The Rise and Fall of Thomas Cromwell

by John Schofield

  Other rising evangelical stars tell the same story. Even though Anne helped him pay his First Fruits, Nicholas Shaxton pointedly thanked Cromwell for many kindnesses received, especially mentioning his bishopric.35 Rowland Lee (Coventry and Lichfield) and John Salcot (Bangor) were two more of Cromwell’s men on the bench. Thomas Goodrich (Ely), consecrated by Cranmer around the same time, may have been another. Lee was catapulted into the bishopric without ever having been in the pulpit.36 The evangelical Archbishop of Dublin, George Browne, also acknowledged his appointment ‘through your good lordship’s [Cromwell’s] preferment’.37

  William Barlow makes an interesting case. Barlow admitted that Anne ‘avouched me unworthy the priorship of Haverfordwest’, a position ‘under her grace’s foundation’. Anne may have enjoyed certain privileges in Haverfordwest because it lay in south Pembrokeshire, where she was created marchioness in September 1532. However, when Barlow encountered opposition to his evangelical preaching there, it was to Cromwell that he wrote for help. When Henry Standish, bishop of Asaph in Wales, died in July 1535, Barlow replaced him. Needing a licence to preach for a supporter of his, one Robert Ferrar, again Barlow approached Cromwell, not Anne. Barlow was transferred to the more prestigious see of St David’s in April 1536, and by this time Anne was out of favour with Henry, so she would have had nothing to do with this move. Barlow later thanked Cromwell for his ‘manifold benefits’, and it is likely that one of these benefits was his bishopric.38

  Even Archbishop Cranmer seemed unable to make clerical appointments without first consulting Cromwell. When Cranmer was trying to obtain a benefice in Northamptonshire for a friend of his called Bennett, he asked for Cromwell’s ‘good mind and favour in this and in all other my suits unto you hereafter’. Cromwell did not answer immediately, so Cranmer had to send polite reminders. Apparently the option of appealing over Cromwell’s head to the queen was not available, and it is not clear whether Cromwell agreed to this request.39

  Cranmer had also recommended Nicholas Heath to Cromwell for his piety and learning, regretting that he ‘hath also no benefice, nor no promotion’, even though in the king’s matter ‘I know no man in England can defend it better than he’. Heath, evangelical in the 1530s, advanced quickly, and became part of Henry’s embassy to Lutheran Germany in late 1535 which Cromwell organized, as we will see. Cranmer also asked Cromwell if John Hilsey, ‘or some other worshipful man’, may be made prior of the black friars in Cambridge. Whether he got this post is not certain, but Hilsey was another who rose rapidly and soon obtained a better reward – he was made bishop of Rochester after the death of John Fisher.40

  Queen Anne once wrote to the bishop of Norwich asking him to admit her chaplain, Matthew Parker, to the deanery of the collegiate church at Stoke, now vacant due to the death of the previous occupant; but whether she was acting entirely on her own authority is less than certain. To her chagrin perhaps, even she had to refer such matters to Cromwell. She took up the case of Richard Herman, a merchant and citizen of Antwerp expelled from England under Wolsey for helping ‘the setting forth of the New Testament in English’. She asked Cromwell if this ‘good and honest’ man could be returned to his freedom. Herman later became an agent of Cromwell’s.41 Another request of hers concerned one Robert Power. Cromwell had granted a nomination for a friend of Power, and because a vacancy now existed at an abbey in Lincolnshire, Anne wrote to Cromwell. ‘We desire and heartily pray you’, she says, that the grant may ‘be fulfilled to help his said friend to the preferment of the said house … for which we shall hereafter have you in our remembrance with condign thanks’. Her letter is headed ‘Anne the Queen’, while the royal ‘we’ and ‘our’ ring out with a flourish; but there is no ‘we command you’, or ‘we require you’, or ‘it is our pleasure’ that you do a given thing. Anne the Queen she may have been, but she still had to ask Cromwell, not give him orders.42

