A History of the Reformation Volume II Part 18

2. An Act forbidding the payment of Peter's Pence to the Bishop of Rome; forbidding all application to the Pope for dispensations; and declaring that all such dispensations were to be sought for in the ecclesiastical courts within England.[422]

3. The Act of Succession, which was followed by a second within the same year in which the nullity of the marriage of Henry with Catharine of Aragon was clearly stated, and Catharine was declared to be the "Princess of Wales," _i.e._ the widow of Arthur; which affirms the validity of the King's marriage with Anne Boleyn, and declares that all the issue of that marriage are legitimate; and which affirms that, failing male succession, the crown falls to the Princess Elizabeth.[423]

4. The Supremacy Act, which declares that the King is rightfully the _Supreme Head of the Church of England_, has been recognised as such by Convocation, and that it is within his powers to make ecclesiastical visitations and to redress ecclesiastical abuses.[424]

5. The Treasons Act must also be included, inasmuch as one of its provisions is that it is treason to deny to the King any of his lawful t.i.tles (the Supreme Head of the Church of England being one), and that treason includes calling the King a heretic or a schismatic.[425]

To complete the list, it is necessary to mention that the two Convocations of Canterbury and of York solemnly declared that "the Roman Pontiff had no greater jurisdiction bestowed on him by G.o.d in the Holy Scriptures than any other foreign (_externus_) Bishop"--a declaration called the _Abjuration of the Papal Supremacy by the Clergy_.[426]

This separation of the Church of England from Rome really meant that instead of there being a dual control, there was to be a single one only. The Kings of England had always claimed to have some control over the Church of their realm; Henry went further, and insisted that he would share that supervision with no one. But it should be noticed that what he did claim was, to use the terms of canon law, the _potestas jurisdictionis_, not the _potestas ordinis_; he never a.s.serted his right to ordain or to control the sacraments. Nor was there at first any change in definition of doctrines. The Church of England remained what it had been in every respect, with the exception that the Bishop of Rome was no longer recognised as the _Episcopus Universalis_, and that, if appeals were necessary from the highest ecclesiastical courts in England, they were not to be taken as formerly to Rome, but were to be settled in the King's courts within the land of England. The power of jurisdiction over the affairs of the Church could scarcely be exercised by the King personally. Appeals could be settled by his judges in the law courts, but he required a subst.i.tute to exercise his power of visitation. This duty was given to Thomas Cromwell, who was made Vicar-General,[427] and the office to some small extent may be said to resemble that of the Papal Legate; he represented the King as the Legate had represented the Pope.

It was impossible, however, for the Church of England to maintain exactly the place which it had occupied. There was some stirring of Reformation life in the land. Cranmer had been early attracted by the writings of Luther; Thomas Cromwell was not unsympathetic, and, besides, he had the idea that there would be some advantage gained politically by an approach to the German Protestants. There was soon talk about a set of Articles which would express the doctrinal beliefs of the Church of England. It was, however, no easy matter to draft them.

While Cranmer, Cromwell, and such new Bishops as Latimer, had decided leanings towards the theology of the Reformation, the older Bishops held strongly by the mediaeval doctrines. The result was that, after prolonged consultations, little progress was made, and very varying doctrines seem to have been taught, all of which tended to dispeace. In the end, the King himself, to use his own words, "was constrained to put his own pen to the book, and conceive certain articles which were agreed upon by Convocation as catholic and meet to be set forth by authority."[428]

They were published in 1536 under the t.i.tle, _Articles devised by the Kyng's Highnes Majestie to stablysh Christen quietnes_, and were ordered to be read "plainly" in the churches.[429] They came to be called the _Ten Articles_, the first doctrinal symbol of the Church of England.

