trial.

The French and English Commissioners had met and parted at Calais. Nothing
had been concluded there, as Cromwell said with pleasure to Chapuys,
prejudicial to the Emperor; but as to submitting the King's conduct to a
Council, Cromwell reiterated that it was not to be thought of. Were there
no other reason, the hatred borne to him by all the English _prestraylle_
for having pulled down the tyranny of the Church and tried to reform them,
would be cause sufficient. The Council would be composed of clergy. More
than this, and under the provocation of the fresh insult, Cromwell said
that neither the King nor his subjects would recognise any Council
convoked by the Pope. A Council convoked by the Emperor they would
acknowledge, but a Papal Council never. They intended to make the Church
of England a true and singular mirror to all Christendom.[331]

Paul can hardly have deliberately contemplated the results of what he had
done. He probably calculated, either that Henry would not dare to go to
extremities with a person of so holy a reputation as Bishop Fisher, or
that the threat of it would force Fisher's and the Queen's friends into
the field in time to save him. They had boasted that the whole country
was with them, and the Pope had taken them at their word. Yet his own mind
misgave him. The Nuncio at Paris was directed to beg Francis to intercede.
Francis said he would do his best, but feared the "hat" would prove the
Bishop's death. Henry, Francis said, was not always easy to deal with. He
almost treated him as a subject. He was the strangest man in the world. He
feared he could do no good with him.[332] There was not the least
likelihood that the King would allow the interposition either of Francis
or of any one. The crime created by the Act of Supremacy was the denial by
word or act of the King's sovereignty, ecclesiastical or civil, and the
object was to check and punish seditious speaking or preaching. As the Act
was first drafted, to speak at all against the supremacy brought an
offender under the penalties. The House of Commons was unwilling to make
mere language into high treason, and a strong attempt was made to
introduce the word "maliciously." Men might deny that the King was Head of
the Church in ignorance or inadvertence; and an innocent opinion was not a
proper subject for severity. But persons who had exposed themselves to
suspicion might be questioned, and their answers interpreted by collateral
evi