notions, there is something inexpressibly disgusting in the openness
with which bribes were tendered to Cromwell by those who were eager to
obtain grants of abbey lands (Suppression of Monasteries, _passim_).
On the other hand, the abbots and abbesses who feared for their houses
had as little scruple in offering him large sums for his protection.
Thus the good Bishop Latimer renders himself the intermediary (Dec.
16th, 1536) of an offer from the Prior of Great Malvern of 500 marks
to the king and 200 to Cromwell to preserve that foundation; while the
Abbot, of Peterboro’ tendered the enormous sum of 2500 marks to the
king and £300 to Cromwell (Ibid. 150, 179). The liberal disposition of
the latter seems to have made an impression, for, though he could not
save his abbey, he was appointed the first Bishop of Peterboro’—a see
erected upon the ruins of the house.
[1162] “They be very pore, and can have lytyll serves withowtt ther
capacytes. The bischoyppys and curettes be very hard to them, withowtt
they have ther capacytes.”—The Bishop of Dover to Cromwell, March 10th,
1538 (Suppression of Monasteries, p. 193). These “capacities” empowered
them to perform the functions of secular priests. The good bishop
pleads that certain poor monks may obtain them without paying the usual
fee.
[1163] 27 Henry VIII. c. 25, renewed by 28 Hen. VIII. c. 6.—Parliament.
Hist. I. 574.
[1164] Burnet I. 227-34; Collect. 160.—Wilkins III. 784, 792,
812.—Rymer XIV. 549.
[1165] 28 Henry VIII. c. 10.—Parl. Hist. I. 533.
[1166] Burnet I. 235-7. These pensions were not in all cases secured
without difficulty, even after promises had been made and agreements
entered into (Suppression of Monasteries, p. 126).
[1167] Suppression of Monasteries, p. 170.—Strype’s Eccles. Memor. I.
262.
[1168] Strype, Memorials of Cranmer, Book I. Chap. ix.
[1169] Suppression of Monast. pp. 194, 203.
[1170] A letter from John Bartelot to Cromwell shows that the abbot
purchased secrecy by distributing thirty pounds to those who detected
him, and promising them thirty more. This latter sum was subsequently
reduced to six pounds, for which the holy man gave his note. This
not being paid at maturity, he was sued, when he had the audacity to
complain to Cromwell, and to threaten to prosecute the intruders for
robbery and force them to return the money paid. Bartelot relates his
share in the somewhat questionable transaction with great naïveté, and
applies to Cromwell for protection.—Suppression of Monasteries, Letter
xxv.
[1171] This may have been true, for Dr. London was one of the miserable
tools who are the fitting representatives of the time. His desire
to discover the irregularities of the monastic orders arose from no
reverence for virtue, for he underwent public penance at Oxford for
adultery with a mother and daughter (Strype, Eccles. Memor. I. 376);
and his zeal in suppressing the monasteries was complemented with equal
zeal in persecuting Protestants. In 1543 he made himself conspicuous,
in conjunction with Gardiner, by having heretics burned under the
provisions of the Six Articles. His eagerness in this good work led him
to commit perjury, on conviction of which he was pilloried in Windsor,
Reading, and Newbury, and thrust into the Fleet, where he died.—Strype,
Memorials of Cranmer, Book I. Chap. 26, 27.
In fact, Henry’s capricious despotism rendered it almost impossible
that he could be served by men of self-respect and honor.
[1172] Burnet I. 238-43.—See also Froude’s Hist. Engl. III. 285 et seq.
During his visitation (Aug. 27th, 1538), the Bishop of Dover writes to
Cromwell, “I have Malkow’s ere that Peter stroke of, as yt ys wrytyn,
and a M. as trewe as that” (Suppression of Monasteries, p. 212). In
a report of Dec. 28th, 1538, Dr. London observes, with dry humor, “I
have dyvers other propre thinges, as two heddes of seynt Ursula, wich
bycause ther ys no maner of sylver abowt them, I reserve tyll I have
another hedd of herse, wich I schall fynd in my waye within theese
xiiii. days, as I am creadably informyd” (Ibid. p. 234). Dr. Leighton
writes in the same spirit to Cromwell—“Yee shall also receive a Bag
of Relicks wherein ye shall see Stranger Things as shall appear by
the Scripture. As God’s Coat, or Ladie’s Smock; Part of God’s Supper,
In cœna Domini; Pars petræ super qua natus erat Jesus in Bethlehem.
