Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 5.djvu/572

552 the Cardinal and the Pope, he put on his cap, like Cranmer, declining to acknowledge their authority. But his scruples were treated less respectfully than the Archbishop's. He was ordered to take it off, and when he refused, it was removed by a beadle.

He was then charged with having denied transubstantiation, and the propitiatory sacrifice of the mass, and was urged at length to recant. His opinions on the real presence were peculiar. Christ, he said, was not the sacrament, but was really and truly in the sacrament, as the Holy Ghost was with the water at baptism and yet was not the water. The subtlety of the position was perplexing, but the knot was cut by the crucial question, whether, after the consecration of the elements, the substance of bread and wine remained. He was allowed the night to consider his answer, but he left no doubt what that answer would be. The bishops told him that they were not come to condemn him, their province was to condemn no one, but only to cut off the heretic from the Church, for the temporal judge to deal with as he should think fit. The cowardly sophism had been heard too often. Ridley thanked the court 'for their gentleness,' 'being the same which Christ had of the high priest:' 'the high priest said it was not lawful for him to put any man to death, but committed Christ to Pilate; neither would suffer him to absolve Christ, though he sought all the means therefor that he might.'

Ridley withdrew, and Latimer was then introduced—eighty years old now—dressed in a threadbare