It may seem strange that Wolsey’s suppression of the smaller religious houses brought him so much unpopularity. It was certainly true that the monasteries had long since ceased to observe the strict traditions of religious asceticism, which had been the watchword of their foundation. Some of them had become resorts of the idle and worthless, who were permitted by supine or indulgent superiors to exchange a life of monastic discipline for one of luxury and indolence, if not of downright vice. But there were a few, seemingly unimportant facts, which outweighed all these charges. In the first place the monks were the easiest of landlords. In their practically defenceless state, it was surely for their advantage to conciliate their fellow men in every way, and to avoid disputes at any cost. They consequently suffered themselves to be imposed upon by their neighbours and tenants, in preference to risking their popularity by asserting themselves. So Wolsey’s measures, which brought in stricter landlords, increased rents, and did away with the good old slipshod management of so many years’ standing, met with ill-concealed dislike. The monks, moreover, were the most hospitable of people; the poor were never turned away unfed, the traveller could always find shelter beneath their roof, and this fact, coupled with the rooted opposition of the less educated class to any sweeping measure of reform adopted apparently without reason, while the old system appeared to all intents and purposes to work well, explained the rest. Wolsey’s measures to suppress the smaller monasteries, and confiscate their possessions to the use of his own colleges, may justly be described as universally unpopular[65].