THE VISITATION OF THE MONASTERIES.
[Sidenote: Exemption of the religious houses from control.]
[Sidenote: Contrast in the monasteries between theory and fact.]
[Sidenote: The original intention.]
Many high interests in England had been injured by the papal
jurisdiction; but none had suffered more vitally than those of the
monastic establishments. These establishments had been injured, not by
fines and exactions,--for oppression of this kind had been terminated by
the statutes of provisors,--but because, except at rare and remote
intervals, they had been left to themselves, without interference and
without surveillance. They were deprived of those salutary checks which
all human institutions require if they are to be saved from sliding into
corruption. The religious houses, almost without exception, were not
amenable to the authority of the bishops. The several societies
acknowledged obedience only to the heads of their order, who resided
abroad; or to the pope, or to some papal delegate. Thus any regularly
conducted visitation was all but impossible. The foreign superiors, who
were forbidden by statute to receive for their services more than
certain limited and reasonable fees, would not undertake a gratuitous
labour; and the visitations, attempted with imperfect powers[480] by the
English archbishops, could be resisted successfully under pleas of
exemption and obedience to the rules of the orders.[481] Thus the abbeys
had gone their own way, careless of the gathering indignation with which
they were regarded by the people, and believing that in their position
they held a sacred shield which would protect them for ever. In them, as
throughout the Catholic system, the sadness of the condition into which
they had fallen was enhanced by the contrast between the theory and the
degenerate reality. Originally, and for many hundred years after their
foundation, the regular clergy were the finest body of men of which
mankind in their chequered history can boast. They lived to illustrate,
in systematic simplicity, the universal law of sacrifice. In their three
chief vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience, they surrendered
everything which makes life delightful. Their business on earth was to
labour and to pray: to labour for other men's bodies, to pray for other
men's souls. Wealth flowed in upon them; the world, in its instinctive
loyalty to greatness, laid its lands and its possessions at their feet;
and for a time was seen the notable spectacle of property administered
as a trust, from which the owners reaped no benefit, except increase of
toil. The genius of the age expended its highest efforts to provide
fitting tabernacles for the divine spirit which they enshrined; and
alike in village and city, the majestic houses of the Father of mankind
and his especial servants towered up in sovereign beauty, symbols of the
civil supremacy of the church, and of the moral sublimity of life and
character which had won the homage and the admiration of the Christian
nations. Ever at the sacred gates sate Mercy, pouring out relief from a
never-failing store to the poor and the suffering; ever within the
sacred aisles the voices of holy men were pealing heavenwards, in
intercession for the sins of mankind; and influences so blessed were
thought to exhale around those mysterious precincts, that the outcasts
of society--the debtor, the felon, and the outlaw--gathered round the
walls, as the sick men sought the shadow of the apostle, and lay there
sheltered from the avenging hand till their sins were washed from off
their souls. Through the storms of war and conquest the abbeys of the
middle ages floated, like the ark upon the waves of the flood, inviolate
in the midst of violence, through the awful reverence which surrounded
them.
[Sidenote: The life of "religion" left it in the 14th century.]
The soul of "religion,"[482] however, had died out of it for many
generations before the Reformation. At the close of the fourteenth
century, Wycliffe had cried that the rotting trunk cumbered the ground,
and should be cut down. It had not been cut down; it had been allowed to
stand for a hundred and fifty more years; and now it was indeed plain
that it could remain no longer. The boughs were bare, the stem was
withered, the veins were choked with corruption; the ancient life-tree
of monasticism would blossom and bear fruit no more. Faith had sunk into
superstition; duty had died into routine; and the monks, whose technical
discipline was forgotten, and who were set free by their position from
the discipline of ordinary duty, had travelled swiftly on the downhill
road of human corruption.
[Sidenote: The darker scandals not to be touched upon.]
[Sidenote: Political and administrative abuses.]
Only light reference will be made in this place to the darker scandals
by which the abbeys were dishonoured. Such things there really were, to
an extent which it may be painful to believe, but which evidence too
abundantly proves. It is better, however, to bury the recollection of
the more odious forms of human depravity; and so soon as those who
condemn the Reformation have ceased to deny what the painfulness of the
subject only has allowed to remain disputed, the sins of the last
English monks will sleep with them in their tombs. Here, in spite of
such denials, the most offensive pictures shall continue to be left in
the shade; and persons who wish to gratify their curiosity, or satisfy
their unbelief, may consult the authorities for themselves.[483] I shall
confine my own efforts rather to the explanation of the practical, and,
in the highest sense of the word, political abuses, which, on the whole,
perhaps, told most weightily on the serious judgment of the age.
[Sidenote: The abbeys intended for the benefit of the poor.]
[Sidenote: Fraudulent neglect of duty.]
[Sidenote: Illegal division of profits.]
[Sidenote: Dishonest administration of the lands.]
[Sidenote: Neglect of hospitality. Neglect of the poor.]
[Sidenote: Simony and profligacy.]
The abbeys, then, as the State regarded them, existed for the benefit of
the poor. The occupants for the time being were themselves under vows of
poverty; they might appropriate to their personal use no portion of the
revenues of their estates; they were to labour with their own hands, and
administer their property for the public advantage. The surplus proceeds
of the lands, when their own modest requirements had been supplied,
were to be devoted to the maintenance of learning, to the exercise of a
liberal hospitality, and to the relief of the aged, the impotent, and
the helpless. The popular clamour of the day declared that these duties
were systematically neglected; that two-thirds, at least, of the
religious bodies abused their opportunities unfairly for their own
advantage; and this at a time when the obligations of all property were
defined as strictly as its rights, and negligent lay owners were
promptly corrected by the State whenever occasion required. The monks,
it was believed, lived in idleness, keeping vast retinues of servants to
do the work which they ought to have done themselves.[484] They were
accused of sharing dividends by mutual connivance, although they were
forbidden by their rule to possess any private property whatever, and of
wandering about the country in the disguise of laymen in pursuit of
forbidden indulgences.[485] They were bound by their statutes to keep
their houses full, and if their means were enlarged, to increase their
numbers; they were supposed to have allowed their complement to fall to
half, and sometimes to a third, of the original foundation, fraudulently
reserving the enlarged profits to themselves. It was thought, too, that
they had racked their estates; that having a life-interest only, they
had encumbered them with debts, mortgages, and fines; that in some cases
they had wholly alienated lands, of which they had less right to
dispose than a modern rector of his glebe.[486] In the meantime, it was
said that the poor were not fed, that hospitality was neglected, that
the buildings and houses were falling to waste, that fraud and Simony
prevailed among them from the highest to the lowest, that the abbots
sold the presentations to the benefices which were in their gift, or
dishonestly retained the cures of souls in their own hands, careless
whether the duties of the parishes could or could not be discharged; and
that, finally, the vast majority of the monks themselves were ignorant,
self-indulgent, profligate, worthless, dissolute.
[Sidenote: A hundred houses suppressed by Henry V.]
[Sidenote: Visitation of 1489.]
These, in addition to the heavier accusations, were the charges which
the popular voice had for more than a century brought against the
monasteries, which had led Wycliffe to denounce their existence as
intolerable, the House of Commons to petition Henry IV. for the
secularization of their property, and Henry V. to appease the outcry, by
the suppression of more than a hundred, as an ineffectual warning to the
rest.[487] At length, in the year 1489, at the instigation of Cardinal
Morton, then Archbishop of Canterbury, a commission was issued by
Innocent VIII. for a general investigation throughout England into the
behaviour of the regular clergy. The pope said that he had heard, from
persons worthy of credit, that abbots and monks in many places were
systematically faithless to their vows; he conferred on the archbishop a
special power of visitation, and directed him to admonish, to correct,
to punish, as might seem to him to be desirable.[488] On the receipt of
these instructions, Morton addressed the following letter to the
superior of an abbey within a few miles of London,--a peer of the realm,
living in the full glare of notoriety,--a person whose offences, such as
they were, had been committed openly, palpably, and conspicuously in the
face of the world:--
[Sidenote: Archbishop Morton visits the Abbey of St. Alban's.]
"John, by Divine permission, Archbishop of Canterbury, Primate of all
England, Legate of the Apostolic See, to William, Abbot of the Monastery
of St. Alban's, greeting.
"We have received certain letters under lead, the copies whereof we
herewith send you, from our most holy Lord and Father in Christ,
Innocent, by Divine Providence Pope, the eighth of that name. We
therefore, John, the archbishop, the visitor, reformer, inquisitor, and
judge therein mentioned, in reverence for the Apostolic See, have taken
upon ourselves the burden of enforcing the said commission; and have
determined that we will proceed by, and according to, the full force,
tenour, and effect of the same.
