clearly appear that he afterwards resided in the university. The king had made an excursion to the neighbourhood; and two of his attendants, Dr Gardiner, afterwards bishop of Winchester, and Dr Fox, afterwards bishop of Hereford, having met Cranmer at Waltham, began to discuss with him the momentous question of the king's divorce from Catherine of Aragon. This princess had been married to Arthur, the elder brother of Henry, but, according to her own solemn averment, their nuptials had never been consummated. For the second marriage, a papal dispensation had been obtained in due form; nor does the king appear to have been accessible to any compunctious visitings, till he found this marriage an impediment to his union with Anne Boleyn. He then exerted all his influence with the pope to procure a sentence, declaring the nullity of a marriage contracted with his brother's widow; but although his holiness might otherwise have been disposed to lend a willing ear to such a suitor, he was restrained by the consideration that Catherine was the aunt of the Emperor Charles the Fifth. Many intrigues had been employed, and much delay had intervened, when this casual discussion took place at Waltham, and when Dr Cranmer suggested the expediency of trying the question out of the word of God, and thereupon to 'proceed to a final sentence.' He strongly urged the propriety of continuing the appeal to canonists and divines, for the faculties of various universities had already been solicited to deliver a formal opinion;* but it is clear that the peculiar merit of his advice must be resolved into a hint, more or less direct, respecting the necessity of deciding the question without the authority of the pope. This controversy, originating, not in the king's scruples of conscience, but in feelings of a very different nature, contributed in no small degree to the elevation of Cranmer, and to the downfall of the church. When Fox, who was then the royal almoner, communicated this plan of effecting a divorce, Henry swore by the Mother of God, that man hath the right

*The consultation of the foreign universities was followed by a curious publication, which bears the subsequent title: "Gravissimæ atque exactissimæ illustrissimarum totius Italiæ et Galliæ Academiarum Censuræ, efficacissimis etiam quorundam doctissimorum Uirorum Argumentationibus explicatæ, de Ueritate illius Propositionis, videlicet, quod ducere Relictam Fratris mortui sine libris ita sit de Iure diuino et naturali prohibitum, ut nullus Pontifex super hujusmodi Matrimoniis contractis siue contrahendis dispensare possit."Lond. 1530, 4to.

'sow by the ear.' His attendance at court was immediately required; and at their first interview, the king enjoined him to lay aside all other avocations, and to bend his faculties to the furtherance of this important device. In the meantime, he commended him to the hospitality of the Earl of Wiltshire, father to Anne Boleyn. It is evident that Dr Lingard has very erroneously described him as a dependant on the family of the 'king's mistress;' for this appears to have been the true origin of his connexion with the family, and his real dependence was first on the hopes, and afterwards on the gratitude, of the king himself. Henry appointed him archdeacon of Taunton, and one of his chaplains; he likewise bestowed upon him some parochial benefice, of which the name is not ascertained.

Unwilling to hazard an open rupture with the visible head of the church, the king again had recourse to negotiation, and Cranmer was conjoined in a mission to the court of Rome, where he saw many things contrary to God's honour.' During the following year, 1531, he was commissioned as sole ambassador to the emperor. He resided for several months in Germany; and there, about the beginning of the year 1532, he married the niece of Osiander, an eminent pastor of Nürnberg. At the period of his first marriage he was a layman; but as he was now in priest's orders, he plainly disregarded the authority of the church. His residence in this country is supposed, and with great probability, to have had the effect of bringing him much nearer to the sentiments of the Protestants: here he must have enjoyed many opportunities of becoming acquainted with their views and feelings; nor could his soundness of understanding and honesty of purpose be unprofitably exercised, in a situation so well calculated to second the impulse which his mind had already received. From the gross error of the real presence he only extricated himself by slow degrees. The human understanding had for many centuries been so stultified by this portentous doctrine, that it seemed incapable of regaining a sound and healthful state; and, in this article of belief, the p.ogress of Luther and his followers was only from one absurdity to another; by rejecting transubstantiation, and adopting consubstantiation, they introduced a change of scholastic and unscriptural terms, leaving their ideas involved in the ancient maze of Popish errors.

Archbishop Warham, the patron of Erasmus, died in the month of August 1532, and Dr Cranmer was immediately tecalled from Germany to fill the vacant see of Canterbury. This sudden and high preferment he is said to have accepted with no small reluctance; and one of the difficulties which

presented themselves, is supposed to have been connected with the peculiarity of his situation as a married priest.* During the preceding reign, as Mr Todd states, it had been decided by the courts of law that the marriage of a priest was voidable, but not void; and consequently that his issue, born in wedlock, was entitled to inherit. But such a marriage was not reconcilable with the principles of the canon law, and much was to be apprehended from the capricious ferocity of the king. His wife was never publicly acknowledged; and, after the promulgation of the six articles in 1539, he found it expedient to send her to her native country. When he was afterwards charged with having thus entered into the state of matrimony, he admitted the fact, but at the same time affirmed that it was better for him to have his own, than do like other priests, holding and keeping other men's wives.' Before he took the oath of episcopal obedience to the pope, he adopted the expedient of making a formal protest, that he only took it in such a sense as was consistent with the laws of God, with the rights of the king and his realm, and with the liberty of declaring his own sentiments in matters of religion, even when they might be in opposition to the authority of the pope himself. How far this protest was privately interposed or publicly divulged, has been much and eagerly disputed between Protestants and Catholics, but it appears to be a question of very little importance. While we are ready to admit that Mr Todd has refuted various allegations of the Popish historians, we still retain a strong conviction that the character of Cranmer is not

