withheld her dog from
her; presently my lady was sent for, and the dog brought with her,
which he taking in his hand, caused his wife to stand at the upper end
of the hall, and the beggar at the other; he then bad each of them
call the dog, which when they did, the dog went presently to the
beggar, forsaking my lady. When he saw this, he bad my lady be
contented for it was none of hers. My Lord Chancellor then gave the
woman a piece of gold, which would have bought ten such dogs, and bid
her be careful of it for the future.

A friend of his had spent much time in composing a book, and went to
Sir Thomas to have his opinion of it; he desired him to turn it
into rhime; which at the expence of many years labour he at last
accomplished, and came again to have his opinion: Yea marry, says he,
now it is somewhat; now it is rhime, but before it was neither rhime
nor reason.

But fortune, which had been long propitious to our author, began now
to change sides, and try him as well with affliction as prosperity,
in both which characters, his behaviour, integrity and courage were
irreproachable. The amorous monarch King Henry VIII, at last obtained
from his Parliament and Council a divorce from his lawful wife, and
being passionately fond of Anna Bullen, he married her, and declared
her Queen of England: This marriage Sir Thomas had always opposed, and
held it unlawful for his Sovereign to have another wife during his
first wife's life. The Queen who was of a petulant disposition, and
elated with her new dignity could not withhold her resentment against
him, but animated all her relations, and the parties inclined to the
protestant interest, to persecute him with rigour. Not long after the
divorce, the Council gave authority for the publication of a book,
in which the reasons why this divorce was granted were laid down; an
answer was soon published, with which Sir Thomas More was charged as
the author, of which report however he sufficiently cleared himself in
a letter to Mr. Cromwel, then secretary, and a great favourite with
King Henry. In the parliament held in the year 1534, there was an
oath, framed, called the Oath of Supremacy, in which all English
subjects should renounce the pope's authority, and swear also to the
succession of Queen Ann's children, and lady Mary illegitimate. This
oath was given to all the clergy as well bishops as priests, but no
lay-man except Sir Thomas More was desired to take it; he was summoned