Amidst these uneasy symptoms at home and abroad, parliament re-assembled on

the 15th of January. It was a changed England since these men first came

together on the fall of Wolsey. Session after session had been spent in

clipping the roots of the old tree which had overshadowed them for

centuries. On their present meeting they were to finish their work, and lay

it prostrate for ever. Negotiations were still pending with the See of

Rome, and this momentous session had closed before the final catastrophe.

The measures which were passed in the course of it are not, therefore, to

be looked upon as adopted hastily, in a spirit of retaliation, but as the

consistent accomplishment of a course which had been deliberately adopted,

to reverse the positions of the civil and spiritual authority within the

realm, and to withdraw the realm itself from all dependence on a foreign

power.

The Annates and Firstfruits' Bill had not yet received the royal assent;

but the pope had refused to grant the bulls for bishops recently appointed,

and he was no longer to receive payment for services which he refused to

render. Peter's pence were still paid, and might continue to be paid, if

the pope would recollect himself; but, like the Sibyl of Cuma, Henry

destroyed some fresh privilege with each delay of justice, demanding the

same price for the preservation of what remained. The secondary streams of

tribute now only remained to the Roman See; and communion with the English

church, which it was for Clement to accept or refuse.

The circumstances under which the session opened were, however, grave and

saddening. Simultaneously with the concluding legislation on the church,

the succession to the throne was to be determined in terms which might,

perhaps, be accepted as a declaration of war by the emperor; and the affair

of the Nun of Kent had rendered necessary an inquiry into the conduct of

honoured members of the two Houses, who were lying under the shadow of high

treason. The conditions were for the first time to be plainly seen under

which the Reformation was to fight its way. The road which lay before it

was beset not merely with external obstacles, which a strong will and a

strong hand could crush, but with the phantoms of dying faiths, which

haunted the hearts of all living men; the superstitions, the prejudices,

the hopes, the fears, the passions, which swayed stormily and fitfully

through the minds of every actor in the great drama.

The uniformity of action in the parliament of 1529, during the seven years

which it continued, is due to the one man who saw his way distinctly,

Thomas Cromwell. The nation was substantially united in the divorce

question, could the divorce be secured without a rupture with the European

powers. It was united also on the necessity of limiting the jurisdiction of

the clergy, and cutting short the powers of the consistory courts. But in

questions of "opinion" there was the most sensitive jealousy; and from the

combined instincts of prejudice and conservatism, the majority of the

country in a count of heads would undoubtedly have been against a

separation from Rome.

The clergy professed to approve the acts of the government, but it was for

the most part with the unwilling acquiescence of men who were without

courage to refuse. The king was divided against himself. Nine days in ten

he was the clear-headed, energetic, powerful statesman; on the tenth he was

looking wistfully to the superstition which he had left, and the clear

sunshine was darkened with theological clouds, which broke in lightning and

persecution. Thus there was danger at any moment of a reaction, unless

opportunity was taken at the flood, unless the work was executed too

completely to admit of reconsideration, and the nation committed to a

course from which it was impossible to recede. The action of the

conservatives was paralysed for the time by the want of a fixed purpose.

The various parts of the movement were so skilfully linked together, that

partial opposition to it was impossible; and so long as the people had to

choose between the pope and the king, their loyalty would not allow them to

hesitate. But very few men actively adhered to Cromwell. Cromwell had

struck the line on which the forces of nature were truly moving--the

resultant, not of the victory of either of the extreme parties, but of the

joint action of their opposing forces. To him belonged the rare privilege

of genius, to see what other men could not see; and therefore he was

condemned to rule a generation which hated him, to do the will of God, and

to perish in his success. He had no party. By the nobles he was regarded

with the same mixed contempt and fear which had been felt for Wolsey. The

Protestants, perhaps, knew what he was, but he could only purchase their

toleration by himself checking their extravagance. Latimer was the only

person of real power on whose friendship he could calculate, and Latimer

was too plain spoken on dangerous questions to be useful as a political

supporter.

The session commenced on the 15th of January.

The first step was to receive the final submission of convocation. The

undignified resistance was at last over, and the clergy had promised to

abstain for the future from unlicensed legislation. To secure their

adherence to their engagements, an act[678] was passed to make the breach

of that engagement penal; and a commission of thirty-two persons, half of

whom were to be laymen, was designed for the revision of the Canon

law.[679]

The next most important movement was to assimilate the trials for heresy

with the trials for other criminal offences. I have already explained at

length the manner in which the bishops abused their judicial powers. These

powers were not absolutely taken away, but ecclesiastics were no longer

permitted to arrest _ex officio_ and examine at their pleasure. Where a

charge of heresy was to be brought against a man, presentments were to be

made by lawful witnesses before justices of the peace; and then, and not

otherwise, he might fall under the authority of the "ordinary." Secret

examinations were declared illegal. The offender was to be tried in open

court, and, previous to his trial, had a right to be admitted to bail,

unless the bishop could show cause to the contrary to the satisfaction of

two magistrates.[680]

This was but a slight instalment of lenity; but it was an indication of the

turning tide. Limited as it was, the act operated as an effective check

upon persecution till the passing of the Six Articles Bill.

Turning next to the relations between England and Rome, the parliament

reviewed the Annates Act,[681] which had been left unratified in the hope

that the pope might have consented to a compromise, and that "by some

gentle ways the said exaction might have been redressed and reformed." The

expectation had been disappointed. The pope had not condescended to reply

to the communication which had been made to him, and the act had in

consequence received the royal assent. An alteration had thus become

necessary in the manner of presentation to vacant bishoprics. The anomalies

of the existing practice have been already described. By the Great Charter

the chapters had acquired the right of free election. A _congé d'élire_ was

granted by the king on the occurrence of a vacancy, with no attempt at a

nomination. The chapters were supposed to make their choice freely, and the

name of the bishop-elect was forwarded to the pope, who returned the

Pallium and the Bulls, receiving the Annates in exchange. The pope's part

in the matter was now terminated. No Annates would be sent any longer to

Rome, and no Bulls would be returned from Rome. The appointments lay

between the chapters and the crown; and it might have seemed, at first

sight, as if it would have been sufficient to omit the reference to the

papacy, and as if the remaining forms might continue as they were. The

chapters, however, had virtually long ceased to elect freely; the crown had

absorbed the entire functions of presentation, sometimes appointing

foreigners,[682] sometimes allowing the great ecclesiastical ministers to

nominate themselves;[683] while the rights of the chapters, though existing

in theory, were not officially recognised either by the pope or by the

crown. The king affected to accept the names of the prelates-elect, when

returned to him from Rome, as nominations by the pope; and the pope, in

communicating with the chapters, presented them with their bishops as from

himself.[684] The papal share in the matter was a shadow, but it was

acknowledged under the forms of courtesy; the share of the chapters was

wholly and absolutely ignored. The crisis of a revolution was not the

moment at which their legal privileges could be safely restored to them.

The problem of re-arrangement was a difficult one, and it was met in a

manner peculiarly English. The practice of granting the _congé d'élire_ to

the chapters on the occurrence of a vacancy, which had fallen into

desuetude, was again adopted, and the church resumed the forms of liberty:

but the licence to elect a bishop was to be accompanied with the name of

the person whom the chapter was required to elect; and if within twelve

days the person so named had not been chosen, the nomination of the crown

was to become absolute, and the chapter would incur a Premunire.[685]

This act, which I conceive to have been more arbitrary in form than in

intention, was followed by a closing attack upon the remaining "exactions"

of the Bishop of Rome. The Annates were gone. There were yet to go,

"Pensions, Censes, Peter's Pence, Procurations, Fruits, Suits for

Provision, Delegacies and Rescripts in causes of Contention and Appeals,

Jurisdictions legatine--also Dispensations, Licenses, Faculties, Grants,

Relaxations, Writs called Perinde valere, Rehabilitations, Abolitions,"

with other unnamed (the parliament being wearied of naming them) "infinite

sorts of Rules, Briefs, and instruments of sundry natures, names, and

kinds." All these were perennially open sluices, which had drained England

of its wealth for centuries, returning only in showers of paper, and the

Commons were determined that streams so unremunerative should flow no

longer. They conceived that they had been all along imposed upon, and that

the "Bishop of Rome was to be blamed for having allured and beguiled the

English nation, persuading them that he had power to dispense with human

laws, uses, and customs, contrary to right and conscience." If the king so

pleased, therefore, they would not be so beguiled any more. These and all

similar exactions should cease; and all powers claimed by the Bishop of

Rome within the realm should cease, and should be transferred to the crown.

At the same time they would not press upon the pope too hardly; they would

repeat the same conditions which they had offered with the Annates. He had

received these revenues as the supreme judge in the highest court in

Europe, and he might retain his revenues or receive compensation for them,

if he dared to be just. It was for himself to resolve, and three months

were allowed for a final decision.

In conclusion, the Commons thought it well to assert that they were

separating, not from the church of Christ, but only from the papacy. A

judge who allowed himself to be overawed against his conscience by a

secular power, could not any longer be recognised; but no thing or things

contained in the act should be afterwards "interpreted or expounded, that

his Grace (the king), his nobles and subjects, intended by the same to

decline or vary from the congregation of Christ's church in anything

concerning the articles of the Catholic faith of Christendom, or in any

other things declared by the Holy Scripture and the Word of God necessary

for salvation; but only to make an ordinance, by policies necessary and

convenient, to repress vice, and for the good conservation of the realm in

peace, unity, and tranquillity, from ravin and spoil--ensuing much the old

antient customs of the realm in that behalf."[686]

The most arduous business was thus finished--the most painful remained. The

Nun of Kent and her accomplices were to be proceeded against by act of

parliament; and the bill of their attainder was presented for the first

time in the House of Lords, on the 18th of February. The offence of the

principal conspirators was plainly high treason; their own confessions

removed uncertainty; the guilt was clear--the sentence was inevitable. But

the fault of those who had been listeners only was less easy of

measurement, and might vary from comparative innocence to a definite breach

of allegiance.

