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mandate is yet extant in the register of Fisher, Bishop of Rochester. What followed makes this justly suspected to have been done on the king's account. To confirm which suspicion, there is a concurring circumstance in a letter from Simon Grineus to Bucer, dated September 10, 1531, where he says*, The king had declared to him, that he had abstained from Queen Catharine, for seven years, upon scruples of conscience.

However, tho' the king had scruples at that time, yet he concealed them carefully from the world, for some years; and the immediate occasion of their breaking out seems to have been given by the French ambassadors, who came † to England to treat of several matters, and particularly of a marriage between the Princess Mary and the French king, or the Duke of Orleans, his second son. This alternative was at last agreed, tho' it remained for some time in suspence ; because the president of the parliament of Paris doubted, whether the marriage between the king and her mother, being his brother's wife, were good or no.'§ The Bishop of Tarbe made the same objection, and renewed it to the king's ambassadors in France, as appears by King Henry's speech to the mayor and citizens of London, concerning his scruples, where he says, 'When our ambassadors were last in France, and motion was made, that the Duke of Orleans should marry our said daughter, one of the chief counsellors to the French king said, It were well done to know whether she be the king of England's lawful daughter, or not; for well known it is, that he begat her on his brother's wife, which is directly contrary to God's law, and his precept.' That this counsellor was the Bishop of Tarbe, is affirmed ** by the Bishop of Bayonne, in the account he gives of this speech to the court of France, in a letter dated the 27th of November, 1528; yet this very Bishop of Tarbe was afterwards advanced to be a cardinal, and was so far from retracting his opinion, that, when he was cardinal of Grandemont, in a letter dated the 27 of March, 1530, he writes to the French court, That he had served the Lord Rochford (Anne Boleyn's Father) all he could, and that the Pope had three several times said to him in secret, that he wished the marriage had been already made in England, either by the legate's dispensation, or otherwise; provided it was not done by him, nor in diminution of his authority, under pretence of the laws of God.' This conduct shews, that it was not religion, but political views, that turned the court of Rome against the king's cause, which they at first plainly favoured. And Now as to the arguments by which the king fortified himself in these scruples. These, as he himself owned †, were, that he found by the law of Moses, "If a man took his brother's wife, they should die childless; this made him reflect on the death of his children, which he now looked on as a curse from God for that unlawful marriage. He found Thomas Aquinas (whom he chiefly valued of all the casuists) of opinion, that the laws of Leviticus, about the forbidden degrees of marriage, were moral and eternal, such as obliged all Christians; and that the Pope could only dispense with the laws of the church, but not with the laws of God: And, when the validity of the marriage came afterwards to be

See Hist. Reform. Part I. + March 2, 1527.
Hist. Reform. Part III.

§ Herbert.

April 30. 1527.
tt Ilist. Reform. Part I-

Hall.

thoroughly canvassed, it appeared that the whole tradition of the church and the opinions of its doctors were against the marriage.

In the year 1527, before Cardinal Wolsey's journey to France, which he began on the 3d of July, to promote the King's marriage with the Duchess of Alenson, the King's scruples were become publick, as two writers testify almost in the same words: 'this season,' says Hall, 'began a fame in London, that the King's confessor, the Bishop of Lincoln, called Dr. Langland, and divers other great clerks, had told the king, that the marriage between him and the Lady Catharine, late wife to his brother Prince Arthur, was not good, but damnable.'

And this suspicion, of the Cardinal's going to promote a second match in France, is confirmed by a letter of his, dated Feversham, July the 5th, 1527, where he says, Archbishop Warham had warned him of the great jealousies which Queen Catharine had of his journey. And by another letter dated August the 1st, 1527, where he labours to satisfy the King, that the Pope's dispensation was in itself null and void. All these particulars will be the stronger proofs of the Cardinal's intention, when it shall be proved that the Cardinal could then have no thoughts of Anne Boleyn; whose father, the Lord Rochford, came over to England from France with the Duchess of Alenson's picture || to shew it to King Henry; and it was then, in all probability, that Anne Boleyn came over with him; for, tho' she had been in England in 1522, yet she did not stay long §, but returned into the service of Claude Queen of France, where she continued till that Queen died, which was in 1524, and then went into the Duchess of Alenson's service, which she left probably at this time. Soon after her coming into England, she was taken into Queen Catharine's court, where the Lord Peircy courted her, and was upon the point of marrying her**, had not Cardinal Wolsey, by the King's order, prevented it; and, as the same author assures us, it was not till after the Cardinal's return from France, which was on the last day of September 1527, that the King opened his affection for Anne Boleyn to him.

