CHAP. II. with a dysentery, which confined him a fortnight, and afterwards to Leicester Abbey, where he died, on the 29th of November, in the 60th year of his age. On the day before his death, Kyngston, the lieutenant of the Tower, entered the chamber of the dying cardinal, and it was to that officer that he addressed those memorable words, in which he so well described the character of Henry, and spoke so bitterly of the time he had spent in the royal service. "Henry," he said, "is a prince of most royal courage; rather than miss any part of his will, he will endanger one half of his kingdom." And then of himself he said, "Had I but served God as diligently as I have served the King, he would not have given me over in my grey hairs. But this is my just reward for my pains and study; not regarding my service to God, but only my duty to my prince.")* "Had such feelings," says Mackintosh, "pervaded his life, instead of shining at the moment of his death, his life would have been pure; especially if his conception of duty had been as exact as his sense of its obligation was strong."+ An unmerited interest is reflected back on his life by the suddenness and violence of his fall; his rule was not good for England, and he hardly deserves the honour of being ranked among English statesmen.

As Henry became more irritated at the dissimulating policy of Rome, and approached his final determination to set at nought the papal authority, he must have perceived that Wolsey was an unsuitable instrument for such a daring policy. "The church. and court of Rome had too many holds on the cardinal. It was the divergence of their political schemes which loosened the ties between the King and the cardinal;" and it was the hand of Anne Boleyn which at last brought him to the ground, "to clear the field for counsellors more irreconcilable to the Supreme Pontiff."+

* Cavendish. † Mackintosh, II., 60,

Mackintosh, II., 60; see Froude's opinion, which differs from that expressed in the text. I.. 166.

SECTION III.-FROM THE FALL OF WOLSEY TO THE END OF THE REIGN. 1530-1547.

I. THE DIVORCE, AND THE ABOLITION OF PAPAL SUPREMACY.

39. General character of the period. We have now arrived at a great period of English history, in which the events are so complicated and contradictory, and the conduct of men is so crooked and uncertain, that we have to feel our way amongst them, and act with the greatest caution.

England was about to witness a greater revolution than any she had hitherto undergone; a revolution that was to endure every variety of "chance, change, and fate," through a space of a hundred and fifty years, before it was thoroughly established and perfected.

"The passions and prejudices which belonged to such a mighty change still survive amongst us," and " give a colour to our political feelings and to our religious life."* Our great duty, therefore, in studying the history of this wonderful period will be, to weigh the evidence which is brought before us, with a calm and unbiassed judgment; not condemning or admiring this or that party, according as our opinions and prejudices incline us; but seeking only the establishment of the truth, whether it be for or against us; and above all, never to compromise our natural hatred of oppression, and cruelty, and injustice, except by regarding these revolutions as the means by which God, "who orders all things in heaven and earth," saw fit to accomplish a paramount good, by the strong hand of wicked instruments.†

40. The Cabinet which succeeded after the fall of Wolsey. The chief members of the administration which succeeded Wolsey were—the Duke of Norfolk, president of the council; the Duke of Suffolk and Viscount Rochford, who retained their former places; Sir Thomas More, Wolsey's successor in the chancery; Sir William Fitzwilliam, treasurer of the household; and Dr. Gardiner, the secretary. They were friendly to a reformation of abuses in the church, though not prepared for a revolution in her doctrine and constitution," and the presence of such a pure and conscientious man as More was a pledge, that if any reformation was made, it would be effected without subverting the rights and interests of the church.+

66

To these six was soon afterwards added Thomas Cromwell, " & * Knight's Pop. Hist., II., 337, .t lbid. ‡ Mackintosh, II, 64; Froude, I., 169.

CHAP. II.

man whose life was a specimen of the variety of adventures and vicissitudes of fortune incident to the leading actors of a revolutionary age."*

History of

Cromwell.

Re

Cromwell, the malleus monachorum, as he was called, was of good English family, belonging to the Cromwells of Lincolnshire. Thomas His father seems to have gone up to London, and established an iron foundry at Putney; but dying early, and his widow marrying again, the young Cromwell left home, and became a vagabond on the wide world. He went to Antwerp, and was employed in an English factory in the capacity of a clerk. Foxe gives a strange account of his being a trooper in the army of Bourbon when Rome was sacked; but this story wants other evidence, and is improbable, because Cromwell was most likely with Wolsey about that time. It is certain, however, that he travelled through Italy, and that he was a military adventurer on the continent for some time. In 1515, he appears to have been employed in a banking-house at Florence. turning to England, he entered the household of the Marchioness of Dorset, and in 1525 found his way into the general asylum of ability in want of employment-the service of Wolsey. Wolsey soon discovered the nature of his new dependent, and employed him in the most important work of visiting and breaking up the small monasteries which the Pope had granted for the foundation of the cardinal's new colleges. When the great prelate fell, Cromwell defended him with ability and fidelity; he accompanied him through his dreary confinement at Esher, and he gallantly opposed the bill of impeachment which the Lords submitted to the Commons against Wolsey. Lingard, on the authority of Cardinal Pole, states that his principles were of the most flagitious description; because he had advised Pole to read the works of Machiavelli. It is more likely that he was thus accused because he had learnt by heart Erasmus's translation of the New Testament. His strange career, however, had taught him a deep knowledge of the world; and it was his shrewdness and boldness, his varied experience, the remarkable vigour of his mind, and, no doubt, the chivalry which he displayed in defending Wolsey, that recommended him to Henry at a most critical period.t

