The Divorce of Catherine of Aragon

The secular arm was not yet called in, and, before Charles could be required to move, one more step would still be needed. But essentially, and on the main cause of the trouble, the Pope had at last spoken, and spoken finally.269 The passionate and devout Ortiz poured out on the occasion the emotions of grateful Catholicity. “The Emperor,” he wrote, “had won the greatest of his victories – a victory over Hell. There had been difficulties even to the last. Campeggio had opposed, but at last had yielded to the truth. The Pope repented of his delay, but now feared he had committed a great sin in hesitating so long. The holy martyr, the Queen of England, had been saved. The Cardinals in past years had been bribed by the French King; by the influence of the Holy Spirit they had all decided in the Queen’s favour. Their conscience told them they could not vote against her.”270

In England the news of the decision had not been waited for. Two days after the issue of the Bull, the Act abolishing the Pope’s authority was read the last time in the House of Lords, to the regret, said Chapuys, of a minority of good men, who could not carry the House along with them.

CHAPTER XV

The Papal curse – Determined attitude of the Princess Mary – Chapuys desires to be heard in Parliament – Interview with the King – Permission refused – The Act of Succession – Catherine loses the title of Queen – More and Fisher refuse to swear to the statute – Prospects of rebellion in Ireland – The Emperor unwilling to interfere – Perplexity of the Catholic party – Chapuys before the Privy Council – Insists on Catherine’s rights – Singular defence of the Pope’s action – Chapuys’s intrigues – Defiant attitude of Catherine – Fears for her life – Condition of Europe – Prospect of war between France and the Empire – Unwillingness of the Emperor to interfere in England – Disappointment of Catherine – Visit of Chapuys to Kimbolton.

Pretenders to supernatural powers usually confine the display of their skill to the presence of friends and believers. The exercise of such powers to silence opponents or to convince incredulity may be alleged to have existed in the past, or may be foretold as to happen in the future; in the actual present prudent men are cautious of experiments which, if they fail, bring them only into ridicule. Excommunication had real terrors when a frightened world was willing to execute its penalties – when the object of the censure was cut off from the services of religion and was regarded as a pariah and an outlaw. The Princes of Europe had real cause to fear the curse of the Pope when their own subjects might withdraw their obedience and the Christian Powers were ready to take arms to coerce them. But Clement knew that his own thunders would find no such support, and he lacked the confidence of Dr. Ortiz that Heaven, if men failed, would avenge its own wrongs. He had not been permitted even to invite the Emperor formally to enforce the sentence which he had been compelled to pronounce. Protestant Germany had been left unpunished in its heresy. The curse had passed harmless over Luther and Luther’s supporters. In England he was assured that his authority was still believed in, and that the King would be brought to judgment by his subjects. But there were no outward signs of it. His Bulls could no longer be introduced there. His clergy might at heart be loyal to him; but they had submitted to the Crown and the Parliament. His name was struck out of the service-books, and the business of life went on as if he had never spoken; the business of life, and also the business of the Government: for, the Pope being disposed of, the vital question of the succession to the Crown had still to be formally arranged.

Since the Emperor would not act Chapuys had been feeling his way with the Scotch. If James chose to assert himself, the Ambassador had promised him the Emperor’s support. “He might marry the Princess Mary, and the Emperor would welcome the union of the crowns of Scotland and England.”271 Had Mary submitted to her father, her claim to a place in the line of inheritance would not have been taken from her, for she had been born bonâ fide parentum and in no reasonable sense could be held illegitimate. But she had remained immoveable. In small things as well as great she had been unnecessarily irritating. Her wardrobe had required replenishing, and she had refused to receive anything which was not given to her as Princess. Anne Boleyn accused her aunt of being too lenient, Mrs. Shelton having refused to make herself the instrument of Anne’s violence. Chapuys feared the “accursed Lady” might be tempted into a more detestable course. But, any way, the nation had broken with the Pope, and Mary could not be left with the prospect of succeeding to the crown while she denied the competency of the English Parliament and the English courts of justice. A bill, therefore, was introduced to make the necessary provisions, establishing the succession in the child, and future children, of Anne.

