Reformation

The articles of reform for English monasteries, which Cromwell issued by Henry's orders, do not deserve the blame which has sometimes been cast upon them. Not only the majority of them, but the most important, were taken straight from the Benedictine rule or from the decrees of popes and other orthodox reformers in the past. When, for instance, Cromwell prescribes "that no monk, or brother of this monastery, by any means go forth of the precinct of the same," he is here only summarizing the plain pro hibition in chapter 66 of St. Benedict's rule. When, again, he goes on to command that "women, of what state or condition soever they be, be utterly excluded," this is one of the most time-hon oured and frequently repeated of monastic statutes. The only real novelties in this Cromwellian document are the command to ac cept and preach royal supremacy, and the freedom given to sub ject monks to complain against superiors who neglect or contra vene any of this long list of injunctions.

But Cromwell's visitation of the monasteries is open to far more serious criticism. He chose base agents, who did their work in a base and hasty fashion. It is quite possible that they invented much of their evidence ; yet we have irrefragable orthodox testi mony to the fact that this unfavourable evidence did not violate probability. The spoils of the monasteries were devoted partly to public purposes, but mainly to pay Henry's courtiers : here Eng land compares very unfavourably with Scotland and some of the German states, where the money went in a large measure to edu cation. Yet, apart from all this which must be said against Henry's unjust and wasteful methods, his dissolution of the monasteries is justified by the experience of other European countries, all of whom, sooner or later, have been compelled to do the same. In Italy and Spain, where Protestantism has been virtually non existent ; in France, where Louis XIV. drove out thousands of Huguenots, and the pastor Francois Rochette was condemned and hanged in 1761 for exercising his pastoral office; in Austria, where the small minority of Protestants was either driven into exile or submitted to the same leaden, crushing tyranny which England exercised over the Irish Catholics ; in all these countries there has been a wholesale dissolution and disendowment.

The Tudor monasteries were probably in much the same state as that Oxford which Gibbon describes in his autobiography: and, if the universities of Gibbon's day had been entrenched behind all sorts of extra-legal privileges ; if the students had been as numer ous as the Tudor Religious were ; and if they had successfully re sisted, for at least three centuries, all serious efforts for reform, then we can hardly doubt that they also would have been disestab lished and disendowed before now. The dissolution was one of

many causes for a rising in Lincolnshire, and for the "Pilgrimage of Grace," in the north, where the people were poorest and least educated, and the monasteries would most be missed. Henry here showed himself a perfidious negotiator and took a very cruel vengeance ; but his cause had been supported by many of the higher nobility ; and he had no difficulty in getting the shire levies of the south to march against the northern rebels (1536).

Edward VI.

Under Edward VI. religious changes came far more rapidly. Henry VIII. had ended by not only permitting but enjoining the popular study of the vernacular Bible (1536-38) and, though the permission was limited in 1543 to the higher classes of society, yet even this implied a freedom of private judgment quite incompatible with mediaeval tradition, and gave an enormous, if not intentional, impetus to Protestantism. Poli tics, however, played almost more part in the Reformation under Edward VI. than under his father. Reformers were dominant on the council of regency which Henry had appointed ; Edward's two tutors, Cheke and Cox, had both been reformers. Under the protector Somerset the chantries were suppressed and confiscated; many of them had also been scholastic foundations in a small way; and thus, though mediaeval England had never possessed an educational system in the modern sense, Edward VI. did far more harm to the schools than he atoned for by a few foundations of his own ( '545) Then, in 1548, came deliberate iconoclasm. The party which looked upon images as a hindrance to true religion was stronger now than those who found them edifying, and much regrettable violence was exercised; yet, when we take a wide view, we find that the orthodox Catholic Montalembert is right in pointing out that a larger proportion of mediaeval Gothic architecture has survived in England than in France. Edward VI. introduced an English liturgy and a Protestant confession of faith in 42 articles (since reduced to 39) ; and he permitted marriage to the clergy.

A Return to Rome.

His early death put the Catholic Mary upon the throne, while the country in general was still halting be tween the rival creeds. She communicated immediately with Rome; Cardinal Pole was sent as papal legate; and both houses of parliament answered affirmatively to Mary's question whether they would return to papal obedience. They next rescinded all the anti-papal legislation of Henry VIII. and Edward VI., and re vived the statutes against heresy. Mary was now free for all violent measures.