Renewed attempts to get Colet into trouble.
The King again supports Colet.
So earnestly had Colet preached, and with such telling and pointed allusion to the events of the day, that the King was not a little afraid that the sermon might damp the zeal of his newly enlisted soldiers. Thereupon, like birds of evil omen, the enemies of Colet hovered round him as though he were an owl, hoping that at length the royal anger might be stirred against him. The King sent for Colet. He came at the royal command. He dined at the Franciscan monastery adjoining the Palace at Greenwich. When the King knew he was there, he went out into the monastery garden to meet him, dismissing all his attendants. And when the two were quite alone, he bade Colet to cover his head and be at ease with him. ‘I did not call you here, Dean,’ he said to him, ‘to interrupt your holy labours, for of these I altogether approve, but to unburden my conscience of some scruples, that by your advice I may be able more fully to do my duty.’ They talked together nearly an hour and a half; Colet’s enemies, meanwhile, impatiently waiting in the court, scarcely able to contain their fury, chuckling over the jeopardy in which they thought Colet at last stood with the King. As it was, the King approved and agreed with Colet in everything he said. But he was glad to find that Colet had not intended to declare absolutely that there could be no just war, no doubt persuading himself that his own was one of the very few just ones. The conversation ended in his expressing a wish that Colet would some time or other explain himself more clearly, lest the raw soldiers should go away with a mistaken notion, and think that he had really said that no war is lawful to Christians.[436] ‘And thus’ (continues Erasmus) ‘Colet, by his singular discretion and moderation, not only satisfied the mind of the King, but even rose in his favour.’ When he returned to the palace at parting, the King graciously drank to his health, embracing him most warmly, and, promising all the favours which it was in the power of a most loving prince to grant, dismissed him. Colet was no sooner gone than the courtiers flocked again round the King, to know the result of his conference in the convent garden. Whereupon the King replied, in the hearing of all: ‘Let every one have his own doctor, and let every one favour his own; this man is the doctor for me.’ Upon this the hungry wolves departed without their bone, and thereafter no one ever dared to meddle with Colet. This is Erasmus’s version[437] of an incident which, especially when placed in its proper historical setting, may be looked upon as a jewel in the crown both of the young King and of his upright subject. It has been reported that Colet complied with the King’s wish, and preached another sermon in favour of the war against France, of the necessity and justice of which, as strictly defensive, the King had convinced him. But with reference to this second sermon, if ever it was preached, Erasmus is silent.[438]
III. THE SECOND CAMPAIGN OF HENRY VIII. (1513).
While the King was trying to pacify his conscience, and allay the scruples raised in his mind by Colet’s preaching, his ambassador (West) was listening to a Good Friday sermon at the Chapel Royal of Scotland, and using the occasion to urge upon the Queen to use her influence with the Scotch king in favour of peace with England. There were rumours that the Scotch king was playing into the hands of the King of France—that he was going to send a ‘great ship’ to aid him in his wars. A legacy happened to be due from England to the Queen of Scotland, and West was instructed to threaten to withhold payment unless James would promise to keep the peace with England. James gave shuffling and unsatisfactory replies. There were troubles ahead in that quarter![439]
Leo X. in favour of peace.
The news sent by West from Scotland must have raised some forebodings in Henry’s mind. The chance of finding one enemy behind him, if he attempted to invade France, in itself was not encouraging. As to any scruples raised by Colet’s preaching, his head was probably far too full of the approaching campaign, and his heart too earnestly set upon the success of his fleet, to admit of his impartially considering the right and the wrong of the war in which he was already involved, or the evils it would bring upon his country. Meanwhile, probably only a few days after Colet’s sermon was preached, the anxiously expected news reached England of the election to the Papal chair of Cardinal de’ Medici, an acquaintance of Erasmus, and the fellow-student of his friend Linacre, under the title of Leo X. The letter which conveyed the news to Henry VIII. spoke of the ‘gentleness, innocence, and virtue’ of the new Pope, and his anxiety for a ‘universal peace.’ He had declared that he would abide by the League, but the writer expressed his opinion that ‘he would not be fond of war like Julius—that he would favour literature and the arts, and employ himself in building [St. Peter’s], but not enter upon any war except from compulsion, unless it might be against the infidels.’[440]
Henry VIII. will not listen to it.
Henry—just then receiving reports from his fleet, dating to April 5,[441] full of eager expectation and confidence on the part of the Admiral, ‘that an engagement with the French might be looked for in five or six days, and that by the aid of God and of St. George they hoped to have a fair day with them’—was not at all in a humour to hear of a general peace. So on April 12, all good advice of Colet’s forgotten, he wrote to his minister at Rome,[442] instructing him to express his joy that Leo X. had adhered to the Holy League, and to state that he (Henry) could not think of entertaining any propositions for peace, considering the magnitude and vast expense of his preparations, at all events without the consent of all parties. A fleet of 12,000 soldiers, the minister was to say, was already at sea, and Henry was preparing to invade France himself with 40,000 more, and powerful artillery. It would be most expedient to cripple the power of the King of France now, and prevent his ambition for the future.[443]
This letter was written on April 12. On the 17th Sir Arthur Plantagenet came with letters from the fleet, under leave of absence. He could ill be spared, wrote the Admiral; but his ship had struck upon a rock, and in great peril he had made a vow that, if it pleased God to deliver him, he would not eat flesh or fish till he had made a pilgrimage to the shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham;[444] and accordingly thither he was bound.
Admiral Howard lost.