Catherine could not yet believe that Parliament would assent. Parliament, she thought, had never yet heard the truth. She directed Chapuys to apply for permission to appear at the bar of the House of Lords and speak for her and the Princess.

After the failure of the Nuncio with Convocation Chapuys had little hope that he would be listened to; but Catherine insisted on his making the attempt, since a refusal, she thought, would be construed into an admission of her right.

The Ambassador wrote to the Council. They desired to know what he proposed to say, and he was allowed a private interview with the Duke of Norfolk. He told the Duke that he wished merely to give a history of the divorce case and would say nothing to irritate. The Duke said he would speak to the King; but the Emperor, considering all that the King had done for him, had not treated him well; they would sooner he had gone to war at once than crossed and thwarted them at so many turns. Chapuys protested that war had never been thought of, and it was arranged that he should see the King and himself present his request. Before he entered the presence Norfolk warned him to be careful of his words, as he was to speak on matters so odious and unpleasing that all the sugars and sauces in the world could not make them palatable. The King, however, was gracious. Chapuys boldly entered on the treatment of the Queen and Princess. He had heard, he said, that the subject was to be laid before Parliament, and he desired to present his remonstrances to the Lords and Commons themselves.

The King replied civilly that, as Chapuys must be aware, his first marriage had been judicially declared null; the Lady Catherine, therefore, could not any longer be called queen, nor the Lady Mary his legitimate daughter. As to Chapuys’s request, it was not the custom in England for strangers to speak in Parliament.

Chapuys urged that the Archbishop’s sentence was worth no more than the Bishop of Bath’s sentence illegitimatising the children of Edward IV. Parliament would, no doubt, vote as the King pleased; but, as to custom, no such occasion had ever arisen before, and Parliament was not competent to decide questions which belonged only to spiritual judges. The Princess was indisputably legitimate, as at the time of her birth no doubt existed on the lawfulness of her mother’s marriage.

This was a sound argument, and Henry seemed to admit the force of it. But he said that neither pope nor princes had a right to interfere with the laws and institutions of England. Secular judges were perfectly well able to deal with matrimonial causes. The Princess Elizabeth was next in succession till a son was born to him. That son he soon hoped to have. In short, he declined to allow Chapuys to make a speech in the House of Lords; so Chapuys dropped the subject, and interceded for permission to the Princess Mary to reside with her mother. He said frankly that, if harm came to her while in the charge of her present governess, the world would not be satisfied. Of course he knew that for all the gold in the world the King would not injure his daughter; but, even if she died of an ordinary illness, suspicions would be entertained of foul play. With real courage Chapuys reminded Henry that the knights who killed Becket had been encouraged by the knowledge that the king was displeased with him. The enemies of the Princess, perceiving that she was out of favour, and aware of the hatred272 felt for her by the Lady Anne, might be similarly tempted to make away with her while she was in Mrs. Shelton’s charge.

If Chapuys really used this language (and the account of it is his own), Henry VIII. was more forbearing than history has represented him. He turned the subject, and complained, as Norfolk had done, of the Emperor’s ingratitude. Chapuys said he had nothing to fear from the Emperor, unless he gave occasion for it. He smiled sardonically, and replied that, if he had been vindictive, there had been occasions when he could have revenged himself. It was enough, however, if the world knew how injured he had been. He then closed the conversation, dismissed his visitor, and told him he must be satisfied with the patience with which he had been heard.273

