rewarded, and his rise in the Church was rapid. In the spring of 1531,
he was made Archdeacon of Leicester, and in November of the same year
he was installed Bishop of Winchester.
"I have often squared" (meaning passed over) "with you, Gardiner," said
the King, when he gave his Minister this valuable preferment, "but I
love you never the worse, as the Bishoprick I now give will convince
you."
The newly-made Bishop sat with Dr. Cranmer, then Archbishop of
Canterbury, when that prelate declared Queen Katherine's marriage with
the King to be null and void, May 23rd, 1533. He was then sent to
Marseilles to intimate to the Pope and the French King, that in case
difficulties should be made respecting the divorce, the King of England
would appeal to a General Council.
On his return home he was called upon, together with all the other
Bishops, to acknowledge Henry as Supreme Head of the Church; and
his pen was henceforth constantly employed in vindicating Henry's
proceedings, both respecting that monarch's divorce and subsequent
marriage, and also with regard to his having thrown off the dominion
of the See of Rome.
Gardiner's writings on these difficult subjects obtained for him at the
time the highest reputation.
During this period of religious agitation, a strange spirit prevailed
amongst all classes of people, of whatever denomination of religion
they might be.
Though all needed tolerance, none would grant it. On the contrary,
intolerance and bigotry seemed to rule every man's heart. Even those
who, whilst they were themselves undergoing its sufferings, had groaned
the loudest under persecution, were, when relieved, equally loud in
their opposition to the smallest indulgence being extended to those who
differed from them in opinion.
Whichever might be the party in the ascendant, its leaders were urged
on to institute persecutions and trials, and to enforce executions
whenever a doctrine was started to which they did not agree.
Some writers assert that Gardiner was vindictive and cruel; others,
that he was forced tacitly to permit proceedings of which he
disapproved, and of which he would willingly have mitigated the
severity.
Others again say that the King's love of power, and his desire to
show himself as a true son of the Church, although he had assumed her
temporal headship, induced him to bear witness to his faith by severe
measures, whenever her authority in doctrines was impugned by his
subjects.
Certain it is, that now began a series of religious persecutions that
cast shame and disgrace upon all who professed the name of Christ.
His holy Church on earth, far from being a tender mother to poor,
suffering, and ignorant mortals, became a by-word for cruelty and
bigotry, a very Moloch, who desired the sacrifice of her children both
by fire and by the sword.
What can men deem are the chief attributes of the Almighty, that to
give Him pleasure it is necessary to torture and put to death the
children that His dear Son came to save?
It is sickening to read the list of those who suffered for religion's
sake during the latter part of Henry's reign, and during the whole of
the reign of his daughter, Queen Mary.
A Frenchman writing at this time from England, tells his friend in
Latin:
"They have a strange way of managing in England, for those who are for
the Pope are hanged, and those who are against him are burnt."
Henry also each year became more tyrannical and overbearing. He brooked
neither opposition nor contradiction. His humours were so capricious
that even his Ministers were constantly in personal danger, it being
impossible to foresee how much involved the King might choose to
consider them in the schisms that were being brought to the Royal
notice.
Gardiner was certainly once in very considerable peril.
His young kinsman and secretary, Germain Gardiner, having been
suspected of denying the King's supremacy, had been tried, condemned,
and executed, and Gardiner's enemies sought to implicate the Bishop in
his secretary's treasonable opinions.
Those who view Gardiner's character mercifully, urge that in order to
secure his own safety and that of his relatives, he was driven into
assenting rather than being a party to the numerous cruel executions
that now sullied the history of this country.
Gardiner ultimately lost the King's favour, from having drawn up a
paper of articles against Queen Katherine Parr.
It appears that, as usual, Henry had conceived some jealous suspicions
of his Queen, and had directed the Bishop of Winchester to prepare
these statements against her.
This important document having been confided to Chancellor Wriothesley,
in order that the Queen should be committed to the Tower, he by
accident or design let it drop from his bosom. It was picked up by a
friendly hand, and immediately conveyed to the Princess.