According to the preface, they were meant to secure, by royal authority, unity and concord in religious beliefs, and to repress and utterly extinguish all dissent and discord. Foxe the Martyrologist describes them very accurately as meant for "weaklings newly weaned from their mother's milk of Rome." Five deal with doctrines and five with ceremonies. The Bible, the Three Creeds (Apostles', Nicene, and Athanasian), and the doctrinal decisions of the first four Oec.u.menical Councils, are to be regarded as the standards of orthodoxy; baptism is necessary for salvation--children dying in infancy "shall undoubtedly be saved thereby, and _else not_"; the Sacrament of Penance is retained with confession and absolution, which are declared to be expedient and necessary; the substantial, real, corporeal Presence of Christ's Body and Blood under the form of Bread and Wine in the Eucharist is taught; faith as well as charity is necessary to salvation; images are to remain in the churches; the saints and the Blessed Virgin are to be reverenced as intercessors; the saints are to be invoked; certain rites and ceremonies, such as clerical vestments, sprinkling with holy water, carrying candles on Candlemas Day, and sprinkling ashes on Ash-Wednesday, are good and laudable; the doctrines of Purgatory and of prayers for the dead were not denied, but people were warned about them.

It should be noticed that while the three Sacraments of Baptism, the Eucharist, and Penance are retained, no mention is made of the other four, and that this is not unlike what Luther taught in the _Babylonian Captivity of the Church of Christ_; that while the Real Presence is maintained, nothing is said about Transubstantiation; that while images are retained in churches, all incensing, kneeling, or offering to images is forbidden; that while saints and the Virgin may be invoked as intercessors, it is said that it is a vain superst.i.tion to believe that any saint can be more merciful than Christ Himself; and that the whole doctrine of Attrition and Indulgences is paralysed by the statement that amendment of life is a necessary part of Penance.

It is only when these Articles are read along with the _Injunctions_ issued in 1536 and 1538 that it can be fully seen how much they were meant to wean the people, if gradually, from the gross superst.i.tion which disgraced the popular mediaeval religion. If this be done, they seem an attempt to fulfil the aspirations of Christian Humanists like Dean Colet and Erasmus.

After warning the clergy to observe all the laws made for the abolition of the papal supremacy, all those insisting on the supremacy of the King as the "supreme Head of the Church of England," and to preach against the Pope's usurped power within the realm of England, the _Injunctions_ proceed to say that the clergy are to expound the _Ten Articles_ to their people. In doing so they are to explain why superfluous holy days ought not to be observed; they are to exhort their people against such superst.i.tions as images, relics, and priestly miracles. They are to tell them that it is best to keep G.o.d's commandments, to fulfil His works of charity, to provide for their families, and to bestow upon the poor the money they often lavish on pilgrimages, images, and relics.

They are to see that parents and teachers instruct children from their earliest years in the Lord's Prayer, the Creed, and the Ten Commandments. They are to be careful that the sacraments are duly and reverently administered within their parishes, are to set an example of moral living, and are to give themselves to the study of the Scriptures.

The second set of _Injunctions_ (1538) goes further. The clergy are told to provide "one whole Bible _of the largest volume_ in English," which is to be set somewhere in the church where the paris.h.i.+oners can most easily read it; and they are to beware of discouraging any man from perusing it, "for it is the lively word of G.o.d that every Christian man is bound to embrace and follow." They are to preach a sermon at least every quarter, in which they are to declare the very gospel of Christ, and to exhort the people to the works of charity, mercy, and faith especially prescribed in the Scriptures. They are to warn them against trusting to fancies entirely outside of Scripture, such as "wandering to pilgrimages, offering of money or candles to images or relics, kissing or licking the same, and saying over a number of beads or suchlike superst.i.tions." They are not to permit candles, tapers, or images of wax to be placed before the images in the churches, in order to avoid "that most detestable offence of idolatry."[430]

The _Ten Articles_ thus authoritatively expounded are anything but "essentially Romish with the Pope left out in the cold." They are rather an attempt to construct a brief creed which a pliant Lutheran and a pliant Romanist might agree upon--a singularly successful attempt, and one which does great credit to the theological attainments of the English King.

