until it be delivered unto her Grace's own hands. I have written all that I remember I said, except that which I spake against the Bishop of Gloucester's own person, which I thought not meet to write. And in some places I have written more than I said, which I would have answered to the Bishop, if you would have suffered me.

You promised I should see mine Answers to the Sixteen Articles', that I might correct, amend, and change them, where I thought good; which your promise you kept not. And mine answer was not made upon my oath, nor repeated; nor made in judicio, but extra judicium, as I protested; nor to the Bishop of Gloucester as judge, but to you the King's and Queen's proctors. I trust you deal sincerely with me, without fraud or craft, and use me as you would wish to be used in like case yourselves. Remember, that Qua mensura mensi fueritis, eadem remetietur vobis, i. What measure you mete, the same shall be measured to you again. Thus fare you well, and God send you his Spirit to induce you into all truth. [Sept. 1555.]

think it meet to write what he had spoken against the Bishop of Gloucester's own person. Can it then be the same with Letter ccxcix, in which he describes him as doubly perjured and as an enemy to "the laws and state of this realm?" Yet if it is not the same, it still remains to be explained, how it was "meet" to insert personal reflections in one address to the Queen, which it was "not meet" to insert in another. And it is possible, that the personal reflections, which he chose to suppress, were distinct from these charges of perjury and treason, which he seems to have had no scruple in repeating. Again it may be said, that any conjecture which rests on Cranmer's supposed delicacy towards her Majesty, is completely overturned by his public declaration before Brokes, that she "must needs be for"sworn" either to the Pope, or to the state of England. But perhaps he might then have been led to such an assertion by the heat of debate, and might subsequently, on reflection, and when communicating directly with the Queen herself, have seen the propriety of omitting the subject in his open letter, and reserving it for one which was sealed. See Letters ccxcix, ccc; and Examination before Brokes, vol. iv. pp. 84, 111.]

[See the Articles and Answers, vol. iv. p. 99, &c. and Cranmer's Appeal, ibid. p. 124.]

CCXCIX. TO QUEEN MARY in.

Letters to

Cover

Martyrs,

It may please your Majesty to pardon my presumption, Certain that I dare be so bold to write to your Highness, but very the Queen, necessity constraineth me, that your Majesty may know my &c. mind, rather by mine own writing, than by other men's re- dale's Letports. So it is, that upon Saturday n, being the seventh day ters of the of this month, I was cited to appear at Rome the eightieth p. 3. day after, there to make answer to such matters as should be Foxe, Acts, &c. vol. iii. objected against me upon the behalf of the King and your p. 672. most excellent Majesty: which matters the Thursday following were objected against me by Dr. Martin and Dr. Storie, your Majesty's proctors, before the Bishop of Gloucester, sitting in judgment by commission from Rome. But, alas! it cannot but grieve the heart of any natural subject, to be accused of the King and Queen of his own realm, and specially The King before an outward judge, or by authority coming from any and Queen person out of this realm: where the King and Queen, as if themselves they were subjects within their own realm, shall complain, than suband require justice at a stranger's hands against their own jects incomplaining of subject, being already condemned to death by their own their own

m

[This and the following Letter, as may be proved from their contents, were addressed by Cranmer to Queen Mary in Sept. 1555, soon after his Examination before Brokes. It is strange therefore, that Strype should mention them, as if they were written subsequently to his degradation, in the beginning of the next year; especially as at the distance of a few pages he assigns the correct date of November the 6th to Cardinal Pole's answer to them. Strype also states, that the Archbishop "thought not fit to entrust them with the commis"sioners, since Weston had served him such a trick in the case be"fore." But this assertion again is not well founded, for these were probably the very letters which accompanied the preceding note to Martyn and Story; and even if they were not, it is clear from the expressions there used, that distrust was not the cause of their being sent by another conveyance. See Letter CCXCVIII; Examination before Brokes, (vol. iv. p. 79, &c.) Strype, Cranm. pp. 377. 381.]

n

["Saturday being the seventh." This is the reading in Certain Letters to the Queen, in Coverdale's Letters of the Martyrs, and in the first edition of Foxe's Acts, and is undoubtedly the true one. In some later editions of Foxe it has been altered to "Wednesday being the "twelfth;" but the 12th of Sept. 1555, fell on a Thursday, and was the day on which Cranmer, as he says just below, was brought before Brokes at St. Mary's. See Processus contra Cranmerum, in Strype, Cranm. Add. p. 1073. Oxford, 1812; Wordsworth, Eccles. Biogr. vol. iii. p. 570.]

make

no better

subject

to an out

ward judge,

laws. As though the King and Queen could not do or have justice within their own realms against their own subas though jects, but they must seek it at a stranger's hands in a they had no strange land; the like whereof, I think, was never seen.

power to

dale.]

The first

the Arch

bishop would not make an

punish him. I would have wished to have had some meaner adversaries: [Coverand I think that death shall not grieve me much more, than to have my most dread and most gracious Sovereign Lord and Lady, (to whom under God I do owe all obedience,) to cause why be mine accusers in judgment within their own realm, before any stranger and outward power. But forasmuch as in the time of the prince of most famous memory, King Henry swer to the the Eighth, your Grace's father, I was sworn never to conmissary, is sent that the Bishop of Rome should have or exercise any authority or jurisdiction in this realm of England, therefore, [Cer- lest I should allow his authority contrary to mine oath, I ters to the refused to make answer to the Bishop of Gloucester, sitting Queen.] here in judgment by the Pope's authority, lest I should run into perjury.

