§ 34. The natural regrets for the destruction of the monasteries and the spoiling of their goods, have, when fairly examined, a considerable amount of compensating good to be set over against them. Indeed, had the suppression been effected by fairer means, and with due regard to existing interests, allowing the generation then in possession to die out in their old homes, and merely prohibiting new professions; had the measure been saved from the slanders, scandals, trickery, and cruelty which in fact disgraced it, those who have regard for the highest interests of the Church and nation would have been able to rejoice over it with an almost unmixed feeling of gratitude and thankfulness. NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. (A) THE ACT FOR THE SUPPRESSION OF THE SMALLER MONASTERIES. 27 HENRY VIII. c. 28. The preamble runs thus:-"Forasmuch as manifest sin, vicious, carnal, and abominable living, is daily used and committed amongst the little and small abbeys, priories, and other religious houses of monks, canons, and nuns, where the congregation of such religious persons is under the number of twelve persons, whereby the governors of such religious houses and their convent, spoil, destroy, consume, and utterly waste as well their churches, monasteries, priories, principal houses, farms, granges, lands, tenements, and hereditaments, as the ornaments of their churches, and their goods and cattle, to the high displeasure of Almighty God, slander of good religion, and to the great infamy of the king's highness and the realm, if redress should not be had thereof; and albeit that rany continual visitations have been heretofore had by the space of two hundred years and more, yet nevertheless little or none amendment is hitherto had, but their vicious living shamelessly increaseth and augmenteth, and by a cursed custom so rooted and infested that a great multitude of the religious persons in such small houses do rather chose to rove abroad in apostasy than to conform them to the observation of good religion; so that, without such small houses be utterly suppressed, and the religious persons therein committed to great and honourable monasteries of religion within this realm, where they may be compelled to live religiously to the reformation of their lives, there can else be no reformation in this behalf. In consideration whereof, 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 honour of God and the total extirping and destruction of vice and sin, having knowledge that the premises be true as well by the accounts of the late visitation, as by sundry credible informations, considering also that divers and great solemn monasteries of this realm, wherein, thanks be to God, religion is right well kept and observed, be destitute of such full numbers of religious persons as they ought and may keep, hath thought good that a plain declaration 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 religious houses now being spent, spoiled, and wasted for the increase and maintenance of sin, should be used and converted to better uses, and the unthrifty religious so spending the same be compelled to reform their lives; and thereupon most humbly desire the king's highness that it may be enacted by the authority of this present Parliament that his Majesty shall have and enjoy to him and his heirs for ever, all and singular such monasteries, priories, and other religious houses of monks, canons, and nuns, of what kinds or diversities of habits, rules, or orders, they be called and named, which have not in lands and tenements, rents, tithes, portions, and other hereditaments above the clear yearly value of two hundred pounds; and in like manner shall have and enjoy all the sites and circuits of such religious houses; and all and singular, the buildings, lands, rights, etc., appertaining or belonging to every such monastery, priory, or religious house, in as large and ample manner as the abbots, priors, abbesses, prioresses, or other governors of such monasteries, priories, and other religious houses now have or ought to have the same in the right of their houses; and that also his highness shall have to him and his heirs, all and singular such monasteries, abbeys, and priories, which at any time within one year after the making of this Act, hath been given and granted to his Majesty by any abbot, prior, abbess, or prioress, under the convent seals, or that otherwise hath been suppressed or dissolved; and all and singular the manors, lands, etc., to the same monasteries appertaining or belonging; to have and to hold, all and singular the premises, with all their rights, profits, jurisdictions, and commodities unto the king's Majesty, and to his heirs and assigns for ever, to do and use therewith his and their own wills, to the pleasure of Almighty God, and the honour and profit of this realin." Then follow clauses to reserve the rights of those who held lands on leases from the abbeys, for the payment of a yearly rent (excepting grants or leases, that