Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 38.djvu/444

Rh assumed a like attitude to the new oath, and he shared More's punishment.

More's contention that the recent act of succession did not justify the oath impugning the papal supremacy was acknowledged by some members of the council. Accordingly, when parliament met again on 3 Nov. 1534, it was voted that the double-barrelled oath as administered to More and Fisher was to be ‘reputed the very oath intended by the act of succession.’ ‘At the same time More was attainted of misprision of treason; grants of laud made to him in 1522 and 1525 were resumed; he was declared to be a sower of sedition and guilty of ingratitude to his royal benefactor.

As a knight, More paid, while in the Tower, fees of 10s. a week for himself and 5s. for his servant, and was treated with much leniency by his gaolers. Although his physical health was bad he suffered from oppression on the chest, gravel, stone, and cramp his spirits were always untameable, and he talked with his family and friends, on their occasional visits to him, with infectious gaiety. In the first days of his imprisonment he wrote many letters, performed punctually all pious observances, and prepared a ‘Dialogue of Comfort against Tribulation’ and treatises on Christ's passion. His resolution to adhere to his position was immovable. His wife, who did not appreciate his conscientious scruples, urged him in vain to yield to the king and gain his freedom. His cheerful reply, ‘Is not this house as nigh heaven as mine own?’ failed to convince her. His stepdaughter, Lady Alington, and his daughter Margaret also begged him to reconsider his action with greater tact, but with no greater success. At the end of 1534 Lady More and her children petitioned Henry for his pardon and release on the ground of his sickness and their poverty. ‘His offence,’ they asserted, ‘is not of malice or obstinacy, but of such a long-continued and deep-rooted scruple as passeth his power to avoid and put away’ (Arundel MS. 152, f. 300 b). In May 1535 the appeal was renewed. Lady More had been compelled to sell her clothes to pay her husband's fees for board in prison (, Letters, ii. 178-80). But Henry was obdurate. In January 1535 he bestowed More's Oxfordshire property (Doglington, Fringford, and Barly Park) on Henry Norris, and in April his manor of South in Kent on Anne Boleyn's brother, George, viscount Rochford. The Duke of Suffolk made application for the Chelsea property, but it was not immediately disposed of.

The parliament that had met in November conferred, for the first time, on Henry the title of Supreme Head of the Church, and rendered it high treason to ‘maliciously’ deny any of the royal titles. In April 1535 Cromwell went to the Tower and asked More for his opinion of these new statutes: were they lawful in his eyes, or no ? More declared himself a faithful subject to the king, and declined any further answer. On 7 May and 3 June the scene was repeated. Cromwell at the third meeting threatened that the king would compel More to give a precise reply. On 12 June Rich, the solicitor-general, held a conversation with him, which is variously reported by the interlocutors. Rich asserted that More denied the right of parliament to confer the ecclesiastical supremacy on the king. On 7 June the discovery that More had succeeded in interchanging letters with his fellow-prisoner, Fisher, had given the council a new opportunity of attack. An inquiry, more rigorous than before, was held on 14 June; More admitted that he had sent Fisher from time to time accounts of his examinations, and had made similar communications to his daughter. He had received replies, but they had conspired together in nothing. The old questions were put to him again, but with the old result. He was accordingly deprived of books and writing materials, although he occasionally succeeded in writing to his wife and daughter Margaret on scraps of paper with pieces of coal. Thenceforth he caused the shutters of his cell to be closed, and spent most of his time in the dark.

The end was now near. On 19 June the Carthusians were convicted and executed for refusing to accept the king's supremacy. Six days later Fisher suffered in the same cause, and royal orders were issued the same day bidding the preachers dwell on his treason and on More's conjointly. More learned the tidings with the utmost calmness. On 1 July he was himself indicted of high treason at Westminster Hall. A special commission of oyer and terminer for Middlesex had been issued for the purpose five days earlier to Lord-chancellor Audley, the Dukes of Norfolk and Suffolk, Cromwell, Anne Boleyn's father and brother, four other peers, and ten judges. The indictment rehearsed at great length that the prisoner had in divers ways infringed the Act of Supremacy (26 Hen. VIII, caps. 1 and 23); it relied for proof on his answers to the council while in the Tower, on the alleged correspondence with Fisher, and on the alleged conversation with Rich. More, owing to his infirmities, was allowed to be seated. With much dignity he denied the principal charges. He