CHAPTER X.

THE precious volumes may have arrived in England in the spring or early summer of 1526, and any more definite assertion is only conjecture, even though the reckoning were made by the Old Style, which carried the end of the year to the last week of March. Many statements on this debated point want precision. Foxe mentions vaguely that Garret brought Tyndale's New Testament to Oxford about the year of our Lord 1526; but forgetful of what he had stated, he affirms in another place, that Tyndale first translated the New Testament "for the profit of the simple vulgar people" about A.D. 1527.1 Joye is as indeterminate as Foxe, for, referring, at the end of 1534 or beginning of 1535, to the octavo, he says: "Thou shalt know that Tyndale, about eight or nine years ago, translated and printed the New Testament, without calendar or concordances." But the date assigned by Christopher Anderson, D'Aubigné, and others, either the close of 1525, or the very beginning of 1526, cannot be sustained, for the following

reasons:

First, There is no ground for doubting the testimony of Cochlæus who was himself present, and made minute personal inquiries. The insurrection of the peasants, which broke out in Swabia on the 19th of July, 1524, and had extended to Frankfort by the middle of 1525, had driven him, a dean of the "Church of the Blessed Virgin" in that city, first to Mentz, and then to Cologne, where he abode for a time in busy seclusion. Tyndale had also come to the same city in the summer of 1525, and as both he and the fugitive dignitary 1 Vol. V, p. 421, p. 119. Apologie, fol. civ.

were employing the same printers, Cochlæus incidentally made the discovery about the mysterious volumes at press. Now, that discovery, as he asserts, was made soon after the despatch of Luther's letter to King Henry VIII, and it was dated 1st September, 1525. The printing had therefore begun some time before that period,1 and consequently it must have been far on in September, or in October, when Tyndale fled away with the sheets to Worms, to avoid the frustration of his labour. Though the utmost expedition possible at that early time had been used, several months must have been consumed in the printing of the octavo and the completing of the quarto. In all likelihood the books could scarcely be ready for exportation before March or April. Cochlæus affords yet another test. In his letter to James V of Scotland, dated 8th June, 1533, he boasts that, eight years before, he had interrupted the printing of the New Testament at Cologne, and thus points to the summer or autumn of 1525.

Second, The supposition that the New Testaments had arrived in January, 1526, does not allow sufficient time for the activity of Garret and other distributors. Garret must have been busy for a period in London, before he went down to Oxford, where he sold the books to "divers scholars," and "remained a while." But his industry had come to light; and search being made for him in the capital, his journey to Oxford was discovered, and measures were at once taken to arrest him in the University. This record of labour and travel on the part of Garret, and of information received and acted on by Wolsey and Tunstall, necessitates an interval of more than three weeks-all that Anderson's theory really allows. Besides, the volumes had been so long in Oxford, before the capture of Garret, that through the study of them there had been formed, prior to that event, "a tender and lately born little flock," so organized that its members called one another "brethren." These results could not have been produced in the single month of January; and it was in February that the search was instituted, though not in February, 1526.

Third, It was not till the metropolis had been explored in

1 Sheets had been printed as far as the letter K. See page 129.

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ARRIVAL OF THE NEW TESTAMENTS.

163

vain for Garret, that instructions were sent from Wolsey to seize him at Oxford. These orders were formally addressed, through Higden, Dean of Cardinal College, to Cottysford as commissary of the University, and he at once obeyed them. But Cottysford could not act as commissary or vice-chancellor in February, 1526, for he was not sworn into office till the 7th of December, 1527.1 The commissary easily caught Garret, and confined him in his own chamber; but when he went out to "evensong," the prisoner "put back the bar of the lock with his finger" and escaped. He was, however, soon seized near Bristol, through the agency of a chapman of that city, the father-in-law of Cole the university proctor; and Cole had given secret notice to Garret and other friends of the intended search.

Fourth, Henry sent first a Latin letter in reply to that of Luther, which he had received on the 20th of March, 1526, "after which letter written and sent him, the king translated it into English, of an especial favour toward his subjects." In the preface to the English letter he refers to the New Testament as being in the country, and calls immediate attention to many corruptions of the holy text, as "certain prefaces and other pestilent glosses in the margin" of the quarto. The Latin epistle was, however, not despatched till late in the year, and on 30th November, 1526, Sir John Wallop apparently acknowledges to Wolsey the receipt of it-"two packets of Luther's matters." 2 Immediately on its translation the English letter was printed by R. Pynson,-finished on the 2nd December, 1526.3 The king's criticism of the New Testament, and the avowal of his purpose that, on consultation with Wolsey, and other reverend fathers of the spiritualty, “the said untrue translation should be burned," imply that the Testaments had come somewhat recently into the country, and that they had been widely dispersed.

