Lacking any evidence from the sources on the subject of the use to which the revenues from the suppression of the monasteries were put, one must judge from this passage, and from subsequent events. An Act giving Henry the power to erect bishoprics by letters patent, was passed in Parliament, May 23, 1539[430]. It was by the authority of this statute, that the King founded the six new bishops’ sees above mentioned, and also converted some of the old houses, such as Beverley, Ripon, and Manchester, into collegiate churches. But the passage in Burnet also hints at other methods of employing the money gained from the suppression of the monasteries, which it seems likely that Cromwell suggested. The use of the funds to strengthen the coast defences along the Channel was always one of his favourite schemes; it is probable that he found no difficulty in persuading the King how necessary such a precaution was, in view of the danger of foreign invasion, which threatened England at the close of 1539. But the plan of selling the lands of the confiscated houses to the nobles at low prices, is even more Cromwellian. It immediately reminds the reader of the course which Wolsey, ten years before, had pursued at his servant’s advice, when he bought off the popular hatred by grants out of his own lands and revenues. Cromwell plainly saw that after the suppression, steps must be taken to ensure the permanence of the reform he had effected. By judicious grants he turned aside the hatred of some of the rural gentry, who were at first opposed to the destruction of the monasteries, and thus, by rendering the work popular at home, he secured himself and it from the attacks of Catholic potentates abroad. But his action at this juncture had another more subtle and more important result. For by the grants which he made to the rural gentry, he laid the basis for the foundation of a territorial aristocracy, destined at a later day to wrest from the Crown the power which he had wrung from the older nobility, lay and clerical. This after-effect of Cromwell’s policy, which was in direct opposition to the aims of his government, did not take place till long after his fall. It was rendered possible solely by the movement of events over which he had no control, and he could have scarcely anticipated it. But it is only fair to mention it here, in order that we may be able to look on the suppression of the monasteries and its after-effects as a connected whole. If we do this, the cruelty and treachery of Cromwell and his agents in gaining their ends will not make us blind to the fact, that in the end the destruction of the religious houses in England certainly accomplished other and better results than those it was originally intended to compass. CHAPTER X THE PILGRIMAGE OF GRACE. 1536