His cruel persecutions of the poor Lollards, his bitter hatred of Lutheranism, and his bigoted attachment to the old religion, caused him to be regarded as the most important and reliable defender of popery in Europe, and secured for him the title of "Defender of the Faith," and the complimentary present of the "Golden Rose," a token of the special love of his holiness of Rome for his renowned son in Christ, Henry VIII.†

After eighteen years of married life, Henry began to disclose to his confessor and to his confidential advisers his doubts of the lawfulness of his connection with his brother's widow. It has been common to attribute these scruples entirely to his desire to be rid of his old and unattractive wife, that he might marry the young and beautiful Anne Boleyn. But it is certainly more charitable, and quite as reasonable, taking all the circumstances of the case into consideration, to suppose that he really had conscientious scruples on the subject of his marriage; and that these scruples were quickened into principles of action by the continued loss of his children. Passionately desirous of offspring, particularly of male children, to whom the

*See vol. 1. pp. 546-62, of this work. For gives the details of these persecutions. Vol. 11. pp. 4-182. See also Burnet, vol. 1. pt. 1. bk. 1. pp. 27-30, and Fox, 11. 209-69, for details of persecutions between 1527 and 1533.

↑ Burnet, vol. 1. pt. 1. bk. 1. pp. 18, 19; and pt. 11. Records, bk. 1. No. 2.

crown might be left without the terrible apprehension of a renewal of those civil wars which had been the bane and curse of England for so many years previous to his father's reign, Henry yet saw his offspring, one after another, either stillborn or sinking into premature graves, with a single insignificant exception, the sickly "Lady Mary." It was not unnatural, therefore, for him to look on these events as frowns of Providence on an unlawful, incestuous marriage.

Whatever may have induced the king to agitate this question of the lawfulness of his marriage, he found his scruples strengthened by a study of the schoolmen, particularly by his favorite, Thomas Aquinas, and also by the opinions of his councillors and others, learned canonists and divines. And after all, it is quite possible that his conscientious scruples may have had an additional strength given to them by the appearance at court, about

*This is Froude's view of the matter. Hist. Eng., 1. 115–18. Henry, the historian, scems to incline to the same view. Vol. XI. bk. vi. ch. 1, p. 204. Froude has collected, from different sources, intimations, or direct assertions, which justify the belief that between June 3d, 1509, and May, 1518, Henry lost, in rapid succession, at least six children; three of whom were known to be sons; one of whom lived less than two months, one died immediately after birth, and one was stillborn. Henry himself says: "All such issue, male, as I have received of the queen, died incontinent [immediately] after they were born; so that I doubt the punishment of God in that behalf." The punishment to which he refers is doubtless that alluded to in Leviticus 20: 21. "If a man shall take his brother's wife, it is an unclean thing: ✶ ✶ they shall be childless."

this time, of a beautiful young lady, whom he soon selected as the successor of the discarded queen.

The first movement of the king for a divorce, beyond his confessional and privy-council room, appears to have been made in the year 1527, when we find Wolsey travelling about the kingdom, consulting.trustworthy dignitaries in Church and State on what he calls "the king's private matier." In the fall of 1527 agents were despatched to Rome to prepare the pope for an application for a divorce, and to decide on "the fittest tools to work by." And on the 5th of December, 1527, Wolsey sent the first despatch to the English ambassador at Rome, Cassali, to proceed in this business "very vigorously and with great diligence"; and laid out for him a plan of operations. The grand end to be sought was, to induce the pope, without con

*It is difficult to deny that the element of love for Anne Boleyn had something to do with the quickened activity of Henry's conscience just at this time. Cavendish gives a long and circumstantial account of the effort of Wolsey, by the king's command, to break up the engagement between Anne Boleyn and Lord Percy, one of the cardinal's attendants. Though the date of this effort is not given by Cavendish, yet there is good reason to believe that it must have been as early as 1527, possibly even a year earlier. Compare Cavendish's Life of Wolsey, pp. 118-34, with pp. 29, 30. See also Herbert's Life of Hen. VIII., 284-87; Soames's Hist. Reformation, 1. 181-90.

Turner says: "There is not the least evidence" that Anne Boleyn came to England earlier than February, 1527; and in another place: "We cannot now determine the precise date of Henry's regard for this interesting young woman; but there is no evidence that it preceded the spring of 1527."— Hist. Hen. VIII., vol. II. pp. 185, 195. The twenty-first chapter is devoted to Anne Boleyn.

sulting any one, to grant a commission to Cardinal Wolsey, with the assistance of such as his holiness should choose, to proceed forthwith in the examination of the cause; and if the pope would grant this, and such dispensations and bulls as might be necessary to carry out Henry's wishes, the king was ready to promise anything that the holy father might ask.

The pope, when first approached, expressed his readiness to accede to the king's wishes. But a Spanish agent, probably suspecting what was going on, interfered, and secured the pope's promise, that nothing should be granted to the king, to the prejudice of the queen, without first communicating with the imperialists. And now began a series of manœuvres and counter-manœuvres, promises and breaches of promise, pretences and deceptions, by which the decision of the question was deferred, and the king flattered with hopes, and deceived by his flatterers, promised relief which never came, kept in expectancy only to be cheated, his case neither decided for nor against him; until his patience was exhausted, and all confidence in "the holy father" at Rome and his equally holy consistory was utterly destroyed; and Henry resolved to do for himself what neither patient waiting, free expenditure of money, nor any amount

*Burnet, vol. 1. pt. 1. bk. 1. pp. 90-94; and pt. 11. Records, bk. 11. No. 3, pp. 12-21. See also other despatches for the same general topic - Nos. 4 and 5.

of pains-taking and promise-making could bring the pope to do for him.

All this consumed at least five full years, during which time Henry was pursuing, with undeviating purpose, his one great object to get divorced from Catharine and married to Anne Boleyn. Still, his measures were so variable and contradictory that no one knew what to depend on. The thing condemned to-day was sanctioned to-morrow; the men in favor one day lost their heads the next day. Thus it was up to the time that Henry took the whole matter of the divorce into his own hands, about 1532-1533.

These years, during which Henry was waiting and hoping for deliverance from Rome, were full of interest to the English protestants, and abounded with incidents of great moment. The Lutheran Reformation had in this time made great progress on the Continent, and exerted a mighty influence on papal England. The spirit of religious inquiry was awakened in both universities, as well as among the parish clergy and the laity throughout the kingdom; and many learned and active men embraced the truth. Such were Bilney, and Garret, and Clark, and Latimer, and Dalaber, and Taverner, and Tyndale, and Fryth. This, of course, was followed by persecutions; for bonds and imprisonment and death were still the price of a good confession of the Gospel. Many protestants escaped into Germany, where they found refuge from their persecutors, and friends to help them. To