VII., no less than one hundred and sixty thousand pounds had been transmitted to Rome on account of this claim; which the parliament, therefore, reduced to five per cent. on all the episcopal benefices. The better to keep the pope in awe, the king was intrusted with a power of regulating these payments, and of confirming or infringing this act at his pleasure; and it was voted, that any censures which should be passed by the court of Rome on account of that law, should be entirely disregarded, and that mass should be said, and the sacraments administered, as if no such censures had been issued. This session, the commons preferred to the king a long com plaint against the abuses and oppressions of the ecclesiastical courts; and they were proceeding to enact laws for remedying them, when a difference arose, which put an end to the session before the parliament had finished all their business. It was become a custom for men to make such settlements, oi trust deeds, of their lands by will, that they defrauded not only the king, but all other lords, of their wards, marriages, and reliefs; and by the same artifice the king was deprived of his premier seizin, and the profits of the livery, which were no inconsiderable branches of his revenue. Ilenry made a bill be drawn to moderate, not remedy altogether, this abuse; he was contented, that every man should have the liberty of disposing in this manner of the half of his land; and he told the parliament in plain terms, "if they would not take a reasonable thing when it was offered, he would search out the extremity of the law; and then would not offer them so much again.' The lords came willingly into his terms; but the commons rejected the bill; a singular instance, where Henry might see that his power and authority, though exten sive, had yet some boundaries. The commons, however, found reason to repent of their victory. The king made good his threats he called together the judges and ablest lawyers who argued the question in chancery; and it was decided that a man could not by law bequeath any part of his lands in prejudice of his heir. The parliament being again assembled after a short prorogation, the king caused the two oaths to be read to them, that which the bishops took to the pope, and that to the king, on their installation; and as a contradiction might be suspected between them, while the prelates seemed to swear allegiance • Burnet, vol. i. p. 116 Hall. Parl. Hist * to two sovereigns; the parliament showed their inteution of abolishing the oath to the pope, when their proceedings were suddenly stopped by the breaking out of the plague at West minster, which occasioned a prorogation. It is remarkable, that one Temse ventured this session to move, that the house should address the king, to take back the queen, and stop the prosecution of his divorce This motion made the king send for Audley, the speaker, and explain to him the scruples with which his conscience had long been burdened; scruples, he said, which had proceeded from no wanton appetite, which had arisen after the fervors of youth were past, and which were confirmed by the concurring sentiments of all the learned societies in Europe. Except in Spain and Portugal, he added, it was never heard of, that any man had espoused two sisters; but he himself had the misfortune, he believed, to be the first Christian man that had ever married his brother's widow.t After the prorogation, Sir Thomas More, the chancellor, foreseeing that all the measures of the king and parliament led to a breach with the church of Rome, and to an alteration of religion, with which his principles would not permit him to concur, desired leave to resign the great seal; and he descended from his high station with more joy and alacrity than he had mounted up to it. The austerity of this man's virtue, and the sanctity of his manners, had nowise encroached on the gentleness of his temper, or even diminished that frolic and gayety to which he was naturally inclined. He sported with all the varieties of fortune into which he was thrown; and neither the pride naturally attending a high station, nor the melancholy incident to poverty and retreat, could eve. lay hold of his serene and equal spirit. While his family discovered symptoms of sorrow on laying down the grandeur and magnificence to which they had been accustomed, he drew a subject of mirth from their distresses; and made them ashamed of losing even a moment's cheerfulness on account of such trivial misfortunes. The king, who had entertained a high opinion of his virtue, received his resignation with some difficulty; and he delivered the great seal soon after to Sr Thomas Audley. During these transactions in England. and these invasions of the papal and ecclesiastical authority, the court of Rome was not without solicitude; and she entertained just appre * Burnet, vol. i. p. 123, 124. Herbert. Hall, fol. 205. hensions of losing entirely her authority n England; the kingdom which, of all others, had long been the most devoted to the holy see and which had yielded it the most ample reve nue. While the imperial cardinals pushed Clement to proceed to extremities against the king, his more moderate and impar tial counsellors represented to him the indignity of his proceed. ings; that a great monarch, who had signalized himself, both by his pen and his sword, in the cause of the pope, should be denied a favor which he demanded on such just grounds, and which had scarcely ever before been refused to any person of his rank and station. Notwithstanding these remonstrances, the queen's appeal was received at Rome; the king was cited to appear; and several consistories were held, to examine the validity of their marriage. Henry was determined not to send any proxy to plead his cause before this court: he only despatched Sir Edward Karne and Dr. Bonner, in quality of excusators, (so they were called,) to carry his apology, for not paying that deference to the papal authority. The pre rogatives of his crown, he said, must be sacrificed, if he allowed appeals