Boston College Law School Digital Commons @ Boston College Law School Rare Book Room Exhibition Programs Daniel R. Coquillette Rare Book Room Fall 9-1-2007 The t.S Thomas More Collection at the Boston College Law Library Laurel Davis Boston College Law School, [email protected] Karen S. Beck Boston College Law School Follow this and additional works at: http://lawdigitalcommons.bc.edu/rbr_exhibit_programs Part of the Archival Science Commons, History of Christianity Commons, Legal Commons, and the Religion Law Commons Digital Commons Citation Davis, Laurel and Beck, Karen S., "The t.S Thomas More Collection at the Boston College Law Library" (2007). Rare Book Room Exhibition Programs. Paper 17. http://lawdigitalcommons.bc.edu/rbr_exhibit_programs/17 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Daniel R. Coquillette Rare Book Room at Digital Commons @ Boston College Law School. It has been accepted for inclusion in Rare Book Room Exhibition Programs by an authorized administrator of Digital Commons @ Boston College Law School. For more information, please contact [email protected]. THE ST. THOMAS MORE and statesman, he was a person of tremendous faith who was a devout COLLECTION AT THE member of the Roman Catholic BOSTON COLLEGE LAW Church. His love for the law and his LIBRARY religious nature were deeply intertwined. More biographer Peter The More Collection was purchased by Ackroyd wrote that “[More] knew that the Boston College Law School in 1961 human justice was only the faintest from the estate of Arthur Brown. It reflection of divine law, but it became contains approximately 100 titles for him the principle and model of focused on the life and work of Sir conduct upon the earth.” Thomas More, patron saint of lawyers and ardent defender of the Catholic More worked as a lawyer and in Church. It includes several very special various administrative positions in editions of More’s landmark work, London after finishing his studies. In UTOPIA, including a beautifully 1517, he became a councillor attendant illustrated 1518 edition and an 1893 to King Henry VIII. His proximity to edition published by William Morris’ the king allowed More to become a famed Kelmscott Press. figure of much authority and power. It was when Henry gave him the This exhibition features lucrative position of Undertreasurer in selections from the More Collection 1520 that he was knighted, thus arranged by themes. It begins in the becoming Sir Thomas More. horizontal wooden case to the left of the entrance door and continues In 1529, Henry VIII appointed clockwise around the room. The More Lord Chancellor, a position exhibit was curated by Laurel Davis, second in power only to the king. At BC Law class of 2006, with assistance this point, Henry was attempting to from Karen Beck, Curator of Rare annul his marriage to Catherine of Books. Much of the text was drawn Aragon, the Spanish princess to whom from Peter Ackroyd’s THE LIFE OF he had been married almost 20 years. THOMAS MORE (1998). It will remain It was around this time that Henry on view through mid-December 2007. began to embrace the Protestant teaching that the Pope was only the Bishop of Rome, and therefore had no authority over the Christian Church as A BRIEF BIOGRAPHY OF a whole. More had been completely devoted to his king, but as Henry ST. THOMAS MORE began to deny the Pope’s authority, More’s qualms grew until he Thomas More was born in London, eventually resigned as Lord Chancellor probably on February 7, 1478, to John in 1532. In 1534, More refused to swear and Agnes More. John More was a an oath he construed as denying the judge and likely influenced his son’s Pope’s authority. For this, he was decision to become a lawyer. Thomas imprisoned in the Tower of London. More never took vows and thus Following his imprisonment, he was remained a layman his entire life, but tried and convicted under the Treason in addition to being a respected lawyer Act for refusing to swear a different published for the first time in 1831. oath that deemed Henry VIII the The project grew out of Mackintosh’s supreme head of the Church. He was research into Henry VIII’s reign. executed by beheading on July 6, 1535. This copy features an attractive vellum cover embellished with gold In 1886, Sir Thomas More was scrollwork. beatified by Pope Leo XIII – the first English layman to be beatified as a ELIZABETH M. INCE, ST. THOMAS MORE martyr. In 1935, he was canonized OF LONDON Saint Thomas More by Pope Pius XI Illustrated by Lili Réthi. New York: after a mass petition by English Vision Books, 1957 Catholics. Ince, a descendent of More’s daughter and son-in-law