Latria

“ It would seem that Christ's soul should not be adored with the adoration of latria. For on the words of Ps. 98:5, "Adore His foot-stool for it is holy," a gloss says: "The flesh assumed by the Word of God is rightly adored by us: for no one partakes spiritually of His flesh unless he first adore it; but not indeed with the adoration called latria, which is due to the Creator alone." Now the flesh is part of the humanity. Therefore Christ's humanity is not to be adored with the adoration of latria. ”

“ It is, therefore, on account of and in relation to his divine person that his human nature is adored with the worship of latria. If our Lord should condescend to come upon the earth again, we are persuaded that every sincere Protestant who believes in his divinity would gladly prostrate himself at his feet to pay him supreme adoration, and, if he were able to look upon his face, would feel that he was gazing upon the very countenance of God, and that the eyes of the Lord of heaven and earth were fixed upon him. ”

“ Among the half-naked barbarians of the desert, the distinction between latria and dulia, the worship of God and the cultus of the saint, is universally understood, in spite of the protestations of controversialists, that it is a distinction that can only be comprehended by the learned, but which will be altogether misunderstood by the vulgar, who will always confound divinewith human worship. ”

“ Neither in the Tabernacle or Temple of the Old Law, nor again now in the Church are images set up that the worship of latria may be paid to them, but for the purpose of signification, in order that belief in the excellence of angels and saints may be impressed and confirmed in the mind of man. ”

“ He shows large acquaintance with books; with the Bible, most of all; with patristic divinity and school divinity; and history, sacred and profane: but if this had been all, he would not have been the Latimer of the Reformation, and the Church of England would not, perhaps, have been here to-day. Like the physician, to whom a year of practical experience in a hospital teaches more than a life of closet study, Latimer learnt the mental disorders of his age in the age itself; and the secret of that art no other man, however good, however wise, could have taught him. ”

“ 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. ”

“ With a high reputation and an excellent cook he enjoyed a great popularity, both with his own party and the world in general; and he was the centre of a small, but distinguished circle of acquaintances, who drank Latimer’s wine, and quoted Latimer’s sayings, and liked Latimer much better, because, not being author or minister, he was not in their way.
Lord Latimer received Maltravers with marked courtesy, and even deference, and invited him to join his own whist-table, which was one of the highest compliments his lordship could pay to his intellect. ”

“ Latimer looked at him plodding along in the scorching, pitiless sunshine, a weary, bent man dragging one ill-shod foot wearily after the other, a man who had no faith in tenderness or love, no belief in the kindliness of human nature. He felt he hated him for one brief second, and then he pitied him. And yet it shamed him to think he had fallen so low that this man was his mate. He would get out, he would. There was a man he knew in Adelaide, he would go to him and ask him to give him another chance, for his father's sake to give him another chance. ”

“ Latimer was the son of a Leicestershire fanner, and rose to be Bishop of Worcester, and to the far higher rank of a martyr for his faith. He has been pronounced by writers of this age as a good but not a great man. To our mind he was a very great man. Not in worldly wisdom, for he was simple and unambitious as a child; but he was a genius, true, racy, original, and inspired. He was made, as his sermons show, for a preacher to the people rather than to princes, though to them he bore a bold and unblenching testimony. ”

“ Except among the gods there can be naught in the wide world to be compared with it. Latona’s offspring, after having sought his herds in every corner, thus greeted great Hermes: “Little cradled rogue, tell me about my illustrious heifers, where are they? Speak quickly, or a quarrel between us must rise, and the event will be that I shall haul you into dismal Tartarus, in fiery gloom to dwell eternally. Nor shall your father nor your mother loose the bars of that black dungeon. Utterly you shall be cast out from the light of day, unblest as they to rule the ghosts of men.” ”

“ Latimer began to preach with zeal in Wiltshire, and not only in his own parish, but in the parishes around him. His diligence was so great, his preaching so mighty, says Foxe, [187] that his hearers must either believe the doctrine he preached or rise against it. ‘Whosoever entereth not into the fold by the door, which is Christ, be he priest, bishop, or pope, is a robber,’ said he. ‘In the Church there are more thieves than shepherds, and more goats than sheep.’ [188] His hearers were astounded. ”

“ Ardea and Velitrae are no longer in the number of originally Latin towns. Only the central portion of that region between the Tiber, the spurs of the Apennines, the Alban Mount, and the sea—a district of about 700 square miles, not much larger than the present canton of Zurich—was Latium proper, the 'plain,' as it appears to the eye of the observer from the heights of Monte Cavo. Though the country is a plain, it is not monotonously flat. ”

“ He will not do that,” he added quickly, but looking questioningly at Latimer and speaking in a tone almost of command. “He will not undo all that he has done; I know him better than that.” But Latimer made no answer, and for a moment the two men stood watching each other and questioning each other with their eyes. Then Latimer turned, and without again so much as glancing at the girl walked steadily to the door and left the room. He passed on slowly down the stairs and out into the night, and paused upon the top of the steps leading to the street. ”

“ Yet Latimer cursed beneath his breath.
“Let’s get on,” he said, and proceeded to feel his way towards the ravine.
In a few minutes they reached it. Here was another sentry-group. Assuring himself that all was in order, he began to retrace his steps. He was conscious of nothing except the procession of fantasies and memories within his brain: verses he had written last year beneath the young flowering laburnum in his father’s garden; a girl’s hand in which his heart seemed to be inevitably cupped; a flannelled figure, with a rapid, crushing serve, on the other side of the tennis-net ”

“ The following, however, is the passage from Latimer’s most strange discourse on the death of the Lord High Admiral, which he preached before the King regarding his uncle’s death; a less charitable or courtly address is not often met with: “As touching the kind of his death, whether he be saved or no, I refer that to God. In the twinkling of an eye He may save a man or turn his heart. What he did I cannot tell, and when a man hath two strokes with an axe, who can tell but between two strokes he doth repent? ”

