Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 69, No. 424, February 1851

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BLACKWOOD'S
EDINBURGH MAGAZINE.
No. CCCCXXIV. FEBRUARY, 1851. Vol. LXIX.
It matters not what may have been the private character of the Cardinal. He has been represented as a man of mild nature, humane disposition, and averse to the infamous cruelties which were then perpetrated, the odium of which has been commonly thrown upon Bishops Gardiner and Bonner. This much at least is plain, that, whatever may have been his opinion as to the methods which were employed for the suppression of Protestantism, he did not deem it expedient to exercise his great power in mitigating the fury or tempering the cruelty of the persecution. He was a passive witness of the enormities, and allowed the mandates of the Church to supersede the dictates of humanity and the merciful teaching of the Saviour.