It was thought good to have a brief manual of religious instruction to place in the hands of the lower clergy and of the people, perhaps because the _Ten Articles_ were not always well received. A committee of divines, chiefly Bishops,[431] were appointed to "compile certain rudiments of Christianity and a Catechism."[432] The result was a small book, divided into four parts--an exposition of the Apostles' Creed, of the _seven_ Sacraments, of the Ten Commandments, of the Lord's Prayer, and the Ave Maria. Two other parts were added from the _Ten Articles_--one on Justification, for which faith is said to be necessary; and the other on Purgatory, which is stoutly denied. Great difficulties were experienced in the compilation, owing to the "great diversity of opinions"[433] which prevailed among the compilers; and the book was a compromise between those who were stout for the old faith and those who were keen for the new; but in the end all seemed satisfied with their work. The chief difference between its teaching and that of the _Ten Articles_ is that the name sacrament is given to seven and not three of the chief ceremonies of the mediaeval Church; but, on the other hand, the doctrine of Purgatory is denied. It was expected that the King would revise the book before its publication,[434] but he "had no time convenient to overlook the great pains" bestowed upon it.[435] Drafts of an imprimatur by the King have been found among the State Papers,[436]

but the book was finally issued in 1537 by the "Archbishops and Bishops of England," and was therefore popularly called the _Bishops' Book_. All the clergy were ordered "to read aloud from the pulpit every Sunday a portion of this book" to their people.[437] The Catechism appears to have been published at the same time, and to have been in large request.[438]

Henry VIII. afterwards revised the _Bishops' Book_ according to his own ideas. The revision was published in 1543, and was known as the _King's Book_.[439]

Perhaps the greatest boon bestowed on the people of England by the _Ten Articles_ and the _Injunctions_ which enforced them was the permission to read and hear read a version of the Bible in their own tongue. For the vernacular Scriptures had been banned in England as they had not been on the Continent, save perhaps during the Albigensian persecution.

The seventh of the _Const.i.tutions of Thomas Arundel_ ordains "that no one hereafter translates into the English tongue or into any other, on his own authority, the text of Holy Scripture either by way of book, or booklet, or tract." This const.i.tution was directed against Wiclif's translation, which had been severely proscribed. That version, like so many others during the Middle Ages, had been made from the Vulgate. But Luther's example had fired the heart of William Tyndale to give his countrymen an English version translated directly from the Hebrew and the Greek originals.

Tyndale was a distinguished scholar, trained first at Oxford and then at Cambridge. When at the former University he had belonged to that circle of learned and pious men who had encouraged Erasmus to complete his critical text of the New Testament. He knew, as did More, that Erasmus desired that the weakest woman should be able to read the Gospels and the Epistles of St. Paul; that the husbandman should sing portions of them to himself as he followed the plough; that the weaver should hum them to the tune of his shuttle; and that the traveller should beguile the tedium of the road by repeating their stories; and he did not, like More, turn his back on the enn.o.bling enthusiasms of his youth.[440]

Tyndale found that he could not attempt his task in England. He went to Germany and began work in Cologne; but, betrayed to the magistrates of that centre of German Romanism, he fled to Worms. There he finished the translation of the New Testament, and printed two editions, one in octavo and the other in quarto--the latter being enriched with copious marginal notes. The ecclesiastical authorities in England had early word of this translation, and by Nov. 3rd, Archbishop Warham was exerting himself to buy and destroy as many copies as he could get hold of both in England and abroad; and, thanks to his exertions, Tyndale was supplied with funds to revise his work and print a corrected edition.

This version was welcomed in England, and pa.s.sed secretly from hand to hand. It was severely censured by Sir Thomas More, not because the work was badly done, but really because it was so scholarly. The faithful translation of certain words and sentences was to the reactionary More "a mischievous perversion of those writings intended to advance heretical opinion";[441] and, strange to say, Dr. James Gairdner seems to agree with him.[442] Tyndale's version had been publicly condemned in England at the Council called by the King in 1530 (May), and copies of his book had been publicly burnt in St. Paul's Churchyard, while he himself had been tracked like a wild beast by emissaries of the English Government in the Netherlands.

