Latimer thereafter sought retirement in the countr3-, where he would have continued to reside had not an ac- cident befallen him, the effects of which he thought the skill of London surgeons would alleviate. He arrived in London when the power of Cromwell was nearly at an end, and the mastery in the hands of Gardiner, who no sooner discovered him in his privacy than he pro- cured accusations to be made against him for his objec- tions to the Six Articles, and he was committed to the Tower. Different causes being alleged against him, he remained a prisoner for the remaining six years of king Henry YIH's reign, his enemies evidently designing mainly to prevent his influence for the cause of the Re- formers in the capital of the nation. Upon tlie accession of Edward YI Parliament offered to restore him to his see, but Latimer was firm in his refusal to receive it : his great age, he said, made him desirous of freedom from any and all respcmsibility. He preached, however, fre- quently, and gave himself up to all manner of benevo- lent works. He was a decided opponent of " the bloody Bonner;" occasionally his advice was sought for by the king, and he was continually active as the strenuous re- prover of the vices of the age; but the reign was short, and with it expired Latimer's prosperity. In July, 1553, king Edward died ; . in September, Mary had begun to take vengeance on the Reformers, and, among oth- ers, Latimer was committed to the Tower. Though he was at least eighty years old, no consideration was shown for his great age, and he was sent to Oxford, March 8, 1554, together with Cranmer and Ridley, to dis-
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pnte on the corporal presence. He had never been ac- counted very learned : he had not used Latin much, he told them, these twenty years, and Avas not able to dis- pute; but he would declare his faith, and then they might do as they pleased. He declared that he thought the presence of Christ in the sacrament to be only spir- itual; "he enlarged much against the sacrifice of the mass, and lamented that they had changed the com- munion into a private mass; that they had taken the cup away from the people ; and, instead of service in a known tongue, were bringing the nation to a worshiji that they did not understand" (Burnet, Re furmation, vol. ii). He was laughed at, and told to answer their argu- ments; he reminded them that he was old, and that his memory had failed; the laughter, however, continued, and there was great disorder, perpetual shoutings, taunt- ings, and reproaches. When he was asked whether he would abjure his principles, he only answered, "I thank God most heartil}' that he hath prolonged my life to tliis end, that I may in this case glorify God with this kind of death." He was found guilty of heresj' and sentenced to death, but the Romanists, to make sure that no claims for the irregularity of the trial shoidd be charged upon them, set aside the sentence which had been passed at the first trial, and, by direction of cardinal Pole, an- other commission, consistmg of Brookes, bishop of Glou- cester; Ilolyman, bishop of Bristol; and White, bishop of Lincoln, was convened on the 7th of September, under the altar of St. Mary's Church at Oxford, and the three "arch heretics" given a second hearing and condemned. Latimer was the last introduced. He was now eighty years old, " dressed in an old threadbare gown of Bristol frieze, a handkerchief on his head with a night-cap over it, and over that again another cap, with two broad Haps buttoned under the chin. A leather belt was round his waist, to which a Testament was attached ; his specta- cles, without a case, hung from his neck. So stood the greatest man, perhaps, then living in the world, a pris- oner on his trial, waiting to be condemned to dcatli by men professing to be ministers of God. . . . Latimer's trial was the counterpart of Ridley's (see Froude, vi, 356 sq.) ; the charge was the same (on the sacrament), and the result was the same, except that the stronger intel- lect vexed itself less with nice distinctions. Bread was bread, said Latimer, and wine was wine ; there was a change in the sacrament, it was tnie, but the change was not in the nature, but the dignity" (Froude, vi, 359 sq.). Every effort was made to induce a recantation, but Latimer, like Ridley, remained lirm, and sentence was pronounced ii]ion them as heretics obstinate and in- curable, and on the 16th of October, 1555, both Latimer and Ridley were led to the stake and burnt, outside the north wall of the town, a short stone's throw from the southward corner of Baliol College, and about the same distance from Brocardo prison, where Cranmer still lin- gered. The last words of Latimer were addressed to his companion, and are characteristic of our subject : "Be of good comfort, master Ridley, and play the man : we shall this day light such a candle, by God's grace, in England, as 1 trust shall never be put out." Gunpow- der had been fastened about his body to hasten his death ; it took fire with the first flame, and he died im- mediately.