THE ENGLISH LAND SYSTEM 97 



hands of different tradesmen who used them as paper 

 in which to wrap their wares.^ 



Turning from the venal squalid part of the question 

 it is impossible to over-estimate the evil effects which 

 the movement had on the rural population. Before 

 the Reformation an immense portion of the land of 

 England, probably one-fourth of the whole, was in the 

 hands of the Church. By the suppression of the 

 monasteries the Church lands were nominally trans- 

 ferred to the Crown, but the great bulk of them imme- 

 diately found their way into the hands of a com- 

 paratively few men who were the favourites and 

 courtiers of the king. The first step in the policy of 

 confiscation was the Act of 1536, by which the lands 

 and other property of the monasteries with an income 

 less than ^200 a year, were given over to the Crown. 

 It is estimated that nearly 300 religious houses came 

 under the operation of this measure. By the Act of 

 1539 the remaining monasteries were dissolved and 

 their property also transferred to the king. The final 

 effect of the dissolution of the monasteries was to place 



^ Those who wish to study the subject should read — in addition to the 

 modern historians named— Strype's "Ecclesiastical and Civil Memorials" 

 (Clarendon Press, 1822); Gasquet's "Henry VIII and the English 

 Monasteries"; Dixon's " History of the Church of England"; Blunt's 

 "Reformation in England"; Fuller's "Church History"; Sir Henry 

 Selman's "History and Fate of Sacrilege" (1632), edition edited by Dr. 

 Eales(i888). 



See also the lengthy preamble to the Act of Dissolution of the smaller 

 monasteries (27 Henry VIII, chap. 28). In this preamble, while the 

 houses dealt with by the Act are condenmed in violent terms, the larger 

 institutions are spoken of as "divers and great solemn monasteries of 

 this realm, wherein, thanks be to God, religion is right well kept and ob- 

 served." It appears that the suppression of these smaller houses served 

 only to whet the appetite of the king and his courtiers for further spoils, 

 and in spite of religion being "right well kept and observed" in them, 

 the large monasteries shortly afterwards shared the fate of the smaller 

 ones. 