Cranmer induced Convocation in 1534 to pet.i.tion for an English version of the Bible, and next year Cromwell persuaded Miles Coverdale to undertake his translation in 1535. It was made from the Vulgate with some a.s.sistance from Luther's version, and was much inferior to the proscribed version of Tyndale; but it had a large private sale in England, and the King was induced to license it to enable the clergy to obey the _Injunctions_ of 1536, which had ordered a copy of the English Bible to be placed in all the churches before August 1537.[443]

The Archbishop, however, had another version in view, which he sent to Cromwell (Aug. 1537), saying that he liked it better than any other translation, and hoped it would be licensed to be read freely until the Bishops could set forth a better, which he believes will not be until after Doomsday. This version was practically Tyndale's.

Tyndale had entrusted one of his friends, Rogers, with his translation of the Old Testament, finished as far as the Book of Jonah, and with his complete version of the New Testament. Rogers had taken Tyndale's New Testament, his Old Testament as far as the Book of Chronicles, borrowed the remaining portion of the Old Testament from Coverdale's version, and printed them with a dedication to the King, signed Thomas Matthew.[444]

This was the edition recommended by Cranmer to Cromwell, which was licensed. The result was that Tyndale's New Testament (the same version which had been denounced as pernicious, and which had been publicly burnt only a few years before) and a large part of his Old Testament were publicly introduced into the parish churches of England, and became the foundation of all succeeding translations of the Bible into the English language.[445] On reconsideration, the translation was found to be rather too accurate for the Government, and some changes (certainly not corrections) were made in 1538--39. Thus altered, the translation was known as the _Great Bible_, and, because Cranmer wrote the preface, as Cranmer's Bible.[446] This was the version, the Bible "of the largest volume," which was ordered to be placed in the churches for the people to read, and portions of which were to be read from the pulpit every Sunday, according to the _Injunctions_ of 1538.

From 1533 on to the middle of 1539, there was a distinct if slow advance in England towards a real Reformation; then the progress was arrested, if the movement did not become decidedly retrograde. It seems more than probable that if Henry had lived a few years longer, there would have been another attempt at an advance.

Part of the advance had been a projected political and religious treaty with the German Protestants. Neither Henry viii. nor John Frederick of Saxony appears to have been much in earnest about an alliance, and from the English King's instructions to his envoys it would appear that his chief desire was to commit the German divines to an approval of the Divorce.[447] Luther was somewhat scornful, and seems to have penetrated Henry's design.[448] The German theologians had no doubt but that the marriage of Henry with Catharine was one which should never have taken place; but they all held that, once made, it ought not to be broken.[449] Determined efforts were made to capture the sympathies of Melanchthon. Bishop Foxe, selected as the theological amba.s.sador, was instructed to take him presents to the value of 70.[450] His books were placed on the course of study for Cambridge at Cromwell's order.[451]

Henry exchanged complimentary letters, and graciously accepted the dedication of Melanchthon's _De Locis Communibus_.[452] An emba.s.sy was despatched, consisting of Foxe, Bishop elect of Hereford; Heath, Archdeacon of Canterbury; and Dr. Barnes, an English divine, who was a p.r.o.nounced Lutheran. They met the Protestant Princes at Schmalkald and had long discussions. The confederated Princes and Henry found themselves in agreement on many points: they would stoutly disown the primacy of the Pope; they would declare that they would not be bound by the decrees of any Council which the Pope and the Emperor might a.s.semble; and they would pledge each other to get their Bishops and preachers to declare them null and void. The German Princes were quite willing to give Henry the t.i.tle of "Defender of the Schmalkald League."

But they insisted as the first articles of any alliance that the English Church and King must accept the theology of the Augsburg Confession and adopt the ceremonies of the Lutheran Church; and on these rocks of doctrine and ritual the proposed alliance was shattered.[453] The Germans had their own private view of the English Reformation under Henry VIII., which was neither very flattering nor quite accurate.

