16 



ENGLAND. (ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY.) 



rows of celibacy or poverty were at first required of 

 the priests inhabiting these monasteries; but they 

 were soon after recommended, and enjoined by suc- 

 cessive popes and metropolitans. The monasteries 

 being richly endowed, drew such numbers to enjoy in 

 them a lay, comfortable life, tliat they soon became 

 intolerable evils to the commonalty. The impious 

 doctrine, broached about the end of the 7th century, 

 that as soon as any person put on the liabit of a 

 monk, all the sins ot their youth were forgiven, 

 induced many kings, queens, and nobles, to flock 

 thither : it, in fact, proved the ruin of the Anglo- 

 Saxons, and paved the way for the conquests of the 

 Danes ; who, finding the monasteries so well stored 

 with booty and provisions, plundered and destroyed 

 them so effectually, that, before the end of the 9th 

 century, there was hardly a monastery or monk left 

 in England. But the converted Danes soon fell into 

 the same error as their predecessors ; and the rage 

 for monasteries broke out anew in the 10th century. 

 An excessive veneration for relics became preva- 

 lent in England about the 7th century. Few Chris- 

 tians thought themselves safe from diabolical machi- 

 nations, unless they carried a relic of some saint 

 jibout with them : and no church could be dedicated 

 without a decent quantity of this sacred trumpery. 

 Kings, princes, and wealthy prelates, purchased 

 pieces of the cross, or whole legs and arms of 

 apostles ; while others were obliged to be contented 

 with the toes and fingers of inferior saints. Agelnoth, 

 archbishop of Canterbury, when he was at Rome, 

 A. D. 1021, purchased from the pope an arm of St 

 Augustine, bishop of Hippo, for 6000 Ib. weight of 

 silver, and sixty Ib. weight of gold. Images, 

 though used in churches at the very commencement 

 of Christianity in England, were not worshipped till 

 the middle of the 9th century. Transubstantiation 

 was not introduced till the end of the llth century, 

 by the famous Lanfrane, archbishop of Canterbury, 

 and the opponent of the great Berenger, the zealous 

 and steady adversary of that most irrational doc- 

 trine. Masses were early introduced into England ; 

 and it was ordained by the canons of the council of 

 Castle Hythe, A .D. 816, that, at thedeath of a bishop, 

 the following offices were to be performed, for the 

 repose of his soul, viz. the tenth of all his property 

 shall be given to the poor, that all his English 

 slaves shall be set at liberty ; that, at the sounding 

 of the signal in the different parish churches, the 

 people of the parish should repair to the church, 

 and .there say thirty psalms for the soul of the 

 deceased ; that every bishop and abbot shall cause 

 six hundred psalms to be sung, and one hundred 

 and twenty masses to be celebrated, and shall set 

 at liberty three slaves, and give each of them three 

 shillings ; that all the servants of God shall fast one 

 day ; and that, for thirty days, immediately after 

 service, in every church, seven bells of pater-nosters 

 shall be sung for him. In return for the kindness of 

 Ethelwolf, who gave a tenth part of all his own 

 lands for the support of the clergy, it was ordained, 

 that the clergy should meet with their people, every 

 Wednesday, in the church, and there sing fifty 

 psalms, and celebrate two masses, one for king 

 Ethelwolf, and another for the nobility who had con- 

 sented to this famous grant, which took place A.D. 

 837 ; and, by another canon, enacted A. D. 928, 

 the clergy were enjoined to sing fifty psalms for the 

 king every Friday, in every monastery and cathedral 

 church. In these times, public worship consisted 

 chiefly in psalmody. In some churches and larger 

 cathedrals, this exercise was continued day and 

 night uninterruptedly, by a constant succession of 

 priests and laity. " This monastic melody was so 

 cliarming, (says an ancient historian,) that it enticed 



great numbers to build and endow monasteries.* 7 

 The organ was introduced into churches in tlip 

 course of the ninth century. Even the private devo- 

 tions of the good people of those times, almost 

 entirely consisted in singing a prodigious number of 

 psalms, as the most effectual way of appeasing the 

 wrath of heaven, and atoning for their own sins, or 

 those of their friends, either living or dead. It was 

 an article in these voluntary associations, called 

 guilds, or fraternities, among the Anglo-Saxons, that 

 each member should sing two psalms every day, one 

 for the living members of the fraternity, another for 

 all who had been members, but were dead ; and 

 that, at the death of a member, each surviving 

 member should sing six psalms for the repose of his 

 soul. Most of those who could afford the expense of 

 learning music, either went to Rome, or sent their 

 sons thither; and the clergyman who sung best, 

 was accounted the most useful theologian. Penances 

 were strictly enjoined by the canons of several suc- 

 cessive councils, and their degrees determined with 

 the greatest precision. Long fastings of several 

 years were prescribed as the proper penances for 

 many offences ; but these fastings were not so for- 

 midable as they appeared at first sight, especially to 

 the rich, as a year's fasting might oe redeemed for 

 thirty shillings, equal in quantity of silver to .4 10s. 

 of our money, and in value to thirty pounds. A 

 rich man, also, who had many friends and depend- 

 ants, might despatch a seven years' fast in three 

 days, by procuring 840 men to fast for him three 

 days, on bread and water and vegetables. This was 

 called fasting by proxy. Pilgrimages were early 

 introduced, and so frequent did they become, that 

 the roads between England and Rome were so 

 crowded with pilgrims, that the very tolls they paid 

 were an important article of revenue to the princes 

 whose territories they passed through. 



Books were so scarce in the end of the seventh 

 century, that for one book, (a volume on cosmogra- 

 phy,) king Alfred gave an estate of eight hides, or 

 as much land as eight horses could plough. At 

 this rate, it was utterly impossible for the common 

 people to have books ; as none but kings, bishops, 

 and abbots, could purchase them at that period, and 

 for some succeeding centuries. 



Slavery was practised in England both before and 

 after the coming of the Anglo-Saxons, and slaves 

 formed a very valuable article of exportation from 

 England to all parts of the continent. It was the 

 sight of a number of English slaves, in the market at 

 Rome, that inspired Gregory the Great with the 

 resolution of attempting the conversion of their 

 countrymen to the Christian faith. The mildest fate 

 that prisoners could expect, in the long continued 

 wars of the British and Saxons, between the several 

 kingdoms of the heptarchy, and between the English 

 ana Danes, was to be sold as slaves. The Jews 

 were the principal slave merchants, and found a 

 good market for their slaves among the Saracens in 

 Spain and Africa. Several laws and canons of the 

 church were made in England against selling Chris- 

 tian slaves to Jews or Pagans. The exportation of 

 slaves continued to the Norman conquest, and the 

 city of Bristol was a noted emporium of this ignomi- 

 nious and cruel traffic. 



At the accession of the great Alfred, A. D. 871, 

 there was hardly a person to the south of the Hum 

 ber, who understood the common prayers of the 

 church, or who was capable of translating a single 

 sentence of Latin into English. The venerable 

 Bede was a brilliant exception to the general 

 ignorance which then prevailed. He lived and died 

 an humble retired monk, unambitious of ecclesiastical 

 preferment, dedicating his whole life to religious and 



