John Frith - Return To England and Arrest

Return To England and Arrest

In 1532, he returned to England, and warrants for his arrest were issued by Thomas More (who at the time was Lord Chancellor). In October he was arrested by the local authorities before he could arrange passage to Antwerp, wearing an elaborate disguise. While imprisoned for approximately eight months in the Tower of London, Frith penned his views on Communion, fully knowing that it would be used "to purchase me most cruel death." John Foxe writes of John Frith and his works and writings and of the great chains that were piled onto his body. Frith, in his last days in London’s Tower, writes a final book, the Bulwark. It has been suggested that Rastell is persuaded to convert to Frith’s views on Christianity because of the meetings they had together, as well as this final book. Rastell was converted through Frith’s final arguments in the Bulwark. The Bulwark is an impressive book in its theological content and in its style, at times relaxed, and at other times serious. Frith claims that men sin if the motives behind their good works were to gain favour with God. The emphasis, then, is placed on justification by faith.

Eventually transferred from the Tower to Newgate Prison, Frith refused to stop his controversial writing. When William Tyndale learned of Frith's plight, he tried to bolster the prisoner's spirits with a pair of letters that still survive. "If your pain", Tyndale counseled, "proves to be above your strength, pray to your Father in that name, and he will ease it."