CRANMER PROTESTS AGAINST THE OATH TO THE POPE. 83

the usual oath of attachment and allegiance to the Pope, he publicly, openly, and expressly, not in a private room, but in the Chapter-House, at Westminster, and then at the Altar, before those by whom he was consecrated, protested against all clauses in the oath which interfered with his duty to the King. He followed, in this respect, the example of Archbishop Chichely. To this extent Bonner could not have disagreed with Cranmer. In the very same document, however, Cranmer not only thus reserved his allegiance to the King, but he no less expressly declares his intention of proceeding with the Reformation, that is, with other alterations in religion. I take this oath, he said, with the understanding that it shall not oblige me to speak, nor consult, nor decree less freely than I should otherwise have done, in all and every thing which in any manner relates to the Reformation of the Christian Religion, to the government of the Anglican Church, to the prerogative of the Crown, and the good of the Commonwealth; and that I will everywhere follow out and reform those things which in the Anglican Church appear to me to require to be reformed, and according to this interpretation, and no other, I take this oath.† Bonner, therefore, knew

* Palam, publice, expresse.

I subjoin the words of the original-Et quod non intendo per hujusmodi juramentum aut juramenta quovis modo me obligare, quominus libere loqui, consulere et consentire valeam, in omnibus et singulis reformationem Religionis Christianæ,

G

84

BONNER OPPOSES CRANMER WITH PRUDENCE.

the determination of the Archbishop, and that all opposition to Cranmer, on his part, must have been useless. He looked on, therefore, in silence, when Cranmer, now being possessed of unrestrained authority and power, proceeded most consistently, but most rapidly and imprudently, to make the changes which he unfortunately thought most advisable ; while Bonner gave only that opposition which I and my friends, under the same circumstances, should perhaps have given,

So early as the 21st of February, 1547, not one month after the death of Henry, the images were commanded by the Council to be removed from the Churches but even before this order was issued, the rude people, freed from the terror of the name of Henry, and anticipating the commands of the Archbishop, broke out into open tumults, and every where began to take down and destroy these memorials of the piety of their fathers. Bonner and the Lord Mayor of London, as the two chief Magistrates of the City, complained of the proceedings of the Council. The Clergyman and the Churchwardens

gubernationem Ecclesiæ Anglicanæ, aut prærogativam coronæ ejusdem, reipublicæ commoditatem quoquo modo concernentibus; et ea ubique exequi, et reformari quæ mihi in Ecclesiá Anglicana reformanda videbuntur; et secundum hunc interpretationem, et intellectum hunc et non aliter, neque alio modo dicta juramenta me præstiturum Protestor, et Profiteor. Sanders is certainly wrong when he says that Cranmer only took the oath before one notary.-See Sanders de Schism., &c., ed. 1583, p. 83.

PRAYERS TO BE OFFERED FOR The dead.

85

of a Church in the City took down not only the images and pictures of the Saints, but even the Crucifix itself out of their Church. They set up

the King's arms in its place, surrounded with texts of Scripture. They painted also texts of Scripture on the walls. Some of the delinquents were punished, but not with sufficient severity. The Nation, the Council, the Bishops, and the Church were divided. The laws were weakened. The influence of Cranmer prevailed with some; the influence of Bonner prevailed with others; and the utmost that Bonner could do was to withhold himself from the active support of the new laws and proclamations.

One of my favorite opinions, which I have defended with most courage, and I think with some success, both in my Tracts and Reviews,* is the doctrine of prayers for the dead. There is, as I have said,† but little in the Roman doctrine of purgatory, taken in the mere letter against which we shall be able to sustain formal objections-though there is much presumption in asserting definitively that there is such a place, it need only mean, what its name implies, a place of purification; and it is a very daring and uncharitable thing to make belief in purgatory a condition of salvation. But I am desirous to go as near to Rome as I can, and I therefore must and do say, that if we consider the doctrine as confined to

* Tract 79. On Purgatory against Romanism.

+ Tract 79, p. 5.

Tract 79, ut sup., p. 5.

86

ARCHBISHOP USHER AN ULTRA-PROTESTANT.

the mere opinion that the good which is begun on earth will be perfected in the next world, the tenet would be tolerable.* The word detentas, which is used in the Creed of Pope Pius as the Creed of the Council of Trent, to describe the detention of the soul in purgatory, expresses a stronger idea than I like; yet, after all, it expresses hardly more, than that the souls in purgatory would be happier out of it than in it, and that they cannot, of their will, leave it; which is not much to grant ; and that the prayers of the living benefit the dead in Christ is, to say the least, not inconsistent, as Usher† shews us, with the primitive belief. Such is our opinion: and here, till further light breaks in upon us, we are now stopping. If, however, the prayers of the living benefit the dead, those prayers may be offered up by the Priest. If the Priest offers them he must be paid for his services. The most solemn way of prayer, too, is that which is attended with the Holy Communion. If, therefore, the Priest must be paid, and the best way of praying is the celebration of the Communion, I cannot quite condemn the custom of paying the Priest for offering those prayers, and for uniting such prayers with the Communion, and for receiving money from the faithful for his services. We have

* Tract, ut supra.

This Usher was a favorite of Oliver Cromwell, and there. fore an Ultra-Protestant, but I like to quote from these fellows whenever I can. Usher has not said that such prayers are Scriptural.

HENRY VIII.'S SOUL REQUIRED BONNER'S PRAYERS. 87

not however, as yet, such is the benighted ignorance of the age, ventured to submit to our countrymen this soothing proposition. Our fathers were wiser. Henry VIII. left money that his soul might be benefited by the prayers of his people after his body was dead. He had destroyed the Monasteries in which prayers were offered for the souls of their founders, but he took as much care as he could of his own soul. He commanded that two Priests were always to say mass at his tomb daily. Bonner, as the Bishop of his Diocese, would probably have ap pointed them. What must have been the indignation of Bonner, if even our indignation is excited, to find that the King's will was disregarded-that no mass-priests were permitted to pray for his soul, and that the changes of Cranmer begun with this scandalous ingratitude to his patron and benefactor? I am sure that the soul of Henry VIII. required as many prayers from the faithful after he was dead as the soul of any man who had hitherto lived. The only wonder was, that any of the faithful could have been found to have accepted the money to have prayed for him. I hope that Bonner prayed for him; even if Cranmer did not. I am convinced that the prayers of Bonner to benefit the soul of King Henry would have been quite as efficacious as those of the ungrateful Cranmer. I think I may safely assert, though Cranmer was Archbishop of Canterbury, and Bonner only Bishop of London, that Bonner's prayers would have done as much good to the soul