manner never before seen in the history of the Christian Church.
The history of the celebrated Præmunire will serve well to illustrate both these propositions. The outline of the well-known story is as follows. After using the statute of Præmunire as an instrument in the overthrow of Wolsey, it seems to have occurred to Henry, or more probably to Cromwell, that it might be further usefully employed for the purpose of improving the position of the Crown. The whole nation, therefore, the clergy first and the laity afterwards, were held to have become involved in the penalties of this law, as having been abettors of Wolsey in his illegal exercise of papal authority; but the course followed with the two classes of offenders was widely different. The clergy were compelled to purchase forgiveness by a heavy payment in money, and, what was of infinitely more importance, by passing in their convocation the famous 'Submission of the Clergy,' whereby they accepted the King as supreme head of the Church, and gave up all claim to legislate for the Church except by his permission and consent. Parliament, on the other hand, showed such a temper that Henry recoiled before it, and, in the words of Chapuys, 'granted the exemption which was published in Parliament without any reservation.'[1]
These few facts speak volumes. They serve to account at once for the widely different measure which Cromwell dealt out to the clergy and to the laity, and, by demonstrating how much more easy it had become to trample on the former than on the latter, may serve as a measure of the little hold which the clergy had retained over the hearts and affections of the people.
- ↑ State papers, Feb. 14, 1531.
