THE FINAL STRUGGLE.
The first of the "good things" brought out of the divorce of Anne of
Cleves was a fifth wife for the much-married monarch. Parliament,
which had petitioned Henry to solve the doubts troubling his subjects
as to the validity (that is to say, political advantages) of his union
with Anne, now besought him, "for the good of his people," to enter
once more the holy state of matrimony, in the hope of more numerous
issue. The lady had been already selected by the predominant party,
and used as an instrument in procuring the divorce of her predecessor
and the fall of Cromwell; for, if her morals were something lax,
Catherine Howard's orthodoxy was beyond dispute. She was niece of
Cromwell's great enemy, the Duke of Norfolk; and it was at the house
of Bishop Gardiner that she was first given the opportunity of
subduing the King to her charms.[1104] She was to play the part in the
Catholic reaction that Anne Boleyn had done in the Protestant
revolution. Both religious parties were unfortunate in the choice of
their lady protagonists. Catherine Howard's father, in spite of his
rank, was very penurious, and his daughter's education had been
neglected, while her character had been left at the mercy of any (p. 398)
chance tempter. She had already formed compromising relations with
three successive suitors. Her music master, Mannock, boasted that she
had promised to be his mistress; a kinsman, named Dereham, called her
his wife; and she was reported to be engaged to her cousin,
Culpepper.[1105] Marillac thought her beauty was commonplace;[1106]
but that, to judge by her portraits, seems a disparaging verdict. Her
eyes were hazel, her hair was auburn, and Nature had been at least as
kind to her as to any of Henry's wives. Even Marillac admitted that
she had a very winning countenance. Her age is uncertain, but she had
almost certainly seen more than the twenty-one years politely put down
to her account. Her marriage, like that of Anne Boleyn, was private.
Marillac thought she was already wedded to Henry by the 21st of July,
and the Venetian ambassador at the Court of Charles V. said that the
ceremony took place two days after the sentence of Convocation (7th
July).[1107] That may be the date of the betrothal, but the marriage
itself was privately celebrated at Oatlands on the 28th of July,[1108]
and Catherine was publicly recognised as Queen at Hampton Court (p. 399)
on the 8th of August, and prayed for as such in the churches on the
following Sunday.
[Footnote 1104: _Original Letters_, Parker Society,
i., 202. _cf. L. and P._, xv., 613 [12].
Winchester, says Marillac, "was one of the
principal authors of this last marriage, which led
to the ruin of Cromwell" (_ibid._, xvi., 269).]
[Footnote 1105: _L. and P._, xvi., 1334.]
[Footnote 1106: So says the _D.N.B._, ix., 308;
but in _L. and P._, xv., 901, Marillac describes
her as "a lady of great beauty," and in xvi., 1366,
he speaks of her "beauty and sweetness".]
[Footnote 1107: _Venetian Cal._, v., 222.]
[Footnote 1108: This is the date given by Dr.
Gairdner in _D.N.B._, ix., 304, and is probably
correct, though Dr. Gairdner himself gives 8th
August in his _Church History_, 1902, p. 218.
Wriothesley (_Chron._, i., 121) also says 8th
August, but Hall (_Chron._, p. 840) is nearer the
truth when he says: "The eight day of August was
the Lady Katharine Howard... _shewed openly as
Queen_ at Hampton court". The original authority
for the 28th July is the 3rd Rep. of the Deputy
Keeper of Records, App. ii., 264, _viz._, the
official record of her trial.]
The King was thoroughly satisfied with his new marriage from every
point of view. The reversal of the policy of the last few years, which
he had always disliked and for which he avoided responsibility as well
as he could, relieved him at once from the necessity of playing a part
and from the pressing anxiety of foreign dangers. These troubles had
preyed upon his mind and impaired his health; but now, for a time, his
spirits revived and his health returned. He began to rise every
morning, even in the winter, between five and six, and rode for four
or five hours. He was enamoured of his bride; her views and those of
her uncle, the Duke of Norfolk, and of her patron, Bishop Gardiner,
were in much closer accord with his own than Anne Boleyn's or
Cromwell's had been. Until almost the close of his reign Norfolk was
the chief instrument of his secular policy, while Gardiner represented
his ecclesiastical views;[1109] but neither succeeded to the place
which Wolsey had held and Cromwell had tried to secure. Henceforth the
King had no Prime Minister; there was no second Vicegerent, and the
praise or the blame for his policy can be given to no one but Henry.
[Footnote 1109: It was popularly thought that Henry
called Gardiner "his own bishop" (_L. and P._,
XIV., i., 662).]
That policy was, in foreign affairs, a close adherence to the Emperor,
partly because it was almost universally held to be the safest course
for England to pursue, and partly because it gave Henry a free hand
for the development of his imperialist designs on Scotland. In domestic
affairs the predominant note was the extreme rigour with which the
King's secular autocracy, his supremacy over the Church, and the (p. 400)
Church's orthodox doctrine were imposed on his subjects. Although the
Act of Six Articles had been passed in 1539, Cromwell appears to have
prevented the issue of commissions for its execution. This culpable
negligence did not please Parliament, and, just before his fall,
another Act was passed for the more effective enforcement of the Six
Articles. One relaxation was found necessary; it was impossible to
inflict the death penalty on "incontinent"[1110] priests, because
there were so many. But that was the only indulgence granted. Two days
after Cromwell's death, a vivid illustration was given of the spirit
which was henceforth to dominate the Government. Six men were executed
at the same time; three were priests, condemned to be hanged as
traitors for denying the royal supremacy; three were heretics,
condemned to be burnt for impugning the Catholic faith.[1111]
[Footnote 1110: 32 Henry VIII., c. 10. Married
priests of course would come under this opprobrious
title.]
[Footnote 1111: Wriothesley, _Chron._, i., 120,
121.]
And yet there was no peace. Henry, who had succeeded in so much, had,
with the full concurrence of the majority of his people, entered upon
a task in which he was foredoomed to failure. Not all the whips with
six strings, not all the fires at Smithfield, could compel that unity
and concord in opinion which Henry so much desired, but which he had
unwittingly done so much to destroy. He might denounce the diversities
of belief to which his opening of the Bible in English churches had
given rise; but men, who had caught a glimpse of hidden verities,
could not all be forced to deny the things which they had seen. The
most lasting result of Henry's repressive tyranny was the stimulus it
gave to reform in the reign of his son, even as the persecutions (p. 401)
of Mary finally ruined in England the cause of the Roman Church.