"So far the King has become Lutheran, that, because the Pope has refused to sanction his divorce, he has ordered, on penalty of death, that every one shall believe and preach that not the Pope but himself is the head of the universal Church. All other papistry, monasteries, ma.s.s, indulgences, and intercessions for the dead, are pertinaciously adhered to."[454]

The English emba.s.sy went from Schmalkald to Wittenberg, where they met a number of divines, including Luther and Melanchthon, and proceeded to discuss the question of doctrinal agreement. Melanchthon had gone over the Augsburg Confession, and produced a series of articles which presented all that the Wittenberg theologians could concede, and Luther had revised the draft.[455] Both the Germans were charmed with the learning and courtesy of Archdeacon Heath. Bishop Foxe "had the manner of prelates," says Melanchthon, and his learning did not impress the Germans.[456] The conference came to nothing. Henry did not care to accept a creed ready made for him, and thought that ecclesiastical ceremonies might differ in different countries. He was a King "reckoned somewhat learned, though unworthy," he said, "and having so many learned men in his realm, he could not accept at any creature's hand the observing of his and the realm's faith; but he was willing to confer with learned men sent from them."[457]

Before the conference at Wittenberg had come to an end, Henry believed that he had no need for a German alliance. The ill-used Queen Catharine, who, alone of all persons concerned in the Divorce proceedings, comes out unstained, died on Jan. 7th, 1536. Her will contained the touching bequest: "To my daughter, the collar of gold which I brought out of Spain"[458]--out of Spain, when she came a fair young bride to marry Prince Arthur of England thirty-five years before.

There is no need to believe that Henry exhibited the unseemly manifestations of joy which his enemies credit him with when the news of Catharine's death was brought to him, but it did free him from a great dread. He read men and circ.u.mstances shrewdly, and he knew enough of Charles V. to believe that the Emperor, after his aunt's death, and when he had no flagrant attack on the family honour of his house to protest against, would not make himself the Pope's instrument against England.

Henry had always maintained himself and England by balancing France against the Empire, and could in addition weaken the Empire by strengthening the German Protestants. But in 1539, France and the Emperor had become allies, and Henry was feeling himself very insecure.

It is probable that the negotiations which led to Henry's marriage with Anne of Cleves were due to this new danger. On the other hand, there had been discontent in England at many of the actions which were supposed to come from the advance towards Reformation.

Henry VIII. had always spent money lavishly. His father's immense h.o.a.rds had disappeared, while England, under Wolsey, was the paymaster of Europe, and the King was in great need of funds. In England as elsewhere the wealth of the monasteries seemed to have been collected for the purpose of supplying an empty royal exchequer. A visitation of monasteries was ordered, under the superintendence of Thomas Cromwell; and, in order to give him a perfectly free hand, all episcopal functions were for the time being suspended. The visitation disclosed many scandalous things. It was followed by the Act of Parliament (1536) for _The Dissolution of the Lesser Monasteries_.[459] The lands of all monasteries whose annual rental was less than 200 a year were given to the King, as well as all the ornaments, jewels, and other goods belonging to them. The dislodged monks and nuns were either to be taken into the larger houses or to receive some measure of support, and the heads were to get pensions sufficient to sustain them. The lands thus acquired might have been formed into a great crown estate yielding revenues large enough to permit taxation to be dispensed with; but the King was in need of ready money, and he had courtiers to gratify. The convent lands were for the most part sold cheaply to courtiers, and the numbers and power of the county families were largely increased. A new visitation of the remaining monasteries was begun in 1538, this time accompanied with an inquiry into superst.i.tious practices indulged in in various parts of the country, and notorious relics were removed. They were of all sorts--part of St. Peter's hair and beard; stones with which St. Stephen was stoned; the hair s.h.i.+rt and bones of St. Thomas the martyr; a crystal containing a little quant.i.ty of Our Lady's milk, "with two other bones"; the "princ.i.p.al relic in England, an angel with one wing that brought to Caversham (near Reading) the spear's head that pierced the side of our Saviour on the cross"; the ear of Malchus, which St. Peter cut off; a foot of St. Philip at Winchester "covered with gold plate and (precious) stones"; and so forth.[460] Miraculous images were brought up to London and their mechanism exposed to the crowd, while an eloquent preacher thundered against the superst.i.tion:

