History of England from the fall of Wolsey to the death of Elizabeth Volume III Part 25

[Sidenote: Scene at an execution at Ipswich.]

The mysteries of the faith were insulted in the celebration of the divine service. At one place, when the priest lifted up the host, a member of the congregation, "a lawyer" and a gentleman, lifted up a little dog in derision. Another, who desired that the laity should be allowed communion in both kinds, taunted the minister with having drunk all the wine, and with having blessed the people with an empty chalice.

The intensity of the indignation which these and similar outrages created in the body of the nation, may be gathered from a scene which took place when an audacious offender was seized by the law, and suffered at Ipswich. When the fire was lighted, a commissary touched the victim with his wand, and urged him to recant. The man spat at him for an answer, and the commissary exclaimed that forty days' indulgence would be granted by the Bishop of Norwich to every one who would cast a stick into the pile. "Then Baron Curzon, Sir John Audeley, with many others of estimation, being there present, did rise from their seats, and with their swords cut down boughs and threw them into the fire, and so did all the mult.i.tude of the people."[439] It seems most certain that the country only refrained from taking the law into their own hands, and from trying the question with the Protestants, as Aske and Lord Darcy desired, by open battle, from a confidence that the government would do their duties, that in some way the law would interfere, and these excesses would be put down with a high hand.

[Sidenote: April. Preparation for the meeting of parliament.]

The meeting of parliament could be delayed no longer; and it must be a parliament composed of other members than those who had sate so long and so effectively.[440] Two years before it had been demanded by the northern counties. The promise had been given, and the expectation of a fresh election had been formed so generally, that the country had widely prepared for it. The counties and towns had been privately canva.s.sed; the intended representation had been arranged. The importance of the crisis, and the resolution of the country gentlemen to make their weight appreciated, was nowhere felt more keenly than in the court.

[Sidenote: The general election.]

[Sidenote: Exertions of Cromwell to secure a strong majority.]

Letters survive throwing curious light on the history of this election.

We see the Cromwell faction straining their own and the crown's influence as far as it would bear to secure a majority,--failing in one place, succeeding in another,--sending their agents throughout the country, demanding support, or entreating it, as circ.u.mstances allowed; or, when they were able, coercing the voters with a high hand. Care was taken to secure the return of efficient speakers to defend the government measures;[441] and Cromwell, by his exertions and by his anxiety, enables us to measure the power of the crown, both within parliament and without; to conclude with certainty that danger was feared from opposition, and that the control of the cabinet over the representation of England was very limited.

[Sidenote: Influence of the crown upon the elections.]

[Sidenote: Election at Shrewsbury in 1536.]

[Sidenote: Lord Southampton canva.s.ses the southern counties.]

[Sidenote: Arbitrary interference at Canterbury.]

[Sidenote: Cromwell cancels an election, and requires the return of his own nominees.]

The returns for the boroughs were determined by the chief owners of property within the limits of the franchise: those for the counties depended on the great landholders. In the late parliament Cromwell wrote to some gentleman, desiring him to come forward as the government candidate for Huntingdons.h.i.+re. He replied that the votes of the county were already promised, and unless his compet.i.tors could be induced to resign he could not offer himself.[442] In Shrops.h.i.+re, on the call of parliament to examine the treasons of Anne Boleyn,[443] there was a division of interest. "The wors.h.i.+pful of the s.h.i.+re" desired to return a supporter of Cromwell: the sheriff, the undersheriff, and the town's people, were on the other side. The election was held at Shrewsbury, and the inhabitants a.s.sembled riotously, overawed the voters, and carried the opposition member by intimidation. On the present occasion Lord Southampton went in person round Surrey, Suss.e.x, and Hamps.h.i.+re, where his own property was situated. The election for Surrey he reported himself able to carry with certainty. At Guildford he manuvred to secure both seats, but was only able to obtain one. He was antic.i.p.ated for the other by a Guildford townsman, whom the mayor and burgesses told him that they all desired. Sir William Goring and Sir John Gage were standing on the court interest for Suss.e.x. Sir John Dawtry, of Petworth, and Lord Maltravers, had promised their support, and Southampton hoped that they might be considered safe. Farnham was "the Bishop of Winchester's town," where he "spared to meddle" without Cromwell's express orders. If the bishop's good intentions could be relied upon, interference might provoke gratuitous ill feeling. He had friends in the town, however, and he could make a party if Cromwell thought it necessary. In Portsmouth and Southampton the government influence was naturally paramount, through the dockyards, and the establishments maintained in them.[444] So far nothing can be detected more irregular than might have been found in the efforts of any prime minister before the Reform Bill to secure a manageable House of Commons. More extensive interference was, however, indisputably practised, wherever interference was possible; at Oxford, we find Cromwell positively dictating the choice of a member, while at Canterbury, at the previous election, a case had occurred too remarkable for its arbitrary character to be pa.s.sed over without particular mention. Directions had been sent down from London for the election of two government nominees. An answer was returned, stating humbly that the order had come too late--that two members of the corporation of Canterbury were already returned. I have failed to discover Cromwell's rejoinder; but a week later the following letter was addressed to him by the mayor and burgesses:--

[Sidenote: The town submits.]

