Note (back) — Chapter IV

For the present, those services were to be remembered. They were not, indeed, inconsiderable. It would be absurd to maintain that, since his accession, Henry had been actuated by respect for the Papacy more than by another motive; but it is indisputable that that motive had entered more largely into his conduct than into that of any other monarch. James IV. and Louis had been excommunicated, Maximilian had obstinately countenanced a schismatic council and wished to arrogate to himself the Pope's temporal power. Ferdinand's zeal for his house had eaten him up and left little room for less selfish impulses; his anxiety for war with the Moor or the Turk was but a cloak; and the value of his frequent demands for a Reformation may be gauged by his opinion that never was there more need for the Inquisition, and by his anger with Leo for refusing the Inquisitors the preferments he asked.[271] From hypocrisy like Ferdinand's Henry was, in his early years, singularly free, and the devotion to the Holy See, which he inherited, was of a more than conventional type. "He is very religious," wrote Giustinian, "and hears three masses daily when he hunts, and sometimes five on other days. He hears the office every day in the Queen's chamber, that is to say, vesper and compline."[272] The best theologians and doctors in his kingdom were regularly required to preach at his Court, when their fee for each sermon was equivalent to ten or twelve pounds. He was generous in his almsgiving, and his usual offering on Sundays and saints' days was six shillings and eightpence or, in modern currency, nearly four pounds; often it was double that amount, and there were special offerings besides, such as the twenty shillings he sent every year to the shrine of St. Thomas at Canterbury. In January, 1511, the gentlemen of the King's chapel were paid what would now be seventy-five pounds for praying for the Queen's safe delivery, and similar sums were no doubt paid on other occasions.[273] In 1513, Catherine thought Henry's success was all due to his zeal for religion,[274] and a year or two later Erasmus wrote that Henry's Court was an example to all Christendom for learning and piety.[275]