XXXIII. CHAP. (strongly contrasted with the undisguised asperity of Mr. Solicitor Rich, who assisted him,) began with reading the indictment, which was of enormous length, but contained four principal charges:-1st, The opinion the prisoner had given on the King's marriage. 2dly, That he had written certain letters to Bishop Fisher encouraging him to resist. 3dly, That he had refused to acknowledge the King's supremacy; and, 4thly, That he had positively denied it, and thereby attempted to deprive the King of his dignity and title. When the reading of the indictment was over, the Lord Chancellor made a last attempt to bend the resolution of the prisoner by saying, "You see how grievously you have offended his Majesty, yet he is so merciful, that if you will lay away your obstinacy and change your opinion, we hope you may obtain pardon." More calmly replied, "Most noble Lords, I have great cause to thank your Honours for this your courtesy; but I beseech Almighty God that I may continue in the mind I am in, through his grace, unto death." No evidence to support the charge. Defence. The last was the only charge in the indictment which was at all sufficient in point of law to incur the pains of treason ; and it was unsupported by evidence. The counsel for the Crown at first contented themselves with putting in the prisoner's examinations, showing that he had declined answering the questions propounded to him by the Privy Councillors, with his answer, "that the statute was a two-edged sword." An excuse was made for not proving the supposed letters to Fisher, on the ground that they had been destroyed. The Lord Chancellor, instead of at once directing an acquittal, called upon the prisoner for his defence. A deep silence now prevailed - all present held their breath - every eye was fixed upon the victim. More was beginning with expressing his apprehension "lest, his memory and wit being decayed with his health of body through his long imprisonment, he should not be able properly to meet all the matters alleged against him," when he found that he was unable to support himself by his staff, and his judges evinced one touch of humanity by ordering him a chair. When he was seated, after a few preliminary observations, he considered the charges in their order. "As to the marriage," he said, "I confess that I always told the King my opinion thereon as my conscience dictated unto me, which I neither ever would, nor ought to have concealed; for which I am so far from thinking myself guilty of high treason, as that of the contrary, I being demanded my opinion by so great a Prince on a matter of such importance, whereupon the quietness of a kingdom dependeth, I should have basely flattered him if I had not uttered the truth: then I might have been accused as a wicked subject, and a perfidious traitor to God. If herein I have offended the King, it must be an offence to tell one's mind plainly when our Prince asketh our advice." 2. As to the letters to Fisher, he himself stated the contents of them, and showed that they were free from all blame. 3. On the charge that he had declined to declare his opinion, when interrogated, respecting the supremacy, he triumphantly answered, "that he could not transgress any law, or incur any crime of treason, by holding his peace; God only being judge of our secret thoughts." Here he was interrupted by Mr. Attorney, who said, "Although we had not one word or deed to object against you, yet have we your silence, when asked whether you acknowledged the King to be Supreme Head of the Church, which is an evident sign of a malicious mind." But Mr. Attorney was put down (and, notwithstanding the gravity of the occasion, there was probably a laugh against him,) by More quietly reminding him of the maxim among civilians and canonists" Qui tacet, consentire videtur." "He that holdeth his tongue is taken to consent." 4. On the last charge he argued, that the only proof was his saying that “the statute was a two-edged sword," which was meant as a reason for his declining to answer, and could not possibly be construed into a positive denial of the King's supremacy. He concluded with a solemn avowal, that "he never spake word against this law to any living man.” CHAP. XXXIII. The jury, biassed as they were, seeing that if they credited More about all the evidence, there was not the shadow of a case against the prisoner, were about to acquit him; the Judges were in to be acquitted. XXXIII. Rich, General, becomes CHAP. dismay-the Attorney-General stood aghast — when Mr. Solicitor, to his eternal disgrace, and to the eternal disgrace of the Court who permitted such an outrage on decency, left the bar, and presented himself as a witness for the Crown. Being sworn, he detailed the confidential conversation he had witness and had with the prisoner in the Tower on the occasion of the removal of the books; and falsely added, that upon his admitting that "no parliament could make a law that God should not be God," Sir Thomas declared, "No more could the parliament make the King Supreme Head of the Church." commits perjury. More's reply on this evidence. I - The prisoner's withering reply must have made the mean and guilty wretch feel compunction and shame, for which his subsequent elevation must have been a miserable recompense: "If I were a man, my Lords, that did not regard an oath, I needed not at this time in this place, as is well known unto every one, to stand as an accused person. And if this oath, Mr. Rich, which you have taken be true, then pray that I never see God in the face; which I would not say were it otherwise to gain the whole world." Having truly related the whole