Реферат: Henry VIII examinational essay by

Cranmer had done what he could to save some of the Church property for purposes of religion and education. But the great families had been so hungry to get hold of it, that very little could be rescued for such objects. Even Miles Coverdale, who did the people the inestimable service of translating the Bible into English (which the unreformed religion never permitted to be done), was left in poverty while the great families clutched the Church lands and money. The people had been told that when the Crown came into possession of these funds, it would not be necessary to tax them. But they were taxed afresh directly afterwards.

One of the most active writers on a Church's side against the King was a member of his own family - a sort of distant cousin, Reginald Pole by name - who attacked him in the most violent manner (though he recieved a pension from him all the time), and fought for the Church for his pen, day and night. He was beyong the King's reach, in Italy.

The Pope made Reginald Pole a cardinal; but, so much against his will, that it is thought he had hopes of marrying the Princess Mary. His being made a high priest, however, put an end to that. His mother, the Countess of Salisbury - who was unfortunately for herself, within the tyrant's reach -was the last of his relatives on whom his wrath fell. When she was told to lay her grey head upon the block, she answered the executioner that her head had never committed treason, and if he wanted her head, he should seize that. So, she ran round and round the scaffold with the executioner striking at her, and her grey hair bedabbled with blood. And even when they held her down upon the block she moved her head about to the last, resolved to be no party to her own barbarous murder. All this the people bore, as they had borne everything else.

Indeed they bore much more; for the slow fires of Smithfield were continually burning, and people were constantly being roasted to death - still to show what a good Christian the King was. He defied the Pope and his Bull, which was now issued, and had come into England; but he bur-ned innumerable people whose only offence was that they differed from the Pope's religios opinions.

All this the people bore, and more than all this yet. The national spirit seems to have been banished from the kingdom from this time. The people who were executed for treason, the wives and friends of the "bluff" King, spoke of him on the scafford as a good and gentle man.

The Parliament were as bad as the rest, and gave the King whatever he wanted. They gave him new powers of murdering, at his will and pleasure, anyone whom he might choose to call a traitor. But the worst measure they passed was an Act of Six Articles*********, commonly called at the time "the whip with six strings", which punished offences against the Pope's opinions, without mercy, and enforced the very worst parts of the monkish religion.

Cranmer would have modified it, if he could; but he had not the power, being overborne by the Romish party. As one of the articles declared that priests should not marry, and as he was married himself, he sent his wife and children into Germany, and began to tremble at his danger. This whip of six strings was made under the King's own eye. It should never be for-gotten of him how cruelly he supported the Popish doctrines when there was nothing to be got by opposing them.

This monarch now thought of taking another wife. He proposed to the French King to have some of the ladies of the French Court exhibited be-fore him, that he might make his Royal choice. But the French King ans-wered that he would rather not have his ladies to be shown like horses at a fair. He proposed to the Dowager Duchess of Milan, who replied that she might have thought of such a match if she had had two heads. At last Cromwell represented that there was a Protestant Princess in Germany - those who had the reformed religion were call Protestants, because their leaders had protested against the abuses and impositions of the unreform-ed Church - named Anne of Cleves, who was beautiful, and would answer the purpose admirably.

The King sent over the famous painter, Hans Holbein, to take her a portrait. Hans made her out to be so good-looking that the King was satis-fied, and the marriage was arranged. But Hans had flattered the Princess. When the King first saw her, he swore she was "a great Flanders mare", and said he would never marry her. Being obliged to do it, he would not give her the presents he had prepared, and would never notice her. He never forgave Cromwell his part in the affair. His downfall dates from that time.

It was quickened by his enemies, in the interests of the unreformed religion, putting in the King's way, at a state dinner, a niece of the Duke of Norfolk, Catherine Howard. Falling in love with her on the spot, the King soon divorced Anne of Cleves on pretence that she had been previously betrothered to someone else, and married Catherine. It is probable that on his wedding day he sent his faithful Cromwell to the scaffold, and had his head struck off.

It soon came out that Catherine Howard was not a faithful wife, and again the dreadful axe made the King a widower. Henry then applied him-self to superintending the composition of a religious book called "A ne-cessary doctrine for any Christian Man".

