t illegal to discuss the marriage
question further, he interfered with no one, and therefore not with her. If
her own word was to be taken, he even showed her much personal kindness,
having offered to make her an abbess, which is difficult to believe,
especially as she said that she had refused his offer. She stated also that
at the time of Lord Wiltshire's mission to the emperor, the Countess of
Wiltshire endeavoured to persuade her to accept a place at the court, as a
companion to Anne; which again is unsupported by other evidence, and sounds
improbable.[330] But it is plain, that until she was found to be meditating
treason, she experienced no treatment from the government of which she had
cause to complain; and thus for the present we may leave her pursuing her
machinations with the Canterbury friars, and return to the parliament.

The second session had been longer than the first; it had commenced on the
16th of January, and continued for ten weeks. On the 30th of March, which
was to be its last day, Sir Thomas More came down to the House of Commons,
and there read aloud to the members the decision of the various
universities on the papal power, and the judgment of European learning on
the general question of the king's divorce. The country, he said, was much
disturbed, and the king desired them each to report what they had heard in
their several counties and towns, "in order that all men might perceive
that he had not attempted this matter of his own will or pleasure, as some
strangers reported, but only for the discharge of his conscience and surety
of the succession of his realm."[331] This appears to have been the first
time that the subject was mentioned before parliament, and the occasion was
reasonably and sensibly chosen. The clergy having possession of the
pulpits, had used their opportunity to spread a false impression where the
ignorance of the people would allow them to venture the experiment; the
king having resolved to fall back upon the support of his subjects,
naturally desired the assistance of the country gentlemen and the nobles to
counteract the efforts of disaffection, and provided them with accurate
information in the simplest manner which he could have chosen.

But the desire expressed by Henry was no more than an unnecessary form, for
as a body, the educated laity were as earnestly bent upon the divorce as
the king himself could be, and might have been trusted to use all means by
which to fur