e to any private person, nor to slay or murder through envy, but
for the restitution of the Church, and the suppression of heretics and
their opinions." It is clear, from the language of the oath, that the
rebels aimed their blows at Cromwell. The secular clergy hated him
because he had shorn them of their power; the monks hated him because he
had turned them out of their cloisters, and clergy and people loathed
him as a maintainer of heresy, a low-born foe of the Church. The
insurgents carried banners on which was printed a crucifix, a chalice
and host, and the five wounds, hence they called themselves "Pilgrims of
Grace." The revolt was headed by Robert Aske, a barrister.

Cromwell acted most cautiously; he selected the strongest men to take
the field. Richard Cromwell said of one of them, Sir John Russell, "for
my lord admiral, he is so earnest in the matter that I dare say he could
eat the Pilgrims without salt." The Duke of Norfolk was entrusted with
the command of the king's forces.

Henry preferred negotiation to battle, in accepting which the rebels
were doomed. To wait was to fail. Their demands reduced to paper were:
1. The religious houses should be restored. 2. England should be
reunited with Rome. 3. The first fruits and tenths should not be paid to
the crown. 4. Heretics, meaning Cranmer, Latimer and others, should
cease to be bishops. 5. Catharine's daughter Mary should be restored as
heiress to the crown. These and other demands, the granting of which
would have meant the death of the Reformation, were firmly refused by
the king, who marveled that ignorant churls, "brutes and inexpert folk"
should talk of theological and political subjects to him and to
his council.

After several ineffectual attempts to meet the royal army in battle,
partly due to storms and lack of subsistence, the rebels were induced to
disperse and a general amnesty was declared. But new insurrections broke
out in various quarters, and the enraged king determined to stamp out
the smoldering fires of sedition. About seventy-five persons were
hanged, and many prominent men were imprisoned and afterwards executed.
This effectually suppressed the rebellion.

The revolt showed the strength of the opponents to the king's will, but
it also proved conclusively that the monarchy was the strongest power in
the realm; that the star of ecclesiastical domination had set forever in
England; that henceforth English kings and not Italian popes we