Thomas More 1478-1535

Thomas More was born in London in 1478. His father, Sir John More, was an important judge and lawyer. During his youth, Thomas More worked as a servant for the archbishop of Canterbury, John Morton. He went to study Greek and Latin literature at Oxford. When he had to choose a career, he found it a difficult choice. He could not decide whether he should become a lawyer like his father, or whether he wanted a career in the Church.

In 1494 he went back to London and studied law. When he graduated he worked as a lawyer (barrister) but he never lost his interest in religion. After a few years of working as a lawyer he decided to become a monk. He lived in a monastery for a few years. However, he felt he should do something for his country and he became a politician. He became a Member of Parliament in 1504 and around that time he also married his first wife.

More continued his political work. In 1515, he was sent to Flanders by King Henry VIII as a negotiator in the conflict the king had with the Belgian cotton industry. Around this time, More wrote his book Utopia. He wrote it in Latin and it was read by humanists all over Europe. It was translated into English in 1551.

In 1518 he became a member of the Privy Council and in 1521 he was knighted. All this time More got along quite well with the king. He helped Henry VIII to write a treatise against Luther. However, when Henry VIII wanted to divorce his wife Catherine of Aragon because she couldn’t give him a son, More protested against the divorce. This made him fall into discredit with the king. More resigned in 1532. He did not agree with the King’s religious reforms. In 1534 the King issued the Act of Supremacy, which made the King the head of the Church of England, a church that had broken with the pope in Rome. All English clergymen had to take an oath in which they agreed to acknowledge the King as the head of the Church. More refused to see the King as head of the Church and therefore he was convicted of treason. On July 6th 1535 More was beheaded. It is often mentioned that his last words were: “the King’s good servant, but God’s first”¹. Exactly 400 years later, in 1935, he was made a saint by the Catholic Church.

More, Erasmus and Humanism

Thomas More was one of the most influential humanists in England. In Utopia, More puts forward a very humanist notion, namely that "knowledge has to be put to use and that it is the duty of good men to act and improve society."² Thomas More was also well known outside England. When in 1499 Desiderius Erasmus, one of the most important humanists of that time, visited England, More became good freinds with him. More and Erasmus are important because they helped to spread and develop humanism throughout Europe. they both had a great interest in classical literature. They used classical texts as a model for their own works, such as Erasmus'famous work The Praise of Folly and More's Utopia. They sometimes held translating competitions together, in which they both wrote a translation of a Latin or Greek text. What they also had in common was their religion. More and Erasmus were both very religious Catholics and they played an important role in defending the Catholic faith during the Protestant Reformation.