The History of England - Vols. 1 to 6 (212 page)

After her departure, the king did her the justice to acknowledge, that she had ever been a dutiful and affectionate wife, and that the whole tenor of her behaviour had been conformable to the strictest rules of probity and honour. He only insisted on his own scruples, with regard to the lawfulness of their marriage; and he explained the origin, the progress, and the foundation of those doubts, by which he had been so long and so violently agitated. He acquitted cardinal Wolsey from having any hand in PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)

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encouraging his scruples; and he craved a sentence of the court, agreeable to the justice of his cause.

The legates, after citing the queen anew, declared her
contumacious,
notwithstanding her appeal to Rome; and then proceeded to the examination of the cause. The first point which came before them, was, the proof of prince Arthur’s consummation of his marriage with Catherine; and it must be confessed, that no stronger arguments could reasonably be expected of such a fact after so long an interval. The age of the prince, who had passed his fifteenth year, the good state of his health, the long time that he had cohabited with his consort, many of his expressions to that very purpose; all these circumstances form a violent presumption in favour of the king’s assertion.
a
Henry himself, after his brother’s death, was not allowed for some time to bear the title of prince of Wales, in expectation of her pregnancy: The Spanish ambassador, in order the better to ensure possession of her jointure, had sent over to Spain, proofs of the

consummation of her marriage:b
Julius’s bull itself was founded on the supposition, that Arthur had
perhaps
had knowledge of the princess: In the very treaty, fixing Henry’s marriage, the consummation of the former marriage with prince Arthur, is acknowledged on both sides.
c
These particulars were all laid before the court, accompanied with many reasonings concerning the extent of the pope’s authority, and against his power of granting a dispensation to marry within the prohibited degrees.

Campeggio heard these doctrines with great impatience; and notwithstanding his resolution to protract the cause, he was often tempted to interrupt and silence the king’s council, when they insisted on such disagreeable topics. The trial was spun out till the 23rd of July; and Campeggio chiefly took on him the part of conducting it.

Wolsey, though the elder cardinal, permitted him to act as president of the court; because it was thought, that a trial, managed by an Italian cardinal, would carry the appearance of greater candour and impartiality, than if the king’s own minister and favourite had presided in it. The business now seemed to be drawing near to a period; and the king was every day in expectation of a sentence in his favour; when, to his great surprize, Campeggio,

on a sudden, without any warning, and upon very frivolous The cause evoked to

pretences,d
prorogued the court, till the first of October. The Rome.

evocation, which came a few days after from Rome, put an end to all the hopes of success, which the king had so long and so anxiously cherished.
e

During the time, that the trial was carried on before the legates at London, the emperor had by his ministers earnestly solicited Clement to evoke the cause; and had employed every topic of hope or terror, which could operate either on the ambition or timidity of the pontiff. The English ambassadors, on the other hand, in conjunction with the French, had been no less earnest in their applications, that the legates should be allowed to finish the trial; but, though they employed the same engines of promises and menaces, the motives, which they could set before the pope, were not so urgent or immediate as those which were held up to him by the emperor.
f
The dread of losing England, and of fortifying the Lutherans by so considerable an accession, made small impression on Clement’s mind, in comparison of the anxiety for his personal safety, and the fond desire of restoring the Medicis to their dominion in Florence. As soon, therefore, as he had adjusted all terms with the emperor, he laid hold of the pretence of justice, which required him, as he asserted, to pay regard to the queen’s appeal; and PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)

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suspending the commission of the legates, he adjourned the cause to his own personal judgment at Rome. Campeggio had beforehand received private orders, delivered by Campana, to burn the decretal bull, with which he was entrusted.

Wolsey had long foreseen this measure as the sure forerunner of his ruin. Though he had at first desired, that the king should rather marry a French princess than Anne Boleyn, he had employed himself with the utmost assiduity and earnestness to bring

the affair to a happy issue:g
He was not therefore to be blamed for the unprosperous event, which Clement’s partiality had produced. But he had sufficient experience of the extreme ardour and impatience of Henry’s temper, who could bear no contradiction, and was wont, without examination or distinction, to make his ministers answerable for the success of those transactions with which they were entrusted. Anne Boleyn also, who was prepossessed against him, had imputed to him the failure of her hopes; and as she was newly returned to court, whence she had been removed, from a regard to decency, during the trial before the legates, she had naturally acquired an additional influence on Henry, and she served much to fortify his prejudices against the cardinal.
h
Even the queen and her partizans, judging of Wolsey by the part which he had openly acted, had expressed great animosity against him; and the most opposite factions seemed now to combine in the ruin of this haughty minister. The high opinion itself, which Henry had entertained of the cardinal’s capacity, tended to hasten his downfall; while he imputed the bad success of that minister’s undertakings, not to ill fortune or to mistake, but to the malignity or infidelity of his intentions. The blow, however, fell not instantly on his head. The king, who probably could not justify by any good reason his alienation from his ancient favourite, seems to have remained some time in suspence; and he received him, if not with all his former kindness, at least with the appearance of trust and regard.

But constant experience evinces how rarely a high confidence Wolsey’s fall.

and affection receives the least diminution, without sinking into absolute indifference, or even running into the opposite extreme.

The king now determined to bring on the ruin of the cardinal 18th Oct.

with a motion almost as precipitate as he had formerly employed in his elevation. The dukes of Norfolk and Suffolk were sent to require the great seal

from him; and on his scrupling to deliver it,i
without a more express warrant, Henry wrote him a letter, upon which it was surrendered, and it was delivered by the king to Sir Thomas More, a man, who, besides the ornaments of an elegant literature, possessed the highest virtue, integrity, and capacity.

