arliament was to relieve
the King from the necessity of repaying the loan
(_D.N.B._, xxvi., 83); and much scorn has been
poured on the notion that it had any important
purpose (_L. and P._, iv., Introd., p. dcxlvii.).
Brewer even denies its hostility to the Church on
the ground that it was composed largely of lawyers,
and "lawyers are not in general enemies to things
established; they are not inimical to the clergy".
Yet the law element was certainly stronger in the
Parliaments of Charles I. than in that of 1529;
were they not hostile to "things established" and
"inimical to the clergy"? Contemporaries had a
different opinion of the purpose of the Parliament
of 1529. "It is intended," wrote Du Bellay on the
23rd of August, three months before Parliament met,
"to hold a Parliament here this winter and act by
their own absolute power, in default of justice
being administered by the Pope in this divorce"
(_ibid._, iv., 5862; _cf._ iv., 6011, 6019, 6307);
"nothing else," wrote a Florentine in December,
1530, "is thought of in that island every day
except of arranging affairs in such a way that they
do no longer be in want of the Pope, neither for
filling vacancies in the Church, nor for any other
purpose" (_ibid._, iv., 6774).]

[Footnote 705: _L. and P._, iv., 4909, 4911; _cf._
5177, 5501.]

[Footnote 706: _Ibid._, vi., 1528.]

To summon a Parliament at such a conjuncture seemed to be courting
certain ruin. In reality, it was the first and most striking instance
of the audacity and insight which were to enable Henry to guide the
whirlwind and direct the storm of the last eighteen years of his (p. 251)
reign. Clement had put in his hands the weapon with which he secured
his divorce and broke the bonds of Rome. "If," wrote Wolsey a day or
two before the news of the revocation arrived, "the King be cited to
appear at Rome in person or by proxy, and his prerogative be interfered
with, none of his sub