Source.—25 H. VIII. cap. 22. (Statutes of the Realm, III. 471.)

... In consideration whereof, your said most humble and obedient subjects, the nobles and Commons of this realm, calling further to their remembrance that the good unity, peace and wealth of this realm, and the succession of the subjects of the same, most especially and principally above all worldly things consists and rests in the certainty and surety of the procreation and posterity of your Highness, in whose most royal person, at this present time, is no manner of doubt nor question; do therefore most humbly beseech your Highness, that it may please your Majesty, that it may be enacted by your Highness, with the assent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and the Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, that the marriage heretofore solemnized between your Highness and the Lady Katherine, being before lawful wife to Prince Arthur, your elder brother, shall be, by authority of this Present Parliament, definitively, clearly and absolutely declared, deemed, and adjudged to be against the laws of Almighty God, and also accepted, reputed, and taken of no value nor effect, but utterly void and annulled, and the separation, thereof, made by the said Archbishop, shall be good and effectual to all intents and purposes; any licence, dispensation, or any other act or acts going afore, or ensuing the same, or to the contrary thereof, in anywise notwithstanding; and that every such licence, dispensation, act or acts, thing or things heretofore had, made and done or to be done, to the contrary thereof, shall be void and of none effect; and that the said Lady Katherine shall be henceforth called and reputed only dowager to Prince Arthur, and not Queen of this realm, and that the lawful matrimony had and solemnized between your highness and your most dear and entirely beloved wife Queen Anne, shall be established, and taken for undoubtful, true, sincere, and perfect ever hereafter, according to the just judgement of the said Thomas, Archbishop of Canterbury, metropolitan and primate of all this realm, whose grounds of judgement have been confirmed, as well by the whole clergy of this realm in both the Convocations, and by both the universities thereof, as by the Universities of Bologna, Padua, Paris, Orleans, Toulouse, Anjou, and divers others, and also by the private writings of many right excellent well-learned men; which grounds so confirmed, and judgement of the said Archbishop ensuring the same, together with your marriage solemnized between your Highness and your said lawful wife Queen Anne, we your said subjects, both spiritual and temporal, do purely, plainly, constantly, and firmly accept, approve and ratify for good and consonant to the laws of Almighty God, without end or default, most humbly beseeching your Majesty, that it may be so established for ever by your most gracious and royal assent.