Cranmer himself, when bereaved of this support, was the more exposed to those cabals of the courtiers, which the opposition in party and religion, joined to the usual motives of interest, rendered so frequent among Henry’s ministers and counsellors. The Catholics took hold of the king by his passion for orthodoxy; and they represented to him, that, if his laudable zeal for enforcing the truth met with no better success, it was altogether owing to the primate, whose example and encouragement were, in reality, the secret supports of heresy. Henry, seeing the point at which they aimed, feigned a compliance, and desired the council to make inquiry into Cranmer’s conduct; promising that, if he were found guilty, he should be committed to prison, and brought to condign punishment. Every body now considered the primate as lost; and his old friends, from interested views, as well as the opposite party from animosity, began to show him marks of neglect and disregard. He was obliged to stand several hours among the lackeys at the door of the council chamber before he could be admitted; and when he was at last called in, he was told that they had determined to send him to the Tower. Cranmer said, that he appealed to the king himself; and finding his appeal disregarded, he produced a ring, which Henry had given him as a pledge of favor and protection. The council were confounded; and when they came before the king, he reproved them in the severest terms; and told them, that he was well acquainted with Cranmer’s merit, as well as with their malignity and envy; but he was determined to crush all their cabals, and to teach them by the severest discipline, since gentle methods were ineffectual, a more dutiful concurrence in promoting his service. Norfolk, who was Cranmer’s capital enemy, apologized for their conduct and said, that their only intention was to set the primate’s innocence in a full light, by bringing him to an open trial, and Henry obliged them all to embrace him, as a sign of their cordial reconciliation. The mild temper of Cranmer rendered this agreement more sincere on his part than is usual in such forced compliances.[*] But though Henry’s favor for Cranmer rendered fruitless all accusations against him, his pride and peevishness, irritated by his declining state of health, impelled him to punish with fresh severity all others who presumed to entertain a different opinion from himself, particularly in the capital point of the real presence. Anne Ascue, a young woman of merit as well as beauty,[**] who had great connections with the chief ladies at court, and with the queen herself, was accused of dogmatizing on that delicate article; and Henry, instead of showing indulgence to the weakness of her sex and age, was but the more provoked, that a woman should dare to oppose his theological sentiments. * Burnet, vol. i. p. 342, 344. Antiq. Brit. in vita Cranm. ** Bale. Speed, p. 780.