This tender-hearted man was also a great patron of men of letters, and probably it was at his table that Tyndale was advised by some unknown friend to go abroad. Upon the Continent he might reasonably hope to complete his translation, and to print it without molestation. Without knowing that he thereby doomed himself to exile which would only terminate in his martyrdom, and yet not shrinking from the ordeal, Tyndale left England in the month of May 1524, and sailed thence to Hamburg. No one observed with interest the austere, nervous man as he gazed for the last time upon his native land, but his voyage was of far more importance to England, and to the world, than any event of the period. Europe watched with mingled feelings Luther’s heroic stand, and the German Reformer was never at any time of his life without many friends who stood steadily beside him in his time of peril. With the exception of Monmouth, who only with much difficulty saved himself from death, Tyndale had no sympathy or helper at all; but, without complaining of this isolation, he went forward with true national persistence in the path of duty. He himself and his work were of such a character that they could not be adequately appreciated then, but long after Wolsey and his hat (to which the nobility bowed, and before which candles were burned) are forgotten, the work of Tyndale will be appreciated, and will exert a powerful influence in the lives of millions through the eternity that is yet to come.
CHAPTER IV.
AN EXILE, YET IN HIS FATHER’S LAND.
“The Scriptures have a might and magnificence all their own;
How comforting are its promises, how precious are its precepts!
How wise and kind and pure and good its influence on the soul!
How strong its hold upon the heart, its power within the mind!”
—Tupper.
“Stars are poor books, and oftentimes do miss;
This book of stars lights to eternal bliss.”
“To recollect a promise of the Bible, this is substance! Nothing will do but the Bible. If I read authors and hear different opinions, I cannot say, ‘This is truth!’ I cannot grasp it as substance; but the Bible gives me something to hold.”—Richard Cecil.