  Though Foxe’s account of Anne has been shown to be based on the testimony of those who knew her, it has to be wondered whether, during the reign of her most illustrious daughter, Anne’s influence was being slightly overstated. Evangelicals living in the 1530s, though naturally delighted to have a queen who appeared to favour their cause at least to some degree, had no doubt who the real powerhouse of the English Protestant movement was. Cromwell had framed much of Supremacy legislation, he was the king’s Vicegerent in spirituals to reform the monasteries, and he was the architect of the Lutheran policy to be discussed later. More power now belonged to him than to anyone in the realm save only the king. It is sometimes suggested that Anne did not always approve of Cromwell’s church policy or his clerical appointments: but if so, her disapproval had little noticeable effect, which only underscores the point that he was the one driving the Reformation forward more than anyone else, including the queen and the archbishop.43

  Apart from the monasteries and the evangelical promotions, the main religious development of 1535 was the growing warmth in Anglo-Lutheran relations. It was another Cromwellian-inspired initiative, though, as with the bishoprics, technically it had nothing to do with his appointment as Vicegerent.44

  Henry had no natural love for the Lutherans. But for Cromwell he may never have showed much interest in them. Not only had Luther ridiculed Henry’s Assertion of the Seven Sacraments and called its author a fool and an idiot, he then added insult to injury by supporting Catherine in the King’s Great Matter. Nevertheless, rapprochement with the Saxons offered England diplomatic as well as spiritual advantages. The new pope, Paul III, had shown some interest in the idea of a General Council to settle Europe’s religious controversies. Henry and the German Lutherans were suspicious of the pope’s intentions, each expecting that any such council would condemn them unilaterally for schism and heresy. This mutual fear provided some common ground between them. Henry also, in Cromwell’s presence, had suggested to the French ambassador that Francis in France should do as Henry had done in England and declare himself Head of the Church. Francis declined, but Charles was now aware of, and becoming concerned by, the possibility of an alliance developing between Francis, England and the Lutheran Schmalkaldic League. Despite scruples within the ranks of his own clergy, King Francis, after listening to his evangelically minded sister, Marguerite de Navarre, had invited Philip Melanchthon to France with a promise of safe conduct. Melanchthon was willing to go and Luther supported the idea; but Elector John Frederick, suspecting that the wily French king was more interested in sowing discord between the Lutheran princes and Charles V, refused permission. Melanchthon was deeply disappointed. Diplomatically he wrote to Francis saying that he had wanted to go but circumstances did not allow it.45

  Henry and Cromwell then sought to capitalize on Francis’s failure. In July 1535 the king authorised Robert Barnes and Christopher Mont to go to Germany to renew efforts to bring Melanchthon to England. Barnes reached Wittenberg in September, and next month he was joined by Nicholas Heath and Bishop Edward Foxe of Hereford. The three of them now comprised a formal delegation, sent with Henry’s full approval, to discuss the possibility of a political and religious treaty with the Lutherans. This German embassy, organized by Cromwell, is an interesting illustration of the English government’s response under diplomatic and moral fire from Rome and elsewhere. The papal censure and condemnations from abroad following the executions of More, Fisher and the Carthusians were still ringing in Henry’s ears. At home Chapuys reported that Henry and Cromwell were concerned about the risk of unrest in England, especially after the poor harvest that summer. Chapuys was ‘daily assailed on every side’ by people – he names no-one – ‘soliciting the execution of the apostolic censures’. Many were convinced that ‘such a resolution of Your Majesty’s [Charles’s] part would be a sufficient remedy, considering the great discontent prevailing among all classes of society at this king’s disorderly life and government’. But nothing much was done to placate such hostility and fend off the danger. The breaks were not applied to the monastic reforms at home,
and no hints were offered that some of the Supremacy legislation might be softened to appease the imperialists and the Papists. Apparently deciding that attack was the best means of defence, Henry and Cromwell pressed ahead with the Lutheran policy. It was a move both bold and astute. It would remove England even further from the Roman church, but at the same time improve England’s security through membership of the Schmalkaldic League.46

