History of the Reformation, vol. 5

Chapter 6

The Pope’s Illness—Wolsey’s Desire—Conference about the Members of the Conclave—Wolsey’s Instructions—The Pope recovers—Speech of the English Envoys to the Pope—Clement willing to abandon England—The English demand the Pope’s Denial of the Brief—Wolsey’s Alarm—Intrigues—Bryan’s Clearsightedness—Henry’s Threats—Wolsey’s new Efforts—He calls for an Appeal to Rome, and retracts—Wolsey and Du Bellay at Richmond—The Ship of the State

On the 6th of January 1529, the feast of Epiphany, just as the pope was performing mass, he was attacked by a sudden illness; he was taken to his room, apparently in a dying state. When this news reached London, the cardinal resolved to hasten to abandon England, where the soil trembled under his feet, and to climb boldly to the throne of the pontiffs. Bryan and Vannes, then at Florence, hurried on to Rome through roads infested with robbers. At Orvieto they were informed the pope was better; at Viterbo, no one knew whether he was alive or dead; at Ronciglione, they were assured that he had expired; and, finally, when they reached the metropolis of the popedom, they learnt that Clement could not survive, and that the imperialists, supported by the Colonnas, were striving to have a pope devoted to Charles V. HRSCV5 828.5

But great as might be the agitation at Rome, it was greater still at Whitehall. If God caused De’Medici to descend from the pontifical throne, it could only be, thought Wolsey, to make him mount it. “It is expedient to have such a pope as may save the realm,” said he to Gardiner. “And although it cannot but be incommodious to me in this mine old age to be the common father, yet, when all things be well pondered, the qualities of all the cardinals well considered, I am the only one, without boasting, that can and will remedy the king’s secret matter. And were it not for the redintegration of the state of the church, and especially to relieve the king and his realm from their calamities, all the riches and honor of the world should not cause me to accept the said dignity. Nevertheless, I conform myself to the necessities of the times. Wherefore, Master Stephen, that this matter may succeed, I pray you to apply all your ingenuity, spare neither money nor labor. I give you the amplest powers, without restriction or limitation.” Gardiner departed to win for his master the coveted tiara. HRSCV5 828.6

Henry VIII and Wolsey, who could hardly restrain their impatience, soon heard of the pontiff’s death from different quarters. “The emperor has taken away Clement’s life,” said Wolsey, blinded by hatred. “Charles,” rejoined the king, “will endeavour to obtain by force or fraud a pope according to his desires.” “Yes, to make him his chaplain,” replied Wolsey, “and with that view, my lord, make up your mind to be pope.”—“That alone,” answered the cardinal, “can bring your Majesty’s weighty matter to a happy termination, and by saving you, save the church and myself also,” he thought in his heart. “Let us see, let us count the voters.” HRSCV5 829.1

Henry and his minister then wrote down on a strip of parchment the names of all the cardinals, marking with the letter A those who were on the side of the kings of England and France, and with the letter B all who favored the emperor. “There was no C,” says a chronicler sarcastically, “to signify any on Christ’s side.” The letter N designated the neutrals. “The cardinals present,” said Wolsey, “will not exceed thirty-nine, and we must have two-thirds, that is, twenty-six. Now, there are twenty upon whom we can reckon; we must therefore, at any price, gain six of the neutrals.” HRSCV5 829.2

Wolsey, deeply sensible of the importance of an election that would decide whether England was to be reformed or not, carefully drew up the instructions, which Henry signed, and which history must register. “We desire and ordain,” the ambassadors were informed in them, “that you secure the election of the cardinal of York; not forgetting that next to the salvation of his own soul, there is nothing the king desires more earnestly. HRSCV5 829.3

“To gain over the neutral cardinals you will employ two methods in particular. The first is, the cardinals being present, and having God and the Holy Ghost before them, you shall remind them that the cardinal of York alone can save Christendom. HRSCV5 829.4

“The second is, because human fragility suffereth not all things to be pondered and weighed in a just balance, it appertaineth in matter of so high importance, to the comfort and relief of all Christendom, to succour the infirmity that may chance not for corruption, you will understand but rather to help the lacks and defaults of human nature. And, therefore, it shall be expedient that you promise spiritual offices, dignities, rewards of money, or other things which shall seem meet to the purpose. HRSCV5 829.5

“Then shall you, with good dexterity, combine and knit those favorable to us in a perfect fastness and indissoluble knot. And that they may be the better animated to finish the election to the king’s desire, you shall offer them a guard of 2000 or 3000 men from the kings of England and France, from the viscount of Turin, and the republic of Venice. HRSCV5 829.6

“If, notwithstanding all your exertions, the election should fail, then the cardinals of the king’s shall repair to some sure place, and there proceed to such an election as may be to God’s pleasure. HRSCV5 829.7

