Foxe - The Book of Martyrs

Foxe’s Book of Martyrs
Sir Richard: "How may that be?"
Palmer: "Right well, sir. For as it hath pleased our merciful Savior, according to the
Gospel's parable, to call me at the third hour of the day, even in my flowers, at the age of four
and twenty years, even so I trust He hath called, and will call you, at the eleventh hour of this
your old age, and give you everlasting life for your portion."
Sir Richard: "Sayest thou so? Well, Palmer, well, I would I might have thee but one month
in my house: I doubt not but I would convert thee, or thou shouldst convert me."
Then said Master Winchcomb, "Take pity on thy golden years, and pleasant flowers of
lusty youth, before it be too late."
Palmer: "Sir, I long for those springing flowers that shall never fade away."
He was tried on the fifteenth of July, 1556, together with one Thomas Askin, fellow
prisoner. Askin and one John Guin had been sentenced the day before, and Mr. Palmer, on
the fifteenth, was brought up for final judgment. Execution was ordered to follow the
sentence, and at five o'clock in the same afternoon, at a place called the Sand-pits, these three
martyrs were fastened to a stake. After devoutly praying together, they sung the Thirty-first
Psalm.
When the fire was kindled, and it had seized their bodies, without an appearance of
enduring pain, they continued to cry, "Lord Jesus, strengthen us! Lord Jesus receive our
souls!" until animation was suspended and human suffering was past. It is remarkable, that,
when their heads had fallen together in a mass as it were by the force of the flames, and the
spectators thought Palmer as lifeless, his tongue and lips again moved, and were heard to
pronounce the name of Jesus, to whom be glory and honor forever!
Joan Waste and Others
This poor, honest woman, blind from her birth, and unmarried, aged twenty-two, was of
the parish of Allhallows, Derby. Her father was a barber, and also made ropes for a living: in
which she assisted him, and also learned to knit several articles of apparel. Refusing to
communicate with those who maintained doctrines contrary to those she had learned in the
days of the pious Edward, she was called before Dr. Draicot, the chancellor of Bishop Blaine,
and Peter Finch, official of Derby.
With sophisitcal arguments and threats they endeavored to confound the poor girl; but
she proffered to yield to the bishop's doctrine, if he would answer for her at the Day of
Judgment, (as pious Dr. Taylor had done in his sermons) that his belief of the real presence
of the Sacrament was true. The bishop at first answered that he would; but Dr. Draicot
reminding him that he might not in any way answer for a heretic, he withdrew his confirmation
of his own tenets; and she replied that if their consciences would not permit them to answer
at God's bar for that truth they wished her to subscribe to, she would answer no more
questions. Sentence was then adjudged, and Dr. Draicot appointed to preach her condemned
233