Fifth, Anderson's argument implies the extraordinary supposition, that King Henry answered Luther's epistle on the

1 Le Neve's Fasti, vol. III, p. 475, ed. Duffus Hardy.

2 State Papers, vol. I, p. 173.

3 A copy of this letter is in the Bodleian Library, and it is also printed in Herbert's Ames, p. 297.

very day on which he received it; for in allusion to Luther's letter, and the day of its reception, he exclaims, "Here, then, was Tyndale's quarto New Testament with glosses denounced as early as 20th March, 1526." The history of the royal letter, given in the previous sentences, disposes at once of the conjecture. Nor could the New Testaments be burned, as he asserts, on the 11th of February, 1526, for the reason already given, that they could not by that time have reached the English shores, and still less could Garret have received them, and begun to distribute them so early as January. Tyndale, in his "Obedience of a Christian Man," and in a personal attack on Bishop Fisher whose sermon he is reviewing, says, for the sake of "a like argument, Rochester and his holy brethren have burned Christ's testament." But does Tyndale here mean by "Christ's testament" his own translation? Does he ever call it by such a name? The word "testament" does not occur at all in the epilogue to the octavo, though in the prologue to the quarto he often mentions the "New Tes

tament." 1

Sixth, The authorities being roused by reports of New Testaments in individual and domestic use, resolved upon a vigorous and simultaneous search after the terrible book in the capital and in the universities. Anderson, and those who accept his premises, lay no small stress on this process as a proof of the early advent of the version, and date it in February, 1526, when the volumes could not by any possibility have arrived. Such inquisitorial and stealthy work certainly shows that the books had been for some considerable time in circulation; but the search dated by Anderson in 1526 could not have taken place at Oxford at that time: for, 1st, as has been shown in a previous paragraph, Dr. Cottysford, rector of Lincoln College, who was concerned in the transaction, and who acted under instructions sent from Wolsey to him as commissary or vice-chancellor of Oxford, was not officially installed till the 7th of December, 1527. 2nd, Dr. London, warden of New College, in writing to Longland, Bishop of

1 Anderson gets point to his in- thus,-have burned Christ's Testaterpretation by printing the clause ment.

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SEIZURE OF GARRET AT OXFORD.

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Lincoln, as Oxford then belonged to that diocese, intimated that the commissary had revealed "the matter" of Garret's arrest and escape to him, "on this Monday the vigil of St. Matthias." But in 1526, St. Matthias day fell on a Saturday, its vigil therefore being on the previous Friday, while in 1528 it fell on a Tuesday, so that its vigil was on the day indicated-a Monday. 3rd, in another letter written two days later, that is, on the 26th of February, Dr. London asserts that "this unhappy Mr. Garret had been at Oxford last Easter distributing books," and adds, "I fear Mr. Clark was his caller to Oxford." Now, to one writing in February, "last Easter" must be Easter of the previous year, or, in Anderson's baseless opinion, that of 1525. But the chronology breaks down at once, for Clark1 himself was not incorporated at Oxford till October 5th, 1525, and could not therefore some months before have invited Garret to the university. The Easter referred to must therefore have been that beginning on April 21st, 1527. 4th, Bishop Longland, in conveying the information about Garret to Wolsey, writes on "Ash Wednesday," which in 1526 was the 14th of February, or before St. Matthias day, that is really before the date of the letter, in consequence of the receipt of which he was sending his epistle; but in 1528, Ash Wednesday happened two days after St. Matthias day,2 or on February 26th or 27th. 5th, Dalaber, indeed, in his interesting and touching story of Garret's capture, dates the occurrence in 1526 or thereabouts. But he wrote from memory more than thirty years afterwards, in 1562, and he corrects his own mistake when he thus notes the period, "Master Ball, of Merton College, and Master Cole, of Magdalene College, being proctors in the month of February.” Now Ball became proctor only on the 10th of April, and therefore could not have acted in the preceding February; and as

1 Clark was one of those students imprisoned in the cellar under Cardinal College, and he died shortly afterwards.

2 St. Matthias day falls on the 24th of February, but in leap year on the 25th; and it is still observed

on that day in the Church of Rome. The discussion as to the proper day of its observance in leap year, and its connection with the old Julian year, may be seen in Wheatley's "Common Prayer," p. 248, Bohn's edition, and also in Demaus and Arber.