At the age of twenty-four Margaret married Will Roper, more to please her father than herself. He was a good fellow, and had studied hard to please Margaret, and helped her father in much of his work. Margaret would have preferred to study and write, rather than marry, but her father convinced her that "one may spend a life in dreaming over Plato, and yet go out of it without leaving the world a whit better for having made part of it," and her father's word was law with Margaret. Her father's departure to Woodstock, the king's court, was a source of grief to Margaret. Two nights after he left, the household was aroused by shouts of "Fire! fire!" Everybody got up, and it was found that part of the Chelsea house was burnt, though all its inmates escaped uninjured. In 1530 Sir Thomas More was made Lord Chancellor, but this high post he only held for two years; he refused to sanction Henry's marriage with Ann Boleyn, together with several other things, and resigned the Great Seal in August, 1532. A great load was taken off his mind, and his spirits returned, but not for long. The storm was about to burst. Threatening visits and letters alarmed the family, and at last the blow came. Sir Thomas More had refused to take the oath of Supremacy, that is to say, he refused to acknowledge Henry VIII. as Head of the Church, and he was summoned to Lambeth to give his reasons. It was with a heavy heart that he took the boat to Lambeth, for he was leaving home for the last time, and he seemed to know it. The days when he was gone seemed long and lonely to his daughter Margaret. He refused to take the oath against his conscience, and was sent to the Tower. There Meg used to visit him, and he told her not to fret for him at home; he explained to her his innocence, his reasons for refusing to take the oath, and told her he was happy. In 1535 he was called to trial at Westminster, and crowds collected to see him pass from the Tower; even his children found it difficult to catch a glimpse of him. Margaret, we hear, climbed on a bench, and gazed her "very heart away," as he went by, so thin and worn, wrapt in a coarse woollen gown, and leaning on a staff, for he was weak from long confinement; his face was calm and grave. The trial lasted many hours, and Margaret waited on through that long day by the Tower wharf till he passed back. The moment she saw him, she knew the terrible sentence was "Guilty!" She pressed her way through the dense crowd, and, regardless of the men who surrounded him with axes and halberds, she flung her arms round his neck, crying, "My father! Oh, my father!" "My Meg!" sobbed More. He could bear the outward disgrace of the king and nation, he could stand without shrinking to hear the sentence of death passed upon him, but this passionate, tender love utterly broke his brave spirit and shook his firm courage. "Enough, enough, my child! what, mean ye to weep, and break my heart?"