3. Wolsey's Legatine Powers.—It is unlikely that Wolsey was much disappointed. His chief sphere of action was England, where since 1518 he had held unwonted authority, as in that year he had been appointed Legate a latere[1] by Leo X. at Henry's request, and the powers of a Legate a latere were superior even to those of Warham, the Archbishop of Canterbury. Wolsey was therefore clothed with all the authority of king and Pope combined. His own life was, indeed, like those of many churchmen in his day, very far from the ideal of Christianity; but for all that he had that respect for religious order which often lingers in the hearts of men who break away from the precepts of religion, and he was too great a statesman to be blind to the danger impending over the Church. The old order was changing, and Wolsey was as anxious as More, though from more worldly motives, that the change should be effected without violence. He knew that the Church was wealthy, and that wealth tempted plunderers, and he also knew that, with some bright exceptions, the clergy were ignorant, and even when not absolutely dissolute were remiss and easy-going in their lives. He was, therefore, anxious to make them more worthy of respect, and, with the consent of king and Pope, he began in 1524 to dissolve several small monasteries, and to apply their revenues to two great colleges, the one founded by him at Oxford and the other at Ipswich. He hoped that without any change of doctrine or organisation the Church would gradually be purified by improved education, and would thus once more command the respect of the laity.
4. Henry VIII. and the Clergy.—With Wolsey's object Henry, being himself well educated and well read, fully sympathised. For many years there had been a tacit understanding between the king and the Pope, and now that both the king and the Pope supported Wolsey's action there seemed to be less danger than ever of any disturbance of the friendly relations between Church and State. Yet though Henry was on good terms with the Pope, he had made up his mind that whenever there was a conflict of jurisdiction in ecclesiastical matters his own will, and not that of the clergy, was to be predominant. As early as in 1515, when a question of this kind was moved, Wolsey asked on behalf of the clergy that it might be referred to the Pope. "We," said Henry proudly, "are by God's grace king of England, and have no superior but God; we will maintain the rights of the crown like our predecessors; your decrees you break and interpret at your pleasure, but we will not consent to your interpretation of them any more than our predecessors have done." Henry VIII., in short, took up the position which Henry II. had assumed towards the clergy of his day, and he was far more powerful to give effect to his views than Henry II. had ever been. Such an act of self-assertion would probably have caused a breach with the great Popes of the middle ages, such as Gregory VII. or Innocent III. Leo X. was far too much a man of the world to trouble himself about such matters.
Tower of Fountains Abbey church; built by Abbot Huby. 1494-1526.
5. German Lutheranism.—Before many years had passed the beginnings of a great religious revolution which appeared in Germany served to bind Henry and Leo more closely together. Martin Luther, a Saxon friar, had been disgusted by the proceedings of a hawker of indulgences, who extracted small sums from the ignorant by the sale of the remission of the pains of purgatory. What gave world-wide importance to Luther's resistance was that he was not only an eloquent preacher of morality, but the convinced maintainer of a doctrine which, though not a new one, had long been laid aside. He preached justification by faith, and the acceptance of his teaching implied even more than the acceptance of a new doctrine. For centuries it had been understood that each Christian held intercourse with God through the sacraments and ordinances of the Church. His individuality was, as it were, swallowed up in the vast community to which he belonged. Luther taught each of his hearers that the important thing was his faith, that is to say his immediate personal relation with God, and that the intervention of human beings might, indeed, be helpful to him, but could be no more. Such a doctrine touched all human activity. The man who in religion counted his own individual faith as the one thing necessary was likely to count his own individual convictions in social or political matters as worth more to him than his obedience to the authority of any government. In Luther's teaching was to be found the spirit of political as well as of religious liberty. This side of it, however, was not likely to reveal itself at once. After a time Luther shook off entirely the claims of the Papacy upon his obedience, but he magnified the duty of obeying the princes who gave him their support in his struggle with the Pope.