Thomas Cromwell

1532 – 1540

Thomas Cromwell, 1st Earl of Essex (c. 1485 – July 28, 1540) was an English statesman, King Henry VIII's chief minister 1532–1540.

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April 10, 2026

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April 10, 2026

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"I am come hether to dye, and not to purge my self, as maie happen, some thynke that I will, for if I should so do, I wer a very wretche and miser: I am by the Lawe condempned to die, and thanke my lorde God that hath appoynted me this deathe, for myne offence: For sithence the tyme that I haue had yeres of discrecion, I haue liued a synner, and offended my Lorde God, for the whiche I aske hym hartely forgeuenes. And it is not vnknowne to many of you, that I haue been a great traueler in this worlde, and beyng but of a base degree, was called to high estate, and sithens the tyme I came therunto, I haue offended my prince, for the whiche I aske hym hartely forgeuenes, and beseche you all to praie to God with me, that he will forgeue me. O father forgeue me. O sonne forgeue me, O holy Ghost forgeue me: O thre persons in one God forgeue me. And now I praie you that be here, to beare me record, I die in the Catholicke faithe, not doubtyng in any article of my faith, no nor doubtyng in any Sacrament of the Churche. Many hath sclaundered me, and reported that I haue been a bearer, of suche as hath mainteigned euill opinions, whiche is vntrue, but I confesse that like as God by his holy spirite, doth instruct vs in the truthe, so the deuill is redy to seduce vs, and I haue been seduced: but beare me witnes that I dye in the Catholicke faithe of the holy Churche. And I hartely desire you to praie for the Kynges grace, that he maie long liue with you, in healthe and prosperitie. And after him that his sonne prince Edward, that goodly ympe, maie long reigne ouer you. And once again I desire you to pray for me, that so long as life remaigneth in this fleshe, I wauer nothyng in my faithe."

- Thomas Cromwell

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"Far from being the ruthless Machiavellian of legend, Cromwell was a man possessed of a high concept of the 'state' and national sovereignty, and a deep concern for Parliament and the law; an administrative genius; one who may have lacked profound religious sense (though instinctively favourable to some kind of Erasmian Protestantism), but something of an idealist nonetheless. That the 1530s were a decisive decade in English history was due largely to his energy and vision. He was immediately responsible for the vast legislative programme of the later sessions of the Reformation Parliament – a programme not rivalled in volume and moment until the nineteenth or even twentieth centuries. He oversaw the breach with Rome and the establishment of the Royal Supremacy. He effected a new political integration of the kingdom and imposed upon it a new political discipline by making war on local franchises and the entrenched bastard feudalism of the northern and western marches, handling the final incorporation of Wales into English political life and giving Ireland a foretaste of determined English overlordship. He directed the immense operation of the dissolution of the monasteries.... Indeed, he left a deep mark on much of the machinery of central and local government. Finally, he was the first royal servant fully to perceive the power of that young giant, the printing-press."

- Thomas Cromwell

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