The government were unwilling to press with severity on the noble lords and

ladies whose names had been unexpectedly brought to light; and there were

two men of high rank only, whose complicity it was thought necessary to

notice. The Bishop of Rochester's connection with the Nun had been culpably

encouraging; and the responsibility of Sir Thomas More was held also to be

very great in having countenanced, however lightly, such perilous schemers.

In the bill, therefore, as it was first read, More and Fisher found

themselves declared guilty of misprision of treason. But the object of this

measure was rather to warn than to punish, nor was there any real intention

of continuing their prosecution. Cromwell, under instructions from the

king, had communicated privately with both of them. He had sent a message

to Fisher through his brother, telling him that he had only to ask for

forgiveness to receive it;[687] and he had begged More through his

son-in-law, Mr. Roper, to furnish him with an explicit account of what had

passed at any time between himself and the Nun,[688] with an intimation

that, if honestly made, it would be accepted in his favour.

These advances were met by More in the spirit in which they were offered.

He heartily thanked Cromwell, "reckoning himself right deeply beholden to

him;"[689] and replied with a long, minute, and evidently veracious story,

detailing an interview which he had held with the woman in the chapel of

Sion Monastery. He sent at the same time a copy of a letter which he had

written to her, and described various conversations with the friars who

were concerned in the forgery. He did not deny that he had believed the Nun

to have been inspired, or that he had heard of the language which she was

in the habit of using respecting the king. He protested, however, that he

had himself never entertained a treasonable thought. He told Cromwell that

"he had done a very meritorious deed in bringing forth to light such

detestable hypocrisy, whereby every other wretch might take warning, and be

feared to set forth their devilish dissembled falsehoods under the manner

and colour of the wonderful work of God."[690] More's offence had not been

great. His acknowledgments were open and unreserved; and Cromwell laid his

letter before the king, adding his own intercession that the matter might

be passed over. Henry consented, expressing only his grief and concern that

Sir Thomas More should have acted so unwisely.[691] He required,

nevertheless, as Cromwell suggested, that a formal letter should be

written, with a confession of fault, and a request for forgiveness. More

obeyed; he wrote, gracefully reminding the king of a promise when he

resigned the chancellorship, that in any suit which he might afterwards

have to his Grace, either touching his honour or his profit, he should find

his Highness his good and gracious lord.[692] Henry acknowledged his claim;

his name was struck out of the bill, and the prosecution against him was

dropped.

Fisher's conduct was very different; his fault had been far greater than

More's, and promises more explicit had been held out to him of forgiveness.

He replied to these promises by an elaborate and ridiculous defence--not

writing to the king, as Cromwell desired him, but vindicating himself as

having committed no fault; although he had listened eagerly to language

which was only pardonable on the assumption that it was inspired, and had

encouraged a nest of fanatics by his childish credulity. The Nun "had

showed him not," he said, "that any prince or temporal lord should put the

king in danger of his crown." He knew nothing of the intended insurrection.

He believed the woman to have been a saint; he supposed that she had

herself told the king all which she had told to him; and therefore he said

that he had nothing for which to reproach himself.[693] He was unable to

see that the exposure of the imposture had imparted a fresh character to

his conduct, which he was bound to regret. Knowingly or unknowingly, he had

lent his countenance to a conspiracy; and so long as he refused to

acknowledge his indiscretion, the government necessarily would interpret

his actions in the manner least to his advantage.

If he desired that his conduct should be forgotten, it was indispensable

that he should change his attitude, and so Cromwell warned him. "Ye

desire," the latter wrote, "for the passion of Christ, that ye be no more

quickened in this matter; for if ye be put to that strait ye will not lose

your soul, but ye will speak as your conscience leadeth you; with many more

words of great courage. My Lord, if ye had taken my counsel sent unto you

by your brother, and followed the same, submitting yourself by your letter

to the King's Grace for your offences in this behalf, I would have trusted

that ye should never be quickened in the matter more. But now where ye take

upon you to defy the whole matter as ye were in no default, I cannot so far

promise you. Wherefore, my Lord, I would eftsoons advise you that, laying

apart all such excuses as ye have alleged in your letters, which in my

opinion be of small effect, ye beseech the King's Grace to be your gracious

lord and to remit unto you your negligence, oversight, and offence

committed against his Highness in this behalf; and I dare undertake that

his Highness shall benignly accept you into his gracious favour, all matter

of displeasure past afore this time forgotten and forgiven."[694]

Fisher must have been a hopelessly impracticable person. Instead of

following More's example, and accepting well-meant advice, he persisted in

the same tone, and drew up an address to the House of Lords, in which he

repeated the defence which he had made to Cromwell. He expressed no sorrow

that he had been engaged in a criminal intrigue, no pleasure that the

intrigue had been discovered; and he doggedly adhered to his assertions of

his own innocence.[695]

There was nothing to be done except to proceed with his attainder. The bill

passed three readings, and the various prisoners were summoned to the Star

Chamber to be heard in arrest of judgment. The Bishop of Rochester's

attendance was dispensed with on the ground of illness, and because he had

made his defence in writing.[696] Nothing of consequence was urged by

either of the accused. The bill was most explicit in its details, going

carefully through the history of the imposture, and dwelling on the

separate acts of each offender. They were able to disprove no one of its

clauses, and on the 12th of March it was read a last time. On the 21st it

received the royal assent, and there remained only to execute the sentence.

The Nun herself, Richard Masters, and the five friars being found guilty of

high treason, were to die; the Bishop of Rochester, Father Abel, Queen

Catherine's confessor, and four more, were sentenced for misprision of

treason to forfeiture of goods and imprisonment. All other persons

implicated whose names did not appear, were declared pardoned at the

intercession of Queen Anne.[697]

The chief offenders suffered at Tyburn on the 21st of April, meeting death

calmly, as it appears; receiving a fate most necessary and most

deserved,[698] yet claiming from us that partial respect which is due to

all persons who will risk their lives in an unselfish cause. For the Nun

herself, we may feel even a less qualified regret. Before her death she was

permitted to speak a few words to the people, which at the distance of

three centuries will not be read without emotion.

"Hither am I come to die," she said, "and I have not been the only cause of

mine own death, which most justly I have deserved; but also I am the cause

of the death of all these persons which at this time here suffer. And yet I

am not so much to be blamed, considering that it was well known unto these

learned men that I was a poor wench without learning; and therefore they

might have easily perceived that the things which were done by me could not

proceed in no such sort; but their capacities and learning could right well

judge that they were altogether feigned. But because the things which I

feigned were profitable unto them, therefore they much praised me, and bare

me in hand that it was the Holy Ghost and not I that did them. And I being

puffed up with their praises, fell into a pride and foolish fantasye with

myself, and thought I might feign what I would, which thing hath brought me

to this case, and for the which I now cry God and the King's Highness most

heartily mercy, and desire all you good people to pray to God to have mercy

on me, and on all them that here suffer with me."[699]

And now the closing seal was to be affixed to the agitation of the great

question of the preceding years. I have said that throughout these years

the uncertainty of the succession had been the continual anxiety of the

nation. The birth of a prince or princess could alone provide an absolute

security; and to beget a prince appeared to be the single feat which Henry

was unable to accomplish. The marriage so dearly bought had been followed

as yet only by a girl; and if the king were to die, leaving two daughters

circumstanced as Mary and Elizabeth were circumstanced, a dispute would

open which the sword only could decide. To escape the certainty of civil

war, therefore, it was necessary to lay down the line of inheritance by a

peremptory order; to cut off resolutely all rival claims; and in

legislating upon a matter so vital, and hitherto so uncertain and

indeterminate, to enforce the decision with the most stringent and exacting

penalties. From the Heptarchy downwards English history furnished no fixed

rule of inheritance, but only a series of precedents of uncertainty; and

while at no previous time had the circumstances of the succession been of a

nature so legitimately embarrassing, the relations of England with the pope

and with foreign powers doubly enhanced the danger. But I will not use my

own language on so important a subject. The preamble of the Act of

Succession is the best interpreter of the provisions of that act.

"In their most humble wise show unto your Majesty your most humble and

obedient subjects, the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and the Commons, in

this present parliament assembled; that since it is the natural inclination

of every man gladly and willingly to provide for the safety of both his

title and succession, although it touch only his private cause; we

therefore, most rightful and dreadful Sovereign Lord, reckon ourselves much

more bounden to beseech and intreat your Highness (although we doubt not of

your princely heart and wisdom, mixed with a natural affection to the same)

to foresee and provide for the most perfect surety of both you and of your

most lawful successors and heirs, upon which dependeth all our joy and

wealth; in whom also is united and knit the only mere true inheritance and

title of this realm without any contradiction. We, your said most humble

and obedient servants, call to our remembrance the great divisions which in

times past hath been in this realm by reason of several titles pretended to

the imperial crown of the same; which some time and for the most part

ensued by occasion of ambiguity, and [by] doubts then not so perfectly

declared but that men might upon froward intents expound them to every

man's sinister appetite and affection after their senses; whereof hath

ensued great destruction and effusion of man's blood, as well of a great

number of the nobles as of other the subjects and specialty inheritors in

the same. The greatest occasion thereof hath been because no perfect and

substantial provision by law hath been made within this realm itself when

doubts and questions have been moved; by reason whereof the Bishops of Rome

and See Apostolic have presumed in times past to invest who should please

them to inherit in other men's kingdoms and dominions, which thing we your

most humble subjects, both spiritual and temporal, do much abhor and

detest. And sometimes other foreign princes and potentates of sundry

degrees, minding rather dissension and discord to continue in the realm

than charity, equity, or unity, have many times supported wrong titles,

whereby they might the more easily and facilly aspire to the superiority of

the same.

"The continuance and sufferance of these things, deeply considered and

pondered, is too dangerous and perilous to be suffered any longer; and too

much contrary to unity, peace, and tranquillity, being greatly reproachable

and dishonourable to the whole realm. And in consideration thereof, your

said subjects, calling further to their remembrance, that the good unity,

peace, and wealth of the realm, specially and principally, above all

worldly things, consisteth in the surety and certainty of the procreation

and posterity of your Highness, in whose most Royal person at this time is

no manner of doubt, do therefore most humbly beseech your Highness that it

may be enacted, with the consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and

the Commons in this present parliament assembled--

"1. That the marriage between your Highness and the Lady Catherine, widow

of the late Prince Arthur, be declared to have been from the beginning,

null, the issue of it illegitimate, and the separation pronounced by the

Archbishop of Canterbury good and valid.

