He calculates the salaries paid to the clergy as amounting to one hundred and thirty thousand angels. "Whereof not foure hundreth yeres passed they had not one peny." He gives historical illustrations to show the desirableness of being freed from such tributes: "The nobill king Arthur had never ben abill to have caried his armie to the fote of the mountains to resist the coming downe of Lucius the emperoure if such yerely exactions had ben taken of his people. The Grekes had never ben abill to have so long continued at the siege of Troie if they had had at home such an idell sort of cormorantes to finde. The auncient Romains had never ben abil to have put all the hole world under theyre obeisance if theyre people had byn thus yerely oppressed. The Turke nowe yn your tyme shulde never be abill to get so moche groande of Cristendome if he had yn his empire such a sort of locustes to devoure his substance." As it proceeds, the tract becomes more and more nervous and truculent. Irritated by the utterance of this "beggars' proctour," More in 1529 replied in his Supplycacion of Soules.
This purports to be an appeal from the "holy souls in purgatory" to all good Christians. The Supplicacion of Beggars is called "an unhappy boke." It is urged that "lacke of belief in purgatory bringeth a man to hell." He refutes the "beggars' proctour" by showing that Peter's pence was paid before the conquest, and exclaims: "Oh! the grevouse shipwrak of the comen weale; he sayeth that in auncient time before the coming of the clergye there were but few pore people, and yet thei did not begge, but there was gyven them ynough unasked, because at that time he saith there was no clargy. ... In thys place we let pas his threfold foly." He says that this "beggars' proctour" should have concluded his "supplycacion" in such terms as these: "After ye the clergy is thus destroied and cast out, then shall Luther's ghospel come in; then shal Tyndal's testament be taken up; then shal false heresies bee preached; then shal the sacramentes be set at naught; than shal fasting and prayour be neglected; then shal holy saints be blasphemed;... then shal the servantes set naught by theyr maysters, and vnruly people rebell against their rulers; then wyll ryse vp ryflyng and robbery, murther and mischief, and playn insurreccion. ... all which mischief may yet be withstanden easilye, and with Godde's grace so shal it, yf ye suffer no such bold beggars to seduce you with sedycyouse billes." More girds on the most substantial armor in the Dialogue concerning Heresies, and other polemical treatises. He maintains that the church cannot err in the interpretations of Scripture; that according to the teaching of early doctors it is lawful to venerate images and render homage to relics. He argues for the real presence, comparing it with St. Chrysostom to one man's face reflected in several mirrors; all the hosts, although in different places, are but one body and divine oblation. He adduces as one of the reasons for which Tyndal's New Testament was burned, that in that version the words priests, church and charity, are respectively rendered "seniours," "congregation," and "love." The word senior, he maintains, would apply "Englishly" rather to aldermen of towns than to priests of the church. The word congregation can be applied equally to a company of Christians and a company of Turks though the church is indeed a congregation, yet every congregation is not the church. "Lyke wysedom was there in the change of this word (charitie) into love. For though charitie be alway love, yet is not, ye wote well, love alway charitie." He blames that "greate arche heretike Wickliffe" for having taken it upon himself to make a new translation of the Scriptures. "Whereas ye hole byble was long before his dayes by vertuous and wel learned men translated into ye English tong, and by good and godly people with devocion and sobrenes wel and reverently red." He sees no reason why Scripture should not be read in the vulgar tongue. Luther's books, however, should be proscribed, "because his heresies be so many and so abominable;" a "ich and tikling of vanite and vain glory has set hym besyde hys minde." He shows that "it is a great token that the world is nere at an ende while we se people so farre fallen fro God, that they can abide it to be content with this pestilent frantike secte;" that "fayth may be without charitie, and so fervent that it may suffer a payneful death, and yet for fault of charitie not sufficient to salvacion." He establishes that "princes be bounden to punish heretykes." He charges heretics with being wont to perpetrate "outrages, and temporall harmes" with "destroying Christe's holy sacramentes, pulling down Christ's crosse, blaspheming his blessed saints, destroying all devocion." He contrasts "Saynt Cypryane, Saynt Chrisostome, Saynt Gregory, and al the vertuous and cunning doctours by rowe," with the doctors "of this newe secte, frere Luther and his wyfe, frere Lambert and his wife, and frantike Tyndall." It must be remembered that the excesses and seditions brought forth by the Reformation in Germany were calculated to establish an association between the ideas of religious reformer and of rebel; nor does the experience of succeeding centuries go very far toward destroying this link. As a statesman, therefore, if on no other ground, More was inclined toward the display of an uncompromising severity. Nor was he alone in this tendency. Both in England and on the continent, heresy was a crime punishable by law. At the same time, there is no reason for thinking that More carried his doctrines on that point into practice, as Fox, Burnet, and others have asserted. This theory is based on a passage of Erasmus, which declares that while More was chancellor no one was put to death in England for adherence to the new doctrines. (Nisard.) In his apology, written after his fall, More candidly exposes both his opinions and the facts of his administration. He vindicates himself from the "lies neither fewe nor small" which certain "blessed brethren" had industriously spread concerning him. "Dyvers of them have said that of suche as were in my house while I was chauncellour, I used to examine theym with tormentes, causynge them to bee bounden to a tree in my gardeine, and there pituously beaten." "Of very truth, albeit that for a greate robbery, or an heighnous murder, or sacriledge in a church, I caused sometyme suche thynges to be done by some officers of the marshalsie, with which orderynge of them by their well deserved paine, and without any great hurt that afterward should sticke by them, I founde out and repressed many such desperate wretches as elles had not failed to have gone farther abrode, and to have done to many good folke a greate deale much more harme."
