If the bishops refused the pope his ancient revenue, they refused the king the new authority claimed by the crown, and maintained that no secular power had any right to meddle with them.[172] Cromwell resisted them, and determined to carry out the reform of abuses. ‘The clergy,’ said the Commons to the king, ‘make laws in convocation without your assent and ours which are in opposition to the statutes of the realm, and then excommunicate those who violate such laws.’[173] A second time the frightened bishops vainly prayed the king to make his laws harmonize with theirs. Henry VIII. insisted that the Church should conform to the State, and not the State to the Church, and he was inexorable. The bishops knew well that it was their union with powerful pontiffs, always ready to defend them against kings, which had given them so much strength in the middle ages, and that now they must yield. They therefore lowered their flag before the authority which they had themselves set up. Convocation did, indeed, make a last effort. It represented that ‘the authority of bishops proceeds immediately from God, and from no power of any secular prince, as _your Highness hath shown in your own book most excellently written against Martin Luther_.’ But the king was firm, and made the prelates yield at last.[174] Thus was a great revolution accomplished: the spiritual power was taken away from those arrogant priests who had so long usurped the rights of the members of the Church. It was only justice; but it ought to have been placed in better hands than those of Henry VIII. [Sidenote: Contradictory Oaths.] Cromwell was preparing a fresh blow that would strike the pontiff’s triple crown. He drew his master’s attention to the oaths which the bishops took at their consecration, both to the king and to the pope. Henry first read the oath to the pope. ‘I swear,’ said the bishop, ‘to defend the papacy of Rome, the regality of St. Peter, against all men. If I know of any plot against the pope, I will resist it with all my might, and will give him warning. Heretics, schismatics, and rebels to our holy father, I shall resist and persecute with all my power.’[175] On the other hand, the bishops took an oath to the king at the same time, wherein they renounced every clause or grant which, coming from the pope, might be in any way detrimental to his Majesty. In one breath they must obey the pope and disobey him.