Charlie Fenton’s Reviews > Stephen Gardiner and the Tudor reaction, > Status Update

‘So high was his esteem for the law that it tended to become, in his view, a safe guide for conscience. Such he deemed the act of Parliament abolishing Papal jurisdiction. He appears to have had little if any doubt of his own or Henry’s actions in the divorces of Catherine and Anne of Cleves, since both cases had been legally conducted.’

'can be no doubt that Gardiner was heartily opposed to Barnes’ opinions, but it seems equally certain that his objection to Barnes at this time was primarily an objection to his patron. He judged the moment had come to strike at Cromwell and saw that Cromwell’s most vulnerable point was his support of continental situation, as we have seen, shifted in Cromwell’s favour, and Gardiner was excluded from the Council.'

‘Just before Wolsey’s final interview with the King, the French ambassador, Du Bellay, wrote that he felt sure that some of the Cardinal’s protégés - hinting perhaps at Gardiner and Tuke, although he named none - had betrayed him. Of modern historians Mr. Brewer remarks that it is not easy to decide whether or not Gardiner helped in the designs of the Norfolk-Boleyn party to estrange the King from Wolsey.’