The History of England - Vols. 1 to 6 (248 page)

At his execution, he made profession of the catholic religion, and 22d Aug.

told the people, that they never would enjoy tranquillity till they Northumberland returned to the faith of their ancestors: Whether that such were executed.

his real sentiments, which he had formerly disguised, from interest and ambition, or that he hoped, by this declaration, to render the queen more favourable to his family.
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Sir Thomas Palmer, and Sir John Gates suffered with him; and this was all the blood spilled on account of so dangerous and criminal an enterprize against the rights of the sovereign. Sentence was pronounced against the lady Jane and lord Guilford; but without any present intention of putting it in execution. The youth and innocence of the persons, neither of whom had reached their seventeenth year, pleaded sufficiently in their favour.

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When Mary first arrived in the Tower, the duke of Norfolk, who had been detained prisoner during all the last reign; Courtney, son of the marquis of Exeter, who, without being charged with any crime, had been subjected to the same punishment ever since his father’s attainder; Gardiner, Tonstal, and Bonner, who had been confined for their adhering to the catholic cause, appeared before her, and implored her clemency and protection.
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They were all of them restored to their liberty, and immediately admitted to her confidence and favour. Norfolk’s attainder, notwithstanding that it had passed in Parliament, was represented as null and invalid; because, among other informalities, no special matter had been alledged against him, except wearing a coat of arms, which he and his ancestors, without giving any offence, had always made use of, in the face of the court and of the whole nation.

Courtney soon after received the title of earl of Devonshire; and though educated in such close confinement, that he was altogether unacquainted with the world, he soon acquired all the accomplishments of a courtier and a gentleman, and made a considerable figure during the few years, which he lived after he recovered his

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Besides performing all those popular acts, which, though they only affected individuals, were very acceptable to the nation, the queen endeavoured to ingratiate herself with the public, by granting a general pardon, though with some exceptions, and by remitting the subsidy voted to her brother by the last parliament.
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The joy arising from the succession of the lawful heir, and from the gracious demeanor of the sovereign, hindered not the people from being agitated with great anxiety concerning the state of religion; and as the bulk of the nation inclined to the protestant communion, the apprehensions, entertained concerning the principles and prejudices of the new queen, were pretty general. The legitimacy of Mary’s birth had appeared to be somewhat connected with the papal authority; and that princess, being educated with her mother, had imbibed the strongest attachment to the catholic communion, and the highest aversion to those new tenets, whence, she believed, all the misfortunes of her family had originally sprung. The discouragements, which she lay under from her father, though at last they brought her to comply with his will, tended still more to encrease her disgust to the reformers; and the vexations, which the protector and the council gave her, during Edward’s reign, had no other effect than to confirm her farther in her prejudices. Naturally of a sour and obstinate temper, and irritated by contradiction and misfortunes, she possessed all the qualities fitted to compose a bigot; and her extreme ignorance rendered her utterly incapable of doubt in her own belief, or of indulgence to the opinions of others. The nation, therefore, had great reason to dread, not only the abolition, but the persecution of the established religion from the zeal of Mary; and it was not long ere she discovered her intentions.

Gardiner, Bonner, Tonstal, Day, Heath, and Vesey, were

Catholic religion

reinstated in their sees, either by a direct act of power, or, what is restored.

nearly the same, by the sentence of commissioners, appointed to review their trial and condemnation. Though the bishopric of Durham had been dissolved by authority of parliament, the queen erected it a-new by letters-patent, and replaced Tonstal in his regalities as well as in his revenue. On pretence of discouraging controversy, she silenced, by an act of prerogative, all the preachers throughout England, except such as should obtain a particular licence; and it was easy to foresee, that none but the catholics would be favoured with this privilege. Holgate, PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)

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archbishop of York, Coverdale, bishop of Exeter, Ridley of London, and Hooper of Glocester, were thrown into prison; whither old Latimer also was sent soon after. The zealous bishops and priests were encouraged in their forwardness to revive the mass, though contrary to the present laws. Judge Hales, who had discovered such constancy in defending the queen’s title, lost all his merit by an opposition to those illegal practices; and being committed to custody, was treated with such severity, that he fell into frenzy, and killed himself. The men of Suffolk were brow-beaten; because they presumed to plead the promise, which the queen, when they enlisted themselves in her service, had given them, of maintaining the reformed religion: One, in particular, was set in the pillory, because he had been too peremptory, in recalling to her memory the engagements which she had taken on that occasion. And though the queen still promised, in a public declaration before the council, to tolerate those who differed from her, men foresaw, that this engagement, like the former, would prove but a feeble security, when set in opposition to religious prejudices.

The merits of Cranmer towards the queen, during the reign of Henry had been considerable; and he had successfully employed his good offices in mitigating the severe prejudices which that monarch had entertained against her. But the active part, which he had borne in promoting her mother’s divorce, as well as in conducting the reformation, had made him the object of her hatred; and though Gardiner had been equally forward in soliciting and defending the divorce, he had afterwards made sufficient atonement, by his sufferings in defence of the catholic cause. The primate, therefore, had reason to expect little favour during the present reign; but it was by his own indiscreet zeal, that he brought on himself the first violence and persecution. A report being spread, that Cranmer, in order to pay court to the queen, had promised to officiate in the Latin service, the archbishop, to wipe off this aspersion, published a manifesto in his own defence. Among other expressions, he there said, that, as the devil was a liar from the beginning, and the father of lies, he had at this time stirred up his servants to persecute Christ and his true religion: That this infernal spirit now endeavoured to restore the Latin satisfactory masses, a thing of his own invention and device; and in order to effect his purpose, had falsely made use of Cranmer’s name and authority: And that the mass is not only without foundation, either in the Scriptures or in the practice of the primitive church, but likewise discovers a plain contradiction to antiquity and the inspired writings, and is besides replete with many horrid blasphemies.
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On the publication of this inflammatory paper, Cranmer was thrown into prison, and was tried for the part which he had acted, in concurring with the lady Jane, and opposing the queen’s accession. Sentence of high treason was pronounced against him; and though his guilt was shared with the whole privy council, and was even less than that of the greater part of them, this sentence, however severe, must be allowed entirely legal. The execution of it, however, did not follow; and Cranmer was reserved for a more cruel punishment.

