But not even with this concentration of authority in a single hand was Henry content. At the close of 1517 he procured from the Pope the Cardinal's appointment as Legate a latere in the realm. Such a Legate was entrusted with powers almost as full as those of the Pope himself; his jurisdiction extended over every bishop and priest, it overrode every privilege or exemption of abbey or cell, while his court superseded that of Rome as the final court of ecclesiastical appeal for the realm. Already wielding the full powers of secular justice in his capacity of Chancellor and of president of the royal Council, Wolsey wielded the full power of spiritual justice in his capacity of Legate. His elevation was no mere freak of royal favor; it was the result of a distinct policy. The moment had come when the Monarchy was to gather up all government into the personal grasp of the King. The checks which had been imposed on the action of the sovereign by the presence of great prelates and lords at his council were practically removed. His fellow councillors learned to hold their peace when the haughty minister "clapped his rod on the board." The restraints of public justice were equally done away. Even the distant check of Rome was gone. All secular, all ecclesiastical power was summed up in a single hand. It was this concentration of authority in Wolsey which accustomed England to a system of personal government under Henry and his successors. It was the Cardinal's long tenure of the whole Papal authority within the realm, and the consequent suspension of appeals to Rome, that led men to acquiesce at a later time in Henry's own claim of religious supremacy. For proud as was Wolsey's bearing and high as were his natural powers he stood before England as the mere creature of the King. Greatness, wealth, authority he held, and owned he held, simply at the royal will. In raising his low-born favorite to the head of church and state Henry was gathering all religious as well as all civil authority into his personal grasp. The nation which trembled before Wolsey learned to tremble before the master who could destroy Wolsey with a breath.

The rise of Charles of Austria gave a new turn to Wolsey's policy. Till now France had been a pressing danger, and the political scheme both of Henry and his minister lay in organizing leagues to check her greatness or in diverting her activity to the fields of Lombardy. But from the moment of Ferdinand's death this power of Francis was balanced by the power of Charles. Possessor of the Netherlands, of Franche Comte, of Spain, Charles already pressed France on its northern, eastern, and southern borders when the death of his grandfather Maximilian in the spring of 1519 added to his dominions the heritage of the House of Austria in Swabia and on the Danube. It did yet more for him in opening to him the Empire. The intrigues of Maximilian had secured for Charles promises of support from a majority of the Electors, and though Francis redoubled his efforts and Henry the Eighth sent an envoy to push his own succession the cry of Germany for a German head carried all before it. In June 1519 Charles was elected Emperor; and France saw herself girt in on every side by a power whose greed was even greater than her own. For, boy of nineteen as he was, Charles from the first moment of his rule meant to make himself master of the world; and France, thrown suddenly on the defensive, nerved herself for the coming struggle. Both needed the gold and friendship of England. Convinced as he was of Henry's treachery in the Imperial election, where the English sovereign had promised Francis his support, the French King clung to the alliance which Wolsey in his uncertainty as to the actual drift of Charles had concluded in 1518, and pressed for an interview with Henry himself. But the need of France had woke dreams of more than mere safety or a balanced neutrality in Wolsey and his master. The time seemed come at last for a bolder game. The claim on the French crown had never been waived; the dream of recovering at least Guienne and Normandy still lived on in the hearts of English statesmen; and the subtle, unscrupulous youth who was now planning his blow for the mastery of the world knew well how to seize upon dreams such as these. Nor was Wolsey forgotten. If Henry coveted France, his minister coveted no less a prize than the Papacy; and the young Emperor was lavish of promises of support in any coming election. The result of his seductions was quickly seen. While Henry deferred the interview with Francis till the summer of 1520, Charles had already planned a meeting with his uncle in the opening of the year.

What importance Charles attached to this meeting was seen in his leaving Spain ablaze with revolt behind him to keep his engagement. He landed at Dover in the end of May, and King and Emperor rode along to Canterbury, but of the promises or pledges which passed we know little save from the after-course of English politics. Nothing could have differed more vividly from this simple ride than the interview with Francis which followed in June. A camp of three hundred white tents surrounded a faery palace with gilded posterns and brightly colored oriels which rose like a dream from the barren plain of Guisnes, its walls hung with tapestry, its roof embossed with roses, its golden fountain spouting wine over the greensward. But all this pomp and splendor, the chivalrous embraces and tourneys of the Kings, the gorgeous entry of Wolsey in his crimson robe on a mule trapped with gold, the fresh treaty which ratified the alliance, hardly veiled the new English purpose. A second interview between Charles and his uncle as he returned from the meeting with Francis ended in a secret confederacy of the two sovereigns and the promise of the Emperor to marry his cousin, Henry's one child, Mary Tudor. With her hand passed the heritage of the English Crown. Henry had now ceased to hope for a son from Catharine, and Mary was his destined successor. Her right to the throne was asserted by a deed which proved how utterly the baronage now lay at the mercy of the King. The Duke of Buckingham stood first in blood as in power among the English nobles; he was the descendant of Edward the Third's youngest son, and if Mary's succession were denied he stood heir to the throne. His hopes had been fanned by prophets and astrologers, and wild words told his purpose to seize the Crown on Henry's death in defiance of every opponent. But word and act had for two years been watched by the King; and in 1521 the Duke was arrested, condemned as a traitor by his peers, and beheaded on Tower Hill. His blood was a pledge of Henry's sincerity which Charles could not mistake. Francis on the other hand had never for a moment been deceived by the profuse assurances of friendship which the King and Wolsey lavished on him. A revolt of the Spanish towns offered a favorable opportunity for an attack on his rival, and a French army passed over the Pyrenees into Navarre while Francis himself prepared to invade the Netherlands. Both princes appealed for aid under their separate treaties to Henry; and the English sovereign, whom the quick stroke of the French had taken by surprise, could only gain time by a feigned mediation in which Wolsey visited both Emperor and King. But at the close of the year England was at last ready for action, and Wolsey's solemn decision that Francis was the aggressor was followed in November by a secret league, which was concluded at Calais between the Pope, the Emperor, and Henry.