r them so much again." The lords came willingly into
his terms; but the commons rejected the bill; a singular instance, where
Henry might see that his power and authority, though extensive, had yet
some boundaries. The commons, however, found reason to repent of their
victory. The king made good his threats: he called together the judges
and ablest lawyers, who argued the question in chancery; and it was
decided that a man could not by law bequeath any part of his lands in
prejudice of his heir.[*]

* Burnet, vol. i. p. 116. Hall. Parl. Hist.

The parliament being again assembled after a short prorogation, the king
caused the two oaths to be read to them, that which the bishops took
to the pope, and that to the king, on their installation; and as a
contradiction might be suspected between them, while the prelates seemed
to swear allegiance to two sovereigns;[*] the parliament showed their
intention of abolishing the oath to the pope, when their proceedings
were suddenly stopped by the breaking out of the plague at Westminster,
which occasioned a prorogation. It is remarkable, that one Temse
ventured this session to move, that the house should address the king,
to take back the queen, and stop the prosecution of his divorce. This
motion made the king send for Audley, the speaker, and explain to him
the scruples with which his conscience had long been burdened; scruples,
he said, which had proceeded from no wanton appetite, which had arisen
after the fervors of youth were past, and which were confirmed by the
concurring sentiments of all the learned societies in Europe. Except in
Spain and Portugal, he added, it was never heard of, that any man had
espoused two sisters; but he himself had the misfortune, he believed,
to be the first Christian man that had ever married his brother's
widow.[**]

* Burnet, vol. i. p. 123, 124.

** Herbert. Hall, fol. 205.

After the prorogation, Sir Thomas More, the chancellor, foreseeing that
all the measures of the king and parliament led to a breach with
the church of Rome, and to an alteration of religion, with which his
principles would not permit him to concur, desired leave to resign the
great seal; and he descended from his high station with more joy and
alacrity than he had mounted up to it. The austerity of this man's
virtue, and the sanctity of his manners, had nowise encroached on the
gentleness of his temper, or even diminished that frolic and gayety to
whic