tendom besides. He had wasted the King's treasure, &c. He had levied
mighty sums of other houses of religion, some for dread to be pulled down,
and others by his feigned visitations under colour of virtuous
reformation. As Chancellor "he had taken up all the great matters
depending in suit to determine after his discretion, and would suffer no
way to take effect that had been devised by other men." In other times
"the best prelate in the realm was contented with one bishoprick." Darcy
demanded that the duties of bishops should be looked into. They should
hold no temporal offices, nor meddle with temporal affairs. They should
seek no dispensation from the Pope. The tenure of land in England should
be looked into, to find what temporal lands were in spiritual men's hands,
by what titles, for what purposes, and whether it was followed or no. The
King's grace should proceed to determine all reformations, of spiritual
and temporal, within his realm. Never more Legate nor Cardinal should be
in England: these legacies and faculties should be clearly annulled and
made frustrate, and search and enquiry be made what had been levied
thereby. He recommended that at once and without notice Wolsey's papers
and accounts should be seized. "Then matters much unknown would come forth
surely concerning his affairs with Pope, Emperor, the French King, other
Princes, and within the realm."[89]

Many of Darcy's charges are really creditable to Wolsey, many more are
exaggerated; but of the oppressive character of his courts, and of the
immense revenue which he drew from them, no denial was possible. The
special interest of the composition, however, is that it expresses
precisely the temper of the Parliament of 1529. It enables us to
understand how the Chancellorship came to be accepted by Sir Thomas More.
It contains the views of conservative Catholic English statesmen who,
while they had no sympathy with changes of doctrine, were weary of
ecclesiastical domination, who desired to restrict the rights of the Pope
in England within the limits fixed by the laws of the Plantagenets, to
relieve the clergy of their temporal powers and employments, and reduce
them to their spiritual functions. Micer Mai and De Soria had said the
same thing; Charles V., likely enough, shared their opinion, though he
could not see his way towards acting upon it. In England it could be acted
upon, and it was.

There is no occasion to repeat the well-known tale of the f