l; and perhaps
it will only make the path that I have to tread still easier. The heart
may move its pinions freely and easily, and return to God."

"Hear me, Anne, hear," said Catharine in a low and hurried voice. "A
terrible danger threatens you! The king has given orders to move you, by
means of the rack, to recant."

"Well, and what more?" asked Anne, with smiling face.

"Unfortunate, you know not what you are saying! You know not what
fearful agonies await you! You know not the power of pains, which are
perhaps still mightier than the spirit, and may overcome it."

"And if I did know them now, what would it avail me?" asked Anne Askew.
"You say they will put me to the rack. Well, then, I shall have to bear
it, for I have no power to change their will."

"Yet, Anne, yet you have the power! Retract what you have said, Anne!
Declare that you repent, and that you perceive that you have been
deluded! Say that you will recognize the king as lord of the Church;
that you will swear to the six articles, and never believe in the Pope
of Rome. Ah, Anne, God sees your heart and knows your thoughts. You have
no need to make them known by your lips. He has given you life, and you
have no right to throw it away; you must seek to keep it so long as you
can. Recant, then! It is perfectly allowable to deceive those who
would murder us. Recant, then, Anne, recant! When they in their haughty
arrogance demand of you to say what they say, consider them as lunatics,
to whom you make apparent concessions only to keep them from raving. Of
what consequence is it whether you do or do not say that the king is the
head of the Church? From His heavens above, God looks down and smiles
at this petty earthly strife which concerns not Him, but men only. Let
scholars and theologians wrangle; we women have nothing to do with it.
If we only believe in God, and bear Him to our hearts, the form in which
we do it is a matter of indifference. But in this case the question is
not about God, but merely about external dogmas. Why should you trouble
yourself with these? What have you to do with the controversies of the
priests? Recant, then, poor enthusiastic child, recant!"

While Catharine, in a low tone and with fluttering breath, thus spoke,
Anne Askew had slowly arisen from her couch, and now stood, like a lily,
so slender and delicate, confronting the queen.

Her noble countenance expressed deep indignation. Her eyes shot
lightning, and a contempt