of commons. turned into The year 1549 was remarkable for the tumults and insurrections Insurrecof the common people which arose in many counties. In Corn- tions in 1549. wall and Devonshire under Humphrey Arundel, and in Norfolk under Ket, the risings assumed formidable dimensions, and were suppressed with some difficulty. They arose partly from oppo- Their origin. sition to the Reformed doctrines, but mainly from discontent at the proceedings of the landowners, who, regardless of the ancient commonable rights of their tenants, made large enclosures of Enclosures the waste or common lands of manors; and, experience having shown that the growth of wool was more profitable than that of corn, converted the arable land into pasture. This strictly Arable commercial mode of dealing with their estates was especially pasture. adopted by the newly-made nobles and gentry who had acquired a large share of the confiscated abbey lands, and both they and the Reformed religion which they professed became objects of hatred to the thousands of agricultural labourers whom the restriction of tillage had thrown out of employment, and the cultivation of commons had deprived of one great source of support. For the suppression of these risings in future, a very severe Act was passed by Parliament against unlawful Act against and rebellious assemblies, by which it was declared to be treason rebellious for any twelve persons to meet together on any matter of state, assemblies. and felony if the object of the assembly was to destroy enclosures.2 Independently of the sanguinary religious persecutions of Violence of Mary's reign, her civil government was characterised by much Mary's violence and arbitrariness. Reference has already been made. to her Proclamation ordering the possessors of heretical and seditious books to be executed by martial law. Her zeal for the restoration of the Roman Catholic religion caused her to anticipate the authority of Parliament in her dealings with the clergy and the services of the Church which she found legally 1 "Parallel to the religious Reformation, social changes of vast importance were silently keeping pace with it. In the break-up of feudal ideas the relations of landowners to their property and their tenants were passing through a revolution; and between the gentlemen and the small farmers and yeomen and labourers were large differences of opinion as to their respective rights. The high price of wool and the comparative cheapness of sheep farming continued to tempt the landlords to throw their plough lands into grass, to amalgamate farms, and turn the people who were thrown out of employment adrift to shift for themselves. The commons at the same time were being largely enclosed, forests turned into parks, and public pastures hedged round and appropriated. Under the late reign these tendencies had with great difficulty been held partially in check; but on the death of Henry they acquired new force and activity. The enclosing, especially, was carried forward with a disregard of all rights and interests, except those of the proprietors." Froude, Hist. Eng., v. 107. "It is the common custom with covetous landlords to let their housing so decay that the farmers shall be fain for small regard or coin to give up their leases, that they, taking the ground into their own hands, may turn all into pasture. So now old fathers, poor widows, and young children lie begging in the streets." Sermon of Lever in Strype's Memorials. 2 3 & 4 Edward VI. c. 15. unlawful and reign. Doubts as to the powers of a queen regnant: established at her accession. She followed the example of her predecessors in extorting loans from her subjects. She imposed a duty upon foreign cloth without the assent of Parliament; and illegal modes of punishment, the torture especially, are "more frequently mentioned in her short reign than in all former ages of our history put together." 2 In 1557, a Commission was issued to Bishop Bonner and others authorising them to inquire rigorously concerning " devilish and clamorous persons" who spread seditious reports or brought in heretical and seditious books, or neglected or contemned the ceremonies of the Church, and in some instances to fine, imprison, or "otherwise punish" the guilty; in others of a graver nature to remit them to the spiritual courts. It was feared at the time that this proceeding was a preliminary to the establishment of the Inquisition; it proved, in fact, to be the precursor of the High Commission Court of the next reign.3 The violence of Mary's reign is in curious contrast with the humane and enlightened sentiments enunciated in the preamble of the first Act upon her Statute-book. Like her immediate predecessor, Mary began her reign by a statute repealing all new treasons and felonies, although, as in his case, new treasons were very soon again introduced. In the preamble of the abolishing statute it is recited" that the state of a king standeth more assured by the love and favour of the subject towards the sovereign, than in the dread and fear of the laws made with rigorous pains and extreme punishment ;" and that "laws made without extreme punishment are more often obeyed than laws made with extreme punishment." Mary was the first queen regnant of England (for it is unnecessary to take into account the nine days' usurpation of the unfortunate Lady Jane Grey); and some doubts were at one time started as to her constitutional powers. Some of the Reformed preachers even went so far as to contend that the government of a woman was both prohibited by the word of God, and unrecognised by the laws of the land, which conferred no authority upon queens. On the other hand a silly book was 1 In the directions to the Commissioners for a forced loan in 1557 they are informed that should any persons be " froward" they were to be com pelled to find sureties to appear before the Privy Council when called on or else to be arrested on the spot and sent to London. £110,000 was collected under this commission, in spite of outcry and resistance. Commission for the Loan, S. P., Mary, Domestic, vols. xi. xii., cited in Froude Hist. Eng., v. 486. 