Cromwell, Cranmer and Lord Lisle: A Study in the Politics of Reform
When Henry VIII raised Thomas Cromwell to the earldom of Essex, most observors were both dazzled by the ceremony and deceived as to its significance. The French ambassador Marillac had taken the measure of events, however. He had speculated that Cromwell would lose authority in religious matters, while perhaps retaining it in worldly affairs. Those whom Cromwell had put in the shade reserved “une bonne pensée” for him, Marillac said. And Cromwell's close ties to religious radicals (Friar Barnes and the Calais Sacramentarians) provided weapons to his enemies. Norfolk and his conservative friends feared further reformation might provide occasions for new waves of rebellion in a country already under diverse threats at home and abroad. They would not miss their chance to cast down the upstart.Modern historians have dismissed Marillac's chief point, that Cromwell would fall because he had used his powers to make a ‘party’ in the State. Foxe, Hall and Burnet had seen the king's minister in that light. Many of Cromwell's contemporaries held such views. But the weight of Professor Elton's opinion has lain heavily on the subject. He dismissed Marillac as little more than an ill-in-formed gossip. Then, turning to the evidence of the Act of Attainder passed against Cromwell, the Cambridge wizard treated it with equal severity. Allegations that Cromwell had illegally retained heretical men, in order to have a force with which to defend error with sword in hand, were obviously contrived.