Pope'scom

to avoid

perjury.

tain Let

The second

cause is, that the

are con

Another cause why I refused the Pope's authority is this, that his authority, as he claimeth it, repugneth to the Pope's laws crown imperial of this realm, and to the laws of the same, trary to the which every true subject is bounden to defend. First, for crown and that the Pope saith, that all manner of power, as well temEngland. poral as spiritual, is given first to him of God; and that [Ibid.] the temporal power he giveth unto emperors and kings, to use it under him, but so as it be always at his commandment and beck.

laws of

The Crown

But contrary to this claim, the imperial crown and jurisand tempo- diction temporal of this realm is taken immediately from is taken God, to be used under Him only, and is subject unto none, immedi- but to God alone.

ral power

ately from

the King

God.[Ibid.] Moreover, the imperial laws and customs of this realm, The oath of the King in his coronation, and all justices when they receive their offices, be sworn, and all the whole realm is the duty of bounden, to defend and maintain. But contrary hereunto, subjects. the Pope by his authority maketh void, and commandeth to [Ibid.]

and justices, and

blot out of our books, all laws and customs being repugnant to his laws; and declareth accursed all rulers and governors, all the makers, writers, and executors of such laws or customs as it appeareth by many of the Pope's laws, whereof one or two I shall rehearse. In the Decrees, Dist. 10. is written thus, "Constitutiones contra canones et decreta præ"sulum Romanorum vel bonos mores, nullius sunt momenti." That is, "The constitutions or statutes enacted against the canons and decrees of the bishops of Rome or their good "customs, are of none effect." Also, Extrav. De Sententia Excommunicationis, "Noverit:""Excommunicamus omnes hæ"reticos utriusque sexus, quocunque nomine censeantur, et "fautores et receptatores et defensores eorum; nec non et

66

66

qui de cætero servari fecerint statuta edita et consuetu"dines introductas contra Ecclesiæ libertatem, nisi ea de "capitularibus suis intra duos menses post hujusmodi pub"licationem sententiæ fecerint amoveri. Item, excommu"nicamus statutarios, et scriptores statutorum ipsorum, nec "non potestates, consules, rectores, et consiliarios locorum, "ubi de cætero hujusmodi statuta et consuetudines editæ "fuerint vel servatæ ; nec non et illos qui secundum ea presumpserint judicare, vel in publicam formam scribere ju"dicata." That is to say, "We excommunicate all heretics "of both sexes, what name soever they be called by, and "their favourers and receptors and defenders; and also "them that shall hereafter cause to be observed the statutes "and customs made against the liberty of the Church, except they cause the same to be put out of their records and

66

chapters within two months after the publication of this "sentence. Also we excommunicate the statute makers and "writers of those statutes, and all the potestates, consuls, "governors and counsellors of places where such statutes "and customs shall be made or kept; and also those that "shall presume to give judgment according to them, or "to write into public form the matters so adjudged."

Now by these laws, if the Bishop of Rome's authority Either the which he claimeth by God, be lawful, all your Grace's laws Pope's laws and customs of your realm, being contrary to the Pope's ful, or else

be unlaw

all England is ac

cursed. [Ibid.]

Note

wherein the
Pope's
laws and

the laws of

England

do vary. [Ibid.]

laws, be naught: and as well your Majesty, as your judges, justices, and all other executors of the same, stand accursed among heretics, which God forbid. And yet this curse can never be avoided, if the Pope have such power as he claimeth, until such times as the laws and customs of this realm, being contrary to his laws, be taken away and blotted out of the law books. And although there be many laws of this realm contrary to the laws of Rome, yet I named but a few; as to convict a clerk before any temporal judge of this realm for debt, felony, murder, or for any other crime; which clerks by the Pope's laws be so exempt from the King's laws, that they can be no where sued but before their ordinary.

Also the Pope by his laws may give all bishoprics and benefices spiritual, which by the laws of this realm can be given but only by the King and other patrons of the same, except they fall into the lapse.

By the Pope's laws, jus patronatus shall be sued only before the ecclesiastical judge, but by the laws of this realm it shall be sued before the temporal judges.

And to be short, the laws of this realm do agree with the Pope's laws like fire and water. And yet the Kings of this realm have provided for their laws by the præmunire; so that if any man have let the execution of the laws of this realm by any authority from the see of Rome, he falleth into the pramunire.

But to meet with this, the Popes have provided for their laws by cursing. For whosoever letteth the Pope's laws to have full course within this realm, by the Pope's power standeth accursed. So that the Pope's power treadeth all the laws and customs of this realm under his feet, cursing all that execute them, until such time as they give place unto his laws.

But it may be said, that notwithstanding all the Pope's decrees, yet we do execute still the laws and customs of this realm. Nay, not all quietly without interruption of the Pope. And where we do execute them, yet we do it unjustly, if the Pope's power be of force, and for the same we