7. =Queen Catharine and Anne Boleyn.=--It was a great disappointment to Henry that he had no surviving male children. England had never been ruled by a queen, and it was uncertain whether Henry's daughter, Mary, would be allowed to reign. Henry had already begun to ask himself whether he might not get rid of his wife, on the plea that a marriage with his brother's wife was unlawful, and this consideration had the greater weight with him because Catharine was five years older than himself and was growing distasteful to him. When in =1521=, in his book against Luther, he assigned a divine origin to the Papacy, he told More of a secret reason for this exaltation of the Pope's power, and it is possible that this reason was his desire to obtain from the Pope a divorce under the pretext that it would secure a peaceful succession. At all events his scruples regarding his marriage with Catharine were quickened in =1522= by the appearance at court of Anne Boleyn, a sprightly black-eyed flirt in her sixteenth year, who took his fancy as she grew into womanhood. Flirt as she was, she knew her power, and refused to give herself to him except in marriage. The king, on his part, being anxious for a legitimate son, set his heart on a divorce which would enable him to marry Anne. Wolsey, knowing the obstacles in the way, urged him to abandon the project; but it was never possible to turn Henry from his course, and Wolsey set himself, in this as in all things else, to carry out his master's wishes, though he did so very reluctantly. Moral scruples had little weight with Wolsey, but in =1525=, when he learnt the king's design, there were strong political reasons against its execution, as England was in alliance with Catharine's nephew, the Emperor, Charles V., and a divorce would be certain to endanger the alliance. [Illustration: The Gatehouse of Coughton Court, Warwickshire; built about 1530.] 8. =Henry's Demand for a Divorce. 1527-1528.=--Two years later, in =1527=, as Henry was veering round towards a French alliance (see p. 374), he had no longer much reason to consider the feelings of the Emperor. On the other hand, the strong position which Charles occupied in Italy after the sack of Rome made it improbable that Clement VII. who was then Pope, and who thought more of his political than of his ecclesiastical position, would do anything to thwart the Emperor. An attempt made by Henry in =1527= to draw Clement to consent to the divorce failed, and in =1528= Wolsey sent to Rome his secretary, Stephen Gardiner, an adroit man of business, to induce Clement to appoint legates to decide the question in Henry's favour. Clement, anxious to please all parties, appointed Wolsey and another cardinal, Campeggio, as his legates, but took care to add that nothing done by them should be valid until it had received his own approval.