[100] 'Of all the people of England, as well ecclesiastical or temporal.—Cranmer, _Letters and Remains_, p. 224. [101] 'Not that he should take any spiritual power from spiritual ministers.'—_Heads of arguments concerning the power of the pope and the royal supremacy._—MS. in Record Office.—Froude, ii. p. 326. [102] Fulke's _Defence_, p. 489. [103] Jewell's _Works_, iv. p. 1144. CHAPTER V. LIGHT FROM BOTH SIDES. (1534-1535.) In England it was reserved for Catholics as well as for evangelicals to give the world, amid great misery, remarkable examples of Christian virtues. Latimer and others preached the truth courageously; martyrs like Bilney, Tewkesbury, and Fryth had laid down their lives for the Gospel. Now in the other party, laymen, monks, and priests, with unquestionably a less enlightened piety, were about to furnish proofs of their sincerity. There were Roman martyrs also. Two armies were in presence; many fell on both sides; but there was a sensible difference between this spiritual war and the wars of nations. Those who bit the dust did not fall under the weapons of a hostile army; there was a third power, the king-pope, who took his station between the two lines, and dealt his blows now to the right, now to the left. Leaders of the pontifical army were to be smitten in the struggle in which so many evangelicals had already fallen. [Sidenote: MORE'S WRETCHED CONDITION.] Sir Thomas More, while in prison, strove to banish afflicting thoughts by writing a history of Christ's passion. One day when he came to these words of the Gospel: _Then came they and laid hands on Jesus, and took Him_, the door opened, and Kingston, the governor of the Tower, accompanied by Rich, the attorney-general, appeared. 'Sir Thomas,' said Rich, 'if an act of parliament ordered all Englishmen to acknowledge me as their king, would you acknowledge me?'—'Yes, sir.'[104]—'And if an act of parliament ordered all Englishmen to recognize me as pope?'—'Parliament has no authority to do it,' answered More. Sir Thomas held that an act of parliament was sufficient to dethrone a king of England: it is to a great grandson of More's that we are indebted for this opinion, which a grand-nephew of Cromwell put in practice a hundred years later. Was Henry VIII. exasperated because More disposed so freely of his crown? It is possible, but be that as it may, the harshness of his imprisonment was increased. Suffering preceded martyrdom. The illustrious scholar was forced to pick up little scraps of paper on which to write a few scattered thoughts with a coal.[105] This was not the worst. 'I have neither shirt nor sute,'[106] he wrote to the chief secretary of state, 'nor yet other clothes that are necessary for me to wear, but that be ragged and rent too shamefully. Notwithstanding, I might easily suffer that if that would keep my body warm. And now in my age my stomach may not away but with a few kind of meats; which, if I