conversation, he continued, "In good faith, Mr. Rich, I am more sorry for your perjury than for mine own peril. Know you that neither I, nor any man else to my knowledge, ever took you to be a man of such credit as either I or any other would vouchsafe to communicate with you in any matter of importance. As you well know, I have been acquainted with your manner of life and conversation a long space, even from your youth upwards; for we dwelt long together in one parish; where as yourself can well tell (I am sorry you compel me to speak it) you were always esteemed very light of your tongue, a great dicer and gamester, and not of any commendable fame either there or in the Temple, the Inn to which you have belonged. Can it therefore seem likely to your honourable Lordships, that, in so weighty a cause, I should so unadvisedly overshoot myself as to trust Mr. Rich, a man always reputed of me for one of so little truth and honesty, about my sovereign Lord the King, to whom I am so deeply indebted for his manifold favours, or any of his noble and grave counsellors, that I XXXIII. should declare only to him the secrets of my conscience, CHAP. touching the King's supremacy, the special point and only mark so long sought for at my hands, which I never did nor ever would reveal after the statute once made, either to the King's Highness himself, or to any of his noble counsellors, as it is well known to your Honours, who have been sent for no other purpose at sundry times from his Majesty's person to me in the Tower. I refer it to your judgments, my Lords, whether this can seem a thing credible unto any of you." This address produced a deep effect upon the by-standers, and even on the packed jury; and Mr. Solicitor was so much alarmed, that, resuming his capacity of counsel for the Crown, he called and examined Sir Richard Southwell and Mr. Palmer, in the hope that they might be as regardless of truth as himself, and corroborate his testimony; but they both said they were so busy in trussing up the books in a sack, they gave no ear to the conversation. up of Lord The Chief Commissioner, however, gallantly restored the Summing fortune of the day; and in an ingenious, animated, and sar- Audley. castic summing up, pointed out the enormity of the offence charged; the danger to the King, and the public tranquillity from the courses followed by the prisoner; that the evidence of the Solicitor General, which he said was evidently given with reluctance and from a pure motive, stood uncontradicted, if not corroborated, as the denial of the prisoner could not be taken into account;- that as the speech related by the witness undoubtedly expressed the real sentiments of the prisoner, and was only drawing a necessary inference, there was every probability that it was spoken; and that, if the witness was believed, the case for the Crown was established. guilty. The jury retired from the bar, and in about a quarter of Verdict of an hour (to the horror, if not the surprise, of the audience,) brought in a verdict of GUILTY; "for," says his descendant, "they knew what the King would have done in that case."* But it is possible that being all zealous Protestants, who looked with detestation on our intercourse with the Pope, XXXIII. - CHAP. and considering that the King's supremacy could not be honestly doubted, they concluded that, by convicting a Papist, they should be doing good service to religion and the state, and that, misled by the sophistry and eloquence of the presiding Judge, they believed that they returned an honest verdict. Forms ob served before sentence. Sentence of death passed. Audley was so delighted, that, forgetting the established forms of proceeding on such an occasion, he eagerly began to pronounce judgment. More interrupted him, and, his pulse still beating as temperately as if sitting in his library at Chelsea talking to Erasmus, "My Lord," said he, "when I was towards the law, the manner in such cases was to ask the prisoner before sentence whether he could give any reason why judgment should not proceed against him." The Chancellor in some confusion owned his mistake, and put the question. More was now driven to deny the power of parliament to pass the statute transferring the Headship of the Church from the Pope to the King, and he took some exceptions to the frame of the indictment. The Chancellor, being loth now to have the whole burden of this condemnation to lie upon himself, asked openly the advice of my Lord Chief Justice of England, Sir John Fitzjames, "whether this indictment were sufficient, or no?"-Fitzjames, C. J. "My Lords all, by St. Gillian (ever his oath), I must needs confess, that if the act of parliament be not unlawful, then the indictment is not, in my conscience, insufficient." * Lord Chancellor. "Lo! my Lords, lo! You hear what my Lord Chief Justice saith. Quod adhuc desideramus testimonium ? Reus est mortis.” He then pronounced upon him the frightful sentence in cases of treason, concluding with * Sharon Turner, actuated by his sense of the "mild and friendly temper" of Henry VIII., (taking a very different view of his character from Wolsey or More, when they were most familiar and in highest favour with him,) is desirous of palliating this prosecution; and a full copy of the indictment not being forthcoming, supposes that there were other charges against More of which we know nothing but the whole course of the proceeding, as well as all contemporary evidence, shows, that he was tried under 26 H. 8. c. 13., for "imagining to deprive the King of his title and dignity," the denial of the supremacy being the overt act relied upon.-See Turn. Hist. H. VIII. |