One would have been thankful for an account of the home life of the Tyndales, and especially for some information about the two parents. We can imagine the grave, sober farmer given up to religious observances like his neighbours, thinking grimly but silently of the evils which he saw in the Churches around him; perhaps also with a tinge of Lollardism as carefully concealed as might be. And the sober, diligent mother, not wholly occupied with the pursuits of the farm, but thinking high thoughts about God and life, that from time to time she communicated to her sons. From what we know of their children, we must form a high estimate of the parents.
Four sons, it would seem, formed the family group, and they were named respectively Richard Tyndale (who succeeded to the farm), Edward Tyndale, William the Martyr, and John Tyndale, a merchant in London.
It is a fact that the last named was fined for sending money to his brother William when the latter was abroad, and for aiding him in the circulation of the Scriptures, so that in all probability the brothers were of one mind in religious opinions. One brother, Edward Tyndale, was appointed receiver of the revenues of Berkley, which had been left to the Crown in the year 1492, so that he at anyrate was fairly well-to-do.
Tyndale himself, in his “Obedience of a Christian Man,” to which reference will be further made later on in this biography, makes the following allusion to his own childhood:—“Except my memory fail me, and that I have forgotten what I read when I was a child, thou shalt find in the English Chronicle, how that King Adelstone (Athelstone) caused the Holy Scripture to be translated into the tongue that then was in England, and how prelates exhorted him thereto.”
We may therefore suppose that the child was taught at home in the ancient records of the Kingdom, and perhaps his attention was called by his father to the significant fact that then the Scriptures could not be read by the people, whereas this had been permitted in earlier days. It is singular that the boy should have noticed such a fact, and it suggests that some one significantly indicated it to him. It is certain that a strong sympathy for the opinions of Wycliffe and his followers existed all through the West of England, and probably William Tyndale’s father hinted to his sons what he did not dare to speak out to others. And there were also here and there, men, in monasteries, vicarages, and dwelling-houses, who were beginning to discern the coming dawn.
“Midnight being past,” says Fuller, “some early risers were beginning to strike fire and enlighten themselves from the Scriptures.” And there was indeed great need for them to do so, for the religious condition of England was at that time lamentable.
As an example of the dissoluteness of the national manners, and principally amongst the clergy, it is said of Mr. Edmund Loud, a gentleman of rank in Huntingdonshire, that he “was disgusted at the dissolute lives of the monks of Sawtry, an abbey in his neighbourhood, and even ventured to chastise one of them who had insulted his daughter. For this, and other circumstances, they determined to be revenged; and he was waylaid and assaulted by six men, tenants of the abbey. He defended himself with a billhook for some time, till a constable came up and stopped the fray, and Mr. Loud was required to give up his weapon. They then proceeded peaceably with the constable; but, watching an opportunity, as Mr. Loud was crossing a stile, one seized him by the arms, while another fractured his skull with the blow of a club, and he died seven days afterwards. The murderers escaped, and the influence of the Romish clergy prevented the matter being properly followed up.”
Dr. Henry in his history of this period observes, however, that “there was one vice, indeed, which the clergy most zealously endeavoured to extirpate. This was what they called the damnable vice of heresy, which consisted in reading the New Testament in English, the works of Wickliff and Luther, and of others of that learning; in denying the infallibility of the Pope, transubstantiation, purgatory, praying to saints, worshipping images, &c. Notwithstanding the cruel punishments that had been inflicted on those who entertained these opinions, their number was still considerable, particularly in London, and in Colchester, and in other parts of Essex. They called themselves Brethren in Christ, and met together with great secrecy in one another’s houses, to read the New Testament and other books, and to converse upon religious subjects. Many of them were apprehended, and brought before Cuthbert Tonstall, bishop of London, and Dr. Wharton, his chancellor. But Bishop Tonstall, being a prelate of uncommon learning and eloquence, and of great humanity, earnestly tried to prevail upon them to renounce, or rather to dissemble, their opinions, by which they escaped a painful death, but incurred the painful reproaches of their minds.”
As a specimen of those who were brought before the tribunals, take these cases:—
“Elizabeth Wightil deposed against her mistress, Alice Doly, that speaking of John Hacher, a water-bearer in Coleman Street, London, she said he was so very expert in the Gospels and the Lord’s Prayer in English, that it did her good to hear him. She was also said to have heretical books in her possession.