The History of England, Volume III Henry VIII A parliament and a convocation
by David Hume
[8th June.] The trial and conviction of queen Anne, and the subsequent events, made it necessary for the king to summon a new parliament; and he here, in his speech, made a merit to his people, that, notwithstanding the misfortunes attending his two former marriages, he had been induced, for their good, to venture on a third. The speaker received this profession with suitable gratitude; and he took thence occasion to praise the king for his wonderful gifts of grace and nature: He compared him, for justice and prudence, to Solomon; for strength and fortitude to Sampson; and for beauty and comeliness to Absalom. The king very humbly replied, by the mouth of the chancellor, that he disavowed these praises; since, if he were really possessed of such endowments, they were the gift of Almighty God only. Henry found that the parliament was no less submissive in deeds than complaisant in their expressions, and that they would go the same lengths as the former in gratifying even his most lawless passions. His divorce from Anne Boleyn was ratified;x that queen, and all her accomplices, were attainted; the issue of both his former marriages were declared illegitimate, and it was even made treason to assert the legitimacy of either of them; to throw any slander upon the present king, queen, or their issue, was subjected to the same penalty; the crown was settled on the king’s issue by Jane Seymour, or any subsequent wife; and in case he should die without children, he was impowered, by his will or letters patent, to dispose of the crown: An enormous authority, especially when entrusted to a prince so violent and capricious in his humour. Whoever, being required, refused to answer upon oath to any article of this act of settlement, was declared to be guilty of treason, and by this clause a species of political inquisition was established in the kingdom, as well as the accusations of treason multiplied to an unreasonable degree. The king was also empowered to confer on any one, by his will or letters patent, any castles, honours, liberties, or franchises; words which might have been extended to the dismembering of the kingdom, by the erection of principalities and independant jursidictions. It was also, by another act, made treason to marry, without the king’s consent, any princess related in the first degree to the crown. This act was occasioned by the discovery of a design, formed by Thomas Howard, brother of the duke of Norfolk, to espouse the lady Margaret Douglas, niece to the king, by his sister the queen of Scots and the earl of Angus. Howard, as well as the young lady, was committed to the Tower. She recovered her liberty soon after; but he died in confinement. An act of attainder passed against him this session of parliament.
Another accession was likewise gained to the authority of the crown: The king or any of his successors was empowered to repeat or annul, by letters patent, whatever act of parliament had been passed before he was four and twenty years of age. Whoever maintained the authority of the bishop of Rome, by word or writ, or endeavoured in any manner to restore it in England, was subjected to the penalty of a premunire; that is, his goods were forfeited, and he was put out of the protection of law. And any person who possessed any office, ecclesiastical or civil, or received any grant or charter from the crown, and yet refused to renounce the pope by oath, was declared to be guilty of treason. The renunciation prescribed runs in the style of So help me God, all saints, and the holy evangelists.y The pope, hearing of Anne Boleyn’s disgrace and death, had hoped that the door was opened to a reconciliation, and had been making some advances to Henry: But this was the reception he met with. Henry was now become indifferent with regard to papal censures; and finding a great encrease of authority, as well as of revenue, to accrue from his quarrel with Rome, he was determined to persevere in his present measures. This parliament also, even more than any foregoing, convinced him how much he commanded the respect of his subjects, and what confidence he might repose in them. Though the elections had been made on a sudden, without any preparation or intrigue, the members discovered an unlimited attachment to his person and government.z
[A convocation.] The extreme complaisance of the convocation, which sat at the same time with the parliament, encouraged him in his resolution of breaking entirely with the court of Rome. There was secretly a great division of sentiments in the minds of this assembly; and as the zeal of the reformers had been augmented by some late successes, the resentment of the catholics was no less excited by their fears and losses: But the authority of the king kept every one submissive and silent; and the new-assumed prerogative, the supremacy, with whose limits no one was fully acquainted, restrained even the most furious movements of theological rancour. Cromwel presided as vicar-general; and though the catholic party expected, that, on the fall of queen Anne, his authority would receive a great shock, they were surprized to find him still maintain the same credit as before. With the vicar-general concurred Cranmer the primate, Latimer bishop of Worcester, Shaxton of Salisbury, Hilsey of Rochester, Fox of Hereford, Barlow of St. David’s. The opposite faction was headed by Lee archbishop of York, Stokesley bishop of London, Tonstal of Durham, Gardiner of Winchester, Longland of Lincoln, Sherbone of Chichester, Nix of Norwich, and Kite of Carlisle. The former party, by their opposition to the pope, seconded the king’s ambition and love of power: The latter party, by maintaining the ancient theological tenets, were more conformable to his speculative principles: And both of them had alternately the advantage of gaining on his humour, by which he was more governed than by either of these motives.
