22 The Fall of the Friar*' Houses and Alien Priories in Wilts. 



institution by looking at it in its highest — its ideal — embodiment. 

 One must admit that both monks and friars degenerated greatly 

 from their ideal (an ideal, be it remembered, far beyond what most 

 men now think even of attempting) , and as the ideal of the friar 

 was, as we judge now, higher than that of the monk, so the de- 

 generation in his case was more complete. The friar, often a 

 wanderer, owning no allegiance, save to the head of his order, and 

 through him to the Pope, easily degenerated into the pardoner— 

 the scandal of his order, and the butt of every mediseval satirist. 



The degeneration began when the friars ceased to live on alms 

 and began to .gain their living by begging, for this career presented 

 to anyone who was too lazy to work the readiest means of obtaining 

 a livelihood. Armed with the power of dispensing or withholding 

 pardon, tempted to use his powers for his own convenience and 

 profit, owning no jurisdiction within the realm save to the superior 

 of his own order, small wonder if the wandering friar was a constant 

 thorn in the side alike of the diligent and of the easy-going parish 

 priest, small wonder if he converted his spiritual power into an 

 engine for extracting from the terrified housewife the good things 

 in her larder. 



In the bill for the suppression of smaller houses no mention had 

 been made of friaries : a fact partly, no doubt, accounted for by 

 their insignificant size and poverty of income. But when the 

 extinction of the smaller houses, and the ease with which the larger 

 came into his hand, together with the complete suppression of the 

 Pilgrimage of Grace, convinced the King that England lay helpless 

 in his grasp, then the fall of the friars was decided on. After all, 

 the sites on which their houses stood, being — as I said before — in 

 towns, had a peculiar value, and were much sought after ; even if 

 the other revenues of the houses yielded little or nothing to the 

 royal treasury ; while the fact that the various orders of friarsl 

 formed in a special sense the outposts of the Papal army, confirmed! 

 Henry VIII. in his determination to be rid of them. 



It may now be convenient to mention here the various houses oil 

 friars in Wiltshire in 1538. They were four in number, and inJ 

 eluded representatives of three out of the four great orders existentl 