2 Hallam, Const. Hist., i. 42. cases of Praemunire." " 3 Burnet, ii. 256; iii. 243. Repeal and take away Treasons, Felonies, and 5 After the capture of King Stephen at the battle of Lincoln, in February, 1141, the Empress Matilda was elected Domina Angliae on April 8 following; but although she held courts and issued charters in Royal form, she never succeeded in making good her claim to the crown. written to exalt Mary's prerogative, on the pretence that as queen she was not bound by the laws of former kings. Mary showed her contempt for this sophism by herself throwing the book into the fire. But to set all questions at rest an Act was settled by passed to declare that "the royal power and dignities vested in Act of Para queen the same as in a king," and that all statutes in which a king was named applied equally to a queen.1 liament. dence of the Under Henry VIII. there is only one instance, in 1532, when Reviving the Commons refused to pass a Bill recommended by the Crown. indepenBut under Edward VI. and Mary, they on several occasions Commons: rejected Bills sent down from the Upper House; and we have seen how they insisted upon the insertion in the Act of Edward VI. creating new treasons, of the provisions requiring proof of the offence by the testimony of two witnesses in open court. rotten These indications of reviving independence on the part of Met by the some of the Commons were met by the creation of rotten boroughs creation of and by the direct interference of the Crown in elections. Edward boroughs VI. created or restored twenty-two boroughs, of which at least and by influencing the half, including seven in Cornwall, were places of no kind of elections. importance. Mary added fourteen to the number, and Elizabeth, in a similar manner, increased the representation in Parliament by no less than sixty-two members. The interference of the Crown in elections was exerted in the most open manner. In 1553 Edward VI. directed a circular letter to all sheriffs, commanding them to apprise the freeholders, citizens, and burgesses of their respective counties, " that our pleasure and commandment is, that they shall choose and appoint, as nigh as they possibly may, men of knowledge and experience within their counties, cities, and boroughs;" and especially that whenever the Privy Council, or any of them, having instructions on the king's behalf, should recommend men of learning and wisdom, in such case their directions be regarded and followed." Accordingly several persons-all of them belonging to the Court, or in places of trust about the king-were recommended by letters to the sheriffs, and elected as knights for different shires.2 The writs for the Parliament summoned by Mary in 1554, to sanction the return of the country to obedience to the Apostolic See, were accom 11 Mary, sess. 3, c. I. 2 Hallam, Const. Hist., i. 45, citing Strype, ii. 394. What appear to be first drafts of circular letters are preserved in Lansd. MS. 3, cited by Froude, v. 464, n. I. In some instances the orders of the Crown were sent direct to the candidate himself. The Council, in a letter to Sir P. Hoby, inform him "that his Majesty hath willed us to signify unto you this his pleasure to have you one of the Commons House, which thing we also require you to foresee, that either for the county where ye abide ye be chosen knight, or else otherwise to have some place in the House, like as all others of your degree be appointed. And herein, if either his Majesty or we knew where to recommend you, according to your own desires, we would not fail but provide the same." Harl. MS. 523, in Froude, v. 465. panied in like manner by Royal circulars requiring the mayors, sheriffs, and other influential persons to admonish the electors to choose as their representatives "such as, being eligible by order of the laws, were of a wise, grave, and Catholic sort; "1 and the Earl of Sussex, one of the queen's councillors, wrote to the electors of Norfolk and to the burgesses of Yarmouth requesting them to reserve their votes for the persons whom he should name.2 1 Froude, vi. 260. These general directions were copied from a form which had been in use under Henry VII. 2 Burnet, ii. 228. [On this period, see “England unter den Tudors," by Wilhelm Busch (Stuttgart, 1892), a valuable contribution to English political history in the 16th century. The author regards the development of Parliament from a new side, and asserts that Parliament really never came into prominence save when the Crown succeeded in getting the better of the higher nobility; and that Henry VII. knew how to curb his nobles. A material aid in this direction were the "informations" which considerably helped to fill the royal coffers. Vide Hist. Zeitschrift (München-Leipzig, 1894).—ED.] CHAPTER XI. THE REFORMATION IN ENGLAND. tical and changes and Eliza THE separation of the Church of England from that of Rome. The Reformally accomplished under Henry VIII., was a Political and formation under Henry Legal rather than a Religious reformation. The doctrinal VIII. Polichanges which followed under Edward VI. and Elizabeth were Legal an unintentional consequence, to which Henry and his Parliament rather than more than once declared themselves utterly repugnant. But Religious. in reality the Reformation, in both its Political and Religious Doctrinal aspects, was the effect of causes which had been in operation for under Edcenturies, not only in England, but throughout Europe. "No ward VI. revolution," says Hallam, "has ever been more gradually beth, an unprepared than that which separated almost one half of Europe intentional from the communion of the Roman See; nor were Luther and Zwingle any more than occasional instruments of that change the effect of which, had they never existed, would at no great distance of time causes long in operation. have been effected under the names of some other reformers. At the beginning of the sixteenth century, the learned doubtfully and with caution, the ignorant with zeal and eagerness, were tending to depart from the faith and rites which authority prescribed." 1 1 Hallam, Const. Hist., i. 57. ... ["The Reformation, like every other great movement transplanted from the Continent into England, assumed, in the island world, a form at once local and peculiar. The causes which led the English Church to take her stand midway between Rome and Geneva; the causes which led the sects dissatisfied with her conservatism to dissent from her creed and episcopal government, in order to establish other creeds and forms of organisation more liberal and republican, were in the main directed and controlled by the special circumstances incident to the local and personal history of the Church in England. . . . The forces of the English Reformation, viewed in their broader aspects, passed through four distinct stages before they reached their ultimate conclusion. The first stage represents the severance which took place during the reign of Henry VIII. of the English Church from the See of Rome. The second represents the doctrinal changes which took place during Edward VI. The third stage represents the dissent of the Puritan and Calvinistic elements from the Established Church. The fourth stage represents the organisation into religious associations of a more extreme class, called Independents."-(Hannis Taylor, Origin of the English Const., p. 597.) Gneist, Hist. Engl. Const., p. 482 (at the opening of his invaluable chapter on the Reformation, loc. cit.), remarks the time at last drew nigh for resuming the work of ecclesiastical reform, which had been interrupted in the 15th century." See also Cobbett's Protestant Reformation, ed. by Francis Aidan Gasquet (1897).—ED.] consequence. Both were |