Peter Martyr, seeing a persecution gathering against the reformers, desired leave to withdraw;
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and while some zealous catholics moved for his commitment, Gardiner both pleaded, that he had come over by an invitation from the government, and generously furnished him with supplies for his journey: But as bigotted zeal still encreased, his wife’s body, which had been interred at Oxford, was afterwards dug up by public orders, and buried in a dunghill
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foreign reformers, were about the same time committed to the flames at Cambridge.
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John a Lasco was first silenced, then ordered to depart the kingdom with his congregation. The greater part of the foreign protestants followed him; and the nation thereby lost many useful hands for arts and manufactures. Several English protestants also took shelter in foreign parts; and every thing bore dismal aspect for the reformation.

During this revolution of the court, no protection was expected 5th Oct. A parliament.

by protestants from the parliament, which was summoned to assemble. A zealous reformer
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pretends, that great violence and iniquity were used in the elections; but besides that the authority of this writer is inconsiderable, that practice, as the necessities of government seldom required it, had not hitherto been often employed in England. There still remained such numbers devoted, by opinion or affection, to many principles of the ancient religion, that the authority of the crown was able to give such candidates the preference in most elections; and all those, who hesitated to comply with the court religion, rather declined taking a seat, which, while it rendered them obnoxious to the queen, could afterwards afford them no protection against the violence of prerogative. It soon appeared, therefore, that a majority of the commons would be obsequious to Mary’s designs; and as the peers were mostly attached to the court, from interest or expectations, little opposition was expected from that quarter.

In opening the parliament, the court showed a contempt of the laws, by celebrating, before the two houses, a mass of the Holy Ghost, in the Latin tongue, attended with all the ancient rites and ceremonies, though abolished by act of parliament.
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Taylor, bishop of Lincoln having refused to kneel at this service, was severely handled, and

was violently thrust out of the house.r
The queen, however, still retained the title of supreme head of the church of England; and it was generally pretended, that the intention of the court was only to restore religion to the same condition in which it had been left by Henry; but that the other abuses of popery, which were the most grievous to the nation, would never be revived.

The first bill, passed by the parliament, was of a popular nature, and abolished every species of treason, not contained in the statute of Edward III. and every species of felony, that did not subsist before the first of Henry VIII.
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The parliament next declared the queen to be legitimate, ratified the marriage of Henry with Catherine of

Arragon, and annulled the divorce pronounced by Cranmer,t
whom they greatly blamed on that account. No mention, however, is made of the pope’s authority, as any ground of the marriage. All the statutes of king Edward, with regard to religion, were repealed by one vote.
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The attainder of the duke of Norfolk was reversed; and this act of justice was more reasonable than the declaring of that attainder invalid, without farther authority. Many clauses of the riot act, passed in the late reign, were revived: A step which eluded, in a great measure, the popular statute enacted at the first meeting of parliament.

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in that respect, to her will and pleasure. There were three marriages
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, concerning which it was supposed that Mary had deliberated after her accession. The first person proposed to her, was Courtney, earl of Devonshire, who, being an Englishman, nearly allied to the crown, could not fail of being acceptable to the nation; and as he was of an engaging person and address, he had visibly gained on the queen’s affections,
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and hints were dropped him of her favourable dispositions towards him.
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But that nobleman neglected these overtures; and seemed rather to attach himself to the lady Elizabeth, whose youth and agreeable conversation he preferred to all the power and grandeur of her sister. This choice occasioned a great coldness in Mary towards Devonshire; and made her break out in a declared animosity against Elizabeth. The ancient quarrel between their mothers had sunk deep into the malignant heart of the queen; and after the declaration made by parliament in favour of Catherine’s marriage, she wanted not a pretence for representing the birth of her sister as illegitimate. The attachment of Elizabeth to the reformed religion offended Mary’s bigotry; and as the young princess had made some difficulty in disguising her sentiments, violent menaces had been employed to bring her to compliance.
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But when the queen found, that Elizabeth had obstructed her views in a point, which, perhaps, touched her still more nearly, her resentment, excited by pride, no longer knew any bounds; and the princess was visibly exposed to the greatest danger.
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Cardinal Pole, who had never taken priest’s orders, was another party proposed to the queen; and there appeared many reasons to induce her to make choice of this prelate.

The high character of Pole for virtue and humanity; the great regard paid him by the catholic church, of which he had nearly reached the highest dignity on the death of Paul III.
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the queen’s affection for the countess of Salisbury, his mother, who had once been her governess; the violent animosity to which he had been exposed on account of his attachment to the Romish communion; all these considerations had a powerful influence on Mary. But the cardinal was now in the decline of life; and having contracted habits of study and retirement, he was represented to her as