“By this time was there a scaffold made upon the greene over against the White Tower, for the ladie Jane to die upon, who being nothing at all abashed, neither with feare of hir owne death, which then approched, neither with the sight of the dead carcasse of hir husband when he was brought into the chapell, came forth, the lieutenant leading hir, with countenance nothing abashed, nor hir eies anything moistened with teares, with a booke in hir hand, wherein she praied untill she came to the said scaffold. Whereon when she was mounted, this noble yoong lady as she was indued with singular gifts both of learning and knowledge so was she as patient and mild as anie lambe at hir execution, and a little before hir death uttered these words:—
‘Good people I am come hither to die, and by a law I am condemned to the same. My offence against the queenes highness was onelie in consent to the device of other, which now is deemed treason: but it was never of my seeking, but by counsell of those who should seem to have further understanding of things than I, which knew little of the law and much lesse of the titles to the crowne. But touching the procurement and desire thereof by me, or on my behalfe, I doo wash my hands in innocencie thereof before God, and the face of all you (good Christian people) this daie.’ And therewith she wroong her hands wherein she had hir booke. Then (said she) ‘I praie you all good Christian people, to beare me witnesse that I die a true Christian woman and that I looke to be saved by none other meanes, but onlie by the mercie of God, in the bloud of his onlie sonne Jesus Christ: and I confesse that when I did know the word of God, I neglected the same, and loved myselfe and the world, and therefore this plague and punishment is justlie and worthlie happened unto me for my sins, and yet I thanke God of his goodnesse, that he hath given me a time and respit to repent. And now, good people, while I am alive I praie you assist me with your praiers.’ Then kneeling downe she said the psalme of Miserere mei Deus in English, and then stood up and gave hir maid (called mistress Ellin) hir gloves and handkercher, and hir booke she also gave to maister Bridges the lieutenant of the Tower, and so untied her gowne: and the executioner pressed to helpe her off with it, but she desired him to let hir alone, and turned hir toward hir two gentlewomen, who helped hir off therewith, and with hir other attires, and they gave hir a faire handkercher to put about hir eies. Then the executioner kneeled downe and asked her forgiveness, whom she forgave most willinglie. Then he willed her to stand upon the straw, which doone, she saw the blocke and then she said, I praie you dispatch me quickly. Then she kneeled down saieng, Will you take it off before I laie me downe? Whereunto the executioner answered, No, Madame. Then tied she the handkercher about her eies and feeling for the blocke she said, Where is it? Where is it? One of the standers by guided her thereunto and she laid downe hir head upon the blocke and then stretched forth her bodie and said, Lord, into thy hands I commend my spirit; and so finished hir life.” (Holinshed, vol. iv. p. 22.)
LADY JANE GREY (1537–1554)
After the portrait in the Collection of the Earl of Stamford and Warrington
Mary’s first Parliament met with the celebration of mass, which was ominous; but it was not too compliant: it was ready to restore the situation as it was in the last years of Henry VIII.; it was unwilling to submit to Rome; and it refused absolutely to restore the Church property. Further, it presented a petition against the proposed foreign marriage. Mary’s second Parliament, more obedient to the will of the Queen, gave its consent to the proposed marriage, but refused to re-enact the statute for the burning of heretics. Her third Parliament went a step farther: it re-enacted the statute for the burning of heretics; it agreed to reconciliation with Rome; but it refused, like its predecessors, to sanction the surrender of Church lands. They were ready to obey their sovereign in matters of faith: the soul may always be left to the care of the Church; but property—property—that, if you please, belongs to the Lay mind. Convocation, on the other hand, was very thorough: it denounced the Book of Common Prayer; it demanded the suppression of the Catechism; it recommended violent measures against the clergy who should deny the Real Presence and against those who should not put away their wives. This meant Revolution. Hosts of priests, and those who still survived from the monasteries, rejoiced to say mass once more, even in the ruined and desecrated churches that were left to them. It meant Restoration. Priests sprang up everywhere from the ground—how had they lived for ten years? Priests in the villages and the parish churches put on their old robes; dragged out the censing vessels; replaced the Host. Ex-monks who had been pensioned from the monasteries; ex-friars who had received no pensions but had been simply turned into the street; ecclesiastics from abroad;—all came, eager to revive the forbidden worship. They looked around them ruefully at the dishonoured shrines and the ruined chapels: it would take centuries to make everything as it had been; but still—one must try.