Katherine so wrought upon the King's affection, that she not only
succeeded in allaying his jealous fears and quieting his suspicions,
but she also so excited his resentment against the writer of the
accusations against her, that from that day Henry would never again see
Gardiner.
It is also believed that this incident was the cause of the Bishop's
name not being included in the list of the King's executors.
At one time, so high did Gardiner stand in the King's estimation, that
Henry had resolved not only to nominate him as an executor, but also
to direct that he should be a member of the Council to whom would be
entrusted the executive power during the minority of his son.
Here again, however, is difference of opinion amongst historians, some
writers asserting that it was not the animosity of Queen Katherine
Parr, but the friendship of the Duke of Norfolk and his family, that
proved the ruin of Gardiner's fortunes at this period.
Henry having become jealous of that powerful noble, seized upon every
opportunity of humbling his relatives and friends.
But this, as well as most of the events of Gardiner's life, have been
related by contemporary writers with such violence of partisanship,
that it is difficult to ascertain the truth.
To Gardiner, however, must be assigned the merit that both during the
life, and after the death of the King his master, he ever spoke and
wrote of him in terms of much deference and respect.
Upon the accession of Edward VI. Archbishop Cranmer laboured earnestly
to establish the great work of the Reformation on a firm basis, and was
very desirous to obtain Gardiner's assistance, or, at any rate, his
concurrence in his plans.
But this wily prelate would neither concur nor disagree with Cranmer's
schemes. His ruling maxim had ever been to keep things quiet, and he
asserted that this could not be done were any great alterations made
either in Church or State.
He agreed in the wisdom with which the Archbishop sought to establish
the Reformed religion, and also in his desire to do away with
superstitious practices, but he saw grave objections to the innovation
being attempted at present.
The King's youth and feeble health, the necessary absence of the
Protector Somerset, who was detained in Scotland by military duty,
made the future not only doubtful, but gloomy; and Gardiner was of
opinion that it would be injudicious to disturb the present Church
government.
However, Cranmer carried his point in so far as having a Royal
Commission appointed for the purpose of visiting each diocese.
The Bishop of Winchester, notwithstanding his love of peace, opposed
this measure, and refused to allow the Commissioners to enter his
diocese. For this contumacy he was committed to the Fleet Prison.
His imprisonment there was not severe, the Warden of the Fleet being
his friend, neither did it last long, and when released he returned to
his diocese, and addressed himself zealously but quietly to his duties
there.
This calm, however, was not of long duration, for within the year he
was summoned to preach in London on St. Peter Day, and his doctrines
so offended the Council that he was sent to the Tower where he remained
a prisoner during the remainder of Edward's reign.
After Edward's death, Somerset visited Gardiner in prison with a view
of effecting his release.
Gardiner readily expressed his approval of all that had been done to
establish the Reformed religion, and promised for the future obedience
to Royal authority, but he would not acknowledge that he had been
guilty of contumacy in the past. On this point he was immovable,
protesting that he was innocent in every respect.
He was brought before the Privy Council, and then three months were
given to him for reflection.
When this period had expired, as the Bishop remained in the same
sentiments, it was resolved to proceed judicially against him in order
to deprive him of the See of Winchester.
He then refused to sign the articles that had been sent him previously,
and to which he had in a measure assented, and he vehemently demanded
to be tried as to the grounds of his imprisonment.
But the Privy Council refused his prayer, and his bishopric was
sequestrated.
All these proceedings were much censured as being contrary to the
liberties of Englishmen, and contrary also to all forms of legal
procedure. It was thought very hard that a man should be put in prison
solely from a complaint having been made against him, and still more
hard that after two years' durance, and without further inquiry,
articles should be put to him for his signature.
Such actions were quite indefensible upon any constitutional principles.
Archbishop Cranmer greatly deprecated this illegal harshness, for he
foresaw the injurious consequences.
Such ill-timed severity would inevitably drive men like Gardiner,
Tonstall, and Day, who had already acknowledged the King's supremacy,
back to the Church of Rome, and the progress of the Reformation must
thereby be sorely hindered.
And so it proved.
