Chapter VII: The Last Efforts of Diplomacy (8)

[702] _Lords' Journals_, vol. i. p. 82. An act was also passed in this session "against the usurped power of the Bishop of Rome." We trace it in its progress through the House of Lords. (_Lords' Journals_, Parliament of 1533-4.) It received the royal assent (ibid.), and is subsequently alluded to in the both of the 28th of Henry VIII., as well as in a Royal Proclamation dated June, 1534; and yet it is not on the Roll, nor do I anywhere find traces of it. It is not to be confounded with the act against payment of Peter's Pence, for in the _Lords' Journals_ the two acts are separately mentioned. It received the royal assent on the 30th of March, while that against Peter's Pence was suspended till the 7th of April. It contained, also, an indirect assertion that the king was Head of the English Church, according to the title which had been given him by Convocation. (King's Proclamation: FOXE, vol. v. p. 69.) For some cause or other, the act at the last moment must have been withdrawn.

[703] See BURNET, vol. i. pp. 220-1: vol. iii p. 135; and LORD HERBERT. Du Bellay's brother, the author of the memoirs, says that the king, at the bishop's entreaty, promised that if the pope would delay sentence, and send "judges to hear the matter, he would himself forbear to do what he proposed to do"--that is, separate wholly from the See of Rome. If this is true, the sending "judges" must allude to the "sending them to Cambray," which had been proposed at Marseilles.

[704] See the letter of the Bishop of Bayonne, dated March 23, in LEGRAND. A paraphrase is given by BURNET, vol. iii. p. 132.

[705] Promisistis predecessori meo quod si sententiam contra regem Angliae tulisset, Caesar illum infra quatuor menses erat invasurus, et regno expulsurus.--_State Papers_, vol. vii. p. 579.

[706] Letter of Du Bellay in LEGRAND.

[707] Ibid.

[708] Sir Edward Karne and Dr. Revett to Henry VIII.: _State Papers_, vol. vii. pp. 553-4.

[709] State Papers, vol. vii. p. 560, et seq.

[710] His Highness, considering the time and the malice of the emperour, cannot conveniently pass out of the realm--since he leaveth behind him another daughter and a mother, with their friends, maligning his enterprises in this behalf--who bearing no small grudge against his most entirely beloved Queen Anne, and his young daughter the princess, might perchance in his absence take occasion to excogitate and practise with their said friends matters of no small peril to his royal person, realm, and subjects.--_State Papers_, vol. vii. p. 559.

[711] LORD HERBERT.

[712] I mentioned their execution in connection with their sentence; but it did not take place till the 20th of April, a month after their attainder: and delay of this kind was very unusual in cases of high treason. I have little doubt that their final sentence was in fact pronounced by the pope.

[713] The oaths of a great many are in RYMER, vol. vi. part 2, p. 195, et seq.

[714] His great-grandson's history of him (_Life of Sir Thomas More,_, by CRESACRE MORE, written about 1620, published 1627, with a dedication to Henrietta Maria) is incorrect in so many instances that I follow it with hesitation; but the account of the present matter is derived from Mr. Roper, More's son-in-law, who accompanied him to Lambeth, and it is incidentally confirmed in various details by More himself.

[715] MORE'S _Life of More_, p. 232.

[716] More held extreme republican opinions on the tenure of kings, holding that they might be deposed by act of parliament.

[717] MORE'S _Life of More_, p. 237.

[718] BURNET, vol. i. p. 255.

[719] MORE'S _Life of More_, p. 237.

[720] Cromwell to the Archbishop of Canterbury: _Rolls House MS._

[721] _State Papers_, vol. i. p. 411, et seq.

[722] Royal Proclamation, June, 1534.

[723] Ibid.

[724] FOXE, vol. v. p. 70.