"In humble wise we certify you that the 20th day of this present month, at six o'clock in the morning, I, John Alc.o.c.k, mayor of Canterbury, received your letter directed to me, the said mayor, sheriff, and commonalty of the said city, signifying to us thereby the king's pleasure and commandment, that Robert Sacknell and John Bridges[445]

should be burgesses of the parliament for the same city of Canterbury; by virtue whereof, according to our bounden duty, immediately upon the sight of your said letter and contents thereof perceived, we caused the commonalty of the said city to a.s.semble in the court hall, where appeared the number of four score and seventeen persons, citizens and inhabitants of the said city; and according to the king's pleasure and commandment, freely with one voice, and without any contradiction, have elected and chosen the said Robert Sacknell and John Bridges to be burgesses of the parliament for the same city, which shall be duly certified by indenture under the seal of the said citizens and inhabitants, by the grace of the blessed Trinity."

The first election, therefore, had been set aside by the absolute will of the crown, and the hope that so violent a proceeding might be explained tolerably through some kind of decent resignation is set aside by a further letter, stating that one of the persons originally chosen, having presumed to affirm that he was "a true and proper burgess of the city," he had been threatened into submission by a prospect of the loss of a lucrative office which he held under the corporation.[446]

For the parliament now elected, it is plain that the Privy Seal put out his utmost strength; and that he believed beforehand that his measures had been so well laid as to ensure the results which he desired. "I and your dedicate councillors," he wrote to the king, "be about to bring all things so to pa.s.s that your Grace had never more tractable parliament."[447] The event was to prove that he had deceived himself; a reaction set in too strong for his control, and the spirit which had dictated the Doncaster pet.i.tion, though subdued and modified, could still outweigh the despotism of the minister or the intrigues of his agents.

[Sidenote: Union of the provinces of Canterbury and York in the convocation.]

The returns were completed; the members a.s.sembled in London, and with them as usual the convocation of the clergy. As an evidence of the greatness of the occasion, the two provinces were united into one; the convocation of York held its session with the convocation of Canterbury; a synod of the whole English Church met together, in virtue of its recovered or freshly const.i.tuted powers, to determine the articles of its belief.[448]

[Sidenote: April 28. Parliament opens.]

[Sidenote: Speech from the throne.]

[Sidenote: The houses a.s.sembled to compose the religious differences in the realm.]

[Sidenote: Committee of opinion.]

[Sidenote: Suggestions offered by the moderate Reformers.]

[Sidenote: A heresy court to be appointed, mixed of priests and laymen.]

[Sidenote: The clergy to be allowed to marry.]

The opening was conducted by the king in person, on Monday, the 28th of April. The clerk of the House of Lords has recorded (either as if it was exceptional or as if the circ.u.mstances of the time gave to a usual proceeding an unusual meaning) the religious service with which the ceremony was accompanied, and the special prayers which were offered for the divine guidance.[449] The first week pa.s.sed in unexplained inactivity. On the Monday following the lord chancellor read the speech from the throne, declaring the object for which parliament had been called. The king desired, if possible, to close the religious quarrels by which the kingdom was distracted. With opinions in so furious conflict, the mode of settlement would demand anxious consideration; his Majesty therefore proposed, if the lords saw no objection, that, preparatory to the general debate, a committee of the upper house should compose a report upon the causes and character of the disagreement. The committee should represent both parties. The peers selected were Cromwell, the two archbishops, the Bishops of Bath, Ely, Bangor, Worcester, Durham, and Carlisle.[450] It was foreseen that a body, of which Cranmer and Latimer, Lee and Tunstall were severally members, was unlikely to work in harmony. The committee proceeded, however, to their labours; and up to this time even the Privy Council seem to have been ignorant of the course which events would follow. On some points the king had either formed no intention till he had ascertained the disposition of the House of Commons, or else he had kept his intentions carefully to himself. A paper of suggestions, representing the views of the moderate Reformers, was submitted to him by some one in high authority; and the tone in which they were couched implied a belief in the writer that his advice would be favourably received. It was to the effect that a table of heresies should be drawn out; that the judgment of the bench of bishops and the ecclesiastical lawyers should be taken upon it; that it should then be printed, and copies sent to every justice of the peace, to be read aloud at every a.s.sizes, court leet, or sessions, and in the charges delivered to the grand juries. A court might be const.i.tuted composed of six masters of chancery, mixed of priests and laymen, to whom all accusations would be referred; and the composite character of the tribunal would be a security against exaggeration or fanaticism. Meanwhile a bill should be prepared to be laid before parliament, relieving the clergy finally from the obligations of celibacy, legalizing the marriages which any among them had hitherto contracted, and for the future permitting them all "to have wives and work for their living." "A little book," in addition, should be compiled and printed, proving "that the prayers of men that be here living for the souls of them that be dead could in no wise be profitable to them that were dead, and could not help them."[451]

