The monks were especially enraged against Henry.  They did all they could to inflame the people by preaching against him and the reformers.  Friar Peyto, preaching before the king, had the assurance to say to him:  “Many lying prophets have deceived you, but I, as a true Micah, warn you that the dogs will lick your blood as they did Ahab’s.”  While the courage of this friar is unquestioned, his defiant attitude illustrates the position occupied by the monks toward those who favored separation from Rome.  The whole country was at white heat.  The friends of Rome looked upon Henry as an incarnate fiend, a servant of the devil and an enemy of all religion.  Many of them opposed him with the purest and best motives, believing that the king was really undermining the church of God and throwing society into chaos.

In 1531, the English clergy were coerced into declaring that Henry was “the protector and the supreme head of the church and of the clergy of England,” which absurd claim was slightly modified by the words, “in so far as is permitted by the law of Christ.”  Chapuys, in one of his despatches informing Charles V. of this action of convocation, said that it practically declared Henry the Pope of England.  “It is true,” he wrote, “that the clergy have added to the declaration that they did so only so far as permitted by the law of God.  But that is all the same, as far as the king is concerned, as if they had made no reservation, for no one will now be so bold as to contest with his lord the importance of the reservation.”  Later on, Chapuys says that the king told the pope’s nuncio that “if the pope would not show him more consideration, he would show the world that the pope had no greater authority than Moses, and that every claim not grounded on Scripture was mere usurpation; that the great concourse of people present had come solely and exclusively to request him to bastinado the clergy, who were hated by both nobles and the people.” ("Spanish Despatches,” number 460.)

Parliament, in 1534, conferred on Henry the title “Supreme Head of the Church of England,” and empowered him “to visit, and repress, redress, reform, order, correct, restrain, or amend all errors, heresies, abuses, offences, contempts, and enormities, which fell under any spiritual authority or jurisdiction.”  The “Act of Succession” was also passed by Parliament, cutting off Princess Mary and requiring all subjects to take an oath of allegiance to Elizabeth.

It was now an act of treason to deny the king’s supremacy.  All persons suspected of disloyalty were required to sign an oath of allegiance to Henry, and to Elizabeth as his successor, and to acknowledge the supremacy of the king in church and state.  This resulted in the death of some prominent men in the realm, among them Sir Thomas More.  In the preamble of the oath prescribed by law, the legality of the king’s marriage with Anne was asserted, thus implying that his former marriage with Catharine was unlawful.  More was willing to declare his allegiance to the infant Elizabeth, as the king’s successor, but his conscience would not permit him to affirm that Catharine’s marriage was unlawful.