Sept. 25.more and more loudly in identifying a separation from Rome with heresy. The presence of these very Germans had given opportunity, however absurdly, for scandal; and, taken in connection with the destruction of the shrines, was made a pretext for charging the King with a leaning towards doctrines with which he was most anxious to disavow a connection.[1] The political clouds which were gathering abroad, added equally to the anxiety, both of the King and his ministers, to stand clear in this matter; and as Cromwell had recommended, after the Pilgrimage of Grace, that the Articles of Unity should be enforced against some offender or offenders in a signal manner—so, to give force to his principles, which had been faintly acted upon, either he, or the party to which he belonged, now chose out for prosecution a conspicuous member of the Christian brotherhood, John Lambert, who was marked with the dreadful reputation of a sacramentary. Dr Barnes volunteered as the accuser. Barnes, it will be remembered, had been himself imprisoned for heresy, and had done penance in St Paul's. He was a noisy, vain man, Lutheran in his views, and notorious for his hatred of more advanced Protestants. Tyndal had warned the brethren against him several years pre-
- ↑ 'They have made a wondrous matter and report here of the shrines and of burning of the idol at Canterbury; and, besides that, the King's Highness and council be become sacramentarians by reason of this embassy which the King of Saxony sent late into England.'—Theobald to Cromwell, from Padua. October 22, 1538: Ellis, third series, vol. iii.
Henry VIII., September 25, 1538: State Papers, vol. viii.