Wolsey was ordered to depart from York-Place, a palace which he had built in London, and which, though it really belonged to the see of York, was seized by Henry, and became afterwards the residence of the kings of England, by the title of Whitehall. All his furniture and plate were also seized: Their riches and splendor befitted rather a royal than a private fortune. The walls of his palace were covered with cloth of gold or cloth of silver: He had a cupboard of plate of massy gold: There were found a thousand pieces of fine holland belonging to him. The rest of his riches and furniture was in proportion; and his opulence was probably no small inducement to this violent persecution against him.

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The cardinal was ordered to retire to Asher, a country seat which he possessed near Hampton Court. The world, that had paid him such abject court during his prosperity, now entirely deserted him on this fatal reverse of all his fortunes. He himself was much dejected with the change; and from the same turn of mind, which had made him be so vainly elated with his grandeur, he felt the stroke of adversity with double

rigour.k
The smallest appearance of his return to favour threw him into transports of joy, unbecoming a man. The king had seemed willing, during some time, to intermit the blows, which overwhelmed him. He granted him his protection, and left him in possession of the sees of York and Winchester. He even sent him a gracious message, accompained with a ring, as a testimony of his affection. Wolsey, who was on horseback when the messenger met him, immediately alighted; and throwing himself on his knees in the mire, received in that humble attitude these marks of his majesty’s gracious disposition towards him.
l

But his enemies, who dreaded his return to court, never ceased plying the king with accounts of his several offences; and Anne Boleyn in particular contributed her endeavours, in conjunction with her uncle the duke of Norfolk, to exclude him from all hopes of ever being reinstated in his former authority. He dismissed therefore his numerous retinue: and as he was a kind and beneficent master, the separation passed not without a plentiful effusion of tears on both sides.
m
The king’s heart, notwithstanding some gleams of kindness, seemed now totally hardened against his old favourite. He ordered him to be indicted in the Star Chamber, where a sentence was passed against him. And not content with this severity, he abandoned him to all the rigour of the parliament, which now, November.

after a long interval, was again assembled. The house of lords voted a long charge against Wolsey, consisting of forty-four articles; and accompanied it with an application to the king for his punishment, and his removal from all authority. Little opposition was made to this charge in the upper house: No evidence of any part of it was so much as called for; and as it chiefly consists of general accusations, it was scarcely susceptible of any.
NOTE [F]
The articles were sent down to the house of commons; where Thomas Cromwel, formerly a servant of the cardinal’s, and who had been raised by him from a very low station, defended his unfortunate patron with such spirit, generosity, and courage, as acquired him great honour, and laid the foundation of that favour, which he afterwards enjoyed with the king.

Wolsey’s enemies, finding that either his innocence or his caution prevented them from having any just ground of accusing him, had recourse to a very extraordinary expedient. An indictment was laid against him, that, contrary to a statute of Richard II. commonly called the statute of provisors, he had procured bulls from Rome, particularly one investing him with the legantine power, which he had exercised with very extensive authority. He confessed the indictment, pleaded ignorance of the statute, and threw himself on the king’s mercy. He was perhaps within reach of the law; but besides that this statute had fallen into disuse, nothing could be more rigorous and severe than to impute to him as a crime, what he had openly, during the course of so many years, practised with the consent and approbation of the king, and the acquiescence of the parliament and kingdom. Not to mention, what he always

asserted,o
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the most formal manner, which, had he not been apprehensive of the dangers attending any opposition to Henry’s lawless will, he might have pleaded in his own defence before the judges. Sentence, however, was pronounced against him, “That he was out of the king’s protection; his lands and goods forfeited; and that his person might be committed to custody.” But this prosecution of Wolsey was carried no farther. Henry even granted him a pardon for all offences; restored him part of his plate and furniture; and still continued, from time to time, to drop expressions of favour and compassion towards him.

The complaints against the usurpations of the ecclesiastics had Commencement of

been very ancient in England, as well as in most other European the reformation in kingdoms; and as this topic was now become popular every

England.

where, it had paved the way for the Lutheran tenets, and

reconciled the people, in some measure, to the frightful idea of heresy and innovation.

The commons, finding the occasion favourable, passed several bills, restraining the impositions of the clergy; one for the regulating of mortuaries; another against the

exactions for the probates of wills;p
a third against non-residence and pluralities, and against churchmen’s being farmers of land. But what appeared chiefly dangerous to the ecclesiastical order, were the severe invectives thrown out, almost without opposition, in the house, against the dissolute lives of the priests, their ambition, their avarice, and their endless encroachments on the laity. Lord Herbert
q
has even preserved the speech of a gentleman of Gray’s-Inn, which is of a singular nature, and contains such topics as we should little expect to meet with during that period. The member insists upon the vast variety of theological opinions, which prevailed in different nations and ages; the endless inextricable controversies maintained by the several sects; the impossibility, that any man, much less the people, could ever know, much less examine, the tenets and principles of every sect; the necessity of ignorance and a suspense of judgment with regard to all those objects of dispute: And upon the whole, he infers, that the only religion obligatory on mankind is the belief of one supreme Being, the author of nature; and the necessity of good morals, in order to obtain his favour and protection. Such sentiments would be deemed latitudinarian, even in our time, and would not be advanced, without some precaution, in a public assembly. But though the first broaching of religious controversy might encourage the sceptical turn in a few persons of a studious disposition; the zeal, with which men soon after attached themselves to their several parties, served effectually to banish for a long time all such obnoxious liberties.