Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 02.djvu/152

 Arundel that he embarked in the Thames at London, passed through Sluys, Aardenborg, Ghent, Oudenarde, and various other places in the Low Countries, and at length, disguised as a monk going on a pilgrimage, came to Henry in the outskirts of Paris. The story, however, requires but a slight correction to bring it into harmony with the statements of other writers. The archbishop's nephew and namesake, Thomas, now Earl of Arundel, eager to avenge his father's death, escaped from the custody of his guardian, John Holland, duke of Exeter, and with the aid of a London merchant fled abroad to join his uncle at Cologne. It was he, in all probability, whose itinerary is given in Froissart, and who conveyed through his uncle the message of the city of London to Henry of Lancaster. There is no doubt, at all events, that the archbishop and the young earl were together with Henry abroad, and landed with him at Ravenspur. The archbishop accompanied Henry to the siege of Bristol, and afterwards into Wales, to intercept Richard's return from Ireland; and it was alleged that Richard's first offer to resign the crown was made to him and the Earl of Northumberland at Conway. Such was the statement of the archbishop himself in Heniy's first parliament, and it must be owned it has rather the look of a political fiction, like the other assertion, made at the same time, touching Richard's formal abdication in the Tower, that it was an act done with perfect willingness and with a cheerful countenance. It is certain that the archbishop had no interview with Richard at Conway, though he had one afterwards at Flint. At Conway it was still possible for the unhappy king to escape by sea, and the archbishop, instead of receiving from him then an offer to resign the crown, was plotting with Henry how to lure Richard into the power of the invader and cut off his retreat.

Soon after his return Arundel took possession again of his see of Canterbury, Roger Walden being regarded as an intruder. He took his place at once in parliament as archbishop, and was one of the lords who witnessed the abdication of Richard in the Tower. This being reported next day to the assembled peers, and Henry having challenged the crown as his right, he took the new king by the right hand, and led him to the throne; then, after he was seated, delivered a sermon in parliament on the text 'Vir dominabitur populo' (1 Samuel ix. 17).

Henry was crowned by Arundel at Westminster on 13 Oct. At the feast in Westminster Hall the same day he sat on the king's right hand, and the Archbishop of York upon his left. For a few days he continued to discharge the duties of chancellor, which seem to have been again imposed upon him from the time that Richard fell into Henry's hands; but he presently resigned the great seal to John de Scarle, master of the rolls, afterwards archdeacon of Lincoln. He was lord chancellor again for the fourth time 1407, and for a fifth time in 1412. But his life after the accession of Henry IV is comparatively uneventful, being chiefly remarkable for two things: first, for his successful opposition to the demand of the Lacklearning parliament (1404) and the parliament of 1410 for a general disendowment of the church; and second, his proceedings against the Lollards. He seems also to have been sent on an embassy abroad in the year 1411, but of the particulars of this mission we have no information. The great business of his later life was to resist the tide of Lollardy. In 1401 he passed sentence of degradation upon Sawtree, and handed him over to the secular arm, when he was burned under the new statute against heresy. In 1408 he summoned a provincial council at Oxford, in which certain constitutions against the Lollards were drawn up, but not immediately published, In 1410 another heretic was brought before him, Badby, a tailor of Evesham, who denied transubstantiation, and, as he could not be induced to recant, was committed to the flames. In 1411 the old question arose again about the visitation of the university, and was settled in the manner we have already shown. In 1413, just after the accession of Henry V, arose the more important case of Sir John Oldcastle, Lord Cobham, whom the archbishop examined at great length, and finally condemned as a heretic, though he was not brought to the flames till some years after the archbishop's death. For Arundel died on 19 Feb. following of a sudden attack of some complaint in the throat. He was buried in his own cathedral, where he had caused a tomb to be erected in his lifetime, but it has been since destroyed.

It is difficult ftdly to appreciate the character and motives of any leading actor in those turbulent times. But we may well believe that Arundel's conduct throughout life was governed by a standard of duty which, though we may not always approve it, wvas in accordance with the general feeling and the principles of his own day. Nor does it appear that he was by any means unmerciful in his treatment of the unhappy heretics brought before him, whose ultimate doom, indeed, did not rest with him. His inhibitions of unlicensed preachers displeased