Meantime, think, if you can, of the deadly hatred which these priests must have felt towards those who had done these mischiefs; think of the silent satisfaction with which even the best of them would witness the execution of one who had been a leader—a Hooper or a Latimer—in bringing about this destruction. But the destruction was stayed. Holy Church was back again, and of course for ever. The Great Rebellion, they thought, was ended. As for the beneficed clergy in possession, many conformed for fear and for safety; very few indeed gave up their wives; happy were the contumacious if their contumacy brought no worse consequence than to beg their bread on the road; happy if it did not lead to a speedy trial, conviction, and the certainty of becoming a fiery example. They might have made up their minds at the outset that Mercy was not a quality for which Mary would be conspicuous. Before the Fires of Smithfield began there were the executions for the Rebellion of Wyatt. It was an excellent opportunity for winning the hearts of the people; Lady Jane Grey’s party never had the smallest chance: she herself might have been allowed to be at liberty with no danger to the Queen, while to execute her boy-husband was as barbarous and useless as to execute herself. Fifty persons, however, officers, knights, and gentlemen, were put to death in consequence of the Rebellion. Four hundred common men were hanged about London. Fifty were hanged on gibbets, and there left to hang a great part of the summer.
ST. PETER AD VINCULA, OVERLOOKING TOWER GREEN
E. Gardner’s Collection.
Meantime, the people of London—partly exasperated by the sight of these gibbets; partly hating the Spanish marriage; partly hating the break-up of the Reformation—showed their minds in every possible way. They shot at preachers of Papistry; they dressed up a cat like a Roman Priest, and hanged it on a gallows in Cheapside; they found a girl who pretended to receive messages from a spirit. It was called the Spirit in the Wall. When the Eucharist was carried through Smithfield a man tried to knock the holy elements out of the priest’s hands. And on Easter Day a priest saying mass in St. Margaret’s, Westminster, was attacked by a man with a knife.
The Marian Persecution began in January 1555. The Queen issued a proclamation that bonfires should be lit in various places in the City to show the people’s joy and gladness for the abolition of heresies. This was the signal for the martyrdoms. John Rogers, Prebendary of St. Paul’s, was burned, to begin with, at Smithfield; Hooper, at Gloucester; Ferrar at St. David’s; Rowland Taylor at Hadleigh; Lawrence Saunders at Coventry; William Flower at Westminster; John Cardmaker at Smithfield; John Bradford at Smithfield. It is enough to state that the martyrs of this Persecution were two hundred and eighty-eight in number: including five Bishops, twenty-one clergy, fifty-five women, four children, and two hundred and three laymen. Of the laymen, only eight were gentlemen. I will invite consideration of this fact later on.
The flames of martyrdom lasted till within a month of Mary’s end. It is difficult to understand how the Bishops could believe that the burning of this kind of heretic stamped out heresy. Hundreds, nay, thousands, of families went in perpetual mourning for the death of brother or cousin, a martyr faithful to the end. The Bishops might have understood the signs of the times: they might have seen the Mayor and Aldermen trying vainly to show conviction rather than obedience in attending all the processions and functions of the Church at which the people looked on sullenly and with murmurs; they might have listened to the wisdom of Cardinal Pole, who pointed out to the Queen and the Council that these severities were destructive to the Catholic Faith in the country. The Persecution reads like the revenge of a revengeful woman. “Burn! Burn! Burn!” she cries. “To avenge the tears of my mother; to avenge the unhappiness of my childhood; to avenge the act that made me illegitimate; to avenge the marriage of Anne Boleyn. Burn! Burn! Burn!”