[The following is in regards to the fall from grace of Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, who had lost the favor of Henry VIII of England.]
There was no place for Wolsey at court now, men hardly troubled to give him news of it, and it was his turn to lament in vain, as Catherine had lamented, that if he could but win back to the King’s side for an hour he could silence all his enemies. For a while he still held his head high. His court of Star Chamber was empty of suitors, but he went to it proudly, though in the King’s Bench there was already sued out against him a writ of praemunire, a terrible, antique legal weapon found rusting in the arsenal of the royal courts, charging him absurdly with procuring papal bulls to be brought into the country, and setting up therein a court, in virtue of authority from the Pope of Rome, contrary to the peace and dignity of our lord the King.
When Norfolk and Suffolk came to take from him the Great Seal, the mystic instrument of his chancellorship, he refused to surrender it until they showed him the King’s written authority. The sight of the familiar signature, sprawled at the bottom of the parchment, broke him.
He inventoried his goods to be surrendered to the King as if he were going to the scaffold, as indeed the London crowds, watching from Thameside the course of his barge, devoutly hoped he was; and when, on his journey to his desolate country house, Sir Harry Norris brought him a bauble and kind word from the King, he was reduced to maudlin tears and meaningless, half-hysterical gestures. Later he was to recover his dignity, but in his first abject despair there was a depth of abasement more painful than tragedy.
Source:
Mattingly, Garrett. “Part III: The Divorce of Henry VIII (1527-1536); Chapter Two, Section v” Catherine of Aragon. New York: Quality Paperback , 1990. 292-93. Print.
Further Reading:
Catalina de Aragón (Catherine of Aragon)
[Sir Henry Norris (or Norreys)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Norris_(courtier\))
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