Chapter XVII
The Norman Period
Norman influence — Lanfranc — Thurstan, Abbot of Glastonbury — St. Osmund of Salisbury — New Sarum — Richard Poore — Sarum Use — Rouen additions to Roman Use — Other MSS.: Leofric Collectar — Rosslyn Missal — Gilbertine Missal — Pontifical of Archbishop Peckham — Pontifical of Edmund Lacy — Breviarium Bothanum — Missale Arbuthnot — Breviarium Aberdonense — Pontifical of Bainbridge, Archbishop of York — Coronation Ceremony of Charles V. of France.
According to the theory which William I. himself maintained, he did not become King of England by virtue of conquest, but as the regular successor of Edward the Confessor by grant, inheritance, and election. Accordingly, there was no sweeping away of English institutions, the English Witan still met, the English law still prevailed, and the English Church still preserved its authority. But the difference lay in the fact that everywhere Normans were placed in possession, power, and authority.
When Edward the Confessor died, Robert of Jumièges had to flee, but Harold allowed the Witan to treat the primacy as vacant and appoint Stigand as Archbishop. One of the first acts, then, of William I. was to have Stigand canonically deposed by the Papal Legate and to replace him by Lanfranc, the Prior of Bec in Normandy. Lanfranc was at this time one of the best European scholars and theologians. He it was who had been called upon by Pope Alexander II. to defend the newly formulated doctrine of Transubstantiation against the attacks of Berengar of Tours.
Thus in the Church the Uses of the Gallic Church in Normandy were introduced, but not always without opposition, for we find that Thurstan, Abbot of Glastonbury, in 1083, compelled the monks there to adopt a style of music invented by William of Fécamp instead of their old Gregorian chant: this gave rise to such an outcry that armed soldiers were brought into the Chapter to drive out these recalcitrant monks, some of whom were slain.1
In 1075 the See of Salisbury or Sarum was founded to take over the old Sees of Ramsbury and Sherborne. This was in accordance with the general policy of the Normans to transfer to the larger towns those Sees where the Bishop had formerly had his ‘stool’ in more remote places.
Three years later, in 1078, St. Osmund became Bishop of Salisbury. He was Earl of Dorset and became Chancellor of England. He drew up a regular constitution, which in time became the model for all the other bishoprics.
About 1220 the bishopric was transferred from Old Sarum to New Sarum, and another cathedral of stone was raised. The Normans were a nation of builders, and in place of the rude Saxon edifices they had throughout the land erected those churches and castles of stone which remain as a lasting record of their stability and symmetry. The New Sarum cathedral was in the later and more polished early English style, and as it has been well said that our cathedrals are an epitomized history of the diocese in stone, so it is not surprising to find that a diocese which could produce such a building was able to produce at the same time a man capable of formulating a more ornate liturgy suitable for the purpose.
We find then Richard Poore, the Dean and afterwards Bishop of Salisbury, developing his Consuetudinary and completing a full code of liturgical rules, and thus definitely fixing the Sarum Use. As we have seen, the effect of the introduction of the Norman personnel into the English Church was to extend the influence of the Use in Normandy, so in the main, this new Sarum Use was based upon that which obtained in the Norman cathedral at Rouen.
When Charlemagne handed over the Sacramentary sent to him by Pope Adrian in 784 to Alcuin, the latter did not feel obliged to adopt it in toto, but in many cases combined it with the existing rites of the Gallic Church, so that the one Use became overlaid upon the other and the prayers became duplicated. This was clearly the case with regard to the Ordination of the Superior Orders, the Roman Consecratory prayers being followed by the Gallican Bidding and Consecratory prayers.
The clearness and fixity of the Sarum Use soon recommended it to other dioceses, and in course of time it was adopted more or less by Wells, Exeter, Lichfield, London St. Paul's (in 1414), and Lincoln. But we must examine the alterations made in the Roman Use after the time of Charlemagne.
The influence of the Gallic Use is shown especially in the introduction of Masses for Festivals of Gallic saints, e.g. St. Leodegarius (St. Ledger, Bishop of Autun, 616), and in Masses of English origin, e.g. Etheldreda, Queen of Northumbria and Abbess of Ely, circa 680, which do not compare favourably with the older forms.
