the highest elevation, obstinately refused to gratify his passion; and all the endearments, caresses, and importunities of the young and amiable Edward proved fruitless against her rigid and inflexible virtue.  His passion, irritated by opposition and increased by his veneration for such honorable sentiments, carried him at last beyond all bounds of reason, and he offered to share his throne, as well as his heart, with the woman whose beauty of person and dignity of character seemed so well to entitle her to both.  The marriage was privately celebrated at Grafton; the secret was carefully kept for some time; no one suspected that so libertine a prince could sacrifice so much to a romantic passion; and there were, in particular, strong reasons which at that time rendered this step, to the highest degree, dangerous and imprudent.

The King, desirous to secure his throne, as well by the prospect of issue as by foreign alliances, had, a little before, determined to make application to some neighboring princess; and he had cast his eye on Bona of Savoy, sister to the Queen of France, who, he hoped, would by her marriage insure him the friendship of that power which was alone both able and inclined to give support and assistance to his rival.  To render the negotiation more successful, the Earl of Warwick had been despatched to Paris, where the Princess then resided; he had demanded Bona in marriage for the King; his proposals had been accepted; the treaty was fully concluded; and nothing remained but the ratification of the terms agreed on, and the bringing over the Princess to England.  But when the secret of Edward’s marriage broke out, the haughty Earl, deeming himself affronted, both by being employed in this fruitless negotiation and by being kept a stranger to the King’s intentions, who had owed everything to his friendship, immediately returned to England, inflamed with rage and indignation.  The influence of passion over so young a man as Edward might have served as an excuse for his imprudent conduct had he deigned to acknowledge his error or had pleaded his weakness as an apology; but his faulty shame or pride prevented him from so much as mentioning the matter to Warwick; and that nobleman was allowed to depart the court, full of the same ill-humor and discontent which he had brought to it.

Every incident now tended to widen the breach between the King and this powerful subject.  The Queen, who lost not her influence by marriage, was equally solicitous to draw every grace and favor to her own friends and kindred and to exclude those of the Earl, whom she regarded as her mortal enemy.

The Earl of Warwick could not suffer with patience the least diminution of that credit which he had long enjoyed, and which he thought he had merited by such important services.  Edward also, jealous of that power which had supported him, was well pleased to raise up rivals to the Earl of Warwick; and he justified, by this political view, his extreme partiality to the Queen’s kindred.  But the nobility of England, envying the sudden growth of the Woodevilles, was more inclined to take part with Warwick’s discontent.