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Anne Boleyn.

BORN A. D. 1507.-DIED A. D. 1536.

Her father was Sir

THIS unfortunate princess was born in 1507. Thomas Boleyn, afterwards created earl of Wiltshire and Ormonde, and her mother was daughter of the duke of Norfolk. At the age of seven or eight, she accompanied Mary, Henry's sister, to France, at the time when that princess became the wife of Louis XII. After Mary's return to England, Anne remained in France, as an attendant on Claude, the queen of Francis I. and she is said to have lived thereafter with the duchess of Alençon. The precise date of her final return to England is uncertain. Burnet supposes that she came back with her father in 1527. In England she became a maid of honour to queen Catharine, in which situation she seems to have been free from gross outward impropriety of conduct. "She carried herself so," says Burnet, speaking of this period of her life, "that, in the whole progress of the suit"this refers to the action of divorce from Catharine-"I never find the queen herself or any of her agents fix the least ill character on her, which would most certainly have been done had there been any just cause or good colour for it." During her residence at court, she attracted the attention of Lord Percy, son of the earl of Northumberland, and a page in the household of Cardinal Wolsey. Accordingly, a marriage between Anne and Lord Percy was proposed, but the cardinal and the king himself objected to the match. Considering the future history of Henry, it is natural to infer from his objecting to the marriage of the noble youth, that his own attachment to the young and beautiful maid of honour had begun; and from a confession of the king himself, an excellent historian has traced that attachment to the year 1527.2 Accordingly we find that in May of that year she was his partner in the dance, at a royal entertainment given at Greenwich. It was in the July immediately succeeding, that Knight was sent to Rome, with a view to a divorce from Catharine. While the tedious process for obtaining that object was proceeding, Anne was considered as a favourite, if not as a mistress, of the king; and few, perhaps, if any, will doubt, that his attachment to the maiden, whose external charms may be allowed-without derogating from the virtuous character of Catharineto have been greatly superior to the queen's, fostered, or at least accompanied his scruples respecting the validity of his marriage, supposing these to be sincere. As to the particular manner, however, in which his passion influenced his mind in his attempt to have the marriage nullified, there may be room for question. Sir James Mackintosh seems

'History of the Reformation, Book ii. The same author has largely refuted, in regard to Anne Boleyn, an old historian, Sanders, by whom she is represented as the daughter of Henry VIII. himself by the lady of Sir Thomas Boleyn, and as very dissolute in the early period of her life. Sanders seems to have aimed at blackening the character of Anne, under the influence of party-feeling.

Sir J. Mackintosh, History of England, vol. ii. p. 191. "He reproaches her," says the historian, speaking of Henry and Anne, "for cruelty to one who was one whole year struck with the dart of love,' which fixes the commencement of his passion in 1527.'

to think,3 that the only conceivable reason for Henry's perseverance in that long and tedious process, is, the refusal of Anne Boleyn to gratify his desire on any other terms than those of an authorized marriage. To us, however, it appears, that, independently of such resistance on the part of Anne, the scholastic scruples and headstrong spirit of the king might go far to explain his perseverance in his suit for a divorce. But that she did hold out against the unlawful gratification of his desires, seems generally admitted, even among those who may doubt whether she did not yield previously to her private marriage with the king in 1533-a question which, like many others, it is now, perhaps, impossible to settle. One of her biographers represents it as questionable whether she would not have been less guilty in becoming Henry's concubine, than in causing the degradation of the virtuous Catharine.* But whether she was influenced in the desire which she seems to have felt for the king's divorce, by her judgment on the moral questions it involved, or whether she was not prompted merely by the prospects of ambition and the blandishments of love, are points perhaps no longer ascertainable. That she heartily entered, however, into Henry's scheme, or at least felt a personal interest in the result, it may be safely inferred from a letter addressed by her and the king conjointly to Cardinal Wolsey.