Henry's bishops themselves could scarcely be brought to agreement.
Latimer and Shaxton lost their sees; but the submission of the rest
did not extend to complete recantation, and the endeavour to stretch
all his subjects on the Procrustean bed of Six Articles was one of
Henry's least successful enterprises.[1112] It was easier to sacrifice
a portion of his monastic spoils to found new bishoprics. This had
been a project of Wolsey's, interrupted by the Cardinal's fall.
Parliament subsequently authorised Henry to erect twenty-six sees; he
actually established six, the Bishoprics of Peterborough, Oxford,
Chester, Gloucester, Bristol and Westminster. Funds were also provided
for the endowment, in both universities, of Regius professorships of
Divinity, Hebrew, Greek, Civil Law and Medicine; and the royal
interest in the advancement of science was further evinced by the
grant of a charter to the College of Surgeons, similar to that
accorded early in the reign to the Physicians.[1113]
[Footnote 1112: Henry soon recognised this himself,
and a year after the Act was passed he ordered that
"no further persecution should take place for
religion, and that those in prison should be set at
liberty on finding security for their appearance
when called for" (_L. and P._, xvi., 271). Cranmer
himself wrote that "within a year or a little more"
Henry "was fain to temper his said laws, and
moderate them in divers points; so that the Statute
of Six Articles continued in force little above the
space of one year" (_Works_, ii., 168). The idea
that from 1539 to 1547 there was a continuous and
rigorous persecution is a legend derived from Foxe;
there were outbursts of rigour in 1540, 1543, and
1546, but except for these the Six Articles
remained almost a dead letter (see _L. and P._,
XVIII., i., Introd., p. xlix.; pt. ii., Introd., p.
xxxiv.; _Original Letters_, Parker Society, ii.,
614, 627; Dixon, _Church Hist._, vol. ii., chaps,
x., xi.).]
[Footnote 1113: In 1518 (_L. and P._, ii., 4450).]
Disloyalty, meanwhile, was no more extinct than diversity in (p. 402)
religious opinion. Early in 1541 there was a conspiracy under Sir John
Neville, in Lincolnshire, and about the same time there were signs
that the Council itself could not be immediately steadied after the
violent disturbances of the previous year. Pate, the ambassador at the
Emperor's Court, absconded to Rome in fear of arrest, and his uncle,
Longland, Bishop of Lincoln, was for a time in confinement; Sir John
Wallop, Sir Thomas Wyatt, diplomatist and poet, and his secretary, the
witty and cautious Sir John Mason, were sent to the Tower; both
Cromwell's henchmen, Wriothesley and Sadleir, seem to have incurred
suspicion.[1114] Wyatt, Wallop and Mason were soon released, while
Wriothesley and Sadleir regained favour by abjuring their former
opinions; but it was evident that the realisation of arbitrary power
was gradually destroying Henry's better nature. His suspicion was
aroused on the slightest pretext, and his temper was getting worse.
Ill-health contributed not a little to this frame of mind. The ulcer
on his leg caused him such agony that he sometimes went almost black
in the face and speechless from pain.[1115] He was beginning to look
grey and old, and was growing daily more corpulent and unwieldy. He
had, he said, on hearing of Neville's rebellion, an evil people to
rule; he would, he vowed, make them so poor that it would be out of
their power to rebel; and, before he set out for the North to
extinguish the discontent and to arrange a meeting with James V., he
cleared the Tower by sending all its prisoners, including the aged (p. 403)
Countess of Salisbury, to the block.
[Footnote 1114: _L. and P._, xvi., 449, 461, 466,
467, 469, 470, 474, 482, 488, 506, 523, 534, 611,
640, 641; _cf._ the present writer in _D.N.B._, on
Mason and Wriothesley.]
[Footnote 1115: _Ibid._, XIV., ii., 142; xvi., 121,
311, 558, 589, 590; _D.N.B._, xxvi., 89.]
A greater trial than the failure of James to accept his invitation to
York awaited Henry on his return from the North. Rumours of Catherine
Howard's past indiscretions had at length reached the ears of the
Privy Council. On All Saints' Day, 1541, Henry directed his confessor,
the Bishop of Lincoln, to give thanks to God with him for the good
life he was leading and hoped to lead with his present Queen,[1116]
"after sundry troubles of mind which had happened to him by
marriages".[1117] At last he thought he had reached the haven of
domestic peace, whence no roving fancy should tempt him to stray.
Twenty-four hours later Cranmer put in his hand proofs of the Queen's
misconduct. Henry refused to believe in this rude awakening from his
dreams; he ordered a strict investigation into the charges. Its
results left no room for doubt. Dereham confessed his intercourse;
Mannock admitted that he had taken liberties; and, presently, the
Queen herself acknowledged her guilt. The King was overwhelmed with
shame and vexation; he shed bitter tears, a thing, said the Council,
"strange in his courage". He "has wonderfully felt the case of the
Queen," wrote Chapuys;[1118] "he took such grief," added Marillac,
"that of late it was thought he had gone mad".[1119] He seems to have
promised his wife a pardon, and she might have escaped with nothing
worse than a divorce, had not proofs come to light of her misconduct
with Culpepper after her marriage with Henry, and even during their
recent progress in the North. This offence was high treason, and (p. 404)
could not be covered by the King's pardon for Catherine's pre-nuptial
immorality. Henry, however, was not at ease until Parliament, in
January, 1542, considerately relieved him of all responsibility. The
faithful Lords and Commons begged him not to take the matter too
heavily, but to permit them freely to proceed with an Act of Attainder,
and to give his assent thereto by commission under the great seal
without any words or ceremony, which might cause him pain. Thus
originated the practice of giving the royal assent to Acts of
Parliament by commission.[1120] Another innovation was introduced into
the Act of Attainder, whereby it was declared treason for any woman to
marry the King if her previous life had been unchaste; "few, if any,
ladies now at Court," commented the cynical Chapuys, "would henceforth
aspire to such an honour".[1121] The bill received the royal assent on
the 11th of February, Catherine having declined Henry's permission to
go down to Parliament and defend herself in person. On the 10th she
was removed to the Tower, being dressed in black velvet and treated
with "as much honour as when she was reigning".[1122] Three days later
she was beheaded on the same spot where the sword had severed the fair
neck of Anne Boleyn.
