HENRY VIII. ACTS AND DOCUMENTS Up to 1529.

In 1511 Henry made an alliance with Aragon, the Pope Julius II, Venice, and in 1513 with the Emperor Maximilian against France. (Rymer's .Foedera, xiii .)
By this alliance Henry entered upon the adventurous foreign policy, which Wolsey afterwards directed with a view to the maintenance of a balance of power in Europe. Though the immediate cost was great with small results to show, there is no doubt that England was thereby replaced in a leading position in Europe, and made ready for her share in the colonial and commercial expansion which were to come from the discovery of the New World and of the maritime route to India, a place which could only be won and kept by a nation recognized as a great power. Indirectly, too, this foreign policy probably resulted in a modification of the exclusively monarchical rule which had been prevailing since Edward IV.'s reign, and which a continuance of Henry VII's policy might have made perpetual.
In 1512, by 4 Henry VIII. sess.2, c. 2, Benefit of clergy was taken from murderers and felons. One of the first indications of the approaching control of the royal over the ecclesiastical courts. (Printed in the Statutes.)
Another sign of the future course of the reign was that in 1524 the royal assent was given to the suppression of the Monastery of St. Frideswide at Oxford; a bull of Clement VII. was issued extending Wolsey's legatine powers for the visitation of monasteries; and another provided for the suppression of all monasteries with less annual income than 3000 ducts. (Rymer's Foedera, xiv.)
In 1514 Henry concluded peace with France, and a marriage treaty was made between Louis XII and the king's sister Mary. ( Rymer's Foedera, xiii. )
In 1515, however, Louis died, and Francis I, his successor, renewing the French claims on Milan, won the great victory of Marignano over the Swiss, who garrisoned the Milanese, and so threatened the balance of European power that England formed a new league with the Pope, the Emperor, the prince of Castile (Charles, afterwards Emperor), and the Swiss. (Rymer's Foedera xiii. )
This league, however, came to little, owing to the poverty and perhaps insincerity of the Emperor and Charles, now king of Spain, having concluded a treaty with France at Noyon, to which the Emperor became a party, England made a peace with France, surrendering to France, and not to Charles as he had hoped, Tournay and its surroundings, and including all the European powers in the pacification, 1518. (Rymer's Foedera, xiii. .)
In 1522, war having broken out between Charles, now Emperor and Francis, England joined the former. But the ill success of the Duke of Suffolk in 1523, the great success of Charles at Pavia, February 24th, 1525, and the sack of Rome, 1526, inclined England to the French side. Peace had been made with France on August 30th, 1525 (Rymer's Foedera, xiv. ), and a treaty was made by Cardinal Wolsey with Francis at Amiens, 1527, to force the Emperor to reasonable terms of peace, England receiving money and a promise of Boulogne and Ardres. (Rymer's Foedera, xiv. )
This change of side left the king free to consider further the question of the annullment of his marriage with Katharine, the Emperor's aunt
In 1529, on August 5th, the general peace of Cambrai was concluded, modifying very much the terms extorted by the Emperor from Francis, when the latter was a prisoner at Madrid, after Pavia. (Rymer's .Foedera, xiv. ; Previous Treaty of Madrid, xiv. 308.)
Though Wolsey was no longer the directing spirit of European affairs - he was deprived of the seal on October 17th, 1529 - yet the peace of Cambrai was a triumph for the policy which he had pursued. It left the power of France and of Charles fairly balanced, and the importance of England to one side or the other well established.

THE BEGINNING OF THE REFORMATION
The series of events which led to the separation of the Church in England from Rome, and to the completion of the royal supremacy over the Church, began with Henry's attempts to annul his marriage with his brother's widow Katharine, on the ground that the marriage was against the law of the Church, and that no Papal dispensation could make it valid. The Pope, not unnaturally, was slow to countenance such a doctrine.
Henry's subsequent measures greatly increased the royal power by adding to it authority in spiritual things. His policy, leading to hostility with the Pope and Emperor, caused a yet further increase of his power on the ground of public safety, as all the elements of opposition to the Crown, the relations of the Yorkist House, the older nobility, and the discontented poor, fond a rallying point in the ecclesiastical discontent.
The king, though practically despotic, conducted his government by the aid of Parliament during this latter half of his reign. The turning out of the mitred abbots from the House of Lords the dependence of the bishops upon the Crown, the creation of new peers, the summoning of members from small boroughs and the distribution of monastic property among commoners, giving the Crown a strong hold over both Houses of Parliament . This revival of Parliamentary activity, however, was pregnant of results in the future.

The increasing frequency of Parliamentary sessions is illustrated by the following table:
PARLIAMENTS OF HENRY VII. AND VIII.
