[325] Confessions of Elizabeth Barton: Rolls House MS. Sir Thomas More gave her a double ducat to pray for him and his. BURNET'S Collectanea, p. 352. Moryson, in his Apomaxis, declares that she had a regular understanding with the confessors at the Priory. When penitents came to confess, they were detained while a priest conveyed what they had acknowledged to the Nun; and when afterwards they were admitted to her presence, she amazed them with repeating their own confessions.
[326] The said Elizabeth subtilly and craftily conceiving the opinion and mind of the said Edward Bocking, willing to please him, revealed and showed unto the said Edward that God was highly displeased with our said sovereign lord the king for this matter; and in case he desisted not from his proceeding in the said divorce and separation, but pursued the same and married again, that then within one month after such marriage, he should no longer be king of this realm; and in the reputation of Almighty God he should not be a king one day nor one hour, and that he should die a villain's death. Saying further, that there was a root with three branches, and till they were plucked up it should never be merry in England: interpreting the root to be the late lord cardinal, and the first branch to be the king our sovereign lord, the second the Duke of Norfolk, and the third the Duke of Suffolk.—25 Hen. VIII. cap. 12.
[327] Revelations of Elizabeth Barton: Rolls House MS. In the epitome of the book of her Revelations it is stated that there was a story in it "of an angel that appeared, and bade the Nun go unto the king, that infidel prince of England, and say that I command him to amend his life, and that he leave three things which he loveth and pondereth upon, i.e., that he take none of the pope's right nor patrimony from him; the second that he destroy all these new folks of opinion and the works of their new learning; the third, that if he married and took Anne to wife, the vengeance of God should plague him; and as she sayth she shewed this unto the king."—Paper on the Nun of Kent: MS. Cotton, Cleopatra, E 4.
[328] ELLIS, third series, vol. ii. p. 137. Warham had promised to marry Henry to Anne Boleyn. The Nun frightened him into a refusal by a pretended message from an angel.—MS. ibid.
[329] The Nun hath practised with two of the pope's ambassadors within this realm, and hath sent to the pope that if he did not do his duty in reformation of kings, God would destroy him at a certain day which he had appointed. By reason whereof it is supposed that the pope hath showed himself so double and so deceivable to the King's Grace in his great cause of marriage as he hath done, contrary to all truth, justice, and equity. As likewise the late cardinal of England, and the Archbishop of Canterbury, being very well-minded to further and set at an end the marriage which the King's Grace now enjoyeth, according to their spiritual duty, were prevented by the false revelations of the said Nun. And that the said Bishop of Canterbury was so minded may be proved by divers which knew then his towardness.—Narrative of the Proceedings of Elizabeth Barton: Rolls House MS.
[330] Note of the Revelations of Elizabeth Barton: Rolls House MS.
[331] HALL, p. 780.
[332] RYMER, vol. vi. p. 160. We are left to collateral evidence to fix the place of this petition, the official transcriber having contented himself with the substance, and omitted the date. The original, as appears from the pope's reply (LORD HERBERT, p. 145), bore the date of July 13; and unless a mistake was made in transcribing the papal brief, this was July, 1530. I have ventured to assume a mistake, and to place the petition in the following year, because the judgment of the universities, to which it refers, was not completed till the winter of 1530; they were not read in parliament till March 30, 1531; and it seems unlikely that a petition of so great moment would have been presented on an incomplete case, or before the additional support of the House of Commons had been secured. I am far from satisfied, however, that I am right in making the change. The petition must have been drawn up (though it need not have been presented) in 1530; since it bears the signature of Wolsey, who died in the November of that year.
[333] Mademoiselle de Boleyn est venue; et l'a le Roy logée en fort beau logis; et qu'il a faict bien accoustrer tout auprés du sien. Et luy est la cour faicte ordinairement tous les jours plus grosse que de long temps elle ne fut faicte a la Royne. Je crois bien qu'on veult accoutumer par les petie ce peuple à l'endurer, afin que quand ivendra à donner les grands coups, il ne les trouve si estrange. Toutefois il demeure tous jours endurcy, et croy bien qu'il feroit plus qu'il ne faict si plus il avoit de puissance; mais grand ordre se donne par tout.—Bishop of Bayonne to the Grand Master: LEGRAND, vol. iii. p. 231.
[334] HALL, p. 781.