than under all the administration of Wolsey. It was as if the Bishops had vented on those poor victims their irritation at the rude treatment of their privileges. The King said that the clergy's province was with souls, not with bodies. They were not in future to arrest men on suspicion, imprison, examine, and punish at their mere pleasure. There was an outcry, in which the Chancellor joined. The King suspended his resolution for the moment, but did not abandon it. He was specially displeased with More, from whom he had expected better things. He intended to persist. "May God," exclaimed the orthodox and shocked Chapuys, "send such a remedy as the intensity of the evil requires."[1] None of Henry's misdeeds shocked Chapuys so deeply as the tolerating heresy.
The Royal Supremacy had been accepted by Convocation. It was not yet confirmed by Parliament. Norfolk felt the pulses of the Peers. He called a meeting at Norfolk House. He described the Pope's conduct. He insisted on the usual topics—that matrimonial causes were of temporal jurisdiction, not spiritual; that the King was sovereign in his own dominions, etc., etc., and he invited the Peers' opinions. The Peers were cold. Lord Darcy had spoken freely against the Pope in his indictment of Wolsey. It seemed his ardour was abating. He said the King and Council must manage matters without letting loose a cat among the legs of the rest of them.[2] The meeting generally agreed with Darcy, and was not pressed further. Papal privilege came before Parliament in
- ↑ Chapuys to Charles V., May 13, 1532.—Spanish Calendar, vol. iv. part 1, p. 446.
- ↑ "Le Roy et son Conseil sçavoient bien qu'il y en avoient à faire sans vouloir mestre le chat entre les jambes dautres." Chapuys to the Emperor, Feb. 14, 1532.—Spanish Calendar, vol. iv. part 1, p. 384; Calendar, Foreign and Domestic, vol. v. p. 381.
