Moved by these considerations, the friars employed all their influence to inflame the people against the king's government; and Henry, finding their safety irreconcilable with his own, was determined to seize the present opportunity, and utterly destroy his declared enemies.
Cromwell, secretary of state, had been appointed vicar-general, or vicegerent, a new office, by which the king's supremacy, or the absolute uncontrollable power assumed over the church, was delegated to him.

He employed Layton, London, Price, Gage, Petre, Bellasis, and others, as commissioners who carried on every where a rigorous inquiry with regard to the conduct and deportment of all the friars.

During times of faction, especially of the religious kind, no equity is to be expected from adversaries; and as it was known, that the king's intention in this visitation was to find a pretence for abolishing monasteries, we may naturally conclude, that the reports of the commissioners are very little to be relied on.

Friars were encouraged to bring in informations against their brethren; the slightest evidence was credited; and even the calumnies spread abroad by the friends of the reformation, were regarded as grounds of proof.

Monstrous disorders are therefore said to have been found in many of the religious houses; whole convents of women abandoned to lewdness; signs of abortions procured, of infants murdered, of unnatural lusts between persons of the same sex.