LATIMER, HUGH (c. English bishop, and one of the chief promoters of the Reformation in England, was born at Thurcaston, Leicestershire. He was the son of a yeoman, who rented a farm "of three or four pounds by year at the uttermost." The year of Latimer's birth is not definitely known. In the Life by Gilpin it is given at 1470, a palpable error, and possibly a mis print for 1490. He was educated at Clare College, Cambridge, graduated B.A. in 1510 and M.A. in 1514. Before the latter date he had taken holy orders. His oration, on taking his degree of bachelor of divinity, was devoted to an attack on the opinions of Melanchthon. Soon his discourses exercised a potent influence on learned and unlearned alike; and, although he restricted him self, as was his custom, to the inculcation of practical righteous ness, and the censure of abuses, a rumour of his heretical tendencies reached the bishop of Ely. Latimer was prohibited from preaching in the university or in any pulpits of the diocese, and on his occupying the pulpit of the Augustinian monastery, which enjoyed immunity from episcopal control, he was summoned be fore Wolsey, who, however, gave him special licence to preach throughout England.
At this time Protestant opinions were being disseminated in England chiefly by the surreptitious circulation of Wycliffe's translations of the New Testament. Latimer had a ready and formidable wit which thoroughly disconcerted his opponents, but he had also a natural distaste for theological discussion, and the truths he was in the habit of inculcating could scarcely be con troverted, although, as he stated them, they were diametrically contradictory of prevailing errors both in doctrine and practice. In Dec. 1529 he preached his two "sermons on the cards," which awakened a turbulent controversy in the university. But he was protected from his enemies by Henry VIII., who invited him to preach before him in the Lent of 1530. Latimer then wrote to the king the famous letter on the free circulation of the Bible, an address remarkable, not only for what Froude justly calls "its almost unexampled grandeur," but for its repudiation of the aid of temporal weapons to defend the faith. Shortly afterwards Henry appointed Latimer one of the royal chaplains. He soon became "weary of the court," but he gladly accepted the living of West kington, Wiltshire, conferred on him by the king in 1531. Harassed by severe bodily ailments, encompassed by a tumult of religious conflict and persecution, he continued to preach the cause he had at heart. At last a sermon which he was persuaded to preach in London exasperated John Stokesley, bishop of the diocese, and furnished an opportunity for summoning Latimer to answer before the bishops in the consistory. After a tedious and captious examination, he was in March brought before convoca tion, and, on refusing to subscribe to certain articles, was excom municated and imprisoned; but by the king's intervention he was released after he had accepted all the articles except two, and con fessed that he bad erred not only "in discretion but in doctrine."
After the consecration of Cranmer to the archbishopric of Canter bury in 1533 Latimer's position was changed. In 1534 Henry formally repudiated the authority of the pope, and from this time Latimer was the chief co-operator with Cranmer and Cromwell in advising the king on the legislative measures entailed by that repudiation.
It was, however, Latimer's preaching more than the edicts of Henry that established the principles of the Reformation in the minds and hearts of the people. His sermons are classics of their kind. Vivid, racy, terse in expression ; profound in religious feel ing, sagacious in their advice on human conduct. To the historical student they are of great value as a mirror of the social and politi cal life of the period.
In Sept. 1535 Latimer was consecrated bishop of Worcester. While holding this office he was selected to officiate as preacher when the friar, John Forest, whom he vainly endeavoured to move to submission, was burned at the stake for denying the royal supremacy. In '539, being opposed to the "act of the six articles," Latimer resigned his bishopric, learning from Cromwell that this was the wish of the king. On this point he was apparently de ceived, but as he now declined to accept the articles he was con fined within the precincts of the bishop of Chichester's palace. After the attainder of Cromwell little is known of Latimer until 1546, when, on account of his connection with the preacher Edward Crome, he was summoned before the council at Green wich, and committed to the Tower of London. Henry died before his final trial could take place, and the general pardon at the ac cession of Edward VI. procured him his liberty. He declined to resume his see, notwithstanding the special request of the Com mons, but in Jan. 1548 again began to preach, and with more effectiveness than ever ; crowds thronged to listen to him both in London and in the country. Shortly after the accession of Mary in 1553 a summons was sent to Latimer to appear before the council at Westminster. Though he might have escaped by flight, and though he knew that "Smithfield already groaned for him," he at once joyfully obeyed. The hardships of his imprisonment, and the long disputations at Oxford, told severely on his health, but he endured all with unbroken cheerfulness. On Oct. 16, 1555 he and Ridley were led to the stake at Oxford. The motives which now inspired his courage placed him beyond the influence of fear, and enabled him to taste in dying the thrill of victorious achieve ment. Ridley he greeted with the words, "Be of good comfort, Master Ridley, and play the man; we shall this day light such a candle by God's grace in England as (I trust) shall never be put out." He "received the flame (as it were) embracing it. After he had stroked his face with his hands, and (as it were) bathed them III a little in the fire, he soon died (as it appeared) with very little pain or none."