of English history covered by the reign of Henry VIII., and the short reigns of the two succeeding monarchs, Edward VI. and Mary, without giving large frontage to the Reformers and religious controversialists. Every scholar was alive to the great battle in the Church. The Greek and Classicism of the Universities came to have their largest practical significance in connection with the settlement of religious questions or in furnishing weapons for the ecclesiastic controversies of the day. The voices of the poets-the Skeltons, the Sackvilles, the Wyatts, were chirping sparrows' voices beside that din with which Luther thundered in Germany, and Henry VIII. thundered back, more weakly, from his stand-point of Anglicanism. We have seen Wolsey in his garniture of gold, going from court to school; and Sir Thomas More, stern, strong, and unyielding; and Archbishop Cranmer, disposed to think rightly, but without the courage to back up his thought; and associated with these, it were well to keep in mind the other figures of the great religious processional. There was William Tyndale, native of Gloucestershire, a slight, thin figure of a man; honest to the core; well-taught; getting dignities he never sought; wearied in his heart of hearts by the flattering coquetries of the King; perfecting the work of Wyclif in making the old home Bible readable by all the world. His translation was first printed in Wittenberg about 1530:* I give the Lord's Prayer as it appeared in the original edition : : "Oure Father which arte in heven, halowed be thy name. Let thy kingdom come. erth, as hit ys in heven. breade. Thy wyll be fulfilled, as well in Geve vs this daye oure dayly And forgeve vs oure trespases, even as we forgeve them which treespas vs. Leade vs not into temptacion but delyvre vs from yvell.. Amen." * William Tyndale, b. about 1480; d. (burned at the stake) 1536. G. P. Marsh (Eng. Language and Early Lit.) says "Tyndale's translation of the New Testament has exerted a But Tyndale was not safe in England; nor yet in the Low Countries whither he went, and where the long reach of religious hate and jealousy put its hand upon him and brought him to a death whose fiery ignominies are put out of sight by the lustrous quality of his deservings. even the I see too amongst those great, dim figures, that speak in Scriptural tones, the form of Hugh Latimer, as he stands to-day on the Memorial Cross in Oxford. I think of him too · in humbler dress than that which the sculptor has put on him yeoman's clothes, which he wore upon his father's farm, in the Valley of the Soar, when he wrought there in the meadows, and drank in humility of thought, and manly independence under the skies of Leicestershire *- where (as he says), "My father had walk for an hundred sheep, and my mother *. more marked influence upon English philology than any other native work between the ages of Chaucer and of Shakespeare." *Latimer (Hugh) b. 1491; d. (at the stake) 1555. He was educated at Cambridge- came to be Bishop of Worcester wrote much, wittily and strongly. A collection of his Sermons was published in 1570-71; and there have been many later issues. |