The ‘Quicunque vult’ was in Use in Gaul in 836, and adopted by Cluny on its foundation about 900. This with Commemorations, the office of Our Lady, originated by St. Peter Damiani, and the Office for the Dead (between death and the burial service, which is not in the Pontifical of Egbert, but is in Amalarius, circa 830) were all imported into the Roman Use between 1000 and 1100. Besides these Gallic innovations to the Roman Use, the following additions which became incorporated in the Sarum Use may be noted:
St. Odilio of Cluny inaugurated All Souls' Day in 1049, and it was made general by Innocent III., 1198–1216. Corpus Christi Day was inaugurated by St. Thomas Aquinas in 1246, confirmed by Urban IV. in 1264 and restored by Clement V. in 1311, after the Miracle of Bolsena, to celebrate which the Cathedral at Orvieto, with the most beautiful West Front in Italy, was erected in that mountain town forty miles from Rome. In 1078 Hildebrand, Pope Gregory VII., inaugurated the festivals of the martyr Popes.
Though we read of St. Gelasius, 492, composing hymns ‘in similitudine Ambrosii’, i.e. metrical, we find the Council of Braga in 569 forbidding anything poetical; however, this was reversed by the fourth Council of Toledo in 633, and we find hymns composed between 600 and 700 in the Irish Antiphonary of Bangor, but these and the Benedictine hymns were not introduced into Rome until 1165.
Amalarius is responsible for the inauguration of the Festival of the Transfiguration about 830, and this seems to have been adopted at Rome about the same time as the hymns.
The scholastic definition of the doctrine of Transubstantiation was adopted by Alexander II. about 1070, of which Lanfranc was his chief exponent and defender against Berengar of Tours, and it was formally ratified at the Council of the Lateran in 1099.
About 1150 the custom of the withdrawal of the Chalice from the laity arose in England, partly from an exaggerated fear of spilling it, partly from a materialistic conception of the scholastic definition of Transubstantiation, and possibly partly from the fact that in general wine cannot be said to be an indigenous product of this country. This custom soon spread to the Continent, where it was turned into a regular article of faith, 1300–1400. Under the Lambeth Constitutions in 1281, the Chalice was forbidden to the laity in the ‘smaller churches’, but this was ignored by the Synod of Exeter, 1287.
In 1237 the Council of Durham directed the laity to kneel at the Consecration, and the Elevation of the Host became general. It must be remarked that in the Gallic services the priests always inclined but never knelt or genuflected, and this had been adopted in the Sarum Use.
In 1222 Canon 6 of the Council of Oxford laid down that the whole of the Mass was to be said audibly in a loud voice and not only the Préface.
About 1300 the Sequences which were attached to the Alleluia between the Epistle and Gospel became very numerous.
“There is an abrupt and fanciful wildness in these compositions which may not unfitly be likened to the style of Choral Odes in a Greek play: their language and grammatical construction is exceedingly anomalous, abounding in Greek words Latinized and others of mediaeval coinage; their meaning is very often obscure and the symbolic allusions are exaggerated and difficult to discern. If some kind of rhythm was intended its rules appear to be so uncertain that they can only be reduced to blank verse.”
Two festivals were also introduced in 1080–1087 by Elsin, Abbot of Ramsey, from the Irish Use, viz. the Conception of St. John the Baptist, September 24, and the Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary, December 8.
These seem to have been the chief innovations before or soon after the establishment of the Sarum Use. Apart from the Sarum Use we have not very much documentary evidence of the liturgy during the Norman Period, but mention must be made of:
- (a) The Leofric Collectar. Leofric Lotharingen was brought to England by Edward the Confessor, and became Bishop of Crediton, 1046–1050, and then of Exeter, 1050–1072. As the collects became shortened in 1200–1300, so the Breviary superseded the use of the Collectar as a separate book.
- (b) The Rosslyn Missal. This contains the Mass for the festival of the Trinity, as to which Pope Alexander II., 1061–73, stated that there was no greater reason for its being celebrated than for a festival for the Unity. It is thought to have been written by the Benedictines of St. Werburgh at Chester about 1100 and taken to Scotland by Bruce in 1316.
- (c) The Gilbertine Missal, written 1150–1230 for the Cistercian Priory of St. Katherine at Lincoln, which was founded in 1148: it contains Masses for St. Hugh of Lincoln, canonized in 1220, and St. William of York, who was canonized in 1227. But they were local saints, so that it is not absolutely necessary to exclude the possibility of its having been written before 1227.
- (d) Pontifical of Archbishop Peckham, 1278–84. Some 200 benedictionary prayers, amongst which is a Benediction of the Cross, which is precisely the same as that used at Lyons and at Evereux in Normandy. The marriage ceremony, also, here takes place at the door of the Church and is continued inside the Church by the Bridal Mass alone.
