History of England from the Fall of Wolsey to the Death of Elizabeth. Vol. III

Mixed causes for the hatred against Cromwell.

For struck down Cromwell should be, as his master Wolsey had been, to rise no more. Not only was he hated on public grounds, as the leader of a revolution, but, in his multiplied offices, he had usurped the functions of the ecclesiastical courts; he had mixed himself in the private concerns of families; he had interfered between wives and husbands, fathers and sons, brothers and sisters. In his enormous correspondence576 he appears as the universal referee – the resource of all weak or injured persons. The mad Duchess of Norfolk chose him for her patron against the duke. Lady Burgh, Lady Parr, Lady Hungerford,577 alike made him the champion of their domestic wrongs. Justly and unjustly, he had dragged down upon himself the animosity of peers, bishops, clergy, and gentlemen, and their day of revenge was come.

June 10.

He is arrested.

Treasonable words are sworn against him.

Exultation of the reactionaries in London.

On the 10th of June he attended as usual at the morning sitting of the House of Lords. The Privy Council sat in the afternoon, and, at three o’clock, the Duke of Norfolk rose suddenly at the table: “My Lord of Essex,” he said, “I arrest you of high treason.” There were witnesses in readiness, who came forward and swore to have heard him say “that, if the king and all his realm would turn and vary from his opinions, he would fight in the field in his own person, with his sword in his hand, against the king and all others; adding that, if he lived a year or two, he trusted to bring things to that frame that it should not lie in the king’s power to resist or let it.”578 The words “were justified to his face.” It was enough. Letters were instantly written to the ambassadors at foreign courts, desiring them to make known the blow which had been struck and the causes which had led to it.579 The twilight of the summer evening found Thomas Cromwell within the walls of that grim prison which had few outlets except the scaffold; and far off, perhaps, he heard the pealing of the church-bells and the songs of revelry in the streets, with which the citizens, short of sight, and bestowing on him the usual guerdon of transcendent merit, exulted in his fall. “The Lord Cromwell,” says Hall, “being in the council chamber, was suddenly apprehended and committed to the Tower of London; the which many lamented, but more rejoiced, and specially such as either had been religious men or favoured religious persons; for they banqueted and triumphed together that night, many wishing that that day had been seven years before, and some, fearing lest he should escape, although he were imprisoned, could not be merry; others, who knew nothing but truth by him, both lamented him and heartily prayed for him. But this is true, that, of certain of the clergy, he was detestably hated; and specially of such as had borne swing, and by his means were put from it; for indeed he was a man that, in all his doings, seemed not to favour any kind of Popery, nor could not abide the snuffing pride of some prelates.”580

A trial intended, but exchanged for an act of attainder.

The first intention was to bring him to trial,581 but a parliamentary attainder was a swifter process, better suited to the temper of the victorious reactionists. Five Romanists but a few days previously had been thus sentenced under Cromwell’s direction. The retribution was only the more complete which rendered back to him the same measure which he had dealt to others. The bill was brought in a week after his arrest. His offences, when reduced into ordinary prose out of the passionate rhetoric with which they were there described, were generally these: —

He had set at liberty persons convicted or suspected of treason.

1. He was accused of having taken upon himself, without the king’s permission, to set at liberty divers persons convicted and attainted of misprision of high treason, and divers others being apprehended and in prison for suspicion of high treason. No circumstances and no names were mentioned; but the fact seemed to be ascertained.

He had issued commissions on his own authority.

2. He was said to have granted licences for money; to have issued commissions in his own name and by his own authority; and, to have interfered impertinently and unjustly with the rights and liberties of the king’s subjects.

He had encouraged heresy.

3. Being a detestable heretic and disposed to set and sow common sedition and variance amongst people, he had dispersed into all shires in the realm great numbers of false, erroneous books, disturbing the faith of the king’s subjects on the nature of the Eucharist and other articles of the Christian faith. He had openly maintained that the priesthood was a form – that every Christian might equally administer the Sacraments. Being vicegerent of the king in matters ecclesiastical, and appointed to correct heresy, he had granted licences to persons detected or openly defamed of heresy to teach and preach.