"2. That the marriage between your Highness and your most dear and entirely

beloved wife, Queen Anne, be established and held good, and taken for

undoubtful, true, sincere, and perfect, ever hereafter."[701]

The act then assumed a general character, laying down a table of prohibited

degrees, within which marriage might not under any pretence be in future

contracted; and demanding that any marriage which might already exist

within those degrees should be at once dissolved. After this provision, it

again returned to the king, and fixed the order in which his children by

Queen Anne were to succeed. The details of the regulations were minute and

elaborate, and the rule to be observed was the same as that which exists at

present. First, the sons were to succeed with their heirs. If sons failed,

then the daughters, with their heirs; and, in conclusion, it was resolved

that any person who should maliciously do anything by writing, printing, or

other external act or deed to the peril of the king, or to the prejudice of

his marriage with Queen Anne, or to the derogation of the issue of that

marriage, should be held guilty of high treason; and whoever should speak

against that marriage, should be held guilty of misprision of

treason--severe enactments, such as could not be justified at ordinary

times, and such as, if the times had been ordinary, would not have been

thought necessary--but the exigencies of the country could not tolerate an

uncertainty of title in the heir to the crown; and the title could only be

secured by prohibiting absolutely the discussion of dangerous questions.

The mere enactment of a statute, whatever penalties were attached to the

violation of it, was still, however, an insufficient safeguard. The recent

investigation had revealed a spirit of disloyalty, where such a spirit had

not been expected. The deeper the inquiry had penetrated, the more clearly

appeared tokens, if not of conspiracy, yet of excitement, of doubt, of

agitation, of alienated feeling, if not of alienated act. All the symptoms

were abroad which provide disaffection with its opportunity; and in the

natural confusion which attended the revolt from the papacy, the

obligations of duty, both political and religious, had become indefinite

and contradictory, pointing in all directions, like the magnetic needle in

a thunderstorm.

It was thought well, therefore, to vest a power in the crown, of trying the

tempers of suspected persons, and examining them upon oath, as to their

willingness to maintain the decision of parliament. This measure was a

natural corollary of the statute, and depended for its justification on the

extent of the danger to which the state was exposed. If a difference of

opinion on the legitimacy of the king's children, or of the pope's power in

England, was not dangerous, it was unjust to interfere with the natural

liberty of speech or thought. If it was dangerous, and if the state had

cause for supposing that opinions of the kind might spread in secret so

long as no opportunity was offered for detecting their progress, to require

the oath was a measure of reasonable self-defence, not permissible only,

but in a high degree necessary and right.

Under the impression, then, that the circumstances of the country demanded

extraordinary precautions, a commission was appointed, consisting of the

Archbishop of Canterbury, the Lord Chancellor, the Duke of Norfolk, and the

Duke of Suffolk; and these four, or any three of them, were empowered to

administer, at the pleasure of the king, "to all and singular liege

subjects of the realm," the following oath:--

"Ye shall swear to bear your faith, truth, and obedience only to the King's

Majesty, and to the heirs of his body, according to the limitation and

rehearsal within the statute of succession; and not to any other within

this realm, or foreign authority, prince, or potentate: and in case any

oath be made or hath been made by you to any other person or persons, that

then you do repute the same as vain and annihilate: and that to your

cunning, wit, and utmost of your power, without guile, fraud, or other

undue means, ye shall observe, keep, maintain, and defend this act above

specified, and all the whole contents and effects thereof; and all other

acts and statutes made since the beginning of this present parliament, in

confirmation or for due execution of the same, or of anything therein

contained. And thus ye shall do against all manner of persons, of what

estate, dignity, degree, or condition soever they be; and in no wise do or

attempt, or to your power suffer to be done or attempted, directly or

indirectly, any thing or things, privily or apertly, to the let, hindrance,

damage, or derogation thereof, by any manner of means, or for any pretence

or cause, so help you God and all saints."[702]

With this last resolution the House rose, having sat seventy-five days, and

despatched their business swiftly. A week later, the news arrived from Rome

that there too all was at length over; that the cause was decided, and

decided against the king. The history of the closing catastrophe is as

obscure as it is strange, and the account of the manner in which it was

brought about is unfortunately incomplete in many important particulars.

The outline only can be apprehended, and that very imperfectly.

On the receipt in Paris of the letter in which Henry threatened to organise

a Protestant confederacy, Du Bellay, in genuine anxiety for the welfare of

Christendom, had volunteered his services for a final effort. Not a moment

was to be lost, for the courts of Rome were already busy with the great

cause; but the king's evident reluctance to break with the Catholic powers,

gave room for hope that something might still be done; and going in person

to England, the bishop had induced Henry, at the last extremity, either to

entrust him with representative powers, or else to allow him after all to

make some kind of concession. I am unable to learn the extent to which

Henry yielded, but that an offer was made of some kind is evident from the

form of the story.[703] The winter was very cold, but the bishop made his

way to Rome with the haste of good will, and arrived in time to stay

judgment, which was on the point of being pronounced. It seemed, for the

moment, as if he would succeed. He was permitted to make engagements on the

part of Henry; and that time might be allowed for communication with

England, the pope agreed to delay sentence till the 23rd of March. This

bishop's terms were approved by the king, and a courier was sent off with

letters of confirmation; Sir Edward Karne and Dr. Revett following

leisurely, with a more ample commission. The stone which had been

laboriously rolled to the summit of the hill was trembling on the brink,

and in a moment might rebound into the plain.

But this was not to be the end. Some accidental cause delayed the courier;

the 23rd of March came, and he had not arrived. Du Bellay implored a

further respite. The King of England, he said, had waited six years; it was

not a great thing for the papal council to wait six days. The cardinals

were divided; but the Spanish party were the strongest, and when the votes

were taken carried the day. The die was cast, and the pope, in spite of

himself, his promises, and his conscience, drove at length upon the rocks

to which he had been so long drifting.[704] In deference to the opinion of

the majority of the cardinals, he pronounced the original marriage to have

been valid, the dispensation by which it was permitted to have been legal;

and, as a natural consequence, Henry, King of England, should he fail in

obedience to this judgment, was declared to be excommunicate from the

fellowship of the church, and to have forfeited the allegiance of his

subjects.

Lest the censures should be discredited by a blank discharge, engagements

were entered into, that within four months of the promulgation of the

sentence, the emperor would invade England, and Henry should be

deposed.[705] The imperialists illuminated Rome; cannon were fired;

bonfires blazed; and great bodies of men paraded the streets with shouts of

"the Empire and Spain."[706] Already, in their eager expectation, England

was a second Netherlands, a captured province under the regency of

Catherine or Mary.

Two days later, the courier arrived. The pope, at the entreaties of the

Bishop of Paris, re-assembled the consistory, to consider whether the steps

which had been taken should be undone. They sat debating all night, and the

result was nothing. No dependence could be placed on the cardinals, Du

Bellay said, for they spoke one way, and voted another.[707]

Thus all was over. In a scene of general helplessness the long drama

closed, and, what we call accident, for want of some better word, cut the

knot at last over which human incapacity had so vainly laboured. The Bishop

of Paris retired from Rome in despair. On his way back, he met the English

commissioners at Bologna, and told them that their errand was hopeless, and

that they need not proceed. "When we asked him," wrote Sir Edward Karne to

the king, "the cause of such hasty process, he made answer that the

imperialists at Rome had strengthened themselves in such a manner, that

they coacted the said Bishop of Rome to give sentence contrary to his own

mind, and the expectation of himself and of the French king. He showed us

also that the Lady Princess Dowager sent lately, in the month of March

past, letters to the Bishop of Rome, and also to her proctors, whereby the

Bishop of Rome was much moved for her part. The imperials, before the

sentence was given, promised, in the emperor's behalf, that he would be the

executor of the sentence."[708]

This is all which we are able to say of the immediate catastrophe which

decided the fate of England, and through England, of the world. The deep

impenetrable falsehood of the Roman ecclesiastics prevents us from

discovering with what intentions the game of the last few weeks or months

had been played; it is sufficient for Englishmen to remember that, whatever

may have been the explanation of his conduct, the pope, in the concluding

passage of his connection with this country, furnished the most signal

justification which was ever given for the revolt from an abused authority.

The supreme judge in Christendom had for six years trifled with justice,

out of fear of an earthly prince; he concluded these years with uniting the

extreme of folly with the extreme of improbity, and pronounced a sentence,

willingly or unwillingly, which he had acknowledged to be unjust.

Charity may possibly acquit Clement of conscious duplicity. He was one of

those men who waited upon fortune, and waited always without success; who

gave his word as the interest of the moment suggested, trusting that it

might be convenient to observe it; and who was too long accustomed to break

his promises to look with any particular alarm on that contingency. It is

possible, also,--for of this Clement was capable--that he knew from the

beginning the conclusion to which he would at last be driven; that he had

engaged himself with Charles to decide in Catherine's favour as distinctly

as he had engaged himself with Francis to decide against her; and that all

his tortuous scheming was intended either to weary out the patience of the

King of England, or to entangle him in acknowledgments from which he would

not be able to extricate himself.

He was mistaken, certainly, in the temper of the English nation; he

believed what the friars told him; and trusting to the promises of

disaffection, insurrection, invasion--those _ignes fatui_ which for sixty

years floated so delusively before the Italian imagination, he imagined,

perhaps, that he might trifle with Henry with impunity. This only is

impossible, that, if he had seriously intended to fulfil the promises which

he had made to the French king, the accidental delay of a courier could

have made so large a difference in his determination. It is not possible

that, if he had assured himself, as he pretended, that justice was on the

side against which he had declared, he would not have availed himself of

any pretext to retreat from a position which ought to have been intolerable

to him.

