The gross immorality so freely imputed to Henry seems to have as little foundation as the theory that his sole object in seeking the divorce from Catherine and separation from Rome was the gratification of his passion for Anne Boleyn. If that had been the case, there would be no adequate explanation of the persistence with which he pursued the divorce. He was "studying the matter so diligently," Campeggio says, "that I believe in this case he knows more than a great theologian and jurist"; he was so convinced of the justice of his cause "that an angel descending from heaven would be unable to persuade him otherwise".[531] He sent embassy after embassy to Rome; he risked the enmity of Catholic Europe; he defied the authority of the vicar of Christ; and lavished vast sums to obtain verdicts in his favour from most of the universities in Christendom. It is not (p. 187) credible that all this energy was expended merely to satisfy a sensual passion, which could be satisfied without a murmur from Pope or Emperor, if he was content with Anne Boleyn as a mistress, and is believed to have been already satisfied in 1529, four years before the divorce was obtained.[532] So, too, the actual sentence of divorce in 1533 was precipitated not by Henry's passion for Anne, but by the desire that her child should be legitimate. She was pregnant before Henry was married to her or divorced from Catherine. But, though the representation of Henry's passion for Anne Boleyn as the sole _fons et origo_ of the divorce is far from convincing, that passion introduced various complications into the question; it was not merely an additional incentive to Henry's desires; it also brought Wolsey and Henry into conflict; and the unpopularity of the divorce was increased by the feeling that Henry was losing caste by seeking to marry a lady of the rank and character of Anne Boleyn. [Footnote 531: _Ibid._, iv., 4858.] [Footnote 532: No conclusive evidence on this point is possible; the French ambassador, Clement VII. and others believed that Henry VIII. and Anne Boleyn had been cohabiting since 1529. On the other hand, if such was the case, it is singular that no child should have been born before 1533; for after that date Anne seems to have had a miscarriage nearly every year. Ortiz, indeed, reports from Rome that she had a miscarriage in 1531 (_L. and P._, v., 594), but the evidence is not good.] * * * * *