religion were at stake, that the jealousy, once aroused, could not be checked. The irritation became so hot and so general as to threaten again the most dangerous consequences; and Paget, pretending to be alarmed at the excitement which he had raised, urged Renard to use his influence with the queen to dissolve parliament.[317] [Footnote 316: _Commons Journals._] [Footnote 317: Paget to Renard; Tytler, vol. ii. p. 382. And compare Renard's correspondence with the emperor during the month of April.--_Rolls House MSS._] Renard, who was only anxious that the marriage should go off quietly, agreed in the desirableness of a dissolution. He told the queen that the reform of religion must be left to a better opportunity; and the prince could not, and should not, set his foot in a country where parties were for ever on the edge of cutting each other's throats. It was no time for her to be indulging Gardiner in humours which were driving men mad, and shutting her ears to the advice of those who could ruin her if they pleased; she must think first of her husband. The queen protested that Gardiner was acting by no advice of hers; Gardiner, she said, was obstinate, and would listen to no one; she herself was helpless and miserable. But Renard was not to be moved by misery. At all events, he said, the prince should not come till late in the summer, perhaps not till autumn, not, in fact, till it could be seen what form these wild humours would {p.134} assume; summer was the dangerous time in England, when the people's blood was apt to boil.[318] [Footnote 318: Pour ce qui ordinairement les humeurs des Angloys boulissent plus en l'este que en autre temps.] Gardiner, however, was probably not acting without Mary's secret approbation. Both the queen and the minister especially desired, at that moment, the passing of the Heresy Bill, and Renard was obliged to content himself with a promise that the dissolution should be as early as possible. Though parliament could not meet at Oxford, a committee of Convocation had been sitting there, with Dr. Weston, the adulterous Dean of Windsor, for a president. Cranmer, Ridley, and Latimer had been called upon to defend their opinions, which had been pronounced false and damnable. They had been required to recant, and, having refused, they were sentenced (April 20), so far as the power of the court extended, to the punishment of heretics. Cranmer appealed from the judgment to God Almighty, in whose presence he would soon stand. Ridley said the sentence would but send them the sooner to the place where else they hoped to go. Latimer said, "I thank God that my life has been prolonged that I may glorify God by this kind of death."