g himself into the New Learning
which was winning its way there with a zeal that at last told on his
physical strength. The ardor of his mental efforts left its mark on him
in ailments and enfeebled health from which, vigorous as he was, his
frame never wholly freed itself. But he was destined to be known, not as
a scholar, but as a preacher. In his addresses from the pulpit the
sturdy good-sense of the man shook off the pedantry of the schools as
well as the subtlety of the theologian. He had little turn for
speculation, and in the religious changes of the day we find him
constantly lagging behind his brother-reformers. But he had the moral
earnestness of a Jewish prophet, and his denunciations of wrong had a
prophetic directness and fire. "Have pity on your soul," he cried to
Henry, "and think that the day is even at hand when you shall give an
account of your office, and of the blood that hath been shed by your
sword."

His irony was yet more telling than his invective. "I would ask you a
strange question," he said once at Paul's Cross to a ring of bishops;
"who is the most diligent prelate in all England, that passeth all the
rest in doing of his office? I will tell you. It is the Devil! Of all
the pack of them that have cure, the Devil shall go for my money; for he
ordereth his business. Therefore, you unpreaching prelates, learn of the
Devil to be diligent in your office. If you will not learn of God, for
shame learn of the Devil." But Latimer was far from limiting himself to
invective. His homely humor breaks in with story and apologue; his
earnestness is always tempered with good-sense; his plain and simple
style quickens with a shrewd mother-wit. He talks to his hearers as a
man talks to his friends, telling stories such as we have given of his
own life at home, or chatting about the changes and chances of the day
with a transparent simplicity and truth that raise even his chat into
grandeur. His theme is always the actual world about him, and in his
simple lessons of loyalty, of industry, of pity for the poor, he touches
upon almost every subject from the plough to the throne. No such
preaching had been heard in England before his day, and with the growth
of his fame grew the danger of persecution. There were moments when,
bold as he was, Latimer's heart failed him. "If I had not trust that God
will help me," he wrote once, "I think the ocean sea would have divided
my lord of London and me by this day."

A c