BY MANDELL CREIGHTON BISHOP OF LONDON M.A. OXFORD AND CAMBRIDGE, D.C.L. OF DURHAM LL.D. OF GLASGOW AND HARVARD MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED ST. MARTIN'S STREET. LONDON 1912 First Edition April 1888 Reprinted 1888, 1891, 1895, 1898, 1902, 1904, 1906 ( twice ), 1912...

All men are to be judged by what they do, and the way in which they do it. In the case of great statesmen there is a third consideration which challenges our judgment—what they choose to do. This consideration only presents itself in the case of great statesmen, and even then is not always recognised. For the average statesman does from day to day the business which has to be done, takes affairs as he finds them, and makes the best of them. Many who deliberately selected the questions with which

Thomas Wolsey was born at Ipswich, probably in March 1471. He was the son of Robert Wolsey and Joan his wife. Contemporary slander, wishing to make his fortunes more remarkable or his presumption more intolerable, represented his father as a man of mean estate, a butcher by trade. However, Robert Wolsey's will shows that he was a man of good position, probably a grazier and wool merchant, with relatives who were also well-to-do. Thomas seems to have been the eldest of his family, and his father'

The death of Louis XII. was a severe blow to Wolsey. The French alliance was not popular in England, and was bitterly opposed by the Duke of Norfolk and the party of the old nobility, who saw with dislike the growing influence of Wolsey. They now had an opportunity of reversing his policy and securing his downfall. It required all Wolsey's sagacity to devise a means of solving the difficulties which the death of Louis created. The new King of France, Francis I., was aged twenty-one, and was as a

The object of Wolsey's foreign policy had been attained by the universal peace of 1518. England had been set up as the mediator in the politics of Europe. The old claims of the empire and the papacy had passed away in the conflict of national and dynastic interests, in which papacy and empire were alike involved. England, by virtue of its insular position, was practically outside the objects of immediate ambition which distracted its Continental neighbours; but England's commercial interests mad

The most significant point in the mediatorial policy of Wolsey was the fact that it threw the Papacy entirely into the shade. What Wolsey was doing was the traditional business of the Pope, who could not openly gainsay a policy which he was bound to profess coincided with his own. So Leo X. followed Wolsey's lead of keeping on good terms with France and the Emperor alike; but Leo had no real wish for peace. He wished to gain something in Italy for the Medici, and nothing was to be gained while F

The failure of Wolsey's plans was due to the diplomacy of Gattinara and to the obstinacy of Charles V., who showed at the end of the negotiations at Calais an unexpected readiness to appreciate his obligations towards his dominions as a whole, by refusing to abandon Fontarabia lest thereby he should irritate his Spanish subjects. It was this capacity for large consideration that gave Charles V. his power in the future; his motives were hard to discover, but they always rested on a view of his en

The events of the year 1523 had practically made an end of the imperial alliance. Henry VIII. was not in a position to go to war again, and his confidence in Charles V.'s good intentions towards him was dispelled. Charles and Francis had had enough of war, and both of them secretly desired peace, but neither would make the first move towards it. Wolsey watched their movements keenly, and strove that English interests should not be entirely sacrificed in the pacification which seemed imminent. He

We have been following the laborious career of Wolsey in his direction of foreign affairs. He held in his hands the threads of complicated negotiations, by which he was endeavouring to assure England's power on the Continent, not by means of war but by skilful diplomacy. In doing this he had to guard the commercial relations of England with the Netherlands, and had also to bow before the selfwill of the king, who insisted on pursuing fantastic designs of personal aggrandisement. Still he steered

If Wolsey hoped that the peace with France, which he had so successfully concluded in the beginning of 1527, would enable him to reassert England's influence on the Continent, and would give him an opportunity for the work of domestic reform, he was sorely disappointed. A new matter arose, not entirely unexpected, but which widened into unexpected issues, and consumed Wolsey's energies till it led to his fall. The project of the king's divorce was suddenly mooted; and this personal matter, befor

When the storm broke over his head Wolsey had no hope of escape. His position as an English minister was due entirely to the king's favour, and when that favour was withdrawn he was entirely helpless. Outside the king there was no motive power in English politics at this period. There was no party in the State strong enough to bring any influence to bear upon him: he was likely to be moved by nothing save the dread of a popular rising, and there was no chance of a popular rising in Wolsey's favo

"No statesman of such eminence ever died less lamented," is Dr. Brewer's remark on Wolsey's death. Indeed, the king had forgotten his old servant; his enemies rejoiced to be rid of a possible rival; the men whom he had trained in politics were busy in seeking their own advancement, which was not to be promoted by tears for a fallen minister; the people had never loved him, and were indifferent about one who was no longer powerful. In a time of universal uncertainty every one was speculating on t

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