THE MONARCHY AGAIN IN THE ASCENDANT.

SIXTEENTH CENTURY.

THE growth of Parliament was utterly checked during this stormy period. From the date of Magna Charta down to Henry VI., the Barons and the Middle Class had co-operated to increase their power at the expense of the Monarchy. The civil war wholly changed the position: for the Barons and Middle Class were divided in their support to the rival pretensions of the two Royal claimants, and so wasted the energies hitherto concentrated on constitutional victories. The result was that when Henry Tudor, Earl of Richmond, mounted the throne, 1485, he found it easy to restore the Monarchy to the power it enjoyed before the birth of Parliament. "The destruction of the nobility in the civil wars," says Rowland, "by lowering the power of the aristocracy, placed Henry VII. in a condition to acquire and exercise absolute power." The number of Barons was reduced to 40: the Clergy were thus in a majority in the House of Lords, and the Clergy gave their support to the King. The Commons, having lost their old leaders, made no opposition to Royal authority. The spirit of independence formerly displayed by the "citizens and burgesses" in Parliament was never visible during the period when the Tudor family occupied the throne. Henry VII. set the example of keeping the Nobility

down, and his son Henry VIII., and his grandchild Elizabeth, adopted his tactics. The consequence was that the Middle Class, deprived of their former chiefs in the House of Lords, were completely cowed, and remained so down to James I.. when the Nobility raised their heads once more, and renewed their old opposition to Absolute Monarchy. Henry VII. was always on his guard against the Barons, "for he kept," says Lord Bacon, "a strait hand on his nobility, and chose rather to advance clergymen and lawyers which were more obsequious to him, but had less interest in the people; which made for his absoluteness, but not for his safety. For his nobles, though they were loyal and obedient, did not co-operate with him, but let every man go his own way." This passage from Lord Bacon, who wrote in the reign of Elizabeth, shows that the Nobles had been so exhausted by the civil wars, that they dared no longer stimulate the Middle Class to resist arbitrary power.

During this reign Canada and Nova Scotia were discovered by the Cabots, who were patronized by the King.

We now enter upon the sixteenth century, usually considered the close of the Middle Ages; but it is questionable if the epoch known as Modern Times can be said to commence before the institutions of the Middle Ages were overthrown; that is, until the year 1688 in England and the year 1789 in France.

Be that as it may, the sixteenth century is renowned for the successful effort in England to suppress the despotism of the primitive Church. For centuries the Papacy had controlled the Governments of Europe by its spiritual power over the masses. Kings and Princes

struggled against the yoke, but were fain to submit. Superstition began to lose ground in the sixteenth century; and Luther dared to protest against the domination of the Pope, and to call on the people to read the Scriptures and work out their own salvation. The invention of Printing now made the Bible accessible to all.

This rebellion against the authority of the Church in the sixteenth century in England was the forerunner of the rebellion against the authority of the State in the seventeenth century.

To England belongs the glory of having pioneered the human race to its emancipation. She became, from the accidents of her history, the champion of humanity against the arbitrary power which the Minority had always, in the name of religion and government, exercised over the Majority of men. The alliance of her Aristocracy and Middle Class, a phenomenon impossible elsewhere, forced Absolute Monarchy, in the thirteenth century, to surrender "rights and liberties" never before conceded to mankind. The hope of freedom thus engendered led the nation, in the sixteenth century, to support a hot-brained King in his impassioned assault on the Papal power. Whilst the growth of political liberty in England is due to the union of her Aristocracy and Freemen, it is equally clear that her religious liberty could not have been secured if this partnership had not been maintained. In the reigns of Henry VIII. and Elizabeth, when the ecclesiastical monopoly was abolished, and free trade in religion initiated, it is true the hands of the Aristocracy and Middle Class were not so visible as in the political struggles of previous reigns, but neither Henry nor Elizabeth

could have conquered the Pope if the Aristocracy and Middle Class had not supported them. The Aristocracy may have been divided by religious scruples, as was also the Middle Class; but the majority of both foresaw that the downfall of religious despotism would necessarily prepare the same fate for political tyranny.

The Tudor Kings, from Henry VII. to Elizabeth-1485 to 1603-were more absolute than either Norman or Plantagenet, and simply because the Aristocracy were crippled by the civil wars, and unable, as before, to lead the Middle Class against the common enemy. Thus it was that during the Tudor dynasty, Parliament seemed to abdicate its old rôle of extending its privileges and curtailing those of the Monarchy. No doubt the peremptory commands of Henry and Elizabeth were cheerfully obeyed when Papal domination was in question; but that no opposition was made to the efforts of Philip and Mary to restore it, is difficult to explain, save by the fear of an invasion from Spain, whose King was the father of Philip. This invasion was actually attempted in the reign of Elizabeth.

These preliminary remarks will awaken attention to the great event of the sixteenth century.

Henry VIII. succeeded to the throne in 1509. He married soon after at eighteen, Catherine, daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain. She had previously married his brother Arthur, who died at the end of five months. The legality of her second marriage was doubted at the time, and at a later period, Henry made this uncertainty a pretext for a divorce.

During the earlier years of his reign he left the Government in the hands of Cardinal Wolsey, his Minister and favorite. The Clergy sustained by Wolsey

exercised unbounded power: and hesitated at no abuses or exactions. "It was common at this time for persons, after committing great crimes," says Rowland, "to go into the priesthood to avoid punishment."

Subsidies for the wars with France were constantly demanded of Parliament, who humbly remonstrated, but dared not refuse. The King frequently resorted to forced loans, if the grants were inadequate.*

England at this period was writhing under the double tyranny of the Church and the Crown. Parlia ment, that had formerly deposed two Kings, and forced Henry IV., a hundred years before, to retreat before their energetic resistance, was now dumb in the presence of the insolent Wolsey, who, as Cardinal and Minister, wielded the thunderbolts of both Church and State.

At this dreary moment occurred "one of the greatest events in history," as Hallam calls it. The language of Bacon is no less striking when he says, referring to Henry's first marriage, "The secret providence of God ordained that marriage to be the occasion of great events and changes." After living eighteen years with Catherine of Arragon, the sensual King conceived a violent passion for Anne Boleyn, a Maid of Honor to the Queen. Resolved to divorce Catherine, and marry Anne, he applied to Pope Clement, 1527, for a Bull to dissolve his first union. Henry had been a zealous son of the Church, and had, by writing a book against the

*The danger of refusing to subscribe to these loans may be seen is the fact that an Alderman of London, Richard Reed, who would not contribute, was sent down to serve as a common soldier on the Scottish border, and the General in command there was ordered to employ him on the hardest and most perilous duty.