[Footnote 1116: _L. and P._, xvi., 1334.]
[Footnote 1117: Herbert, _Life and Reign_, ed.
1672, p. 534.]
[Footnote 1118: _Ibid._, xvi., 1403.]
[Footnote 1119: _Ibid._, xvi., 1426.]
[Footnote 1120: _Lords' Journals_, pp. 171, 176.]
[Footnote 1121: _L. and P._, xvii., 124.]
[Footnote 1122: _Ibid._]
Thus ended one of the "good things" which had come out of the
repudiation of Anne of Cleves. Other advantages were more permanent.
The breach between Francis and Charles grew ever wider. In 1541 the
French King's ambassadors to the Turk were seized and executed by (p. 405)
the order of the imperial governor of Milan.[1123] The outrage brought
Francis's irritation to a head. He was still pursuing the shadow of a
departed glory and the vain hope of dominion beyond the Alps. He had
secured none of the benefits he anticipated from the imperial
alliance; his interviews with Charles and professions of friendship
were lost on that heartless schemer, and he realised the force of
Henry's gibe at his expectations from Charles. "I have myself," said
Henry, "held interviews for three weeks together with the Emperor."
Both sovereigns began to compete for England's favour. The French,
said Chapuys, "now almost offer the English _carte blanche_ for an
alliance";[1124] and he told Charles that England must, at any price,
be secured in the imperial interest. In June, 1542, Francis declared
war on the Emperor, and, by the end of July, four French armies were
invading or threatening Charles's dominions. Henry, in spite of all
temptations, was not to be the tool of either; he had designs of his
own; and the breach between Francis and Charles gave him a unique
opportunity for completing his imperialist projects, by extending his
sway over the one portion of the British Isles which yet remained
independent.
[Footnote 1123: _L. and P._, xvi., 984, 991, 1042.]
[Footnote 1124: _Ibid._, xvii., 124.]
* * * * *
As in the case of similar enterprises, Henry could easily find
colourable pretexts for his attack on Scots independence.[1125] Beton
had been made cardinal with the express objects of publishing in
Scotland the Pope's Bull against Henry, and of instigating James (p. 406)
V. to undertake its execution; and the Cardinal held a high place in
the Scots King's confidence. James had intrigued against England with
both Charles V. and Francis I., and hopes had been instilled into his
mind that he had only to cross the Border to be welcomed, at least in
the North, as a deliverer from Henry's oppression. Refugees from the
Pilgrimage of Grace found shelter in Scotland, and the ceaseless
Border warfare might, at any time, have provided either King with a
case for war, if war he desired. The desire varied, of course, with
the prospects of success. James V. would, without doubt, have invaded
England if Francis and Charles had begun an attack, and if a general
crusade had been proclaimed against Henry. So, too, war between the
two European rivals afforded Henry some chance of success, and placed
in his way an irresistible temptation to settle his account with
Scotland. He revived the obsolete claim to suzerainty, and pretended
that the Scots were rebels.[1126] Had not James V., moreover, refused
to meet him at York to discuss the questions at issue between them?
Henry might well have maintained that he sought no extension of
territory, but was actuated solely by the desire to remove the (p. 407)
perpetual menace to England involved in the presence of a foe on
his northern Borders, in close alliance with his inveterate enemy
across the Channel. He seems, indeed, to have been willing to conclude
peace, if the Scots would repudiate their ancient connection with
France; but this they considered the sheet-anchor of their safety, and
they declined to destroy it. They gave Henry greater offence by
defeating an English raid at Halidon Rig, and the desire to avenge a
trifling reverse became a point of honour in the English mind and a
powerful factor in English policy.
[Footnote 1125: For relations with Scotland see the
_Hamilton Papers_, 2 vols., 1890-92; Thorp's
_Scottish Calendar_, vol. i., 1858, and the much
more satisfactory _Calendar_ edited by Bain, 1898.
A few errors in the _Hamilton Papers_ are pointed
out in _L. and P._, vols. xvi.-xix.]
[Footnote 1126: This had been asserted by Henry as
early as 1524; Scotland was only to be included in
the peace negotiations of that year as "a fief of
the King of England"; it was to be recognised that
_supremum ejus dominium_ belonged to Henry, as did
the guardianship of James and government of the
kingdom during his minority (_Sp. Cal._, ii., 680).
For the assertion of supremacy in 1543 see the
present writer's _England under Somerset_, p. 173;
_L. and P._, xvii., 1033. In 1527 Mendoza declared
that all wise people in England preferred a project
for marrying the Princess Mary to James V. to her
betrothal to Francis I. or the Dauphin (_Sp. Cal._,
iii., 156) and that the Scots match was the one
really intended by Henry (_ibid._, p. 192; _cf. L.
and P._, v., 1078, 1286).]
The negotiations lasted throughout the summer of 1542. In October
Norfolk crossed the Borders. The transport broke down; the commissariat
was most imperfect; and Sir George Lawson of Cumberland was unable to
supply the army with sufficient beer.[1127] Norfolk had to turn back
at Kelso, having accomplished nothing beyond devastation.[1128] James
now sought his revenge. He replied to Norfolk's invasion on the East
by throwing the Scots across the Borders on the West. The Warden was
warned by his spies, but he had only a few hundreds to meet the
thousands of Scots. But, if Norfolk's invasion was an empty parade,
the Scots attempt was a fearful rout. Under their incompetent leader,
Oliver Sinclair, they got entangled in Solway Moss; enormous numbers
were slain or taken prisoners, and among them were some of the greatest
men in Scotland. James died broken-hearted at the news, leaving his
kingdom to the week-old infant, Mary, Queen of Scots.[1129] The triumph
of Flodden Field was repeated; a second Scots King had fallen; (p. 408)
and, for a second time in Henry's reign, Scotland was a prey to the
woes of a royal minority.