"And it has come to our ears, being at once publicly notorious and
brought before us upon the testimony of many witnesses worthy of credit,
that you, the abbot aforementioned, have been of long time noted and
diffamed, and do yet continue so noted, of Simony, of usury, of
dilapidation and waste of the goods, revenues, and possessions of the
said monastery, and of certain other enormous crimes and excesses
hereafter written. In the rule, custody, and administration of the
goods, spiritual and temporal, of the said monastery, you are so remiss,
so negligent, so prodigal, that whereas the said monastery was of old
times founded and endowed by the pious devotion of illustrious princes
of famous memory, heretofore kings of this land, the most noble
progenitors of our most serene Lord and King that now is, in order that
true religion might flourish there, that the name of the Most High, in
whose honour and glory it was instituted, might be duly celebrated
there;
"And whereas, in days heretofore the regular observance of the said rule
was greatly regarded, and hospitality was diligently kept;
[Sidenote: Delinquencies of the abbot and the monks.]
"Nevertheless, for no little time, during which you have presided in the
same monastery, you and certain of your fellow monks and brethren (whose
blood, it is feared, through your neglect, a severe Judge will require at
your hand) have relaxed the measure and form of religious life; you have
laid aside the pleasant yoke of contemplation, and all regular observances;
hospitality, alms, and those other offices of piety which of old time were
exercised and ministered therein have decreased, and by your faults, your
carelessness, your neglect and deed, do daily decrease more and more, and
cease to be regarded--the pious vows of the founders are defrauded of their
just intent; the antient rule of your order is deserted; and not a few of
your fellow monks and brethren, as we most deeply grieve to learn, giving
themselves over to a reprobate mind, laying aside the fear of God, do lead
only a life of lasciviousness--nay, as is horrible to relate, be not afraid
to defile the holy places, even the very churches of God, by infamous
intercourse with nuns.
"You yourself, moreover, among other grave enormities and abominable
crimes whereof you are guilty, and for which you are noted and diffamed,
have, in the first place, admitted a certain married woman, named Elena
Germyn, who has separated herself without just cause from her husband,
and for some time past has lived in adultery with another man, to be a
nun or sister in the house or Priory of Bray, lying, as you pretend,
within your jurisdiction. You have next appointed the same woman to be
prioress of the said house, notwithstanding that her said husband was
living at the time, and is still alive. And finally, Father Thomas
Sudbury, one of your brother monks, publicly, notoriously, and without
interference or punishment from you, has associated, and still
associates, with this woman as an adulterer with his harlot.
"Moreover, divers other of your brethren and fellow monks have resorted,
and do resort, continually to her and other women at the same place, as
to a public brothel or receiving house, and have revived no correction
therefor.
"Nor is Bray the only house into which you have introduced disorder. At
the nunnery of Sapwell, which you also contend to be under your
jurisdiction, you change the prioresses and superiors again and again at
your own will and caprice. Here, as well as at Bray, you depose those
who are good and religious; you promote to the highest dignities the
worthless and the vicious. The duties of the order are cast aside;
virtue is neglected; and by these means so much cost and extravagance
has been caused, that to provide means for your indulgence you have
introduced certain of your brethren to preside in their houses under the
name of guardians, when in fact they are no guardians, but thieves and
notorious villains; and with their help you have caused and permitted
the goods of the same priories to be dispensed, or to speak more truly
to be dissipated, in the above-described corruptions and other enormous
and accursed offences. Those places once religious are rendered and
reputed as it were profane and impious; and by your own and your
creatures' conduct are so impoverished as to be reduced to the verge of
ruin.
"In like manner, also, you have dealt with certain other cells of monks,
which you say are subject to you, even within the monastery of the
glorious proto-martyr, Alban himself. You have dilapidated the common
property; you have made away with the jewels; the copses, the woods, the
underwood, almost all the oaks and other forest trees, to the value of
eight thousand marks and more, you have made to be cut down without
distinction, and they have by you been sold and alienated. The brethren
of the abbey, some of whom, as is reported, are given over to all the
evil things of the world, neglect the service of God altogether. They
live with harlots and mistresses publicly and continuously, within the
precincts of the monastery and without. Some of them, who are covetous
of honour and promotion, and desirous therefore of pleasing your
cupidity, have stolen and made away with the chalices and other jewels
of the church. They have even sacrilegiously extracted the precious
stones from the very shrine of St. Alban; and you have not punished
these men, but have rather knowingly supported and maintained them. If
any of your brethren be living justly and religiously, if any be wise
and virtuous, these you straightway depress and hold in hatred....
You...."
But this overwhelming document need not be transcribed further. It
pursues its way through mire and filth to its most lame and impotent
conclusion. The abbot was not deposed; he was invited merely to
reconsider his conduct, and, if possible, amend it.
Offences similar in kind and scarcely less gross were exposed at
Waltham, at St. Andrew's, Northampton, at Calais, and at other
places.[489] Again, a reprimand was considered to be an adequate
punishment.
[Sidenote: Visitation of archbishop Warham in 1511.]
Evils so deep and so abominable would not yield to languid treatment;
the visitation had been feeble in its execution and limited in extent.
In 1511 a second was attempted by Archbishop Warham.[490] This inquiry
was more partial than the first, yet similar practices were brought to
light: women introduced to religious houses; nuns and abbesses accusing
one another of incontinency; the alms collected in the chapels
squandered by the monks in licentiousness. Once more, no cure was
attempted beyond a paternal admonition.[491] A third effort was made by
Wolsey twelve years later: again exposure followed, and again no remedy
was found.
If the condition of the abbeys had appeared intolerable before
investigation, still less could it be endured when the justice of the
accusations against them had been ascertained. But the church was
unequal to the work of self-reformation. Parliament alone could decide
on the measures which the emergency made necessary; and preparatory to
legislation, the true circumstances and present character of the
religious bodies throughout the whole country were to be ascertained
accurately and completely.
[Sidenote: Issue of a commission for a general visitation.]
[Sidenote: Character of the commissioners.]
[Sidenote: First intention of the crown to reform and not to destroy.]
Accordingly, in the summer of 1535, directly after Sir Thomas More's
execution, Cromwell, now "vicegerent of the king in all his
ecclesiastical jurisdiction within the realm,"[492] issued a commission
for a general visitation of the religious houses, the universities, and
other spiritual corporations. The persons appointed to conduct the
inquiry were Doctors Legh, Leyton, and Ap Rice, ecclesiastical lawyers
in holy orders, with various subordinates. Legh and Leyton, the two
principal commissioners, were young, impetuous men, likely to execute
their work rather thoroughly than delicately; but, to judge by the
surviving evidence, they were as upright and plain-dealing as they were
assuredly able and efficient. It is pretended by some writers that the
inquiry was set on foot with a preconceived purpose of spoliation; that
the duty of the visitors was rather to defame roundly than to report
truly; and that the object of the commission was merely to justify an
act of appropriation which had been already determined. The commission
of Pope Innocent, with the previous inquiries, puts to silence so
gratuitous a supposition; while it is certain that antecedent to the
presentation of the report, an extensive measure of suppression was not
so much as contemplated. The directions to the visitors,[493] the
injunctions they were to carry with them to the various houses, the
private letters to the superiors, which were written by the king and by
Cromwell,[494] show plainly that the first object was to reform and not
to destroy; and it was only when reformation was found to be
conclusively hopeless, that the harder alternative was resolved upon.
The report itself is no longer extant. Bonner was directed by Queen Mary
to destroy all discoverable copies of it, and his work was fatally well
executed. We are able, however, to replace its contents to some extent,
out of the despatches of the commissioners.
[Sidenote: The commissioners issue an inhibition against the bishops.]
Their discretionary powers were unusually large, as appears from the
first act with which the visitors commenced operations. On their own
responsibility, they issued an inhibition against the bishops,
forbidding them to exercise any portion of their jurisdiction while the
visitation was in progress. The sees themselves were to be inspected;
and they desired to make the ground clear before they moved. When the
amazed bishops exclaimed against so unheard-of an innovation, Doctor
Legh justified the order by saying, that it was well to compel the
prelates to know and feel their new position; and in the fact of their
suspension by a royal commission, to "agnize" the king as the source of
episcopal authority.[495]
[Sidenote: And commence work at Oxford, Sept. 12.]
[Sidenote: Condition of the University.]
[Sidenote: Efforts of the heads of houses.]
[Sidenote: Parish clergy idling at the colleges under pretence of
study.]
[Sidenote: The disturbers of order and quiet.]
[Sidenote: Revolution of studies.]
Truly it was an altered world since the bishops sent in their answer to
the complaints of the House of Commons. The visitors, in this haughty
style, having established their powers, began work with the university
of Oxford. Their time was short, for parliament was to meet early in the
spring, when their report was to be submitted to it; and their business
meanwhile was not only to observe and inquire, but any reforms which
were plainly useful and good, they were themselves to execute. They had
no time for hesitation, therefore; and they laid their hands to the
task before them with a promptitude at which we can only wonder. The
heads of houses, as may be supposed, saw little around them which was in
need of reform. A few students of high genius and high purposes had been
introduced into the university, as we have seen, by Wolsey; and these
had been assiduously exiled or imprisoned. All suspected books had been
hunted out. There had been fagot processions in High-street, and
bonfires of New Testaments at Carfax. The daily chapels, we suppose, had
gone forward as usual, and the drowsy lectures on the Schoolmen; while
"towardly young men" who were venturing stealthily into the perilous
heresy of Greek, were eyed askance by the authorities, and taught to
tremble at their temerity. All this we might have looked for; and among
the authorities themselves, also, the world went forward in a very
natural manner. There was comfortable living in the colleges: so
comfortable, that many of the country clergy preferred Oxford and
Cambridge to the monotony of their parishes, and took advantage of a
clause in a late act of parliament, which recognised a residence at
either of the universities as an excuse for absence from tedious duties.
