hey had determined to send him to the
Tower. Cranmer said, that he appealed to the king himself; and finding
his appeal disregarded, he produced a ring, which Henry had given him as
a pledge of favor and protection. The council were confounded; and when
they came before the king, he reproved them in the severest terms; and
told them, that he was well acquainted with Cranmer's merit, as well as
with their malignity and envy; but he was determined to crush all their
cabals, and to teach them by the severest discipline, since gentle
methods were ineffectual, a more dutiful concurrence in promoting his
service. Norfolk, who was Cranmer's capital enemy, apologized for their
conduct and said, that their only intention was to set the primate's
innocence in a full light, by bringing him to an open trial, and
Henry obliged them all to embrace him, as a sign of their cordial
reconciliation. The mild temper of Cranmer rendered this agreement more
sincere on his part than is usual in such forced compliances.[*]

But though Henry's favor for Cranmer rendered fruitless all accusations
against him, his pride and peevishness, irritated by his declining state
of health, impelled him to punish with fresh severity all others who
presumed to entertain a different opinion from himself, particularly
in the capital point of the real presence. Anne Ascue, a young woman of
merit as well as beauty,[**] who had great connections with the chief
ladies at court, and with the queen herself, was accused of dogmatizing
on that delicate article; and Henry, instead of showing indulgence to
the weakness of her sex and age, was but the more provoked, that a woman
should dare to oppose his theological sentiments.

* Burnet, vol. i. p. 342, 344. Antiq. Brit. in vita Cranm.

** Bale. Speed, p. 780.

She was prevailed on by Bonner's menaces to make a seeming recantation;
but she qualified it with some reserves, which did not satisfy that
zealous prelate. She was thrown into prison, and she there employed
herself in composing prayers and discourses, by which she fortified her
resolution to endure the utmost extremity rather than relinquish her
religious principles. She even wrote to the king, and told him, that as
to the Lord's supper, she believed as much as Christ himself had said
of it, and as much of his divine doctrine as the Catholic church had
required: but while she could not be brought to acknowledge an assent to
the king's explications,