“And to win more friends for the king, you shall promise, on the one hand, to the Cardinal de’Medici and his party our special favor; and the Florentines, on the other hand, you shall put in comfort of the exclusion of the said family De’Medici. Likewise you shall put the cardinals in perfect hope of recovering the patrimony of the church; and you shall contain the Venetians in good trust of a reasonable way to be taken for Cervia and Ravenna (which formed part of the patrimony) to their contentment.” HRSCV5 829.8

Such were the means by which the cardinal hoped to win the papal throne. To the right he said yes, to the left he said no. What would it matter that these perfidies were one day discovered, provided it were after the election. Christendom might be very certain that the choice of the future pontiff would be the work of the Holy Ghost. Alexander VI had been a poisoner; Julius II had given way to ambition, anger, and vice; the liberal Leo X had passed his life in worldly pursuits; the unhappy Clement VII had lived on stratagems and lies; Wolsey would be their worthy successor: HRSCV5 829.9

Wolsey found his excuse in the thought, that if he succeeded, the divorce was secured, and England enslaved for ever to the court of Rome. HRSCV5 829.10

Success at first appeared probable. Many cardinals spoke openly in favor of the English prelate; one of them asked for a detailed account of his life, in order to present it as a model to the church; another worshipped him (so he said) as a divinity Among the gods and popes adored at Rome there were some no better than he. But erelong alarming news reached England. What grief! the pope was getting better. “Conceal your instructions,” wrote the cardinal, “and reserve them in omnem eventum.” HRSCV5 829.11

Wolsey not having obtained the tiara, it was necessary at least to gain the divorce. “God declares,” said the English ambassadors to the pope, “Except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it. Therefore, the king, taking God alone for his guide, requests of you, in the first place, an engagement to pronounce the divorce in the space of three months, and in the second the avocation to Rome.”—“The promise first, and only after that the avocation,” Wolsey had said; “for I fear that if the pope begins with the avocation, he will never pronounce the divorce.”—“Besides,” added the envoys, “the king’s second marriage admits of no refusal, whatever bulls or briefs there may be. The only issue of this matter is the divorce; the divorce in one way or another must be procured.” HRSCV5 830.1

Wolsey had instructed his envoys to pronounce these words with a certain air of familiarity, and at the same time with a gravity calculated to produce an effect. His expectations were deceived: Clement was colder than ever. He had determined to abandon England in order that he might secure the States of the Church, of which Charles was then master, thus sacrificing the spiritual to the temporal. “The pope will not do the least thing for your majesty,” wrote Bryan to the king; “your matter may well be in his Pater noster, but it certainly is not in his Credo.” “Increase in importunity,” answered the king; “the cardinal of Verona should remain about the pope’s person and counterbalance the influence of De Angelis and the archbishop of Capua. I would rather lose my two crowns than be beaten by these two friars.” HRSCV5 830.2

Thus was the struggle about to become keener than ever, when Clement’s relapse once more threw doubt on everything. He was always between life and death; and this perpetual alternation agitated the king and the impatient cardinal in every way. The latter considered that the pope had need of merits to enter the kingdom of heaven. “Procure an interview with the pope,” he wrote to the envoys, “even though he be in the very agony of death; and represent to him that nothing will be more likely to save his soul than the bill of divorce.” Henry’s commissioners were not admitted; but towards the end of March, the deputies appearing in a body, the pope promised to examine the letter from Spain. Vannes began to fear this document; he represented that those who had fabricated it would have been able to give it an appearance of authenticity. “Rather declare immediately that this brief is not a brief,” said he to the pope. “The king of England, who is your holiness’s son, is not so like the rest of the world. We cannot put the same shoe on every foot.” This rather vulgar argument did not touch Clement. “If to content your master in this business,” said he, “I cannot employ my head, at least I will my finger.”—“Be pleased to explain yourself,” replied Vannes, who found the finger a very little matter.—“I mean,” resumed the pontiff, “that I shall employ every means, provided they are honorable.” Vannes withdrew disheartened. HRSCV5 830.3

He immediately conferred with his colleagues, and all together, alarmed at the idea of Henry’s anger, returned to the pontiff; they thrust aside the lackeys, who endeavoured to stop them, and made their way into his bedchamber. Clement opposed them with that resistance of inertia by which the popedom has gained its greatest victories: siluit, he remained silent. Of what consequence to the pontiff were Tudor, his island, and his church, when Charles of Austria was threatening him with his armies? Clement, less proud than Hildebrand, submitted willingly to the emperor’s power, provided the emperor would protect him. “I had rather,” he said, “be Caesar’s servant, not only in a temple, but in a stable if necessary, than be exposed to the insults of rebels and vagabonds.” At the same time he wrote to Campeggio: “Do not irritate the king, but spin out this matter as much as possible; the Spanish brief gives us the means.” HRSCV5 830.4