Besides there is in Bethlehem plenty of Stones and sometimes Quarries,
and maketh their mangers of Stone. The scripture of every thing shall
declare you all. And all these of Mayden Bradley. Where is a holy
Father Prior; and hath but six Sons and one Daughter married yet of
the goods of the Monastery. And he thanketh God, he never meddled with
married women; but all with Maidens, the fairest could be gotten. And
always married them right well. The Pope, considering his fragility,
gave him license to keep a w——: and hath good writing, sub Plumbo, to
discharge his conscience” (Strype, Eccles. Memor. I. 253).—Nicander
Nucius (op. cit. pp. 51-62) relates some of the stories current at
the time of the miracles engineered by the monks to stave off their
impending doom.
[1173] Parl. Hist. I. 535.
[1174] 31 Henry VIII. c. 13 (Parl. Hist. I. 537).
[1175] 32 Hen. VIII. c. 24 (Ibid. 543-44).
[1176] Burnet I. 262-3.
[1177] Rymer XIV., XV.
[1178] 37 Hen. VIII. c. 4 (Parl. Hist. I. 561).
[1179] Parl. Hist. I. 537. Such hospitals, chantries, &c., as were
spared by Henry VIII. were speedily swept away, as soon as Edward VI.
succeeded to the throne, by the act 1 Edw. VI. c. 14 (Parl. Hist. I.
583).
[1180] This may readily be considered no exaggeration. A letter from
John Freeman to Cromwell values at £80,000 the lead alone stripped from
the dismantled houses (Suppression of Monasteries, p. 290).
[1181] Such is the substance of a memorandum in Henry’s own
hand-writing (Suppression of Monasteries, No. 131, p. 263).
[1182] 31 Hen. VIII. c. 9 (Parl. Hist. I. 540).
[1183] Burnet I. 300.
[1184] Strype, Eccles. Memor. I. 345.
[1185] See letters of the Lord Chancellor Audley and the learned Sir
Thomas Elyot to Cromwell.—Strype, Eccles. Memor. I. 263-5.
[1186] Op. cit. I. 392-403; II. 258-63.
[1187] 5-6 Edw. VI. c. 2 (Parl. Hist. I. 596).
[1188] 1 Edw. VI. c. 3.—Parl. Hist. I. 583.—Burnet II. 45. In 1538 the
Bishop of Dover interceded with Cromwell for licenses to enable some
ejected friars to abandon their monastic gowns, “For off trewthe ther
harttes be clene from the relygyon the more parte, so they myght change
ther cotes, the whyche they be not abull to paye for, for they have no
thenge” (Suppression of Monasteries, p. 197).
[1189] Fœdera, T. XIV. p. 551.
[1190] Froude, Hist. Engl. IV. 543.
[1191] Thus “An Exposition into the sevenith Chapitre of the firste
Epistle to the Corinthians” seems to have been almost entirely devoted
to an argument against celibacy, adducing all manner of reasons derived
from nature, morality, necessity, and Scripture, and describing
forcibly the evils arising from the rule. The author does not hesitate
to declare that “Matrimony is as golde, the spirituall estates as
dung,” and the tenor of his writings may be understood from his
triumphant exclamation, after insisting that all the Apostles and their
immediate successors were married—“Seeing that ye chose not married men
to bishoppes, other Criste must be a foole or unrighteous which so did
chose, or you anticristis and deceyvers.”
The “Sum of Scripture” was more moderate in its expressions. “Yf a
man vowe to lyve chaste and in povertie in a monasterie, than yf he
perceyve that in the monastery he lyveth woorse than he did before, as
in fornication and theft, then he may leve the cloyster and breke his
vowe without synne.”
Tyndale in “The Obedience of a Cristen Man” is most uncompromising.
“Oportet presbyterem ducere uxorem duas ob causas.” ... “If thou bind
thy self to chastitie to obteyn that which Criste purchesed for the,
surely soo art thow an infidele.”