- (e) The Pontifical of Edmund Lacy, Bishop of Hereford, 1417, and Exeter, 1419–55. He was adviser to King Henry V. and became one of his executors. In the form for Consecrating a Church we find, besides the consecration of relics, a form for the consecration of a stole and of the Plenarium or Four Gospels as part of the Rite. Further, in the Consecration of a Bishop, it is mentioned that it was not the custom for the Bishop-elect to offer two torches, two loaves, and two barrels of wine as was the custom of Pope Melchiades in 313. Nowhere else is mention made of the existence of this custom. In the Rite of Ad includendum Anachoritum, it is directed that before Mass the candidate shall lay prostrate in the middle of the choir, or if a layman within the door of the choir, or if a woman in the west part of the church ‘ubi mos est feminis orare’. A requiem Mass is directed ‘tam quam pro mortuo’ as enjoined by the French Ritual, followed by the Mass de Spiritu Sancto, together with Extreme Unction and Commendation.
- (f) The Breviarium Bothanum 1450, Missale Arbuthnot 1491, Breviarium Aberdonense 1509, are all Scottish, and practically follow the Sarum Use. The Scottish Church was made independent of the See of York by Bull of Clement III. in 1188 and Decretal Epistle of Celestine III. in 1191. It has been said that the Sarum Use was introduced into Scotland by King Edward I. in 1279, but that is incorrect, for a Bull of Alexander III. in 1172 directed it to be used at Glasgow: this, however, must have been the Use at Sarum before it was developed under Dean Poore.
- (g) Pontifical of Bainbridge, Archbishop of York, 1508–1514, is chiefly interesting as containing a list of all the Pontificals then believed to be in existence.
- (h) Finally, we have the Coronation Ceremony of King Charles V. of France, which was written the next year as a record rather than for use at the Ceremony: it was written in 1365 and the coronation took place in 1364. It came into the possession of the Duke of Bedford about 1450, and the English Oaths of Allegiance and an English Pontifical were added to it about 1500. It is now one of the Cotton MSS. in the British Museum. One of the Miniatures clearly depicts the King as receiving the Holy Communion in both kinds. It does not appear clear whether he received both kinds in virtue of his kingly office or because as King of France he was ex officio a Canon of St. Martin of Tours, even as the kings of Scotland down to James IV. were Canons of Glasgow.
Chapter XVIII
Conflict with the Papacy
Anselm — Council of Westminster — Lay Investiture — Council of the Lateran — Henry I. — New Bishoprics — Codification of Canon Law — Papal Legates — Constitutions of Clarendon — Becket — Benefit of Clergy — Stephen Langton, right of election of bishop — John — Fealty to Pope — Magna Carta — Avarice of the Papacy — Annates — Edward I. — Parliament — Convocations — Bull ‘Clericis laicos’ — Captivity of Avignon — Great Schism — Statute of Mortmain — Circumspecte Agatis — Statute of Provisors — Praemunire — Wicliffe — Lollards — English Bible — Council of Constance — Martin V. — Cardinal Beaufort — Archbishop Chichele — Summary.
It is not, prima facie, obvious what connection there is between the ecclesiastical history for the 500 years which elapsed between the Conquest and the Reformation and the formation of the Liturgy which superseded that of Sarum. But without some knowledge of the inter-relationship of the Crown, the Papacy, the Clergy, and the laity, the cause and import of the Reformation cannot be properly apprehended.
The ‘Consuetudines’ of William I. have already been noted in Chapter XVI.; it was in reliance on these that William II. based his quarrel with Anselm, Archbishop of Canterbury. William II. regretted the appointment of Anselm, who was Abbot of Bec in Normandy, like his predecessor, Lanfranc, had been. Now at that time, there were two rival Popes, Clement III. and Urban II. Normandy, including Bec, of which Anselm was still Abbot, had decided in favour of Urban II., but William II., as King of England, had not yet given any official recognition to either. In order to obtain his pall as Archbishop, Anselm had to apply to the Pope, and naturally he applied to Urban II., so directly Anselm applied for permission to go to Rome to obtain his pall from Urban II., William accused him of treason, but finding that he had gone too far, he sent an embassy to Rome, and agreed to recognize Urban, who had by now obtained the support of most of Europe; this was in 1095. Two years later, in 1097, in accordance with his feudal duties, Anselm had to supply a contingent of soldiery for a war against Wales, when William expressed a rage, either real or assumed, against ‘that awful draft’, a matter not unknown in later days. William charged Anselm with a gross breach of feudal duty, and claimed that he should answer for it in the King's Court, but Anselm appealed to Rome, and eventually was given permission to go there.