During the few remaining years of Edward's life, Gardiner remained
in the Tower, a prisoner, and yet not strictly kept, for during this
period he wrote many controversial pieces, and several Latin poems,
besides putting into verse some of the most beautiful and poetical
passages in the books of Ecclesiastes, Wisdom, and Job.
On the 3rd August, 1553, Queen Mary made her solemn entry into the
Tower, when Bishop Gardiner, for himself, and also in the name of his
fellow prisoners, the Duke of Norfolk, the Duchess of Somerset, Lord
Courtney, and others of high rank, delivered a congratulatory speech to
Her Majesty, who at its conclusion gave them their liberty.
On August 8th, he, with Archbishop Cranmer, and in the presence of the
Queen, performed the obsequies of the late King Edward VI. The young
monarch was buried in Westminster Abbey, and the ceremonial was the
English funeral service.
The next day Bishop Gardiner again took possession of Winchester House,
Southwark, after an imprisonment of rather more than five years. On the
23rd, he was declared Chancellor of England.
On the 1st October he had the honour of crowning the Queen, and on the
5th of the same month he opened the first Parliament of her reign.
He was also again restored to his academical honours, and was
re-elected Master of Trinity Hall.
Not only were distinctions and emoluments thus showered upon him, but
the esteem that the Queen manifestly had for him, and the confidence
she reposed in him, led to his being speedily endowed with an unusually
large share of civil as well as ecclesiastical power.
Mary was exceedingly anxious on three points.
The first was to substantiate the legitimacy of her birth by annulling
her mother's divorce; the second was to effect the restoration of the
old religion in England, and to reconcile this country to Rome; and
thirdly, she eagerly desired to obtain the consent of Parliament to her
marriage with Prince Philip of Spain.
In all these difficult and important matters Bishop Gardiner aided her
with marvellous sagacity and unflagging zeal.
Thus it came to pass that the same man who procured the divorce for
the father, obtained for the daughter the reversal of that divorce.
Now it was, in these days of triumph and success, that Gardiner gave
evidence of his ambition, and of his time-serving nature. To preserve
his ascendency over a weak and obstinate woman, he allowed himself
to yield many points of which he disapproved, and then, having begun
to swim with the stream, he found himself compelled to go faster and
farther than he had intended.
The Spanish match was as distasteful to him as it was to the bulk of
the nation, foreseeing, as he did, that it would involve this country
in great expense, and that it would not tend to increase either the
happiness or the good disposition of the Queen.
Unhappily, Mary had inherited obstinacy and violence of temper from
her father, and a jealous and melancholy temperament from her ill-used
mother.
All the early years of her life had been overshadowed by misfortune
and insult, and she had been taught to believe that her sorrows mostly
arose from the sinfulness of the nation in resisting the authority of
the Church to which she belonged.
Unattractive in mind as well as in person, she loved a man who cared
but little, if at all, for her, who had only consented to the marriage
from motives of policy, and whose morose and sullen manners embittered
the rare visits he accorded to his wife.
However great were Gardiner's errors, not only as a religious bigot,
but as an unscrupulous and ambitious statesman, it must be remembered
to his credit, that he was ever zealous in preserving what he deemed
the constitution of his country, especially so in guarding her from the
encroachments of foreigners.
To preserve his own power, he yielded against his judgment to the
Queen's desire for her marriage with Philip of Spain, but in drawing
up the articles of the marriage contract he took care so to frame them,
that they would not only be passed easily by the English Parliament,
but also that the Spaniards should be entirely excluded from any share
in the Government of England.
To Philip was granted the "Title" of King of England, and his likeness
was to be united to that of the Queen upon every coin and seal, but
Mary's signature alone sufficed to give authority to all deeds and acts.
No Spaniard could hold office in this country.
The Queen could not be obliged to leave England, nor any child, should
there be children, without the consent of Parliament.
The Queen was to have a jointure of £40,000 a year from Spain, and
£20,000 from the Netherlands. Should the Queen have only daughters,
they were to succeed to her throne, and have from Spain the usual
portions of kings' daughters.
Should Philip survive the Queen, he was to have no share in the English
Government.
