represented
his ecclesiastical views;[1109] but neither succeeded to the place
which Wolsey had held and Cromwell had tried to secure. Henceforth the
King had no Prime Minister; there was no second Vicegerent, and the
praise or the blame for his policy can be given to no one but Henry.

[Footnote 1109: It was popularly thought that Henry
called Gardiner "his own bishop" (_L. and P._,
XIV., i., 662).]

That policy was, in foreign affairs, a close adherence to the Emperor,
partly because it was almost universally held to be the safest course
for England to pursue, and partly because it gave Henry a free hand
for the development of his imperialist designs on Scotland. In domestic
affairs the predominant note was the extreme rigour with which the
King's secular autocracy, his supremacy over the Church, and the (p. 400)
Church's orthodox doctrine were imposed on his subjects. Although the
Act of Six Articles had been passed in 1539, Cromwell appears to have
prevented the issue of commissions for its execution. This culpable
negligence did not please Parliament, and, just before his fall,
another Act was passed for the more effective enforcement of the Six
Articles. One relaxation was found necessary; it was impossible to
inflict the death penalty on "incontinent"[1110] priests, because
there were so many. But that was the only indulgence granted. Two days
after Cromwell's death, a vivid illustration was given of the spirit
which was henceforth to dominate the Government. Six men were executed
at the same time; three were priests, condemned to be hanged as
traitors for denying the royal supremacy; three were heretics,
condemned to be burnt for impugning the Catholic faith.[1111]

[Footnote 1110: 32 Henry VIII., c. 10. Married
priests of course would come under this opprobrious
title.]

[Footnote 1111: Wriothesley, _Chron._, i., 120,
121.]

And yet there was no peace. Henry, who had succeeded in so much, had,
with the full concurrence of the majority of his people, entered upon
a task in which he was foredoomed to failure. Not all the whips with
six strings, not all the fires at Smithfield, could compel that unity
and concord in opinion which Henry so much desired, but which he had
unwittingly done so much to destroy. He might denounce the diversities
of belief to which