Section 510

faith, which he preeented to the king. Being again cited to appear before the archbiahop, and refusing compliance, he wais committed to the Tower by the idng's order. '* Upon the 26th of September, 1418, he was brooght again by the lieutenant of the Tower be- fore the archbishop, the bishops of London, Winches- ter, and Bangor sitting upon the bench with Mm. The archbishop desired Sir John to move for the abso- lution of the Church in the customary form. He re- plied he would b^ absolution of none but Grod Al- mighty. After this, the archbishop desired him to make an express declaration concerning the sacrament of the altar. To which he gave this answer: tiiat as Christ, when upon earth, consisted of the divine and human nature, his divinity being concealed under his humanity, so in the sacrament of the altar there is both a real body and real bread ; that the bread is the object of our sight, but that the body of Christ, con- tained or shrooded under it, is imperceptible to our senses. When he was pressed closer to the point of transubetantiation, he declared expressly against it, adding withal that the common belief in tlSs article was a contradiction to the holy Scriptures ; that the decision was modem, and that the Church did not vary thus from the old standard till she was poisoned by being endowed. And as to penance and confession, he affirmed that if any person happened to be under the misfortune of any great crime, and was not in a condition to disentangle himself, he conceived it would be advisable to make use of the direction of some holy and discreet priest. But then he did not think there was any necessity of confessing to the parish curate, or any other of that character ; for that in this case there was needed no man than contrition iQ cancel the &alt and restore the penitent. Touching the worship- ]Hng the cross, he maintained that only the body of Christ, which hung upon the cross, ought to be adored. And being further interrogated what regard was to be paid to the resemblance of that cross, to this he replied directly that all the reverence he could pay was only to clean it and keep it handsomely. Being interroga- ted further about the power of the keys, and what his opinion was of the character and authority of the pope, of the archbishops, and bishops, he made no scruple to declare that the pope was downright Antichrist, and the head of that party ; that the bishops were the members, and the friars the hinder parts of this anti- Christian society ; that we ought to obey neither pope nor prelates any further than their virtue and probity could command; and that unless they imitated our Saviour and St. Peter in the sanctity of their lives, the pretence of their commission was not to be regarded ; that he who was most unblemished in his conduct, most remarkable for his sanctity, was St. Peter's suc- cessor, and that all other titles to Church authority idgnified nothing*' (Hook, EccL Biography, i, 817). Having remained six months in the Tower, he escaped mto Wales. In 1414 the king set a price of a thou- sand marks upon the bead of Cobham ; and for four years he continued in exile in Wales ; but at length his enemies engaged the lord Powis in their inter- est, who, by means of his tenants, secured and deliv- ered him up. He received sentence of death both as a heretic and a traitor. On the day appointed for his execution (Christmas, 1417) he was brought out of the Tower with his arms bound behind him, but with a cheerfid countenance. Arrived at the place of exe- cution, he devoutly fell upon his knees, and implored of God the forgiveness of his enemies. He was hung up alive by the middle, with iron chains, on the gal- lows which had been prepared, under which, a fire be- ing made, he was burned to death. — Jones, Christian Biography, s. v. ; Middleton, Metn/drs of the Rrformers (3 vols. Lond. 1829), i, 98 sq. ; England and F*rance im- der the Houm of Lancaster (London, 1862) p. 60-87 ; Erkctie Sevieto, 4th series, xvi, 249 ; Milner, Church History (Lond. 1829, 4 vols.), ui, 807-829.