Margaret and First wooden case to left of entrance: William Roper, wrote this biography of More for children. According to her, BIOGRAPHIES OF More used to warn his children that ST. THOMAS MORE they would “never get to heaven on feather beds!” WILLIAM ROPER, LIFE AND DEATH OF SIR THOMAS MOORE, KT. RICHARD MARIUS, THOMAS MORE: A London: Printed for C. Davis, 1626 BIOGRAPHY William Roper was More’s son- New York: Knopf, 1984 in-law and his earliest biographer. He This widely praised book was a was also a wealthy and successful finalist for the National Book Award. lawyer in his own right. Married to Marius’ depiction of More – not as a More’s beloved eldest daughter, saintly figure but as a flawed human Margaret, Roper spent a great deal of being – caused a good deal of time with More, living with Margaret controversy. Marius assessed More’s in the family home for more than life and legacy from a modern sixteen years. This biography was perspective, criticizing what he saw as written around 1555 but first published More’s religious fanaticism and in 1626. intolerance toward Protestants. The book is opened to the title page and an engraving of More. Note REV. MICHAEL J. LARKIN, SAINT the wormholes on the paper. Behind THOMAS MORE: MODEL FOR LAWYERS the title page you can see part of a AND LAYMEN large fold-out table showing the New York: Paulist Press, 1937 genealogy of the Roper family. According to the author, this little purple pamphlet was intended to JAMES MACKINTOSH, THE LIFE OF SIR “bring to the public in a small way an THOMAS MORE epitome of the life of the recently London: Longman, Brown, Green and canonized saint, Thomas More; one of Longmans, 1844 the most fascinating characters in Mackintosh was a nineteenth- history.” century Scottish historian, critic, and politician. He wrote this biography shortly before his death in 1832; it was 2 ERNEST EDWIN REYNOLDS, MARGARET After close to 20 years of ROPER marriage, Henry began to claim that London: Burns & Oates, 1960 Catherine’s marriage to his brother This is a biography of More’s had indeed been consummated. If this oldest daughter, Margaret. More made was true, it would mean that his own no distinctions in the way he educated marriage violated the dictates of his daughters and his son; Margaret Leviticus, which forbade one from was a fine classical scholar who sleeping with his brother’s wife. It is translated one of Erasmus’ works into unclear how much of Henry’s English. She remained her father’s motivation stemmed from a true closest confidante throughout his life religious conviction that his marriage and was the last person to visit him in was invalid and how much arose from prison before his execution. his newfound interest in Anne Boleyn. STANLEY MORISON, THE LIKENESS OF Regardless, Henry began to THOMAS MORE explore, through his then Lord New York: Fordham Univ. Press, 1964 Chancellor Thomas Wolsey, whether This book collects and analyzes the Pope would annul his marriage to the many images of More that have Catherine based on the dictates of been created over the years. It is Leviticus. As More’s biographer Peter opened to two portraits of More and Ackroyd notes, the central question his family, both painted in the early became one of the extent of papal 1590s by Rowland Locky after Hans power, and, in particular, of the ability Holbein. In the top portrait, More sits of the Pope to waive the injunction of at the center with his dog at his feet. Leviticus. As it became increasingly His wife sits with her pet monkey at clear that the annulment would not be the far right, and his daughter granted, Henry began to assert that Margaret sits to the left of her mother, divine law had made his marriage holding an open book. abhorrent to God and that no pope had the authority to abrogate that law. Wooden case to right of entrance: Henry appointed More to MORE’S DISPUTE WITH replace Wolsey as Lord Chancellor in KING HENRY VIII 1529. At first devoted to Henry and his assertions of royal prerogative, More The disagreement that ultimately led became uneasy when Henry began to to More’s execution began with King deny the authority of the Pope. More Henry VIII’s desire to divorce his wife, eventually incurred Henry’s wrath for Catherine of Aragon. Catherine had refusing to acknowledge the king as been married to Henry’s brother, but the head of the Church of England, upon his death she claimed (and and for objecting to moves by Henry continually maintained) that the and Parliament to weaken papal marriage had been unconsummated. authority. More was put on trial for Because of this, a papal dispensation treason in 1535.