Urban II., whilst taking care not to give any formal decision in his favour on this question of feudal dues, showed him marked attention and invited him to attend a Council at the Lateran in 1099, when excommunication was pronounced against all prelates who accepted investiture from a layman. Now it had been the custom in England for every bishop to receive his staff and ring, the emblems of his office, from the King. Anselm's presence, so adroitly managed by Urban II., bore fruit in the next reign of Henry I.
At the commencement of his reign, no one did more than Henry I. to assist Anselm in holding his Council of Westminster in 1102 for promoting ecclesiastical reforms, of which celibacy of the clergy was first, though in practice this continued to be disregarded. The question of lay investiture then came up, and Anselm could not go back on the Council of the Lateran at which he had been present and in which he had taken part. For four years the controversy raged between the Crown and the Papacy, which ended in a victory for the latter. Henry I. had to give up the custom of the Crown to invest bishops with the staff and ring, and content himself with an oath of homage to himself, which was the acknowledgement of feudal allegiance. This was in 1115, seven years before the ‘compromise of Worms’ in 1122 reached between Calixtus II. and Emperor Henry V. to much the same effect. However, Henry insisted that though the Bishops were elected canonically, the election should be in his Court, that the clergy should elect his candidate. Cf. congé d'élire to Dean and Chapter to elect a bishop. Further, that though archbishops might hold councils, they should only deal with matters mentioned in the Royal letters of business, and finally though Papal jurisdiction was not excluded, yet no Papal Legate should enter the kingdom without Royal licence.
During the next fifty years ecclesiastical life was peaceable and progressive, and during that period the new bishoprics of Llandaff in 1107, Ely in 1109, St. David's in 1115 and Carlisle in 1133, were created. It was about this time that the ecclesiastical law was codified under Ivo of Chartres1 and Gratian. However, Honorius II. and Innocent II. sought to increase their authority in England by appointing legates who claimed to take precedence over the Metropolitan Archbishop of Canterbury. To avoid them having to be subject to one of their own Suffragans, who might happen to be appointed legate, it became the custom after the time of Stephen Langton in 1205 for the Archbishops of Canterbury to apply for a legatine commission at the same time as they applied for their pall on their appointment. The Archbishops of York, after 1352, were likewise made legates. In this way, the constitutional question ceased to exist, but it was always open to the Papacy to claim that every exercise of metropolitan functions over the rest of the episcopacy was indeed an exercise of the legatine functions, which the Archbishop clearly held of the Pope.
Henry II., after the turmoils of the reign of Stephen, sought to impose a regular administration not only of the civil law but of ecclesiastical, and to co-ordinate the two he promulgated the Constitutions of Clarendon in 1164, which brought the administration of the Church more clearly under the Crown, except with regard to strictly ecclesiastical affairs. Becket the Archbishop first gave his assent and then withdrew it and was forced to flee the kingdom. He complained to Pope Alexander III. and Louis VII. of France, but at their suggestion he retired to the monastery of Pontigny. Henry then caused his son to be crowned by the Archbishop of York, but finding Becket more dangerous in exile, in 1170 came to terms with him.
However, on his return, Becket proceeded to excommunicate those barons who had been opposed to him,2 and it was this that led to the outburst from the king which brought about Becket's assassination. The resulting revulsion of opinion forced Henry II. to do public penance, and the Constitutions had to be practically withdrawn.
No further check was placed on appeals to Rome than the right of the King to stop Papal Letters from being introduced into the country and to prevent his subjects leaving the country without his consent.
Finally, in 1176, Henry II. agreed that no tonsured person should be tried or sentenced by a civil court on a criminal charge, except on a charge against the forest law. Bishops, however, were ready to give the tonsure to any who could read and write, so that what originally was devised as a means to escape the tyranny of the Crown, at a time when to be accused was practically tantamount to being condemned, became in time to be but an abuse, whereby miscreants sought to escape the penalties of their crimes.
