Roman Canon, which enacted the separate treatment of clerks and laymen, was introduced into England about the end of the reign of Stephen (Stubbs). It ran as follows: The ROMAN CANON. "Clerks shall not be unjustly seized nor detained from the ordinary, upon pain of excommunication and interdict. And their accusers also shall be excommunicated. Clerks vagi et ignoti being seized, shall be demanded by the ordinary, who, if they be amerced, shall not levy it, and so in all cases which are merely spiritual." It was upon this point that the great dispute between Henry II. and Thomas Becket mainly arose. The Constitutions of Clarendon enact that "clerks accused of any matter, when summoned by the king's justice, shall come into his court, and there plead, so that the king's justice may see whether the matter be to be inquired into in his court or in the Church court. If it belongs to the Church court, the king's justice shall send into the Church court to see what the sentence is, and if the clerk shall be convict, the Church ought not to defend him further." It is probable that this arrangement was never carried out, and that practically all clerks, that is persons in any degree of orders, and the servants of such, were completely free of the temporal courts, until the mischief growing to a great head, it was modified by various statutes. Statutes on this head.-By 52 Henry III. c. 27, those who bailed persons who afterwards pleaded benefit of clergy were liberated from their obligations, it having before been the practice to amerce them, just as if the bailee had fled. This statute was in aid of the privilege. So also was 3 Edward I. c. 2, which enacted that "a clerk taken for felony shall be delivered to the ordinary, accordto the privilege of holy Church: and 9 Edward II. cap. 16, which enacted that "if a clerk makes a confession of any crime before a temporal judge, yet, if demanded by the ordinary, he must be given up." 18 Edward III. enacts that if a clerk "holding him to his clergy" will not answer, he must be given to the spiritual court. 25 Edward III. c. 4, seems to be the first limitation; this enacts that if clerks convict of treason or felony touching other persons than the king, shall plead clergy, they must be given up. 25 Edward III. c. 5, enacts that clerks demanded by the ordinary shall not be sent to gaol on other matters, but shall be tried on the point at issue. The privilege of "benefit of clergy" was fully recognised by 10 Richard II. c. 1. 4 Henry IV. c. 2, confirms 25 Edward III., ordains that clergy, even when indicted for open violence or highway robbery, shall be delivered to the ordi naries without delay. As women could not plead "clergy," Acts were passed to ordain that they should not suffer death for matters wherein men might plead clergy. The first real limitation to this astounding privilege was made by 4 Henry VII. cap. 10. This statute recites that persons upon trust of the privilege of the Church have been more bold to commit murder, robbery, theft, etc. It is therefore ordained that they shall have the privilege of clergy but once if within minor orders, and that they shall be marked M if murderers, T if thieves, but if the culprit pleads higher orders, he shall be obliged to prove his orders, and if not clergy not to be allowed. By the 12 Henry VII. c. 7, those in minor orders were not allowed clergy for murdering or attempting to murder the king. 4 Henry VIII. c. 7, extends this to all murderers, sacrilegious persons, robbers with violence. These, except in higher orders, were not allowed clergy. This statute excited great opposition. It was only temporary. 23 Henry VIII. c. 1, enacts that persons in holy orders, convict for petit treason, murder, or felony, and delivered to the ordinaries, shall not be admitted to purgation, but kept continually in prison (except they find two sufficient sureties). The ordinary may degrade a clerk conviet, and send him to the justices of King's Bench, who then may proceed against him as if he were no clerk. 28 Henry VIII. c. 1, abjurers not to have clergy, even if within holy orders. 