Why then do the Papists pretend to say, that the King would never have had thoughts of a divorce, or scruples against his first marriage, had not his unlawful passion for Mrs. Boleyn prompted him to them? Whereas it is plainly proved, that the King's scruples were infused in him from his infancy, on the justest grounds; that they were revived in him three years + before they were made publick, and that they were commonly talked of, and a new match contrived for him to the Duchess of Alenson, before Anne Boleyn appeared at court. All which will still appear more clearly in the ensuing letters. But, before I make any remarks on these, I must first give a short account of the King's negotiations at Rome, without which some of them cannot be understood. In the end of 1527 ++, the King sollicited the Pope for a commission to judge the validity of his marriage with Queen Catharine, which after some time was obtained in a bull, dated the 13th of April, 1528 §§, impowering Cardinal Wolsey, with the Archbishop,

• Stow, Hall: Camden.

+ Herbert.

Hist. Reform. Part I. * Cavendish. + Viz. 1524.

Flist. Reform. Part III. 9 Rymer, Tom. xiv.

Hist. Reform. Part I. It Hist. Reform Part I.

or any other English bishop, to judge the marriage. But this was not made use of; perhaps because it was thought, that a stranger ought to be employed, that the proceeding might be more impartial. So a new commission * was desired, and obtained, bearing date the 6th of June, in which the Cardinals Wolsey and Campegio (an Italian) were appointed joint legates to judge the marriage.

And, to make this the surer, there was a pollicitation (or promise) procured on the 23d of July, 1528, that the Pope would never inhibit or revoke this commission to judge the marriage; and a decretal bull, which contained an absolute decision of the cause, which was only shewn to the King, and Cardinal Wolsey, by Campegio; but all these precautions which were admitted of, when the Pope was in a distressed condition, did not restrain his holiness from sending one Campana before the end of the year, to see the decretal bull secretly burnt; and from recalling the legate's commission, and avocating the cause to Rome the next year, when his affairs were more flourishing, and the Emperor (who was Queen Catharine's nephew) had granted all his demands.

Now as to the letters themselves. It may be presumed reasonably, that, if there had been any thing in them that had reflected on the King's honour, or on Anne Boleyn's, they would certainly have been published by the Papists at that very time; for they were in their hands soon after they were written, as appears from this passage in Lord Herbert's history.

"When Cardinal Campegio came to take ship, the searchers, upon pretence he carried either money or letters from England to Rome, ransacked all his coffers, bags, and papers, not without hope, certainly, to recover that decretal bull our King so much longed for. I find also (some relation) that divers love-letters betwixt our King and Mistress Boleyn, being conveighed out of the King's cabinet, were sought for, though in vain; they having been formerly sent to Rome."

To explain this account, it must be supposed, that they were taken, not out of the King's but out of Aune Boleyn's cabinet. This is the more probable, because, in fact, they are all letters from the King to her; whereas, if his cabinet had been rifled, her answers to him would have been more likely to be found there.

As to the time in which the King's letters to Anne Boleyn were written, in all probability, it was immediately after her dismission from the courtt, which was done to silence the clamours of the people on her account; but she was sent away in so abrupt a manner, that she determined to absent herself altogether; which made the King soon repent of his severity, and press her to come back. But this was not obtained for a long time, nor without great difficulty; as appears by some of the following letters. The time of her dismission was not till May 1528, for there is a letter extant from Fox to Gardiner, at Rome, dated London, May the 4th, 1528, where he writes, of his landing at Sandwich, May the 2d, His coming that night to Greenwich, where the King lay, His being commanded to go to Mistress Anne's chamber in the tilt-yard-And declaring to her their

Herbert.

↑ Idem.

Lately in the Earl of Oxford's Library, 39 B. 4.

expedition in the King's cause, and their hastening the coming of the legate To her great rejoicing and comfort -Then came the King, to whom he delivered his letters, -And opened his negotia tions Then he went to the Cardinal,' &c.

