Nothing remained save for the legates to proceed to the trial of the case; and in the trial Campeggio's instructions bade him procrastinate to the utmost in hopes the king might give way before the long delay. Wolsey had foreseen this possibility when he demanded that Campeggio should bring with him a decretal defining the law as applicable to the case. This decretal Campeggio was instructed to show the king, but keep in his own hands, so that it was useless for Wolsey's purpose. His first object was to get hold of this decretal, and he wrote urgently to the Pope asking that it should be delivered into the king's hands, and shown to the Privy Council. "Without the Pope's compliance," he sadly wrote, "I cannot bear up against this storm." But Clement VII. felt that he was more dependent on Charles V. than on Henry VIII., and declared that he had granted the decretal merely to be shown to the king and then burned; he had never consented that it be shown to the king's counsellors. When he was further pressed he tossed his arms and said, with great agitation, "I do consider the ruin that hangs over me; I repent what I have done. If heresies arise, is it my fault? My conscience acquits me. None of you have any reason to complain. I have performed my promise, and the king and the cardinal have never asked anything in my power which I have not granted with the utmost readiness; but I will do no violence to my conscience. Let them, if they like, send the legate back again, on the pretext that he will not proceed in the cause, and then do as they please, provided they do not make me responsible for injustice." Here the Pope touched upon a noticeable feature of the case. Henry was bound upon a course which was neither legally nor morally right, though national interests might to some degree be pleaded in its behalf. He was, however, resolved to be legally and morally justified in his own eyes and in the eyes of others. He would not content himself with setting aside the law, and leaving it to others to prove him in the wrong. The Papal Court was slow to justify him; it would have been slower to condemn him. Most men would have been satisfied with this knowledge, and would have acted upon it. But Henry was not only minded to do what he wished, but was resolved that what he wished should be declared absolutely right. He was determined that there should be no doubt about the legitimacy of his children by Anne Boleyn; and some recognition is due to him for not allowing his desires to overcome his patriotism, and leave to England the deplorable legacy of a disputed succession. As a man, Henry did not strive to subject his desires to the law of right; as a king, he was bent upon justifying his own caprice so that it should not do hurt to his royal office, or offend his duty to his kingdom. Henry sinned, but he was bent on sinning royally, and believed that so he could extenuate his sin.