The question, however, had ended, "as all things in this world do have

their end." The news of the sentence arrived in England at the beginning of

April, with an intimation of the engagements which had been entered upon by

the imperial ambassador for an invasion. Du Bellay returned to Paris at the

same time, to report the failure of his undertaking; and Francis,

disappointed, angry, and alarmed, sent the Duke of Guise to London with

promises of support if an attempt to invade was really made, and with a

warning at the same time to Henry to prepare for danger. Troops were

gathering in Flanders; detachments were on their way out of Italy, Germany,

and Bohemia, to be followed by three thousand Spaniards, and perhaps many

more; and the object avowed for these preparations was wholly

incommensurate with their magnitude.[709] For his own sake Francis could

not permit a successful invasion of England, unless, indeed, he himself was

to take part in it; and therefore, with entire sincerity, he offered his

services. The cordial understanding for which Henry had hoped was at an

end; but the political confederacy remained, which the interests of the two

countries combined for the present to preserve unbroken.

Guise proposed another interview at Calais between the sovereigns. The king

for the moment was afraid to leave England,[710] lest the opportunity

should be made use of for an insurrection; but prudence taught him, though

disappointed in Francis, to make the best of a connection too convenient to

be sacrificed. The German league was left in abeyance till the immediate

danger was passed, and till the effect of the shock in England itself had

been first experienced. He gladly accepted, in lieu of it, an offer that

the French fleet should guard the Channel through the summer; and

meanwhile, he collected himself resolutely, to abide the issue, whatever

the issue was to be.

The Tudor spirit was at length awake in the English sovereign. He had

exhausted the resources of patience; he had stooped even to indignity to

avoid the conclusion which had come at last. There was nothing left but to

meet defiance by defiance, and accept the position to which the pope had

driven him. In quiet times occasionally wayward and capricious, Henry, like

Elizabeth after him, reserved his noblest nature for the moment of danger,

and was ever greatest when peril was most immediate. Woe to those who

crossed him now, for the time was grown stern, and to trifle further was to

be lost. The suspended act of parliament was made law on the day (it would

seem) of the arrival of the sentence. Convocation, which was still sitting,

hurried through a declaration that the pope had no more power in England

than any other bishop.[711] Five years before, if a heretic had ventured so

desperate an opinion, the clergy would have shut their ears and run upon

him: now they only contended with each other in precipitate obsequiousness.

The houses of the Observants at Canterbury and Greenwich, which had been

implicated with the Nun of Kent, were suppressed, and the brethren were

scattered among monasteries where they could be under surveillance. The Nun

and her friends were sent to execution.[712] The ordnance stores were

examined, the repairs of the navy were hastened, and the garrisons were

strengthened along the coast. Everywhere the realm armed itself for the

struggle, looking well to the joints of its harness and to the temper of

its weapons.

The commission appointed under the Statute of Succession opened its

sittings to receive the oaths of allegiance. Now, more than ever, was it

necessary to try men's dispositions, when the pope had challenged their

obedience. In words all went well: the peers swore; bishops, abbots,

priors, heads of colleges swore[713] with scarcely an exception,--the

nation seemed to unite in an unanimous declaration of freedom. In one

quarter only, and that a very painful one, was there refusal. It was found

solely among the persons who had been implicated in the late conspiracy.

Neither Sir Thomas More nor the Bishop of Rochester could expect that their

recent conduct would exempt them from an obligation which the people

generally accepted with good will. They had connected themselves, perhaps

unintentionally, with a body of confessed traitors. An opportunity was

offered them of giving evidence of their loyalty, and escaping from the

shadow of distrust. More had been treated leniently; Fisher had been

treated far more than leniently. It was both fair and natural that they

should be called upon to give proof that their lesson had not been learnt

in vain; and, in fact, no other persons, if they had been passed over,

could have been called upon to swear, for no other persons had laid

themselves open to so just suspicion.

Their conduct so exactly tallied, that they must have agreed beforehand on

the course which they would adopt; and in following the details, we need

concern ourselves only with the nobler figure.

The commissioners sate at the archbishop's palace at Lambeth; and at the

end of April, Sir Thomas More received a summons to appear before

them.[714] He was at his house at Chelsea, where for the last two years he

had lived in deep retirement, making ready for evil times. Those times at

length were come. On the morning on which he was to present himself, he

confessed and received the sacrament in Chelsea church; and "whereas," says

his great-grandson, "at other times, before he parted from his wife and

children, they used to bring him to his boat, and he there kissing them

bade them farewell, at this time he suffered none of them to follow him

forth of his gate, but pulled the wicket after him, and with a heavy heart

he took boat with his son Roper."[715] He was leaving his home for the last

time, and he knew it. He sat silent for some minutes, and then, with a

sudden start, said, "I thank our Lord, the field is won." Lambeth Palace

was crowded with people who had come on the same errand with himself. More

was called in early, and found Cromwell present with the four

commissioners, and also the Abbot of Westminster. The oath was read to him.

It implied that he should keep the statute of succession in all its parts,

and he desired to see the statute itself. He read it through, and at once

replied that others might do as they pleased; he would blame no one for

taking the oath; but for himself it was impossible. He would swear

willingly to the part of it which secured the succession to the children of

Queen Anne.[716] That was a matter on which parliament was competent to

decide, and he had no right to make objections. If he might be allowed to

take an oath to this portion of the statute in language of his own, he

would do it; but as the words stood, he would "peril his soul" by using

them. The Lord Chancellor desired him to re-consider his answer. He retired

to the garden, and in his absence others were called in; among them the

Bishop of Rochester, who refused in the same terms. More was then recalled.

He was asked if he persisted in his resolution; and when he replied that he

did, he was requested to state his reasons. He said that he was afraid of

increasing the king's displeasure, but if he could be assured that he might

explain himself safely he was ready to do so. If his objection could then

be answered to his satisfaction, he would swear; in the meantime, he

repeated, very explicitly, that he judged no one--he spoke only for

himself.

An opening seemed to be offered in these expressions which was caught at by

Cranmer's kind-hearted casuistry. If Sir Thomas More could not condemn

others for taking the oath, the archbishop said, Sir Thomas More could not

be sure that it was sin to take it; while his duty to his king and to the

parliament was open and unquestioned.

More hesitated for an instant, but he speedily recovered his firmness. He

had considered what he ought to do, he said; his conscience was clear about

it, and he could say no more than he had said already. They continued to

argue with him, but without effect; he had made up his mind; the victory,

as he said, had been won.

Cromwell was deeply affected. In his passionate regret, he exclaimed, that

he had rather his only son had lost his head than that More should have

refused the oath. No one knew better than Cromwell that intercession would

be of no further use; that he could not himself advise the king to give

way. The parliament, after grave consideration, had passed a law which they

held necessary to secure the peace of the country; and two persons of high

rank refused obedience to it, whose example would tell in every English

household. Either, therefore, the act was not worth the parchment on which

it was written, or the penalties of it must be enforced: no middle way, no

compromise, no acquiescent reservations, could in such a case be admitted.

The law must have its way.

The recusants were committed for four days to the keeping of the Abbot of

Westminster; and the council met to determine on the course to be pursued.

Their offence, by the act, was misprision of treason. On the other hand,

they had both offered to acknowledge the Princess Elizabeth as the lawful

heir to the throne; and the question was raised whether this offer should

be accepted. It was equivalent to a demand that the form should be altered,

not for them only, but for every man. If persons of their rank and

notoriety were permitted to swear with a qualification, the same privilege

must be conceded to all. But there was so much anxiety to avoid

extremities, and so warm a regard was personally felt for Sir Thomas More,

that this objection was not allowed to be fatal. It was thought that

possibly an exception might be made, yet kept a secret from the world; and

the fact that they had sworn under any form might go far to silence

objectors and reconcile the better class of the disaffected.[717] This view

was particularly urged by Cranmer, always gentle, hoping, and

illogical.[718] But, in fact, secresy was impossible. If More's discretion

could have been relied upon, Fisher's babbling tongue would have trumpeted

his victory to all the winds. Nor would the government consent to pass

censure on its own conduct by evading the question whether the act was or

was not just. If it was not just, it ought not to be: maintained at all; if

it was just, there must be no respect of persons.

The clauses to which the bishop and the ex-chancellor declined to bind

themselves were those which declared illegal the marriage of the king with

Catherine, and the marriage legal between the king and Queen Anne. To

refuse these was to declare Mary legitimate, to declare Elizabeth

illegitimate, and would do more to strengthen Mary's claims than could be

undone by a thousand oaths. However large might be More's estimate of the

power of parliament, he could have given no clear answer--and far less

could Fisher have given a clear answer--if they had been required to say

the part which they would take, should the emperor invade the kingdom under

the pope's sanction. The emperor would come to execute a sentence which in

their consciences they believed to be just; how could they retain their

allegiance to Henry, when their convictions must be with the invading army?

What ought to have been done let those say who disapprove of what was

actually done. The high character of the prisoners, while it increased the

desire, increased the difficulty of sparing them; and to have given way

would have been a confession of a doubtful cause, which at such a time

would not have been dangerous, but would have been fatal. Anne Boleyn is

said to have urged the king to remain peremptory;[719] but the following

letter of Cromwell's explains the ultimate resolution of the council in a

very reasonable manner. It was written to Cranmer in reply to his

arguments for concession.

"My Lord, after mine humble commendation, it may please your Grace to be

advertised that I have received your letter, and showed the same to the

King's Highness; who, perceiving that your mind and opinion is, that it

were good that the Bishop of Rochester and Master More should be sworn to

the act of the king's succession, and not to the preamble of the same,

thinketh that if their oaths should be taken, it were an occasion to all

men to refuse the whole, or at least the like. For, in case they be sworn

to the succession, and not to the preamble, it is to be thought that it

might be taken not only as a confirmation of the Bishop of Rome's

authority, but also as a reprobation of the king's second marriage.

