In England from Wicliffe to Henry VIII - James Aitken Wylie

From the hour that the stake for Protestantism
was planted in England, neither the king nor the
nation had rest. Henry Plantagenet (Bolingbroke)
had returned from exile, on his oath not to disturb
the succession to the crown. He broke his vow, and
dethroned Richard II. The Church, through her
head the primate, was an accomplice with him in
this deed. Arundel anointed the new king with oil
from that mysterious vial which the Virgin was
said to have given to Thomas aBecket, during his
exile in France, telling him that the kings on whose
head this oil should be poured would prove valiant
champions of the Church. The coronation was
followed by the dark tragedy in the Castle of
Pontefract; and that, again, by the darker, though
more systematic, violence of the edict De
Hereretico Comburendo, which was followed in its
turn by the imprisonings in the Tower, and the
burnings in Smithfield. The reign thus inaugurated
had neither glory abroad nor prosperity at home.
Faction rose upon faction; revolt trod on the heels
of revolt; and a train of national calamities
followed in rapid succession, till at last Henry had
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