"Divers and many persons," it was found, "beneficed with cure of souls,
and being not apt to study by reason of their age or otherwise, ne never
intending before the making of the said act to travel in study, but
rather minding their own ease and pleasure, colourably to defraud the
same good statute, did daily and commonly resort to the said
universities, where, under pretence of study, they continued and abode,
living dissolutely; nothing profiting themselves in learning, but
consumed the time in idleness and pastimes and insolent pleasures,
giving occasion and evil example thereby to the young men and students
within the universities, and occupying such rooms and commodities as
were instituted for the maintenance and relief of poor scholars."[496]
These persons were not driven away by the heads of houses as the
Christian Brothers had been; they were welcomed rather as pleasant
companions. In comfortable conservatism they had no tendencies to
heresy, but only to a reasonable indulgence of their five bodily senses.
Doubtless, therefore, the visitors found Oxford a pleasant place, and
cruelly they marred the enjoyments of it. Like a sudden storm of rain,
they dropt down into its quiet precincts. Heedless of rights of fellows
and founders' bequests, of sleepy dignities and established indolences,
they re-established long dormant lectures in the colleges. In a few
little days (for so long only they remained) they poured new life into
education. They founded fresh professorships--professorships of Polite
Latin, professorships of Philosophy, Divinity, Canon Law, Natural
Sciences--above all of the dreaded Greek; confiscating funds to support
them. For the old threadbare text-books, some real teaching was swiftly
substituted. The idle residents were noted down, soon to be sent home by
parliament to their benefices, under pain of being compelled, like all
other students, to attend lectures, and, in their proper persons, "keep
sophisms, problems, disputations, and all other exercises of
learning."[497]
[Sidenote: Revolution of discipline.]
[Sidenote: Memorable fate of Duns Scotus.]
The discipline was not neglected: "we have enjoined the religious
students,"[498] Leyton wrote to Cromwell, "that none of them, for no
manner of cause, shall come within any tavern, inn, or alehouse, or any
other house, whatsoever it be, within the town and suburbs. [Each
offender] once so taken, to be sent home to his cloyster. Without doubt,
this act is greatly lamented of all honest women of the town; and
especially of their laundresses, that may not now once enter within the
gates, much less within the chambers, whereunto they were right well
accustomed. I doubt not, but for this thing, only the honest matrons
will sue to you for redress."[499] These were sharp measures; we lose
our breath at their rapidity and violence. The saddest vicissitude was
that which befell the famous Duns--Duns Scotus, the greatest of the
Schoolmen, the constructor of the _memoria technica_ of ignorance, the
ancient text-book of _a priori_ knowledge, established for centuries the
supreme despot in the Oxford lecture-rooms. "We have set Duns in
Bocardo," says Leyton. He was thrown down from his high estate, and from
being lord of the Oxford intellect, was "made the common servant of all
men;" condemned by official sentence to the lowest degradation to which
book can be submitted.[500] Some copies escaped this worst fate; but for
changed uses thenceforward. The second occasion on which the visitors
came to New College, they "found the great Quadrant Court full of the
leaves of Duns, the wind blowing them into every corner; and one Mr.
Greenfield, a gentleman of Buckinghamshire, gathering up part of the
same book leaves, as he said, to make him sewers or blawnsheres, to keep
the deer within his wood, thereby to have the better cry with his
hounds."[501]
To such base uses all things return at last; dust unto dust, when the
life has died out of them, and the living world needs their
companionship no longer.
[Sidenote: Progress of the visitors.]
[Sidenote: Uniformity of result.]
[Sidenote: The _animus improbus_.]
On leaving Oxford, the visitors spread over England, north, south, east,
and west. We trace Legh in rapid progress through Bedfordshire,
Cambridgeshire, Lincoln, Yorkshire, and Northumberland; Leyton through
Middlesex, Kent, Sussex, Hants, Somersetshire, and Devon. They appeared
at monastery after monastery, with prompt, decisive questions; and if
the truth was concealed, with expedients for discovering it, in which
practice soon made them skilful. All but everywhere the result was the
same. At intervals a light breaks through, and symptoms appear of some
efforts after decency; but in the vast majority of the smaller houses,
the previous results were repeated, the popular suspicions were more
than confirmed. Wolsey, when writing to the pope of his intended
reformation, had spoken of the _animus improbus_, and the frightful
symptoms which existed of it. He was accused, in his attempted
impeachment, of having defamed the character of the English clergy. Yet
Wolsey had written no more than the truth, as was too plainly
discovered. I do not know what to say on this matter, or what to leave
unsaid. If I am to relate the suppression of the monasteries, I should
relate also why they were suppressed. If I were to tell the truth, I
should have first to warn all modest eyes to close the book, and read no
further. It will perhaps be sufficient if I introduce a few superficial
stories, suggestive rather than illustrative of the dark matter which
remains in the shade.
[Sidenote: Sion Monastery.]
[Sidenote: The confessional, and the fruits of it.]
I have spoken more than once of the monastery of Sion. It was the scene of
the Nun of Kent's intrigues. It furnished more than one martyr for the
Catholic cause; and the order was Carthusian--one of the strictest in
England. There were two houses attached to the same establishment--one of
monks, another of nuns. The confessors of the women were chosen from the
friars, and they were found to have abused their opportunities in the most
infamous manner. With a hateful mixture of sensuality and superstition, the
offence and the absolution went hand-in-hand. One of these confessors, so
zealous for the pope that he professed himself ready to die for the Roman
cause, was in the habit of using language so filthy to his penitents, that
it was necessary to "sequester him from hearing ladies' confessions." The
nuns petitioned the visitors, on the exposure of the seduction of a sister,
that he and his companion might come to them no more; and the friar was
told that his abominable conduct might be the occasion that "shrift should
be laid down in England."[502]
This is one instance of an evil found fatally prevalent.
[Sidenote: Forged licenses for profligacy.]
Again, the clergy were suspected of obtaining dispensations from their
superiors indulging in a breach of their vows. The laxity of the church
courts in dealing with clerical delinquents had perhaps given rise to
this belief; but the accusation was confirmed by a discovery at Maiden
Bradley, in Wiltshire. The prior of this house had a family of
illegitimate children, whom he brought up and provided for in a very
comfortable manner;[503] and the visitor wrote that "_the pope,
considering his fragility_," had granted him a licence in this little
matter; that he had, in fact, "a good writing _sub plumbo_, to discharge
his conscience." I do not easily believe that _authentic_ dispensations
of such a kind were obtained from Rome, or were obtainable from it; but
of forged dispensations, invented by reverend offenders or fraudulently
issued by the local ecclesiastical authorities, to keep appearances
smooth, there were probably enough, and too many.[504]
[Sidenote: Visit to Langden Abbey, Oct. 22.]
The more ordinary experiences of the commissioners may be described by
Leyton himself, in an account which he wrote of his visit to Langden
Abbey, near Dover. The style is graphic, and the picture of the scene
one of the most complete which remains. The letter is to Cromwell.
"Please it your goodness to understand that on Friday, the 22nd of
October, I rode back with speed to take an inventory of Folkstone, and
from thence I went to Langden. Whereat immediately descending from my
horse, I sent Bartlett, your servant, with all my servants, to
circumspect the abbey, and surely to keep all back-doors and
starting-holes. I myself went alone to the abbot's lodging, joining
upon the fields and wood, even like a cony clapper, full of
starting-holes. [I was] a good space knocking at the abbot's door; _nec
vox nec sensus apparuit_, saving the abbot's little dog that within his
door fast locked bayed and barked. I found a short poleaxe standing
behind the door, and with it I dashed the abbot's door in pieces, _ictu
oculi_, and set one of my men to keep that door; and about the house I
go, with that poleaxe in my hand, _ne forte_, for the abbot is a
dangerous desperate knave, and a hardy. But for a conclusion, his
gentlewoman bestirred her stumps towards her starting-holes; and then
Bartlett, watching the pursuit, took the tender damoisel; and, after I
had examined her, [brought her] to Dover to the mayor, to set her in
some cage or prison for eight days; and I brought holy father abbot to
Canterbury, and here in Christchurch I will leave him in prison. In this
sudden doing _ex tempore_, to circumspect the house, and to search, your
servant John Antony's men marvelled what fellow I was, and so did the
rest of the abbey, for I was unknown there of all men. I found her
apparel in the abbot's coffer. To tell you all this comedy (but for the
abbot a tragedy), it were too long. Now it shall appear to gentlemen of
this country, and other the commons, that ye shall not deprive or visit,
but upon substantial grounds. The rest of all this knavery I shall defer
till my coming unto you, which shall be with as much speed as I can
possible."[505]
[Sidenote: October. Nunnery of Lichfield.]
