Page:Seventeen lectures on the study of medieval and modern history and kindred subjects.djvu/300

 houses in one day: the Proclamation Act and another for the rehabilitation of the religious, were, on the other hand, rejected by the Commons, redrawn and passed after several days' discussion.

I must now pass very briefly over the incident of the remaining parliaments. In that of 1540 the king's matrimonial relations with Anne of Cleves were, by petition of parliament, referred to and discussed in the convocations: the abbots finally disappeared from parliament; the House of Lords agreed that Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays should be devoted, by the Royal Commissioners appointed for the purpose, to the preparation of measures of religious reform. Bishop Tunstall is bold enough to draw up a protest against the subsidy, but this is the only trace of opposition. Cromwell's fall was sudden and without sympathy; the Bill of Attainder for treason passed the House of Lords without an opposing vote; the Commons added attaint for heresy as well as for treason; not a voice seems to have been raised for him. Nay, in the House of Lords not a single measure of the king's was opposed at all, and it is left on record in the most unsentimental of all registers, the Journals of the Lords, that not a single division occurred during the whole session. In 1543, in the same way, no protest is made against the sacrifice of Catherine Howard. But the king is not satisfied with silent acquiescence; he does not hesitate to urge both houses to work harder at that and other public business; again we find Tunstall protesting alone against some minor measure:, the most remarkable event, from our point of view, is the withdrawal from the House of Lords, at the request of convocation, of a bill allowing laymen to act as ecclesiastical judges; a measure which, though withdrawn now, became law in 1545. The convocation itself was very busy in the matter of the translation of the Bible and Scriptural formulae of prayer and belief. The same work occupied the session of 1543, in which we find Lord Mountjoy voting by himself against the amplification of the Proclamation Act; and four bishops opposing the Bill for Collectors and Receivers. Clearly the independent spirit, has nearly evaporated. The