The “Revelation of Anticriste” carries the war into the enemy’s
territory in a fashion somewhat savage. “Keping of virginitie and
chastite of religion is a devellishe thinge” (Wilkins III. 728-34).
[1192] Strype, Memorials of Cranmer, Book III. Chapter 34.
[1193] For instances of these practices, see Froude’s England, Ch. III.
[1194] Wilkins III. 778.—Strype, in his “Memorials of Cranmer,” Bk.
I. Chap. 18, gives this proclamation as dated Nov. 16, in the 30th
year of Henry VIII. which would place it in 1538, and Bishop Wilkins
also prints (III. 696) from Harmer’s “Specimen of Errors” the same
with unimportant variations, as “given this 16th day of November,
in the 13th year of our reign,” which would place it in 1521. It is
impossible, however, at a time when even the Lutherans of Saxony had
scarcely ventured on the innovation, that in England priestly marriage
could already have become as common as the proclamation shows it to be.
The bull of Leo X., thanking Henry for his refutation of Luther, was
dated Nov. 4th, 1521, and we may be sure that the king’s zeal for the
faith would at such a moment have prompted him to much more stringent
measures of repression, if he had ventured, at that epoch, to invade
the sacred precincts of ecclesiastical jurisdiction—a thing he would
have been by no means likely to do. The date of 1521 is therefore
evidently an error.
For the same reasons I have been forced to reject a discussion in
convocation of the same year (Wilkins III. 697), in which the question
of sacerdotal marriage was decided triumphantly in the affirmative.
The proceedings are evidently those of Dec. 1547, in the first year of
Edward VI.
[1195] Burnet’s Collections I. 319.
[1196] MS. State Paper Office (Froude, III. 65). Ap Rice’s report
to Cromwell is sufficiently suggestive as to the interior life of
the monastic orders to deserve transcription. “As we were of late
at Walden, the abbot there being a man of good learning and right
sincere judgment, as I examined him alone, showed me secretly, upon
stipulation of silence, but only unto you as our judge, that he had
contracted matrimony with a certain woman secretly, having present
thereat but one trusty witness; because he, not being able, as he said,
to contain, though he could not be suffered by the laws of man, saw he
might do it lawfully by the laws of God; and for the avoiding of more
inconvenience, which before he was provoked unto, he did thus, having
confidence in you that this act should not be anything prejudicial unto
him.”
[1197] MS. State Paper Office (Froude, III. 372). It is not to be
assumed, however, that the clergy were worse than the laity. During the
visitation of the monasteries, Thomas Leigh, one of the visitors, says,
in writing to Cromwell, Aug. 22, 1536, concerning the region between
Coventry and Chester “For certain of the knights and gentlemen, and
most commonly all, liveth so incontinently, having their concubines
openly in their houses, with five or six of their children, and putting
from them their wives, that all the country therewith be not a little
offended, and taketh evil example of them” (Miscellaneous State Papers,
London, 1778, I. 21). It perhaps would not be easy to determine the
exact responsibility of the clergy for this immorality of their flocks.
[1198] Strype, Eccles. Memorials, Vol. I. Append. p. 176.
[1199] Burnet’s Collect. I. 362.
[1200] Formularies of Faith, Oxford, 1856.—Wilkins III. 826.
[1201] Suppression of Monasteries, pp. 160-1.
[1202] He made one exception. Nuns professed before the age of 21 were
at liberty to marry after the dissolution of their houses, whereat,
according to Dr. London, they “be wonderfull gladde ... and do pray
right hartely for the kinges majestie” (Suppression of Monasteries, p.
214).
[1203] Strype’s Eccles. Memor. I. 320.
[1204] Burnet I. 254-55; Collect. 332, 347.
[1205] “Nothing has yet been settled concerning the marriage of the
clergy, although some persons have very freely preached before the king
upon the subject.”—John Butler to Conrad Pellican (Froude III. 381).
[1206] Burnet, Collect. I. 329.
[1207] Strype’s Eccles. Memor. I. 339, 343.
[1208] Strype’s Eccles. Memor. I. 344.—Wilkins III. 847.
[1209] Yet the moderate party ventured to submit to parliament
“A Device for extirpating Heresies among the People,” among the
suggestions of which was a bill for abolishing ecclesiastical celibacy,
legalizing all existing marriages, and permitting the clergy in general
“to have wives and work for their living”—Rolls House MS. (Froude III.