[Sidenote: Two of the sisterhood found "not barren."]
Towards the close of the year, Leyton went north to join Legh; and
together they visited a nunnery at Lichfield. The religious orders were
bound by oaths similar to those which have recently created difficulty
in Oxford. They were sworn to divulge nothing which might prejudice the
interests of the houses. The superior at Lichfield availed herself of
this plea. When questioned as to the state of the convent, she and the
sisterhood refused to allow that there was any disorder, or any
irregularity, which could give occasion for inquiry. Her assertions were
not implicitly credited; the inspection proceeded, and at length two of
the sisters were discovered to be "not barren"; a priest in one instance
having been the occasion of the misfortune, and a serving-man in the
other. No confession could be obtained either from the offenders
themselves, or from the society. The secret was betrayed by an "old
beldame"; "and when," says Leyton, "I objected against the prioresses,
that if they could not show me a cause reasonable of their concealment,
I must needs, and would, punish them for their manifest perjury,--their
answer was, that they were bound by their religion never to confess the
secret faults done amongst them, but only to a visitor of their own
religion, and to that they were sworn, every one of them, on their first
admission."[506]
[Sidenote: Abbey of Fountains.]
[Sidenote: Theft and sacrilege committed by the abbot.]
A little later the commissioners were at Fountains Abbey; and tourists,
who in their daydreams among those fair ruins are inclined to complain
of the sacrilege which wasted the houses of prayer, may study with
advantage the following account of that house in the year which preceded
its dissolution. The outward beautiful ruin was but the symbol and
consequence of a moral ruin not so beautiful. "The Abbot of Fountains,"
we read in a joint letter of Legh and Leyton, had "greatly dilapidated
his house, [and] wasted the woods, notoriously keeping six women. [He
is] defamed here," they say, "_a toto populo_, one day denying these
articles, with many more, the next day confessing the same, thus
manifestly incurring perjury." Six days before the visitors' access to
his monastery "he committed theft and sacrilege, confessing the same. At
midnight he caused his chaplain to seize the sexton's keys, and took out
a jewel, a cross of gold with stones. One Warren, a goldsmith in the
Chepe, was with him in his chamber at that hour, and there they stole
out a great emerald, with a ruby. The said Warren made the abbot believe
the ruby to be but a garnet, so that for this he paid nothing. For the
emerald he paid but twenty pounds. He sold him also the plate without
weight or ounces; how much the abbot was deceived therein he cannot
tell, for he is a very fool and miserable idiot."[507]
[Sidenote: The visitors instructed to make inventories of the property,
and to bring away the superfluous plate.]
[Sidenote: False returns made by the abbots.]
Under an impression that frauds of this description were becoming
frequent, the government had instructed the commissioners to take
inventories of the plate and jewels; and where they saw occasion for
suspicion, to bring away whatever seemed superfluous, after leaving a
supply sufficient for the services of the house and chapel. The
misdemeanour of the Abbot of Fountains was not the only justification of
these directions. Sometimes the plate was secreted. The Prior of Christ
Church, Canterbury, was accused of having sent in a false return,[508]
keeping back gold and precious stones valued at a thousand pounds.
Information was given by some of the brethren, who professed to fear
that the prior would poison them in revenge.
[Sidenote: Scene at Norton Abbey in Cheshire.]
Occasionally the monks ventured on rougher methods to defend themselves.
Here is a small spark of English life while the investigation was in
progress, lighted by a stray letter from an English gentleman of
Cheshire. The lord chancellor was informed by Sir Piers Dutton, justice
of the peace, that the visitors had been at Norton Abbey. They had
concluded their inspection, had packed up such jewels and plate as they
purposed to remove, and were going away; when, the day being late and
the weather foul, they changed their minds, and resolved to spend the
night where they were. In the evening, "the abbot," says Sir Piers,
"gathered together a great company, to the number of two or three
hundred persons, so that the commissioners were in fear of their lives,
and were fain to take a tower there; and therefrom sent a letter unto
me, ascertaining me what danger they were in, and desiring me to come
and assist them, or they were never likely to come thence. Which letter
came to me about nine of the clock, and about two o'clock on the same
night I came thither with such of my tenants as I had near about me, and
found divers fires made, as well within the gates as without; and the
said abbot had caused an ox to be killed, with other victuals, and
prepared for such of his company as he had there. I used some policy,
and came suddenly upon them. Some of them took to the pools and water,
and it was so dark that I could not find them. Howbeit I took the abbot
and three of his canons, and brought them to the king's castle of
Hatton."[509]
[Sidenote: Monks under 24, and nuns under 21, set free from their vows.]
If, however, the appropriation of the jewels led to occasional
resistance, another duty which the commissioners were to discharge
secured them as often a warm and eager welcome. It was believed that the
monastic institutions had furnished an opportunity, in many quarters,
for the disposal of inconvenient members of families. Children of both
sexes, it was thought, had been forced into abbeys and convents at an
age too young to have allowed them a free choice in the sacrifice of
their lives. To all such, therefore, the doors of their prison house
were thrown open. On the day of visitation, when the brethren, or the
sisterhood, were assembled, the visitors informed everywhere such monks
as were under twenty-four, and such nuns as were under twenty-one, that
they might go where they pleased. To those among them who preferred to
return to the world, a secular dress was given, and forty shillings in
money, and they were restored to the full privileges of the laity.
[Sidenote: The monks at Fordham petition for release.]
The opportunity so justly offered was passionately embraced. It was
attended only with this misfortune, that the line was arbitrarily drawn,
and many poor wretches who found themselves condemned by the accident of
a few more days or months of life to perpetual imprisonment, made
piteous entreaties for an extension of the terms of freedom. At Fordham,
in Cambridgeshire, Dr. Legh wrote to Cromwell, "the religious persons
kneeling on their knees, instantly with humble petition desire of God
and the king and you, to be dismissed from their religion, saying they
live in it contrary to God's law and their consciences; trusting that
the king, of his gracious goodness, and you, will set them at liberty
out of their bondage, which they are not able to endure, but should
fall into desperation, or else run away." "It were a deed of charity,"
he continued, fresh from the scene where he had witnessed the full
misery of their condition, "that they might live in that kind of living
which might be most to the glory of God, the quietness of their
consciences, and most to the commonwealth, _whosoever hath informed you
to the contrary_."[510] Similar expressions of sympathy are frequent in
the visitors' letters. Sometimes the poor monks sued directly to the
vicar-general, and Cromwell must have received many petitions as
strange, as helpless, and as graphic, as this which follows. The writer
was a certain Brother Beerley, a Benedictine monk of Pershore, in
Worcestershire. It is amusing to find him addressing the vicar-general
as his "most reverend lord in God." I preserve the spelling, which,
however, will with some difficulty be found intelligible.
[Sidenote: Letter of a monk of Pershore to Cromwell.]
"We do nothing seyrch," says this good brother, "for the doctryn of
Chryst, but all fowloys owr owne sensyaly and plesure. Also most gracyus
Lord, there is a secrett thynge in my conchons whych doth move mee to go
owt of the relygyon, an yt were never so perfytt, whych no man may know
but my gostly fader; the wych I supposs yf a man mothe guge [is] yn
other yong persons as in me selfe. But Chryst saye _nolite judicare et
non judicabimini_, therefore y wyll guge my nowne conschons fyrst--the
wych fault ye shall know of me heyrafter more largyously--and many other
fowll vycys done amonckst relygyus men--not relygyus men, as y thynck
they owt not to be cald, but dyssemblars wyth God.
"Now, most gracyus Lord and most worthyst vycytar that ever cam amonckes
us, help me owt of thys vayne relygyon, and macke me your servant
handmayd and beydman, and save my sowlle, wych shold be lost yf ye helpe
yt not--the wych ye may save wyth one word speking--and mayck me wych am
nowe nawtt to cum unto grace and goodness.
"Now y wyll ynstrux your Grace sumwatt of relygyus men, and how the
Kyng's Gracis commandment is keyp yn puttyng forth of bockys the
Beyschatt of Rome's userpt pour. Monckes drynke an bowll after collatyon
tyll ten or twelve of the clok, and cum to matyns as dronck as myss--and
sum at cardys, sum at dycys, and at tabulles; sum cum to mattyns
begenying at the mydes, and sum wen yt ys almost dun, and wold not cum
there so only for boddly punyshment, nothyng for Goddis sayck. Also
abbettes, monckes, prests, dun lyttyl or nothyng to put owtte of bockys
the Beyschatt of Rome's name--for y myself do know yn dyvers bockys
where ys name ys, and hys userpt powor upon us[511]."
