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Wolsey to help him; but this did not suit the cardinal, and the king therefore was determined to ruin him. He was compelled to give up his palace at York, where he was Archbishop; and the king seized all his grand plate and rich furniture, and then ordered him to be arrested and brought to London, to take his trial for high treason. He began his journey, and proceeded as far as Leicester; but he had great difficulty in performing this long journey, for he was then old, and sick, and feeble. When he got to Leicester, he went to the abbey, and the monks came out to meet him. He told them that he was come to die among them, and begged them to give him, for charity's sake, a little earth to cover his weary bones. Soon after this, he died, full of sorrow and remorse,-grieving that he had wasted all his life in pursuit of worldly greatness, instead of aiming at that heavenly kingdom, where the happiness and rich reward are all-glorious and everlasting! "Had I but served my God," he cried, "with half the zeal that I have served my king, he would not in mine age have given me over to mine enemies."

The reason which Henry pleaded to get rid of his wife, was, that as she was the widow of his elder brother, Arthur, who died very young, his marriage with her was not lawful. This, however, he did not think of till the queen had lived eighteen years with him, and had a daughter by him, (who was afterwards the bloody Queen Mary.) The truth was, that he had found a young and handsome lady in his court whom he liked better than his wife; this was Anna Bullen; and he was determined to divorce Catherine, that he might marry her ;-this did not please Wolsey and the Papists, because Anna Bullen was inclined to the Protestant religion: and it was Wolsey's unwillingness to encourage this match, which first provoked the king's anger against him, and brought on his fall. The king, soon after

this, married Anna Bullen privately; and, after a time, he publicly acknowledged her, she brought him a daughter, who was afterwards the famous Queen Elizabeth. Soon, however, the king grew weary of this queen, as he had done of the former one, and he seemed determined to get rid of her, and to marry another beautiful lady, called Jane Seymour. To effect his purpose, he endeavoured to find some accusation against the queen, which might justify him in cutting her off; she was accused of loose behaviour and high treason, and she was condemned to death; and was soon afterwards executed on Tower Hill. She was beheaded by the executioner of Calais, who was brought over from France on purpose, being considered more expert than any in England. Her body was thrown into a common chest, and was buried in the Tower. If you ever go to see the Tower of London, they will shew you the very axe which was used in beheading Queen Anna Bullen.

The very next day, the cruel tyrant married Jane Seymour; and he declared that both his daughters, Mary by his first wife, and Elizabeth by the second, were illegitimate, and that they were neither of them to succeed to the crown. The savage and tyrannical acts of the king, we may be sure, excited great hatred in the minds of the people, and there were many insurrections and rebellions;—the king denied the power of the pope, but still he held the doctrines of popery, so that he persecuted the Papists for supporting the Pope's high power, and he persecuted the Protestants for denying the popish doctrines; his angry passions, indeed, were dreadful, and the discontents and oppositions of his subjects filled him with fury. He was, however, put in better humour for a time by the birth of a son (who was afterwards that excellent prince, Edward the Sixth ;) but his queen died two days afterwards.

Not long after this, the king resolved to have

another wife, and here he took a foreign lady whom he had never seen;-her picture was painted for him, and the artist (Holbein) had made it handsome; but when she came over, and the king met her at Rochester, he declared she was a great ugly person, and that he never could like her. However, he still determined to marry her, because it was a match that would gain him friends and allies on the continent, and add to his power. The king's dislike, however, to this lady, continued, and he resolved to get rid of her; and, moreover, he had fixed his affections upon another lady, Catherine Howard, and he turned off his queen, and married this new favourite. Henry seemed for a time delighted with his new wife, he was soon, however, informed that her character was bad, and that she had been guilty of much improper conduct, both before and after her marriage. She was tried, and found guilty, and beheaded on Tower Hill.

All this time the king pretended to be concerned about the affairs of religion; he had, indeed, a good deal of what is called learning on these matters; but religious learning is a very different thing from true religious faith and practice. The king wrote some books on the disputes of that day between the Catholics and Protestants. He had, some time before this, written a book in defence of the seven Sacraments, for the Catholics say that there are seven Sacraments; we Protestants say that there are only two, namely, Baptism and the Lord's Supper, and we say this, because we do not find any thing in Scripture which justifies us in saying that there are any more Sacraments than these two. Henry, however, pleased the Pope by defending the seven Sacraments, and gained the title of " Defender of the Faith," which was indeed a good title in itself, and has been kept by the kings of England ever since; there was, however, nobody who ever deserved it less than Henry the Eighth. About a year after the

death of the late queen, Henry married another, Catherine Parr, a widow; she was a discreet and pious woman, and studied, by her gentle behaviour, to calm the savage temper of the king. This, however, was beyond her power; and at one time she was in great danger of losing her own life, in consequence of some difference with the king on religious subjects. However, she managed to pacify him on this point: but his savage temper broke out towards his subjects, and many excellent and worthy people were put to death by him. As his end approached, the pains of his body seemed to increase the violence of his temper. He had a painful disorder in his legs, which, growing worse and worse, at length carried him off, in the year 1547. There is a great deal of very interesting matter in this reign; but I only pretend to give you a few heads of the History of England, and you may, perhaps, when you have leisure and opportunity, read more fully for yourself, on these things.

I am your affectionate Father,

T. S.

Oct. 21, 1823.

NATIONAL SOCIETY.

THE returns of the Collections in Churches made, in consequence of the King's Letter, for the "National Society for the Education of the Poor," have not been yet all received; and therefore the whole sum collected is not yet known. It is, however, gratifying to learn, that from about 4000 parishes, about 18,0001. has been collected. This sum will be applied to the purposes for which this excellent Society has already been so usefully exerting itself,that of aiding different parishes throughout the kingdom in building School-rooms, and giving them such assistance as may enable them to carry on the great

work of the Christian Education of the Poor. There ought to be no parish in the kingdom without a School where a cheap and good education may be had; and this should not be left to the uncertainty of individual exertion, but it ought to be something fixed, and certain, and national, and consequently upon a plan which shall ensure the blessings of education, not to the children of the present generation only, but to their children's children for ages to come. What a mass of wickedness is going on, from generation to generation, in many families in crowded Towns! These poor creatures are wholly without any education in what is good; and it is therefore almost certain that they must grow up in a course of wickedness. And in small parishes, too, where there is no Christian instruction, wickedness is the natural growth. Now, to correct this, there must be a sure and certain means of education, which shall be within the reach of every poor child in the kingdom. We know, indeed, that merely learning to read will not turn bad children into good ones; but we know that it is one means of leading them to what is right: and the study of the Scriptures, and other good books, assisted by God's grace, which, in the course of a Christian education, children are all taught to seek for, is certainly the most probable method which we can use to lead these children into the right way. Mr. Cobbett says, that to teach a boy to be hard-working and industrious is much better than teaching him to read the Bible. We are as anxious as Mr. Cobbett is, that every person should be hard-working and industrious. But teaching him to read his Bible will not prevent this; on the contrary, it will teach him that he must be industrious, and diligent, and provide honestly for himself, instead of being idle, and profligate, and dishonest, and a burden to others. The Bible teaches us right principles,—and, when a man's principles are right, he will be glad to work for his livelihood,-if they are not right, he will

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