Lives of Eminent Persons, Consisting of Galileo, Lord Somers, Kepler, Caxton, Newton, Blake, Mahomet, Adam Smith, Wolsey, Niebuhr, Sir E. Coke, Sir C. (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1833 edition. Excerpt: ...than the other; nor is the point of any importance, except as illustrating his imperious and unscrupulous nature. The remains of Wolsey were interred in the Abbey church of Leicester, after having been viewed by the mayor and corporation of Leicester, for the prevention of false rumours. On removing the body, it was found that he wore a shirt of haircloth next to his skin, an act of penance customary among the pious in those days; and, though indicating very false conceptions of the will of that Being who has constituted our frames for enjoyment, and who has beautifully exemplified the image of happiness in the infant state of man, this little circumstance, which was unknown to the attendants of Wolsey, proved that repentance and selfabasement were in his thoughts. It was deemed proper that the Cardinal's corpse should be interred decorated with such vestures and ornaments as appertained to his holy oflices. Thus, -attended to the last by some semblance of human grandeur, all that remained of Thomas Wolsey was deposited in the grave by torch-light, between four and five o'clock of the morning of St. Andrew's day, November 30th, 1530; the abbot and all the convent attending in solemn order, the canons singing dirges, and offering orisons. The king, upon hearing of the death of his former favourite, is said to have expressed poi nant concern, and to have declared that e would rather have lost twenty thousand pounds than so valuable a man; fiyet his grief did not prevent the sel sh monarch from interrogating Cavendish, who conveyed to him the tidings, with some anxiety, about a sum of fifteen hundred pounds due to him from Wolsey; nor could his regard for the memory of a distinguished subject induce him to give it the 'ust and even accustomed..