had been made within the year preceding), and giving to the king all the jewels and ornaments, cattle, and debts, belonging to the monasteries on the 1st day of March 1536, whatever they may be, or to whomsoever sold (excepting the cattle sold or killed for the necessary support of the house). A clause excusing the heads of any of these monasteries appointed since Jan. 1, 1535, from the payment of first fruits. A clause fixing the value of the houses according to the valuation in the king's exchequer. A clause, saying that," in consideration of the promises, his Majesty is pleased and contented of his most excellent charity, to provide to every chief head and governo of every such religious house, during their lives, such yearly pensions and benefices, as for their degrees and qualities shall be reasonable and convenient. Wherein his highness will have most tender respect to such of the said chief governors as well and truly conserve and keep the goods and ornaments of their houses to the use of his Majesty without spoil, waste, and embezzling of the same; and also his Majesty will ordain and provide that the convents of such religious houses shall have their capacities, if they will, to live honestly and virtuously abroad, and some convenient charity disposed to them towards their living, or else shall be committed to such honourable great monasteries of this realm, wherein good religion is observed, as shall be limited by his highness, there to live religiously during their lives." A clause follows making it im perative that the great convents shall receive such persons; others as to the payments of tithes and debts due from the convent estates. Another empowering the king by his letters patent, to refound any of the monasteries dissolved by this Act. Another reserving the rights or claims of founders or patrons, which shall be a charge on the property, into whosesoever hands it may pass. Another, enacting that whosoever shall become possessor of the abbey lands, "shall be bounden by authority of this Act, under the penalties hereafter ensuing, to keep or cause to be kept, an honest continual house and household, in the same site or precinct, and to occupy yearly as much of the same domains in plowing and tillage of husbandry," as was before, under the penalty for each month of offending of £6:13:4, which offence may be enquired into and determined, and the fine inflicted by the justices of the peace. (B) CONTEMPORARY SKETCH OF THE DISSOLUTION OF A MONASTERY. "Which thing was not a little grief to the convent, and all the servants of the house, departing one from another, and especially such as with their conscience could not break their profession, for it would have made an heart of flint to have melted and wept to have seen the breaking up of the house and their sorrowful departing; and the sudden spoil that fell the same day of their departure from the house. And every person had everything good cheap, except the poor monks, friars, and nuns, that had no money to bestow of anything. Such persons, as afterwards bought their corn and hay, and such like, found all the doors either open or the locks and shackles plucked away, or the door itself taken away, and went in and took what they found, filched it away. Some took the service-books that were in the church, and laid them upon their wain coppes, to piece the same; some took windows and hid them in the hay, and likewise they did of many other things; for some pulled forth the iron hooks out of the walls, that bought none, when the yeomen and gentlemen of the county had bought the timber of the church. It would have pitied any heart to see what tearing up of the leads there was, and plucking up of boards, and throwing down of the spars; and when the lead was torn off and cast down into the church, and the tombs of the church all broken (for in most abbeys were diverse noble men and women, yea, and in some abbeys, kings, whose tombs were regarded no more than the tombs of other inferior persons, for to what end should they stand, when the church over them was not spared for their cause), and all things of price either spoiled, carped away, or defaced to the uttermost. The persons that cast the lead into fodders, plucked up all the seats in the choir, wherein the monks sat when they said service, which were like to the seats in minsters, and burned them, and melted the lead therewithal . . every person bent himself to filch and spoil what he could, yea, even such persons were content to spoil them that seemed not two days before to allow their religion, and do great reverence at their matins, masses, and other service, and all their doings, which is a strange thing to say that they could one day think it the House of God, and the next the house of the devil." 1 1 Ellis, Orig. Letters (Series 3). 33, 34. CHAPTER IX. THE REFORMATION PERIOD. 