The Marquis of Dorset had introduced him to the resident gentry around him, and he met at his hospital board Sir John Nafant, who became particularly attached to him. He delighted to hear him discourse, and encouraged him in all his sallies of wit. From Sir John he received repeated invitations to partake of hospitality; and, though their years were dissimilar, their tastes for literature and knowledge were alike. Wolsey made a great impression upon this worthy knight, who not only conversed with him upon affairs of state, as then existing in England, but corresponded with him on foreign affairs, and was equally astonished at his comprehensive estimate of the resources of the kingdoms of Europe. Sir John did not forget to make a very handsome tribute offering to Wolsey, in acknowledgment of those talents which he displayed. To none had Wolsey revealed the early disappointment he had met with, which he neither then nor afterward--though fields of ambition and vain-glory lay in his way--could totally forget. Neither cloistered walls nor lofty battlements, neither profound learning, nor great estates, can change a man who has once imbibed licentiousness of spirit, and suffered it to usurp the place of love in the human heart. A man who does wrong, and persists in it without shame, let the wrong be the transgression of any moral commandment of God, will find a very poor excuse for his conduct, however much he may be devoted to learning, and to art or science. No robes, however white, which a man can put on, will cover the licentiousness of a corrupt heart. No crown--not even the triple one which adorns the head of the Pope--can free a man from the troubles of conscience. Better for him to cease to do evil, and learn to do well, than to bestow all his estates upon the priesthood, who may mutter masses for his soul, which can never be released from sin but by the obedience of faith. Sir Amias Pawlet, a knight whom Wolsey met one day at the table of the Marquis of Dorset, was a man of very different character to Sir John Nafant. He saw with a jealous eye the ambition of this young priest, who seemed to delight in holding him up to the company as an ignorant county magistrate. Wolsey was certainly not gifted just at this time with that amiability of mind and temper which could brook the overbearing arrogance of a man who seemed to think himself superior to all others in the country. At the table of his patron, Wolsey scarcely refrained from exposing his ignorance. He narrated a very simple and pithy story about a pullet who assumed all the dignity of the dunghill, and looked down with contempt on all other fowls. He exposed the want of judgment and flippant manner of the pullet with such force and pointed wit, that Sir Amias, who perceived it to be levelled at him, was greatly disconcerted, and threatened Wolsey, for being a public slanderer, with the penalty of the law.