324 THE MAGISTRATES SEND PRISONERS TO BONNER. Richard Southwell, on the very same day, wrote up to Bonner, from another part of the country, to entreat him to take care that an 66 arrogant heretic," sent to Bonner by Lord Riche, should be proceeded against according to law.* Tyms, the Curate of Hackley, was apprehended by Tyrrell, and sent to Bonner. Tyms reminded Tyrrell that he (Tyrrellhimself) had conformed to the laws of religion in the days of Edward. The remark exasperated only the Anti-Protestant. "I never conformed in my heart," was the answer: and Tyms was committed to the charge of Bonner, and, refusing to recant, was burnt. Was it the fault of Bonner, that the law required no other trial than the suspicions of a Magistrate, the questioning of the Bishop, and the refusal to recant, or to conform, as the Bishop might require ? "Wilt "thou recant?" "Wilt thou conform ?" "Wilt thou "submit to the Catholic Church, as an obedient "child?" demanded Bonner. "I am of the Catho"lic Church," was the answer; "but he was not of "the Church of Rome, or of the Church of England, "as it had submitted to Rome, and by that submission, "was in unity with Rome;" and the obstinate and insolent Ultra-Protestant was burnt. "We have "sent to your Lordship," wrote Sir John Mordant and Edmund Tyrrel, Magistrates for Essex, "three persons who be not conformable to the orders of "the Church, and not doubting that the parishes 66 *Foxe, vol. vii., p. 371. Foxe, vol. viii., pp. 108, 109. BONNER'S GENTLENESS. 325 "of Burstead and Bellerciay shall be brought to "good conformity, if they be punished." And I could refer to many other instances in which Bonner was neither the instigator, nor the encourager, of the informations; but rather endeavoured to save the poor wretches who were committed to him, than to condemn them with the haste and zeal which pleased the Government; and cemented the reconciliation with Rome.+ 3. But what, it will be asked, is the meaning of the epithet so generally applied to Bonner, as the "bloody "Bonner," if he thus generally abstained from seeking out for condemnation the delinquents who refused to be convinced that there was an actual sacrifice in the Eucharist; that prayers for the dead are to be offered, and that the second Service book of King Edward was unworthy of approbation, when compared with the Canon of the Mass? Have we been all misinformed? Is the testimony of tradition, which always, every where, and by all persons, has been believed, that Bonner was the cruel and unfeeling persecutor, to be now denied and overthrown? If the conduct of Bonner was capable of defence, how can we believe the most common facts of history, or give credit to any reports which are handed Foxe, viii., p. 142. 2nd March, 1556. + See the accounts of the manner in which Sir John Brown and Sir Thomas Tye exerted themselves to procure the condemnation of the Ultra-Protestants.-Foxe, vol. vii., p. 753, and vol. viii., p. 383. 326 THE LAW, Not bonneR, TO BE CONDEMNED. down to us upon the authority of contemporary and continuous evidence. Bonner, I again reply, was only a specimen of that class of executioners of the public law which will ever be produced by that state of society, in which the mass of the people oppose the change in religion which the Churchmen and the Government may endeavour to enforce, in conjunction with the influence of the Church of Rome. Severe legal enactments form severe magistrates. The law, not Bonner, was to be condemned. Many harsh and severe expressions were undoubtedly uttered by Bonner, but common candour requires that we should not look to these alone. When he had in vain endeavoured to persuade the prisoners to recant: when he found his efforts to be useless, then he frequently lost his temper, and spake unadvisedly, from the impatience and impulse of the moment. In the novel of Quentin Durward, Sir Walter Scott has drawn the portraits of two executioners, who were respectively known by the names of Jean-qui-pleure, and Jean-qui-rire. One was accustomed to encourage his prisoners, when he hanged them, by jokes, jests, familiar expressions, and terms of affection and endearment. The other was used to console and comfort them, with texts of Scripture and sentences of religion and devotion; and both these persons, says the novelist, were more utterly detested than any creatures of their kind before or since.* Sir Walter was wrong. Bonner has Edition, 1824. * Quentin Durward, vol. i., chap. vi., p. 140. BONNERS WILL BE ALWAYS MADE BY GOOD LAWs. 327 concentrated more hatred and detestation on his name than either of these; not because he resembled one more than the other, but because he united in himself the peculiarities of both. He did not, it is true, either utter jokes, or quote texts; but he first invited to recant, and then pronounced sentence on the obstinate. He was deemed hypocritical in the former, and the union of the supposed hypocrisy and cruelty, which is nothing but the spirit of the old Papal law, in requesting gentleness from the Magistrate, whom it commands to burn the heretic, has been regarded as the crime of the individual, instead of being the unavoidable characteristic of the Magistrate. "Let us but establish our principles, and Bonners will abound in every See, till all opposition be as effectually removed in England, as in Italy, Austria, or Spain." To understand the character of Bonner rightly, therefore, we must regard him as acting in the spirit of the Church; and consider the gentle expressions by which he would have persuaded the Ultra-Protestants to recant, before we censure him for the harsher language in which he expressed his condemnation of their inveterate Ultra-Protestant obstinacy. During the six days of Hooper's imprisonment, Bonner and others of his own selecting, Packingham, Chadsey, and Harpsfield, constantly went down to the prison to persuade him to relent, and to become a member of the Reconciled Church. They quoted Scripture -they promised worldly advantages-they urged 328 BONNER'S GENTLENESS TO HIS PRISONERS. every argument in their power-they threatened only the intolerable punishments decreed against the Ultra-Protestantism, hated by us, as well as by Bonner, when all other reasoning was of no avail.* "If ye will return," said Bonner to Higbed, "I will gladly receive you."† "Bonner," says Foxe, "pronounced judgment upon Pigot, Knight, and "Laurence, when he found that his fair flatterings, "and his cruel threatenings were alike in vain.”‡ The Bishop used the threatening in mercy, when he found that his entreaties were useless. Three times, Bonner is related by Foxe to have persuaded Flower, the madman, who struck the priest at the altar, to submit to the "unity of the Catholic Church."§ "It was his old manner-his wonted manner-he "urged the reasons he was commonly wont to use to others," says the hateful martyrologist. || Bonner urged and solicited Ardeley to recant. "Thou "art a proper young man," said Bonner to Hawkes, "I would be glad to do thee good." "I am thy ** "Pastor, and one that should answer for thee." "Wats," said Bonner to another, "consider with "yourself-cast not away your soul."†† Bonner la * Foxe, vol. vi., p. 650. Foxe, vol. vii., pp. 74, 75. |