Wherefore, to the intent that no such things should be brought into the

heads of the people, by the example of the said Bishop of Rochester and

Master More, the King's Highness in no wise willeth but that they shall be

sworn as well to the preamble as to the act. Wherefore his Grace specially

trusteth that ye will in no wise attempt to move him to the contrary; for

as his Grace supposeth, that manner of swearing, if it shall be suffered,

may be an utter destruction to his whole cause, and also to the effect of

the law made for the same."[720]

Thus, therefore, with much regret the council decided--and, in fact, why

should they have decided otherwise? They were satisfied that they were

right in requiring the oath; and their duty to the English nation obliged

them to persevere. They must go their way; and those who thought them wrong

must go theirs; and the great God would judge between them. It was a hard

thing to suffer for an opinion; but there are times when opinions are as

dangerous as acts; and liberty of conscience was a plea which could be

urged with a bad grace for men who, while in power, had fed the stake with

heretics. They were summoned for a last time, to return the same answer as

they had returned before; and nothing remained but to pronounce against

them the penalties of the statute, imprisonment at the king's pleasure, and

forfeiture. The latter part of the sentence was not enforced. More's family

were left in the enjoyment of his property. Fisher's bishoprick was not

taken from him. They were sent to the Tower, where for the present we leave

them.

Meanwhile, in accordance with the resolution taken in council on the and of

December,[721] but which seems to have been suspended till the issue of the

trial at Rome was decided, the bishops, who had been examined severally on

the nature of the papal authority, and whose answers had been embodied in

the last act of parliament, were now required to instruct the clergy

throughout their dioceses--and the clergy in turn to instruct the

people--in the nature of the changes which had taken place. A bishop was to

preach each Sunday at Paul's Cross, on the pope's usurpation. Every secular

priest was directed to preach on the same subject week after week, in his

parish church. Abbots and priors were to teach their convents; noblemen and

gentlemen their families and servants; mayors and aldermen the boroughs. In

town and country, in all houses, at all dinner-tables, the conduct of the

pope and the causes of the separation from Rome were to be the one subject

of conversation; that the whole nation might be informed accurately and

faithfully of the grounds on which the government had acted. No wiser

method could have been adopted. The imperial agents would be busy under the

surface; and the mendicant friars, and all the missionaries of

insurrection. The machinery of order was set in force to counteract the

machinery of sedition.

Further, every bishop, in addition to the oath of allegiance, had sworn

obedience to the king as Supreme Head of the Church;[722] and this was the

title under which he was to be spoken of in all churches of the realm. A

royal order had been issued, "that all manner of prayers, rubrics, canons

of Mass books, and all other books in the churches wherein the Bishop of

Rome was named, or his presumptuous and proud pomp and authority preferred,

should utterly be abolished, eradicated, and rased out, and his name and

memory should be never more, except to his contumely and reproach,

remembered; but perpetually be suppressed and obscured."[723]

Nor were these mere idle sounds, like the bellow of unshotted cannon; but

words with a sharp, prompt meaning, which the king intended to be obeyed.

He had addressed his orders to the clergy, because the clergy were the

officials who had possession of the pulpits from which the people were to

be taught; but he knew their nature too well to trust them. They were too

well schooled in the tricks of reservation; and, for the nonce, it was

necessary to reverse the posture of the priest and of his flock, and to set

the honest laymen to overlook their pastors.

With the instructions to the bishops circulars went round to the sheriffs

of the counties, containing a full account of these instructions, and an

appeal to their loyalty to see that the royal orders were obeyed. "We," the

king wrote to them, "seeing, esteeming, and reputing you to be of such

singular and vehement zeal and affection towards the glory of Almighty God,

and of so faithful, loving, and obedient heart towards us, as you will

accomplish, with all power, diligence, and labour, whatsoever shall be to

the preferment and setting forth of God's word, have thought good, not only

to signify unto you by these our letters, the particulars of the charge

given by us to the bishops, but also to require and straitly charge you,

upon pain of your allegiance, and as ye shall avoid our high indignation

and displeasure, [that] at your uttermost peril, laying aside all vain

affections, respects, and other carnal considerations, and setting only

before your eyes the mirrour of the truth, the glory of God, the dignity of

your Sovereign Lord and King, and the great concord and unity, and

inestimable profit and utility, that shall by the due execution of the

premises ensue to yourselves and to all other faithful and loving subjects,

ye make or cause to be made diligent search and wait, whether the said

bishops do truly and sincerely, without all manner of cloke, colour, or

dissimulation, execute and accomplish our will and commandment, as is

aforesaid. And in case ye shall hear that the said bishops, or any other

ecclesiastical person, do omit and leave undone any part or parcel of the

premises, or else in the execution and setting forth of the same, do coldly

and feignedly use any manner of sinister addition, wrong interpretation, or

painted colour, then we straitly charge and command you that you do make,

undelayedly, and with all speed and diligence, declaration and

advertisement to us and to our council of the said default.

"And forasmuch as we upon the singular trust which we have in you, and for

the special love which we suppose you bear towards us, and the weal and

tranquillity of this our realm, have specially elected and chosen you among

so many for this purpose, and have reputed you such men as unto whose

wisdom and fidelity we might commit a matter of such great weight and

importance: if ye should, contrary to our expectation and trust which we

have in you, and against your duty and allegiance towards us, neglect, or

omit to do with all your diligence, whatsoever shall be in your power for

the due performance of our pleasure to you declared, or halt or stumble at

any part or specialty of the same; Be ye assured that we, like a prince of

justice, will so extremely punish you for the same, that all the world

beside shall take by you example, and beware contrary to their allegiance

to disobey the lawful commandment of their Sovereign Lord and Prince.

"Given under our signet, at our Palace of Westminster, the 9th day of June,

1534."[724]

So Henry spoke at last. There was no place any more for nice distinctions

and care of tender consciences. The general, when the shot is flying,

cannot qualify his orders with dainty periods. Swift command and swift

obedience can alone be tolerated; and martial law for those who hesitate.

This chapter has brought many things to a close. Before ending it we will

leap over three months, to the termination of the career of the pope who

has been so far our companion. Not any more was the distracted Clement to

twist his handkerchief, or weep, or flatter, or wildly wave his arms in

angry impotence; he was to lie down in his long rest, and vex the world no

more. He had lived to set England free--an exploit which, in the face of so

persevering an anxiety to escape a separation, required a rare genius and a

combination of singular qualities. He had finished his work, and now he was

allowed to depart.

In him, infinite insincerity was accompanied with a grace of manner which

regained confidence as rapidly as it was forfeited. Desiring sincerely, so

far as he could be sincere in anything, to please every one by turns, and

reckless of truth to a degree in which he was without a rival in the world,

he sought only to escape his difficulties by inactivity, and he trusted to

provide himself with a refuge against all contingencies by waiting upon

time. Even when at length he was compelled to act, and to act in a distinct

direction, his plausibility long enabled him to explain away his conduct;

and, honest in the excess of his dishonesty, he wore his falsehood with so

easy a grace that it assumed the character of truth. He was false,

deceitful, treacherous; yet he had the virtue of not pretending to be

virtuous. He was a real man, though but an indifferent one; and we can

refuse to no one, however grave his faults, a certain ambiguous sympathy,

when in his perplexities he shows us features so truly human in their

weakness as those of Clement VII.

* * * * *

NOTES.

[1] Printed in FOXE, vol. iv. p. 659, Townsend's edition.

[2] 24 Hen. VIII. cap. 4.

[3] Bishop Latimer, in a sermon at Paul's Cross, suggested another purpose

which this act might answer. One of his audience, writing to the Mayor of

Plymouth, after describing the exceedingly disrespectful language in which

he spoke of the high church dignitaries, continues, "The king," quoth he,

"made a marvellous good act of parliament that certain men should sow every

of them two acres of hemp; but it were all too little were it so much more

to hang the thieves that be in England."--_Suppression of the Monasteries_,

Camden Society's publications, p. 38.

[4] 32 Hen. VIII. cap. 18.

[5] 25 Hen. VIII. cap. 18.

[6] _Antiquities of Hengrave_, by Sir T. GAGE.

[7] See especially 2 Hen. VII. capp. 16 and 19.

[8] 24 Hen. VIII. cap. 9.

[9] See especially the 4th of the 5th of Elizabeth.

[10] 10 Ed. III. cap. 3.

[11] Statutes of the Realm, vol. i. (edit. 1817), pp. 227-8.

[12] "The artificers and husbandmen make most account of such meat as they

may soonest come by and have it quickliest ready. Their food consisteth

principally in beef, and such meat as the butcher selleth, that is to say,

mutton, veal, lamb, pork, whereof the one findeth great store in the

markets adjoining; besides souse, brawn, bacon, fruit, pies of fruit, fowls

of sundry sorts, as the other wanteth it not at home by his own provision,

which is at the best hand and commonly least charge. In feasting, this

latter sort--I mean the husbandmen--do exceed after their manner,

especially at bridals and such odd meetings, where it is incredible to tell

what meat is consumed and spent."--HARRISON'S _Description of England_, p.

282.

The Spanish nobles who came into England with Philip were astonished at the

diet which they found among the poor.

"These English," said one of them, "have their houses made of sticks and

dirt, but they fare commonly so well as the king."--Ibid. p. 313.

[13] _State Papers_, Hen. VIII. vol. ii. p. 10.

[14] HALL, p. 646.

[15] 25 Ed. III. cap. I.

[16] _Statutes of the Realm_, vol. i. p. 199.

[17] 3 Ed. IV. cap. 2.

[18] 10 Hen. VI. cap. 2.

[19] STOW'S _Chronicle._

[20] _Statutes of Philip and Mary._

[21] From 1565 to 1575 there was a rapid and violent rise in the prices of

all kinds of grain. Wheat stood at four and five times its earlier rates;

and in 1576, when Harrison wrote, was entirely beyond the reach of the

labouring classes. "The poor in some shires," he says, "are enforced to

content themselves with rye or barley, yea, and in time of dearth many with

bread made either of peas, beans, or oats, or of all together and some

acorns among, of which scourge the poorest do soonest taste, sith they are

least able to provide themselves of better. I will not say that this

extremity is oft so well seen in time of plenty as of dearth, but if I

should I could easily bring my trial. For, albeit that there be much more

ground eared now almost in every place than hath been of late years, yet

such a price of corn continues in each town and market, that the artificer

and poor labouring man is not able to reach to it, but is driven to content

himself with beans, peas, oats, tares, and lentils."--HARRISON, p. 283. The

condition of the labourer was at this period deteriorating rapidly. The

causes will be described in the progress of this history.

