CRANMER. 



511 



only be used upon the end of an axis. The bell crank, 

 Fig. 2, may be used in any part of an axis. The 

 double crank, Fig. 3, produces two alternate motions, 

 reciprocating with each other. 



CRANMER, THOMAS, famous in the English re- 

 formation, during the reign of Henry VIII., was torn 

 in 1489. He entered as a student of Jesus college, 

 Cambridge, in 1503, took the degree of M.A., ob- 

 tained a fellowship, and, in 1523, was chosen reader 

 of theological lectures in his college, and examiner of 

 candidates for degrees in divinity. In the course of 

 conversation on the then meditated divorce of Henry 

 VIII. from his first wife, Catharine of Arragon, Cran- 

 mer remarked that the question of its propriety might 

 be better decided by consulting learned divines and 

 members of the universities than by an appeal to the 

 pope. The opinion thus delivered having been re- 

 ported to the king by doctor Fox, his majesty was 

 highly delighted with it, exclaiming, at the prospect 

 it afforded him of being able to remove the obstacles 

 to the gratification of his passions, " By , the 

 man has got the sow by the right ear !" Craniner 

 was sent for to court, made a king's chaplain, and 

 commanded to write a treatise on the subject of the 

 divorce. In 1530, he was sent abroad, with others, 

 to collect the opinions of the divines and canonists of 

 France, Italy, and Germany, on the validity of the 

 king's marriage. At Rome, he presented his treatise 

 to the pope, and afterwards proceeded to Germany, 

 where he obtained for his opinions the sanction of a 

 great number of German divines and civilians, and 

 formed such intimate connexions with the rising party 

 of the Protestants as probably influenced greatly his 

 future conduct. He also contracted marriage, though 

 in holy orders, with the niece of doctor Osiander, a 

 famous Protestant divine. Cranmer was employed 

 by the king to conclude a commercial treaty between 

 England and the Netherlands ; after which he was 

 ordered home, to take possession of the metropolitan 

 see of Canterbury. He hesitated to accept of this 

 dignity, professing to be scrupulous about applying 

 to the pope for the bulls necessary for his consecra- 

 tion. This difficulty was obviated by a vague and 

 secret protestation, which can be justified only on the 

 Jesuitical principle of the lawfulness of mental re- 

 servations or virtual falsehoods. The application 

 being therefore made, in the usual manner, to the 

 court of Rome, the pall and bulls were sent. Soon 

 after, he set the papal authority at defiance, by pro- 

 nouncing sentence of divorce between Henry and Ca- 

 tharine, and confirming the king's marriage with Anne 

 Boleyn. The pope threatened excommunication, and 

 an act of parliament was immediately passed for 

 abolishing the pope's supremacy, and declaring the 

 king chief head of the church of England. The arch- 

 bishop employed all his influence in forwarding such 

 measures as might give permanence to the reforma- 

 tion. The Bible was translated into English, and 

 dispersed among the people ; the monastic institutions 

 were suppressed ; the superstitious observances con- 

 nected with them were abolished ; and provision was 



made for the instruction of all ranks in the principles 

 of the prevailing party. 



In 1536, the casuistry of Cranmer was a second 

 time exerted, to gratify the base passions of his ty- 

 rannical sovereign. When Anne Boleyn was des- 

 tined to lose her reputation and her lie, that the 

 king might take another consort, it was determined 

 also to bastardize her issue ; and the archbishop 

 meanly stooped to pronounce a sentence of divorce, 

 on the plea that the queen had confessed to him her 

 having been contracted to lord Percy, before her 

 marriage with the king. The compliances of the pri- 

 mate served to insure him the gratitude of Henry, 

 though he was obliged to make some important sa- 

 crifices to royal prejudice, which was strongly in fa- 

 vour of the ancient faith, where that did not tend to 

 curb the king's own passions or prerogatives. In 

 1539 was passed an act of parliament, called the 

 bloody act, condemning to death all who supported 

 the right of marriage of priests, and communion of 

 both kinds to the laity, and who opposed transub- 

 stantiation, auricular confession, vows of chastity, 

 and the necessity of private masses. Cranmer op- 

 posed, as long as he dared, this enactment ; but, 

 finding his efforts vain, he gave way, and sent his 

 own wife back to her friends in Germany. He sub- 

 sequently succeeded in carry ing some points in favour 

 of further reformation ; and, in 1540, he published a 

 work for popular use, chiefly of his own composi- 

 tion, entitled the Necessary Erudition of a Christian 

 Man. 



On the death of Henry, in 1546 7, the archbishop 

 was left one of the executors of his will, and mem- 

 ber of the regency appointed to govern the king- 

 dom during the minority of Edward VI. He united 

 his interest with that of the earl of Hertford, after- 

 wards duke of Somerset, and proceeded to model 

 the church of England according to the notions of 

 Zuinglius, rather than those of Luther. By his in- 

 strumentality, the liturgy was drawn up and esta- 

 blished by act of parliament, and articles of religion 

 were compiled, the validity of which was enforced 

 by royal authority, and for which infallibility was 

 claimed. Under Cranmer 's ecclesiastical govern- 

 ment, Joan Bocher and George van Paris were 

 burnt as heretics ; and the fate of the former is 

 rendered peculiarly striking by the fact that the 

 primate, by his spiritual authority and pressing im- 

 portunity, constrained the young king to sign the 

 death warrant for the auto-da-fe of the unhappy 

 criminal, which he would not do till he had disbur- 

 dened his own conscience, by telling the archbishop 

 that, if the deed were sinful, he should answer for it 

 to God. The exclusion of the princess Mary from 

 the crown, by the will of her brother, was a mea- 

 sure in which Cranmer joined the partisans of lady 

 Jane Grey, apparently in opposition to his own 

 judgment. With others who had been most active 

 in her elevation, he was sent to the Tower on the 

 accession of Mary. That princess had personal 

 obligations to Cranmer, who is said to have pre- 

 served her from the anger of her father, which 

 menaced her with destruction, for her pertinacious 

 adherence to the Catholic faith ; but she could not 

 forget or forgive the disgrace of her mother and her- 

 self, in effecting which, the archbishop had been so 

 important an agent ; he was therefore destined to 

 become the victim of popish ascendency. He was 

 tried before commissioners sent from Rome, on the 

 charges of blasphemy, perjury, incontinence, and 

 heresy, and cited to appear within eighty days at 

 Rome, to deliver, in person, his vindication to the 

 pope.' To comply with this mandate was impossible, 

 as he was detained in prison ; nevertheless he was 

 declared contumacious for not making his appear- 