[Footnote 1127: _L. and P._, xvii., 731, 754, 771.]
[Footnote 1128: _Ibid._, xvii., 996-98, 1000-1,
1037.]
[Footnote 1129: See _Hamilton Papers_, vol. i., pp.
lxxxiii.-vi.; and the present writer in _D.N.B.,
s.v._ "Wharton, Thomas," who commanded the
English.]
Within a few days of the Scots disaster, Lord Lisle (afterwards Duke
of Northumberland) expressed a wish that the infant Queen were in
Henry's hands and betrothed to Prince Edward, and a fear that the
French would seek to remove her beyond the seas.[1130] To realise the
hope and to prevent the fear were the main objects of Henry's foreign
policy for the rest of his reign. Could he but have secured the
marriage of Mary to Edward, he would have carried both England and
Scotland many a weary stage along the path to Union and to Empire.
But, unfortunately, he was not content with this brilliant prospect
for his son. He grasped himself at the Scottish crown; he must be not
merely a suzerain shadow, but a real sovereign. The Scottish peers,
who had been taken at Solway Moss, were sworn to Henry VIII., "to set
forth his Majesty's title that he had to the realm of Scotland".[1131]
Early in 1543 an official declaration was issued, "containing the just
causes and considerations of this present war with the Scots, wherein
also appeareth the true and right title that the King's most royal
Majesty hath to the sovereignty of Scotland"; while Parliament
affirmed that "the late pretensed King of Scots was but an usurper of
the crown and realm of Scotland," and that Henry had "now at this
present (by the infinite goodness of God), a time apt and propice for
the recovery of his said right and title to the said crown and realm
of Scotland".[1132] The promulgation of these high-sounding pretensions
was fatal to the cause which Henry had at heart. Henry VII. had (p. 409)
pursued the earlier and wiser part of the Scottish policy of Edward
I., namely, union by marriage; Henry VIII. resorted to his later
policy and strove to change a vague suzerainty into a defined and
galling sovereignty. Seeing no means of resisting the victorious
English arms, the Scots in March, 1543, agreed to the marriage between
Henry's son and their infant Queen. But to admit Henry's extravagant
claims to Scottish sovereignty was quite a different matter. The mere
mention of them was sufficient to excite distrust and patriotic
resentment. The French Catholic party led by Cardinal Beton was
strengthened, and, when Francis declared that he would never desert
his ancient ally, and gave an earnest of his intentions by sending
ships and money and men to their aid, the Scots repudiated their
compact with England, and entered into negotiations for marrying their
Queen to a prince in France.[1133]
[Footnote 1130: _L. and P._, xvii., 1221, 1233.]
[Footnote 1131: Wriothesley, _Chron._, i., 140.]
[Footnote 1132: 35 Hen. VIII., c. 27.]
[Footnote 1133: _L. and P._, vol. xviii.,
_passim_.]
Such a danger to England must at all costs be averted. Marriages
between Scots kings and French princesses had never boded good to
England; but the marriage of the Queen of Scotland to a French prince,
and possibly to one who might succeed to the French throne, transcended
all the other perils with which England could be threatened. The union
of the Scots and French crowns would have destroyed the possibility of
a British Empire. Henry had sadly mismanaged the business through
vaulting ambition, but there was little fault to be found with his
efforts to prevent the union of France and Scotland; and that was the
real objective of his last war with France. His aim was not mere
military glory or the conquest of France, as it had been in his (p. 410)
earlier years under the guidance of Wolsey; it was to weaken or
destroy a support which enabled Scotland to resist the union with
England, and portended a union between Scotland and France. The
Emperor's efforts to draw England into his war with France thus met
with a comparatively ready response. In May, 1543, a secret treaty
between Henry and Charles was ratified; on the 22nd of June a joint
intimation of war was notified to the French ambassador; and a
detachment of English troops, under Sir John Wallop and Sir Thomas
Seymour, was sent to aid the imperialists in their campaign in the
north of France.
Before hostilities actually broke out, Henry wedded his sixth and last
wife. Catherine Parr was almost as much married as Henry himself.
Thirty-one years of age in 1543, she had already been twice made a
widow; her first husband was one Edward Borough, her second, Lord
Latimer. Latimer had died at the end of 1542, and Catherine's hand was
immediately sought by Sir Thomas Seymour, Henry's younger brother-in-law.
Seymour was handsome and won her heart, but he was to be her fourth,
and not her third, husband; her will "was overruled by a higher
power," and, on the 12th of July, she was married to Henry at Hampton
Court.[1134] Catherine was small in stature, and appears to have made
little impression by her beauty; but her character was beyond
reproach, and she exercised a wholesome influence on Henry during his
closing years. Her task can have been no light one, but her tact
overcame all difficulties. She nursed the King with great devotion,
and succeeded to some extent in mitigating the violence of his (p. 411)
temper. She intervened to save victims from the penalties of the
Act of Six Articles; reconciled Elizabeth with her father; and was
regarded with affection by both Henry's daughters. Suspicions of her
orthodoxy and a theological dispute she once had with the King are
said to have given rise to a reactionary plot against her.[1135] "A
good hearing it is," Henry is reported as saying, "when women become
such clerks; and a thing much to my comfort to come in mine old days
to be taught by my wife!" Catherine explained that her remarks were
only intended to "minister talk," and that it would be unbecoming in
her to assert opinions contrary to those of her lord. "Is it so,
sweetheart?" said Henry; "then are we perfect friends;" and when Lord
Chancellor Wriothesley came to arrest her, he was, we are told, abused
by the King as a knave, a beast and a fool.
[Footnote 1134: _D.N.B._, ix., 309.]
[Footnote 1135: Foxe, ed. Townsend, v., 553-61.]
