All persons
suspected of disloyalty were required to sign an oath of allegiance to
Henry, and to Elizabeth as his successor, and to acknowledge the
supremacy of the king in church and state. This resulted in the death of
some prominent men in the realm, among them Sir Thomas More. In the
preamble of the oath prescribed by law, the legality of the king's
marriage with Anne was asserted, thus implying that his former marriage
with Catharine was unlawful. More was willing to declare his allegiance
to the infant Elizabeth, as the king's successor, but his conscience
would not permit him to affirm that Catharine's marriage was unlawful.
The life of the brilliant and lovable More is another illustration of
the mental confusions and inconsistencies of that age. As an apostle of
culture he favored the new learning, and yet he viewed the gathering
momentum of reformatory principles with alarm, and cast in his lot with
the ultra-conservatives. Four years of his young manhood were spent in a
monastery. He devoted his splendid talents to a criticism of English
society, and recommended freedom of conscience, yet he became an ardent
foe of reform and even a persecutor of heretics, of whom he said: "I do
so detest that class of men that, unless they repent, I am the worst
enemy they have." When a man, whom even Protestant historians hasten to
pronounce "the glory of his age," so magnificent were his talents and so
blameless his character, was tainted with superstition, and sanctioned
the persecution of liberal thinkers, is it remarkable that inferior
intellects should have been swayed by the brutality and tyranny of
the times?
The unparalleled claims of Henry and his attitude toward the pope made
the breach between England and Rome complete, but many years of painful
internal strife and bloodshed were to elapse before the whole nation
submitted to the new order of things, and before that subjective freedom
from fear and superstition without which formal freedom has little
value, was secured.
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