Foxe - The Book of Martyrs
The mystery of history is not completely dark, since it is a veil which only partially conceals the creative activity and spiritual forces and the operation of spiritual laws. It is commonplace to say that the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church yet what we are asserting is simply that individual acts of spiritual decision bear social fruit …For the great cultural changes and historic revolutions that decide the fate of nations or the character of an age is the cumulative result of a number of spiritual decisions … the faith and insight, or the refusal and blindness, of individuals. No one can put his finger on the ultimate spiritual act that tilts the balance, and makes the external order of society assume a new form… Persecution, powerless to destroy or even to shake this new community, made it only the more sensible of its own strength, and pressed it into a more compact body.
The mystery of history is not completely dark, since it is a veil which only partially conceals the creative activity and spiritual forces and the operation of spiritual laws. It is commonplace to say that the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church yet what we are asserting is simply that individual acts of spiritual decision bear social fruit …For the great cultural changes and historic revolutions that decide the fate of nations or the character of an age is the cumulative result of a number of spiritual decisions … the faith and insight, or the refusal and blindness, of individuals. No one can put his finger on the ultimate spiritual act that tilts the balance, and makes the external order of society assume a new form… Persecution, powerless to destroy or even to shake this new community, made it only the more sensible of its own strength, and pressed it into a more compact body.
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<strong>Foxe</strong>’s <strong>Book</strong> <strong>of</strong> <strong>Martyrs</strong><br />
the fatal spot, knelt down, prayed, and rehearsed the Fiftieth Psalm. When the chain<br />
enveloped him, he said, "Fear not them that kill the body, but fear him that can kill both body<br />
and soul, and cast it into everlasting fire!" As one Cadman placed a fagot against him, he<br />
blessed the hour in which he was born to die for the truth; and while trusting only upon the<br />
all-sufficient merits <strong>of</strong> the Redeemer, fire was set to the pile, and the blazing fagots in a short<br />
time stifled his last words, "Lord, have mercy on me! Christ, have mercy upon me!" <strong>The</strong> ashes<br />
<strong>of</strong> the body were buried in a pit, and with them one <strong>of</strong> his feet, whole to the ankle, with the<br />
stocking on.<br />
Mrs. Cicely Ormes<br />
This young martyr, aged twenty-two, was the wife <strong>of</strong> Mr. Edmund Ormes, worsted<br />
weaver <strong>of</strong> St. Lawrence, Norwich. At the death <strong>of</strong> Miller and Elizabeth Cooper, before<br />
mentioned, she had said that she would pledge them <strong>of</strong> the same cup they drank <strong>of</strong>. For these<br />
words she was brought to the chanellor, who would have discharged her upon promising to<br />
go to church, and to keep her belief to herself. As she would not consent to this, the chancellor<br />
urged that he had shown more lenity to her than any other person, and was unwilling to<br />
condemn her, because she was an ignorant foolish woman; to this she replied, (perhaps with<br />
more shrewdness than he expected,) that however great his desire might be to spare her sinful<br />
flesh, it could not equal her inclination to surrender it up in so great a quarrel. <strong>The</strong> chancellor<br />
then pronounced the fiery sentence, and September 23, 1557, she was brought to the stake, at<br />
eight o'clock in the morning.<br />
After declaring her faith to the people, she laid her hand on the stake, and said, "Welcome,<br />
thou cross <strong>of</strong> Christ." Her hand was sooted in doing this, (for it was the same stake at which<br />
Miller and Cooper were burnt,) and she at first wiped it; but directly after again welcomed<br />
and embraced it as the "sweet cross <strong>of</strong> Christ." After the tormentors had kindled the fire, she<br />
said, "My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit doth rejoice in God my Savior." <strong>The</strong>n<br />
crossing her hands upon her breast, and looking upwards with the utmost serenity, she stood<br />
the fiery furnace. Her hands continued gradually to rise until the sinews were dried, and then<br />
they fell. She uttered no sigh <strong>of</strong> pain, but yielded her life, an emblem <strong>of</strong> that celestial paradise<br />
in which is the presence <strong>of</strong> God, blessed forever.<br />
It might be contended that this martyr voluntarily sought her own death, as the chancellor<br />
scarcely exacted any other penance <strong>of</strong> her than to keep her belief to herself; yet it should seem<br />
in this instance as if God had chosen her to be a shining light, for a twelve-month before she<br />
was taken, she had recanted; but she was wretched until the chancellor was informed, by<br />
letter, that she repented <strong>of</strong> her recantation from the bottom <strong>of</strong> her heart. As if to compensate<br />
for her former apostasy, and to convince the Catholics that she meant to more to compromise<br />
for her personal security, she boldly refused his friendly <strong>of</strong>fer <strong>of</strong> permitting her to temporise.<br />
Her courage in such a cause deserves commendation-the cause <strong>of</strong> Him who has said,<br />
"Whoever is ashamed <strong>of</strong> me on earth, <strong>of</strong> such will I be ashamed in heaven."<br />
Rev. John Rough<br />
This pious martyr was a Scotchman. At the age <strong>of</strong> seventeen, he entered himself as one<br />
<strong>of</strong> the order <strong>of</strong> Black Friars, at Stirling, in Scotland. He had been kept out <strong>of</strong> an inheritance<br />
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