[22] _Chronicle_, p.568.

[23] 33 Hen. VIII. cap. II. The change in the prices of such articles

commenced in the beginning of the reign of Edward VI., and continued till

the close of the century. A discussion upon the subject, written in 1581 by

Mr. Edward Stafford, and containing the clearest detailed account of the

alteration, is printed in the _Harleian Miscellany_, vol. ix. p.139, etc.

[24] Leland, _Itin._, vol. vi. p.17. In large households beef used to be

salted in great quantities for winter consumption. The art of fatting

cattle in the stall was imperfectly understood, and the loss of substance

in the destruction of fibre by salt was less than in the falling off of

flesh on the failure of fresh grass. The Northumberland Household Book

describes the storing of salted provision for the earl's establishment at

Michaelmas; and men now living can remember the array of salting tubs in

old-fashioned country houses. So long as pigs, poultry, and other articles

of food, however, remained cheap and abundant, the salt diet could not, as

Hume imagines, have been carried to an extent injurious to health; and

fresh meat, beef as well as mutton, was undoubtedly sold in all markets the

whole year round in the reign of Henry VIII., and sold at a uniform price,

which it could not have been if there had been so much difficulty in

procuring it. Latimer (_Letters_, p.412), writing to Cromwell on Christmas

Eve, 1538, speaks of his winter stock of "beeves" and muttons as a thing of

course.

[25] STAFFORD'S _Discourse on the State of the Realm_. It is to be

understood, however, that these rates applied only to articles of ordinary

consumption. Capons fatted for the dinners of the London companies were

sometimes provided at a shilling apiece. Fresh fish was also extravagantly

dear, and when two days a week were observed strictly as fasting days, it

becomes a curious question to know how the supply was kept up. The inland

counties were dependent entirely on ponds and rivers. London was provided

either from the Thames or from the coast of Sussex. An officer of the

Fishmongers' Company resided at each of the Cinque Ports whose business it

was to buy the fish wholesale from the boats and to forward it on

horseback. Three hundred horses were kept for this service at Rye alone.

And when an adventurous fisherman, taking advantage of a fair wind, sailed

up the Thames with his catch and sold it first hand at London Bridge, the

innovation was considered dangerous, and the Mayor of Rye petitioned

against it.

Salmon, sturgeon, porpoise, roach, dace, flounders, eels, etc., were caught

in considerable quantities in the Thames, below London Bridge, and further

up, pike and trout. The fishermen had great nets that stretched all across

Limehouse-reach four fathoms deep.

Fresh fish, however, remained the luxury of the rich, and the poor were

left to the salt cod, ling, and herring brought in annually by the Iceland

fleet.

Fresh herrings sold for five or six a penny in the time of Henry VIII., and

were never cheaper. Fresh salmon five and six shillings apiece. Roach,

dace, and flounders from two to four shillings a hundred. Pike and barbel

varied with their length. The barbel a foot long sold for five-pence, and

twopence was added for each additional inch: a pike a foot long sold for

sixteen pence, and increased a penny an inch.--_Guildhall MSS. Journals_

12, 13, 14, 15.

[26] "When the brewer buyeth a quarter of malt for two shillings, then he

shall sell a gallon of the best ale for two farthings; when he buyeth a

quarter malt for four shillings, the gallon shall be four farthings, and so

forth... and that he sell a quart of ale upon his table for a farthing."--

Assize of Brewers: from a MS. in Balliol College, Oxford.

By an order of the Lord Mayor and Council of the City of London, in

September, 1529, the price of a kilderkin of single beer was fixed at a

shilling, the kilderkin of double beer at two shillings; but this included

the cask; and the London brewers replied with a remonstrance, saying that

the casks were often destroyed or made away with, and that an allowance had

to be made for bad debts. "Your beseechers," they said, "have many city

debtors, for many of them which have taken much beer into their houses

suddenly goeth to the sanctuary, some keep their houses--some purchase the

king's protection, and some, when they die, be reckoned poor, and of no

value, and many of your said beseechers be for the most part against such

debtors remediless and suffer great losses."

They offered to supply then: customers with sixteen gallon casks of single

beer for eleven pence, and the same quantity of double beer for a shilling,

the cask included. And this offer was accepted.

The corporation, however, returned two years after to their original order.

_Guildhall Records_, MS. Journal 13, pp. 210, 236.

[27] 28 Hen. VIII. cap. 14.

The prices assessed, being a maximum, applied to the best wines of each

class. In 1531, the mayor and corporation "did straitly charge and command

that all such persons as sold wines by retail within the city and liberties

of the same, should from henceforth sell two gallons of the best red wine

for eightpence, and not above; the gallon of the best white wine for

eightpence, and not above; the pottle, quart, and pint after the same rate,

upon pain of imprisonment."

The quality of the wine sold was looked into from time to time, and when

found tainted, or unwholesome, "according to the antient customs of the

city," the heads of the vessels were broken up, and the wines in them put

forth open into the kennels, in example of all other offenders. _Guildhall

MS._ Journals 12 and 13.

[28] _Sermons_, p.101.

[29] See HARRISON, p. 318. At the beginning of the century farms let for

four pounds a year, which in 1576 had been raised to forty, fifty, or a

hundred. The price of produce kept pace with the rent. The large farmers

prospered; the poor forfeited their tenures.

[30] The wages were fixed at a maximum, showing that labour was scarce, and

that its natural tendency was towards a higher rate of remuneration.

Persons not possessed of other means of subsistence were punishable if they

refused to work at the statutable rate of payment; and a clause in the act

of Hen. VIII. directed that where the practice had been to give lower

wages, lower wages should be taken. This provision was owing to a

difference in the value of money in different parts of England. The price

of bread at Stratford, for instance, was permanently twenty-five per cent.

below the price in London. (Assize of Bread in England: _Balliol MS_.) The

statute, therefore, may be taken as a guide sufficiently conclusive as to

the practical scale. It is of course uncertain how far work was constant.

The ascending tendency of wages is an evidence, so far as it goes, in the

labourer's favour; and the proportion between the wages of the household

farm servant and those of the day labourer, which furnishes a further

guide, was much the same as at present. By the same statute of Henry VIII.

the common servant of husbandry, who was boarded and lodged at his master's

house, received 16s. 8d. a year in money, with 4s. for his clothes; while

the wages of the out-door labourer, supposing his work constant, would have

been £5 a year. Among ourselves, on an average of different counties, the

labourer's wages are £25 to £30 a year, supposing his work constant. The

farm servant, unless in the neighbourhood of large towns, receives about

£6, or from that to £8.

Where meat and drink was allowed it was calculated at 2d. a day, or 1s. 2d.

a week. In the household of the Earl of Northumberland the allowance was

2-1/2d. Here, again, we observe an approach to modern proportions. The

estimated cost of the board and lodging of a man servant in an English

gentleman's family is now about £25 a year.

[31] Mowers, for instance, were paid 8d. a day.--_Privy Purse Expenses of

Henry VIII._

[32] In 1581 the agricultural labourer, as he now exists, was only

beginning to appear. "There be such in the realm," says Stafford, "as live

only by the labour of their hands and the profit which they can make upon

the commons."--STAFFORD'S _Discourse_. This novel class had been called

into being by the general raising of rents, and the wholesale evictions of

the smaller tenantry which followed the Reformation. The progress of the

causes which led to the change can be traced from the beginning of the

century. Harrison says he knew old men who, comparing things present with

things past, spoke of two things grown to be very grievous--to wit, "the

enhancing of rents, and the daily oppression of copyholders, whose lords

seek to bring their poor tenants almost into plain servitude and misery,

daily devising new means, and seeking up all the old, how to cut them

shorter and shorter; doubling, trebling, and now and then seven times

increasing their fines; driving them also for every trifle to lose and

forfeit their tenures, by whom the greatest part of the realm doth stand

and is maintained, to the end they may fleece them yet more: which is a

lamentable hearing."--_Description of England_, p.318.

[33] HALL, p. 581. Nor was the act in fact observed even in London itself,

or towards workmen employed by the Government. In 1538, the Corporation of

London, "for certain reasonable and necessary considerations," assessed the

wages of common labourers at 7d. and 8d. the day, classing them with

carpenters and masons.--_Guildhall MSS. Journal_ 14, fol. 10. Labourers

employed on Government works in the reign of Hen. VIII. never received less

than 6d. a day, and frequently more.--_Chronicle of Calais_, p. 197, etc.

Sixpence a day is the usual sum entered as the wages of a day's labour in

the innumerable lists of accounts in the Record Office. And 6d. a day again

was the lowest pay of the common soldier, not only on exceptional service

in the field, but when regularly employed in garrison duty. Those who doubt

whether this was really the practice, may easily satisfy themselves by

referring to the accounts of the expenses of Berwick, or of Dover, Deal, or

Walmer Castles, to be found in the Record Office in great numbers. The

daily wages of the soldier are among the very best criteria for determining

the average value of the unskilled labourer's work. No government gives

higher wages than it is compelled to give by the market rate.

[34] The wages of the day labourer in London, under this act of Elizabeth,

were fixed at 9d. the day, and this, after the restoration of the

depreciated currency.--_Guildhall MSS. Journal_ 18, fol. 157, etc.

[35] 4 Hen. VII. cap. 16. By the same parliament these provisions were

extended to the rest of England. 4 Hen. VII. cap. 19.

[36] HALL, p. 863.

[37] 27 Hen. VIII. cap. 22.

[38] There is a cause of difficulty "peculiar to England, the increase of

pasture, by which sheep may be now said to devour men and unpeople not only

villages but towns. For wherever it is found that the sheep yield a softer

and richer wool than ordinary, there the nobility and gentry, and even

those holy men the abbots, not contented with the old rents which their

farms yielded, nor thinking it enough that they, living at their ease, do

no good to the public, resolve to do it hurt instead of good. They stop the

course of agriculture.... One shepherd can look after a flock which will

stock an extent of ground that would require many hands if it were ploughed

and reaped. And this likewise in many places raises the price of corn. The

price of wool is also risen ... since, though sheep cannot be called a

monopoly, because they are not engrossed by one person; yet they are in so

few hands, and these are so rich, that as they are not prest to sell them

sooner than they have a mind to it, so they never do it till they have

raised the price as high as possible."--Sir THOMAS MORE'S _Utopia_,

Burnet's Translation, pp. 17-19.

