James Gairdner

“ Full of domestic feeling, yet no less full of incomparable wit and humour, dragged into the service of the Court against his will on account of his high legal abilities and intellectual gifts, he had refused to yield one inch to solicitations against the cause of right and conscience. A true saint without a touch of austerity, save that which he practised on himself in secret, he lived in the world as one who understood it perfectly, with a breadth of view and an innate cheerfulness of temper which no external terrors could depress. ”

“ Men lost faith in their religion. Greedy courtiers sprang up eager for grants of abbey lands. A new nobility was raised out of the money-getting middle classes, and a host of placemen enriched themselves by continual peculation. Covetousness and fraud reigned in the highest places.
Yet "there is some soul of goodness in things evil," and the same policy that under Henry VIII destroyed the autonomy of the Church and suppressed the monasteries made him seek not only to unify his kingdom but to bring together the British Islands under one single rule. ”

“ England was strong, and even stronger than she had been. The only active pretender to Henry's throne, Richard de la Pole, self-styled Duke of Suffolk, "White Rose" as his followers called him, had been slain at the battle of Pavia fighting for Francis. Moreover the Duke of Albany had left Scotland for the last time (he accompanied Francis to Italy and, but for the event of Pavia, would have gone on to Naples) ; so that the French party in Scotland was overpowered, and though there were changes enough in that country none of them were injurious to English interests. ”

“ Next day Surrey was tried at the Guildhall, and he was executed on the 19th. Against Norfolk a Bill of Attainder was passed in Parliament, and only awaited the royal assent, for which a commission was drawn on the 27th; but the King died that night, and the Duke was saved.
The reign of Henry VIII has left deeper marks on succeeding ages than any other reign in English history. Nothing is more extraordinary than that within less than a century after Fortescue had written in praise of the Constitution and Laws of England, a despotism so complete should have been set up in that very country. ”

“ A strange occurrence in February in Bishop Fisher's household had produced a most unpleasant impression. A number of the servants fell ill, and two of them died. It was found that the cook had put poison in some pottage, of which happily the Bishop himself had not tasted; but it was generally believed his life had been aimed at by Anne Boleyn's friends. The King, however, was very angry; and, to avert suspicion, caused the Parliament to pass an ex post facto law, which was at once put in force, visiting the crime of poisoning with the hideous penalty of being boiled alive. ”

“ The league between Henry and the Emperor had been hollow from the first; nor had it then been easily adjusted, the objects of the allies being entirely different. Henry had foreseen, long before he entered on it, that his Scottish policy would involve a war with France; the Emperor desired, if he could not drive the Turks out of Hungary, at least to break up the shameful alliance between them and the French King. The Pope meanwhile was urging both the Emperor and Francis to peace, so that a General Council might meet to put down heresy-that of England most of all ”

“ The importance of the command of the sea was shown in two instances at the end of the reign, when the French besieged the English in Boulogne, and when the Scotch government attempted to besiege Henry's friends, the murderers of Cardinal Beton, in St Andrews. The hold which Henry thus had both on France and Scotland was important for his own protection; and the foundation of England's greatness as a world-power may be traced to a tyrant's strenuous efforts to defend his own position. ”

“ If among the laity he had neither lord nor commoner who durst withstand him, there were churchmen like some of the Observant Friars who actually spoke out against the public scandal which he was creating by repudiating his lawful wife; and the King felt, truly enough, that if he was to have his way, the voice of the Church must be either silenced or perverted. So the central authority of Christendom was no longer to determine what was right or wrong. In England the Church must be under Royal Supremacy.
To this decisive breach with Rome Henry himself was driven with some reluctance ”

“ The news of Bowes' defeat made Englishmen all the more eager to avenge it. But James had done nothing to provoke war. His ambassador was still in the English Court, desiring a passport for a larger embassy to treat of peace; and, though he hardly met with due civility, a meeting was at length arranged, which took place at York in September between commissioners on both sides. But musters were made at the same time all over England; and, as Henry would accept no terms, without free delivery of the prisoners taken by the Scots and renunciation of their alliance with France, the result was war. ”

