Under these circumstances, the Catholic party in England were alarmed and perplexed. Catherine had been undeceived at last in her expectation that the King would submit when the Pope had spoken. She informed Chapuys that she now saw it was necessary to use stronger remedies. What these remedies should be Chapuys said she dared not write, lest her letters should be intercepted. She was aware, too, that the Emperor knew best what should be done. Something must be tried, however, and speedily; for the King was acting vigorously, and to wait would be to be lost. A startling difference of opinion also was beginning to show itself even among the Queen’s friends. Some might turn round, Chapuys said, as they feared the Emperor, in helping her, would set up again the Pope’s authority, which they called tyrannical. It was the alarm at this which enabled the King to hold his subjects together.[281]
Though Mary had “shown her teeth” at her mother’s bidding, she had not provoked her father to further severities. He asked Mrs. Shelton if her pride was subdued. Mrs. Shelton saying there were no signs of it, he ordered that she should be more kindly treated; and he sent her a message that, if she was obedient, he would find some royal marriage for her. She answered that God had not so blinded her that she should confess that her father and mother had lived in adultery. The words, perhaps, lost nothing in the repeating; but the King said, and said rightly, that it was her mother’s influence. Catherine had persuaded her that his kindness was treachery, and that there was a purpose to poison her.[282]
A serious question, however, had risen about the Statute of Succession. The oath had been universally taken by everyone to whom it had been offered save More and Fisher. The reason for demanding it was the notorious intention of the Catholic party to take arms in Catherine’s and Mary’s interests. Were others to be sworn, and were the two ladies chiefly concerned to be exempted? Catherine, in ceasing to be queen, might be held to have recovered her rights as a foreigner. But she had remained in England by her own wish, and at the desire of the Emperor, to assist in fighting out the battle. Mary was undoubtedly a subject, and Catherine and she had both intimated that if the oath was demanded of them they would not take it. The Peers and Bishops were called together to consider the matter, and, as Catherine was a Spanish Princess, Chapuys was invited to attend.
The council-room was thronged. The Ambassador was introduced, and a copy of the statute was placed before him. He was informed that English subjects generally had voluntarily sworn to obey it. Two ladies only, Madam Catherine and Madam Mary, had declined, and the pains and penalties were pointed out to him which they might incur if they persisted.
Chapuys had been refused an opportunity of speaking his opinion in Parliament. It was now spontaneously offered him. He might, if he had pleased, have denounced the hardship of compelling the Queen and her daughter to assent personally to a statute which took their rights from them. The preamble declared the King’s marriage with Catherine to have been invalid, and in swearing to the Act of Succession she would be abandoning her entire plea. There was no intention, however, of forcing the oath upon the mother. Mary was the person aimed at; and Mary might have been spared also, if she had not “shewn her teeth” so plainly. Chapuys, however, spoke out boldly on the whole question. The King, he said, could not deprive the Princess of her place as heir to the crown, nor was the English Parliament competent to decide as to the validity of a marriage. The preamble of the statute was a lie. He would have proved it had he been permitted to speak there. People had sworn because they were afraid, and did not wish to be martyrs; and the oath being imposed by force, they knew that it could be no more binding than the oaths which he had lately taken to the Pope had bound the Archbishop of Canterbury. For a general answer, he produced the Pope’s sentence. The obstinacy which they complained of, he said, was in them, and not in the ladies. He could not persuade the ladies to swear; if he could, he would not, unless under orders from the Emperor; and he warned the Council that if they tried further violence they must be prepared to find the Emperor and Ferdinand their open enemies; the Emperor regarded the Queen as his mother, and the Princess as his sister; and, though he allowed that he was speaking without instructions, he intimated distinctly that the Emperor would not fail to protect them, and protect the cause of the Church, which had been intertwined with theirs.
Chapuys was bold, bolder perhaps than the Council had expected. The Bishop of Durham rose after a short pause. He had been Catherine’s advocate, and, as Chapuys said, was one of the most learned and honest prelates in the realm. But he, too, had come to see that the cause now at issue was the independence of England. He said that the statute had been well considered. It had been passed for the quiet of the realm, and must be obeyed. On Chapuys rejoining that the quiet of the realm required the King’s return to his wife, Tunstall mentioned the promises which had been made at the beginning of the suit, and produced the decretal which the Pope had given at Orvieto, declaring the marriage with Catherine invalid. Chapuys, in his answer, admitted, unconsciously, the justice of the English plea. He said the decretal had been issued when the Pope had just escaped from St. Angelo, and was angry and exasperated against the Emperor. As to other promises, he might or might not have made them. If he said he would give judgment in the King’s favour, he might have meant merely such a judgment as would be good for the King; or perhaps he was doing as criminal judges often did—holding out hopes to prisoners to tempt confessions from them. Such practices were legitimate and laudable.
The English argument was that a judge such as Chapuys described was not to be trusted with English suits. Henry himself could not have put the case more effectively. The Bishop of London spoke, and the Archbishop of York, and then Sampson (the Dean of the Chapel Royal), who affirmed bluntly that the Pope had no inherent rights over England. Man had given him his authority, and man might take it from him. Chapuys replied that the King had found it established when he came to the throne, and had himself recognised it in referring his cause to the Pope. Cranmer was present, but took no direct part. He brought out, however, the true issue, by suggesting, through Tunstall, that the Pope had incapacitated himself by submitting to be controlled by the Emperor. This was the point of the matter. To allow an English suit to be decided by Charles V. was to make England a vassal state of the Empire. To this Chapuys had no valid answer, for none could be given; and he discreetly turned the argument by reflecting on the unfitness of Cranmer also.
So far the laymen on the Council had left the discussion to the Bishops, and the Ambassador thought that he had the best of it. The Duke of Norfolk, he imagined, thought so too; for the Duke rose after the taunts at the Archbishop. The King’s second marriage, he said, was a fait accompli, and to argue further over it was loss of time. They had passed their statute, and he, for one, would maintain it to the last drop of his blood. To refuse obedience was high treason; and, the fact being so, the ladies must submit to the law. The King himself could not disobey an Act which concerned the tranquillity of the realm.
Chapuys would not yield. He said their laws were like the laws of Mahomet—laws of the sword—being so far worse, that Mahomet did not make his subjects swear to them. Not with entire honesty—for he knew now that Catherine had consented to the use of force—he added, that they could have small confidence in their own strength if they were afraid of two poor weak women, who had neither means nor will to trouble them.
The Council said that they would report to the King, and so the conversation ended. Chapuys spoke afterwards privately to Cromwell. He renewed his warning that, if violence was used, there would be real danger. Cromwell said he would do his best. But there was a general fear that something harsh would be tried at the instigation of the “accursed Concubine.” Probably the question would be submitted to Parliament, or as some thought the Queen and Princess would be sent to the Tower.[283] Conceiving extremities to be close, Chapuys asked the Scotch Ambassador whether, if a mandate came from the Pope against England, the Scots would obey it. Certainly they would obey it, was the answer, though they might pretend to regret the necessity.