came to him
one morning early (26 Oct. 1528) and told him the Queen had asked the
King for leave to make her confession to him (Campeggi), and had
obtained it. A couple of hours later the Queen appeared before him.
She told him of her earlier marriage, which was never really
consummated; that she had remained as unchanged by it as she had been
from her mother's womb; and this destroyed all grounds for the
divorce. Campeggi was however far from drawing such a conclusion; he
advised her in plain terms to make a vow and enter a convent,
repeating the motives stated before, to which he now added the example
of a Queen of France. But his words died away without effect. Queen
Catharine declared positively that she would never act thus; she was
called by God to her marriage, and resolved to live and die in it. A
judgment might be pronounced in this matter; if the marriage was
declared to be invalid, she would submit, she would then be as free as
the King; but without this she would hold fast to her marriage union.
She protested, in the strongest terms conceivable, that they might
kill her, they might tear her limb from limb, yet she would not change
her mind; had she two lives, she would lay them both down in such a
cause. It would be better, she said, for the Pope to try to divert the
King from his design; he would then be able to trust all the more in
the inclination of her kinsman the Emperor to help in bringing about a
peace.

In the presence of the counsellors given her at her wish, both legates
repeated two days later in a formal audience their admonition to the
Queen not to insist on a definite decision; but already Campeggi had
little hope left; he was astonished that the lady, usually so prudent,
should in the midst of peril so obstinately reject judicious
advice.[95]

The question between King and Queen was, we might say, also of a
dogmatic nature. Had the Pope the right to dispense with the laws of
Scripture or had he not? The Queen accepted it as it had been accepted
in recent times, especially as the presupposed conditions of a
marriage had not been fulfilled in her case. The King rejected it
under all circumstances, in agreement with scholars and the rising
public opinion.

But into this question various other general and personal reasons now
intruded themselves. If the question were answered in the negative
Wolsey held firmly to the view of forming an indissoluble union
between France and England, of secur