established and in full possession of the religious houses, the universities, and the learned professions. The foe that was advancing in the opposite direction, though without the conscience of a hostile purpose, was the new power of human reason animated with the revived sentiment of classicism. In More’s mind both these hostile influences found a congenial home. Each had its turn of supremacy, and in his early years it seemed as if the humanistic influence would gain the final victory. About the age of twenty he was seized with a violent access of devotional rapture. He took a disgust to the world and its occupations, and experienced a longing to give himself over to an ascetic life. He took a lodging near the Charterhouse, and subjected himself to the discipline of a Carthusian monk. He wore a sharp shirt of hair next his skin, scourged himself every Friday and other fasting days, lay upon the bare ground with a log under his head, and allowed himself but four or five hours’ sleep. This access of the ascetic malady lasted but a short time, and More recovered to all outward appearance his balance of mind. For the moment the balance of his faculties seemed to be restored by a revival of the antagonistic sentiment of humanism which he had imbibed from the Oxford circle of friends, and specially from Erasmus. The dates as regards More’s early life are uncertain, and we can only say that it is possible that the acquaintance with Erasmus might have begun during Erasmus’s first visit to England in 1499. Tradition has dramatized their first meeting into the story given by Cresacre More[1]—that the two happened to sit opposite each other at the lord mayor’s table, that they got into an argument during dinner, and that, in mutual astonishment at each other’s wit and readiness, Erasmus exclaimed, “Aut tu es Morus, aut nullus,” and the other replied, “Aut tu es Erasmus, aut diabolus!” Rejecting this legend, which bears the stamp of fiction upon its face, we have certain evidence of acquaintance between the two men in a letter of Erasmus, with the date “Oxford, 29th October 1499.” If we must admit the correctness of the date of Ep. 14 in the collection of Erasmus’s Epistolae, we should have to assume that their acquaintance had begun as early as 1497. It rapidly ripened into warm attachment. This contact with the prince of letters revived in More the spirit of the “new learning,” and he returned with ardour to the study of Greek, which had been begun at Oxford. The humanistic influence was sufficiently strong to save him from wrecking his life in monkish mortification, and even to keep him for a time on the side of the party of progress. He acquired no inconsiderable facility in the Greek language, from which he made and published some translations. His Latin style, though wanting the inimitable ease of Erasmus and often offending against idiom, is yet in copiousness and propriety much above the ordinary Latin of the English scholars of his time.
More’s attention to the new studies was always subordinate to his resolution to rise in his profession, in which he was stimulated by his father’s example. As early as 1502 he was appointed under-sheriff of the city of London, an office then judicial and of considerable dignity. He first attracted public attention by his conduct in the parliament of 1504, by his daring opposition to the king’s demand for money. Henry VII. was entitled, according to feudal laws, to a grant on occasion of his daughter’s marriage. But he came to the House of Commons for a much larger sum than he intended to give with his daughter. The members, unwilling as they were to vote the money, were afraid to offend the king, till the silence was broken by More, whose speech is said to have moved the house to reduce the subsidy of three-fifteenths which the Government had demanded to £30,000. One of the chamberlains went and told his master that he had been thwarted by a beardless boy. Henry never forgave the audacity; but, for the moment, the only revenge he could take was upon More’s father, whom upon some pretext he threw into the Tower, and he only released him upon payment of a fine of £100. Thomas More even found it advisable to withdraw from public life into obscurity. During this period of retirement the old dilemma recurred. One while he devoted himself to the sciences, “perfecting himself in music, arithmetic, geometry and astronomy, learning the French tongue, and recreating his tired spirits on the viol,”[2] or translating epigrams from the Greek anthology; another while resolving to take priest’s orders.
From dreams of clerical celibacy he was roused by making acquaintance with the family of John Colt of New Hall, in Essex. The “honest and sweet conversation” of the three daughters attracted him, and though his inclination led him to prefer the second he married the eldest, Jane, in 1505, not liking; to put the affront upon her of passing her over in favour of her younger sister. The death of the old king in 1509 restored him to the practice of his profession, and to that public career for which his abilities specially fitted him. From this time there was scarce a cause of importance in which he was not engaged. His professional income amounted to £400 a year, equal to £4000 in present money, and, “considering the relative profits of the law and the value of money, probably indicated as high a station as £10,000 at the present day” (Campbell). It was not long before he attracted the attention of the young king and of Wolsey. The spirit with which he pleaded before the Star Chamber in a case of The Crown v. The Pope recommended him to the royal favour, and marked him out for employment. More obtained in this case judgment against the Crown. Henry, who was present in person at the trial, had the good sense not to resent the defeat, but took the counsel to whose advocacy it was due into his service. In 1514 More was made master of the requests, knighted, and sworn a member of the privy council. He was repeatedly employed on embassies to the Low Countries, and was for a long time stationed at Calais as agent in the shifty negotiations carried on by Wolsey with the court of France. In 1519 he was compelled to resign his post of under-sheriff to the city and his private practice at the bar. In 1521 he was appointed treasurer of the exchequer, and in the parliament of 1523 he was elected Speaker. The choice of this officer rested nominally with the house itself, but in practice was always dictated by the court. Sir Thomas More was pitched upon by the court on this occasion in order that his popularity with the Commons might be employed to carry the money grant for which Wolsey asked. To the great disappointment of the court More remained firm to the popular cause, and it was greatly owing to his influence that its demands were resisted. From this occurrence may be dated the jealousy which the cardinal began to exhibit towards More. Wolsey made an attempt to get him out of the way by sending him as ambassador to Spain. More defeated the design by a personal appeal to the king, alleging that the climate would be fatal to his health. Henry, who saw through the artifice, and was already looking round for a more popular successor to Wolsey, made the gracious answer that he would employ More otherwise. In 1525 More was appointed chancellor of the duchy of Lancaster, and no pains were spared to attach him to the court. The king frequently sent for him into his closet, and discoursed with him on astronomy, geometry and points of divinity. This growing favour, by which many men would have been carried away, did not impose upon More. He discouraged the king’s advances, showed reluctance to go to the palace, and seemed constrained when there. Then the king began to come himself to More’s house at Chelsea, and would dine with him without previous notice. William Roper, husband of More’s eldest daughter, mentions one of these visits, when the king after dinner walked in the garden by the space of an hour holding his arm round More’s neck. Roper afterwards congratulated his father-in-law on the distinguished honour which had been shown him. “I thank our Lord,” was the reply, “I find his grace my very good lord indeed; and I believe he doth as singularly favour me as any subject within this realm. Howbeit, son Roper, I may tell thee I have no cause to be proud thereof, for if my head would win him a castle in France it should not fail to go.” As a last resource More tried the expedient of silence, dissembling his wit and affecting to be dull. This had the desired effect so far that he was less often sent for. But it did not alter the royal policy, and in 1529, when a successor had to be