Only twice did he punish any heretic in this manner—a boy and a lunatic, whose case he thus relates:
"Another was one whiche, after that he had fallen into that frantik heresies, fell soone after into plaine, open fransy beside; and albeit that he had therefore bene put up in Bedelem, and afterward by beating and corecion, gathered his remembrance to him, and begaune to come again to himself, being thereupon set at liberty, and walkinge aboute abrode, his olde fransies begaune to fall againe in his heade, and I was fro dyvers good holy places advertised, that he used in his wandering about to come into the churche, and there make many mad toies and trifles, to the trouble of the good people in the divine service, and specially would he be most busye at the time of most silence, while the priest was at the secretes of the masse, about the levacion. ... whereupon I, being advertised of these pageauntes, and being sent unto and required by very devout, religious folke, to take some other order with him, caused him as he came wanderinge by my doore, to be taken by the counstables and bounden to a tree in the streete before the whole towne and ther they stripped him with roddes therefore till he wared weary, and somewhat longer; and it appeared wel that his remembrance was goode enoughe, save that it went about in grasing till it was beaten home; for he could than verie well reherse his fautes himselfe, and speake and treate very well, and promise to doe afterward as well, and verylye, God be thanked, I heare none harme of him now; and of al that ever came into my hand for heresye, as helpe me God, saving, as I said, the sure keping of them, and yet no so sure neither, but that George Constantine could stele away; els had never any of them any stripe or stroke given them, so much as a fylyppe on the forehead."
He also gives an amusing instance of the manner in which slanderous accusations were fabricated against him. Simon Fryth, author of the "Supplication of Beggars," charged More with having said that "his heresye shoulde coste him the best blude in his body." More answers that:
"Some truthe they might happe to heare, whereupon they myghte buylde theyr lye. For so was it that on a tyme one came and showed me that Frithe laboured so sore that he sweat agayne, in studieng and writing against the blessed sacrament; and I was of trouth verie heavy to heare that the younge fooly the felowe shoulde bestowe suche labour about suche a develyshe woorke. For if that Fryth (quoth I) swete in laboring to quench that faith that al true Christen people have in Christe's blessed body and bloude, which all Christen folke veryly, and all good folke frutfuly receive in the fourme of bread, he shal laboure more than in vayne; for I am sure that Frith and al his felowes, with al the friendes that are of theyr affiniti, shal neither be able to quench and put out that faith, and over that if Frythe labour about the quenching thereof till he sweate, I would some good friend of his shoulde showe hym that I feare me sore that Christe wyll kyndle a fyre of fagottes for hym, and make hym therin sweate the bloud out of his bodye here, and straight from hence send hys soule for ever into the fyre of hell. Nowe in these wordes I neyther ment nor meane that I would it wer so. For so help me God and none otherwyse, but as I would be glad to take more labour, losse, and bodelye payne also, then peradventure many a man would wene to winne that yonge man to Christe and hys true faythe agayne, and thereby to preserve and keepe hym from the losse and peryll of soule and body both."
And in another part of the same treatise he declares that
"as touching heretikes, I hate that vice of theirs, and not their persons, and very faine would I that the one were destroied, and the tother saved ... and if all the favour and pity that I have vsed among them to theire amendement were knowen, it woulde I warrant you well and plaine appere, whereof if it were requysite I could bring forth witnesses more than men would wene."
In these earnest words is reflected his innocence of persecution. These apologies for his career as chancellor were written after his fall.