1 Edward VI. c. 12, Lords of Parliament to be allowed to plead clergy, 'even if they cannot read." 1 Edward VI. cap. 13, instead of making purgation, the clerk convict may be kept for a certain period as a slave. It was not till quite modern times that the last vestiges of the privilege of "benefit of clergy" passed away. (C) HISTORY OF THE ROYAL SUPREMACY. WILLIAM I. undoubtedly exercised a supremacy "in all causes and over all persons, ecclesiastical as well as civil." He would have no pope acknowleged within his dominions without his con mitted to the Bishop of Rome, nor the laws of this realm by him frustrated and defeated at his will, to the perpetual destruction of the king and his sovereignty." Then followed the famous statute of Præmunire (16 Richard II.), which is interpreted by Sir E. Coke to make penal all applications to a foreign jurisdiction either in the court of Rome or elsewhere (i.e. to the ecclesiastical courts of the realm), in prejudice of the king's crown and dignity. This enabled the judges very much to control the ecclesiastical jurisdiction, and to assert the king's prerogative over spiritual causes; so that whenever there was a danger of the spiritual and temporal jurisdictions coming into collision, the former had to give way. Long before the Reformation the excommunications of the pope in this realm were illegal (Brooke's Privy Council Judgments, Introduction). The king might take away jurisdiction from an ordinary, or grant it to him. It is abundantly clear, therefore, that the royal supremacy in causes ecclesiastical is an ancient right of the crown, that it was not a new claim set up by Henry VIII., but that "the principles which nourished and sustained it were firmly planted in the roots of the English constitution, which, itself slowly built up, was but a reflex of the character and genius of the people." sent; no bulls were allowed to have force CHAPTER III THE GROWTH OF REFORMING OPINIONS IN ENGLAND. 1511-1527. § 9. § 1. Punishments for heresy at the beginning of the reign of Henry. § 2. Luther's commencement. § 3. Spread of his opinions in England. § 4. Wolsey constrained to act against the Lutherans. § 5. The burning of books at St. Paul's. § 6. The king writes against Luther. § 7. Reception of his book in Rome. § 8. Character of the king's book. Luther's reply, and answer to it. § 10. Sir T. More's work. § 11. Bishop Fisher's. § 12. Wolsey obtains leave to suppress monasteries for foundation of his colleges. § 13. Cardinal College at Oxford. §14. The Cambridge men introduced there. § 15. William Tyndale. § 16. Publication of the New Testament in English. § 17. The bishops seize the copies of it to burn them. § 18. The books are spread abroad in the country. 19. Trial and sentence of Thomas Bilney. § 20. Reforming views had gained a footing in England. § 1. IT has been already said that there was in England at the commencement of the sixteenth century a large number of persons, mostly of low rank and little education, who held religious views derived from Wyclyffist and Lollard sources. These persons, for the most part allowed to remain in obscurity, became nevertheless from time to time the objects of severe measures on the part of the bishops. On the 2d May 1511 six men and four women, most of them of Tenterden, were brought before Archbishop Warham, at his manor of Knoll, and caused to abjure certain opinions as to the necessity of the sacraments, the power of the priest, the efficacy of pilgrimages, the worshipping of saints, etc. They were also charged to inform against any who held opinions similar to those which they had abjured. On the 15th and 19th May others were made to abjure at Lambeth. These facts are noted in Warham's Register, and in the same register similar entries occur for June, July, August, September. These poor people, having abjured, were made to do penance by carrying a faggot in a procession, and by having a faggot in flames marked on their clothes in such manner that it could be conspicuously seen, which mark had to be carried for the remainder of their lives. This was the case with those who were willing to abjure and recant. But when any of the accused ventured to defend his opinions and refused to abjure, he was, after being dealt with by argument and threats, if he continued obstinate, handed over to the secular arm for punishment Also, if any who had once abjured had relapsed into heresy, the same was done. For one or other of these reasons William Carder of Tenterden, Agnes Greville, Robert Harrison, John Brown, and Edward Walker, were at this time handed over to the secular power, the archbishop's writ running thus :-" Our holy mother, the Church, having nothing further that she can do in this matter, we leave the forementioned heretics, and every one of them, to your royal highness and your secular council." 