“ In August the Duke of Suffolk was appointed Captain-general of a new invading army-a larger one, it was said, than had sailed from England for a hundred years. France was not only in great poverty but was now isolated. Scotland could not help her, and her old ally, Venice, had turned against her, not being allowed to remain neutral. Moreover, Henry was calculating on the disaffection of the Duke of Bourbon, with whom both he and the Emperor had been for some time secretly in communication. ”

“ But little came of the mission of a Nuncio (Nicholas von Schomberg, Archbishop of Capua) , whom the Pope sent to France, Spain, and England successively to mediate a peace. Negotiations went on with Bourbon on the part both of the Emperor and Henry for a joint attack on France. But the King and Wolsey had long suspected the Emperor's sincerity, and were determined that there should be either peace or war in earnest. Bourbon invaded Provence, and laid siege to Marseilles; whereupon orders were issued in England, September 10, to prepare for a royal invasion in aid of the Duke. ”

“ Evidently France was so impoverished by taxation that she would have been glad to stave off war by any means. But Henry would hear nothing about prolonging the truce while Albany was in Scotland; and he wrote to the Estates of that country in January, 1522, not to allow him to remain there, seeing that he had escaped from France surreptitiously and his presence was not even safe for their King. This was just what Henry had told them before; but it was a stranger plea to urge than formerly; for this time Queen Margaret, James Vs own mother, had solicited Albany's return. ”

“ In September, while professing peace with Scotland, Henry had meditated a further outrage by an invasion under the Duke of Suffolk; but this was wisely forborne. The Scottish people were already deeply incensed; and the English ambassador, Sir Ralph Sadler, had to leave Edinburgh for his own safety, and take refuge in Angus' Castle of Tantallon. In December the Scotch Parliament met, declared the treaties with England no longer binding, and renewed the old league with France. Henry immediately sent a herald to Scotland with a threatening and reproachful message to be read to the Estates. ”

“ At this time Francis I had stirred up war against the Emperor, who was already perplexed with a rebellion in Spain, while occupied in Germany with Luther and the Diet of Worms. Charles, hard pressed, was willing to accept Henry's mediation, and the French, after some reverses for which their early success had not prepared them, were glad to accept it also. But the Imperialists changed their tone with the change of fortune, and demanded Henry's aid by the treaty of London against the aggressor. Wolsey was sent to Calais to hear deputies of both sides and adjust the differences. ”

“ But the Pope was trying to make peace between them; and having created Reginald Pole a Cardinal in December, he gave him on February 7 a commission as Legate to bring about Henry's return to his obedience to Rome. Pole was a grandson of the Duke of Clarence, brother of Edward IV; and his mother, the Countess of Salisbury, was a sister of that Earl of Warwick who was put to death by Henry VII. At the beginning of his reign Henry VIII wished to atone for his father's wrong and Reginald Pole, showing a great love of letters, was educated at the King's expense at Oxford and Padua. ”

“ In England, to complete the work of the year, Parliament met in November, and passed, among other legislation, Acts for confirming the King's title as Supreme Head of the Church, for granting him the first-fruits and tenths before paid to the Pope, and for attainting More and Fisher of misprision and the Earl of Kildare of treason. But Parliament passed measures at dictation, and several of the chief lords of England were in secret communication with the imperial ambassador Chapuys to urge the Emperor to invade England. ”

“ The precise effect of the fall of the monasteries upon pauperism is not altogether easy to estimate; but the statement of Chapuys removes all doubt that it was the immediate cause of bitter penury. The evidence of the Statute-book on this point requires careful interpretation; for it was only in a later age that law was invoked to do the duty of charity. Down to the middle of Henry VIII's reign repeated Acts had been passed for the punishment of sturdy beggars and vagabonds; but it gradually came to be perceived that this problem could not be dealt with apart from relief of the deserving poor. ”