Such stringent conditions appeared very disadvantageous to Spain; but
so great was Philip's desire to obtain a foothold in England, that
he yielded every point, believing, probably, that when once firmly
established in this country, his own influence, combined with the power
of the Church of Rome, would overcome much opposition and enable him to
gain important concessions.
Parliament passed the Bill, and all obstacles to the marriage being now
removed, King Philip, attended and accompanied by a magnificent suite
of nobles, and escorted by a large fleet, put to sea, and arrived at
Southampton at the end of July, 1554.
From thence he proceeded to the Palace at Winchester, where he was
magnificently entertained by the Bishop. The following day he was
solemnly married to the Queen by that prelate in the Cathedral of
Winchester.
The newly-married pair made their entry into London with every
circumstance of pomp and splendour.
At Windsor the King was installed a Knight of the Garter, and whenever
he and the Queen appeared in public they were received by the people
with universal acclamation.
But this pleasant and joyful state of things was not to be of long
duration.
Philip speedily gave evidence of the distaste he felt for his bride,
who, poor woman, had not only the misfortune of having an unlovely
and unlovable countenance, but was also afflicted with a peevish and
jealous temper. She was well aware how little attractive she was, and
therefore suspected and disliked every woman who approached her. Her
half-sister and heir, Elizabeth, was especially the object of her
jealous fears.
This Princess, however, behaved with so much prudence and fortitude
that she gave no loophole for the attacks of her enemies. Still,
despite her care and prudence, and through the machinations of Gardiner
and Cardinal Pole, she was sent to the Tower; but she was saved from
perhaps a worse fate by her brother-in-law, Philip of Spain, who
interceded in her behalf.
There is much reason to believe that of the two Philip much preferred
the younger sister, and as Queen Mary was in bad health and her life
most precarious, he hoped to marry Elizabeth after his wife's death.
The unhappy Queen, in the bitter disappointment occasioned by her
marriage, again turned to her Church for consolation, and in spite of
the King's and the Chancellor's opposition, insisted upon Cardinal
Pole's coming to England, armed with a license under the Queen's Great
Seal to exercise his functions as the Pope's Legate.
Soon after Pole's arrival, the Houses of Lords and Commons presented a
petition to the King and Queen, praying that the nation might again be
received into the bosom of the Catholic Church.
The Cardinal, after a lengthy oration, granted the petition, absolving
the people of England, and declaring them reconciled to the See of Rome.
But the joy attendant on this proclamation was speedily troubled by
the revival of the sanguinary laws for the repression of what was now
called heresy.
These laws were speedily carried into execution with much rigour, and a
bloody persecution was set on foot in almost all parts of the kingdom.
Whether this persecution was actively concurred in, or only passively
submitted to by the Bishop of Winchester, is a matter of doubt. On one
side he ever showed himself of the popular opinion by siding with
Cardinal Pole when they sat together on various commissions. On the
other hand, he saved the lives of many Protestants by merely locking
them up until quieter and more peaceable days should come.
These were indeed dismal and dreadful times. A frightful religious zeal
prevailed in the minds of men, inducing them, under colour of promoting
the Gospel, to act precisely contrary to its spirit.
Gardiner, no doubt, had his share, and a large one, in these barbarous
proceedings; but the whole reproach of these savage cruelties must not
rest upon his memory.
It is certain that when there were hopes of an heir to the throne, the
Chancellor induced the Queen to restore several prisoners to liberty.
He went in person to the Tower on January 18th, 1555, and released the
Archbishop of York, Sir Edward Rogers, Sir James Crofts, Sir Nicholas
Throckmorton, Sir Edward Warner, Sir George Harper, Sir William
Saintlow, Sir Gawin Carew, Sir Andrew Dudley, William Gibs, Cuthbert
Vaughan, John Harrington, John Tremain, and others of less note.
It must not be forgotten, also, that during Mary's second Parliament,
far from advocating the stringent laws that were in course of
preparation against heretics, as persons of the Reformed religion were
now called, he endeavoured to mitigate their severity; but in this, as
in other matters, he was borne on by the stream of Royal and popular
opinion, and, perhaps, compelled to acquiesce in proceedings of which
he disapproved.
