Сн. A.D. 1533. CH. 7. death;' and that these and similar prophecies were carefully written out, and were in private circuDecember. lation through the country, the matter assumed a The dangerous complexion: it became at once essential extensive to ascertain how far, and among what classes of culation in the state, these things had penetrated. The pro secret cir a written form. The Friars Mendicant. Arrest of the Nun and five monks. Friars Mendicant were discovered to be in league with her, and these itinerants were ready-made missionaries of sedition. They had privilege of vagrancy without check or limit; and owing to their universal distribution and the freemasonry among themselves, the secret disposition of every family in England was intimately known to them. No movement, therefore, could be securely overlooked in which these orders had a share; the country might be undermined in secret; and the government might only learn their danger at the moment of explosion. No sooner, therefore, were the commissioners in possession of the general facts, than the principal parties-that is to say, the Nun herself and five of the monks of Christ Church at Canterbury -with whom her intercourse was most constant, were sent to the Tower to be 'examined'-the monks it is likely by 'torture,' if they could not otherwise be brought to confession. The Nun was certainly not tortured. On her first arrest, she was obstinate in maintaining her prophetic character; and she was detected in sending messages to her friends, 'to animate them to adhere to her and to her prophecies.'* But her *Papers relating to the Nun of Kent: Rolls House MS. A.D. 1533. She con A list is of the who were with her. courage ebbed away under the hard reality of her CH. 7. position. She soon made a full confession, in which her accomplices joined her; and the half-com- December. pleted web of conspiracy was ravelled out. They fesses. did not attempt to conceal that they had intended, if possible, to create an insurrection. The five monks-Father Bocking, Father Rich, Father obtained Rysby, Father Dering, and Father Goold-had persons assisted the Nun in inventing her 'Revelations;' implicated and as apostles, they had travelled about the country to communicate them in whatever quarters they were likely to be welcome. When we remember that Archbishop Warham had been a dupe of this woman, and that even Wolsey's experience and ability had not prevented him from believing in her power, we are not surprised to find high names among those who were implicated. Vast numbers of abbots and priors, and of regular and secular clergy, had listened eagerly; country gentlemen also, and London merchants. The Bishop of Rochester had 'wept for joy' at the first utterances of the inspired prophetess; and Sir Thomas More, 'who at first did little regard the said revelations, afterwards did greatly rejoice to hear of them.* We learn, also, that the Nun had continued to communicate with the Lady Princess Dowager' and the Lady Mary, her daughter.'† เ These were names which might have furnished cause for regret, but little for surprise or alarm. The commissioners must have found * Papers relating to the Nun of Kent. † 25 Hen. VIII. cap. 12. A.D. 1533. CH. 7. occasion for other feelings, however, when among the persons implicated were found the Countess December. of Salisbury and the Marchioness of Exeter, with The their chaplains, households, and servants; Sir Salisbury Thomas Arundel, Sir George Carew, and 'many Marchio- of the nobles of England.'* A combination Countess of and the ness of Exeter. confederacy under the headed by the Countess of Salisbury, if she were supported even by a small section of the nobility, would under any circumstances have been dangerous; and if such a combination was formed in support of an invasion, and was backed by the blessings of the pope and the fanaticism of the Danger of a clergy, the result might be serious indeed. So White Rose careful a silence is observed in the official papers on this feature of the Nun's conspiracy, that it is uncertain how far the countess had committed. herself; but she had listened certainly to avowals of treasonable intentions without revealing them, which of itself was no slight evidence of disloyalty; and that the government were really alarmed may be gathered from the simulArrest taneous arrest of Sir William and Sir George Nevilles. Neville, the brothers of Lord Latimer. The papal sanction. of the connexion and significance of these names I shall explain presently; in the meantime I return to the preparations which had been made by the Nun. As the final judgment drew near-which, unless the king submitted, would be accompanied *Papers relating to the Nun of Kent: Rolls House MS. 25 Hen. VIII. cap. 12. The 'many' nobles are not more par ticularly designated in the official papers. It was not desirable to mention names when the offence was to be passed over. The Nun that the Lady Mary have help time was with excommunication, and a declaration that CH. 7. the English nation was absolved from allegiance, A.D. 1533. -'the said false Nun,' says the report, 'surmised December. herself to have made a petition to God to know, prophesies when fearful war should come, whether any man should take my Lady Mary's part or no; and should she feigned herself to have answer by revelation when the that no man should fear but that she should have succour and help enough; and that no man should put her from her right that she was born unto. And petitioning next to know when it was the pleasure of God that her revelations should be put forth to the world, she had answer that knowledge should be given to her ghostly father when it should be time.'* come. municates With this information Father Goold had She comhastened down to Bugden, encouraging Catherine with Queen to persevere in her resistance;t and while the Catherine, imperialists at Rome were pressing the pope for sentence (we cannot doubt at Catherine's instance), the Nun had placed herself in readiness to seize the opportunity when it offered, and to blow the trumpet of insurrection in the panic which might be surely looked for when that sentence should be published. For this purpose she had organized, with con * Report of the Commissioners-Papers relating to the Nun of Kent: Rolls House MS. Goold says the Act of the Nun's attainder travelled to Bugden, to animate the said Lady Princess to make commotion in the realm against our sovereign lord; surmitting that CH. 7. A.D. 1533. And or ganizes a corps of friars to surrection. siderable skill, a corps of fanatical friars, who, when the signal was given, were simultaneously to December. throw themselves into the midst of the people, and call upon them to rise in the name of God. 'To the intent,' says the report, 'to set forth preach in this matter, certain spiritual and religious persons were appointed, as they had been chosen of God, to preach the false revelations of the said Nun, when the time should require, if warning were given them; and some of these preachers have confessed openly, and subscribed their names to their confessions, that if the Nun had so sent them word, they would have preached to the king's subjects that the pleasure of God was that they should take him no longer for their king; and some of these preachers were such as gave themselves to great fasting, watching, long prayers, wearing of shirts of hair and great chains of iron about their middle, whereby the people had them in high estimation of their great holyness, and this strait life they took on them by the counsel and exhortation of the said Nun.'* First Catholic treason. Here, then, was the explanation of the attitude of Catherine and Mary. Smarting under injustice, and most naturally blending their private quarrel with the cause of the church, they had listened to these disordered visions as to a message from heaven, and they had lent themselves to the first of those religious con Report of the Proceedings of the Nun of Kent: Rolls House MS. |