1554.
After the parliament and convocation were dismissed, the new laws with regard to religion, though they had been anticipated in most places by the zeal of the Catholics, countenanced by government, were still more openly put in execution: the mass was every where reëstablished; and marriage was declared to be incompatible with any spiritual office. It has been asserted by some writers, that three fourths of the clergy were at this time deprived of their livings; though other historians, more accurate,[**] have estimated the number of sufferers to be far short of this proportion. A visitation was appointed, in order to restore more perfectly the mass and the ancient rites. Among other articles, the commissioners were enjoined to forbid the oath of supremacy to be taken by the clergy on their receiving any benefice.[***] It is to be observed, that this oath had been established by the laws of Henry VIII., which were still in force.
* Mem. Cranm. p. 354. Heylin, p. 50.
** Harmer, p. 138.
*** Collier, vol. ii. p. 364. Fox, vol. iii. p. 38. Heylin,
p. 35. Sleiden, lib. xxv.
This violent and sudden change of religion inspired the Protestants with great discontent; and even affected indifferent spectators with concern, by the hardships to which so many individuals were on that account exposed. But the Spanish match was a point of more general concern, and diffused universal apprehension for the liberty and independence of the nation. To obviate all clamor, the articles of marriage were drawn as favorable as possible for the interests and security, and even grandeur of England. It was agreed, that though Philip should have the title of king, the administration should be entirely in the queen; that no foreigner should be capable of enjoying any office in the kingdom; that no innovation should be made in the English laws, customs, and privileges; that Philip should not carry the queen abroad without her consent, nor any of her children without the consent of the nobility; that sixty thousand pounds a year should be settled as her jointure; that the male issue of this marriage should inherit, together with England, both Burgundy and the Low Countries; and that if Don Carlos, Philip’s son by his former marriage, should die, and his line be extinct, the queen’s issue, whether male or female, should inherit Spain, Sicily, Milan, and all the other dominions of Philip.[*] Such was the treaty of marriage signed by Count Egmont and three other ambassadors, sent over to England by the emperor.[**]
These articles, when published, gave no satisfaction to the nation. It was universally said, that the emperor, in order to get possession of England, would verbally agree to any terms and the greater advantage there appeared in the conditions which he granted, the more certainly might it be concluded that he had no serious intention of observing them: that the usual fraud and ambition of that monarch might assure the nation of such a conduct: and his son Philip, while he inherited these vices from his father, added to them tyranny, sullenness, pride, and barbarity, more dangerous vices of his own: that England would become a province, and a province to a kingdom which usually exercised the most violent authority over all her dependent dominions: that the Netherlands, Milan, Sicily, Naples, groaned under the burden of Spanish tyranny; and throughout all the new conquests in America there had been displayed scenes of unrelenting cruelty, hitherto unknown in the history of mankind: that the inquisition was a tribunal invented by that tyrannical nation, and would infallibly, with all their other laws and institutions, be introduced into England; and that the divided sentiments of the people with regard to religion would subject multitudes to this iniquitous tribunal, and would reduce the whole nation to the most abject servitude.[***]
* Rymer, vol. xv. p. 377.
** Dépêches de Noailles, vol. ii. p. 299.
*** Heylin p. 32. Burnet, vol. ii. p. 268. Godwin, p. 339.
These complaints being diffused every where, prepared the people for a rebellion; and had any foreign power given them encouragement, or any great man appeared to head them, the consequence might have proved fatal to the queen’s authority. But the king of France, though engaged in hostilities with the emperor, refused to concur in any proposal for an insurrection, lest he should afford Mary a pretence for declaring war against him.[*] And the more prudent part of the nobility thought that, as the evils of the Spanish alliance were only dreaded at a distance, matters were not yet fully prepared for a general revolt. Some persons, however, more turbulent than the rest, believed that it would be safer to prevent than to redress grievances; and they formed a conspiracy to rise in arms, and declare against the queen’s marriage with Philip. Sir Thomas Wiat purposed to raise Kent; Sir Peter Carew, Devonshire; and they engaged the duke of Suffolk, by the hopes of recovering the crown for the lady Jane, to attempt raising the midland counties.[**] Carew’s impatience or apprehensions engaged him to break the concert, and to rise in arms before the day appointed. He was soon suppressed by the earl of Bedford, and constrained to fly into France. On this intelligence, Suffolk, dreading an arrest, suddenly left the town with his brothers, Lord Thomas and Lord Leonard Gray, and endeavored to raise the people in the counties of Warwick and Leicester, where his interest lay; but he was so closely pursued by the earl of Huntingdon, at the head of three hundred horse, that he was obliged to disperse his followers, and being discovered in his concealment, he was carried prisoner to London.[***]
* Dépêches de Noailles, vol. ii. p. 249; vol. iii. p. 17,
58.
** Heylin, p. 33. Godwin, p. 340.
*** Fox, vol. iii. p. 30.
Wiat was at first more successful in his attempt; and having published a declaration, at Maidstone in Kent, against the queen’s evil counsellors, and against the Spanish match, without any mention of religion, the people began to flock to his standard. The duke of Norfolk, with Sir Henry Jernegan, was sent against him, at the head of the guards and some other troops, reënforced with five hundred Londoners commanded by Bret: and he came within sight of the rebels at Rochester, where they had fixed their head-quarters. Sir George Harper here pretended to desert from them; but having secretly gained Bret, these two malecontents so wrought on the Londoners, that the whole body deserted to Wiat, and declared that they would not contribute to enslave their native country. Norfolk, dreading the contagion of the example, immediately retreated with his troops, and took shelter in the city.[*]
After this proof of the disposition of the people, especially of the Londoners, who were mostly Protestants, Wiat was encouraged to proceed; he led his forces to Southwark, where he required of the queen that she should put the Tower into his hands, should deliver four counsellors as hostages, and in order to insure the liberty of the nation, should immediately marry an Englishman. Finding that the bridge was secured against him, and that the city was overawed, he marched up to Kingston, where he passed the river with four thousand men; and returning towards London, hoped to encourage his partisans who had engaged to declare for him. He had imprudently wasted so much time at Southwark, and in his march from Kingston, that the critical season, on which all popular commotions depend, was entirely lost: though he entered Westminster without resistance, his followers, finding that no person of note joined him, insensibly fell off, and he was at last seized near Temple Bar by Sir Maurice Berkeley.[**] Four hundred persons are said to have suffered for this rebellion:[***] four hundred more were conducted before the queen with ropes about their necks: and falling on their knees, received a pardon, and were dismissed. Wiat was condemned and executed: as it had been reported that, on his examination, he had accused the lady Elizabeth and the earl of Devonshire as accomplices, he took care, on the scaffold, before the whole people, fully to acquit them of having any share in his rebellion.