When he left the king, he hurried off to his friends, particularly to Cromwell. The burden which Henry was laying upon him seemed more insupportable than ever. Knowing how difficult it is to resist a prince of despotic character, he foresaw conflicts and perhaps compromises, which would embitter his life, and he could not make up his mind to sacrifice his happiness to the imperious will of the monarch. ‘Take care,’ said his friends, ‘it is as dangerous to refuse a favor from so absolute a prince as to insult him.’ But Cranmer’s conscience was concerned in his refusal. ‘I feel something within me,’ he said,[243] ‘which rebels against the supremacy of the pope, and all the superstitions to which I should have to submit as primate of England. No, I will not be a bishop!’ He might sacrifice his repose and his happiness, expose himself to painful struggles; but to recognize the pope and submit to his jurisdiction was an insurmountable obstacle. His friends shook their heads. ‘Your _nolo episcopari_,’ they said, ‘will not hold against our master’s _volo te episcopum esse_.[244] And after all, what is it? Permitting the king to place you at the summit of honors and power.... You refuse all that men desire.’ ‘I would sooner forfeit my life,’ answered Cranmer, ‘than do anything against my conscience to gratify my ambition.’[245] Henry vexed at these delays, again summoned Cranmer to the palace, and bade him speak without fear. ‘If I accept this office,’ replied that sincere man, ‘I must receive it from the hands of the pope, and this my conscience will not permit me to do.... Neither the pope nor any other foreign prince has authority in this realm.’[246] Such a reason as this had great weight with Henry. He was silent for a little while as if reflecting,[247] and then said to Cranmer: ‘Can you prove what you have just said?’ ‘Certainly I can,’ answered the doctor; ‘Holy Scripture and the Fathers support the supreme authority of kings in their kingdoms, and thus prove the claims of the pope to be a miserable usurpation.’ Such a statement bound Henry to take another step in his reforms. As he had not yet thought of establishing bishops and archbishops without the pope, he sent for some learned lawyers, and asked them how he could confer the episcopal dignity on Cranmer without wounding the conscience of the future primate. The lawyers proposed, that as Cranmer refused to submit to the Roman primacy, some one should be sent to Rome to do in his stead all that the law required. ‘Let another do it if he likes,’ said Cranmer, ‘but _super animam suam_, at the risk of his soul. As for me I declare I will not acknowledge the authority of the pope any further than it agrees with the Word of God; and that I reserve the right of speaking against him and of attacking his errors.’