need not be surprised, if, to mortify her vanity, Wolsey should employ all the art and skill he was master of, to clog the grand affair of the Divorce with premeditated delays. Queen Catharine, tired with his treacherous behaviour and double-dealing, was obliged to lodge an appeal at the Court of Rome, and to remit the merits of her cause from the Pope's Legate (for in that high character then was Cardinal Wolsey) to the Pope himself. Nor was the King less irritated at the tergiversation and trifling conduct of his dilatory minister, as Mr. Fuller has observed. "Now began Cardinal Wolsey," says he, "to decline in the King's favour, suspecting him for not being cordial in his cause, and ascribing much of the delay to his backwardness therein. More hot did the displeasure of Queen Catharine burn against him, beholding him as the chief engine who set the matter of her divorce first in motion.". But though the Queen, in her perplexed situation, could do little else but weep and pray, our boisterous Monarch (who never ruined any man by halves) took up a sudden resolution, to convince the Cardinal how dangerous a thing it was for him or any one else to check the progress of his amour. In fine, to wind up my story, the King ordered his attorney-general to prefer a bill of indictment against Wolsey, for his having presumed to execute the office of a Pope's Legate à Latere in this realm without the royal licence (as he pretended) and contrary to a statute made and provided in the reign of King Richard II. Against this accusation the Cardinal pleaded "The King's License under his hand and broad seal, to indemnify him; but that he could not produce the instrument, because his trunks and coffers were seized. However, not thinking it adviseable to maintain his conduct, he confessed the indictment, sent his submission, and cast himself upon the King's honour.". -All which circumstances are more fully and pathetically displayed in a moving speech which his Eminence made to the King's Commissioners; to whom (being now arrested and a state prisoner) he thus discovered the anguish of his soul. "I am now sixty years old, and have spent my days in his Majesty's service, neither shunning paius, nor endeavouring any thing more than (next to my Creator) to please him. And is this that heinous crime, for which I am, at this age, deprived of my estate, and forced, as it were, to + Fuller's Church History, B. v. pp. 175, 176. beg my bread from door to door? I expected some accusation of a higher strain, as treason, or the like: not that I know myself conscious of any such matter, but that his Majesty's wisdom is such, as to know it little becomes the constancy and magnanimity of a King, for a slight fault to condemn, and that without hearing, an ancient servant, and to inflict a punishment on him more horrid than death! What man is he, who is so base minded, that he had not rather a thousand times perish, than see a thousand men (for so many my family numbereth) of whose faithful ser vice he hath had long trial, for the most part to perish before his eyes? But finding nothing else objected, I conceive great hope that I shall easily break this machination of combined envy, as was that late one against me in the Parliament concerning treason. It is well known to his Majesty (of whose justice I am confident) that I could not presume to execute my power legatine before he had been pleased to ratify it by his royal assent, given under his seal, which notwithstanding I cannot produce; that, and all my goods (as you well know) being taken from me. Neither indeed, if I could, would I produce it; for to what end should I contend with the King? Go, therefore, and tell his Majesty, that I acknowledge all that I have (but alas! what speak I of what I have, who indeed have nothing left me?) or whatsoever I had, to be derived from his royal bounty, and do think it good reason that he should revoke his gifts, if he thinks me unworthy of them. Why, then, do I not remit my cause to his Majesty's arbitriment, at his pleasure to be either absolved or condemned? To him, then, if you will have me acknowledge my fault, behold I will make short work with you, I confess it. The King knows my innocency, so that neither my own confession, nor the calumnies of my adversaries, can deceive him. His Majesty, from the fountain of his natural clemency, doth often derive the streams of his mercy to delinquents; and I know, though I should not desire it, he will regard my innocency."-Stow's Annals. If this speech be genuine (which consent of authors encourage us to believe) thus much we may venture to say of it, that though it does not come up to the standard of the most refined language, nevertheless its sentiments are very striking. Like a fine portrait done by some masterly hand, it places in full view a great man, astonished, confounded, and thunderstruck with a sudden and unexpected reverse of fortune! Cast down headlong from the summit of power and preferment, to the low and rueful condition of a beggar from door to door! stript in a moment of the princely retinue of a thousand servants! trembling under the apprehension of a punishment more horrid than death! avowing with the same breath, his guilt and his innocence! pleading for mercy, and imploring the clemency of one who was an entire stranger to those royal virtues! All which sad circumstances, so pathetically enumerated, might be apt to melt one to compassion, did not the well-known arrogance and the boundless ambition of this proud Prelate mutually conspire to shut out pity. But to enter a little further into the Cardinal's plea. It appears from the articles of his impeachment, that he actually had the King's licence to exercise his legatine power; and the 28th article in particular insinuates as much. I shall first lay it before the reader, and then subjoin Mr. Collier's reflections upon it. Art. 28th. "Also whereas the said Lord Cardinal did first sue unto your Grace to have your assent to be Legate de Latere, promising and solemnly promising before your Majesty, and before the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, that he would nothing do, nor attempt, by virtue of his Legacie, that should be contrary to your gracious prerogative or regality, or to the damage or prejudice of the jurisdiction of any ordinary, and that by his Legacie no man should be hurted or offended: And upon that condition, and no other, he was admitted by your Grace to be a Legate within this realm. This condition he has broken, as is well known to all your subjects."