Henry VII Parliament met in 1485, 1487, 1489, 1491, 1495, 1497, 1504,
Henry VIII. Parliament met in 1510, February, 1512, November, 1512, 1513, 1514, 1515, 1523, 1529, 1530, 1531,1532, 1533, 1534, 1535, 1536, 1539, 1540, 1542, 1543, 1544,1545.
The same Parliament sat from November 3rd, 1529, till July 18th, 1536, and passed the most important of the anti-Papal Acts.

ACTS AND DOCUMENTS
The suppression of some of the smaller monasteries and the application of their revenues to the foundation of colleges, had been already begun by Wolsey. (See too AD. 1414.)
In 1528 a Bull of Pope Clement VII. gave the king leave to suppress very small monasteries for the benefit of his colleges at Windsor and Cambridge (hodie the chapter of Windsor, and Trinity College, Cambridge). (Rymer, xiv. 270.)
In the same year another Bull provided for the suppression of monasteries with less than twelve inmates, and their amalgamation with larger houses. (Rymer, xiv. 272.)
Another Bull to the same effect was issued in 1529.
Yet another sanctioned the suppression of small monasteries for the sake of providing funds to build new cathedrals. (Rymer, xiv. 273.)
The subsequent entire suppression of the monasteries was therefore the completion of a policy which had already been entered upon by degrees, both with and without Papal concurrence.
The larger houses whose abbots and priors were summoned to the Parliament of 1529 were the following: St. John's Colchester, St. Edmund's Bury, Abingdon, the Holy Cross of Waltham, Shrewsbury, Cirencester, Gloucester, Westminster, Bardney, Selby, Hulme, Thorney, Evesham, Ramsey, Hide, Glastonbury, Malmesbury, Croyland, Battle, Winchcombe, Reading, St. Augustine's Canterbury, St. Mary's York, Tewkesbury, Tavistock, Coventry. The Prior of St. John of Jerusalem, in England, the head of the English Knights Hospitallers, was also summoned.
Henry VIII. 21, c. 24. The king released from his debts by Act of Parliament on the ground that he had expended his treasure in securing the peace of Europe. (Printed in the Statutes.)
Henry VIII. 22, c. 15. The clergy of the province of Canterbury acknowledging that they are liable to the penalties of Praemunire for obeying the Legatine authority of Wolsey, pardoned on payment of £100,000 in five years.
Henry VIII. 23, c. 19. The clergy of the province of York similarly pardoned on payment of £18,840 0s. 10d. The royal supremacy practically vindicated thereby. (Printed in the Statute.) 1552. Henry made with Francis of France a defensive alliance against the possible hostility of the Emperor, on account of his meditated repudiation of the Emperor's aunt. (Rymer, xiv. 434.)
Henry VIII. 24, c. 12. An Act forbidding any appeals to Rome
"Whereas . . . this realm of England is an Empire, and so hath been accepted in the world, governed by one Supreme Head and King. . . he being institute and furnished .... with plenary, whole and entire power . . . to render and yield justice and final determination to all manner of folk . . . and that part of the body politick called the spirituality, now being usually called the English Church ..... hath been always thought and is at this hour sufficient and meet of itself ..... to declare and determine all such doubts, and to administer all such duties and offices as to their rooms spiritual doth appertain," &c. (Printed in the Statutes.)
It is noticeable that the King in Parliament asserts the separation of England from the Holy Roman Empire, of which the Bishop of Rome was naturally the chief bishop. Reference is made to the statutes of Edward I., Edward III, Richard II., and Henry IV., and appeals to Rome, or to any foreign power, are made punishable by the penalties of Praemunire, the old Act under which a Royal Supremacy over spiritual persons and causes had been vindicated. The Act of Praemunire itself being based on more ancient precedents.
In 1533 the Convocation of the Province of Canterbury determined that the king's marriage with his brother's widow was null and void from the beginning and that no Papal dispensation could render it valid, in accordance with which decision the Archbishop's Court dissolved the marriage. (Rymer, xiv. 454.)
Henry VIII. 25, c. 19. Convocation was only to assemble by the king's writ and was only to enact constitutions by the king's leave. Appeals from the Archbishops' Courts were to be to the Court of Chancery.
Henry VIII. 25, c. 20. The payment of Annates and First-fruits to Rome forbidden, Persons elected to bishoprics not to be presented to the See of Rome, and if election by the chapter is delayed, the king empowered to present to a bishopric by letters patent under the Great Seal. Henry VIII.. 26, c. 3. First-fruits and Annates granted to the crown.
Henry VIII. 25, c. 21. All payments to the See of Rome, and all law; dispensations, indulgences, licenses, and visitations by the See of Rome abolished in England.