He had released heretics from prison.

4. He had addressed letters to the sheriffs in various shires, causing many false heretics to be set at liberty, some of whom had been actually indicted, and others who had been for good reason apprehended and were in prison.

He had rebuked their accusers and prosecutors.

5. On complaint being made to him of particular heretics and heresies, he had protected the same heretics from punishment; “he had terribly rebuked their accusers,” and some of them he had persecuted and imprisoned, “so that the king’s good subjects had been in fear to detect the said heretics and heresies.”

He had threatened to maintain them by force.

6. In fuller explanation of the expressions sworn against him on his arrest, he had made a confederation of heretics, it was said, through the country; and supposing himself to be fully able, by force and strength, to maintain and defend his said abominable treasons and heresies, on declaration made to him of certain preachers, Dr. Barnes and others, preaching against the king’s proclamation, “the same Thomas Cromwell affirming the same preaching to be good, did not let to declare and say, ‘If the king would turn from it, yet I would not turn; and if the king did turn, and all his people, I would fight in the field, with my sword in my hand, against him and all others; and if that I live a year or two, it shall not lie in the king’s power to let it if he would.’”

He had amassed a fortune by bribery,

7. By bribery and extortion he had obtained vast sums of money; and being thus enriched, he had held the nobles in disdain.

And had menaced the nobility.

8. Finally, being reminded of his position with respect to the lords, and of the consequences which he might bring upon himself, he had said, “If the Lords would handle him so, he would give them such a breakfast as never was made in England, and that the proudest of them should know.”582

Were the accusations true?

And if true, was his escape or acquittal possible?

The amount and character of the evidence on which these charges were brought we have no means of judging; but the majority of them carry probability on their front; and we need not doubt that the required testimony was both abundant and sound. The case, of course, had been submitted in all its details to the king before the first step had been taken; and he was called upon to fulfil the promise which he had made of permitting justice to have its way. How was the king to refuse? Many a Catholic had gone to the scaffold for words lighter than those which had been sworn against Cromwell, by Cromwell’s own order. Did he or did he not utter those words? If it be these to which he alluded in a letter which he wrote from the Tower to the king,583 Sir George Throgmorton and Sir Richard Rich were the witnesses against him; and though he tried to shake their testimony, his denial was faint, indirect – not like the broad, absolute repudiation of a man who was consciously clear of offence.584 Could he have cleared himself on this one point, it would have availed him little if he had suspended the action of the law by his own authority, if he had permitted books to circulate secretly which were forbidden by act of parliament, if he had allowed prisoners for high treason or heresy to escape from confinement. Although to later generations acts such as these appear as virtues, not as crimes, the king could not anticipate the larger wisdom of posterity. An English sovereign could know no guidance but the existing law, which had been manifestly and repeatedly broken. Even if he had himself desired to shield his minister, it is not easy to see that he could have prevented his being brought to trial, or, if tried, could have prevented his conviction, in the face of an exasperated parliament, a furious clergy, and a clamorous people. That he permitted the council to proceed by attainder, in preference to the ordinary forms, must be attributed to the share which he, too, experienced in the general anger.

Cranmer declares his confidence in Cromwell’s integrity.

Only one person had the courage or the wish to speak for Cromwell. Cranmer, the first to come forward on behalf of Anne Boleyn, ventured, first and alone, to throw a doubt on the treason of the Privy Seal. “I heard yesterday, in your Grace’s council,” he wrote to the king, “that the Earl of Essex is a traitor; yet who cannot be sorrowful and amazed that he should be a traitor against your Majesty – he whose surety was only by your Majesty – he who loved your Majesty, as I ever thought, no less than God – he who studied always to set forwards whatsoever was your Majesty’s will and pleasure – he that cared for no man’s displeasure to serve your Majesty – he that was such a servant, in my judgment, in wisdom, diligence, faithfulness, and experience as no prince in this realm ever had – he that was so vigilant to preserve your Majesty from all treasons, that few could be so secretly conceived but he detected the same in the beginning! – I loved him as my friend, for so I took him to be; but I chiefly loved him for the love which I thought I saw him bear ever towards your Grace, singularly above all others. But now, if he be a traitor, I am sorry that ever I loved or trusted him; and I am very glad that his treason is discovered in time; but yet, again, I am very sorrowful; for who shall your Grace trust hereafter, if you may not trust him? Alas! I lament your Grace’s chance herein. I wot not whom your Grace may trust.”585