  An example of Cromwell’s growing confidence was the increasing amount of Lutheran literature now appearing in England with his sanction and support. Even though Luther’s works were still officially banned, a primer of Cromwell’s protégée, William Marshall, was published in 1535. It drew amply on Luther’s writings, particularly in attacking the cult of the saints and purgatory. Another treatise of Marshall’s that appeared around the same time, this one based on a work of Martin Bucer, contained a sharp critique of prominent religious images. Bolder still was Marshall’s evangelical treatment of the mass, which opposed the medieval moral doctrine – still in practice in schismatic England – of the propitiatory sacrifice availing for the living and the departed. This was too much even for reformist men like Audley, who advised Cromwell to find something less controversial for Marshall to do. Cromwell did not listen, however, and a second edition appeared the following year. Marshall also translated, with only minor amendments, Luther’s work of 1522 against the papacy and bishops. Luther’s anti-clerical writings might have been safe enough in Henry’s England, but the same work also attacked clerical celibacy and vows while defending justification by faith alone, ideas that were still risky in England in the mid-1530s.47

  However, events were working in Cromwell’s favour. In Germany Melanchthon was unsure whether he would be allowed to come to England, but having heard from Barnes and others about the evangelical progress here, he decided to dedicate his new Loci Communes to Henry. The work was sent to Cromwell, who presented it personally to the king. Henry was delighted, and sent Melanchthon a gift of 200 crowns and a personal letter signed ‘Your friend, King Henry VIII’. Henry did not agree with everything in the Loci, but it made a most favourable impression overall, especially as Melanchthon had been nuancing two aspects of early Lutheranism that Henry had profoundly disliked.48

  The first of these concerned salvation, or ‘justification’ as theologians frequently called it. During his spiritual crisis that led to the birth of the Reformation in 1518–19, Luther was an almost embarrassingly pious monk. With his fasts, prayers, masses, vigils and confessions, he far surpassed most of his brethren in zeal. Nevertheless, a close study of Scripture, and especially St Paul, convinced him that all this monastic piety was useless for the soul’s salvation. Slowly and painfully he became persuaded that by virtue of Christ’s atoning death on the Cross for the sins of the world, justification was a free and entirely gracious gift of God, which could never be earned by any human act or effort. Man’s salvation, therefore, depended on receiving this gift by faith rather than earning it by works or sacrifices. Thus Luther raised the Reformation banner of justification by faith alone (sola fides). Luther did not mean to disparage genuine good works such as loving thy neighbour, gifts to the poor, prayers and so on; but these were fruits of a true faith, and they played no part whatever in justification. Some of his opponents, however, accused him of making good works and charity redundant, thereby threatening a complete breakdown in civil order and peace. Henry had enthusiastically joined these accusers; and in his Assertion of the Seven Sacraments, written more than ten years beforehand, he charged Luther with making faith a ‘cloak for a life of sin’. Luther was furious, hence his vitriolic reply, but such accusations spread like a fire impossible to put out.49

  Melanchthon joined Luther in trying to combat the charges and clarify the Lutheran teaching. His new Loci defended sola fides, but it also contained the statement that good works were ‘necessary for salvation’. He meant a necessary consequence, not a necessary cause. Resting his case on St Paul (Romans 8:12; 1 Corinthians 9:16; Ephesians 2:10), Melanchthon stressed that baptised believers were called to live according to the will of God, and were indebted to do so. He was not, as some within his own church strangely suspected, slipping back into medieval ways. He fully supported Luther on justification as a divine gift impossible to earn or to merit, and he defended it at some length in the Loci. Melanchthon was also anxious to counter the so-called ‘antinomian’ tendency that had sprouted up in parts of Germany, which dismissed charity and good works as all rather meaningless if justification is awarded solely through faith. Henry’s reaction to the Loci proves that the king was pleasantly surprised at what he read there, and much of his former antipathy towards Lutheranism dissolved away. Unfortunately, he did not quite grasp the fine distinction between a necessary consequence and a necessary cause. This point, and the repercussions of it, will become clearer in subsequent chapters.

