A Child's History of England

by Dickens, Charles

  Popes died in pretty quick succession; but the foreign priests were

  too much for the Cardinal, and kept him out of the post. So the

  Cardinal and King together found out that the Emperor of Germany

  was not a man to keep faith with; broke off a projected marriage

  between the King's daughter MARY, Princess of Wales, and that

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  sovereign; and began to consider whether it might not be well to

  marry the young lady, either to Francis himself, or to his eldest

  son.

  There now arose at Wittemberg, in Germany, the great leader of the

  mighty change in England which is called The Reformation, and which

  set the people free from their slavery to the priests. This was a

  learned Doctor, named MARTIN LUTHER, who knew all about them, for

  he had been a priest, and even a monk, himself. The preaching and

  writing of Wickliffe had set a number of men thinking on this

  subject; and Luther, finding one day to his great surprise, that

  there really was a book called the New Testament which the priests

  did not allow to be read, and which contained truths that they

  suppressed, began to be very vigorous against the whole body, from

  the Pope downward. It happened, while he was yet only beginning

  his vast work of awakening the nation, that an impudent fellow

  named TETZEL, a friar of very bad character, came into his

  neighbourhood selling what were called Indulgences, by wholesale,

  to raise money for beautifying the great Cathedral of St. Peter's,

  at Rome. Whoever bought an Indulgence of the Pope was supposed to

  buy himself off from the punishment of Heaven for his offences.

  Luther told the people that these Indulgences were worthless bits

  of paper, before God, and that Tetzel and his masters were a crew

  of impostors in selling them.

  The King and the Cardinal were mightily indignant at this

  presumption; and the King (with the help of SIR THOMAS MORE, a wise

  man, whom he afterwards repaid by striking off his head) even wrote

  a book about it, with which the Pope was so well pleased that he

  gave the King the title of Defender of the Faith. The King and the

  Cardinal also issued flaming warnings to the people not to read

  Luther's books, on pain of excommunication. But they did read them

  for all that; and the rumour of what was in them spread far and

  wide.

  When this great change was thus going on, the King began to show

  himself in his truest and worst colours. Anne Boleyn, the pretty

  little girl who had gone abroad to France with his sister, was by

  this time grown up to be very beautiful, and was one of the ladies

  in attendance on Queen Catherine. Now, Queen Catherine was no

  longer young or handsome, and it is likely that she was not

  particularly good-tempered; having been always rather melancholy,

  and having been made more so by the deaths of four of her children

  when they were very young. So, the King fell in love with the fair

  Anne Boleyn, and said to himself, 'How can I be best rid of my own

  troublesome wife whom I am tired of, and marry Anne?'

  You recollect that Queen Catherine had been the wife of Henry's

  brother. What does the King do, after thinking it over, but calls

  his favourite priests about him, and says, O! his mind is in such a

  dreadful state, and he is so frightfully uneasy, because he is

  afraid it was not lawful for him to marry the Queen! Not one of

  those priests had the courage to hint that it was rather curious he

  had never thought of that before, and that his mind seemed to have

  been in a tolerably jolly condition during a great many years, in

  which he certainly had not fretted himself thin; but, they all

  said, Ah! that was very true, and it was a serious business; and

  perhaps the best way to make it right, would be for his Majesty to

  be divorced! The King replied, Yes, he thought that would be the

  best way, certainly; so they all went to work.

  If I were to relate to you the intrigues and plots that took place

  in the endeavour to get this divorce, you would think the History

  of England the most tiresome book in the world. So I shall say no

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  more, than that after a vast deal of negotiation and evasion, the

  Pope issued a commission to Cardinal Wolsey and CARDINAL CAMPEGGIO

  (whom he sent over from Italy for the purpose), to try the whole

  case in England. It is supposed - and I think with reason - that

  Wolsey was the Queen's enemy, because she had reproved him for his

  proud and gorgeous manner of life. But, he did not at first know

  that the King wanted to marry Anne Boleyn; and when he did know it,

  he even went down on his knees, in the endeavour to dissuade him.

  The Cardinals opened their court in the Convent of the Black

  Friars, near to where the bridge of that name in London now stands;

  and the King and Queen, that they might be near it, took up their

  lodgings at the adjoining palace of Bridewell, of which nothing now

  remains but a bad prison. On the opening of the court, when the

  King and Queen were called on to appear, that poor ill-used lady,

  with a dignity and firmness and yet with a womanly affection worthy

  to be always admired, went and kneeled at the King's feet, and said

  that she had come, a stranger, to his dominions; that she had been

  a good and true wife to him for twenty years; and that she could

  acknowledge no power in those Cardinals to try whether she should

  be considered his wife after all that time, or should be put away.

