Some writers assert that Gardiner was vindictive and cruel; others, that he was forced tacitly to permit proceedings of which he disapproved, and of which he would willingly have mitigated the severity.
Others again say that the King's love of power, and his desire to show himself as a true son of the Church, although he had assumed her temporal headship, induced him to bear witness to his faith by severe measures, whenever her authority in doctrines was impugned by his subjects.
Certain it is, that now began a series of religious persecutions that cast shame and disgrace upon all who professed the name of Christ.
His holy Church on earth, far from being a tender mother to poor, suffering, and ignorant mortals, became a by-word for cruelty and bigotry, a very Moloch, who desired the sacrifice of her children both by fire and by the sword.
What can men deem are the chief attributes of the Almighty, that to give Him pleasure it is necessary to torture and put to death the children that His dear Son came to save?
It is sickening to read the list of those who suffered for religion's sake during the latter part of Henry's reign, and during the whole of the reign of his daughter, Queen Mary.
A Frenchman writing at this time from England, tells his friend in Latin:
"They have a strange way of managing in England, for those who are for the Pope are hanged, and those who are against him are burnt."
Henry also each year became more tyrannical and overbearing. He brooked neither opposition nor contradiction. His humours were so capricious that even his Ministers were constantly in personal danger, it being impossible to foresee how much involved the King might choose to consider them in the schisms that were being brought to the Royal notice.
Gardiner was certainly once in very considerable peril.