His appreciation of the increased difficulty of waging war abroad compared with that in previous ages, because of lack of bases of supplies and friendly towns on the Continent, which before had been numerous, betokens great foresight and knowledge of details. Though he expressly declares, at the beginning of his speech, his intention to leave to ‘sage persons’ the task of deciding how the war should be carried on, he hints that it would be better to play a waiting game and weary the French, while things were consolidated at home, than to try to conquer France by invasion. His attitude about Scotland is repeated with great vigour at the close of his speech. For the King to unify England and Scotland would secure him greater honour than his predecessors had ever attained, and would in the end prove a much more telling blow against France, than a direct invasion. The question of gaining possessions across the sea is of secondary importance: the first thing is to obtain control of a country which belongs to the same island. Thus Cromwell succeeded in clearly enunciating the main principles of the policy by which he was so soon to guide the affairs of England, while he so flattered King, nobles, and people, that he made many friends, and avoided the enmity of those opposed to him. The man who could make such a speech as this, would not be likely to escape the notice of such an astute man as Henry VIII. It was probably within the walls of this Parliament, that Cromwell laid the first stone of his future greatness as servant and counsellor of the King. CHAPTER III WOLSEY’S SERVANT After the year 1524, there is no further mention of Thomas Cromwell as the cloth-merchant and wool-dyer. He probably realized that his business as a lawyer brought him into much more prominence as a public man, but his term in Parliament doubtless aroused in him a desire for even greater things than the life of a successful solicitor. His advance in legal prominence, however, is marked by his admittance in 1524 as a member of Gray’s Inn, and by his appointment in the same year as one of the Subsidy Commissioners for the Hundred of Ossulton in Middlesex[62]; but such petty distinctions fade into the background in the face of a matter of far more absorbing interest, that is, his rapidly growing favour and intimacy with Cardinal Wolsey.