[Sidenote: The circ.u.mstances of the late rebellion and conspiracies laid before parliament.]

[Sidenote: Lady Exeter and Lady Salisbury attainted without trial.]

It is hard to believe that the king's resolution was fixed, or even that his personal feelings were known to be decided against the marriage of the clergy, when a person evidently high in office could thus openly recommend to him the permission of it, and the reforming preachers at the court had spoken freely to the same effect before him in their sermons.[452] For the present, however, this matter with the rest waited the determination of the committee of religion, who remained ten days on their labours, and so far had arrived at no conclusions. In the interval the history of the northern rebellion was laid before the houses, with an account of the late conspiracy of the Marquis of Exeter and Lord Montague. Bills of attainder were presented against many of those who had suffered, and in the preambles their offences were stated, though with little detail. The omission in all but two instances is not important, for the act of parliament could have contained only what was proved upon the trials, and the substance of the accusations is tolerably well known. A more explicit statement might have been desired and expected when a parliamentary attainder was the beginning and end of the process. The Marchioness of Exeter and the Countess of Salisbury were not tried, but they were attainted in common with the rest; and it can be gathered only from the language of the act that circ.u.mstances were known to the parliament of which the traces are lost.[453]

[Sidenote: Display of a tunic found in the house of Lady Salisbury.]

Lady Salisbury, after her sentence, was removed from Cowdray to the Tower. A remarkable scene took place in the House of Lords on the last reading of the act. As soon as it was pa.s.sed, Cromwell rose in his place, and displayed, in profound silence, a tunic of white silk, which had been discovered by Lord Southampton concealed amidst the countess's linen. On the front were embroidered the royal arms of England. Behind was the badge of the five wounds, which had been worn by the northern insurgents.[454] Cromwell knew what he was doing in the exhibition. It was shown, and it was doubtless understood, as conclusive evidence of the disposition of the daughter of the Duke of Clarence and the mother of Reginald Pole. The bill was disposed of rapidly. It was introduced on the 10th of May; it was concluded on the 12th. There was neither dispute nor difficulty; the interest of both houses was fastened on the great question before the committee.

[Sidenote: May 16. The Duke of Norfolk, finding no progress to be made by the committee of religion, proposes an open discussion.]

[Sidenote: The six articles.]

The time pa.s.sed on. No report was presented, and the peers grew impatient. On the 16th the Duke of Norfolk stated that, so far as he could perceive, no progress was being made in the proper business of the session, and, judging from a conversation which had pa.s.sed when the committee of opinion was nominated, little progress was likely to be made in a body so composed. He therefore moved that the whole parliament be invited to discuss freely the six ensuing articles. 1. In the eucharist after consecration does there, or does there not, remain any substance of bread and wine? 2. Is communion in both kinds necessary or permitted to the laity? 3. Are vows of chast.i.ty deliberately made of perpetual obligation? 4. Is there or is there not any efficacy in private ma.s.ses to benefit the souls of the dead? 5. Are priests permitted to have wives? 6. Shall auricular confession be retained or be not retained in the Church? The duke's own opinion on each and every of these points was well known; but the question was not only of the particular opinion of this or that person, but whether difference of opinion was any longer to be permitted; whether after discussion such positive conclusions could be obtained as might be enforced by a penal statute on all English subjects.

[Sidenote: The debate opens.]

[Sidenote: Cranmer speaks in opposition.]

[Sidenote: Act for the extension of the prerogative.]

