Note (back) — Chapter VIII

In accordance with his instructions, Campeggio first sought to dissuade Henry from persisting in his suit for the divorce. Finding the King immovable, he endeavoured to induce Catherine to go into a nunnery, as the divorced wife of Louis XII. had done, "who still lived in the greatest honour and reputation with God and all that kingdom".[612] He represented to her that she had nothing to lose by such a step; she could never regain Henry's affections or obtain restitution of her conjugal rights. Her consent might have deferred the separation of the English Church from Rome; it would certainly have relieved the Supreme Pontiff from a humiliating and intolerable position. But these considerations of expediency weighed nothing with Catherine. She was as immovable as Henry, and deaf to all Campeggio's solicitations. Her conscience was, perhaps, of a rigid, Spanish type, but it was as clear as Henry's and a great deal more comprehensible. She was convinced that her marriage was valid; to admit a doubt of it would imply that she had been living in sin and imperil her immortal soul. Henry did not in the least mind admitting that he had lived for twenty years with a woman who was not his wife; the sin, to his mind, was continuing to live with her after he had become convinced that she was really not his wife. Catherine appears, however, to have been willing to take the monastic vows, if Henry would do the same. Henry was equally willing, if Clement would immediately dispense with the vows in his case, but not in Catherine's.[613] But there were objections to this course, and doubts of Clement's power to authorise Henry's re-marriage, even if Catherine did go into a nunnery.