effect, upon their rival. The Court of Rome could as little venture at the present day to send an unbeliever to the stake, as the Court of St James's; and the code of canon law for which the Reformers of the Church of England desired the sanction of Parliament, was no more tolerant of what the Church of England considers heresy, than the code of the Inquisition.[1]
The council could prosecute heretics. They were earnest, too, in the purification of the faith from superstition. The conscientious acceptance of the Prayer-book was possible as yet to believers in transubstantiation. The Prayer-book, with the help of the foreign refugees, was about to be revised, and Ridley was no sooner settled in the See of London, than he undertook
- ↑ Cranmer and the other authors of the Reformatio Legum, include, in a list of heresies, 'The denial of the inspiration of the Bible,' or 'of the inspiration of the Old Testament,' or 'of the two natures in Christ.' For the way in which these opinions were to be dealt with, they say: 'Fideles omnes in nomine Dei et Domini nostri Jesu Christi obtestamur ut ab his opinionibus pestilentissimis se longissime abducant. Et ab illis etiam vehementer contendimus qui rempublicam et ecclesiam administrant ut istas hæreses ex regno nostro penitus evellendas et radicitus extirpandas quantum in se est curent.'
A heretic was to be tried by a bishop. From a bishop he might appeal to the Court of Arches, and from the Court of Arches to the King's Bench.
'Qui vero,' the proposed law continued, 'qui vero nec admonitionem nec doctrinam ullâ ratione admittuut sed in Hæresi prorsus induraverunt, primum hæretici pronuntientur. A judice deinde legitimæ feriantur excommunicationis supplicio. Quæ sententia cum lata fuerit, si infra spatium sexdecim dierum ab hæresi recesserint, primum exhibeant publice manifesta pœnitentiæ indicia. Deinde solenniter jurent in illâ se nunquam hæresi rursus versaturos. Tertio contrariæ doctrinæ publice satisfaciant, ac his omnibus impletis absolvantur—Cum vero penitus insederit error … tum consumptis omnibus aliis remediis ad extremum ad civiles magistratus ablegetur puniendus, etc.'—Reformatio Legum.