But inasmuch as he had broken the law openly and repeatedly,

And inasmuch as the law in a free country is the only guide to the magistrate, his condemnation was inevitable.

The intercession was bravely ventured; but it was fruitless. The illegal acts of a minister who had been trusted with extraordinary powers were too patent for denial; and Cranmer himself was forced into a passive acquiescence, while the enemies of the Reformation worked their revenge. Heresy and truth, treason and patriotism! these are words which in a war of parties change their meaning with the alternations of success, till time and fate have pronounced the last interpretation, and human opinions and sympathies bend to the deciding judgment. But while the struggle is still in progress – while the partisans on either side exclaim that truth is with them, and error with their antagonists, and the minds of this man and of that man are so far the only arbiters – those, at such a time, are not the least to be commended who obey for their guide the law as it in fact exists. Men there are who need no such direction, who follow their own course – it may be to a glorious success, it may be to as glorious a death. To such proud natures the issue to themselves is of trifling moment. They live for their work or die for it, as their Almighty Father wills. But the law in a free country cannot keep pace with genius. It reflects the plain sentiments of the better order of average men; and if it so happen, as in a perplexed world of change it will happen and must, that a statesman, or a prophet, is beyond his age, and in collision with a law which his conscience forbids him to obey, he bravely breaks it, bravely defies it, and either wins the victory in his living person, or, more often, wins it in his death. In fairness, Cromwell should have been tried; but it would have added nothing to his chances of escape. He could not disprove the accusations. He could but have said that he had done right, not wrong, – a plea which would have been but a fresh crime. But, in the deafening storm of denunciation which burst out, the hastiest vengeance was held the greatest justice. Any charge, however wild, gained hearing: Chatillon, the French ambassador, informed his court that the Privy Seal had intended privately to marry the Lady Mary, as the Duke of Suffolk had married the king’s sister, and on Henry’s death proposed to seize the crown.586 When a story so extravagant could gain credence, the circular of the council to the ambassadors rather furnishes matter of suspicion by its moderation.

The attainder passes.

The quarrel with the Emperor is at an end.

The attainder passed instantly, with acclamations. Francis wrote a letter of congratulation to the king on the discovery of the “treason.”587 Charles V., whose keener eyes saw deeper into the nature of the catastrophe, when the news were communicated to him, “nothing moved outwardly in countenance or word,” said merely, “What, is he in the Tower of London, and by the king’s commandment?”588 He sent no message, no expression of regret or of pleasure, no word of any kind; but from that moment no menacing demonstrations or violent words or actions ruffled his relations with England, till a new change had passed upon the stage. His own friends were now in power. He knew it, and acknowledged them.589

Triumph of the reactionaries.

The barrier which had stemmed the reactionary tide had now fallen. Omnipotent in parliament and convocation, the king inclining in their favour, carrying with them the sympathy of the wealth, the worldliness, and the harder intellect of the country, freed from the dreaded minister, freed from the necessity of conciliating the German Protestants, the Anglican leaders made haste to redeem their lost time, and develope their policy more wisely than before.

The Bishop of Bath is despatched to the Duke of Cleves.

July 1. Improvement of the machinery for the enforcement of the Six Articles.

July 6. Parliament discusses the marriage.