* When Cranmer had fallen from his high estate, an elaborate book against the marriage of priests was published by Dr Martin, a lawyer who was employed against him in the inquisitorial proceedings at Oxford. "A Traictise, declarying and plainly prouying that the pretensed Marriage of Priestes and professed Persones is no Marriage, but altogether vnlawful, and in all ages, and all countreies of Christendome, bothe forbidden and also punyshed. Herewith is comprised, in the later chapitres, a full Confutation of Doctour Poynette's boke, entitled a Defense for the Marriage of Priestes. By Thomas Martin, Doctour of the Ciuile Lawes." Lond. 1554, 4to. This book is said, probably without due foundation, to have been chiefly written by Bishop Gardiner and Dr Smith. Of the reputed author, Bishop Ponet averred that he was a person who could put off all shame, and put on all impudence.' But Martin, whatever else he might be, appears to have been a man of ability; and some of the arguments with which he pressed the unfortunate archbishop, were very acute and cogent.

But

materially benefited by his zealous defence. To entitle the archbishop elect to receive the bulls from the pope, it was necessary for him to take a prescribed oath: the authority which imposed this oath manifestly left no room for private interpretation; nor can we regard such an expedient in any other light than that of a mere subterfuge. It was,' says Mr Todd, the pleasure of his sovereign, but his own aversion, we • have seen, that these forms should yet be followed. instead of engaging himself to the oath, he declared to the king, that without the liberty of opposing it he would decline the honour that was proffered. Of this conduct he never after'wards repented.' Vol. I. p. 68.-But is not this a most lame and impotent conclusion? When swearing is not a mere act of profanity, it is in its very essence the act of a man engaging himself by his oath; and if Cranmer thus reserved to himself the liberty of opposing an oath, which he yet consented to take, he was openly swearing to perform what he secretly considered as unlawful. What his biographer subjoins is not more satisfactory. Thus much for the notoriety of the protest. It has been wished that he had taken the papal oath, as his predecessor Warham had taken it, without reserve or explanation, and then proceeded quietly in opposition to the pontiff, as that prelate is believed to have done by submitting, not long before, to the regal supremacy, and thus advancing a decisive 'step towards a reformation. The clamour against Cranmer, as 'to disingenuousness, might then, it has been thought, have been 'comparatively little, or none. But Cranmer was sincere, and Warham the reverse.' Casuists may suggest divers expedients and salvos, but an honest man has only one method of taking an oath.

That Cranmer's elevation is chiefly to be referred to the aptitude which he had discovered for promoting the dissolution of the royal marriage, is a fact which cannot well be doubted. Soon after his consecration he addressed to the king a letter, in which he zealously urged the necessity of bringing this important question to a determination; and as the pious monarch had already been declared the head of the church of England, he had no hesitation in returning an answer, which, says the biographer, was in perfect accordance with the primate's suggestion; in which he forgot not to maintain the supremacy he had lately re'covered.' Of the origin and progress of the anomalous, and, we will venture to add, very absurd maxim, that the king is the head of the church, this may be considered as rather a curious account; for in what sense could Henry the Eighth be said to recover a right or prerogative which had never been possessed

by him or any of his predecessors ?* The Queen of England was cited to appear before the archbishop at Dunstable, within a few miles of Ampthill, the place of her residence; and on the 8th of May 1533, he opened his new court, assisted by the bishop of Lincoln as his assessor. Catherine having failed to make her appearance before this irregular tribunal, was, after the expiration of fifteen days, declared contumacious; and the marriage was adjudged to be null and void from the beginning, as having been contracted in defiance of the divine prohibition. In the month of January, Henry had privately married Anne Boleyn, after having cohabited with her for several years; but it seems to have been asserted without foundation that Cranmer was present at their scandalous nuptials. It is well known that she did not long retain the king's affections. Ardent love, in so ferocious a breast, was easily converted into deadly hatred; and Anne, when supplanted by a new favourite, was accused of various acts of infidelity, of which it is not certain that she was guilty. The archbishop was again required to exercise his divorcing faculty. The trial and condemnation of the queen,' says Mr Todd, almost immediately followed. Not content with this result, the king resolved on further vengeance; and after two days more, the afflicted archbishop was obliged judicially to declare her marriage invalid, and her offspring illegitimate.' Vol. I. p. 157. But how was the archbishop obliged to perform, an act which is tacitly admitted to have been wrong? The reader must bear in mind that this sentence could have no reference to the queen's alleged adultery; for, according to the canon law, marriage, which is one of the seven sacraments, cannot be dissolved by any course of judicial procedure; and we may here remark, in passing, that although the modern law of England does not professedly adhere to this notion of a sacrament, it is not completely disentangled from the ancient superstition the ecclesiastical courts may declare a marriage to have been invalid from the beginning, but they cannot dissolve the

6

* Dr Martin, when counsel against the archbishop, reduced him to the necessity of admitting that, according to his principles, Nero was the head of the Christian church at Rome, and the Turk at Constantinople. Then,' rejoined the civilian, he that beheaded the heads of the church, and crucified the apostles, was head of Christ's 'church; and he that was never member of the church, is head of the church, by your new-found understanding of God's word.' Vol. ii. p. 441.

See Dr Lingard's Hist. of England, vol. iv. p. 239, and Mr Turner's Hist. of the Reign of Henry the Eighth, vol. ii. p. 458.