  Another aspect of Lutheranism that had shocked Henry in the 1520s concerned the subject of freewill. The early Luther had broadly followed the predestinarian teaching of St Augustine – the doctrine of the salvation of the ‘elect’, divinely foreknown before the world began. This implied, without expressly saying so, that salvation was a gift predetermined only for a section of the human race, not freely offered to all of it. It also left little or no room for freewill in Lutheran theology, at least so far as salvation was concerned. Luther’s opponents, including Henry, seized gleefully on this, accusing Luther of denying all human responsibility and thereby making God accountable for everything that happened, the evil as well as the good. Naturally they never levelled this charge at Augustine, but this inconsistency soon became a bit academic when Melanchthon, patiently but firmly, sought to entice Luther and the Lutheran church away from predestination. In his writings from the 1520s, and especially in his new Loci, he contended eloquently for its antithesis, known technically as the doctrine of universal grace – the belief that God desires the salvation of all mankind, and that there is no secret decree arbitrarily nominating some to blessing while consigning others to perdition. Melanchthon gave this, and the related subject of freewill, a great deal of space in his Loci: God’s grace is for all, and God’s Spirit seeks to draw the hearts of all men to Christ; empowered by this divine influence, the human will is able to believe the Gospel and be converted; man may reject Christ and carry out all kinds of evil, but if so the responsibility is his, not God’s.

  The timeliness and significance of the Loci in the English Reformation can hardly be over-stressed. Though Melanchthon wrote it for the widest possible European audience, in these two important theological subjects it could almost have been calculated to assuage the hostility to Luther that Henry had shown in his Assertion. It was not enough to induce Henry to unconditionally accept the Augsburg Confession, but it did make a huge improvement in Anglo-Lutheran relations. Having broken England’s ties with Rome, Henry needed religious as well as political allies, and suddenly he was able to see the Lutherans in a far more favourable light. The king who had once called Luther a ‘serpent’ and a ‘hellish wolf’ – and had been called worse still in return – was now minded to parley with the Germans, even to consider a formal alliance with them. We must, however, emphasise the word ‘consider’. Henry was not yet ready to commit himself. Nor was he a man to be rushed or stampeded into alliances against his will. Cromwell and his allies still had much work to do to persuade Henry to become a Lutheran.

  Nevertheless, Cromwell lost no time in exploiting the much improved situation. As well as the monasteries, he was now reforming the major universities on evangelical lines. He sent Richard Layton to Oxford, from where Layton reported that daily lectures in divinity, philosophy and Latin were now ‘well kept and diligently frequented’. But Cromwell in England, like Luther and Melanchthon in Germany, was determined that the language of the New Testament should be more widely taught and known, so Layton directed all Oxford’s colleges to establish lectures in Greek as well as Latin. Layton triumphantly added that the
medieval scholastic theologians had been given the boot – ‘we have set Dunce (Duns Scotus) in Bocardo, and have utterly banished him from Oxford for ever, with all his blind glosses’.50

  A similar reformation was underway in Cambridge, quickly becoming an evangelical seat of learning. Cromwell was now the Chancellor of Cambridge University, and he issued a set of injunctions to be followed. These included daily public lectures in Latin and Greek, and in the Old and the New Testament; additionally, students were to read the Bible in private. From now on there would be no lectures on, and no degree course in, canon law. As at Oxford, the medieval theologians were sent packing. As at Wittenberg University, this evangelical curriculum would be complimented by the finest of the humanities, with courses in logic, rhetoric, arithmetic, geography and music. Compulsory reading included the works of Aristotle, Rudolph Agricola and also Melanchthon. Officially the injunctions specified only Melanchthon’s humanist writings, though the likelihood must be that his Apology and Loci were discreetly admitted as well. The university was delighted to receive Cromwell’s injunctions, or so they told his visitor, Thomas Legh.51

  Soon after this Legh issued a subsequent set of injunctions confirming those of Cromwell, though with a few interesting additions. One added Hebrew to the curriculum, while another forbad masters and fellows from selling fellowships or accepting bribes to receive scholars. A third instructed all heads of houses, scholars and students to attend a mass each month ‘for the souls of the founders of the university … and for the happy state of the king and the lady Anne, his lawful wife and Queen’. Cromwell would have approved the first two and he may have ordered them, but whether he gave the directive for the mass is less certain. Maybe Legh was acting on his own initiative and authority as Cromwell’s authorised visitor.52