th his grandeur, he felt the stroke of adversity with double
rigor.[**] The smallest appearance of his return to favor threw him into
transports of joy unbecoming a man. The king had seemed willing, during
some time, to intermit the blows which overwhelmed him. He granted
him his protection, and left him in possession of the sees of York and
Winchester. He even sent him a gracious message, accompanied with a
ring, as a testimony of his affection. Wolsey, who was on horseback when
the messenger met him, immediately alighted; and, throwing himself on
his knees in the mire, received in that humble attitude these marks of
his majesty's gracious disposition towards him.

* Cavendish, p. 41.

** Strype, vol. i. p. 114, 115. App. No. 31, etc.

*** Stowe, p. 547.

But his enemies, who dreaded his return to court, never ceased plying
the king with accounts of his several offences; and Anne Boleyn, in
particular, contributed her endeavors, in conjunction with her uncle,
the duke of Norfolk, to exclude him from all hopes of ever being
reinstated in his former authority. He dismissed, therefore, his
numerous retinue and as he was a kind and beneficent master, the
separation passed not without a plentiful effusion of tears on both
sides. [*] The king's heart, notwithstanding some gleams of kindness,
seemed now totally hardened against his old favorite. He ordered him
to be indicted in the star chamber, where a sentence was passed against
him. And, not content with this severity, he abandoned him to all the
rigor of the parliament, which now after a long interval, was again
assembled. The house of lords voted a long charge against Wolsey,
consisting of forty-four articles; and accompanied it with an
application to the king for his punishment, and his removal from all
authority. Little opposition was made to this charge in the upper house:
no evidence of any part of it was so much as called for; and as it
chiefly consists of general accusations, it was scarcely susceptible of
any.[**] [6] The articles were sent down to the house of commons; where
Thomas Cromwell, formerly a servant of the cardinal's, and who had been
raised by him from a very low station, defended his unfortunate patron
with such spirit, generosity, and courage, as acquired him great honor,
and laid the foundation of that favor which he afterwards enjoyed with
the king.

* Cavendish. Stowe, p. 549.

** See note F, at the end of the volu