In reply to these and similar evidences of the state of the monasteries,
it will be easy to say, that in the best ages there were monks impatient
of their vows, and abbots negligent of their duties; that human weakness
and human wickedness may throw a stain over the noblest institutions;
that nothing is proved by collecting instances which may be merely
exceptions, and that no evidence is more fallacious than that which
rests upon isolated facts.
It is true; and the difficulty is felt as keenly by the accuser who
brings forward charges which it is discreditable to have urged, if they
cannot be substantiated, as by those who would avail themselves of the
easy opening to evade the weight of the indictment. I have to say only,
that if the extracts which I have made lead persons disposed to differ
with me to examine the documents which are extant upon the subject, they
will learn what I have concealed as well as what I have alleged; and I
believe that, if they begin the inquiry (as I began it myself) with
believing that the religious orders had been over-hardly judged, they
will close it with but one desire--that the subject shall never more be
mentioned.
[Sidenote: New regulations enforced by the commissioners.]
Leaving, then, the moral condition in which the visitors found these
houses, we will now turn to the regulations which they were directed to
enforce for the future. When the investigation at each of the houses had
been completed, when the young monks and nuns had been dismissed, the
accounts audited, the property examined, and the necessary inquiries had
been made into the manners and habits of the establishment, the
remaining fraternity were then assembled in the chapter-house, and the
commissioners delivered to them their closing directions. No differences
were made between the orders. The same language was used everywhere. The
statute of supremacy was first touched upon; and the injunction was
repeated for the detailed observance of it. Certain broad rules of moral
obedience were then laid down, to which all "religious" men without
exception were expected to submit.[512]
[Sidenote: The monks confined within walls.]
No monks, thenceforward, were to leave the precincts of the monastery to
which they belonged, under any pretext; they were to confine themselves
within the walls, to the house, the gardens, and the grounds.
[Sidenote: No women to be admitted within the precincts.]
[Sidenote: The brethren to dine together in hall, gravely and decently.]
No women were to come within the walls, without licence from the king or
the visitor; and, to prevent all unpermitted ingress or egress, private
doors and posterns were to be walled up. There was, in future, to be but
one entrance only, by the great foregate; and this was to be diligently
watched by a porter. The "brethren" were to take their meals decently in
the common hall. They were not to clamour, as they had been in the habit
of doing, "for any certain, usual, or accustomed portion of meat;" but
were to be content with what was set before them, giving thanks to God.
To ensure gravity and decency, one of the brethren, at every refection,
was to read aloud a chapter of the Old or New Testament.
The abbot was "to keep an honest and hospitable table;" and an almoner
was to be appointed in each house, to collect the broken meats, and to
distribute them among the deserving poor.
[Sidenote: Valiant, mighty, and idle beggars no longer to be supported.]
Special care was to be taken in this last article, and "_by no means
should such alms be given to valiant, mighty, and idle beggars and
vagabonds, such as commonly use to resort to such places; which rather
as drove beasts and mychers should be driven away and compelled to
labour, than in their idleness and lewdness be cherished and maintained,
to the great hindrance and damage of the commonweal_."
All other alms and distributions, either prescribed by the statutes of
the foundations, or established by the customs of the abbeys, were to be
made and given as largely as at any past time.
The abbots were to make no waste of the woods or lands. They were to
keep their accounts with an annual audit, faithfully and truly.
No fairs nor markets were any more to be held within the precincts.[513]
Every monk was to have a separate bed, and not to have any child or boy
lying with him, or otherwise haunting unto him.
The "brethren" were to occupy themselves in daily reading or other
honest and laudable exercises. Especially there was to be every day one
general lesson in Holy Scripture, at which every member of the house was
bound to be present.
[Sidenote: Some portion of the rule which the monks have professed shall
every day be read to them.]
Finally, that they might all understand the meaning of their position in
the world, and the intention, which they had so miserably forgotten, of
the foundations to which they belonged, the abbot, prior, or president,
was every day to explain in English some of the portion of the rule
which they had professed; "applying the same always to the doctrine of
Christ." The language of the injunctions is either Cromwell's or the
king's; and the passage upon this subject is exceedingly beautiful.
"The abbot shall teach them that the said rule, and other their
principles of religion (so far as they be laudable), be taken out of
Holy Scripture: and he shall shew them the places from whence they be
derived: and that their ceremonies and other observances be none other
things than as the first letters or principles, and certain
introductions to true Christianity: and that true religion is not
contained in apparel, manner of going, shaven heads, and such other
marks; nor in silence, fasting, uprising in the night, singing, and
such other kind of ceremonies; but in cleanness of mind, pureness of
living, Christ's faith not feigned, and brotherly charity, and true
honouring of God in spirit and verity: and that those abovesaid things
were instituted and begun, that they being first exercised in these, in
process of time might ascend to those as by certain steps--that is to
say, to the chief point and end of religion. And therefore, let them be
exhorted that they do not continually stick and surcease in such
ceremonies and observances, as though they had perfectly fulfilled the
chief and outmost of the whole of true religion; but that when they have
once passed such things, they should endeavour themselves after higher
things, and convert their minds from such external matters to more
inward and deeper considerations, as the law of God and Christian
religion doth teach and shew: and that they assure not themselves of any
reward or commodity by reason of such ceremonies and observances, except
they refer all such to Christ, and for his sake observe them."[514]
Certainly, no government which intended to make the irregularities of an
institution an excuse for destroying it, ever laboured more assiduously
to defeat its own objects. Those who most warmly disapprove of the
treatment of the monasteries have so far no reason to complain; and
except in the one point of the papal supremacy, under which, be it
remembered, the religious orders had luxuriated in corruption, Becket or
Hildebrand would scarcely have done less or more than what had as yet
been attempted by Henry.
[Sidenote: 1536. Parliament meets for its last session.]
[Sidenote: February. Preliminary measures.]
[Sidenote: The commissioners present their report.]
But the time had now arrived when the results of the investigation were
to be submitted to the nation. The parliament--the same old parliament
of 1529, which had commenced the struggle with the bishops--was now
meeting for its last session, to deal with this its greatest and
concluding difficulty. It assembled on the 4th of February, and the
preliminaries of the great question being not yet completed, the Houses
were first occupied with simplifying justice and abolishing the obsolete
privileges of the Northern palatinates.[515] Other minor matters were
also disposed of. Certain questionable people, who were taking advantage
of the confusion of the times to "withhold tythes," were animadverted
upon.[516] The treason law was further extended to comprehend the
forging of the king's sign-manual, signet, and privy seal, "divers light
and evil-disposed persons having of late had the courage to commit such
offences." The scale of fees at the courts of law was fixed by
statute;[517] and felons having protection of sanctuary were no longer
to be permitted to leave the precincts, and return at their pleasure.
When they went abroad, they were to wear badges, declaring who and what
they were; and they were to be within bounds after sunset. In these and
similar regulations the early weeks of the session were consumed. At
length the visitors had finished their work, and the famous _Black Book_
of the monasteries was laid on the table of the House of Commons.
This book, I have said, unhappily no longer exists. Persons however who
read it have left on record emphatic descriptions of its contents; and
the preamble of the act of parliament of which it formed the foundation,
dwells upon its character with much distinctness. I cannot discuss the
insoluble question whether the stories which it contained were true.
History is ill occupied with discussing probabilities on _a priori_
grounds, when the scale of likelihood is graduated by antecedent
prejudice. It is enough that the report was drawn up by men who had the
means of knowing the truth, and who were apparently under no temptation
to misrepresent what they had seen; that the description coincides with
the authentic letters of the visitors; and that the account was
generally accepted as true by the English parliament.
[Sidenote: Two thirds of the monks are living in habits which may not be
described.]
It appeared, then, on this authority, that two-thirds of the monks in
England were living in habits which may not be described. The facts were
related in great detail. The confessions of parties implicated were
produced, signed by their own hands.[518] The vows were not observed.
The lands were wasted, sold, and mortgaged. The foundations were
incomplete. The houses were falling to waste; within and without, the
monastic system was in ruins. In the smaller abbeys especially, where,
from the limitation of numbers, the members were able to connive
securely at each other's misdemeanours, they were saturated with
profligacy, with Simony, with drunkenness.[519] The case against the
monasteries was complete; and there is no occasion either to be
surprised or peculiarly horrified at the discovery. The demoralization
which was exposed was nothing less and nothing more than the condition
into which men of average nature compelled to celibacy, and living as
the exponents of a system which they disbelieved, were certain to fall.
[Sidenote: A great debate in the House.]
There were exceptions. In the great monasteries, or in many of them,
there was decency and honourable management; but when all the
establishments, large and small, had been examined, a third only could
claim to be exempted from the darkest schedule. This was the burden of
the report which was submitted to the legislature. So long as the extent
of the evil was unknown, it could be tolerated; when it had been exposed
to the world, honour and justice alike required a stronger remedy than
an archiepiscopal remonstrance. A "great debate" followed.[520] The
journals of the session are lost, and we cannot replace the various
arguments; but there was not a member of either House who was not
connected, either by personal interest, or by sacred associations, with
one or other of the religious houses; there was not one whose own
experience could not test in some degree the accuracy of the _Black
Book_; and there was no disposition to trifle with institutions which
were the cherished dependencies of the great English families.