We have seen the arrangement made by Henry I., that though the cathedral chapters should have the right of election, such election should take place under the control of the King, so that there should be no doubt of the success of the King's nominee: previous to the Conquest, such elections had been made by the King and Witan, and then by the King alone, according to some professed acquiescence on the part of the Great Council. Now, on the death in 1205 of Walter, Archbishop of Canterbury, a faction of the monastery of Christ Church, Canterbury, appointed their sub-prior Reginald, without the control of the King, and sent him off to Rome to get the pall, whilst the remainder proceeded to elect de Grey, the Bishop of Norwich, on the nomination of the King in the usual way. They then sent some of their number to Rome to explain to Pope Innocent III. what had happened.
The Pope, therefore, set aside both the elections, and ordered this deputation to elect Cardinal Stephen Langton, an English friend of the Pope himself, which they purported to do, and the Pope proceeded himself to consecrate him in 1207, thereby hoping to establish a claim to control the election of the English primacy. King John refused to accept Langton, and the Pope replied by putting the kingdom under an interdict. This, however, did not disturb John, who sequestrated the whole of the ecclesiastical revenues. To what extent the interdict was to be enforced was a very moot point, so that the reply of Innocent III. to the English bishops is of great interest. It is as follows:
“Innocent the bishop, etc., to the Bishops of London, Ely and Worcester greeting and apostolic blessing. We reply to your enquiries that whereas by reason of the interdict new chrism cannot be consecrated on Maundy Thursday, old must be used in the baptism of infants, and if necessity demand, oil must be mixed by hand of bishop or else priest with the chrism that it fail not. And although the viaticum seem to be meet on the repentance of the dying, yet if it cannot be had, we who read it believe that the principle holds good in this case ‘believe and thou hast eaten’ when actual need and not contempt for religion excludes the sacrament and the actual need is expected soon to cease. Let neither gospel nor church hours be observed in the accustomed place nor any other though people assemble in the same. Let religious men whose monasteries people have been wont to visit for the sake of prayer admit pilgrims inside the church for prayer not by the greater door, but by a more secret place. Let church doors remain shut save at the chief festival of the church when the parishioners and others may be admitted for prayer into the church with open doors. Let Baptism be celebrated in the usual manner with old chrism and oil inside the church with shut doors, no lay person being admitted save the God-parents; and if need demand new oil must be mixed. Penance is to be inflicted as well on the whole as on the sick; for in the midst of life we are in death. Those who have confessed to a suit or have been convicted of some crime are to be sent to the bishop or his penitentiary, and if need be are to be forced to this by church censure. Priests may say their own hours and prayers in private. Priests may on Sunday bless water in the churchyard and sprinkle it; and can make and distribute the bread when blessed and announce feasts and fasts and preach a sermon to the people. A woman after child-birth may come to church and perform her purification outside the church walls. Priests shall visit the sick and hear confessions and let them perform the commendation of souls in the accustomed manner, but they shall not follow the corpse of the dead because they will not have church burial. Priests shall on the Day of Passion place the cross outside the church without ceremony so that the parishioners may adore it with the customary devotion.”
John, however, in 1213, under threat of an invasion from France, gave way, and in order to secure the assistance of the Pope consented to receive Langton, and swore fealty to the Pope for his kingdom, and promised him tribute. Henry II. had given a good form of administration of the law, which, however, had consisted of nought but the king's will. Langton sought to obtain good law which should be superior to the sole will of the Crown; and, obtaining the assistance of the barons, forced John in 1215 to sign the Magna Carta.
But Innocent III. now came to John's aid and annulled the Charter and suspended Langton; the controversy was not carried on for long, for both the King and the Pope died the next year. The new Pope Honorius III. recognized accomplished facts, and during the Minority of Henry III., the Charter was re-enforced, and Stephen Langton was allowed to exercise in co-operation with Pembroke and Hubert de Burgh a wise governance. The Magna Carta was thus obtained, but the kingdom became a fealty of the Papacy, and the tribute promised by John was not finally repudiated until 1366.
Henry III. declared himself of age in 1226, and in 1229 Gregory IX. succeeded Honorius III. At this time the Papacy became involved in its long struggle with the wonder of the world, Emperor Frederic II., a poet, philosopher, freethinker, and warrior, more concerned with the learning which he acquired from the Saracens in Sicily than with his northern dominions.
Gregory IX. and Innocent IV. could conceive of no better use of their feudal and spiritual rights over England than to enforce its aid of the church by providing the sinews of war. Thus began the great spoliation of the Church in England in which the Crown shared.
