Sermon being ended, Dr. Cole asked him to clear himself of all suspicion of heresy, by making a public confession. "I will do so," said Cranmer, "and that with a good will." He rose up, and addressed the vast concourse, declaring his abhorrence of the Romish doctrines, and expressing his steadfast adherence to the Protestant faith. "And now," he said, "I come to the great thing that is troubling my conscience, more than anything that I ever did or said in my whole life. And forasmuch, as my hand offended, writing contrary to my heart, my hand shall therefore first be punished; for, may I come to the fire, it shall be first burned." Hardly had he uttered the words, when the priests, filled with fury at hearing a confession contrary to what they expected, dragged him tumultuously to the stake. It was already set up on the spot where Latimer and Ridley had suffered. As soon as the flames approached him, holding his right hand in the hottest of the fire, he exclaimed, "That unworthy right hand!" and there he kept it till it was consumed, repeatedly exclaiming, "That unworthy right hand!" His constancy amazed his persecutors. He stood in the midst of the flames unmoved as the stake to which he was bound. His last words were those familiar to so many martyrs, and first uttered by the noblest of all martyrs-"Lord Jesus, receive my spirit." And in a few moments, his happy soul, released from all its cares and troubles, joined his companions in the paradise of God. "Absent from the body, present with the Lord." (2 Cor. 5:88We are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord. (2 Corinthians 5:8).)
Within three years (from 1555 to 1558) according to the historians of the time, two hundred and eighty-four martyrs suffered by fire, while many perished in prison from hunger and ill-usage. "Over all England," says one, "from the eastern counties to Wales on the west, and from the midland shires to the shores of the English Channel, blazed those baleful fires. Both sexes, and all ages and conditions, the boy of eight and the man of eighty, were dragged to the stake and burnt, sometimes singly, at other times in dozens. Just two days before the death of the queen, five martyrs were burnt in one fire at Canterbury." The news of her death filled the country with rejoicings. It is said that bonfires were lighted, that the people setting tables in the street, and bringing forth bread and wine, "did eat, drink, and rejoice." Thus was fulfilled the saying of the wise king, "When it goeth well with the righteous, the city rejoiceth: and when the wicked perish, there is shouting. By the blessing of the upright the city is exalted: but it is overthrown by the mouth of the wicked." (Prov. 11:10, 1110When it goeth well with the righteous, the city rejoiceth: and when the wicked perish, there is shouting. 11By the blessing of the upright the city is exalted: but it is overthrown by the mouth of the wicked. (Proverbs 11:10‑11).) The world, notwithstanding the native enmity of the heart, bears its testimony to consistent godliness, both in princes and people; and what a testimony against wickedness when the death of a wicked ruler is matter of national exultation! So it was on the death of Mary; there was the shout of joy throughout the whole land. And such was the joy of Rome on the death of Nero; and of France on the death of Robespierre. And such shall it be at last when God shall judge the harlot, and avenge the blood of His saints at her hand. Then heaven shall rejoice, and shout its loud Alleluia! Alleluia! (Rev. 18:2020Rejoice over her, thou heaven, and ye holy apostles and prophets; for God hath avenged you on her. (Revelation 18:20).)
On the same day that Mary breathed her last-November 17th, 1558-died Cardinal Pole, her guilty counselor. The system of Jezebel, reared at the cost of so much blood, fell with these two, never to be restored. Mary's zeal for Rome had been fired into fanaticism by her marriage with Philip II. of Spain; and her three advisers-the bigoted Gardiner, the brutal Bonner, and the sanguinary Pole-led her to believe that in burning her Protestant subjects she was doing the will of God. When mourning the cold-heartedness of Philip, who rarely came to see her, Pole assured her that the estrangement of her husband was God's displeasure for her leniency towards the Amalekites: then a few more were sacrificed to bring over the gloomy bigot; but Philip cared not to come, which, with other things, in the great mercy of God to this afflicted nation, hastened her to the grave in the forty-third year of her age, and in the sixth of her reign.
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