Dr. Browne soon found that it was incomparably easier for Henry to issue commands in England, than for him to enforce them in Ireland.  He therefore wrote to Cromwell, from Dublin, on “the 4th of the kal. of December, 1535,” and informed him that he “had endeavoured, almost to the danger and hazard of my temporal life, to procure the nobility and gentry of this nation to due obedience in owning of his Highness their supreme head, as well spiritual as temporal; and do find much oppugning therein, especially by my brother Armagh, who hath been the main oppugner, and so hath withdrawn most of his suffragans and clergy within his see and diocese.  He made a speech to them, laying a curse on the people whosoever should own his Highness’ supremacy, saying, that isle—­as it is in their Irish chronicles, insula sacra—­belongs to none but the Bishop of Rome, and that it was the Bishop of Rome that gave it to the King’s ancestors."[390] Dr. Browne then proceeds to inform his correspondent that the Irish clergy had sent two messengers to Rome.[391] He states “that the common people of this isle are more zealous in their blindness, than the saints and martyrs were in truth;” and he advises that a Parliament should at once be summoned, “to pass the supremacy by Act; for they do not much matter his Highness’ commission, which your lordship sent us over.”  Truly, the nation which had been so recently enlightened in so marvellous a manner, might have had a little patience with the people who could not so easily discern the new light; and, assuredly, if the term “Church by law established” be applicable to the Protestant religion in England, it is, if possible, still more applicable to the Protestant Establishment in Ireland, since the person delegated to found the new religion in that country, has himself stated it could only be established there by Act of Parliament.

The Parliament was summoned in 1536; but, as a remote preparation, the Lord Deputy made a “martial circuit” of Ireland, hoping thereby to overawe the native septs, and compel their submission to the royal will and pleasure.  “This preparation being made,” i.e., the “martial circuit”—­I am quoting from Sir John Davies;[392] I request the reader’s special attention to the statement—­“he first propounded and passed in Parliament these Lawes, which made the great alteration in the State Ecclesiastical, namely, the Act which declared King Henry VIII. to be Supreme Head of the Church of Ireland; the Act prohibiting Apeales to the Church of Rome; the Act for first fruites and twentieth part to be paid to the King; and lastly, the Act that did utterly abolish the usurped Authoritie of the Pope.  Next, for the increase of the King’s Revenew.  By one Act he suppressed sundry Abbayes and Religious Houses, and by another Act resumed the Lands of the Absentees.”

The royal process of conversion to the royal opinions, had at least the merits of simplicity.  There is an old rhyme—­one of those old rhymes which are often more effectual in moving the hearts of the multitude than the most eloquent sermons, and truer exponents of popular feeling than Acts of Parliament—­which describes the fate of Forrest, the Franciscan friar, confessor of the King’s only lawful wife and the consequences of his temerity in denying the King’s supremacy:—­