1536-1539. § 1. Inconsistency of the king as to the reforming movement. § 2. Latimer's sermon to the Convocation. § 3. Crumwell and his deputy take precedence in Convocation. § 4. King's divorce from Anne Boleyn ratified. § 5. Convocation complains of ribald opinions. § 6. The "Ten Articles.' § 7. Gradual nature of the advance of the Reformation movement. § 8. Convocation regulates holidays. § 9. Proceedings in Germany relating to the proposed General Council. § 10. Henry declines union with the Germans. § 11. Convocation condemns the proposed Council. § 12. The king's protest against it. § 13. Injunctions to the clergy. § 14. The rebellions. §15. The articles of the northern clergy. § 16. King's letter to the bishops. § 17. Meeting of the bishops to discuss doctrine. § 18. A committee appointed to draw up a book of doctrine. § 19. The "Institution of a Christian Man." § 20. Matthew's bible. § 21. Crumwell's injunctions of 1538. § 22. Process against Thomas Becket. § 23. Excommunication published against the king. § 24. Negotiations in England with the German reformers. § 25. They come to nothing. § 26. Proclamation against the married clergy. § 27. Case of Nicholson or Lambert. § 28. Proclamation to uphold ceremonies. § 29. Crumwell endeavours to support the Injunctions. § 30. The king angered by the "Ribalds." § 1. THE two things connected with the reforming movement for which the king chiefly cared, were the inordinate assertion of the supremacy of the Crown in ecclesiastical matters, and the obtaining for his own use the goods and lands of the monasteries. In the first of these he was gratified to his utmost aspirations by Gardiner, Sampson, Bonner, and the divines of the "old learning"; to the second he was helped by the vigorous and unscrupulous action of Crumwell and the party of the “ new learning." Both parties may be said to have bid high for the king's support, and to have gone considerable lengths in their rivalry to obtain it, and Henry himself was under the influence sometimes of one sometimes of the other of the two parties, which may be considered as represented by Gardiner on one side, and Crumwell on the other. To this conflict of influences is due the inconsistency which appears in the king's attitude towards the Reformation movement. At one time he seems embarked in it with all zeal and earnestness, at another he appears as the vigorous upholder of the old system, the severe punisher of any departure from it. During the time that he was reaping the rich harvest of monastic plunder the king went almost entirely with the new party, and the Reformation advanced; when this was over the German alliances proved distasteful, Crumwell fell, and the party of reaction triumphed. In designating the period comprised between the end of the Reformation Parliament and the meeting of the Parliament of 1539 the Reformation period, while the remainder of the reign of Henry is treated as the Reactionary period, it must not be assumed that any more is intended than the predominant aspect of the two portions of time. In both, many events which do not correspond with this predominant aspect will occur. § 2. On June 9, 1536, the new Convocation of the province of Canterbury met. The archbishop was altogether in favour of the party of the new learning, and he accordingly selected as preacher the most prominent of the reforming divines-Hugh Latimer now become bishop of Worcester. Latimer's sermon was preached on the text, "For the children of this world are in their generation wiser than the children of light” (Luke xvi. 8). The preacher drew a picture of his brethren even more severe than that which had been sketched by Dean Colet on a like occasion, twenty-four years before. He accused the bishops and clergy of being unfaithful stewards of their Master's interests, of coining new money, of mingling and debasing the good old coin, of causing "works lucrative, will-works, men's fancies, to reign, while Christian works, necessary works, fruitful works, be trodden under foot," of preaching seldom and hindering those who would preach. For any good that had been done hitherto the king was more to be thanked than the clergy, who, in their late Convocation had done nothing at all. But were there not many reforms needed? The corruption and bribery of the church courts, the profane and licentious manner of spending the holy days. The gross superstitions of image-worship and pilgrimages. The using all services, even such as matrimony and baptism, in a tongue not understood by the people. The sale of masses. All these things cried aloud for reformation. "Come," said the preacher, “my brethren, leave the love of your profit, study for the glory and profit of Christ. Feed tenderly, with all diligence, the flock of Christ. Preach truly the word of God. Walk in the light, and so shall ye be called the children of light in this world, and shine in the world to come bright as the sun." 1 § 3. When, after this severe lecture, the Convocation met for its second session, another mortification awaited the clergy. Dr. Petre, a civilian, deputed by Crumwell to represent him, appeared 1 Latimer's Works (ed. Watkins), i. 31-54. |