Identifier: thomascranmereng02poll (find matches)
Title: Thomas Cranmer and the English reformation
Year: 1905 (1900s)
Authors: Pollard, A. F. (Albert Frederick), 1869-1948
Subjects:
Publisher: Hamden, Conn., Archon Books
Contributing Library: The Library of Congress
Digitizing Sponsor: The Library of Congress

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ission would be sent down into Kentto deal with the accusations. They now directedtheir efforts towards excluding Cranmer from thecommission; it was hoped that Gardiner himselfwould be placed at its head and that its memberswould include the very prebendaries who were spe-cially aggrieved against the Archbishop.^ On the 4thof May they had so far succeeded that the PrivyCouncil passed a resolution that ** if the King shouldbe so content a commission should be sent intoKent to examine generally all abuses and enormi-ties of religion. It was probably something morethan a coincidence that, on the following day, theKings Book of Religion^ which was to confound allheretics, was read in the Council Chamber beforethe nobility of the realm. It would have gone ill with Cranmer and the causeof the Reformation in England had that commissionwith Gardiner at its head, and with Henry VIII.s * He was Speaker in the 1543 Parliament. ^L.andP.^yiMlW., ii., 327. ^ Acts of the Privy Council^ i., 126, 127.
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THOMAS CRANMER FROM A STEEL ENGRAVING 1545) Catholic Reaction 151 authority at its back, been let loose in Kent. Butthe plotters little knew their King; Henry had manyfailings, but no monarch had a keener insight intomens minds or less liking for being made the toolof others. What reception he gave to this demandof the Privy Council and to the accusations againstCranmer is not known. He kept his counsel andhis sentiments to himself,* until one day, as he wasbeing rowed past Lambeth Palace in his barge, heespied the Archbishop standing on the edge of thesteps. Calling to him, he made Cranmer take a seatbeside him. Ha, my chaplain, he said, ** I havenews for you ; I know now who is the greatest here-tic in Kent; and he pulled out of his sleeve thearticles against Cranmer and his preachers signedby the Justices and prebendaries. The Archbishopdemanded the appointment of a commission toinquire into their truth. ** Marry, said Henry,so will I do; for I have such affiance and confi-dence in

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