William was canonized, and exercised
his office, whatever it was, for two brief centuries. Then the
Cromwell of Henry VIII. took possession of it in behalf of the
crown, and the saint's charge was practically abolished. He was
even deprived of his head, for the relic was encased in gold and
jewels, and was therefore worth the king's having, who was most a
friend of the reformed religion when it paid best. The later
Cromwell, who beat a later king hard by at Marston Moor, must
have somehow desecrated the Minster, though there is no record of
any such fact. A more authentic monument of the religious
difficulties of the times is the pastoral staff, bearing the arms
of Catharine of Braganza, the poor little wife of Charles II.,
which was snatched from a Roman Catholic bishop when, to the high
offence of Protestant piety, he was heading a procession in York
in 1688. The verger showing us through the Minster was a good
Protestant, but he held it bad taste in a predecessor of his, who
when leading about a Catholic party of sight-seers took the
captive staff from its place and shook it in their faces, saying,
"Don't you wish you had it?"
IV
There is no telling to what lengths true religion, may rightly
not go.
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