[Sidenote: March. Difficulty of arriving at a resolution.]
[Sidenote: Conflicting interests. The representatives of the founders.]
[Sidenote: Divided opinion of the Reformers.]
[Sidenote: Latimer, and Knox after him, desired to preserve and reform.]
[Sidenote: Crammer opposed to ecclesiastical corporations under any
form.]
[Sidenote: Cranmer more right than Latimer, as experience has proved.]
[Sidenote: The instincts of the laity guide them truly.]
The instincts of conservatism, association, sympathy, respect for
ancient bequests, and a sense of the sacredness of property set apart
for holy uses, and guarded by anathemas, all must have been against a
dissolution; yet, so far as we can supply the loss of the journals from
other accounts of the feeling of the time, there seems to have been
neither hope nor desire of preserving the old system--of preserving the
houses, that is, collectively under their existing statutes as
foundations in themselves inviolate. The visitation had been commenced
with a hope that extremities might still be avoided. But all expectation
of this kind vanished before the fatal evidence which had been produced.
The House of Commons had for a century and a half been familiar with the
thought of suppression as a possible necessity. The time was come when,
if not suppression, yet some analogous measure had become imperative.
The smaller establishments, at least, could not and might not continue.
Yet while, so far, there was general agreement, it was no easy matter to
resolve upon a satisfactory remedy. The representatives of the founders
considered that, if houses were suppressed which had been established
out of estates which had belonged to their forefathers, those estates
should revert to the heirs, or at least, that the heirs should recover
them upon moderate terms.[521] In the Reforming party there was
difference of opinion on the legality of secularizing property which had
been given to God. Latimer, and partially Cromwell, inherited the
designs of Wolsey; instead of taking away from the church the lands of
the abbeys, they were desirous of seeing those lands transferred to the
high and true interests of religion. They wished to convert the houses
into places of education, and to reform, wherever possible, the
ecclesiastical bodies themselves.[522] This, too, was the dream, the
"devout imagination," as it was called, of Knox, in Scotland, as it has
been since the dream of many other good men who have not rightly
understood why the moment at which the church was washed clean from its
stains, and came out fresh robed in the wedding-garment of purity,
should have been chosen to strip it of its resources, and depose it from
power and preeminence. Cranmer, on the other hand, less imaginative but
more practical, was reluctant that clerical corporations should be
continued under any pretext--even under the mild form of cathedral
chapters. Cranmer desired to see the secular system of the church made
as efficient as possible; the religious system, in its technical sense,
he believed to have become a nursery of idleness, and believed that no
measures of reform could restore the old tone to institutions which the
world had outgrown.[523] In the present age it will perhaps be
considered that Cranmer's sagacity was more right than Latimer's
enthusiasm, however at the moment men's warmer instincts might seem to
have pleaded for the latter. The subsequent history both of the Scotch
and English church permits the belief that neither would have been
benefited by the possession of larger wealth than was left to them. A
purer doctrine has not corrected those careless and questionable habits
in the management of property which were exposed by the visitors of
1535. Whether the cause of the phenomenon lies in an indifference to the
things of the world, or in the more dubious palliation that successive
incumbents have only a life-interest in their incomes, the experience of
three centuries has proved the singular unfitness of spiritual persons
for the administration of secular trusts; and the friends of the
establishment may be grateful that the judgment of the English laity
ultimately guided them to this conclusion. They were influenced, it is
likely, by a principle which they showed rather in their deeds than in
their words. They would not recognise any longer the distinction on
which the claims of the abbeys were rested. Property given to God, it
was urged, might not be again taken from God, but must remain for ever
in his service. It was replied in substance that God's service was not
divided, but one; that all duties honestly done were religious duties;
that the person of the layman was as sacred as the person of the priest;
and the liturgy of obedience as acceptable as the liturgy of words.
[Sidenote: Necessity of caution.]
[Sidenote: Aversion of English statesmen to sweeping measures.]
Yet if, in the end, men found their way clearly, they moved towards it
with slow steps; and the first resolution at which they arrived embodied
partially the schemes of each of the honest reformers. In touching
institutions with which the feelings of the nation were deeply
connected, prudence and principle alike dictated caution. However
bitterly the people might exclaim against the abbeys while they
continued to stand, their faults, if they were destroyed, would soon be
forgotten. Institutions which had been rooted in the country for so many
centuries, retained a hold too deep to be torn away without wounding a
thousand associations; and a reaction of regret would inevitably follow
among men so conservative as the English, so possessed with reverence
for the old traditions of their fathers. This was to be considered; or
rather the parliament, the crown, and the council felt as the people
felt. Vast as the changes were which had been effected, there had been
as yet no sweeping measures. At each successive step, Henry had never
moved without reluctance. He hated anarchy; he hated change: in the true
spirit of an Englishman, he never surrendered an institution or a
doctrine till every means had been exhausted of retaining it,
consistently with allegiance to truth. The larger monasteries,
therefore, with many of the rest, had yet four years allowed them to
demonstrate the hopelessness of their amendment, the impossibility of
their renovation. The remainder were to reap the consequences of their
iniquities; and the judicial sentence was pronounced at last in a spirit
as rational as ever animated the English legislature.
[Sidenote: Act for the Dissolution of the smaller houses. Forasmuch as
religious persons in the little abbeys are living in manifest sin,]
[Sidenote: To the displeasure of God and the great infamy of the realm;]
[Sidenote: And forasmuch as reformation is seen to be hopeless,]
[Sidenote: It is believed that God will be better pleased to see the
possessions of such houses, now wasted in evil living, applied to better
purpose.]
"Forasmuch," says the preamble of the Act of Dissolution, "as manifest
sin, vicious, carnal, and abominable living, is daily used and committed
among the little and small abbeys, priories, and other religious houses
of monks, canons, and nuns, where the congregation or such religious
persons is under the number of twelve, whereby the governors of such
religious houses and their convents, spoil, consume, destroy, and
utterly waste their churches, monasteries, principal houses, farms, and
granges, to the high displeasure pleasure of Almighty God, the slander
of true religion, and to the great infamy of the King's Highness and of
the realm, if redress should not be had thereof; and albeit that many
continual visitations hath been heretofore had by the space of two
hundred years and more, for an honest and charitable reformation of such
unthrifty, carnal, and abominable living; yet nevertheless, little or
none amendment is hitherto had, but their vicious living shamelessly
increaseth and augmenteth, and by a cursed custom is so rooted and
infested, that a great multitude of the religious persons in such small
houses do rather choose to rove abroad in apostacy than to conform them
to the observation of true religion; so that without such small houses
be utterly suppressed, and the religious persons therein committed to
great and honourable monasteries of religion in this realm, where they
may be compelled to live religiously for the reformation of their lives,
there can be no reformation in this behalf: in consideration hereof the
King's most royal Majesty, being supreme head on earth, under God, of
the Church of England, daily finding and devising the increase,
advancement, and exaltation, of true doctrine and virtue in the said
Church, to the only glory of God, and the total extirping and
destruction of vice and sin; having knowledge that the premises be true,
as well by accounts of his late visitation as by sundry credible
informations; considering also that divers great monasteries of this
realm, wherein, thanks be to God, religion is right well kept and
observed, be destitute of such full number of religious persons as they
ought and may keep; hath thought good that a plain declaration should be
made of the premises, as well to the Lords Spiritual and Temporal as to
other his loving subjects the Commons in this present parliament
assembled. 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 spiritual houses, now spent, and spoiled, and
wasted for increase and maintenance of sin, should be converted to
better uses; and the unthrifty religious persons so spending the same be
compelled to reform their lives."[524]
[Sidenote: The lands of all having less than 200_l._ a-year to be given
to the king. The monks either to be distributed among the larger houses,
or to be pensioned off, to live honestly abroad.]
[Sidenote: The few houses reputed clear may be reestablished by the
Crown.]
The parliament went on to declare, that the lands of all monasteries the
incomes of which were less than two hundred pounds a-year, should be
"given to the king."[525] The monks were either to be distributed in the
great abbeys, "or to be dismissed with a permission," if they desired
it, "to live honestly and virtuously abroad." "Some convenient charity"
was to be allowed them for their living; and the chief head or governor
was to have "such pension as should be commensurate with his degree or
quality."[526] All debts, whether of the houses or of the brothers
individually, were to be carefully paid; and finally, one more clause
was added, sufficient in itself to show the temper in which the
suppression had been resolved upon. The visitors had reported a few of
the smaller abbeys as free from stain. The king was empowered, at his
discretion, to permit them to survive; and under this permission
thirty-two houses were refounded _in perpetuam eleemosynam_.[527]
This is the history of the first suppression of the monasteries under
Henry VIII. We regret the depravity by which it was occasioned; but the
measure itself, in the absence of any preferable alternative, was
bravely and wisely resolved. In the general imperfection of human
things, no measure affecting the interests of large bodies of men was
ever yet devised which has not pressed unequally, and is not in some
respects open to objection. We can but choose the best among many
doubtful courses, when we would be gladly spared, if we might be spared,
from choosing at all.
