King Henry's long diplomatic intrigues with Spain and the Emperor brought him no very great profit in the end. But it was otherwise with his dealings with his neighbours in the British Isles. After the defeat of Perkin Warbeck, he made an advantageous peace with James IV. of Scotland, who married his daughter Margaret, and became his firm ally. For the last ten years of his reign Scotland gave no trouble. The still more difficult task of pacifying Ireland was also carried out with considerable success. Henry dealt very gently with the Irish chiefs, in spite of the treasonable support that they had given both to Simnel and to Warbeck. His plan of ruling the country was to enlist in his favour the Earl of Kildare, the most powerful of the Irish barons, by making him Lord Deputy, and entrusting him with very full control over the rest. "All Ireland cannot rule the Earl of Kildare," it had been said; but the king answered, "Then the Earl of Kildare shall rule all Ireland."
Poynings' Act.
This policy was attended by a fair measure of success; if turbulent himself, the earl at least put down all other riotous chiefs. Henry's reign was also notable in Ireland for the passing of Poynings' Act at the Parliament of Drogheda. This put the Irish legislature in strict subordination to England, by providing that all laws brought before it must previously receive the assent of the king and his English Privy Council (1495).
Henry Tudor died before his time in 1509, having not yet reached the age of fifty-four. He left behind him a land peaceful and orderly, a nobility tamed and reduced to obedience, and a treasury filled with £1,800,000 in hard cash—the best possible witness to his wisdom and ability, for no king of England had ever built up such a hoard before. If his aims had been selfish and his hand hard, he had at any rate given England "strong governance," and saved her from sinking into anarchy.
FOOTNOTES:
[30] Seven years later, Henry VIII. executed this unhappy prisoner in cold blood, and for no new offence.
CHAPTER XXI.
HENRY VIII., AND THE BREACH WITH ROME.
1509-1536.
The young king who succeeded to the cautious and politic Henry VII. was perhaps the most remarkable man who ever sat upon the English throne. He guided England through the epoch of change and unrest which lay between the middle ages and modern history, and his guidance was of such a peculiar and personal stamp that he left an indelible mark on the land for many succeeding generations. All Europe was transformed during his time, and that the transformation in England differed from that on the continent in almost every respect, was due to his own strange combination of qualities.