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198 acknowledges that he was the creature of his favour; and that all he had, rank and fortune, were his to take away, as he had given them. His tears for so great a reverse, for such a stripping down of fame and honour, are natural; and his tears and sorrow for his faithful servants open up the noblest place in his heart, and go far to make one love and honour him. "We cannot help comparing the career of Thomas à Becket and his own. Probably under the same circumstances Wolsey might have put on the same air of menace and defiance. But here matters were in a different position. Henry VIII. was not Henry II., nor was the Papal power now of the same terrible force in England. Bluff Harry was one that could and would have his will, outrageous and bloody as it might be; and the spirit of the Reformation was already shaking the tiara to the ground in this country.



Of Wolsey, as he appeared at this moment, scathed and stunned by the thunderbolt of the Royal wrath, we have a striking picture. The Bishop of Bayonne, the French ambassador, says in a letter:—"I have been to visit the cardinal in his distress, and I have witnessed the most striking change of fortune. He explained to me his hard case in the worst rhetoric that was ever heard. Both his tongue and his heart failed him. He recommended himself to the pity of the king and madame (Francis I. and his mother) with sighs and tears; and at last left me, without having said anything near so moving as his appearance. His face is dwindled to one-half its natural size. In truth, his misery is such that his enemies, Englishmen as they are, cannot help pitying him. Still, they will carry things to extremities. As for his legation, the seals, his authority, &c., he thinks no more