Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 5.djvu/487

1554.] were in their enemies' hands. Simultaneously Gardiner obtained for the bishops' courts their long-coveted privilege of arbitrary arrest and discretionary punishment, and the clergy obtained, as they desired, the restoration of their legislative powers. The property question alone disintegrated the phalanx of orthodoxy, and left an opening for the principles of liberty to assert themselves. The faithful and the faithless among the laity were alike participators in Church plunder, and were alike nervously sensitive when the current of the reaction ran in the direction of a demand for restitution.

Here, therefore, Paget and his friends chose their ground to maintain the fight.

It has been seen that Pole especially dreaded the appearance of any sort of composition between the country and the Papacy. The submission had, in fact, been purchased, but the purchase ought to be disguised. As soon, therefore, as the Parliament set themselves to the fulfilment of their promise to undo the Acts by which England had separated itself from Rome, the legate required a simple statute of repeal. The Pope had granted a dispensation; it was enough, and it should be accepted gratefully; the penitence of sinners ought not to be mixed with questions of worldly interest; the returning prodigal, when asking pardon at his father's feet,