Melancthon to England. He would certainly have come, as Luther advised him to do, notwithstanding the disgust with which even protestants regarded Henry's acts, but he was forbidden by the elector of Saxony. Henry accordingly sent over divines to Germany to see how far united action was possible on matters of religion between him and the Smalcaldic League. Events, however, in the course of a few months enabled him to dispense with their assistance.
During the latter half of 1535 Henry vindicated his new supremacy over the church by appointing a royal visitation of the monasteries, of the universities, and of the church at large, inhibiting the bishops at the same time from exercising their functions until each had obtained from him a license to discharge them. The studies at Oxford and Cambridge were remodelled, and a mass of information, of very doubtful credibility, was collected as to the filthy and abominable lives of the inmates of a large number of the monasteries, as well as the superstitions which they encouraged. Strict injunctions, quite impossible of observance, were also laid down by the visitors (whose own characters would not bear much inspection) for the future regulation of these houses, with the express object of compelling applications to Thomas Cromwell [q. v.], as the king's vicegerent, for dispensations. In the following spring the parliament, which had first met more than six years before, signalised its last session by giving the king the possessions of every monastery which did not possess a revenue of 200l. a year.
On 8 Jan. 1536 Catherine of Arragon died, and Henry, who had been seriously afraid that the emperor would make war on England in her behalf, expressed his delight at the event by dressing in yellow. Anne Boleyn did likewise. Fears were now entertained for the Princess Mary, who was hated by Anne Boleyn, besides being in danger of the law for refusing to acknowledge the statute whereby she was made a bastard; and secret plans were laid by the imperial ambassador, in concert with persons in the Netherlands, for enabling her to escape abroad. Anne Boleyn's influence, however, was already on the wane. On 2 May she was arrested, and a jury of peers found her guilty of incest with her own brother and criminal intercourse with other courtiers. She was beheaded on the 19th, and her supposed accomplices two days before [see Anne, 1507–1536]. Her removal was expected to lead to the restoration of the Princess Mary to her place in the succession. On the day (20 May) after Anne's execution the king was formally betrothed to Jane Seymour; the marriage was privately performed ten days later. As for the Princess Mary, the king agreed to take her again into favour only on condition that she would acknowledge the nullity of his marriage to her mother, and ask his pardon humbly for having so long withstood him. These repulsive conditions the unhappy young woman felt compelled to accept.
On 8 June a new parliament met and finally extinguished papal authority in England. A new act of succession was also passed, declaring the issue of both Henry's former queens illegitimate, and entailing the crown upon his issue by Jane Seymour. A most unusual provision was added, enabling the king himself, in default of such issue, to dispose of the crown by will, and it was said that he intended putting his bastard son, the Duke of Richmond, into the succession before Mary. The duke, however, died on 23 July 1536, five days after that brief parliament had been dissolved. Convocation at the same time drew up a set of articles of religion, and declared against the right of the pope to summon a general council without the assent of Christian princes.
In the beginning of October 1536 a rebellion broke out in Lincolnshire, when the commissioners for levying the subsidy came to Caistor. Hatred of oppressive taxation was joined to dislike of innovation in religion and of the suppression of monasteries, which had already made some progress. The Duke of Suffolk was sent down in haste to Lincolnshire, while the Earl of Shrewsbury, anticipating the king's commands, ordered loyal subjects to meet him at Nottingham and march against the rebels. The king himself also proposed to take the field. The rebels, after being warned by Lancaster herald to disband, showed a disposition to submit, and the muster which the king had intended to take at Ampthill had been already countermanded, when it was found that the insurrection, now called ‘the Pilgrimage of Grace,’ had spread in a more threatening shape to Yorkshire [see Aske, Robert]. The Duke of Norfolk, who had been sent northwards, felt it necessary to make terms with the rebels on 27 Oct., and promise them a hearing for their complaints on their sending up two deputies to the king. Henry received these men, and after much delay dismissed them with a diplomatic answer, and a conference of the leaders on both sides was arranged at Doncaster for 5 Dec. There also the northern clergy assembled in a sort of convocation to consider the state of religion. The king was warned both by Norfolk and Suffolk that it would be absolutely necessary to grant a
