t when it was on
their own side, was of little importance to the church authorities. As
they had failed to prove Philips guilty of heresy, they called upon him
to confess his guilt by abjuring it; "as if," he says, "there were no
difference between a nocent and an innocent, between a guilty and a not
guilty."[94]

He refused resolutely, and was remanded to prison, in open violation of
the law. The bishop, in conjunction with Sir Thomas More,[95] sent for
him from time to time, submitting him to private examinations, which
again were illegal; and urged the required confession, in order, as
Philips says, "to save the bishop's credit."

[Sidenote: He is imprisoned unconvicted for three years.]

The further they advanced, the more difficult it was to recede; and the
bishop at length, irritated at his failure, concluded the process with
an arbitrary sentence of excommunication. From this sentence, whether
just or unjust, there was then no appeal, except to the pope. The
wretched man, in virtue of it, was no longer under the protection of the
law, and was committed to the Tower, where he languished for three
years, protesting, but protesting fruitlessly, against the tyranny which
had crushed him, and clamouring for justice in the deaf ears of pedants
who knew not what justice meant.

[Sidenote: He appeals at length to the House of Commons, and recovers
his liberty.]

If this had occurred at the beginning of the century, the prisoner would
have been left to die, as countless multitudes had already died,
unheard, uncared for, unthought of; the victim not of deliberate
cruelty, but of that frightfullest portent, folly armed with power.
Happily the years of his imprisonment had been years of swift
revolution. The House of Commons had become a tribunal where oppression
would not any longer cry wholly unheard; Philips appealed to it for
protection, and recovered his liberty.[96]

[Sidenote: The Bishop of London responsible in the first degree; but
More was severely censurable.]

The weight of guilt in this instance presses essentially on Stokesley;
yet a portion of the blame must be borne also by the chancellor, who
first placed Philips in Stokesley's hands; who took part in the illegal
private examinations, and who could not have been ignorant of the
prisoner's ultimate fate. If, however, it be thought unjust to charge a
good man's memory with an offence in which his part was only secondary,
the following iniquity was who