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indeed seem, that there was any intention to treat him altogether as a canonical offender, for although his metropolitan, a diocesan bishop, and a distinguished dignitary were among his judges, yet the court was completed by the addition of two lay statesmen. Nor did the sentence affect his ecclesiastical character. He was in fact dismissed from the bishopric of London, an office which he had consented to hold during pleasure. That the authority from which he held that situation was justly used in cashiering him, there appears no reason to doubt; for his conduct plainly tended to contravene the policy and to menace the stability of the existing administration. After deprivation, he was detained in prison": a severity with which, it is likely, the government could not dispense. If such a man had been at large, it is most probable, that he would have embarked in projects injurious to the progress of that ecclesiastical system which illumines so brilliantly young Edward's brief career.

Whatever might be the satisfaction with which the friends of scriptural religion viewed Bishop Boner's disgrace, it was sadly alloyed by the troubles which almost immediately afterwards overtook the Protector. That nobleman had been, throughout the summer, beset with difficulties enough to baffle a genius far above his own. In addition to the tumults raging so extensively at home, unfavourable events abroad had

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rendered the government highly unpopular". The French had taken some of the forts about Boulogne, and were unremitting in their endeavours to carry that place itself. Of their ultimate success in this object, there appeared, indeed, little reason to doubt, and this prospect, so mortifying to English vanity, was attributed to the negligence and incapacity of the Protector. In Scotland, also, the war either languished, or was decidedly unsuccessful: so that the nation's military fame appeared altogether upon the decline. Difficulties in the cabinet enhanced the importance of these diappointments in the field. England's only ally was the Emperor, but upon that prince's friendship no reliance could be placed. As usual, indeed, when it served his purpose, Charles was lavish of professions; but an application for effective assistance induced him to employ his habitual evasions, and he even intimated that the Romish system must be restored among them, if his English allies aimed at securing his cordial co-operation. If Somerset could have looked to France, he might, indeed, have calculated reasonably upon strengthening his administration; for that country was interested in supporting the German Protestants. The French statesmen too

"The confusions this year occasioned that change to be made in the office of the daily prayers; where the answer to the petition, Give peace in our time, O Lord, which was formerly, and is still continued, was now made, Because there is none other that fighteth for us, but only thou, O God. Burnet, Hist. Ref. II.

were anxious for peace with their insular neighbours; but then, as a preliminary, they insisted upon the restoration of Boulogne. To gratify them in this, was entirely the Protector's wish, because he felt severely the difficulty of preserving that fortress; and he justly reasoned, that it never could be worth while to make any considerable sacrifice for retaining possession of a place, which must be surrendered, according to treaty, at the end of a very few years. Among the people, however, the capture of Boulogne had given general satisfaction, and the national honour would have been tarnished in the eyes of most men if they saw that town relinquished before the stipulated period. In this view of the case a majority of the council affected to coincide. It became every day more doubtful, whether Somerset possessed ability sufficient for bringing to a prosperous issue the serious difficulties which crowded upon him. His political rivals anticipated, therefore, the downfal of his power from the continuance of foreign hostilities, and hence they urged every obstacle in the way of making peace. In this state of disunion and embarrassment had the English administration passed the summer. Early in the autumn the Earl of Warwick returned to London flushed with his success against the Norfolk insurgents, and that ambitious peer no longer affected to conceal an aversion for Somerset, but openly charged upon his unfitness for the Protectorate the manifold evils which distracted the kingdom.

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The Duke, when at Hampton Court with his royal nephew, becoming sensible that he was menaced by some serious evil, mustered his armed retainers, and took measures for assembling a guard, one thousand strong, under colour of ensuring Edward's personal safety. Before these troops arrived, he removed the King to Windsor by night, being apprehensive, that the palace at Hampton, if attacked, would be found capable of offering very little resistance. In Windsor Castle were with the young sovereign and his uncle, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Sir William Paget, and Secretary Smyth. The other members of the council were in London, and the Earl of Warwick persuaded them to meet at Ely House, in Holborn, where he then resided. There, before the assembled board, various causes of discontent were recapitulated, and the blame of them all was laid upon the Protector. Of him it was even said, that he was keeping the King in durance, and that he was maturing a design for subjugating the kingdom. As if to prevent these misfortunes, the scheming councillors sent for the Lord Mayor, and enjoined him to obey no orders from the Duke of Somerset. They sent also for the lieutenant of the Tower; and that officer, though a creature of Somerset's, made little hesitation in promising obedience to the party which appeared likely to prove the stronger. The city, when assured that the restoration of popery was not in agitation, was found equally ready to abandon the Protector. Indeed that unfortunate nobleman was now for

saken by all that motley and unprincipled crew of frivolous or interested sycophants whom great men too commonly consider as their friends. In Cranmer, however, Somerset found that real friendship, of which a virtuous mind alone is capable. The Archbishop, grieved to see an honest man immersed in such overwhelming difficulties, in conjunction with Smyth and Paget, wrote to the council in London. This letter, which reached its destination through Sir Philip Hoby, thus admonished Warwick's partizans; "that they caused great uneasiness to the King, being evidently but little intent upon restoring the general tranquillity, and upon warding off the dangers by which the state was menaced; that they seemed forgetful of the benefits received from their late sovereign, and of the allegiance which bound them to the reigning prince; that the Protector's acts had flowed from an anxiety to secure his Majesty's safety, and to perform conscientiously what his duty to God required; and that his opponents should seriously reflect upon the propriety of doing as they would be done by.." Before the receipt of this letter, as it seems, the councillors in London transmitted to their colleagues at Windsor, a vague communication, in which they charged the Protector in general terms with spreading false reports, and enjoined him to depart from his Majesty's immediate presence, for the purpose of being treated according to

• Strype, Mem. Cranm. 275.

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