A.D. 1527.

desperate one, and if it failed it was ruinous. CH. 2. The nation at that time was sincerely attached to Spain. The alliance with the house of Burgundy was of old date; the commercial intercourse with Flanders was enormous, Flanders, in fact, absorbing all the English exports; and as many as 15,000 Flemings were settled in London. Charles himself was personally popular; he had been the ally of England in the late French war; and when in his supposed character of leader of the anti-papal party in Europe he allowed a Lutheran army to desecrate Rome, he had won the sympathy of all the latent discontent which was fermenting in the population. France, on the Unpopulaother hand, was as cordially hated as Spain was policy. beloved. A state of war with France was the normal condition of England; and the re-conquest of it the universal dream from the cottage to the castle. Henry himself, early in his reign, had shared in this delusive ambition; and but three years before the sack of Rome, when the Duke of Suffolk led an army into Normandy, Wolsey's purposed tardiness in sending reinforcements had alone saved Paris.*

There could be no doubt, therefore, that a breach with the emperor would in a high degree be unwelcome to the country. The king, and probably such members of the council as were aware of his feelings, shrank from offering an open affront to the Spanish people, and anxious as they were for a settlement of the succession,

* Letters of the Bishop of Bayonne, LEGBAND, vol. iii.; HALL, 669.

rity of this

Сн.

A.D. 1527.

CH. 2. perhaps trusted that advantage might be taken of some political contingency for a private arrangement; that Catherine might be induced by Charles himself to retire privately, and sacrifice herself, of her free will, to the interests of the two countries. This, however, is no more than conjecture; I think it probable, because so many English statesmen were in favour at once of the divorce and of the Spanish alliance-two objects which, only Wolsey uses on some such hypothesis, were compatible. The spect of the fact cannot be ascertained, however, because the divorce to divorce itself was not discussed at the council table until Wolsey had induced the king to change his policy by the hope of immediate relief.

the pro

gain Hen

ry's con

sent.

Wolsey has revealed to us fully his own objects in a letter to Sir Gregory Cassalis, his agent at Rome. He shared with half Europe in an impression that the emperor's Italian campaigns were designed to further the Reformation; and of this central delusion he formed the keystone of his conduct. 'First condoling with his Holiness,' he wrote, 'on the unhappy position. in which, with the college of the most reverend cardinals, he is placed,* you shall tell him how, day and night, I am revolving by what means or contrivance I may bring comfort to the church of Christ, and raise the fallen state of our most Holy Lord. I care not what it may cost me, whether of expense or trouble; nay, though I have to shed my blood, or give my life for it, assuredly so long as life remains to me for

A.D. 1527.

Wolsey in

he has de

Henry from

this I will labour. And now let me mention the CH. 2. great and marvellous effects which have been wrought by my instrumentality on the mind of my most excellent master the king, whom I have persuaded to unite himself with his Holiness in heart and soul. I urged innumerable reasons to induce him to part him from the emperor, to whom he clung with much tenacity. The most effective of them all was the constancy with which I assured him of the good-will and affection which were felt for him by his Holiness, and the certainty that his Holiness would furnish proof of his friendship in conceding his said Ma- Dec. 6. jesty's requests, in such form as the church's forms the treasure and the authority of the Vicar of Christ pope that shall permit, or so far as that authority extends tached or may extend. I have undertaken, moreover, the empe for all these things in their utmost latitude, pledging my salvation, my faith, my honour and soul upon them. I have said that his demands shall be granted amply and fully, without scruple, without room or occasion being left for after- And that in retractation; and the King's Majesty, in conse- has underquence, believing on these my solemn asseverations that the Pope's Holiness is really and indeed will conwell inclined towards him, accepting what is divorce. spoken by me as spoken by the legate of the Apostolic See, and therefore, as in the name of his Holiness, has determined to run the risk which I have pressed upon him; he will spare no labour or expense, he will disregard the wishes of his subjects, and the private interest of his Realm,

ror,

return he

taken that the pope

cede the

Сн. 2.

A.D. 1527.

to attach himself cordially and constantly to the Holy See.'*

These were the words of a man who loved England well, but who loved Rome better; and Wolsey has received but scanty justice from catholic writers, since he sacrificed himself for the sincere ser- catholic cause. His scheme was bold and well church of laid, being weak only in that it was confessedly

Wolsey a

vant of the

Rome.

titled to

suppose

that if he

succeeded,

success

would justify him.

in contradiction to the instincts and genius of the

nation, by which, and by which alone, in the long run, either this or any other country has been He was en- successfully governed. And yet he might well be forgiven if he ventured on an unpopular course in the belief that the event would justify him; and that, in uniting with France to support the pope, he was not only consulting the true interest of England, but was doing what England actually desired, although blindly aiming at her object by other means. The French wars, however traditionally popular, were fertile only in glory. The rivalry of the two countries was a splendid folly, wasting the best blood of both countries for an impracticable chimera; and though there was impatience of ecclesiastical misrule, though there was jealousy of foreign interference, and general irritation with the state of the church, yet the The spread mass of the people hated protestantism even worse of protes than they hated the pope, the clergy, and the and the consistory courts. They believed-and Wolsey aversion to was, perhaps, the only leading member of the privy council, except Archbishop Warham, who was not under the same delusion-that it was

tantism,

English

it.

* State Papers, vol. vii. pp. 18, 19.

A.D. 1527.

possible for a national church to separate itself CH. 2. from the unity of Christendom, and at the same time to crush or prevent innovation of doctrine; that faith in the sacramental system could still be maintained, though the priesthood by whom ɔse mysteries were dispensed should minister gilded chains. This was the English historical heory handed down from William Rufus, the second Henry, and the Edwards; yet it was and is a mere phantasm, a thing of words and paper fictions, as Wolsey saw it to be. Wolsey knew well that an ecclesiastical revolt implied, as a certainty, innovation of doctrine; that plain men could not and would not continue to reverence the office of the priesthood, when the priests were treated as the paid officials of an earthly authority higher than their own. He was not to be blamed if he took the people at their word; if he believed that, in their doctrinal conservatism, they knew and meant what they were saying: and the reaction which took place under Queen Mary, when the Anglican system had been tried and failed, and the alternative was seen to be absolute between a union with Rome or a forfeiture of catholic orthodoxy, prove after all that he was wiser than in the immediate event he seemed to be; that if his policy had succeeded, and if, strengthened by success, he had introduced into the church those reforms which he had promised and desired, he would have satisfied the substantial wishes of the majority of the nation.

The fullest account of Wol- will be found in a letter adsey's intentions on church reform | dressed to him by Fox, the old