Thus Henry's severities and injustice were now emulated and surpassed
by Mary's severities and cruelty.
If Gardiner disapproved in his heart of the persecution of heretics,
his clemency or merciful inclinations did but little or nothing towards
diminishing the frightful number of blazing piles that day by day
consumed the bodies of miserable victims of religious fury.
Tortured by jealous love, unblessed with children, the unhappy
Mary turned with increased fervour to religion as her only solace.
Convinced, as she was, that the Church alone could afford relief to her
sorrows, the bigotry of her nature and education demanded the holocaust
of thousands of victims to appease the anger of an offended Deity.
Violent and obstinate, her Ministers, even had they wished to oppose
her, could not, without peril to themselves, have resisted her stubborn
resolution to have her way.
Unhappily then for England, her Ministers were both yielding and
unscrupulous.
Not only was the Queen relentless in her resolve to exterminate heresy,
but if the Bishop of Winchester relaxed in zeal, Bishop Bonner, and
William, Marquis of Winchester (who for a time held the Great Seal),
were eager to show their love for their Church by the torture they
inflicted on her enemies.
Gardiner, whatever may have been his personal wishes, also yielded to
the pressure put upon him; and by his dexterity and brilliant talents
made himself of inestimable value to the Queen, and by so doing
secured for himself supremacy in the Council, and also kept away other
pretendants, especially Cardinal Pole, who was a formidable rival.
But if, as the writers who view him favourably assert, the Bishop of
Winchester was thus impelled by the temper of his Royal mistress,
and by a series of circumstances beyond his control, to acquiesce in
actions of which he disapproved, what must be thought of the conscience
of a man, who as statesman and Churchman permitted tortures to be
inflicted, and executions to take place, that have made the reign of
Mary a by-word of bloodshed and cruelty, and have covered the memories
of this monarch and her Ministers with indelible disgrace?
The land was deluged in blood. The smoke of burning human beings
darkened the air, as it rose in hideous sacrifice to the Almighty
Father, and the shrieks of tortured victims, the prayers of martyrs
at the stake, ascended daily to heaven in one great agonised cry for
mercy--and for vengeance.
For a time England seemed as one stunned by the frequency of such
unusual and horrible spectacles, but by degrees the mighty spirit of
the nation was roused.
Laymen and Churchmen alike shook off their lethargy. The degrading
cruelties of the reign of Catholic Mary placed Protestant Elizabeth
more firmly on the throne; and when James II. struggled vainly to
restore his Church to England, it was doubtless the remembrance of
such scenes that induced many staunch Englishmen to welcome with
enthusiasm the advent of the foreign Prince of Orange, and his English
wife.
Fox, who describes Gardiner as a monster delighting in torture and
blood, declares that the Bishop was stricken down by dreadful and
deadly disease, the very day on which he had consigned Bishops Latimer
and Ridley to the flames at Oxford.
This historian relates that the Duke of Norfolk came to sup at
Winchester House, but that Gardiner would not sit down at table until
the messenger from Oxford had arrived to say the sacrifice of the
martyrs had been consummated.
As he joyed over the narrative of their sufferings, the hand of Heaven
fell heavily upon him, and he died soon afterwards in inexpressible
anguish of body and mind.
Other biographers say but little of the malady to which he succumbed,
but Fox's account is clearly incorrect in many particulars. The
Duke of Norfolk Fox alludes to, had been dead some thirteen months,
and Gardiner made a speech in Parliament more than a week after the
execution of these Bishops.
It is also a disputed point whether Gardiner really exhibited
vindictive eagerness in bringing about the deaths of Latimer and
Ridley, or whether, as some say, he endeavoured to save them, straining
indeed his authority by offering Latimer a pardon without the knowledge
of the Queen or the Council.
Bell, as well as Fox, declares that his death was a judgment brought
on him for his cruelty to these martyrs, but Dr. Godwin, Bishop of
Hereford, Dr. Fuller, and Archbishop Parker, all ascribe his death to
natural causes.
For some years Gardiner had suffered from rheumatic gout, and
ultimately consumption of the lungs was joined to his other diseases.