[Illustration: C]<g>RANMER</g> deplored “the woeful dissipation of church property, which he would have applied to the uses of religion, education, and charity; but he had not often the courage to press this subject with the king, whose displeasure, more easily excited than ever, was equivalent to a death-warrant. The archbishop, however, did what he could with safety to himself; and Henry, startled perhaps by a popular outcry, resolved to appropriate a part of the spoil to the advancement of religion. Parliament passed an act for the establishing of new bishoprics, deaneries, and colleges, which were to be endowed with revenues raised on the lands of the monasteries. But it was too late; the money and lands were gone, or the king and his ministers needed all that remained. The number of new bishoprics was reduced from eighteen to six--those of Westminster, Oxford, Peterborough, Chester, Bristol, and Gloucester; and these were so scantily endowed, that they hardly afforded the new bishops the means of living.” At the same time fourteen abbeys and priories were converted into cathedrals and collegiate churches, with deans and prebendaries; but the king kept to himself a part of the lands which had been attached to them, and charged the Chapters with the obligation of contributing annually to the support of the poor, and the repairing of the highways.[144] The preamble of the act for the suppression of the lesser monasteries thus concludes: “Whereupon the said Lords and Commons, by a great deliberation, finally be resolved that it is, and shall be, much more to the pleasure of Almighty God, and for the honour of this his realm, that the possessions of such houses now being spent and wasted for the increase and maintenance of sin, should be used and committed to _better uses_, and the unthrifty religious persons so spending the same, to be compelled to reform their lives.”[145] Besides that at Canterbury, already noticed,[146] “other shrines had been plundered, and certain miraculous images and relics of saints had been broken in pieces at St. Paul’s Cross, and the machinery exposed, by which some of the monks had deluded the superstitious people;” but now every shrine was laid bare; or, if any escaped, it was owing to the poverty of their decorations and offerings.