"The bearded crucifix called the 'Rood of Grace' (was brought from Maidstone, and) while the Bishop of Rochester preached it turned its head, rolled its eyes, foamed at the mouth, and shed tears,--in the presence, too, of many other famous saints of wood and stone ... the satellite saints of the Kentish image acted in the same way. It is expected that the Virgin of Walsingham, St. Thomas of Canterbury, and other images will soon perform miracles also in the same place; for the trickery was so thoroughly exposed that every one was indignant at the monks and impostors."[461]

A second Act of Parliament followed, which vested all monastic property in the King; and this gave the King possession not only of huge estates, but also of an immense quant.i.ty of jewels and precious metals.[462] The shrine of St. Thomas at Canterbury, when "disgarnished," yielded, it is said, no fewer than twenty-six cartloads of gold and silver.[463]

This wholesale confiscation of monastic property, plundering of shrines, and above all the report that Henry had ordered the bones of St. Thomas of Canterbury to be burned and the ashes scattered to the winds, determined Pope Paul III. to renew (Dec. 17th, 1538) the execution of his Bull of excommunication (Aug. 30th, 1535), which had been hitherto suspended. It was declared that the Bull might be published in St.

Andrews or "in oppido Calistrensi" in Scotland, at Dieppe or Boulogne in France, or at Tuam in Ireland.[464] The Pope knew that he could not get it published in England itself.

The violent destruction of shrines and pilgrimage places, which had been holiday resorts as well as places of devotion, could not fail to create some popular uneasiness, and there were other and probably deeper roots of discontent. England, like other nations, had been suffering from the economic changes which were a feature of the times. One form peculiar to England was that wool-growing had become more profitable than keeping stock or raising grain, and landed proprietors were enclosing commons for pasture land and letting much of their arable land lie fallow. The poor men could no longer graze their beasts on the commons, and the subst.i.tution of pasture for arable land threw great numbers out of employment. They had to sell the animals they could no longer feed, and did not see how a living could be earned; nor had they the compensation given to the disbanded monks. The pressure of taxation increased the prevailing distress. Risings took place in Yorks.h.i.+re, Lancas.h.i.+re, and Lincolns.h.i.+re, and the insurgents marched singing:

"Christ crucified, For Thy woundes wide, Us commons guyde, Which pilgrims be, Through G.o.des grace, For to purchache, Old wealth and peax Of the Spiritualitie."[465]

In their demands they denounced equally the contempt shown for Holy Mother Church, the dissolution of the monasteries, the spoliation of shrines, the contempt shown to "Our Ladye and all the saints," new taxes, the enclosure of commons, the doing away with use and wont in tenant rights, the branding of the Lady Mary as illegitimate, King's counsellors of "low birth and small estimation," and the five reforming Bishops--Cranmer and Latimer being considered as specially objectionable.[466] The Yorks.h.i.+re Rising was called the Pilgrimage of Grace.

The insurgents or "pilgrims" were not more consistent than other people, for they plundered priests to support their "army";[467] and while they insisted on the primacy of the Bishop of Rome, they had no wish to see his authority re-established in England. They asked the King to admit the Pope to be head of spiritual things, giving spiritual authority to the Archbishops of Canterbury and York, "so that the said Bishop of Rome have no further meddling."[468]

The insurrections were put down, and Henry did not cease his spoliation of shrines and monasteries in consequence of their protests; but the feelings of the people made known by their proclamations, at the conferences held between their leaders and the representatives of authority, and by the examination of prisoners and suspected persons, must have suggested to his shrewd mind whether the Reformation was not being pressed onward too hastily for the great majority of the English laity. England did not produce in the sixteenth century a great spiritual leader inspired by a prophetic conviction that he was speaking the truth of G.o.d, and able to create a like conviction in the hearts of his neighbours, while he was never so far before them that they could not easily follow him step by step. The King cried halt; and when Cromwell insisted on his plan of alliance with the Protestants of the Continent of Europe, he went the way of all the counsellors of Henry who withstood their imperious master (July 28th, 1540).