  With that, she got up and left the court, and would never

  afterwards come back to it.

  The King pretended to be very much overcome, and said, O! my lords

  and gentlemen, what a good woman she was to be sure, and how

  delighted he would be to live with her unto death, but for that

  terrible uneasiness in his mind which was quite wearing him away!

  So, the case went on, and there was nothing but talk for two

  months. Then Cardinal Campeggio, who, on behalf of the Pope,

  wanted nothing so much as delay, adjourned it for two more months;

  and before that time was elapsed, the Pope himself adjourned it

  indefinitely, by requiring the King and Queen to come to Rome and

  have it tried there. But by good luck for the King, word was

  brought to him by some of his people, that they had happened to

  meet at supper, THOMAS CRANMER, a learned Doctor of Cambridge, who

  had proposed to urge the Pope on, by referring the case to all the

  learned doctors and bishops, here and there and everywhere, and

  getting their opinions that the King's marriage was unlawful. The

  King, who was now in a hurry to marry Anne Boleyn, thought this

  such a good idea, that he sent for Cranmer, post haste, and said to

  LORD ROCHFORT, Anne Boleyn's father, 'Take this learned Doctor down

  to your country-house, and there let him have a good room for a

  study, and no end of books out of which to prove that I may marry

  your daughter.' Lord Rochfort, not at all reluctant, made the

&nbs
p; learned Doctor as comfortable as he could; and the learned Doctor

  went to work to prove his case. All this time, the King and Anne

  Boleyn were writing letters to one another almost daily, full of

  impatience to have the case settled; and Anne Boleyn was showing

  herself (as I think) very worthy of the fate which afterwards befel

  her.

  It was bad for Cardinal Wolsey that he had left Cranmer to render

  this help. It was worse for him that he had tried to dissuade the

  King from marrying Anne Boleyn. Such a servant as he, to such a

  master as Henry, would probably have fallen in any case; but,

  between the hatred of the party of the Queen that was, and the

  hatred of the party of the Queen that was to be, he fell suddenly

  and heavily. Going down one day to the Court of Chancery, where he

  now presided, he was waited upon by the Dukes of Norfolk and

  Suffolk, who told him that they brought an order to him to resign

  that office, and to withdraw quietly to a house he had at Esher, in

  Surrey. The Cardinal refusing, they rode off to the King; and next

  day came back with a letter from him, on reading which, the

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  Cardinal submitted. An inventory was made out of all the riches in

  his palace at York Place (now Whitehall), and he went sorrowfully

  up the river, in his barge, to Putney. An abject man he was, in

  spite of his pride; for being overtaken, riding out of that place

  towards Esher, by one of the King's chamberlains who brought him a

  kind message and a ring, he alighted from his mule, took off his

  cap, and kneeled down in the dirt. His poor Fool, whom in his

  prosperous days he had always kept in his palace to entertain him,

  cut a far better figure than he; for, when the Cardinal said to the

  chamberlain that he had nothing to send to his lord the King as a

  present, but that jester who was a most excellent one, it took six

  strong yeomen to remove the faithful fool from his master.

  The once proud Cardinal was soon further disgraced, and wrote the

  most abject letters to his vile sovereign; who humbled him one day

  and encouraged him the next, according to his humour, until he was

  at last ordered to go and reside in his diocese of York. He said

  he was too poor; but I don't know how he made that out, for he took

  a hundred and sixty servants with him, and seventy-two cart-loads

  of furniture, food, and wine. He remained in that part of the

  country for the best part of a year, and showed himself so improved

  by his misfortunes, and was so mild and so conciliating, that he

  won all hearts. And indeed, even in his proud days, he had done

  some magnificent things for learning and education. At last, he

  was arrested for high treason; and, coming slowly on his journey

  towards London, got as far as Leicester. Arriving at Leicester

  Abbey after dark, and very ill, he said - when the monks came out

  at the gate with lighted torches to receive him - that he had come

  to lay his bones among them. He had indeed; for he was taken to a

  bed, from which he never rose again. His last words were, 'Had I

  but served God as diligently as I have served the King, He would

  not have given me over, in my grey hairs. Howbeit, this is my just

  reward for my pains and diligence, not regarding my service to God,

  but only my duty to my prince.' The news of his death was quickly

  carried to the King, who was amusing himself with archery in the

  garden of the magnificent Palace at Hampton Court, which that very

  Wolsey had presented to him. The greatest emotion his royal mind

  displayed at the loss of a servant so faithful and so ruined, was a

  particular desire to lay hold of fifteen hundred pounds which the

  Cardinal was reported to have hidden somewhere.