* * * * *
The winter of 1543-44 and the following spring were spent in preparations
for war on two fronts.[1136] The punishment of the Scots for repudiating
their engagements to England was entrusted to the skilful hands of
Henry's brother-in-law, the Earl of Hertford; while the King himself
was to renew the martial exploits of his youth by crossing the Channel
and leading an army in person against the French King. The Emperor was
to invade France from the north-east; the two monarchs were then to
effect a junction and march on Paris. There is, however, no instance
in the first half of the sixteenth century of two sovereigns (p. 412)
heartily combining to secure any one object whatever. Charles and
Henry both wanted to extract concessions from Francis, but the
concessions were very different, and neither monarch cared much for
those which the other demanded. Henry's ultimate end related to
Scotland, Charles's to Milan and the Lutherans. The Emperor sought to
make Francis relinquish his claim to Milan and his support of the
German princes; Henry was bent on compelling him to abandon the cause
of Scottish independence. If Charles could secure his own terms, he
would, without the least hesitation, leave Henry to get what he could
by himself; and Henry was equally ready to do Charles a similar turn.
His suspicions of the Emperor determined his course; he was resolved
to obtain some tangible result; and, before he would advance any
farther, he sat down to besiege Boulogne. Its capture had been one of
the objects of Suffolk's invasion of 1523, when Wolsey and his imperialist
allies had induced Henry to forgo the design. The result of that folly
was not forgotten. Suffolk, his ablest general, now well stricken in
years, was there to recall it; and, under Suffolk's directions, the
siege of Boulogne was vigorously pressed. It fell on the 14th of
September. Charles, meanwhile, was convinced that Boulogne was all
Henry wanted, and that the English would never advance to support him.
So, five days after the fall of Boulogne, he made his peace with
Francis.[1137] Henry, of course, was loud in his indignation; the
Emperor had made no effort to include him in the settlement, and
repeated embassies were sent in the autumn to keep Charles to the (p. 413)
terms of his treaty with England, and to persuade him to renew the war
in the following spring.
[Footnote 1136: See for the Scottish war the
_Hamilton Papers_, and for the war in France
_Spanish Cal._, vol. vii., and _L. and P._, vol.
xix., pt. ii. (to December, 1544).]
[Footnote 1137: For Charles's motives see the
present writer in _Cambridge Modern History_, ii.,
245, 246.]
His labours were all in vain, and Henry, for the first time in his
life was left to face an actual French invasion of England. The horizon
seemed clouded at every point. Hertford, indeed, had carried out his
instructions in Scotland with signal success. Leith had been burnt and
Edinburgh sacked. But, as soon as he left for Boulogne, things went
wrong in the North, and, in February, 1545, Evers suffered defeat from
the Scots at Ancrum Moor. Now, when Henry was left without an ally,
when the Scots were victorious in the North, when France was ready to
launch an Armada against the southern coasts of England, now, surely,
was the time for a national uprising to depose the bloodthirsty
tyrant, the enemy of the Church, the persecutor of his people.
Strangely enough his people did, and even desired, nothing of the
sort. Popular discontent existed only in the imagination of his
enemies; Henry retained to the last his hold over the mind of his
people. Never had they been called to pay such a series of loans,
subsidies and benevolences; never did they pay them so cheerfully. The
King set a royal example by coining his plate and mortgaging his
estates at the call of national defence; and, in the summer, he went
down in person to Portsmouth to meet the threatened invasion. The
French attack had begun on Boulogne, where Norfolk's carelessness had
put into their hands some initial advantages. But, before dawn, on the
6th of February, Hertford sallied out of Boulogne with four thousand
foot and seven hundred horse. The French commander, Marechal du Biez,
and his fourteen thousand men were surprised, and they left their (p. 414)
stores, their ammunition and their artillery in the hands of their
English foes.[1138]
[Footnote 1138: Herbert, ed. 1672, p. 589; Hall, p.
862.]
Boulogne was safe for the time, but a French fleet entered the Solent,
and effected a landing at Bembridge. Skirmishing took place in the
wooded, undulating country between the shore and the slopes of
Bembridge Down; the English retreated and broke the bridge over the
Yar. This checked the French advance, though a force which was stopped
by that puny stream could not have been very determined. A day or two
later the French sent round a party to fill their water-casks at the
brook which trickles down Shanklin Chine; it was attacked and cut to
pieces.[1139] They then proposed forcing their way into Portsmouth
Harbour, but the mill-race of the tide at its mouth, and the mysteries
of the sandbanks of Spithead deterred them; and, as a westerly breeze
sprang up, they dropped down before it along the Sussex coast. The
English had suffered a disaster by the sinking of the _Mary Rose_ with
all hands on board, an accident repeated on the same spot two
centuries later, in the loss of the _Royal George_. But the Admiral,
Lisle, followed the French, and a slight action was fought off
Shoreham; the fleets anchored for the night almost within gunshot,
but, when dawn broke, the last French ship was hull-down on the
horizon. Disease had done more than the English arms, and the French
troops landed at the mouth of the Seine were the pitiful wreck of an
army.[1140]
[Footnote 1139: Du Bellay, _Memoirs_, pp. 785-9.]
[Footnote 1140: _State Papers_, ed. 1830-51, i.,
794, 816.]
France could hope for little profit from a continuance of the war, (p. 415)
and England had everything to gain by its conclusion. The terms of
peace were finally settled in June, 1546.[1141] Boulogne was to remain
eight years in English hands, and France was then to pay heavily for
its restitution. Scotland was not included in the peace. In September,
1545, Hertford had revenged the English defeat at Ancrum Moor by a
desolating raid on the Borders;[1142] early in 1546 Cardinal Beton,
the soul of the French party, was assassinated, not without Henry's
connivance; and St. Andrews was seized by a body of Scots Protestants
in alliance with England. Throughout the autumn preparation was being
made for a fresh attempt to enforce the marriage between Edward and
Mary;[1143] but the further prosecution of that enterprise was
reserved for other hands than those of Henry VIII. He left the
relations between England and Scotland in no better state than he
found them. His aggressive imperialism paid little heed to the
susceptibilities of a stubborn, if weaker, foe; and he did not, like
Cromwell, possess the military force to crush out resistance. He would
not conciliate and he could not coerce.
[Footnote 1141: _State Papers_, ed. 1830-51, i.,
877, 879; Odet de Selve, pp. 31, 34.]
[Footnote 1142: _State Papers_, v., 448-52;
_Harleian MS._, 284; _Original Letters_, i., 37.]
[Footnote 1143: Odet de Selve, _Corresp.