He married yet once more. Yes, strange to say, he found in England another woman who would become his wife, and she was Catherine Parr, widow of Lord Latimer. She leaned towards the reformed religion, and it is some comfort to know, that she argued a variety of doctrinal points with him on all possible occasions. After one of these conversations the King in a very black mood actully instructed Gardier, one of his Bishops who favoured the Popish opinions, to draw a bill of accusation against her to the scaffold. But one of the Queen's friends knew about it, and gave her timely notice. She fell ill with terror, but managed the King so well when he came to entrap her into further statements - by saying that she had only spoken on such points to divert his mind and to get some points of infor-mation from his extraordinary wisdom - that he gave her a kiss and called her a sweatheart. And, when the Chancellor came next day to take her to the Tower, the King honoured him with the epithets of a beast, a knave, and a fool. So near was Catherine Parr to the block, and so narrow was her escape!

***

A few more horrors, and this reign was over. There was a lady, Anne Askew, in Lincolnshire, who inclined to the Protestant opinions, and whose husband being a fierce Catholic, turned her out of his house. She came to London, and was considered as offending against the six articles, and was taken to the Tower, and put upon the rack - probably because it was hoped that she might, in her agony, criminate some obnoxious per-sons. She was tortured in a most cruel manner without uttering a cry, but afterwards they had to carry her to the fire in a chair. She was burned with three others, a gentleman, a clergyman, and a tailor; and so the world went on.

Either the King became afraid of the power of Duke of Norfolk, and his son the Earl of Surrey, or they gave him some offence, but he resolved to pull them down, to follow all the rest who were gone. The son was tried first - of course for nothing - and defended himself bravely; but all the same he was found guilty, and was executed. Then his father's turn came. But the King himself was left for death by a Greater King, and the Earth was to be rid of him at last. When he was found to be dying, Cranmer was sent for, and came with all speed, but found him speechless. In that hour he perished. He was in the fifty-sixth year of his age, and the thirty-eighth of his reign.

Henry the Eighth, a bloody tyrant, has been favoured by some Protest-ant writers, because the Reformation was achieved in his time. But the mighty merit of his lies with other men and not with him.

What else can I say about Henry VIII?

He was more a beast than a man.

He executed hundreds of people.

Though he was wise enough to rule a country.

His reign was bloody and he did not do a lot for his country.

His six marriages caused the country to finish

all treaties with the Roman Church.

And the King's bloody deeds ashamed the mighty England.

For Charles Dickens he was the most

untolerable man, a shame for humanity.

Notes.

· Hans Holbein (1497-1543)* - the German painter. Known as Hans Holbein Jr.

· the Battle of Spurs** was held on the 16th of August, 1513 a.d. During it the French cavalry fled because of the advancing armies of Henry VIII and Maximilian I.

· Thomas Wolsey (1473-1530)***, Chancellor of England since 1515 till 1529. Since 1514 - the Archbishop of York, since 1515 - the Cardinal. In 1529 he was arrested for treason.

· Wittemberg**** - the Saxon city where in 1517 Luther read his 95 thesises against the Catholic Church.

· the Reformation***** - the movement against the Ca-tholic Church in Western and Central Europe. It's crea-tor was Luther.

· Martin Luther (1483-1546)****** - the leader of the Re-formation. He also translated the Bible into German.

· John Wickliffe (1330-1384)******* - the English refor-mator. He said that the Pope was not necessary and wan-ted the Church to abandon its lands.

· Thomas More (1487 - 1535)******** - the great lawer and political leader, was against the Reformation. Being a writer, he created "Utopia". Anne Boleyn, the second wife of the King, knowing that More had helped the King to dismiss Catherine of Aragon, caused Henry to execute this clever and honest Chancellor of England.

· Act of Six Articles*********. Was written in 1539. It abolished the monasteries and showed that England was interested in religion and that damage inflicted to the Church was a crime. So, many Protestants were executed.

List of the Used Literature.

1. J. J. Bell. The History of England.

2. L. V. Sidorchenko. Absolute Monarchy.

3. I. I. Burova. Just for Pleasure. Intermediate Level.

4. D. Capewell. The History of English Monarchy.