[Sidenote: The laity only see their way clearly.]
[Sidenote: Unwisdom of the Protestant bishops.]
In this great transaction, it is well to observe that the laity alone
saw their way clearly. The majority of the bishops, writhing under the
inhibitions, looked on in sullen acquiescence, submitting in a forced
conformity, and believing, not without cause, that a tide which flowed
so hotly would before long turn and ebb back again. Among the Reforming
clergy there was neither union nor prudence; and the Protestants, in the
sudden sunshine, were becoming unmanageable and extravagant. On the
bench there were but four prelates who were on the moving
side,--Cranmer, Latimer, Shaxton, and Barlow,[528]--and among these
Cranmer only approved the policy of the government. Shaxton was an
arrogant braggart, and Barlow a feeble enthusiast. Shaxton, who had
flinched from the stake when Bilney was burnt, Shaxton, who
subsequently relapsed under Mary, and became himself a Romanist
persecutor, was now strutting in his new authority, and punishing,
suspending, and inhibiting in behalf of Protestant doctrines which were
not yet tolerated by the law.[529] Barlow had been openly preaching that
purgatory was a delusion; that a layman might be a bishop; that where
two or three, it might be, "cobblers or weavers," "were in company in
the name of God, there was the church of God."[530] Such ill-judged
precipitancy was of darker omen to the Reformation than papal
excommunications or imperial menaces, and would soon be dearly paid for
in fresh martyr-fires. Latimer, too, notwithstanding his clear
perception and gallant heart, looked with bitterness on the confiscation
of establishments which his mind had pictured to him as garrisoned with
a Reforming army, as nurseries of apostles of the truth. Like most
fiery-natured men, he was ill-pleased to see the stream flowing in a
channel other than that which he had marked for it; and the state of his
feeling, and the state of the English world, with all its confused
imaginings, in these months, is described with some distinctness in a
letter written by a London curate to the Mayor of Plymouth, on the 13th
of March, 1535-36, while the bill for the suppression of the abbeys was
in progress through parliament.
[Sidenote: Letter of a London curate to the Mayor of Plymouth.]
[Sidenote: Vision of the Trinity by Dr. Crewkhorne.]
"Right Worshipful,--On the morrow after that Master Hawkins departed
from hence, I, having nothing to do, as an idler went to Lambeth to the
bishop's palace, to see what news; and I took a wherry at Paul's Wharf,
wherein also was already a doctor named Crewkhorne, which was sent for
to come to the Bishop of Canterbury. And he, before the three Bishops of
Canterbury, Worcester, and Salisbury, confessed that he was rapt into
heaven, where he saw the Trinity sitting in a pall or mantle or cope of
blew colour; and from the middle upward they were three bodies, and from
the middle downward were they closed all three into one body. And he
spake with Our Lady, and she took him by the hand, and bade him serve
her as he had done in time past; and bade him preach abroad that she
would be honoured at Ipswich and Willesdon as she hath been in old
times.
[Sidenote: March 13.]
"On Tuesday in Ember week, the Bishop of Rochester[531] came to Crutched
Friars, and inhibited a doctor and three or four more to near
confession; and so in Cardmaker and other places. Then the Bishop of
London's apparitor came and railed on the other bishops, and said that
he, nor no such as he, shall have jurisdiction within his Lord's
precincts. Then was the Bishop of London sent for to make answer; but he
was sick and might not come. On Friday, the clergy sat on it in
Convocation House a long time, and left off till another day; and in the
meantime, all men that have taken loss or wrong at his hands, must bring
in their bills, and shall have recompence.
[Sidenote: Latimer preaches at Paul's Cross, and is disrespectful to
persons in authority.]
"On Sunday last, the Bishop of Worcester preached at Paul's Cross, and
he said that bishops, abbots, priors, parsons, canons, resident priests,
and all, were strong thieves; yea, dukes, lords, and all. The king,
quoth he, made a marvellous good act of parliament, that certain men
should sow every of them two acres of hemp; but it were all too little,
even if so much more, to hang the thieves that be in England. Bishops,
abbots, with such others, should not have so many servants, nor so many
dishes; but to go to their first foundation; and keep hospitality to
feed the needy people--not jolly fellows, with golden chains and velvet
gowns; ne let these not once come into houses of religion for repast.
Let them call knave bishop, knave abbot, knave prior, yet feed none of
them all, nor their horses, nor their dogs. Also, to eat flesh and white
meat in Lent, so it be done without hurting weak consciences, and
without sedition; and likewise on Fridays and all days.
[Sidenote: What Cranmer will do with the unpreaching friars.]
"The Bishop of Canterbury saith that the King's Grace is at full point
for friars and chauntry priests, that they shall away all, saving them
that can preach. Then one said to the bishop, that they had good trust
that they should serve forth their life-times; and he said they should
serve it out at a cart, then, for any other service they should have by
that."
The concluding paragraph of this letter is of still greater interest. It
refers to the famous Vagrant Act, of which I have spoken in the first
chapter of this work.[532]
[Sidenote: The Vagrant Act the first fruits of the suppression.]
"On Saturday in the Ember week, the King's Grace came in among the
burgesses of the parliament, and delivered them a bill, and bade them
look upon it, and weigh it in conscience; for he would not, he said,
have them pass either it or any other thing because his Grace giveth in
the bill; but they to see if it be for the commonweal of his subjects,
and have an eye thitherwards; and on Wednesday next he will be there
again to hear their minds. There shall be a proviso made for the poor
people. The gaols shall be rid; the faulty shall die; and the others
shall be rid by proclamation or by jury, and shall be set at liberty,
and pay no fees. Sturdy beggars and such prisoners as cannot be set at
work, shall be set at work at the king's charge; some at Dover, and some
at places where the water hath broken over the lands. Then, if they fall
to idleness, the idler shall be had before a justice of the peace, and
his fault written. If he be taken idle again in another place, he shall
be known where his dwelling is; and so at the second mention he shall be
burned in the hand; and if he fail the third time, he shall die for
it."[533]
[Sidenote: The penal clauses of this statute.]
The king, as it appeared, had now the means at his disposal to find work
for the unemployed; and the lands bequeathed for the benefit of the poor
were reapplied, under altered forms, to their real intention. The
antithesis which we sometimes hear between the charity of the
monasteries--which relieved poverty for the love of God--and the worldly
harshness of a poor-law, will not endure inspection. The monasteries,
which had been the support of "valiant beggary," had long before
transferred to the nation the maintenance of the impotent and the
deserving; and the resumption of an abused trust was no more than the
natural consequence of their dishonesty. I have already discussed[534]
the penal clauses of this act, and I need not enter again upon that
much-questioned subject. Never, however, at any period, were the
labouring classes in England more generously protected than in the reign
of Henry VIII.; never did any government strain the power of legislation
more resolutely in their favour; and, I suppose, they would not
themselves object to the reenactment of Henry's penalties against
dishonesty, if they might have with them the shelter of Henry's laws.
[Sidenote: Payment of firstfruits remitted to the Universities.]
The session was drawing to an end. At the close of it, the government
gave one more proof of their goodwill toward any portion of the church
establishment which showed signs of being alive. Duns Scotus being
disposed of in Bocardo, the idle residents being driven away, or
compelled to employ themselves, and the professors' lectures having
recovered their energy, there were hopes of good from Oxford and
Cambridge; and the king conceded for them what the pope had never
conceded, when the power rested with the See of Rome: he remitted
formally by statute the tenths and firstfruits, which the colleges had
paid in common with all other church corporations. "His Majesty is
conscious," says the act which was passed on this occasion,[535] that
the enforcing of the payment of firstfruits against the universities,
"may prejudice learning, and cause the students to give their minds to
other things, which might not be acceptable to God;" and "he has
conceived such hearty love and tender affection to the continuance of
honest and virtuous living, and of the arts and sciences (wherewith it
hath pleased Almighty God abundantly to endow his Highness), as that his
Grace cannot compare the same to any law, constitution, or statute; nor
tolerate any such ordinance, though the commodity and benefit thereof
should never so much redound to his own profit or pleasure, if it may
hinder the advancement and setting forth of the lively word of God,
wherewith his people must be fed; or if it may imperil the knowledge of
such other good letters as in Christian realms is expedient to be
learned. He has therefore,--(for that the students should the more
gladly bend their wits to the attaining of learning, and, before all
things, the learning of the wholesome doctrines of Almighty God, and the
three tongues, Latin, Greek, and Hebrew, which be requisite for the
understanding of Scripture,)--thought it convenient" to exonerate the
universities from the payment of firstfruits for ever.
[Sidenote: April 4. Dissolution of the parliament, and summary of its
labours.]
