He was thence led to the stake amidst the insults of the Catholics; and having now summoned up all the force of his mind, he bore their scorn, as well as the torture of his punishment, with singular fortitude.

He stretched out his hand, and without betraying, either by his countenance or motions, the least sign of weakness, or even of feeling, he held it in the flames till it was entirely consumed.

His thoughts seemed wholly occupied with reflections on his former fault; and he called aloud several times, "This hand has offended." Satisfied with that atonement, he then discovered a serenity in his countenance, and when the fire attacked his body, he seemed to be quite insensible of his outward sufferings, and by the force of hope and resolution to have collected his mind altogether within itself, and to repel the fury of the flames.

It is pretended, that after his body was consumed, his heart was found entire and untouched amidst the ashes; an event which, as it was the emblem of his constancy, was fondly believed by the zealous Protestants.
He was undoubtedly a man of merit; possessed of learning and capacity, and adorned with candor, sincerity, and beneficence, and all those virtues which were fitted to render him useful and amiable in society.
His moral qualities procured him universal respect; and the courage of his martyrdom, though he fell short of the rigid inflexibility observed in many, made him the hero of the Protestant party.[*] After Cranmer's death, Cardinal Pole, who had now taken priest's orders, was installed in the see of Canterbury; and was thus, by this office, as well as by his commission of legate, placed at the head of the church of England.

But though he was averse to all sanguinary methods of converting heretics, and deemed the reformation of the clergy the more effectual, as the more laudable expedient for that purpose,[**] he found his authority too weak to oppose the barbarous and bigoted disposition of the queen and of her counsellors.