Politique_, 1886, pp. 50-120, _passim_.]
* * * * *
Meanwhile, amid the distractions of his Scottish intrigues, of his
campaign in France, and of his defence of England, the King was engaged
in his last hopeless endeavour to secure unity and concord in religious
opinion. The ferocious Act of Six Articles had never been more than
fitfully executed; and Henry refrained from using to the full the powers
with which he had been entrusted by Parliament. The fall of (p. 416)
Catherine Howard may have impaired the influence of her uncle, the
Duke of Norfolk, who had always expressed his zeal for the burning of
heretics; and the reforming party was rapidly growing in the nation at
large, and even within the guarded precincts of the King's Privy
Council. Cranmer retained his curious hold over Henry's mind; Hertford
was steadily rising in favour; Queen Catherine Parr, so far as she
dared, supported the New Learning; the majority of the Council were
prepared to accept the authorised form of religion, whatever it might
happen to be, and, besides the Howards, Gardiner was the only convinced
and determined champion of the Catholic faith. Even at the moment of
Cromwell's fall, there was no intention of undoing anything that had
already been done; Henry only determined that things should not go so
fast, especially in the way of doctrinal change, as the Vicegerent
wished, for he knew that unity was not to be sought or found in that
direction. But, between the extremes of Lutheranism and the _status
quo_ in the Church, there was a good deal to be done, in the way of
reform, which was still consistent with the maintenance of the Catholic
faith. In May, 1541, a fresh proclamation was issued for the use of
the Bible.[1144] He had, said the King, intended his subjects to read
the Bible humbly and reverently for their instruction, not reading
aloud in time of Holy Mass or other divine service, nor, being laymen,
arguing thereon; but, at the same time, he ordered all curates and
parishioners who had failed to obey his former injunctions to provide
an English Bible for their Church without delay. Two months later
another proclamation followed, regulating the number of saints' (p. 417)
days; it was characteristic of the age that various saints' days were
abolished, not so much for the purpose of checking superstition, as
because they interfered with the harvest and other secular business.[1145]
Other proclamations came forth in the same year for the destruction of
shrines and the removal of relics. In 1543 a general revision of
service-books was ordered, with a view to eradicating "false legends"
and references to saints not mentioned in the Bible, or in the
"authentical doctors".[1146] The Sarum Use was adopted as the standard
for the clergy of the province of Canterbury, and things were steadily
tending towards that ideal uniformity of service as well as of
doctrine, which was ultimately embodied in various Acts of Uniformity.
Homilies, "made by certain prelates," were submitted to Convocation,
but the publication of them, and of the rationale of rites and
ceremonies, was deferred to the reign of Edward VI.[1147] The greatest
of all these compositions, the Litany, was, however, sanctioned in
1545.[1148]
[Footnote 1144: _L. and P._, xvi., 819; Burnet,
iv., 509.]
[Footnote 1145: _L. and P._, xvi., 978, 1022,
1027.]
[Footnote 1146: _Ibid._, xvi., 1262; xvii., 176.]
[Footnote 1147: See the present writer's _Cranmer_,
pp. 166-72.]
[Footnote 1148: _Ibid._, pp. 172-75.]
The King had more to do with the _Necessary Doctrine_, commonly called
the "King's Book" to distinguish it from the Bishops' Book of 1537,
for which Henry had declined all responsibility. Henry, indeed, had
urged on its revision, he had fully discussed with Cranmer the
amendments he thought the book needed, and he had brought the bishops
to an agreement, which they had vainly sought for three years by
themselves. It was the King who now "set forth a true and perfect
doctrine for all his people".[1149] So it was fondly styled by (p. 418)
his Council. A modern high-churchman[1150] asserts that the King's
Book taught higher doctrine than the book which the bishops had
drafted six years before, but that "it was far more liberal and better
composed". Whether its excellences amounted to "a true and perfect
doctrine" or not, it failed of its purpose. The efforts of the old and
the new parties were perpetually driving the Church from the _Via
Media_, which Henry marked out. On the one hand, we have an act
limiting the use of the Bible to gentlemen and their families, and
plots to catch Cranmer in the meshes of the Six Articles.[1151] On the
other, there were schemes on the part of some of the Council to entrap
Gardiner, and we have Cranmer's assertion[1152] that, in the last
months of his reign, the King commanded him to pen a form for the
alteration of the Mass into a Communion, a design obviously to be
connected with the fact that, in his irritation at Charles's desertion
in 1544, and fear that his neutrality might become active hostility,
Henry had once more entered into communication with the Lutheran
princes of Germany.[1153]
[Footnote 1149: _L. and P._, XVIII., i., 534.]
[Footnote 1150: Canon Dixon.]
[Footnote 1151: See the present writer's _Cranmer_,
pp. 144-60.]
[Footnote 1152: Foxe, on the authority of Cranmer's
secretary, Morice, in _Acts and Monuments_, v.,
563, 564; it receives some corroboration from
Hooper's letter to Bullinger in _Original Letters_,
i., 41.]
[Footnote 1153: See Hasenclever, _Die Politik der
Schmalkaldener vor Ausbruch des Schmalkaldischen
Krieges_, 1901.]
The only ecclesiastical change that went on without shadow of turning
was the seizure of Church property by the King; and it is a matter of
curious speculation as to where he would have stayed his hand had he
lived much longer. The debasement of the coinage had proceeded apace
during his later years to supply the King's necessities, and, (p. 419)
for the same purpose, Parliament, in 1545, granted him all chantries,
hospitals and free chapels. That session ended with Henry's last
appearance before his faithful Lords and Commons, and the speech he
then delivered may be regarded as his last political will and
testament.[1154] He spoke, he said, instead of the Lord Chancellor,
"because he is not so able to open and set forth my mind and meaning,
and the secrets of my heart, in so plain and ample manner, as I myself
am and can do". He thanked his subjects for their commendation,
protested that he was "both bare and barren" of the virtues a prince
ought to have, but rendered to God "most humble thanks" for "such
small qualities as He hath indued me withal.... Now, since I find such
kindness in your part towards me, I cannot choose but love and favour
you; affirming that no prince in the world more favoureth his subjects
than I do you, nor no subjects or Commons more love and obey their
Sovereign Lord, than I perceive you do; for whose defence my treasure
shall not be hidden, nor my person shall not be unadventured. Yet,
although I wish you, and you wish me, to be in this perfect love and
concord, this friendly amity cannot continue, except both you, my
Lords Temporal and my Lords Spiritual, and you, my loving subjects,
study and take pains to amend one thing, which surely is amiss and far
out of order; to the which I most heartily require you. Which is, that
Charity and Concord is not amongst you, but Discord and Dissension
beareth rule in every place. Saint Paul saith to the Corinthians, the
thirteenth chapter, _Charity is gentle, Charity is not envious,_
_Charity is not proud_, and so forth. Behold then, what love and (p. 420)
charity is amongst you, when one calleth another heretic and
anabaptist, and he calleth him again papist, hypocrite and Pharisee?
