THE TRIAL OF QUEEN CATHERINE. (See p. [151.])
(After the Picture by Laslett J. Pott.)
It now occurred to him that, though the Pope had granted permission for Wolsey and the legate to decide this momentous question, yet he might be induced, by the influence of Charles, to revise and reverse the sentence pronounced by his delegates: and this might involve him in inextricable dilemmas, especially should he have acted on the sentence of divorce, and married again.
Clement was placed in a very trying situation. He was anxious to oblige Henry, but to grant the bull confirming the sentence to be pronounced by Wolsey and the Legate, was to annihilate the dogma of Papal infallibility, for Julius II. had granted the Church's dispensation, notwithstanding the fact of Catherine's union with Henry's brother. Clement had been also informed that Henry's object was only to gratify the wish of a woman who was already living in adultery with him. But this was rebutted by a letter already received from Wolsey, assuring the Pope that Anne Boleyn was a lady of unimpeachable character. Driven from this point, Clement still demurred as to the formidable bull; and only consented, after consultation with a convocation of cardinals and theologians, to issue an order for a commission to inquire into the validity of the dispensation granted by Pope Julius, and to revoke it, if it was found to have been by any means surreptitiously obtained.
Campeggio, who had most reluctantly undertaken the appointment of commissioner in this case, was all this time slowly, very slowly, progressing towards England. He was an eminent professor of the canon law, and an experienced statesman. He had been a married man, and had a family; but, on the death of his wife, in 1509, he had taken orders, was made cardinal in 1517, and had been employed by Leo and his successors in various arduous cases to their highest satisfaction. Campeggio arrived in London at last, on the 7th of October, 1528, but in such exhaustion, from violent and long attacks of the gout, that he was carried in a litter to his lodgings, and remained for some time confined to his bed. Henry, with his characteristic hypocrisy, on the approach of the legate, again sent away his mistress, and recalled his obliging wife, with whom he appeared to be living on the most affectionate terms. They had the same bed and board, and went regularly through the same devotions. The arrival of the legate raised the courage of the people, who were unanimous in the favour of the queen, and, though Wolsey made every exertion to silence and restrain them, they loudly declared that, let the king marry whom he pleased, they would acknowledge no successor in prejudice to Mary.
It was a fortnight before the legate was ready to see the king. On the 22nd of October he made his visit, and was, of course, most graciously received by Henry and the cardinal, but they could extract from him no opinion as to the probable result of the inquiry which was at hand. Henry and Wolsey exerted all their arts to win over the great man. The king paid him constant visits; and to mollify and draw him out heaped all sorts of flatteries upon him, and made him the most brilliant promises. He had already made him Bishop of Salisbury, and presented him with a splendid palace in Rome; and he now offered to confer on him the rich bishopric of Durham, and knighted his son Ridolfo, by whom he was accompanied. But nothing moved the impenetrable ecclesiastic; for if favours were heaped on him here, terrors awaited him at Rome if he betrayed the trust of his master, the Pope. He replied to all solicitations that he had every disposition to serve the king, so far as his conscience would permit him. To produce a favourable bias in the opinions of the inexorable man, the judgments of eminent divines and doctors of the canon law on the king's case were laid before him. These he read, but still kept his own ideas locked in his breast.
Henry next endeavoured to obtain from Campeggio the publication of the decretal bull, or, at least, that it should be shown to the Privy Council, but the legate remained firm to his instructions. The king's agents at the same time plied Clement with persuasives to the same end, but with the same result. So far from giving way, the agents informed Henry that the Emperor had given back to the Pope Civita Vecchia and all the fortresses which he had taken from the Holy See, and that it was to be feared that there was a secret understanding between the Pope and Charles. At this news Henry despatched Sir Francis Bryan, Master of the Henchmen, and Peter Vannes, his secretary of the Latin tongue, to Francis I., upbraiding him with his neglect in permitting this to go on; and they then proceeded to Italy, and requested the Pope to cite all Christian princes to meet in Avignon and settle their differences. In the meantime these agents were to consult the most celebrated canonists at Rome on the following extraordinary points:—"1. Whether, if a wife were to make a vow of chastity, and enter a convent, the Pope could not, in the plenitude of his power, authorise the husband to marry again. 2. Whether, if the husband were to enter into a religious order, that he might induce the wife to do the same, he might not afterwards be released from his vow, and have liberty to marry. 3. Whether, for reasons of State, the Pope could not license a prince to have, like the ancient patriarchs, two wives, of whom one only should be publicly acknowledged, and enjoy the honours of royalty."
On the 6th of February, 1529, the intelligence arrived that Clement was dying, and by that time was probably dead. Now was the time to place Wolsey in the Papal chair, and thus end all difficulties. Francis promised cordially to aid in the attempt; but, to their dismay, Clement revived, and dashed their hopes to the ground. Made desperate by these chances, Henry now gave the invalid Pope no rest from his solicitations. His agents forced themselves into his very sick chamber, and demanded that the fatal mandate of dispensation granted by Julius II.—a copy of which Catherine had obtained from Spain—should be revoked, or that Charles should be compelled to exhibit the original. But the Pope remained firm. He declared that he could not depart from the course already prescribed, that Catherine had even entered a protest in his Court against the persons of her judges, and he recommended Henry to lose no time, but to try to determine the matter in his own realm.