381).
[1210] Burnet I. 258-9.—31 Henry VIII. c. xiv. Mr. Froude endeavors
to relieve Henry of the responsibility of this measure, and quotes
Melanchthon to show that its cruelty is attributable to Gardiner (Hist.
Engl. III. 395). He admits, however, that the bill as passed differs
but slightly from that presented by the king himself, with whom the
committee which framed it must have acted in concert. According to
Strype, “The Parliament men said little against this bill, but seemed
all unanimous for it; neither did the Lord Chancellor Audley, no, nor
the Lord Privy Seal, Cromwel, speak against it: the reason being, no
question, because they saw the king so resolved upon it.... Nay, at the
very same time it passed, he (Cranmer) stayed and protested against it,
though the king desired him to go out, since he could not consent to
it. Worcester (Latimer) also, as well as Sarum (Shaxton), was committed
to prison; and he, as well as the other, resigned up his bishopric
upon the act”—(Memorials of Cranmer, Book I. Chap. 19). This shows us
how the royal influence was used. Cranmer, indeed, in his reply to the
Devonshire rebels, when in 1549 they demanded the restoration of the
Six Articles, expressly asserts “that if the king’s majesty himself had
not come personally into the Parliament house, those lawes had never
passed” (Ibid. App. No. XL.).
[1211] 31 Henry VIII. c. 6 (Parl. Hist. I. 536-40).
[1212] Parl. Hist. I. 540.
There is a story current that soon after the passage of the Act,
the Duke of Norfolk, who had had so much to do with it, on meeting
a former chaplain of his named Lawney, jocularly said to him “O, my
Lawney (knowing him of old much to favor priests’ matrimony), whether
may priests now have wives or no?” “If it please your grace,” replied
he, “I cannot well tell whether priests may have wives or no; but
well I wot, and am sure of it, for all your act, that wives will have
priests.”—Strvpe’s Memorials of Cranmer, Book I. Chap. viii.
[1213] Dr. London chronicles the troubles of this class. “I perceyve
many of the other sortt, monkes and chanons, whiche be yonge lustie
men, allways fatt fedde, lyving in ydelnes and at rest, be sore
perplexide that now being prestes they may nott retorn and marye”
(Suppression of Monasteries, p. 215).
Nicander Nucius asserts that many did marry openly—“ἂλλους δδὲ γυναῖκας
ἐννόμως συνεύνους εἰσαγομένους” (Op. cit. p. 71).
[1214] His first marriage was entered into while he was still quite
young, and before he had taken orders. The second, however, shows
that he acted with some independence, for it took place in 1531,
before Henry’s open rupture with Rome, and while he was ambassador
to the Emperor. At that time he was King’s chaplain and archdeacon
of Taunton, and his nuptials therefore were plainly an indication of
heresy.—Strype’s Memorials of Cranmer, Book I. Chap. iii., Book III.
Chap. xxvii.
[1215] Burnet I. 256-7. It was not until 1543 that he ventured to
confess this to the king (Ibid. p. 328). At his trial in 1556 his two
marriages were one of the points of accusation against him (Ibid. II.
339).
Sanders, in commenting upon Cranmer’s time-serving disposition, which
enabled him to accommodate himself to Henry’s capricious opinions, and
yet to enter fully into the reformatory ideas predominant under Edward
VI., does not fail to satirize his connubial propensities. “Unum illud
molestissime tamen ferens, quod meretricem quandam suam non poterat
palam uxoris loco libere habere, quia id non laturum Henricum sciebat,
sed partim domi eam occultare, partim cum foras prodiret, cista quadam
ad id affabre facta inclusam, secum una circumferre cogeretur. Iste
ergo jam desiit esse Henricianus, et tam ex immatura regis Edouardi
ætate quam ex Protectoris in sectas summa propensione, suæ statim
simul et libidini et hæresi habenas laxandas statuit; nam et scorto
suo mox est publice pro uxore usus, et catechismum Edouardo dedicatum,
falsæ impiæque doctrinæ plenum, in lucem edidit.”—De Orig. et Prog.
Schismatis Anglicani, p. 193 (Ed. 1586).