Be these tokens of Charity amongst you? Are these signs of fraternal
love amongst you? No, no, I assure you that this lack of charity among
yourselves will be the hindrance and assuaging of the perfect love
betwixt us, except this wound be salved and clearly made whole.... I
hear daily that you of the Clergy preach one against another, without
charity or discretion; some be too stiff in their old _Mumpsimus_,
others be too busy and curious in their new _Sumpsimus_. Thus all men
almost be in variety and discord, and few or none preach truly and
sincerely the Word of God.... Yet the Temporalty be not clear and
unspotted of malice and envy. For you rail on Bishops, speak
slanderously of Priests, and rebuke and taunt preachers, both contrary
to good order and Christian fraternity. If you know surely that a
Bishop or Preacher erreth, or teacheth perverse doctrine, come and
declare it to some of our Council, or to us, to whom is committed by
God the high authority to reform such causes and behaviours. And be
not judges of yourselves of your fantastical opinions and vain
expositions.... I am very sorry to know and to hear how unreverently
that most precious jewel, the Word of God, is disputed, rhymed, sung,
and jangled in every Ale-house and Tavern.... And yet I am even as
much sorry that the readers of the same follow it in doing so faintly
and so coldly. For of this I am sure, that charity was never so faint
amongst you, and virtuous and godly living was never less used, nor
God Himself among Christians was never less reverenced, honoured, (p. 421)
or served. Therefore, as I said before, be in charity one with another
like brother and brother; love, dread, and serve God; to which I, as
your Supreme Head and Sovereign Lord, exhort and require you; and then
I doubt not but that love and league, that I spake of in the
beginning, shall never be dissolved or broke betwixt us."
[Footnote 1154: Hall, _Chron._, pp. 864-66; Foxe,
ed. Townsend, v., 534-36; Herbert, ed. 1672, pp.
598-601.]
* * * * *
The bond betwixt Henry and his subjects, which had lasted thirty-eight
years, and had survived such strain as has rarely been put on the
loyalty of any people, was now to be broken by death. The King was
able to make his usual progress in August and September, 1546; from
Westminster he went to Hampton Court, thence to Oatlands, Woking and
Guildford, and from Guildford to Chobham and Windsor, where he spent
the month of October. Early in November he came up to London, staying
first at Whitehall and then at Ely Place. From Ely Place he returned,
on the 3rd of January, 1547, to Whitehall, which he was never to leave
alive.[1155] He is said to have become so unwieldy that he could
neither walk nor stand, and mechanical contrivances were used at
Windsor and his other palaces for moving the royal person from room to
room. His days were numbered and finished, and every one thought of
the morrow. A child of nine would reign, but who should rule? Hertford
or Norfolk? The party of reform or that of reaction? Henry had
apparently decided that neither should dominate the other, and
designed a balance of parties in the council he named for his
child-successor.[1156]
[Footnote 1155: This itinerary is worked out from
the _Acts of the Privy Council_, ed. Dasent, vol.
i.]
[Footnote 1156: This is the usual view, but it is a
somewhat doubtful inference. Henry's one object was
the maintenance of order and his own power; he
would never have set himself against the nation as
a whole, and there are indications that at the end
of his reign he was preparing to accept the
necessity of further changes. The fall of the
Howards was due to the fear that they would cause
trouble in the coming minority of Edward VI. Few
details are known of the party struggle in the
Council in the autumn of 1546, and they come from
Selve's _Correspondance_ and the new volume (1904)
of the _Spanish Calendar_ (1545-47). These should
be compared with Foxe, vol. v.]
Suddenly the balance upset. On the 12th of December, 1546, (p. 422)
Norfolk and his son, the Earl of Surrey, were arrested for treason and
sent to the Tower. Endowed with great poetic gifts, Surrey had even
greater defects of character. Nine years before he had been known as
"the most foolish proud boy in England".[1157] Twice he had been
committed to prison by the Council for roaming the streets of the city
at night and breaking the citizens' windows,[1158] offences venial in
the exuberance of youth, but highly unbecoming in a man who was nearly
thirty, who aspired to high place in the councils of the realm, and
who despised most of his colleagues as upstarts. His enmity was
specially directed against the Prince's uncles, the Seymours. Hertford
had twice been called in to retrieve Surrey's military blunders.
Surrey made improper advances to Hertford's wife, but repudiated with
scorn his father's suggestion for a marriage alliance between the two
families.[1159] His sister testified that he had advised her to become
the King's mistress, with a view to advancing the Howard interests.
Who, he asked, should be Protector, in case the King died, but his
father? He quartered the royal arms with his own, in spite of the (p. 423)
heralds' prohibition. This at once roused Henry's suspicions; he
knew that, years before, Norfolk had been suggested as a possible
claimant to the throne, and that a marriage had been proposed between
Surrey and the Princess Mary.
[Footnote 1157: _L. and P._, XIV., ii., 141.]
[Footnote 1158: _Acts of the Privy Council_, i.,
104; Bapst, _Deux Gentilshommes poetes a la cour
d'Henri VIII._, p. 269.]
[Footnote 1159: See the present writer in _D.N.B.,
s.v._ "Seymour, Edward"; _cf._ Herbert, pp.
625-33. G.F. Nott in his life of Surrey prefixed
to his edition of the poet's works takes too
favourable a view of his conduct.]
