CHAMBERS'S INFORMATION FOR THE PEOPLE. 



Haven, he advanced into the country', and speedily 

 gained such accessions of force as enabled him to 

 meet and overthrow Richard at Bosworth Field, 

 where the tyrant was slain, and the victorious 

 Richmond was immediately proclaimed king, 

 under the title of HENRY VII. The new monarch 

 in 1486 sought to strengthen his title by marrying 

 Elizabeth, the daughter and heir of Edward IV. 

 by which it was said the families of York and 

 Lancaster were united. 



It was during the struggles between the nval 

 Houses of York and Lancaster that printing was 

 introduced into England, William Caxton, a native 

 of Kent, who had probably learned the art in the 

 Netherlands, setting up a press in 1474. A large 

 number of Caxton's books were translations from 

 the French, and were in what is styled black-letter 

 type. 



HOUSE OF TUDOR HENRY VII. 



The reign of Henry VII. was much disturbed 

 by insurrections, in consequence of his imperfect 

 title. A baker's boy, named Lambert Simnel, and 

 a Jew's son, named Perkin Warbeck, were succes- 

 sively set up by the York party the one as a son 

 of the late Duke of Clarence, and the other as 

 Richard Plantagenet,Dukeof York, younger brother 

 of Edward V. but were both defeated. Warbeck, 

 who, some even yet maintain, was no impostor, 

 was hanged at Tyburn in 1499; and about the same 

 time, Henry procured, by forms of law, the death 

 of the Earl of Warwick, the real son of the late 

 Duke of Clarence, a poor boy, whom he had kept 

 fifteen years in confinement, and whose title to the 

 throne, being superior to his own, rendered him 

 uneasy. 



Henry, though a cruel prince, as were most of 

 the sovereigns of his age, was a sagacious and 

 peaceful ruler. The greatest fault in his character 

 was his excessive love of money, of which he 

 amassed an immense sum by extortions, having 

 for his instruments two lawyers, Empson and 

 Dudley. During his reign, Ireland was made 

 more dependent on the English crown by a statute 

 prohibiting any parliament from being held in it 

 until the king should give his consent. 



HENRY VIII. 



Henry VII. died in April 1509, in the fifty-third 

 year of his age. His eldest surviving son and 

 successor, Henry VIII. was in his eighteenth 

 year. Young, handsome, and supposed to be 

 amiable, he enjoyed at first a high degree of popu- 

 larity ; and gratified many by beheading Empson 

 and Dudley. Some years before, he had been 

 affianced to Catharine, a Spanish princess, who 

 had previously been the wife of his deceased 

 brother Arthur : he was now married to this lady, 

 the pope having previously granted a dispensation 

 for that purpose. The chief administration of 

 affairs was committed to the celebrated Cardinal 

 Wolsey, son of a burgess of Ipswich. The king 

 became much engaged in continental politics ; 

 and during a war which he carried on against 

 France, his brother-in-law James IV. who sided 

 with that state, made an unfortunate irruption 

 into the north of England, and was overthrown 

 and slain, with the flower of his nobility (Sep- 

 tember 9, 1513), at Flodden, 



138 



THE REFORMATION IN ENGLAND. 



About this time some changes of great import- 

 ance to European society took place. Almost ever 

 since the destruction of the Roman Empire, the 

 nations which arose out of it had remained in sub- 

 jection to the see of Rome. With knowledge, the 

 rise of a commercial and manufacturing class, and 

 ready access to knowledge given through the in- 

 vention of printing, came a disposition to inquire 

 into the authority of this great religious empire. 

 Meanwhile an important event took place in 

 Germany. At Wittenberg, in Germany, there was 

 an Augustine monk, named Martin Luther, who 

 became incensed at the Roman see, the immediate 

 cause of his anger being the fact of the pope having 

 granted the privilege of selling indulgences to the 

 Dominican order of friars. Being a man of a bold 

 and inquiring mind, he did not rest satisfied till 

 he had convinced himself, and many others around 

 him, that the indulgences were sinful, and that the 

 pope had no right to grant them. This happened 

 about the year 1517. Controversy and persecution 

 gradually extended the views of Luther, till he at 

 length openly disavowed the authority of the pope, 

 and condemned some of the most important 

 peculiarities of the Catholic system of worship. 



Henry VIII. as the second son of his father, 

 had been originally educated for the church, and 

 still retained a taste for theological learning. He 

 now distinguished himself by writing a book On 

 the Seven Sacraments, against the Lutheran doc- 

 trines ; and the pope of the day, Leo X. was so 

 much pleased with it as to grant him the title of 

 Defender of the Faith, In the year 1527, however, 

 he became enamoured of a young gentlewoman 

 named Anne Boleyn, who was one of his wife's 

 attendants. He immediately conceived the design 

 of annulling his marriage with Catharine, who had 

 only one living child, Mary, born in 1516, and 

 marrying this younger and more attractive person. 

 Finding a pretext for such an act in the previous 

 marriage of Catharine to his brother, he attempted 

 to obtain from the pope a decree declaring his 

 own marriage unlawful, and that the dispensation 

 upon which it had proceeded was beyond the 

 powers of the former pope to grant. The pontiff 

 (Clement VII.) was much perplexed by this re-^ 

 quest of King Henry, because he could not accede 

 to it without offending Charles V. Emperor of 

 Germany, one of his best supporters, and the 

 nephew of Queen Catharine, and at the same time 

 humbling the professed powers of the papacy, 

 which were now trembling under the attacks of 

 Luther. 



Henry desired to employ the influence of his 

 minister, Cardinal Wolsey, who had become in 

 succession archbishop of York, chancellor, a car- 

 dinal, and the papal legate. But Wolsey, with 

 all his greatness, could not venture to urge a matter 

 disagreeable to the pope, who was more his master 

 than King Henry. The process went on for several 

 years, and still his passion for Anne Boleyn con- 

 tinued unabated. Wolsey at length fell under the 

 king's displeasure for refusing to serve him in this 

 object, was stripped of all his places of power and 

 wealth, and in November 1530, expired at Leicester 

 Abbey in disgrace. Henry having consulted the 

 universities and scholars both at home and abroad, 

 privately married Anne Boleyn. His chief adviser 



