"He has, however, always been a faithful servant and an attentive friend to me.

It was he who delivered me from the unholy bond with Catharine of Aragon: it was he too who warned me of Catharine Howard, and furnished me with proofs of her guilt.

Of what misdemeanor do you accuse him ?" "He denies the six articles," said Gardiner, whose malicious face now glowed with bitter hatred.

"He reprobates auricular confession, and believes not that the voluntarily taken vows of celibacy are binding." "If he does that, then he is a traitor!" cried the king, who was fond of always throwing a reverence for chastity and modesty, as a kind of holy mantle, over his own profligate and lewd life; and whom nothing more embittered than to encounter another on that path of vice which he himself, by virtue of his royal prerogative, and his crown by the grace of God, could travel in perfect safety.
"If he does that, then he is a traitor! My arm of vengeance will smite him!" repeated the king again.

"It was I who gave my people the six articles, as a sacred and authoritative declaration of faith; and I will not suffer this only true and right doctrine to be assailed and obscured.