  The opinions concerning the divorce, of the learned doctors and

  bishops and others, being at last collected, and being generally in

  the King's favour, were forwarded to the Pope, with an entreaty

  that he would now grant it. The unfortunate Pope, who was a timid

  man, was half distracted between his fear of his authority being

  set aside in England if he did not do as he was asked, and his

  dread of offending the Emperor of Germany, who was Queen

  Catherine's nephew. In this state of mind he still evaded and did

  nothing. Then, THOMAS CROMWELL, who had been one of Wolsey's

  faithful attendants, and had remained so even in his decline,

  advised the King to take the matter into his own hands, and make

  himself the head of the whole Church. This, the King by various

  artful means, began to do; but he recompensed the clergy by

  allowing them to burn as many people as they pleased, for holding

  Luther's opinions. You must understand that Sir Thomas More, the

  wise man who had helped the King with his book, had been made

  Chancellor in Wolsey's place. But, as he was truly attached to the

  Church as it was even in its abuses, he, in this state of things,

  resigned.

  Being now quite resolved to get rid of Queen Catherine, and to

  marry Anne Boleyn without more ado, the King made Cranmer

  Archbishop of Canterbury, and directed Queen Catherine to leave the

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  Court. She obeyed; but replied that wherever she went, she was

  Queen of England still, and would remain so, to the last. The King

  then married Anne Boleyn privately; and the new Archbishop of

  Canterbury, within half a year, declared his marriage with Queen

  Catherine void, and crowned Anne Boleyn Queen.

  She might have known that no good could ever come from such wrong,

  and that the corpulent brute who had been so faithless and so cruel

  to his first wife, could be more faithless and more cruel to his

  second. She might have known that, even when he was in love with

  her, he had been a mean and selfish coward, running away, like a

  frightened cur, from her society and her house, when a dangerous

  sickness broke out in it, and when she might easily have taken it

  and died, as several of the household did. But, Anne Boleyn

  arrived at all this knowledge too late, and bought it at a dear

  price. Her bad marriage with a worse man came to its natural end.

  Its natural end was not, as we shall too soon see, a natural death

  for her.

  CHAPTER XXVIII - ENGLAND UNDER HENRY THE EIGHTH

  PART THE SECOND

  THE Pope was thrown into a very angry state of mind when he heard

  of the King's marriage, and fumed exceedingly. Many of the English

  monks and friars, seeing that their order was in danger, did the

  same; some even declaimed against the King in church before his

  face, and were not to be stopped until he himself roared out

  'Silence!' The King, not much the worse for this, took it pretty

  quietly; and was very glad when his Queen gave birth to a daughter,

  who was christened ELIZABETH, and declared Princess of Wales as her

  sister Mary had already been.

  One of the most atrocious features of this reign was that Henry the

  Eighth was always trimming between
the reformed religion and the

  unreformed one; so that the more he quarrelled with the Pope, the

  more of his own subjects he roasted alive for not holding the

  Pope's opinions. Thus, an unfortunate student named John Frith,

  and a poor simple tailor named Andrew Hewet who loved him very

  much, and said that whatever John Frith believed HE believed, were

  burnt in Smithfield - to show what a capital Christian the King

  was.

  But, these were speedily followed by two much greater victims, Sir

  Thomas More, and John Fisher, the Bishop of Rochester. The latter,

  who was a good and amiable old man, had committed no greater

  offence than believing in Elizabeth Barton, called the Maid of Kent

  - another of those ridiculous women who pretended to be inspired,

  and to make all sorts of heavenly revelations, though they indeed

  uttered nothing but evil nonsense. For this offence - as it was

  pretended, but really for denying the King to be the supreme Head

  of the Church - he got into trouble, and was put in prison; but,

  even then, he might have been suffered to die naturally (short work

  having been made of executing the Kentish Maid and her principal

  followers), but that the Pope, to spite the King, resolved to make

  him a cardinal. Upon that the King made a ferocious joke to the

  effect that the Pope might send Fisher a red hat - which is the way

  they make a cardinal - but he should have no head on which to wear

  it; and he was tried with all unfairness and injustice, and

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  sentenced to death. He died like a noble and virtuous old man, and

  left a worthy name behind him. The King supposed, I dare say, that

  Sir Thomas More would be frightened by this example; but, as he was

  not to be easily terrified, and, thoroughly believing in the Pope,

  had made up his mind that the King was not the rightful Head of the

  Church, he positively refused to say that he was. For this crime

  he too was tried and sentenced, after having been in prison a whole

  year. When he was doomed to death, and came away from his trial

  with the edge of the executioner's axe turned towards him - as was

  always done in those times when a state prisoner came to that

  hopeless pass - he bore it quite serenely, and gave his blessing to

  his son, who pressed through the crowd in Westminster Hall and