would secure an impartial exercise of his autho- CH. 2. rity. And unless he could have shown (which he never attempted to show) that the circumstances of the succession were not so precarious as to call for his interference, it would seem that the express contingency had arisen which was contemplated in the constitution of the canon law;* and that where a provision had been made by the church of which he was the earthly head, for difficulties of this precise description, the pope was under an obligation either to make the required concessions in virtue of his faculty, or, if he found himself unable to make those concessions, to offer some distinct explanation of his refusal. I speak of the question as nakedly political. I am not considering the private injuries of which Catherine had so deep a right to complain, nor the complications subsequently raised on the original validity of the first marriage. A political difficulty, on which alone he was bound to give sentence, was laid before the pope in his judicial capacity, in the name of the nation; and the painful features which the process afterwards assumed are due wholly to his original weakness and vacillation. the Deeply, however, as we must all deplore the *The dispensing power of popes was not formally limited. According to the Roman lawyers, a faculty lay with them of granting extraordinary dispensations in cases where dispensations would not be usually admissible-which faculty was to be used, however, dummodo causa Сн. The dis limit of the jurisdiction a crisis. CH. 2. scandal and suffering which were occasioned by the dispute, it was in a high degree fortunate, that putes on the at the crisis of public dissatisfaction in England spiritual with the condition of the church, especially in the brought to conduct of its courts of justice, a cause should have arisen which tested the whole question of church authority in its highest form; where the dispute between the laity and the ecclesiastics was represented in a process in which the pope sat as judge; in which the king was the appellant, and the most vital interests of the nation were at stake upon the issue. It was no accident which connected a suit for divorce with the reformation of religion. The ecclesiastical jurisdiction was upon its trial, and the future relations of church and state depended upon the pope's conduct in a matter which no technical skill was required to decide, but only the moral virtues of probity and courage. The time had been when the clergy feared only to be unjust, and when the functions of judges might safely be entrusted to them. The small iniquities of the consistory courts had shaken the popular faith in the continued operation of such a fear; and the experience of an Alexander VI., a Julius II., and a Leo X. had induced a suspicion that even in the highest quarters justice had ceased to be much Position of considered. It remained for Clement VII. to the pope. disabuse men of their alarms, or by confirming them to forfeit for ever the supremacy of his order in England. Nor can it be said for him that the case was one in which it was unusually difficult to be virtuous. Justice, wounded dignity, the A.D. 1527. and the interests of the See pointed alike to the C. 2. same course. Queen Catherine's relationship to emperor could not have recommended her to the tenderness of the pope, and the policy of assenting to an act which would infallibly alienate Henry from Charles, and therefore attach him to the Roman interests, did not require the eloquence of Wolsey to make it intelligible. If, because he was in the emperor's power, he therefore feared the personal consequences to himself, his cowardice of itself disqualified him to sit as a judge. It does not fall within my present purpose to detail the first stages of the proceedings which followed. In substance they are well known to all readers of English history, and may be understood without difficulty as soon as we possess the clue to the conduct of Wolsey. I shall, however, in a few pages briefly epitomize what passed. the danger cession in At the outset of the negotiation, the pope, He admits although he would take no positive steps, was all, of a disin words, which he was expected to be. Neither puted suche nor the cardinals refused to acknowledge the England. dangers which threatened the country. He discussed freely the position of the different parties, the probabilities of a disputed succession, and the various claimants who would present themselves, if the king died without an heir of undisputed legitimacy.* Gardiner writes to Wolsey,† 'We A.D.1527-8 did even more inculcate what speed and celerity the thing required, and what danger it was to the realm to have this matter hang in suspense. His * Knight and Cassalis to Wolsey: BURNET's Collect. p. 12. STRYFE'S Memorials, vol. i., Appendix, p. 66. Jan. I. A.D. 1528. CH. 2. Holiness confessed the same, and thereupon began to reckon what divers titles might be pretended March 30. by the King of Scots and others, and granted that, without an heir male, with provision to be made by consent of the state for his succession, and unless that what shall be done herein be established in such fashion as nothing may hereafter be objected thereto, the realm was like to come to dissolution.' In stronger language the Cardinal-Governor of Bologna declared that 'he knew the gyze of England as well as few men did, and if the king should die without heirs male, he was sure it would cost two hundred thousand men's lives. Wherefore he thought, supposing his Grace should have no more children by the queen, and that by taking of another wife he might have heirs male, the bringing to pass that matter, and by that to avoid the mischiefs afore written, he thought would deserve Heaven.'* Whatever doubt there might be, therefore, whether the original marriage with Catherine was legal, it was universally admitted that there was none about the national desirableness of the dissolution of it; and if the pope had been free to judge only by the merits of the case, it is impossible to doubt that he would have cut the knot, either by granting a dispensation to Henry to The hesita- marry a second wife-his first being formally, pope, owing though not judicially, separated from him-or in some other way. But the emperor was 'a lion tion of the to his fear of the em peror. * Sir F. Bryan and Peter Vannes to Henry; State Papers, vol. vii. p. 144. + STRYPE'S Memorials, Appendix, vol. i. p. 100. in his path;' the question of strength between the Cя. 2. French and the Spaniards remained undecided, A.D. 1528. and Clement would come to no decision until he was assured of the power of the allies to protect him from the consequences. Accordingly he said and unsaid, sighed, sobbed, beat his breast, shuffled, implored, threatened;* in all ways he endeavoured to escape from his dilemma, to say yes and to say no, to do nothing, to offend no one, and above all to gain time, with the weak man's hope that 'something might happen' to extricate him. Embassy followed embassy from England, each using language more threatening than its predecessor. The thing, it was said, must be done, and should be done. If it was not done by the pope it would be done at home in some other way, and the pope must take the consequences.† Wolsey warned him pas- Wolsey sionately of the rising storm, a storm which threatens would be so terrible when it burst 'that it would the conse * STRYPE'S Memorials, Appendix, vol. i. pp. 105-6; BURNET'S Collectanea, p. 13. Wolsey to the Pope, BURNET'S Collectanea, p. 16: Vereor quod tamen nequeo tacere, ne Regia Majestas, humano divinoque jure quod habet ex omni Christianitate suis his actionibus adjunctum freta, postquam viderit sedis Apostolicæ gratiam et Christi in terris Vicarii clementiam desperatam Cæsaris intuitu, in cujus manu neutiquam est tam sanctos conatus reprimere, ea tunc moliatur, ea suæ causæ perquirat remedia,quæ non solum huic Regno sed etiam aliis Chris him with quences of a refusal. |