A.D. 1500-5. CHAP. IV. The leaven, silently but surely, was leavening the surrounding mass. But Colet probably did not see much of the secret results of his work. That it was his duty to do it was reason enough for his doing it; that it bore at least some visible fruit was sufficient encouragement to work on with good heart. Colet made Paul's. So the years went by; and as often as each term came round, Colet was ready with his gratuitous course of lectures on one or another of St. Paul's Epistles.' It happened that, in 1504, Robert Sherborn, Dean of Doctor and St. Paul's, was nominated, being then in Rome on an embassy, to the vacant see of St. David's. It was probably at the same time2 that Colet was called to discharge the duties of the vacant deanery, though, as Sherborn was not formally installed in his bishopric till April 1505, Colet did not receive the temporalities of his deanery till May in the same year.3 Colet is said to have owed this advancement to the patronage of King Henry VII. The title of Doctor was at length conferred upon him, preparatory to his acceptance of this preferment, and it would appear as an honorary mark of distinction.4 2 In Colet's epitaph it is stated 'structing them in the knowledge | following the example of St. Paul, 1'How many years did he (Colet), 1519, this will bring the commencement of his administration to 1504 at latest. See also the note in the Appendix on Colet's preferments. 184. Fasti Ecclesiæ Anglicanæ, p. 4 Eras. Op. iii. p. 456, C. A.D. 1500-5. It was to the work, writes Erasmus, and not to the CHAP. IV. dignity of the deanery, that Colet was called. To restore the relaxed discipline of the college-to preach sermons from Scripture in St. Paul's Cathedral as he Colet's had done at Oxford-to secure permanently that such workin sermons should be regularly preached-this was his first work.1 By his remove from Oxford to St. Paul's the field of his influence was changed, and in some respects greatly widened. His work now told directly upon the people at large. The chief citizens of London, and even stray courtiers, now and then, heard the plain facts of Christian truth, instead of the subtleties of the Schoolmen, earnestly preached from the pulpit of St. Paul's by the son of an ex-lord mayor of London. The citizens found too, in the new Dean, a man whose manner of life bore out the lessons of his pulpit. He retained as Dean of St. Paul's the same simplicity of character and earnest devotion to his work for which he had been so conspicuous at Oxford. As he had not sought ecclesiastical preferment, so he was not puffed up by it. Instead of assuming the purple vestments which were customary, he still wore his plain black robe. The same simple woollen garment served him all the year round, save that in winter he had it lined with fur. The revenues of his deanery were sufficient to defray his ordinary household expenses, and left him his private income free. He gave it away, instead of spendThe rich living of Stepney, which, ing it upon himself.2 in conformity with the custom of the times, he might well have retained along with his other preferment, he London. The habits of the new Dean. CHAP. IV. resigned at once into other hands on his removal to A.D. 1505. St. Paul's.1 The Dean's table. Inner circle of intimate friends. It would seem too that he shone by contrast with his predecessor, whose lavish good cheer had been such as to fill his table with jovial guests, and sometimes to pass the bounds of moderation.2 There was no chance of this with Colet. His own habits were severely frugal. For years he abstained from suppers, and there were no nightly revels in his house. His table was neatly spread, but neither costly nor excessive. After grace, he would have a chapter read from one of St. Paul's Epistles or the Proverbs of Solomon, and then contrive to engage his guests in serious table-talk, drawing out the unlearned as well as the learned, and changing the topics of conversation with great tact and skill. Thus, when the citizens dined at his table, they soon found, as his Oxford friends had found at their public dinners, that, without being tedious or overbearing, somehow or other he contrived so to exert his influence as to send his guests away better than they came.3 Moreover, Colet soon gathered around him here in London, as he had done at Oxford, an inner circle of personal friends. These were wont often to meet at his table and to talk on late into the night, conversing sometimes upon literary topics, and sometimes speaking together of that invisible Prince whom Colet was as 1 Walter Stone, LL.D., was admitted to the vicarage of Stepney, void by the resignation of D. Colet, Sept. 21, 1505.-Kennett's MSS. vol. xliv. f. 234 b (Lansdowne, 978.) He seems to have retained his rectory of Denyngton. 2 Eras. Op. iii. p. 465, E. 4 Ibid. E and F. Grocyn and Linacre had also removed to London. More was already there. personal loyalty to loyally serving now in the midst of honour and prefer- CHAP. IV. ment as he had done in an humbler sphere.1 Colet's A.D. 1505. loyalty to Him seemed indeed to have been deepened Colet's rather than diminished by contact with the outer world. The place which St. Paul's character and writings had Christ. once occupied in his thoughts and teaching, was now filled by the character and words of St. Paul's Master and his. He never travelled, says Erasmus, without reading some book or conversing of Christ. He had arranged the sayings of Christ in groups, to assist the memory, and with the intention of writing a book on them. His sermons, too, in St. Paul's Cathedral bore witness to the engrossing object of his thoughts. It was now no longer St. Paul's Epistles but the Gospel History,' the Apostles' Creed,' the Lord's Prayer,'5 which the Dean was expounding to the people. And highly as he had held, and still held, in honour the apostolic writings, yet, as already mentioned, they seemed to him to shrink, as it were, into nothing, compared with the wonderful majesty of Christ himself. 6 sermons at The same method of teaching which he had applied Colet's at Oxford to the writings of St. Paul he now applied in St. Paul's. his cathedral sermons in treating of these still higher subjects. For he did not, we are told, take an isolated text and preach a detached discourse upon it, but went continuously through whatever he was expounding from beginning to end in a course of sermons.6 1 'Impense delectabatur amico- 5 Ibid. p. 456, E. 'rum colloquiis quæ sæpe differebat Thus 6 Porro in suo templo non sum ' in multam noctem. Sed omnis il-'ebat sibi carptim argumentum ex lius sermo, aut de literis erat, aut 'de Christo.'-Eras. Op. iii. p.457, A. 2 Eras. Op. iii. p. 459, F. 3 Ibid. p. 457, A. Ibid. p. 459, F. Evangelio aut ex epistolis Apostolicis sed unum aliquod argumentum 'proponebat, quod diversis concionibus ad finem usque prosequeba CHAP. IV. these cathedral discourses of Colet's were continuous A.D. 1505. expositions of the facts of the Saviour's life and teaching, as recorded by the Evangelists, or embodied in that simple creed which in Colet's view contained the sum of Christian theology. And thus was he practically illustrating, by his own public example in these sermons, his advice to theological students, to 'keep to 'the Bible and the Apostles' Creed, letting divines, if 'they like, dispute about the rest.' A.D. 1500-4. More's le II. MORE CALLED TO THE BAR-IN PARLIAMENT-OFFENDS After the departure of Erasmus, More worked on diligently at his legal studies at Lincoln's Inn. A few more terms and he received the reward of his industry in his call to the bar. During the years devoted to his legal curriculum, gal studies. he had been wholly absorbed in his law books. Grocyn, Linacre, and More all in London. Closely watched by his father, and purposely kept with a stinted allowance, as at Oxford, so that his 'whole mind might be set on his book,' the law student had found little time or opportunity for other studies. But being now duly called to the bar, and thus freed from the restraints of student life, his mind naturally reverted to old channels of thought. Grocyn and Linacre in the meantime had left Oxford and become near neighbours of his in London. Thus the old Oxford circle partially formed itself again, and with the renewal of old intimacies returned, if ever lost, the love of old studies. For no sooner was More called to the tur: puta Evangelium Matthæi, | Dominicam.'-Eras. Op. iii. p. 456, 'Symbolum Fidei, Precationem D, E. |