t the repressive power of
that "personal monarchy" procured peace for the English people and,
despite "benevolences" and other exactions, they grew into a stronger
national unity.

Simultaneously with this increase of royal authority came the
discovery of a "New World," in which England and her colonies were to
have the chief part. A century will elapse before those discoveries
begin to bear fruit. After that, our attention will no longer be
confined to the British Islands, but will be fixed as well on that
western continent where British enterprise and English love of liberty
were destined to find a new and broader field of activity.

Henry VIII--1509-1547

338. Henry's Advantages.

Henry VIII was not quite eighteen when he came to the throne. The
country was at peace, was fairly prosperous, and the young King had
everything in his favor. He was handsome, well educated, and fond of
athletic sports. His frank disposition won friends everywhere, and he
had inherited from his father the largest private fortune that had
ever descended to an English sovereign. Intellectually, he was in
hearty sympathy with the revival of learning, then in progress both on
the Continent and in England.

339. The New Learning; Colet, Erasmus, More.

During the greater part of the Middle Ages the chief object of
education was to make men monks, and originally the schools
established at Oxford and Cambridge were exclusively for that
purpose. In their day they did excellent work; but a time came when
men ceased to found monasteries, and began to erect colleges and
hospitals instead.[1]

[1] In the twelfth century four hundred and eighteen monasteries were
founded in England; in the next century, only about a third as many;
in the fourteenth, only twenty-three; after that date their
establishment may be said to cease.

In the course of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries William of
Wykeham and King Henry VI built and endowed colleges which were
specially designed to fit their pupils to live in the world and serve
the state, instead of withdrawing from it to seek their own salvation.

These new institutions encouraged a broader range of studies, and in
Henry VI's time particular attention was given to the Latin classics,
hitherto but little known. The geographical discoveries of Henry
VII's reign, made by Columbus, Cabot, and others (S335), began to
stimulate scientific thought. It was evident that the day was not far
dist