In 1226 Honorius had demanded the revenues of two prebends of each cathedral; in 1229 Gregory IX. claimed a tenth of all movables not only of the clergy but of the laity; in 1239 this was raised to one-fifth of the movables of the clergy.
In 1246 Innocent IV. asked for one-third of the revenues for three years from all resident incumbents, and one-half from all non-residents. In 1253 he granted the King a third of all ecclesiastical tithes for three years, which was continued for another two years by Alexander IV. Further, Gregory IX. in 1231 forbade the English Bishops to appoint to any benefices until some of his nominees had been provided for, and in 1240 he required the Bishops of Lincoln and Salisbury to find benefices for 300 foreigners. In 1256 Alexander IV. claimed ‘Annates’ or first-fruits, being the first year's revenue, from all newly-appointed bishops and incumbents of benefices. But it must be noted that about this period the monasteries, apart from having acquired about one-third of the tithe, owned nearly one-third of the land of England.
Edward I. included bishops and mitred abbots as representatives in his Parliament of 1272, and in 1283 he established under Archbishop Peckham the Convocations of Canterbury and York, and gave to them the sole right of taxing the clergy.
Boniface VIII., more to display his own authority than to relieve the clergy, in 1296 issued his bull Clericis laicos which forbade temporal sovereigns to tax their clergy and the clergy to pay taxes to their sovereigns. When the clergy in England accordingly refused to grant him an aid for an expedition in Flanders, Edward I. outlawed them as a whole. Finally the matter was settled by Edward I. granting a confirmation of Charters in 1297 and vesting the taxation in the hands of Parliament. Boniface VIII. died in 1303, and for seventy years the Popes were prisoners at Avignon, where they became but little more than appanages of the French Court. Following this, the great schism arose, when for forty years there were rival Popes. Their moral power died with the captivity at Avignon, and after their rehabilitation, by the Council of Constance in 1417, they were only regarded as heads of a great religious organization and rulers of an important temporal state; but their great position as supreme judges of faith and morals had passed away.
Indeed, no thought was given to the character of those who were elected Popes with regard to their fitness to be judges over individuals, much less over nations; the advantage of their temporal possessions was regarded as their sole care.
The result of this decline of the Papacy is shown by the attitude of Parliament. In 1279 the statute ‘De Religiosis’, or Statute of Mortmain, 7 Edward I. was passed to protect the rights of the feudal lords over land which, by becoming the property of religious corporations, ceased to yield ‘reliefs’, which were payable on a succession to an inheritance. This was followed by the Statute ‘Circumspecte Agatis’ in 1283, 13 Edward I., which confined the ecclesiastical jurisdiction to matters which were of a distinctly religious nature.
Likewise, in 1301, the position of Pope Boniface VIII. in the adjudication of the claims to the throne of Scotland was defined by Parliament definitely as that of arbitrator and not as feudal lord of England.
Under Edward III., on the decline of the Papacy, we find first the Statute of Provisors in 1351, 25 Edward III. c. 4, against the obtaining of a benefice from the Pope in derogation of the rights of the patrons, followed in 1353 by the Statute of Praemunire, 27 Edward III. c. 1, which rendered those who sued in foreign courts matters cognisable in the King's Courts subject to outlawry. This was re-enacted in 1365 with special reference to the Papal Court, and in 1366, Parliament finally repudiated the annual tribute payable to the Pope agreed to by King John, which, in point of fact, had been in arrear for many years.
With regard to the Lollards, Wicliffe regarded worldly position, political power, and temporal wealth to be incompatible with clerical office, but, unlike St. Francis of Assisi, he vindicated his position by attacking those who held a different theory. He thus became a convenient tool for those of the Barons who were desirous of wresting the offices of State from the hands of the Ecclesiastics. Later he sought to emphasize his repudiation of the Pope by denying the technical definition of the doctrine of transubstantiation, basing his objection entirely on the technical use of the philosophical terms, ‘substance and accidents’, in the official definition. For this he was convicted as a heretic in 1382, which overthrew his influence at Oxford. As he was no longer dangerous, he was allowed to spend the rest of his life in peace at his rectory of Lutterworth. This he did, occupying his time in translating the Vulgate into English. Those portions of the Bible which were used in the Church Services had been frequently translated into English since the time of Bede, but this was the first translation of the whole Bible. (It may be noted, however, that Pope Alexander VII. in 1661 issued a Bull against the translation of the Mass into French, and in Spain to this day the qui pridie or anamnesis is not translated.) But the Lollards who sought to put into practice Wicliffe's academic arguments soon found themselves aiming at the overthrow of Society in general, not only the Church in particular.