from his own kingdom; and as the question regarded conscience, not power or interest, no proxy could supply his place, or convey that satisfaction which the dictates of his own mind alone could confer. In order to support himself in this measure, and add greater security to his intended defection from Rome, he procured an interview with Francis at Boulogne and Calais, where he renewed his personal friendship as well as public alliance with that monarch, and concerted all measures for their mutual defence. He even employed arguments, by which he believed he had persuaded Francis to imitate his example in withdrawing his obedience from the bishop of Rome, and administering ecclesiastical affairs without having further recourse to that see. And being now fully determined in his own mind, as well as resolute to stand all consequences, he privately celebrated his marriage with Anne Boleyn, whom he had previously created marchioness of Pembroke. Rouland Lee, soon after raised to the bishopric of Coventry, officiated at the marriage. The duke of Norfolk, uncle to the new queen, her father, mother, and brother, together with Dr. Cranmer, were present at the cere mony.* Anne became pregnant soon after her marriage, and this event both gave great satisfation to the king, and was Herbert, p. 340, 341. regarded by the people as a strong proof of the queen's for mer modesty and virtue. [1533.] The parliament was again assembled ; and Henry, in conjunction with the great council of the nation, proceeded still in those gra lual and secure steps, by which they loos ened their connections with the see of Rome, and repressed the usurpations of the Roman pontiff. An act was made against all appeals to Rome in causes of matrimony, divorces, wills, and other suits cognizable in ecclesiastical courts; appeals esteemed dishonorable to the kingdcm, by subjecting it to a foreign jurisdiction; and found to be very vexatious by the expense and the delay of justice which necessarily attended them.* The more to show his disregard to the pope, Henry finding the new queen's pregnancy to advance, publicly owned his marriage; and in order to remove all doubts with regard to its lawfulness, he prepared measures for declaring, by a formal sentence, the invalidity of his marriage with Catharine; a sentence which ought naturally to have preceded his espous ing of Anne.t The king, even amidst his scruples and remorses on ac count of his first marriage, had always treated Catharine with respect and distinction; and he endeavored, by every soft and persuasive art, to engage her to depart from her appeal to Rome, and her opposition to his divorce. Finding her obsti nate in maintaining the justice of her cause, he had totally forborne all visits and intercourse with her; and had desired her to make choice of any one of his palaces, in which she should please to reside. She had fixed her abode for some time at Amphill, near Dunstable; and it was in this latter town that Cranmer, now created archbishop of Canterbury, on the death of Warham,‡ was appointed to open his court for exam ining the validity of her marriage. The near neighborhood of the place was chosen, in order to deprive her of all plea of ignorance; and as she made no answer to the citation, either by herself or proxy, she was declared "contumacious; and the primate proceeded to the examination of the cause. The evidences of Arthur's consummation of his marriage were anew produced; the opinions of the universities were read, together with the judgment pronounced two years before 24 Henry VIII. c. 12. + Collier, vol. ii. p. 31, and Records, No. 8. by the convocations both of Canterbury and York, and after these preliminary steps, Cranmer proceeded to a sentence, and annulled the king's marriage with Catharine as unlawful and invalid. By a subsequent sentence, he ratified the marriage with Anne Boleyn, who soon after was publicly crowned queen, with all the pomp and dignity suited to that ceremony.* To complete the king's satisfaction on the conclusion of this untricate and vexatious affair, she was safely delivered of a daughter, who received the name of Elizabeth, and who afterwards swayed the sceptre with such renown and felicity. Henry was so much delighted with the birth of this child, that soon after he conferred on her the title of princess of Wales,* a step somewhat irregular, as she could only be presumptive. not apparent heir of the crown. But he had, during his for mer marriage, thought proper to honor his daughter Mary with that title; and he was determined to bestow on the offspring of his present marriage the same mark of distinction, as well as to exclude the elder princess from all hopes of the succession. His regard for the new queen seemed rather to increase than diminish by his marriage; and all men expected to see the entire ascendant of one who had mounted a throne from which her birth had set her at so great a distance, and who, by a proper mixture of severity and indulgence, had long managed so intractable a spirit as that of Henry. In order to efface as much as possible all marks of his first marriage, Lord Mountjoy was sent to the unfortunate and divorced queen, to inform her, that she was thenceforth to be treated only as princess dowager of Wales; and all means were employed to make her acquiesce in that determination. But she continued obstinate in maintaining the validity of her marriage; and she would admit no person to her presence who did not approach her with the accustomed ceremonial. Henry, forgetting his wonted generosity towards her, employed men. aces against such of her servants as complied with her com mands in this particular; but was never able to make her relinquish her title and pretensions.‡ When intelligence was conveyed to Rome of these transac tions, so injurious to the authority and reputation of the holy see, the conclave was in a rage, and all the cardinals of the imperiai faction urged the pope to proceed to a definitive sen *Heylin, p. 6. + Burnet, vol. i. p. 134. Herbert, p. 326. Burnet, vol. i. p. 132. |