The Bill for the settlement of the crown was thus discussed without Chapuys’s assistance. The terms of it and the reasons for it are familiar to all readers of English history. The King’s efforts to obtain an heir male had, so far, only complicated an already dangerous problem. Though the marriage with Catherine had been set aside in an English court, the right of such a Court to pronounce upon it was not yet familiar to the nation generally. The Pope had given an opposite sentence: many of the peers and commons, the Duke of Norfolk among them, though reconciled to the divorce, had not yet made up their minds to schism;274 and Mary had still many friends who were otherwise loyal to her father. But, after the experience of the last century, Englishmen of all persuasions were frightened at the prospect of a disputed succession, which only a peremptory Act of Parliament could effectively dispose of. The Bill, therefore, passed at last with little opposition. Cranmer’s judgment was confirmed as against the Pope’s. The marriage with Catherine was declared null, the marriage with Anne valid, and Anne’s children the lawful heirs of the crown. The Act alone was not enough. The disclosures brought to light in the affair of the Nun of Kent, the disaffection then revealed, and the rank of the persons implicated in it, necessitated further precautions. Any doubt which might have existed on the extent and character of the conspiracy is removed for ever by the Spanish Ambassador’s letters. The Pope was threatening to absolve English subjects from their allegiance; how far he might be able to influence their minds had as yet to be seen; a Commission, therefore, was appointed to require and receive the oaths of all persons whom there was reason to suspect, that they would maintain the succession as determined in the Act.

The sentence from Rome had not arrived when the Bill became law, and no action was taken upon it till the terms in which Clement had spoken were specifically known. Catherine, however, seemed to think that the further she could provoke Henry to harsh measures, the nearer would be her own deliverance. She had always persuaded herself that judgment once given at Rome for her, the King would yield. The Act of Succession was thus specially galling, and with the same violent unwisdom which she had shown from the first, and against the direct advice of Chapuys, she had decided that the time was come for Mary “to show her teeth to the King.”275

It was not for her to expose her daughter to perils which she professed to believe were threatening the lives of both of them. But Mary obeyed her but too well. While the Succession Bill was before the two Houses, Anne, probably at Henry’s instance, went to Hatfield to invite her to receive her as Queen, promising, if she complied, that she should be treated better than she had ever been. Mary’s answer was that she knew no Queen but her mother; if the King’s mistress, so she designated Anne, would intercede with her father for her she would be grateful. The Lady, Chapuys heard, had said in a rage that she would put down that proud Spanish blood and do her worst with her. Nor was this all. The determined girl refused to be included in Elizabeth’s household, or pay her the respect attaching to her birth. Elizabeth soon after being removed from Hatfield to the More, Mary declined to go with her, and obliged the gentlemen in attendance to place her by force in Mrs. Shelton’s litter. The Ambassador felt the folly of such ineffectual resistance. Never, he said, would he have advised her to run such a risk of exasperating the King, while the Lady Anne was never ceasing day or night to injure her. His own advice had been that when violence was threatened she should yield; but he had been overruled by Catherine.276

Chapuys’s intercourse with the Court was now restricted. He was received when he applied for a formal interview; but for his information on what was passing there, he was left to secret friends or to his diplomatic colleagues. He asked the French Ambassador how the King took the Pope’s sentence. The ambassador said the King did not care in the least, which Chapuys was unable to believe. The action of the Parliament alarmed and shocked him. Among the hardest blows was the taking from the Bishops the powers of punishing heretics – a violation, as it appeared to him, of common right and the constitution of the realm. The sharp treatment of Bishop Nixe he regarded as an outrage and a crime. The Easter preachers were ordered to denounce the Pope in their sermons. Chapuys shuddered at their language. “They surpassed themselves in the abominations which they uttered.” Worse than sermons followed. On the arrival of the “sentence,” the Commission began its work in requiring the oath to the Succession Act. Those whose names had been compromised in the revelation of the Nun were naturally the first to be put to the test. Fisher, who had been found guilty of misprision of treason, had so far been left unpunished. It is uncertain whether the Government was aware of his communications with Chapuys, but enough was known to justify suspicion. The oath was offered him. He refused to take it, and he was committed to the Tower in earnest. He had been sentenced to imprisonment before, but had been so far left at liberty. Sir Thomas More might have been let alone, for there was no fear that he would lend himself to active treason. He, too, however, was required to swear, and declined, and followed Fisher to the same place. The Pope had declared war against the King, and his adherents had become the King’s enemies. Chapuys himself was suspected. His encouragement of disaffection could not have been wholly concealed. He believed that his despatches had been opened in Calais, and that Cromwell had read them. There had been a Scotch war. As the Emperor was disinclined to stir, Chapuys had looked on James as a possibly useful instrument in disturbing Henry’s peace. A Scottish Commission was in London to arrange a treaty, “as they had found England too strong for them alone.” The Ambassador, more eager than ever, tried his best to dissuade the Chief Commissioner from agreeing to terms, pointing out the condition of the kingdom and the advantage to Scotland in joining in an attack on the King. The Scotchman listened, and promised to be secret. Chapuys assured him of the Emperor’s gratitude,277 and, though the treaty was concluded, he consoled the Ambassador by saying “that the peace would not prevent his master from waging war on the English. Pleas in plenty could easily be found.”278

