Page:The Life of Sir Thomas More (William Roper, ed by Samuel Singer).djvu/126

 to church and be confessed, to hear mass, and be houseled; so did he likewise in the morning early the selfsame day that he was summoned to appear before the lords at Lambeth. And whereas he evermore used before, at his departure from his wife and children, whom he tenderly loved, to have them bring him to his boat, and there to kiss them, and bid them all farewell, then would he suffer none of them forth of the gate to follow him, but pulled the wicket after him, and shut them all from him: and with a heavy heart, as by his countenance it appeared, with me and our four servants there took boat towards Lambeth. Wherein sitting still sadly a while, at the last he rounded me in the ear and said; "son Roper, I thank our Lord the field is won." What he meant thereby I then wist not, yet loath to seem ignorant, I answered; "Sir, I am thereof very glad." But, as I conjectured afterwards, it was for that the love he had to God wrought in him so effectually that it conquered all his carnal affections utterly. Now at his coming to Lambeth, how wisely he behaved himself before the commissioners at the ministration of the oath unto him, may be found in certain Letters of his sent to my wife remaining in a great book of his