This policy once adopted, the task of selecting a bride was easy. As early as 1530[1066] the old Duke of Cleves had suggested some (p. 383) marriage alliance between his own and the royal family of England. He was closely allied to the Elector of Saxony, who had married Sibylla, the Duke of Cleves' daughter; and the young Duke, who was soon to succeed his father, had also claims to the Duchy of Guelders. Guelders was a thorn in the side of the Emperor; it stood to the Netherlands in much the same relation as Scotland stood to England, and when there was war between Charles and Francis Guelders had always been one of the most useful pawns in the French King's hands. Hence an alliance between the German princes, the King of Denmark, who had joined their political and religious union, Guelders and England would have seriously threatened the Emperor's hold on his Dutch dominions.[1067] This was the step which Henry was induced to take, when he realised that Charles's friendship with France remained unbroken, and that the Emperor had made up his mind to visit Paris. Hints of a marriage between Henry and Anne of Cleves[1068] were thrown out early in 1539; the only difficulty, which subsequently proved very convenient, was that the lady had been promised to the son of the Duke of (p. 384) Lorraine. The objection was waived on the ground that Anne herself had not given her consent; in view of the advantages of the match and of the Duke's financial straits, Henry agreed to forgo a dowry; and, on the 6th of October, the treaty of marriage was signed.[1069] [Footnote 1066: _L. and P._, iv., 6364.] [Footnote 1067: See the present writer in _Cambridge Modern History_, ii., 236, 237. The Duke of Cleves was not a Lutheran or a Protestant, as is generally assumed. He had established a curious Erasmian compromise between Protestantism and Roman Catholicism, which bears some resemblance to the ecclesiastical policy pursued by Henry VIII., and by the Elector Joachim II. of Brandenburg; and the marriage of Anne with Henry did not imply so great a change in ecclesiastical policy as has usually been supposed. The objections to it were really more political than religious; the Schmalkaldic League was a feeble reed to lean upon, although its feebleness was not exposed until 1546-47.] [Footnote 1068: _L. and P._, XIV., i., 103; _cf._ Bouterwek, _Anna von Cleve_; Merriman, _Cromwell_, chap. xiii.; and articles on the members of the Cleves family in the _Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie_.] [Footnote 1069: _L. and P._, XIV., ii., 285, 286.]