Ireland was a yet more promising field of operations. On the first rumour of the divorce the Earl of Desmond had offered his services to the Emperor. Chapuys discovered a more promising champion of the Church in Lord Thomas Fitzgerald, whom he described as “a youth of high promise.” If the Pope would send the censures to Dublin, he undertook that Lord Thomas would publish them, and would be found a useful friend.

Again, in spite of refusal, he urged the Emperor to take action himself. Harm, he said, would befall the Queen and Princess, if there was longer delay; Mrs. Shelton had told Mary that she would lose her head if she persisted in disobedience; the people loved them well, but were afraid to move without support. The Lutherans were increasing, and would soon be dangerously strong. The present was the time to act. The King thought he could hold the recusants down by obliging them to swear to his statute; but if the chance was allowed, they would show their real minds.279

One difficulty remained in the way of action. The Pope, though he had given judgment, had not yet called in the secular arm which was supposed to be necessary as a preliminary, and all parties, save Catherine and her passionate advisers, were unwilling that a step should be taken from which there would be no returning. The Emperor did not wish it. Francis, irritated at the refusal to listen to Du Bellay, told the Pope that he was throwing England away. “The Pope,” wrote the Cardinal of Jaen to Secretary Covos, “is restive. If we push him too hard he may go over to the enemy.”280 Charles ordered Cifuentes to keep strictly to his instructions. The evident hesitation amused and encouraged the English Cabinet. “Which Pope do you mean?” said the Duke of Norfolk to the Scotch Ambassador, who had spoken of Clement as an arbiter on some point in dispute, “the Pope of Rome or the Pope of Lambeth?” Henry, finding Francis had not wholly deserted him, “praised God” at a public dinner for having given him so good a brother in the King of France.

Under these circumstances, the Catholic party in England were alarmed and perplexed. Catherine had been undeceived at last in her expectation that the King would submit when the Pope had spoken. She informed Chapuys that she now saw it was necessary to use stronger remedies. What these remedies should be Chapuys said she dared not write, lest her letters should be intercepted. She was aware, too, that the Emperor knew best what should be done. Something must be tried, however, and speedily; for the King was acting vigorously, and to wait would be to be lost. A startling difference of opinion also was beginning to show itself even among the Queen’s friends. Some might turn round, Chapuys said, as they feared the Emperor, in helping her, would set up again the Pope’s authority, which they called tyrannical. It was the alarm at this which enabled the King to hold his subjects together.281

Though Mary had “shown her teeth” at her mother’s bidding, she had not provoked her father to further severities. He asked Mrs. Shelton if her pride was subdued. Mrs. Shelton saying there were no signs of it, he ordered that she should be more kindly treated; and he sent her a message that, if she was obedient, he would find some royal marriage for her. She answered that God had not so blinded her that she should confess that her father and mother had lived in adultery. The words, perhaps, lost nothing in the repeating; but the King said, and said rightly, that it was her mother’s influence. Catherine had persuaded her that his kindness was treachery, and that there was a purpose to poison her.282

A serious question, however, had risen about the Statute of Succession. The oath had been universally taken by everyone to whom it had been offered save More and Fisher. The reason for demanding it was the notorious intention of the Catholic party to take arms in Catherine’s and Mary’s interests. Were others to be sworn, and were the two ladies chiefly concerned to be exempted? Catherine, in ceasing to be queen, might be held to have recovered her rights as a foreigner. But she had remained in England by her own wish, and at the desire of the Emperor, to assist in fighting out the battle. Mary was undoubtedly a subject, and Catherine and she had both intimated that if the oath was demanded of them they would not take it. The Peers and Bishops were called together to consider the matter, and, as Catherine was a Spanish Princess, Chapuys was invited to attend.

