and tavern, contrary to the true meaning and doctrine of the same.... Be in charity one with another, ... to the which I, as your supreme head and sovereign lord, exhort and require you; and then I doubt not but that love and league, which I spake of in the beginning, shall never be dissolved or broken between us.'[435] The school-master had not spoken amiss. The parliament did not make the retort, 'Physician, heal thyself,' though it might have been applicable. One of the measures by which the king manifested his 'sweet charity' proves that, if he were not, like some old school-masters, a tyrant of words and syllables, he tyrannized over the peace and the lives of his people. [Sidenote: ANNE ASKEW.] There were at the court a certain number of ladies of the highest rank who loved the Gospel--the duchess of Suffolk, the countess of Sussex, the countess of Hertford, Lady Denny, Lady Fitzwilliam,[436] and above all the queen. Associated with these was a pious, lively, and beautiful young lady, of great intelligence and amiable disposition, and whose fine qualities had been improved by education. Her name was Anne Askew. She was the second daughter of Sir William Askew, member of a very ancient Lincolnshire family. She had two brothers and two sisters. Her brother Edward was one of the king's bodyguards. The queen frequently received Anne and other Christian women in her private apartments; and there prayer was made and the Word of God expounded by an evangelical minister. The king, indeed, was aware of these secret meetings, but he feigned ignorance. Anne was at this time in great need of the consolations of the Gospel. Her father, Sir William, had a rich neighbor named Kyme, with whom he was intimate; and being anxious that his eldest daughter should marry a rich man, he arranged with Kyme that she should wed his eldest son. The young lady died before the nuptials took place; and Sir William, reluctant to let slip so good a chance, compelled his second daughter Anne to marry the betrothed of her sister, and by him she became the mother of two children. The third sister, Joan, was married to Sir John Saint-Paul. The Holy Scriptures in the English version attracted Anne's attention, and ere long she became so attached to them that she meditated on them day and night. Led by them to a living faith in Jesus Christ, she renounced Romish superstitions. The priests, who were greatly annoyed, stirred up against her her young husband, a rough man and a staunch papist, who 'violently drove her out of his house.'[437] Anne said, 'Since, according to the Scripture, "if the unbelieving depart, let him depart. A brother or a sister is not under bondage in such cases,"[438]--I claim my divorce.' She went to London to take the necessary proceedings; and either through her brother, one of the guards, or otherwise, made the acquaintance of the pious ladies of the court and of the queen herself.