41. Henry's Appeal to the Universities in the matter of his Divorce. The vexatious delays and specious pretexts with which the papal court had hitherto contrived to prolong the cause of * Mackintosh, II., 64. + Froude II., 103-113; Lingard, VI, 176,

1530

reported to

the divorce, had now filled Henry with impatience and irritation. While in this state of mind, Drs. Gardiner and Fox reported to him that, when they were at supper with a gentleman Cranmer's at Waltham Abbey (1529), the subject of conversation suggestion being the divorce, the family tutor had suggested that Henry. the king should spend no more time in negotiating with the Pope, but should propose to all the universities of Europe the plain question-" Can a man marry his brother's widow?"

The hint was relished and adopted; the tutor was immediately summoned to court, and ordered to draw up his opinions in writing; he was soon made chaplain to the King, and was sent as one of the chief agents to carry out the scheme he had proposed. The tutor who thus gave such happy advice was Thomas Cranmer. He was born at Aslacton, in Nottinghamshire, in 1489; was educated at Cambridge; and, having cultivated the polite and humane literature introduced by Erasmus into northern Europe, had early caught some sparks of that generous zeal for liberty of writing, which the Humanists, or followers of Erasmus, were accused of carrying to excess. But though he preferred the new, Cranmer was not ignorant of the old learning; he was eminent both as a theologian and canonist, and was regarded as one of the ornaments of the university.* The idea of obtaining the opinions of the most learned divines and most cele-: brated universities of Europe had before been recom- between mended by Wolsey, and agents had already been sent to and consult some of the foreign schools. But it was not objects in intended to make their decision final, or subversive of to the the papal authority; whereas, this was Cranmer's ties. intention; and the main argument of the book which he wrote was to the same purport.

Distinction

Wolsey's

Cranmer's

appealing

universi

This appeal to the universities was a kind of irregular appeal. to the church in its dispersed state, and was considered as the best substitute for a general council. For the bold proceedings of the Council of Constance in deposing and electing popes, had so terrified the court of Rome, and had spread such a wide and well founded belief that the Catholic Church in council assembled had an authority paramount to that of the Supreme Pontiff, that it was determined never to call another general council. Besides this, no general council could now be assembled without the consent of the Emperor, who would certainly withstand every project for facilitating the divorce.t

* Mackintosh, II., 54. † Ibid, 52, 53.

CHAP. II.

Two plain questions were, therefore, put to the universities:I-Whether marriage with a brother's widow was prohibited by the divine law? 2-And, whether a papal dispensation could release the parties from its obligation?

The French universities of Orleans, Angers, Bourges, and Toulouse, and the Italian universities of Ferrara, Padua, and Pavia, together with those of Bologna and Paris, the two most famous schools of civil and canon law on the continent, concurred in declaring that such a marriage was contrary to the divine law, and that no papal dispensation could make it lawful.

In Germany, Lombardy, Naples, and Spain, where the universities were under the control of the Emperor, no answers were obtained; and even the German Reformers, who were certainly not under any dread of the Emperor, refused to purchase Henry's good will by sanctioning the divorce. Both Luther and Melancthon agreed in saying, that they would rather allow Henry to have two wives than to separate from Catherine for the purpose of marrying another woman.

Means

That Henry's agents distributed money plentifully, in order to obtain favourable decisions, is an undoubted fact, and taken to even in France he had to make great sacrifices. The favourable English universities were also unfriendly to the King's cause, and it was not till after a great deal of violence that favourable decisions were extorted from them.

obtain

answers.

42. Henry's final negotiations with the Pope. It had been originally intended to lay before the Pontiff this mass of opinions and subscriptions, as the united voice of the Christian world pronouncing in favour of the divorce. But it was deemed more prudent to substitute a letter to the Pope (July, 1530), subscribed by the Lords spiritual and temporal, and by a certain number of Commons, in the name of the whole nation, beseeching his holiness to bring the King's suit to a speedy termination, and intimating in forcible terms, that if he delayed any longer to do justice, desperate remedies would be tried. Wolsey was Wolsey was the first subscriber to this letter.*

To this menacing remonstrance, Clement replied in a letter (September 27th), containing specious explanations and fair promises. In the previous March, he had been compelled by the Emperor to publish a breve, forbidding Henry to contract a new marriage under pain of excommunication; but he now secretly proposed to Cassalis, the English agent at Rome, that he would

* Lingard, VI., 173; Froude, I., 334.