‘Expositio fidelis de morte D. Thomae Mori et quorundam aliorum insignium virorum in Anglia Anno mdxxxv.’

This small Latin book, printed in Paris during the very month following their deaths, is interesting from the fact, besides other points, that it is the most contemporary account at any length which we possess of the death of the victims of Henry’s cruelty. It is not exactly a rare book, but is certainly not a popular one, and in any case the story which it gives is worth making more widely known.

The author shows a considerable local knowledge of London, as well as being fairly acquainted with the English judicial system, English titles, habits and so forth. We will leave the question of the authorship of this and one or two related accounts until the end of this paper.

After the usual introduction the author goes on : ‘You will receive, therefore, my dearest Sir, from your far from cheerful friend an account of the death of certain very eminent Englishmen, but especially that of Thomas More, who was during his life a famous baron and supreme judge of the kingdom whom those people call the Chancellor.

The phrase ‘class war’ is in common use, and like many another phrase is more readily uttered than defined. Daily do we read of the ‘preaching of class war’ or the denouncing of class war, and vague but decidedly horrible visions are projected of arson, murder and red terror. (‘All Sir Leicester Dedlock’s old misgivings relative to Wat Tyler, and the people in the iron districts who do nothing but turn out by torchlight’ may be recalled, and ‘the obliterating of landmarks, opening of floodgates, and all the rest of it.’)

The trouble with metaphors is that they will conjure up such vastly different and often such very shocking visions. Other military metaphors in common use are less disturbing. The ‘hotly-contested fight’ of the cricket field, or the by-election, suggests no bloodshed. The vigorous campaign of the politician is not more fearful than the ‘fierce attack’ of the forwards, or the ‘stubborn defence’ of the goal-keeper in the football season. As for leading ‘forlorn hopes’ and the readiness to ‘die in last ditches,’ we may approve the sentiment even when we find the metaphor somewhat absurd. That the motto of the famous Middlesex Regiment should be calmly appropriated by a section of one of our political parties, that ‘Die Hard’ should come to be used for a set of opinions, is perhaps the most glaring example of this fondness for military terms in civil life.

Ever since the Council of Trent defined that ‘in the Mass is offered a true and proper Sacrifice’ (Conc. Trid. Sess. XXII, De Sacrificio Missae. Can. I), theological speculation in the schools has been rife evolving multifarious theories as to how the Mass is a Sacrifice, or what it is that formally determines the sacrificial character of the Mass. Various views have been advanced with which famous names of the Society of Jesus are identified, as, for instance, Vasquez, de Lugo, Perrone, Franzelin, Schouppe, Pesch and Billot. These theologians unanimously agree that the immolation of the Victim in the Sacred Passion is itself the complete Oblation or Sacrifice of Redemption, and that this Immolation was an Act of Sacrificial Oblation distinct from, and subsequent to the Last Supper. Not one of these theologians even implies that Immolation is not itself the complete act of Sacrificial Oblation. For example, Cardinal Billot, whom justly Père de la Taille calls a Prince of Theologians, teaches that Immolation is the Sacrificial Oblation of a bloody Sacrifice whether the term be applied to the Mosaic Sacrifices or to the Sacred Passion (cf. Billot, De Sacrific. Miss. Thesis liv, § 2). In the elaboration of their views—although conceivably we may not entirely agree with any one of them—it is notable that on the subject of the Redemptive Sacrifice they keep strictly within the limits traced by theological Tradition and the Council of Trent.

Recent affairs have stirred afresh the interest in early British intercourse with Russia which Hakluyt and Early Voyages awakened. To those who love to find history repeating itself it will be especially gratifying to learn that three centuries ago there was a projected Russian treaty which failed. In 1623 the movers were the representatives of the Royal Houses of Stewart and Romanoff; in 1924 they were the Socialist and Soviet Governments of the two countries of Great Britain and Russia.

Casting a glance on previous relations and events it is to be recalled that the Muscovy Trading Company was formed nearly fifty years before the famous East India Company. In 1635 this financial venture (the outcome of the veteran Cabot’s voyages of discovery) was entered into by many persons of high degree as well as by influential merchants, and received a royal charter. Three ships were equipped, and under the leadership of Chancellor made the voyage and returned with many promised trading privileges from the Czar, Ivan the Terrible. So the Muscovy Company was reconstituted into the ‘Company for the Discovery of New Trades,’ and, in its royal charter in 1566, was empowered to secure solely any trade’ established by sailing north, north-east or north-west from England.’ These terms suggest the spacious times to which they belong.