That Calais was not lost to England under the incompetent management of Lisle (whose actions from first to last were too much influenced by the whims of a foolish wife), was solely due to the guidance which he received from Cromwell. The brilliant success of the great minister’s administration in England was fully equalled by the wisdom and skill of his dealings with her immediate neighbours and dependencies. In every case the dominant principle of his policy had been the same; the completion of the work begun by Henry VII.--the elevation of the Crown to absolute power on the ruins of every other institution which had ever been its rival. In attaining this end, which (as we must not forget) was one that commended itself to most patriotic Englishmen of the time, Cromwell had been confronted by a multitude of problems of great difficulty and infinite diversity: he handled them all with uniform success; and the monarchy, under his guidance, passed safe through one of the gravest crises in the history of the realm, finally to emerge triumphant, absolute, supreme in Church and State. CHAPTER IX THE MONASTERIES The suppression of the English monasteries, though in one sense but a single branch of Cromwell’s internal administration, still deserves to be considered in a separate chapter. Of all the changes that followed the breach with Rome, none bears as plainly as this the stamp of Cromwellian origin. The sinister genius of the King’s minister particularly fitted him for this task of destruction, and his title of _malleus-monachorum_ is thoroughly well deserved. Cromwell’s intent in suppressing the monasteries was obviously, like that of all the rest of his internal administration, the strengthening of the Crown: how far his measures were successful in accomplishing what was expected of them must be determined not only from their immediate effects, but also from the developments which later resulted from them.