At length, after a protracted suit for a divorce, and before he had obtained it, the king was privately married to Anne Boleyn, who had previously been created marchioness of Pembroke. The marriage took place, by one account, on the 14th of November, 1532, by another, about the 25th of January, 1533. Dr Lee is said to have performed the ceremony, in presence of Lord and Lady Wiltshire and other friends. In May thereafter, Archbishop Cranmer pronounced the king's marriage with Catharine invalid, and on the 1st of June, Anne was crowned. "Which mass and ceremonies done," says Cranmer, speaking of this occasion, "all the assembly of noblemen brought her into Westminster-hall again, where was kept a great solemn feast all that day; the good order thereof were too long to write at this time to you. But now, Sir, you must not imagine that this coronation was before her marriage; for she was married much about St Paul's day last, as the condition thereof doth well appear by reason she is now somewhat big with child. Notwithstanding, it hath been reported throughout a great part of the realm that I married her, which was plainly false, for myself knew not thereof a fortnight after it was done. And many other things be also reported of me, which be mere lies and tales."

115

On the 7th of September, Anne was delivered of a daughter-afterwards the illustrious queen Elizabeth. But from the height of her greatness, a few intermediate notices of her life will bring us to the circumstances of its melancholy close. That she joined her husband in his support of religious reformation there cannot be a doubt; nor, on the other hand, can we deny, that, in the earlier part of her residence at court she conformed to the Romish church. It has been represented

Life of Sir Thomas More, in Lives of British Statesmen (Lardner's Cabinet Cy clopædia), vol. i. p. 77.

Female Biography, by Mary Hays, vol. ii. p. 10.

5 Original Letters, illustrative of English History, edited by Mr Ellis, 1st Series

as no very uncharitable way of accounting for her renunciation of the authority of Rome, to consider it as resulting from a belief that it would clear for her a passage to the throne. It might seem almost unnatural to suppose, that this consideration, and a prudent or somewhat careless subservience to the will of Henry, had no influence in determining her profession and her creed; but, it is also to be considered, that the question of ecclesiastical authority became, about the time of her marriage, a subject of learned and general debate, so that a mind even moderately free from Romish bigotry, might be led to a change of opinion on the subject. It is remarked, too, by Bishop Burnet, that she received impressions in favour of Protestantism during her residence with the duchess of Alençon." She chose Staunton and Latimer as chaplains; and to her influence has been attributed the choice of Henry to have the Bible translated into English, and also an attempt which was made to accommodate the differences with foreign Protestants. She also seems to have been of a kind disposition. It is said that, in the course of nine months, she bestowed upwards of £14,000 in charity; and, in a statute granting pardon to persons not included in the act of attainder, for concealment and misprision in the matter of the maid of Kent, the king is represented as bestowing it "at the humble suit of his well-beloved wife, Queen Anne."

Two eminent official characters-Fisher, bishop of Rochester, and Sir Thomas More-fell victims to their refusal to take the oath relative to the new succession to the crown. The latter had set himself decidedly against the marriage of the king with Anne, and had cautioned the bishops against attending at her coronation. But, when in prison, and shortly before his execution, which occurred early in July, 1535, his amiable heart seemed to think of her with pity. He asked of his daughter, Margaret Roper, how the new queen was. "Never better," she replied. "Never better, Meg!" said More, "Alas! it pitieth me to remember into what misery, poor soul, she shall shortly come." The prediction was fulfilled-and in a manner of which she seems to have little thought, when she gave signs of satisfaction on occasion of Catharine's death, in January, 1536. That year, Anne was delivered of a still-born son. To this circumstance a change in Henry's affection has been ascribed-a change which was encouraged by her enemies of the Romish church. On the 24th of April, there was issued a commission to certain noblemen and judges, to inquire into allegations which had been raised against her: and, according to a popular story, at a tilting held at Greenwich on the 1st of May, a handkerchief dropped by the queen, and picked up and returned to her by Henry

See a summary of arguments on both sides of the question between the king and the pope in reference to ecclesiastical supremacy, and a representation of the successive steps by which the power of the latter came to be called in question, in Burnet's History of the Reformation.' It is not impossible that Henry himself was in some de gree influenced by the arguments adduced in support of the civil magistrate, on the subject of ecclesiastical authority-an idea not inconsistent with the belief that there is truth in the pointed, but somewhat indecorous line of Gray :

"And Gospel lignt first beamed from Bullen's eyes."

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"Anne Boleyn," says he, Hist. of Reform.' "had, in the duchess of Alencon's court, (who inclined to the reformation), received such impressions as made them"members of one of the English universities-" fear that her greatness and Cranmer's preferment, would encourage heresy, to which the universities were furiously averse.”

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