Soon after the date of this letter, she was dismissed; for, in the first of the letters that follow, the King makes excuses for the necessity of their being asunder; and, in the second, complains of her unwillingness to return to court. In neither of these, is a word of the sweating sickness, which raged violently in June; and, of which he speaks in his third letter, as of a thing that had lasted some time, and of which he had formed many observations from experience. Between this letter, which seems to have been writ in July, and the sixth, which, mentioning the Legate's arrival at Paris, must have been written in the end of September, there are two letters, which, by the carnestness of the business, were plainly written within a few days of one another. Probably, soon after the latter of these was sent by the King, where he expressed how much he was pleased with her answer to his earnest desire in the former,† in the heat of his gratitude, he paid a visit to his mistress; in which time they wrote a joint letter to Cardinal Wolsey, which is added in the Appendix, where the King expresses his wonder, that he has not yet heard of the Legate Campegio's arrival at Paris; which makes it probable this happened in September. The King stayed not long with her after this; for, when she had received the Cardinal's answer, she writes a second letter, without mentioning the King's being there; and again shews impatience to hear of the Legate's coming, of which the King gave her the first news soon after. But,

To return to the fourth letter, which, from all these particulars, may be supposed to have been written in Angust; it is the most important in all the collection, for it fixes the time when his affection to Anne Boleyn began. He complains in it, That he had been above a whole year struck with the dart of love, and not yet sure whether he shall fail, or find a place in her heart or affection.' Now, by the nature of his complaint, it is visible, that he pleads all the merit that a long attendance could give him: and, therefore, if, instead of a year, he could have called it a year and a half, or two years, he would certainly have done it, to make his argument the stronger. It may likewise be probably concluded from the same words, that he had not then known her much above half a year; for it would have been an ill compliment in him, to let her understand that he had seen her some time, before he was at all in love with her.

These remarks confirm the account already given, of her coming from France with her father; and, by that means, serve to establish the King's vindication from the scandal thrown on him by the Papists, that he had no scruples about his marriage, till he saw Anne Boleyn.

Though it may be here questioned, how the time of any particular letter can be known, since they have no date, and therefore may have been put out of their order. But those, that will read them with any attention, will find a chain of circumstances referred to, that plainly shew they were laid together by one that knew the order in which they were

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written, very likely by Anne Boleyn herself; and whoever stole them, as he took them all together, so would be careful, no doubt, to keep them in the order he found them in, that the discoveries to be made from them might be the more compleat.

It will not be doubted by any that read these letters, that the King's affection to Anne Boleyn was altogether upon honourable terms. There appears no pretension to any favours, but when the Legates shall have paved the way. There is but one offence that can be taken at these letters, which is, that there are indecent expressions in them. But this is to be imputed to the simplicity and unpoliteness of that age, which allowed too great liberties of that sort; and it must be owned by his enemies, that there are but three or four of these sallies in all the collection, and that there are letters which make much more for the King's picty and virtue, than those irregularities can sully his character.

In the fifth letter he tells her, 'God can do it, if he pleases; to whom I pray once a day for that end, and hope, that, at length, my prayers will be heard.'

In the sixth, I trust shortly to enjoy, what I have so long longed for, to God's pleasure, and our both comforts.'

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In the ninth, Praying God, that (and it be his pleasure) to send us shortly togydder.' Surely, these religious expressions would have been very improper, to make an unlawful passion succeed.

In the thirteenth, speaking of the ill character of one that was proposed to be made Abbess of Wilton, he writes, "I would not, for all the gold in the world, clog your conscience nor mine, to make her ruler of a house, which is of so ungodly a demeanour; nor I trust you would not, that, neither for brother nor sister, I should so destain mine honour or conscience.' The whole letter is of an excellent strain, and would have been a very improper exhortation to one against whose virtue he had a design.

correspon

The last of the letters mentions the Legate's illness, as a reason why he had not yet entered upon his office; which shews, that the dence ended at least in May, 1529, when the process began. There is but one thing after the letters, that it seems very material to add here in the King's defence, and that is, the approbation of his cause by the learned men of Europe.

During the tryal, Warham and Fisher, who were advocates for the Queen, declared, That they having been lately consulted by the King, &c. had answered, that the King's conscience was disturbed and shaken, not without the weightiest and strongest reasons.'*

After the Legates had trifled some months, and, at last, Campegio, under a pretence of the rules of the Court of Rome, had adjourned the Court for three months; during which time he obtained an avocation from the Pope; the King was advised, by Cranmer, not to depend longer on the decisions of the See of Rome, but to consult the several Univer sities of Europe, as well as his own, about the validity of his marriage. One Crook was employed in this negotiation, and he obtained the opi nion of almost all the Universitiest whither he went, for the nullity of the

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