The intimacy increased. Cromwell, though Imperial in politics and no admirer of Anne Boleyn, was notoriously Henry's chief adviser in the reform of the clergy; but to this aspect of him Chapuys had no objection. Neither the Ambassador nor Charles, nor any secular statesman in Europe, was blind to the enormities of Churchmen or disposed to lift a finger for them, if reform did not take the shape of Lutheranism. Charles himself had said that, if Henry had no objects beyond the correction of the spiritualty, he would rather aid than obstruct him. Between Chapuys and Cromwell there was thus common ground; and Cromwell's hint that the King might perhaps reconsider his position may not have been wholly groundless.
The action of the Rota, pressed through by Davalos, had taken Henry by surprise. He had not expected that the Pope would give a distinct judgment against him. He had been equally disappointed in the support which he expected from Francis. That he should now hesitate for an instant was natural and inevitable; but the irresolution, if real, did not last. Norfolk wrote to the King from Paris "to care nothing for the Pope:" there were men "enough at his side in England to defend his right with the sword."[1] Henry appealed to a General Council, when a Council could be held which should be more than a Papal delegacy. The revenues of the English sees which were occupied by Campeggio and Ghinucci he sequestrated, as a sign of the abandonment of a detestable system.
His own mind, meanwhile, was fastened on the approaching confinement of Anne. With the birth of
- ↑ Chapuys to Charles V., Aug. 23, 1533,—Spanish Calendar, vol. iv. part 2, p. 777.
