greeing to any doctrine
unless the same doctrine were established by a law
of the realm before" (Foxe, ed. Townsend, vi.,
141).]

[Footnote 1176: The Countess of Salisbury and
Cromwell are the two great exceptions.]

[Footnote 1177: _L. and P._, vi., 954. It may be
reading too much into Francis I.'s words, but it is
tempting to connect them with Machiavelli's opinion
that the French _parlement_ was devised to relieve
the Crown of the hostility aroused by curbing the
power of the nobles (_Il Principe_ c. 19). A closer
parallel to the policy of Henry VIII. may be found
in that which Tacitus attributes to Tiberius with
regard to the Senate; "he must devolve on the
Senate the odious duty of trial and condemnation
and reserve only the credit of clemency for
himself" (Furneaux, _Tacitus_, Introd.).]

History, in a democratic age, tends to become a series of popular
apologies, and is inclined to assume that the people can do no wrong;
some one must be the scapegoat for the people's sins, and the national
sins of Henry's reign are all laid on Henry's shoulders. But the
nation in the sixteenth century deliberately condoned injustice, when
injustice made for its peace. It has done so before and after, and may
possibly do so again. It is easy in England to-day to denounce the
cruel sacrifices imposed on individuals in the time of Henry VIII. by
their subordination in everything to the interests of the State; but,
whenever and wherever like dangers have threatened, recourse has been
had to similar methods, to government by proclamation, to martial law,
and to verdicts based on political expediency.

The contrast between morals and politics, which comes out in Henry's
reign as a terrible contradiction, is inherent in all forms of human
society. Politics, the action of men in the mass, are akin to the
operation of natural forces; and, as such, they are neither moral nor
immoral; they are simply non-moral. Political movements are often as
resistless as the tides of the ocean; they carry to fortune, and they
bear to ruin, the just and the unjust with heedless impartiality. Cato
and Brutus striving against the torre