2 Whether all or any of these sentences were carried out is somewhat doubtful. But if they were not, the poor wretches who were condemned by them must have lain perhaps for many years in a miserable prison, expecting their dreadful doom-a punishment far worse than the immediate execution would have been. It is probable that, previously to any reforming opinions having been broached on the Continent, other bishops besides the primate had taken severe measures against the so-called heretics of the Lollard type. The Register of Fitz-James, Bishop of London, has entries similar to those quoted from Warham;3 and Nix, Bishop of Norwich, and Longland, Bishop of Lincoln, are said to have taken severe measures against sectaries.* § 2. This partial and occasional punishment of heresy indicates no alarm on the part of the Church authorities, and no special vigour or obtrusiveness on the part of the sectaries. But a great change was speedily to be observed. In 1517 Martin Luther published at Wittenberg his ninety-five Theses, condemning the most flagrant abuses of the papal system, and immediately a controversy began, in which Luther and his assistants, Melanchthon and Carlostadt, defended by scriptural arguments the position they had taken up. Some of their writings were not long in finding their way into England, were translated, and eagerly read. King Henry was as much interested in these new and startling writings as any of his subjects. As early as 1518 he appears to have formed the design of writing against Luther. attention of many being drawn to the reformer's opinions, now so boldly broached, every fresh work on the subject was sought for and welcomed. Luther's great work on the Babylonish Captivity The 1 For the form of handing over a relapsed person to the secular arm, see Notes and Illustrations, extract from Longland's Register. 2 Burnet, Hist. Reformation, i. 22 (ed. 1841), from Archbishop Warham's Register. None of these proceedings are mentioned by Foxe. He. has recorded the burning of John Brown, but appears to have put it under 3 Ib. a wrong year. By Foxe; but, so far as Longland is concerned, there is no justification for the statement from his Register. Calendar of State Papers of Henry VIII., vol. ii., Nos. 4257, 4266. of the Church was published in 1520. Early in 1521 it had found its way into England. § 3. On March 8 (1521) Archbishop Warham wrote to Wolsey, stating that he had received letters from Oxford, containing news which he was very sorry to hear. "For I am informed that divers of that university be infected with the heresies of Luther, and others of that sort, having among them a great number of books of the said perverse doctrine, which were forbidden by your grace's authority, as Legate de Latere of the See Apostolic, and also by me, as Chancellor of the said University, to be had, kept, or read by any person of the same, except such as were licensed to have them, to impugn and convince the erroneous opinions contained in them." He earnestly entreats Wolsey's interference, desiring at the same time that the university incur as little "infamy" as possible; for it were great pity, he writes, "that through the lewdness of one or two cankered members who have induced no small number of young uncircumspect fools to give ear unto them, the whole university should incur the scandal of so heinous a crime." He wishes the "captains of the said erroneous doctrines to be punished, to the fearful example of all other," but that the inquiry into the conduct of the less guilty should take place at Oxford rather than in London. Both the universities, he fears, are contaminated. Oxford had for many years been void of all heresies, and Cambridge had boasted that she was never defiled, but now seems to be the original cause of the fall of Oxford. He would have the cardinal make a list of all writers who are "fautors " of the Lutheran opinions, that their writings may be proscribed.1 On April 3 (1521) Warham wrote to the cardinal another letter, in which, thanking him for a handsome jewel sent to the shrine of St. Thomas, he again reminds him of the "most accursed writings of Luther." 2 About the same time John Longland, Bishop of Lincoln, the king's Confessor, attacks the cardinal on the same subject. He writes to say that a certain monk of St. Edmund's had preached at Oxford a most seditious sermon, railing against cardinals and bishops, maintaining certain opinions of Luther, and comforting erroneous persons in their opinions, saying, "Be not afraid of them that kill the body."3 Again he writes to Wolsey, beseeching him, for "the honour of God," to remember the "infecte persons" at Oxford, and to take some order and punishment with them; "for if sharpness be not now in this land, many one shall be right bold to do ill." He thinks there are many heretics at Oxford, as appears by the libels set up at night on church 2 Tb. 245. 3 Ib. 251. 1 Ellis, Original Letters (Third Series), 1. 239. |