and in any contest which might arise they were certain to be found on the side of the Holy See. The hero of the imagination of every English priest was Becket of Canterbury. In theory he regarded the secular prince as ruling only by delegation from the Supreme Pontiff, and as liable in case of contumacy to be deposed. In case of quarrel between the clergy and the State the enormous influence of the Church was pledged to the order and to its chief at Rome.
The spiritualty were already exasperated by the clipping of their claws in the last session. From the Bishop of Rochester, who represented clerical opinion in its most accentuated form, from great ladies, and from a party of the nobles with whom, as Catherine's friends, he mainly associated, Chapuys had heard unanimous censures of the King's conduct. These persons told him that the whole nation agreed with them, and certainly the opposition of a body so powerful as the clergy was by itself formidable. Before it came to war, therefore, with the Pontiff, the King had prepared his measures to disarm the Pontiff's legionaries. To clip their claws was not enough. Their mouths had to be held with bit and bridle. Parliament, after repeated prorogations, was opened at last in January. Convocation, which was called simultaneously, was put formally in possession of a fact which had appeared on the first rumour of it incredible—that the whole body of the clergy lay under Præmunire for having recognised Cardinal Wolsey's legation and the Papal Bull by which it was instituted. It was an intimation that the old English laws were awake again. The clergy were subjects of the Crown, not of the Pope, and to impress the fact upon their minds they learnt that legally their property was forfeited, that they would obtain their pardon only on