“ As she came to understand the King's mind, she was more resolved than ever to have her cause decided at Rome.
And Rome was at last really moved in her behalf. Slow as he was to take action, Clement was compelled, on January 25, 1532, to send the King a brief of reproof for his desertion of Catharine and cohabitation with Anne Boleyn. But Henry induced the Parliament, now assembled for a new session, to pass a bill,—which he told the Nuncio was passed against his will by the Commons out of their great hatred to the Pope- for abolishing the payment of First-fruits to Home. ”

“ Encumbered by heavy artillery Albany moved slowly, and at last laid siege to Wark Castle on November 1 The fortress seemed in real danger, the outer works being actually won; but the garrison made a gallant defence, and next day, as Surrey was coming to the rescue, Albany suddenly gave up the siege, and returned to Edinburgh. His mysterious retreat was branded by the English as a shameful flight, and satirised in contemptuous verse by Skelton, the poet laureate. But the truth seems to be that several of the Scotch lords deprecated a policy of invasion as being only in the interest of France. ”

“ Foreign nations were scandalised, but no foreign prince could afford lightly to quarrel with England. Henry was considered an enemy of Christianity much as was the Turk, but the prospect of a crusade against him, though at times it looked fairly probable, always vanished in the end. Foreign princes were too suspicious of each other to act together in this, and Henry himself, by his own wary policy, contrived to ward off the danger. He was anxious to show that the faith of Christendom was maintained as firmly within his kingdom as ever. ”

“ Early in the reign he made large use of churchmen, such as Warham, Fox, Wolsey, Pace, and Gardiner; for churchmen were generally men of greater penetration than ordinary lay agents of the Crown. A perceptible change took place in this matter, when with Cromwell's aid he compelled the Church to acknowledge Royal Supremacy and disown the Pope's authority. The churchmen then promoted were only those who fell in with the new policy and who, occupied in enforcing it on the clergy, were not capable of much service in framing Acts of State or assisting in secular government. ”

“ In March, 1542, Henry began pressing his richer subjects for a loan; which, though little hope was entertained of repayment, was generally granted, in the expectation that the money would be used in a war against France. But, though Francis and the Emperor were on the verge of war, and the formet really invaded the latter's dominions in July, England remained neutral for nearly a whole year after. Henry's design was first to get Scotland completely into his power. ”

“ James had no desire to quarrel with his uncle, but the intrigues of Angus, together with border raids, brought about the hostilities which we have noticed in 1532, when the Earl of Northumberland invaded the East Marches as far as the neighbourhood of Dunbar. By the mediation of Francis peace negotiations were opened next year at Newcastle, and in May, 1534, peace was concluded in London. Henry then sent to his nephew the Order of the Garter and afterwards endeavoured, but without success, to draw him into his own policy in religion against the Pope. ”

“ The child was Mary Stewart, who thus became Queen when only a week old. On hearing of her father's death, Henry liberated the Solway Moss prisoners from the Tower, and called his pensioners, the Earl of Angus and his brother, to a conference with them, proposing a treaty between the two kingdoms, with provisions for the future marriage of Prince Edward with the new-born babe, who was to be brought up in England till she reached marriageable age. ”

“ The Emperor Charles V is said to have declared that he would rather have lost the best city in his dominions than such a councillor as Sir Thomas More. In Italy More was vehemently lamented, and men related with admiration the touching devotion of his daughter, Margaret Roper, who broke through the guards to embrace him on his way to the Tower. He was indeed a man to inspire affection far beyond his own family circle. ”

“ This the Imperialists had procured on the Queen's demand for justice, which the Pope could not resist, and Henry saw that it was a death-blow to his expectations.
The fall of Wolsey was now inevitable. From the first the business of the divorce had been a source of intense anxiety to him, knowing as he did that, if he failed to give the King satisfaction, his ruin would be easily achieved by the leading lords who had been so long excluded from the King's counsels. And now that the failure was complete he was visibly out of favour. ”