[1216] Melanchthon. Epist. Ed. 1565 p. 34.
[1217] 2-3 Edw. VI. c. 21 (Parl. Hist. I. 586).
[1218] 32 Hen. VIII. c. 10.—Burnet I. 282.—Parl. Hist. I. 575.
Richard Hilles, writing in 1541 to Henry Bullinger, assumes that this
modification of the Six Articles only applied to those who were guilty
of incontinence, and that it did not “appear to the king at all extreme
still to hang those clergymen who marry or who retain those wives whom
they had married previous to the former statute” (Original Letters,
Parker Soc. Pub. p. 205)—but both Burnet and the Parliamentary History
make no such distinction, and in the abstract of the bill as printed
in the Statutes at Large (I. 281) it is described as applicable to
“priests married or unmarried.”
[1219] [see transcriber’s notes] Hooper to Bullinger.—Original Letters,
Parker Soc. Pub. p. 36.
[1220] Thus Dr. Parker, afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury, was
married on June 24th, 1547, within six months after Henry’s death, to
Margaret, daughter of Robert Harlston of Mattishall. As he had been
in priest’s orders since 1527, he assumed a liberty which was not
even asked of Parliament until nearly eighteen months later (see his
autobiographical memoranda in his Correspondence, pp. vii., x., Parker
Soc., 1853).
[1221] 1 Edw. I. c. I, 12 (Parl. Hist. I. 582-4).—Wilkins IV.
16.—Burnet, II. 40, 41; III. 189.
[1222] 2-3 Edw. VI. c. 21 (Parl. Hist. I. 586).—Burnet II. 88-9.
[1223] Wilkins IV. 26.—Cardwell’s Documentary Annals, I. 59. Wilkins
and Cardwell date this in 1547, which is evidently impossible. Burnet
(II. 102) alludes to it under 1549, which is much more likely to be
correct.
[1224] Sanderi Schisma Anglic. pp. 214-5.
[1225] Strype, Memorials of Cranmer, Bk. II. chap. 14.—Smith
subsequently at Louvain continued to urge the necessity of celibacy
and was answered by Peter Martyr. Strype calls him a filthy fellow,
notorious for lewdness, and his championship of chastity excited some
merriment. There is an epigram upon him by Lawrence Humphrey—
“Haud satis affabre tractans fabrilia Smithus
Librum de vita cœlibe composuit
Dumque pudicitiam, dum vota monastica laudat,
Stuprat, sacra notans fœdera conjugii.”
(Ibid. Chap. 25.)
[1226] The vast growth of the sheep-farms had long been a subject
of complaint. Even as early as 1516, Sir Thomas More describes with
indignant energy the misery caused by the ejectment of the agricultural
population in order to form enormous sheep-walks, which were found more
profitable to the landlords than ordinary farming. He declares that the
sheep “tam edaces atque indomitæ esse cœperunt, ut homines devorent
ipsos, agros, domos, oppida vastent ac depopulentur.”—Utopia, Lib. I.
[1227] Burnet II. 117-9.
[1228] Strype’s Eccles. Memorials, II. 420.
[1229] Burnet II. Collect. 217. In the Latin version, “ Episcopis,
presbyteris et diaconis non est mandatum ut cœlibatum voveant; neque,
jure divino coguntur matrimonio abstinere” (Wilkins IV. 76).
[1230] Strype’s Eccles. Memorials, II. 355.
[1231] Ibid. p. 445.—“Our curate is naught, an Assehead, a Dodipot, a
Lack-Latine, and can do nothing.”
[1232] 5-6 Edw. VI. c. 12 (Parl. Hist. I. 594).—Burnet II. 192.
It is curious to observe that the modern “Ritualistic” portion of
the English clergy adopt the same line of argument from the marriage
service of the Anglican ritual, and apply it not only to the priesthood
but to the whole body of believers. See “The Church and the World,”
edited by the Rev. Orby Shipley, 2d edition, 1866, p. 161.
[1233] Reform. Legg. Eecles. Tit. de Hæresibus. cap. xx. (Cardwell’s
Ed., Oxford, 1850, p. 20).—Cf. Tit. de Matrimonio c. ix. (p. 44).
