fore, thou strike not awry for saving of thine honesty." So passed Sir Thomas More out of this world, to God, upon the very same day which he most desired. Soon after his death came intelligence thereof to the Emperor Charles. Whereupon he sent for Sir Thomas Eliott, our English ambassador, and said to him: "My Lord ambassador, we understand that the king your master hath put his faithful servant, and grave wise counsellor, Sir Thomas More, to death." Whereupon Sir Thomas Eliott answered, "that he understood nothing thereof." "Well," said the emperor, "it is too true: and this will we say, that had we been master of such a servant, of whose doings ourselves have had these many years no small experience, we would rather have lost the best city of our dominions, than have lost such a worthy counsellor." Which matter was by the same Sir Thomas Eliott to myself, to my wife, to Master Clement and his wife, to Master John Heywood and his wife, and unto divers others his friends accordingly reported.