“Against men who wish to subvert the whole of Society instead of improving it, Society has always been quick to protect itself and has not unfrequently used the first weapon which came to hand. It was easy to proceed against them as heretics, but it was difficult to attack them as seditious or traitorous as long as they did not take up arms.”
So Acts of Parliament were passed, which struck at men's political action through their religious opinions, such as De Comburendo Heretico in 1401, 2 Henry IV. c. 15, and ‘The Long and Bloody Bill against the Lollards’ in 1406, which were supplemented by the ‘Merciless Statute against the Lollards’, 2 Henry V. c. 17, in 1414, after the attempted rebellion under Oldcastle.
In 1414 there were present at the Council of Constance the Bishops of Salisbury, Bath, and Hereford. The new Pope Martin V. demanded the repeal of the Statutes of Provisors and Praemunire, but Parliament refused to do so.
To punish Archbishop Chichele, the founder of All Souls, Oxford, Henry Beaufort (an uncle of Henry VI.), Bishop of Winchester, his suffragan, was appointed Cardinal and Papal Legate in 1427; however, in 1431 Martin V. died.
During the Wars of the Roses neither party could afford to antagonize the Papacy, so these Statutes became a dead letter. The clergy continued to pay a tenth of ecclesiastical revenue and also Annates to the Pope. Martin V.'s successors were content to receive the money, and no further steps were taken with regard to the repeal of these Statutes. Thus it may be seen that originally the Papacy supported the clergy, when the law was no more than the will of the Crown, and then entered into an agreement with the Crown to share in the undoubted wealth of the clergy. Finally, as the laity became stronger in Parliament, it sought to support the clergy from their encroachments, and during the Wars of the Roses the Papacy became in fact as powerful politically in England as it ever had been, though to a large extent it had lost its spiritual force. Likewise, originally it had been much concerned with its right of appeals, which had sustained the Papal lawyers, but by the time that the Statute of Provisors was passed the source of revenue to the Papal Court had shifted from the matter of Appeals to that of Dispensations; this was because a mass of Papal enactments had come into force, which could be rendered nugatory by those who showed their zeal in religious affairs by contributing to a sufficient extent to the central funds in the hands of the Papacy.
It must at the same time be remembered that the anti-papal legislation of the Middle Ages was not directed against the spiritual headship claimed by the Pope, but rather against administrative incidents of the Papal Court.
Chapter XIX
Monastic Institutions
Monastic institutions no direct effect on Liturgy — Benedictines — Cluny — William of Warren — Cistercians — Stephen Harding — St. Bruno — Carthusians — Black or Austin Canons — Praemonstratensian, Sempringham or Gilbertine Canons — Knights Templars — Knights Hospitallers of St. John of Jerusalem — Special privileges — The ‘Comperta’ — Friars, Franciscans, Dominicans — Schoolmen, Duns Scotus, St. Thomas Aquinas.
As far as the services of the various monastic institutions are concerned, our English Liturgy has nothing whatever to do with them, being derived entirely from the ‘secular’ services. But in considering the different factors of the Reformation with its effect upon the Liturgy, there would be a considerable hiatus was not the position and history of the monasteries taken into consideration.
It has been noted that Wilfred and Benet Biscop were the first to introduce the Benedictine rule, about 680 (founded by St. Benedict of Nursia in Umbria at Monte Cassino, near Rome, 480–543), how Odo and St. Dunstan about 950 reintroduced the rule after the Danish invasions, and how Lanfranc by a constitution in 1075 compelled all English monasteries to adopt it. In 910 the monastery of Cluny in Burgundy was founded as a reformed Benedictine Order, and about 1100–1200 it had no less than 2000 daughter houses, and its abbot became second in influence to the Pope. This Order was introduced into England by William of Warren in 1077, but owing to the priors, who were heads of the houses, being dependent on the foreign House of Cluny, they never flourished in England to any great extent.
In 1098 Stephen Harding, an Englishman, founded the Cistercian Order at Citeaux in Burgundy, of a much plainer type even to meanness; they established themselves chiefly in the forests and on the edge of the moors and later, through encouraging the breeding of sheep, became great wool traders with Flanders. The celebrated houses of Tintern and Fountains belonged to this Order.
