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i26 V. THE REFORMATION (A.D. 15201592).
"
ordinarius
"
of Linkoping, but Laurentius and others
consented to crown the queen. Laurentius retained the
same opinion twenty years later, when he published a tract
on the prohibited degrees. He has been attacked for
weakness of character in so far condoning the act as to
crown the queen.
42
But the situation was a very difficult
one for him to handle, owing to the absence of any detailed
Church law in the country at this period, and the general
impression that the king was a fountain of such law. He
had, in fact, been used to give dispensation in marriage
cases to others. Nevertheless, his own instructions, given
through Norman, just quoted, only mentioned marriages
in "the fourth or fifth degree" of the canon law, and
marriage with a wife s niece is in the third degree of that
law.
Gustaf died at Michaelmas, 1560 a man \vho would
have been conspicuous in any age both for his personal
virtues and for the skill which ensured his wonderful suc
cess. He was remarkable for the tenacity and consistency
of purpose with which he pursued his ends, for the
prudence which taught him when to give way or to hold
his hand, and for the courage with which he used an
advantage when the time was ripe for strong action. His
early hardships and adventures had made him more
familiar with the character and feelings of his countrymen
in their solitary dwellings than any of their other rulers
had been. I
may, perhaps, apply to him the words of an
English poet :
"
Love had he found in huts where poor men lie ;
His daily teachers had been woods and rills,
The silence that is in the starry sky,
The sleep that is among the lonely hills;"
and although these teachers did not quench all ambition in
him, or soften away his natural roughness and impatience,
42
He has been defended by Dean Lundstrom in the essay
already referred to above, note 33, K. H. Arsskrift, 6, pp. 200-3.
In England the archbishop was required to refer to the king
or his Council in difficult cases of dispensations.
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