So closed the first great parliament of the Reformation, which was now
dissolved. The Lower House is known to us only as an abstraction. The
debates are lost; and the details of its proceedings are visible only in
faint transient gleams. We have an epitome of two sessions in the Lords'
Journals; but even this partial assistance fails us with the Commons;
and the Lords in this matter were a body of secondary moment. The Lords
had ceased to be the leaders of the English people; they existed as an
ornament rather than a power; and under the direction of the council
they followed as the stream drew them, when individually, if they had so
dared, they would have chosen a far other course. The work was done by
the Commons; by them the first move was made; by them and the king the
campaign was carried through to victory. And this one body of men, dim
as they now seem to us, who assembled on the wreck of the administration
of Wolsey, had commenced and had concluded a revolution which had
reversed the foundations of the State. They found England in dependency
upon a foreign power; they left it a free nation. They found it under
the despotism of a church establishment saturated with disease; and they
had bound the hands of that establishment; they had laid it down under
the knife, and carved away its putrid members; and stripping off its
Nessus robe of splendour and power, they had awakened in it some forced
remembrance of its higher calling. The elements of a far deeper change
were seething; a change, not in the disposition of outward authority,
but in the beliefs and convictions which touched the life of the soul.
This was yet to come; and the work so far was but the initial step or
prelude leading up to the more solemn struggle. Yet where the enemy who
is to be conquered is strong, not in vital force, but in the prestige of
authority, and in the enchanted defences of superstition, those truly
win the battle who strike the first blow, who deprive the idol of its
terrors by daring to defy it.
NOTES:
[480] The English archbishops were embarrassed by the statutes of
provisors in applying for plenary powers to Rome. If they accepted
commissions they accepted them at their peril, and were compelled to
caution in their manner of proceeding.
[481] 27 Hen. VIII. cap. 28. The statute says that many visitations had
been made in the two hundred years preceding the Reformation, but had
failed wholly of success.
[482] To enter "religion" was the technical expression for taking the
vows.
[483] A summary of the condition of the Religious Houses, in the Cotton
Library, Cleopatra, E 4; MS. Letters of the Visitors, in the same
collection; three volumes of the correspondence of Richard Layton with
Cromwell, in the State Paper Office; and the reports of the Visitations
of 1489 and 1511, in the _Registers_ of Archbishops Morton and Warham.
For printed authorities, see _Suppression of the Monasteries_, published
by the Camden Society; Strype's _Memorials_, Vol. I., Appendix; Fuller's
_Ecclesiastical History_; and Wilkins's _Concilia_, Vol. III.
[484] At Tewkesbury, where there was an abbot and thirty-two monks, I
find payment made to a hundred and forty-four servants in livery, who
were wholly engaged in the service of the abbey.--Particulars relating
to the Dissolution of the Monasteries, section 5: Burnet's
_Collectanea_, p. 86.
[485] See the Directions to the Visitors: Burnet's _Collectanea_, p, 74.
[486] See, for instance, _Suppression of the Monasteries_, p. 86.
[487] "In a parliament held at Leicester, in 1414, the priories alien in
England were given to the king; all their possessions to remain to the
king and to his heirs for ever. And these priories were suppressed, to
the number of more than a hundred houses."--Stow's _Chronicle_, p. 345.
[488] The commission is in Morton's _Register_, MS., Lambeth Library.
[489] Morton's _Register_, MS., Lambeth.
[490] Warham's _Register_, MS., Lambeth.
[491] Ibid.
[492] See Injunctions to the Clergy: Foxe, Vol. V. p. 165.
[493] Burnet's _Collectanea_, p. 74.
[494] Strype's _Ecclesiastical Memorials_, Vol. I., Appendix, p. 214.
[495] Legh to Cromwell, Sept. 24th: Strype's _Ecclesiastical Memorials_,
Vol. I., Appendix, p. 216.--_Cotton. MS._ Cleopatra, E 4, fol. 225.
[496] 28 Hen. VIII. cap. 13.
[497] Ibid.
[498] That is, the exhibitioners sent up to the university from the
monasteries.
[499] Strype, _Memorials_, Vol. I. p. 323. Leyton to Cromwell:
_Suppression of the Monasteries_, p. 71, et seq.
[500] Id quod meis oculis vidi, Leyton writes: Ibid.
[501] Leyton to Cromwell: _Suppression of the Monasteries_, p. 71, et
seq.
[502] Leyton to Cromwell: _Suppression of the Monasteries_, p. 48. Let
it not be thought that the papal party were worse than the other. The
second confessor, if anything the more profligate of the two, gave his
services to the king.
[503] The prior is an holy man, and hath but six children; and but one
daughter married yet of the goods of the monastery. His sons be tall
men, waiting upon him.--Leyton to Cromwell: _Suppression of the
Monasteries_, p. 58.
[504] I leave this passage as it stands. The acquittal of the papal
courts of actual complicity becomes, however, increasingly difficult to
me. I discovered among the MSS. in the Rolls House a list of eighteen
clergy and laymen in one diocese who had, or professed to have
dispensations to keep concubines.--Note to Second Edition.
[505] Leyton to Cromwell: _Suppression of the Monasteries_, pp. 75, 76.
[506] Leyton to Cromwell: _Suppression of the Monasteries_, p. 91.
[507] Leyton and Legh to Cromwell: _Suppression of the Monasteries_, p.
100.
[508] Christopher Levyns to Cromwell: Ibid. p. 90. But in this instance
I doubt the truth of the charge.
[509] Sir Piers Dutton to the Lord Chancellor: Ellis, third series. Vol.
III. p. 42.
[510] Legh to Cromwell: _Suppression of the Monasteries_, p. 82. The
last words are curious, as implying that Cromwell, who is always
supposed to have urged upon the king the dissolution of the abbeys and
the marriage of the clergy, at this time inclined the other way.
[511] Richard Beerley to Cromwell: _Suppression of the Monasteries_, p.
132.
[512] These rules must be remembered. The impossibility of enforcing
obedience to them was the cause of the ultimate resolution to break up
the system.
[513] At one time fairs and markets were held in churchyards.--Stat.
Wynton., 13 Ed. I. cap. 6.
[514] A General Injunctions to be given on the King's Highness's behalf,
in all Monasteries and other houses of whatsoever order or religion they
be: Burnet's _Collectanea_, p. 77.
[515] 27 & 28 Hen. VIII. cap. 24
[516] Ibid. cap. 20.
[517] Ibid. cap. 9.
[518] Strype's _Memorials_, Vol. I. p. 387; _Suppression of the
Monasteries_, p. 114.
[519] When their enormities were first read in the parliament house,
they were so great and abominable that there was nothing but "Down with
them!"--Latimer's _Sermons_, p. 123.
[520] 27 Hen. VIII. cap. 28.
[521] Many letters from country gentlemen to this effect are in the
collection made by Sir Henry Ellis.
[522] Latimer at first even objected to monks leaving their profession.
Speaking of racking Scripture, he says, "I myself have been one of them
that hath racked it; and the text, 'He that putteth his hand to the
plough and looketh back,' I have believed and expounded against
religious persons that would forsake their order, and would go out of
their cloyster."--_Sermons_, p. 60. We find him entreating Cromwell to
prevent the suppression of Great Malvern, and begging that it may be
allowed to remain,--"Not in monkery, but any other ways as should seem
good to the King's Majesty, as to maintain teaching, preaching, study,
with praying and good housekeeping."--_Suppression of the Monasteries_,
p. 149. Late in his life, under Edw. VI., he alluded bitterly to the
decay of education, and the misuse of the appropriated abbey
lands.--_Sermons_, p. 291.
[523] "This is my consideration; for having experience, both in times
past and also in our days, how the sect of prebendaries have not only
spent their time in much idleness, and their substance in superfluous
belly cheer, I think it not to be a convenient state or degree to be
maintained and established: considering that commonly a prebendary is
neither a learner nor teacher, but a good viander."--Cranmer to
Cromwell, on the New Foundation at Canterbury: Burnet's _Collectanea_,
p. 498.
[524] 27 Hen. VIII. cap. 28.
[525] Either to be held under the Crown itself for purposes of State, or
to be granted out as fiefs among the nobles and gentlemen of England,
under such conditions as should secure the discharge of those duties
which by the laws were attached to landed tenures.
[526] The monks generally were allowed from four to eight pounds a-year
being the income of an ordinary parish priest. The principals in many
cases had from seventy to eighty pounds a-year.
[527] Burnet's _Collectanea_, p. 80.
[528] In the autumn of 1535 Latimer had been made Bishop of Worcester,
Shaxton of Salisbury, and Barlow of St. David's.
[529] Strype's _Memorials_, Vol. I., Appendix, p. 222; Burnet's
_Collectanea_, p. 92.
[530] Strype's _Memorials_, Vol. I., Appendix, p. 273.
[531] John Hilsey.
[532] 27 Hen. VIII. cap. 25.
[533] Letter of Thomas Dorset to the Mayor of Plymouth: _Suppression of
the Monasteries_, p. 36.
[534] Vol. I. chap. 1.
[535] 27 Hen. VIII. cap. 42.