In fact, Charles V had twice shown Lee the original document, and Wolsey, after this ambassador’s report, began to believe that it was not Charles who had forged the brief, but that Pope Julius II had really given two contradictory documents on the same day. Accordingly the cardinal now feared to see this letter in the pontiff’s hands. “Do all you can to dissuade the pope from seeking the original in Spain,” wrote he to one of his ambassadors; “it may exasperate the emperor.” We know how cautious the cardinal was towards Charles. Intrigue attained its highest point at this epoch, and Englishmen and Romans encountered craft with craft. “In such ticklish negotiations,” says Burnet, (who had had some little experience in diplomacy,) “ministers must say and unsay as they are instructed, which goes of course as a part of their business.” Henry’s envoys to the pope intercepted the letters sent from Rome, and had Campeggio’s seized. On his part the pope indulged in flattering smiles and perfidious equivocations. Bryan wrote to Henry VIII: “Always your grace hath done for him in deeds, and he hath recompensed you with fair words and fair writings, of which both I think your grace shall lack none; but as for the deeds, I never believe to see them, and especially at this time.” Bryan had comprehended the court of Rome better perhaps than many politicians. Finally, Clement himself, wishing to prepare the king for the blow he was about to inflict, wrote to him: “We have been able to find nothing that would satisfy your ambassadors.” HRSCV5 830.5

Henry thought he knew what this message meant: that he had found nothing, and would find nothing; and accordingly this prince, who, if we may believe Wolsey, had hitherto shown incredible patience and gentleness, gave way to all his violence. “Very well then,” said he; “my lords and I well know how to withdraw ourselves from the authority of the Roman see.” Wolsey turned pale, and conjured his master not to rush into that fearful abyss; Campeggio, too, endeavoured to revive the king’s hopes. But it was all of no use. Henry recalled his ambassadors. HRSCV5 831.1

Henry, it is true, had not yet reached the age when violent characters become inflexible from the habit they have encouraged of yielding to their passions. But the cardinal, who knew his master, knew also that his inflexibility did not depend upon the number of his years; he thought Rome’s power in England was lost, and, placed between Henry and Clement, he exclaimed: “How shall I avoid Scylla, and not fall into Charybdis?” He begged the king to make one last effort by sending Dr. Bennet to the pope with orders to support the avocation to Rome, and he gave him a letter in which he displayed all the resources of his eloquence. “How can it be imagined,” he wrote, “that the persuasions of sense urge the king to break a union in which the ardent years of his youth were passed with such purity? The matter is very different. I am on the spot, I know the state of men’s minds Pray, believe me The divorce is the secondary question; the primary one is the fidelity of this realm to the papal see. The nobility, gentry, and citizens all exclaim with indignation: Must our fortunes, and even our lives, depend upon the nod of a foreigner? We must abolish, or at the very least diminish, the authority of the Roman pontiff… Most holy father, we cannot mention such things without a shudder.” This new attempt was also unavailing. The pope demanded of Henry how he could doubt his good will, seeing that the king of England had done so much for the apostolic see. This appeared a cruel irony to Tudor; the king requested a favor of the pope, and the pope replied by calling to mind those which the papacy had received from his hands. “Is this the way,” men asked in England, “in which Rome pays her debts?” HRSCV5 831.2

Wolsey had not reached the term of his misfortunes. Gardiner and Bryan had just returned to London: they declared that to demand an avocation to Rome was to lose their cause. Accordingly Wolsey, who turned to every wind, ordered Da Casale, in case Clement should pronounce the avocation, to appeal from the pope, the false head of the church, to the true vicar of Jesus Christ. This was almost in Luther’s style. Who was this true vicar? Probably a pope nominated by the influence of England. HRSCV5 831.3

But this proceeding did not assure the cardinal: he was losing his judgment. A short time before this Du Bellay, who had just returned from Paris, whither he had gone to retain France on the side of England, had been invited to Richmond by Wolsey. As the two prelates were walking in the park, on that hill whence the eye ranges over the fertile and undulating fields through which the winding Thames pours its tranquil waters, the unhappy cardinal observed to the bishop: “My trouble is the greatest that ever was! I have excited and carried on this matter of the divorce, to dissolve the union between the two houses of Spain and England, by sowing misunderstanding between them, as if I had no part in it. You know it was in the interest of France; I therefore entreat the king your master and her majesty to do everything that may forward the divorce. I shall esteem such a favor more than if they made me pope; but if they refuse me, my ruin is inevitable.” And then giving way to despair, he exclaimed: “Alas! would that I were going to be buried tomorrow!” HRSCV5 831.4

The wretched man was drinking the bitter cup his perfidies had prepared for him. All seemed to conspire against Henry, and Bennet was recalled shortly after. It was said at court and in the city: “Since the pope sacrifices us to the emperor, let us sacrifice the pope.” Clement VII, intimidated by the threats of Charles V, and tottering upon his throne, madly repelled with his foot the bark of England. Europe was all attention, and began to think that the proud vessel of Albion, cutting the cable that bound her to the pontiffs, would boldly spread her canvass to the winds, and ever after sail the sea alone, wafted onwards by the breeze that comes from heaven. HRSCV5 831.5

The influence of Rome over Europe is in great measure political. It loses a kingdom by a royal quarrel, and might in this same way lose ten. HRSCV5 832.1