For the parliament now elected, it is plain that the Privy Seal put out his utmost strength; and that he believed beforehand that his measures had been so well laid as to ensure the results which he desired. “I and your dedicate councillors,” he wrote to the king, “be about to bring all things so to pass that your Grace had never more tractable parliament.”[447] The event was to prove that he had deceived himself; a reaction set in too strong for his control, and the spirit which had dictated the Doncaster petition, though subdued and modified, could still outweigh the despotism of the minister or the intrigues of his agents.
Union of the provinces of Canterbury and York in the convocation.
The returns were completed; the members assembled in London, and with them as usual the convocation of the clergy. As an evidence of the greatness of the occasion, the two provinces were united into one; the convocation of York held its session with the convocation of Canterbury; a synod of the whole English Church met together, in virtue of its recovered or freshly constituted powers, to determine the articles of its belief.[448]
April 28. Parliament opens.
Speech from the throne.
The houses assembled to compose the religious differences in the realm.
Committee of opinion.
Suggestions offered by the moderate Reformers.
A heresy court to be appointed, mixed of priests and laymen.
The clergy to be allowed to marry.