The original charge against Surrey was prompted by personal and local
jealousy, not on the part of the Seymours, but on that of a member of
Surrey's own party. It came from Sir Richard Southwell, a Catholic and
a man of weight and leading in Norfolk, like the Howards themselves;
he even appears to have been brought up with Surrey, and for many
years had been intimate with the Howard family. When Surrey was called
before the Council to answer Southwell's charges, he wished to fight
his accuser, but both were committed to custody. The case was
investigated by the King himself, with the help of another Catholic,
Lord Chancellor Wriothesley. The Duke of Norfolk confessed to
technical treason in concealing his son's offences, and was sent to
the Tower. On the 13th of January, 1547, Surrey was found guilty by a
special commission sitting at the Guildhall;[1160] a week later he was
beheaded.[1161] On the 18th Parliament met to deal with the Duke; by
the 24th a bill of attainder had passed all its stages and awaited
only the King's assent. On Thursday, the 27th, that assent was given
by royal commission.[1162] Orders are said to have been issued for the
Duke's execution the following morning.
[Footnote 1160: See an account of his trial in
_Stowe MS._, 396.]
[Footnote 1161: Wriothesley, _Chron._ i., 177, says
19th January; other authorities give the 21st.]
[Footnote 1162: _Lords' Journals_, p. 289.]
That night Norfolk lay doomed in his cell in the Tower, and Henry (p. 424)
VIII. in his palace at Westminster. The Angel of Death hovered over
the twain, doubting which to take. Eighteen years before, the King had
said that, were his will opposed, there was never so noble a head in
his kingdom but he would make it fly.[1163] Now his own hour was come,
and he was loth to hear of death. His physicians dared not breathe the
word, for to prophesy the King's decease was treason by Act of
Parliament. As that long Thursday evening wore on, Sir Anthony Denny,
chief gentleman of the chamber, "boldly coming to the King, told him
what case he was in, to man's judgment not like to live; and therefore
exhorted him to prepare himself to death".[1164] Sensible of his
weakness, Henry "disposed himself more quietly to hearken to the words
of his exhortation, and to consider his life past; which although he
much abused, 'yet,' said he, 'is the mercy of Christ able to pardon me
all my sins, though they were greater than they be'". Denny then asked
if he should send for "any learned man to confer withal and to open
his mind unto". The King replied that if he had any one, it should be
Cranmer; but first he would "take a little sleep; and then, as I feel
myself, I will advise upon the matter". And while he slept, Hertford
and Paget paced the gallery outside, contriving to grasp the reins of
power as they fell from their master's hands.[1165] When the King woke
he felt his feebleness growing upon him, and told Denny to send for
Cranmer. The Archbishop came about midnight: Henry was speechless, and
almost unconscious. He stretched out his hand to Cranmer, and (p. 425)
held him fast, while the Archbishop exhorted him to give some token
that he put his trust in Christ. The King wrung Cranmer's hand with
his fast-ebbing strength, and so passed away about two in the morning,
on Friday, the 28th of January, 1547. He was exactly fifty-five years
and seven months old, and his reign had lasted for thirty-seven years
and three-quarters.
[Footnote 1163: _L. and P._, iv., 4942.]
[Footnote 1164: Foxe, ed. Townsend, v., 692;
Fuller, _Church History_, 1656, pp. 252-55.]
[Footnote 1165: _Cotton MS_., Titus, F. iii.;
Strype, _Eccl. Mem_., II., ii., 430.]
"And for my body," wrote Henry in his will,[1166] "which when the soul
is departed, shall then remain but as a _cadaver_, and so return to
the vile matter it was made of, were it not for the crown and dignity
which God hath called us unto, and that We would not be counted an
infringer of honest worldly policies and customs, when they be not
contrary to God's laws, We would be content to have it buried in any
place accustomed to Christian folks, were it never so vile, for it is
but ashes, and to ashes it shall return. Nevertheless, because We
would be loth, in the reputation of the people, to do injury to the
Dignity, which We are unworthily called unto, We are content to will
and order that Our body be buried and interred in the choir of Our
college of Windsor." On the 8th of February, in every parish church in
the realm, there was sung a solemn dirge by night, with all the bells
ringing, and on the morrow a Requiem mass for the soul of the
King.[1167] Six days later his body "was solemnly with great honour
conveyed in a chariot towards Windsor," and the funeral procession
stretched four miles along the roads. That night the body lay at (p. 426)
Sion under a hearse, nine storeys high. On the 15th it was taken to
Windsor, where it was met by the Dean and choristers of the Chapel
Royal, and by the members of Eton College. There in the castle it
rested under a hearse of thirteen storeys; and on the morrow it was
buried, after mass, in the choir of St. George's Chapel.
[Footnote 1166: The original is in the Record
Office; a copy of it was made for each executor,
and it has been often printed; see _England under
Protector Somerset_, p. 5 n.]
[Footnote 1167: Wriothesley, _Chron._, i., 181.]
Midway between the stalls and the Altar the tomb of Queen Jane Seymour
was opened to receive the bones of her lord. Hard by stood that
mausoleum "more costly than any royal or papal monument in the
world,"[1168] which Henry VII. had commenced as a last resting-place
for himself and his successors, but had abandoned for his chapel in
Westminster Abbey. His son bestowed the building on Wolsey, who
prepared for his own remains a splendid cenotaph of black and white
marble. On the Cardinal's fall Henry VIII. designed both tomb and
chapel for himself _post multos et felices annos_.[1169] But King and
Cardinal reaped little honour by these strivings after posthumous
glory. The dying commands of the monarch, whose will had been
omnipotent during his life, remained unfulfilled; the memorial chapel
was left incomplete; and the monument of marble was taken down,
despoiled of its ornaments and sold in the Great Rebellion. At length,
in a happier age, after more than three centuries of neglect, the
magnificent building was finished, but not in Henry's honour; it was
adorned and dedicated to the memory of a prince in whose veins there
flowed not a drop of Henry's blood.
[Footnote 1168: _L. and P._, iv., Introd., p.
dcxviii.]
[Footnote 1169: _Ibid.; cf._ Pote, _Hist. of
Windsor Castle_, 1749.]