But this is to antic.i.p.ate. Negotiations were still in progress with the Lords of the Schmalkald League in the spring of 1539,[469] and the King was thinking of cementing his connection with the German Lutherans by marrying Anne of Cleves,[470] the sister-in-law of John Frederick of Saxony. The Parliament of 1539 (April 28th to June 28th) saw the beginnings of the change. Six questions were introduced for discussion:

"Whether there be in the sacrament of the altar transubstantiation of the substance of bread and wine into the substance of flesh and blood or not? Whether priests may marry by the law of G.o.d or not?

Whether the vow of chast.i.ty of men and women bindeth by the law of G.o.d or not? Whether auricular confession be necessary by the law of G.o.d or not? Whether private Ma.s.ses may stand with the Word of G.o.d or not? Whether it be necessary by the Word of G.o.d that the sacrament of the altar should be administered under both kinds or not?"[471]

The opinions of the Bishops were divided; but the lay members of the House of Lords evidently did not wish any change from the mediaeval doctrines, and believed that no one could be such a wise theologian as their King when he confounded the Bishop with his stores of learning.

"We of the temporalitie," wrote one who was present, "have been all of one opinion ... all England have cause to thank G.o.d and most heartily to rejoice of the King's most G.o.dly proceedings."[472] So Parliament enacted the _Six Articles Act_,[473] a ferocious statute commonly called "the b.l.o.o.d.y whip with six strings." To deny transubstantiation or to deprave the sacraments was to be reckoned heresy, and to be punished with burning and confiscation of goods. It was made a felony, and punishable with death, to teach that it was necessary to communicate in both kinds in the Holy Supper; or that priests, monks, or nuns vowed to celibacy might marry. All clerical marriages which had been contracted were to be dissolved, and clerical incontinence was punishable by loss of property and benefice. Special commissions were issued to hold quarterly sessions in every county for the enforcement of the statute.

The official t.i.tle of the Act was _An Act abolis.h.i.+ng Diversity of Opinion_. The first commission issued was for the county of London, and at the first session five hundred persons were indicted within a fortnight. The law was, however, much more severe than its enforcement.

The five hundred made their submission and received the King's pardon.

It was under this barbarous statute that so-called heretics were tried and condemned during the last years of the reign of Henry VIII.

The revival of mediaeval doctrine did not mean any difference in the strong anti-papal policy of the English King. It rather became more emphatic, and Henry spoke of the Pope in terms of the greatest disrespect. "That most persistent idol, enemy of all truth, and usurpator of Princes, the Bishop of Rome," "that cankered and venomous serpent, Paul, Bishop of Rome," are two of his phrases.[474]

_The Act of the Six Statutes_ made Lutherans, as previous Acts had made Papists, liable to capital punishment; but while Cromwell remained in power he evidently was able to hinder its practical execution. Cromwell, however, was soon to fall. He seemed to be higher in favour than ever.

He had almost forced his policy on his master, and the marriage of Henry with Anne of Cleves (Jan. 6th, 1540) seemed to be his triumph. Then Henry struck suddenly and remorselessly as usual. The Minister was impeached, and condemned without trial. He was executed (July 28th); and Anne of Cleves was got rid of on the plea of pre-contract to the son of the Duke of Lorraine (July 9th). It was not the fault of Gardiner, the sleuth-hound of the reaction, that Cranmer did not share the fate of the Minister. Immediately after the execution of Cromwell (July 30th), the King gave a brutal exhibition of his position. Three clergymen of Lutheran views, Barnes, Garret, and Jerome, were burnt at Smithfield; and three Romanists were beheaded and tortured for denying the King's spiritual supremacy.