d that the court of Rome and the clergy should
be sensible that they were entirely dependent on him, and that his
parliament, if he were willing to second their inclinations, was
sufficiently disposed to reduce the power and privileges of the
ecclesiastics. The commons gratified the king in another particular of
moment: they granted him a discharge of all those debts which he had
contracted since the beginning of his reign,[**] and they grounded this
bill, which occasioned many complaints, on a pretence of the king's
great care of the nation, and of his regularly employing all the money
which he had borrowed in the public service.

* Parl. Hist. vol. iii. p. 59.

**Burnet, vol. ii. p. 82.

Most of the king's creditors consisted of friends to the cardinal who
had been engaged by their patron to contribute to the supply of Henry's
necessities; and the present courtiers were well pleased to take the
opportunity of mulcting them.[*] Several also approved of an expedient
which, they hoped, would ever after discredit a method of supply so
irregular and so unparliamentary.

* Burnet, vol. ii. p. 83.

The domestic transactions of England were at present so interesting
to the king, that they chiefly engaged his attention; and he regarded
foreign affairs only in subordination to them. He had declared war
against the emperor; but the mutual advantages reaped by the commerce
between England and the Netherlands, had engaged him to stipulate a
neutrality with those provinces; and, except by money contributed to the
Italian wars, he had in effect exercised no hostility against any of
the imperial dominions. A general peace was this summer established
in Europe. Margaret of Austria and Louisa of Savoy met at Cambray,
and settled the terms of pacification between the French king and the
emperor. Charles accepted of two millions of crowns in lieu of Burgundy;
and he delivered up the two princes of France, whom he had retained as
hostages. Henry was, on this occasion, so generous to his friend and
ally Francis, that he sent him an acquittal of near six hundred thousand
crowns, which that prince owed him. Francis's Italian confederates were
not so well satisfied as the king with the peace of Cambray: they were
almost wholly abandoned to the will of the emperor, and seemed to have
no means of security left but his equity and moderation. Florence,
after a brave resistance, was subdued by the imperial arms, and finally
de