On the eve of the execution four distinguished men, one of whom was Latimer, were dining together in London. It was commonly reported that Bainham was to be put to death for saying that Thomas à Becket was a traitor worthy of hell. ‘Is it worth a man’s while to sacrifice his life for such a trifle?’ said the four friends. ‘Let us go to Newgate and save him if possible.’ They were taken along several gloomy passages, and found themselves at last in the presence of a man, sitting on a little straw, holding a book in one hand and a candle in the other.[215] He was reading; it was Bainham. Latimer drew near him: ‘Take care,’ he said, ‘that no vainglory make you sacrifice your life for motives which are not worth the cost.’ ‘I am condemned,’ answered Bainham, ‘for trusting in Scripture and rejecting purgatory, masses, and meritorious works.’—‘I acknowledge that for such truths a man must be ready to die.’ Bainham was ready; and yet he burst into tears. ‘Why do you weep?’ asked Latimer. ‘I have a wife,’ answered the prisoner, ‘the best that man ever had. A widow, destitute of everything and without a supporter, everybody will point at her and say, That is the heretic’s wife.’[216] Latimer and his friends tried to console him, and then they departed from the gloomy dungeon. The next day (30th of April, 1532) Bainham was taken to the scaffold. Soldiers on horseback surrounded the pile: Master Pave, the city clerk, directed the execution. Bainham, after a prayer, rose up, embraced the stake, and was fastened to it with a chain. ‘Good people,’ he said to the persons who stood round him, ‘I die for having said it is lawful for every man and woman to have God’s book. I die for having said that the true key of heaven is not that of the Bishop of Rome, but the preaching of the Gospel. I die for having said that there is no other purgatory than the cross of Christ, with its consequent persecutions and afflictions.’—‘Thou liest, thou heretic,’ exclaimed Pave; ‘thou hast denied the blessed sacrament of the altar.’—‘I do not deny the sacrament of Christ’s body,’ resumed Bainham, ‘but I do deny your idolatry to a piece of bread.’—‘Light the fire,’ shouted Pave. The executioners set fire to a train of gunpowder, and as the flame approached him, Bainham lifted up his eyes towards heaven, and said to the town clerk: ‘God forgive thee! the Lord forgive Sir Thomas More ... pray for me, all good people!’ The arms and legs of the martyr were soon consumed, and thinking only how to glorify his Saviour, he exclaimed: ‘Behold! you look for miracles, you may see one here; for in this fire I feel no more pain than if I were on a bed of roses.’[217] The primitive Church hardly had a more glorious martyr.