The cruel king married another very pretty young woman the very next day. Her name was Jane Seymour, and she had a son, who was afterwards King Edward VI. She died two days after the little prince was born, or perhaps Henry might have used her as ill as he did poor Anne Boleyn.

The strange king seemed tired for this time of marrying English ladies, so he sent to ask the Princess Anne of Cleves, a German lady, to marry him. But he took a dislike to her looks, so he put her away as he did Queen Catherine, and gave her a house to live in, and a good deal of money to spend, and thought no more about her.

Next he married the Lady Catherine Howard; but a very few months afterwards he accused her of some bad actions; and without caring whether his accusation was true or not, he had her beheaded. So he had put away two of his wives, he had cut off the heads of two others, and only one had died a natural death. No wonder the young ladies in England were afraid to let the king see them, lest he should ask any one to marry him!

At last he found a lady, named Catherine Parr, who was a widow. She was very clever, and contrived to keep the passionate and cruel king in good humour till he died, when I dare say she was not sorry to find herself alive and safe, for he had once intended to put her to death like Anne Boleyn.

Now we will end this chapter about Henry's wives. You find that as he grew old he grew more and more passionate and cruel, and in what I have to tell you about some other parts of his reign, in the next chapter, you will see that he grew wicked in almost everything.

CHAPTER XXXIX.

HENRY VIII.-continued.

How the Pope and the friars imposed upon the people; how disputes arose in England about religion; how King Henry seized the convents and turned out the monks and nuns; how he called himself Supreme Head of the Church, and put many people to death who did not agree with him in all things.

In several parts of our history we have read of the Pope, that is, the Bishop of Rome. When Thomas à Becket was murdered in the reign of Henry II., I told you it was done after a quarrel between the king and Thomas, because Thomas wanted the Pope to have the power to punish clergymen in England, or to let them go without punishment when they did wrong, without caring at all what the law and the right might be.

Now more than three hundred years had passed, and the Popes pretended every year to have more and more power. And a great many new kinds of clergymen, especially the FRIARS, had begun to go about the country, doing nothing themselves, and pretending that the people ought to give them meat, and drink, and lodging, because they could read and say prayers. Besides that, they used to pretend to cure diseases, by making people kiss old bones, or bits of rag, and other trash, which they said had once belonged to some holy person or another, which was as wicked as it was foolish. It was wicked to tell such lies. It was foolish, because the cures that God has appointed for diseases are only to be learned by care and patience, and have nothing to do with such things as old bones and rags.

However, almost everybody believed these things for a long time. But at last, people began to read more books, as I told you in the chapter about Henry VII.; and they learned how foolish it was to believe all the friars had said.

One of the first books they began to read was the Bible, in which they found the commands of God; and they saw that all men ought to obey the laws of the countries they live in. And they found that clergymen might marry, and that, though they ought to be paid for teaching the people, they had no business to live idle.

It was not only in England that the people began to think of these things, but in all other countries, especially in Germany, where a learned man, named Martin Luther, was the first who dared to tell the clergymen how ill he thought they behaved, and to try to persuade all kings and princes to forbid the Pope's messengers and priests to meddle with the proper laws of the country. There were many other things he found fault with very justly, which I cannot tell you now, as we must think of what was done in England.

You have not forgotten that I told you that gentlemen began to study a great deal in the reign of Henry VII., and I promised to tell you something about Thomas Linacre's scholars.

One of these was a gentleman of Rotterdam, in Holland, who came to England on purpose to learn Greek. His name was Erasmus, and he was famous for writing better Latin than anybody had done since the time of the old Romans.

Another was Sir Thomas More, who was Lord Chancellor of England during part of Henry VIII.'s reign; he was very learned and wise, and, besides that, very good-humoured and cheerful.

Erasmus and Sir Thomas More were very great friends, especially when Sir Thomas was young; and they used to write pleasant letters and books, to show how wrong those persons were who believed in the foolish stories told by the friars, and how wicked many of the clergymen were, who lived idle lives, and passed their time in eating and drinking, and many bad things, instead of teaching the people, as it was their duty to do.

Besides these two great friends, there were several others, especially Tonstall and Latimer, who both are remembered to our time for being learned and good, and who were taught by Linacre.

By degrees, the English heard all that Martin Luther said in Germany about the Pope and his messengers, and the bad part of the clergymen; and many disputes arose among the people. Some said that we had no business to obey the Pope at all in anything, and that many of the things the clergymen of Rome taught were wicked and false, and that God would punish those who believed them, now that they could read the Bible, and learn what was right for themselves.

Others said that those things were not false, and that we ought to believe them; and as to the Pope, we ought to obey him in everything about our churches and our prayers, and the way of worshipping God.

But the thing that made the people, who took the opposite side in the dispute, most angry, was the quantity of land and money that the clergymen had persuaded different people to give them.

Those who were against the Pope said that the clergymen had deceived the people, and had pretended that they could prevail upon God to forgive

their worst sins, if they would only give their lands and money to the churches and convents, that the monks and friars might live in idleness.

The others, who were for the Pope, pretended that clergymen were better and wiser than others, and therefore they ought to live in comfort, and grandeur, and leisure, and to have more power and money than

other men.

Now I believe the truth is, that in those days the clergymen were a great deal too rich and powerful, and that they oppressed the people in every country, and that they tried to keep them from learning to read, that they might not find out the truth from the Bible and other good books.

However, in England there were a great many good men on both sides.

At first, the king took the part of the Pope, and, as he was very fond of showing his learning, he wrote a book to defend him, and everybody and everything belonging to him; in return for which the Pope called him DEFENDER OF THE FAITH.

But soon afterwards King Henry began to change his mind. He thought the English clergymen would be better governed if the King of England were at their head instead of the Pope. Then he thought that, if all the convents were pulled down, and the monks and nuns made to live like other people, instead of idly, without doing anything, he might take their lands and money and give to his servants, or spend himself, just as he liked.

As soon as Henry thought of these things, he set about doing what he wished. He would not listen even to the old men and women, who had lived in the convents till they were too old to work; he turned them all out. He would not listen to some good