The gentleman stopped and looked at the prisoner. It was by such language that Bilney had been seduced; but Fryth kept himself in the presence of God, ready to lose his life that he might save it. He thanked the gentleman for his kindness, and said that his conscience would not permit him to recede, out of respect to man, from the true doctrine of the Lord’s Supper. ‘If I am questioned on that point, I must answer according to my conscience, though I should lose twenty lives if I had so many. I can support it by a great number of passages from the Holy Scriptures and the ancient doctors, and, if I am fairly tried, I shall have nothing to fear.’—‘Marry!’ quoth the gentleman, ‘if you be fairly tried, you would be safe; but that is what I very much doubt. Our Master Christ was not fairly tried, nor would he be, as I think, if he were now present again in the world. How, then, should you be, when your opinions are so little understood and are so odious?’—‘I know,’ answered Fryth, ‘that the doctrine which I hold is very hard meat to be digested just now; but listen to me.’ As he spoke, he took the gentleman by the hand: ‘If you live twenty years more, you will see the whole realm of my opinion concerning this sacrament of the altar—all, except a certain class of men. My death, you say, would be sorrowful to my friends, but it will be only for a short time. But, all things considered, my death will be better unto me and all mine than life in continual bondage. God knoweth what he hath to do with his poor servant, whose cause I now defend. He will help me, and no man shall prevail on me to step backwards.’
The boat reached Lambeth. The travellers landed, entered the archbishop’s palace, and, after taking some refreshment, started on foot for Croydon, twelve miles from London.
The three travellers proceeded over the hills and through the plains of Surrey. Here and there flocks of sheep were grazing in the scanty pastures, and to the east stretched vast woods. The gentleman walked mournfully by the side of Fryth. It was useless to ask him again to retract; but another idea engrossed Cranmer’s officer,—that of letting Fryth escape. The country was then thinly inhabited: the woods which covered it on the east and the chalky hills might serve as a hiding-place for the fugitive. The difficulty was to persuade Perlebeane. The gentleman slackened his pace, called to the porter, and they walked by themselves behind the prisoner. When they were so far off that he could not hear their conversation, the gentleman said: ‘You have heard this man, I am sure, and noted his talk since he came from the Tower.’—‘I never heard so constant a man,’ Perlebeane answered, ‘nor so eloquent a person.’—‘You have heard nothing,’ resumed the gentleman, ‘in respect both of his knowledge and his eloquence. If you could hear him at the university or in the pulpit, you would admire him still more. England has never had such a one of his age with so much learning. And yet our bishops treat him as if he were a very dolt or an idiot.... They abhor him as the devil himself, and want to get rid of him by any means.’—‘Marry!’ said the porter, ‘if there were nothing else in him but the consideration of his person both comely and amiable, his disposition so gentle, meek, and humble, it were pity he should be cast away.’—‘Cast away,’ interrupted the gentleman, ‘he will certainly be cast away if we once bring him to Croydon.’ And lowering his voice, he continued: ‘Surely, before God I speak it, if thou, Perlebeane, wert of my mind, we should never bring him thither.’—‘What do you mean?’ asked the astonished porter. Then, after a moment’s silence, he added: ‘I know that you have a great deal more responsibility in this matter than I have; and therefore, if you can honestly save this man, I will yield to your proposal with all my heart.’ The gentleman breathed again.
Attempt To Save Fryth.
Cranmer had desired that all possible efforts should be made to change Fryth’s sentiments; and these failing, he wished to save him in another way. It was his desire that the Reformer should go on foot to Croydon; that he should be accompanied by two only of his servants, selected from those best disposed towards the new doctrine. The primate’s gentleman would never have dared to take upon himself, except by his master’s desire, the responsibility of conniving at the escape of a prisoner who was to be tried by the first personages of the realm, appointed by the king himself. Happy at having gained the porter to his enterprise, he began to discuss with him the ways and means. He knew the country well, and his plan was arranged.
‘You see yonder hill before us,’ he said to Perlebeane; ‘it is Brixton Causeway, two miles from London. There are great woods on both sides. When we come to the top, we will permit Fryth to escape to the woods on the left hand, whence he may easily get into Kent, where he was born, and where he has many friends. We will linger an hour or two on the road after his flight, to give him time to reach a place of safety, and when night approaches, we will go to Streatham, which is a mile and a half off, and make an outcry in the town that our prisoner has escaped into the woods on the right hand towards Wandsworth; that we followed him for more than a mile, and at length lost him because we were not many enough. At the same time we will take with us as many people as we can to search for him in that direction; if necessary we will be all night about it; and before we can send the news of what has happened to Croydon, Fryth will be in safety, and the bishops will be disappointed.’
The gentleman, we see, was not very scrupulous about the means of rescuing a victim from the Roman priests. Perlebeane thought as he did. ‘Your plan pleases me,’ he answered; ‘now go and tell the prisoner, for we are already at the foot of the hill.’
The delighted gentleman hurried forward. ‘Master Fryth,’ he said, ‘let us talk together a little. I cannot hide from you that the task I have undertaken, to bring you to Croydon, as a sheep to the slaughter, grieves me exceedingly, and there is no danger I would not brave to deliver you out of the lion’s mouth. Yonder good fellow and I have devised a plan whereby you may escape. Listen to me. The gentleman having described his plan, Fryth smiled amiably, and said: ‘This, then, is the result of your long consultation together. You have wasted your time. If you were both to leave me here and go to Croydon, declaring to the bishops you had lost me, I should follow after as fast as I could, and bring them news that I had found and brought Fryth again.’
The gentleman had not expected such an answer. A prisoner refuse his liberty! ‘You are mad,’ he said: ‘do you think your reasoning will convert the bishops? At Milton Shone you tried to escape beyond the sea, and now you refuse to save yourself!’—‘The two cases are different,’ answered Fryth; ‘then I was at liberty, and, according to the advice of St. Paul, I would fain have enjoyed my liberty for the continuance of my studies. But now the higher power, as it were by Almighty God’s permission, has seized me, and my conscience binds me to defend the doctrine for which I am persecuted, if I would not incur our Lord’s condemnation. If I should now run away, I should run from my God; if I should fly, I should fly from the testimony I am bound to bear to his Holy Word, and I should deserve a thousand hells. I most heartily thank you both for your good will towards me; but I beseech you to bring me where I was appointed to be brought, for else I will go thither all alone.’[[322]]
Those who desired to save Fryth had not counted upon so much integrity. Such were, however, the martyrs of protestantism. The archbishop’s two servants continued their route along with their strange prisoner. Fryth had a calm eye and cheerful look, and the rest of the journey was accomplished in pious and agreeable conversation. When they reached Croydon, he was delivered to the officers of the episcopal court, and passed the night in the lodge of the primate’s porter.