[39] I find scattered among the _State Papers_ many loose memoranda,

apparently of privy councillors, written on the backs of letters, or on

such loose scraps as might be at hand. The following fragment on the

present subject is curious. I do not recognise the hand:--

"Mem. That an act may be made that merchants shall employ their goods

continually in the traffic of merchandise, and not in the purchasing of

lands; and that craftsmen, also, shall continually use their crafts in

cities and towns, and not leave the same and take farms in the country; and

that no merchant shall hereafter purchase above £40 lands by the

year."--_Cotton MS._ Titus, b. i. 160.

[40] When the enclosing system was carried on with greatest activity and

provoked insurrection. In expressing a sympathy with the social policy of

the Tudor government, I have exposed myself to a charge of opposing the

received and ascertained conclusions of political economy. I disclaim

entirely an intention so foolish; but I believe that the science of

political economy came into being with the state of things to which alone

it is applicable. It ought to be evident that principles which answer

admirably when a manufacturing system capable of indefinite expansion

multiplies employment at home--when the soil of England is but a fraction

of its empire, and the sea is a highway to emigration--would have produced

far different effects, in a condition of things which habit had petrified

into form, when manufactures could not provide work for one additional

hand, when the first colony was yet unthought of, and where those who were

thrown out of the occupation to which they had been bred could find no

other. The tenants evicted, the labourers thrown out of employ, when the

tillage lands were converted into pastures, had scarcely an alternative

offered them except to beg, to rob, or to starve.

[41] _Lansdowne MS._ No. I. fol. 26.

[42] GIUSTINIANI'S _Letters from the Court of Henry VIII_.

[43] Ibid.

[44] 22 Hen. VIII. cap. 18.

[45] Under Hen. VI. the household expenses were £23,000 a year--Cf.

_Proceedings and Ordinances of the Privy Council_, vol. vi. p. 35. The

particulars of the expenses of the household of Hen. VIII. are in an MS. in

the Rolls House. They cover the entire outlay except the personal

expenditure of the king, and the sum total amounts to £14,365 10s. 7d. This

would leave above £5000 a year for the privy purse, not, perhaps,

sufficient to cover Henry's gambling extravagances in his early life.

Curious particulars of his excesses in this matter will be found in a

publication wrongly called _The Privy Purse Expenses of Henry the Eighth_.

It is a diary of general payments, as much for purposes of state as for the

king himself. The high play was confined for the most part to Christmas or

other times of festivity, when the statutes against unlawful games were

dispensed with for all classes.

[46] 18 Hen. VI. cap. 11.

[47] 4 Hen. VII. cap. 12.

[48] During the quarter sessions time they were allowed 4s. a day.--Ric.

II. xii. 10.

[49] The rudeness of the furniture in English country houses has been dwelt

upon with much emphasis by Hume and others. An authentic inventory of the

goods and chattels in a parsonage in Kent proves that there has been much

exaggeration in this matter. It is from an MS. in the Rolls House.

_The Inventory of the Goods and Catales of Richd. Master, Clerk, Parson of

Aldington, being in his Parsonage on the 20th Day of April, in the 25th

Year of the Reign of our Sovereign Lord King Henry VIII._

_Plate_

Silver spoons, twelve.

_In the Hall_

Two tables and two forms.

Item, a painted cloth hanging at the upper part of the hall.

Item, a green banker hung on the bench in the hall.

Item, a laver of laten.

_In the Parlour_

A hanging of old red and green saye.

Item, a banker of woven carpet of divers colours.

Item, two cushions.

Item, one table, two forms, one cupboard, one chair.

Item, two painted pictures and a picture of the names of kings of England

pinned on the said hanging.

_In the Chamber on the North Side of the said Parlour_

A painted hanging.

Item, a bedstedyll with a feather bed, one bolster, two pillows, one

blanket,

one roulett of rough tapestry, a testner of green and red saye.

Item, two forms.

Item, one jack to set a basin on.

_In the Chamber over the Parlour_

Two bedsteads.

Item, another testner of painted cloth.

Item, a painted cloth.

Item, two forms.

_At the Stairs' Hed beside the Parson's Bedchamber_

One table, two trestylls, four beehives.

_In the Parson's Lodging-chamber_

A bedstedyll and a feather bed, two blankets, one payr of sheets, one

coverlet of tapestry lined with canvas, one bolster, one pillow with

a pillocote.

Item, one gown of violet cloth lined with red saye.

Item, a gown of black cloth, furred with lamb.

Item, two hoods of violet cloth, whereof one is lined with green

sarsenet.

Item, one jerkyn of tawny camlet.

Item, a jerkyn of cloth furred with white.

Item, a jacket of cloth furred.

Item, a sheet to put in cloth.

Item, one press.

Item, a leather mail.

Item, one table, two forms, four chairs, two trestylls.

Item, a tester of painted cloth.

Item, a pair of hangings of green saye, with two pictures thereupon.

Item, one cupboard, two chests.

Item, a little flock bed, with a bolster and a coverlet.

Item, one cushion, one mantell, one towel, and, by estimation, a pound

of wax candles.

Item, Greek books covered with boards, 42.

Item, small books covered with boards, 33.

Item, books covered with leather and parchment, 38.

_In the said Chest in the said Chamber_

Three pieces of red saye and green.

Item, one tyke for a bolster, two tykes for pillows.

Item, a typpett of cloth.

Item, diaper napkins, 4, diaper towels, 2.

Item, four pairs of sheets, and one shete, two tablecloths.

_In the other Chest in the same Chamber_

One typpett of sarsenett.

Item, two cotes belonging to the crosse of Underbill, whereupon hang

thirty-three pieces of money, rings, and other things, and three

crystal stones closed in silver.

_In the Study_

Two old boxes, a wicker hamper full of papers.

_In the Chamber behind the Chimney_

One seam and a half of old malt.

Item, a trap for rats.

Item, a board of three yards length.

_In the Chamber next adjoining westwards_

One bedstedyll, one flock bed, one bolster.

One form, two shelf boards, one little table, two trestylls, two awgyes,

one

nett, called a stalker, a well rope, five quarters of hemp.

_In the Buttery_

Three basins of pewter, five candlesticks, one ewer of lateen, one

chafing

dish, two platters, one dish, one salter, three podingers [?

porringer],

a saltseller of pewter, seven kilderkyns, three keelers, one form,

five

shelves, one byn, one table, one glasse bottell.

_In the Priest's Chamber_

One bedstedyll, one feather bed, two forms, one press.

_In the Woman's Keeping_

Two tablecloths, two pairs of sheets.

_In the Servant's Chamber_

One painted hanging, a bedstedyll, one feather bed, a press, and a shelf.

_In the Kitchen_

Eight bacon flitches, a little brewing lead, three brass pots, three

kettles,

one posnett, one frying-pan, a dripping-pan, a great pan, two

trivetts,

a chopping knife, a skimmer, one fire rake, a pothanger, one

pothooke,

one andiron, three spits, one gridiron, one firepan, a coal rake of

iron,

two bolts [? butts], three wooden platters, six boldishes, three

forms,

two stools, seven platters, two pewter dishes, four saucers, a

covering

of a saltseller, a podynger, seven tubbs, a caldron, two syffs, a

capon

cope, a mustard quern, a ladder, two pails, one beehive.

_In the Mill-house_

Seven butts, two cheeses, an old sheet, an old brass pan, three

podyngers,

a pewter dish.

_In the Boulting-house_

One brass pan, one quern, a boulting hutch, a boulting tub, three little

tubbys, two keelers, a tolvett, two boulters, one tonnell.

_In the Larder_

One sieve, one bacon trough, a cheese press, one little tub, eight

shelves,

one graper for a well.

_Wood_

Of tall wood ten load, of ash wood a load and a half.

_Poultry_

Nine hens, eight capons, one cock, sixteen young chickens, three old

geese, seventeen goslings, four ducks.

_Cattle_

Five young hoggs, two red kyne, one red heifer two years old, one bay

gelding lame of spavins, one old grey mare having a mare colt.

_In the Entries_

Two tubbs, one trough, one ring to bear water and towel, a chest to keep

cornes.

_In the same House_

Five seams of lime.

_In the Woman's Chamber_

One bedstedyll of hempen yarn, by estimation 20 lbs.

_Without the House_

Of tyles, ----, of bricks, ----, seven planks, three rafters, one ladder.

_In the Gate-house_

One form, a leather sack, three bushels of wheat.

_In the Still beside the Gate_

Two old road saddles, one bridle, a horse-cloth.

_In the Barn next the Gate_

Of wheat unthrashed, by estimation, thirty quarters, of barley

unthrashed,

by estimation, five quarters.

_In the Cartlage_

One weene with two whyles, one dung-cart without whyles, two shod-whyles,

two yokes, one sledge.

_In the Barn next the Church_

Of oats unthrashed, by estimation, one quarter.

_In the Garden-house_

Of oats, by estimation, three seams four bushels.

_In the Court_

Two racks, one ladder.

[50] Two hundred poor were fed daily at the house of Tomas Cromwell. This

fact is perfectly authenticated. Stowe the historian, who did not like

Cromwell, lived in an adjoining house, and reports it as an eye

witness.--_See_ STOWE'S _Survey of London._

[51] HARRISON'S _Description of Britain_.

[52] The Earl and Countess of Northumberland breakfasted together alone at

seven. The meal consisted of a quart of ale, a quart of wine, and a chine

of beef: a loaf of bread is not mentioned, but we hope it may be presumed.

On fast days the beef was exchanged for a dish of sprats or herrings, fresh

or salt.--_Northumberland Household Book_, quoted by Hume.

