OF SELBORNE 277 



" times all the religious houses throughout his diocese, and being 

 " well informed of the state and condition of each, and of the 

 "particular abuses which required correction and reformation, 

 " besides the orders which he had already given, and the remedies 

 " which he had occasionally applied by his commissioners, now 

 " issued his inj unctions to each of them. They were accommodated 

 " to their several exigencies, and intended to correct the abuses 

 " introduced, and to recall them all to a strict observation of the 

 " rules of their respective orders. Many of these injunctions are 

 " still extant, and are evident monuments of the care and attention 

 " with which he discharged this part of his episcopal duty." ^ 



Some of these injunctions I shall here produce ; and they are 

 such as will not fail, I think, to give satisfaction to the antiquary, 

 both as never having been published before, and as they are a 

 curious picture of monastic irregularities at that time. 



The documents that I allude to are contained in the Notabilis 

 Visitatio de Seleburne, held at the Priory of that place, by Wykeham 

 in person, in the year 1387. 



This evidence, in the original, is written on two skins of parch- 

 ment ; the one large, and the other smaller, and consists of a 

 preamble, 36 item^, and a conclusion, which altogether evince the 

 patient investigation of the visitor, for which he had always been 

 so remarkable in all matters of moment, and how much he had 

 at heart the regularity of those institutions, of whose efficacy in 

 their prayers for the dead he was so firmly persuaded. As the 

 bishop was so much in earnest, we may be assured that he had 

 nothing in view but to correct and reform what he found amiss ; 

 and was under no bias to blacken, or misrepresent, as the com- 

 missioners of Thomas Lord Cromwell seem in part to have done at 

 the time of the reformation.^ We may therefore with reason 

 suppose that the bishop gives us an exact delineation of the morals 

 and manners of the canons of Selhome at that juncture ; and that 

 what he found they had omitted he enjoins them ; and for what 

 they have done amiss, and contrary to their rules and statutes, he 

 reproves them ; and threatens them with punishment suitable to 

 their irregularities. 



This visitatio is of considerable length, and cannot be introduced 

 into the body of this work ; we shall therefore refer the reader to 

 the Appendix, where he will find every particular, while we shall 



' See LowtKs Life of Wykeham. 



2 Letters of thig sort from Dr, Layton to Thomas Lord Cromwell are still extant. 