Their handiwork is to be traced in the various measures which occupied the remainder of the session. The first step was to despatch the Bishop of Bath to the Duke of Cleves, to gain his consent, if possible, to his sister’s separation from the king; Anne, herself, meanwhile, being recommended, for the benefit of her health, to retire for a few days to Richmond. The bill of attainder was disposed of on the 19th of June; on the 22d the bishops brought in a bill for the better payment of tithes, which in the few years last past certain persons had contemptuously presumed to withhold.590 On the 1st of July a bill was read enacting that, whereas in the parliament of the year preceding “a godly act was made for the abolishment of diversity of opinion concerning the Christian religion,” the provisions of which, for various reasons, had not been enforced, for the better execution of the said act the number of commissioners appointed for that purpose should be further increased; and the bishops and the bishops’ chancellors should be assisted by the archdeacons and the officials of their courts.591 This measure, like the attainder, was passed unanimously.592 On the 5th a general pardon was introduced, from which heretics were exempted by a special proviso.593 The new spirit was rapid in its manifestation. The day after (for it was not thought necessary to wait for a letter from Germany) the Cleves’ marriage was brought forward for discussion; and the care with which the pleadings were parodied which had justified the divorce of Catherine, resembled rather a deliberate intention to discredit the first scandal than a serious effort to defend the second; but we must not judge the conduct of a party blinded with passion by the appearance which such conduct seems to wear in a calmer retrospect.

Speech of the Lord Chancellor not to the purpose.

The chancellor, once more reminding the lords of the wars of the Roses, and the danger of a disputed succession, informed them that certain doubts had arisen affecting the legality of the king’s present marriage. The absence of a prospect of issue was the single palliative of the present proceedings. The chancellor injured the case, so far as it admitted of injury, by dwelling on the possibility of an issue of doubtful legitimacy. The questions raised, however, belonged, he said, to the canon law, and he proposed that they should be submitted to the clergy then sitting in convocation.

A delegacy of the two Houses waits upon the king.

The queen consents to accept the judgment of convocation.

When the chancellor had ceased, the peers desired to communicate with the other House. Six delegates were sent down to repeat the substance of what they had heard, and returned presently, followed by twenty members of the House of Commons, who signified a wish to speak with the king in person. The lords assented, and repaired in a body with the twenty members to Whitehall. The formality of state interviews may not be too closely scrutinized. They requested to be allowed to open to his Majesty a great and important matter, which his Majesty, they were well aware, had alone permitted them to discuss. His Majesty being confident that they would make no improper demands, they laid before him the proposition which they had heard from the woolsack, and added their own entreaties that he would be pleased to consent.594 The king was gracious, but the canon law required also the consent of the queen; for which, therefore, the Duke of Suffolk, the Bishop of Winchester, and other noblemen were despatched to Richmond, and with which they soon returned.595 Six years were spent over the affair with Queen Catherine: almost as many days sufficed to dispose of Anne of Cleves.

July 7. The convocation undertake the investigation.

Evidence is given in.

On the Wednesday morning the clergy assembled, and Gardiner, in “a luminous oration,”596 invited them to the task which they were to undertake. Evidence was sent in by different members of the Privy Council whom the king had admitted to his confidence; by the ladies of the court who could speak for the condition of the queen; and, finally, by Henry himself, in a paper which he wrote with his own hand, accompanying it with a request that, after reviewing all the circumstances under which the marriage had been contracted, they would inform him if it was still binding; and adding at the same time an earnest adjuration, which it is not easy to believe to have been wholly a form, that, having God only before their eyes, they would point out to him the course which justly, honourably, and religiously he was at liberty to pursue.597

His personal declaration was as follows:598—

The king makes a declaration of his own conduct.

