176 CHURCH OF ST. JTTST-IN-PENWITH. 



1318, when (7tli May) the custody of the manors of Conertonand 

 Drym, and of the Hundred of Penwith, was committed to him by 

 the Bishop, by reason of the minority of John, son and heir of 

 John Arundell. He died in 1334, and Henry Marsley was nomi- 

 nated to the vacant rectory by Sir Eichard Champernowne, 

 custodian of the infant John de Beaupre, the patron of the 

 living. There appears to have been a suspicion of wrongful 

 collusion between him and Sir Richard, for, on the 10th of April, 

 1334, Bp. Grandisson issued his commission to Master William 

 de Nassingtone, a Canon of Exeter, to inquire into the matter, 

 and, if satisfied, to institute Marslcy to the rectory. There is no 

 record of the result of the inquiry ; but, as he did not institute 

 him, we may fairly conclude that there was something wrong. 

 Marsley, however, had not long to wait. A pen has been passed 

 through the entry, and a marginal memorandum informs us that 

 the Bishop instituted him at Clyst on the 20th of April. This is the 

 man whose services were so useful a few years later in acting as 

 interpreter between the good people of St. Buryan andthe bishop 

 when they wanted to discuss matters connected with their parish, 

 and found that they did not understand each other's language. I 

 do not know the names of any rectors earlier than Beaupre, but 

 the last rector of the parish was Reginald of St. Austle, in whose 

 time the benefice was appropriated to the College of Glasney. 



For, by this time, the spirit of appropriation, which had such 

 an important influence on the history of the Middle Ages, had set 

 in in fullest force, and the revenues of St. Just, as of so many 

 other churches, were diverted to a purpose for which they were 

 never intended. Kennett has calculated that within three centuries 

 of the Norman Conquest no less than one third of the English 

 churches had been appropriated to some monastery or college, 

 and by the time of the Reformation at least another third. Every 

 now and then, some one had the courage to protest. One of these 

 protests I notice, because I do not think it is much known. In 

 the celebrated dispute, in 1125, between St. Bernard of Clarvaux 

 and Peter the Venerable of Clugni, on the subject of monkish 

 discipHne, the former wrote: "On what ground do you hold 

 parish churches, first fruits, and tithes, when, according to the 

 canons, all these things pertain not to monks, but to clerks ? 

 That is, they are granted to those whose ofiice it is to baptize, and 



