Tyndale’s Answer
SIR THOMAS MORE’S DIALOGUE,
INTRODUCTORY Notice to Answer to Sir T. More 2
Preface to the Answer 5
Answer to Sir T. More’s Dialogue 11
To the First Book of the Dialogue 78
To the Second Book 110
To the Third Book 133
To the Fourth Book 170
Introductory Notice to the Supper of the Lord 218
The Supper of the Lord 222
Introductory Notice to Exposition of Tracy’s Testament 269
The Testament of W. Tracy, Esq 272
The Exposition of it 273
Specimens of Tyndale’s Transitions 284
Vol. i. p. 22, 1. 11. The word pastor is in old editions paster; probably an ancient typographic error for plaster .
p. 98, 1. 12, for 2 Cor. xii. r. 1 Cor. xiii.
p. 522, 1. 17, for iii. r. iv. Vol. II. p. 271, margin, for xiv. r. iii.
p. 307, note 5, for n. r. Cans. xi.
p. 335, 1. 19, for tasle, r. stale. Vol. in. p. 270, 1. 8, for Lib. i. r. Lib. in.
p. 272, 1. 9, for xiv. r. xix.
Sir Thomas More’s Dialogue
[Tyndale, Hi.]
[Introductory Notice
IT was in 1528, that Sir Thomas More, being already regarded as the most accomplished scholar in England, and having before his eyes a near prospect of being invited to fill the chief place in his sovereign’s council, was induced to accept bishop Tonstal’s permission to read the works of the reformers, that he might be qualified to refute them1; nor did he suffer the year to elapse before he had com posed, as the first fruits of his consequent researches and zeal, an imaginary dialogue between himself and the confidential messenger of a friend desirous to know his opinions respecting the religious ques tions which were then forcing themselves into general notice. In the edition of Sir Thomas More’s works, printed at London in 1557, and then dedicated to queen Mary, as ” To that person to whom specially of all worldly creatures the editor [William Rastell, Serjeant at law] trusted the book should be most acceptable,” the title of this effort to write down Tyndale and his labours is as follows: “A dialogue of Sir Thomas More, knt. one of the council of our sovereign lord the king, and chancellor of his duchy of Lancaster. Wherein he treated divers matters, as of the veneration and worship of images and reliques, praying to saints, and going on pilgrimages, with many other things touching the pestilent sect of Luther and Tyndale, by the one begun in Saxony, and by the other labored to be brought into England. Made in the year of our Lord, 1528.” The dialogue was divided by its author into four books; and occupies in that quarto edition a hundred and eighty-four closely printed pages.
The date in the above title-page tells when More’s Dialogue •was composed; but Mr Anderson’s researches have led him to con clude that it was not published till the summer of 15292. Tyndale’s title-page in like manner tells us that he made his answer in 1530; but though Vaughan’s dispatch to Henry VIII. of the date of Jan. 26, 1531, confirms this fact, it was not committed to the press till about the close of the spring of that year3. By that time More had been promoted from the chancellorship of the duchy to the elevated post of lord high chancellor of England. But the laborious duties of that judicial and political office did not prevent his undertaking to write a ” Confutacyon of Tyndall’s Answer ;” and on such a scale, that when he had not advanced beyond the first thirty pages of his opponent, he found he had written enough to fill a folio volume of above three hundred and sixty pages ; which was printed for him by his brother-in-law, William Rastell4, in 1532. It is divided into three books ; and the most prominent feature in the first book is the con-
[J Biog. Notice, Vol. i. p. xxxvi.]
[2 And. Annals of Eng. Bible, Vol. i. p. 237, B. i. $ 6.]
[3 See Biogr. Notice of Tyndale, pp. xlii— l.J
[4 Probably father to the serjeant.j
INTRODUCTORY NOTICE. 3 tinual recurrence of abusive mention of Luther’s marriage with Katha rine Boren. As she had been a nun, and Luther a priest, it was to be expected that More would consider their marriage as illegal and sinful ; and would consequently think himself entitled to speak of her as of a harlot. But it is strange that he should not have perceived, that there was neither argument nor decency in twitting Tyndale with Luther’s marriage, page after page, and in the coarsest terms, as More has here done. See especially, Conf. pp. vi— x.
When out of office, More continued his Confutacyon, till it had reached the length of nine books ; the eighth of which is however altogether a digression from Tyndale to Barnes. So wordy a reply to Tyndale’s Answer was not likely to have many readers; and we accordingly find that in five and twenty years it had fallen into such neglect that Serjeant Rastell could not meet with a complete copy of the ninth book, for his edition of More’s works. He had made his printer go on till he had put the last words of a fragment before him into type, viz. These things hath (I saye) — and there he was obliged to terminate his reprint with the following note : ” There can be no more found of this ninth book written by sir Thomas More.” Works, p. 832. It is however to the credit of More’s fairness, as a controver sialist, that the extracts from Tyndale incorporated into his Confuta cyon are so many, and so accurate, as to have been of material use to the present editor in his endeavour to form a correct text ; for which purpose he has also collated Day’s folio reprint of 1573, with a copy of Tyndale’s Answer, now in the Cambridge University Library, and not unlikely to have been the first edition. It is a black letter duo decimo, without date of place, or year. The type is foreign ; but is not Hans Luffs. The punctuation is German. It is not paged ; but the leaves are numbered in small Roman ordinals : and it is bound up with” A Disputacyon of purgatory e made by Johan Frith,” which is in the same type. We have already had occasion to mention that Frith is said, by a contemporary, to have superintended the printing of Tyndale’s Answer, at Amsterdam. Yol. i. p. 1.]
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