[1234] Strype’s Eccles. Memor. III. 20. This story derives additional
piquancy from the fact that this Dr. Weston was somewhat notorious for
uncleanness and was subsequently deprived of the Deanery of Windsor for
adultery (Ibid. pp. 111-2).
[1235] 1 Mary c. 2 (Parl. Hist. I. 609-10).—Burnet II. 255.
[1236] Strype’s Eccles. Memorials, III. 52.
[1237] Burnet II. Append. 264. According to Strype, Bonner’s impatience
did not wait for the royal injunctions, for in February he deprived
of their livings all the married priests in his diocese of London and
commanded them to bring all their wives within a fortnight in order
that they might be divorced.—Memorials of Cranmer, Bk. III. chap. 8.
Julius III. issued a Bull, March 8th, 1554, defining Cardinal Pole’s
legatine powers, among which was that of removing the excommunication
from married clerks and legitimating their children, the fathers being
removed from function and benefice, separated from their wives, and
subjected to penance (Cardwell’s Documentary Annals, I. 131). This was
the course adopted for a time, but as the kingdom was not yet formally
reconciled to Rome, the action had was under the local authorities.
[1238] Strype’s Eccles. Memor. III. Append. 33.—In the same place (p.
31) may be found a copy of the summons served upon offenders of this
class.
[1239] Burnet II. 275 and Append. 256.—Rymer (T. XV. pp. 376-77) gives
a similar commission dated March 9th, issued to Stephen Gardiner to
eject the canons and prebendaries of Westminster in the same summary
manner. The proceedings throughout England were doubtless framed on
these models.
[1240] Burnet II. Append. 260.
[1241] Bishop Poynette wrote a book entitled “An Apologie on the Godly
Marriadge of Priestes,” in rejoinder to Martin’s “Traictise declaryng
and plainly prouyng that the pretensed marriage of priestes and
professed persones is no marriage,” which was a reply to Poynette’s
previous work. Bale also issued a bitter attack on Bonner’s Articles
(Cardwell’s Documentary Annals, I. 135) and Dr. Parker, afterwards
Archbishop of Canterbury, published a voluminous rejoinder to Martin.
[1242] Wilkins IV. 96-7.
[1243] Burnet II. 276; III. 225-6.
[1244] A specimen of the form of restitution subscribed by those who
were restored on profession of amendment and repentance has been
preserved—“Whereas ... I the said Robert do now lament and bewail my
life past, and the offence by me committed; intending firmly by God’s
grace hereafter to lead a pure, chast, and continent life ... and
do here before my competent judge and ordinary most humbly require
absolution of and from all such censures and pains of the laws as by
my said offence and ungodly behavior I have incurred and deserved:
promising firmly ... never to return to the said Agnes Staunton as to
my wife or concubine, &c.”—(Wilkins IV. 104).
[1245] Strype’s Memorials of Cranmer, Bk. III. chap. 8.—Nov. 14th,
1554, we find a record of four priests doing penance in white shirts
and holding candles at Paul’s Cross, London, while Harpsfield preached
a sermon.—Strype’s Eccles. Memor. III. 203.
[1246] Parl. Hist. I. 616.
[1247] The Bull is dated December 24, 1554 (Wilkins IV.
111).—Parliament repealed the attainder of Cardinal Pole, November 22d,
and on the 24th he arrived in London as legate (Burnet II. 261-2).
[1248] 1 and 2 Phil. and Mary c. 8 (Parl. Hist. I. 624). The title
of the bill shows that, though the Parliament was almost exclusively
Catholic, it was disposed to make its obedience to Rome the price for
obtaining confirmation of the abbey lands—“A Bill for repealing all
statutes, articles, and provisoes made against the See Apostolique of
Rome, since the 20th of Henry VIII., and for the establishment of all
spiritual and ecclesiastical possessions and hereditaments conveyed to
the laity.”
[1249] 2 and 3 Phil. and Mary, c. 4 (Parl. Hist. pp. 626-8).
[1250] Mag. Bull. Roman. T. I. p. 809.
[1251] Original Letters, Parker Soc. Pub. p. 149.
[1252] Parl. Hist. I. 626; II. 342.
[1253] Card. Poli Constit. Legat. Decret. V. (Wilkins IV. 800).