Page:Church and State under the Tudors.djvu/120

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
96
CHURCH AND STATE UNDER THE TUDORS

the authors of it, Heath and Bonner, Tunstall and Gardiner, Stokesly and Thirlby, were the schismatics. The separation was made to our hands. It was not till Edward's days that the Church of England embraced the doctrines of the Reformation.'

It is worth while, before concluding this short summary of the results of Henry VIII.'s ecclesiastical legislation, to call attention emphatically to the authority by which all these changes were made.

It would seem, then, that, of the various measures which we have noted in the last chapter, the work of the session of 1529, though it may not impossibly have been discussed in Convocation, was actually performed in Parliament alone. It consisted mainly in the passing of the 21 Hen. VIII. 5, 6, and 13, regulating the fees to be received by the clergy for probate and mortuaries, and also their residence, pluralities, farming, trading, &c. The next step was the King's proclamation forbidding the introduction of bulls from Rome, with which, of course, neither Parliament nor Convocation had any concern. The year 1531 is mainly famous for the celebrated Præmunire, the consequent submission of the clergy in Convocation, and the passing of the two bills in Parliament 22 Hen. VIII. c. 15 and 16, concerning the pardon of the clergy and laity respectively.

The proceedings of the year 1532 are of a more complicated character. On the one hand, we have several Acts of Parliament, as above noted, dealing somewhat roughly with the privileges of the clergy; and we have also the complaint of the Commons against them, and the Three Articles founded upon the latter, brought to the Convocation by Edward Fox, the King's almoner, and, after some discussion, agreed to. We have, on the other hand, the petition of the Convocation to the King