England under the Tudors

by Arthur D. Innes

The most arresting figure of the period is that of Henry himself. No English King has been presented by historians in more contradictory colours than he. One has painted him as the Warrior of God who purged the land of the Unclean Thing: to another he is merely a libidinous tyrant. One contrasts his honesty and honour with the habitual falsehood of his contemporaries: to another he appears supreme in treachery. In fact, there is an element of truth in both estimates, however exaggerated.

[Sidenote: His Morals]

In the matter of personal morality, in the restricted sense, it does not appear—in spite of his list of wives—that he compares unfavourably with contemporary princes. He had only one child certainly born out of wedlock—which cannot be said even of Charles V., [Footnote: It should perhaps be remarked that whenever Charles had a wife living he appears to have been faithful to her. His divagations took place in the intervals.] and contrasts with the unbridled profligacy of Francis, the frequent amours of his Stewart brother-in-law and nephew. The stories of his relations with both Anne and Mary Boleyn before the marriage, even if untrue (which is not probable), would never have been told of a man whose life was clean; but it is what may be called the accident of his numerous marriages which has given a misleading prominence to licentious tendencies not perhaps abnormally developed. With the exception of his passion for Anne Boleyn, there is no trace of his amours influencing his general conduct: and it is at least probable that after the death of Jane Seymour he would have remained a widower, but for the desire to make the succession more secure. Yet the story of his reign hinges upon the Divorce; and in the divorce, however much other considerations may have influenced him, the controlling consideration was the determination to make Anne Boleyn his wife since she would have him on no other terms. That fact, with the disastrous termination of the marriage with her, the fiasco of Anne of Cleves, and the catastrophe of Katharine Howard, is responsible for the somewhat mythical monster of popular imagination. The man who divorced two wives and beheaded two more is too suggestive of Bluebeard to be readily regarded as after all to some extent the victim of circumstance.

[Sidenote: His general character]

While Anne Boleyn was the object of his pursuit, Henry was dominated by his passion for her: but that passion cooled quickly enough after possession. Jane Seymour was not his wife long enough to put him to the test: but it would certainly seem that his affections were short-lived and easily transferred. This was manifestly the case with men: at least it never appeared to cause him a moment's compunction to hand over an intimate to the executioner. While a man was rendering him efficient service the King was lavish of praises and rewards; when the need for him was past the services were forgotten. His sentiments were always of the loftiest; it habitually "consorted not with his honour or his conscience" to do otherwise than he did; but the correspondence between his honour and conscience on one side and his personal advantage on the other presents a unique phenomenon. His conscience permitted him to connive at schemes for kidnapping the King of Scots or assassinating his ministers, and his honour permitted him to encourage his own servants in a course of action for which he had subsequently no hesitation in sending them to the block. He could give, prodigally; but what he gave had generally been taken from some one else. He could protest against the cruel burden of the annates, and then absorb them himself. And with all this, it is not difficult to suppose that he constantly persuaded himself that he was an honest man beset with dishonest rogues, since he rarely broke the letter of an engagement except on the pretext of bad faith made manifest in the other party.

[Sidenote 1: His peculiar abilities]
[Sidenote 2: Intention and achievement]

Henry's ethical standards were thus in no way calculated to hamper his actions, owing to his happy capacity for colouring his actions in conformity with them. When he set an end before himself, no influence could make him waver a hair's-breadth in his pursuit of it, and he spared neither friend nor foe in the attainment of it. As a statesman he did not lay down far-seeing designs. But he had the art of maintaining popularity, and a shrewd eye for a good servant. Thus as a rule he gave Wolsey a free hand and very vigorous support. But when he elected to order a change of policy, the Cardinal proved to have been right and the King wrong. His candidature for the Empire, and his dreams of the French and Scottish thrones show him capable of indulging in entirely impracticable visions. The vital achievement of his reign was the severance from Rome; and that was merely—as far as he was concerned—the accidental outcome of the Pope's opposition to the Divorce. In the destruction of the ecclesiastical imperium in imperio, the subordination of the Church to the State, it is difficult to tell how far the policy was his own and how far it was Cromwell's; but the King never recognised as Cromwell did that the logical corollary of the whole ecclesiastical policy was a Protestant League. The defiance of Rome, and the subjection and spoliation of the Church, were accompanied by a measure in which Cranmer was the moving spirit, and to which Henry gave full support—the open admission of the Scriptures in the vernacular—which made it no longer possible for the individual to disclaim responsibility on the score that the priesthood alone held the key to the mysteries of religion. This was in truth the keystone of the Reformation, since it entailed upon every man the duty of private judgment even though the right continued to be denied; yet this was not the effect which Henry contemplated. Hence, out of the four points in the ecclesiastical revolution of the reign: the subordination of the Church to the State was a constitutional change absolutely Henry's or Cromwell's own; the spoliation was the same, but reflects no credit on either; the severance from Rome was an accident; and the creation of the duty, to be ultimately recognised as the right, of private judgment was unintentional. And on the kindred subject, the persecution of innovators labelled as heretics, Henry's policy represented nothing but the commonplace attitude of Authority in his times.

[Sidenote: A Dominant personality]

We cannot, in short, find in Henry a statesman remarkable for far-sighted perceptions or ennobling idealism: but he gauged the sentiment of his subjects and the abilities of his servants acutely and was shrewd enough as a rule to identify himself with the schemes of those whom he trusted. Nevertheless he stands out, with all his faults, as a very tyrannical King yet a very kingly tyrant. If his personal ambitions and desires over-ruled other considerations, he never forgot the greatness of the country he ruled, and his personal ambitions at least involved England's magnification. For good or for evil, his actions were on a great scale. He knew his own mind, and he never shrank from the risks involved in giving his will effect. He defied successfully the Power which had brought the mightiest monarchs to their knees. He had the kingly quality, shared by his great daughter, of inspiring in his servants a devotion which made them ready to sacrifice everything for his glorification. Two of the most powerful ministers known in English history recognised the domination of his personality whenever he chose to exercise it.

[Sidenote: Summary]