“ It is by such unshakable fidelity that great revolutions are accomplished.
Latimer Excommunicated. As Latimer was deaf to all their persuasion, there was nothing to be done but to threaten the stake. The charge was transferred to the Convocation of Canterbury, and on the 15th of March, 1532, he appeared before that body at Westminster. The fifteen articles were set before him. ‘Master Latimer,’ said the archbishop,’the synod calls upon you to sign these articles.’—‘I refuse,’ he answered.—All the bishops pressed him earnestly. ”

“ Latimer did not allow himself to be stopped by such obstacles, and resolved to attack this difficult position openly.
‘Your Grace,’ he wrote to Henry, ‘I must show forth such things as I have learned in Scripture, or else deny Jesus Christ. The which denying ought more to be dreaded than the loss of all temporal goods, honor, promotion, fame, prison, slander, hurts, banishment, and all manner of torments and cruelties, yea, and death itself, be it never so shameful and painful. [77] ... There is as great distance between you and me as between God and man ”

“ I’ll leave you and Mr. Latisan to talk over your business.”
“I can’t blame you for going,” said Latisan. He followed her, and to her profound amazement she discovered that a woodsman could be as temperamental as a prima donna. “I’m going, too, Mr. Flagg,” he called over his shoulder. “I’m going for good and all where you’re concerned. I’m done with you. I gave you your fair warning. Send another man north to the drive.”
“Just one minute, there, Latisan!” called the master, harshly. “Unless you’re afraid to stay here that length of time or can’t spare the minute away from your wench!” ”

“ We have heard Pole; we will now hear the heretic leader. His object on the present occasion was to tell the clergy what especially he thought of themselves; and Latimer was a plain speaker. They had no good opinion of him. His opinion of them was very bad indeed. His text was from the sixteenth chapter of St Luke's Gospel: 'The children of this world are wiser in their generation than the children of light.'
The race and parentage of all living things, he said, were known by their fruits. He desired by this test to try the parentage of the present Convocation. ”

“ Flagg,” declared Latisan, at last, pricked by the repeatedly iterated plaint. “You can depend on me just as far as I can stretch my ability.”
“But you told me you didn’t like me for myself. You said you were joining drives with me because I was proposing to fight. Now I can’t fight. No man will do my fighting for me unless he likes me for myself.”
[64] “I’ll do it for you, sir,” insisted Ward, determinedly. “It’s right in line with my plans. I’ll take your orders. I’ll come to you regularly at Adonia. You shall know every move. I’ll be merely your right hand to do what you want done.” ”

“ The court was at chapel, where Latimer, recently appointed one of the king’s chaplains, was preaching. The vice-chancellor came in during the service, and heard part of the sermon. Latimer was a very different man from Henry’s servile courtiers. He did not fear even to attack such of his colleagues as did not do their duty: ‘That is no godly preacher that will hold his peace, and not strike you with his sword that you smoke again.... Chaplains will not do their duties, but rather flatter. But what shall follow? Marry, they shall have God’s curse upon their heads for their labor. ”

“ Here, many hundreds of years ago, lived Laertes--a man of simple habits, who thought his little island home a kingdom large enough, and never sighed for a greater. Not many men had seen so much of the world as he; for he had been to Colchis with Jason and the Argonauts, and his feet had trod the streets of every city in Hellas. Yet in all his wanderings he had seen no fairer land than rocky Ithaca. His eyes had been dazzled by the brightness of the Golden Fleece, and the kings of Argos and of Ilios had shown him the gold and gems of their treasure-houses. ”

“ Jeffray found the Lady Letitia, his aunt, playing piquet in the damask drawing-room with Dr. Sugg, the rector of Rodenham. The Lady Letitia was a red-beaked and bushy browed old vulture, with wicked eyes and a budding beard. Her towering “head” was stuffed full of ribbons and feathers, her stupendous hoop of red damask, her gown flowered red and blue. The Lady Letitia was one of those preposterous old ladies who labor under the delusion that a woman of sixty may still presume to trade upon the reputation of impudent loveliness she had created some thirty years ago. ”

“ Latimer broke the silence by saying:—
"Miss Iola, I think that you brood too much over the condition of our people."
"Perhaps I do," she replied, "but they never burn a man in the South that they do not kindle a fire around my soul."
"I am afraid," replied Dr. Latimer, "that you will grow morbid and nervous. Most of our people take life easily—why shouldn't you?" ”

“ I’m sure it won’t be a prayer to the God of the Old Testament, such as Eck Flagg was reading about. I’ll whisper up to Mother Mary. She understands women. I don’t.”
He bowed in silence when she gave him a hasty “good night!”
Latisan whirled suddenly after the girl closed the door behind her—came about on his heels so quickly that he nearly bumped into the assiduous operative Crowley, who had been taking desperate chances that evening.
But Latisan’s gaze was directed downward in deep thought as he walked slowly away, and he did not perceive the eavesdropper. ”

“ The dear innocent charms of my Laeta's fair face;
Not a thrush thrill'd the grove with a carol so choice
As the silvery strains of my Laeta's sweet voice.
The shy nymphs of the woodlands, the fount, and the plain,
Strove to equal her beauty, but strove all in vain;
Yet no envy they bore her, while fruitless they strove,
For so pure was my Laeta, they could only love!
When the warm breath of Auster play'd soft o'er the flow'rs,
And young Zephyrus rustled the gay scented bow'rs,
Ev'ry breeze seem'd to pause as it drew near the fair,
Too much aw'd at her sweetness to tumble her hair. ”