The council-room was thronged. The Ambassador was introduced, and a copy of the statute was placed before him. He was informed that English subjects generally had voluntarily sworn to obey it. Two ladies only, Madam Catherine and Madam Mary, had declined, and the pains and penalties were pointed out to him which they might incur if they persisted.

Chapuys had been refused an opportunity of speaking his opinion in Parliament. It was now spontaneously offered him. He might, if he had pleased, have denounced the hardship of compelling the Queen and her daughter to assent personally to a statute which took their rights from them. The preamble declared the King’s marriage with Catherine to have been invalid, and in swearing to the Act of Succession she would be abandoning her entire plea. There was no intention, however, of forcing the oath upon the mother. Mary was the person aimed at; and Mary might have been spared also, if she had not “shewn her teeth” so plainly. Chapuys, however, spoke out boldly on the whole question. The King, he said, could not deprive the Princess of her place as heir to the crown, nor was the English Parliament competent to decide as to the validity of a marriage. The preamble of the statute was a lie. He would have proved it had he been permitted to speak there. People had sworn because they were afraid, and did not wish to be martyrs; and the oath being imposed by force, they knew that it could be no more binding than the oaths which he had lately taken to the Pope had bound the Archbishop of Canterbury. For a general answer, he produced the Pope’s sentence. The obstinacy which they complained of, he said, was in them, and not in the ladies. He could not persuade the ladies to swear; if he could, he would not, unless under orders from the Emperor; and he warned the Council that if they tried further violence they must be prepared to find the Emperor and Ferdinand their open enemies; the Emperor regarded the Queen as his mother, and the Princess as his sister; and, though he allowed that he was speaking without instructions, he intimated distinctly that the Emperor would not fail to protect them, and protect the cause of the Church, which had been intertwined with theirs.

Chapuys was bold, bolder perhaps than the Council had expected. The Bishop of Durham rose after a short pause. He had been Catherine’s advocate, and, as Chapuys said, was one of the most learned and honest prelates in the realm. But he, too, had come to see that the cause now at issue was the independence of England. He said that the statute had been well considered. It had been passed for the quiet of the realm, and must be obeyed. On Chapuys rejoining that the quiet of the realm required the King’s return to his wife, Tunstall mentioned the promises which had been made at the beginning of the suit, and produced the decretal which the Pope had given at Orvieto, declaring the marriage with Catherine invalid. Chapuys, in his answer, admitted, unconsciously, the justice of the English plea. He said the decretal had been issued when the Pope had just escaped from St. Angelo, and was angry and exasperated against the Emperor. As to other promises, he might or might not have made them. If he said he would give judgment in the King’s favour, he might have meant merely such a judgment as would be good for the King; or perhaps he was doing as criminal judges often did – holding out hopes to prisoners to tempt confessions from them. Such practices were legitimate and laudable.

The English argument was that a judge such as Chapuys described was not to be trusted with English suits. Henry himself could not have put the case more effectively. The Bishop of London spoke, and the Archbishop of York, and then Sampson (the Dean of the Chapel Royal), who affirmed bluntly that the Pope had no inherent rights over England. Man had given him his authority, and man might take it from him. Chapuys replied that the King had found it established when he came to the throne, and had himself recognised it in referring his cause to the Pope. Cranmer was present, but took no direct part. He brought out, however, the true issue, by suggesting, through Tunstall, that the Pope had incapacitated himself by submitting to be controlled by the Emperor. This was the point of the matter. To allow an English suit to be decided by Charles V. was to make England a vassal state of the Empire. To this Chapuys had no valid answer, for none could be given; and he discreetly turned the argument by reflecting on the unfitness of Cranmer also.