On the first no disagreement was antic.i.p.ated. No member of either house, it is likely, and no member of convocation--not even Latimer--had as yet consciously denied the real presence; but the five remaining articles on which an issue was challenged were the special points on which the Lutheran party were most anxiously interested--the points on which, in the preceding summer, negotiations with the Germans were broken off, and on which Cranmer was now most desirous to claim a liberty for the Church, as the basis of an evangelical league in Christendom. Norfolk, therefore, had opened the battle, and it was waged immediately in full fury in both houses of parliament--in both houses of convocation. There were conferences and counter-conferences. Cromwell, perhaps knowing that direct opposition was useless, was inclined to accept in words resolutions which he had determined to neutralize; Cranmer, more frank, if less sagacious, spoke fearlessly for three days in opposition; and the king himself took part in the debate, and argued with the rest. The settlement was long protracted. There were prorogations for further consideration, and intervals of other business, when acts were pa.s.sed which at any other moment would have seemed of immeasurable importance.

The Romans, in periods of emergency, suspended their liberties and created a dictator. The English parliament, frightened at the confusion of the country, and the peril of interests which they valued even more than liberty, extended the powers of the crown. The preamble of the eighth of the thirty-first of Henry VIII.[455] states that--

[Sidenote: In order that the king may not be driven to illegal encroachments,]

[Sidenote: Fresh powers are conferred on him by parliament.]

"Forasmuch as the King's most Royal Majesty, for divers considerations, by the advice of his council, hath heretofore set forth divers and sundry proclamations, as well concerning sundry articles of Christ's religion, as for an unity and concord among the loving and obedient subjects of his realm, which, nevertheless, divers and many froward and obstinate persons have contemned and broken, not considering what a king by his royal power may do, for lack of a direct statute, to cause offenders to obey the said proclamations, which, being suffered, should not only encourage offenders to disobedience, but also seem too much to the dishonour of the King's Majesty, who may full ill bear it, and also give too great heart to malefactors and offenders; considering also that sudden causes and occasions fortune many times, which do require speedy remedies, and that by abiding for a parliament in the mean time might happen great prejudice to the realm; and weighing also _that his Majesty, which, by the kingly power given him by G.o.d, may do many things in such cases, should not be driven to extend the liberty and supremacy of his regal power and dignity by the wilfulness of froward subjects, it is thought in manner more than necessary_ that the King's Highness of this realm for the time being, with the advice of his honourable council, should make and set forth proclamations for the good and politic order of this his realm, as cases of necessity shall require, and that an ordinary law should be provided, by the a.s.sent of his Majesty and parliament, for the due punishment, correction, and reformation of such offences and disobediences."[456]

[Sidenote: And royal proclamations are invested with the authority of statutes.]

For these reasons the extraordinary privilege was conferred upon the crown of being able, with the consent of the Privy Council, to issue proclamations which should have the authority of acts of parliament; and pains and penalties might be inflicted to enforce submission, provided the specific punishment to follow disobedience was described and defined in each proclamation. A slight limitation was imposed upon this dangerous prerogative. The crown was not permitted to repeal or suspend existing statutes, or set aside the common law or other laudable custom.

It might not punish with death, or with unlimited fines or imprisonments. Secondary penalties might be inflicted, on legitimate conviction in the Star Chamber; but they must have been previously defined, both in extent and character. These restrictions interfered with the more arbitrary forms of tyranny; yet the ordinary const.i.tution had received a serious infringement, in order that it might not be infringed further by a compelled usurpation. A measure something larger than the suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act--the most extreme violation of the liberty of the subject to which, in the happier condition of England, we can now be driven, a measure infinitely lighter than the "declaration of a state of siege," so familiar to the most modern experience of the rest of Europe, was not considered too heavy a sacrifice of freedom, in comparison with the evils which it might prevent.[457]

[Sidenote: The king avails himself of the confidence reposed in him,]

While the Six Articles Bill was still under debate, the king at once availed himself of the powers conferred upon him, again to address the people. He spoke of the secret and subtle attempts which certain people were making to restore the hypocrite's religion--the evil and naughty superst.i.tions and dreams which had been abolished and done away; while others, again, he said, were flying in the face of all order and authority, perverting the Scriptures, denying the sacraments, denying the authority of princes and magistrates, and making law and government impossible.[458] He dwelt especially on his disappointment at the bad use which had been made of the Bible: "His Majesty's intent and hope had been, that the Scriptures would be read with meekness, with a will to accomplish the effect of them; not for the purpose of finding arguments to maintain extravagant opinions--not that they should be spouted out and declaimed upon at undue times and places, and after such fas.h.i.+ons as were not convenient to be suffered."[459] So far, it seemed as if the fruit which had been produced by this great and precious gift had been only quarrelling and railing, "to the confusion of those that use the same, and to the disturbance, and in likelihood to the destruction, of all the rest of the king's subjects."

[Sidenote: And warns the people for the last time to live peaceably.]