-Upon which Mr. Collier makes the following reflections. "The 28th Article declares expressly, he had the King's Licence to exercise his Legatine Authority; and since the Cardinal had the King's leave, and was admitted by his Highness, as the article speaks, to be a Legate within this realm, was it not a great hardship he should be indicted upon the statute of Præmunire? For it appears by the process, he was not prosecuted so much for the abuse, as for the bare using of his Legatine Commission. Thus the King made the privilege of his Letters Patent a crime, sued against his own Licence, and brought the Cardinal under a severe forfeiture, for making use of the Royal Authority." Now, should we take it for granted, that the Cardinal's incurring the penalty of a Præmunire was a great hardship, and that his plea was not inequitable; nevertheless, in despite + Collier's Eccl. Hist. Vol. II. b. i. p. 43. of all arguments and remonstrances to the contrary, our sturdy Monarch persisted in his resolution to seize Wolsey's person and effects, for no other reason that I can find, but only this, that such was his will and pleasure. And truly, after K. Henry VIII. had renounced all obedience to the great Obstacle of his infamous Desires, his conduct and his actions were generally the result of this arbitrary and tyrannic principle: "Sic volo, sic jubeo, stat pro ratione voluntas."...Juv. Sat. vi. "I have the sov'reign power to save or kill, And give no other reason but my will."...Dryden. §2.-How the Clergy were drawn into a Præmunire, and fined to the Tune of L.118,840.... That foreign Universities were bribed to declare for the Divorce....The King assumes the Title of Supreme Head of the Church of England.... His Title is acknowledged by the Clergy with a Limitation. UPON the disgrace and removal of Cardinal Wolsey, a Parliament was called, wherein the Clergy were, with little ceremony, voted guilty of a Præmunire, for their having acknowledged that Prelate's Legatine Authority and in consequence of this vote, the whole body of the spirituality were indicted in the King's Bencht. Wherefore being willing to redeem their whole estates forfeited by law, they were glad to commute it into a sum of money; and this commutation cost the province of Canterbury L. 100,000, and the province of York L. 18,840. These arbitrary amercements (whatever motives might be pretended) were levied with a view to reimburse his Majesty, who had been, for a considerable time, at no small expense in procuring proper instruments from foreign universities (which he had profusely bribed) to declare in favour of his Divorce. Indeed Bishop Burnet, with a front of assurance peculiar to himself, positively affirms there was no such thing as bribery in the case. But if that random-writer had taken the least pains to enquire into the truth, (which, by the bye, was none of his business) he might, perhaps, have been convinced of the contrary; if, indeed, it were possible to convince such a man. + Fuller's Ch. Hist. B. v. p. 184. H 66 6 For, not to insist upon the authorities of the famous Cornelius Agrippa, Sleidan, and the Author of the Life of Bishop Fisher, Cavendish, Cardinal Wolsey's Gentleman-Usher, is another authority, that the King was at a considerable expense for the gaining the foreign universities. He tells us, that those who governed those societies, or had the keeping of the common seals, were fed by the commissioners with great sums of money, and gained by the prevalence of bribery. One of our Parliaments concurs with Cavendish in his reflections. It is 1 Mur. Sess. ¡¡. c. 1. The act sets forth, That the seals, as well of certain universities in Italy and France, were gotten (as it were for a testimony) by the corruption of money, with a few light persons, scholars of the same universities: as also the seals of the universities of this realm, were obtained by great travel, sinister working, secret threatenings and entreatings of some men of authority specially sent at that time thither, for the same purposes.' -Add to this the Pope's Letter to the King (extant in Mr. Collier's Collection of Records) which absolutely confirms the above complaint of unfair dealing and sinister practices with the universities abroad, part of which is as follows: "As for those universities and men of learning, who, as you will write us word, incline to your side of the question, very few of their opinions have come to our hands; and even those few have not been duly presented by orators, or agents in the King's name. At the best they are but crude reasonings, unsupported by that which ought, in this case, to be principally considered; I mean, the authority of the word of God, and the holy Canons."-See the Appendix No. I. In the mean time, the process of the Divorce moved but slowly at Rome. So many troublesome difficulties, obstructions, and demurs from that quarter, one upon the neck of another, gave the King's patience a deep wound. But two of the most noted state-quacks of those times, Cromwell and Cranmer, (who, as the Author of the Short View assures us, was made Archbishop of Canterbury on purpose to dissolve the King's Marriage) had prepared a plaister for that sore. At a private audience, which was easily obtained, they assumed the freedom to acquaint his Highness, that it was in vain to wait any longer for a Dispensation from Rome, and that, to make any farther attempts that + Collier's Ecclesiastical History, Vol. II. B. i. p. 58. Cujus Consilii Cromwellus et Cranmerus clam fuisse authores existimabantur. Antiq. Brit. C |