Volume III Part 33 (2/2)

The absence of a prospect of issue was the single palliative of the present proceedings. The chancellor injured the case, so far as it admitted of injury, by dwelling on the possibility of an issue of doubtful legitimacy. The questions raised, however, belonged, he said, to the canon law, and he proposed that they should be submitted to the clergy then sitting in convocation.

[Sidenote: A delegacy of the two Houses waits upon the king.]

[Sidenote: The queen consents to accept the judgment of convocation.]

When the chancellor had ceased, the peers desired to communicate with the other House. Six delegates were sent down to repeat the substance of what they had heard, and returned presently, followed by twenty members of the House of Commons, who signified a wish to speak with the king in person. The lords a.s.sented, and repaired in a body with the twenty members to Whitehall. The formality of state interviews may not be too closely scrutinized. They requested to be allowed to open to his Majesty a great and important matter, which his Majesty, they were well aware, had alone permitted them to discuss. His Majesty being confident that they would make no improper demands, they laid before him the proposition which they had heard from the woolsack, and added their own entreaties that he would be pleased to consent.[594] The king was gracious, but the canon law required also the consent of the queen; for which, therefore, the Duke of Suffolk, the Bishop of Winchester, and other n.o.blemen were despatched to Richmond, and with which they soon returned.[595] Six years were spent over the affair with Queen Catherine: almost as many days sufficed to dispose of Anne of Cleves.

[Sidenote: July 7. The convocation undertake the investigation.]

[Sidenote: Evidence is given in.]

On the Wednesday morning the clergy a.s.sembled, and Gardiner, in ”a luminous oration,”[596] invited them to the task which they were to undertake. Evidence was sent in by different members of the Privy Council whom the king had admitted to his confidence; by the ladies of the court who could speak for the condition of the queen; and, finally, by Henry himself, in a paper which he wrote with his own hand, accompanying it with a request that, after reviewing all the circ.u.mstances under which the marriage had been contracted, they would inform him if it was still binding; and adding at the same time an earnest adjuration, which it is not easy to believe to have been wholly a form, that, having G.o.d only before their eyes, they would point out to him the course which justly, honourably, and religiously he was at liberty to pursue.[597]

His personal declaration was as follows:[598]--

[Sidenote: The king makes a declaration of his own conduct.]

”I depose and declare that this hereafter written is merely the verity, intended upon no sinister affection, nor yet upon none hatred or displeasure, and herein I take G.o.d to witness. To the matter I say and affirm that, when the first communication was had with me for the marriage of the Lady Anne of Cleves, I was glad to hearken to it, trusting to have some a.s.sured friend by it, I much doubting at that time both the Emperor, and France, and the Bishop of Rome, and also because I heard so much both of her excellent beauty and virtuous behaviour. But when I saw her at Rochester, which was the first time that ever I saw her, it rejoiced my heart that I had kept me free from making any pact or bond before with her till I saw her myself; for I a.s.sure you that I liked her so ill and [found her to be] so far contrary to that she was praised, that I was woe that ever she came into England, and deliberated with myself that if it were possible to find means to break off, I would never enter yoke with her; of which misliking both the Great Master (Lord Russell), the Admiral that now is, and the Master of the Horse (Sir Anthony Brown) can and will bear record. Then after my repair to Greenwich, the next day after, I think, I doubt not but the Lord of Ess.e.x will and can declare what I then said to him in that case, not doubting but, since he is a person which knoweth himself condemned to die by act of parliament, he will not d.a.m.n his soul, but truly declare the truth not only at that time spoken by me, but also continually until the day of the marriage, and also many times after; wherein my lack of consent I doubt not doth or shall well appear, and also lack enough of the will and power to consummate the same, wherein both he and my physicians can testify according to the truth.”

[Sidenote: The clergy deliberate for three days, and on the fourth deliver their sentence.]

Nearly two hundred clergy were a.s.sembled, and the ecclesiastical lawyers were called in to their a.s.sistance. The deliberation lasted Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday.[599] On Sat.u.r.day they had agreed upon their judgment, which was produced and read in the House of Lords.

[Sidenote: Owing to the imperfectly cleared pre-contract,]

The contract between the Lady Anne of Cleves and the Marquis of Lorraine was sufficient, they would not say to invalidate, but to perplex and complicate any second marriage into which she might have entered.

[Sidenote: Conditions unfulfilled,]

Before the ceremony the king had required the production of the papers relating to that engagement with so much earnestness, that the demand might be taken as a condition on which the marriage was completed. But the papers had not been produced, the uncertainties had not been cleared ... and thus there had not only been a breach of condition, but, if no condition had been made, the previous objection was further increased.

[Sidenote: The enforced consent of the king,]

Consent had been wanting on the part of the king. False representations had been held out to bring the lady into the realm and force her upon his Majesty's acceptance.

The solemnization of the marriage was extorted from his Majesty against his will under urgent pressure and compulsion by external causes.

[Sidenote: The absence of consummation,]

[Sidenote: And from other causes affecting the interests of the kingdom,]

Consummation had not followed, nor ought to follow, and the convocation had been informed--as indeed it was matter of common notoriety--that if his Majesty could, without the breach of any divine law, be married to another person, great benefits might thereby accrue to the realm, the present welfare and safety whereof depended on the preservation of his royal person, to the honour of G.o.d, the accomplishment of His will, and the avoiding of sinister opinions and scandals.

Considering all these circ.u.mstances, therefore, and weighing what the Church might and could lawfully do in such cases, and had often before done,[600] the convocation, by the tenor of those their present letters, declared his Majesty not to be any longer bound by the matrimony in question, which matrimony was null and invalid; and both his Majesty and the Lady Anne were free to contract and consummate other marriages without objection or delay.

[Sidenote: They declare the marriage dissolved.]

[Sidenote: The continuance of the marriage could not have been desired.]

[Sidenote: But the scandal was great and inevitable.]

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