The church in general was averse to the reformation; and the lower house of convocation framed a list of opinions, in the whole sixty-seven, which they pronounced erroneous, and which was a collection of principles, some held by the ancient Lollards, others by the modern protestants, or Gospellers, as they were sometimes called. These opinions they sent to the upper house to be censured; but in the preamble of their representation, they discovered the servile spirit, by which they were governed. They said, “that they intended not to do or speak any thing which might be unpleasant to the king, whom they acknowledge their supreme head, and whose commands they were resolved to obey; renouncing the pope’s usurped authority, with all his laws and inventions, now extinguished and abolished; and addicting themselves to Almighty God and his laws, and unto the king and the laws made within this kingdom.”a
The convocation came at last, after some debate, to decide articles of faith; and their tenets were of as motley a kind as the assembly itself, or rather as the king’s system of theology, by which they were resolved entirely to square their principles. They determined the standard of faith to consist in the Scriptures and the three creeds, the Apostolic, Nicene, and Athanasian; and this article was a signal victory to the reformers: Auricular confession and penance were admitted, a doctrine agreeable to the catholics: No mention was made of marriage, extreme unction, confirmation, or holy orders, as sacraments; and in this omission the influence of the protestants appeared: The real presence was asserted, conformably to the ancient doctrine: The terms of acceptance were established to be the merits of Christ, and the mercy and good pleasure of God, suitably to the new principles.
So far the two sects seem to have made a fair partition, by alternately sharing the several clauses. In framing the subsequent articles, each of them seems to have thrown in its ingredient. The catholics prevailed in asserting, that the use of images was warranted by Scripture; the protestants, in warning the people against idolatry, and the abuse of these sensible representations. The ancient faith was adopted in maintaining the expedience of praying to saints; the late innovations in rejecting the peculiar patronage of saints to any trade, profession, or course of action. The former rites of worship, the use of holy water, and the ceremonies practised on Ash-wednesday, Palm-sunday, Good friday, and other festivals, were still maintained; but the new refinements, which made light of these institutions, were also adopted, by the convocation’s denying that they had any immediate power of remitting sin, and by its asserting that their sole merit consisted in promoting pious and devout dispositions in the mind.
But the article, with regard to purgatory, contains the most curious jargon, ambiguity, and hesitation, arising from the mixture of opposite tenets. It was to this purpose: “Since according to due order of charity, and the book of Maccabees, and divers ancient authors, it is a very good and charitable deed to pray for souls departed; and since such a practice has been maintained in the church from the beginning; all bishops and teachers should instruct the people not to be grieved for the continuance of the same. But since the place where departed souls are retained, before they reach Paradise, as well as the nature of their pains, is left uncertain by Scripture; all such questions are to be submitted to God, to whose mercy it is meet and convenient to commend the deceased, trusting that he accepteth our prayers for them.”b
These articles, when framed by the convocation, and corrected by the king, were subscribed by every member of that assembly; while, perhaps, neither there nor throughout the whole kingdom, could one man be found, except Henry himself, who had adopted precisely these very doctrines and opinions. For though there be not any contradiction in the tenets above mentioned, it had happened in England, as in all countries where factious divisions have place; a certain creed was embraced by each party, few neuters were to be found, and these consisted only of speculative or whimsical people, of whom two persons could scarcely be brought to an agreement in the same dogmas. The protestants, all of them, carried their opposition to Rome farther than those articles: None of the catholics went so far: And the king, by being able to retain the nation in such a delicate medium, displayed the utmost power of an imperious despotism, of which any history furnishes an example. To change the religion of a country, even when seconded by a party, is one of the most perilous enterprizes, which any sovereign can attempt, and often proves the most destructive to royal authority. But Henry was able to set the political machine in that furious movement, and yet regulate and even stop its career: He could say to it, Thus far shalt thou go and no farther: And he made every vote of his parliament and convocation subservient, not only to his interests and passions, but even to his greatest caprices; nay, to his most refined and most scholastic subtilties.
[x] The parliament, in annulling the king’s marriage with Anne Boleyn, gives this as a reason, “For that his highness had chosen to wife the excellent and virtuous lady Jane, who for her convenient years, excellent beauty, and pureness of flesh and blood, would be apt, God willing, to conceive issue by his highness.”
[y] 28 Hen. VIII. c. 10.
[z] Burnet,, vol. i. p. 212.
[a] Collier, vol. ii. p. 119.
[b] Collier, vol. ii. p. 122, & seq. Fuller. Burnet, vol. i. p. 215.