About this time St. Bruno founded his monastery at Chartreuse, but the silence imposed upon its members and its austerities did not appeal to the English, and only about ten or twelve Charterhouses were founded in England, though the Priory of Witham, founded by Henry II., produced St. Hugh of Lincoln, circa 1200.
About 1100 William of Corbeil, Archbishop of Canterbury under Henry I., introduced the order of the Canons Regular of St. Augustine, usually known as the Black Canons or Austin Canons; they were very popular, and had offshoots called Praemonstratensian Canons, and also the Sempringham or Gilbertine Canons, with some 175 houses in all at the time of the Dissolution of Monasteries.
In consequence of the Crusades, the Military Orders of Knights Templars, who were founded to defend the Holy Sepulchre, together with the Knights Hospitallers of St. John of Jerusalem, to protect the sick and dying crusaders, sprang up in most large towns between 1200 and 1300. All these monasteries, which in the course of time, through pious benefactions and prudent management, came to own nearly a third of the land of the country, were always very provincial in their outlook. For them their monasteries and their glorification were their chief objects in life; for them their Mother House was in every way superior to all others. For their houses they were always seeking special privileges, and they were ardent in their support of the Papacy, from whom such privileges were most easily obtained. A constant struggle, which had its echoes at the Council of Trent, arose out of their endeavour to escape from the right of visitation by the local Bishops. The Cistercians, the Austin Canons, and the Military Orders obtained exemption for the whole of their Orders from such episcopal visitations, but the Benedictine Houses had to obtain exemption individually.
With regard to the scandals which were alleged to attach to them in the time of Henry VIII., it must be conceded that on the whole their mode of life compared very favourably with similar houses on the Continent. The celebrated ‘Comperta’ now in the British Museum, is no part of the Black Book destroyed in Mary's reign, and only purports to deal with 120 houses in York and 24 in Norwich, and it is not certain that it was ever submitted by the King to Parliament; moreover, it contains the names of many of the greater houses in which, on the suppression of the smaller monasteries, Parliament only three years before had found that ‘religion is right well kept and preserved’.
Of the other ‘regular’ clergy in England, we find the two great Orders of Friars. St. Francis of Assisi, 1181–1226, founded the Grey Friars or Franciscans, who were vowed to poverty and were not encouraged in intellectual pursuits or speculations on matters of faith; they laboured mostly amongst the country folk. But later they procured permission to hold property and took to study, and between 1300–1400 they captured Oxford and produced famous divines like Roger Bacon, William of Occam, and Duns Scotus, and ventured to dispute with their great rivals, the Dominicans of Paris.
St. Dominic, 1170–1221, likewise founded an order of Friars, called Dominicans, whose special task was that of teaching the faith. They were ‘the Watch Dogs of the Lord’, Domini canes (all their buildings bear dogs as their emblem); they usually settled in the towns and centres of learning like the universities, and addressed themselves to the educated. They were not vowed to poverty, but appear to have adopted it from the Franciscans. However, later they became a wealthy Order. At first these Friars lived on alms, but as their Order became wealthy these were no longer forthcoming, and the consequence was that the less important members took to begging. From this it was but a short step for them to use their religious cloak as a cover for simple extortion and rascality, by which they imposed themselves upon the ignorant and pious. To such degradation did they descend, that they can best be compared with the habitual tramp of modern days, ekeing out a roving existence by mendacity, cunning, and vice.
The waves of changing thought, the disputes of the schoolmen, and the Renaissance with its growth of learning of the Greek classics derived from the culture of the Saracens and Moors, had but little effect in England upon the secular clergy, but were fully reflected in the leading circles of the Monks and Friars, who through ignorance or degeneracy too often attacked from entirely the wrong position, striving to settle disputes by inveighing against increase of learning.
Though not exactly germane to our subject, it is worth while recalling that John Duns Scotus, 1265–1308, who had been a Franciscan Friar at Merton College, Oxford, went to Paris, and took his degree of Doctor of Divinity there, and upheld the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception in 200 answers against the Dominicans. From him arose amongst the schoolmen the school of thought called the Cordeliers, who were in opposition to the Jacobins or Thomists, who were the followers of St. Thomas Aquinas, and from whom they differed on this and other doctrines, such as that of Grace. Scotus' chief work was his Commentaries on Aristotle, and that of Aquinas his Summa Theologiae, in which “he broke from the prevailing Platonic tradition and boldly accepted the principles of Aristotle, but instead of permitting them to establish a pagan philosophy, he built up a vast and closely inter-related system which included within it the whole teaching of the Church”.