That had been built up, not on the (p.

219) denial of the Pope's power to dispense, but on the technical defects of a particular dispensation.

Now it appeared that the validity of the marriage did not depend upon this dispensation at all.

Nor did it depend upon the brief, for Catherine was prepared to deny on oath that the marriage with Arthur had been anything more than a form;[615] in that case the affinity with Henry had not been contracted, and there was no need of either dispensation or brief.

This assertion seems to have shaken Henry; certainly he began to shift his position, and, early in 1529, he was wishing for some noted divine, friar or other, who would maintain that the Pope could not dispense at all.[616] This was his first doubt as to the plenitude of papal power; his marriage with Catherine must be invalid, because his conscience told him so; if it was not invalid through defects in the dispensation, it must be invalid because the Pope could not dispense.