hurch was the curer of
souls, not the curer of the body politic.

Katharine's cause sank into the background. The voice of justice was
drowned by the birth shrieks of the Reformation.

[Illustration: _Photo: Emery Walker_

KATHARINE OF ARAGON

From the Portrait in the National Portrait Gallery]

THE REFORMATION

We must remind ourselves that the divorce was merely the irritation which
brought the discontent with Rome to a head. Religious affairs were in a
very turbulent state. The monasteries were corrupt. The rule of Rome had
become political, not spiritual. Luther had worked at shattering the
pretensions of the Pope in Europe. Wolsey had prepared the English to
acquiesce in Henry's religious supremacy by his long tenure of the whole
Papal authority within the realm and the consequent suspension of appeals
to Rome. Translations of the New Testament were being secretly read
throughout the country--a most dangerous innovation--and Anne Boleyn, who
had no cause to love the Pope or his power, held complete sway over the
King.

She and her father were said to be "more Lutheran than Luther himself."
Though Henry was anti-Papal, he was never anti-Catholic, but, as the
representative of God, as head of his own Church, he claimed to take
precedence of the Pope. Moreover, the spoliation of the Church was not an
unprofitable business.

Rome declared the divorce illegal. Henry, with the support of his
Parliament, abolished all forms of tribute to Rome, arranged that the
election of Bishops should take place without the interference of the
Pope, and declared that if he did not consent to the King's wishes within
three months, the whole of his authority in England should be transferred
to the Crown. This conditional abolition of the Papal authority was in due
course made absolute, and the King assumed the title of Head of the
Church.

"The breach with Rome" was effected with a cold and calculated cunning,
which the most adept disciple of Machiavelli could not have
excelled."--(Pollard.)

With an adroitness amounting to genius, Henry now used the moral suasion
(not to use an uglier word) of threats towards the Church to induce the
Pope to relent and to assent to the divorce. One by one, in this deadly
battle, did the Pope's prerogatives vanish, until the sacerdotal
foundations of Rome, so far as England was concerned, had been levelled to
the ground.

After many further political troubles and intrigues Henry pr