Mary Tudor - Anna Whitelock [99]
Yet Pole still pushed for an immediate and full restitution: “He [God] destroyed the government that displeased Him without any human action, and gave power to a virgin, who trusted in Him,” he railed, yet Mary “thinks that temporal matters should be taken care of first. She must not be so ungrateful … nothing more neglectful than putting off religion to the end. Her impudent councillors must not intimidate her.” And he implored Mary, “[God] did not give you such great courage so that you might become fearful as Queen.”5 In a subsequent letter he told her, “You have given your enemies good argument that you [are] schismatic, since [you] have taken Parliament’s authority for most important confirmation of your claim.” It was “no excuse” that some of Parliament had proved resistant. Her adversaries could say that she was “no better than Northumberland” with regard to obedience. “You look weak now,” he ended; “these acts establish schism.”6
Despite Pole’s insistence, Mary knew she could not move too fast. Yet she dared not show “the intent of her heart in this matter,” given the opposition expressed.7 On the day that Parliament rose, a dead dog with a shaved crown, representing a tonsured priest, a rope about its neck, was slung through the windows of the Queen’s Presence Chamber.8 Mary was indignant and warned Parliament that “such acts might move her to a kind of justice further removed from justice than she would wish.”9
AS OF DECEMBER 20, religious services were to be conducted and sacraments administered as they had been in the last years of Henry VIII’s reign. It marked the beginning of restoration and reform. Although Mary did not use the title, she did use her authority as supreme head to press for reform. In royal articles of March 1554, she ordered the strict observance of the traditional ceremonies and the repression of “corrupt and naughty opinions, unlawful books, ballads, and other pernicious and hurtful devices.” Married priests were to be deprived, all processions were to be conducted in Latin, all “laudable” ceremonies were to be observed, and “uniform” doctrine was to be set forth in homilies.10
The restoration of the Mass and of Catholic ceremonies demanded the return of all that the Edwardian government had had stripped out of the churches. In articles designed for the visitation of his diocese in the autumn, Edmund Bonner, bishop of London, outlined a program of reconstruction to be adopted by bishops. The articles specified what his church now required, and parishioners were ordered to return property still in their possession:
Whether the things underwritten (which are to be found at the cost of the parishioners) be in the church: it is to wit, a legend, an antiphoner, a grail, a psalter, an ordinal to say or solemnize divine office, a missal, a manual, a processional, a chalice, two cruetts, a principal vestment with chasuble, a vestment for the deacon and sub-deacon, a cope with the appurtenances, it is to wit an amice, alb, girdle, stole and fannon, the high altar with apparel in the front and parts thereof, three towels, three surplices, a rochet, a cross for procession with candlesticks, a cross for the dead, an incenser, a ship or bessel for frankincense, a little sanctas bell, a pix with an honest and decent cover, and a veil for the Lent, banners for the Rogation week, bells and ropes, a bier for the dead, a vessel to carry holy water about, a candlestick for the paschal taper, a font to christen children with covering and lock and key, and generally all other things, which after the custom of the country or place, the parishioners are bound to find, maintain and keep?11
Bonner’s investigation was minute in its detail, from issues of dress to clerical residence and morality. But it also focused specifically on seeking