“No matter,” cried Bonner. “Let the sacramentarians conform outwardly. We care not to search their hearts. Enough for us if they profess themselves Catholics.”
“I grieve to hear you say so, my lord,” rejoined the Cardinal. “It is better to have an open enemy than a false friend. Our Church does not desire to encourage dissimulation, put to eradicate error and schism. I beseech your Majesty to pause before you proceed further in a course which I foresee is fraught with danger. Hitherto, all has gone well. Your enemies are confounded. Your people are loving and loyal, willing to make any sacrifices for you, save those of conscience. The faith of your forefathers is restored in its integrity. Your kingdom is reconciled to the Holy See. Is this an opportune moment for persecution? Would you sully the snowy banner of the Church with blood? Would you destroy a tithe of your subjects by fire and sword—by burning and massacre? Yet this must be done if persecution once commences. Such means of conversion are as unwarrantable as impolitic—contrary to the will of Heaven, and likely to provoke its wrath. I defy the advocates of severity towards heretics to produce a single passage from the Gospel that would authorise Christians to burn their fellow-men for questions purely of conscience. As, therefore, such rigour cannot be sustained by appeal to Holy Writ, neither can it be upheld by any other consideration. It will increase the evil complained of, rather than mitigate it.”
“Your Eminence forgets how much we have suffered from the Reformers,” remarked Bonner.
“If they have done ill, ought we to imitate them in ill-doing?” rejoined Pole. “Let us prove to them that we are better Christians than they are. Your Majesty may trust me, that the true way to convert the Protestants is to reform our own clergy, whose ill-regulated conduct has led to heresy and backsliding. Better this remedy than the stake.”
“All this shall to the Pope,” observed Gardiner, in a low tone, to Bonner. “His Eminence will be speedily recalled.”
“It is high time he should be recalled, if he entertains these opinions,” rejoined the other, in the same tone.
“Nothing that has been urged will shake my purpose,” said Mary. “I will free my kingdom from the curse that has so long afflicted it, even though I inundate the land with blood. But I agree with your Eminence that much reform is needful in our own clergy, whose manners provoke scandal, and encourage infidelity. I will address myself to the task. To you, my Lord Chancellor, and to you, my Lord Bishop,” she added to Gardiner and Bonner, “I commit the extirpation of heresy. Relax not in your efforts.”
“Rest assured we will not, gracious Madam,” replied Gardiner.
“Your Eminence seems to think,” observed Bonner to the Cardinal, “that the Lord Chancellor and myself have not used proper means of weaning back these misguided men from their errors. As there are two prisoners confined within the Lollards’ Tower for religious offences, may I venture to inquire whether you have succeeded in accomplishing their conversion?”
“Not as yet,” replied Pole; “but I do not despair of ultimate success.”