Henry VIII, 26, 1. " The King our Sovereign lord shall be taken, accepted, and reputed the only Supreme Head in earth of the Church of England, called Anglicana Ecclesia "
This Act was confirmatory of what had been already determined. In February, 1531, the Convocation of Canterbury, and in May, 1531, the Convocation of York, had admitted the Supreme Headship of the king " so far as the law of Christ allows " On June 15, 1535, the king formally took the title In terra supremum caput Anglicanae Ecclesiae. Rymer, xiv. 549. The title was adopted on their succession by Edward VI and Mary. The above act was repealed by 1 and 2 Philip and Mary, c. 8. The title was never afterwards assumed.
Henry VIII. 26, a 13. The penalties of treason extended to cover wishing or desiring by words or writing any bodily harm to the king, queen, or their heirs apparent depriving them of any dignity, style, or name, or publishing that the king is an heretic, schismatic, infidel, or usurper. An act which the spies employed by Thomas Cromwell turned into a frightful engine of tyranny, men being made traitors for hasty words.
Henry VIII 27, c. 10. The Statute of Uses, providing that the possession of land shall be in him or them who hath the use. The effect of the law was to hinder the power of landholders to make provision for younger sons by a charge upon their land, and it was one of the grievances of those gentlemen who joined the "Pilgrimage of Grace."
The Acts, Henry VIII. 32, c. 1, and Henry VIII. 34 - 5, c. 5, allowed the owners of real estate (Land) to devise it by will.
Henry VIII 27, e. 28. All monasteries with lands, if not above £200 a year value, given into the king's hands.
Henry VIII 28, c. 17. The king's successor empowered to repeal any statutes made in his reign before he reaches the age of twenty-four.
Henry VIII. 31, c. 8. The king's proclamations given the force of law. An act which if carried to its possible extent would have entirely abrogated the Parliamentary constitution. Repealed Edward VI 1, c. 12.
Henry VIII 31, c. 13. Suppression of all remaining monasteries reciting that many have been already surrendered, and confirming such surrenders to the king.
Henry VIII. 31, c. 14. The Statute called the Six Articles. By this denial of Transubstantiation was punished as heresy, with death by burning, and forfeiture of all goods to the crown. Affirmation of the necessity of Communion in both kinds for the laity; of the lawfulness of the marriage of priests; of the lawfulness of marriage by persons who have professed chastity or widowhood; that private masses are not lawful, laudable, and agreeable to the law of God; or that auricular confession is not expedient and to be used ; to be punished by death, as felony, with forfeiture of goods. If a priest or other man or woman who has vowed chastity or widowhood marry or commit unchastity, both parties to be adjudged felons.
The excessive seventy of the act may have tended to make it a dead letter, or it may have been intended rather to terrify the extreme Reforming party and satisfy the Ecclesiastical Conservatives than to be strictly enforced. Though certainly a large number, and such as the archbishop himself who was married, must have been liable to its penalties, Foxe has only collected the names of twenty-eight persons who suffered under it and they cannot all be certainly included.
Henry VIII 34 - 35, c. 26. (Extending and completing the act, Henry VIII. 27, c. 26.) Dividing Wales into counties, establishing a President and Council for Wales, and Justices of the Peace as in England. Members were returned to Parliament from Welsh counties and boroughs, and the later boundaries not only of Wales, but of the English counties bordering upon Wales were fixed. The present geographical Wales dates only from these acts.
Henry VIII 35, c. 3. An Act confirming an Irish Act of Henry VIII. 33, c. 1, giving Henry the title of king (Rex) of Ireland, instead of lord (Dominus). The creation of a kingdom had been in mediaeval Europe the prerogative of the pope or emperor, and by this act Henry continued to assert the imperial independence of the crown of England.
Henry VIII. 35, c. 12. The king's debts incurred since the thirty-third year of his reign remitted, and sums repaid by him to be returned. The lands and revenues of the monastic houses had been expended in erecting new bishoprics, in building castles for coast defence, in small pensions to former inmates, and chiefly in extravagant grants to nobility and gentry, Moreover the total revenue of the abbey lands had apparently not been so large as was expected.
Henry VIII 37, c. 4. Divers Colleges, Free Chapels, Chantries, Hospitals, Guilds, &c., suppressed. The terms of the act seemed to include the Colleges in the Universities, but the King promised that they should be unmolested. The above are all printed in the Statutes. 1546, June 7. A peace concluded with France to terminate the war undertaken in conjunction with the Emperor in 1543,stipulating for the return of Boulogne to the French on the payment of certain sums of money, neither party to erect new fortifications in the Boulonnais till after Michaelmas, 1554.(Rymer, xv. 93.)