'Non deest tibi, et Collegis tuis amplissima potestas nullis terminis aut conditionibus limitata sive restricta, et quicquid feceris, scito omuia apud hunc Regem et me esse grata et rata. Nam omnia, ut paucis absolvam, in tuo ingenio, et fide reposuimus. 'Nihil superest aliud scribendum, nisi quod supplex orem ut ones actiones tuas secundet Deus optimus Maximusq; et ex corde vale. 'Ex œdibus meis West Monast. vij., Februarij. 'Tuæ salutis et amplitudinis cupidissimus. 'T. Car, lis Ebor, propria Manu.'* * _Stevin_ (_i.e._) Stephen Gardiner, then at Rome, called Dr. Stevens. This letter will sufficiently show that confidence which the Cardinal had then in himself, when he said, that upon his being made Pope depended not only the health and wealth of princes and their realms, but all Christendom. The man who could have such conceit of himself, might well be unable to endure the growing boldness of the Reformation. Though his learning was so vast, and his influence at home and abroad so great, never did a subject rise to higher splendor, and never did a great man fall more suddenly. How ephemeral is the favor of princes! Few historical records give any but mortifying pictures of the misfortunes and discomfitures of great men. Few, either warriors or statesmen, but well know the reverses of public favor, and few poets, authors, artists, and skilful men in science, or in law, physic, or divinity, but have to contend with poverty and persecution, even in their eminence. What a happy man is he who trusts in God, and takes all things as he has them, coming from Him who '_lifteth up and putteth down_.' In the very year of the Cardinal's utmost ambition and presumption, when he sought to raise himself above all princes--in the very year of his greatest splendor and wealth, the same man is made to exclaim, according to his faithful historian and apologist, Cavendish: 'Now it is come to pass that it hath pleased the King to take all that I have into his hands, so that I have now nothing to give you, for I have nothing left me but the bare clothes on my back.'--(Fiddes, p. 47, 5 fol. ed.) One instance, however, of the softening of the heart of this great man remains to be told, which does him honor; but, to be rightly understood, the reader must be referred to those stirring times when the Papal power, having reached the summit of its presumption, began to be looked at with the eyes of truth, and the unnatural and impious monstrosity of its proceedings began to be questioned openly by the Reformers. Poor Bilney was at this time preaching at Ipswich. He, though conscious that he should meet with as little pity as his former friends, Thomas Ayers, who was burnt at Eccles, in Norfolk, and Thomas Bingay, who was four score and six years of age when he was burnt at Norwich, yet boldly attacked the blasphemous doctrines of the Church of Rome.