“I depose and declare that this hereafter written is merely the verity, intended upon no sinister affection, nor yet upon none hatred or displeasure, and herein I take God to witness. To the matter I say and affirm that, when the first communication was had with me for the marriage of the Lady Anne of Cleves, I was glad to hearken to it, trusting to have some assured friend by it, I much doubting at that time both the Emperor, and France, and the Bishop of Rome, and also because I heard so much both of her excellent beauty and virtuous behaviour. But when I saw her at Rochester, which was the first time that ever I saw her, it rejoiced my heart that I had kept me free from making any pact or bond before with her till I saw her myself; for I assure you that I liked her so ill and [found her to be] so far contrary to that she was praised, that I was woe that ever she came into England, and deliberated with myself that if it were possible to find means to break off, I would never enter yoke with her; of which misliking both the Great Master (Lord Russell), the Admiral that now is, and the Master of the Horse (Sir Anthony Brown) can and will bear record. Then after my repair to Greenwich, the next day after, I think, I doubt not but the Lord of Essex will and can declare what I then said to him in that case, not doubting but, since he is a person which knoweth himself condemned to die by act of parliament, he will not damn his soul, but truly declare the truth not only at that time spoken by me, but also continually until the day of the marriage, and also many times after; wherein my lack of consent I doubt not doth or shall well appear, and also lack enough of the will and power to consummate the same, wherein both he and my physicians can testify according to the truth.”

The clergy deliberate for three days, and on the fourth deliver their sentence.

Nearly two hundred clergy were assembled, and the ecclesiastical lawyers were called in to their assistance. The deliberation lasted Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday.599 On Saturday they had agreed upon their judgment, which was produced and read in the House of Lords.

Owing to the imperfectly cleared pre-contract,

The contract between the Lady Anne of Cleves and the Marquis of Lorraine was sufficient, they would not say to invalidate, but to perplex and complicate any second marriage into which she might have entered.

Conditions unfulfilled,

Before the ceremony the king had required the production of the papers relating to that engagement with so much earnestness, that the demand might be taken as a condition on which the marriage was completed. But the papers had not been produced, the uncertainties had not been cleared … and thus there had not only been a breach of condition, but, if no condition had been made, the previous objection was further increased.

The enforced consent of the king,

Consent had been wanting on the part of the king. False representations had been held out to bring the lady into the realm and force her upon his Majesty’s acceptance.

The solemnization of the marriage was extorted from his Majesty against his will under urgent pressure and compulsion by external causes.

The absence of consummation,

And from other causes affecting the interests of the kingdom,

Consummation had not followed, nor ought to follow, and the convocation had been informed – as indeed it was matter of common notoriety – that if his Majesty could, without the breach of any divine law, be married to another person, great benefits might thereby accrue to the realm, the present welfare and safety whereof depended on the preservation of his royal person, to the honour of God, the accomplishment of His will, and the avoiding of sinister opinions and scandals.

Considering all these circumstances, therefore, and weighing what the Church might and could lawfully do in such cases, and had often before done,600 the convocation, by the tenor of those their present letters, declared his Majesty not to be any longer bound by the matrimony in question, which matrimony was null and invalid; and both his Majesty and the Lady Anne were free to contract and consummate other marriages without objection or delay.

They declare the marriage dissolved.

The continuance of the marriage could not have been desired.

But the scandal was great and inevitable.

To this judgment two archbishops, seventeen bishops, and a hundred and thirty-nine clergy set their hands.601 Their sentence was undoubtedly legal, according to a stricter interpretation of the canon law than had been usual in the ecclesiastical courts. The case was of a kind in which the queen, on her separate suit, could, with clear right, have obtained a divorce a vinculo had she desired; and the country had been accustomed to see separations infinitely more questionable obtained in the court of the Rota or at home, with easy and scandalous levity.602 Nor could the most scrupulous person, looking at the marriage between Henry and Anne of Cleves on its own merits, pretend that any law, human or divine, would have been better fulfilled, or that any feeling entitled to respect would have been less outraged, by the longer maintenance of so unhappy a connexion. Yet it is much to be regretted that the clergy should have been compelled to meddle with it; under however plausible an aspect the divorce might be presented, it gave a colour to the interpretation which represented the separation from Catherine as arising out of caprice, and enabled the enemies of the Church of England to represent her synods as the instruments of the king’s licentiousness.603