[53] Some notice of the style of living sometimes witnessed in England in

the old times may be gathered from the details of a feast given at the

installation of George Neville, brother of Warwick the King Maker, when

made Archbishop of York.

The number of persons present including servants was about 3500.

The provisions were as follow--

Wheat, 300 quarters.

Ale, 300 tuns.

Wine, 104 tuns.

Ipocras, 1 pipe.

Oxen, 80.

Wild bulls, 6.

Muttons, 1004.

Veal, 300.

Porkers, 300.

Geese, 3000.

Capons, 2300.

Pigs, 2000.

Peacocks, 100.

Cranes, 200.

Kids, 200.

Chickens, 2000.

Pigeons, 4000.

Conies, 4000.

Bitterns, 204.

Mallards and teals, 4000.

Heronshaws, 4000.

Fesants, 200.

Partridges, 500.

Woodcocks, 400.

Plovers, 400.

Curlews, 100.

Quails, 100.

Egrets, 1000

Rees, 200.

Harts, bucks, and roes, 400 and odd.

Pasties of venison, cold, 4000.

Pasties of venison, hot, 1506.

Dishes of jelly, pasted, 1000.

Plain dishes of jelly, 4000.

Cold tarts, baken, 4000.

Cold custards, 4000.

Custards, hot, 2000.

Pikes, 300.

Breams, 300.

Seals, 8.

Porpoises, 4.

[54] LATIMER'S _Sermons_, p. 64.

[55] _Statutes of the Realm_, 1 Ed. VI. cap. 12.

[56] HOOKER'S _Life of Sir Peter Carew_.

[57] In a subsequent letter he is described as learning French, etymology,

casting of accounts, playing at weapons, and other such exercises.--ELLIS,

third series, vol. i. p. 342-3.

[58] It has been objected that inasmuch as the Statute Book gives evidence

of extensive practices of adulteration, the guild system was useless, nay,

it has been even said that it was the cause of the evil. Cessante causâ

cessat effectus;--when the companies lost their authority, the adulteration

ought to have ceased, which in the face of recent exposures will be

scarcely maintained. It would be as reasonable to say that the police are

useless because we have still burglars and pickpockets among us.

[59] Throughout the old legislation, morality went along with politics and

economics, and formed the life and spirit of them. The fruiterers in the

streets were prohibited from selling plums and apples, because the

apprentices played dice with them for their wares, or because the

temptation induced children and servants to steal money to buy. When

Parliament came to be held regularly in London, an order of Council fixed

the rates which the hotel-keeper might charge for dinners. Messes were

served for four at twopence per head; the bill of fare providing bread,

fish, salt and fresh, two courses of meat, ale, with fire and candles. And

the care of the Government did not cease with their meals, and in an

anxiety that neither the burgesses nor their servants should be led into

sin, stringent orders were issued against street-walkers coming near their

quarters.--_Guildhall MSS. Journals_ 12 and 15.

The sanitary regulations for the city are peculiarly interesting. The

scavengers, constables and officers of the wards were ordered, "on pain of

death," to see all streets and yards kept clear of dung and rubbish and all

other filthy and corrupt things. Carts went round every Monday, Wednesday,

and Saturday, to carry off the litter from the houses, and on each of those

days twelve buckets of water were drawn for "every person," and used in

cleaning their rooms and passages.

Particular pains were taken to keep the Thames clean, and at the mouth of

every sewer or watercourse there was a strong iron grating two feet

deep.--_Guildhall MSS. Journal_ 15.

[60] And not in England alone, but throughout Europe.

[61] 27 Hen. VIII. cap. 25.

[62] Ibid.

[63] Ibid.

[64] 22 Hen. VIII. cap. 4; 28 Hen. VIII. cap. 5.

[65] _Statut. Winton._ 13 Edw. I. cap. 6.

[66] 12 Rich. II. cap. 6: 11 Hen. IV. cap. 4.

[67] ELLIS'S _Original Letters_, first series, vol. i. p. 226.

[68] It has been stated again and again that the policy of Henry the Eighth

was to make the crown despotic by destroying the remnants of the feudal

power of the nobility. How is such a theory to be reconciled with statutes

the only object of which was the arming and training of the country

population, whose natural leaders were the peers, knights, and gentlemen?

We have heard too much of this random declamation.

[69] 33 Hen. VIII. cap. 9.

[70] From my experience of modern archery I found difficulty in believing

that these figures were accurately given. Few living men could send the

lightest arrow 220 yards, even with the greatest elevation, and for

effective use it must be delivered nearly point blank. A passage in

HOLINSHED'S _Description of Britain_, however, prevents me from doubting

that the words of the statute are correct. In his own time, he says that

the strength of the English archers had so notoriously declined that the

French soldiers were in the habit of disrespectfully turning their backs,

at long range, "bidding them shoot," whereas, says Holinshed, "had the

archers been what they were wont to be, these fellows would have had their

breeches nailed unto their buttocks." In an order for bowstaves, in the

reign of Henry the Eighth, I find this direction: "Each bowstave ought to

be _three fingers thick_ and squared, and _seven feet long_: to be got up

well polished and without knots."--Butler to Bullinger: _Zurich Letters_.

[71] Page 735, quarto edition.

[72] The Personages, Dresses, and Properties of a Mystery Play, acted at

Greenwich, by command of Henry VIII. _Rolls House MS._

[73] Hall says "collar of the _garter_ of St. Michael," which, however, I

venture to correct.

[74] Rich. II. 12, cap. 7, 8, 9; Rich. II. 15, cap. 6.

[75] _Lansdowne MSS._ 1, fol. 26.

[76] Injunctions to the Monasteries: BURNET'S _Collect._ pp. 77-8.

[77] Letter of Thomas Dorset to the Mayor of Plymouth: _Suppression of the

Monasteries_, p. 36.

[78] "Divers of your noble predecessors, kings of this realm, have given

lands to monasteries, to give a certain sum of money yearly to the poor

people, whereof for the ancienty of the time they never give one penny.

Wherefore, if your Grace will build to your poor bedemen a sure hospital

that shall never fail, take from them these things.... Tie the holy idle

thieves to the cart to be whipped, naked, till they fall to labour, that

they, by their importunate begging take not away the alms that the good

charitable people would give unto us sore, impotent, miserable people, your

bedemen."--FISH'S _Supplication_: FOXE, vol. iv. p. 664.

[79] 27 Hen. VIII. cap. 25.

[80] Roads, harbours, embankments, fortifications at Dover and at Berwick,

etc.--STRYPE's _Memorials_, vol. 1. p. 326 and 419.

[81] It is to be remembered that the criminal law was checked on one side

by the sanctuary system, on the other by the practice of benefit of clergy.

Habit was too strong for legislation, and these privileges continued to

protect criminals long after they were abolished by statute. There is

abundant evidence that the execution of justice was as lax in practice as

it was severe in theory.

[82] 27 Ed. III. stat. 1; 38 Ed. III. stat. 2; 16 Rich. cap. 5.

[83] 25 Ed. III. stat. 4; stat. 5, cap. 22; 13 Rich. II. stat. 2, cap. 2; 2

Hen. IV. cap. 3; 9 Hen. IV. cap. 8.

[84] See p. 42.

[85] _Lansdowne MS._ 1, fol. 26; STOW'S _Chron._ ed. 1630, p. 338.

[86] 2 Hen. IV. cap. 3; 9 Hen. IV. cap. 8.

[87] 2 Hen. IV. cap. 15.

[88] Hen. VII. cap. 4. Among the miscellaneous publications of the Record

Commission, there is a complaint presented during this reign, by the

gentlemen and the farmers of Carnarvonshire, accusing the clergy of

systematic seduction of their wives and daughters.

[89] Hen. IV. cap. 15.

[90] MORTON'S _Register_, MS. Lambeth. See vol. ii. cap. 10, of the second

edition of this work for the results of Morton's investigation.

[91] MORTON'S _Register_; and see WILKINS'S _Concilia_, vol. iii. pp.

618-621.

[92] Quibus Dominus intimavit qualis infamia super illos in dictâ civitate

crescit quod complures eorundem tabernas pandoxatorias, sive caupones

indies exerceant ibidem expectando fere per totum diem. Quare Dominus

consuluit et monuit eosdem quod in posterum talia dimittant, et quod

dimittant suos longos crines et induantur togis non per totum apertis.

[93] The expression is remarkable. They were not to dwell on the offences

of their brethren coram laicis qui semper clericis sunt infesti.--WILKINS,

vol. iii. p. 618.

[94] Johannes permissione divinâ Cantuar. episcop. totius Angliæ primas cum

in præsenti convocatione pie et salubriter consideratum fuit quod nonnulli

sacerdotes et alii clerici ejusdem nostræ provinciæ in sacris ordinibus

constituti honestatem clericalem in tantum abjecerint ac in comâ tonsurâque

et superindumentis suis quæ in anteriori sui parte totaliter aperta

existere dignoscuntur, sic sunt dissoluti et adeo insolescant quod inter

eos et alios laicos et sæculares viros nulla vel modica comæ vel habituum

sive vestimentorum distinctio esse videatur quo fiet in brevi ut a multis

verisimiliter formidatur quod sicut populus ita et sacerdos erit, et nisi

celeriori remedio tantæ lasciviæ ecclesiasticarum personarum quanto ocyus

obviemus et clericorum mores hujusmodi maturius compescamus, _Ecclesia

Anglicana quæ superioribus diebus vitâ famâ et compositis moribus floruisse

dignoscitur nostris temporibus quod Deus avertat, præcipitanter ruet_;

Desiring, therefore, to find some remedy for these disorders, lest the

blood of those committed to him should be required at his hands, the

archbishop decrees and ordains,--

Ne aliquis sacerdos vel clericus in sacris ordinibus constitutus togam

gerat nisi clausam a parte anteriori et non totaliter apertam neque utatur

ense nec sicâ nec zonâ aut marcipio deaurato vel auri ornatum habente.

Incedent etiam omnes et singuli presbyteri et clerici ejusdem nostræ

provinciæ coronas et tonsuras gerentes aures patentes ostendendo juxta

canonicas sanctiones.--WILKINS, vol. iii. p. 619.