• AUTHOR OF " THE ASSERTIO SACRAMENTORUM," &C. 197 



jto that of the French and Spanish kings. Here, therefore, was a 

 strong impelling motive for Henry to do what he proposed to do 

 with all his might — to task himself for an achievement of intellect 

 which should justify to the world and to posterity his claims to that 

 title, the Defender of the Faith,^ which he afterwards obtained, in 

 consequence of this once applauded, t hut now disregarded, book. 

 Resides, too, he reasoned, and plausibly enough, it must be allowed, 

 that the new views of Luther — which were spreading with so 

 strange a rapidity over Germany, replete with dangers to its thrones 

 — might at length reach his own kingdom with an augmented force 

 difficult to be suppressed. Policy, therefore, as well as predilection, 

 dictated an avowed and determined hostility to them. Added to 

 which, the Saxon reformer had treated the writings of Aquinas 

 with ostentatious insult ; and this was a mortal offence to Henry, 



account, for the wilful misstatements of Fra Paolos' work on that subject. 

 And a more able advocate could not have been selected by the Romish See, 

 if the list of three hundred and sixty errors in matters of fact, committed by 

 the Venetian Historian and appended to the end of Pallavicino's book, be 

 taken as a true one. 



* Some of the holy Synod debated whether the Apostolic, the Faithful, or 

 the Angelic, were the fittest appellation to bestow upon their orthodox hero. 

 But the suggestion of the Pope at last prevailed, and the Bull was accordingly 

 issued to confer the above mentioned title upon Henry. See Pallav. Concil 

 de Trente. Lib xi., cap. i., p. 177' This title, to which Clement afterwards 

 added that of l^iberator Urbis llomse, Dr. Lingard maintains, belonged to the 

 'King personally and not to his successors. History of Enylandy vol. vi., note, 

 p. 144. But surely these words imply it was to be transmitted to his posterity 

 hoc et immortale Glorise tuse Monumentum Posteris luis relinquere. See 

 Rymer's Foidera, vol. vi., par. i., p. 199. Bulla pro titulo Defensoris Fidei. 

 It is well known that Henry retained this title after he had thrown off his 

 allegiance to the Church of Rome; and the act passed in 1543 for the ratifi- 

 cation of his Majesty's style declares it to be thenceforth annexed for ever to 

 the imperial crown of England. See Itym. Feed., vol. xii., p. 756. 



f His reputation was so extensively diffused by this work, that those 

 eminent Italian scholars of the time, Vida and Colocei, sang his praises, and 

 the former in a strain that must have put Henry to the blush, if he had not 

 so delighted in the language of flattery, particularly when his intellectual 

 attainments were the muse's theme. 



*' Lingua dimicat acrius 

 Novis dum rationibus 

 Doctus sacrilegos premit 

 In vos ore furentes. 

 Quis unquam fuit aut erit 

 Qui regi meritis tot huic 

 Tot virtutibus enitens 

 Compararier ausit." 



